#laios and falin's mother
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gothiethefairy · 8 months ago
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so, i've been thinking about laios's relationship with his mother. we all know about his daddy issues by now, but no one thinks about his mother. i mean, he disowned her as well. he hardly talks about her. he has a lot to say about his dad but when it comes to his mother, the most he'll say is "idk, she was kinda sick a lot."
and i think it was because he did hold her on a high pedestal. she's his mother, his protector. i know for sure she babied him a lot. mothers who's first-born is a son mostly do.
she was the one who even gifted him his precious monster manual!
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so, what happened? why did he also lump her with his father and decided "i'm never speaking to them ever again." ?
to put it in simple terms, it was falin. laios was so upset about how his parents treated the situation about the villagers' abuse to falin. both of them didn't know how to handle it, but they both failed at protecting her. the best their father can come up with is sending falin away to the magic school. (without explaining why bc their dad sucked at communicating with his family.)
their village was also very conservative, especially towards magic-users. i always found it to be odd since magic does seem to be the norm in the "dungeon meshi" world, however evidence shows it's not all well-known all around the world. i mean, rin's parents were burnt to death for using magic that was thought to be "black magic".
and falin's natural magical talent being "talking to the dead" would make anyone nervous bc that could be linked to black magic.
their mother is always described to be "frail", and i bet it's mostly because she's very superstitious. gotta be honest here as well, she maybe wasn't mentally healthy. this is just an assumption but their mom comes off as paranoid and anxious, and then does these made-up rituals to try to "heal" her daughter.
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hurting falin like this was the final nail in the coffin for laios, because maybe he thought he could rely on her? "hey mom, can you tell dad not to send falin away? please?"
yeah, she had "good intentions", but she still abused her daughter? because she made the situation about herself and went "oh god, it's my fault my daughter is a freak. i have to fix this."
also, laios looking so stressed and haggard here makes me so sad. like, what if their mother did something similar to him when he was younger? he wouldn't care about himself getting hurt, but seeing his own mother doing it to falin is nerve-wrecking.
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the way both siblings are portrayed as autistic in different ways is important to their characters. just because falin understood why their parents did what they did, doesn't make it okay. they still hurt her, and laios knows that. and in a way, they hurt him too.
if their parents couldn't protect them from awful, nasty people and expected their children to just bare it, how can laios trust them?
this is scary to see for a child.
after that, he pretty much gave up on his parents and never looked back. but i also think, if he misses them, it's more his mother than his father.
afterall, he did his best to keep his monster manual safe.
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s-aint-elmo · 1 year ago
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part 2 of my pining falin agenda aka I STAND WITH MARCILLE THAT DRESS WAS CUNT
part 1
(ID in alt text)
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a-normal-panda-bitch · 6 months ago
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You know, laios would still be in contact with his parents if they'd take the time and explain how they were trying to help falin and their own feelings about how the town was treating her. But no, all of laios's relationships suck because no one wants to have an up-front conversation with him.
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(Ironically, it's Father Touden that helps falin the most and he suffers the most with communicating his ideas with the Touden household. He doesn't even talk about it to his wife.)
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possamble · 8 months ago
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The hypocrisy of "I wasn't gonna be a kid forever" is devastating but we all knew she would be like this
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orionangeline · 8 months ago
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I love dunmeshi bc the fandom is like yeah when they're asking if eating the dragon that ate falin is cannibalism it's cannibalism foreshadowing and then you get the senshi backstory and think you're safe but :)
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blee-bleep · 9 months ago
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if we put the dung mesh party in luna nova, laois would prolly eat the faerie staff, fafnir, and professor pisces
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a-normal-panda-bitch · 6 months ago
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Mother Touden has a very strained relationship with her kids due to her own guilt as a mother. It makes sense that a small town would blame the mother for her child's mistake and perceived evil/wickness/general weirdness.
Adding falin's and laios autistic characterization only makes it more sad.
