#anyways. Thanks again for the ask <3

[a-real-chicxulub-vibe]

Heyo! This is a bit out of the blue, but I am missing Ciaran and the Knights of Gwyn these days, so since I know you are a fellow Ciaran stan, I wanted to ask if you had any favorite headcanons for her? :)

Oh man!! Lots! Thank you for asking, the Lord's Blade is a seriously compelling character and I'm always happy to talk about her. :>

Here's a few to do with her pre-Knighthood days.

🥀🥀🥀

🗡️ Ciaran remembers when the world was young. Orphaned and friendless at a young age, she spent her childhood among the ghettos of New Londo, built underground to help withstand the frequent dragon attacks.

🗡️ Ciaran is indeed a full-blooded Medial, or one born of Gwyn's race. Her parents likely died in the war, though as a girl she always secretly suspected they abandoned her. All the other adults of New Londo were shady, dangerous. Her parents must have fit right in.

🗡️ As a child, Ciaran developed a passion for theater. Ciaran would eventually weaponize this to become anyone she needed to be as the mission demanded. But as a child, it was innocent, and for a time she and the other children would perform shows in the evenings. Perhaps she had always wanted to be someone else.

🗡️ Ciaran loves flowers. As a child in New Londo, sny artifacts from the surface were treasures. The glowing Darkroot Lilies became particular favorites, as they grew best in the dark.

🗡️ As a young woman, she too volunteered to fight in the Dragon War, and eventually became a Silver Knight. As a New Londo urchin, who was familiar with the humans and the shadows, she was already an outcast. She also became known for forgoing any shield on the battlefield, preferring dual swords.

🗡️ The snowy-white north was a deathtrap. The Dragons still ruled there in Ciaran's time, and the territory was of little value. Still, she and her company were assigned to go, and serve under an unproven captain.

🗡️ Those years in the north were the hardest she had ever known. Endless ice, blizzards, snowfalls higher than the top of one's head. People starved. People died. Ciaran was a recluse. She twisted orders. She broke off from formations. She was ungovernable. She was hopeless. She was going to die here. And for who?

🗡️ A great dragon ambushed the meager camp one day, and Ciaran predictably became separated. She was ready to accept her fate. But the captain leapt from the side, and misdirected the deadly strike. Shielding her with his body, he suffered horrific scars, before the dragon moved on. There, they were abandoned in the snow, left to die.

🗡️ Ciaran came to terms with the betrayal of her peers slowly. Not that she was shocked to have been forgotten, per se. She had already seen herself as unlikeable, unknowable. But the fact that one specifically of their number -- the strange young captain -- had almost died for her. And now they both lay injured and dying and alone in the snow. And with nothing else to do but wait, they talked.

🗡️ Ornstein, he said his name was. His family destroyed by the dragons, just like hers apparently was. But somehow the moron managed to twist his tragedy into a misguided sense of honor and duty. How sad. Didn't save his life, now did it?

🗡️ She heaved him onto her back that day, and they trudged through the snow. They rendezvoused with the rest of the contingent days later, where the poor captain was wheeled away by a gaggle of priests. Surely he wouldn't make it. It all was surely for naught. Everyone was going to die, one day. She couldn't understand why she had even bothered to help.

🗡️ She deserted. They could search all they want--Ciaran knew disappearing like no one else. Her next years were regrettable. She drank, she gambled. The terrible memories of the north stuck to her, like starvation to one's ribs, like frostbite to the toes. It was vital that she forgot. It was vital that she find out how to live again. It was vital she that she forget she never knew how to live at all.

🗡️ Years later, she received a plain-stamped letter. A letter of thanks. An invitation to a warm meal and a warm bed, courtesy of a nameless benefactor. How could she refuse? And indeed, how could said benefactor not find and repay the woman who long ago in the terrible North had saved his life?

sorry, I you said "favorite headcanons", but,,,

[appallinnballin]

waves!! hiiii so i wanted to ask if you could perhaps like, draw N or like J from murderdrones bc i love them and i think they would look so cool in your style!!

i love your art sm, byeee

hiiiiiiiiii i just did J but hope that is acceptable ^_^

[basketobread]

How does Lunara feel about... Lolth

not good lol

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

I love how you draw Xie Lian fucking jacked lmao

He's built like a trucker. To Me.

[inkyajax]

gmorning Clari!!! 💘 I’m not sure you’ve done it before, but I’d loooove to know what type of yanderes you’d classify your genshin faves as 😘

ANDYYYY i am so sorry i am responding a few days late to this and that’s because i accidentally wrote you a whole novel for an answer :) your ask sparked so many thoughts and i just BLAAAH spewed them all over the page (*ﾉωﾉ) ugh ahahaha ANYWAY oh gosh okay i have so much to say, let’s get into it!!! also apologies for how MASSIVE ajax’s is waaaah

characters: wriothesley, ajax [childe], kamisato ayato, thoma warnings: 18+ minors do not interact, yandere behaviour (gaslighting, obsessiveness, toxic relationships, delusional thinking, manipulation, over-protectiveness, etc) words: 2.1k

₊˚⊹ 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐲

WRIOTHESLEY is the controlling, authoritarian type that feels like a really strict father, all under the guise of ‘protecting you’ and ‘keeping you safe’. he veers into delusional territory a little here because he genuinely believes what he’s telling you (and himself) and genuinely believes himself to be doing the right thing. he isn’t possessive, he just wants to make sure you’re going out with safe people. he isn’t obsessive, he just wants to know where you are at all times in case an emergency strikes and he has to come find you. he isn’t overbearing, he just cares and is proactive—don’t you want him to care? can’t you see he’s only this ‘protective’ because he loves you? 

he has thoroughly convinced himself that this behaviour has nothing to do with jealousy or a desire to keep you locked up, to keep you 100% certainly safe and his forever, and nothing to do with wanting to exert complete control over you, orchestrating your every decision—and he’s pretty good at continuously deluding himself into believing it. he’s so good, in fact, and his logic is so sound, that it has YOU wondering if you’re ‘just being crazy’, if you’re overthinking things or reading too much into them. wriothesley has had a lot taken away from him, after all, and he knows exactly how the mind of criminals tick—can you really blame him for being a bit paranoid? maybe you’re the one who’s overreacting and being unreasonable. maybe you’re even feeling a little guilty for being so ungrateful—shouldn’t you appreciate having someone who loves and cares for you this much to go to such extents? shouldn’t you want to relinquish all power to someone you love equally as much? shouldn’t you trust him to make only the best, most sound and appropriate decisions for you? you probably should. 

