#because for some reason I haven't got there yet

[indycinders]

Gonna add my own thoughts to this too because this was cool to think about /w\ maybe mild spoilers ahead?

When you think about them and MC, it makes a lot more sense.

Caleb wants you to only see him as that person that's always been by your side, that's always played with you and took care of you and protected you. He never wanted you to see his dark thoughts, his obsession, his feelings. And his eyes reflect that. He's carefully guarded and chooses what you see. It's almost scary how good he is at manipulation and deception. I wouldn't want to piss off the Colonel if I wasn't MC haha.

Even after the events of his chapter and when you unlock him, in his following memories, he still struggles with dropping that mask after you know everything. Even if you accept all of him, as he is, flaws and all, he's so conditioned to this that it's his default now. In one of his phone calls, we hear his vulnerability with him saying something like, "Even if he's the worst Caleb of all of them, you still want him?"

Caleb is so tragic to me but that also makes me love him so much more. I'm waiting on the last shard before I peruse his myth, so my feelings might change, but what I know so far makes my heart break.

When it comes to Sylus, he's got that carefully crafted criminal leader persona. And that's what it is, a persona. Made from the struggle of survival, from the judgment of humans, from not being good enough for whatever reason he feels that is. I wouldn't say he's manipulative, but he is definitely calculating. He's playing 4D chess while we're all still figuring out checkers.

His eyes are so expressive because that's how he communicates. He feels the weight of responsibility for a position such as his and he can't often let himself outwardly show emotion. In his Night of Secrecy card, when he covers our eyes, even then he's hiding himself from us. We get a glimpse of him losing control of that facade and giving into that weakness, that vulnerability that we cause him.

I also think he's not afraid of showing his emotions through his eyes simply because of his power with the Aether core and ability to know people's desires. And maybe a part of him lets himself be vulnerable in that way because he can expose others vulnerabilities.

We know he's not guarded like Caleb. We see it in the way he treats us, the way he cares and shows love. Anything we ask, he has an answer for. He never lies, not really. He might omit the truth but he also expects us to be keen enough to know what he's saying. Like, again, in his Night of Secrecy card. He tried to slip away by making an excuse but knew we would catch on and follow him.

I haven't gone through his Conqueror myth yet (thanks Caleb for distracting me lmao), but I know his Abysm Sovereign myth. We know some part of him feels self loathing and almost shame for what he was.

In my opinion, he doesn't bother fully masking his emotions because he knows that the only one worthy and capable of handling what he lets slip through is us. He knows that we can and have accepted every part of him, good and bad.

He said it best in Razor's Grip. "There is no love purer than mine." And there really isn't.

Not to be weird on main or anything, but I've been studying screenshots of Caleb's expressions and it's so funny how comparatively less expressive his eyes are to Sylus'.

Like Sylus communicates 98% with those big red eyes of his. Caleb communicates only very VERY big changes of his expression solely through his eyes.

So I was compiled some eye screenshots because I really love the expressions Sylus has and did the same with him, (and have way too many saved), but I realised how little his eyes share. These however, are some gems;

When compared to Sylus's eyes though;

It becomes super obvious how much of Caleb's expressions are pretty performative, in the kind of way that is very familiar to me as an autistic person, and feeds in quite nicely to the common theme of him wearing a mask throughout the main story.

Sylus' communication is done mostly verbally because the game actively conveys the fact that he doesn't emote or physically show his feelings very often (he's labelled cold or numb or distant, in a similar way to Zayne, but with more disdain from those around him. It's only the twins who have ever looked at him and realised he was lonely.) because of that his expressions reflect it. His lips don't move much, but his eyes tell stories for him because they're much harder to control.

Meanwhile, Caleb's eyes betray him in big moments. When he's overwhelmed or very emotional, often in the negative, but for the most part he keeps it under control and performs his emotions through the use of smiles and expression. Without his full face, his expressions don't come through properly.

🤷 it doesn't mean a lot, but it was fun to dig through while I was compiling images.