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Thinking about the Touden siblings again.
it was just the two of them in all the memories of their childhood. It seems they didn't have any childhood friends, only each other and their animals. Iike they were the only children of that age.
Were other kids wary of them because their father was the chief?
I keep thinking about the empty chairs at the dinner table, just Laios and Falin at first, and then Falin, all alone.
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I also noticed the shadow at the door. It's probably their mother watching them (I'm guessing)
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I wonder why she didn't join - was it because of Falin's magic? Was she scared of her own daughter?
No wonder Laios felt the need to leave.
No wonder Falin was so happy to have Marcille as a friend.
No wonder both Laios and Falin are willing to sacrifice everything for each other.
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eruhamster · 10 months ago
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not to be annoying but i do think a lot of people mischaracterize falin. shes got the most drastic canon v fanon thing going on. which i guess makes sense bc 1. we dont see much of her and 2. lot of the fan stuff are anime-onlies that have seen even less
but i think like a good 90% of the time i see falin-centric art or posts im like hrm hrm hrm thats all wrong no nope no-siree
she's just a cool chick that takes life as it comes, doesn't hold grudges even against a mother that apparently was trying to beat the magic outta her, finds her older brother the coolest person in the world, and has autism about observing life (and death, she loves the ghosts she has a connection to) and nature and taking care of things (including taking care of her brother, which is why she's even in the dungeons; she saw her scrawny mess of a brother and decided she had to fix that).
and i think my favorite part that people don't talk about is... she would have done the same for marcille or laios if it were one of them that was eaten. you could see it in her eyes:
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it's what shuro misunderstands about her. it's easy to see her feminine, cute, good girl pieces and forget the rest of her. but she loves things to an ends-of-the-earth extent; the kind of caring that makes you a little insane. and that's how I think she and laios end up on the same page with their weirdness. they have different interests, but they are the same level of committed to those interests.
it's easy to love her, because she probably loves you just as much, if not more.
EDIT: for the love of god stop reblogging this only to add some comment or tag or reply saying 'op you forgot [BLATANTLY FANON INTERPRETATION]'. falin as we know her is not a pushover/people pleaser/infantilized, see this version of my post. also stuff like 'female shuro was in love with laios in the genderbent comic' and 'falin was going to marry shuro because she felt bad' are just things you made up in your head
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savaralyn2 · 1 year ago
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Dungeon Meshi - Laios/Falins Mother
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tagasaing · 11 months ago
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i have to get this out of the way, re: dungeon meshi discussions
major spoilers ahead, obviously.
you know for a series that focuses so much on platonic and familial relationships it’s weird that dungeon meshi has attracted so much useless ship wars though. the most important driving force in the story is two sibling relationships (laios’s search for falin, thistle’s search for delgal) and one of the central themes is how loving others way too much can lead to your downfall (thistle’s desperate attempt to keep his loved ones leads to his mental state deteriorating so much he starts torturing people he claims to protect, marcille’s fear of losing her friends leads to her being easily manipulated by the main antagonist)
even with regards to falin. thistle wants to bring the ‘brother’ he raised back at all costs, he saw a young human woman as nothing more than a dragon, his tool. marcille wants to bring falin back at all costs, she didn’t care about the repercussions of using monster meat instead of animal meat even though she was an expert at ancient magic and should know why it’s such a dangerous practice.
each and every single one of the major characters has some form of tragedy with their family one way or another: the toudens, marcille and her dad. chilchuck and his wife. senshi’s entire backstory. izutsumi’s hidden desire for a mother. namari’s father. shuro and his family. kabru and his mother(both tallman and elf). mithrun and his brother. thistle and the melinis.
even some of the minor characters: flamela and her dead twin sister. the twins and the floke couple. kuro being the closest mickbell has to a family. etc etc
as someone who has reread this manga several times by now, i wonder if people just… read it once as fast as they could and act like they’re some sort of authority on fan discussion. i’ve seen people brag about reading the entire thing in one sitting as if it’s something to be proud of. this manga isn’t meant to be read that fast, that’s how you get people claiming that laios doesn’t reaaally love falin as much as marcille does.