₊˚⊹ 𝐚𝐣𝐚𝐱

AJAX is kind of like, the typical yandere, and he encompasses several ‘types’, evolving throughout the course of your relationship and shapeshifting into different variants depending on the situation itself. and while the other three men seem normal until you’re in too deep with them, refraining from showing symptoms of yandere-ness until after you’ve been with them for an extended period of time and mean a lot to them, ajax is weird from the very beginning. 

almost immediately you can sense that there’s something slightly off about him, but you can’t put your finger on what it is. it’s so subtle that it doesn’t strike you as particularly dangerous, leading you to merely write it off as one of his quirks and nothing more. 

he’s overbearing right from the start, of course; not necessarily enough to be concerning just yet, but enough for it to be abnormal—unusual—and noticeable (which reminds me of your lil ajax piece!!!). from the instant he sees you, he is irreversibly obsessed with you. you permeate his every waking thought, and eventually begin to leak into his dreams, too, and suddenly he can barely breathe without knowing where you are and what you’re doing, his concentration consumed by you. 

he begins stalking you—‘overseeing’, he had called it—making detailed notes of your favourite locations and your most frequented friends. he’s constantly got an eye on you one way or another, even if he has to employ other people to do it for him, discreetly reporting their findings every few hours. he tells them you’re in danger—which, you are, technically—and that you must be observed at all times from afar, silently and stealthily. 

ajax is patient and he can play the waiting game, carefully devising and then revising his strategy based on your moves. he loves playing predator and prey, gets a thrill from how the hunt unfolds—much like a battle, it’s a story, a rich tapestry you and he are constantly and concurrently creating, together. and that he thinks is so beautiful.

in textbook yandere fashion, once he’s gathered a sufficient amount of intel, he begins ‘showing up’ randomly at your usual spots, ‘bumping into you’ fortuitously. charming and sweet, the only thing that’s initially unsettling is just how well the two of you get along. ajax is sure not to mimic you too much—he doesn’t want to be a mirror, after all, and being too similar is far from a good thing (especially when it matches so well it simply can’t be coincidental).

well—that, and the sharp glint in his eye that flares with something dangerous every time you giggle or gush, every time you fall further for him. and once he has you enchanted, ensnared, you’re trapped for life, tangled up in him so tightly that he might as well have fused to your flesh. 

ajax likes to tell you it isn’t about power and control, but he knows that it is. he’s smart, and he’s self aware, and he doesn’t really care if this is ‘wrong’—he sees it as necessary and he genuinely believes he knows better than you do. he has to take care of you, or else who will? you’re clearly not capable of satisfactorily doing it on your own, so he must (god, how would you manage without him?). even if you oppose him or fight back against him, he’s purely convinced you’re bull-headed and stubborn, snorting at your wanting to be independent when he truly knows you’re too stupid take care of yourself ‘properly’ all on your own.

violence is a mainstay of your relationship, but not towards you; never towards you—merely towards everyone around you. his jealousy knows no bounds, but you will rarely see it outright. instead, ajax prefers to hone his emotions, to fashion them into a weapon or use them as fuel to thoroughly tear apart anyone who looks your way in a manner he doesn’t like. it’s his job as your lover and keeper, isn’t it? 

₊˚⊹ 𝐤𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐨 𝐚𝐲𝐚𝐭𝐨

AYATO knows what he is, and he doesn’t care. why should he, when he’s sure what he’s doing is ultimately correct and he’s used to having everything that he wants, and everything going his way, even if he has to force/manipulate it to? he’s so skilled at that in particular—manipulating situations and events to procure favourable outcomes for himself. in ayato’s mind, you should be grateful that he affords you so many freedoms—he could lock you away in the basement or a padded room, chain you to a bed with no entertainment or stimulation save for the books he has so conscientiously selected for you, and no other human contact aside from himself. but he trusts you, and he doesn’t want to go to those measures (though rest assured, he has promised you he will not hesitate to reach such heights if he deems it absolutely necessary, no matter how much he doesn’t want to; you staying his comes before his personal preferences and pleasures). as such, he allows you to roam the estate grounds under the watchful eye of his closest confidants and most capable guards (usually thoma, unless he is otherwise occupied and busy); he allows you access to letter writing materials (though they must go through two rounds of supervision and revisions before they are approved; once by thoma, and once by ayato himself); he allows you to go out in public as long as you are with him, etc. 

despite these apparent freedoms he affords you, he still picks your outfits out for you each day, and he devises a comprehensive meal plan for you each week, and creates schedules and rules he expects you to follow, thoroughly and meticulously to the letter. it is these subtle forms of ownership that he enjoys the most. he doesn’t feel the need to shout from the mountaintops, loudly and aggressively, that you are his, because the fact is so obvious, so evident, the second anyone merely glances at you. you walk like him, you talk like him, you sit, stand, and bow like him, just like he trained you to. 

ayato is also the type of yandere to punish you. he is molding your pretty little mind into exactly what he wants it to be, and that means that undesirable behaviours must be immediately and severely corrected through appropriate punishments—you must learn, or be taught what is right and what is wrong in ayato terms + definitions, so you will refrain from repeating such behaviour in the future. he is truly crafting you into the most perfect, precious, obedient little doll—and having a blast while doing so. it’s his little pet passion project, in a way; something he looks forward to working on when he has a moment of spare time. 

