#and the ones in between either have no idea what they're doing or they're just goofing off

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Do you have any RSA headcanons? Love your blog btw ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡

Thank you, thank you 💞

A popularish speculation I've seen regarding RSA is that the school and the people associated with it aren't actually as squeaky clean as they appear and actually have a very sinister side to them. While I do think this is an interesting idea to explore, I genuinely don't think this is canon. (Think about what that would do for Vil and Neige's conflict in book 5; by making Neige a "villain", it strips book 5 of its nuance and would position Vil as the one in clearly in the right.) So when I talk about my headcanons, I will NOT be considering that fan theory.

I'll be honest though 💦 I don't think about RSA a ton, so I have way fewer ideas and the ones I do have aren't super fleshed out. Here's a handful:

There are also 7 dorms at RSA, each mirroring the Great Seven-inspired ones at NRC and upholding different values. For example, Ignihyde's equivalent might feature the Son of the Thunder God (Hercules) or the Thunder God (Zeus) himself, and maybe they value courage/bravery or the strength of one’s heart.

Cooperation and friendship is promoted and integrated in many aspects of campus life. For example, a lot of courses involve group projects and it's part of RSA athletic club culture to do group chants before a sporting match.

... The staff at RSA actually give a shit and intervene quickly if trouble arises among their students, LOL (as opposed to NRC staff, who either scold + assign punishment or just leave the students to resolve the problems on their own).

The students are such good sports... Like, they'll go up and offer hugs and handshakes to the NRC students (who only stare at them with expressions twisting from disgust).

The Seven Dwarves and Neige are almost always seen together. Everyone knows they're the bestest of friends!

Neige is influential in his own dorm due to his status as a celebrity, even if he doesn't hold a formal title.

Chenya is also infamous around campus. He's known as a lax, easygoing guy that speaks in tongues and pulls the occasional prank.

Chenya's dorm leader is constantly daydreaming and getting lost; because of this, it's usually one of his duties to find them and lead them home. Yes, I have a twisted Alice OC that I barely talk about and I am giving them a cameo here--

When RSA students visit NRC, they are greeted with hate and get chased off campus. When NRC students visit RSA, they're welcomed warmly and even offered snacks. Big contrast between them.

Getting hired as staff at RSA is extremely competitive (this is somewhat confirmed in Trein's Strict Suit vignettes).

Most students love to sing and dance. Stepping onto RSA campus feels like walking into a Disney live action musical (but like... a GOOD Disney live action musical). The Theatre Club also boasts a high membership.

The campus newspaper has a section dedicated to naming a Good Samaritan of the edition, as many of its student body engage in charity work or are just generally nice.

Like NRC, there are black sheep amid the students. I like to imagine these are usually students inspired by Disney characters that have bad intentions but present themselves as good people (such as twist villains).

[yanderedrabbles]

Yandere Movie Week [review]

Day 2 - Secret Obsession (2019)

Yandere Score: 9/10

Overall Score: 6/10

I hate to only give this movie a 6/10, because I really enjoyed it.

But it's the kind of fun, turn-your-brain-off flick best enjoyed with ice cream and zero critical thinking skills.

The premise is solid - our heroine Jennifer (Brenda Song) wakes up with amnesia after being chased down by a masked killer. A great set up for tension, and a pretty classic intro to a thriller.

The opening scene yanks us straight into the action. A rainy night. A mysterious, knife wielding stranger. A desperate dash for safety. (If only they could have kept this pace up for the entire movie, sigh).

You can see where I'm going with this. It doesn't go well for our girl.

After she wakes up in the hospital, we're introduced to her husband, Russel (Mike Vogel). His character design had two words on it and those were "buff nerd." Biceps and bifocals.

He's with her through every step of her recovery, sweet and steadfast while she grapples with the guilt of not remembering him, or their life together.

But most importantly, he's here to whisk her away to safety! That safety being a gorgeous house out in the mountains.

With no cell service or nearby neighbours.

I love the cabin chic look Jen, but maybe not the best place to be when there's a killer out for blood.

As you can expect, things go south and they go south fast. Not even half an hour in and we get our first on screen murder. Trust me, this particular yandere is not shy about his intentions.

He works hard to earn his 9/10 rating. He's been obsessed with Jen for years, and her getting married is the final straw. Either she can be his, or she can join his rapidly growing list of victims.

We've got plenty of the classic tropes. Cameras in her bedroom. Isolation. Chaining her to the bed. A total catch, no idea why Jen was never into him.

He's the quintessential "If I can't have you, no one can" sort of guy. Doing whatever he has to to keep his girl. He gets creative with it too. How many yanderes can say they broke out Photoshop as part of their grand plan?

Unfortunately, he's far from perfect. And I don't mean the murders. (Hot guys can do a little murder sometimes, as a treat).

His plan hinges on people just... not checking ID? You're lucky you made it as far as you did, pretty boy. Guess some deranged killers get all the luck.

On top of that, the chemistry between him and Jen is terribly lukewarm. A few tense moments, but nothing simmering hot.

For the most part, he isn't very scary or emotive. Which is a HUGE missed opportunity.

Show us the passion that led him to this point! Show us a man on the end of his tether, desperate to keep his girl! Give us something more than bland acting, and a range beyond straight-faced and slightly-less-straight-faced.

Despite his long list of crimes, he just isn't intimidating.

Maybe the intention was to have this non-threatening guy do all these things as a way to ratchet up the tension, but I don't think the movie had the budget or the time to pull it off.

He gets much better in the third act - more demanding, more handsy. But it never reaches the point where I'm at the edge of my seat wondering if he's about to lose his shit.

Jennifer as a character is moderately likeable. Despite spending quite a bit of time with her, I struggle to think of anything majorly distinctive. Not great. Not terrible. I think it's Brenda Song herself rather than Jennifer who I end up liking.

She's also - how do I say this politely - not always the smartest. And I get it girl, it's hard to think under pressure. But how the hell do you manage to lock your keys inside your car when you're being chased by a killer?

She's lucky she has her golden retriever man to protect her, really.

In terms of technicals, I'd say they're okay. Not very eloquent of me, but that's exactly what they are.

The cinematography is passable. There weren't a lot of shots that made me pause and stare. It has that glossy look that a lot of direct-to-streaming movies have, where you can tell the budget is stretched a bit thin, and the camera guy is antsy to get his cheque.

The score doesn't stick out to me at all. Hate to say it.

Don't go in expecting a blockbuster, high budget film. It's fun but utterly mid-teir in budget, story and characters. The premise has promise, but it fails to deliver as much tension and terror as it could.

Would I recommend? Despite its issues, I'd say it's worth picking up. Not the scariest or prettiest movie on this list, but it's a quick fix of yandere to get you through the day.

Day 1 - Fear (1996)

Day 2 - Secret Obsession (2019)

Day 3 - Hush (2016)

Day 4 - The Perfect Guy (2015)

Day 5 - The Boy Next Door (2015)

Day 6 - The Invisible Man (2020)

Day 7 - Til Death Do Us Part (2017)

Taglist: @jsprien213 @trolleri-trollera @mel-vaz

[basedhighsenberg]

Tonight at work I had an engaged couple in their 40s come in who have been a regular of mine for a while now.

Every time they come in they, specifically he, asks for me. The guy is a textbook himbo construction worker but he's also one of the nicest most genuine people I've met since working there. Imagine a golden retriever that has been trained to operate a cement mixer.

They come up the counter and he is visibly anxious and turning red. He puts a small box on the counter and starts to say "So this is my mom's ring-" except can't quite finish the sentence and starts ugly sobbing in the store, in front of like a dozen other guests. He continues to take it out of the box while sobbing.

His fiance and I do our best to calm him down. I bring them over to a sitting area and grab a box of tissues for him. Finally he calms down, and he's able to actually talk his ideas through- which are actually very sweet. He goes on to explain that his mother passed recently and they had discussed using some of the diamonds in her old ring for for his future wife's engagement set.

He already had an idea- he wanted to combine two white gold contour bands into a ring-wrap to go with the ring she already had, and wanted to sub out several of the diamonds in the already existing WG bands for ones in his mom's ring. After inspecting the ring and consulting with my jeweler, we decided it was extremely feasible and should only take two-ish weeks.

Before I can use stones from an outside ring though, I have to test them to be sure they're diamonds. So as we do this, he again gets super anxious and starts welling up with tears. Thankfully though, all diamonds according to my tester (and my eye- I can now spot fake shit through a microscope fairly well).

I watch the wave of catharsis role over him like a warm blanket as I tell him the diamonds are all real. He then proceeds to run on a tangent. "is the ring good? Like, did my dad do good? Cause they were poor growing up and they did right by me and my sisters but like, is it a good ring? Did he have to work a lot for it? Is it good? I think it is but I'm not an expert. What do you think?"

