#and then the next part is karma because i have to actually explain the evil slime man in his part anyway

[bonetrousledbones]

hope yall are enjoying how much my brain switches between past and present tense btw

[sorcerersandskillusers]

Fyodor and the Devil: Analysis of Fyodor's motives and role in the narrative

Asagiri has stated that he based Fyodor not on Dostoyevsky the author but on a specific scene from one of his books The Brothers Karamazov where Ivan Karamazov confronts “the devil” in his room.

(It's a really good book, you should read it if you have time. Also. fun fact, Fyodor and the devil wear the same hat, “His soft fluffy white hat was out of keeping with the season.”)

Having read the book and gone over this scene, I realized that this could be used to find out a lot more about Fyodor as a character than we see in the story, including a potential glimpse at his real motivations.

A bit of context for the scene. Ivan Kramazov is a clever but deeply trouble man who has struggling with the concept of God and rationalising him with the cruelty of humanity, at one point while very sick, Ivan starts seeing a man in his room who claims to be “the devil”. Their conversation is a fascinating look at morality and why evil exists in the world, and if you look at it closely it reveals a lot about the role of a “villain” in a story.

This line from “the devil” is really interesting to me, and seems to explain a lot about Fyodor’s character, as well as align perfectly with how Asagiri has described Fyodor in interviews:

Before time was, by some decree which I could never make out, I

was predestined 'to deny' and yet I am genuinely good-hearted and not at all inclined to negation.

'No, you must go and deny, without denial there's no criticism and what would a journal be without a column of criticism?' 

Without criticism it would be nothing but one 'hosannah.' But nothing but hosannah is not enough for life, the hosannah must be tried in the crucible of doubt and so on, in the same style. But I don't meddle in that, I didn't  create it, I am not answerable for it. Well, they've chosen their scapegoat, they've made me write the column of criticism and so life was made possible.

Basically the devil is saying that he was created because without evil then good means nothing, if everything was perfect then nothing would happen or change, life couldn’t exist, so he was forced to be that evil even though he never wanted to be.

This is so similar to how Fyodor is described in the BSD exposition 2020:

Fyodor is the antagonist, he is the villain of the story, that is the role he plays. This explains why he chooses to commit so many atrocities in the name of  “following God's plan”. It even connects to his line in The Dead Apple, and his ability name. He is both crime and punishment, as “crime” or sin originates with the devil, but it's also the devil who punishes sinners.

(I mean the title of the episode he is introduced in is literally “My Ill Deeds Are the Work of God” by committing evil acts he is fulfilling God's purpose for him.)

And if Fyodor is really based on “the devil” it's very likely he also either does or used to wish for release from this role that was assigned to him, but he knows that he cannot stray from his path or the story will cease to exist. My evidence for Fyodor wanting to be free of his mission is just one interaction, when he kills Karma.

Look at Fyodor's expression here, this is the only time in the entire series where we see him look truly sad. This isn't an act, there is no one there for him to trick, he simply says a quiet prayer for the life of a boy who's only purpose was to suffer and die.

This next part of “the devils” speech actually seems to fit very well for Dazai, it's interesting since he is the narrative foil to Fyodor and clearly is a very similar character.

We understand that comedy; I, for instance, simply ask for annihilation. No, live, I am told, for there'd be nothing without you.

If everything in the universe were sensible, nothing would happen. There would be no events without you, and there must be events. So against the grain I serve to produce events and do what's irrational because I am commanded to.

For all their indisputable intelligence,men take this farce as something serious, and that is their tragedy. They suffer, of course... but then they live, they live a real life, not a fantastic one, for suffering is life. Without suffering what would be the pleasure of it? It would be transformed into an endless church service; it would be holy, but tedious. But what about me? I suffer, but still, I don't live. I am x in an indeterminate equation. I am a sort of phantom in life who has lost all beginning and end, and who has even forgotten his own name. 

This ties perfectly into Dazai and Fyodor’s debate on the nature of God in the sky casino arc.

Dazai here points out that it's not perfection and harmony that make the world move, it's the irrational, it's the foolishness and stupidity of humans who charges into life making a million mistakes but always finding ways to fight on through it. Here Dazai and Fyodor represent the conflicting sides of “the devil” with Fyodor embodying his mission to drive the world and Dazai embodying his secret love for, and wish to join, humanity.

“I love men genuinely, I've been greatly calumniated! Here when I stay withyou from time to time, my life gains a kind of reality and that's what I like most of all. Yousee, like you, I suffer from the fantastic and so I love the realism of earth. Here, with you, everything is circumscribed, here all is formulated and geometrical, while we have nothing but indeterminate equations! I wander about here dreaming. I like dreaming. Besides, on earth I become superstitious. Please don't laugh, that's just what I like, to become superstitious. I adopt all your habits here: I've grown fond of going to the public baths, would you believe it?

And I go and steam myself with merchants and priests. What I dream of is becoming incarnate once for all and irrevocably in the form of some merchant's wife weighing eighteen stone, and of believing all she believes. My ideal is to go to church and offer a candle in simple-hearted faith, upon my word it is. Then there would be an end to my sufferings.”

“"Why not, if I sometimes put on fleshly form? I put on fleshly form and I take the consequences. Satan sum et nihil humanum a me alienum puto."*

* I am Satan, and deem nothing human alien to me.”

This piece from the devil feels like it could be a description of Dazai’s character, his wish above all else to find happiness and love as a human despite believing he is a demon. Both Dazai and Fyodor have strong ties to the Devil, both of them are often described as demonic or inhuman, with emphasis placed on the darkness of their souls and the isolation they feel due to their minds.

But the difference between them is how they dealt with it, Fyodor chose to embrace it and fully commit to his role in the story as the ultimate evil for the greater good, but Dazai has always shown a fasciation with humans and has spent his life trying to connect to them and find meaning in his existence.

Finally, let's look at what we can learn about Fyodor’s motivation. Fyodor is the villain, he is the final obstacle the protagonist has to overcome, he is the driving force behind so much of Atsushi’s life and the reason so much of the series has played out at all. He sent Shibusawa to torture Atsushi as a child, he was an informant to the guild who put the bounty on Atsushi making the mafia turn on him, he was involved in the guild invasion, and obviously he was the master mind behind cannibalism and Decay of Angles.

If he is aware of his position as the antagonist, then he also is probably aware Atsushi is the protagonist, he knew he was the “envy of all ability users” after all, so he knows Atsushi has some significance to the world as a whole.

Atsushi is also the “guide to the book” which is seemingly Fyodor’s end goal, so even though Fyodor doesn’t seem to be focused on Atsushi, he has been indirectly influencing his whole journey up to this point. This also explains why Fyodor is only moving actively now, because the protagonist has appeared and his role as the villain can finally be fulfilled and he, like “the devil” can finally get the “annihilation” he asked for. Hence, Fyodor’s true goal is to erase himself from the narrative.

There is actually quite a lot of evidence for this. The obvious part is that Fyodor wants to rid the world of ability users while he himself is an ability user, he cannot exist in his perfect world. 

Then there’s the fact that in the Dead Apple, Fyodor calls himself “crime” if Fyodor is “crime” or “sin” then a world free of sin would not contain him at all

Even when Fyodor talks about sin, he says how humans are easily manipulated into killing each other, while he constantly manipulates characters into killing each other, he is the cause of the sin he fights.

A really strong bit of evidence is this interview with Asagiri and Harukawa

Not only does Asagiri reiterate Fyodors role as the person who moves the story, Harukawa specifically mentions that Fyodor might be trying to create a world without ability users because he thought it was a “bad thing to do” aka the action a villain would take that would lead to a hero stopping them.

“Dos-san is the biggest villain in the story so far, but I have continued to draw him with spaced out eyes that are neither righteous nor evil for a long time. The only time I drew his eyes completely white was when he said he would create a world without skill users. It was because, in reality, we would decide what is evil or not by our own scales, but I wasn't sure if he himself was doing it because he thought that was a bad thing to do.”

This also connects to how Fyodor was able to understand Gogol when no one else could, Gogol is chooses to fight against the way the world is to prove to himself that he truly is free. Fyodor, who is bound to play a part in a narrative, would understand that feeling and that longing to be truly free.

To be clear, I don’t think that Fyodor is really a good person whose just been trapped in an awful position against his will, we see many times that Fyodor revels in his cruelty and enjoys killing and torturing others. Its the same with “the devil” in the book, although he hates the job he was given, he tells Ivan stories of the people he’s corrupted and seems very proud of himself for it.

My personal interpretation is that the sadistic zelot personality Fyodor displays is a mixture of a mask and a coping mechanism, kind of similar to Yosano developing a sadistic side to help her deal with the guilt of half killing people in order to heal them. I think it makes sense that after centuries of cruelty and manipulation a person would become detached and stop really caring about the lives he destroys.

This analysis is partially unfinshed but I wanted to post it now and see what other people think of it.

[freakinator]

I see a lot of Will Wood songs as Red-coded (and half of it is because I just think C!Red would like that music) so I'm very curious on why you think a lot of Will Wood songs are Kab-coded especially Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In!

okay so i dont actually listen to will wood that much so im just gonna list the songs that i Have listened to

warning this is really long like Really long, i may have forgotten stuff from past streams, i talk about several things such as mental illness in a symbolic sense rather than directly engaging with the message, and theres a bit of surface-level buddhism there as well

part 1 cause i exceeded the image limit lol

starting off with Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In!

aside from the running theme of psychology which kab is Very fond of, kab has a recurring problem of doing something objectionable only to have her not remember it the next day whether genuinely (hashtag adhd) or as a manipulation tactic (deliberately acting as though she doesnt remember parts of her conversations with zam one moment only to mock him for it the next) she also has a recurring problem of refusing to take the blame and directing it to something or someone else (mainly the accuser) for things she doesnt feel guilty doing that are objectively her fault (such as deliberately killing planet)

she had (possibly still has, still need to see what she does after the zam stream today) a desire for getting worse (being evil is not the same thing as getting worse btw, i would say before this stream going evil Was kab getting worse but after the stream today going evil is actually her getting better. i suppose i define getting worse as "doubling down" rather than any conventional sense of the word) which is something that she wanted to drag zam down with her as well after the consequences streams before she accepted the fact that she cares about him with her thoughts regarding him fitting the lyrics on these parts the desire to get worse originates from her desire to prove something, to other ppl yes but mostly to herself -- she feels the need to get worse because she feels the need to protect herself but feels as if the only way to do so is by being the most untrustworthy and manipulative person on the server and she keeps feeling the need to hold onto it tightly despite the fact that it has ruined her reputation, her quality of life, and her relationships because she feels as though it (and clown) are the only things she truly has on the server

in this part the genius annotation explains my thoughts well

Laplace’s Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!)

in this part i think it connects well with how she felt from the start of the server up to the box arc the first two lines taken literally in regards to mane killing her, the red betrayal, and the woogie arguments and taken symbolically to represent her very intense trust issues that left her disconnected not only to her team but the rest of the players as well the later two lines is in regards to how her relationship with team mice went, at first she felt as though she carried the team in many ways even when it was hard for her, even when she felt as though it wasnt worth it, she kept trucking on until she couldnt take it anymore and decided she was gonna betray as soon as all pretenses collapse and clown offers to ally with her. but when red betrayed her first? she collapsed and threw everything away: her relationships, her former goals, and even her interactions with the entire server

in these parts i think it fits with her initial thoughts about the server which was reinforced by mane and red killing her: everyone is evil, everyone sucks, this is normal and natural and there is no way around it and trying to go agaainst it by being tender and vulnerable will only hurt you so i should become the worst mfer out there so i can never be hurt ever again

karma and her relationship with revenge

its so funny how this one lyric is so isolated from the other verses and choruses cause i think that fits kabs character very well: she wants help desperately but shes far too alone and resistant to other ppl to truly ever receive some for the things she actually needs help with

this is her basically every yap session shes had with zam (esp the 4th part lol)

