#one of these people is my actual blood related father unfortunately

[merlinsbed]

living in this house is exhausting

my dad and his wife have been on vacation for the last month and a half, meaning I’ve had the house completely to myself. within an hour getting home yesterday they both already managed to remind me that they think of me as a dumb baby who isn’t capable of doing anything.

there’s a pile of old recycling I’ve been slowly working my way through that’s currently in a room that is literally used for storage only. like this room is literally just for storing boxes and other shit. less than an hour after getting home and seeing the pile of recycling, my dad was going, “can I help you sort that out tomorrow?” like no??? I’m gonna be 30 in 2 days why the fuck would I need your help?????

his wife was even more of a bitch. I literally spent yesterday morning cleaning the kitchen and like I know it wasn’t perfect, but I wiped down the counters, I ran the dishwasher and put the dishes away, I washed all the towels and washcloths. About an hour after they got home, I went upstairs to see all the towels and washcloths had disappeared from the kitchen. when I opened the cabinet to get a plate, the ones I’d literally just ran through the dishwasher were all gone. opened the silverware drawer for a butter knife and almost everything was gone.

this woman literally said to herself, “I don’t trust my step daughter to do anything so I’m going to deep clean the kitchen myself because I know she didn’t do it to my neat freak standards” because she hates me. I’m not even joking I believe that woman hates me and thinks I’m just a stupid spoiled brat who spends my spare time coming up with ways to make her and my dad miserable. she does not speak to me unless she literally has no other choice.

and like, at this point, it’s not so much about my dad’s wife hating me or my dad being an asshole who makes only surface level attempts to understand me at all. it’s about the fact that they treat me like a stupid child. they treat me like I’m not capable of doing things for myself so either my dad has to help me or his wife has to just do it all again herself because to them I’ve proved myself too stupid to be treated like an adult. and it hit me especially hard yesterday because I had a month and half to actually do things in a way that works for me without constantly worrying about being nagged and looked down on and a part of me convinced myself that finally this might give them some fucking proof that I am a functioning adult but apparently not.

I literally talk to actual children more respectfully than my dad or his wife talk to me. that’s fucking sad. like it’s really pathetic of them. and it’s just super fucking frustrating for me.

[blaithnne]

I think my one complaint about Anders is that I wish we’d seen him leave of his own accord at least once. Unfortunately I doubt that would be possible due to time constraints but, I think if we’d gotten to see how Hilda was affected by him actually leaving and not being fairynapped it would have better shown what kind of person he is, and been a really good representation of what a lot of real kids go through. That moment where Hilda finally realised her Father abandoned her is so heartbreaking, raw, and real, and the fact that it’s later revealed he didn’t kind of undermines that.

I’m not against Anders changing for the better - it’s a kids show, and it makes sense they’d want to give him a character arch instead of just introducing him to be a dick lol. It also makes sense for his character to have nearly losing his entire family forever be a wake up call for him. But I wish we’d gotten more time with him, and really seen the effects of him leaving for real. Without that, we can generally assume that it had the same effect as him being kidnapped did in canon, but it’s just not the same.

I’m of the opinion that introducing Hilda’s dad as a concept was a good decision, and I don’t think it undermines the shows found family. It gives Hilda a relatable and realistic aspect to her that I think is important for kids in similar situations to see. I am, however, very biased in that regard.

My biological father was an asshole who fucked off before I was born, but I’ve had no absence of family or fatherly role models - I’m very close with my adoptive dad and my grandad. But that didn’t mean I never had questions, or insecurities.

It’s easy to look at fictional tropes and say that found family is clearly superior and biology doesn’t mean shit, and that’s true! But when you’re living in that reality, when you’re young and coming to terms with it for the first time, it’s hard. Especially when you’re surrounded by people who all have blood relations with their families, and when the person you’re related to is regarded as a dick. it really makes you feel isolated and like there’s something wrong with you, like you’re an outsider — you’re different.

Real life people are messy and have insecurities that defy reason, you might logically know that biology doesn’t matter, but when you’re thirteen and insecure and full of inner turmoil, you can’t help but feel bad.

Personally, as I got older, I met people in similar situations and realised I wasn’t alone, that it was okay to have those feelings but it didn’t make them true. But at that age, having grown up in a rural community, I really was alone.

Hilda’s insecurities in season 3 are a great representation of that, she feels like she’s never had a proper family, this thing with Frida, David, Tontu, Alfur and Johanna and Astrid is all new to her. You can tell her Father’s absence has hurt her, how she’s felt different and alone and like something was missing. Hilda defines her worth through her relationships with others, how she can help them make them happy, it destroyed her when she felt like she failed Frida, imagine how she feels about her father.

What I think season 3 was missing was for Hilda to realise that she doesn’t need Anders, and that her happiness isn’t reliant on him being there, I wish she’d had a tad more agency in the relationship, yk? She wants him to be in her life, and he’s going to make an effort now to do that, but she has a support system in place and will be perfectly fine without him. I wish the show had properly acknowledged that just because this is how things ended up, it wasn’t the only option — with or without Anders, Hilda would still have been happy with her family in the end, the fact that he’s a part of it is a nice bonus, but not an essential one.

In general, I think Anders is the best they could do with the time they were given. Having him be a realistic shitty dad who loves his daughter but is just so bad at it is relatable and realistic, though I wish they’d better emphasised that just because he loves hers that doesn’t make his actions okay (perhaps by slightly altering Johanna’s moment with Hilda at the end of The Job), because it’s clear, I think, as a diehard fan, but might not be for more casual viewers.

Having him be redeemable and stick around to do better is a good conclusion for his arch, it’s a happy ending all around and makes sense for the story - it could’ve been weird if they just had him show up and then immediately leave with zero resolution to his character, unless they made him an all out irredeemable abuser, which I think would’ve been worse than what we got. Portraying abusers as unforgivable and cartoonish villains only makes it harder for real life victims to recognise their situations, so if it couldn’t be portrayed properly (which thanks to time constraints and the overall narrative I don’t believe it could be) I’m glad they went with something else.

What we’ve got is, and I know I’ve said this many times lol, a realistic depiction of a crappy, absentee father, that young viewers can recognise and relate to. On that end, the biggest issues are Hilda’s lack of agency within their storyline, since she has no control in the resolution of their relationship, young people looking to this show for ways to cope with their own situations might be discouraged by the end resolution of “he decided to stick around”, since that resolution rests on his decision, not Hilda’s, if that makes sense.

TLDR; Overall, I think Anders’ was a good character and the best that could’ve been done with what the team was given, but,

A) I wish we’d gotten to see him leave of his own accord at least once, so that Hilda’s final realisation that he left her on purpose has more impact and doesn’t loose its meaning in retrospect, and,

B) That Hilda had more agency in the final resolution of their dynamic, that their happily ever after wasn’t entirely reliant on Anders swearing he won’t leave. An alternative solution, maybe presented earlier on in the season when he first left, that provided her with a coping mechanism/outlet in case he does, so that her happiness and mental health isn’t in his hands, would’ve been pretty neat.

[katerinaaqu]

Unfortunately my mind came up with two more questions

1. More historic than classic texts related

Since men didnt marry until their 30s usually, and im very sure they did not tend to be THAT chaste nor was birth control safe or common (im assuming lol), what happened to illegitimate children? I'm guessing theyd stay with their mothers (who more commonly probably wouldnt be free citizens from all i could guess) if they didnt get abandoned (which probably ended deadly or in slavery often enough ig unless they got extremly lucky?) ....idk just a random shower thought x)

2. Actually text related, again Odyssey/Iliad bc the fixation is still fixating:

How do we know when Iliad/Odyssey was supposed to have happened? We roughly when Homer was supposed to have lived

But from what i remember from the one or two lectures I had on ancient history and troy, there are a bunch of inconsistencies of descriptions in homers work (iirc the example being used was a helmet not worn anymore at the time of writing) but they also mentioned that during Homers time they mightve seen the ruins and archeological finds of that time which he/the oral tradition couldve used as inspiration or more like, coming up with a story for these finds?

So what is that assumption of when it'd happened based on?

The descriptions , archeological finds (tho i think with the whole "did they find troy" story, they wouldve based their assumption of having found the city on the already established time frame of how old the city wouldve had to be), other text evidence? Cultural evidence?

DID Homer mix (to him) historic/archeological/cultursl finds AND (to him) current descriptions/customs/etc?

So many thoughts so many questions fjdjksjsdj

Im curious if/what you know about that, thank you again for your time!! ^^

Oh my! Thank you so much! Your questions are fire! Let's get down to it then! ^_^

Well I cannot say that really they DIDN'T get married before their 30s, it is just that this was considered the ideal age for them to marry

That is because in ancient Athens men had plenty of dues to fulfill to the city before settling for a life such as finishing their education or serving the army etc. In one essence it was considered the perfect time for them to be married given how they have finished all their dues towards the city and society but that doesn't necessarily imply they never got married before that age. It was just considered the ideal. Just like nowadays they say the ideal age for someone to have children is till roughly the mid-30s but that doesn't mean people do not have children early or later etc.

Oh that is a very good question. Indeed by n large the illegitimate children didn't have rights on the family's fortune and by n large they stayed with their mothers unless of course one would adopt them and recognize them officially but of course the status of the children differed massively depending on their parentage. For example if the illegitimate child (or Νόθος, Nothos, "bastard") was a product of two Athenean citizens or from an Athenean and a non-citizen (mētroxenoi) then of course the status was expected to differ. And that of course might have played much greater role for the time when the Athenean pure blood propaganda was high enough. One would expect that being illegitimate was a reason for someone to be stigmatized. Mythologically for example Odysseus was often called "Son of Sisyphus" being insulted that not only he was not legitimate son to Laertes but also a product of a man that was sinful and shameful. So even in myth it was a sign used for offending him (see also my random inspiration on Philoctetes where I partially use it) Historically they say that Diogenes the Cynical Philosopher mocked a boy that was born out of a prostitute who threw stones at public by yelling "Hey watch out you might hit your father!"

