#i can't stop babbling

[sleepy-aletheas]

Casually losing my mind over Celestia

This is me tossing my free train of thoughts with no edits or double-checking, cause it buzzes in my brain so loudly, I need it out.

It's a mess.

Simulanka = same story cycles with each ending its own

Phanes = 4 forms of names/roles = 4 tries of “cycles” = Paimon is 5th??? 4.5???

Primordial One (it/its) = Istaroth/Tokoyo Ookami/King’s Priest = King (incarnation* of the Primordial One) = ? = ?

*incarnation is such a messy word, because it means something along the lines of divinity made flesh; so like, a divine power assumes the body of a human or animal. In Christianity it’s in relationship with Jesus, but apparently it was a hot topic for debate for centuries, cause no one actually ever agreed on one interpretation, where some made Jesus to be the Creator and not the created, or he was God but also Man at the same time…

Since the four shades are split off of PO, it either could mean that they’re all split at the same time into different (but 50% same?) individuals, or the splits came one after another, for each samsara Teyvat went through.

On that note, the Narzissenkreuz split the samsara cycles into Hyperborea, Natlantean, Remuria, Khraun-Arya, in which AT THE TIME THE ORDO WROTE THIS DOWN they were still in the first half of the 4th cycle (since the ordo established after the Cataclysm, but they were children during it, it must be written down 400+ years ago present time). Those names were just taken from ancient texts, and that the samsara (and these names) are in relation to the spiritual evolution. (also there might be some more details in the Akademiya, with how they worded it to not step on toes…hmm)

What if Celestia is empty, because in a last “trial” (a last hail mary) the Primordial One left Celestia to try and mend this corruption that just keeps seeping through the Abyss…and that last trial character, the last role, the last form…is Paimon?

Hell, maybe the Sustainer is another split from Paimon (or Paimon is the little split, connected with a rainbow string up to the Heavens…) who’s job now is not slapping the wrists of Archons for abandoning their gnosis/jobs, or slamming more nails down, or punishing people for committing cardinal sins (we don’t talk enough about those, really), but instead they're keeping the sky from breaking, and stop anyone trying to leave Teyvat (for some reason).

On a side note, the Primordial One is making my brain turn to mush, because what is the deal with it???? Born of an egg with wings and a crown and androgynous, but for the world to be created, the shell of the egg had to be broken, and yet “Phanes” (quotation marks, cause ‘maybe’ feels like a weird thing to put in the sentiment of calling something from the recounting directly from Istaroth…) used the eggshell to separate the “universe” from the “microcosm of the world”. So either the egg never cracked and Teyvat is a dreamworld because we have to wake up Phanes to become real (and if Paimon is Phanes, her continuous dislike and skepticism of dreams and fantasies and absolute refusal of accepting such things for some reason when others are fine with it…is weird, especially when she’s chill with so many other things. Is it because of some weird dream-logic where the dreamer has build in defenses from realizing they dream to not wake up?? I genuinely don’t know, I have lucid dreams, I’m not sure how it usually works), or the egg cracked in some of the samsara (or in each one a little more, in different places) or because of the Second Who Came, and that’s why the abyss (the universe) is seeping into the dream, into Teyvat, and it’s corrupting it with nightmares and corrosion.

In the quest with the Pari, we found out in a document that the Khvarena and abyssal powers work the same way, using the same sort of energy, but have different results (paraphrasing from the back of my mind). And since the Khvarena is music (and so is the Aranara’s Sourcesong, and Remuria with their Phobos/Symphony), we could see Teyvat’s natural power that shapes it as lullabies, and the abyss is the nightmares that seep in from the outside, tarnishing everything it touches.

If Simulanka is the reflection of Teyvat, with its stars representing the people of “the real world”, then Teyvat is a reflection of reality, and the vision bearers (the prominent stars with specific roles and destinies) are a reflection of reality of someone else. The tracks that is destiny to keep the people of Metropolis safe was meant to protect until the people there grew strong enough to let go of it, returning the tracks back to the stars and live their lives on their own. And even if not everyone is ready, they’re not alone, and have to teamwork their way through life.