It was built probably in the 60s when gold was cheaper and rings were often chunkier. A cathedral style mounting in 14k yellow gold, with three bands of diamonds- one with baguettes on the central cathedral arms flanking the 1ct-ish marquis center diamond, and two bands of round diamonds running below the cathedral arms to give the ring a look like it had two wedding bands joined to either side. It was well made and had weight to it, and all-in-all probably clocked in between 3-4 TDW. A comparable ring like that would probably easily be $10k+ retail in today's market.

So I tell him his dad did good, and he again gets super emotional- but manages to pull himself back enough to calculate the payments with his future wife. They figure out how to make it work, I ring them out and the ball starts rolling. They both shake my hand on the way out and he gives me one of the brightest smiles I can recall seeing anytime recently.

I should mention- his fiance had actually been a regular of the store before when she was married to another guy, who I found out after she left him was extremely abusive towards her. Every time they came in, his vibe was just rancid and everyone could pick up on it. I was happy to learn about her leaving him when she came in and asked me to help her clean up a bunch of jewelry that he had bought her (while cheating on her) so that she could sell it. I was happy to assist.

But, when she and this new dude first met a while later, I thought they weren't long for each other. She's a semi-professional Hispanic woman with 3 kids, and he is... again, a big retriever puppy. You would never picture these two together otherwise.

I see a lot of couples come in that I genuinely feel like are soul mates, or at the very least extremely compatible matches. I also have a lot of couples come in that aren't destined to be together long, and it's apparent within the first few minutes talking with them.

This time though, I have seldom ever been so glad to admit that I was wrong. By any rational measure of thought these two meeting shouldn't have happened, let alone falling for each other and discovering that they work extremely well together. All they want to do is spoil each other, and you can see the love in their eyes when they're talking with one another.

God brings people together through the strangest and craziest of circumstances in a way they never could have facilitated on their own, to form something greater than they ever could make by themselves.

The more I get to see the fruits of that in person, the more I consider myself blessed to have been brought by God to where I am now, to be in a place where I can help people take their miracle and run with it into the sunset.

I don't know if I'll do this job forever. But in the meantime, it sure is good.

[ckret2]

I have never watched samurai jack. Is aku gay for jack or is it straight up loathing. Cause with the Ford situation, he can be either "I get you" or "what the fuck is wrong with you"

All right let's do a full analysis. Essay time: Is The Evil Tree Gay.

it's loathing, but like, the kind of cartoon hero/villain rivalry where it's gone on so long that sometimes they get weirdly casual about hating each other. Although there's no real evidence to support the idea that Aku's harboring secret adoration for Jack, there's just enough empty space where you could insert that if you decide to. If tomorrow the showrunner declared "btw Aku was secretly gay for Jack" I'd go "sure."

if you WANT it to be gay, here's what you've got to work with:

– when Jack first time travels to the future to hunt Aku, Aku makes a big deal about how he can and will be watching Jack's every move. There are multiple scenes where he's just glowering at Jack through a magic window, occasionally asking why he won't just die. Which isn't affectionate, but IS obsessive.

– Eventually he's so distraught by the fact that this guy just won't die that he gets a therapist who bans him from mentioning Jack's name during their sessions. (The therapist is himself. Aku's not in a great place.) so, like, again: not affectionate, but sooo obsessive. I cannot stop thinking about this guy to the point it's becoming a problem obsessive.

– (and you only asked about Aku's feelings but I'll mention on Jack's end: from the age of 8 Jack spends 17 years traveling the world just to train to kill Aku, and then 50 years solely dedicated to trying to kill him. So, the obsession goes both ways.)

– Aku loves to hang around after Jack's lost just so that he can laugh and taunt him. And when Aku finally captures Jack, he makes a big deal about choosing his method of execution and making a public show of it. So like, he hates Jack but he doesn't hate him so much that he doesn't even wanna look at him. You could even say he likes Jack... as long as Jack's suffering.

– there's an entire episode where Jack searches for a magic jewel that can help him defeat Aku, and he teams up with a pretty gal who tells Jack about how Aku's tormented her. they spend days (weeks? I'd have to rewatch) traveling & camping together. when they find the jewel, the gal smashes it and reveals she's actually Aku in a shapeshifted disguise, at which point he laughs at Jack and leaves. The dynamic between fake-gal & Jack wasn't quite romantic, but it was very friendly and Aku didn't break character once during their journey.

– there's another episode where Aku, this time disguised as a Wise Old Hermit Mentor Figure (albeit a particularly crabby one), tricks Jack into collecting the parts of a weapon for him. This time it's Jack who sees straight through Aku's disguise and only pretends to play along so that he can catch Aku off guard and try to kill him. So, they're mutually willing & able to (pretend to) play nice with each other if it's for some other benefit.

– this is where it really gets weirdly casual: there's an episode where Aku goes "look, Jack, every week or so I pop up and we fight and you almost kill me with your sword and I fly away going 'you haven't seen the last of me!' and a week later we do it again. How about we just have a duel." Jack's not sure where Aku's proposed duel site is; Aku offers to give him a ride there. Also they decide they need to wrestle in loincloths for some reason.

– Their duel rules are no sword, no magic, no minions, Aku restricted to a human form/strength. Aku cheats, so Jack cheats by going for his sword; Aku reveals he's additionally cheated by bringing a minion that already stole Jack's sword; and this conversation ensues:

– And also Aku left this note when his minion stole Jack's sword:

So, taken all together:

they're mutually obsessed with each other

as long as both of them exist at the same time their lives are defined by each other

they're mutually willing to swallow the hate for extended periods when it gets them something beneficial

Aku's put himself in a position where he was willing to act very friendly/potentially romantic with Jack

Starting with Aku, they're willing to treat this murdering-each-other business like a chore they both just have to deal with rather than something driven by burning loathing

they both know each other so well that they can predict each other's moves several steps ahead

they've fought near-naked, voluntarily

aaand Aku signs notes to Jack "Love, AKU ♡"

And as a bonus, they were both born on the same day, Jack as the heir to the sole weapon that could kill Aku, Aku knowing his whole life that Jack was & is the only person that could destroy him. Something something entwined destinies.

As a bonus-bonus, Jack ultimately hooks up with Aku's daughter so like, you could read into that if you want to. She doesn't resemble her dad much though. I don't count it but I wouldn't knock someone else for counting it.

So, it's not enough material for a shipper to say "this is gay." Neither one of them expresses any hint that they'd feel empty or unfulfilled if the other one was dead; neither one expresses a grudging admiration for any of the other's traits; neither one hints that he has some sort of void in his life that the audience realizes the other one of them could fulfill.

But it's enough material for a shipper to say "I can make it gay."

It'd be easiest to push it straight into "homoerotic foe" "my hatred fuels my passion" "I'm so obsessed with you that it simply transmuted into another kind of obsession" territory.

But a ship based on them liking each other would take more creativity and either a major AU or a major characterization adjustment. Some hero/villain ships you can go "well one's good and one's evil, but that isn't necessarily a dealbreaker"; this is one ship where it's 100% a dealbreaker on Jack's side and 80%-100% a dealbreaker on Aku's side. (It's clear Jack hates evil & evildoers; but we don't know whether Aku HATES good & do-gooders, or just looks down on them and hates them when they're trying to stop him. But however he feels, he sure doesn't admire good.)

Someone claiming they could make them like each other without changing someone's characterization would very much be an "I'm skeptical that you could, yet intrigued that you may" situation.

[harmonicpearl]

Something i don't know how ppl still dont understad is how OBVIOUS it is that no Mark is gonna outtake the other, no love (neither for Gemma nor Helly) is gonna outgrow the other. And it's not only a matter of if that is possible (it is, its a tv show) it's a matter of narrative and thematic ideas.

The writers have briliantly gave Mark and Gemma a 5-year marriage and Mark s and Helly a half life relationship (because even if they are very young they have known each other for a huge portion of their concious life). This balances the stakes and validation for each Mark, and makes their battle so interesting, because they are literally equally deserving. And since they are equally deserving, having one of them "win" would be contradicting that claim. It doesn't matter if you as an individual have a preference, as liking one of the Marks more (hell, i myself like one of them more, that's human) but ethics dont work like that, ego death doesn't work like that either and obviously the show is trying to say that. This opens two crucial themes to discuss:

First things first, this impossible-winner situation is the fucking dramatic drive of the show. I wouldnt phrase it as Helly and Gemma because they're characters in their own right, but Mark's relationship with Helly and Gemma is there to represent a battle of the ego and conflicted desire. I really think the show chose to make this a romantic conflict because, yeah who doesn't love romance, but most importantly because we are so monogamous as a society that it was the clearest way to show how these two Marks are different people. We can't fathom the idea that you can love more than one person romantically at the same time (it doesn't matter if it's true, it's the predominant thought of our society). And i think they use this aknoledgement of how society works and they were so right to do so because look what everyone is talking about. That's why im so really shocked that some people are trying to bend the laws and philosophy of this show to theorize which Mark will win or which love will he choose at the end. Neither will, and both will. And simply because narratively, thematically, thats the only coherent choice. One of the Marks "winning" or Mark choosing completely either Helly or Gemma, would destroy the very points this show is trying to make. The love for Helly needs to be a rightful pushing force just as equal as the love for Gemma, just as Mark S needs to keep existing as a foil to Mark Scout. The show is trying to say that (to put this coloquially) doesn't matter how shitty or brief or undeserving your life is to a system or to others you are deserving of human rights, freedom and autonomy.

