#obviously I don't think this is all going to line up bc generally it's just that Some elements of it do but. I gnaw delicately on this

[muppetebbtide]

ok wait wait so following on from my tlt-classical mythology name meaning post the other day... I vaguely ascribed gideon to andromache or patroclus semi-ironically, or even achilles (though that more belongs to pyrrha or harrow in my eyes), but now I'm realising. gideon is one of the children of the doomed noble house who had to be killed to stop its downfall, wasn't, and survived to cause problems. gideon is part of the reason that a lot of people in the ninth died (though not all of it). gideon is seen as lesser to harrow and resented for surviving. gideon had a choice between love, power, and millitary prowess. gideon is a self-deprecating flirt who was coddled by cytherea, allusive of aphrodite, and has the favour of other god(s). gideon has two names that mean the same thing.

gideon isn't patroclus or andromache, at least not entirely. gideon is a child of priam (the ninth house) all the same as harrow. gideon is paris.

when paris was born, hecuba was told to kill him because of a dream she'd had where she gave birth to a burning torch and that was interpreted as 'paris will be the ruin of troy' (which was um. true. lol. sorry paris.) priam and hecuba give him to a herdsman to do the job coz they feel bad, obviously he does Not do it, paris survives, comes back to cause problems. gideon isn't a crap fighter or a wet wipe like the mythological paris, but she does have the favour of aphrodite (cytherea) like he does, and then later other gods, like. Actual God lol. eventually in her quasi-judgement of paris (between hera, who offers imperial power, athena, who offers millitary prowess, and aphrodite, who offers helen), gideon chooses (rather than the cohort), love, and kills herself for harrow. however, once she gets brought back as kiriona (paris also gets Two Names, he's called alexander sometimes), she gets the other two from john; millitary prowess and imperial power. it's like a weird AU where paris picked another path that wasn't helen.

to say nothing of what paris does to achilles, whether that's pyrrha or harrow, or someone else entirely... <3

(obviously there's another reading where alecto is helen, which def works better, and harrow is paris, which kinda doesn't, but let's stick with this for now. there's also another reading where gideon is achilles. this is chaos it's like iliad soup but I'm LOVING pulling on this thread)

[thegnomelord]

Sorry for blowing up your inbox, but you've really got my creative juices flowing. So I want to expand on 2 ideas.

No. 1

Shrike Harpy Reader w/ oblivious Graves (bc from my knowledge, he's usually a vampire or regular guy) or Ghost (bc he was human before)

In which Shrike reader is getting progressively more obvious with their advances bc Ghost/Graves don't understand. The particular idea I had was where they think it's some kind of threat or prank. So reader is getting more obvious, and they think that the threat/prank is getting more intense.

That would be hilarious! Obviously, they will either find out or be told about the advances eventually. But the idea that you are courting them and they miss the mark entirely is so funny to me. Especially if their teammates laugh and refuse to tell them the obvious truth.

No. 2

Going off of the spider's sexual dimorphism + a different version of monster au. Pairing spider hybrid reader w/ octopus (cthulhu?) König (if you do reqs for him), where spider reader looks at him and is like:

So you're telling me there's an eight-legged hybrid, approximately five times my size, that could snap my spine like a toothpick, just beyond enemy lines.... Do you need someone to volunteer for a solo recon mission any time soon?

Oh no! My recon mission turned into a hostage situation, how unfortunate. But while I'm here, I should interrogate him... yeah, interrogating is exactly what I'll be doing with this giant tied up man rn....

👑 anon

No, no, anon I'm always so happy reading all the stuff you guys send me! I know next to nothing about Konig except the stuff I've read about him that turns him into a really perverted disgusting degenerate and while I'm not comfortable writing that, I hope one of my mutes picks it up bc it is super cool! I got a dancing with Ghost ask I really wanna do so Graves it is lol

CW:SWF-ish turns suggestive at the end, Graves being oblivious

Graves hates being the butt of the joke.

For the last couple of months he's been getting 'gifts' in the form of chunks of meat stabbed through various knives. It had started a knife being stabbed through burgers and steaks(typical American food), which he couldn't eat, but slowly progressed to rarer and rarer pieces of meat until he wound up finding just raw and bloody chunks of meat; a leg of some large animal turned into a pincushion, a still beating heart stabbed through with a knife, livers shish kebabed on a bayoneted blade. . .

And he'd find them everywhere, in the communal fridge, in his office, in his room. And while he didn't mind the free meal, he was a little unnerved. He knew it was you doing it because he had screened the minds of all his shadow's, but he didn't know why you were doing it.

He can see the way his shadows smirk at you when he finds another bloody organ skewered on your favorited knife in the fridge, your feathers puffing up and a not so quiet chirp escaping your lips when he sneaks the meat away to feast on.

You also become more touchy with him when you notice him accepting your gifts, though he has no idea of it. He trusts you, which is why you're allowed to sneak up on him, your wings spreading out to wrap around him like a cloak as you chirp a "Hello commander."

It makes him jump out of his skin, and though he chastises you about it, it's never as harsh as he could make it, his shadows giving him a knowing look that he can't reciprocate.

That's the worst part. None of his shadows will tell him anything.

He doesn't know much about your species of harpy except for the generalized knowledge of extreme speed and craftiness, so he can't figure out if this is some kind of joke, or threat, or you just seeing him as part of the flock? Or maybe it means nothing? He's especially confused when you grow bolder and one day he walks into his office to see a Bison leg sitting on his desk, once again skewered. Where did you even get the bloody bison? Hell knows but certainly not him.

Eventually a shadow grows annoyed by your constant bloody gifts in the fridge and with a very annoyed huff drops a harpy encyclopedia on his desk.

He'll need to get them a gift basket after this; he spends the next few hours just reading about all kinds of harpies, ears progressively getting hotter as the book delves deep into every aspect of the harpies, each sub-race's specific courting and matting habit and making him feel like he's reading porn.

Then he finds a chapter about your type of harpy, eyes growing wide like dinnerplates as he reads about your quirks. He doesn't know whether to go search for a cross or tissues. He reads more and more, turning pages upon pages, his eyes scorching every anatomical picture into his brain and making him think of what you're packing, his pants growing tight as the minutes tick down.

Just his luck that you'd decided the moment when his face is the hottest to walk into his office without knocking, another skewered offering on a plate in your hands.

"Christ!" He yelps, slamming the book shut and looking at you like you're his parent and caught him looking at a playboy magazine.

You puff up in surprise, your wings spreading out a bit before flattening back to your back, a soothing chirp leaving your lips. It used to mean nothing to him, now he knows what it means, his cock getting a bit harder in his pants.

"You alright commander?" You ask, walking closer, the talons of your feet clicking against the ground.

"Yes, yep, perfectly fine." He grunts, desperately hoping his vampiric state will suppress the heat in his face, but to no avail. "You-" His eyes settle on the plate in your hands, his body practically conditioned to salivate when he sees a familiar knife sticking out of the food.

"I?" You ask, then you note the book on his desk, your head tilting in confusion. "Graves?"

He swallows, eyes darting from the food to you, and he doesn't know which one he's starved for more. "You've been wooing me like a dolly huh?" He asks.

"Yeah." You're unsure of what else to say, in your head, had he not wanted your advances he would have never taken your offerings. Then you realize. "Don't tell me you just noticed." You deadpan.

Graves gives that awkward chuckle you've grown to love, and you decide you need to be bolder. You place the plate on his desk and lean over it, a coo rumbling in your chest— deeper, rougher, seductive.

"How about I show you what I want?"

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA if I tried to covertly exclude one of my friends from game nights ? 🎮🎧📞

tw: disordered eating, self harm

I've got a discord friend group of about 15 people though only 10 or so are regularly active and game nights often are usually around 6 people but they rotate who participates often. We're all in the 20s and mostly nonbinary / genderqueer / trans one way or another. I'm 25 ftm personally (they them) and the friend this is about in particular is 22mtf (she/they).

Friend is really excited to hit the 1 year marker in her transition and loves sharing how excited she is about her progress - how strangers at her job are gendering her correctly more and more often, how her cup sizes are growing, how much weight she's lost, wardrobe updates, getting to learn girl things from their very supportive mom, etc etc etc. It's all very exciting, I remember hitting my 1 year marker and i'm genuinely really happy for her.

