#i have nothing to do with it tho

[youdontloveme-yet]

utter betrayal & helplessness.

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[giarossin]

istg the moment i saw jayce d**th threats i realised how much i overestimated cognitive abilities of this fandom. they were just happy to jump on a hate train without taking a second to comprehend what even happened. "his mind [fucking] suffered", viktor told y'all himself. not to mention what horrors he saw in arcane backrooms. not to mention viktor literally wanted him to destroy the hexcore before he became jesus and literally dumped him because he didn't do it.

[sysig]

Permission to headbutt: Granted (Patreon)

[why-the-heck-not]

me, a responsible being, working on the coding project as I should vs. me, a dysfunctional shithead, getting distracted by reading about brains (once aGAIN damnit (it's my favorite "I need to study my field but bc I should do that it's an impossible unthinkable feat now, so I'm reading about something else to fool my brain I'm still being productive"-topic))

[hajihiko]

don't know what to draw, draw hugs

[xxplastic-cubexx]

oh noooo or whatever

bonus aka The Real Motive Behind This:

SURPRISE double bonus. textless ver of the first pic under the cut

[blackberry-s0da]

Mercy waiting for me to give him any sort of story that doesn’t involve him lingering naked in an invisible background

[demaparbat-hp]

Oh, Lala...

[collophora]

"Let's fix this drawing" *redraw the whole thing*

[casualavocados]

Was this your first nosebleed? Have your gums been bleeding? Do you have a rash anywhere I can't see? What are you doing? Are you diagnosing me?

9-1-1 3.10 • Christmas Spirit

[vanyafresita]

after seeing this post by the artist afkeii on instagram, i got inspired to write a poem... and then i drew something to make it into a zine...

the way i feel about romantic love is... complicated... but i've known i'm on the aromantic spectrum for over a year now ! yippiee !

if you'd like to have a physical copy, feel free to [download the print version here] , and check [how to put it together / make a 8-page zine here]

[starry-bi-sky]

mmmmmm read a disciple shen yuan/shizun luo binghe fanfic about two days ago where the first chapter was the Immortal Conference arc, and SQQ was the one who had to be pushed into the abyss (he was still the villain) except Luo Binghe was refusing and was like, lowkey losing his mind about SQQ being so close to the edge. SQQ ended up having to be the one to fall in himself because of the system's punishment system. The rest of the fic is leading up to that moment. But like, MMM i've been obsessively thinking about that first chapter for DAYS ever since.

now i've been in svsss for a grand total of *checks watch* a week. but god obsessed with that. I want to write/read a fic where disciple SQQ goes a little nuts down there. Like keep all of the things that make SQQ, SQQ, but just. Throw in a little bit more trauma in there. A little bit of a mental break. Let him go a little nuts as a treat. Just a tad unhinged. I wanna see him go, just a little, "god fuck it, i've tried so hard to change this shitty story's outcome and it feels like everything i've done has been for nothing. I'm going to die in this world no matter what I do, I've been doomed from the start, so might as well die the way I want to." and he just, breaks a little! Under all the stress.

He still retains the traits that makes shen yuan, shen yuan, like his overwhelming kindness. But he's just! yk. A little less patient. Paranoid. Jumpy. Colder. A little more aloof and closed off. A little more Shen Jiu. He's no asshole child abuser, but he was a Number One Hater in his past life and he's leaning into that old habit a little more now.

(On a totally coincidental not-at-all related note, there's not enough SJ-and-SY-are-the-same-people fics out there that i've found. This is totally unrelated...)

The Endless Abyss turns the mind into an over-sharpened blade, and SQQ is both fascinated and perhaps a little excited to explore a place that doesn't have a lot of info on it in the mortal realm, but still terrified out of his mind. And he's no Luo Binghe, he doesn't have the sheer brute strength and power to just bulldoze his way through, so he has to be a lot more sneaky and cunning if he wants to survive.

The fic itself role-swapped LBH and SQQ so that SQQ was the half-demon (which lowkey fucks) and LBH the human, but I'm equally-if-not-more obsessed with the idea that LBH remains the half-heavenly demon and SQQ the human. If only because I keep thinking about SQQ befriending some demons (particularly and specifically a group of succubi) and they grow very attached to this Human Cultivator so through magic plot stuff they create some kind of seal/illusion/talisman that makes SQQ appear as a demon because a human cultivator in the endless abyss may as well be the equivalent of putting a giant neon target on your back.

And iirc Shen Jiu was taught demonic cultivation by that one guy(?? i've only been here a week so im not caught up in ALL of the lore yet) so that could totally happen here.

(On the other end of the realms, poor Shizun Luo Binghe is just. losing his fucking mind over losing his most precious and beloved disciple. About .5 seconds from burning down the peaks himself. somebody sedate him.)

