#technically they died and resurrected as a demon king

[sing-me-under]

Dude I’m just so obsessed with the fiancés (mostly c!Sapnap). Like, I just love them so much. It’s frankly absurd.

They’ve been dead since 2021 and it’s almost 2023 and 90% of my artistic energy goes straight into these three. I like to draw them, and my notes app is mostly Even my post it notes at work are just some variation of KSQ. I have no idea to explain it.

[devilmen-collector]

Origin of the names of the 7 kingdoms of Hell

Ever wonder where do the names of the kingdoms (or regions) of Hell come from? Let's find out in this trivia post :3

WARNING, this post contains religious theme. If you feel comfortable, please ignore this.

Gehenna

"Gehenna", in the Bible and in real life, was originally the name of the valley of Hinnom, outside of the city of Jerusalem. In this valley, many committed the gruesome sin of sacrificing children to the god Moloch. Because of this sin, the valley was cursed by the Jews and its name was used to call the final punishing place of the reprobate. In Christianity, "Gehenna" is used to designate the place where all the demons and the damned human will thrown in at the Last Judgement, "the lake of fire", "the unquenchable fire".

Tartaros

"Tartaros", or Tartarus, was originally the term to describe the abyss of torment and suffering for the wicked and the Titans in Greek mythology.

In the 4th century BC, Greek culture and language were spread to all Eastern Mediterranean countries by the conquest of Alexander the Great. Greek became the common language in these countries and remained so for many centuries. The New Testament of the Bible was written in Greek. The term "Tartaros" was adopted by Christianity to describe Hell. Although "Tartaros" doesn't technically appear in the Bible, the associated verb tartaroō ("throw to Tartaros") does. (The verb itself is a shortened form of another verb with similar meaning kata-tartaroō ("throw down to Tartaros").

In the Bible, Tartaros is the place where fallen angels are chained to wait for judgement.

Hades

The name of the underworld in Greek mythology. It was also adopted by Christianity and used to describe Hell. However, different from Gehenna and Tartaros, Hades is a little bit complicated.

Before the work of redemption was completed in Jesus's death and resurrection, the gate of Heaven was closed. So when a someone died, that person would go to Hell (Hades) ragardless of good or bad. However, in Hades, there was "a great chasm", according to the Bible, separating the good and the bad. The good people either didn't suffer or was purified of their venial sins, while the bad people on the other side really did suffer. No one from "the good side" could cross to the other side, and vice versa.

After Jesus died, his soul descended to Hades and released the just who were detained in Hades and brought them to Heaven, while leaving the damned on the other side of the chasm, waiting for the Last Judgement, after which, both Hades and the wicked in it will be thrown into Gehenna "the lake of fire", for eternal punishment.

Abyssos

The name "Abyssos" comes from "abyss", which is also a word to describe Hell. The precise word "Abyssos" does not exist in the Bible or mythology, as far as I know.

Paradise Lost

This country shares its name with the famous work written by the poet John Milton in the 17th century. The poem Paradise Lost is a dramatized version that retells the story of the fallen angels and their role in the fall of Adam and Eve.

Niflheim

The name comes from Norse mythology of the Scandinavian people. Originally, Niflheim was realm of primordial ice and fog, being one of the two primordial realms, the other being Muspelheim, the realm of fire. Later, the realm became the abode of Hel, the daughter of the god Loki, and it became the afterlife for those who didn't die a heroic or notable death, overlapping with another realm in Norse cosmology, Helheim.

Abaddon

In the Bible, "Abaddon" is both a place and an entity. As a place, Abaddon is the place of destruction, the realm for the dead. As an individual entity, Abaddon is described in the Bible as "a king, the angel of the bottomless pit; whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek Apollyon; in Latin Exterminans" - Revelation 9:11

Now "Abaddon" is entirely tied with the meaning of destruction. Abaddon itself means destruction or "place of destruction". The root of the word abad means perish, or destroy. Both the Greek name Apollyon and the Latin name Exterminans mean destroyer.

[artificial-ascension]

Creepypasta Allegiance HCs because I'm board and feel like exposing you all to my ramblings

Slenderman:

All of his family, obviously. Though they don't really do anything other than cheer him on and sometimes helping him with mundane tasks

Most of the proxies. Obviously he mind controls them and influences them to be loyal but Tim and Brian are a bit better at resisting him than the average person so their loyalty isn't guaranteed

Candypop and Seed Eater have been with Slenderman for the past 400-ish years, both are pretty loyal and are treated pretty well. Honestly they're the of the most loyal of all the non proxies

Jeff The Killer got picked up by Slenderman to be used as a proxy shortly after The Incident. Unfortunately Jeff is completely immune to Slender's control and Toby got attached. Now Jeff lives in the mansion and will sometimes do things for Slender considering Jeff knows that without his protection he'd probably be in jail and he is somewhat grateful to Slenderman for taking him in

Liu, Jane, Nina, Clockwork and most other human killers are loyal for the same reason. Slenderman lets them live there even though he can't control them but they still do things from time to time considering without him they'd either be dead or in prison

Eyeless Jack and Dr. Smiley were specifically recruited to be doctors. Their loyalty is iffy. As demons they can't be controlled by Slenderman and both of them are fully capable of disappearing into the woods and living of the grid if they need to, and the only reason the agreed to join was for extra protection (Smiley isn't a very strong demon, but EJ in his true form can physically overpower most things) and while they are treated with the same respect as Seed Eater and Candypop, they both have very strong bonds with the humans and any mistreatment towards them tends to rub EJ and Smiley the wrong way. Not to mention EJ is especially nosy and won't allow his proxy friends to risk their lives when they don't know what their end goal is

(Spoiler alert, Slenderman's end goal is to get strong enough to beat the shit out of Zalgo because they have beef and Slenderman feeds off human fear and suffering, so he pretty much needs proxies to harass people for him)

Bloody Painter is a really weird case. He was originally with Trenderman but switched to Slender because he likes the masnion atmosphere more and thought he'd fit in with the killer crowd a bit more

Laughing Jack and Jason The Toy Maker both joined together and LJ has is in a Candypop situation where he joined as a supernatural entity working under Slender and Jason is thus allowed to do whatever because he's LJ's friend

Smile Dog is. A dog. They're a pet and they're ok with that. They were originally Splendor's then they got given to Slender and is now officially Jeff's dog. They're loyal to Jeff and only Jeff

BEN and Sally are weird because they're ghosts. BEN only needs to worry about his cartridge and Sally just needs to avoid regular ghost hunting stuff. Really they don't really side with Slenderman but they do side with the people under him, as they only really hang around the mansion for the socialization

Zalgo:

He has his whole army of demons at his disposal, he's the demon king what did you expect. Not all demons are loyal to him though. (Seed Eater and Smiley, fo instance.) About 400 years ago there was a big confrontation between Zalgo and Slenderman and instead of dealing with Slender himself he sent one of his most beloved generals, Chernabog, deal with it. Obviously he fucking died and like, half of all demons decided that Zalgo was a shitty king for sending him in a suicide mission and stopped listening to him

Because Chernabog was uh, kinda the dad of the demon possessing EJ, that demon in question actually really hates Slenderman and is loyal to Zalgo, even though Zalgo was technically the reason he died

Nurse Ann was resurrected by Zalgo after she was murdered by Smiley. They were partners at some point and Ann was in love with him but Smiley was only interested in manipulating and and killing her so she doesn't really like him anymore. Zalgo actually brought her back so that she could hunt and kill Smiley's species of demon as, while fairly weak, they are hard to kill and they won't just die off unless there's an actual extermination plan. Ann agreed because it ment she'd be allowed to kill Smiley so now she works loyally to hunt rogue demons for Zalgo while also doing her own thing on ths side

Lazuri isn't really loyal to Zalgo but he is her dad and he is nice to her so she doesn't really side with anyone other than her friends. She lives with Eyeless John and Lulu at Splendor's place

Lulu is also a friend of hers and they both stick together pretty well (same with Sally, but Sally stays in the Slender Mansion mostly and technically sides with Slender)

Kagekao works as a messenger for Zalgo because Zalgo promised to help him find his parents if he did. Japanese demons are kinda weird because Japan is like Madagascar for demons, all the demons there are very unique and it's a very unique ecosystem so alot of them don't really consider themselves subjects of Zalgo normally, same with Kagekao. Mostly he just does his job then goes and messes with people. He's good friends with all the Slender brothers except Slender (because Kagekao likes to bully his proxies, they tend to be more sturdy than normal humans so they last alot longer) He also lives with Splendor as he's a member of Eyeless John and Lazuri's little group

Splendorman:

Eyeless John is EJ's brother and the demon possessing him is the step brother of EJ's demon. John gets along with his demon very well and that demon doesn't really like Slenderman or Zalgo and considering John didn't immediately jump down the path of evil after being possessed like his brother did he also doesn't like Slender or Zalgo much. However he does babysit Lazuri for Zalgo so he does somewhat side with him, but he's more in league with Splendor

Judge Angles lives with Splendor as well and helps John in his criminal killing from time to time

Laughing Jill similarly lives with Splendor but she's cool with any Slender brother. She just ended up with Splendor

Splendor also has lots of proxies. He calls them Buddies though. He jas way more buddies than Slender has proxies and is also much stronger than Slender, and honestly Zalgo too, but he's a pacifist and doesn't want there to be anymore bloodshed than there already is

He wants Slender to be nice to humans and wants Zalgo to stop his fued with Slender and rule over the demons properly. He hasn't had much luck in convincing them.

Ok that's everyone I have opinions on, I think. Tagging this is going to suck.

[everyothermouse]

A lil group portrait of the time au adventuring gang!! Them <333

Basically tol fucked up as a kid and is now on the run from the law, but realized that since his life was so crazy he could live off of telling stories of his wacky adventures. When he met Jay he wanted him to come with him, and when he found out jay couldn't come cus he was virtually a demon/god/magic magnet he decided he NEEDED to bring him to capitalize on how it'd make more cool stories. And yeah it worked so since then he's been collecting wackos to aaa go crazy aaaa go stupid (and also bcus safety I numbers or whateva, pop and pip are also criminals and pastel and jay are crimes against god <3) more about each individual under the cut!

Doin them from left to right :)

Pastel: died when she was messing around with some friends and got stuck under a big rock and left to starve. But because of a fluke in the underworld her God decided to resurrect her, a right usually only belonging to saints. Because of this she's now poorly pretending that she totally did something to deserve being revived (she tells a different story every time someone asks, she thinks it's funny) to avoid being persecuted for suspected witchcraft. She met Jay when they were both drunk and they had fun fucking around in the city, and she spilled the beans to him that she was revived for no reason. She regretted it, but jay didn't kill her because even though he's religious he knew what it felt like to be magically cursed and have everyone be pissed at u for it. Also she's really funny with jay so tol begged her to come with them to add more Comedy(tm) to his memoirs

Pop: a time traveller and angel who is trying to hide both of those facts but only really succeeding at hiding the time travel thing. When they were a kid they traveled to this time with his friends Lustre and Cherrybomb, but when they were attacked by the vicious royal guard they weren't able to escape without leaving Lustre behind. Cherrybomb super repressed that memory, and while pop recovered from some minor injuries they vowed to never time travel again. Yeah they only kept that up until they were like 15, but they still couldn't bring themself to go back to when they left Lustre. But now they're 26 (well technically they're like 33 but in their time their supposed to be 26) living with their boyfriend cherrybomb and have years of time travel experience under their belt, and they're ready to go back. Except they can't go back because they created a travel block for themself by accident because of how upsetting the event was, so instead they traveled as close as they could, about 10 years in the future of the time. Now they search for any form of closure, all they need to know is what happened to their friend, and they will do whatever it takes to find this out. But angels aren't super welcome in the past, especially not with uncut wings, so it's not exactly easy for them to navigate this time period. But after a while of their search they met two lovely children (well young adults), a demon and a "cursed" (nowadays they call em spiritually gifted) and felt so bad for how much the world seemed to be against them they decided they could travel with them, just for a bit, to protect them. They tried not to get attached. They failed. They're in it for the long run now aren't they TwT also as they explore this time and learn more about the gods, they start to realize that they might... be the God of longevity???? Or at least an older version of them became them? Time travel is fucked man

Btw Lustre plays a big role in this plot, her hyper futuristic knowledge, 'blessed' white eyes, and strange God gifted clothing would all lead to him rising to a much different role than fugitive rather quickly, but they're not who this post is about ;) also I'm gonna go bottom to top for the 3 in the middle let's go

Lune: just a little guy :) lune is a young rancher/gardener who worships the God of the wood, who kind of goes missing sometimes and is lowkey the least loyal God but shhhh he loves them. Lune and tol were childhood friends (along with their pal cleo) but on one of their little excursions tol took something very important to a very powerful king, and refused to give it back. As retribution the king destroyed their entire town, and cleo put all the blame on tol, tol and lune both knew lune had to take the side against tol in order to not have the town turn on him. So yeah he moved with the town to bring up a brand new farm, long awaiting the day when tol would come home and say that things were OK and they could settle back in town together, hopefully with cleo too. That didn't happen, but tol did come back and peer pressure lune into part time adventuring with him! So yeah generally lune just runs his lil farm and prays, but when tol comes to pick him up he gets a chance to go be free to act batshit crazy, just like when he was a kid 🥰

