#the Grail Heroine

[taliesin-the-bored]

The Grail Heroine leading Galahad to the ship, where Percival and Bors wait

Stained glass by Veronica Whall for King Arthur’s Great Halls at Tintagel

[poparthuriana]

The Grail Four: Bors, Galahad, the Grail Heroine, and Percival

Survivors of Camlann: Bedivere, Cynwyl Sant, Griflet, Kay?, Lucan, Morvran, and Sanddef

[faline-cat444]

Mainly additives,not everything.Some are predicted to show tomorrow and/or Thursday while others could be me confusing it with whatever is due for next week.

[kingchaos20]

Dear FGO fans.

After recent events on JP, Idol Ecchan has a message for you all:

[brave-symphonia]

And at then end, she even reaches out to X, wondering how she is and where she is now.

Man, I just love this event so much.

[magdalene-spirit]

At some point, having fulfilled the dream of outer success & building the dream life comes the waking up, slowly-slowly, gnawing feelings of discontent & of something not quite right rises to the surface.

We thought we had it all, but something is missing.

Life feels arid in the Wasteland.

Remember, in the Grail stories, the wasteland is the forgetting of Goddess (resulting in ecological collapse, poverty & war). The search for the Cup is the search for living waters, the search for Soul, the search for Goddess.

Life has been lived for outer values (of the patriarchy) & not for the Soul (individually & collectively as civilisation).

Feelings of shallowness, emptiness, hollowness, meaninglessness suffuse the body as literal sensations of void & death.

Longing for substantiality is longing to be filled with our own Being-Existence, the truth of who we are.

Consciousness vibrates with a living hum.

We want to feel our own vibration & to feel aliveness pulsing in our ground, the inner body, the matrix. We remember the ground, because it is our true home.

The living ground into which we bottom out, in which we have our Soul origin is the Mother.

The “stable” foundation - we long for, holding us in this world.

Pulsing with warmth. The heat of life. The void of absence of Soul is cold & empty.

The warmth nourishes & kindles the flame of existence & aliveness of being.

#liminalspace #heroinesjourney #liminal #consciousness #being #presence #aliveness #beingbecoming #becoming #grailquest

[typellblog]

Illyasviel von Einzbern: The Hole at the Center of Fate/Stay Night

Emiya Shirou is the beating heart of Fate/Stay Night. Every character radiates outwards from Shirou, shapes and is shaped by him. He fights against foils like Archer and Kirei while growing alongside the three main heroines in each route.

There's really only one character who precedes Shirou in influence, who shapes him near-completely but cannot himself be shaped.

Emiya Kiritsugu is already dead, after all.

It's his legacy that drives the novel - but something oft-undiscussed is that Shirou only has half of it. He inherits his father’s justice, and the one that inherits his ruthlessness is Illya. Thus, Illya’s relationship to Shirou is dictated from the start.

She is everything his father left behind, the first gatekeeper of the moonlit world of death and magecraft that Shirou now finds himself in. In this role she transcends routes, appearing at the end of the third day to deliver a near-lethal attack just as the story branches off.

She seems intent to deliver Kiritsugu’s baggage to Shirou, to make him reckon with the past that he himself never experienced; the truth that a hero can only help those he sides with while many others are left alone in the cold.

In this way her very existence is a far more fundamental challenge to Shirou’s ideals than that of any other character - and yet this challenge is met only indirectly. Much of the information regarding her true identity and relationship to Shirou is elided until the end of HF.

She functions similarly to Sakura, a character who totally changes the reader’s perception of the first two routes in retrospect. The reveals about Illya force us to reevaluate how positive her ending in the Fate route really is.

In the narrative of Heaven’s Feel, both Illya and Sakura are considered ‘doomed’ - able to be saved only by Shirou sacrificing his own life to Archer’s arm.

It’s the crux of their characterisation, in the same way that Saber’s pursuit of the Holy Grail leads her into timeless and uncountable doomed battles. In a route based around that character, you would expect fixing it to be the main thrust of the plot.

And so just as the Fate route is focused on Shirou clashing with Saber over her lack of regard for her safety, and Heaven’s Feel is focused on accepting even the ‘impure’ parts of Sakura, there is no route focused on showing Illya that she needn't give up on having a normal life.

Instead all of her scenes in Heaven’s Feel are about accepting that she cannot have one.

This is the hole in the center of FSN that I’m talking about. Its absence is felt keenly throughout the novel, because Illya has another role besides a specter of Shirou's past. She embodies the prize and object of the Holy Grail War itself - the very same wish-granting device.

Many of the characters in this story are not fighting for the Grail specifically, but nonetheless their strong personalities and desires cause them to clash with one another, in a process Kirei sees as comparable to everyday life.

Their wishes, both in the form of the dead’s regrets and victor’s will, enter the neutral, empty Grail in order to produce a miracle. The only one not allowed a will of their own is the vessel of the Grail, who, in absorbing these desires, must completely erase their humanity.

Illya is not intended to have a reason to pursue the Grail, nor any life beyond obtaining it. The war is premised on the sacrifice of the Servants, yes, but nonetheless they enter as contestants. Illya, like Justeaze before her, enters the ritual only as a sacrifice.

And yet an outside element is introduced. Illya being part-human, the product of an actual family rather than just a clone allows for her to have personal motivations. She holds on to her resentment of Kiritsugu, despite knowing that it’s pointless, because it’s all she has left.

