#otherwise its all on a scale of 'i like existing in it' 'i like the aesthetics' and 'i find it really fascinating'

[mariacallous]

Next year will be Big Tech’s finale. Critique of Big Tech is now common sense, voiced by a motley spectrum that unites opposing political parties, mainstream pundits, and even tech titans such as the VC powerhouse Y Combinator, which is singing in harmony with giants like a16z in proclaiming fealty to “little tech” against the centralized power of incumbents.

Why the fall from grace? One reason is that the collateral consequences of the current Big Tech business model are too obvious to ignore. The list is old hat by now: centralization, surveillance, information control. It goes on, and it’s not hypothetical. Concentrating such vast power in a few hands does not lead to good things. No, it leads to things like the CrowdStrike outage of mid-2024, when corner-cutting by Microsoft led to critical infrastructure—from hospitals to banks to traffic systems—failing globally for an extended period.

Another reason Big Tech is set to falter in 2025 is that the frothy AI market, on which Big Tech bet big, is beginning to lose its fizz. Major money, like Goldman Sachs and Sequoia Capital, is worried. They went public recently with their concerns about the disconnect between the billions required to create and use large-scale AI, and the weak market fit and tepid returns where the rubber meets the AI business-model road.

It doesn’t help that the public and regulators are waking up to AI’s reliance on, and generation of, sensitive data at a time when the appetite for privacy has never been higher—as evidenced, for one, by Signal’s persistent user growth. AI, on the other hand, generally erodes privacy. We saw this in June when Microsoft announced Recall, a product that would, I kid you not, screenshot everything you do on your device so an AI system could give you “perfect memory” of what you were doing on your computer (Doomscrolling? Porn-watching?). The system required the capture of those sensitive images—which would not exist otherwise—in order to work.

Happily, these factors aren’t just liquefying the ground below Big Tech’s dominance. They’re also powering bold visions for alternatives that stop tinkering at the edges of the monopoly tech paradigm, and work to design and build actually democratic, independent, open, and transparent tech. Imagine!

For example, initiatives in Europe are exploring independent core tech infrastructure, with convenings of open source developers, scholars of governance, and experts on the political economy of the tech industry.

And just as the money people are joining in critique, they’re also exploring investments in new paradigms. A crop of tech investors are developing models of funding for mission alignment, focusing on tech that rejects surveillance, social control, and all the bullshit. One exciting model I’ve been discussing with some of these investors would combine traditional VC incentives (fund that one unicorn > scale > acquisition > get rich) with a commitment to resource tech’s open, nonprofit critical infrastructure with a percent of their fund. Not as investment, but as a contribution to maintaining the bedrock on which a healthy tech ecosystem can exist (and maybe get them and their limited partners a tax break).

Such support could—and I believe should—be supplemented by state capital. The amount of money needed is simply too vast if we’re going to do this properly. To give an example closer to home, developing and maintaining Signal costs around $50 million a year, which is very lean for tech. Projects such as the Sovereign Tech Fund in Germany point a path forward—they are a vehicle to distribute state funds to core open source infrastructures, but they are governed wholly independently, and create a buffer between the efforts they fund and the state.

Just as composting makes nutrients from necrosis, in 2025, Big Tech’s end will be the beginning of a new and vibrant ecosystem. The smart, actually cool, genuinely interested people will once again have their moment, getting the resources and clearance to design and (re)build a tech ecosystem that is actually innovative and built for benefit, not just profit and control. MAY IT BE EVER THUS!

[analog-television]

you know what it's only fitting i ask this

some clarifications on the options below cut 👇

calm sunny days can refer to both warm days and cool days - whichever you prefer (or if you're a fan of both).

i would rather foggy and overcast be separate, but i don't have enough poll options (sad!). however they are both rather moody. feel free to clarify if you only like one or the other though.

some cool looking clouds include: nacreous clouds, horseshoe clouds, lenticular clouds ... maybe even those bright colorful sunsets. point being you love a nice aesthetic clouds (i do too).

for tornadoes ill accept waterspouts (since -spouts are just a term for non-mesocyclone tornadoes). landspouts also exist. i dont think dust devils (and other -devils) really count here, as even though they are vortexes they're not considered to be tornadoes.

severe thunderstorm warning stuff can refer to: hail, strong winds (such as those formed by derechos), and mesocyclones which don't spawn tornadoes but look cool anyway.

space weather is. technically meteorological as well. i also just learned that there are things known as space tornadoes??? there are also space hurricanes. both can spawn auroras. if your favorite weather occurs on a different planet you can vote here as well. :)

forgive me if i missed your favorite weather, there's quite A Lot that can occur in the skies and its challenging including everything. :') i admittedly couldn't really squeeze in rainbows anywhere, despite really liking them.

[randomdragonfires]

Parallel Lines, Act I

Text Divider by @saradika-graphics

SUMMARY | He fears her proximity, and she fears his distance. As war looms, they’ll have to learn to make their marriage work to find comfort in each other.

Or at least, try.

PAIRING | Aemond Targaryen x Wife!Reader

WARNINGS | 18+; SMUT; Angst; Complicated Relationship Themes; Emotional Negligence; Infidelity; Major Character Death; Aemond and his issues are a warning on their own ok?

AUTHOR’S NOTE | All Valyrian lines were translated from english using a free online translator. They are likely to be grammatically wrong - but I don’t even know man. Yeah.

WORD COUNT | 9.5k - and not a single word is beta read. We die like warriors, I guess?

The moonlight spilled through the series of windows of her husband’s - not theirs, his - apartments in the Red Keep, casting a silvery glow over the austere elegance of the chambers. His wife stood by the window, her silhouette framed against the backdrop of the night sky, the soft rustle of her gown the only sound in the otherwise silent room.

She turned slowly, her gaze sweeping across the dimly lit interior, taking in the cool, stone walls that seemed to absorb the flickering torchlight. She glided through the hall where intricate tapestries depicted dragons in flight, their scales shimmering with threads of gold and silver. The grand fireplace dominated one wall, the warmth emanating throughout the space from the burning logs within. She folded her arms into her chest, as if to preserve the heat as she shivered from the cold night - her thin nightdress didn’t help. Above the mantelpiece, Vhagar's fierce eyes followed her every movement, a fierce presence in paint.

Moving through the chambers, she passed through his personal library, every page a stern reflection of his interests. Shelves of dark, polished wood lined the walls, filled with ancient tomes and scrolls, their faint scent of aged parchment and leather permeating the air.

He mostly smelled of smoke, fire and leather. Of books and dragons - both of which he is passionate about.

It makes sense then, that no one will ever catch a whiff of her perfume on him.

They were far from passionate, after all.

In the center, his heavy, ornately carved desk was strewn with maps and documents, a well-used quill and inkwell ready for his expert hand to wield. She leaned on the table to look at it all, and spun one of the wooden markers between her nimble fingers for a moment - as she had seen him do countless times - before leaving it back where she found it.

She stepped into the bedchamber, its stark stone walls softened by the rich, crimson fabrics of the large, canopied bed. Dragons were subtly woven into the bedspread and curtains, a constant reminder of the Targaryen lineage that she had married and given birth to.

How long has it been since she laid with him on this bed? More than a year, she surmised. They did their duty on their wedding night, and the Mother was graceful enough to make his seed quicken in her immediately. She laid with him for a few weeks after - and when the maesters made it known that she was with child, that had stopped.

A good wife knows how to keep her husband satisfied, they said. Her husband never sought her out. If the whispers of the few around her were to be believed, he frequents a whore in a Silk Street brothel.

Was she not a good wife then?

She gave him a son. He may be sickly, but he is a son nonetheless. Surely it must count?

With a weary sigh, her eyes shifted to the adjoining armory, where Aemond’s armor and weapons were meticulously displayed. This part of his room exuded an air of readiness, a silent promise of the warrior who would soon return to his space.

From the whorehouse, no doubt.

She turned back to the window, her thoughts as fluid as the shimmering waves below. The apartments were a microcosm of her husband's existence: regal yet austere, scholarly yet martial.

And no sign of marriage, leave alone happy or healthy. How could there be, when he doesn’t feel half the happiness with her that he does when left alone with his beast or books?

There was no hate between them, surely not. Her husband was agreeable, but that was that. There was never any doubt in her mind that he did not want her - or the idea of her - but had to marry her anyway. There was no passion, and she could count with two hands the number of times they have lain with each other in the past year that they have been married - even that was before she had become with child.

There was nothing, truly.

She tried with him, initially. But any illusion of interest that she thought he may grow towards her was shattered the moment she heard that the very night that she’d met him, he was seen moving out of the castle grounds and into the Street of Silk.

He didn’t even bother with making it discreet.

Their wedding was a morose affair. They were the very picture of a royal couple, but neither felt the part - more like a pair of chastised children made to listen after a screaming bout. Even when he took her, he took her from behind - and she was fully clothed. It was nowhere close to the slow exploration that some of her ladies promised. He’s a scholar, he’d be willing to learn for your pleasure, they had said. He’d not even kissed her after their wedding ceremony, not once - he simply demanded that she get on the bed, and took her like an animal while the Small Council and their families watched her eyes pool with painful tears.

What had she done to warrant such embarrassment? She didn’t know what she’d done to make him shirk her so, but it was the way it was. It just was.

When he kept calling her back, he’d taken to offering her wine when they were finished. She didn’t linger when her goblet was emptied. She simply walked out, and wished him a good night.

He never once asked her to stay.

When the news of the babe in her belly had arrived, she’d been relieved - she’d never have to lay with a man who did not want her, ever again. He didn’t seem overjoyed either, and simply hummed with a hand on her belly.

“There is blood of the dragon in you now,” he said. And then he let his thumb run over her cheek. It was the softest he’d ever been with her, and she relished those few seconds. For a moment, he looked so peaceful and content… a stranger. That’s when it occurred to her that perhaps there’s more to Aemond than what he lets anyone see.

She could have fallen in love with him, if he’d cared enough to show her. But it seemed that he’d only viewed her as a duty and a burden.

The ghost of his touch lingered, and she brought her own hand to her cheek as though the warmth still remained. What did the whores have that she did not? Or was it the same whore each time?

Jealousy is unbecoming of a princess, she reminded herself. But so is unhappiness and a constant sense of dread, surely?

Her thoughts were interrupted as the door swung open. Her husband strode into the room, immediately aware of her presence. She felt the shift in the air and watched as the shadows of his boots slow, absorbing the sight of her. He removed his cloak with a fluid motion, letting it fall onto his chair before approaching her with the deliberate grace of a predator.

“Wife.” His voice was clipped and devoid of warmth, as though addressing a servant rather than the mother of his son.

She turned to face him, the pale moonlight highlighting the tension etched across her features. "Husband," she responded, mirroring his tone, though a flicker of hurt glimmers in her eyes.

Do you think of me as I think of you? Do you think of me at all?

A heavy silence settled between them, thick with unspoken words. Her gaze scanned his face, searching for any trace of the man whom she foolishly once thought would love her. Instead, she found only the cold mask he wore, a fortress against the world and his own buried emotions.

Against her.

“Has the council kept you long?” she asked, her voice steady despite the turmoil within. They both looked outside the windows, with her leaning into the railing while he stood with his hands held back, ramrod straight.

Always on guard.

“Long enough,” he replied, his eyes drifting to the dark expanse of the bay. “There are matters that require my attention.”

“And our son?” she asked, a touch of warmth infusing her words at the mention of their child. “Will you see Aerys tonight?”

For a brief moment, something softened in Aemond’s gaze, a fleeting shadow of tenderness. She must have imagined it - it was too fleeting and quick to hold any kind of weight.

She was jealous of her own son, for he elicits more from Aemond than she ever has, as little as it is.

“Perhaps. If time allows.”

She nodded, turning back to look at him; to see him.

The weight of his indifference settled over her like a shroud. The Blackwater Bay stretches out before them, vast and unchanging, mirroring the growing distance between them.

“I worry for you,” she murmured, her voice almost swallowed by the night. “War will come to us soon, will it not?” If it hadn’t come so far, she knew it would now. Vaemond Velaryon’s rolling head and King Viserys’ worsening condition only made sure of it.

He stood rigid beside her, his posture unyielding. “It is my duty,” he said, as if that alone suffices.

“I know,” she replied, sadness threading through her voice. “But you are more than your duty, Aemond. You are Aerys’ father and my…”

The emotions were high tonight, higher than they’d ever been. She didn’t know why she sought him out. There has been ample evidence to support that he would not care, and yet here she was.

She wanted safety, and the only person she could approach is the one who has never made her feel welcome or safe in any capacity.

Who else do I have here?

The tears mangle her vision and she swallowed what threatened to follow.

“I have given you a son.” She trembled, her voice threatening to give way to s stream of tears. “The shadow of war looms upon us, and you’ve set me aside and I worry…”

He lifted his head just slightly as the words sank in, but she was too dejected to care about his acknowledgement. He may be cold, and his reactions to her come far and few in between - but she could not bring herself to mull over it too at the moment.

“War is coming. I am as certain of it as I am of the sun rising on the morrow and I know you are too -” He opened his mouth to interfere, but she was quick to not give him the gap to take over her speech. “Do not insult my intelligence by suggesting otherwise.”

“I was not.”

She turned to face him, a whirlwind of emotions swirling in her eyes as she wondered why the Gods had not seen fit to give her a husband who loved her. He was beautiful, a cruel irony that made her anger flare even more. Despite all the hurt he had caused, she could not help but feel drawn to him. To hide her tears, she looked to the floor, trembling as she forced out her next words.

“I know you do not love me. I know you do not want me. But I… I have given you a son. An heir to continue your legacy, and that… I like to think that it would be reason enough to ask you to not forsake me. We have not supported each other all this time, but the least you can do is assure me that you will keep us safe.”

