#With first boss I mean like the one at the end of the crusade

[drawbudd]

played cult of the lamb with a controller for the first time but since it was kinda a cheapy one it had drift

So anyways I decided to see how hard I can make it for myself and ended up playing pentinence mode on extra hard difficulty along with controller drift (because that's how I am) and I beat the first boss first try!!

[kneelingshadowsalome]

As a history and Mythological lover, I love your works, they are so addictive, and you write so well, and the Minotaur konig fic was such a pleasure to read. I remember when you first uploaded the Roman konig story and I was so ecstatic about it, I remember checking on my break at work, If you’d uploaded another part haha, I mean I still check tumblr on my breaks to see who had uploaded so I know what I can read after I get home lol.

I think you’ve found your niche!

Also if you don’t mind answering what other time periods you’d think konig would fit in? Victorian era?

Nasty, oily and covered in coal, konig is walking home through the streets and bumped into a clean wealthy beautiful young woman, ooh do I love forbidden romances, just like your nun fic lol.

Ahh thank you! Mythology, fairytales and historical au’s are a passion of mine 😭

And puh-leeze, a forbidden romance between a dirty worker and a rich uptown girl? Filthy coal miner König who bumps into this fancy lady dressed in white? How can he ever make up for his clumsiness?? Please don’t have him beaten like the poor bastard he is, he already fucked up today by accidentally destroying boss’s new machinery by showing off his strength...

Tries to steal a peek at her ankles, and under her dress while dusting off her skirts with some napkin that’s hardly much cleaner than his hands. And she’s just giggling at him – great, now he’s hard... How is he going to explain this when he rises from here?? (Rich lady also being protected at all costs from dirty dogs like him! He's soon panting at her door!)

As for other historical au’s and fairytales... >:)

CW: Fear of SA (historical au), wife stealing (yandere fairytale imagine)

Obviously I see König as this dark knight of the Teutonic Order, punishing pagans with his sword somewhere in the wild woods of old Europe. How about another forbidden romance between a cold-hearted crusader & a cute pagan girl who lives in the woods and worships the old gods?

She gets captured during some awful raid, and is pulled into the camp by her hair, angry tears streaming down her face. The soldiers tie her to a thick wooden cross and leave her in the rain, probably to have their way with her later, taking turns with her after they've gambled and had a drink. Then this dark, giant knight happens to walk by, not a regular foot soldier but an actual knight with armor as black as night. She remembers him from the battlefield, wielding a fat morningstar, splitting people’s skulls from atop the huge black destrier he rode...

A terrible beast, dark and silent and big, the rain batters his helmet as he takes one look at the shivering maiden on the cross, her white linen dress glued to her skin in the downpour, and stops.

The soldiers have a crude sense of humour and what’s arousing, but he has seen worse… The knights of the Holy Order are even more perverted when it comes to having “fun” with women. But something pierces his defense when seeing the frightened stare of this pagan girl, her weak body trembling on the cross, the wide dark nipples perked up from cold. He’s seen so much death, his soul is drenched in blood by this point, but somehow, this woman who hasn’t even been broken in is the last straw.

Ends up taking her down, and she attaches herself to him like he’s her saviour, even the cold black armor apparently warmer to her skin than the cold rain. The cruelest of knights feels a moment of pity for this girl and sets her free, pushes her to the woods and waves his hand in a gesture of Get the hell out of here while you still can. (=gtfo before I get hard enough to take you in the mud...)

Months later, she finds him bleeding to death under a tree after a battle. All the other soldiers are screaming and crying for their mothers, but this one is silent, eyes darkening when he recognizes her. He says something, already delusional, and she can’t help but kneel and offer him water…

(and from this point on it would go somewhere in @wordstome s Kosovo maiden territory, perhaps slightly darker? But you get the point!)

And then there’s this old Inuit story that always reminds me of König, it has many variations but it’s basically about this lonely hunter who gets a little too resentful for not having a wife yet. Goes to paddle his boat in these moonlit waters and sees a bunch of maidens dancing in the moonlight on a small little island, notices their seal skins on the ground, and because he’s lonely and in despair, he steals one of them.

One by one, the maidens put their seal skins on and rush back into the water, but one woman can’t find her seal skin no matter how hard she looks for it. The hunter emerges, holding her beautiful skin, saying he’ll give it back to her if she comes to live as his wife for 7 years. She has no other choice but to say yes, and for a while they live happily, they even have a son, but then the seal woman starts to miss her seal skin and the sea...

It’s a tragic tale and the hunter won’t let her leave even if she cries so this would make a wonderful yandere scenario, you could always make a twist and write the woman as some other animal, a deer perhaps, and König as this lonely brooding hunter of the Austrian mountains :)

[the-artist-grimm]

What does Anthea do about spies/dissenters in the cult? Sorry if you answered before!

I've gotten an ask about dissenters previously, but not one about spies before!

Though all in all Anthea handles them almost the same as dissenters-they just get sent to Nona and usually either A, get so fed up with being bossed around by the old lady that they leave early or B, are forced to actually look at the cult as a community of people with names, personalities, and lives rather than just 'heretics' they can hand-wave off. Usually its the latter that happens since Anthea prefers trying to see the best in people first, especially since a lot of the bishops' followings are built on fear. Like for many they were born into the Old Faith and think the behaviors there are normal.

You catch more flies with honey, and when you're used to a leader whom would kill you without a second thought and fellow cultists who'd slit your throat to get ahead, spies suddenly finding themselves in an actual community where everyone tries to help each other can be a bit of a reality check.

Though that's not to say that Anthea takes no precautions. Dissenters are annoying but are typically quicker to subdue/are usually just angry over their pride being hurt or unused to community life. Spies however have a mission with an expectation of reward in the end. Their job is to gather information such as Anthea's movements, cult numbers, plans, weak points, ect.-things that can be used to launch an attack or hinder Anthea's crusades.

The first spy appeared not long after Barbatos' defeat, meaning the cult had 3 of Chaos' disciples in its ranks. Amdusias, Valefar, and Barbatos. (which unrelated sidenote why did I think that all the mini-bosses were witnesses??? I've been calling them all witnesses this whole time, gonna have to go edit some texts it seems now KEKW. Anyway...) As the rest of the cult was unable to fight due to either inexperience or physical injuries, Anthea decided to create a new role within the cult-one where former high-ranking generals or disciples of the Bishops, once proven trustworthy, are permitted to act at their discretion IF a threat arises when Anthea's not present. They know how to fight and how to get around outside the cult grounds without dying, and thus if a spy turns violent are allowed to physically defend, or if the spy flees they are permitted to follow and intercept. Later on as Witnesses are added they too are given the same permission, though as they trend far older (likely centuries even with many having been beside their Bishops for a long, long time), Anthea usually has them work in more scholarly areas instead.

[warsofasoiaf]

Alright. I'll bite. What do you make of sad boi Vlad, sorry, I mean Messmer the Impaler?

When I first saw Messmer the Impaler in the trailer, there was some stuff that I figured out going in. He was a demigod, responsible for Marika's brutal purge in the Land of Shadow. A genocidal warlord waging a war so brutal that no one outside of it could ever be made aware of its existence. Given my experience with FromSoft games, I should perhaps have known better than to simply accept it all at face value. Messmer has been stated by Miyazaki as being one of GRRM's favorite characters that just couldn't find his way into the base game. What we get is brutal, as FromSoft loves to give.

Messmer is barely hinted at in the first game, an off-hand reference to a "forgotten son" which could have easily been applied to Mohg or Morgott, cast off into the Subterranean Shunning Grounds. The Impaler's Catacombs, and the bodies of giants on the Mountaintop, impaled as befits Messmer's sobriquet. His vibrant red hair suggests that he was a son to Radagon, and this has some issues with the timeline. He must have been in the Lands Between, and not the Lands of Shadow, after Radagon's marriage to Renalla in order to successfully have Rellana, the Twin Moon Knight and sister to Rennala, join his crusade. However, he is an "older brother" to Radahn, who was borne of Radagon's union with Rennala. That means Marika must have had Messmer either before her marriage to Godfrey and the position of Elden Lord (before she became a god) or she had taken Radagon as a lover while Godfrey was her consort making Messmer a bastard. Of these two, I actually like the second thematically, Messmer being shunted to do the cruel, unfortunate, unwanted task of destroying those without the grace of Gold in the Lands of Shadow.

As further proof that Radagon was Messmer's father, Messmer, like Malenia and Miquella, was born with a terrible curse. From birth, Messmer was afflicted with the Abyssal Serpent, a terrible, transcendent curse that Marika tried to cure in vain. First, she attempted to cure him with the Blessing of Marika, but it availed him not. Much as we see with Malenia and Miquella's curses, the power of Marika and/or Radagon is incapable of ending the afflictions inflicted upon the children of their divine self-cest by other Outer Gods. What Outer God afflicted the Abyssal Serpent, and what relation this serpent may have had, if any, to Rykard's blasphemous studies regarding the God-Devouring Serpent, is unknown. When that failed, Marika plucked out Messmer's eye and placed a seal of grace upon him, sealing the serpent away, a seal which holds until the Tarnished forces Messmer to unseal it during their boss fight. This is fascinating, because we do not see a similar seal of grace placed upon Malenia to seal away her rot or Miquella to restore his ability to age. Maybe the Abyssal Serpent is a wholly weaker curse that it could be sealed by the grace of gold. Maybe Marika permanently weakened herself with such a seal that she could not replicate the feat with her other cursed children. Whatever the case, we do know that whatever Messmer had to keep the serpent in check, it lasted until his death when he willingly surrendered it - it did not creep out of his body the way the Scarlet Rot leaked out of Malenia and infested the Haligtree.

At some point after the incorporation of Caria into the Golden Order, Marika charged Messmer with going into the Land of Shadow, to cleanse the land with flame. All those without the guidance of grace would perish by Messmer's flame. Messmer would serve as the focal point for the wrath of the Hornsent, and as death centered in the Lands of Shadow with the spectral gravestone piling higher and higher, it was Messmer who they cursed. Messmer would pursue this crusade with abject cruelty with an assortment of troops, commoners, nobles, from across the Golden Order's lands. Those who followed Messmer were of mixed loyalty - his Fire Knights were said to truly know him and his serpentine nature, while Black Knight Commander Andreas and his son Huw rebelled when they learned of the serpent within. Rellana was known to be absolutely loyal in her belief, as was Commander Gaius, both would rise to be Messmer's senior leaders, and swore away any rights and titles they would have in the Lands Between to pursue his crusade. And pursue it he did, breaking Belurat Tower Settlement and sealing away the Divine Gateway, impaling the Hornsents great Dancing Lions and destroying them as a people, now reduced to mere fringes and scattered survivors desperately hiding from Marika's crusade.

Messmer however, is not simply a cackling villain. Deep under the Shadow Keep, he tends to the wounded jars that the Hornsent brutalized, trying to give what comfort he can to Marika's people, tortured in the Bonny Village, butchered and melded into viscera to be made into saints for the Hornsents own attempts to create divinity on earth. When his men betrayed him, he gave them honorable burials, wanting to give regard to their intent both to come with him on the crusade and stick to his beliefs.