Cotard’s Solution (Anatta, Dukkha, Anicca)

starting with the title, im not buddhist and have forgotten basically everything i learned about it so this may not be as nuanced as id like but nonetheless its connected to why i associate it with kab anatta - without self dukkha - dissatisfaction brought about by desires and attachment anicca - impermanence and eventual decay in buddhism we are trapped in samsara aka the endless cycle of birth, death, and rebirth brought about by anicca and avidya (ignorance) which brings with it dukkha, to achieve nirvana or permanence/freedom from samsara you must realize anatta and relinquish all desire and attachment in a lser context its very similar to the concept of the cycles and the worldenders but rather than trying to achieve anatta in order to reach nirvana they are instead trying to ensure that samsara keeps continuing, every apocalypse has been done with the knowledge that they can not only start over but that they Should start over, repeating the cycle all over again and actively denying nirvana because to acieve nirvana, emptiness, peace, goes against the very nature of lifesteal itself in a kab context (i will be ignoring how she uses karma cause its far more rigid, reliant on one person, and material-based than the buddhist definition of karma is, the consequences naturally brought about by the server is a far better demonstration of karma while kabs definition of karma would far better fit the concept of social justice instead) she has a lot of trouble with impermanence and attachment, with a much stronger fear of death compared to a lot of other players and having such severe trust issues that it genuinely makes her fear making attachments as it could possibly be used against er in some way. she also has a lot of trouble with her sense of self: constantly denying what she wants, always throwing plots and selves at the wall to see which one wold stick, which one would give her what she wants, which ones would keep her safe, resulting in her often having wants that are severely incongruous to what she needs not much to say from the cotards side of the title cause aside from her being one of the more paranoid and death-fearing members of the server she doesnt really have much of a "walking corpse" quality to her and i associate that part entirely with zam lol (honestly i associate this song with zam more in general as in he fits every line while kab doesnt fit certain verses lol)

i think this reflects her uncertainty with the server brought about by a visceral fear of death very well, she fears that doing the wrong thing will cause her to get punished, severely. the lost two lines in the first image in particular i think fit very well with her box arc

yet another part that i think summarizes her convos with zam lmao

Mr. Capgras Encounters a Secondhand Vanity: Tulpamancer’s Prosopagnosia/Pareidolia (As Direct Result of Trauma to the Fusiform Gyrus)

capgras delusion - delusional misidentification, commonly comes in the form of believing that someone close to you has been replaced by an indentical copy, there have also been cases where patients believe that time has been warped in some manner, aggression is common towards the perceived replacement prosopagnosia - a condition wherein you cant recognize faces/facial expressions pareidolia - pattern recognition of familiar objects in unrelated items such as faces in stains fusiform gyrus - a part of the frontal lobe with an unknown function that is directly linked to recognition kab sees the current her in past zam and vice versa in addition to all the traits they already have in common. kab also constantly reminds zam of joker while zam constantly picks and prods at kab until she becomes honest with him. theres also the fact that kab constantly misinterprets zam and the fact that zam does not like it when ppl remind him of himself due to the subject matter, the song has a running theme of fakery and replacement and indeed kab and zam are constantly questioning each other whether it be to gather information or to just figure out whats up with the other, trying to figure out what are the lies and what are the truths about the other with zam trying to remove kabs many masks and kab trying to reach deep withing zam, trying to find joker or whatever inner evil she seems to think he has

typical kab and zam behaviour honestly

Dr. Sunshine is Dead

honestly the whole song could be taken to metaphorically show kabs journey into adapting to lifesteals brutality

the song starts in media res with the singer character already having adjusted to the dark and fearful of sunshine but still unsure of themself, paranoid of shadows despite the fact that they were already in a dark room to begin with which fits kabs character whos already used to "eviller" smps but has yet to experience the horror that is being on lifesteal so although she already had a natural suspicion of kindness she nonetheless tried to seek it out despite herself only to find that the other lsers were already, in her own words, "broken" and "bitter" she constantly projects herself upon other ppl cause she sees the same patterns that shes done herself but with no context for why they act the way they do, assuming that its simply how the way they work whether by nature or nurture, which is reinforced not only by lifesteals very own reputation but also by the dramatic collapse of team mice -- an event that was theoretically avoidable but was realistically inevitable thanks to their backgrounds and personalities and already present lack of trust

i think this takes place after the mane and red killings she doesnt want to be boxed in and yet does so to herself both literally by imprisoning herself into an an obsidian box that contain reminders of her past and not allowing herself to get out of the box unless she was absolutely alone, and unintentionally metaphorically by not only defining her goals in relationship to someone else (woogie, red, and zam, not yet mane cause shes still too scared at this point) and seemingly being so tunnelvisioned to her goal that she misses many meaningful interactions between herself and the other ppl on the server

this is after she left the box zam wasnt there for her so she aligned herself with wemmbu and joined what would eventually become the california girls despite the fact that she hates wemmbu, shes gained Some confidence from teaming with who is arguably the servers most wanted and has decided to fully give in to her malice, basically going on her own joker arc, assuming the worst of everyone according to her intuition, and denying both to others and herself the fact that deep down inside shes still as scared as she was the day that mane killed her this is also when she starts moving mane up her list of priorities as hes not only the most active of his targets but hes also the one who keeps going after her

the same dilemma as the previous chorus except this time its fully metaphorical and intentional, she boxes other ppl in because its what she thinks is truth (her mind can only be changed if she was already unsure in the first place, otherwise she takes her knowledge as absolute truth), and she boxes herself in cause its what she wants-- or rather what she Thinks she wants, she wants to be evil but she still cares so when she starts targetting zam her facade starts to crumble

this is when kab keeps going after zam, finding that hes the only one left on the server who would not only listen to her but also not kill her kab heavily relies on her psychological analysis, intelligence, and willingness to play dirty due to the fact that its her only real weapon and when youre in a server like lifesteal its very important that youd have Some way of arming yourself so she uses it as often as possible shes become extremely cynical at this point and does not think she has anyone she can truly rely on except for clown... who hasnt logged on the server in months she keeps going after zam cause really what else is there to do? shes a psychological analyzer and she cant do that if nobody is willing to listen to her and may even kill her so she goes after zam cause she wants to be evil but would be unable to deal with the consequences of going after someone more willing to kill than him the whole time shes wearing not just one but several masks and yet zam manages to keep seeing past them so she unmasks her again and again and she doesnt like that and yet she got attached cause not only did he see past her and not only has he been relentlessly attacked by several ppl over and over again but hes also been Nice to her and it scares her cause Nice only means trouble so she tries to look for the evil within him: joker and yet despite that he keeps managing to see past her and her mask crumbles more and more, and she becomes stuck in between her wants and needs, her desires and fears, her mask and her real self, she wants to be evil So badly but she cares and she cant help caring and she cant deny it anymore shes unable to go back to who she once was

this is when she starts truly reevaluating herself, what she wants, and what she needs she realizes that she does not know nearly enough about the server to have her methods work, at least to the same extent as the other smps shes been in and that she needs to do a reevalutaion shes not trying to box herself in anymore, she realizes now that ultimately its not what she really wants so she decides she wants to try to bridge the gap made bwtween her mask and her true self with karma, a way to be the caring person she knows she is but still indulging in that malice she wants to foster and still heavily immersed in that ultimately bitter view of the server and way of living

despite everything shes still kab and shes still scared, whatever happens next happens next

[trlvsn]

i’m thinking about mvk right now wtf happened to him? why is he like that? who did this to him? what do you think his tragic backstory is i know he has one and i need to know right now

oh anon you're gonna wish you didn't send this ask.

what i think people often forget when trying to understand certain characters is that characters are a part of a story first and a person second. to understand manfred and some other related things, let's look at this from the beginning, specifically, from the first "evil" major character we get introduced to (and by evil i mean someone the protagonist opposes) - miles edgeworth.

miles edgeworth is introduced to us as the demon prosecutor, the guy who uses dirty tricks in court, is famous for being ruthless and thinks everyone should be punished, a guy who strives for perfection is his job as a prosecutor. that brings us to a point where we think miles edgeworth represents something the justice system overall should not be - biased, devoid of empathy, driven by a perfect record and a desire for a good career instead of the genuine desire to find the truth. the story could as well have made us defeat edgeworth because of that - that approach is not needed in the court, so we expose him for some kind of crime and get him fired, goodbye, who's the next character going to be? however, the writers make the decision to humanize him, make him not just a character that represents a wrong idea but a person who has a backstory and some good in his heart, a person with a pretty good moral code, actually, a nerd, a friend, a man. this is where we start to question what exactly made him like this - this is why miles gets a tragic backstory. he is meant to be explained, he is meant to be human, he is meant to be more.

so manfred von karma becomes the answer. he is the reason, he is the influence, the part of miles's life that made him like this and the part that he starts to oppose. manfred von karma is an asset, a tool we are given to understand edgeworth better and draw some conclusions: "hey, maybe the guy wasn't, like, evil and demonic, he was manipulated as a kid, you know". manfred is like a mirror of edgeworth, which is a tool one can see frequently in ace attorney writing. there are characters that represent one character trait of another character, hyperbolized and extended. damon gant is edgeworth's authority mirror, representing what could happen if miles went from cutting salaries to grabbing more and more power to himself. manfred is miles's perfection mirror (self-explanatory).

what do we get from this, then? manfred von karma is undeniably linked to a more important character, appears for one single case (if we don't count aai) and serves one purpose - get the idea across. "don't get too focused on perfection, kids! this is a job that determines other people's lives, and to manipulate the verdict in order to serve your own selfish purposes is yucky!". manfred is a symbol first, person second, that's why he doesn't get a backstory.

manfred von karma is not just a man - it's what every prosecutor could become. a prosecutor gets a high salary, which the game establishes, and that salary depends on the amount of cases won, or, if i'm wrong, one's reputation depends on that, and the reputation causes bias. in such an objectively terrible system any prosecutor would slowly go from "i'm going to find the truth!" to "i'm going to win", and manfred went there a little too much. manfred's backstory is his habitat, he is the product of the system. with every case won and every close call, every paycheck earned, with all the competition in the field empathy and common sense leaves him - it gets to a point where a penalty causes him to commit murder. he is not a sane person at the moment of the crime - he is quite literally delusional thinking it was some kind of fate that the gun was there. he is what happens when a man loses himself in his career, what happens when the law is about money and success and not fairness, what can happen to anyone and should not happen.

so, to me, manfred does not need a backstory, apart from the one i mentioned above - he on his own is one.

but let's imagine this is the real world for a second and ignore the fictional, ideal aspect of it all. it's quite definitely possible manfred was somehow abused, but do i think it HAS to be so? no. a person does not need to be traumatized or a victim to grow up shitty. he could simply be spoiled, actually, with all of the wealth he clearly has. to prove my point, imagine a scenario where you raise a child with nothing but praise. you give it all the love and care, feed it, cherish it, but a child is curious by nature. eventually, it will do something bad, like pinch you or hit another child. you, the universally loving parent, still give it love and feed it candy after it does the bad thing, and you continue to do so. with nothing but love and care, the child will grow up with a defected sense of right and wrong, selfish, entitled, unempathetic.

point is - i don't find a tragic backstory to be a necessary thing for manfred's character. i don't think he needs a backstory at all.

however, that is not to say i'm somehow trying to prove anon wrong. theorizing and coming up with explanations IS fun and good. i'm just giving my personal view of his character here.

[ilynpilled]

im curious how you envision bran and jaime's reunion going down? or at least your thoughts on their future relationship? if jaime is making it to winterfell to fight in the long night which i think he does he will certainly have to fight his case. i personally think whats gonna bridge the gap between dany + the starks and jaime is brienne, tyrion and JO bringing the lannister army). but jaime's adwd chapter and the whole idea of forgoing blood feuds is definitely foreshadowing for the starks and lannisters in my opinion. anyway i kinda went off track but yeah bran lol

i do desperately want a bran jaime interaction in the books. and not really like the one in the show. though in some ways the show version is the worst thing jaime can get because it is so ‘neutral’. it is not forgiveness nor is it damnation and judgement/punishment. and from what we have seen in the books and his confessions it does drive him crazy if he does not get an answer. because then he has to fill up the blanks. and that leads to worst case scenario. so that is kind of torturous and sexy to me personally, but what bugs me about the show version is just the handling of bran’s character in general, and also how none of this was fleshed out on jaime’s part either really. in terms of book canon, i actually would really like jaime not receiving forgiveness from him necessarily. bran being unable to fully give it. like i do not think it is necessary for bran for catharsis, though george has his own view of forgiveness, and he expressed it regarding jaime in specific a lot:

“he said something like he wanted to explore the concept of forgiveness (with jaime) and whether it's ever possible to be forgiven for doing such horrible things, and that his goal was to ask the question, not give an answer.” (2006)

“One of the things I wanted to explore with Jaime, and with so many of the characters, is the whole issue of redemption. When can we be redeemed? Is redemption even possible? I don't have an answer. This is one of the areas where I'm asking the next question-just the two of us talking here, but also in my fiction. Is there the possibility of redemption? How do we forgive people? When do we forgive people? You see it all around in our society, in constant debates. Should we forgive Michael Vick? I have friends who are dog-lovers who will never forgive Michael Vick. Michael Vick has served years in prison; he’s apologized �� Our society is full of people who have fallen in one way or another, and what do we do with these people? Can they have redemption? Can they rejoin society? Does a good act make up for a bad act? How many good acts make up for a bad act? If you're a Nazi war criminal and then spend the next 40 years doing good deeds and feeding the hungry, does that make up for being a concentration-camp guard? I don't know the answer, but these are questions worth thinking about. I want there to be a possibility of redemption for us, because we all do terrible things. We should be able to be forgiven. Because if there is no possibility of redemption, what's the answer then?” (2014)

Interviewer: Your books have a very strong storyline associated with the atonement of sins. For example, the way of Jaime Lannister, do you yourself believe in karma?

GRRM: “I don't believe in karma per se, although sometimes I have my doubts because sometimes I think I see things that could be explained by karma. [Laughs.] But no, I don't really have any beliefs in the supernatural. I do believe in the possibility of redemption. And I believe that human beings, all human beings are gray. And I try to remember that when I write my characters. We are all heroes, we are all villains, we all have the capacity for great good and we all have the capacity to do things that are selfish and evil and wrong. Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference. In your lifetime, you can be both. And it's making choices that defines us as human beings…There's this sensation of compartmentalism. This eagerness to judge everybody based on the worst thing they ever did, not the best thing they ever did. And you know, I think Shakespeare in Julius Caesar wrote the evil that men do lives after them. The good is often interred with their bones. And sadly that's true. And I think it should be the reverse. We should remember the good things and the noble things that people did, and forgive them for their failures and moments of selfishness or wrongdoing because we all have them. When we forgive them we are essentially forgiving ourselves. Redemption should be possible.” (2018)

the whole concept is a prevalent motif all throughout his chapters very obviously, has been explicitly mentioned since his second asos chapter, and interrogated a lot through his journey in affc. but what i think i would personally like is the reality that sometimes changing does not result in absolution. some actions you cannot come back from like that. you are not entitled to the forgiveness of the individuals you hurt so drastically, even if you have changed. certain things cannot be reversed or undone. but that puts the weight back on you. you might have done things that are unforgivable to certain people. and i like the question that poses. like what then? what is reformation truly about? that should not mean you stop changing. anyhow, the result i would want from a jaime/bran interaction is jaime psychological torture chamber of his own making and some kind of catharsis for bran 😁 jaime is a very mature interrogation of redemption, and george so far did not simplify it or make it easily digestible. despite his personal beliefs, and how they have evolved a little bit over time slightly it seems, i do think george is still posing a question rather than giving a clear cut answer, and i do believe someone like bran not fully forgiving him would fit that. as for the rest, i wont extrapolate that much. we will see, i might change my mind depending on what things happen

[bookishtheaterlover7]

You are a weirdo. GET MENTAL HELP. You are obsessed and stalking a man who DOESNT know you. //

HELLO anon, Megan and team, and most importantly CHRIS. Hi.

