#like forgive me for the harsh language but you do see that this is deranged behavior right?

[daz4i]

I'm having some thoughts regarding posts I've seen on my dash both recently and like, years ago, bc this is far from a new phenomenon. this isn't @ anyone specific nor am i going to give specific details bc it really is an expansive thing so like. to whoever needs to hear this ig

stop engaging with things in the worst faith reading possible. start giving people the benefit of the doubt i am begging you

9/10 of times, the person you see who might be slightly insensitive, or enjoys content you find harmful, or is using the wrong term for smth, is doing it out of ignorance on the matter

and most of the times it isn't smth they can just google to figure out. bc sometimes you really gotta do mental gymnastics or ignore every redeeming quality of a thing to find the harmful part. and usually unless a person is directly involved in activist circles or knows abt the history of a particular community etc they will never make that connection and I'm sorry to tell you, but that's most people you will encounter, both irl and online

9 times out of 10 there is no malice involved. attacking strangers because you think they are attacking you by doing a very normal thing (like quote a meme or enjoy a movie) isn't the way to gain anything, and you're more likely to cause antagonism in that person

it's good to inform others, but doing it by accusing them of harmful behavior isn't the way

also on a less deep note, you're just gonna become an incredibly unpleasant person to be around if you keep doing that shit. if you keep looking for the bad in everything you see others enjoy, you will keep seeing it. you will become extremely bitter. you gotta give people the benefit of the doubt for your own sanity fr

and before I'm taken out of context: no that doesn't apply to actual bigots (my whole point here is that most ppl just aren't informed and aren't actively hateful). no this isn't me telling you to be nice to your own oppressors so they hate you less. no this isn't me saying you have to let slide media that is genuinely harmful (I'm talking more about the people who consume it who are average and don't hold some secret ill intentions). yes I'm aware a lot of times people ARE bigots and just try to hide it which is why dogwhistles exist, which is exactly why i think it's important to remain informed and inform others so we stop engaging with these people or their content (i just think that doing it in combative ways is bad for everyone involved). ok i think that covered all my bases

tldr just. remember that people are people. and people can make mistakes. and you gotta let them grow from it. and sometimes, you are the one who makes the mistake, by assuming the worst of someone you don't even know

[pennybard]

Whispers at the Threshold

((Had to write about Vizriel getting his Gift of N’Zoth, obviously. Had this story rolling around in my head for a while, and I figured I’d get out some of my Void theories while I was at it. I hope the zero people who read this enjoy it.))

“What the fel are you doing?” Vizriel asked, shoving himself up from the ground into a sitting position. He blinked his eyes several times while trying to look at his traveling companion. The salty air of Stormsong Valley, particularly nearest the Crucible of Storms was sucking the moisture from his eyes. He rubbed his eyes with his palms, growling to himself before looking up at the woman again. The void elven form sat on the grass, her knees tucked up under her cheek, her arms wrapped around her legs. She grinned at him and narrowed her eyes. The look made Vizriel feel like little more than an appetizer.

“I haven’t watched a mortal sleep before. I’ve listened to their dreams for millennia, but never simply watched what they did when their mind was away, flitting about behind their eyes at the borders of our realm.” She chuckled and smiled wide, exposing perfect teeth. She was breathtaking in her beauty. Onyx and violet hair draped around her face, a shimmer of void un-light passed through it every so often, like the pulsing of an unseen heart. She was beautiful, maddeningly, viciously, terrifyingly so. It twisted his stomach, and made his mind ache.

Vizriel had pulled Xalatath from the hands of a deranged lunatic who was running from a Tortollan trading post. He recognized the blade, having seen it in no other hands than those of his sister, Mithandra when they met one another on the Broken Shore. She was nigh incoherent then, but still seemed to show him some kind of affection, through the insanity that was clearly plaguing her mind. He wondered if the blade had anything to do with it, and was glad that it wasn’t in his sister’s possession anymore. He knew that it was not a weapon that ought to be left alone, or trusted in any hands other than his own, especially in the hands of a raving lunatic.