Marika's intentions were to seal Messmer away, to consign him to the Land of Shadow, fearful of the serpent that he carried within him. When Messmer marched to the Land of Shadow, it was a one-way trip. He would be forgotten by the Lands Between, cursed by the Land of Shadow, and he would receive no sense of recompense. Messmer burned inside just as he burned those with his flames, and yet, he was committed. Even as it continued with no end in sight, he continued to throw the Hornsent into the great Furnace Golems, continued to dispatch troops to wander the Land of Shadow and slay those without the grace of gold. His troops began to resent Marika, even in the Shadow Keep, statues of Marika are often decapitated as the people realize they're perpetually sentenced to stain their souls for eternity, a new twist on hell. The cruelty once given to Marika's people by the Hornsent is now visited back on them, forever, trapping everyone in a negative nexus from which neither body nor soul escapes.

Messmer as a boss is a tremendous presentation. From his first words, he sounds properly menacing - and yet your presence makes him wonder. Why does a Tarnished, bereft of grace and banished from the Lands Between, now come to take the mantle of Elden Lord? His moves are sinewy and flowing, like a snake. He looks lean, hungry, ever bit the sinister villain he was depicted in the trailer. He dances, jumps, and integrates his spear and flame spells artfully. He constantly puts pressure on the player, and his combos are fast but predictable. He can summon spears to impale you, and use the same flame spells that his Fire Knights used that kept pestering you as you climbed up the Specimen Storehouse, as well as a big one of his own creation.

When Messmer is wounded enough, he realizes that his own strength is insufficient, he apologizes to Marika, and tears out the seal of grace within his own eye, unleashing the Abyssal Serpent in his body. His new move set adds visually impressive serpents, such as the Orb of Messmer being in the abyssal serpent's mouth, and his dive engulfing him in serpents. His form changes as well, not just his empty eye socket. His legs change to look like serpent scales, he sheds his armor like a snake. The Hornsent, if he was summoned, exalts in the glory of Messmer's new form, as to the Crucible, the melding of life and the taking on of aspects of it was considered holy. The snakes not only make Messmer more intimidating, but they distract the player from dodging, incentivizing panic rolling and upping the pressure while decreasing Messmer's punish windows. It's a proper fight, start to finish.

When the Tarnished finally cuts him down, Messmer falls, cursing Marika for the things she compelled him to do. To become a figure of hatred due to the circumstances of his birth, to wage a war for Marika's glory that he could never share. To be separated from his siblings - Radahn who he regarded with fondness as a younger brother, and Melina who was also cursed with visions of fire (and possibly also inherited the Gloam-Eye from the previous Empreyean of the Godskin Apostles thus making them share in a curse contained within their eyes), and possibly others - after all, everyone seemed to love Godwyn the Golden.

Messmer: genocidal warlord and deeply wounded fighter. Commanded to be despised, he did the despicable to the despicable, and the genocide that defined Marika's life would in turn define Messmer's, until all that was left was a bitter shell wrapped around a curse, cut down by the Tarnished, cursing the mother that condemned him.

Thanks for the question, Mist.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

[bellepeppergirl]

The Rauh Civilization

Throughout the base game, there were always strange structures that I and many others wondered about. They were pillars and platforms built into or out of the cliffsides; almost looking as if they were holding the very world up. These ruins could be found everywhere, but never were the explained, nor did we get to see much of them aside from these pillars and platforms, save for two locations; the Highroad Cave in Limgrave and the Ruin-Strewn Precipice connecting Liurnia and Altus.

It would not be until the DLC came out that we got anymore information about these ruins, which came with the Rauh Ruins in the Northeastern region of the Lands of Shadow. Even then, information is rather scarce, as these locations and the cultures that inhabit them seem incredibly ancient.

If I were to hazard a guess, my first idea would be that the people of Rauh were the original inhabitants of the land when the Lands Between and Land of Shadow were one; existing before the arrival of Marika's people or even the Hornsent. I would also assume they were likely the worshippers of the Crucible as we can find Devonia in the Rauh Ruins, as well as the Bird Warriors and Golden Hippos, all of which use Aspects of the Crucible.

Devonia in particular was said to have set out on her own to search for the Crucible, so her being in this location suggests to me that this place has to be very important to and connected to that which she is looking for.

Throughout Rauh, we can also find statues of a strange woman.

We have no idea who this woman is as of yet, nor what her significance was. I have seen some put forward the idea that she herself is Rauh, but I am personally of the opinion that Rauh was simply the name of region/nation and its culture, rather than a singular person. Regardless, she is objectively important to them and this place; possibly even being the god the Lands Between during the Age of the Crucible prior to the take over of the Hornsent and then Marika.

Her outfit also has some similarity to good ol' Elden John from the base game, who is notably absent from the DLC, as is much of the architecture we currently associate with the underground and the Uld Palace Ruins. It's possible these two cultures had some connection; possibly being one in the same or, perhaps the people of Rauh were not the first to inhabit the land, but took it from the Uld people, only to have the land taken by the Hornsent, and then taken again by the Golden Order. Perhaps this cycle of taking land and erasing ancient cultures is far older than we realize.

Another idea I had about the Rauh lady is that she could be Romina. Evidence? Well, she's the boss of Rauh, and Romina's Kindred can be found around the base of the ruins, as well as within alongside some good old rot puddles. We also never see what Romina looked like before her transformation, save for her silhouette during the crusade in the Story Trailer for the DLC. The end point of Rauh is also notably a church filled with Rot and Romina, which could imply that this area and civilization was one that worshipped the Rot, which I have mentioned in a previous post has its own sort of cycle of life, death, and rebirth like the Golden Order did. Rot's power is rather intense; after all, just look at Caelid. There's also the Lake of Rot, which connects to the Grand Cloister, which has the Uld civilization ruin architecture and Elden John statues, possibly linking these two once more, but it could also just be a coincidence.

One idea that I am a fan of is that the Rauh people are actually Ancestral Followers. The title of Ancestral implies an ancient heritage, which of course could simply imply the worship, or follow, their ancestors, but perhaps it also means they are the ancestral people of these lands; the natives who were looked down upon for their "primitive" ways by the overzealous Golden Order, and thus shunned and left to live underground. It would not be the only time undesirables found themselves trapped underground, after all. And, once again, this may connect Uld to Rauh, as Uld is a place where we can find Ancestral Followers. In fact, it is the only place they can be found above ground.

Rauh also seems a bit like a tomb. This is a weak connection, but if they are worshippers of their ancestors, a giant tomb would be fitting. Additionally, Hornsent legend speak of ancient Horned Warriors, whom their own horned warriors are based upon, according to their item descriptions. The Ancestral Followers are seen wearing headdresses of horns and antlers, possibly implying that they were the horned warriors of legend who the Hornsent appropriated following the banishment of the Followers, or that they too revered some ancient horned warrior and sought to imitate them in the same manor as the Hornsent.

Another idea that I had was that these people worshipped Eiglay; the God-Devouring Serpent. We learn there were worshippers from the Serpent Curved Sword, which can be found in the Ruin-Strewn Precipice. Their potential reverence of snakes could explain why they would be erased from history, assuming they were. Aside from that though, and the Sword of Light being available in Rauh, which connects to the Sword of Dark, which loosely connects maybe to the Abyssal Serpent, and then the snake skin in the Land of Shadow... there's not much there.

Once again, I'll have to do some more digging around and stuff to come to more conclusive conclusions, but it's also possible that all we'll ever be able to do is speculate, and that's part of the fun. Would love to hear any other potential theories. One thing we can be sure of, however, is that the Rauh people were likely once a dominant civilization in the Lands Between pre-split and that, whoever they are and whatever happened to them, they are seemingly gone and forgotten; possibly even intentionally so.

[jotadoul]

i'm trying to summarise the way i engage with the fiction i really enjoy, like, the divide between enjoying its presentation at face value and enjoying pulling it apart to see how it works. in trying to talk about it through text it's sorta hard to avoid coming off as pretentious instead of earnest, so just know the crux of this is that i'm both fun funny and whimsical and also deadly fucking serious.

contains spoilers for escaflowne and jjba. and i guess metal gear?

i love to feel. i love melodrama. i love art which seeks to consume you, to share a body with you, briefly, to remind you what it is to feel a feeling. not in literal form (and melodrama is usually taken to mean "flat", lacking subtlety) but a fantastical representation of an ache deeply felt— and in that way it becomes more real than anything. the desperate dejection of the father in INTO THE WEST. the hard and physical, breathless, and then suddenly floating, drifting mood at the end of HEAT.

i've never been much of a shipper or whatever because most of the time, with the stuff i really love, focusing on that feels like a distraction. i don't enjoy Ace Attorney through the lens of phoenix/edgeworth, because i find their canon (and implications therein) friendship (along with larry) so riveting, i want to follow that thread to its many conclusions. if that makes me sound like a joyless crank, um... well, i'm not.

my JJBA OTP, namesake of this blog lol, is a personal delusion yes, but the reason why it struck me the way that it did is because it's based on a moment in JJBA which is then repeated with other characters going forward— a turning point between two people (this is key to it also, that it suddenly turns intimate) which expands the story right out from under you, a painful rugpull, a literary move. it's not solely about the plot expanding— the plot of stardust crusaders remains the same— but the entire work expands because the author has suddenly revealed that there was always more going on, and to stay on your toes. shaking your foundation. everything is the same and everything has begun to change. that's what grips me about it, that's why i find it so romantic, and i mean that in a classical sense too.

going back to Ace Attorney, most of those turning point moments are expressed/developed by the story of the familial bond between maya and phoenix. because that is/coincides with the actual plot, i don't really find myself inventing new "what if?" relationships because i'm so satisfied by the presentation of the facts.

i think the storyline of MGS3: Snake Eater falls into this too. you know what your mission is, and can expect what will happen, but the heartbreak of finally fulfilling what it promises feels completely new once you reach it. the Boss is like the peak example of characters who are aware of their narrative, aware of the role they're made to play by forces beyond their control, and despite being correct, must suffer for it. in my own work i tend to call this The (trans) Male Cassandra, because that's the type of guy i keep writing, almost like i have a vested interest in doing so. it's in this one way that i think characters like n'doul and jotaro are similar, and that's not only rare, but the way it's presented is rare too. especially for a story like stardust crusaders. but from there on, because of it being in stardust crusaders, i can see the future more clearly, and i can hold the story to a higher standard, because it's also holding me as a reader to a higher standard.

spoiler | the way n'doul reacts to jotaro, what he says about him, admires about him, laments to him, tells us more about how we should see jotaro. the way jotaro reacts to him does the same thing. in this singular fight, first jotaro is freaked the fuck out, then they're both having fun and mutual respect is earned and acted upon. when we realise jotaro means to keep n'doul alive, the reader is abruptly put in a position of knowing what's about to come before jotaro does. he should, but he doesn't, because, for this one moment, he thought something else was possible. even the type of death is different (suicide) and jotaro's reaction is different (shock/horror.) we saw rules, we suddenly see exceptions to rules, we knew what to expect, suddenly those expectations are changed— and the immediate tragedy of possibility denied. watching him try to do something we know isn't going to work out also serves to make him seem younger, and putting this in sometime before the fight with dio is a good reminder that he's human.