This is the hatred YOU all are pushing towards the only real fans CE has left.

People who believe your brainwash Narrative and support the racist duo, telling fans to get mental health help for seeing your shitshow for the reality it is.

IRONIC, considering one side of your couple used to be such an activist for anxiety and mental health. Guess nothing matters when money is involved, GOT IT. WE understand who he is now. Successful PR campaign.

How does it feel? That money in your pockets feel good right now? It will never be fuller than the guilt your consciences will give you for the way you've treated and forcibly INVOLVED a whole fandom of innocent people to YOUR OWN mental games, to SELL a fuckshit show, who are now being blamed for everything, being told they are mentally ill, and gaslighting what is the TRUTH anyway.

Y'all are NASTY. Beyond nasty. I hope all your businesses rot. I hope your projects fail. I hope none of you get recognized for anything other than the abusers you are.

I hope 2024, the year of Karma, treats you accordingly.

I'm sharing this one, because there are WAY too many blogs on here, calling every PR blog and Mod insane, because we choose to believe something different...

Okay, fine. Whatever. The thing is, I don't really care about what you have to say, anymore. I'm saying my part, the GP sees what y'all clearly don't, so I'll take that as a win.

I won't stoop as low as you all do, because honestly it's sad how you're all the same. Resorting to insulting words, using the same words everytime.

And one thing I learned in life, you can't change minds, or force your beliefs on anyone, so it's best for you to adjust instead. And that means not giving any fucks about those other blogs.

And P.S. you can call me all those vile things, because like I said, I've had way worse. And I've got a life outside of y'all, not that any of you care, since y'all see one post and then jump to the conclusion of us being insane 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 . And that's not something I need to prove.

Besides, I'm going to answer all the different asks that's against her, and by extension, him. Because one thing none of y'all could ever understand is the catharsis that comes with screaming and venting out frustrations, something I'm sick of explaining to you close minded people.

Anyway, respect to the person who's actually not a coward to hide behind anon, but respectfully, as I can to someone who supports and condones her actions. Get off my blog.

As for this An🫶n, they're so right. This Fandom is so fucked up over this. And Hate Anons don't bother sending in your hate messages, because so much energy is wasted on y'all. And if y'all are going to continue sending hate, maybe y'all should be the ones getting professional help 🤔

Until next time!

🫶Booky

P.P.S. I don't really care if you miss out on my fics. You're blocked, because I don't want to be drained by your toxicity. I've done that to evil Mods, and I will do it to children, who resort to school yard taunts, instead of growing a pair and acting like an adult. ❤️

[gale-gentlepenguin]

Gale poorly explains legend of Korra

(I would normally have done this by season, so for the sake of sanity. Here is season 1)

Gale poorly explains: Legend of Korra (season 1)

-“Aang is gone and we need to find the new avatar”

-Tiny Korra bursts in

Korra: “Sup bitches! I’m the avatar”

-“Sure is kyoshi up in here”

———————————————————————-

(15 years later)

(Korra shows up in republic city)

Korra: Time to act like a female protagonist in the 2010s

(Proceeds to get arrested)

Lin: I’m a straight lace cop that is completely the opposite of my mother toph who has a metal pole up her ass.

Tenzin: I’m Aang’s son and I have to reign Korra in this season and will fail miserably.

Korra: I’m gonna slay at air bending

(Proceeds to get messed up)

Tenzin: Korra meet my family.

Pema: Hi, I’m the woman that is single handedly restoring the Air nomads until season 3. I also stole Tenzin from Lin

Jinora: Hi I’m Jinora, the only character that people like in all four seasons of the show and considered the best addition to the cast.

Ikki: I’m the annoying middle child that will piss off EVERYONE for stopping them from hearing about Zuko’s mom.

Meelo: I make fart jokes. I am one of the comic reliefs.

Korra: Well this is a thing… I’m gonna go pro bend

___________________________________

Bolin: Hey I’m the actual comic relief, and the second best character in the show. I will be trying to date you until you end up kissing my brother… in which case I will get over it after an episode

Mako: hey, im the tsundere dude that looks so generic that people wonder why im a main character. But apparently that’s sexy.

Korra: it is. I can’t wait to kiss you and cause more drama. But first a sport that makes very little sense and is really nerfed for the earth bending team.

(Winning at pro bending!)

Amon: I am part of the Equalist movement. A movement which actually makes little sense in retrospect because there are no rules descriminating against normal people, if anything it’s more like benders have it rough considering the amount of bending criminals.

Korra: He’s stealing bending! He must be stopped!

_____________________________________

Asami: Hey, I’m the hot non-bending rich girl that is a genuinely good person and I have way more chemistry with Korra than Mako, but for this season and next will be a Mako simp.

Mako: Cool

Korra: I hate her… but also am attracted to her.

Bolin: I’m just here to have fun

Hiroshi: I’m Asami’s father and totally cool with my daughter dating a filthy fire bender

_____________________________________

Tarrlok: I’m the sketchy mayor that is actually really creepy and trying to get you on bored to fight Amon.

Korra: I’m down.

(Joins the force and gets traumatized)

Korra: Yea… he is horrifying.

Lin: I’m quitting the force. Now for some character development.

_____________________________________

Bolin: Back to Probending

Tenzin: I was originally against this but now I’m a fan of this game.

(Their opponents cheat and win)

Tenzin: Is that ref Blind!? Wtf!

Korra: They cheated!

(Amon arrives and delivers karma by stealing the bending of the opponents)

Korra: okay that’s a bit Effed up.

____________________________________

Tarrlok: Now I’m gonna enforce some laws that will give the Equalists reasons to actually rebel

(Arrests Korea’s friends)

Korra: Could you not arrest my friends!

Tarrlok: No, now bend the knee

Korra: No, cause I realize you are a creepy f***er. And I will never let an obviously evil water bender trick me into helping ever again… (stay tuned for season two)

Tarrlok: Kidnapping it is!

(Reveals bloodbending)

Korra: OP please nerf

_____________________________________

(Korra learns about the blood bending past from Aang)

Aang: Long story short. Cameos and Yakone was a dick to everyone.

Korra: Dang.

(Everyone learns Tarrlok lied)

Tarrlok: Well it doesn’t matter, no one can beat me with my blood bending

Amon: I heard that you were talking s*** and you didn’t think that I would hear it.

(Steals Tarrlok’s bending)

Korra: I’m outtie (flees)

_________________________________

Amon: Time to take this city!

(Takes city)

Iroh: I’m a reference to Iroh and have Zuko’s voice. I’m immediately the best character this season. Unfortunately I’m useless right now

Korra: So we have to stop Amon. Oh look it’s the jerk mayor.

Tarrlok: Amon is actually my brother. He’s a blood bender.

Korra: Gasp! Oh wait I knew that

_____________________________________

Asami: Sorry dad, I’m not joining your equalists. Your group claims it’s fighting against controlling regimes only to become one as soon as you get power. It’s very hypocritical.

Hiroshi: Hey! Our protests were mostly peaceful. Now let us use our weapons to kill your friends.

_____________________________________

Amon: Ready for me to steal your bending

(Cue fight scene)

Amon: I stole your bending

Korra: not my air bending.

(Blasts him out the window causing him to expose himself as a bender)

Equalists: Gasps! Our leader is a bender. We’ve been lied to. This somehow ruins our movement.

Amon: (revealed to be Noatak) I must flee now.

____________________________________

Korra: Well I am only an airbender now.

Aang: but what if you weren’t. (Restores bending)

Korra: Bitching, time to fix everything

___________________________________

Noatak: Hey bro, sorry about stealing your bending let’s GTFO

Tarrlok: How about double suicide

(Off screen explosion)

____________________________________

Mako: So are we dating now

Korra: Yep!

[girl4music]

For Gabrielle… her way is to protect and defend, not to injure and kill. Gabrielle’s way was to create and cultivate peace and love - and it happened to be that sometimes that had to be through violence and killing because her soul’s karma was to be a guardian warrior.

For Xena… her way was truly the way of the warrior. Xena’s way was to make war to maintain the balance between good and evil in order to atone for her sins. It’s why Ares was always a draw for her despite being what always pulled her back into her dark side. Ironically, it was the way to become mother of peace.

To achieve what they would become in their next life they had to do the opposite of what they would do because eventually the roles would switch over.

Gabrielle would become more like Xena.

Xena would become more like Gabrielle.

And they’d walk separate paths yet again. It’s just this time it’d be on the opposite ends of the spectrum.

That is the nature of yin-yang. It’s true meaning.

Yin-yang may be total opposites, and therefore contradictory but they carry the seed of each other because they fundamentally are of the same nature.

This is why I always find it funny when people debate over which one was the butch and the femme or which one was the top and the bottom: “which one” - as if they’re separate entities because they’re individual people. But they’re forgetting that they can’t function as those individual people without each other there.

The answer actually is that they’re both both because the true nature of who/what they they are is whole already. People often look at yin-yang as dual because of how opposite and contradictory they are. And they are. But above that - at a greater scale - they’re not because they cannot function as the whole without being a sum of each other’s parts. And vice versa.

And what’s really profound about that - about that teaching - and therefore about Xena … is that that is the way of nature. It is literally the nature of nature.

They refer to it as “The Way” because nature is not a thing. It’s an array of forces working as one being. That’s why looking at it as two parts - as duality - is so easy. Because consciousness trains itself to separate and differentiate the way of all being by perceiving it as things inside and outside things… it misses the bigger picture of it. Which is that it is never not one and that there can never be a picture at all if it wasn’t.

Humanity comes in and uses experience to have life. And then it mistakingly separates and differentiates itself from it as if it’s not what cut the umbilical cord. So it comes to have an experience of the dual all the while not knowing that the only reason it can is because it is fundamentally not dual. It’s non-dual.

Taoism is a very profound teaching and philosophy because it’s not dogmatic. It just simply is what is. The whole point is not to explain but experience and then find a way to communicate said experience without placing a limiting or restrictive idea on it.

Xena teaches Taoism without knowing it’s doing it.

Which is - of course - the right way to teach it.

I love that we get to see how different Xena and Gabrielle are as fighters. Xena seems to take great enjoyment in the fight and seems to toy with her food whereas Gabrielle is more serious and tries to dispatch her opponents as quick as possible.

[thelovelyghostwriter]

Non-anime Asian TV Shows that I liked

This is just a short list of some Asian TV shows I liked, list is not exhaustive. Thank you  @cautionworksstuff​ for encouraging me to do this since you wanted to know more about other foreign TV shows other than anime. 

When I say non-anime, it means shows that are not Japanese animated series. 

1. Kingdom [Netflix] (South Korea)

This series hits HARD. It’s an original Korean Netflix series. Now, there’s a lot of shows/movies that are named “Kingdom”, so let me clear about this one: this is the one that is set with a Zombie apocalypse during the Joseon period. 

It follows the story of the Crown Prince who is being framed for treachery by his evil stepmom (the Empress) and her clan, as soon as his father died. In the midst of that, a disease outbreak happens that turns everyone into zombies, and the Prince struggles to avoid being defeated by the corrupted government officials as well as to save his people from the zombie apocalypse. 

What makes this one stand out from series/movies like The Walking Dead are two things: 1) the political setting - while there is a zombie outbreak, it’s also the battle for power, 2) the historical setting - the guns used here are very limited, and the science/medicine explained behind this outbreak is not like “oh due to biotech experiment gone wrong”, 3) unlike Walking Dead, they actually explained the cause of the illness, the cures and the weaknesses. 

They are going to come up with a new one-episode spin-off(?) this month. 

2. Girl from Nowhere (Thailand) 

This is also available on Netflix. This series follow a character named Nanno, who goes to various schools as the new girl. In the second episode, she’s revealed to be some sort of immortal entity that goes on to expose the sins and wrongful acts of parents, teachers and students. She then punishes them as some form of karma. Beware, some episodes are downright disturbing and only for mature audience. 

I don’t have a confirmation of this, but according to Wikipedia and actress Chicha Amatayakul, the character Nanno draws inspiration from Junji Ito’s Tomie, and the similarities are very obvious. From the way the people react to her, the hairstyle and the even to the beauty mark near the eye, the similarities are very obvious. 

One difference though, I must say, is that Nanno is an extremely charming character as compared to Tomie. You will really root for her and can’t help but like her presence, even if she’s a little scary. When I read Tomie, I didn’t exactly felt the same magnetic pull as Nanno did for me. Season 1 was really good. Season 2 was more brutal but I think Season 1 was slightly better. 

3. Trese (Philippines)

This was actually based on a Filipino comic series, with the same name. I had actually waited for this series to be animated. This series features Filipino supernatural beings. I had always wondered how it’ll be like if there was a cool anime about Filipino mythological creatures, such as the manananngal, aswang, tikbalang etc. I think their designs and stories are interesting and not very talked about in the media. 