A parallel can be made to the Grail itself. Supposedly a pure wish-granting device, it becomes corrupted through the influence of Angra Mainyu, one small, perverse wish colouring the whole thing black.

The desired salvation of the Einzberns, their thousand-year project relies on being able to reproduce the miracle, to understand every component part of their attempts in order to draw ever closer to the Third Magic, but Illya is a random factor, born to a human parent.

She’s also their greatest creation since Justeaze. Miracles, after all, exist because they are not understood.

The corruption of the Grail with the darkest desires of the world is just the inevitable result of any wish - the price of becoming a human instead of existing as a machine. Live long enough and anyone would turn into Zouken, higher goals suborned by a base desire to escape pain.

Like Illya the Grail is a failed project, a tool that can only provide salvation of a limited nature & only fulfill its purpose incompletely, proof positive that true perfection does not exist in the world of Fate/Stay Night.

In Illya’s case the bug in her programming comes fundamentally from a desire for family, for someone to be close to her. Despite her dysfunctional initial approaches she’s perfectly capable of living normally alongside Shirou.

The issue, then, is the Grail War itself.

Her two sides, two different origins, come into conflict here, and her role as the Holy Grail consistently wins. Not because she desires it in any real sense, but because she doesn’t believe that she can do anything else.

Consider how the Fate route ends with Saber and Shirou trying to live without regrets, accepting both the negative and positive aspects of the past without dwelling on that which cannot be changed.

Consider how Illya in the Fate route doesn’t say a single thing about her condition, refuses to burden others with that knowledge, accepting the fact of her death and instead choosing to live in the moment.

Consider how the Unlimited Blade Works route is about Shirou trying to live without regrets, accepting that he will not always succeed, that his self-sacrificing nature will hurt him, but nonetheless his pursuit of that goal is worthwhile.

Consider how Illya’s death is used to illustrate this, how she cannot be saved regardless of whether Shirou makes the choice to intervene or not, how his sorrow is used as proof of his brokenness and his ability to move forward regardless is used as proof of his strength.

Consider why the Heaven's Feel route is named after the ritual that materializes the soul, why this is identified with salvation and rebirth by the Einzberns. I would argue that the Third Magic is a metaphor for the process Shirou undergoes throughout the novel.

He evolves from a machine into a human, gaining his own desires and the will to live. And just as Heaven’s Feel, the ritual, requires a sacrifice: Justeaze’s blood forms the foundation, so too does Heaven’s Feel, the route: Illya spends her own life to fully realize Shirou’s.

In moving past Kiritsugu’s legacy, he moves past his belief that his life is worth less than others. He wants to live, wants to let Illya save him, wants to let her sacrifice herself for him. In moving past Kiritsugu’s legacy, he moves past Illya.

I don’t blame him. I just want to emphasize how significant to this novel the existence of suffering is, how important the figure of someone who cannot be saved, how necessary a single person’s sacrifice. And how this falls on Illya in every route.

In the latter parts of the Fate route she quickly disappears from story relevance. Her functions as a Grail offer a convenient excuse to have her sleeping for much of the day, as it does for Kirei’s kidnapping of her, stringing her up as a sacrifice to open the gate.

In UBW we have Gilgamesh brutally ripping out her heart. He values her purely for her core, which holds the Grail, tossing aside the rest of her body.

If her role as the Grail is what drives her doom, though, she is at least partially able to overcome this at the end of Heaven’s Feel.

For a brief moment, Illya escapes the bonds of fate by uniting her deeply personal wish with the impersonal functions of the Grail.

She also dies. She fucking dies, okay? I’m so tired of talking about this as though it’s supposed to be a good thing, as though we’re just supposed to accept it as the best possible option.

It works precisely because we know there is another, because we know for a fucking fact that an Illya route could have existed, that her salvation is possible not just from a meta perspective but directly implied in-universe.

Illya’s power is to grant wishes, but she is incapable of giving voice to her own. She needs someone there by her side to tell her that it’s okay to want to live, and yet- Shirou is so fucking broken that he needs her to do that for him instead.

Illya could have lived, but she doesn’t, and in not doing so she carries half the weight of this story’s tragedy on her back.

In a way this is an excuse for the lack of an Illya route. I really do think its blatant absence adds something to Fate/Stay Night, really sells the tragedy of HF, becomes even more beautiful precisely because of its unattainability.

It’s a comment on how the artistic process, materializing your soul on paper if you will, is an inherently restrictive one, rife with failure and things left on the chopping board.

But it does not, not for a second, mean that we should accept the lack of an Illya route. It doesn’t mean the desire for it is a bad thing. It doesn’t mean that its addition would make Fate/Stay Night worse.

It would, however, become a different game at that point, and here I want to pay respect to the one that has lived alongside me for twenty years.

Thanks for reading, and happy anniversary to my favourite story of all time.

