#but that doesn’t mean their conclusions are well-cited or sound | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

phantomtutor · 2 years ago

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Response Essay #1:For Monday, February 28, write an essay that responds to and/or uses and cites Jennifer Boylan’s essay on summer jobs. 2-3 pages double-spaced. This essay is an exercise in essay structure as well as the use of reading. Your Essay should be a reflection on work and incorporate your own experiences or observations. Talk about life as you know it. Don’t make stuff up!Essay Structure: While the content of your essay is obviously your own, the structure of your essay should be very similar to the model essay you’ll find below. The structural key components are indicated in color. Feel free to color-code your essay as well. Not required, though.Title1st paragraph: Introduction with thesis (central idea, in purple).2nd paragraph: Summary of the reading (blue) with in-text citation (green).3rd-4 or 5th paragraphs: Your response points. Each paragraph begins with a Topic Sentence (orange) that states the idea that paragraph will discuss. Use specific examples from your own experience (red) and cite Boylan whenever you quote or paraphrase her ideas.Last paragraph: Conclusion that recaps the main idea and possibly adds a little observation or recommendation.1 of 4The model essay is below. It’s called “Service is the Rent we Pay for Living”Service is the Rent we Pay for LivingI don’t remember where it came from, but I like that quote. At a time when people talk a lot about self-care and pleasure, I may sound like the Grinch when I declare that the meaning of our lives is not derived from what we do for ourselves or what others do for us, but that a life’s worth should be measured by what we do for others, and apart from loving our families, partners, and friends, that service for others typically takes place at work. Work is the central way in which the social web all of us are a part of is formed, and it allows individuals to make contributions to society, which in turn creates feelings of self-worth. Children should learn that work is valuable early in life, and one way to teach that lesson is by encouraging teens to get summer or weekend jobs while they are still in school.In the short New York Times essay “The Value of a Mindless Summer Job,” Jennifer Finney Boylan reflects on the summer jobs she had as a teenager in the 1970s—selling hot dogs on the Jersey Shore, mowing lawns, working as a teller at a bank—and she worries that her sons might be missing out by doing major-related internships instead. She wonders “whether their summer jobs are as likely to build their characters as their résumés” (Boylan 2). She doesn’t quite spell it out, but I assume she is talking about traits such a perseverance, resilience, and kindness. I am sure some of the customers at McDonald’s are annoying, but working there one would learn quickly how to be able to treat all customers with respect and not take rude behavior personally, important life lessons.2 of 4Another important issue Boylan addresses is social inequality. She feels that working an entry-level job makes people aware of class privilege, which is why it is especially important for teens from privileged backgrounds to work. We live in a society characterized by enormous socio-economic inequality and even full-time employment doesn’t guarantee a comfortable, safe life, especially for people with families to support. Lots of people who work full-time remain poor while a few individuals are paid astronomical sums for their work. CEO Tim Cook’s pay was over 1,400 times the average Apple worker’s in 2021. And then we have these co-called Social Media “Influencers” who don’t work at all but make millions for posting trivial, absurd, misleading, or obscene “content” on the Internet. While a few CEOs and celebrities are paid astounding salaries, lots of people work back-breaking jobs on construction sites or in restaurants and hospitals for just enough money to pay the bills. What’s troubling, in my experience, is that most people who have cushy jobs

or are lucky enough to be supported by their parents or a spouse don’t think that’s a problem.This inequality and lack of respect for workers might have to do with the fact that work per se is not valued. The only careers that are respected are those of highly skilled, well educated, successful professionals: doctors, lawyers, software engineers, entrepreneurs, athletes, and performers, but I suspect that we admire them only in part because of their qualifications. I think we admire them because they are well paid. But what about all the other not so well-paying jobs all of us depend upon in our day to day lives? Not everyone can or wants to go to school for years and years to get a fancy degree. And not everyone is a maverick with a special gift. I don’t see anything wrong with that, and I think mowing the lawn and selling hot dogs are a perfectlyreading link:https://learn-us-east-1-prod-fleet02-xythos.content.blackboardcdn.com/61aab133e7df2/12857282?X-Blackboard-Expiration=1645563600000&X-Blackboard-Signature=E%2FVVYjwEKzidMW7tGRFFdkNJNSu54Vipvr2xabrwLb4%3D&X-Blackboard-Client-Id=100211&response-cache-control=private%2C%20max-age%3D21600&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%2A%3DUTF-8%27%2712%2520The%2520Value%2520of%2520a%2520Mindless%2520Summer%2520Job.pdf&response-content-type=application%2Fpdf&X-Amz-Security-Token=IQoJb3JpZ2luX2VjEAgaCXVzLWVhc3QtMSJGMEQCIEt3RQZLrzyBQFmHCEbiMK9E%2Bi4LPVzCeSMALNZQe0rVAiBeGslddEN4CVTzFPI4amdPWN8UknenVn1jeF%2FiaTVNNir6AwhhEAIaDDYzNTU2NzkyNDE4MyIMUNmCALCTddsc0n91KtcDHDCFGtOE0KHy5ts%2BzWnt%2FHzNpACdxk%2FbKAK56tvld0IUVOi3He5B8mAmfw7BEJ%2FVGCGnTy7SIByBuamMf7X%2F1xgo65iYOaCDQHk2AFoo6CEBxYwYlorz9YhuBvBU80Et8547F8XE7sY2MjnXf64qgJTMm21rmpR%2BqRBqCeaXTT5iciSYhRo%2FORnS53UkDvKMEycbRlXwRTG39V7s0cIocL%2FGJ2xW69yXMgLhJTcvBaKpwpXwYmGTbGQaB%2BOPPRK8AJb5K4y%2F%2Bt%2BVqPjdsG%2Bn8XJqu1ctfygt6w2OHs%2FnxxOXTfaqTXqu6C5x%2F6WoG95bl%2FZQCSKNLcdLY6boTBIFm1tSIMPVTIv%2FqIbjKeWbQg0fzeLfs6D7ezmc1r13AObyyAyqhMXLPscRWPf5MIBTRqN3fJm4wPOKegrD87guhge9v7N1CoGH9BqlCZaaMRZxaafGPIQ83JKmJF%2BC5teX6WP4CVhbNFhPermF8yM%2F1XigXiNREuP9S894Cm8Y9b0BJ6yj0RfHOnAlrMOn0trq8tC6egrmdjpTr03UrENzRmGtrquqQbgWllSL6b%2Fjd%2F9IPOOJRqIXjACFC1PC41ab6mwWkiw5xhUlAAvoj9YPhCZ7MJcil00YMNWB1JAGOqYBLoyxOwRvSpjgmW2h7vyotbAbMTUQh1SqdfQ7%2FXJDph3QAyxWtP2T1mT5LR2%2BdCtkmPZcMco96WnWE16kVfe07EFRjwSnd9Kl8ax%2BbSixFX1k%2Faur0fsdxzcakDX5BxoLOU1ZHG%2BDWSvKt8vHxBZpdOGHam%2FYJ%2B3djaPSGsyFGPdAMybuGY%2BbRLK%2BLCcJ1fF0goxwpEDaDZ0J9SmNoDUpo%2FNfVmiqMA%3D%3D&X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Date=20220222T150000Z&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Expires=21600&X-Amz-Credential=ASIAZH6WM4PLRGK3SYUJ%2F20220222%2Fus-east-1%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Signature=3daa84d70bdac592e05f5f81afbec12699843d06c07eb2383840bcb0c8fb9720

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ibijau · 3 years ago

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Futures Past pt13 / on AO3

Nie Huaisang is visited again by his future self, which goes even less pleasantly than before

Nie Huaisang did not enjoy in the least being dragged out of bed in the middle of the night, a hand firmly pressed over his mouth to keep him quiet and avoid waking the other Nie disciples.

His future self really needed to find a better way to visit him. They had to decide on a schedule of some sort, Nie Huaisang ranted when they were outside, hidden away near the cabin he currently inhabited. Or a signal. Or something other than the absolute terror of a stranger taking him out of his bed in the dark.

“Couldn’t you at least have told me when you were planning on coming back?” Nie Huaisang complained, to which his future self shrugged.

“I was supposed to, but I forgot,” the older man muttered from being his fan. “Not that I would have kept to the schedule anyway. I had to know how your time in Yunping City went, so I… pushed hard to come here as early as I could. I probably won’t be able to return again until late fall, or even the bew year.”

He did look tired, and had a slight trembling in his hands, Nie Huaisang noted. Though that could just have been excitement rather than a sign something was wrong with him.

“It went well in Yunping City, I think,” Nie Huaisang announced. “I don’t think that Meng Yao will be going to Lanling Jin now, not if he has even a little bit of brain, and…”

“He’s more stupid than you’d expect,” his older self snapped. “I take it he’s still alive then?”

Nie Huaisang hunched his shoulders and looked down at his feet.

“It’s not like I could actually have killed him! And anyway, he’s nice. Well, I thought he was nice…” The older Nie Huaisang scoffed. “And Lan gongzi thought it too…” Another scoff, and when Nie Huaisang risked a glance, he was met with an expression of disgust. “And Jiang gongzi too had a good opinion of him!”

“You saw Jiang Cheng?” his older self asked, lowering his fan while something shifted in his voice. “How was he? Was Wei Wuxian there too?”

He sounded almost eager to get news, as if he cared about these people.

He sounded almost human.

“I don’t think that other one was there,” Nie Huaisang said, trying to remember. He'd been so nervous about that Meng Yao business, he hadn't paid attention to anything else. “And Jiang gongzi mostly seemed interested in chatting with Lan gongzi. They were getting along just fine. I think they’re writing to each other now? I think Lan gongzi mentioned that the other day.”

Whatever softness had briefly taken over his older self melted in a second, replaced by something dark.

“That’s new,” he said, closing his fan with a flourish before tapping it against his hand. “I knew they would have met briefly in Yunping City, but to my knowledge they didn’t speak at all. We’ll have to be careful. I don’t like the idea of Jiang Cheng siding with that idiot." He sighed. “We’ll see what comes of it in the future. For now, tell me what you’ve done with Meng Yao, since you’re apparently too much of a coward to properly get rid of the man who killed da-ge.”

Nie Huaisang felt breathless at that casual mention of Meng Yao’s true role in his brother’s future death. His older self had said that Meng Yao was involved, that he needed to be dealt with, but Nie Huaisang hadn’t thought…

How could someone like Meng Yao ever kill his brother? Even if he worked day and night, even if he tried as hard as he could, Meng Yao would take years and years to catch up to even a normal cultivator’s level. He would never compare to Nie Mingjue who everyone agreed was a cultivation genius, a force of nature. In a direct confrontation, Meng Yao could never win.

It would have been something more insidious then, Nie Huaisang thought. Poison, or backstabbing, or some other under-handed thing. And since Lan Xichen had appeared so instantly fond of that Meng Yao, since his future self hated him too, maybe he’d accidentally given him the means of coming close to Nie Mingjue. That would certainly explain why that older Nie Huaisang despised both men so intensely.

A little shaken by that theory, Nie Huaisang started recounting what had happened in Yunping City. Or at least, he explained most of it. He was so embarrassed about failing to find the right brothel that he didn’t speak about that, meaning he also didn’t say anything about meeting Lan Xichen in the red district, and that complete breakdown the poor boy had. And while he proudly explained that Meng Yao was now part of Yunmeng Jiang where he appeared to be doing very well according to letters Lan Xichen had received, Nie Huaisang didn’t mention that to obtain that result he’d insulted a sect leader and gotten harshly punished for it. He didn’t think his older self would show much sympathy for his suffering.

Really, talking to that man was like talking to Nie Mingjue when he asked about his brother’s cultivation progress. Except at least Nie Mingjue was only like that some of the time, when the elders had pestered him about Nie Huaisang’s lack of talent for anything one time too many. His older self felt as if he was this way all the time.

“I suppose Yunmeng will have to do,” the older Nie Huaisang sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “The Jiangs certainly aren’t going to give him a recommendation to join Lanling Jin. Anything is better than Lanling or Qinghe at this point.”

Nie Huaisang pinched his lips, quite glad he hadn’t mentioned his initial plan of bringing Meng Yao to Qinghe. It had been a stupid plan, he now realised. But he hadn’t known that Meng Yao would be his brother’s actual murderer, and his future self hadn’t said anything, and…

“Now that Meng Yao is dealt with, let’s talk about what you have to do next,” the older Nie Huaisang said.

“About… about S-Su She?” Nie Huaisang quickly asked, trying to sound as indifferent as he could.

His older self opened his fan with an elegant gesture that Nie Huaisang was starting to hate, and shook his head with a cruel smirk.

“No. I’ve given this some thought,” the older man explained, fanning himself slowly. “I’ve reached the conclusion that I don’t care much whether Jin Zixun and him kill each other. Good riddance, neither of them are worth even the dirt used to bury them. These two are just…”

“He’s my friend,” Nie Huaisang squeaked. By which he meant Su She of course, but also…

Jin Zixun and him had exchanged a few glances here and there during particularly boring lessons, and they’d chatted a little when they’d been punished again together, this time over a failed assignment. Jin Zixun wasn’t a friend, but he might have become an acquaintance, and that was probably more than anyone could say about Jin Zixun.

His older self closed his fan with a sharp gesture and glared at him.

“He’s not.”

“But he is!” Nie Huaisang insisted. “I met Su-xiong a while ago, and he’s real nice, and we get along fine, and he even…”

“A man like Su She doesn’t have friends. He’s only using you to get something. What did he make you promise? Support? Help? Money?”

“He’s not like that!” Nie Huaisang cried out, letting his voice rise higher than was truly wise at such an hour of the night.

But he couldn’t let Su She be insulted that way. Maybe it was different where his future self came from, maybe Su She and him hadn’t met over there, but they had met here, and they were true friends.

Su She had amply apologised about not coming to see Nie Huaisang that whole week he’d been punished for his fight with Jin Zixun. He had cited his own punishment, as well as Lan Xichen enrolling him in his book-copying scheme. Both were valid reasons, but Su She still appeared very sorry that he’d let Nie Huaisang deal with that on his own, and shared some candies with him as a way of apology.

Su She was the best friend Nie Huaisang had ever had in his life, and he refused to hear anyone insult him, even himself.

“Su She is no friend of yours,” his older self claimed. “Stop whatever acquaintance you have with him right away. Da-ge wouldn’t approve, anyway.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re at the point of my life where I’m a little idiot who cannot do anything right. If you’re making a decision, it’s always going to be the wrong one, and it will anger Da-ge. So drop Su She immediately.”

"Da-ge isn't like that," Nie Huaisang grumbled.

"I've known him longer than you," his future self retorted. "I know what he thinks of me."

Which might have been true, but it still felt wrong. Nie Huaisang and his brother had their disagreements, of course. Many of them, in fact. They argued over just about anything, but rarely seriously, or about anything really important, and they always made up quickly. Sure, some people misunderstood their relationship and thought they didn't get along. Some had even tried to take advantage of that perceived rift between them, but both brothers knew where they stood.

Nie Huaisang knew his brother would like Su She when he met him. In fact, Nie Mingjue had already promised he could invite his new friend to come to the Unclean Realm, provided he passed his exams.

Maybe it had been too long since his future self had last seen Nie Mingjue, if he could only remember their few disputes and none of the affection.

"The only person you're supposed to pay attention this year to is Lan Xichen," his older self reminded him. "So how are things going on that front? I swear if there's still no progress…"

"No, there is!" Nie Huaisang said, raising his hands in a defensive gesture. "A lot of progress! We spend at least a shichen together every week lately, sometimes more!"