Pipes: DEmon! One time lune and tol had a little squabble so lune was like 'im gonna get a new best friend and ur gonna regret this' and tol was like 'yeah right, u live with a bunch of criminals right now no one's gonna wanna be ur bestie dumbass' so lune just walked into a cave at night and dragged out this little nonverbal demon because demons who live alone in caves don't have high standards for friends. Even tho it was just a ploy to make tol jealous lune went super hard on it and now pipes is actually friends with the gang lmaoo

Tol: like I said with lunes, stole something important from a king as a kid, monarch got pissed, blew up the town, town got pissed at tol for it, and since then he's been on the run because he's too stubborn to give back the damn thing (they could have just attacked HIM for it, but since la queen decided to fuck with his town, his family, tol thinks he doesn't deserve to have it back.) He had to run from town to town and got into a lot of danger in his attempts at finding places to hide, but he lacks fear and tended to fight stuff off. As a kid he found that he could get enough pity to be welcomed into towns if he told people he had to fight a monster to get there, so he told stories at every town and camp he went to of his hardships. But as he got older, those he stayed with beckoned him to keep talking, and more and more people said they had heard of his adventures. And that's when when it clicked, his shining ticket to true freedom wasn't a place, it was his stories. They gave him food, shelter, fun, memories, a life. So he made it his mission to never settle down, to make his life as crazy as possible and to talk about it as much as possible, and if he ever ran out of energy to adventure, he'd spend the rest of his dying days writing and writing his entire life story. He thought this was a life he'd live alone, but one day he sought refuge in jays little lonely house because he thought it was abonded, luckily though Jay had just been praying for a second chance at life and decided that considering the timing, tol must be that second chance. So yeah jay patched him up, found out on his monthly supply route he was harboring someone very wanted, and took care of tol even harder because he didn't know or care why he was wanted, he just knew that anyone who had a drawing of them as a child on a wanted poster definitely didn't deserve it. So yeah they're besties now.

AAA I wrote out a really long description for jay but tumblr glitched and I lost it :'O ble here's a shorter rewrite cus I'm not writing out that whole thing again >:P

Jay: brought up in a church village,, he was born with the curse, which allows him to tap into magical properties very easily, and be very easily controlled, manipulated, and possessed by them. This allowed him to be very connected with his god (the god of longevity) but also meant he was often treated as a security risk and a monster by the adults of his town since he could let in evil spirits so easily. He spent most of his time praying and he became obsessed with acting on compulsions (repeated prayer, overscrubbing, scratching himself, touching religious things until he felt like he touched them "right") because he believed they were messages from God and would prevent him from becoming evil (look he was a teenager and everyone told him he was a monster his whole life leave him be.) He gets possessed twice, mage as a rep of the town is like "either have ur cursed removed or leave town forever" (uncursing is only hypothetically possible, it's hella dangerous) and he's scared itd sever his connection to his god so he leaves and he's upset bcus his entire life plan was built around his church, so now he's livin alone on a hill and leaving like once a month, he stays up there and sews and prays mostly, he sort of works on himself and becomes vaguely mentally stable, so he prays for a second chance at life since he lost his original path and needs a sign where to go, and then boom tol shows up and the rest is history. Now he has his own little family and things are going great :) other than the still getting possessed like once a week but shhhh

Pip: in between the entrance to hell and the religious central of the continent is a little town that sides with neither. They mostly fuck around and find out, and in this town lives a monster researcher and her less formal wife, pip! Pip is just a silly goofy little guy livin life, and when the crazy bunch shows up she feels like he's finally found her people :3 and for the first time the group gains a member who's begging to join them as opposed to the other way around

Ya and together they all go on wacky lil adventures with demons and monsters and monarchs and what not.

Tldr pastel is a funny lil dead guy, pop is a time traveller and the Adult of the team, lunes a lil farmer man, pipes a hobo demon they picked up off the side of the road, tols a little criminal demon adventurer, jays a religious weirdo who tol dragged out of his hermit hut, and pips an insane little guy

[ghirahims-trophyhusband]

send me a 💫 and I’ll tell you something about my f/o’s source or f/o’s character! Feel free to specify what f/o you want to learn abt

@hobgobbin​​ @iguinn​​ @meari-ships​​

AH! MI AMOR! 💖✨🥺

/sits in a gay little way that pisses you off

Mr Gary Hams or as he’d probably like to be called: Demon Lord Ghirahim, is the main villain for Skyward Sword, which I played for the first time WAYYYY back in 2011 when the game first came out on the wii! (I am very excited for the switch release like oh my god finally......... my husband, my beloved, my main mans, my favourite idiot in HD......) I still remember how happy I was when the game came out omg, I even got it a day early!

Ghirahim, as a character, is a right motherfucker and absolute bastard who I would still punch despite loving him so (I mean, he repeatedly threatens Link with violence so he might need a slap or two to calm down), but he’s so fucking funny to watch hjgflh I can never get enough of how expressive and over the top he is. He’s like a kid who was never told ‘hey dude, this isn’t drama class anymore...’ or he just refuses to change how he acts because that’s his brand baby!!

His main goal throughout the game is to kidnap Zelda so he can use her to resurrect his master: Demon King Demise, which he does eventually succeed in doing so you know what? King shit 💖 Love that for u~

And because of his goal to catch Zelda, he gets A LOT of cutscenes throughout the game, typically appearing before a boss or being the boss himself (you fight him 3 times total!). The one dungeon he doesn’t show up in is the Sandship in Lanayru Desert (and the Sky Keep but that’s not on the Surface like the other dungeons), so from that I personally headcanon he maybe has thalassophobia (fear of deep water/the ocean)! Which would make sense since he is technically a giant big ass sword and so, made of metal. So he’d probably sink in seconds LMAO.

ALSO I have to comment on this but way back when, I made a joke how ‘oh i bet Ghirahim is a sword spirit like Fi!’ simply because of the gem on his belt, and I was right and I was so mad I was right too ghfdkjghdfgdf. BUT it does apply more context to his actions in certain scenes! For example, how was he able to track Zelda so closely where he was always JUST a step behind? He could dowse for her aura just like Fi can!

In conclusion, I love this terrible man and yes, even his terrible decisions that end up biting him in the ass later on (like letting Link live/not checking Link dies during certain bosses because he’s an idiot). Let Ghirahim throw hands with a 17 year old from day one trust me bro it would be hilarious.

Anyway I can’t wait to see him when Skyward Sword HD arrives! Especially his true forme because I Am Looking Respectfully at that 7′4″ body of his~

And this one shot of him smiling bc it’s pretty much the one time in the game where he smiles genuinely, given the context, and I think it’s very sweet and when he smiles I smile 💖✨ (yes he did basically just ‘kill’ Zelda to resurrect Demise but this ain’t about her)

[aahsokaatano]

King I would love that essay about Changing Channels

Fjdjshjdhdjd thanks for reading my tags Jesse you're the real VIP here.

Okay SO "Changing Channels" is the 8th episode of the 5th season of Supernatural. I give this information bc it's important in looking at the context of the episode - now I've complained a LOT about how SPN is terrible at giving us canonical timeframes within the episodes (y'all i was SHOCKED to discover the first season is supposed to cover a little over a year's worth of time, I thought it was like... 4 or 5 months) so I can't say for sure how long before and after the other episodes happen in-universe around "Changing Channels" BUT

The episode before is "The Curious Case of Dean Winchester" where Dean and Bobby bet years of their lives in a game of poker with a witch. The episode after is "The Real Ghostbusters" where Sam and Dean end up at a fan convention for the in-universe Supernatural novels.

Why am I pointing this out? Because it's important, please, no audience participation, this is like a Brian David Gilbert panel.

[under a cut bc this got...... STUPID long. Who knew I still had this many opinions about SPN in 2020?]

Okay first of all I wanna talk about the cinnamon topography of this episode - I love the way the first 5 seasons are shot because you really feel the americana gothic horror aesthetic they were going for (I have a whole ‘nother rant about the first 5 seasons vs the last 10 but thats for another time). Everything is a little washed out and grey-toned, the camera angles generally serve to make Sam and Dean appear even taller than they actually are (larger than life - again, another post for another time), and there’s honestly a LOT of shots from the ‘monster’s’ perspective, which is really neat! I’ve said it before (on another blog - YES i have a dedicated spn rant blog, don’t @ me hdjfhfjfh) but the episode that really got me hooked on spn back in the day was the second one, about the w*ndigo. Yes, it’s a racist, culturally appropriating shitstorm, but the way its SHOT is fantastic. I’m honestly not a horror fan, but that episode could have easily relied on jumpscares and they DIDN’T and it was scary as all fucking hell and just - fuck okay getting off topic. 

In “Changing Channels” we get that distinctive grey-washed tone in the beginning and the very end of the episode, but the middle? When they’re in TV Land? Everything is bright. Almost comically so, I mean - okay look at these two shots of Sam (apologies about the crappy phone pics, netflix won't let me screenshot)

This one is from the start of the episode, in the "real" police station

And this is from a little later in the "TV" hospital

Ignoring that my phone is washing him out a lot in both pics, you can still see the warmer tones in the hospital shot as compared to the cold greyness in the police station one

Okay, now look at this picture

Dean inside the Impala, and those warm tones are back. Why? Because even though Sam and Dean believe that they’re back in the “real” world, they aren’t - so instead of the grey-washed shots that we’re used to, its the bright and warm shots that we see in “TV Land”! So the viewers pick up, even if its just subconsciously, that the boys aren’t out of the woods yet - everything is still too bright to be the in-universe reality we’ve come to expect from SPN by season 5

Which is also why i love this shift so much

These shots are literally SECONDS apart. The first is in "TV Land" and the second is in the "real" world. I have some red strip lights behind my bed, which are reflecting off my laptop screen - notice how much brighter they seem in the second picture? That’s because literally all of the warm colors have been drained out of the shot. As soon as Gabriel snaps them all back into “reality,” things get so much colder.

Okay, so the second thing I want to talk about is some of the very pointed dialogue choices within the “shows” the Winchesters take part in. Not between Sam and Dan and Gabriel, but from the, for lack of a better term, NPCs within the shows.

In the hospital, Dr. Piccolo tells Sam that he is “the finest cerebrovascular neurosurgeon I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So that girl died on your table; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Sometimes people just die.” Standard cheesy soap opera dialogue - but lemme just swap some words here and - 

“You are the finest hunter I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So that girl died on your hunt; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Sometimes people just die.”

Or even - 

“You are the finest hunter I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So Jessica and Mary died above you; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault [but Azazel’s]. Sometimes people just die.”

Keeping in mind that the NPCs are basically Gabriel’s mouthpieces, its easy to see why so many people ship Sabriel. I’d actually love to see a fic that explores them talking about this moment in particular later on and the kind of gentle forgiveness that Gabriel can give Sam... getting off topic again.

In an abrupt about-face, the herpes commercial (much meme’d within the fandom) is straight up Gabriel shaming Sam. Because if you replace “genital herpes” with “demon blood” it’s.... dark. And very intentional.

So that’s what I did! (I combined all spoken lines to make the message easier to read, rather than splitting them up across 3 speakers as in the episode)

“I’ve drank demon blood. I tried to be responsible... did I try. But now, after being forcibly detoxed, I fight my addiction every day to reduce the chances of passing back into that toxic mindset. Ask your loved ones about a demon blood intervention today. [...] I am doing all I can to slightly lessen the chance of drinking demon blood again. And that’s a good thing.”

Like... the subtext throughout this episode sure is. Something.

Okay this is getting ridiculously long so I wanna wrap up by talking about The Best Scene In The Whole Goddamn Show

I’m talking, of course, about Gabriel’s Confession

“Max,” you might be saying, “there are so many better scenes out there, even within the first five seasons!” and to that i say, again, no audience participation, please. Also, you’re WRONG and here’s why!

Gabriel’s confession hits every goddamn emotional chord that the fandom begged for on this show - fear, rage, grief, pain, guilt, and even, yes, absolution. 

Okay, here’s the scene again for those of you who don’t think about it at least once a week like me

Now this video is missing some of the conversation, but most of it is there, enough for you to see what I’m talking about. Gabriel up to this point has been, essentially, a nameless antagonist - this is the third episode he appeared in, and before this, we didn’t even know he was going by Loki. He was just referred to as ‘The Trickster’. But here, not only do we get a name (a real name at that), but we also get a glimpse of his backstory and a hell of a lot of character development in less than 5 minutes. I mean, Sam didn’t get this much character development throughout the entirety of season 1! There’s a good reason Gabriel has been a fan-favorite for a very long time, and I think a big part of it is this particular scene.

Because here, we get to see Gabriel being vulnerable. And we even see Dean show a little vulnerability, as he can empathize being the third party to explosive arguments between the two people who mean everything to him.