[flimflamfranky]

okay, there's a LOT happening here and i need to go over it before i fucking explode

first things first, we've got these beasts or gods which seem like parallels to the ancient weapons, with the sea, sky and land (from right to left). i've got two theories about this: these are just representations of the ancient weapons as monsters or the gods that the ancient weapons are based on OR we already know one ancient weapons is actually a person. what if they were all original living beings and some got turned into monsters? especially with pluton, i'm reminded of franky's bad end from sbs 101.

references to the enel's maxim traveling to the moon. seems like someone tried that before and failed because of the ancient weapons?

this might be a bit of a stretch, but this profile looks like an elephant. specifically zunesha

another stretch, but this profile looks like imu

here, it looks like we've got people harvesting 'suns' to power a city, as well as some people with halos. this is probably the slaves and forbidden sun the text mentions, but the halo people are interesting, since we haven't seen that before.

here, we've got a group of a bunch people fighting one of the monsters. there's nika, emet, giants, minks, mermaids, dwarves, and lunarians. there are also the people on the boats which might represent different kingdoms? one looks like they have a top-knot which could be wano. there are also the people riding a whale, which seems to imply a tribe of people linked to the island whale that we haven't seen yet. and then there's the people fighting with the monster. this all seems linked to the war that happened in the void century, referenced by the middle text box.

and finally, the text box itself. i highlighted a few bits that i found most interesting, so i'll go through those:

so "within the earth" there was a "forbidden sun". this either is or is a precursor to the mother flame that vegapunk discovered/invented to create his own sun/endless energy (ch 1114). seems like maybe people in the past tried that and got punished by the sun god for it. regardless, the idea of a forbidden sun is fascinating.

then, the "earth god [...] shrouded the world in death and darkness" leading to the second world aka the void century. now, im not sure if these gods are tied to the monsters shown in mural or the ancient weapons. my guess would be they're tied to the ancient weapons with the earth god and sea god, but the forest god instead of a sky god complicates things- wait. i was going to mention that the forest god was mentioned in skypiea, along with the sun, earth and rain (sea?) god (ch 287). we also see one of their gods in kashigami, the giant snake. and one of the meanings of kashi (according to google) is oak. so it stands to reason that kashigami is the forest god. a forest god from a forest IN THE SKY. boom, we can tie it to the ancient weapon uranus, problem solved.

also, speaking of the rain god, it's the only one from skypiea not mentioned here (unless it is just a different version of the sea god since skypedia doesn't have a sea and ya know, the water cycle and all that), but there is some rain over the whale people that seems significant.

anyway, moving on to "they will never meet", which is repeated in the second world too. while i believe this references the sun god (not) meeting the other gods during these times, it also reminds me of roger mentioning that they "were just too early' (ch 968) with discovering the one piece.

then in the second world, we've got the "void" and "the fires of war", aka the void century and the great war that occurred during it.

also, i didn't highlight it, but the "forest god tamed demons" bit is also interesting. for demons, the three things i think of is the mythical devil fruits of the five elders, the giant shadowy beings from the florian triangle, or the maybeeee the horned ancient giants? my bet is on the florian triangle beings since they kinda looks like shadows cast from skypiea

then, there are "those of the half-moon [and] the moon". now, we known that one of these are the people from the sky island, from enel's cover story (ch 470 and 472). then, there are the lunarians, which given their name and wings, also come from the/a moon. now, which group is the moon or the half-moon, i don't know, but it's interesting that there are two separate moon groups.

and then, finally, we have "the sun god dances and laughs, guiding the world to its end". now, this is probably the most important bit from the whole thing. we know from saul that the third world here is the present, so this is, like, direct foreshadowing. this could be metaphorical, that luffy will end the current "world" aka the world government and usher in a new world, "a new morning". but it could be literal. i don't remember if i came up with this or if i heard it somewhere else, but i have this theory that luffy might destroy mary geoise and destroy the red line, which this line might support.

and finally, we have "and they will surely meet", echoing the last lines of the the previous two stanzas. now, in those two, "they" seem to be the gods, but that's not so in this one. of course, this leaves a lot of things that it could be but either way, luffy will meet someone who will be important the end game of this whole thing. my completely based on nothing, just pure vibes guess? that maybe, the one piece is alive.

and of course, i am very excited that franky is the one kinda front and center here, literally, so i can only hope that maybe him (and robin) will get a lot more focus in the upcoming arcs. a guy can dream.