The thing is I struggled with disordered eating in the past. Several others in our friend group have as well and it's something we've talked about both in related and unrelated convos to this issue. Friend keeps an excel spreadsheet with her measurements from bust to hips to weight and will update us frequently whether we've expressed interest in hearing the exact numbers or not. Exact Numbers was one of the things I kept track of and hearing her tracking them (for very different reasons) will often set me off and i'll start taking more and more unhealthy actions, falling back into disordered habits.

Friend has adhd and very poor impulse control. She often joins conversations and talks over people, completely changes conversational topics on a dime, or forgets who is in a call at any moment and brings up someone's triggers. She'll almost always apologize if someone mentions a social mistake she's made, but because the weight/food intake/number watching is so important to them as a way to track their transition it's the one thing that keeps coming back and back and back. I and the others have tried talking in voice calls, mentioning in text chats in the group and even DMing her but because of the topic and this group being the friend group she feels safest in (we were all the first to know and hyped them up on the hrt journey) these are some convos she only gets to have here

and because of the topic, i feel rude or embarrassed when I have to say "hey can we not talk about this right now or i'm gonna have to leave". So on most nights if it comes up I'll just deafen / go afk / just zone out entirely until the conversation has passed. If it doesn't seem like it's going to or they are so in depth that it's genuinely triggering a self harm response i'll fully leave instead so she can keep having her fun and get excited

Game nights are different though

I'm usually the host of game night and so can pick when we play our silly little games. Obviously people can and do still hangout and do things together Not on specific game nights, and we all do, but game nights are my thing. We play party games over discord or multiplayer competition games or lately have been getting into games like content warning and lethal company when there's 4 or sometimes 5 of us (either someone wants to hang out but only watch or we rotate around who plays round by round)

Friend is often working in the evenings and so bc this is an online friend group they don't actually know my work schedule. We usually only have about half the total number of participants be around for game night anyways, so I've been thinking of occasionally lining up game nights for nights when she's mentioned being busy by saying i work the other nights - but only sometimes. I do really like friend. She can be so much fun to hang out with, excitingly competitive and with interesting knowledge to share and generally a good sport no matter the actual game we're playing. But sometimes the worry about the triggering and the trigginering itself are too much. sometimes i just can't handle when she does it and knowing i can't leave and asking her to stop expressing her joy makes me feel like an asshole anyways so i don't want to be around it.

To be clear. I do not think they are an asshole. Friend is genuinely one of my friends. I like her and hanging out with her. they do not trigger me (or any of the others w this same trigger) maliciously. this is solely would I be the asshole.

TLDR: My friends way of tracking her transition sometimes triggers my eating disorder. would I be the asshole for planning game nights that I host and cannot leave / tune out conversations during so that she cannot attend as often in hopes that I am not triggered as often?

[roseykat]

Okay sooo, I don't know if you're into this but I'll leave it here

Since we've established that minsung can and would probably get you pregnant with their babies at the same time, and since breasts produce milk based on how many babies you have to feed...

Lactation kink with minsung

Thoughts?

I got too carried away with this one lmao

No bc firstly Minsung would be so in love with seeing you develop into motherhood. Despite its trials, tribulations, and hardships with carrying their babies, they always see you persevere especially through areas where sometimes there’s nothing they can do to help.

One of those issues would be when your milk starts coming through early and it starts to hurt and feel uncomfortable because there's nowhere for the milk to go. You can pump even though you’re just over a month out from giving birth but it wouldn’t be as beneficial to store it since it will end up expiring regardless if there are other methods for its use prematurely.

Which is why and when Minho tells you that he and Jisung can help out by using some of your breast milk for other things while you’re still carrying the babies. So he suggests that you pump to collect your milk in order to use it for cooking, in cereal and what not, mainly just food for related purposes.

But Jisung thinks along a different line.

Whenever he’s helping you get ready to pump, you sometimes need to massage your breasts because you know it helps with milk flow. Then one day Jisung is sitting next to you, ready to help you set up to pump as you take your bra off. You’re exhausted, sore, fed up, and borderline done with being pregnant until Jisung scoots himself closer to you and very gently starts massaging your breasts for you.

Then just out of fucking nowhere, he leans down and latches his mouth down onto you nipple and sucks. You’re stunned at first, definitely not angry, but taken aback because you didn’t know he’d be into that. Then again, he’s a bag full of surprises.

“So sweet,” Jisung would say as he releases, then will come to his senses, realising what he’s done. “Sorry, I don’t know what came over me. Just…needed to taste you.”

You’d reassure him to not feel guilty because not only did it feel good to get some of that milk out, but simply because there’s just nothing wrong with it in general. Minho wasn’t actually surprised that Jisung wanted to drink straight from you since he’s always been a tits man. Not that that’s the point but, Minho has seen the way Jisung has been looking at you ever since he saw that bump grow.

But then again, Minho is the same way too, just less obvious. He had to admit to himself that watching you get your milk out wasn’t something he was prepared to find satisfying. From that point on, you wouldn’t mind if that’s how either of them wanted to taste your milk.

However, even afterwards - after you give birth, when you start overproducing milk, you’re able to bottle and store extra, but there are days where it doesn’t stop. That’s where Minho and Jisung come to help.

Firstly, you all make sure both of their sons (I’m calling it that they have boys) have a sufficient supply of milk because the last thing they want is to obviously deplete them of their only food sustenance that they have.

Once that’s ensured, both Jisung and Minho help you by practically latching onto you. Both of them would start out by stimulating your sensitive nipples with their tongues before eventually sucking to taste your milk.

I’m also just imagining those two like fucking bulking up bc of how nutrient rich breast milk is. Like they work out a lot and undoubtedly their gains would just shoot through the roof. Minho’s biceps and thighs get bigger, Jisung’s chest and arms get bigger. Christ. They just end up getting thick and they’d look so fucking good. At that point you’re not just helping nurture and grow two babies, but also the babie’s two fathers lmao.

[caineinthecorner]

Hi. I binged like 80 chats in a row and I have opinions(tm) about physical strength and general power stuff of the brothers. Mostly just strength related things, but I tried to cover most of their battle stuff.

Yes I know, yes I know, "they're ranked as siblings by power blabla", but that's LAME. So here are my personal takes mostly for fun. Canon is dead and I ate it.

Also I finished the dividers and general aesthetics of this blog woo

★ Lucifer.

Generally the strongest, period, can and WILL kill almost anyone without much issue or even second thought

Physical strength, however? He’s not the best, as he doesn’t rely on it at all for battle / conflict

He didn't need it in heaven, after all

(Beel was his brawns and he was already a powerful angel so it never was a requirement)

I don't see him actively working out (anymore, at least), so most of his strength is merely his baseline

His main tactic conflict wise is intimidation.

Cough giving MC death threats cough

Very prideful of himself in battle, obviously

Rarely would ever use any sort of dirty tricks

Would probably prefer to go down the "honorable way"

Target his brothers though and he WILL play every trick in the book with little regard to his pride or his own life

This fuck looks like he knows swordsmanship and is probably the only of the brothers who does so

(except maybe Satan who is learning just to copy / be better than him)

Either that or he knows fancy sword dances for angel rituals he cannot partake in anymore (and doesn't do them anymore)

Diavolo has photos of him doing said dances but his lips are triple sealed since it is a heavily touchy subject

★ Mammon.

Canonically this man is physically weak (or at least has a weak complexion / scrawny arms)

Probably the most disappointing in terms of strength because he is literally the second born

His saving grace is his unholy speed and dirty tricks, using it to cover his weaknesses / lack of physical strength.

A LOT of dirty tricks and bs magic stuff. So so many. Never ends

He’s the living embodiment of the “random bullshit go!!!” meme

You know Looney tunes? Yeah this man has the Bugs bunny's levels of bullshit

But he has the best stamina out of his brothers (so he can run away from his debts)

Doesn't train because he's already perfect as it is (<- that's his ego talking he can barely pick up the weights at Beel's gym)

Honor is for the dead type of person. Nothing is out of the table in battle

(^ that makes him terrifying to fight against btw)

He either tries to intimidate (imitating Lucifer) or sweet-talk his way out of conflict

It usually just pisses off his adversary more which actually leads to the fights starting, but hey, he tried 乁⁠(⁠ ⁠•⁠_⁠•⁠ ⁠)⁠ㄏ

★ Leviathan.

