#i dont know any other context there tho so i didnt put it in the post

[2024skin]

1 month ago today my exes mom died is it too soon to tell him I unfriended him and ignored his message because I kind of think he raped me

[kerorowhump]

the duality of kururu is that he could've actually forgotten to tell keroro to mind the height of the door on the aircraft in ep26... but maybe he didn't say it on purpose because he likes to have fun at others' misfortune... but MAYBE it was also that he was trying to stop keroro 🤭 like when he made angol mois fall in his solitary jail ... pulling the strings so that ultimately the GOOD outcome can still happen... pushing fuyuki in the water with a lifesaver? he almost drowned later, he could use the skill of Knowing How To Swim... or... anything in the cavity episode still resulting in the cavities being taken care of... (even if he enjoyed blowing him up from the inside 🫢)... to me he's like a true chaotic neutral, he enjoys teasing others and if that helps achieve a positive goal too that's nice

[puhpandas]

Can we talk about how dr rabbit is genuinely scary tho? In the patient 46 tapes when I was listening to it I was slightly uncomfortable because of how quiet they were and the way they found some odd stuff funny. Then in the ggy story it was revealed to be Greg like hello? The idea of a kid being possessed and killed people bigger then them is genuinely terrifying and the fact they’re smart as hell as well? I would’ve minded my business if I was Tony as soon as I saw glam rock freddy watching me bc no sir..

seriously and imagining his personality showcased in GGY is just a front he puts up. like the real unpossessed Gregory acts like GGY did in the book, but glitchtrapped characters are shown so far to be the opposite of themselves when they're 'performing', just exaggerated. like Vanessa being angry and snappy and Vanny being playful and soft spoken.

Gregory would be snarky, clever and charismatic as himself, but as Dr Rabbit, he should be quiet, stoic, and calm. but he isnt. which makes me think his whole personality shown to Tony and Ellis is just a front he puts up, like how it was with Vanessa, and when hes alone or in the clear, he just drops the act. goes from smiling and making quips to a blank uninterested face so fast its jarring. genuinely creepy to think about

and it is creepy imagining just how small Gregory is. like Tony makes a point in saying that Gregory's the smallest boy in his class, but people still seem to like him. after knowing some context, Gregory being small and deceiving and hiding the fact that somethings wrong so well to the point where girls literally crush on him while at the same time hes hacking the system and killing countless people and getting away with it.

like it hammers in how much people dont see him as being suspicious in any way, and if Gregory hadn't gotten freed somehow he could very well have gone on for much longer

and 46s tapes showcase my other point even more. GGY didnt care if the therapists saw his other side. he didn't care if he didnt have his 'Gregory' front on. he let them see him as himself, quiet, stoic, uninterested, and mysterious. he didnt care because hes just going to kill them, anyway, and he literally got away with it

for a long time, too, if how far behind 46 is compared to Vanessa's 71 is

it just hammers in how much Gregory really was the perfect pawn. the star player. the most favored apprentice. he had every single thing going for him to keep what glitchtrap was doing under wraps, and glitchtrap knew that. he was literally the favorite.

I just love thinking about GGY and 46 and Gregory and what his alter ego would be like, especially with all of the evidence we have to branch off of

[enlighten3d]

More thoughts on r!au, because you brought it up again:

There are 3 eras of wifies and his person, both of whom have similar skill sets. First comes evilfies and masked wato, who create escape rooms. Then comes clonefies and ken, who escape them. Finally comes lastfies and parrot who kill to survive. (Hearts at least are technically craftable)

Ken managed to rescue clonefies by outsmarting their predecessors. By proving that clonefies was more than a clone, through a game rigged in their favor.

Parrot managed to rescue lastfies by killing their predecessors. By proving that lastfies was just a clone, through mistaking one for the other.

There are so many stars in the bright sky, all of them basically identical. It takes knowing them and how they relate to the others around them to identify them. Who could blame you if just after sunset, when only a few are visible, you mistook one star for another? (And the sun is still a star, even as it burns you. It's your fault for mistaking distance for peace, and still inviting it closer)

And then, because the spyglass reminded me, you can't look directly at the sun- it'll blind you. Parrot can't look directly at his own actions, can't look clearly at lastfies, can't process what happened. Is it because of how bright his mistakes shine? Or is it because his spyglass is stained with blood?

(and yes, in my opinion, lastfies and parrot can share being represented by the sun. Clonefies needs something specific to contrast and parrot deserves every parallel he gets)

Finally, does wato eventually stop putting hanging roots in their escape rooms? I doubt lastfies would know enough about escape rooms to confidently declare them as the most useless item, and why bother sneaking in a signature when you have to show up to help them out of softlocks you could have sworn they would never get into.

Just what do you do when you don't have any of your friends. Wifies is different, and parrot won't meet your eye and ken is trapped in a prison that blocks messages. (except no one off-server has heard from him and the prison seems abandoned when you try to arrange a visit and you're pretty sure that ken wouldn't have let his stasis despawn and this is apparently the only prison that parrot won't try to break someone out of)

What do you do when you have no proof, but your server feels like a graveyard.

(post in which i brought up rau again, and heres the post explaining rau. yay for having context! context is great.)

forewarning that i wrote this over the course of like, a day, sorry if its disjointed lol. but then again, what else does one expect from a long lime post but incoherency.

HI HELL YEAHHH RAU THOUGHTS!!! REPLACEMENT AU!!!!!!!!!!! i love rau did you know that <- fucking insane about this au. nonnie i love you thank you. this is going to be as incoherent + probably hard to read as usual! sorry gonna yap a lot about rau!wato here because you made the mistake of mentioning rau!wato. replacement au may be about wifies clones stuff but OUGH DOES RAU!WATO HAUNT ME. that will be the latter portion of this post tho

SO!

OOOHHH OKAY GOOD POINT. about. fuck okay thats insane? have NOT thought about the eras of wifies each having their own person and the 'transitions' reflecting their relationships... actually fucking insane. dont have anything to add just know that im staring at you w wide eyes /pos

its your fault for mistaking distance for peace, and still inviting it closer- actually wild line im- okay. okay.

YEAH THE. the. yeah. you get it perfectly, i have no notes.the spyglass and the sun thing- fuck. he tries to look at the sun, his actions, and doesnt see, doesnt understand, but still he does it via the spyglass, via that same frame of mine of clonefies that hes unwilling to abandon. look at lastfies, understand him through the lense of parrots relationship with clonefies, understand him only as clonefies. hes still the same person! parrot didnt do anything! nothing happened! youre fine! look at lastfies, look at his own actions/mistakes through the lense of a spyglass. frame of mind of his relationship with clonefies. actuallly insane.

lastfies and parrot can share the sun/daytime. wild thought actually, i do agree. because. the sun is a star - clonefies is the stars and lastfies is just similar enough but also not really; part of a larger category but different, so different. and parrot always denies how much of himself he sees in lastfies, its a whole thing. theyre similar in so many ways but- no! this is still the same wifies! and wifies would never be like parrot. never!

OKAY. SO. NONNIE. NONNIE. ABOUT WATO. ABOUT RAU!WATO. THERES A LOT. that never got mentioned on tumblr i dont think. theyre so theatre metaphor (coughs long poem coughs). genuinely like. okay. we (milo and i) have thought abt all of what youve mentioned here. sorry the rest of the post is going to be about rau!wato i am actually fucking insane about rau!wato holy shit

the escape rooms stop having those personal touches. no hanging roots, no little injokes, hints at familiarity. theyre easier, because they know that what theyd normally make is for clonefies, who they know would figure it out. so the escape rooms are easier, and he still watches, and he still has to interfere where he shouldnt have to (why doesnt parrot pick up on these things either? (hes in denial, wato. deeeeep denial.)). its wrong on every level. because- rau!wato is so interesting. she knows that lastfies isnt clonefies. hes in WAYYY less denial than parrot (its actually impossible to out-denial rau!parrot), AND he... he was the one that found lastfies in the first place, right? so she knows about lastfies existence, she knows that something is wrong. still theres a little bit of hope (parrot wouldnt kill wifies afterall, right?) that gets held out. maybe theyve got the story wrong! but still they pull away. this wifies is wrong, theyve never been close with parrot, ken is trapped in a prison unable to escape (somethings so off about that, right? why isnt parrot helping? why is he 'respecting kens wishes' when those wishes go entirely against what he stands for? why does parrot look that way whenever ken gets mentioned? something is so wrong about this.)