I mean... okay, it will never see the light of day, but I wrote a little bit of a Reverse ‘Verse fic (because I’m a sucker for Reverse ‘Verse) and this was the scene I started with. Not s1e1, not even the resurrection in s4e1, but this scene. Because this scene, more than any other, is critical to the way not only Gabriel’s (first) arc plays out, but also to how Sam and Dean conduct themselves for the rest of the season (and maybe a bit beyond, it’s been a hot minute since I watched s6 and later). Dean is angry but determined, he has a point to make, he is going to save Sammy and if he can’t do that, then he’s going to damn well die trying. But Sam... it’s after this episode that we start really seeing how bone-achingly tired Sam is. It’s after this conversation - where one of the other archangels, one of the few beings who can truly understand how powerful Michael and Lucifer are - says that there’s no other way around this that Sam seems to start inching towards giving in. Saying yes.

Sure, in the actual episode, he seems outraged by the idea, practically scoffs at it - “you want us to say yes to those sons of bitches?” - but it’s after this where Sam really seems run down.

I mean, look at the episodes before and after (HAH you thought I forgot about that first point I made at the very beginning of this post! I did, briefly, but I’ve circled back to it, thanks for being understanding). In “The Curious Case of Dean Winchester,” Sam behaves much as he did since the start of s4, which is to say, ‘annoying little know-it-all brother tossed into the middle of the apocalypse and just trying his best’ and it works well for the mad scramble for any scrap of information that’s happening in s4/early s5.

But in “The Real Ghostbusters” it’s different. This is another funny meta episode - except, while Sam and Dean are technically aware of the joke, they aren’t as amused by it as the audience is. And it’s not because of the ghosts. It’s because they’re just... done. Especially Sam. Dean has that nice little moment with the cosplayers at the end of the episode, but Sam... threatens to shoot Chuck. Sam ‘goes darkside’ more often than pretty much any other character in the show, but that moment is different. It’s a flat promise, not a threat. He’s not being an asshole, like he is after losing his soul. He’s just... done. And it’s obvious to see.

Gabriel’s confession is the turning point for Sam in s5, and it informs a lot of his behavior through the rest of s5, and possibly beyond! Like I said, I haven’t watched past s5 in a very long time, so I don’t feel confident enough to analyze that specific sort of character line, but I feel confident in saying that hearing one of the most powerful beings in the universe basically say “it doesn’t matter what you do - your destiny is unavoidable” and then he’s proven right (Sam says yes to Lucifer, and Dean eventually does say yes to Michael down the line!)... like, that’s really gotta fuck up your world view that was built on free will and throwing off the shackles of fate. Sam managed to avoid his ‘destiny’ in s2... but then it turns out that that wasn’t ever his destiny. Lucifer was his destiny.

Talk about an obscured view of the inner self.

[phoebehalliwell]

What do you think an AU would look like if the Twice-Blessed prophesied child had been Phoebe's son with Cole? Or one of Paige's children (half-Whitelighters of the original half-Whitelighter)?

before we begin i wanna state for the record i have typed out the answer to this not once but twice and yet somehow both times i have managed to exit the page, deleting very large chunks of witty and insightful text So i am gonna try this One More Time and i hope it works!

alright: phoebe and cole’s baby. funky lil man. (tho acutally i would love to see the baby be a girl as a reverse of the plotline where everyone thought piper’s baby was a girl and it turned out to be a boy). personally, i could see this plotline happening a couple of ways. 

option one: cole never became the source or mortal. don’t ask me how. the point cole was never possessed by the source, he and phoebe never ruled the underworld, s4 was carried by some different form of drama. so, they baby is born, half demon, half witch (though technically, the baby is only a quarter demon bc cole is half demon half human. the halliwells definitely bring up this little statistic every single time the elders pop down like 👀👀 oh 👀 is that baby still alive? 👀👀 y’all still keeping the demon baby with a whole bunch of prophesized powers alive? 👀👀 okay yep alrighty well then imma just leave my number 👀 in case you ever 👀 uhh 👀👀 wanna kill that baby mmmkay?) a driving plotline for the following season could be cole’s demon mother coming out of the woodwork and trying to lay claim to her grandson, which would also generate relationship drama for phoebe and cole that doesn’t stem from lies and manipulation. also! we get a He Only Murdered People Because He Was Sad plotline for cole, a fun key to his tragic backstory.

option two i’ve actually built upon before but imma do it again. cole gets possessed by the source but he’s fighting it the whole time. yes he becomes king of the hell and yes phoebe follows him as queen but! phoebe decides that she can’t do this anymore. she can’t be evil. and guess what? cole decides that to. he love phoebe, and he loves good, and love is the most powerful magic of all so he is able to overcome the source and the two flee. but uhh you can’t really rule the underworld for an month and then be like “nevermind actually this shit blows imma be good now” Because That’s Not How It Works. so, there’s this big battle, cole & the charmed ones vs. all of evil, and in the end, cole sacrifices himself for phoebe and for good as a whole, and dies a hero. no desperate attempts at a resurrection (unless the elders make their first ever demon to whitelighter promotion in a later season ? 👀👀) so, phoebe has her twice blessed baby (named cole jr., obvi), and the baby is raised by single mother phoebe and her two sisters, with driving plots for the season being many a demonic faction who still believe the baby is the source and try to kidnap it and make it their leader.

third and final option for this ask: s4 happens. part of s5 happens. phoebe vanquished cole. she hates his guts. he crawled out of the demonic wasteland like howdy 🤠 glad 2 be back woahwaitareyoupregnantwaitwithababywaitwithmybaby?? and that baby does turn out to be cole’s son and also: The Twice Blessed. and now cole’s all like. hmm 👀 twice blessed you say 👀 as in two have blessed that baby 👀 as in 👀 i count a blessed 👀👀👀 and phoebe’s like yeah eat shit cole. but the two have a sort of joint custody situation, both because of the law (which cole is happy to bring up) but also because phoebe can tell that cole really cares for the child and want to make sure that the baby isn’t raised like he was but instead has the opportunity to be a good witch like his mama. and through these good faith efforts not for phoebe but out of the goodness of his heart and for his son, maybe phoebe finds herself not hating cole. but she’s doesn’t love him. no. she can’t do that again. but maybe she’s really tired after taking care the baby so cole stops by and puts the little guy to sleep and maybe they order take out from that restaraunt they both love and maybe they’re laughing over old memories and haha and oh shit phoebe’s in love with cole again.

as far as one of paige’s kids being the twice blessed: i think it would be a little far fetched because henry’s a mortal but uhh Consider This. okay, so arthurian legend in canon in charmed and wyatt’s like arthur or whatever but like arthur’s mortal if i’m not mistaken. arthur is a fully human, non magical dude. merlin’s the one with magic. also, clearly, in this au, wyatt does not exist So Picture This. henry is actually a descendant of / the next king arthur. paige has merlinian blood. and also i think it’d be fun if the twice blessed were also twins.

[yeniayofnymeria]

Arya Stark and Black Swan

(I don't know who the picture belongs to, I found it a long time ago.)

Hello/Selam,

In fact, as you know, Arya is one of the biggest five of GRRM. She has a key role in the books. The problem is that it's hard to predict exactly what this role is. I've been trying to piece together her puzzle pieces for years. The result I have achieved so far; Arya is on the side of the ice in the Battle of Ice and Fire alongside FM / Great Other ... Most people see this story as a classic good-bad battle, but I don't. The reason I think so is GRRM's statements.

Men are still capable of great heroism. But I don’t necessarily think there are heroes. That’s something that’s very much in my books: I believe in great characters. We’re all capable of doing great things, and of doing bad things. We have the angels and the demons inside of us, and our lives are a succession of choices…[Woodrow Wilson] was a racist who tried to end war. Now, does one cancel out the other? Well, they don’t cancel out the other. You can’t make him a hero or a villain. He was both. And we’re all both. - GRRM

...

Much as I admire Tolkien, and I do admire Tolkien — he’s been a huge influence on me, and his Lord of the Rings is the mountain that leans over every other fantasy written since and shaped all of modern fantasy — there are things about it, the whole concept of the Dark Lord, and good guys battling bad guys, Good versus Evil, while brilliantly handled in Tolkien, in the hands of many Tolkien successors, it has become kind of a cartoon. We don’t need any more Dark Lords, we don’t need any more, “Here are the good guys, they’re in white, there are the bad guys, they’re in black. And also, they’re really ugly, the bad guys.” - GRRM

So I don't see the side of ice and fire pure good and pure bad. They're both. Just like the Stark and Lannister war. So I don't see any problem putting Arya on the ice. After all, she's a Stark, and the Stark family is portrayed as "ice."

Lets continue.

The post was created using multiple topics(I combined them.): u/DutchArya 's https://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/146440-arya-the-singing-bird-stark/ post and u/Arya1100's https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/7vw332/spoilers_extended_black_swans_and_arya_stark_an/ post.

It's an old theory(of theirs), but it's been a year or so. I wanted to resurrect. I just added a few things. And I commented in my own words.

Black Swan Theory

The black swan theory or theory of black swan events is a metaphor that describes an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight**.** The term is based on an ancient saying that presumed black swans did not exist – a saying that became reinterpreted to teach a different lesson after black swans were discovered in the wild.

The theory was developed by Nassim Nicholas Taleb to explain:

The disproportionate role of high-profile, hard-to-predict, and rare events that are beyond the realm of normal expectations in history, science, finance, and technology.

The non-computability of the probability of the consequential rare events using scientific methods (owing to the very nature of small probabilities).

The psychological biases that blind people, both individually and collectively, to uncertainty and to a rare event's massive role in historical affairs.

Unlike the earlier and broader "black swan problem" in philosophy (i.e. the problem of induction), Taleb's "black swan theory" refers only to unexpected events of large magnitude and consequence and their dominant role in history. Such events, considered extreme outliers**, collectively play vastly larger roles than regular occurrences:**xxi More technically, in the scientific monograph 'Silent Risk', Taleb mathematically defines the black swan problem as "stemming from the use of degenerate metaprobability" - From wikizeroo.org

Black Swan in summary = A term used to refer to an unexpectedly large event, effect, event.

Arya Stark is thought to have a connection with the Black Swan... This is both a “theory i'm issue I mentioned above and a kind of ugly duckling that turns into a beautiful swan.

Black Swan

Arya felt as though the lake were calling her. She wanted to leap into those placid blue waters, to feel clean again, to swim and splash and bask in the sun. But she dare not take off her clothes where the others could see...

From up here, she could see a small wooded island off to the northeast. Thirty yards from shore, three black swans were gliding over the water, so serene . . . no one had told them that war had come, and they cared nothing for burning towns and butchered men. She stared at them with yearning. Part of her wanted to be a swan the other part wanted to eat one. - (Arya, A Clash of Kings)

The important thing in this quote is that he sees “3 BLACK SWAN as I mentioned above. In fact, the Europeans did not know Black Swan until the 1697s, and I think that this is the basis of the theory that I mentioned first. So, in essence, these animals are a very rare species. Considering that the ASOIAF universe is a kind of a different version of Europe... In other words, the author added a “black swan" instead of the common white swan.

In the next book (book 3) Arya meets some of the Brotherhood and Lady Ravella Smallwood. She treats Arya well, washes and dresses her.

It was even worse than before; Lady Smallwood insisted that Arya take another bath, and cut and comb her hair besides; the dress she put her in this time was sort of lilac-colored, and decorated with little baby pearls. The only good thing about it was that it was so delicate that no one could expect her to ride in it. So the next morning as they broke their fast, Lady Smallwood gave her breeches, belt, and tunic to wear, and a brown doeskin jerkin dotted with iron studs. "They were my son's things," she said. "He died when he was seven."

"I'm sorry, my lady." Arya suddenly felt bad for her, and ashamed. "I'm sorry I tore the acorn dress too. It was pretty."

"Yes, child. And so are you. Be brave."

This woman from House Swan. Their sigil is so interesting 

Battling swans black and white and so is the House of Black and White and that is where Arya is being reborn at every dark moon.

In the books Black and White was often touted as the struggle for darkness and light; therefore, we may interpret the question of swans as the struggle between dark and light parts of Arya or some kind of foreshadowing, which expresses an "enemy" in the future. In another comment 3 black swans; 3 can not be predicted to affect the story, may also express the great effect.

Water Dance

Arya stands on her toes, on one leg. This is indeed reminiscent of ballet. Ballet dancers learn to stand upright, on the tip of their toes, often on one leg. It's explicitly linked to the water dancing. So, "water dancing" = "ballet" and Swan Lake is a ballet that also has narrative similarities to Arya's story.

Ned stopped and looked at her. "Arya, what are you doing?"

"Syrio says a water dancer can stand on one toe for hours." Her hands flailed at the air to steady herself.

Ned had to smile. "Which toe?" he teased.

"Any toe." - (Eddard V, aGoT)

Later on, Arya wishes she could dance on water. This is what the Swan ballet dancers do!