to these people, laios just gets in the way, as if it wasn’t his idea to go down the dungeon in the first place, it wasn’t him who said his pain doesn’t matter because falin suffered more than him, it wasn’t him who felt immense guilt for leaving falin behind, it wasn’t him who found her skull, it wasn’t him who killed her to save her from her chimera form. i feel like people forget about the ‘too’ part when marcille said “i miss falin too”
marcille knows how much falin and laios love each other. that’s why she asked him if she’s allowed to resurrect her and didn’t act on her own. that’s why when both times a shapeshifting monster copied marcille to trick laios, it was what she looked like at the time she was reviving falin.
as someone who DOES ship farcille, none of the romance is canon. this isn’t meant to be anti-farcille. one of the post-canon comics is about falin gently turning down shuro because she wants to travel the world, “you can’t tie a dragon down” after all. she wants to travel the world and find herself because she doesn’t know who she is outside of marcille and laios. even marcille, who was hoping she’d reject him, tears up because of how beautiful and tragic it was.
there are a lot of ship teases because what author doesn’t like a good ship tease. but to say that dungeon meshi is a romantic love more than it is a story about family(both real and found) is a great misinterpretation of the text.
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loriache · 10 months ago
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Butch up that Elf: my Marcille manifesto
TBQH, this came into being because the Falin "dragoness" fanart rewired my brain completely. It's sillytimes, but we're going to make a serious argument: trying out being a little butch would Fix Her.
1. Marcille Gender Discomfort
Now, Marcille LOVES feminity. She loves playing dressup, she loves elaborate gowns, she spends her free time going to the spa - the absolute last thing I want is to deny that. However, there's also a definite vibe that this isn't just a preference. Specifically, the way that she pushes Falin towards femininity suggests that she isn't comfortable with gender nonconformity in the people around her.
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If this was something she was 100% confident about ("I'm doing this for myself and nobody else!") surely what other people do wouldn't be a big deal? Of course, you can read this as a little bit of solipsism; "what works for me must work for you too! I think this is so cute and would suit you - wouldn't you agree?"
But for the sake of this argument, all I'm trying to suggest is that gender nonconformity (and probably sexual nonconformity... well, frankly, any kind of sexuality at all) is unlikely to be something that's on Marcille's "radar". She hasn't tried out other ways of presenting and decided she doesn't like them. I do think she'd be a very flamboyant butch - "ouji lolita" vibes, you know? It's a whole new set of wardrobe options she could play dress-up in, even.
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After the story ends, she starts dressing like her mother in all black, which makes sense - her mother was also a court magician, so she's probably emulating her in order to project confidence and authority. But I can't say I think she should stick with this. Break away and be your own person, Marcille! Try a fancy waistcoat and frilled jacket!
2. Haircut
This is another potential hard sell, I'm sure. The people she loves doing her hair is a cute symbol of their care for her, and her hair is key to her magic - so there's plenty of reason for her to keep it long. But like... think practically. Having someone do your hair every morning, for the whole of her long life, while it gets messier over the day (because she can't remember to keep it neat)... That's got to be such a pain. My hair gets messy when I put a hoodie on. And I have short hair.
It would require her to go through a change of mind, and probably a little more growth in how secure she feels in her relationships, but - the hairdo's a symbol. The more important thing is the relationships themselves. Eventually I think there might be something liberating about cutting it off, even if she might eventually decide to grow it out again.
The lion, her trauma, took something away from her which was really important to her. The people around her are able to make that easier, and make up for it, and soften that loss, but... Mithrun isn't the person he was before, you know? He's a new person. The relationship he has with his brother is new, and I don't know if it's one that the person he was before could have had. If Falin hadn't died, they wouldn't have gone on that wonderful adventure! They wouldn't have met Senshi or saved Izutsumi and Laios and Marcille wouldn't have gotten so close. So I think it's totally congruent with the themes of the story that the burning away of this part of Marcille's self might eventually create the potential for new growth in a new direction, not clinging onto the parts that are gone.
