#beyond nadir

[lethalfrogposting]

what? shut up and look at misusu for a moment

[lethalfrogposting]

THE WIZARRRRDDDDD

@lethalfrogposting The time of Novava wizard van is nigh

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Nadir Kraken by Dan Scott

[catastrxblues]

the fact that i quoted so many of the guts lyrics wrong because i was basically keysmashing when i wrote them and i’ve only realized it now, a full 24 hours later, is going to do some damage to that small perfectionist part of myself. it’s like i can already hear her screaming

[n0cturn4]

Character: Adult!Damian Wayne x Reader Summary: “I offer you my heart,” he murmured, his voice now an intimate whisper. “And the freedom to do with it as you will.” Word Count: 1185 Music: Habibi

It was a night of scorching heat in the infinite desert, where the sky, dotted with stars, reflected the glow of a fate written long before the birth of kingdoms. In the palace of Al-Nadir, grand and carved in marble and gold, Prince Damian Wayne, now a grown man, wandered silently through its vast corridors. His firm steps echoed like a whisper of responsibility and power. Damian, the prince who carried the weight of two legacies within him, had always been an enigma, a man made of shadows and steel. But that night, something beyond the throne unsettled him. He felt an emptiness, an absence that neither gold nor glory could fill.

The festival of Al-Nadir pulsed like a living heart in the city below, where the people celebrated, and the arts flourished under the desert heat. On that special night, dancers from all corners came to showcase their talents, but there was one in particular, a presence that stood out among all, like a rare flower in the sands of destiny.

And then he saw her.

You, a dancer whose movements seemed to defy the very stars. Your feet glided across the stage like a gentle breeze over the dunes, and your eyes, burning and mysterious, revealed stories that words could never contain. Your body, adorned with veils and jewels that shimmered in the torchlight, moved with a grace that did not belong to this world. Every gesture, every curve of your body was silent poetry, a promise of freedom and power.

Damian, a man accustomed to hiding his emotions, felt his heart waver. The serenity he always carried like armor shattered before your dance. He, a prince of steel, was captivated by a flame he did not understand but could not ignore.

When the music ceased and the applause echoed, Damian knew he had to meet you. He ordered to be taken to you, not with the arrogance of a prince, but with the curiosity of a man before a mystery he longed to unravel. In the palace’s private gardens, beneath the shadows of exotic trees, he waited. The sound of water running through the fountains was the only noise besides his own heartbeat.

You arrived, your eyes raised, firm and fearless, as enigmatic as your dance. There was no fear in your posture, only calm curiosity, as if you knew this encounter was inevitable.

“You called for me, Your Highness?” your voice was a thread of silk, as soft as the night breeze.

Damian tilted his head, his green eyes analyzing you as if he could read your soul through every subtle movement.

“There is something in your dance,” he said, his voice deep and controlled, “something that goes beyond art. There’s a story behind every one of your movements. A battle... a freedom.”

Your lips curved into a slight smile, something enigmatic, like a moon partially veiled by clouds. You observed him with the same care, surprised by his insight.

“Every gesture I make carries the weight of my own story,” you replied. “Dancing is the only freedom I truly have.”

Damian stepped closer, his words like veiled promises in the warm night air. “What if I could offer you more than just that fleeting freedom? What if I could give you something greater?”

You raised an eyebrow, your eyes sparkling with curiosity. “What exactly would you offer me, Your Highness?”

He did not hesitate, his words were precise, like the arrows he so skillfully wielded. “A choice. Stay by my side. Not as a prisoner of my will, but as an equal. Someone who challenges my spirit and shares the burden of power with me. I see in you what few would—strength that deserves to be honored, not tamed.”

The night seemed suspended between you, the wind carrying only the echoes of something forming, something neither of you had anticipated.

“And if I accept this offer,” you asked, your tone low but filled with meaning, “what do I get in return, besides power and your wealth?”

Damian took another step closer, until his eyes, intense as the desert itself, penetrated yours.

“I offer you my heart,” he murmured, his voice now an intimate whisper. “And the freedom to do with it as you will.”

You stepped forward, reducing the distance that still remained between you. Your eyes, deep and mysterious, met his with firmness. It was like looking into a distorted mirror—you, the free dancer, and he, the chained prince. Two worlds so different, yet drawn to each other as if the universe had conspired for this moment.

“And what would you do, Prince,” you began, your voice flowing like a soft melody, “if I took your heart and turned it into my own dance? If I made it part of who I am?”

Damian smiled, a rare smile, almost imperceptible, carrying both melancholy and hope. There was something vulnerable in his stance, a man who had always been a fortress now lowering his defenses before a stranger, yet still, a soul he seemed to have known forever.

“Then,” he replied, with a soft gleam in his eyes, “I would become part of your freedom. Because in the end, there is no greater power than being in the hands of someone you trust.”

For a moment, the world around you seemed to stop. The sounds of the festival in the distance, the murmuring fountains, even the soft breeze among the leaves, all silenced in the intensity of that moment. The moon poured its silver light over the garden, as if the heavens were watching and approving of what was unfolding.

You stepped even closer, until you were so near that you could feel the heat emanating from his body, his presence strong and solid. Your fingers, delicate and skilled like in your dance, gently touched Damian's chest, right over where his heart beat. The touch was light, almost like a breeze, but the connection that formed was deep, instantaneous.

“Your freedom and mine are like two stars dancing in the sky, Prince,” you said softly. “I accept what you offer, but know that I will not be a silent companion. My soul is not meant to be contained.”

Damian breathed deeply, as if your words had the power to ignite something deep within him. His eyes never left yours for a moment.

“That is exactly why I chose you,” he murmured, his voice dense, full of promise. “I don’t want someone who bows, but someone who walks beside me. I want someone who challenges me, who makes me question the world as it is.”

You tilted your head slightly, studying him, as if deciphering the final secret hidden in his soul.

“Then, Prince Damian,” you said, a light smile on your lips, “we will dance together.”

And so, under the stars that silently watched, the bond between you was formed. The Prince of Al-Nadir, with his heart in the hands of a dancer, and you, with the promise of a love that could not be contained by borders or duties. The night, a silent witness, became the stage for the first act of a story that would defy fate and time.

