#kai. study.

[chstart]

kai is the legal heir to hiwatari enterprises, a dispute between his father & grandfather leading to the former being functionally disowned & thus taken off all contracts & documents that could lead to susumu taking over the company in soichirou's stead ; his custody of kai is the only thing susumu was able to maintain ( though only on paper, as kai never acknowledged this custody beyond not arguing his father's decision to send him to a boarding school, going so far as to refuse to call him "father" ) .

the rights to the seat of ceo are solely kai's, but, as he's currently pre-occupied with, to him, more important things, he's yet to take this seat after soichirou's arrest, & the company is currently directionless & unable to make any big decisions due to the lack of a hiwatari signature, not to mention the intensive investigations it's been enduring from the top down & back up, — as far as kai's concerned, the company can slowly crash & burn for all he cares ; he's in no rush to take over anything connected to his grandfather's legacy. monetary inheritance, as well as the hiwatari mansion, have also gone to kai, though he signed off the estate to his father when he returned to the world of battling, having no intention of going back.

[evesedenramblings]

Despite what Damon Maitsu wants to think, he has been incredibly trusting and kind throughout the Killing Game thus far. His actions contradict a lot of his own inner thoughts. Even though he is often rude he’s also rather kind, and that’s important to recognize since he wants to believe he’s so de-attached from everyone.

I think the first thing that comes to mind is the first trial’s Pathos route, where Damon decides to defend Diana based on his gut feeling despite all the clear evidence- or, trusting Diana’s character to be true over his own deductions. The second thing is when he realizes his trust of Eva is built on nothing. What both of these things have in common is how mad Damon is about it. Damon doesn’t want to defend Diana, he gets incredibly mad at himself when he realizes he’s sympathetic to her crying and wants to trust in her. The same goes for Eva, but his trust is lost instead. Damon gets angry when he realizes the only reason he trusted Eva was because he fell into the “Us vs Them” mentality, and he automatically grouped Eva in with himself, but Eva didn’t do the same thing. At the core of the issue, Damon is mad because without even realizing it, he is a hypocrite. He claims the students shouldn’t be able to so easily trust each other, then went and easily trusted just the same- and chose the worst person to acknowledge he trusted.

I say Damon acknowledges he trusted Eva because I think Damon trusts the other students more than he realizes. He is easily able to engage in Free Time Events with every student, except Grace. The fact there’s no Grace FTE’s, or to be Meta an exception to “hang out with your favourites!” rule, makes it feel in-character that Damon trusts the other students enough with his safety, but not Grace. Also, a lot of what happens in those FTE’s like Jean picking up Damon by his ankles has to mean they’re at least some sort of comfort with each other. The other students do seem comfortable with Damon, even the youngest student Toshiko knows she can call Damon a cutesy name like Mochi- he’s unhappy about it but ultimately does nothing. Ingrid asks him to help with the laundry and he agrees- grumbles about it later to himself but doesn’t actually protest to Ingrid’s face, and does his share. There’s also the fact that Damon doesn’t protest the roommate rule, and then how immediately comfortable he gets with said roommate. He even prefers to sleep in Kai’s room at a certain point, as sleeping alone in his own room makes him too anxious as opposed to sleeping along with someone else. For someone who claims to be untrusting, Damon spends a lot of time with other people one-on-one and in group settings, and being kind to them as well.

The only time I can think Damon doesn’t cooperate with the group is when Eva shows him the Tozu Equation and he says they should keep it secret. However, even then, Damon means *he and Eva* should keep it secret. He still means to work with Eva, as their own private team. He doesn’t go work on it on his own at any point, and asks her about it later if she had made any progress. When she says no, Damon assures her that he hadn’t expected her to with all the ongoing issues. He believes her at face value and doesn’t go to check on it, and was kind to her about the issue.

Still, there is an obvious elephant in the room: Damon is still an outsider. He’s not part of the group, there’s no equal exchange of first. The obvious solution, and one Damon comments on himself multiple times, is that he’s cooperating with them only to gain their trust, *not* because he trusts them. However, I think Damon is lying to himself, or is just unaware of how much trust he puts into his actions. For a comparison, I want us to look at Eva. Eva only spends time individually with Damon, who she “trusts”. Other than that, the only time we see her with others is to gather information or purposefully be seen while plotting her murder. We don’t have much insight on her rooming situation but Diana’s comments imply Eva was often absent from their room. Eva tends to lurk in the boiler room alone, specifically because nobody wants to go down there. She has no interest in her classmates and doesn’t trust any of them, and only takes interest in them when she needs them. Now this could just be a difference of strategy (Eva wanting to gain trust when the time was right, and Damon wanting to gain trust in advance) but frankly, it didn’t work. Damon spent more time cooperating with the class, and yet in the trial they hesitate to believe him over Eva based on his character. The only reason they choose to believe him is because they take a moment to reassess everything Damon has been saying, and draw a logical conclusion. Damon has still gained no real trust from their group, so what was the point of everything he’s done if it amounted to nothing?

Damon, whose situation is extremely close to Eva’s, is willing to share his living space with another person, to the point he shares the bed with them (his idea btw), not even swapping the bed every night. Eva feels more safe alone with her own mind and intelligence, but Damon has always reached out to other people for security. After Tozu threatened him, Damon went to Kai despite his belief Kai might kill him. When Wolfgang turned the group against him, Damon automatically latched onto the one other outcast, Eva without even realizing it. He’d already latched onto her from the moment they awoke in the boiler room together.

I definitely missed some stuff, like how Damon was the only one willing to grab Kai’s ring in the FTE- just say no if you don’t want to do it Damon. It’s going to be important to remember how kind he is in these earlier chapters since that kindness and trust he employed has now been thrown back in his own face and spit on (thanks Eva), so I’m not sure we’re ever going to see Damon be this unintentionally kind again.

