#some by virtue fall

[ariaste]

"Dear Blorbo" Advice Column

Are you a fan of the Chantiverse books? Have you ever wanted to ask a fictional character for advice in a sticky situation? Now is your chance! Submit your burning questions via the google form below.

Questions may be addressed to any character from my books. Silly questions, serious questions, fake questions, and horny questions are all welcome! Your choice of which character to address will naturally determine the seriousness of the answer you get. ;)

(Answers will be published on Instagram, Tumblr, and perhaps elsewhere.)

[starful02]

Let's give a warm welcome to Yield Under Great Persuasion! Looking for a cozy m/m romantasy for the fall? This might be the novella for you! It features a local gremlin of a man named Tam Beckett and his long-standing complication who is sunshine in a human form, Nicolau Lyford. Follow Tam as he begins the messy, hard process of not only figuring himself out and becoming better but also figuring Lyford out, who he has known since childhood and has not forgiven him for a vegetable smashing, contest entry ruining incident that happened they were nine. Them sleeping together for the last ten years being irrelevant of course. It took me four days to read but I was also a very busy human who used every bit of free time to read this book and enjoyed every second of it! There is a gorgeous aching warmth to this book that is unlike any other that l've ever read. Even some of the conversations l've never seen in another. So it should come to no surprise that I highly recommend checking it out if any of this calls to you! If not, check out @_alexrowland’s instagram post about it for more info!

[sabertoothjello]

solution: Alexandra Rowland

they’ve got IT ALL

quality worldbuilding? YES

excellent romance? YOU BET

gay sex? ABSOLUTELY

a taste of gold and iron has a whole section about economics and how currency works and also YEARNING

Some By Virtue Fall = theater lesbians

Yield Under Great Persuasion = romance + therapy + gay sex

A Taste of Gold and Iron = the Prince Of Anxiety Disorders and his Bodyguard (and a whole cast of AMAZING side characters) (and Tadek, who deserves his own category)

Running Close to the Wind = pirates and SO MANY DICK JOKES god you won’t believe the number of dick jokes and also other jokes listen this book is HILARIOUS. i started listening to it on the treadmill at the gym and a significant number of the people around me probably thought i was insane for how often i randomly started laughing while walking on the treadmill

To summarize:

@ariaste

me, reading fantasy book not explicitly about romance: why is nobody horny where is the spice why did that fade to black me, reading romance books: why is everybody that horny all the time and why is romance literally the only thing that takes up space in these people's minds can I please have some plot and worldbuilding

evergreen mood why am I like this why is it so rare to get me a book that can do both

kushiel's dart has ruined me

[fumifooms]

Dungeon lord Chilchuck

What would his wish as a dungeon lord be? What would he be like? Headcanons & speculation post for fun. But I’ll start with analytic lead up because that’s always fun for me, though feel free to skip and skim.

When it comes to what Chilchuck’s dungeon lord desires could/would be like we have mainly 3 hints: His nightmare, his succubus and what the winged lion says to him.

Why: — From what we see nightmares are based on the person’s worst fears and insecurities, both Laios’ and Marcille’s nightmare were closely tied to their dungeon lord wishes (Laios’ dream monster being summoned to crush the ghosts of relationships that represented the pressure to fit in and belong, Marcille seeking control over death and aging through magic to avoid loss), the fuel behind their desire/goal if you will. Fear and deep-seated desires are seemingly closely tied, something also supported by Thistle and Mithrun’s reigns as dungeon lords (Thistle proving his worth through fulfilling his given duty + protecting his loved ones, being listened to instead of having to listen, Mithrun escaping rigid two-faced elven society and living in a wonderland where he has no enemies and he’s loved, free from everyone he knew yet propped up by the person symbolizing his brother being chosen over him, the bastard child).

— I’ve talked about the significance I assign to the succubi often by now, but rundown: What we see of each character is all very telling if you care to listen, it shows not only someone’s "ideal form" but what they want from it. Izutsumi’s is familial, offering a hug and comfort, Marcille’s is romantic with a character she knows and loves, offering a kiss on a hand and a connection regardless of how distant it actually is, and Laios’ is platonic, arguable at first but then Laios’ fear of judgement is placated and he is offered the picture perfect friend group that accepts his interest (if you want my full look at Laios’ succubus go here). They take on the most alluring form, most ideal person of their victim, even uncovering deep subconscious desires, so precisely and effectively to the point it leaves victims physically frozen before the object of their desire. Succubi and the demon are themselves tied in lore and it’s easy to see how similar their core skill are. Succubi don’t give a good idea of what a character would wish for on their own but they certainly give hints on what they crave, regardless of how you want to read it.

