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azrielbrainrot · 2 months ago

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After The Show

Pairing: Band Member!Azriel x F!Reader

Kinktober 2024: Thigh Riding

Description: Azriel invites you to another of his concerts and you can't stop thinking about how hot he is the whole time.

Warnings: Smut, thigh riding, semi public sex, car sex

Word Count: 1,2k

Rating: 18+ MDNI

Notes: This story is simultaneously part of my band au and one of the stories I wrote for kinktober. This is just smut though so you don't really need to know about their lore before reading this or anything. Also I proofread this on the subway so I hope it's fine. Hope you enjoy!

Band AU Masterlist

Kinktober 2024 Masterlist

Azriel has always brought out the most intense feelings out of you, this much wasn't new. You've also seen him perform a million times before, even when you weren't officially dating yet, and while you had always thought he looked incredibly mesmerizing up on that stage, you had never had such a visceral reaction to it.

As you watched him play his bass and sing along with the music on stage tonight, you couldn't focus on anything other than unfairly attractive he was, eyes darting from his beautiful face to the way his shirt tightened around his biceps and expert fingers played the bass, plucking every string with ease. You barely even managed to pay attention to the music during the whole show even though he played one of your favorite songs.

So when he came down to give you a kiss after finishing his set to find you unbearably turned on, it came as a bit of a surprise for the both of you. You had been so needy that he couldn't resist putting away his stuff quickly, almost ignoring his friends and letting you drag him to the backseat of his car.

This wasn't a good idea, seeing as the bar was still open and your friends were still inside, but you were certain that if he didn't touch you right then and there you would explode. Azriel had tried to protest, wanting to drive you home so he could fuck you properly, but you shut him down with needy pleas and passionate kisses. And that's how you ended up straddling him and grinding down on his muscular thigh like your life depended on it.

The angle was awkward and there was barely enough space for you to sit on him let alone move properly. The short dress you wore had been hastily pulled up to your waist, his strong hands holding it in place so he could see the movement of your hips, the black panties you picked out drenched and on display for him, but you didn't care at all. Your only concern in that moment was the feeling of your soaked and sensitive cunt grinding against the rough material of his jeans, giving you just enough friction while he trailed wet kisses over your neck and shoulders, making you lose your mind even further.

The windows were fogging up with the temperature rising in the car, your harsh breaths and barely muffled moans filling up the space. It would be obvious what you were up to in there for anyone that passed by, good thing it was still early and the act playing after Azriel was good enough to keep everyone entertained.

“Fuck,” he breathes out, his own desire evident in his tone, sitting back, sadly abandoning your neck, focusing on your body, mesmerized by the way your hips ground down on his thigh, so wet even though he had barely touched you. “You're making a mess, princess.”

A mess was an understatement, the fabric of his jeans was absolutely drenched under you. If you weren't seeing it too, you might have tried to deny it.

“This is your fault,” you manage to get out, the tone not as accusatory as you meant for it to be between your shaky breaths, your movements never faltering even though you were in such an uncomfortable position and your muscles were starting to burn.

“My fault?” He chuckles, hands grabbing onto your asscheeks, the rings he wore cool against your overheated skin. “I didn't even do anything.”

“You don't have to.”

“Yeah?” He starts guiding your movements, making you grind down into him even harder. “Love me that much?”

Nodding feverishly, you lean down to kiss him, knowing words aren't enough to tell him how much you truly love him, and you definitely couldn't find them in this moment, not when even breathing was proving too difficult and your thoughts were so scattered.

It's a messy kiss, teeth clanging together as you grab onto his hair, desperately needing more. One of his hands abandons your ass, trailing over your skin teasingly, too slowly for the current situation, until he finds your panties, pushing them to the side with his thumb so your cunt was grinding directly into the rough material of his jeans, the new sensation sending you to new heights.

Azriel resumes his earlier assault on your neck, leaving open mouthed kisses and sucking on the skin, probably hard enough that you'd have to cover up a few marks tomorrow - you couldn't even complain about the jovial nature of him leaving hickeys on your neck when you had been the one to drag him to the back of his car like a horny teenager. Wrapping a hand around your neck softly, he tilts your head to the side, kissing a trail up to your ear.

“You need to cum so I can drive you home and fuck you properly, princess.” He sounded a bit feverish himself. If you were a bit more lucid you would have noticed the way his cock was straining against his pants and the way his body seemed to tremble along with yours.

“I'll let you ride me just like this,” he whispers right against your ear, guiding your hips harder, showing exactly what he wanted. Gods, just the thought of his cock stretching you out makes you clench around nothing, a needy moan escaping you.

With how wound up you had been ever since he stepped on stage it's no surprise that your orgasm hits you so fast, it's actually stranger that you had managed to hold out for so long. It hits you like a wave, pulling you under until you can't breathe. You lean down and hide your face in his neck, a silent scream escaping you as you try your best not to make too much noise and alert the whole bar about the mind numbing orgasm your boyfriend just pulled from you in the backseat of his car.

Azriel keeps guiding your hips slowly, dragging it out until your body is shaking too much. He lets you wrap your arms around him and catch your breath as you come down, massaging your thighs softly. It takes you a while to come back down to earth, but when you do the first thing you notice isn't even how bad your muscles are burning after the intense workout, it's the soaked fabric under you and the wetness around your thighs.

“Still with me?”

His voice pushes you out of your thoughts, leaning back to find him watching you, his fingers coming up to push your hair behind your ear, the adoration in his hazel eyes sending a different kind of butterflies flying through your stomach.

“Yeah,” you say at last, kissing him softly before adding, “Still need you.”

The promise he made earlier hadn't been forgotten even in the midst of your jumbled thoughts, and as much as the intense orgasm had taken most of the edge off, you still wanted him to fuck you.

He hums, a teasing smile trying to fight its way onto his lips. “Think you can wait until we get home this time?”

You let out a soft laugh of your own, “As long as you get me there fast.”

#azriel x reader #azriel smut #azriel x you #azriel x y/n #azriel acotar #azriel shadowsinger #azriel fic #acotar fanfiction #acotar x reader #acotar smut #acotar kinktober

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mixtapedoh · 5 months ago

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and it was all yellow | y.j.

welcome back to SVTU ! lost your way? refer to our campus map for directions.

pairing: yoon jeonghan x gn!reader with guest appearances from c. seungcheol, h. joshua, w. junhui, and more !

word count: ~5.9k genre: neighbors to friends to lovers warnings: language, intermittent Lore Dumping™ (i have to kick us off into svtu somehow), jeonghan is a little shit, light suggestive themes (heavily lampshaded and perhaps only occuring twice?)

☄. *. ⋆

olive's notes: these individual headcanon sets are going to be very ~stream of consciousness~, so bear with me, here. second, cheol and jeonghan are brothers (and there's a secret third brother i'll introduce eventually, don't you worry), also, thank you for stopping by <3. now here's the content you signed up for.

☄. *. ⋆

now playing... ılı.lıllılı.ıllı. ... ⌜ angel baby — troye sivan ⌟

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW ☄. *. ⋆

— it all started when jeonghan realized that jun was loaded.

now, don't get him wrong. it wasn't as though he had befriended jun because jeonghan had been looking for someone rich and easily persuaded. it's not like jeonghan used his ineffable charm to win over the quasi-cryptid that was wen junhui because of jun's apparent legacy funds.

not that jeonghan couldn't have done — he clearly had the persuasion and cunning to do it — he just didn't. jeonghan wasn't in need of someone else's money. please. he was very capable of taking care of himself, thank you very much, he was just also, however, very good at knowing things.

especially those things that could be used to his advantage.

— and well... wen junhui was loaded. wealthy as shit. a classic trust fund baby. a walking dollar sign that just so happened to share classes with jeonghan every year since he started SVTU as a political science major (of arts, of course. he hadn't taken latin in high school to not absolutely crush the romance languages in uni).

— you see, SVTU had this fun little program for long-suffering students interested in the government and manipulating it to their will wherein if you took merger courses — lectures that ate up a hell of a lot of your time and money but gave substantial credit hours that counted for both applied and allied course credit — you could get a jump start on your degree, be offered more opportunities for internship, and explore a subject's "many facets" through "multiple lenses."

to jeonghan, it meant working faster and harder so that he might graduate early and get into the actual politics of pol sci quicker — at a more “genius” and “revolutionary” age.

(half of politics, after all, was being appealing enough to make headlines. there wasn’t time to waste, in the long run.)

to wen junhui it had to mean something different — after all, jun was a pre-law student with a completely different career path from the other party involved (though jeonghan had considered law at one point in time — something he’s not above admitting though certainly not pining after). merger courses for him likely meant an expedited process to law school. but that was truly beside the point. an aside.

— what mattered in the end, was that jeonghan and jun had more than enough shared merger courses to go around, and in the process of things, had gone from strangers to acquaintances, then study partners (blame it on the fact that jun — the altruistic leaning bastard he was — actually tutored in his free time. willingly. as in, not a joke.) to committed group project members, and eventually to that nebulous thing called friendship.

ask them both when that final stage commenced and you’d get varying responses — jeonghan always far more generous than jun in such regards, but almost annoyingly so, like he wanted to be the one leaning more on the ridiculous.

— yes, it was quite a ways into their friendship when jeonghan learned that wen junhui, his sweet jun, was loaded. like, living alone off of campus in his own two bedroom apartment on the wealthy side of the city that prospered from the University Living Aesthetic™, loaded. as in, so loaded he could have easily found more than enough willing bodies to become roommates with him and help pay for the exorbitant expenses but simply decided against it because he hadn’t, and i quote “thought about it before.”

“never thought about it? jun. how much does this place cost?”

and jun had to think for a minute. genuinely think about how much he paid in monthly rent. “i suppose for a month’s rent i pay around… [REDACTED].”

and jeonghan was no stranger to dramatics, to be sure, but anyone else would have gaped the same as him. “[REDACTED]??”

"[REDACTED]."

"...shit."

— yes, jeonghan finding out that jun was loaded, living in a (rather well kept) apartment with an empty room, no roommates, and an assortment of (dying) houseplants that needed care, was truly the beginning of it all.

— after all, while the chaos settled in a year after the fact when he and joshua would finally move in with jun because of circumstances that aren't truly relevant to the here and now, all true origins start a little before dramatic changes. there's always a gentle precursor, something soft that sets the stage. rumblings of change are necessary forefathers to the strength of revolution; jeonghan learning that jun was a walking line of credit with property to his name and a work ethic that would make any professor blush was necessary groundwork for the events that would follow.

and goddamn, if things didn't follow.

— but i suppose, if we're back tracking all the way to jeonghan and shua moving in with jun on one very ill timed sunday (jun had an exam in his special topics in deviance, crime, & the law course the next day), we are also brushing up against jeonghan meeting you.

another precursor to the chaos that would follow. another tremor that would shake the ground and cause things to tumble.

— you also lived in the terraces on 17th and attended svtu. you lived on the same floor as jun — two apartments down from his, no less — and his first week there, you showed jeonghan the campus shuttle routes that passed right outside the complex (he'd come to learn that the domino route was the one you took most often, as it led right to the heart of the university, but the pinwheel route was also a convenient option for evening courses).

— you and jeonghan weren't friends right away. no, you were always a friendly face around the complex and a decent conversationalist when stuck in the elevator together, but it wasn't as though you and jeonghan became fast friends. you were just neighbors for a while; just another person grabbing mail on monday afternoons, stopping at the in-residence coffee shop on bleak wednesday mornings, ordering pizza on saturday evenings and giving joshua a slice after he weaponizes his big, brown eyes.

— and then came The Series of Fire Alarm Mishaps.

— you see, at some point in the middle of the semester, someone new moved into the apartment building, in the same hall as you and jeonghan. at first, you barely even noticed the change, and then they started cooking.

— which wouldn't have been a problem. if they had been good at it.

the first few times the (incredibly loud and not unreasonably sensitive) fire alarms from down the hall had gone off, it had been unfortunate - a mild nuisance that disrupted what jeonghan had been doing, and nothing more. but then, the first few times became multiple, and from multiple, came a pattern. every other day, at least twice, the fire alarm next door would go off. and it would always be at different times - breakfast, the afternoon, early evening, even sometimes at 1:28 in the morning. the fire alarm would sound, and while it would mostly be no longer than a minute or two, it was still enough to be irritating.

you and jeonghan talked about it every time you saw each other in passing, or just so happened to be taking the same shuttle to campus (which happened quite often, anymore, since jeonghan enrolled in an extra course to help him graduate all the sooner). your neighbor and that damn fire alarm. your neighbor and their inability to cook, yet unnecessary dedication to the craft. you both joked about the inevitability of them actually burning the apartment down.

— and then, one day, the fire alarm went off at 2:19, waking jeonghan up out of a dead sleep (he hadn't meant to fall asleep at his desk, and his neck would pay for it all the next day). he heard it, and immediately decided to ignore it, knowing it would stop soon.

but then it didn't.

at about 3.5 minutes of non-stop alarms, jeonghan was annoyed enough that he left his room and staggered into the kitchen for some water, where shua and jun were already waiting around, likely with the same idea (though it was clear that shua hadn't ever fallen asleep, and perhaps jun was in the same boat, though he'd changed into sweats and a light t-shirt).

at about 6 minutes, jeonghan opened the door to see if anyone else was, well... concerned.

and at 13 minutes, he was standing outside in the brisk autumn air, agreeing with jun as he whispered that if there wasn't an actual fire but just their talentless neighbor attempting to cook in the middle of the night, he was going to kill the bastard himself.

