#but it technically could be considered a ‘force cult’ as well

[asteroids-and-tractorbeams]

I have no idea how much The Acolyte is going to tie in to the High Republic books, but part of me can’t help but think the Republic prohibiting non-Jedi from instructing children in the use of the Force is related to what happened with the Path of the Open Hand

[valehour]

been idly discussing this with a friend, and generally just kind of ruminating on the DLC's final boss and end story and how mad it made me. so consider this significant rewrite to make the story more like I think I now want it to be because my opinions are obviously important """fix""" to the story.

What if the Miquella's lord was just- the player character, not Radahn?

(Full (and Extremely Long) justification under the cutoff)

this is born from my previous thought/rant on the fact that the player isn't given a motivation to actually oppose Miquella within the game itself.

By contrast, the player being the potential Consort of Miquella necessarily helps solidify the conflict around Miquella's Age of Compassion, and the player's place in it.

the Fundamental nature of Miquella in this DLC is that, ultimately, Miquella's love is amoral, stretching the full range from compassion to overtly abusive manipulation. one of the most evocative descriptors of Miquella's love is that it is "Terrifying". That feels like it's a fundamentally punchy, heavy thing for the player to wrestle with. The Age of Compassion is something that the War-torn Lands Between so clearly needs, it needs peace, and love, a more gentle place to cope with the trauma and the suffering and the Ruin, not merely from the Shattering, but the world that preceded it. but it's being created and enforced by a "terrifying", manipulative Cult leader (for want of a better term) who's channeling a very "All Shall Love Me And Despair!" energy.

There's a familiar throughline created by this- the player (both as the Tarnished, and as the Player has a particular impression and idea of Miquella, one who ultimately promises and provides salvation. As we advance through the story of the DLC, we increasingly learn the truth behind what that means- who Miquella is and the full extents of the implications presented.

The biggest moment in regards to this, is, of course, the Approach and descent into the Fissure, and the one of the most important parts of the story.

"I abandon here my doubt and vacilation"

"I abandon here my love"

"Kindly Miquella. I see you've thrown away... Something you should not have. Under any circumstances. How will you salvation Offer... to those who cannot be saved? When you could not even save your other self?"

Miquella's pursuit of godhood has excised St Trina, who appears to have fundamentally dissented Miquella's deification, as it's her, delivered through sleep, who tells us that we shouldn't side with him, but kill him, instead.

This Feels spiritually adjacent to something like encountering Darkstalker Kaathe for the first time, and hearing his side of the story, an argument for The Age of Dark. but, as far as I can tell, this doesn't actually matter. Knowing that St Trina values preventing Miquella's Age of Compassion means nothing in the game, it's just an explanation as to why she was ditched halfway across the realm of shadow in a pit . But the argument St Trina raises, the doubting of Miquella's agenda means nothing because the final confrontation with Miquella is not born from the player's decision to reject the Age of Compassion, it's born from someone on the Fromsoft Dev team needing to put a final bossfight into the DLC.

it's this that forms the main Issue with the ending. The Player is forced into a passive role- the story happens To them, not Because Of them. the "choice" given by the game mechanics is to "Fight Radahn", or quit the DLC. but while the second one is technically a valid resolution to not opposing the Age of Compassion. It really isn't in any practical metrics because, well, That's not actually narrative resolution- putting a book down halfway through does technically end the story, but it doesn't resolve any of the plot threads or conflicts that the audience is expected to engage with- it stops abruptly and unsatisfyingly, told that we're not supposed to care about those plot details- Literally just the "it was all a dream" ending, but punching through the fourth wall. Simply Stopping Engaging with it isn't narratively satisfying for any work who's resolution isn't designed around the idea of putting the story down. and SOTE quite unambiguously isn't designed around that. So even if we view it as "an" ending, it's still fundamentally a bad ending.

but fighting Radahn is also narratively unsatisfying as an ending simply because of the fact that it's DLC- there was no space or time to establish or set up this plot thread or idea that Miquella and Radahn had any relationship or meaningful interactions in the base game (which, fair enough, it'd've bloated the main game which already has a lot to say and discuss in regards to it's own story). but without the idea that Miquella and Radahn actually interacted, this "reveal" is unsatisfying because like. Why should we care? Why Radahn? many other people have commented that Godwyn would be a better fit, but regardless, I think it still doesn't really address the underlying problem- The Player is a passive actor in this story.

So then 9+ paragraphs later, we get to the actual proposal of this unhinged rant essay:

What if the player, due to being tarnished, became the Consort of Miquella, much like one becomes the Consort of Marika and thus Elden lord in the age of fracture. Tarnishedness is a status that can apparently be conferred and withdrawn, and is not, in fact, a limiting factor in lordship (given you can become Elden lord regardless). Not to mention that being opposed to the present order, why should Miquella care as to whether or not the Golden Order values tarnishedness or not? Additionally, Miquelladahn already has an attack where he bewitches you (his grab attack), and should he successfully accomplish it twice, provides an instant game over due to your newfound love and affection for your new God.

This confers the advantage that now the player an active participant of the story, allowing them to choose, for themselves, whether they embrace or reject the Age of Compassion. it's the question posed by the ghost in the Fissure: "How will you salvation Offer... to those who cannot be saved?" Opposition is largely fronted by Ansbach (who resents the use of Mohg in this ritual. Which like. Me Too Buddy.) and St Trina, who fears that Miquella will become "trapped" by godhood, much like Marika was. but now the player can also decide for themselves whether or not to Oppose Miquella. maintaining a Hard-as-fuck bossfight as a result of refusal also creates a rather fascinating ludonarrative tinge to the amorality of his love, and it's most villainous side- after all, if he valued a gentle place, why does he support Radahn ultimately destroying you? Clearly, his world order is at least founded on the same violence that everyone else's is. it's a Fascinating argument against pacifism, calling out it's hypocrisy- that in truth, peace is violent, born from crushing those who ultimately oppose it- the police- The State's armed body do not enforce "The peace" by beating bankrobbers in a debate, only by beating bankrobbers. It's a strong argument against meekly accepting the shape of the world and one's part to play in it- that one ought to stand up for themselves against someone else's will, that one should fight for one's own world.

It's an argument, effectively, in favour of the worldview supposed by Ranni The Witch, who is arguably one of Miquella's strongest narrative foils. She used a shocking act of violence (the assassination of Godwyn) as a tool of liberation, to overthrow the order imposed by another. the shape of society shall not be determined by militarist-Faith, or a cult of adoration, but by self determination, the power to pursue one's own ends. Ranni and Miquella both have love play a part of their quest, but whereas Ranni spurns and fears love, maintains a cold exterior in favour of her duty- keeping the power of the Greater Will distant from the world- that the player must actively pursue and be willing to share the burdens of the thousand year journey into the chill night- a choice and a sacrifice you have no obligation to actually make- but you choose to do out of love, a willingness for, just a moment, Ranni to be truly vulnerable, share her past and her beliefs. But, Ranni's world, for all it's freedom, guarantees none of them, guarantees no true success, that people would actually be free, only that they be free to choose. what stops great warriors from simply founding a new kingdom, a new empire? Are Crowns not warranted by strength, after all?

Miquella, by contrast would build that peace, build it so intensely, that it feels obsessive, maddening. You drown you in it- drown in his Peace, his Love. You can choose to agree with him- because the world should be more gentle, more kind, more loving. This war has gone on too long, the cities in Liurnia are sinking into the ground, Leyndell partly buried into the ash of a failing world order. Stormveil suffers under a mad tyrant-king, the Albinaurics oppressed for the "sin" of their birth. Where are the people? Where is harvest and harvesthome? Miquella's peace, Miquella's love can give it to you.

but if you refuse to serve leally, if you refuse to submit, refuse to build his peace. Well, you join the corpses scattered about the divine gate. you walk in again. Godling Miquella asks you once, again, in a voice polite, courteous, filled with love and civility. to join him. You refuse, and he and his servants, be it the resurrected Radahn or some original boss crushes you again. And Again. it hurts. the pain of asserting your boundaries, your body, to refuse to give in to the world he'd build. it'd be so easy to submit.

Miquella would love you, to the best he was capable. and after all, what's the alternative? marrying Marika into an Age of Fracture? perpetuating the age of an obviously flawed Golden Order as it continues to decline? Or is it a more inclusive order- that welcomes those who live in death? It's reactionary principles jolted forward in a moment of tolerance. But Fia's hallowbrand doesn't save the Albinaurics, though- only Those Who Live In Death. It's still a bigoted, reactionary order, making a concession to what is explicitly framed as a social minority only because it's literally written into the laws of reality.

Is the failure of the Order that the gods were not held accountable to it's principles? But Ranni didn't want to be an Empyrean. Didn't want to be someone with explicit fertility-childbearing metaphors. her freedom is in many ways a story of fighting that selfsame Order, the literal Laws Of Reality in the name of her bodily autonomy and her self expression. but that was only because she was not held accountable to The Order, because she could dissent. Don't you see Tarnished? Is this pursuit Not Flawed? But he could fix it. and He would, he would save people To the best of his ability. Miquella loves you and he suffered Apotheosis to save you. But what happens to those who Cannot be saved because they Refuse to be saved. For Miquella Loves you and Suffered Apotheosis to Save You. But only if you submit to his shape of "Being Saved". and If you don't? Well, the Swords of the Haligtree will sever parts of you until you can.