— Last bit is self-explanatory. To placate Chilchuck and win his compliance over, the monster that reads your soul like an open book offers to give him something specific. But! It’s also important to remember that the lion isn’t offering to fulfill Chilchuck’s dream world wish here, it’s a second prize, because his goal with what he promised Laios is that they’d stay in this world, away from everyone and everything else. Chilchuck wants to get away but is kept back, and it’s here the lion placates him with "hey it’s okay! You can’t do that but I can still give you this! This is enough right? It’ll make everything easier on you".

What each bit says: — Long version in another post. Tldlr: His daughters and family are obviously important to him, and this reinforces that he takes on the role of protector a lot, he’s constantly worried for his party members’ lives and implicitly his family’s. Safety and stability, both economical and otherwise, are his core values and goals, and he berates both others and himself if someone fails on those fronts. Here, there’s the fear of not being enough, of not having been able to protect, and of course of loss.

— Chil’s succubi are obviously sexual, and not only that but agressively and straightforwardly so. It’s not like Marcille’s where there’s personality involved, all they do is give him sultry looks and pretty smiles before jumping on him. His succubi aren’t like Izutsumi’s, always the same exact person and appearance, so it’s not someone but an appealing general idea. The idea of a sexual being he can regard as simply a gorgeous piece of meat and a good time no strings attached. In my interpretation, especially with my reading of Laios’ succubus where even with deep-seated desires negative emotions can be too intense to effectively freeze a victim, I think this doesn’t contradict his character. Relationships have been painful to him in the past, in the succubus scene when his wife gets mentioned his immediate reaction is to yell "Don’t bring her up now!", like with his habit of drinking and as a tallman liking his senses feeling dulled, it’s about not having to feel emotions with how difficult they are to deal with sometimes and just feeling good, or at least not having to think, for a while. If a succubus showcases someone’s ideal connection with an ideal person, then Chilchuck’s is with a pretty person that doesn’t stir any negative memory or drama, someone low stakes and low maintenance that doesn’t require him to manage or talk out feelings because there’s none involved in the first place.

— Once more, wife and family are important! He does long for his family, not only his wife but his daughters, and vice versa. This suggests not only that he wants good relationships with them but that he wants them to be with him, a family life. Far from the cut communication they all more of less have during canon, and perhaps far from their life pre-canon when he worked away from home a significant amount of time. We’ve seen recreations of people by the winged lion before with doppelgangers and monsters (naga), and though he claims he can make satisfying imitations, what we’ve seen is that they base themselves on the best memories of that person, like with Marcille’s dad, or twist behavior to be more pleasant, like Mithrun’s lover (and possibly twist appearances depending on the person’s view of them, but that’s Mithrun analysis). The line does suggest Chilchuck would want his family members as they are in reality and not idealized versions, but the circumstances are chaotic and urgent enough in the scene (and again the lion isn’t fulfilling Chilchuck’s wish but trying to make him content for Laios’) that it could just be the winged lion saying what he needs to to convince him the fastest possible, and like we see with Laios that can crumble to give way to deeper or more complex desires.

On top of that we just have general info on Chil. How does Chilchuck deal w his issues? What does he like to do? He likes alcohol and ignoring his problems. We have to remember there is a split between what someone would consciously wish for and what their soul uncontrollably irrationally craves. As always with Dunmeshi, there’s a narrative of irrational deep-seated desires vs active wants, what you crave vs what you strive for, what you dream of vs what’s actually good for you, the animal vs the human inside you, heart vs mind. Chilchuck craving a harem of hot babes in his fantasies but wanting his family life & wife back again is not mutually exclusive. You may crave becoming a monster and tasting what humans are like a little but still want to save the world & your friends more.

Btw can we adress the irony of him terrified of being the last one alive, of being left by his daughters and wife, of having left and coming back home one day to see everything gone or rampaged, yet not caring about dying of liver failure himself, knowing every time that he enters a dungeon there’s a real risk he may not come out. Die somewhere I can’t see you. I prefer leaving you than being left behind. He’s selfish and shortsighted like that… Chilchuck is selfless in many ways of course, but perhaps also due to his own relationship with his parents, he often undermines the effects he has on others in his relationships, both the good and the bad (he talks himself down about being cowardly and greedy yes, but never hints at his bad health habits, alcoholism and starving himself, may have affected his loved ones, doesn’t question his wife falling into a bad mood the night before she left, and talks about the possibility of dying here and there very casually, though obviously he tries his best to stay alive when it doesn’t concern his health).