So being illegitimate was generally seen as a sign of shame for the individual. Most of information we have are from classical Athens for example the law of Solon Whichever woman her father or brother born of the same father or paternal grandfather should betroth on a just basis to be a wife (damar), from this woman the children are to be legitimate (gnēsioi). And we do see a series of laws as to who is considered illegitimate and what responsibilities or rights they bare. Other writers such as Aristpphanes also mention stuff even in their theatrical plays such as A nothos may not have the participation-right-of-close-relatives (anchisteia) if there are legitimate (gnēsioi) children. But if there are no legitimate children, then the estate is to be shared by the nearest kin. So by n large the illegitimate children have no right to the estate apart from those who were officially adopted although there seems to be a generally smaller amount of money called "notheia" that a father can leave to their bastard children if he sees it fit. I believe initially the illegitimate children still could hold some hope for succession but later on that was less and less possible to happen. Need to research more on that though. For example Plutarch mentions how a child that was born from an etaira (aka official concubine) shouldn't be even looking for their father anymore. Demosthenes also agrees Neither male bastard (nothos) nor a female bastard (nothē) may have participationright-of-close relatives (anchisteia) in the sacred and holy rites (hiera kai hosia) from the archonship of Euclid So yeah by n large we see a separation of the illegitimate chilren from their father unless the father seems to wish to adopt them. A classic example in Homer is Teucer and Ajax. Ajax is legitimate but Teucer even if he is older he is illegitimate. Ajax is the leader of the fleet of his city, Teucer's job is to support him instead and we can expect after Ajax's death Teucer was left alone with no kin due to his illegitimate status. The father usually recognized a child upon the tenth day of its birth in an official ceremony (decate) but that didn't automatically give them economical rites of succession, rather than religious ones. With the latter the classical athenean constitution basically considered anyone not owning land or rites of their family not useful for the prosperity of the land and so the bastard children fell often in this category since as it was above they rarely ever inherit their father's estate.

Which I find quite interesting given how many children in mythology are technically illegitiate born by some god or other and succeed. Quite possibly blood indeed runs thicker than water for high class bastard children over common ones I would suppose. Okay that is a very blunt analysis. I would be happy to search further in the future.

2. Yay! Here we go!

Okay the short answer would be; thanks to Schlieman! The dude dug up the city that we now know as Troy in the 19th century. Ever since the city was thoroughly examined by modern day archeologists and based on not only the descriptions in Homer but also the evidence provided from the city itself we do believe that Troy fell probably around 1200 BC. One key point is that we do not see for example in Homer Doriean greek tribes such as Macedonians or northern kingdoms of Epirus etc which are mentioned later as part of the campaigns of the greek heroes to the north such as Neoptlemous establishing the kingdom of Epirus or Odysseus traveling to Thesprotia to repent himself to Poseidon. We know the Doriean Greeks arrived to the area around 1100 BC so the fact that Homer doesn't include them in his narrative was an indicative of the time the war took place. It is also linked to the fights and wars that we believe happened among the greek kingdoms before the fall of Bronze Age kingdoms and the beginning of the "Dark Ages" at the Iron Age which was the time Homer lived in. Th layers of the city that we now know as Troy are very well preserved despite the fact that Schliman did a great deal of damage by digging deep. Archeologists have timed the layers they discovered based on evidence or stylistic details. The city itself named Troy is not just a hypothesis of modern archeology but it seems to be a roman hypothesis too given that we have found tablets from Roman times speaking on the city of Ilium/Troy. Possibly it was already a tourist attraction for the romans at that time given how it was their legendary origin city through Aeneas. Can we say with 100% certainty this is Troy? Perhaps not but we still have very good evidence to support it. Obviously we cannot be sure of the timespan given by Homer to my knowledge but it is safe to assume a war happened at that time in Troy we just establish it was probably a war over the control of the area the coastline and the crops and the passage with the east.

Homer is actually surprisigly accurate in some things (for ecample Meriones giving a boar tusk helmet to Odysseus and the helmet is very well described and fits the mycenaean counterparts) but yes he uses anachronisms a lot for example the mention of iron weapons in his narrative even if Iron was't widedly used at that time or round shields mentioned were more common in Homer's time than mycenaean times. The same goes with other weapons. It is more a case of anachronism rather than a case of inconsistency. We also see burial customs that are more consistent with Homer's time and later times as well rather than Mycenaean times. Or some politica ideals and so on such as the gatherings for voting among the kings or soldiers or the ideal of straightforward battle or being remembered in eternity which were all ideals we know were establishing by Homer's time but we do not know how much of it is true about the mycenaean times. Which makes sense given how Homer was mentioning things he and his audience were familiar with. Another we can see from subjects of shame and modesty such as Penelope covering herself in a veil for modesty. That we do not know if it was a thing in mycenaean times although in Homer's time we can assume it was more common which was done again in classical times where women should by n large be covered in the presence of men.

Yeah probably it was a mix of oral mythical traditions and historical traditions that survived from mouth to mouth given how we unfortunately do not have much written evidence from that time and since myth and history were often tangled together in ancient greek tradition it makes sense how both travel the same way. Homer probably hears the stories and the traditions and indeed mixes in some of the customs or details more familiar in his time and creates his story. Unfortunately given how the mycenaean scripts are scarce and all of them are logistics and not literature or history, is really hard to be 100% certain on their society and history but it does seem to be a very good amalgamation between history, myth and anachronysm. Homer also provides us so much detail on warfare and wounds that it is estimated he was at war possibly at a high position or that he was trained as a doctor among others. Many of the anatomical details he mentions are simply on point which makes it even more interesting as a hypothesis.

Obviously one cannot use Homer as a historical source to learn about the war of Troy but rather they can use it as a reference as to how these wars of the late Bronze Age Greece passed on to the immediate next generations a few hundred years later.

[gwendeeagain]

What do you think of Siblings Karushuu AU ?

Short Answer:

It's fine, they're cute... I guess. I don't care much for it, not because I dislike the idea, but because I feel like them being siblings doesn't really add much to their existing dynamic.

Long Answer:

I attempted to write Siblings!Karushuu early on. I have 1 complete oneshot, and I think one WIP (I don't remember if I published it in my Scrapbooks collection).

Thing is, I'm not sure what exactly about them being siblings is a draw as opposed to them being unrelated or just interacting in any other premise.

The both of them already have quite a robost family setup that influences their personality - Karma with absent parents, Gakushuu with his too-present father (and ?absent mother).

Sibling AU fics that I've read tend to shoehorn in Gakuhou to be Karma's father, which is expected since he's an established character in canon, and his role can't be omitted without too much damage to the rest of the plot. (Furthermore, if you're the kind of person who is writing a Karushuu siblings AU, you're clearly interested in the Asano family dyanmic (that's actually all there is to Gakushuu) so you're just not going to omit Gakuhou.)

Unfortunately I've observed that this rarely influences anything about Karma. Karma either remains as he is in canon and it's explained that he's a black sheep in his family to have ended up in 3-E, or the plot puts him in 3-A and it's explained that he either has an impending transfer to 3-E/it's his last chance; or that his nepotism is what keeps him in 3-A. Karma's values and principles about academics and the inherent worth of human beings is rarely affected in these retellings (because that's what people like about Karma) but because that's Gakuhou's main shtick, it feels like the whole premise didn't matter at all.

There's even less to say about Gakushuu's mother because neither Karma nor Gakushuu's mothers are present in canon anyways and it's easy to just explain them away as unimportant, given how much space Gakuhou takes up in the mind. Usually I read that their mother takes off with Karma and leaves Gakushuu alone with Gakuhou, so... no changes there.

Another potential appeal is the sibling dynamic between Gakushuu and Karma - but then I'll just question what exactly about a sibling relationship differs from... any other relationship between two unrelated people. Karushuu in canon already has the sort of snarky-bantering-rivalry energy anyways, if that's the thing you're looking for. I've seen fics that write them as estranged by having their parents split them up as kids, but then that's essentially the same as a childhood friends AU. I guess we really can't replicate familial love and the obligation of being blood related unless it's this specific context. The idea that they're cut from the same cloth, only separated by time, but they will eventually reunite... oh hey, we can make them soulmates, put a curse on them, or make a demon pact.

There's also the resentment angle, as overcompeting siblings tend to have, "you look like the other parent" acidity if we throw in a divorce plot. But that doesn't affect their existing interaction, I feel - it gives them different things to say when they fight, but they're still rivals as they would in canon.

I don't know. My point is that I guess I can't think of a premise that would interest me in a sibling au above any other au if I had the option. Any differences that do arise feel miniscule and don't affect the broad strokes of whatever I'm looking for in a fic.

...Not even incest, which is a hot take. Yeah, I read/write and enjoy incest. But come on, whatever Gakushuu and Gakuhou have going on in canon already is far more interesting than anything I could ever manufacture for sibling Karushuu. The strange enmeshment and tension that the canon Asanos have in Mamasano's absence, ...could work similarly to sibling Karushuu's furtive us-against-the-world codependency under their Father's omniscent gaze... if you're into that sort of thing. I could be, but more often than not the Asano family dynamic pulls me away from looking elsewhere.

I mean, I'm just not into the siblings thing. You could be. Don't take this post as my condemnation of Karushuu siblings, I still enjoy reading them and the quality of the fic takes precedence. I've had my expectations pleasantly subverted before.

