#shit what's the tag

[ghostwise]

mors omnibus communis :: 1,088 words tags: act 1, cleric of shar, cleric of kelemvor, discussions of death and mortality and also how hot women are, shadowheart x tav

Zirahuén can feel it, if she focuses: a pressure, a tiny heartbeat like a faint twitch of a muscle. The presence of the parasite invites dizzy spells, flashes of light, mood swings… It's something she can ignore, most of the time.

But at night, when it's her and the glow of the campfire, and the smoke stretching up to the heavens in a serene column, it's more difficult. A lot more.

Ceremorphosis. It's not only her life, but her very soul which is at stake. So, if she's crying it is only proof of its stubborn persistence. A display of weakness, sure, but it is hers.

(Oh, let her indulge a while longer. Existence is bittersweet. Let her feel it, while it lasts.)

She doesn't let up crying—won't do anything to stem any genuine expression her heart comes up with, no, not while she can still feel it—not even when footsteps sound nearby.

They are light and even in their stride. Zirahuén listens. The footsteps skirt the edge of her camp, and then come to a halting stop. Whoever it is does not speak. Who is it, lurking in the shadows?

With a shiver of her shoulders, she sits up.

But already the figure is gone, leaving her alone in the night.

-

The following day is better. There is a funeral.

Gale discovers the murdered man in a thicket of trees. He has been hastily concealed; perhaps a victim of some highway robbery, as they are far from the nearest settlement. The perfect place for a crime.

Zirahuén crouches near the body. She sniffs the air gently. She runs her gloved hand through the dirt; little insects teem through the soil, already well on their way to consuming the corpse. She can spot the discoloration of the hands, and the eyes.

"A day," she says. "Perhaps two."

"Seems about right. How unfortunate," Astarion sighs. "They've a rancid taste at this stage. Although… eugh, no, nevermind."

"Poor man," Gale hums. "I propose we move on quickly. I would hate for us to meet a similar fate. After all, whatever factors precipitated his death could very well remain in the area."

"You all may move on," Zirahuén says, unclasping a pouch from her belt. With a smooth flick she unrolls it, displaying her funerary tools: Incense and sweet oils, prayer scrolls, and more, the sight of which make Lae'zel groan and roll her eyes.

"Again! What is the purpose of adorning a stranger's death in this manner?" she asks.

"All deaths are holy," Zirahuén replies.

"So you have said," Lae'zel states in a tone which is perhaps less derisive than usual. "But we know not of this man's identity, his merits nor his achievements. We cannot judge his life aptly, so-"

"You all may move on if you wish," Zirahuén interjects. "I'll catch up."

The breath leaves Lae'zel in a hiss. She shoulders her bag and starts down the path without another word, while the others follow suit.

"You sure?" Wyll calls out.

"I am," Zirahuén assures him.

"I'll stay with you," Shadowheart says.

This earns a sidelong glance from Astarion as Lae'zel picks up her pace, aiming to be out of earshot as quickly as possible. But Shadowheart comes to kneel beside Zirahuén, and gestures to the funeral supplies. "I can ensure your safety while you tend to him."

Zirahuén meets her gaze, dark brown eyes framed by thick lashes. Dark brown, nearly black. She nods.

Then, without waiting a moment longer, and as the retreating figures of their companions disappear into the distance, she lulls her mind into that magic sliver of space between Here and There. Where the dead can converse with the living. Where the gulf between them is not very wide at all.

-

The sunlight casts sharp shadows on Zirahuén's face when she finishes. It's nearing dusk.

The man is washed and buried. His spirit can rest, having been given the chance to rage, to question, to weep, to share all about his life and about the villains who brought it to its (in his view) premature end. But the epitaph on his makeshift headstone simply reads his name.

Shadowheart, in all this time, has spoken not a word. Giving the deceased his privacy seems only right to her; she pictures the roles reversed, and understands it is not her business to know a thing about him. In fact, she has no interest. But she has watched Zirahuén with an utterly unreadable expression all the while.