Or I guess we could have what we actually got where we show up and Radahn immediately throws hands for unclear reasons with someone he's seen for like 3 seconds, in a game that fails to like, explain a motivation as to why the player is fighting Miquella aside from "Because the DLC needs a final boss" with his admittedly sick as fuck wrestler intro for a plot thread that has left at least a few fans with more than a sour taste in their mouths. Myself included. Hence the essay. Anyway, if you finished reading this, congratulations. :D

[mellowscrolls]

I’ll bite! Tell me about your Dragon Cult headcanons :0

Okay! Dear God, let me go find my notes spread over like ten different documents (exaggeration)!

Alright, so starting off, I'm going to throw in a disclaimer that this is lore built off of Metallic and Liches' works and headcanons all given a new coat of varnish as I scoot my plagiarism ray out of frame. I'm going to throw it under a read more for clarity and the sake of everyone.

TW for manipulation, cults, mutilation (non-graphic)

Starting with the ancient hierarchy, I have it go somewhere like: Alduin > High Ranking Dovah > Konahriik > High Rank Dov's Ruling Priest > Low Ranking Dovah > Their Ruling Priest > Wooden Masks > Acolytes (unmasked) > Divines Clergy > Everyone Else. Technically Akatosh/Bormahu was supposed to be/was advertised as the top of that chain, but that didn't work out so much in practice.

Within the cult itself were a few key customs. Let's start with the masked priests.

Dov have one masked priest each to handle the politics and mortal affairs of their Junaar (kingdom). These masks are made of precious metal or material and can be made custom to the specifications of the dov who requires them. There is one Masked Priest per dovah who earns one, and that internal hierarchy amongst the dragons means that your status and what you are in charge of may change very frequently depending on your dragon's social standing.

It is a great honor and a great burden to be chosen for the role of a Named Masked priest. Masked priests are given names by their dovah, usually approved by Alduin, in a naming ceremony that erases their mortal name from living and recorded memory. Only the dov bestowing the new name may remember the old, and to keep a copy of the name in physical form is considered a great insult.

In preparation for a naming ceremony, priests are usually imbued with "blessings" by being carved with (or even forced themselves to carve) Words of Power into their skin, which are then imbued with power and bound to the priest-to-be's soul by their dovah. These enchantments are binding to the soul in a way that can either slightly shift their personality to favor the nature of the word or can make them a completely different person, at their dovahthuri's discretion. These blessings are extremely hard to sunder and cannot be harmed by the person they are upon unless directly ordered by their dovah or Alduin. (Most of the carving part of the headcanon was pioneered by @metallic-scaled-scarf with Nonvul, go check them out)

Under the Masked priest within their own Junaar was usually a group of attendants ranging in number from about 3-5. They are the Wooden Priests, wearing wooden masks in the style of their Priest, symbolizing their un-named and un-blessed status. They were not allowed to speak, but were usually able to communicate telepathically as a sort of hivemind while still maintaining most of their original personality. Masked Priests were always chosen from their predecessor's pool of Wooden Priests, so there was a long-term competitive nature usually fostered within their little group. Any Clergy below the Masked and Wooden Priests went without a facial covering and could communicate freely. When converging in Bromjunaar for moots, the Masked Named priests would trade their masks for wooden ones to hear the words of Konahriik, as both a gesture symbolizing equality as well as silence before the words of the Mouthpiece of Alduin.

In global politics, mer were much more unlikely to ever make it to the rank of Masked Priest, with the Falmer treated as slaves and prisoners of conquest while the Ayleids and Chimer were treated as highly tenuous allies at best. Dragons did not usually care for their priests so much as use them as tools of communication and politick. A Masked Priest was very regularly simply a new game of chess to start with the other Dov as one would vie for another's power, land, or status.

As for individual Headcanons, or how I write my dragon priests, I will make another post in the near future.

[poppy-purpura]

The Tin of Your Sight (TToYS) It was just a city with laboratories and experimental facilities. Tin was not the first of the purpose organisms with the ability to think; technically, he was the sixth. They were not yet called iterators and they did not have large bodies (and obviously they had some specific tasks and established identities). But it was precisely during the time of Tin that everything began to change. He was chosen to grow into something more, to have more opportunities (and jobs). But his construction turned out to be quite a long process and the House (Cult of Drinking Liquid Metals), which sponsored it, decided to first invest in the construction of another iterator - AoS, the construction of which led to easier access to the Void. Therefore, Tin was not the first, but I prefer to generally consider him to be zero. Anyway due to the fact that this city was mostly engaged in development, the whole structure looked more like an anthill. In addition, besides Tin, there were other “non-iterators” in the structure. Later, Tin had to take care of them (many of their processes were under his control). Tin was quite attached to the Ancients, especially to those who directly worked with him, who changed spare parts for his puppet. Although he knew about the religious intentions of the Ancients, he was still not ready to let them go. And he did everything his way, forcing at least some of them to stay.

This is just a sketch for the development of the structure. I usually call this structure an anthill. This is quite rough, because I don’t have a very good idea of the development process of such organisms. Maybe... Someday I'll draw it better.

Here are notes on what the Tin puppet looked like. It even had a slightly different way of interacting with the panels. You can also see here what previous versions of Tin look like. They don't have names, but they probably made them up. Not all of them have puppets, they're more like just AI. They can communicate, their bodies need to be maintained.

The final design of Tin and it is also shown here that it was the Ancient who led the TToYS project who gave him the headband.

It should be made clear that since Tin's superstructure was constantly being expanded and modernized, he had incredibly more freedom than an iterator could have. When he found that he did not want to let Ancients go, he changed their diet by adding certain plants. Yeah, he got them hooked on drugs to control their minds (for obvious reasons he could not perform a lobotomy directly) or something until they were the only ones left. Their religion has undergone a change, so that Tin now enjoys the status of God.

He is not very interested in his local group because he has always been involved in the affairs of the Ancients + he has his "family". He hides his actions from the group and is forced to defend his territory from overseers. Other iterators sometimes try to know about him but he speaks only to the point and simply ignores inconvenient questions. well AoS knows about TToYS's shenanigans with Ancients anyway. But this group has much problems so AoS just pretend he dont know anything

Swits are just... birds who can run and chase creatures. They are not really good at flying, but still they able to do it Overseers are slightly modernized in order to exclude other overseers

He is not very kind to his eldest. They depend on him, but they have their own consciousness and their own small tasks. In essence, they are really just calculators with their own opinions Only two of them has own puppets, other three are just text and some big boxes with em... brain staff (the 4th had puppet but it broken now)

Also he is a spoiled child tehee

[rinwellisathing]

Get to know my OCs: sibling relationships:

Sentry Ojeda:

Sentry is set as Chosen to be in charge of all of his Bhaalist siblings, their perfect prince of slaughter. Tomi and Gabraela follow him without complaint, both of them fond of him in their own way with Gabraela feeling protective of him as he is a fellow tiefling young enough to be her son and she was forced to kill her own child. Tomi has a more doting older sister relationship with Sentry, content to simply be a respected daughter of Bhaal and left to her own devices until things get serious. Orin used to adore Sentry when they were younger and they would create art together and he would protect her, but Sarevok turned her against him, bitter in his own way that Sentry was so favored by Father and also that Sentry escaped the role of breeder he was born into and that Bhaal simply allowed Sentry to 'decide to be a man'. Jackal is violently jealous of Sentry and hates him, wanting nothing less than to put him in his place. Sentry has a soft spot for Orin and Tomi, but Gabraela's mothering annoys him and he wants to kill both Jackal and Sarevok painfully.

Jaina Thalassia:

Jaina and Tiburon Thalassia have probably the most normal, relatable sibling relationship. They love and care for eachother, they played together happily as children, but Tibs underestimates Jaina and views her as fragile and flighty, in need of protection and meanwhile Jaina views Tibs as foolish and content with the drudgery of being a Flaming Fist as opposed to trying for something more. They tease and needle eachother, but the family bond is there. Also part of Tibs overprotectiveness of Jaina comes from the fact that he did accidentally nearly kill her once when they were children, not that she holds it against him since it led to her being named Umberlee's chosen.

Kroger and Octavia of Creche K'liir:

While technically they are siblings by virtue of being born into the same clutch, they actually consider themselves and Lae'zel siblings because of a bond forged across battles and journeys together. They were usually grouped together in a party and worked well together/trusted eachother. Also Lae'zel saw the potential in the two despite neither being physically strong.

Ilya Barghest:

Although Ilya considers every fellow paladin trainee he studied with at The Open Hand Temple a brother in arms, he had the closest relationship with Sentry as they were both tieflings, both orphans, both trans men, and both in relationships with wealthy, powerful men. Although Sentry mostly views Ilya as an annoying pretty boy, he does have a soft, protective spot for the younger man and Ilya, completely oblivious to how he annoys Sentry, views the older paladin as his very best friend and a close confidant. Ultimately, this relationship shakes out in a positive way when all is said and done and their friendship becomes close and unbreakable. Even if Sentry still can't help but see Ilya as an annoying little brother.

Jackal Silk:

Jackal hates and resents every last one of his siblings, jealous and angry that even as a Bhaalspawn he cannot escape the role of unimportant and unimpressive extra son who exists to serve a more powerful and valuable sibling. If he had his way he would torture and murder them all, but he knows Gabraela would easily kill him and now that Sentry is fully grown and not a scared child anymore so would he. Tomi and her poisons could rob him of his mind and control of his body just like the medicines and treatments back at the madhouse, Orin is too heavily guarded by Sentry when she was young and by the cult when she becomes chosen, and Sarevok...well, Jackal figures it would be a waste since he's already come back a few times.