[yarrayora]

because of the lack of female protagonists in... pretty much every genre, really, people tend to hype up a lot of series as "better than the average [insert genre]" just because it has a female protagonist rather than male

(personally i think girls deserve formulaic schlock, too, like how bofuri is basically the average MMOVR with a black haired plain looking boy repeatedly stumbling upon cheat powers except the protagonist is a girl)

but when i look for new titles saying "i want interesting worldbuilding where we get to see how this fantasy world works as a society and the court intrigue goes beyond high school level mean girl bullying" and people respond with titles like "i'm in love with the villainess" it's like asking for a grilled steak and getting handed a hamburger

burger's good, but not what i'm looking for

so here's a list of my manga/webtoon recommendations for stories of political intrigue in fantasy worlds with a female protagonist (not all of them are isekai or regression or reincarnation, most are straight up just fantasy world):

The Holy Grail of Eris

The story of a kingdom after the villainess is executed for attempting to poison the heroine beloved by the crown prince. Our protagonist is Constance Grail who finds herself being haunted by the ghost of the villainess Scarlet Castiel who saved her from suffering the humiliation of having her engagement broken because of a false accusation.

Scarlet claims that she has been framed, and together the duo is set to find out the truth regarding her death sentence.

Saying more than this would ruin the plot twists, but read this if you're interested in a story where it makes sense for a ducal daughter to be sacrificed in exchange for a lady of a lower class as the nation's queen.

Itsuwari no Freya (localized as Prince Freya)

A small kingdom struggles to defend itself against a powerful warmongering kingdom with the leadership of their cunning prince. Except, the prince has died. To prevent the flame of hope from being extinguished, the prince's inner circle employs the aid of Freya, a village maiden with the same face as the late prince.

There is no time to prepare her to learn the ropes of politics. Now Freya must plunge immediately into international turmoil and figure out a way to secure support from other nations with the help of the prince's knights and, of course, her own charisma and intelligence.

Ebony (localized as Lady Evony)

Sensational news sweeps the nation: the Grand Duke has put a criminal under his protection. Evony was accused of her father's murder and ended up suffering all kinds of abuse in the hands of the prison wardens who despise her.

Yet her time at the women's prison was also the only time she was able to gain education in a misogynistic nation who still bars women from learning while other countries have a headmistress for their famous college and traveling tradeswomen.

As she heals from the wounds inflicted both on her body and her heart, she realizes she wants to become someone who can stand equal to the Grand Duke and not just a fragile flower to be protected in his garden.

Great if you're looking for slow burn romance where the main couple are equals instead of the usual "obsessive yandere male lead who holds to power/lovely lady who struggles to be useful" or "stupid but doting male lead who needs his very smart lady to show him the way"

Also great if you're looking for a korean webtoon where all their problems CANNOT be solved by the protagonists being wealthy capitalists

The Falcon Princess

While other webtoons tend to focus on noblewomen's tea parties as a source of conflict, The Falcon Princess focuses on a kingdom in the middle of being invaded.

The protagonist is a princess on the run when the imperial palace ends up ransacked by the enemy nation. She wakes up as a falcon and ends up finding herself as her kingdom's commander's messenger bird.

Despite the language barrier, the princess helps the commander figure out the enemy's location, strategy, and various ways to defeat them and finds herself becoming a symbol of hope who leads the army into reclaiming her nation.

JK Haru is a Sex Worker in Another World

Last but not least but is definitely the most controversial pick. Haru is a girl who gets reincarnated in another world after she got hit by a truck alongside her otaku classmate.

While said otaku is living his best life as his power fantasy becomes a reality, Haru refuses to be his girl in exchange for a comfortable life, even though the only job she could have in a misogynistic world where women can't even eat at a restaurant without a chaperone is at a brothel.

And yet, she doesn't hate it. Although the customers can be rough, she befriends the other prostitutes at the brothel and figures out how to enjoy her job. It's a story that depicts sex workers with respect, acknowledging their struggles without turning it into misery porn.

It also asks an important question regarding the trope of "overpowered isekaid protagonist changes the world for the better": CAN they actually change the world just because they have cheat powers? After all, societal issue isn't something you can solve using brute force and money alone

[lightheaded-dullahan]

Alright, strap in for the lie of the decade So I got this ask

So I think; “well what’s this all about?” I open it up and its this pretty quoted interview, so I’m like “huh so what’s ‘oh boy’ about this? Then I start to read. AND OH BOY.

I think most people who look into Fate/Apocrypha have heard of this interview with Nasu and Higashide. If you haven’t; here is a quick run down of its contents.

Written out; if the image is annoying to read:

Trivia from interview with Kinoko Nasu, Takeshi Takeuchi, Konoe Ototsugu & Yuichiro Higashide. (Source from Comptiq, Newtype and etc). - The ligh novel was greenlit by Nasu, as supervisor, Higashide as writter and Konoe as illustrator art. - David, St.George, Kintoki Sakata & Musashibo Benkei were scrapped by Kinoko Nasu’s idea. - Nasu said these servants doesn’t fit into plot and they were replaced by four new servants instead. - Chiron, Avicebron & Achilles were designed by Takeuchi & Nasu, illustrated by Konoe in charge of character design. - Mordred is the culture of festival achievement thanks from TYPE MOON fanbase. - Addition of Mordred into F/A was Takeuchi’s idea and Nasu agreed. - Mordred was orginally to be male but Nasu feel that having two male characters look feminine (the other being Astolfo) would be too much. - However, Mordred as a male was not Nasu’s claim of actual fact. In truth, Nasu didn’t decided for final Mordred’s gender since Fate/Stay Night until Fate/Apocrypha. Which mean Mordred was “genderless” in F/SN. - After the project of online game was scrapped, Nasu said that all servants are too ridiculous powerful and might bored if the player’s powerful servant was facing against other player’s powerful servant. It’s like a hax. - The online game was based on Infamous 2’s gameplay style. - Nasu & Takeuchi were laughing about more Saber clone. In fact, Mordred is the real clone of Saber (Altria), so the wish has come true for those people who still saying about Saber clone. - Karna is Nasu’s favorite servant. Karna’s popularity has been skyrocket thanks to Fate/Extra CCC. - Astolfo is Konoe’s favourite servant. He is symbol mascot of Fate/Apocrypha. Higashide can’t even tell if this is comfortable or not since Astolfo is dude. - Yggdmillennia, Sisigou & Kotomine Shirou were planned by Nasu, Takeuchi & Higashide. - Higashide wrote all Sisigou, Reika & Black camp’s character development, while Homunculus, Kotomine Shirou & four new servants’s character development was already written by Nasu. - Nasu said that Shirou is basically a character who look to have “light outside and darker inside” personality. Uncanny different trait from Kirei. - Homunculus (Sieg) was Nasu & Takeuchi’s idea. Nasu wanted introduce male homunculus in Fate series for the first time. - Takeuchi & Konoe said Homunculus looks cute but dense person. - Takeuchi stated Homunculus & Jeanne are his new favorite characters, along with Altria. - Interviewer mention about why Takeuchi like Homunculus. He reply "It’s a secret" due it will trigger the spoiler. - Jeanne is based on real french student girl according to Takeuchi. She was at same college where Takeuchi studied, before he met someone as model of Arcueid Brunestud’s design from Tsukhime come to his mind. - The difference between Altria & Jeanne is sex appeal. Which is already explained in TYPE MOON April Fool 2012, where Heroine X (Altria) in furious when she heard that Jeanne’s sex appeal is better than her. - Tsukihime is Higashide’s favorite visual novel. - Nasu stated homunculus like Mordred can summoned as Heroic Spirit despite not human being. - The rules of magecraft in Apocrypha universe are same as in Fate/Stay Night & Fate/Zero except that there is no rule of Ruler classes. - Ruler’s duty is protect the Holy Grail and oversee the battle. - Interviewer asked Nasu & Higashide about why Jeanne hijack Leticia’s body rather than ritual summon. Nasu stated it was something broke the rule of HGW and corrupted the system. - Nasu mention the first servant who hijack human body is Avenger, Angra Mainyu from Fate/Hollow Ataraxia. Who control Emiya Shirou’s body and mind since he has no body but void form. The theory that come from Rin Tohsaka was correct. - Roa from Tsukihime was also can hijack the human body (Ciel & Tohno SHIKI) but reincarnation soul while he was in Akasha. - Nasu & Higashide admit it was silly idea in the first place. But they wanted Jeanne to have some disadvantages/weakness for herself due she was powerful servant and might kinda “boring” if she summoned as spirit form. (Avoid fan calling her a mary sue). - Which mean any servant can hijack the human body while in critical condition but it's rarely. - Karna’s background story has been altered in comparison to his original myth in Mahabrarat. This means, Karna is Nasu!Karna, not Myth!Karna which we know. - The rule of summoning Ruler is who can guide the war during in his/her past and a sainthood(?) as specific condition. Only one Ruler class is summoned in one war. The this system works in Apocrypha universe only. - St.George was remove because of this. Karna, however he refuse refer himself a saint and a killing machine who can kill God, summoned as Lancer class instead. - The Greater Grail force summon the servant as Ruler when met the condition completed. - If Jeanne is summoned in different universe without rules of Ruler, her class will be obviously Saber. She still will be summoned as Ruler if the mishap of war affected the result in different universe. - Jeanne was first mention in Kara no Kyoukai’s light novel reference: Mikiya Kokutou mentions her when he was discussing about Heroic Spirits who utilized the power of the Counter Force. - While the design for Jeanne wasn’t made during the production of the Fate/Zero novels, the design was completed around the time of the anime adaptation.

This translation was provided by @/ shinichameleon - who, in fact, is still pretty active in this fandom. They still post to this day. Now; what’s wrong with this? Well most importantly, Mahabharata is misspelled- no I’m joking that’s not the most important. 

Most importantly is This interview is a lie.

https://web.archive.org/web/20151107012557/http://shinichameleon.tumblr.com/post/62039911382/fateapocrypha-vol2-translation-of-detail

This is the interview being claimed has this information. But - this is an interview by Higashide ALONE after Apoc Vol. 2 was releasing. Nasu isn’t in this interview. At all. So; is there *any* interview with Nasu & Higashide? Yes; in Type Moon Ace 8. But that was *before* Apoc began its release so none of this information would have been there. So; maybe its another one? Well, as Petrikow on Fate/Apocrypha Free Range Spoiler thread discovered; no archivist has listed any other interview with both of them. Well what about the rest of the post? Seems like information is just from the product itself, not any interview. But why does this matter? Well; because this user, Shinichameleon has a rather ...unsavory reputation.

