#i am very strict about the preservation of information

[friendofthecrows]

People can block me for talking about this too much, whatever. But here's the thing: I'm anti-censorship so I don't care and will continue talking about it. Don't want to see it? Block me. Block the tags. You know, just like you can do with things you don't want to see on ao3.

[loeyshandtattoo]

hindsight (chapter 1) | park chanyeol x reader

a/n: finally, i did some few alterations on how the first chapter would look like, i hope all the readers would be able to understand how my fictional mind is taking its place, but here you are! thanks for staying tuned for the publishing of the first chapter.

disclaimer: this is a work of fiction, everything that is mentioned does not depict facts.

warning: mention of cuss words

word count: 3.9k words

pictures are from pinterest**

THE SCHOOL uniform was being hung on the hook by the careful maids as my eyes were adjusting to my newly found consciousness. The school emblem is printed on the jacket, and the plaid skirt has a hem that ends on the knee. Then Anne entered the room with a smile. "Good morning, Young Miss," she said.

"Good morning, Anne, I replied.

Anne smiled dearly and opened the curtains, which allowed the rays of the sun to enter the room. Then the delightful Charity entered the room with an iPad in hand.

"Young Miss, I hope you had a wonderful night's rest. Here is your schedule for today, she says as she hands me the iPad. I rolled my eyes at the continuous scheduled activities. In the world of elite society, you must always make publicity, as we are prominent figures representing our heritage far from home.

Our Asian elite society has been the most refined selection of people in the east coast, specifically in Manhattan where most of the members of the high-class people are situated, as for my family who are one of the upper elites, we were expected to live in the most elegant way possible and that is how we managed to own an estate in Upper East Side of NYC, most aristocratic families also reside with us in this area, our noble families with what we say, ‘of blood’ reside in a foreign country for multiple of reasons, and that is first, to preserve the remaining Asian nobility from eradicated monarchial governments, our ancestors way back before, as monarchial form of government was being threatened and new forms were arising, their titles were being threatened and some people made violent attempts on ending the lives of the nobility, so that is how with all the money they had left, fled to America.

"I thought we had cleared out all the events for the rest of this month. Was it not possible to inform me there were some to follow?" I asked her as I palmed my forehead.

Charity remained silent, prompting me to apologize for my erratic behavior: "Char, I am sorry."

She sighed, "It’s alright, Young Miss. I understand the frustration." She completely assured me that my anger is valid. I felt embarrassment and decided to find purchase from the comfort of my comforter, and Anne immediately tapped on my shoulder as it was her time to make the bed, eliciting a growl as I sat up and grabbed my phone from the nightstand.

"Char. Do you mind giving me more details about this event I am going to?" I asked her. I glanced to see that she was ensuring that my uniform was clean and ironed well, as Mom is a bit strict about going outside with cloth wrinkles; she says that is very peasant style.

Charity opened her iPad as she assessed this later event: "The yangban association hosted a charity auction for children of orphanages all across South Korea, and as the lady of the Byun household who is about to debut anytime soon, you have to show that you are prepared." Charity explains as I step out of the comfortable bed. The lace nightgown, with its fabric that can be felt on my skin, Then I arranged the bed to not add more work for Anne and the rest of the maids.

Our family’s roots originate back in Korea, and after the Japanese seized our land, my great-grandfather had to take his family to America for safety as our titles were stripped from us together with the royal family. The title given to us from the Yangban was the highest ranking in the caste system of the Joseon dynasty. As we lost identification as members of the yangban, our family was referred to as refugees only and not those of respectable position, just like we once used to. However, as Asian monarchies started to falter in power, they also found refuge in America.

As part of the peace treaty that was signed by Japan with the U.S. after the war, as atonement for causing disruption, the noble clans that fled from Korea were given the right to reestablish their titles with the help of the surviving Royal family of Korea where they can be situated in the area of Manhattan, and they were the highest noble being looked up by all members of the elite society today as they are the major restorationist of our society—they all refer to this as the Day of Miracle, and just like those of European nobility structure and inspired from the Goryeo’s nobility structure as well, we were granted of Dukedom, Earldom, Viscounty and Baron, and the Byun family was entitled to Dukedom to my grandfather and passed down to my father, and will be in turn passed down to my brother, Baekhyun. The secret royal family back at that time in the reestablishment of our titles, they chose 9 most trustworthy men to look over to the major provinces of the country and that is how my father, Byun Min became the duke of South Jeolla province, and the surviving members of the yangban most especially military leaders were granted Earldoms and Barons, and while the remaining Joseon intellectuals who were not granted Dukedoms were given the Viscounty title, with that formed the House of Yangban comprising of Korea’s nobility, and they are given the authority as condition of the U.S. for aiding Korea back in the Korean War to authorize the nobility to be involved in the political affairs with the connections from the secret royal family.

"School day, first period, you have Algebra that will be taken up for the rest of the morning and Literature after lunch; afterwards, you have to meet your instructor as it is a Monday; and then, once you are home, you will meet up with Haley for your hair and makeup for this evening’s event."

What an eventful day!

My friend, Angel, also said that her family would show up at the Masquerade charity event later that evening. Although Angel’s family is not part of yangban and is one of the lower elites of Elite High Society, through her mother’s connections with the head of yangban, their family was invited to this high-class event.

The elite high society held a caste system that the Yi Clan created, which was the upper elite, mainly aristocrats, as they were the real purpose for the establishment of the society. The rest are called the lower elites, which follow the class of businessowners filled with Asian billionaires and millionaires, but as far as I am concerned, they also have their own ranking system, and lastly, the most recent addition to the lower elite society are Asian celebrities; they formally decided to add celebrities as they are important for publicity.

Angel was part of the businessowner class, and their father is a well-known billionaire.

Hearing from my friend Angel that she would also be attending the charity event had me at peace because sometimes I hate showing up to these kinds of functions, and they do bore me every single damn time.

Once we were fully settled into the class, Sir Hwang finally entered the room and now introduced the topic, the objectives, and the date of the quiz.

After class, Angel and I exited the room as I noticed the familiar figure lurking around the hallways of the school. "Hey, sis. This evening’s charity event—are you going to attend?" He asked.

"Yeah, and what about it?" I asked while reorganizing my textbooks inside the locker.

Baekhyun pleaded, "Can you tell Mom and Dad that I can’t come over for the auction event later? Hearing this, I slammed my notebook against the expanse of his chest. "Hey! You need to be there. I don’t want you to get scolded by Dad for saying that you are irresponsible, and all those things that he is saying about you hurt my feelings, I whined at him.

"You really, for sure, don’t want me to get scolded?" Baekhyun quirked a brow. I chuckled and pleaded with him to go, but he said about bringing his best friend, which is going to throw Dad off again.

Well, my brother’s best friend belongs to the businessowners class, which makes my dad bitter about his son hanging out with boys with no certain future at all, which is what aristocrats think of businessowners. My dad thinks that Elite high society should only be limited to those of aristocrats and not people with no class despite owning a very large amount of money. "You should really stop hanging out with that dude, honestly," I advised him.

With the ongoing caste system that has created division and inequality among the elites, this has led to reforms among the children of lower and upper elites. People of upper elites are for people of upper elites in different engagements, and most especially marriage, the head of yangban strictly wants to impose the idea that to show gratitude to the secret royal family, we must keep our blood blue. That is why all children of upper elites also have after-school classes in the afternoon to teach us the way of the yangban and the morals.

But as our elite society struggles to modernize, some of the aristocrats break the normality and stereotype of not mingling with other people, but the majority, with their moral views and principles, regard this as a preposterous act of gratitude. What happened to the famous Confucian moral of karma?

Baekhyun sighed, C'mon, Cali, don’t be like Dad as well; we should stick up for each other."

"Sure thing, and yet here you are telling me earlier about your plans to ditch me." Baekhyun laughed and replied, "Fine. I will be there with Chanyeol." I simply sighed as I made my way to the lounge to eat lunch with Angel.

The white gown paired with a feathery white mask was the outfit that my mom had planned out for me. She shared with me her thoughts about how I look clean and innocent in white. The stylists then went inside my room and smiled. "This is the third time this month, Young Miss." I chuckled at her comment.

"Look forward to more. The debutante season is fast approaching." I added further and grinned at Haley. Then my mom entered the room and greeted Haley, saying, "Haley, about Calista’s makeup. Please make her look innocent, and for the hair, I want it loose with soft curls. For the accessories, let Cali choose." Mother spoke softly to Haley and the rest of the stylists.

After she was done discussing the details, she looked at me through the mirror and held my shoulder, saying, "Dearest, I’ll leave you for a while. See you later, beautiful." She kissed my cheeks and went straight for the door to exit my room.

Haley was amazing as she handled the styling process, and now it's as if mom’s desires were printed onto my face. I loved the look and thanked Haley for an amazing job.

Anne then entered the room and complimented, "You look beautiful, Young Miss." She spoke with a grin. Then the maids began unzipping the fabric of the ggown,and since I already wore the underdress while my makeup was being prepared, I searched through the drawers of the display table in the middle of the closet, where rows of jewelry were placed. Once I was ready for the event, I sprayed my favorite Jo Malone perfume.

Baekhyun later informed me that he won’t hitch a ride with us and is going to drive with Chanyeol to the event. "When will that boy straighten up?" Dad expressed his frustration about Baekhyun. He was his heir, after all.

"Min, let the boy savor the last moments of his high school." My mom ensures that Baekhyun will straighten up at the right time. "Bit-na, that boy in the next two months will graduate and choose Harvard, Yale, or Stanford. Oxford, Cambridge, and the rest of the good schools of his choice. When in his dictionary will he understand the definition of professionalism? Now that I know that the only heir of Park Enterprise is part of his circle!" Dad expressed his madness. My dad is a bit of an egoistic man; well, owning such a company and earning his pride with it made him be like this. Back when I was still in my toddler years, I remember that he was still like Baekhyun—more of a goof ball and a laughing festive in the room—and the monthly visits to grand-pabi except when he died when I reached the glorious age of fifteen, and now all the matters are left in his hands.

But Mom was still the regular Mom; she was caring but demanding; she was softspoken but insulting; she was kind but sometimes looked down at me with disdain. Imagine doing that to your only daughter. My thoughts stopped flowing when she calmed Dad with a chuckle: "Aigoo Min, admit it; that was the only way that I got attracted to you. Baekhyun with that attitude will find himself a beautiful lady soon." She assured dad there was nothing wrong at all.

The Met was still the same since the time that mother hosted that party; the Met is a regular setting that almost all the Yangban use for functions like this and other aristocratic houses.

My eyes searched for Angel, and she was nowhere to be found. I sighed and chose to isolate myself in a nearby garden and perhaps wait there for a moment while her family arrived at the event. However, my desires for isolation were cut short when Mom pulled me to a group of ladies conversing on the side.

"There you are, Cali!" Mom greets, and I notice that she is not alone and is accompanied by a group of ladies that look familiar. Ah, those were the madhatters that Angel and I used to call. They sort of know by heart and by mouth the living conditions of the elite society from manners, but not from control of the mouth. Put them together in a room and make a mess, and you won’t be sleeping comfortably during the night for the next few months considering their chatter that can potentially destroy someone.

For all I know, they are the ones spreading gossip around the upper elite.

Lady Hee looked absolutely dashing with her baby blue mask designed with gold sparks all over it, saying, "I have the best venue in mind for your eighteenth birthday, which also reminds me that it marks your debut to high society!—and they’re also the traditional females. Since most of them are members of the Yangban Association,  they are pretty meticulous, especially when representatives like us from the Yangban House are concerned.

Lady Hee announced, "In Lake Como, my dearest."

This had rendered me silent. "In Italy, your ladyship?" I asked her politely as Mom was observing us.

She nodded with excitement and said, "You will appreciate how fine that place would be, Calista." She advised me to choose that place instead.

"I’m afraid your ladyship has gone over the top, I replied.

"Byun Calista." My mom scolded me.

I held it in instead and replied, "On second thought, Lake Como would be fine. My apologies for answering in a bad tone when you’re doing us a favor."

Then I saw Angel's family arrive. "How about we discuss my debut plans further next time when my mom has finally reserved Lake Como? I smiled—and that was the fakest smile I can pull. "Excuse me, ladies." I bid and finally sighed in relief that I got out of it; it was a hassle communicating with those kinds of people. They are too close-minded.

"I saw you back there with the madhatters chattering away with your mom. Are you alright?" Angel asked. I nodded. "It looks like I am celebrating my debut in Italy."

She laughed. "Do you think they are pulling a secret plan to embarrass you, Cali?"

I groaned and rolled my eyes. "Feels more like it, Angel. I just want to celebrate my birthday by just going on a shopping spree in the Upper East Side and hiding away in South France, I ranted.

Angel examined my white gown and the white mask. "Not to mention you look so beautiful and divine today, Cali!" She complimented. I chuckled, "Yes, Angel. You look stunning tonight as well, I assured her, which elicited a laugh from Angel.

"Angel, we are leaving! She exclaimed. But she only got here!

She added, "If not for your mother, Calista, you two would still be conversing happily." She spoke.

I sighed. "What did my mother do again, auntie?" I queried. Angel also conditioned her mother by asking a few questions here and there, and she assured her daughter that she was alright and fine, but she explained how my mother and the rest of the madhatters only invited her to be their source of comedic outbursts at the party. I groaned in frustration at how much my mother and the rest of the aristocratic ladies are supposed to be acting within their morals, and yet here they are insulting Angel’s mother.

"I apologize on her behalf; I’ll make sure that she won’t do it next time." Angel’s mother smiled, which prompted Angel to also bid her goodbyes. "See you at school tomorrow, alright?" She said, and I nodded, and we both hugged before she left.

The idea of isolation came back to mind, and thus I made my way through the garden to at least put every noise inside behind me and think straight. I pulled a dime from my clutch and exclaimed, "Ugh. I hate it here." I exclaimed with an annoyed tone and tossed the coin to the fountain as it made a blobbing noise.

"Same with you." A masculine tone disrupted my moment and I faced a man with a black mask wearing a tuxedo with a matching bowtie. His hair was styled, his lips were a bit glossy, and he had dark chocolate orbs. "At least I am not the only one feeling the same thing, I replied as I searched through my clutch again, not minding about this man in front of me.

After finding another dime that I found in my bag, I handed it to him, and he broke into a smile on his face.

"A dime?" He asked with a curious tone. He was not thinking clearly at all. Well,  I would not be thinking the same way if he were in my position.

My eyes darted to him. "Toss it; don’t keep it." I scoffed.

"You know these don’t actually work, he said, and I glanced at him.

"Still. Does it still matter when these wishes come true?"

"No matter how much you wish, in the end you would somehow end up regretting it. So, I don’t expect, and I don’t have a piggy bank either." I explained to him, and he ended up laughing at my reasoning.

But he still tossed the coin into the fountain, and silence remained, as if he were making a wish. Even though I don’t believe in these wishing fountains and all, I hope whatever this man is wishing doesn’t come true.

"Have I seen you somewhere?" He asked.

I smirked and answered, "Is this not the whole point of masquerade?"

"I did not agree on the fact that it would hinder me from seeing your beauty, he replied.

He is flirting with me! Such a creep! I was stabilizing myself in case this man is a stalker or someone who can be potentially dangerous. "Stop with the flirting." I warned him and was ready to walk away, but when I heard his voice, I stopped any further movement.

"Too bad a Duke must find himself a wife." I was surprised by what he said, which made me scoff, and I made a vomiting sound just to freak him out, perhaps.

"I’m sorry, Sir. I think you have mistaken me for some prostitute, but just so you know I am not, don’t pick me up as if I am some desperate woman, and has it not occurred to you that children of aristocrats are betrothed? We can’t pick who we exactly want to marry."

He laughed. "Okay, chill, woman. I’ll make sure that you won’t happen to be engaged to me."

I rolled my eyes and said, "Go ahead, and I’ll make sure of that." I spoke and strutted my way out of the garden. I was exhausted from bickering and the madhatters as well, and I wanted to go back home.

At least I know someone.

"Going once, going twice... Sold to His grace, Duke of South Jeolla, he announced.

Then I saw Baekhyun clapping happily like a seal, and then I strutted towards him and recognized that I was walking towards him. Hey, sis, you look beautiful." He smiled as he eyed me from head to toe.

"Ew, Stop it. Take me home." I commanded him to. His brows furrowed again. "Don’t you dare fucking ask." I pointed a finger at him. He placed down his glass of whisky and said, "You’re perfectly able to drive?" I made sure to condition him first. He nodded, smiled at me, and grabbed the bunch of keys with that clinking sound. "Let’s go, sis." I guess he was also eager to leave; at least I am not alone.

I went to my mom and told her that I wanted to go home and had studying as an excuse.

"Okay, dear. Be careful on your way home." She kissed my cheeks and had to bid farewell to my dad as well. Since I would only be stuck inside my room, barely make any movement, and sleep afterwards.

Then I rushed towards Baekhyun and said, "Let’s get out of this shithole."

-

Wow, this car runs so smoothly, and since when did dad gift you a Rolls-Royce Boat Tail? " I asked him, then he shook his head. "I wish," He chuckled, and then I was baffled.

"The fuck, whose car is this then?" I yelled at him. I’m too young to be accused of kidnapping!

"Chill. This is Chanyeol’s car! He exclaimed.

Flabbergasted, "The fuck, Baekhyun!" I yelled.

"Cali, we’re about to crash if you don’t stop yelling at me!" Baekhyun complained. I tried to calm myself down. I looked over to my window and then decided to remain silent instead and not speak of anything.

Baekhyun initiated another talk: "Is it me or you have some sort of distaste against my friend? I gazed at him and raised a brow. "You have eight friends. Be specific, I told him.

"Park Chanyeol in particular, he said. Oh, no. He was getting into that subject.

I decided to distract myself with my phone that was in my clutch. "Yeah, and what about him?" I asked him to try to act dumb.

Baekhyun spoke, "Don’t act all dumb, Calista. You have known him since when you were in fifth grade."

"I don’t want to talk about your best friend, Baek, I pleaded, yet he insisted as he rested his other arm from the steering wheel and his left hand manipulating the wheel, and I could see the gifted Rolex on his wrist.

"Byun Calista, you had a crush on Park Chanyeol. I knew about it ever since." Wow, imagine hearing it from him.

[markscherz]

Hi, I am a student nurse. I would like to ask if you have some information about preserving a placenta, I would like to know some information about it because I find it hard to find some information about it. I have research already but I can't find a suitable answer and then I had stumbled upon to some blog I have read and I found your name there as a reference. It it leads me here. Thank you and I am looking forward with your answers.

The standard procedure would probably be to fix the placenta with 4–10% buffered formalin, wash with water, and transfer to 70% ethanol for long-term storage. That being said, you certainly could also fix it with 90–96% ethanol instead, which would be much safer to work with in future if you need to handle it e.g. for teaching purposes. How one would go about giving it a natural shape is a very important and difficult question. I have no real suggestions.

But I guess I don't need to tell you that there are very strict laws on handling and disposal of human tissues in most countries. So don't do anything illegal.

[soulmate-game]

Harley’s Plea for Help: Chapter 2

Chapter 1

“How long do you think it’s gonna take before she decides to sneak out?” Nightwing asked over his comms, lazily leaning against the balcony railing in front of him with his head resting on one hand.

“Dude, I started sneaking out almost twenty minutes ago,” a girl’s voice made Nightwing squeak and turn around, to reveal a teenage girl leaning against the door that led to the balcony he was on. “I didn’t want to draw attention to myself by doing unnecessarily showy gymnastics down from my hotel room’s balcony, no matter how much fun that would be, so I just snuck out one of the hotel’s back exits. Then I looked up to admire the moon and saw you here, staking out what is clearly my suite, and decided to come pay you a visit.”

“How long have you been there? And how did you even get behind me? I hope you didn’t break and enter, that’s an actual lived-in apartment behind us right now,” Nightwing asked, turning around to analyze the daughter of Harley Quinn for the first time in person.

She looked just like in her pictures, of course. Jet black hair like her father’s, except it seemed to have a bluish shine in the light. And her eyes were definitely Harley’s— thank goodness for that —vibrant blue and clearly analyzing him with the same amount of intensity as his did her. He had to bite back a chuckle. In a turn of complete irony, she really did look like a Wayne kid. Fit all of Bruce’s usual criteria to be adopted. But she was tiny, even smaller than Harley’s lithe form. He, Bruce, and Tim were of the hypothesis that the exposure both her parents had to Ace Chemical’s vats of acid likely had an effect on her DNA that stunted her growth. Perhaps there were other effects that they wouldn’t be able to figure out until they got to know her better, too, though it was clear that her skin was a likely one. It wasn’t unnaturally pale like her parent’s after their acid dips but it was paler than normal for sure, just a shade or two shy of being paper white.

And he could see, now, what Harley meant when she referred to Marinette as a powerhouse. It wasn’t very noticeable in pictures, but up close Dick could see the carefully honed muscle of an acrobat curling over her otherwise slim build. Combined with the knowledge that Marinette had been taught at least some serious self defense from a young age, he could see how such a tiny package could be a remarkable threat when necessary.

Marinette grimaced as the other Batfam, who were all nearby staking out her room from different angles, dropped onto the large balcony with them.

“Uh, well. I didn’t break and enter, I rather not get off to a criminal-ly start on my first night in Gotham, you know? But I realized that even though I was able to figure out the exact room you were staking me out from, I realized as soon as I got into the first floor of the building that I had no idea how to actually get to you. So I just climbed the stairs all the way to the roof and scaled my way down to this balcony, and pretended I’ve been here for a while when really I was barely able to hear you ask when I was gonna sneak out. I’m still out of breath, actually,” she put a hand on her chest and sure enough her breathing was still slightly fast. But not enough to be worrying or even all that noticeable. Yet another piece of evidence to show that she was a very active individual and had resistance built up to physical activity.

“Yup,” Robin groused grumpily, crossing his arms. “With all that rambling, you couldn’t be anyone else’s child but Quinzel’s.”

Marinette’s face immediately flushed pink all the way to her ears. “I’m sorry! I’ve been trying so hard to quit that habit, too!” She grumbled a bit to herself, putting her face in her hands. They all chuckled at the display. Red Hood ambled over, draping his arm over her shoulders (he nearly had to bend in half to do it, the height difference was that bad).

“As adorable as your freak out is, why’d you even come up here anyway? There’s no way you’d scale down a ten-story building just to say hello.”

She let out a heavy sigh at that, slowly peeling her face out of her hands. “Yeah, I recognized you guys right away. And honestly, as much as Momma Harley would be super proud of me for managing to give an entire group of vigilantes the slip, she’d also ground me for life if she found out that I saw you guys and still snuck away even though she probably swallowed her pride and asked you guys to babysit me, right? Self preservation. Contrary to popular belief, I do actually have some.”

“Wait,” Red Robin held up a hand, brows clearly furrowed under his cowl. “You expected her to ask for our help?”

“Well,” she made a so-so motion with her hand. “I didn’t think of it beforehand, but it all clicked once I saw Nightwing. I know how much my mom is worried about me, especially since you-know-who broke out a few days ago. She is more than worried enough to ask you guys for help. Even if she does complain about you guys, a lot actually, she also has made it clear that she trusts you guys with the stuff that actually matters.

“‘You know who’?” Batman repeated, arms crossed. If Marinette squinted, she thought there might have been a grin on his lips. “Is that how you always refer to him?”

“What else am I gonna call him?” she asked, face going deadpan. “Sperm donor? Source of a large amount of my self doubt and depreciation? The prime reason I haven’t been able to see my mom in person more often over the years? Oh, I know! How about I just always refer to him as ‘that bastard I wanna punch,’? That sounds good!” she rolled her eyes sarcastically. “Only one person in this world has the right to be considered my father in any capacity, and it sure as hell isn’t him. Genetics notwithstanding.”

Red Hood straight up guffawed at that, landing several rough pats on her back that made the girl stumble a bit. “Yep, I like this one! But as fun as it would be to see you give that jackass a mean left hook, it’s better if he never finds out who you are or knows that you’re here,” the vigilante’s voice got dark and serious very quickly. “He doesn’t forget people he finds interesting easily, and if he ever finds out about the connection you have to him, he’ll be a constant threat in your life.”

“I know,” Marinette agreed with a nod. “And if this conversation was happening two years ago, I’d say that my mom’s concerns aren’t unfounded. That I am too easily emotionally compromised and despite my deep seated issues and hatred for that man, I couldn’t guarantee he would be unable to get to me.”

Batman straightened up, as did all of his sons around him. None of them had missed the ‘if’ there. Batman’s voice went from charmingly deep to it’s usual gruff grumble. “What changed in two years?”

They all watched as Marinette gulped, taking a deep breath as she stalled for time, looking out at the view on the balcony before seeming to steel herself and return her gaze to Batman’s. When she did, it was suddenly full of iron will.

“I didn’t lie when I told Mom that I came to visit her— but that isn’t the whole truth, either. If I just wanted to visit her in Gotham, I would have waited until I was eighteen like we agreed. But I can’t wait, Paris can’t keep going on like this. I entered that contest because it was the fastest way to see you. I didn’t know if I would win, but… I had to take the chance. There was no way I’d be able to get to Gotham behind my mom’s back otherwise.”

“What are you talking about?” Robin hissed, stepping up to his father’s side. “Paris has been silent. If anything were happening, we would have heard about it by now.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” Marinette corrected, never losing that ironclad look in her eyes. “Because a combination of magic and politics is keeping it quiet. No news about Paris’ situation is able to leave the city limits. Magic makes any non-native who leaves Paris think that everything they experienced was just a crazy dream. Natives won’t forget, but politics has all of us under very strict NDAs if we leave city boundaries, and all of our local news and social media is blocked from being accessed by anyone outside the city. But, I figured a little breaking of the rules wouldn’t exactly put a stain on my family’s reputation or anything, so,” she dug in her pocket and pulled out a thumb drive, holding it up for all of them to see. She swallowed again, but never stopped her eye contact with Batman. She held out the thumb drive.

“I came to Gotham to ask for your help. This sped things up, I didn’t expect to see you on my first night here, but two years in Hawkmoth’s Paris has really taught me how to roll with the punches. This,” she shook the thumb drive. “Holds videos of every fight since HawkMoth first showed up. It has all the information I’ve gathered over two years, tracks his movements and lists all his targets and— everything. But I’m not a detective, I’m a designer. I make clothes, I spar on the weekends, I am not good at getting evidence to prove that someone is a magic-abusing villain holding an entire city hostage.”

“We’re gonna need some details, Little Q,” Red Hood finally removes his arm from around her shoulders, instead crossing his arms and looking down at her sternly. “If your city has a villain holding it hostage, is anyone fighting him? And if you do have someone fighting him, why don’t you need our help, or why didn’t they call the Justice League? The JLE should be in Paris, right?”

Marinette snorted, face scrunching up in obvious distaste. “I’ll have to answer those a little out of order. First; the JLE was kicked out of Paris. They moved their headquarters to Italy about five years ago, I’m just surprised they apparently kept that secret from you,” she gestured to all of them, who indeed seemed very caught off guard by that tidbit. But Marinette just sighed and continued. “Though that’s a good thing, actually. We do have heroes, it started out as just a pair but it’s grown into a small team out of necessity. They didn’t call the Justice League because the last thing we need is any powered heroes coming in and making it worse— your league doesn’t have the best reputation for letting newer heroes take the lead even on their home turf, you know,” she pointed out, which made Batman shift a bit guiltily. He knew the JL was often a bit… heavy handed in their methods.

“What makes the situation so bad that you don’t want to bring experienced heroes into it?” Red Robin cut in, sounding as if the whole situation was a puzzle he was determined to sort out. Which, really, was exactly what Marinette had been counting on. She shot him a finger gun, grinning.

“That’s exactly the point! Hawkmoth uses a magical artifact, like I said— but this artifact can brainwash anybody who experiences even the slightest negative emotion. Sadness, anger, fear— anything negative. And it gives them powers, but puts them largely under his influence,” her expression twisted again, this time into a wry little grimace. “I guess you can say that my momma’s psychiatry background has secretly come in handy a lot over these past two years. And Hawkmoth is exactly why I try to tell Momma Harley to stop visiting me— I have worked my butt off to keep her from finding out about his attacks or getting Akumatized. Every time she shows up it gives me a heart attack!”

“Akumatized?”

Marinette waved a hand dismissively. “It’s the term used for when someone is turned into a super powered villain because of HawkMoth. The brainwashing— really it’s more similar to a straight up corruption. The person usually lacks their usual moral compass, and just seeks to soothe whatever set off their negative emotion in the first place. Usually, that means they seek a bloody revenge. And if someone who already has extensive training or extremely strong powers gets Akumatized, guess what?” She made jazz hands even though her face was deadpan. “Extra powers, or amplified ones, for the metas or superheroes who are Akumatized. And imagine what someone with, say, Batman’s level of experience could do if he had powers and no moral compass,” the silence that followed her words was deafening. She just nodded, knowing she had gotten her point across. “I’ve been working my butt off to stay positive, because if I’m Akumatized…” her shoulders fell, and she had to swallow a lump in her throat. “... I have no idea what I’d turn into, but if you take into consideration both my training and my family history… it’s really best if we never find out what kind of magic-powered supervillain I’d make.”

“So, let me get this straight,” Nightwing said after another long moment of silence for that to all sink in. He gestured at her with an open palm. “You’ve been dealing with a terrorist for two years who targets emotional vulnerability, you apparently have never been corrupted by this magic at least to present day, but your mother still worries about you being very emotionally fragile. And your heroes are not detectives, which is clearly what you need or you wouldn’t have asked us for our help.”