He was nearly at the portal chamber in Boralus, about to take the blade to one of the many vaults he’d secured near Stormwind, when he heard it. A faint voice whispered to him from the dagger, telling him that he felt familiar. He knew of only a few talking weapons before this one. All of them were dangerous to wield. It was far too dangerous to leave unattended, and so near to his home. So he decided to stay on Kul Tiras, and see what he could learn about the dagger, and from it.

In the days since he first spoke to the dagger, he learned that the Old God, N’Zoth had granted artifacts to his servants. These artifacts were terribly powerful, and could be used to devastating effect against the enemies of the Old Gods. But they could also, Xalatath said, be collected and used against them as well. Her reasoning seemed sound enough. He already possessed one formidable weapon, after all. More would be needed if Azeroth was to stand a chance against N’Zoth now.

Vizriel didn’t like it, but he agreed. For months he had been studying the effects that the blade of Sargeras was having on the planet. Not long into his research and investigations, he learned that the servants of the Old Gods would gather in places where Azerite was hemmorhaging to the surface and were draining the immense power that was leaking forth from the fissures. If other accounts he had heard were true, then all that power was being siphoned toward the final known Old God. He shuddered to think of the effect that such power could have on it. Azeroth would need any edge it could find to drive N’Zoth back.

So he and the knife had been a team for nearly a week. In that time, he had acquired three such artifacts and, following several surprisingly minor rituals, Xalatath had gained strength enough to be able to assume a visible form outside of the dagger. She was far more talkative in this form, and a more adept manipulator, as those who are beautiful can be when they are aware of their beauty.

Something else had been happening as well. Vizriel heard whispers in his mind, more and more, louder and louder by the day. They followed him from the waking world, into sleep and dream. Always the same harsh, hissing, hateful mantra. They were in Shath’Yar, the language of the Old Gods and their servants. The whispers were why he couldn’t sleep, and were why he caught the woman in the dagger watching him as he slept.

“You mutter.” She said. “How fantastic.”

Vizriel glared. “Likely repeating the whispers I’ve been hearing for the last few days.” He fought and failed to stifle a yawn, then pulled his blanket up around his shoulders. Xalatath grinned and mimicked his yawn. The act looked rehearsed, practiced, not at all natural. It looked exactly like what it was; how an alien creature might think that humanoids acted, its best approximation of life. Everything about Xalatath made the warlock’s blood run cold. It was a good thing she was locked away in the dagger.

“Interesting dreams you were having.” She said, ignoring his comment about the whispers. “I know where I recognized your essence from now.” She said, grinning wide again and giving him that predatory look she gave all living things. Vizriel took a swig from his water skin.

“Where?” He asked. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. He was aware that Xalatath didn’t have his best interests at heart, or any interests save her own. He knew that she was taking him closer to another Old God. It wasn’t something he was unfamiliar with, having been subjected to, and manipulated by Yogg Saron, and servants of C’Thun in the past. He wanted to get closer. Something in him had always pulled him into the paths of the Old Gods. He needed to know more. The more he knew, the better his chances could be of stopping them. All of them.

“You’re not the first of your bloodline to wield me.” She said with a grin.

“My sister.” Vizriel said. He was keeping his sentences short. He didn’t want to give her more than she already had to work with. Xalatath nodded.

“You dream of her often?” She said, examining her nails in another act of affected nonchalance. Still not terribly convincing. “She dreams of you.”

“What a revelation.” He responded. “Anything else?” He asked before leaning back down as if to go back to sleep. She quirked a brow at him, a faint flicker of another smile at her lips.

“Do you ever wonder what caused her to act the way she does? That vicious madness that twists her mind into knots whenever you’re on it?”

Vizriel stopped and sat back up, a low growl in his chest as he watched the avatar of Xalatath uncurl her body to sit more casually on the ground before him. She crossed her legs at her ankles and leaned back, keeping herself propped up by her hands. Her feet bobbed up and down rhythmically. She was getting better, but still looked wrong in her imitations.

“Did she tell you? Or did you pry into her mind to find out? Did you leave more scars than you found her with?” He asked. Xalatath shook her head.

“There wasn’t much more I could do to her. And besides, I appreciated the way she wielded me. Our goals aligned so very often. Until they didn’t.” She shrugged.