[valictini]

There’s this zelda AU that’s been cooking in my mind for years now that I’ve rewritten and reworked so many times that at this point, idk if I’ll ever have a definitive version of it… but since it’s a creation myth featuring old forgotten gods At The Beginning Of Time, I recently started to consider all the versions ‘canon’ in the sense that they all exist in-universe in one form or another, leading to many changes from version to version, but with the overall plot and characters staying the same. The myth would be VERY niche too, as in no one really considers it an actual myth and more like an interesting work of fiction inspired by the golden goddesses creation myth.

So now I imagine these different versions as like, one is an educational children’s book loosely inspired by the original myth, one is a well meaning but ultimately erroneous transcription of the myth, one is the oral retelling of said transcription that somehow gets closer to the truth thanks to one bard’s wild imagination, one is the closest they have to the actual sequence of events but is so vague that it’s ultimately useless, one is the extrapolation of one gruesome event that serves as a piece of propaganda for an obscure cult…. and of course I’m always working on the actual sequence of event but now I feel more free knowing that any unsatisfactory draft can go into the pile lmao

Anyway here’s the most recent version of my boy Dawn which isn’t even up to date anymore since he shouldn’t technically have this sword

(More details about the AU concept under the cut if anyone’s interested)

For anyone interested the basic infos of this au (or at least, the current version) is that at the beginning of the zelda universe, after the golden goddesses departed, there were four deities ruling over the world: Dawn (later transformed into the spirit of the hero, “first hylian”), Day (later known as Hylia), Dusk ( the reason this au even exists, complicated to explain in one sentence. “first sheikah”) and Night (later known as Demise)

You could say they’re the embodiment of four parts of a same cycle. They’re the different times of the day, as their names suggest, but they’re also the four seasons, the stages of life etc. Basically, they’re Beginning, Apogee, Decline and End, succeeding eachother forever.

Day and Night, the deities of pure light and pure darkness, constantly fought over the land, trying to overpower the other in any way possible. Dawn and Dusk, both constituted with equal amounts of light and darkness, basically played peacemaker and did their best to make the transition between day and night more smooth. To do their job and prevent any conflict from escalating, each had in his possession a unique power to dominate one of the deities: Dawn could overpower Night, and Dusk could overpower Day.

Time passes and Night was eaten inside by evil machinations instilled by his own desire of conquest and encouraged by malice (cosmic chaos, “wants” the world of the golden goddesses to stop existing and go back to the void) and eventually backstabbed Dusk, stole his power, renamed himself Demise, and went to launch an attack on Hylia with the combined power of two gods and the chill of none.

Dawn, who was supposed to be a neutral force in the conflict, is forced to join Hylia’s side to keep things as balanced as they can be in such a situation. He eventually gave his dark-sealing power to Hylia, who forged it into a sword, and then sacrificed his entire being to the hands of destiny in order to create the “spirit of the hero”, a fail safe to prevent Hylia from falling and the world from collapsing on itself. Meanwhile, Hylia has to figure out a way to fix things before malice overtakes everything, which eventually leads to the games and the story were told in SS.

There’s a lot more, so much more, but it’s late and I need to stop typing rn

[drippingheart]

. . . . Why was he being dragged into such a mess? Upon questioning his benefactor as to the nature of the Jujutsu Technical Schools ( the precise purpose, its similarities or lack thereof to traditional Japanese schools ), Fushiguro Megumi had been assured with a condescending poke to the nose and a sickly sing-song tone that there were more similarities between a cult and Jujutsu Tech. Megumi really should have continued the line of questioning.

Living on his own in the first year doom rooms along with his highly professional interactions with his senpais had prematurely assured him that he would not be bothered with the drivel of ordinary school. Time and time again, Megumi was proved wrong, and he believed the universe enjoyed having a chuckle or two at his expense. School rivalries, bullies, superficial girls, and now school events which resembled those he was forced to tolerate for so long really made the premise of premature death appealing.

The heavy cover of the novel Megumi did not have the pleasure of delving into was shut loudly — dramatically, as much as possible considering it was just a book. Itadori Yuuji already struck with him the occasional migraine, but at least the optimistic teenager had some . . redeeming qualities. Kugisaki Nobara @waraningyo was simply too interested in all the things which the onyx haired teenager loathed; the business with Zen'in Mai only exasperated his annoyances. Wasn't being half beaten to death by curses bad enough? Mai and Tōdō Aoi could shove all their pettiness and egocentrism down their throats.

── ❛ No matter what outcome, she'll have something to complain about . . as will you. The Zen'ins have all this wealth; there's no way you're going to beat HER and them. ❜

It wasn't what Nobara wanted to hear, and he already dreaded the earful which would inevitably conclude with a temporary case of tinnitus. He rose from the well-used sofa in the shared living space and tucked the book he had been indulging with beneath his arm. Gemstone eyes looked to the left toward the hallway leading to their bedrooms. He didn't want to throw Yuuji into the ring of fire, but considering how merry and personable he was, it was actually a great task for him. For them both. Megumi not included.

── ❛ Ask Itadori — He probably excelled at all the school events, and those muscles of his can hold your shopping bags. ❜

[a-writhing-mass]

Hi I just need to say your dalek fic has scratched so much of my brain itches and I love it. It’s beautiful prose, and I really wanna get more into the other daleks brains, especially thay’s since we haven’t gotten to see her mindset yet. It all makes me think of Sec basically attracting like minded weirdos that didn’t fit in as well to the dalek empire either and finding solace that they aren’t the only ones after all, even if it’s buried deep under like twenty layers of repression. Idk, I just really relate to the idea of ‘struggling to fit in with society and almost breaking because of its expectations until you find others struggling just as much as you and finally you can carve out your own space now’. Of course that’s just me projecting, might not even be what you intended with it all, but hey it’s what my brain started thinking.

Ahh thank you so much for the comment. I'm glad some folks seem to enjoy it. <3

Gunna put my rambling reply under a cut to spare folks walls of text~

I hope you don’t mind me replying. And don’t worry if you feel like you're projecting anything – we all do that at some point. We all need someone or something to relate to. I totally understand the feeling of not fitting in. It's probably why I find I often relate more to the non-human or least popular characters in media.

As for the Cult I’ve been using their little origin story, Birth of a Legend as a base for trying to figure them out. It’s the only other bit of ‘canon’ media about them I’m aware of.

Granted there’s not even much to work from in that, sadly. It's only a few pages long and was clearly written for children (nothing wrong with that!) but don't expect anything particularly deep or expansive should you get your hands on a copy of it.

The only clues to the other Daleks personalities might have is the ranks they had before the Cult of Skaro was created and the scant few lines they had in the show. In that story the Emperor put them together and gave them their names because they showed ‘rare initiative’ - although we only learn of what Sec did to catch the Emperor’s eye.

As nice of an idea it would be that a group of oddball Daleks would form on their own accord (Genuinely, would love to see such a story!) I could only really see it happening in extreme circumstances - and said group would immediately have to go into hiding to avoid being punished, probably exterminated, by their own kind, or other advanced species for that matter (technically this has happened before in the comics - but with Alpha and Beta, and those Daleks had initially been humanised by the Doctor. Unfortunately their end wasn't exactly a happy one either).

I don't really see the Emperor allowing an unconventional group like the Cult of Skaro to have such power without having approved it all in the first place - the Emperor apparently doesn't even allow more than three Daleks to have a meeting without his approval first. There's a word for it in the Dalek dictionary, if you consider that canon (at least it's something Terry Nation wrote). (Brindigulum- "a conference or talk between four or more Daleks. None may be held without the Emperor Dalek's agreement.") He is quite the paranoid, tyrannical, little critter and I think it only serves to imply just how desperate he was getting before he created the Cult. I'm not even convinced even the Emperor views them as a good thing, considering he named them a 'Cult'. That suggests he wants other Daleks to be wary and critical of them.

But despite all that, it's still entirely possible, probable even, the Cult developed some kind of camaraderie and solace from being in one another’s company for so long. Even, as you say, if it's buried under ‘20 layers of repression’.

I think it’ll be fun to develop their personalities further. Other than Sec, I think it likely Jast is the most open to change. He’s quiet and observant, and was the Force Leader of the Outer Rim Defensive Battalion.

Thay seemed to be the most outspoken one, maybe even a little argumentative. My guess is she might like discussion and brainstorming ideas– being the one with the scientist background (Commandant of a very secretive research station, Station Alpha). And I know some may argue Thay ‘slipped up’ when talking to the Cybermen and revealing their species but I think it was intentional. The Daleks wouldn’t want to talk in circles for long. They had a mission to complete.

Caan, once an ‘Attack Squad Leader’, I imagine being a bit sneaky. A bit ambitious. Very aggressive. And also perhaps the most loyal – though during the events of the Manhattan arc that loyalty was stuck on the Dalek Empire, then when we saw him later in the finale of the 4th series his loyalty had 180’d to Sec and the Doctor. I think he’d be the hardest to ‘break’.

And I think they’d all be rather imaginative and inventive (up to a point) otherwise they never would have intrigued the Emperor so.

Considering the Dalek’s ancestors were once peaceful philosophers, scientists and teachers I like to think that they all still retain those traits. They’re just buried deep. Very deep. And any sense of peace has been beat and brainwashed out of them. It'll take a lot of work to undo all that and pull those old traits back out into the open.