what defines rau!wato is the inaction. theyre trapped in the audience, and the one time they forced their way onstage, tried to help, to do something for once, it goes wrong. and clonefies dies. now she just doesnt do anything. shes fucked everything up once already (this is all her fault, right? right?). shes got the most information out of anyone other than lastfies and parrot, shes the only one who can do anything. but he doesnt. hes messed it up already, and he doesnt know enough to get people to believe him. what do you mean, wato? what do you mean this wifies isnt the same wifies? no, hes always been this way? this violent, this quiet, this loyal- yeah sure hes a bit different from when he joined, but maybe getting chunkbanned messed him up just that much, you know? youre making things up. you have no evidence. and so wato doesnt say anything. theyre trapped in the audience, watching this play set to music that they wrote themselves, and they cant do anything about it. and everywhere he looks, theres death.

parrot and lastfies canonically die, in rau. not sure if i ever mentioned this on tumblr but whatever, am (re?)explaining it. eventually someone gets suspicious about the weirdness at proton, and maybe wato slips a piece of information or two, but they go and investigate, and theres no one there. its abandoned, more than just the lack of guards whom to ask to visit the supposed sole prisoner. theres no one there. breaking in is easy, figuring out that kenadian is not there is easier. naturally, one goes to parrot, the very person who said that ken was trapped in the first place. question him. parrot runs. lastfies follows. but parrot cant run forever, not from a bunch of people who considered ken a friend/ally, not a manhunt

this all started on a cliff, didnt it? parrot and clonefies watched the sunset from a cliff right before the lastfies thing. it ends on a cliff, too. a cliff, above the ocean. he jumps, doesnt fly, and lastfies, of course, follows willingly (theres a lot to say about lastfies). and then theyre dead, the both of them

the next day, theres an eclipse.

wato is the only person who really visits that cliff. theres this really pretty scene in the animatic milo is (was? idk) making about rau, where wato stands at that cliff during the eclipse, holding hydrangeas, and the petals fly off

onto the shore wash an earring, a spyglass, and a headband. (nothing else. parrots lost himself.)

and so, rau!wato is the last one left. out of everyone, hes the last one left. what now? pick up the pieces? sure, but theres no pieces to pick up. things remain obscured; its not like parrot or lastfies (the only ones who really knew everything, and even then their perceptions were warped in their own ways) ever wrote anything down or talked to anyone- and ken is dead, too. all she can do is piece together what she already has, and shes already done all that she could, and assumptions are dangerous, and-

its just this really really deep-seated feeling of unresolution. there will never be any resolution. watos just the last one left, left to grieve everything that happened and everyone thats died, and he cant even really talk to anyone about this, he never could, and he doesnt even know everything thats happened. hes just left to deal with the consequences of everything. and nothing is ever quite the same. whats she to do now? (they dont know.)

a server the feels like a graveyard, indeed

(pspspspspsps @milo-the-mage... i summon thee.....)

[kindred-spirit-93]

Sup, it's me Astron

I adore the idea of a reality TV show with the Olympians. Poseidon rambling underwater, but the only thing we get from him is bubbles - has to be my favorite. I love the idea of that gag

I'm currently taking a break from the Astral Train brainstorm asks, mainly because I have the memory of a goldfish, so I can't remember everything I've already told you - but if you have any questions please let me know! I hope everything is well!

ahahaha that would be my bad! ill get to them inshallah and then ill make a masterpost thingy because i am, much like my blog, a little very all over the place. i need to spring clean the place fr.

im something of a goldfish cracker memory owner myself (fun fact humans now have an average attention span less than a goldfish!)

--

i am in fact a lil curious about the coup hera and athena kicked off (be it in the context of AT or the mythos whichever u prefer) if thats up ur alley :D

keeping up with the olympians!! muehehe perhaps i could take a few scenes from astral train and draw a lil comic >:)

in the meantime have a doodle of the olympian bros lol ft. a sopping wet poseidon bc i havent recovered from get in the water yet

slapped some colours on (dont look too close lol)

i had a bit of a brainwave w zeus' braids being zig zags like lightning, but the rest of his hair is neal illustrations'! also the idea was a sun bleached moment but idk it looks odd with the colours lol. glimmering gold (similar to heras in concept) and side burns lmao. i think hed prefer looking more youthful. do kings wear crowns? didnt know what kind of headpiece to give him. ignore his random earring pls

kickass poseidon! his hair is bluer here and he has a bit of a surfer tan thing going on lol? i think hed spend time on land/ near the surface a lot bc his love for the earth and leave amphitrite do most of the ruling and administrative work. he still lives in the palace but he doesnt like to be tied down to one place. she made him the necklace tho :) they have an interesting & unconventional dynamic i think.

hades my beloved, the idea of him being something of a nerd abt minerals and geology and all that good stuff is so funny to me i love it. his jewelry is gold but mainly precious stones. the eldest and most sensible. also the tallest (ha! take that zeus). i think he and persephone do each others hair, its like a bonding thing they have; she weaves gold into his hair and he picks flowers to put in hers. they als have an interesting dynamic. i love complex couples lol

poseidon with his hair down! classic wet strand of hair in his face bc hes going through it. his hair pin (not shown lol) is a lil harpoon hehe

--

thank u for ur patience and see u in the next one >:D

[selfindulgentsillinessbracket]

A Huge Update Post!!!!!!

Hi everyone, @thattoastygecko (your moderator) here. It is me.

This bracket has been quiet recently but now it is time to resume it. But I have a buncha changes to make bc let's face it, this bracket? It's an unorganized mess lmao

Congrats to our last winners!

Also I was thinking of going back to doing 2 groups of contestants at a time again, y'know 8 votes at once. Because let's face it this bracket is huge & honestly some of the entrants I kiiiind of wish I didn't put in.

Example of what I mean: Hanamusa. Don't get me wrong I love that ship, they've brought me so much comfort. But honestly they got like 600 votes. & Something about seeing them bring in THAT MUCH ATTENTION but none of the other polls got anywhere close to that kind of attention & knowing they'll probably just completely sweep the entire thing makes me think putting them in was not a great move. If only because it's gonna be super unfair & also makes me a bit sad that none of the other parts of the bracket are gonna get that much attention. I SWEAR IF I EVER TOOK THEM OUT IT'S NOT BECAUSE I HATE THEM IM HAPPY IF THEY WIN ITS JUST

seeing the rest of the poll get ignored so hard in comparison just makes me sad bc i feel like it means i did a crummy job on the rest of the tournament when it doesnt involve them, it's entirely my fault & just how my brain is, so pls understand that

But ultimately I am gonna avoid doing this, because I also don't wanna remove anyone. I mean if any character is in this poll, its because they damn well earned the right to be in this poll. They all mean something to me even if its just very very barebones like "they look cool"

I mean I put my own OCs in this fucking poll ffs & I know all of those guys are probably gonna lose. I love Oddworld but that series is obscure & I know they won't win.

LOOK AT POOR BLINX. I LOVE BLINX BUT LETS FACE IT YOU GUYS PROBABLY DONT KNOW WHO THIS IS & HES PROBABLY NOT GONNA WIN THIS NO MATTER HOW MUCH I WANT HIM TO.

Please pray for this poor cat guys, he's gonna need it. Because he's struggled to get the love he damn well deserves & by god I want him to win at least one match on this poll. He deserves at least that much.

I'm gonna try to not remove them tho bc I would feel bad if I did too, bc it's my fault for not realizing how immediatley biased this site is gonna be in their favor. I think it's just on me for not thinking that through, but I promise you guys

I PROMISE YOU AINT GONNA BE LIKE THE MODERATOR FOR THAT SAPPHIC SHIPS BRACKET THAT CANCELLED THE WHOLE THING BECAUSE THEY WERE WINNING & THEY WERE IDK SALTY OR WHATEVER???? LIKE OK BRO BUT IF YOU DIDNT WANT THEM TO WIN YOU SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF THAT BEFORE PUTTING THEM IN BUT IM AT LEAST ADMITTING ITS MY FAULT FOR PUTTING THEM IN HERE IN THE FIRST PLACE KNOWING HOW BIASED IT WAS GONNA BE GIVEN ALL THE CONTEXT BEHIND WHAT THE SHIP WAS BUILT WITH. Aka being kickstarted by a well known popular storyboard artist with a big following & being yknow on here of all sites and etc. Like yeah it's gonna instantly be a landslide in their favor to some degree. It's like putting Rise Donatello in this bracket & being angry when he is gonna start sweeping too. Because we all know Donnie is gonna be winning several rounds at least. I know he will. & I love Rise Donnie so I'm okay with it. Donnie Nation strong. I AINT GONNA BE A BITCH LIKE THAT OTHER POLL THO NO MATTER WHAT. Like No I aint gonna cancel the whole bracket over them, if Delia & Jessie win? Fuck it I mean I put them here I knew it was gonna end up this way the second they were in the limelight. But no matter what happens I ain't gonna disqualify them for existing. I guess it's more just the fact that they got so much more attention & I cvan't help but put myself down for it.