Marinette nodded. “I used to be very impressionable. At the start of all this, I was a huge people-pleaser. I got attached to new people in a matter of minutes. My mom always said I reminded her too much of herself— but two years of fighting off a guy trying to get into my head—“

“Wait,” Batman nearly barked, taking a step forward. “He’s been targeting you? You specifically?”

Marinette nodded grimly, mouth a straight line. “Not from the beginning, but this past year it’s been painfully obvious. He might be able to sense the strength of people’s emotions, and unfortunately I don’t exactly experience my emotions very… gently. All of my emotions tend to the much more intense side of the spectrum. If that’s true, then he might know that any negative emotion I feel will make an extremely strong Akuma. Either that, or he’s going by process of elimination. All of my friends, except for one, have been Akumatized already. So has my Papan and my grandmother. But it’s obvious when he’s targeting someone, I’ve felt him try to override my will on several occasions. But I can’t just repress all of my negative emotions forever, so consider us working against the clock right now. That thumb drive has all the details you need about our heroes, how exactly Hawkmoth’s powers work, and so on.”

“Do your heroes know you’re asking for our help?” Red Robin asked, gaze burning a figurative hole through Marinette’s face. “Better yet, if this drive has as much information as you say it does, how did you get it?”

Marinette handed the drive over to Batman, who finally took it and tucked it in his belt as she answered.

“Momma Harley might have a lot to say about your detective skills, but you are all still strangers to me. So consider this a test of your abilities— I expect that you will all go to extreme lengths to verify all of the information I gave you anyway. After all, I’m still the daughter of your most hated enemy. Right?” She met each of their gazes, one by one, with a challenging one of her own. “You’ll just have to figure out my connection to the heroes on your own. And how I got the information, too. It shouldn’t be too hard for the so-called world’s greatest detectives. And maybe this can double as a trust exercise. I fully expect you guys to scour through every inch of my past, and dig up everything you can on me. I encourage you to try to find everything you can, so that hopefully you can decide to trust me on your own once you have all the details laid out in front of you. By the way, for your own sanity? I’d start with reading about all of our heroes’ powers and abilities before you watch any footage of past attacks.”

Red hood rocked back on his heels, trading glances with the other vigilantes before they all shared a nod. Apparently having decided their course of action, Red Hood leaned down and hoisted Marinette up into a princess carry. All traces of her previous iron will melted away in favor of the high pitched squeal of surprise she gave, and once more she became an overly flustered teenager.

“Alright, little cutie. Let’s get you to your mom’s place before she and her crazy plant lady fiancé come hunting us down.”

“I can walk! I can freerun on my own! Mon dieu please let me down! Eeeeek!” She squealed again as Robin slapped a domino mask over her eyes and Red Hood wasted no time jumping over the balcony railing with her still in his arms. The fact that they were lowered down by a wire wrapped around Hood’s waist didn’t seem to take away any of the fright that came with a sudden drop over an eighth-story balcony.

Part 1

@emotionalsupportginger @alysrose-starchild @emistar0 @kibastray @justanotherfanficlovinbitch @alyssadeliv @blackroserelina @blackstarlight-co @readingalldaysleepingallnight @maanae @aespades @jaybird-and-co @fleursroses @probably-a-hologram @misterpianoman (didn’t work sorry)

[kal-djarin]

Attached

Fandom: Star Wars

Date Posted: January 30th, 2021

Pairing: Jedi! Reader x Obi-Wan Kenobi

Warnings: none that I know of?

Request: nah

A/N: so this is my first time ever writing anything so I am so sorry if it is terrible, I didn't have the guts to proof-read it. Also, sorry if the romance feels rushed, I tried to time it as best as I could. Please let me know how I can make my writing better!!!

Word Count: 4.4k (I DIDN'T REALIZE IT WAS SO LONG UNTIL I FINISHED)

Obi-Wan Kenobi has always had an addictive personality, to say the least. He had a way of making light of any situation with his sarcastic quips and quick wit, even during the most gruesome of battles. Maybe this was the cause of your ever-growing infatuation with the reputable Jedi or perhaps it was the way he always had a hint of rebellion in his eyes, despite his groomed appearance and strict code-abiding ways.

As Plo-Koon’s padawan, you weren’t able to see Obi-Wan as often as you wished, but it made even the smallest of interactions memorable; just making eye contact with the man while walking through the halls of the Temple resulted in sleepless nights. Even Anakin began to sense your constant flustered state whenever his Master walked into the room, no matter how hard you tried to keep those feelings out of your force signature. He teased you constantly and would always try to see how embarrassed he could make you in front of Obi-Wan.

Once you and Anakin underwent the Knighting ceremony, he went as far to tell you to follow your heart and confess your feelings for him.

“Y/N, you can’t keep walking through life bottling up every emotion you feel!” Anakin said, exasperated

“Isn’t that the whole point of being a Jedi,” you say, not at all surprised that it would be Anakin telling you to rebel against the Order.

“And anyways, unlike you, Anakin, not all of us decide to go against our entire upbringing and marry a senator.” you pointed out, effectively shutting him up about the subject.

It was inconceivable just to think about revealing your feelings to Obi-Wan. There were too many factors against you and the idea of being rejected by him after years of secret pining would be devastating. The worst part is that you know he would reject you in a gentle and kind way, making it impossible for you to hate him for it.

Not only were attachments forbidden by the Jedi council, but Obi-Wan was known for his adherence to the law and there’s no way he would break it for anyone, especially you. You were only a newly knighted Jedi and probably completely off of his radar, if he even had one. There was only one solution for your feelings for Obi-Wan: try to avoid him until they begin to fade.

But since the Maker has a vendetta against you, you, Obi-Wan, R2-D2, Anakin, and his padawan, Ahsoka, were assigned to leave Coruscant for a mission on Naboo. Senator Amidala was having a ball to celebrate the Festival of Light and there were rumors regarding a potential attempt on Senator Organa’s life, so the Order offered to send some Jedi to ensure the safety of the guests and Padmé.

The trip is going to be about a week long, so you mentally prepare being in close quarters with Master Kenobi. When you arrive at the hangar, you are pleasantly surprised to see the ship that was being boarded by Anakin and Ahsoka was bigger than what you expected. You board the ship with a new-found confidence in being able to complete the mission without embarrassing yourself.

“How is the whole avoiding Obi-Wan thing going for you, (Y/N),” Anakin teases once he sees you enter the cockpit.

“Why are you trying to avoid Master Kenobi?” Ashoka asks, looking between you and Anakin confused.

“Anakin I swear to-”

“Our beloved (Y/N) here has a crush on him.” Anakin interrupts and before you can yell at him for sharing that embarrassing information you hear a set of boots walking up the ramp. Your heart stops and you say a prayer to whoever is listening that Obi-Wan did not hear your conversation.

“Is everyone about ready to leave?” Obi-Wan’s accented voice rings out, coming closer to the cockpit.

Feeling yourself heat up from embarrassment, you quickly turn around and face the pilot seat in front of you in an attempt to avoid seeing him. You release a relieved breath, not sensing he heard anything. He walks in and once you calm down and realize how rude you must look, you slowly turn back towards him. He greets you with a smile and you can’t help but return the gesture. That breathtaking smile alone makes you feel like a flustered padawan again but you realize that if you are going to get through this mission and over your feelings, you must overcome your want to shy away.

“Hello Master Kenobi. Yes I believe we are all ready,” You say; your words were stiffly said but at least they weren't a stuttering mess.

He nods in acknowledgment and sits down in the pilot seat across from where you are standing. Anakin closely follows and sits in the adjacent seat, but not before stifling a laugh at the glare you give him for almost revealing to Obi-Wan how you feel. You sit behind Anakin and Ahsoka sits beside you. Anakin starts the ship and begins to fly towards the Chommell sector, where Naboo resides. Once you have left the atmosphere, he initiates hyperspace travel.

Once in hyperspace, Obi-Wan excuses himself and leaves the cockpit to meditate. Right when the door to the cockpit shuts Ahsoka snaps her head towards you.

“You have a crush on Master Kenobi?!” she whisper shouts, but it is still loud enough to facilitate a small internal freak out from you.

You don’t respond and keep looking out the window, contemplating whether or not to jump into the void of blurring stars in order to avoid this confrontation. Ahsoka, on the other hand, takes your silence as a confirmation to her statement.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Ahsoka exclaims to you and Anakin, mostly in disbelief that you never mentioned this and that Anakin was able to keep a secret like that to himself.

“Well it’s not exactly something I’m proud of, Ahsoka,” you say, turning towards her.

“We’re Jedi.” you state solemnly, “It doesn’t matter who knows about our feelings; it doesn’t change the fact that we will never get to act on them or even truly experience them.”

“I know, but maybe you could-” Ahsoka starts but you are quick to shut down any false hope she could make for you.

“Ahsoka, there’s nothing you can do, I just have to get over it,” you say a bit harsher than intended. You and Ahsoka don’t have the most conventional of Padawan and Jedi Knight relationships, but then again neither did her Anakin. Since you were still a young Knight, you two were more like sisters, making you feel infinitely more guilty for taking your frustration out on her

“Look, Ahsoka, I’m sorry, it’s just that I don’t want to get my hopes up over something that will never happen”

“I just don’t like seeing you hurting, (Y/N)”

“You could always tell him.” Anakin chimes in,

You look at him, annoyed with his ever present need to pull the trigger, and then turn back to Ahsoka.

“I’ll be fine, I always am,” you assure her, but honestly you say it more to reassure yourself.

****

A couple of days past and you successfully have limited your time with Obi-Wan as much as physically possible. He was a very structured man and figuring out his daily routine was easy, so all you had to do was go to a part of the ship he wasn’t, or in worst cases, meditate so he couldn’t interact with you even if he wanted to.

But of course, Anakin, always being the meddler, picked up on your perfectly coordinated avoidance of his Master. He decided to “spontaneously” take Ahsoka to the back to do more training, leaving you and Obi-Wan to man the cockpit.

You approach the metal doors, mentally preparing having to spend the next couple of hours or so with the Jedi Master.

“Master Kenobi.” you greet as soon as you walk in.

“General (L/N), how nice of you to finally join me.” He says with a sarcastic edge but the smile on his face shows he means nothing by it. “In fact, I’ve hardly seen you this entire trip.” He states, matter-of-factly.

You nervously laugh while sitting down in the pilot seat next to him, in an attempt to release some stress over the fact that he noticed. The worst part is that there is a sick kind of rush of pleasure you get from the fact that he noticed you were missing.

You face forward, trying to ignore the way he is watching your movements.

“How much time until we reach Naboo?”

“According to the navigation system, about 23 hours, allowing us to arrive about…7 hours before the actual festivities.” He responds, looking at the display before returning his gaze to you.

“You seem unsettled,” He continues and you meet the concerned look in his eyes.

“I-I’m just…preparing myself for the mission,” you quickly come up with an excuse, slightly cursing the force for putting your emotions on display.

“There’s no reason to worry, at least from what the Council and Anakin have told me, but then again, Anakin is not known for his accuracy of judgement of how difficult a mission may be” Obi-Wan replies while grimacing, most likely remembering his padawan’s past misjudgments.

“There is something to be admired about Anakin’s lack of self-preservation,” You joke, starting to loosen up at the fact that Obi-Wan didn’t pick up on your lie.

You feel a sense of pride go through you when you see him laugh at your attempt of humor.

“Yes, Anakin has al-” He starts but is quickly interrupted by an angry series of beeps coming from the navigation system. You check the monitor and don't see why the ship is freaking out, until hundreds of small dots appear on the radar.

Obi-Wan is quick to react and begins to prepare the ship to enter the asteroid field. It doesn’t seem to be too congested but enough where you begin to worry.

“R2, take control of the steering!” He shouts and is given a series of beeps of affirmation by the astromech

You enter the field and suddenly wish you remembered to buckle up; R2’s steering is jerky and all over the place, but at least the ship is still intact. You grab on to the armrests of your seat as tight as you can and hope R2 will be successful.

Obi-Wan, as outwardly calm as ever, says, “Hope you don’t mind a bumpy ride!”

His sarcastic words force a laugh out of you. Even still, despite the fact you could be facing imminent death, he expresses dry humor.

The field seems to stretch on forever and R2 navigates through it without error. Finally seeing the end approaching, you begin to loosen your death grip on the chair. To your horror, R2 sharply jerks the ship to the left one last time, throwing both you and Obi-Wan out of the pilot seats. Landing with your back on the far wall, your eyes shut on instinct when your head slams into the metal. It’s not until you feel breath fanning your face and open your eyes that you realize that you weren’t only one who fell over here.

Obi-Wan’s hands are pressed against the metal beside your shoulders, caging you in. His arms are bent at the elbows from absorbing the impact of his landing, making his body even closer to your own. His nose is close enough to touch your own and you can feel his legs tangled between your own.

His eyes widen in shock and you begin to see the parts of his cheeks not covered by his trimmed beard turn a rosy pink. You would almost find it cute how his ears were becoming a bright red if it wasn't for your own embarrassment. It only makes matters worse when you watch Obi-Wan slowly glance down at your parted lips, still taking in the image of you pressed against him. If he could sense your unsettledness when you walked into the room, there is no doubt in your mind that your force signature is screaming your feelings. The seconds felt like hours and it seemed that both of you were completely frozen. You are so lost in the moment that you hardly react quickly enough to separate from him when the metal doors to the cockpit slide open.

Anakin’s annoyed shout entered the room.

“What the hell was that!” Thankfully, he didn’t seem to notice the flustered state of both you and his former master.

“I-it w-was an um…” his voice trails off as he keeps looking at you.

“An asteroid field! It was an asteroid field,” you quickly say in an attempt to fill in his words.

“Thanks for the heads up,” Anakin says sarcastically, still oblivious, and heads to the back to make sure Ahsoka was alright.

It’s only then when you begin to feel the throbbing in your head. Your facial expression must have given away the pain you are currently in, since Obi-Wan quickly sits you down and looks at the place where your head hit the wall, making sure you had no serious injuries. Throughout the entire examination, he didn’t meet your eyes once and he didn’t have the same surety in his movements like he usually did. Once Obi-Wan finished, he quickly excused himself and left the room, leaving you more confused than you had been.

Not even a minute later, Anakin pops his head in, quickly rubs R2 affectionately on the head, and then turns his attention to you.

“What the hell did you do to Obi-wan, he looks like he’s seen a ghost.”

***

After the accident, Obi-Wan was now the one avoiding you. He would excuse himself whenever you entered the same part of the ship as him. You couldn’t help but feel guilty for making him so uncomfortable, even though it wasn’t your fault.

You were going to apologize to him, but by the time you arrived on Naboo, you realized the moment had already passed. Senator Amidala greets you right when you walk down the boarding ramp. You and Padme have always had a close relationship, especially since you are one of the only people who actually knows about her and Anakin.

“Master Kenobi, General (L/N), General Skywalker, it’s always a pleasure to see you,” Padmé said in her always regal and kind voice.

“Senator Amidala, in need of our assistance once again?” Anakin teases her, but still tries to keep the outward formal relationship displayed.

Padmé playfully rolled her eyes and escorts us into the

building that we are supposed to rest for the rest of the trip in.

She brings Anakin to his room first to his dismay, but quietly reassures him that she’ll be back after making sure you, Ahsoka, and Master Kenobi are settled in. Obi-Wan still hasn’t made eye contact with you or even truly acknowledged your presence. Once Padmé shows him to his room, she goes to the two doors across the hall, and lets Ahsoka into one and opens the other.

“and here is your room (Y/N).”

You walk inside and just like everything else on Naboo, the place is absolutely beautiful.

“I’m going to send up some dresses for you to choose from for the ball tonight and we could get ready together, if you want.” Padmé says, seeming excited at the idea of dressing up with you.

“Sorry Padmé, I was just going to wear my robes.” You tell her, while still preoccupied with exploring the room.”

“Didn’t Anakin tell you? To ensure that the supposed assassins don’t realize that they have been compromised, you all are supposed to dress in normal clothes.”

***

After hours of being poked and prodded by some of Padmé’s servants, you finally were ready for the ball. You looked beautiful when you looked in the mirror, but you couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable because of this sudden change of appearance. You couldn’t remember the last time you dressed like this and your head still couldn’t wrap around the image it saw in the reflection. The dress you decided to wear was floor-length with a slit that stopped at your mid thigh and was a light blue. The top was a bit more modest but not by much. It was more risque than what you expected to wear, but Padme insisted that it look beautiful on you; also the slit allowed you to strap your lightsaber to your thigh, keeping it accessible, but still hidden. Your hair was in an intricate half-up half-down braid so it looked formal enough for the ball, but if you needed to engage with the potential assassin, it wouldn’t get in the way. As much as you protested, Padmé insisted on you borrowing her jewelry and makeup.

By the time you all finished, It was time to head to the ball. You, Ahsoka, and Padmé all arrive together, and quickly scan the outside for anything suspicious. You head inside and immediately people begin to swarm Padmé and thank her for hosting. You and Ahsoka excuse yourselves and begin to scan the crowd for Anakin and Obi-Wan.

You spot the back of a strawberry-blonde head next to Anakin’s always messy hair talking to a senator you didn’t recognize and begin heading towards them. Ahsoka gets there first, quickly getting Anakin’s attention and talking to him. When Anakin sees you he looks impressed.

“Wow, you clean up nice.” Anakin jokes, making Obi-Wan turn to see who he is talking to. When he sees you his smile falters and his eyes widen a bit. His cheeks start to redden.

“It’s just weird for you as it is for me, trust me” you say trying to overcome the sudden rush of self consciousness you feel.

“N-no you look…radiant, General (L/N).” Obi-Wan breathes out, his eyes scanning your body, slightly widening when they catch your upper thigh peeking through the slit.

You instantly flush at his words and look down in embarrassment from such a compliment from Obi-Wan.

You catch a glimpse of his shined shoes and realize that he, too, is not wearing his Jedi robes. Your eyes trail up his whole body and see he is in robes, but they appear much softer than the rough ones issued by the order and they resemble what a senator would wear. He looks absolutely breathtaking. “And you look…” your voice trails off in shock, “...very handsome, Master Kenobi”

Pamdé finally joins you, unintentionally saving you from the awkward tension. Anakin greets her and as always he instantly appears calmer and more relaxed in her presence.

You awkwardly sit in on their conversation, trying to distract yourself by scanning the room for anything or person out of place. Suddenly, the music began to shift to slower and people began to pair off. Anakin started slow dancing with Padmé, making sure that there was enough room between them to avoid any suspicion.

Obi-Wan walks into your field of vision.

“Would you like to dance with me...to blend in of course.” He says while raising his hand in an invitation.

“I-I would love to.”

Obi-Wan’s rough hand encloses your own and he leads you to the dance floor. Once, there his other hand comes around and rests above the small of your back and yours over his shoulder, hovering over the skin, scared to touch him. You start to slow dance and Obi-Wan glances over at your stiff hand, and his mouth breaks out into a grin

“Relax General (L/N). You are allowed to touch me.” He says quietly.

Your eyes widen at his sudden boldness, but comply nonetheless. He readjusts his grip on your hand so that they woven together and you place your hand on his shoulder. You look at him with uncertainty, but he gives you a small smile of encouragement and nod to approve of your actions. The longer you dance, the more you relax into it, and only internally freakout at his hand sliding a bit lower to the small of your back and his body moving much closer to yours.

You can’t imagine he isn’t seeing the emotions you are trying so hard to contain in your force signature. Your mind is freaking out at just how close Obi-Wan’s body was to you. Your body, however, wants to completely submit to the feelings and melt into his. By the time the song ends, you two are so close that you can feel Obi-Wan’s shaky breath on your cheek, and it all becomes much too overwhelming.

“Excuse me.” you quickly say, removing yourself from Obi-Wan.

You quickly shove your way through the crowds until you find doors leading out to a balcony. You open them and take several gulps of the fresh night air in an attempt to calm yourself. You hold onto the railing and stare out into the starry Naboo sky, trying to make sense of what the hell just happened. Suddenly, you feel the doors open behind you and sense Obi-Wan’s presence.

“Did I upset you, General (L/N)?”

“I can’t do this right now, Obi-Wan” you mutter, dropping the pleasantries of titles.

“And what exactly is this” He questioned, his voice sounding more desperate than you have ever heard before.

You turn to face him and see that his facial expression matches his tone: desperate and concerned. His eyes search your face as if he can find what you're thinking if he just looks hard enough.

You shake your head in disbelief.

“Do you think this is a game, Obi-Wan” you demanded.

His facial expression warped into one of confusion.

“A what?” He replies, seeming taken aback.

“A game. Do you think toying with me is fun? You just want to see how flustered you can make me, huh?”

“General (L/N), I don’t understand where all of this coming fro-”

“I am attached to you!” you interrupt, not realizing what you are saying before it leaves your mouth. Your eyes widen and you watch in horror as Obi-Wan comprehends what you just said.

“You are attach-” Obi-Wan starts, trying to understand the meaning behind your words but before he can, a loud crash is heard from inside the building. You rush past the frozen Jedi, relieved for the unexpected interruption. You attempt to shove down all of your feelings so you can evaluate the situation going on inside the ballroom.

People are fleeing from every which way, making it damn near impossible to understand what exactly is going on. The lights go out, making the room break out into even more chaos. You finally see Ahsoka, who is hovering over Senator Organa’s body. Thinking the worst, you rush over, but are quickly relieved to see him alive. Ahsoka notices you and fills you in.

“A sniper hidden in one of the interior balconies attempted to assassinate Senator Organa, but they only hit his blast vest, thankfully. Anakin is scanning the area right now to see if he can find them before they escape”

“Stay here with the senator, I’m gonna look around and see if I can find anything,” You say, running off to scan the outside of the building. Once you get out there, you see Anakin in pursuit of a tall figure running in the direction of a small single-person starship. You join in the chase, catching up to Anakin. “It’s a bounty hunter, she may have information on who wants Senator Organa dead!” He yells, not at all winded by the sprinting he is currently doing.

She gets to her ship, quickly hopping in and starting up the engine. You and Anakin jump onto the wings and ignite your lightsabers to try and disable the ship from leaving. The ship begins to hover just above the ground and veer left and right in an attempt to throw the two of you off.

“Where the hell is Obi-Wan!” Anakin swore while trying to maintain his balance.

“Finally ready to admit that you need me, Anakin? I thought I’d never live to see the day,” Obi-Wan suddenly quips, as if the last twenty minutes never happened, and uses his lightsaber to effectively damage the ship's engines. The bounty hunter tries to jump out, but Anakin quickly grabs her and throws her to the ground. The entire time that the girl is being put into custody and brought to the holding cell, you avoid Obi-Wan completely, mortified that you confessed how you feel for him.

When the whole ordeal is taken care of and she is set to return to Coruscant with you guys to be questioned there, Padmé insists that you, Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Ahsoka stay another night to rest. You quickly take her up on that offer, thankful that you can try to ease your embarrassment with another night with a hot shower and plush bed.

You head straight to your room, not bothering to talk to anyone, and immediately take a shower. You sit there under the scalding hot water trying to process what you have done. When you get out, you change into your pajamas. You try to relax, but quickly realize that you need to do something to resolve the unsettled feeling you have in the pit of your stomach. As much as you hate to admit it, you need to talk to Obi-Wan. You just have to say that you didn’t mean what you said and that it was just word-vomit, no true meaning behind them. You open your door and are about to step out until you realize that the man you want to see is right there, with his hand raised, about to knock on the door. His eyes widen in shock at the sudden opening of the door but before he can react you quickly try to explain yourself.

“Master Kenobi! I-I was just about to come see you. You see, I truly didn’t mean what I said earlier. It-t m-must have been the stress getting to m-” You ramble but quickly are cut off by the feeling of Obi-Wan’s hands cradling the sides of your face.

You look up in surprise but see his eyes holding a questioning look, asking if this is alright. You quickly nod and his lips are on yours. Obi-Wan’s kiss is just how you imagined it would be like: Soft and sweet and with his beard tickling your cheeks. His hands stay on your face as he pulls away all too soon and rests his forehead against your own and catches his breath.

“I have grown quite attached to you, as well, (F/N).”

[thefogoflife]

I think a big friction point of the debate over the banning of Trump from Twitter boils down to one question: is social media considered a public good?

Because, here's the thing. Obviously, and this is from someone in the middle that tends to lean right, the majority of the nation and world has wished that he was banned. Regardless of whether or not you support Trump's policies, I think the majority of human beings can agree that he was petulant, unprofessional, and outright dishonest in his social media presence.

He shared dishonest and unreputable/extremist news sources (again, this is from someone that consumes conservative media, and I will say that Qanon, Breitbart, etc, is not acceptable for the leader of the free world, or generally most people, to post to the masses, especially as proof alongside actual journalistic sources), legitimizing them by being promoted by the president, giving them a mouthpiece to spread other dishonest or radical rhetoric.

He used his presence to interfere in the economy, by telling people not to buy from certain stores (the case I'm talking about is because Ivanka had a deal that fell through with the company, I forget which, and he was trying to influence it), which the president is not supposed to do.

He also conducted smear campaigns and constant barrages of insults at opponents of all kinds. Not thoughtful, heated debate, but just insults, which normalized it for both sides of the aisle and further destroyed bipartisan discourse.

Even if you only agree with me on one of these points being valid (even though all of them are true and documented), a president should do none of these things, as they're supposed to set the supreme example for not just the US, but for the free world to follow. Again, I'm not talking about policy, I'm talking about personal conduct.

So I think it's fairly established that most people think he deserves to be deplatformed, or even if they don't think he deserves it/is entitled to his rights, it's safe to assume they wish he would shut up, or tone it down and act more professionally. Essentially, if this man was acting this way on the internet and wasn't the president/representative of a party that includes half the nation, he would be an internet villain/pariah.

However, even if the majority of people wish he would shut up, or would love for him to be deplatformed, the reason this is being decried is because of the implications of the action. The president has been censored, and does that set a precedent that political censorship is now going to become commonplace? Political social media bans have almost exclusively been of conservatives, despite both sides committing egregious misconduct and unprofessionalism. I would chalk this up to the fact that social media users, as well as most founders, lean left, and therefore have a bias that makes the conduct seem unbalanced.

But I digress.

I personally am concerned about the precedent this sets as well, but simultaneously I've wanted that oaf to shut up for half a decade now (a big part of my candidate choice is how the conduct and carry themselves, as I care greatly for geopolitics and grand strategy, and professionalism is a vital component).

But the arguing about it isn't going to help solve anything. The argument we need to have is: is social media a public good? Or should it be run as a private company providing a service? If so, that means that censorship, even of the politically biased variety, is justified, as it is at the companies' discretion.

This, technically speaking, should be the free market/libertarian/libright perspective, as it promotes limited government and independent action of actors in a free market.

However, many conservatives seem to be abandoning this small government perspective because the precedent and implication for a dystopian censorship of only conservative entities (or maybe just strict censorship in general), is terrifying. The only way to mitigate this that I see would be to consider social media a public good, as then the companies would have to be held accountable in preserving constitutional rights. However, this could lead to a nationalization/federalization of social media, and then the state controls the flow of information, and we're right back at dystopia.

A further layer on this is, if social media is not a public good, is the internet? And if that answer is yes, then do these companies have obligation to preserve constitutional rights because they are dispensing their service via a public good?

I think these are the true questions, and important ones at that. I think that this discourse can be civil, as it has opportunity for the left to understand advocating free market/limited government policies to better society (letting social media companies act independently in order to be able to ban people at their discretion), and the right to understand advocating for government oversight/regulation to preserve freedoms (considering social media as a public good to hold companies accountable for the preservation of free speech).

It's a very weird, mirror world, inverted beliefs kind of scenario, but I think it is a really good starting point for civil discourse and the depolarization of politics, if the debate catches on.

[elennare]

Do I know "priestess of H'esper" was just Tom being startled by sudden cat on desk? Yes. Is that going to stop me taking it as inspiration for trans Quill headcanons (poor birb is so stressed he accidentally misgendered himself in what is probably a second language?)? Absolutely not! (A lot of this I already rambled about in the HR group chat, but I wanted to preserve it in a less ephemeral format.)

One thing I immediately loved is how with Mireeka at the leaders meeting, it makes her "you are not nothing, you are my son!" line even more impactful - I love you and I respect your identity, my son; also I am furious at you for basically faking your own death and you will never hear the last of it.

I've been thinking about "transitioned post-Valley of Storms" Quill especially - maybe a Quill who'd never really thought much about gender identity, or really questioned anything about the life path that’s always been lying ahead... A Quill who has just been stripped of wing and basically everything, wandering the lowlands, trying to figure out a whole new life; meeting this lovely guardian who very politely asks about pronouns because Sentry has never met a bird person before! She wants to get it right! And Quill, who's had to do more introspection in the past few days than in the three years before, suddenly realises "It's - it's he/him? I think? Yes... yes, it’s he/him."

Which would also mean Mireeka’s probably just found it out and accepted it immediately! (She may scold him for not telling her about that either at some point...) Mireeka to her poor Reyn equivalent at the meeting: Did you say Qillek Ad Khollar is here?? Oh, I am going to murder my daughter... Poor Reyn equivalent: Um, ma'am, all my information on Champion Qillek refers to "him"? Mireeka, immediately readjusting: Oh, thank you! Mireeka: Now let me through, I am going to murder my son! (Poor Reyn equivalent, as she flies off: ma’am please do not actually murder him Dannica will be mad at me...)