spoiler | it's a big part of what compels me about folken, as well as what i find bottomlessly heartbreaking about him. death seems to be a necessary component of the role of the seer/cassandra, but escaflowne shows us how desperate and dire the escape from fear and violence is. this being folken's ultimate aim above all else (to free van from the cycle), and hitomi pleading with him saying if he dies, then van will be all alone... hitomi is telling me why it doesn't make sense, and the story then sets it up such that it lacks even the paltry comfort of closeness, if not catharsis, for van. at that point in the story, i can't help but find it cruel in a way i don't find n'doul to be, or even the boss. cruelty is done to the boss in the storyline, the internal world is cruel to her. you can critique the "fridging" or whatever, but it isn't a departure. it doesn't unravel the story, it's key to it, for all time.

i was telling my partner that when it comes to something like Metal Gear or Ace Attorney, the quality of the thing imo speaks entirely for itself. if someone doesn't like it, or focuses on only some minute aspect of it, or goes off on a mad one interpreting signs and symbols that imo aren't there, the thing speaks for itself so loudly and plainly that any difference of opinion rolls right off my back.

then with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure it's similar, where i think araki's career and evolution of maturity in his storytelling and contemplation speaks for itself too, but my experience in the fandom (going way back now) was of people who claimed to enjoy it admitting they neither read nor even watched it, and were in no way capable of or interested in taking it as a piece of art. instead it was something to consume through someone else's summary, as fast as possible. which made having genuine conversations about it difficult when i'd try to talk about textual aspects of the series. conversations were dominated by moralising and headcanons. so compared to the above, i do feel more moved to defend it on that basis.

there's a nasty habit of presuming araki is a fucking slapdash idiot and that none of his choices have any internal coherence, which is plainly wrong, rude, anti-intellectual, and past a certain point, probably racist. the man has written books about his approach to writing manga and there's decades worth of interviews for more. but the game of telephone people play with JJBA in lieu of any sincerely felt relationship to it is a barrier i have a hard time talking through. so while it bothers me and i still try to talk it up, ultimately i have to shrug this off. we're having two different conversations.

then with Escaflowne i feel like i have to defend her with a knife LOL.

i know this isn't literally true, but having seen and read and talked a lot over the years, it seems like a huge chunk of people on earth are coming to it with either preconceived notions and expectations or preconceived notions in the form of feelings crystalised at grade school age. the latter isn't a criticism, it's life, it happened to me. if your feelings crystalised simply but positively, i do believe it was for a reason; you felt something and couldn't make heads or tails of it then. or you attributed it to something which then becomes something else later.

i'm not going to pretend there's no alternative to liking escaflowne, lol, i understand disliking it. however, dislike shouldn't preclude one from respecting it/taking it seriously. i talk about this below, but designating a piece of art— particularly from a time period in which art was funded, lol— valueless, especially foreign art, isn't something i personally want to be caught doing.

preconception of any kind is hard to disentangle because it must be tested. i think it was like that for me, and now with my adult perspective i can really easily point to what about it stirred and stuck with me because i have a map of creative work from then to now which points to it. (particularly in writing, if not art, though i think the film particularly informed my sensibilities.) and i'm still surprised by many things i missed. even if emotionally they landed, conceptually they didn't. which is why i really believe that in key respects it Is that deep.

i see people compare it to magic knight rayearth, but it's simply the truth that escaflowne sought to accomplish different things than rayearth and for a different audience. rayearth's narrative in the manga and anime is furibund in a way escaflowne isn't. escaflowne's masterful approach to pacing means episodes can fit a lot in them without being hectic— what frenzy there is, it's sustained only within the scene for which it's appropriate. but it doesn't have the same bounce as rayearth. there's breathing room. it differs structurally. escaflowne's story is in great part shown not only through character parallels, but scene parallels, done back to back in direct poetic contrast. so from that, i understand it's only being compared in terms of genre, but in terms of genre, escaflowne defies shorthanding. and as time goes on, that's more and more impressive to me. elevator pitches don't do much for me, and "[IP] meets [IP] x [trope]" takes me out instantly. inability to summarise it concisely (without ignoring some key component) is to me a credit to its form, not a shortcoming.

the problem is, like JJBA, it takes time to show someone what makes escaflowne's deft feats of emotional storytelling stand out. even though everyone agree the soundtrack is beast mode, for some reason it's harder to believe that escaflowne deserves that soundtrack. deserves its all-star team of artists. deserves its film. as if to say, you, the viewer, also don't deserve to witness (and are encouraged not to think about) this great joint effort, this great coalescing of ideas.

its staying power isn't immediately recognisable in still images. among things i'll mention further down, lack of time/patience and preference for secondhand experience is a real problem which affects art as much as anything. the art may not appeal to everyone but with how much art i hope fellow artists (in particular) have been exposed to, i need them to come to grips with the possibility that outright aversion to style might be a juvenile bias relative to where they're at in their creative career. if you're a professional artist, and the most technically skilled you've ever been, and you can't recognise or value work different from your own, or amateur work, there is a gaping deficiency in your skillset. unwillingness to engage in "low culture" is as tedious to me as unwillingness to engage in like... theory or whatever.

like great people, great works of art are often reviled in their time, then smoothed out and rebranded, defanged, resold. discussing art and examining ones own responses to that art is i think essential for the spirit and those around you. it's infectious and influential. it's actually, like, good and important to be self-serious sometimes. there's a totally insufferable cowardice in refraining from emotional indulgence. not just making "weird art," but feeling it. admitting your influences. admitting what you wish you could do. and trying.

and i really think even if you don't like the art, there are other aspects that succeed. i'm interested in film enough that i can point out all the camera work, shifting of perspective, timing, that make the series uniquely filmic, utilising techniques we associate with live action. that should be interesting to you not just on its own but because it isn't something we tend to have reason to expect from anime (because anime can tell a story through other means) nor expect it to be carried throughout so consistently as a crucial part of what we're meant to understand. if you don't like the plot, i still think the means of the plot expanding are executed with clever creativity. but it's the same problem: this requires time, and this comes through in motion. the visuals of the series are informed, altered, recontextualised, by the sound and the silence. someone has to be willing to see it, not past it.

escaflowne is a huge exercise in inference.

and it rewards for that reason— it rewards care and attention. because it doesn't beat you over the head with exposition, there's room for more nuanced storytelling. i think that is The enduring magic of it, what it demands from the viewer as a participant in the experience. it's not passive. or, its seeming passivity as a story/experience is a deception. i have full faith in the writer and team that the metaphors, symbols, parallels are exactly as intentional and significant as they are, because they are what sells the meaning of the story— but even at the time it stood apart for the same reason it's difficult to get people into it now, which is that we've since rapidly moved into such an age of western literalism and graceless lore and total lack of respect for art as craft, as work, as language. art as not simply aesthetics, but art as communication. when what's being communicated becomes simpler and done through simpler means, in as simple a process as possible, and only references the aesthetics of the past to imply history/thought without having to think, and in turn buries history.

one has to deeply, earnestly want to communicate something. and be willing to work to accomplish it, risks and all. the risks are necessary. failure is a teacher, and in that way, failure ceases to exist. and i don't say this stuff because i think it's easy. i am bad at working. i am bad at staying afloat. the same qualifiers as always: the work is hard, making time is hard, the work you like may not be what you're naturally inclined to make, not all forms of work are accessible/possible for all people, communication comes in many forms, and it's not only work to communicate, it's also work to learn how to become fluent/familiar with someone else's communication style/method. but that process fascinates me. it's a challenge. i'm not always up for it. but i can't help wanting for connection. i value the time i allow myself to sit inside something for however long it takes to process. if i dislike something, i want to understand my reaction and see if i can understand the method and motivation in which it's told, and if that clarifies something. i'm always hungry to understand. art is also fearless for me— the craft, the labour, if nothing else, makes me closer, more familiar, with the world, including the people i admire. sentiments like this mean so little to me. i don't imagine my inspirations/aspirations in defensive RPF like this and if i were treated poorly by someone i admire, i wouldn't admire them, because i don't admire that behaviour. and, their disapproval of my work wouldn't sway me. but i also don't approach art, or artists, even my favourites, with the goal of permission-seeking.

bearing in mind how much physical and mental effort it takes to create art, i am completely comfortable meeting/respecting it when it's shown to me, and, completely comfortable ignoring something disingenuous and soulless. escaflowne does not need a remake, no matter how much more "content" you might want. look at the anime remakes of recent years, they're horrifying. the source of your nostalgia already exists— it doesn't justify a hollow reanimation.

in a similar vein, i also don't need or yearn for it to be gay or trans just because i am, because my identity comes from myself, and the experience of being me is expressed in the art/stories i make. absent of my response to it, the media i enjoy is, to others, as representative of me as a blank sheet of paper. i don't cultivate my interests based on what i think will best represent me As Gay. i don't cultivate my interests based on the checkboxes of a scene i'm trying to fit into. transness is inextricable from me, but the things that look and feel like transness to me do not to other people. this doesn't make it lesser.

folken's narrative could effortlessly be explored as a transsexual one even if just because it mirrors what in my own life feels intrinsic, inseparable from transness, in the only way i've experienced it. but it's my own art that i hope speaks loudest to the nature and quality of my soul and ethics/ethos. you should demand better. but knowing when to demand that of yourself, not others, is important and affirming. shipping etc. is your own imagination, so you've already accomplished part of the work of creation. not all, but some!

it feels too easy and unfair to insist the series would be "better" if it were less heterosexual, as if profound pain and romance can only affect you if it's a 1:1 recreation of yourself. you are always bringing yourself into what you love. and you can aspire to it. you can be shaped by it. you can be dissatisfied and seek resolution, but eventually you're going to hit a wall where there are no more answers, because they were never intended to be answered in the first place. what's your next move?

i like thinking about art and i like making it. i have insane, baseless faith in my motivations and, if not my execution, then my interest in learning how to execute them. it isn't enough for me to have my interests, ideas, inspirations floating around in the realm of the hypothetical. i demand more. at the same time, i should settle for less, and i'm making a serious effort to learn how so i can avoid burning out (if that's even possible when capitalism is designed to be punitive and disabling.) but i also know i won't be satisfied by languishing. art has been the singular constant in my shitty, chaotic life— by making, i'm also making myself more real.

i'll always be able to laugh at Ace Attorney as much as i'm able to be held in the cinematic grip of, in particular, the drama of the last case of the 3rd game. and i'll always be able to think about eli snake hanging out with his 3 dipshit dads and whipping machine parts off of mother base and zipping around in heelys til he eats shit. as well as thinking about how beautiful it is that david snake fulfills the role/will of the boss in a way of which the same dipshit dad is incapable. i'm invited to play and also to contemplate the critique of the american war machine. i'm not saying this because i think this is a unique ability, lmfao! this is very simple, this is the baseline.

what i AM saying is... what a treat it is to love escaflowne. to enjoy such well-considered art, indulging in the wholeness of the vision. it can't be overstated just how much effort went into its creation— to have not only a series but a chance to revisit in the form of (possibly? definitely?) one of the most lavish anime films ever made. even my ample critiques come from a place of trying to meet and respect the art from its position, in its own internal context, its place in the world, and in my life. if i'm a good artist/writer, it's because i saw escaflowne when i was 12.

and that's why i wield the knife. lmao

[issak]

AHHHHH I did it, Nari almighty!