Hehe thanks for the ask! I love rambling

[copajay]

lightning bolt

⋆˚✿˖° 𐙚 ₊ ⊹ ♡

masterlist

ITS BEEN ALMOST 3 YEARS SINCE I LAST LEFT THIS SERIES OMG but here’s soobin! not even gonna lie I hate this one esp bc I'm rusty after my writing break </3

summary: choi soobin has been madly in love with his best friend since they were kids, but she's never seemed to notice. when she starts showing interest in another guy, soobin realizes he needs to make a move or move aside. (not proofread)

date: 12/28/23

series: txt demigod series (located in masterlist)

scenario themes: best friends to lovers!au, percy jackson! au

idol: soobin or choi soobin of txt

concept: fluff

warnings: swearing, soobin making bad decisions

word count: 2.1k

choi soobin's father is none other than the king of the Gods. the widely revered and respected zeus, who also happens to be quite the lady's man...if you consider turning into an animal to seduce a woman romantic.

soobin, on the other hand, isn't so lucky when it comes to romance. he could easily get with most of camp half-blood's residents with his impressive height, handsome features, and high status (being zeus's son and all). but soobin has only ever had eyes for one demigod: y/n l/n, the child of dionysus and half-sister of choi yeonjun, soobin's good friend.

like your brother and father, you're exceptionally outgoing and flirtatious. meanwhile, soobin is exceedingly reserved and has virtually no game. the two of you are polar opposites, which is why it comes as a shock to most people once they find out you're the closest of friends.

growing up in the same neighborhood with your respective human parents, soobin and you walked hand-in-hand through every stage of life--from sitting next to each other on the school bus in kindergarten to finding out that you're both full-blown demigods on a class trip to the empire state building.

once you guys made your way to camp half-blood upon the discovery of your mythological lineage, soobin felt a surge of confidence. he was related to the most powerful being on mount olympus, there's no way you'd curve him now... right?

unfortunately, right before he could even attempt to make a move, he met your newfound older half-brother and camp counselor, choi yeonjun, who scared the absolute shit out of him. luckily for soobin, he was able to form a close friendship with the older boy, but that doesn't mean he scared him any less.

it's always been difficult for soobin to express himself romantically, especially around you. terrified of rejection, he could never bring himself to tell you how he feels. you, however, have no problem making romantic advances towards others. notorious for being a camp heartbreaker, you often share tales of your many flings with soobin, unbeknownst to the fact that he absolutely despises hearing about them.

the only thing that keeps soobin from sobbing in his pillow every night is knowing that you're never serious about any of your prospects. sure you have a tendency to go on and on about them, but in a matter of days, you'll simply move on to the next.

although it frustrates him to no end, he'd rather have it this way than have to see you actually in love with someone else. soobin wouldn't know what to do with himself if you actually fell for someone that isn't him, which is why he was a complete and total mess when you finally did.

it started off just like any other short-lived crush of yours: giggling over the new addition to camp half-blood: lee jeno, son of aphrodite. he might be painfully good-looking, but soobin was sure you'd be over him within less than a week.

"you don't get it. his nose is, like, perfect." you raved as soobin felt the biggest eye roll of his life coming on. "uh-huh" the boy absentmindedly responded.

once you had officially been fangirling over this jeno character for two weeks, soobin started to get worried.

"why don't you approach him, then?" soobin asked, irritated. you've been talking about jeno nonstop for an hour and it was seriously starting to piss him off.

not only that, but you told yeonjun of all people. you've never told yeonjun about any of your small crushes before, so why are you starting now? soobin was beginning to panic, was he really about to lose the love of his life to some guy she just met?

"because... I guess I'm nervous. i don't know?" you responded awkwardly. "you? nervous?" he teased, "it's weird, I don't think I've every felt this way about someone."

uh oh.

that was all he needed to hear to confirm his worst fear. you were actually starting to like this guy, and soobin had yet to tell you how much he liked you first.

"i've gotta go." he said abruptly, leaving you mid-conversation. what the hell is his problem? you thought to yourself.

soobin didn't know what to do or how to feel. whenever he has a problem he usually goes to either you or yeonjun, and he definitely can't go to you for this one.

after pacing around camp for nearly 10 minutes, he wound up at the dionysius cabin door. with a shaking fist, he knocked gently on the wooden door. per usual, yeonjun opened the door with a wide smile on his face, and all soobin could think of is how that smile would disappear after the conversation he was about to initiate.

"could I talk to you in private maybe?" the younger boy proposed, hands still shaking. "of course. is everything alright?" yeonjun responded, ushering soobin inside.

"you know how to get girls right?" soobin asked awkwardly once the pair had made their way to yeonjun's desk. chuckling, yeonjun simply nodded his head.

"look, i need you to promise me you won't get mad." he pleaded. "of course I won't, soobin." yeonjun promised. "i'mkindainlovewithyoursisterandnowshelikesanotherguyandidontknowhowtowinherover." soobin stammered.

yeonjun's pursed lips quickly transitioned into a cheshire smile. "soobin. everyone knows you like y/n, why would I get mad?"

"EVERYONE?"

"well, I guess not y/n herself, but pretty much everyone else."

was it really that obvious? soobin thought he was pretty slick, but people definitely began to connect the dots after he rejected yet another admirer to follow you around all day.

"then what should I do?" soobin retorted. "have you tried telling her how you feel?" yeonjun shrugged, leaning against his bedframe.

soobin felt himself turning red, far too embarrassed to answer. "of course you haven't" the other demigod replied. "isn't there another way?" soobin pleaded, ignoring yeonjun's facepalm.

"this guy belongs to the aphrodite cabin, right?" yeonjun began, causing soobin to nod his head vigorously. "well good luck with that, it's impossible not to fall in love with one of aphrodite's kids. they're walking love potions."

"love potions? those are real?" soobin prompted. yeonjun's face immediately stiffened, "are you seriously about to use a love potion on my half-sister."

"nope. I'm going to use it on jeno and make him fall in love with someone else." soobin declared excitedly. "that doesn't sound like a good idea bro-"

"don't worry about it! I won't!" soobin hurriedly shouted before his friend could protest. "shit, what did I just do?" yeonjun mumbled to himself as soobin made his way out the door.

perhaps soobin was acting irrationally out of desperation, but he couldn't care less. in moments like these, he really resembled his father: going on a fiery rampage over something seemingly insignificant. he was in way too deep to turn back now, and as he marched to find a way to access a love potion, he found his golden ticket: choi beomgyu.

beomgyu is a mutual friend between soobin and yeonjun, but more importantly, another son of aphrodite. if anyone could get him a love potion, it was the youngest choi of the trio.

"beomgyu! what's up buddy," soobin mused. turning around, the slightly shorter boy cheerfully responded, "long time no see, soobin. what's up?"

"you wouldn't know how to get a love potion, would you?" soobin feigned a nonchalant attitude, getting straight to the point. "a love potion is pretty easy to make, but what would you use it for?" beomgyu questioned. "umm I'm just curious! I think I read about it in a book somewhere." soobin lied. although he felt guilty, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.

as soon as beomgyu listed the ingredients, soobin ran off in the opposite direction, shouting a quick "thanks!" before heading out

that night, soobin ran all around the camp and forest to find everything he needed to create his very own love potion. finally finishing around 2 a.m., he crashed in hopes of succeeding in his plans.

the next morning, as he confidently made his way to the mess hall, he saw jeno and you sitting side by side eating breakfast. the sight made his stomach turn and him even more eager to hatch his plan so he could finally win you over.

all he had to do was create a distraction so he could slip the love potion into jeno's orange juice, so he shot a lightning bolt directly at the window to shatter it. maybe that wasn't the smartest idea, but soobin was running out of patience. as the campers ran to investigate the window, he rapidly poured his homemade love potion into jeno's drink before taking the seat opposite him.

as you and jeno made your way back you noticed soobin was sitting at the same table that you were previously at. "soobin!" you waved. the boy turned and shot you a smile before dapping up jeno beside you.

"what are you doing here?" you asked, ignorant to the situation. "oh, I got a bit hungry and saw that this table was empty. what a coincidence!" he shared awkwardly.

jeno simply laughed and reached for his juice to take a sip before soobin realized just how stupid this whole plan was. he didn't even know how a love potion works... who's he going to fall in love with? how fast would the results appear? is it even ethical to use a love potion? IS IT EVEN LEGAL?

before jeno's lips could touch the cup, soobin reached over and slapped the drink out of his hand. the silence that followed was deafening. you and jeno looked up at him in shock, along with the rest of the campers at the mess hall.

humiliated, soobin ran out. he wasn't sure where he was going or how he was going to face you. he just knew he couldn't handle all the attention he was getting back there.

"soobin, what the hell was that?" you yelled running behind him. turning around, he struggled to find the words as you looked at him equally disappointed and angry.

"woah woah what's going on?" yeonjun butted in after hearing you yell across the patio, with beomgyu trailing behind him. "what was that for?" jeno confronted angrily, emerging from behind y/n.

the next thing soobin knows, he's cornered by four people he lied to and he can't think of another lie to get himself out of this situation.

"I was planning on using a love potion to get jeno to fall in love with someone else and not y/n." he admitted with his head down.

yeonjun simply sighed while beomgyu gasped. you were still processing why your best friend would sabotage your first potential relationship until jeno opened his mouth.

"fall in love? I was just looking for a hookup. she isn't really all that anyway," jeno quipped.

you immediately whipped your head in his direction, dumbstruck. "excuse me?" yeonjun quickly retorted, fists balling up. meanwhile all beomgyu could do is gasp again.

for once in soobin's life, he didn't feel nervous or hesitant. he felt angry, furious even. without thinking, he pushed jeno to the ground, hovering over him.

"soobin, calm down." yeonjun interjected. confused, you decided to take matters into your own hands.

"first of all, you're an asshole jeno," you began, "and you." pointing at soobin, "are an even bigger one."

you stormed off but you could hear soobin trailing behind you. "leave me alone." you sputtered. "please just hear me out, y/n," he begged.

"how could you possibly justify that? how could you defend anything you did?" your voice broke towards the end of the sentence, breaking soobin's heart. it felt like he was being hit by a million lightning bolts.

"I can't. I acted immaturely and carelessly. the truth is I've liked—loved you for a long time now, but I didn't know how to tell you, and i felt threatened by how much you liked jeno so I made an idiotic decision. i know it’s not enough but im sorry.”

as mad as you were, you couldn’t help but feel bad. were you really that oblivious?

“you’re right about it being an idiotic decision…” soobin’s gaze was stuck to the ground in shame at this point. ���but i’d be lying if i said I didn’t have feelings for you. I guess that’s why i never really settled for one guy, because none of them were you. and jeno… was clearly a mistake.”

soobin finally looked up hopefully, “does this mean…” he started, “not until you make it up to me.” you shut him down.

“oh.” he replied awkwardly, scratching his neck. “…by taking me out tomorrow.” you added, grinning.

“of course.” he agreed, mimicking your smile.

[creepercraftguy]

My Thoughts on OMNI-MAN VS BARDOCK

Death Battle made its triumphant return today, and I've decided I'm gonna start posting short reviews of each new episode that comes out.

This isn't gonna be a long-winded review, just me sharing my basic thoughts.

And I'll be putting all of my stuff under the cut so that I don't spoil it for anybody. Please, make sure, if you're interested, that you watch the episode first, and don't read on so that you don't get spoiled.

To start off with, the matchup itself did really interest me. I remember around the time that Omni-Man vs Homelander came out that people were trying to come up with ideas for who would be a better opponent for Nolan, because frankly, Homelander was an absolute piece of piss for him.

