#but my heart has desires

[dalmations-nations]

made the mistake of making taco dip, and now every waking minute is a battle between my self-control, and the urge to shovel the whole fucking thing into my mouth

[shadowtraveled]

"mithrun is the only real monsterfucker in dungeon meshi" is objectively the funniest bit you can get out of his everything, but in all seriousness i think his attraction to his love interest is deliberately overstated—and that makes sense, because romantic jealousy is a classic and digestible motive, which is explicitly what kabru was aiming for in condensing mithrun's backstory, and also because until chapter 94, mithrun wasn't willing to admit to the true nature of his desires.

but because romantic envy is both classic and digestible, it probably isn’t a unique enough or complicated enough desire to tempt a demon’s appetite. mithrun’s wish, as far as we can figure from kabru’s reduced retelling, was to have a life in which he had never become one of the canaries, and that carries like 3857 implications and desires within it. that’s delicious. his love interest acts as sort of a red herring to his motivation for making it, though. (side note: i'm saying "love interest" here because, keeping in mind that i barely speak japanese on a good day anymore, "想い人" is something i'd usually take as just kind of an old-fashioned and romantic way to refer to a lover, but in context i wonder if both the connotation of yearning and the vagueness are intentional, and i think this phrasing gets those aspects of it more effectively. anyway.)

mithrun considered his love interest to be untrustworthy. there was a minute where i thought that comment might be about a similar-looking elf (yugin, one of his squad members), but comparing the two…

the "sketchy" arrow is definitely referring to the elf we know as his love interest—the bangs go toward her right, she only has the one forehead ornament, and, most notably, her ears aren't notched.

every time she’s given a full-body depiction in his dungeon, she’s drawn as a chimera, with the body of a snake from the waist down. (side note: the “what if a dungeon has chimeras before reaching level 4?”/“then the dungeon lord is unstable” exchange just being mithrun grilling his past self alive is so funny. he’s so. but anyway) there are a couple things about this.

first, the snake part of the chimera appears to be modeled after some species of coral snake mimic

which, in the biology-for-fun manga, i… doubt is a coincidence, especially with the added context of the “untrustworthy” comment. the dungeon’s conjured illusion of mithrun’s love interest was a harmless copycat of a venomous original. for whatever reason, he felt this person was a threat and made up a "safe" version of her to be in a relationship with, and while it’s definitely possible to be attracted to or even love someone you find to be toxic and/or intimidating, when you take that into consideration alongside the configuration of her body, you get some interesting implications.

which brings us to our second point: if we assume that mithrun was not in fact fucking a snake, then sexual attraction, at least, was so far removed from his idea of a relationship with this person that he did not even bother to keep her dungeon copy human enough to maintain the illusion of the option of a sexual relationship. this is somewhat echoed in the depictions of their interactions, which also imply a frankly unexpected romantic distance. she kisses his cheek and he doesn't seem to react; she's at the edge of a narrow bed with only one set of pillows, on top of his blankets while he's underneath them.

the kiss is particularly interesting because it seems to contrast the text. kabru's narration tells us this was everything mithrun could have asked for, but mithrun is there looking unreadable to pensive, likely because this is right before the panel that makes it clear things in the dungeon are beginning to go wrong.

walking through this backwards for a minute, we have the physical barrier of his bedding and the spatial separation inherent in a bed made for one person, the emotional barrier of his mounting anxiety getting in the way of his ability to enjoy the affection he sought, and... the snake, which historically carries the connotation of temptation, yes, but also mistrust, barring physical intimacy. okay. ok. if a dungeon reflects the mentality of its lord, all of this might suggest that mithrun was not able to have any real desire for a relationship with this person. his unwillingness to be vulnerable or let another person in was insurmountable. but in that case, why was she such a focal point that she remained to the end, after his dungeon had stopped creating iterations of his friends to come and visit him? why would he get so upset over her meeting with his brother that he became lord of a dungeon about it?

well. mithrun's brother was also interested in her, probably genuinely. and mithrun had to win.

you have an older brother who your parents completely ignore, probably in part because he is chronically ill/disabled and almost definitely in part because he received a ton of recessive traits that resulted in rumors that he was an illegitimate child. you are aware, most likely because those same parents fucking told you, that you actually are an illegitimate child. but they keep you around because you had the good fortune of looking just like your mother. what can that possibly teach you but that you, like your brother, are disposable?

