#so what’s the harm in believing?

[mxtxfanatic]

The funny thing about that scene is that Jiang Cheng is actually said to have questioned the truth of Wei Wuxian’s tale multiple times since he agreed to getting a new core. Even on the walk up to “Baoshan Sanren’s” mountain, he is still questioning if Wei Wuxian is lying to him. He knows that the tale is too fantastical to be true, but he is also afraid to dig more into it because he really wants a new golden core. Even way back in the Yi City arc, we are told that it is fantastical thinking to believe that even a sage like Baoshan Sanren can regrow limbs and organs out of thin air and that the only way to replace them is through donation. Even if Jiang Cheng believes that Wei Wuxian remembers Baoshan Sanren’s location (he doesn’t), he definitely doesn’t believe her capable of pulling a golden core from nothing. But all of this is really not the point, because Jiang Cheng is not bothered by where he gets his core from. He’s not even really bothered by who he gets it from. He’s bothered by what it says about him, his actions, and the specter of his “righteous fury” that Wei Wuxian did this for him in secret, and was willing to die with this secret despite Jiang Cheng having killed him once already.

“Just how much do you owe the Jiang Sect? Am I not supposed to hate you? Can I not hate you?! Why is it that now it’s like I’m supposed to have wronged you?! Why do I have to feel like I’m a fucking clown all these years?! What am I? Do I deserve to be blinded by all your dazzling splendor?! Am I not supposed to hate you?!”

—Chapt. 102, exr

This is what Jiang Cheng is bothered by. He is not bothered that he was lied to about Baoshan Sanren’s magically abilities because he was lied to, he is bothered by the realization that the people he hinged his entire life’s resentment and adulthood personality on are the very people who willingly and selflessly saved his life. He is bothered by the fact that he owed more life debts than he knew, that he couldn’t outsource to something else (like he did when he completely ignored the fact that Wen Ning returned his parents’ bodies to him). He isn’t in Guanyin Temple crying about how Wei Wuxian could bear to lie to him; he is crying about how dare Wei Wuxian’s ultimate act of selflessness make Jiang Cheng’s over a decade-long public grudge look like the tantrums of a clown. By his own design.

If we’re really being honest, Jiang Cheng has no issue relying on Wei Wuxian when he can outsource his gratitude to someone/-thing else. Despite the fact that he is knowingly relying on Wei Wuxian for a golden core, knowingly stealing Wei Wuxian’s favor to get a new golden core (in his mind), the person who “really” did anything was “Baoshan Sanren,” so Wei Wuxian can be neatly cut out of the list of people he “has to” feel gratitude towards. Knowing that it wasn’t Baoshan Sanren, that it was actually two “Wen-dogs” and the “son of a servant” that lived up to his clan’s motto better than him? THAT’S the insult.

"Jiang Cheng should have been allowed informed consent".

He did. As in he was informed he'd receive a core regardless and accepted. Also his issue was never about the harm it would cause to Wei Wuxian or the loss it would be for Wei Wuxian. It was compounded that he did owe grace to Wei Wuxian for what he had done for Jiang Cheng. Let's also stop omitting that Jiang Cheng was set on committing suicide by starving himself because he could no longer cultivate in direct contrast to Wei Wuxian reasoning that he was simply giving back what he had been given by the Jiang Clan anyways by giving his core that was developed with their methods.

The only reason he is upset about anything to do with that situation is that once again he did and always had relied on what Wei Wuxian said and did for him while constantly calling Wei Wuxian ungrateful.

[canisalbus]

What if I told you that RoobrickMarine went and wrote an entire novella starring my 16th century dog couple? It's very canon-adjacent, well researched and thoughtfully put together, has inspired me a ton during these past months and it's now publicly available at AO3. I highly recommend it.

✦ Separation ✦

[lazycranberrydoodles]

getting back into the untamed and i had a thought. / follow for more yllz babygirlism

[marypsue]

Man, it's cool and all if you see a metaphor for marginalisation in the monstrous, and if you want the power fantasy of 'what if you could just eat anybody who threatened you/pissed you off'. Me too.

However, as soon as you start saying 'no, these monsters are a 1:1 on Specific Marginalised Group, and you have to treat them in the fiction like they are directly representative of real human members of the marginalised group', BUT you also, in the fiction, make them hurt/kill/eat humans? And then try to shame me, your audience, for noticing or engaging with the bit where they kill people, because you made them directly representative of a real-world marginalised group? You have lost me, and also, I think, the plot.

[purplesaline]

Piracy is preservation, and authors would rather have their books in front of people who can't access many books for free instead of looking those people in the eye and saying "fork over your month's earnings"

Shut up

To be clear, I'm not against Piracy in general. In fact I'm not only an advocate, I'm a prolific pirate myself.

