#enderal the shards of order

[manahtheprophetess]

[forevermarked]

The lips of time leech to the fountain head; Love drips and gathers, but the fallen blood Shall calm her sores. And I am dumb to tell a weather's wind How time has ticked a heaven round the stars.

[the-big-cheese]

SECOND ENDERAL PLAYTHROUGH, YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS

Playing Enderal rn, what do you guys think of my donkey’s name?

[luciasatalina]

Prophetess. My baby

[kryp-does-random-stuff]

Jespar fanart, from Enderal: Forgotten Stories. Tbf, I hate this one. So much fundamentally wrong shit happening here I wouldn't be able to finish the list until tomorrow evening. But hey, it exists as a reminder, that in art, are also ups and downs.

[platform-soul]

Something I love about Enderal is how both romance options are bi, and not in a “their sexual orientation is the player” way. The writers actually buckled down and created not one but two bisexual disasters and I love them both.

[sheyri]

Fan art of my favourite song from my favourite game? Hell yes!

Art inspired by the song "Winter sky"

[sideshow-cellophane-blog]

Honestly leveling up to 30+, getting Tharael and playing the Rhalata quest line sets you up to kiiiiinda be prepared for the main story's similar themes. Nessa left Tealor Arantheal waiting for her answer for literal months so she could at least start a life in Enderal first. She gets through the Golden Sickle, does bounty missions, explores Riverville and the Sun Coast before finally drinking enough to take on the Monster in the Arena.

And then everything you experience during the Rhalata quest with the Father mirrors the main story. Pride, hatred, obsession, unethical experimentation (not the Order itself, but Calia's father), body switching, dealing with the cruelty of the world and madness, finding that ONE person who understands you and dealing with them being taken away by the world (mirroring what happened to Yero and his wife, the Aged Man, Letho, Sirius, etc).

The trial during "Part of Something Momentous Part II" is a piece of cake for Nessa, who already knows of psionic illusions and the mind games that evil magic can play. Not much in Enderal tops what nightmares happened in the Rhalata's excavation site. Her and Tharael share that trauma and they have definitely talked through nightmares and ideas and psionics, they are probably more informed than the Order is since psionics and The Butcher of Ark are banned. A lot of Keepers and Novitiates seem ignorant of a lot of Enderal's darker secrets.

Aixon feels like someone the prophet once knew, rather than a total figment of your imagination. He represents the fear that holds you from escaping. You can pick up that skull at the end, "Regret," and instead of picking up the human heart or empty wine bottle at the altar you leave Regret on the stone that frees you. You leave Regret behind and it frees you. Nailaq left behind Qalian, Tharael left behind Brother Wrath. You kill Aixon, who represents fear and anxiety, and it frees you from the trial (I personally tried to kill him every time he opened his annoying mouth).

Then the High Ones meet the prophetess, and because you're level 30+ it's a sobering experience...for them. They may have brought the prophet back into this world, but like The Father and Tharael, you are fucked up because of it and stronger than you were. If Tharael can continue on, so can you.

Honestly having gone through the Rhalata quest and have Tharael by your side after is my favorite way to play. It adds a feeling of readiness instead of hopelessness at being called pathetic over and over again by the High Ones, who need to read a thesaurus and get more colorful words.

Nessa gives them the middle finger. How about you guys?

[flailingart]

every item of clothing here is stolen

read more for a little vatty lore :)

Vatyra's half Skaragg. That's a whole story on it's own, let's say for now that it hasn't done her any favors. She meets Lishari and suddenly Vat wants to grab everything green. It's not solidarity for Nehrim, it's solidarity for their heritage and shared creator cult bullshit. They drink together a lot.

You remember the godawful 'madame/myser deLuna' clothes right? turns out with enough dirt and roughing up, parts of it can be nearly salvageable.

Vat spends most of her 'free time' either in ark's market or at the docks. She's a decent ship hand, after all she was a pirate before she fled Nehrim. No one has to know that though. She's not ashamed of it, not in the slightest-- you just don't go showing your entire hand to everyone you meet, yea?

As much as she loves the sun, she's drawn to the Undercity like a moth to flame. It takes her no time to find the Silver Cloud and the Dust Pit, and even less to make herself a regular at both establishments. It does her no favors that she shares her name with The One and Only Vatyra, so most people think she's giving a really bad fake name when she meets them. She takes it with audacity and stride when she finally enters the Dust Pit as a competitor, strumming out her name sake's song on a 'borrowed' lute.

It's.... certainly something no one forgets.

[thewirewitch]

I always love watching people play Minecraft, but I always end up feeling sorry for all the Endermen that have to get killed to go to the End.

My poor lanky boys...

[sheyri]

Enderal had such a big impact on my life! I wish I could play it for the first time again. I wish I could play certain quests over and over again, not just once per playthrough.

And I'm so glad I found people, and met some of them irl, who share my obsession love.