In addition this this set; they’ve also posts a supposed new route for the Ufortable adaptation.  Which....is blatantly untrue as we’ve seen. But then so this person lies about fate stuff (and gets it circulated for a decade), so what? Well they’ve also got banned from fate reddit(s) for posting false information. This includes falsely claiming Japanese Mordred and Semiramis fans hated each other; than Semiramis was hated in JP, KR, and CN fan bases after vol.4,5, and 6. They also tried to pull something similar with summer Ibuki, which is also proven not reliable at all through machine translation, using their own opinion as proof of character popularity, taking people out of context, and genuinely bringing bad fate (heh) arguments. But what else have they done? Completely make up information about Kiara Sessyoin?? Yep. They completely made up info.

“According from Kinoko Nasu & Takeuchi Takashi in EXTRA Material, Kiara Sessyoin is not her real name. Her real name is Inoriara Sessyoin and her actual age is late twenties. She was born as the daughter of true mantra of Tachikawa yo Tennaga, but she was bedridden and didn’t existed until at the age of 14 because she was sickly by birth. She was caught in commandments, that for their own “pitiable” appearance of the surrounding people who didn’t know it saves by saying, a pure human’s image that existed in the story vanished too.

At the age of 14, the believer was told by a doctrine of spirit hacking, her sickness recovers in a moment completely unknown to the outside. However, it accompanies along missing people and the dead increased suddenly, and she was completely denied in the presence level to the father who became aware of the accident, the reason “Though she is a woman, I am seeking to become one with that woman”, he  denied to realize it, then expelled on suspicions of violating two taboos of the Tachikawa Style. To that morrow, she takes away the father’s skull principal image, states “the master is deprived of technique tools” the last taboo was broken with this, the killer match of the believer, it left from all religious organizations that had become the dead, excluding her.

Afterwards, though she has saved the believers’ belief of the Tachikawa Style, the believe who became loved dearly was said to committed suicide one after another for her. In addition, she was put on the wanted list by the Western Europe plutocracy for the exploitation of code cast of the electronic brain, the maximum taboo in history.

Also she can fights and take down an average human nor a weak servant by her own potential without her final boss form. Just look at this video and count how many skills she got (Spoiler alert). And she is the first person who awakes ORT from eternal slumber....according from Koha Ace. Are you for real Keikenchi? “ So; fun fact -- none of this is true. It’s all made up. Oh; but you know what’s the MOST infruitating? “ The difference between Altria & Jeanne is sex appeal. Which is already explained in TYPE MOON April Fool 2012, where Heroine X (Altria) in furious when she heard that Jeanne’s sex appeal is better than her. “

THIS IS FAKE. THE FUCKING SEX APPEAL DIFFERENCE IS FAKE. You know the shit about Siegfried and Semiramis having a different artist and copyright issues with that is probably fake too. Anyways; what does this all mean? WE need to fucking recheck probably a good chunk of things we’re spreading around in this fandom. It also means that a lot of information on the Fandom wiki is likely straight up false (not surprising) which can mean its absolutely *useless* for lore referencing for *anyone*. This is for the English speaking side of the fandom so far; so; yeah. This is pretty fucked. Shinichameleon is now posting in danganronpa reddits so; I guess look out danganronpa fans.

[lillipad72]

The Annotated Anne of Green Gables ~~ a special rereading

CHAPTER II ~~ Matthew Cuthbert is Surprised

"The little birds sang as if it were/The one day of summer in all the year."

These verses at the beginning of Chapter II come from a long verse parable by James Russel Lowell, "The Vision of Sir Launfal," published in 1848. I could not find much besides a quick synopsis of the poem, but we can learn much from it. This poem is a twist on the classic Grail story. Sir Launfal decides not to search for the Holy Grail after a dream causes him to realize that the real meaning of the Grail is charity. These verses come as Matthew travels to pick up an orphan boy from the train station only to discover our heroine, Anne Shirley, waiting instead. While the verses perfectly describe the beautiful spring day of the setting, the poem as a whole fits into the theme of the novel. It was the charity in the Cutherberts' hearts that led them to find their Holy Grail, Anne, even if it wasn't the orphan boy they thought.

"Her face was small, white and thin, also much freckled; her mouth was large and so were her eyes, that looked green in some lights and moods and gray in others. So far, the ordinary observer; an extraordinary observer might have seen that the chin was pointed and pronounced; that the big eyes were full of spirit and vivacity; that the mouth was sweet-lipped and expressive; that the forehead was broad and full; in short, our discerning extraordinary observer might have concluded that no commonplace soul inhabited the body of this stray woman-child."

This is the introduction and description of Anne Shirley! While there is so much here to unpack, I'll leave that for another day; for now, I will discuss L.M. Montgomery's inspiration for the appearance of Anne. I knew about this before, but this book pointed it out, and well, I love this fact! So Montgomery said she saw a photo of a girl in an American magazine that she then used as a model for Anne. Montgomery said she had no idea who the girl was and if she had any idea that her face was the model for Anne. Well, that girl has been identified as none other than Evelyn Nesbit! The exact photo is above! For those of you unaware of the lovely Evelyn, she was a chorus girl and model in New York City at the beginning of the 20th century, but she really became famous when her husband, Harry K. Thaw, murdered Stanford White. (White was a famous architect who designed such buildings as the Pennsylvania Station in New York; he is also a character in the Gilded Age on Max). Nesbit alleged that White raped her when she was a minor and that she had told her husband that, causing him to shoot White to defend her honor. The trial would go on to be called "The Trial of the Century" (despite it only being 1907), and Nesbit was the star witness in her husband's defense. Her fame would rise, and she became a star in vaudeville. Another fun fact is that she (according to her grandson) received $25,000 from her husband after the trial, and she donated it to the anarchist Emma Goldman (who I really suggest looking into; her work was fascinating). Anyways, all that to say: I wonder what L.M. Montgomery would have thought if she knew that Evelyn Nesbit, a woman of 'loose morals,' was her inspiration for the appearance of Anne?