And in that dance of souls and hearts entwined, Damian Wayne's world began to change, one step at a time.

[apoemaday]

Lorelei

by Sylvia Plath

It is no moon to drown in: A full moon, river lapsing Black beneath bland mirror-sheen,

The blue water-mists dropping Scrim after scrim like fishnets Though fishermen are sleeping,

The massive castle turrets Doubling themselves in a glass All stillness. Yet these shapes float

Up toward me, troubling the face Of quiet. From the nadir They rise, their limbs ponderous

With richness, hair heavier Than sculptured marble. They sing Of a world more full and clear

Than can be. Sisters, your song Bears a burden too weighty For the whorled ear's listening

Here, in a well-steered country, Under a balanced ruler. Deranging by harmony

Beyond the mundane order, Your voices lay siege. You lodge On the pitched reefs of nightmare,

Promising sure harborage; By day, descant from borders Of hebetude, from the ledge

Also of high windows. Worse Even than your maddening Song, your silence. At the source

Of your ice-hearted calling -- Drunkenness of the great depths. O river, I see drifting

Deep in your flux of silver Those great goddesses of peace. Stone, stone, ferry me down there.

[starryeyed-seer]

What Lurks Within: 99 whispers and what they might mean

The 6th Coil of the Labirynth of Tigers is full of Mystery but some of the most intriguing are found in the rare occurrence of the sealed door. Investigating it reveals one of 99 texts depending on random chance. They're a mix of everything, from deep lore to literature references to invitations to join a monstrous polycule.

Below the cut, I'm going to look at all of them and some thoughts as to what they might mean.

Spoilers for everything.

I've sorted them by topic, aproximately, so we're starting with the coil and moving out from there.

---

The Story of The Sixth and Seventh Coil

A lot are clearly snippets from the love affair of the seventh coil, and the tiger keeper too. These get a shoutout for being unabashedly Pretty Horny in a perfectly monstrous, sensual way. Congrats whoever wrote those.

Once a tiger prince and a finger king fell in love, the tiger welcomed the fingerking to live inside him and they became a new entity, the Seventh Coil. Everything about the union was forbidden, and they were locked away out of fear in the Sixth Coil.

"—two kings apart and a king together and it is only right and proper that you kneel—"

The Tiger Prince+The Fingerking are both kings, of a sort. As the shared body of the Coil, they are still a king. Being in their presence causes an inclination to kneel.

"—amusing that they thought this a prison, and not a sanctuary—"

The Labirynth might be a prison, but it is also a safe place they may be together considering their union is Very Illegal. As much as the Coil is trapped, they are together (and not fully cut off from the outside world either)

"—presence is a joy at last, after time-outside-of-time spent with a recusant court—"

"—it would have been better if they knelt of their own free wills—"

The tributes sent into the Coil exist as the 'court', and seem lost in a dream-like haze, which the liminal Is and Not nature of the Sixth Coil causes.

"—o lover, I see thee only in mirrors—"

"—the labyrinth has been so very cruel to you, dearest—"

The Tiger Keeper encountered the Coil in dreams, and fell in love. Seeing one's lover only in mirrors also can refer to the Prince/FK affair.

"—Consort dearest, your eyes will fill with scales—"

Being possessed by a fingerking changes one's eyes, but this also reminds me of eyeless skulls: the change of the nadir, where skulls will grow plating to cover the eyes entirely from enough exposure. Considering the links between light and sight, I do wonder if this is related: your vision of the world will change forever, away from that of regular vision (and the way Judgements prefer you to see the world?)

"—your devotions reached us on the dreaming airs, so sweet upon our tongue—"

"—rest among my coils. You have travelled far to be here—"

"—show me your paws; let me test thine sharpness—"

"—claws of silver and eyes afire—"

"—and of your pelt I shall make my bed—"

—pierce me, run me through, let my blood wash over your fur—

"—sip my venom; let me into your vein—"

"—and in these knots what limbs are bound—"

"—do you shiver as I bind you?—"

"—tighter and tighter until your bones collapse—"

"—and with this knot, I take thee—"

"—nothing to fear but each other—"

"—of banded fur and speckled bands—"

"—for a tiger to change his stripes—"

"—do you love what you have become?—"

"—are you sated?—"

"—there exist no two hearts that cannot be joined—"

Do I need to say anything about these.

Parabola and Dreamin'

Parabola is the home of Fingerkings, and where Tigers conduct their sacred war against them to keep the waking world safe, a duty they were raised up for by Stone herself.

—those cold seas beyond the edges of Parabola, where dreams die—

Parabola seems to be only part of the 'Is-Not', or an aspect of it. For example, Irem isn't what Is, but isn't Is-Not either. I'm not sure what this means: perhaps a link to the Slow River.

—the weeping pus of dead dreams—

—the dense dreams of the extinguished—

There's a lot of focus on dead/th dreams, and I have a theory on that I'll get to. Let's just enjoy how many there are.

—the extinguished dreams of the one they drowned—

Oh this is easy, that's Mr E------ (violently silenced by the Masters)

 —the black dreams of flukes, the icy dreams of catankeri—

Many flukes are on a whole bitterly angry about the deal they made with the Bazaar long ago. While rubbery men, their creations, dream of the Sea of Spines, Lorn-Flukes (the pissiest ones) are probably in darker dreams. Cantankeri are from Sunless Skies, in the High Wilderness, very grumpy isopods creatures which attack anything they dislike (most things)

—the faceless dreams of Snuffers—

Snuffers were long ago exiled from the Garden after the first Snuffer, the Thief-of-Faces, stole diamonds from Stone's womb and created Mt. Nomad as a 'weapon to serve its hate'. We don't really know a ton about what went on here. The Thief-of-Faces made the Snuffers in the Garden, but seems to have come from outside it. What is it? What does it want? Unknown. Hate. Snuffers are shapeshifters who can remove people's faces and wear them, so their dreams being faceless is likely because they lack a 'true face'. Faces/lacking is a reoccurring theme in FL tied to identity, with one of the things the Sapphir'd King requires before consuming souls in SSkies being the removal of one's Face and Name.