A flicker of something unrecognizable flashed in his eye, and he turned to face her fully, leaning against the window arch. “Did you… truly think that I would leave you to die if it came down to it?”

“You haven’t given me reason to believe that you’ll want me around.” Her voice was bitter, dripping with contempt.

He was ethereal as he reached out, holding her jaw between his thumb and finger, bringing her closer to his porcelain skin and alabaster hair. Her gaze flitted about chaotically, struggling to meet his eye. Her body shivered from the cold, torn between wanting him to let her go and needing him to hold her tight.

“You are my wife. I swore to the Gods that I would honor and protect you. You and Aerys are my family, and I would be slain a hundred times over before I see either of you hurt. I may not be… I may not be the man you want, but I can assure you that I am an honorable husband who will safeguard you and our boy.”

She did not know what she expected. A declaration of hidden love? Certainly not. But somehow, his assurances fell short. “Honorable.” She tested the word on her tongue, finding it the most bitter sound she had ever uttered. Her cheek alarmed him, and she spat venom. “Honorable?” His grip on her chin tightened, and she took it as a sign to continue.

“I know you frequent the Silk Street brothels. I know you’ve been going there since the very first day we met. Unless the professions of whores have changed, it is safe to assume that you are not honorable or loyal. And if you are, it is certainly not to me.”

A whore out there enjoyed her husband’s undying devotion, while she sat in the castle hoping and praying he would recognize her, let alone love her.

His expression shifted, a storm brewing behind his eyes, but he did not release her. The weight of her words hung heavy in the air, a chasm of pain pulling them apart. She met his intense gaze finally, tears brimming in her eyes, the anguish of their fractured bond laid bare for him to see.

He tasted of smoke and fire, and yet her mouth craved him anyway. He was an eternity away from her—always, always—and yet her fingers yearned to touch him.

“I do not go there for…” He took a long breath before completing his sentence, almost as if he needed his composure to simply survive.

Not there for what? Was he not fucking the whores? What else could he possibly do?

“Do you think I do not know the sacrifices you have made?” His voice was a harsh whisper, a mixture of anger and something deeper, almost pleading. “Do you think I do not feel the weight of our shared duty, the responsibility to our son? My responsibility to you?”

“But you have never shown me,” she whispered back, her voice breaking. “You have never given me a reason to believe that you care, that you see me as more than just a broodmare for an heir!"

For a moment, they stood frozen, the distance between them both physical and emotional. The moonlight casted a cold glow over their figures, highlighting the stark contrast between their proximity and their separation.

“It is not easy for me.”

“It should not be hard to love your wife. Or at the very least respect her.”

“I—”

She brought her hand up to stop him before any more of his lies spewed out and stepped away from him. She walked to the door at an amazing speed, her skirts swishing past as she tried to get out before her tears spilled out. In a late change of heart though, as her hand rested on the door latch, she turned.

“No lady should beg her husband to love her. No matter if he is a prince. It is beneath her, and I am no different. I will not beg…” If she had looked at him properly, she’d have noticed him flinch at her damning words.

“I will not beg you to love me after dismissing me all this time; I do have my pride. But I will beg you to save my life if it needs saving. That is all I ask.”

“You never had to ask.”

She took a breath and drank some leftover wine in the goblet next to her, not caring for whose it originally was. The thought would make her retch usually, but she was beyond caring.

“Your mother… she loves me surely, but I think she doesn’t like me very much. Your sister and I never managed to understand each other. Your brother… well he is a mindless lecher. I can’t quite figure out your grandfather at all. And you… you know what we’re like. I just… I worry that in this impending war within kin, I will be forgotten and left to die simply because my job is done with the birth of my son and I am too close to the storm and you don’t care and I don’t want to die. I don’t want anyone to die-”

“You are my kin.” he said. It made her smile, albeit a woeful one. “You may need to remind me every once in a while.”

He didn’t respond. She simply left.

And even now, he didn’t ask her to stay.

She wished he did.

Aemond stood by the hearth, cradling their feverish son in his arms. 

Dressed in his somber blacks, he looked every bit the stern warrior, yet the gentle way he held Aerys belied that image. The babe was flushed and fretful, his tiny hands gripping Aemond’s hair and tugging insistently. Aemond hissed softly at the sharp pull, but did not dislodge the child's grip.

“Byka zaldrīzes,” he grumbles. It is strict, but not unaffectionate - she was familiar with that tone. She’d watched him use it with their son often when he thought no one was looking. [Little dragon.]

From the doorway, she watched them. They looked like a loving family - the devoted mother standing watch, her eyes filled with affection as she observed her husband and son. But appearances were deceiving, and both of them knew the truth beneath the surface.

Aerys, in his restless state, grabbed at Aemond’s eyepatch, tugging it down and exposing the scarred, empty socket. Aemond’s expression tightened as he shifted the boy from one arm to the other, quickly adjusting the patch back into place. In that brief moment, their eyes met, and she glimpsed the vulnerability he so meticulously hid. He seemed to close himself off even more, as if shielding his heart from her gaze.

It was a deep, almost dark blue. She noticed, she always noticed.

“I came to check on him before luncheon,” she said softly, breaking the silence that had settled like a heavy shroud. She always ensured that she made a solitary routine of her visits, ensuring that he’d have time alone with her son like he seemed to want. To be together - as a family - stumped her beyond belief, no matter how second nature it should be.

What was he doing here?

Aemond nodded, his voice measured as he recounted the maester's instructions. “The maester believes he will grow healthy with time. We must be diligent with the poultices and draughts.” His tone was clinical, as if discussing a strategy for battle rather than the wellbeing of their son.

She watched as he laid Aerys gently in the cot, the child’s feverish grip slackening as he drifted into a fitful sleep. She approached, brushing a strand of hair from Aerys’s forehead, her touch tender and light.

Aemond stepped back, retreating to the armchair close to the cot where a goblet of wine awaited him. He took a long sip, his gaze fixed on her as she sat at his foot, and peered in to take a look at their son. Facing away from him, she began to sing softly. Her voice, though tinged with sorrow, was soothing, and Aemond’s stern expression softened as he watched the scene unfold. For a moment, the room was filled with a fragile peace.

The Seven Gods who made us all,

are listening if we should call.

So close your eyes, you shall not fall,

they see you, little children.

Just close your eyes, you shall not fall,

they see you, little children.

She didn’t say anything and let the silence engulf them both when she finished her song. She then turned around and sat on the floor near his feet, her back leaned against her son’s cot as she looked up to face her stoic husband. After what seemed like an eternity, he spoke - his words measured but with the intent of concern. He spoke them like he was testing them out on his tongue.

“The maesters… they say you’re being given herbs as well.”

She nodded, feeling the weight of her exhaustion in every fiber of her being. The birth had been horribly hard on her body, leaving her depleted and fragile. Only now was she beginning to regain her strength. The whispers of the servants echoed in her mind—comments about how all this suffering was for a sickly child. But those whispers meant nothing to her. She would move the ends of the earth for her son, no matter what anyone thought. 

He was the blood of the dragon. Dragons do not concern themselves with the opinions of sheep, and she would not allow her son to be any different.

“Ever since the birth, I have grown… weak,” she began, her voice barely above a whisper. “Aerys took a toll on me when he came.”

Aemond’s eyes were detached, but she heard the slight concern and contemplation in his voice. “Were you in pain? In the days after?”

She hesitated for a moment, surprised by his sudden show of concern. “Yes,” she admitted, her voice trembling. “I was. I still am.”

His questions were gentle, as if he truly cared, as if he genuinely wanted to understand what she had gone through. This unexpected tenderness from him was jarring, and it took all her strength not to withdraw. She had longed for this moment for so long, the chance to finally, truly connect with the man she had married.

And now that it was here, it felt as foreign to her as the other continents of the realm.

“I should have been there,” he said, his voice laced with regret. He didn’t look at her, head turned away as he spoke.  “I should have been by you-”

She’d heard the rumors that her good mother worked hard to ensure she’d never hear. While she labored and went through all the Seven Hells giving birth to their son, Aemond was at a whorehouse, doing Gods know what.

She shook her head, her eyes filling with unshed tears. “I don’t want to know,” she interrupted, her tone gentle but firm. “I’d rather choose blissful ignorance than a painful truth. Especially when it comes to you.”

Aemond nodded slowly, regality exuding from him even in his slightest movements. “I have failed you,” he confessed, his voice almost a whisper. He did not apologize, and she knew that he never would. This was the most she would get from him, and for now, it had to be enough.

It didn’t mean that it shocked her any less.

Summoning her remaining strength, she stood and moved toward him. She leaned forward, resting her hands on the armrests of his chair, bringing herself closer to him. The curve of her breasts nearly brushed his chin, and she could feel his breath, warm and shallow, on her skin. His goblet of wine lay forgotten on a nearby desk, the contents slowly going tepid.

He looked up at her, surprise and something deeper flickering in his eye. His expression was a mixture of pain and longing, as if he too yearned for what she did. Slowly, almost hesitantly, he moved his hand and covered hers with his. His touch was tentative, as if he feared she might pull away. But she held firm, her fingers entwining with his. 

He was warm to the touch. She remembered that much from the first days of their marriage, but it felt better to be reminded of it this way. Almost as though he was tender towards her, like they never spent any time being purposefully apart from each other.

She felt like they were getting somewhere, a tentative bridge forming between their fractured hearts. Carried away by the newfound closeness, she hesitated only for a moment before reaching out, her hand trembling as it neared his face. Her fingers were delicate, soft against the rough texture of his skin as she traced the scar that marred his otherwise perfect visage.

Aemond’s breath hitched, his entire body tensing at the intimate touch. She moved slowly, her fingers gliding over the jagged lines. Her touch was feather-light, almost reverent, as if she could heal his old wounds with her tenderness.

Her eyes locked onto his, searching for any sign of discomfort or rejection. Instead, she saw vulnerability, a crack in his formidable armor that allowed her a glimpse of the man beneath the warrior’s facade. His eye, the one not covered by the patch, was wide and filled with an emotion she couldn't quite name - something between longing and fear.

With a gentle caress, her finger traced the path of the scar down to his cheekbone, lingering there for a moment before moving toward the eyepatch. She felt his breath warm against her hand, the rise and fall of his chest quickening as her fingers danced over the leather. The eyepatch was cool and rough under her touch, a stark contrast to the smoothness of his skin.

She paused, her heart pounding in her chest as she felt the tension coiling in him. Would he push her away? Would he retreat back into the cold distance that had defined their relationship for so long? But he remained still, his gaze fixed on hers, a silent permission in his eyes.

Encouraged by his silence, she allowed her fingers to explore the edges of the eyepatch, feeling the worn leather against her skin. Her thumb brushed over the strap that held it in place, her touch gentle and soothing. He shivered, a barely perceptible tremor that ran through him, and she felt a surge of something warm and hopeful rise within her.

His reaction was slow, almost imperceptible. He closed his eye briefly, as if savoring the sensation, then opened it to meet her gaze again. She could see the conflict within him, the struggle between the desire to protect himself and the yearning for this rare moment of intimacy.

She moved closer, her body almost pressing against his as she continued her exploration. The curve of her breasts brushed against his chin, and she felt the heat radiating from him, the tension in his muscles. Her fingers lingered on the eyepatch, tracing the lines where it met his skin, feeling the pulse of his heartbeat beneath her touch. His hand reached up, covering hers. For a moment, the world shrank to just the two of them, suspended in a fragile, tender silence.

“Will you let me see?” she whispered, her voice trembling.

His hesitance and silence said more than his words ever could. 

The moment stretched, taut and fragile, until it seemed to snap under the weight of unspoken fears. She saw the flicker of rejection in his eye, a retreat behind the barriers he had so carefully constructed. Her face fell, the light of hope dimming as she realized she had pushed too far. But she understood; perhaps he needed more time. Withdrawing her hand, she felt the ghost of his touch linger on her skin, a burning reminder of the closeness they had almost shared.

He grasped her wrist gently, as if he wanted to ask her to stay, but the words remained unspoken. She did not want to stay unless he wholeheartedly asked her to. His grip was firm, yet she felt the reluctance in it, the silent struggle to decide whether to hold on and let go.

“I should go,” she said softly, gathering her skirts. “Your mother and sister await me at luncheon, and it would be unseemly to be late.”

He watched her walk away, her steps slow and measured, each one pulling her further from the fragile connection they had started to form. Left alone with his son, Aemond felt the weight of his failure press down on him, a cold, heavy burden that settled in his chest.

Aerys slept in the cot nearby, his tiny body trembling with each breath as if the sickness that plagued him might take him at any moment. Aemond moved his chair closer to the cot, peering down at the infant with a mixture of fear and determination. The soft tufts of silver hair marked him as undoubtedly his, a tiny mirror of his own lineage.

How many nights had she spent alone, watching over him like this? Scared that if she stepped away, Aerys may be gone?

In a quiet tone that would otherwise go unheard, he whispered to his son, his voice thick with emotion. “Ao kostagon’t tepagon bē va īlva, riñnykeā.” [You can’t give up on us, child.] After a moment of composure, he continued. “Ziry braved vīlībāzma naejot tepagon ao naejot issa. Gaomagon daor henujagon zȳhon.” [She braved battle to give you to me. Do not leave her.]

Aemond's voice trembled, the words almost breaking under the weight of his desperation. He held his son closer, cradling the tiny, fragile body against his chest. He thought of his wife's strength, the pain she had endured, and winced at the realization of how badly he had treated her. His neglect, his coldness - they had all but shattered her. 

He had done enough to her. The last thing he wanted was to see her lose Aerys too.