Which gets me to the second point: This goes both ways. Because even if Mark Scout belittles Mark S's experience, lumon did the same to him when they kidnapped Gemma and lured him into severance. They are both being used. After all, i very much think this is a postmodern show dealing with the residue of modern capitalism. This is a show about the problematic and complex relationship between revolution vs establishment. A modern show made in the past century would have framed this as a straight up victim vs victimizer problem but this is different. Capitalism creates this micro-power relationships. Corporations expoit the white collar worker and the white collar worker exploits the cleaning lady. And even if they are both clogs in a machine, the white collar worker and the cleaning lady may have different ideas on how a revolution should play out, or even if a revolution should occur in the first place. And sometimes revolutionaries can have disregard of the lower classes in the name of grater good. With all the shipping stuff (that i also fully enjoy) we forget that THIS is also the conflic that's taking place between Mark Scout and Mark S. Even if they clearly arent aware of all this shit at the moment.

Even so, they, again, are equally deserving of happiness and compensation. And to put Mark Scout in the position of opressor and opressed at the same time is amazing. They both need to win. But how can they both win? Will they both win? And how would a win-win situation look like? This is why i think severance really is something else. I'm at the edge of my seat because i don't have a fucking clue how they will resolve this. But i trust this show to be better than simply make him choose one of his loves or make one Mark overrule the other. They won't do that, mark (jk) my words. Both Marks need to truly work as one, to understad the other's struggle and see it as equally valid and well, negotiate. Just as the white collar worker will have to negotiate with the cleaning lady if they truly want to make an impact should a revolution actually happen. Both Marks need to understad they are not the real enemy and even more, that the real enemy is the cause of this friction in the first place, a friction that only diverges them from the real goal. Helly's and Gemma's love is only the cathalyst to put in motion this conflict. A GREAT choice because just as the Marks, they too will have ideas of their own on how to navigate this situation, yes, but they will also have a say in the innies vs outies vs lumon conflict and well i think these four are gonna surprise us.

[gachagon]

Ena's are treated by others based on how capable they are

Yesterday I played through the entirety of Ena Dream BBQ and it was the most fun and surreal time I'd ever had playing a video game since I played OFF.

After I finished it though, I couldn't help but think about how Ena was treated as some kind of dangerous, menacing entity that has the potential for harm from the other entities in the game. Everyone in the game either treats Ena as if she is a troublemaker or someone who is too dangerous to be left by herself or to be alone with. Which is strange because Dream BBQ Ena never does anything like that to anyone in the game.

So why does everyone hate Ena? I think it has to do with the idea that Meanie/Salesperson Ena is way more *capable* and aware than the Classic!Ena from the youtube series.

Meanie/Salesperson Ena is more proactive and is able to advocate for herself, and even has a job (which shocks a some of the characters when they learn that this Ena has a job lol) Meanie/Salesperson Ena is much more capable of doing "bad" things or harm then the Classic Ena we see in the show.

Classic Ena seems to lose control over her "sad" side a lot even if she's not really sad. And sometimes when she *is* sad, it becomes too much and literally makes her ill.

A lot of the characters in the youtube series aren't afraid of this Ena though they do still want her to leave them alone anyways. Nobody is panicked or frightened or even a little bit wary of this Ena because she doesn't even really have control over her own emotions, and she falls apart at the slightest bit of adversity.

And as far as I'm aware this Ena doesn't have a "job" like Dream BBQ Ena does. Meaning I don't think someone other than Moonie has trusted her to do things for them. No one gives her any kind of hard responsibility and once they see how out of control she is over herself, many of the entities seem to relax around her even though she's an Ena.

I know some people have been saying what if the reason Ena's are so mistreated is because they were maybe made to cause trouble or to harm other entities, but I think it's more so that Ena's have the potential to cause harm based off of how capable they are and how in control they are of themselves.

Classic!Ena is not able to pull herself together most of the time and it seems to take a great deal of strength to reel back in her "sad" side. Her sad side also doesn't seem to speak rationally and demeans herself, unlike how Meanie/Salesperson clearly talk and are always on the same subject most of the time. I think for the other entities if you knew Ena's were bad news for some reason and you met one who could barely walk straight because of how "sad" she was all the time, you'd probably think the Ena who's 100% in control of *both* sides to be a little spookier because now you're messing with a person who can seriously do harm to you somehow.

I also think Meanie/Salesperson is aware of this dichotomy between different Ena's thus why they constantly have to reassure other people that they're not doing any kind of "sketchy" or bad things. Entities have probably treated this Ena way worse in the past just because of being an Ena, and being capable and more aware most likely didn't actually help with trying to get people to trust her more.

Meanie/Salesperson might also not be quite as innocent as we may think based off of the ending of chapter 1 because in the end they do kind of "destroy" everything, and in the end the only person who comes out of it okay is Ena.

We don't actually know what their job really is, lol but them having a job at all was enough for a lot of the entities to just trust them to do things for them. I think the fact that Meanie/Salesperson Ena was able to complete their task at all and come out of it okay, kind of proves that maybe the entities in the Uncanny Valley were right to be a little wary because now the Uncanny Valley is gone thanks to Ena turning the smoke off T_T

[leonawriter]

ok so. I mostly just wanna ramble about stuff.

don't read on if you haven't done the event!

OK so. The pair-offs.

I can't help but think that who each Sinner was paired off with (no, not in a shippy way) has got major implications and lore reasoning.

The elephant in the room is, of course, Ryoshu and Hong Lu, since they're the focus of the next two Cantos.

Ryoshu is the seemingly content and happy-go-lucky Hong Lu, while Hong Lu's body is now piloted by Ryoshu, giving us some chillingly terrifying moments, when she glares, and threatens execution if Hong Lu (in her body) tries to unsheathe her sword.

Personally I think that's a huge glaring neon sign toward Hong Lu's issues with violence and anger that've been repressed. His body is capable of it, even when his mind is elsewhere... just as Ryoshu is - as we know from things like TKT and C6 etc, perfectly capable of being nice, and defending someone who whose family are shit.

Talking of, the other really obvious pair from the start is Heathcliff and Sinclair, who have both had their Cantos, and I think their connection is pretty obvious - Heathcliff's anger is expressed clearly and openly in an outward way, while Sinclair lives in a balance between showing his rage and hatred, and... just plain not letting it be who he is. I have yet to read Demian. I feel like I'd know his character better if I did.

But yeah, we see Heathcliff acting nervous and skittish and much younger, when we know that he was abused as a child. And we see Sinclair acting brash and aggressive, when... oh, yeah, the ID that's releasing after the next maintenance? Is his Middle ID. Where he is full of violence and rage, and he looks to be in his element.

So. They, too, match.

Some of the others aren't as clear-cut, but are just... hilarious to watch, but also fascinating with the implications.

We have Meursault and Rodya, when we have no idea what Meursault's back ground is past what people have asked him to tell of it, but we DO know that he was in N Corp for a while, and he no longer is, as well as that he used to speak in a less concise way, and started speaking the way he does now because he thought people would understand him better. In other words, both Rodya and Meursault either aren't truly being themselves all of the time, OR they have adapted to suit being around other people.

Don Quixote and Faust seems like an odd match-up at first, but - oh, wait. Both of them have a "hive-mind" of sorts! Faust has the Gesselschaft (the Fausts) and as we saw in the LCB-RCU... Don Quixote has the entirety of the Family's thirst riding on her back. And in the event, both of them are "cut off" (either through Rocinante, or "Access Denied") from that outside force of voices.

OH- also? We know that Faust as we know her is usually on top of things all the time, right? But there WAS one single time she wasn't - MOTWE. During which she did some pretty out there things, such as smiling while picking up human viscera. And she got excited to investigate things with absolutely no backup from Gesselschaft.

I think that's our other connection here - both of them have the capacity to become very excitable and expressive, and they also both have the capacity to be straight-faced and logical.

Gregor and Ishmael are a fun pair, and I feel like others might have more to say than me, but... there is the fact that both of them have been turned into something "else" by someone they followed (Gregor with Hermann, Ishmael with Ahab). It was less literal with Ishmael and Ahab, but Ishmael does literally refer to following Ahab as "becoming her mermaid" at various points. In C5, it's almost literal; she gets caught up so much that Heathcliff has to tear her free from becoming something other than human... just as Gregor is. They've also both lost the entire group that they would have once fought alongside, while they're the only survivors.

Which leaves us with Outis and Yi Sang, which I think is... oh, just. Fascinating.

Here we have the guy who refused to sell out his inventions, whose friends sold him out and who has issues connecting with the world and who just wants everyone to get along, paired up with Outis, who... is associated with a famous story where SHE'S the one who sells others out. Outis, who makes it her life's work - whether she intends it, or realises it, or not - to tear others down and form wedges between the group.