We also talked with @highrollersobsessed about how aarakocra, or falcon/hawk-like aarakocra like Quill at least, might not have strict gender roles - with falcons and hawks the visual male/female difference is not that large... And the sample names in the race description aren’t gendered! (Which is pretty unusual - I only found tiefling “virtue” names, genasi element-based names, and goliath, kenku, tabaxi, and tortle names as other examples; most races have sample male and female names.) So maybe being trans is a common accepted thing in aarakocra society?

Anyway, please give me your trans Quill headcanons!

[lifeofyellowpearl]

Yellow Pearl Goes Over Old Files: The Diversion Agreement

Of the hundreds of files present on my holo-screen, my eyes fixed upon yet another of personal significance. Its personal meaning, found not within its content but within my experience surrounding the controversy brought upon by its abrupt inception. It is suspected, though seldom acknowledged, that the current resource crisis, which has come to define Era 2, had long been foreseen by White Diamond. And that in its earliest beginnings, the eldest ruler had begun making turns for redistribution of resources as well as redelegation of personnel. It is doubtless to me, with that in mind, that it was her surreptitious need for redelegation which prompted White to do what she did. Though I had heard whispers of Pink Diamond’s violent tendencies, I had never seen first-hand the full extent of her rage. That is, never until that fateful day.

I still had the duty of serving Pink Diamond as her temporary pearl since White Diamond had yet to provide a suitable replacement for the one she seized from the neophyte ruler. We had just returned to the moon base from a particularly clamorous meeting over which Pink was still fuming. Much to Pink’s greatest annoyance, White had made the unilateral decision to divert 10,000 Lapis Lazuli away from the construction of Pink’s colony. To the end that they may be redelegated to other projects throughout White’s Jurisdiction.

To make such a call without even bothering to alert - let alone consult with - Pink Diamond was not only a measure yet unheard of but a gesture of great disrespect. That White Diamond had violated the very protocol she, herself, ratified in making such a discourteous move infuriated Pink all the more. When word of this reached the young diamond, an emergency meeting was convened at which even Blue and Yellow Diamond expressed marked shock and discontent at White’s thoughtless action. And so, to placate her peers, White Diamond agreed that the order for redelegation would be - hastily - rewritten into a “mutual agreement” between White and Pink, requiring the signatures of both parties. Pink was not happy with this arrangement - especially considering that the gesture was all but purely symbolic. But, at the very least, she would be allowed to retain the Lapis Lazuli of terraform company 16. A company comprised of some of the finest that Homeworld has to offer. Pink also managed, after throwing a tantrum presenting her arguments, to secure the promise that White would no longer make attempts to divert resources away from Pink’s colony. These admittedly meager concessions were enough to earn Pink Diamond’s signature - albeit after some gentle convincing from Blue Diamond. But alas, it was not enough to quell Pink’s fury over the entire affair.

And so, for the very first time, there at the Earth Colony moon base, I was able to bear witness to one of the emotional blowouts for which the Pink Diamond was infamous. “I can’t believe her! Why would she do that! Why would she think I’d be okay with this??” Pink angrily paced, following no strict path or predictable direction, as she continued her tirade over what White had tried to do, “Oh but of course when I break the rules, it’s this huge goodman deal, but when she does it, it’s perfectly fine?? What even is that?? How is that FAIR?? I just… I can’t even….GAAAAAA!!!!”

I watched on as Pink, lost in the whirlwinds of her own rage, marched over to one of the glass panes of the base’s dome; upon which she took out her frustrations with a steady cascade of thunderous strikes. With every punch that Pink brought against the glass, I swear the moon itself trembled as though its very surface were jolted by the force of one thousand nuclear blasts! Truly it was a terrifying sight! As the rhythmic assault continued on, cracks in the pane began to appear, spread, and multiply; stoking mental imagery of potential disaster in which we are depressurized from the base as a result of the pane’s shattering.

Even more frightening were recollections of the injury sustained by Pink Diamond’s erstwhile pearl. An injury the poor gem was loath to discuss, as talks of its causation were a source of nothing but great anxiety and anguish for Pink’s loyal servant. Nevertheless, I had my suspicions of what - that is to say ‘who’ - caused that unfortunate pearl’s trauma. And seeing Pink Diamond now, in this truly horrific state, served to confirm my suspicions were correct. With this in mind, I was certain to maintain my distance and allot Pink the time she needed to fully release her anger. I did my best to remain at attention, in spite of the full-body tremors brought upon by the terror I was feeling at that moment. 

As time went on, the frequency of her pulsating strikes began to decrease. Until, at last, her onslaught came to an end and the final echoes of her thunderous rapping gave way to the default silence of this desolate place. The silence, however, did little to ease my nerves. For Pink Diamond now stood rigid and sullen with balled fists down at her sides, mumbling expletives through gritted teeth. Pink’s titanic fury had not died. It had only moved inward; barely concealing itself just beneath the surface of her inner gem. To this very day, I can still safely declare that at that moment, I was more frightened than I had ever been before or since.

My thoughts wandered back to Pink’s former pearl as many of her idiosyncrasies began to make sense to me. The ease with which she startled, the frequent hand tremors, and, most telling of all, her occasional hesitation in returning to her diamond’s side when summoned back from the pearl chamber. “I do hope her elders didn’t upset her too much.” I once heard her say. What I initially thought to be a statement of selfless concern, I now recognize to have been an expression of self-preserving fear. Indeed, that pearl had seen, known, and personally experienced, the truest extent of Pink Diamonds capabilities.

All of this, I was contemplating when my thoughts were interrupted by the tone of an incoming message. Still on edge, I fumbled with my holo-screen until I was finally able to answer the call. A Lapis Lazuli appeared on my screen. It was then commander of Terraform company 16, 528’s predecessor. I don’t remember her facet or her cabochon, and due to the circumstances leading to her unfortunate stranding on that doleful planet, such identifying information was blacked out on any and all files in which she is mentioned. I struggled to gather myself, “This is the Yellow -Er - White…” I had to pause and take a breath, “Sorry. This is the Pink Diamond control room.”

“Yeah, hey...” The Commander replied with an air of mild vexation, “I’m calling about the proposal my company sent to Pink Diamond?”

“Proposal? Which one?”

The commander nearly rolled her eyes. But she knew better than to let slip such an expression of disrespect when speaking of a diamond - unlike her loathsome colleague, 528. She did, however, sharply inhale before pursing her lips, I assume to prevent the quiet utterance of an expletive eager to escape her breath. “Uh, yeah. It was the proposal about a stretch of land that was originally reserved for the construction of a city. Peridots in my company have found that this land would be better suited for a kindergarten and that the city could be moved further north.” The Commander awkwardly rubbed the back of her neck “I eh...heh...I forwarded that proposal to Pink Diamond several weeks ago, and the city planner is really getting on my case.” Her nervous laughter did little to mask her exasperation.

I had to ponder for a moment before I remembered, “Oh yes, of course” I replied, “how could I forget such...wait, has Pink Diamond still not gotten back to you on that?”

“Nope.” The Commander’s frustration was still actively tempered but no less apparent, “Nope. Nope. Not at all. I mean, I get it. Pink Diamond’s busy but...I kinda need an answer so if you could just...”

“I’m sorry, but now’s not really a good time.” Of course now wasn’t a good time! Now was quite literally the worst possible time! I had no intention of disturbing Pink Diamond now. Not while she was in this horrible state. I’ll admit it, I was frustrated with Pink. I didn’t want to be, but I couldn’t help it. I had forwarded that proposal to her the moment I received it because I understood it’s importance. I marked it to be saved under her “high priority” tab and even let her know that the proposal was there, waiting for her reply. She acknowledged it but was so distracted by the images of “Earth’s beauty” - her words, certainly not mine - that it likely slipped her notoriously absent mind.

The Commander took another deep breath. I could already see that her forced politeness was dissipating, “Well, here’s the thing. The city planner is threatening to move forward and break ground, so I need an answer. Like...right now.”

“I understand, commander but with all due respect…”

“Please...don’t ‘with all due respect’ me. I have waited patiently for weeks, and I am running out of time. I need to know what to tell the city planner, and I need to know immediately.”

“Commander please, listen-”

“No, you listen…” I watched, over the course of our interaction, as The Commander’s demeanor change from a forced civility, to an abject annoyance, to a calm sternness, “When word gets back to the Diamond Authority that a city was built on top of a potential kindergarten without Pink Diamond’s knowledge, they’re going to be asking why she wasn’t made aware of that land’s viability before we went ahead with construction. They’re going to wonder why Pink Diamond wasn’t given a chance to make a final call. Do you understand what I’m saying?” 

I sighed. I did understand. Someone would be held responsible for ultimately allowing tons of raw material to go to waste. That someone couldn’t be a diamond, and The Commander was making it clear that that someone wouldn’t be her. I could see it, now - stained on my record in bright red lettering, ‘Failure to forward vital information to her superior.’ Such an error would not be easily forgiven. The Commander wasn’t giving me a choice, “I understand.” I said, resigned, “I will remind Pink Diamond of your proposal, immediately.”

There was a sigh of relief followed by a brief moment of silence. The sternness with which The Commander addressed me had gone. Replaced by what appeared to be a twinge of remorseful understanding, “Look...I heard about what’s been going on, and I understand that Pink Diamond isn’t exactly in the best mood right now. But this shouldn’t cause too much of a fuss, right? All I need is ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’ That’s it.”

“Yes...of course.”

“Thank you...good luck.” We both signed off with an unspoken understanding that this would not, in fact, be easy. But it was necessary. I turned to Pink, who was still facing the damaged pane, her back turned to me. Still seething. Still grumbling. Still ruminating. I began my approach slowly and methodically, so as not to startle the irate diamond. I could almost feel the ire radiating from her person as I got closer. Once directly behind her, I cleared my throat in an, albeit immature, attempt to grab Pink’s attention. It seemed to have worked as her head raised slightly. Yet, she did not turn to face me. I took a deep breath, mustering every ounce of courage that I had at my disposal, “Sorry to disturb you My Di-”

“Now now…” She growled those words with a quiet intensity that would send a chill down the back of even the most hardened quartz.

I truly wanted nothing more than to leave Pink Diamond be. Unfortunately, the situation obligated me to press further, “My Diamond, please. This is very impor-”

“I said, ‘not now’” again, I was shaken by her simmering inflection. But time was of the essence. I couldn’t let up.

And so, pushing aside the remainder of my apprehension, I made one final, more forceful, attempt, “My Diamond, I beg of you. We really need your…”

“SHUT UP!!!” In a single, rapid, fluid motion, Pink whipped around! For a fleeting second, I looked into the eyes of the frightful, raging diamond! Words could never describe that hateful look in her eyes! Much less the true extent of the fear it struck. But it was only for a second that I was able to catch a glimpse of that hideous gaze. For the very next second, I was off the ground! In the air! Ascending! Flying! Then falling!

I have no recollection of the moment I hit the floor. I can only recall the moment immediately thereafter. I was lying on my back, staring up into the heavens through the glass dome above. Only half-aware of what had just transpired. My ears were ringing. My mind was abuzz. I was all but deafened by the cacophony of voices of my now panicked inner-pearls. As the moment went by, the voices began to fade as my cruelest inner pearl regained her dominance over the rabble. Once I recovered the full extent of my faculties, I was able to hear her voice, loud and clear; just as biting and scornful as always. You stupid clod! You stupid idiot clod! You stupid worthless idiot piece of filth clod!! You just had to push her, didn’t you? This is what happens when you forget your place!! You’ve killed us! Do you understand? You’ve killed us!! You’ve killed us!!

‘You’ve killed us.’ Over and over that statement rang through my head until I was finally able to surmise it’s very grim, very literal meaning. Without looking, I placed my hand over my gem and shuttered internally when I felt the rapidly spreading cracks. In that moment, I thought of what I could have done differently. Of what I could have done better. I knew how Pink Diamond was. I knew how forgetful she was. I should have anticipated that the proposal would slip her mind. Why didn’t I remind her? Why didn’t I at least ask about its status? Why didn’t I try harder? Why didn’t I do more? I should have been more proactive! I should have been more tactful! I should have been more careful! There was little room for doubt. I was dying, and it was my fault. Stupid clod. I thought to myself, look what you made her do. Stupid...stupid clod. Though I knew that I was static, it felt as though my body were sinking, and it appeared as though the stars above were receding away, further into the ether. I felt that the heavens themselves were judging me, mocking me. And, of course, they were right to do so.

It wasn’t too much longer before I heard the rapid, approaching footsteps of a now panicked diamond. “Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!” Before long, Pink Diamond came into view. She knelt down over me, clasping her head in both of her hands with a look of frenzied concern. “OhmygodOhmygodOhmygodOhmygodOhmygod!!!” In a gesture far outside the realms of social acceptability, Pink bent down and embraced me, cradling my head in her hands as she rocked back and forth, all the while hyperventilating. With my cheek now pressed against hers, I could feel the tears streaming down her face, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” No. This wasn’t right. A diamond should never find reason to apologize to a pearl. I wanted ever so badly to remind her that the fault was mine and mine alone! That it should be me apologizing to her! That I was the one to provoke her. And now, thanks to my worthless stupidity, I have caused even further distress! I wanted so much to tell her all of this, but I found myself, for reasons unspecified, yet unable to speak. 

Pink Diamond then pressed her face against my chest, sobbing into my gem, releasing my head to hang limp and allowing me another view of the stars above. There was no room for doubt. The heavens were indeed judging me. 

“I’m sorry!” Pink cried, “I’m so sorry!” as her tears made contact with my gem, I could feel the cracks disappearing and my body regaining its vigor. It was as though Pink’s tears had healed me of the very injuries she inflicted. I was then able to raise my head and see Pink, yet unaware of my rejuvenation, still crying into my gem. Making for a somewhat awkward situation.

“My...Diamond?” Pink pulled away, seeing that she had healed me. She embraced me again, now overjoyed. “Oh, thank the stars!” she exclaimed. She got up and helped me to my feet, “I am so sorry. I-I don’t know what came over me! I was angry at the other diamonds and I just.” There she goes, again. I hated that she felt the need to apologize. Or, to be more accurate, I hated that I made her feel like she had to apologize. As if I didn’t feel terrible enough, what Pink said next still makes me cringe to this day, “Can you ever forgive me?” 

I bowed my head in absolute shame. That I had driven a diamond to the point of asking me, a pearl, for forgiveness was a misdeed that I could hardly bear. “There’s...nothing to forgive, My Diamond.” I whispered, “It was my fault. I’m the one who should be sorry...”

Silence. I didn’t dare look up at Pink, though I suspect she still felt guilty for what had transpired. Perhaps she wanted to say something to ease my distress. But there was nothing that she could have said. I am her pearl. The responsibility was, and always will be mine. 

I suspect it was her realization that nothing could be said to ease my feelings of shame and self-loathing, which prompted her to change the subject, “Um...right. So what was it that you needed?” 

In the frenzie, I had nearly forgotten. I, too, wanted nothing more than to put this conflict behind us. And so, I gathered myself and stood at attention to properly address Pink Diamond, “Oh...yes. Um, The Commander of Terraform Company 16 requested your response to a proposal. She had sent you. It was the…”

“Oh god! The proposal!” Pink exclaimed with a gasp. Pink brought up her holo-screen and anxiously scrolled through her inbox. “Gah! I can’t believe I forgot about that! Where was it? Where was it?”

“It should be at the top of your ‘high-priority’ tab, My Diamond” I said.

Following my suggestion, Pink found the proposal. “Oh! There it is! Now what was it…?” Pink tapered off as she went to sit on her throne, now fully engrossed in her current task. It seemed she had almost immediately forgotten about the preceding events. I went to take my place next to Pink Diamond. Standing at attention as she carried out her tasks. The rest of that day was largely uneventful, but that conflict would remain fresh in my mind. Amazingly, the same couldn’t have been said for Pink. For her, it really was though the whole thing never happened. 

As I observed this, I remembered something else Pink Diamond’s former pearl once said of her, “What I really admire about Pink Diamond is how quickly she’s able to forgive herself. She almost never dwells on her actions for long. Why, she hardly dwells on them at all! I sure wish I were like that!” ------

Author’s Note: Hey guys. Finally got around to posting another entry. Sorry about the delay but the truth is, I haven’t been doing well. Like...at all. Don’t wanna get into specifics but everything is kinda been falling apart, lol 😅. This may seem weird but if you don’t mind, I could use some words of encouragement if you get ‘em Anyway, here’s the Diversion Agreement. Making these documents has been surprisingly fun. They certainly make for a nice distraction, lol

[script-a-world]

hello. i want to write a story set in a very religious place. like fanatic level of religious. in my mind, this place is ruled by what the church says but has a "cover" figure to "connect" with the people. the people of this place are devoted to their religion, meaning they know passages, go to mass, and shun those who don't support it. here is my question: how does one go about creating a religion that feels real? what do i need to take into consideration (i'm not religious myself).

Mod Miri Note: At the same time this came in we also received from the google form the question “How do I world build a religion?” I can’t confirm they’re the same anon, but we’re combining them for the answer.

Brainstormed: You seem to have a very… narrow perception of religion? If you aren’t religious yourself and you’re (presumably) from a Western culture, it makes sense that the Christian church and more specifically Catholicism are your go-to images of hyperreligion. Saying “mass” and “church” and “passages” kind of gives away the fact that you’re trying to base your religion off of at least your idea of an Abrahamic religion, but I’d ask you to reconsider. Right now it sounds like you’re trying to create a negative critique of these religions, and even if that is what you’re going for, you need to do a lot of research on their theology, history, and practices before you can do so with any competence.

I’d suggest doing some basic research on types of religions, like animism, pantheism, polytheism, general superstition, etc. There are plenty of spiritual worldviews that you might consider way over the top, but whose believers find it more bizarre when people don’t follow their teachings. Fanatics are never fanatics in their own mind, and especially among their own people, but also… fanatic might be a relative term. If you’re approaching this from a nonreligious background, then you might consider X-amount of religion in one’s lifestyle to be fanatic-level. Whereas a person who actively practices religion would consider X-amount to be perfectly normal, and only folks who take it to XX-amount plus some shadier practices are the true fanatics.

Remember, religions start because people want to make sense of the world. There is a deeper feeling of wonder and personhood and power, both within a human being and in the whole world around us, that drives spirituality and generates superstition. Religion, at least to start, is beneficial to people, otherwise no one but sadists would follow its teachings. Now, like anything else, religion can devolve into a means of power hoarding and control of a populace, but only because of the people in charge getting greedy. The vast majority of religions I’ve studied have had radical, freeing, empowering teachings applicable to everybody when they first sprang up, and only later did adherents twist those teachings into societal oppression. If there is no satisfaction or benefit in your religion, there won’t exactly be any incentive for people to follow it so closely, aside from whatever negative consequences occur for those who fall away. And negative consequences aren’t often enough to keep people in a religion. If following religion is more painful than the consequences of leaving it, plenty of people will jump ship.

Religion can also show up in every single part of life. According to Wikipedia:

A religious experience (sometimes known as a spiritual experience, sacred experience, or mystical experience) is a subjective experience which is interpreted within a religious framework. The concept originated in the 19th century, as a defense against the growing rationalism of Western society. William James popularised the concept.

You look up and see a cloud, a spiritual person sees a portent, or a spirit, or a castle where the gods live. You take a break from work for a minute, a spiritual person now has time to mutter a prayer, or observe the mood of the world, or dedicate their work to their god. A person doesn’t have to be anywhere near a fanatic to have their religion be in every part of their life. Especially if they adhere to a more lax spirituality or superstitious worldview instead of an organized religion, the central spiritual experience of religious belief alters the perception of self and surroundings. It isn’t only a set of rules to follow.

It can even help areas of society that modern Western society considers nonreligious! Historically, medicine has always come under religion. Witch doctors, medicine men, witchcraft, even the hygiene laws laid out in the Christian Bible. Physical health has often been considered a reflection of spiritual health, which, in a way, is true! The placebo effect means tending to one’s mental and emotional health with the reassurance of religion will improve one’s physical health as well. Not only that, but the power of a “spiritual experience”, regardless of if you believe the supernatural is real, can cause religious ecstacy, something you might perceive as a serious psychological problem but those who experience it consider to be a deep form of spiritual expression to be treasured and sought after. The spread and preservation of information is also often aided by religion, even though that can change should those in power want to change history or obscure truth for their own reasons. Just look at the history of the printing press and how that was driven by the need for Bibles. Many cultures, most famously Australian Aboriginal peoples, have oral histories thousands of years long that tie in closely to their spirituality.

You also might be confusing religion with cults. If you think all religion is predatory, playing on people’s weaknesses and fears in order to coerce them into a miserable lifestyle of following strict laws and living under control of those in power, you definitely have conflated “religion” and “cult”. If you’d like to worldbuild a cult, go ahead! It’s likely to be smaller and less acceptable than an established organized religion, not very transparent to the outside world nor its members, and have a spirituality that is in fact just a veneer over gaining power, instead of genuine belief and devotion, and may in fact require people to murder or commit suicide. Just look at Scientology, or these, or even Jared Leto, and a more in-depth look from this organization covering many different kinds of cults.

On a more worldbuildy note, are those who practice this religion correct? Does their god(s) exist? Is the supernatural real? If yes, then are they really fanatics if they’ve been right all along? Even if they’re incorrect, the dedication and deep-held beliefs of religious people shouldn’t be mocked wholesale, in my opinion. Make sure to keep some genuine three-dimensional development for characters who are part of this religion, or include other religions with different practices, or the only thing you’ll accomplish is “waaaa religion bad believers dumb”. And if that is the story you want to write, feel free, but I can’t help you there.

Feral: What makes a religion feel real? Sincere faith.

Specifically among the leaders. I mean, sure, those lemming-like peasants who actually believe that superstitious nonsense will have sincere faith, but honestly? There is going to be a higher percentage of people faking it among the masses than among the clergy. Clergy members are generally required to go through rigorous studies and often take vows that can cause great discomfort. I am sure there are those who did it for the power - there are in atheist organizations as well, humans can be crap - but if you actually read the writings of important Church leaders of the past, not to mention rabbis, imams & mullahs, and archakas, you’re going to find that they have sincere faith.

Something you should always keep in mind when developing pre-modern religion in a Western context is that before the advent of modern scholarship, which starts to become a thing in the West during the Renaissance, all the important scholars were clergy. And again, those learned people either had to be really, really dedicated to their power-hungry ambitions or had to have sincere faith.

That does not make religions perfect by any means nor does it mean that the god they have sincere faith in is omnibenevolent (though the qualities of an omnibenevolent god will be strongly dependent on the culture that worships it). And religious leaders are absolutely capable of doing terrible, terrible things even if they profess to worship an omnibenevolent god, and politicians can definitely twist things around to suit their needs (again, this is not exclusive to religiosity). But your ask has this weird given that a major religion (on par with Catholicism/Christianity) in your world is a scam, and while yes, that happens in cults and alternative religions and in splinter groups*, as Brainstormed pointed out that’s just not how, at least, the four major religions of our world got started.

Yes, it’s true that bureaucracies of a certain size and age will inevitably begin to change focus to protecting its own existence. And yes, it’s true that ambitious sociopaths will be drawn to places of authority even if they are difficult to achieve. And yes, it’s true that an individual entering a toxic environment is more likely to be changed by the environment than to change the environment. But guess what! That has nothing to do with whether the organization is religious or not.

Why does a religion exist in the first place? It explains the universe in a pre-modern world; it provides organization and structure for community focus - in other words, many social programs have historically been run through religious organizations and leadership. And it provides hope and comfort in a very scary world.

Some clergy might be able to fake all of that for a little while, but a large bureaucracy with many clerics who are all in on the fake? No. Allow me to rephrase: hell no. People are not dumb. Maybe you believe that of all religious people, but you are wrong and they are not. The people in your world, if they’re anything like the people in our world, are gonna sniff out the bullshit if none of their religious leaders believe what they’re selling. There is a reason Scientology has to keep blackmail files on all its adherents, and I promise you, the Catholic Church does not do that.

*A note on cults, alternative religions, and splinter groups: Cults and alternative religions (their PR friendly name) are “religions” that are scammy and/or actively dangerous to the participants or others: People’s Temple, Branch Davidian, etc. Splinter groups are congregations that start as normal members of a large religion or denomination but its insular culture creates a divide that just takes things a little too far even for the most fanatical of the main sect (think terrorist groups that link themselves to religions). These types of religions might be what you are actually asking about. Groups like these can be highly, highly influential but in a very contained area. What cults often do is the leader settles in an area and buys property and builds a church and maybe a school and then encourages the members to all move either onto the plot of land if it’s large enough or to buy up surrounding land and homes and push out all the non-believers. That area can then be fortified or just have a de facto boundary with the rest of the world. Sometimes a group like this can become large enough to constitute an entire town, but rarely a city - groups that large will more often have centralized compounds but with the members living scattered among non-believers, as Scientology does. Obviously a group concentrated like that will have an impact on local politics, if they are allowed to participate, but it’s not going to go farther than the county line, so to speak. As we all know from the news, splinter groups like ISIS can become very large and globe spanning, but those types of groups have within them splinter groups and factions, and I don’t think that’s what you’re asking about anyway, so I’m just going to leave it there.

But frankly, your ask reads to me as “how do I create a fantasy!Catholic that is secretly evil and will show the audience how evil religion is in the real world? Opiate of the masses!” And my advice is… don’t. Because it lacks compassionate understanding of people of faith (many faiths), it lacks a factual understanding of how world religions differ and function, it totally lacks nuance, and finally, because it is absolutely, monumentally, extremely, really, very cliche.

Maybe the way your ask is coming across to me is totally not how you intended it. Maybe you only used the jargon you used because you assumed we wouldn’t know any other terms and maybe your understanding of world religions is actually quite sophisticated. Maybe you really do have this insanely clever way to spin a tired cliche into some new and original. In these cases, we strongly encourage you to come right back with as jargon-full and specific an ask as you can write, use our submission google form to do it. Otherwise, give our responses some thought and if after you’ve developed your religion, you want to come back with a specific ask other than “how do I world build a religion?” (which is a little too broad), please feel free.

[qqueenofhades]

I have a question about your opinion as a historian about how to deal with problematic past. I am French, not American, so not quite as aware of what is happening right now in the US regarding statues as I probably should. My question is the following: many of the politicians who promoted (admittedly white) social equality in France, worked on reforming labor laws, etc, in the 19th / 20th century were certainly not anti-colonialist. How to deal with this "mixed legacy" today? Best wishes to you!

First off, I am honoured that you would ask me this question. Disclaimer, my work in French history is largely focused on the medieval era, rather than modern France, and while I have studied and traveled in France, and read and (adequately?) speak French, I am not French myself. So this should be viewed as the perspective of a friendly and reasonably well-informed outsider, but not somebody from France themselves, and therefore subject to possible errors or otherwise inaccurate statements. But this is my perception as I see it, so hopefully it will be helpful for you.

(By the way if you’re interested, my post on the American statue controversy and the “preserving history!” argument is here. I originally wrote it in 2017, when the subject of removing racist monuments first arose, and then took another look at it in light of recent events and was like “WELP”.)

There’s actually a whole lot to say about the current crisis of public history in a French context, so let me see if I can think where to start. First, my chief impression is that nobody really associates France with its historical empire, the same way everyone still has either a positive or negative impression of the British Empire and its real-world effects. The main international image of France (one carefully cultivated by France itself) is that of the French Revolution: storming the Bastille, guillotining aristocrats, Liberté, égalité, fraternité, a secular republic overcoming old constraints of a hidebound Catholic aristocracy and reinventing itself as a Modern Nation. Of course, less than a generation after the Revolution (and this has always amused/puzzled me) France swung straight back into autocratic expansionist empire under Napoleon, and its colonialism efforts continued vigorously alongside its European counterparts throughout the nineteenth and well into the twentieth century. France has never really reckoned with its colonialist legacy either, not least because of a tendency in French public life for a) strong centralization, and b) a national identity that doesn’t really allow for a hyphen. What I mean by that is that while you can be almost anything before “American,” ie. African-American, Latino-American, Jewish-American, Muslim-American, etc, you are (at least in my experience) expected to only be “French.” There is a strong nationalistic identity primarily fueled by language, values, and lifestyle, and the French view anyone who does not take part in it very dimly. That’s why we have the law banning the burka and arguments that it “inhibits” Muslim women from visually and/or emotionally assimilating into French culture. There is a very strong pressure for centralization and conformity, and that is not flexible.

Additionally, the aforementioned French lifestyle identity involves cafe culture, smoking, and drinking alcohol -- all things that, say, a devout Muslim is unlikely to take part in. The secularism of French political culture is another factor, along with the strict bureaucracy and interventionist government system. France narrowly dodged getting swept up in the right-wing populist craze when it elected Emmanuel Macron over Marine Le Pen (and it’s my impression that the FN still remains relatively popular) but it also has a deep-grained xenophobia. I’m sure you remember “French Spiderman,” the 22-year-old man from Mali who climbed four stories of a building in Paris to rescue a toddler in 2018. He was immediately hailed as a hero and allowed to apply for French citizenship, but critics complained about him arriving in France illegally in the first place, and it happened alongside accelerated efforts to deny asylum seekers, clear out the Calais migrant camp, and otherwise maintain a hostile environment. The terror attacks in France, such as 2015 in Paris and the 2016 Bastille Day attack in Nice, have also stiffened public opinion against any kind of accommodation or consideration of non-French (and by implication, non-white) Frenchpeople. The Académie Française is obviously also a very strong linguistic force (arguably even more so than the English-only movement in America) that excludes people from “pure” French cultural status until they meet its criteria. There really is no French identity or civic pride without the French language, so that is also something to take into consideration.