—if the Sun has a skin, does the Moon—

The Parabolan sun is called The Skin Of The Sun, it was made during the second city and is a glass bulb of iron, glass, and Cosmogone light. The Moon in Parabola resembles a sleeping cat, but we know little else of it. It's never been called 'the skin of the moon'.

—the brass from which their sun was forged—

The Skin of the Sun was forged, but it's never been called brass. Brass is devil associated, you could also call the orange-ish colour of Cosmogone 'brassy', but this is an odd reference.

I FORGOT ABOUT THE SUN THE SUN THE SUN THESUNTHESUNTHESUNTHESUN---

(thanks to @barnabusbarnabus for noting the dawn machine is made of brass!!)

—our caught kin in their galleries and prisons—

'Serpent Galleries' are a way of containing FKs. In stone, I think, I'm not 100% on the specifics but it's certainly a way of trapping them.

—and what blood seeps from their Boil—

The Boil of Calamities is a notable Fingerking who guards the Dome of Scales and the Parabolan Sun, AKA The Skin of The Sun. I'm not sure about it bleeding.

—to knot, to boil, to conjoin, to grow, to blister— 

Fingerkings have a tendency to join together into Congregations, many FKs becoming one complicated knot-entity. The 7th Coil is knotted like this in a way.

It's notable how often this is a reoccuring theme in FL: rats have rat-kings, spiders have spider-councils, there's a lot of creatures out there who present power through unionizing into some form of joined/hiveminded entity.

—the sourceless source of the Writhing River—

The Writhing River is in Parabola, and made of snakes. (There's non-fingerking snakes in Parabola, FK may be more the 'royalty' of sneks). You travel to the source in becoming a Silverer, where you find a rock one snake at a time emerges from, silver trees, and cosmogone sap you made your glasses from.

—can tell you why the Hanging Mountains despise the Smoking Sea—

Places in Parabola, I couldn't tell you why they hate each other though.

—a banner of shed skin—

Parabola is dominated by war, banners and snakeskin, pretty straight forward.

—a hollow shell for hollow kin—

Hard to say exactly. FK can't exist in reality without a vessel, and part of their history with devils is the fact devils are hollow.

—seven marches for seven cats, along the borders of dreaming—

Stone gave cats (and tigers) a mission to protect humanity from FK and the Is-Not, watching over the borders of dreaming. Seven is the number. 7 cats specifically occurs in the dreams you get after drinking Hesperidean Cider, in the 'dreams of the Garden'

The woman stands, her work done. Seven holes in the rich, springy soil. Seven neat mounds. All seven together The woman whistles, and cats slink out of the trees. They play, tumble and purr. Seven cats. The woman is overjoyed. She embraces you. She starts gathering the cats, near the holes.

—she who gave them the spear—

—our spear went slither-slice—

—not come to bring a sword, but a spear—

Spears come up in two places, both might be related: There's the spear the cats have, which was 'liberated from the Sleeping King'. it's used in Light Fingers to crack the Skin of the Sun and is a sacred relic to them.

There's also "a sky-spear" which Might Be A Thunderbolt. I'll get to the Storm connection later but I'm mentioning it now.

Kings and reality and unreality

—Parabola, and the hypocrisies of its creation—

Oh boy!!! LET'S GO! you know how crazy I am about Judgement lore.

Parabola being a 'hypocrisy' is expressed a lot. With Judgements dictating existence and deciding what Is, they're responsible for the line of what Is-Not, and likely the reason Fingerkings aren't allowed to exist.

—admitted unreality so they would not have to fix reality—

So. In ruling reality, the Judgements may have exiled things which didn't belong in their vision of what Is, and created the idea of What Isn't as a way to deal with that. Parabola may be then a dumping ground, or aftereffect of how Judgements prune reality to suit their ideal, hidden away by Being Illegal so others won't realize the reality they control is innately flawed.

—the place where they bury their mistakes—

The Neath has been referred to as something like this a lot. The 'their' may again be Judgements, and Parabola could be where mistakes are buried.

—no king has ever made a law without wishing for exceptions—

Judgements are Kings. They present as infallible gods, but they aren't. They're definitely hypocrites.

—none live by their own rules. It is not only the Mountain's parent who sins—

An accusation that (likely) Judgements do not follow the rules they enforce on others. With that in mind, 'the mountain's parent' is almost certainly the Sun, Sol, rather than the other parent of the Bazaar. The Bazaar is a sinner, but the Sun is the one who still acts as a proper Judgement while having had a secret affair and hiding his daughter in the basement.

—the forsaken products of furtive experiments—

Similar to 'burying their mistakes'. The Neath has been referred to as the Sun's experiment, it's a hiding place of illegal Shames, it's not a far reach to suggest this might be talking about the Neath. It also may be the case Parabola is like this for Judgements.

—what Law forbids, and what dark abides—

The stars have strict laws, but you can get away with a lot in the dark.

—they war as they play, toying, feinting—

Part of other clues around the Sixth Coil is the suggestion the war between FKs and Tigers is a false one or unnecessary one. They're in an ancient, endless war serving ancient forces and grudges... but why must it be this way?

—of dream, they made a cage—

Calling the 'they' here to be Judgements. Parabola is a cage for the Is-Not. Dreams are a prison for what can never be.

—and shapes are dreams before they are born—

But where do dreams come from? What does this mean?

—the burning dreams of wayward words—

—the words afire and the words excised—

—sulphurous and thought-executing fires—

The Correspondance is a language of fire, and the language of reality-defining Judgements. There's three references here to words being forbidden, exiled, violently stopped.

There's been plenty of assumptions and guessing going on throughout this, but here's my big swing:

Thoughts, dreams, words which cannot be by Judgement law are what make up Parabola. Fingerkings themselves may be some aspect of those exiled ideas, or born of them. I keep thinking about the name Fingerkings and the fact Judgements are also kings.

Could they be at all, y'know... the fingers... of Kings...?