[wernerherzogs]

stealing the amnesia topic from hima but. buck and eddie had only Just got their shit together&got together in rl and it's buck who gets amnesia. and. reverts to buck 1.0 days. :) maybe he remembers abby, but only from, like, the very early stages, so she's just this cool older chick he's been kinda talking to, and he's Not committed to her and has not been domesticated yet. and he Does Not feel ready to be in a relationship (a lie but buck 1.0 feels too cocky and too like an open wound to admit otherwise). he wants to keep having fun and sleeping around. and he thinks eddie's super hot so he keeps trying to get to know him and to convince him to sleep with buck but only casually. and eddie's just quietly devastated all the time and keeps saying No. until he caves one day for some reason. it's easily a top 3 fuck of buck's life with all the spots being taken by eddie but buck doesn't even Remember. and the next morning buck's like :) ok that was fun! maybe we should do it again sometime haha. bye :) or WORSE maybe he sneaks out in the middle of the night because at some point things had got kind of overwhelming emotionally and buck doesn't know Why and he's scared. cue ANGST. buck keeps sleeping around but he also keeps thinking about eddie more and more while eddie is. i haven't decided but. maybe he's stonewalling buck now. and that's not even touching the CHRIS of it all who at this point is probably actively trying to put a hit out on buck. obviously buck regains his memory at some point and spends MONTHS groveling and trying to make it up to eddie who hadn't even blamed buck for anything at any point despite having had his heart broken because it's eddie. but until they get there...... YAY

[amageish]

Why I think Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man's Nico Minoru is already a witch

I see some speculation about Nico potentially discovering her magical powers in the new Spider-Man show... I'd like to propose a different reading.

I think she already has them and is trying to avoid using them.

Looking at the prequel comic, there's a few extra details about Nico's life that haven't yet been mentioned in the show. She is confirmed to be in foster care, living with the O'Hara family (a reference to Spider-Man 2099), and is confirmed to be originally from LA, like she is in the comics. This suggests that her parents are already out of the picture.

She is also noted to have experiences dealing with mobsters.

From Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (2024) #1 Written by Christos Gage with art by Eric Gapstur and Jim Campbell.

She mentions a vague "we" when she discusses the mobs of LA and then warns Peter against trusting the police to deal with this problem.

From Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (2024) #1 Written by Christos Gage with art by Eric Gapstur and Jim Campbell.

All of this really makes me think some version of the events of Runaways (2003) has already happened in this universe. Nico and the Runaways discovered their parents were evil, their parents got arrested or killed, and Nico ended up moving to New York, looking for a fresh lease on life.

From Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (2024) #1 Written by Christos Gage with art by Eric Gapstur and Jim Campbell.

Now, in the show itself, she immediately is casting doubt on the morality of Norman Osborn, claiming anyone that rich must be up to shady things to maintain his wealth and power... That could be because her own parents were rich people who hid their super-villainy under a mask of philanthropy, just like Osborn does.

Furthermore, we know she is going to be sparking up a friendship with Harry Osborn in the coming episodes... Perhaps she could be helping him as he goes through the same traumatic realization that his father is evil that she went through with her parents back in LA?

I think Nico is a witch who is traumatized after the reveal that her parents turned out to be evil. She is looking for an all-new start and is trying to avoid using her superpowers... but will learn from Peter that she should use them to protect the people she loves - great power, great responsibility, you know the song and dance.

Furthermore, perhaps there was a reason the symbiote in episode one was attacking her specifically. Perhaps she will begin training under Doctor Strange, as she was recently established to have done in the comics in a flashback back-up story... Idk. We'll see!

[isaagt]

The difference of being a nice person and a good person, a Curly analysis

Today i’ll be making an analysis i didn't see much on the Mouthwashing fandom, with a particular take on Curly’s character, and his relation with his good and bad traits.

As the game starts and we get to play from his perspective, Curly is presented to us as a nice and good guy. It's stated a few times how he has a good reputation, how he got to a good position in life, Jimmy himself even mocks about it, when they discover about how Ponny Express will only maintain Curly after the shipment “You just couldn't frame it to yourself in a way that kept you as the hero. Abandon the crew but remain the model captain”, here the world ‘kept’ is the most important for us to understand everyone's thoughts on Curly, how he's seen, he's a hero, a nice man, a good captain, someone good with only the best intentions at heart.

Until this moment, everyone saw him as a hero, their vision could be broken by the news they're receiving (it's not), but it's arguable that he told them about it way before he was supposed, because it was the right thing to do, because he couldn't bear to keep it as secret from his crew, from his people.

Until this point, we only see him as the good guy of the story, Swansea was shown as rude and moody, Jimmy is aggressive and confrontational (as we see in his response to it), we saw his jealousy of Curly before too, not much heroic, Daisuke is just chill, more like the comic relief, he's not willing to become our hero, because the game treats him like a kid, and Anya is quiet and reserved, she's not presented as someone particularly good (nor evil), she's professional (as we saw when she was taking Curly’s psychological eval), but that does not mean good.