ayato was sly and clever with the way he initially enticed you, entrapped you, but underneath his cool, precisely chiseled exterior, ayato is selfish, manipulative, and extremely controlling. all decisions are ultimately made by and go through him. he will skillfully and carefully cut you off from all lifelines and communication, rendering you wholly dependent on him, and then will meticulously chip away at your mind until he sculpts it into exactly what he desires—someone who is as obsessed with him as he is with them. he slowly, stealthily, and steadily induces a severe, irreversible case of stockholm syndrome. the damage he does to your mind is permanent—and that’s exactly his goal. you now live for him. your days are marked by his appearances, his comings and goings, and the only thing you have to look forward to is seeing + spending time with him. you live to please him, live to be with him, and become absorbed by him, so you are merely an extension of him and no longer an individual yourself. everything revolves around ayato—he is your entire universe. 

₊˚⊹ 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐦𝐚

THOMA is the most dangerous type of yandere, because thoma is genuine. thoma’s feelings are 100% authentic—and he earnestly intends to bring you no harm whatsoever—they’re just way too intense. he loves you so much that it veers into insanity, and the passion he feels towards you (and towards keeping you safe + claiming you as his) is so fierce that it physically hurts him to experience, chest blistering with scorching adoration and razored affection, something so dense and so all-consuming that thoma wants to claw through his own flesh and pry his ribcage apart spoke by spoke just so he can experience a shred of relief. 

thoma is, for the most part, an honest guy—starkly, brashly honest, so honest it shatters his words and gnaws at his voice, leaving it rough and raw, splintered to shards; but you can always trust he says exactly what he means. he severely lacks self awareness, not even realizing that his behaviour is inappropriate and extreme (he just cares about you SO much! it blinds his rationale and erodes his logic, incapacitating his ability to understand that he’s so suffocating it borders on terrifying). 

but what makes thoma so incredibly perilous is his sincerity. he truly just wants to keep you safe, eyes brimming with tears and voice hitching on barely contained emotion as he thoroughly explains to you his logic for stashing tracking devices in your bags or his reasoning for shattering the kneecaps of the man who made you uncomfortable at work, sentiment thick in his throat, words straining with the weight of his honesty, with the desperation for you to understand, to see it his way. he swears to the high heavens that he’d never hurt a single hair on your pretty, precious little head, and promises that he doesn’t want to scare you, but firmly asserts that he will do whatever it takes to keep you safe. 

and he means it. thoma is, in the most essential sense, your guard dog. he’s so sweet towards you, even submissive at times, always subservient to your every wish and whim, your every demand and desire, but he’ll fucking rip anyone within a meter of you to pieces with his teeth and bare hands alone if he feels as though you are being threatened in any way—and his standards and definition of ‘threatened’ are extreme and absurd, of course, causing him to react in a way that is severely disproportionate to the situation.

it borders on too much all the time—he is too obsessive, too protective, too clingy, but he’s also so sweet, so gentle, so incredibly bonafide that you can’t help but not be upset with him. he only does what he does because you’re his entire world, right? what’s so harmful about that? 

[hailsatanacab]

I'll ask after that secret number 8!

I only remembered secret number 8 because I saw your wip here! I'd started this one based on the same prompt, then lost said prompt and stopped working on it 😅

Instead of a snippet, I'm just dropping it all here - maybe that way I'll feel inspired to finish it?

———

It’s a full house for dinner tonight and, really, that should have tipped him off.

Bruce sits at the head of the table, smiling softly as he watches over everyone’s antics. Damian is regaling Dick with everything they saw at the zoo that day (Danny had been so happy to see Delilah the purpleback gorilla again, and her new little additions to the troupe, too!) and how well they are implementing the grant the Wayne Foundation had gifted them. Tim, Steph, Cass, and Duke are all engaged in a thumb-war tournament which Danny has no interest in participating in. It just wouldn’t be fair on them.

Danny loves that look. The one where Bruce’s eyes crinkle when he thinks none of the kids can see him. It oozes love and it makes Danny’s heart, his core, ache. 

It’s been a little over a year since Alfred found him on the street and managed to wrangle him back to the manor to stay—even after the whole biting thing when he realised how rich they were. 

A little over a year here and Danny’s starting to feel like family.

Starting to feel like he might, just maybe, like to make it official.

“Danny,” Bruce says, drawing everyone’s attention. Danny starts at his name, but Bruce’s voice is warm and calm, and his shoulders lose their tension almost immediately. “Danny, I have something I would like to tell you.”

“Uhhh…” is all Danny can croak out, eyes flicking back and forth between Bruce and the rest of them. Smooth. Looking good, Danny.

Except… they’re all happy. All smiles, all relaxed body language, all radiating calm and love and acceptance. Well, not Damian—his face is as thunderous as it always is—which at least means it’s nothing too out of the ordinary.

“Danny, first of all, I just want to impress upon you that this is in no way something you have to do. You are under no obligation to join us and, no matter what, you shall always be welcome with us in the manor.”

Wait, what? Danny squints at Bruce, trying to parse exactly what he’s saying… Is he—is this them asking to adopt him? Do they want to make it official, too? 

It’s been a little over a year and of course Danny has imagined calling Bruce ‘Dad’. Of course he’s imagined being part of the family, of course he wants to make it official!

He can’t help the beaming grin or the bright and bubbling “Yes!” already waiting on his lips. All Bruce has to do is ask, all Danny needs to hear is—

“I’m Batman.”

The smile freezes on Danny’s face.

His lungs stop working, his heart stops working, he stops working, he just—

“And I’m Nightwing,” Dick smiles, breaking the awkward silence. 

Danny’s eyes snap to him, and then down to Tim when he admits to being Red Robin. Duke is Signal, Steph is Spoiler. Damian begrudgingly tells him he’s Robin, but Danny can barely hear it over the ringing in his ears.