I had once complained about this. We have so many interesting Filipino mythological creatures, but why do we focus on mostly drama series on love and family, and not come up with a horror series featuring them? 

This one’s available on Netflix as well, and it’s in three audios: English, Filipino and Japanese. I do recommend the Filipino audio because the pronunciation of the creatures are better. But that might be just me listening to my native language. 

Although, just a tiny criticism - there are only six episodes so far. All in less than 30 minutes. This was an issue for me and also my family who had watched it because we felt the pacing was too fast. They didn’t explain what the creatures were, what they do, which can be confusing for people who are not familiar with the mythology. Yeah, I really think it’s because the pacing was fast due to the small number of episodes. If they slowed down, it would be great. Hopefully we get more episodes the next season. 

4. Meteor Garden (Taiwan) [2001] OR Boys over Flowers (South Korea) OR Hana Yori Dango (Japan) 

This was adapted from a manga called “Hana Yori Dango” (Boys over Flowers). It has been adapted in numerous shows, with Japan doing the first live action film in 1995. 

The one that I had watched is the Taiwanese drama version, Meteor Garden (2001 version). There was also a Korean drama adaptation called “Boys over Flowers”. I didn’t watch that one but quite a number of my friends did. There was also the Japanese adaptation, as well as Thai and Chinese adaptation of it. I can’t say for sure which one is the best because I only remember watching the Taiwanese (2001) version and it’s close to my heart. The Taiwanese (2001), South Korean and Japanese drama versions are often being compared. I’ll let you guys decide based on this information.  

I don’t remember much from the plot, although it was this drama was very hyped back then.

This was the summary on Wikipedia: 

It tells the story of Tsukushi Makino, a girl from a middle class family, whose mother enrolled her in an elite high school to compete with the families from her husband's company. While at Eitoku, she encounters the F4, a gang of four young men who are children of Japan's wealthiest families, and who bully anyone that gets in their way.

5. The Little Nyonya [2008] (Singapore)

Saving the last for the one that resides a special place in my heart, and perhaps for a lot of people in Singapore. 

Words cannot describe how much this was well-liked in Singapore. I remember everyone praising this. This was hands-down one of THE BEST drama ever produced in Singapore. I remember coming home, waiting at I think 8pm? Just to tune into local TV and then watch this show for a good 40minutes. I know they did a remake in China, which I didn’t watch, but I highly recommend the Singaporean version (since it’s the original and the setting is in Singapore/Malaysia anyway). 

This series really introduced the Peranakan culture to the Singaporean audience. I like to think this story has two parts where it follows the story of a Nyonya (Peranakan Chinese woman). 

The first part’s setting is during WW2. Huang Ju Xiang, a woman born into a Peranakan family and her mother was a 2nd wife. Because of her mother’s status, she’s been ostracised by her family and is tasked to do the household like a servant. She meets a Japanese man and yeah, since it’s in the midst of WW2, their love story was kinda “forbidden” too. The first part is actually my favourite. 

The second part follows the story of their daughter, Yue Niang Yamamoto. This story is longer and Yuening has to face the same type of ostracisation her mother had endured by the Huang family. 

[warcrimesimulator]

I actually had a long and coherent dream last night.

Long-ass dream under the cut.

I was in some really nice public space with a bunch of friends- I guess this was some alternate utopian USA where we actually had walkable cities, and trains apparently (I'll get to that later.) It was getting dark, so we decided to stay at a small, cheap motel for the night.

Then an axe-wielding blonde guy with a bowl cut (lmao) broke in and tried to murder us. We barricaded ourselves in the bathroom, and I opened up this hatch on the wall that led into a tunnel system- the tunnels were too narrow and small to stand up in, so we had to crawl.

We eventually found an exit that led back out into the streets. The murderer had gotten into the tunnel and was following us, so I decided to cause mass panic so it would be easier to lose track of him. I split up from my friends, too. He caught up with me though, and insisted it was only me that he was after. Then he turned into an ugly fucking mangy wolf- like, with warts and everything. It was ugly as fuck. I ran into a crowd of people to lose him again, and then this middle-aged woman (who looked exactly like my 7th grade English teacher, for whatever reasons) grabbed my arm and told me to come with her. We ran to this field area in-between some buildings, and she turned herself into a cat, and turned me into a cat too. She said "we have to catch the next train, and then I'll explain everything"

So we ran to the train station, turned back into humans, and boarded the train. She told me that in the world there are shapeshifters who secretly live alongside people- the most common are wolf shapeshifters. She said that she was born as a wolf shapeshifter, but because of her "positive karma" (lmao), she became a master shapeshifter- someone who can turn into any animal or person. She said that I was also a master shapeshifter, a very rare, "once every ten thousand years" type that is born into a regular human family and has to be awakened.

We made it to another city, and got off the train. She gave me a map and said I have to find this old mansion called the Liminal Mansion, and there I can learn more. I found the mansion in the middle of the woods, and entered it- it was a sort of non-eucladian space, bigger inside than outside and full of seemingly endless hallways full of doors. I was greeted by these two weird Russian kids- one was a wolf shapeshifter and the other was a fox shapeshifter. They both had laptops and were playing Minecraft. They said I will have to meet with the leaders of every shapeshifter clan to learn more about my role in the world and also to figure out how to deal with the evil wolf man™ who was actively hunting me down, but they live in various parts of the world. I was like "how the fuck am I supposed to travel the world?" and they said I'll have to use the doors in the mansion.

The wolf kid explained that they're still researching the mansion, that it's older than humanity and it's unknown how it came to be, but they've already mapped out a lot of the doors and where they lead. They opened up one of the doors. Inside was a desert- a sort of desert dimension that makes travel quicker in the real world. There was a path marked out in the sand, and they said I will have to open this door at the end of the path to end up in the Himalayas, where I will have to find the leader of the Snow Leopard Clan. He said it's important to remember where I arrive, though- because I'll have to return there to noclip back (lmao)

So, I arrived in the Himalayas. I was immediately hit with altitude sickness. Thankfully it didn't take long for someone to find me. He said he knew I was an awakened shapeshifter, and all I had to do was visualize another form and my entire physical being would be deconstructed and then reconstructed into the visualized form. So I turned myself into a snow leopard so I would no longer be sick. The guy said that his name was... [long fucking sigh] Tenzing Norgay and he was the Snow Leopard Clan leader, and that I was in the Khumbu region of Nepal. Of course at this point I did not give a fuck about whatever I was supposed to be doing- I had to go see Mount Everest. He was really just like "yeah okay sure. let's go"

So we were just exploring the land as snow leopards, and he was talking about how shapeshifting is the most pure form of being because it's in direct defiance of the physical laws of the earth. He then asked if I've ever wondered what it was like to fly. I was then hit with the realization that I really could just be anything. I turned into a golden eagle (a really shiny golden eagle, like that binch from The Rescuers Down Under) and took flight and I got to see Mount Everest and it was the coolest fucking shit in the world.

I woke up and I was mad cuz I wanted this dream to continue I was just so intrigued by all of this. big lel @ the mansion that was basically a Backrooms level and the snow leopard dude being named Tenzing fucking Norgay though

[fu-aki]

Chapter 5

So this is going to be my attempt to summarize part 1 of the beginning part of chapter 5 (episode 1 to 21) of twisted wonderland.

Again, spoiler alert since I’m about to write out everything that happened, and I apologize for my grammar and horrible French in advance.

 You heard someone singing -> it was the scenes from snow white when the evil queen asks the mirror on the wall and snow white singing into the well  -> player choice: a beautiful women was watching from the window…/ I felt like I’ve meet that beautiful person before… -> you woke up from dream -> in the main street, you meet up with Ace and Deuce -> after seeing the statue you realized you’ve seen them in your dreams before

In classroom -> Ace felt it wasn’t weird to have dreams like that when you see those statues everyday -> you mentioned about in your dream “mickey” appeared in the mirror -> Ace and Deuce never heard of that name before -> Ace suggest to take a photo of it with the “ghost camera” you got from Crowley since it can even take pictures of ghosts

Crewel showed up and explained about “nationwide sorcerer training school culture festival” -> it’s a 2 day event with representative students from all the sorcerer training school, a festival with speeches and debates all about magic related music & art topics -> for NRC, all the 4th year students will be send all across country for internship and research study -> they will all come back on that day to share their experience and result -> end of the homeroom -> fight Crewel for the defense magic class

In the dorm leader meeting -> Malleus is not there again -> Lilia mentions how he couldn’t find Malleus anymore after class so he’s here instead -> Idia questions if Malleus is missing meetings on purpose -> Lilia talked about how fairies feels time different from humans, and how Malleus have some troublesome karma on him as well

The meeting starts -> Riddle started reporting everything about the event -> but the “vocal & dance championship” has surprising amount of media focused on it -> Riddle was surprised since he thought it was just a chorus competition -> because of the time change and consideration for different types of music, now it includes singing, dancing, and performance -> and because of how popular it got, it becomes one chance for students to professionally debut -> and now it’s getting extra notice because the famous influencer Vil and Neige are in it -> Lilia commented how Neige is getting really popular online and on TV -> Idia surprised that people in Diasomnia actually go online -> Lilia “kuhuhu, of course, we are still just students in high school, we watch dramas and play games.” -> Crowley “Vila and Neige, 2 world known famous celebrity are going to appear in VDC, it won’t be an exaggeration to call it the highest degree of attention we are going to get in this event.” -> Crowley ask Riddle to make preparation in case of troubles -> Azul offered to help since he learned all about it from magic shift event -> Leona “hey octopus bastard… do you want your flappy tongue to turn into dried food or what?” -> Azul “oh my how scary” -> Riddle refused Azul’s help since he don’t want Azul ask for something later -> Kalim “just tell us if something is bothering you, we’ll help you anytime.”

-> Kalim “I can’t wait for the day of festival~!” ->  Idia “sign~~~… the popular guys just looks so happy everyday. I had to think about the day to announce our research result… if I just step on stage, everyone would be like ‘hey isn’t his hair burning?’ ‘could he be Shroud family’s…’ ‘what kind of dark research is he doing?’ aah I can’t… for person like me to do a speech on stage is just challenge level EX.” -> Riddle mentioned how the rules said student have to go on stage themselves and offer to train Idia for speech after school -> Idia said he’ll manage something himself (whispering) “I really don’t wanna have a farming event with demonic trainer Riddle.” -> end of meeting

In Vil’s room -> Vil “Mira, Mira” -> Mira “what can I help you with?” -> Vil “who is the fairest of them all right now?” -> Mira “the account with the most mention of fair in web currently is… Neige.” -> Vil “Neige…! Finally… this time have arrived.” -> Mira “sorry, I couldn’t quite hear you. Could you please repeat what you said?”

Few days later in cafeteria -> Ace, Deuce, Grim, and you saw the poster for the VDC audition -> the reward for wining the championship is 5 million Madollar to spilt among the members -> Crowley popped up and explained many corporation sponsored this event -> Grim wanted to join for the money so he can buy tuna cans

The song for audition is “piece of my world” -> Ace wanted to try so if he got accepted he don’t need to help set up the places anymore -> Deuce wanted the reward money to help his family -> but he never did singing or dancing before so he didn’t want to join ->

In courtyard you heard someone singing beautifully -> you saw Epel ->Deuce remembered the time he bumped into Epel last chapter -> He asked Epel why is he practice singing here -> it was because Vil told Epel to practice singing to the well so Epel can hear his voice clearly -> Deuce “does Pomefiore have some rules where you have to be good at singing?” -> it was because Epel has to take the audition for VDC and practice for a more lovely voice -> Epel (whisper) “event like that should just disappear…” -> “oh my Epel, are you skipping practice and talking with pigeons now?” -> it was Vil -> Grim “that guy’s leg looks like it’s 1 meter longer than MC’s!” -> Vil “there’s only 2 month left till VDC, Epel have no times play with muddy potatoes like you people.” -> “Epel, you too, if this keep going on you won’t be able to become the ‘red poisoned apple’ let’s go.” -> Epel “…But I actully don’t!” -> Vil “did you forgot the promise with me? Just come here already.” -> Ace and Grim was pretty mad and wanted to fight -> Vil “It’s not bad for a walk after meal. Come at me, I’ll make you into mashed potato.” -> fight time -> you are beat up by Vil -> and he only gives you 5/100 for the fight since you lacked the beauty when fighting -> Epel has to go back with Vil and Vil mentioned how it ends up like this because Epel skipped practice in break

The next day -> Deuce decided to try the audition -> so if they are accepted, Epel might got eliminated and don’t need to practice anymore -> Deuce “as a honor student, I can’t just watch him being forced into the things he don’t like.” -> Ace “I don’t think it’s very honor student of you to call yourself honor student.” -> dance practice time

Kalim and Jamil showed up practice for audition too -> Kalim “honestly you guys are pretty bad at this, you look like a panicked elephant trying to stand on 2 legs! Ahhaha!” -> Deuce “man this really hurts when he’s not even try to be mean.” -> Ace asked Jamil to teach them how to dance -> Kalim “oh sure! Jamil is really good at singing.” -> Jamil “why are you replying for me! … well it is also review for me when I’m teaching someone, fine I’ll do it.” -> teaching time -> Kalim “hey, how about we practice together tomorrow too? Jamil is really good at singing, we’ll show you.” -> Jamil “! You just decided that yourself too…!” -> Kalim “it’ll be fine, besides isn’t it more fun when you have more people for dancing, singing, or partying?” -> Jamil “fine, just don’t expect me to be so kind.” -> Jamil “for now, let’s just clean up, take some mops from the storage room -> Deuce, Ace, Kalim “okay.” -> Jamil “Kalim, you don’t have to do it… sigh.”