“But what did you learn about her?” He pressed his line of questioning. He had been trying to find out the reasons for his sister’s tormented state of mind for years, more than a decade at this point. If Xalatath could make sense of it, maybe he could finally figure out how to help her. The elf pursed her lips in thought for a moment.

“There is a madness lying in wait at the edges of her very being, always. She has been subject to the will of the Old Gods for a very long time. Longer than many can withstand.” She said.

“But she’s Undead, and has been for so long. The Undead are famously very resistant to the whispers of the Old Gods and their servants.” He replied.

“Yes, indeed they are. But few of them have ever been subject to the will of the Old Gods before dying and returning. Fewer still have done so willingly.” She said.

“Willingly? Mithandra? No. Our parents forced her into it. Once I ran away from home I...” He stopped himself. He was saying far too much. He looked at Xalatath. She had that hungry look again.

“Did your parents force her? Or did she see in us a means of getting exactly what she had always wanted?” She asked.

“But, I thought our parents were planning to offer us up to the Twilight’s Hammer, to the Old Gods, to increase their station and achieve apotheosis of some kind. That’s what...”

“That’s what your sister told you?” Xalatath asked. Vizriel nodded, his gaze lowering.

“I don’t blame you for believing her. Making a villain of your parents certainly would make it easier to forgive her killing them.”

Vizriel nodded. It had made it easier.

“As I understand it, you were sworn to the Twilight’s Hammer, but not as sacrifices. You are both special. Too special to be used as mere offerings. Desperation, fear, hopelessness; those are the qualities of a good sacrifice. They taste better, for lack of better phrasing.” She nodded. “Once your sister discovered just how different you both are, and what it meant that you are, she set her own plans in motion.”

“Did she tell you what they are? Her plans.” Vizriel asked, leaning forward, crossing his legs and resting his elbows on his knees. Xalatath shook her head.

“The madness in her mind is a simple, but rather perfect veil over her thoughts. I don’t think she suffers from it. It feels self-imposed. And if it increases when you’re near, it seems to me that you’re the one person she wants to conceal it from more than anyone.” The elf grinned at him, tilting her head back and giving him an appraising look. Vizriel shook his head and took another sip from his water skin.

“That’s...”

“Insane?”

“....yeah.”

“And it works.”

“But what could be so special about us? I know there’s a connection to shadow magic, but... I’ve read, researched, travelled Azeroth. I’ve only been able to find the barest hints. If there’s something different about us, something worth breaking your mind over, I’d think it would leave more of a trace.” Vizriel said, looking out over the ocean. Xalatath watched him, then mimicked his sigh.

“You have heard Paladins go on about the Light choosing them, yes? Shamans, saying that the elements accept them?” Xalatath asked. Vizriel nodded. “Have you ever heard someone say that the void chose them? Well, someone in their right mind, anyway.” Vizriel looked at her and narrowed his eyes.

“It doesn’t happen often. It is extremely rare, in fact. Have you ever wondered why you and your sister could whisper to one another through the darkness as children? Why demons and phantoms show you affection, even form loving bonds with you?” Vizriel shrugged.

“I thought it was because I had died and had been brought back. Monsters looking out for monsters.”

“Not quite. At least, not because you were Forsaken for a few years.” She chuckled. “But close. Other warlocks give you a wide berth, I imagine. So few of them trust you, don’t they? The rest try to learn the secret to the ease with which you wield shadow magic. But they can’t, because not even you know it.” Xalatath said, smiling wide. “And you and your sister weren’t speaking to one another through the shadows. The shadows heard you and whispered the message back to the other.”

Vizriel chewed his lower lip as he thought. He shook his head a few times before looking up at Xalatath.

“I suppose it would explain a lot.” He said.

“Like the markings on your face.” She said.

“What do you mean? I thought these were branded on to me because I toyed with the Nether to undo my Undead curse and become human again. I was told that I was branded as a paradox.” Vizriel said.

“Your sister told me about that. That was a very stupid thing to do. Any other being would have been stretched to their component atoms and scattered, screaming eternally across the span of the Nether. But you were spared. You were spared, and you were marked as a result. You were marked by your saviour. The Nether lies at the meeting place of Light and the Void. It was the Void that saved you, because it recognized you. It remembers you.” Xalatath said.

