#speculative history???

[happyia]

Why not add cannibalistic programs to my fantasy sci-fi worldbuilding project?🖳

I had this idea for a while, but decided to work on it yesterday when I was sick, so the text bit sounds more dramatic. <3 I'm not sure if this will be 100% canon in AA, but I have always been a big fan of evil sentient computers in media, soo..

Generative AI also doesn't exist in this worldbuilding, but that's due to conflict with one specific (very petty) sapient dragon, but I will explain another time.

[kaiserin-erzsebet]

One of the more frustrating things about the particular kind of anti-intellectualism directed at the humanities here and on places like tiktok is that pointing it out makes you seem like a killjoy.

No, I actually didn't find your "historians will say they were just friends" joke funny. No I don't think speculating that old photos are in black and white to make them seem older is harmless. But I seem uptight and "not fun" when I say these things.

[charcoaldustonmyfingers]

Raphael skeletal anatomy! Click for better quality

Turtle shells are really funky, and in real life turtles, their shoulders and hips are actually fused to the shell and form immobile shoulder and pelvic girdles. Their scapula (shoulder blades) therefore are pushed almost fully downwards to give turtle arms that elbow up look. Most of their muscles are attached via ligaments to their plastron and limbs, with their large neck muscles reaching back along their spine with very minimal muscles on their sides or back.

Because of how funky their bones are, I tried to find a good middle ground between the brothers’ humanoid shape and mobility vs. their original species limitations. Their shoulders are very human, with their collarbone instead connecting to the top of their plastron rather than a sternum (flat bone in the middle of the ribs) with the addition of their shoulder blades resting much lower than a humans and protecting the open space in the armpit of their shell (rather than being set on their back under their carapace). Their necks can stretch slightly longer than a humans and have some extra mobility, on account of how they usually sit curved and tucked into their shoulders. Their pelvises and lumbar vertebrae (hips and lower back) are not fused to their shell to enable them to twist their torsos some.

As for how flexible the show depicts their shells to be… suspension of disbelief! I like to keep the idea of their shells being turtle like, so even though they’re all bone, I’ll allow cartoon physics to bend them some.

Additional info on Raph: The spikes on his shell are mostly bone. Also (something I didn’t draw because it was only after I finished this that I was able to find a picture of an alligator snapper shell bone without its scutes) there are small gaps between his pleural bone plates (middle of shell) and his peripheral bone plates (edges of shell). The scar on his shell is probably from a bone deep injury, as broken scutes shed away, but because scars don’t grow with a person, the injury is small enough that it probably happened so long ago that Raph can’t even remember it.

This is all just my speculation, so feel free to disagree or expand upon these ideas!

[General][Donnie][Leo][Mikey][Splinter]

[fox-teeth]

Hundreds of years in the future and thousands of light-years away, Mazu from Three-Hills practices her culture’s ancient art of sculpting spirit guides for the dead. But when technology from beyond the stars encroaches on her people’s lives—and deaths—what will happen to her art?

Read the rest of my new graphic novella "The Maker of Grave-Goods" this October exclusively through ShortBox Comics Fair--the innovative all-digital comics convention! @shortboxcomicsfair

[magnetothemagnificent]

Just had a shower idea about an alternative history where the Second Beit HaMikdash is still around in modern times....

-The field of dermatology is dominated by Cohanim because they're the only ones who can diagnose tzara'at and they want to be as educated as possible

-Airlines that fly to Israel are built to have livestock storage for people bringing korbanot

-Pigeons never became feral en masse, at least in Israel and in areas with a high population density of Jews, because dove-keeping stayed extremely prevalent due to their use in korbanot

-Price caps were enacted on transportation to and from Israel during the pilgrimage seasons

-The astronomical observatories in Israel are considered sacred sites because of their usage in determining the months.

-The old method of fires on high points to announce the new month is still used in Israel and some nearby regions because of tradition, but once Jews became established further and further across the globe, a communication center was established in the Temple compound. At first, it used messenger pigeons, horseback runners, and ships. It was upgraded once the telegram was invented, then again when audio radios were invented, again when telephones were invented, again when television was invented, and again when the Internet was invented.

[knuppitalism-with-ue]

Forgot to post these yesterday here! Our first two constructed ecosystems are coming together for the #LemuriaChallenge. We started yesterday with the coral reefs...

And continued today with the rudist reefs...

Afterwards we laid the foundation for the carbonate platform reef which will be finished today. Also on the menu later tonight: coasts!

