#finally i can rest
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its snowball season! get ready for a snowball fight!
#art#artists on tumblr#young artist#digital art#spirou et fantasio#spirou#fantasio#seccotine#winter#fanart#yall im sorry if spirou’s hair is too brown 😭😭😭 i dont wanna redo it fuck#finally i can rest#bye guys art block is consuming me#oh my god the trees and bg makes me wanna kill people
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A Christmas Walk, continued
First piece here
Hope you all have a safe and fun holiday. You all have been very good, so you deserve some more showtime art.
#tadc#the amazing digital circus#tadc pomni#tadc caine#caine#pomni#showtime#caine x pomni#pomni x caine#tadc showtime#showtime ship#showtime tadc#tadc fanart#tadc comic#the voices told me to do this#protip: don't make a comic about hands right before the holidays#Finally I can rest
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Chapter 20 / 20 "No Regrets"
Summary: Xie Lian wakes up on a straw mat.
Additional Tags: Coffin Rescue, Coffin AU, AU - Canon Divergence, AU - Different First Meeting, Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Identity Reveal, Revenge Plot, POV Alternating, Blood and Injury, Dream-Reality Confusion, Canon-Typical Violence, Hua Cheng AND Xie Lian have Self Esteem issues, Hua Cheng & Xie Lian Invented Love, Slow Burn, Mutual Pining, Hua Cheng bout to make it 34 gods
That's all folks! Until I inevitably write the sequel
(It's coming, but don't hold your breath. I'm so tired).
Anyhow, thanks for coming on this experimental little journey with me! I've appreciated every comment (or keyboard smash). I'm so glad I gave fic writing a shot, it's been so much fun! I hope you find the ending satisfactory!
Also, huge shoutout again to my beta readers (@lildoodlecat @afanbeingatheart & @crystalsamethyst) who had to deal with my insane weekly deadline for literally four months. XL has something to say:
#tgcf#heaven official's blessing#hualian#tgcf fic#tgcf fanart#my fic#finally i can rest#and by rest i mean i can get back to that underwater kiss comic#and rbb#you know originally i thought this fic would be 50k words... not almost 120k lmao#ngl im a lil emotional about it all be done
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Guide Ahead Means Something To Me
Writing about Guide Ahead is…. extremely difficult, for a few reasons. One is that it is a very dense story, and to fully unpack it would require an essay so unfocused that it would be functionally unreadable. But the biggest one is that Guide Ahead is a story that focuses really heavily on the subjective nature of interpretation. How can I speak authoritatively on the thematic meaning of the plot when even a basic description of its events demands a deeper poetic interpretation?
The answer is “I can’t.” So, let’s piss off my English teacher, and coat an entire essay in the phrase “in my opinion.” Because I have to get personal if I’m going to tell you why Guide Ahead is my favorite video game story ever told.
I was raised Mormon. My mother was religious, but my father was absolutely not. You can understand why I related to Cecilia basically immediately.
Ultimately, the thing that draws me to Guide Ahead is the very thing that makes it hard to write about. Guide Ahead is, in my reading, a story about the subjectivity of divine meaning.
The most obvious manifestation, and the most important, is Law. But, Law’s execution, in traditional Arknights fashion, is kinda unclear, so I’ll recap for those who have hobbies outside of this, unlike me.
Law is the supercomputer buried underneath Laterano, and is the sentient religion that binds all the Sankta together into a hivemind of sorts. The Sankta are actually just Sarkaz connected to Law, given halos, wings, and empathic communication between each other. But, the main thing they gain, is a biological impulse to obey the Lateran religion’s thirteen doctrines. Anyone who breaks these doctrines are marked as Fallen, are cut off from the empathic connection, and slowly revert back to Sarkaz. Law represents religion as a concept and a community. Saints and sinners are just one and the same. But despite that, the laws of religion are created just to perpetuate the existence of a special in-group. One enforced by empathic connection they cannot share with anyone outside of them. That is Patia’s point - the Sankta have created an “us” and a “them,” and even the devout Liberi are not seen as “us.” They’re just converts, not real Sankta.
But, Falling has… weird grey areas. Like how Andoain was able to shoot Lemuen, or draw his gun on the fucking Pope, and not Fall in the process. This is because the doctrines are not actually the guidelines they’re held to. The Doctrines are subjective interpretations of the objective Law that they are all beholden to. That Law being “It must survive.” Law only is interested in the perpetuation of Itself, and, as a result, the continued existence of the Sankta as a societal structure.
This is the first and strongest example of what I mean when I say Guide Ahead is about meaning. Law says that the failure of religion is ultimately that religions supplant any subjective meanings with an “objective” meaning. But this “objective” meaning is just another person’s interpretation of the in-group’s best interest. Laws biologically programmed into the Sankta’s souls are revealed to be nothing but interpretation of Law’s interpretation of events.