And who we have left? Curly, who listened to Anya about Jimmy's eval, who is great friends with Jimmy, who talks with Daisuke and has Swansea’s respect (to some extent). Curly, who's calm and centered, who knows what to do and can speak with any of them.

So we have Curly as the good guy here, the right one to lead the crew, the best they could take. Or is it?

When we’re in Jimmy's pov, after the crash, even though we’re led to believe Curly caused the crash, no one appears to see him as bad. Of course, I'm saying it from what we see from Jimmy's biased perspective. Anya even asks about his reasons to do so (even tho i think she could imagine it wasn't him who did it, it's my personal thoughts so i’m counting).

Everyone seems to pity him, Daisuke and Swansea talk about him sometimes but that's it, they don't (or we just haven't seen it) visit him in the infirmary, Anya (and Jimmy, to some extent) takes care of him and that's it.

We pity him, he’s in constant pain (not because of the disability he now has, please know the difference), his so-called ‘friend’ literally punches his pills on him, no one puts him out of his misery, how they did to Daisuke later on.

He’s suffering, it's clear to anyone see, but yet again suffering never made anyone good or evil, suffering is suffering to every human being.

When Anya locks herself with him, we see Jimmy get nervous, not because of Anya herself, but about what she could do to Curly. He still cares about keeping his friend alive, but is it because of the good in his heart or the care for a friend? No, it's about the control he lost on what happens to him.

You could see Curly as a martyr here, he's suffering, forced to watch but not have any control over anything, not himself and not others like before. But as we see later in the game that's his pay for his and Jimmy's sins. (i can get on this point in another analysis)

But even so, we have a moment where Curly laughs at his friend, the new captain's misfortune. He laughs because the things he suffered from Jimmy are being paid how he's paying for Anya and the crew’s suffering.

And here this leads to my point. When we’re Curly again, we interact with Anya, and two of these interactions and another one with Jimmy are what makes me say Curly is not a good man.

The first scene i’m talking about is the conversation he has with Anya when both couldn't sleep. They're looking at the representation of the night sky, and they talk about the dead pixel.

He doesn’t truly understand what she's trying to say here, he says he would look for this dead pixel that haunts her, but dismisses it not long after. He doesn’t understand the correlation with her asking about locks on the doors.

“Safety” he says and this conversation is stopped here.

Now, this scene alone couldn't just prove that Curly isn't great and good and all the jazz. But, it is where she tells him about the SA Jimmy put her through. Why do I think that? Because of the next scene i’m talking about.

In this specific scene we’re looking for the gun, and we find Anya instead, she talks about hiding the gun and how she has hidden it for her own safety. Here she says to us she's pregnant. Curly asks who and she says “Captain, I told you”, this right here makes me believe when she told him, he didn't believe her, he listened, but didn’t recognize what she said as true. He doesn’t immediately think of his friend, he doesn't comfort or protect Anya.

He goes to the third scene i talk about, where he doesn't confront Jimmy, but says it's not his fault, this right here is what says to me he's not a good person. To say he can fix this, is to assume he could erase it, cause there’s no other way this could be fixed. He doesn't make it up to his role as captain protecting someone of the crew. He takes his friend's side, said friend who just puts his blame on him, saying it's his fault and that he will suffer the consequences too.

He doesn't do nothing, he enables it. And when he lets Jimmy take care of it, they end up with the crash, with Jimmy trying to kill everyone else.

When he says to Anya he would do anything to help her he forgot to say that's anything that's not against Jimmy.

He pays for his sins, being forced to watch the consequences of inaction, and is the last one because a captain goes down with the ship, right?

A good man wouldn't let something like that just be, a good man and good captain would protect Anya, and would do the best for the crew.

(i know his situation was hard, i get it, he can't get rid of Jimmy without killing him, but he could let Anya sleep in infirmary, he could make sure they interact the less possible, he could distance himself from an abuser, but he doesn't because it wasn't to him the bad thing happened)

He, although, is a nice man, he's charismatic, he seemed to care, he has a brilliant personality, he’s a good captain for calm times, he isn't prepared for any crisis, to deal with real problems, because he isn't ready to separate personal from professional when it comes to his best friend. He’s a human after all, a nice human, not all the bad, but not good either.

So, that's my analysis, what do you guys think? I would like to discuss this more and see what others think. I took inspiration from other people so don't be surprised if some things look alike some other takes.

