#the generals angel a crisis core story

[roseartsandfics]

The General's Angel Art Cover (REDRAWN)

Here is my new version of an art cover for my fanfic The General's Angel: A Crisis Core Story.

This was started back in either February or March, and then finished just a couple of days ago, and I really love how it turned out! Especially the shadowing and background ^^

Here are some changes to this art cover. Rose and Sephiroth holding hands are the same, but with the additions to the background. I did use watercolors for clouds and the fan brush for the grass and probably the smudge, which I actually liked how it turned out :). Used different kinds of tools to make this look good! The plateau mountains are kinda of a challenge ^^;. Oh, that golden rose? This is the Goddess' Rose is I like to call it, that blooms on the Corrinian soil :). More info on it's origins that will be there soon (unless if it's on Rose's bio lol). You probably noticed the two animals are the eagle or a dear. Actually, they are going to be named as they are known to be the Corrinian animals, which will be identically names soon! Just brainstorming fan settings and species lol.

This was drawn during virtual camp last week and really impressed with myself after finishing this. Oh, and those swirls and leaves near the corners are NOT drawn. They were part of the fonts on Phonto, which I use to titles, letterings, etc.. I decided to add those one there :). Well, I hope y'all like it ^^. It took so much energy out of me getting this done ^^;

Sephiroth and Crisis Core - Final Fantasy VII - Reunion ©Tetsuya Nomura, Hajime Tabata, Yoshihiro Hirota, Mariko Sato, SQUARE ENIX and Tose

Rose LaBelle, artwork and story ©@RosePrincessArts

No copyright infringement is intended

Used: Sketchbook app from iPad and Phonto

[reasonsforhope]

"Faced with declining membership, aging buildings and large, underutilized properties, many U.S. houses of worship have closed their doors in recent years. Presbyterian minister Eileen Linder has argued that 100,000 churches may close in the next few decades.

But some congregations are using their land in new ways that reflect their faith – a focus of my urban planning research. Some are repurposing their property to provide affordable housing, as the housing crisis intensifies across the country.

Take Arlington Presbyterian Church in Arlington, Virginia. In 2016, the church sold its historic stone building to the Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing to construct a 6-story complex with 173 apartments, known as “Gilliam Place.” The building still houses space for the congregation, as well as La Cocina, a bilingual culinary job training facility and cafe. In Austin, Texas, St. Austin Catholic Parish is partnering with a developer to build a 29-story tower providing 200 beds of affordable student housing, in addition to new spaces for ministry.

Other houses of worship are pursuing similar projects today.

Same mission, new projects

Faith-based organizations have been building housing for many years, but generally by purchasing additional property. In recent years, however, more houses of worship are building affordable housing on the same property as the sanctuary.

This can be done in a variety of ways. Some congregations adapt the existing sanctuary and other faith-owned buildings, while others demolish existing buildings to construct a new development, which may or may not have space for the congregation. Another option is to build on excess property, like a parking lot.

Depending on how a development deal is structured, a faith-based organization may receive proceeds from the sale of its land, or from leasing their property to a developer – funds which they can then spend on ministry or on a new space for worship. If a new development includes space for the congregation, sometimes they rent out those spaces when the space is not being used for worship, which can also financially benefit the congregation.

Faith-based organizations often see these projects as a way to do “God’s work.” In some instances, they include community services beyond the housing itself.

Near Los Angeles, the Episcopal Church of the Blessed Sacrament in Placentia partnered with a nonprofit affordable housing developer – National Community Renaissance, also called National CORE – to develop 65 units for older people. The complex also includes a 1,500 square foot (140 square meter) community center. The city’s diocese has a goal of building affordable housing on 25% of its 133 properties.

For some congregations, these are mission-driven projects rooted in social justice.

In Washington, D.C., Emory United Methodist Church redeveloped its property and constructed The Beacon Center – which has 99 affordable housing units, community spaces, and a commercial kitchen that provides job training for recently incarcerated people – while preserving the sanctuary. In Seattle, the Nehemiah Initiative is working with Black churches in the Central District, a historically African American neighborhood, to redevelop its properties into affordable housing to keep residents from being displaced."

Potential to evolve

As states and cities struggle to provide affordable housing, studies have been conducted from Nashville to New York City on the amount of land faith organizations own, and their potential as housing partners.

In the D.C. metro area, for example, the Urban Institute found almost 800 vacant parcels owned by religious organizations. In California, a report from the Terner Center at University of California, Berkeley found approximately 170,000 “potentially developable” acres of land owned by religious organizations and nonprofit colleges and universities...

When thinking about the redevelopment process, Arlington Presbyterian member Jon Etherton told me, “the call from God to create, do something about affordable housing was bigger than the building itself.”"

-via The Conversation, July 19, 2024

[the-pirate-captain]

One of my all time favorite top musicals of all time is Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber). The play follows the "plot points" of the Bible pretty closely; really the only thing left out (of Joseph's story) was the elaborate back-and-forth of his brothers getting Benjamin from Canaan (they all went to Egypt in the first place). The music is so fun and catchy, and just an all around good time. My favorite parts include:

Joseph is such a snob. He is so spoiled. "Hey guys I had this dream where my perfect and beautiful sheaf of corn was being bowed to by your small ugly gross sheaves. Weird, right?" Yeah your brothers hate you.

The brothers sing "The dreams are more than crystal clear, the writing on the wall" referencing a part of the Bible that hasn't happened yet. Good job Mr. Rice.