“I’m Black Bat.” Cass cocks her head, almost looking concerned. It always felt like she understood him the most. Whenever he was feeling low, too in his memories, or stewing after a nightmare, she was always there, ready to card her fingers through his hair and never mention his tears. It makes his heart ache to think of it now. “It’s okay, Danny.”

It’s meant to be reassuring, but how—how can it be okay? How? 

Danny’s spent a little over a year with them. A little over a year with Batman. 

Batman, who works with the Justice League, who works with…

A little over a year. 

Just under 16 months since he escaped.

“Danny? Are you alright?” Bruce asks

Finally, his lungs kickstart and suck in a shuddering breath, only for everyone to drop their smiles.

Didn’t take them long, did it? Now that their ruse is up, there’s no kindness in their eyes, they’re just… cold, calculating. Evaluating. 

“Why?” Danny gasps, his fingers tingling, his heart in his throat.

Just under 16 months since he—has he escaped? Or was this just another one of their experiments?

"I... I trusted you, why—" Danny chokes back a sob, gritting his teeth as his shoulders shake. Why? Why would they do this? "I was happy here, with you. I thought... Weren't you happy?"

"Danny..." Bruce is looking at him, eyes narrow and eyebrows pinched, in some cruel facsimile of confused concern and all Danny can think is how much of an actor he is. How well he can play the part of a doting father. How much he made him want that.

"I don't understand, why..." 

"I'm sorry we didn't tell you before, I can imagine that it comes as a shock. We shouldn't have lied to you, Danny, but—"

"Stop it!" Danny slams his hands down on the table and pushes himself up on wobbly legs. Even standing, he feels so small. Smaller than Bruce, than all of his adopted siblings. They crowd above him when they all stand, too. "Just stop it! Why are you doing this, why are you still pretending? Stop it!"

It was easier, with Danny's biological parents. The knowledge that they'd do anything to get him on a lab table, to open him up and see what makes him tick, to rip him apart molecule by molecule, had always been there. He knew they hated ghosts. He knew they hated Phantom. He knew they hated him. It was easier because it was something he'd known all his life. When he died, when he became a ghost, he knew what to expect from them. It hurt, of course it did.

But it was easier than this.

"Danny, I'm going to need you to take a deep breath. You're having a panic attack and you need to breathe."

"Breathe?" Danny laughs, the sound harsh and choking, too high pitched in his hysteria. "You're joking, right? Or is this just more of the—the experiment?"

"Danny, please, we don't know what you're talking about, you—"

"You don't know? You're Batman! You work with the Justice League, you work with—" His words choke off as his stomach churns, bile rising in his throat. His whole body itches, screaming at him to leave, he can't go back, he can't, he can't, he can't!

Bruce takes a hesitant step forward and Danny scrambles back, his feet catching on the chair behind him and sending him careening to the floor. Where are the agents? Why aren't they swarming in, ready to apprehend him, strap him back on the table, carve him from the inside out.

"Please, Danny, calm down. We don't—"

Danny stops listening. His back hits the wall and he pulls his knees into his chest, his shoulders dipping down as he begins to sob. His heart throbs inside his throat, too painful to swallow around. Tears fall hot and heavy on his face.

Sure, he could run. He could phase out through the wall and he could be out of Gotham in a couple of hours. He's escaped the GIW once, he can do it again.

But that was before Batman knew who he was. Before he had the World's Greatest Detective on his tail.

Before he... 

He really thought this would be different, you know?

He wanted to make it official.

"Why did... Why were you so nice to me? Why did you make me like you? I really—I really liked you. I-I thought we could be a family."

"Danny, we are a—"

"Don't lie to me!" Danny snaps, but the force of his anger leeches all the fight from him, and suddenly all that's left is a bone-weary tiredness. There’s a lump in his throat that hurts. There’s a line down his chest that burns. "I don't care. I don't care anymore, I don't. Just... don't make me go back there. Please." 

Is it futile? He thought he knew how the GIW operated by now, the depths that they would go to achieve their results, but this... this was a whole new level of pain that Danny thought he had left behind him in Amity.

"We're not going to make you go anywhere, Danny, you're safe here, I promise."

"Safe? Safe? You must have—" he takes a deep breath, tries to stop the quivering of his voice. It’s all starting to make sense, now.  "The reason you're telling me who you are is because you must have told them everything already. I know the Justice League—I know you're working with them, which means the ex-experiment is over now, and they're coming to take me back. And I can't go back."

"Danny—"

"I can’t!” Danny glares at Bruce with all the rage he can, fingernails digging into his skin. “I’m not going back!"

"That's right, you're not going back, Danny. I won't let that happen." Bruce crouches down in front of Danny, his hands open and raised as if he's trying to say he's not a threat. "I don't know who you're talking about, and I'm sorry about that, but I can promise you that you’re not going back there. We will keep you safe."

Danny pulls himself closer, tucks himself further into the wall, eyes flickering all across the room waiting for that tell-tale flash of white as the agents start to swarm.

He should take his chances now and run, he should go, he needs to go!

The rest of them, his brothers and sisters of a little over a year, are spread out, giving him and Bruce some space. The same concern colours all of their faces. Why are they still pretending?

Steph is chewing on her thumb. 

Danny liked Steph and her brash confidence, her jokes. She's been promising to paint his nails for months now, they've just never found the time. He was going to go for green and black, or maybe a galaxy theme, depending on what she felt comfortable doing.

He likes them all.

"You were supposed to be my family." His mouth turns down at the corners and his voice shakes like a child. "You were supposed to—why? Why would you—I don't understand why you would make me like you..."

"This isn't an experiment, Danny," Bruce's voice is steady, soothing. "I promise."

"But you work with them and—"

"Who do I work with?"

"The Justice League."

"Yes, I do, but we—"

"And the Justice League works with them. The GIW." Danny trembles with the name, clutching tightly onto his hoodie. "I'm not going back there, Bruce."