Stars burn without end, creating eternal light and in most cases eternal day. Do stars sleep? I doubt it. Do stars dream? Not in sleep.

Do you think stars might want things which cannot be? As much as they shape and dictate reality, they obey the law of each other (to some degree, what with the hypocrisy). What happens then, to daydreams? To forbidden desires? Perhaps those things are burned before they can be born, exiled to unreality before they corrupt the Is.

—a cracked and broken Curve—

Reality, the Is, is called the Curve. It's called this extremely rarely, with my first immediate source being one of the endings of SMEN. It makes sense though: if reality is a Curve, than the reflection is another Curve, forming a Parabola. It's not been called cracked and broken before, but especially with SSkies there's an idea of the cosmos failing and dying. The stars are dying. They can't keep this idea of reality together like they used to, no matter how hard they pretend.

I have another thought on FKs and Judgements, but it involves

Storm!?

—eldest brother, eater-of-aeons—

Storm is an Aeginae, a cosmic dragon which consumes time. He's dead. There's another aeginae in the Neath, but I doubt we're talking about Nook here. Dragons are 'mercenaries' of the stars, and specifically are said to have an 'ancient pact' with them, which is different to how most being who serve Judgements are referred to.

Eldest brother is not something I believe has ever been connected to Storm before though.

—the thunder speaks not to us, my love—

—the mouths of thunderheads—

—the invisible worm, that flies in the night in the howling storm—

The fact there's so many of these connected to Storm really interests me. Especially since I'm about to add a few more. Storm being dead makes him 'invisible', one could say, and language-wise there is very little separating Worm from Wyrm. In fact, you can extend that out a bit: Dragon=Wyrm=Worm=Serpent=Snake.

Aeginae have a shared mother, the Burrower Below, who is said to gnaw at the roots of the world, something which invokes Níðhöggr, a dragon/serpent from Norse mythology. Storm is connected to Norse motifs in other ways, like the urchin Valkyrie.

The use of 'eldest brother' above also means we can tie some of the whispers that refer to siblings and family potentially to Storm:

—pale and wriggling imitations of he who hatched first—

—a thousand thousand siblings— 

—do you see me, siblings? Do you hear— 

The latter is the Coil calling out to FKs, but the link between 'siblings' 'eldest brother' and 'he who hatched first' seems like... something. Especially when you consider what dragons do, which is eat time.

—a thing that eats is a useful thing, if its hungers can be directed—

In Firmament, at one point there's a bit of an illegal timeline hanging around, and it is consumed by Storm. Beyond eating time as a concept, dragon's role may be to eat forbidden timelines. What pact do the Aeginae have with the Stars? Perhaps it's a mutual one: the dragons eat and exile all timelines the stars do not approve of, leaving one Is, and dragons in turn get lots of tasty treats.

Perhaps then Fingerkings are related to this. Born of eaten timeline which can never be, meaning they can never be. Related to dragons, but never allowed to be them. Maybe up close an Aeginae is just a billion tightly wound serpents. They do have enough eyes for it.

Other Lore Bits

—clocks, maps, glass, breath, hearts—

Treacheries!! These are ways the Neath isn't quite Right, the way existence can be a bit unreliable. Basically. The treachery of maps is why distance and location are unreliable or inconsistent. The one of clocks is why you can do an action which the story says takes 3 weeks but still have it be Auguest 22nd at the end of it. There's said to be seven of them, and 'hearts' is new to the list.

—all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well—

This is a common phrase that appears all across FL in a variety of ways. The Bazaar is often linked to it but so is everyone else. It's from Julian of Norwich

—Salt spoke to us before he left, but we do not remember—

Omg hiiii Salt!! The notion Salt spoke to the Seventh Coil is a mysterious one. How, when, and why did he stop by? Who's to say. After, he exited east out of the universe

—when the Nadir touched the Zenith—

The Nadir is the place of forgetting, full of irrigo, and part of what hides the Neath from Judgements so well. The Zenith is on the roof. I'd bet it's a place of remembering, but we haven't seen it yet. It's full of scribes. When they touched would be before the Neath was carved out of the earth.

—the cleaving-places where gravity is shorn—

Gravity is surprisingly consistent in the Neath, for being a rather lawless place. There's some idea of messing with and changing it using red science. The use of 'cleaving-places' calls to mind the roof to me, and the idea of the Nadir/Zenith once touching.

—needles to bind, bones to fold, glue to keep—

Very evocative of the Librarians in the Stacks, part of Firmament. There's much to the idea of people, timelines, realities as books, so there may be something to 'bind' and 'keep' here: laying down exactly what Is and Isn't by the process of archiving and defining it. Perhaps

—amalgamy that begat the Hound of Heaven—

Not totally sure still what happens when you 'Breed' monsters in the Labirynth, but this is how the Hound of Heaven is made: a snake that sniffs out devils. the amalgamy here is the act of creating a weird hybrid offspring, and similar to the creation of the 7th coil in that way.

—no mouth—

oh hey no-king :) This is a phrase related to the Discordance.

—from the First, a bronze mirror—

—from the Second, a dream of sunlight—

—from the Third, the taste of blood—

—from the Fourth, iron bars—

—from the Fifth, a craving of feathers—

The bronze mirror means 'the first mirrors' aka the entrance to Parabola. We didn't have perfect glass mirrors for a long time historically.

The dream of sunlight is the creation of the Parabolan Sun.

The third city is notable for being when the god-eaters and Mr Eaten occurred, though that's less Parabola related.

The fourth city was marked with a lot of conflict with Parabola. I'm assuming this is connected to that somehow.

I don't know what the craving of feathers means. I immediately think of flight, the desire to ascend, icarus, but how that links specifically to London and Parabola I'm not sure.

—pay with a little of the Will-Be rendered into the Might-Have-Been—

This is from if you take a certain Terrible Deal in Irem. Irem is 'will be',. 'What might have been' could be Parabola, could be the Stacks, could be something else.

—a lie, of course. But all lies can be made true, in time—

The division between true and false comes up often. What is true? Who decides it? A king can lie and that lie can become reality.