— and there, in the middle of all this stupidity — sleepily rocking back and forth from one foot to another — and on the other side of him, was you.

— and, well, when you offered to buy him and the rest of his roommates coffee at the convenience store that was just down the street, not far, he couldn't do much beyond say yes. what was he going to do? decline your offer?

and so all four of you walked to the convenience store and aimlessly wound your way through the almost neon colored aisles. jeonghan used the opportunity to stick to you like glue and get you to open up — about yourself and your roommates, both of whom had gone home for two weeks for (separate) family vacations (not that you were jealous. clearly the superior option was to stay at the apartment, embroiled in course work and standing outside at 2:00 am because of some loser neighbor who can't cook a singular meal without burning the building to the ground, and yet refuses to have anything delivered).

— in the end, the fire hadn't been bigger than something contained in the pan ("thank god," you had said, shaking your hands in lackluster triumph, "i have a physics exam next week. i need those notes more than you know"), but at only 4 months of having a new neighbor, someone new moved in within 2 weeks at most. and, after being neighbors for almost 7 months, you and jeonghan were decidedly friends.

after all, you bought him a triangular gimbap, ice cream, and convenience store coffee. jun had slipped away with just a banana milk (which he promptly paid back the next day), and shua nearly bought out the whole store once the two of you got to talking about the best midnight (and hours after) snacks lining the walls. at the least, he was indebted to you, which could only be solved by more trips to the convenience store with more mindless conversation, and more time for the both of you to endear yourself to the other.

and the way jeonghan saw it, friendship at that point was inevitable. especially when, at the start of the next semester, you and jeonghan both had an early morning class and used the domino route to get to class via campus shuttle.

(and sure, jun had an early class, too, and drove himself to campus everyday, meaning jeonghan could have easily just gotten a ride, but he didn't. for no particular reason, really, he just never did; but one frost bitten morning after a snowstorm, when jeonghan was waiting at the shuttle stop and you stood beside him, bundled up in a thick winter coat and rubbing the tips of your fingers to keep them warm, you turned to him, the cord of the wired headphones the both of you always shared swaying from the movement (a streak of yellow against all this white, the sun in the middle of stark winter), and smiled, "i'm glad you're here with me." and maybe — just maybe — that was reason enough.)

— and thus, for reasons above explained, in the end, it all started with jeonghan learning jun was loaded. if it weren't for that simple knowledge, he wouldn't be anywhere near where he currently stood.

— which was the open doorway of jun's apartment, garbage in hand, falling in love with you.

"what?"

and you at least had the presence of mind to be flustered by it.

jeonghan could laugh, really. "is that my jacket?"

it totally was, and perhaps the way you fiddled with the sleeve of it and scoffed awkwardly, refusing to meet his eyes, was the true giveaway that you knew it most certainly was. "i don't know, is it?"

you were met with smug silence, so of course, you'd elaborate.

"i thought it belonged to my ex. i just chose what looked the warmest. it's storming out there — you might want something more than a sweatshirt if you're taking that all the way to cans." you gestured to the garbage bag — a detail jeonghan had almost forgotten at the sight of you in his clothing.

"you think your ex would have bought that?"

of course he wasn't going to take your bait in changing the subject. that would make things easy. you rolled your eyes, spinning your key ring and making it jingle. "hoseok has great style. it's just different from yours."

"and that jacket is more my style than his."

"it is," you conceded. under jeonghan's gaze you stuck one half of the jacket out, towards him. "do you want it now? you'll need it out there."

"i don't think i will. not when i'll have your sunny presence to warm me."

and for a split second your eyes narrowed. you had just come in from the storm — that much was plain to see from the wet of the jacket to the reusable grocery bag in your hand, full of pantry odds and ends. there was no need to go back out, and you and jeonghan both knew it. and not to mention that the invitation (thinly veiled) was unattractive — stay inside where it was warm or brave the stormy weather once more, all for a garbage run?

"race you to the elevator."

— and see, the truth of the fact was, it wasn't as though you made it difficult to fall in love with you (though even if you had, jeonghan would have liked the challenge, perhaps. there's fun in plenty of things). you were generous, a good conversationalist, you bitched about people with jeonghan but still tried to see the best in them, you were knowledgeable about the most random yet oddly applicable things, and for all of his teasing, you put up with him. perhaps enjoyed him.

— it certainly confused seungcheol, to say the least (but don't such things always confuse brothers).

"as someone who's had a lifetime to cherish your personality, there has to be something wrong with this y/n if they're willingly spending time with you. i'm trying to save my soul, putting up with you on the daily. they have no excuse."

"if i'm going to respond to that, you'll have to give me five minutes to run first."

and it ended with jeonghan quickly pushing away from the table, trying to duck out of seungcheol's grasp; but of course, the older brother and president of the boxing club would get him anyway, and through laughter, attempt to knock some humility into jeonghan (it wouldn't stick).

— but no need to focus on all of that, now. after all, this deep into the semester, jeonghan was busy enough without Crippling Thoughts of Romance.

— the worst damage you wrought thus far was making him choke that day you wandered into karaoke club and he was in the middle of a duet joshuji had managed to cajole him into doing on the spot (you swore up and down that you didn't know he was even in the club to begin with, but something about your flustered behavior and shua's glee at the whole affair made him consider otherwise); while it had been a (minor, he claimed) blow to his pride, it was easily pushed aside. jihoon, the bastard, might bring it up on occasion — the one (1) time angel voice yoon jeonghan chokes, and it's all on camera — but other than that, jeonghan? cool as a cucumber.

the last thing he'd do is be awkward around a crush. jeonghan was cool; jeonghan was suave; jeonghan was speaking in the third person because joshuji had been on a self-love bender a few months back and had said daily affirmations into the mirror every morning, and after finding out and teasing him relentlessly for it, jeonghan unfortunately picked up the habit.

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW (CONT.) ☄. *. ⋆

— and now that we've gotten this far, i suppose it's time we bring up Jeonghan Habits™ because there were many, the closer you and jeonghan got to each other, strings of fate drawing you ever nearer, joining you at the hip.

— for one, it seemed that ever since that first unfortunately timed run to the convenience store at hours after-midnight, jeonghan felt comfortable just showing up at all odd hours of the evening, all messy hair and too-big hooded sweatshirts (most stolen from seungcheol, he'd reveal to you one day when you were confused as to just when jeonghan had picked up a love of coton de tulear puppy conventions — enough to get a commemoriative sweatshirt, no less), with the oh-so-enticing offer of going to grab a snack.

he even called it a date, once, when you were wrapped up in three blankets and your fuzzy house slippers, weakly try to convince him to just rummage through you're cupboards instead

"you're so cold you're going to cancel our date? and here i thought we had something real."

(you'd been so flustered by the whole exchange you simply ended up going to the with him, hoping that the act of Just Doing It would buy you time against his rapid fire machine gun comebacks — probably exactly what the fucker had planned in his 4d chessboard of a brain — and jeonghan took the opportunity to file away in his mind the cute expression that crossed your face in the split second that the words hit you fully in the chest and you floundered, wide-eyed into recovery)

— another, of course, was his habit of casually leaving things at your place whenever the two of you hung out; the first few times he left something — his jacket, a pair of sunglasses, necklaces that you don't ever quite recall him taking off to begin with — you promptly returned it with the naive belief that it was a one-off mistake not like to happen again. but it just kept happening, and so eventually, you just stopped returning.

if it were important, jeonghan would have texted you about it — he texted you about all kinds of random things, anyway, his lost socks would be no more strange than texts of ootds or how particularly sparkly his eyes looked that day.

and he never did...

until you started to wear the things he left, of course.

'should i get two of these?' the text came in while you were walking to your next class, taking your sweet time since the weather had cleared up nicely and the campus shuttles were running smoothly — not a single one hand been late all week, a sure change from usual. a moment later your phone chimed again, and jeonghan had sent a picture of a silver ring with a greek key styling. it was cool enough, and fit in nicely with jeonghan's usual style of accessory (not that you were particularly knowledgeable of such things... haha.)

'sure, but why 2?'

'so you can have one of your own instead of stealing it.'

'???!?'

'look at your outfit right now. you're wearing MY necklace. it's been missing for weeks.'

'YOU LEFT IT AT *MY* APARTMENT??????'

'you still have necklaces of your own; didn't have to be mine.'

'😑'

'so what's your ring size?'

'stfu'

— in your defense, you didn't think it was an issue, borrowing the things he'd randomly leave at your apartment. it had started off innocuously enough — seonghwa and momo (your roommates, bless them) needed you to go grab a few last minute ingredients for dinner (they were the ones cooking, so charitably you offered to do the grunt work) and when you couldn't find your own sunglasses, there were jeonghan's, just sitting on your dresser and waiting to be used.

and after that, well... jeonghan had nice style, okay? you were not immune to convenient and accessible clothing. if jeonghan wasn't so forgetful of his own articles of clothing, it wouldn't be the case that you steal his favorite sunglasses and borrow his usual rings and get a little too caught up in the way his cologne lingers on his jackets and night shirts, a smell all-too comforting and somehow tempting...

— you attempted to give the necklace back later that week when you and jeonghan met up to take the domino route to university, but he just shrugged it off and told you that you might as well keep it. he already bought himself another.

and besides. it looked good on you.

— and as for the last of Jeonghan's Habits™ (certified and trademarked, of course, everything jeonghan did was protected by common law)... well... the discovery of this one came later, at a time you weren't expecting it, and so perhaps that explains why it makes you as flustered as it does.

— see, it's of no surprise that yoon jeonghan is clingy in a very positive sense.

being friends with jeonghan is always being kept in the loop, having an ongoing dialogue about most everything, doing lot of Things together and always knowing that if there's something you're even thinking of doing, jeonghan has already cleared his schedule in anticipation of going to do said thing alongside you.

— what surprised you, but really shouldn't have (so perhaps the right word is simply astonished, flustered, made giddy by the realization of), was that he was also very cuddly. and very hard to be talked out of, no less.

— and like, okay, sure, it was kind of hypocritical of you to be taken aback when you'd been indulging jeonghan of his affinity for physical touch for quite some time, now.

the surprise hugs whenever he caught you waiting for the campus shuttle or simply Minding Your Own Business, his inclination towards taking your hand to make you walk a little faster when the two of you were going convenience store diving (yes, again), the quite literal poking and prodding whenever he was attempting to get you to change your mind and agree with his worst impulses... it was all pretty damning, in retrospect. but it never really fazed you: jeonghan's cuddly sort of behavior.

though you had gotten a smug kind of glee whenever you initiated contact and jeonghan's cheeks would warm to a beautiful shade of pink before he'd counter his own seeming embarrassment with a comment like "aaahhhh y/n, you're so familiar, what would others think if they saw you?"

randomly touch jeonghan's forearm, whether to pull him closer for some reason or another or just to softly massage the skin while you absentmindedly scrolled on your phone (instagram scrolling was sacred time you and jeonghan shared — then you didn't have to send him the reel with your comments, you could just tap him on the shoulder and show him). they way jeonghan would get all shy at the touch — like maybe he felt some of those butterflies that perpetually fluttered about in your stomach whenever he was around — was all the satisfaction you could ever need.

— so yes, you were quite used to clingy jeonghan. but cuddly? you had never quite strayed into full cuddle territory... until you did.

— that fateful night, you had lovingly been given notice via a very abrupt group text that you would not be able to return to your apartment for the evening (someone was going to have company over, doing... things that familiar company do) and when you had told jeonghan of your plans to join seonghwa in his trip to the computer rooms at crescent hub (they were open 24 hours and while it was based on reservation, you were almost always able to get a seat), he offered you come to his apartment instead.

either that, or i guess you could spend your time watching the gaming club host whatever tournament they had going on — apparently jun was planning to be gone for Quite Some Time (as a senior member of the club) and shua was there... for moral support? that part was unclear, to be quite honest, but it wasn't as though shua ever needed a reason to be Busy and Outgoing, so it didn't quite matter much, in the end.

"why aren't you at crescent hub with your roommates, then?"

"and encourage them? ah... don't make me look soft."

and you're sure that the way you roll your eyes can be heard through the phone.

"i had an assignment to finish." / "you had work to finish."

"but! it's all been submitted now."

"then i'll meet you."

— after all, it's not like you were a stranger to jun's apartment — you'd hung out there plenty of times as your bond with jeonghan deepened and your friendship to shua and jun grew — and they did have a rather comfy couch... you were almost certain jeonghan's offer implied and unspoken 'you can at least get some comfortable sleep on our vertiable cloud of a couch when i'm done prying at the finer details as to just who momo decided to bring home.'

you both, after all, had a deep-seeded delight for gossip.

— and when you got there, it was exactly what you expected: jeonghan had seemingly raided the pantry finding ingredients so the two of you could make dakdoritang — excepting the carrot, of course.

despite his seeming love for convenience store runs and general lazy attitude toward preparing his own meals, cooking together seemed to be something jeonghan enjoyed lately — or at least, that's what you surmised. to you, it seemed that one day jeonghan woke up and chose cooking as a new hobby.

if you were to ask jeonghan, he would brush it off, of course, probably saying something about his mom visiting and praising jun's affinity for cooking and there was no way jeonghan could let the bastard win — but really all it had taken was one (1) absentminded hand on his chest from you and a "hannie, can you pass me the garlic cloves?" for him to make cooking with you a new personality trait of his. go figure.