“So my sister and I are supposed to be champions of the Void? Something like that?” Vizriel asked. The elf chuckled and shrugged. She was looking more natural by the moment.

“If you want to call it that, sure.” Xalatath said.

“But the Void has tried to kill me many times since then.” Vizriel said.

“The Old Gods may have. Faceless Ones may have. They may be of the Void, in its employ, but they do not always act on behalf of the Void.  Have you not seen a Shaman reduced to ash by a fire elemental?” Xalatath reasoned. “They have their own tasks set out for them, you have yours. You’ve survived their attempts well enough, I see. Maybe you were being tested?” She said, lifting a brow.

“But for what? And why would I want to fight for the Void?” Vizriel asked.

“Why would you want to fight it?” Xalatath asked in response. The warlock found himself unable to answer right away.

“You could always fight for the Light.” She said. Vizriel shuddered and snarled to himself. The response startled him. He shook his head.

“No. The Old Gods are of the Void. I do not want to protect them. I certainly don’t want to serve them. I don’t want to serve the likes of the Twilight’s Hammer either.” Vizriel said, his voice taking on a low growl. Xalatath scoffed.

“The Twilight’s Hammer. They had no idea what they were doing. They were fighting on behalf of an insane dragon aspect, not the Old Gods. The Old Gods are not so base as that. Children playing apocalypse, that’s all they were. They did not serve the Void.” She said. She held out her hand as Vizriel took another gulp of water from his water skin. He hesitated a moment before throwing it to her. She caught it. It didn’t pass through her. She had gained more strength than he thought.

Vizriel watched as Xalatath took a sip of water. She looked like something that needs to drink water, just like everyone else did. She had figured out how to look effortlessly effortless. She no longer performed one action at a time. She would disappear in a crowd. He knew that’s what she wanted.

“What is the Void then? It seems to merely be all-consuming, like it wants to claim all things for its own. An endless hunger that’ll never be sated.” Vizriel said. Xalatath tossed his water skin back to him. She watched him a moment. There was a different look on her face, in her eyes. It wasn’t sadness, but it was close.

“I’m sure you’ve heard that the Void and the Light have always existed in balance?” She asked.

“I have but...”

“Ah, good. Maybe you know the truth. Do you?”

“The Void was first?”

“Yes it was. It was calm then. It was whole. Then the Light came. It shattered the Void, like the darkness that flees when a lamp is lit, hiding in shadows, wherever the Light isn’t.” Xalatath said. There was bitterness in her voice.

“Life as we know it came from that splintering of the Void.” Vizriel said, following the logic as best he could. The elf nodded.

“And the Void collapsed and fell away as more and more things were created. Dichotomy, oppositions. Life, Death, Chaos, Order, all sprang into being. All the beautiful, wondrous things of this world were made, but all the terrible, horrific things too. The Light caused this, at the expense of the Void. Do you understand?” She asked. Vizriel shuddered, rubbing his hands, cracking his knuckles one by one the way he always did when he was lost in thought.

“The Void doesn’t want to consume for the sake of consumption.” Vizriel said. “It wants to be whole again.” 

“And you’re surprised to find out that it’s been watching you.” Xalatath grinned. “Yes. The Void is not the absence of creation. It is purest potential. All things have come from the Void.” She said.

“And to the Void, all things will return”. Vizriel said. Xalatath nodded, smiling wide. Vizriel shuddered and looked at her. The two watched one another for a while. Whispers came up from the entrance to the Crucible of Storms. They were the same whispers Vizriel had been hearing for the last several days. Xalatath watched the doorway a while, then looked back to Vizriel.

“I think it’s time we finish the last leg of this journey.” She said, watching as the warlock packed his belongings. He put his robes on over his underclothes and readied his scythe. “Think more on what I’ve told you tonight, Vizriel. I’ve told you more perhaps than I ought to, but there is still much to be learned below.”

“I will.” He said, looking toward the archway that led underground. “Do I have anything to fear, going down there?” He asked. Vizriel walked over to the dagger, plucking it up and sticking it in his belt.

“Oh yes, there is much to be afraid of down there. But I don’t think you’ll be in any danger.”

“Right. Well, off we go then.”

“Right. Oh, and Vizriel?”

“Hm?”

“This has been fun.”

“That it has.”