Danny doesn't miss Bruce's look over his shoulder, nor Tim's nod in return. Tim turns slightly to the side to hide his movements, but Danny bets he has his phone in his hand, probably letting them know they can take him now. Guess this is it, then. They'll be here soon, and he'll be gone.

"Kill me."

"Danny? What do—"

"If you ever had any kindness for me, if you ever cared, kill me. Please, Bruce. I can't do it again."

"Danny..."

"End me now. Take my core out and break it, please, before they get here."

[lilybug-02]

Wait so how do you know for sure the sprite is Ralsei? No hate, I do believe you haha, but I too am a lore scientist and I wanna know your evidence. Does it show up in-game? I could definitely believe that I saw it in-game and forgot about it :P

YES. Finding legitimate sprites directly from Toby Fox games can be surprisingly difficult. There are so many fan-made character sprites, that it can be hard to differentiate from the real ones!

Guess how many are NOT fan-made? .....only one 🗿

...(please don't question why google is in italian)

Official Websites like Spriters Resource (Ralsei's Offical Sprite Sheet) are very helpful in this regard :)

They may even include unused file graphics. Like this unused face of Ralsei.

Sprite legitimacy is a big rabbit hole that I personally don't have enough knowlege on :( ((BUT OH MY GOSH The internet is notorious for reposting fan-spriteworks without sourcing. It can be really hard to find the original artist.))

It's also HILARIOUS how many people have redone Ralsei's sprite. It is quite obvious from my Ralsei poll and through his mass of fan-redesigns, that many people in the Deltarune community REALLY LOVE his Chapter 1 sprite more.

Ralsei sprite fan-art is amazing and I personally want to mod it into my game bc it looks so good. Below I have some really cool fan-sprites I found and the artists who made them!

Left (Ralsei Ch 2 redesign- metr0nix727), Middle (Ralsei based off Ch 1- larituca), Left (Full Ralsei Chapter 2 Sprite sheet with Hat- artist unknown**)

**this sprite sheet was submitted through Sprites Resource but I traced it back to TaxeisNotOkay, who I presume to be the original artist. I could not find any other information regarding the full sprite sheet, so feel free to correct or inform me if you find anything!

Looking back at Ralsei's Chapter 2 head sprites..... they just don't look as good as they could in my opinion. I dont like them :(...uhhh NO HATE OF COURSE!!..ahklasdkflansdf I'll go jump in this hole now.

[originalartblog]

are the tinies more comfy w being affectionate w each other (than their normal sized selves) or do they just simply not notice when they're cuddling?

a bit of both? the first time on the couch just kind of happened because they were tiny and tired I still need to finish the continuation/conclusion of that but there is like. negative chances of them not being aware they're cuddling in the same bed when one of them is not even where he's supposed to be.

I've already said I don't really care whether skk get romantic or not, but here we are all about the longing for each other's presence. The tinies feel the same things but more, so like everything else the denial is harder to deal with. Because of that, they skipped a few steps and now they do all of their usual stuff but also they cuddle.

Meanwhile the big guys are stuck in their 14+ layers of denial and pride, so the tinies doing their thing in front of them is both chipping at those layers and so embarrassing, I don't think they see how the other one is acting as much as their own little guy is betraying them will you stop that what will they think???

[sixteenthchapel]

I love your sanzang? He's Amazing!! I know I may be biased because he's my fav but I love your representation. He's an honest kind guy, he tries his best even if he doesn't succeed and is always an inch from having a panic crisis hahaha. Thank you for sharing with us.

Also Wukong has edgy sassy grandpa vibes but also doesn't seem old at all, the kind that would give Sanzang grey hairs if he had any left. Ty!

Thank you so much!! Its true about Monkey, he may be old, but wisdom doesn't always come with age... But that's something I love about him. 100% confidence and 100% wrong lol. Tripitaka is really trying though...

[bookshelfdreams]

sexually assaulted by his peers? did i miss that? 😵‍💫

(content warning: discussions of csa, but nothing explicit)

Nigel. After he recounts the rowboat thing he says "And the horse. When we made you french kiss the horse".

Which - well, assault might not be the entirely correct word. But it's definitely an act of sexualized violence/humiliation.

This is, to my understanding, a well-documented pattern of behavior in environments like this. When people are locked somewhere together where they can't escape each other, have communal bathrooms and bedrooms, and are encouraged to enforce a strict pecking order, the resulting peer-to-peer violence often includes a sexualized element. Especially when said people are children who haven't fully developed social skills and empathy yet, especially once puberty hits (which, since Stede left/finished at 15, happened during his boarding school days). And just like with "regular" bullying, children who are perceived as weak, socially inept, or gender non-conforming (or all 3 in Stede's case) are most vulnerable to fall victim to that.

It's not a huge stretch of the imagination to believe other things in that direction were done to him as well, though that's obviously veering off into headcanon territory. I personally think it's implied as strongly as it can be in a fun little romcom; there's no reason to disbelieve Nigel, and there's no reason to believe the horse or the rowboat were singular incidents. Of course Nigel isn't gonna bring up things that can't be laughed away as "hilarious pranks" between boys, even by an a-grade assface like him.

And it fits in with the general impression a lot of people (including me) have of Stede and his problems - his hangups about his own body, the likeliness that he never had a positive sexual experience. It's an interpretation that's heavily text-based, in my opinion, though again, a lot of it is never actually said. So. Think of that what you will.

But anyway, yes, Stede textually suffered at least some degree of sexualized violence in his childhood, which is sadly not uncommon.