— and so the two of you made your stew while debating which movie you should watch when you were done. you ended up compromising on some drama that you'd seen people claim was so bad it was good, and it really was. the cringe,,,, the mutual yelling at the tv,,,,,,, threatening the lives of fictional characters,,,,,,, talking over whole dialogue scenes because you had a brilliant rewrite in mind and jeonghan simply couldn't resist the way you looked when there was an earnestness in your eyes and an opinion on your lips,,,,

it was quite late, indeed, before you even knew it. and when you switched the tv to a music video you really wanted to show jeonghan, the autoplay sort of took over, and your mind sort of shut down... drifted off to sleep.

— you woke up at some point in the early morning; the sound of the lock clicking and the door opening wasn't the sound you were used to, in your apartment two doors down, and it was just enough to snap you awake momentarily, still half in dream yet with one foot in reality.

it was just shua and jun, and they whispered an apology before padding off to their respective rooms (jun his own, shua his shared room with hannie), clearly worn out from their gaming activities.

— but that little push to semi-wakefulness was just enough for you to take stock of where you were, and you noticed belatedly that jeonghan had never left to go back to his room. you were both sleeping on the couch, legs intertwined; jeonghan was resting his head on your shoulder and your hands were reaching out, as if almost to give him a subconscious hug.

— the embarrassment ran through your nervous system almost instantly, and when you made to slowly and gently move your limbs so you were less... interwoven, jeonghan stirred and, still sleeping, pulled you back towards him. perhaps even closer than before.

you couldn't help yourself. a giggle escaped you; perhaps half nerves, mostly endearment. jeonghan stirred again and the sound and you covered your mouth, not wanting to wake him.

he stilled soon enough, and before drifting off again, you kissed him on the forehead.

— when you fully woke up the next morning, jeonghan had already began his day, but he didn't even try to hide the fact that the both of you had unwittingly unlocked a new feature in this friendship of yours. he sort of just... took the night prior as a confirmation that cuddling was on the list of approved actions and refused to let go of you, after.

not that it bothered you, of course.

it just seemed that the butterflies in your stomach were given wild energy at this new development; all your strategies for calming them suddenly ineffective.

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW (CONT.) ☄. *. ⋆

— so.

if you had asked jeonghan at any point in his life if he were good at manipulating, his answer would be an unequivocable yes.

deceit? of course.

scheming? obviously.

lying? naturally.

blackmailing? most assuredly.

gaslighting, gatekeeping, girlbossing? undoubtedly.

changing criteria? yes.

moving goalposts? clearly.

hiding the apparent? well...

— see, the thing is... you get so good at the others that concealing the obvious isn't exactly necessary. everyone might know to be wary of the scheming, cheating, self-serving yoon jeonghan, but it didn't change the fact that he was so astute at the rest of it, image didn't exactly matter.

and besides, why save face when it was so fun to see people accuse him of what they were all very aware?

— so yes, jeonghan was quite skilled at all manner of deception. the one facet he was not so adept in was hiding his feelings toward the matter.

— thus, it should be no surprise that everyone and their mother knew jeonghan had a crush.

and it was only getting worse.

— don't ask jun when he put the dots together — he was more emotionally intellectual than he let on most of the time — and don't ask joshuji when either — that fucker had this quirk where he joked about something before it had real honest basis, but in some way only attributed to the gift of clairvoyance, he always seemed to be right. if you were to ask joshua, he'd likely recall the first time he had looked at jeonghan and wiggled his eyebrows and call that he knew then (he didn't; at least, not really).

— as for s.coups... well, don't ever ask cheol anything about jeonghan. he'd rather die than give it to you straight.

please. when he could embarrass jeonghan? seungcheol lives for that shit.

after all, what else are older brothers for?

— so yes, it was obvious to those close to him that jeonghan was in the long-suffering limbo of Having A Thing For Your Best Friend But Not Acting On It, and it had been apparent for months.

— after all, it felt like centuries ago that joshua had offered to play matchmaker for jeonghan and you — the veritable apple of his eye — and set the two of you up on a date.

it had been some lazy morning and jun nearly spit out his breakfast.

"you'd both love it! i'd get jihoon to play something romantic on the violin; well, maybe recorder—"

cue jun choking once more.

"and you could be there waiting in full suit and tie."

"with couples rings waiting in the bread basket." and joshua's eyes went comically and maniacally wide at jun's inclusion.

"ah, cheol would crash any date like that."

"but then y/n could get his blessing!"

— at some point, jun was at his wits end.

in his defense, it was him who had to see the two of you be all sweet and love-struck all the time, giggling and teasing each other on his couch in his apartment while all he's trying to do is eat a sorry excuse of a subway sandwich (eat fresh.) before jetting off to his internship again.

if you had to see that shit while eating soggy bread you'd be annoyed, too.

one more "aigoooo" while jeonghan squishes your cheeks, and you bat him away with a roll of your eyes and jun would take a knife out of the block behind him.

— especially when jeonghan started calling you "angel" at every chance he got. had jun's eye twitching, it did. never had he regretted getting roommates until jeonghan fell in love.

one day jun learned that the phrase "get a room" made at least one of you self conscious enough to at least tone it down, and he never stopped weaponizing it, since.

— of course, overtime jun's protests became background noise, but once, when your roommates and jeonghan's all went to the museum of fine arts together to celebrate the end of finals week (it was free admission so long as you had your svtu activities card), jun had deadpanned his new favorite phrase in the middle of the outdoor conversation area. jeonghan had turned to you grinning, like it was the excuse he'd been waiting for all day, and after a lighthearted "shall we?" you grabbed his hand and the two of you pranced off to explore the sculpture terrace.

jeonghan had raised an eyebrow at your choice of exhibit, but you pulled him over to a sculpture of a human figure with black wings and flashed a smile: “it’s not a private room, but i think it works.”

“if you’d prefer it, i’m sure there’s a custodial closet we could go to instead. i bet there's one right outside, even.”

you snorted. “and if i did kiss you? what would you do then?"

— you stunned him into silence. him. yoon jeonghan.

— right as he was about to recover and shoot back some smartass comment, you laughed — the sound clear and playful, bright and radiating with warmth — and then you wandered to where they showcased student work.

— umm... uhhh... WHATTHEFUCKWEREYOUDOING WHATTHEFUCKWASGOINGONNNNNN

“angel.”

you hummed absentmindedly, only half hearing jeonghan through the internal screaming reverberating in your skull.

“y/nnnnnnnnnnnnnnn…”

he was closer now, if you focused, you were sure you could feel him, inching closer, right behind you, just to your right…

— he kissed your cheek: half on the corner of your lips, half on the soft of your skin.

— you couldn’t help yourself. you turned.

“if you were bold enough to kiss me here, i’d kiss you back. then i’d be scandalized, ‘how forward!’”

your mouth opened: in shock, in delight, in laughter, in a heavenly mix of the three. jeonghan just stood there, all self-satisfied grin.

“you could waste your time finding a comeback, or you could be forward.”

“i think i have time for both.”

☄. *. ⋆

end of file .

SVT (sophrosyne; virtù; truth) University hopes you've enjoyed your stay !

#writing.svtu #seventeen x reader #seventeen imagine #seventeen x you #svt x you #svt imagine #svt x reader #jeonghan x reader #jeonghan x you #jeonghan imagine #yoon jeonghan x reader #still in that limbo of not knowing how to tag things but fuck it we ball ✌︎#if you want more svtu!jeonghan feel free to send in asks!!!!#honestly svtu has been eating at my brain for so long i have NOTES for this universe i'm so full of this story you could ask me any minute #detail and i probably have Reasons and Thoughts for it #all at once i had more planned for this headcanon set and yet nothing to add so we'll see what i end up doing with this headcanon set #also i think this reader deserves to have poodle jeonghan too that hairstyle lives rent free

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gffa · 7 months ago

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TALES OF THE EMPIRE wound up being a mixed bag for me, there was a lot I enjoyed but there was a lot that just felt really unfulfilled. Morgan's episodes were very pretty to look at but I couldn't help thinking--the entire time I was watching, even--that Filoni's not great at creating new characters that can carry entire episodes like this, none of this felt particularly necessary or like it was fulfilling a void that I wanted to know more about. It doesn't help that I still think her arc in live action was badly handled, that if she was meant to be a Nightsister from the beginning, her first episode should have dealt with that, instead of springing it on us later, so when filling in the background of her on Dathomir in TOTE, it brings all that up for me again.

Morgan's first episode was so pretty and it was interesting to potentially get more Dathomir lore (even if it's incredibly thin and I felt it was too close to the "we see others suffering in the galaxy, but we don't want to get our own hands dirty by fighting for other people or getting involved in helping others, btw we're morally better for that :)" trope for me personally) but everything on Corvus just felt superfluous to me and I spent time trying to figure out why I felt that way. If they had done her story this way or that way, would I have enjoyed it more? If they had included this or that, would I have thought it more necessary?

And ultimately I just kept coming back to that I don't really care about Morgan Elsbeth enough that I wanted three animated shorts dedicated to her, when I could have had so many other characters get fleshed out better. I appreciated that they were showing two characters on opposite journeys, that Morgan was falling into the dark step by step, while Barriss was slowly clawing her way out of it, but that's about all that I appreciated of Morgan's story (other than the beautiful animation).

But I'm not sure I feel like Morgan's motivations were all that well planned out. It's clear that she's looking for revenge and trying to find a new family at the same time, but it's not really clear why she's working with the Empire or how she thinks this leads her to her goals. Grievous is the one who murdered her village, how does working with the Empire (as the Separatists were folded into the Empire, too) achieve that goal? Who or what is her revenge focused on? Is it that she just wants the whole galaxy to burn, because if her village burned, so should everyone else? I feel like that's probably what they were going for, but that it could have been more coherently written.

Barriss' episodes hit a lot harder, where I'm glad that she at least got an arc, but I feel like it just missed so many marks, like why even have Vader there, I'm all for gratuitous Anakin cameos, he's my trash can man and I'm always excited to see him, but absolutely nothing was done with him, despite that he was looking Barriss right in the face there. Not even a moment of showing the audience, "Oh, his soul is so far into the dark of fear, hate, and rage that he doesn't even care about her anymore." Just nothing there, like there was no connection at all. How do you go to the lengths of putting Vader in a scene with Barriss and then treat it like there's no history between her and Anakin??? So completely unsatisfying!

And then it's another series where other guest appearances would have made sense--Barriss has a whole unfinished story with Ahsoka and you don't include her here? I'm as tired of Filoni putting Ahsoka in everything as anyone else, but here it would have made sense and would have brought that relationship full circle on-screen, Barriss' betrayal of her and her clawing her way back to the light after all the trauma and hurt, there's so much she and Ahsoka would have between them. And then nothing.

Or Barriss' relationship with Luminara, TCW never really got into how that must have felt for Luminara, to have her student betray the Jedi so profoundly, for her to fall to the dark, there's such a well of potential there and it's just entirely ignored. She mentions Luminara once and it was a lovely mention, but there's no sense of resolution or completion to that arc.

I did enjoy her story with Lyn and I try not to compare what the show wanted to do with what I wanted the show to do, but I couldn't help it. During all those scenes, all I could think was that this could have been so much more powerful and complete if it had focus on Barriss' established relationships and characters I already care about, because a new random Inquisitor is just not going to hold the same weight for me as my pre-investment in Ahsoka and Luminara. (On the other hand, with the way they butchered Luminara in the last season of TCW, maybe I dodged a bullet!)

For all that negativity, though, I really loved that Barriss found herself in being a healer again, that she found the light again. That's all I've wanted for my girl!!!! (That and put a headdress on her, ffs.) I legitimately took in a hard breath when she said, "Then you have one more Jedi to deal with." because Barriss is still working through too much to fully come back to clarity re: the Jedi at that point , but when it really came down to it, when she really saw what the dark side really was, part of her still was a Jedi. And the way she spoke of her time as a Jedi, once she had a clearer, lighter head again, was sweet, I was so surprised that we got that much from her, but I'm so glad because, if nothing else, Barriss herself deserves to be in the light again.

The way she was settled into her own skin by the time she confronted Lyn on the icy planet, the way she genuinely wanted to help her, but wouldn't let her hurt innocent children, the way she could sidestep Lyn's predictable moves and could stop the blade with just a hand held out, she found her path and what she wanted to do, and oh it was so lovely to see Barriss finding herself again. I loved so much that her unshakable compassion did reach Lyn, it was such a satisfying arc for Barriss to reach that place after all the people she'd hurt. I loved so much that Barriss getting back to this place does a lot to remind us that her foundation is a compassionate one, even if she was lost to the dark for awhile.

I just wish that there had been acknowledgement of those she hurt, the people that died because of her, the betrayal she stabbed people in the back with, rather than just "sees the dark side is bad, walks away, finds the light again", which goes back to that this feels like a generic story that's mostly impactful because I'm filling in the gaps myself because I already know Barriss as a character, rather than that it continues the story that was previously told about her.

