#because unlike dante with hell

[theastrophysicistnextdoor]

The Ineffable Detective Agency presents: Decoding 1941 Hell – The Hidden Morse Messages

The Good Omens team never fails to surprise us: In the Hell scenes set in 1941, there are subtle beeps in the background that many might have missed: morse code messages! 

We took the time to decode these messages from about 5 minutes of the show – some parts are easy to identify, some parts are really hard due to overlying sounds or noises. 

We used the 5.1 audio and selected only the channel with the morse signals. Check out an easy snippet – which line is it? :)

Then, we applied high- and low-pass filters to emphasize the code’s pitch around 1360 Hz. Some of us have pretty sharp ears, some of us worked with the frequency spectra to mark short and long signals as well as pauses in between. 

Here is what we have heard or seen, together with some facts and thoughts on the lines. Let us know what you think!

S2E4 06:19 to 08:23 “Have a miserable eternity”

Here are the pieces we have successfully decoded: 

HAVE A DREADFUL ETERNITY

We are wondering why this is different to the text via loudspeaker as well as Furfur’s “have a miserable eternity”...

TOMMY’S A LEGEND

Do we know a Tommy?

1) There's the Welsh magician/comedian Tommy Cooper (his magical act specialized in magic tricks that appeared to fail), who was the inspiration for the red fez in the magic shop. Cooper died live on television suffering a heart attack. :(

2) There's also the lead character Tommy in Brigadoon, the plot of which feels seriously GO-coded. There is a magic village hidden outside time that only appears in Scotland once every 100 years and is connected to the rest of the world with a bridge, outsiders who find "clues about the village and its people that make no sense", and a plot about unlikely lovers who are separated (because one "can't just leave everything in the real world behind"), and an ending that reunites the lovers against all odds because of the strength of their love ("I told ye, if you love someone deeply enough, anything is possible ... even miracles.")

PAUL’S OUR MIXING HERO

Could that be the Re-Recording Mixer PAUL McFADDEN?

ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION ABAN

The phrase "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here" is a quote from Dante’s Inferno, Prelude to Hell, Canto III, Vestibule of Hell: Dante passes through the gate of Hell, which bears an inscription ending with the phrase "Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate". So, the minisode is THE place where we get quotes from the two most famous literary accounts of Hell – with Furfur's quotation of Paradise Lost in the dressing room at the Windmill Theater: "In dubious battle on the Plains of Heaven". 

S2E4 09:16 to 10:09 “Processing the Nazis”

ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION

S2E4 11:07 - 13:12: “The offer to return as Zombies”

These two minutes are very tricky: while in the first half it is ok-ish to identify the signals in the spectrum, the second half is overlaid by so much noise… – yes, we are calling the dialogues and sounds in hell noise now :D – that we chose a different approach. 

It looked as if the sequence starts from the beginning, so we compared both parts, and now we are quite sure that it is the same pattern. 

DO NOT LICK THE WALLS HEAVEN LOOKS DOWN ON YOU BECAUSE YOU ARE PATHETIC ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION DO NOT LICK THE WALLS HEAVEN LOOKS DOWN ON YOU BECAUSE YOU ARE PATHETIC ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE CHEER UP IT’S ONLY ETERNAL DAMNATION DO NOT LICK THE WALLS HEAVEN LO …

So those are the sections we are pretty certain we have correct. However, there is one section we are still unsure on - maybe you can help?

Back to S2E4 06:19 to 08:23

We have been fighting hard with the first six seconds, before “HAVE A DREADFUL ETERNITY” and we think it is:

SHE’S IN MA PHONE

Who are we talking about now?

Do you have any other ideas of what this could be? If it is “She’s in ma phone”, what does that mean? Or is the S just noise and it starts with an H? Or even with a B – BE’S IN MA PHONE?

So, what are your thoughts on all of these messages? Why go to the effort of putting morse code here? Is it a fun easter egg, or something more? And why say “dreadful eternity” in morse when the quote used in the show is “miserable eternity”? We have so many questions!

Spoiler: There is more code hidden throughout the series.  Let us know what you see or hear!

-... .    -.- .. -. -..    - ---    . .- -.-. ….    --- - …. . .-. 

An amazing joint effort with @noneorother, @kimberleyjean, @thebluestgreen, and @embracing-the-ineffable at the @ineffable-detective-agency (with the incredible @maufungi, @somehow-a-human, @lookingatacupoftea, @komorezuki, @havemyheartaziraphale, and @dunkthebiscuit)

See more of our posts, plus a collection of Clues and metas from all over the fandom, here.

[msmysticfail]

How to manifest (Law of Attraction) for 8th house and Scorpio placements:

The 8th house, like Scorpio, is ruled by Pluto, the great God of the underworld, of the bowels of the Earth. It is the magnetic force of Pluto that acts on the Earth's core, which is why people with important placements in the 8th house and Scorpio are magnetic, they have that sublime magnetism that pulls people in, attracting them with that something that people generally don't know how to define it exactly.

Unlike the magnetism of the Sun, which is hot and radiates light and which everyone wants to be close to its heat, Pluto is quiet, cold, it’s extremely silent, it is that spirit that stands still in one of the corners of the room, without anyone noticing it. It's energy is not clearly perceived, felt, but it's so strong, so strong, that it doesn't need clear manifestations, "scandalous" situations to show itself. Its vibration is extremely low but he is extremely powerful. Pluto gets what he wants because his strength is vibrating so strongly within itself that it becomes a pole of magnetism for the things around him. Pluto governs irresistible attractions, governs the depths of the earth (the richest and purest gold), governs the most lethal bombs, governs the most dangerous places, Pluto governs the strength to walk through “Hell”.

Okay, so how to manifest using Pluto?

1- Look inside yourself and see what/how your thoughts are.

Have you ever stopped to think about where/what your thoughts are most of the time? You may be dwelling on what someone did to you, your mind may be fixated on the bad things that happened to you in the past, you may be furious with your insufferable boss or your ex's new girlfriend. You're going to have to start paying attention from now on - while you're manifesting - where your thoughts are in the moment.

2- Change your thoughts from what bothers you to what you want.

You know what you want, 8th house and Scorpio individuals always have something they really want and they know what it is. So, from the moment you start manifesting you will have to redirect your thoughts from the things that bother you to the things that please you, the things that you really want. This process is not easy, you may need to heal some wounds from the past first, so that you can finally have a strong and clear mind to act on your desires.

3 – Write what you want and don’t show it to anyone

Write down what you really want to manifest, you can use any type of manifestation method (scripting), write with all your heart what you want to manifest, be it a boyfriend, be it a position at work, be it the fame you want to gain, connect with the desire and let your words flow. Keep the notebook/sheet in secret (Pluto), and let its manifestation be something intimate between you (8th house or Scorpio placement) and Pluto (force of the Universe).

4 - Activate your personal power

You are angry that things are not going the way you want, you feel ugly, you feel disconnected from yourself, you feel bad inside yourself. Look, this is the hardest part. You will have to change your entire emotional universe to work deeply with your emotions, remember, the 8th house is the house of deep emotions, just like the 12th house, you will have to dive completely within yourself, to discover what hurts you (8th house), what you are afraid of losing (8th house), what gives you pleasure (8th house) even if it is prohibited. You will enter one of the most sensitive areas of yourself. There's no getting away with Pluto, however. If you want your gold, you'll have to walk through hell first. Remember, however, that Persephone had the help of Hecate, Dante had the help of Virgil, so you can also ask for help, whether from a psychologist, through witchcraft, meditation, or through physical or emotional self-care.

5 – Keep working on your personal power

After you understand your inner universe, now it's time to activate the power of Pluto. “What I want also wants me”, “What is mine is coming to me”, “I love myself, I accept my intensity, I accept my power. My power doesn’t scare me”, “I’m not going to give that power to him/her, I have the power to move forward, I have the power to change this situation”. These are some of the phrases that you will repeat to yourself, at any time of the day, while you are manifesting, you can create others, just remember that they should remind you of your personal power, that they should affirm your power, be creative and repeat firmly because Pluto will listen to you.