[jsabspinkhorsepro123]

The Angel Of Death ("Thrasher" 's Story)

AN- Please know that this, though being a backstory, will be a bit of a spoiler for both the original Long Live Nock, and especially for the eventual new version. As Thrasher is a major character in both, and this will make a lot of this boy’s story parts less surprising. Also, reading the warnings will give spoilers as well (but trust me when I say, you WILL likely want to read them as this story gets very very dark) so please be aware of that.

Also, I had a lot of technical issues on this, including not being able to upload the font I made for this to Tumblr so instead just taking pics, a video in this for some reason I could not crop correctly-

I refuse to work on this anymore so it is what it is lol.

Other than Copper, this is my most anticipated backstory. He has undergone a hell of a lot of character development since his first introduction, so much that honestly he is pretty much not even the same character.

Be aware, I consider his backstory the darkest out of everyone’s, so this is not for the faint of heart. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A shape shouted in an olden language, that was long supposed to be forgotten to all but the ancient sage’s.

10 Pure’s in white robes stood around a table, the sound of screaming clear as they chanted. For hours they had been doing this, as a lady huffed and pushed.

As the cry of a baby filled their ears, their chanting stopped as they rejoiced, the green hair and skin like emeralds to them. The father stepped up, grinning as he held onto his wife’s hand. Small black dove wings were curled around the baby as they spread a vial of blood upon his head.

“Welcome to the world… our little angel of death.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

   The young kid looked around his small room, sighing weakly. His name, Razor, son to the most loyal followers of the cult leader ; to [ , Cruci and Laplace.

 He had been training constantly for years for… what he didn’t know. His parents just wouldn’t tell him. He hadn’t been able to go to school, wasn’t allowed to see other shapes not in the cult, and was constantly being forced to his limits. When he peeked over the fence and saw the kids playing and laughing, he couldn’t help but feel envious.

He didn’t understand why he was so different…

At 7 years old he was brought to meet the leader of the cult… Lady Marlene.

She looked at him with a look he couldn’t decipher, being just a bit younger than his parents. The look, he didn’t like, he didn’t know why- “Ah, my loyal followers, how goes the training?” “Wonderful my queen, we thought it was finally time for Razor to meet you.”

The lady’s eyes traveled across him, making the young one shiver uncomfortably. “Perfect. I would like time to check on his training, his holiness, and deliver his first… rune.”

They both bowed to say of course, lightly pushing Razor forward. He didn’t understand what that all meant, and he was terrified to find out. Why, he didn’t know. He slowly took her hand, though not wanting to, her leading him into what seemed like a bedroom fit for royalty.

“You should feel honored my dear, not everybody gets the chance to be this close to me.” “… U-Um… o-ok?” He didn’t know what to say, but with her expression very lightly 'souring he was sure he didn’t say it right. “You don’t understand what your future entails do you? You stupid kid~”

Her grip tightened right before Razor attempted to step back, him whimpering lightly. “I-I’m sorry- please let g-” He let out a cry as her hand collided with his face, the grip keeping him from falling. “YOU are destined to be my King, that means you have to get used to me.” The words made him fearful. King? She also sounded, angry, and there was a tone he didn’t understand nor like.

“Now, we have a major thing to do.” She walked into the closet, grabbing a strange box. When she opened it, his heart started beating quickly, seeing multiple strange metal symbols. “I think your old enough to be known as mine~”

He didn’t know how long he was in that room, screaming as the metal sizzled around his skin, in pain, crying and horrified as she did things he didn’t understand.

When he woke up again, his left leg felt like it had been through a house fire. He cried, trying to call out for his parents.

…. No one answered. He was left alone, with a new fate written out for his eyes to see.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Less than 3 years later, on his birthday he slowly opened his eyes, hearing the pitter patter of footsteps coming up the stairs. Today would be the day, he was supposed to find a hero’s tattoo somewhere. He couldn’t help but be excited, which hero would he be? Water, Earth, Nature, Sky? He heard his door open, him quickly sitting up in bed.

“My dear, are you ready to see your fate?” Razor nodded, heading to the mirror.

 None on his face or neck, so he lifted up his shirt. Nothing, next he checked his legs.

… There was nothing. No tattoo… His parents didn’t take it well. They lost it, blaming him, saying he must’ve done something wrong. He cried out begs and sorries as he was beat into a bloody mess. When they finally left to tell the cult the news, his room was ruined, his body bloody , and his spirit broke.

He did something wrong… Like always. It always seemed to be his fault. He wished he knew what to do.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Breaking news.

The 1st known hero, Copper and his family has gone missing, along with his boyfriend Aero. If you have any information, please contact General Loga.

The headline of the newspaper was super surprising for Razor, especially since he hadn’t seen his parents in a couple of days. He tried again looking around for the two, shooting up hearing the door open. He walked over, his face paling seeing them covered in blood. “Razor. Grab a backpack and fill it with the essentials, now.”

Their tone scared him, but he did what he was told. He overheard them talking, making it clear to him they were the reason the Earth hero had gone missing. They had tried to kill him the usual way heroes were killed, ridding of all their reasons of living, and their hope.

… But he was still alive. Something was different. His heart beat quickened at the thought, but he had no time to think as they forced him out the door. They walked through the streets, his jacket keeping him hidden from the world. He cried as they suddenly threw him into an alley, his head smashing into the ground.

“Now, your real training begins.” Was what he heard as he slowly tried to get back up. When he looked up… they were both gone.

“…Mom…? Dad?” No answer made his heart pound, as he again called out for them, close to crying. He had never been outside on his own, or anywhere other than his backyard, training grounds and the cult place. It smelled horrible, was filled with creepy sounds, and felt cold-

With no one answering, he curled into the corner, sniffling his hands wrapped around himself.

Real training.. he was scared to find out what that meant.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Razor had been walking throughout the forest for days, feeling more and more hungry and thirsty. A cigarette in hand to keep him calm, he smoked anxiously wondering what he was supposed to do. He had no idea why he was out here… but he sure knew he was getting weaker and weaker. His legs were feeling like they were made of lead,

Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t long before he collapsed, his vision weak. Before he passed out, he looked up, noticing someone staring down at him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Razor sure wasn’t expecting to wake up warm and comfortable, but it was a nice feeling. He slowly opened his eyes, growing confused. He was in a bed in a house he didn’t know… And he could smell food near him.

The house though, smelled strange. And was rather od and beat up.

“Hey kid, glad to see your awake.” He quickly looked over, seeing the older shape that he passed out to. He lightly backed up, before being calmed down by them. “It’s ok, not gonna hurt ya. My name’s Deviance… I’m sure your hungry.” He slowly ate, feeling himself relax, it being strangely really good.

“Where… am I?” “Let’s, call it an abandoned house for now-

… I was called to find you by your parents… You don’t deserve to have to go through this kid.”

Razor didn’t know what to say to that, tensing as the other wrapped their arms around him. It didn’t take long after he realized it was just a hug to bury into it, trying to register all that had happened.

After a few days of getting his strength back, he was shown around his, apparently new home. It seemed to be, well simply a crack house- But… despite that title strangely, the shapes inside seemed nice. They all said hi, them playing around while they worked… it was better than anywhere he had been.

Now he had his own bedroom again… but he was still sure it didn’t mean any big difference between what was waiting for him when the cult wanted him. He wasn’t ready for more pain and training… but he didn’t have much of a choice.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Come him being 15, his body was almost fully covered in runes, he had became the leader of the crack house now that Deviance was old and “retired”. Well, kind of, the other still ran everything mainly-

Razor now though, had found about the horrors and wonders of addition, becoming an alcoholic, drug addict, and nicotine addict. He loved being able to feel numb, though he did things he never remembered or wanted to do while the poison rushed through his veins. Seeing Copper though, that was the biggest shock of the past year. Him, Klay and Swarm had been the ones to see him, apparently they beat him silly after he knocked one of his teeth out. Luckily their healer, Shaku was easily able to fix it, still hurt though-

He found himself walking through the forest late at night, per usual, smoking his 5th cigarette today. He was interrupted by his train of thought though… by a soft meow.

He looked around in shock, a cat? Even if it was a cat based shape, that sure as hell wasn’t common. He quickly began looking around, the meow sounded so young. The meowing luckily was easily able to find… and it lead him to the smallest and most beautiful white kitten.

“Heya sweetheart…” The pained meow hurt his heart, slowly leaning down as they limped over. Seemed to be a girl, no collar, so most likely no owner… He carefully picked them up, beginning to walk home. Once they were healed, he softly cleaned them, their purrs making him feel so happy. “I’m going to need to give you a name sweetheart…” They meowed happily curled up on his lap, him smiling as she purred.

“… I got it. Snowball?” “Meow!” He laughed as they nuzzled and licked his cheek, him petting her. “Snowball it is.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The sound of chanting was clear as he covered his ears, shaking in pain and general exhaustion. He had finished his last rune… but that wasn’t why he was terrified. He knew what was happening outside of the cell he was in, the corruption. They were praying for the corrupteds to be dealt with. He was terrified of not knowing whether his family (Not the piece of shit mom and dad he had, he hadn’t seen them since they abandoned him) and little kitten were ok, not knowing what was happening outside the stone walls he was stuck in.

He heard footsteps approach him, each step making him terrified. He knew those footsteps. And he knew damn well what they brought with them.

