#thank you for reading if you did

[irithylldancer]

Messmer and Melina are the bookends to Marika's family. Her family begins and ends with a vision of fire.

Just something I've been thinking about today. It's taken me a while to come up with a satisfactory narrative for Messmer's origins and I don't think I would have come to any conclusions if I didn't think on the origins of Melina. Some scattered thoughts from me and others can be found in this thread here. Also some extra context for this theory: I don't think Marika was ever put into the jar and I think Radagon was always a part of Marika, not a separate person who then joined with her.

I want to preface by saying that I think the Gloam Eyed Queen is a foil to Marika. There isn't much info in the game about her and she remains quite mysterious. They're both Empyreans chosen by the fingers and possibly, also born influenced by fire. To what extent, I couldn't really say for sure unless I go into super speculative town. We know GEQ harnessed the power of Destined Death via fire, giving the ability to her apostle children; and Marika passes on the affinity for fire to Messmer and Melina. I think it's something that's passed down genetically (idk another word to describe it lol) and not them being influenced directly by outside forces (like Malenia and Miquella) because of Radagon also naturally having that red hair. As a divestment of Marika, he took on that property. Essentially, GEQ embraced her fire while Marika smothered hers.

Malenia and Millicent's characters helped give me a lot of answers to questions. We know from completing Millicent's questline that she was born when Malenia bloomed her scarlet rot. An action that was most likely very a intense emotional and physical pressure (a reference to a crucible? heavy emotions and bodily stress strained to make new life akin to smelting?). Another huge clue was looking through the various statues of Marika. They help give us a decent view of the timeline.

The headless one is kind we find in the Land of Shadow. Middle is Marika holding baby Messmer from his boss arena (from kitetales on YT), and the last one is the kind we find around the Lands Between. Judging from the length of her hair, we can start to piece some info together. The story trailer for Shadow of the Erdtree and the Hornsent Grandame mention Marika's betrayal. I think they were the ones who constructed those churches around the land. As an Empyrean, a vessel, they saw the potential for her to become their new living god. It's why I don't think Marika was ever put into the jar. She was already a living jar in their eyes.

Then we have this snapshot from the story trailer. Her hair is much longer than the statues depicted in the LoS. What's also interesting is how she's dressed. It's not her typical attire, but something very similar to what Radagon wears. In this moment, if we assume that Radagon's persona has come into existence and they share the same body, her ascension didn't happen alone. If we reference back to Malenia and Millicent's creation, Markia becoming a vessel for the Elden Ring would also count as intense emotional and physical pressure, off shooting new life in the form of Messmer. If this is the case, he is technically the son of Marika and Radagon. Radagon's mix into this off shooting of Messmer is what classifies him as their child, earning him a butterfly. His birth would have been incredibly special if it happened in that moment and why I think Messmer was given so many blessings and love. Why he was the 'chosen one' for her crusade. Now looking to the statue of Marika holding baby Messmer, her second braid has been cut (it's hard to tell from the photo, but kitetales does rotate the statue in a video and the braid is gone). That cut braid we find later in the Shaman Village as the Golden Braid talisman, an offering she leaves before veiling the LoS.

As for Melina (also butterfly baby), we know for sure that Marika and Radagon had converged back together because I think she was born as a result of shattering the Elden Ring. Another moment of extreme emotional and physical pressure. Melina tells you she was born at the foot of the Erd Tree and that her purpose was given to her by her mother from inside of it. Anything she remembers revolves around the Erd Tree. And since most fans agree that Marika is influencing the guidance of grace, it's also possible she was able to convey Melina's purpose to her while crucified inside the Tree. I won't go too into detail about Melina as a person since I've discussed it in another thread, but we can reference Millicent as her parallel. Offshoots of divine beings, not raised by their mothers, but they feel this compulsion to complete a journey and fulfill a purpose. In the end, they both regain some memories and find their autonomy as their own persons.

Ending this really long post by bringing up Law of Regression.

The fundamentalists describe the Golden Order through the powers of regression and causality. Regression is the pull of meaning; that all things yearn eternally to converge.

I think this sum up Messmer's, Melina's, and Millicent's narratives really well. Despite having no memories, Melina and Millicent feel this pull. A force of yearning to return to their mothers in some way because they are fragments of them. And I think Messmer feels this pull too, but he knows he can never make his journey home.

[mildlycursedhistoricalobject]

TW: SA

This is the only thing I’m gonna say about this, but yes, this post is about the Neil Gaiman allegations. Before I write my actual post, I’d like to say that my heart is with the victims and the victims only. I hope they receive both the support and justice they deserve.