The dim light of the chamber cast soft shadows on Aemond's face, highlighting the sharp lines of his jaw and the furrowed brow etched deep with worry. His eye, normally a piercing blue, now seemed almost muted, dulled by the depth of his concern. He reached out, placing a gentle hand on his son’s chest, feeling the weak but steady rise and fall of his breaths. Aerys stirred slightly, his tiny fingers curling around a strand of Aemond’s hair. The grip was weak, but determined.

“You are the blood of the dragon,” he continued, his voice a fierce whisper. “You will grow strong.”

The Dragonpit was packed, the air heavy with the murmurs of the gathered smallfolk and the flickering light of countless torches. She stood beside Aemond, her posture as straight and regal as she could manage, her heart pounding in her chest. The spectacle of Aegon's coronation was unfolding before her eyes, a momentous event that would shape the future of the Targaryen family.

Hers.

The ceremony began with the Grand Maester stepping forward, the crown of Aegon the Conqueror held reverently in his hands. The weight of history seemed to press down on the room, making every breath feel heavy, every movement deliberate. Aegon - looking more like a squabbling, crying child than a King - ascended the steps to the dais, his face a mask of acceptance.

And when her husband nodded to his new King, she bowed deep.

She watched as Aegon’s expression shifted from indifference to a flicker of recognition of the power now bestowed upon him. The crowd erupted in cheers, their loyalty and fervor palpable, yet she felt a pang of unease amidst the celebration.

Beside her, Aemond stood tall and vigilant, his eye never leaving the proceedings. She glanced at him, seeking comfort in his composed demeanor, his presence a steady anchor in the sea of chaos. The noise of the crowd swelled, and she could feel the anticipation hanging thick in the air, a tangible force that seemed to wrap around them all. 

Aegon, now crowned, raised Blackfyre high above his head, the ancient sword gleaming in the firelight. The sight was awe-inspiring, a symbol of power and legitimacy. Yet, beneath the grandeur, she sensed the underlying tensions and overheard the words that Helaena kept mumbling. 

There is a beast beneath the boards.

Her feet shifted, and she heard the hollow sound that the ground made when her shoe met the surface. A hollow sound that comes when feet meets -

The boards.

Suddenly, the ground beneath them trembled, a low rumble that grew into a deafening roar. Gasps of shock and fear rippled through the crowd, and she instinctively reached for Aemond’s hand. Before she could react further, the floor of the Dragonpit exploded upward, sending debris and chaos flying in all directions.

Rhaenys, astride her dragon Meleys, emerged from the smoke and dust, her presence formidable and terrifying. The dragon’s scales shimmered with an otherworldly glow, its eyes blazing with fury. The people scattered, screams of panic filling the air as the beast roared, the sound reverberating through the hall and shaking her to her core.

Her heart raced, terror gripping her as she stared at the massive dragon, its wings spreading wide, casting a shadow over the entire chamber. Aemond’s hand tightened around hers, pulling her behind him protectively. She could feel his body tense, ready to shield her from any danger. Despite the fear that threatened to overwhelm her, a faint surge of gratitude washed through.

You never had to ask.

Meleys roared again, the sound like thunder, and the heat of its breath washed over them. She could see the flames flickering in the dragon's throat, the promise of destruction just a heartbeat away. Rhaenys, regal and unyielding, locked eyes with Alicent, a silent challenge passing between them.

Aemond stepped forward, his presence a wall of defiance and strength. “Get behind me,” he commanded, his voice steady despite the chaos. She obeyed without hesitation, her body pressed close to his, drawing comfort from his unwavering resolve.

The dragon’s eyes fixed on them, and for a moment, time seemed to stand still. She could hear her own heartbeat, a frantic drumbeat in her ears, and the cold sweat on her palms. Every muscle in her body was taut with fear, and she kept her eyes firmly set to the ground.

This is how I die. Do you call it a dragonrider’s death when you don’t ride a dragon?

My son. AerysAerysAerys-

Aemond.

Rhaenys stared at them all, the weight of her decision hanging in the air. Meleys shifted, the ground trembling beneath its weight, and for a moment, it seemed as though the dragon would unleash its fury. But then, as if making a choice that defied all expectations, Rhaenys turned Meleys away, the dragon's wings beating powerfully as they ascended through the shattered roof of the Dragonpit.

The relief was overwhelming, a rush of emotions that left her weak at the knees. She clung to Aemond, her breath coming in short, ragged gasps as she tried to process what had just happened. The hall was filled with the sounds of weeping and the murmurs of disbelief, the aftermath of the encounter leaving everyone shaken.

Aemond’s arm wrapped around her, pulling her close, his breath warm against her ear. “Are you all right?” he asked, his voice low and filled with concern. She nodded, still trembling, her heart beginning to slow as the adrenaline ebbed away.

She did not notice how closely he held her when it came down to it - for the very first time. 

Aemond's fingers dug into Sylvi's hips as he thrust into her from behind, each movement fierce and relentless. Her back arched under the pressure of his hand, pushing her down onto the bed. The room was filled with the raw sounds of their coupling, echoing off the walls.

His breath came in ragged gasps, mingling with her moans. His grip tightened, nails biting into her flesh as he drove into her harder, seeking release in the violent act. The scent of sweat and sex hung heavy in the air, an intoxicating mix that fueled his aggression. "Gods,” He growled, his voice a low, primal rumble. He watched as her body responded to each thrust, the way her muscles tensed and relaxed, the sheen of sweat on her skin glistening in the candlelight. She was a willing vessel for his frustrations, and he took her with a ferocity that bordered on madness.

Her moans turned into cries of pleasure, her fingers clutching the sheets beneath her as she braced herself against his onslaught. He felt a dark satisfaction at the way he could bend her to his will, the power he wielded in these moments of raw, unbridled lust.

The climax came in a wave of intense pleasure, his body shuddering as he spilled into her. He collapsed over her, panting, his chest pressed against her back as he tried to catch his breath. The aftermath was a stark contrast to the ferocity of their coupling – a quiet, intimate moment where their bodies remained entwined, slick with sweat and the remnants of their shared passion.

Her arms wrapped around Aemond's naked body, her touch tender and soothing after their rough encounter. The room was dimly lit, the soft glow of candlelight casting shadows on the walls. The air was thick with the scent of sweat and sex, mingling with the faint aroma of lavender from the sheets.

Aemond's breathing gradually slowed, his chest rising and falling against hers as he allowed himself to relax in her embrace. His mind, however, was anything but at ease. He thought back to the scene that had haunted him since he left his chambers earlier: his wife, cradling their son, her eyes red from crying, her body and mind still fragile from the ordeal of facing a dragon at Aegon’s coronation.

"She was crying before I left to come here," he began, his voice a low murmur against her neck. "Holding our son, so shocked by near-death.. It didn’t seem as terrifying to me, but... she was so scared. She's worried, you know. About the impending war."

The Madame’s fingers traced gentle circles on his back, encouraging him to continue. "She doesn't have dragonrider's blood," he went on, almost to himself. "I didn’t know how to comfort her. I want to help, but I don’t know how."

Her hands moved up to his shoulders, her touch grounding him. Her presence was a stark contrast to the chaos in his mind. He lowered his head to her chest, his lips finding her breast. He suckled softly, kneading the soft flesh, seeking solace in the familiar act.

Holding their son brought comfort to his wife, and for him, coming here to the Madame, was his escape. The warmth and intimacy they shared, however fleeting, was his way of coping with the weight of his responsibilities and the emotional distance between him and his wife. As he continued to be held, he couldn’t help but wonder if he and his wife would ever find this kind of comfort in each other; if he’d ever find the courage or the trust to truly tell her what he needs without worrying about losing her respect.

If he'd walked in and held her while she cried instead of leaving her to it and coming here, could he have made her feel safer?

Too many questions, not enough courage for answers. Too much pride and so little sense between them both.

Aemond's heart pounded in his chest as Vhagar soared through the stormy skies back to King's Landing. The cold wind bit at his face, but it was nothing compared to the icy dread gripping his heart. 

He had killed Luke. His nephew, his blood. 

The act had been unintended, a consequence of their reckless chase, but it was done. There would be no undoing it. If there hadn't been a war before, there certainly was now. The weight of his actions settled heavily upon him, more suffocating than the fiercest storm. As the familiar silhouette of the Red Keep came into view, a storm of emotions churned within him. Guilt, fear, and a desperate need for comfort twisted together, making his insides writhe. 

He dismounted Vhagar with a heavy heart, his drenched form slipping through the darkened halls of the castle like a shadow. His mind raced, an entire host of thoughts battering against the walls of his consciousness. He needed solace, a place to hide from the storm he had created. The whorehouse crossed his mind briefly, a familiar escape, but he knew it wouldn’t be enough this time. He needed... he needed...

Before he knew it, his feet had taken him to her apartments.

Her. His wife.

He stood before the door, hesitating for a moment before pushing it open. His wife was readying for bed, her state of undress evident. She wore a robe over her shift, her hair loose around her shoulders. The soft light from the hearth bathed her in a gentle glow, as he took her in. She turned to him in shock, her eyes widening at the sight of him. It was clear how rare this occurrence was, how unexpected his presence was in her chambers. But she was quick to pull him in, taking in his drenched form with a worried expression.

"Husband, what has happened?" she asked, her voice filled with concern.

He did not answer, his eyes trained on her as she moved. Her exposed skin drew his attention, and he found himself wondering. 

Was she softer? Kinder? Would she hold him in her soft arms if he so wished? Did he deserve it from her? Would she shame him?

She kept asking, but he remained silent, his mind too chaotic to form coherent words. She moved to find him something to dry off with, but he reached out, his hand wrapping around her wrist in a death grip.

"Don't go," he whispered, his voice raw and choked, barely more than a breath.

She looked up at him, her confusion gradually giving way to a quiet curiosity. He gently guided her arms around his cold and damp waist, his touch unexpectedly tender. This was not a whore; this was his wife. She deserved to be treated differently. 

At first, she froze, her body tense and uncertain, but slowly, she let herself relax – at least as much as she could manage with a husband who had sought her out for the first time in a year.

He felt her hesitation and understood the significance of her yielding. The weight of his guilt pressed harder against his heart, but he clung to this moment of closeness, desperate for the comfort he so craved.

"What has happened, husband? Why are you here?" she asked softly, parts of her words muffled into his chest.

He remained silent, waiting to see what she would do. Her repeated questions slowly stopped, a resigned understanding settling in her gaze. In the silence, he became acutely aware of her form – soft, untouched by anyone but him, made for him. The thin layers of her robe and shift did little to keep his hands from exploring her.

His fingers trembled as they traced the curve of her spine, brushing against the delicate fabric of her robe. Every slight movement, every breath, every shiver she made became magnified in his mind. Her body responded to his touch with a delicate gasp, and he felt a surge of something he couldn't quite name – a need, a longing, a desperate desire for solace in her embrace.

He watched the rise and fall of her chest, every intake of breath, every flinch and gasp. He noticed a stray hair that had fallen across her face, the way the delicate hairs on her skin raised at his touch, the way her eyes widened and then softened. Each detail etched itself into his mind, a stark contrast to the murder that had driven him here.

She tightened her arms around him, her touch gentle yet firm. He buried his face in her hair, breathing in her scent – lilacs and something uniquely her that anchored him to this moment, to her. It was a comfort stronger than any he had ever received, yet calm and grounding at the same time.

His hands roamed her back, feeling the delicate curve of her waist, the slight tremor in her muscles as she responded to his touch. He pressed his lips to her neck, feeling the pulse of her heartbeat, steady and reassuring. Her breath hitched, and he felt the vibration of her voice as she whispered his name, a question and a plea all at once.

"Aemond," she murmured, her voice breaking the silence. His body reacts in shivers and heat at the sound of his name upon her lips. "Please, tell me what's wrong."

Had she ever said his name out loud before? He did not know. But he wanted to hear it again and again until the world as he knew it ended. Perhaps it was the guilt - over Luke, or over his neglect of his wife - he did not know. But it was all bubbling at the surface now, and he was much more open and vulnerable than he’d ever been.

He bent his head down, his eye locking onto hers. The intensity of his gaze seemed to drown out the room, focusing solely on her. He could see the concern, the worry etched in her features, and it tore at him. He couldn't tell her, not yet. Not about the blood on his hands, the life he had taken, not why he was here and what he’d wanted.

But he could let her consume him, to forget. He could lose himself in her.

He felt the warmth of her skin, the softness of her curves against him, and for a moment, he allowed himself to forget the horrors of the night. He traced the line of her jaw with his fingers, memorizing every curve, every angle. Her skin was smooth and warm, a stark contrast to the cold, damp leathers clinging to him.

He pressed his forehead to hers, their breaths mingling in the scant space between them. Her eyes searched his, looking for answers he couldn't give. Despite her confusion, the turmoil in his mind quieted, replaced by the steady, reassuring rhythm of her heartbeat. She was his anchor, his solace, and he clung to her like a lifeline in the storm.

Wordlessly, he moved back enough to get a good look at her, his eyes tracing her form with a reverence that made her pulse quicken. He then slowly untied the front of her robe, the silk falling away with a whisper. His hands fell to her shoulders, pausing there for a moment as he sighed. As he pushed the sleeves down, his hands traced the newly revealed skin - his fingers glided from her collarbone to her shoulders, down her arms, and finally to her fingers, which he intertwined with his own. The robe slipped to the floor, leaving her in a thin shift that clung to her curves, leaving little to the imagination.

His eyes remained locked on hers, the intensity of his gaze a silent plea for forgiveness, a desperate need to be anchored by her presence. He took her trembling hands and placed them on his damp leathers, his touch firm but gentle, giving her silent permission—no, a quiet command—to undress him. His breath hitched slightly as he waited for her to take the lead.