Literary references

Shoutout to house-of-mirrors for pointing out most of these. I. don't know my Old Proper English Literary references very well </3

—in that sleep of death, what dreams may come—

Hamlet. The dreams of the dead can be visited with Cardinal's Honey, or black honey, though those dreams seem to be unique to the honey rather than 'the dreams of people who are dead'.

—to break one's staff; bury one's book—

The Tempest. Very evocative of giving up power and leaving it behind, as it is in the original context.

—blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage—

King Leer. Also about storms and raging, like a certain dragon we know!

—vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts—

King Leer again, from the same scene. Few notable words to FL here: thunderbolts for Storm, but also courier relating to the Bazaar. (I doubt in this case courier means the bazaar though, just pointing out)

—shall I compare thee to a moonlit night—

Sonnet 18, originally is 'summer's day'. Moonlight represents possibility and dreams.

—but a walking shadow—

Macbeth.

—you have but slumbered here—

Midsummer night's dream. Link obvious.

—did he who made the Lamb make thee—

The Tyger, by Willaim Blake. Poem was referenced with the reoccurring dreams had during the Estival. Lamb like this usually means Jesus, it in full context of the poem is a line like 'did god who made the goodness of the lamb also make the ferociousness of the tiger? why?'. The poem also has a line of 'When the stars threw down their spears' which might be relevant to the several mentions of spears already covered.

EDIT:

"—of banded fur and speckled bands—"

Sherlock Holmes short story!

—the invisible worm, that flies in the night in the howling storm—

The Sick Rose by William Blake!

Other dregs

—what you think is a labyrinth may be a maze—

A labyrinth is traditionally actually a singular winding path, where a maze has branching paths and dead ends. Is the labyrinth of tigers a maze after all, with wrong ways? Or perhaps reality is not a singular winding path but one with many branches, constantly being sheared off...

(lost it when this hint came out because the labyrinth/maze idea of reality and judgements is something I'd just written into the latest chapter of my suncrab fanfic lol)

—see your heat, little mouse—

The 7th Coil is talking to us directly here as we search the coil.

—the heart is the heart is the heart— 

Also the name of the play the bohemians put on during the Estival! Hearts are important. There's a lot of em out there.

—yes yes yes yes yes—

Similar to the want want want want want want text you get for Temptation's presence within the coil.

—animal that you are, little more than squirming fluid—

Probably just the Coil watching us.

—writhing in the shadow they cast—

Hard to extrapolate much specific meaning here beyond the fact the FKs exist in the shadow of reality (and the Neath does too). The use of 'they' in this has often been suggestive of Judgements, so yeah: light is needed to cast a shadow, a shadow is a place without light, certain things writhe and live there

—those things which preceded them—

I try not to be stuck with my head in the stars but also another case where I think you could read the 'them' here to be Judgements. But it's been put here in the dregs because it's another very vague one that could mean anything.

With the idea of Judgements as unjust-kings who claim to be truly divine but are as fallible as their subjects, you have the idea of what there was before Judgements. Was there a before? If the Judgements truly aren't all-gods who have always dictated reality, then there must have been. Probably.

—and I shall not climb upon the scaffold they have made for me—

A very evocative phrase I can't confidently sort!

I think it could be related to the rejection of power and the way of kings: both the Tiger Prince and the Fingerking who became the 7th coil rejected their elevated places to commit the sin of love and chose each other. 'I will not stand up there above all, though they say it is My Place'

---

Anyway! These have been my many thoughts. I'm sure I'm missing stuff or a bit off or anything else... Please, feel free to talk about it with me! I want to know people's thoughts. I've held a torch for the Storm/Dragons/Snakes link for a while so seeing a bunch of hints that back me up was really exciting, but I also know I can be a bit blinded by how open to interpretation a lot of FL lore is. I see that crab everywhere....

[quiddie]

Hah, oh noooooo! I'm sorry, boo! 🥺 Okay I know I swore off commenting, but I simply cannot resist a stoat pfp so I do just want to clarify that she actually said "If I know, I'll do it" which is an important difference!

“if you tell me what’s right i’ll do it”

Ugh @quiddie just rip my entire heart out of my chest why don’t you?

I cried my real human tears when I heard Suvi sobbing and pleading for her obedience to make her safe and loved and protected. I can’t be losing electrolytes like that. In this economy? Please.

[lethalfrogposting]

oops! all novava 😁 hi uglyyy

(more various doodles ft an expression sheet wip from the past week or so because ive been developing his lore... shtuuupid novava)

[billie-black]

Thread of odd connections between Ikora, Elsie and Eris

I was scrolling through concept art when I noticed that, despite not being so in-game, The Stranger's rifle is Branded as a Cassoid weapon. This wouldn't mean much, bungie tends to use decals at random, except-

The curse of osiris variant, The Machina Dei 4, is also branded with a slightly altered version of the Cassoid logo, which I think proves that it has been upgraded with components from the foundry.

But let's put a pin on that and talk about another Cassoid weapon, The Invective shotgun, Ikora's signature weapon. The Invective has an ornament called Iconoclast, a word which here means "Destroyer of images used in religious worship." This nomenclature is very similar to-

The Vex Mythoclast, a weapon which, thanks to its sister weapon, The Worldline Zero (which coincidentally also has a prophecy variant), we know to be made by Elsie Bray. Canonically, we earn the Mythoclast as part of-

the "Not forged in light" quest, which ends with Elsie gifting us the No time to explain. A weapon which eventually ends back up in her hands and she gifts to us again earlier in the timeline as-

The stranger's rifle, which hangs around until it becomes the Machina Dei 4 (later Adhortative). And the prophecy attached to the Machina Dei 4 desribes Eris Morn and the events of Shadowkeep, when Eris discovers stasis and starts using the darkness.

A charnel but effulgent orb.

beacon in a loathsome dark.

Fêted, fetid corpses rise.

a too-long-absent gibbous spark.

Now, it's generally accepted that No time to explain (and all it's variants by proxy) was created at some future point in a distant timeline, this is incorrect. Ghost specifically points out that "parts" of it shouldn't exist, because the rifle itself is a common suros frame.