"That's a very precise amount," his older self noted. "How do you know it is that much?"

"Well, see, he gives me music lessons. He says I'm quite good at it actually," Nie Huaisang added with pride.

That pride was met with a dark, angry look. Or perhaps not angry as such, Nie Huaisang thought after a moment. Maybe envious instead. Considering the opinion his future self had of Lan Xichen, it was impossible he'd ever been given those lessons, or surely he wouldn't have hated Lan Xichen so much. And since they were the same person, or at least had been the same person before his future self grew up into an asshole, then they had to have the same tastes, the same aspirations.

"What instrument ?"

"The guqin, of course. You know, I always figured it'd be really hard, but I'm liking it a lot, and it's really fun to practice a little every day, and Lan Xichen is a really nice teacher, and he's actually fun, and…"

"He's not," his future self cut him. "And while I'm glad you're finally remembering the part you have to play in our plan, I don't want you to get distracted. Music isn't your goal. Neither is it to actually befriend Lan Xichen. You only need to make him think you're his friend, getting attached as well would be a mistake."

"But…"

"In fact," his older self continued, slowly fanning himself, "it would be best if you gave up already on the idea of having friends. It's not for the likes of us. If you were a little more charismatic and likeable perhaps… but in the end, none of the 'friends' I made at your age were there for me when I needed them. I had to trick them into helping when the time came to avenge da-ge, or they would have let his murderers live free."

"Well maybe if you weren't such a prick they'd still be yours friends," Nie Huaisang muttered, which earned him a slap.

It didn't immediately register that he'd been hit. He just stood there, staring at his older self, vaguely aware of a noise too loud in the quiet night of the Cloud Recesses, and a rising sensation of heat on his cheek.

"I can't believe nobody has ever done that, with how annoying I am," his future self remarked, shaking his hand as if the blow had hurt him too. "Now listen to me. You are not likeable. You are not charismatic. You're not even particularly clever most of the time. Why would anyone want to be friends with you? At best they're tolerating you because it's impossible to just reject the heir of a great sect, but make no mistake, your only quality is Nie Mingjue. In terms of popularity, you rank about as high as someone like Jin Zixun. Do you understand what it means?"

Nie Huaisang failed to contain a few tears as he brought one hand to his smarting cheek. It felt hot to the touch, and he'd have to expend some spiritual energy into it, or else there might be a mark in the morning that would be difficult to explain.

As for his older self's question, Nie Huaisang shook his head the way he felt might be expected of him.

"It means you have to treat people the way they treat you," his older self said. "Keep your heart closed, and use them for what they're worth. Especially Lan Xichen. Get him to trust you, but don't make the mistake of trusting him back. He is a rather poor friend to those who make that mistake."

Gritting his teeth, Nie Huaisang obediently nodded, fearful of being hit again.

But it didn't sound right. He refused to believe that people were as bad as his future self said. Surely Su She at least was better than that. Nie Huaisang could doubt anyone in the world, but not Su She, so he was absolutely not going to dump his friend just because some old creep with trust issues told him to. Not even if the old creep was himself.

As for Lan Xichen… not so long ago, Nie Huaisang might have accepted that unkind assessment of his brother’s friend. But now that they hung out together more frequently, he thought Lan Xichen wasn’t so bad. Their music lessons really were nice. Lan Xichen was patient and encouraging, something few teachers in Nie Huaisang’s life had ever been. He didn’t mind when Nie Huaisang got too tired to focus, or when he struggled with something that should have been easy. He also didn’t take Nie Huaisang’s moments of easy success as proof that he was faking whenever he struggled, and for this alone Lan Xichen had Nie Huaisang’s gratitude.

Not only that, but Lan Xichen had proven that he wasn’t as stiff and boring as Nie Huaisang used to think. He’d listened about the problems that Su She had, hadn’t he? And not just listened, but he’d done something about it, and he was still doing something about it, and not only for Su She’s sake either.

Su She had told Nie Huaisang that any inner clan disciple who bothered an outer disciple was in serious trouble these days if Lan Xichen heard about it… or worse still, if Lan Wangji got involved. He was a stickler for rules that one. Once his brother had casually mentioned to him that some people were breaking Lan principles behind the teachers’ back, Lan Wangji hunted them down and made sure those people regretted it.

All because Nie Huaisang had told Lan Xichen that he didn’t like how people treated his friend.

How could Nie Huaisang not have started liking him a little after that?

“Speaking of making friends,” his future self said, “you remember you need to fail your classes this year, right? We have big plans for next year.”

Nie Huaisang nodded again, with more sincerity this time. Failing his exams would not be difficult. At all. In fact, he was quite good at failing. Lan Qiren could have testified that when it came to failing, he’d never had a student as great as Nie Huaisang.

“Good, excellent. Now, I don’t have much time left here today but… I have a task for you when the classes end.”

“Another thing?” Nie Huaisang lamented. “That wasn’t the deal!”

“It is for da-ge’s good,” his future self snapped, and once again Nie Huaisang wondered if he really loved his brother enough to bother with all this.

He did love Nie Mingjue, no doubt. But he still wondered.

“In fact, it’s for the good of the whole cultivation world,” his future self continued. “This might be the most selfless thing you’re ever going to do, so don’t mess it up. When the classes end, you’re not going home. You’re going to the city of Kuizhou…”

“Really? Oh, that’d be neat. I’ve always wanted to see…”

“You’re not going there to sightsee and think about poetry,” his older self cut him. “You’re going there to find a young criminal by the name of Xue Yang and ensure he never gets to create trouble for the cultivation world. You’ve disappointed me with Meng Yao, but I think you should manage to do the right thing with Xue Yang. He’s only ten or eleven, and you have a sabre, surely it can’t be too hard to dispose of him.”

“You don’t mean…”

The older man closed his fan, his face devoid of emotion. “I would think my meaning is clear enough, but I’m not letting you mess this up as you’ve done with Meng Yao. Xue Yang must die. He grows into too much of a menace as an adult. Even if we're going to make sure his particular skills never become needed by any sect, letting him live is just too risky. He’s devious enough to come up with demonic cultivation all on his own if given the chance to grow up, and he certainly doesn’t have any ideals of justice to help him keep it under control. Kill him before he harms anyone.”

"I'm not a killer!" Nie Huaisang shouted, too loud, far too loud, but he didn’t care, horrified by the very idea of what he his future self was demanding. He felt sorry when fighting fierce corpses and tended to cry at exorcisms, how could he ever… and to a living person, to a child.

And yet his future self rolled his eyes as if his horror were but another minor annoyance to deal with, and started fanning himself again.

"You'll learn fast. Just find a cat, snap its neck, and you'll see how easy it is. After two or three you stop feeling sorry for them, and people aren't so different from cats."

“I don’t think da-ge would want that,” Nie Huaisang protested in a trembling voice. “I don’t think he’d like that at all. It’s just… it’s a kid! Good people don’t kill kids! Even a lot of bad people don’t kill kids!”

“Be quiet, or we’ll be found by whichever Lan disciple is patrolling tonight!”

Good, Nie Huaisang thought. If they were found he’d be punished, sure, but more importantly he’d be forced to tell someone about everything his older self had told him, from the war that was coming, to Nie Mingjue’s death, to killing children. But of course Nie Huaisang couldn’t be so lucky, and no one appeared to have heard him.

“You’re really too naive,” his older self said. “Everyone kills children, they just don’t speak about it and pretend they’re righteous. Even da-ge is no better. I only realised that after the war with the Wens, but it’ll be good for you to grow out of your illusions earlier than that. Besides, you don’t have to tell da-ge that you’ve killed that boy. Keeping secrets is your only real skill, use it.”

“Da-ge isn’t like that,” Nie Huaisang hissed, and felt he’d started crying again.

His brother wasn’t a murderer. He was a good person, he wouldn’t harm anyone who didn’t deserve it… but he might make an exception when it came to the Wens, who nobody in Qinghe Nie really counted as people anymore.

They were just a disease upon the cultivation world, pests that needed to be eliminated. Nie Huaisang, who had always agreed to that, had never really paused before to think that Qishan Wen also counted a number of children, of elders, of servants, of people who really had nothing to do with his father’s death and maybe didn’t even realise there had ever been such a person in the world.

“Da-ge is only human,” his older self said. “And all humans are ready to kill to get what they want. Da-ge wanted to avenge our father. You want to protect da-ge. It’s not so different. If it helps, Xue Yang really deserves to die, so don’t bother feeling sorry for him. He would kill you for candies, given half a chance.”

“I’m not like that,” Nie Huaisang sobbed.

“Not yet perhaps,” his older self conceded in a softer voice. “But you’ll get there anyway. The world is cruel. We must be worse than it is, if we are to survive, if da-ge is to survive.”

The man raised a hand toward Nie Huaisang's head, wanting perhaps to comfort him by ruffling his hair. It was what Nie Mingjue would have done. But Nie Huaisang flinched, fearing to be struck again, and his older self's hand dropped at his side.

“So remember well,” his older self ordered, his tone dry once more. “An orphan boy named Xue Yang, who lives in Kuizhou. He’s a petty criminal for now, he hasn’t yet switched from theft to violent crimes I think, but it’ll come soon. He would be tall for his age I believe. He has a missing little finger on his left hand, and when he smiles his canines are very prominent. He is a monster, and he cannot be allowed to live. Do you understand?”

Through heavy tears Nie Huaisang nodded. That seemed to satisfy his older self who vanished.

Nie Huaisang understood indeed, but he didn’t agree and was certain he never would.

#xisang #nie huaisang #lan xichen #though this one is really just a double dose of nhs who can't stand himself lol #double time travel #jau writes #mdzs

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fatefulfaerie · 4 years ago

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Brighter

Inspired by @hetsuu and @itsmeyaboi ‘s ramblings so honestly all credit goes to them I just play with a computer keyboard and a word document like a toddler plays with a toy xylophone and a stick. Music comes out because there’s sound y’all but that doesn’t mean I ever know what I’m doing or that it sounds good lol

Spoilers for Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity under the cut:

Link wasn’t a fool, and thus there was no use in denying it.

His claim to the Master Sword had triggered for one reason and one reason only.

He was in love with the Princess of Hyrule. And, in the very moment that he reached for her, wishing that some way, somehow it would be enough to save her, his sword broken and shattered to pieces, the Master Sword shone bright with a renewed purpose.

Link needed to save his love and, chosen hero or not, the Master Sword had allowed him to do just that. It didn’t matter to Link that Her Highness was unaware of his growing love for her. As far as he knew, reciprocation on her end was out of the question and there was no use in inquiring after her feelings. Especially considering the impending fight against Calamity, Link knew he needed to set aside what the the King he swore loyalty to would surely call a frivolous distraction. Link couldn’t afford that with the weight of the kingdom on his shoulders and on the shoulders of the woman he was in love with.

Zelda however, expected to unlock her sealing power with as much ease as Link had pulled the sword that seals the darkness, was fruitless in her multitude of tiring attempts.

By the time the Calamity had befallen upon Hyrule, Zelda’s power awakening seemed a distant dream, a hope too good to be true and a wish that had ruined their expectations of victory.

Onslaught after onslaught, battle after battle, this widespread war seemed one they could never win, warriors forgetting rest in the midst of sleepless nights. At the mere hope that peace may return, that the tide of the war may be turned, warriors of all races attempted to counteract these insurmountable forces.

And yet, like beavers building a dam to stop the rush of a river that was just too strong, it seemed that, stick by stick, Hyrule would wash away into oblivion.

Link himself finally lost hope of victory when he was surrounded by Ganon’s blights, a fierce strike everywhere he turned. And yet, knowing Impa was hurrying Zelda to safety by his quick nod to prompt her, he was determined to fight to his very last breath. The odds were against him and still, he would do nothing else but fight for the slim chance that he may degrade the forces of Calamity Ganon just enough to help Hyrule win, even if by a hair’s breadth.

“Link!” He heard her exclaim as a bright yellow light surged in the corner of his eye. Link panted as he stood up from where he had crumbled to the ground, hearing Guardians whirring with decreasing power, seeing Ganon’s blights diminish into mere specks, blotted by the light.

Link turned around to find the source of this salvation, expecting perhaps to see an angel, greeting him into the afterlife he was waiting for. Perhaps he had died at that last strike from Thunderblight Ganon and so here was transcending mortality all together.

But when he turned around and instead found Her Highness, his princess, the love of his life with her power finally awakened reaching for him, Zelda had afforded him the tiniest of moments to suspect that she may harbor similar feelings of love for him. Before, of course, the seemingly endless battle waged on. His suspicions had to be set aside.

Zelda unlocking her sealing power was the turning point against the forces of the Calamity. Every soldier fought with a renewed strength at the light in her leadership. It was a hard battle to win, but in under a day, the ashes of war were descending into the dirt of a new Hyrule and a sun was rising on a completely new era.

Link’s suspicions only grew without the pressure of the calamity upon them, although he didn’t know what to do with his quandaries, never being particularly good at voicing them.

It was only an inkling of suspicion, after all, Link reminding himself that it could have merely been out of fear of losing such an integral warrior that her sealing power was awakened, or the stress of the situation, or just random chance, or any number of things. Jumping to conclusions by acting on his suspicions would be much too embarrassing for him and he would have to leave Hyrule all together.

Thus, Link assumed he was misinterpreting things and disregarded it.

After the victory over the Calamity, the King insisted that Link take some time off duty. Link, who didn’t quite understand the point or meaning of a break, took the extra time to train. Zelda, who felt her increasing duties had kept her from time with her dear friend, sought him out, soon finding him alone in a training room in the castle.

She stood leaning on a doorway watching him with adoring smile, knowing better than to alert someone armed with a sword and ready for anything. He may accidentally chop her head off thinking her a Bokoblin.

Zelda hoped Link found her at least prettier than a Bokoblin.

Nonetheless, she greeted him after he had sheathed his sword, Link turning his head and bowing immediately.

Zelda insisted he stand up and yet once he did his face paled completely and his eyes had widened with shock. He looked completely frozen, but it wasn’t just because Zelda was only a foot away from him.

It was because she was glowing golden like the sun, not enough for her to notice, but enough for him.

“Uhm,” he said with a nervous chuckle. His eyes scanned nothing and darted every which way as it came together in his head. This was real, this wasn’t just an illusion, she was really glowing. No one else was around and this was the first time they were alone since the calamity. Link could hardly catch his breath. What was he supposed to do?

“Link?” Zelda asked, tipping her head. “Is something the matter?”

“With me?” Link asked, his voice cracking before he cleared his throat. “N-no of course not, uhm…”

Somehow this was far more nerve-wracking than facing a Lynel. His breaths were heavy and panting. His heart was pulsing out of his chest and his brain felt foggy.

What was he supposed to do?

There was no protocol for this, no guidebook for what to do if you fall in love with the Princess of Hyrule and you find out she may love you back because she’s glowing. Glowing. She is glowing.

“I…I-I have to go,” Link said practically running past her and into the hallways of the castle. Zelda turned her head, following him with her eyes and a furrowing brow. She questioned to herself the rest of the day what was wrong with her knight.

When Link returned to his duty defending Her Highness, his stoicism was borne from trying to keep his love inside, much like it was before the Calamity. Zelda didn’t press the matter of his acting odd around her because of this stoicism. Perhaps things were going back to normal, but at the same time, did she want that?