We have over 950 entries with several thousand species to choose from, so this will be a lot of work

We continue with these around 9 PM CET

[chronurgy]

Gortash designs and builds mechanisms so I imagine he has to be able to sketch fairly decently in order to sketch his projects and designs. And I'm imagining a pile of charcoal sketches of Durge, done over their entire acquaintance, starting out with sketches of them in battle and then slowly becoming more detailed and intimate and as they do, the titles changing from things like "The Bhaalspawn" and "Bhaal's Chosen at Their Bloody Work" to "The Chosen in Contemplation" and finally just Durge's name

[o-craven-canto]

Filters in the way of technologically advanced life in the universe and how likely I think they are

1. Abiogenesis (4.4-3-8 billion years ago): Total mystery. The fact that it happened so quickly on Earth (possibly as soon as there was abundant liquid water) is a tiny bit of evidence for it being easy. Amino acids and polycyclic hydrocarbons are very common in space, but nucleotides aren't, and all hypothetic models I've seen require very specific conditions and a precise sequence of steps. (It would be funny if the dozen different mechanisms proposed for abiogenesis were all happening independently somewhere.)

2. Oxygenic photosynthesis (3.5 billion years ago) (to fuel abundant biomass, and provide oxygen or some other oxidizer for fast metabolism): Not so sure. Photosynthesis is just good business sense -- sunlight is right there -- and appeared several times among bacteria. But the specific type of ultra-energetic photosynthesis that cracks water and releases oxygen appeared only once, in Cyanobacteria. That required merging two different photosynthetic apparati in a rather complex way; and all later adoptions of oxygenic photosynthesis involved incorporating Cyanobacteria by endosymbiosis. For all that it's so useful, I don't know if I'd expect to see it on every living planet.

3. Eukaryotic cell (2.4 billion years ago?): Probably the narrowest bottleneck on the list. Segregated mitochondria with their own genes and a nucleus protecting the main genome are extremely useful both for energy production (decentralized control to maximize production without overloading) and for genetic storage (less DNA damage due to reactive metabolic waste). But there's a chicken-and-egg problem in which incorporating mitochondria to make energy requires an adjustable cytoskeleton, but that consumes so much energy it would require mitochondria already in place. Current models have found solutions that involve a very specific series of events. Or maybe not? Metabolic symbiosis, per se, is common, and there may have been other ways to gene-energy segregation. Besides, after the origin of eukaryotes, endosymbiosis occurred at least nine more times, and even some bacteria can incorporate smaller cells.

4. Sexual reproduction (by 1.2 billion years ago): Without meiotic sex (combining mutations from different lineages, decoupling useful traits from harmful ones, translating a gene in multiple way), the evolution of complex beings is going to be painfully slow. Bacteria already swap genes to an extent, and sexual recombination is bundled in with the origin of eukaryotes so I probably shouldn't count it separately (meiosis is just as energy-intensive as any other use of the cytoskeleton). Once you have recombination, life cycles with spores or gametes and sex differentiation probably follow almost inevitably.

5. Multicellularity (800 million years ago?): Quite common, actually. Happens all the time among eukaryotes, and once in a very limited form even among bacteria. Now we'd want complex organized bodies with geometry-defining genes, but even that happened thrice: in plants, fungi, and animals. As far as I know, various groups of yeasts are the only regressions to unicellularity.

6. Brains and sense organs (600 million years ago): Nerve cells arose either once or twice, depending on whether Ctenophora (comb-jellies) and Eumetazoa (all other animals except sponges) form a single clade or not. Some form of cellular sensing and communication is universal in life, though, so a tissue specialized for signal transmission is probably near inevitable once you have multicellular organisms whose lifestyle depends on moving and interacting with the environment. Sense organs that work at a distance are also needed, but image-forming eyes evolved in six phyla, so no danger there (and there's so many other potential forms of communication!). Just to be safe, you'll also want muscles and maybe mineralized skeletons on the list, but I don't think either is particularly problematic. An articulated skeleton is probably better than a rigid shell, but we still have multiple examples of that (polyplacophorans, brittle stars, arthropods, vertebrates).

7. Life on land (400 million years ago): (Adding this because air has a lot more oxygen to fuel brains than water (the most intelligent aquatic beings are air-breathers), and technology in water has the issue of fire.) You're going to need a waterproof integument, some kind of rigid support system, and kidneys to regulate water balance. Plenty of animal lineages moved on land: vertebrates, insects, millipedes, spiders, scorpions, multiple types of crabs, snails, earthworms, etc. Note that most of those are arthropods: this step seems to favor exoskeletons, which help a great deal in retaining water. Of course this depends on plants getting on land first, which on Earth happened only once, and required the invention of spores and cuticles. (Actually there are polar environments where all photosynthesis occurs in water, but they are recently settled and hardly the most productive.)