6-End: Don't be afraid of the journey

Pluto rules you, baby! Don't be afraid of the shadows, let them work for you, not against you, the dark cannot scare you, you are a creature of the depths, a child of the realms of the darkness. Good luck!

[lu-is-not-ok]

*rises from the grave*

*trips and falls flat on my face*

Heyyyy, it's ya boy, your favorite chronically exhausted Hong Lu identity that forgor about posting to Tumblr. Hi. Hello.

So. Timekilling Time, huh? Very fun, very exciting, we love focusing on Sinners that are misunderstood both in and out of character. We love Rodya, Hong Lu, and Ryoshu focus. We love Ryoshu's butch mustache swag.

Anyway, allow me yap about it a bit, because I took frame by frame screenshots of the teaser and I haven't yapped on Tumblr in a while. I'll also give a general update on how I've been doing at the end of the post for those who are interested.

The first thing I've noticed in the teaser is Dante actually lays out the exact traits that their choice of Sinners would need. These being (exact wording):

Someone who can support Dante

Someone who can remain laser-focused on the case

Someone who can be free from biased judgement while making rational, quick spur-of-the-moment decisions

In other words, we need Sinners who will help Dante out, are able to stay focused, and who can think on their feet without relying on their own internal biases.

I think it's important to lay those out as clearly as possible, because it makes the selections made by Dante and Verg very interesting, and also kind of funny.

Let's look at Dante's picks - Yi Sang, Meursault, and Faust. These are all, at a surface level, decent general picks, as all three of them are seen as smart and rational. However, if we look at them while keeping the previously mentioned traits in mind, it turns out these three might just be some of the worst picks Dante could ever fucking make.

The biggest issue - none of these bitches can think quickly. Faust is especially notorious for this, as it's consistently pointed out how she always needs a long time to come to a conclusion or otherwise has to pause to come up with answers. We also know Yi Sang is the type of person to get lost in his thoughts and just meander instead of getting to the point. Meursault is a bit of an outlier in that we see that he can think quickly, but if he's not given any orders he's never gonna act on those thoughts. Admittedly, he has been getting better at speaking up over time, but he's still mostly in this "only does what he's told to do" mode of operations.

This is where their issues split up a little bit.

Yi Sang is probably the most likely to be supportive of Dante out of the three - we see that he cares about others and has learned to interfere and give advice when he feels it's necessary (though who knows if he's doing well enough to keep that up after Canto 6, oof). No, rather his other issue lies in the focus department. This is the guy who, as I previously mentioned, meanders all over before getting to the point. Again, like Meursault, he has been getting better at not doing that, but he's still got ways to go.

Faust and Meursault on the other hand have the opposite issue. While they're fairly goot at staying focused on what they have to do, the issue is that they never fucking speak up. They're probbably the furthest from being supportive of Dante. They're most likely to learn info and just keep it to themselves until everyone has wasted way too much fucking time. Hell, Meursault would probably make a decently good detective if allowed to do the case all on his own, but since he's meant to be a part of a group, he's unlikely to help out that much without Dante directly ordering him around.

Now, onto Verg's picks - Rodya, Hong Lu, and Ryoshu. This is where things get really, really interesting. Because we have the reverse situation to Dante's picks - on the surface the choices seem random and counter-intuitive, but if we look deeper, it turns out they all fulfill the requirements surprisingly well.

I'm about to go on a tangent here, but I find it extremely important that we're focusing on this group of Sinners in the first Intervallo between what I consider to be the most thematically different arcs within Limbus. The first half of Inferno has been pretty squarely about confronting one's past, whether learning to face it properly after running away from it (Gregor, Rodya, Sinclair), or learning to move past it after refusing to let go of it (Yi Sang, Ishmael, Heathcliff).

However, looking at the Sinners we have left, it feels like the second half of Inferno might be focused less on the past specifically, but more about the Sinners' general reality. Especially the next upcoming trio of Cantos - Don Quixote, Hong Lu, and Ryoshu - have some heavy thematic focus on the idea of one's perception of reality, especially fitting for the three Sinners with weird eye shit going on.

With Timekilling Time focusing on the Sinners most misinterpreted by others in-character (and out of character), it feels like the perfect intro to this switch in thematic focus - exploring the actual realities of people who are otherwise hard to understand.

Anyway, back to discussing how Rodya, Hong Lu, and Ryoshu fit Dante's requirements.

Supportive of Dante - this is the requirement all three fulfill pretty well. Let me explain.

Rodya is probably the most obvious - she's a hypegirl through and through, and happy to take the reigns in some way or another if nobody else is able to, as we see in Canto 2. She's often one of the first people to point out when someone is not doing well, and shares a lot of her insight if in the mood, but she also knows when discretion is necessary.

Hong Lu is a fun one here - he's extremely perceptive and insightful, often sharing his thoughts with very little prompting. His only issue is that he tends to backpedal when he feels like he said something wrong, or generally just words shit in weird slightly offensive ways. He's supportive, he just doesn't always talk like he is.

Ryoshu is one I find most interesting here, as a lot of people seem to miss this about her character - despite her short temper and peculiar manner of carrying herself, she's actually pretty understanding and helpful towards people she's on amicable terms with. She always explains her acronyms if asked (and when she doesn't it's usually because people stop asking or Sinclair translates instead), she listens when told to stand down or otherwise do something when asked of by Dante or Sinclair, and the reason she tends to stay quiet is because she only speaks when she feels what she has to say is important.

Staying focused - this one is a bit harder to judge, but I'd say the only one who might not fulfill this one is Hong Lu, but only by a margin. Ryoshu is shown to get so focused she gets impatient when she can't get to the point, and Rodya always has her goal in mind even when she might act like she doesn't. Hong Lu is a bit harder to judge, as he seems to be the type to prioritze gathering information and satiating his curiostiy over the main goal, but in a case like this that might just be a massive plus.

Unbiased quick thinking - again, all three fulfill the quick thinking part very well. Rodya shows it constantly throughout Canto 2, Hong Lu shows it best in social interactions, and Ryoshu just doesn't want to waste time and so she naturally thinks quickly as well. It's when we come to the unbiased part that things get extremely interesting.

As individuals, Rodya, Hong Lu, and Ryoshu are all very biased people. Rodya sees the world from the perspective of someone who suffered in the poor Backstreets. Hong Lu sees the world from the perspective of a rich Nest dweller coming from a family of dubious morality. Ryoshu sees the world from the perspective of (probably) an ex-Ring member obsessed with the art that is reality. Their backgrounds color the information they take in a lot.

However... this means that as a group, all three balance each other's biases out. Rodya's cynicism gets balanced out by Hong Lu's idealism, which is balanced by Ryoshu's realism. Their backgrounds couldn't be more different, and thus give the widest possible perspective when put together.

I think this is the point Verg is making with this selection. Dante's selection is the easy way out. It's people that Dante already knows how to deal with, and would rather pick even if their skillsets don't fit the situation. Verg is making Dante learn how to work with Sinners who might be harder to deal with, but have skillsets more fitting for the situation at hand.

Dante can't keep half-assing everything by always turning to the same few people. Every Sinner in the group has their use and are smart in their own unique ways. They have to figure what every Sinner's strong point is, otherwise they'll end up putting everyone in danger by relying on people who are simply not good in a situation while ignoring those who could help.

So... that's what I think.

Anyway, personal general update - I'm still alive! And also very swamped with college and constant exhaustion. So, things will have to change a bit moving forward.

Number one - I will not be returning to old analysis requests. There's too many at this point, and I just don't have the time to sit down and write longass posts whenever I want anymore. However, that isn't to say E.G.O and Sin analyses will never return! I have plaaans for what I want to do with those moving forward, it just may take some time to materialize.