There is so much certainty in what she does. There's not even a hint of a flinch or a tremor. Not when the man first seethed his angry words at her, accusing her of pilfering his things. Not when a grub slid from the wound at his side, when she buried him. In fact, she'd moved it out of the way kindly. It hadn't done anything wrong. It was fulfilling its natural role.

Beautiful.

Zirahuén is utter calm, utter quiet. At least, when it comes to death.

The tiefling seems renewed when she comes to sit beside her. The funeral has stirred something within her. Is it catharsis? Is it love? There is an energy about her that Shadowheart finds—surely Shar understands—compelling.

(She will not call it enticing. Compelling is the proper word.)

But she cannot rightly say, So what is your relationship with Death? You seem very at ease. One could say you are all aglow. One could even say it suits you. Death. And dying.

She cannot say what she thinks, or Zirahuén will surely take it the wrong way.

So she doesn't say anything.

For a while they sit in silence. The breeze picks up, bringing the scent of flowers from far away. It tousles Zirahuén's hair in dark curls, like a nighttime river. She shuts her dark eyes—

"I hope," Shadowheart speaks, her heart doing an odd sort of skip in her chest, "I hope you are the one to do my funeral."

Zirahuén slowly opens her eyes and turns to look at her, a tiredness to her gaze, yet also something curious and inquiring.

(Orchids. New moons. Forgotten pantheons. Shadowheart swallows the feeling down.)

"You are marvelous at it. People so often fight against the end, yet you… embrace it." Shadowheart hopes her explanation makes sense. It is quite out of her comfort zone, but she finds the words leaving her all the same, in a breathless rush: "I admire that."

Zirahuén smiles.

It seals Shadowheart's fate, but neither know it yet.

[musubiki]

my favorite fields of mistria boys 🥰

[excali8ur]

When you meet your past lives but they're all ignoring you and freaking out over this one guy?

I've seen a few versions of this floating around with the different Leos and I wanted to have a go at doing one for Mikey. They're all collectively realising what a bus sized bullet they dodged by not ending up as messed up as Ronin

[lunarlivs]

pov: you’re harry being born to a bunch of 21 year olds

their thoughts and doodles below the cut <3

[ikiprian]

Mr. Fenton is a competent teacher. Almost too competent.

If Mr. Daniel Fenton had any more than a BS (with a minor in education), Tim would’ve flagged his profile as a potential Rogue. That’s the way of most charismatic academics, at least in Gotham. (Got a PhD? Instant watchlist.) Instead, he’s Gotham Academy’s newest celebrity, as a young, passionate, out-of-towner substitute while the chemistry teacher’s on maternity leave.

Tim gets the hype. Fenton seems to genuinely love teaching, and is invested in the welfare of the student body. He hands out bananas during exam week, hosts a “study habits seminar” each month to coach effective learning strategies, and the third time Tim falls asleep in his class, he even pulls Tim aside to ask if he’s doing okay. With all the late work he accepts and the protein bars he sneaks Tim, he’s every teen vigilante’s dream teacher. He could’ve been Tim’s favorite.

In fact, Mr. Fenton was Tim’s favorite. Up until Tim walks into Mr. Fenton’s chemistry classroom for a forgotten textbook, an hour after the final bell.

On the board where tallied scores for today’s review game had been kept, “THE CHEMISTRY BEHIND DR. CRANE’S FEAR GAS: ANXIOGENICS, NERI’S, & YOU,” is now scrawled. A detailed diagram of the human endocrine system projects in front of a small crowd of adoring and attentive students.

Fenton is wrist-deep in the skull cavity of an anatomical model. A short tug, and out pops the brain.

It’s plastic. It’s fake.

Tim identifies the nearest emergency exit.

Fenton turns to the door, and in the dark classroom with the projector illuminating half his face, his eyes almost seem to flash red. “What’s up, Tim?” he asks. His friendly grin is too big for his face. “I didn’t know you wanted to join the Just Science League!”

