#but I want to rely on the characters to do that

[trials-of-a-spirit-worker]

I'm not in the field of Psychology yet.

But I do know this: Episodes like this are more often than not an extreme cry for help. Like said above, someone probably is off their meds, someone probably needs meds and maybe did not previously have access to them. Episodes are scary. People like that are out of their fucking mind and they don't want to be. Imagine doing some shit that's out of character, something you don't want to do and you're just watching yourself do it. Imagine being displaced and fucked up, hallucinating and not knowing how to come back to reality.

Cops are willing to shoot people like that without a second thought.

I respect the fuck out of social/case workers who have to go on the line and help that person from practically killing themselves. Cause unlike the overfunded, murder happy pigs people tend to stupidly rely on, these motherfuckers do the work. And continue to do the work, despite the danger they may be in.

Meanwhile, you can google a bunch of those uniformed pigs tackling women and children for the sake of "my life was in danger" when most of the time the "danger" was unarmed or displaced.

The social/case worker is in khakis and a fucking button up more positively impacting lives than any bullshit "good cop" hands a black kid ice cream or whatever bullshit that arises whenever they get shit for hurting someone.

Social/Case workers, Psychologists and people of that ilk are unsung heroes and they can all do it without relying on their gun and a god complex.

FUCKING ACAB because if a FUCKING McDONALD's WORKER CAN DE-ESCALATE SHIT BETTER THAN YOU YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE A FUCKING GUN.

[blazekurumu]

Isn't it funny how we put so much hatred on Marinette Dupain-Cheng?

Season 6 drops and all I see when I open up Instagram is how much people hate Marinette. They hate that she's the main character. They hate that she hides secrets from her boyfriend. They hate that she keeps having to learn the same lesson over and over again.

Almost like they just want to hate her because she has FLAWS!

But it baffles the mind that these same people praise a hero like Peter Parker for doing the exact same things!

Peter has a secret identity that he hides from his family and friends. Peter had to keep the secret that his best friend's father was evil. He made stupid decisions like judging people, stealing stuff, and relying on himself instead of asking for help.

Yet he gets beloved by the Fandom and dragged through the mud by New Yorkers.

Where Marinette gets dragged by the Fandom and beloved by the Parsians.

It's the same formula, different characters. Why does one get constant praise while the other gets thrown under the bus? It's almost as if you lot prefer flawed male teens over flawed female teens.

[hederasgarden]

Do you have any darker thoughts about your fav ATJ characters?

Bestie, I have so many thoughts, and I’m totally blaming @otaku-girl-ao3 for this. A few weeks ago, we spent an afternoon on Discord brainstorming what the ATJ characters would be like as dark versions of themselves and how that would manifest in distinct and interesting ways.

Just a quick note—this is quite a departure from the usual content on my blog and the type of things I typically write about. Recently, I’ve been gathering the courage to explore some darker themes in my writing (I blame BookTok for introducing me to a lot of questionable tropes). Please be kind and let me know if you’d like to see more of this kind of writing from me!

Characters: Sergei Kravinoff (Kraven the Hunter), Friedrich Harding (Nosferatu), Tangerine (Bullet Train), and Ives (Tenet) Rating: Explicit, 18+ only. Dead dove, do not eat. VERY dark, depraved, and horny thoughts direct from me to you. Not all themes are tagged. Read at your own risk.  Please comment or reblog if you enjoyed this and want to see more. Or scream at me in my inbox. That always makes my day.

Aaron Taylor Johnson Character Masterlist

Sergei is a meticulous planner, taking his time to observe you and learn your habits. He likely comes across you by chance—perhaps while on the job or visiting his brother. It’s your scent that first grabs his attention, but it’s not what draws him back. It’s the softness and sweetness in your demeanor, the vulnerability you exude, completely unaware of the dangers around you. You’re the easiest prey he’s ever tracked, unaware even of the most basic threats. You’re always buried in a book or your phone, headphones on at full blast. If it weren’t for his quiet intervention, you would have been robbed or worse on your way home at least twice. 

He takes you because he believes you're not meant to be on your own. You need someone to care for you, to protect you from the world that you don’t fully understand. Really, it’s lucky your paths crossed. He’s certain you’ll come to see things his way in time. Until then, he’s turned his home into a beautiful little cage for you to live in, complete with an entire library filled with your favorite books, cozy blankets to keep you warm, and all the ingredients for the meals you love to cook and enjoy. He’s done his research on what you like and he’ll bring you anything you ask for. Afterall, he’s a provider at heart.

There’s no concern of you running away. You've seen the large snow leopard that prowls around outside, and the one time you made a foolish attempt to escape, Sergei was quick to show you that he wouldn't always be so gentle or understanding. As @writercole suggested, once he has you back, he’ll also end up keeping you tethered by the ankle for a while, a lesson that if you try to run, he’ll leash you.

After you recover from that experience Sergei finds you’re a much better pet, settling into your new life and role. You start cooking for him when he's home, and willingly crawl into bed beside him, seeking out his warmth on those cold winter nights. Soon, Sergei knows you’ll be ready for the next step: starting a family of your own.

Friedrich (in a modern AU) strikes me as the type who would quietly manipulate situations to his advantage, working behind the scenes to ensure things unfold just how he wants. He’d spot you working at a cafe or store he frequently visits and, from that moment, start working on a plan to make you his.

Rather than using overt force, he’d rely on subtle pressure and gaslighting, making you doubt yourself and your choices. He’d skillfully set up circumstances to undermine you—ensuring you miss out on a job you desperately need, getting you fired, or putting you in a position where you have no choice but to turn to him. When you're at your lowest, he’ll swoop in as the savior, the one who appears to protect you. His goal is to make you dependent on him alone, carefully ensuring that when the time comes for him to make his move, you're in no position to resist. Consent would be questionable, but he'd remind you every time you hesitated that you said yes, that you asked for his help, and that you invited him in.

I can also see him isolating you from friends and family, slowly pulling you away from the support system you once had. He’d definitely be the type to love-bomb you, showering you with overwhelming attention and affection, using his money and influence to manipulate you further. 

He strikes me as a baby trapper, sabotaging your birth control or tampering with his condoms to ensure you get pregnant. He believes you'd be the perfect wife and mother—you just need his help to realize that. Once he has you, he’d be the most loving and attentive husband, always caring, but beneath that sweetness lies an unshakable belief that he knows what’s best. He’s the one who makes the decisions, subtly guiding everything with quiet confidence until, over time, the balance shifts in his favor and you start looking to him for help with even the easiest things. Despite all of this, Friedrich would likely still view himself as a good person, firmly rejecting any notion that he is abusive or in the wrong.

Tangerine is on the opposite end of the spectrum, much more inclined to use brute force and physical violence to make you understand your place. He has a short temper and struggles with impulse control, especially when you don't follow his demands. There’s no slow build-up with him—he has no time or patience for romance. The moment he sees you on the street, he decides you’re coming home with him, and that’s final. Or maybe Tangerine and Lemon are sent to kill your husband but when Tangerine sees just how sweet you are, completely unaware of who and what your husband really is, he decides to keep you for himself. After all, no one's going to miss you. They’ll assume you died in the house fire with your husband. 

Once he had you he would try and spoil you with a beautiful place to live, fine clothes and decadent food. He’d want you to look and dress a certain way for him. A darker version of him would fit the profile of a classic abuser—lashing out at you in anger, only to later show up with flowers and a hollow apology, turning the blame onto you as if you were the one who provoked it.

“Why do you have to make things so fuckin’ hard, huh?” Tangerine questions, caressing your bruised skin. “I hate when you make me do this to ya luv. You need to listen better.”

He’d definitely be the most terrifying of all the dark versions of the ATJ characters because of his unpredictability. (I do not know why but I have such a strong sense he’d pop you in the mouth/back hand you with those rings on and just….yeah.)

If Ives were to go dark, he’d likely abuse his power and authority in the workplace, targeting someone beneath him—someone who wasn’t military and who he could easily manipulate using his strength and knowledge. Maybe you’re his admin, someone he works closely with, and no one questions the fact that you’re often in his office with the door closed or staying late to finish tasks together. He’d be blunt about his intentions with you, setting clear expectations for how things would unfold. His actions would be predictable—if you were a good girl, you’d be rewarded; if you misbehaved, there would be consequences. Ives would be a steady, unyielding force, confident that, with time, you’d fall into line.

[sweatersexual]

I just saw somebody claim that Lirin couldn't feed his family due to his ideals so I'm bringing this post back

Also, running a "pay what you can" medical service isn't some pie-in-the-sky utopian fantasy. That's how a lot of community-based resources function. I think it's really easy to forget this in our modern society where a lot of us are so alienated from our neighbors, but in a small town like Hearthstone where everybody knows everybody, there's more accountability when it comes to community resources. People who try to freeload face social consequences much more easily than they would as an anonymized population in a city. Nobody wants to be the guy who ruined the good thing for everyone when everyone knows you and where you live

So you're going to do your part to make sure your town's only doctor can continue to treat people for free. Even if you have to start doing it under the table. Which is exactly what the people of Hearthstone did, and even then, Lirin and his family's standard of living didn't drop by too much. It was stressful but still tenable

That's also why Lirin knew revealing the faces of the men who came to rob him would work. He de-anonymized them and reinforced their sense of accountability. Those principles are what kept his family fed and his clinic operational for years on end. It was not such a huge gamble for Lirin to de-escalate a violent situation that way too

I think it's wild that people seem to think of Lirin as living in some ethics professor's ivory tower when his idealogy is very much grounded in the world of the brutal society he lives in. A lot of people have pointed out that Lirin was learning/practicing medicine during the reunification of Alethkar. He knew he was living under a tyrant. Gavilar was at the height of his power and knew how to maintain control. Violent rebellions get brutally put down under those conditions - we know what happened to Rathalas. Lirin has deeply held convictions about nonviolence, but his pacifism is also pragmatic. Lirin's resistance is rooted in empowering his community, that's why he refuses to leave them behind