Chilchuck king of "Let me just avoid and ignore my problems surely they’ll go away, things might work out and if they don’t well tough luck I’ll survive and I probably deserve it anyways". If I don’t look at it it will dissapear <3 Why care when you can simply not think about it.

You might not understand Mister "my love will stay strong through months of work travel and also 4 years of separation" and Mister "well idk my siblings and me are kinda strangers and my dad is dead but that’s kinda whatever", but typically relationships need some form of maintenance and emotional availability…

The actual headcanons finally

I kinda have 2 routes in mind for dunlord Chil and both of them are centered on "I care too much, i wish things were easy", so first is a lot like his succubi, it’s full on indulging in his guilty pleasures like alcohol and bodies and it’s to keep him in a constant state of thrill and euphoria and distracted, unfeeling about stuff that really matters. "Nothing matters except that I’m enjoying the moment!" vibe. He gets to live a life worthy of Dionysus, with alcohol and women and debauchery and like— never having to think again, never having to feel anything but pleasure again, never have to feel guilty or shitty or angry or sad. He has a harem and gets everything on a silver platter.

Breaking news demon magic-induced rush of euphoria and power still not enough to cure this man of his self-hatred nor his capacity for thought!! But in his case a state of euphoria is what he seeks I think, to kinda mask or replace the Everything Else.

The other is what I think closer to what canon suggests, with what WL implied too with "I’ll make you a new wife and kids like the originals!! 😊", it’s a (spoilers) Wandavision type thing where it’s a slice of life where he’s never at work and always at home and the family eats lunches at the dinner table together and everything and everyone at any moment is just. Happy. No issues. It was all a dream, this is real and everything is fine and your family is perfect and happy. I like to think the timeline would be wonky, his daughters would fluctuate in age, but he’d want to be there for what he missed, would want them to still rely on him and look up to him like when they were young, would like to forget that they’re now independent adults and the distance that grew between Chilchuck and his siblings is happening between them as well. Chil would want doppelgangers of his family imo, at its core just a general wish for a peaceful happy family life with no drama, no need to compromise, a little paradise of unconditional love and no consequences. It’s for sure straightforward, but Chilchuck is a man with straightforward desires…

But see Chilchuck is a greedy man, and he wants it both ways without having to sacrifice anything or expanding any efforts himself. He wants to have his cake and eat it too. I think playing with these two opposite directions and mixing and matching is most fun. Him leading a life where he indulges in all his worst habits while still having everything he wants… Him getting to have BOTH his wife and any woman he can imagine up, his life like two sides of a coin he can flip at any moment where he’s partying then he’s at home enjoying the quiet and his toddler daughters playing with toys on the carpet. Christ when you remember it’s all an illusion that’s terrifying, the doppelgangers and succubi from the winged lion playing chilchuck ping pong.

A safe little haven both security-stability wise and emotionally. Gets to have both the relaxing and the thrilling in any dose he wants, mixed or separatedly. What I’d argue he had pre-canon too: Can live it up in taverns away from home, stays away from home for long periods of time, and can come back to home aka the symbol of relaxation and safety whenever he decides to. Something he can leave and come back to at will, an anchor he can trust in (until it’s taken from him and his wife leaves. Or in his worse nightmare people rush in and kill his daughters). The ideal of a house and family to a working man, perhaps…

I think it’s fun to think on wether or not these desires would be interesting at all to the winged lion… In canon he seeks out "rare/complex desires", common simple things like I imagine riches, sex, substances and pleasure would be are boring to him, he’s eaten those so many times already. So perhaps he wouldn’t last long as a dunlord, the WL would want to eat him fully quick, can’t keep him interested or waiting long for a meager meal, too much effort raising the cattle and too low quality meat. By making it more twisted or layered Chil’s desire would become more desirable to the demon, it’s part of what’s fun with the third option to me. But whatever. Has he ever eaten a guy with this much repression and self-sabotage... Like trying to get the meat out of a walnut, enrichment…

Other dunlord Chil takes I’ve seen that are fun and good:

@feelo-fick and @pluvio-floret have a dunlord Chilchuck AU project dubbed "tragedy AU" where Chilchuck is said to be "on vacation", in a weird delirious state, only half-there half of the time… From which he doesn’t want to wake up </3 Quoting Feelo, this is why the vacation thing is only a half-joke cause he is 1) letting all his responsibilities go 2) indulging in himself and 3) "spending time with his family" <- lie but you get what i mean. Additional comments that have me vigorously nodding: because changing is hard why cant things just be okay right now without the effort !!! Life is hard he’s so so tired he just wants to feel good… he just wants life to feel nice and easy for a sec while he can learn to breathe again and lose the stress and trauma he’s accumulated…….. spoiler alert yes !!! in fact a depressed person can suck themselves into their job and lock out the world who wouldve thought !!!