Honestly I'm still both amused at and I want to dissect each of the scenes where she's trying to get Yi Sang, in her body, to speak louder, more confidently, and talk down the other Sinners... only for him to say that he can't.

And lastly but not least, we have... Charon and Vergilius.

We have Charon fighting in Vergilius' body, with her Kkomi teddy bear as her weapon, wanting sweets. And we have Vergilius in Charon's body, guiding them through the fight and being their Announcer.

And... I gotta say that I think that it fits them, too.

Vergilius, in this event, has his immature, childishness brought out. I'm not kidding. We see that Charon is capable of throwing a childish tantrum through his body, and Vergilius himself is sitting back and half letting it happen, sure, but if we go by literally all of the others?

At least a part of Vergilius still retains that child-like immaturity, or, no... just the way that a child thinks that the world should be the way it should be, fair and just. We see the way he reacts to certain things in both Leviathan and in various Cantos. The way he is with Charon. Sure, he's the Red Gaze now, but... what about before?

So, uh. Yeah. This event minisode. I think it hints at character and personality traits that the Sinners (and Charon and Vergilius) are all hiding or repressing. And by swapping them seemingly randomly, we get a glimpse of what they don't want us to see that they're capable of, even if it's mortifying for them.

[false-anachronism]

goddd i have 2. talk abt nhw the hive. relationship dynamics and such. theyre rly important 2 me bc they're all some secret third thing but in different ways ok this is a rant made for me and like maybe 2 people. there r some sex dynamics discussed in here but it's like not detailed so w/e

rand aromantic ace-spec but has no words for his identity (he's fuckin 60 or somethin give him a break) the idea of romance makes him want to crawl into a hole and throw up don't come at him with that shit!!! totally down to do typically romantic perceived stuff (say i love you and kiss and hold hands and cuddle) but never in like. a casual domestic partner way yk. he's not using petnames and if he goes out with one of the others he would rather die than call it a date. using the word boyfriends for his relationships makes him want to die. would definitely call himself ace-spec if he knew about labels!!! he could honestly take or leave sex he doesn't care too much either way but he does enjoy it when it happens. almost never actively initiates it but will be annoying at rolan brat-style on the rare occasion he does want it in hopes that someone will pick up what he's putting down (they do!!!). rand and rolan best friends with benefits (the benefits being occasional sex + rand freeloading off rolan's pension and work benefits + understanding each other on an intrinsic level). kian closest thing rand will ever want or have to a conventional boyfriend. down to do some more romantic-ish things w him sometimes. will put himself in kian's hands and say hey i'm having a bad time can you make me stop thinking and kian will oblige without hesitation. becky RIDE OR DIE!!! freeloader solidarity. kinda chip and jay coded in my beautiful mind. would make fun of each other and push each other over in public in front of god and everyone but could and would kill for each other without a moment's hesitation. nothing about them is romantic/sexual but becky could be there while rand and rolan are makin out. she's chill like that

oouhhh rolan........ bisexual disaster........ realized he liked guys soon after leaving for college. after galloway he got paranoid that somehow being a clone since he was 14 is actually was "turned him gay." he's really normal guys dw <3 got over the being bi thing real fast because he had bigger shit to worry about (being a clone!!! parahumans everywhere!!!! everything sucks!!!) feels Something for rand but it's definitely not romance. doesn't know how to describe it. they're cool with their weird situationship and don't need a label for it. DEFINITELY feels romantic feelings towards kian which is perfect bc kian feels the same. only pairing in the polycule u can possibly simply describe as boyfriends (ofc there's.more to it too but they're fine with calling it that)!! physically affectionate and sometimes go on dates if they feel up for it etc. becky..... she ranked higher than him in the queen's little army or w/e so he's constantly reminding himself he doesn't have to do what becky says and she's constantly forcing herself to drop the automatic commander persona around him and they get better at this over the years. extreme bone deep instinctual understanding between these two. they're not even affectionate as friends and they barely talk at each other in a human way. if u saw them out together you would not even think they were friends they're so distant but in reality they're constantly silently communicating and probably know more about each other than they do about themselves. hivemates who could not function without each other!!

kian. ok well hypersexual and bi first of all so jot that down. kinda knew he was queer from a young age and kept it a secret for a while but just kinda rolled with it after he moved to la. NEEDS physical intimacy or he will die. used to be reallyyyyy weird and hesitant about nonsexual physical affection but then he got a lil bit of it after galloway and now he needs to be clinging to someone like at least 80% of the time. loves all three of the others a lot in a romance way and a friend way and just in a general "i would die for you" way. gets that rand would rather die than be boyfriends and is chill with being partners/friends who have sex sometimes. really normal about rand letting him do some kinky shit with him (famously paranoid guy putting himself in ur hands and trusting u not to break him when all u have ever done ur whole life is fuck things up. he's so normal!!). does less kinky shit with rolan but rolan's also down to try a lot of things if kian's doing it.... kian's really normal about this too (guy you've had a crush on since you were teenagers saying hey i want to kiss you can we be boyfriends can we do that is that weird i wanna do that also i have barely had any sex my whole life can we do that too..... kian really normal about intimacy stone!!!) godddd becky. kian likes to be in control in general when it comes to any kind of intimacy but with becky he's going to put his entire being in her palms and say i love you and i trust you. can you take care of me. he is self destructive and lowkey a masochist and he trusts becky to fulfill that part of him that Wants to be hurt in a safe way

becky my girlllll ok i swear im not projecting but she's some flavour of bi too. to me. probably most definitely more attracted to guys but she could fuck w girls if she wanted. lowkey to me i see her as like. a lil sex repulsed after The EventsTM at the tree in galloway. feels like she can't fucking trust herself even tho after a certain point she had about as much agency in what happened as kian did (which is to say!!! fucking none!!!) anyway ok. rand. ride or die friends. they're so easy. friendships are so much easier for her than anything else. he's just a normal fucking guy who she doesn't fuck with and also isn't a bug clone!! literally just some Guy she can be normal friends with!!! she needs that!!!! god does she needs that!!! and she and rolan are like. idk. two halves of a whole in a lot of ways. function together on the field like a well oiled machine with all their silent communication. out of costume it looks like they don't interact much at all but that's because they're basically in each other's heads and don't rly need to interact in any conventional human way. and with kian she is soooo fucking scared. she is so so scared of hurting him all the time. she's is 100% stone (ha) and does not even get undressed the first time she and kian try having sex after galloway. rarely ever takes her pants off and almost never gets off. handles him like glass for years until like after their argument post lagos behemoth attack when she kinda realizes Damn Yeah i don't. think i could hurt him. not more than what's already been done to him. still carries this complex with her for the rest of her life but now has the ability to beat it back with a stick so she can kiss her stupid boyfriend without feeling like the scum of the earth. damn this got long sorry i had a lot of becky thoughts

[felixcloud6288]

Dungeon Meshi Adventurer's Bible Characters Part 4

Kabru and his party

Kabru

Kabru is a major character in the story, but there were still so many things in his section that were new surprises to me.

His birthday is May 28.

First thing of note is his real name is unknown. Kabru always puts on a fake personality to get close to people. It's no surprise he'd also be using a fake name. There are moments in the flashback in chapter 61 where Milsiril said his name. That could either mean he lied to her about his real name, or he told us a slightly altered story similar to how Mithrun's backstory was actually Kabru's retelling of events.

His birthplace is the western continent. So he's from somewhere near where the Canaries are from as well.

He doesn't like elf cakes. Milsiril fed him elf cakes. He probably just doesn't like them because of the association.

Got surprised to learn he can use magic. Aside from the wildcard stat, they're exactly the same as Laios's. The parallel would be better if Kabru's wildcard was also "People skills".

Kabru's magic repertoire is the same as Laios's. The only time he ever used magic was chapter 83 when he mentions he'll need to use waterwalk to escape. The notes say he gets worn out from casting magic.

His mother was suspected of infidelity because of his eye color. I never paid any mind about his eyes. Their shade tended to be somewhat inconsistent especially early on when he was portrayed as a far more sinister and antagonistic figure.

A lot of details about Kabru's combat skills and stats seem to emphasize that the reason he can't make it through the dungeon while Laios was able to conquer it was the lack of experience, knowledge, and ingenuity needed to do so. Kabru's stats are the same as Laios's, and he actually has formal training in sword use. Kabru knows how to properly wield a two-handed sword, unlike Laios. But Kabru's combat experience is entirely about fighting people. He doesn't know enough about individual monsters to fight them efficiently.

And despite their magic potential being the same, Laios is able to use magic without wearing himself out too much. He only just learned to cast but he's able to cast healing magic on himself a few times before getting sick.

And of course, ingenuity and creativity are what ultimately helped Laios the most. He's the only adventurer who considered eating monsters and foraging in the dungeon would work. He takes bits of information and can concoct plans that no one would ever consider and would call him insane for trying.

Recall that when Kabru encountered mermaids, he went with the standard solution of using earplugs and that got his party wiped by a fishman ambush. Laios instead decided to sing with the mermaids and it kept him and Chilchuck from being hypnotized.