Going back to The Invective, you're probably more familiar with its legendary sister, The Comedian, and its D2 counterpart, Deadpan Delivery. The Comedian's flavor text reads "A. A ha. A ha ha ha. A ha ha ha ha ha ha ha" In D1 the joke wasn't really clear, but with the addition of a lore tab in D2, the joke has become the vanguard's falling victim to a hive god's deceit. Now, let's take a little trip to The dark future.

In The dark future, Beyond light never happened, Eramis was allowed to grow her armies and master stasis, which led to a massive attack on the city by Cabal remnants, Savathûn, and the glorious House Salvation, all masterminded by Eris Morn, who up to that point was believed to be an ally, but had been corrupted by stasis and the darkness.

Coming back to our timeline, let's look at differences between our case exotics and their variants. Elsie's rifle has undergone many more modifications than Invective. Matter of fact, Invective has barely undergone any changes from its default. It's painted red, AND It has tape wrapped the handle and the grip, just like No time to explain. (I know I'm talking about grip tape right now but please don't go, it gets better, I promise)

It's a weak link, many weapons have grip tape, but I think many of these small details add up and point to The Iconoclast being one of Elsie's gifts. Let's review the similarities between Iconoclast and other gifts from Elsie.

>It's sourced from one of the city foundries and later received Cassoid upgrades (Invective and it's variants are nadir products)

>It has grip tape where the original does not.

>Mythoclast and Iconoclast are very similar terms and could point to a connection.

>It has a perpetual ammo function, like No time to explain and The Mythoclast.

But we should also look at Iconoclast within it's own context. Invective being her weapon, what does it mean for Ikora? She's never been been known to combat or really oppose any sort of religion, at least that I can find. And let's make it clear, the gun is not the Iconoclast. Just like the Mythoclast is not The Mythoclast. The weapons, in this case, are named for the wielder. You kill Atheon and so you become the Mythoclast, the gun is more of symbol. So, what religious figure is Ikora supposed to kill in order to become the Iconoclast?

Well, just this season, the hive have come out with a brand spanking new god, one very close to Ikora. Now I don't think Ikora is going to kill Eris. Eris would need to do something completely heinous for her to even consider that. Like, idk, bombarding the last city with House Salvation and the shadow legion... i. e., what happens in the dark timeline.

Look, I really don't believe Eris is going to turn evil all the sudden, that would be character assasination of the highest magnitude. But from Ikora's point of view? She has a supposed time traveller yelling at her that she's letting everything go sideways.

So my theory is that Elsie took Ikora's Invective from some other failed timeline (possibly the one where they smooch) and gave it to Ikora as the Iconoclast, along with the idea that alternate Ikora ruined everything because she failed to act and put Eris down when she could.

And this is where Deadpan Delivery comes in. You see, Ikora doesn't use invective anymore, and she doesn't use the Comedian. She exclusively wields Deadpan Delivery. Now, I know this was probably just the animators being faithful to her character, seeing how she prefers shotguns-

But the retroactive additions to the Comedian's lore, outside my crazed theories, implies a statement from Ikora. The Comedian's joke is the vanguard falling victim to a hive god's deceit, and in the dark timeline that god, the Savathûn figure, is Eris morn. And so-

By maining Deadpan delivery Ikora is subtextually saying "It's not funny. I'm not laughing. I don't subscribe to the narrative put forward by the comedian or Elsie. I trust Eris". And by rejecting the Comedian she's additionally disavowing it's older sister, The Invective, which is a symbol of the gung ho attitude which defined her in her youth. And wether my Iconoclast theory is correct or not, we can definitively say: Ikora is against what it represents , she is a guardian, and she will make a new fate no matter what.

[lethalfrogposting]

erm. who is this guy

@lethalfrogposting I promise his deals are very fair and reasonable.

Thank you for commissioning me to draw your orikero!

[ascendingaeons]

Set As a Champion of Mental Wellness

One of Set’s most prominent domains is that of a Storm God. Ancient Egypt was the most far-reaching civilization known to history, to the point that less time has passed between the life of Cleopatra and the present day than the construction of the Great Pyramid. Ancient Egyptians had archaeologists and engineers to study and repair structures that were already millennia old. For much of its history, life along the Nile was homeostatic and predictable, so much so that Set came to embody all that was disorderly and unexpected.

Think about the scene in the Book of Coming Forth by Day where Set plunges His spear into the throat of Apep. Set is fighting for Ra when He is incapable of defending Himself. During a time of mental crisis, we are not unlike the linen-bound Sokar, our greatest nature suppressed during the nadir of drastic, catalytic transformation. And Who is there for us in our darkest hour but the very Eye of the Storm?

I recently drew a connection between storms and the release of stress hormones during traumatic moments. When we are in a dangerous or intense situation our adrenal glands release a chemical called cortisol which is essentially the “fight-or-flight” hormone. The release of cortisol is meant to ensure our survival until such time that the danger we’re facing passes, much like the role performed by Set on the Solar Barque.

Here’s the funny thing about that: danger always passes and, in that moment, a new kind of self-care is required. There comes a time when our bodies no longer need those stress hormones. Even though they once helped us survive during hardship they inevitably become armor that is otherwise detrimental and must be set aside. Consider that maybe the parts of you that are making life so hard are the remnants of those survival habits and that, even now, they are doing everything they can to keep you safe. They have no awareness that they’re making things worse. The key to healing, then, is loving the parts of you that are trying to kill you.

Set is a many-faced Netjer. The aspect of His nature I’m proposing is but one of many both within and beyond us. Set is simultaneously the tempest, the ship, and the very heart of the sailor. Were He much less than that He would not have been worshiped since before the dawn of the written word. That’s the funny thing about the perception of value: it is most prone to change depending on where we’re standing.

Mental illness is a multifaceted battle fought every single day. Some days offer ceasefires. On others, a violent storm can bring a reprieve. Many days can simply blend into one long continuum. Imagine this as a mountain, if you will, or the long hours of night mentioned in Ancient Egyptian papyri. Regardless of the imagery you choose, the implication remains the same.