"One More Angel in Heaven" is such a fun song, especially the transition after Jacob leaves and the brothers repeat the refrain "Joseph we'll never forget you, it's TOUGH but we're gonna get by (yeehaw!)"

Just in general, every song in the show is a different "genre" and that really makes it so fun to listen to and sing

The narrator says, "letting out a mighty roar" and Potiphar actually does say, "Roooooar!!!!"

Poor Joseph is locked in jail forEVER but oh no, it's fine, just let him DECAY he DOESN'T MATTER anyway

His situation in prison is objectively terrible but he has such a little pity party about it

"According to your dream Pharaoh will execute you :( yeah sorry :( I mean, don't take MY word for it. I've never been wrong though"

Pharaoh as Elvis is an excellent choice. Also loved the part when he says "I was standing doing nothing in a field out of town" as a way to explain the setting for his dream

Joseph: Well, looks like you're going to need someone to head this crisis. I have no idea who could possibly help you though. Not even a little clue. Sorry :(

Pharaoh: YOU shall lead us through this crisis

Joseph: :O me??????????

"Canaan Days" is the best overall song in the play, I think. The drama. The French accents. The phrase "where diiiiiiiiiiid they go?" gets progressively longer each time, with drawn out gasping for air. They throw in an "incroyable!" in the background when Reuben sings, "actually I kind of miss Joseph, maybe he wasn't such a bad kid."

Joseph saying, "your TRAGIC STORY really GETS TO ME" when his brothers come bowing and scraping to him

"Benjamin you nasty youth, your crime has SHOCKED me to the core! ... Guards seize him, lock him in a cell! Throw the key into the Nile as well!" just so, so dramatic.

And then of course Joseph says, "look guys it's just me. Surprise! I'm not dead! Or a slave! Okay that's a wrap"

What an all-around fun time. The sound track (and the whole musical is just singing) is around an hour and I highly highly recommend a listen.

[bardic-tales]

Happy STS!

What is one of your favorite words or phrases to use in writing? Or if you don't have a favorite, what do you find yourself using the most?

What trope have you not written yet, but want to?

What title do you want to use, but can't figure out a story to fit?

Happy very belated STS, Andi! Thank you for all of these questions, and I hope you are having a wonderful day.

Degradation. You would think with how many times I have written degradation over the past years that I would know how to spell it by now. This is a word that comes up a lot in Final Fantasy 7, as the people (SOLDIERS) who are injected with Jenova cells often experience this. In the FF 7 world, it is a term given to the slow deterioration of the body as a result of not having the incomplete powers of Jenova. In the Crisis Core Complete Guide, it stems from the ability to create copies of oneself. This comes from one of Jenova's powers that allows her to convert her targets into monsters by implanting their bodies with cellular matter which acts as a virus.

For Bianca, this term embodies the loss of humanity and the struggle for identity with is central for Bianca Moore, my ff 7 OC. The word captures the essence of her experiences and the impact of the Jenova Project and Project N (the project that is devoted to Bianca's angelic / infernal heritage).

As for tropes, I generally write about whatever interests me, so I really don't have a specific one in mind that I haven't explored. I enjoy pushing boundaries and diving into a variety of themes, which right now includes the exploration of mourning and death. I tend to write to help me cope with loss.

There is one title I had in mind for this answer. I haven't used it, but it is called 'A Celestial Dance'. I haven't found the right plot for it yet.

[wander-across-the-firmament]

When I saw Sephiroth for the first time

I've been wanting to share my personal story with you for a long time now, how I came to love FF7 and how I slowly grew to love Sephiroth. Since I don't have anyone else to share it with, apart from my best friend (she probably knows the story from the way I've told it so many times because this character just captured my heart haha. Love you best friend ♡ ), I wanted to write it here on tumblr and maybe also on twitter. The first time I saw anything FF7 related was the movie FF7 Advent Children. (Yep, I'm late to the party but I think better late than never) When the movie came out I was only eight years old and I can't remember how old I was when I saw the movie but I watched it with my family as well. Maybe I was older? Unfortunately I don't know. In any case, I was extremely excited about the movie from the start even though I didn't really understand the story. "It was from the FF series so it can only be good" thought my little self. I only saw action at the time and thought the fights were the coolest. When I saw Sephiroth appear for the first time I didn't know anything about his tragic story and had question marks over my head. My little self thought at the time "didn't the young man have short hair just a moment ago?" (It's not like Sephiroth was seen right at the beginning of the movie, silly haha) I found his style very interesting at the time and thought it was a shame that we didn't see him often in the movie and would have liked to have seen more of him (you'll see him a lot soon hehe) but my little self was always on the side of the good people and never questioned the backgrounds of the villains in FF7 (or in fiction in generel), so the focus on Sephiroth was gone for a long time and my focus was elsewhere and no longer on FF7 for many, many years.