8. Human-like intelligence (a few million years ago?): There seems to a be a general trend in which the max intelligence attainable by animals on Earth has increased over time. There's quite a lot of animals today that approach or rival apes in intelligence: elephants, toothed cetaceans, various carnivorans, corvids, parrots, octopodes, and there's even intriguing data about jumping spiders. Birds seem to have developed neocortex-like brain structures independently. Of course humans got much farther, but the fact that even other human species are gone suggests that a planet is not big enough for more than one sophont, so the uniqueness of humans might not necessarily imply low probability. (We seem to exist about halfway through the habitability span of Earth land, FWIW.) The evolution of sociality should probably be lumped here: we'll want a species that can teach skills to its offspring and cooperate on tasks. But sociality is also a common and useful adaptation: many species on our list (octopodes are a glaring exception) are intensely social and care for their offspring. I mentioned above that the land-step favors exoskeletal beings, which in turns favors small size; but the size ranges of large land arthropods and very intelligent birds overlap, so that's not disqualifying.

9. Agriculture and urban civilization (11,000 years ago): Agriculture arrived quite late in the history of our species, but when it arrived -- i.e. at the end of the Wurm glaciation -- it arrived independently in four to eight different places around the world, in different biogeographic realms and climates, so I must assume that at least some climate regimes are great for it (glacial cycles are a minority of Earth's history; but did agriculture need to come after glaciations? Maybe a shock of seasonality did the trick). And once you have agriculture, complex urbanized societies follow most of the time, just a few millennia later. Even writing arose at least three times (Near East, China, and Mexico), and then spread quickly.

10. Scientific method and industrialization (300 years ago): We're getting too far from my expertise here, but whatever. The Eurasian Axial Age suggests that all civilizations with a certain degree of wealth, literacy, and interconnection will spawn a variety of philosophies. Philosophical schools that focus on material causes and effects like the Ionians or Charvaka have appeared sometimes, but often didn't win over more supernaturalist schools. Perhaps in pre-industrial times pure materialism isn't as useful! You may need to thread a needle between interconnected enough to exchange and combine ideas, and also decentralized enough that the intellectual elite can't quash heterodoxy. As for industrialization, that too happened only once, though that's another case in which the first achiever would snuff out any other. I hear Song China is a popular contender for alternative Industrial Revolutions (with coal-powered steelworks!); Imperial Rome and the Abbasid Caliphate are less convincing ones. For whatever reason, it didn't take until 18th century Britain.

11. Not dying randomly along the way: Mass extinctions killing off a majority of species happened over and over -- the Permian Great Dying, the Chicxulub impact, the early Oxygen Crisis -- but life has always rebounded fairly quickly and effectively. It's hard enough to sterilize an agar plate, let alone a planet. Disasters on this scale are also unlikely to happen in the lifespan of planet-bound civilizations, unless of course the civilizations are causing them. A civilization might still face catastrophic climate change, mega-pandemics, and nuclear war, not to mention lesser setbacks like culture-wide stagnation or collapse, and I couldn't begin to estimate how common, or ruinous, they would actually be.

****

I have no idea how common the origin of life is, but the vast majority of planets with life will only have bacterial mats and stromatolites. Of the tiny sliver that evolved complex cells, a good chunk will have their equivalents of plants and animals, most of which may have intelligent life at least on primate- or cetacean-level at some later point. At any given time, a tiny fraction of those will have agricultural civilizations, at an even tinier fraction of that will have post-industrial science and technology. Let's say maybe 1 planet with industrial technology out of 100 with agriculture, 100,000 with hominid-level intelligence, 10 million with animal-like organisms, 100 millions with complex cells, and 10 billions with life at all?

[a-dauntless-daffodil]

It’s hilarious how Vaggie made herself a ‘sinner’.

How that linked her up with Charlie is such a weird, round about truthful way, even when she was lying by omission about it.

And how amazingly dumb it all makes Adam and Lute look.

Thousands of helpless souls killed by her, but she didn’t do anything ‘wrong’ until she wondered if what she was doing was right. The divine powers in her life only took her wings and condemned her to hell after she doubted their orders, their idea of justice, and quietly chose not to completely follow them.

“You fucked up” they tell her “your mistake” she “left the band” “tried for a solo career". It’s so pathetic. They're so butthurt over the idea of one of their own having a mind of her own.

It’s also so funny, because they spin her simple act of whispering “Go, run. Now!” to demon kid she’d been holding at spear point like it was big defiant move- which makes it into one- even though she never challenged them openly, or threatened them.

Hell, Lute’s “You always were weak” plus exorcist Vaggie always frowning while her murder sisters all grin with glee as they kill sinners- it paints a picture of Vaggie never having been as into exterminations as she ‘should’ have been. Too weak to be a proper exorcist no matter how good at killing she was, not just “the traitor” but also “the failure”.

And she was scared of that. She didn’t want anyone seeing her spare that child, whispered her words to them in a back alley, out of sight.

She was scared of what would happen and didn’t even fight it when Lute took her eye and wings- she was scared and no threat in any tangible way, but apparently refusing to do one single murder is enough to freak Adam and Lute the fuck out.

One woman. Doesn’t do exactly what she’s told. After who knows how many decades of being one of the “top girls” at murder, a “bad bitch” named after “the best thing ever”, and they still get spooked by that tiny moment when she wasn’t under their total control. Like it's such a betrayal to them, her daring to so much as think this level of violence isn’t justified actually, and for a split second act on that thought.