I'm so fucking mad that I know that there is one of the most incredible, complex and beautifully haunting stories I have ever seen and I will probably never get to see a single person enjoy it because it comes in the form of a FUCKING SKYRIM MOD

Like. It's so fantastically written. The worldbuilding is insane. The characters are insane. The plot and the lore and EVERYTHING is so wonderful. It's one of the pillars of my endless love for cosmic, eldritch, psychological and body horror and every character is so interesting and unique and AGAIN IT IS A FUCKING SKYRIM MOD HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO ADVERTISE THAT TO PEOPLE

here's a link to the main theme instead. it's worth taking a minute to listen to this song its really good okay. okay.

[manahtheprophetess]

[aasteraarts]

Uuuu… (￣y▽,￣)

I carried this idea in me for so long and finally I was able to bring it to life. Ψ(￣∀￣)Ψ Calia really sunk into my soul that I can't stop drawing her o(*￣▽￣*)o

Sweet little angel (❤´艸｀❤)

[sideshow-cellophane-blog]

He jumped my first time and I cried. Didn't make that mistake again and now he goes everywhere with my prophetess! I love his follower mod!

...that's crap

Or what other emotions did you experience after completing Tarael's quest?

I'm fucking shocked.

[notmuchtoconceal]

verily, verily, i say unto you -- so yeah. i don't need to do this part.

the only way the zelda downfall timeline makes sense to me is if you treat the production order as a chronology in its own right.

let me explain.

(so) the legend of zelda (the original, which is always best) takes place at the end of a later-to-be-revealed fallen timeline, yet even in the stated status quo of the original game, the kingdom of hyrule is in ruins.

ganon has seized the triforce, of which there are now only two.

zelda divides the second piece, pertaining to wisdom -- into eight pieces, which the hero link must find to prove himself worthy to ender the secret 9th dungeon, the sprawling underground skull rock which you enter through a recurrent formation in the shape of an eyeglass.

link, in the sequel, must then locate the hidden triforce of courage.

he does this --(in a mysterious northern isle actually the main body of the previously glimpsed southern aisle) through a dramatic shift where the poles of his awareness are flipped to a narrow and unnatural side-on perspective, necessitating steep grinds and a mastery over magic and the vertical axis, he renders inert an enchantment by placing six crystals in six statues to open the gate to a palace hidden on the most-distant near-proximity of the new continent ;-- where he must thenface-off against a vaguely deco-inspired monster of Native American myth before overcoming his own dark side and claiming his place as rightful inheritor and possessor of the final enchanted triune artefact.

(this is also the first (and only) time there seem to be two zeldas in existence at the same time ;-- the rescued maiden and the awakened beauty.)

so, yeah.

that's the classic NES duology and that's where it ends.

the north american title of the SNES prequel is particularly relevant, for though a significant upscale in terms of graphical fidelity and precision of control, the narrative posits itself as deliberately backwards looking ;-- this is an attempt by the now unified kingdom of hyrule to reckon with its history. in the intro cinematic to this story about a good king assassinated and usurped by a conniving enchanter, we hear of the imprisoning war, seemingly the source of all this cute lil redneck kingdom's seemingly endless woe. it tells of how the triforce was first bloodied by human hands, perverting the sacred realm and contaminating the magickal-psychic matrix of the land's consciousness.

After a detour where Link realizes that life is merrily, merrily but a dream and collects the Eight Instruments of the Sirens in what is not-at-all a deliberate mirroring of his future-forerunner's collecting of the 8 Shards of the Goddess's Wisdom, he cracks the world egg atop a mountain by playing live an extended lullaby for the Wind Fish who is more accurately a Land Whale, and slays the Nightmares who held him to slumber, incidentally liberating the only freedom-loving soul from its illusion --

After that brief detour, what seems to occur -- you being jaunty enough to continue to humor this, among my many other thought experiments -- is this hypothetical backwards looking perspective (related to Zelda's later archeological ambitions...? I haven't played either BotW, do allow your own knowledge to fill-in or contradict as necessary) which deigns to witness the Imprisoning War (I suppose they could be so direct as to ask the Triforce itself?) seems to split the timeline by observing it (Butterfly Effect, quantum fluctuations, the atomic weight of consciousness) in effect erasing the original from existence as it creates the two.

If this seems absurd, do be aware -- Ganondorf receives the Triforce of Power in Twilight Princess seconds before his death by execution at the Light Swords of the Sages. This is a deliberate deus-ex-machina which the narrators refer to as a "divine prank" and seems to rely on the player's familiarity with the events of the previous games (so much of what, in Twilight Princess's narrative seems to be nostalgia points simply reinforcing -- it's eerie familiarity. This land's status as the shadow of a former (or estrange contemporary's) glory.

That is -- the knowledge that Ocarina of Time ends with Link possessing foreknowledge, his meeting with Zelda in the post-credits will ensure that a change will occur.

The Triforce is a Divine Object belonging to the Sacred Realm and so Exists Above and Outside of Time.