I said it multiple times when we first saw him in combat, and I'll say it again. Kabru is an assassin. He's not an adventurer. Kabru knows how to kill people, but the moment he's facing something that doesn't have the same weaknesses, he's out of ideas. He doesn't have the creativity needed to survive in a dungeon.

There's a year between Kabru reaching the island and forming a party. That was probably the time where he tried getting in contact with Laios and it would have been before Marcille came to the island and joined Laios's party. I kind of wander how things would be different if he'd managed to talk to Laios and potentially get into his party. He was with Rin at the time so she could have potentially gotten to join as a mage, but there wouldn't have been room for Kabru.

Several of Kabru's notes on others are just observations. In particular, he doesn't seem to have any opinions about Daya, Holm, and Kuro. Also, Kabru can apparently speak kobold, and Rin is tsundere for him.

Kabru's mantras are "I've been waiting for ages for somebody to unmask them", "Was she worth going to such lengths to revive?" and "I have a really bad feeling." I'd some his mantras up as "Always assume people are hiding something. Know them enough that you can disarm them with words."

And the Kabru comic just adds another big surprise about him. He had a childhood fear that he was part monster.

He only mentioned his eye color and the trauma surrounding how it caused his family to fall apart as part of this. The notes on him mention his mother sometimes drunkenly complained about the situation. I think some of his fear is also rooted in what happened in Utaya. The dead turned into monsters. He's seen people change into monsters, so maybe he was afraid that might happen to him as well.

Genetics is more complex than what you're taught in biology 101, but it's enough to explain Kabru's eye color. Brown eyes are dominant genes while blue eyes are recessive. If Kabru has blue eyes and both of his parents have brown eyes, then that would mean both of his parents had a brown eye and blue eye allele and Kabru inherited the blue eye gene of both.

Milsiril's attempts to assure Kabru implies that elves and Tall-men have the same genetic rules about inheriting eye and hair color.

Milsiril taught Kabru how to fight. And she specifically taught him how to fight humans. Since the Canaries are tasked with conquering dungeons, there probably has to be someone specialized in human-to-human combat so they can quickly kill the Dungeon Lord (or anyone who gets in the way). Mithrun is probably the person with that role in the story. When fighting monsters, he preferred to immediately teleport them away. And when they faced Marcille, he said he'd kill her and ordered the others to handle the monsters.

Helki did not like being used as a training dummy.

We've seen succubi in the story and they're capable of turning into men or women. The succubus demons being the ones that look like women means that the exploration teams that discovered them were all men (or lesbians).

Knowing Laios, this childhood story makes Kabru cooler in his mind.

Mikbell

His birthday is February 22. And he is correctly gendered here. It probably helps that the bio says he's male. He kind of hasn't been referred to by name since chapter 56.

His bio opens up with the most important thing about him: Why he hates Chilchuck. And it's because he thought Chilchuck's guild was some sort of scam.

Mikbell's relation to Kuro is a bit toxic. He's afraid Kuro would abandon him if he didn't have anything Kuro needs, which really says more about Mikbell's past experiences and thoughts. He saved Kuro from a slaver and Kuro killed the slaver when he threatened Mikbell. If Kuro became self-reliant, he would still stick with Mikbell and help him.

Kuro

Kuro was born September 22.

His bio says he wanted to see the world when he was captured and sold to slavers. His bio says he is from the Western Continent, but Mikbel found him in Kahka Brud in the Eastern Continent. He's been taken far.

Kuro's real name is Yodan. He probably has trouble saying his real name in common. I thought I'd look up the characters in his name to see if there's anything interesting, like maybe a barking pun. His name is entirely in katakana, and "wan" is the Japanese onomatopoeia for a dog barking. Da (ダ) and wa (ワ) look kinda similar I guess so maybe?

And yeah, he was snarling at Izutsumi because he sensed her chimera-esque body. I didn't find him interacting with Lycion. I'd like to know if he'd hate him because of the beastman magic or if he'd like him because he's a fellow dog.

Kabru can indeed speak kobold and Kuro is quite eloquent in his native tongue. And here's a fun detail about kobold speech in Japanese: The kanji are laid out and have to be read left-to-right, top-to-bottom like in most western styles. Kobold is also mostly in katakana.

Daya

The party member with the least focus through the story. She was born January 7.

She's from the same tribe as Namari. But based on some backstory info, it's probably more like she joined the dwarf community at the Island rather than being related in any way. The two of them probably would not get along.

She's currently betrothed. That's interesting.

Her real name is Diamond. Daya is probably just the first two katakana that would spell diamond.

The Shadow Lord is Daya's first cousin once-removed, which means he's the cousin of one of her parents. He introduced Daya to Kabru and I have to question why he did that? Did Kabru get into the Shadow Lord's good graces and he thinks Kabru is going to conquer the dungeon? Or was it more like he knew Kabru was trying to form a party and he just passed the notice to her?

And another interesting thing about the world that is a thing but is irrelevant to the story.

I want to know what Dungeon Keepers are. Do dwarfs live in the dungeons and the keepers are border security? Are they guarding a dungeon that previously grew too big like Utaya and making sure that doesn't happen again? Are they doing this because they don't want the elves to muscle in on their territories? Does every dungeon in dwarf territory have dungeon keepers?

Holm

Birthday is August 3.

What do you mean he researched ancient magic and has been previously arrested by the elves?!? Ancient magic research is kind of a big deal in the story!!! Does he know anything about the nature of dungeons? He didn't show any interest in Marcille knowing Ancient Magic even as Laios and Shuro were screaming at each other because of it.

I'd pointed out that he has what appears to be a sylph in the chapter 38 title image, and now it's confirmed that he does indeed have one of every elemental spirit. Fire spirits are called a salamanders and Holm's is named Catzie. His sylph is Clarier.

I'm curious how Holm would feed his other spirits mana, especially the salamander.

The joke at the end is that the undine is made up from all sorts of bodily fluids and Mikbell and Kuro using it as a shower is actually really gross. But honestly, water is water. Holm's words imply it only absorbs the water from whatever bodily fluids it eats. An undine is probably the cleanest water you could ever wash yourself in.

Rin

Her birthday is July 8.

She's ethnically an east islander, but she was actually born in the Northern Continent. She's probably from somewhere near Laios's village since her parents suffered an even more extreme persecution for magic use than Falin did. Falin was probably "safe" because she was the daughter of the village chief. Rin's family didn't have any such status and they were foreigners on top of that.

Kabru met Rin in 501 so that's likely when her parents were lynched and she was taken into Flamela's custody. And I 100% believe that the rumors about Rin's parents using ancient magic was false. It was just a bunch of superstitious people spreading rumors and inciting violence against foreigners with strange customs.

Helki was still part of the Canaries a few years after Utaya. And he's the one who told Milsiril about Rin. So he ultimately was responsible for Kabru and Rin meeting.

Rin's experience with elves is probably far more common than Kabru's. They're both refugees from a tragedy related to a dungeon, but Rin was taken in as a prisoner to interrogate. Flamela straight up called her an "impounded article".

Honestly though, Kabru and Rin's situations are two different results of the same mindsets. They were both treated more like animals than people by their caretakers. The only difference is Kabru was treated more like a kitten taken in by a cat lover, while Rin was treated more like a stray animal caught by animal control.

Everyone in Kabru's party has died at least once. Kabru, Daya, and Holm all died to things on the second floor. Rin and Mikbell's first deaths were to traps. Kuro's could have been anywhere.

Here's what I imagine are the series of events:

Kabru and Rin tried to run the dungeon by themselves and Rin got killed by a trap on the first floor. Then they decided to hire Mikbell and Kuro came along too. And then Mikbell screwed up disarming a trap and got killed on the first floor. Then Kuro tripped and fell on the way back. Then they got Daya and Holm. The party managed to reach the second floor and they suffered a total party wipe.

back

[justanintrovertedweirdo]

Spoilers for the new digital circus episode

THE NEW EPISODE WAS SO GOOD OH MY GOD AAAAAAAA!!!!!!! They totally teased us with that Jax angst, but it was still amazing! They better bring back Gumigoo in a future adventure. Man did not deserve what happened to him. He had his entire reality crushed and just when things were going well for him again, he got deleted. And of course it was Pomni who had to get close to him. My poor girl just can't catch a break. ALSO, THEY HAD A FUNERAL FOR KAUFO. THEY HAVE FUNERALS. I AM NOT OKAY. THE ENDING WAS SO FUCKING SWEET MY GOD!!!! POMNI HAS FRIENDS NOW AAUGDKDVAJSG!!! All it took was for her to get trapped in a digital hell hole. Good for her! Also there's a Kinger plush. I must have it. I need to cuddle him.

[discoreptile]

As of yet unnamed game card art!