The years flew by and pictures and videos on youtube about FF7 Crisis Core and FF7 in general kept appearing in my life but the focus was still not completely back. I knew that the story existed and that I liked it but my life took a different turn at that time and I was more focused on it. Until the trailer for the FF7 Remake was announced and shown at E3. From then on I started to show more interest in FF7 again and was still a Cloti fan to this day and initially concentrated on the story in general. By then Sephiroth was no longer unknown to me and I knew what he was doing, but when FF7 Remake came finally out I found Sephiroth already extremely pretty and ethereal (Oh yes, he is such an angel ♡ ) and my interest in him increased. However, I still had this "You're only allowed to like the good people" phase and asked myself internally whether it would be okay to like villains as well (oh dear you have no idea haha)

Because of the "you can only like the good fictional characters" phase, I kept my distance from Sephiroth and unfortunately this lasted until FF7 Rebirth. In the back of my mind, however, I wanted to know more about him and watched a few videos about him on youtube. Facts that I already knew, so I watched his scenes in the FF7 Remake many times until FF7 Rebirth was announced. The trailer came and you could see Sephiroth and Cloud both wandering around Nibelheim. From then on, the ice broke in me. I saw how Sephiroth behaved and my interest in him was enormous. I saw how he cared for others and because of that I was extremely happy about it. It didn't take long until I read all the content of FF7, watched all the playthroughs to understand what was happening around Midgar, Nibelheim, Gaia and then I turned my attention to FF7 Crisis Core again and was overwhelmed by the story and how Sephiroth was portrait at that point. The moment I read all the information and story lore about him, he grew closer to my heart. I could understand him and knew his pain. (Losing a mother is painful. I know that all too well. In his case he never had the chance to meet his mother what is extremely sad.)

After all the years he had to endure at the hands of Hojo, Jenova and Shinra, I just wanted a happy ending for him. Sure, he's an iconic villain. I agree with everyone there. I just think that he deserves a happy ending after everything he had to go through. I started to like villains and so I started to end my "phase" and concentrate fully on Sephiroth. FF7 Rebirth was released shortly after and the story was as exciting as ever. That was when I fell down the rabbit hole. Sephiroth became one of my absolute favorite characters in the entire FF franchise and I loved every second he accompanied the group in Nibelheim. It was refreshing to see him being helpful and kind to others. How he cared about others again while you could see his emotions. Since then I have hoped that he will also get his happy ending in the third part. No matter how, the main thing is that he can smile again.

It didn't take long before I heard about FF7 Ever Crisis and of course I was interested. A story for Sephiroth? That sounds perfect! So I watched videos about the game again and had mixed feelings. I was happy to learn more about him and was surprised that we see him in his younger years. However, this is by far the most tragic and saddest story for me in FF7. So I had even more reasons to hope for a happy ending for him and that will continue to be the case. Sephiroth building a wall around himself even though he is looking for social contact, how he searches for his mother in vain, how he is manipulated by Hojo and Jenova…The latest chapter broke my heart into a thousand pieces and Sephiroth simply deserves better than that. The worst part is that his tragic story could have been prevented if only he had been loved more especially as a child.

OK, I had to write all that out of my soul haha. I still find it funny how I used to "avoid" him when I was little because he was a villain and I didn't know him well, and now I love this character so much and his story that continues to be told. For me, he is a very well-written character and I am glad to have seen and read his story and that of FF7 in the right place at the right time. I can well imagine how he felt and that is why he has become my comfort character. I think Sephiroth also appeared at exactly the right time in my life because he gives me the strength to carry on and not give up. That's why he means a lot to me At the moment I'm catching up on all FF7 games and am currently playing FF7 Crisis Core Reunion and FF7 Ever Crisis. FF7 Remake and Rebirth will have to wait a little longer until I've finished the DLC for FF16, but then I'll get to work on those two games too. I can't wait for my journey! Thank you so much for reading this far. That means a lot to me! ♡

[withgreatpowercomesmyfuckingdick]

I find it fascinating how the event of Crisis Core seems so important and so big in it's era, but when in Remake, the event seems insinifiant . Yes, it had been at least five years, but it's crazy how everyone just forgets about it , in a way like Soldier First Class Genesis and Angel never existed in the first place.

Thanks for the ask lovely! And yknow what, I’ve actually wondered abt this myself and my primary explanation is this:

Shinra’s propaganda is Just That Good.

Like let’s please keep in mind that Shinra is everything. They’re the news, the press, the internet, the market, the government, everything. Whatever they can control, they do.

We have canon confirmation that the Firsts’ fan clubs were run by Shinra PR. Everything supplied to those fan clubs was through the filter that Shinra put up. They could easily sour the tone of the fan clubs overnight. (Ofc, staying accurate to a real fan club, it’s quite likely the really loyal ones would set up different forums and probably end up conspiracy theorists, but the primary ones would eventually go down thanks to Shinra’s ownership)

I’m sure Angeal ‘deserting’ on a Wutai mission helped fuel some racist propaganda and fear of ‘corruption’ of Midgar. If they twisted it that way, like Genesis and Angeal were active traitors, popular opinion would turn against them.

Sephiroth couldn��t have been as easy, and I’m sure the damage couldn’t completely be mitigated, so they may have played into the ‘grieving company’ ploy instead of trying to hide that Sephiroth was dead.

So I wouldn’t say things are forgotten so much as Shinra makes sure things aren’t talked about. People remember, but Angeal and Genesis being related to Wutai/rebellion against Shinra makes them a no-go topic, and Sephiroth is painted to be a traumatic experience for Midgar (how ironic) and is only spoken in a ‘how sad, how tragic’ type tone.

And I mean, these events are consequential to US because of how much they affect Zack’s/Cloud’s stories, but five years is a large gap when you think about it. To the Midgar people, those three were more celebrities than SOLDIERs. The general population remembers them but they aren’t going to be a day to day topic. SOLDIERs on the other hand, they likely remember a lot, but there aren’t many of the originals left considering Genesis dragged a shit ton of them with him during his mass desertion. SOLDIER after the Firsts are gone is basically a new program altogether. There aren’t enough people that care enough to keep the rumor mill going, and those that have suspicions are either tracked down by Shinra or know to keep their heads down so they don’t get a Turk on their ass.