This also isn't totally out of the norm for elven mages - both Otta and Flamela have short hair. Otta is canonically butch, and potentially Flamela reads that way to elves too, but the point is it clearly is possible to be an accomplished mage without long hair.
3. Desiring (to be) a chivalrous prince
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Marcille's succubus is clearly General Halleus from her favourite book series, the Daltian Clan. The fact that this is her ideal man.... it certainly plays into readings of her as Not Straight. But at least, this conveys the way her conception of sex and romance is strongly idealised, dissociated from the bodily and from physical desire.
There are many ways to interpret that, including thinking about what types of desire this fixation is obstructing because she is not comfortable with it, but I am going to focus here on what this desire does signify. She likes the trappings of courtly romance, and is clearly comfortable putting herself in the role of the princess, being taken away on a white horse by a noble (but tormented; eyepatch has "death" on it lmao) prince. (Though I think he's actually the token male lead who isn't royalty; he's a General. There's always one in Romfan, lmao. IYKYK)
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A kiss on the hand - this is so chaste, I think it's clear it's more about desire to play a role in a dynamic than it is about desire in a physical sense. There is undoubtedly a big part of Marcille that wants to be a beloved and chased-after princess, but I think it isn't at all impossible that she'd also enjoy being the powerful, cool, and chivalrous "prince" to someone (a pretty girl, perhaps) who needs her protection.
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This is a little silly, because it's clearly just aping the shoujo artstyle that articulates basically the same idea as her succubus, that Marcille is attached to highly abstracted and idealised romantic (and Romantic) tropes and ideas. But the imaginary "successful" Marcille from chapter 4 looks quite similar to her succubus. (Another thing I noticed is that in the fantasy she has sharp ears... like full elves have. Despite what she says, I think the cultural messaging that this trait is "attractive" and hers are inferior got to her at least a bit. 😥)
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Also, the way that she treats Falin, scolding her indulgently, trying to look after her and wanting to be looked up to and respected by her... that aligns more with the "masculine" role in the trope that her succubus is referencing. "What are we going to do with you...?" I can imagine her saying this to Falin, word for word. Whereas, if anyone real started talking down to her, even affectionately, I don't think she'd like it, given the negative way she reacts when people don't respect her or her skills. Especially after canon, given the way the Winged Lion was treating her.
Her attitude to Falin is partially down to her reluctance to acknowledge Falin as an adult, who is independent and can grow beyond her and leave her behind. But I think even as they move on from that unhealthy dynamic, Marcille is still going to get pleasure from feeling capable, reliable, able to look after and protect Falin. She'd like to pull the chair out for her in a restaurant on a date, you know?
4. Conclusion
Even after the growth she goes through during the story, there are parts of Marcille's character that are very much obstructed. Romance, sexuality, and gender, feel like one of those to me. The way that her discomfort with the messy origins of food betrayed a deeper, more significant discomfort with the cycles of life and death.
Much in the same way, I'd argue that the simplified, idealistic, and safely fantastical way that she views romance, as well as her very "safe" gender presentation and tendency to push it onto others as well, suggest an underlying discomfort in her own gender and sexuality. The character growth she goes through leaves her in a place where it may be possible to safely re-evaluate her relationship with Falin, as well as her choice of clothing and hairstyle, both things that go through a change at the end of the manga. Neither, I think, reach a sustainable stopping point that we see - there will be a point when it's more servants doing her hair than friends, just out of practicality, because they're all going to be so, so busy. The black clothing to copy her mum is cute, but once she gets some more self-confidence in her own skills as a court magician, I think she'll move on from it. And... who knows what direction her relationship with Falin will develop, over the years? I'm rooting for them, anyway.
In all those cases, I think moving outside of the things she's done before, into something really different from the things that are "safe" and expected, will be the most rewarding path for her. Like in the dungeon, things that she would initially reject were actually able to sustain her and broaden her tastes. She loves dressing up, looking after people, and "princely romance". So I say: Butch Marcille! It'll be good for her!!