[jinkamuraisqueen]

hello, id like to request if you have the chibis for obscuary! theyve been on my mind so much omg

hello!! sorry for the late reply, I don't really understand tumblr so I'm rarely active here😭

anyway, the chibi for obscuary hasn't been implemented in the game yet, so i currently dont have it</3

as you can see, they're still censored in the game itself😭 i think they'll be available by the time we can pick lyca and ed at the start of the game! when that time comes, I'll post them:)

in the meantime, you can see them (although in bad quality) here♡ I'll go check the files if the other obscuary chibis are available in the game

[corviiids]

THANKS @kimdokjafan you are so kind and generous. ok im cashing in the first of three blank checks to talk about faith trust and pixie dust (most recent chatfic) because the last two directors commentaries were too serious so let's do a silly one.

some p5r spoilers, and this is mostly about sumire, and it's long again. do i need to keep disclaiming that these are long? you should know me by now.

i had this written for a while before i started formatting it because i wasn't really sure if i should post it? i feel like silly chatfic is something people go to for predominantly lighthearted nonsense so i was like, maybe there's too much plot and dramatic misunderstanding and i should just keep this one for myself. but then i was like well nothing matters and maybe someone will have fun with it. it's kind of terrible how much fully or mostly completed fic there is my docs that just doesn't see the light of day lol. write for yourself etc but i like sharing! too bad it comes with the mortifying ordeal etc. anyway that was a tangent

potato counter is a neopets game. there's no deep lore i just like neopets. i guess in this universe ryuji doesn't play neopets? or maybe he's just never played potato counter specifically. i also have a different fic where ryuji DOES play neopets. it's about neopets and ryuji and goro talking on neopets.

i think this might literally be the first time ive written sumi in a fic because i haven't actually written that much fic for royal, like, now that im looking, literally almost none? and none that had a group dynamic. so it was kind of fun to find her voice for the first time in a silly groupchat like this. i was worried people would find her exclamation marks annoying but i personally thought it was endearing so i added it in there.

every time i do a gag where a character corrects their own typo i have to code more stupid little bubbles to make it happen but i think it's worth it. all the effort that goes into making tgis look as much like a real chat as possible

this obviously doesnt take place in the canon p5/r universe, but im imagining sort of a postcanon sumi personality where she's more comfortable being herself and isn't borrowing kasumi's brand of confidence, but she's visibly a really anxious person without that kasumi veneer. i also think in this universe sumire is a fairly recent addition to the friend group, and while everyone likes her a lot and she really likes them, i kind of wanted to emphasise that feeling of being in a friend group where everyone's established and you're sort of a plus-one? you don't really fit yet. part of that is her being new, part of it is her anxiety, part of it is just the kind of person sumi is where she's so polite and self-conscious she ends up taking herself out of things with her own good intentions. stuff like her interrupting the flow of an existing conversation by greeting everyone instead of jumping straight in because she doesn't feel comfortable inserting herself, which means everyone else stops to greet her even though that doesn't normally happen in a friend group, or making a point of thanking everyone for being invited to events while the others take it as a given.

idk i love that she feels a bit out of place with the phantom thieves in p5r. and part of that is a natural consequence of being a new addition in royal who can't be naturally integrated with an existing dynamic but i honestly feel like the writing team realised that and acknowledged it, and really leaned into it, and that made it work incredibly well for me. like, it's part of her character that she's sort of an outsider. it's not like p4g's incredibly clumsy integration of marie and subsequent attempt to shove her down everyone's throat as the canon love interest in p4ga (knife). sumi has that outsider vibe on purpose and it makes me really like her dynamic with the thieves as an individual

goro also feels slightly out of place in these chats, but his conversational style blends more naturally with the other thieves at this point and he even uses their codenames sometimes. i keep saying my chatfic series isn't a real Series because the lore keeps changing, but if we accept that they're all kind of following a General Continuity, assume this takes place some time after the last fic in which ren added goro to the groupchat and they made an effort to integrate him into their friend group. he's kind of there now and has settled into being the weird boyfriend. that's his role.

every time goro says something like "ren and i" assume it's the text equivalent of him talking to the group with his arm around ren's waist.

ok i got really fond of this silly running joke where sumi brings up the weather when she's feeling uncomfortable. she's so polite. i like this thread because setting it up meant i got to tie it off like this:

this just made me happy lol i liked writing this. i tried to use it to demonstrate that despite goro's abrasiveness he obviously knows sumire pretty well, he's attuned to her quirks and knows how to tell when she's having a bad time with her anxiety, so he uses her little weather habit to ground her.

i honestly dont think goro and sumire could be considered close in p5r and as much as i like the "royal trio" in canon they're not really... like... friends? with each other? they're both attached to ren, so it' more a V shape than anything else. but that said, i really LIKE goro and sumi's canon dynamic. he takes a really grouchy but politely attentive supervisory role to her during their few forays into the palace as a trio where he doesn't really know her well but clearly identifies her as a harmless little tryhard who needs some guidance and steps into that role grudgingly, and she immediately looks up to him despite being very wrong footed by his ruthlessness, which i find incredibly charming. i think given time they could be good friends, they just didn't get much chance to know each other very well in canon. so i tried to kinda do that here.

once goro stops being evil and joins the group they all kind of tiredly accept that his role is to occasionally push a cup off a bench while smirking and refuse to clean it up. emotionally, i mean.

wait i need to backtrack chronologically to talk about akeshu.

in this scene they're in the same room lol talking and snickering while typing. im trying to get at that vibe of the annoying couple who is flirting with each other, via you. you know? like ostensibly they're talking to you (sumire) but everything they say to you is part of their stupid game. sumi is incidental to goro and ren teasing each other about flirting with someone else, goro is reporting everything ren says because his boyfriend is so eye-rollingly foolish in a cute way. they're very tickled by how amusing and charming they are. gross. disgusting. sumire im so sorry for putting you through this

anyway here are too many of my favourite jokes from the fic

[ybkitten]

He might be my boy but he's still going in the cube. I'm sorry Doppo. Anyway-

It's Doppo Day and it's MerMay so it's time to draw fanart for a mermaid Doppo fanfiction I read!! You should go read @partywo's deep serpentine! And its sequel, brackish, boiling! It's good! I'm eating it like a man starved for Matenro.