Ok. Can we please stop attacking each other? People who are discrediting the stories of the women involved should stop, because surely they can see how the narratives they’re pushing are not only unhelpful but actively harmful. There really shouldn’t be “sides” here, because none us are involved in this situation, but it’s insane to me that some people have been so quick to completely dismiss the stories of each woman. People you like can be shitty.

However, everyone saying I told you so? That is equally NOT helpful. You’re not morally superior for disliking Neil Gaiman first, and again, the narrative that people “should’ve known better” is actively harmful for victims of SA.

In continuation, people are allowed to be upset that a work they’ve found solace in turns out to be created by someone accused of SA. I agree that this shouldn’t overshadow the emotional impact on the woman actually involved in the situation, but people expressing their own feelings about personal links to his work is not harming anyone, and shutting people down for doing that is once again NOT helpful.

I doubt I can seperate the art from the artist in this case, but those are my individual feelings. If someone doesn’t want to read his work anymore, that’s fine. If someone does, that’s also fine. Stop attacking each other, because like I said, the victims need to be put first, and forcing people to cut ties or not with Gaiman’s WORK isn’t doing anything constructive.

Now, in light of what I’ve just said I want to share two things (these are potentially triggering so please feel free to skip):

1. I was sexually assaulted in November last year by someone who I trusted, looked up to, loved, and I am still dealing with the consequences.

2. Do you know what novel helped me through this experience? Neil Gaiman’s “The Ocean at the End of the Lane.”

That book became very impactful in my life, very recently. So yes, as I said, I doubt I’ll be able to have the same relationship with it, or with Gaiman’s work, but I’m sure it’s pretty obvious that this whole thing has brought stuff up for me.

There are people like me all across various fandoms conected to Neil Gaiman. Stop assuming that you’re helping victims of SA by telling us we can’t feel upset because the work we found safety in was created by a man accused of the very thing that hurt us. You’re not helping.

I apologise of this post came across as irritated, or superior, because that’s really not my intention. I’m just saying there’s nuance here, and we should all think before we post. I’m just feeling pretty tired of all this “discourse” I keep seeing, and it’s distracting us from actual issues that we as a society need to be addressing.

To summarise, stop attacking one another. We should be supporting each other and the women involved.

(Edited a couple of words for clarity.)

[toomanyfandomsneverenoughtime]

If you haven’t listened to Shania Twain’s “That Don’t Impress Me Much” and thought about the Ghosts during the most fitting section of the song for each of them, you’re listening to music incorrectly.

[thestrangestwatermelonofall]

alright time to write more about my precious fruit of the harvest instead of washing the dishes right away.

So obviously, I like watermelon a lot. I've since decided that it is my favorite food even though most of the time people are asking what your favorite meal is when they ask your favorite food. If I could eat watermelon as every meal I certainly would. If it was nutritious enough to survive off of only watermelon, I would. I can eat watermelon nonstop and eat enough for it to replace a meal. So, watermelon is my favorite food as it is the superior thing to eat. I made up the name "strange watermelon" when I was in middle school and was making an animal jam account with my friend. I got addicted to animal jam for a while and I liked the name for an online presence so I kept it. I don't think I'd ever explained my tumblr username before so there is the origins. The name "strangewatermelon" was taken, so I just made it a little different. I am the strangest, all the other iterations will never be as strange. where was I going with this? Oh yeah. I grew a watermelon in my backyard garden.

so. As the days became hotter and I went into marching band season, the watermelon seeds that I had planted long ago began to grow. The vines grew long and unruly. The flowers bloomed. And the first watermelon in the yard came to be. I got really exited about it and took a photo when I discovered it. About the size I imagine a kidney would be, and shaped like one too. So. After about a week that one died. It shriveled up, and I was a bit too busy to give extra care, so it was gone. then I discovered another. And another. Two small ones on the same vine. On a windy day, one of them snapped off. It was for the best, as two right next to each other wouldn't work out well when it was such a small garden with limited nutrients. And then the winner appeared

a fruit began to grow right next to the concrete. It became snug in there, so the wind wouldn't knock it around. And that baby just grew and grew. Only a month after I saw the first flowers, I had this huge fruit. I have written too muchc on this post. I fear that the people will grow bored. If you read this, let me know. So this huhe friit was the most beautiful thing ever. And cutting it off the vine felt sinful. But it had to be done if I wanted to get to eat it before the bugs. there was a spider and a centipede that were both living underneath the watermelon when I moved it. I suppose the spider kept away the bugs that wanted to eat the fruit. I don't know much about centipedes. So after cutting at the vine and finally getting it off, I wiped the big dirt and any bugs that might be there with a rag, and carried the harvest inside. There. I took a photo with it, then I washed it in the sink and with a rag, and finally threw her down on the table to be cut. Upon cutting, I couldn't stop admiring the beauty of it all. The beautiful green stripes, the interior bright red, the way the seeds just fell out easily and left little hollow spots in the flesh. The swirls in the flesh. This fruit grew from the dirt, the sun, and the rain. The bugs and creatures that I saw invading my other vegetable plants spared this fruit to let it grow large and unbothered. I've never grown anything so big. And even though I tried to keep the weeding up and the watering constant, as time went on I just gave up. But today I went weeding again and I pulled up all the invading grasses, I felt bad for them, but I kept going. And then I got to see this gorgeous fruit that came from it all. It was so sweet

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[stil-lindigo]

lead balloon (the tumblr post that saved me)

if this comic resonated with you, it would mean the world to me if you donated to this palestinian family's escape fund.