Physical strength is shit.

he will get his shit kicked if he tries to brawl with almost anyone

Except maybe the lowest hanging fruit (humans)

Magical or general strength is decent, but he's definitely not the greatest in battle out of the brothers

^ he's kinda insecure about this and he wishes he were stronger (he sulks about it)

Wishes that actual irl battles were like Fire Emblem or strategy games bcs he's actually good in those

Update: I didn't make it clear (mb lol) but I see him as the best strategist of the brothers by far, he just isn't good at front-line action

^ Being away from the front lines keeps the pressure away from him for the most part, and it avoids him getting riled up and acting rash

He once tried to workout with Beel but quickly got overwhelmed because Beel shoved 200kg weights onto him thinking it was an reasonable starting point

So he kinda has trauma(tm) about it

Despite his garbage physical prowess, he WILL start fights and get riled up easily

He goes onto his demon form immediately when he wants to fight

^ bcs his strength isn't great, and he needs any boost he can get

Plus, awful anger management

My man will get onto a fist fight with the demon equivalent of a redditor over anime waifus and he will lose

★ Satan.

As the literal embodiment of Wrath, he does pack quite a punch and will maul you to death with only his fists. No problems at all

But that's merely his baseline strength (which is a lot) since he doesn’t really train physically

Probably focuses on other areas (read: intelligence) instead of physical strength.

Which is ironic because he could kick Lucifer's ass in a fist fight if he actually trained more

But oh well. Books do be booking

Surprisingly strategic while in fights, although not above Going Apeshit

Funnily enough the least likely of the brothers to enter a fight

Has read The Art Of War and will quote it just to be a smartass

★ Asmodeus.

Physically? Weak.

Probably the weakest of the brothers, having more or less the strength of a human (and on the weaker side of that).

He doesn’t train whatsoever; Likes his slender figure and muscles “ruin” that.

However, he makes up for it on the "trickster" scale.

As the Avatar of Lust, he will probably go the charm route instead of wanting to directly fight his enemies, or he make someone else do the dirty work for him.

Think of Mammon but make it a bit less scummy, tricks wise.

His go-to is sweet talk.

Something something the Avatar of Lust being physically weak since sex is considered an act of vulnerability and therefore the lowering of one’s guard something something

Something something the poetic narrative of the Avatar of Lust having only power through Communication something something

★ Beelzebub.

Contrary to Asmo; he does lift for days and can pack quite the punch, being one of the stronger brothers physically despite being one of the youngest.

I don't see him caring much for magic or other types of strength, he is content in packing the punch and has the capabilities to back him up.

Fight wise he will probably punch the problems away

Maybe use one or two tricks he’s learned

Mostly relies on his intuition and gut and it surprisingly works out

Nothing fancy; Dictionary definition of all muscle no brain battle wise

Literally one of the scariest brothers to ever fight he will actually beat you to a bloody pulp

And make a smoothie out of it

★ Belphegor.

This fucker doesn't lift at all you can't tell me shit

At MOST he'll accompany Beel to the gym and would sleep at the benches

The strength he has is the strength he was born with

Which isn't a lot, but still above human average by quite a lot

More or less demon standard of strength. Maybe a slightly below it

But he's still above most demons by a mile in other regards, mostly magic prowess

He's stronger than Levi because I think it would be hilarious that the dude who sleeps all day is stronger than him

(or you can make him really physically strong just because it'd be funny to see the sleepy dude kick ass)

(either way is funny as shit go ham)

★ Physical strength chart

Behemoth type strength :

Beel (only barely)

Lucifer

Satan

High / Low above human average :

Mammon

Belphie (low diff w/ mammon)

Levi

Asmo

★General strength chart

Can kill hundreds no effort :

Lucifer

Satan (If apeshit)

Are not as strong but still terrifying :

Mammon

Beel

Belphie

Levi, Asmo (Tie)

[komaneko-kun]

[CW: mentions of grooming and SA]

i'm starting to watch baby reindeer and it's nothing like what i expected it to be and I'm a bit in shock because so far I've never related so much to a portrayal of grooming/SA

honestly none of the shows or movies I've watched before have gotten it just right like this show does, i think it's because most of those I've watched are situations where the victim doesn't develop a bond(? with their abuser and either they are abused by a stranger or a partner becomes suddenly abusive, but not many explore the complexities of grooming and how much it makes the abuse worse, a lot of them also make the abuse the plot of the story and don't focus on what happens after someone survives abuse or the before about what factors can make someone more vulnerable to being victims of grooming, a lot of stories don't focus on these parts because they are messy but they need to be talked about more

there were so many things i unfortunately related to, how being abused by someone you want approval of hurts so much, how you can both be afraid of and also look for comfort in the same person that abuses you, the feeling of wanting to somehow protect this person that has hurt you and blaming yourself. you try to empathize with someone who never had your feelings in mind, you try to find ways to "negotiate" during the abuse and you think it gives you some sense of control, that it means you can deal with this situation. you downplay what happened to you because it's easier to move on than face it.

the other part that is rarely explored in media and that I've only seen it twice before is the sexual confusion and the incessant wondering if you were fucked up from the start or if that person ruined you forever, this topic makes the average person very uncomfortable but it's so important that it's talked about because victims carry so much shame because of it.

brains have strange ways of coping with trauma and a lot of times for victims it means that they feel the need to recreate the abuse they experienced in a setting where they have control of the situation, it also means that a lot of us develop hypersexuality and will put ourselves in risky situations, sometimes without realizing that it's tied to the trauma.

unfortunately society's reaction to these things is...bad, very bad. people that don't understand how trauma works use it to argument that victims wanted their abuse to happen, people also shame those who use kink to cope and heal AND when people see victims actively showing these signs, instead of helping, a lot of people judge without questioning if something is going on below the surface (at least this was my case, when i was very obviously putting myself in risky situations i was seen as someone that had something inherently wrong with him instead of someone that needed help and people did absolutely nothing to put me away from risk!)

the fact that it's the story of a male victim of SA is also relevant bc it's generally seen as less serious, I've been laughed at before when talking about my abuse and people tend to treat it as something you should want to happen to you etc.

anyways i hope more stories of SA are more like this, i hope all these topics are explored no matter how uncomfortable they might be, i hope more stories cover grooming in specific

it's been important to me at least, trauma from grooming can be so isolating because you really only feel understood by people who have gone through the same and it's so messy and confusing and it impacts your life for years, decades down the line..the part of loving hating myself more than i loved her hit me extremely hard because that's what trauma does, it takes away anything good that could happen to you

if you made it to here and are considering watching keep in mind trigger warnings because it was a difficult but necessary watch for me

[usereddie]

Please with a cherry on top 🍒💕 tell us all about your little aus you have for bucktommy.

Especially the season 1 divergence 💛

surely i will!!!! this got very long btw so i'm putting it under a read more but the aus i mentioned in the tags of this post are

model au

college au

neighbor au

canon divergence s1 meeting

okay here you go:

model au: this is the one that sparked that entire post bc i saw those two photos and went "wait....." anyway. buck and tommy meet on a shoot and buck is immediately reduced to a giggly, blushing mess. he's new to the modelling industry but so ridiculously pretty he's already getting booked left and right. tommy's been in the game for a while, and he's so comfortable in his skin in front of the camera that it has buck watching him in awe. a bts video of a shoot they did together blows up on twitter, people talking about their chemistry, how hot they are together, and it gets people talking. buck is terribly, terribly embarrassed, worried tommy's gonna realize buck's got a huge crush on him, but then tommy doesn't mind at all, and is actually really, really on board with buck's feelings if the hickeys the makeup department have to cover the next time he's in front of a camera are anything to go by

(also, buck discovering he loves being behind the camera and getting every candid of his boyfriend possible. the professional, smoldering, glamour shots are nice, yeah, but the one of tommy smiling when he realizes buck's been taking pictures of him? those are his favorites.)

college au: listen, i know hs/college au's aren't for everyone but i love them. the frat parties, the "we kissed the day before christmas break and now i don't know how you feel because we're not talking and i can't just show up at your dorm" angst, their friends pestering them about the obvious feelings they have for each other. come on!!! buck and tommy are both freshman though tommy's a bit older because he took some time between high school and college to get a job so he could pay for his school. buck thinks tommy doesn't like him very much but tommy's kind of in love with the guy, but the way he shows his affection and his teasing attempts at flirting are clearly not getting the message across. so he kisses him in the front lawn of a frat house during a party because obviously they're in frats and buck doesn't get it, thinks tommy's doing it because he found out buck likes him and is making fun of him, and tommy doesn't even let him finish angrily confessing his feelings before he's tackling him onto the lawn and kissing him stupid.