[babybirbb]

Just started watching suits recently and was wondering if you had any good fic recs, particularly AUs. The nature of the show really lends itself to Selkie fics imo but also I just love selkies

anon i need you to know that as soon as i saw your ask i immediately went scouring through the AU tag on ao3. i’m not gonna lie, i'm not usually an AU reader but i wanted to challenge myself to provide some recs as unbiasedly as possible.

at first observation, i noticed a lot of the AU fics were still in some way canon (divergent and adjacent)-- usually splitting off somewhere along the show or a situation where Mike or Harvey is still a lawyer, while the other was not. i will say i skipped over smut-based (omegaverse, bdsm) and lengthy fics (under 20k is nothing, anything more than 50k is pushing it for me) cause i just did not have the brainpower to even try to get through them :/

so of course the ones i ended up liking were mostly canon divergent/adjacent but i tried my best to get you something different. what i managed to dig up for you is under the cut and i really hope you like them anon (also fyi these are all pretty much marvey fics, hope that's okay!) <3 also thanks so much for the ask! i enjoyed this little scavenger hunt haha!

As the World Caves In by SupernaturalIdjit16 | Mature - Zombie Apocalypse, Warning for the usual triggers that come with zombie apocalypse. It’s not a complete work but it literally got updated today!

Here at the end of all things by tattooedsiren | Explicit - Apocalypse, Hurt/Comfort, Mike and Harvey protecting each other, Mike does shoot someone and goes a bit into the psychological aftermath, light smut towards the end

The Haunting of Penthouse B by Skara_Brae | Teen+ - Supernatural Elements, Happy ending, Mike’s a ghost…or is he?

Meet Me at Midnight by butdaddyilovehim | Teen+ - Superheroes/Superpowers, Protective Harvey, he's also Batman…need i say more?

Complications by LearnedFoot | Teen+ - Canon divergence, Fake/pretend relationship, Harvey decides not to hire Mike, instead asks for his help to spite Jessica, of course they end up falling in love

The Touch by FrivolousSuits | Teen+ - Magic, Angst, Soulmate inspired, it’s also from Donna’s pov which was super fun and interesting, as was the nature of the magic

TBR list:

Wear My Name by Lunarflare14 (Teen+) and whatever the question by tattooedsiren (Explicit) - These are both Fake/Pretend relationship AUs based/inspired by The Proposal movie! (a very good movie imo)

The Game by FrivolousSuits | Teen+ - It’s a Hunger Games AU so i am intrigued, just haven't gotten around to reading it yet

Ocean Dream by Blue_Five | Mature - i apologize for being unable to provide you with a selkie fic so the best i could do was the incomplete merperson au... i hope it's enjoyable...😅

[thekidsarentalright]

Idk if you have talked about this (you probably already did) but I'm just curious, in your opinion what is the kids aren't alright about? Have you done any analysis on the song?

i probably Have analyzed it but i can't find it and its been so long so. will Happily ramble here about what i think its about <3 tbh this is the most beautiful ask i could ever get thank u <3

since you asked what i think tkaa is about, i'm not gonna do this in the normal way i analyze songs, which is a more line-by-line style to paint a picture of the whole story of the song, but instead just wanna like. ramble fksjdnf about it and what it means to me

i think the entire meaning of the song can be summed up by the line, "and in the end, i'd do it all again / i think you're my best friend", which really is to mean that i think that the overarching theme of the song is that life can be worth repeating and going through again for the people that you go through it with. connection and relationships give life incredible meaning, even with the bad things, even with sorrow and darkness, love makes it worth it- i'm yours, when it rains it pours, stay thirsty like before, as the song goes. when the storm comes, as the rain starts pouring and destruction closes in on you, wouldn't it be more comforting to have somebody beside you? facing the chaos with their hands in yours? wouldn't it be worth going through the storm again (stay thirsty like before) just to have those moments with the people you love?

and normally when i analyze songs, i very much try to stay away from analyzing them in a way that is very personal to pete/the members of the band just because... i don't wanna be presumptive! but, this song feels like one of the few that i Can't look at separate from pete and the band. no song feels more like a love letter to the band, and even to the fans, than the kids aren't alright. this band has known each other for over half their lives, they have been best friends and brothers for longer than they haven't been. every up and down each of them have gone through since they met each other, they have gone through together, they have seen their darkest sides and deepest depressions and through it all have Still chosen to love each other and stick together. as the rain has come and poured on them, as the storm that is life shipwrecked the band and sent them stranded in seemingly opposite directions, the love remained. the found each other again, because they were willing to do it all again for each other. their love and friendship is the purest embodiment of the song, and is the thesis of fall out boy as a band, to me. even through destruction and overbearing egos and inner turmoil each of them were experiencing that we are likely to never know the depths of- they Chose that their bonds were worth it, their bonds made life worth living and fighting for.

i feel that spirit, that life is worth fighting for if you have someone/something you love to Live for, is perfectly encapsulated by the lyrics, "and it's our time now if you want it to be / maul the world like the carnival bear set free"- if you want, life is ours for the taking regardless of the rest of the world. carnival bears were often mistreated and repressed, beaten down for acting in their nature, if one were set free they would finally truly be Free to be how they wish to be. in the context of the song, because we have each other, we can take the world on how We want, we can be who We want to be, Together. This is also something that i think is the thesis of fall out boy- the band of underdogs for underdogs, fighting for a space in the world to be safe and express themselves how they want to, and because they've found each other and an audience that Understands them, they can maul the world like the carnival bear set free. they are mauling the world, with every song released and show performed, they're taking on the world on their terms as a united band of best friends. and with their fans behind them, that spirit is embodied tenfold, making this song not only feel like a song for the band, about the band, but Also about the fans and for the fans.