Real life resistance doesn't look like Katniss Everdeen taking down bad guys with her bow and arrow (there's a reason Suzanne Collins goes out of her way to emphasize that Katniss is a symbol, not an organizer). Real life resistance starts with meeting people's needs and reducing their dependence on the corrupt system. That's what Lirin does. He doesn't rely on magic powers to save the day because for almost his entire life the remnants of his world's magic system were controlled by his oppressors. His ideals were not formed in a classroom, they were formed while he was doing real, unglamorous resistance work in the middle of a war

Tl;dr Lirin is an organizer who knows how to not only meet his own family's needs but his community's as well. He is a pacifist because he is deeply in touch with his lived reality. It's not his fault he doesn't know he's a side character in an epic fantasy

If you give lirin shit for staying in hearthstone you're wrong. It is made VERY clear in the text that while his family was under financial strain under Roshone, they were NOT starving. They weren't eating GREAT food but they were eating. They didn't go without any major necessities. And they could afford medical supplies on top of it. Also it's wild that people assume they could afford to move if they couldn't afford to eat. And Lirin says they could afford to move

Not going to downplay that financial stress is bad for a kid's home life but at the same time, you can tell that Lirin and Hesina were shielding Kaladin and Tien from most of it, which is what good parents do when they've fallen on hard times

And yeah, it would be a dick move to deprive an entire town of their ONLY medical professionals just because of a grudge. Do the lirin haters know what community building is and that you're not going to always get along with the people you're in community with. At the end of the day they were practicing mutual aid and I hope the lirin haters remember that the next time they call him a liberal centrist or whatever

[utilitycaster]

After the fireside chat, its true what you said. Matt is TERRIBLE at anticipating what his players are going to do. I wonder if this is why c3 felt like both a railroad (as he held firm to his plot) and also aimless (as he did not expect bells hells to be so incurious, anti theist, and the lack of general care for the world. I know obe example is he didnt realise Laura would try to save Imogen's mom.

what gets me is that like...it feels he expected the players to keep doing something that was consistently not rewarded. Like it's true that this was an incurious and stupid party...but the fact that they DID want to do research early on which was genuinely revealing and then they got sent to Bassuras, got lore-dumped on extensively, lost contact or access to every NPC with a decent INT score, and kept relying on their initial tie to Keyleth is like. I'm not surprised they didn't research how to approach Predathos or defeat it when the vibe was "all this information was stolen, hidden, or destroyed"! Like I think the characters' antipathy towards the gods and those who follow them remains nonsensical, especially in an ending that leaves the gods intact, but at some point you have to pick up on like. no they are not going to go to the accord and ask for access to The Forbidden Texts, or dive into Luxon lore, because why would they, when Ryn got paralyzed and their Jrusar contacts were killed and they had to flee Yios immediately after learning things and there's a ticking time bomb in the Feywild you just dropped on them? On some level it's like no wonder these characters don't give a shit about the world; it keeps getting whisked by them too quickly for them to develop any care for it let alone learn about it.

[bunni-v1]

Pls the thing with Jamil from your Yuu being wary of scarabia post and why he kept Yuu around like that. Elaborate I’m begging you it’s too interesting of a dynamic before and after. I can pay you in my adoration keep it up here!

🍓Okay so I really haven't touched twst in a long time, but this idea continues to haunt me. I think about it so frequently, and I've been into twst again because of Malleus statue, so I decided to revisit this concept. It's more of a big long ramble, but I do hope you like it <3

TW: Manipulation; Creepy behavior; Power imbalance; This IS written with implied romance (but it's pretty fucked up and toxic); Possessive behaviors; unedited

Info: Jamil x Reader; Angst

Disclaimer: Jamil is an incredibly complex character with very contradictory actions throughout the whole of book four. This is my take on his character, and it may not align with how you view him. It's important to note that the only canon interpretation of his character is what is in-game and official depictions.

Post referenced

Jamil is very aware of you far before you're aware of him. He makes it his job to know who to avoid, and you're very high up on that list. You have a reputation that he's pretty certain you're not fully aware of, and trouble seems to follow you wherever you go. It's not really something he wants to have to deal with.

For whatever reason, though, he does end up bringing you back to Scarabia. In part, this is almost a power play on his part. You make him have a sense of power he doesn't really have with anyone else around NRC, even as vice housewarden. You rely on him, and your naivety is something addicting to someone who craves power. Not to mention he also considers that you could help him sell his story much better.

Kalim abusing the magicless, helpless human from another world would only make his case for upheaval all the better amongst his dorm members. So to start it's all part of his plan, a means of stroking his ego.

However, the issue comes in when he makes a genuine connection with you. You are kind, generous, and understanding with no real ulterior motives -- a genuineness he hasn't really experienced before. Of course, he doesn't actually open up to you much. He keeps you pretty distant, despite how he does his best to play up that warm and welcoming persona. But he does give you crumbs of his real struggle, shrouded in manipulation.

He finds himself... attached. Jealous of any time you spend with Kalim, wanting to keep your attention on him, and desperate to sell the idea of Kalim as a monster to you more than others. It's an odd feeling for Jamil, who doesn't usually care for more than surface-level appearances and feelings. It's just another addition to his ultimate overblot, and he's quite terrifying when he does finally blot.

One of the very first things he does is isolate you from your "friends" (if you can count the tweels and Azul as friends at this point), making sure your attention is on him. He wants you to worship him, he wants that reliance that he craved so much in the time you spent together, he wants to feel powerful. Next to you, he feels so very powerful.

I don't even believe he would do anything violent or too cruel, mostly just worshiping and demanding attention and praise. It's not much different from what you normally go through, though a little less blatantly violent and aggressive. That's what makes it so awful to you, though.

Before everyone else was just blatantly being... evil. Jamil manipulated, lied, extorted, and so much more. You liked Jamil, you genuinely thought he wanted to be friends with you and meant well. He reveals otherwise in your time (sort of) alone with him, and it really shakes you up. It would shake anyone up.

What's worse is you don't have time to process all that terror and anger and betrayal. Everything happens in such quick succession, one moment you're being kidnapped and the next there's a grand celebration. It's all too much for your brain to process, and it only gets the chance to do so when Ace and Deuce -- your safe space -- come to get you.

Your reaction, on the surface, seems incredibly dramatic. Collapsing and sobbing until your throat is so raw you can't make noise, but after the trauma you've endured, it's wholly reasonable. Jamil falls into the former way of thinking, believing you're just being overdramatic and theatrical. You'd been through many overblots at this point, with much more powerful sorcerers... this reaction is a bit much...

After all's said and done, though, Jamil doesn't spare you much thought. Of course, there is a lingering sense of... something. Not quite guilt, not quite regret, just an ache that he doesn't have the time or energy to address himself. He's far too busy dealing with his own reputation and wellbeing to bother you.

Your sobs, though, they keep him up at night. He has dreams where he hears them tear through the silence, and they continue to ring in his ears long after he's woken up. He isn't sure why it's bothering him so much, it really shouldn't, but it does. It's a constant nag at his conscience, just a bug that he swats away when he doesn't want to think about it.

He doesn't have to confront it until he comes face to face with you during VDC auditions. The genuine terror on your face when he looks at you, like he might overblot then and there again, it's sobering. He'd seen that look a million times on his parents faces, horror as they face punishment from the Asim's. It's not a face he'd imagined he would be the cause of -- not a face he wanted to be the cause of.

It hits him hard in that moment just how... evil he was. He knew he was bad. He's fully aware he's selfish and the stunt he pulled was something unspeakable in a lot of ways. Yet, he never thought he would have to deal with someone looking at him like that, someone thinking of him the same way he thinks of his captors.

It's just his luck that he can't avoid you, ending up on the official VDC team and literally living in your space. It's not just you, either, both Ace and Deuce seem to hate his guts with a passion. Grim voices that anger all the time, and Kalim doesn't help the tension with his guilty puppy demeanor. You do end up forgiving Kalim, thanks to Kalim finally making an active effort by himself for once. Jamil won't lie and say it doesn't make him a little jealous, but he also fully understands he doesn't deserve your forgiveness.

He doesn't push or pull, he just allows you to do what you will. It's not his place to push or pull, you are the only person who can decide what you need. He won't apologize unless you seem to want him to by seeking him out, he won't ask for forgiveness unless you seem willing to give it to him. He just allows you to be, which is quite honestly the best reaction you've gotten from any former overblotees.

He, of course, ends up confessing this all to his sister. Heavily edited and censored, for her own wellbeing. Najma tells him he's a moron, but encourages him to make amends with you, or at least try to let you know he's sorry. Without him knowing, she even talks to you about it a bit when you visit the Scalding Sands. There is a notable shift in your comfortability around him after it, though he doesn't know why this is.

He does eventually get the chance to talk to you, though you have to approach him. It's a quiet night when it happens, and he just couldn't sleep and the warm air in the dorm was making his skin far too hot, so he takes a walk and ends up outside of your dorm. His guilt led him there like an idiot, a rare show of vulnerability.

You, who also couldn't sleep, saw him out there and invited him despite better judgment. He accepts, despite his own better judgment, and finally, you talk. He expects anger and hatred, but of course, you cannot manage that even against him. You are understanding and gentle, even with the way you tremble as you speak. He gets to apologize, genuinely, for scaring you and doing the things he did. Explains that he, at some point, was genuine about his friendliness with you. That he did like having you around, but all of that means nothing with what's already happened.

Whether or not you two fix things and are able to be friends is up to you, but you do both get closure.

[lesbianherald]

No because they’re both going through corruption arcs!!!!!! I think all the time about how S1 arc 1 Jayce and Viktor are the comic relief characters - their scenes are always a source of hope and levity when everyone else is going through the horrors of impending war and how intentional it is for when they eventually fracture. The story is literally set up so that you fall in love with these characters and then watch them lose themselves.