[emblemxeno]

I can see the argument there and I appreciate the perspective, but to me that's just it. Byleth has gotten the blessing of retrospective.

By association with 3H, Byleth gets any valid complaints softened or outright shut out. 3H was a critical and commercial success and lacked prominent controversy beyond the factionism discourse, so many of Byleth's issues are handled with kid gloves compared to other characters.

Byleth having the problems that Corrin got flamed for are ignored because the rest of the 3H cast overshadows that, despite him still being the main character. His mere presence still heavily dictates the course of an entire continent, despite being a mercenary-turned-professor all through happenstance and "the flow of time", having no agency yet still holding all the power in the world.

Even with Byleth's trailer and reveal for Smash being the most critically panned one in that series' history, people will still say "oh but he's better than Corrin though" and prefer to keep Byleth in spite of lack of defining traits beyond the 'distance demon' moniker for his disjointed hitbox + slow frame data combo which was pretty quickly eclipsed by Sephiroth a year later. And the only reason given is "oh because 3H was a success and the best selling FE game" which, idk, maybe I'm being a petty cunt about it, but if that were the primary metric of who deserves to stay or get in Smash, then most of the Smash roster would look completetly different (Ike wouldn't have been in the game period, at least not in Smash 4).

For my last part, I'll acquiesce and say that yes Byleth does have semblance of a personality, but the delivery of it is so remarkably undercooked to me. I think most can agree that, despite never being confirmed directly, the devs were trying to emulate Persona protags with Byleth and some of the game's structure. But what makes the Persona protags so memorable is that despite being silent, they are very personable, charming, stylish, and cool within both gameplay and story. They have unique looks, animations, whole entire non-combat statlines dedicated to rizzing up other characters, and that feeds back into the gameplay loop of using a fuckton of cool Personas.

Byleth uses the same animations as the rest of 3H's cast and has extremely barebones (and at times, barely different) dialogue choices. They have a style, but F!Byleth's is kind of a mess, and M!Byleth's still doesn't detract from the blank face and lack of emoting. And while Byleth's competent, they aren't doing anything show stopping that other main characters haven't done in the past, and their in story power up, while impressive given that they cut a hole in the sky, only amounts to a hair and eye change and new threads, something that was done in Awakening, and arguably as early as Gaiden.

When I compare that to Corrin, I can admit that a lot of it is bias because Fates is one of my fav FE games while 3H is the only one I dislike, but even then, I just look at introductory defining scenes. Corrin's early big moment is risking his life to protect hostages of an enemy nation, even fighting back against his brother who has been ordered to kill him. Byleth's big defining moment is almost getting his shit kicked in by a bandit before turning back time thanks to Sothis, and then the game informing the player he makes a good teacher over time until the war starts.

Ultimately, they are different characters, and Byleth's role is very advisory which is fitting for a teacher, but he's still the main character in the game, yet things happen around him rather than as a result of him despite the game treating it as the opposite.

Sorry for the mismatched rant, it's just something I can't put into clear words.

It's 5am where I am so I'm no doubt gonna regret posting meaningless whining about my favs compared to other characters when I wake up but rn who tf cares

I'm still incensed under the surface about how Byleth gets a better reception than Corrin, and how Corrin specifically is represented in a grand scheme of the FE franchise, mostly with Heroes.

"Corrin gets positions and authority when he doesn't deserve it!" then silence for Byleth when he gets a teaching position, and later either the archbishop spot or outright becomes king of an entire continent.

"Corrin's dragon powers aren't used in the plot enough!" Byleth's powers are only ever plot device fodder, are mechanically indistinct from other FE protag powers before and after him, and have terrible ludonarrative applications.

"Too many people worship Corrin!" About 70% of the cast's morality when defecting from their home (and sometimes partaking in harming it) is dictated by Byleth having enough tea parties with them, after being enrolled in a job he wasn't qualified for

"Corrin's character and personality is bad" Byleth doesn't even have one, he's just a dialogoue choice generator

"Corrin is the worst FE rep in Smash, had the worst trailer, and is representative of FE having imbalanced representation" FE has a clone/Echo fighter problem and consolidating Roy, Lucina and Chrom into Marth as alt skins a la Bowser Jr. would auto fix that controversy given the Smash community's "if I don't see it, it doesn't exist" approach to character slots; there is no universe where a trailer showcasing one of the worst villains in 3H-and the FE series as a whole-is better than even the cringiest lines in Corrin's trailer; there is more unique properties and applications just in Corrin's side special than there is in Byleth's entire kit, which was really a mish-mash of different Smash archetypes, inlcuding ones other FE characters covered. Not to mention the fucking PNG Sothis Final Smash with the embarassing lip flaps, jesus.