neighbor au: they both work odd hours. tommy's still a firefighter but buck's a nurse and they've seen each other a few times on the job, enough that buck's coworkers always let him know when the hot firefighter came by, but they have no idea they're neighbors because their hours just never. line. up. until one day buck's sick to the point not even he can justify going to work and tommy's got his day off and they run into each other in the hallway of their apartment complex when buck goes out to get his door dash. he is immediately horrendously embarrassed because ohmygod the hot firefighter knows what i look like in spongebob pajama pants. tommy doesn't mind though, clearly, because a few hours later he's knocking on buck's door and handing over a tupperware of homemade cookies. tommy doesn't stick around very long because buck is clearly super tired, but when buck opens the lid there's a note with tommy's number and a 'next time we have off on the same day, you wanna grab coffee?' the smiley face is lopsided and uneven but it makes the biggest grin appear on buck's face

(also, they have dogs in the selfies i used in that post and i like to think their dogs are also dating thanks)

canon divergence: oh man i LOVE canon divergence in general, but s1 bucktommy would go so hard. like au where tommy doesn't leave the 118 so he's there for buck's probie year? incredible. tommy, for starters, wouldn't be able to stand buck 1.0 and buck, like the oblivious bisexual he is, wouldn't understand why he cares so much. slowly, buck starts trying to get his attention. talking to him, getting to know him. tommy's still in the closet and trying to keep from losing his mind because the pretty playboy who sleeps around is suddenly no longer hooking up with women in favor of trying to get to know him. tommy knows he should tell buck to stop because there's no way this won't end with his heart broken (who hasn't fallen for a straight person and cried to sad ballads about it? queer culture), but buck is actually sweet and he's not funny because his jokes are terrible but he makes him laugh and tommy's determined to introduce him to all the best, classic romcoms (the man's favorite movie is love, actually, c'mon). the more time they spend together the less buck goes out, and after a long shift, sitting on the floor of tommy's living room eating pizza, when tommy starts leaning in, buck doesn't think twice before closing the distance. tommy pulls back, asks if he's sure, if this is okay, and buck, who hasn't had sex since he realized he wanted tommy in a big, bad, really really gay way, kisses him breathless.

tommy doesn't want to pressure buck, doesn't want to move too fast because he really, really likes him. buck is annoyingly charmed by it because he's never had a meaningful relationship and as weird as it is to want that with a guy he really does want it with tommy (but he also obviously takes it as a challenge to see how far he can push his boyfriend's buttons before he bends him over the back of the couch).

okay yeah these are my bucktommy au ideas i love them very bad thanks mwah!!!

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

i think you're onto something with the romance novels world and plot points needing to mirror the kind of outlandishness of the love story. bc the main characters are already inherently acting absurd just by falling madly in love in a month or whatever and then if you add in the contrivances of romance tropes, it starts to feel like whiplash trying to pretend the characters live in any sort of grounded "normal" world. Like when the author adds in a family conflict subplot where the MC is like in absolute shambles because her mom said something slightly passive aggressive at lunch. that reads as more jarring to me than like conflict being something ridiculous that her mom doesn't want her being a marine biologist bc they come from a long line of fishmongers. Give me absurd drama to match the over the top dialogue and character emotions, I knew it would be unrealistic it's a romance novel! I guess this applies more to romcoms, but the same would apply I think to an analogous serious scenario. Or at least that's my take on it

okay so having just finished genuinely the most boring romance novel I have ever read in my LIFE I'm going to expand on this a little so thank you for sending an ask that gives me such a great platform to do that

I personally generally prefer a romance that just gets fucking silly with it, like really outlandish. A Lady for the Duke (Alexis Hall) is obviously the dream, being a whole swoony historical trans-affirming fantasy, but contemporary fake relationship stories can also be fun in their sheer ridiculousness, like Love, Hate, and Clickbait (Liz Bowery), which I actually liked, and Unfortunately Yours (Tessa Bailey), which I did not like but was very funny. and let's not forget queen Helen Hoang's Bride Test, which has a premise that dances perilously close to human trafficking but all works out in the end!!!

BUT HAVING SAID THAT. I don't think that something needs to be totally implausible to be a good romance. two of my very favorites romance novels anywhere ever are Helen Hoang's Heart Principle (no one should be surprised Hoang is on her twice I adore her) and Akwaeke Emezi's You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty. both of these books are very grounded in reality but with very uncommon situations to heighten emotions and add urgency; in Hoang's case it's a character's adult autism diagnosis + death of a parent and in Emezi's case it's a very sudden and #problematic attraction coming out of absolutely nowhere. the stakes are very real, mostly centering around being true to yourself v disappointing your family, but the circumstances are still wild enough to make you say "god DAMN" and keep turning pages. hell, I'll even be extremely generous and include Mistakes Were Made (Meryl Wilsner) which is kind of a flop but does have the intriguing premise of "what if you were fucking a milf but her kid was YOUR BEST FRIEND and it was a secret?"

those are like the two sweet spots TO ME, and this book I just read (which was Thank You for Sharing by Rachel Runya Katz, I feel so bad putting it on blast but I know people are going to ask) really solidified it for me because TYFS didn't fall into either of those categories. I'm going to say something absolutely insane, which is that multiple times while I was reading it I found myself wishing that the book was fanfic, because on its own it just... didn't bring a lot to the table? it falls into the grounded category but doesn't really bring any of those heightened stakes to the story, it's just 330 pages of people in their late twenties complaining about dating and their office jobs. if I wanted that I could just ask my group chat! there's nothing particularly particularly gripping about watching made up strangers do it!

but then I was like oh hang on... if this was two fictional characters who are usually fighting with swords or throwing cars at each other or something this would be so gripping. it's literally the coffee shop AU principle, right? like seeing people in a very mundane setting having an office job and going to a bar is very shrimpteresting when they're normally defusing space bombs. I was explaining this to my housemates and I couldn't think of a straight couple to apply it to (the book is m/f) so I said Naruto and Sasuke, which is crazy because I've never seen a single episode of Naruto, but like. idk Naruto being a museum curator who has to work with Sasuke, a marketing specialist who he had beef with a summer camp 14 years ago, sounds kind of compelling, right? definitely more than just two people I don't know.

there's a post on here that I think about a lot that talks about why advertising a story with tropes doesn't work for original fiction as well as it does for fan fic because knowing the tropes is more helpful when you already have a sense of investment in the characters and their personalities, and I think this is related to that! I think sometimes you NEED to have a wider sense of scope for the characters for them to be interesting in a very mundane setting!

ANYWAY. much to consider, etc.

[jinn-exe]

ever since i heard temeura's version of Can't Take My Eyes Off of You, I've been thinking abt modern au codywan where they don't know each other but most of their friends or acquaintances have a mutual group. And they've never met once, not until cody's brother, Fox, gets married to Quinlan, and they're obviously the best man for their respective sides. Okay, so they dont meet during the rehearsal dinner either, bc obi-wans some type of special forces agent, and he missed it due to being off country, but he promises Quinlan he'll make it on the day of the wedding! Fast forward to the reception part, they're all having fun, drinking, dancing, and the general chaos that comes whenever there's a shit ton of Fetts in one social gathering. Anyway, the vocalist they hired for the live band ends up bailing, and they're immediately in an emergency family meeting bc whos going to sing now??? Of course, Rex perks up and says, "What about Cody?" And everyone agrees bc like why didnt we think of that?? And Cody VEHEMENTLY refuses, they're all tackling him to the ground begging, screaming, and using their younger brother privilege until finally, finally, Cody relents with a tired sigh. He goes on stage, and looks a bit flustered, but he ends up singing it anyway and everyones howling clapping cheering him on, and just as he gets to the part of, "Now that I found you, stay" his eyes land on one very attractive and equally curious Obi-Wan kenobi mouthing the lyrics. If Cody's voice wavered a little during the next line, no one noticed or bothered to care. The audience shouts for an encore and Cody has no other choice but to do it, and you can imagine it's a very long night, most of the guests have already made their way home and have trickled into a small crowd of family and close friends. Cody's disappointed bc he didn't get to speak to the handsome gentleman, but what he didn't expect to happen was to find the same man waiting for him at the hotel venue, grinning fondly as if they’ve known each other their whole lives.