“Ah my King~ Glad they have finally finished painting your body~” He tried desperately to back away, his heart beating quickly. Marlene’s hand grabbed his chin, fingernails digging into his skin as she ran her other hand across his cheek. He hated this.  He hated being so… helpless to her. So easily controlled…

As her hands travelled down, tears ran down his face, knowing there was nothing he could do to stop this.

He could feel his hope fading, it obvious to him that his fate would be everything he didn’t want for himself.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next 8 years passed by in a blur, his addictions the only thing keeping him sane. He didn’t know what he did in those moments he didn’t remember, he didn’t know he was attacking Fresh, he hadn’t known he beat up Copper as a desperate trying to pass the blame he felt for himself. All he knew was the few moments he wasn’t drunk or on drugs, of misery and pain, exhaustion, and emptiness.

Now though… He was in front of a King. Nock, the king of corrupteds in the forest. His stare was deadly, his stance and energy filled with so much menace and hatred he felt it could rival the Corrupted Lords.

“HoW AbOUt WE hAVe A LiTTlE ChAT?~” ‘Does he think I’m dumb??’ He said, well what any smart shape would, no way while quickly walking away. But… they said something that immediately made him stop.

“i MaY HaVE a WAy TO hELp YOuR “PrOBlEM”.” He quickly looked over, the look on his face… He knew it was dumb.

But god was he desperate to change his fate. To have his own life. So, he slowly nodded, following the other. They sat down at a table, Nock offering a drink. He knew it probably was dumb to drink, but with his alcohol tolerance he doubted one drink of anything could get him drunk. So he acceoted.

… All it took was one sip.

And Nock had him wrapped around his finger, corrupting him to his will.

“aNGeL Of DEaTH, I HAvE ChANgED yOUr FAtE. NoW…

YoU WiLLbE KnOWn AS cRUsADeR.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

AN- And it’s finished! This is the last backstory I had planned, next will be… the remake of Long Live Nock. I’m really glad to finally have been able to tell these stories, also there probably will be some extras for these two backstories posted later.

Hope you all enjoyed!

(Also I will be posting an extras post for the two stories-)

[hyuninho]

Can I get a quick intro to gore and horror?

I’m so sorry it took me so long to respond to this one! I kind of wanted to have another short story out before I answered anymore asks, but oh well! ^^ (also for some reason I mostly used examples of movies and games in this answer?? For that I am so sorry, it is 3:00 am and my brain is short circuiting. I’ll probably update it later with more book recs!)

To kind of prepare you for everything I’m about to say; no, I cannot give a short intro to horror. I can try with gore, but I doubt it will be very short (I apologize in advance! ^^;). I say this all to you also with the warning that I am not like, A Horror Professional, I’m just someone who has spent an unreasonable amount of time silently observing and absorbing my favorite type of media.

So, anyways; gore by itself is, yes, technically probably a genre, but it’s also a great plot device in media that may not actually be considered gore. Pulling just from movies here as an example- the Final Destination series is creatively gorey, and are definitely considered gore films in their own right; however, I wouldn’t consider The VVitch gore. While getting pretty nasty with the gore & graphic imagery in the last third, it serves to kind of draw to themes in the story & to symbolize. Midsommar is a great example of both- a very gorey film in retrospect, BUT the deaths and bizzare body horror shown all served either some sort of symbolism, a parallel that could be drawn, or did it’s plot job of showing us how messed up and unsettling the cult was. I would say these 3 examples are kind of okay-ish benchmarks to how gore can be divided.

For gore (this goes for horror too, really!) I find it incredibly helpful to divide media I interact with not by its genre, but more by the themes within the story & effect it had on me, as a reader. Using ‘Fridge horror’ to describe a couple of books instead of looking at each one individually and being like, “ok, this is a sci-fi body horror, this is a splatterpunk, this is a supernatural slasher-” etc, really helps me out, because I’m someone who tends to read the same type of horror, rather than the same genre.

All the categories I use personally I’ll list below, but I warn you these are very specific to me because I read a lot of the same thing, & I like a good character before anything else. I think that shapes a lot of the media I interact with. I don’t know if everyone uses all of these, or if no one’s used these and I’m just a funky little loser, but this is my personal system;

Fridge Horror; A story that becomes terrifying after you’ve read it and let it sink in. For gore specifically, I find it’s less actual gore, and more “wow, you just compared a house to a human and now that thought will never leave my mind lol”, OR, gore used as weird obscure symbolism for the actual thing going on at hand- and once you’ve figured out what that thing is, it puts the piece of media into a whole new perspective. (ANATOMY by kittyhorrorshow is a wonderful game, and prime example of both!)

Obsessive Horror; Stories & Media that uses gore & body horror as a way to describe a character’s mental state (and usually obsession with a specific concept/idea) OR a set of characters' mental decline but obsession with each other. I would say the movie The Perfection (2019) does this well!

Sad/Vulnerable Horror; kind of self explanatory, but very similar to Obsessive Horror- the only usual distinction between the two is that instead of obsession being the overarching thing to tie it all together, it’s usually grief, or a character struggling with some sort of obstacle that has forced them to stop- a character being unable to move on from something and it getting gradually worse. Midsommar is a great movie for this!

Philosophical Horror; in a gore sense, I do find it funny that this one tends to be less like. Human oriented and usually has some sort of monster involved, but it’s usually something along the lines of like “what makes us human?” (insert violent gorey scene here) lol. Very entertaining. I’m gonna come back and edit this post to add specific media examples for this one, because none come to mind right now except for fanfic, but it’s also… 3AM please be patient with me haha ^^;

I don’t have any recs for ppl just dipping their toes in, because everyone is different and I don’t know what preferences work for everyone- but I would just say to engage with the media that’s kinda popular and seems to interest you in the horror genre- and work from there. It really helps to make accounts on sites like goodreads & letterboxed just to kind of stalk what other people are watching and reading! On goodreads I joined a couple of groups, and while I’m not the best at having a one on one convo with someone just yet, it really helps me to look through the forums and conversations available and to be like “Oh, shit, this person also likes B.R. Yeager? And is recommending another book in relation to Negative Space? I’ve gotta check it out!” You don’t even have to engage with people if you don’t want to in these kinds of settings- you can silently stalk forums discussing media they liked and why- its glorious and a good way to quickly add to your collection & get more into the swing of things without feeling bad because you’re never gonna read the book you got yourself 2 years ago & now sits untouched on your shelf lol.

(Definitely not a self call out.)

I don’t really know how to end this one, so I’ll end it with my favorite kind from the list I previously mentioned; Vulnerable Horror/Gore. (SPOILERS FOR KATHE KOJA'S THE NEGLECTED GARDEN INCOMING).

I personally love a good piece of media that has character specific body horror- things that frighten us, because, holy shit that sounds awful to experience- but also have an innate and personal terror to the character it’s happening to;

Kathe Koja’s short story, The Neglected Garden, is a perfect example of this. Throughout the entire story, we never learn the narrator’s name- only the name of his girlfriend, Anne, and the impact she makes on him after he attempts to break up with her- which she responds to by crucifying herself to his fence. You understand the narrator’s reaction to Anne’s crucifixion- and as it continues and gets worse- how she ended up there in the first place. Obvious parallels are drawn to their relationship before she went to such extreme measures; both too cruel and stubborn to be together- but too desperate and obsessed with each other to ever break up. The narrator is arguably, not at all sympathetic- but you still understand the horror of what he witnesses. Koja goes into graphic detail when describing Anne’s initial crucifixion, and then, the slow growing of grass and flowers as she stays still and unmoving. Her body slowly morphing into a disgusting infected carcass that’s somehow still alive is described with alarming depth. But it serves a purpose to the story, and the characters- or rather, it serves as a vehicle for understanding their relationship.

So… yeah! Lol, I’m sorry, this probably wasn’t as helpful or as informative as you were hoping, but I hope it’s still enough to kind of get a general idea of where to start. If you don’t want to spend a lot of money on specifically splatterpunk (general subgenre of gore) books, I highly recommend godless.com, as they have a lot of short story collections & stand alone pieces that you can buy for sometimes as little as 50 cents! I do warn you though, sometimes there’s a bit of odd fetish content on there? Lol so… have fun with that.

Sorry for the ramble, thank you for the ask! Bye lol

[alligatorjesie]

Well since @flightsofwonder has shit-for-brains syndrom and can't seem to read well enough to understand that Ben Solo isn't a fucking nazi in the new Star Wars movies, let's repost this post I made some time ago and maybe the pictures will help them understand how fucking stupid they are and realize there are no fucking nazis in Star Wars.

We’re gonna ignore all the Nazi shit because we have established long fucking ago that Ben isn’t a fucking Nazi here. It’s Hux if there was one. I know this because of this scene:

In saying that, there are technically no nazis in Star Wars as that is not an ideology anyone in these movies can have because there’s not jewish people in which to be fucking antisemitic to. Ben don’t really have a scene like this. In fact Ben came to Snoke originally not because he desired world domination but because he’s pretty sure his uncle just tried to kill him and knew Snoke well enough to consider that a good place to hide out at for a little bit. You know. From his uncle. Who he thinks just tried to kill him.

It’s all in this comic, not that you’ll fuckin’ read it.

Ben didn't even blow up the fucking temple. He crawls out of the rubble of his own hut after the whole Luke and his horribly timed moment of self reflection thing and it is only after he attempt to wake up the other students THEN the temple blows up. The boy didn't have jack shit to do with it.