While guarding the Princess, Link would attempt small things like closing the distance between him and Zelda and trying not to gasp when she emitted a faint glow. He would quickly move away so Zelda wouldn’t notice his experiments, but anyone in their right mind would have noticed them.

Zelda even went so far as to ask Impa and Purah if they noticed anything strange about Link recently, citing his odd behavior. Robbie interjected with his analysis of what he called post-calamity oddity syndrome, but Robbie’s pre-existing eccentric nature made Zelda disregard his analysis as legitimate, although she thanked him for his efforts. Impa and Purah said they noticed nothing odd, and Zelda thanked them as well for their honesty.

Zelda, who was at her wit’s end, was the complete opposite to Link, who was ready to try the next attempt up his sleeve in order to confirm his suspicions.

Link was standing by the door, standing guard much like a statue as Zelda tinkered with Terrako on the other side of the lab. Purah and Robbie were huddled around the diminutive Guardian, all three spouting observations Link didn’t even try to make sense of.

Zelda finally stopped tinkering, her hands letting go of the tools she used and dropping to the table loosely. Link spotted his chance and seized it. He knew not how he was going to explain himself out of this one if his suspicions were incorrect, but he was almost sure of her feelings now.

“With enough parts I’m confident we will be able to restore Terrako in full,” Zelda said as Link approached, Link in particular wiping the sweat off his hands via his Hylian trousers. “I think we may even be clo—”

Link had taken Zelda’s hand, which immediately interrupted what she was saying.

“Link, what are you doing?” She asked as she looked over at him, but his expression was deep with love and his blue eyes somehow reflected gold. Aside from the warm blush on her own cheeks that she was fairly certain he would disregard by now, she wasn’t sure what else he could be looking at.

“Link?” Zelda asked again before she looked over to Purah and Robbie, whose mouths had popped open completely, Purah’s red eyes and Robbie’s goggles reflecting a similar gold sheen.

Zelda finally looked down at herself to see her form absolutely coated in a golden light, Zelda hurrying away from the stool she sat on, declasping her hand from Link’s.

She looked at her glowing palms for a lingering second for she looked to Link, her expression softening from confusion to something akin to love and affection. She started to shake her head.

“I didn’t mean for you to find out like this,” she said. “I didn’t know you were acting strange because…because you…”

Zelda couldn’t even bring herself to say it, and Link was smiling, almost warmer than how she beamed. His eyes were sick with love and so were Zelda’s as they stared at each other with an unspoken understanding between them.

“Purah,” Link said. “Do you have goggles like Robbie?”

“Uhh I can,” Purah said, hurrying to a nearby shelf and sorting through a particularly messy stack of all sorts of gadgets and gizmos. She finally found a pair with an “Aha!”

“Be careful with those, now,” Robbie said as Purah returned to his side,. “You break it, you fix it.”

“Oh, so intimidating,” Purah said sarcastically before offering the goggles forward to Link. “Here you go.”

Link chuckled, shaking his head and returning his gaze to Zelda.

“They’re for your eyes,” Link said. “Not ours.”

Link walked toward Zelda, placing a gentle hand on her cheek. Zelda was already brightening when Purah put the goggles on.

“I love you,” Link whispered. Zelda smiled.

“I love you, too,” she said before they both went in for a kiss, their lips meeting slowly and yet with a passion they couldn’t contain.

The golden light from the laboratory could be seen from the castle and, although Zelda’s power would deteriorate over the next few years, her love for Link only grew.

#zelink #age of calamity #aoc #tloz #the legend of zelda #aoc spoilers #hyrule warriors #hyrule warriors age of calamity

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lucky-sevens · 4 years ago

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mechanisms magic system

before i begin this meta, huge credit to @jenn-locke for assisting me in the writing of it! this is something we have been discussing and working on for a long time, and i’m very happy to finally be able to publish it!

there are four examples of things that could potentially be considered magic in the mechanisms universe (excluding narratomancy, which is a subject of its own); the events of the bifrost incident, the mechanisms’ immortality, brian’s prophetic powers (which are actual prophecy) and carmilla being a vampire. i have reason to believe these are all tied to eldritch and/or extra-dimensional forces, and this theory in large part is viewing the various magical events in that lens.

before we get into the other two, which are going to be the most interesting to pick apart, a brief recap! i will be citing things from the bifrost incident as we go, including lesser-known lore, but i feel like everyone in the mechanisms fanbase already has a pretty cohesive knowledge of it; if you don’t, go listen. the mechanisms’ immortality being eldritch is obviously less of a well known thing, but i’ve already talked about it several times, and have a meta here and discuss it in the ‘world lore’ section of my deep lore post here.

now, let’s address drumbot brian! going off the idea that a mechanism requires an eldritch component, it’s important to note that the priest brian brought back to life could be interpreted as being mechanized. this post notes him as ‘being partially mechanical, so he outlives many other enemies we make’ and while that isn’t solid evidence, it definitely sounds similar. adding to the list of eldritch associations, there’s some uncanny parallels with loki and odin. brian crashlands on a planet with no memory, similar to how loki loses her memory. originally, i thought, as lyf assumes, that her memory loss was caused by some sort of torture odin did to her, unrelated to the bifrost. however, her memory being brought back by reexposure suggests otherwise. regarding odin, odin has prophetic dreams. (i’ve done it/though i never knew/the dreams that ate at me were true in ragnarok ii and ‘i could not have guessed this is where the songs i had dreamt of would lead’ in ragnarok iv.) this could be of a similar nature to brian’s prophecy! (it’s relevant to note there are other examples of prophecy, potentially tying to immortality, in the mechanisms universe, but that requires a meta of its own.)

there is a large unknown portion of brian’s backstory. obviously, there is the amnesia, but there was actually a full gptvtmk-style album planned for him. on the lyrics page on the website, there’s a section entitled ‘Indistinguishable from Magic (Drumbot Brian)’, with lost in the cosmos being the only song underneath it. ruth thedreadvampy and cadi wickedace discuss what happened to the album here (it was scrapped), and mention a second song that included ‘Jonny singing very fast about casting Brian into space’, so likely still on the planet he landed on, rather than earlier. still, that doesn’t mean it couldn’t have had a wider span.

in conclusion to this section, it’s likely he has involvement with eldritch powers of some sort that we do not know about. @jenn-locke has posited the idea that he might have been immortal before meeting carmilla. an interesting note from the earlier post cited is that the priest ‘[became] the thing he most hated’. this could potentially mean brian was immortal. locke’s theory is that him crashlanding on a planet with no memory is a cycle; that he would go to planets, leave, and wake up with no memory. this cycle of amnesia could have been halted by the constant exposure to the bifrost that being mechanized would give him. of course, lost in the cosmos contradicts this, as he does die. however, it’s important to note that a) immortality in the mechanisms universe seems to mean you die but regenerate, and b) lost in the cosmos does not line up with the actual physics of what dying in space is like.

now to discuss carmilla! there is no clear information as to how she became a vampire. she and loreli are the only two vampires in the universe, and one may have turned the other; however, we do not know which one, or how they became a vampire in the first place. it’s relevant to note that according to the old dr carmilla and the mechanisms tv tropes page, there’s an unreleased song called ‘the alchemist’ that seems to be part of carmilla’s downward spiral. this could connect to ‘welcome to medi bay co.’, which is one of the only doc c songs i can’t find a place for in the lore. my theory is that carmilla’s immortality was caused because she was exposed to an eldritch event. this is supported by the fact terra was subject to some kind of cataclysm (x). maki has said that carmilla ‘changed’ terra, but that she was not entirely responsible for its destruction. depending on how literally you take rocket girl, the original population could have fled before it was destroyed, and left carmilla behind. though this may not be directly relevant, i’d also like to note that carmilla destroyed one of terra’s moons. (see my aurora meta).

we don’t have any more knowledge about her turning, but along the lines of carmilla and eldritch things, i’d like to talk about the weird. we know almost nothing about it except that it’s the plane the silvana, carmilla’s ship, travels through. as opposed to the aurora, the silvana is faster than light (x), which could point to warping of time and space. it is also the only silvana-class starship in existence (x). the weird is likely strange and volatile; we have a very small piece of knowledge of it from messages on the mechscord (which are not citable). my theory is that it is an eldritch extradimensional space.

in conclusion, there’s more to drumbot brian than there seems, and mechanization and vampirization are likely both caused by eldritch forces.

#the mechanisms #the mechs #drumbot brian #meta #my posts #locke tag #edit: added 'keep reading' bar #dr carmilla

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kellerose · 4 years ago

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Holistic Analysis of ‘Volver’ by Pedro Almodovar

tw// mentions of child abuse, pedophilia, death, blood, and sharp objects

Conduct a holistic of the film Volver by Pedro Almodovar. Be sure to integrate terminologies and concepts from course discussions on both photography and film in your analysis. Cite all borrowed materials.

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‘Volver’ by Pedro Almodovar is a 2006 Spanish film set in Madrid, Spain as well as a small village in the La Mancha Region. Upon further research, it’s noted that La Mancha is where Almodovar grew up, which indicates that this film highlights the essence of his childhood.

‘Volver’, which is Spanish for ‘to come back,’ beautifully captures the importance of women’s lives and what comes of life after death. The film is compacted with stunning architecture, camera angles, color, music and sounds, and visual images that all fit into the film’s overall message.

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Composition: I have noticed throughout the film that Almodovar chose interesting and compelling camera angles for different situations. When people walk through big doors-- mostly with the windy village in La Mancha-- the camera would be at a one-point perspective. The center of the door would be the ‘vanishing point’ of the frame so that you’ll see the rest of the hallway that the characters will soon walk down. When Almodovar films the characters going up a flight of spiral staircases, he puts the camera on the ground facing upwards in the center to show the movement of the characters. When his characters are going down the set of stairs, he changes the angle so that the camera is at the top facing downwards. When characters are walking down or off onto the street, the camera tends to follow their movement in a single shot; either in front of the characters for more intense scenes and dialogue or on the side of the characters in a distance shot to move along the plot. I also noticed his choice of car scenes. He would usually show the red car driving down a dirt road of wind turbines in a distance shot. If there were people in the back seat, the camera would shoot from the front of the car, and if it’s only one person or two they would shoot their side profiles. I also noticed that certain frames had significance to the plot as an angle would be used for multiple shots; one with Raimunda cleaning the knife before and after the murder of Paco, and when Raimunda was standing by the tree by the river after burying Paco then later that same angle was used when Raimunda and Paula visited the same spot.

Visual Cues:

Color- The main color of the film-- as well as any Almodovar film-- is red. The color symbolizes death as well as womanhood-- the passion, empowerment, and life that goes with women. The film was full of bright colors, which is a usual touch that the director loves to add to all of his films. Almodovar chooses his color precisely by the setting, as he stated in his interview with Jennifer Merin about the film. He chose to use a lot of black and white because of the location and social environment of La Mancha. Those colors, he says, aren’t ones he typically uses but were the best choice for those certain parts of the film.

Gestalt Laws:

Proximity- The closeness between Raimunda and Paula throughout the entirety of the film shows that the two are related in some way. The fact that the two characters are inseparable and are seen living together, an individual can assume that they’re mother and daughter. Paco getting constantly pushed away and being distant from the characters symbolizes the dysfunctional relationship he had with Raimunda and Paula. When Sole ran away screaming from Irene upon first meeting her, one can assume that the relationship is unwanted by the forcible distance. However, we see about 20 minutes later, Sole allows Irene into her home and ends up sleeping next to her in the night. The sudden closeness indicates the love and comfortableness between a parent and child.

Common fate- The people of Madrid and La Mancha always kissed each other’s cheeks as a form of greeting. Raimunda and Irene both had their partners murdered for doing something taboo. Irene’s husband was having an affair and sexually abused and impregnated their daughter Raimunda. Raimunda’s partner, Paco, was stabbed by her daughter Paula for sexually assaulting her. Another common fate is that Raimunda and Paula were both sexually assaulted by their fathers/father figures.

Semiotic Signs and codes:

Indexical Sign- The abundance of people are dressed in minimal amounts of clothing which indicates that the weather must be quite warm. When the characters are in the La Mancha village, the character’s clothes and hair move rapidly indicating that the area has harsh winds.

Symbolic Sign- The use of red in the women’s clothing, on and in buildings, on the furniture, vehicles, and close-ups on vegetables and blood certainly doesn’t go unnoticed. However, an individual who notices may not understand its significance. Therefore, the color red is an example of a symbolic sign in this film. It emphasizes the meaning of life after death and the importance of womanhood. Another example of a symbolic sign is the song sung by Raimunda within the film. The title of the music is the same as the movie’s title, ‘Volver’. The song is about the need for one’s life to come back, especially a mother’s, in order to move forward in life, which is an addition to the film’s message. One final example is at the very beginning of the film. The women of the La Mancha village are seen cleaning off the gravestones in the local cemetery. The way the women talked with one another made the audience indicated that this was a common practice. This scene set up the meaning of life beyond death and womanhood because only women were standing over the dead.

Purpose of the Work: A main purpose of the work was for the director to pay homage to his childhood as the movie filmed in the place he grew up and the characters were similar to the women who raised him.

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Personal Perspective:

As usual, when films start, I need to take some time to get into it. This is the same with any kind of story, even with books. But, unlike books, I can stay focused and entertained by good cinematography. The Spanish film ‘Volver’ did just that for me. The stunning single-point shots and frames kept me wanting more. I completely adored the close-up shots of characters doing simple tasks. For example, when Raimunda was putting away Tupperware, washing the dishes, and grabbing paper towels-- just to name a few-- I absolutely adored how they were shot. When the plot began to thicken, however, it was more than just the cinematography that left me breathless. The acting was incredible that I was convinced I was watching someone else’s life right before my eyes. There were many surprises that I didn’t see coming that left me on the edge of my seat the whole time. When the film ended, I had felt satisfied and unsatisfied. I wanted to know more of the story, it felt like the conclusion was only starting when the credits began to roll. But, at the same time, I was okay with how it ended because I can make up my own conclusions about how I feel the story will continue. I really enjoyed how the visuals throughout the whole film were chosen carefully to match the overall message.

Cultural Perspective:

Almodovar uses a lot of past and present aspects of the Spanish culture in his films. As he grew up in Spain, it’s something he knows well and feels most inspired from. The director is obsessed with the media of Spanish culture-- such as telenovelas, magazine stories, infomercials. Almodovar adds Spanish media to his films quite often. For example, in ‘Volver,’ he uses the idea of a film-within-a-film aspect near the end of the movie. Another example is when Paco was watching soccer on the television in the earlier shots of the film. Almodovar claims that the brightness and intenseness of the colors match the drama that Spanish films have, which is why he tends to this culture more to satisfy his creativity. A quote from a 2006 interview mentioned in an Amuse article by Colin Crummy, Almodovar states, “It is something very Spanish but it is hardly used in Spain. It corresponds both to my personality and the baroque behaviour of my fictional characters. Explosions of colour fit in very well with high drama.”