[eerna]

Hii wanted to bring this up to you because i love your tfota discussions(and other fandoms as well). i've noticed that a lot of the target audience for this series is very superficial and don't really appreciate and understand the series in its entirety but you always have great points.

so anywaysss with that being said. something that sort of made me side eye tpt a little was jude and cardan. obviously characters change overtime and i think the fact that jude and cardan sort of started to resemble each other in indirect ways is a nice little detail but i felt like some of their interactions were very unnatural. it felt like hb was feeding into how a lot of the audience sees them which isn't terrible but it feels the slightest bit out of character. like what did it for me specifically was in the end when jude excuses herself by saying she was going to go yell at people. i mean jude has always been very sarcastic and witty but it seemed weird for her to say that, it felt like one of those incorrect quotes. like yeah she probably would be yelling at people but would she really say that? like basically it's just very small things that seem like fan service more than intentional writing ya know? now don't get me wrong i love them and i shamelessly enjoyed all of their appearances i also think they were still pretty consistent as characters but it's basically that it seemed like things they said were only there to please the public which fed onto the whole superficial view the general audience has of them.

Hiiii! I definitely miss a lot of stuff so I wouldn't dare claim I get an entirety of anything, but I am very glad you enjoy my discussions nevertheless~

I get what you mean! For me it was that Jude "knife wife" line, and Cardan complaining about the snake thing. Knife-wife could have been funny if it was written smarter and not literally quoting a fandom meme. If we wanted to have a comedic moment where Cardan complains about something gross and Jude shuts him down, it could have been a new thing instead of an event that happened ages ago that we've seen on-page. It reads like a parody, the self aware "haha"s are so awkward. HOWEVER. In theory I wouldn't mind them being written as funnier than they used to be. Like you said, they are a decade older than the last time we've seen them, and they've solved most of the issues that made them not want to joke around during the trilogy. And it's also amusing bc HB said she had problems figuring out what an almost-thirty-years-old Cardan would be like, so the fact that she settled on "clown uncle" is hilarious.

Which leads me to my main problem with it: The things that make them fun aged-up epilogue versions of themselves also make them worse main characters. Jude and Cardan in their late 20s are by default much less interesting than Jude and Cardan in the middle of their young adult angst unsolved trauma roller coaster. They should join Roiben and Severin in the lineup of side characters that are still plot relevant, but no longer the center of attention, which would make their shallower presentation less noticeable.

[transmutationisms]

do you have any insight on roman and incest? i know that in succession, business = fucking and at some points all of the sibs talk about fucking their dad as in one upping him business wise, but ceirtain comments roman makes are obviously different. i've been rewatching s3 and he joked about repetedly entering his mother's vagina at ken's birthday, in that same episode he tells shiv that she's mad logan doesn't want to fuck her anymore bc he's fucking roman now... also when he tells her she can be his sexy secretary when he takes over, and many more examples

and this last episode when he was listening to that edited video of logan over and over, i know i'm not the only one who thought he might start jacking off... i guess my question is do you think roman has any actual incestuous desires? and if not, why does he say these things? is it attention seeking? trying to make people uncomfortable?

first of all, the jacking off undertones of that deepfake scene were absolutely there on purpose. i mean, what logan is 'saying' in that clip echoes the sort of dirty talk gerri used to provide, and the reason for that is because the whole driving force of the roman-gerri affair was him getting her to say things that logan used to say about him. gerri was always a daddy proxy for him; it was always about him jacking off to the way his father verbally degraded him, but then combined with gerri's willingness to serve as an actual business mentor for him, something logan would never do because he was frankly just disgusted at roman as a general rule.

which is to say: yes, roman has some genuine incestuous desire for his father, to the same degree that anyone else with a negative oedipus complex does. and this is central, i think, to the critique of the nuclear family that runs through succession. these psychoanalytic complexes are products of that family structure, which is itself embedded within the capitalist mode of production. roman's subconscious desire to fuck/marry his father is, the show suggests, just a more overt manifestation of the standard dysfunction that inherently plagues the social form of the family. it's elevated because of the degree of control logan asserted over roman, even well into adulthood, and the way his wealth and corporate power created that dynamic. but the suggestion here is not that the roys are uniquely incestuous or that roman is intrinsically a pervert; it's that family structures, which are capitalist structures, create this type of psychosexual (under)development. it's freud if he slayed (was friends with wilhelm reich and gilles deleuze).

i don't think we have any textual reason to think roman has incestuous desire for his other family members. he talks like that for a handful of other reasons. with the caroline stuff, he's partly just responding to shiv and logan accusing him of wanting to fuck her (logan does this because he thinks roman is a pervert but can't consciously face the fact that he's, like, gay for real, so his catholic brain goes straight to He's A Boy Who Wants To Fuck His Mother; shiv makes these accusations partly for similar reasons of seeing roman as dirty / perverted / abnormal and having no other explanation, and partly because she's deflecting from her own glaring caroline issues).

with the shiv stuff, this is sort of central to their relationship—that they both make crude sexual comments to each other. it's part of how they negotiate that rivalry-camaraderie thing. it's almost cute. also, most of these comments are so off-base that they're not actually bothered by them; it's noticeable when one of them actually crosses a line (like shiv saying "some day you're actually going to have to fuck something").

overall roman's relationship to his own sexuality is fraught, partly because of logan's homophobia and resulting surveillance of roman's sexual expression, and partly because of roman's relationship with his body. also, like his siblings, roman grew up in the middle of the sexual violence corporation. he doesn't really know how to think about sex in any way besides as a violation, and this is reflected in how he talks about it. he uses incestuous or sexually crude jokes as a way to deflect from certain emotional intimacies, to present himself as disgusting so that he can pre-empt other people making him feel that way, and as a way of conveying his sense that he's at the bottom of the hierarchy and is emotionally, physically, and sexually vulnerable.

[magicalgirlsirin]

hi rly enjoyed ur post on elysian realm! ik ur a new fan (i am too) but i heard that before retcon, elysia was a lot more morally gray. would you happen to know how exactly?? im rly curious bc i think it would be a severe improvement obviously. we deserve complex women who do wrongs

So when I say retcon in relation to the elyrealm arc it's less so "things they changed because of the story evolving and wanting to expand previously established events" and more "things they straight up forgot about in service of making Elysia a herrscher". It's not like hi3 is a stranger to retcons though?

For example, Durandal being the "original" Kiana is a retcon. The fact that our Kiana was a clone remained the same, but it's clear from older story stuff (iirc it's Everlasting Memory/Theresa's chronicle set?; second eruption manga doesn't focus on the Kiana part) that Durandal wasn't originally there. Otto refers to Kiana as K-423, and that Theresa needs to retrieve her, which implies that Theresa knows it's not Siegfried and Cecilia's kid, but her distress remains the same. The later game retcon by Thus Spoke Apocalypse is that OG!Kiana and Siegfried were going to go retrieve K-423, but OG!Kiana ended up injured and so Siegfried only left with K-423. And if you're confused then so am I because the details don't really super line up with the presentation, but it's like, fine, because at the end of the day the current writing intention and trajectory is for Durandal and Kiana to be sisters, and to both be Siegfried's daughters.

Anyways, for Elysia, a lot of her retcons occur in a very rapid pace from the first realm chapter set to Elysium Everlasting. Like I mentioned in my last post, the herrscher reveal is nonsense just going off of basic information like the fact she received MANTIS surgery like all the other Flame Chasers. However, there are other plot threads that are completely dropped for the sake of making Elysia a very special good girl who you should love because she's so nice and never did anything bad.

[About Betrayal 1 - Chapter 2]

[About Betrayal 2 - Chapter 2]

Elysia the traitor plot is something I was, well not hopeful for (a friend had already warned me that the game wouldn't do anything interesting with it] but I still ended up mulling it over a lot because it was such an interesting hinge piece for her initial presentation.

What stands out to me is the phrasing. Kevin says she never endangered humanity even if she was a traitor. Kevin says that Elysia made a decision. This implies agency, like Elysia was actively choosing to do something dangerous for the sake of the Flame Chasers. However, if Elysia was a herrscher from the beginning, then none of this makes sense. She doesn't choose to be a herrscher if she was one from the beginning, so why even make it seem like her betrayal was her choice at all?

[Traitor - Chapter 1]

It doesn't stop there though. Mobius' active disdain implies that whatever choice Elysia made, it was enough to make Mobius of all people consider her a lost cause. Mobius, who body mods and injects honkai energy into anyone with a pulse (hyperbole) to try and make humanity last just the slightest bit longer.

[Traitor - Chapter 1]

Mobius wants us to doubt Elysia's intentions. If you go through all their shared information, you'll find that the worst Elysia really does is just... coerce Mobi to wear pink dresses, and while that is obnoxious, it wouldn't warrant utter contempt for Elysia as a person.