Praise the Lamb.

Seriously, every single follower is so NEEDY, It takes me like 3-4 days to set up a new crusade, otherwise the cult grounds are in shambles, Stop Killing each other just because you know I can bring you Back, Stop destroying the Bishop's statutes whenever you are drunk, Please eat some food the farmlands are right THERE!!!!

YOU WHINY , TRAUMATIZED , CHILDREN !!!!

I love them all.

Did I seriously play an entire game because of some FanFic I happen to pick at random.... Yes yes I did, you should too.

+Play Cult of the Lamb, It has a love of love into it, the art in the backgrounds, the multitude of weapons and curses, the bosses, it can be as short as you want it to be. May the RNG... I mean may THE ONE WHO WAITS smile upon ye.

+Read The Rehabilitation of Death By BamSara on AO3, I got curious due to the influx of fanart on Tumblr since Devolver announce the next update to be release on August 12, I didn't realized the severity of the undertaking I was about to embark into, It's Good, Post first ending with a What if story line when the lamb Challenges Narinder for the Red Crown, and If you like emotionally constipated Characters OHH BOY Nari is your Boy, that cat is 90% the root of all his problems, But he is addicted to that Denial Copeism, you get trauma And YOU get trauma, YOU ALL GET TRAUMA, they are also on Tumblr and they update a slightly more humorous version of TROD in comic format.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Alexei  navalny did not like tragedies. He preferred Hollywood films and fables in which heroes vanquish villains and good triumphs over evil. He had the looks and talent to be one of those heroes, but he was born in Russia and lived in dark times, spending his last days in a penal colony in the Arctic permafrost. A fan of “Star Wars”, he described his ordeal in lyrical terms. “Prison [exists] in one’s mind,” he wrote from his cell in 2021. “And if you think carefully, I am not in prison but on a space voyage…to a wonderful new world.” That voyage ended on February 16th.

Mr Navalny’s death was blamed by Russian prison authorities on a blood clot—though his doctor said he suffered from no condition which made that likely. Whatever ends up on his death certificate, he was killed by Vladimir Putin. Russia’s president locked him up; in his name Mr Navalny was subjected to a regime of forced labour and solitary confinement. Mr Navalny will be celebrated as a man of remarkable courage. His life will be remembered for what it says about Mr Putin, what it portends for Russia and what it demands of the world.

A man of formidable intelligence, Mr Navalny identified the two foundations on which Mr Putin has built his power: fear and greed. In Mr Putin’s world everyone can be bribed or threatened. Not only did Mr Navalny understand those impulses, he struck at them in devastating ways.

His insight was that corruption was not just a side hustle but the moral rot at the heart of Mr Putin’s state. His anti-corruption crusade formed a new genre of immaculately documented and thriller-like films that displayed the yachts, villas and planes of Russia’s rulers. These videos, posted on YouTube, culminated in an exposé of Mr Putin’s billion-dollar palace on the Black Sea coast that has been watched 130m times. Despite the palace’s iron gates, adorned with a two-headed imperial eagle, Mr Navalny portrayed its owner not as a tsar so much as a tasteless mafia boss.

Mr Navalny also understood fear and how to defeat it. Mr Putin’s first attempt to kill him was in 2020, when he was poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok smeared inside his underwear. By sheer good luck Mr Navalny survived, regained his strength in Germany and less than a year later flew back to Moscow to defy Mr Putin in a blast of publicity.

He returned in the full knowledge that he would probably be arrested. On the way back to confront the evil ruler who had tried to poison him he did not read Hamlet. He watched Rick and Morty, an American cartoon. By mocking Mr Putin, he diminished him. “I’ve mortally offended him by surviving,” he said from the dock during his trial in 2021. “He will enter history as a poisoner. We had Yaroslav the Wise and Alexander the Liberator. And now we will have Vladimir the Poisoner of Underpants.”

Mr Navalny was sentenced to 19 years in jail on extremism charges. He turned his sentence into an act of cheerful defiance. Every time he appeared in court hearings via video link from prison, his smile cut through the walls of his cell and beamed across Russia’s 11 time zones. On February 15th, on the eve of his death, he was in court again. Dressed in dark-grey prison uniform he laughed in the face of Mr Putin’s judges, suggesting they should put some money into his account as he was running short. In the end there was only one way Mr Putin could wipe the smile off his face.

In his essay “Live Not by Lies”, in 1974, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, a Nobel-prize-winning Soviet novelist, wrote that “when violence intrudes into peaceful life, its face glows with self-confidence, as if it were carrying a banner and shouting: ‘I am violence. Run away, make way for me—I will crush you’.” Mr Navalny understood, but instead of running he held his ground.

His great strength was to understand Mr Putin’s fear of other people’s courage. In one of his early communications from jail he wrote that: “it is not honest people who frighten the authorities…but those who are not afraid, or, to be more precise: those who may be afraid, but overcome their fear.”

That is why his death portends a deepening of repression inside Russia. Mr Navalny’s murder was not the first and it will not be the last. The next targets could be Ilya Yashin, a brave politician who followed Mr Navalny to prison, or Vladimir Kara-Murza, a historian, journalist and politician who has been sentenced to 25 years on treason charges for speaking against the war. The lawyers and activists who continue to defend these dissidents are also in danger. Since Mr Putin’s return to the presidency in 2012, the number of prisoners has increased 15 times. Even as the remnants of Stalin’s gulag fill with political prisoners, professional criminals are being recruited and released to fight in Ukraine.

Mr Navalny’s death also casts a shadow over ordinary Russians. In Moscow and across Russia, people flooded the streets at the news. Before the police started to arrest them, they covered memorials for previous victims of political repression in flowers. Yet that repression is intensifying. Since the start of the war in Ukraine, 1,305 men and women have been prosecuted for speaking out against it. A wave of repression is also swallowing up people who never before engaged in politics. The president will shoot into the crowds if he must.

For the West, Mr Navalny’s death contains a call to action. Mr Putin considers its leaders too weak and too decadent to resist him. And for many years Western politicians and businessmen did much to prove that fear and greed work in the West, too. When Mr Putin first bombed and shelled Chechnya in the early 2000s, Western politicians turned a blind eye and continued to do business with his cronies. When he murdered his opponents in Moscow and annexed Crimea in 2014, they slapped his wrist. Even after he had invaded Ukraine in 2022, they hesitated to provide enough weapons for Russia to be defeated. Every time the West stepped back, Mr Putin took a step forward. Every time Western politicians expressed their “grave concern”, he smirked.

The West needs to find the strength and courage that Mr Navalny showed. It should understand that Mr Navalny’s murder, the soaring number of political prisoners, the torture and beating of people across Russia, the assassination of Mr Putin’s opponents in Europe and the shelling of Ukrainian cities are all part of the same war. Without resolve, the West’s military and economic superiority will count for nothing.

Western governments should start by treating people like Mr Kara-Murza as prisoners of Mr Putin’s war who need to be exchanged with Russian prisoners in the West or prisoners of war in Ukraine. They should not stigmatise ordinary Russians living under a paranoid dictator and his goons, or put the onus on ordinary people to overthrow the dictator who is repressing them.

The best retort to Mr Putin is by arming Ukraine. Every time America’s Congress votes down aid, Russia takes comfort. The leaders assembled at the Munich Security Conference, who heard Mr Navalny’s wife, Yulia, speak of justice for her husband’s death, need to stiffen their resolve to see through the war. For their part Ukrainian politicians must see that standing up for Russian activists and prisoners is also a way of helping their own country—just as Mr Navalny called for peace, for rebuilding Ukraine and the prosecution of Russian war crimes. Liberating Ukraine would be the best way to liberate Russia, too.

The voyage ends

After he had been poisoned, Mr Navalny returned home because he believed that history was on his side and that Russia was freeing itself from the deadly grip of its own imperial past. “Putin is the last chord of the ussr,” he told The Economist a few months before he took that last fateful journey. “People in the Kremlin know there is a historic current that is moving against them.” Mr Putin invaded Ukraine to reverse that current. Now he has killed Mr Navalny.

Mr Navalny would not want Mr Putin’s message to prevail. “[If I get killed] the obvious thing is: don’t give up,” he once told American film-makers. “All it takes for evil to triumph is the inaction of good people. There’s no need for inaction.”

Mr Navalny’s death has seemed imminent for months. And yet there is something crushing about it. He was not alone in believing that good triumphs over evil, and that heroes vanquish villains. His courage was an inspiration. To see that moral order so brutally overturned is a terrible affront. ■

[teecupangel]

pardon me if I am insensible with cold medicine but consider

in the thing I suggested where Desmond replaces Altaïr and ends up in Malik's arms as he grieves growing in place of (what he considers to be) a better man

imagine that

Altaïr

ends up reborn as Robert de Sablé

as in, Altaïr fully remembers his life, how it went without Desmond's interference

and then found himself being reborn as an enemy to the assassins

of course, when he gets to the Levant and learns there's still an eagle of masyaf, he has to assume that it's Robert, switched with him at birth

he can't say why this has happened, but he does know that he made mistakes in his first life, mistakes he is trying to rectify as a member of the Templar order

but of course he has to be wary of "Altaïr" aka Robert and whatever he's planning

could this all be an incredibly long game to get the Apple of Eden?

cue a LOT of Altaïr being sneaky and suspicious ans trying to strategize as Robert (and of course promoting Maria in the organization as soon as he could without tarnishing her reputation)

And Deamond just like wow i don't remember Robert being such a shifty fuck before, weird

Guess Altaïr just glossed over a lot of that in favor of fights

The Desmond replaced Altaïr comment from @twitcherpated (that’s in this post):

in the same vein as the other sad ideas I've been pitching, consider: Desmond gets reborn, Yew Branches style, not as someone in Altaïr's orbit but as Altaïr himself. He's guilty and depressed about replacing a man he can't live up to, but at least he takes comfort in Malik being around. He always liked him in Altaïr's memories, and now he has a chance to get close to him, spend time with him, think about him when he should be training--oh no.

One of the problems I think Altaïr would face with being reborn as Robert is his relationship with Maria. Maria doesn’t strike me as the type of person who would have a romantic relationship with her boss, she’s too much of an honorable person to do something like that. Their relationship would be strictly professional and Altaïr would forever miss his dear wife, of course, but he would know that the Maria who is working for him isn’t his wife.