Skinny as they were, her legs were strong and springy and growing longer every day. She was glad of that. A water dancer needs good legs. Blind Beth was no water dancer, but she would not be Beth forever. - The Blind Girl, ADWD

...

She was not far from the Gate as the crows flies, but for girls with feet instead of wings, the way was longer. - Mercy, Winds

Ugly Duck and Beautiful Swan

You all know the story of the ugly duckling. The swan, which started life as an ugly duck, is considered by all to be ugly and excluded. But one day something happens that when the ugly duck grows up, it turns into a beautiful swan and amazes everyone.

Readers think that the swan motif is also one aspect of it, which I'm sure everyone who reads the books carefully noticed it.

Arya considered herself ugly from the very beginning, and Sansa and Jeyne mocked her long face and subjected them to “Horse-faced” insults. According to Arya, her mother told her; if she wore beautiful dresses like Sansa and combed her hair, she could have been as beautiful as her sister.

But Jon and Ned always said she was beautiful; his father stated that she resembled his sister Lyanna, who is said to be a very beautiful girl. On the other hand, as she grew up during her adventure (such as Lady Smallwood), some began to emphasize that she was “beautiful.. For example, we have recently seen The Gentle Man said to her face is beautiful.

There is also a reference link to the swan and beauty in the series.

Arianne touched the pin that clasped [Balon’s] cloak, with its quarreling swans. “I have always been fond of swans. No other bird is half so beautiful, this side of the Summer Isles.”

“Your peacocks might dispute that,” said Ser Balon.

“They might,” said Arianne, “but peacocks are vain, proud creatures, strutting about in all those gaudy colors. Give me a swan serene in white or beautiful in black.” - The Watcher, ADwD

Thank you for read.

[ridiasfangirlings]

An AU where everyone has daemons (the ‘His Dark Materials’ brand). When did their daemons settle and what kind of animal did they settle as?

Obviously Fushimi has a penguin, it's canon :P Animal K would be the easiest answer but I like the idea of a bit more variety. Mikoto's is the easiest one though, he definitely has a lion and his probably settled at an early age to no one's surprise, his personality is just so intrinsically lion-like that anything else would have been strange. He would be one of the rare people with a same-sex demon though, since Mikoto's personality is more lion than lioness, even as a kid I imagine him walking around with this full grown male lion and looking totally chill about it. Munakata by contrast I could see going with animal K and having like a big shaggy wolf which gets along horribly with Mikoto's lion. Though I admit I do kinda like the idea of Munakata having a peacock daemon, just imagine Mikoto and Munakata fighting and there's Munakata's peacock waving its tail in the face of Mikoto's lion with the perfect aura of 'smug bastard' just radiating from it.

For the rest of Homra, Anna's I think wouldn't settle until at the earliest when she becomes King. I could see her daemon settling as some kind of red bird to mimic her Red King phoenix, like a red-tailed hawk or a brahminy kite. Totsuka would probably have something small and mostly helpless, like his animal K sheep would actually kinda work especially if it constantly manifests as a lamb (plus bonus 'lion and lamb' imagery with Mikoto). Or maybe something small like a cute dwarf rabbit or a field mouse, something little and relatively powerless which nevertheless is perfectly calm with Mikoto's lion. Similarly Kusanagi having an owl would be kinda amusing, especially if people keep commenting on the similarity between himself and his daemon and he gets annoyed by it, though I could also see him having something with strong motherly instincts like some species of monkey (or something interesting like a spider, carrying babies on her back and weaving webs in the background while also keeping the bar free of bugs). Yata would likely have something high energy, like he gets his very own chihuahua demon. Though actually I could see Yata having some kind of dog demon, like an African painted dog which is high energy and wants to form social bonds with everyone, once he finds Homra it's like he's got his 'pack' at last.

Fushimi I could see having something standoffish that tends to snap when in danger and his daemon probably settled early at least partly due to Niki's abuse. I could kinda see him maybe having some type of snake, likely something venomous like a type of cobra or an adder (Niki, naturally, has a mongoose and laughs whenever Fushimi's snake tries to bite him). Having a snake makes Fushimi probably stand out amongst most of his peers, while everyone else's daemons are settling as mammals or birds here he's got this snake on his shoulder at all times whose presence is like a physical wall around him and it will only slightly relax around people that he's close to. His snake never liked Mikoto's lion and was always coiling near him but it doesn't seem to mind Munakata's stupid peacock at all. Awashima I think would have some kind of Tundra animal to match her nickname, like maybe a snowy owl (and then Kusanagi has a barn owl so they have a match) or even a snow leopard like her animal K self.

For the Greens, I wonder if Hisui would even have a daemon since he's technically dead, like did it disappear when he died and then reappear once the Slate resurrected him. Maybe he makes it look to everyone that Kotosaka is his daemon but really somewhere in jungle there's a small green very rare breed of parakeet that's in like a perpetual stasis and is kept somewhere very safe because it belongs to the King. I feel like for Iwafune a raven would work really well, it just fits his whole black aesthetic thing. Oh maybe he used to have a dove when he was Ootori Seigo and then his daemon actually underwent a shift after the Kagutsu Crater, like the emotional blow was so heavy on him that it caused his daemon to change. Yukari I see having something beautiful but deadly, like imagine him having this brilliantly colored poison dart frog as his daemon. Sukuna's probably wouldn't have settled yet during the time of the series and it only finally does later on after Hisui dies (for some reason I imagine him with like a weasel, to match his weapon).

The Silvers, Kuroh definitely has some form of large dog, maybe even something like a maned wolf. Neko I think would have a cat as her daemon too but probably not a normal house cat, I could see her having something rare or endangered like a flat-headed cat or Andean cat. Shiro feels like he should have some kind of bird too, like maybe an Albatross or something, though I do like the idea of him having a mouse just to fit the theme of his clansmen – actually it'd be interesting if he had just a plain small white mouse, similar to the type that gets used in scientific experiments and people often assume the Silver King has no daemon because it's so easy to overlook. Everyone assumes that as Gold King Kokujouji must have something really majestic but actually he totally has a cute lop-eared bunny daemon and I will have no arguments on this point.

[nitrateglow]

Rick Blaine, Carrie White, Helen Grosvenor

Yay!

Favorite thing about them: How he ultimately does the right thing. He’s heartbroken and bitter, yet in the end, he does not let his pain destroy his noble side. He forgets himself and in so doing resurrects the good man he once was.

Least favorite thing about them: Nothing. Well, except that one scene where he basically calls Ilsa a slut, but he was sad and drunk and obviously regretted saying that.

Favorite line: “We’ll always have Paris.”

brOTP: Rick and Renault are so awesome. I love how Renault really wants to get under Rick’s skin, but in a playful way. Their banter is great. I would love to see fic showing what they got up to after the plane was out of sight.

OTP: Rick and Ilsa, obviously. 

nOTP: Rick and Renault. I know some people ship them and Renault is kinda flirty in some of their scenes (”If I were a woman, I should be very in love with Rick”) but I prefer them as friends. Something tells me Renault is not exactly the monogamous type anyhow and that Rick very much is when you get down to it.

Random headcanon: Some people say they think he died during WWII, but I like to think he survived the war. However, I think he stayed away from the US for a long time. He was probably reluctant to go back again because so much in the world has changed since he last saw it. Eventually, he does visit NYC in the 1960s for a brief spell, but he eventually just goes back to his old haunts in Europe. He never sees Ilsa again.

Unpopular opinion: None!

Song I associate with them: What else? “As Time Goes By.”

Favorite picture of them:

Because I like having my heart torn out.

Favorite thing about them: How she stands up to her mother at the end of the movie. It makes you wonder what kind of person she might have grown to be otherwise.

Least favorite thing about them: Well, she didn’t handle public humiliation very well.... to say the least.....

Favorite line: “ It has nothing to do with Satan, Mama. It's me. “

brOTP: None.

OTP: Carrie and Tommy. He really does seem like he was starting to see Carrie as more than a weird girl to pity. At the very least, they might have become good friends had prom not sucked that year.

nOTP: Nothing comes to mind, unless someone was compelled to write gross fic with Carrie and Margaret *shudder* the sick, sick fic writers.

Random headcanon: I don’t really have any for this movie aside from things I would like to think would have happened had Carrie’s night at the prom turned out better. Like her and Tommy getting closer, or her slowly becoming more outgoing at school, or testing out her powers more and maybe making friends with Danny Torrance years later, I DON’T KNOW JUST LET HER BE HAPPY STEPHEN KING.

Unpopular opinion: None.

Song I associate with them: That opening music from the movie.

Favorite picture of them:

I just want to think the movie ends here. Let her be happy!

Favorite thing about them: I enjoy how Helen so goes against the 1930s horror movie heroine stereotype. She’s strong willed. She isn’t an ingenue and seems to have inner demons we only just get to glimpse. She’s attracted to the past yet she knows she can only be happy if she lives life in the present. Also, she rescues herself in the end. There is a lot to love.

Least favorite thing about them: Actually, nothing. She’s really cool.

Favorite line: “Do you need to open graves to find girls to fall in love with?”

brOTP: None. She doesn’t seem to have many friends in the movie.

OTP: Helen and Imhotep in the past, when she was the princess. They seemed like truly devoted lovers considering how they betrayed their religion to be together.

nOTP: Helen and Imhotep in the present. She’s too bold to put up with his crap. Plus, there’s the whole he wants to kill and mummify her thing.

Random headcanon: I don’t think she and Frank got married after the movie. I mean, I know that’s expected, but I have to wonder if she would ever really fit with someone like Frank, who’s so much less haunted than she. Maybe that would be her attraction to him, but I don’t know, I can’t see them lasting.

Unpopular opinion: I wish the reincarnation scene showing all her past lives hadn’t been cut. I know it technically slows the story down, but it would have been interesting to see. If only the footage at least existed. Oh well, there are plenty of stills that are still around.

Song I associate with them: Actually, I associate a piece of music from the Coppola Dracula with her called “Love Remembered,” mainly because I came across a fan video that used that piece to accompany images of the cut reincarnation sequence. It’s a melancholy piece that fits Helen to a T.

Favorite picture of them: Bad wig aside, I enjoy her sparkly Egyptian get-up in the last scenes.

Thanks for the great asks!

[thatboomerkid]

Twist of Deadly Wishes

Twist of Deadly Wishes -- Pathfinder Feat

... Glancing away, the mage visibly struggled with his emotions. “Any wish, then. Is mine.”

“Yes.”

“Mine to make as I see fit.”

The demon smiled. “Oh, indeed. Most certainly and truly, master.”

“Any ... any wish at all?”

Shadibriri shrugged. “Within ... ah, limited guidelines. Barring a wish for more wishes, there is little of which I am not capable. As I have said before, to other men in other places: I can call forth any spell, I can resurrect the dead, I can rewrite time and space. I can create from nothing, and make you wealthy beyond your wildest dreams; I can open doors to other worlds, and cast you across the infinite pleasures of the planes as you desire. I can turn lead to gold, pig-farmers to pigs, and day to night. With but a word, I can unmake mountains, reshape flesh and topple kings ...”            

“Very well.”            

The demon smirked. “I was not done, master, and am still bound to speak the truth. The whole truth. I can also rewire your brain so that you think you’re a hummingbird, or set your bones on fire, or turn you into a pillar of salt and throw you into the ocean to dissolve, as a certain nameless sorceress once discovered. My abilities are not much limited; you drink from the very waterfall of creation’s torrent when you unleash my gifts. Be careful, I suppose they say, what you wish for.”            

“It is to you, then, to interpret the meaning of my wish?”

The demon shrugged again. “My powers are great, and call on majesties older that your species can fathom; even I do not truly comprehend the full scope of what I do, any more than you understand the mysteries of digesting a glass of warm milk and turning it into blood and flesh, nor how it is that you fall to sleep, and dream, and then wake again. I would be careful, were I you, to know exactly what you want, and to make it clear to me what you want, and to phrase what you want as precisely as possible. Barring that, you should also hope that I’m in a good mood, and that my values coincide rather perfectly with your own.”

The mage swallowed, hard. He then allowed himself a thin smile, but it was wry, and without much humor. “Heh. Yes.”

-- from Twisting Amongst Mages

You command the very waterfall of creation’s torrent.

Brought to you absolutely free to enjoy, to test & to share – as always – by the fine folks of my Patreon.

original image from here

Prerequisite: Ability to use spells, spell-like abilities or supernatural abilities of any kind; non-good alignment; see Special, below

Benefit: When you gain this feat, roll three ten-sided dice and arrange them in order from highest to lowest; you will generate a three-digit or four-digit number from your result (somewhere between 111 and 1099). If your highest score is a ten, it represents 1,000; otherwise, tens always represent zero.

For Example: Mike rolls a 3, a 9 and a 10. His final result is 1093. Amber rolls two 3s and a 7. Her final result is 733. Kelsey rolls two 10s and a 1. Her final result is 1,001.

This is the total Twist Score you much reach to Cash-Out your wish. Each time you Cash-Out, you re-roll this 1d100 and once again begin the long climb to your new target score.