At the end of the day, I enjoyed it and I recognize that I'm being a little unfair in how I'm saying I wanted this, this, and this, rather than digesting what the show itself wanted to do, but when you're crafting two stories that are specifically about showing us the journey of two characters that originate elsewhere, you're drawing on the stories from those other origins--except TOTE decided to only halfway do that. There's a lot to love in these shorts, the animation was incredible, the voice work was incredible, Barriss' emotional journey was incredible and I'm so thankful that they even gave her any kind of compassionate resolution. But the specter of how much the shorts ignored hangs over it too heavily for me to say that they were anywhere near what they could have been imo.

#lumi.txt #star wars #barriss offee #morgan elsbeth #meta #tales of the empire #tales of the empire spoilers

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couldyouimagine-that · 5 months ago

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Take a Moment

Genre; hurt/comfort, fluff

Word count; 1.8k

Warnings; description of reader feeling overwhelmed, reader having a little doubt as to why Gabriel is helping them so much.

Pairing; Gabriel (Supernatural) x Reader

Gabriel who is absolutely smitten with the reader sees they are feeling overwhelmed whilst researching a case and offers to take them somewhere quiet – comfort and cuddling ensues.

I’m back! I really enjoyed writing this one (I'm rewatching Supernatural at the moment and my love of Gabriel has been rekindled) and I’m considering doing something similar with Lucifer – let me know if that’s something you would want to read. Enjoy!

Masterlist

You didn’t even have to say anything for Gabriel to know something was wrong. Castiel was never likely to notice, but the archangel had to forgive him that. His brother wasn’t the most perceptive when it came to emotion. The Winchesters were very perceptive, but they were only human and you were covering your discomfort well. Your breathing was regular and steady, there were no signs of a tapping foot or a repetitive hand movement, or anything that would signal how you felt.

But Gabriel could actually feel how you felt, one of the perks of his true form being an enormous series of celestial wavelengths. It was incomprehensible to you, he was sure, but you understood enough about angels to get the gist. He watched as you sat at the end of the table in the bunker’s library, having put yourself there so that no one would sit down next to you. You had your legs crossed tight at the knee, your arms crossed where you leaned forward on the table. Your posture looked closed off, but there was a mug of coffee by your side and you had been reading lore for hours. The others would assume you had slept poorly or were bored senseless. What that posture really meant was that you were protecting yourself, consciously or not.

Nothing had happened to trigger it, but it was clear to Gabriel that you felt incredibly overwhelmed. He stayed were he had set himself up by one of the bookshelves, one hip cocked against it. He had seen you leave situations like this in the past, when things finally did get too much and you needed some space to yourself. Equally, he had seen you try to tough it out and pretend everything was fine more times than he wanted to count. He truly wishes you knew you didn’t have to, regardless of if that meant you wanted his help or not.

Sam and Dean were sitting far enough down the table that it didn’t seem to be affecting your clear need – or clear to Gabriel, at least – for personal space. Castiel was browsing books along the shelves on the other side of the room, so whilst Gabriel wanted desperately to intervene and help you, he was glad for a moment to think that he wouldn’t need to.

That was until the idiot brothers decided to open their mouths.

“Hey Y/N, did you find anything on that weapon?”

Gabriel would have liked to snap Dean’s mouth shut. You told him that you hadn’t with a small smile, short but not unkind. Gabriel could see the effort it took for you to regain your focus on your reading. Just a few minutes later and Sam was the one to interrupt you, asking for the title of a book you had mentioned to him the previous day. This time it was harder for you to concentrate on your task again. It was when Dean disrupted your work for a third time, asking if you wanted more coffee as he stood and made his way to the kitchen, that you couldn’t take it a second longer.

Your refusal was decisive and your chair legs scraped against the floor as you pushed back from the table. You left the room quickly with a muttered excuse about going to look for a different book. Gabriel took his chance and flew ahead of you, leaving the library without anyone noticing. He was leaning against the wall outside your room when you arrived in a flurry from the speed at which you had been walking. You jumped in surprise when you rounded the corner to see him standing there and promptly tried to push straight past him in an effort to get a moment by yourself.

“Sorry Gabriel, I just need a minute.” Your words were quiet and your breathing had turned heavy. He knew that he would be making things worse for you in the moment, but he also knew he could help in the long run.

“Hey, sugar…” he murmured, voice even softer than it normally was when he spoke to you. “You wanna go somewhere quiet?”

You paused, hand on the door to your little closed in space in the bunker. No windows, not much by way of fresh air, and a whole group of people in the library just waiting to interrupt your alone time. You trusted Gabriel, knew he would never do anything to hurt you. And you desperately needed a break from it all.

He could have jumped for joy when you nodded, but he kept his reaction contained. He offered you a hand, palm up, which you took hold of immediately. The bunker was gone in the time it took you to blink. Instead, you stood in the main room of a sunny villa-like house, all open plan and large windows. Orange sunlight streamed in from a setting sun and to your right, double glass doors led out onto a sprawling patio. Bright blue pool water glimmered from its centre.

Gabriel let your hand slip from his as you took a few steps into the room, looking around with a beautiful if not tired smile.

“Is this yours?” You asked, a hint of wonder in your words that made Gabriel’s chest swell.

“Just a bit of real estate I have over in Cali.” He gave you his classic playful smirk as you looked back at him, amused by his dismissal of such a nice place. “Make yourself at home, sugar. You want a drink?” You seemed to consider something for a moment, rolling the sentence around in your mouth.

“Actually, I – this is probably silly, but can we just sit down for a minute?”

We.

You wanted to sit down with him until you felt better. That was how much you trusted him, how safe you felt with him. Outwardly, he just gave you a smile and sauntered over to one of the couches arranged artfully around the room.

“Course we can! And don’t ever worry about sounding silly with me.”

He held an intense moment of eye contact with you to make sure his message sank in. You took a seat on the other side of the couch and Gabriel couldn’t resist stretching an arm out along the back of it, behind your head. Not touching, but the invitation was there. You smiled to yourself at his less than subtle antics. He grinned like a cheshire cat when you shifted further towards him and rested your head on his shoulder. He slid his arm around your shoulders and pulled you in close, resting his cheek atop your head. You in turn curled into him fully and wound an arm around his neck.

Gabriel didn’t bother to fight the warm feeling in his chest. He felt no need to deny to himself how fond he was of you, instead just enjoying the moment. He felt you relaxing against him physically, but he also felt your mind becoming calmer. His breath shifted your hair as he took in the scent of your shampoo. He had years of experience passing time in the company of humans, but this little display of trust you were putting on meant more to him than a lot of that put together.

His other hand alighted on your hip as you moved closer still, mindlessly seeking comfort. You tucked your legs up onto the couch and the movement allowed you to put more of your weight against the archangel. He wrapped an arm around your waist and you reached your own up over his shoulders. He smiled at you ever so warmly as you tucked your face into his neck, watching your eyes close as you let out a contented sigh. He began to card his fingers through your hair, lightly scraping his nails over the back of your head, and all but basked in the way your head tilted further forwards onto his shoulder.

“You know you can talk to me when you feel like that, right? Or any time. I’m always here if you need me to be.” You tightened your hold on him for a brief moment. “And you can come here whenever you want, just give me the word.”

You leaned back a little at that, catching his eye.

“Gabriel, thank you. Really, thank you, but… why are you doing all this for me?” He rolled his eyes playfully without missing a beat.

“Oh no, the big bad archangel Gabriel looks like he might actually give a crap about some human.” He waved his hands around for dramatic affect before placing them back on you. He then tilted his head forward, narrowing his eyes and raising a brow. “Seriously?” The half shrug you offered had him muttering heatedly to himself in Enochian. “Seriously? Is it really that shocking that I give a damn about you? Why is this coming as such a surprise?” You were planning on not answering that verbally but he refused to let you look away. “Come on, sugar. You must know I care about you by now.” Gabriel’s hand started on a steady path up and down your back, waiting for your answer. You stumbled around your words for a lot longer than you would have liked, still unhappy with what you settled for in the end.

“I – didn’t really realise.”

“You think I bring anyone else here when I can see they need some space to breathe?” He wasn’t mocking, or even upset, he was just being direct.

“I’m surprised you brought me here,” you muttered, very quiet. He didn’t deign to answer that in words, but the look he gave you said come on. You gave a soft sigh of your own. “Gabriel, look. I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t realise you cared about me so much, I really didn’t.” He went to hit back, likely with something disparaging, so you tapped his nose to get his attention. The self-righteous expression of how dare you had a grin pulling at your lips. “You can complain about me not realising later, alright? You were a much more calming influence when you weren’t saying anything.” He repeated that back to you, absolutely exasperated by your nerve, but you tucked your face back into his shoulder instead of replying. You felt him shake his head, even as his arms wound back around you.

You knew you wouldn’t have much time left before you needed to return to the bunker, but for the time being, you simply enjoyed your moment of peace.

#gabriel x reader #supernatural gabriel x reader #supernatural gabriel #supernatural x reader #archangel gabriel x reader #supernatural reader insert #spn gabriel x reader #spn gabriel #supernatural

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cauli-is-awake · 6 days ago

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life series theorising (spoilers ahead beware)

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

i like lore and was bored so i compiled this neat lil theory about the life series'.

the main thought in this is, what if it was meant to end with secret life?

and that's why it was so different from the other series before? it was meant to be a big dramatic finale from the watchers and it got fucked up by the players still, and that's why we have wild life -where the watchers are angry and have completely let loose- .

think about it, the really obvious watcher reference in the secret keeper, no more mystery and controlling the games ominously from the shadows, they were directly "we are in control and doing this to you". the tasks getting harder and building up to the final "win secret life" it's so much an order than any other finale:

third life "there can only be one winner" -grian desperately wants to remain in his desert peacefully with scar but is forced to give it up to make it so there is only one winner as the watchers intended. even his jump of the cliff is an act of defiance, killing himself on his terms.

last life "i've spent all season being honourable, im not about to stop now" -scott isn't in a bloodlust like many other players, he is defying the watchers, not by living on peacefully (for he knows that isn't possible) but by having a fair match, being honest and never betraying allies and ending it in a similar fashion, the watchers are furious and strike him down for defying them, vowing to end this treachery.

double life "tilly death do us part" -pearl is given the win by scott. in lore you cant tell me that wasn't purposeful a pairing, and after sessions and sessions of fighting it all comes to an end with scott's sacrifice (already going against the watchers in not going with his soulmate and again by killing himself). the watchers are hoping, WAITING for this full scale fight that never happened. and the worst part is, PEARL FORGAVE HIM. they made up. the watchers are fucking pissedddd.

limited life "this is a death match for a reason" -martyn in the watchers grasps is common is lim life fics, and it leans into that build up of wanting control and watching players thwart it every time, so they full on possess a player and make him win the way they want, with betrayal and violence (even better the players were trying to organise another "fair fight" between the final three). They brought back the boogie, maybe that was there anger festering and they had to cause more chaos and bloodshed and on such short notice just borrowed from Last life? Even the life gimmick of lim life kinda feels like a hint at the near end, time is counting down like the watchers patience and willingness to play, once the countdown (limlife) is over, the finale begins. This time the game ends as the watchers want BECAUSE they interfered, proving to themselves they still control the games.

then we get to secret life and everything is meant to end:

jimmy isn't the first to die (canary curse)

scotts alliance breaks apart (his loyalty is finally tested)

a substantial amount of murder from non reds (boogey apocalypse)

in secret life everything changes

BUT IT DIDNT (dun dun dun)

LIZZIE DIED FIRST BUT WAS STUCK IN THE VOID, CANARY CURSE CONTINUES

GEM AND THE SCOTTS FALL APART IN THE BOOGEY APOCALYPSE BUT SCOTT IS STILL LOYAL AND LAYS DOWN HIS LIFE FOR GEM

AND PEOPLE SURVIVE THE BOOGEY APOCALYPSE, SO THE TASK FAILS

(i could draw more differences but this is enough example for me)

so their big dramatic finale failed

maybe that's why scar lived?

the watchers forgot him in the secret life world in their rage

UNTIL WILDLIFE:

when they are throwing everything at them possible (WILDNESS)

(atleast this time it seems to be working if mumbo's death is anything to go by)

thanks for listening to my yapping ^-^

i love drawing silly conclusions from the series

#life series #trafficblr #3rd life #last life #double life #limited life #secret life #wild life smp #the sillies in my brain went rahhhhhh and then i had this #me when my two braincells slap eachother until i form a Thought

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samdeancass · 2 months ago

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Too Much

Requested by Anonymous

Prompt: #39 from my Prompt List: "I'm not a human, I never was. So why are you expecting me to act like one?"

Pairing: Castiel x Winchester!reader

Genre: Angst, Slight Fluff

Characters: Castiel, Y/N, Dean, Sam

Description: Lately, Castiel hasn't paid much attention to Y/N, leaving them feeling lonely and confused. When they confront him about it, they don't get the reaction they were expecting.

From the moment you first saw Castiel, you knew you would fall hard. However, being the sister of Sam and Dean Winchester made it ten times harder than it should have been. Dean was always very overprotective when it came to you and was not very happy when you confessed your unique and deep feelings for Cas to him.