She moved slowly, her fingers deftly working the buckles and straps, peeling away the layers of his clothing until he stood before her in only his trousers. Her hands hover over his chest, her touch hesitant, almost afraid, as if she's not sure she's allowed to touch him. His skin was warm under her fingertips, his heart pounding just beneath the surface.

His hands covered hers, guiding them lower, to the waistband of his trousers. His touch was both a plea and a command, silently asking, demanding, begging her to take this final barrier away. She did, her movements slow and deliberate, until he stood bare before her, exposed in every sense of the word.

She did not dare try to take off his eyepatch, not this time.

He watched her intently, noting every flinch, every gasp, every shiver that runs through her. His fingers traced delicate patterns on her skin, exploring every inch with a tenderness that speaks of his desperation for her. He needed this moment, her touch, to forget what he'd done to Luke, to drown the guilt that threatened to consume him. Every breath he took was a reminder of his failures, every brush of her skin against his a lifeline that pulled him back from the proverbial edge.

He leaned in, his lips brushing against her neck, her collarbone, her shoulder - not her lips, he had not kissed her on the lips since their wedding ceremony. His hands roamed her body, mapped out the places that made her gasp, the spots that made her arch into him. He was attuned to her every reaction, his focus entirely on her.

All he asked for in return - with no words - is that she make him feel safe for this one night.

With his body bare and hers still clad in her shift, he silently gestured to her bed with a tilt of his head. She moved toward it, her movements graceful yet hesitant, and then crawled to the back, letting her spine rest against the headboard. He stood there for a moment, watching her, his breath uneven and his mind a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions.

He did not miss the way she looked at him. Desire flickered in her eyes, growing with each second her gaze roved over his body. Her eyes widened when they settled on his manhood, and he could see the anticipation building within her. She expected him to take her tonight, he knew. He hadn't given any indication otherwise in the last few moments, and she had no clue what he actually wanted; or why.

Would she welcome him to her bed if she knew he was a kinslayer?

The thought gnawed at him, but he chose not to tell her. She might not offer her true acceptance, but he would take her false comfort tonight – even if she thought it true.

He moved to the side of the bed with all his characteristic grace. She looked up at him, her eyes filled with a mix of confusion and longing. When he lifted his knee to place it on the plush mattress, she shifted to make space for him. He laid down beside her, his movements deliberate and slow, as if fearing she might vanish if he was too hasty. She mirrored his actions, and soon they were facing each other, their warm breaths mingling in the stillness of the room.

Their eyes locked, and he saw her questioning gaze. Her next words, soft and tentative, knocked the breath out of his lungs.

"Are you alright?"

For a moment, he couldn't answer, the weight of the day's events pressing down on him. He looked at her, truly looked at her, and saw the worry etched in the lines of her face, the softness of her eyes, the way her lips parted slightly as she waited for his response.

"I will be," he finally said, his voice rough with emotion.

Tentatively, he placed his hand on her thigh, feeling the warmth of her skin through the thin fabric of her shift. He slid the material up, his fingers tracing the smooth expanse of her leg. 

"Gevie.” [Beautiful.]

His fingers continued their journey, moving to her inner thigh. Her legs shivered at his touch, and he smirked for a moment before he withdrew his hand and moved closer. Their bodies were now a hairsbreadth apart, the heat between them palpable. 

His hands moved to her breasts, feeling their fullness beneath her shift. He was acutely aware of every breath she took, every flinch and gasp that escaped her lips. Each reaction to his touch drew him further into the present moment, away from the dark thoughts that threatened to consume him. Her body was a haven, a sanctuary where he could lose himself, if only for a while.

Encouraged by her soft gasps, he continued to knead the mounds of flesh and pinch her pert nipples, his touch gentle yet insistent through the shift. Lowering his head, he nestled himself at her bosom, inhaling deeply. The scent of lilacs and milk overtook him, and he let out a contented sigh.

"You are a mother... the mother of my heir," he murmured into her chest, his voice a mix of reverence and disbelief.

She said nothing, but when her initial shock faded, she began to comb her fingers through his soft hair, humming the same song she sang to their son to sleep. The melody was soothing, a balm to his frayed nerves. He didn't know if her singing was to calm him or herself, but he found solace in the gentle rise and fall of her breasts with each breath she took.

He took in the way her body trembled slightly beneath him, the softness of her skin, the rhythmic beating of her heart against his cheek. This was not the harsh, immediate and uncertain release he sought at the whorehouse. 

This was more, more, more.

Sleep came to him easily in her arms, draped in her comfort; devoid of any nightmares, dreams, or heavy thoughts. 

If she wondered why he'd simply laid with her rather than fuck her, she did not ask.

Would she welcome him again when she finds out what he did?

The council branded him a kinslayer when he told them what he'd done. He embraced it, staring into their eyes, defiant and unyielding. He told them he did it on purpose, each word a dagger thrown with precision. Kinslayer, kinslayer, kinslayer-

Aegon patted his back, a twisted smile playing on his lips. "A job well done, drawing first blood in the King's name," he said, his voice a blend of admiration and malice. His grandfather's face remained a mask, revealing nothing. Criston was disappointed, his disapproval a heavy weight in the room. And his mother... 

His mother was disgusted, her eyes filled with a sorrow he had never seen before. When he stepped out and walked through the corridors, the word had spread like wildfire. 

Kinslayer. 

The whispers followed him like a relentless shadow. Servants and maids stepped out of his way, their gazes avoiding his. The tension was palpable, a living thing that tightened the air around him. He wanted to escape them all, to flee to the skies where their judgment could not reach him. But before then, he wanted to see them.

He stood near the doorway as she had a few days prior, watching her rock their fitful, sick son to sleep. Her movements were gentle, contrasting all the shock, anger and brashness he’d seen since he stepped out of her room before she awoke. He wanted her to look at him, to see beyond the blood and the sin. He was asking too much of her, he knew that. They were strangers bound by duty, their recent shared moments brief and fraught with his own selfish needs for comfort.

His heart pounded as she finally met his gaze. He was not prepared for the slight fear in her eyes. It cut through him deeper than any sword ever could. She looked at him as if he were a creature she could not recognize. 

Kinslayer, kinslayer, kinslayer-

The word echoed in his mind, a relentless chant that drowned out everything else. He took a step forward, his hands trembling. "I—" he began, but the words died in his throat. What could he say? How could he explain the unexplainable, justify the unforgivable? She held their son closer, her grip tightening protectively. The room was thick with unspoken words, with the weight of what he had done and what it meant for them. His mind raced, filled with a cacophony of anger, regret, and despair.

The need to escape surged within him again. He wanted to flee to the skies, to find solace in the cold, indifferent clouds. But he couldn't move, couldn't tear his gaze away from the image of her fear-stricken eyes.

Kinslayer, kinslayer, kinslayer-

With a heavy heart and a mind in turmoil, he turned and walked back into the shadowed corridors, each step echoing the relentless chant of his new title.

Kinslayer, kinslayer, kinslayer-

The word echoed through the empty halls, a reminder of the path he had chosen and the price he would pay.

If he’d told her last night as he laid in her arms, would she have understood?

He’d never know.

NEXT

MASTERLIST

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[super-ultra-mega-deluxe]

Simply believing in ML, or joining an ML org, will not help when the lights go out or food runs out. How can we contend with that?

Marxism-Leninism isn't an arbitrary set of beliefs for one to adopt on a whim, it is a political theory and specifically action, part of which is in fact to "help when the lights go out" or even better, to make sure they don't! communist politics- and really any politic- are what those politics do. Marx explicitly frames it as such, as an ideological formulation that is a tool for practical application. taken outside of its context and application, Marxism is an absurd nothing, as again are all politics. i could provide examples of how communists facilitate the production and distribution of goods, or otherwise manage economics at variable scale and locale, which is rather what i assume you mean to be getting at with your question. your framing is rather nonspecific however: in what economic and political context is there a communist party contending with failures in energy infrastructure and food production and distribution?

the "help when the lights go out" strikes a particular chord, as somewhat recently the socialist nation of Cuba has been forced to contend with fuel shortages; their domestic oil production can't meet the needs of the general populace, and oil imports are inconsistent due to the US embargo. the people of Cuba are, thankfully, not becoming grossly immiserated or dying en masse despite such being the intention of the embargo. they have instituted fuel rationing and rolling blackouts to further conserve fuel and maintain essential services, such as their healthcare system. this of itself is obviously only a reactive policy; the state has also been rebuilding and expanding its oil storage facilities to better handle fluctuations in supply, and more recently they have agreed to a bilateral development agreement with China to substantially expand Cuba's nascent solar power generation. paired with their newfound partnership with BRICS- a move which undermines the aforementioned embargo in a much more material way than a UN vote- Cuba is on a path to fully meet the energy needs of its people and even expand access over the next decade.

that all said, i doubt you specifically care much for Marxist-Leninist experiments as they exist, and are more concerned with the prefiguration of politics before anything like achieving state power, and more specifically within the imperial core, where denying the possibility of effecting revolutionary politics is the most prominent. there are not presently many Marxist-Leninist parties of note in the US, the imperial core, but even less principled communist parties nonetheless consider the economic realities of the workers they represent first and foremost. the old Black Panthers were perhaps the closest to a truly revolutionary socialist movement in the US, and one of the policies they are most famous for is the free breakfast program and the broader Survival Programs they ran. these programs provided food and medical care and education and transportation for many who were subject to economic insecurity; the failure of these programs was a failure of militancy and counterintelligence and scope. the modernly popular if unfortunately less coherent and less principled PSL also runs health and wellness programs, such as kitchens and exercise classes and vocational programs and so on, which is their attempt at replicating such formulations.

it is rather specifically a concern of communists to organize the proletariat to provide for their own needs outside the purview of a capitalist state, and every revolutionary of note before, during, and after seizing power emphasizes such. the ability to do so pending a revolutionary moment is necessarily limited however; you cannot build an administration of economy parallel to an extant state without coming into conflict with that state. even non-communist organizations attempt to build up community programs, but they are either dissolved or incorporated into the state apparatus or otherwise operate under its purview. the ultimate goal is then as always the destruction of the bourgeois state machine and the building of a proletarian state machine, the armies of people organized in enforcing the will of the proletariat as a class, which allows for the more concrete and pointed organization of the economy broadly.

[coriphallus]

DA: The Veilguard Spoiler review pt2 - The Grime

this is a hard one to tackle without strawmaning anyone because itll be a direct response to alot of defense ive seen for the games morality system so ill just start by saying, iykyk

never a genre has been better equipped to discuss ethics than the interactive medium of games and yes, bioware games have been doing it since baldurs gate and no, theyve not always been 'centrist' and 'conservative'. im not even gonna entertain that idea. do you remember the cultural landscape DA:O released to? the landscape it was developed in? dont give me that just because zevran doesnt write in his little notes -that you can conveniently read- 'gay good. not me but me bisexual'

Thedas is a flawed world and its a world thats just as desperate to hang on to its status quo as our own. every time you play an elf thats thriving, or a human thats queer, or a mage thats not institutionalised you exist in a world that doesnt want you, it is an act of defiance that you do.

im sure we can all see why these games were so popular with the audience they can only weakly try to pander to today.

derailing time again; so one of my favourite paintings of all time is saturn devouring his son. it makes me feel so uncomfortable that it gave me nightmares as a child, and i still cant look at it without feeling this knot in my throat. i hate it. i hate how it makes me feel, how that man looks at me in terror like its begging me for help while cannibalising another. weird story but i was bewitched by that painting as a little kid.

it is not a well drawn painting, the proportions are all over the place, brush strokes crude and inelegant. it doesnt even have a deeper story nor was it intended for an audience. i will never know what goya thought of when drawing it.

i thought alot about that painting later in my life when i was struggling with mental health problems, i thought about goya alot too as an adult and after learning about his life. i stared at his paintings and remembered when i told my dad that i hated [saturns] big eyes and hed jokingly said "it would be scarier if he didnt have eyes"

i know what the drawing looks like now, nearly everyone with a little access to the internet does. if somebody removed saturn from it, we'd still be left with a brutalised headless carcass of a man in a canvas too big for itself. if we removed that too all we'd be left with would be void.

i dont want to live in a world where all i know of goya is his rococo work, i dont want to stare at the painting of a void knowing what filled it before. i hated every second of germinale but i never wanted it to be anything other than itself, the story it tells could never hold credence otherwise.

DAV has done its best to paint over it, but its still on the old canvas and i cant look away from the negative space its left, i know whats under it and it unsettles me, infuriates me. it hands me a palette with baby blues and pinks and tells me to paint over it to make a prettier painting. didnt i hate the eyes? wasnt it gross before?

i am not going to write why we need some grime in art, but its absence is disheartening. and to those who say hanged people in the streets or blighted villagers is dark and mature ill say no. its a kids idea of maturity, its the aesthetic of it with no substance. it means nothing to me if rook can just drench themselves in gallons of blight as they crawl through it. the horror of blight has never been the black goo and slimy tentacles, or the monster woman with way too many tits. it is watching people you love slowly fade away, it is a woman who was forced to cannibalise the contaminated flesh of her friends because the woman she loved betrayed her, it was the sheer scale and inevitability of it.

one area we go to is overrun by it and the game begs me to feel hopeful that flowers are growing again when it never let me lose hope. people have already prevailed, they have roofs over their heads and a steady supply of food on their tables. their spirit is unwavering.

its bad, everybody says. the sky is grey and soil is blackened, as my rook turns some statues to access a haunted house whos inhabitants are long gone and the only story they could ever tell is gone with them.

if the question is do i want to see famine? plague? misery? abuse? assault? the answer is yes. yes. i want to see it all of the filth. i rather face the fucking monster head on with its big bulging eyes and misshapen limbs than stare at the abyss its absence leaves on the canvas.

and if nothing else, this bastardization is disrespectful to the people who gave the IP its fame.