It’s an instant ticket to ousting her from the exorcists AND from heaven, while they fly the fuck off again.

“If angels can do whatever, and remain in the sky-”

and they do. After doing that to one of their own. They did that, to someone who was supposedly meant to be in heaven. They didn’t wait for divine justice- took it, and her eye, and her wings, and her halo, into their own hands and tore them away from her. Then happily, they spend the next three years up in heaven, slurping smoothies and doing more murder sprees.

until Vaggie comes strolling back with the princess of hell, there supporting her girlfriend and the idea that all the shit she did for so long really was and IS wrong.

oh and Adam and Lute are pisssssssed about it. They take her being there PERSONALLY, wanna solve it with VIOLENCE

She hurts them without even trying. Without even noticing they're there.

They're told to fix the princess of hell situation and they have no concept of forgiveness, of caring about sinners, so they guess (rightly) that Vaggie hasn't told Charlie about her past and bet (wrongly) that Charlie would never forgive her if she knew, and also assumed (rightly) that Vaggie would be terrified of that

But they don't get that she's scared of hurting Charlie. Of Charlie being hurt by her. It's a selfless thing. That's her whole PROBLEM.

Her running to hold Charlie after the reveal- her NOT breaking down when Charlie takes alone time in the aftermath, respecting that right up until she thinks Charlie's actively in danger- afraid FOR Charlie when the deal with Alastor is made, no crumbling that Charlie went to someone else for help, when being helpful to Charlie is basically her raison d'étre- agreeing to go alone to an overlord, after learning she can DIE and THIS OVERLORD knows how to do it- all this for the sake of Charlie's dream, their shared goal, their hotel. Their friends, resigned to despair in the hotel lobby, losing hope and maybe hours away from losing their lives

No shit she was never going to bow down to the blackmail?? It'd be like turning herself inside out. Charlie isn't just some "little hottie" or whatever, they're partners. They're in this together. Even when Charlie out loud doubts if that's true, it still is.

Lute and Adam don't GET what it means, that Charlie assumed Vaggie was a sinner already. That the thing she'd be hurt about was the lying, not the murder. She was scared of not really being loved by Vaggie- of everything else wonderful between them being a lie too, all that support and faith empty empty- she wasn't afraid of loving Vaggie, whoever Vaggie had been, she was afraid of who Vaggie might be now and that she'd never really believed in Charlie at all.

Charlie was angry at the thought that Vaggie didn't think she would've accepted her. The idea of not really being understood or trusted by Vaggie, that's what hurt.

And it goes against everything Lute and Adam are, Charlie actually caring about sinners while knowing what they've done- about an exorcist after finding out who they'd been- really trusting that people can change. Lute and Adam hear her say it and see her stand up for it and they just want her to shut up and die

again though, no shit she was going to stick with Vaggie after the truth came out, in the end. Once she had a moment to take a breath and step out of her head long enough for a reality check

Vaggie didn’t say to Charlie what she'd done or who she'd been. But she’s been and keeps doing what she can to follow that idea, unvoiced, from that day when she couldn’t kill a sinner- something Charlie didn't know about but now knows must have happened- A final death means no second chance and no worth as a person, but Vaggie didn’t think that, even before meeting Charlie she didn't think that.

She's always been on Charlie's side. They were on the same side before they ever set eyes on each other. All this time, for three whole years, and now she's off to go find a way to protect everything they've built together.

"-words are cheap, but actions, they speak the truth"

Charlie never really stopped trusting her. Maybe she wondered if she should, but even then, she had Vaggie go to Carmilla to find the key that might save them all.

"She killed an exorcist in the last extermination. She knows how they can be harmed."

"But… I- I didn't even know that was possible."

"If you did, would you have told me?"

So Charlie asked. A pretty painful thing to say- and she said it even as she sent an angel to go find out a way to hurt other angels.

She DID trust that Vaggie WOULD tell her.

The irony of all this happening thanks to Adam and Lute trying to keep it from happening, and all of it leading up to Vaggie getting back part of what they took from her, because now she doesn't need them or heaven to be an angel anymore.

Charlie has faith in her. Enough to send her off on an important mission even after Vaggie hurt her- and send her right to the person who end up helping Vaggie get back her wings.

“The rules are shades of gray when you don’t do as you say”

Vaggie’s new fucking wings are gray when Lute sees them. When Vaggie’s standing over her, sparing her life, her wings and that one, fucking unexplained stripe separating her from the other exorcists, all of it is GRAY.

That visual gut punch of, you’re. Fucking. Wrong. You’re wrong about sinners, you’re wrong about supposedly protecting heaven, you’re wrong thinking you can just DO this shit. That imagery of an angel who DIDN’T stay in the sky because she DIDN’T think being angel meant everything she did had to be right- who’s here in hell, trying to protect sinners from heaven’s slaughter-

And Lute wanted Vaggie to “correct” HER “mistake”? Vaggie’s???