"That's not a good idea," Dean warned. But you stood your ground. "Cas isn't like the others. He chose us over his own family. That's not the action of an emotionless being!" Dean, defeated, pulled you into a hug. "I'm happy for you, but please, be careful. I don't want to see you hurt."

Sam, always the voice of reason, had a different perspective on your feelings for Castiel. 'I thought angels couldn't be with humans. How would it even work? Can they start families? Do they even understand human emotions?' Sam pondered these questions while you stood in the doorway, rolling your eyes. 'I've never read anything that says angels can't be in a relationship with a human. And I believe that Castiel and I can figure it out.' Your determination shone through your words. Sam smiled and nodded. 'Thanks for sharing, Y/N. I'm sure it'll all work out.'

After dealing with your brothers, you weren't sure that Cas could feel the same about you, whether he would even understand what they would mean. After spending hours trying to figure it out, you decided to just go ahead and tell him. He was sitting in the library, looking through lore books, when he looked up and smiled widely at your sudden presence. "Hello, Y/N." You smiled back at Cas, his smile always infectious. "Hey, Cas." You sat opposite him, twiddling your thumbs in your lap. He tilted his head with worry and confusion, clearly recognising your feelings. "Y/N, what's the matter?" You locked eyes with Cas, and your breath hitched in your throat before taking a deep breath. "Truth is, Cas, I've got something to confess. I've felt something for you for a while, but I haven't had the confidence to tell you until now. I wasn't sure whether you could reciprocate those feelings or even understand what they mean, but I needed to tell you."

To your surprise, Castiel smiled widely back at you, his hand reaching across the table to take yours. "I feel the same way, Y/N. At first, I wasn't sure what they meant, so I talked with Dean. He said, and I quote, 'If you hurt her, I will kill you, bring you back and send your ass down to hell.' I wasn't sure how you felt about me, so I kept them to myself. So, you couldn't imagine how happy you have just made me." You brought your hand up to your mouth and kissed it, a sentiment that made Cas blush. "I can imagine, angel. I feel the same way."

For the next few months, your relationship with Castiel and your feelings for each other grew. Considering your hunting life, you could have never imagined you would ever find someone to love. There were dangers to being the girlfriend of an angel, but you were already a Winchester, so you were used to the threat. Your relationship wasn't conventional; you had to teach Castiel a lot about love and how to treat the person you loved, but you didn't mind. He was your angel, and his innocence made you love him even more.

However, no matter how hard you tried to teach Castiel how to act with the person you loved, it never seemed to stick. You often found yourself alone in the bunker whilst he and your brothers were off hunting, stuck on the sidelines and feeling rather lonely. He never used to leave you behind; he loved being by your side whilst hunting, but something has changed, and you were determined to know what.

You waited until they returned from the hunt and walked into the war room, arms across your chest. "Oh no, Cas, you've done something wrong, buddy. She's got that look in her eyes." You narrowed your eyes at Sam, a silent warning to shut the hell up. He chuckled and held up his hands in surrender before making his way to the kitchen, Dean following suit but not before making sure you were ok. "Hey, kid. Everything good? Do I need to make good on my promise?" You smiled slightly at him and shook your head. "Everything's fine, Dean. Cas and I just need to chat; that's all." He nodded in understanding before following his brother. Cas made his way towards you, a soft smile on his face and placing a kiss on your head, but sensed your tenseness and his features changed completely.

"Y/N, what's wrong? Did something happen while we were away?" You shook your head, a soft breath leaving your mouth. "Let's go to my room; we need to talk about something." He looked confused but followed you to your room, closing the door behind him. "What's the matter? I can sense that there's something wrong." "You're right, Cas. There is something wrong. Something wrong with us." His expression changed as you finished your sentence to a look of hurt and sadness. "What do you mean? I don't understand. We both love each other; there's nothing wrong with that." You took his hands and guided him to the foot of your bed, sitting yourselves down. "I agree; there's nothing wrong with us loving each other, Cas. But it's been feeling rather one-sided lately. I always show you how much I love you by doing your favourite things and teaching you the ways of the human world. I always want to spend time with you, but you either push me away or you're too busy. You leave me behind on hunts even though you know I can handle my own. I'm kind of sick of being in this relationship alone. When humans are in a relationship, actions and feelings are reciprocated."

Castiel ripped his hands from yours, and his expression turned into frustration and hurt. "You seem to forget, Y/N, I'm not a human, and I never was. So why are you expecting me to act like one? I don't know how you act or treat each other in relationships, and I barely even know how to act properly with my friends. I'm trying so hard to let you know that I love you, but I don't know how. I never want to push you away, Y/N; I just don't know how to act around you, and it becomes too much for me to handle. I never want to leave you behind when I go with your brothers, but I feel like I must, so I know you're safe; that's the only way I know how to properly show you my love. If that's not good enough, then I suppose our relationship isn't working at all."

Before you could say anything, Castiel stormed out of the room and past the kitchen, alerting the brothers that something had happened. You knew he had left with the bang of the bunker door, and sobs wracked your body. You hadn't realised Cas didn't know what to do; you just thought he was lousy. Sam and Dean rushed to your room and wrapped you in their arms, seeing your state. "He's gone, hasn't he? He's really gone. I've really hurt him, guys. I need to find him to get him back." You were about to stand up, but Dean pulled you back down, shaking his head. "No, princess. Let him cool off; he'll be back. No matter what happened between the two of you, he'd never leave you." You smiled and nodded, but you had a horrible feeling in your stomach that he wouldn't come back.

Tags:

@bxoken-heartss @deascheck

#castiel #castiel x reader #castiel imagine #castiel fanfiction #castiel fluff #castiel angst #dean winchester #sam winchester #supernatural #supernatural imagine #supernatural fanfiction #supernatural fluff #supernatural angst

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zaahvi · 2 months ago

Text

dirthamen and ghilan'nain's intertwined history — a theory

the relationship between dirthamen and ghilan'nain within the lore has always been unclear but incredibly fascinating to me, and after these past few months of being haunted by it i think i've finally figured it out!

in this *very* long post i'll be breaking down their connections and piecing together theories to make sense of their dynamic and history, investigating the more puzzling elements of dirthamen's lore, and exploring how this all ties into the evanuris' eventual betrayal of mythal. i've kept this theory free of veilguard spoilers so everyone is able to read it!

—————

the connections

the reason why dirthamen and ghilan'nain's dynamic is often overlooked is because most of the ties they have to each other can be easily missed or are sometimes misinterpreted. there is only ONE codex entry that explicitly mentions them together, and while that is already widely discussed, there are many smaller connections between them. so here is everything i've found!

the bear mural:

this mural in dai shows a white antlered figure embracing a green bear. to me, it looks like the bear is being protective of the figure (judging by the fact that they are reaching up to it). the art style looks elven and it's used in a few locations, such as the skyhold barn...

...aaand at calenhad's foothold in the hinterlands:

and well well well, that's dirthamen's statue seated just above it...

so this mural seems to depict dirthamen as the bear and ghilan'nain as the antlered figure, specifically how the dalish may depict them in their legends:

dirthamen's sacred animal was the bear (x), (source is a dalish elf, this info is not found anywhere in elvhen lore)

ghilan'nain had "snowy white hair" and became the first halla (x), (source is a dalish elf, this info is not found anywhere in elvhen lore)

it should be said, the amount of actual elvhen lore we have is very limited, so these could in fact be true and not just misinterpreted by the dalish. though they've been twisted, dalish legends came from somewhere, and especially in ghil's example it makes complete sense to portray her as a woman with antlers and white hair when her sacred animal has antlers and white fur. and while dirthamen is mentioned only with corvids in ancient elvhen lore, they are mentioned as seperate entities than him, so the bear could in fact be the representation of himself. in any case, i'm proceeding with the assumption that this mural is indeed supposed to portray them.

so, as the figure is reaching out to the bear herself, i'm ruling out any possibility of the bear being hostile towards her. it looks like the bear is protecting her, from what? or who? above them is the moon, perhaps it's an indication that mythal is watching, and/or that the bear is protecting or hiding the antlered lady away from her?

———

mosaics in the lost temple of dirthamen:

the design of dirthamen's temple is really fascinating. there's elven imagery scattered all throughout, but mosaics of himself are completely missing. there are, however, mosaics of two other elven gods...

there are five green mosaics of falon'din... and two red ones of ghilan'nain. next to one of ghil's there is also this:

falon'din being there makes sense given that he and dirthamen were "twin souls", which we're not entirely sure what that meant, but either way they had some sort of deep bond. ghilan'nain, however... and this specific mural... less so. this art in particular really reminds me of this description of the bas-reliefs from the horror of hormak:

"The halla were different, wrong. They had too many horns, for one, and a harder, more rounded look than normal. A look that was almost insectile. And the horns themselves were longer and ridged. Organic, somehow."

so, why would dirthamen have put her mosaics in his temple? clearly they had some sort of connection, close enough that he decided to honour her within his own place of worship. you don't just put some other god in your temple for no reason, you know?

on why dirthamen's mosaics are missing:

my best guess is that they were defaced/taken down afterwards, either by his own priests or by invaders. the codex entry for the lost temple mentions madness caused by the secrets they held...

"We will not have it, will not have it! The secrets are madness in our ears, but they are ours The Highest One cannot take them from us. Only Dirthamen, our Keeper, only he And if he does not take the secrets They are ours forever."

...and unless dismembering your high priest was a holy tradition to dirthamen then yeah, it doesn't seem like they were entirely sane. for whatever reason, in their madness, they could have torn down the mosaics.

though invaders seem more likely here, simply because they would have just... done a better job defacing mosaics if they truly wanted to. and to remove only dirthamen's mosaics, and not falon'din's or ghilan'nain's.

"They will come for us in the night Those who could steal the words from our lips And our god no longer rises to our defense."

this part of the codex implies that there were attacks on the temple by those who would steal the priests' secrets, and that dirthamen would defend them against these invaders. when he was locked away, he couldn't defend them anymore, and so these attackers could have easily gotten in. interesting... breaking in and removing his mosaics but not falon'din or ghilan'nain's would indicate a hostility towards dirthamen himself, but not the other gods...

———

the sinner:

by now we've all seen this widely discussed codex entry:

"His crime is high treason. He took on a form reserved for the gods and their chosen, and dared to fly in the shape of the divine. The sinner belongs to Dirthamen; he claims he took wings at the urging of Ghilan'nain, and begs protection from Mythal. She does not show him favor, and will let Elgar'nan judge him." For one moment there is an image of a shifting, shadowy mass with blazing eyes, whose form may be one or many. Then it fades.

so apparently "taking the shape of the divine" was a crime bad enough that it counts as high treason and mythal referred judgment to elgar'nan for it, which is REAL bad. this sinner claims ghilan'nain urged him to do it, but why? one would assume the sinner didn't survive elgar'nan's judgment, and if you really wanted someone dead there would be easier ways to kill them... so to me this reads as an attempt to sow discord, either between dirthamen's worshippers or to paint them as troublesome and dirthamen himself as irresponsible in the eyes of the other evanuris? at least that's my takeaway here.

———

the next few are going to be smaller hints that basically rely on subtler location design and stuff like that. i could just be picking at nothing but it's worth mentioning either way!

ghilan'nain's grove and the crow fens:

there are two inaccesible areas in the exalted plains for which you need to complete war table missions to access: ghilan'nain's grove, and citadelle du corbeau. ghil's grove specifically leads you to two other areas: the dead hand, and the crow fens.

the crow fens are interesting because of dirthamen's connection to crows and/or ravens, as written in his dalish legend and by two of the runes from his quest:

"The revealed symbols show what appears to be Dirthamen, the elven god of secrets, on the back of a large crow."

"The revealed symbols show two ravens. One grips a heart in its talons, the other a mirror."

seems like the ravens are fear (heart) and deceit (mirror) while the crow is... idk, just some Big Bird he has. i guess.

so a location named after one of dirthamen's favourite animals right next to ghilan'nain's grove — and let's also go back to that other unlockable area, citadelle du corbeau:

there he is again! the structure is elven, maybe the citadelle was once a place of worship dedicated to him? it's interesting that it's in such close proximity to ghilan'nain's grove, and what's also interesting is the massive statue of fen'harel watching over the entire area:

finally, the description of the quest Rifts in the Fens, which covers the fade rifts in the general ghilan'nain's grove area, says this...

"Active Fade rifts has been spotted in Montevelan Village, Dirthamen's Grove, and the Crow Fens."

seems like it was mistakenly left in, but it definitely implies that ghilan'nain's grove was originally named dirthamen's grove. alright...

———

elven pantheon codex entry placements:

also a smaller one that may mean nothing, but anyway. each of the elven god codexes are scattered through the exalted plains, with four of them being located in the ghilan'nain's grove/crow fens region. these are:

Dirthamen: Keeper of Secrets & Falon'din: Friend of the Dead, the Guide — both found within the dead hand puzzle area

Andruil: Goddess of the Hunt & Ghilan'nain: Mother of the Halla — both found within the crow fens area, on halla statues standing opposite each other

these two pairings found in the same zone is really interesting, especially that dirthamen's is in an area closer to ghilan'nain's grove and ghil's is in the crow fens. :)

———

mosaic placements in the temple of mythal:

most of the elven god codexes in the temple of mythal are scattered about, with the exception of three who are bunched up in the same room together:

elgar'nan, dirthamen, and ghilan'nain.... interesting bunch to put together considering there are no documented interactions between them so far, save for the sinner codex (and ghil & elg now i guess....) in addition, there's also two golden owl (usually representing falon'din) statues flanking dirthamen and a mosaic of fen'harel to the left of elgar'nan, but those don't grant any additional codex entries.

the reason i find these placements interesting is because of the placements of the falon'din and andruil murals in the temple. they're both on either side of the door to the inner sanctum and both of their codex entries mention mythal fighting them. it just seems very deliberate to me, so maybe this is too.