I was going to write as well about a few song lyrics that appear in this chapter, but I talked too much already I feel, so if anyone wants to know about the lyrics, let me know

next chapter

[taliesin-the-bored]

any platonic ships?

I like the wacky friendship between Galahad and the Grail Heroine. They’re both such weirdos (affectionate) that he thinks nothing of wearing a belt which she made of her own hair which she had previously been carrying around in a box because she had a prophecy. He needed a belt. She had hair. That’s just how they are. 

When it comes to not-canon-anywhere friendships in not-canon-anywhere timelines, I think that it would be entertaining if Galahad was also friends with Mordred but either Galahad strenuously denied it to himself until he couldn’t any longer or was somehow unaware of or unable to comprehend the absolute havoc wreaked by his friend.

[poparthuriana]

Arthurian Friend Group Tournament Finals!

Morally Dubious Sorceress Squad: the Lady of Avalon, Morgan le Fay, the Queen of Norgales, and Sebile

The Grail Four: Bors, Galahad, the Grail Heroine, and Percival

[pollenallergie]

i hate you plastic surgeons on social media who speculate about what work celebrities and influencers have had done. i hate you celebrities and influencers who pump their faces and bodies with fillers and/or get surgery after surgery, then proceed to lie about it all for years, crediting some bullshit weight loss tea or dumb workout routine or ‘holy grail’ beauty product. i hate you fashion brands who make their clothes to suit a very specific body type that only a small percent of people have and only carry a small range of sizes bc, fuck it, they feel like it.

i hate you diet companies for pushing unrealistic standards, promising unrealistic results, targeting mostly young women and girls, and just straight up lying to people in much of your advertising. i hate you social media (especially fucking instagram) for pushing a bullshit, unrealistic beauty standard and telling us that we all have to meet it or else we’re ugly and unlovable. i hate you “legging legs” and “body by ozempic” and “buccal fat removal” and “bbl body” and “heroin chic,” i hate you body type trends.

i hate you people who feel the fucking need to incessantly comment on the foods people eat and their body size and tell them that “that’s so unhealthy” as if they don’t already fucking know that!! just let them fucking enjoy their goddamn meal and feel comfortable in their own skin!!! it’s not that fucking hard!!! i hate you skincare companies that market your anti-aging products to teenage girls and women in their twenties. i hate you doctors who refuse to take women, trans people, people of color, fat people, and those who belong to two or more of those identities seriously when they come to you with their health issues.

i hate you politicians for turning something as simple as preferred pronouns into ammunition for your bullshit ideological warfare that you use to distract from the fact that many of your constituents can’t even afford to live and that, currently, you are working as hard as you possibly can to strip our rights away and set us back decades upon decades. i hate you news stations who would rather focus on celebrities and their lavish fashion and their lavish events and their lavish PR stunts than the genocides and geopolitical conflicts in Palestine, Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Artsakh, etc.

[derekscorner]

Fated Rantings: Where to start Fate

A scary question, believe me I know.

I asked my own self this question over a year ago now after finding myself lured into the series through lore videos like a child being led by candy. I even started FGO just because it was a free way to begin the series.

Would I recommend that for everyone? No. Fate Grand Order (FGO) is a gacha game after all. Unless you have the patience to grind or cheese your battles like me you'll give in fast and I’d never recommend someone giving money to a gacha game.

Although, if you're already into Fate or just genuinely curious about FGO then I can confirm that it has some of the best written stories I've ever seen. I won't claim every singularity (arc) as a banger but there are some that are legitimately good.

I'd also recommend you be wary if you think that watching the FGO anime is enough. That's more of a companion piece to the gacha than a true adaption.

Where to actually begin

So with my warnings of FGO aside where is the best place to begin the Fate series? Where does the story begin and what is the latest entry?

Fair questions but don't let many fans fool you. There is no one starting point to the Fate series. The reason for this is a simple one;

Every Fate story is on it's own timeline

Nasu Kinoko the writer who created the original 'Fate/Stay Night' stated as much.

Now this doesn't mean that some of his works are "not canon". It's actually the opposite, "everything is canon".

Nasu's company, Type-Moon, got off the ground with his visual novels 'Tsukihime', 'Fate/Stay Night', 'Kara no Kyoukai', and 'Mahoyo' among others. With each of these novels have multiple endings to them.

What confuses so many is them lacking the knowledge that these novels and their various endings share a universe. Some event in one could be mentioned in another. For example, "the church" from Tsukihime is very much present in Fate. The magecraft you see used in Mahoyo is the same magic system and society that pops up in Fate and Tsukihime.

In essence, Nasu's stories are sharing the same world but taking place at various points in that world.

Fate Specific

If you're curious about Mahoyo or Tsukihime then I'd recommend the remakes on Steam or Switch. If you're just genuinely curious what a visual novel is I'll leave you to discover them. I brought these things up because they're related.