This too shall pass.

I write this as I struggle with my own hours of night, from a place where it is easy to feel my prayers go unheard. Set is a bastion of the greatest form of strength – that which is self-begotten. Set is the one Netjer I do not have to pray to during hardship or crisis for one very simple reason: He is already and always there. It doesn’t matter whether you believe in the existence of Set or the Netjeru. What I offer you to take away from this is that no matter who you are or where you find yourself, you possess exactly what you require to take just one more step. That is what recovery and healing are, essentially, just taking one step at a time.

I offer you this lesson much as I offer my experience of it to Set. May it serve you well, my friends.

Dua Set!

Image is credited to Joan Lansberry.

[wishsparkleemoji]

Sky iceberg tier 4: Cat hair

Full iceberg

Remembrance fanart controversy: When the remembrance spirits were first revealed, one Sky fan artist popped up and said that the spirits were near-identical to some fan-spirits they had created years prior and accusing TGC of stealing, and in the middle of this someone else popped up claiming their fan spirits were used for sanctuary, and it was overall a huge mess I WISH I had gotten to see, and eventually it was revealed that in TGC/Sky’s TOS, TGC has full right to use fan creations (shoutout to ���skykid-nadir” for correcting me on this entry btw! I thought it was something different).

meditate_night_night_2: One day, the daily quest was to meditate on the Vault’s second floor, but instead of the usual meditation question, the “question” was “meditate_night_night_2”. Likely just a weird error on TGC’s end, but it was surreal getting it.

Corrupted mantas: In treasure reef, the underwater mantas have black tints. This is likely because of the extraction of their light in the creation of darkstone.

Crabs help flipped crabs: Try this in shipwreck— deep call to flip some crabs, and watch how the non-flipped crabs react. They help up their flipped buddies! How cute!

Higher planes of existence beyond space and time: There are many planes of existence in Sky’s world: The normal layer, spirit layer, Eden, Vault floors 3+, the elder cutscene rooms, the trials and ancient memories, and finally the death room. Each layer slowly breaks down the laws of physics, until there is nothing.

Dreamlike vault: The vault is noticeably dreamlike; with the purple ambiance, starlight desert (which I still count as part of it), cosmic mantas, and the whole breaking down space and time thing.

Dreams hat controversy: The hat worn by the dancing performer is pretty clearly inspired by some culture; specifically the Korean gat. Chinese players thought it was inspired by Chinese culture though, and TGC was trying to be neutral by saying “it’s fantasy, not real life” or something along those lines, and people were hurt. I don’t really know what happened.

Eden not the only way to Orbit: Seen in the Aurora concert. She ascends with all the skykids to Orbit after Eyes of a child. Eyes of a child seems to take place somewhere in wasteland, so dying in Eden must not be the only way to reach Orbit.

[diesvitae]

once you're finished the game could you share your elgarook Thoughts? as i fellow villain fucker i also want him but i cant think of a plot that makes sense for rook and him to get together in any way shape or form akdbsj

OH HI!!! In truth now that I'm done with the game I still have to rework some points in my Elgarook timeline. But in case of Nadir and Elgar'nan... (POSSIBLE SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT)

1) Their first (solo) meeting is an attempted assassination from my lil Rook, who was probably also kinda drunk, since he attacks with a normal dagger which is... kinda useless against a god. Elgar'nan in game seems pretty chill, offering "mercy" more than once so I doubt he would be pissed at Nadir for trying. 2) Words are exchanged, Nadir is trapped and probably panicking a bit once he understands the situation he got into, he's able to flee, but there is some sort of curiosity between the two: Elgar'nan can easily sense Nadir is a mage (and a powerful one) but my lil Rook never uses magic, especially the offensive one. That's a mystery he's curious about considering it makes no sense to him (one who's obsessed with power) Nadir refuses to use his natural gifts. And this fear to use magic makes him a perfect pawn to be manipulated and guided to become someone like him. Plus it would be a nice little revenge against Solas, to steal Rook away. Nadir, while looking like this cute smug creature, is pretty insecure, he hates using magic due to hurting people by mistake each time he tried to control it. He hates acting like a hero because he can't see himself as a good person, just a cursed one. But around Elgar'nan he doesn't have to pretend to be perfect, to be controlled. Elgar'nan is the enemy, who cares about his opinion after all? And somehow that lack of care becomes a sense of freedom. So for a while they seek each other out, to learn, to test boundaries, it's a little game neither give much importance. Elgar'nan needs a hobby beyond conquering the world and Nadir needs time away from responsibilities.

That being said, despite starting a literal affair with the enemy, my Rook is beyond loyal to the team, and makes it clear he won't divulge anything which could hurt his friends or help the evanuris. Another part of their dynamic is what they gain from each other. Nadir is quite the atheist, he recognizes Elgar'nan can be considered a god, but he doesn't feel the need to worship anything or anyone. Which makes him see Elgar as a person. He's close to him not to gain godly favor, power or whatever. He simply enjoys his company and the parts of Elgar'nan which can be considered... human (wrong word XD) A person who's built empires using only his power would end up with nothing if that power were to disappear. But Nadir? He would stay. So Elgar'nan gains what it feels to get real unconditional love. On the other hand Nadir gets to be free from his fears. He doesn't have to be scared about using magic around the evanuris because he literally can't hurt them, and even if he were to... it's enemies! Technically he would be doing good by hurting them XD Plus Elly is training him! He doesn't have to act like a hero amonst his enemies. He doesn't have to act like a leader since that's a role Elgar'nan won't leave to anyone. There is also the affection which builds over time which is always nice XD (and the fucks are real good too.) In the end I want them to be like two jigsaw puzzle pieces which lock with each other perfectly despite being completely different. (And yes, Nadir is still going to kill him at the end, in a tragic and painful scene.) As for you, it depends what kind of dynamic you want! You can have your rook act as a spy, joining his side to gather his secrets only to fall for him. Or you can have Rook kidnapped only to have Elgar'nan treating them courteously. Honestly it depends on your tastes!