There's actually a lot of stray text that implies there's something wrong about Elysia's existence, which I guess in generous terms could be interpreted as setup for the herrscher reveal? But it just feels like it's just there to add to the mystery that won't go anywhere.

[The Blind Spot - Recollection]

This right here nags at me. Deeply so. Elysia isn't so much a character as much as she is just a concept, the idea of a story that could be told. Not even in the canon-compliant weird endgame hook meta-textual breakout in Transcending Finality about the power of stories... Although, there's a way to introduce it here and tie it to Elysia to give some semblance of connectivity.

I went this long without actually giving my thoughts on how to make Elysia's writing good though. Disclaimer for clarity sake I know not everyone will agree with the changes I want to make and I'm also not claiming to be a more skilled writer than anyone in the hi3 team, they're all people with enough talent to be employed by the company.

That out of the way.

This isn't so much about making Elysia morally grey as much as it is about giving her an emotional core, because right now she's pretty hollow. Rather than a pristine girl who never did anything wrong, I'd rather cast her as a romantic, tragic heroine who would move heaven and fate just to seem noble.

Elysia was born human. Maybe she loved stories, and how they transported her to far off places, far far far away from the tiny town she was growing up in. When she was old enough, she traveled the world. Honkai descends. Because she was a globe trotter she ended up connected to many people, and was given the chance to join the MOTH organization. She gets MANTIS surgery. As the number of soon-to-be Flame Chasers grow, discussion begins about if the strength of the soldiers is enough.

'Maybe, if I had power comparable to a herrscher, we could fight with less casualties.'

She doesn't say this out loud, of course. It's a dangerous thought, a line that shouldn't be crossed. But she's curious. She breaks into Mobius' lab [Miss Pink Spy - Pristine Memory] to find the information she wants. Mobius figures out her intentions and warns Elysia off. It's not even in consideration, so keep whatever plan you have in mind off the table before you do something irreversible.

Mobius thought that Elysia gave up on the plan after the seventh erruption. The haunted look behind Kevin's eyes, the sadness creasing Elysia's face, all of it makes it seem like a simple consideration forgotten by the sands of time.

Elysia doesn't have a discipline. She told Dr. Mei it wasn't needed since her combat performance was well above standard margins anyways. (She is on par with Kevin in strength, after all.) At least, we all thought she didn't. A deal is made with Aponia.

Aponia, Aponia, apostle of fate, I offer you my 'humanity' to become a 'story'.

Elysia cannot receive any more disciplines. The target has to be "human". Elysia as a story, unchanging, pristine, capable of remaining as she is without blemish, can reach out and become a herrscher while remaining herself. She's desperate. She wants to help. She reaches into the deep, the start of the universe, and gathers the power. She names it Origin, since it's something she found at the source.

She's a herrscher.

Herrschers are an enemy of humanity.

Kevin runs her through with Shamash.

Elysia is still herself though, talking like she would as usual.

-Oh Kevin, I wanted to know if your tears would freeze, but I was hoping it wouldn't be like this. They're so warm, though. Thank you for crying for me.

-I see no herrscher here, just... the flame chaser, bearing the signet of ego.

The Elysian Realm keeps a secret. Aponia keeps it, the fact that Elysia gave up her humanity. The final banquet? A polite way to refer to Elysia's own demise.

It's sad, isn't it? That strength she wanted to give fell right through her fingers. Her own undoing, the desperate plan of a foolish girl who wanted to be a hero, but only ending up as a villain to oppose. It's so much more meaningful, then, that Elysia's gift, the power of sapience, is kept on to the next cycle of humanity. Held again, the power of ego, of humans, to someone with a kind heart to move beyond the past she's trapped in. Thank you, Raiden Mei, for carrying on the ideals of the thirteen trailblazers, the moths who chase the flame.

so anyways yeah i think elysia couldve been interesting whos to say

[viviennelamb]

What do you think is the goal behind women talking so much about "purity culture?" I try to avoid feminist discussion in general now but I occasionally see this topic brought up, and they usually equate loving purity/wanting to be pure with pedophilia or something similar ( I recently saw someone say "purity culture is rape culture.") I seriously doubt it would ever happen, but I like the idea of getting to be in an actually loving relationship with a women who values the same things as me. I don't seek it out becauce there's no point in doing that, it's more of a "it would be cool if this happened" thing. But when they say things like this, it makes me feel like I'm wrong or perverted for seeing purity as a positive trait in a partner.

These are my thoughts: I see grown women put on that fake mask of purity that's meant to attract men's attention (and sometimes women's bc I've seen lesbians have these kinks) towards them. One of the more obvious examples: the whole pink ribbon coquette "I'm an innocent little submissive bunny uWu" thing they do. And oc these women obviously adore pedophilia and want to roleplay having their innocence stolen again. They don't have it anymore so they have to play pretend to reach physical excitement, which is why these kinks exist in the first place. But then "purity culture" is blamed for these people finding purity sexually exciting, like it's some made-up concept, when that's literally what sex is- degrading someone else by using their body for a high. The more innocent someone is, the more degrading (aka exciting) the sex is for, therefore innocence is sexually beguiling to most people whether they admit it or not.

I've seen that the "sex-critical but not anti-sex" crowd hates people using different scenarios to act out degredation and referencing the predator/prey dymanic of sex through kink, bdsm, etc. But they think sex is fine as long as they don't overtly acknowledge that what they're doing is degrading or an exchange of power. Like an "out of sight, out of mind" thing. So they draw very random and rigid lines around what sex is okay and what sex isn't, and what isn't okay is anything that takes them out of the lovey-dovey lie they tell themselves and reminds them of what's really getting them off. To me there's something even more predatory about these people, because even if the kind of lust they engage in is less violent/extreme, they're incredibly manipulative about their intentions. Their whole shtick about sex being an "expression of love" is the most coercive thing ever.

Everyone in the world seeks to consume purity and people only ever encouraged purity as a temporary measure in one's goal of finding "the one." Like a virgin distribution system, it's about everyone getting to their fair share of innocence to taint, not about loving innocence itself. That is the real "purity culture", but instead of defending purity they think the solution to this problem is to just pretend purity is a made up concept. They decide to blame it all on a toxic ideology instead of being honest about reality, just like they do with every other problem in the world. Like if you simply decide to think about an action in a different way, that somehow changes the action being wrong. They decide that purity doesn't exist and that lust isn't harmful, which gives them the freedom to go about life feeding on innocence guilt-free, degrading themselves and others but believing they're morally superior than people who are more upfront about why they do what they do. I hope this makes sense and I'm not just writing in circles, I know why their logic is flawed in my head but I'm bad at piecing my thoughts together in a coherent way for others.

Also this is random but I had to share: The most hilarous thing I ever saw in my radfem tumblr days was a post telling you how to suck dick without it being patriarchal and degrading. As if you can take away the inherent degredation of stuffing one's face with some man's dick. It said to not kneel, to not stare up at him in the eyes like pornstars do, and to not go far back enough to gag. Sex pest logic: "It's natural and there's nothing wrong with it, just don't look him in the eye while you do it or it's degrading."

I've heard of the “purity is perversion” thing, and they're jealous. Women want to be attractive to everybody, even if they're not attracted to that individual, so they create think pieces on why they should be included in other people's dating pools, how beauty standards should change, etc. Now Twomen are engaging in the same behavior saying that you're a bigot if you're not attracted to them.

Even though 99.9% of people want an impure partner, they talk about purity way too often for it to not be an envy-based concern. Purity is the only trait that matters in a partner, everything else falls into place after that. If purity isn't the foundation for a relationship, that's when people get into these weird and oddly specific traits that don't really matter because they truth is they'd screw anything with a pulse. And they do.

When people fake like purity, they want the image of purity projected, but if you're actually pure, that makes them insecure and run for the hills because your standards are too high to live up to. And you won't fuck them, of course.

Sex-addicts also delude themselves into believing that “having sex through your heart” or “having sex with your brain” purifies their act, which is why they're so impressed with themselves when they speak like this. I can't believe I have to say this, but you can only have sex with your genitals. There's no purifying or romanticizing sex—it's for the painfully horrifying ordeal of self-sacrificial procreation. If people want to deny this, fine, but I don't want to hear them complain about rape and pedophilia. You don't get to justify sex for yourself, then criticize how other people have sex and who they have it with.