For the Fate series in particular it was important that I explain them because this universe of multiple endings are all canon to a degree.

The reason many of you will find Fate hard to get into is because several Fate anime are based on these specific story routes from the visual novels.

The "Fate Route" was adapted as the Fate 2006 anime.

Unlimited Blade Works was adapted from the route of the same name.

Heaven's Feel is another route from the novel.

All three of these big anime names are routes from the same visual novel 'Fate/Stay Night'. Each route, and thus each anime, focuses on a heroine that the lead Shirou Emiya falls in love with.

So each show isn't some reboot or relaunch of a series, they're adaptions of a different timeline of events.

It does not stop at 'Fate/Stay Night' either

As I said earlier, some events are shared between them because these stories share a world and some things happened in each. The characters are citing world events from their perspective. For example;

In many version of Fate the 1st to 4th Holy Grail War happened.

In every version of Fate the "Age of Gods" came and went.

In most Fate stories there is a Rin Tohsaka or a Shirou Emiya somewhere in the world even if they do not appear in the narrative.

In every Type-Moon story the "Clocktower" exists.

Dead Apostles and vampires exist in most Type-Moon stories.

This may seem silly to some of you but I have pointed it out because there will be someone see something said in a Fate story and be confused because it doesn't quite line up with a Fate work they've previously seen.

Or they'll see things stated that makes them think two Fate stories are intrinsically linked when they aren't. If you still find that confusing then allow me to show you the famous Fate/Zero.

Fate/Zero

Many are told to "start here" because Fate/Zero is a prequel to 'Fate/Stay Night' which isn't entirely true.

Yes, Saber will reference the 4th Grail War and her hazy memories of it. She even remembers Shirou's adoptive father Kiritsugu Emiya.

But don't be fooled, that's where Nasu's statement comes in. He did not consider Fate/Zero canon to his novel.

However, that does not mean Saber is lying either. What this means is that the 4th war that Saber remembers in Fate Stay Night is a different conflict than what you see in Fate/Zero.

This is the best example of shared events not being the same per work. The anime of Fate/Zero is it's own timeline while the 4th war Saber mentions in the novel or anime adaptions was different.

We do not know what the exact differences are between Fate/Zero and the 4th Grail War Saber mentions in Fate/Stay Night but we know they existed.

Then you have stories in which the timeline diverted far earlier

These stories are much easier to dive into since their timelines diverged more drastically. In Fate 2006 or Heaven's Feel the point of divergence is the choice in love interest but for these stories the timeline diverges much earlier. For example;

Fate Grand Order actually takes place in a timeline in which there was only one Holy Grail War.

Fate Extra takes place in a world where there's a super computer lodged in the Moon that's been recording Earth's history for nearly 4 billion years.

In Fate Apocrypha there was only three Holy Grail Wars before someone managed to steal the Greater Grail during World War II.

Despite these three in particular being entirely removed from 'Fate/Stay Night's various routes they still fall back on the same world history. They just happen to diverge much earlier for various reasons.

This is relevant because they too will reference similar things but they're much easier to start with because their settings are more unique.

Though, you'll still will see Rin Tohsaka in Fate Extra. Waver Velvet from Fate/Zero also appears in many stories as his older self.

Actual Sequels or Prequels

Now before you have a heart attack with that sub title let me explain. Yes, I do still fully mean that each Fate story is essentially it's own thing.

However, I would be doing you a disservice if I did not warn you that a few have true sequels. I do not know every sequel across Type-Moons gallery of novels but I can warn you about Fate/Hollow Ataraxia.

Ataraxia is a true sequel to the original Fate/Stay Night visual novel. You don't need to play it to enjoy the FSN novel or it's anime adaptions but do not mistake Ataraxia as a solo story. This is the one time I will give you that warning after my long post arguing otherwise.

Granted, I am not sure where'd you come across Hollow Ataraxia but just be warned. This visual novel is a true sequel to Fate/Stay Night.

As for the various anime that's been adapted over the years, as I've said, many are just adaptions of a particular story route from the novel.

That said, if you came to view the anime as it's own pocket universe I could see why. Heaven's Feel, the movies, will even flashback to Fate/Zero scenes.

The character Velvet Waver from Fate/Zero has his own novel series and animes based on those novels. What does this knowledge mean for you my dear reader?

Nothing. I can see why someone would think this way but that doesn't mean you need to heed it. If someone gives you an anime list to watch in a particular order then I'd argue it's fine to either take that advice or ignore it.

At best, watching Fate/Zero will help you appreciate the El Melloi series more but it's also not necessary.

What I am telling you is that it can confuse many but you can start with any anime you're able to get ahold of.

Conclusions

I'm afraid I may have confused many of you more than I helped but I bothered to explain all of that just to say one thing;

"you can start wherever"

And I truly mean that. No matter what some insistent person tells you any Fate work can be your first Fate story. Where you go from there will be up to you.

The only two warnings I will over is that Hollow/Ataraxia is a true sequel so definitely don't start there assuming you can even find it. Secondly, do not start the FGO anime because Babylonia does not adapt the full FGO story.

The FGO anime is worth watching but it won't supplement it's source.

Now then, hopefully I've convinced you to try something. I'd personally recommend you watch Fate/Zero or Apocrypha to feel out the series but you can't quite literally start near anywhere.