That’s Lute, admitting that people in hell can get second chances and make up for what they did. Admitting that “Sinful filth” like Vaggie can be redeemed in some way, by following Lute’s version of what’s right.

But wasn’t her and Adam’s whole thing the idea of blowing your shot? Getting no other chance after it?  

Oh yeah. Vaggie doesn’t believe that though. Not for sinners like her, not for angels like her.

She let’s Lute live. She does it to make Lute suffer, but there are a lot of ways to make someone suffer- an eye for an eye for example- and Vaggie chooses the one that doesn’t hurt Lute more than it has to, that leaves her alive, and leaves Lute’s suffering to be something completely of Lute’s own making (a HELL of Lute's own making, if you will) (Lute choosing to tear her OWN arm off to continue the fight-).

She's totally dismissive of the woman who was just going after her remaining eye like a dog after a bone.

Why is it that nothing Adam and Lute to do her matters?

Why don’t THEY matter to her at all?

Walking right past them, being so done with them up in heaven, not caving to the blackmail, only being worried about Charlie afterwards, not letting that crack in their relationship stop her from doing what she can for their hotel, Lute threatening to take her other eye and BLIND her just making her snark- even the vague threat to Charlie only gives Vaggie the oomf she needed to defend herself.

“Pathetic” she calls Lute. She’s right- they’re so pathetic, both them, Adam and Lute. They’re so scared of being wrong. So pissy over the idea of being less than great and perfect.

It breaks them. Adam’s last words are him having a meltdown in the face of not actually being hot shit. Where’s his respect, he wails, they should all be worshiping him! But they’re not. One of his random decedents stabs him to death because he would’ve done the same to her, and one of the last things he hears is Vaggie- the fuck up, the traitor, his former grumpy top girl Vagina- whooping with glee as he dies.

And Lute lives knowing that could’ve been her, too.

If it wasn't for Vaggie.

Being not all that didn’t break Vaggie. Finding out she was wrong got her to stop and think and change, not run straight on blindly into a fight that ends up with her (with HIM) dead.

Why does she go from terrified of Lute and Adam, to dismissive and annoyed and just all around not caring about them at all?

They gave up all her respect for them when they demanded the death of a child.

The father of humanity wanted a child killed. A helpless, whimpering kid, sacrificed to his ego and bruised pride, and for shits and giggles. His first lieutenant saw failing to do so as a sin worthy of hell. All this over a child. How could she ever take them seriously after that.  

She came down from high and chased the child and held a blade over them on divine command.

Then, somehow, she saw the HORNS in her own shadow above them- even though she wasn’t WEARING her MASK, and she stopped.

She was her own messenger angel.

She chose to give the child mercy, and became the sacrifice herself.

Vaggie stuck it to the man. Didn’t steal that life. And, terrified of what would happen to her next, acted selflessly. The same thing that got her left behind in hell should have earned her place in heaven, according to Adam-

heaven was shit to her though. Made her into a soldier. Sent her to kill and kill and kill. Taught her trust on the battlefield- in heaven, of all fucking places-

Timeline wise we see her very first smile when she meets Charlie. When a stranger does- again- the bare minimum for someone else.

When she’s back up in heaven later she isn’t wistful, just angry, uncomfortable, annoyed. She isn’t happy there. It’s not home to her, like her and Charlie’s room back at the hotel is. Why should it be? What good did she ever find in herself up there?

Down here though, she's happy. Hell is where her heaven started. So I guess in the end, she did find what she’d earned after all. Or it, Charlie, found her.

When “The rules are shades of gray…”

Sometimes they’re wrong, and you have to break them.  

People like Lute and Adam would rather crack under the pressure and die instead, but not Vaggie. They're out for blood. She's out for love.

Sucks to be them~

[marzipanandminutiae]

Museum Exhibit I'd Like To Curate:

"Never Married; Best Friends- Erasure, Discovery, and the Work of Queer Historians"

(shocker: we're not all straight/cis and we're not all out to erase queer history at every turn. never have been. of course, that doesn't mean queer historians have never been complicit in erasure, for safety reasons or personal bias against another letter of the acronym or what have you. I'd love to explore that- and our contributions to the queer history field -in greater depth)

[alpaca-clouds]

If I had a penny for every time a Belmont got startled by a fox...

So, @aquilaofarkham pointed this out on BlueSky, and is totally right about it (they made the screenshots to, thanks for allowing me to use them!). Why I clocked this scene in Nocturne as well - I actually did not draw the comparison to the Trevor season 3 scene. But yes, that is indeed...

If I got a penny for every time a Belmont got startled by a fox, I would have two pennies, which is not a lot, but it is weird it happened twice.

And you know what that means, right?

THEORY TIME!!!