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lgbtlunaverse · 10 months ago
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This page from the adventurer's bible makes me want to cry
Like basically any neurodivergent dungeon meshi fan, I see a lot of myself in the Touden siblings. But I was blindsided by just how much I suddenly related to Falin in this little comic from the adventure bible's complete version.
It's about the Touden siblings' differing relationships with their parents, and why Laios still holds their treatment of Falin against them, while Falin herself doesn't.
We know that Falin was isolated and ostraziced by their village after she saved Laios from a ghost, displaying her uncanny affinity for magic. Her parents, instead of defending her, sent her away, which angered Laios so much he ran way himself before Falin even left for magic school, hoping to make a living so he and Falin could live together alone.
He tells Marcile this, but when she goes to Falin, she says she sees things differently. Her father sent her to magic school to protect her form the rest of the village without having to cause a conflict. He didn't explain that, and we actually see her burst into tears when he says it.
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But, well... Laios was gone for a year before Falin went to magic school, and everyone else in the village avoided her. The understanding Falin has with her parents to me looks like one borne out of necessity, she literally didn't have anyone else to talk to.
And this is where we get to the page that made me want to cry
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Like I said, I relate to the Toudens because I'm neurodivergent myself. that feeling of suddenly realizing you're disliked, but not knowing what you did wrong or what you should have done instead? Yeah... that's one I recognize.
When I was around 9 years old, the same age Falin is in this comic, a bunch of kids in my class decided to make a "game" where you lost if you touched me. It was basically the 'cheese-touch' from diary of a wimpy kid, except I always had it and couldn't pass it along. They'd pretend I was poisonous or disgusting and run away from me screaming or gagging. The point was to make fun of me. But my autistic little 9 year old ass thought "Oh I get it! It's tag but I'm always it!" So I... played along. Running at a boy and having him fall on the ground screaming in fake pain because you tapped him is, in isolation, pretty funny.
It wasn't until months into the "game" that I realized it was meant to be meanspirited. That the reason I was the one who was always 'it' wasn't an arbritrary rule but the whole point. Because I was weird and gross. I wasn't in on the joke, I was the punchline.
Falin may have come to understand her parents' intentions, but she didn't always. The adventure bible actually tells us that she at first didn't even notice that the rest of their village disliked her. She clearly knows now, but she had to be told. So when her mom tried to exorcise her, she just saw it as an activity she got to do with a mother she usually didn't get to spend much time with because of her poor health. It's only Laios who notices something is wrong.
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(Sidenote, Laios being hyper-aware of people's poor attitudes towards Falin but completely blindsided when he's in the same spot, like with Toshiro, is also very relatable as an eldest sibling)
It probably also took Falin months, until after her brother had left and she had no one but her parents, to realize why her mother had been doing all those things.
And I know they're not the same. Even misguidedly, Falin's mom was trying to help her, not make fun of her like those boys in my class. (Though, as a queer person who also cares a lot about the queercoding in Falin's storyline, a parent trying to 'exorcise' their child of a fundamental part of them the parent thinks is evil or corruptive? yeah... that's not perfectly wholesome)
But do you know what I did, when I finally figured out the game was always meant to make fun of me?
To me, it looked like I had a choice.
See, those boys eventually figured out I didn't understand that they were being mean to me. I'd laugh every time I managed to catch one of them, I was visibly having fun. And while it no doubt only made me more of a weirdo in their eyes, they never informed me that I shouldn't be enjoying myself. That the point was for me to feel hurt.
So now that I did know, I had a choice. I could either get upset, and let the insult land as it was supposed to. That wouldn't stop them, because making fun of me was the original goal. Or I could ignore it and go on as usual. They had already accepted that I didn't get it, and they weren't gona stop me from having fun, so why should I?