And everyone, including the companies that own both Invincible and The Boys, knew that going in. So it wasn't really a hyped episode for who would win or not, but more so what was actually going to happen during the fight itself. Creating a spectacle was more important than creating a fight.

Not that Omni-Man Vs Homelander was bad. It is actually one of my favourite DB's from its execution, but the fact was it was not a difficult fight for Omni-Man AT ALL.

So when people started to think of who would be a much fairer fight for him, and one that had a lot of connections, Bardock was a big one, and it wasn't hard to see why:

Both are powerful alien warriors who are known for...kind of being dicks. Nolan is a Viltrumite, a race of highly advanced, powerful beings who conquer and dominate other planets. His mission on Earth is initially hidden but later revealed to be part of this expansionist agenda. Bardock is a Saiyan warrior, a race known for their battle prowess and ability to get stronger after every fight. The Saiyans, under Frieza's rule, conquer planets, wiping out their inhabitants for Frieza’s empire.

Both are the blood-related fathers of their series protagonists, Mark, AKA Invincible, and Kakarot, AKA Son Goku, respectively.

Both characters suffered conflict with their own people. Omni-Man's conflict comes from the fact that he is torn between his Viltrumite duties and the love he develops for his family and Earth, and eventually, he decides to defy the Viltrumite empire to some extent after being confronted by Mark’s humanity. Bardock becomes disillusioned with Frieza and attempts to fight back after learning about Frieza's plan to annihilate the Saiyan race. While his resistance is ultimately futile, he still stands against his ruler in an effort to protect his people.

Both characters are initially presented as being ruthless, unforgiving, and bloodthirsty, but this changes over time (across multiple iterations in Bardock's case) Initially, Omni-Man is ruthless in his mission, killing thousands to assert Viltrumite dominance, showing little regard for human life. However, as he develops a bond with his family, especially Mark, he begins to reconsider his values.And while Bardock begins as a battle-hardened warrior who cares little for the planets he conquers, he undergoes a transformation when he learns of Frieza’s betrayal and seeks to protect his home and his son.

And a few more on top of that, but I'm not sure I need to go through all the connections myself.

So, I start this off with the analysis portions of the episode, and I immediately noticed something when I went through Nolan's analysis.

I know this probably has to do with Death Battle trying to preserve their budget and keep their independence up, but unfortunately, it seems that we no longer have any cutaway scenes showing Wiz and Boomstick. They host the show as always, but we don't actually physically see them at all, not even during the post-analysis.

This is kind of a shame because, while yeah, the cutaways are normally hit or miss, the jokes they try to make land a lot better with them.

But on the other hand, it does make retaining the information a lot better. And to the credit, the analysis really made it clear where each characters strengths lay.

Going into this, I was under the impression that Bardock held an advantage, because I know the Dragon Ball scaling goes way above the scaling of Invincible. However, when I actually saw some of the feats Nolan achieves in the comics, compared to Bardock's...honestly kind of messy timeline, I started to change my tune.

I still held out for hope for Bardock, but when the fight ended and Omni-Man took the win...I understood why.

So yeah, the analysis and post-analysis were good because it really made me understand how the fight went the way it did.

With that being said, this was, to no one's surprise, a much harder fight for Nolan than Homelander was. Saiyan's just ARE stupid powerful aliens, and Omni-Man would actually have to put in the work for a win as opposed to completely stunting on the guy.

Okay, so now for the fight. If I had to rank it on a scale of 1 to 10, I think I'd give it a solid 7.

That's no fault of DevilArtimis, or Death Battle themselves though. Unfortunately, with the respective abilities these guys are known for, there's a severe limit to what you can have them do in the span of a 5 or so minute fight.

Besides Bardock's ki blasts, neither really have any powers of their own that don't just involve beating the shit out of people, tearing them apart, and just sheer brutality, so ultimately, what you are left with is a battle that just shows these two evil daddies pounding each other.

And no, I'm not taking back my phrasing there.

However, while that does limit my enjoyment of the fight, it doesn't do so severely. There's still a lot to love about the clash.

I always like to talk about my thoughts on the voice acting, and in this case, Omni-Man was reprised by Tom Schalk (also previously voicing Kool-Aid Man, Dio, Spongebob, and Megatron) and Bardock was voiced by Kamran Nikhad (previously having voiced Sephiroth, Mario, Boba Fett, Black Adam, and Martian Manhunter)

Schalk is one of the best voice actors that Death Battle have in their cast. He killed it as a sinister, condescending, and stern Omni-Man in Omni-Man Vs Homelander, and though he doesn't speak nearly as much in this one, he does equally well as a despaired, enraged, protective Omni-Man too. He killed it once again. As for Nikhad, he was fine, but definitely not the same sort of inflections that Sonny Strait gives Bardock that make his voice so iconic. Just a minor complaint.

Another minor complaint I have is Bardock's model looks a little weird, at least the mouth movements do, especially when shown from the side, and Nolan's model is kind of uncanny because it's weird seeing Omni-Man in 3D. Sure, he's 3D in Mortal Kombat, but that's also a realistic art style that would have clashed with Bardock, so I'm glad they didn't go that route. Still cool though.

And props to DevilArtemis for doing what he could to keep you engaged with this fight, and capturing both characters behavior, transformations, attacks, and inflections really well with the movements.

Considering, as I already mentioned, this fight would not go as easily as the fight with Homelander did, Omni-Man's attacks feel a lot more damaging, and ferocious than they did in his previous episode. My favourite part of the fight is when he grabs Bardock's tail, brutally tears it off, and then just whip slaps him with it. Definitely in line with the Viltrumites knack for tearing people to bloody chunks.

And for Bardock, considering he's an early Dragon Ball guy, it's really good to see some more recent recontextualization and coverage for classic feats. Also, for some reason, this is the first time we're ever seeing an Oozaru in Death Battle.

If I have any complaints for the fight, Bardock's Death was...kind of flat. It was brutal, but I didn't expect it, nor want it, to be so graceful. But that's all I really have to say about it. The sequence itself was really solid.

And in case I didn't make it clear, while I DO like Bardock more than Nolan as a character, the result did not dissatisfy me because, like I said, it was explained very thoroughly, and very well, in a way that made me understand.

Also, two little side notes, I want to address my take on a few arguments that I kept on seeing in the build up to this episode, and when the episode dropped. The first being whether or not Bardock should have been allowed Super Saiyan, and how it was kind of unfair for Bardock to be given a composite version of his character. To that, I say this.

First of all, if Bardock wasn't given all of his abilities across his iterations, this fight wouldn't have been nearly as cool. If you have the choice between seeing Bardock go Super Saiyan, or not seeing Bardock power up and go gold, why would you ever choose the latter? Death Battle tried to justify their decision, but for me at least, they didn't really need to.

What I wanted to know, in regards to Super Saiyan's conclusion, is this: Would Bardock having Super Saiyan be the edge he needs to win the fight? And would he lose if he didn't have it?

If the answer is yes, then I take issue. Because I don't like it when characters in this series win all because of one minor feat they have, especially if that feat is only semi-canon, like Super Saiyan Bardock is. However, in this case, the answer is no.

Super Saiyan definitely gave Bardock a boost that put Nolan on the ropes, but it wasn't enough to net him a win. So there's no real issue because having Super Saiyan ultimately didn't affect the results, so I'm fine with it.

The second argument I keep seeing is that Omni-Man wouldn't have been able to take down that giant planet without the 2 other characters that were with him. In the comics, he needed the assistance of those two, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to do it.

However, I want to note that the point that DB were trying to make was that Nolan, even if he was a third of the power required to take down that planet, is still VERY CAPABLE of wiping out entire planets on his own, and far more efficiently than Bardock would be. Bardock's own planet-busting feats weren't even his; he was scaled off of King Vegeta, so that's honestly more of a loose connection than Nolan smashing the planet.

And it's not as if that feat alone is what gave Nolan the edge in the fight. He still had all the other stuff like smart atoms on his side.

I will quickly remind everyone that this was not a stomp for Omni-Man. Death Battles usually aren't stomps, and they show off what both characters are capable of by pushing them to the brink. The aforementioned Omni-Man Vs Homelander is only one of few examples of unfair stomp fights.

And the last thing I want to talk about is the music track, though I don't have much to say on it. I know that Brandon kind of struggled with this track, but he did a great job, as he always does. With that being said, I still like Diabolical Invincible Me more than Solid State Invincible, not because SSI is a bad track, but because DIM is just...SOOO good, by a large margin. In fact, SSI even takes lyrics and beats from DIM.

So that's about it...A REALLY solid comeback for Death Battle. Not one of my top fights, but definitely a super strong opener.

...

...Although I feel like I'm forgetting something...There was one other thing that I really liked but I can't quite remember-

...

...

...

...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-

[thelegolashairappreciationclub]

My two favourite FAVOURITE Gil Galad theories are Gil Galad son of No-one Really and Gil Galad son of Everyone Kind Of?

Like I adore the idea that someone who by blood is no-one, parents were random noldo or sinda soldiers, doesn't even know who his parents are, that this strange elf becomes one of the best Kings of the Noldor and the only one to rule mostly in peace since finwe. That this person who was not Finwe's heir is the one to inherit his mantle in its truest form.

But also... what if he's everyone's son?

I have seen this done both as weird magic stuff and also as the worlds most complicated polycule and the kid that resulted. But i prefer the Hot Potato Origin: That in his life Gil Galad has been passed through so many of the Noldorin and Sindarin Lords and been adopted so many times that no one is sure at this point who actually contributed genetically.

Post rebirth there's a tally system of whose traits he shows the most of out of the finweans (concerningly, Argon is currently in the lead) and no one wants to ask him directly because if They are one of the parents it would be horrendously embarrassing to not Know That. This also means that most of them have adopted a sort of parental attitude towards him even if they're fairly certain that they aren't related.