Every problem that Corrin is accused of having, Byleth does it worse. Every problem that Byleth gets jabbed with, eventually gets redirected back to Corrin for "starting it."

And it's seen as justified, because why? Well, 3H is a "better" game of course! After all, it's the best selling one! If it sold that much and was so well received that means it must have done everything exponentially better than Fates did! (ignore the fact that Fates was the best selling game in the series before 3H please). Why wouldn't Byleth simply be objectively, immutably better than Corrin in every metric going by this logic?

And, like always, CYL is gonna reaffirm this again for everyone. Cuz why wouldn't Byleth get so many votes last year despite him getting a great Christmas alt just the month before? He deserves it after the female version already won after all! And why wouldn't he win this year when he's guaranteed an Emblem alt in the future, and most likely to be on one of Valentine's, Children, or Wedding banners?

It made sense for the Robins to win one after the other cuz they're cool and awesome and not weak and annoying, so it makes sense for Byleth too!

Why would Corrin get this "it's his turn treatment" when he's not a good character and the female version only won because everyone knows she's just dumb fetish bait 🤪🤪🤪/s

It's just... so infuriatingly transparent. Even Male Alear isn't hit with this quite as hard tbh, because at worst he had half the votes Female Alear did, whereas M!Corrin at best had barely over a third of F!Corrin. And that only fuels my perspective on how M!Corrin, for all his alts, always feels like his presence is treated compulsory and obligated, and F!Corrin is always sold with "she's hot, who cares" in mind.

FE fans made it clear that Corrin's character was hated, so the solution became to sell the Fem one for horny whales, and have the Male one just slightly behind in numbers to keep up the illusion of fairness (while always making him inferior in gameplay).

All that just for Byleth, a non-character, to get every excuse and love from a fandom that hated Corrin for the same issues he has. Crazy.

[lemonbeemon]

I should really get around to writing my Wizard of Oz au for TWST, but I'd feel too guilty while my P3 crossover is a WIP...

[soutsuji]

There's an English class on Golden Age detective fiction being offered next semester but the prerequisite for it is the intro to literary study class required for all English majors (which I haven't taken because I'm in a hard STEM major and don't have much time for electives, which means that I have to be really picky with my electives and only go for stuff I like AND doesn't have an awful workload) and also even if I did have that prereq, I wouldn't be able to take the class because it's at the same time as one of my major reqs. And also I'll be in two labs next semester and one of them is pure hell so like I literally don't have the time to take more than 13 credit hours (as tempting as it is to keep up my streak of taking 17-18 every semester even though it's been like really pretty bad for my social life and hobbies). Sigh. (Pressing my hand wistfully against the glass) maybe someday they'll offer the class again

[rawliverandgoronspice]

realizing I'm very sensitive to pacing, actually

[anonyanonymouse]

🙈

[keeps-ache]

my HOUSE.png

[icewindandboringhorror]

A dramatic lighting sunlight window boye

[shrews-art]

I'm back in Budapest so I'd have thought I'm ready to make some art now but we've been having renovation/repair work in the apartment for days now and I haven't known a moment of peace 😭

[culmaer-sideblog]

please forgive me, but I need to complain and over-share or my brain is going to explode please feel free to ignore

[linagram]

[ 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚒𝚍𝚎 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚜' 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚏𝚒𝚕𝚎𝚜 ]

here they are!! finally!!

okay, so at first i thought that i should add something like "part 1", since this post will include only the guilty trio's side characters, but i thought about it and.. i don't really think i should make profiles for other side characters too? most side characters are just the family members (like asahi's adoptive father or eiko's mother) or they're those prisoners' friends (riku's friends/bandmates, reina's friends, etc) and i don't want to make profiles for all those friend groups.

but we'll see! maybe i'll just drop some family/friends lore when i feel like it.