Number two - I'm generally just more active on Discord than on Tumblr. Yapping on Discord feels more natural for me, as it's just... less formal than making a full post I guess. So, if you want to discuss things with me, or if you're on a server that you think would do well with having me yapping in there, feel free to shoot me an invite link in replies (or in DMs if you don't want it to be public)!

Number three - Go check out the Absolute Pride Resonance event on Youtube! I'm not a part of it maybe next time wink wink nudge nudge, but you should still check it out cause it's a bunch of cool people doing very scuffed streams, as is fitting for the scuff Project Moon is known for.

Alright, that's it. I still don't know how to end Tumblr Posts. Bye.

[vintagerpg]

Friends, if there is one Role Aids product you should have on your shelf, it is this box set, Realms of Fantasy: To Hell and Back (1993). I have had it on my shelf for a while and kind of paid it no mind, partly because of use of a colored Doré engraving from Inferno just makes the thing seem so generic. Especially as it came out in the shadow of the very Vertigo-esque Role Aids sub-line, Demons, which was a far glitzier series of box sets. But this is the one. Pure gold. Probably my very favorite Role Aids product.

Inside are two primary books, by the late, lamented Nigel Findley. The first essentially translates Dante’s Inferno into game terms, from the first circle to the ninth. The second half of that book presents Dis, the city of hot iron, in fairly vivid detail. Grade-A stuff, distinct in character from and very much anticipating Planescape, which was still a year off.

The second book is perhaps even more interesting, because I simply didn’t expect it. Here we have profiles of other realms: Atlantis, Avalon, Faerie and, most intriguing, Selene, the city of vampires. The first trio adhere, essentially, to what you expect, with just a little bit of spice added by Findley. The fourth though, was a complete surprise, based on a vampire novel by Frenchman Paul Féval, one of three he penned decades before Stoker’s Dracula. I have never heard of this before and it is so exciting: in the original novel, the city is made of black jasper and situated near Belgrade, but normally invisible to mortal eyes until Ann Radcliffe (yes, the author of The Mysteries of Udolpho) and a band of unlikely allies lay siege to it in order to rescue a kidnapped friend. I need to read this ASAP.

There is also a pile of maps and a sheaf of monster sheets, full of interesting critters. The art throughout is excellent: the historical images, credited to P. Domain and Clip “The Clipper” Art, mix well with new work by Julian Jackson and Joe Develasco. Get this. You won’t be disappointed.

[aria-hannah]

Layers of Hell

For Deadboyween Day 10 - Hell, I decided to try and pick out some extra details from hell, from a combination of what we can see of Edwin's notes in the show, what we see on screen and cross-referencing information on Dante's Inferno which it is based on.

0. Vestibule Edwin's notes: Endless staircase

Limbo Edwin's notes: Do Not Ring

2. Lust No written notes from Edwin here just a floorplan, I wonder if the Xs are doors that go nowhere or doors that don't lead out of Lust

3. Gluttony Edwin's notes: written notes on the floorplan show the way to level II (Lust), the way "Back to Doll House NO." and the way to Avarice with text "Wrong Way. AVARICE. Everything too heavy."

3.a. The Doll House I'm including the Doll House inside Gluttony since that's the level it seems to be connected to based on the floorplan, though that seems to have been via tearing a hole through the wall so there should be another proper connection somewhere, based on that and Edwin saying that the babydoll spider would need to find another way through, and it did. It's also interesting to note that Charles sees a couple of misery wraiths hanging out around a door which matches the design of the door into Simon's punishment room, though this scene takes place after Simon has moved on so it is unlikely they were drawn to him specifically, possibly these rooms hold other punishments for other people as well? We only get a very quick glimpse of Edwin's notes on the doll house while Charles is looking at the ripped section of the Gluttony page but what we can see shows a partial maze with some areas crossed out, a question mark in one area and couple of places just labelled "No." There are also drawings of the gates that are found in the doll house, notably these match the design of the gates that seem to lead into the area the babydoll spider drags Edwin to, presumably it's lair. Edwin's notes: No. ___(Bolt?) the gate

3.b. Simon's punishment room I'm including this here because Edwin found his way into here from the Doll House. One of the most interesting things about this room in terms of hell itself is that it shows that: a. The blue light can come for souls in hell b. The endless' realms can connect here (I wonder if Desire looks in on the Lust and Avarice levels?)

4. Avarice Edwin's notes: Heavy labour, everyone in your way

5. Wrath No notes

6. Heresy No notes

7. Violence Edwin's notes: trapped, impaled, submerged in blood

8. Fraud Edwin's notes: snake pit, regain human form by biting other humans circle I. whipped circle II. covered in excrement circle III. flipped + feet set on fire circle IV. ___(swim?) in hot pitch circle V. head twisted backwards circle VI. weighted clothes circle VII. snake pit turn into snakes circle VIII. ____(wrapped/wreathed?) in big flame circle IX. wounded, disfigure circle X. leprosy, dropsy, ____(rashes?) Interestingly circles 4 and 5 are switched in Edwin's notes as compared to the info I could find on Dante's Inferno, so in Dante's Inferno circle 4 has all their heads twisted backwards and circle 5 has them thrown in boiling hot pitch/tar.

9. Treachery Edwin's notes: frozen + stuck + chewed on

Overall thoughts: Given the lack of notes on Wrath and Heresy, it's likely that Edwin either spent little to no time in these circles or he wrote about it in detail in another page of his notebook (as he did with the doll house). On the other hand given the notes covering all 10 circles of Fraud, he spent enough time there to have seen all 10 of them and has paid particular attention to circle 7 both in his drawings and his side notes. He also has some notes on both Treachery and Violence, which makes me think that he spent some time in Fraud and while trying to escape from there saw the circles either side, just like he has notes on Avarice from trying to escape from Gluttony in that direction.

[icycoldninja]

Hey, I read your rules, but there was no way to signify whether or not your requests were open that I could see. If they're not, feel free to ignore this, but I've had a thought about the DMC boys.

What would it be like dating them throughout the years? Like your relationship starts in game one and how it evolved through game 5?

Again, feel free to ignore if you want, have a good night/day/evening/morning!

Oh, that's OK. Requests are open for now. Enjoy!

Sparda boys + V x Reader longtime relationship headcannons

WARNING: MAAAAAJOR SPOILERS FOR ALL THE GAMES!!

¤ Dante ¤

-Let us remember that the DMC timeline is not in the same order as the games. When you first met Dante, he would have been in his late teens, during the events of DMC3.

-He would undoubtedly be very depressed and push you away after Vergil "dies", but you're committed enough to date someone like him, so you'll find a way to get him to open up to you.

-You'd end up accompanying him through almost every mission, spending your downtime at Devil May Cry, trying to keep the place clean. Of course, you'll also be working really hard to try and pay off his debts.

-You were by his side when he fought Nelo Angelo, being the only one he could truly rely on after that incident, and you were also one of the first besides Dante himself to meet Nero.

-By this point, he would be much older and much wiser, his depression now masked by an air of comedic flamboyance and extroversion. He does a great job fooling everyone else, but not you. You see right through him, but you don't really care. He's been your Dante since the beginning of this saga and he always will be.

-You'll watch him dive off the top of the Qliphoth with his brother whom he thought he lost, and you'll smile, silent tears of both nostalgia and sadness running down your cheeks. You guys have grown so much throughout the years. He started out as a disrespectful punk, much like Nero is today, and now he's grown into a seasoned middle aged man, but he's still your Dante.

-Will you ever get to see each other again? Most would tell you that you would not, but knowing that pizza-crazed idiot, he'll find a ridiculous way to come back home to you.

■ Vergil ■

-You met Vergil during his travels for MOTIVATION, as he searched for POWER. He did not want to get involved with a pathetic human such as yourself, but you stuck around anyway, and managed to make him get used to you.