———

the varterral:

i've seen a few theories about the varterral being one of the creatures that ghilan'nain created - valid, by the way, since it does look like a mix of creatures and something she may create. however...

"...On the fourth day, Dirthamen heard them. He whispered into the mountains and the fallen trees of the forest gathered, shaping an immense and agile spider-like beast. It was the varterral. With lightning speed, vicious strikes, and venomous spit, it drove back the serpent. From then on, it was the guardian of the city and its people." — Codex entry: Varterral

here dirthamen is credited with the creation of the varterral. but it's worth noting that, 1. this is a dalish tale so it may have happened differently, and 2. it's not stated that he created the first varterral or anything, just that he made one. regardless, he made a creature, and an awfully ghil-flavoured one at that.

—————

theories on dirthamen & ghilan'nain's relationship

so what we know now is that they're placed next to each other a lot, there's a mural of them embracing, ghilan'nain was clearly important enough to dirthamen for him to put her mosiacs in his temple, and she may have turned against him later.

firstly, an idea: in ancient elvhenan, a lot of the population were enslaved to the evanuris, whether directly or indirectly through a noble that served them. we don't know if the nobles, or any of the chosen, also had vallaslin like the slaves did. but consider that ghilan'nain was once a normal elf; she became an evanuris later. so the two possibilities here are: 1. she was one of these nobles or chosen, or 2. she was a slave. either way the question remains: which god does someone who makes monsters serve?

the most likely suspects:

andruil: in dalish lore ghil is often mentioned as andruil's favourite, her beloved, a huntress who served her, etc. in the elvhen story of her ascension, it is andruil who approaches her with the offer of godhood. it's possible ghil was making monsters for andruil to hunt (she is specifically mentioned in the story as hunting them,) or perhaps andruil simply intervened when the monsters were getting out of hand first, and their relationship came later?

dirthamen: ghil was a scientist... she made monsters yes, but she conducted experiments and collected research (remember the taken shape?) — she gathered knowledge. that seems just like the kind of thing dirthamen would encourage and value: maybe that's why her mosaic is in his temple, and that's what the bear mural means — he was like a patron to her, she reached to him for assistance, and he granted it?

as for the servant/slave question, i personally think she was not a slave, just based on all she was able to do (she had free rein of all those thaigs, seemingly got subjects delivered to her, had that massive gemstone wall — basically, it's clear her experiments were funded) although i do think it would be super badass if she was a slave beforehand, as well as kinda tragic. like... she broke free of her bindings and became a goddess, but eventually turned into those who once oppressed her... sigh anyway

onto some ideas/possibilities:

ghil served andruil, and made monsters for her to hunt. the connection to dirthamen isn't clear.

ghil served dirthamen freely, and he supported her research. after she ascended, she turned on him for unknown reasons. her relationship with andruil began after ascension.

ghil served dirthamen, and he supported her research, but she did technically "belong" to him. after she ascended, she turned on him, perhaps as revenge? her relationship with andruil began after ascension.

ghil wasn't aligned with any god, and could have just been a noble with her own funds. she could have interacted with and formed relationships with multiple gods, as she wasn't bound to a single one.

i personally think number 2 is the most probable here. going from dirthamen -> andruil rather than andruil -> dirthamen makes more sense, considering that the ghilandruil mural from the missing was clearly drawn after ghil's ascension (since she has her headpiece) and also, from what we've seen of ghil so far, she seems very proud of her creations. why would she want them hunted? again, the bargain she made was to destroy her creations in exchange for godhood. it was a sacrifice.

finally, considering her resources it makes more sense for ghil to have been a servant rather than a slave. what remains now is the question: why would she have turned on dirthamen?

a reason for betrayal

between the missing mosaics in his temple, ghil convincing his followers to commit crimes, and the stabbed fade statue, you can probably tell by now that something's different about dirthamen. remember the fen'harel statue looking over the citadel? there are more potential connections to solas if you look close enough:

fen'harel statues in the lost temple:

dirthamen's mosaics in the elven mountain ruins (note: these are the only evanuris mosaics in the entire area, not counting the forgotten sanctuary):

mosaics in the forgotten sanctuary (on each wall: dirthamen - mythal - fen'harel - falon'din - dirthamen)

symbol of the two ravens in the forgotten sanctuary armoury

so what does this all mean? well u/eravas on reddit had a theory that these are hints that dirthamen could have potentially been helping solas and mythal with the rebellion. remember how morrigan said it was weird the temple of mythal had fen'harel statues? and the mountain ruins were a sanctuary, so why keep the mosaics? (there are also a few other hints eravas mentioned that i missed, but these are the most important!)

and remember how i said that attackers on the lost temple of dirthamen could have torn his mosaics down specifically and left the others? and i came to the conclusion that they must have had a grudge against dirthamen specifically. well, there is some other defaced imagery... in the form of these decapitated statues of mythal:

so, why would dirthamen have helped solas? i don't know, but we don't really have explicit answers as to why mythal helped him either. and then, why did solas trap dirthamen along with the others? well, there is one last thing...

the statue in the fade: the final piece of the puzzle

and now, the part that lives in my head rent free!

if kieran exists in your worldstate, then during the quest The Final Piece you will find him and flemeth in the fade, and above their meeting ground there is a massive statue of dirthamen with a blade in his back, with blood pouring out of the wound and his eyes:

alright so to be clear this takes place in the raw fade, not the "dreaming" fade; we know the fade usually reflects the dreamer, but know less about the "raw fade" when we aren't dreaming. it's complicated, but from the random statues and scattered memories we see in the fade during here lies the abyss, it's safe to assume that some of the aspects of the dreaming fade (such as it being ever-shifting and a reflection of the waking world) are also present in the raw fade. therefore, i'm guessing that this statue's presence here is mirroring something that happened in the waking world... so what is it?

i think there are two possibilites:

someone betrayed dirthamen, and this captures the moment of his betrayal

dirthamen betrayed mythal, and this statue is a "reflection" of this

while 1 is more of a direct mirror and is more likely, we don't have that much info about who could have done that to him. yeah, ghil maybe, but she was only stirring the pot and this seems more... severe. 2 is what i believe due to flemeth's deliberate choice to use that specific area as a meeting spot. also, if one of the other evanuris had betrayed dirthamen, well solas said they fought among each other all the time, so that would seem pretty insignificant. on the other hand... mythal was betrayed by what we assume was all of the other seven evanuris. why portray dirthamen specifically?

the betrayal of mythal

so now we have the idea of dirthamen helping solas and mythal, and we have the fact that solas trapped all seven remaining evanuris for their murder of mythal, which includes dirthamen.

that is the missing piece: dirthamen helped murder mythal, despite helping her and solas, and presumably sharing their goals. why? let me go back to something i said about the sinner codex...

this reads as an attempt to sow discord, either between dirthamen's worshippers or to paint them as troublesome and dirthamen himself as irresponsible in the eyes of the other evanuris

consider that ghilan'nain and dirthamen were close, and she was this young elf who had just gotten into the ranks of the gods, probably trying her hardest to fit in. consider that perhaps she stumbled upon her friend's - and now fellow god's - involvement in a rebellion against the gods. but she was the youngest of them. she could not just go to the other evanuris and say, "dirthamen is plotting against us", because she was so new to their group that they would just simply not believe her word over mythal and dirthamen's. so what else could she do to discredit his word? cause discord among his followers, maybe? to paint him as irresponsible, untrustworthy, and suspicious?

and maybe she succeeded. maybe the evanuris found out about the rebellion, and mythal and dirthamen's roles, or perhaps only mythal's? either way, it all ended up with them asking dirthamen to join them in their plot to murder mythal - if his involvement was revealed, perhaps he was threatened or promised to be spared if he helped. either way, the question is: why did he agree? did he change his mind and side with the evanuris? or did he do it for preservation reasons? to save himself, and all he'd acquired? honestly, i cannot imagine a god who gathers secrets and knowledge agreeing to throw away his life like that.

so there you have it. i think dirthamen betrayed mythal, and solas, with a much deeper cut than any of the other evanuris could have possibly delivered. and for that he was trapped alongside them, paying the price for his treachery.

the full narrative, summarised

to break down all my theorycrafting and brainstorming in a short summary:

dirthamen was ghilan'nain's patron, until she ascended to godhood and discovered his involvement in solas and mythal's rebellion. unable to simply tell the other gods, ghilan'nain began to sow discord in attempt to discredit dirthamen's word. when the evanuris eventually turned against mythal, dirthamen went along with them in order to preserve himself, and ultimately paid the price by being trapped in the fade alongside the others. the end!

—————

final note: companion parallels

i first touched on this briefly here but i have a small theory that part of bellara and davrin's characters will be to sort of act as parallels to the gods whose vallaslin they have. what i found curious about veilguard's early marketing was the focus on companions and how important they will be, and i specifically noted the multiple times the writers said that the companions were all deeply thought through and are significant to the plot. it's clear the companions were thoughtfully crafted in order to provide different perspectives and experiences, which is why i found it incredibly interesting that they decided on two dalish elf companions — in a game about elven gods terrorising the world, you'd think that one dalish elf and one city elf could provide more differing perspectives, but bioware specifically picked two dalish elves instead. it implies that, despite their similar upbringings, bellara and davrin may have completely differing opinions about the current threat, or about solas, or something else we don't know about yet. it was clearly a very deliberate decision, and with how important the vallaslin is to dalish elves, it has to mean something.

bellara is an elven lore nerd who loves exploring ancient ruins and uncovering secrets. dirthamen was an easy guess, and the design - although new and very unique - matched up to patterns on his inquisition vallaslin. as of sept 19, it has been confirmed her vallaslin is indeed dirthamen's.

davrin is a grey warden and a monster hunter. his vallaslin design was harder to figure out, at first i thought it was june's but the lines and layout really remind me more of ghilan'nain's.

the parallels are pretty clear. bellara is more similar to dirthamen, being interested in secrets and knowledge and such. whereas davrin and ghilan'nain are at odds: davrin being a grey warden monster hunter, ghil being a blighted monster maker. one similarity, and one anithesis, which makes them unique to each other. and for all the gods bioware could have picked, to choose dirthamen and ghilan'nain... well, ghil is of course one of our antagonists, but dirthamen has no direct connection to the plot...

........ or maybe he does? we'll have to find out :)

#pre-veilguard posts archive #dragon age #dragon age the veilguard #dragon age lore #dirthamen #ghilan'nain #mythal #solas #evanuris #*emerges from a cave covered in blood with 10 pages of deranged rambling* hey guys look at my fun little theory #i finally finished it after like. a month.#it's been on my mind for... so long...#but yeah. the only thing that is kind of a plot hole here is why dirthamen would help solas #but i can't really explain why mythal would either #so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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betweenlands · 1 year ago

Text

It takes exactly two seconds between Impulse looking up at the top of the Secret Keeper and him realizing what he's actually seeing up there to decide he is officially sick and tired of seeing ghosts.

There are seven entire ghosts around the thing today -- a couple appear to be tinkering with the secret delivery mechanisms. Impulse squints at them.

"What are you doing?" he says.

"Trying to figure out how to load more tasks into this thing," one of them replies, kicking one of the blocks with buttons on them. He's got a full beard and some weird green glowing mushrooms poking out of cracks in his face. It's definitely... a look, Impulse will give him that. Very Mycelium Resistance. "But whoever designed it used freakin' command blocks, and you can't even see the randomizer run."

"How many times did your randomizer break again?" one of the other ghosts calls from up on top of the Secret Keeper.

"Never!" the mushroom ghost protests, causing at least two other ghosts to crack up laughing. "It worked completely flawlessly except for user error."

One of the ghosts, someone who appears to have a floating cactus block for a head, snorts. "And programmer error."

"You shut it," the mushroom ghost responds.

"He's not wrong," the more normal-looking brown-haired ghost over by the command blocks says absently, purple eyes clearly focused on trying to trace the wiring back to the actual command blocks.

Impulse just stands there, bewildered -- both because the ghosts are actually talking to him, and also because these are extremely weird ghosts to be talking to who look nothing like anyone he's even vaguely heard of.

"Fine," he says, "you know what, I'll bite. Why are you guys here?"

"Checking in," a ghost sitting on one of the lower rocks says. He's wearing blue and yellow, looks to be a little more transparent than the others. "Y'know, new season and all that?"

Impulse squints at him. "No, I meant, why are you following me?"

"Ohhhh!" The ghost laughs. "Hadn't looked into what you were doing yet, and these guys wanted to see if they could get some of their tasks into the machine, so I just brought everyone along."

"That's not really a good answer," a ghost leaning inside the alcove under the Secret Keeper says. He's got a mask pulled up over his face, though his voice doesn't really sound muffled at all.