I'm telling you this because I know you wont read this comic and it sounds like you could use some fucking cliff notes.

It's very rich being told by someone who seems to deeply sympathize with Anakin, a character we do actually witness kill women and children, no even in wartime.

and then children in his own cult because a old fuck told him if he did that he could help Anakin cheat death.

And maybe his wife? A little bit? I mean he did have a hand in it.

But thinks Ben is just nonredeemable evil because he killed some enemies of war during wartime. I don’t think even outside of the movie material like in the comic and novelizations do we see Ben kill anyone who wasn’t apart of the war and enemies to the faction he was a part of.

I’ve never thought to sit down and do an actual fucking body count on these 2 characters but we fucking can if you want. Off the top of my head I’m pretty fucking sure Anakin has a way fucking higher ‘noncombat of war’ kill count vs Ben with just the sand people alone. That was an entire town he kill. Not even mentioning the jedi younglings he fucking slaughtered. At lest this town in The Force Awakens didn’t have any fucking kids in it because it's a Resistance town.

Yeah, that town at the beginning of The Force Awakens? That was filled with Resistance members. It’s a Resistance town. Says so in the audiobook. Were you ever fucking curious as to why everyone here was ready to throw down the fucking second the First Order showed up?

This place? Maz's temple? They said out loud they tracked Finn here, an AWOL solider they're actively looking for. Maz, who we can all be assured does not have a history of aligning with the Empire or the First Order.

This entire solar system?

Oops! That wasn’t Ben.

Hux and Snoke organized that one.

I figured this out when it was spoken out loud by Snoke in the movie, Not once but fucking twice:

As seen here by Snoke telling HUX to prepare the weapon and not sending BEN off to fucking do that instead.

And the second time:

Ben is literally tasked with Rey and is entirely uninvolved in all this bullshit.

I’m sympathetic to the character of Ben Solo because that’s kinda the point of these fucking movies. Even The Rise of Skywalker, fucking incoherent shit show that it was, couldn’t ignore the fact that the character of Ben Solo was always meant to be redeemed. As if it wasn’t telegraphed loudly enough by making him the emotionally damaged son of two characters who want their son back since they fucking say it enough, Leia Organa and Han Solo.

Not even halfway through the movie we have a whole interaction with this character that is him questioning his own faith.

Fuck, he stabs Han and Immediately has some pretty fucking intense feelings of regret.

so intense his own mother reacts to his grief.

This isn't Leia getting punched in the empathy so fucking hard she has to sit down from Han dying. Han died with peace, knowing his death would be the thing that finally brings their son home. This is Leia reacting to the pain that Ben is feeling in this moment.

Adam Driver and Carrie Fisher didn’t put their entire fucking badoosy into these genuine expressions of grief for you to sit there and misunderstand the basic structure of these character’s motivations.

And while I hate fucking saying this because I would absolutely love to spend hours explaining to you in graphic fucking detail how much further Ben's character progresses to the Light Side is throughout this movie, we’re just gonna fucking ignore The Last Jedi for this chat because I still have your mom and dad to fuck and plants to water. Assured that you’ve stopped reading beyond this point already as I am.

Listen, I get it you don’t like the character of Ben Solo/Kylo Ren but making a keystone of your fucking personality hating them through some real fucking obvious personal choices to disregard whole sections of the source material then going into tags you don’t fucking belong in to harass the people who do like that character isn’t winning you any fucking internet points mate. We're skipping merrily right over this scene:

God fucking knows I hate this shithole movie but that don't look like Rey smooching on Kylo Ren there you ignorant asshat.

Pretty sure she wouldn't be playing tonsil hockey with a space nazi. Long story short, You're a fucking moron and Ben Solo isn't a fucking nazi. The fans in this fandom can write him as a jewish character because at no fucking point in the original stories did Ben Solo join the First Order because he hates space jewish people and want's to subjugate and control them all.

He was a scared kid who ran to the only person left he felt he could trust. Now do us all a solid and pull your head out of your ass and get the fuck out of this tag.

[lilithvibeplace]

HI. I FORGORT HOW TO SPELL IT IMMEDIATELY. AZ CAN WE HEAR MORE ABOUT AZ

YES HI SORRY IVE BEEN DEAD THE PAST EONS BUT I YET LIVE AND YET MAY STILL AZ INFODUMP

Azazel is a special lil enby they're delightful and lovely. And by that i mean of course WAR CRIMINAL 2 ELECTRIC BOOGALOO WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOo

line break time since Az, like Nox, has much to be discussed

alrighty gang so starting at the start, Azazel is a little introverted lil enby who's particularly adept with some less well regarded magic, in particular necromancy and other fun things! they were thrown to Nox early on before the Watchers formed as a squire and pseudo-apprentice. technically they were under the apprenticeship of the same dude as Nox (Andros - Hey slij i know you'll read this im so sorry this was a genuine accident but i did name him the same as one of ur dnd characters in our campaigns im SO sorry) but in reality Nox was the one teaching them.

Anywho, Az had a bit of jealousy originating with Dusana's relationship with Nox, who as you may recall had a kind of pseudo-parental figure thing going on. This is because Az also is very depressed and lonely and found comfort in Nox and felt like Dusana was stealing her time when Dusana totally couldve just been going to Alice instead. Lots of stupid melodrama that the rest of the group is aware is stupid melodrama. But once Alice returns from Erelia with a dead Dusana and a missing Nox, Az goes wild.

They first threaten Alice demanding to know where the ever living hell Nox is. This goes badly and Az is forced to spend the night on a solo mission to spend some time away from the group. When they return, they attempt Necromancy to revive Dusana as a way to seek forgiveness from Alice. This goes worse.

Alice arrests Az for using illegal magic and is preparing plans to send them back to the Magi Council for trial. Maverick, being the icon he is (and the closest thing to a friend Az had, real opposites attract type friendship), helped Az escape and thus begins the Many Trials of Azazel, as they escape but are on the run knowing that news will spread relatively quickly of their actions.

Trial One: Azazel takes a trip to the Cursed Lands!

The Cursed Lands (name change pending) is a little section of the continent (abt 1/4 of the landmass) that is still lightly radioactive due to that time Romana went nuclear and destroyed a large part of the continent in the Erelian War for Independence. Here Azazel goes to hide out for a few months hoping to wait out the inevitable head hunt that will occur for them. And here as well, they learn more about a certain celestial, Passentha who was one that Nox worshipped and also one that was very illegal to worship. Yet her cult exists here in what is effectively a no mans land.

Trial Two: Azazel Goes to Windsbane and Steals A Sword!

Next up, Azazel after learning more from the Ashen Chrysanthemum (the cult of Passentha) and in particular the skill to alter their appearance, they head north to Windsbane, an Empire currently ran by an authoritarian and expansionist Emperor, hoping to forge a great Northern Empire to ensure no southern nation could ever conquer them again. (they are considered a rogue empire by most nations and a large coalition is forming against them, REGARDLESS) While in Windsbane, Az learns a neat thing or two about the celestials, in particular, how to kill one! and they need a certain sword, aptly named Godkiller (previously known as Wintersbane) which is a relic owned by House Zima, the dynasty in control of Windsbane.

After doing some assassinations and quite the solo heist, they pull it off and gain Godkiller! Woooo! Congrats to our little demon! In this trial they learnt how to manipulate and take advantage of people and that people are, at the end of the day, disposable! They also cause a civil war here but thats another story for another time. They also learn that Nox is supposedly dead.

Trial Three: Az Fights a God (fails)

After Windsbane, Azazel heads south! with only a horse and Godkiller on them, they come across the Knights of the Endless Night, a cult of Neternia that began taking advantage of the chaos of the wartorn north, and had gotten into raiding local towns and churches after the Church of Santiryn had their big split and the godly civil war restarted. Again, tale for another time. Anywho! Azazel tries fighting off these rogue brigands but of course because they never were trained with a sword, regardless of how incredibly powerful the sword may be, they quickly fall in battle and are kidnapped as part of a ritual to summon an Avatar of Neternia.

While they do manage to escape this ritual and secure Godkiller, they come across the summoned avatar of Neternia who, despite being very weak due to the ritual only partially succeeding, still kicks their ass but Az using tricks learnt from the Ashen Chrysanthemum escapes still.

Trial Four: Az Becomes a Double Agent

Az reaches Erelia right as Nox began her plans to take control of the city and restore the Erelian Empire (it's a long story.), and joins up with the Ashen Chrysanthemum formally, hilarious not knowing that Nox is the newest leader of theirs.

During this, Az also meets up with Maverick and after some convincing, rejoins the Watchers and Alice forgives Az for their many, many crimes against the Magi Council since they all now have a much bigger issue, the upcoming Erelian Coronation!

So this is where stuff gets a bit messy. The Erelian Coronation is where Nox coups the coalition-installed government of Erelia and revives the Erelian Empire, and there are three simultaneous conspiracies going on here.

Conspiracy One: The global leaders invited to the Coronation are all planning in secret a plot to assassinate Nox by any means necessary even if it means most of them dying because its only been a 100 years or so since Erelia fell and they all agree we can never live under such circumstances again.

Conspiracy Two: The Magi Council alongside the Watchers are also plotting to assassinate Nox (only Alice is aware Nox is the target though), not for any geopolitical reason just because they are all very aware of how dangerous and powerful Nox is.