Azul showed up -> Grim mentioned how Jamil’s evil plan was streamed worldwide last chapter.” -> Azul “why do you think the merciful me would end my classmate societal life like that?” -> Jamil “…you would.” -> that day Azul was just on phone with Jade -> Azul “different from Leona, I don’t have an interest to beat down someone more than necessary, besides it’s a secret that I’ve finally got, I won’t do anything to make the price fall like that.” -> Jamil “hate to say it, but thanks to Azul’s mercifulness, my parents and Asim family didn’t know the real reason I overblot. But the dorm students…”

Flashback -> Scarabia students questioned why Kalim don’t change the vice dorm leader after what happened

-> Kalim “are you guys worried about me? Thank you! But… he was not the only one wrong this time, I’m also at fault. Besides, is there anyone in Scarabia that have not received help from Jamil?” -> student “that, that is true… if there’s something going wrong we would always just ask him…” -> Kalim “I know right? He is an excellent vice dorm leader. A lot better than me, the dorm leader. His judgements might be clouded back then, but he is still great at his work. He did try to expel me by manipulating you guys but… up till that incident, he has never hurt me even once before. He has many chances to do other much more horrible things to me, but he didn’t. Not once, in 17 years. I won’t call him a good guy but… it’s hard to explain but would you please give us more times?” -> students “…if that’s what you said so…” -> Jamil “…”  -> end of flashback -> Jamil “the chance I had for holiday was once in a lifetime, thought my life would be over if I failed, but in the end it didn’t change that much… surely something to be ‘grateful’ for. So unless I’m fired by Kalim, I’ll continue to serve him. And I’ll continue to show everyone how useful I am.” -> Grim “Jamil… your character really changed a lot after the holiday.” -> Azul “if you are fired by Kalim, Octavinelle will always welcome people like you with open arms.” -> Jamil “thank you for the offer, but no matter what happened I would never go to Octavinelle.” -> Kalim “Hey you guys~ if we don’t head out soon we are gonna be late for class!”

3 days later -> everyone is getting better at dancing and singing -> Jamil reminded them to sign up for audition with Rook in class 3-A -> Grim saw Leona and called out to him -> Leona: angry lion noises -> Grim asked where is Rook Hunt -> Leona “why are you trying to find that weird guy.” -> Rook suddenly popped up from behind -> Rook “hahaha, did I surprised you? Pardon. Conceal my footstep sound was a habit I had. I am Rook Hunt. The hunter of love that set his life theme as looking for beauty, helping beauty.” -> Leona “tsk, there it is, that weird guy.” -> Rook asked where is monsieur dandelion -> Leona “no way we are together 24/7, just take those herbivores and go.” -> Deuce questioned who is monsieur dandelion -> it was Ruggie -> the reason why Rook calls him that is because last spring, Rook saw Ruggie picking dandelion in the sports field. Ruggie plans to eat those since his budget is a little tight this month -> so Rook calls him monsieur dandelion out of respect -> Leona “that guy… is he really fine with eating everything that’s not rotten? He didn’t make me eat dandelions too, right…?” -> Rook “non non, it’s not poison, it’s not good to be picky like that lord lion.” -> Ace brought up the audition for VDC, we almost forgot about that because of what happened -> Rook “I apologize, so you guys are, human species Ace Trappola, height 172cm, from class 1-A with student number 25. Human species Deuce Spade, height 173cm, from the same class 1-A with student number 24. And human species MC with demon beast species Grim, height 70cm. right?”

-> Deuce “how did you know our class and student number!?” -> Ace “and even height too!?” -> Rook “huhuhu. As a hunter, I have to at least know the species and heights about the students.” -> there’s no need to write anything to sign up, you only need to show up to the audition 3 days later in Pomefiore’s ballroom -> Rook ask why don’t Leona try for the auditions too -> Leona “who would go to a game event like that, besides, that annoying Vil is also there. I would never go.” -> Rook “the Vil with the beauty of metropolis, and Leona kun with the beauty of wilderness. If both of you dances and sings together it would definitely be beautiful. The competition between different types of beauty, it’s just tres bien!” -> Leona “this guy really doesn’t listen to other people at all…”

3 days later -> in Pomrfiore dorm lounge, you saw around 50 students who’s also trying for audition -> Cater was also one of it -> since he wanted to go to the event with the famous celebrity Vil -> Ace “isn’t that reason a little too light hearted?” -> Cater “really? I thought everyone is like that, I mean look.”

-> pointed at Ruggie who’s clearly here for money -> Lilia popped up again -> you recognized him as the person who handed you the holiday card -> Grim “he wasn’t the sender?” -> Lilia “the initials are different from mine right?” -> Lilia is here since he’s in light music club and it just makes sense for him to try -> he tried to invite Malleus too but he said he don’t want it to become the exhibition of some kind so he refused -> Lilia “that guy is kind of shy” -> Cater “I feels like that’s a little bit different from shy…” -> Lilia asked why didn’t Cater brought Trey along -> Cater tried but Trey has to help Riddle with all the works

they saw Ortho by himself for audition too and was surprised -> Ace commented on how Ortho looks like an elementary school student -> Cater said Ortho is accepted into this school with Idia, and they always take classes together -> Grim “how much of a brothercon is Idia…” ->Ortho “don’t talk bad on my brother!” -> Ortho explained how everything was approved by the principals, and is not like Idia brought him just because he’s lonely by himself -> Cater “sorry sorry, we kinda got to excited while talking about it since the Shroud brother is like the 7 mysteries of this school.” -> Ortho “I want to apologize for getting too upset as well, I just don’t want you to misunderstand my brother…” -> Cater asked if Ortho is also here for audition -> flashback -> basically Idia made a software with his voice to read out everything he typed -> for the speech since he just can’t talk in front of everyone -> but Idia also got pretty interested in the sound editing world -> Idia “since virtual idol is getting popular, should I put vocal synthesizer in Ortho too?” -> Ortho “sounds fun! I wanted to sing too.” ->Idia “alright~ let big brother handle everything.” -> so to test how far the vocal synthesizer can go, Ortho is here to take the audition -> Ace was surprised that they can just make singing sounds from programs -> Cater said those got quite popular and he likes it too, and wanted to show Grim a video of it -> there was an ad

Neige is promoting in the ad -> Cater mentioned how popular he is getting -> Vil, Rook, and Epel kicked in with sparkling effects -> Vil started introducing himself and explains how he will be the producer for the members appears in VDC

Auditions starts -> Ruggie sung and danced

-> Rook “monsieur dandelion. Such a light step and bright smile. With manliness and loveliness combined perfectly. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “his way of moving isn’t bad, but his dancing and singing is still messy… next!”

Cater -> Rook “monsieur magcam. Your voice sounds just like the elegant sparkling diamond! I wanted to listen to it forever. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “singing and dancing wasn’t bad, but I can’t feel any passions… next!”

Lilia -> Rook “monsieur curiosity. Such a lovely form and singing voice with an alluring aura… Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “I don’t know why… but I can’t feel any freshness of a high school student from Lilia. Next!”

Ortho -> Rook “monsieur doll. What a brand-new style…! Your robot dance and singing voice, will be sculpted into my eyes. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “no matter how genre-less this event is, there’s a limit… next!”

Kalim -> Rook “lord gold! Your dance were just like the breeze that blow through the hot sand! And the singing that make me felt like flying. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “hmm, it’s a little bit better than the vegetables that’s just rolling around.”

Jamil -> Rook “monsieur mulch. As expected… I can feel your buring soul underneath your cool mask! Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “not bad, he’s the most normal one out of all of them.”

Epel -> Rook “monsieur crabapple. So lovely! Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “that kid, misstep again, no matter how good was his rehearse, it would be meaningless if he can’t do good in the real deal. Also, Rook. aren’t you giving out nothing but 100 points? Are you judging seriously?” -> Rook “of course, but it’s so hard to pick a first when everyone are so wonderful. There’s beauty in the neatness, and there’s also beauty in the twisted. Don’t you think so?” -> last group -> Ace, Deuce, and Grim -> Rook “…I see I see.” -> end of the audition -> result will come out tomorrow -> Rook recommend the trio to Vil

Next day, Ace, Deuce, Grim just got off from class -> suddenly an arrow flies across barely missed Deuce’s nose -> Ace realized there’s a piece of paper on the arrow -> Deuce “what!? Is it a challenge to fight!?” -> Ace “stop connect everything to a fight, let me see…” -> both Ace and Deuce are accepted -> you are also asked to go with those two

You all headed towards Pomefiore -> you saw both Kalim and Jamil -> they are accepted as well -> but after going in Pomefiore, students keep showing up asking for fight -> finally you arrived to the ballroom

-> Vil showed up with sparkling effects again -> apparently the students are fighting with you because you are accepted members, it was a warm up Vil prepared for all of you so he can start the lesson right away -> Vil “listen up, start from now on we would be the representation for NRC, and aim for the first place in the VDC. The members that can’t even win a fight like that is not needed. The battle has already started and all of you should be prepared to be whipped to shape!” -> Kalim “I don’t really understand but okay!” -> Grim asks why are him and you here when you are not accepted -> Crowley showed up and explained, in order to practice for the team work, all of the members will live together in Ramshakle dorm -> Grim wanted to refuse -> but Vil and Rook said they will give you all of their reward money since their goal in this event is not money -> which is around 1.42 million -> you decided to accept the deal after all ->Vil “now let’s start the lesson!” -> Ace “I thought the lesson starts when we starts living together?” -> Vil “don’t get a big head, new potato number 1. You are still an amateur at singing and dancing, we can’t waste a single minute.” -> practice time.

 End of this update.

Oh man it tooks me a whole entire day to do this… and to think this is just like part a of part1. The chapters are getting so much longer…

I Honestly felt like I missed up half of Rook’s nicknames since I don’t know French at all, basically got everything from google so please correct me if I’m wrong.

Also, Rook’s nickname for Epel is kinda weird, he call Epel hime ringo which directly translate to princess apple, but it is also a type of apple. In English it’s called crabapple, which kind of feels different then the Japanese text.

Can I just say I love the fact that we can fight Crewel now? And I just love how he call us zasshu while fighting, it probably referenced to like mixed blood dogs and all but it only reminds me of Gilgamesh lol.

Ahhh I really want Crewel to slap me.

[tobeornottotc]

Things mentioned in TKEM that might help you predict what’s going on. -King Arthur Part 1 (Lee Lim)

These are just brain dumps, and ideas about how she might be using this story as a base. 

The legend of King Arthur has been an interesting base in TKEM. Especially surrounding the two men who are involved in the battle for the monarchy essentially: Gon and Lee Lim. The first time this book is mentioned is by Eun Sup, he listens to Taeul explain who Gon is, and calls him King Arthur. A king who starts of as a small boy who is fated to take the sword out of the stone and become king. He also has a tragic fate to be betrayed by all who he loves and fight for the control of his own throne. Sounds familiar so far with TKEM.

However, we are then introduced to Fate, and she has a conversation with Lee Lim, about the story, I became confused as well because here it seemed as if Fate was hinting that Lim is actually Arthur of the story. They have a conversation about Justice and his opinions on the story. This is not the first time we see a warped ideology on stories about fate and destiny with Lee Lim. He outright tells his brother as he kills him that he’s not afraid of being a villain because he does not believe in Karma or justice, once he’s the king he’ll change the meaning of that and succeed. Again, he does this with the yoyo boy who is known as Fate. I will explain about her later during this series.

Fate and Lee Lim’s conversation about Arthur is also interesting, she’s mocking his ideologies, but he stays steadfast. He believes because he knows the powers of the flute that he has the right to become the king, the knows how to change the laws of the universe because he has an object ‘his sword’ that can do his bidding. This is compared to Gon who uses the Flute to try and eliminate Lee Lim to get justice for the death of his loved ones. the title of the drama is all about these two, The King Eternal Monarch, its about the throne, its always been just as how the story of Arthur was also about the eternal reign of King Arthur even after he disappears. 

  So, with that I’m going to split this legend in two views, One where the King Arthur represents Gon, and another where if you actually think about it, it’s a base for Lee Lim and his tragic fate.

Lee Lim as Arthur.

Let’s go back to that conversation with Fate. Before we look at that here are certain points that are shown during that conversation:

   First it happens after Lee Lim has just had a conversation with Buyeong about coveting the throne.  Buyeong and Lim are like mirror characters, he also could have become the King, if he took the path Lee Lim took.  

Lightning causes scarring on his face, we know this hurt so its scarier he doesn’t react. This also means he’s accustomed to the symptoms of the flute for an exceptionally long time, he doesn’t care about that and he’s determined to find the other half I guess to mend it. 

Fate tells Lim that she hates blood, this shows you what side Fate is on, in my opinion, she doesn’t agree with Lim’s actions and is annoyed that he refuses to listen. 

The book is described as a story about a man with noble blood drawing a sword and becoming King. The focus is on the sword, we’ve seen the sword already. It was shown by Gon’s father and Gon uses the speech on the sword to threaten Lim about the rights of the throne. I think Lim does not care about that sword however and is more focused on the Flute instead as the sword that proves he can take over the throne. Because he has control over the flute, he has control over the monarchy and will reign forever which is his goal essentially. Also, fate is mocking Lim here again, she makes sure to emphasise that its noble blood which annoys him. Therefore, he becomes evil; he was pushed away because he wasn’t noble blood. This is fate also warning him yet again about his ideology. He also uses the sword to kill Gon’s father almost forgot about that!