And then Cabinette I know posted about his dunlord take once but I don’t have the link, in which Chil has a lot of nosebleeds because of mana overload which is fun and interesting to think about imo~

In dunmeshi, where characters get underground pockets of the world as their playground disconnected from everything outside and the rest of the world, it’s important to remember to face reality even if it has conflict and people with different views and stances from you, it’s something Chilchuck and Marcille and everyone needed to learn, and the thing with a dungeon lord AU is that you imagine a timeline where he fails to <3

A timeline where his dungeon lord wish is to desire nothing bc hope and want has only ever hurt him would also go so hard. Very universal thing though I suppose.

… And this is why a Chilchuck-centric Coraline AU is really really interesting and fitting and topical— Ok that’ll go in a separate reblog/post at @Fumiku I need to let this end

[widowshill]

— And do you or do you not have difficulty remembering such simple instructions? — Only during thunderstorms, sir.

THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1965) / DARK SHADOWS (1966)

[tombstoneswerewaiting]

infinity on high vs vices and virtues part 2

[part 1]

[good-to-drive]

I totally agree with the general consensus that Ringo provided a lot of emotional support and coolheadedness to the other beatles to the point where they'd have probably killed each other without him but I do also wonder sometimes how much of that is being supernaturally patient and easygoing and how much of it is Ringo just having a tumultuous and isolated childhood where he was never taught to recognize and assert his own emotional needs so he became a blank slate on which others could process their emotions

(And tbh I also wonder how an inability to access or assert his feelings may have contributed to his tendency to process pain by numbing himself and the pretty shitty way he treated women)

[wackus-bonkus-maximus]

wackus helpppp how do you decide which enneagram characters are you're the enneagram person help meeeee

hello empress you have come to the right place!! you know i cannot shut up about the enneagram esPECIALLY when it comes to fictional characters hehe!

it's actually pretty straightforward imo. a character needs 3 key elements to be good; a desire, a fear, and a flaw. the enneagram gives us all of that, making it a perfect tool for character building.

type 1 - the reformer (marinette & kagami)

core desire: to be good, right, better, perfect core fear: being evil/ corrupt/ wrong flaw: judgemental, critical (esp of themselves)

type 2 - the helper (nino & sabrina)

core desire: to be loved core fear: being unwanted, unloved, unworthy flaw: manipulative, coercive

type 3- the achiever (chloe & lila)

core desire: being valuable, worthwhile core fear: being worthless flaw: exploitative, deceptive, narcissistic

type 4 - the individualist (gabriel, zoe)

core desire: identity, significance core fear: being insignificant, oblivion, the void flaw: dramatic, melancholic

type 5 - the investigator (felix, max)

core desire: knowledge, understanding, being competent core fear: being incapable or incompetent flaw: reclusive, unemotional

type 6 - the loyalist (roland, mylene)

core desire: being secure, stable core fear: crisis, chaos flaw: suspicious, paranoid

type 7 - the enthusiast (adrien, kim)

core desire: experience, fulfillment core fear: deprivation, missing out flaw: impulsive, materialistic

type 8 - the challenger (alya, majestia)

core desire: autonomy core fear: being harmed, controlled flaw: dominating, confrontational

type 9 - the peacemaker (luka, master fu)

core desire: harmony core fear: conflict, separation from others flaw: self-forgetting, indolent

of course a character can have more desires, fears, and flaws than just these! the enneagram will just be a jumping off point for you. for example, knowing a type 9 character yearns for peace with everyone, fears separation, and can't say no to anybody can also extend into further study. they can't say no, so they become detached from their friends and family so they don't HAVE to say no, then end up not being there for them when it's important. and boom there you go, character conflict 👉🏼👉🏼thank you enneagram!

i hope this helps you and makes your characters sparkle off the page 💖 please don't ever hesitate to send me more enneagram asks 😍 you know i am obsessed.

check out these links for more!

the miraculous enneagram post nobody asked for

the enneagram institute

[a-very-zilly-gooze]

ok but folie à deux is such an underrated album. makes me want to beat up men and wear over-the-top winged eyeliner and leather jackets and skinny jeans and drive entirely too fast down desolate roads late at night. genuinely my favorite fall out boy album, 10/10.