As some people might know: Since season 1 of Nocturne was out, I am very very certain of one thing. And that thing is, that the Belmont bloodline also goes back to a god.

In S1 of Nocturne when Annette talks about her own divine bloodline, she says a lot of people do have a divine ancestor, but the knowledge got lost. And to me this instantly read as: "Actually, by the way, the Belmonts totally have a divine ancestor as well!"

And I have been riddling since then, who it could be.

So, what if the fox is a representation of that ancestor?

Yes. This does mean I get to talk mythology again.

So, foxes. In early European folklore the fox is basically equivalent to coyote in North American folklore. Especially in Germany and France Reynard or Reinecken shows up a lot as a trickster spirit in the form of a fox. While there are some theories on Reynard somewhat going back to an actual deity, we kinda don't know about that for sure, because we have absolutely no textual evidence for it, and it mostly goes back to the fact that throughout the area in early medieval times the depiction of Reynard as a trickster is very very consistent - and also lines up with more eastern depictions of fox adjacant deities. Since we know that those are connected through Indo-European culture group it is not so weird to assume that there might have been a fox trickster deity, though if there was, we do not know their name.

But the good news is: The Belmonts are French in origin, and we do know from Trevor that they had contact to indigenous European people (aka the Celts). So, the highest likelihood for a divine ancestor is definitely a Celtic god or goddess.

Now, if we talk about Celtic deities we obviously run into the problem: Outside the Gaelic culture we know Jack Shit. Because fuck the fucking Romans and fuck the Christians even more, who very thoroughly erased most stuff about those religions. My anthropology heart does not spend three hours a day crying about this fact at all!!!!

Of course, we know the Celtic cultures were related, so there is a high likelihood that at least some of the deities from the Gaelic culture will also show up in the Gaulic culture, but we do not know for certain.

Which on the bright side also means, that my guess is about as good as whatever the writers might come up with. Hooray!

So, my first guess is Adsagsona. A goddess about whom we know exactly nothing. We know she was a goddess of magic, who was invoked in spells. And we have the suspicion she was maybe linked to foxes. Maybe. Because the thing is, we do have one written evidence of her being invoked, and some artifacts from the same area she was invoked in that might be related to her and the practice of magic. Which is not a lot. Cool bit about that, of course: It would totally give a writer freedom to make up whatever about this.

Next guess would be Arduinna. She was a forest goddess who got merged with Diana when the Romans colonized what is France today. She definitely got depicted a lot with forest animals, and definitely also was connected to the hunt (which works well with the Belmonts), though the preferred animal for her to be paired with was either the deer or the boar. Which, I would guess, makes sense, because people hunted those more for food than they would hunt foxes.

A bit more vague would be the god Cunomaglus. Because he is British, not Gallic, though definitely he is a hunting god, and while his main animal was the dog, he definitely got also depicted with foxes. No doubt about that bit. xD

Next up would be a probably related god to Cunomaglus: Nodens. Again, British. Again, hunting. Again, the main animal are gods. I would not know about him being depicted with foxes, but given he has a lot of overlap with Cunomaglus I would also not be surprised. Bonus points, because I know there is fandom-overlap between GDT's Hellboy movies and Castlevania: Nuada is based on the Irish equivalent to Nodens, and draws a lot of influence from the Brittanic god.

If we go a bit more wild, we could also make a guess for Ceres, though that one would be a bit weird. Ceres is of course a Roman Goddess, but Romans were also in France forever, so it is not impossible. Ceres is heavily associated with foxes, though mainly in the sense that foxes are sacrificed for her. But there is a fox association.

There is also with the Roman gods a very loose association with both Dionysus and Diana. But Diana usually gets depicted with dogs and stags, and for Dionysus there is exactly one myth linking him to foxes. So... Eh.

Lastly... I will just leave here that Diana's Slavic equivalent, Devana, actually gets depicted as a fox more than once. But Slavic culture is kinda on the other end of Europe. So it is possible, but also... Eh. It is a far bit away. But then again, the Belmonts lived in today's Romania for a long while, so it is not impossible, I guess.

And that's it. For today at least.

But I wanted to get this off my chest.

[happyia]

Worldbuilding? Wrong, Worlddestruction.

Exploring concept of needless destruction that happened before current time of Axolotl Afterparty setting. It's still a work in progress, but history is a theme I want to explore. The three nations are currently at peace with each other.

Some clarification rambling: Post Dragon Planet explosion, Catfolk, Birdfolk and Anguine lost part of access to their magic abilities (part of self?), they can still cast spells and such, just not specific ones that were important parts to their identities. Example: Catfolk lost ability to shapeshift

This specific medallion pictured has a bird on top to symbolize Phoenix King's prowess in war.

[jeannereames]

Is there something about Alexander you just know in your bones but can’t academically prove beyond doubt yet?

Things I Can’t Prove but Believe about Alexander

The first thing is that he and Hephaistion were lovers.