France also has a strong anti-authority and labor rights movement that America does not have (at least the latter). When I was in France, the joke was about the “annual strike” of students and railway workers, which was happening while I was trying to study, and we saw that with the yellow jacket protests as well. Working-class France is used to making a stink when it feels that it’s being disrespected, and while I can’t comment in detail on how the racial element affects that, I know there has been tension and discontent from working-class, racial-minority neighborhoods in Paris about how they’ve been treated (and during the recent French police brutality protests, the police chief rejected any idea that the police were racist, despite similar deaths in custody of black men including another French Malian, Adama Traoré.) All of this adds up to an atmosphere in which race relations, and their impact on French history, is a very fraught subject in which discussions are likely to get heated (as discussions of race relations with Europeans and white people tend to get, but especially so). The French want to be French, and feel very strongly that everyone else in the country should be French as well, which can encompass a certain race-blindness, but not a cultural toleration. There’s French culture, the end, and there isn’t really an accommodation for hybrid or immigrant French cultures. Once again, this is again my impression and experience.

The blind spot of 19th-century French social reformers to colonialism is not unlike Cold War-era America positioning itself as the guarantor of “freedom and liberation” in the world, while horrendously oppressing its black citizens (which did come in for sustained international criticism at the time). Likewise with the American founding fathers including soaring rhetoric about the freedom and equality of all (white) men in the Constitution, while owning slaves. The efforts of (white) social reformers and political activists have refused to see black and brown people as human, and therefore worthy of meriting the same struggle for liberation, for... well, almost forever, and where those views did change, it had to come about as a process and was almost never there to start with. “Scientific” white supremacy was especially the rage in the nineteenth century, where racist and imperialist European intellectuals enjoyed a never-ending supply of “scientific” literature explaining how black, brown, and other men of color were naturally inferior to white men and they had a “duty” to civilize the helpless people of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and so on, who just couldn’t aspire to do it themselves. (This is where we get the odious “white man’s burden” phrase. How noble of them.) So the nineteenth-century social reformers were, in their minds, just doing what science told them to do; slavery abolitionists and other relief societies for black and brown people were often motivated by deeply racist “assimilationist” ideas about making these poor helpless people “fit” for white civilization, at which point racial prejudice would magically end. This might have been more “benevolent” than outright slave-owning racism, but it was no less damaging and paternalistic.

If you’re interested in reading about French colonialism and postcolonialism from a Black French perspective, I recommend Frantz Fanon (who you may have already heard of) and his 1961 magnum opus The Wretched of the Earth/ Les Damnés de la Terre. (There is also his 1952 work, Black Skin, White Masks.) Fanon was born in Martinique, served in World War II, and was part of the struggle for Algerian liberation from France. He was a highly influential and controversial postcolonial theorist, not least for his belief that decolonialization would never be achieved without violence (which, to say the least, unnerved genteel white society). I feel as if France in general needs to have a process of deep soul-searching about its relationship to race and its own imperial history (French Indochina/Vietnam being another obvious example with recent geopolitical implications), because it’s happy to let Britain take the flak for its unexamined and triumphalist imperial nostalgia. (One may remark that of course France is happy to let Britain make a fool of itself and hope that nobody notices its similar sins....) This is, however, currently unlikely to happen on a broad scale for the social and historical reasons that I discussed above, so I really applaud you for taking the initiative in starting that conversation and reaching out for resources to help you in doing it. Hopefully it will help you put the legacy of these particular social reformers in context and offer you talking points both for what they did well and where their philosophy fell short.

If there does come a point of a heightened racial conversation and reckoning in France (and there have been Black Lives Matter protests there in the last few weeks, so it’s not impossible) I would be curious to see what it looks like. It’s arguably one of the Western countries that has least dealt with its racial issues while making itself into the standard-bearer for secular Western liberalism. France has also enthusiastically joined in the EU, whereas Britain has (rather notoriously....) separated from all that, which makes Britain look provincial and isolated while France can position itself as a global leader with a more internationalist outlook. Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel are currently leading the effort for the $500 billion coronavirus rescue package for the EU, which gives it a sense of statesmanship and stature. It will be interesting to see how that continues to change and develop vis-a-vis race, or if it does.

Thanks so much for such an interesting question, and I hope that helped!

[qm-vox]

Let The World Never Falter - Playing Paladins in D&D

(Pictured: Anastasia Luxan, Knight of the Tainted Cup, one of only two people in her friend group that are not evil-aligned. Her wife Aisling is not the other good-aligned person. Characters are from my novel Mourners: Scum of Shatterdown; art credit goes to J.D)

Paladins are one of Dungeons and Dragons’ most striking, and most controversial, character classes. Few character classes and character concepts capture the imagination as quickly or start arguments of such ferocity. I’ve been in this game awhile - I remember when D&D 3e was released - and paladins have been one of my most loved and most hated parts of D&D and its legacy systems that entire time. So here I am again, about to write a long-ass article offerin’ my perspective on paladins through the ages (hopefully highlighting the strongest parts of each vision of them), talk about their pitfalls and problematic elements, and offer some advice on bringing your own paladin to life.

While this article draws on my long experience with D&D and will be citing specific sources, it would not be possible without the help of some other people in my life. I mention Afroakuma a lot in the context of D&D, and our friendship has once again been invaluable here. @a-world-unmasked , also one of my oldest friends, has long been a source of ethical discussion and debate, especially about thorny questions of justice & mercy, amends, redemption, and punishment, and provided information on D&D 4e’s paladins and paladin-like classes. SSG Jacob Karpel, United States Army, brought a Jewish perspective on paladins and their themes into my life and has borne questions of faith, dogma, and tradition with remarkable enthusiasm and patience. @swiftactionrecovery provided further perspective on D&D 4e, and her current paladin (”paladin”; it’s complicated), Aurora, is a great example of a non-traditional take that is at the same time very on-brand. Emerald has long provided the service of beating my ass when I start getting stupid about my own values and beliefs, and @ahr42p‘s fascination with fantasy ethics has informed a lot of my own thoughts on the same. None of this would be possible without you folks.

This article’s title is drawn from Maverick Hunter Quest, written by Cain Labs & Hunter Command. It appears as the motto of the 10th Urban Unit; dedicated soldiers whose specialty was preserving lives, preventing collateral damage, and steering disasters away from the innocent.

None of my articles are quite complete without Content Warnings; the following will contain mentions and descriptions of violence (including state-sanctioned violence such as executions), mentions of high crimes such as slavery and forced conversion, discussion of religion in both fictional and non-fictional contexts, and discussion of fascism and fascist ideology. It is also the end result of more than 20 years of both passionate love for paladins and equally passionate hatred of the same. If you’re wondering what some of that has to do with paladins...well, you’re in for a ride.

So, without further ado, let’s get into...

The Order Of The Kitchen Table - Paladins Through D&D’s History

I hope you like walls of text because I am about to fuck you up with some.

D&D and Pathfinder have a long history with paladins, and they’ve changed a lot through the ages. The following is an overview of the different editions of paladins, what each introduced, and their strengths & weaknesses as a vision of paladinhood. Though the advice in this article is weighted towards 3.PF and 5e, it should in theory be applicable to any of these editions; I should also note that while Pathfinder 2e has its own version of paladins, I am not familiar enough with its vision of paladins to be able to speak on it in good faith. Let’s start with the oldest first, shall we?

AD&D 1e & 2e: Rise A Knight - 1e and 2e were fucking wild. The original incarnation of the paladin showed up as a sub-class of the cavalier, a warrior-group class which had an aura of courage, rode a horse, and had other ‘knightly’ abilities. Paladins had to be a cut above and beyond cavaliers, but unless they also violated the code of the cavaliers in addition to the paladin code, they would become cavaliers when they Fell rather than fighters, which was a bit of a better spot to be in. These paladins were very specifically part of the military arm of a feudal state, with all that entails, and had restrictions on what they could wear and what weapons they could use that were rooted in their social status. In point of fact, in 1e? Paladins couldn’t use missile weapons at all; bows, crossbows, and their kin were for “peasants”. These paladins had to tithe 10% of all income to a ‘worthy’ institution (usually a Lawful Good church of some kind, but other examples include hospitals, charitable initiatives, orphanages, and monasteries), had sharp limits on how many magical items they could own & of what kind, and were beholden to a strict code of conduct rooted in medieval feudalism & romantic ideals of chivalry. While the very original paladin had many of the iconic powers associated with them today (laying on hands, curing disease, an affinity for holy swords), it was not until AD&D 1e proper that paladins developed the ability to cast spells for themselves.

AD&D 2e’s vision of paladins was similar in many ways; they had the same powers, similar ability score requirements, and were similarly rare and elite. They had wealth limits, had to tithe from their income, could only own certain numbers and kinds of magical items, and had to be of Lawful Good alignment. Where things get interestingly different here is who becomes a paladin, and why. In both editions, only humans could be paladins, but where 1e required paladins to be drawn from or else become nobility (because they were derived from cavalier, which was all about status), 2e opened up many origins for paladins. The majority of these can be found in The Complete Paladin’s Handbook, just under 130 pages of nothing but paladins. Reading that book is a fucking trip; it was published in 1994, and while I am not gonna pretend that it’s woke or unproblematic, it has some stunningly modern takes. Do you expect to open up an old D&D supplement about paladins and find it defending poly relationships as valid? NEITHER DID I.

It’s important to note that in both of these editions, paladins lacked magical avenues of attack entirely; Smite Evil was a later invention, and paladin spells, in addition to coming online late in their career (9th level), were sharply restricted to a specific list that included no offensive magic whatsoever. Therefore, any paladin origin had to explain from whence one’s martial skills came, since you are in many ways a warrior more than anything else. There’s some expected ones; religious patronage, which ignores social status but requires an organized church that’s permitted to raise men under arms. Government sponsorship, generally conducted in urban areas where you can actually retain recruiters. Inherited title, if you wanna run a paladin that really hates Mom for forcing them into this. Mentors, for running paladins that are just straight-up shonen protagonists, and my personal favorite, DIVINE INTERVENTION, where one day your god starts talking to you but instead of filling your soul with martial skill she makes you sew training weights into your clothes and miraculously makes a bear live in your house so you can learn courage. It’s fucking amazing.

From those origins, anyone who manages to swear their oath and become invested with the power is essentially part of the nobility from then on; paladinhood marks them as an exemplar of noble ideals, which even in a non-romanticized culture sorta grabs the bluebloods by the short hairs. It’s a bit hard to argue divine right if you try to throw the embodiment of your supposed ideals out of your house. Since these paladins were often, though not necessarily, members of militant organizations they were generally expected to have superiors to whom they answer, a chain of command of which they are part, and to eventually construct a stronghold of some kind and put its services at the disposal of that organization in addition to utilizing it to serve the needy and defend the weak. 2e was a lawless and strange time in D&D, in which building such a stronghold and hiring followers was a class feature of warrior-group classes, and one of the paladin’s key benefits was the opportunity, but not the promise, to acquire some manner of holy sword, which which she gained powerful protections against evil that let her stand toe-to-toe with powerful spellcasters.

Tying all of this together was an in-depth exploration of the most complex and probably the most nuanced code published for paladins in any edition. Though the default was a rigid and inflexible code which defined acceptable behavior, associations, and even employees for the paladin, The Complete Paladin’s Handbook introduced an alternate method of handling code violations that ranked infractions by their severity & intent, and assigned penalties accordingly. Was it perfect? No. Not even a little. The Code was, is, and probably forever will be the most trash part of paladin. But it was a damn sight better than basically any incarnation before it, and most of them after. This code was broken down into (in order of importance), Strictures, Edicts, and Virtues. Strictures are the things a paladin must do and have simply to be a paladin; they must be Lawful Good, they must tithe to a worthy institution, they must abide by their wealth limits, and they must not associate (here meaning ‘serve, be friends with, or knowingly hire’) with evil people. Edicts are the commands of those to whom the paladin is sworn to obey; often this will be a church, a government, or both, but a paladin might instead or also swear to obey edicts given by their family, their mentor, their secular philosophy, or even their wider culture. Military commands and orders are edicts, but so are daily practices such as keeping a kosher diet, maintaining a family burial ground, or obeying a system of formal etiquette. A paladin freely chooses the source of her edicts, but once she’s sworn to obey she cannot selectively turn down a given edict unless it would conflict with one of her Strictures (for instance, if her king orders her to beat a helpless prisoner) or with a ‘higher’ source of Edicts (in general, a paladins religion or philosophy takes precedence over her liege or mentor, who in turn takes precedence over family or culture).

Virtues are where we get real interesting. Lemme quote The Complete Paladin’s Handbook, page 32:

Virtues are traits exemplifying the highest standards of morality, decency, and duty. They comprise the paladin’s personal code. Although not specifically detailed in the PH definition of a paladin, a paladin’s virtues are implied by his strictures as well as his outlook, role, and personality. Just as a paladin must obey his strictures, he must also remain true to his virtues.

Though most paladins adhere to all of the virtues described below, exceptions are possible. For instance, a paladin from a primitive society may be so unfamiliar with civilized etiquette that including courtesy as part of his ethos would be unreasonable. All adjustments must be cleared by the DM at the outset of a paladin’s career.

No system was attached to virtue ‘violations’, because they weren’t oaths to keep as such. Rather, virtues represented commitments to a paladin’s ideals and worldviews; they were the behaviors and values which someone serious about being a paladin would live by because that’s the kind of person they are. They were very Christian and very European in nature, tied up in Catholic ideas of knighthood from which paladins as a class were originally drawn, but there’s definitely a point to be made here. If you don’t walk your talk, can you call yourself a paragon? We’re gonna get into this specific topic more later in the article, when I start discussing other the virtues extolled by other kinds of warriors, but the ones listed and expanded on in this book are as follows:

Fealty - A paladin swears loyalty and service to, at minimum, a faith or philosophy that is lawful good in nature. This forms the foundation of her convictions and informs the kind of good she tries to do in the world. A paladin remains conscious of the fact that she is seen as an embodiment of those ideals, takes joy in her service, and pays respect to those to whom she has sworn her troth. Notably, this is not classic feudal fealty; a paladin swears service to institutions, not people, with some exceptions (generally in the form of paladins who swear fealty to their mentors).

Courtesy - Paladins strive to show respect by following social customs, being polite and well-mannered, and treating even enemies with dignity. A paladin responds to insults with grace, considers the feelings of others, and does not stoop to insults or slander. Remember the Kingsmen gentleman rules? That. This is just that.

Honesty - A paladin speaks the truth as she knows it. She is free to withhold information (especially from enemies), and may state that she would prefer not to answer when asked questions - or that she is ordered, enjoined, or otherwise required not to answer, if that is the truth - but does not intentionally mislead or deceive others. If you ask your paladin friend a question and they say they would rather not answer, think real hard about how bad you want their opinion.

Valor - Paladins display courage in battle. Given a choice between many enemies, a paladin chooses the most dangerous. If someone has to take a risk to defend the innocent, cover a retreat, or ensure the success of the mission, the paladin volunteers for that risk. A paladin only retreats from battle to fulfill a higher part of her ethos.

Honor - A paladin conducts herself with integrity even when no one is watching or when it is of no benefit to herself. She shows mercy, refuses to inflict undue suffering even on such wretched beings as demons, does not cheat or cut corners, and does not compromise her principles. The description of the virtue of honor contains the rawest line in the entire book: “It is an admirable act to comfort a dying friend, but an act of honor to comfort a dying enemy.”

The above are the ‘universal’ virtues a paladin is meant to embody. The book briefly touches on the idea that a paladin might also choose to uphold other virtues and work them into her Code of Ennoblement, the ceremony by which she is invested with the power of a paladin...or isn’t. The sample ‘bonus’ virtues provided are humility, chastity, celibacy, and my absolute favorite, industry, in which you swear to have no chill at all, ever, until the day you finally die, and instead spend all of your waking moments in some effort of self-improvement or work such as reading, building houses for the needy, repairing tools & equipment, and otherwise being completely incompetent in the art of self-care. It’s great, I absolutely love it.

Together, this code and the paladin’s abilities present a vision of classical knighthood, something like, oh...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35GUTY_Gr14

That. A defender and paragon of medieval virtues, who lives to help others.

“Alright Vox, surely you’re reaching the end of AD&D 2e now?” you ask. “We’ve been through the mechanics, we’ve been through the vision of paladins as members of feudal states who are figuratively and legally ennobled by righteousness, we’ve even gone into more detail about the code than was strictly necessary. 3e time right?” AFRAID NOT, MY WILD RIDE DOES NOT END. AD&D 2e didn’t have feats, didn’t really have spell selection in this context, and while it had a sort of skill system (the Proficiency system, greatly utilized and suggested by The Complete Paladin’s Handbook) that was hardly a way to make one paladin feel mechanically distinct from others. So how did players do that? Ability score rolls and loot drops?

Nope! We had Kits.

Kits modify a class or multiclass combo (not relevant to this article, but as a f’rinstance, the original Bladesinger was an elf-only Fighter/Mage kit found in The Complete Book of Elves); they give it additional features and additional restrictions. They could, but did not always, have ability score requirements above and beyond the typical ones for their class, and they might also have backstory or roleplaying requirements. A kit might who your character is in the society of the game world, the abilities they brought to the adventuring party, or both. Like Pathfinder’s Archetypes, some kits would strip abilities from the standard class, but not all of them did so.

So what did paladin kits do? In short, they changed the kind of knight you were. An Errant, for instance, is kept on a long leash by their liege and does not often have to fulfill edicts - but in exchange, she’s on her own and cannot expect funding from the state. Ghosthunters, who specialize in the destruction of the undead, gain the power to dispel evil, immunity to paralysis, turn undead just as well as a cleric does, and get access to a holy sword a minimum of 2 levels earlier - but they can’t lay hands, cure disease, cast priest spells, or enjoy immunity to disease. Inquisitors (I know) are paladins who see magic as a good and benevolent force, which is corrupted - profaned, even - by the practice of evil magic; they’re similar to ghosthunters in a lot of ways, but also represent an organized philosophy. The Complete Paladin’s Handbook has 22 pages of kits for standard paladin alone, which you can mix and match to create your own unique take on the concept, plus information on “demi-paladins” - non-human fighter/clerics who slowly gain paladin powers in addition to their own. This was back in the day when certain races just could not be good at certain classes due to level restrictions or being unable to take those classes in the first place, but here was the first glimmer of D&D confronting some of its own bullshit; before this book, the implication was that no non-human race was moral enough to be a paladin.

There’s so much more in this book but I’m not gonna get into all of it or this article’s just gonna be a review of one supplement; if you can get your hands on a PDF or even a hard copy, I highly suggest it as a read. It’s not that I endorse its vision for paladins as being the best or as being objectively correct, because I don’t; the potential of paladins is much broader than this narrow vision of Christian feudalism. It’s that no other book, before or after, has paid such loving attention to who paladins are in the game world, including thought given to details like their mortality rate (paladins that manage to survive to 40 are forcibly retired in the hopes that they can teach the youngbloods to do the same), the economics of knighthood, meta-commentary about how the class’s aesthetic and presentation is built to enhance themes about the game and the setting, and even a chapter on weaving faith into your game world and thinking about your paladin’s relationship to her own. The great strength of AD&D 2e’s paladins is that they, more than any others, have this loving care devoted to them that makes them feel like a real part of the worlds in which they live, and their great weakness is a vision that is more narrow than it wanted to be. You can see the author grasping for something broader, something more inclusive, only for it to slip between his fingers.

D&D 3.5: Up From The Gutter - Ah, D&D 3.5, the demon that will not die. This game spawned a million spin-offs and heartbreakers, love for it contributed to the rise of Pathfinder, and it remains incredibly popular and played. It’s also garbage, but c’est la vie, c’est la morte. Its vision of paladin is not as detailed as AD&D 2e’s was, and its main innovations were mechanical in nature. However, 3.5 did offer some in-depth explorations on what it means to be Good-aligned that previous editions did not, and given the context that’s about to be important to talk about.

3.5′s vision of paladin mechanics was remarkably similar to 2e’s, with the most notable change being race selection (anyone can now be a paladin as long as they’re Lawful Good) and the addition of Smite Evil, which can be used a certain number of times per day to gain more accuracy and damage when attacking evil-aligned creatures. Paladins are still warriors, they still cure disease, lay on hands, detect evil, and own a horse; in other words, they barely changed. Unfortunately, the game changed, and this left paladins high and dry. I’m not gonna mince words: for most of 3.5′s run, paladins lagged so far behind in terms of combat prowess, skill selection, and general utility that they were essentially unplayable, including and in some ways especially against classic foes such as demons and dragons.

I’m not gonna get into why, because that is a separate and much angrier article that will spark a lot of controversy due to people who run their ignorant mouths like they know what the fuck they’re talking about, not that I’m bitter. The relevant part of this is that over 3.5′s run, paladin did in fact slowly improve. The Serenity feat, published in Dragon 306, (and much more easily available to you in Dragon Compendium) helped clean up the dizzying amount of attributes upon which they were dependent. Battle Blessing (Champions of Valor) made it easier to incorporate their native spellcasting into their play (though nothing ever quite solved their sharply limited spell slots), and Sword of the Arcane Order (Champions of Valor again) both opened up an alternate vision of paladins as a different kind of magical knight & offered broader utility in paladin’s spell list. The Prestige Paladin in Unearthed Arcana converted paladin from a base class to a prestige class, which let you build it off of more mechanically viable classes - further enhancing your ability to customize your paladin, especially since as a PrC you could stop taking Prestige Paladin at any time you felt you were sufficiently knightly. Access to these and other options eventually made paladin, if not good, at least viable, able to be played in most campaigns and pre-made adventures without undue worry or getting chumped out of basic encounters.

In all of their forms, these paladins still had a code. Observe:

Code of Conduct

A paladin must be of lawful good alignment and loses all class abilities if she ever willingly commits an evil act.

Additionally, a paladin’s code requires that she respect legitimate authority, act with honor (not lying, not cheating, not using poison, and so forth), help those in need (provided they do not use the help for evil or chaotic ends), and punish those who harm or threaten innocents.

Associates

While she may adventure with characters of any good or neutral alignment, a paladin will never knowingly associate with evil characters, nor will she continue an association with someone who consistently offends her moral code. A paladin may accept only henchmen, followers, or cohorts who are lawful good.

Ex-Paladins

A paladin who ceases to be lawful good, who willfully commits an evil act, or who grossly violates the code of conduct loses all paladin spells and abilities (including the service of the paladin’s mount, but not weapon, armor, and shield proficiencies). She may not progress any farther in levels as a paladin. She regains her abilities and advancement potential if she atones for her violations (see the atonement spell description), as appropriate.

Like a member of any other class, a paladin may be a multiclass character, but multiclass paladins face a special restriction. A paladin who gains a level in any class other than paladin may never again raise her paladin level, though she retains all her paladin abilities.

You know all the horror stories you’ve read of DMs maliciously making paladins Fall, or miscommunications in groups leading to alignment arguments? The ones about youth-pastor paladin characters sucking all the fun out of a party? Meet the culprit. 3.5 did not have The Complete Paladin’s Handbook’s discussion on same-paging with your group to prevent these problems, and this vague code wording paired with immediate and extreme consequences didn’t do it any favors. That’s not to say that this code is unworkable, exactly, but trying to sit down and agree with 4-6 other adults on what ‘gross violations’ actually means is essentially the world’s shittiest round of Apples to Apples and your reward for it is resenting the character you just built.

And that’s the paladin part, which means we have to get into the “being good-aligned” part. Lemme tell you about Book of Exalted Deeds, a historically significant garbage fire of a book that is somehow both the best supplement released about Good and the worst supplement released about Good at the same time.

For those of you with the fortune to have never played 3.5, its books are like that a lot.

So, bad parts first: all the mechanics. Just all of them. The prestige classes? Bad. The feats? Generally bad. The redemption rules revolving around Diplomacy? Sloppy. Magic items? Bad. Spells? Look up an online discussion about sanctify the wicked and then get back to me on that one; they’re bad too. Ravages and afflictions (good-aligned poisons and diseases) were a bad idea that were also a case of stunning hypocrisy from a book whose stance was that dealing ability score damage is ‘needless cruelty’. Even the write-ups for the planar NPCs kinda make them into these basic bitch pushovers, which, you guessed it, is bad. There’s a lot to say against this book and you can find someone saying it in most open web forums if you want to take a journey into the godawful design of the liminal space between 3.0 and 3.5.

But the good stuff was real good. D&D had/has long been stalked by ‘ethical dilemmas’ such as the so-called Goblin Baby Problem, where players would ask if it’s good to let goblin children live since they would only grow up to become goblin adults. Book of Exalted Deeds was the first D&D publication to make a hard stance against racial genocide (hell of a sentence, I know), and it doubled down on The Complete Paladin Handbook’s implied stance that all forms of romance and sexuality are valid as long as they’re between consenting adults that respect one another. BoED strove to define Good not just as the avoidance of evil (”The utter avoidance of evil is, at best, neutral.”) but as actively striving to respect life, practice altruism, and make the world a better and more just place. While its take on ideas like forgiveness, redemption, and justice were not necessarily perfect, it went out of its way to try to offer nuanced takes on those ideas and to note emphatically that practices such as slavery and racism do not become good just because certain historical cultures thought they were at the time.

The other notable thing that Book of Exalted Deeds did for the idea of a Good alignment was firmly state on the record that NG and CG are just as valid and Good as LG is. The existence of paladins and their alignment-locked nature had long implied that Lawful Good was the “best” Good, or the “most” Good, but Book of Exalted Deeds didn’t just introduce material for characters that were paragons of other Good alignments, it provided examples of such characters in action. D&D is still somewhat stalked by that “Law is Good and Good is Lawful” problem, but BoED and other books in its niche (notably including Heroes of Horror - I know, it doesn’t sound like it but trust me - and Champions of Valor) helped push back against that problem and open the floor to other heroes.

I wouldn’t be wholly done talking about 3.5 paladins without mentioning Unearthed Arcana, which introduced the paladin of freedom (CG), paladin of tyranny (LE), and paladin of slaughter (CE). Their hearts were in the right place here, but all three of them were...better ideas than executions, as it were, without much to talk about for them. Still, they make good examples of 3.5′s great strength in paladins: breadth of concept. Ideas that were previously impossible as paladins became commonplace, including paladin-like characters who were not members of the class and which I would absolutely consider paladins myself. It didn’t stick the landing on the mechanics, but that’s just 3.5 for you; if you weren’t a dedicated spellcaster, chances are you were gonna have some manner of bad time. This idea of paladins from all walks of life, from all levels of society and all peoples, has become a cherished part of the popular conception of paladins and it absolutely should be brought forward to other editions.

Which, honestly? It was.

Pathfinder 1e: Two Steps Forward, One Step Back - Pathfinder 1e’s baseline paladin release was essentially 3.5′s in many ways. The key mechanical differences were a revamped Smite Evil (which finally made it effective against its intended targets), the aura line of abilities that begin adding additional effects beyond Aura of Courage at 8th level and up, and Mercies - riders for the paladin’s Lay on Hands ability that cause it to also cure status effects, which in turn greatly enhances the paladin’s utility as a support class. Pathfinder also cleaned up some of 3.5′s attribute problems by orienting all of paladin’s magical abilities to Charisma instead of splitting between Wisdom and Charisma. Another small but significant note is the alteration from ‘gross’ violations of the code to any violation of the code. “Gee Vox, that doesn’t sound like it would really help code problems,” you say, to which I reply: it absolutely fucking did not.

Once we leave core, we get quite a few quality-of-life improvements. Though Pathfinder 1e lacks Battle Blessing, it replicates some of its effects by having many swift-action spells in-house for paladin, notably including the Litany line. Pathfinder’s archetype system for class customization offers options for the paladin that further customize its concept, though on the balance it’s harder to mix and match archs than it was to do so with kits. Archetypes always trade something, so in taking an arch you will lose some part of the base paladin kit and gain something which replaces it.

Narratively, things get more specific outside of core as well. Paizo’s one-and-only setting, Golarion, is one in which paladins must swear fealty to a specific god they serve above all others, and their power is derived directly from that god, who can grant or withhold it as they see fit. These gods (generally LN, LG, or NG in alignment, though certain specific CG deities sponsor paladins who must still be LG themselves) offer their own codes of conduct, which their paladins must follow. A paladin may be obligated to oppose ‘heresy’ as vigorously as chaos or evil, which is an awkward fucking feel, and paladins in Golarion’s setting can be found working for organizations such as the Hellknights, or in the armed forces of nations that practice slavery and forced conversion. That’s not to imply that they’re not also depicted in unambiguously good contexts, but when it comes to establishing paladins (or, well...anyone...) as good-aligned people Paizo has a bad habit of dropping the ball.

Like 3.5, the great strength of the Pathfinder 1e paladin is customization, and in this case a more solid mechanical base in comparison to the rest of the game. Pathfinder similarly flounders in that its vision of paladins is narrow and not fully realized in the game world.

Discussion of Pathfinder 1e’s paladin wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the Anti-Paladin, the only “alternate class” to see mechanical support beyond its initial publication. Baseline anti-paladins must be chaotic evil and have abilities that are the inverse of the baseline paladin; similarly, anti-paladin has archetypes available that change it to different kinds and methods of evil. It has its fans, and in terms of playability it’s as good, if not a little better, than paladin, but on the whole I tend to break on the side of thinking that Good and Evil are not mirror images of one another, and thus an anti-paladin is inappropriate as an idea. At least, one done in this way, as an explicit reaction to a supposed paragon of virtue, as things are about to get real interesting in...