And the thing is that I had... one friend, in that whole class. One person who actually liked talking to me and hanging out with me. I was lonely. And the 'game' provided me with another social interaction, mean-spirited as it was, that I desperately needed. And it was so delightfully simple. Navigating actual friendships as a kid with autism and adhd was so fucking complicated, and I'd never know when I might break an inivisble rule. But I knew the rules to the game perfectly!
Sometimes, if I was chasing one of them, the others would trap him and hold him down so I could tap him. In those moments it actually did kind of feel like I was playing with them, rather than against them. And it didn't change much, they didnt start actually liking me. But they were willing to roll with the fact that I wasn't upset, and I took advantage of that because I needed to.
So you can look at Falin seeing the best in her parents as her being naïve, but I look at this page and I see myself, at first unable to differentiate between playing and being made fun of. And then later, when I did see the difference, deciding not to get mad about it because that'd mean losing that social interaction, and I couldn't afford to.
Like I said, Falin probably first realized this in the year she spent with her brother gone, and everyone else avoiding her like the plague. If she refused to talk to her parents, like Laios did, she'd have no one left.
I see a lot of people relating to the fight between Laios and Toshiro. that frustration when you realize someone you thougth was your friend actually hates you, and they never said anything, never gave you a chance to fix it because you had no idea that you were even doing something wrong! And I can see that, too. But sometimes, when people don't fully hate you, it feels better to go along with the pretending. Because adressing it won't fix it. Because the problem isn't a specific behaviour, it's you. And if they're willing to tolerate you, despite the fact that it's you, then you'll take it. Because other people do hate you, so this is the best you'll get.
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a-normal-panda-bitch · 8 months ago
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I can't stop thinking about how Laios views his mom in his mind.
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She seems so sad right? I think it's so fascinating how his most unforgettable memory of his own mother was warped by the distress she felt about falin's magic.
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It's not like she's only in distress, seems very kind and motherly outside of falin's magic issue. Falin herself seems to understand that more than her own brother. I want to see more of the way Laios and his parents interact and their sort of miscommunication of each other's feelings on falin.
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possamble · 10 months ago
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Needlessly close reading and long commentary on chapter 57 and how the audience actually has an extremely limited view on what Marcille has been like over the course of her life.
I am once again thinking about how pre-dungeon Marcille is so quiet and stoic that she seems like a completely different person. How jarring chapter 57 is for the audience. Like you have Marcille, who has been just the most blindingly expressive person with resting baby face
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And then the chapter drops a title page of Marcille hearing from Falin for the first time in four years and it's like.
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Who is that. Genuinely. Would you even realize that's Marcille without the context clues?
And then the chapter just keeps coming in with the sucker punches.
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We have SEEN Marcille meet strangers. It was never with this understated of a smile.
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literally who the hell is this. the few times the audience gets to see some Signature Marcille Faces that they're used to is when she finally gets to see Falin again
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when she's testing out her new spells
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(and when Laios and Falin are fantasizing about her being their damsel in distress, funnily enough)
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And then finally. Finally you get to a fully recognizable Marcille when she fucking DIES and comes back to life to geek out about necromancy.
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We know she loves magic. We know she loves Falin. So it's not so surprising that she wouldn't be able to keep a mask up when thinking or talking about the things she loves. But why the mask in the first place? Where does it come from? It's tempting to think that, maybe, Falin's departure just hurt her so much that it turned her into a quiet person.
But that's only half true. If you go back, the first instance you see of this incredibly mild personality is actually introduced much earlier, in chapter 17.
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What if she was always like that. What if her default after her father died was to hold people at arm's length, to never really emote past being polite and friendly. What if Falin was the first person who was able to bring her out of her shell, and when she left, Marcille just went back to how she was.
And when comparing her detached demeanour with someone else...
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It's not exact, but wouldn't you say there's a resemblance? Wouldn't you think she might be trying her best to imitate what she saw of her own mother working as an accomplished mage?
It would certainly explain why she's hiding behind her portrait in her nightmare, at least.
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We aren't told that Marcille has been distancing herself from everyone around her using a mature and dignified personality she modelled off her mother. But we sure as hell are shown it, I think.