This is a really interesting way to look at it! I hesitate to call Viktor's a corruption arc in the traditional sense of the word because so many of the choices he makes I think are so rooted in this base desire to survive.

ok more below sorry for yapping so much today

To survive in piltover first and then just to survive in general. I think part of Viktor's arc is so interesting because he's not necessarily making all the right or safe decisions, but he's making decisions I think most people could see themselves making in his shoes.

His fatal flaw i think is his inability to see himself as someone who has support. He thinks he has to shoulder this alone. Shoutout singed! His mentor essentially signs off on his death. The bridge scene happens which makes him feel like he can't rely on Jayce. Sky is present, but he completely doesn't recognize (or want) her affection for him or her ability to help in a way that's so extreme it results in her death. Piltover doesn't give a shit about him. (Every scene in the council room with Viktor, and the scene with mel, jayce, and the weapons conversation are so important in illustrating this)

I also think his desperation to live + a bit of his internalized ableism play a huge role in Viktor's arc as we find him going back to the hexcore before having any shimmer that would guarantee his survival. He's 1000% responsible for his own actions but his own actions are so based in his lack of power in so many ways so its hard to view him and Jayce's arcs as the same type of corruption at least.

I see a really interesting thread between Viktor's arc being tied to isolation and Jayce's arc being tied to being surrounded by the wrong people (!!piltovian high society in general!!). Viktor's arc being what happens when you feel you have nobody and Jayce's arc being what happens when you have a lot of people and feel you have to please everybody.

I also see Jayce's arc as one of what happens when power you don't want gets handed to you and Viktors as what happens when no matter what you do you can never obtain the power you need. It puts them at really interesting odds.

[spread-the-influence]

i'm sorry this has been my roman empire SINCE i entered the fandom i have to get even more into detail . please forgive me for another essay

i don't want to bash on people's interpretations of ragatha because at the end of the day we will only truly know her once the other 5 episodes of tadc release .

so , i am Not going to list stuff i don't like . INSTEAD i'm just going to go into what i think is often missing when it comes to ragatha because my problem with fanon content of her is that she doesn't Feel like Ragatha enough . she often times feel more like a predisposed caretaker character that will have whispers of ragatha's flaws but none of , like , The Character if you get what i'm saying .

SILLINESS - this is the one that sticks out the most to me because it's Very obvious when there's not enough silliness in a ragatha . again , she's emotionally immature , which is apparent in her dialogue and gestures . maybe it's the psychology nerd in me but i Never really got mom vibes from her , i always saw everything she does as an epitome of anxious attachment i ammm not against putting her in a mom-child dynamic , i am not against the concept of mom ragatha and i have seen a fic that executed that well . it's just that when i see it pulled off , it's often ignoring that she puts one million emotional walls between herself and everybody - and it also ignores that there have been many implications where she's Not as helpful as she seems . this also often leads to infantilizing pomni and i Do not like that as well

insincerity - this is something that makes me go INSANE when i see it represented . i need to see this girl be dishonest , or Lie . i think it's so fascinating how much she hides her feelings to keep others from not liking her . i also think this is one thing i always find missing whenever i see other people's ragathas . there's just not enough of that insincerity . i'm not saying you should make her Lie all the time i'm saying that ragatha puts up a mask and is constantly thinking about what'll make the other person not hate her . she's just not a genuine person , which doesn't really help you on forming deep and personal relationships .

instability - ragatha does Not have her shit together i'm sorry . she wants people to like her to the point it's unhealthy and she has a grasp on her happy mask tighter than gangle's . this woman is a cocktail of internal issues . her self-esteem is Six Foot Underground . i have joked that she would do drugs if given the chance and guess what this bitch is at high risk of developing an addiction — now she's not like completely dysfunctional . but something to note is that her coping mechanisms are : Suppress Everything That Makes You Feel Bad , Ignore Your Pain , and Rely On Other People's Approval . we still don't know exactly Why she does those other than ' to not abstract ' , believe it or not they're still up for interpretation right now but yeah those are the stuff she does .

Does this make anyone else think of how the fandom treats Ragatha?

ehh i feel like the fandom has done a good job of acknowledging her flaws and how she's a people pleaser . if there's a problem i have with the general characterization of ragatha really , it's that there's just so little ... ragathaness in it ??

to put it into words , i feel like not a lot of people grasp that ragatha , at her core , is Emotionally Immature . she doesn't really act like her age . and i'm not saying that turning 30 means you have it all together and all of your problems disappear , it's more like that if we Ignored pomni and ragatha's appearances and compared their actions together , people would've thought that ragatha was Younger than her .

and this is intentional to show the contrast between them . pomni , whenever she's having The Conversation™ , tries to understand and offer suggestions . ragatha , i'm sure she does lend a listening ear but i do not trust ragatha " Toxic Positivity Incarnate " tadc to give advice that isn't as surface level as ' just don't worry about it ! ' or ' keep smiling ! ' , which is already kind of implied through gangle's dialogue

it just puts me off in a lot of fanon content . like i would read a fic and then i had to put it down because i'm like No ragatha knows too much about what she's doing She Literally Never Does that's her point please a ragatha is not complete without some element of anxiety , insincerity , and silliness i have the ragatha recipe right here

[sucker4beam]

Denji's character development.

A little analysis/my take on how Denji is progressing.

So, i know alot of people are annoyed at Denji for not developing and falling back into his old habits, so I wanna discuss this and how I view it.

Denji has primary motivations, those being a happy life, loved ones, and sex. In recent chapters, including the newest one, we see Denji grapple with his priorities of choosing between his loved ones and sex. I feel part of this is the fact he IS a teenage devil. As much as he is human, he is also a devil.

When he loses his newfound family, that being Nayuta and the animals, he also loses his home as well. This would be the fourth time in his life this has happened (his parents, Pochita, Aki and Power, Nayuta and his pets). Denji is at a point where he feels he has no reason to continue living, and wants to attempt enjoying whatever he can before he dies.

In chapter 193, Denji is presented and incredibly familiar idea. Kill the death devil and have sex with Yoru, or fail and be turned into a weapon by Yoru. This is incredibly similar to Makima's offer with killing the gun devil. So why does Denji fold and take this offer?

Part 2 has shown Denji's struggles with grief and trauma, which we have to remember, all happened just a few months prior. He has not had the time to grow and move on from it, and he has no figures to guide him either. Denji is the only person he can rely on. So, after losing everything most important to him, he is ready to accept whatever comes his way.

Denji takes up Yoru's offer because he does not care one way or another. He has accepted that she wants to kill him, and has accepted that he could possibly live while achieving one of his last remaining goals.

Denji doesn't mind either outcome because what he truly needs is a close connection with others. He has almost no connections with others at this point, and none of the ones he currently has are nearly on par with what he had with his prior loved ones. He doesn't care if he lives or dies, as long as he has fun, because he feels like his life had no importance without a deep connection with someone else.

He lacks priority with Nayuta because, while he loves her, she cannot fill the hole inside him left by those he loved at Public Safety. He prioritizes Power over his trip with Makima because at that time, this hole was incredibly minimum.

That is why he continues to fumble and aim for sex, because he feels he has nobody. He is chasing something to fill the pit inside him, which will inevitably fail to do so.

So yes, while it is frustrating to watch Denji make these choices, we have to remember what he is and where he comes from.

[ewingstan]

Hrm. I'm aware that there's a common narrative that Ward suffered from wb steering the text to directly respond to people who gave Amy too much credit. I've already given my thoughts on the way Amy's character has been handled so far—I certainly understand how people would see Amy's increasing propensity to give weak excuses to her actions and read them as wb strawmanning their own reactions to the text. Strictly speaking though, it didn't have to be read that way— its possible, for instance, that Amy's development was driven by wb really wanting Breakthrough's struggles with becoming better people to be contrasted against a villain who's too prone to abdicate responsibility to grow. I have my misgivings about that as a theme, but it is in line with the broader focus of the text, and doesn't rely on an assumption that wb is writing her that way to pwn commenters.

Eric though. Eric really does just seem inexplicable unless you read him as wildbow getting frustrated at certain parts of his fanbase and wanting to dress them down. At least when Amy gave weak justifications for herself, it was for herself—there's a legible reason why she'd do it in the first place. And as I said, it served a thematic purpose of contrasting Breakthrough's attempts to get better by taking responsibility for their actions with Amy spiraling from a refusal to do the same. What similar thematic purpose is Eric showing? What purpose is he serving at all, outside of claiming that people who "defend" Amy are the type of people who don't face real hardship and stare at women's boobs?

The type of defense here is important to note, because the main thing he does is push back against Victoria reading everything Amy does in the worst possible light. This is behavior that makes sense in a comment section when you're trying to detangle your own feelings about a character from a narrator who has a justifiably hostile perspective towards her. It's not the behavior of someone responding to a current crisis event. And it's not the behavior of someone talking to Victoria rather than other readers, considering how obvious Vicky makes it that there's history between her and Amy. Yes, the oddity of that reaction is to some degree intentional, in that its supposed to make Victoria feel increasingly alienated from those around her—but Eric also seems to be getting posed as a synecdoche for non-capes in general here, a representative of a common type of thinking, rather than a wackadoodle who choose a very bad time to defend a stranger's intentions.

On that point. I don't think that wildbow is fully uncritical of Victoria's tendency to fully dehumanize some of her more heinous enemies, or her tendency to see the unpowered masses she's nominally acting in service of as just not understanding the Great Sacrifices™ and Tough Choices™ of their protectors. Ward has flirted with those attitudes in the past, but there's usually enough tension in the framing to suggest it's not fully the intended takeaway. And I don't want to overstate my case, because even here the framing pushes against some of what Victoria takes away from Eric—its made clear that Victoria's in a particularly ugly state of mind right now. The characterization of Larue right afterwards pushes back somewhat against her attitude towards non-capes, and the conversation with Jessica made the idea of seeing Amy's perspective on an issue, and the idea of denying a villain's full responsibility for their actions, seem less ridiculous on its face. Reading Eric's inclusion in the best possible light, I'd see him as the text introducing certain ideas in an unflattering light in order to make Jessica's later reaffirmation of the theme that everyone can act horribly in the right circumstances hit that much harder.