-Yes, this does mean you are Nero's mother, and yes, originally, you guys planned to be a happy family before he began overthinking and worrying too much.

-He did try to warn you after Nero was born that sticking around him was foolish, and that you would only get hurt, but you didn't care. Turns out, he was right. You had the displeasure of watching him fall off the Temen-ni-gru to what you could only presume was his death.

-Heartbroken, you then sent Nero to an orphanage while you searched for a way to enter Hell and against all odds, you succeeded. You were met with horrors and challenges unlike anything you'd ever seen before down there, but you persevered for the sake of your loved one.

-You found him strung up in chains, the Yamato lying brokenn on the ground nearby, his body bruised and broken. You tried to free him, but Mundus appeared and commanded his demons to take you away. By the time you'd escaped and returned, he was gone.

-Thankfully, you never had to witness your beloved turn into Nelo Angelo, because honestly, the chances of your mental state surviving that whole ordeal is less than 10%.

-You would have had a tearful reunion when he came back, but he had higher priorities: destroying the Qliphoth. He'll be back soon, you reasoned, as you held your grumbling son in your arms, leading him back to the van. He always returns--he has to.

□ Nero □

-Your relationship with Nero really isn't that complicated.

-You guys met in the orphanage where he was abandoned by his very thoughtless mother, and grew closer as you got older.

-You comforted him when he was bullied by the other kids, oftentimes fighting back with insultes just as vile as the ones they threw at him.

-You are the only person Nero never gets mad at. You're an angel in his eyes for sticking by his side for so long, so he can't find it in his heart to snap at you.

-By the time he meets Dante and joins him as a fellow devil hunter, you guys are ready to elope. While your wedding plans get sidetracked by Urizen's emergence and the loss of Nero's arm, you're still madly in love.

-You were once again at his side, helping him while he struggled to cope with the fact that the very demon he had been attempting to kill was part of his dad all along, and continued to support him as he watched the only family he ever knew leap off a demonic tree, presumably never to be seen again.

-You still plan to get married, but Nero wants to wait until Dante and Vergil return so they can be present at the ceremony.

● V ●

-Your relationship with V may have been short, but in that small amount of time, you made extremely precious memories.

-You met him a few days after his birth, deciding to approach him after seeing him wandering around with that bird of his.

-Introducing yourself was one of the smartest decisions you'd ever made, for it opened the gateway to a beautiful friendship and passionate romance.

-You only knew him for a month or so, but it felt like you'd known each other forever. He just understood you in ways you never understood yourself.

-You help each other through your respective problems; he gives great advice and you help him walk on days when he simply cannot move properly on his own.

-Watching him return to Vergil was one of the saddest moments of your life, but at least you can take comfort in the fact that he's not dead, simply gone.

-Besides, Vergil can summon him again whenever he wishes, so perhaps if you befriend him, he'll give you your precious poet back.

[ao3cassandraic]

Angels, demons, language, and culture part 4: Literalism and metaphor

Part 1 (angels are never children, and that matters), Part 2 (written language is mostly coded human rather than ethereal/occult in Good Omens), Part 3 (human writings contain useful social rules, which is partly why Aziraphale values them)

It may be time to restate @thundercrackfic's original questions?

How good is Aziraphale’s reading comprehension? How much does he understand subtext and metaphor? Because his behavior this season struck me with the impression that he didn’t really understand the books he collects. He’s clever at puzzle solving, and contains vast knowledge; but he always seems to take things at face value (when he’s not willfully misunderstanding), and refuses to give up black-and-white thinking, which would make it very difficult to analyze texts.

I think there are definite reasons to believe that reading comprehension of human literature (as defined in the question) is difficult for Aziraphale. One of them, as stated in part 1, is that Aziraphale doesn't get the tremendous advantage of childhood and its brain plasticity, which (among other things) is known to help with learning language. I'm not surprised his French is pretty bad. Learning another language from the ground up as an adult can be a cast-iron PITA (yes, experience speaking).

Another is simply that Aziraphale is not human. He's an outsider to humanity. He's fairly empathetic, and he does learn (unlike almost all his fellow angels!), but that leaves him without much of a yardstick to gauge when human literature is being literal and when it's not. There also seems to be a general angelic tendency to believe what they're told? Muriel definitely has it, Michael seems to as well, and even s1!Gabriel can only (and barely) muster skepticism on one occasion that I recall (the photo incident). I can see this making Aziraphale's reading, especially early in his existence on Earth, a good bit harder for him than reading is for, say, me. I'm used to unreliable narrators and figurative language and other sorts of clever fun productive lying. Aziraphale's acquaintance with lying is -- well -- his lies don't usually involve much metaphor? I suppose one could argue that "big sharp cutty thing" is a kenning, but not really in the human way of kennings because he only uses it the once.

Moreover, it appears (based on the s1e3 cold open, mostly) that he bops around the world quite a bit until finally settling in London (with the occasional jaunt elsewhere when he gets peckish). Nothing at his creation other than the auto-polyglottism She bestows on Her angels seems to give him any tools for navigating the bewildering variety of human cultures and customs... and literary metaphor (along with lots of other literary things) is commonly culturally-bound, culturally-specific.

I mean, if you read something (maybe in high school (or analogue) or college) that was written A Long Time Ago and/or Very Far Away, didn't it probably have a ton of what lit-critters call "apparatus" in it? Explanatory introductions, bibliography, and above all footnotes/endnotes/margin notes, many of which explain figures of speech that otherwise wouldn't make sense? Not to mention stuff like (just as an example) which local then-current political morass Dante threw this particular historical person in this particular circle of Hell for. Stuff that if you're not there, not embedded in the culture and the time, you're just plain gonna whiff. Hell, even Shakespeare editions have a ton of apparatus, and Shakespeare's in Early Modern English for pity's sake!

(Which is not to say that something has to be ancient or not-from-here to benefit from some apparatus. What is The Annotated Pratchett File if not apparatus for Discworld?)

So our peripatetic angel reading literature of whatever time he's actually in (which mostly won't have apparatus he can rely on for help) will often find himself not clued-in enough to a given human culture to completely understand its literary figures, metaphors included. And sure, that's going to lead to some misreadings and misunderstandings and overliteral takes! I can't read Dante's Inferno and understand everything in it! It takes Italianists years, if not decades, to do that!

And to make the problem even more difficult, literature feeds on itself, and on other arts as well. (Hi hi hello, comparative literature major, I totally studied various flows of literary and artistic influence in college and wouldn't trade that major for anything ever, it was the best major.) Think about all the time and effort GO meta-ists have spent of late teasing out callbacks and allusions and references in GO s2. That kind of work is also part of what Aziraphale has to do to understand fully what he reads... and it's a lot of work, even for a reader as voracious and possibly sleepless as our angel.

So yeah, in sum, I don't think Aziraphale has a perfect -- or even good -- track record on understanding what he reads. I adore him because he reads anyway! He never gives up on trying to understand! That's absolutely praiseworthy! (Crowley has something of an analogue to this in his love for human inventions. He doesn't understand how anything actually works, for the most part, but he loves it all the same.)

I think there's also an outstanding question about what Aziraphale gains from reading, a sense of social rules (Part 3) aside? Well, it's known that reading (especially fiction, especially fiction about characters who are Not Like The Reader) increases empathy. I don't know if Aziraphale reads specifically for that reason, but I'm absolutely willing to believe that fiction works on him that way, just as it does on us, even if he doesn't fully understand everything he reads. Did you fully understand everything you read as a child? Or even as an adult? I would never claim that of myself. Yet I certainly will claim that I picked up a lot of what I suppose I will call my character -- it runs deeper than personality -- and my general understanding of life (insofar as I have one) from reading.

If I had to answer why Aziraphale reads, though? I'd think back to my own childhood, as a bullied child with somewhat neglectful parents who held outsized expectations of me. Reading for me was peace, was escape, was enjoyment, was something to think about that wasn't my own unhappiness, was -- now and then, honestly not often enough -- seeing myself reflected in a book and feeling less alone. I hope and believe that human literature and music served similar purposes for our poor angel.