Buuuut ultimately a lot of what I said is more theory/headcanon than confirmed fact, but we’re getting some interesting new content lately. Maybe they’ll address this in the future? Who knows who knows

[altocat]

Ok, for positive EC talk, I will say that I adore the white feather symbolism, because it’s so…beautifully ironic?

Little Seph was Shinra’s perfect, shining angel…the face of a company that presented itself as pure and righteous (I LOVE villain organizations that pose as clean and holy), so of course he is represented by this divine, Messianic assortment of doves and seraph wings! As long he was their puppet, they considered him unsullied.

But what taints him? In truth, his very existence was always a corrupted lie. He was paraded as a hero, but he was a lab experiment being controlled by an outwardly polished company. They were like a glimmering, ivory goblet full of poison. They were just using him to achieve their goals and present themselves as “the good guys.”

And yet in the eyes of Shinra’s lie, Sephiroth loses some of his purity when he dares to be more human than machine and form connections beyond the confines of his preordained stage…connections with more liberated people like Gen and Angeal, or maybe with these new characters in EC. He dares to have a mind of his own and a conscience, which “stains” the wings Shinra gave him in a sense, because it makes him question his purpose and Shinra in general. It is a domino effect that leads to him considering abandonment of his lifelong masters in Crisis Core.

I suspect this EC story will be about Sephiroth’s “loss of innocence,” but only from a certain perspective. We know that his innocence is already long gone, but does he? That’s not what he was raised to believe. That’s not what Shinra will say.

So, the metaphorical loss of innocence is about his “perfect Solider” image being challenged by morality that doesn’t adhere to Shinra’s morality. He is no longer their angel when he questions and considers the lives and wishes of others. He is…impure. Shinra’s greatest weapon being pulled to consider alternative loyalties? How dare he!

It’s a twisted type of “sullying.” It’s like someone raised in a puritanical church discovering the world beyond and showing empathy to sinners. To Shinra, that is a form of corruption. If EC introduces Sephiroth in his ironically “pure” form, only to have it be challenged, I think the white feather symbolism will be sooo much more meaningful.

The tragedy of it all though, is that when Sephiroth discovers Shinra’s great lie and believes himself to be something that was tainted and monstrous from birth, he breaks down mentally and falls into Jenova’s trap. He trades one lie for another, and only then do his wings truly darken.

Yesss! That's a fascinating way to look at it! And I really hope the loss of innocence angle is something they actually do in EC, while also keeping Seph in character.

[prismaticpichu]

Updated Master List!

Howdy!!! Hope you’re having an awesome day! I thought it was high-time to do an updated Masterlist of all my little thingies! If y’all don’t know who I am and wondering wtf is on your dash, I’ma little gremlin who loves to write FF7: Crisis Core-centric stories :33 If you do know who I am, you know that Zack & Sephiroth dominate almost every individual sentence that my keyboard produces. Either way, I’m shoving this in your face!