People Fall not because they have broken a concrete law, but because Law… because the in-group has decided they did. Or when they broke the rules, they did something that’s good for the church. There is no objective laws within the Lateran religion, no matter what the machine is named. The system just declares sin when it deems worthy, and absolution when sin is a benefit.
It is this very hypocrisy that drives Andoain.
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I remember being pulled aside at church one day. Everyone above 14 was given a sermon about the recent legalization of gay marriage. He said it was wrong, the church would never accept it. I asked him if it was like the time the church refused to give black people the Priesthood. He said this was different. I asked him how. He did not answer. I left and someone followed me out. He asked if I was okay. I told him whatever he was saying in there was not the teachings of any god that I know, and wasn’t the teachings of any god that loves me. I kept going to church after that, but deep down, I think I didn’t believe in it anymore. I didn’t feel like part of the community, I lost that reciprocation with my people. I just… began to think.
Andoain, as an antagonist, is defined by a search for meaning. He was the bishop of an Iberian church, and Iberia is doing pretty bad lately. His request for aid from Laterano was denied, and the message was clear to him. “You are one of us, but they are not.” But that answer just created a new question. Why? Why would those who claim faith and utopia as their ideals reject those who are suffering?
He searched for an answer in exile, and he didn’t find one. Instead, he found another story. The Sarkaz man who died in the watchtower to warn a town who hated him of an invading force. And this story made his question develop. Why would someone who is hated by everyone give their life to protect those very people? And why would those people then cry over the grave of someone they hated?
He had seen the realities of the Sarkaz and Sankta laid bare, but he couldn’t figure out the meaning behind it. He tells Cecilia these stories, knowing full well he doesn’t know what to make of them. I think he tells them to hope he finds the point partway through.
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As much as I hate the Mormon church for dear god everything they’ve ever done holy shit look at them? My feelings are predictably complicated. Years later, my family fell upon hard times. I don’t want to say more than that for my own sake. We were struggling to even live. But… the church helped us. None of us gone to church for years, but they offered a hand. They gave us access to the Bishop’s Storehouse, gave us food and supplies for free, because we were starving.
And yes, I know. I know they do this in an attempt at creating a false brotherhood in an effort to create a fascist sense of community. I have also read that part of Brothers Karamazov. I have also read Guide Ahead, come to think of it. But… Shit. Most of them tried to pretend we didn’t exist when we met them in the grocery store. And… they still helped us. In their eyes, I was Fallen.
But still, they saved us, and didn’t even ask for faith in return. I still can’t figure out why.
This is why I just… can’t see Andoain as a villain. I mean, yeah, he shot Lemuen, but even she doesn’t blame him for shooting his friends while holding the Stick That Makes You Shoot Your Friends. His entire goal is an attempt to sort through the cognitive dissonance between what the church tells him and what the church does. A dissonance that is, because of Law and the doctrines, innate to what the church is. An experience that should feel damn familiar to anyone who has spent time as an apostate. His plan is to simply confront the Pope about this hypocrisy, to get an answer, to find a meaning.
The answer he gets back is… It Must Survive. Law must survive. The in-group must survive. It doesn’t matter if we cry over the grave of the Sarkaz, because the Sarkaz would die for us. He searched for the answer to a question, the meaning of a statement. You are one of us. They are not. All this time, he searched for the meaning of those words, but in reality, those words were the meaning. That was all they ever had to say. He just needed to accept that.
…but if the in-group is all that mattered… why allow Mostima in Laterano? Why give her her position? She’s not needed for the survival of the in-group, the Law has deemed her an exile.
And… Why not Andoain?
Before he leaves, his gun is taken from him. A gun that, according to the church, has meaning. A meaning he takes as truth. He believes a part of him is left behind there. I don’t think he realizes it, but Mostima and Fiammetta are the question he left behind. They are Not Sankta, but yet they are accepted. And… I don’t know if there is a meaning to that. I still can’t figure out why.
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For a long time, I missed those days spent in the community I had left. I would remember the things I left behind. The churchball basketball games we were destined to lose. The conversations held on the roof of the storage building behind the church. The scouting activities that were clearly an excuse to go bowling. The shitty halloween parties with the game where you ate donuts tied to a string hanging from a fishing pole. I missed it, for a time. I couldn’t help but look back.
Cecilia is searching for meaning to almost everything. When Andoain tells his stories to Cecilia, he tells her that he can’t find the meaning of them. That if there is meaning to be found, she’ll have to find it herself. So. She does.
Cecilia was faced with the same situation Andoain was obsessed with. But for her, it wasn’t hypothetical. She existed between Us and Them. She felt the pull between the community and the love and fun they represent, and the outsiders who were hated and rejected by the people around her. Society told her the meaning of her dual identity, the meaning behind each half, and then told her to choose. But… she’d experienced otherwise. She’d felt the kindness of the Sarkaz from the Pathfinders, and the hatred from the Church. She’d felt things that contradicted the meaning that she was told was true.