Why choose to be good?

back in the bsn days ive wondered why, even in a fictional universe where your choices have no real-life repercussions what-so-ever, players had more 'good' playthroughts than 'bad'?

what happens when you start killing NPCs, when youre needlessly mean to them? the game actively closes off its own content. you get less out of the game. just as, completely incidentally, you'd get less out of your life if you just started killing everyone around you. The world would be emptier, youd be alone.

in that quote i stole from good place chidi doesnt ask "why be good?" the wording is painfully deliberate. doing good is always a choice, and often not the easy one. what makes the act matter is that you chose to do it, even when given 6 other options not to. did i stop in the middle of an important quest to help a man retrieve an heirloom from a darkspawn infested hut? did i hear what that heirloom meant to him?

i cant stop thinking about that speech ever since playing this game after knowing its predecessors.

So, why do it then? Why choose to be good, every day, if there is no guaranteed reward we can count on, now or in the afterlife? I argue that we choose to be good because of our bonds with other people and our innate desire to treat them with dignity. Simply put, we are not in this alone.

i cant stop looking at this game that spits on its own legacy and think how could they have missed what fundamentally makes us human so bad, what makes us relate and empathise with eachother. what makes us pick the option to interact with an npc who openly hates what hawke is, and allow us to see the traumatised man underneath.

these characters of fiction are written by real people. i have absolutely nothing in common with a guy from canada yet for a brief moment in time i feel a sense of camaraderie as ive felt with goya that i couldnt articulate as a kid.

Nothing too terrible

DAV says it over and over again -as its wont to do with every piece of its flimsy morality- that people can change, people can be redeemed yet it shines as the game with most static characters in its franchise. it simply says things, and since it has nothing to show for it it makes sure to say it repeatedly, in case you missed it.

so when i first played DAO i was in high school, i started with a human noble because fresh out of dark side edgy kotor fame i wanted to be a posh brat. also because, ya kno, we were poor my entire life up until that point and i wanted to have power.

i committed to it, even as the game stripped cousland of everything he had, because i thought a man like him would. i picked the racist options, the sexist options, the options a man in couslands place would. halfway point of the game as i exhausted the initial dialogues something happened; this man who got paid to kill people, who showed no remorse nor care for his victims, begged my cousland to stil his blade.

and i did. i thought maybe he would be as confused as i was, maybe he had a moment of clarity but from thereon bit by bit he was less of an asshole. the characters grew around me, and my character grew around them. i chose to be good because -textually- we were in this together, at the end of all things.

rook is not a character, theyre a mascot. and quite frankly i think they may be a very evangelical mascot because they remind me of evangelical preachings of jesus more than the man from the bible (and i say this as someone whos only exposure to christianity has been through foreign media and the bible ive read that one time). they are the epitome of do no evil and their existence hinges on the frail concept of moral purity. theyre not a person trying to do good, who wants to be good, they are 'good'

-and lemme tell you its a wild choice to have someone like that locked in a prison of 'regret'-

rook can be mean to only one person in the game, and thats someone they dont even have a personal beef with for the most part. but even then they would be shouting at a wall because the game doesnt only undermine them with its narrative, but also every npc in the game suddenly gets possessed by the ghost of wattpad rejects past for a moment to tell them everyone can be redeemed. and i believe it because i played the other games, i believe it because i know zevran and sten and morrigan, isabela and thom and iron bull and dorian. i know it because i can see the vague shapes behind the new coat of paint but i am not rook.

so no, the game fails to get people-can-change points by its own merit, and it cannot gain points from its prequels because it destroyed them. none of those characters i watched grow exist in this universe. zevran cant exist with DAV crows, fenris` story cant exist in an imperium with invisible slaves only glimpsed through empty cages and broken chains left scattered on the ground. i dont know which morrigan this NPC is, is it the woman who grew to learn kindness, who begged to sleep with her friend just to save them despite knowing it would play into the plans of a destiny she so desperately tried to break free from? or is she the clever puppet her mother groomed her to be who wanted to harness the power of a god? i dont know her, i dont know this dorian or this isabela beyond their names ipso facto this is not a sequel.

bellara asks an assassin why he is trying to save the world and his answer is "ive done some things in the past im not too proud of. nothing too terrible, but some of it was bad." and i can hear the games desperation for me to not engage with its material in that 'nothing too terrible'

lucanis never killed anyone innocent, taash never harmed an animal they could shoo of or reason with, emmrich venerates the dead and is friends with every wisp he pulls to use in menial labour, davrin joined the wardens willingly because he wanted to do good...

rook tells harding that her anger is justified when shes not even allowed anger of her own.

nothing too terrible.

aside from creating boring and nonsensical and static characters it creates a dreadful echochamber that we're forced to sustain. No taash is not valid, their gender is but their behaviour is not and for the character to grow and mature it needs to be addressed. lucanis doesnt need to be pampered in shock blankets he needs to see how repressing his problems and jeopardising his health puts people around him in danger etc etc. they are adults and they need to learn more complex ways of healing. and if rooks flaw is that theyre an enabler, then that needs to be acknowledged by the narrative in some way too, and not mindlessly endorsed because they say some buzzwords.

none of these interpersonal relationships feels real because none of these people feel real beyond some draft of themes and tropes. some interactions literally remind me of two bots in facebook comments

i look at this dialogue wheel with familiar symbols and all im reminded of is hawke telling carver he carries every death with him, of him telling his uncle that he wasnt fast enough, of him begging the person he loves to tell him that his mothers death wasnt his fault.

and they dont. they just sit there with him.

[centaurianthropology]

One thing that I think a lot of Disco Elysium meta misses (likely because a lot of it is very clearly written by young Americans writing from an intensely American-centric cultural perspective without even really realizing it) is that one of the singular and central themes of the game is massive-scale generational trauma in a home that is economically collapsing as its resources and people are being drained by an occupation.  People have noted that no one tries to help Harry, despite the fact his mental illness is incredibly obvious to everyone around him.  He tells Kim that he completely lost his memory, and Kim politely asks him to focus on the work.  He tells Gottlieb that he had a heart attack, and Gottlieb tells him that if he’s still alive it couldn’t have been that bad.  That he’ll drop dead sooner or later, but then so does everyone.

And that’s the most important thing: so does everyone.  Look at Martinaise.  Look at the world in which Harry lives.  It is not our own, but it is adjacent to ours.  More specifically, it is clearly adjacent to the states of the Eastern Bloc: overtaken and occupied by a faraway government that clearly doesn’t care about Revachol or its people.  And that is obvious in every tired face, every defeated citizen, everyone trying to eke out a little happiness or meaning in spite of the overwhelming trauma and damage around them.  The buildings are still half-destroyed.  The bullet holes are still in the walls.  The revolution was decades before, but it still feels to the people there like a fresh wound.  The number of men of Harry’s generation who are not alcoholic or otherwise deeply fucked up are very few.  Some, like Kim, hide it better, but the deeper you dig into his history, the more you realize how damaged Kim is.  He’s more than a little trigger happy, and hates that about himself, but he is a product of his environment: Kim’s entire life is seeing people he cared about shot and killed, so his instinct now is to shoot first himself, to protect those few people left who still matter to him.

Harry is not unique in his trauma.  He is a distillation of an entire culture of people who tried to rise up and make something beautiful, and were instead routed and occupied.  He is trapped between the occupation and the people on the ground, along with all the rest of the RCM.  Their authority comes from the occupying government, but it is implied that they were formed out of the remnants of the citizens militia which sprung up from Revachol itself as a way to try to mitigate some of the horrors being committed on its streets.  The Moralintern sure as hell wasn’t going to get their hands dirty, so they happily conscripted (and therefore could better control) this group, who are only recognized in certain places, and whose authority mostly amounts to giving out fines.  The RCM is corrupt, but it is corrupt in the same way its culture is.  Bribes are considered standard with them, not a moral failing, but a necessity, so long as those bribes are correctly logged as ‘donations’.  It’s how the RCM stays afloat, and the rest of Revachol completely understands that.  Everyone would take a bribe if it meant they kept eating.  Everyone would take a little under-the-table money if it meant keeping a roof over their heads.  The officersof the RCM certainly don’t make enough to see a doctor.  They have an in-house lazarus, and if he can’t fix them they just die.  Mental health care?  What mental health care?  Harry doesn’t get it for the same reason no one else does: it doesn’t really seem to exist.  There are no counselors, no psychologists, no psychiatrists.  How would they even start?  If the world is what is broken, if everyone is suffering a similar catastrophic amount, it makes sense that Harry’s trauma would simply get rolled up with all the rest.  Kim asks him to get on with the job because Harry’s suffering is not remarkable in Revachol.  He is one of an entire generation who have an astronomical number of orphans from the revolution, and so many younger people are left more or less orphans as their parents drink themselves into oblivion like Cuno’s father.  So Harry’s truly unique attribute is embodying all that trauma, having it all inside of him, filling him to bursting.

To really engage with the themes of the game, engaging first and foremost with the reality of Revachol is imperative.  Imposing our own reality onto Revachol, particularly if coming from an American perspective (which tend to have the habit of both viewing the world through an American lens and not realizing they’re doing it because they’ve never experienced a different lens), will always feel shallow to me because of this.

All that is to say, I would love to hear some more explicitly European meta about this game, and especially Eastern European meta.  If anyone can point me to some good, juicy essays from that perspective, I would be grateful!

[galacticlamps]

ok I have A Lot of thoughts about the staircase confession (well really about Edwin's whole character arc, but all roads lead to rome) but for now I just wanna say that, yes, I was bracing myself for something to go terribly wrong when I first watched it, and yes, part of me was initially worried its placement might be an uncharacteristically foolish choice made in the name of Drama or Pacing or Making a Compelling Episode of Television but at the expense of narrative sense--

But I wanna say that having taken all that into account, and watched it play out, and sat with it - and honestly become rather transfixed by it - I really think it's a beautifully crafted moment and truly the only way that arc could've arrived at such a satisfying conclusion.

And if I had to pinpoint why I not only buy it but also have come to really treasure it, I'd have to put it down to the fact that it genuinely is a confession, and nothing else.

That moment is an announcement of what Edwin has come to understand about himself, but because it takes the form of a character admitting romantic feelings for such a close friend, I think it can be very easy, when writing that kind of thing, to imbue it with other elements like a plea or a request or even the start of a new relationship that, intentionally or not, would change the shape of the moment and can quickly overshadow what a huge deal the telling is all on its own. But that's not the case here. Since it is only a confession, unaccompanied by anything else, and since we see afterward how it was enough, evidently, to fix the strangeness that had grown between him & Charles, we're forced to understand that it was never Edwin's feelings that were actually making things difficult for him - it was not being able to tell Charles about them. 'Terrified' as he's been of this, Edwin learns that his feelings don't need to either disappear completely or be totally reciprocated in order for him to be able to return to the peace, stability, and security of the relationship with which he defines his existence - and the scale of that relief a) tells us a hell of a lot about Edwin as a character and b) totally justifies the way his declaration just bursts out of him at what would otherwise be such a poorly chosen moment, in my opinion.

Whether or not they are or ever could be reciprocated, Edwin's feelings are definitively proven not to be the problem here - only his potential choice to bottle it up - his repression - is. And where that repression had once been mainly involuntary, a product of what he'd been through, now that he's got this new awareness of himself, if he still fails to admit what he's found either to himself or to the one person he's so unambiguously close with, then that repression will be by his own choice and actions.

And he won't do that. Among other things, he's coming into this scene having just (unknowingly) absolved the soul of his own school bully and accidental killer by pointing out a fact that is every bit as central to his self-discovery as anything about his sexuality or his attraction to Charles is: the idea that "If you punish yourself, everywhere becomes Hell"

So narratively speaking, of course it makes sense that Edwin literally cannot get out of Hell until he stops punishing himself - and right now, the thing that's torturing him is something he has control over. It's not who he is or what he feels, but what he chooses to do with those feelings that's hurting him, and he's even already made the conscious choice to tell Charles about them, he was just interrupted. But now that they're back together and he's literally in the middle of an attempt to escape Hell, there is absolutely no way he can so much as stop for breath without telling Charles the truth. Even the stopping for breath is so loaded - because they're ghosts, they don't need to breathe, but also they're in Hell, so the one thing they can feel is pain, however nonsensical. And Edwin certainly is in pain. But whether he knows what he's about to do or not when he says he 'just needs a tick,' a breather is absolutely not what's gonna give him enough relief to keep climbing - it's fixing that other hurt, though, that will.

Like everything else in that scene, there's a lot of layers to him promising Charles "You don't have to feel the same way, I just needed you to know" - but I don't think that means it isn't also true on a surface level. It's the act of telling Charles that matters so much more than whatever follows it, and while that might have gone unnoticed if anything else major had happened in the same conversation, now we're forced to acknowledge its staggering and singular importance for what it is. The moment is well-earned and properly built up to, but until we see it happen in all its wonderful simplicity, and we see the aftermath (or lack thereof, even), we couldn't properly anticipate how much of a weight off Edwin's shoulders merely getting to share the truth with Charles was going to be, why he couldn't wait for a better, safer opportunity before giving in to that desire, or how badly he needed to say it and nothing else - and I really, really love the weight that act of just being honest, seen, and known is given in their story/relationship.

[ossidae-passeridae]

4. What’s the worst part of fanon? 😈

Question from here

That'd be the implicit racism thanks for asking!