D&D 4e: The Knight Unshackled - D&D 4e built off of the foundations laid down by the Book of Exalted Deeds and Unearthed Arcana by completely removing all alignment restrictions from both paladin and its counterpart class, blackguard. This section will also need to talk about cousin classes to paladin; specifically, the Avenger and the Invoker. Let’s start from the top, shall we?

Paladins in 4e are predicament dommes defenders; they use their abilities to place Marks on enemies, who then suffer damage if they choose to engage someone other than the paladin (all defenders in 4e force choices of a similar nature, though the penalty for failing to make the ‘right’ choice is not necessarily damage). In 4e, paladins are not granted their power by gods, nor are they empowered by their faith in righteousness alone; in point of fact, 4e paladins have no restrictions on their alignment whatsoever and are the first paladins to be open in this way. Instead, a paladin in D&D 4e is invested with power in rites kept secret by individual churches. Once invested, that’s it, no take-backs; the paladin remains a paladin even if they forsake that church entirely. The other classes I’m gonna talk about - avenger, blackguard, and invoker - are similarly invested, with invoker being the exception in how they get invested, but not in their no-takebacks status.

So, what powers a paladin after that investiture? Virtue; specifically, caring about others in some way. An LG paladin empowered by their belief in justice might be a classic knight in shining armor, defending her allies in righteousness’s name, but an LE paladin empowered by the same virtue might easily turn totalitarian, determined to establish justice no matter who has to suffer and die. In this model, evil-aligned paladins are those who care too much about something, to the point where they trample and harm others to see it fulfilled.

Paladin’s inverse, blackguard, is a striker class focused on direct damage. They gain their power through vice, inward-facing desires such as greed, selfishness, lust, or five pounds of nachos in one meal (don’t @ me). Blackguards are also not restricted by alignment. A classically selfish blackguard, out for their own power and safety, might be an amoral mercenary who kills because they can’t be bothered not to, but a good-aligned blackguard who’s selfish is, well, Tiffany Aching: protecting the world because it’s her world and how dare you fucking touch it.

Avengers have more in common with barbarians than paladins, but are notable here for their commonalities with paladin as a divine warrior concept, and also for having bones in with the later Oath of Vengeance concept in D&D 5e. Avengers are invested to smite the enemies of their church; they tap into their power by swearing an oath against specific enemies, and then dissociate until those enemies in particular are dead at their feet. Are you really into Alexander Anderson from Hellsing? Do you want to explore the terrible consequences of power, consequences that might not have been clear when you signed up to become an avenger? This could be for you.

Lastly we have invokers, the odd duck out. They are ranged controllers who fight with pure divine power. Invokers are created directly by gods, but unlike the previous three have no associations with churches; instead, their job is to look out for threats to all of existence and make sure that they don’t happen. Even evil-aligned gods create and tend to respect invokers, because you can’t conquer the world and rule it as its Dread Master if there’s no world left to rule. Because invokers are invested by gods directly, they tend to have a lot in common with the divine intervention paladin origin mentioned waaaaay up there in the 2e section; you’re minding your own business when one day God goes “TIME TO LEARN HOW TO SAVE THE WORLD” and that’s just your life now.

D&D 4e’s paladins and paladin-like classes fully realize the breadth of concepts and characters that paladins could fulfill; they offer intriguing possibilities for roleplaying, engaging character and plot hooks, and mechanically distinct interpretations of divine power. In unshackling paladins from alignment, 4e opens them up to questions of heroism, conviction, and belief that were in many ways previously closed, especially because paladins in other editions were often made to Fall for asking those questions. Their big weakness is, well, being in 4e. It’s not that D&D 4e is a bad game - in many ways it’s the most honest edition of D&D, and certainly the most tightly-designed - but rather that 4e’s context is highly specific. It can be hard to find players or DMs familiar with it, might be frustrating to gain access to its books, and once you do adapting its material requires significant narrative changes if you remove it from the context of the Points of Light setting.

D&D 5e: This I Vow - D&D 5e’s paladin is, in many ways, a combination of and refinement upon previous elements. Like 4e’s, it is not restricted by alignment (though the three Oaths in core do suggest particular alignments). Like 3.5′s paladin, it combines magical power with martial skill, though 5e’s paladin is both more overtly magical and gains access to better spells, faster, than its predecessor. Though the paladin gains some warrior-type abilities (notably including their choice of Fighting Style and the Extra Attack feature), the majority of their abilities are supernatural in nature, including Lay On Hands (in the form of a pool of hit points that can also be expended to remove poisons and diseases), immunity to disease, an array of defensive and utility spells (as well as the Smite line for bursts of damage), a Divine Smite that trades spells for damage directly, and native auras that protect the paladin’s allies as well as herself. Their defining feature, however, is the Oath they select at third level, which defines what sort of paladin they are.

Your selection of Sacred Oath nets your paladin 2 utility abilities at 3rd level, an additional aura at 7th, a strong upgrade of some kind at 15th, and a capstone at 20th that neither you nor any other living being will ever see because 5e campaigns barely get to 14th, God forbid 20th. Each Oath also provides a set of tenets that you are meant to live up to, but unlike previous incarnations of a Code of Conduct 5e’s relationship to these tenets is more...human. The following passage is from the Player’s Handbook, page 83 (”Creating A Paladin”):

As guardians against the forces of wickedness, paladins are rarely of any evil alignment. Most of them walk the paths of charity and justice. Consider how your alignment colors the way you pursue your holy quest and the manner in which you conduct yourself before gods and mortals. Your oath and alignment might be in harmony, or your oath might represent standards of behavior you have not yet attained.

Emphasis mine.

The baseline assumption for 5e’s paladins are believers in righteousness, whose faith in virtue empowers them to protect the weak, but more than any other edition, 5e recognizes that paladins are still people, who have flaws, strengths, and ambitions. Its Background system helps flesh out your character both mechanically and narratively, and material presented both in the Player’s Handbook and Xanathar’s Guide to Everything encourage you to think about the things that drive and oppose your paladin. Importantly, though the books say that evil paladins are rare, no actual alignment restriction on paladins exist, which opens up some interesting possibilities in terms of character creation. We’ll get more into that down the article a bit, when I talk about same-paging and refluffing.

Because Oaths come with both mechanics and an ethos, there is a strong incentive to create new Oaths for 5e if you want to embody a new ethos, but this may not always be strictly necessary. Additionally, the Player’s Handbook implies that paladins who flagrantly fail or abandon their oaths might become Oathbreakers (Dungeon Master’s Guide, page 97, under “Villain Options”), but this too may not be the correct move, especially in cases where a paladin abandons one set of high ideals for a different, but no lower, form of belief. We’ll get into that later too.

5e’s paladins are in the best mechanical position they’ve ever been in; they’re one of the strongest classes in the game line, easy to build and play, and difficult to fuck up. They have strong thematics with their abilities and especially their Oaths, and the way 5e encourages you to make your characters helps you realize them as people in the game world. The great weakness of this vision of paladins is customization; 5e lacks player options in many senses, and quite a few of those options are gated behind rules that may not be in use (such as Feats). It can be difficult, in many cases, to make two paladins of the same Oath feel different when the dice hit the table.

And at long last, we have finished the establishing-context section of this article, and can move on to the actual fucking article. I did warn you, way up top, that you were in for a ride.

Raise Thy Sword - Paladins At Your Table

The following section is meant to help you in making and fleshing out a paladin concept to play or even to use as an NPC. Most of the advice will be edition-agnostic; advice that isn’t will be marked as such. Also covered herein will be the related topics of same-paging, refluffing, and the common pitfalls that paladins have fallen into over the years (and how to avoid them).

Same-Paging - In Which We Communicate Like Adults

Same-paging is the practice of talking to your group in a way that helps set mutual expectations, and it’s something every RPG group should strive to do regardless of the system they’re playing in. You’ve probably done this to an extent before, as part of being pitched a game (”We’re going to do a dungeon crawl through the deadly halls of Undermountain”), during character creation, and the like. In the specific case of paladins, you want to talk to your group and DM about topics like alignment & alignment restrictions, your code of conduct or oath, and whether or not the group wants to handle things like ethical dilemmas and moral quandaries. Though paladins are famous for those last two, they’re certainly not a requirement; you can just as easily play a paladin in a campaign like Expedition to Undermountain or Princes of the Apocalypse where there is a very clear bad guy who needs to be stopped with enormous applications of violence and guile. However your group wants to play it is fine, but you want to be sure everyone’s on board for it and that you’re ready to rock. If your group signs on for a kick-in-the-door dungeon crawl and then the DM decides to make you pass a series of ethics tests, that DM is an asshole; likewise, if you agree that you want to explore the morals at the heart of your paladin’s ethos and then you just don’t do that, you’re causing the problem.

Who Is Your Deity, And What Does She Do? - Making Your Paladin

Once you and your group have communicated your expectations to each other (and, again, same-paging is something all groups should be doing regularly, not just ones in which you want to play a paladin), it’s finally time to start sketching out your concept! There’s many ways to start this, and while I personally tend to start at the roleplaying end (with ideas about who they are as a person and the themes I want to explore with them), starting with mechanical ideas, with questions, or even with specific dramatic scenes in mind, are also viable. That is to say, “I’m interested in how Aura of the Guardian (Xanathar’s Guide to Everything, page 39) can help me play a damage mitigation tank,” is just as valid as, “Kass, my character, was lifted from a life of crime by a paladin who reformed her neighborhood and campaigned against a corrupt system, and she’s striving to become a paladin in his image.” That said, if there’s one thing D&D and its related communities are good at it’s mechanical guides, so I’m not gonna try and write one here. We’d be here all day; instead, the following questions are things to consider for fleshing out your paladin’s backstory, personality, and goals.

Why did you become a paladin? The origins of your paladin will probably color how they think of their virtues, as well as how they think of evil. A beaten-down girl from the slums understands that kicking the shit out of muggers doesn’t give the downtrodden food, medicine, or roofs that don’t leak, while the third son of a noble family is in a position to understand the damage done by corrupt leaders and faithless lords. In addition to your background and home life, think about what motivated your character to become a paladin specifically. Were they mentored by an older paladin who saw potential in them? Recruited by the militant arm of a church? Did they grow up with stories of paladins and yearn to become the sort of person those stories were written about, or were they, perhaps, seemingly called to paladinhood without much conscious understanding of what it was?

Where did you learn to fight? Paladins are warriors, and even a paladin that Falls (for those campaigns that use Falling as a concept) remains a warrior. 5e paladins, the most overtly magical of all the available options, still spend a lot of time randomizing the atoms of evil with sharpened metal, and that’s a skill you only get through training and dedication. Who taught your paladin to fight? What’s their relationship with that teacher or organization, and how did it shape their ideas about violence? We all catch things off of our teachers, and your paladin’s instructor in combat will, for better or worse, be as big an influence on their life and ideals as their faith and family are. Don’t be afraid to get wild here; AD&D 2e had full-blown godly training montages where the voice of a god ran you through drills, and paladins join warlocks and sorcerers for being fertile ground for some of the weirdest shit. Did you fight daily duels against a stained glass knight only you could see? Did you find a scimitar in the gutter and pick it up to defend your friends from gangs? Were you bankrolled by an old man who later turned out to be a lich, whose motives you still don’t understand? Live your best Big Ham life if that’s the life you wanna live, this is the class for it.

How do you imagine good and evil? What does your paladin’s vision of a Good world look like? What is the face of wickedness that comes to mind when they’re asked to think of Evil? A knight from a kingdom plagued by portals to the Abyss is going to think of both of these things very differently from a gutter rat whose ascension came with a prosthetic hand to replace the one she lost to gangrene, to say nothing of differences in ideals when one factors in Law and Chaos. Your paladin doesn’t have to be perfect, or even, honestly, correct. Your classic ‘noble, but kind of a dick’ paladin (such as Corran d’Arcy in the novelization of Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor, who we’re gonna talk about more later because he’s a weirdly great example of an adventuring paladin) thinks of evil as evildoers, who must be Brought To Justice, which while not entirely wrong is lacking in important nuance. He may conflate manners with virtue, or allow his prejudices to color who he does and doesn’t think of as ‘good’, but that doesn’t change his fundamental desire to Do Good - a desire that could be the catalyst for personal growth. A flawed understanding of virtue and wickedness could be a great character arc for your paladin, especially if it dovetails with the themes of the campaign.

What do you enjoy? Paladins are still people (shocking, I know) and people tend to have hobbies, preferences, and goals. Xanathar’s Guide to Everything has some nice material to quickly flesh out some of those aspects of your paladin (a personal goal, a vice that tempts them, a nemesis that dogs their footsteps), and I highly encourage you to think about such things as well. Does your paladin crave glory, wealth, or revenge? What sort of things do they turn to when they want comfort, or to have a good time? Do they still practice a trade from their youth, such as painting or blacksmithing? The archetype of a knight looking for their true love (or at least a series of whirlwind romances that always seem to end in someone’s bedroom) is a staple, of course. These things don’t necessarily need to be sinister temptations that lead you away from justice; they can just be nice things you like, or comforts that sustain you in your long fight against evil.

How do you relate to your faith? Many settings (notably including Forgotten Realms & Points of Light in D&D, and Golarion in Pathfinder) explicitly link paladins to churches and patron deities, and even in ones where this explicit link does not exist you see paladins who fight in the name of their faiths, serve in the militant arm of their churches, and otherwise seek to live their lives in accordance with their religion. D&D’s history is also full of paladins whose relationship to their faith is more distant, more questioning, or even outright rebellious. In Eberron, for instance, a paladin might dedicate herself to the Kraken - an evil god embodying sea monsters and catastrophes - with her understanding of that faith being preventing monster attacks and protecting the innocent from hurricanes and tidal waves. A paladin might be retained by the Church of St. Cuthbert as a barometer for their own morality, trusted to leash his peers when their retribution grows out of hand & play the devil’s advocate against them, or a knight might simply try to live their lives in accordance with the ideals of beauty, joy, and wonder espoused by Sune Firehair, without being for or against the actual church. What or whom does your paladin believe in, and why? Remember as well that not all, or even most, faiths are particularly similar to Christianity, and as a result your paladin’s relationship to that faith might just be business as usual. A Jewish paladin arguing with God is Judaism working as intended; similarly, a paladin dedicated to the Aesir doesn’t get to act surprised when they come home one day and Freya is chilling in their bathtub with a glass of wine and a ‘small request’.

You Wouldn’t Download A Class Feature - Refluffing & You(r Paladin)

So: you’ve come up with your concept, you’ve asked yourself all the relevant questions, but damn, some things just seem to not be fitting. What do you do? It may be the case that refluffing - changing the flavor of a mechanical option to better fit your campaign or setting - may be the right move for you. Refluffing gets a lot of pushback from a certain school of tabletop gaming that believes the flavor of an option is part of its mechanical balance. These people are wrong and I encourage you not to associate with them, in particular because the first party publishers often refluff material for similar reasons. For instance, the setting of Eberron has ‘anything published in D&D has a home here’ as one of its meta-tenets, and in the process of giving many of those things a home it changed their identity. Those hordes of angry ancestor-worshiping elves? That’s refluffing elves. In 3.5 you can see explicit discussion of refluffing in Oriental Adventures, which...well...it’s a book that exists, let’s leave it at that. Oerth having an entire alternate Material Plane where all the mirror of opposition copies come from? Refluffing.

So, when do you refluff? An obvious example is when your group is comfortable with an option being on the table, but is not playing in the setting that option comes from (for instance, the Sword of the Arcane Order feat from Champions of Valor when you are not playing in the Forgotten Realms). Refluffing is also great for when the narrative you’re building for a character implies or requires certain mechanics, but the flavor of those mechanics does not fit that narrative. In the ancient past I briefly GMed a game where one of the PCs was a ‘barbarian’ - a mean-streets kid looking to make a better life for himself, whose Rage was just the fight-or-flight kicking in from living in the garbage parts of Waterdeep. The important things to keep in mind when you choose to refluff an option is to stay on the same page as the rest of your group, and also to not replace the original fluff with nothing; mechanics do help define flavor (they’re the tools with which you interact with the game world), but you still need some reason that your paladin casts wizard spells, or has the abilities of the Oath of Vengeance when the original version of that Oath doesn’t exist in this setting. A very common school of refluffing is changing the origins of one’s power; rather than pure faith, for instance, a paladin’s powers might come from her innate spiritual energy, or from the favor of kami rather than gods.

Refluffing is also great for playing paladins that don’t have levels in the class named paladin. This option is especially relevant in the context of 3.5 and Pathfinder, when it may be more suitable to the needs of the campaign for you to be playing a more powerful or versatile class. In this context, clerics especially make very competent ‘paladins’, as do wizards (you wouldn’t think so, but I’ve seen that campaign played), inquisitors, crusaders, and even druids depending on how your concept is. You don’t need Fall mechanics to follow a code, after all.

For What The World Could Be - Defining Your Paladin’s Ethos

More than almost any other aspect of the class, possessing and following an ethos has defined paladins through the ages. For many years, this was a very specific ethos based on European ideas of chivalry and Christian virtue, and there’s something to be said for it when done well (certainly the Arab warriors from whom Europeans acquired the code of chivalry were lauded for their honor and virtuous conduct, so at a bare minimum one set of folks following these ideals in the real world absolutely nailed it). This is not, however, the only set of high ideals to which a paladin might cleave or aspire, and many fine homebrewers, players, and dungeon masters out there have chosen to craft their own, or to represent their own beliefs in the game world. Many cultures throughout history and all over the world have retained elite warriors held to high standards of conduct, and those traditions are rife for representation as paladins.

I fully intend to provide some specific examples of ethea (evidently this is the plural of ‘ethos’, no I didn’t know that before I started writing this, yes it looks wrong to me too) beyond the ongoing D&D default, but before I do you may want to consider how your paladin relates to those high ideals. After all, these are virtues that your character holds dear, but not everyone does so in the same way. Does she believe that everyone would be better off if they tried to live up to her standards, or does she believe that only certain people should (or must) do so? Does she consider her virtues an impossible ideal, something to strive for rather than fulfill, or does she not harbor such doubts? Is your paladin an idealist, who believes in the power of Good in itself, or is she more cynical?

The answers to these questions don’t necessarily make your paladin less Good as a person. A warrior who believes that there’s always a selfish bastard reason to do the right thing, who sees Evil as suboptimal, could still be a paladin if they work to bring Good into the world. An idealist who still needs to learn about the real consequences of barging into complex problems in a morally complicated world is equally valid, to say nothing of just...playing a genuine in-the-bones Hero, here to Do The Right Thing. Each speaks to a different kind of virtue, and a different life that has led them to these choices, and each deserves their day in the sun. You might have a lot of fun playing someone whose view of what Good is, and why, is different from yours!

Some specific examples of ethea (god that looks so wrong) follow. For the sake of convenience I’m gonna skip anything that’s actually showed up in a paladin entry before, or I’m gonna be here until I die. I am also very much not a member of just about any of the cultures and/or religions I’m about to talk about, and while I have sought the advice and review of those who are, I’m not about to claim that I’m an expert. Any errors in what’s presented are mine, and not those of my friends & readers; I welcome correction and discussion.

Irish Celtic: Blood & Troth  - The ancient Celts were not a people shy about death, and excellence - skill, improvement, and genuine growth - in all of your crafts was one of their high virtues. In addition to excellence, a Celtic warrior was expected to be honest (to never tell a direct lie, and to keep all promises given), hospitable (to be a gracious host & and honorable guests, and defend the sanctity of the home), to be charitable with their skills and their worldly possessions (to give to the needy, defend the weak, and fight for the helpless), to display loyalty to their family, clan, and gods, and to be courageous. That last virtue is an interesting one, because it dovetails with excellence; it’s less about acting in spite of fear, and more about enjoying fearful situations and the call of battle. A paragon of Celtic warfare should love her job, perhaps even revel in it; she relishes combat and the mayhem of the killing fields. Paladins following these virtues are likely to be Chaotic in nature, skewing towards Chaotic Neutral as D&D thinks of these things, and prone to contemplation on concepts of obligation, truth, and the nature of political violence. The crows know that there is always a final answer to injustice.

Irish Celtic paladins are likely to look towards Fionn Mac Cumhaill as a role model; as warriors with magical powers of protection, defense, and healing, they would be valued as keepers of lore, wisdom, and art, more warrior-poet than berserker. If your paladin is part of a wider culture from which she derived this ethos, she was probably expected to both learn knowledge and pass it on to others, and to restrain more eager warriors in favor of cunning plans and clever tactics. Imagine the look on your party members’ faces when they meet your family and realize you’re the sane one; that’s the exact emotion you wanna look to create if you really want to bring this out in the classic vein.

Jewish: We Shall Serve The Lord  - Judaism places a lot of emphasis on the sanctity of life, restorative justice, and doing the good you can do here, and now, with what’s in front of you. Though there is no tradition of elite Jewish warriors in the vein of knights or samurai, Jewish citizens tend to serve under arms slightly more often (about 5% more often) than their countrymen, and defending the innocent & helpless is certainly one way to do good now. A Jewish paladin would be expected to uphold the sanctity of life (preservation of life is the highest calling; a Jew may do anything except deny God in order to preserve life), to practice the principle of Tikkun Olam (’repairing the world’, working actively to make the world around them a more just, peaceful, and pleasant one), to show compassion and generosity to others, to uphold and defend hospitality, to know the Torah and the Law, and, where necessary, to practice intelligent and purposed dissent and skepticism. In the context of D&D, such a character is not likely to be particularly scholarly (paladins haven’t needed a decent Intelligence score at any point in the class’s evolution), but they’re probably conversant in the techniques of reading and research, critical thinking, argument, and debate, if only through exposure. Jewish paladins are most likely to be Good, leaning Lawful, as D&D thinks of these things.

The Jewish ethos describes a set of minimum standards for a righteous person, the Noahide Laws, and greatly encourages you not to associate with any person or culture that can’t meet that standard. They’re honestly not hard to meet either; you basically have to not be a dick about God (don’t try to stop folks from worshiping, don’t spend your time mocking and blaspheming their faith), know that lying and murdering are wrong, don’t be a sexual predator, don’t eat animals that are still alive, and bother to establish a system of laws for self-rule. Though Judaism lacks an elite warrior tradition, you might look to people like Joshua, Judah Maccabee, or Solomon as inspirations for a Jewish paladin character; warriors known for their wisdom, determination, and and in many cases, self-sacrifice. Solomon is also notable as an example of someone who swore the Nazarite Oath, a promise to God to fulfill a mission or task, and to not rest until one has done so. Nazarites are held to higher standards than their peers, notably including the expectation that the object of their oath becomes their only goal until they get it done or die.

As stated before, I am not Jewish and while this information was provided to me by Jewish friends, it is far from complete. @oath-of-lovingkindness might be by to expand on it, if they’re comfortable doing so.

Kemetic Pagan: The Power Of Truth - It’s difficult to talk about how the ancient Kemetic faiths were practiced; there was a lot of strife between the various cults of the gods, sometimes backed by pharaohs who were willing to revise history to get their way about thing, and then the English got a hold of the records. The English getting a hold of your culture’s history rarely ends well for just about anyone. The modern practice of Kemetic worship places great emphasis on service and identity as a member of the community, the promotion and preservation of knowledge, learning, and education, opposing is/fet (’chaos’, here also very much including the breakdown of social bonds and the systems which sustain life), and truth. A Kemetic paladin would be expected to oppose chaos by sustaining or creating such systems (funding schools, founding a neighborhood watch, finding or creating jobs for the poor), defend the defenseless, further her own education and knowledge & teach the ignorant, to be honest and forthright in word and deed, and value strength and justice. They are likely to be Lawful, skewing towards Good, as D&D thinks of these things. For a society to be just, it must first be a society; preservation of the order (both natural and artificial) which sustains human lives comes first.

Kemetic paladins are unlikely to be priests or even to be formally part of a religious heirarchy, again because they have traditionally had issues being scholarly people; instead, they uphold ma’at (what is true, what is just, what is necessary; ma’at is the principle that establishes a community, that relates one person to all other people and defines obligations between them, and opposes chaos) by fulfilling roles that assist their community. Such a paladin might look to one of their patron gods as an example of both the behavior they wish to emulate and their role in the community. A defender and guardian who supports the rural folk might look to Sobek, whose great strength guards the Nile; a would-be hero who craves power and the glory that power might buy her could instead look to Set, who guards the sun-barge and tests the established order so that it can grow strong. This is an ancient faith with quite a few gods, and I haven’t even gone deep enough to say I’ve scratched the surface; if they’re comfortable doing so, @merytu-mrytw may be by to expand on this topic for those interested in learning more.

Samurai: Reaching For Heaven  - You knew we were gonna go here eventually. As famous as knights, and perhaps even more known for their strict code of honor, the samurai were the elite warriors of feudal Japan and members of its ruling class. A samurai was expected to be a warrior, to cultivate an appreciation for high arts such as calligraphy, poetry, and sculpture, to be a scholar or patron of scholars, and to otherwise serve their lord and establish justice in that lord’s name. Today the samurai ethos is often called Bushido (”the way of the warrior”), but that name and conception of their code of conduct is actually a relatively recent invention, dating back only as far as the 20th century. It has its bones in with a 12th century dramatization of a war between two proud clans, and the ideals embodied by the warriors of those clans. Notably, these ideals were considered unattainable; something to strive for, and in striving grow as a person, but not a realistic expectation for a living human in a physical body. I’m gonna go ahead and quote the breakdown of this code that was given to me, because I feel the long form is going to be helpful here. These were the things to strive for, if one wished to call oneself a samurai:

Your duty calls on you to die if necessary. Your honor is more than your life; to live in shame is worse than death. You are expected to be righteous - to have integrity, sincerity, and honesty. To display heroic courage - to be intelligently aware of risks, but to face them boldly, not rashly or foolishly. To be benevolent and compassionate - for you have strength of arms that others cannot fathom. To show respect, even to your enemy. Cruelty, mockery, showboating, boasting, these are against the samurai code. Your strength and stature come through how you stand in adversity, unyielding. To understand that there is no such thing as a promise, or "giving your word" - you do not speak unless you mean what you say. Meaningless words are for shameful people. To safeguard your own honor, for you are its judge - and you will know what will cause you to live in shame, which as noted above, is worse than death. To show loyalty and be dutiful - if you give your service to another, it is theirs to command, and if you set someone's life above yours, you cannot keep honor if you live and they die. To demonstrate self-control - excesses and wants are openings to great shame. Moral character lies in the desire being sublimated toward the better self and higher standing among men.

As the politics and culture of Japan evolved through the years, so too did attitudes towards, and understanding of, this code of conduct, but most dramatic and romantic depictions of the samurai ethos root back to something a lot like this. A paladin dedicated to this ethos is likely to be Lawful Neutral, bending towards Good, as D&D thinks of these things; it emphasizes the virtues of loyalty, duty, and the obligations of both lord and vassal to one another. It is particularly appropriate for characters who see high ideals of virtue as being an unattainable goal to strive for anyway, or for character-driven campaigns looking for high drama that comes from tensions between personal desires and societal expectations (you can see it used for this to wonderful effect in the Legend of Five Rings RPG, most recently published by Fantasy Flight Games).

There are of course many other potential sources for a paladin’s ethos; check out D&D 5e’s homebrew materials and the DM’s guild for just a few. If I didn’t include something here, I promise you that it’s because I’m either ignorant or not confident of my ability to speak on it even in this limited context, not because I was trying to deliberately leave anything out. As I said above, any errors here are mine, and I welcome corrections. I’m also eager to hear about other ethea and how they might be adapted for paladins, so if you’ve got some thoughts there, please, slap ‘em on! I’m quite literally begging to read your paladin takes!

That said, remember that these are real beliefs, that real people follow. If you’re looking to explore an ethos from a culture that is not your own, you should do so with respect and especially with consideration for others that might be affected. It’s one thing to realize 12 sessions into a campaign at your own house that you’ve been accidentally blaspheming someone’s religion; it’s quite another thing to realize that if you’ve been playing in a public place such as a library or a gaming store. Ask folks from the culture or faith in question about it if you can at all do so, and just...if you wouldn’t want someone to be depicting you in a particular way? Don’t depict them that way.

The Trolley Problem And Other Forms Of Psychological Torture - Paladins, Falling, & Alignment

All editions of paladins except 4e have some kind of rule for Falling; losing one’s paladin status and powers, generally because of violations of your code of conduct or a failure to maintain your alignment. 5e sorta-kinda has those rules in a “well if the DM says so” way, which is, in some ways, a worse situation to be in since it leaves the matter unclear. In particular, many editions of paladins require that you have and maintain a Lawful Good alignment, and completely strip you of all powers if you ever change alignment for any reason. If the above sections of this article didn’t make it clear already, I tend to break towards 4e’s school of thought and support unshackling paladins from both alignment and Falling mechanics for general play; they certainly haven’t been powerful enough in the meta to mechanically justify additional restrictions.

This isn’t to say that you can’t use Falling or the threat of Falling for interesting stories and excellent character moments, just that I personally feel that it’s not as necessary as some schools of thought seem to think it is. If you want to incorporate this idea into your campaign, make sure you bring that up when you’re same-paging with your group; it’s definitely one of those topics everyone wants to have a clear understanding about. From there, it’s on the DM to not be a dick about things. Using paladins to explore ethical dilemmas can be very rewarding, but putting one in an ‘impossible’ scenario is rarely any fun. For some great examples of using ethical dilemmas as a form of character growth and to explore the concept of morality, check out The Good Place if you haven’t already. Remember: it’s a game. The goal is to have fun, yeah?