Conspiracy Three: The Ashen Chrysanthemum, under the orders of Nox, are plotting to kill everyone at the coronation in an attempt to summon Passentha and meld their plane of reality with hers as a final push to let the Pestanae Pantheon win the Celestial Civil War (there's a lot of proper nouns here im so sorry).

Az is aware of conspiracies two and three, and becoming the deeply brooding pessimistic asshole that they are, will align with conspiracy three! So come time for the Coronation and when the cult, Watchers, and nobility all begin massacreing each other, Az is right in the middle and gets proper site of exactly who they've been following this whole time and realize it's Nox! This causes them to fucking lose it (again) and leaving the coronation ceremony through one of the cults many secret exits, goes on a brief massacre in town to cope with the fact Nox has been alive this whole time and never once reached out to say hi.

Alice presumes Az is dead, Nox and Az meetup and have their reunion (both covered in blood, vastly worse people then they were years ago when they last saw each other), and join up with Az becoming the Court Magi for the Erelian Court, and Nox's closest confidant. And of course, leader of the newly reformed Erelian Magi Corps.

As Head of the Erelian Magi Corps they do such fun things such as:

Using magic to completely and permanently alter the terrain of the world in a twisted corrupted nature in order to bond the land more with Passentha’s ideal of the world

Using necromancy to raise troops that had just fallen in battle, effectively creating an endless cycle of troops in the middle of a battle completely ruining an opposing army’s ability to fight

Nuclear suicide bombers (think modern day dirty bombs)

consistently creates plagues to infect people in advance to an invasion

Of course, they were also tasked with handling the war on the Church of Santiryn while Nox focused on the actual war going on. This Does Not Go Well.

basically any of the Septanae that can spare time or power are sending influence or outright appearing as avatars to fight against Az’s Magi Corps and its very fucking frustrating to them, to the point that in a moment that i’m not sure i’ll keep because it is an incredibly dark turn even for my already incredibly dark turn plot arc, az forces a magi to replicate Romana’s great sacrifice, and effectively forces a magi to become a nuclear suicide bomb detonated smack dab in the middle of the Celestial Cathedral. obviously a random magi who’s not entirely willing to do an action does not have the same power as Romana’s sacrifice, and they knew this! which is why they were fine doing it in the middle of the city of Erelia. It did infact obliterate the cathedral though! and several city blocks! and leaves them with like Chernobyl level radiation. It's a completely fucked situation.

I don't particularly have their ending thought out yet, but the gist is that they'll be killed by Maverick around the same time Alice is killed by Nox. Because i'm a fucking sucker for "friends turned to tragic enemies due to an ideological divide" and Az' death is a necessary action to help end the war.

But yeah! that's Azazel! lil trauma enby who is absolutely fucking going through it :)

[tempest-toss]

OOOOO THEMED ASK TIME, okay *ALL* of the asks for O5-4, our fav Werewolf!

*sweating* oh golly gee let's get into this then!

🐱---- Is your muse graceful? Do they possess a skill that they're quite precise and never sloppy with?

Graceful? Not really. He's not necessarily a klutz but he nor others would consider him graceful. He does possess a precise skill if you count him transforming others into werewolves. In both blessing and bite he has maximized powerful transformations with minimal blood.

🐶 ---- Does your muse get excited easily? Is there someone (or particular people) that make them excited?

It depends, even though he'd not show it visibly (aside from his tail). Of course the loves of his life make him excited, and he practically beams upon seeing them

🐎 ---- How strong is your muse? Could they fight someone with a stronger skillset than them?

Extremely strong. He is an Embodiment after all, a rank stronger than Titans. Not only that but I've mentioned many a time how he has herculean build in his werewolf form that is more than 3x the height of a human. Could he fight someone stronger? Yes. Will he always win/be invincible? No. On his own he wouldn't have been able to defeat the Scarlet King if it weren't for his fellow pantheon that weakened the SK.

🦒 ---- How does your muse feel about height? Do they like their height or are they ashamed of it?

He's indifferent to it. He's also indifferent to his own height, in both forms.

🦝 ---- What things have your muse gotten away with? Do they get sneak away often?

Murder mostly. And being the figure of worship for two cults. And some more murder. Rizzing upRomancing the enemy. He does technically sneak away every full moon, mainly for the safety of the building and subsequently his friends and family.

🐻 ---- What are some strange sleep patterns your muse has? Do they sleep a lot, too little, not at all?

Not necessarily a pattern but he does sometimes involuntarily shift into his full-wolf form while he sleeps. He tries not to sleep at all, but ever since gaining more than a few new partners he's found a joy in sleeping in, spooning.

🐲 ---- Is your muse hot-headed? Do they have a short-temper? If so, what are some signs that they're getting to the boiling point.

He isn't hot-headed and his temper has cooled thanks to Eight providing him with some therapy. Some signs of him reaching a boiling point includes forced transformation, destruction of property (usually a mug), and the splintering of his antlers.

🦘 ---- If they have kids, what type of parent is your muse? If not, what type of parent would your muse be?

Counting his step children he has 63 of them, and he tries as much as he can to be there for him. Thankfully they're all busy so he can dedicate most of his time to being a councilman, but he would drop everything to help them in an instant!

🐍 ---- Has your muse ever been two faced? Do they talk badly of others behind their back? And how often are they this way?

Has he? Yes (although I'm totally blanking on a specific example). He doesn't talk badly about others behind his back though, and he usually isn't two-faced, either biting his tongue or critiquing them directly.

🐬 ---- Is your muse considered smart by their peers? If so, what do other people think of their intelligence?

Yes. They definitely wonder why he's not full time department of technological development, considering he made the Power Inhibitors the Foundation uses globally. Instead he splits his time with that department as well Anomalous Welfare.

🐙 ---- Is your muse a hugger? Do they enjoy physical affection whether it's platonic or romantic?

He's only a hugger to those he's close with. He definitely enjoys romantic-based physical affection, although usually he won't say no to some head scritches.

🦉 ---- What's the wisest thing your muse has ever said? Are they often that way?

Four keeps his wise words to himself. He'd much rather other, more profound people like Eight talk...er, sign. No, he's not often a wise old man.

🐞 ---- Do they believe in love at first sight? If not, what's the reason?

Yes, did you see him and Nikos?

🦋 ---- How sociable is your muse? Do they make friends easily? If not, is there a reason why they aren't / don't?

He's generally not sociable at all, only getting talkative with close friends (Five, Six) and family and loved ones. He doesn't make friends easily, and that's usually because everyone is intimidates by him lol.

🦂 ---- How deadly is your muse? Do they have the capabilities to kill someone? Would they if given the opportunity?

Extremely, and yes..and yes! I have written him murdering before and I will continue to in the future. With his grand reveal as the Embodiment of Nature, there's so much that he's capable of doing no >:D

🐝 ---- Has your muse ever helped someone in a tough situation? Do they enjoy helping others?

He's helped others when 408 broke out, he voted for Abel to be with their SOs, he voted to help Foundingverse, the list can go on. He is indifferent on enjoyment of helping others, especially when it comes to strangers.

🐌 ---- Does your muse take their time on things that are important? Are they the patient type of person?

Yes. He's been alive for over 5,000 years, he has developed a lot of patience to deal with annoyances and to take his time with the important duties of a councilmember.

[drippingviolets3]

So I’ve decided to do a little bit of world building for the SAGAU idea I’ve had in mind. No plot yet so don’t expect any story chapters or blurbs to come out soon, but yeah. Have some brainrot instead ig.

Something that’s always bothered me about this AU is how every nation views the creator in the same manner, and handles their religion the same way. I get that it’s supposed to be a cult, but it just feels unrealistic to me. So one of the first things I changed for my AU; The views on the creator. Specifically Mondstat’s (you will see a huge change there), but you’ll see what I have for the other two nations as well dw

Mondstat

Mondstat is the city of freedom, and we all know that. So how I imagine they handle their “religion” is like this:

•Looking like the creator is taboo, mostly if you personally changed your appearance to look like them, but it won’t send a angry crowd after you since it wouldn’t be fair if you were just born like that. The whole “angry crowd gets sent after you because you look like the creator” part really bugs me, because no one really considers if the reader looks plain. What if they looked like any other NPC? What if they looked like Donna, would she be scorned and killed? No one considers that the reader could have some sort of common hair or eye color, and that jumbles up more then you’d think.

•No one is forced into the religion, that seriously counters the cities beliefs. Instead, the church is more manipulative, like IRL Christians (not all Christians ofc). They’re kind of like “oh you don’t follow the religion of our lord and savior ____? What a shame, we would have loved to have you at the church, but we don’t want to force you into anything. Just know that you’re walking the path of sin now and it’s never too late to convert and seek redemption byyyye!”

•To delve deeper into this manipulation from the church, those who devote themselves to the creator and heavily praised and adored, where as those who don’t are more outcasted. Barbara for example, devoted herself to the creator, and is extremely religious. This earns her brownie points from the church and so they spread the good word on Barbara the people, and further influences her popularity. But Rosaria, someone who isn’t extremely religious and probably doesn’t even remember the creator’s name, is usually scorned and outcasted from the church’s influence. She’s never outright attacked, but she knows that if given the chance, the people would be hurling rocks at her.

• All in all Mondstat is still technically a cult. They prey on those who can be taken advantage of and outcast those who aren’t one of them, treating them with nothing but cruelty.

Liyue

•Liyue is and always will be a capitalistic nation, and we don’t see much of a church there, but even they worship the creator. However, they go about it….differently so to speak.