A non snappy response, aka to explain what I mean by that:

A lot of fanon tropes implicitly reinforce a very white, America-centric POV, and in a universe like the GFFA which lies somewhere between heavily Asian-inspired and gloriously multicultural, that really rubs me the wrong way. (To clarify upfront: it is not racist or whatever to enjoy these tropes or to write them, but it worries me when people don't even seem to realise it)

An obvious, innocuous-seeming example is the tendency to use 'Ben' instead of Obi-Wan's actual name in AUs — especially when others' names (Anakin, Mace, Cody, etc) aren't changed as well. The biggest difference between those names and Obi-Wan's is that Obi-Wan's is obviously Asian inspired, and theirs aren't. It's not something I expect most people even think about! But it always leaves a sinking feeling in my chest.

(Obviously if, like in canon, Obi-Wan is using Ben as a pseudonym while in hiding that's a very different kettle of fish.)

A larger example is how incredibly common it is to cast the Jedi as space-Christians — some common examples being focus on tenets (the Jedi Code, which is a meditation mantra, not a rulebook), the pervasive Catholic Guilt which is very explicitly Christian in nature, the emphasis on worship as ritual rather than a state to work towards, the generalised "all organised religion must be Bad" sentiments that feel very specifically ex-Christian in nature.

Thinking about one's own religion and expressing thoughts through fiction/art isn't an issue in and of itself.

The thing is, the Jedi are explicitly based on Asian Buddhists. Not just in set dressing, but from the ground up, from their beliefs and the way they act, to their clothing to the structure of their temple — to strip that away is to remove what makes the Jedi the Jedi. It's to remove the Asian-ness and replace it with something predominantly white. It implies that Asian influence shouldn't or can't exist in the GFFA, or that there's something inferior or wrong about Buddhism that needs to be "fixed".

Again this isn't something where I think that fan authors are sitting there going "muhahaha I'm going to be RACIST today", I know that's not what's happening. But when so much Jedi-centric content being produced minimises the Asian influence and pushes a western one, it starts to say "there's something wrong with this group, we're trying to erase it because there shouldn't be representation at all" — an issue of scale, at its core.

(Then ofc there's all the "the Jedi steal babies" and "the Jedi ban emotions" and "the Jedi need to be destroyed" which, entirely separate from the above, if you replace 'Jedi' with 'Buddhists' I'm kind of starting to wonder why you hate Asian people/Asian religions, you know?)

I won't even get into the fanon surrounding the clones, because that'd require me to talk about KT far more than I'd like to on any day, but especially today 🤣

(All opinions expressed above are solely those of pass e. ridae and do not express the views or opinions of any affiliates or associates, passerine or otherwise)

[bethelighthalazia]

Chapter 1 - A journey´s beginning

Summary:  Y/n witnesses a fight on the village´s market and things start to get stirred up in her life. Who are these strangers and why does she feel that something about them will decide her fate?

Genre: adventure, fluff

Pairing:  ?? x fem!half-siren!reader

Additional Characters: ATEEZ, Stray Kids

Word Count:  2014

Warnings: mentions of violence, mentions of weapons, fighting

Networks: @mirohs-aurora-society

Notes: There might be an explanation ‘chapter’ for some things, only if you all want/need it. As for now, ‘mother rain’ is just a name that y/n has given her parent. The being itself does use any pronouns, but is feminine appearance wise, which is why y/n calls them mother.

additional links: << PrevCh Masterpost Next Ch >>

© by bethelighthalazia. Do not repost, copy or translate. Unless stated otherwise, those works are mine and born from my own ideas. I don't have any claim on the mentioned real existing Idols whatsoever.

“When the red moon rises, And paints the land in its fiery shade. A child shall be born to land and sea, Its’ heart's voice with the power to unite. The path will be torn,  But a heart's melody will lead. Clawed embraces like a thorn, The one eyed’s Illusion offers a home. When the child gains powers,  Land and sea their witness and friend. Deep ocean's bell calling home all sirens, To gather under one heart's voice. A new queen will be raised to her throne,  Her call heard far and near. Friends won't shy, fighting for her to rise, When blood is against her, seeking demise.”

It had been eons since the last red moon hung in the night sky, so the excitement rose high when the birth of y/n fell on the day of this very rare lunar event. Highly anticipated amongst the sirens of this clan, since the child born on this day would become the ruler of their entire species, even though y/n was only the outcome of her mother being bedded by a human pirate. Excitement was replaced with disappointment the moment y/n took the first breath of air and water, because even though she looked as if screaming from the depths of her lungs, no sound was heard. The girl was born without a voice. How could this thing become their queen one day? This had to be kept a secret, the child disposed of very quickly. So, in the dead of night, one chosen of the clan's warriors was sent to bring the child to the highest mountain of the nearest island, so it would not be able to touch the sea and soon starve and dry out. 

Fate had different plans for this half siren though, and even if left for its death, the child survived thirteen days without food or water before she was found by none other than the soul of the sea itself. Disguised as a human being, they took her in and raised y/n, naming her after a mythical remedy that had long been forgotten. The child's youth was filled with warmth, wonders and love, protected and sheltered by the incarnation of the sea itself, yet living in a small hut on land.

Years went by and the little rainbow scaled half-siren rose into a beautiful young woman, her white hair shimmering in all the colors of the light when swimming in the water. While growing older, she learnt to hide her scales from human eyes, so she could walk through the nearby village, sirens have always been feared and often hunted. Every time she'd leave home to visit the market, y/n had been told to be careful. “Remember, my child. The wolves control these lands, do not cross the crescent moon pack.” The sea always told her and, once again, the young woman nodded with a smile. Y/n had heard these words often enough that they have carved itself into her mind by now. The basket for goods from the market in hand, her flute and a bag with some coin attached to her belt, the young half siren walked over to her parent, kissing their forehead.

‘Do not worry, mother rain. I will not stray from my path. My friend will accompany me again.’ Y/n communicates, using her hands and a language without words for this. Not many people understand her, nor do they want to, most of them call her way of communicating a work of magic and don't want anything to do with it. At the name y/n had given them, the sea let out a melodic laugh, shaking his head. “You have yet to explain to me why you call me that, my little tadpole,” they hum, cupping the girl's cheek for a moment before sending her off to the market. 

Why does y/n call them mother rain? She doesn't quite know herself. Mother, because they always have been there for her as far as she could remember. They're her mother, it's that easy. Rain, because - well, why? Walking down the dirt path to the village, y/n kept thinking about an explanation and before entering the market, she found it. The falling rain always has been soothing for y/n, the feeling on her scales, the sound it makes when hitting the ground, it just made her feel safe and calm. Mother rain had the same effect for the young woman. And she never learned her parent’s real name, nor is she aware that they are the sea itself.

“Y/n! Over here,” a familiar voice called out when y/n neared the village, drawing her attention to the young male, who's crouched on a boulder. His ashen brown hair falling into his face didn't hide a new scar under his eye. Her eyes wide and brows furrowed in worry, y/n pointed at the scar when she came closer, causing the young man to chuckle. “This? Oh, it's fine, don't worry.” He hummed, jumped off the boulder and stepped closer to y/n, so she could inspect the scar. “Wolves do cry sometimes. I just had to be reminded of it.” Now that y/n was able to see it up close, the scar reminded her of tears trailing down the man's face, causing her to huff out some air. “Don't be upset, please. It didn't hurt…well, not badly at least-” His words drew another huff from y/n, who shook her head. Her best friend often misjudged the gravity of some of his actions, so he got into trouble a lot and therefore got punished by - well, she's not sure by whom. Although, now that she thought about it - he usually referred to himself as one of the wolves. Y/n always downplayed this as him joking around, but what if he really is one of the feared pack controlling these lands?

A tap on her nose pulled her out of her thoughts, causing her to look up at the face of her friend. Jeongin never judged her, nor did he ever harm her or get her into dangerous situations, so why should she judge him? Even if he was one of the pack, she would never want to lose him as her best friend, one of the only people in this village who liked her and talked to her. “Did Rain send you to the market again?” The young man asked, gesturing towards the empty basket and when y/n nodded, he took her hand to walk with her to the village. Jeongin never cared or minded that she was mute, he didn't need to hear her talk to understand her. Being dragged after the young male, y/n gave a silent chuckle, but then stopped, holding Jeongin back from walking further. She could sense something familiar, something that sent a shudder down her spine; she felt the presence of another siren. 

“Huh? What's wrong, y/n? Are you not feeling well? I can bring you back to Rain, if you like-” Jeongin stopped, his head snapped towards the market, because sudden shouting and other noises came from there. Both of them looked at each other before the young male started running towards the commotion, y/n stumbling after her best friend. It only took them a few moments to reach the market and both could see what caused the noises. People hurriedly put away their wares and tried to get their market stands out of the way, while others were standing around the entry to the tavern.

Eyes wide, y/n let go of Jeongin's hand when the young male hurried towards the commotion to talk to one of the people around. The young half siren also stepped forward, freezing in place when she saw what's happening. A young man with dark hair and one eye covered by a bandage was fighting with someone else. 

“Hyung! What happened?” y/n could hear Jeongin's voice and she walked over to him, grasping the young man's arm with a frightened expression. “Jisung, why is your mate fighting that man?” The one Jeongin spoke to was trembling slightly, looking worried to the fighting people before turning to the younger male. “This man shoved me, I- I accidentally bumped into that man's friend-” Y/n could sense that the man Jeongin called Jisung was nervous, maybe even scared, so she put a hand on his arm gently, trying to calm him down.

A collective gasp drew the young woman's attention, her hands going up to her mouth when she saw what happened to cause this. The black haired one, who was wearing the same clothes like Jisung, had managed to cut, or rather claw, the other's chest. However, the other didn't seem to give up, despite the begging of his friend, a white haired male. “Hongjoong, please! Stop it, or this wolf will kill you!” The man pleaded, causing y/n to freeze, her eyes widened in realization. That white haired person was the siren she sensed, another half siren! 

“Minho, stop!” Another man walked onto the marketplace, but he didn't seem in a hurry. He looked intimidating, a scar across his face and the fur vest not covering much of his torso, which also was scattered with old and some seemingly newer scars. His voice actually made the fighting male stop, it had something like an echo to it, as if he wasn't the only one speaking, yet no one else had opened his mouth. What seemed off to her, was that Jeongin and Jisung also cowered at this voice. “Chan, he attacked Ji-” “Stop! We do not start fights with guests of the village, Minho!” The man, Chan, hushed the other quickly, none of them noticing the movement from the one eyed one called Hongjoong.

Y/n did notice though and before he could attack the others again, she rushed between them, stomping on the ground hard once, which sent a little shockwave of water across the area, a faint ring of a bell sounding through the water. This not only calmed the people in the area, but also revealed the rainbow scales on her legs for a split second. Despite that, Jeongin and his friends, as well as the white-haired one and Hongjoong saw it before y/n was able to hide them from view. “Seonghwa, she’s-” Hongjoong gasped and looked at his friend, the white haired guy, but the friend just shook his head. When the young woman looked at Jeongin, she got a glimpse of his shocked expression, but even though he was surprised about this revelation, he spoke up quickly, approaching the injured Hongjoong with y/n. 

“We have to bring him to Rain, they can help.” Jeongin spoke calmly and helped the white haired guy to pick up Hongjoong and support him. Chan watched the scene cautiously, gesturing to Minho to follow their youngest. “You go with him and make sure he comes home in one piece. I'll clean up your mess here, Minho,” the oldest of the wolves hissed, wondering how none of them had noticed a siren living close by. Minho already wanted to protest, but one look from Chan silenced him. 

Leading them down the path to Rain's hut, y/n was thinking about what happened, how shocked the ones who saw her scales were. “Y/nie, Stop worrying-” Jeongin's voice got cut by Seonghwa, who sounded curious rather than upset or scared. “You're a half siren, aren't you?” He asked in a calm manner, still supporting his friend while walking. Y/n merely nodded, her head hanging low. She remembered her parent's words, that most people despise sirens and are afraid of them. The group stayed silent the rest of the way, only when they reached the small hut, y/n got more lively again, hurrying inside and dragging the others with her. The only one who stayed outside the hut was Minho, who was very suspicious of the whole situation around this young woman.

taglist: @mingis-mizu, @tinyelfperso, @hotteokkay, @minkilicious, @bunnliix,

@gong-fourz, @yeosangiess, @dinossaurz, @scuzmunkie, @h3arteyes4mingi

(if you want to be added to a taglist, follow the taglist-link in my pinned post)

[lurkdragonstuff]

I'm an atheist and a philosophical materialist. I don't think there's anything more to the universe than what can be observed and measured. Disagree if you want, that's fine, but take as read that this is where I'm coming from.

As you can imagine, this makes it very strange to me that my brain thinks I'm a dragon.

I have been trying to square this circle for years. Since around the 2000's, when I first made contact with the Internet, I would look in on the otherkin community, and the draconic community nested inside it, and I would think, man. I wish I could believe that. I wish I could believe that souls were real, and that I had one, and that it was a dragon, and that's why I was so odd. For quite a while, I just explained it as a furry fandom thing. Sure, yes, my fursona is feral, but ferals are furries, too. This is still true! I'm still in furry fandom, and my dragonself still acts as my fursona. But they are also, in a deeper sense, me.

I'm a secular pagan. I don't think gods exist, and I don't think magic is literally real. I can't really cast a curse on shitty charities. The moon's a big shiny rock. It doesn't care if I roar at it when the sun reflects off it just so and I can see the whole of its tidally locked face.