Genocide Is Not An Ethical Dilemma - Common Paladin Pitfalls

This is the part of the article where I get very angry about things.

As I alluded to before, there have been some common pitfalls when it comes to paladins both in the history of their formal writing and in the way the fanbase has chosen to play and relate to them. This section is going to discuss those and what you can do about them, so without further ado:

Fascism  - Paladins have some unfortunate bones in with fascist ideology, particularly the Third Reich’s obsession with ‘will’, as well as the fascist preoccupation with the Crusades, the Crusades themselves, and with being members of social classes which are often oppressive in nature. You really do not have to go far to find some jackoff posting DEUS VULT memes about their paladin, and that’s a problem, first because fascists are bad, and second because that definitely misses the fucking point by a country mile. All editions of D&D and its legacy systems have struggled with this, but a shout-out goes to D&D 5e for publishing the Oath of Conquest, because we definitely needed to respond to this problem by creating an option that gives you heavier, more ornate jackboots to put on people’s necks.

So, what do you do about this? Well, for one thing if you find a fascist at your gaming table you throw them the fuck out into the street, and beyond that mainly you just...try not to play a fuckin’ fascist character. This isn’t really a problem you can solve at the table level, since it’s buried into the writing; all you can do is be aware of it, and not play into it. It shouldn’t be terribly difficult to not make a paladin who’s into kicking poor people and undermining the rights of sapient beings, yeah? Paladins tend to fall into these sorts of problems when they’re depicted as supporting strongmen, or as being the Special And Exalted People to whom the rules do not apply - basically the same situations that give superheroes as a genre their ongoing fascism problem. Keep a weather eye out.

Genocide - The two-for-one combo! Paladins have had a genocide problem as far back as AD&D 2e, where several had racial or religious genocide in their backstories. Sometimes those paladins Fell as a result, sure, but a disturbing amount of them didn’t. We also have such gems as, “A local paladin has started a crusade against half-breeds” (a plot hook published in Draconomicon for 3.5), that greentext story about the paladin and dwarf ‘bros’ who spend their free time murdering orc children, and everything that’s ever been written about how drow are characterized and treated by others. Now, in fairness to paladins, Dungeons & Dragons itself has problems with the themes of race and with its depiction of the morality of genocide, and paladins could be merely caught up in that. On a basic level, solving this issue is easy; don’t endorse genocide, don’t make edgy racist concepts to see if you can ‘still be good’. Even if that wasn’t already tired and worn, someone else already took that concept and went pro with it.

For more information about fantasy’s troubles with race and racial coding, I highly suggest this article & its sequel, as well as Lindsay Ellis’s Bright video.

Youth Pastor Syndrome - This one’s not as dire a problem as the other two; there’s a tendency to play paladins in a way that sucks the fun out of the rest of the group, either because you’re being a judgemental asshole in-character (and possibly out of it), or because they’re constantly having to tiptoe around you to get things done or do what they want in the campaign. In theory, same-paging should help solve this problem before it starts, and it honestly mainly stems from the various ‘association’ clauses in paladin codes through their history. An uptight paladin isn’t necessarily a bad concept, but make sure it’s the right concept for your group before you just go there. Your desire to run a particular character is not an excuse to shit on everyone else’s fun.

Sir Dumbass the Just - So this topic isn’t so much a ‘pitfall’ as something that doesn’t get talked about a lot. There has not been a single incarnation of paladin that is rewarded for investing in Intelligence; instead, they tend to crave Strength or  Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom and/or Charisma (depending on edition and build). Once your main three are solved, Wisdom is the next-most important ability score for an adventuring paladin, because it directly relates to detecting threats, seeing through illusions, and resisting mind control, which leaves Intelligence in the dust next to whichever one of Strength or Dexterity you didn’t pick. This means, more often than not, that paladins are going to struggle in scholarly pursuits, be bad at Knowledge-type skills, and otherwise be uneducated in many ways, which most assuredly influences both their internal culture and the sorts of people who become successful paladins. Give the matter some consideration when you’re making your own.

Lady Natasha Pointe-Claire of the Dust March - Paladins as NPCS

Related to what was discussed just above, not all paladins are necessarily adventurers. Though the image of the paladin as a knight-errant, wandering the world in order to defeat foul plots and punch demons in the asshole, is both valid and probably very relevant to paladin player characters, there are other roles that a paladin might fulfill in your campaign setting. Such paladins are still members of a warrior class, and will thus have things in common with player character paladins, but their different roles will encourage investment in other kinds of abilities and skills which might not lead to a successful adventuring paladin, but will lead to a pretty good life in the other job. The following examples are by no means exhaustive, but they should provide a good place for a DM to start if they wanna incorporate paladin NPCs into their games in roles other than fellow (or rival) adventurers. Mentor - Probably the most straightforward; this paladin was a successful adventuring paladin who ended up retiring due to age, injuries, or just to enjoy time with their loved ones/family/children rather than getting mauled to death by undead birds. Take a normal paladin build, ratchet them up into Middle Age or Old Age, call it a day. Such paladins are likely to be a lot calmer and more pragmatic than the younger set, with a combination of painful experience and perspective guiding the advice they give on how to fight evil and how to dodge the fireballs that evil be throwing.

Knight-Hospitaller - Hospitallers are healers, caretakers, and guardians of the sick, injured, and infirm. Such a paladin might help maintain a home for those who have been traumatized (abuse victims, soldiers, people laboring beneath magical curses), be employed at or run a hospital, or maintain a temple dedicated to a god of healing and medicine. Hospitallers tend to choose options that enhance their Lay on Hands ability, memorize more healing spells than attack or defense ones, and value Wisdom and Intelligence more highly than their peers, often at the expense of their Strength or Dexterity (or even their Constitution; paladins, being immune to disease, can afford to be surprisingly frail of body in this role).

Fortress Knight - These paladins have a lot in common with adventuring paladins, but are for one reason or another posted in one spot from which they do not leave. They might be the guardians of a frontier village, soldiers watching over a sinister portal, the personal bodyguards to a powerful noble, or any other role in which they take on a defensive, reactionary stance rather than actively seeking out new and exciting forms of evil. Fortress knights need a higher Wisdom and to invest in Perception-type skills, and will tend to focus on utility-type spells with a strong subtheme of attack; they need to be able to rouse the alarm, dispel magic on their allies, and keep an enemy pinned down.

Example Paladin - Corran D’Arcy

I promise you, your long journey through my article is almost over. I wanna talk about a specific paladin to kinda tie things together, as an example of some of these principles and ideas in motion and because Corran d’Arcy is just weirdly legit when he has absolutely no fucking reason to be. Corran appears in the novelization for Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor, written by Carrie Bebris. The book is based on the videogame of the same name, which in turn was made to celebrate the release of D&D 3.0. “Should I play this game?” you ask, to which I reply: absolutely fucking not, the game was a rough ride when it came out and it has not aged remotely well. 3.0 was rapidly updated to 3.5 because of deep and wide mechanical flaws that made the play experience almost physically painful, and converting it to a CRPG did not help that experience at all.

The book though? Excellent. Legitimately one of the best D&D novels. Spoilers for it follow, but I’d still suggest reading it if you get the chance.

The novel is told from the perspective of Kestrel, a petty thief trying to raise enough money to quit her life of crime and, ideally, die in bed of old age rather than of blood loss in some gutter. A series of poor and alcohol-related decisions leads her to volunteer to guard an evil pool of soul-stealing water, which is where she meets Corran d’Arcy, a paladin of Tyr and the third son of a noble family. The two get on like water and oil; to Kestrel, Corran is a pompous, classist piece of shit who judges her without knowing her, and to Corran, Kestrel is the exact kind of criminal and evildoer he so often fights in his day job. When another team opens a portal to beg for help while they’re being slaughtered, Corran quite literally throws Kestrel through it when she’s trying not to go, nearly killing them both.

This puts their professional relationship off to a bit of a distant start, as you might imagine.

Corran’s prejudice, as well as Kestrel’s more-justified-but-still-unhelpful resentment, hinder the party as they attempt to survive in Myth Drannor and defeat the Cult of the Dragon’s schemes there. Corran’s life of privilege has left him unfamiliar with Kestrel’s skills, and he consistently misuses those skills or forgets to ask for her opinion and expertise - to the detriment of the group. This painful oversight aside, however, Corran proves surprisingly practical; he works with the party’s wizard to create effective combat tactics, utilizes invisibility for surprise attacks against powerful foes, and coordinates well in the heat of battle; after all, the Cult of the Dragon is not taking requests for formal duels, and the fate of the world is at stake. Corran is polite even to his enemies, and openly negotiates with the minions and allies of the Cult in order to avoid combat - notably including drow houses that have made their homes in Myth Drannor. Through the course of the novel, he and Kestrel go from being openly antagonistic towards one another to developing a newfound respect, starting when Kestrel calls Corran out for endangering the party by refusing to retreat. Corran, in turn, forces Kestrel to confront the fact that she has been unhappy living her life with no purpose other than to die another day, a revelation that shakes her to her core.

Things come to a head when one of Corran’s decisions gets a man killed. Kestrel calls him out on it, accusing him - correctly - of hurting those he’s trying to protect by misusing her skills and ignoring the advice of his companions. Seeing his genuine anguish over these events softens Kestrel’s rage towards the paladin, enough that they essentially start their relationship over from the top with genuine change from both of them. A scene late in the book where Kestrel helps Corran find the confidence to attempt divine magic (a gift given only to ‘truly worthy’ paladins) cements what has finally become a trusting friendship.

Corran d’Arcy is an excellent example of a classic paladin archetype with life and humanity breathed into it. He has prejudices and insecurities; he feels pressured to live up to a long legacy of knighthood that intimidates him. At the same time, the virtues he lives up to reward him over and over again, from his bold valor (which sees to the defeat of many evildoers) to his courtesy and honor in social situations (which wins him unlikely allies in a ruined city overrun by wickedness). Though he starts out as a dick, Corran is not malicious, and it’s his genuine desire to do good by others that motivates the change in his behavior; when he learns that he is hurting his friends, he knows that he must change.

That’s the end of the article proper! I hope you found it informative and, more than anything, helpful in creating paladins for your game and campaign setting. I absolutely welcome questions, comments, critique, additions, and the like; my Ask box is open, and the Reblog button is right there.

That said, if you’re interested, Mister Vox’s Wild Ride is not yet over. I got bit by the homebrew bug halfway through this damnable thing, so here’s a paladin oath based on a family from my first completed interactive story, Dungeon Life Quest. Constructive critique of this material is also very welcome!

Oath of the la Croix (D&D 5e Sacred Oath)

(River la Croix, journeyman necromancer and demonologist, ex-mercenary. Character is from Dungeon Life Quest, art provided by Domochevsky.)

The la Croix family have been necromancers for longer than they’ve been the la Croix; they laid down much of the foundations of modern necromancy, and have, through the ages, been tyrants, villains, refugees and, these days, heroes. To be a la Croix is not a matter of blood, but of commitment to the family’s ideals; one must be willing to help those in need, to serve the community, be a level head in times of trouble, to show respect for death and the dead, and to make hard choices with a calm heart.

Though most la Croix are necromancers, alchemists, healers, or summoners of various kinds, every now and again a paladin-like warrior emerges from the ranks of the family, often by adoption. Whether or not such cousins are ‘real’ paladins is a subject of languid internal debate in the family - no la Croix has ever fallen to the point where she lost her powers, but a few have managed to go mad enough with that power to end up hunted down by the rest of the family. The question doesn’t really need answering, but it’s fun to argue about after three cups of wine.

Tenets of the la Croix The high standards expected of la Croix paladins are also expected of anyone who chooses to bear the family name. You can give up the name at any time, but most la Croix children - by adoption or by blood - try to wear it with pride.

Life is for the Living, Death is for the Dead. No one chooses to be born, and very few people choose to die. Respect these truths. Take life when you must, but not cruelly, and never for personal gain. Remember that you, too, are alive, and deserve the chance to enjoy that life as all people do.

Your Name is ‘Somebody’. If there is a call for help, you are the one to answer; when you hear ‘somebody do something’, ‘somebody help me’, you are Somebody, child of Anyone. If you can’t help directly, do everything you can anyway. None of us deserve to be alone.

Serve, Not Rule. A la Croix’s place in her community is service to that community. We are not nobles, tyrants, or generals; we dwell among the common people to protect and shelter them, and to remind ourselves of all the ways in which we are alike. Our power makes us different, not better.

They, Too, Are Victims of Life. You do not know the struggles others go through, just as they do not know yours. All are condemned to live and to die, and deserve your compassion even when you are moved to strike them down for the greater good. Bury your enemies and give them their last rites as if they were your own family.

Oath Spells You gain oath spells at the paladin levels listed.

3rd - bane, false life 5th - darkness, gentle repose 9th - bestow curse, fear 13th - phantasmal killer, shadow of Moil* 17th - danse macabre*, planar binding

*appears in Xanathar’s Guide to Everything

Channel Divinity When you take this oath at 3rd level, you gain the following Channel Divinity options.

Ancestral Protection - You can use your Channel Divinity to call upon your la Croix ancestors for protection. As an action, you suffer damage equal to your paladin level; this damage cannot be prevented or reduced in any way. Then, you and all allies within 30 feet of you gain a bonus to armor class equal to your Charisma modifier for 1 minute.

Balefire Blast - You can use your Channel Divinity to scourge an enemy with death-in-flame. Make a spell attack against a creature within 30 feet. If you hit, that creature suffers necrotic damage equal to your paladin level, plus fire damage equal to your paladin level. If it dies within 1 minute of being hit, it counts as dying of old age in addition to its actual cause of death (usually meaning that it is much more difficult to bring back from the dead).

Necromancer’s Aura Beginning at 7th level, you radiate constant necromantic wards that protect you and your allies. You and allies within 10 feet of you have resistance to necrotic damage and radiant damage, and you make saving throws against effects which would kill you outright with advantage.

At 18th level, the range of this aura increases to 30 feet.

Friend of Death Starting at 15th level, you regain 1 spell slot of 3rd level or lower whenever a creature within 30 feet of you is reduced to 0 or less hit points. You can regain a number of spell slots this way equal to your Charisma modifier; once you reach this limit, you must finish a long rest to use this ability again.

Aphrael’s Chosen At 20th level, you gain the ability to enter a state of heightened necromantic power, in which you can channel far more sorcery than usual. As an action, you suffer damage equal to your paladin level, then begin channeling raw death magic for 1 minute. While in this state, you gain the following benefits:

- You are immune to all effects which would kill you outright - Whenever you cast a paladin spell, you can make a weapon attack as part of casting that spell. You are not required to make this attack. - Creatures make their saving throws against your spells with disadvantage.

Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a long rest.

[arcanalogue]

Notes on the Tetractys: Vol. 1

I have promised to do some writing about the Tetractys, so here it goes.

The first time this symbol blipped onto my radar was in 2009, when I learned about the it via somebody else’s artwork. At that point I had studied a bit of Greek philosophy and a heap of that Hebrew-adjacent mysticism that modern occultists appear to have bet everything on.

There’s literally no end to the amount of information out there about all of my favorite subjects, just waiting to be learned! This is why it’s so daunting for beginners who want to connect to certain magickal traditions: you want to know your shit, but we’re talking about areas of study which are notoriously difficult to access, and in many cases have been selected against in the great evolutionary arms-race of education. And then there are the gatekeepers upon gatekeepers upon gatekeepers...

The internet is an amazing tool for educating oneself, but there are so many ways to use it, and not a lot of instructions (just endless corrections). It takes a dexterous and inquisitive mind to exercise its potential in any focused way — to know what there even is to search for in the first place, and then how to search for it, how to dig into the crevices you find between related subjects and mine them for additional information... which informs future searches, etc.

But we still have it so much easier than anyone who came before us! Reading about the ways in which knowledge was passed down from teacher to student, from generation to generation, during the times of Pythagoras and other Greek philosophers is just fascinating to me. How did they manage to keep the chain from breaking? 

Then you realize how many chains did break along the way. Those we have access to are just the ones which gained a critical mass of interest, or happened to be preserved, or managed to survive all the historical incidents that have wiped out massive amounts of history. 

We gradually realize that at virtually any point during its existence, a thing can be lost. Sometimes these things are lost on purpose, other times they slip through our fingers as we reach for other things. And then in some rare instances, a lost thing can be found again. So there’s often a continuity in a thing’s existence that isn’t evident in our historical record — which, from a distance, could probably be visualized as a string of lights blinking on and off again as various things (ideas, objects, people) are lost, forgotten, rediscovered, and then lost again, blipping across humankind’s awareness and then retreating, over and over across centuries.

Basically we humans are playing a giant “don’t let the balloon touch the floor” game with our own history, except with billions of people and balloons in play at once, and some of the players unfairly seem to be armed with pointy sticks. It’s an absurdly clumsy scenario, and no matter how well we try to play together... suffice to say, there will be casualties.

The Greeks knew this. They’d already seen it! Which is why some of the traditions you read about were so strict, or so eccentrically intense. These teachers knew their entire body of work could go up in smoke, literally anytime. In many cases they’d observed it firsthand. In some instances, they’d personally wielded the torches! Since the very dawn of technology, probably pre-dating language itself, humans have been engaged in informational warfare.

This is one way that teachers, inventors and explorers actually manage to change the course of history: by determining who can be trusted with emerging information. That’s why security and access remain central to conversations about technology to this very day. What is beneficial to keep secret, and what should be made available to the public? 

Some make these choices wisely, others choose unwisely, and everything we see around us is basically the grand result of all those choices.

Wait, wasn’t this supposed to be about the Tetractys? 

*bops balloon back toward ceiling*

There’s a reason why certain symbols and designs from antiquity remain in play today, thousands of years later. It’s the same reason that creators are constantly trying to create new ones, or in some cases just scooping up old symbols, dusting them off, remixing and repurposing them for a new mission.

Symbols and patterns are sticky. We like looking at them, thinking about them, playing with them. Remember how you did this as a child, over and over: encountering a new symbol, you would draw it, repeat it. As a product of embedding it in your own memory, you leave it where it may be found by someone else. As a technology, symbols are uniquely equipped for longevity in the human world.

The human eye and brain are linked in a way that’s predisposed to recognize patterns, and pattern recognition is key to learning (among many other things) mathematics.

Mathematics (which I’m terrible at, so don’t worry, this isn’t about to become a math blog) will always the key to understanding the reality we inherited, and to seeing its potential as we gradually fabricate a new one.

The Tetractys is both a symbol and a pattern, which makes it especially sticky and especially fun to play with. With very little explanation, its layers of meaning begin to unfold in the mind. It teases, it reveals, it obscures. The Tetractys nudges us new toward thresholds of awareness, echoing the cascading effect of reality’s formation described in the Tetractys itself.

As such, it remains its own best recommendation. Is it any wonder that Pythagoreans flipped their collective lids over it?

The author at Organelle writes:

“What [Pythagoras] was gave us is nothing like what it at first appears to be. This is why people were swearing by his name for having brought this simple diagram into the world of human experience: a toy which none could own, and anyone with a stick and some dirt could instantly play with. It requires no manufacture — it cannot not be stolen or co-opted, and ‘giving it away’ causes the giver and the gifted to become ‘exponentially more wealthy’ — in ongoing progressions.“

As early mathematicians fleshed out new concepts, and invented new symbols to represent their discoveries, they were basically just skipping stones further down the stream, packaging ideas in ways that other humans would be able to recognize and access and build upon. Sometimes this was done in full public view, but often they worked in secret, because their bodies of work (as well as their actual bodies) were vulnerable to being dismantled by anyone who found them threatening.

The reason I chose to begin writing about the Tetractys this way was to highlight that there are many different forms of information, many forms of teaching, many forms of learning. And, as we have finally proven, the world is also full of different kinds of human intelligence, capable of many different things. We’re slowly digging out from preconceptions imposed on us by minds that were overly concerned with ideals; any deviations from the ideal were considered to be of lesser value, selected against.

That’s one consequence of hierarchical religious thinking, and it’s not hard to see how even the Tetractys — with its depiction of reality cascading downward from a perfected “monad” state to an earthly “tetrad” — could end up appearing to confirm earlier humans’ preconceptions about what human perfection ought to look like, sound like, be like. Contemplating the pure language of mathematics, or seeking the pure spiritual experience, we crave to reform ourselves and our world to reflect this pursuit. 

Science and religion were conjoined for so long in our ancient history, it’s not surprising that notions conflating scientific purity and spiritual purity still turn up everywhere you look. We’re hooked on them! You see it a lot in New Age thought, and the desire to find confirmation of our spiritual beliefs in “natural” phenomena; the dreaded quest for “authenticy.”

I wanted to start by pointing out that I am not qualified to teach others in the formal sense. I have no accreditation. My academic pedigree is limited to... well, words written in a blog post, however thoughtfully I manage to string them together.

To learn tarot and other various practices, first I had to learn how to learn. For the most part, my education was missing this crucial step. I’ve always been quite naturally absorbent, but the moment my curiosity in any subject was satisfied, I considered my work done. 

That’s probably how most people function when left to their own conclusions... unless survival dictates otherwise. But some of us discover we simply have to keep evolving, keep looking for answers, in order to endure. How do I adapt to survive in this world? What are its qualities? Where are its boundaries? What am I actually capable of?

Taking responsibility for my own education in the longer term is one of the greatest accomplishments in my life. I never thought so before; it’s been too easy to focus on everything I’m still lacking. But now that I’m looking back from my forties, I see a surprising amount of continuity and steady progress. By now I’ve also noted the way knowledge fades when it’s seldom-used, so that means I’m often stuck with the humbling, non-glamorous chore of re-learning everything that used to be right at my mental fingertips.

The Tetractys flickered in and out of my awareness back in 2009, and then lit up again years later when I was working on a series of instructional posts about the minor arcana cards. 

This was the phase in my own practice when I began to leave the Tree of Life and other Qabalistic studies behind; the deeper I’d dug into them, the more I had to admit that my questions weren’t being answered — and in the meantime, I was being inundated with information that I had no practical use for. And as a non-Jewish person who reads and discusses the tarot quite often, I became uncomfortable relying on concepts related to the Hebrew alphabet that had been passed down by Western occultists.

At best, I had to admit that it was no longer helping me survive in this world.

Researching the overlapping history of the Tree of Life and the Tetractys, I realized this was a much firmer basis for my own personal investigations. The history of numbers and of symbolism has no direct path! But it’s very easy to end up sticking to the most well-trod path, even if it’s not going exactly where you’d hoped.

The Tetractys jewelry I created with Azamel was a way of marking that commitment with a reminder to keep learning, to question and refine my own interest in the subjects that appeal to me. I must be willing to adjust course, even if it means wandering through grass higher than my head. That feeling of ignorance and vulnerability is reminiscent of being child again, and comes with all of the wonder and discovery of childhood, as well as the requisite bumps and mistakes and redundancies.

In upcoming posts, I will share some of what I’ve learned from the Tetractys and how I’ve reinvested that into my tarot practice. I’m not “teaching” you how to use the Tetractys in your tarot practice, but I’m happy to help give the balloon another bump, and point to sources that might give you that delightful cascading sense of awareness. 

By now I know many of you personally (even if just a bit!) and I know that our love of that feeling is one that knits us together. It also unites us with all the teachers and students of past traditions, many of whom made tremendous sacrifices just to be able to pursue and relive that feeling.

Thanks for reading! And special thanks to those who snapped up this bit of jewelry early on, it has meant the world to have SOME small thing to show for the long months sitting here in the vast semi-darkness of 2020. Developing the consecration ritual for the Tetractys jewelry, I felt almost like I was visiting people, imagining their surroundings, their cards, their questions.

It’s comforting to be surrounded by so many who are still searching, still learning. I do not believe this ever ends, even after death.

[mahoikutranslationproject]

MGRP: Black Chapter 1 Thoughts and Reactions

So I’m actually in a unique position because as a translator I can’t exactly “react” after I read it, and I’ve read MGRP way before I started translating it, but, then I had a thought.

What if I type out my reactions, put it in notepad or some other text document, preserve it, and then after I translate it, post them all up? That way, it’ll technically still be my reactions and thoughts at the time, and I can kinda sorta join in the fandom discussion.

With Black coming out I thought Black was the perfect arc to start it, so I’ve been typing up my reactions starting with Chapter 1. I actually wanted to do it for Queens too, I just only had the idea after I was halfway through Queens. In any case, here we go:

NOTE: By this point I only have knowledge of Chapter 1 as I read it.

The Entire Regulations and Rules section before the Prologue

This part reminds me of something like DanganRonpa or something similar where the rules are quite normal and nice until you get to stuff like “DON’T TALK ABOUT ANYTHING TO SOCIAL MEDIA >:C”. Which I guess makes sense for Magical Girls, but there’s a vague air of... sinisterness? I wonder if Pythie was behind this school.

Also I like the school anthem. I wish there was an accompanying background music, but I’ll try and sing it in my head.

Gradually, her ego took form, and the girl began to regain her sense of self. She stretched her body, and hit a flat hard object. It was cold, and her butt also felt the same. Perhaps she was sitting on the floor. Without rushing, but without being slow about it either, she opened her eyes, as if realizing this is not how things should be. 

A woman was smiling straight ahead. Who was she? She was bending down and looking at her, tilting her neck. Beside her, there was a human-sized object that was tied up in chains and stuck with a tag.

The girl blinked, held her breath, and gulped.

Actions that she should’ve done without thought now felt agonizing, as if this wasn’t her own body. Why? She wondered, and as if answering, her mind replied If you have questions, just ask. She opened her mouth and said “Uh.” After confirming what her voice sounded like, she looked towards the woman, and asked her question.

Okay, so is Kana asking herself a question in her mind? Curious how her power works here. Also, what was that about a human-sized object tied in chains and stuck with a tag? That’s... bizarre. Kana where are you? Also she’s clearly been out for some time, probably. Like she’s probably not used to having this body. My other guess is that she’s not used to the sensation of being a Magical Girl.

“This isn’t my body anymore, is it?”

Wrong. This was definitely a girl’s body.

“You haven’t used it for a while, have you?”

Supports my theory above.

She was inside a small room, with concrete walls and floors unadorned with any decorations. It was about twice her height. Meanwhile, its width and depth were about six times her height. When she looked behind her, she could see a cylindrical vertical container. Did she just come out of it? The floor, walls, and the colors of the container were all pale white. Its material was soft, like resin or something. The only exit was the one metallic door frame. The woman in front of her was standing as if she was guarding said door. While her smile seemed like an average smile, but there was something off about it. As soon as she took her eyes away from her, though, she couldn’t exactly place why it felt so off. She wore a skirt, with high heeled shoes, and glasses. The impression she got from her outfit was that she was formal, yet her smile was mischievous.

What the hecky was she in cryostasis!? Also this sounds like Pythie/Yoshioka

“......Where are we?”

The woman didn’t answer. But the answer popped into the girl’s head regardless. This was a prison. The woman bowed and spoke,

Okay so this is Magical Girl prison.

“I am Yoshioka. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Yoshioka.”

I knew it.

“But now the tides have changed.”

“The Land of Magic doesn’t change so easily.”

She knows about the Land of Magic. Kana you are interesting. 

“You are a Magical Girl named Kana. Do you remember?”

“Kana.”

She shook her head rapidly, and grabbed any unkempt hair. Now that she mentioned it, that did seem right. Within her vague memory, she recalled a Kana hidden somewhere there.

“Right. Kana. My name is Kana.”

“Now, as for what you did before-”

Before she could even utter another word, a name popped into Kana’s head.

“Caspar…”

At this point I’m thinking she’s probably related to Ratsumu? Is she potentially the actual Third Sage? She doesn’t seem Sagey but she’s got like... a potential for it. Especially cause she said she recalled “a Kana hidden somewhere”. What if she’s only a fragment of the Sage? Like how Ratsumu’s name is inhumanly long.

“Perhaps you may have noticed, but that is your Magical Skill. When you ask a question to someone, you will immediately know their answer. A wonderful, powerful ability, though one that shouldn’t be abused.”

“And why shouldn’t I abuse it?”

Immediately, the answer popped into her head. Because answers are subjective. If the respondent would answer a lie that they believe to be true, the answer will be distorted as well. There are also things that are better left unknown. Also, it was much better to use your own head to figure things out rather than relying on your powers. Perhaps because it might be a breach of privacy to Yoshioka. Kana certainly didn’t want her own privacy being breached. A variety of answers popped into her head. All of them Yoshioka’s, perhaps gained through her powers.

What happens if Kana asks someone a question in a livestream... Also this power is less powerful than I expected, which means it may not be Sage-level, but it doesn’t rule out the fact that she could be a Sage.

She followed Yoshioka into a hallway filled with a series of rugged iron bars, which led to large pillars further ahead, and these iron bars and large pillars continued to surround her path forward. There were doors lined equally on the sides, with prisoners just like Kana imprisoned inside, pacing around as they stared at the iron bars. This scenery repeated across the floors until they reached the sixth floor. This was a pretty big facility. If there was one prisoner per door, she’d guessed this jail housed about 100 or 200 prisoners. There were tags within tags, used to mark these prisoners down. Naturally, security was supposed to be strict, but other than Yoshioka and the Magical Girl packed inside that object, nobody was here visiting anyone else. 