[tobiasdrake]

I've often wondered what would happen if you used the Dragon Balls to resurrect someone that's been reincarnated?

While it has a fuckton of original fantasy elements to it, the spiritual mythology of Dragon Ball is rooted in Japanese Buddhism. Upon death, you are taken before Enma-Daio, a real mythological figure who governs the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth known as samsara.

Fun fact, it's commonly believed that Goku was rewarded for his good and meritorious deeds by being allowed to keep his body and go train under Kaio. But actually, Enma-Daio was against letting Goku go to Kaio because of his good and meritorious deeds.

Enma's position was basically, "This guy's earned a full ride to The Good Place and you want to throw that away on a risky death-hike that will probably land his ass in Hell!? Are you out of your goddamn mind?"

He reluctantly acquiesced, but he wasn't happy about it.

You really want to go dumbass yourself into Hell then whatever. No skin off my back, I guess.

Hell, or Jigoku as it's known in Japanese Buddhism, is a bit complicated. There are various "planes", so to speak, of Jigoku not unlike the circles of Dante's Inferno but with one particular key difference.

Under samsara, the afterlife is a transient experience. For everyone, good and bad alike, save for those who manage to break free from the karmic cycle. This is the ultimate goal.

Note that while we never see Jigoku for ourselves in the manga, it does show up in the anime - Along with two more real mythological figures.

This is Gozu and Mezu, a pair of oni who serve the role of dragging people into Jigoku. Fun fact, this episode is actually based on two separate misadventures of the Monkey King Sun Wukong, who Goku is meant to be an adaptation of. Understanding the assignment, Toei drew a lot of inspiration from Journey to the West when writing Goku-centric filler episodes.

In any case, time spent in Jigoku is limited, determined by the extent of one's negative karma. There are a few references to the transient experience of being dead, predominately for villains. The most prominent is, of course, the fate of Majin Buu.

In gratitude to Goku for the great service he's performed, Enma-Daio made that happen. He rushed Buu through the cycle, allowing him to be reborn on Earth and with his power intact.

Post-God Merger Piccolo also brings up the karmic cycle when Vegeta, in a rare moment of self-reflection, seeks spiritual clarity from him.

Vegeta's going to Jigoku to expend the bad karma he's accumulated over his life, and then he too will be born again as a new incarnation.

This is the system of life and death that forms the foundation of Dragon Ball's mythology. You die, you expend the good or bad karma you've accumulated in life, and then you are reborn to go another round.

Complicating the matter is that not only does reincarnation exist within this mythology but. Uh. So does resurrection.

There are restrictions, of course. Shenron cannot revive someone who has already died before.

And a mass-revival under a shared condition has a time limit of one year.

But there's no such limitation on single revivals. At least, it's never established that there is one. The time to bring it up would probably have been Goku's afterlife training for one year in preparation for the Saiyans' arrival.

So. That. Raises an interesting question.

What would happen if you had Shenron resurrect someone whose soul is presently occupying another body in the mortal world?

[ruinaimagines]

what do you think it would take for Heathcliff to warm up to somebody? because right now I feel like he'd scare a lot of people off with how brash and violent he is, but it'd be interesting if someone managed to befriend him.

I love him. And yes, I am alive! I am still crawling on. somehow.

Heathcliff Warming up to Someone Headcanons:

It is true that his outwardly brash nature is what a lot of people are initially met with, especially if they happen to be of some authoritative stance, but that’s mainly because of his own preconceived judgements. He’s a rather reasonable and good man otherwise.. Just a bit quick to jump to opinions.

If he doesn’t feel as though you are demanding respect from anyone then you have quite a decent chance of getting along. Talk to him as though he’s an actual person and you’ll find he’s pretty cooperative unless what you’re telling him to do is something he deems as outrageous.

Even though I lovingly call him an idiot, he’s quite the opposite. Heathcliff is a very apt man. We’ve seen this during Canto II with how he diverts the attention of the casino guards. He’s just a bit impulsive in some cases in the same sense that Don is. If he sees something he considers to be wrong, insulting, or similar he is quick to action if no one else is. He’s very good with short-term solutions but doesn’t immediately consider the implications for the long term. That’s Faust’s job. He’s clever and witty.

His recklessness also stems from the fact that death isn’t actually a problem for him (poor Dante), so not much is stopping him from speaking his mind. Unless the situation is really dire he has no desire to shut his mouth. Will still mutter under his breath.

He would immediately get along a lot better with you if you share any kind of similar passions in disrupting the system, calling people out, and overall being very blunt on the blatant ignorance and audacity some people have. While not to say the other sinners don’t agree, they just typically don’t really comment on it either. To have someone else that he can rant with and be brutally honest with? Ohhh that is just going to fuel the flames.

Would find you funny as hell if you insult the smug, sleazy workers of the city you happen to run into. Even better if it’s directly in their faces. Will back you up even if you don’t know each other much at this point because it’s entertaining. 

I believe that you have a pretty solid chance of getting along even if you don’t immediately call out someone to their face so long as he overhears you complaining about it later. Not all people have the confidence he does, and sometimes it’s easier for you to let it be in the moment as long as it’s not too treacherous or there’s quips here and there.

The most crucial part in befriending him is first and foremost about establishing a sense of likemindedness. If he doesn’t see you as an agreeable person, then chances are he won’t think well of you either. You don’t have to be as loud about it as he is but even stating something along the lines of ‘That is wrong and it needs to be acknowledged and not smoothed over’ after the fact works for him.

I think that it would be a lot more difficult for him to see eye to eye with someone who so compliantly follows along with orders and seems indifferent to the cruelty and justice around them. There needs to be some kind- any kind of proof that you have humanity and aren’t willing to stay complicit with continuing what is seen as morally wrong by him.

He’s a very passionate guy which can be a little difficult to navigate because he can very easily get lost to more aggressive feuds or grudges, in these situations he’s a bit unreachable in that he is very unlikely to hear others out. When it calms down though his opinion may alter slightly especially the longer he knows a person. Still sticks very close to his own truth nonetheless.

With this it becomes easier to talk to him because there’s no longer that  preconceived notion he holds over you, whatever it may be. You might find him even gravitating more near you or valuing your opinions a little higher than the others. When Faust is droning on he tends to tune her out, but whatever you’re saying he’s more encouraged to listen in on. There isn’t much of a difference in the moment, but you’ll notice that he’s completely forgotten what Faust has advised whereas he brings up a note that you mentioned instead.

Don’t expect the bickering to go anywhere. Friend or not, there will still be snide remarks here and there, though if you’re on good terms with him they’re meant in a more playful snarky way as opposed to a genuine complaint. Best be quick witted yourself.

You’re one of the few who can get away with insulting him without paying the typical price of being smacked over the head unconscious with his bat! Something that has happened an unnecessary amount of times with the other sinners much to the displeasure of Dante. Don’t expect to be completely devoid of being pushed around though. I imagine him to be the type of person to slam his hands around your shoulder with such force that it will completely knock the wind out of you for a joke.

Heathcliff is sort of hard to reach emotionally, even if you two get along very well. It can be kind of difficult to delve deeper into his own problems no matter how good on terms you are with him. He’s approachable in the way that his inferiority complex makes it extremely unlikely for him to ever mention his own shortcomings or communicate his distress in a way other than anger. Heathcliff does not want to have someone pity him, and above all he doesn’t want to be seen as weak.

It’s very hard to navigate, there’s hardly a right answer of how to go about it because it’s something that’s so emotionally fuelled that your best case scenario is just trying to listen and be more casual about it if something ever did get brought up. It’s a sore spot, don’t be surprised or feel bad if he snaps at you because he feels like you’re trying to be his therapist, it’s a spur of the moment thing and he’d feel bad afterwards. He just wants to be seen as a person.