Her story isn’t just being forced to pick a side between the church or apostacy, it’s being forced to pick what meaning she ascribes to the world. Ultimately, that’s why her answer can only be her own. Your belief is… subjective.
And she answered… with a bell. A Sarkaz girl, bearing a halo, ringing a bell that has not been rung since the Sankta were still called Teekaz. A bell that once marked the beginning of the new era. A bell that carries the weight of a Sarkaz, hated by the place they called home. A bell that rings with the melody of a Sarkaz lullaby once sung by a Sankta. A bell that asserts her answer. She’s not Sarkaz, she’s not Sankta. She is Cecilia.
Everyone else finds their own subjective meaning within that action. Something as mundane as the ringing of the bell suddenly has more meaning than divine scripture.
No one else understood the nuance of what she said, but they understood parts of it. They understood what they wanted to. Those who know nothing of Lateran culture understand it as just… a beautiful welcome, celebrating the arrival of talks of peace. Most have their meaning determined by the church’s traditions. The pious see it as the beginning of a new era, whatever that signals to them. To the Church, it is that their talks will bring about a new era of peace. To the Pathfinders, it is a signal to begin their attack on Laterano to begin their new era.
There is so much meaning in that action, but in the end, it’s still just a fucking bell. There’s got to be hundreds, maybe thousands of them in Laterano. But this bell meant something more than the other bells. This bell had meaning, and that meaning made it divine.
This, to me, is what Guide Ahead has to say. That there is so much meaning to be found in something as mundane as a ringing bell. Within such a simple action, there is personal expression, liberation, the sound of change. And in all of this, there is the echoes of divinity, the echoes of faith, as if all of these things are, in themselves, divine.
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When I left the church, I couldn’t help but look back, still tethered to a community who hated me. I think I wished I could stop looking back. I don't know if I realized I was.
In the end, everyone else looks back. They still have meaning to be found in Laterano. Andoain looks back, a part of his soul anchored there by the symbol he was told to believe in. Mostima looks back, knowing she’ll return just as she always does. Fiammetta looks back, because she refuses to let herself leave. Ezell looks back, unsure if he will be able to return home after what he has found.
But… Cecilia doesn’t. She has decided that she is not defined by the church, or the meaning they try to give her. She has decided to leave Laterano and see the world outside of it, to explore the world around her and find the meaning for herself.
And the last thing Cecilia does is... defined by ambiguous meaning. She sees Andoain walking in the sunset - and a word appears to her. The title of Martyr. A title she doesn’t understand the meaning or weight of, but that she feels is appropriate regardless. A title that, to other people, would mean something more. But to her, brings to mind the saints she heard of as a youth, a word her mother told her was important.
The story is ending, and they end it with an assertion. Cecilia is finding meaning, and others will find what they will within. Perhaps even she doesn't know all of it.
A while back, during a theater rehearsal, I suddenly remembered a conversation I had years before I left the church. I remembered speaking with my friends outside of the chapel after a sunday service. My friend said a sentence that has stuck with me ever since. “I don’t think science goes against God. I think God uses science and math. I think those things are holy, because they’re… what everything is made of.”
I remember looking around the rehearsal space and thinking that if science could be sacred, then… so is this moment, now. So is my time spent with the people I love. This is sacred. What I missed, what kept me looking back. It wasn’t the actual religion, but instead… just belonging to something. So… I stopped looking back. In that moment, however fleeting it was, I had found whatever it was I needed.
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Look. You probably had a different interpretation of Guide Ahead. This story is just… So goddamn dense. There is so much there that I didn’t even touch on. For the love of god, I just did an analysis of Guide Ahead and didn’t even really discuss Fiammetta?? What kind of hack writer am I? (I just… couldn’t talk about her without being more personal than I am willing to be in public.)
If you have an interpretation that is different than mine, that’s great. I encourage you to hold on to it, and hold it close. That meaning is yours, and yours alone, and that’s a precious thing.
Because to me, what I found… is that very idea.
There is meaning to be found in anything - and a meaning that is yours, and yours alone. All you have to do is find meaning. and the idea that there is meaning to the world, that everything has meaning not because there is a “true” meaning to it, but because we find one there, because we put one there… that makes everything feel… divine, to me.
So… wherever you find meaning, you can find the divine.
You can find divinity in a ringing bell. In a terrible cactus tart. A carnival game you know how to beat. The promises of peace around a table. A cup of coffee. A city you hate. A community you love. A flower growing near a grave. A weapon you carry. A people you surround yourself with.
Those are all… holy to me.
And to me… that meaning is enough.