I realize that may surprise some of you as I’ve written on it both informally and formally, arguing they were. But the plain fact is…we just don’t have conclusive evidence. I do think we have plenty of evidence that Alexander was queer. But for whether he and Hephaistion were lovers, all the evidence is either circumstantial or late. It IS perfectly possible to make a cogent argument they weren’t.

But, as the asker put it, I know in my bones they were.

That’s what fiction is for. Ha.

In fact, a lot of things I suspect but can’t prove I’ve thrown into the novels.

A couple other things:

Alexander was a neat-freak. He didn’t like mess or disorder. He was also a perfectionist.

He took criticism way too personally and internalized it. This is why only certain people were allowed to criticize him; it had to be someone he believed truly loved him.

He was not an alcoholic (in any modern sense), but as time went on, came to depend too much on alcohol to relax because he was an extremely high-strung person.

He was quite shrewd, but also highly emotional and visionary. These were sometimes at odds.

He loved his sisters and felt close to them, more than typical for men of his era.

He loved animals more than typical. (I think there’s good evidence for this, but I mean more than typical.)

He was left-handed. (Pure speculation, but it’s a sneaking suspicion.)

He could sing quite well, but nobody wanted to listen to him because his voice was rough. He’d have made a great blues singer. (Again, some evidence for this, but it’s largely anecdotal which is suspect by definition.) He was also a very good dancer, and loved to dance, related to…

He was an excellent fighter, physically extremely tough and strong. He didn’t really feel fear in the middle of combat. (While this is attested in the sources, I put it in the “can’t prove” column because it could also have been pure flattery by later sources.)

The “Sleep and sex remind me I’m mortal” line is a real quip. He was trying to be funny. People took him more seriously than he meant, and he was actually referencing sleep more than sex. (Along the lines of our, “I can sleep when I’m dead.”)

He really did believe he was favored by the gods and his birth was special/fated; it wasn’t purely political. This grew the more he beat incredible odds. He never believed he was divine beyond what a human could achieve.

[worksbycam]

Egg Thief 🪺

[bixels]

If it's not too much trouble would you mind sharing more on your thoughts about AJ? Esp the line she shouted at Rarity and her "struggle with sexual identity" I'm kind of new so I would like to hear more! Does Rarity also struggle with sexual identity and fearing AJ would leave? I love the family oriented person A and the business inclined and impressed by shiny new things person B trope

Ok, this is gonna get into head canons and personal opinions.

The writing in Rollercoaster of Friendship (and EQG as a whole) is much simpler and more stripped down in comparison to FiM (most likely to appeal to a younger audience; don't want to seem like I'm dissing the writers), but that one confrontation made me sit up in my seat because it carries the entire special.

More under the cut cuz I don't want MLP analyses clogging up my blog.

For one, we've seen AJ get frustrated and angry about the same exact conflict over a girl in FiM (Rara), establishing a pattern. And even though she's right (her friend really is being manipulated), I read both cases as her acting out in jealousy too. Here's this girl who she's felt a unique attachment to being "taken away" and changed by someone new. This is most apparent in RoF; the moment Vignette introduces herself, kisses Rarity on both cheeks, and establishes herself as Rarity's "new best friend," AJ immediately reacts with shock, betrayal, and boldfaced jealousy (made even worse when Rarity forgets her during introductions). Although AJ acts independent, she's actually very emotionally dependent on certain people in her life.

If we come into this with the assumption that AJ has romantic feelings for Rarity –– which is a normal assumption given the director/writer confirmed the special was written as a romantic drama between the two –– AJ's line is all the more heartbreaking. If I may slip into fictional speculation: your crush is no longer listening or paying attention to you, even though you know something is wrong and that she's getting hurt. Your frustration at her lack of awareness is really your anger at her lack of care –– she doesn't care about you anymore. So in a fit of rage, in your big, dramatic confrontation, just to make her look at you, react at you, feel how she's been making you feel all day –– unwanted and unspecial –– you hurt her back. AJ yells, "You're not special!" and Rarity cries.

And what really gets me is that AJ lies. In this moment, she lies that Rarity's not special when (again, assumption of romance) she's the most special person in the world to her. So special that she's placed all her feelings of self-assurance and security on their relationship. So special that the moment their relationship is shaken and she doesn't know to recover it –– recover herself –– she lashes out, acts against her character, and says something dishonest just to hurt the girl she loves.

(Honestly, rewatching this special, AJ is so insecure and attention-needy. The way she pouts and slouches and lags behind the group and says, "Never mind. It's nothing," when asked what's wrong is textbook "please pay attention to me and ask me what's wrong because i need a reason to be honest about feelings i know i should be ashamed of" behavior.)