Thank you so much forever and always for giving me a safe place to share my stuff!! <33

~~~

✨ Pichu’s Writing ✨

The Bonds That Kept Me Sane Universe - A universe revolving around the unbreakable friendship between Sephiroth & Zack Fair! Stories are extremely floofy and filled with a lot of heart! You will find a needle or two in there, but for the most part, this is the safe side of town <33

1. Blazes & Bullets (10 chap/10) - Zack refuses to accept that his friend has gone insane, and instead decides to try and break through rather than fight against him (later rewritten as Candle in the Rain- really recommend reading that instead xD).

2. Wish - Sephiroth doesn’t know it’s his birthday.

3. Procedure - Sephiroth’s brutal memories of getting his wing.

4. Surrogate - Zack is homesick; Sephiroth remedies this.

5. Snow Angel - Snowball fight!

6. Guard Dog - Zack retrieves his sick friend from Hojo’s lab.

7. From My Eyes - Zack is mourning over Angeal

8. Movie Night - It’s literally a movie night, mate.

9. A Silver Veil - Sephiroth doesn’t like Halloween; Zack absolutely does.

10. Daylight - Sephiroth accompanies Zack to visit Aerith.

11. I’ll Name the Dogs - Zack comes home from a solo mission.

12. Green-Eyed Reindeer - Sephiroth goes home with Zack to spend Christmas in Gongaga.

13. Let Sleeping Puppies Lie - Sephiroth wonders why Zack left his favorite toy behind on a mission.

14. The Art of Distraction - Zack doodles during working hours.

15. Purify - Following the events of Nibelheim, Zack solaces his broken best friend.

16. Enter the Plush Dragon - It’s Zack’s birthday! Sephiroth needs to find a present stat.

17. Don’t Cry Over Spilled Coffee - Early in their friendship, a small mistakes causes a small fight.

18. Shedding Coats - Zack & Sephiroth swap clothes for the fun of it!

19. You Ain’t Nothing but a Hound Dog! (2 chaps/?) - Zack is turned into an actual puppy, and now he and Sephiroth have to fix that little pickle.

20. On Pins and Needles - Zack walks in on an unexpected hobby.

21. Scissors - Zack discovers his friend’s wing, and what it symbolizes to him.

22. It’s the Best Medicine - Zack remembers the first time he heard Sephiroth laugh.

23. How to Save a Life - Zack finally thanks his friend for saving him from Ifrit.

24. The Zack & Sephiroth Safe Haven - A collection of originally-deleted works I put together because I regretted taking them down; all of these take place in the same universe, consisting of:

Just Your General Soup - Sephiroth gets the sniffles

Irreplaceable - A misunderstanding breaks Sephiroth’s heart.

Songs of Silence - Zack is away in Junon, and things are too quiet in the office.

The Cozy Caretaker - Zack’s a little sick; fic is bite-sized.

The Bright Side of White - Angeal comes to visit his old puppy in his sleep.

Cereal Killer - A 7-yo Zack discovers his hero on the back of a cereal box.

Dream Catcher - Zack & Sephiroth share nightmares about the other.

Candle in the Rain - This is what I was talking about! An updated version of Blazes & Bullets that ACTUALLY takes “Sephiroth not being too happy about the Jenova Project” into account; same plot and outcome, with Zack trying to break through to a mind-controlled evil Sephiroth.

Say Cheese! - Zack accidentally gets Sephiroth’s coat dirty.

Paths Ahead - Sephiroth is thinking about the future; Zack assures him they’ll always be together.

Under My Wing - Following the events of Modeoheim, Sephiroth vows to take care of the broken puppy left behind.

Sandwiched Between Society - Sephiroth eats Oreos wrong.

Palentines Day - Zack celebrates Valentine’s Day with his very platonic pal.

Cat’s in the Cradle - Sephiroth thinks his slitted eyes make him a monster; Zack is there to assure him otherwise.

25. Catch You Letter - Sephiroth goes into panic mode after finding a love letter written by Zack

26. Are You For Teal? - (An AU of this universe) - Zack develops a little something in his heart while taking a magazine quiz with Sephiroth

27. Lightning - Zack comforts his rattled friend after Sephiroth relives a horrible memory

Traffic Cones on the Highway to Arson - Disjointed fics that revolve around the sole purpose of keeping Nibelheim flame-free!!

1. Fragments - Before Sephiroth can reach the library, Zack stops him right in the Nibelheim mountains.

2. To Soothe the Savage Beast - Zack has a clever solution to get Sephiroth to fall asleep in the manor.

3. Sephiroth’s Pet Rock - Sephiroth gets a pet rock. This cures his depression.

4. Call to Action - All it took was one single phone call to save the day

5. The Inns and Outs of Things - A last-minute confession at the Nibelheim inn changes the course of history.

Miscellaneous, uncategorized fics! - Fics that don’t fall into either category and are purely just Ideas™️ brought to life!

1. Angeal and the Kitty Crisis - Hollander’s clone machine malfunctions.

2. Paw-Padded Calamity (10 chap/10) - Zack finds a lost little Pichu in the slums. May revive the sequel if I decide to continue!

3. Treasure - Masamune breaks.

4. Study Buddy - A time traveling Zack warns his younger self not to leave Him alone in the library.

5. The Thirst for Knowledge - Sephiroth passes out from dehydration and wakes up in Cloud’s childhood bed.

6. Take Your Best (Mug) Shot - J-cell purging coffee!

[browniefox]

Another Week, Another Crisis Core Chapter!

Before playing this, I did a TON of sidequests (I got like 30% of them complete) which meant I didn't struggle against any enemies. on one hand, it meant I could get to focus on all the good scenes, but on the other hand, I didn't get to show off any of the new summons I'd gotten ;-;

God I love this church. Because this game works at break-neck pace, I doubt that Aerith and Zack are going to get, like, as many scenes together as I'd like, but I do think this chapter does a decent enough job starting to develop their relationship at the very least.

Zack is so tall I love it, and aw cute little date <3

While I got really frustrated with the little Bruno segment pretty fast, I do like that all the Slums citizens immediately clock Zack as not from around there, and immediately go to protecting Bruno. You can really feel the distrust and disconnect between those above and below plate.

I just Love Aerith <3

Where the general symbolism of monsters and angels is so heavy handed I roll my eyes every single time, I actually really loved this interaction between Zack and Aerith, when Aerith is talking about being afraid of SOLDIERS. To those who know Aerith's story, it's easy to see that she's both projecting her own desire to be normal (why in the world would people sign up to be made less normal?) as well as her own understandable trauma with the Shinra company, onto her thoughts and feelings on SOLDIERS.

Additionally, I love that she's actually scared of the sky. I think in teh Slums, that's not too rare of a feeling.