Try to pry very little, what small trace amounts you get from him of his own personal experiences is something you’ll just have to take. Heathcliff might seem to be in particularly pissy and broody moods from time to time, whether from a bad interaction or something deeper, you can ask him what happens but if he says to drop it then it's recommended you do.

I feel like he isn’t ready to unpack everything, he finds it unneeded and a hindrance to get all sappy and focus on how he feels. That said I don’t know if there ever would be a proper time… aside from his canto.

You become his complaining buddy. He will trash talk either the others or some unpleasant person you’ve met while at work. It’s honestly fascinating some of the most obscure and abhorrent insults he can construct, beat only by Ryoshu of course. Her’s is just vulgar.

He is so biased it’s not even subtle. Heathcliff might seem a bit unapproachable at first but you’ll quickly come to realize that if you offer a sort of loyalty then he will return it. Might make fun of you for getting into a tricky situation, but he will do everything he can to pull you out of it and I think that’s what makes him such a good companion.

[thelampisaflashlight]

Some general headcanons and lore I've established about the ghouls and other things in my fics. Below the cut for length.

-Hell is multi-layered, and follows the same sort of structure as the one in Dante's Inferno, except the circles are treated more like regions, and the residents of Hell (ghouls, demons, etc...) are able to freely move between these areas, but they cannot leave unless summoned and/or striking a deal with the toll man.

This is largely to ensure the surface doesn't get overrun.

While that might seem counter intuitive to the whole apocalypse/ruling the world thing, Hell likes bureaucracy... and paperwork.

...Pity the demons living in Limbo, that's where all the contracts and other bullshit gets sent to be filed.

Rain certainly doesn't miss it, that's for sure.

-Mountain used to be human, but he may or may not have committed mass murder on some monks/the former residents of the abbey, way, waaaay back when the original building was only about two decades old and got sent to Hell.

Additionally, his original home, his cottage/cabin, is still standing on the abbey's property; It's the gardener's cottage now, and he's real proud of how well the structure has kept up.

When asked, he will neither confirm nor deny the murder allegations.

-Dew is a hybrid; Water/Fire, with a smidge of Air mixed in to maintain the balance between his primary elements, but his percentages are even lower than half and half, because he's also part human.

He didn't display any "abnormalities" while growing up, so no one knew he was anything other than human... until he kind of sort of maybe smacked his head a little too hard in the woods and woke up in Limbo.

Rated it a 4/10, gets why Rain wanted to leave.

Toll man was cool though.

-Swiss is a half-ghoul, with a similar composition to Dew, except he had a vague idea of his heritage growing up, just not the full extent of it.

Unlike Dew, however, he didn't have to die in order to activate his ghoulish side.

Significantly less traumatic.

And lastly;

-The ghouls' den is laid out so that there are two communal areas, and a "powder room" (a bathroom with a toilet and sink, but no shower/bath), while their individual rooms have a sort of dorm style set up with the addition of personal, on suite bathrooms.

Mountain and Dew's dorm is the only shared room, and this is largely because of Dew's skull smacking through the thin drywall dividing their rooms, resulting in both a concussion and a large hole in the wall.

When Aeon and Aurora came along, and the dorms got remodeled, Mountain and Dew elected to remain roommates at the cost of sacrificing one of their bathrooms, because they'd gotten used to sharing.

[mako-neexu]

I do feel like Obe and Dante's way of showing affection is different from each other bc of their roles as servant. Oberon's love is quiet and you have to read through the lines to understand that (which isn't all that hard to do for Guda) because of his nature as a servant. Someone who pretends, it's not that he has to act like he doesn't like them that's just his nature but he does love Guda a shit ton he is just unable to outwardly admit that loudly.

Meanwhile avengers are loud in their love. Their love burns and is the equivalent to tough love as we've seen w oc2 and date's event and interludes. He loves guda and it's for that reason he burns them in a sense, remind them that they're alive that they can still move. Unlike him. He'll burn worlds for them if he must, he'd do anything to help them achieve their goals even if it's murdering someone or ending worlds WHICH guda has never and will never want, which is why he burns the bridge that connects the two because the only way for them is forward. He'd burn himself for them too, an avenger's love is all encompassing and it will turn everything into ash.

And idk man I'm just emo ig I really wanted to see obe Dante interactions but wtvr... Huhuhuhuuu.....

[servafes 2.0 spoilers, OC ch2 spoilers]

i think its not necessarily a matter of loud and quiet. its more of how they convey it due to their nature as servants as avengers that are extra classes nearly impossible to summon , as pretenders with a lying curse.

both convey their love neither quietly nor loudly, but they convey it in ways for guda. just for guda. using their own methods that would fit them the most.

oberon's care is showing guda an "out" like you see on valentines day, his summer lines etc. but he supports them too. he gives guda advice like in Servafes 2.0 where they barged into their room to talk to them despite the dangers of morgan oblitering his spiritual core, they also talk to each other on an equal standing like you see with oberon approaching them during at the inn and at gloucester in lb6. being someone with fairy eyes along with a lying curse, he tends to be roundabout with his words to portray what he means because no matter what he says, the world will twist it so he has skirt around it like in valentines day, you could interpret what he said with "call me wiht a sigh when you run out of dependable allies and options" as perhaps something mocking and malicious when, knowing oberon's nature now past lb6, he truly is caring almost to the point of selflessness. because we see his care for castoria as well as the insects in the autumn forest, that would apply to guda to, where he has the right words to soothe their soul, casually tear that mask guda has been holding onto for so long and become just "Fujimaru Ritsuka" and not "Humanity's Last Master".

dantes, of course, as the greatest of all avengers, his natures stems that from his revenge story by dumas, dantes who is also real in the typemoon universe has dumas write his story as revenge for his enemies on making everyone forget about him. and the story became so popular around the world that his spirit origin is twisted into that of an Avenger, that sole excerpt of The Count of Monte Cristo without that happy ending written into his saint graph. still, "edmond dantes" is still there, beneath gankutsuou. he's a man who tasted happiness and love, who was thrown into the bowels of depths and despair, gone through hell itself and crawled his way back to the surface no matter how painful it got. an Avenger that is intimate with pain, with suffering the most, know love and compassion the most.

both dantes and oberon understand guda's journey and what they've been through. its just that their approach is different. being an Avenger, a class of bloody teeth and howls, of course he would wield his flames that would aid his accomplice. he's seen their determination. he's seen them bleed, get beaten up before rising back again to finish a battle once and for all. he's seen guda love. he's seen guda love mash, da vinci, dr. roman, their friends these Servants who are people made up of fragments/fragments made up of people. they chose not retribution and continued to love despite the pain of it all.

dantes saw guda as a bright, radiant star because of that. him saying you are "fire" would just feel like completely undermining everything guda is. (and a fire for an Avenger, is a different meaning altogether). so he likens you to a star. a soul so bright that could even conquer dark flames that threaten to consume you whole but you would ultimately win out in the end... because thats who you are. a person who doesnt give up, will never give up no matter how your heart is beaten and battered. dantes supports you in a way where he has your back and will fight for you in this path downwards to hell. for oberon though, he's the abyssal insect. the one that ended fairy britain and as all things will inevitably end, like i said, he offered guda to go down the abyss with them should their heart finally give up once and for all. he'll be there by their deathbed to see it through. (i wanna add more about oberon with the shining star and titania but i can add stuff next time if i make a post like this.

that said, ive been thinking of dantes and oberon interactions too. but i do imagine either dantes would test oberon first before coming with him and abby to guda's trash heap or maybe exchange some words about guda, and probably gets convinced by oberon www

[boyorgirlor]

Hozier is really out here making me remember my humanity by being a speaker for the story of Dante's inferno, to provide a human-ness to a divine comedy. A divine comedy being so paradoxical because comedy, to laugh, to be improper, to err, to suffer, is so human but on the same token there's something so unique and sacred about being human, the experience is unlike any other conscious being in the universe throughout space and time, there will be no same moment as now. And to love, to truly experience the euphoria, destress, depression, and just a holy experience of loving with your whole soul, and to lose them does feel like going through hell. But there's something that first light is able to give me hope, Dante's ascension, an unreal unearthing of both being borne again but I remember. How all things end, but there will always be a new beginning. How I will love, hurt, die, but be reborn again.