Side character 001: Saito Arata

Name: Saito Arata (斎藤新) (his last name means "purification, worship" and his first name means "fresh, new")

Age: 17 y/o

Gender: Male

Birth date: March 23rd (Aries)

Height: 176 cm

Blood type: AB

Occupation: High school student (first year)

Personality: Arata is an interesting and unpredictable person. It's hard to tell what's going on inside his head, but he always looks like he's up to no good. He does whatever he wants and whenever he wants and he doesn't care what others say. He's very chill and relaxed most of the time and there's only a few things that can make him angry. He's very talkative and outgoing, but he still has no friends.. Or maybe he has one, if you can call that boy his friend. It's hard to impress someone like Arata, so if you manage to do that, don't be surprised if he suddenly becomes obsessed with you and starts basically worshipping you. But also.. don't be surprised when he just as suddenly decides that he doesn't find you interesting anymore and leaves you. His interests change all the time, he can't control it. And also, even if you are like a god to him, it doesn't mean that he will forget about everything else. He's not as loyal as he likes to make people believe. Also, what's the point of being so obsessed with someone if he actually has more power than anyone else here?

Trivia:

Arata's grades aren't that good and one of the reasons why he started to like Akio is the younger boy agreeing to let him copy his homework.

Arata doesn't look exactly like Riku, but they share some other traits, like age, zodiac sign, blood type, being taller than Akio and having dark hair. Also, Riku not looking like an exact copy of Arata and Akio still liking him because of how much he reminds him of his follower can be explained as Akio missing Arata too much.

Arata is a year older than most of his classmates, but there's not any particular reason for that.

Arata really likes animals that are considered to be weird, dangerous or scary by most people and he was obsessed with insects and dinosaurs when he was a child (he still is). He also has a huge shark plushie in his room, but it's not cute at all and it's actually kinda creepy. When Akio found out about that interest of his, he tried to find as much information as possible, so that he could impress Arata with his knowledge later.

Arata actually didn't care about Akio that much when he first met him, he only had to spend time with him for reasons I can't talk about yet, but as he kept learning more about him and what kind of person he is, he started to admire him and be truly supportive of him.

Arata knew Akio's victim well not only because of them all being classmates, but also because Akio's victim really wanted to be friends with Akio and that annoyed Arata even back when he wasn't interested in Akio (or at least he thought so). When he fully turned into Akio's follower, he did everything to make his victim's life worse: from stealing his medications to "accidentally" pushing him down the stairs. Akio actually didn't need to try and "manipulate" Arata to kill the poor boy for him, Arata would do it anyway sooner or later.

If you remember, the silhouettes' eyes in Akio's MV were green (meaning envy and jealousy) and only one of them had pink eyes (meaning love and genuine support). Yes, those other figures are Akio's classmates and the pink-eyed figure is supposed to be Arata.. but only in this particular MV (symbolism, am I right), because in real life, as you have probably already noticed, Arata has heterochromia and one of his eyes is pink, meanwhile his other eye is green. And yes, I've made his eyes like that on purpose.

Remember how Akio mentioned in his interrogation that he's okay with anything his mother cooks, but something was crossed out? He actually wanted to write "anything Arata cooks", but quickly changed it to his mother, because he found it too embarrassing and he didn't want the guards to ask about Arata. The funniest thing about this is that Arata actually can't cook at all and he just bought random food and then he was like "Yeah, I've made it for you, do you like it? <3". It worked though and Arata had to hold his laugh every single time because Akio genuinely believed him.

Side character 005: Mikazuki Ruka

Name: Mikazuki Ruka (朏 瑠日) (his last name means "crescent moon" and his first name means "lapis lazuli" and "sun")

Age: 21 y/o

Gender: Male

Birth date: May 19th (Taurus)

Height: 164 cm

Blood type: A

Occupation: Unemployed

Personality: Ruka wishes people would just.. ignore him or pretend he's not here. He doesn't like talking to people and finds it exhausting. Even simply being around people is too much for him. No, actually, everything is too much for him. Getting up in the morning or even simply eating or breathing is too much work for him. It would be nice if he had someone who could just.. do all of that for him. He'd be okay with doing anything in return for that.. well, if it's not too exhausting. Ah, and if this doesn't sound too weird yet, Ruka has this interesting habit of saying that he's actually dead if anyone asks him to do something he's too lazy to do or simply asks him a question about his past or how he's feeling right now. He often says something like "'Cause I'm dead" in the end of his sentences. He never explains why he does that and it seems much more serious than just him trying to come up with an excuse not to talk about something or not to do something. Maybe it's because he genuinely feels like he's actually a corpse and that's why he's always so tired?.. Ah, but don't think that he's always so cold and emotionless. He's actually very expressive, but only around one specific person.