I'm sure you can find a handful of authors who feel that way, but those I know personally (one indie author and one traditionally published) as well as those I've seen comment on the issue are adamant that piracy has caused them significant personal harm.

They'd far rather people who can't afford their books use libraries to access them or, if the libraries they have access too don't carry the book(d), they'd rather people reach out to them personally to arrange for a copy within their budget (sometimes including for free).

Pirating books is not the same as pirating movies. It's the difference between attacking a Spanish galleon and a fishing sloop.

Bigger names like Brandon Sanderson, Steven King, Diana Gabaldon, etc have a entire fleet of sloops and are unlikely to miss a couple going missing, but the less famous (and thus less highly paid) authors can have their entire career ruined by their book being pirated. It can even prevent them from getting offered another book deal, meaning there won't be any more books by that author for you to read.

We aren't entitled to the intellectual property of others. Full stop.

If the author wanted their book to be free, they'd have made it freely available (as some do!). Maybe if everyone had a universal basic income that covered the cost of living we'd see more art available at no cost, but as it stands artists need to make a living too and that means they need to earn a profit to survive. If they can't do that with their art they have to find another way to do it which means less time and energy to make art.

Not to mention the advance an author gets is usual peanuts, and unlike actors who get paid by the time the movie is out, an advance isn't a wage and if the author doesn't sell enough books they have to give back whatever amount of the advance the sale of their books didn't cover. If they get a $5000 advance and only sell $3000 worth of books they owe the publisher $2000.

Again, I'm not against piracy. I am against harming individual artists to the point where it significantly impacts their career. I want more art in this world.

I'm also not telling people they can't, or shouldn't pirate books. I'm against it but I'm not trying to for e others to believe the same as me. I'm providing information so people can make a more informed decision and better understand the consequences of their choices.

So do what you will with the info I've provided. Just be willing to acknowledge the harm you cause with those choices. Even the piracy I take part in causes harm on a smaller scale.

I have no argument against "I don't care, I'm doing it anyway" and I won't bother trying to argue it.

[bluemoondust]

Realized the reason why I like Sunday is that he falls into the pretty delulu man who has the potential to become unhinged category of my faves (Mr. Reca too),,, Like,,,

He's the type of guy who believes they are the only person who can keep you from harm's way and from being tainted by the world. What's that? You are tainted? That's preposterous and untrue. He proceeds to act like he has never heard such a thing. Oh, how the world has already put such labels on you. It must be a burden. Luckily, he does not see you in such a way. You have been hurt, your heart has been broken, and your faith has been tested, but that does not mean you're far from saving. There is still a light within you and he will draw it out. He'll be your salvation. He forgives you for everything held against you; a true believer in your will and light.

Any sort of mental scars and/or trauma you may have are treated like wounds and need to recover under his care. You've been wounded too much to press on, let him take you in. The strong must protect the weak, after all. That was not meant to be an insult. He was once weak as well. He was someone weak before he grew stronger. Now he is strong enough to help others who are weak. You have to ask yourself at some point; how long until you can't keep going? Who will hold your hand then? It doesn't have to get to that point, you know. Just take his hand and everything will be alright. You won't have to worry about anything. You are better off without those burdens weighing you down. You are better off being free of the pain and anguish the world has to offer. He will make sure none of it reaches your senses.

Ignorance is bliss.

[luck-of-the-drawings]

[OLD ART ALERT] A COLLECTION OF SCENES FROM THE GILLIONS CATSCRATCH ARC THAT BROUGHT ME GREAT JOY. i love fishy chips especially when its just gillion being delirious and violent and hostile

[hellamorte]

do you ever think about how lucanis keeps losing and losing and losing — his entire life? losing his parents, losing his childhood because of the crow training, losing his freedom, his sleep, and one year of his life due to imprisonment. then the maker smiles upon him, and he's discovering something good (rook, the veilguard team, purpose), acquiring something back (his family, his life, his freedom, his job, his city), finding some peace in mundane things (coffee, cooking, taking care of others). it feels like the scales are finally moving, balancing — only for him to lose again. he loses caterina, he can lose his city to blight, he loses at weisshaupt, he loses grip on himself (thanks to spite), he loses control — he loses himself, piece by piece. rook can help lighten the load on his chest (thanks to spite), he gets caterina back, and breathing feels a little bit easier. but loss is not done with him. he loses illario, and it feels like losing a limb, a large piece of himself violently torn away. he's visibly shaken, but no one truly knows what it takes to string the assorted pieces of himself together and keep functioning. and then loss deals what seems like the final blow: some of his friends are dead or lost, and rook is gone, too. he failed; he only knows death, doesn't he? life only takes, and takes, and takes, giving only to tease and take it back. at that moment, he's falling apart completely — until they find rook, and there's a sliver of hope once again. the scales are moving, the team wins, they eventually go back to their lives — and that's when he realizes that the final blow is the life as the first talon.