But my dragon brain doesn't know that. It likes the big shiny rock. It likes little shiny rocks, too. It likes to light things on fire, and considers this a sacred act, both bringing destruction to noxious things and bringing honour to things worthy of it. It likes to growl and hiss when things annoy it. It likes to collect things, to have a hoard. It likes to range around its territory, keeping an eye on what's around in what season. It finds it frustrating that its wings don't seem to work at all, and its other limbs barely better. It wants its tail back. It wants its fire breath.

I'm autistic. Sometimes speaking is hard, and I growl and hiss when things annoy me. I like to collect things related to my special interests; I have a sprawling collection of cetacean, Nintendo, and SEGA figurines, as well as lots of little animal figures. Plushies, too, and videogames, and books. I do wildlife photography, as well, marking who's around in what seasons. This is, to my frustration, limited a lot by waning energy because of chronic health problems.

If backed into a corner, to say what I really believe, of course I'm a human. It is in my DNA, expressed in a bipedal body plan, five fingers on the forelimbs only, nails and not claws, no wings, no muzzle, no tail, short neck, skin and fur instead of scales. Not even any horns. I find this frustrating, but it is what it is. I also find it frustrating when people call me 'she' and not 'they', and that really there is no feasible gender presentation that would guarantee that strangers would use the right word. The best I can hope for is that people will read the 'they/them' button on my hat, or otherwise call me 'he'. Still wrong, but at least novel.

I honestly think my draconic identity developed when I was younger as a way to explain why I was so weird. I have never been normal. I will never be normal. As an adult, I have fancy words like "autism" and "anxiety and depression secondary to post-traumatic stress disorder" and "seasonal affective disorder" to explain why I'm abnormal.

But a part of my brain, I think the same one that still believes in magic and deities even though I don't, tilts its head, then grins a sharp grin and says, "Cool story, bro. I'm still a dragon."

I generally have, for any given of my eccentricities, the philosophical materialist explanation (generally that I am either brainweird in some way or another or am playing pretend for placebo purposes to manage executive function etc.) and the dragon explanation (generally what the pretend play revolves around). But - and this is hard to explain - it isn't exactly playing pretend, either. It's me.

When I'm pretending to be Link, either playing a Zelda game or writing Zelda fanfic, Link isn't me. I might be inhabiting him as an actor, but he isn't me. When I play Animal Crossing, and I'm playing a character named after me, that's closer. It's me but greater. Me but more. Me existing in a life I wish I could have.

When I put on my mask, when I sit and daydream about the multiverse-hopping shenanigans I get up to, when I hiss at someone startling me by getting into my space, that's me. I'm not a dragon, I'm a human wearing a mask, daydreaming, hissing because "back the fuck off!" isn't allowed in the workplace.

Yeah. Cool story, bro.

I am still a dragon.

[doshmanziari]

Shadow of the Erdtree: Some Reflections

Well, folks, since no one asked, here are some thoughts I've had while exploring Elden Ring's add-on, Shadow of the Erdtree.

The existence of an alternate shadow realm has solidified my conviction that what Elden Ring is depicting on micro and macro scales is the phenomenology of etheric bodies -- extending even to the moon, the double of which is visible from the Moonlight Altar plateau (this is reflected by Rellana's Twin Moons spell). Each of these bodies possess a regulating function. Although each might be generally described as doppelgänger, the occult scientist Rudolf Steiner wrote of the Doppelgänger proper as its own sort of body, responsible for the tension between aspiration and temptation. It's interesting to me that this is such a major preoccupation of the game, because it indicates a layer of esoteric involvement, on the part of Elden Ring's narrative conceptualizations, that I don't think anyone in the so-called lore community has picked up on yet. The shadow realm helps explicate the otherwise inexplicable Godefroy the Grafted, too.

Various details have also strengthened my impression that the revolt against Nature we see in Elden Ring is a revolt against motility -- motility being the ultimate enemy of utopia: a human conceptualization reliant upon infinite stasis. In the base game, I think we see this revolt most profoundly in the narrative of Ranni, who first abandons her own flesh and then strives towards the realization of an Age of Stars, that "thousand year voyage under the wisdom of the Moon." Although the Seedbed Curse represents its own revolt against Nature, it remains within the organic order. Ranni's vision is of the inorganic and remote. And I don't think it's unrelated that, in certain esoteric cosmological systems, the moon stands as most distant from the Absolute.

The colors of the landscapes and sky are amazing: vivid, autumnal, and strange. These palettes have only made me dislike the game's rain effect all the more, which does not deepen the arboreal colors (as it should) but drains all surfaces of color and sets them into a depressing, bland grayscale. To say that the rain is a part of why I consider Raya Lucaria to be Elden Ring's low-point in the realm of major level design could be seen as a trivial complaint, but visual drudgery will wreck even the best schemes; and Raya Lucaria is as far as you can get from that anyway. FromSoftware has done fine with types of snow (see, e.g., the Frigid Outskirts or Painted World of Ariandel), but I think they've yet to figure out rain, among some other graphical technicalities.

The forges are among my favorite instances of discrete level design, even if, or maybe because, they tend to contain only two or three enemy types, feature no bosses, and severely scale back the level of challenge. I happened upon one yesterday that I did find a little dull, but the other two were wonderful, brief, atmospheric knots, quiet sequences of colossal architecture, that sort of evoked shades of Stonefang Tunnel from Demon's Souls. On that note, I'd call special attention to the forges' theme music. The only other piece of music from the DLC that's gotten my attention is the theme for Belurat.

Plants are People, Too.

Torrent is just... a terrible inclusion for this game. It's maybe obvious enough to not warrant being said, but -- any design decision has to be evaluated on what it contributes to the system it's been set into, and Torrent adds nothing outside of the occasional, brainless convenience. I could maybe see an argument for Torrent's presence if he had some emotionally charged narrative integration, maybe like what Shadow of the Colossus did. Without this, Torrent is nothing but a tool which perpetually problematizes the overworld's scale (a bit too big, yet no fun to traverse at high speed) and trivializes all of its gauntlets on a potential and actual level far worse than anything the Spirit Ashes could ever do. Better to me would've been if the only way to use a mount were by defeating a mounted knight without killing their horse and then sneaking up to the runaway to gain ownership of it.

I'm finding the map much more engaging than that of the base game because of how it plays with abstractions and builds anticipation through that. One part of the map, for instance, shows a bunch of trees with red leaves. Reaching this place reveals these "trees" to be enormous red flowers. Another section shows pink, purple, and orange specks. What are these? And what are the gray, finger-like lumps erupting from the mass next to it? I've also found it tough to figure out how to progress from one plane to another because of how densely stacked and knobby the continent's features are, so consulting the map has been helpful in a way I rarely experienced with the base game's.

Love how much the Ancient Ruins of Rauh resemble The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, from the explosion of verdure, to the crude, architectural naivety defining the pseudo-Gothic structures.

With Shadow of the Erdtree, I keep coming up against an unresolvable simultaneity like the one mentioned above regarding the overworld. There's a lot of good level design to be found here among the dungeons, castles, and forts, yet the abundance and enormity of it all seems to have deprived the game of significant contrasts, and those special spatial moments, which I found much easier to locate and reflect upon with, say, Dark Souls or Bloodborne. Sure, the sky-piercing spiral of Enir-Ilim is a sight to behold; but soon enough the sequences of grand staircase upon grand staircase, great bridge upon great bridge, creates a perpetual climatic grandiosity that diminishes the very effect of a climax (and I'm not even sure that Enir-Ilim is the DLC's intended final location). Anor Londo or the Nightmare of Mensis could feel special because the qualities and features of their spaces stood apart from everything else. Elden Ring, I think, has gotten itself into a predicament by trying to one-up its internal material and all prior FromSoftware games through the enormity of its scale -- and challenge. More and more, I've been craving a new project from them that resets these terms of engagement, even while enjoying the consistency of the material at hand.

That's all for now! In time maybe I'll turn these thoughts to an essay for my Substack page, perhaps with a focus on the first two points.

[buttered-milky]

https://youtu.be/XqXZ0tJppok?si=kF5httv3agxyOzqe

Messmer can actually turns into a snake it's his original form, and he looks soo abused and neglected maybe because of the seal?

Eeeee okay so. The summon he uses a: appears to have more blood and/or burn wounds on it. and b: otherwise has most of its scales and doesn’t have the transparency effect I thought it had like the winged serpents!! Also there’s a bunch of eyeballs all over the place but we’ll get to those later.

Burn wounds are pretty straightforward and also interesting since they imply either the serpent fucked around and found out (Messmer burned it) or the serpent fucked around and found out (burned itself like an idiot, not surprising in the slightest for snakes since they miss prey strikes all the time and are, in my humble snake owner opinion, some of the dumbest creatures you’ll ever meet. Curious yes. But also. Idiots)

The snake Messmer turns into has much deeper wounds and scarring on it than just the summon of the abyssal serpent. This snake also appears to have a blind right eye (note for any reptile keepers who care: not the temporary blindness that comes with shedding). Its body is very misshapen and there are scales trying to protrude along the spine, and in several places where there don’t appear to be any wounds the scales are just…missing. This is as expected not good for snakes! They need those scales! I am honestly not quite sure how to interpret the overlapping layers of scales in some places. Like sometimes it looks like a shedding issue but also it seems like it’s the attempts of two souls trying to occupy one body? Also missing shed transparency effect! Idk what the hell was going on in my brain or if it was just lighting but I was sooooo fucking sure of the shed buildup. I was also really tired though and don’t care. The visual read was still fun. It can be a headcanon to me <3

So on those thoughts of it being two souls trying to occupy one body. What strikes me about this design is that some of the wounds look like bite scarring you’d see from live prey fighting your snake back. Again, this is a thing entirely avoidable with good husbandry (don’t live feed unless absolutely necessary). The scales to me still imply shedding has gone very wrong at some point. You’d expect to see shedding heal and scar over these wounds, but they’re all fresh. Very symbolic. You can’t heal violence by just pretending it doesn’t exist.

Ideally when a snake is wounded, you do routine care to help them with sheds and make sure the wound is clean. The scales will grow back and the wound will scar, but it will take several sheds and consistent work! You cannot, as Marika tried to do, just put a bandaid on it. You also can’t just lock a snake in a cage it will hurt itself trying to get out of (ie messmer himself) and expect that to go even remotely well.

Some of this feels like visual symbolism of self-hatred. Like I said, the base serpent looks like it’s gotten in a fight. With its host. Some of it also feels like visible neglect (ie the wounds not being healed, missing scales)

I’m gonna discuss the eyeballs bc I fuck w them immensely. First of all congrats Messmer on having an Eldritch Horror in ur body. Second of all, all these eyes appear to have lids. Actual snakes don’t. They have hard eye caps instead and cannot blink. Some of the eyes seem like they might not be able to blink, but the scales around them are still more closed than you’d expect? I fuck with it. Fits with Messmer’s blindness motif which maybe I’ll make a post on eventually. But in regards to the base serpent specifically, of course violence can afford to close its eyes and be blind to who it chooses to hurt. Violence is also something that, when committed, always seems to haunt you. Its gaze will always be there.

It’s interesting that Marika replaced Messmer’s eye to seal the serpent off, and so maybe it grew more eyes? That could be why the scales around them aren’t correct—they’re trying to protrude from the body. This occurs in both the summon and the physical snake form Messmer has. Repression of identity = Eldritch horrors? Sure I’ll take that fromsoft.

Final thing on the eyes. They’re red, not green. The winged serpents have green eyes, Elden Ring’s color of endurance. Super fitting! The abyssal serpent’s eyes are all red, the color of rot and death in this game. Red to me also feels primordial given its use in lightning by the dragons, but I digress. It’s pretty obvious why a base serpent would have base powers. This thing is old as fuck.

Okay. I’m sure you all thought the post was done but one last note on snake biology! So, snakes’ tongues retract into their mouth. When a snake opens their mouth you won’t see a forked tongue just curled up, hanging out. It’s in a little pocket for safe keeping :)

Neither of the base serpent’s forms appear to have the anatomy for this, since there are eyeballs replacing this anatomy. This is problematic for Messmer in a snake form specifically since he’s blind, and real snakes compensate for shitty vision by having an incredibly strong sense of smell. Messmer’s snake form also doesn’t have the heat pits that the abyssal serpent has. Heat pits are another part of snake anatomy, usually located below the nostrils, and are what they use to “see” heat and locate prey. In pythons (like the winged serpents) you’ll see multiple heat pits all in a row above the lip as opposed to the single very deep pit behind and below the nostrils in vipers. This single pit is what the base serpent (summon) has. Neither Messmer’s base serpent form nor his winged serpents have heat pits which is…interesting. It could be a modeling error but I don’t think so given base serpent has very clear heat pits.

My point is, Messmer is somehow even more blind than you’d expect from a snake. Maybe this makes sense given Messmer carries an internal fire, which would likely fuck with infrared? Still interesting nonetheless.

In summary: The base serpent alone (summon) seems overall in better shape than its other form (transformation). I think this is pretty straightforward symbolism—as a being on its own the serpent would probably be fine. It’s just that it uses Messmer as a host and this causes issues. Fuck around and find out I guess, base serpent.

And holy shit Messmer Cannot fucking see. Good luck with the seeing eye snakes babe because snakes notoriously have shit vision !

(Also just an aside both of the base serpent forms kind of have narrower faces than you’d see on a real snake? Like they’re more eel like to me. Anyways.)

[serpentface]

i really like how this setting has a very well defined history to it, the past, the way it has been described so far, genuinely feels like another place and still one that would logically lead to the present, so i wanted to ask, have you thought at all about this in the other direction? what will the setting look like in 10, 50, a 100 years? just where is this world going exactly?