Some of them have become full conspiracy theorists about it (Fingon: what if I DID have a wife and i just FORGOT because of head trauma?? Galadriel: subtly interrogating all her siblings to build a full timeline of their entire lives in Beleriand) others are throwing fuel on the fire for their own amusement (Nerdanel: actually he's our Secret 8th Son, we sent him on later, that's why he has freckles. Elrond: he's actually Elros, we were lying for fun, ignore that we dont look at all alike.) Some of them have just kind of shrugged and acknowledged that they are a possible candidate and moved on (Caranthir: if Haleth had a child she Absolutely would not have told me and she's clever enough to have organised this, the timeline works out. Aredhel: unfortunately large chunks of my time in nan elmoth are fuzzy and i would not put it past Eol to rid himself of any "unsuitable" children.) Finrod and Maedhros have remained So silent on the issue that others are Sure they Know something (the pestering results in Both of them suddenly claiming to be his parents: Finrod is his father, Maedhros his mother Actually. The charade of being star crossed lovers is convincing enough that people start doubting their real marriages.)

Gil Galad is honestly completely uninvested in this and is just glad that they're bickering between themselves instead of questioning him constantly. Besides he has lunch with his birth parents every Wednesday; if they wanted to stop the rumours they would.

[fullmetal-scar-simping]

Finding your blog is a blessing because I have ALWAYS been a Scar fan; and while I do generally prefer brotherhood's overall storyline, every time they bring up Ishvalans I have to prevent myself from committing violence because they bungled the imperial/genocide plotline so bad😭😭😭

And look not to be on the crazy agenda but it does deeply bother me that the only named Ishavalan we have in the series is Major Miles, whose father is likely Amestrian and that makes his surname also Amestrian.

And fine okay my babygirl Scar abandoned his name out of religious belief but damn...brotherhood gave me NOTHING about Ishvalans (except solidifying their ethnic features- after a lifetime of white silver-blond people in fantasy, it's sooo good to see brown people, who actually deserve white hair because they still have brows fhsjfj)

And look I like Miles. I genuinely do like him and enjoy the Briggs arc in mangahood, but he could have been such an interesting insight into the nuances of race politics because we know his Ishvalan grandfather and Ishvalan relatives were slaughtered during the war (and still he stays in the military😐); but what about his half-Ishvalan mother?

Was she spared the racial persecution because of her diluted blood in the same way Miles must have avoided going with the way of other Ishvalan soldiers? Or are you telling me Miles really hears that his Ishvalan family members, including his mother, were shot dead for being Ishvalans and decided that he's #different and he could totally liberal utopia his way into a Better Amestris😭

And I have the toughest life in the world because I am unfortunately a Miles/Scar shipper if only because I experience catharsis at the thought of Miles' third eye finally opening and he's no longer part of the Amestrian sheeple chsjdhsj

Again I do broadly speaking prefer mangahood (although I'll admit that opinion is changing with age), mangahood fans have to stop talking shit about 03 because that adaptation was phenomenal in its handling of the genocide that fmab conveniently forgets🙄

Chill mangahood fans who can recognize the pro-imperialism/militarism and racist politics in their fave media are always welcome here. I'm glad this blog feels like a blessing, even with how much I vent about mangahood and general fan wank. (o^-')b✨

I'll join you in committing violence on behalf of the Ishvalans. Hell, I'll encourage it even! I can never endure Broho again because of how they're treated, ignored, and written.

[Rant incoming]

Yeah, Arakawa, I have no doubt the various Ishvalan refugee settlements are living happily in spite of being displaced from their homes and carrying the horrors of a genocide fresh in their minds. Nothing bad happens to refugee camps and settlements at the hands of the dominant nation they've been forced to hide within. Scar's just unreasonably angry and violent, unlike all other Ishvalans who are nice and placid. (Being anti-racist is when you insist most people in an ethnic group would never raise a finger against fascists, right?)

Except also Scar states that the Ishvalans aiding the coup are "[H]ere to bring change... without resorting to terrorism." This both reads as Scar flagellating himself before his Amestrian 'allies', while simultaneously implying that all Ishvalan actions outside of quietly rotting in Amestris' margins was all terrorism (or more accurately, a 'negative' method of addressing their own oppression and occupation).

(This is why I argue that mangahood Scar's characterization once he's apprehended in Briggs is completely off. Arakawa derails the character she setup to instead force feed us a "redemption" arc that reforms the military. No one who watched their lives and loved ones get mercilessly slaughtered before their eyes would ever think that their murderers 'had some valid points' about how the relations between oppressor and oppressed ought to be run. This isn't what a character like Scar would say or believe, it's Arakawa's politic, boldly out in the open.)

Ahem.

For as much as I, rightfully, drag mangahood through the mud for how an ethnically oppressed group is (under)written, I do have to say that 03 could have also been better in many areas too! I wish there were more named Ishbalans, period. Especially named Ishbalan women with a major presence in the story (Lust is the only one we get, and as fantastic as her arc is, her Dante-gifted sin name is not her Ishbalan name). But I really appreciate that Ishbalans in 03 have diverse features AND opinions, unlike the Ishvalans in Broho. Both all have the unifying feature of red eyes, but for some reason Brotherhood makes it so that every single Ishvalan has the same hair colour and skin tone. They try to reflect this during the genocide flashbacks with the Amestrians being all blond and blue-eyed, but as we can see with both Amestrian civilians and the soldiers/war criminals, that's not true at all.

I'm on the same page regarding Scar (any version) relinquishing his previous name as working within motivations that align well with his character. On the one hand I like to think mangahood Scar does eventually take on a new name rather than giving others free real estate over how he's referred to. On the other, the sense of mystery is fun- until the recollection of the myriad ways he's dehumanized and mistreated throughout Broho come crashing in and I end up seeing his indifference towards deciding a name for himself as just another way to give ownership over himself to Amestris.

(Decent arguments can be made that this is his way to keep his future open, and that this could even be Scar intending to give himself space to create himself anew; only then would a new name become necessary. At least these are my more good faith theories on the matter.)

And hey, for all my ire about mangahood, Miles, and even Miles/Scar, I don't begrudge people liking any of the above. I'm not gonna shit on anyone for liking what I don't, even when I routinely express my dislike.

Miles is a maddening character for me precisely because of the incongruence of his backstory, familial line, his opinions on the military, his participation in their oppression, and how he sees Scar's actions in comparison to his own. I've said it before, but Miles feels less like a character to me and more like Arakawa's mouthpiece (one of many, Ed being the main one). There's no conflict in him regarding his position in the very military that destroyed his own family, no moment where he actually has to reassess everything he's done and believed, and make a decision on whether he wants to continue being Amestris' preaching lapdog or not. This is why I can't simply view him as a complex character with warped politics who makes atrocious decisions, but instead a token oppressed strawman for Arakawa to defend her fictitious militia.

Hard not to wonder though: how would Miles' arc go if he was written by someone who wasn't disturbed by radical actions against the state? There was potential for something far less insulting and racist, but that's not what we got. I can see why Miles fans like yourself would be conflicted with how he's used in mangahood, and I can also understand what potential he held that you folks see in him.

"I experience catharsis at the thought of Miles' third eye finally opening," honestly? Based. If Miles/Scar shippers have Miles finally enter his anti-military era, and both he and Scar shed their liberalism henceforth, then I'm here for it. May they both tear apart the ongoing Amestrian regime, brick-by-brick!

Anyway, bless you for this ask! I have no beef with mangahood enjoyers who aren't talking out their ass (in general and at us 03 fans). I may not post much about mangahood outside of my routine complaints, but we at least have a love of Scar to unite us. 🤝

[noa-de-cajou]

Myrrah belongs to @hel-phoenyx

Soren belongs to @corneille-but-not-the-author

This text contains depiction of ptsd related to war and domestic abuse.

Car alarm outside.

Phone ringing in another alley.

It's loud. It's too loud. If it’s loud enough for me to hear, it's too loud.

Everything is too loud, too much. The screams, the noise, the gunshots, the dust in my clothes and the sweat on the back of my neck and the sounds of boots and the screams again and the roaring of the engine and the bomb and the gun at my belt

Belt

Belt

My father’s belt, smacking

My father’s hands, smacking

My father's knife, slashing

The knife in my hand the rifle in my hand the rifle in my father's hands the blood my blood their blood the blood on her my baby and she's screaming she's screaming so loud

It’s too loud everything is too loud the sweat is sticky if it's even sweat maybe it’s blood maybe it's the brains of someone I killed it was a man it was a man it was someone and I still remember the smell and the heat scorching and the people dying and the kids the kids it's always the kids and the screaming the screaming the screaming –

“Lubell. Lubell, can you hear me?”

A woman’s voice.

Over the screaming.

Run away. Run away. It's not safe here. You need to run away.

“Lubell, listen to me. You are safe here.”

The voice is calming. But I can't hear it over the screams.

“Dear, if you keep going like that, you're going to hurt your throat.”

… Oh.

The screaming is my own.

When I realize that, it dies down pretty quick. My vision is still a blur. Where…

“Good. Very good. Nod if you can still hear me.”

I nod. I think I nod, at least.

“Perfect. Now we are going to do a small recap, Lubell, to try and keep you grounded. How old are you?”

I’m twenty. I'm twenty and I can feel the blood mixed with sand on my hands.

“Twenty…. Twenty…”

Lenneth claps her hands in glee. It’s just the two of us and yet she's so enthusiastic. It feels forced sometimes.

“Happy birthday to you… Happy birthday to you… Happy birthday to you, Lubell…”

“... Five. Twenty-five. Twenty-six, in a few days…”

“In a few days, really? My, my. When is your birthday, then?”

“J-January… 17th.”

“January 17th,” she repeats, and it slowly sinks in.

Yeah. January 17th, 1999. That makes me twenty-five, as of today. Not twenty. I'll never be twenty again.

I still can’t see much, but I can feel something on my shoulders. A coat, I think. It’s warm and heavy. Smells of perfume and clean fabric. It feels nice.

“And where do you live, Lubell?”

At the base. Or camp. Wherever they decide we should go.

“I… live…”

“About 30 minutes from the downtown area.”

Soren isn’t looking at me. Her eyes stare at the void beyond the bus window.

“You're getting off before me, then.”

“... With my sister. Closer to the center of town than to uni.”

“Really? With you here so often, I thought you lived at the student dorms nearby. You are a student, are you not?”

I’m a soldier. I obey. I shouldn’t speak. I should answer only if asked.

“I’m…”

“What the fuck are you trying to do.”

Soren’s wary of me, I can tell. The way a battered shelter cat is.

“Just because I'm a psychology student doesn't mean I'm a master at mind games, you know. You're giving me too much credit here.”

“... A psychology student.”