If any magical attack you make – or supernatural ability you use – would ever kill a living intelligent creature outright, you may choose to reduce your damage by any amount and thus leave the creature alive; if you choose to do so, you may demand that your victim make a wish.

If your target hears and understands you, and freely chooses to make this wish, you gain the ability to grant this wish (caster level 21st), much like an efreeti or glabrezu.

A wish made in this way must be a statement that can be uttered, in full, in six seconds or less.

Demanding that your target make a wish in this way ends your turn. On your opponent’s next turn, she may speak her wish as a free action. On your next turn, you may then grant this wish as a full-round action.

You may not grant more than three wishes per day. If you are a PC, you may not grant the wish of a fellow PC. Whether you are a PC or NPC, you may not grant a wish to an ally of any kind; if you attempt to do so, your attack’s damage is not reduced in any way and your ally is instead slain.

You may always freely choose to fulfill a wish of this type in a destructive or even deadly manner, although you must TECHNICALLY fulfill a mortal’s stated desires by use of this magic: if a target states that she wishes she could see in black-&-white, rather than in color, you could not, for example, just summon a horde of baboons to beat her to death and then say “your wish is granted.”

If your target says “I wish for limitless riches,” however, you are 100% percent within your rights to crush them beneath a tide of gold coins Plutokinesis-style or banish them to a section of the Elemental Plane of Earth composed entirely of diamonds ... but without a breathable atmosphere.

Your GM is the final arbiter of what are and are not legal responses to the granting of a wish; strong, open and above-all honest communication with your GM is not simply encouraged for this feat but is instead required.

If your GM cannot decide what a specific character would wish for, she may choose to roll 3d6 on the chart below (ignoring any result and rounding down if that option has already been used too many times) to determine the character’s wish; possible responses from you are also listed after each choice:

I wish I wasn’t here! / I wish I was somewhere else! [You may plane shift your target to the Abyss, to the City of Brass or to another location of your choice]

I wish I could escape / I wish there was something I could do to get away safely! [You may baleful polymorph your target into a rabbit or a frog]

I wish you weren’t here! / I wish you would just go away! [You may use greater teleport, moving to any location that is outside of your target’s immediate visual field]

I wish I was home! / back home! / at home! [You may teleport your target back to their home, bringing along yourself and your party or other combatants if you desire]

I wish this hadn’t happened! [Your target is teleported, unharmed and healed of all conditions & wounds, back to where they last awoke or to wherever they were 12 hours ago, whichever is greater]

I wish you would just let me go! [You and your target are both teleported 100 feet into the air, with you grappling your target. At the end of your action, you are teleported back to your previous location]

I wish you were on fire! [You gain the benefits of fire shield]

I wish you would leave me alone! [Your target is subject to a maze effect]

I wish I could kill you! [Your target is given one round to kill you. All other creatures in the area benefit from a sanctuary spell. If you are not dead at the end of the round, your target dies]

I wish you couldn’t see me! [Your target gains permanent natural invisibility, as per an invisible stalker. She also gains a permanent overwhelming scent of rot, death and the grave (or some other scent, as you choose); all opponents within 30 feet may freely detect her purely by sense of smell. If she is upwind, the range increases to 60 feet; if downwind, it drops to 15 feet. Her exact location is not revealed, only her presence within range and the general direction toward her. When she is within 5 feet of any creature with a sense of smell, that creature automatically pinpoints her location even if otherwise blinded to her. She may also be tracked by her smell: any creature may attempt to follow from where she has been by making a Wisdom (or Survival) check to trace her movements and current whereabouts, even if she possesses the trackless step ability. The typical DC for smelling her out is 10; this DC increases by 2 for each hour since she departed the area. This otherwise follows the rules for the Survival skill.

I wish I was immortal! / I wish I was undefeatable! [Your target gains the benefits of the Immortal Creature template and is subject to a baleful polymorph effect]

I wish I was invincible! [Your target is transformed to adamantine, as per a special flesh to stone spell]

I wish your magic would fail! [You may gain the benefits of transformation]

I wish there was another way we could settle this! [You and your target are both teleported to another location, as per a maze spell. You may challenge your opponent to any test of skill -- that is NOT combat! -- that you desire; if you opponent fails against you, she dies]

I wish you would face me alone! [You and your target are both teleported to a location of your choice]

I wish you were dead! [You instantly split yourself into a pair of creatures: your spectral true self and your corporeal false self. Your true self becomes both invisible and incorporeal, and must remain directly adjacent to your false self until this effect ends. You may take no actions while you are so disjointed, nor interact with your environment in any way except to observe. Your false self dies for one hour per character level you possess or until you choose to end the effect. At any time while this effect is active, you may choose to end the effect as a free action: thereby collapsing yourself back into a single creature under your full control. All reversible effects related to your death are undone instantly at this time, just as though you had not died; this includes any damage and/or all secondary effects that would have been avoided if your false self had not died. You are the beneficiary of a true resurrection effect.

I wish ... I wish ... uh ... (stuttering) [your target is forced to answer the following round]

I refuse! [you may not force the creature to make a wish]

You are not required to grant a wish made of you in this way. For example, if a victim says “I wish your bones were all broken,” you could offer to your GM the option “Very well ... I gain all the benefits of an elemental body (or fluid form) spell, and all of my ‘bones’ are ‘broken’”; if your GM doesn’t like that, however, you are within your rights to simply say “I will not grant such a wish.”

If you choose not to grant a wish, you lose one Twist Point from your current Twist Score. This does not count against the total number of wishes you can grant each day.

Each time that you grant a wish by use of this feat, you add a number of Twist Points to your Twist Score equal to your target’s Hit Dice. Once you have reached your goal, you may Cash-Out all of your Twist Points as a full-round action and immediately gain the benefits of a wish spell.

Special: This feat assumes that your GM will establish additional specific, in-universe backgrounds and requirements for gaining this ability; the prerequisites (above) for this feat are thus left intentionally vague, entirely up to the storyteller. In a traditional fantasy game, this power might be limited only to elves or to other creatures with ties to the First World, only to demons and their mortal kin, only to wishcrafters or witches with specific Patrons, only to members of a certain lineage or arcane tradition, only to mad chaos-gods and their spawn, to the seventh son of a seventh son, or to certain “chosen ones” who are born to fulfill a dark destiny.

—

NOTE:

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[sinsfox]

Care to tell us about Ban's depression and all?

yoko you just had to ask this since i mentioned it to you huh

OF COURSE I CAN TALK ABT IT

this is gonna get long, so ima put it under the cut but theres going to be content warning galore, but itll be tagged

im really not going to beat around the bush here. 

i headcanon ban to have depression, but at this point, it seems to me to be implied that he does. would it be professionally diagnosed? fuck no. ban gives less than a shit about himself, i dont think he would be obligated to figure out why he feels hollow or dulled. why life is a bore, and he only ever feels alive in a fight or when hes ‘killed’.

to him its a feeling he can easily shrug off and ignore and he easily puts up a front of being the easy going, out there kind of guy that he is. eccentric and melodious in his tone, fight enthusiastic and seemingly taking his interest in whatever seems convenient at the time. stealing what he wants, even if its the clothes off someones back. drinking ale and laughing it up like no tomorrow until he passes out.

but at the end of the day, hes lonely. hes tired. despite the things that are fun that he does have fun with, its still hard to completely forget the void that he feels and how much duller things seem nowadays ever since the incident in the fairy kings forest.

it only got worse since that day.

his childhood was the start of it all.

his parents neglected him and his sister. his little sister died from starvation at four years old. that was the first time ban felt alone. his parents cared nothing for them. ban was used to try and obtain food for his mother and father, while not being allowed to eat himself. his father would beat him if he did eat. his father would beat him if ban even slept. it wasnt a good environment. ban ran away from home often.

then ban was caught stealing and was sent to prison and that was where he met zhivago and they escaped together. and ban took to secretly meeting zhivago whenever he could and was given food by him to eat. zhivago helped him survive. zhivago taught ban all he needed to know about thieving and even saved his life from starvation and from being kidnapped and almost being sold to a noblewoman who tortured and killed children.

zhivago adopted ban. he referred to ban as his son in a conversation with ban himself. telling him how he had one son named therion who was nothing like ban, a shy kid. and how he had another son named ban who was a troublemaker with a bad mouth.

hearing that made ban happy. and he felt like he had family again.

then one day when they were to do a heist together, ban got impatient and went on his own. and got caught by the guards and was beaten by them. and zhivago was handed two choices: save ban or save therion. ultimately zhivago made his choice and abandoned ban ( he was crying when he made his choice ) for the sake of saving his own son, which he was too late in doing.

that was the second time ban felt alone in the world.

years pass, ban is a bandit now. he goes after the fountain of youth after hearing talk of it in a bar. he enters the fairy kings forest. he persists in getting to the fountain. thats when he meets elaine. and in seven days he grew close to her and helped her battle her seven hundred years of loneliness. and he fell in love with her and was going to bring her brother back to the forest, and make him take her place so ban could take her away.

but then a demon attacked. and elaine, who ban wanted to save with the fountain of youth, fed the water to ban which made him immortal. and he kills the demon, but elaine dies before he can even begin to help her.

that is the third time ban felt alone in the world.

and he was heart broken.

its at this point in time that ban believe he cannot be close to anyone, for they are going to leave him. by dying or by abandoning him. he refuses to fight when he is arrested and accused of a false crime but what can he do. he has no proof against their claim, and they cannot do anything to an immortal being. so he takes the brunt of it all and allows himself to be executed over and over again in his time captured.

its at this point that ban wishes he could die. because he doesnt want to live. not when he had nothing to consider a family from his little sister dying so young, his parents neglecting and abusing him. zhivago was his ideal father, he never held a grudge against the man for abandoning him but it still left a hefty hole for ban to carry. and elaine was killed before him and she used the last of her strength to save him instead of herself.

he was powerless to stop any of this from happening. despite that he was only a child, that he was just a human.

meeting meliodas was another of the happier moments in his life. when the man busted him out of prison, literally punching him through the wall, ban knew immediately that meliodas was someone he did not want to lose. there was an interest gained in this man. ban didnt want meliodas to disappear on him. he didnt want him to leave like the rest.

of course history happens, ban gets imprisoned by the weird fangs when he hears that meliodas had passed ( a lie ). and he endures torture yet again to ease the emptiness that wracks his being. bans stated before that dying is just another part of life for him. a daily occurrence. hes mentioned before that hes felt like dying. that its been a long time since he felt like dying.

it doesnt change the fact that hes felt that way.

there are points in time where ban berates himself. degrades himself. hes called himself a bad person. hes referred to himself as a useless piece of shit. that hes powerless. that hes an awful friend. all in regards to being unable to protect those he loves and cares about.

ban cares little about his own well being. its why he fights as reckless as he does, aside from his immortality. ban does not care about himself. theres nothing he likes about him. theres… nothing. he feels nothing for himself. he doesnt even consider himself human anymore unless hes referred to as one.

one wouldnt even think ban feels or thinks this way considering the way he is, as i said before. its easy to think ban is someone who doesnt feel that way but really its been eating at him for over the entirety of his life. ever since his childhood. ever since elaine died. 

and he has terrible ways of coping with it all.

ban drinks himself silly. he lets himself get brutally murdered just come back to life and have it done again when he fights. he seeks out getting arrested to endure torture to feel something than nothing. because hes so tired of feeling nothing.

but in the end, no one except meliodas and elaine ( and king ) are capable of telling really telling bans actual emotions and the way he feels. because around them he drops the face of the fox sin everyone knows. because hes tired. hes empty. he can fake a smile and really well at that. he can put on the face of excitement, the outgoing personality and passion he can exude when needed. but at the end of the day, those feelings and thoughts are still there.

ban has, since gaining immortality, fantasized about death. idealized it. wished he could die. because being immortal is boring. living and dying near constantly runs dry after a time and to think that dying is a daily part of life now is cruel to him when he wakes up like nothing happened.

it was worse when the rumor meliodas had died got around, after hed finally learned to be happy again after the loss of elaine.

when he learned meliodas was indeed alive, and was busted out of baste dungeon to reunite with meliodas, he was happy again.

when the ten commandments and demon clan were released from their seal, and melascula using her magic with the venegeful soul revival, elaine was resurrected and ban was able to reunite with her too, after quelling her anger and hate towards those who had spent their time around ban when she could note and melascula still being kept alive kept elaine alive.

ban was made all the more happier then, too.

but elaine can read bans heart like fairies can. meliodas can read ban like a book because theyre best friends and meliodas understands ban just as ban understands him. and hes able to be open with them, more so than anyone else.

they are the only two he can really be truthful with in regards to his emotions because they are the only two that he trusts enough to let his guard down around and let them see the side that he hides from everyone else.

because he doesnt need more people worrying or whatever in his mind. he doesnt need peoples concerns when hes fine by technicality because hes immortal and nothing will ever come of anything even if he tried to do something. his sense of self-worth is abyssal, he cares so little about himself. hed rather everyone around him be okay and happy than have people worrying over him because its something hes felt for a long time, a very long time. something hes dealt with all on his own ( until elaine and meliodas came into his life ) and hed rather not include anymore people in it.

ban has gotten the short and shit end of the stick too many times to count. hes lost people. hes been unable to save people. he feels powerless in situations he cant do anything to change or fix. he berates himself over these things.

and he tries to keep others out of it because its not something they should deal with, its his own problem. but its hard to deal with it when he doesnt want to. he wants it to go away, he wants to stop feeling and thinking it. but its hard when its constant and he cant do anything about it. aside from drown himself in ale and liquor. and fight so recklessly and with abandon because hell be fine, hell come out unscathed and it gives him something to better focus his energy on than the hollow dull ache in his chest.

thats about the long and short of it

[pml1225-blog]

3: lets backtrack and talk about the timeline.