It's a shame that I feel like the Zack-Angeal relationship is done so poorly at the beginning, because this interaction really makes me start to like their dynamic! Angeal confiding in Zack and trusting Zack really says a lot. Also, I love the detail that Angeal has found that he likes flying, and just kind of carries Zack :D

I do think it's super funny though that it's way brighter and cheerier under the plate than on top of it, and that Zack just totally forgot and put off the mission he was on to go on a not-date with a cute girl.

THE FACT THAT THE FIRST THING ANGEAL SAYS TO SEPHIROTH IS THAT HE LOOKS THINNER SHIT BOYYYYY! I think it just does a lot to characterize their relationship, and especially how this whole thing has been affecting Sephiroth.

Genesis should have just killed Hojo. True good ending <3 It is funny to me that this segment ends with Hojo totally uninjured and honestly, probably happier than before bc he got to do random experiments on Zack.

They put so much effort into making Genesis' model look hot and honestly I love it. When I first saw Genesis in an amv, I thought he was a girl, and I guess that's my hot take for the day is that I think it'd be fun if he was. There is not one single female SOLDIER. There should be more women who got experimented on to be part of the army #feminism

This is here because I was hoping this quest line would mention Reeve, but it didn't and now I'm super disappointed.

I don't think I've seen anyone mention this before, but from this interaction it's implied that Zack is not Angeal's first mentee. Maybe perhaps his most promising, clearly the only one to make it to first, but Angeal had tried to instill his values onto other SOLDIERS.

And then my final thoughts for now is the interesting dynamic between infantry and SOLDIER. Before this game, I thought they were sort of the same group, but no they're actually two very distinct groups within Shinra. I also feel like infantry is often portrayed as always trying to become SOLDIER or something, but mostly there seems to be some resentment towards SOLDIER, and this hate that infantry will never be able to do as much as SOLDIER can. Very interesting, especially when considering Cloud.

[blazehedgehog]

Do you think any of the compilation of FF7 enhances the original game?

With full disclosure: I've never played any of them. I've only heard about them.

Dirge of Cerberus came out before I had a PS2, and by the time I had a PS2, it already had a pretty dire reputation. I've never had a PSP, so Crisis Core was right out (until the recent HD remaster, I suppose).

The only Compilation material I have first-hand experience with is Advent Children, and I hate Advent Children.

There's nothing stopping me from looking at the games now, I suppose. I've had ISOs downloaded for Dirge and Crisis Core for literal years now, it's just a case of the "never got around to it"s. Came closer to starting Crisis Core more than a couple times over the years, though.

Generally, I think these materials are to be feared, and hearing they might be incorporating elements from them into episodes of Final Fantasy VII Remake has me scared to death. I don't want Angeal or Gackt Genesis to be canonical.

Much like going back to Shadow the Hedgehog and injecting this Alien Blood Pact into his origin after the fact, going back and injecting all this new lore about SOLDIERs being winged Angeals angels muddies so much of the water around why Sephiroth is iconic. At best, it's going back to the well and saying "You like Sephiroth? We have more Sephiroths! We have a Sephiroth played by Japan's ultimate real-life bishonen hot guy!"

Don't explain things that don't need to be explained. It's a top ten rule of storytelling. It's okay. You don't have to shine a light on every single corner and crevice of a world. You're not a deep sea explorer, you're just trying to tell one really good story. And even if you somehow manage to pull that off, future stories can and will ruin your One Good Story if you tell them badly enough.

That being said I know more about why to be afraid of Crisis Core's prequel lore expansion than I do about Dirge of Cerberus. I basically have no idea what Dirge of Cerberus is about outside of the fact it might involve the Turks? And the controls are bad? No idea.

But generally I do not like or want them. Maybe if I actually play Crisis Core I'd warm up to it more, but from the outside it looks like it also contributes to the general feeling that after Final Fantasy VII came out, nobody really understood what those characters were and everybody got flanderized in some really weird, annoying directions.

Like, the common one is that in the supplemental material around Advent Children, Barret wants to use mako energy from the Shinra power plants to solve that movie's toothless pandemic, and when he's told he can't do that, he invests in becoming an oil baron instead. Can you believe that? The leader of an eco-terrorism sleeper cell, whose primary goal is saving the planet, wants to use the very tools that harmed the planet and others that will further harm the planet.

There's comic irony, and then there's just character assassination.

They are bad additions.

[strapskinkstories]

Mar 29 2024 - Where’s the content? WHERES THE FUNDING! WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF FUNDING!

theres been no new content because there’s a funding crisis. Provisional talks are in progress with an angel funder who might save strappyskinks from going belly up due to lack of funding.

That all said. One angel investor can’t float me forever.

See this? You can actually donate towards my clothing food electric internet phone and other things eligible to be paid from my disability trust account.

Before you ask: can gear come from the trust account?

Answer:YES! - Gear is classified either as clothing not otherwise specified or sensory therapy equipment not otherwise specified.

Ultimate dream is for this trust account to explode one day. How is it findoms can get a damn Lamborghini and have people constantly fill its tank and get them sushi and Starbucks when I can’t even complete one of my basic life goals Pay off the house so me and my caregiver can live in peace without worrying about busting ourselves or ending up out of runway to run the business. StrappysKinks is very much technically a business. Even though the product is free. I create content, written video and photographic as well as AI generated entertainment art.

All that content has *intrinsic value* that intrinsic value so you are all aware. Per video. The intrinsic value of an approximately 50 minute bondage video of Amateur/ProAm (I consider myself ProAm at the actual gear stuff. Still kinda amateur on the camera work cut me some slack, I’m working on zero funding right now! Read: out of pocket funding from my already paltry social security) costs pay per view $20.99 YOU PEOPLE HAVE OVER 50 OF SUCH VIDEOS FREE! That’s over $2,500 OF VIDEO CONTENT PER PERSON THAT IS FREE! 100 views would usually = $2,099 if I were running hard core PAY PER VIEW.