“Amazing. What year are you in?”

“It’s my first international mission, Sergent.”

“I… Hum…”

Bronya looks a little shocked when she hears that I'm a year behind her. I'm older than the usual age for uni, so I don’t blame her. I know I'm behind on a lot of things.

“I’m a second year.”

“I see, I see. I believe it's your turn on the questions now, if you feel better.”

My breathing has gotten slower, that’s for sure. I can distinguish vague shapes, one of which is a human. A woman, if I had to guess. She's… kneeling at a respectable distance, which unfortunately happens to be the distance where myopia kicks in. Even though the bright pink of her hair is easy to distinguish.

Just like Szerelem’s.

“... Where are my glasses? A-Actually, better question, where am I right now?”

“One at a time, love, one at a time. First and foremost, here are your glasses.”

My frames are handed to me, I take them with a hand that shakes much more than I wish it would. I blink, the silhouette in front of me gets more precise. Long hair tied up into a bun, gentle eyes, a body much smaller than mine in a wool jumper and a skirt. I know her. She’s the librarian. Mrs… Mrs Reyes-Denethor. Right. She smiles at me, head tilted.

“I’m sorry for taking them off, but I felt that was the safer thing to do.”

“The safer… What do you mean? I’m sorry, I… My memory’s a little fuzzy.”

Her smile falters a little, with an emotion I can't decipher.

“You had a panic attack earlier in the library. Someone called because you suddenly fell in one of the alleys. At first, we thought you fainted, but when we touched you you tried to hit. I still managed to get you safely to the storage room, with some help, but you wouldn’t stop screaming and kicking around… I’m glad you seem to have perked up now.”

…

My heart just sank.

I remember now. It's the car alarm in the street. The phone someone forgot to turn off. It’s been a while since I had an episode triggered by something small like this. Maybe I've been too tired and preoccupied lately? Trying everything all at once isn’t doing me good, but I don't know what to do if not power through.

“I'm… I'm really, really sorry I disturbed everyone with this. Did I… Did I hurt you?”

She shakes her head.

“You didn't. There’s no need to apologize, I've seen many like you before. If anything, I'm just a little worried. You’re still very pale. Maybe calling an ambulance would be…”

“No!”

I shouted. She blinks slowly. I curl back into a ball.

“S-Sorry. I’m okay, I promise. Just… Please, no ambulance. No hospital.”

I never want to set foot in one again unless I'm dying. I just hope she doesn’t think I'm crazy, but she doesn’t look it.

She doesn’t look afraid, either.

Even my sister looked afraid at some point.

“Alright. No ambulance, then. But I do advise you remain seated a little longer. The library will close in a little, but I'll make an exception for you. Do you need anything? You already have my coat, but maybe something to eat?”

Oh. So it's her coat. I thought the smell was familiar. It's nice. Soothing.

And now that she mentions it, I'm starving. Did I even eat today? Maybe I didn’t. That probably didn't help either.

“I'd like that, if… if it's not too much trouble.”

She chuckles, and slowly rises up, smoothing her skirt with her hand.

“Oh, dear, it really isn’t. I’ll fetch you some water and cookies. No tea, we wouldn’t want to overstimulate your poor nerves, am I right?”

I crack a smile. It's tiny, and it hurts a little, but it's there. Relieved.

She didn’t ask why I broke down. She didn’t ask the reason. For that, I'm grateful. Really grateful.

I don't want to explain how most of these scars don't even come from the missions.

“Thank you, Mrs Reyes-Denethor. Really.”

“Lubell, you're a regular, aren’t you? At this point, I think you can call me Myrrah. I wouldn’t mind.”

“Oh! Hum… Sure. Thank you, hum, Myrrah.”

Myrrah. It���s a pretty name. Goes well with her accent. Spanish, if I'm not mistaken. And as for how she knows my name… Right. My library card. And the multiple borrows. Every week. I’m a little embarrassed about how much time I spend here, but this library is just so well-stocked, I can’t help it.

And well, the librarian has a smile that makes this whole place feel like home. A smile that, right now, is directed to me.

“I’ll go get everything. Your bag is right next to you, if you need to call anyone. I’ll be right back.”

And out the door she goes. I breathe in and out, slowly. The storage room smells of paper, wood and cardboard. It’s a little colder here, but darker too. I like darkness better when I'm like this.

There’s a constant with these episodes, usually. Something that sticks to me afterwards and never leaves.

Shame.

But today, strangely, I hardly feel any.

All I feel is the warmth of the coat on my shoulders.

[lucistarsfire]

ignore these ghost ramblings I feel like sharing

they are random and not at all connected to each other.. just the thoughts that bounced out of my brain

• The Band Ghost: A semi-fictional metal band formed by Tobias Forge. I'm sure you all know the lore! It begins with Nihil, somewhat. The father of our original beloved Papas. Primo, Secondo, Terzo- and most recently found, Copia. Consider the falling romance for Nihil's last love- Sister Imperator. The two were vilely in love with a terrifyingly complicated romance. Isn't it beautiful? An unloyal dickbag and his beautiful horrible woman. I personally dislike them both as people but enjoy their characters deeply! In fact, the animated music videos and the story of their love does bring tears to my eyes.

• Primo Emeritus stands as he is the first known Papa, revealed to be the son of Nihil Emeritus. Though little was known about him, that doesn't stop the headcanons. I headcanon that he had long blonde hair, and bouncy bangs brought to thr front. I feel as though his hair was straight, but curved in at the ends to form a naturally rounded shape. I feel that he loved gardening and still would, be that he was here today. I see a sweet man all throughout life, at worst being a frustrated snap followed by a sincere apology.

• Secondo, whore of the clergy. The love of my life. This is the man who should probably kiss me on the mouth. Kidding. Mostly. I enjoy his character and the lengths of which I can take it in fiction. He's funny, he's kind, but he's also described as cold and bitter. I think I can see that. Different people see different sides of one. On that note, I'm very in love with my son-of-Secondo OC. In my character's canon, he doesn't find out about their blood relation until adulthood. But recently, I have played around with the idea of him actually being raised by Secondo. How would that have gone?

• Terzo Emeritus, my beloved muse. I could go on for years, I'm certain. A man of pure confidence and respect, up until his sudden and unfortunate death. I see him as traumatized upon return. Scarred, patched back together, but to have to be fixed means you were once destroyed. Perhaps deliberately, and in this case it was so. Torn apart after death and for what? I know in full heart that he was beyond broken. That doesn't mean anyone is meant to know it.

• Copia! My third favorite muse and the one I allow more of me into! His likes remind me of my own. Never did I feel so freed before him, how was I meant to know that he was going to be so relatable? The childish interests as well as being thrown into sudden positions of responsibility, his character is one you should be gentle with should you write. You wouldn't want to slip up such a delicate and worked upon story.

•I must continue. Nihil. I only spoke briefly before, but with the tiny sliver of younger-him that we have, it's my job to elaborate on him. My very purpose. One who's life was filled with shattered romances and one night who-gives-a-fucks, but never did he think he'd find himself playing around with one of his own ghouls. Hence my own ghoul, Air. Era 0 keyboards. A heart grasped deliberately, but unintentionally shattered. But Air was a proper worker, and despite his devastation when he couldn't keep what he had with Papa, it's only right to pretend it's okay, to pretend you're okay with him circling forever around her. Because he respects her too. I think with better communication, monogamy was never going to be good for Nihil. Nor Air. I don't know enough about Sister nor do I understand her enough to try to interpret her relationship with, well, relationships.

[setaflow]

Sorry WHAT HAPPENED to your war domain cleric??? Can I have the DETAILS???

Unfortunately resolution is somewhat scant only because this all happened over the course of the last two sessions of a freshly rebooted campaign and we're all on an extended break for the holidays lol, but absolutely you can have details--

In my DM's homebrew setting, my cleric is a noble from a country that's ruled over by several half-brothers that each control one chunk of territory. The brothers are all related to the other by their father, but one of their mothers had a daughter as well who doesn't have a title claim but is more of a Princess Diana-type: adored by the people and has political sway through sheer force of social standing. My character is 29 and the princess is roughly 26-ish, so my DM and I improvised we'd know each other in our childhoods (thanks partly to a relatively high history roll), but weren't exactly on positive terms due to my character's haughty and hyper-competitive personality.

Flash forward a few sessions. My party is in this same country solving a string of serial killings, and I get a letter from the princess to come and meet up after dark. I go to the location with my party's fighter and bard, but I head up to meet her alone. A few shenanigans ensue that result in my cleric accidentally breaking an artifact of hers that was letting her see visions of something. As she was apologizing, the princess started kissing her, and I was like "Welp, my cleric absolutely doesn't pull away and starts kissing her back in the attic of this hat shop".

As I was mentally trying to pick what flavor of childhood-rivals-to-lovers sapphic revelation my girl was going to have through the rest of her story, my DM asks me to make a wisdom saving throw. I have a +9 to wisdom saving throws. I rolled a 2 on the dice.

My DM: "As you're kissing her, you feel your mind shut off for a quick minute. In the next moment of genuine awareness you have, you're standing in a blood-filled room with a sickle you don't recognize in one hand, and the princess's head in the other as you finish carving through the last few tendons in her neck."

End of session. I had my head on the table for five straight minutes.

My character spends the next session in basically a horror-filled fugue state as everyone with a shred of political power (plus her family, who she's on so-so terms with) puts on a sham trial and pins all 27 serial killings on her. Some more shenanigans happen and I think the real killer's about to take us all into a dungeon to murder us there, but that was the last session we had and I don't get back to the table until mid-January thanks to a work event I have to attend right after the holidays lol.

I know it was actually the princess and not someone disguised as her thanks to casting Locate Creature beforehand, and the flavor text/saving throw of the situation definitely aligns with Dominate Person, but basically all the whos, hows, or whys haven't been revealed because this was all the last two sessions and our party hasn't had the chance to look for clues.

As soon as my girl ceases to be an enemy of the state, I have to teach myself a nifty little resurrection spell so I can be like "So....sorry about murdering you, but can we give that other thing another shot pwease 👉👈 👩‍❤️‍👩❓".

[flickynightdarkness]

I thought of something of the Brave and The Bold episode "Trials of the Demon" and I imagine on that episode could be related for my DC OCs; Iris Miranda and the twins Oliver and Misty Miranda.