Here is an attempt to summarize the Wikipedia article on the Zelda timeline. These are in my view, the important games* and what happens. Heavy Spoilers for like Every Game In the Series.

THE VERY BEGINNING

Farore, Din, and Nayru are goddesses who create everything, including the Triforce. The Triforce is the Macguffins of Macguffins – it literally just grants wishes, but it has no like morals or whatever. Hylia is the guardian of the Triforce. She does a few things – protects Hylians (humans), creating the Goddess Sword, and trapping the demon Demise. Then she gives up her powers and becomes reborn into Link (the first one).

Skyward Sword (I didn’t play this game).

Link (the first one), with the help of his friend Zelda (the first one), gets the Goddess Sword and destroys Demise. But Demise vows to reincarnate and forever torment Zelda and Link’s descendants. Apparently all you need to do is vow to do something and boom – a eternal war emerges.

Ocarina of Time (This is a Very Good Game).

Ganondorf is trying to get the Triforce. Ganondorf is a Gerudo King who has the rage of Demise inside of him. Link is a kid, is caught up in some shenanigans around Hyrule to get into the Spirit Realm where the Triforce is, but Ganondorf takes it first and takes over Hyrule. Link stays in a coma for 7 years, wakes up and gathers the seven Sages who have the power to seal Ganondorf away, and gets the Master Sword (this is the same as the Goddess Sword), all while time traveling with a magic ocarina. It turns out that Ganondorf was too unstable for the Triforce, splitting into the Triforce of Courage, Power, and Wisdom, of which he has Power. Adult Link defeats Ganondorf/Ganon (Ganon is a pig-beast that Ganondorf becomes with the Triforce of Power) and becomes the Hero of Time (or does he?), and he gets sent back to his childhood to continue living his days.

THE B I G S P L I T

Nintendo aka the Biggest Bullshitters of All Time posits that there are three outcomes from the Ocarina of Time. In the first, Link fails to actually beat Ganondorf (making OoT technically not canon in this timeline). He dies, as does Zelda. The sages still seal Ganondorf away, and he’s in the Dark Realm. What is the Dark Realm? Who cares.

The second and third outcomes are just continuations of the two timelines that result from OoT. Ganon is dead (sealed somewhere) in the Adult Timeline, but Ganondorf is resurrected. Since Adult Link was sent back to his childhood (Very Important Plot Reason from post 2), there is no Hero of Time to come back and save everyone. In the Child Timeline, Ganon never comes to power, Ganondorf is executed (or is he?), and everything is Gucci™.

TIMELINE 1: The Decline of Hyrule (the boring one because these games are old and story wasn’t important back then)

A Link to the Past

Link (the Hero of Legend) is telepathically called by Zelda who is trapped in a dungeon to defeat some wizard who is trying to unseal Ganon (remember, Hero of Time Link died but Ganondorf was still sealed). He beats the wizard with the Master Sword, but Jokes! It was Ganon the whole time! Link defeats him.

The Legend of Zelda (the very first one)

Link (The Hero of Hyrule) has to find the shards of the Triforce of Wisdom that Zelda hid from Ganon before she was captured and defeat Ganon. It’s kind of unclear how/when Ganon was resurrected this time.

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (the second game released)

Link finds the Triforce of Courage and awakens Zelda from a deep sleep, somehow. They live happily ever after. This was the 80s. But hey! Now all three parts of the Triforce are accounted for.

TIMELINE 2: The Hero of Time is successful, but disappears (is sent back in time)

Wind Waker (This is my favorite game.)

Ganon comes back imbued with the Triforce of Power, but the Hero of Time isn’t there. The King of Hyrule, Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule (yes, really), out of options, prays to the goddesses to help, and they flood Hyrule, separating it into islands so Ganon’s influence can’t spread (boats aren’t very common, evidently). Link (the Hero of Winds) goes on an adventure to save his sister, who is kidnapped by Ganondorf, with the help of a pirate named Tetra who his sister was mistaken for. Along the way, he is guided by a talking boat named the King of Red Lions. He resurrects the spirits of the sages that sealed Ganon away in OoT, finds the Triforce of Courage which the Hero of Time hid after completing his mission, and gets the Master Sword. He beats Ganon, with Tetra’s help (she happens to actually be Princess Zelda, wearing the Triforce of Wisdom as a necklace). However, Ganondorf manages to unite the three pieces of the Triforce momentarily, but the King of Red Lions (who is actually Daphnes whatever the heck his name is) touches it first and wishes to completely flood Hyrule. Ganon is dead, Hyrule is gone, so Link and Zelda set sail on her pirate ship to find a new place to establish Hyrule.

TIMELINE 3: Link from OoT got sent back to his childhood.

Now that they know Ganondorf is evil, they try to kill him but fail. Instead, they seal him in the twilight realm with a magic mirror.

Twilight Princess

Link (The Hero of Twilight), a descendant of Hero of Time, accidentally becomes a wolf while trying to save some kids. He gets roped into saving Hyrule by Zelda and an imp named Midna from a sorcerer named Vant, who is the King of the Twilight Realm and is trying to consume Hyrule in Twilight. After killing Vant, it turns out that surprise! Ganondorf was behind this the whole time! Again. Link kills Ganon and saves Hyrule.

WAY IN THE FUTURE (Unknown which timeline)

Breath of the Wild

Ganon has given up on reincarnating through Ganondorf, and decides to just be a pure force of energy known as Calamity Ganon. Zelda is trying to unlock her power to seal Ganon away, but can’t. Meanwhile, she is amassing a huge army of mechanical spider things called Guardians and four huge robots called Divine Beasts, which are piloted by a group of Champions. When Calamity Ganon takes over everything and turns all of the machines against them, killing the Champions, Link (the Hero of the Wilds) dies protecting Zelda, but she uncovers her power trying to protect him. She finds a way to put him in a medically induced coma, where he lies for 100 years while she goes to Hyrule Castle to try to contain Calamity Ganon. Link wakes up 100 years later, regains control of the Divine Beasts and frees the Champions’ spirits, and then goes to Hyrule Castle, where Zelda has been holding Calamity Ganon at bay for a century. With her help, they cast Calamity Ganon away, and Hyrule is able to rebuild.

*important is a very subjective word. For my purposes, these are basically the games where Link fights Ganon. The Minish Cap was an extremely fun game and Four Swords Adventures looks super lit, but honestly, with the amount of times that Ganon disguises himself as secondary villains only to take the glory of being the Big Bad™ at the very end of games, I don’t really care about people like Vaati or Bellum.

[scribblindown]

The Chocobros in a Supernatural AU

Supernatural x Final Fantasy XV 

Noctis: 

Species: Human [formerly], Demon 

Title: Prince of Hell 

History: Noctis was originally one of God’s chosen ones, but along his journey he was led astray by the then-King of Hell, Ardyn, and failed his prophesy. As punishment, he died at the age of thirty and his soul went down to Hell. He turned into a demon, rose in the ranks and later on Ardyn left his position as King of Hell, leaving the seat vacant for Noctis to take. 

Vessel: Noctis’ one true vessel was a twenty-year-old boy by the name of Ray, the son of a mayor of a large city. Noctis left Hell for the first time in millenniums to prepare for Lucifer’s rising and for the Apocalypse. 

He took his vessel’s father’s car, the Regalia, simply because he could. 

As a demon, he was mostly seen in pure black suits, pressed and dry-cleaned to perfection, but he can see the appeal in Ray’s black cargo pants, tee shirt, and the occasional bomber jacket. 

Since he is a stronger demon, his eyes are a blood red, not black. 

Noctis is cool and collected. Unlike other demons, he isn’t shown to be teasing, sassy, or charismatic; instead he’s mostly quiet and calm, choosing to watch silently at the happenings around him and plan accordingly. Noctis only shows his temper when demons under him ruin his plans, things don’t go accordingly, and he becomes snarky when he fights. 

This stems from his failed past life, where he didn’t meet the expectation of God, so he has a subtle perfectionist streak in him. 

His more humane side comes out when he shows that he cares for some of the demons under him, notably Ignis and Gladio, as well as sparing the angel, Luna’s, life.  And later on, falling in love with you. 

You were just a hunter that traveled around the States, but somehow you ended up in the front lines of the Apocalypse, and so you crossed paths with Noctis often, with all of them ending up as failed attempts at killing him. 

Somehow, you ended up in a strange on-and-off alliance with Noctis. Noctis always says that it’s for his own gain, but more often than not, most of your alliance is him saving you from tough spots. 

Your intimate relationship started off as purely sexual, but soon evolved into a romance where he would willingly admit that he loved you and that he would do anything for you. 

He ended up getting incapacitated by hunters, killing you as well for allying yourself with him until you were resurrected by an Archangel. 

You started a journey of being on the run from the other hunters and had a goal of doing a tough ritual to bring Noctis back. 

The ritual brought Noctis back, but purged Ray’s soul out of him, letting Noctis use the shell of the vessel. Noctis also needed to be sustained by human blood occasionally, bringing back some of his former human side. 

Noctis betrayed Lucifer, and the two of you went on the run together. 

Prompto: 

Species: Angel [formerly], Human 

Title: Rogue Angel 

Vessel: None 

History: Prompto started out as an angel created by God, and while he never met God, he always faithfully followed him and his orders. However, your soul was created, and after your first death you were sent to Heaven. Prompto became interested and fond of your individual version of Paradise, so he came to visit your soul often. Prompto soon came to fall in love with your soul, and became enamored with the idea of human loving, forgiveness, and loyalty. When you requested reincarnation, Prompto wanted to follow, so he threw away his grace and became a human. 

As a newly born human, Prompto was born to a couple that was absent for a majority of his life because of work. 

As a child, Prompto had many breakdowns because he still had an unstable connection with Heaven, and sometimes spoke hysterically of his “true father.” Eventually, he was able to suppress the angel side of him completely up into his time as a young adult. Once he hit his late teens, he went to college as a simple photography major. 

Prompto is overly kind, trusting, and compassionate, as both human and angel, but as a human he’s more nervous and jittery. 

When he was an angel he always knew that he was a bit different from his “siblings.” While he was just as loyal, if not more, than the rest of the angels, Prompto always felt like an outcast because he was the interested with the idea of human emotions and felt that it was something more valuable than the life as an angel. The fact that he fell in love with your soul was enough to prove everyone else’s point. 

As a human he felt inferior and an outcast as well. He was a silent kid for a majority of his childhood, but he craved to be happy. Eventually grew up to be a popular young adult with several friends, but never lost that feeling of being different. 

Once the Apocalypse drew nearer, Prompto started to regain some of that lost connection to Heaven, and this attracted some strange supernatural happenings that led to his human parent’s deaths. 

You were a hunter that investigated his parent’s deaths, and when you went over to interview him under the disguise of being part of the “FBI,” he fell in love with you at first sight. 

You dug deeper into his parent’s deaths and events led to him remembering his origins. Prompto and you also solidified your relationship after that as lovers. 

To save Prompto from both demons and angels alike, you begged for the help of Noctis, the Prince of Hell, and Prompto eventually joined Noctis’ party of demons for self-preservation, but grew to care for Noctis, Ignis, and Gladio like they’re his own brothers, and them in return to him. 

“But being a human is so beautiful!” Prompto cried among tears at other angels. 

Ignis: 

Species: Demon 

Title: Prince’s Second-in-Command 

History: Unknown, only that he is older than Noctis. 

Vessel: Ignis’ current vessel is a twenty-two-year-old boy named Adam that was a senator’s son. Ignis didn’t leave Hell until several months after Noctis. 

The Yellow-Eyed Demon. 

He isn’t narcissistic, but knows that his current vessel is attractive, so he takes care and pride in his appearance. He is mostly seen wearing dark designer suits, shoes, and accessories. Even though he has better-than-perfect vision, he still chooses to wear glasses. 

Some demons say that he’s scarier than Noctis because Ignis can be crueler and is the true mastermind behind Noctis’ actions and plans. 

Ignis mostly has a composed, cunning, and serious personality, loyally following Noctis and keeping him in line. However, Ignis has shown clear signs of being merciless and cruel. He isn’t above manipulating people or even torturing them to get what he wants, or doing what he believes is best for Noctis. He also becomes sassy and sarcastic when he wants to be, so no one ever knows when Ignis is joking or not. 