[webism]

pornstar!shiu who started out as your agent. he’d book your gigs, stand and watch with cigarette in hand as you were fucked on film for a fat check that he’d take a cut of.

pornstar!shiu who would take you out for celebratory drinks after landing larger acts—be it a shoot for a dirty magazine or a collaboration with the current biggest name in adult film. shiu is good at getting you in—and he doesn’t much mind watching your artwork either.

pornstar!shiu who helps you set up a secondary source of income: an onlyfans. he helps you garner an audience, set your prices and start looking for guest stars. he lines a few up, lets you pick from them and even pours them a drink when they come over to film. shiu lets you have privacy with these shoots, but insists on staying in the house just in case anything goes sideways: they never do, though. most of the guys you film with are put off by the look shiu gives them when they first walk in. mean.

pornstar!shiu who slowly starts to get sick of accommodating the men you film with. it's just work, sure, but he doesn't get jealous like this of the girls that his other client Toji works with. he doesn't watch their videos back on repeat to make sure their hands don't wander where they aren't welcome. he doesn't fuck his fist at night thinking about him. it's just a you thing.

pornstar!shiu who gets an email one day from a well known pornstars agent practically begging to hitch up a collab between you and him. satoru gojo is a name shiu has heard plenty times before, be it through the business side of being your agent or through his computer speaker when he's edging himself to mindless porn in the dead of night. he knows he fucks good, seen it first hand.

pornstar!shiu who knows you're excited for this shoot, to finally get to try out the guy known for giving real orgasms in hopes of a more raw shoot. shiu almost feels bad when he tells you, twenty minutes before your shoot, that gojo can't make it. that he's sick with something nasty and you'll have to reschedule if his calendar opens up for you.

pornstar!shiu who listens to you whine about how you promised your online audience something good tonight. nods as you beg for him to find someone else on such short notice. he pretends to scroll through his phone and send a few texts as you stress your pretty mind over leaving your followers hanging. shiu can't help but smile at your desperate pout when he tells you that no one can make it on such short notice... but that he does have another idea, albeit an unconventional one.

pornstar!shiu who, within twenty minutes, has your face pressed into your pillows and his hand forcing your arch so he can fuck you just that little bit deeper. the moans you let out, even though they're muffled by your satin pillow, are nothing short of pornographic. it's fitting, and pulls a smile onto shiu's face because he's hearing better moans from you than he thinks gojo could ever pull. and god you feel better than he'd ever imagined: he wonders how he'll ever lay down for another person again know that he's felt you wrapped around his cock.

pornstar!shiu who insists it's just a favour: just work. he's given you five orgasms and a dirty movie to show for it too. you two fuck for an hour and he showers at your place before helping you edit and post it over dinner. it's casual, nothing awkward, but when the comments start rolling in about this new man that makes you cum like none other has, you swear he blushes.

pornstar!shiu who quickly becomes a regular on your page. goes from being your agent to somewhat of a partner in film. over the course of a few weeks, you have more money than you know what to do with: people keep subscribing to watch you cum on his cock in the mindless way it seems only he can pull from you. your library grows daily, with videos of him fucking you on the kitchen counter, whipped cream eaten straight from your chest, to videos from his perspective as he takes drags of a cigarette while you get your fix from your lips wrapped around his thick cock. he's somewhat of a pornstar himself now.

pornstar!shiu who, for someone who insisted this was just work, gets into the habit of kissing you through your orgasms. or conveniently forgetting to press record so that your marathon sex session on his couch stays for his eyes only. or starts leaving things at your house on the off chance to have someone else over to film with, so they'll see his hair gel or large shoes by the front door and realise you're spoken for, even if he doesn't have the right to speak for you.

pornstar!shiu who's asleep in your bed one night, his cock still nestled deep inside of you after making love to you for the first time. you're littered with lovebites and your mind is hazy with feelings you never thought you'd have for your agent of all people. the night is dark, and as you're cockwarming the man who is much more than just a co-star to you, your phone dings. he stirs, and you check it to find a message from Satoru Gojo, who is asking after you. he says he's upset you didn't get to film together the other week but he hopes you're feeling better. your sickness seemed pretty nasty, from what your agent said when he cancelled on your behalf.

what a shame!

[the-one-who-lambs]

4. Did your lamb kill anyone prior to their first death? If so, who?

...Technically, no. However, there was someone whose death they feel directly responsible for. Who and why has been alluded to since the beginning of the fic, but will finally come to light over the next couple of chapters.

5. When your lamb mourns a dead loved one from their past.. who is it?

They primarily miss their family (father, mother, and twin sister). However, they don't have as many memories of their father as they do of their mother, since their father went missing before they were about ten years old. Their mother lasted a few more years, and was captured + sacrificed when they were about sixteen. Juno was their constant companion after that.

Spoilery details to these questions below the cut because I want to talk about this SO BAD and have talked about it on stream before but I want this written too. This also references spoilers to question #1 so if you either didn't read that or caught a sneaky detail I hid in plain sight in Chapter 15, be forewarned!

Lambert tries so hard to suppress it, but Juno's death really fucked them up, and it manifests in ways that continue to influence their thought process and how they make decisions.

Juno was the second-to-last lamb. Lambert (then known as Jehovah) made sure they stuck together, kept her going, and motivated her when she wanted to give up and felt hopeless. Jehovah was the energetic, stubborn to a fault, determined half to Juno's placid, go-with-the-flow, sometimes melancholic demeanor. Despite how different the twins were, they were inseparable, and Jehovah never wanted to give up on her.

They're both aware of the prophecy. They both know why the lambs have been culled. A couple years after their mother is killed, something silently begins to shift between them.

Jehovah knows that, as the population of sheep dwindles, the chance that the prophesied liberator will be one of them is looking more and more likely. Jehovah was so determined to hold on to life as long as they possibly could, not only to spite the Bishops but also secretly because they wanted to be the one to topple the Old Faith-- but, of course, them being the last does mean they'll have to lose their best friend and sister, and they can't reconcile the motivation they're keeping hidden with their love for their twin. They care deeply about her and wouldn't do anything to get her hurt, nor would they do anything to tip the fates in their favor if it means putting her in danger or leaving her vulnerable. So Jehovah makes sure they both stay alive as long as they possibly can, together.

Juno's views are completely the opposite. Her kind is dead. All but one of her family members and friends are dead. She knows there is nothing she can do to outrun the genocide of her species, but she doesn't want to submit to the idea that the mass violence the Bishops enacted is for a greater "reason." The way she saw it, the prophecy was simply a way to justify the horrors she has witnessed, and if she didn't refuse to accept it she would be giving the Bishops legitimacy for their deeds, so to speak. Suffering is suffering, no matter the motive or outcome. Its purpose is what it accomplishes.

Juno wanted to hang on for a little while after their mom was captured and sacrificed. But as the twins approached adulthood in a future that they know cannot hold them both, Juno just wanted to accept her own death. She wanted a peaceful reunion with her family in the afterlife. If she, and hopefully Jehovah's stubborn ass, both die before either of them can be the last lamb, they'll all be able to be together.

But Jehovah is hellbent on staying alive, and if they keep living, then so too must Juno. They make sure of it.

Jehovah has good intentions. They really do. And they make sure she keeps going because they love her and don't ever want to see her hurt. But what they do out of love just ends up becoming more and more harmful as time goes on; the longer Juno is forced to live, the more prolonged her pain becomes. Juno knows exactly what is inevitably in store for her and Jehovah will not let her get it over with.

She grows to resent them.

Jehovah is tangentially aware that something has torn between them. They can feel that, for some reason, Juno's attitude towards them has flipped a switch. But they're scared and don't know what else to do-- they love their sister and don't want to hurt her or see her hurt, but there really is no safe option to avoid that anymore. Especially when the population of the lambs drops to the hundreds, then the dozens, then the single digits.

If they'd been able to let her go as she wished, if they'd given her the satisfaction of letting her take a risky move so that she'd be able to put her blood on someone else's hands, maybe things wouldn't have ended so badly between them. But Jehovah could never admit to her, or even to themself, that they were scared to lose her, that they are so deeply afraid of being alone. And that lonesomeness has followed them, defined their characterization, and driven their primary internal conflict (lack of a coherent sense of self) ever since. Even if they've lost their identity, even if they're so lost in molding themself into a cult leader (and now, god) that they can't tell which facets of themself are real and which they've invented, the one thing they can hold on to is their loneliness.

But in their last few months, Jehovah could still sort of look the other way from the distance growing between them, and even if they didn't know why they've become so torn they did know it was starting to feel unfixable. Juno basically descends into actual madness. She's barely able to sleep, she's hallucinating, she's having petrifying nightmares (recall that detail from a very early chapter, when Lambert can tell how Narinder's having nightmares and decides to give him a moon necklace? teehee), Jehovah is having to keep her quiet when they're trying to stay hidden because she keeps yelling out to nobody, etc. She's miserable, and it's their fault and they don't know exactly why but they know it.

A few days before Jehovah is captured, they finally, finally have an embittered argument about it.

Juno does not want the prophecy fulfilled. She does not want there to be a last lamb. She does not want to let the Bishops get to say they killed the lambs off for a purpose, so they'll have no justification to hide behind and must face the futility of their own corruption.