The conversation then mentions the villain drawing the sword. Since I’m looking at Lim as the Arthur in this POV, its important, Lim has already drawn the sword in his opinion, he’s already become King Arthur, what he’s doing now is fighting his enemies for the throne, and trying to make a legion of followers like what happened at the end with Arthur even after he died. Lim also can’t die; he has figured out a way to keep coming back which also goes back to Arthur being reincarnated time and time again.

End of scene

 So how can Lim be Arthur? Why might KES have used him instead or his warped version of King Arthur as a base for this story? I think it lies in the original story of the legend. The fight between Arthur and Mordred. I was so excited when I discovered this even if this is just a theory.  There are many versions of the story of Arthur, his fight for justice and fight to find a good political system to help his monarchy. And his downfall.  

 Gon as Mordred

 In the earliest Arthurian legends, Mordred seems to have been regarded a hero. It wasn’t until later stories that he becomes a villain.

Mordred is always the key to his downfall. And he is normally a villain that is obsessed with vengeance and hate for Arthur. Maybe not in this case. You see Mordred is Arthur’s son in many versions. However, in the original version he is Arthur’s brother’s son Lot. See where I’m going with this. In Lamonte de Arthur, Arthur is warned to kill Mordred as a kid because he is destined to get rid of Arthur, Arthur manages not to get rid of Mordred. This is familiar to the beginning of TKEM. Lee Lim got rid of Gon’s dopple ganger in the other world and tried to also get rid of Gon but Gon was protected by a mysterious person. He failed to get rid of him and Gon is fated to destroy his plans.  In my opinion Lim is a twisted version of Arthur, he’s drawn a different sword and is trying to take over the throne, he has a legion of followers, and people willing to do his bidding but he’s going to be betrayed by them (I’ll explain my theory on this) and he’s going to be killed by his nephew just like in the original story of the legend.  I also found it exciting that Lee Lim saved Gon’s mother in Korea and is holding her hostage, remember in other text Arthur is connected to Mordred’s mother who is half-sister, or in the original his brother’s wife. Why is Lee Lim keeping Gon’s mother alive? I don’t know that’s another mystery to figure out, maybe she ends up even representing the Guinevere of the story. I’m really intrigued by her role in the drama. Let me know what you guys think about this.

Shin Jae as Lancelot

  That brings us to the next part of this theory who is the Lancelot and Guinevere of the story. The key characters to Arthurs downfall as well. I’m not sure but I have an idea about this as well. I think Kang shin Jae connects to that aspect of it. Lancelot is a loyal follower and friend of Arthur, but he gets tempted by love and betrays Arthur. Shin Jae’s mother is in the castle spying on Gon, and Lee Lim has been keeping an eye on Shin Jae. He mentions how Shin Jae is a mistake that he made I think he meant to raise up Shin Jae to be one of his ‘knights’. There’s so many people hinting to Shin Jae that instead of being good, he can be on the other side of the law, it’s like he has to constantly fight the temptation to go to the other side, I think that parallels Lancelot. He’s torn between doing the right thing (and his belief God) and giving into this lust for Guinevere.  So, what if the betrayal of Shin Jae ends up being one of the catalysts of Lim’s downfall just like Lancelot’s betrayal with Guinevere ended up weakening Arthur’s resolve making it easier for Mordred to get rid of him. What if its his most loyal follower, the man who is in the bookstore, the guy who follows the trail of Lim’s subjects?

 Taeul as Guinevere

So, thinking of Shin Jae as Lancelot I continued researching, I learnt that in the original Guinevere was you guessed it Mordred’s wife as well. What if because of Shin Jae’s love for Taeul (Lancelot’s love for Guinevere) he betrays Arthur (Lim) and she ends up with Mordred. In the original text before Lancelot was introduced, Instead of Lancelot, Guinevere was in love with Mordred, i.e. Lee Gon and Taeul’s love story we’re watching unfold. I also believe she is the key as well to Lim’s downfall so I can see how she can also play the role of Guinevere in that case.  

  This is if KES is using Lim as Arthur in this narrative and if my theory is right Lim will always come back just like Arthur except we’re in support of Mordred in this theory instead so he’s always going to be defeated by his nephew. I’m going to make a different post about what if Gon is the Arthur instead later. This will include the unbreakable sword and how KES will avoid the tragic fate of Arthur for Gon. 

[im-not-corrupted]

Safi, No (A Witchlands Fanfiction) - Chapter Six

Written with @un-empressed, who wrote Aeduan’s POV!

Read the previous chapters here: Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three | Chapter Four | Chapter Five

Chapter Summary:

Aeduan and Iseult really, really want to know why they’re friends with everyone else. Also, Safi likes to Bribe and Corrupt people.

Also on Ao3!

"Maybe tomorrow we can start some rumour?" Safi suggested, grinning widely. A gleam of mischief shone in her eyes, but really, that was pretty much there all the time now. It was her default setting, especially when it came to Merik.

Leopold hummed in acknowledgement. "Yes. Maybe tell everybody he was born with two heads and the other was surgically removed."

At the other end of the table, Vaness rolled her eyes. "That's far too unrealistic, let alone unbelievable. At least come up with something that makes sense." Iseult had been convinced Vaness wouldn't even bother with Safi's revenge plan, but here she was, in the flesh. She was fairly sure Safi had used her new method of Bribery and Corruption to convince her.

Even Stacia Sotar, one of Merik's group members, joined their group that lunch time. Iseult had to admire how well Safi's Bribery and Corruption was working, even if she didn't approve and Safi didn't actually use it on Stix.

"Or don't come up with a rumour at all," Iseult suggested. "You know, like decent people." It fell on deaf ears, though. Of course it did. They were all far too invested in this, and Iseult really wanted to know what she had done in this life to have been involved in this. Surely this was a form of karma.

"Maybe we could just say he had a terrible accident as a child and suffered a head injury which caused his brain to be very damaged, hence his stupidity?" Safi replied, seemingly taking Vaness's advice seriously. Far too seriously, considering what they were talking about.

Leopold nodded eagerly. "Yes, yes, that could work. That could definitely work." Then he turned to Vaness, who watched the two with an expression that said 'what the fuck is wrong with you two?' Based on what Iseult knew about her, she was very surprised Vaness didn't just say it. "People tend to listen to you."

"No they don't."

"Yes they do," Leopold argued.

Vaness rolled her eyes. "I am not getting involved in this."

Safi raised an eyebrow slowly and grinned at Vaness. "Oh, really?"

"Yes, really."

"Then I suppose I must resort to annoying you during geography class."

Vaness sent her a glare, which did nothing but make Safi laugh. Iseult found that a little confusing - the other day, she was scared to death of Vaness - but then she figured out why. "Fine," Vaness sighed. "But you can't annoy me in geography."

Safi grinned. "Of course." Then she turned to Iseult. "I told you. Bribery and Corruption - works like a charm."

Iseult sighed and shook her head at her friend. How on earth was she friends with Safi? They were nothing alike. Iseult was quiet, and wouldn't do something as reckless as this. Safi was loud and outgoing and determined, and come up with insane plots such as the Merik-Revenge-Plan.

But really, Iseult wouldn't replace her and Safi's friendship for something else. Even during times like this - listening to a plan on how to get revenge on someone she had never met, listening to them creating an insane rumour about the very same person - Iseult still loved her friend. Even if her friend was a terrible person sometimes and Iseult had to play the role of babysitter.

During her inner discussion with herself regarding her friendship with Safi, Aeduan had joined them, sitting next to Iseult. He didn't look happy to be here, so Iseult asked him, "Did they resort to Bribery and Corruption to get you here, too?"

Aeduan looked mildly confused by this, and he shook his head. "No? Leopold just spammed my phone with messages until I agreed to come."

She sighed. "Sounds like Bribery and Corruption to me."

That seemed to confuse him more, but he just turned to survey their company. "What did I miss?"

Iseult raised an eyebrow. "Do you really want to know?"

"Not entirely, but why not?"

"Suit yourself." She sighed. "Well, this morning, Safi resorted to Bribery and Corruption to get Vaness involved, Stacia Sotar is part of this now-"

"Wait, isn't Stacia part of Merik's group?"

She shrugged. "I thought so, but apparently not. And now Leopold wants Vaness to start a rumour about Merik."

He shook his head. "What the hell is wrong with these people?"

"Do you want a list of that, too?" She asked him. "I could probably write one up by tomorrow."

He laughed slightly, loud enough for Safi to hear. She sent her a small smirk before continuing her planning. "No, I think I can figure that out."

"Thank god," she replied, smiling faintly. "My hand would hurt a lot if I had to do that."

This time, he laughed loudly, eyes bright. And Safi didn't even bother reserving her smirk for just her, because Aeduan noticed it. "Why is she doing that again?"

She sighed. "You don't want to know." When he looked like he was about to protest, she said, "Trust me."

Aeduan shrugged. "If you say so."

Then Safi checked her phone and groaned. "Well damn, Eron wants me home." Iseult felt like cheering at that. "We'll continue planning over the group chat." She didn't feel like cheering at that.

"There's a group chat?" She questioned, because this was news to her.

Safi grinned. "Of course. Check your phone."

Iseult did, and groaned when she saw the notification. She mostly kept her phone on silent, with vibrate off, so she hadn't noticed. Safi had named the group 'REVENGE PLAN' and both words were bracketed by an evil devil emoji. She quickly checked to see who else was in it, and found it was the whole gang, including Aeduan and Vaness. "Really, Safi?"

Aeduan snorted and she glared at him. "You're on here too."

His eyes widened in panic and he searched through his pockets to find his phone. He quickly looked for the notification and groaned when he found it. "Really, Safi?" He echoed.

Safi nodded eagerly. "Of course. Now, I must go. See you." Then she glared at Vaness. "Don't forget to spread that rumour."

Vaness rolled her eyes. "The chances of me forgetting this are non-existent."

[x]

It was foolish of Aeduan to think that he would escape the revenge plan that day. Still, getting hundreds of messages from Leopold was not what he expected. Looking back on it, Aeduan didn't know how he didn't see it coming. Leopold was truly something else.

Aeduan didn't know why he let himself get dragged along, but he found that he didn't mind. He noticed new faces. One of them had to be the Vaness Safi was planning on convincing to help them. Or maybe convincing wasn't the right word.

Aeduan sat next to Iseult, hoping she would see how lost he was and explain who the newcomers were. Instead she asked him : "Did they resort to Bribery and Corruption to get you here, too?"

Well, Bribery and Corruption sounded way more accurate than just 'convincing', but it wasn't what he was expecting. He shook his head. "No? Leopold just spammed my phone with messages until I agreed to come."

"Sounds like bribery and corruption to me."

Aeduan didn't even know why he was there. Iseult was the only half sane person in the group, and even she confused him endlessly. "What did I miss?"

Iseult raised her eyebrows. "Do you really want to know?"

Aeduan did not. "Not entirely, but why not?"

"Suit yourself." She sighed. "Well, this morning, Safi resorted to Bribery and Corruption to get Vaness involved, Stacia Sotar is part of this now-"

Now Aeduan was even more confused. "Wait, isn't Stacia a part of Merik's group?" Iseult shrugged. "I thought so, but apparently not. And now Leopold wants Vaness to start a rumour about Merik." He shook his head. Out of all the annoying people he could've met, he got himself involved with the worst group possible. "What the hell is wrong with these people?" "Do you want a list of that, too?" Iseult asked him. "I could probably write one up by tomorrow." He laughed slightly, loud enough for Safi to hear. She sent her a small smirk before continuing her planning. "No, I think I can figure that out." "Thank god," Iseult replied, smiling faintly. "My hand would hurt a lot if I had to do that." Aeduan laughed, despite it not really being a joke in the sense that it was untrue. He caught Safi looking at him and Iseult, much like yesterday. "Why is she doing that again?" She sighed. "You don't want to know." When he looked like he was about to protest, she said, "Trust me." Aeduan shrugged. "If you say so." Then Safi checked her phone and groaned. "Well damn, Eron wants me home. We'll continue planning over the group chat." "There's a group chat?" Iseult asked Safi grinned. "Of course. Check your phone." Iseult did so, and then groaned. "Really, Safi?" Aeduan snorted and she glared at him. "You're on here too." His eyes widened in panic and he searched through his pockets to find his phone. He quickly looked for the notification and groaned when he found it. The group chat had the least subtle name of all, and Aeduan wasn't even sure how Safi got his number. Probably Leopold. "Really, Safi?" He echoed. Safi nodded eagerly. "Of course. Now, I must go. See you." Then she glared at Vaness. "Don't forget to spread that rumour." Vaness rolled her eyes. "The chances of me forgetting this are non-existent."

When Aeduan got home, he checked the group chat once again. He saw that there was already a conversation going on, and the name had changed from REVENGE PLAN to BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION. That inside joke still confused Aeduan. He had to admit that it was awfully fitting, though.

He scrolled up to the beginning.

Stix: My friends asked what I was doing with you the rest of the lunch? And I don't know what to say?

Safi: Say you were bribed and corrupted

Iseult: Do not say that

Safi: Come on, we all know that bribery and corruption is the only way

Leopold: Only way to do what?

Safi: The only way

*Safi changed the group name to BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION*

Stix: That does not answer my question

Vaness: Say you were just standing up for Merik?

​​​​​Stix: Ahahahahha as if I would ever

Safi: I like you already

Stix: Feelings not mutual until you return my pen

Stix: I still can't believe you gave it to someone who didn't need a damn pen

Safi: I thought it was Merik's, you can't blame me

​​Stix: I certainly can

Aeduan was amused by the exchange.  He was about to type an excuse, but Vaness already sent something.

Vaness: I might be planning to "bribe and corrupt" another person. She refused once but I cannot deal with the lot of you on my own

Safi: Love you too

*

Read Chapter Seven here: Chapter Seven.