Even so, he truly cares about Noctis, and that transcends his demonic nature. 

You were the vessel of a powerful angel, and due to Ignis planning ahead, he was able to figure this out and decided to sought you out to kill you, since it was predicted that your angel was going to kill him in the near future. 

However, you had gotten a warning and a blessing by the prophet, Gentiana, so Ignis was unable to kill you no matter how hard he tried. 

If he was unable to physically hurt you, he could at least corrupt you, and that’s what he planned to do. Ignis hung around you, and by being by your side almost all the time, he fell in love with you. 

The former King of Hell, Ardyn, got bored and came to you to trick you into thinking that Ignis’ feelings were false, and broke your trust in Ignis by saying that the next time he Ignis would see you, the Second-in-Command was going to kill you. 

When Ignis came to see you, the two of you ended up getting into a violent fight where you slashed his eye with a Demon-Killing Blade and threw Holy Fire at him. You didn’t succeed in killing him, since Ignis was older and stronger, but he didn’t want to hurt you, so he let you do this to him. 

ignis’ ultimate show of love was when he allowed you to kill him, but you were unable to go through with it in the end because you loved him too. 

However, by doing this, Ignis technically succeeded in corrupting you over to his side. Your angel would be unable to use you as a vessel. 

In his time in the human world, he has shown a fondness for cooking, but he doesn’t eat any of the things he made himself. 

Ignis goes on a quest to get revenge against Ardyn, teaming up with the angel, Ravus, along the way. 

Gladio: 

Species: Demon 

Title: Seven Deadly Sin’s Pride 

History: He is older than both Noctis and Ignis, created from Lucifer’s own pride after the Archangel rebelled. After him came his direct siblings, Sloth, Wrath, Lust, Greed, Gluttony, and Envy. 

Vessel: His current vessel was a twenty-three-year-old young man named Chris, who was a part-time security guard, and a college student studying criminal justice. Even though he is a powerful and older demon, he was unable to leave Hell and stuck close to Noctis until after the prince left. 

Gladiolus never served Ardyn, and was given the title of bodyguard after Noctis took the throne. Originally he believed that Noctis was only a spoiled brat that wasn’t even able to follow God’s prophecy, but eventually Noctis proved to be a strong leader, and now follows Noctis loyally, even when he was given orders by Lucifer to go ahead and kill Noctis. 

As true to his title, Gladiolus is very prideful, and from this he holds all of the other seven core sins as well. He isn’t a cold demon, but rather a playful one that gets in people’s heads. He’s suave and has a good-natured, friendly personality, but under that he’s sadistic and short-tempered. He likes to tease the former angel, Prompto, with friendly banter. 

He has dark red eyes that’s almost black, and most people think that it is, so they classify him as a lower-class demon at first glance. The rest of his siblings have black eyes. As a demon, he doesn’t dress any differently than Chris, other than being more comfortable in his skin. 

Gladio starts to show traces of humanity when Chris started to unconsciously fight against his demonic nature when it came to his sister, Iris. Even as a cold and merciless demon, Gladio grew to care for his human sister genuinely. 

In a scuffle during the heat of the Apocalypse, Iris gave the angel, Cor, permission to use her as a vessel, and fought Gladio. Gladio was able to overpower her, but Iris managed to send Chris’ soul to Heaven, which was her true intention in the first place, allowing Gladio to use the body indefinitely. 

As a hunter, you often crossed paths with Gladio, and had a love-hate relationship with him. The two of you were finally able to bond when Gladio was stuck in a Devil’s Trap, and you were locked in the same room for a week. Gladio taunted you for the weeks you two were together, but they became less frequent as the time went by. 

He became impressed by your strength and the two of you got to know each other really well in that time period. 

When you were finally about to die of dehydration, you broke the Devil’s Trap to let Gladio go, and he immediately took you to the nearest hospital. 

Afterwards the two of you came to some weird agreement and on-and-off relationship where the two of you were too prideful to admit that you liked each other. 

In his time on Earth, Gladio became fond of the outdoors, and was fascinated by the human invention: cup noodles. 

Gladio’s favorite pastime is to just sit on a clear field, and enjoy the warmth of the sun and the chirping of the birds. 

“Looks some of the creations from the guy upstairs isn’t all bad after all.” 

[ao3feedsamifer]

A Lesson in Pain, Agony, and Suffering

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/2rtVjD8

by 48eyesand32teeth1sharptongue

They may always end up stuck together, but Sam is going to beat the Devil no matter what it takes. Sam loses a lot of battles, but he always wins the war.

Lucifer thinks Sam belongs to him and will do anything to keep it that way. However, he knows Sam's track record for beating him, and he's not taking "No," for an answer.

(Starts off sometime in the future, then kicks off after S13E21 and the timeline jumps around.)

Words: 17365, Chapters: 8/60, Language: English

Fandoms: Supernatural

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con

Categories: F/F, F/M, M/M

Characters: Sam Winchester, Lucifer (Supernatural), Jack Kline, Dean Winchester, Castiel (Supernatural), Kelly Kline, Other characters will be around

Relationships: Lucifer/Sam Winchester, Lucifer & Sam Winchester, Sam/Happiness and Sam/Curbstomping Lucifer and Punching him in the Face OTP, Very One-sided Lucifer/Sam, Lucifer/His Ego, Kelly Kline & Justice, Other endgame OTP is Sam/Freedom, Sam/Walking Out of Hell and Being Whole, It's mostly Sam/Lucifer for the majority you have been warned and disclaimed, Past Sam/Ruby but that was awful for Sam too, Sam/Jess but with a twist, past Samifer, but it was never happy because Lucifer is coercive, Kinda current Samifer, but Sam really is not happy about it at all, Side-pairing Dean/Castiel, but that is not the main focus

Additional Tags: Jack Kline & Sam Winchester Friendship, Sam endgame pairing is happiness but boy is it gonna be a long time to get there, Major Abuse, Rape, non-con, mind-rape, Torture, Psychological Torture, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Eventual Hurt Comfort Fic, mostly horror, Cage Trauma, Sam is not about this life, Sam deserves happiness but life is like nope, In Honor of S13E21, Major Canonical Changes, Semi-Canon Compliant except for the stuff I forget or deliberately change, Flashbacks, bi sam winchester, Gender-changing Lucifer, Lucifer is also Jess, Lucifer is Also Nick, Stalking and Pain, Also making Dean less abusive and toxic than canon or at least acknowledging it, Assumed Abusive John Winchester past references, Sam is Jack's biological parent in this, No technical Mpreg because it squicks me out, I don't know what else to tag this other than the title is a lot of what you get in this fic, A lot of torture in a lot of different forms, Mostly a horror fic with alternate endings and some fix it tacked on after the suffering, Sam was in the cage longer than he's lived and boy does that trauma show, Enochian, Conditioning, Horrible family dynamics, Lucifer chooses to be a horrible person and wants to use Sam anyway, Lucifer thinks he's in love but doesn't know or care about actually not being abusive, Toxic Jack and Lucifer relationship because Lucifer sucks, Kelly Kline & Sam, The power of friendship, Sam is a survivor, Maybe some Prince of Hell and White Eyed Demon resurrections if not related to time travel, Multiple Endings, Also Sam/Ruby mentions, Probably not explicit sex scenes or they will be implied but sparse because I'm bad at writing them, if this changes you'll know, When Sam is male presenting in the show he's using male pronouns, If Sam is female presenting going to change pronouns when convenient, OH ALSO Demon Blood Addiction, Angel Blood Addiction, AND A METRIC TON OF MANIPULATION, Lucifer wants Sam to love him and feels something, Gender changing Sam, Chuck can fight me, Probably time travel, Probably some reversed character deaths, Surrogacy, because nephilim birth body counts, Sam Winchester Has Powers, S13 Spoilers!, sam is just done, and barely holding on to reality, Lucifer pays lip service to the idea of redemption, but is too self-absorbed to actually change, Lucifer tries to be a Dad but has awful role models, nevermind his actual personality, Casifer, Lucifer is an awesome antagonist, I just wanted to write something extra painful, Sam working with Lucifer to fight Michael, even though he'd rather not, Non-Linear Narrative, Hallucifer probably will be mentioned somehow, Implied Sexual Content, Dubious Consent, some of their earlier S5 interactions will be different and less antagonistic, sort of, Lucifer's Cage, Sam Centric Narration mostly, But I might add Lucifer's perspective in there too, I can't believe I forgot, Stockholm Syndrome, yay, Sarcasm, also Kelly is Jack's surrogate mom, she still dies but might come back, also more s5 type lucifer, then character development, let's just say Lucifer is pissed his OTP seems in denial, and that they are defending humanity because lucifer, so that's gonna change canon a bit, but only slightly because stuff still seems to play out the same, watch me justify all my canon changes badly, Lucifer is like why don't you love me?, Sam is like have you seen yourself? Do you need an itemized list?, destroying parts of canon with fire through sheer laziness, Lucifer believes in Sam but doesn't want to, Lucifer takes the abandonment from God and latches on to dear life, to the person he thinks can't abandon him even if he tries because Fate, It would almost be tragic if Lucifer didn't treat Sam so bad, which negates all potential sympathy imo, Dysphoria, sort of ftm sam, but I'm not sure how solid gender is in this fic, because Lucifer is a genderless entity who just chooses to present as whatever is convenient, and Sam only has issues with the gender change when its magic, and inflicted against his will, because Lucifer thinks pregnancy will force Sam to be even more tied to him, and because he likes making Sam uncomfortable, because revenge for perceived wrongs, and disappointment, torture and murder and awfulness are not answers to life's problems, but Lucifer sure as heck is gonna try to make them, these tags could be a fic of their own at this point., also this is listed f/f because Lucifer and Sam switch genders in this fic, sam doesn't really care about gender too much, but the devil generally mirrors sam's gender unless there's an ulterior motive, because possessiveness and possession, honestly though Lucifer was going the Labyrinth Goblin King route in this, until Sam beat him and he had a tantrum, Possession, also Lucifer's MO is basically, everyone else: Lucifer no, and lucifer, canonically from every point ever: Lucifer yes, Majorly diverts from canon after I deal with S13 and the flashbacks, Sam trying to beat the Devil at his own game, Pseudo-redemption (except it fails for obvious reasons), Sam's level of hate and fear for Lucifer is canonical or even more, Plus past feelings, and past betrayal, Also Jack is a beautiful ray of sunshine, who also only deserves happiness, so him and Cas and Dean are gonna be trying to make things right, and maybe give a break from all the pain and suffering all the time, Trauma, All aboard the MAXIMUM ANGST TRAIN, Lucifer is like an Ex that won't accept you've broken up, Angels are also basically eldritch monsters, which is basically canon, Suicide Attempts, but we all know that doesn't work, also everything is this fic is completely out of order, until I finish it, because I can't write linearly at all

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/2rtVjD8

[sirtravisjacksonoftexas]

Was Jesus a Mythical Figure Based on Odin? Um, NO, and Here is Why:

Odin, aka Othin, aka All-Father (among many other names) was the King of the Norse gods. He was the god of the sky, his eyes symbolic of the sun and the moon (the latter willingly sacrificed). Though he often traveled and took human form, his spiritual essence was omnipresent, filling all of creation. Armed with Grungir, a magic spear that never failed to hit its target, He would ride across the sky on the back of Sleipnir, an eight-legged flying horse. Odin’s thirst for wisdom was legendary, having sacrificed an eye and even his own life in order to attain more of it. From morning to night his raven spies, Muninn (Memory) and Huginn (thought) would fly around earth, later whispering to Odin what they had witnessed. Though highly intelligence, his knowledge came with a price, for Odin knew of Ragnarok, the end times battle where both the gods and the Einherjar (souls of those who died in battle) would fight an army of monsters and damned souls led by Loki, god of fire. The gods would fall, the cosmic tree Yggdrasil would burn, and Odin would be swallowed by the giant wolf Fenrir. However, his knowledge gave him comfort as well, knowing that a new, perfect age would arise afterwards.

Odin is a perplexing character of world myth, a heroic trickster bound by fate. But was he more than this? Was he, as some Jesus Mythicists believe, the inspiration for Jesus Christ?

Let’s tear apart this hopeless boneheaded idea.

1. Creator God?

After Odin and his brothers Vili and Vey slay the frost giant Ymir, they made the world out of his body. They made plants, animals, and the first humans.

 Ask, the first man, was made out of an ash tree, while Embla, the first woman, was made out of an elm tree or vine. Odin in particular gave them souls.

Jesus is likewise creator (John 1:1-3). Indeed, when he is called “Word” in a passage that talks about him creating all things (lbid), it harkens back to Genesis 1 where God creates…by speaking things into existence.

In this sense, both Jesus and Odin are creator gods, though while Odin created only some things, Jesus created ALL things.

Does the fact that both were creator gods prove that Jesus was a mythical figure based on Odin?

No.

Keep reading…

2.Born of a Virgin?

No. His parents, the god Bor or Borr and the frost giantess Bestla, had (drum roll) Sex!