She brings Jehovah back to the wreckage of their hometown. She hands them one of the daggers that they gave her for self-defense and keeps one visible in her hand. She tells them that if they are indeed the last lambs and they die together, there won't be a last lamb at all. (Shamuraesque levels of trying to find a loophole out of a prophecy) Jehovah does everything they can to convince her that her plan won't work, because they know they can't talk her out of the wanting to die part, and that's all they have left to appeal to.

Juno will not let herself walk away from this alive. Jehovah will not let her convince them to take their own life after keeping them both going for so long and they refuse to end this way.

So since neither of them are budging, Juno stabs herself in front of them as a last resort.

She begs them. She's already dying and they can't save her now. Jehovah, you've tried so hard to make sure this never had to happen, now that it is and you can't stop it, what will you do? If they loved her, they'll take their own life too. Don't leave her alone. Don't let yourself be alone. Listen to Juno for fucking once because she's had to suffer through all you put her through. She's already done it, Jehovah, you have no choice but to go through with it now.

They don't. They can't. Juno spends her last breath calling her sibling a coward and Jehovah's last words to her are calling her one back.

There are SO many ways that Juno's death and what happened between them has fundamentally altered Lambert. They're both petty in opposite directions. The love was there but it could not save them. Not this time. And that fucked up Jehovah/The Lamb/Lambert irreparably in ways that meant they can't fully process how they lost her until they almost lose someone else they care about deeply, because Lambert will not let that happen between them and Narinder.

(Hence why, in Chapter 14/15, when Narinder realized he was in love and he suddenly became closed off, Lambert's alarm bells were going off and their reaction was so extreme. Someone who was very close to them had a sudden attitude change they couldn't explain and it ended catastrophically badly.)

Lambert needs to come to terms with what happened between them and Juno so they can fix things with Narinder and let Narinder fix things when he tries to without being blindsided by their own hurt. Parts of Juno's story begin to peek through when Lambert decides to go back for Narinder in Chapter 15, something recalled vaguely but not dwelled upon so they can focus on the urgency of the danger Narinder's in. It's a recurring reminder that something like this has happened before and they cannot let it happen again. ("Outrunning death had only ever pushed the blade into someone else’s chest, after all.") ("They had made that mistake one too many times.")

They'll fix things with Narinder, of course, to get that happy ending. But both Lambert and Narinder have a lot of problems they need to address before that can happen, and they need to make peace with the wrong they've done and understand the ways they've hurt others so they don't repeat the same mistakes against each other. There's a lot more to that, but at its core, that's why the events of/surrounding Chapter 15 needed to happen. The only way these two would finally begin to put that work in is being threatened with coming very close to losing each other. The only reason they deal with the consequences of their own internal issues is understanding that if they don't, they'll hurt (again, even) the other who has become so dear to them. Having stakes that high is the only tipping point they'd respond to-- they'll change for each other's sake, but they won't (yet) see their own selves as a worthy enough reason to heal.

TL;DR: Juno used her own suicide as a manipulation tactic. Juno my tragic daughter who haunts the narrative so so terribly I love you so much.

50 Lamb Questions

I'm answering these questions for how I write Lambert in The Risen Lamb and the Fallen God. These will contain spoilers, and I'll put them under a cut when I include them! There are so many things I've been wanting to talk about and this is totally enabling me.

1. Does your lamb go by any name other than The Lamb? If so, what?

Many readers have noticed by now that names are a huge theme in Risen/Fallen. A longer ramble that includes spoilers will be below the cut, but they originally had a name that was given to them by their family. Over time, they lost much of their identity, and with it, their name. (Lambert's loss of identity shows up in tons of other ways as well. It's a major question they have to grapple with over the course of the fic and guides their choices, for better or for worse.) As they worked to fit the leadership role they were thrust into, they eventually became just "the Lamb." The impersonal title encompassed much of what they had become, especially the parts of their identity that were out of their control: being an endling, the prophesied liberator of The One Who Waits, a leader of a civilization who needed to rise above the image of the mortals they commanded. These were the parts of themself they felt reduced to, and all they held onto for a long while.

In Chapter 6, "How to Be a God For Dummies," when they admitted to Narinder that they'd forgotten their original name, Narinder felt a twinge of guilt. If he'd asked them for their name more than a century before, maybe they wouldn't have forgotten, or maybe he would know and could have reminded them, but this was one of the moments that made him realize how downright selfish he'd been towards them. Despite how angry he was about their attitude and bitterness after the final boss battle, this kind of forced him to face the fact that much of the person that the Lamb had grown into was his fault and now he was suffering the consequences of that in a way he wasn't prepared to.

Did he get this through his mind completely? Absolutely not. He's stubborn to a fault, after all, and so are they. But he reckons with this just enough to want to give them a name. He names them Lambert in his head, tries to keep it to himself, and accidentally lets it slip at the end of the chapter. Thus, the Lamb got the name Lambert because Narinder gave it to them.

There is a lot more significance to this and all will be revealed in the story once Chapter 15 goes up. But since I'm using this as a writing warmup, I'm gonna give y'all a treat and spill below since it gets me excited. (Btw, Spring Break started yesterday for me, so I think I'm gonna get most if not all of the rest of the chapter done over it!! Manifesting)

I use names very particularly in the narration, though. For Lambert, this has meant that even after they receive their name from Narinder, I refer to them as "the Lamb" sometimes still. How they are referred to in the narration depends on the context of the setting, especially who is around them in a scene. When they're around followers, the narrative voice simply refers to them as "the Lamb." When they're around Narinder or Ratau, they're Lambert. Their followers don't get to know their authentic self; that's a privilege reserved for a select few.

With all that said, though... I'll get into some spoilery talk about this below the cut.

And since I'm having a fucking blast finally getting to talk about this, there's one more part of names that I'm gonna reveal ahead of time. Lambert's original name will be revealed soon as well, which forces them to choose between accepting the past and moving forward vs. continuing to blame themself for it, symbolically. Their original name and its significance is under the readmore as well.

SO.

Long story short, names are such a massive motif in Risen/Fallen because they not only reflect how a character is perceived by others, but also how they choose to take charge of their own fate.

There is… so much to this. But I wanna make sure I talk about this theme explicitly somewhere on my blog, even though it's all gonna be very clear in the story soon anyway.

The Mystic Seller, Vic, has known way too much for a long while now. About what's happening between Narinder and Lambert, but especially how they've orchestrated their own entangling in each other without them even realizing exactly what they've done.

Narinder named Lambert, yes, but Lambert named Narinder, too. This is mentioned a couple of times in the earlier chapters, but it's a game mechanic as well: when you indoctrinate him, his name is still "The One Who Waits." The Lamb has to make an intentional choice to return Narinder's name to him. What this means symbolically is up to the player, but in this fic, the Lamb (yet unnamed) does so as an act of mercy. Narinder himself doesn't quite see it as a representation of a second chance for a few years, because he takes it as pseudo-mockery at first, but ultimately the Lamb wants to force him to acknowledge that he is not bound to his past mistakes. He may be so set on holding himself to them (and holy shit does he ever, especially going into chapter 15, hint hint wink wink nudge nudge), but this frustrates the Lamb/Lambert in pretty minor ways... up until the scene that I finished writing about a month ago, when Narinder fucks up badly and hurts them both.

To each other, Narinder and Lambert come to see their exchange of names as something that simply shows how they've come to care about the other. But Vic keeps hinting to them that something about that is much bigger.

When you're interacting with ??? for the first time, it asks you to make a contract. This contract is sealed by giving it a name.

In the language of gods, bestowing a name upon someone else is much more than just a name. And because Narinder and Lambert have both given a name to the other, because they have turned this into equal and mutual exchange, they have made something much more binding than a one-way contract. In divine terms, they've made some sort of promise, some sort of vow.

What this means hasn't quite clicked yet for either of them, but this is only the first of two ways that Lambert and Narinder tie their fates together. Lambert's going to have a realization about it very soon, and when they do, they'll tie themself to him in that second way.

On Lambert's original name:

A bit of cultural history first! I chose their old name from biblical tradition and cultural Judaism. In Judaism, God has an actual name like people do, and "God" is more of a title. However, God's name is traditionally not spoken aloud out of respect. One interpretation is that God's identity is considered pretty much incomprehensible to humans, another is that using God's name in vain is avoided and so by extension it is not really used at all because one might feel that no praise would be great enough to warrant using it. So, in Jewish prayers, whenever the word "Yahweh" is written in text, people will avoid saying it and instead say something else like Adonai (Lord), HaShem (The Name), etc.

Similarly, Lambert became "the Lamb" to their followers because, as a cult leader, they needed to maintain this idea of perfection and so their identity (and all the flaws associated with it) was something that needed to be kept private. So I took the idea above and slapped it directly onto the Lamb. Lambert's original name is taken directly from God (Yahweh). But, I used the Latinized spelling of it instead: Jehovah.

So when my lamb is eventually faced with the choice between Jehovah and Lambert, they choose going forward as Lambert into a new future they'll be able to share with Narinder without being weighed down.