"What," the blue and yellow ghost says, "am I supposed to say something like it's because you're one of the people with no hard-and-fast thematic associations to stick to and therefore easier to facilitate a meeting with and freak him out more?"

Impulse squints harder. "Are you guys Watchers?"

The blue-and-yellow ghost snorts. "Hah! That's Martyn's lore, bud, not yours. Nope, nothing to do with the Watchers."

"Aren't you technically--" the ghost in the alcove starts.

"Tsssssshhhhhh," the other ghost replies by way of shushing him aggressively, "spoilers!"

"Alright," the alcove ghost says, spreading his hands in mock defeat, "fine, have it your way. He's right though. Not Watchers."

"Lowercase-w maybe," the brown-haired ghost still inspecting the redstone with the mushroom ghost says, "but otherwise, no."

Impulse is starting to feel like he's wandered into something way above his pay grade.

The alcove ghost snaps his fingers. Impulse notes somewhat absent-mindedly that he has, like, a lot of piercings on one ear. "Hey," he says, "come to think of it, we might be able to help you out with some stuff."

"I swear to God," another ghost says from on top of the Secret Keeper, "if you try to sell another person on your weird coffee god thing again-"

"I wasn't going to!" he responds. "Honest! I was just gonna say, it looks like there's a plains biome here, that means oxeye daisies, that means suspicious stew with regen if you can get a good source of mushrooms."

"Unfortunately," the mushroom ghost says, looking up from where he and the other ghost appear to now be trying to cram books into the ground, "the space for the hearts seems like it just kinda vanishes when people get hit. At least, if I'm not misunderstanding the programming."

"If you're misunderstanding the programming then we're both reading this code wrong," the brown-haired ghost says. "And I'm pretty sure I used something similar here for Dark Path stuff, so probably not?"

"Dang," the alcove ghost says, then tilts his head back towards Impulse. "Maybe make splash poison potions, then? That'll take out a good chunk of someone's health if they can't regen."

"He is green," the cactus-headed ghost says. "Why's he gotta make poison potions right now?"

A shrug in response. "Never hurts to prep early."

The blue-and-yellow ghost leans forward, squinting at him. "Alright," he says, "one of my wisps give you that idea or what?"

Another shrug. "I mean, what if they did?"

"Last time you started listening to his wisps," the brown-haired ghost says, "they told you to try and kill everyone just because I beefed it before the dragon fight."

"It would've worked if you hadn't warned them," the ghost in the alcove replies. "I can't believe you tried to sabotage my attempt at avenging you."

"I can't believe you listened to them in the first place," the blue-and-yellow ghost says. "They're bloodthirsty, they don't really give good advice."

"And I," Impulse says, having inched his way over towards the new task button, "am going to take my task and leave, because you guys are weird."

He hits the button and flips through the taskbook.

"End every sentence said to another player in a question?" he says, squinting down at it.

"You're already doing better than some of us were!" one of the ghosts on top of the Secret Keeper yells down.

"Oh my god, shut up!" the mushroom ghost yells back, and then turns to Impulse. "Hey, by the way, have you considered getting a pet parrot?"

"That's still a bad loophole and you know it," the blue-and-yellow ghost cuts in.

"I heard him just fine," the brown-haired ghost says. "Hey, hang on -- that's one of ours! It worked!"

Impulse decides he's not even going to bother trying to be polite about leaving. He has had entirely enough of these ghosts in particular.

#secret life #secret life smp #impulsesv #gilded hardcore #vikingpilot #this minific brought to you by: gilded is good go watch it #unlike last impulse fic i will not bother with a pretense of it being symbolism. this one is fully because it is funny to me #there's SOME stuff in there if you squint but it doesn't actually have anything to do with impulse #anyway sorting tags time:#yt #txt #solar scraps #solar scrawls #slsmp #gilded #you may have noticed i tagged the blue and yellow ghost. this is because i fear no man. or pronoun stealer for that matter #oh dunk wait i should also tag the others #devonsdesk #thefoolnse #avidmc #and then whimzee and trog are in the background (sorry guys i didn't have the voices down yet)#oh and fun fact about this one. the identity of one of these ghosts is Really Questionable #like just a little bit... it could be him acting weird or it could be something else entirely yknow? something more aware of certain things #but ehhhhhhhhhhhnnnn that's spoilers so who am i to blow up its spot #update josh got a new username so #codeneon

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rgbstatic · 2 years ago

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i think in both regards to story, and in terms of meta/real life

doomsday and the destruction of l’manberg killed the server.

whether people were for or against or apart of l’manberg or not, it was a gathering point that brought people together to talk. it was a place people would hang out. it was a place with lots of chests to steal food and supplies from. in new l’manberg so so many people spent their time their even if they were completely unaffiliated or lived somewhere else.

storywise when it was destroyed, the story just lost a central characteristic for conflict, and a very important thing. l’manberg wasn’t just a place. it was ideals it was imagery, it was a goal, it was safety it was so many things, and with it gone with no hopes of returning, no matter how many new places people built they were all empty and never the same.

and with it gone everyone literally had to go their own ways. everyone who gathered there went far far away to make their own homes.

on a meta standpoint, people like talk about how much they miss old dream smp streams and that’s because of the non serious lore streams. where walking down a path and bumping into someone could lead to goofing off or serious talks.

where tommy could build a pathway from manberg to pogtopia for prime and for the upcoming rebellion, and get caught by a vice president who decided it was his day off and he was going to roleplay as a mcdonald’s worker.

it’s how you have tommy and tubbo goofing off on the server not doing lore, only for schlatt to see and they go lore mode and have to make up a pregnancy excuse.

it’s how you got silly serious moments. it’s also just straight up how you had people interact. if everyone lived hundreds of blocks away, it’s harder to just randomly run into each other while building or running to do something, meaning you’re less likely to talk, and less likely for anything to happen.

when l’manberg acted as a central hang out spot, people built their homes in close proximity, they would stick around the area and things naturally happened.

destroying l’manberg was, in my opinion, the worst thing they could have done. doomsday did very very little narratively to the story. the community house gathering did more to the story than doomsday did. and it was awful because tommy rallied people behind him to fight in doomsday not for him, but because if they could do this to l’manberg what would stop them from doing it to every other group.

and everyone fought, and despite an entire server fighting it was pointless.

the only thing doomsday did was force people to hide. and you can make claims for ranboo who went to live with phil and techno- but ranboo’s character arcs could’ve had a very similar outcome by staying with almost anyone else.

no l’manberg ultimately just drove everyone away, and there was never any serious or successful move to make anything on that server take its place, to fill the hole, so there was nothing to actively pull things together. no driving force or motivation, nothing to supply passive roleplay, nothing to bring people together.

everyone lost on doomsday. that loss of l’manberg meant no one could ever win again. just think about it. after doomsday, it was loss after loss.

the final disc confrontation? tommy and tubbo lost. they were rescued, but they lost their fight, and it was a trap anyway.

dream in prison? well he has punz on the outside, doesn’t matter, and he can control ranboo, and he still got to kill tommy AND ghostbur. it was a loss. and he escaped.

every single fight after. quackity lost, wilbur lost, tommy and tubbo lost again, and again. the server for everyone ended in a loss.

there was not ever a win again. usually in stories, after losses, you want something good to happen to make those hardships worth it. just like when good things happen you want bad things to happen to make it worth it, you need a balance.

think of the revolution. the up and down rollercoaster. the freedom into war into loss and death into hope into loss into compromise into win.

the election was a nail biting race where depending on who you voted for, was lose and a win. for tommy and wilbur it was a loss, but they quickly gathered things up, they had hope, and they had energy, and a plan, and techno joined and they were confident. there were ups and downs up until doomsday, afterword no character seemed to get an up. any positive was immediately trivialized. for example tommy’s decided to try and heal and make a hotel which was immediately turned into a problem where people tried to fight him over it and then he died. or he got a pet that made him happen and everyone tried to set it free or kill it. he finally starts to feel safe no relax and dream breaks loose, and he is endlessly stalked the entire time, and he dies alone with his abuser and his abuser’s accomplice.

there is never an up after doomsday, and killing l’manberg that day killed the dream smp.

#tommyinnit #l’manberg #doomsday #rgb talking #dsmp analysis #long post #wbrst #2020-2024

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demonsfate · 4 months ago

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I'm so tired but at the same time I just wanted to write that... TK8 may truly be one of the worst stories in all the games lol. Not as bad as TK6 (solely because I'm biased and TK6 ruined my favorite character) but like... with each game, it feels like they're just making more and more of a mess with the lore, and TK8 just felt like they stopped caring completely about consistency. And really? It is actually getting harder to care about the story because of that.

But why exactly? You see, it's just hard to care about anything at all. It's hard to even know what's going to happen next, and not in a good way either. Not, "they're so clever, they're good at surprising and subverting expectations!" But in a "they will literally just do anything even if it contradicts previously established lore." Like there are zero stakes. If a character dies, it means nothing. That character is very likely alive, and we'll even probably see them soon.

It's hard to even really like characters when they can be completely altered on a whim.

Like Claudio, who was clearly being set up to be a bad guy in next game.

Only for... that to not happen lmao. In fact, he's very good now. Which also just takes away stakes of Xiaoyu being placed in a situation where she could be harmed, and Kin having another adversary that isn't just Kaz. which yes, a lot of ppl prefer Claudio being a good guy after all. But again, it's a thing they completely disregarded.

Devil Jin is another example of a character just being completely changed for no good reason. How he went from a murderous, cannibalistic, highly violent and sadistic person, to... being a force of good, someone that was always trying to protect Jin but Jin was just denying it? Like yes, those two examples I show from Tekken 6 are technically "non canon", but it's clearly what Devil's character was supposed to be. He wasn't supposed to like Jin, he was ashamed of Jin, he saw Jin as a weakling. He was never meant to be his protector - he wanted Jin out of the picture so he can be free to do whatever he wants, which usually involves killing, maiming, and gaining power.

But see? A character can go from a parasitic force that corrupts the host, to being a guardian devil just because the writers decided they wanted to do that. Disregard to previous canon. The same thing happened to Jin in Tekken 6. Jin was a complete good guy, but then he was suddenly turned into a ruthless, heartless, warmonger all because Harada thought it was "cool", again - disregard to what Jin was, what his story meant, everything his character was.

Or how Zafina had Azazel in her arm, could've potentially became a more important character because of this new power she possessed. Only... for Kazuya to take it away from her at practically the start of the game. A story for her character that went nowhere.

Because of that, it's just so hard to even become attached to a character because you just don't know when they're going to be completely changed into something they weren't... or when their stories will be dropped and they'll go nowhere. (Paul from being a comedic relief who had amazing feats of strength, to just becoming a complete joke with no wins and that nobody takes seriously. Or Asuka, obviously meant to be Jin's cousin and even hinted at possessing Jun's powers of purification. Only... for her to become Lili's sidekick and completely irrelevant to the story. Even Lili gets more respect than she does in TK8)

Then of course, with characters not being able to stay dead... not even for a single game. It's becomes more difficult to care when a character "dies" or is "about to die" when you know nothing is gonna happen. The character will come back, regardless of how they died, just because the writers want to use them again. Even if it means ruining the weight of the other games, or the developments characters had.

There's also the problem with the game itself becoming too saturated with jokes. I've spoke about this somewhat recently, but before, a lot of the characters were allowed serious endings or side stories. (Like check out Tekken 4's endings, I think almost every character had a serious ending with real character development in that one). But now the majority of the character endings are just either fluff or wacky shenanigans. Which again, makes you feel less invested in the characters when nothing serious is actually going on, and also makes it feel like the writers just... don't care as much anymore.

And I get that Tekken is a fighting game, but like... it still has a story it "proudly" presents. Therefore, it's still something people are liable to get invested in, and become disappointed when all canon is thrown out the window. It just makes you wonder what's the point of caring about what happens if it's gonna be undone in the next game. It makes you wonder why care about a character when their story, or even the character themselves, can be changed completely next game?

Of course, I love Tekken, and I am interested in seeing how crazy it can get. But I will say, I am becoming less invested with each game lol! TK4 had amazing writing and aesthetics, and I really wish the game could've kept following in TK4's footsteps rather than going completely off the rails like this. Really, TK's writing peaked at TK2-TK4, then it started going downhill from TK5.

#✏️ - ᴛʜᴇ ʜᴏsᴛ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴏsᴛ // (ooc)#// i forgot how ugly claudio was in tk7 LMAO #// anyway now i'm goin to bed FR #// i'll probs reblog this tomorrow morn or afternon 'cos i wrote it so late xD

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bonzosbunker · 10 months ago

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I’ve been getting a lot of love for The Scareiff recently, so I wrote down a lot of lore and ideas n’ stuff for you all.

HIS STORY:

The Scareiff was outstanding in his field of entertainment, enough so that he was the star of his own show. His show was called “Scareiff’s Saloon” which combined family fun with crazy spaghetti western action! The show was a hit, and he had plenty of fans. But then everything changed when someone, thought to have been a fan of his, got too close to him. His show and him started going downhill. He started messing up his parts, he made bad PR for himself, and he became a total mess. Shortly after C. Rook came into the picture, he was booted from Cathode Entertainment and his show was cancelled. Nobody knows where he is now. But he’s somewhere out in that desert, hoping an opportunity will come by where he can prove his worth again.