I just kinda wanted to vent about it a bit because I was being overly mean to myself & I know it's just my brain being a jerk. So I'm gonna keep my spirits up

Also I mean heck the attention picked up a bit. Rayman fans apparently felt seen in my statements so thanks rayman nation for that. I too am salty about ubisofts treatment. Speaking of:

Thanks to your votes: MURFY IS BEING PUT IN THE BRACKET!!!

AND THANKS TO ANOTHER BONUS

MIKU IS BACK!! & After discussing it with some friends in group chats, they told me I should team her up with one of my OCs. So I went with my MAIN OC ZOEY!!

Speaking of Zoey:

1. My blog @thornsboroughcomic is a thing Zoey is the protag also thanks for voting her it means a lot to me I cried a few times ngl

2

ZOEY GOT A FULL REDESIGN A BIT AGO: Behold Zoey's current design. :]

And now Hatsune Miku has been brought back from elimination after you guys voted her to come back!! And Zoey is a huge Miku stan so she's very excited to team up with her.

And while I'm here: I'm gonna reveal to you guys some of the new contestants entering the bracket!!

I might also consider bringing back more old contestants who got eliminated via voting & maybe I'll start having team ups happen periodically that you guys vote on. I want this bracket to be just, I'm gonna embrace what a total mess it is. It's unorganized, chaotic & nonsensical & I think we just gotta embrace the pure chaos of it all. So that's what we're gonna do!!

A FEW OF THE MANY NEW CONTESTANTS COMING IN!!

[transfemlogan]

i had someone say they had 2 ask around/look up the genders i listed bcuz they didnt know them.

which i can understand for isogender, which is why i put a meaning, so it cant be that. or xenogender. MAYBE, transneutral. even tho its sitting side by side transmasc & transfem & we can use context clues. AND MAYBE intersex. but thats like only 3 terms.

but i didnt even think any of the other ones as being too confusing or out there. is genderqueer that out there or something. r there sasi fans that dont know what nonbinary or agender mean. thats wild 2 me

[seven-stars-in-his-palm]

august help rat and i are going absolutely feral over running minds au . i didnt even know anything abt fnaf before this but i have been CONVERTED homestly . i need to ficify it so bad . God . oh right thats why im here i was wondering if you have like any writing tips ?? because i have Zero Clue what im doing and you are By Far the best writer out of everyone i know Shoves microphone in your face whats your advice to someone who has like never written ever . actually i have an unrelated actually pretty decent quarter-ish of a fanfic sitting in my notes app but i barely remember how i Did That so it doesn't count i dont remember what wizardry i performed to materialize all those Words

OKAY OKAY OKAY ive figured it alllll out. its honestly not much but it's My process. LETS A GO

august's shitass guide to all things fanfiction and planning (which is near nonexistant!) 🔥

i will be using my current nano project for this because honestly this is the epitamy of writing i have right now and i love talkin about it. sooooo GOOOO

1: Bare Basics

the tagline. the who when what where why. why are u writing this fanfic. for me its the Talking: i want my angel and demon to talk about Feelings, so im gonna make them talk about FEELINGS. this is personal fulfillment. it might take a while to get there, but i want them to TALK. for you, i suppose would be for ford and michael to meet and go on whimscal adventures. basics!

2: How To Get There

so how are we making aziraphale and crowley talk. how are we getting ford and michael afton smushed together in the multiverse. you, of course, have told me how that works. now is it important enought to flesh that out before the rest or just needs to be explained in a quick flashback? your pick, but since my topic is so vague, i definitely need context before it. that, my friend, is up to you. nothing much more to it. if u dont know how to start a fic, just explain how we got to what's intriguing about it (the crossover :))

3: Notes.

now is where the process BEGINS. what happens in the story. i usually start with miscellanous bullet points--everything i want to happen, no matter the order it'll happen, in a little page. here's a picture of one of my pages ib my notebook, with things i want to happen in my titanic fic (handwriting reveal?!??!) (TEA, IF UR READING THIS SOMEHOW, DONT LOOK AT THE IMAGES🫵🫵🫵) (SORY FOR HURRIED SCRIBLES, I WAS TRYNA REMEMBER IT ALL)

there's literally no order. just stuff that need to be there, there. even if its as simple as the au coming to fruition, or even just one conversation, PUT IT THERE. its all the appeal. what you're doing this for. dontforget....

4: Outlines

now, before i tell you how to do this, there really isn't a way. here's a picture of my timeline for the fic mentioned earlier (not the titanic fic) (TEA AND OTHER READERS OF THE SERIES, ALSO DO NOT LOOK TYYYY ❤️❤️)

see? complicated as fuck. it doesnt have to be that way tho, obviously: each chapter or one shot could be as simple as "michael is fucking ZAPPED, and meets ford" it just has to be something to work with. (i, on the other hand, need extensive help. so. there's the thing above. theres eve more its just online)

there really isn't too much other than that in the planning department. understand why you're doing it, know how to get there, and PLAN. detail it out. idk if this is an adequet explanation actually. if u need more specifics i can try again, but is what i got. do what works for you, work at ur pace, and such like. it doesnt have to be at this level, or even close. have fucking fun, dude. if u need morehelp, pls ask, or even consult blogs that help out specifcally for that stuff. GOOD LUCK!!!!! <3

[red-dyed-sarumane]

hello i am also a hiiragi magnetite enjoyer but a casual one (the songs just bang. they're really good. i loop them) and i had no idea until we became mutuals and i looked at your posts that their songs are part of a series. i had never looked into it. i am genuinely interested and if you ever wanted to rattle off to me what it's about i will eat that shit up fr. it's been so long since i was last majorly into a vocaloid song series

hi hi! i hope you dont mind a public answer bc you're far from the only one who didn't know. once u know what to look for tho it starts making a bit more sense.

in short: its a sci-fi, time loop-type story about a group of people trying to stop the world from ending

but i'll get into the songs a bit for u. (this is long)

in long:

yes its absolutely a series with the exception of fabric flower, perfection, nadenna, uni, and rasshaina. everything else so far is part of the same series. (in their personally uploaded songs obviously their commission songs arent part of it)

idk where to throw this in so im sticking it at the beginning all of the characters have names. i asked & they answered me directly. but they're keeping them a secret until they feel like the time is right so i would LOVE to tell u their names but uh. no one knows but hiiragi magnetite.

aru sekai series is actually a fan given name. hiiragi magnetite has never addressed the series out side of the songs themselves unless asked about it. if you called it aru sekai series to them, they dont correct you, so until they want to give it a name themself, i'll be calling it aru sekai series. the name coming from the first song aru sekai shoushitsu of course.

im going to put my proof its a series here first bc i see a lot of eng fans say they didnt know, and even jpn fans that realize theres a series will get it wrong & say theres 2 different series going on. its the same story its one series.

the easiest way & the way that made me realize it is aru sekai shoushitsu opens with "nami no ne no yume wo miyou ame hodo no uruoi wo/ umareyou mou ichido nakuse domo nai keredo" etc which is important in a lot of ways but for right now we're just going to focus on the melody of it.

this same melody occurs in all aru sekai series songs except for kugutsu ashura & laboratory. kyuuyaku hankagai has it in the last chorus at 4:48 as well as the more obvious 5:16. shuuen touhikou has it in the choruses as well at 1:20, 2:34, and 2:46. oumen mokushiroku is the only song so far that has it in lyrics as well instead if mixed into the instrumental, its the last lyrics starting at 2:30 "ah mata aete yokatta ne to itte hoshikatta no ni/ tasogare ga tokete yuku kiete yuku nanimo mienakunaru". unplanned apoptosis its a bit harder to hear & much shorter but its at 0:57, 1:06, 2:16, and 2:26. i dont know why i see people insisting marshall maximizer is a separate series bc its one of the obvious ones with the motif at 2:23 (or at least more obvious than some others). canon has it at 2:20.

theres also the theme most people realize that (kyuu)yaku, (shuu)en, and (ou)men have the same kanji as what starts lines in aru sekai shoushitsu.

a lot of songs also have text in the bg thats basically lore & helps connect & clear up somethings. a lot of these repeat lines from previous songs.