Thinking she is would sully the memories of his wife and will be a great disservice to the Maria he has with him right now.

Whether they do get past that wall between them though is another question altogether.

The reason why I focused on this is because you wished for Maria to rise up the ranks and Altaïr would want that for her. He needs an ally he can trust completely in this den of snakes and he believes that Maria deserves recognition for her strength and chivalry.

BUT this is the 12th century and the Crusaders weren’t exactly known for being… ‘open-minded’ on this kind of thing.

The Crusaders would probably whisper behind their back how she slept her way to the top and other unflattering things about her. They’d ignore it, of course, but that meant that there will be many who would oppose Altaïr’s plans for reformation just because of his ‘treatment’ of Maria.

But the Templar Order though… now that’s another story. Altaïr taking on the mantle of the Grand Master of the Templar Order (shudder) would mean he has the chance of making the Templars more in line with de la Serre’s Templar faction in Unity and Maria will be his second in command. Those who are part of the Templar Order would definitely respect her.

As for Desmond…

Well…

Sure, Desmond is confused by Robert!Altaïr being a shifty fuck but just imagine Altaïr’s own confusion when he thinks Altaïr!Robert who is really Altaïr!Desmond being mostly a chill dude who obviously has a crush on Malik.

The horrific expression on Altaïr’s face when he sees that Malik feels the same way and the two idiots are being all lovey-dovey without even realizing it.

Altaïr wondering if all they needed to do to get Robert to be a chill more amicable dude was for him to fall in love. XD

===============================

Okay, crazier idea:

Man, you know what would be even funnier? If Altaïr was reborn as Robert de Sablé in the idea where Desmond was reborn as one of King Richard’s illegitimate brothers.

Like, just imagine Desmond’s confusion to why this Robert de Sablé is… more cooperative and seemed to support his push for reforms in the Templar Order that goes against everything that the Templar Order actually stands for. He’s even willing to kill the really bad ones like Garnier for Desmond and Desmond’s just “What the fuck is happening? Why is he so reasonable and nice. Is Robert de Sablé actually a good guy???”

Altaïr, on the other hand, actually thinks that Desmond is a real historical figure that got lost in time or never made a mark in history because he has assassins (no, not Assassins, just those pathetic killers for hire kind) hounding him almost every day and one of them killed Desmond too early. Altaïr had to get Maria to coordinate with him so someone is always with Desmond because the nobility definitely wants King Richard’s “fuck y’all, I’m gonna change this country for the people, not for the powerful” illegitimate brother (and Desmond doesn’t even know what he’s doing is affecting the country) dead before he poisons King Richard’s mind with all these talks of equality and whatever. Altaïr honestly believes that Desmond died in the original timeline (which is true BUT not in the year Altaïr assumes) and that keeping Desmond alive would be key to keeping everyone he cared for safe and ushering in a better future for everyone.

And then we can fuck this even more by making the current Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad be any of the following:

The real Robert de Sablé - this would be the most fucked up timeline because you know that Robert will have his own plans already in place and might even have taken Al Mualim’s place already by the time 1191 rolls around.

Lucy - It would be funny and Lucy would be trying so hard to keep the timeline in check and then she sees Desmond who is just happy to see Altaïr (not thinking he’s had Altaïr with him for years even before this) and she’s like “who the hell is this guy???”. Also, just Lucy suffering the entire time trying to be Altaïr XD

Elijah - “How can we make Desmond’s life more complicated with this idea?” Bring in the son he never knew who is also a Sage and who may or may not have an agenda of his own in this entire mess. They never interacted with one another in canon, sure, but Elijah knew his father was Desmond Miles so the potential drama and angst are there.

Ezio - … just imagine Desmond and Altaïr’s confusion when they meet the supposed Altaïr who turns out to be so charismatic and well-liked that the Assassins honestly believed him when he said ‘yeah, Al Mualim’s a bad dude’ and has been the mentor by the year 1190…

[a-shrieking-cloud-of-bats]

some notes and suggestions on MD2 hard mode for people struggling with it;

- you are expected to lose clashes, the game up to this point has largely framed losing a clash as a freak accident. It Will Happen in MD2H and learning how to take these losses gracefully is important, in abnormality fights inparticular try to line up clashes you can’t beat with units that have a resistance to the enemy’s damage type, bonus points if their stagger resist is high, Meur is great for this as a lot of his IDs have a very generous starting stagger resist, usually around 60% as opposed to 75%, many shi IDs have good stagger resists as well. You can obviously do that in a non abnormality fight too, but you obviously have less options. Do your best, and remember defense dice exist, they have very generous rolls and can save you from a bad time sometimes, and block dice straight up reduce damage via a shield so they’re usually good.

- Do Not Use An EGO Just Because You’re Losing A Clash; this partially ties in to my above point, but if you’re using an EGO to avoid losing a clash that’s going to do like 2 damage because it’s 1 coin and the target has ineffective resist to the damage type and applies no status effects you’re wasting EGO resources that are going to be Very Valuable on the higher floors; most final MD2H bosses require some degree of EGO spam at this point, uptie 4 may change this. Again, Losing Clashes Is Okay; enemy attacks can be surprisingly ineffective in the right circumstances.

- EGO gift meta right now leans towards ego resource generation gifts and healing gifts; if you’re struggling healing gifts will give you much more wiggle room, homeward and phlebotomy pack are both extremely good, but any heals you can get are great. Other EGO gifts aren’t bad nessacerily but they’re obviously more comp dependent and often more reliant on winning clashes

- Stacking similar damage types and resists is a heavy risk, especially in your initial party. If you’re anything like me you have all 4 liu units built up, but if you take all 4 into your initial party and guido shows up on the first boss, he is going to turn you inside out. Him and his gang do mostly pierce damage, liu IDs are all fatal resist against pierce damage, and all his buddies roll extremely well and will roll extremely Better when they start dying; gregor and meur liu are basically useless in this scenario and they can’t even risk taking a losing clash because they’ll take boatloads of damage from basically anything they do. Crusaders might be weak to blunt, but that doesn’t mean they’re weak to liu.

- some ID/EGO suggestions: Base heathcliff is honestly surprisingly good, his sk2 and sk3 clash well in lower floors and he has a self power buff that can make them competitive even on higher floors. Lobotomy Corp Remnant faust was and still is among the best clashers in the game, she can neutral clash even some surprisingly big rolls in higher floors with opportunistic, and her sk2 shreds on lower floors. This is counterbalanced by her having maybe one of the worst sk1′s in the game, keep an eye out for skill swap machines with her face on em.

Shi don isn’t incredible for general use but overbreathe is an EGO tier coin that can help take some pressure off your EGO resource reserves.

R Heathcliff is as always decent, though he can struggle to clash sometimes (though not more then base heathcliff! would argue he’s always worth taking over base heath, though I’m still working with base heath, his self power buffs might end up making him clash better on higher floors)

Defensive IDs in general are helpful as they can usually take clashes more gracefully, meur is a surprisingly good sinner in general just because all his IDs are skewed towards being able to take shots; presumably K corp hong lu is a beast as usual but I don’t have him so I can’t confirm on how well he clashes.

If you have Fluid Sac Faust, it’s an excellent support EGO that is also an AoE; it’s the best of both worlds.

Pursuance is a targeted heal and can really save a sinner’s butt if they’re in trouble

AoE EGOs can be helpful in general for boss fights that summon adds; they’re also just good damage in general on non boss fights. Legerdemain continues to be extremely good.

MD2 Hard mode is mostly hard because the game up to this point hasn’t really been encouraging good play habits, I suspect as time goes on this content will get “solved”, but for now this stuff should help you out if you’re struggling to clear. As you get some of these habits into your system I suspect the content will get much easier to handle; again this is mostly just learning there’s more to the system then auto win and use ego when clash bad (I certainly know that’s how I was playing before MD2H).

[squalodinoappreciationsquad]

Headcanons: Dino Cavallone's entire family tree - Pt. 1

Because I can and I will.

Ofc this is ALL headcanons and also I have ADHD, pls don't take this too seriously.

So, because of several conversations I had with beloved anons, I am going to do this at best of my ability, because I am very hyped.

Let's start this one. Under cut pls :D

PART ONE!!!

The Cavallone Family Ancestor

Well, all families have a start and sometimes the start is not as glorious as one might think.

The first was Bencivenni lo Caballone. He was a knight who rersponded to Pope Innocent III's call for crusades. He participated to the Fourth Crusade (1202-1204), sacked Costantinople (1204) bringing home some souvenirs, let's call the loot like that.

The Pope ofc granted him a piece of land on the Romagnan coast, a small castle, a noble title and the forgiveness for all of his sins, because that's what the Pope had for people who could not pay actual cash money to have their sins forgiven.

Also "lo Caballone" was originally just a nickname, but that is how the 60% of Italian surnames were born.

We now have several centuries of relative anonymity, during which the family formally established their name as Cavallone and expanded their influence through strategic alliances and marriages and whatnot.

Most notably, the firstborn daughter of Marquis Duccio Cavallone, Gemma, was sent to be married into the D'Este family, a most notable noble family (c.a. 1400s) and a couple of centuries later the second born son of Marquis Petronio Cavallone, Ambrogio Cavallone, became a quite influential cardinal at the Vatican (c.a. 1600s).

This of course granted the family quite the fortune, and also granted their survival amongst the various wars among who should rule the Sacred Roman Empire, who had to be Pope and who should survive Plague 1.0 (1300s) and Plague 2.0 (1600s).

But then we arrive at the 1700s.

The Austrian Wars and the birth of Cavallone the 1st

This will be the summary of the summary of the summary historically speaking.

The 1700s are interesting years for the peninsula. Italy will only fully reunite only in 1871, so there is still a long way to go. Historically speaking the Spanish who had invaded the peninsula and took possession of it started to lose their grip, also because King Charles II of Ausburg dies with no heir, thus beginning a war lasting for 13 years, they therefore sign first the Peace of Utrecht in 1713, the Treaty of Rastatt in 1714 and finally the Treaty of Aja in 1720, thus ending their domination in the peninsula.

The peninsula is not free, but becomes property to be sold and divided among the powerful dynasties. It is a mess and by 1748 the geopolitical panorama has completely changed.

This includes also the Romagnan territory, which is now half under the Medici's dominion and half under the Pope's dominion. Which means that all of the small families were very limited. However the Romagnan people were rioting and this is definitely fertile soil for ANY sort of change.

Now, up until that moment the Cavallone family has been fairly quiet, but all of this happening in their area is worrying, so Duke Domenico Cavallone has to do some damage control.

It's the period where the Illuminists really take on Italy, so there are newspapers, magazines for men and for women, cafes, places where people can debate and talk about phylosophy et cetera.

So Domenico Cavallone invests some cash money and becomes the patron and founder of several cafes and promotes several magazines and newspapers.

He also pours some other cash money in creating his own personal army, which will later become the foundation of the future bosses body of subordinates.