If Ganondorf possesses the Power of the Gods in One Timeline, he possess them in All Timelines -- even one's where he's a loser convict on death row about to get iced by elderly nerds.

How do the two interact?

If Ganondorf does something in one timeline, does it effect what he does in all timelines? Do the two newly introduced split timelines somehow feed into one another? Perhaps Ganondorf's brief ascension in TP -- his feeding off of his symbiosis with Zant and the associated corruption of the Twilii people -- is enough to give Ganondorf in the Wind Waker timeline the strength he needs to break free of his bindings? This would, in effect, make TP as much a prequel to WW as sequel to MM!

Does this imply -- do indulge me this detour, let us see together to what fruitful avenues it may lead! -- that the more Hyrule's history is revealed, the more its awareness of itself seems to diverge and fragment into dead-ends, side-roads, alternate possibilities, predecessor upon predecessor, past upon past, coming to accrue as much as it clarifies -- bouncing like a ping-pong ball ball (by which i mean that more exquisite art -- the energy tennis match between hero and villain) as the chaos gives way to shape and the chaos to some deeper form?

Conclusions in one windswept corner in time, from bouncing back and forth from some fairy tale past about an enchanted cap and a world of little people and a blade which divides one into four ... and a land where your kingdom was drowned for good, your patriarch renouncing his entitlements, to bless you to open and terrible freedom to not repeat the mistakes of your ancestors, setting sail for a distant land you will make you own ... which you discover is spider-webbed with train-tracks which were already there. designed by a more mechanically advanced-prior civilization. train-tracks. across the entire-continent. already there.

not connected to some heartland city, no -- of course not. simply another variation on the tower of babel and wasteland motifs you've already glimpsed in that other other timeline's alternative alternate world.

i confess, on my first and only playthrough of Spirit Tracks (despite or perhaps precisely because of its inoffensive nature) i found myself so bored, i put it down halfway through and didn't pick it back up for six months, and when i did it was only because -- there would be a new game soon.

skyward sword was yet a glint on the horizon. there were no plans yet announced for a zelda on the wii which wasn't already on the cube.

i had a dream where i was in a sprawling floral-lattice work of a stream-shrouded 1920's train station and there was an inkling i needed to finish that last zelda there would be another one soon.

i needed to finish it, there would be another one soon.

i can't recall if there were skylights, yet i seem to suspect.

skyward sword, it is my regret to feel, though not openly repeat -- was so bad, i fear despite being intellectually open to another zelda, it left me feeling i had outgrown video games as a general hobby and this was a good place to stop. i feel it was giving me a dreadful warning.

all technology from this point on is simply training you to play fetch for the AI girlfriend who is submissive waifu masking claustrophobic smother-demon timesink. It was telling me get out all now. All further digital games will simply be coded nanny state propaganda.

i feel the entire series Zelda herself has been slowly transitioning from Mother-Sister to Sister-Wife and Now Link Has to Put His Dick In Her and It's Repulsive. I don't want it. I understand why infinite access to bitches and bling turned Ganondorf into an insipidly hunky blue swine beast.

I do not wish to wed the nanny state through a symbolic incestuous union with the machine. I can't imagine the level of loneliness and feelings of personal disempowerment would could ever possibly drive one to wish to own, let alone interact with an Alexa. I have no idea why anyone would consider this histrionic. I suspect most are half-aware, barely alive.

The first Demon to which I ever bore witness was the Microsoft Office Paperclip and I immediately knew it was evil; a withering force of infantilization which yearned to strip me of my savvy and I rightfully shunned it! I do not wish for my interfaces to have personalities or crack jokes! I want machines to be machines! A machine with a soul should be cathartic only for it reflects a solitary intellect's capacity to endure.

If you've ever seen The Film Simply Called Moon by David Bowieson, they did it right in that. That was a good AI companion. He was one step above Wilson from Cast Away. He was basically a totem comfort object with a short term data cash which functioned as semi-authentic short term memory. He was a simple machine, but it was real. That was honest.

Why would anyone ever love a son? It takes a saint to love a son. Autism is basically Son: The Personality cause They're All Like That. That's what it is to be a Boy, which is why it is so confusing when you are an Autistic Girl who is also Heterosexual! Being An Autistic Lesbian makes everything hilarious, oh my God. That level of natural detachment, if properly harnessed -- constant lazer vision. Carve microchips into people's faces. Rub your swampy crotches together to create fungal blooms live-erupting out of hot spring geysers scarring lily-white flesh!

A son is a little whelp you fuck emotionally until it's manly.

It's horrible. You have to actually love that to do it right. Look at yourself and see how hard it is to love you, apparently. It doesn't make any sense to me when you're repulsed by yourself. Why would you find either you or me repulsive? We're having fun maybe you should get that checked out.

[sideshow-cellophane-blog]

Shhhh they can't afford Ambrosia but they can get high on self medication and sugar shhhh