I don’t. Because I think paysites suck. And I also think JFF onlyfans all that sucks.

But let me continue. Then there’s my thousands of stories and now my anesthesia stories. Per document a story typically is about $1-$5 let’s just assume I’ve written 5000 stories and documents to keep shit simple. That is again $5000 of content PER PERSON THAT IS FREELY AVAILABLE. AS FREE AS GATDAMN LINUX! Now let’s talk about my image library. It’s on Flickr and spans 14,000 images. Typically a photo set in a paysite is like $10.99 so a little division aaaand the math comes out to… 466 image sets or a value of $4,660 PER PERSON FREELY ACCESSIBLE. It’s late. I can’t math right now. I’m too upset but when I just smash those numbers together and total them up you get. As a single viewer. If you access all of my social medias and my Flickr and use my XHamster. $15,000 of content FOR FREE!!!

I cannot continue as the American economy shoots disabled people in the foot and also screws over low income LGBTQ folks to produce content for free. Something has to change.

Either I have to shut down production. Whoa. Holy fuck.

I didn’t expect the outcry to be so intense. It wasn’t even outcry on Twitter.

The telegram group members went into total open outcry status.

Ok. So. Shutting down production is not an option.

Sustaining production at current funding levels is impossible. Especially considering I just lost $120 per month of government funds thanks to reckless cuts on food stamps and the affordable connectivity program being recklessly ended by a Congress that I can only politely describe as a pile of diarrhea dung from a deathly ill cow with mad cow disease.

So. This is not a tribute me. This isn’t a fucking pay up call.

This is a do me a favor.

Look at yourself in the mirror.

Think about how many times you’ve probably jacked off looking at my videos or photos. Then think about how much time money and gear it takes to make that entertainment material go from here to your screen. I want my 3000 something followers (as I am carbon copying this onto Twitter Etc as well) Do the following

1. Self reflect on your consumption of my media. You owe it to chip a dollar or two in if you’ve done so much as listened to a minute or two of my video. An average street musician gets a hundred dollars a day if they are in a good area. If you’ve watched my videos and you’ve done nothing not even liked them retweeted them or thought about donating them. Are you really being a sustainable consumer? Sustainable consumers support the creators who provide them content. If they can’t give financial support at the least hit the goddamned retweet button. It is not hard! One tap or click ffs!

2. ITS TAX DEDUCTIBLE! (Not sure if you can deduct for 2023 still. But you can deduct it on your 2024 taxes.) So instead of sending money to the fat cats at some national charity where the executives take multimillion dollar paychecks IM LOOKING AT YOU YA MOTHERFUCKERS AUTISM SPEAKS. WE DONT WANT A CURE RESEARCHED AND WE DONT NEED YOUR DAMN BIG HONKY TONK GALAS ON TV EITHER.

3. Realize that if funding doesn’t change in the next 20 days. Immediate cutbacks will begin and by 2026 StrapsKinks will entirely stop filming, photographing, producing AI art, and writing stories as all funding will be exhausted and instead of engaging in kink I’ll have to start selling off gear and computer equipment as we do last ditch efforts to make ends meet before ending up in a shitty apartment rental again or worse homeless. So yeah. Thanks everyone. Thanks for almost a decade of consume consume consume. All without giving back a damn dime. Hopefully this makes things start changing and before the first April 21 cutoff. If funding doesn’t increase by April 21 Twitter stories will permanently cease and the StrappysKinks website will be slated for destruction. If funding doesn’t increase by June gear purchases from Bronco and other planned vendors will be postponed and or canceled If by December funding does not increase there will likely be no further new gear acquisitions and if equipment breaks it won’t be replaced. If by January 2025 nothing changes. All Twitter accounts and the Tumblr will be deleted. The Flickr account will be deleted. The website will be erased in preparation for the October 2025 termination of the StrappysKinks services. At that time anyone who has my contact details will know me and those left in the community simply won’t. At that point I’ll just disappear off of social media and take all my stuff down.

Because guess what.

I’m not leaving $15,000 of content available for free if I go bankrupt. So sit down. Think about what you people are doing to small creators especially those with disabilities and think. Do you want to see StrapsKinks go bankrupt.

The fate rests in your hands folks. This is a publicly funded venture technically. Public funding from the federal and private……. Yeah that’s the problem. Nobody done fuckin stepped up to actually do the funding. Let’s hope this funder that is on the lines actually comes through because if he does his single round could set us back onto at least able to sustain current production even if it does mean slowing down gear purchases. That said. If new funding lines are not received by January 2025 *STRAPPYSKINKS WILL GO BANKRUPT*

[roseartsandfics]

The General's Angel Art Cover

Here I present the art cover I made for my fanfic The General’s Angel: A Crisis Core Story ❤️

I did this back in December, and finished in January for editing, and in all of honesty, I really adored how this turned out with Sephiroth and Rose holding hands (which was the hardest part to draw lol) <3

Yes, the fanfic is pretty much going to be late to get started on. However, I would clarify that Rose would be 17-18 during this fanfic, even when my 19th birthday is coming up. Also, I am pretty nervous about playing Crisis Core Reunion, and wondered how I am going to do in the game. THAT part I am afraid of, along with the Crisis Core story in Ever Crisis. Well, I will do my best to see how the gaming goes ^^;. I hope to enjoy it ^^

I am also hoping to get my story going during playing the game and learning the story well (I hope), and OH! The background in this cover is the portion of my fanbase setting Corrinia in the fields or plateau, as I would like to call it lol. I found this art cover to be a romantic one with these two ❤️

Well, I hope y'all like the fanfic art cover ;3 Wish me luck on Crisis Core Reunion: >

Work in progress pics:

Sephiroth and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII - Reunion ©Tetsuya Nomura, Hajime Tabata, Yoshihiro Hirota, Mariko Sato, SQUARE ENIX and Tose

Final Fantasy VII ©Hironobu Sakaguchi, Yoshinori Kitase, Yusuke Naora, Tetsuya Nomura and SQUARE ENIX

Rose LaBelle and art cover ©RosePrincessArts

No copyright infringement is intended

Used: Sketchbook app from iPad

[roseprincessarts]

FF Fanfics Plans And Beyond

Hey y'all Final Fantasy fans!