Most people are pedophiles. This goes much deeper than an orgasm, it's a state of consciousness, and it's the most evil form of it. The world isn't the way it is for no reason, the thoughts of the population materializes, which the news sheds a light on hourly. People think the news is cherry-picking to sow doom and gloom, but the news is actually very sanitized and is vastly underreporting on reality, saving airtime for the most deplorable cases.

If you want to find a genuine person, they won't have a reputation to uphold. People with reputations are manipulators. Individuals who know they're evil welcome bad karma and get off on their misfortune and the decay of their body. They're not only sadistic, but also put themselves through the ringer for sexual gratification. These are beings who intentionally contract STDs, and spread them, will burn themselves and others, put themselves in situations to get raped and rape others. Fake good people believe they're victims, even though they engage in the same behavior as overtly evil people because they engage in the New Age religion of “just think of it differently, and you will dodge karma!” You can't dodge the self-made structure of your brain.

To the ordinary person, purity culture is having to actually apply their philosophies to everyday life. If you're speaking to a feminist separatist who says she hates men, but then you point out that she has a boyfriend, she will call you a purist for expecting her to abide by the values she says she has. Purity culture isn't only about sex, it's about actually being who you say you are. This is where impurity and the split mind come into play, most people cannot reconcile reality with what is going on in their head, which is the basis of all mental illnesses.

If you call a slut a slut, you're being rude, but if you call a slut an innocent angel, she will become gleeful even though she doesn't fit the criteria. The ordinary person is begging to be lied to, and then they get upset when they get played. People love poetic whores for this reason. The individual's lack of self-awareness is why they are taken advantage of repeatedly. This level of naivety has clarified that the cabal does need to deploy mind control, as most are not interested in controlling their minds. The primary way people are controlled is through their senses. When I see people with zero discipline write pieces on how they abuse their senses in this never-heard-of-unique way even though it's very mediocre, as if they have any autonomy, it's kinda funny. Just like the essing dee example you gave.

The “think of x differently” mindset is exactly what false religions are about and how dogma springs up. If somebody is consistently having sex, their consciousness is at that level. It doesn't matter how intelligent they project themselves to be, people who are actually smart aren't popular & can see through their facade. If you're popular yet, claim to speak the truth, that's a contradictory statement. One must lie, pander and grift in some manner, or they're stupidly reinventing the wheel to gain traction in this world.

Although I absolutely despise evil, I'd rather deal with an overt devil than the covert one. The ones who openly brag about their disgusting nature and don't try to justify themselves, but these individuals are relatively rare. Overt psychopaths are the ones women hate because women are covert psychopaths who are terrified of men who make no effort to hide their true nature. This is because women like to be warmed up to the sexophile's vulturine nature slowly, then claim victimhood. Women as a collective hate the truth because women lie that much.

The language people use is indicative of their true nature. It's a sign of how versed they are in grooming, manipulation and “lovebombing." Convoluted, confusing and flowery language is meant to romanticize degeneracy. Predators are predictable, but people with smooth brains will always be easy prey. Oh well, survival of the fittest, right?

The majority of the world is still illiterate, and most of the people who can read do so at a 2nd grade level (and that is dwindling according to what these teachers are saying). So to even have good enough karma to read yet waste one's eyesight on garbage is a personal choice. What you're saying is literally incomprehensible to everybody. Realistically, there is only a small portion of the world this information is available to, a lecture room of people who can comprehend it and a handful who will actually apply it. Still worth it for those who are genuinely suffering, so any truth you can speak is infinitesimally useful.

Eating genitals is no different than drinking piss and eating shit. These are dog-people who are only one step away from eating plated feces as a delicacy, which is why westerners are projected to eat bugs soon. We're seeing more and more people with veneers for a reason. It's not just to get a Hollywood Smile. I would talk about this more, but 120 Days of Sodom demonstrates Satan Consciousness well enough. These beings are not human but take on the appearance of such. Actual humans are at least aware of their souls and demonstrate discipline and decorum. Animals are at the will of their base urges.

[soupdeewoop]

why (in my mind) down bad is Remus Lupin's song

[Verse 1]

Did you really beam me up In a cloud of sparkling dust i like to think that this part is when like (based on atyd) when Dumbledore comes and enrolls remus at hogwarts, and takes him to this place that is so new and sparkling to him.

Just to do experiments on? Tell me I was the chosen one so this is also about Dumbledore. i mean if you've been in the fandom long enough we know that Dumbledore isn't exactly a great person like he's deemed to be. i like how this line includes "chosen one" bc harry (obviously). it just goes to show how Dumbledore has done the same bads things for two generations of people.

Showed me that this world is bigger than us Then sent me back where I came from going back to atyd (i haven't finished atyd and not everything i say here is gonna be about it btw), remus being exposed to hogwarts and being (somewhat) happy i what i connect this line to. he came from a place of loneliness, to hogwarts, and then the war, and back to not having anyone around.

[Pre-Chorus]

For a moment, I knew cosmic love hogwarts. the marauders. sirius. yeah.

[Chorus]

Now I'm down bad, cryin' at the gym lol fuck my man probably doesn't go the gym but it does make sense for him to cry at the most random places yk? he's lost the people he loves

Everything comes out teenage petulance i feel like a lot of people would definitely become petty and like "ugh whatever" kinda attitude. after losing so many people, i mean, is there even a point to even think rationally? it might not be correct, but does it matter?

"Fuck it if I can't have him" "I might just die, it would make no difference" remus has felt this way throughout so much, i mean, should we be supreised? cause i think not. i feel like the "him" is sirius, cause he did have him back but then he DIED, so remus is just like "wtf wtf wtf why cant i just HAVE HIM you gave him to me BACK! ykw, i might just die it would make no difference"

Down bad, wakin' up in blood Starin' at the sky, come back and pick me up I'm sorry but he is a werewolf sadly. he wakes up in blood. ALONE THO. it makes sense for him to stare at the sky (maybe looking it the sirius start mayhaps?) and being like "PICK ME UP PLEASE"

Fuck it if I can't have us I might just not get up, I might stay

[Post-Chorus]

Down bad Fuck it if I can't have him Down bad Fuck it if I can't have him i (don't like) to think how he would just be on the floor after his transformation, down bad on the floor, "fuck it if i cant have him here next to me, helping me" "i could just stay here, there's no point in getting up"

[Verse 2]

Did you take all my old clothes Just to leave me here, naked and alone i mean, sirius stealing moonys sweaters and clothes is one of my favorite things, but in this context, he dint only steal that. he stole everything. his clothes, his sense of belonging, his whole fucking soul basically. and then he left him forever.

In a field in my same old town That somehow seems so hollow now? i mean this town can literally mean HIS TOWN or maybe even hogwarts? imagine how bad it must have been for him when he went to hogwarts as a teacher, the hallowness in his heart there without everybody he's known and loved for years.

They'll say I'm nuts if I talk about The existence of you um well sirius is in azkabhan. yeah.

[Pre-Chorus]

For a moment, I was heavenstruck he was heavenstruck, sirius was moonystruck

[Chorus]

Now I'm down bad, cryin' at the gym (Cryin' at the gym) Everything comes out teenage petulance "Fuck it if I can't have him" (Fuck it if I can't have him) "I might just die, it would make no difference" Down bad, wakin' up in blood (Wakin' up in blood) Starin' at the sky, come back and pick me up Fuck it if I can't have us I might just not get up, I might stay

[Post-Chorus]

Down bad (Like I lost my twin) i like how this one says "like i lost my twin" cause i feel like wolfstar are soulmates argue to the fucking wall. in my mind they're not opposite but not exactly the same. kinda like two sides on the same coin yk?

Fuck it if I can't have him (Down bad) Down bad (Wavin' at the ship) Fuck it if I can't have him

[Bridge]

I loved your hostile takeovers Encounters closer and closer after sirius escaping, maybe they did try to get back together? their encounters, where sirus gets "closer and closer". slowly but surely.

All your indecent exposures How dare you say that it's— their "indecent exposures" being at hogwarts. the love and affection. maybe sometimes being indecently exposed (sorry james [not sorry] peter)

I'll build you a fort on some planet Where they can all understand it remus would. he would whisk them both away to somewhere where no one can find them both.

How dare you think it's romantic Leaving me safe and stranded now, back to the petulance. obviously he knows this isn't sirus's fault, but sometimes pettiness takes over.

'Cause fuck it, I was in love So fuck you if I can't have us 'Cause fuck it, I was in love let him be. my man was in love with sirius black. his soulmate. he can be upset.