But Eric really feels like who'd you write when you wanted to complain about the bleeding hearts. His presentation is much more what I'd expect from a jingoistic action flick, the most unflattering caricature of someone who wants basic limitations on the actions of cops and soldier. Very "decadent ivory tower cultural relativist who wants you to consider the drug lord/terrorist/rapist degenerate's point of view," who's putting obstacles in the way of the action hero's righteous and necessary cleansing crusade against the subhuman hoards. Why the fuck is a character made to support the worldview of Dirty Harry or the fucking Turner Diaries in a wildbow novel?

[10yrratiolover]

I feel like I missed something that everyone else sees. Why do so many people seem to believe [or hope] that Dr. Ratio is from Amphoreus? Like, aside from the greco-roman inspirations I really don't see any other connection, and I just don't think it'd make sense timeline wise if you go off of his character stories. And, in the case of his character stories lying to us or being purposefully misleading [plus all the hoops to jump through to justify it], it feels like that would be extremely cumbersome and unsatisfying from a writing standpoint, so why would you even want that?

If I were to be completely crystal clear, I want Ratio content in Amphoreus (just at all, he doesn't even have to be here) it's because I just really want new actual Ratio content. We haven't seen him since Penacony, unless you count miscellaneous events, but it's almost like Hoyo only half-forgets he exists, if that makes sense.

I also just think it would be pretty interesting if he was, mostly since I'm curious as to how that would be handled in-game. I have my own theories but those are just my thoughts at the end of the day.

I couldn't speak on deeper possible connections as I haven't finished the main quest yet, but details like bathing being extremely important in Okhema culture, and that one enemy having the exact pose as one of Ratios statues, and also most enemies having his same colour pallet. These could obviously just be coincidences since they seem so miniscule, but a lot of people chose to believe they're implications or ties of sorts.

The quests he's been in have mostly been showing a response to some sort of crisis (Ifrit in the Station, Penacony albeit loosely), I personally enjoy trying to understand his motivations and why he's doing whatever he's doing. (Ex. He wasn't just lying to lie during the Station quest, he was showing people that they couldn't rely on the Geniuses during times of crisis and had to help themselves.)

Assuming that that pattern follows, I'd be interested to see what sort of issues are arising in Amphoreus as I assume we aren't done on the planet just yet, so, there's bound to be more conflict that needs settling.

[tae-rambles]

@allthatmay oh no, i don't think you were suggesting he's docile, i was mostly reacting to one of the hashtags the person i reblogged the post from wrote - that there are times Shanks should have acted instead of waiting around - which i disagree with bcs i can't think of an instance that was shown where that would apply. the only thing that comes to mind is his "inaction" towards Ace. but i already explained why he couldn't do more during the War of the Best, and we don't know if he knew/figured out that Ace was Roger's son when Ace came to thank him for saving Luffy. and even if he knew, would Ace, who hated Roger with a passion and rejected him as his father, be even willing to listen or let Shanks help him not because of who he is as a person but because Roger's blood flows in his veins? i don't think so. it's funny how the fandom keeps putting way too much importance on Ace being Roger's son and how the characters should treat him as such when the story keeps explicitly telling us that's the wrong thing to do and the only characters that care about that are the WG and Marines, i.e. the villains.

(oh yeah, ppl criticize Shanks for not doing enough to save Ace. they wanted him to be in two places at once while disregarding his position and impulsively jump into a conflict that didn't involve him and thus endanger the countless lives of all that depend on him (like Whitebeard and Luffy did) and jump into the fray guns blazing. it's very much the same thing they expect Dragon to do. all those characters are doing the best they can with the resources they've got within the borders of their ideals. everyone has a part to play that fits them in the revolution and all they can do is believe the others will play theirs. just like Luffy has to rely on others to defeat the henchmen so he can focus on the big bad. it's unreasonable to expect anything more.)

So, today my husband said, "Some people think Shanks is a radial leftist, but I think he's the most centrist character in the show. Dragon fills the role of the radial leftist/anarchist that people often attribute to Shanks."

And, huh, yeah. People do often talk about Shanks like he's an anarchist, but he's really not. I've always said that Shanks is a mediator, keeping a tentative peace between the pirate tribes and the government until the time comes wherein the One Piece can be claimed and the mysterious consequences can happen, but that means he is effectively playing the part of a centrist—straddling the fence, as it were. The key difference, I think, is that Shanks knows for certain that change is coming in the form of a rubber deity, and he is trying to guide it into place. All his work is done behind the scenes with very little violence if he can help it.

Now, it's easy to assume that Shanks' plans involve the complete dissolution of the government as it presently stands; that he is simply using his power & influence to mitigate harm for the many until the "real fight" can begin (and, with him having recently decided to chase the One Piece, now it has), but that might not be the case (and, even if it is the case, a lot of centrists use "mitigating harm for the many" as a reason not to take action against some truly heinous acts). The reality may be that Shanks doesn't see the need for the total collapse of the government, or perhaps he knows something about it that we don't (i.e. because he might be of Celestial Dragon blood). I don't really believe this is the case because, as far as I'm aware, Shanks hasn't ever shown any real support for the World Gov but he has shown, time and time again, that he believes in dreams, in people's personal willpower, and in the ability of anyone to become strong and change the future. But the truth is that we can't know his intentions for certain without Oda giving us more information, so my husband's assertion that Shanks is a centrist makes some sense.

In particular, Luffy is what makes this theory interesting: slap him in between Dragon and Shanks, and there's a very real dichotomy between the two "fathers" in his life. See, Luffy idolises Shanks and thinks of him similarly to a father, but he might realise as time goes on that he can't be like Shanks; he might realise that Shanks' ideals will only carry him so far. After all, what good is it to be a pacifistic when your enemy is a powerful government that is comfortable with mass murder?

(My rebuttal is that Luffy is the only one who can be like Shanks. He is effectively Shanks' dream: Shanks wants to be strong enough to do all the work himself, to suffer all the pain himself, and while he is one of the strongest men in the world, he simply can't do that; what he can do is only achievable through the support he has at his side. Meanwhile, Luffy has close support in his crew, and he has the Gum-Gum Fruit! He can literally become a godlike figure and shape the world around him! He can do everything that Shanks wants and needs and, as sure as I am that Shanks wishes he could have done it himself—I'm thinking back to his days with Roger here—he knows that it was never meant to be him.)

This is where Dragon comes in. Dragon, in direct contrast to Shanks, uses violence as a tool whenever he can. He's all about the greater good, for lack of a better term. His thinking is along the lines of, "People are suffering now and we can help, and we have no qualms in forcibly dismantling a government that uses slavery, genocide, and imprisonment to control its populace. We don't wait for the right time to act, we simply act." Do I think Shanks would approve of Dragon's goals? Yes. Do I think he would approve of Dragon's means in achieving those goals? No, but mostly because Shanks is very self-sacrificial and tries to take whatever suffering is necessary for change onto himself, relying only on his small, personal crew, whereas Dragon is happy to let other people martyr themselves for the rebel cause. He lets a small, amnesiac child join them, for crying out loud—something Shanks would never do, not even if the child proved very capable.

If anything is to come from this difference of ideals, I think it's that Luffy will learn from both of them and find his own way to the One Piece and into the world waiting beyond. Why? Well, because Luffy is all about freedom, and no one on the side of Dragon or Shanks is truly free. As for the world itself, it's hard to predict what will happen after Luffy's done with it because it's pretty dependent on Oda's philosophy. For instance, Oda seems to approve of monarchies, which is not something I would personally imagine remaining in a world without a governing body—but, hey, what do I know?

Of course, we all know that the true centrist in the show is undeniably Garp. He will let real, undeniable harm befall those he cares about in order to maintain the status quo, or to stop the government from toppling because [gasp] that would be the worst thing ever! He's a man who believes the government is essential and joins up in order to change it from the inside, only to fall short of his own expectations because he won't stand up when it matters most. Not even for the sake of his beloved grandson.

[jo-harrington]

Luminous Beings - Episode 1: A Long Time Ago...

Art by @monologichno || Beta Read by @undead-supernova Part of the @eddiemunsonbigbang

Summary: Eddie Moonsun learned early that if he wanted to be saved, he was going to have to do it himself. The galaxy, the force, fate...they promised nothing but the dirt beneath his feet, and he only ever dreamed of the sky. But they also promised chaos, and chaos is exactly what he got one day, sitting in a cantina on Nar Shaddaa. Chaos in the form of a Star Tours flight attendant who would change his life forever.

Word Count: 3.9k

Pairing: Eddie Munson x OFC (Thalia Trieste)

Warnings/Themes: Star Wars AU, Action, Meet Cute, Fluff, Romance, Mention of Alcohol and Substance Use, Minor Canon Inaccuracies/Adaptation, Politics, Miscommunication

Note: This idea has been a long time coming, mixing two of the fandoms that I adore so much. Star Wars has been a part of my life since I was really young, it was the reason I studied costume design. It only felt right to drop my current Borbo LOML into it. Thanks to everyone who heard me ramble on about the vestiges of this idea for the past, idk, 2+ years, thanks to the Eddie Munson Big Bang for giving me the opportunity and motivation to write it, thanks to @undead-supernova for not only being my beta but for being someone who is barebones in SW knowledge so I can really test how accessible this story is, and thanks to my excellent Big Bang Partner @monologichno for being absolutely on board with my madness and my Original Character.

Although this story has a romantic pairing listed, this is truly Eddie's story and his chance to live the epic adventure he always dreamed.

Luminous Beings Masterlist - Jo-Harrington's Masterlist

Please do not interact if you are not 18+.

Thank you for reading. Enjoy!

Coruscant, 14BBY

This was everything he ever wanted.

And some things he only ever let himself dream of.

Eddie stared upwards at the towering skyscrapers. He let the lights twinkle in his eyes, absorbed all the sounds and smells, and tried not to smile.

This was it.

The moment it all changed.