[maythedreadwolftakeyou]

(DATV thoughts with spoilers ahead; i think my tags will keep it filtered but just in case it doesn't since i dont want this in the actual game tags)

i just... man. i don't have a well formulated thought for this yet (and its my PERSONAL OPINION and other people can feel as different as they want, this is not an attack) but it keeps bouncing around my head, so. i know the popular thing right now is coming up with in-universe justifications for The Pantry Almost-Kiss Scene in ways that imply Lucanis didn't mean it/it doesn't represent him as a person/he was Faking It.

and i just don't like any of them. they make me sad!!!!!! i don't like the idea that one of the like 4 romance scenes we get in this game is him Pretending in some way, even if he does at that point like Rook back at least somewhat. None of the justifications i've seen make me feel Better about that being the point where we declare him as a romantic interest, which is what it is in the game, functionally. It doesn't lock you in yet but that point IS where the game says "they will take your flirting more seriously now". I did those same scenes for Davrin, Emmrich, and Taash and this is the formula the game uses (the "interrupted almost-kiss/confession" happens for almost all of the companions).

so if the answer for Lucanis' is "actually he stopped because he Didn't like what he was doing/feel that way yet" or that he felt he had to pretend for Rook's sake... it's kind of a letdown you know? esspecially when it comes right after what seems like an actually authentic moment (dispelling his "perfectly gathered clouds of doom"). Because, at that point in the game from my/Rook's perspective, it was like he finally was reciprocating. It made me hope that he'd acknowledge whatever was between him & Rook more in future scenes, especially because you get so little else from him at any other point, in terms of flirting back/showing you he IS interested. like up to that point I felt kind of bad for continuing to flirt at him, when he'd just change the subject right after! if someone did that in real life i would take it as a hint to stop. This is pixels and not real people so I didn't but they have done "reluctant/fearful interest" better in other characters if that's truly what they were going for in this one.

so after finishing the romance and getting the rest of content... idk. I don't like saying "one of the major chunks of characterization we get needs to be Thrown Out Actually because he was Pretending". because it's not like he or Rook ever actually address it in game--you just don't get to talk about feelings until some dialogue choices only in the act 3 romance scene, and then his speech at endgame (not even a full conversation, so much as his personal declaration). like it takes until the VERY end of the game for him to say the thing about "he was afraid to want you", but that comes after you've already hooked up, even.

I think truly what annoys me is that it's a story choice that can only make sense in HINDSIGHT not AS PLAYING. Only once you have all the scenes can you say "this one is out of character" and then you either have to accept it as bad writing, or come up with some in-universe justification to explain it... and so far none of the in universe ones feel good to me. i wish they did because maybe then I'd be less annoyed, rip. but at the end of the day i think even if there was some intent there, it was a poor choice for his story arc, because it doesn't effectively convey anything... and the reason why we can project a lot of different explanations onto it is simply because it is never addressed again (and again, Lucanis Dellamorte is NOT A PERSON he is a CHARACTER used to further a story for you the player, and so the reasons I don't like this choice are story-level and not a dig at how real life people feel or act).

So yeah at the end of the day. that is simply not a narrative device I would ever personally use in this way on a player/reader. certain kinds of hindsight revelations have their place (see: what the devs tried to do with Varric though I also think that falls apart on close inspection, but at least it has justification in-universe), but for a romance it just makes me embarrassed for Rook. In a game where you don't have nearly as many back-and-forth conversations with characters and have to resort to eavesdropping on them talking to each other, it's sad that one of the like 5 times you actually get to talk to Lucanis one on one we're maybe supposed to believe he wasn't being authentic, and also that Rook can't respond to this ever. It would be different if it had any kind of follow up, imo. or honestly as i've said before i would rather it have been swapped out with something entirely different or where we get to talk about their feelings instead, before i get labeled as one of the "people mad he's not Zevran 2.0/a sexy latin sterotype".

But having to step back to player-level analysis versus in-character analysis when looking at his whole romance arc just feels sloppy. but i'd much rather stick to "bad writing" than "intentional character choice" in terms of how to interpret the scene I guess, at this point, for poor Rook's sake. and i know people disagree with when I've said that before bc as much as I love Mary Kirby in other areas, she has said many times that she doesn't like writing romance, and I think it really does show here. As much as I love Lucanis and the scraps we got I wish I didn't have to do so much filling-in-the-blanks on our own.