This is because he is secretly financing the riots against the Pope/the Medici and he is expecting an attack at any moment.

And the attack arrives.

Duke Domenico Cavallone is in the front line, ready to defend his turf. There is also his army behind him and the Pope has sent his army to quiet down, quote, "the dirt and the plebs", but the pope was expecting barely armed populace, NOT a full army and the Duke Cavallone.

Chronicles report that the Commander in charge of the Pope's army told Duke Cavallone that he would be in trouble, and that the Duke replied with a "we will talk after I win".

And the Duke won. Chronicles report that a white flame engulfed him as he charged to defend his city and his land and defeated the Pope's army. Ever since a flame mark appeared on his left arm.

In any case after the defeat the Pope retreated and left the Duke and his territory alone. The Duke however was excommunicated, and the excommunication has not yet been lifted.

None of the Cavallone has had any interest in having that lifted yet though.

Duke Domenico and his wife Bice Ricciardelli went on and prospered. They had four children who lived after infancy. The second born and first son, Alvise Cavallone, inherited the will and the assets of Duke Domenico Cavallone.

Lo and behold the family tree part 1

***

NEXT GENERATION ON A DIFFERENT POST!

[emmashouldbewriting]

It's just a shame Meghan wanted out because she wasn't number one in the heirarchy.

👆🏼 also proves to me that Harry didn’t really want out, and tbf neither of them wanted to be completely out — they wanted to collaborate with the queen lmaoo

Anyway, over the years Harry has had so many opportunities to not take up a big royal role, he was in the military (and I think he was expected to stay way longer in the army but he didn’t have it in him), and after that he spent like half of the year in Africa doing unclear things. I think it ultimately came down to a few things, and that is that William and Kate moved back to London which meant that William got a much bigger presence in the office. It wasn’t just the office for the three of them, William is the boss of KP and Harry the “sidekick” who was there because he’s William’s brother (this is why it was a mistake of them in the first place to create an office together, because they were always going to have to remove Harry from it when William became the Duke of Cornwall). Before WK lived there that hierarchy probably wasn’t as clear as it became, especially considering the press narratives at the time.

Now, the same time as this is happening Kate is pregnant again which means another cute baby who will make Harry less important, which he does care about no matter what he says. And he had met a woman who was willing to marry him, but he wasn’t truthful to her about what it meant (or she didn’t want to understand). So when that realisation finally came that “yeah it doesn’t matter how many people google our names, we will still not be as important as William and Kate” it was hard for them to understand and buy that, because they had bigged up themselves in their own minds, “modernising the monarchy” or whatever even though no one asked them to. And you know Harry’s the grandson of the queen so he needs to be prominent, completely ignoring the fact that the only grandchild who matters for the monarchy was William.

It can’t be easy to go through life knowing that your older brother have this huge destiny in front of him, will always be more important etc, but you can choose how to deal with it. Harry (and Meghan) choose to throw the tantrum we still see.

you're absolutely right in all of it. harry was expected to have a decorated military career like andrew then quietly retire to royal duties to be a steadfast working royal (and i think we can all say that ~professionally~ andrew was a hardworking royal, and we should all hold respect for him for his military service imo) but harry was such a spoilt little bastard

in the end, he mixed hollywood with royalty and it doesn't work. it worked for grace kelly in monaco because they're kind of celebs anyway, but not for us. harry's problem was marrying a d-lister, not an a-lister

and i'm so glad harry's crusade to be a prominent grandson of the queen has worked out. it's been lovely seeing him in the third row at his father, the king's, coronation

[paniwarhamauser]

I just realized I never finished posting Grot crusade write-ups here! Last was week 3! And that Crusade has ended back in May, and new one starts in a month😅

Guess I'll just dump weeks 4-10 here all at once.

And also end-of-crusade art for my guy 😁

Week 4

Me and ladz 'ere rollin' around lookin' for da good scrap. And dere it was. Da shiny fishboy Devilfish, dem curves glistenin' in da sun!

Nachurally we WAAAAGH'd!

Fishboyz are ded shooty, but you know wot? Stompa is ded STOMPY! 

Afta Bigtoof turned deir kommander into da kanned fishpaste dey 'ere done for!

Only one fishboy on da floaty fingie flew off. Looked so smug too. As if 'e was not running away, but akchually won. Weird...

Speakin' of winnin'. Zippy better deliver on 'is promise to build anuvva Gargant!

Da ladz collected enuff scrap today ta finish da job!

WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAAAGH!

Week 5

Gorksome is da beatiful little Gargant.

Zippy did da mighty gud job. Not dat I'd ever tell it to 'is face. Not givin 'im any ideas of bein betta at sum fings den da greatest Grotboss in 'istory!

And Gork was pleased by it too. We did not even had to look for da fight dis time! Bugboyz came to us!

Dis was a glorius day! Fighting everywhere! Gorksome got to shoot its first targetz! Even Zippy remembered 'e can fight too!

Too bad bugboyz 'ave nuffin' ta scrap. No matter, dey go SQUISH funny! Ladz larfed deir rumps off! And 'e got bugboyz snaks for dayz too!

WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAAGH!

Week 6

'E made it, ladz! Da 'umie Empra's shiny boyz (mega nobz beakies or whateva dese Kustardes are?) came ta fight us! And everywun knows dey fight only da most dangeros foez!

Of course I ALWAYZ knew I am da most dangeros! But 'tis nice ta be aknowleged.

And da best fing? Da stompa went BOOM. Dis was glorius! I almost kried of joy - ta witness da wrath of Gork and Mork wiff me own eyez!

'E even got enuff of goldy scrap ta fix stompa right up.

WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAAAGH!

Week 7

Da fightin' is da most fun, but 'e gotta make anuvva Gargant. And dis means 'e need more scrap.

Mork smiled upon us today. 'E 'eard 'BLOOD FOR DA BLOOD GOD' warcry, and I knew my ladz 'ere sent anuvva gud fight! 

Red and spikey beakies are ded fighty. And dey charge like da best of orkz too. Gotta respect dat! Also dey brought tanks! Wich mean dere was plenty of spikey scrap to collect afta da battle.

Da ladz even charged da spiky rhino and stole deir icon! Scrap and trophiez, da best life all around!

WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAGH!

Week 8

Would you look at dat! Stuntiez again! And dey have a new trukk too! Time to scrap it! WAAAAGH!

'Tis was fun! DAKKA-DAKKA-DAKKA! Dead stuntiez everywhere! 

And den weirdgurl and hammergurl 'ere at it again. Is Gork'n'Mork trying to tell me somefing by sendin' dem at me again? That I should I get a weirdboy and a hammer too? Interestin'...

Either way, a message from Gork and Mork is always a WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAGH!

Week 9

I was an idiot! Surprised at me sayin' dat? Da greatest grotboss is not afraid to admit mistakes!

I thought Devilfish were shiny! But Empra's goldie boyz showed me how wrong I was! Deir gravy-tank is proppa shiny! I 'ave never seen such a beauty in me life before!

Nachurally I called WAAAGH and sent ladz ta get me dat gravy-tank at all costs!

'Tis was a good fight. We krumped deir boss and deir nob too! Gargants are da best! Not as best as me, but close! Though I only cared for gravy-tank, if I'm honest. Nuffin else mattered.

Always keep da eyez on da prize, as dey say!

And wot a prize it is! Now I has da Goldy Throne of me own!

WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAGH!

Week 10

I was sittin' on Da Goldy Throne, surrounded by me trophies, pettin' me squig and thinkin' of changin' me title from Grot Boss to Grot Empra. No uvver boss has Da Goldy Throne, after all!

Me thinkin' was interrupted by watchlad screaming 'SCRAWNIES ON DA HORIZON'

Scrawnies are sure need to be krumped. Let me finish my shroom brew and den we WAAAGH!

W-wot is happenin'? Why I can no move? Wot is dis green glow? Did Gork and Mork came to see me and name me deir new profeet? Now dat's a REAL WIN FOR DA GROT WAAAAGH!

***

Trazyn closed the tessaract and chuckled to himself, - 'Don't you just love when a specimen arranges itself into a nice display, saving me the trouble!'

[wanderingmind867]

This is a character that should have been a part of Infinity Inc. I even worked in real stuff that happened in comics! I checked my facts! And using the canon of the golden age, I made a roman mythology based, adopted daughter of Jim Corrigan. A perfect addition to a team like Infinity Inc.

The Lare (Olivia Corrigan): In January, 1942, Jim Corrigan was resurrected from the dead (More Fun Comics #75). The Spectre and Jim Corrigan were still tied together (and if Jim Corrigan died again, for example, The Spectre would lose his host body), but The Spectre could now operate independently of Jim Corrigan. This means Jim (brought back at the same age he was when he died) is now free to pursue a relationship with Clarice Winston. And although Jim Corrigan left to serve in the military in 1943, The Spectre continued his crusade against crime on the homefront with Percival Popp, the Super Cop.

When the War finally ended in 1945, Jim Corrigan returned home and finally got married to Clarice Winston. Around a year after that (in 1946), The Spectre vanished mysteriously. Jim never figured out where he went, but he took it as a sign that his mission was accomplished and he could finally rejoin the ranks of the living. So Jim continues his detective work, and he adopts a child with Clarice (turns out dying left him completely infertile, but he can adopt).

More specifically, in 1953 Jim saves a baby from a fire at a mob bosses's home. An innocent woman dyed trying to save the child. So to honour this woman's dying wishes (and to finally fulfill his and clarisse's desire to start a family), they adopt the kid. Her mom never had a chance to tell them her name, but Clarice chooses to name her Olivia. Olivia Corrigan.

For the first thirteen years of her life, Olivia Corrigan feels blessed. Jim and Clarisse raised her to be a smart and clever child, one who's polite and yet not afraid to speak her mind. She loved her parents. But then, in 1966… everything goes downhill. When on a case, The Spectre comes back. Jim Corrigan becomes no more than a phantom. He abandons Clarisse and Olivia, because The Spectre insists that he do so. Losing her father at 13 was a harsh blow, and Olivia never really got over it. Especially not after it forced her to become her mom's crutch, as Clarisse Corrigan mourned a husband she still loved.

Angry at her father for abandoning his family, she tries to hunt him down for fifteen years. Finally, in 1981 she manages to find him and corner him. But on that same occasion, Solomon Grundy ends up attacking her. While she struggles vainly against him, The Spectre hears a murder just occured elsewhere, and he forces Jim Corrigan to abandon his daughter. So Solomon Grundy ends up killing Olivia Corrigan, breaking her like a twig. Her body falls limply to the floor. She was only 28 years old, and she still didn't know who her real parents were. On top of that, her adopted father abandoned her, and now her 73 year old adopted mom was all alone.

Angry at The Spectre for taking her father from her, gods from other pantheons take pity on her. Specifically, her real father, the Roman God Pluto, decides to give her a gift. Just like The Spectre, she too rises from the dead. A ghost with incredible powers and abilities. But unlike Jim Corrigan, Olivia isn't sharing a body with any kind of godly avatar. No, she's in complete control of all of her actions. And her first action is to find her dad and make him pay. She is now The Lare, a blessed daughter of pluto!