& then we get to kugutsu ashura & laboratory which dont have any of those but they are part of the series your key is in the lyrics using similar themes & concept & wording to other songs.

so what are the songs about

aru sekai shoushitsu

this is a headache of a song that, im so grateful they give us so many songs to expand on bc trying to make sense of it with no context was actually the worst. the absolute most important thing u want to know here is the lines they made into the motif for the series which establishes this tragedy is repeating. the theme of rain/blue is the symbol the current world is coming to an end and they'll later be "reborn" and try again.

no one has any idea what the repeating greek(?) means. i can figure out the words toroid & function & thats it & ive never seen anyone else get any farther with it. if anyone knows please i am begging u to tell me. anyway, from the word toroid alone though i know it has something to do with the world repeating itself.

thats the next main theme i'll get into. the story is a loop of sorts but i hesitate to say its a true time loop bc there is very clear emphasis on the concept of fractals, so repeating but not exactly the same, and toroid shapes, so not a perfect loop like say a sphere or circle would be. instead of a time loop sending them back to the beginning of the day its more like waking up in an alternate timeline altogether. its not a 1:1 learn what the day brings and get out that way. each time's different in its own way. the fractal theme drifts off a bit after a few songs but its still there overall.

the other big one is the concept of things seeming the same when theyre different, and this is easier to miss bc it's actually in the bg text rather than the lyrics. there's a whole paragraph about if a man dies in a swamp from lightning and then miraculously another bolt of lightning in the same area creates a man that's exactly the same in structure, memory, everything, is it still the same man as the one who died. this not only applies to the concept of the world itself, that not only is the world itself not quite the same when everything restarts, but is also a big thing with the characters themselves. there is something that people have that make them "people", something that can be lost, and without that, even though they seem to be the same, they're more of a "thing" than a "person." very big detail that was only a theory until laboratory was posted and confirmed it. aru sekai shoushitsu also says, in lyrics, "however, as long as you exist as people, the old world's legacy will continue on in the toroidal direction." so as long as they still have what makes them a "person" they can still be reborn in the next iteration of the world.

i think those are the most important things. the lyrics are a bit objective overviews of the next songs based on the starting kanji and also a bit more technical detail of whats going on, and the rest of the text is a more subjective view of the events than the lyrics.

kyuuyaku hankagai

this one's the start of our subjective character songs. all the text in it is at the beginning. i won't get too into it bc i dont think there's anything specifically u need to know from it, put it definitely helps put the level of desperation into perspective. theres a bit of play in it with the concept of "people" again, but its more about the lengths everyone will go to to do something about the situation iirc.

quite obviously this is the "past" song and establishes this has been going on for a while. i dont have an exact timeline for you, and im not telling you that because its the "past" that this is the beginning of everything. however. we do get told once again the concept of a "self" is important to the continuation of this. we also get a bit of world description, saying about how the world gets torn up and destroyed at the end.

short overview of it is they've been at this a very long time, everyone is well aware of the stakes, they're desperate & tired, but in the end they know even if they die at the end of the world because they cant save it, they're going to wake up and need to face it all over again. thats why theres so many long notes in this. this song is this characters cry for help. they cant let go bc if they do, if they lose their "self" its all over for them, they know that (although its not blatantly said at this point), so they have to keep going through all the "fractals" hoping that something they do sometime is going to work.

song has a lot of specific terms but its not as impersonal as shoushitsu u can feel the character in this song, especially with all the specific "byebye" written with various forms of regret and pain of separation etc. in an effort to keep this short im going to stop there for now.

shuuen touhikou

song that fits with the "end" (shuu) lines of aru sekai shoushitsu. quite literally an answer to the question of what would happen if they tried to escape instead of facing it.

the first part of text sets up the characters frame of mind, that they've been through this so many times trying to save everything, what if they didn't have to?

also in the text are the "shuu" lines from aru sekai shoushitsu, as well as part of the text from the beginning of kyuuyaku hankagai. and the last text deals with the concept of "ego" a bit instead of a "self".

the lyrics are such that this character is still part of whatever everyone's doing to fix this, but doesn't really agree with how its being handled, constantly being frustrated by how nothing's changing and no one wants to try anything too different. they entertain the idea of just running for it, that theres some town out there that they'll be safe if they can reach, that maybe running is enough to do something that they arent just standing around hoping anymore.

so effectively, no, even if they were to drop everything and run for it, it won't do them any good. (by extension they might also not be able to come back from it, but i cant say that for sure)

oumen mokushiroku

the concave "ou" song. also the only one i can accept the ""official"" english title for since mokushiroku is read as apocalypse in aru sekai shoushitsu.

theres no text in this one! unless u want to count the ou kanji.

this one's interesting bc instead of a part of the human team we have an angel who can't do anything to help them. shes watching over them, she wants to help, but for various reasons she just cant. she cant tell them it's not her fault, she cant affect anything in a way that matters. part of the reason she has the broken umbrella i think is just to really get across shes supposed to be the safeguard but she cant. for reasons beyond her control she cant.

some of the lyrics kind of mirror other songs, "inoru you ni" "omotai kaze furiharau you ni" for example relating to similar phrases in shuuen touhikou, "ima sakenda" like the main lines of kyuuyaku hankagai, starting of with rain similar to aru sekai shoushitsu among other things.

and of course like i said this is the only song that uses the motif in the lyrics & this is a theory but im putting it out there i feel like that implies the others are a part of this but this character in particular can actually do something about it. i dont know if shes actually the one who makes the whole world be reborn or not but i will put that out there.

theres also the line like "we lost something without a shape or feeling" & i think thats another tie into the theme of needing to keep their "self" for any of this to be possible.

unplanned apoptosis

theres a lot going on here. this chara is hilarious to me bc all the others are pretty collected about the whole thing all things considered and shes just acting out the whole time.

she hates it. shes fed up & i think should be considered an unreliable narrator to an extent. she tries to act like fine whatever i dont care but she does. she does. she also doesnt want to take blame for anything.

now, theres the line in here like jibun wo koroshite and this isnt in the way u might immediately think. i also hesitate to say its the same "self" the other songs are talking about considering its jibun rather than jiga. its more like suppressing & denying her true feelings to deal with everything. not that that wouldnt tie in to that big theme if she took it too far but for now shes safe.

theres text in this song this time tying it directly to oumen mokushiroku in case the art wasnt enough for u to know that. its a bit about fate being predetermined for them, a bit about things continuing in the same direction they've been, but shes brought back again

the songs really a lamentation of losing her past and future to this as well as showing how badly shes handling it.

and theres a bit of foreshadowing here in the what with the window(s) behind her being dark and broken while also being the exact same in composition to the one in oumen mokushiroku. which u think initially is because the angel cant help her, but the lines in canon about something causing the glass to break i really think is in reference to this and is saying she's at least part of the reason the angel cant help anyone. whether shes aware of this i cant say bc shes a liar who doesnt take blame for anything & since this is her viewpoint thats a bit unclear.

marshall maximizer

i think its that it's asa's art instead of sena yuta's that people think this is unrelated but honestly arent u people so confused. u look at these lyrics and think its a stand alone song? are u not so confused?

anyway, this is actually another big one in terms of plot

welcome to sunk cost fallacy the song. like literally. thats what it is, admitting they've put everything into what they're doing that it's probably not worth it, but they've been at it this long they can't just stop either. its gotta pay out eventually right-

but if u take anything away from this, its that "people" or at least this character can tell when someone isnt one of them anymore. theres the lines like "observing you acting like a person gone mad" "to you who's pretending to be a person gone mad" where both "person" and "you" are written in katakana much like when the concept of being a "person" is discussed in aru sekai shoushitsu. "you" (kimi) being similar to "thing" (mono) in this case (shout out to hayato in the hiiragima tag on twitter for figuring this out btw)

theres also the iconic lines up to hito de nashi? as though to say, but if you act as a person does, then arent you a person as well?

and then the text. its. heavy. discussing what it means to be a person, if there's something special about it, if it matters to be alive for yourself or because of something else (in a series context. so. being forced to live without the "self" they need for example) it even starts to get into the "mono" versus "hito" concept until both characters talking get too overwhelmed by it. the character they were talking to then "disappears" after admitting they might nit be a "person" which seems to say those that lose their "self" dont get to continue.

for now though, the character narrating the song is still a "person" they still get to try again, and they continue to

canon

another one i see people say isnt part of aru sekai series. it says aru sekai de in the first lyric. whats not clicking.

this ones more on why things arent quite working out.

theres a sense of balance they need to keep in place, presumably, so they can make it out of this, but each time something happens that upsets the balance. again, theres the mention of cracking the glass that i think is a reference to that window in both oumen mokushiroku and unplanned apoptosis. this seems to be their sign if things are working out or not, the chorus of this song seems to being saying if the glass breaks theyve messed up, nothings going to change and they need to try again.