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eclecticmiasma · 8 months ago
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I kept thinking what if Chilchuck or Laios had been kidnapped by the monster! reader, how the reader saw them hurt or mistook them for chicks and saved them from being killed by another monster.. Now the reader monster is taking care of him in his nest/house, as if they were his own chicks (reader is a gentle monster who doesn't want anyone getting hurt or dying), and the reader being a sentient monster where she knows the dungeons are dangerous...
Note: the reader's appearance is similar to that of a human but with some animal characteristics, thus confusing the adventurers, who may think that she is a human cursed by the mad wizard and thus has the monster part... But the reader is a cool and conscious monster
Large brained thoughts, honestly! Perhaps reader could be the ghost of a creature that lost its young and uses shape-shifting to lure dungeoneers and other monsters to her nest as replacements? I would imagine that she would become extremely protective of her targets especially once they have been tricked into becoming one of her offspring. We don't see any examples of monsters being benevolent per se, but there is a benevolence/kindness to reader's selfish desires.
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I think reader would appear very different to Laios and Chilchuck, and their reactions would be completely 180 degrees. Some slight anime spoilers ahead! SFW, canon typical violence.
Laios
Reader appears to Laios in a form that's nearly identical to her original. She has thick claws and black, wet eyes. Her teeth are sharp but framed by soft human lips and her ashen hair is silken and braided like a Northern maiden. She might have a long scaly tale and feathers on her abdomen and thighs because, due to Falin's current condition, it's a form that Laios finds subconsciously comforting.
She lures Laios while the others are asleep. A monster that he's never seen before is too intriguing to pass up- the party is safe enough where they are. Just a peak, a chance to learn-
Before he knows it, Laios is somewhere wholly unfamiliar. The thick dungeon bricks lining the walls slowly give way to moss and grass. The air is warm and smells like petrichor.
Despite a small, nagging anxiety, he presses further. The creature smiles as she leads him farther into the jungle atmosphere, a smile so sparkling and human that is makes Laios blush.
Before long, he's walked right into reader's nest. It's a cozy hovel carved into the base of a tree. Laios is delighted to find smaller monsters of all sizes in a daze, lounging around on the thatched flooring. As he steps inside, he feels a veil of calm close around him and vaguely realizes that its why the monsters aren't hostile towards each other.
Laios succumbs, at first. He lets reader take him into her arms, drag her long claws through his hair and sing a tune that numbs his mind into a pleasant mush.
Reader feeds him, gives him her milk (a high he'll never reach again until the day he dies), lays out the comfiest spot for her newest treasure and goes on her way to find the next target.
Genuinely, if Laios wasn't on a quest this would be his life for eternity. His own mother wasn't very loving, so a meld of monsters and mothers is more than a guy could ever ask for.
It could be hours, it could be days, but eventually Laios begins to remember that this isn't where he's meant to be. He sees a monster that reminds him of Falin, and all at once knows he reluctantly has to return to reality.
Once reader realizes Laios is gone, only killing her will end her crusade to get him back. While the others simply see a deranged monster, Laios sees a terrified mother desperate to drag him back to the safety of her home. Laios hesitates before killing her, too torn apart by the tears in her eyes. Marcille has to take the final blow.
Senshi and Laios briefly consider cooking the inhuman parts of reader into a sort of beef stroganoff as tribute, but Chilchuck's screeching reminder that they are not to eat humanoids leaves them to bury her instead.
Chilchuck
Is just off the heels of grumbling about being treated like a child when he spots what looks to be a small figure huddled in the darkness.
He calls out to the others but doesn't hear a response, only the soft whimpers of whoever has managed to get themselves into this state.
Chilchuck is much more on guard than Laios would ever be. He immediately assumes that it could be a trap or an illusion, so he calls to the figure from afar.
She answers, desperation coloring her tone as she sobs, relieved that someone has come across her.
"Th-they're dead, I don't know where they are but they're dead and I..."