Critical Perspective:

There were multiple mentions of child abuse and pedophilia within the film. One example is that Raimunda’s father abused and raped her as a child that led to the birth of Paula. Near the beginning of the film, there was an up-close shot of the fourteen-year-old girl’s private spot indicating that Paco-- the supposed father-- was looking at it, and he was creeping on her while she got undressed in her room. After a few scenes roll by, we see Paula waiting for her mother at the bus stop in the rain looking petrified. After Paula didn’t give a clear answer, we see Raimunda finding Paco’s dead body on the kitchen floor. Paula began to explain the whole event of the assault that led to her stabbing him in detail. The aspect of child abuse and murder is enough to provoke a strong response from the viewer. The whole event is extremely traumatizing that will make people talk about it afterward. A major theme throughout this film is death and the afterlife. The superstitions of spirits visiting you before you pass on overflowed the village. Irene was thought to have passed in a fire four years prior to the story’s timeline. So, when she had visited her sister who was dying, many suspected that it was her spirit helping the living pass on. The idea of death and the afterlife is a difficult topic to bring up in conversation, so it wouldn’t be unusual if someone had felt uncomfortable. There were many ways death occurred within the film; stabbing, old-age, a house fire(that was intentional), and cancer. Each death-- and the reason it happened-- can provoke an emotional response from the audience. The running themes and cultures of the film will leave anyone’s mind wondering: what’s next?

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References

Merin, Jennifer. “Jennifer Merin Interviews Pedro Almodovar Re ‘Volver.’” ALLIANCE OF WOMEN FILM JOURNALISTS, 13 Dec. 2006, awfj.org/blog/2006/12/13/jennifer-merin-interviews-pedro-almodovar-re-volver/.

Team, Amuse. “A Musical Tour of Ibiza.” Amuse, 24 Mar. 2021, amuse.vice.com/en_us/article/bvg3p4/a-musical-tour-of-ibiza.

Lester, Paul Martin. Visual Communication: Images with Messages. Sixth ed., Michael Rosenberg, 2014.

Almodóvar, Pedro, Agustin Almodóvar, Esther García, Penélope Cruz, Carmen Maura, Lola Dueñas, Blanca Portillo, Yohana Cobo, Chus Lampreave, Antonio . Torre, Carlos Blanco, José L. Alcaine, and Alberto Iglesias. Volver. , 2006.

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sepublic · 4 years ago

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You know, I've seen plenty of great ideas for Amphibia x TOH swaps, but there's one thing I haven't seen anyone point out yet. If Luz takes Anne's place and goes to Amphibia, then she gets something she's always wanted at the start of TOH: Being part of a prophecy.

…That is, a VERY interesting concept, not gonna lie!

The thing about Luz’s fundamental issues prior to meeting Eda was… She really had a problem with distinguishing fantasy from reality, learning to set the boundaries between the two, and fully respect said boundaries. She wasn’t malicious of course, but regardless…

This is an interesting ask because we don’t know yet how the prophecy will unfold and be revealed within the show, or even its exact nature! But regardless, this is making me imagine Luz meeting the Plantars, and… Really, I can see Hop Pop’s more down-to-earth nature helping Luz learn to distinguish fantasy from reality, to an extent. Especially since Hop Pop himself is lowkey like Luz in that they’re very unorthodox heroes who don’t quite save the day the way they expected to; But their methods are –usually- valid. Such as Hop Pop accidentally inspiring a revolution among the Frogs, or that time he served as a martyr for those tiny frogs, with his mistreatment by the Hasslebacks being the final injustice that pushes them to fight back and defend themselves, without having to rely on any outsiders to do the work for them. Then there’s him projecting a Noir Film onto his search for Sal, to the point where he straight-up kills an innocent man…

And, that’s making me imagine Luz and Hop Pop kind of bonding over this (not the murder though), especially with Hop Pop’s failed dreams of becoming an actor. I can see Luz being pretty sympathetic and a lot more involved in Hop Pop’s stint with Renee Frodgers, a lot more than Anne did- And considering we see her try out for Romeo and Juliet at one point, maybe she also has a taste for theater herself! Not to mention, all of this discussion of confusing fantasy with reality is just reminding me of Marcy… Specifically, the speculation of Marcy low-key seeing her time in Amphibia as more like a videogame with its tropes, to a potentially harmful extent as she might not treat this situation as a very real one with actual stakes and living, breathing people.

Of course, the thing to remember is- Luz takes a lot of initiative in her own character development, too! She’s a receptive person and self-reflects. I feel like even if she never met Eda, it wouldn’t have been out of the question for Luz to still resolve her own issues… It’d have just been a much more difficult and tedious journey, especially if Luz had to go through that Reality Camp. But regardless, when you remember that Hop Pop also goes through similar character development, albeit more around the Season 2 timeframe… With Hop Pop making the conscious decision on his own to call out Renee on her thievery, without Anne nor any circumstances goading him into it, because he’s a very moral character at heart…

Maybe Luz could have issues like Marcy. It’s worth considering if Andrias is manipulating and feeding into Marcy’s dreams. But regardless, I see Luz and Hop Pop working together, mutually, to get past their own issues, well before the prophecy is revealed- And we still don’t know when that’s going to happen! Maybe Luz and Hop Pop could be a duo reminiscent to Luz and King during Sense and Insensitivity. I can’t say for sure if Luz’s character development will be as potent by the prophecy’s reveal, as she is as of the Season Finale in HER show… I think Eda is ultimately a wiser character than Hop Pop, and characters like Willow and Amity serve as neat narrative contrasts/foils to Luz’s own antics. Though, I can imagine Luz getting caught up in shipping Sprig and Ivy, and possibly the fallout of this leading to a lesson or two…

But in the end, as I said- Luz has a good heart, and she goes around to do the right thing, in the end. She’s like Hop Pop in that regard, and of course there’s also the existence of Sprig and Polly, not to mention what a fellow weirdo like One-Eyed Wally might have to say, here or there. I guess a lot of it depends on the exact context of how this prophecy is revealed, and how it even works… But I see Luz as being grounded by the more down-to-earth Wartwood, well before she gets to Newtopia. This does raise the interesting idea of her possibly backtracking on her character development, especially with Marcy’s influence and Andrias’ potential manipulations…

And yet, I can see Luz still turning around to do the right in the end, just as Hop Pop did; Even when his dreams DID come true, and he became a renowned actor! I think Luz would come to the conclusion that even being ‘chosen’ by some divine force doesn’t really make her any better than anyone else… Not to mention that the people and world she’s saving is still very much its own thing, not beholden to her. So I see Luz accepting the mantle of being a hero, if only because she’s a good person and of course she’s not going to let something bad happen… And I can imagine the Plantars helping to gently nudge and remind Luz of her past lessons, to not get confused with fantasy and reality again. The prophecy would definitely be a twist antithetical and contradictory to Luz’s character development, given how she’s being transplanted into a different show with different themes, originally intended for a different protagonist…

But, if Marcy is going to learn her lesson and get past her own issues –assuming those specific issues ARE a thing of course- then I can see Luz being a guiding light and force for her… Maybe the two mutually navigate past potential delusions together, who knows? I’ve speculated in the past how Luz would handle the revelation of having powerful magical heritage... How Luz would truly show off her character development by rejecting even this seemingly objective, tangible cosmic reason for her being special, and still asserting her equal standing with everyone else. Even when placed on top of the hierarchy, Luz rejects it, showing how much her lessons mean to her. I can see Andrias trying to set Luz up to agree with his hierarchy under that concept of divinely-ordained ‘specialness’, and how it’d all just tie into Luz working to abolish the caste system with Hop Pop.

I can see it being a contrast to Sasha and Grime, who want to topple the current Newt Hierarchy… More than likely, so they can switch it around with Toads on the top. Not exactly the most helpful change, in the end… Luz decides that instead of reversing the roles, it’s best to just get rid of the roles entirely. It could play into a discussion of privilege, and it’d be interesting to see how Luz, Marcy, and Sasha would all bounce off of one another- Sasha low-key has her issues with dismissing the people of Amphibia, and once talked about ‘having fun’ there. Obviously her respect for Grime has changed this a lot… But there’s still that willingness to conquer what she fully recognizes now as an actual civilization of people. She would certainly take the revelation of a prophecy as full justification that she was never wrong about anything, and that Sasha is of course entitled to taking over Amphibia- Especially if Grime feeds into this both out of genuine support and his own desires.

Then there’s that idea of Sasha and Grime enabling one another to be worse, even if they also still go through a little bit of positive character development… And as for Marcy and Andrias, I can’t quite say because the latter is still quite the enigma. Either way, Luz has to serve as a grounding force for the other girls with Hop Pop’s help… And really, it sounds like the set-up for total chaos, a battle royal, a complete free-for-all with every Amphibian and Human for themselves as they navigate one another amidst the backdrop of this prophecy. If we want to apply Luz’s motif and themes of being a guiding light for other characters in her own show, I can see her forcing Sasha and Marcy to confront the reality of what they’re doing… And I think interactions between her and Grime would be fascinating, as she’d be VERY much in favor of toppling the monarchy- But specifically to undo the hierarchy entirely, instead of switching it around to the Toads’ favor. If Sasha and Grime enable one another, perhaps Luz will have to act as a voice of reason and buffer between the two- And again, it depends on how Sasha and Grime’s character development goes.

Overall, this sounds like QUITE the debacle, and I’m kind of fascinated, imagining how these different characters with different motifs, meant to be compatible with narrative parallels and contrasts, amidst the themes of their particular show; And how they’d adapt and fit into another show’s cast and themes! Anne taking Luz’s place in the Boiling Isles would be interesting, given how Anne has clearly internalized Sasha’s idea of ‘knowing what’s best for someone you care about’, and how this seems to be a recurring trend amongst people like Emira and Edric toward Amity, Lilith with Eda, etc. And, I guess I could go into a whole ‘nother discussion of how Eda has to help Anne recover from this low-key abuse and toxicity, and Anne having a similar moment of standing up to Sasha with those characters, possibly citing her own experiences… But, that’s probably a discussion for another time, I think. I guess it depends if I have the time and energy for it, and my cyclical focus aligns just right…

#the owl house #owl house #amphibia #the owl house luz #luz noceda #amphibia hop pop #hopediah plantar #speculation #meta #ask

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pau-neko-chan · 4 years ago

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Small details that make me ship karumana

Various fans have already contributed supplementary materials as fuel for the karumana ship but I’m here to talk about more minute details of their individual characters that make me believe in a supportive and refreshing relationship that can develop between these two. I plan to discuss details ranging from the start-up ship fuel from the main series to the supplementary material hints in order to provide a more psychological perspective in their compatibility.

Anime: S1 Ep 8 - Karma expresses interest in Okuda when the boys in class asked him who he likes.

The foundations of this ship

Many may claim that their interactions in the series aren’t enough to support a ship but if you look into supplementary material and analyze their individual characters beyond the obvious spotlight ship in the series, you can see how much Matsui Yusei teases fans with karumana ship fuel. According to Okuda’s character profile, she’s someone that the ever-alert Karma has allowed to get close. While in Karma’s character profile, Okuda is said to be the girl he can talk to about anything and his cautious heart and distant nature faded away around her. They’re cited to be the most easy-going boy-girl relationship in the class. In a translated character relationship chart from the official fanbook, Matsui confirms that these two like each other for how comfortable they are with each other, Karma finds her to be the easiest person of the opposite sex to talk to, Okuda feels relaxed around Karma in general, and Karma thinks Okuda is cute.

With these foundational details in mind and by reading beyond what the series gives us, here are a few points that make me believe in Karma and Okuda’s chemistry.

Okuda is not spineless

While she appears to be helpless and shy, she can stand her ground on what she believes in. Much like others in 3-E, she is her own character and doesn’t exist to be that token straight ship for Karma. During the class civil war, she chose the “save” team because she believes that if science can destroy, it can also save.

Anime: S2 Ep 17; Manga: Ch 144 - Okuda chooses the Blue team to save Koro-sensei

They could have easily put her in Karma’s team because of friendship and loyalty but the choice to “kill” would simply be against Okuda’s caring and harmless nature, one of the main traits why Karma is so comfortable around her. Later into the game, Isogai and Maehara talk about who they think would win and Okuda yells out that she wants Karma to win, despite being in the “save” team. This shows her own resolve and ability to separate her personal principles from her relationship with Karma.

Manga: Ch 147 - Okuda states why she wants Karma to win

It’s not that she wants Koro-sensei to die, it's that she understood what killing Koro-sensei means for Karma. She, of all people, knew the hard work Karma put on behind the scenes. When others simply dismiss Karma’s achievements as “genius,” she (and Koro-sensei) knew that Karma works hard, no matter how much he tries to hide that side of him to the world. This comes with his resolve that he is not the best and he has to put in effort if he wants to be the most capable in reaching his goal. Okuda sees all that. Given the choice, Okuda would rather save Koro-sensei, yet if things don’t go her way, she trusts that Karma earned the chance to fulfill his goal. This duality illustrates that whether the class decides to save or kill, she can accept it wholeheartedly. She wouldn’t have regrets because she gave it her best shot from a decision she made herself.

Anime: S2 Ep 1 - Karma hides evidence of him studying hard on the last day of summer break

In relationships, it’s important to have set boundaries for what you share with your partner and the things that make you, you. Okuda’s character exemplifies this well as she is not shown to be a side character that follows Karma around, she’s a friend whom Karma can share his vulnerabilities with while being able to keep her individuality intact. While she is known to be lacking in the ability to communicate, in the end, she’s able to say what’s on her mind when it matters—without any filters. She is brave and strong in her own way and has the capability to provide a new perspective—a trait that can stimulate Karma’s intellect. I believe this would blend well in their relationship because Karma seems to be the type who would get bored hanging out with someone who can’t keep up with him. This shows that their relationship can be an equal exchange of support and trust rather than one being subservient or wary of the other.

Additionally, her pure honesty and lack of fear for Karma is a perfect example of how she can stand up on her own. Everyone is afraid of Karma to some extent which makes them avoid him, possibly right according to how Karma likes to push people away with his behavior. Having someone whose basic nature is to not get swept away by the norm, to be able to choose for herself in how she views Karma, and to be overall honest with her intents really paves the way for a mutual trusting relationship.

Anime: S1 Ep 8 - The girls in class find Karma attractive but scary but Okuda disagrees.

What I find interesting in Okuda’s lack of fear for Karma is that she says this even after seeing him directly start a fight with delinquents the day before. This is episode 8, 3 episodes after her debut in episode 5. Assuming that Karma only started approaching her after learning about her poison-making skills, that’s quite a short period to get to know Karma—a known violent delinquent and the most skilled fighter in class—and to claim that he is “not that scary.” This implies that by this time, they have started to get to know each other better, Karma probably treats her well, and that they’ve interacted enough off-screen to arrive at the conclusion that he is not scary. Much like how Karma’s interest in her comes from her chemistry skills rather than her looks, this girl knows Karma is more than his external features and she can speak her mind even though it’s contrary to the public opinion.

Karma’s character development

Manga: Ch 19 - The boys ask Karma who he’s interested in among the girls in class

From the key scene that fueled this ship, many may claim that Karma is just using her for personal gain. I personally believe this argument is made by people who stopped understanding character growth at season 1 or simply cannot grasp at all that humans change over time. As with a lot of relationships, the interest in other people has to start somewhere. For Karma, the interest starts here with the maturity level of a 15 year-old prankster. Being one of the main characters, Karma goes through character development in the way he views the world, himself, and the people surrounding him. He changes a lot in a span of one year so it wouldn’t be impossible to believe that his interest in Okuda grows beyond having a convenient drug dealer.