[sakebytheriver]

Community is a Chekhov play and the gun that foreshadows the ultimate tragedy of the Greendale study group is in the Dean's first speech with his missing card,

"Many of you are halfway through your first week here at Greendale, and as your dean, I thought I would share a few thoughts of wisdom and inspiration. What is community college? Well, you've heard all kinds of things. You've heard it's a loser college for remedial teens, 20-something dropouts, middle-aged divorcees, and old people keeping their minds active as they circle the drain of eternity. That's what you heard... However, I wish you luck! ... Okay, you know... Oh-oh. Okay, there's more to this speech. There's actually a middle card that is missing."

That middle card is Community's equivalent of Chekhov having a character hold a gun in the first act. The card is never found just the same way the study group never really escapes Greendale as anything but what the dean describes them as in his speech, the missing card is their potential, lost to time, lost to incompetence, lost on the Greendale campus never to be found again. Troy never really graduates instead becoming the epitome of remedial teens running from the world by literally floating through it on a boat, Britta remains stuck at Greendale a twenty something dropout unable to get a degree but also unable to leave and in the original draft of the pilot the dean even adds an aside that the dropouts are "crawling their way back to society" an acomplishment Britta never reaches by the end of the series, Shirley never becomes more than a middle aged divorcee with a husband that came crawling back only to leave her once again losing herself in Louisiana to play nursemaid to a man she just met, and Pierce dies the same way he lived depressed, gross, broken, and alone. Jeff, Annie, and Abed don't have equivalencies in the speech that appears in the pilot, but Annie is given an aside in the original draft in the same moment as Troy, being labeled "a young person who couldn't get into a university" and she never does make it to a real university. In the end, Annie and Abed are the only two given endings that can be read as happy, she leaving for the FBI Academy and he leaving for film school in Los Angeles, the only two able to escape the Greendale purgatory for supposedly greener pastures, but Annie's ending is to become a cog in the system, a cog that would have happily sent her younger self to jail for the rest of her life for an addiction beyond her control finally reaching the lofty goal she thought she must reach as the small overachiever Annie came to Greendale as, finally able to grow up and be a big girl. Maybe her ending was happy or maybe it was just another form of corruption. Perhaps Abed Nadir is the only one whose ending is truly everything he ever wanted, but he goes to film school alone, he reaches his dream far away from all of the people who loved him, the only people who ever loved him, Abed Nadir ends the series the same way he entered it, the same way they all entered it, alone. And of course, Jeff Winger, the man who wanted to stay at Greendale for the shortest timeframe he could possibly achieve is now stuck there, dedicated his life to teaching there, to fixing the broken school that somehow fixed him and broke him even more left watching everyone else leave him behind.

The missing card, the one that could have told them all what they could be, what they could have acheived at Greendale is never found, but it comes back in the third act in the form of Season 7, the cutaways the group comes up with in the finale of what their season 7 could look like, the missing potential that notecard used to have now inside they're own minds and as Jeff pulls the trigger, fires the only bullet left in the chamber and begs the others to please just stay with him, to stick around and make the idealic season 7 he has created in his own imagination, the gun backfires and explodes in his own hand as reality comes crashing down to steal that last bit of hope he had left

"The plays that Chekhov wrote were not complex, but easy to follow, and created a somewhat haunting atmosphere for the audience."

This quote from Chekhov's wikipedia stands out to me in a way that perfectly describes a modern sitcom and I feel it especially fits with the atmosphere Community created. It was funny, it was broken, it was irreverent, and it was goofy, but it's a show that has haunted me for years, has haunted the entire fanbase for seven years demanding a movie until the powers that be finally gave in

E. J. Dillon thought "the effect on the reader of Chekhov's tales was repulsion at the gallery of human waste represented by his fickle, spineless, drifting people" and R. E. C. Long said "Chekhov's characters were repugnant, and that Chekhov revelled in stripping the last rags of dignity from the human soul".

And these quotes, while they were striking at Chekhov's work in a disparaging way, they just make me think of the characters from Community. Is there a better description for the Greendale 7 than a group of fickle, spineless, drifting, repugnant people stripped of their last rags of dignity? Chekhov was known for being able to capture the specific sadness of an ensemble of depressed codependents trapped in the utter monatony of a working class sedentary life and his popularity was credited to his, "unusually complete rejection of what we may call the heroic values." There are no heroic values in any of the Greendale 7, they are a group of flawed indivudals who come together to create a flawed Community. The Greendale 7 don't have a perfect happy ending, the last moments of Community don't fall into place the way you want a feel good sitcom about a group of friends to end. The ending is bittersweet and broken, a show that shambled on for more seasons than anyone ever believed it could hemoraging cast members along the way feeling like it had died many years before it actually ended, but Abed delivers a speech about the nature of TV and you're crying and you're smiling and when they all leave for the last time with a tight hug that feels like the earth is shattering you're launched into one last self aware fourth wall breaking gag that jolts your emotions before credits roll and they're the last credits that play for the entire show and you don't know if that was an ending or if you should wait for something else.

Virginia Woolf mused on the unique quality of a Chekhov story in The Common Reader (1925):

"But is it the end, we ask? We have rather the feeling that we have overrun our signals; or it is as if a tune had stopped short without the expected chords to close it. These stories are inconclusive, we say, and proceed to frame a criticism based upon the assumption that stories ought to conclude in a way that we recognise. In so doing we raise the question of our own fitness as readers. Where the tune is familiar and the end emphatic—lovers united, villains discomfited, intrigues exposed—as it is in most Victorian fiction, we can scarcely go wrong, but where the tune is unfamiliar and the end a note of interrogation or merely the information that they went on talking, as it is in Tchekov, we need a very daring and alert sense of literature to make us hear the tune, and in particular those last notes which complete the harmony."

Community ends not with a bang but a whimper and a broken note that makes you question what happens next, where do they go from there, what scene fits here in the script, is this truly the end or just where the writer put down his pen. It's a Chekhov play written in six seasons and soon to be a movie

In the end, the tragedy of Community is literally written on the cards

[lethalfrogposting]

various froge doodles from the past week or so since i forget to upload OTL shtupid frogs...