(CW: Mentions of death, drowning and murder)

So first with Iris, she was executed for multiple murders during around the Victorian era across London. Iris was then executed by being left to drown in a lake.

The twins(also her nephew and niece) Oliver and Misty saw this and became upset, the only thing they have of her is her scarf. They both lash out at a group of people who were responsible for the death of their aunt.

However, the next thing happened was that Iris' scarf has gone missing. The twins search in their home and they go outside of London to find it. Then they found it but it held by a man with a tall hat and a monocle inside a carriage.

The two follow the man into his hideout. He caughts them getting their aunt's scarf. The man now known as James Craddock or Gentleman Jim(before he became the villain Gentleman Ghost). Craddock said that he knew Iris before her demise.

Craddock offered the two a deal, where that the twins will help him gain the last few souls for himself. If they retrieve the last souls for him, he will give the scarf back to them.

He gave them outfits to fit his style of the 1800s.

Oliver and Misty have many skills to be able to get the souls, such as disguise and using their friendliness to lure them into the same carriage Craddock got in.

However when Sherlock Holmes finds the two and that they found a dead body wrapped in a black body bag. But this will all a trap, Oliver and Misty then attempt to capture him and hold him in place for Jim to retrieve the tenth soul.

But that was stopped by Batman(he traveled to this world as summoned by the occultist Jason Blood). The twins see Jim head out and that since they helped him with his deal, he now gives them their aunt's scarf back.

They haven't noticed of when he is given immortality by the First Demon of Hierarchy; Asteroth.

After Jim's death and swearing for his revenge at Batman when he rises from his grave as his villain self: Gentleman Ghost. Oliver and Misty feel sad about his death, they considered him like a fatherly figure much like their actual father Norman(who unfortunately doesn't exist in TBATB universe).

When Ghost sees his adopted son Ash Craddock become a ghost too. He required him to look after the twins. Ash becomes sort of a brother figure like with Ghost's fatherly behaviour to the two.

Oliver and Misty were then killed as they were burned to death. The people who came to Ghost's execution were stood by his hideout and one of them threw a torch, which sets it on fire. The twins try to escape themselves out but the door was locked. Their body start to burn, they cry from the pain and in need to be out. They immediately burst out of the door in flames, which results in their deaths.

The twins each miss one of their eyes, Oliver misses his left and Misty misses her right. Because of the people who were shocked that they killed two twin children that are locked into a criminal's hideout.

However, they are brought by a sorcerer named Ginger Nail, they gave them the way to where Iris is at right now.

Iris is now cursed forever. According to that with her sclera is red and her irises are white with slit pupils. Her body became pale by the cold weather she suffered through.

[deeptrashwitch]

@stuffireadandenjoy @snootlestheangel @alypink @catterdraws @justasmolbard it's done!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

I came across with a post about how to properly draw an asian character, and it was really interesting to see everything, also is a good lesson. So I thought about how colombians are pictured around the world, and is sure to say that certain people has marked the perception of us. I love how many people recognize people like Shakira or Gabriel García Márquez (I love this man books 💕), but unfortunately Escobar is also recognizable.

I don't know. Maybe no one will use this or maybe someone will, but here are some tips to write a colombian character. Remember this is my experience, and it still limited to what I've known all my life. I might have something wrong.

-First things first. The accent! I know that probably you have heard the accent used for some series or maybe you heard Shakira's accent. But those aren't the only ones in Colombia, actually those are really specific.

We have regions, and the accents change from one to another and from a city to another! The most known is from Medellín (we call them paisas) and it is stronger than others from the same department. For example I have a friend that travels a lot to that part of the country, and she says that outside Medellín the accent is somehow softer.

And from the Caribbean region, the accent is (from what I've heard) quicker and they speak louder, as far as I know is because of the heat and a physics matter. I only have traveled to Cartagena once, but is a big difference between their accent and mine, I can assure you that. Also, unfortunately I haven't visited many places, so I can't say for sure about other regions, for example I have no idea how the accents change on the Pacific region or the Orinoquia.

But I can speak a bit more about the Andean region. I'm from Bogotá and I sound weird sometimes, but if someone tells you that in Bogotá we don't have accent, that's bullshit. We do have an accent and it varies from a part of the city to another, I don't know how to describe it.

When you are in the north, it sounds like they are eating something while they speak (my mom compared it with a hot potato). And in some parts of the south, some people speak with many words impossible to traduce to english and it sounds like they are going to start a fight.

-Next, the skin color. It's usual to think, even among colombians, that a skin tone is unique for a region, but in reality there isn't a specific tone. There are afro-descendants, indigineous people, half-blood, and white people. Many skin colors can be present in a same family, again the example case is my own family.

I'm white as well as cousin but my uncle is black, and my grandma, she has brown skin. All of us are related by blood, but our skin is really different. As far I have investigated and seen, the most common tone is brown, and is really usual to see black/brown hair and brown eyes (red or blonde is rare, also are blue and green eyes).

And our height is a big comparison too! While my dad is 6', his mom is 5'3, his brother is 6'2 and his father was 5'4 (I'm 5'6 btw).

Something I really hate to admit, but that gives more information about my own country, is that even after all this time and the change of decades, many people continue being racist unconsciously. Across the country is usual that the mother tell the daughter to marry a white guy, but I'll be usual to discourage a marrriage or a relationship with a black person. (My experience, when I introduced one of my best friends that born in Chocó Pacific region, my family thought he was my boyfriend and wanted me to broke up with him.)

-About people, we are religious in many levels and most of the kids are raised catholic, not necessarily nuns schools, but religion is really important in most schools. It's normal to see many grandmas doing the rosary while making the lunch and many grandpas going to mass during sundays. And so, it's usual to use expressions such as "Ave María Purísima!" when you are surprised or "calle la boca que Cristo escucha" when someone says something weird and "Dios me lo bendiga, mijo" if you are grateful for something.

Also across downtown Bogotá there are many churches, a cathedral on the main square, churches near many neighborhoods and a church on top of the Eastern hills (Monserrate to be specific). Personally I'm not very religious, but during part of my childhood I was dragged to mass, because of homework and now I just memorized part of the service.

Some universities are also religious, or at least managed by an archidiocese. The one I attend is laic, but one of my professors also teaches on one that is religiously managed and he told us that they asked him to keep some...topics outside the pensum.

-There are some expressions apart of the ones above that are only colombian, even some are from only one region or city. I'll write and try to explain some of them.

"No dé papaya, hermano...": This one is used mostly when you have a valuable item (cellphone, jewelery or your wallet) outside without a care in the world. Unfortunately is awfully common to get robbed, so if you "das papaya" is like let yourself get robbed basically.

"Este chino es juicioso, tranquilo": In Colombia, "juicioso" means be responsible, respectful and kind. More or less. To be honest, is difficult to explain, so I'll write as I interprete it.

"Uy no, ya paila": This one is used when someone is beyond reparation or fixing. For example when you made a big mistake and there's no way to solve it, also when something is broken and you can't repair it.

"El man es un bacán": When someone is really cool and fun to be around.

"El que busca encuentra": Is the equivalent of "fuck around and find out".

"Se le corrió el shampoo": We use it when some is acting weird, or acting differently from how they usually act. My mom uses it often with my dad, he is a bit childish and well, there it goes.

"Mande al chino": It's to send the child to do something. Here we call "chino" to a kid.

"No me abra los ojos que no le voy a echar gotas": The moms use this one, mostly when a kid is getting scolded and they open their eyes in surprise or disgust. But also it's used to warn a kid that the are misbeheaving.

"Son como uña y mugre": It's when someone is so close with other person (family or not) that they do almost everything together, and know eachother perfectly. They can know eachother from a long time, at least that's my case.

"Ay sí, no jodas...": You use this one when you don't believe something that someone tells you.

"Ese man es más abeja": This is when a person is cunning or sly, and it can be said in a good or a bad way.

"Este es como los burros cuando les echan flores": When someone got praised, but a moments after they do something stupid.

"Va pal' cielo y va llorando": This one is about someone that has everything, or that thir life is going right, and keeps complaining about little things.

-Our geography is variated and some of us are used to some aspects of it. For example people that live near the coast are way more used to the heat, but people from the center mostly can't stand heat (my case). And on the other hand, the people of the center are used to the altitude and the steepness of the road (fucking downtown streets), and I've seen that, during the first year of a classmate from Guaviare, it was difficult to get used to the altitude.

The weather are really different from place to place, humid, dry and more. In Cartagena is a dry heat (I think) and in Bogotá is usually cold and foggy, but it can change in a minute. During january to june are the hottest months and during august to december are the coldest ones.

In Bogotá can be raining hard (an aguacero as we call them) and five minutes later can be doing a hellish heat. Personally I prefer the rain and the cold that the heat, but the sun is appreciated from day to day.

Also, the road trips can be from two hours (Bogotá-Ubaté) to almost two days aprox. (Leticia-Riohacha)

-Music! I love the music and many people also does! And if I can think of something that always make me laugh are the songs tipical from december!

Here are many songs that we hear for the holidays (the radio stations usually start to put them since september because...tradition), some of them we know them so good that we identify them just with the rythm. I can think of many but the names just don't appear, but the ones I'll never forget are:

Adonay by Rodolfo Aicardi (*muttering* Adonay, ¿por qué te casaste, Adonay?)

Cariñito by Rodolfo Aicardi (dancing this one with my grandpa. Do I know how to dance? No, but I don't give a fuck, it still a beautiful memory :"3)

Daniela by Rodolfo Aicardi (now that I think about it...the rythm is great but the story is fucked up xd)

El hijo ausente by Pastor López (this one hits worst when you're far from home even if you only are outside your city)

Cinco pa' las doce by Néstor Zavarce (like it's title says, it's always on the speakers when is 11:55 pm)

And some that are obligatory in my house during christmas and New Years!

En Barranquilla me quedo by Joe Arroyo

Rebelión by Joe Arroyo

Oiga, Mire, Vea by Orquesta Guayacán

Niégame Tres Veces by Silvestre Dangond (For some reason, a cousin is always going through a break up during holidays and always sings this one drinking aguardiente and also he puts El Venao'. I wonder why... /s)

Ella es mi fiesta by Carlos Vives (THAT is when I start singing without shame and my cousin /my favorite\ joins me)

For now is everything, but if something else comes to mind, I'll edit this! And if another person thinks I left something outside, feel free to add it! I want to see other perspectives about the country!