before coming to any sweeping conclusion, i wanna talk about the bridge, because i feel like it is the last piece that does fully show what i think the song is about in totality. The bridge goes, "sometimes i just want to sit around and gaze at my shoes / and let your dirty sadness fill me up just like a balloon"- other than the carnival bear line, i believe this might be my favorite lyric of the song (which is saying a lot in a song of banger after banger line), as i feel the imagery it paints is just so heartaching and melancholy in such a beautiful way. there's a lot here in these lyrics, from how in the genius annotations pete annotated this line with a still of someone's shoes and a bunch of guitar pedals on the ground- something he would no doubt gaze down at when gazing down at his shoes while recording or performing, hammering home the meaning of this song being about/for the band and the fans. they share their sadness with each other, with the fans (to an extent), and the fans share their sadness back- music is always a reminder of the bond we all share in our heaviest moments, as is the guitar pedals being present when gazing down at your shoes in sorrow or guilt. another point i want to make is about "gaze at my shoes" perhaps being a play on words about "shoegaze" as a genre of music defined by guitar distortion and effects and a dreamy/ethereal feel- connecting the picture, the lyrics, the meaning of the band and fans always being there and music being a connection between us all, in a way. essentially, i feel this lyric is just a very melancholy, beautiful way to say sometimes its very easy to just wallow in your feelings, but having somebody with you to help take on your sadness, having these connections and these bonds, can make it lighter.

to try and find a way to summarize it, i really do just think the kids aren't alright is about love. in its purest form, it's about love. loving other people enough to live for them, finding the bonds and connections that give meaning to a meaningless existence, allowing yourself to feel pain in equal measure with pleasure. these are things that make life what it is, without these things life would be numb, meaningless nothingness. in the purest way, i believe the kids aren't alright is about what it is to be human and to love with reckless abandon, to be free to be and feel and love even if pain is present. Because pain doesn't diminish the love or light you can experience in life, and allowing yourself to believe anything less is to deny yourself a instrumental piece of the human experience.

[sugarsnappeases]

kara i wanna know allllll about your reg. tell me EVERYTHING <3

so obvs canonically pretty much the only thing we know about reg is his betrayal of voldemort and the cause etc etc so i like to centre that in most of my thoughts about him……

he joins the death eaters bc he’s a loser w a freakish voldemort obsession who has like three friends and bc he’s lonely and he hates sirius and he wants to spite him by joining the group to which he’s so opposed. he wants to prove sirius wrong and prove himself right and i believe wholeheartedly that, even if he was influenced somewhat by the way he was raised and by the circles he runs in, he joined the death eaters completely of his own volition!!! i’m passionate about this!!! i think it destroys the nuance of his character to say that he was forced to join or that he joined w the intention to betray them all along or whatever . to me, he was fucking gagging to be a death eater and he’s so smug when he’s allowed in. i picture him ranting to barty and evan about ‘the great honour that has been bestowed upon him’ whilst lovingly stroking his dark mark

anyway, then he gets scared. he’s just a boy!!! and he realises he’s in too deep when it’s far too late… to me he just can’t stand the violence of the death eaters. like he’s a blood purist and further than that thinks he personally is superior to pretty much everyone else, on account of his black blood, but he hates that he has to get his hands dirty in order to see his idealised vision of the world (sans mudbloods and blood-traitors) realised…. he’s soft and weak and squeamish and lonely and always so so miserable at all times as a rule. he also tries to hide how scared he is by being a massive bitch. classic.

then he realises that tom has a horcrux (and imo he would figure this out fairly easily after the kreacher thing, bc he’s smart but also bc tom read about them in a book in the HOGWARTS LIBRARY!! so it’s not much of a stretch to say that the same book and probs further, more detailed books would be in the library at grimmauld, likewise in most of the darker pureblood family libraries…. this is another thing i’m passionate about. horcruxes aren’t this big secret. nobody makes them bc nobody’s a fucking idiot like tom is. they’re also warned off properly by their rents. tom doesn’t have this…. ANYWAY) he realises tom has a horcrux and that the guy he’s idolised and basically sold his soul to is fucking bonkers (shameless self promo - i write a bit about this realisation in the regulus letter in my fic ‘where can i put it down?’…. makes me crazy) and he’s scared and alone and he wants out and he does the one brave thing of his life in dying…..

and he doesn’t think it’s a brave thing. he tells himself that sirius was a coward for running away and betraying them and specifically him. he tells himself he’s being brave, braver and better than sirius, when he’s like sticking it out, joining the death eaters, following the role prescribed to him, so when he decides he’s gonna go to the cave it’s like giving up, it’s being a coward, its admitting to himself that he’s never been better than sirius no matter how much he want or tries to be, it’s betraying the cause and everything he’s stood for but he HAS to do it. for sirius and for kreacher and for himself and for the chance that maybe he’s not past saving. he spends his whole life trying to be good but in the sense of behaving and then his death, his first (and last) real rebellion, is the only time that he actively attempts to be good in terms of a moral act even if it has nothing to do w a renouncement of blood purity. and i don’t think he fully realises that when he does it bc it’s all so tangled up in other things. and i’m not saying that he’s like morally reprehensible the rest of the time (he’s just a boyyyy) but the majority of his active choices have been kinda bad ones up to this point even if he’s been like . passively good . and also literally just a child. an angsty teen if you will

his life is marked by inaction and bad decisions and his final act is kinda the antithesis of this and it’s tragic bc he’s not ever going to survive it. and sirius is never gonna know. it makes me miserable. does any of this even make sense lmaooo basically he’s a loser and he misses his brother and he’s so lonely and he loves sirius so much even as he hates him and he’s quiet and he wants so desperately to be a good death eater bc this is everything he’s ever wanted but he just can’t in the end!!! he’s just a boy!!! a boy who would nurse birds with broken wings back to health and cry when they flew away, a boy who would hold his brother’s hand and hang on every word he says and exist almost entirely in sirius’ shadow until said shadow is suddenly gone and he’s left reeling, a boy who’s so so soft and gentle but who hides it all behind layers of barbs and cold remarks, a boy who is desperately desperately sad and scared and GOD I LOVE HIM……