One common trait that makes Karma comfortable around people like Nagisa and Okuda is that they are seemingly harmless to him. The statement and intent sounds problematic as a standalone but it’s important to point out how Karma uses this information in his relationships. A typical toxic psychopath would prey on their harmlessness to bully them into taking advantage of them. Karma’s comfort hanging around harmless friends stems more from their inability to hurt him rather than his capability to hurt them. Although Karma is labeled as a violent delinquent, he isn’t a low-level scum-type delinquent that starts a fight for the sake of fighting. As far as I can remember, all cases of Karma’s problematic delinquent behavior is fighting with strangers who provoked him first or he was actually trying to defend someone weaker. His friendship with Nagisa started with a common interest and he was comfortable until he felt threatened by Nagisa’s dormant skill for assassination. Not once did he try to take advantage of Nagisa’s pacifist nature for his personal gains. The same applies for his friendship with Okuda—she piqued his interests with her chemistry skills, he learns that she is harmless and comfortable to be with, and a genuine friendship evolves from there. His interest in her skills may be mischievous but he never showed any aggression or intent to take advantage of Okuda. Neither did he force or threaten her to do those for her. She even wrote that she was able to experience challenging experiments because of his requests in her yearbook message to Karma, something that sounds like she actually enjoyed the fruit of his mischievous intents.

Anime: S1 Ep 8 - Karma tells why he’s interested in Okuda

For those who believe that this scene is a weak foundation for liking someone, well, at that point, Karma hasn’t really developed a romantic type of interest in her. As mentioned, this is how his interest in her begins, not the sole reason for him to be attracted to her. Playing around, making mischief happen, sharing fun times is something that develops friendships. A good friendship is the solid foundation for a comfortable romantic relationship later on. Character development is a real thing and these two won’t have the brain of mischievous middle-schoolers for the rest of their lives.

Anime: S2 Ep 6 - The Witch and The Knight used chloroform to save the day

Karma can feel at ease with Okuda

During the Test of Courage, Karma and Okuda were paired up which gave them time alone to talk about something that’s been bothering Karma. As we all know, Karma never shows his vulnerabilities to anyone at this point in time, not even around classmates who are known to get along with him. Koro-sensei had to earn it by looking out for him and it took time for him to warm up yet even then, he wouldn’t be caught casually sharing something as personal as his fear. The exception is Okuda. The series never explicitly shows how Okuda earned that trust but this scene paints something unusual in Karma’s well-guarded nature. It’s not impossible that they’ve shared enough moments off-screen—moments valuable enough for Okuda to earn Karma’s trust halfway through the school year. To note, it appears that Okuda never even initiated asking Karma what’s bothering him and yet, Karma simply shared what’s on his mind to her.

Anime: S2 Ep 1 - Karma talks about his fear to Okuda during the Test of Courage

We don’t actually see this kind of vulnerability display around friends that Karma spent a lot of fun times with on-screen such as Nakamura and Terasaka. During the civil war, Nakamura notices something unusual in Karma, as if something is bothering him but Karma immediately brushes it off and shows his usual face excusing it as having just woken up. Karma and Nakamura have been shown to get along well as fellow pranksters, possibly with more lines in scenes together than Okuda and Karma ever had in the entire series, yet for some reason, this friendship hasn’t reached the point where Karma can at least give a hint of what’s bothering him when he’s alone with Nakamura even after she asks him about his thoughts.

Manga: Ch 144 - Nakamura notices something unusual about Karma at the start of the class civil war

As for Terasaka, he seems to have earned a teasingly trusting friendship with Karma. Terasaka gives his trust in being manipulated by Karma’s wits and Karma seems to show acknowledgement for how this pseudo-Takaoka has grown. Yet the most Karma would show around him is a vague suggestion that he would like to see him in the real world again someday as colleagues. Perhaps this is simply how men communicate with each other but I guess with everything they’ve experienced, Karma acknowledges some sort of friendship with Terasaka, but not enough for him to expound or eloquently communicate why he would like to see Terasaka as a politician when he himself becomes a bureaucrat. Karma’s unsolicited suggestion for Terasaka hints at his vision for his future and how he sees someone like Terasaka in it but his language doesn’t scratch the surface of intimate vulnerability as it did around Okuda in the test of courage.

Anime: S2 Ep 9 - Karma tells Terasaka to become a politician after career counseling with Koro-sensei

Throughout the series, we see Karma come out of his small world and slowly connecting and caring for his classmates. He gets along quite well with them and appreciates their company and how this class allows him to be himself. All this is temporary as they will go their separate ways once they graduate. In addition, Karma also appears to be the type to value the quality friendships he has built. This would imply that in order to maintain a bond with him after graduation, Karma would have to actively show an interest in connecting with them. In the case of Okuda, he seems to be interested in her enough to look forward to spending more time with her after graduation, as shown in his yearbook message to her stating that his year was made more fun with her around and that he’s looking forward for more.

It seems in each relationship he has, there exists an aspect that makes one distinct from the others. The existence of shared interests and getting along, a sense of comfort and security without fear of being betrayed, the willingness to extend effort in seeing them again, and the extent of being able to express in detail his vulnerabilities and deeper musings seem to be some distinct factors that make up Karma’s quality relationships. While each notable friendship satisfies at least one or two categories, none of them have all four except Okuda. The presence of all these qualities in his relationship with Okuda makes her stand out and have the potential to grow from good mischievous friends to lifetime supportive partners.

In the case of battle compatibility, Okuda may be far from giving Karma direct assistance in the battlefield. However, there’s an angle I wish to discuss that makes me think of how it translates to their compatibility. One scene that oddly stood out for me was during their encounter with delinquents in their Kyoto trip. The delinquents attacked, leaving the boys unconscious, subsequently kidnapping Kayano and Kanzaki. Okuda managed to slip away and hide leaving her to check on the boys when the environment became safe.

Anime: S1 Ep 7 - Okuda reappears apologizing for hiding when the delinquents attacked.

What made this scene interesting is that Okuda could have been kidnapped along with Kayano and Kanzaki and the result would have been the same. The boys could have read the trip manual and called Koro-sensei. Sure enough, Koro-sensei could single-handedly save them once they got to the hideout. It didn’t matter whether one, two, or three unarmed girls got kidnapped. So why paint this scene with her being able to slip away without the delinquents getting a chance to grab her?

My interpretation for this small detail is that Karma doesn’t always have to worry about Okuda. Karma gets into a lot of fights. Even in his future career as a bureaucrat, he will surely get into dangerous situations involving politicians. He has always been the type to be on guard 24/7. Even back when he was comfortable around Nagisa who he believed to be harmless and a good friend, he couldn’t let his guard down. Imagine the stress that burdens his shoulders having to keep his guard up for himself and having to extend that to another person. Wouldn’t that be too much for him to sustain in the long run?

Anime: S2 Ep 18 - The feeling Karma got when Nagisa sneakily poked his back while looking for him in WcDonalds

Anime: S2 Ep 18 - Karma and Nagisa hanging out in the middle of their second year

For someone without exemplary combat abilities like Okuda, slipping away to safety is a smart move. Even at that moment, Karma acknowledged that she did the right thing. Of course we know this is not the type of running away in order to abandon a comrade. I believe it’s safe to claim that nobody in 3-E would truly go that route. What Okuda did was wise and if the scenario were a little different, slipping away could have given her the chance to send support, prepare weapons, and an overall better fighting chance than just standing there frozen or getting herself kidnapped. She slipped away using quick thinking and if you think about it, it takes skill to sneak away unnoticed when both ends of a narrow ally are surrounded by big, menacing delinquents. Her ability to act wisely by herself can definitely be a load off Karma’s chest knowing that the people he cares for can take care of themselves should he be rendered unable to protect them.

Additionally, Okuda’s nature is the type that Karma can trust to be capable enough to protect herself without feeling that she’s a threat to him, something rare among his relationships with other friends. This detail is small and subtle but it hints her potential supportive and reassuring dynamic with Karma wherein Okuda can safely lend background assistance without worrying a combat-ready Karma. As Karma mentions back at her later in the series, running away is also a battle strategy. Whether he learned this technique from Okuda or not is a mystery but I like to think that towards the end of the series and almost a year of trust and friendship, some of Okuda’s traits and mindsets have rubbed off on Karma enough for him to adopt it in his strategies.

Anime: S2 Ep 23 - Karma grabs Okuda’s wrist to get away from danger

For someone as cocky as Karma, being able to pull off a humble-yet-wise move is something noteworthy. This humility could be the mixed influence of Koro-sensei’s care and Okuda’s nature. Not only does Okuda provide a load off his shoulders, she is also capable of bringing new perspectives in solving problems for Karma.

In a long-term relationship, Karma deserves to feel at ease. Whether as a friend or a life partner, he deserves someone he can trust not just in opening up, but also at times when he’s vulnerable. For me, this is something that his dynamic with Okuda can provide. She may not be the best to fight alongside others in the frontline but she can provide background support so Karma can be guaranteed that he is not alone in a fight and he will not be coming home to a lonely place after a fight.

From being an approachable friend that he gets along with to a partner he can trust and be vulnerable around, all these seem to point at a special connection Karma feels around Okuda—enough for her to be just the right support he needs while being able to treat her right. Okuda may not talk or stand out much but Karma seems to see traits in her that make him gravitate towards her with ease. She doesn’t stand out in the general crowd but she stands out for Karma, where her traits are appreciated.

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Notes: I have the tendency to lean towards the less popular ships in Anime (such as Yukihira Souma x Tadakoro Megumi in Shokugeki no Souma) over the obvious ships in the spotlight. I believe it has something to do with my inclination to more mature and supportive relationships that appeal to people in their 20s rather than hormone-induced pairings that sound like high school flings targeted for 14 year old girls. To note, I was at that age once but once you hit your 20s, you realize that some ships are more problematic than you remember. This is my second time watching AC (first time was in 2016) and I honestly don’t recall shipping them back then. I don’t even recall picking up on karumana hints before. But now after rewatching it in my 20s, I find it quite intriguing how I find this couple so cute, while knowing that I’ve grown out of my shoujo manga days. These days, I don’t have tolerance for shoujo-esque ships that are practically “it’s not sexual harassment if he’s hot.” Looking back, a lot of shoujo mangas/anime were like that in my teenage years. While Karma started out with high Marty Stu potential like shoujo main boys, AC developed its characters well such that their characters and future career paths were more realistic—something you come to appreciate as someone who has already gone through their own 7-year timeskip.

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gloomverse-theories · 4 years ago

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Who is Amaryllis?

The first magician in the history of Gloomverse, Amaryllis, is shrouded in mystery. A legend who opened the doors for humankind to a new era: one of magic, and freedom.

However, they have yet to make an appearance in the comic unlike the others, and they have been missing ever since that first accomplishment. In this post, we will try to figure out who could be Amaryllis.

Let’s start with the obvious one and get it out of the way:

Amaryllis is dead.

This one seems logical. It’s been 2000 years since that first feat of magic, and if the strain of parting the Storm didn’t sever them, then time took care of it.

But I have some objections to that.

Mancers seem unaffected by time, and are both ageless and hard to kill. Even Prisma is not completely gone after what the Dark Lord, another mancer, did to her. Unless the same happened to Amaryllis, they are likely still kicking as much as Amadeus, Malus and Hyacinth are.

What if the effort was too much? They were a young teen, a new magician who used magic for the first time in history! They wouldn’t have known about the rules and the risks, and severed themself.

As we have seen with Cakegirl, there’s still a body left after a severing. She’s also (probably) completely intact and not broken like a statue or with huge scars from the blast and the fall.

If Amaryllis had severed, the body would have been preserved! Sure, it could have been lost, but the myth would have more solidity to it if for a time there was a body to call Amaryllis. Oral traditions would pass the word around, and pilgrimage would have taken place, which is something that can be traced with archeology.

My conclusion? Amaryllis is still alive and actively avoided the spotlight. They went into hiding after that first act and remained a legend on purpose.

Amaryllis is Amadeus

We already alluded to that theory in some posts.

In my last point I stated that Amaryllis purposefully remained in the shadows, and… so did the Dark Overlord. Absolutely nothing is mentioned about a fifth mancer in Purple’s book, no name, no deeds, nothing. Yet there was a fifth figure in the illustration of the mancers, and that’s the only proof we have that they exist. The rest of the evidence and records of their existence might have been erased, possibly on purpose, to keep themself out of the spotlight…

But as readers, we have access to more knowledge than Purple. We know that our resident mooching Hobo is also known as Amadeus the Dark Overlord, and that he is undeniably a mancer. In the dream, all of the known mancers were present: Prisma and a younger Amadeus (?) who were the stars of the show, but behind Yellow we also see (who we theorize to be) Malus and Hyacinth rushing towards the temple.

They’re all in the same room! Except one…. Have you ever seen Amaryllis and Amadeus together in the same room? No? Then I rest my case.

More seriously, Yellow calls out a name, but never finishes it. She says “AMA—” before being interrupted/before Rylie wakes up. Coincidentally, both Amadeus and Amaryllis start with “Ama” and we have no way of knowing which one she was saying.

Our one eye witness of the scene didn’t seem to know whether the Dark Lord was a man or a woman, so their look is ambiguous (long dark hair, face obscured, (possibly malnourished) slim body, concealing rags, nothing to indicate a preferred gender presentation). If it hadn’t been that way, we would have been more prone to say “oh he’s a man, so it’s definitely Amadeus / oh she’s a woman, so it’s definitely Amaryllis”.

HOWEVER

That’s only if we assume cisnormativity.

Who’s to say an immortal and powerful being would stay as their assigned gender? Sounds fake.

If one person would get that gender is a social construct that doesn’t really matter, it’s a millenias old hermit with magical power.

Which brings me to this conclusion: Amaryllis and Amadeus are the same person who goes by different names depending on how they’re feeling or what others call them.

Hobo never threw a fit like Rylie about being called by his name, and in that he reminds me of Wander. Embracing the names given to him.

What about the Storm? Amadeus and Amaryllis don’t have the same magical abilities, one works with Darkness and the other deals with the sky. A good point, for which I fortunately have a retort.

Compared to a random magician, mancers have incredible powers and magic potential. This also includes their “magic personality” which is much broader and encompassing than your average magician. Compare Cakegirl who can only create and manipulate cakes and other sweets, to Amadeus who’s domain is darkness and who can presumably create and control everything that relates to it. Your first thought might be that controlling shadows isn’t as all encompassing and powerful as what I’m making it out to be, but I’ll reply that you’re thinking too small. With mancers, the sky's the limit! (pun intended)

Speaking of sky, a storm can count as Darkness, can’t it? It casts an enormous shadow, and if you can manipulate shadows, you could also manipulate what casts it. The Storm also has a color palette reminiscent of the Dark Lord: Red, greys, black… I think there’s a link!

And I’ll end with this:

Amaryllis was the first person to gain magic, and they did so as a child who grew up in caves, unable to go outside because of the raging Storm. Magic is based on your interests, on what you like to do. Would a child have such a love for the Storm depriving them of freedom that their magic would be sky-themed? Or would they resent it for everything they put them through? It’s possible that Amaryllis was indeed fascinated by the Storm and that their sky magic reflects that, but I think it’s also likely that Amaryllis’ magic was not sky magic, but rather shadow magic. They grew up in caves, playing and hiding amongst the omnipresent darkness, and I think it’s more likely that they developed a fondness for this rather than for the storm. Since their first feat of magic was getting rid of the Storm, people remembered them as a sky magician, and they disappeared into the shadow before proving them wrong.

Amaryllis is Yellow

Did that last one seem a bit too far-fetched? Well I’m not done!

Let’s say there IS indeed five mancers, and not actually four.