Wow. This is a huge prison. Were they all stripped of clothing and equipment too, or was it just Kana? Also, a thought that occurred to me later on past my initial reactions during my readthrough, “why wasn’t Kana tagged?”

“That’s yours. Please feel free.”

“Clothes and underwear.”

She turned them around, and the bright light inside the room bounced from her silver hair to make a shining circle. There was also a matching skirt.

“This doesn’t look like a costume.”

“It’s a uniform.”

It looked like a sailor suit with a crimson color scheme. It had a design that had low degrees of exposure. This would be too plain for a Magical Girl costume. Kana didn’t feel like this matched her. She wasn’t flashy, sure, but this was even worse. It also felt Eastern somewhat.

“This doesn’t look like something you wear for a Magical Girl job.”

“Oh, my apologies. These clothes are enchanted by magic, so it won’t ever break. Not to worry. And, it fits where you’re supposed to go.”

That explains why Kana’s clothes are so plain. This wasn’t her actual costume at all.

☆ Mariko Fukuroi

Black is officially the best arc. Case closed.

All of a sudden, Mariko became known as the head of information. She was then entrusted with more things than would befit a temporary assistant. With there being two Magical Girls in this school, school life was generally very chaotic.

How did she get so many jobs. I mean, I’m proud of you Marika but how. Weren’t you just a sub?

Originally, Mariko had only been sent as a substitute teacher because one of the homeroom teachers was on maternity leave

Yes, you WERE!

Despite that, Yamada kept exercising on his own. His spirit was nearly unbreakable, even to the eyes of a Magical Girl. But who knows how far that’ll take him. Carefully, but also quickly, Mariko sought out a way to solve the problem, by listening, being attentive, and alert.

I hope you become a Magical Girl some day Yamada.

Turning around, she saw two girls. She knew their faces, but they weren’t from her class. In fact, they weren’t even the same grade. Standing in front of her was Yoshiko Yoshinoura, with an expression that showed how determined she was. Behind her, Sari Kasuga seemed worried. Both, however, seemed to be anxious. Both were friends of Koyuki Himekawa.

Props to Yoshiko for also surviving all the way to Black. She, Snow, and Ripple are the only long-running survivors at this point. If Snow and Ripple bite the dust, this ironically makes her the one who outlived literally every other cast member. Poor Sumire never shows up again though.

“Hey teach, you’re kinda looking a bit weird. Gritting your teeth like that.”

“Mmph?”

It seems her face had contorted from her clenched jaw. Yoshiko’s suspicions only grew further. Mariko managed to cover by coughing twice. Mariko went back to a cool nonplussed “What? You didn’t see anything” kind of face.

“I uh, have canker sores.”

“Really?”

“Uh huh. I swear, I do.”

Mariko Fukuroi—the Magical Girl Marika Fukuroi—always hung out with Snow White whenever they were both Magical Girls. She’d help her with anything she had on her plate. Whenever she did so, Marika was almost always filled with joy. Such was the freedom of the Magical Girl known as Marika Fukuroi. However, she still had trouble remembering all her students’ faces. They flickered back and forth in her mind. Her inner storm didn’t really make for a nice warm personality. 

Answer. Your. Phone. Snow.

Also, it’s cute how Marika cares so much about Snow White this way. I always knew she did, but now it’s even better. Marika’s a huge brutish brawler, but she also just has trouble socializing, and letting out her actual feelings. This is great.

After opening the door to the science lab, she closed it and held it down with her body, the girls still outside. Then, she bit back a loud scream and pulled her hair.

I really wish this was animated, or drawn, or just... something. I really really really want to see this.

Snow White’s new Magical Phone—that she hasn’t used yet—began to vibrate inside her costume. Whatever the reason, it’d be interrupting what she was doing now. So she held her hand to her costume and turned off her phone.

ANSWER. YOUR. PHONE. SNOW.

She had faintly heard the voice of someone’s mind from beyond the trees, meaning she had to close the distance. She made a circle with her thumb and index finger, and the Magical Girl running up behind her, Uluru, saw her signal.

I am so glad they’re partners now. Snow White and Uluru, Batman and Robin, it fits so well.

“There she is! That’s the girl you beat up in the cave…” Uluru said, pointing to a blue Magical Girl standing in front of the trees. Princess Deluge.

Whoa, they found Deluge already? Wait, are they going to fight again? OH MY GOD ARE THEY!? ARE WE GONNA SEE ANOTHER FIGHT? IN THE PROLOGUE?

Back when Puk Puck had raided the caverns, Uluru had told Snow White that she fought with Deluge, and then promptly thought that it might be a bad idea to mention that. The Uluru she knew before would always say what’s on her mind without fault. Now, Uluru had grown. She cared for others, and chose her words carefully.

I like how we’re checking in with everyone, and I like that Uluru is growing as a person and a partner. This fills me with joy. Snow and Uluru are one of my favorite Snow pairs next to Marika, cause both of them can basically kick ass Batman Robin style (well with Marika it’d be Batman and... uh... insane battle hungry Robin? a nicer Jason Todd Robin?)

Standing around Deluge were Armor Arlie, Blade Brenda, and Cannon Catherine, all facing Snow White. These three black-suited Magical Girls had also been manipulated by Puk Puck and fought alongside her. However, Arlie, who had never taken off her visor, even while in briefings, breaks, or fighting with Puk Puck, had now lifted her visor. She looked just like Brenda and Catherine, yet she was also completely different from before.

Snow White smiled back in reply to the black-suited Magical Girls who were happily waving about their weapons, before relaxing her expression and facing Deluge.

D’awwwww she LIKES them!!!!!!!!!

Alright, Chapter 1 proper. I can’t believe it ends THERE! So wait, Armor Arlie’s still Arlie, and there’s no Dory, which means... Where is she? Is she part of Deluge’s group? Wait, where’s Shadow Gale? Did they just... leave her at home? Without a babysitter? Does she have food? Will she be okay?

☆ Tetty Goodgripp

The nearest station from her house was around three minutes; from there, she’d catch two trains, then she’d exit the largest station from the west side, and walk one minute until she arrived at her destination. The building had no elevator and was all broken down and rusty, but she still had to travel up to the seventh floor. Finally, she would reach the Gate to her school. This was her normal route to school.

So the school uses a Gate in the 7th floor? That’s pretty rad.

From there, she entered the building from the roof. She had considered the fact that the rooftop door not being locked was a sign of courtesy for other Magical Girls.

Isn’t she breaking the rules here, Class Rep?

 As she ran across the hallways, she saw a sign on the wall that read “No running in the halls.” It’s fine. It was a short walk to class anyway.

That’s two rules broken.

They all belonged to one of the three groups. Group three to be precise. Hearing Fujino’s footsteps, they turned around, in time for Fujino to say a warm “Good morning!” towards them.

I’ll not paste every single one of their descriptions but while I can see Lightning being hime-girl, Diko being mohawk girl threw me off so much.

“Ello.”

“Ewo.”

God, these two are gonna get me so much.

These three groups refuse to interact with each other at all. At best, they’d greet each other, but the only one who would respond with a smile among anyone was Sally Raven. The rest are generally salty to any outsiders. Except for one girl in group two, who wasn’t just elementary school friends with Fujino—she also became a Magical Girl in the same exam.

Fuko Sayama—Magical Girl name Mepis Pheles. She had been estranged from Fujino when she transferred out, but miraculously, they made a reunion here. At first, they got along well, but then they started to talk less and less because she kept getting mad whenever they played cards.

Mepis is one person I didn’t expect to be the angry type, but now I’m even more interested in her.

At this point we’ve gotten an illustration, and I notice compared with the human illustrations in twitter that they’re arranged in exactly the same way as their groups! Which means the ones that don’t have human illustrations WASN’T Arlie and Dory, but Calcolo (cause she’s a teacher) and Kana. This was further confirmed when the two twins actually ARE Arlie and Dory.

“Well duh, they’d be a Magical Girl! This is a Magical Girl CLASS! I’m talkin’ about somethin’ ELSE! They’re a bit more mhm mhm, y’know?”

With her fingers on her sun-tanned cheeks, Wrappy Tip shook her chestnut hair out and about. She normally speaks loud, and now she spoke even louder somehow.

WRAPPY!!! WHY DO YOU SCREAM SO MUCH! I’m joking I love you for that Wrappy. Your Magical Girl form looks like Tepsekemei but you’re actually HIGHLY ENERGETIC!

“I’m glad OUR group has five! If we had four, then WE’D get the inmate! God, can you imagine the TENSION!?”

“You don’t have to be so mean.”

“I’m not MEAN! I’m SCARED!”

Wrappy’s words seemed nervous, but her expression and tone were completely at odds with it, being so cheerful.

I have a feeling Wrappy is going to be like this for the entirety of Black. She’s just gonna be in danger and be like “OH MY GOD WE’RE IN DANGER!” with googly eyes and a gasping look on her face.

“So hang on, you’re telling me she’s been released, right?”

“Well, she wouldn’t have broken out, would she?”

“Prison Break.”

“Season 2.”

The fact that Arlie and Dory knows Prison Break and Season 2 of Prison Break leads me to believe they watched it with Deluge or something and Shadow Gale during their stint at that hideout. Which is both cute and amazing.

Her height was 170cm, and her face seemed so mature. She had trimmed natural blonde hair that reached her shoulders. She had fair skin, blue eyes, and a European Magical Girl name. But unlike Arlie and Dory, her Japanese was very fluent. Thunder General Adelheid made a warm smile and waved her right hand.

THUNDER GENERAL ADELHEID!!!! Now this is one Magical Girl I’m going to keep an eye out throughout Black.

“Hmm, it seems you’ve heard the rumors.”

“About the PRISONER!? YEAH YEAH, WE DID!” replied Wrappy Tip while violently headbanging.

My opinion of Wrappy shot up due to her violent headbanging.

“For now, I shall treat her as if she were kin. However, I do feel like she may quarrel with Mepis.”

Little did I know, this was the understatement of the year.

She hadn’t changed one bit. Her appearance had changed, now wearing glasses and braids, but her personality hadn’t. Despite being seemingly literary and well-read, this girl was surprisingly quick to anger, and felt more like a gangster. When she was in elementary school, it didn’t matter if it were boys or even seniors, she picked a fight with everyone—mostly people she found annoying. The Daifugo card game during her lunch break was cancelled early because she had a tantrum for losing, and the teachers couldn’t handle her, so they just banned her from bringing cards at all.

Okay Mepis is going to be a fun ride when she finally does get a POV and dialogue. That being said, the glasses girl was one of my secondary and tertiary guesses for Mepis solely because a winky face human is a little too obvious. It’s hilarious how so out of personality her human self looks from her Magical Girl self though.

Tetty Goodgripp had been chosen to become their Class Rep. Still, group two’s problems should be solved by group two. Thinking about it though, it seemed their leader was Mepis Pheles, and considering how their leader was the one itching for a fight, there was no way they could solve any problems whatsoever on their own.

The consistent opinion among these girls seems to be “Mepis is not going to be a good time”

When she looked at Miss Lille, she saw that she seemed almost pale, as if saying “I’m sorry for what you’re about to endure”. Wrappy meanwhile was just waving both her hands in the air as if saying “HI GUYS! WE’RE TALKING ABOUT YOU!”

Wrappy shoots up yet again in the best Black characters rank, though so far everyone’s off to a great start personality-wise.

Dory meanwhile was grabbing her spear and was bonking Arlie in the head repeatedly. Arlie looked sad, but Dory kept bonking.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA WHAT!? WHY?

These two looked like they came in a set, yet most of the time, they kept on fighting each other. It’s hard to tell if they were actually close with each other or not.

So do they actually just hate each other? That’s hilarious.

☆ Halna Medhi Melen

a mage? Oh boy. And a new one too. Side note, I really love how we can just determine mages from their ridiculous names. Mana, why isn’t your name so ridiculous?

Calcolo may be a talented Mage herself, but she was far from mature, so she’d make a horrible teacher.

GASP!!!! CALCOLO’S A MAGE MAGICAL GIRL!!!!! AAAAAAAAA!!!! We’ve heard this being possible in Breakdown and F2P but this is our first main series character to BE one.

Halna glanced at her own pointed ears

First off. Elf. Secondly, how the hell do you glance at your own ears???

The cause of the Calcolo’s nervousness was 20% Magical Girl and 80% Calcolo’s timid personality.

Oh Calcolo’s gonna be a favorite. She’s like 7753′s personality mixed with Kuru-Kuru Hime’s job.

“My name is Halna Medhi Melen. I am the supervisor of this school. This is Calcolo Callumph. She’s your homeroom teacher. Her Magical Girl name is Calcolo.”

Callumph is such a nice last name, but why is your Magical Girl name literally your actual name, Calcolo? Didn’t you learn from Nokko-Chan and Akane?

Also the entire section of this part was just Halna raging at Kana as Kana innocently answers questions was the best. Calcolo’s boss is much angrier than 7753′s was for sure, and that makes for a brand new flavor of “depressed office worker Magical Girl”, of which there are so many in MGRP.

Since being assigned to Class 2-F, there has been no day where Calcolo didn’t feel pain and agony. What kind of a teacher has no mood for classes, or any abilities, or just seems to complain whenever there’s an event? Why did she have to make up a rule to ban cards during lunch? Why can’t the kids just get along?

I knew I’d love her. She literally has 7753′s personality about her job.

She remembered her first day as a teacher, when she was determined to be the best teacher she could be. She opened the door and saw a girl with a mohawk and tattoos on half her face like she was from the feudal age. That’s when she thought “Yeah. No. I don’t think this’ll work out.”

Hey, I’m sure Diko didn’t mean anything bad by it. That being said this made me laugh so much and got Calcolo even higher on my best characters list.

Her bloodline can be traced back to one of the Three Sages, Shayn Osk Val Mer, and not only that, her proficiencies are on the level of specialists. She has eyes that could peer through the essence of others, and has a fierceness that enables her to make decisions without hesitation. She had pointed ears and heterochromatic eyes, which seemed an anomaly even for Mages

So, does this mean Osk had children? Also, is this where elves came from? Her heterochromatic eyes are also shared by Puk.

There’s like an entire section dedicated to how the school is just a proxy war between the factions and I love how they’re still scrambling at each other despite not physically having the capabilities to.

For now, they focused on finding any Mage who can transform into a Magical Girl. Thus, the spotlight shone on Calcolo, the girl who studied day and night to become an authority on criminology. Oh, and she can transform into a Magical Girl too.

I like how her degree was used first. This makes Calcolo sound like Buzz Lightyear during his Mrs. Nesbitt phase in Toy Story 1.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“No? What’d I forget?”

Her expression, or lack of, felt like she’s not really judging her or being mad, but Calcolo felt like she was going to dive into a pit of something much much worse.

“Well, classes are divided into two sections. General Education, and Magical Girl Education. Gen Ed classes will be taken in your human forms, and Magical Girl Classes in your Magical Girl form.”

“Okay,” Kana said, pulling her chair out and standing up.

Oooh boy, I’m gonna love Kana’s interaction with everybody if she keeps this up. She’s not exactly clueless, but everyone else thinks she’s an idiot. Which I can’t blame. She looks kinda dumb.

Basically, if Calcolo reported any problems with Kana, worst comes to worst, Halna will pick a fight with Caspar.

I enjoy the fact that Calcolo basically said “If I report Kana, I may indirectly cause a war with Caspar. Nope.”

“Your clothes-”

“It’s the school uniform.”

“No, I know. I just meant, parts of them are torn.”

“It’s to make it easier for me to move in.”

I didn’t notice this at the time, but my editor pointed out that she basically ripped the “unrippable” clothes. Kana what are you?

Well, those are my initial thoughts on it. When I first read chapter one, I was super intrigued at how the school worked, and what Halna and Calcolo’s plans are for it. It seems I was mistaken that the school was a Pythie-run thing, but I do think Pythie is using Kana in some way. I also think Kana’s potentially related to the third Sage, Caspar herself. Time will tell how this plays out.

[1-800-444-tune]

Demonology + Witchcraft🀄♠

Introduction

Part 1 or I , and the other volumes will be posted at a later date, each separately. (Enjoy)😆

To find my copy of Demonology......

so you are going to want to search tags that I use if you're looking for it. Or just follow me, that's easier.

Letters written in the 1800's have resurfaced and are being preserved by some very highly spiritually invested peoples; I own a copy and the rights to distribute this material as long as I am within the very strict guidelines agreement I signed with this website that is helping to distribute and preserve older historical witchcraft or paranormal and spiritual writings that are not related to The Holy Bible. At all! Lol. Anyways, I have been wondering for quite some time how to approach the problem of having a very looooong post; so this will be the introduction and partial of...

Letter 1: by Sir Walter Scott

With an Introduction, By: Henry Morely

Professor of Literature @ London University College ; London, UK.

demonstrates to all men, except the few who are hardened to the celestial voice, that there is within us a portion of the divine substance, which is not subject to the law of death and dissolution, but which, when the body is no longer fit for its abode, shall seek its own place, as a sentinel dismissed from his post. Unaided by revelation, it cannot be hoped that mere earthly reason should be able to form any rational or precise conjecture concerning the destination of the soul when parted from the body; but the conviction that such an indestructible essence exists, the belief expressed by the poet in a different sense, Non omnis moriar must infer the existence of many millions of spirits who have not been annihilated, though they have become invisible to mortals who still see, hear, and perceive, only by means of the imperfect organs of humanity. Probability may lead some of the most reflecting to anticipate a state of future rewards and punishments; as those experienced in the education of the deaf and dumb find that their pupils, even while cut off from all instruction by ordinary means, have been able to form, out of their own unassisted conjectures, some ideas of the existence of a Deity, and of the distinction between the soul and body—a circumstance which proves how naturally these truths arise in the human mind. The principle that they do so arise, being taught or communicated, leads to further conclusions.

These spirits, in a state of separate existence, being admitted to exist, are not, it may be supposed, indifferent to the affairs of mortality, perhaps not incapable of influencing them. It is true that, in a more advanced state of society, the philosopher may challenge the possibility of a separate appearance of a disembodied spirit, unless in the case of a direct miracle, to which, being a suspension of the laws of nature, directly wrought by the Maker of these laws, for some express purpose, no bound or restraint can possibly be assigned. But under this necessary limitation and exception, philosophers might plausibly argue that, when the soul is divorced from the body, it loses all those qualities which made it, when clothed with a mortal shape, obvious to the organs of its fellow-men. The abstract idea of a spirit certainly implies that it has neither substance, form, shape, voice, or anything which can render its presence visible or sensible to human faculties. But these sceptic doubts of philosophers on the possibility of the appearance of such separated spirits, do not arise till a certain degree of information has dawned upon a country, and even then only reach a very small proportion of reflecting and better-informed members of society. To the multitude, the indubitable fact, that so many millions of spirits exist around and even amongst us, seems sufficient to support the belief that they are, in certain instances at least, by some means or other, able to communicate with the world of humanity. The more numerous part of mankind cannot form in their mind the idea of the spirit of the deceased existing, without possessing or having the power to assume the appearance which their acquaintance bore during his life, and do not push their researches beyond this point.

🔮🕯🕯🕯🕎

Enthusiastic feelings of an impressive and solemn nature occur both in private and public life, which seem to add ocular testimony to an intercourse betwixt earth and the world beyond it. For example, the son who has been lately deprived of his father feels a sudden crisis approach, in which he is anxious to have recourse to his sagacious advice—or a bereaved husband earnestly desires again to behold the form of which the grave has deprived him for ever—or, to use a darker yet very common instance, the wretched man who has dipped his hand in his fellow-creature's blood, is haunted by the apprehension that the phantom of the slain stands by the bedside of his murderer. In all or any of these cases, who shall doubt that imagination, favoured by circumstances, has power to summon up to the organ of sight, spectres which only exist in the mind of those by whom their apparition seems to be witnessed?

If we add, that such a vision may take place in the course of one of those lively dreams in which the patient, except in respect to the single subject of one strong impression, is, or seems, sensible of the real particulars of the scene around him, a state of slumber which often occurs; if he is so far conscious, for example, as to know that he is lying on his own bed, and surrounded by his own familiar furniture at the time when the supposed apparition is manifested, it becomes almost in vain to argue with the visionary against the reality of his dream, since the spectre, though itself purely fanciful, is inserted amidst so many circumstances which he feels must be true beyond the reach of doubt or question. That which is undeniably certain becomes, in a manner, a warrant for the reality of the appearance to which doubt would have been otherwise attached. And if any event, such as the death of the person dreamt of, chances to take place, so as to correspond with the nature and the time of the apparition, the coincidence, though one which must be frequent, since our dreams usually refer to the accomplishment of that which haunts our minds when awake, and often presage the most probable events, seems perfect, and the chain of circumstances touching the evidence may not unreasonably be considered as complete. Such a concatenation, we repeat, must frequently take place, when it is considered of what stuff dreams are made—how naturally they turn upon those who occupy our mind while awake, and, when a soldier is exposed to death in battle, when a sailor is incurring the dangers of the sea, when a beloved wife or relative is attacked by disease, how readily our sleeping imagination rushes to the very point of alarm, which when waking it had shuddered to anticipate. The number of instances in which such lively dreams have been quoted, and both asserted and received as spiritual communications, is very great at all periods; in ignorant times, where the natural cause of dreaming is misapprehended and confused with an idea of mysticism, it is much greater. Yet, perhaps, considering the many thousands of dreams which must, night after night, pass through the imagination of individuals, the number of coincidences between the vision and real event are fewer and less remarkable than a fair calculation of chances would warrant us to expect. But in countries where such presaging dreams are subjects of attention, the number of those which seemed to be coupled with the corresponding issue, is large enough to spread a very general belief of a positive communication betwixt the living and the dead.

Somnambulism and other nocturnal deceptions frequently lend their aid to the formation of such phantasmata as are formed in this middle state, betwixt sleeping and waking. A most respectable person, whose active life had been spent as master and part owner of a large merchant vessel in the Lisbon trade, gave the writer an account of such an instance which came under his observation. He was lying in the Tagus, when he was put to great anxiety and alarm by the following incident and its consequences. One of his crew was murdered by a Portuguese assassin, and a report arose that the ghost of the slain man haunted the vessel. Sailors are generally superstitious, and those of my friend's vessel became unwilling to remain on board the ship; and it was probable they might desert rather then return to England with the ghost for a passenger. To prevent so great a calamity, the captain determined to examine the story to the bottom. He soon found that, though all pretended to have seen lights and heard noises, and so forth, the weight of the evidence lay upon the statement of one of his own mates, an Irishman and a Catholic, which might increase his tendency to superstition, but in other respects a veracious, honest, and sensible person, whom Captain ——had no reason to suspect would wilfully deceive him. He affirmed to Captain S—— with the deepest obtestations, that the spectre of the murdered man appeared to him almost nightly, took him from his place in the vessel, and, according to his own expression, worried his life out. He made these communications with a degree of horror which intimated the reality of his distress and apprehensions. The captain, without any argument at the time, privately resolved to watch the motions of the ghost-seer in the night; whether alone, or with a witness, I have forgotten. As the ship bell struck twelve, the sleeper started up, with a ghastly and disturbed countenance, and lighting a candle, proceeded to the galley or cook-room of the vessel. He sate down with his eyes open, staring before him as on some terrible object which he beheld with horror, yet from which he could not withhold his eyes. After a short space he arose, took up a tin can or decanter, filled it with water, muttering to himself all the while—mixed salt in the water, and sprinkled it about the galley. Finally, he sighed deeply, like one relieved from a heavy burden, and, returning to his hammock, slept soundly. In the next morning the haunted man told the usual precise story of his apparition, with the additional circumstances, that the ghost had led him to the galley, but that he had fortunately, he knew not how, obtained possession of some holy water, and succeeded in getting rid of his unwelcome visitor. The visionary was then informed of the real transactions of the night, with so many particulars as to satisfy him he had been the dupe of his imagination; he acquiesced in his commander's reasoning, and the dream, as often happens in these cases, returned no more after its imposture had been detected. In this case, we find the excited imagination acting upon the half-waking senses, which were intelligent enough for the purpose of making him sensible where he was, but not sufficiently so to judge truly of the objects before him.

But it is not only private life alone, or that tenor of thought which has been depressed into melancholy by gloomy anticipations respecting the future, which disposes the mind to mid-day fantasies, or to nightly apparitions—a state of eager anxiety, or excited exertion, is equally favourable to the indulgence of such supernatural communications. The anticipation of a dubious battle, with all the doubt and uncertainty of its event, and the conviction that it must involve his own fate and that of his country, was powerful enough to conjure up to the anxious eye of Brutus the spectre of his murdered friend Cæsar, respecting whose death he perhaps thought himself less justified than at the Ides of March, since, instead of having achieved the freedom of Rome, the event had only been the renewal of civil wars, and the issue might appear most likely to conclude in the total subjection of liberty. It is not miraculous that the masculine spirit of Marcus Brutus, surrounded by darkness and solitude, distracted probably by recollection of the kindness and favour of the great individual whom he had put to death to avenge the wrongs of his country, though by the slaughter of his own friend, should at length place before his eyes in person the appearance which termed itself his evil genius, and promised again to meet him at Philippi. Brutus' own intentions, and his knowledge of the military art, had probably long since assured him that the decision of the civil war must take place at or near that place; and, allowing that his own imagination supplied that part of his dialogue with the spectre, there is nothing else which might not be fashioned in a vivid dream or a waking reverie, approaching, in absorbing and engrossing character, the usual matter of which dreams consist. That Brutus, well acquainted with the opinions of the Platonists, should be disposed to receive without doubt the idea that he had seen a real apparition, and was not likely to scrutinize very minutely the supposed vision, may be naturally conceived; and it is also natural to think, that although no one saw the figure but himself, his contemporaries were little disposed to examine the testimony of a man so eminent, by the strict rules of cross-examination and conflicting evidence, which they might have thought applicable to another person, and a less dignified occasion.

Even in the field of death, and amid the mortal tug of combat itself, strong belief has wrought the same wonder, which we have hitherto mentioned as occurring in solitude and amid darkness; and those who were themselves on the verge of the world of spirits, or employed in dispatching others to these gloomy regions, conceived they beheld the apparitions of those beings whom their national mythology associated with such scenes. In such moments of undecided battle, amid the violence, hurry, and confusion of ideas incident to the situation, the ancients supposed that they saw their deities, Castor and Pollux, fighting in the van for their encouragement; the heathen Scandinavian beheld the Choosers of the slain; and the Catholics were no less easily led to recognize the warlike Saint George or Saint James in the very front of the strife, showing them the way to conquest. Such apparitions being generally visible to a multitude, have in all times been supported by the greatest strength of testimony. When the common feeling of danger, and the animating burst of enthusiasm, act on the feelings of many men at once, their minds hold a natural correspondence with each other, as it is said is the case with stringed instruments tuned to the same pitch, of which, when one is played, the chords of the others are supposed to vibrate in unison with the tones produced. If an artful or enthusiastic individual exclaims, in the heat of action, that he perceives an apparition of the romantic kind which has been intimated, his companions catch at the idea with emulation, and most are willing to sacrifice the conviction of their own senses, rather than allow that they did not witness the same favourable emblem, from which all draw confidence and hope. One warrior catches the idea from another; all are alike eager to acknowledge the present miracle, and the battle is won before the mistake is discovered. In such cases, the number of persons present, which would otherwise lead to detection of the fallacy, becomes the means of strengthening it.

Of this disposition, to see as much of the supernatural as is seen by others around, or, in other words, to trust to the eyes of others rather than to our own, we may take the liberty to quote two remarkable instances.

The first is from the "Historia Verdadera" of Don Bernal Dias del Castillo, one of the companions of the celebrated Cortez in his Mexican conquest. After having given an account of a great victory over extreme odds, he mentions the report inserted in the contemporary Chronicle of Gomara, that Saint Iago had appeared on a white horse in van of the combat, and led on his beloved Spaniards to victory. It is very curious to observe the Castilian cavalier's internal conviction that the rumour arose out of a mistake, the cause of which he explains from his own observation; whilst, at the same time, he does not venture to disown the miracle. The honest Conquestador owns that he himself did not see this animating vision; nay, that he beheld an individual cavalier, named Francisco de Morla, mounted on a chestnut horse, and fighting strenuously in the very place where Saint James is said to have appeared. But instead of proceeding to draw the necessary inference, the devout Conquestador exclaims—"Sinner that I am, what am I that I should have beheld the blessed apostle!"

The other instance of the infectious character of superstition occurs in a Scottish book, and there can be little doubt that it refers, in its first origin, to some uncommon appearance of the aurora borealis, or the northern lights, which do not appear to have been seen in Scotland so frequently as to be accounted a common and familiar atmospherical phenomenon, until the beginning of the eighteenth century. The passage is striking and curious, for the narrator, Peter Walker, though an enthusiast, was a man of credit, and does not even affect to have seen the wonders, the reality of which he unscrupulously adopts on the testimony of others, to whose eyes he trusted rather than to his own. The conversion of the sceptical gentleman of whom he speaks is highly illustrative of popular credulity carried away into enthusiasm, or into imposture, by the evidence of those around, and at once shows the imperfection of such a general testimony, and the ease with which it is procured, since the general excitement of the moment impels even the more cold-blooded and judicious persons present to catch up the ideas and echo the exclamations of the majority, who, from the first, had considered the heavenly phenomenon as a supernatural weapon-schaw, held for the purpose of a sign and warning of civil wars to come.