As Chilchuck gingerly steps towards her, he realizes that what he sees is another half-foot. A small archer that's bloodied and bruised. Something about her reminds him immediately of his wife.
All logic leaves Chilchuck as he finishes approaching her, asking what's wrong and tearing off a piece of his sleeve to prepare to bandage the deepest of her wounds. When he goes to wrap the material around her forearm he stares in confusion. The wounds are gone.
He doesn't even have time to react before reader cups his small face in her. "You're lonely," She says, a matter of fact. The half-foot can't deny it, "It's time you stop doing these dangerous things. The only end for a half-foot in the dungeon is in the mouth of a monster. Let me take care of you."
Her words are like honey, her touch even moreso. Feeling the touch of a woman isn't a luxury Chilchuck had been afforded in many moons. But even in the fog of reader's touch, Chilchuck feels that something is off. Her hands are too cold, eyes too deep and dark- almost like black pools of liquid.
The sharp tips of her teeth set him off, and he knows he has to get away. She's no different than a mimic, he tells himself. Even if part of him desperately wants exactly what she has to offer.
Chilchuck mimes as if he is going to fall into her allure, cupping his hands over her own and giving her the most smitten look he can muster. All before kneeing her in the face and dashing at speeds only half-foots can muster to get away.
Reader chases him desperately, form filling the room as she wails in sorrow. "Can't you see they're using you? You're going to end up as bait. You're going to die down here, you'll never see your family again!" Chilchuck mentally bats away at each assertion even as they hook into his skin.
The others finally come running, proximity close enough to hear the commotion at last. With a few well-placed blasts and a slice to the throat via Kensuke, reader is felled and left for good. Even in death, she seems to be in mourning.
Chilchuck doesn't sleep well for weeks.
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[RULES] [MASTERLISTS] [AO3] [KO-FI]
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absolutechaosss · 8 months ago
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Do you ever go insane thinking about how every member of Laios' party is extremely atypical for their species, but a lack of exposure and understanding smoothes out these differences and makes everyone think they're the "typical" representation.
Senshi is terrible with other dwarves since he has no practical interest in mining or weapons craft. We cannot know this until Namari and later, Senshi's backstory are introduced. When we see him interact with dwarves, it's awkward and clear there's a fundamental disconnect.
Chilchuck is incredibly tall for a half foot and as such has to manage his weight more than other half foot dungeoneers so he doesnt set off traps. The first detail takes the changlings to properly understand, the second is referenced in text but is fully explained in additional materials. It is plot relevant that people who don't have the exposure to half foots might not even realize they're their own species.
Marcille as a half elf is kind of obvious to many of the elves who encounter her and they're deeply cruel and assume she's driven by a desire to be able to have children but the party never notices and Senshi especially thinks of her as a typical elf even though in truth she's so outcast she could never dine with her mother at the queens table.
Laios and Falin are a bit more complicated, since we as the audience do have context for most of tallman culture, since it mirrors our own mostly, but both of them have magical aptitude that both people like Marcille, who has a lot of access to mana and people like Chilchuck, who has very little and no magical training, fail to understand how isolating it is to have that much potential and aptitude.
Arguably Toshiro and Namari fall into this as well. Toshiro looks like the embodiment of the silent but noble warrior, but his own party and extra material confirm that he's abnormally shy and introverted, something that makes it hard for him even in his own family. Meanwhile Namari is able to stand on her own as a weapons expert and "typical" dwarf, but total dwarves who are total strangers like Dya know who she is and resent her.
Arguably a lot of dungeon meshi is about peeling back layers and assumptions not working out, but it's so great that every member of the core party gets interpreted by others (and maybe the reader) as "typical", especially with the skills line up, as a human fighter, halfling rogue, and an elven mage are so basic a stereotype. But none of are able to achieve that standard. These assumptions and misunderstandings only thrive because each party member is so inexperienced with both the biology and culture of the others. The only way they gain context is either interacting with a wider pool of people or experiencing it for themself. Everything in this story is so layered and I love it.
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