Maybe Teyvat’s constellations act the same way. Some people gain constellations to fulfill certain roles, and their vision are the training wheels to help them achieve these ambitions. But eventually they don’t need them. And so they go back to the sky. And some destinies can change, because stories follow rules, unfolding in cyclical patterns, but each should follow its own course...

…..

I lost my train of thought. Stormy weather truly messes with me.

[natalieleif]

I know Jack and Maddie's relationship in canon is probably MEANT to be seen--depending on the episode--as a pretty bog-standard, 2000s-era "idiot big dad and exasperated, smart wife who puts up with him" trope.

BUT

my personal favorite interpretation is that BOTH are equally genius engineers who are also equally on the autistic spectrum, with a specific hyperfixation on ghosts and mad science.

The main difference is that Maddie has siblings and female social expectations, so she had to learn how to mask in ways that are seen as sociable and polite and attractive and "smart." When she does bumble major social cues (such as not recognizing Vlad's flirting until Danny points it out decades later, or humiliating her kids by showing up in a hazmat suit at school), it feels more "socially acceptable" from her.

She genuinely loves Jack because he could not care less about her being Feminine or Socially Acceptable. He just wants to shout with her about ghosts! So the nanosecond she's around him she can yank the mask off and go chasing spirits with a toaster turned into a machine gun.

[aterfish]

Being ace is an opposite of fuck around and find out:

Fuck nobody and never know for sure

[a-driftamongopenstars]

you know what else I love about The Final Shape?

it's how this dlc followed each concern you might have had and it nailed it.

not only was it an extremely hard bar to reach in terms of closure, it also had to deal with giving a beloved returning character a good arc without cheapening the death. it's also very, very hard to create a really good villain that delivers and whose defeat would be impactful.

destiny has so many plot strings to pull on, and sometimes some of them need to wait, but you need to know which to choose to tell a good story.

and the final shape did all that, all of the above, and so much more.

[beatlebug987]

Conan. You cannot just drop a new song about growing up out of the blue. Do you know what that did to me????? DO YOU KNOW HOW INSANE I'M GOING RIGHT NOW???????????

[anghraine]

One of the more peculiar things about my current academic existence is that it's like—

me (to my best friend): It feels kind of strange that I've always had so many ties to people who are much more literary than me. There are all these people I know who keep ending up at "I discovered True Art and now I'm too good for Star Wars" and I'm just thinking, "damn, couldn't be me."

best friend: ...you have a PhD in literature.

me: True, but not their kind of literature!

best friend: It's still a PhD in literature. Do these people have that?

me: Well, hmm, maybe not, technically. But I've never been all that interested in major experiments with form and style—doing that stuff myself or reading the kind of literature that focuses on pushing those boundaries. I've always cared more about popular literature that prioritizes immersion and world building and just getting people to care a lot about characters and plot and such, not the really prestigious stuff.

best friend: You literally teach Shakespeare.

me: Well, I decided not to study the things I love most so they didn't get tainted by academia. And anyway, I still focused on popular literature from my eras. The seventeenth-century stuff I was writing about made a lot of the late Victorians very angry because they thought it was crude and cravenly appealing to unrefined common tastes instead of True Art. The novel in Austen's lifetime was even more of a low-prestige popular form at the time, especially the female-dominated genres, which were most of them, and she took care to identify herself as a woman.

best friend: I know you did get into academia through Tolkien and then didn't study anything close to that.

me: I couldn't let them ruin him for me! And besides, I know that Shakespeare and Austen are about as prestigious as it gets now, but for me they've still got that pop culture media energy, you know? Though sometimes when people make sweeping pronouncements about artistry and literature that don't make sense for anything in English published before 1700, I have to fight the temptation to be ... that person.

best friend, laughing: You mean pulling a well akshually? At least you have the credentials. You could even do it like "well actually, *obnoxious cough* as someone with a PhD in this subject..." now. You spent years earning this! Tell a few people Well Actually as a treat and then go watch Star Wars.