this chara's like the others in that shes also tired of everything, but she still has her "self" so she has to keep trying. only she'll do anything that might work so they dont have to do this again, so they "don't say goodbye" again. which includes lying a bit so people will try her ideas.

theres also the part admitting they didn't want any sacrifices for this, but, clearly, that didn't work out in their favor. this is probably a pretty broad definition of sacrifice, can be everything from time, energy, etc to sacrificing their "selves" for their cause.

theres also text in this song!! its coded in the video but shunnanna in the hiiragima tag decoded it so we know the text! it talks a bit about coming to and realizing the worlds okay, theres pretty flowers, and it smells like it just rained. it also then repeats the nami no ne no lines from aru sekai shoushitsu. the last part talks about a risky experiment that got out of control and ended up destroying everything. which that last part, to me, seems to imply this whole thing was their fault in the first place.

in the end tho, this songs the same they don't accomplish much and have to try again.

kugutsu ashura

tongue twister mantra the song.

this ones interesting bc the character isnt human to begin with (being ashura) so i think thats why the motif isnt here. they get to repeat in their own way tho.

shes just that. a puppet really. she cant do anything to help out, rather she can only do what she's supposed to so to speak.

if u can get through the wording though theres a lot to this!

its a bit more of an outsider's perspective at how needlessly desperate this how thing is. things are awful, everyone's having a bad time, hell, people are actually dying, but no one listens to reason and things keep continuing on in the same way. it places a lot of blame on the place that started the whole thing, the place mentioned in the canon text i believe, honestly for a good reason, and kind of criticizes whats going on.

and then u have the ending that really cements its part of the series for me, the whole thing changes into what feels like almost hope which is a nice change for this series. it talks of moving forward, of getting new starts, it works in the theme of rain especially with urufu as the same base as uruoi wo from aru sekai shoushitsu, and then of course the "mata ibukuyou ni" being thematically similar to the "umareyou mou ichido" also from aru sekai shoushitsu

theres a lot of specifics in the whole thing & a lot of very specific word choice but i think that gets the point across for now

theres no extra text either but honestly the lyrics are quite enough context if u can decipher them

laboratory

this song is so heavy. like. up until now things have been left rather vague and theres room to doubt how dire everything is especially with how subjective the songs are but this.

this girl is losing her "self". thats the whole song. her just terrified and being completely unable to stop it even though she would do anything to change things. all that talk from the other songs about whos a "person" and whos a "thing" this is a "person" whos becoming a "thing" and doesnt have a choice in it. i dont know what she did. but this is her punishment for it. she ignored things she shouldn't've and now she cant be her "self" anymore.

this is telling us directly its not just the world theyre fighting for, theyre fighting for everything that makes them who they are too. it's traumatizing in its own way that they live through the end of the world repeatedly. but now shes living through the end of herself and she wont get another chance. and thats why theres no motif in this one. she is no longer a "person" she can no longer continue. theres also no extra text in this song.

thank u if u read the whole thing thats where we're up to right now!! i hope thats enough to at least get started. theres a lot of deep diving u can do in this series & its a lot of fun to keep up with as it happens bc sometimes a new song just clicks so many things into place.

[utterdrip]

hello im back (that anon who cant play bg3 herself but needs to Explode dekarios-style over her tav and astarion)

i wrote a full ask for axelias backstory to provide context but then i realized how long the ask would get . so here i am with half of what i need to rant over AJSJSJA

ANYWAYS axelia (my rogue tiefling who was a street urchin) and astarion are absolutely enemies to lovers in the same way shadowheart and lae'zel would be enemies to lovers !! they initially hate each other w a Passion but thats before they realize how eerily similar they are w their experiences and outlooks, and how the other can only really begin to understand why they behave the way they do

initially axelia hates astarion bc she has Issues with political figures (the start of her Trauma is bc of one bribed politician that fucked her already poor family over .) and while she wouldnt admit it easily she had a bias AJSJAJAJJ the only thing she really cared about when she got out of the nautiloid was to get back to her younger sister (hope). astarion would pick up on the friction pretty quickly and sass her right back the most to the point where its honestly a routine for them to fight and the only thing missing is either of them copying shadowheart and laezel w the blade at the throat

however. axelia got to know more about astarion beyond his facade . what really was the first thing that made her empathize w This One Of All People is how they both really dont trust/like ppl who display themselves as a lawful hero AJSJAJJAJ she grew up as a street urchin who was forced into that position bc of a guy who pretended to be good, and nobody would help her, a starving dirty tiefling child whos providing for both her and her sister, without smth in return ? so yeah no she Fucking Gets It .

time passes on and she develops an old married couple dynamic w astarion AJJSJSJA like still bickering but more lighthearted as they learn to empathize more w each other. fast forward to him trying to seduce her for the first time and it was a "might as well happen" thing for her KWNRKSJAJA she felt comfy enough that she didnt see any reason to refuse, and she didnt want to admit it at the time but she was def growing more unironically fond of him and his company

the more she hears about astarions story the more she gets furious for him and determined to show him that there are people who will fight for him . its the protective kind of love that axelia doesnt even realize is whats happening. she just knows that above all else, cazador needs to Die and she'd be willing to risk her own safety just to help astarion see it through

by this time theyre in a relationship w no labels AJJSAAA basically act 2 relationship. theyre both not exactly sure what they are to each other but they both know they can rely on the other to actually Give A Shit about them. while they both still love to argue and Disrespect each other its the fun kind where they definitely know its just banter at this point that they can easily use to team up on the others <33

act 3 comes and while axelia also gets the fear behind astarion wanting to ascend so badly she also knows that thats not a decision hed be too proud of if he could see the consequences now AJSJAJAJ so ofc spawn route <33

this is already a super long ask and i apologize for that but thats roughly how i see them progressing if i could acrually play the game </3 i have more Thoughts but ill shut up for now AJSJSJAJA but thank you for reading all that if ever <33

-✨️ (new anon !)

SPARKLY NONNIE U HAVE MADE MT ENTIRE DAT KNOW THIS

axelia sounds like a fucking Deligjt and i empathize SO HARD. with distrusting political figures. astarion says magistrate and i tense up like a scared cat

it mustve been like whiplash for axelia tho!! him first acting all posh and haughty and “im a magistrate i put away trouble makers i do it sooooo often its boooooring to talk about” and then. hes like okay so if u had to die. how would u want to die. are u cool if i just like drain the baddies we kill. can i please please pleeeease open this door to creatures fucking i wanna see what they look like and make fun of them. like this little fop being the most bastard gremlin of a man is everything to me

honestly playful bickering is So Important to me like if u cant chat the shit with your partner, if you cant make fun of yourself with and for them its just boring imo.

i wonder—how does she begin to start opening up to him as well? like is there a specific catalyst do u think? like i feel like her having a protective anger over astarion would make him be like ????we are barely more than strangers why do—oooooooooohhhhh you have siblings. dont you (disdainfully)

idk im just throwing shit at the wall bht im adoring this i reallt hope ur able to make it a reality sooner!!!!!!

[n7punk]

oh my god I hate to think you thought people weren't LOVING lmr chapter 4! seems like there really was a universal lag in people not seeing the update, myself included. maybe more of your followers like football than u thought...

i didn't know there was any football stuff going on lol. i know there Are A Lot Of Sports Fans in the world in general but my vibe of the catradora fandom is that our football-viewer percentage is lower than average, unless you're talking about women's soccer 😂 i also think it was influenced by the archive having issues that day (partially down) since i had at least two people tell me they never got an email. I also didn't really mention i posted it on here - which i don't always do for fics, but i had been doing for the previous the chapters. i usually only mention it if im posting something or answering an ask anyway and can tack it on without like, having to make a Whole Post dedicated to it (this is a theme that will return later in this post)

normally when i do fic notes, i include a "what's next" section, but i left it off this time because im not sure, actually! i was initially planning (like, back a month ago when i first started writing) to do an au next but it would be a Lot and my interest is swaying towards canon rn so i thiiiiink it will be some OotW fics since i have a few wips for that and one In Particular that i need to figure out if its a one shot, or multichapter fic, or like two or three fics in a miniseries. i have like a dozen wips rn so its really hard to say.

i actually only realized i was posting on valentines day like two hours ago when i was given someone's milk chocolate haul since they only like dark chocolate lol. honestly im a bad person to ask this because im not one for dates or gifts or any of the stuff valentines is based on. i dont like Special things i just like the little everyday stuff, so valentines seems like a chore to me and its hard to come up with stuff for it. it also depends if you're talking like, in a modern au or for the etherian equivalent of valentines day. my vague answer is just they take it as an excuse to spend an entire day together since they love being around each other, or they go on a fun little adventure they havent found the time for yet. i can see them doing stuff with glimbow "double date" style too.