•I can see them using the creator in marketing. You want to make a food offering to one of their statues? Their food is the best of the best! And the creator deserves only the best, so why not buy them? That sort of thing.

•In Liyue I think they would absolutely make looking like the creator illegal. The nation is full of adepti, it’s too easy to mistaken someone for the creator as a mortal. Even if the people don’t know of the adepti’s presence and think the law is unfair, who are they to go against Ningguan?

•If Morax comes before business, the creator comes before Morax. They’re extremely valued, even if everyone’s reason for worshipping them isn’t pure. To explain, I think in Liyue most people worship the creator in hopes of getting a blessing in turn. This results in rivalry between businesses and worshipers, everyone is trying to outdo each other, but it’s hard to tell who’s doing it for their own benefit or not.

•Those who don’t worship the creator are outcasted as well, but I think they’d also be feared. They survive despite not caring for their almighty creator, who must be doing their best to thwart them. Just how are they making it? It’s unknown, and humans fear the unknown.

Inazuma

•Ah Inazuma, the most beautiful nation (in my opinion), with the worst archon (also my opinion. Ei can go f*ck herself). They are heavy worshippers, and it’s by far the most dangerous nation to be a non-believer in.

•Ei forces her ideals of eternity on everyone, the same applies for worshiping the creator. Every method of worship must be preserved, no matter how outdated.

•The vision hunt decree makes it worse though. Because this is a act to preserve eternity, it’s also used to hunt down any non-believers. Yae Miko is in charge of hunting down non-believers, and you already know she does a damn good job of it.

•Looking like the creator can and will get you killed. The creator’s image must be preserved, and if you go around acting crazy while looking like them, you are tainting that image, therefore destroying the eternity of their image.

•Part of why the resistance has such little support is drawn back to eternity: They believe the resistance goes against the creator’s wishes of Inazuma representing eternity since they’re fighting for visions, and are viewed as godless heathens in a sense. In reality though a lot of the resistance soldiers pray to the creator.

•Inazuma may be divided amongst itself, but they all unite under love for the creator, whether our of fear or genuine love however is unknown.

[lazella]

So, for the infinity stone AU, how about just everyone recounting their adventure and everyone just being baffled on the ridiculous stuff they've been through. Also, technically, Arc V Yu boys did technically pulled a Thanos on the dimension.

We Had To Get Spiderman to Judge This One

Peter loved hanging out at the Avengers Tower nowadays. Ever since Judai and his group showed up, he finally had some other superpower kids his age to talk to. Ned was great and all but there were some topics of the superhero life he couldn’t understand. Judai and the others always lent an ear about the more stressful parts of world saving and in turn shared some of their experiences which led to his question that had been on his mind.

“So what is the craziest thing that happened to you guys?”

Everyone paused whatever they were doing as mulled over this question.

“Are we counting time travel as crazy?” Judai asked.

“If you are asking about the time we dealt with Paradox I think we can file that under normal by now.” Yugi said, “Time travel really isn’t surprising anymore.”

“Never thought I would hear that sentence….” Yusaku muttered.

“If time travel isn’t surprising, what do you consider weird?” Peter asked.

“Well there was that one time a cult obsessed with the color white took over my school by brainwashing people.” Judai nonchalantly said, “And a falling satellite got involved at one point...but I think the kid we found living in the jungle was only slightly more bizarre since we were on an island and could have returned to civilization at any time.”

“How’s a feral kid more crazy than a cult?!” Peter asked in disbelief. 

“It was the third weird student I met that week alone….” Judai shrugged, “Wondered what happened to him when the school got teleported to another dimension?”

“That happened to you too?” Yuya asked.

“First time accidentally, second time on purpose.”

“Why were there two occasions?!” Peter exclaimed. 

“I wonder how Kaiba is going to feel about this when tell him about what happened to his school…..” Yugi wondered.

“Honestly no one knows…” Yusei said, “Our history books really don’t indicate any drastic action on his part...other than investing in better security and moving the campus to the mainland.”

“Nothing like that happened to me…” Yuma stretched in his seat, “Though we did take the Key Ship on a world tour to investigate mysterious ruins. Surprised that school didn’t notice us missing from class…”

“I really could use something like that.” Peter said, “I’m running out of excuses to give my teachers to leave class.”

“I just skipped school….” Yusaku admitted from his corner, “I was ahead of the material anyway and I could always hack the attendance records if numbers got too high.”

“I can’t decide if that is brilliant or irresponsible…..” Yusei muttered, “Then again I never went to school myself and had to teach myself living on the streets.”

“Never thought of you as a street kid.” Yuya said.

“I used to be in a street gang with my friends.”

Yugi choked on his drink, “Sorry...I never would have pictured you as a gangster.”

“In my defense….I wasn’t the one who came up with the idea.” Yusei explained, “My friend Kiryu was the one who put it together as he wanted to make the streets of Satellite safer for younger children.���

“At least you guys had good intentions…” Peter said.

Yusei just quietly sipped his drink as he decided against mentioning the Earthbound Gods.

Peter then turned to Yugi, “Got any stories to share? Because I think the white obsessed cult is winning so far.”

Yugi thought to himself for a very long time. As if he was trying to think of the most child friendly tale to share. Then he spoke…

“There was a time where we had to deal with the remnants of the last city of Atlantis. It turns out that their king was possessed by an ancient force that compelled him to steal souls to revive its god. Its followers carried part of its power in a field spell card that took the loser’s soul at the end of the duel. Not to mention it was rather overpowered for the user game wise. We had to travel to America then ran all over the country trying to track them down. That was all before the giant battle in the sky in the middle of the ocean against a giant serpent. Not to mention that we almost got eaten by osmosis.”

Silence descended over the group.

“Yeah I think he wins this one…” Peter eventually said.

“Somehow that makes interdimensional war sound ordinary….” Yuya shook his head and sighed.

[sgcairo]

Capitano Being The Most Chill and Violent Man I Ever Did See- The Headcanons

Gather round my cult, because it's time for my Capitano headcanons (as per a request from @doxomoxo)! I love this man, and I've been hiding it for too long so here we go!

"Put out the light, and then put out the light: If I quench thee, thou flaming minister, I can again thy former light restore..."

-Overall, doesn't talk much. When he does talk, it's straight to the point, as he hates wasting words on useless topics. When he does have an order to issue, it's short and precise, though he sometimes uses "noble" language because of his upbringing.

-He would definitely carry a greatsword, change my mind. While I see a lot of claymore Capitano, I think he'd be better suited for a greatsword. While a claymore technically is a variant of a greatsword, I think that Capitano would be better suited for the classic two handed greatsword:

-He's actually quite attractive under the mask, despite his scarring. Hunk material for sure. He does have some pretty intense scarring on the right side of his face, but most don't know about it, as he's never been seen without it. He considers these scars as a shameful failure, and will not show them to anyone, as they are proof of his weakness, which he cannot afford. (Either that or he's a littler void but... I'm going to go with the safest option here.)

-He's definitely a knight archetype, not to mention his obsession with honor. To him, combat is sacred, and to have it disgraced is something of a personal offense. He does not lose his temper easily, but forgoing honorable combat will not get you on his good side. In fact, it'll get you more than what you bargained for.

-He's polylingual, from being stationed in a variety of nations. As a major player in the Tsaritsa's military force, he has been deployed dozens of times, to ensure that everything runs smoothly. As a result, he has picked up several languages from around Teyvat, and can speak moderately well in most of them. The only issue is that he keeps forgetting the word for egg in all of them. Which really is an issue, but it's kind of annoying in very particular situations.

-He's tall. Impressively so. I'd definitely put him on the higher end of the six foot range. He towers over the other Harbingers, and knowing that Tartaglia is only 6'1", Capitano just picks him up and puts him down a distance away so he'll stop bothering the Captain about fighting him.

-Would definitely be into classical theatre and plays, especially the Genshin equivalent to Shakespeare. Just because a lot of them have to do with honor and death.

-Exceptional in combat, definitely. Likely the leader of the Tsaritsa's military, not to mention that he has the build for some serious damage- If he takes you down, you're staying down. There's a reason he's so high ranked among the Harbingers, and it's not because he schemed and plotted, no. It's because he's an absolute unit that could cave your trachea with two fingers.

-He's often found alone, but when he does want company, he often goes to Sandrone, as she's quiet and allows him to simply sit in her presence. Nothing romantic or anything, just two Harbingers enjoying a comfortable silence together. Sometimes, he even lends a hand with any bolts that won't unstick, or lifts something heavy for her.

-He's a master of military strategy too, which comes with commanding the Tsaritsa's forces. Often he'll play chess with Pierro, just for the formation aspects and abstract thinking it provides him. He has yet to win, but he's not far from beating Pierro at long last.

-When he cares for something, he's gentle with it. In the past, he's been known to break things that are fragile with his underlying strength, and he doesn't wish to break the things he holds dear. This often includes people, which is while he maintains a physical and emotional distance from others that could match him at an intimate level, not just a professional one.

-I like to think that he can get caught up in battle, sort of like a barbarian's rage. Bloodthirsty, irrational, the whole shebang. He loses himself in battle, covered in blood and acting like a feral animal, his composure thrown to the wayside. Once he comes down from this "high", he's absolutely exhausted, though he never shows it.

There you go, some thoughts on Capitano! I really like him as a character, though there's not much that we know about him so far. I have a feeling he might be one of my favorites in the future.