[atamascolily]

Lily reads Star Wars: Red Harvest, part four

In which sentient plants offer excellent advice, but it doesn't help, and the zombie mayhem at Sith Hogwarts begins.

(If you’re just joining me, check out the “Red Harvest” tag on my blog for previous posts)

At Sith Hogwarts, we learn that the Big Bad is even more devious than we previously assumed:

Her name’s Hestizo Trace,” the Whiphid said. “She’s the orchid’s keeper. It needs her to—”

“Survive,” Scabrous said. “I know. That’s how I knew you were bringing me the genuine article.” He reached up and touched her face, his gloved hand cold against her cheek, like leather wrapped around an iron rod. “It was the one piece of information that I withheld about the orchid.”

PRO-TIP: DON'T DO BUSINESS WITH THE SITH. THEY *ALWAYS* CHEAT.

The Sith Lord nodded. “My droid will pay you on the way out.”

Time for another double-cross? That droid ain’t a HK for nothing...

Anyway, horrible Sith experiments follow using the orchid. Other Sith students spy and scheme. The student Scabrous tortured to death rises from his cage and breaks free. The zombie's first act is to bite off part of Darth Scabrous's face. Good for him, though it doesn't take.

Metal struck metal with a flat, declarative clang that reminded him somehow of the sound of training blades clashing at the top of the temple. It was a noise that said: Things have been put into motion, and whatever happens next, there will be no going back.

#accurate

More Sith students die, but it's hard to care because they're such terrible people. (Though we also learn that some of them were conscripted into the Academy, so they didn't necessarily start off as terrible people, but they sure are now!) I'm skimming a lot because it's all incredibly violent.

Zo escapes in the chaos. Darth Scabrous does some awful Sith alchemy to keep from turning into more of a monster than he already is. Zo eavesdrop on the Sith masters explaining to the students that it's just another Tuesday:

Zo realized as she listened that she could hear a slight but unmistakable tremor of concern in the Master’s tone. He was doing everything he could to cover it up, and perhaps the students were fooled, but to her mind he might as well have been wearing a placard: I’M DOING MY BEST TO SPIN A SITUATION THAT I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO ABILITY TO COMPREHEND, LET ALONE CONTROL, AND—

The orchid talks to Zo and warns her of trouble, but it doesn't help. The bounty hunter shows up again and grabs her before the infected students do. Cliffhanger!

Meanwhile, we meet a Sith nerd who just wants to translate secret Sith scrolls for Ultimate Power--who is also the only female student we've seen thus far. There's a sentient tree librarian in a crumbling library and I'm here for it.

“Something unsettling you, Kindra?” His voice was thick and raspy. “Some uncertainty of the mind, yes?”

“No.”

The librarian didn’t respond, just continued to slither his branches downward until the great bulk of his trunk dangled upside down in front of her, the warty, centuries-old eyes narrowing with myopic consideration. Dail’Liss had been the curator of the library for as long as anyone could remember, perhaps going back a thousand years or more. Although his elaborate root system was permanently embedded somewhere deep in the foundation, a seemingly endless network of branches and limbs allowed him to slide unimpeded through its walls and hollows. Ironically, it was this constant writhing and squirming that undermined the infrastructure of the building itself. Rumor was that it would only be a matter of time before the Neti brought the library down on top of him, sealing himself forever amid his own precious holdings—a fitting enough end, when Kindra thought about it.

“Look.” Kindra shook her head, increasingly irritated by the librarian’s evasiveness. “Either you have answers for me or you don’t. Either way I’m not going to stay in here and hide.”

“Best course of action, I would say.”

Tree!Librarian is right. She's not going to survive is, she? But I'm still kinda rooting for her, if only because everyone else is so awful in comparison. We haven't seen Kindra doing anything evil yet, but I'm sure she has, if only because she's still alive in this place and kindness is anathema to baby Sith.

The Tree!Librarian also doesn't seem evil... yet? How did he get here? What's his deal and why? I am so curious and this is all the backstory I'm getting, which is to say, almost nothing. Sigh.

One of the students gets bitten. His arm starts rotting.  This Is Fine.

“Something’s wrong.”

“Meaning what?”

“I’ve got a bad feeling.” ...

“About what?”

“I don’t know—this night, everything. You feel it?”

“Nope.” He shook his head, feigning an indifference that he didn’t even remotely feel. “Just another day in paradise, as far as I’m concerned.”

LOL, irony.

More zombies. More attacks on Sith students. Chapter Twenty is called "Lockdown" and I just can't even. Most of the Sith students are literally locked in the cafeteria with their ex-colleagues, and then the bloodbath starts. They're using the Dark Side to fight the zombies. It doesn't go well.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, this whole premise is fucking genius, because again, everyone at a Sith Academy is a horrible person doing horrible things in their horrible gothic nightmare castle, so it's hard to feel bad when they are horribly murdered by horrible Sith zombie alchemy monsters. It just feels like Laser-Guided Karma.

Shit just got real because Not!Qui-Gon arrives at the Sith Academy. The mechanic who greeted the bounty hunters is now missing, presumed dead It's tough to be psychometrist when everything you touch generates visions of violent death.

Meanwhile, a handful of surviving Sith students team up, kinda:

Ra’at held Maggs and Hartwig in the same regard that he did the rest of his classmates, with a kind of suspicious indifference. Their motives were purely selfish, as were his; he had no intention of sharing information that didn’t somehow improve his own situation. At this point they all knew something had gone very wrong, contaminating the academy or the entire planet; for the moment they were allies of opportunity.

These Sith can't even work together long enough to survive the crisis. No wonder the Jedi eventually kicked the Siths’ collective asses through the Power of Friendship.

Here, have some conspiracy theories along with your nightmare fuel:

“We all feel something kind of bad in the air, right? Like maybe some kind of a … disease. But who’s to say it’s not just one of Scabrous’s drills?”

Kindra’s eyebrows went up. “Excuse me?”

“For all we know he started this himself.”

“Why?”

“Maybe it is a training exercise,” Maggs put in. “Or maybe he’s culling the weak students. It’s happened before. Remember the unakki eye spiders?”

“This is worse,” Kindra said.

“Don’t be so sure,” Hartwig said. “Eleven students went blind. Two of them died. Remember Soid Einray?”

“Soid Einray was a defective already.”

“Maybe, but he still hung himself afterward. And then we found out that Scabrous had reactivated the fertilized spider eggs from the pathogen bank as a nerve-reflexivity drill.” Hartwig refused to lower his stare. “I still wake up with blood in my eyes sometimes.”

Just another day at Sith Hogwarts, am I right? What a terrible place.

Ra’at began concentrating solely on himself and his own survival, forgetting all the others. The Masters at the academy had trained them to fight as a unit when necessary, but a Sith warrior’s true strength lay in his or her own personal will to power. When you could trust no one, fighting alone was axiomatic, a natural state.

Flattening himself to the wall, he felt the Force’s dark side coursing through him, a crackling electric chill that rendered fear and apprehension obsolete, and welcomed it. In that moment, he felt only a ready vigilance, weightless and unrelenting. Since arriving here on Odacer-Faustin, it was the closest to happiness that he dared let himself experience. Yet in so many ways it was superior to any happiness he’d ever encountered. It made traditional happiness look anemic by comparison.

The POV Sith students watch the cafeteria zombie attack on the security cameras, and realize what they're up against. Meanwhile, Zo is also realizing how much trouble she's in, and the orchid is having a breakdown:

They can’t be killed, a voice whispered from the back of her mind, they’re already dead, look at them. At first she thought she was hearing her own thoughts, and then she realized it was the Murakami orchid, roiling in its own guilt and misery, yammering out words that she alone could hear. Dead but alive, Hestizo, dead but alive, I did this to them, it was my fault, when Scabrous put me into that horrible vat, and now I’m inside them—

Poor orchid. I really like that it isn't evil and is just as horrified as Zo about all this. I’m still not sure how that’s possible, or what actually happened, but that’s okay, because none of the character do, either!

Zo is about to be eaten by the zombies, but then--

I’ve got an idea, she told the orchid. Grow.

What?

You’re in them now, she said, aren’t you? You’re a part of them. You said so yourself.

The orchid does, and the zombies explode through Plant Power.

She concentrated harder—she could actually see the flora growing inside the things now, driving it harder, farther, faster from within, even as the orchid began crying out, begging her to stop, telling her that this hurt, it couldn’t do it anymore—

A lot of screaming follows. But it does work. Once. And then the orchid passes out and... becomes evil? Oh, no, I hope not. Turns out the bounty hunter is still alive, and she's working with him now to survive, like you do. I bet he’s regretting his life choices right now, too.

At that moment, Scabrous had assumed that what he’d seen was a kind of exaggerated nervous twitch, a biochemical accident that the drug and the orchid had triggered inside Nickter’s body. But now—

I wasn’t kidding when I said nobody knows what’s going on; not even the Big Bad has any idea of the forces (ha!) he’s unleashed. He determines that Zo is fleeing for the library, and prepares to trap her there. Will not!Qui-gon get there in time?

Spoiler: not quite.

[davetheshady]

may I politely request ⭐dealer's choice director's commentary⭐for pretty much any part of Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies?

Did you mean: infodump about Chapter 5?

We start off in medias res during Pteranodon Attack-Gate from Episode 4: PTA Meeting. Since most of the fic runs parallel to WTNV’s storyline for the first ~two years, the way I narrowed down which events to feature was to read through the transcripts and take note of which ones had Carlos, which ones featured science/magic/time travel-related elements, which ones had weird discrepancies or unsolved details that could be explained by Carlos/science/magic/time travel/all of the above, and which ones I just liked a lot. 

Incidentally, Cecil issues a correction that the winged reptiles in question were actually pterodactyls, not pteranodons, which was then promptly forgotten by the showrunners lol.

"—And then Kelly pulled her hamstring while they were doing the Fixing of a Nail position. I'm trying to convince her that she and Joe should do yoga together, I think it would really cut back on minor injuries and also they both look great in yoga pants. Anything new with you, Carlos?"

"Nothing that compares to... hamstring injuries," says Carlos, from his position on top of the Sciencemobile.

"All right," says Kate, adjusting an enormous pair of mirrored aviator shades. "Then describe the Barstow formation."

Since literal character doubling was such an important part of the plot, I had a lot of fun with thematic character doubling, too. Carlos and Kate (and the other grad students) are actually pretty close in age, and here we see her willing to put herself into danger to get the job done while casually chatting with her colleagues. Also, there’s a nice dose of karma for the books in Carlos having to deal with someone else oversharing details about their relationships, compounded by the fact that unlike his all of Kate’s are actually true. (In nicer doubling news: Kate is the one who gets her degree in science, has functional romantic relationships, AND continues to work in Night Vale, which are all eventually Carlos’ hashtag life goals.) 

"Maybe it was future you," asks Julie, who does not sound appropriately concerned for the potentially diverted course of the Currents of Time. Or for the potentially diverted course of the already unlinear life of Carlos.

This is the first conversation where she’s ‘Julie’ in his mental narration. I enjoyed having her be hilariously unsympathetic to his concerns here, because her priorities are still very different, but it also sets up a baseline. She doesn’t bother worrying about hypotheticals from the weird shit, but actual hard data (like, Carlos not sleeping and having minor breakdowns in her lab) is what prompts her to share reactions besides SCIENCE! and snark.

His stomach roils at the thought of more time travel. "Some kind of illusion is more likely," he says: some person or creature temporarily assuming his form, probably for sinister purposes. He reluctantly adds those weird doubles from the sandstorm to his list of possible suspects, though his dissolved right in front of him in the middle of next March and there haven't been any sandstorms recently.

oh hey haha what’s that

One of my biggest pet peeves in fiction is when allegedly intelligent characters ignore obvious plot points so the writer can railroad the story in their chosen direction. On the other hand, it is genuinely difficult to avoid spoiling your plot twists if your main character is actively trying to figure them out. I leaned heavily on “the character has all the basic details… along with so much other information they can’t realistically narrow it down”, combined with some red herrings: an obvious one (illusion magic) and hopefully a more convincing one (time travel as the only relevant plot: it's DEFINITELY involved, but its presence is obscuring another facet of the plot altogether).

There's always a risk that astute readers will figure it out, but, like… so? That just means instead of shocking plot twist reveal, they get an “I KNEW IT!” reveal, which is equally satisfying in a different way. As long as the characters have convincing reasons for not figuring it out, it's hopefully still enjoyable to follow along with them as they wander around in the dark. 

(And just for clarification: that was Doppel-Carlos crashing the town hall meeting when he and Dr. Raith were testing out time vortices.) 

Andre hands him a copy of the Night Vale Daily Journal. “’Look your best to face the void. Smooth-chinned souls are most enjoyed’,” reads Carlos. “‘Burma-Shave.’”

"No, below the ads," says Andre.

1) ‘character reads wrong piece of information in paper’ is a classic goof (“There’s a sale at Penney’s!”) and I found it very amusing to repeatedly attribute it to Carlos, since he’s genuinely trying to locate the important information. Unfortunately for him, he lives in Night Vale and no longer has a filter for “useless nonsense”, because even the nonsense has proven relevant and/or kinda murdery before.

2) Burma-Shave! This was passed down to me as part of our Great American Roadtrip Family Lore (I come from a long line of roadtrippers) and it’s definitely the kind of kitschy 50s detail that fits so well in Night Vale.

"Oh!" says Cecil. "What were you studying?"

"Bioremediation for contaminated pit lakes via sulfur-reducing bacteria," says Carlos truthfully.