[artemisiafem]

Ok last post before I sleep, I’m generally finding this course to be interesting - it’s looking at global politics through a feminist lens, and while each topic really deserves its own course, it’s been ok. But it’s so clear how vilified radical feminism is, in the Introduction to Feminism week there was one mention of radical feminism, only in relation to the split between gender critical feminists and TRAs. There was no mention of radical feminism in the slides about feminist history, and no mention of any feminist thinkers who explicitly identified as radical feminists. The slide listing types of feminism had “Islamic feminism” but no radical feminism. It just makes me sad, honestly.

[sanguinepeccatorum]

Tag Dump!! <3

The Gate to Tomorrow is Not the Light of Heaven but the Darkness of the Depths of the Earth. || Final Fantasy 7 || ,

I Was Frozen in Time but Now I Feel as if my Time is Just Beginning. || Advent Children ||,

To Escape from a World of Illusions. I Wonder if it is Better. || Post Dirge of Cerberus || ,

And This. This is my Punishment. || Post Dirge of Cerberus AU ||,

Hearing Your Stories Has Added Upon Me Yet Another Sin. More Nightmares Will Come to Me Now. More Than I Previously Had. || Return to the Turks AU ||,

Our Battlefield is Now Beneath the Earth. || Devil May Cry ||,

Some Rise by Sin and Some by Virtue Fall. || Metal Gear ||,

True Power is Not Something That is Found by Those Who Seek It. || Final Fantasy XV ||,

Civilization Begins With Order and Grows With Liberty and Dies With Chaos. || Final Fantasy XVI ||,

[starful02]

Sometimes there's nothing better than sitting down with a favored cup of tea and a good book. Especially now that the cooler months are settling in. And what better book to do it with than Yield Under Great Persuasion? Yield is a cozy, fall romantasy (romance fantasy) featuring the shenanigans of local goblin of man named Tam Becket, who owns a tea shop, and Nicolau Lyford, lord of the local manor. Follow these two have they deal with nosy but wonderful gods, an adorable infant with a fragile heart, and trudging through the difficult quest for self care, forgiveness, a second chance, and the revelation of the deeply precious knowledge of that someone loves every bit of you and always has. Yield is the third installment of the Seven Gods Series (the others being "The Lights of Ystrac's Woods" and "Somd by Virtue Fall") that takes place in the Chantiverse, the completely wonderful universe in which all of Alexandra Rowland's fantasy novels take place. So if you enjoy Yield and want more goodness, consider seeking those out! Of course with your fall beverage of choice and a comfy reading spot. A certain harvest goddess would want nothing less after all.

[impossible-rat-babies]

I’ve been thinking about eyrie and lyse something bad lately omg

[fulgursmediaanalysisdrama]

Nihilism is a positive, life affirming philosophy. Something my christian mother couldn't, or didn't want to, understand

And Schoppenhauer is interesting but only worth anything when you conclude he is wrong

Berserk as a Nietzschean Tragedy — Art, Morality, Affirmation by Jonas Čeika

[akkivee]

so in regards to the bat charm, esp in the hella awesome banquet mv!!!!

the tag itself is called ofuda, a protective talisman!!! there are many different types of ofuda (omikuji are also classified as a kind of ofuda for instance) and throughout the hella awesome banquet mv, we do see the bat charm used as said various types!!!!

here in these two shots, we see the bat charm used as a senjafuda!!! senjafuda are these talismans with personalised designs that, once upon a time ago in japan, were passed around in secret councils like trading cards. ofuda typically have a deity written on it to call for luck, wealth, health, whatever said deity presides over. senjafuda, however, tend to have the person’s name on it and when people would go on pilgrimages, they’d stick the senjafuda on temple shrine gates like a very decorative ‘we were here’ tag lol

fits with the journey to hell narrative that seems to be happening in the mv!!!

and this type of ofuda is known as fuin no ofuda!!!! this one is used as a type of seal to keep evil, vengeful spirits enclosed and away from humans. the more powerful the spirit, the more seals are required to contain in the enclosed space. it’s already a little worrisome to see imagery of kuukou getting killed but this puts a evil spirit/vengeful spirit spin on top of it 🤔

[waitwithwaluigi]

I think the funniest(/s) part of of how medicalised things are becoming is that being a good values or compassion is being written off as being part of your Childhood TraumaTM.

Like yeah, Bethany, me helping out someone is ONLY because of I wasn't treated well as a kid. I have major hero complex and I am trying to save myself as a kid. Fuck empathy am I right???