The Endless Abyss sucks and SQQ is having a really terrible time and can feel himself going lowkey mad, but also holy shit look at all this WORLD-BUILDING. look at all this flora and fauna, and oh if he had the equipment for it he'd be writing all of this down. ALL OF IT. He was kinda-sorta-already planning on never leaving the Abyss as some sort of fucked up self-exile and self-preservation thing, but now he might? actually just?? never leave if he can help it, like he lowkey likes it down here.

anyways the next time anyone ever sees SQQ again he's got hair so long its almost touching the ground and he's either in rags and half-feral or he's been completely dolled up by his adoptive succubi sisters and still about three seconds from biting anyone who tries to touch him. (he's also lowkey trying to book it back down to the abyss even if he has desperately missed all of his friends and shizun)

[circuitcircus]

in defense of kabumisu……..

addressing things I see people say about why kabru being shipped w mithrun is ‘bad’ or why their canon relationship ‘doesn’t mean anything’ while also clearing up misconceptions of the characters some fans have

listen it keeps popping up and I just gotta do this or my brain will melt (if you don’t see it around then god I wish that were me) there’s an age gap!- erm there’s also an age gap in farcille (ily), the most popular ship in the series...also chilchuck looks like a kid but a lot of fans recognize him as a dilf because of his relative age, so there should be no age gap discourse among adult characters because it feels so conditional tbh

kabru taking care of mithrun is racist!- marcille likes to take care of others as well. is that sexist, or just an aspect of her character?

kabru isn’t treated like a servant, waiting on mithrun hand and foot…I mean he gives mithrun a foot massage but no one told him to do all that lmfao

he's also not the only one to care for mithrun. pattadol is shown to worry for him and milsril was the one to start taking care mithrun in the first place after he…...y’know. speaking of which-

they probably met when kabru was a kid!- neither of them showed signs of recognizing each other the entire time mithrun was introduced nor when they were together. and im pretty sure KABRU of all people would show some kind of recognition if they'd met before. it's kabru!!! the people person!!! mr. "i-noted-down-50+-characters-in-this-dude's-backstory-for-fun-and-actually-enjoy-social-gatherings"

you would think some kind of memory would come back to him especially after hearing mithrun’s backstory if milsril had even told kabru about him as a kid. but nope. it’s just fan speculation unless there's a side comic suggesting otherwise that i haven't seen

mithrun doesn't care about kabru, his shapeshift double looked like shit!- it's obviously because of mithrun's (then) lack of desires that it looked like that, but they really grow on each other

i think it's safe to assume it'd look more like kabru after they spent so much time together (also laios can barely even remember kabru's name..also saw his face multiple times and didn’t recognize him when they talked for the first time)

mithrun is racist!- he’s actually the least likely character to be racist since he lost his desires and that includes a desire for superiority over others. he even calls his past self out on that part of himself. the other elves in that side comic were being just as racist to shorter lived races but just didn’t use ‘outdated slurs’

(unfortunately literally every main character in dunmeshi is at least a lil prejudiced, but I believe it’s worldbuilding and a sign of the times rather than a reason ryoko kui is giving to hate each character)

taking care of others is a pain in the ass!- saying this as a reason kabru and mithrun shouldn't be together is basically saying disabled people shouldn't be allowed to have romantic relationships because they're a "burden"...if someone is actually willing to put in the work, then let them be.

that's not even all of their relationship, mithrun is the fighter of their duo and kabru would've been killed by the shapeshifter or something if he'd fallen down the hole on his own since he sucks at fighting monsters. mithrun helps collect ingredients for cooking every time, too (barometz fruits and griffin egg). he pulls his weight and then some!! i feel like people forget that part of mithrun a lot somehow.

+senshi literally cooks for everyone all time. it's kind of an important aspect of the narrative.

+also, while it is a popular fan thing I see around that kabru handfeeds mithrun, he literally never does lol this is mithrun using his own hands to eat:

also here we have him washing his own body

just saying because people like to treat mithrun like a baby even though the narrative respects him as a capable adult who also has special needs because of an accident. he’s captain for a reason

kabru hates taking care of mithrun!- not exactly, he was initially surprised and put off but got used to it quickly. i’m sure he’s grateful for all the times mithrun saved him from a monster and teleported them out of danger as well

he even starts doing “unnecessary” things for mithrun’s comfort and safety like when mithrun pushes himself too hard fighting, even after his mission to take care of him was complete when the canaries came back

here is even kabru resting while mithrun keeps watch (mithrun let him sleep for 5 hours before waking him up from the nightmare earlier, too):

there's nothing more to their relationship!- they actually have had a very tight and consistent dynamic since they met and they incite the most change within each other by the end. kabru is the one who inspires mithrun to create new desires so he doesn't waste away, and mithrun is the first person we see kabru being genuine with and it leads him to be more honest with others by the end instead of tiptoeing around everyone all the time (that mask was also the reason some ppl initially disliked kabru…)

kabru’s relationship with mithrun is honestly so important for his character and vice versa, but it’s often disregarded because of one over exaggerated aspect of it (an aspect that isn’t even the first way they interact with each other) or because people want to just straight up ignore it for some reason 🥲🥲

kui dedicates many panels to them that don't particularly serve the narrative as a whole in order to demonstrate this and i think that's pretty significant

you're taking this too seriously!- as if i'm the first person in the world to be crazy about a ship or the characters 😭 i love analyzing text and it's upsetting to see them mischaracterized when kui lays out the characters so clearly and deliberately

also they end up touching each other like all the time and have the kind of canon validation most ppl can only dream of lol i feel so insane look at this:

and this is just when they're first getting to know each other cuz there's a fuckload more

kinda hard to explain how i don't actually need them to get married or whatever but i'd die on this hill for them and i enjoy their dynamic immensely

haha you thought you were reading ship discourse but it was actually a character analysis 🤪🤪🤪

also don’t somehow take this to mean I think anyone has to ship them, I just need everyone to understand these accusations kind of don’t make sense especially when they can also apply to other pairs or characters

bonus kabru just looking at mithrun:

[julykings]

life lately

[hikarisbeam]

기막힌 사내들 / The Happenings (1998)