[nyxronomicon]

Head empty. Only thought is Simeon finding out about your self hatred and railing you until you can't remember any of those thoughts

-body worship, insecurity, bit of angst, breeding in the tags-

Omg he'd be so gentle... He asks what's troubling you when he sees you frown at yourself in the mirror. When you tell him you're feeling self conscious and ugly he just disagrees immediately.

But Simeon knows all too well how little words can change someone's mind, often feeling disgusted and disappointed with himself for abandoning the brothers like he did. For choosing the celestial realm just for its familiarity. He's such a coward.

He knows now that conventional beauty is only skin deep and the ugliness just beneath the surface is often much worse than one would think. And he's stunned when you're talking about yourself like that because in all the time he's known you, he's never even once thought anything about you was ugly.

If anything, he was the ugly one.

His first attraction to you was your looks and the way you carried yourself. Every moment he spends with you he finds new things to love about you and it just crushes him that you don't see it. So even if he can't change your mind, he at least needs to prove to you that it doesn't matter what you think.

You're beautiful without even trying. Just a smile from you takes his breath away without fail. The words to describe how incredible you are always fail him. Being with you is healing. His wretched broken heart has been heavy with sin and betrayal for as long as he can remember but you make him feel like it can be fixed. Or maybe that he never really was broken to begin with.

All he wants is to give that feeling back to you.

So he shows you. Pulls you away from the mirror. "Focus on me. On how I love you." Is all he mumbles before tenderly kissing you. Your kisses get deeper, your insecurities vanishing as he pulls away. His eyes are full of adoration, lost in you.

You close your eyes and feel. His hands worship every part of you, taking his time to press kisses down your torso, wherever he thinks you're most insecure. He mumbles loving words as he goes, the author in him crafting the ultimate love scene just for you to hear.

And if you still don't believe him? Well, he'll keep going as long as he needs to~

[y-rhywbeth2]

I feel like this part of the novels is relevant to a character or two in the various Baldur's Gate games:

“You desired godhood, control over your destiny, and great power,” Ao said. “You will have only two of these - godhood and power - to exercise as you will in the Realm of the Dead. And all of the suffering in Toril will be yours as well, to cause and inflict as you wish. But you will never know contentment or happiness again.” “But the thing you have desired most, Lord Cyric, will never come to pass. I am your master now. You serve me… and your worshipers. I believe you will find that you now have less freedom than you had as a child in the alleys of Zhentil Keep.”

That and the thing where everybody's getting mad at the gods, and the mortals think they'd be better and care... No: the rules fundamentally don't allow it, because that isn't how this works or what gods are. You are a cog in the cosmic machine of the universe, or a line of computer script or whatever analogy: do your damn job.

[officersnickers]

Four years since The Promised Neverland ended...

[makuzume]

"Let me just make a short, 3 sentence drabble. I just wanna talk about this one scene in my head."

*7k words later*

"Woah, what was that"

[teddybeartoji]

satoru fucking you while jerking off your strap thank youuuuu

[tweltchy]

Where will you be during the random bird event?

[weavewilled]

HE IS FINISHED

[asexualbookbird]

im actually glad october is almost over bc let me be honest im running out of doodle ideas

[beatlebug987]

It's actually so unfair that I can't go to Found Heaven On Tour

[anghraine]

I was just thinking today about using direct quotations in essays or meta, as I sometimes do, and how on the one hand, I do think it's important to refer to what you're talking about, but on the other hand, tossing around decontextualized quotes to substantiate a sketchy reading is ... very common, also.

I don't have my copy of LOTR on me, but it's like, you can talk about the description of Faramir as "a lord who tamed a wild shieldmaiden of the North" or something to that effect and how #problematic it is. But in context, that line is Éowyn half-joking about what their relationship might look like to racist Gondorian Dúnedain.

That is, she's asking if he's cool with people saying that their relationship = he tamed a wild (by Gondorian standards) woman of a racially inferior people when he might have chosen a more pure-blooded Númenórean. Faramir does not give a single fuck what those people think and kisses her in full sight of the city.

So if you take all that away and just extract the "tamed" quote, you're ... kind of misrepresenting its function in the dialogue and what they're actually talking about in the first place. Meh.