the answer is both! i go days without messages sometimes (which works for me because i like talking to yall but it also takes energy) and then other times i get a bunch at once. messages naturally gather around talking points (specific posts, fic uploads) so like, ive checked my asks twice tonight and had a decent number of asks both times, but when i posted chapter three i waited a few hours to gather some asks before replying since i knew they would be trickling in for the evening as people read the update.

it's also taken me two hours just to type out the replies in this post (which might give context to my "asks take energy" thing) so during that time more messages can come in and be answered in the same post as long as i remember to check right before i go to post it.

i like putting them all in one post just because it makes my blog and the dashboard experience Neater so i do it when reasonable, but i dont usually wait more than a few hours for the purpose of collection, if i do at all. it also lets me reply to and acknowledge some messages even when i dont have anything to say to them directly (like, i didnt have a reply to that ahhhh anon on its own, but it made me laugh so i wanted to post it, and by putting it in a larger group i can do that).

oh thank you! i feel like its something im actually terrible at since i do have a tendency to ignore/delete messages when im not up to talking (in general, or just dont have anything to say on the topic/in response). i do really love my comments and message tho so thank you to everyone who leaves them! i hope the blanket thank-yous are enough because usually they're the best ive got lol

idk i feel like never figured out the social interaction of thanking people (even/especially irl), so it makes me not reply to comments much because i feel like the best i can do is a canned, one-sentence "thank you!" response (and, of course, that still takes energy as mentioned with spoons, which doesn't feel worth what it "gives back" you know).

actually, ive talked about this for so long, so let me just take a temperature and i can gather responses (or post replies, those are great too!) for a bit: 1) are comments sections usually just [thoughtful comment]["thanks!"] and im otherthinking this because i havent read other author's comment sections, 2) do you Care if an author replies to your comment or not, at least when it's not a question (like, does it influence your decision to leave one if you think they won't reply. i personally don't care at all which is probably where part of my whole thing comes from), and 3) if it does influence you, does a simple "thanks!" really add anything to your decision. im almost certainly not going to change my approach because it's what im comfortable with, but i would like to know if im expending an unwarranted amount of mental effort on this XD

i have before! it's called Let's Get Physical. frankly its just harder to write lol

(also going back to the gathering asks thing, this ask came in while i was writing this post and thus got tacked on right after i posted it)

i have more lmr asks but im waiting until morning because spoilers and i want to put the reply to one in the fic tag so i think that should be in a smaller, more focused post.

[khodorkovskaya]

Thank you v much for your response I really appreciate it

My ex used to do similar things tbh, except he would do it by messaging all the time, but if I didnt reply he would then start to accuse me of stuff (turns out he was doing everything he accused me of, if someone accuses you of stuff you're not doing, they're probs doing it) and would have me 2aiting all day for him to be ready so I could do anything at all because I would constantly be waiting dor him and then the day would be gone too.

But he would use super manipulative language too all the time, like I only do certain things because I love you, and if I didnt do stuff he wanted he would be super annoyed and upset or he would ignore me until he got what he wanted and then be happy. I found myself trying to please him all the time :(

This guy tho, a lil bot of context, some is probs my fault tbh, like when I like someone whether its romantically or platonic ally I get really nervous and at first when I talk to them I often reply slow because I'm nervous of making a mistake etc and putting them off so I'll wait hours because I'm thinking of the perfect reply etc... I do this with people I wanna be friends with too..... it's awful really I need to get out of the habit of it tbh... but anyway I did that with him but I've tried to speed it up a bit becasue j know it can be self destructive and I dont mean any harm by it but its prkbas partially my fault tbh

hey, it's natural to be nervous when talking to someone you like, everyone's like that, it's okay! but just don't obsess, you know? if he doesn't reply to your messages, well so be it. bc if you expect too much, you'll be even more disappointed.

and the most important thing here is, it's better to be alone that to be chasing after someone who doesn't care. i have to remind myself of that all the time... like yeah, sometimes it gets super lonely and you really really really wish you had that special connection with someone. but the feeling of loneliness is nothing compared to the feeling of frustration and feeling like you're not good enough for someone and the constant waiting for the other person to show any sort of affection. like i remember the things id put myself thru for my ex and it makes me shudder. id much rather be 10x more lonely than go thru that again.

and don't get me wrong, i don't want to victim blame, but it's very important to take responsibility for yourself too. if you know that you're susceptible to letting men walk all over you, watch out for the kind of behaviour that attracts manipulators who want to take advantage of that and change it. stand up to them and form relationships on your own terms and if it makes some men flee, it means that you're weeding out the bad ones. i know for sure that in my next relationship im not gonna be cancelling plans just for the possibility of him texting me, im not gonna be all pathetic if he wants to ignore me over a misunderstanding, im not gonna let him get away with things that cross my boundaries from day one, etc. it's gonna be hard bc you need to be very confident, know yourself well to know and assert your boundaries, but it's gonna be so worth it!

so about the guy you've been texting, please don't take things so close to heart! if he replies, great, if he doesn't, well so be it, no big deal. and i know it's hard bc im the first one start making wedding moodboards on pinterest the second i have a crush on someone lol, but girlie please don't worry about it so much! <3

[ajdrawshq]

ztd crossover with kh but it's just Carlos meeting Terra, Diana meeting Aqua and Sean meeting Ven. Cursed or blessed concept. Go

HM. WELL. i immediately leaned toward cursed bc like (gestures vaguely at ztd) but that feels mean so im gonna try putting some thought into this

Carlos and Terra :] very good pair for the most part i think. just 2 big older bros doing what they do to try to help people.. but it all goes to shit kupo. i can see them getting along pretty well, both due to their personal experiences and bc of who they are in general. also now that i think abt it its kinda funny that both of them happen to be plagued by visions but only Carlos' have an actual explanation?? Terra morphogenetic field moment?? even funnier is that both of them have the same "welp. anyway" reaction to it like yeah this just happens sometimes 👍 kind of unfortunate Terra couldnt use his to prevent bad things from happening too but oh well. its not like hopping timelines is that easy in his universe anyway. Terra still gets bonus points on an individual level bc while there was very little he couldve done differently there Are things Carlos couldve just uh. not done. yknow. things that i think Terra would kick his ass over tbh

Diana and Aqua.... oof. on god we're gonna get u girls some therapy. they were both so severely fucked over by like. literally everything from ingame events to the narrative itself. trapped in two different but absolute hellholes of sitautions for Very Long Amounts of Time and only called upon as a pawn in a game that both defines and ruins their lives and their entire world, and they barely even know it. and the only people they get to talk to at some point in their respective hells are Sigma and Micheal Mouse (and Terra sort of).. yea i think id lose it too tbh. its interesting that Diana was a 100% crucial part of why ztd happened while Aqua's role in Xehanorts plan wasnt really until ddd/kh3 unless u count him planning the whole end of bbs.. before that she was more of an outside force? not that taking her out wouldnt change anything ofc but her direct actions were more harmful to the overall plan than going according to it. i might need to play bbs again to confirm that more but uhh i forgot where i was going with this. i could see them getting along but i dont really remember enough about Diana as a person to know just how well they would? i guess itd at least be nice to have someone else who knows what their oddly specific and horrific situations are like, more or less

finally Sean n Ven.. Man. talk abt kids who cant catch a break for their entire lives no matter how outragously short OR long. they both just have a Lot going on and play some of the most major roles in their respective stories and god knows they didnt ask for any of it!! tho weirdly enough i dont feel much for Sean considering how he fits into the kinda characters i usually get attached to. but maybe thats just bc it was ztd. anyway !! out of the 3 duos here i think these two are most likely to become actual friends. from the memory fuckery to having a greater role in everything than they couldve imagined (both of them essentially being a key at some point..) to even just. having a very limited world in some way. and not having full control over their bodies. and several other major things im probably forgetting they both have. lots and lots and lots of things. they are friends to me

and just some general other thoughts - while im. not entirely sure how to feel abt what ztd does with the morphogenetic field i can at least appreciate the weird memory stuff that comes with body hopping and the possibilities that has when tied to all the other weird memory stuff that already happens in kh for similar or different reasons. like the way ztd (and vlr to some extent) went about it didnt quite hit the way i wanted it to but the concept is cool to me? itd be fun to play around with it in the context of kh i think. or vice versa. altho maybe introducing multiple timelines to the kh universe isnt the best idea.. hm. much to think about

but yeah!!!! overall verdict: mostly blessed with some underlying hints of cursed. like a weird aftertaste