THE BATTLE:

They didn’t call him a sheriff for nothing. He was an expert with a pistol, and he performed all of his stunts. This expertise in the art of combat is why you most certainly need the Shadow Mantle. With such, you’ll be able to effortlessly deflect his shimmering bullets. Then you can find his whereabouts in Dreamy Desert, inside of a place called Ghost Town. Pacifying him grants you the Gleam Badge, a badge made out of pure hope.

Taking the more aggressive route makes The Scareiff impossible to find in Ghost Town. Instead he will try to hunt you down. He hopes that by turning in The Fun Gang to Tenna that that’ll get him his show back. As soon as you find the Shadow Mantle, he ambushes you. The battle with him is significantly harder in this route, even with the mantle aiding you. If you manage to strike him down, he still refuses to give up, as if his unwavering hopes are what’s keeping him going. It is this overwhelming hope that begins to turn him into a mess of TV static, withering him down until there is nothing left but his Shadow Crystal. In the process, he drops his gilded Fire-Arm, something you can equip to Toriel.

THEMES:

- Ghost Town

- Music that plays upon finding The Scareiff’s hideout

- Standoff

- Song that plays when The Scareiff is encountered

- DARN SHOOT’N

- Pacifist/Normal Route battle theme

- SERVIN’ JUSTICE

- Aggressive Route battle theme

- Cancelled

- Post-Agressive Route battle scene

QUOTE EXAMPLES:

* Y- Y’ALL’VE NEVER’RE SEEN MY SHOW BEFORE… ?

* WELL THAT’RE BE A DARN SHAME. Y’ALL’RE MISS’N OUT!

* Y’THINK’N SOME RAGGEDY OL’ CAPE’S GUNNA STOP ME???

* YOU SHOULD’VE STUCK’T TO YER’ GUNS INSTEAD!

* WELL I GOT MY OWN HOPE’S N’ DREAM’S TOO Y’KNOW!

* SO IT’D BE GREAT IF Y’ALL’D JUST’T. LET. ME. WIN.

OTHER THOUGHTS AND IDEAS:

- The Scareiff’s unwavering hope and refusal to back down in the Aggressive Route is meant to reflect the fight with Undyne the Undying.

- Continuing the theme of all the secret bosses being “trapped” in some way. Despite all of The Scareiff’s hopes, he is never able to overcome that feeling and return to normalcy. But he does try his best, and comes considerably closer than any of the other secret bosses in my lore for the game.

- There is no “friend” inside of The Scareiff. There’s only hope and straw in there. However, if you’ve been looking at any of my past posts, there still is a “friend” in my take on Chapter 3.

- The Scareiff rode a horse at one point that left him a long time ago. He misses him, but he does have a cool stick horse now!

- The Scareiff knows about the other secret bosses, much like how Spamton knows Jevil. He thinks the rest of them are a bunch of weirdos and suckers. He especially doesn’t like Spamton, who he thinks is lousy and incapable of doing anything for himself.

#deltarune #woody theory #the scareiff #deltarune chapter 3 #cowboy #undertale #secret boss

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haunted-xander · 1 year ago

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Hsr age headcanons except I also explain my reasonings bc I read everyones lore to get it more accurate.

(Also, a few things to note that will be relevant to my explainations: Some of these I'm not 100% certain of the age groups I put them in here, so some might not be as specific. Blade will be considered his age prior to being mara-struck for the sake of this post. Imbibitor Lunae is a stand in for Dan Feng.)

Let's begin, shall we?

Child (6-12)

Hook: I believe she's around 7-8. She's very obviously a kid, but I don't think she's like, a toddler or anything. She's smart enought to pull the clever little tricks she does, and has enough awareness to understand some harder topics (like Fersman's declining health and the reality of her birth parent's deaths).

Clara: I originally figured she was around 14 or so, but since one of her stories claim she's of similar age to Hook, and one of Hook's stories has her note Clara is a few years older than her, I think I'd put her around 11-12. Maaaaaybe 10, but that feels a bit too young for her.

Early to mid teens (13-17)

Arlan: Probably around 17 or so. We know he's younger than Asta, who met him when he was a kid and offered him a job for her family, and she also mentions that she took him in during her companion mission. Herta also says in her voice line about him that he's probably one of the "exceptionally gifted" kids Asta gave money to.

Lynx: She's much younger than Gepard and Serval, obviously, but she's also probably around the same age as Pela (who is confirmed to be 16) given how close they are and how they interact. Her companion mission also largely revolves around her trying to escape her older siblings protectiveness, which I feel is relatable to a lot of teens lol.

Late teen (18-19)

Silver Wolf: Tbh I don't have any solid justification for this, mostly just vibes. She's definitely younger than Kafka, but other than that I don't really have much to go off of. Probably 19, but I could see her maybe being early 20s too.

Guinaifen: I'm not completely sure about this one tbh. She's definitely a teenager, she says she's close to but not yet an adult to Bailu after we chase her and the Heliobus possessing her. She's also very close friends with Sushang, (who is confirmed to be around 16-17) so it makes sense for Gui to be a similar age too. The thing that's tripping me up is that one of her stories says she spent all her teenage years on the planet she lived on prior to coming to the Luofu, which would make her 19 at minimum. It could also just be exaggerating, or not counting 18 & 19 as teen years (that one seems unlikely though).

Young adult (20+)

Trailblazer: Well, obviously, Trailblazer is actually like a few months old at most seeing as we start the game by being "born" but, ya know. They're treated as an adult by everyone around them, not to mention they're clearly meant to be around the same age as March and Dan Heng, who are also depicted as adults (Dan Heng has been seen drinking in official art, for example). I think maybe like, around 20-22 would fit.

March: There's what I mentioned previously of course (being close in age to Trailblazer and Dan Heng), but the whole "girls like me/my age all like this and this" thing is a very typical mindset of late teens & very young adults. The way she talks about taking pictures of food in one of her stories also sound very much like how a young adult would explain it lolol. Like Trailblazer, probably around 20-22. Tbh I'm not sure how to explain my reasoning when basing it off of her behaviour without it sounding like I'm saying all girls her age do this, I'm not 😅 but it is common enough I feel like it adds to her feeling that age, ya know?

Asta: As mentioned with Arlan, we know she's notably older than him. I would say her position on the space station means she has a decent amount of life experience for her to do it so well, but this is Hoyoverse and anyone can do anything regardless of age, so that doesn't really work lol. That said, she clearly has had the position for a long time, so even if she wasn't an adult when she started, she definitely should be now. Probably around 23-24.

Bronya: She's been in the Silvermane Guards for long enough to be well-known and trusted for her skills, and with how easily she took up the position of Supreme Guardian, she has a lot of public faith and trust as well. She needs to have been serving for a good amount of years, to get all that. That said, I do think she started young, so I'd put her at around early-to-mid 20s. probably around 23-24 like Asta.

Seele: Canonicly around the same age as Bronya, so probably about 23-24 again.

Luka: Not much concrete to go off of, but he's probably around the same age as Seele given their interactions. He's also obviously an adult, or Hook would've dropped the 'honourary' part and just make him a proper Mole lolol. Around 23-24 again.

Topaz: In her voice line about Bronya she says they're around the same age. March also notes that she's pretty young for an executive, and her character stories explain that she started working for the IPC at a VERY young age. Probably around 23-24 yet again.

Adult (30+)

Sampo: He's a notorious scammer who's being doing his work in Belobog for a long enough time to become notorious, so him being in his 30s seems likely. I don't have any other reasoning besides that, really. probably around mid 30s, like 35-36 or something.

Himeko: She had already finished college when she found the express, so she was already an adult then. It's been many years since then, so she's definitely not some young 20-something year old lolol. probably mid-to-late 30s, like 37-38 or the like.

Gepard: Mid-to-late 30s. He's younger than Serval, so he's below 40 (not that I really thought he was middle-aged anyway) and he's probably older than Bronya, as in one of her stories he comforts her after the first death to happen under her leadership, clearly having already gotten used to it. Also, apparently he has a bachelor's degree? (According to the fandom wiki's trivia section). Anyway. Around 37-38 probably.

Luocha: I couldn't really find anything that indicates anything in particular, so I'm just gonna say he's mid 30s based off of vibes alone. Like 35-36 or something.

Kafka: Her age is only ever stated as "unknown" and, like Luocha, I couldn't find anything that indicates anything in particular. So I'm just gonna say she's mid-to-late 30s like Himeko and call it a day. 37-38.

Argenti: His character stories show a variety of different scenes throughout his journey as a Kmight of Beauty, so he has experienced a great deal. Mid 30s, probably. Like 35-36. I don't have much else to go off of.

Middle aged and beyond (40+)

Herta: We know she's like, really old. Like really really old. I don't know exactly HOW old, but old. I think she's still within a human lifespan though, so maybe like 70-80 or something. Physically speaking though, she herself states that her current puppet body looks "70% like I did as a child" so. Yeah. Baby grandma.

Natasha: She raised Seele and was the main caretaker at the orphanage she grew up in, so she ain't exactly young (despite what hyvs aversion to portraying older people properly will tell you). Probably late 40s to early 50s. 49-50 maybe.

Serval: Canonicaly the same age as Cocolia, who raised Bronya for most of her life. Bronya also recognizes Serval as Cocolia's old friend from when she was a child. Mid-to-late 40 probably. 45-46 maybe.

Blade: Yingxing is refered to as 'middle-aged' in-game at around the time it all went down, and he's shown with visible aging and with grayed hair (that is, assuming Blade's current black hair is his natural haircolor?). Probably late 40s, like 48-49 or something.

Canon age

Pela: 16, as stated by Lynx in her & Lynx's companion mission. People have pointed out that this is a plot hole due to other information we have about Pela, but 1) the only thing that goes against this is the claim she was a founding member of Serval's band, which I can 100% believe is either a mistranslation or a case of a writer not cross-referencing properly. (also, I don't remember where this is ever claimed in-game, so if anyone can point me to it I'd appreciate it.) And 2) her being a teen makes more sense with how she's written, imo, so I don't really care if it's actually a plot hole.

Sushang: One of her stories says she's "around 16 to 17 years old". Obviously, this isn't her REAL age since she's a Xianzhou native, but it is the age she is equivalent to for a short-life species.

Welt: 80+. He arrived in the hsr universe at the time of APHO, which takes place in 2025. Since Welt was born in 1947, this would make him 78. While we don't know exactly how long he's been here, he seems to have been here a quite a while, so, 80+ it is.

Long-life species

(equivalent to) Child (6-12)

Bailu: She's been described as a child many, many times, including by herself (multiple times). Although she's probably older than she looks, as both she and several others remark that she has trouble growing bigger for some unknown reason. I'd say maybe around 10-11.

(equivalent to) Early to mid teen (13-17)

Qingque: She reads to me like a 14 year old being forced to take up a summer job by her parents because 'you need to get experience so you can get a job easier when you're older!'. Actually I think that's literally what's going on except summer jobs don't exist on the Luofu so now she has a full-time job at 14 years old. Yeah I don't actually have anything else to go off of other than the level of control her parents have over her life.

Yanqing: His character stories say he is 1) not yet of age (so below 18) and 2) a teenager. Very simple. Not sure why people are arguing about his age so much when it literally says right there in the game that he is a teenage boy. Probably 15.

Huohuo: Honestly not much to go off of. Probably around 14, based solely on vibes.

(equivalent to) Young adult (20+)

Dan Heng: Depicted as a young adult of similar age to Trailblazer and March, as mentioned previously. Pretty simple. That said, I do want to note that one of Blade's stories describe him as a teen. But, based on the way it's written, this seems to be Blade's first encounter with him, so it's probably not accurate to Dan Heng's current age.

Tingyun: Her stories describe her as pretty young, but the way she carried herself and the sort of businesses she did makes me think she was at least 20. Like 20-21 probably.

Fu Xuan: Once again, not much concrete to go off of. Her stories give me the impression she joined the divination comission rather young, and I think she's been the master diviner for quite a while now. Maybe early 20s, like 22-23 or something.

(equivalent to) Adult (30+)

Dan Feng: We don't really know how old Dan Feng was when everything went down other than that he was older than Dan Heng is currently. I'd put him in mid 30s, solely on vibes. I mean, he got engaged and quite literally made a child, so I'd say 30 fits. Ignoring the fact neither of those things have much to do with his age at all. 34-35 maybe.

Hanya: Honestly I have no clue and her stories just confused me. She has the vibes of a 30-something year old so I put her here. My view on her age will probably change once Xueyi is out if only bc I might be able to figure Xueyi's age out better and Hanya would then be somewhere under that.

(equivalent to) Middle aged and beyond (40+)

Jing Yuan: Listen. He's seen shit. He has lived a long ass time. And it's canon he basically raised Yanqing, he's a dad ya'll. probably early-to-mid 40s, like 44-45 maybe. I don't know.

Yukong: She's old. Like actually old. Technically much younger than Jing Yuan, but since foxians lifespans are shorter than other long-life species, she's equivalent to a lot older than he is. She's 249 and foxians live up to 300. She's OLD. I'd say she's like 70 or something.

Jingliu: Also old. She's like, 2000 years old or something, she's a grandma. Probably equivalent to up to 80-something. Except she looks 30 bc Mara. And also long-life species don't actually age past a certain point, so she physically is not capable of looking above 30.

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