Amaryllis’ name has been cited in the comic by Cirrus. In Stratoverse, the Sun is revered as a Goddess who gives stratoversians their weather magic and looks after them. This Goddess is known by the name Amaryllis.

Amaryllis is a flower, as most ecoversians are named after a plant, but amarillo is also the color "yellow" in Spanish. Coincidentally, Yellow is both of those. She's originally from Ecoverse as her room indicates (the bed sheet has a Hyacy symbol), and she was briefly in Gloomverse during its foundation as part of Prisma’s entourage. After the events that transpired there, she went to Stratoverse where she is nowadays seen as a Goddess. The grandchildren of the King admire her and the Queen takes orders from her: she’s in a position of power, in the shoes of a leader.

Sidenote: if the theory that Prisma and Yellow were a couple is exact, and that Rylie is their child (or a reincarnation of), then she’s the “daughter” of two mancers and as such, probably dangerous. She’s also Rainbow themed, and what is a rainbow if not the convergence of Sky/Cloud and Light? Rylie Rainbow Mancer Confirmed.

It also makes sense that the weather mancer would find herself in Stratoverse, the cloud kingdom, near the planetary Storm that she cast away many years ago. She may be here because of the Storm, to keep it at bay with the help of other weather magicians. It is said that the closer you are to Stratoverse, the stronger magic potential you have. Coincidentally, Stratoverse is where the discoverer of magic resides. Could she be the source of magic?

However, Yellow has a ladder in her room and likely can’t fly. If she was a weather magician or even a weather mancer like Amaryllis must have been, then she should be able to fly like the other stratoversians. Beside her passive coloration abilities, she doesn’t showcase any magic. Why? Maybe she lost her wand and hat after the events in Gloomverse, maybe she can’t use magic anymore… or maybe she does not have weather magic.

In her room, the bedsheet has a Hyacy symbol which means she’s from Ecoverse, but AFTER the revolution of Malus and subsequent peace of Hyacinth. Unless the 500 years old Yellow really liked Hyacy ideology yet didn’t feel the need to intervene during the slavery, the revolution or the restoration, it’s safe to say that she wasn’t alive at the time and grew up during a period where it was already an established religion.

Purple also says that the Colors were a Mancer’s servant and even if “servant” may not be entirely accurate, Prisma still seems to be in charge. If Yellow were a mancer, would she still be “Yellow”? Being a Color puts you under the authority of Prisma, if she truly was a Mancer (and an older one than Prisma) why would she become one of her followers and not an equal? I can see two ways out of this. Either Yellow is indeed a mancer and wanted to have her abilities enhanced by Prisma via Colorification, or Yellow is not the original Amaryllis, but a reincarnation who became a Color before getting magic/figuring out her powers.

Between those two, Yellow being a reincarnation is more convincing. However we don’t know what are the consequences of becoming a “Color”, and if Yellow being a mancer would affect this in anyway. Since Harold’s and Purple’s “color palette switch” happened when they got their magic, we can theorize that Yellow became a color when she got her magic. How did it affect her powers? It’s unclear, but like I said before, Yellow can’t fly and likely can’t use other forms of magic. Prisma “gave” her magic (like Hobo did for Harold) but maybe also took its real version away? Prisma had the power of another mancer under her control, which could explain why she had to be taken down.

While Yellow = Amaryllis is a very interesting theory, I believe that Yellow being Amaryllis is a red herring.

She literally denies being a goddess to the Stratoversian children who believe her to be Amaryllis.

Amaryllis is Rylie

I mentioned in the last one that Amaryllis may have “reincarnated” or something of the sort in Yellow. It’s unclear if there IS a reincarnation mess in gloomverse, but the whole Color thing makes it seem plausible. It also explains why Amaryllis didn’t do anything when human rights were being violated: they weren’t there anymore.

Why Rylie though? Isn’t Yellow a much likelier Amaryllis? Well, my dear conspirator, this theory also explains why Yellow wants her dead.

Let’s go over the evidence!

Rylie’s magic is very air-themed: she has blue boots that make her fly and yellow gloves that make others fly (Cakegirl got to fly thanks to the AIR PUNCH Rylie gave her). Both of her altered hats have a little wing as decoration and her wand is composed of two clouds (and a rainbow) which are sky symbols.

We also know that Amadeus and everyone else involved in this shebang didn’t want Rylie to get magic. Why not? Magic is supposedly based on someone’s interest, so her getting magic when she was obsessed with unicron the unicorn would have resulted in a non-threatening magic. It seems they were more worried about her potential than what kind of magic she would get, though Hobo looked like he recognised her wand/power when she used them during the camp out.

Everyone looked away. He did not.

Rylie’s magic is sky themed, and her potential was frightening enough that Amadeus tried to keep magic away from her. That sounds like a (sky) mancer to me.

During her dreams (specifically Hereafter) she is often seen in a cloudy landscape, walking on clouds in an open sky with no lands beneath. The clouds take her where she wants to go, they obey her instinctually.

And where does she want to go? To a cave, similar to the ones early humans might have lived in, maybe the cave the original Amaryllis lived in? The scene she sees inside possibly comes from either Prisma, Yellow or the baby, but the outside must come from Amaryllis, or an equally old mancer.

Now here comes the fun part. Why did Yellow ask Virga to kill Rylie? Why did Amadeus keep her magic away from her for so long?

Because Rylie is Amaryllis. A Sky mancer with the Storm, the deadliest phenomenon to exist on the planet, under her control. What would happen if an inexperienced magician accidentally unleashed their power? What if the Storm came back and sent all of humanity in a dark age?

Well… what if it had already happened once before?

In his book, Purple mentions “The Return” but never explains what it is for legal reasons. We believe that the “return” that drastically changed stratoverse’s society was the return of the Storm.

Amaryllis was the only one who could control the Storm, but they disappeared for centuries, and had no reasons to make it return.

Which is why I think it was an accident. A newly reincarnated Amaryllis would not be aware of the scope of their power. Like Wallis showed us, magic tends to go wild when a powerful magician is feeling… strong emotions. Sadly that magical outburst affected a lot more people and threatened all of Stratoverse. It seems like people don’t want that to happen ever again.

It may seem harsh to kill Amaryllis and all of their reincarnation, but the fate of the world is in the balance. Yellow has shown with Stratoverse’s system that she cares more about the greater good than for the individuals. What’s one person in the grand scheme of things? Not much. It’s a trolley problem, really. Except you either kill one person every time they reincarnate, or risk dooming the entirety of humanity. Would you be willing to take that risk? Yellow isn’t.

Amadeus has tried a more peaceful way of resolving this conundrum: no hat, no magic, no problem! Alas Cakegirl forced his hand, and now he is keeping a close watch on Rylie. He won’t let it happen again.

One thing doesn’t hold up. Amaryllis is seen as a Sun God, as a personification of the Sun. Not as a sky mancer. Even though the sun is in the sky, it’s much more related to Light, to Prisma, to Yellow. Everyone is quick to assume that she IS Amaryllis, but in this theory, she would be usurping this name to get her ways. I don’t know if Virga would be aware of that, or if she’s going to find out that Yellow lied to her and ordered the death of her goddess. Wouldn’t that be fun :3

One last thing: AmaRYLLIS => AmaRYLIE

Amaryllis is Ylil

I know that it sounds crazy. Ylil is an inversian and she doesn’t even have magic. What sort of proof could I possibly have? Just one. Amaryllises the flowers are closely related to lillies. Lilly…. or should I say Yllil?

That’s it, that’s the theory.

More seriously, while they may not be Ylil, it is possible that Amaryllis lives in Inverse. Maybe not as an official resident or maybe not currently, but them retiring from the world by living in Inverse when all the other events went down would make sense. It would explain their lack of intervention or relevance.

Inversian eyes can only support blues because the color of the sky is the only one that can not be blocked. The sky, the weather, they cannot be blocked. They’re the only ones allowed. The only magician to be tolerated in Inverse is the sky magician.

Thematically, Amaryllis relates more closely to Inverse than to Stratoverse.

Important event marked by a discovery? Check

Retiring from the world to get away from magicians? Check

Only like the sky? Check

Very secretive? Check

Instead of Amaryllis=Stratoverse and Prisma/Amadeus=Inverse/Gloomverse, I think we have Amaryllis=Inverse, Prisma=Stratoverse and Amadeus=Gloomverse.

Amaryllis is… someone else

Sometimes people exist to add flavour but end up not being relevant and that’s okay.

It’s not. I’m a conspiracy theorist. Everything MUST be linked.

The end.

TL;DR

Amaryllis diseappeared on purpose, either by fleeing to inverse, staying in the shadows or going by a different name and face. While Yellow is a convincing Amaryllis at first glance, some stuff doesn’t hold up. Amadeus and Amaryllis are linked, if not the same person. It’s possible that Amaryllis reincarnated, perhaps in Rylie, and is a danger to humanity because of their control of the Storm.

#gloomverse theories #gloomverse #mod green #gv #amadeus #amaryllis #mancers #rylie #yellow #well that was long #also i came up with TWO MORE theories while writing this post #sooooo #welp #guess there's gonna be some more posts soon

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synthmusic91 · 3 years ago

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thoughts? kjfhlkjdfh asking bc i rb'd the original post from u a bit ago because i agreed w/ original poster but i just saw this rb of it and wanted to know what u thought. ciaran(.)tumblr(.)com /post/652413157345820673/there-is-a-genre-of-posts-thats-obsessed-with-the

well first of all i hope this isn't a bait ask. this reply really doesn't deserve the time and effort i put into refuting it, but there was a point in time when i was emotionally confused by these..."arguments", so whoever u are, anon, i hope this is helpful. i also recommend some distance - literally, "go outside and touch grass", which is a lot more difficult than it sounds, but it needs to be done. anyway, here's my "analysis":

for context, here's what the post in question said:

and the tags:

at a high level, we can see that what ciaran is saying doesn't really respond to what OP was talking about. for this reason, i'm not going to bring in much of what OP said, because it's uncontested in this context, and look at ciaran's reply. i'll try to break this up...

EDIT: i had a long-ass response here, but then i realized it was dumb because the source material is dumb. i cut out most of it, but here are the highlights.

"there is a genre of posts that’s obsessed with the notion that fandom is something much larger, more prevalent, and more able to affect the way media is processed and consumed, than it actually is in reality."

so, as we can all see on tiktok and, indeed, on the electronic lore olympus billboard that takes up a side of a literal skyscraper, fandom is no longer the niche thing that "fandom olds" make it out to be. also, we can't ignore how many (white) fandom players go on and work in the industry (cassandra clare, whoever wrote 50 shades, man idk much of anything so there's probably many more). so this comment is sort of myopic. and since this is what characterizes the rest of the reply, well...it's not great.

also don't look up lore olympus; it's basically a dd/////lg fanfic that happens to be one of the most popular series on the line webtoon app, which is rated for teens...and for $1 to the creator's patreon, you can view not sfw p*dophilic art, so. also obviously i didnt do that; there was a video essay about this. i can't find it though

"ironically but understandably, these posts are made by people who are so terminally fandom-poisoned that they ascribe phenomenal power to it, and think of it as some great evil that must be defeated (by making posts on tumblr, which is obviously a very influential thing to do)"

"fandom-poisoned" is such a nebulous term, especially since it appears to mean "has had some really significant, (in this context) bad experiences with fandom." this is, first of all, a huge assumption to make about a stranger, and second, not the own they think it is. i'm just going to link this post, and hopefully you can see how it relates.

anyway, the "making posts on tumblr is meaningless" is um...interesting, seeing as off the top of my head i can think of two very influential tumblr blogs that talk about really important issues, Gradient Lair and Red Light Politics. I don't know as much about Red Light Politics, but Gradient Lair is frequently cited by academics (not getting into academia nonsense now but... -_-). also, they sound more pissed that the original post did gain traction, but whatever. this paragraph doesn't really make sense, but nothing here does, because i wasn't given much to work with.

"...and then because these people have basically no imagination and unfailingly pick on others for their own faults, they project their own experiences on everyone they perceive as being more ‘in fandom’ than them,"

jesus christ. i'm going not say anything about the tone of this because i put too much effort into this for some rando to call me a cyberbully.

i think what they're thinking about is how there appear to be some "fandom critical" people who try to, holistically, "ruin everyone's good time" by "stirring up drama" about popular fandom artists/writers/whoever else idk. oftentimes these people will also make jokes about fandom whatever, seemingly picking on random people's interests.

however, if you look at the long history of fandom racism, fandom's normalization of p*dophilia, and even general fandom harassment, and then you look at fandom's visceral, unwarranted reaction to criticism regarding these things, you can quickly see that disillusionment towards fandom is entirely reasonable. as for the joking, well...this an oversimplification but not everyone needs to like what you like. it sounds like they just need to get over themself.

and go “You, a 27 year old queer blogger who is into [tv show/anime/movie] an embarrassing amount, are now going to be the face of Capitalism” with no self-reflection or critical thought given to how fucking cringe it is-"

so, i'm regretting putting so much effort into this because this is so fucking long and i have to analyze this nonsense...it feels like i'm back in my feminist thought class. nightmarish. but anyway, this seems to deal with- [CUT FOR LENGTH. nothing important was missed].

EDIT 2: actually here's a summary of what I had. it deserves better than to be a response to this nonsense, but first it detailed how this took 1. the op's post and 2. a comment that we don't even know if op agreed with and misinterpreted that, and threw quite a fit about this- and i hate to say this because this term is misused so often by redditors, but- strawman.

I then went on to discuss how, for example, PoC can uphold systems of white supremacy. while obviously no person of color is going to be the "face" of white supremacy, the discussion still needs to be had, especially within that group. similarly, while fandom constituents may not be the face of capitalism, there needs to be a discussion, within fandom, on how they support and are defined by capitalist (and other) systems.

it was really too good of a point to be making for this trash reply. I could go say more, but I'm still trying to stay on topic, unlike ciaran.

"to act like random people on the internet, end users with no influence over corporate decisions, are the ones personally responsible for the fact that late-stage capitalism has destroyed popular art and culture in an increasingly sordid attempt to make money."

we've been over the "no influence" bit - because in fact fans do have influence, especially since media creators are literally fans, etc etc. i'm tired of people acting like they have no power and using that as an excuse to support and perpetuate harmful, easily avoidable behavior.

also, to act like the nebulous system of late-stage capitalism is the only cause of bad media is ludicrous. first of all, someone has to make these so-called "corporate decisions", and the people making artistic decisions are, again, overwhelmingly members of "fandom." this comment is really trying to keep marvel trash and lore olympus-esque nonsense in the same atomic, indivisible category lest someone catches a whiff of nuance.

"the above post is a great example of this phenomenon because op admits freely that they only think fandom is destroying media because they have been spending more time in fandom and thus have an over-inflated sense of its importance in greater culture. posting your own Ls indeed."

i'm so tired. this person literally has 120 works on ao3 like...who is spending more time in fandom.

and the tags:

#i assure you that fandom has no bearing on my actual real life #and if it does on yours. then that is your problem #it's also a very funny problem to

now this is just egregiously tone deaf. you do not need to do more than a cursory google search to find a bottomless well of examples of fandom harassment, threats, doxxing, and violence, much of which is racially motivated. you can see why it would be bad to make fun of this.

also the way that “fandom has no bearing on their actual real life“...120 fanfics on ao3. 120.

conclusion:

the reply clearly misinterprets of op's point, and as such, does not refute it. they responded to another issue altogether, which is that of the sanctity of their ~coping mechanism~ or whatever it is. their argument in this respect was, in my opinion, delusional and pathetic, especially given that they wrote it on someone else's unrelated post.