Is this blasphemy? Eh. Maybe. That's an issue for my rabbi and also for God if they're mad about it.

Anyway, my Lamb's names have gone from Jehovah -> The Lamb -> Lambert.

And I've been rambling about this for too long this has become too long of a "warm up" BUT ONE MORE THING

In Lambert's dream from Chapter 8, when Juno addresses Lambert and it comes out as a garbled utterance that they know was their name at one point, I left exactly seven spaces for the seven letters of their original name. :) This happens again during the flashback in Chapter 11.

[absentlyabbie]

seriously, though. i work in higher education, and part of my job is students sending me transcripts. you'd think the ones who have the least idea how to actually do that would be the older ones, and while sure, they definitely struggle with it, i see it most with the younger students. the teens to early 20s crowd.

very, astonishingly often, they don't know how to work with .pdf documents. i get garbage phone screenshots, sometimes inserted into an excel or word file for who knows what reason, but most often it's just a raw .jpg or other image file.

they definitely either don't know how to use a scanner, don't have access to one, or don't even know where they might go for that (staples and other office supply stores sometimes still have these services, but public libraries always have your back, kids.) so when they have a paper transcript and need to send me a copy electronically, it's just terrible photos at bad angles full of thumbs and text-obscuring shadows.

mind bogglingly frequently, i get cell phone photos of computer screens. they don't know how to take a screenshot on a computer. they don't know the function of the Print Screen button on the keyboard. they don't know how to right click a web page, hit "print", and choose "save as PDF" to produce a full and unbroken capture of the entirety of a webpage.

sometimes they'll just copy the text of a transcript and paste it right into the message of an email. that's if they figure out the difference between the body text portion of the email and the subject line, because quite frankly they often don't.

these are people who in most cases have done at least some college work already, but they have absolutely no clue how to utilize the attachment function in an email, and for some reason they don't consider they could google very quickly for instructions or even videos.

i am not taking a shit on gen z/gen alpha here, i'm really not.

what i am is aghast that they've been so massively failed on so many levels. the education system assumed they were "native" to technology and needed to be taught nothing. their parents assumed the same, or assumed the schools would teach them, or don't know how themselves and are too intimidated to figure it out and teach their kids these skills at home.

they spend hours a day on instagram and tiktok and youtube and etc, so they surely know (this is ridiculous to assume!!!) how to draft a formal email and format the text and what part goes where and what all those damn little symbols means, right? SURELY they're already familiar with every file type under the sun and know how to make use of whatever's salient in a pinch, right???

THEY MUST CERTAINLY know, innately, as one knows how to inhale, how to type in business formatting and formal communication style, how to present themselves in a way that gets them taken seriously by formal institutions, how to appear and be competent in basic/standard digital skills. SURELY. Of course. RIGHT!!!!

it's MADDENING, it's insane, and it's frustrating from the receiving end, but even more frustrating knowing they're stumbling blind out there in the digital spaces of grown-up matters, being dismissed, being considered less intelligent, being talked down to, because every adult and system responsible for them just

ASSUMED they should "just know" or "just figure out" these important things no one ever bothered to teach them, or half the time even introduce the concepts of before asking them to do it, on the spot, with high educational or professional stakes.

kids shouldn't have to supplement their own education like this and get sneered and scoffed at if they don't.

[foone]

Bad idea: Age gap discourse but in a fantasy land where there's multiple races who have vastly different lifespans and life styles.

Is it wrong for a 27 year old human to date a 140 year old stone elf, considering most stone elves don't get out of diapers till their 30s?

Is it wrong for a 80 year old dwarf to date a two year old fire wisp, when fire wisps only live up to 5 years (between the eruptions) and have memories of their past lives, so in a way they're "born" at age 400,000+? That octogenarian dwarf is way younger than the fire wisp that's only physically younger than some of the socks the dwarf has!

Is it wrong for a chronomancer who was never born to date, well, anyone? They are zero years old and infinity years old and negative one hundred and seventeen years old all at once. They look like an old human, sure, with the long white beard and the wrinkly skin, but as far as anyone can tell, they've always looked like that. We've seen the cave paintings.

Is it wrong for a 30 year old lizardman (that's old in lizardman years) to date a human who is 60 years old in biological years (because of aging spells), 26 years old in lived-experience years, but only 13 years old in calendar years? (ie, they were born 13 years ago, but spent some of that time in sideways timelines, so they've lived more years than have passed in their home timeline?)

Is it wrong for a 12,000 year old dragon date a pile of 400 kobolds when kobolds only live like 10 years on average, but reach full maturity in one year? And if you disagree, can you do anything about it? You do know what happened to the last policeman who tried to arrest a dragon, right? Their city is still smoldering, 50 years later.

Is it wrong for anyone to date the time worm? It's the same age, every year. So the age gap can only intensify. If you start dating the time worm when you're both the same age, when do you break it off because you've become too much older than them?

And most confusing of all... What about the fairies? They could be anything between a thousand and a day old, they would lie about their age either way, and they can look like whatever they want. There's fairies we know for a fact have been around since the founding of The City of Towers, who met the silent mother herself, and also look like they're at most ten years old. Is it wrong to date them, or just really uncomfortable for everyone who sees it? And on the other side there's fairies who are "born" (hatched? They come from plants, I'm not sure what the verb even would be. Seeded? Sprouted, maybe) this week who are already appearing like middle-aged men and dancing with widows in what looks like a scheme to run off with her fortune but they never take the money, because what would a fairy want with worthless metal discs? Maybe fairies have a hive mind or genetic memory or reincarnation with full memories, they'd never tell you or give you a straight (or consistent) answer anyway.

Stonefolk are really the only inter-race dating situation anyone can agree on. They're unthinking & unmoving solid rock during the day, so those hours don't count. Thus their "real age" is a nice even half of their true age. So if you meet a stonefolk who was dug out 30 years ago, watch out: that's a 15 year old, and if you're a 25 year human, that's too young for you, even though their dig-date is five years before your birth-date.

EDIT: 2024/01/12: Changed the name of the Stonefolk

[graphic--horde]

How do you make your stamps? :0

Disclaimer: this is an obscenely long explanation, with pictures. Efficiency is stupid

So, for the static ones, I make a 99x56 px file on ibis paint x. Other programs are probably available online but I don't use them.

After that, I either upload an image I want to make into a stamp, or I draw one.

Then, I find a frame I want to use. Ill upload them here but let it be known I stole all of these right from deviantart

Most of them are from Lil-Devil-Melii on deviantart. The rest i have no idea. They're not all 99x56px but you can crop the canvas it's fine

Make sure to erase the edges of the picture , so they're transparent. It's not as cute otherwise

Upload those frames over your image in whatever art program you're using and viola, stamp.

For moving ones, it's a lot harder. Mostly because I refuse to download Photoshop.

There are a couple ways to do this. Some are simple animations, like with flashing text and whatnot. For these, you download the individual animation frames from your art program. Make sure it's transparent.

Then, upload each frame to ezgif.com under the option "GIF maker." You can play around with how fast each frame goes and whatnot but in the end, it'll be a stamp with some rad text that moves. This is easy, and doesn't make me want to shit my pants and cry. If you're new, do this. This is fun. This is good. This does not kill me inside

I made that↓ stamp with this method :)

this next one is how we turn gifs into stamps. This one makes me sad. It involves math and sucks. But we gotta do it. For the vibe

First, grab your gif. I'm using this cow gif because it's awesome

Then, I resize it using ezgif. Literally everything for this will be using ezgif. I am a simple man

At this point you should decide what frame to use. I'm using this one because its the first one I clicked

Figured out what size the inside of the frame is. That's what I resize the gif to, so the edges can be transparent. The inside of this one is 93x50 px, so those are the dimensions I'm making the gif.

Figure it out by putting the frame into ibis paint and realizing the canvas to fit just the inside of the frame, then seeing what the dimensions are. But there could be easier ways

Woah it's so small now

Then, still on ezgif, I go to the "crop" option.

Make sureeee to upload the smaller gif

press the button that says "extend canvas size", and then put the "width" and "height" as the dimensions for your FRAME. This'll put a bit of a transparent border around the gif. For this frame, I did 99px and 56px.

The "left" and "top" boxes show how many pixels the cropping happens from the edges of the canvas. The formula for finding that is

(width of gif / 2) - (difference between gif width and frame width / 2) = left box

For me it's (93 / 2) - (6 / 2) = 43.5

Then you do the same.for the height, which for me ends up being 22 from the top

This is reallyyy touchy and annoying though

Here's my result , with no visible difference

Okay so THEN you go to the "overlay" option, under "effects." And upload your frame. If the cropping was done right, you shouldn't have to move the frame at all and can just download it

Here's my result:

if you don't care about transparency, you can resize your gif to be the same size as the frame, and then put the frame over it. But I'm a slut for transparency

Anyways. I'm sorry if anything was unclear, it's two am. And I hope this was helpful :) these really are fun to make once you get it down

also if anyone has an easier way to make stamps from gifs, please god tell me