[midyearflowers]

i have some Thoughts about totk that i have to get out cause i watched zeltik's review and i agree so hard

obviously major spoilers ahead

so i wanna start by saying i absolutely LOVE totk and its easily my fave zelda game ever, with botw being in second. but i will say both games as incredible as they are definitely suffer from the nintendo treatment in that there are awesome moments that blow everything out of the water, and then there are some bad moments that can really bring them down. case in point for totk specifically, zelda's sacrifice and draconification brings me to tears every time and her final words give me goosebumps. but then the cutscenes after each dungeon are... literally copy and paste. like you play them together and its beat for beat the same ("demon king?? secret stone???" nintendo why....)

like i love the story and think they couldve really had something if they had put more effort in and not only fleshed it out more but delivered it better. the whole "find the memories that can be out of order" thing worked for botw cause you already knew the ending so they were mostly additions rather than the full story. but with totk you dont know the ending, you dont know what its all leading up to. there is a mystery to it all, and being able to basically walk up to the end without any other context just ruins that. its just a weird decision honestly

and this all makes it clear that 90% of the development time went to the gameplay. which isnt entirely a bad thing, the gameplay is fucking AWESOME. the world and the way you interact with it is seamless, they NAILED the atmosphere and sound design for every single thing. like the tense beginning as you get closer to ganondorf, the ancient and solemn sky islands and ruins, the creepy and unknown depths. diving down my first chasm, which wasnt the story one so there were NO lights waiting for me at the bottom, i got CHILLS. Falling further and further, the area getting darker and more gloom infested, to land in endless darkness in all directions and having "the depths" title appear onscreen. *chefs kiss*

tho that brings me to another point in that, like botw, totk suffers from "world too big" and there ends up being many pockets where theres just. nothing. maybe a korok, but those get boring after the first few. but theres so much that is just empty and bare that you wonder if they wouldnt have benefited from a smaller map. like i love open world games, and totk at least added caves to the surface world which helped, but theres really only so many random puzzles you can do before youve seen everything. the depths being an inverted hyrule is SO cool, but they didnt really do anything with it. aside from the camera quest and very brief yiga stuff, there really isnt any real reason to comb the depths, unless you need some zonaite or something. the dlc stuff being treasures you could find was neat, but also nearly every armor being the same as botw except for a couple extras was kinda a let down. the new dragon armors are so cool and unique, i wish they did more

the zonai. merely hinted at in botw through ruins and vague item descriptions. they were so mysterious and literally everyone was theorizing on them. and then we get a game that is going to explore it all! the mystery is going to be solved! .....except it wasnt. id almost argue we know LESS about the zonai than we did before. they supposedly descended from the heavens with magical artifacts and founded the kingdom of hyrule, and then when zelda travels back to this time, theres only 2 zonai left and they barely know anything about their own species??? like what?? its like the timeline between the first mural and the second is like. centuries. why are there only 2, where did the rest go? if they were there before the kingdom of hyrule, what did they do? WHY did they descend from the heavens? it feels like nintendo needed to explain where the new tech was from since it wasnt sheikah, so they just kinda made stuff up as they went to justify it. its as if the story was just built around the gameplay. which id honestly believe cause initially it was just supposed to be dlc for botw but they came up with too many ideas so just made a new game in the same world

which brings me to my next point. why was it marketed as the sequel to botw, when it basically did its hardest to pretend botw didnt even happen. the botw references were basically just that. references. not continuing the story or adding to it. its just "yea that happened and we're rebuilding now". the fact the developers literally just said "eh the sheikah tech just disappeared one day and no one knows why" like come ON. not to mention all of the important characters you directly affected in botw seemingly forgetting link exists within the 2-3 years between the games. the man who you paid to build your house doesnt even recognize you! HESTU doesnt recognize you, and youre one of like 3 people who can see him!! the people of HATENO where link literally LIVES dont recognize him!!!!!!!! WHY

i have more but this is already long. i have something else on ganondorf but ill make a separate post. anyway i do love this game with all my heart but nintendo has me scratching my head more often than not

[shwarmii]

i just moved three boxes (two light and one heavy-for-me) to my car to take to the storage unit after a break and i AM SO BRAVE

context: i am still in the process of moving (un-moving? i am here, in a new residence, but i am surrounded by boxes and shit ugh) and i was very kindly gifted a storage unit by my parents since i down-sized so much (and my dad is a hoarder so he was very "YOU CAN'T GET RID OF YOUR BREAKFAST ISLAND CHAIRS JUST BC YOU NO LONGER HAVE A BREAKFAST ISLAND" even tho i got the three plush chairs for a total of $20 bc thrifting yay). but i couldnt supervise the movers (bc i was so wiped i was gonna throw up or faint if i didnt lay down and let them do whatever) and they apparently read like.. 2 or 3 of my labels and none of the rest. so they ignored so many that instructed them to put things in the storage unit. and i dont feel comfy calling them for a discount bc they had to deal with so much regarding me and my disability already (mainly: that i didnt finish packing before they got there. yeah. i did 2 or 3 all-nighters in a row just before they came, worked for weeks, and still couldnt do it all. best i could do was make them piles of the remaining stuff and go "please help")

but yeah, im quite disabled and sickly and i have muscle weakness, and i am spent FOR A DAY after a carrying a single case of Arrowhead water from my car to my personal cart to my apartment, so you can imagine the havoc a medium-to-large Costco Box of board games is apparently causing me

(read more is just more of me complaining about boxes, ft. me breaking down how my internalized ableism skews my pov of how difficultly heavy things are by using my little sister for comparison)

i was so shaky after, it sucked so bad. im so glad my storage unit has carriers by the door so i dont gotta haul that shit long-distance anymore. my body is so disregulated, jfc, that box felt like it might as well have been 50 lbs but i know for a fact it was on the heavier side of "light". bc my little sister helped me out with the worst of my heavy boxes a week or so ago (aka: my book boxes. bastards were the heaviest thing by far bc i have a concept art book collection and those books are weirdly shaped and hardcover and even just five of them is heavy enough for me to struggle. though, in my defense, i had a physical therapist test my muscle strength and she openly said "Oh, god, that's not good" lmao rip) and like.. my lil sister is an athlete, sure (and built like a model jfc she is so tall and dainty, hOW?? shes got muscle mass but its so stretched out that she looks like she doesnt have much. but bitch works out for fun, runs at least a mile every morning before college classes, and does sports and dance for shits and giggles. and also she's STEM. beauty and brains. jfc, i love her, her future partner better worship the ground she walks on, i swear. but yeah, her favorite way to show love is acts of service and she likes doing physical labor, so when i asked for help all hesitantly and ready to bribe, she was like "Okay!!✨️" before i even finished and rejected any form of payment that was more than a starbucks frap. she's back in college on the other side of California now anD I MISS HER COMPANY.. AND ALSO HER MUSCLES...) but she truly carried all my book-boxes like they weighed as much as a handheld-basket of laundry

and i even asked her "Is that an okay weight? I can grab another cart, we can take as many breaks as you need, would you like a water, thank you so much for doing this, are you okay??" and she just laughed like a mix of Santa Claus and the blonde girl from Utena (/positive)

she was so fine with what she was carrying. the only reason she agreed to a cart was to make shit faster with less trips, but she didnt care about the weight of the boxes themselves. she even said "These aren't nearly as bad as you made them out to be!" (as bad = me telling her I couldn't lift them. i had to make the boxes and tower then ontop of one another and put a book in individually at a time. after they were filled, i could not lift those boxes at all). she openly found these boxes easy to deal with. they were about Office Depot File Cabinet size bc i worried using a BIG box for books would be truly unliftable. but yeah no she was fine. my sister was very open about it even and did a couple of tricks for the comedy of making me go "EY EY EY, BE CAREFUL, DONT HURT YOURSELF" and fuss over her

so. like. i know she'd be able to carry this board-game box i am currently struggling with, probably even one-handed if it wasnt for its awkward size of it which would necessitate she use two hands. and you might go "shwarmi, your sister is probably not an accurate representation of a person's strength, im sure those boxes were heavy, books are heavy, so are board games" and im like:

the book-boxes were likely heavy but mangeable for most people. the board game box was definitely heavy-end-of-the-"light" weight-spectrum. also, my sister is a great barometer for me because i am in F-tier, maybe D-tier on a good day, and she is A-tier. she is likely not S-tier, she isnt a body-builder, doesnt have obvious muscle definition, no a six-pack, no evident biceps or calfs, nothing. so most people are B- or C-tier. so she is actually a good litmus test for me, personally, because i see the strain on a B-/C-tier person and i spiral into thinking they feel like me when they DONT. so seeing my sister have no problems or strain beyond "this cart that your storage unit supplied sucks to steer!" makes my dumbass go "...ahhh, i see how different me struggling versus a B-/C-tier person struggling is now that i see my sister's limits and think of her proverbial Strength Stat as ridiculously high". i have a few other friends (and a brother, who teagically lives far away from me boo) who pride themselves on their strength that similarly make me do a double-take of "OOOOOOH.. oh, okay, my frame of reference has been righted, okay"

really brings to light a reminder that i still have a SHIT TON of internalized ableism. it is very hard rn to not kick myself for only doing three boxes in one trip today. my dumbass really wants to go "DO A NORMAL PERSON AMOUNT OF STORAGE MOVING" but, my comrade, i am not normal. i am disabled. i very physically weak. there is a reason why my loved ones and i make frequent jokes comparing me to "sickly Victorian ghost children" (hence why my @/playbychoices account had that John Mulaney quote as its blog-title for so long). i can do these three boxes today. hopefully, i can do the equivalent or more tomorrow, but i also could have another week-plus long flare-up like i did this past period before today. so. today. just three. very sadge. but alas, the way things do be

anyway

praise me for this stupid fucking board-games box. the other two were easy, even for me. one was even the same awkwardly medium-large Costco box but just had lighter shit inside. but the board game box??

shit sucked. im sitting next to an a/c with an ice-cold drink and my feet up, trying to get my likely-POTS-raddled body regulated back to a mangable level

but still

shit sucked

[matoitech]

actually im just gonna list some shit out right now that i cant get out of my brain. its not one of those things i think ppl should necessarily check out for themselves to see what i mean, cuz its not like FUN bizarre or bad choices. some things r understandable for being like an indie furry novel but some things r just so atrocious or nonsensical you dont get a pass

theres a lot like just vaguely weird bullshit that the author brings up in the text like 'yeah i know it sounds weird but just dont worry about it!' (ex: the bio soldiers arent really siblings, but theyre kiiiinda siblings, or at least SOME of them view each other that way, but the ones that need to not view each other that way for the romances in the plot dont???) and youre just like, well, this was Written by someone, you CHOSE to write it that way when you did not need to, so am i supposed to just assume you wrote it that way for a reason? or did you just genuinely not think that far ahead? theyre grown in a vat, you didnt have to do this

so many things in this that did not have to be there at all and at the timeid think 'maybe this is there for a reason and is going to be explored later, maybe its there on purpose to be weird and Say Something about the character doing it or whatever' but it was not. some examples off the top of my head that i wont get into further bcuz this post is long enough as is: bryce and the creepy guard on the space prison (homophobic stereotypes that make me wonder what the hell is going on w the i ASSUME gay dude writing this), shep telling kesondra who was a teenager at the time she was 'mature for her age' w writing that makes me wonder how the hell that was meant to read (HOW DID ALARM BELLS NOT GO OFF? ARE WE SUPPOSED TO /LIKE/ SHEP?), bryce not recogizning holly now as an adult woman as the kid he saved once and other characters making jokes abt him flirting w her (THE CHARACTERS DONT KNOW, BUT THE READER KNOWS. HOW IS THAT SUPPOSED TO COME OFF?) why r u making these stupid in universe explanations for what feels like either a poor attempt at 'oh gross, thats weird in context!' 'jokes' later, or you just wanting an excuse to be weird or something?

two of its most massive glaring issues were present with like, the first chapter, when i realized this adult novel said a made up work for 'fuck' in the furry dog universe, and they say the made up word for fuck a LOT, and women are written so bad i thought i stepped backwards into the 1950s. the way women r written is way worse than them not saying the word fuck but it stands out so much i couldnt not mention it

i rly cannot stress the bizarre way the like 4 women in this book r treated enough. their interactions with other women and internal monologues have that pretty typical 'guy who has never rly given much thought to women as People thinks women feel about themselves and each other and their bodies etc' thing. i mean im saying this as a guy but its very blatant and basic misogyny its not hard to notice when ur also a man and point out. theyre referred to as 'dogesses' instead of dogs (dog is only reserved for the men, i guess) so u know right out the gate what brand of misogyny is going down. i dont think any of them have been described as wearing pants the entire book (apparently all women in this wear dresses). the male characters will randomly call them shit like either 'sweetheart' or 'bitch' apparently and it doesnt feel like youre supposed to think the guys r weird or creepy or shitty for this??? maybe shitty for the bitch thing but sweetheart honey darlin gets by totally fine? theyre not getting decked for that?

THE POTENTIAL RAINE HAS AS A CHARACTER THAT ISNT EXPLORED AT ALL MAKES ME WANT TO PUT MY HEAD THROUGH A WALL. I COULD WRITE A WHOLE OTHER ESSAY. i will say this tho, if i was writing this she would be trans

im like 400-500 (i dunno i havent checked) pages into the book and i cant really figure out a read on most of the politics in something that i was under the impression would be kinda political drama-y. theres like, a startling lack of politics in a book that DESPERATELY needs politics. i dont think the author has really wanted to worldbuild that far so you just get implications that there are politics going on, or the characters tell you that directly, or plot points happen that MUST be politically driven, but god forbid you find out why, i guess. maybe at the end.

indie furry novels need editors really really bad. it does that thing stuff thats really long that doesnt need to be that long does where it wanders around for 100 pages and then suddenly some shit is introduced and you can FEEL the author remembering the plot or realizing that he forgot to explain something 300 pages ago. some of the characters suddenly all start talking abt their sexualities like midway thru it bcuz the author forgot to mention it before, i guess? its kind of hard to tell when someone is actually gay or bisexual or when the other characters are just being homophobic for some reason. there r bases for good characters and story and worldbuilding but it doesnt reaaaally want to get into it enough for ALL its words and pages to make all that meandering feel worth it

i understand that so much of this is apparently just like middle aged british (??) cisgender (i assume, i would be in MISERY if this guy wasnt cis and writing like this) gay man male power fantasy and the extremely buff dudes he finds attractive but there is so much like lack of introspection the author has done and too much 'i did this cuz i thought it was hot and not bcuz it made ANY sense at all' like i am NOT against stuff existing in media bcuz the author thinks it'd be fun or sexy (when its done like, without being bigoted or smth, obviously) but when characters that r meant to be very smart do not think through like very basic things most ppl would think about (sasuke doesnt want to fuck w the x dogs programming too much and possibly ruin them, but he doesnt think anyones going to notice him bringing the same dogs back to life over and over, being the same age, and those dogs being MASSIVELY FUCKING HUGE AND RIPPED SUPER SOLDIERS? nostalgia can only explain away leaving them basically untouched and sasuke not caring if anyone noticed so much. i know theyre mostly penned but you'd think they'd take more precautions. they really dont give a fuck tho for some reason) and the book doesnt really want to ask those questions i just think like why didnt u get this edited??

the amount of ableism in this makes me feel like this man has literally never spoken to or seen a disabled person around him at all ever in his life. but theres just an undercurrent of general 'intersectionality isnt a word in my vocabulary' so thats kind of a given

the x dogs r also 'out of the box' as adults but the way theyre written w age and development and stuff is very weird i really could write a whole other thing about this

the fade to black sex scenes r so embarrassing for something that screams written for adult men. you cant even say fuck

theres like a moment when toby, a gay male character whose clothing style seems to be vaguely androgynous says smth like 'im not THAT far gone' as a joke about wearing heels or something. i hated it. that sentence encapsulated most of my biggest problems w this book bcuz it really just feels like this author has never bothered to talk to literally anyone with an even remotely different life experience than him. its also giving internalized homophobia like half the time. its so confusing i cant even tell if this was meant to be transphobic, bcuz again youre meant to LIKE these people

there r literally so many interesting things you could say about characters that are LIVING WEAPONS and how they feel about this, the dehumanization theyve experienced at the hands of the state or scientists creating and using them for war etc, but for some reason it doesnt really want to 'say' much of anything, at least so far?? its BOGGLING. there r probably way more things i could expand on or talk about (i could talk about specific characters even) but i need to cut myself off. i feel like i have more thoughts about what any of this Means than the guy writing it had writing like almost a thousand pages or whatever of Words

so i have been reading dogs of mars for like a full year bcuz its a Lot to get thru not even in length (tho yes its long) but in that a lot of the time its taken me so long bcuz ive had to put it down and just sit there thinking 'what was this guy thinking? what is going on?' ive been finishing it at all mostly bcuz i think i need to write a collection of my thoughts once im done. which mostly means my criticisms. because wow i have a lot of thoughts.