FINAL NOTE: i cut out lots of this because the reply went in so many different directions, so some stuff might not make sense. let me know if you have any questions.

#answered #anonymous #fandom #long post #q slur #s

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awsugar · 4 years ago

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Someone sent you an anon like two days ago I think asking you why you were so sure franks in love with g and u said you were going to answer it later......... the people want to know........ 👉👈👉👈

hmmmm ok. where to even begin. this is already getting so long so i’m putting it under a cut. you asked for it!!! sorry!

in this interview (its the first question) frank talks about the beginning of the band and the beginning of his relationship with jamia. disclaimer by the way: this is the only like. instance that i’ll discuss her. and it’s not even her it’s my perception of their relationship. she doesn’t want to be in the spotlight and he doesn’t want her to be either, i respect that. but it inevitably comes up with the frerard stuff, “well he was with jamia” so i have to address it to answer this fully. he says that he was sure that he loved her from the beginning but being on tour and stuff your paths don’t always fit together perfectly, and they shift and that sometimes you have to experience life before you can be together. i’m paraphrasing. basically i interpret this as meaning they were in some kind of open relationship and that frank was in a position to potentially develop feelings for someone else as well. this is all talked about in the context of the song all i want is nothing which has the line “wasted time with a crooked spine when i really should have spent my time with you”. so like. we KNOW that there was someone else and that it coincided with the band being on tour. the logical explanation to me is that it would have been someone he was on tour with. you can’t really have a side chick while you’re on tour unless she’s on tour with you lol. so right off the bat gerard is a possibility to me. but mainly this interview says to me that they were open or seeing other people.

this is a screenshot from the FT Willz myspace:

he lists himself as a swinger. the basic definition of swinging is just swapping sex partners but it adds to the non-monogamous theory.

something that definitely proves to me that they had something going on is the kiss on conan. i don’t take any of the “stage gay” as proof of their “relationship” for lack of a better word. it was really performative for the most part, i’ll fully admit that. but this one is different. it’s not during a song it’s not the heat of the moment (as they’ve cited as a reason for it in the past) they’re not doing it for an audience, conan had literally just cut to commercial, no one was supposed to see it and frank just turns around and grabs gerard’s face and kisses him. it’s an action that reeks of comfort and familiarity. there’s no way that was their first kiss. so like. stuff like that was going on behind the scenes clearly.

i know i said i don’t care about stage gay but frank’s reaction to some of it is telling to me. we’ve been over it a millions times but The Kiss™(1:44). the way frank reacts to it drives me so crazy. the way he drops his guitar to wrap his arms around him like he can’t help himself. it’s just definitely the actions of someone who has feelings to me.

another thing for me is just. the way frank looks at him and talks about him. i’m not going to link sources on that cause i think everyone knows what i mean. frank thinks gerard is the funniest, most brilliant, talented person he’s ever met it’s so CLEAR. it speaks volumes.

i think i may need to go into my theories on what went down. thankfully i answered this on my other blog in the past. this ask is mainly about my thoughts on the fight but i go into a bunch of stuff on what i thought was going down. after projekt rev is when i think everything stopped, whatever it was that was going on. another ask on what i think happened.

so that’s all nice and good but a big part of why i’m sure frank was in love with him is solo lyrics.

i’m not going to do a full millions breakdown here because i have in the past. if you’re actually curious about all this i suggest reading that post because it just says so much in one song, whereas frank’s lyrics about the situation are really spread out over different songs. gerard has said the song is about the end of the band but there’s also a lot of lyrics in their that are about an unrequited relationship. “you don’t understand we don’t hold hands” sounds SO directed at frank, who was in love with gerard and thought he could have both jamia and gerard and gerard was just like...no.

a big part of it to me is that it seems like they’re writing their two sides of the same story. gerard says “you don’t understand we don’t hold hands” “i think you’re sore i think i’m done” the william it was really nothing reference. frank says “someone i love threw me away” (also related to the end of the band, frank took it extremely hard and the fact that he was in love with gerard probably made it worse, made it feel like gerard was doing away with him, he probably took it extremely personally) “i’m not what you wanted”. there are a lot of other lyrics i think are about gerard but those specifically seem like different sides of the same coin, the juxtaposition between frank and gerards lyrics on both of their first solo albums.

i don’t know if i’ve done a good job at explaining my viewpoint here. i think part of it is that i’ve been around for so long and i’ve watched it all go down and i’ve come to my conclusions. the solo lyrics (of which there are MANY more) solidified it all for me. there’s no denying that frank was in love with someone other than jamia with whom it didnt work out. i think it was gerard based on the other sutff i’ve said here.

#frerard #anonymous #answered

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ilovetragedies · 4 years ago

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On the origins of Vision: an analysis of WandaVision and its application of real-world science.

[This post contains WandaVision spoilers and some science jargon. It’s also kinda long coz I got excited. You have been warned.]

The law of conservation of matter states that in any given system (that is closed to the transfer of matter), the amount of matter in that system stays constant. This suggests that matter, same as energy, cannot be created nor destroyed, only transformed or altered.

We see this in action during Episode 5, when Monica discovers that her funky pants where actually 80% Kelvar, the very same material her bulletproof vest was made of prior to her Hex entry. (In a non-science context, it’s akin to how “sorry” and “désolé” have the same underlying meaning despite having different outward forms, especially when you travel from one border to another.)

In this example, Wanda’s power is thus implied to be a form of “Transformation”—a drastic change in phenotype, but otherwise retaining an object’s original genotype or core internal code (ie. DNA).

HOWEVER, this principle is contested in several episodes.

The (sudden) birth of the twins, Billy and Tommy, in Episode 4, leans towards “creation” rather than transformation—though more popular theories suggest that they are actual pieces of Mephisto’s soul, which Wanda was able to manipulate and “transform” to her will. Demon spawn, indeed. (How/why Mephisto is even inside the Hex is another question all together).

The appearance of Fietro at the end of Episode 5 is another example, but Agnes/Agatha Harkness debunks this in Episode 8, explaining that he was a “crystalline possession”—which insinuates Fietro as a visual/auditory/tactile hallucination, as compared with Agatha’s “transmutation” spell, which she also demonstrates by transforming a cicadian into a bird and vice versa.

So far, so good.

But then, there’s Vision.

Two Visions.

Particularly, Hex Vision, who sprouted from Wanda’s red power flare like the goddess Athena from Zeus’ own brow.

In Episode 6, Darcy discovers D@ckwad—ehem—Hayward tracking Hex Vision via decaying signatures of vibranium. Together with that traumatizing scene of Vision slowly being torn apart when he left the Hex, this implies that Hex Vision has a true physical form, subject to natural forces. (Maybe.)

Since it is unlikely that Hex Vision has the same origins (baby daddy) as the twins, and unless there was a secret stash of very expensive vibranium in Westview, this again leans towards more on the “creation” side of the spectrum, contrary to all other examples we’ve cited thus far. Right?

So how do we even begin to explain Hex Vision’s existence?

Well...

Remember how the law assumes a closed system, in which matter simply cannot be created (or destroyed) inside it?

But “closed” does not mean that objects and people cannot ENTER that system (Hex, in this case), setting a new equilibrium of matter that can be transformed to Wanda’s will. We’ve seen this with Monica, Darcy, the drone/helicopter, the agent/bee-keeper, most of SWORD/biggest clown circus ever—watch the end of Episode 6 for reference.

White Vision’s rebirth as a soul-less synthezoid removes him as a possible source of Hex Vision’s vibranium skeleton. And again, unless the quiet town of Westview is secretly Wakanda 2.0 (LOL), there’s a distinct lack of 3 billions worth of highly coveted material to make Hex Vision a reality—

Which (conveniently) brings us to the next plausible explanation:

The Multiverse.

Am I proposing that Wanda inadvertently stole/“transferred” another reality’s Vision to become her fantasy hubby/adoptive father of her devil-born children (perhaps another reason why Hex Vision has absolutely NO memory of his life before Westview)?

Am I saying that Wanda, with the sheer power of her chaos magic/energy, was able to open a tear in the fabric of time and space, the magnitude of which only previously seen with now atomized infinity stones (which, coincidentally, is the source of her powers)?

From what we’ve seen in the depictions in Dr. Strange and Endgame, the idea of the multiverse becoming an integral part of the MCU is more and more likely rather than not.

Thus, “spontaneous creation” becomes a misnomer, pointing instead to “matter transference and transformation across the multiverse”. (Which, frankly, doesn’t sound as catchy. So for now, “spontaneous creation” it is.)

As the MCU has yet to divulge its secrets, it is certainly understandable why this phenomenon is described as such—anyone would automatically think “creation” when seeing something appear from seemingly nothing after all.

In conclusion, it can be said the MCU is somewhat grounded in the laws of physics and chemistry, with evidence suggesting that Hex Vision as originating from another reality, and most importantly,

Wanda Maximoff is among the MOST POWERFUL characters across the WHOLE MCU multiverse.

#wandavision #wanda and vision #wanda maximoff #vision #law of conservation #marvel #marvel cinematic universe #the multiverse #thank you for coming to my TedTalk

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vynnyal · 5 years ago

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Throwing random thoughts, headcanons, and a variety of pasta at the wall (but only those having to do with vessels and/or their biology this time): The Thrilling Third Installment™

...aka pretending i can be dark and dramatic jskhdfd

Thk's larger form is not the standard, but the exception. Thk was cited as being "raised and trained to prime form", which people take to mean pk assisted in the vessel's natural growth. However, that conclusion leaves a lot of unanswered questions, most important of which being “then what about Ghost?” In short, I think that train of thought is backwards. Vessels can't grow- they are ageless, and immortal. We know this due to Ghost, despite living as long if not longer than thk, being completely unchanged over the years. The only thing pk trained into "prime form" was thk’s mind and fighting prowess. Their body... well, I think it was mutated. Most likely either directly by pk, or ordered by him- and with the shenanigans happening over in the sanctum, I wouldn't be surprised if Soul was involved, too. In any case, it was in no means natural. Vessels are corpses reanimated by void; neither corpses nor void tend to make drastic changes on their own all that often. Whether pk predicted the vessel’s “issues” and intended to manually “upgrade” them from the beginning, it's hard to say. But... yeah. Unless Ghost goes out of their way to make themselves grow- if its even possible, now that pk is gone- its fairly safe to say, they never will.

...with that in mind, we are promptly gonna ignore that for the rest of this post lmaooo

Grown-up vessels wouldn't look like thk; while they are described as being raised into "prime form"... prime form, to whom? Rather than looking like an idealized pk soldier, it sounds much more fitting that they’d have an entirely different, natural adult form. Consider: their cloaks being longer and fuller, perhaps filling out into something with a more practical use to their “species”. Better yet, they could even grow up to be more beast-like. Feral vessels, YEhaW

The black egg temple is cited as being "built to sustain [vessels]", yet it can't be their lifespan that is sustained. Rather, it seems the egg is specifically designed to keep the radiance from tearing thk apart, physically and/or mentally. Ngl its p obvious, but worth noting.

Sorta-au where Ghost’s shade has 8 eyes, and/or is generally all-around more cryptid-looking.

@ the sharpshadow charm and the strange, 6-eyed creature their shade turns into: kudos to this post, they bring up something super interesting- the creature not only resembles the Shade Lord, but the lord outright becomes it during the Embrace the Void cutscene.

makes me respect the ol’ civilization a whole lot more if a single charm can turn a baby shade into a baby lord.

The concept of finding ghosts unconscious body, laying next to a corpse, while they battle in their dreams. Alt: when ghost enters the dream realm, their shade leaves their shell... And protects their body from harm.

If steel soul mode is taken as canon, just how did ghost and the shade meet? Alt: Ghost may never have “met” it at all, as it technically doesn’t exist in that mode- instead, its more of a metaphor than an actual entity.

What the vessels looked like- or were supposed to look like- before the void. Alt: a story following a child, alive and untouched, that somehow managed to be spared. They could even have a gender. Alt alt: the void intentionally spared them for some purpose, or even out of simple kindness- or at least, something that resembles kindness.

Re: the shade inexplicably having a nail: all the vessel's swords are crafted from “will-bearing rock”- of which i’ve come to lovingly call living stone- and as such, are of void themselves. That's how the shade seems to conjure up its own copy; it merely shapes it, from the ground, using void. And, while more of a stretch, Ghost’s nail being some sort of living stone/pale ore alloy could explain just how Ghost can do seemingly pretty crazy things with an otherwise ordinary nail. Better, while 100% a baseless hc, its material might actually enable Ghost to build it up and modify it to suite their size as they grow older. finally, a logical reason adult Ghost has an adult-sized nail-claymore. hdsfghjfghdsjf

On that same thought: Ghost outright invented the "art" of manipulating- or creating- living stone to make their nail. ...gimme a sec. The other escaped vessels have nails, too, right? Either meaning they also discovered this ability... or that theres some legitimate ground for the “vessel gang” hc. Or, yanno, i’m reading too much into Ari’s sprites but sHHhh

How did all the vessels know to race to the top? They seemed to be falling merely because they had just been born and had literal, actual baby strength; yet not only did they inexplicably risk everything competing to the top, they somehow knew death was waiting if they lost. Alt: pk just, bringing a fucking megaphone and telling them like a sports announcer.

What if Ghost made it, and instead of falling, they managed to joined thk at the lip? What would pk do? Push them off the edge??? Or just adopt them both?? Oh fuck au where they're raised as twin sacrifices. Or worse yet, they’re raised unequally, and one is trained only as an afterthought. As a backup.

Alternatively, pk keeps all the vessels au, only a few years later when they're grown. Pk now has a literal army of pure knights. Radiance is fucked.

Hm. If vessels were fully coherent entities from the moment of birth, why was there a crib in the white palace? Did... did they use it? I have a feeling team cherry made that asset before the abyss scene lmaooo alt: they did, uh, use the crib. Cue a very awkward scene of thk, clearly not a normal baby, staring at wl with like... idk, the poofy baby hat and pacifier. I can’t tell if the image is more funny or more sad rn shdfgfjsdgg

The og notes that inspired this post, in case my rambling makes more sense (and w/o the awful comic hjsfgjsdfhj): Oh oh OH i GET it now. The void is all about "will" and whatnot, right? And shades are "fragments of a lingering will"- will, like the one you leave after your death, but instead of inheritance its the vessels' desires...last regrets.... DAMN team cherry, that symbolism is clever as heck. That took me a while. Kinda funny how a will is, technically, a person's last regrets Like I knew they were last regrets but I didn't understand WHY. Duh, it's because they're literally Made Of Will. They are the vessel's "wills". I'm so stupid.

Ghost, walking thru the abyss, getting increasingly fed up / freaked out, ducking into a crack in the wall. They follow the crack into the Scream Chamber, pause, then exhale in relief that this was EXACTLY what they needed.