And please, people that has seen Narcos, for God's sake, stop thinking that all the colombians sound like we came from Antioquia. If I hear another person ask me to say "'mor", I'm going to fight that person, I swear.

[cursedvaultss]

HPHL OC Profile: Cordelia Duncan

“Autumn is an interesting season, even in the metaphor of life, is a time of decline, of loss, but also intense and haunting beauty. Some places, like some people, never are or have been, as beautiful in their fall."

Name: Cordelia Annalise Duncan

Nicknames: Cordy

Birthdate: April 22nd, 1875 (or depending on the timeline)

Zodiac Sign: Taurus

Blood Status: Unknown, possibly Muggleborn

Nationality: British

Sexuality: Bisexual

I haven't actually played Hogwarts Legacy and I'm not exactly planning to, but I'm not above stealing the cool aspects of the story and using them for my own purposes, so that's what Cordelia is here for!

Physical Appearance

Hair: Dark brown/black

Eyes: Brown

Height: 175.3 cm (5ft 9)

Weight: 55kg 

Faceclaim: Sofia Wylie

Background

Home: An orphanage in London and Hogwarts

Family

Cordelia is an orphan and she doesn't know who her parents are. As she grows up, she wants to find out the identities of her mother and father and whether or not they're alive or if she has any other relatives left alive.

Hogwarts

House: Slytherin

Career

11-17: Hogwarts Student 

17->: tbd

Personality & Attitude

Cordelia can be a little complicated. On one hand, she wants to be a good friend and kind, but on the other, she often puts her own goals ahead of those around her. She knows many people around the school and can be sociable and fun, but she doesn't let people really close to her easily. She has developed a hard exterior during her life living in the orphanage and having to fend for herself. She probably gets along best with people who can understand or even relate to her circumstances. Priorities: Making her goals a reality, success, helping her friends

Strengths: Ambitious, cunning, sociable, adaptable, wants to do good and be good

Weaknesses: Single-minded, self-centered, guards her true emotions closely

Stressed: When she feels stuck, either with her goals or physically

Calm/Comforted: While studying, while with her friends

Favorites

Colours: gold, green

Weather: Clear skies, sun

Hobbies:

Fashion: Cordelia doesn't have a lot of money so she starts out wearing whatever she has been given at the orphanage but during her time at Hogwarts she acquires a few more extravagant pieces which she values and takes good care of.

Relationships

Significant Other/Love Interest: OPEN

Friends:

Sebastian Sallow

Anne Sallow

Ominis Gaunt

Cecilia Balinor by @endlessly-cursed

Zelda Cairncross, Lillian Brokenshire, Sidonie Lewis, Benji Gerhardt, and Galen Stagg by @cursebreakerfarrier

Lettie Heyes, Milo Foy, and Ambrose Penvellyn by @cursedlegacies

Atticus Doherty, Fred Graham, Anastasia and Florence Osada by @hphmmatthewluther

Danny Gibson by @catohphm

Logan Rosseto, Haldir Eilphyra, Johnny Tazar Jr., Ayas Perphyra, Elyon Vamaer, and Elisen Chaeyra by @nicos-oc-hell

Brianna O’Rourke by @unfortunate-arrow

OPEN FOR INTERACTION!

Rivals:

Sebastian Sallow

Trivia

Cordelia enjoys fashion, although she hardly had money to spend on clothes. She knows how to make her own clothes either by hand and later with the help of magic.

When she grows up, she wants to do something to help other children who come to the Wizrding world with no money and no clue what's going on.

She cares about people deeply, although she doesn't often show it.

[barbatusart]

❄️❄️❄️❄️💨💨💨💨

DIAGNOSE THOSE FREAAAAAKS!!!!! ❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️🌬🌬🌬☃️☃️☃️💎💎💎💎

❄️❄️❄️❄️☃️☃️☃️☃️💦💦💦💦

i didnt know what you meant for a split second LOL but word ok I GOTCHA. i did write everybody with cognitive "touchstones" in mind but used it more as one of multiple building blocks in shaping everybody's personalities & tried not to have anybody be a stereotype of their neural makeup. SPOILERS ABOUND BELOW THE CUT HEADS UP!

jake i wrote pretty explicitly as autistic. im not autistic myself but i have multiple close family members who are; ive been around it since i was little to present day & wanted to try my hand at writing an autistic character. i think i had it that his father is also autistic so his parents caught on pretty quickly & got him all the tools he needed growing up to live happily. unfortunately hes also extremely gullible & a firm believer in geek social fallacy

sal is a case of C-PTSD (compounded with the multiple head injuries sustained at the end of sad sack by the time sortie rolls around if thats illuminating at all) which is something he combats by making himself as physically large & intimidating as possible while using that as a social shield if that makes sense. he has this concept of himself as something he needs to mask (often literally) in order to behave as his "true" self, which also is a concept of himself that is "Not Me" that he shucks off anything he may have ever done wrong onto so he never has to take responsibility for anything. i deliberately did not write DID here but he is highly dissociative with poor emotional regulation & deeply low EQ (again: see sortie)

mal is a very nebulous anxiety disorder in an extremely extraverted person. his treatment of it involves trying to "shout" over his anxiety even louder to try & drown it out which goes about as well as youd expect; he actually nearly breaches into a full-on panic attack in book 3 where hes trying to light his cigarette. self medication is also 2 packs a day & his BP is like 220/120 at rest, but he doesnt go to the doctor much or declines blood pressure on the regular cus if he doesnt see it then nothing's wrong. nothing's wrong! he's also got some shit going on with not being able to perceive himself in any positive light unless he's positioning himself to be praised as a hero or directly comparing himself with somebody he considers "lower" than him, which when you put that up against the context of book 3 is like get the fuck away from me dude. more on that later, i got comic-related plans for mal lol

stone is a deep depression mixed in with barely functional alcoholism (starting to not so subtly breach over into alcoholic psychosis) which all roots back into an unmanaged grief thats turned into him looking for you-know-who in the people around him (ie romantic partners, this dudes a mess) he kinda laid his shit bare in 4 so the less said about that the better, his whole situation honestly skeeves me out bigtime

garv ive gone into his nonsense on here plenty but he is an unintelligent sociopath (no childhood woes he just got born that way) with the added issue of being raised on /b/ LOL

[serelyly-hikari]

SPOILERS FOR 3.5 ARCHON QUEST AHEAD

DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVENT DONE THE QUEST!

Okay crack theory time!

Look I came up with this at like…12 AM

And yes…I did play the Archon quest at that hour, don’t at me.

Achem, now that we have gotten that out of the way, on with the crack theory that isn’t really a theory but more like some random tumblr user ranting on something that may not even be true but still wants to share cause thoughts.

So the quest was called “Caribert,” who we now know is the son of Eide (I’m not using his actual name, I don’t feel like writing it all), the Abyss Order Founder Aka, some relative of Kaeya (I will walk about that in a minute.)

The quest starts off with Kaeya, but unfortunate for many of us, he was only present for like…two minutes before going off to who knows where. But not before it gets revealed that he is related to the founder of the Abyss Order. Kaeya brushes this off and goes off his marry way. Again, it was a very short interaction, right?

Well hold that thought.

After a series of…events we happen to find this guy with a hilichurl. This hilichurl is none other than his son whose name is “Caribert.” According to him, Kheanri’ah took in anyone who did not wish to follow a god, meaning that anyone from any of the seven nations could be found in Kheanri’ah. Due to certain circumstances he met and fell in love with a women from Mondstadt. She gave birth to their son but not long after the cataclysm hit and their life was…well…destroyed. Eide says that those of pure Kheanri’ah Blood were cursed with immortality while those who forsook their god (those who came from any of the other seven nations) were cursed to forever roam the land as monsters. These are the hilichurls. Given Caribert was half Mondstadtian, he was cursed to be a hilichurl like his mother.

Towards the end of the quest, after a series of events, Caribert stands at the edge of a cliff and says that “he cannot take it anymore” and takes off his mask…only to explode in what seems to be abyssal energy. From there the player faints and that’s the last we see of Caribert.

Or so it seems.

You see…again…this is just a very very random thought and it could very well not be true…but…I couldn’t help but wonder…

Could it be that Caribert and Kaeya are the same?

Could it be that Kaeya isn’t just related to the found of the Abyss but is the SON of the founder?

Again, I can be completely wrong but like…there was stuff that just didn’t fit.

For one, why would they integrate Kaeya in the quest in the first place? Just to give Dainslef a justification to bring up the founder of the Abyss? Surely they could have found another way to do that, right? And why go through all that trouble just to show him so briefly? In all honesty, it didn’t sit well with me.

So my 12 AM brain went down a rabbit hole and started to connect stuff (I didn’t connect crap.)

Caribert’s mother was from Mondstadt. And Kaeya was left behind in Mondstadt. Interesting, no? I mean, it might just be a coincidence. But you have seven nations to choose from Hoyo, and you so happen to choose Mondstadt? Yeah that sounds a little fishy.

There is also the thing about “you’re our last hope,” thing Kaeya supposedly heard from his father. Okay…what makes Kaeya so special then? Why would he out of all people be the last hope of Kheanri’ah? Idk but if he is Caribert, who was called by his own father, the “Loom of Fate,” that would really give a whole new meaning to that, no?

I know I know…this doesn’t make any sense. But like…WHAT IF?

Anyways, onto a more “tamed” theory.

I bet everyone is wondering what the heck was that crystal that looked the the Defiled Statue, no? Well I sure don’t know what the heck that thing is nor do I have any significant comments on it but I do have a theory on the Defiled Statue (more like a thought.)

For the longest time I couldn’t understand why the Abyss Order stole Venti’s statue out of all the statues of the seven that there are all over Teyvat. Was it just random? Or is there a deeper meaning? Could it be because he is related to the god of time? Maybe (most likely). But now that we know the founder’s wife was from Mondstadt, it really makes you see the whole Defiled Statue situation differently.

Think about it: If your wife was cursed to be a monster because she turned her back on the god she was supposed to worship, wouldn’t you want to like…do something against that god? What better way then to defile a statue of his? It’s just a thought but like…you know…

Any who, I’m going back to my corner. I’ll leave you guys with your thoughts. :D Bye bye~