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no creative notes because this isn't that kind of comic.

I know I don’t owe any of you anything but I still felt compelled to write about my long term absence. And I feel far enough away from the dangerous spot I was in to be able to make this comic. I have a therapist now, and she agreed that making this could be a very cathartic gesture, and the start of properly leaving these thoughts behind me. I am still, at seemingly random times, blindsided by fleeting desires to kill myself. They’re always passing urges, but it’s disarming, and uncomfortable. I worry sometimes that my brain’s spent so long thinking only about suicide that it’s forgotten how to think about anything else. Like, now that I've opened that door for myself, I'll never be able to fully shut it again. But I’m trying my best to encourage my mind in other directions. We'll see how that goes.

I am still donating all proceeds from my store to Palestinian causes. So far, I've donated over $15K, not including donations coming from my own pocket or the fundraising streams which jointly raised around $10K. In the time since I made my initial post about where this money would be going, the focus has shifted from aid organisations to directly donating to escape funds.

If you'd like to do the same, you can look at Operation Olive Branch, which hosts hundreds of Palestinian escape funds or donate to Safebow, which has helped facilitate the safe crossing and securing of important medical procedures for over 150 at-risk palestinians since the beginning of the genocide.

[andstuffsketches]

girl who lives in a cave

[inkskinned]

at some point it's just like. do they even fucking like the thing they're asking AI to make? "oh we'll just use AI for all the scripts" "we'll just use AI for art" "no worries AI can write this book" "oh, AI could easily design this"

like... it's so clear they've never stood in the middle of an art museum and felt like crying, looking at a piece that somehow cuts into your marrow even though the artist and you are separated by space and time. they've never looked at a poem - once, twice, three times - just because the words feel like a fired gun, something too-close, clanging behind your eyes. they've never gotten to the end of the movie and had to arrive, blinking, back into their body, laughing a little because they were holding their breath without realizing.

"oh AI can mimic style" "AI can mimic emotion" "AI can mimic you and your job is almost gone, kid."

... how do i explain to you - you can make AI that does a perfect job of imitating me. you could disseminate it through the entire world and make so much money, using my works and my ideas and my everything.

and i'd still keep writing.

i don't know there's a word for it. in high school, we become aware that the way we feel about our artform is a cliche - it's like breathing. over and over, artists all feel the same thing. "i write because i need to" and "my music is how i speak" and "i make art because it's either that or i stop existing." it is such a common experience, the violence and immediacy we mean behind it is like breathing to me - comes out like a useless understatement. it's a cliche because we all feel it, not because the experience isn't actually persistent. so many of us have this ... fluttering urgency behind our ribs.

i'm not doing it for the money. for a star on the ground in some city i've never visited. i am doing it because when i was seven i started taking notebooks with me on walks. i am doing it because in second grade i wrote a poem and stood up in front of my whole class to read it out while i shook with nerves. i am doing it because i spent high school scribbling all my feelings down. i am doing it for the 16 year old me and the 18 year old me and the today-me, how we can never put the pen down. you can take me down to a subatomic layer, eviscerate me - and never find the source of it; it is of me. when i was 19 i named this blog inkskinned because i was dramatic and lonely and it felt like the only thing that was actually permanently-true about me was that this is what is inside of me, that the words come up over everything, coat everything, bloom their little twilight arias into every nook and corner and alley

"we're gonna replace you". that is okay. you think that i am writing to fill a space. that someone said JOB OPENING: Writer Needed, and i wrote to answer. you think one raindrop replaces another, and i think they're both just falling. you think art has a place, that is simply arrives on walls when it is needed, that is only ever on demand, perfect, easily requested. you see "audience spending" and "marketability" and "multi-line merch opportunity"

and i see a kid drowning. i am writing to make her a boat. i am writing because what used to be a river raft has long become a fully-rigged ship. i am writing because you can fucking rip this out of my cold dead clammy hands and i will still come back as a ghost and i will still be penning poems about it.

it isn't even love. the word we use the most i think is "passion". devotion, obsession, necessity. my favorite little fact about the magic of artists - "abracadabra" means i create as i speak. we make because it sluices out of us. because we look down and our hands are somehow already busy. because it was the first thing we knew and it is our backbone and heartbreak and everything. because we have given up well-paying jobs and a "real life" and the approval of our parents. we create because - the cliche again. it's like breathing. we create because we must.

you create because you're greedy.