it's utterly unsurprising that mithrun, under these circumstances, developed a pathological need to be better than everyone around him. people don't keep you otherwise. i'd argue this is also why he says he looked down on everyone he knew while milsiril claims his dungeon reeked of feelings of inferiority—he sought out people's worst traits and prioritized them in his mind to protect his already extremely fragile sense of self-worth, and all the while he tried to be as likable and high-performing as he possibly could be. his parents disposed of him anyway, but even then he tried to keep up the performance. he was kind to everyone. he never once lost to a dungeon.

when he saw his "love interest" meeting up with his brother, what he saw was himself being replaced by a person his parents had always treated as worthless, and if that was what they thought of the child they'd kept, what value could anyone possibly see in the bastard they'd given away to die? mithrun and kabru tell the story like he wanted to win this unnamed elf's heart, but it was never about being with her. it was about cementing his worth, proving that he didn't deserve to be thrown away.

and so it's particularly cruel that his demon discarded him, too. but maybe it's also particularly gentle that, in the end, there was someone who refused to even consider giving up on him.

kui laid it out in three panels better than i could hope to.

yeah. it's love. you wanted to be loved, even when the only way you were able to understand it was through the desire to be wanted, and you wanted that so badly that the idea of being consumed felt like the promise of finally mattering to someone.

[its-ate-oclock-somewhere]

Futamono Flower Meaning

So you're telling me that the very night after Will whore Graham sent someone to murder Hannibal simp Lecter, the man created this?!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Flagrant Favourism.

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[secriden]

*screams very quietly* Something oh so very tender soft about Fadel drinking himself tipsy-drunk in episode 5 to enable himself to let go of his control and lay himself on his back for Style to make him come undone vs Style drinking himself tipsy-drunk in episode 1 to gather the audacity to pull Fadel flush against him and lay himself back against the bench for Fadel to callously fuck his frustrations out on him.

It's the way Fadel is drinking to let himself go for Style but Style was drinking to force Fadel into frustrated action.

It's the way neither of them were interested in opening up to the other person in episode 1, the way they are purely concerned with their own very separate goals, and the way episode 5 was a coming together of a mutual desire for a deeper and more honest connection.

It's the way Style was utterly selfish in episode 1 and how careful and tender and achingly selfless he is in episode 5.

It's the way their actions may look the same on the surface, but the motivations and the context and the way they now know some of the most intimate and tender spaces of each other's hearts now, that makes their growth and journey so very evident.

[beadelmare]

"everybody's falling in love and i'm falling behind" except it's because i'm so deeply in love with someone in another reality that it's physically impossible for me to like anyone else here

[stefisdoingthings]

i put my hand near my mouth so i know i'm still breathing

[secondbeatsongs]

don't mind if I do!!

[warning-heckboop]

Oh to be able to make the complex lore comic that lives in my head about the concept of fairies, anti-fairies, and pixies once being a civilization of one single species of fae that splintered both metaphorically and literally due to internal conflict

[tinseltownie]

Don’t do what I just did which is watch the podium celebrations in Japan 2023 where Lando walks straight to Oscar to drench him in champagne and then watch the podium celebrations in Hungary 2024 where Lando walks straight past Oscar to ignore him completely. It will break your heart

[sainz100]

2024 Hungarian GP | x (edited)

[wildsaltair]

on my knees begging this man to save me from the clutches of desire

[lizzybeeee]

Blessed in that I have only one hyperfixation...cursed because that fixation is Dragon Age.

[andromeda-vita]

okaayyyy first on the list of designnsssss,,, rayman !! yeah incredible , ik ik just. stay with me here

a brief rundown of it is taking that whole "guardian of this world" concept, and being an embodiment of dreams, bravery and light.. then making it into a silly forest spirit,,

some inspos are sky children of the light, over the garden wall, adventure time, and zelda . again , weird mix , i knowwww . but!!!

i would need an entire doc to list all the things i've written on him thus far but i'd love asks/questions (and perhaps suggestions!)

im gonna be real here... most of the changes have to be the fact he has a cape and, messy hair, with flowers/leaves caught in it (ever heard of a brush???)

[beadelmare]

I keep seeing jegulus hate posts and jegulus defenders but here's the thing james potter is MINE so let's all calm down💞💞

[riverashifts]

last dr count i was just over 150 and now... we hit 225!!!! and definitely more to come 'cause i love the multiverse 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️