"In the year 1686, in the months of June and July," says the honest chronicler, "many yet alive can witness that about the Crossford Boat, two miles beneath Lanark, especially at the Mains, on the water of Clyde, many people gathered together for several afternoons, where there were showers of bonnets, hats, guns, and swords, which covered the trees and the ground; companies of men in arms marching in order upon the waterside; companies meeting companies, going all through other, and then all falling to the ground and disappearing; other companies immediately appeared, marching the same way. I went there three afternoons together, and, as I observed, there were two-thirds of the people that were together saw, and a third that saw not; and, though I could see nothing, there was such a fright and trembling on those that did see, that was discernible to all from those that saw not. There was a gentleman standing next to me who spoke as too many gentlemen and others speak, who said, 'A pack of damned witches and warlocks that have the second sight! the devil ha't do I see;' and immediately there was a discernible change in his countenance. With as much fear and trembling as any woman I saw there, he called out, 'All you that do not see, say nothing; for I persuade you it is matter of fact, and discernible to all that is not stone-blind.' And those who did see told what works (i.e., locks) the guns had, and their length and wideness, and what handles the swords had, whether small or three-barr'd, or Highland guards, and the closing knots of the bonnets, black or blue; and those who did see them there, whenever they went abroad, saw a bonnet and a sword drop in the way."[1]

[Footnote 1: Walker's "Lives," Edinburgh, 1827, vol. i. p. xxxvi. It is evident that honest Peter believed in the apparition of this martial gear on the principle of Partridge's terror for the ghost of Hamlet—not that he was afraid himself, but because Garrick showed such evident marks of terror.]

This singular phenomenon, in which a multitude believed, although only two-thirds of them saw what must, if real, have been equally obvious to all, may be compared with the exploit of the humourist, who planted himself in an attitude of astonishment, with his eyes riveted on the well-known bronze lion that graces the front of Northumberland House in the Strand, and having attracted the attention of those who looked at him by muttering, "By heaven it wags! it wags again!" contrived in a few minutes to blockade the whole street with an immense crowd, some conceiving that they had absolutely seen the lion of Percy wag his tail, others expecting' to witness the same phenomenon.

On such occasions as we have hitherto mentioned, we have supposed that the ghost-seer has been in full possession of his ordinary powers of perception, unless in the case of dreamers, in whom they may have been obscured by temporary slumber, and the possibility of correcting vagaries of the imagination rendered more difficult by want of the ordinary appeal to the evidence of the bodily senses. In other respects their blood beat temperately, they possessed the ordinary capacity of ascertaining the truth or discerning the falsehood of external appearances by an appeal to the organ of sight. Unfortunately, however, as is now universally known and admitted, there certainly exists more than one disorder known to professional men of which one important symptom is a disposition to see apparitions.

This frightful disorder is not properly insanity, although it is somewhat allied to that most horrible of maladies, and may, in many constitutions, be the means of bringing it on, and although such hallucinations are proper to both. The difference I conceive to be that, in cases of insanity, the mind of the patient is principally affected, while the senses, or organic system, offer in vain to the lunatic their decided testimony against the fantasy of a deranged imagination. Perhaps the nature of this collision—between a disturbed imagination and organs of sense possessed of their usual accuracy—cannot be better described than in the embarrassment expressed by an insane patient confined in the Infirmary of Edinburgh. The poor man's malady had taken a gay turn. The house, in his idea, was his own, and he contrived to account for all that seemed inconsistent with his imaginary right of property—there were many patients in it, but that was owing to the benevolence of his nature, which made him love to see the relief of distress. He went little, or rather never abroad—but then his habits were of a domestic and rather sedentary character. He did not see much company—but he daily received visits from the first characters in the renowned medical school of this city, and he could not therefore be much in want of society. With so many supposed comforts around him—with so many visions of wealth and splendour—one thing alone disturbed the peace of the poor optimist, and would indeed have confounded most bons vivants. "He was curious," he said, "in his table, choice in his selection of cooks, had every day a dinner of three regular courses and a dessert; and yet, somehow or other, everything he eat tasted of porridge." This dilemma could be no great wonder to the friend to whom the poor patient communicated it, who knew the lunatic eat nothing but this simple aliment at any of his meals. The case was obvious. The disease lay in the extreme vivacity of the patient's imagination, deluded in other instances, yet not absolutely powerful enough to contend with the honest evidence of his stomach and palate, which, like Lord Peter's brethren in "The Tale of a Tub," were indignant at the attempt to impose boiled oatmeal upon them, instead of such a banquet as Ude would have displayed when peers were to partake of it. Here, therefore, is one instance of actual insanity, in which the sense of taste controlled and attempted to restrain the ideal hypothesis adopted by a deranged imagination. But the disorder to which I previously alluded is entirely of a bodily character, and consists principally in a disease of the visual organs, which present to the patient a set of spectres or appearances which have no actual existence. It is a disease of the same nature which renders many men incapable of distinguishing colours; only the patients go a step further, and pervert the external form of objects. In their case, therefore, contrary to that of the maniac, it is not the mind, or rather the imagination, which imposes upon and overpowers the evidence of the senses, but the sense of seeing (or hearing) which betrays its duty and conveys false ideas to a sane intellect.

More than one learned physician, who have given their attestations to the existence of this most distressing complaint, have agreed that it actually occurs, and is occasioned by different causes. The most frequent source of the malady is in the dissipated and intemperate habits of those who, by a continued series of intoxication, become subject to what is popularly called the Blue Devils, instances of which mental disorder may be known to most who have lived for any period of their lives in society where hard drinking was a common vice. The joyous visions suggested by intoxication when the habit is first acquired, in time disappear, and are supplied by frightful impressions and scenes, which destroy the tranquillity of the unhappy debauchee. Apparitions of the most unpleasant appearance are his companions in solitude, and intrude even upon his hours of society: and when by an alteration of habits, the mind is cleared of these frightful ideas, it requires but the slightest renewal of the association to bring back the full tide of misery upon the repentant libertine.

Of this the following instance was told to the author by a gentleman connected with the sufferer. A young man of fortune, who had led what is called so gay a life as considerably to injure both his health and fortune, was at length obliged to consult the physician upon the means of restoring, at least, the former. One of his principal complaints was the frequent presence of a set of apparitions, resembling a band of figures dressed in green, who performed in his drawing-room a singular dance, to which he was compelled to bear witness, though he knew, to his great annoyance, that the whole corps de ballet existed only in his own imagination. His physician immediately informed him that he had lived upon town too long and too fast not to require an exchange to a more healthy and natural course of life. He therefore prescribed a gentle course of medicine, but earnestly recommended to his patient to retire to his own house in the country, observe a temperate diet and early hours, practising regular exercise, on the same principle avoiding fatigue, and assured him that by doing so he might bid adieu to black spirits and white, blue, green, and grey, with all their trumpery. The patient observed the advice, and prospered. His physician, after the interval of a month, received a grateful letter from him, acknowledging the success of his regimen. The greens goblins had disappeared, and with them the unpleasant train of emotions to which their visits had given rise, and the patient had ordered his town-house to be disfurnished and sold, while the furniture was to be sent down to his residence in the country, where he was determined in future to spend his life, without exposing himself to the temptations of town. One would have supposed this a well-devised scheme for health. But, alas! no sooner had the furniture of the London drawing-room been placed in order in the gallery of the old manor-house, than the former delusion returned in full force: the green figurantés, whom the patient's depraved imagination had so long associated with these moveables, came capering and frisking to accompany them, exclaiming with great glee, as if the sufferer should have been rejoiced to see them, "Here we all are—here we all are!" The visionary, if I recollect right, was so much shocked at their appearance, that he retired abroad, in despair that any part of Britain could shelter him from the daily persecution of this domestic ballet.

There is reason to believe that such cases are numerous, and that they may perhaps arise not only from the debility of stomach brought on by excess in wine or spirits, which derangement often sensibly affects the eyes and sense of sight, but also because the mind becomes habitually predominated over by a train of fantastic visions, the consequence of frequent intoxication; and is thus, like a dislocated joint, apt again to go wrong, even when a different cause occasions the derangement.

It is easy to be supposed that habitual excitement by means of any other intoxicating drug, as opium, or its various substitutes, must expose those who practise the dangerous custom to the same inconvenience. Very frequent use of the nitrous oxide which affects the senses so strongly, and produces a short but singular state of ecstasy, would probably be found to occasion this species of disorder. But there are many other causes which medical men find attended with the same symptom, of embodying before the eyes of a patient imaginary illusions which are visible to no one else. This persecution of spectral deceptions is also found to exist when no excesses of the patient can be alleged as the cause, owing, doubtless, to a deranged state of the blood or nervous system.

The learned and acute Dr. Ferriar of Manchester was the first who brought before the English public the leading case, as it may be called, in this department, namely, that of Mons. Nicolai, the celebrated bookseller of Berlin. This gentleman was not a man merely of books, but of letters, and had the moral courage to lay before the Philosophical Society of Berlin an account of his own sufferings, from having been, by disease, subjected to a series of spectral illusions. The leading circumstances of this case may be stated very shortly, as it has been repeatedly before the public, and is insisted on by Dr. Ferriar, Dr. Hibbert, and others who have assumed Demonology as a subject. Nicolai traces his illness remotely to a series of disagreeable incidents which had happened to him in the beginning of the year 1791. The depression of spirits which was occasioned by these unpleasant occurrences, was aided by the consequences of neglecting a course of periodical bleeding which he had been accustomed to observe. This state of health brought on the disposition to see phantasmata, who visited, or it may be more properly said frequented, the apartments of the learned bookseller, presenting crowds of persons who moved and acted before him, nay, even spoke to and addressed him. These phantoms afforded nothing unpleasant to the imagination of the visionary either in sight or expression, and the patient was possessed of too much firmness to be otherwise affected by their presence than with a species of curiosity, as he remained convinced from the beginning to the end of the disorder, that these singular effects were merely symptoms of the state of his health, and did not in any other respect regard them as a subject of apprehension. After a certain time, and some use of medicine, the phantoms became less distinct in their outline, less vivid in their colouring, faded, as it were, on the eye of the patient, and at length totally disappeared.

The case of Nicolai has unquestionably been that of many whose love of science has not been able to overcome their natural reluctance to communicate to the public the particulars attending the visitation of a disease so peculiar. That such illnesses have been experienced, and have ended fatally, there can be no doubt; though it is by no means to be inferred, that the symptom of importance to our present discussion has, on all occasions, been produced from the same identical cause.

Dr. Hibbert, who has most ingeniously, as well as philosophically, handled this subject, has treated it also in a medical point of view, with science to which we make no pretence, and a precision of detail to which our superficial investigation affords us no room for extending ourselves.

The visitation of spectral phenomena is described by this learned gentleman as incidental to sundry complaints; and he mentions, in particular, that the symptom occurs not only in plethora, as in the case of the learned Prussian we have just mentioned, but is a frequent hectic symptom—often an associate of febrile and inflammatory disorders—frequently accompanying inflammation of the brain—a concomitant also of highly excited nervous irritability—equally connected with hypochondria—and finally united in some cases with gout, and in others with the effects of excitation produced by several gases. In all these cases there seems to be a morbid degree of sensibility, with which this symptom is ready to ally itself, and which, though inaccurate as a medical definition, may be held sufficiently descriptive of one character of the various kinds of disorder with which this painful symptom may be found allied.

A very singular and interesting illustration of such combinations as Dr. Hibbert has recorded of the spectral illusion with an actual disorder, and that of a dangerous kind, was frequently related in society by the late learned and accomplished Dr. Gregory of Edinburgh, and sometimes, I believe, quoted by him in his lectures. The narrative, to the author's best recollection, was as follows:—A patient of Dr. Gregory, a person, it is understood, of some rank, having requested the doctor's advice, made the following extraordinary statement of his complaint. "I am in the habit," he said, "of dining at five, and exactly as the hour of six arrives I am subjected to the following painful visitation. The door of the room, even when I have been weak enough to bolt it, which I have sometimes done, flies wide open; an old hag, like one of those who haunted the heath of Forres, enters with a frowning and incensed countenance, comes straight up to me with every demonstration of spite and indignation which could characterize her who haunted the merchant Abudah in the Oriental tale; she rushes upon me, says something, but so hastily that I cannot discover the purport, and then strikes me a severe blow with her staff. I fall from my chair in a swoon, which is of longer or shorter endurance. To the recurrence of this apparition I am daily subjected. And such is my new and singular complaint." The doctor immediately asked whether his patient had invited any one to sit with him when he expected such a visitation. He was answered in the negative. The nature of the complaint, he said, was so singular, it was so likely to be imputed to fancy, or even to mental derangement, that he had shrunk from communicating the circumstance to any one. "Then," said the doctor, "with your permission, I will dine with you to-day, téte-à-téte, and we will see if your malignant old woman will venture to join our company." The patient accepted the proposal with hope and gratitude, for he had expected ridicule rather than sympathy. They met at dinner, and Dr. Gregory, who suspected some nervous disorder, exerted his powers of conversation, well known to be of the most varied and brilliant character, to keep the attention of his host engaged, and prevent him from thinking on the approach of the fated hour, to which he was accustomed to look forward with so much terror. He succeeded in his purpose better than he had hoped. The hour of six came almost unnoticed, and it was hoped might pass away without any evil consequence; but it was scarce a moment struck when the owner of the house exclaimed, in an alarmed voice, "The hag comes again!" and dropped back in his chair in a swoon, in the way he had himself described. The physician caused him to be let blood, and satisfied himself that the periodical shocks of which his patient complained arose from a tendency to apoplexy.

The phantom with the crutch was only a species of machinery, such as that with which fancy is found to supply the disorder called Ephialtes, or nightmare, or indeed any other external impression upon our organs in sleep, which the patient's morbid imagination may introduce into the dream preceding the swoon. In the nightmare an oppression and suffocation is felt, and our fancy instantly conjures up a spectre to lie on our bosom. In like manner it may be remarked, that any sudden noise which the slumberer hears, without being actually awakened by it—any casual touch of his person occurring in the same manner—becomes instantly adopted in his dream, and accommodated to the tenor of the current train of thought, whatever that may happen to be; and nothing is more remarkable than the rapidity with which imagination supplies a complete explanation of the interruption, according to the previous train of ideas expressed in the dream, even when scarce a moment of time is allowed for that purpose. In dreaming, for example, of a duel, the external sound becomes, in the twinkling of an eye, the discharge of the combatants' pistols;—is an orator haranguing in his sleep, the sound becomes the applause of his supposed audience;—is the dreamer wandering among supposed ruins, the noise is that of the fall of some part of the mass. In short, an explanatory system is adopted during sleep with such extreme rapidity, that supposing the intruding alarm to have been the first call of some person to awaken the slumberer, the explanation, though requiring some process of argument or deduction, is usually formed and perfect before the second effort of the speaker has restored the dreamer to the waking world and its realities. So rapid and intuitive is the succession of ideas in sleep, as to remind us of the vision of the prophet Mahommed, in which he saw the whole wonders of heaven and hell, though the jar of water which fell when his ecstasy commenced, had not spilled its contents when he returned to ordinary existence.

A second, and equally remarkable instance, was communicated to the author by the medical man under whose observation it fell, but who was, of course, desirous to keep private the name of the hero of so singular a history. Of the friend by whom the facts were attested I can only say, that if I found myself at liberty to name him, the rank which he holds in his profession, as well as his attainments in science and philosophy, form an undisputed claim to the most implicit credit.

It was the fortune of this gentleman to be called in to attend the illness of a person now long deceased, who in his lifetime stood, as I understand, high in a particular department of the law, which often placed the property of others at his discretion and control, and whose conduct, therefore, being open to public observation, he had for many years borne the character of a man of unusual steadiness, good sense, and integrity. He was, at the time of my friend's visits, confined principally to his sick-room, sometimes to bed, yet occasionally attending to business, and exerting his mind, apparently with all its usual strength and energy, to the conduct of important affairs intrusted to him; nor did there, to a superficial observer, appear anything in his conduct, while so engaged, that could argue vacillation of intellect, or depression of mind. His outward symptoms of malady argued no acute or alarming disease. But slowness of pulse, absence of appetite, difficulty of digestion, and constant depression of spirits, seemed to draw their origin from some hidden cause, which the patient was determined to conceal. The deep gloom of the unfortunate gentleman—the embarrassment, which he could not conceal from his friendly physician—the briefness and obvious constraint with which he answered the interrogations of his medical adviser, induced my friend to take other methods for prosecuting his inquiries. He applied to the sufferer's family, to learn, if possible, the source of that secret grief which was gnawing the heart and sucking the life-blood of his unfortunate patient. The persons applied to, after conversing together previously, denied all knowledge of any cause for the burden which obviously affected their relative. So far as they knew—and they thought they could hardly be deceived—his worldly affairs were prosperous; no family loss had occurred which could be followed with such persevering distress; no entanglements of affection could be supposed to apply to his age, and no sensation of severe remorse could be consistent with his character. The medical gentleman had finally recourse to serious argument with the invalid himself, and urged to him the folly of devoting himself to a lingering and melancholy death, rather than tell the subject of affliction which was thus wasting him. He specially pressed upon him the injury which he was doing to his own character, by suffering it to be inferred that the secret cause of his dejection and its consequences was something too scandalous or flagitious to be made known, bequeathing in this manner to his family a suspected and dishonoured name, and leaving a memory with which might be associated the idea of guilt, which the criminal had died without confessing. The patient, more moved by this species of appeal than by any which had yet been urged, expressed his desire to speak out frankly to Dr.——. Every one else was removed, and the door of the sick-room made secure, when he began his confession in the following manner:,

I

I have read this demonology book when I was I think, 11 or 12 maybe 13. Anyways, I am getting a far lot more out of it NOW ; as compared to then!

The next posting about this Demonology and Witchcraft by Sir Walter Scott will be in the next hour or so, if not then when I wake up!

[hellsbovnd-archive]

LF RP — LEONNAUX ALTOIX

For all practical purposes a ghost, this Elezen only appears on public records as far back as three summers ago. It’s likely, then, that he’s chosen to live under an assumed name. He tends to use his appearance to his advantage, passing himself off as a Wildwood whenever it suits his interests—which, given the discrimination that Duskwights face, is more often than not.

He first stepped into the public’s eye as a small-time journalist—and, unbeknownst to all but those closest to him, the proprietor of The Cloak & Dagger (under the alias “Crow”). He is passionate about magicks and has a demonstrated talent for alchemy beyond what one may expect of a man who’s only twenty and one summers old. Shortly after founding The Cloak & Dagger, he retired from journalism to pursue academia full-time.

In Character

Profession(s): Academic — Director of Alizarine Research & Reclamation ( @alizarinefc ). Information Broker — Proprietor of The Cloak & Dagger, and current self-proclaimed leader of the Ebonguard ( @ebonguardls ). Formerly — Mythril Eye beat journalist.

Alignment: Generally neutral. Loyal to the Eorzean Alliance, but not particularly interested in being a law-abiding citizen.

Professional Talents: Magic — Arcanima and other rune-based arcane arts. Alchemy. Warding and minor enchantment. Illusions. Bartending/mixology.

Current Residence: The Goblet, Sultana’s Breath.

Likely Haunts: Ul’dah and Thanalan, primarily. Bookstores. Antique Shops. Magic Shops. Bars and Taverns. Gambling Establishments.

Hobbies: Gambling, primarily poker and other card games. Magic tricks, primarily sleight of hand. Reading, anything he cant get his hands on. Occasionally writes poetry. Music. Fashion.

Abbreviated Bio: Leonnaux is a Shroud-born Duskwight. He is obsessively studious and somewhat selfish in nature, though simultaneously surprisingly laid-back. Those who can make it past his strictly-business demeanor might note a heart of gold, despite the kind of work he’s often involved in via The Cloak & Dagger.

Having run away from home and come to Ul’dah, he quickly had to find a way to make money, which led him to dip his toes into the criminal underworld... and after he took the plunge, he never looked back, using his position as a journalist as leverage over his contacts. He took advantage of his new-found freedom (both in person and, to an extent, in finances) to continue his studies into the flow of aether and alchemy.

MORE INFORMATION: Full Bio | Tag

Out of Character

Hi there! I’m Mid and I use they/them pronouns! I’m generally most active during NA Evenings and Late Nights. I play on Balmung, but I'm open to RP connections from across the Crystal datacenter.

You can find detailed information about my hopes and expectations for RP on my dossier, here. The quick and dirty version:

OOC Communication > All

I am a med/heavy lore-strict RPer. I prefer medium-to-low power levels in RP and character- and plot-driven scenes. I won’t RP with any player under the age of 18 but as long as you’re not making it weird/creepy, I don’t have a problem with underage characters.

I run an FC and an LS, so I can be pretty busy OOC because I have to run a lot of stuff related to that.

I do not RP on Discord, but I have always been smitten with Tumblr RP as a longform format, so if in-game RP is impossible for some reason, I’m happy to write starters.

In terms of things I’m looking for:

Casual acquaintances and friends!

Business contacts!

Long-term plot-focused RP connections!

Recommendations for events to attend? (And company to drag me along since I hate flying solo.)

Discord and Linkshell communities! Leonnaux is a Shroud-born Duskwight, a criminal, and a mage, so any Discords and Linkshells catering to that would be great for forging connections, though I'm fairly shy. u.u

In relation to some character development, I would love to find a mentor for Leonnaux!

Detailed RP Hooks Under the Cut!

Thanks for reading! If you're interested in playing with me then please feel free to send me a message or make a note of it in the tags or comments on this post. My Discord is available for OOC arrangements and chatter upon request! If I’m slow please bear with me; I have a habit of getting absolutely swamped with stuff at more or less complete random, and my energy levels vary wildly from day to day and week to week.

RP Hooks

1. The Academic/Scholarly Community.

While the majority of Leonnaux’s academic career has been spent in seclusion, teaching himself the skills he’s learned, he eventually came out of his shell. He’s always looking to expand his horizons, and has an extensive personal collection (although it’s doubtful that he’s read every book cover-to-cover).

Leonnaux is very interested in alchemy and, as he practices a mixture of arcanima-rooted rune-based magic and component-based magic resembling alchemy, he’s always itching to learn more about other schools of thought regarding the art. He’s taken a shine to Ul’dahn alchemy since moving to Ul’dah, but he himself heavily utilizes traditionally Duskwight methods. 

Despite his talent for alchemy, he also doesn’t always have the time or knowledge to go out and collect his own reagents and materials, so he relies heavily on outside help, be they merchants in Ul’dah or independent suppliers.

He is also the director of Alizarine Research & Reclamation, a company focused on such academic pursuits as well as the study and acquisition of artifacts, regardless of whether their significance lays in their history or their properties.

2. The Criminal Element

For a long time, Leonnaux’s primary source of income was selling information. He’s always had somewhat of a disdain for law and authority, viewing such things necessary only insofar as they serve his ends. 

He sells secrets and whispers under the guise of a somewhat ostentatious man known as “Crow,” using his “messenger” (really a cover to ensure that he was taken seriously in his work, and to protect his identity/safety if things went awry) as an intermediary between himself and business contacts as a means of protecting his identity due to the nature of his work. He is also not above thievery and is knowledgeable about underground trade networks.

“Crow” is also known to be the leader of a loose criminal network that he calls “the Ebonguard” and is the proprietor of an establishment known as The Cloak & Dagger, a restaurant meant to be a sort of ‘neutral ground’ for criminals and n’er-do-wells to do business and have a good bite to eat.

Leonnaux is known to gamble his money in seedy places. More than happy to sit for a game of cards or a cigarette, one might notice that he can get an uncanny winning streak going under the right conditions. The keenest might be able to connect the dots to the pronounced talent for sleight of hand and other magic tricks that he seems to possess.

In the criminal underground as Crow, he’s earned a reputation for declining the use of force except where absolutely necessary, instead preferring to use blackmail and public humiliation as his primary source of leverage over his contacts and clients. However as he’s given up his job as a journalist, he lacks that leverage and his position is far more precarious. Past clients or contacts with an axe to grind are 100% welcome as pre-established contacts, as long as we talk about it first! 

3. Contract Work.

Leonnaux is more than willing to take contract work, although he has his boundaries. This is in its own heading because he’s willing to take work to research things or track down artifacts as he is to sell information or organize heists to steal valuables. His only hard line is that he won’t kill on contract and he will not aid in any plot involving human trafficking.

Note though that Leonnaux is comfortable enough financially that he may not take every job that’s pitched to him. High risk jobs that offer little reward are likely to be declined, but if the pot is sweet enough then he can be convinced to do anything that doesn’t cross one of his hard lines.

(Note that RPing contracts in the east will be difficult, as I don’t generally play with IC teleportation due to playing on the lower end of the power spectrum.)

4. Mentor + Apprentice

Leonnaux is primarily a self-taught mage, though recently he’s been shown that while it’s an impressive accomplishment, he’s nowhere near as skilled as his peers. His casting is sloppy and reliant upon prerequisite components, which means that he’s not great in situations where he has to improvise. In general he lacks discipline, and he can’t take a hit to save his life. He would love to get stronger, but is unsure of how to go about it.

(Note: This is an extremely long-term plot hook, so I won’t pursue it with anyone I’m not comfortable with. If you’re interested in exploring a mentor/apprentice dynamic with Leonnaux as the apprentice, then feel free to reach out to me and we’ll get talking; I’d like to get to know you via unrelated interactions and general shitposting/chatter first! Forgive me for being awkward, though, I’m very bad at keeping up with people. orz)

Leonnaux is also open to passing on his knowledge of alchemy to others, given that he practices an unusual form of it and would like to see the Duskwight practices preserved outside of Duskwight communities.

[ceeyuin666]

Rules

Some pretty obvious things but for anyone new, there’s just a couple of housekeeping things I’d like to bring up.

Do not talk about actors in any Disney Park project

Do not repost anyone else’s content from any SNS platform

Do not QRT others on Twitter

Do not confuse Disney’s Villains Recruiters with the mobile app Twisted Wonderland (details below)

Please click on the read more for more information and details.

These rules are my own opinion and how I enjoy this fandom, it is all out of courtesy. You are of course welcome to enjoy the content of the blog as you wish, but when interacting with this blog in particular, I ask that everyone respect these rules.

If nothing else, there may be times i do not answer certain questions or present content in a certain way because I myself, adhere to the following when i enjoy the fandom.

These are not things I have been particularly strict on on my side blogs, but as this blog will be focused on Disney, I’d like to establish the following:

Do not mention, allude to or talk about actors/cast members in regards to ANY of Disney’s shows

You may have heard of how all Disney’s Parks prefer to protect the illusion of magic within its parks, meaning its characters exist inside the park and there is not “a person that plays Mickey Mouse” or “someone acting as Snow White”. The same goes for Tokyo’s parks and a good portion of the fandom is actually against speaking of the actors at all (in a public space that is; many people have side accounts or locked accounts where you can follow the actors or discuss them). 

As this is a general rule of the fandom, I wish to preserve it on this blog. Please refrain from reblogging/sharing/commenting and adding comments/tags such as “[actor’s name] looks so great as this character” or sharing photos of the actors outside of costume and calling them by their character name. The topic is open to discussion within DMs, private conversations or on locked accounts on networks such as twitter.  

Please note that none of the actors in any of TDR’s shows have their roles listed on their portfolio or their online profiles for this very reason. If you do follow the actors, please do not comment about their roles at Disney on their blogs/twitter etc.

Personally, I am OK with DMs with questions or comments about the cast but only in private.

Do not repost content that is not originally yours (photos, fanart, videos etc.) on tumblr or any other social media platform

Fan content including photos and videos you will find on Youtube, Twitter, Tumblr etc should be treated with the same respect as any other fan content. Please do not collect other people’s work and post it on your own blog, even if you credit back to the original source. 

Saving photos/videos and sharing them privately with friends is OK!

This goes the same for my own content; all photos and videos I post will be my own. On the occasions that I wish to reference content that is not mine (eg videos of shows I did not record myself), you will find a link to the original material and will view it on the original content creator’s page (this may not be on tumblr).

On Twitter, please do NOT quote-RT Japanese fans and add comments especially if they’re not in Japanese

A vast majority of this fandom is on Twitter so while this does not have so much to do with this blog, I just wanted to put it out there. 

Quote-RT’ing (Retweet with comment) in general, is seen as rude within most Japanese fandoms. Of course there are many that do not mind, but it really doesn’t hurt not taking that risk. For this fandom in particular, I ask everyone to remember an original content creator will see your comments in their notifications if you QRT them. While google translate is a thing, many find it off putting to see a comment they cannot read slapped on their own work (also google translate is far from perfect and you don’t want your words to come off incorrectly)

Much like artists that check tags on reblogs on Tumblr, you’ll find a lot of artists and others check out the profiles of people that RT their work so if you RT something and then write “RT IS SO COOL, THIS ARTIST IS A GOD” as a seperate tweet, chances are your praise will not go unheard.

Tokyo DisneySea’s ‘Disney Villains Recruiters’ and the mobile app “Disney’s Twisted Wonderland” are two entirely different projects, please do not confuse them

This gets a bit sticky, so I do apologise.

While many Recruiters fans I know were overjoyed at the announcement of the mobile game, Twisted Wonderland and there have been countless comparisons between the two projects, please note they are entirely unrelated projects that have nothing to do with each other.

The Recruiters can be enjoyed as their own thing and Twisted Wonderland can be enjoyed as its own thing, some fans have said they do not wish to mix the two, and I for one am of a similar opinion. Crossover art and comparisons are fine, but I will not be posting any sort of Twisted Wonderland content here as my main focus is projects within the parks at Tokyo Disney Resort.