He was just a small town boy and suddenly he was stepping into a brave new world, a big city with his friends, away from everything he'd ever known.

Away from his only family, his uncle Wane.

It was terrifying but he knew his uncle was proud of him.

Proud that he was gonna make something of himself, more than his father did or, truly, anyone else in the family. Proud that he waited and finished school first. Proud that he let his friends finish school too before springing them from their sad little destinies of putzing about their close-minded community.

Well, maybe not proud of that last one exactly. More relieved that Eddie wouldn't be out in the universe alone and that all of the boys would have each other.

Eddie was a little relieved about that too, to be honest. Jeff, G'areth, and Dayv had been his backbone for years. While other friends moved on, got themselves out and didn't look back, they made sure he knew that they were in it together.

Still, he would miss Wane. Hell, they'd miss each other, more than either of them could ever admit aloud. It’d been years since they had anyone more than each other to rely on.

Wane knew Eddie had a bigger destiny on the horizon and getting out was the first step and the hardest one.

But here he was.

Backpack slung over his shoulder, guitar safely packed away for the big move, lucky vest thrown over comfortable travel clothes.

Out of the pit he called home for the past 20 years. Free to be himself. Finally.

There was a crash behind him and he turned on his heel, idealistic daydreams forgotten, to find his friends standing over a fallen pile of boxes.

“Careful with those!” Eddie hollered and winced as another box crashed onto the durasteel floor of the landing platform.

"Kriff, I'm pretty sure it was part of my drum kit," G'areth ran a hand through his hair and heaved a long sigh.

"We're never gonna pass the cargo inspection if we don't have our shit together," Dayv panicked.

"Here we go," Jeff rolled his eyes as Dayv started heaving and whining about Empire this and trooper that. Eddie waved a dismissive hand and motioned for his friend to start restacking their belongings.

"Listen, hey, listen," Eddie grabbed Dayv by the shoulders to look him in the eye. "Breathe. When the inspector gets here, everything's gonna be ok. We're just a couple of guys coming to Coruscant to play a few gigs at some cantinas, trying our luck to make it big. And if it works out, maybe we'll stay. How many others have tried that before? Huh?"

"Tried and failed."

"You get it," he squeezed Dayv's shoulders and shot him a calm smile. "Bunch of dumb scrapper kids? We're not gonna make it far. In a month, we'll either be slinging Bantha Hash at a diner or fixing shuttle thrusters in some shop in CoCo town."

"I think I'm just nervous, Ed."

"It's alright. I'm nervous too. But what's the worst that could happen? We're not hauling anything illegal." Not yet.

"What if they just send us back?"

"Then at least we made it this far." He clapped a hand on his back.

If Eddie was a betting man, he'd put all of his money that they'd make it even further.

And he'd win.

The inspection went without a hitch, although all three of Eddie's friends nearly shit themselves at the sight of two stormtroopers in the speeder along with the imperial inspection officer. Which meant he did most of the talking.

He did pretty well, if he said so himself. Remained calm, had all of his paperwork in order, made sure to mention his father's old sabacc buddy—Lip Tonrick, a name that he always mixed up—as a contact.

He even got the inspection officer to laugh at a joke about their ship, a clunky old retrofitted defender-class corvette that he affectionately called the Dragonborn, thanks to its scaly red exterior.

Before they knew it, the inspector was off to the next landing platform, and they were in the clear.

Eddie turned to his friends with his arms out triumphantly.

"We're gonna do big things, boys!" he cheered amidst their whooping and hollering. "We're gonna make a name for ourselves."

He was gonna make a name for himself.

Eddie Moonsun. The best smuggler in the galaxy.

Nar Shaddaa, 10BBY

The crew of the Dragonborn walked into the Surly Sarlacc like they did about this time every few months: absolutely exhausted.

But that didn't stop the handful of regulars who recognized them to cheer at their arrival.

They parted ways to talk to familiar faces and get drinks at the bar, then returned to their usual table until it was time for their performance.

It wasn't the nicest cantina on Nar Shaddaa—located in the Red Light sector of the Under City, it had its own set of issues—but being away from the watchful eye of both the Empire and the Hutt Cartel up in the Corellian District meant that you could get away with more.

You couldn't even stop for a slice of pie at the Meltdown Cafe without getting stopped by some sleemo asking questions.

Eddie always preferred the seedier parts of planets though. You could talk to more people, hear interesting stories, and get better paying jobs. Plus, you could find real music, instead of the trendy, commercialized, sanitized entertainment in the tourist traps of the Upper City.

The Surly Sarlacc was just that kind of place. They'd found it on their first excursion on-planet, when they were younger and new to the smuggling game. They didn't have much besides contact with one of Lip’s buddies, but they had a reliable ship and a can-do attitude, so the owner of the Sarlacc took a liking to them. Not only their work ethic, but their music.

"We could have a two-for-one thing happening," he offered. "You do a few jobs for me, and you can play your little band here and we'll call it a cover. Call it even."

"And you'll give us free drinks," G'areth haggled with the Rodian.

"Kid has gumption," was the response, but a quick handshake sealed the deal.

The cantina had been their base of operations whenever they were in the system from that point on.

"If it's not my favorite guys," came a voice from the crowd once they'd gotten settled in at their booth. Thraffort Bing, a small-time Iktotchi spice dealer, elbowed through and took a seat at their table. "How was Jakku?"

"Sandy," Dayv scoffed. "I hate sand."

"I'm not in the business of advertising our travel plans Thraff," Eddie said with a sigh. "Were you looking for something special that we might've acquired at Ponemah Terminal or are you just making smalltalk before you ask us for a bigger favor?"

Thraff placed a hand on his chest in outrage, but dropped the act upon the skeptical glares of the whole crew.

"I might need a hand picking up a shipment from the Pykes," he admitted, immediately earning the groans of all four young men. He held out his hands and tried to play the innocent card. "Hey now, I'll make it worth your while."

"I hate doing deals with the Pykes," Jeff groaned. "You either insult them, or you insult the Hutts."

"They're gossips," Eddie added with a tight, condescending smile. "You remember what happened last time we worked with them, Thraff; the Dragonborn was flagged at every spaceport in the outer rim."

The conversation continued, the boys arguing back and forth with their potential associate until it was time for their set.

That was the real benefit of using the Sarlacc as their base—they could get away from unruly offers like that one.

They were quick to down their drinks and excuse themselves from the uncomfortable conversation.

Smuggling might have been the key to a continued existence for Corroded Coffin, but music would always be their passion.

Once they were up on that stage, things were different. They weren't just dumb kids, trying their hands at smuggling, stumbling their way through one job or another. They were living their dream.

The stage at the Sarlacc was definitely what one could call makeshift. But having some kind of entertainment in your cantina was always a bonus. A lot of the other places that Corroded Coffin performed over the years had dancers, some had in-house bands like theirs—they'd even played a battle of the bands once.

Eddie started strumming his guitar along to the beat, staring past the blinding makeshift spotlights that had been erected and into the crowd. Bodies shifted, heads bobbed, drinks were poured and served quicker than they had been before. The newfound energy in the room was undeniable, and it was all because of them!

And Eddie basked in it.

All of the good feelings, all of the applause, all of the joy and enjoyment, just because of them.

It was the same feeling he got when they finished a job; their benefactors were happy with their swift and discreet services, the smuggled goods always delivered on time and with very little trouble from either the Empire or the cartels.

For the first time in his life he was good at something. They all were.

They played for almost an hour, watching as patrons entered the cantina, stayed for drinks and entertainment, and then left.

And then something unexpected happened.

Among the sea of unrecognizable faces, leathers and homespun clothes, in the seedy underbelly of the Smuggler’s Moon, there was a flash of bright blue and orange.

A human woman with bright blue curls styled fashionably upon her head, and the cleanest jacket Eddie had ever seen in his life, let alone on this planet, proudly bearing a sharp and obvious logo on the sleeve.

What was a Star Tours flight attendant doing here of all places? And dressed so...conspicuously.

The Red Light District was about as far from the spaceport as you could get, and certainly wasn't a place for tourists. He'd seen many unassuming travelers come to Nar Shaddaa for the casinos or the clubs, and then get lured into the depths of the city, only to get robbed or swindled or simply disappear forever. Surely Star Tours gave that warning to their employees; if she just wanted to stop for a drink, she could have it anywhere else.

As he auto piloted through the remainder of the performance, Eddie's eyes stayed locked on her—as did many others with more nefarious purposes than him. He watched as she navigated through the crowd, seemingly unaware of the attention she drew to herself, and approached the bar.

At first, he thought she would sheepishly order a drink and maybe dance, but she tapped on the shoulder of a figure dressed head to toe in black leathers, head obscured by a helmet.

A recipe for disaster. You didn't just tap on people's shoulders.

But the leather-clad stranger turned and greeted the flight attendant enthusiastically, setting an arm around her shoulder to pull her closer to the bar.

What a relief.

Although he no longer needed to keep an eye on the newcomer, Eddie still noticed his eye being drawn to that bright, colorful figure sharing drinks with her friend.

He figured that it was hard not too; once again, she was a seemingly obvious target here amongst a sea of strangers. Once though, towards the end of their set, he glanced up from his guitar to stare at her and his eyes locked with hers as she bobbed her head to the music. A sense of calm washed over him instead of the panic that he expected.

He squinted his eyes a bit to try and see her face a little better through the makeshift spotlights, and found her smiling and laughing along with her friend, who gestured wildly towards the stage. Her eyes shifted away for a moment and she said something, then back to Eddie, and then away again.

Back and forth a few times until she fully turned herself away from the stage.

But not before she gestured at him with an exaggerated clap, as if to say their music was good.

Eddie couldn't help the bashful smile that bloomed on his face.

It was unfortunate for Eddie that the person who'd gotten his attention was such an obvious target, because that meant his buddies had noticed her in the crowd too.

"Come on, you gotta go over there and talk to her," Jeff insisted, hand clamped on Eddie's shoulder.

"I dunno man," he groaned and tried to roll his eyes at the suggestion.