Now, Bor himself seems to have been the product of a virgin birth, albeit a strange one. Buri, his father, was the first god, one whom Audhumla, the primordial cow, freed from primordial ice by licking it around him. 

Right after being freed, Buri had seemingly given “birth” to Bor. This is quite similar to the birth of the frost giant Bergelmir, who was born by the six-headed frost giant Thrudgelmir. Thrudgelmir himself emerged from the feet of Ymir, the first frost giant.

 More emerged from Ymir’s armpit sweat. Thrudgelmir, Bergelmir and Bor were all born by a male frost giant or god, and none of their parents had sex beforehand (they had only recently been created when they gave birth). Given the latter fact, these three births would technically qualify as virgin births. However, though Ymir is considered the mother as well as father of the frost giants, the giants who were formed out of his sweat were not born, but created. Indeed, their creation is similar to Eve’s, who was created out of Adam’s rib. In neither case is a virgin birth involved. They are created, not born. Still, as Thrudgelmir Bergelmir and Bor show us, the concept of a virgin birth was not unknown to the Norse. However, its hard to imagine a connection between these tales and that of the virgin Mary.

3. Incarnate god?

No, Odin was never a god incarnate in human flesh.

 4. Son of god?

He was the son of the god Bor. Jesus was called Son of God for two reasons; his conception came about by the power of both God the Father and God the Holy Spirit, not a man (Luke 1:34-35), and he was also God the Son, one of three persons within the Trinity. Long before he was born, he was God (John 1:1-3, 8:58).

5. Trinity?

No, Odin was not a person within a divine trinity. His statue, along with one of Thor and another of Freyr, were supposedly in the Temple of Uppsala, but this doesn’t mean that they were members of a trinity; it just simply means that the temple had the statue of three gods. Besides, it’s not known for a fact that such statues were inside the temple.  

6. Star proclaimed his birth?

No.

 7. Wise men?

No.

 8. Survived a king’s purge shortly after he was born?

No.

 9. Taught in the temple as a boy?

No.

10. Baptized?

No.

 11. Tempted by the Devil?

No, Loki, the Norse equivalent of the Devil, didn’t tempt Odin, let alone in a wilderness.

 12. Miracle worker?

All gods were, big deal.

 13. Turned water into wine?

No.

 14. Multiplied bread and fish?

No.

 15. Walked on water?

No.

16. Healed the sick?

Among other things, Odin was the god of healing, although he is not shown healing others in the manner that Christ did in the Gospels. He did keep Mimir’s head from rotting and thus “heals” him (see below), but this isn’t really much like Jesus’ healing miracles.  

17. Raised the dead?

After Mimir, one of the Aesir gods (which Odin ruled) was decapitated by the Vanir, another race of gods, Odin used herbs to keep it from rotting and magic to enable it to speak. Thus, Odin “resurrected” Mimir.

Jesus would have called that a half-butt job (Matthew 19:23-26, Luke 7:11-17, John 11:1-44).

 18. Cast out Demons?

No.  

19. Betrayed? For thirty pieces of silver?

Odin was betrayed, but not for 30 pieces of silver. His son Balder had been made all but invincible, which ticked Loki off. After some investigating, Loki learned of Balder’s Achilles’ heel: Mistletoe. Only it could harm Balder, the god of light. Loki therefore tricked Hodr, the blind god of darkness, into throwing some at Balder. Balder fell, dead as a doornail. Considering that Loki was a fellow god, this was a serious  betrayal. However, betrayal is too broad a category for one to conclude that Odin’s myth gave rise to the story of Christ. After all, how many people have been betrayed? How many gods and heroes in world religions have been betrayed? If I get betrayed by someone, would that mean that I am a fictional character based on Jesus or Odin?

20. Crucified?

No, he was hung on the cosmic tree Yggdrasil for nine days.

 True, the Bible sometimes states that Jesus was “hung” on a cross (Acts 5:30, Acts 10:39), and metaphorically calls the cross a “tree” (Acts 10:39, 13:29, 1 Peter 2:24), these are just figures of speech, not meant to be taken literally. Now, it’s true that the myth of Odin hanging on a tree predates the New Testament. Nevertheless, the myth has nothing to do with crucifixion and everything to do with sacrificial hangings. You see, sometimes the Norse would sacrifice a person by hanging them from a gallows tree. Being hanged in this way ensured that one would go to Valhalla. This is what the Vikings had in mind when they told the story of Odin hanging 9 days on the cosmic tree Yggdrasil.

Question: why would 1rst century Jews base a hypothetical fictional Christ’s crucifixion on the Norse myth of Odin hanging from a tree (and the Norse practice of sacrificial hanging)…instead of crucifixion, which they would have been at the very least FAR more familiar with?

Now, there are other similarities between the death of Odin and that of Christ, including being stabbed with a spear (Jesus was pierced by a Roman soldier’s spear after he died (John 19:34), while Odin stabbed himself with Grungir), being offered an alcoholic beverage (Jesus was offered sour wine in a sponge (Matthew 27:48, Mark 15:36, Luke 23:36, John 19:28-30) while Odin was offered Mead) and yelling before their demise. Combined with both “hanging” from a tall wooden object…their deaths seem to be quite similar…

Does this mean that the story of Christ’s crucifixion was inspired by the myth of Odin hanging on a tree?

Nope.

Keep reading…

 21. Died willingly?

Yes. Though Jesus asked God to have him avoid crucifixion if it was possible, nevertheless he said “…not my will, but yours, be done.” (Luke 22:42). Just like a soldier who doesn’t want to die, but dies willingly to protect his country, Jesus doesn’t want to die, but dies willingly to save mankind. Odin likewise dies willingly, but does so in order to gain wisdom, not save humanity.

 22. Resurrected?

Yes, Odin did resurrect after hanging on Yggdrasil for 9 days. Unlike most supposed pagan candidates that Jesus Mythycists harp about, Odin at least resurrected himself. 

A victory for Mythicists?

Um, nope.

Keep reading… 

23. Rides a flying horse?

Odin rides the flying 8-legged horse Sleipnir. Sleipnir was born of a fling between Loki (while in the form of a mare) and the stallion Svadilfari.

A male god…taking the form of a mare…sleeping with a stallion.

I’ll give you a moment to process…that.

Jesus is depicted as riding a white horse which flies to the earth in Revelation 19:11-16 (compare with Revelation 1:9-18). Before we read too much into this, let’s remember that the Book of Revelation is rich in symbolism, being in the genre of apocalyptic. Its symbols are not meant to be taken literally. Nevertheless, its not impossible that Jesus will ride on a horse when he comes to fight at the Battle of Armageddon. Perhaps the horse is specially created for this, or perhaps it’s the soul of a horse that has died (Despite both Christian and Jewish doctrine, the Bible doesn’t teach that animals don’t have souls. Indeed, it implies that they do (see Ecclesiastes 3:18-21).

Is this proof that Jesus was a mythical figure borrowed from Odin?

Nope.

Keep reading…

 24. Leads an army in an end times battle against the forces of evil?

In Norse mythology, Odin, while riding on Sleipnir, will one day lead an army of gods and Einherhar against Loki and an army of monsters and damned souls at the battle of Ragnarok.

Likewise, Jesus, while riding a white horse, will lead heaven’s armies (who are also riding white horses) against the forces of the Antichrist at the Battle of Armageddon (Revelation 19:11-21).

Sounds similar?

Yes…but there are differences as well, the most important being…

…That Jesus wins his end times battle.

Odin…loses.

The gods are nearly exterminated at Ragnarok. Odin himself meets a heroic end when he faces the giant wolf Fenrir (aka Fenris), another child of Loki. Fenris is said to be so large that when he opens his horrendous mouth, his upper jaw touches the heavens, while the lower jaw touches the earth. Despite Odin’s vast powers and his mighty spear, he is swallowed by the colossal wolf.

 At the end of the battle, the fire giant Surt sets all creation on fire with his magic sword, bringing about the apocalypse. This latter aspect is strikingly similar to 2 Peter 3:1-13, which describes how the earth will on day be destroyed by fire and great heat. 

Makes you wonder where the Vikings got that idea from…

Jesus, however, wins the Battle of Armageddon (Revelation 19:11-21).

Nevertheless, does the fact that both lead an army in an end times battle against the forces of evil... prove that Jesus was a mythical figure based on Odin?

Nope.

Keep reading…

25. A New Age after his battle?

Yes. While Ragnarok is followed by the creation of a new world, the Battle of Armageddon is followed by the Millennial Reign, when Christ will reign on earth for a thousand years (Revelation 20:1-4). After this (and another end times battle), a New Heavens and a New Earth are made (Revelation 21).

However, while Jesus will reign in both the Millennial kingdom and the New Earth, Odin will neither resurrect nor be resurrected to enjoy the new earth in Norse mythology.

So, Odin does have some interesting parallels with Christ, right? I mean, they share at least nine similarities (not all of them good ones), so there must be a connection, right?

Wrong!

As I mentioned in my previous articles on Thor and Balder, the Norse Myths were first put into print by Norse Christians in the so-called Dark Ages. Before then, the pagan Vikings had long been acquainted with Christians and Christianity. Plus, the New Testament was written in the first century AD, a few centuries before the Dark Ages started and around a thousand years before the Norse were known to put their myths to paper. 

I also noted how Christian missionaries would take elements of Norse Myth and combine them with the biblical tale of creation, which helped in their missionary efforts. the Vikings themselves likewise borrowed aspects of Christianity and put it into their own faith. Indeed, Jesus was considered by the Vikings as another god to worship, alongside Odin, Thor and other homegrown favorites. 

Now, to be fair, the only similarity between Jesus and Odin that seemingly wasn’t inspired by Christianity was the latter’s hanging on the cosmic tree Yggdrasil. This is because the myth predates Christianity (though not all scholars agree). Indeed, even the part where he is stabbed with a spear while hanging is possibly older than the New Testament (Odin was a spear god). However, not only is the latter idea not known for sure, but scholars note that the story, even if it is older than Christianity, was influenced by the story of Christ’s crucifixion. Even if it was originally as similar to Christ’s crucifixion as it seems in the originally written sources, this doesn’t prove that Jesus was a mythical figure based on Odin, any more than the similarities between the Titanic and the novella “Futility/Wreck of the Titan” by Morgan Robertson proves that the former was a fictional ship based on the latter (which was written 14 years before the Titanic disaster occurred), or the similarities between the sinking of the Mignonette and the novel “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket” proves that the former was a fictional story based on the latter (which  was written 46 years before the Mignonette sank). True, one could simply invoke pure coincidence between the story of Christ and that of Odin without also invoking Jesus Mythicist stupidity, though as we’ve seen, scholars note that Christianity influenced Norse Mythology. 

Thus, Jesus wasn’t based on Odin.

Jesus isn’t mythology.

Jesus is reality.

Jesus is Lord and Savior.  

Sources: 

“The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Mythology” by Arthur Cotterell and Rachel Storm, 186-87, 190-91, 199, 210, 216-17, 220, 228, 246-248, 252-53 

“The Prose Edda” by Snorri Sturluson (Translated with introduction by Jesse L. Byock, ix-xiv, 11-18, 24-25, 30-32, 46-48, 50-52, 65-75, 116, 119-22

“The Poetic Edda” Translated by Lee M. Hollander, ix-x, 36-37 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/religion_01.shtml

“Myths of the Norsemen: From the Eddas and Sagas” by H.A. Guerber, 3-7, 16-18, 22-26, 30-34, 329-37 

“The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World” Documentary series by Professor Robert Garland, episode 38 (”Being a Viking Raider).

“The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World: Course Guidebook” by Professor Robert Garland, 262

https://www.ancient.eu/odin/

https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Vikings_and_Their_Age/AA7YBgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Odin+Thor+Freyr+three&pg=PA102&printsec=frontcover%C2%A0  

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Favorite_Norse_Myths/8ia337txkBAC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Balder%2Bodin%2Bfavorite%2Bson&pg=PA5&printsec=frontcover

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Odin-Norse-deity

“The Story of Christianity: 2000 Years of Faith” by Michael Collins and Matthew A. Price, 28-29

“In the Footsteps of Jesus: A Chronicle of His Life and the Origins of Christianity” by Jean-Pierre Isbouts, 263-67

“The Portable Seminary: A Master’s Level Overview in One Volume” by David Horton (General Editor), 281

“Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary: Completely Revised, Updated and Expanded” by Chad Brand, Charles Draper and Archie England (General editors), 79-81

“Zondervan’s Pictorial Bible Dictionary” by Merrill C. Tenney, General Editor, 49-50

https://sirtravisjacksonoftexas.tumblr.com/post/628627120722198529/was-jesus-a-mythical-figure-based-on-the-norse-god

https://sirtravisjacksonoftexas.tumblr.com/post/629088091319255040/is-jesus-a-mythical-figure-based-on-the-norse-god

https://sirtravisjacksonoftexas.tumblr.com/post/628113211750776832/do-supposed-parallels-between-the-gospels-and

“Encyclopedia of the Gods: Over 2,500 Deities of the World” by Michael Jordan, 196-97