[timbit-robin-art]

Jump up, kick back, whip around, and spin. Amiright, fellas?

[tellsfromninjago]

It's a wonderful night for eyebrows.

I admit I'm not the best at EYEBROWS. I messed up Kai's a lot in that one comic. Mainly because I didn't check my references. I pray the spelling is alright. 🙏

Updated with wrinkles and lines. Could possibly add more.

[eccentricallygothic]

I am not saying I want Steve Rogers to bend me over his desk and whip my ass to get me to do/finish my homework but that's exactly what I am saying.

[sward-iak]

I was gonna wait to post this but I’m way too excited. @charliemwrites has an awesome Persephone AU (NSFW Content!) in the works with Captain MacTavish and I just had to do something for it. The painting is a study of a 17th Century Oil Painting known as the “Abduction of Persephone” (abduction is sometimes replaced by a different more triggering word, it depends on preference as far as I can tell but do correct me if I’m wrong!) made by an Unknown Artist. Charlie was so fun to work with on this project and her server was so encouraging throughout the whole several month process, I can’t thank you guys enough <333

I may end up doing another photo set inspired by this fic cause it’s just!!! There’s only two chapters but I’m going fucking nuts for it, I can’t wait for her to write the next part!!!

If you guys enjoy this painting please consider checking out my Gumroad or donating to my Ko-Fi <3

[kai-sh1]

hedgehogs

[skierisa]

kai but arcane painting style

eh, didnt like it that much

comparsion with lloyd and nya

[rainbow-sunshine-unicorn]

Anthony Bridgerton is proof that you can annoy beautiful women into falling in love with you

[starot]

actually pulled off an all nighter kay chung moment for my quantum mechanics exam. definitely. don't recommend, but i did well !!!

treated myself 2 some eggs and grape ade after (genuinely. love them. genuinely)

[enavstars]

Background studies with RGB siblings in the Cyberpunk au, 2 versions.

Just the kids exploring the abandoned city :)

(Nya carries a metal stick and likes to hit stuff with it. Kai has a flamethrower but I didn't draw it in this)

Here's part of the process if you’re interested:

After that I went section by section doing the details.

(Other characters in the au coming soon)

[chstart]

it was only in hindsight that kai realized that the way he had run the shell killers gang was no different from how vladimir ran borg at the abbey. intolerance of the smallest of transgressions, destroying the equipment of members deemed failures before their very eyes & in the most violent way possible followed by banishing the ex-members from the grounds ... of course, kai had no memory of his experiences at the abbey at the time, he could not recall the punishments doled out to weak battlers there. but when he remembered ... when he truly & completely broke free from borg & his grandfather ... when he connected the two things, realized what he had been doing, even as the gang had long since become another fragment of his past, he felt sick. he felt absolutely disgusted with himself, for internalizing borg's brutal teachings &, subconscious though it may have been, exemplifying his grandfather's & vladimir's mentalities. for him it became just another example of him being tainted & corrupted to the core, yet another source for shame & self-hatred.

[evesedenramblings]

I want to talk about the Greek Myth of Damon and Pythias and how I think it could tie into Project: Eden’s Garden. For those unfamiliar, the story of Damon and Pythias basically goes like this:

A man named Pythias is to be given the death penalty for his crimes of protesting tyrannical authority against a man named Dionysus (not the God, just named after him). However, Damon volunteers to take his place so Pythias can tend to his affairs (basically say final goodbyes). If Pythias does not return by a certain time, Damon shall be executed in his place. Pythias arrives in time and neither character dies, and Dionysus praises the two for their friendship and loyalty, and even asks to join the two in their friendship but is rejected.

It’s important to look at the framework of the story rather than the details. If we do that, I think there’s a lot to work with.

The story ties very neatly into the idea that Tozu’s Killing Game “continues until there’s only two people”, those two people in this context being Damon and Pythias, especially considering Tozu has the ongoing theme of lying! The Killing Game would end, but then maybe only one person gets to leave, and then begins the free-for-all seen in the Prologue. But then if Damon is Damon, who is Pythias supposed to be? Who is Damon willing to go against his entire ideology for with the belief they won’t kill each other? Honestly it’s too early to say. But that’s not all we can take from the story.

I think Tozu is our Dionysus. Dionysus is a tyrannical ruler named after, but not actually, a God, which is interesting in terms of a power complex. His role in the story is to pit Damon and Pythias against each other, making them doubt and question their trust for each other. The key difference is obviously Tozu will be relying on them to kill each other- however, should the story follow beat-by-beat, they won’t kill each other, and Tozu will be so impressed, he may let the two of them go. Frankly, I have another theory pertaining to Tozu that I haven’t created it into a proper post yet, but I think Tozu may try to bring them into his organization, and the two reject.

It’s an interesting story that makes for a fascinating theory. Considering how often the myth comes up in the origin of the name Damon, I imagine it has to have some form of relevancy. Not to mention the story is just a little bit too perfect of a character arc for Damon and a kick in the nuts for Tozu.

Brief aside: thanks to @panomiels-box for inspiring this analysis! They reminded me my “Damon and Pythias” draft exists and did their own analysis on Damon and Pythias. Our theories are pretty different which is why I’m not reblogging off their post, I’d hate to take away from their theory. Make sure to read theirs too, they make a lot of interesting points!

[spinjitsuburst]

since @icy-watch has finished seabound (my condolences btw a heartbreaking season finale to get through) I feel I should remind us all of one of the BEST FIGHT SCENES IN NINJAGO

[rockore]

The sequel no one asked for

Based on this post

[ksilberne]

color + shading practice/study with scrunkly Kai :')