"Did you suddenly become a monk overnight?" Dayv scoffed. "What is this?"

Eddie wouldn't call himself a philanderer—he knew other smugglers who were the biggest whores in the galaxy—but he wasn't exactly picky when it came to bedmates.

None of them were.

It got lonely in space! And there were so many beautiful souls out in the galaxy with stories to tell and moves to make and pleasure to give. Who were they to say no when they were not in the middle of a job and had an actual bed to sleep in, instead of their assigned bunks on the Dragonborn?

But there was something about this woman that felt...different.

Something that told him to go over there, and something that told him that if he did, it might change his life forever.

A feeling in Eddie's gut.

"To hell with your gut feelings, Ed," G'areth punched him in the arm. "Go over there and put the moves on her!"

"She's got blue hair," Dayv added. "You know what they say about girls with blue hair."

"You know what they say about Star Tours Flight Attendants," Jeff hissed the amendment in his ear. "They're always putting out and it's always wild. Now go and get it. This is all of our collective dreams and she smiled at you. Go!"

They all clapped Eddie on the shoulder and pushed him towards the bar.

It was the most nervous that he'd ever been in his entire life.

More than the first time he'd flown the Dragonborn, more than when he'd told Wane he and the guys would be leaving Bracca to start their own adventure despite the watchful eye and iron fist of the Empire, more than running his first job as a smuggler.

More than the first time they'd been hired for a job by Jabba the Hutt himself.

He tried to convince himself that this was just regular jitters, tried to practice pick-up lines in his head. He knew that if it was too strange and uncomfortable, he could just buy this woman a drink and then walk away.

But the moment he was at arm's length of her and her leather-clad friend, that calming feeling returned.

It felt...special. Different. It was addictive, like spice. Brought down all of the defensive walls that he put up and replaced them with tranquility.

Was anyone else feeling this? Or was it just him?

The leather-clad figure nudged the flight attendant and then gestured to him; they muttered something quickly in Huttese and then excused themselves. Eddie couldn't help but watch as they exited the cantina entirely.

Then they were alone.

And he was oddly ok with that.

"You just gonna stand there?" the woman asked with a small smile as she sipped her drink—a bubbling green concoction Eddie happened to favor when he wasn't going for whatever was on-tap.  "Or are you gonna order something?"

Eddie immediately stepped forward and tapped his hand on the bar; the bartender was quick to pour him a draft of Gamorrean ale.

"I'm Thalia," the flight attendant greeted as he took a sip. He glanced back at her, keeping his mouth on the rim of his glass as he observed her in close proximity.

She looked...tired.

That was the first thing that came to mind. Something that wasn't so obvious from afar, especially not with her polished exterior. She was about as old as he was—that is to say, not all that old at all, he'd just turned 26 not too long ago—but he saw it in her eyes and her posture and the way that she breathed. Exhaustion practically came off of her in waves, almost as much as the calm did.

She looked as tired as he did when he saw his own reflection. A good sort of tired, a fulfilled tired, but tired nonetheless.

"I'm Eddie," he finally offered in his own greeting. "Eddie Moonsun, nice to meet you."

"Your band played great up there," she said immediately. "You were great. Have you been together for very long?"

"We've been friends since we were kids," Eddie offered and leaned against the bar. "Actually started playing...7 or 8 years ago?"

Thalia snorted a bit of a laugh into her drink and then schooled her expression to something more neutral; Eddie narrowed his eyes at her.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"No, tell me, I can take a joke," he insisted. An interesting thought came to his mind, a bending of logic to try and explain why he felt comfortable here with her. "Had you seen us play when we first started? I wouldn't blame you if you booed."

"No, nothing like that," Thalia dismissed with a wave of her hand.

"Then what?"

She tapped a finger against the edge of her glass and then leaned a little closer to him conspiratorially.

"Awfully brave of you to start a band when the Emperor is so vocal about his hatred of culture." The corners of her mouth quirked, but she leaned back and her eyes shifted around. "Sorry."

"Hey," Eddie laughed. "If you think you're going to find anyone sympathetic to the Empire in here, I've got some news for you, sweetheart."

That was the kind of flirting he craved; the stick-it-to-the-man type that probably wasn’t flirting at all. He was as keen to one-night-stands as the next guy, but a little defiance always translated well in the bedroom. She had gumption; he liked gumption.

Thalia got a glint in her eye and she pulled her shoulders back confidently.

"I'm surprised we're allowed to have music in the galaxy at all," she announced. "The Emperor is a tyrant! Did you ever hear that he shut down all of the artist academies on Naboo? Naboo! That's essentially the birthplace of art in the galaxy."

Eddie tossed his head back and cackled at the fire behind her words.

"You sure you're just a flight attendant?" he questioned playfully. "Seems like you're trying to start a rebellion."

"Maybe not a rebellion." She scrunched her nose and took a sip of her drink. "But I can be a concerned and outraged citizen at times."

Eddie glanced back at his buddies at their table, who all shot him gestures of encouragement, then he looked back. He confidently took a step closer, until he was in close proximity, close enough to see beyond the tiredness again. To notice the plumpness of her lips, to hear her breathing, and see the color of her eyes.

A swirl of browns and greens, organic and wild. Something he wasn't quite used to, especially now in this life he'd made for himself.

"What else are you concerned and outraged about, Thalia?" he asked, voice soft and low.

She stared at him through hooded eyes, and replied seductively, "I'm concerned about how much of a cut you take off a smuggling job, and if I'd be able to afford it."

The impact of her words hit him hard. The realization.

He backed away from her and eyed her suspiciously.

So that was what she was doing on Nar Shaddaa.

"Not even a flight attendant then, huh?" he asked, trying to hide the disappointment in his voice. He should've known that she wasn't interested in him, just what he had to offer.

"No, I am." She nodded, her eyes got soft and apologetic. "Gotta pay the bills somehow."

"Right," he scoffed. He knew how well smuggling paid the bills. "So what cartel are you working with? Crimson Dawn? The Wandering Star Gang?"

"None of them," Thalia shook her head and tried to close the distance between them again, almost desperately. "You could consider me...a freelancer. Or part of a network of them. Someone wants something, we find it for them, work together to help the product get to the destination."

"Lady, I've heard that before," Eddie scoffed and threw back the remainder of his drink. "Before I hauled a hundred tons of Death Sticks to Mondo-Mod's Arena of Doom. Have a nice day."

He slammed his glass down on the bartop and was about to turn and head towards his friends, when Thalia grabbed his arm with a surprisingly strong grip and tugged him back to her.

He looked into her eyes again and really saw the desperation there. He fought the calm feeling this time, choosing instead to try and harness his annoyance.

It didn't matter what she said to him. He would tell her to kark off and find someone else to haul freight across the galaxy.

"I'm telling you the truth," she insisted through gritted teeth. "I'm a one-person operation. There’s a bit of cargo at the Nar Shaddaa spaceport that needs to get to Coruscant and it must not be found by the Empire under any circumstances.

"I know I was kidding around earlier but I'll pay anything for your services. Yours. I know all about you, Eddric Moonsun of Bracca. You and your friends. And I set up this exchange, on this planet, on this day, knowing you'd be here. There isn't anyone else who can take this job. It has to be you."

He was shocked when she mentioned Bracca. Sure, it wasn't like it was a secret if you knew where to look, but in order to protect their families back home, he and his friends kept their cards close to their chests.

So how this...Star Tours flight attendent...knew was concerning.

And why she'd sought him out specifically.

"Me?" he snorted in disbelief. "Why me?"

"Because you might not think so but you have a reputation about you. And you might think you're mean and scary or suave or just a scoundrel...but you’re a good man. You're the kind of person who keeps their eye on a single woman who stands out in a crowd on a dangerous planet like this one to make sure she doesn't get hurt. Or worse."

He practically flinched at how well she'd dished out that observation.

"So when said woman comes to you and asks for your assistance, we both know you'd take the job."

"And what if I said no?" he questioned. "Because I'm about 30 seconds away from going to find my buddy Thraff and accepting a job he offered earlier."

The hand gripping his arm got tighter, and the calmness around him suddenly turned to desperation. It was palpable; he couldn't even explain it. He was about to open his mouth again to question just what the kriff was happening, when he stopped and looked at Thalia.

And she looked at him, tears building up in her eyes as she met his challenge. 

"Help me, Eddie Moonsun," Thalia whispered. "You're my only hope."

Next Chapter: Episode 2: Not the Smuggler You're Looking For (Coming 2/14 at 7PM CST)

The Tag List for Luminous Beings is currently open; please comment/ask/DM to be added.

[cherish-if]

DEMO COMING SOON

HEARD ABOUT IT? The biggest entertainment company in South Korea is launching a survival show, it’s obvious whatever girlgroup gets out of the program is gonna be one of the biggest in the world.

But for now you’re just a girl. Well, a 23 year old girl. As girls in k-pop debut younger and younger, you feel the gap growing everyday. You’re getting older, for a trainee, and well… you’re not even a trainee anymore. The company you were in went under. Now you swear it to yourself: Get on this show, or it’s back to college, back to the good old normie life. Living far from from the spotlight, for whatever reason, you know you’d hate that, so you have no choice, do you?

Fight for your place in CHERISH, SJM Entertainment’s newest girlgroup. You’re against 15 others, will you shine even among all this talent?

Genderlocked female MC, in part because giving the choice to be a man would imply changing the gender of 16 characters in total. Also because of course I intend to explore the double standards of being a female artist in an industry as cut-throat as k-pop.

Four romance options, two fellow contestants, your stylist and a judge.

Shape your personality and image as you make choices. Will you fight to be in front of the group, or will you stay behind, accommodating others? What will you seem like, a cold bitch or an aegyo maniac?

Choose your strength and weaknesses between vocals, rapping, dancing and visuals. Pick the right choices, rely on your qualities, or the judges will JUDGE alright.

Try not to cause too many scandals, whether that’s by being mean to others, not working hard enough or being unlucky and falling victim to the network’s evil editing. Keyword here: try.