Trivia:

Ruka's voice is very androgynous and most of the time people have to ask him about his gender. It doesn't help that he has a unisex name as well. And when someone asks him or thinks he's a girl, he simply shrugs and goes "I'm dead anyway, so it doesn't matter". He often wears skirts and dresses too.

Speaking of that habit of his, at first Kei thought that Ruka suffers from "Cotard's syndrome", a condition in which the person thinks that they're actually dead or don't have any blood or organs, but he has soon found out that Ruka knows perfectly well that he's alive, he just likes to think that he's dead, a walking corpse or even a zombie.

Ruka stopped growing when he was 14 years old and he still looks very young and people often mistake him for a teenager. When Kei first met him in a night club, he actually got worried and wondered how this kid was allowed in here. Ruka kinda likes the fact that he looks so young, since "it proves that he really has died and stopped aging".

Ruka is much more talkative around Kei in general. And just so you understand, he wasn't a "poor innocent guy who Kei has kidnapped and tortured in his basement", he was free to go anywhere he wanted to (without leaving the house, of course) and do anything that he wanted. He even made fun of Kei and made jokes like "Ah, do you like me for my childlike appearance or something? You're even more of a creep than I've thought" (Kei punched him right after that and made him take his words back because even he got uncomfortable after hearing that) and "Just beat me up and take as many photos as you want already, I wanna go to sleep as soon as we're done". He even teased him and said things like "What, is this everything you've got?" while Kei tortured him. Kei absolutely did horrible things to him, but Ruka still had more freedom than it was shown in Kei's MV and even though he's still a victim of kidnapping, he actually kind of enjoyed the process because he thought he was finally about to die for real.

The outfit that he's shown wearing has sun and moon motifs which is a reference to his name meaning. I wanted his name to be related to both sun and moon to show that he's Kei's "sun and moon", that meaning that he's Kei's everything.

According to Ruka, he doesn't have any parents or siblings and he also hates when people ask him about them. He still had a friend group (he didn't care about them at all) and he actually was basically forced to come with them to that night club from Kei's MV. They have still spent a lot of time explaining that he really is an adult This is how Kei and Ruka met and Kei went "Oh.. He's just like me fr.."

It's hard to explain what kind of relationship Kei and Ruka had, since it's hard to call them friends and they weren't really a couple. Their relationship had platonic, romantic and sexual elements, but they still had no idea who they are to each other and they mostly just treated each other like an artist and a muse at first before they started to become closer.

Side character 008: Kanasawa Takame

Name: Kanasawa Takame (金沢喬女) (her last name means "gold" and "swamp, stream" and her first name means "high, noble" and "woman")

Age: 31 y/o

Gender: Female

Birth date: November 16th (Scorpio)

Height: 170 cm

Blood type: O

Occupation: Maid cafe manager

Personality: Takame is a polite and gentle woman who is always very kind to everyone, especially her employees. She has a very good reputation and everyone knows her as a caring and understanding person who never lets her employees overwork themselves and if she sees someone making them uncomfortable, she will make sure to take care of that and protect them. She's quite passionate about anime, manga and games and that's.. uh.. one of the reasons why she decided to open a maid cafe. What about the other reasons? Haha, you don't have to know that. Maybe this woman really does have a dark side, but only one of her workers knows about it. And that worker still loves her no matter what.

Trivia:

Takame secretly has a thing for cute girls in maid outfits and that's a second reason why she opened a maid cafe.

Takame really does have a secret second job and her being a cafe manager is just something she does to hide her secrets and make herself look like a normal person who doesn't do anything illegal.

Unlike other two side characters who actually liked their prisoners, she didn't have any feelings for Yurika and just manipulated her because she knew that Yurika is the only worker who would agree to help with something like Takame's second job and she knew that Yurika really needs someone to rely on, so she promised she will take care of everything that Yurika has problems with. She thought that Yurika is cute, but that's all.

Takame really does like anime, manga and games and that's not something she made up. She believes that no matter how old you are, you should still do what you like, even if other people judge you for it.

She knew everything about Yurika's past and her problems and she knew about Yurika's relationship with her victims. She used that information to make Yurika trust her, but no matter how manipulative she was, she actually did protect Yurika from her stalkers and people who harassed her. Of course, that made Yurika like her even more, but when Takame did that, she genuinely wanted to protect Yurika because she didn't want her to go through anything like that.

[theflyingfeeling]

still sick but alive, unfortunately 🤧