She initially starts out as an enemy of the JSA and Infinity Inc, because of her rage and anger towards her adopted father. But they make up eventually. She will not forgive The Spectre, but she will forgive Jim Corrigan. Also, she never ends up a permanent member of infinity inc. She comes and goes as she pleases, mostly because her godly powers are too strong to make a character we could use on a permanent basis (she's sort of like her adopted father in that regard). But she is still a member of Infinity Inc, and she'll aid them if they need her.

[300iqprower]

So I was playing Elden Ring and just noticed how every boss is literally weakened by the passage of time. Is this a thing in all Fromsoft games? Elden Ring is the first one I've played and it's fascinating how Fromsoft made it a point to show bosses facing their end because they've been eroded by time.

Is that a thing mechanically? Like I know its open world so do the bosses you choose to do later get scaled down/dont scale to your new level to make it so the later you do a boss the weaker they are? If that's what you mean, no that is an Elden Ring thing.

If you mean lorewise, does the game show how these are ancient beings who are long past their prime and at best a hollow shell of what they once were pretending to be the legend described, oh yes that is very much a FromSoftware thing. And I dont know WHY IN GOD’S NAME I felt a need to systematically break down some examples, but I super did. So here we fcking go.  [BUT THATS YOUR TLDR: “YES.” WTF IS WRONG WITH ME THE REST OF THIS IS LIKE 4K WORDS. Oh and sorry in advance for the length before the break but it only lets ya put one Keep Reading i guess...]

Gonna put a spoiler break only later on for heavy spoilers. In the meanwhile there will be light spoilers for Dark Souls 1, 2, 3, and Bloodborne. There will be no Elden Ring or Sekiro spoilers in this post (albeit only cause I've avoided spoiling myself as much as possible on both lol)

Again, the answer is basically “yes.” Like, that is Fromsoft design 101. That has been the core philosophy of every final boss across Dark Souls, Demon's Souls, and Bloodborne. Hell, most bosses in the series in general. It's even a thing in Sekiro, albeit a lot of it is presented very differently (As far as I am anyways. See above.)

> Light spoilers for Bloodborne follow.

Father Gascoigne, the first mandatory boss of Bloodborne, sets the tone very well for this sort of thing. Hunters are very clearly supposed to be the ones who keep order and cull the insane and the beasts during the Night of the Hunt, and when you encounter the only named Hunter thus far it starts out exactly like that, finding a priest in a graveyard with the same weapons you start with, dressed similarly to the default Hunter's attire and hacking at a beast...except, it becomes immediately apparent that it’s already long dead, less a hunter killing prey and more a butcher obsessed with a carcass. Upon noticing you, a fellow hunter, he says “Beasts All Over The Shop…..You’ll be one of them….Sooner Or Later….”

before turning around and revealing he's blindfolded as he lets out a raspy, feral growl. ...And then halfway through the fight he turns into a fucking werewolf.

Yeah, despite being a Fromsoft game, Bloodborne is very quick to make clear what's going on in it. Between the insane mob of villagers, the werewolves running around, the giant roaring abomination that's supposedly a Cleric, and now the first fellow hunter you meet (one working for the Church that is supposed to be the governing authority no less) is as crazed as the beasts themselves and several times as deadly in his brutality, this is clearly a place that has gone to hell long ago, and Gascoigne already told you why: "Sooner or later, you'll be one of them too." Between Gascoigne turning into a beast moments after telling us we'll eventually be one ourselves, and the cryptic lines from our hub dream world about how this is all happened before and is a tradition that will continue, it's pretty clear Bloodborne is about ‘he who fights monsters’ in the most literal sense, and it demonstrates that by having you fight people who have been fighting monsters for far too long to hold onto who they were. This world where crusading hunters once took up arms to defend their home from a plague of beasts are now as bloodlusted as the beasts themselves, to the point where the second mandatory boss ALSO transforms from human to monster before our eyes.

It's really the DLC that goes all in on this idea though. without properly spoiling anything (this is all stuff that is literally in the official description and its CALLED The Old Hunters), names that you heard lauded as great heroes finally make their appearance proper...but as twisted and broken beings who bear no resemblance to their legends and every resemblance to the things they were meant to destroy.

> Light to moderate spoilers for DS3.

You know how Elden Ring does that thing at the start where it shows you all these long fallen characters you yourself will eventually encounter and stuff? Yeah that’s something of a staple of Fromsoftware, specifically what they did with DS1 and 3. While 1 is a lot more coy about it and waits til like the halfway point, though, 3 makes it clear it’s doing the same thing DS1 did right out the gate. “The world is dying, you’re gonna face these guys, and you’re gonna catch on quick they’re all mere shadows of the legends they’re meant to be, in fact we are literally telling you this in the intro.”

And much as I love taking any chance whatsoever to rave about how the best boss in the entire series is The Abyss Watchers, it’s actually everyone’s favorite DS3 meme Yhorm the Giant who takes it. He’s possibly the most built up of all the bosses: Last of the giants and their king, a being who can’t even be killed by the weapons of men, a descendant of a conqueror and a warriors king in his own right...now nothing but a mindless, burnt out husk quietly waiting for death on a subconscious level. He once wielded a greatshield but now two-hands his sword, having long since stopped acting as a ruler in the face of all he’s lost and becoming nothing more than a weapon. Long ago he would give the Storm Ruler, the giant-slaying sword, to those who did not trust him to rule as an act of honor; now it lies carelessly strewn alongside his throne, and Yhorm will attempt to crush you long before you reach it. His one friend Siegward joins you because he knew from the start Yhorm would be like this, and seeks to put the husk out of its misery, even if it costs him his life. Siegward makes clear he would rather die than let his once friend Yhorm spiral ever further into a decay that he is too great to be consumed by yet not great enough to escape, and that’s the entire point. Greatness is a curse, not a blessing. Immortal Life can do nothing to stop the world around you from succumbing to erosion and decay. Just as Yhorm awoke from kindling to find his people still suffered, just as his empire inevitably fell and left him alone, so too did the entire world begin to die as the fire faded ever further. Hollowing is inevitable, because you will always be powerless against entropy in the end. Yhorm knows this beyond any other Lord of Cinder. Whereas the others all went astray in their selfishness or simply went insane from corruption, Yhorm is the one who truly despaired and simply...gave up, on trying to hold onto what he was. His body persisted as a hollowed husk of a once incredible being, but the mind within it died in the face of an immutable reality. Even in gameplay he’s just a walking shell, one of the easiest boss fights in sosulborne history thanks to him having kept a weapon designed for killing him at his side; the Storm Ruler isn’t some measly damage buff against an enemy type, this thing kills him in like 5 hits. From the start you weren’t ‘fighting’ something that was meant to be fought, but to be put down.

> Moderate spoilers for DS1 (middle third of the game or so)

DS1 arguably has the most wide scale example of this, since the entire point of the game is that every major boss is a once great god gone astray, and you have an entire city demonstrating this. At the start of the game we’re shown all these incredible being of old, and it’s made out as if we’re watching legends who created the world give us context on our upcoming adventure. These beings are made out as distant entities so much greater than any of us, meant to be acted in the name of as we kill dragons and stuff. But then, around the third to halfway point, it becomes clear we’ll be fighting them ourselves, and these ‘distant almighty gods’ have fallen from their glory and become what are simply more monsters to be cut down. Nito the lord of the dead is least changed but acts entirely in self interest at this point, dwelling the dark catacombs after imposing the very concept of death onto the world and not caring the slightest for what came after, to the point that what truly weakens him is not Pinwheel’s fucking about, but rather the sheer energy he is putting out to impose the concept of death onto an ever more undead world. The Witch of Izalith? Where to start, how about the fact that in her hubris of thinking she could recreate the first flame, that as a being who had lost their glory she could simply recreate that glory, she turned herself into a horrid abomination and shit-tier boss fight? Because of COURSE that happened. How could you reclaim the height of your power when even at the height of your power you could not hold onto it? How about Seath? Oh the things to say about Seath, what can we call him? Cruel, Jealous, Spiteful, literally and figuratively jaded, insane, pathetic, but of all the things we can call him those things are not “glorious” or “immortal”. He became desperate for the immortality he supposedly “proved” he didnt need by killing his scaled brethren. From declaring he did not need his peers’ immortality, to going insane over his obsession with cloying at whatever possible escape from death there might be.

From Nito’s indifference to Izalith’s hubris to Seath’s madness, they are all fallen in their own way. All their attempts to hold onto their glory only serve to further remove them from it. So many millennia and the god of Death has only become weaker as the world dies. The Witch’s magic that is meant to bend chaos to its will could only damn its wielder in the face of nature’s course. The crystal dragon’s immortality is exactly that: crystal, the fruits of his cruelty and madness nothing more than a feeble crystal easily shattered.

But to loop it all back around, it’s the final bosses of the series who really hammer the theme of ‘faded glory’ home.

> Major spoilers for DS1, DS2, and Demon’s Souls to follow, starting with DS1.

First though....Hey remember that bit I casually dropped about an entire city? You arrive to Anor Londo, carried from desolate undead asylum or the dregs of Blighttown to a great golden city illuminated perpetually by the sunset, powerful knights and cleric giants all over the place, lightning and miracle using enemies whose powers are synonymous with Gwyn’s legacy, and at the end of that gauntlet are Ornstein and Smough in their golden armor and every bit tough and lively as their legends portray. Beyond them, you meet the beautiful Gwynevere who gives you the Lordsoul to truly start your quest for the gods in linking the flame. Even if the gods are all fallen or helpless on their own, we can at least see the legacy they created and hopefully spread through the land. We can at least bring this light back to the rest of the world, knowing it can still be sustained.

Except, that was a lie. It was all a fucking lie. 

A lie orchestrated by one feeble god desperate to maintain a literal illusion of his family’s grandeur. A god whose main tactic should you fight him is to run away forever in an endless hallway and blast you with magic because he’s otherwise powerless against a simple human. Should you find and successfully kill Gwyndolin, the magic he cast over the city fades, and we see Anor Londo for what it really is: Dark. The city of the gods, the capital of the Age of Fire that stands against the Dark, has itself gone Dark, and we can’t even begin to imagine for how long it’s been that way. The gods, their cities, their subjects, their champions, all of it is just a shadow cast so long ago that it doesn’t resemble that which cast it, and any evidence that their time hasn’t passed is just another lie you’ve been fed. (...Side note, watch this video I subconsciously almost quoted verbatim)

Thus enters the God who lived and died for that lie, unable to accept a reality in which he did not rule. Thus we meet Gwyn himself....or at least, what little is left of him. Because that guy the game has been building up as your ultimate challenge? That top god who by this point has Final Boss written all over him? That guy who STARTED all this crap and is basically Zeus the Dragon Butcher? Gwyn, Lord of Sunlight?