[egophiliac]

I don’t think we’ve ever seen you draw knight of dawn before 🤔 what are your thoughts about him? Or take?

I've drawn him a couple of times, just really little/in the background. but I should draw him more, I love this guy a lot! I have many, many thoughts about him and the way he parallels Silver...and also I think it is extremely funny that his ghost is stuck in a ring. especially considering where that ring has been for the last 16-ish years.

[h00f]

T4TM (Theseus4TheMinotaur)

lost wax cast bronze, patina & paste wax

2023

(process photos & info under cut <3)

my minotaur boy!! pls click on the photos for higher res! my thesis is focusing on trans men and creatures (how original ik) and this was last semester's final. i spent a lot of time looking at sculptures of the theseus/minotaur story, and yknow? a LOT of them are erotic! i'm pretty sure i saw some of them on tumblr a decade ago, and that's led to this now!

as you'll notice, the minotaur has a big t-dick! i wanted to give him breasts and an enlarged clitoris to present a very masculine trans figure. the boy on the bottom is also trans because i say so . the piece is about looking up to older, bigger, hairier trans men and seeing something awe-inspiring and beautiful. the minotaur was locked up by a cruel father for being different, and i think modern adaptations tend towards a sympathetic asterion (his name in one version)

making this piece was. so much effort. it took me about 3 months to get it all together - from clay model (plasticine) to 3D print to silicone mold to wax cast, and finally bronze pour into the shell mold. and then a TON of filing, sanding, dremel-ing, and various other metalworking techniques that probably took years off my life.

i started with sketches and made theeeeeee ugliest model ever:

then used a 3D scanner to get it digital, then spent a goooood month or two making him pretty in blender! then i spent an agonizing few weeks trying to get it print-ready, and fiiiiiinally did

^^^ an early resin printed draft of the model - you can see in the final that i added lots to theseus after some feedback, but sadly the nosering broke off every time i cast it so i just. let that be <3

then came the moldmaking, and then the wax dipping!! the yellow stuff is shell mold (ground up ceramic bits and algae soup, sticks to the wax, then silica sand in varying sizes on top) which gets the wax melted out, and bronze poured in!

then it's all metalworking, cutting stuff off, and working with hot metal. they don't tell you about all the bronze dust and how annoying it gets wearing a respirator AND goggles. but it is for me health, me boy. here's him all cleaned up before the patina:

and then i spray him down with various chemicals to make it "patina" (aka rust) in pretty colors. wait a few days, then apply paste wax to seal it and give it that shine!

then we get what you see above!!! the blue was actually unintentional, and i'm still not super sure why it looks that way.. but it's pretty so idc <3

thanks for reading!! if you ever have any bronze/casting questions, don't hesitate to message me! <3

[hattersarts]

a third old man yaoi has hit the lesbian

(acd canon dated, mostly based on granada series)

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Who is this sassy lost child?

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[aceissomunster]

discowing + jaybin ! press for quality

txtless + ref under the cut

ignore my horrible art please i drew this on ibis paint x with my finger and the soft felt tip pen brush. and my crappy penmanship.

[commsroom]

the u.s.s. horrible unending nightmare 💥 (once again from the incredible @hehearse)

[vaguely-concerned]

So much of Garak as a person starts to make sense once you know his childhood was a fucking gothic novel. His main playground was a graveyard and he'd play pretend by perfoming improv eulogies to an imagined audience. For a long time his main touchstone for most important figures from recent history is 'oh yeah I know about that guy my dad buried him. great flower arrangements for that one'. He finds out later his 'parents' are actually a brother and sister who had to get married to avoid the utter shame and social devastation of having a child born out of wedlock, and they live in the basement of his biological father's house. (the madwoman in the attic vs. the tiny elim in the basement.) His biological father calls himself his uncle and locks him in a closet whenever he fails to live up to his insane and unpredictable expectations and everyone just has to act like that's normal and expected, and his will hangs over everything at all times, unseen but always felt keener than anything else. The father who actually raised him grows the world's most beautiful (and as it turns out, most poisonous) orchids and keeps the mask of a god hidden in a box in his work shed. Everyone in the house is choking down secrets like it's the only air they know how to breathe anymore.

What I'm saying is that right from the get-go this guy never had the faintest shot at turning out normal, so I'm glad that by middle age he's found a way to get a bit silly with it as he continues to be deeply deeply not normal about anything ever <3

[stil-lindigo]

warmth.

a comic about not being alone.

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creative notes:

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