#foils in life and death

[im-here-homie]

a happy audience is the key to the academy's heart

shadow milk design by @catxolotlquoise

[smoozie]

Screaming, crying, throwing up. What do you mean immediately after killing Scar, Grian says "I don't feel good" and immediately after killing Impulse, Martyn says "oooh that feels good"

[st4rking]

tfw you, as a mind reader, have to team up with a man who thinks too much

Slight spoilers in tags

[littlemsterious]

holy fuck harrow is a product of her parent’s genocide and alecto is a product of jod’s genocide how have i never put this together before

i’m trying to spell out my thoughts about this but i cant get past how a horrific number of people had to die in order for them to exist

[lgbtlunaverse]

While rereading mdzs I am once again shocked by how talked about the "you were the only mistake he ever made" line from Lan Xichen to Wei Wuxian is and how heated it gets some people because honestly... I don't think he actually even believes that.

Stay with me. Look at the actual line. (I Included 2 translations for comparison's sake)

Firstly, yes he is mad at Wei Wuxian in this scene. But his biggest moment of anger was actually before this. By this point he's realized that Wei Wuxian forgot what happened after nightless city (and therefore ISN'T stringing along his baby brother on purpose) so he has in fact calmed down a bit.

Secondly, notice that he starts by talking about how his uncle felt. This is not Lan Xichen making a value statement about what he thinks. When he says Lan Wangji was proper and righteous he is talking about him being a model lan, he's talking about their family and clan's perspective of Wangji. Indeed, in their eyes, Wei Wuxian is the only time Lan Wangji was ever not the textbook perfect Lan.

Thirdly, what is Lan Xichen trying to say here? What is he mad at Wei Wuxian for? It's that he doesn't know Lan Wangji is in love with him. His anger is eased by realizing Wei Wuxian doesn't remember the very blatant confessions lwj made in the cave after nightless city, or Lan Wangji fighting his own clan elders for Wei Wuxian, and so had no way of knowing the whipmarks on Lan Wangji's back were related to him. But he is still mad, he still thinks Wei Wuxian should have been able to figure it out. So what does he highlight?

The fact that the only thing Lan Wangji, perfect model-Lan righteous Lan Wangji, ever defies his clan for is Wei Wuxian.

And Wei Wuxian has seen him do this! Even if he doesn't remember this one instance. Because Lan Wangji has been doing that the whole story through. Wei Wuxian has watched Lan Wangji blatantly stand against the entire cultivation world for him, and here Lan Xichen is highlighting just how unusual that is, how much Wei Wuxian must mean to Lan Wangji that he's willing to do that. The important part of the sentence here is not "mistake" it's "only."

Lan Xichen here isn't trying to say that he disapproves of Wei Wuxian, or telling him to stay away from his brother. Remember, the thing that made him mad in the first place was Wei Wuxian saying that he and Lan Wangji slept in seperate rooms. He thought they were together! He's mad because they're not!

At no point does Lan Xichen say he individually considers Lan Wangji's feelings for Wei Wuxian a mistake. If he ever did, it's clear he accepted them regardless long ago. Mistake or not, what he wants is for his little brother to be happy.

[jayktoralldaylong]

Imagine being the most powerful person in the world, but every time you draw your weapon and use it to fight, your life force diminishes.

That's why Chinese torture remains unmatched, their imagination is out of this world. Ain't no one does suffering like them. I do be gagged when I read their novels.

And yes I'm thinking of Yue Qingyuan! And how he became a pacifist and always fought for diplomatic solutions. Then threw it all away when Luo Bingge basically announced he was going to execute Shen Jiu. How he literally gave up his entire life. 😭😭 All his achievements, his title, his wealth, his power.

And how Shen Jiu only realised this....when Bingge scattered before him the broken shards of Yue Qingyuan's sword. And Shen Jiu realised he'd lost the one person that he sacrificed all his happiness for.

All that time wasted because these mfkers couldn't bring themselves to fking TALK!!!

[mossyflowers]

CAN WE PLEASE STOP PUTTING MEN IN EXPERIMENTAL SUPER JETS WHO HATE ANOTHER GUY CARNALY AND THEN MAKING THEM FIGHT TO THE DEATH. PLEASE. FOR MY MENTAL HEALTH

[gingermintpepper]

Recently read a really fantastic fic on Ao3 by the very talented @hellokittysasuke (Link can be found here - do check it out if you're interested in an exploration of Apollo and his many griefs) and one of the things they mentioned in their wonderful reply to my extremely long comment has been rolling around in my head a bit.

Specifically, it was about readings of the Iliad where people view Apollo's directing of Paris' arrow as an act of mercy - that it was a rare act of compassion from a god that had been otherwise adversarial to Achilles because he, more than any god or mortal, understood the pain of continuing to live after one's soul has already died. I find this interesting for a myriad of reasons - the fact that Achilles' death is not actually portrayed in the text of the Iliad notwithstanding - but chiefly because, well, put plainly, Apollo despises Achilles. And, even more relevantly, in the context of this fic which deals primarily with Apollo writing a letter to Hyacinthus, I felt like it highlights even more intensely what Apollo despised about Achilles.