Why? Because I edited one of my friends’ papers on it, that’s why. (Birds kept landing on it and dying, which is also a very Night Vale detail.)

When he returns, he finds Cecil standing by the record player with his back against the wall, staring fixedly at Carlos’ vinyl copy of Ixnay on the Hombre.

One of the DF books (I think White Night) had a hilariously high number of characters showing up wearing band t-shirts, and Carlos’ was for The Offspring. (The original file name for this fic was Original Prankster, back when I thought it would be three chapters long.)

“It’s about a wizard stranded in a strange, uncharted desert territory,” [Cactus Judy] says serenely.

Cactus Jane! I decided to make her a recurring character because 1) she’s in a time travel episode (Episode 18: The Traveler), 2) both she and TMITJ had the detail where no one can remember their real name, which seemed significant, and 3) WTNV itself did not have very many recurring female characters at that point. She’s into Shakespeare because I personally knew a lot of relevant Shakespeare quotes, but also as a hint that’s she’s a lot older (and thus a lot more supernatural) than she seems: Shakespeare was a HUGE part of pop culture in the 19th century, particularly in the southwest. Theater companies used to make more money going on tour through states with precious metal mines than they did during their whole season in the big coastal cities, probably because jaded city folks never threw gold nuggets on stage to show their appreciation.

If life is a contest between good and evil, Cecil would be one of the people handing out stickers just for participating.

This is one of my favorite lines.

My plan is fool-proof! It's sheer elegance in its simplicity!

Look, if you enjoyed this fic, WTNV, and/or The Dresden Files, you should probably go watch The Middleman. Yes, I know it’s not streaming, do it anyway. Load up on antivenom and go rent it from your local library.

“Could you [create a time vortex]?""Oh, for sure," says Carlos. "All I'd need would be a couple years to do nothing but work on a highly illegal spell and figure out a way to steal an entire ley-line's worth of power and excise my sense of morality and self-preservation.”

And WHAT are the odds of THAT

It's not that Carlos doesn't like him. It just wouldn't be fair to lead him on when Carlos wouldn't actually—

Well, Carlos wouldn’t mind asking but he doesn’t normally go for—

Okay, Carlos could definitely make an exception for Cecil and—

And—

oh NO he accidentally used logic to make himself admit he has FEELINGS

One of the reasons I love this pairing is that you have Cecil, who is incredibly emotionally open (all the time, on public radio) as a distinct contrast to Carlos, who is so used to putting up a very specific facade that he even does it to himself and then struggles when he doesn't have it to rely on. It creates conflict, but it also means they have very different perspective they can share with each other. 

"Did the earth move for you, too?" says Cecil.

"Bwuh?" replies Carlos.

"At the monitoring station," says Cecil, because right, they're talking about science and not about how Carlos may or may not have accidentally developed a tiny, tiny crush on Cecil, who is standing right in front of him and looking extremely interested in what he's saying and will commit his words to memory and lovingly repeat them for all the world, or at least all of Night Vale and anyone else who received the same odd death curse as Carlos, to hear.

"Oh. Hmm – unh," replies Carlos, then shakes his head. Not talking, that's the way to go. That way he won't accidentally say something he doesn't mean, or worse, something he does mean but probably shouldn't say. Cecil can ask him science questions and he can shake his head yes or no, and maybe refer him wordlessly to supplementary materials, and it will all be very professional and—

"Where did you get your shirt?" asks Cecil. "It fits you so well."

"I'll look at my notes and computer models and see if I can figure out what's going on," Carlos blurts out, and practically runs from the room.

One of the reasons I started writing this fic (SEPTEMBER 2013, BABY god I feel old) was because we all knew Carlos was immensely important to Cecil, but had relatively little information about him, and ALL of it was filtered through our unreliable narrator. So… I just kind of ran with that. 

But on top of the obvious unreliability of “didn't notice Carlos was a wizard from a different series”, I wanted to do it on the smaller scale, too, and put a different spin on the touchstones of their growing relationship that everyone was already familiar with. So this interaction is now a crisis for both of them, and for dramatically/hilariously different reasons. 

“If you’re worried about going native, I’ve got bad news for you, buddy, because you do more chanting than anyone I’ve met.”

Another one of my favorite lines.

“I’ve had to hunt down people I know before, and trust me, it’s not a fun date night!”

Between Molly and fanon interpretations of Cecil, Carlos’ type is apparently 1) weird tattoos, 2) unusually-colored hair, and 3) can kill him

There's a brief hiss from the TV's speakers, and then Cecil says, in a small, forlorn voice, “I don't know if he listens to me, sometimes.”

Carlos puts his head down and laughs bitterly.

I LOVE IRONY 

But even though I wanted to subvert the surface meaning, Cecil DOES still have a point. He got a good look at Carlos’ soul when they first met and still fell in love instantly, but Carlos has a difficult time hearing that because at this point he fundamentally does not believe he’s worthy of that kind of love. In order to truly believe Cecil, he also has to start learning to love and accept himself. (It’s very much a work in progress, but nobody’s perfect.) The title isn’t just meant to refer to romantic love – self-love, friendship, familial love, and unconditional love for the humanity of his trash fire town are equally important, because they all support each other.

hmu for more dvd commentary!

[killinbills]

hi! i’m currently struggling with the summary for my fic like i don’t want to make it boring with barley anything but i also don’t wanna i reveal everything (did that even make sense¿) any advice?

(this was sent weeks ago and im so sorry it took me so long to respond!!)

right ok so, when i write a summary, in the first summary i make sure to introduce the main character especially. (im gonna use clueless, morningstar, and ruby ruby as an example) (the only reason im using a few is bc i want to show that there are lots of different ways of writing a summary, it really depends on the story)

this is super long so read under the cut xo

CLUELESS: OK, SO, BRIAR CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH — she did not mean to act out the second she stepped foot in Beauxbatons, her grandparents deciding that Hogwarts (for ‘reasons unknown’) was no longer good enough for her and her little brother. She did not mean to find out that her grandparents had forced her and her brother out of the country to avoid them from meeting their father, who had become the newest D.A.D.A. professor… Nor did she mean to get so angry by this that she, well, gave her best friends a run for their money. Fireworks lighting up the dining hall, statues transfigured to resemble David Bowie — everything she remembered her best friends talking about doing, she did, putting her own twist on it (hence David Bowie… and Freddie Mercury… and ABBA…)

MORNINGSTAR: HERE’S THE DEAL — Isabelle Oswald is, sort-of, a changeling. The daughter of the devil given to a human man, a rich lawyer in the Upper East Side, who couldn’t have another kid. Her best friend Riley says that it isn’t really a changeling, more like a demon, but anyway. All Isabelle knows is that she’s pretty much a vampire, swap the blood-sucking for a general need to feed off of energy. And she supposes that’s where her 'birth name’ came from, Moroi Morningstar, but again, whatever. The main issue on the table isn’t so much Isabelle’s weird, but rather, Isabelle doesn’t have to be evil, so she isn’t going to — like, sure, her birth father was a fallen angel, but that doesn’t mean she is. It’s the same as those creeps that are half-angel. (The only saint she needs is Laurent, thanks!)

RUBY, RUBY: RUBY SULLIVAN likes to do the right thing — and she knows this sounds like bullshit, what with associating herself with Carol and Tommy, but for some reason her best friend Steve likes them and that’s enough for her to stomach them. But she likes to do good. Her dad always says stuff about karma and Ruby hopes that if she’s good to the world, the world will be good back… And by “good back,” she means that she’ll get into a good college, or at least find a way to escape Hawkins… And maybe, along the way, Ruby will be able to finally stand up for herself…

so in the first paragraph, i’ve introduced the main character and the situation that they’re in. it’s not so much the actual plot, but like, it’s some background on the character and what’s going on, and also it gives the readers an idea of where the story’s going to start. also, if when you’re writing about what’s going on with your character, if you can find the opportunity to mention other details

eg

“the newest D.A.D.A. professor” = remus is briar’s dad, and “her best friends a run for their money” = if you’re a fan of hp you can gather she’s friends with the twins

“she’s pretty much a vampire” then the specifics introduce isabelle’s powers, and the description about her dad and her origin also explain what’s going on. also, you’re introduced to her best friend riley, and although she’s introduced anyway in the actual story and you don’t need to introduce every single character, riley is important and by having her in the intro puts some emphasis on that

“likes to do the right thing” so ok you know ruby’s motivation already, but also the fact that she’s friends with carol, tommy, and steve. with “escape hawkins” and “stand up for herself,” you can also gather that in this story, you’re gonna have a character that wants to leave her hometown and wants to stand up for themselves (a lot of this does focus more on my next point tho)

then, this is optional, but if possible, you can introduce the character’s personality and, uh, character. obviously this depends on your writing style and whether or not when you’re writing the summary you can add it in without it sound strange, but if possible, introduce the readers to your character. (it’s not like u want them to read a whole story about them)

examples:

from clueless you can gather that briar’s rebellious but also what music she likes. tbh this summary doesn’t show this point as much as the others but that’s okay!! sometimes one summary will have lots of background or introducing the character’s personality and sometimes it won’t!! it depends on the story you’re writing!!

for izzy however, you can get her personality. the informal language (”kid,” “blood-sucking,” “those creeps”) kinda give the sense that izzy’s the opposite of serious, and again that sort of language in a way shows izzy’s age a little? also, the same goes with the “but whatever,” and “but anyway.” like izzy as a character is quite carefree and bubbly. and then, with “the only saint she needs is laurent, thanks!” introduces a couple of things: izzy makes remarks, izzy is rich (bc she’s mentioning a luxury brand like it’s a brand she’s accustomed to), and izzy can be materialistic. like. the only saint she needs is laurent. she’s what madonna was singing about in material girl likeee

with ruby it’s a lot more obivous, and also a lot more stressed? so like in the intro to ruby ruby it shows: ruby wants to do the right thing (so her morals), ruby’s an optimistic character (”she hopes”), and she wants to stand up for herself. because with ruby ruby, the full introduction introduces all of the sullivans, the paragraph for each character was sort of more “yo this is this one” and much less of “this is the full story.” for ruby ruby, the full story’s introduced a lot more in the final paragraph

normally when i write a introduction i stick to two paragraphs and then maybe one sentence right at the end, which often becomes the short summary for the full thing. so in the second paragraph, i introduce the plot. not all of it, but enough to get a reader interested.

CLUELESS: But things take a turn at the end of the school year, when Madame Maxime pulls her aside and informs her of the Triwizard Tournament, a game where Beauxbatons competes against Durmstrang Institute and Hogwarts. And, in the words of Madame Maxime herself — “the school will burn down if I leave you here, so, you are coming, too.”

Fair enough.

MORNINGSTAR: The thing is, though — Isabelle doesn’t want to become a superhero. There are lots of other ways to improve the world, and if anything, she wishes she could keep her powers as hidden as possible. But, when things start to go upside down, it becomes a lot less difficult to stay secret. More and more monsters begin cropping up in her side of the woods, girls from her high school are disappearing left, right, and centre, with the explanation of “We want Morningstar” — and to top it off, her heart skips a beat every time she runs into the kid called Spiderman, even though they’ve managed to be on opposite ends of the civil war between the Avengers…

Life’s hard when you’re the devil’s daughter.

RUBY, RUBY: So when Will Byers goes missing, both Ruby and Lisa are thrown into the deep end. Whilst Ruby’s helping his older brother Jonathan, Lisa’s forced to speak to her own friends again, upon noticing the weird girl that she and Ruby helped escape from the restaurant earlier that week. And now, both girls are living up to their parents’ life lesson of “the most important thing is being good,” even if it means they’re hurtling towards the life their parents escaped from all those years ago…

normally it starts with, “so when this happens,” and it won’t introduce all of the plot, but it’ll introduce part of it.

like, with clueless, in the intro you learn that briar’s going back to hogwarts. you don’t know she becomes a werewolf, you don’t know that she starts to have doubts about preferring hogwarts to beauxbatons, a lot of the plot is unknown, but there’s still enough for a reader to like the sounds of it, and keep on reading.

same with morningstar. it carries on the explaining from the first paragraph but then, you find out that monsters are appearing (but not which ones) and that girls are going missing because someone wants isabelle, but you don’t know why. the stuff’s introduced, in enough detail for a reader to be interested, and then i introduced the love interest. like your readers don’t need to know every single detail off the bat, just enough to be interested

then with ruby ruby. ruby and her little sister are going to be involved with the main story in stranger things. you know who they’ll be hanging out with, but you don’t really know why, nor do you know the rest of the details. at the end i mentioned that their parents were connected with the upside down at one point, but you don’t know what they actually did. just that they were involved. it’s just enough for the reader to be like, “oh shit” and want to read the actual chapters

so, in summary:

introduce your character (because it’s that kid that’s gonna attract readers at the end of the day)

introduce the plot but not in much detail. just enough for readers to be intrigued

make sure the intro reflects upon the story like,,,, don’t give me a fun introduction when the actual story is sad and serious u know

i know it’s super difficult to actually write a summary but i try to keep things in mind when i’m writing mine. like i always want to make sure that the introduction properly reflects upon the story and the character. and again, a lot of the stuff i talked about i don’t make sure to include, it’s more like, i’ll be conscious of the words i’m using when i’m writing it. also a lot of my intros are pretty informal but that’s because my narrative style’s definitely influenced by reading too much meg cabot and lisi harrison when i was little lmao

also!! when you’re writing a summary don’t be afraid to have a look at others. like don’t copy them but look at how different people have written them. like even with three of mine, there’s some variety. there’s no harm in reading others to get a feel of what to write yourself

hope this helps!! :-)

ask me questions!!

also: clueless, morningstar, ruby ruby