[Chorus]

Now I'm down bad, cryin' at the gym (Cryin' at the gym) Everything comes out teenage petulance "Fuck it if I can't have him" (Can't have him) "I might just die, it would make no difference" Down bad, wakin' up in blood (Wakin' up in blood) Starin' at the sky, come back and pick me up Fuck it if I can't have us I might just not get up, I might stay

[Post-Chorus]

Down bad (Like I lost my twin) Fuck it if I can't have him (I'm down bad) Down bad (Wavin' at the ship) Fuck it if I can't have him

[Outro]

Like I lost my twin Fuck it if I can't have him Down bad (Wavin' at the ship) Fuck it if I can't have him

and yeah. that why this song is so remus coded.

[vaiztohirez]

SVSSS College/University AU!!

(mostly STEM, and with assumptions arising from the American systems, bc that's what I know)

Shen Yuan: In accordance with my headcanons for canon, I think he'd still be studying evolutionary biology in this AU. He'd have fun with it, and I think he'd be decently good at it. Same energy as my roommate doubling Chem and Archeology bc Alchemy isn't an option

Luo Binghe: Shen Yuan tutored him once when they were in middle school and high school respectively, and Bingy majored in STEM about it. That and I think it would make sense with his backstory, for him to be studying biochemistry or molecular biology with the intent of becoming a cancer biologist. Like I said earlier, he'd be phenomenal in wet lab because of his skills in the kitchen (and general badassery) transferring to the lab. If he actually had Protagonist Powers I think he'd probably manage to actually cure cancer lol.

To get the relationships right, I think Ning Yingying and Ming Fan have to be studying something related to biology, but I don't have a good enough handle on their characters to decide what exactly within the broad broad field of bio they might be interested in. But I do know that the three of them were put in a study group during intro bio and managed to make that into actual friendship further down the line.

Shang Qinghua: I Knew he had to be Computer Science all the way. As someone who is intimately acquainted with the precise flavor of dying all CS majors are, he's absolutely got the energy. Plus, I had a daydream/plot bunny back when I was taking Algorithms that the type of procedural thinking taught in CS would be invaluable on An Ding. He absolutely still writes a ton to keep some semblance of sanity. If you see him in the CS building at 11 pm typing furiously it's a coin toss as to whether he's writing or debugging lol. He and Shen Yuan made instant hatefriends with each other in the university's anime club their first year, and slowly transitioned to being die-or-die (yes, that was not a typo, they are both dying at the end of this ride lol) best friends.

Literally everyone else I could think of under the cut:

Shen Qingqiu: I think he and Shen Yuan are cousins at most, so the QiJiu backstory can be had in some capacity. Of course, they can't literally be slaves named after numbers in a modern AU, but the separation/reconciliation/etc can happen. I think he's either premed and angry about it, or aggressively going towards academia. Math, maybe? I know those are two very different things, but whatever he's studying, he's mean about it, but very good.

Yue Qingyuan: I think he is in the med school at whatever university he's at. One of those freaks who manages to be dying entirely on the inside instead of the outside. This is why I think it'd be useful to have SJ|SQQ as premed, so their paths crossed. I think SQQ was delayed in enrolling by QiJiu Backstory, which is why they're in different years. He's maybe planning on going into family medicine, I think.

Mu Qingfang: How could I make the doctor character not a doctor? He's out of school, kind of. I think he's doing his residency at a hospital near the university. He's friends with YQY, and is Concerned at the bits of QiJiu Backstory he's picked up over the course of that.

Qi Qingqi: Thinks all you doctor types are a bit insane (affectionate, but deep down). I think she's a graduate student studying chemistry, maybe drug delivery if I had to pick something specific? No real reason, just vibes.

Liu Qingge: The emotionally constipated Sporty Ponytail(TM), so... Sports Medicine, obviously. I think he might be minoring in environmental studies or something, so there's reasons for him to cross paths with Shen Yuan. Story reasons, I mean -- he's doing it because he got interested in high school.

Liu Mingyan: I don't know if it's too on the nose to tie her to a field that'd make her excruciatingly aware of the reasons why to wear a mask, but I think she'd be studying Epidemiology or Public Health, something similar to that. I think she'd be good at thinking on the personal, community, and population levels, and balancing that.

Sha Hualing: So that she has some overlap with both LMY and LBH, and because I just think it fits somehow, I think she'd be studying molecular biology with the intent to go into virology.

Mobei-Jun: Honestly I'm not entirely certain he's in school. I think it might make more sense for him to be running the restaurant location Binghe works part time at. Which brings me to the rest of the demons!

Meng Mo: Head chef of the restaurant Bingy managed to finangle his way to a part time chef position at. No, I don't know how he managed that either, because it's a pretty high end restaurant, and "chef" doesn't tend to be a part time position from what I know. Binghe is just that good at cooking, I guess. Meng Mo is kind of mad about it.

Tianlang-Jun: He owns the restaurant and probably a bunch of other things, but he's rich-person bankrupt because he was suspected of murdering his wife (he didn't, obvs. Honestly it might be funny if Su Xiyan wasn't even actually dead). It was suuuuuper awkward when it came out that LBH was his biological son, but Binghe Refuses to touch business, so Zhuzhi-Lang is the successor.

That's all I've got for now!

[themolluscasometimes]

(if you havent seen dmeon slayer s3 or read the mange this has spoilers)

okay no but look-

who tf. gave genya a sword an told him to go to final selection

It's stated that Genya calmed down and mellowed out after getting Gyomei to train him. ALSO he got mega buff between when we see him at final selection and when he see him next like yeah he obviously had a growth spurt but the point is he went from scrawny to brawny. He was also a giant asshole at final selection so like. Genya 100% only got trained by gyomei after passing final selection.

Which MEANS either someone ELSE sent a kid that cant use breathing to final selection with a sword OR he got himself there. I dont believe anyone wouldve willingly sent him given how important breathing is to the demon slayer corp

also. The only trainers we really see are hashira or former hashira. Im SO convinced there are other that we don't see given that not every water breather couldve been taught by Urokodaki but it still makes sense that these teachers are retired professional demon slayers that lived long enough to be no longer in active service even if they aren't hashira

which leaves us with options:

OPTION 1:

genya tried to learn breathing from a cultivator/some other demon slayer, failed, stole a nichirin sword and probably shook the poor sod down to get info on the when and where for final selection

OPTION 1a

When the person who tried to teach breathing to Genya refused to continue after finding out he cant Breathe Right, said teacher was too strong for genya to really do anything about it (see: they're teaching him and it seems likely that the teachers of demon slayer tend to be upper ranked at least) Genya fucked off and assaulted some weak random demon slayer to steal a sword from and get info

Or, you know, something along these lines because he had to get a nichirin sword and infomraiton from somewhere, and Im doubtful it was willingly given to him since he like. cant fucking breathe.

HOWEVER

when we see him at the end of final selection, he's like. mega obsessed with the sword thing. like. super. like yes these are special swords but here's the thing everyone there already has one of the special swords, just not one of their own.

It kinda maybe implies that Genya. Doesnt have a special sword. So.

OPTION TWO:

Genya has been roughing it with a regular ass sword for seven days and given that he can't Breathe his primary form of defense would've been step one: cut the demons arm off. step two: monch. step three: beat the demon to within an inch of its life with demon enhanced brute strength until he can get away or force it die in the sun.

In which case Genya was not likely to be doing much direct demon slaying during those seven days.

(even if he HAD a nichirin sword theres no guarantee that without breathing he wouldve been strong enough or skilful enough to use it to kill all the demons he ran across but given how obsessed and intense he is with getting his hands on a nichirin blade and how much not one single person would want him to go to final selection, i honestly think he had just some random sword. It would explain why he's so desperate to get one, other than being generally unhinged. Anyway-)

While everyone else was roughing it, surviving and slaying demons in the night, Genyas experience of the final selection exam was somewhere between a survival challenge and an all you can eat buffet, with not a lot of demon slaying involved.

can u imagine being part of his cohort and running across some dude that needs you to cut off this demons head thats missing a suspicious amount of its body bc he doesnt have a nichirin sword for some fucking reason. also he has really, really, fucked up eyeballs.

can you imagine watching one of your fellow exam participants use a sword only to defend himslef bc its a functionally useless offense only to attack by eating the fucking demons.

can you imagine seeing him at one point, looking a certain way bc hes been eating a demon and then seeing him again later looking human. or looking like a different demon. or both.

can u imagine struggling to feed yourself during these seven days and this man is having a straight up feast. and also couldnt be assed to show up with a sword for demonslaying to the exam for fucking demon slaying