So enjoy and bye~

P.S. yes that last image is an official timeline. It's not actually needed but it's neat. :D

========================

For my other experiences with Fate go here: https://derekscorner.tumblr.com/tagged/fated-rantings

[brave-symphonia]

I really love this as the ending to the event.

Everyone performing one last show, culminating in Ex unveiling a new song, all for Miss Crane, all to make her happy before it all ends.

[mermaidsirennikita]

Hiiii!!! I love your recs especially your historical romance stuff but I was wondering if you had any dark romances recs?? Like contemporary? I want to read some more darker stuff but the stuff booktok is on is mediocre at best.

Yes! Not as many as I'd like, tbh, but that's because a) time management issues b) me being excessively picky. Unfortunately, the flooding of the dark romance market means that a lot of them... are not good. Mediocre at best, as you say.

Soooo I would recommend Sierra Simone. Not just because she's one of my favorites, but because, if you're looking for something on the darker end but not like, "WELCOME TO MY TWISTED MIND" shit... Yeah. Would recommend her.

Her darkest series is her Thornchapel books, which does have some mysticism and magic to it, but not enough for me to properly call it paranormal (though I do sometimes). It's like gothic-toned. And it has one thing that even a lot of dark romances I read don't do. An extreme taboo, shall we say.

Basically, the plot (it's 4 books, all must be read in order) is that six childhood friends come back together as adults, with various issues with each other, etc. They find out about these bacchanalian rituals their parents used to do (think... orgies lol) and decide to take part on a lark, which opens some really fucked up, insane shit. There are two main relationships, one of which is MMF and one of which is FF. It's very kinky (think BDSM, free use, again a lot of group sex). It's very intense. Everyone does have sex with each other at some point lol.

If you want NO magic, her Lyonesse series is billed as dark romance, and while there is darker stuff out there, it's still dark. It's a retelling of the Tristan and Isolde myth, MMF, kinky. Basically: a banking heiress who wants to be a nun and enjoys killing people (for God) is betrothed to a powerful, cold kink club owner/former CIA killer man as a power trade. (This is contemporary, though.) Shit happens, and during their engagement (during which they're living in separate countries) he also begins a relationship with his sad-eyed 'd, beautiful bodyguard. Said bodyguard is heartbroken when he finds out Mr. Boss is engaged, and is sent to fetch her... and they begin something too. And also there are secrets. And murder. Some torture. Loooots of sadomasochism. Moral gray-to-charcoal behavior. One of my favorite endings in recent memory. Lots of mindfuckery.

It's GREAT. start with the prequel novella, Salt in the Wound, and go from there (must be read in order). I would also recommend reading her New Camelot trilogy first, which... Like, less murder happens? I guess? It's more political. But I still consider it on the darker end, tbh. There's kidnapping, there's war, there's betrayal, there's that taboo shit again, there's fucking while one of you has open, poorly patched bullet wounds and the blood is slicking between your bodies... Basically, this one of my holy grail series and I think it's perfect. MMF, very kinky, hot hot hot, cry cry cry, based on Arthurian legend.

King's Captive by Amber Bardan is BONKERS and a great dark romance (I need to read more by her, but again, time management problems). The heroine's father is killed by the hero in the beginning, and the hero sweeps her off to his private island. Flash to years later, and she's been there the whole time. And he hasn't touched her (not really). But things are boiling.... Very twisty-turny, and again, WILD. There's some good, weird shit in here.

On the mafia end, I'd recommend Mila Finelli's Kings of Italy (Italian mafia) which is super hot and has some good kink. On the "violence is all around us" kidnapping/biiiig age gap (no underage shit, but think 18 and 38) end. Mafia Madman is my favorite (and the darkest—he keeps her in a cage lol), but I'd recommend reading them in order. Kresley Cole's Game Maker series is a bit darker, Russian mafia, has a lot of murder, kidnapping, some wacky shit. Really well-done, especially the latter two books.

Run, Posy Run by Cate C. Well is a good Italian-American mafia romance, definitely darker, in which the heroine's boyfriend (who's like... kind of emotionless lol) finds out she was cheating on him. Except she wasn't. She goes on the run, he chases her, there's a lot of threatening shit, etc. It's great.

If you want to read some legit fucked up shit that's more on the erotica end of the spectrum (though there is still a pretty amazing central romance) then Tiffany Reisz's Original Sinners series is right there. This has some MESSED. UP. SHIT. Dubcon, noncon, underage activity, seriously risky kink (bloodplay, cutting, choking with a belt and with hands, lots of pain play—our main "hero" is a Catholic priest who can't get it up without inflicting pain, even though he doesn't want to like... legit hurt the heroine). Femdom, pegging, group sex, free use... you'll find it all here.

Not all of this series ages well. I don't love the underage stuff. I really don't love the way the author handles POC (there's like... one main character of color from what I remember, and she's basically a white guy's love interest, and she's great in theory, but boy do I dislike a lot of the way Reisz talks about her on the page). But it is fascinating in many aspects, and I do love the main three characters.

Catch: if you want it to have an HEA, just stop on book 8.... She revived the series after years with book 9. It sucks. It leaves you on a sort of open situation with no sign of when the next book will come out, and I'm not sure how that'll all... end up. It's really not good.

BUT the original series is over, and if you stop there the ending is great. And that's the only ending I acknowledge.