[hell-drabbles]

🎤

Ra-On with Companion that's also Solomon's descendant

Their very distantly related

Like Solomon is literally their only common family

The devils get to compare Ra-On and Companion to eachother

My train of thought isn't all together yet

But I remember thinking this had great potential to make Ra-On worst

🏃💨

-Dante Anon

Yeah this would be the perfect opportunity to make him 100% worse and real fucking gross.

Fucking imagine man: creepy cousin Ra-on. Ugh! That'll be a fun route to go down. Absolutely disgusting and it entertains me.

I want that fucker dead. And he'd probably want himself dead at the same time for feeling like that. I've certainly encountered my fair share of creepy cousins.

Is it bad that that was my first thought? Creepy cousin Ra-on? Yeah probably but oh well. Moving on.

The devils being devils probably don't really care much about this topic, so they're always entertaining the thought of having a threesome with them both.

Ra-on's a fun and easy fuck, and is so private about his own opinions and thoughts that it makes it easy for the devils to project Solomon on him. With the Companion, they can't really do that. Certainly they hold themselves with assuredness, and with a complete understanding of the limits of their power, but it's not quite the same as Solomon.

Companion is just too different, too specific of a person for the devils to project Solomon onto. And they have to admit, out of the two of them, they do feel that this Companion would probably have a better chance of saving Hell. Unlike Ra-on, they don't let themselves be distracted by lust or anything like that, so the devils can't help but deem the Companion as the responsible one. Certainly I would imagine they were reluctant at first, because the devils projected hard and they obviously wanted Ra-on to have a trump card up his sleeves and be the one to save Hell. But, no. Ra-on is... pathetic.

And this would make his learned helplessness worse in the long run.

[lu-is-not-ok]

o mighty hong lu master, the autism i have of him bowing down to you in your honor, i must ask a question relating to his family...

so when dante is overheating in the yield flesh intervallo and they start saying things about the ego and such, hong lu says "they're starting to sound like my grandfather!"

see i dont think hong lu's the type to compare anybody rambling to unrelated rambling so i was wondering if like. there could be any potential meaning in What his grandpa was saying relating to ego or other more crazy stuff!!

since the jia family has had super huge connections ive had maybe the idea of like. i dunno they had some insider knowledge in the past and they sent hong lu out specifically to find out more about what the more unnatural parts of the city entail since limbus as a company is secretive about that stuff. so they want to understand it proper... but that does feel a Bit out there. what do you think :3c

There is some interesting things in this ask that I wanna discuss. However, you might find some of my answers... a little bit disappointing in places. I'm gonna try to take these things point by point.

Canto 7 spoilers onward.

Hong Lu's Grandfather

There are exactly two mentions of Hong Lu's Grandfather in the game as of now iirc. The scene you mention, where Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings to his grandfather, and another mention in the Observation Logs for Pink Shoes, where Hong Lu brings up the fact that his Grandfather would scold him and pester him into keeping a diary, something he claims he used to hate but is now not so averse to.

The most interesting thing about Hong Lu's Grandfather is that there is no living grandfather figure in Dream of The Red Chamber. Baoyu is only ever mentioned to have a grandmother. This already puts some intrigue on him, as he's a complete wildcard adaptation-wise. There is no real way for us to predict what his deal is based on DOTRC.

That means that the fact that Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings about ego and sin to how his Grandfather talks is something to note for sure. However... well, I'll get to it.

The Knowledge the Jia Family has

Canto 7 came with some major reveals about the Jia Family due to Xichun's presence and her interactions with Hong Lu. More specifically, we know roughly what kind of esoteric knowlege the Jia Family possesses, and what they're looking for.

Xichun, and by extension the rest of the Family, are aware of the existence of the Rivers - one of which being the River of Oblivion that was introduced in Canto 7, as well as, very likely, the very same River that Lobcorp would draw from using Cogito. So yes, it's not unlikely for the Jia Family to have some awareness of the more supernatural side that the human subconscious possesses. Hell, Xichun herself outright states she, in some way, can sense Bari's past presence, who need I remind you is also the Bookhunter from one of the bad endings in Library of Ruina.

However, that's not all! Xichun also reveals what exactly the Family is looking for, and what they sent out the current candidates for becoming the next Family Head for - a River that can grant immortality. Specifically, "the immortality of the mind", which Hong Lu himself describes as "to be free from aging and death".

So, hey, case closed right? We know exactly why Hong Lu was sent out now, don't we?

Well... it's not that simple. Because, unfortunately, there's some things I want to correct you on before I conclude this.

Hong Lu's Comparisons

Here's the thing with Hong Lu. Unlike what you say, he is absolutely the type to compare different unrelated things with each other. In fact, one of his major MOs during conversations is using tangentially related anecdotes to steer conversations - see how he brought up his sibling cheating at a game in response to Heathcliff doing a jab at rich people in Canto 2, or how on the empty party ship in Canto 5 he goes off on a tangent about a spooky story that's barely related to the situation at hand.

Deflection and distraction is something Hong Lu does a lot, especially right after he says things that are concerning or otherwise don't get a positive reaction out of others. His comparisons of things going on to his home is one of those kinds of deflections/distractions. In fact, I'd say it's a lot more common for him to compare things that aren't That related rather than compare things that are Actually related.

So while I do think it is something to note that Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings to those of his Grandfather, I really don't think the connection here is nearly as strong as you posit.

Yes, we know the Jias have knowledge that most common folk in the City don't have access to, among which is the knowledge of the Rivers. It's also very likely that this is the kind of thing Hong Lu's Grandfather could go on tangents on, especially with how many of the Rivers we currently know of having effects that affect specifically the mind.

That being said, since this is Hong Lu we're talking about, I doubt the connection is as direct as his Grandfather literally rambling about the exact same topic. Again, we're talking about the guy who, upon hearing the mention of shareholders, shares an anecdote about a sibling trying to get a specific color of passport as justification for asking about whether Vergilius specifically knows the shareholder of H Corp. The connections he makes aren't usually all that strong, and that's kind of the point.

Which is where I have to talk about the elephant in the room.

Hong Lu almost definitely lied about why he left the Jia Household

See, in TKT Hong Lu shares that he was sent out by his elders to "see and experience as much of the world as possible before he returns", but... isn't it kind of strange?

That doesn't match what Xichun said about what the Family Head Candiates were sent out into the worl for. They're meant to be looking for immortality specifically, not fucking around and learning as much as they can.

And, in fact, this isn't the only thing Xichun says that clashes with Hong Lu's version of events. In fact, I'd argue it outright proves that he lied about it - she shares that the Jias are actively looking for him. If Hong Lu was really sent out to gather as many experiences and knowledge as possible, why would they want to cut that short by finding him and bringing him back by force?

That's not all in fact. This exact same story is what Hong Lu tells in his Wing IDs, the ones where it's confirmed he directly got the positions because of nepotism. But, again, that's strange. If he's meant to be experiencing the world and learning new things, why would the Jias put him in jobs that require he stays in a single specific place most of the time? K Corp Hong Lu's Uptie story outright draws attention to this, pointing out how odd it is for someone whose job involves being put in stasis in some vat for extended periods of time until they need to do some killing to have been given that job to "experience more of the world".

So, if Hong Lu is lying about why he left his home... what actually happened? Do we have any hints?

Turns out... yes. A very, very major hint in fact. Because you see, this is the Corrosion line Hong Lu says in his newly released Lasso E.G.O.