LEE DAON, 28, F/M ✧ They’ve got your fate in their hands, as a judge and mentor for Objective: CHERISH. Emotionally distant, mastered the art of suppressing their feelings. Used to be part of an extremely popular k-pop group, left after they sued their company for abuse. Will you be the one to break that mask of indifference they’ve made for themselves?

OH YEONWOO, 25, F/M ✧ With their perfect skin and their cat eyes, you’d think Yeonwoo is another contestant. Nope. They’re here to make you shine. Sensitive, good listener, kinda melodramatic sometimes. They’re a star in their own right, among industry stylists. SJM Entertainment has only hired the best, after all. May you crack their glittery shell, behind the scenes. First of all, you’ll have to prove you’re not one of these arrogant celebrities they’re so used to working with!

KIM YISEO, 24, F ✧ If Yiseo had to be described in a word, it’d be angry. Don’t even ask at who, what or why. The answer is everyone, everything, and none of your business. She wants to be an idol, it’s her lifelong dream, she’d kill for it. A lone wolf, the edge of her white teeth glistens under the spotlight.

HOSHI MOE, 21, F ✧ Ever since she was announced as a contestant, people have been guessing it, and they’re right: Though it’s not something she talks about, Moe used to be a vtuber. Controversies forced her to retire, following intense bulllying. Used to date an older vtuber, which wasn’t taken well by her fans and his. Upbeat as always, she’s determined to forget her past and earn her new beginning in a whole new country.

[theadhddimsenion]

Why I want millie and loona to be the "losers" of season three.

We all know that blitz moxxie and stolas have all been through the wringer when it comes to their character development and I think that it would only be fair that as blitz, mox and stole complete their arcs the butt monkey statis moves away from them and onto the girls as they go through their arcs.

I'm not saying I want them reduced to helpless damsels in constant need of rescue but I would like to see them fail a bit more so we can see their more fallible sides.

People are already complaining that the i.m.p team need tougher oppents they can't easily beat and that millie and loona are underutilized so I think having them become the "weak links" in the i.m.p as their arcs go on will be fitting.

Like for example we could have millie getting increasingly upset at being left out and her pregnancy starts to throw off her fighting skills.

And we could have loonas lack of field experience cause her to make poor choices and as a result she gets her ass kicked.

Now with all this talk of butt monkey statis I think that contrary to what some might say I don't think moxxie needs anymore lessons for his arc I think he's gone through enough no what he needs is something where he gets to SHOW his development by doing something really cool and/or mature. I actually came up with an idea for a episode where moxxie and loona are stranded in the human world and loona is injured so she has to rely on moxxie for support and unlike in pervious episodes loona is actually the butt of the joke and moxxie is the smart and competent one.

The whole thing is about loona learning that it is ok to put your trust in people and you don't have to judge people based on superficial strength because moxxie has proven that his strength lies not in physical power but in being probably the best strategist i.m.p has the problem being that he is both often over cautious and can't get people to repect and listen to him like blitz can.

So the whole episode is mostly comedy at loonas expense with her constantly being comically injured and humiliated and her failed attempts at doing things herself undermine moxxies actual competence like for example loona tries to get some fresh venison from an overly disney like deer but it turns out to be a huge elk or moose and it's whole herd chases after her trampling moxxies freshly finished cabin. At one point she gets stuck in her feral from and perved on by a pack of feral wolves and is unable to escape until moxxie saves her and after hours of being unable to care for herself loona finaly admits defeat and accepts moxxies help bitterly.

Now right here moxxie has the opportunity to get her back for everything she has said and done to him and never let her live it down but here comes the big mature moment I was talking about. Instead of being petty and rubbing her nose in her failures he does the mature thing and actually starts to relate to her when it comes to his own experiences being the universes chew toy.

If there's one thing moxxie has learned by now it's that trying to make people feel lesser doesn't make you feel greater in the long run. Let's face it moxxie was kind of a negative Nelly when it came to his profession, he was always the first to try and put his boss down even when blitz did nothing to provoke him and we all saw the horror show of unhappy campers. So I feel that moxxie is in ironically a really good place to help loona with that.

Now we can't let moxxie have all the good moments can we? So let's talk about some opportunities to show off character development for my boy blitz.

The first one I had in mind was for him to actually have to try and help veroskia for whatever reason wether it's cause she needed rescue from the dhorks or some other villain, needed help dealing with glitz and glam or even because she discovered she had a half human son and needed parenting advice whatever the case I think it would be cool if just like moxxie can share his life lessons with loona blitz could help her understand that he knows better than anyone the danger of holding onto the past and refusing to forgive yourself better than him.

Another idea is him having a real father daughter moment with loona where she asks him why he hasn't thrown her out even after all she's done to him. And he answers that he loves her and when he saw just how miserable she was in that pound he saw himself and he wanted to be the good parent he never had.

Hell I just thought up a way for stolas to help millie! I mean yes stolas has only just begun his arc but I think he would know the dangers of keeping secrets from people considering how he lost his daughter for that very reason and plus I've heard that owls can tell when other animals are pregnant and for a double bonus blitz can return the favor by helping millie by pointing out that there was no way someone like moxxie would ever hate her for her desicon regarding the child I mean it's moxxie we are talking about here.

In short the point I am trying to make here is that this show often uses physical and emotional suffering as a way of bringing out character development and I think it's only fair that the female cast members get that treatment.

[synchodai]

Despite all my yap, it appears I have not made some of my points clear. That's my fault, so let me lay it out. The TL;DR of my reply is highlighted for readers tired of my yap.

People are free to interpret Mystra as an abuser.

Or groomer or rapist or whatever word appropriately conveys her level of villainy to them. If that's their interpretation of the text, more power to them. In the post, I express my distaste and disagreement for these approaches towards her character, but I was careful not to outright say they're wrong. Readings like that are subjective and there's no point in arguing over subjective interpretation.

That being said, I have not seen a single "groomer" interpretation that doesn't trigger my main gripe with these kinds of things.

My gripe with "Mystra is a groomer" posts is that they are deeply uncritical and unproductive.

The point of this post is to explain why I think that most "Mystra is a groomer" takes are intellectually lazy, incurious, and sometimes outright dishonest. They often rely solely on personal bias to make their arguments, and actively eschew parts of the source material.

They refuse to engage with Mystra outside of her relationship to Gale. They ignore her place in the Forgotten Realms canon, saying that old D&D fans' attachment to Mystra is a hindrance to analysing her as a character. The times they do engage with Mystra's lore, they flatten her into a static, one-dimensional character to fit their argument.

If you (general you) are not interested in Mystra outside of the part she plays in BG3, that's fine. But don't then go on cherry-picking the Forgotten Realms wiki for evidence to support your "Mystra is a vengeful ex" reading, misinterpreting and removing all the context from the "facts" you used to bolster your objectively wrong statements (like Mystra goes after young men, Mystra damned Gale's soul to a fate worst than death when she cast him out, etc.)

I have seen posts sympathizing with Gale as a victim that are meant to be jumping off points for the OP to share their own experiences with their faith or religious authority figures. There is nothing wrong with these. I was not complaining about that kind of post. Those write-ups are less about analyzing Mystra as a character and more about the OP relating their personal experiences to Gale.

I was talking about people who put time and effort to (often erroneously) cite Forgotten Realms lore and pick apart in-game dialogue to slap Mystra with monstrous crimes, all so Gale can have a villain on the level of a Cazador or Viconia that his white knights can vanquish. I have never seen Mystra brought up as a groomer to explore what abuse looks like in a world where magic and gods are indisputably real. They are clearly and primarily written to villainize her and justify negative feelings towards her, as their conclusions never go beyond the reductive "Mystra is a villain and this is why you should hate her as much as I do."

That sort of pretense, using the serious issue of abuse for nothing more than to justify petty grievances over a fictional character, is ultimately why this discourse frustrates me (and the commenter judging from what they wrote).

I do not care about convincing anyone whether it was "actual" abuse, grooming, or rape.

There are probably good discussions out there in the world wide web tackling the power dynamics of mortals and immortals in the Forgotten Realms. I do not care to join them. This post was not made to define what "actual" abuse or grooming in this scenario is, because I don't and have never claimed to know. If you want to have those discussions, I sincerely support you in that endeavor, but this was never one of the points I was trying to make:

I also strongly disagree with the idea that power imbalances are moot if the mortal half of the couple actively wants to sleep with the immortal half.

This was never meant to be a statement about the ethics of mortal-immortal relationships in general. (These scenarios will never be reality, so I don't see a point in having an ethical stance on it, but more power to you if you do and you see value in it as a thought experiment.) But I understand why what I wrote can be read this way, so let me clarify.

In D&D, where one party is a real person roleplaying a character and the other party is a non-player character whose decisions are all decided by dice roll, the other players around the table do not get to accuse the DM of setting up a rape scene when the player character sleeps with the the much more powerful, immortal goddess. This is what I meant by my original statement:

I've already yapped on about how Forgotten Realms writers and D&D players love to make goddesses fuck their heroes, and all that pearl-clutching over "power imbalance" and "consent" is moot when the mortal party is actively rolling to seduce the divine entity.

I see Mystra and her character as inextricable from the TTRPGs tables she was designed for. That's why I went into so much detail about how she was used and characterized in those tables.

I wrote that not in reference to pearl-clutching over Gale and Mystra, but to Mystra's relationships with mortals in general, seeing as how they've been misconstrued as evidence of a "pattern of abuse" and how she is "canonically a female predator." In reality, it was never meant to be a pattern. It's unconnected writers and players horny for Mystra slotting her into the same archetype. It's different playthroughs of a the same game being re-interpreted and then distributed as an anthology of her "conquests."

It's the ignorance and disrespectful approach towards the medium that rankles me. These "Mystra is a groomer" takes cannot make it more obvious that they don't care about D&D. Mystra could have been a telenovela character and it wouldn't make a difference to their analysis of her.