I hope yours is for you.
#arknights#critical analysis#feel free to reblog#i know this is personal but don't worry I wrote it to be shared#thank you all.#finally i can rest
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Paul
(Image description, and close ups of elements, behind the cut)
I have been obsessed with the idea of Paul as the Rebis, the Great Alchemical Work, since the moment I read the birth scene (a few weeks ago now). It just fits too perfectly, and I am sure it is not a coincidence. From Wikipedia:
The Rebis (from the Latin res bina, meaning dual or double matter) is the end product of the alchemical magnum opus or great work.
After one has gone through the stages of putrefaction and purification, separating opposing qualities, those qualities are united once more in what is sometimes described as the divine hermaphrodite, a reconciliation of spirit and matter, a being of both male and female qualities as indicated by the male and female head within a single body.
I wanted to do it in a style evocative of the time that alchemy was 'popular,' and include imagery evocative of story elements surrounding Paul's birth and origins. I looked at a lot of medieval illustrations, especially woodcuts, for inspiration. This took me 84 years to do, so I hope you will enjoy! :)
Like what I do? Please consider supporting me! Prints and other merch is available on redbubble, or you can sponsor me on patreon!
Image description: An illustration in medieval woodcut style of Cam/Pal/Paul as the Rebis, the great alchemical work. It is a fusion of their male and female bodies. Their heads are crowned, and skeletal bat wings spread from their shoulders. Camilla, on the right, holds one of her knives, while the half that is Palamedes holds a key. Immediately behind the figure is Noodle. In the Background on the right is the ruins of the Building, with the Greek letter Rho below it; and on the left is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The figure is standing on a rock where also rests the skull of the sixth house. In the foreground the River is depicted with skeletal hands reaching upward, and bones bobbing among the waves. The constellation Cassiopea is above.
#the locked tomb#nona the ninth#camilla hect#palamedes#palamedes sextus#locked tomb#paul#religious imagery#alchemy#rebis#art#my art#finally I can rest
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godspeed chimera baby
#I DREW THIS IN LIKE. 30 MIN LOL#finally i can rest#sth#sonic#sonic the hedgehog#sonic oc#sonic oc showdown#rime the cat#sonic art#sonic fanart#art#fanart#digital art#vixenart
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НІ. НЕ ЦЕ.
#sherlock holmes the awakened#frogwares sherlock#sherlock#john watson#shta#my art#finally i can rest#but it was interesting and special??? yeah
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They come bundled together, DO NOT SEPARATE ✋🏼❌🚫
(Guess who managed to finally draw Blake 💀)
Originals here & here 👈🏼
(Ɔ ˘⌣˘)♥(˘⌣˘ C)
#rwby#yang xiao long#blake belladonna#bumbleby#rwby fanart#devaffect art#I did it!! 😭#finally I can rest#no way was i drawing their entire outfits lmao#ya’ll get the bare minimum 🤲🏼🖤💛
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I'm...done..with chapter 2..!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It might be up for about an hour after some additional fix and beta reading myself...!
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Ponytober Day 4: Wrong Cutiemark!
I MANAGED TO FINISH THIS ONE JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT WHICH MEANS I WIN AHAHAHAHAHA
MY PONYSONA AND HER DAD AFTER MAGICAL MYSTERY CURE PART 2!
#cowberry art#ponytober#mlp#my little pony#ponysona#oc art#mlp oc#wrong cutiemark#magical mystery cure#oh no she's apples#she's been turned into apples oh no#i wonder where her cutiemark went actually...#i didn't think that far ahead-#finally i can rest
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OKAY THERE FINE I DID MY TAXES LEAVE ME ALONE ALREADY
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Hey pookie bear been a while 😭😭😭 schools killing me but how are youuuuu
HI SWEETIE, IT'S OKAY I UNDERSTAND!!! I'm hanging in there... work has been draining.... I am powering through......
#I'm annoyed cause my boss gave me weekends off and I was like#finally I can rest#and then he acted like it was an accident and scheduled me for weekends again 😭#I'm gonna ask if I can go back to having weekends off cos I can't I need to rest#but... confrontation... scary#maybe I'll end up just working anyway#you must really be struggling... because you didn't add a meme to your ask...#hang in there... me and aki will give you strength#ask mags
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POWER IS ON WE ARE SO FUCKING BACK
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June 14, 2022: 100% Jedi: Fallen Order
June 24, 2023: 100% Jedi: Survivor
#FINALLY I CAN REST#survivor took 57.8 HOURS bc i’m dumb and couldn’t figure out i was missing a skill#i’ve finished two games and these are them#it’s funny bc i got fallen order the year it came out and just#never got around to playing it#star wars#sw jfo#sw js#star wars jedi fallen order#star wars jedi survivor#jedi: fallen order#jedi: survivor
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