In Book 24, when Apollo makes a stand against Achilles' prolonged desecration of Hector's corpse and rights as a warrior, he says:

"But murderous Achilles... that man without a shred of decency in his heart... his temper can never bend and change--/Achilles has lost all pity!... No doubt some mortal has suffered a dearer loss than this, a brother born in the same womb, or even a son... " "The Fates have given mortals hearts that can endure."

Because grief affords lenience - just as wrath, or passion or any other myriad of intense, afflicting emotion but Achilles had lost his humanity in his anger, had lost every human decency and thus had to be hunted like a beast and slain with the arrow instead of the sword. And I think the contrast between Achilles' grieving and the other examples that are presented in the fic - Prometheus' anguish as he's eaten alive, primordial man when they were severed down the middle and left yearning, Apollo who must love and lose in perpetuity - are that they are examples of that human quality of endurance. That yes, things hurt - they might even hurt for thousands of years, but eventually, eventually they will stop hurting. The pain that was endured will be alleviated, it will be a memory, it will be a kindness and it must be accepted just as joy and peace and love are accepted.

Anyway, go read hellokittysasuke's fic, it's really good and I cannot stop thinking about it.

[foremyth]

fear is required for evolution etc etc the fear of death that yhwach wants to permanently erase is what pushes the world to its betterment and aizen, who has ultimately been cut off from the possibility of evolution, resigns to stillness with a heavy heart and he is closer now to yhwach than he's ever been before in this essay i will

[septembersghost]

it's just that "i was half-convinced i'd waken, satisfied enough to dream you" is such a delicate declaration, yet so ardent. if perhaps you aren't real, if you are something my own mind has concocted, that's enough. (come back to me, even as a shadow, even as a dream.) the mere gossamer thread of fantasy would be enough to fill my heart, would be real enough if you don't exist in this waking world, i'll bring you into it, i'll find you in a dream. "happily, i was mistaken," and have never been so glad to be wrong. you do exist, some miracle of fate led me to that window, and as long as you are real, there is hope to hold onto. that love could be realized too. anthony is the only person in the story who still believes in anything, and it's love. my heart has followed a winding path, and that you exist is enough to persist. in the cracks of light, i dreamed of you. it was real enough to get me through. 'til i'm with you, then i'm with you there.

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

one of these days i'll write up a post about the parallels and foils between vivi and hermes and why it fucking kills me. for now all i can say is in hindsight the 'latched onto vivi Hard as a kid' to 'latched onto hermes Hard as an adult' pipeline is Real

[kazelnoot]

HELLO HELLOO!! Here's my piece for the @blossominglovezine !!! Absolutely wonderful project that i am honored to have worked on :)

[evie-writes-sometimes]

One thing about me is that I do not tolerate Wen Ning erasure in the slightest. Like I would throw hands for him (and have).

[sylvctica]

as food for thought, even tho it's the asscrack of night: sylvie never had closure on losing their entire identity as a god; they died as a god and woke up with that identity completely stripped away

their people were dispersed, their history was lost, Foras died in the mondstadt forest 1000 years ago in a war that claimed the lives of many friends, and the person who was left standing was not Foras anymore. they had their 'freedom' of responsibilities and burdens, but at what cost?

they never had a chance to properly mourn that their identity died that day they awoke. they feared mourning because that, to them, means confirming that 'foras' is truly gone and forgotten ... because although they do not acknowledge that part of themselves all too often, they still carried it within them -- its one of their utmost deep-rooted fears to be fully forgotten, so it's an emotional conflict within themselves to go through with a 'funeral' being held for the self of the past

[quietwingsinthesky]

uriel deserved better :(

[marsixm]

big spoiler cw for the finale- i understand why a lot of people didnt feel like it made sense for how ed was acting during izzy’s death scene, like it didn’t feel earned or whatever bc they’d been at odds w each other since last season, but for me, and understand i’m not saying my personal experience making it make sense for me is trying to give undue writing cred or whatever, but i had a very difficult relationship with my very transphobic/bigoted mother. she made my life a nightmare a lot of the time. but i had to care for her in death. i had to watch her die for months. it was a waking nightmare, and it had a profound effect on me. it was complicated. it made my relationship to my memory of her very complicated. (and even if it hadnt been a months long ordeal i was caught in the middle of i’d probably still feel similarly) and that’s how ed dealing with izzy’s death feels to me. just like him having to kill his father, it was the right thing to do, but it still left him with difficult emotions. when ed says “you’re the only family i’ve got left” to izzy, after all the bullshit they put each other through, i get it.