Ghost's shade rolling up its void-sleeves like “fuck it, ima defeat thk myself”

Why was thk's sword there? Was its pedestal decayed? Did it fall from their body? Was it place there as an afterthought, or hurriedly? alt: taking thk's sword before freeing them, but doing the mom thing like you're grounding them hdhfjchjch

I can’t believe it just occured to me now, but... as objectivley stupid as the vessel’s test was, Ghost... technically came in second place. What if that whole scene was a metaphor? Because really, it’s just too silly to take seriously. To do so isn’t too far fetched, either; many other elements in the game’s story are better taken as symbolic or metaphorical, anyways. Take the PoP cutscene- while it could’ve been a literal moment, where they just happened to find themselves standing around and took the moment to appreciate each other... imo it makes much more sense to read it as the concept of their faint ~forbidden love~ and parental pride itself. Or, better yet, the scene at the end of the 4th pantheon. Sorry, but I severely doubt that was an actual event. What I’m trying to get at is the significance of “second place” in the cutscene. My brain is too fried to chase down any other possible connections to this theme rn (if thats even what the theme is), but even without proof, the theory smooths out a few interesting tidbits related to just how Ghost could tough it out when all others failed. All except for #1, anyway. Either way I’m just happy to take this as an excuse to pretend that cutscene didn’t literally happen because like, l m a o

The story of a small group of vessels as they work together to escape hallownest. (aka the aforementioned vessel gang hc... im sure theres a more formal name but you get the idea). Its impossible to tell how long it took them to discover that near-invisible hole, the last exit remaining after the king ordered the abyss to be sealed up. Once they did, however, the remaining vessels were quick to make a desperate scramble to escape- only for the entrance to suddenly crumble shut, far, far too soon. The remaining 8 slowly made their way through deepnest, their numbers quickly dwindling as the jouney started to take its toll. The group was nearly wiped out by those terrible, spiney-legged creatures that used their own kinship against them. Only three finally escaped the deep, yet only two made it through the basin- the third, largest sibling, left to fight alone againt a hopeless battle, just to buy the others time. It was in greenpath, so close yet so far to their goal, that the second succumbed to the infection. It was a mercy killing, that nail through the heart. The last, after all of that, finally made their way to the very precipice of howling cliffs, hesitating for just a moment to gaze out upon the still-fresh ruins of hallownest. But only for a moment, before Ghost jumps down to begin their journey beyond this wretched place.

A vessel running from its shade as it tirelessly pursues them, the vessel refusing to put it to rest.

tw: suicide, + personal on main

Ugh ugh ugh ugh Either thk was fully conscious and in terrible pain for all those years... or they couldn’t feel anything at all. The former is horrible, but imagining thk waking up, chained, unable to do anything but wait for Ghost to heed their call? Did they turn their nail on themselves to help Ghost, end the pain, or some awful mix of both? For someone who has personally dealt with close friends and family that struggled with suicide themselves, hollowknight is one of the worst horror stories I've ever seen. And the fact that the story is so personal, so open to interpretation? The fact that each character is so genuine yet vague enough to be read completely differently to someone else’s biases? Its why hollow knight- the game, and the character- will forever be one of the most powerful stories to me.

in short, good LORD THIS GAME IS SO FUCKING SAD

#hollow knight #Thonking abt hollowknight #blabbing.txt #i should probably proof-read this.... uuuaaaah #anyways #@ that last one: i had to take a week-long break after tiso died. so like. you can imagine my reaction to thk #other than that some of these are VERY OLD #and dsfhhfdj the test one literally just occurred to me #sweet catharsis.... fuck you pk....#also.... yeah. vessels have a p bad time all considered #ghost is like 'i know i look 7 but im actually 1000 years old!'#then hornet punts them into the sun #OH WHAUFHDFKJ

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roseglimmerofhope · 3 years ago

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ᴛɪᴛʟᴇ: English-APP Reading Record (September 14 - September 23)

UNIT 1 : The Nature of Academic Text

In this unit I have learned further knowledge about the Nature of Academic Text. To be honest, I had no idea what an academic text was at first, but thanks to our teacher who elaborate and make me understand what is the purpose for us to learn this lesson. So, according to what I've learned, academic text are specialist texts authored by skilled experts in the given field and they uses formal language. When we say formal, we're not referring to our everyday conversations. In academic writing for example the word didn't, we are obligated to write the two words did not instead of didn't. Academic text also delivers facts rather than our opinions, and it is technical since certain terms or phrases are required for a certain discipline. Another example is when we talk about the word train, it's meaning is strengthening or improving our skills, while another meaning of this is a kind of rail transportation. I also learned the IMRAD structure, which is very familiar to me due to our research subject. IMRAD stands for introduction, method, result, and discussion. The introduction states the issue that what was asked, the method that refers the used in study, the conclusion that what was discovered, and the interpretation of what the findings signify. We've also discussed the primary disciplines and their sub-disciplines, which include here the business, humanities, natural and applied sciences and social sciences. Business for those students like me who choose the ABM strand. Under the business we have accountancy, management, finance, marketing economics, and other fields relating to business ethics that fall under the ABM thread. These are the knowledge that I have learn in this unit. In addition, I now know how to analyze a text and able to figure out the different structures of an academic text.

UNIT 2 : THESIS AND OUTLINING

In this unit I have learned, that a thesis statement is like a roadway map for us readers. It tells us where our essay is about to go. It helps us to guide our ideas. The thesis statement is not only stated a topic, it states the main idea and it reflects our own opinions or our judgement towards about what we've read or in any of our personal experiences. It is comprehensible and expressive most importantly it is base on facts. I also learn that if I will make a thesis statement my thesis statement should be broad enough and will make an appeal or impact to my readers or to my audience and also specific enough for me to narrow it and I will be able to focus on the main points of the details in my argument. I must also have a back up with doing research or seeking information and gather them all with evidences to stand my statement. In this way I can be assure that my thesis statement will be a debatable and base on facts. On the other hand outlining is one of my favourite part of this unit the reason is that because of this I was able to get all of my ideas well organized before I start writing in the actual paper. This helps me to ensure my ideas are clear and connected to each other. My arguments are supported with evidences and I am writing in coherent manner.

UNIT 3 : SUMMARISING

One of the most crucial aspects of summarizing is that we must extract the key events or ideas from the source or in a specific paragraph and put them in our own words. In a nutshell, a summary is nothing more than an abstraction of the original text. It should be kept short and simple because we are only required to cite the main ideas. I used to think that summarizing was simple, but I was mistaken. I need to have a good reading comprehension and a thorough understanding of the entire text in order for me to grasp the important elements. Example of this is when you're telling a long narrative to your friend, but you only retelling the important details to keep the story short and much understandable. When we summarize a text or a paragraph, we must know how to recognize the major ideas, key facts, and supporting details, just like when we are writing an essay or a research paper. Using a single word makes our summary more clear and understandable at the same time. When we say we should use our own words, it doesn't mean that we should analyze and interpret the content according to our own understanding but instead, we should make our own summary sound like an independent piece without incorporating any form of misinterpretation. One thing I've learned is that we need to keep our summaries brief. Because a summary is short, we should be able to avoid repeating ideas while we are writing. This will maintain the flow of our summarized, and coherence is also a key feature. Even if we simply choose the most important points, we should ensure that our summary should be concise and well-organized.

UNIT 4 : PARAPHRASING

This unit has taught me more about paraphrasing. According to what I've learned, paraphrase is the process of rephrasing someone else's work or thoughts into our own words while maintaining the same level of the details. I've noticed that in academic writing, it's usually better to paraphrase rather than restate because it shows that we've read the source and able to understand it, makes our work more authentic, and improves our ability to communicate information. It is disadvantage for me also to take notes before I start paraphrasing for me to be able to create a good paraphrase. I have also learn the techniques in written sources. I recommend that we should be carefully read the original material to ensure that we thoroughly get to understand the text, and then after that we will establish the connections between the given text's concepts and our own ideas. Paraphrasing can truly assist us in putting the concepts of the text into our own words. In addition, I've learned also that paraphrasing is useful when we want to use someone else's notion to support our own ideas, but we shouldn't use their exact words if we want to clarify an author's idea to the readers and most importantly to ourselves.

UNIT 5 : CITING SOURCES

In this unit, I have learned further knowledge about the citing sources and it's importance. As I start my junior highschool life I remember how I usually experience being lazy and irresponsible student everytime our English teacher will gives us a task to do writing essays. Because of my laziness I tend to search and copy someone's else work online, in short I owned it without giving credits to the writer or author of that work. I didn't have any idea that time that it is a serious offense. In my own understanding to cite refers to the process of documenting and identifying the sources that we utilized in a piece of writing. We need to show where we found the information we used. It does not matter what or which type of source it is, whether hard copies or online, or whether it is an image we must do responsibilities to cite and credit the sources. We may commit plagiarism or copying the work of others without proper attribution and if we take someone's idea or information without properly crediting and acknowledging them. Another reason that we must cite the sources is so that our viewers or readers may get the information they need for their own usage and verify that our work is authentic. Citing sources has benefits, such as increasing our implausibility for ourselves and also in our works. It also protects us from plagiarizing. I realize now and regretted my past actions it is really wrong to steal someone's work without indicating its source or without their permission. I should motivate myself that time to do it on my own capability and I should think the efforts and struggle of that author for him/her to be able to finish that work. It is critical that we should aware of and follow these kind of principles. By this we can demonstrate that we appreciate and respect the owner's intellectual property rights by citing their works. For those students like me let's motivate ourselves to act as a responsible leaders and standing for integrity. #NOTOPLAGIARISM #CITETHESOURCES #PLAGIARISMCOMMITSCONSEQUENCES #RESPECTTHEOWNERSINTELLECTUALRIGHTS

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presumenothing · 4 years ago

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so that pokeani fic? yeah i finished it. also on AO3

“Gou? You awake?”

Ash’s voice wakes Gou from the half-doze he’d fallen into; he stifles a yawn as he leans to peer blearily over the edge of the top bunk. “Yeah. Why?”

It’s hard to tell for sure in the nighttime gloom, but even though Ash’s gaze is directed upwards Gou is oddly certain that he isn’t looking at him.

Which is pretty unusual, especially when Ash had been the one to start talking first and there aren’t exactly many pokemon around to distract him, but that’s nothing compared to what he says next. “How much do you trust Professor Cerise and the others?”

“Wha–” Gou startles completely awake at that.

No matter how hard he rubs at his eyes, though, he can’t seem to rearrange the words into a shape that makes sense – or better yet, reveal this as some weird dream that he’s having.

“He’s a Professor, and Chloe’s dad,” Gou says slowly, trying to piece together an answer to a question he can’t even begin to understand, but the words fall short into a silence that’s not unlike every single time Ash has said something incomprehensible to anyone but him and Pikachu.

And Ash definitely looks mystified now, one arm still curled around a sleeping Pikachu as he frowns vaguely at Gou. It’s a novelty, being on the other end of this situation, but Gou finds that it’s not one that he’s enjoying at all.

Flopping back down on the bed, Gou blinks up at the ceiling: okay, so he’s clearly missed something fundamental to the question. Time to backtrack.

“Why’d you ask?” Gou questions in turn. If he can understand that, then maybe…

“What Chrysa and Ren were talking about just now – you heard it too, right?” Ash says instead, leaving Gou to scramble in the wake of the non-answer. “About the whole bond phenomenon thing.”

Gou winces despite himself; talking about is putting it mildly, really. The two research assistants had gone from planning upcoming studies in Kalos to loudly disagreeing over some witness reports of an unnamed trainer exhibiting the bond phenomenon with their Greninja. It’d clearly been a well-trodden argument between them: Ren had been adamant that it was genuine, while Chrysa remained skeptical, citing the convenient lack of properly documented evidence, and honestly Gou is inclined to agree with h–

–no, wait.

Thoughts screeching to a halt, Gou backtracks again, this time putting Kalos together with Ash’s improbable aptitude at making friends (faster than Gou can even catch a pokemon), and nearly sends himself careening over the edge of the top bunk as he sticks his head out again to stare at Ash.

“Don’t tell me you know who that trainer is?” The words come out in a near-yelp, though Gou manages to keep it down almost belatedly at the sight of Pikachu’s still-snoozing form.

“…I guess you could say that, yeah,” Ash answers after a beat, a strange expression playing across his face, and if it’d been literally anyone else Gou would’ve said that they were exaggerating, maybe playing up the most passing of acquaintances just to brag.

His experience with Ash so far suggests that the exact opposite is likely to be true here, and it’s only further evidenced by the sheepish look he gives Gou now. “It just kinda happened, y’know? I did say that I travelled around Kalos for quite a bit.”

One of these days, Gou thinks, he needs to come up with an appropriate (so probably pokemon-related) metaphor to explain to Ash how astronomically unlikely the stuff that “just happens” to him is.

For now Gou decides to just accept that Ash had somehow run into a trainer whose existence might as well be legend, and backtracks yet again. “What does that got to do with how much I trust them, though?”

This time the pause stretches out, long enough that Gou almost wants to check if Ash had fallen asleep instead.

But Gou’s also well-aware by now that Ash is a restless if deep sleeper, like he can’t stop being on the move even when at rest, and right now the other boy is far too still for that.

So Gou waits. Catching pokemon has given him plenty of practice in patience, at least.

“The last time someone took notice of… what that trainer and Greninja could do,” Ash eventually says, “some really bad stuff happened.”

It might be the first real answer he’s gotten so far, but to Gou it feels like his world has just turned on its end. For Ash, who runs towards potentially-lethal pokemon moves and a dozen other dangers like he can’t even imagine getting hurt, to call whatever happened really bad –

Gou doesn’t know what to think.

He’s still trying to figure that out when Pikachu, who must’ve stirred awake at some point without him noticing, slips out from under Ash’s arm to nudge up firmly against his chin.

Ash laughs, and it’s like lifting away a cloud cover Gou hadn’t even realised was there. “I’m fine, Pikachu. Go back to sleep, you trained real hard today.”

“Pi pika, pikapi,” answers Pikachu, sounding… reproachful? Concerned? Gou can’t really tell, not like Ash can, but either way he agrees with the sentiment.

Ash gives an exaggerated groan. “Don’t you even start,” he grumbles, but he’s already curling his other hand up even as he says it, and Pikachu settles with a pleased pikaaa as Ash begins running fingers through its fur.

Gou doesn’t miss the residual tension in either of their postures, though, if only because he knows to look for it right now, and that decides the answer for him. “That’s exactly what being a research fellow is all about, though!”

Ash goes back to looking confused. “Huh?”

“Gathering data, and drawing your own conclusions from that,” Gou explains, and hopes to Mew (or whoever else might be listening) that this is the right answer – or not the wrong one, at least. “Regardless of whether I trust them, you should observe and figure it out for yourself, then decide what to tell them based on that. That’s how research works!”

“The power of science, huh?” Ash says, grinning, and Pikachu snickers even as Gou blinks in puzzlement. “Thanks for the advice, Gou.”

“Anytime,” Gou answers around a massive yawn, eyelids already drooping closed as he lies back down. “G’night, Ash.”

He’s asleep almost before he hears Ash’s reply, but it’s long enough for him to realise that Ash has known him pretty much as long as he’s known Professor Cerise and the rest.

But for some strange and wonderful reason, Ash… trusts him enough, apparently, to tell him this much when he hadn’t said a word to the others earlier.

It’s a nice feeling to have, Gou finds himself thinking.

(He falls asleep with a smile on his face.)

gou, the next day: besides, shouldn’t you ask them first before you say anything? your trainer friend, i mean

ash: um wha- oh yeah of course!! haha, ha,,,

pikachu: *looks into the camera like it’s on the office*

#pokeani #pokemon #pokemon ns #pokemon 2019 #trainer go #ash ketchum #fanfiction #mine #once again...... hello new fandom #for the third time(?) this year #gotta love that multifandom life

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