[OR: Danny’s a science teacher at Tim’s school. Gotham’s a pretty wild place, even for someone who grew up a superhero in a ghost-infested town, so he takes it upon himself to start a club teaching kids how to manage themselves in the event of a crisis. These Gothamites are pretty hardy, but a little extra training never hurt anybody! And he suspects one of his students might be a teen vigilante, like he’d been, back in the day. As a senior super, it's Danny’s duty look out for him! Surely, this is the subtlest and most appropriate way to give the kid pointers.]

[Tim immediately assumes supervillain.]

[sandflakedraws]

re : how each brother reacts learning that they can't go back

you'll have to pry the "all the Brozone Bros knew what happened at the tree" headcanon outta my cold, dead dead dead hands.

[nova-rpv]

a redraw of the first drawing i posted here to celebrate the fact that ive been in tumblr for more than a whole year posting my shit and havent deleted my blog in panic yippee \:D/ (mushy rant in tags)

[piratespencil]

This is so funny to me. Reducing them down to their simplest attributes. Turning them into symbols.

[tastelesssandwiches-reheated]

[gophergal]

Guilt tripping people does nothing but cause vulnerable folks to spiral and make folks who dont live with moral OCD feel negatively toward your cause

[mewos-laptop]

Dude I need ppl to get real normal abt mental-illness born alterhumanity real fast

"Oh well alterhumanity is smth you're born w/ and there's all these rules !!!" No lmao

There are literally no rules, and I NEED ppl to stop spreading that false info online lmaoooo

Literally if you feel like an animal (nonhuman) in any way shape or form, then literally use the label.

Ppl irl will try their best to understand, and literally no one outside of the internet cares abt sum1's identity as much as you think they will.

Tbh just live true to yourself, and dude, shoutout to my alterhumans who are non-human in whatever way because of their neurodivergency/mental illness. I see y'all, and I love y'all.

[tofixtheshadows]

This is one of my favorite minor details in Dungeon Meshi, firstly because what in the femme fatale, but also because it's one of those little things that raises so many questions about worldbuilding.

The Occam's Razor defense attorney in me says that Ryoko Kui gave Kabru a boot knife because she wanted him to escape from his bonds here. And Kabru is a very competent swordsman, why wouldn't he have a boot knife, sure. He's already got a dagger, he can have this too.

And yet: the implications. Kabru, why do you have that? That is not remotely something that could be easily accessed or used in combat. Nobody is pulling out a pen knife from the heel of their boot during a fight with a monster. It's useless in the dungeon ... unless you're the type of person who isn't just worried about monsters.

I've mentioned this before, but I consider one of Kabru's functions in the narrative as being the character who fully brings the idea of human ecosystems into the story. There's a reason why he's always connected to large groups of people (Toshiro's party, the Canaries). He (along with Mr. Tansu, briefly) introduces the reader to the social and political forces working on the dungeon, showing us that none of this is happening in a monster-filled vacuum. His confrontation with the corpse retrievers, who very nearly kill Kabru's party permanently with their reckless murder-for-money scheme, reminds us that monsters are not the only things that prey on humans. Kabru understands the ways the dungeon causes people to put profit over human lives.

We only get hints of it in the story, but like any gold-rush-style economic boom, it's implied that there is a lot of crime and corruption surrounding the dungeon.

So yeah, it really makes me wonder why Kabru keeps a tiny knife in his boot, meant to be carried on him even in situations where he would otherwise be unarmed. Stored exactly in the place where it's easy to reach, even if, for some reason, your hands are tied behind your back.

[alfheimr]

you feel real to me.

[hrokkall]

Mama gave me music lessons,

now I play the saddest songs

[thevioletcaptain]

i genuinely don't care how good a piece of ai generated art or writing looks on the surface. i don't care if it emulates brush strokes and metaphor in a way indistinguishable from those created by a person.

it is not the product of thoughtful creation. it offers no insights into the creator's life or viewpoint. it has no connection to a moment in time or a place or an attitude. it has no perspective. it has no value.

it's empty, it's hollow, and it exists only to generate clicks (and by extension, ad revenue.)

it's just another revolting symptom of the disease that is late stage capitalism, and it fucking sucks.

[juniorectobiologist]

ouppies PART ONE

PART TWO <- here