You don’t fight him. You fight a walking husk, and this time I mean that literally. Burnt inside and out with a body of charcoal and soul of ash. You fight one of the easiest bosses in the game, a boss the devs explicitly stated was designed to make sure any possible build would not struggle much with. You fight a guy who doesn’t have a single lightning attack. You fight Gwyn, Lord of Cinder. And by the next game, he doesn’t even have a name. The one who conquered the everlasting dragons and ushered humanity into their first age is barely a memory in Dark Souls 2, simply known as a distant sun god; his own miracles that were so crucial to his legacy don’t even acknowledge him. The one person we meet who remembers he properly existed regards Gwyn as a blind fool who did not save humanity, but damn it.  And by Dark Souls 3, Gwyn isn’t even his own being, he’s just one of many nameless souls to link the first flame. 

Once the most powerful of all gods and savior of humankind, now no more valued than the random undead schmuck you played as. Without a doubt the one you see fall the furthest in any Fromsoft game is Gwyn, and it’s exactly what he deserved. 

> Onto DS2

Because while Gwyn is the definitive example, he’s not the most extreme example; I’d argue that’s Vendrick. You might disagree since his fall was not as far, but what we saw of him WAS harsher than anything we saw of Gwyn. If not the most extreme, he’s certainly the most tragic, because unlike so many other cases of this in the series, Vendrick knew and accepted that this would happen to him. He’s one of a handful of figures across the series who embody the idea that, among all these legends, the ones truly worth being remembered for their glory are the ones who recognized they must eventually let go of said glory. 

What I mean by “what we saw” is...well, just like Gwyn, Vendrick is built up over the course of the game as the great king and conqueror who ruled over the world you’re travelling around, and while Gwyn is foreshadowed as the big bad, Vendrick is directly made out to be the final boss. You’re given a quest, you overcome trials, and it’s all directly in the name of reaching this ancient tyrannical being who as a mere man conquered giants and reigned dragons. And when you finally go through a gauntlet to reach him and break his seals...

...you’re met with a feeble, shriveled Hollow who can barely drag his sword. 

Gwyn at least gave the player a sense of who he was. He was a husk, and he was weak, but he put up a fight. He was waiting for you, undeniably himself in body if not mind, and commanding the first flame as his own with a blade wreathed in those flames. He stares you down as you enter and rushes you when you approach, his iconic theme playing as he silently lashes out at you. He was a husk, but he was never completely without dignity. Vendrick doesn’t have any of that. He’s hunched and aimlessly wandering his small chamber when you find him, not even attacking until you’ve hit him several times. He has no grand, iconic requiem accompanying his battle. Instead there is the scant few piano chords of a whisper filled dirge fading in and out, as faded as the empty being before your that has thrown away all but his blade and his crown. His robes, his precious ring, all of it cast aside, knowing the fate that awaited him would have no use for them. He’s nothing more visibly imposing than a giant version of the most basic hollows. His only unique abilities are the incredibly durability and raw strength, both of which he can longer wield effectively as one of the most predictable fights in the game; the same bait and strike tactic that works on any starting grunt works just as well on him. The closest thing to a unique attack he has is a single curse spell that represents everything he was trying to defy. 

Gwyn was a far cry of his once glorious self, but he was a proper final boss in atmosphere and presentation if not strength or challenge. There’s no comparison to Vendrick, who is downright unrecognizable and was never your true foe to begin with...just a poor hollow to be put out of its misery...

> But Wait There’s [one] More [thank god]! It’s finally Demon’s Souls time.

Demon’s Souls is very much the Proto-Dark Souls in a lot of ways and how it conveys its themes is no exception. The big thing about soulsborne games is how, as you said at the start of this essay, the things we fight have all been eroded by the passage of time. We don’t see what their true potential is. We never meet them in their full glory. We can only strike down what remains of that faded legend. Even when something like time travel gets involved with various DLCs, we fight things like the Burnt Ivory King and Artorias of the Abyss. Even in the past, the legends we face are already corrupted almost beyond recognition. You simply don’t get to see what their prime is, no matter how curious we may be, because that’s the whole point of the theme of fading glory: You can’t get that back. You can only accept that it’s gone. 

.....Old King Allant is a massive, blitz speed, Final Explosion-ing, soul sucking exception to this. 

Look at this. Look. At. This.  LOOK  AT  THIS  SHIT.

This is not a shell, this is not a husk, there is nothing faded about this Alabaster curb-stomper - he’s practically radiant. Whether he’s something exceptional in difficulty is up to debate, but what isn’t up for discussion is how he’s presented, because every. single. attack. of his radiates power. I’m talking, like, Vergil levels of  P O W E R. He’s got a winged aura of storm winds, he delays his windups only to then lunge forward at breakneck speed, just the way he draws sword to face you gives off raw “I’m going to fuck you up” energy - the sword in question being Soulbrandt, a blade that he never once let go of out of his infatuation with the way it grew in strength as his soul grew darker. He sends shockwave projectiles, not magic sword beams, pure shockwaves from how hard and fast he’s attacking. He almost never gets stunned compared to any other human, he has resistances against just about everything including the ability to shrug off any magic you throw at him, and his own magic is so powerful he can either one-shot explode you or steal your levels as he kills you. Above all else though, he’s brutal. He’ll attack relentlessly and swiftly, taking out anyone who’s relying on heal-tanking or fucking around to find out. There are various exploits as there always are, but for most players, regardless of difficulty he’s the one boss we all fear: The kind where there is no trick, you just have to git gud at learning his patterns and countering them. And that’s the main thing that stick with you, just like with Artorias or Maria or Ludwig or Gael or every single bloody Sekiro boss [and from what I’ve seen almost certainly Melania], there’s a swiftness, brutality, and efficiency that truly conveys the power of this legendary figure you’re up against.

Not bad for an illusion, eh?

Yeah I’ve ignored that bit long enough. Old King Allant, or to give his other name, the False King Allant, is truly worthy of being called a warrior king at the peak of his glory....because he was created to be that. The game’s final boss, King Allant XII, is not some alabaster tyrant who conquers dragons and command the demons. He is something even lower than Vendrick in its own way, a mass of mutated, inhuman flesh that pulses and can barely so much as reach out to you let alone strike you, unable to even wield the Soulbrandt fused with its lower carcass, still desperately clinging to it even as the power of the Old One has overwhelmed his physical form. He sought ever more glory, ever more certain his could never fade, and so unlike Gwyn who was puppeted or Vendrick who was hollowed, he became something not just less than human, but unrecognizable as human. We saw him in his glory, and while he retained the strength and power to make that zenith seemingly eternal, intent on and complacent with ruling from his dwelling with the Old One as a mere specter goes forth in his image, when confronted he is not powerful at all. He is, if anything, completely powerless.

Gwyn retained his visage and his dignity, but lost who he was, a burnt husk who possesses none of his own legacy and was doomed to ultimately be forgotten for the very reason of desperately holding onto his glory. Vendrick never ceased to represent that which he believed in, but lost his visage, his dignity, his kingdom, his mind, and his soul, ultimately left with nothing but the acceptance of his own inescapable fate.

Compared to the both of them, Allant is still the most on the nose, because unlike the rest we see that glorious legend. We meet it and fight it before we then deal with the reality of what is left of that same legend. Allant is not a once great, now faded light. He is a blazing pyre snuffed out right in front of our eyes. We go back to back from the peak of his tyrannical and power-mad glory, to a wretched and pathetic abomination pleading for mercy and understanding he does not deserve.

.................................................................................................................................... sigh

There. It’s done.

Ideally I would either now go into how Bloodborne does this amazingly as well with its final boss, but i don't want to spoil it. Not even tagged. Bloodborne has what might be my absolute favorite final boss in all video games, both because of themes discussed here and so many other merits, and I don't want to spoil it for anyone under any circumstance. I don’t care if it’s a 7 year old game (oh god my back), I won’t be the person to spoil that experience for anyone, invested or otherwise. Of course, I could go into the much more willing to spoil Lady Maria because just about EVERYONE knows about her, and from what I’ve seen of Elden Ring she might even have been a sort of “Proof of Concept” for Melania, or I could talk about how Maria is an inverse of this philosophy of “fading glory” and how she stands against the idea of holding onto such…

….but i think i already spent far too long on this, especially when for all i know you were in fact referring to a gameplay mechanic in which case this completely unsolicited WHY DID I WRITE THIS-

[cassyapper]

UM so i think about an au where jotaro is the one to die in sdc instead of anyone else and i throw up from grief but anyway i then go on to think about how like future parts would get impacted by this and like i dont think i’ve seen much discussion of that so let me . yeah. 

um so i think it follows the theme of like the crusaders basically making it up to jotaro in retrospect. and like . cleaning it up for him not cause theyre blood but because they were family nonetheless. so like

diu is mostly the same but instead of jotaro there it’s kakyoin and joseph. kakyoin wildly switches from being super overbearing to kinda like mean and hostile to josuke and josuke does not get it until kakyoin one day admits he can’t look at him without seeing jotaro and josuke is like. well that sucks and all but i’m not jotaro. i’m josuke. do i not get the opportunity to exist to you just because of another joestar. and kakyoin is like hmm. and he gets better and treats josuke better and theyre good buddies by the end

um in part 5 like. avdol is there the whole time. iggy is the one who fucks around with gio like koichi did in the first ep tho just btw. but like avdol is there the whole time. he’s very blunt about the fact he’s here to watch gio and gio has very rustled feathers but avdol isn’t trying to stop him from anything and he did help with the black sabbath fight so whatever. at the halfway point we meet polnareff rather than waiting on the finale and it convinces everyone including fugo to betray the boss cause like the requiem arrow. while theyre on this week from hell btw pol andf avdol drop hints about his dad/jotaro’s death. when gio almost dies cause of the requiem arrow he’s engulfed by both pol and avdol and they both cry that they can’t lose another kid like that again and while gio could kinda piece some stuff together at that point, this kind of confirmation -- that even tho his dad is the one who took their previous charge from them, they still see him as a kid worth caring about to the extent they cared about jotaro -- makes him cry for the first time in uh his life. i guess. abbacchio doesnt die btw but bruno and nara might still. we’ll see.

anyway and then part six instead of jolyne caus ejotaro. is dead. is kakyoin infiltrating the prison pucci is working at and them just going nuts at each other. when it’s clear neither can get the upperhand in a fight they fall into a very uneasy game of just constantly circling each other. with this comes familiarity though and they were friends once back when kakyoin was fleshbuded. they begin to talk. kakyoin explains what happened to him and pucci is like ah. and kakyoin is like “so see dio is fucked up and he hurt you too” and pucci is like noooope not dealing with that. but he doesnt have the opportunity to kickstart the bone bullshit with kakyoin watching him like a hawk and he can’t deny that he has doubts. anyway with kakyoin still there pucci begins to fall in on himself more and more until he just breaks down crying cause he realizes that while dio was his friend he was his abuser first. kakyoin comforts him. together they burn the bone and forever end any hope of dio’s dream coming to fruition. and at last letting jotaro rest in peace. um yeah idk