If you want to examine Mystra in the vacuum of Baldur's Gate 3, then by all means. But litigating the "power imbalance" between Gale and Mystra the way a lot of these posts do is so reductive and betrays such a limited understanding of the text. Never mind the mechanics of magic, never mind that gods in Faerûn are not omnipotent or omniscient, never mind the complex powerplay between deities and their worshippers, never mind the history of gods being usurped and betrayed, never mind how powerful Gale would have to be to call himself an archmage. None of those "Mystra is a groomer" takes seem to take any of those into account. They reduce all that to Mystra = immortal and therefore she has more power than mortal Gale and therefore she is the abuser in this scenario, and anyone who brings any nuance beyond that are hypocritically dismissed as D&D nerds who can't see past their attachment to Mystra. I'd call these "analyses" a close reading to the point of myopia if these were actually critical readings and not callout posts feigning at analysis.

Debate the ethics of Mystra and Gale's relationship if it sparks joy and camraderie, more power to you — your conclusions are yours at the end of the day. But think carefully on what point you're trying to make in the first place. (Again, generic you, this is not directed at the commenter specifically; they had a good point about framing this relationship as abuse in the context of exploring the subject religious trauma). I have no interest in playing judge in these characters' divorce court. Why do you, though? What do you get out of striking your gavel and declaring to our online void that Mystra is unquestionable abuser and Gale is her unquestionable victim? What does that judgment add to our experience of the text and its themes? Does your worldview really not allow you to read this relationship, with all the history and lore that led up to it, as anything beyond that?

"Mystra groomed Gale" takes rustle my jimmies like no other. I get how some people who don't know much about her beyond BG3 may have this interpretation, but if you're like me, a woman who's been playing since the days of AD&D, you'd understand why accusing Mystra of being the bad person in this scenario may hit a nerve.

TL;DR: Did Mystra take advantage of Gale's devotion to her as his goddess? Definitely, she's a Faerûnian deity — they subsist on worship and adulation. Does that make her his abuser? Eh... man, maybe it's high time that a lot of us learn different terminology for unhealthy relationship dynamics other than abuser-victim. I've seen a couple of posts that are really gung-ho about forcing every companion character to be some sort of abuse victim, because that's what they've decided the game is about. I mean, they're free to interpret the game that way, but damn, we're really out here flattening god, the very concept of magic itself, into the role of an abusive ex, huh? A fantastical, nuanced relationship between mortal and immortal set against the backdrop of a rich palimpsest multiverse digested like a YouTube drama video.

Let me try to explain my perspective by going through the history of Mystra, how she's utilized in Forgotten Realms lore, and treated within D&D games in general.

MYSTRA THE MAN-EATER

Since her creation, she has always been depicted as the sexy goddess whose main purpose was to be a wizard player's muse as well as their patron. Back then, D&D (and TTRPGs in general) was a heavily male-dominated hobby, so Mystra (and Mystryl, her avatars, and all her other incarnations) was catered and shaped by that demographic.

Because it's the player characters and Wizards of the Coast who have narrative agency and many of them want to fuck a goddess, they make stories where Mystra comes on to them because their character is just so good at magic. They designed Mystra to be a mysterious, beautiful love interest because they wanted to use her as the crown jewel of their power fantasy of being a super cool and powerful magic man. You can pretty much see this in the Elminster books and the Avatar series with Midnight (one of Mystra's avatars). Gale himself seems to be an exploration of this typical kind of wizard character.

As far as power fantasies go, making the goddess of magic have an intimate relationship with a mortal character is fine. It's the ultimate validation for a burger-flipper when the god and all source of burger-flipping is head over heels in love with them. It also doesn't have to have a sexual component to have "magic" and the magic system itself enamored with a character — depending on the game and DM, Mystra's favor can be entirely symbolic and metaphorical. A fine power fantasy in the power fantasy generation game.

So because everyone literally wants a piece of her, you end up with Mystra having more Chosen running around than any other god. Understandable given what she has to do to maintain her massive portfolio. It fits her as the personification of magic — someone who entices ambitious young spellcasters but burns them out through obsession and overreaching. Consume any Forgotten Realms-related media, and you've probably come across at least one campaign, novelization, or character backstory that use Mystra for the role of sexy sorceress goddess that's the alluring (yet often demanding) patron of some magic man. Whomst amongst our wizards haven't been visited by Mystra in the night ordering him to do plot point, he rolls to seduce her, and she has no choice but to admit that she's actually attracted to him because the dice said so? It was a community inside joke passed around tables: Mystra the Man-eater.

But then some BG3 fans started taking the joke seriously...

MYSTRA THE GROOMER AND WHORE

This piece of dialogue has done so much irrevocable damage.

Some (Galemancers specifically) have interpreted this to mean that Mystra is known to go after young men. She does not. She has more documented Chosen than other gods due to her massive portfolio and power level, but there are just as many female Chosen as there are male Chosen. Minsc, like most of us in this fandom, is speculating and doing so in a way that uplifts Gale at the cost of taking a bit of a jab at Mystra.

"Mystra's a whore. She boned Kelemvor and Elminster and so many of her Chosen, taking advantage of them as a goddess," they say as if she didn't have her romantic relationships all as different people and in different bodies. Her avatar Dasumia was the one who had an intimate relationship with Elminster, and it was the human Midnight (who later ascended to become Mystra) who was Kelemvor's lover (who himself was a mortal adventurer at the time).

This is why Mystra is, how other people put it, "a whore." Because WotC canonized a handful of those stories where different sexy female mage love interests whom otherwise have nothing in common are slapped with the Mystra label for one reason or another. Sometimes they're mere avatars or magical projections, sometimes they're actual people possessed by Mystra, and sometimes they're destined to be the new Mystra but don't know it yet. But those sort of nuances are lost to people who learn their lore secondhand from deliberately provocative tweets and reddit posts, flattening extremely fantastical relationships to clumsily fit a more relatable framing that'll net them more online engagement.

I don't want to argue what is and isn't grooming. But I have encountered arguments taking Gale's mentions that he was "a young man" to mean Mystra groomed him as a child. But I doubt he would have said "young man" if he meant child...

Mystra took off the gossamer veils from her body to fully reveal herself to him — or whatever romanticized way Gale tells you that they were intimate. The man speaks in half-abstraction and metaphors because it's revealed later on in the romance that all their love-making happened outside the Material Plane. They were very intimate, but never physically had sex (or had any physical contact at all because gods are only allowed to interact with mortals through their avatars or projections). If Mystra "groomed" Gale, so did every other god who revealed themselves and made themselves vulnerable to their followers. Shar grooms her justiciars when she brings them into her dark embrace. Umberlee grooms her clerics when she swallows them up and gives them her wet kiss.

MYSTRA IS A FAIR GOD ACTUALLY

Look, gods in D&D-verses are, more often than not, dicks. They have to be or else there would be no need for adventurers to fix wrong-doings if the gods weren't so detached to the suffering of mortals and regularly making earth-shattering calamities.

Mystra, as a patron, is actually one of the more fair and hands-on dieties. She's one of the few gods who rewards benevolent ambition and punishes destructive hubris, knowing the line between the two. In the Elminster series, she (or one of her avatars) assists Elminster in taking down one of her rebel Chosen who has abused her blessing to become a tyrant. Azuth, one of her Chosen, has achieved godhood through her. In fact, she is divinely obliged — forced against her will, some might say — to help mortals she would personally rather smite. There have been so many instances where Mystra has to be the bigger person. As far as gods abusing their followers go, Mystra is low on that list.

There are barely any stories of magic abusing spellcasters, but there are cautionary tales aplenty of spellcasters abusing magic.

ON GALE SPECIFICALLY: HOW IS MYSTRA THE BAD GUY HERE?

Gale is the first to tell you that he "violated her boundaries." Mystra told him not to mess with the Tome of Netheril and he did it anyway, so he's fully aware that the orb in his chest and his fall from grace is his own fault. Mystra didn't cast him aside just because she felt like he was getting too big for his britches. His actions actively endangered her and the Weave.

(Mystra is wrong about certain details on the Karsite Weave if we're going by Forgotten Realms lore, but she's not wrong about its existence being a danger. BG3 takes a lot of liberties with the world Faerûn, so I can't definitively say whether Mystra being wrong was her lying, Larian rewriting canon, or this incarnation of Mystra not knowing the true nature of the Fall of Netheril. I could go on about what effects the Karsite Weave actually would have on magic, but this post is already long enough. )

Gale only starts to resent Mystra when she asks him to detonate himself. Elminster makes it sound like an order, but from the way she doesn't punish him in the epilogue if he chooses to keep the orb, it feels more like a suggestion. If Mystra wanted Gale well and truly dead, she has so many options.

Throughout Faerûn's history, Mystra herself has constantly been betrayed and taken advantage of — her power coveted by ambitious men who claim to worship and love her. Honestly, as far as goddesses with traumatic histories of being killed by ambitious men go, she's pretty chill about Gale. The fact that she allows him to become the god of ambition in the end if you choose that path? Well... let's just say she's not the one who looks like the evil ex who was only with their partner to take advantage of them in this scenario.

CONCLUSION

Mystra isn't the only goddess to have romantic relationships with her followers. I've already yapped on about how Forgotten Realms writers and D&D players love to make goddesses fuck their heroes, and all that pearl-clutching over "power imbalance" and "consent" is moot when the mortal party is actively rolling to seduce the divine entity.

But notice how the male gods rarely have intimate relations with their mortal charges? It's almost as if Mystra was objectified for years by horny nerds to be the sexy sorceress who validates the more important male hero. Fast forward years later, she's now being slut-shamed for all the lore of her sleeping with the more important male hero by a new crop of fans who would love to think they're more progressive than the horny nerds of the 80s, but fall into the same trap. Mystra has so much potential for complexity, but they choose to flatten her because they ultimately don't care about making stories involving complex female characters.

Instead, one of the most powerful beings in Faerûn has no bigger role in this universe than to be your girlfriend or your current boyfriend's evil ex. Wow, the realms of your creativity and respect for women truly know no bounds.