10 years absolutely. 50 years not so much. 100 years barely. Far future not at all. Here's a summary of the localized 10-15 year outcome (posting the (incomplete, already outdated) map again because it is extremely necessary for the paragraphs to come)

(Titenegal is the star just to the west of Godsmouth, the Mouth is the stretch of sea between Bur and the Wardi empire, the Viper trails off a little off-map to the east, the seas west of the Viper form the Inner Seaway)

I have a pretty solid idea of the next 10-15 years for Imperial Wardin. The former king (technically emperor but the word for 'king' is used for this title) Stavis Amanti honorably and nobly and TOTALLY willingly replaces the destined white calf in sacrifice, and the Odomache takes his dynasty's place as the emperor. As God Itself incarnated, the state is now functionally a theocracy with a god-emperor. The Imperial Wardi faith has always been the greatest unifying factor in an otherwise fragmented imperial entity, and this change results in a greater centralization of power than what's seen in Whitecalf (in which it is essentially composed of allied city-states conditionally loyal to a king, it's integrity is very tenuous in general and actively falling apart in the famine). The city-state of Lobera and Godsmouth both disavow the Amanti dynasty during the famine and the former wholly secedes and declares itself an independent state near the end of the story (the latter re-avows its loyalty to the new god-emperor). Lobera pulls some nearby imperial tributary territories under its protection and and the territorial size of Imperial Wardin is diminished (basically the entire northeast is lost).

The drought DOES end in the same year as the pilgrimage (yayyyy it worked) but actual recovery from a 6.75 year drought and famine, especially in the context of a shift in political power, takes time. The famine cannot be considered to have fully ended for another 4-5 years (conditions just gradually improve until normalization) and this time is spent in with focus being inward and on recovery and reunification. The city-state of Erub in particular fully collapsed by the end of the famine (the Yellowtail river ran Completely dry and tens of thousands of people in that region alone died from starvation and disease) and is never reformed in this 15 year period, though some refugees (and opportunists grabbing lands from dead or fled farmers) start to trickle back in as the land recovers.

The shift in power from a dynastic imperial monarchy to an imperial oligarchy is actually wildly popular among much of the public (the notion existed long before it actually happened, the public opinion on the imperial family is EXTREMELY low during the famine and the pilgrimage is largely a desperate attempt to save face). The social perception that God Itself incarnated and made head of state is what ended the drought and famine is massively beneficial to the new power structure. Imperial Wardin emerges from famine recovery at the most united and centralized in power it's ever been.

A full scale war between Imperial Wardin and Lobera+Allies finally occurs about 6 years out, and lasts a little over a year before Lobera is utterly crushed and re-absorbed. Control over tributary states is reaffirmed, and efforts start to be made to make Imperial Wardi territory fully contiguous (in the map, only the red sections are Fully controlled territories)

Meanwhile Titenegal is more aggressively courted into full alliance with Godsmouth, and the majority of elected officials vote for a merger, which in practice absorbs it into the Wardi empire (while retaining elected officials for local affairs, though these must defer to the emperor). This basically splits the united Burri nations in half (both in public opinion and in a literal territorial capacity) and is extremely contentious. Imperial Wardin is clearly in the process of pulling the old switcheroo and conquering Bur, through diplomacy for the time being.

And with the full cross-Mouth unification having occurred, attention is turned back north to Finnerich (which has been fully independent of its tributary status for over a decade now, and has been a major pain in the ass for both Wardi and Burri interests). A much stronger, much more unified, and much more militarized Imperial Wardin starts preparing for another round of invasions, while the self-declared king of Finnerich has been courting historical enemies into allegiance against it. At this point the Wardi Empire is entering a strong expansionist era and trying to conquer the entire Viper Seaway and Mouth, with hopes of finally digging that canal at the end of the Viper (a seaway that peters out about 40 miles from the ocean, many have tried to dig a canal and all have failed) to completely monopolize the eastern tradeways. It has a long way to go to actually get there though.

All this stuff is the political backdrop for Blightseed (the story).

In the LONG and broader term, the only really imminent world-altering scenario would be the greater spread of firearms. At the moment the most complex and powerful firearm being produced is types of flintlocks/matchlocks most comparable to the arquebus (also there's some smaller pistols with similar mechanisms) (I'm also going back and forth on whether I should downgrade the gun tech), but the majority of firearms that exist are more basal fire lances and handcannons (and the VAST majority of peoples have no firearms at all). In the 'contemporary' these matchlocks are only just starting to spread through very powerful states in the Inner Seas tradeway and are generally rare and elite weapons, which are slowly being disseminated through capture and illegal trade and reverse engineered by other people. The spread of relatively efficient and powerful handguns would have profound implications for warfare and the power structures involved in trade networks and will probably be a major contributing force to mass societal changes in the next 100-300 years.

I also haven't provided a good sense of scale via not posting world maps but most of the imperial entities described are relatively tiny on a global scale. There has never been anything in the setting on the scale of the Roman empire or the Mongolian empire at their peaks. Imperial Wardin's total mass of occupied territories (not including claimed but unoccupied land, blue on the map) is a little under the size of the full extent of the Aztec empire (and they have some similarities in being largely composed of a tributary states). It's a world that has heavy interconnection via trade along coasts and seaways, but its societies are mostly (relatively) small in scale. This is a long way of saying I think the mass spread of firearms could result in something closer to that scale of territorial landgrabbing forming.

[crepes-suzette-373]

In chapter 1066, Shaka explained this story about the Void Century. It was a big dramatic reveal scene, and most of the chapter was about Ohara and their research efforts on the Void Century. In the cover, sensei chose to depict a zoomed out view of the Germa castle, with all its "66" banners.

Is this a coincidence or a hint?

Based on the fragmentary snippets that we've heard of Germa's history, it sounded almost like... Germa's destruction is a "smaller scale" version of what happened to the ancient kingdom. They were able to continue to exist somehow, but their history was so obscured that barely anyone know the truth about them.

Even someone like Brook was only able to vaguely know that "they conquered North Blue".

Previously I assumed that World Government destroyed the empire, but I now consider the possibility that the other North Blue kingdoms just allied together to defeat it. A mirror of the Void century history, but localised in the North Blue instead of the whole world.

Judge had said he wanted revenge against the North Blue kings. It would stand to reason that he might have wanted to do that because the other kings banded together to take down Germa 300 years ago.

Germa might have been allowed to continue to exist as a smaller kingdom because WG is not involved in the destruction. They just turned a blind eye towards its destruction.

That being said, though, I have been suspecting for a while that Germa is hiding knowledge related to the old Void Century kingdom.

Germa has been a kingdom of science for generations, but lineage factor and cloning was Vegapunk's discovery. So what was Germa doing before?

Very likely, it's something more similar to what we would call "engineering" in our world. Back in MADS, Judge was seen building that spear that would eventually become his main weapon.

Not to mention that even in the drafts, sensei had planned for Judge to be titled "Earl of Mechanisms". Both of those, plus the snail ships and the raid suits, they all seem to suggest that Germa's main scientific endeavours before were machinery and gadgets.

So, when did Germa develop the snail ships and why? If these were newer, then I would be wondering "What did the Germa kingdom look like before they made the snails? Just normal ships?".

However, if these ships have been around since their land's destruction 300 years ago, then was the Germa empire's eventual goal to conquer the entire world? Why else would they need the snail ships that can climb the Red Line otherwise? Did maybe the old empire had wanted to make All Blue? Perhaps due to their knowledge of the Void Century?

This assuming that All Blue here is not a specific location, but just "the open sea" in general, not blocked by the Red Line.

Something about all this is just so weird.

I had the vague idea that Sanji is going to ironically be the one to "fulfil the goals of the old Germa empire", which was originally not evil whatsoever. I just don't know what the hell that "goal" is. But if their goal was in fact "All Blue", then it's an even more insane irony. It also fits the samurai conspiracy I had (TL;DR, basically "unification").

Another thing related to the machinery.

Is it possible that Germa had been the one to send the ancient robot up to the Red Line? Nobody knew who sent this robot, and it just died midway because it ran out of power.

It's possible that it was done by some other unknown entity. For example, from the same island as Professor Tsukimi who built the small automatons, since that shows that there's someone knowledgeable in robotics. Or maybe the robot just woke up on its own and started moving around. Especially with the revelation in chapter 1111 where it woke up apologising to Joy Boy.

But if Germa is a nation with very advanced ability in mechanics, it could be that they found the ancient robot and reactivated it. They just might not have known how to refuel/charge it up, so it collapsed midway.

It's rather unlikely, but it's not impossible.

This is also somewhat related to how the snail ships were able to climb the Red Line. If the old Germa's ambition was something to do with the Red Line (like, perhaps destroying it), then it's not unreasonable to think that they would try to send this powerful looking robot to do the job.

[dailyadventureprompts]

What’s fasinating about the d&d movie is that it is all the fun of d&d removed from the rigid restraints of the the clunky game system: Thrills and laughs and hairbrained schemes minus the minutia of needless rolls or waiting for your turn in initiative to circle around. Part of this is idealization, but as someone who’s obsessed with making my favorite game system the most fun possible I can’t help but draw some comparisons.

Combat: Holga’s fight scenes were a highlight of the film for me, displaying a huge amount of kinetic creativity as she pinballed between different combatants swapping out weapons, bouncing off the surrounding terrain . This is a far, far cry from how being a fighter plays out at the table, as most martial characters are focused into doing just one type of attack as good as they can because it’s their only reliable contribution to combat. Try to model Holga’s fights in game and you’d be caught in a boring slog of dealing 1d4+STR damage to a bunch of guards whittling away at their hitpoint pools, a far cry from the lighting quick flury of smashing, bashing, and flips that make her the film’s action setpiece.  

What d&d needs is a system for combat that exists alongside the traditional damage/HP paradigm: an additional layer of complexity for martial characters that encourages tactical thinking and lets those who do their damage up close feel just as cool and as clutch as casters. My mind’s already whirling thinking up something that revolves around stuns, suckerpunches, and positioning, so expect it later this week. 

Powercreep: This might be subjective but I find it fascinating that the official stats put out for the party has them hovering around level 16, a point in character progression  a)that  most characters never get to b) by which the game’s difficulty systems have begun to break down. I suspect this was done in order to keep their on-screen abilities in line with how they are in the base rules, but I can’t help but feel like its odd for the “idedalized” dnd experiance to be playing around with toys that most groups will never get their hands on. 

In my experience d&d is on a sliding scale of stakes V Shenanigans, with the exact ballance evolving over the course of a campaign:  Your group starts out as a bunch of dumbfucks and at some point while you’re making  making absolute fools out of yourselves you become a found family just in time for the consequences of your actions to circle back around and threaten the realm. First the characters start caring about eachother, then they care about the world, then they have to save that world. Level 16 is, for me, distinctly in “save the world” territory, despite the fact that the HaT crew are clearly still figuring out who they are and what they care about.  It makes me wish D&D was more free with its shenanigan enabling magic/items/class features at lower levels to help fuel these kinds of antics.  

Attunement: Perhaps the best “ oh I’m totally going to steal this” moment came from Simon’s attempt to attune to the helm of disjunction. Turning what was otherwise a rote game mechanic into an oppertunity for character growth was genius on behalf of the writers, though one I’d only really employ with items that were as necessary for my plots as the helm was for the heist. Just like Simon’s major flaw was self doubt, I could easily see delicious storytelling potential in throwing up other emotional hurdles depending on the situation: A hero’s sword refusing to attune to the haunted survivor until they’ve come to terms with what they’ve done, an otherwise altruistic character being forced to admit their sin and self interest by an evil-aligned artifact. 

Over all, I really enjoyed the movie, though paradoxically It didn’t hook me as much because for me one of the biggest charms of fantasy is the feeling of discoverying a new world, and I’ve been living the d&d world for the past 20 years so it didn’t come of as wild and magical as it could have been, having hewn so close to established d&d material. 

[lakesbian]

What is naissancee? :0

naissancee is my beloved free first-person decently short platforming game from 2014 wherein you wander through an empty, alienating superstructure :)

it was inspired by works like blame (a manga set in an obscenely massive superstructure spanning as far as at least jupiter's orbit that is now entirely out of human control & growing without regard for human architectural conceits or necessities), and actually includes a few panels from it explicitly incorporated into the environment.

naissancee is similar to blame in that while its structures contain many recognizable human elements, and are possible for people to navigate with enough trial and error, the logic of the architecture is entirely divorced from that of human design in a way that makes it fundamentally alien and unwelcoming. i think it really encapsulated the game experience when i got my brother to play some of it and, upon successfully completing the very first section of the game, he commented with concern that he felt like he had gotten out of bounds somehow and "wasn't supposed to be here."

critically, i wouldn't describe it as hostile architecture, but as indifferent architecture--"hostile architecture" would mean that it was built with dissuading humans in mind, and naissancee doesn't feel like it was built with humans in mind at all. while a game having architecture hostile to you can, depending on the game, signal that you're on the right path, naiassancee conveys the feeling of random pathfinding through a structure that has no idea you exist, or that any people exist.

i would recommend it pretty much solely to People Who Like Weird Buildings or Abstract Environments or when games otherwise Put You In A Location With A Distinct Atmosphere. i am not the world's expert on game design but i think there's something really fantastic about how well it insinuates a truly massive scope of structure and forces you to contort your own schema for interacting with the architecture. shoutout to the part of the game where i realized i was instinctively crouching before going into a tunnel that was actually tall enough for me to stand upright in and would be more traditionally called "a hallway" if not for how the massive scale of the rest of the structure had changed my perspective of it. shoutout to the part where it forces you to navigate a section with your eyes adjusted entirely to seeing in negative space. i don't have a conclusion about how this is one of the top games of all time or anything i just think it's fun + interesting + extremely catered to my tastes and i like to see what relationship people form to the game design while they're playing