[krikidilly]

Yours is a life worth living.

[phoebespenglers]

can we please stop telling people to kill themselves and to rot in hell and that they deserve to be bullied and that they are inherently horrible people who deserve to die and get doxxed. please. can we please stop doing that.

[venomouslilith]

.

[cinderflower]

Last night someone very close to me made a remark of "I don't know how you write from scratch, I love using chatgpt, it makes it so easy and I don't have to think".

It seems innocent enough as a statement, but especially in the light of everything currently happening in the world, it's a reflection of the current mindset of the average person. They meant it as a half-compliment and expected me to respond by agreeing with them by saying writing is hard. And to an extent, yes, it absolutely is. It's something that's deeply time consuming and takes a lot of effort if you want to get very good at it and hone it as a craft.

But at the same time, it's not hard at all. Just writing for the sake of writing, for the pure intent and joy of creating something, only requires that you have an idea and put forth the time and effort to create something out of it. Writing can be a book, a fanfic, a blog post, a journal entry, or hell even a background story for a DND character - it's all writing and it's all valid, no matter what your skill level is because it's something you are making.

"Why put forth all that effort when you can just ask [insert AI tool here] to do it?"

The act of writing and creating should never be viewed as something unfathomable and unattainable without the assistance of AI. It is something that each and every person is capable of. It is something that humans have been doing for thousands of years. To create is to be human - do not let them convince you that you are incapable of it. Or worse, that it is not worth your time.

I don't know who needs to hear this, but just because something is convenient doesn't mean it should be used. There's a reason why it's being pushed so aggressively by the same large tech corporations and billionaires that are directly funding fascist agendas. There's a reason they're actively trying to dismantle the public education system.

Anti-intellectualism is the goal.

It's a well-documented and researched phenomenon that the less educated a population is, the better it is for capitalists and fascists. An educated population is more likely to organize and engage in critical thinking and criticism because they are able to analyze and understand the underlying sources of the systemic flaws that are the heart of the problem. An uneducated population will allow themselves to be divided and will happily be exploited. They will actively advocate against their own best interests.

There's a reason they are pushing AI so strongly in creative fields and are trying to automate away those jobs specifically. Because not only is creativity skilled labor, it is not guaranteed to be profitable. To them, you are more valuable as cheap, uneducated, unskilled workers that can be more easily alienated from your labor.

It goes hand in hand with the rise of "gig economy" jobs (uber, door dash, etc) and the systemic dismantlement of labor protections. Not only do they want you to be uneducated, they want you to be isolated, poor, and overworked. They want as many hours of your labor as they can possible squeeze from you for the lowest cost and highest profits. They want you to be exhausted in your free time and to fill the void in your heart with rampant consumerism to keep you docile and put more money in their pockets. It's in part why things like phones, tvs, and other formerly luxury goods focused on mindless entertainment have become so cheap.

Time spent on creativity that doesn't drive profit is considered wasteful, but it is also considered dangerous. It encourages critical thinking, community, and it opens the door for people to engage with "radical" ideas that through AI tools they can censor and ensure don't surface. It is why any pro-censorship arguments are inherently pro-fascist. Make no mistake - they are doing everything in their power to make it as desirable as possible to not pursue creative endeavors or engage with anything outside of the carefully cultivated messages in the entertainment they provide.

Instead of turning to chatgpt or whatever other AI tool is out there the next time you want to create something - don't. Challenge yourself to create it on your own. It doesn't matter how "bad" or "sloppy" it is because that's the beauty of it. No one starts out as a master of their craft, their writing becomes better over time because they practice. They write and write and write even if they never publish it. They learn and grow with every piece they create. That is something worth celebrating, now more than ever.

Do not be docile and blindly accept the tools they hand you.

Do not welcome the boot they intend to use to crush you.

Do not advocate for your own demise.

[the-woman-upstairs]

Luther reassuring Ethan that he has no regrets about their partnership

[batcavescolony]

What ever you do don't think about Percy reading Estelle a little kid version of 'The Odyssey' because that's what Sally read to him but he doesn't want to scare her. Don't imagine Sally looking on with guilt in her eyes cus she HAD to read him the real one so he knew what to expect. Don't think about Sally looking down on her little girl with tears in her eyes cus she doesn't need to worry about snakes in her bed or teachers being Cyclopes. Don't think of Sally seeing Estelle with Paul and having to leave the room cus when Percy was that age they had Gabe. Don't think of the unimaginable guilt that Sally must feel for being relieved that Estelle's biggest battle at 16, is her Dad being her teacher. And whatever you do don't think about Percy feeling like an outsider in his own family even though he gets constantly reassured that he's part of it and loved.