I think AJ's insecurities (which could be tied to her lack of experience with romantic relationships) reveal how she has a tendency to misattribute and redirect anger onto the person she cares most about (see Simple Ways as well, where she's caught on the opposite end of a jealousy spat). This could easily become a very toxic trait, but AJ grows past it. Near the end of RoF, the two come together and apologize. AJ recognizes her entitlement and confesses her insecurities about their relationship. She felt hurt and attacked when her status as Rarity's best friend/girlfriend was threatened because it's a role she uses to self-identify –– if Rarity isn't hers, she loses part of her identity. And she admits that she thought her motivation was to protect Rarity, but really she was just being selfish and protecting herself. Rarity was busy and stressed and needed someone to lean on just as much AJ needed her. She isn't AJ's emotional support girlfriend, and it wasn't right to expect her to be one.

(Which is why Rarijack is peak because throughout both series, they repeatedly show just how important honesty, open communication, and trust is in maintaining, supporting, and growing a romantic relationship.)

[whereserpentswalk]

There's a door somewhere that's been closed forever. As long as people can remember, the first records of its existence, it's been closed. And even in the first records of its existence, people were watching it, waiting for it to be opened.

It's a massive door, in an underground chamber, the room its in is the largest room on earth. It's beautiful and ornate, and so strangely alien. After the initial hallway the room with the door is the only room in the chamber, like it's the entrance to a massive complex that humanity will never see. It's architecture is like no known culture, there are carvings on the walls of animals that don't exist, and writing in a language nobody knows. Some think that it's the work of aliens, some think it's the work of an advanced ancient culture, others that it's the work of beings from another dimension. Scientists and historians find all of those possibilities disturbingly possible.

There are tons of theories as to what's beyond the door. Every single religion that has come in contact with the door has managed to tie it into its mythology, especially ideas about the end of the world. And secular conspiracy theorists love it just as much. There are theories that the door will lead to hell, and that the rapture will start when it opens, theories that the door is where the messiah waits, or where God's body on earth is. There are theories that behind the door lies the secret of eternal life. Theories that aliens will open the door when they're ready to contact humanity. Theories that behind the door are the secrets to the universe, that it'll usher in a new age of humanity when opened. Theories that there's treasure behind the door, or technology that will change the way humanity lives. But there is one throughline amoung almost all theories, at least those belived by those invested in it, which is that they believe the door will open soon, and that those who see it opened will benefit the most. And there's been theories like this for thousands of years.

People of all religions will save up to make holy pilgrimages to the door, skipping meals, depriving their children of toys, so they can sit in front of the door for a few days, hoping to be the ones to see it open, returning home disappointed. There are conmen who'll sell the smallest things from the door, from water thats touched it, to pebbles that have fallen off of it, and people will believe it'll heal the sick, or work miracles. In ancient times conquerors would go to the door, making such a big deal out of it being in their lands. In modern times a small republic of a few thousand people, as old as the first world war, controls the territory of the door, they do their best to let people of all walks of life come to it, and try to stop any single group from dominating the space.

And of course there are people who live near the door. The entrance to the chamber is now surrounded by a modern city, and the room the door is in, and the hallway before it, are so large that they basically contain an entire town/neighborhood. The people who live in the room of the door are all those who are waiting for it to open (and a small population of people making good money off of them). They all have their own sections within the giant room, from evangelicals waiting to see Jesus behind the door, to alien theorists waiting to see the secrets of the stars, to new agers waiting for the opening of the doors to enter earth into a new era. The underground town is one of the most crowded places on earth, and as long as you're outside you can see the doors. Basically everyone who lives there thinks it's the only place they can ever be, as dark as it is down there they need to live where the doors will soon open. Some even go so far as to never leave the room even temporarily, many people living and dying in this one underground room, never being anywhere else, never seeing the sun. When those who where born in the room grow up to move somewhere else, abandoning their hopes of seeing the door open, their parents grieve as if they've lost their chance at salvation, and mourn them as if they were dead oftentimes.

Trying to get very close to the door is nearly impossible. It gets more and more crowded the closer you get to the door. And the space where it's close enough to actually touch the door is constantly covered with people, you have to sift through the thickest crowds on earth to get close enough to touch it, and people, thinking it has mystical properties, will. People have been trampled to death trying to touch that door. The entire underground town is unreasonable crowded, but nothing comes close to that small sliver of space where the door can be touched.

Science has had a rough relationship with the door. In older times people have tried to open it. The last time it was tried was when it was under British rule in the 19th century. It didn't go well. They might be able to do more now, but most of the people the door is important to don't want them to. There was a scientist who was beaten to death by an angry mob in the 1970s for suggesting there might he nothing more then an empty room behind the door, not even that it was likely, juet that it was possible. Science has spoken little on the door since then. And the government that has the territory of the door now does not allow any door based science to occur.

The reason why I bring all of this up, is that a few days ago the doors opened just the slightest amount. Not enough for anyone to step through, but enough to be noticeable. It's so hard to see through, but reports are starting to come in. They say that behind the door is a short hallway, and at the end of the hallway is another set of doors, of similar size and shape, waiting just as patiently to open.