This is the only time anything Rose Hunter related calls the subject avoiding their fate a fugitive and makes a direct reference to running away. I don't think it's a coincidence.

Because if this line is a direct reference to Hong Lu, to him literally running away from his fate and escaping the Jia household, it would certainly explain some things.

Why would the Jias be out actively looking for him? Because he's not actually supposed to be out like this.

Why would his Wing Identities be put in environments where Hong Lu is primarily confined to specific locations? Because the Jias don't want him out of their sight.

Why would his claim that he's looking forward to going back home be so contradictory to how he acts and tries to prolong his time outside of the household? Because he's lying, either to himself or others, and doesn't actually want to go back.

Hell, it would even provide some context to certain other oddities about him.

Why would he know not just how effective a rich household's security system is at killing people, but also how to safely get past it (based on what he says about Wuthering Heights in Canto 6)? Because he might have had to do so himself to escape.

Why would his ID picture, likely taken right after he was found by Limbus Company, have him in a very plain tracksuit, completely unlike the traditional and fancy clothing the rest of his Family is seen wearing? Because dressing plainly would help him blend in once he got out of there.

So, yes, the Jia Family is sending out its young members to search for something supernatural within the City. However, I believe Hong Lu is an exception and wasn't supposed to be out at all.

[myreputatioooon]

Outis and the Dante Dish

AKA the messy five-second analysis of possible parallels and maybe self-report on the quality of my memory using Hell's Chicken only

to my greatest regret I fell off on watching Limbus playthroughts midway through Canto III and have only just started watching Canto IV, and with the breaks I'm taking off of catching up to Limbus comes time to digest what I'm watching

Particulary the part where Outis makes a dish for Papa Bongy and dedicates it to Dante by making it look like a clock, which I'm starting to think I misinterpreted, or at least didn't interpret wholly

Outis makes a dish to reach Papa Bongy's heart, yes, but she's dedicating it to her direct superior, Dante

It's a lot like how P.Bongy made chicken to make a meal using it that his mother would finally like

and this is where we can start branching in interpretations

1. Outis ≈ Papa Bongy, Dante ≈ P.Bong's Mother

this is likely the conclusion lots of people will make if they put fuck all into thinking about Outis and her enviornment, aka The City

It's easy to see why as well; Outis/Bongy wants to prove themselves to their superior Dante/P.B.'s mom

The thing is that while P.B's become disillusioned to a degree whilst still holding onto his relationship with his mother, Outis continues to stand her ground on her stance regarding Dante

plus Dante was touched by Outis' meal, whereas P.B's mom never touched his chicken due to being a picky eater preferring Pizza

2. Outis ≈ P.Bong's Mother, Dante ≈ Bongy

Instead of using the lens of superior and subordinate however, I'm much more a believer of this one idk how to name

You expect anybody aged and experience in City whose worked under her fair share of bosses to not find her own way of aquiring tactics that give her advantages in getting a leg up against death or other unwanted scenarios prior to Limbus Company?

Lobotomy & Library have proven how deplorable authorities are willingly to act towards those below them, it isn't unlikely that Outis had dogshit bosses and had to figure out how to rig the game in her favor aka be treated as least shittily as possible

Which likely involved bootlicking and egostroking; acts which may have turned her peers away from her, but they would be peers that mattered little if it meant her bosses felt less inclined to throw her towards the wolves and whatnot

And at her age, depending on how long she's been playing this act, it might even be second nature

Dante is an amnesiac who is also a decent person for now but we and she don't know jackshit about Dante prior to becoming clockface

What's the likelyhood Dante wasn't a piece of shit once upon a time?

What's the likelyhood she won't be under their command if they regain their memories and keeps their clockface memories?

she's doing herself a favor, protecting herself from Dante's future wrath by presenting herself as their most reliable most praiseworthy underling at their most ignorant

it's not her concern if Dante comes to feel insulted by her fellow sinners and makes them pay for it. Her wellbeing is her concern

She's just like Meursault like that, just with her own spin on his take

Dante thinks Outis is their most reliable employee when their relationship is just like how PB thought he was never good enough at making chicken when his mother never liked it all along and prefered Pizza

3. Yes

Circling back to the post I hyperlinked, where I chipped away at what might be a mask by Outis and then I fell for it again, the answer could be both

Outis could be torn between the two ideas, maybe she started at One, then ended up becoming Two, or the otherway around, or she was always split between these ideas

and thats where im ending this off because my brain wont brain anymore, teehee~!

[icycoldninja]

Alucard from Hellsing got me thinking about a female reader who is similar to Alucard (Another red clad duel pistol wielding powerful being similar to a certain woohoo pizza man but is sadistic and is a vampire), she looks intimidating and scary and has a demonic form that rivals the Sparda men. Demon blood has become her new favorite thing to eat, and she considered trying the blood of the Sparda bloodline, but due to the respect she has for Sparda and his sons and grandson in general and she fell in love, she instead goes after the lesser demons and when she’s not being a bloodthirsty killing machine, she shows affection towards Dante, Vergil, Nero and V.

I love vampires, and I think Hellsing’s Alucard is the best depiction of vampires in fiction in my opinion.

Oh yeah, here we go

Sparda boys + V x Alucard-like!Reader headcannons

¤ Dante ¤

-Dante loves your style, you look just like him!

-When you go out in public, people sometimes mistake you for siblings, which is hilarious, or they come to the conclusion that you're a couple who likes to dress alike, which is cute and kinda true.

-He was sure you were going to bite him, being a vampire and all that, and surprisingly did not object. He actually wanted to get bitten, simply out of curiosity.

-You ended up not going through with your plan out of respect for Sparda and his bloodline, as well as your love for Dante. You simply couldn't hurt your precious idiot.

-You instead go after lesser demons to sate your desires, Dante usually tagging along. He helps shoot down demons so you can get to feed on them quicker, which is very sweet of him.

-Speaking of being sweet, you can be all lovey-dovey too, though only behind closed doors, when the battleground is far away.

■ Vergil ■

-Vergil saw your outfit and immediately thought of Dante. Your flashy fighting style is no help either; he's starting to see you as a female version of his idiot brother than anything else.

-Still, he loves you, even if you are a bloodsucking vampire that may or may not bite him in his sleep.

-He's rather tense around you, especially at night when he thinks you'll be most hungry. He's very worried you'll feed on him when he goes to sleep, so he tries not to sleep when you are near.

-You quickly assure him you won't feed upon him or any Spardas because you knew Sparda himself and have great respect for everyone in his bloodline. You will only consume lesser demons, never even baring your fangs at him.

-Vergil is now considerably more at ease around you, even going as far as to bring you freshly slain demons for your convienence.

-He also finds it very endearing that you're willing to be all vulnerable and affectionate to him--and only to him.

□ Nero □

-Nero thought your vampiric nature was cool as hell.

-Your clothes were pretty neat too, and unlike someone Nero knows, you don't look like a total slob in them.

-He thinks you're the hottest vampire to have ever existed, and occasionally calls you his "sexy goth girl" because you are.

-He wasn't too concerned about your feeding habits. If you needed his blood, he would gladly offer up his neck to you.

-You announced that you wouldn't need him for sustenance, however, and that you only fed off of lesser demons out of love for him and respect for his grandfather.

-Those special moments when you are kind and loving to him are moments Nero cherishes the most. He loves seeing this adoring side of you, and wishes he could see it more.

● V ●

-V, being a rather morbid soul, was intrigued by you, and the fact that you were a vampire.

-Since vampires live for a very long time, he reasoned you must have met, or at least seen William Blake at some point during his prime.

-If you have, do tell him everything you know, it makes him very happy.

-He thinks your clothing and fighting style are unique and beautiful, just like you.

-He wasn't the least bit worried that you would drink his blood, and was actually secretly hoping you would. He's always wondered what it would feel like.

-You love him too much to harm him, and would never drink his blood for sustenance, but perhaps you could sneak in a bite or two while passionately kissing him or something like that.