So I finally came up (two months ago) with a name for my FFVII, which will be called The General's Angel - A Crisis Core Story :)

Now, the plot that I can explain for right now until further planned is The General's Angel is a romantic, adventure and humorous fanfic that can be focused on Sephiroth X my OC Rose LaBelle, since I am a HUGE simp for Sephiroth, as like all of you if y'all are a simp for him as well :) (actually discovered him since Advent Children lol). The fanfic also focuses the events before (possibly) Crisis Core, which I can play on Ever Crisis until I get Crisis Core Reunion for Christmas :), where Rose was trying to fit in as a 1st Class SOLDIER to try to impress Sephiroth, her childhood friend as of during or before the events of First Soldier from Ever Crisis (which I need to play soon), but ends up being clumsy enough to almost fail, despite being trained as a 2nd Class before, as of never knowing what it could mean for her as being something as a 1st Class SOLDIER, and has never experienced such high qualities like it before, and ends up falling in love with Sephiroth, unknowning that a mysterious threat is about to come to her.

That will be all until I can get the fanfic plot well developed after playing Ever Crisis and Crisis Core :). The fanfic will be having fanbased OCs, villians, settings, items, etc., just to make it look interesting as I can develop some OCs, fanbased villians and settings soon for my story :)

Now, it's December, yes. Christmas is coming, and will (hopefully) get Crisis Core Reunion, and possibly World of Final Fantasy, FFXV and Kingsglaive: FFXV on Blu Ray :)

Now, I am playing the OG FFVII, but since doing the fanfics, I might have to restart the game just to know what exactly happens in the game to know exactly how to make a perfect fanfic. Now I can make other Final Fantasy fanfics besides FFVII series, I might restart FFIX as well to know exactly what happens in the game (when I sometimes can't remember what happens after awhile of not playing them lol). I will do my best to get the other Final Fantasy games and make some wonderful FF fanfics ! But my writing will get a little messy, and more complicated grammarwise, but I will do my best to make them look interesting and beautiful ❤️

As a FF fan, it will be an opportunity for me to create wonderful FF fanfics and lovely illustrations of them as perfectly captured, and hopefully to get involved into other FF fanfics and the fandom :)

Welp, that's all!

~RosePrincessArts 🌹

[snowlily95]

How Zerith Ticks The Romance Genre

(This post is an organised rearrangement of our Zerith fangirling as to why we really love and appreciate their story of love. All credits go to my fellow Zerith shippers on Twitter; @eleamaya​, @sylvthea, @ZeroTwt0, @artbyshimo, @KeyToAeris, @aerithluvletter. This one’s for you guys!)

Written for @zerith-week​ Day 2 — Dating/Kisses

The rule of thumb is, FINAL FANTASY VII is not a romance story. This was accentuated by the ending of the original game where Hironobu Sakaguchi, who was the producer and created the story concept of the original game had said; "And what happened to the characters? It doesn't really matter, after all. It's their growth through the content of the game, though important. The main story of FINAL FANTASY VII is the battle for Planet. Focusing on each character would have distracted from the most important themes. Nothing is more important than a Planet. Nothing is more important than life."

Despite that, Zack and Aerith had been portrayed to have a romantic relationship from the get go. Aerith had mentioned Zack as her first love, and Zack had written to his parents about a girlfriend. Not to mention the numerous times the NPC in Crisis Core had addressed Aerith as his girlfriend as common knowledge, and Zack Fair Fanclub visiting Aerith upon the announcement of him being KIA in a mission as an act of condolences to the deceased's girlfriend. In the story compilation of FINAL FANTASY VII, we did get some love stories; Cloud and Tifa, Cid and Shera, and also... Zack and Aerith.

So how was Zack and Aerith shown to be a romance?

Tracy Wolff, a New York Times bestselling author had said; "Writing an emotionally compelling love story is all about the connection between your characters. The emotional payoff only happens when you've stoked the flames between them as high as the stakes that should be keeping them apart." And while there isn't one specific way to drive the point home, these bestselling authors had listed general rules to create this romance in stories, compiled by J. Kenner in "How to Write Romance Scenes; Ultimate Guide for Romance Authors", which had impressively projected on the love story of Zack and Aerith.

1. Start with attraction.

Even enemies-to-lovers story, there needs to be an attraction, a spark. Zack and Aerith are not an exceptional to this rule during their meet cute. The meet cute is the term for the inciting incident in a romance that sets the tone for the entire story. It had been well-known that when Zack first saw Aerith, he was attracted to her to the point of calling her an angel. He proposed a date to her not because she reminded him of someone but because he was attracted—okay, that was half joking lol. But anyway, this is really self-explanatory. Zack is a ladies-man. He’s not some kinda aloof guy who would hold back his flirting when he saw a girl he was attracted to. And Aerith is not a shy girl. She was also shown to be attracted to the guy when the game showed how her eyes followed his every movements since he doubled back up. She even admitted that she wanted to spend more time with him. Zack also tried to look cool by showing his strength against some monsters, and Aerith wasn't buying it. They share the same sense of humour that magnetizes them towards one another. We got some nice teasing and flirting scene back and forth which became the dynamic of their relationship onwards. But there was still an emotional gap between them here. When Aerith mentioned he was strong, and Zack thought about what was happening with Angeal, he felt deflated. He didn't immediately share what he was thinking with Aerith despite her asking, and that was realistic considering they have just met. Both of them are vocal about their initial attraction, even if the emotional bond has not formed yet. Not to mention their aesthetic and height difference make them look good together, but let's not go there. lol.

2. Building chemistry and dynamic.

Someone once commented that Zack and Aerith fell in love within ten minutes and then they only had cute moments with no development. This is false. The attraction and spark were there within the first ten minutes. The bond was built through time. Through each scene, their observations of one another get deeper and more intimate in a non-high-five way lol. But as I pointed out earlier, FINAL FANTASY VII is not a love story, thus the proportion of the romance being told becomes secondary or even tertiary to the plot. If you’re expecting a love story, FINAL FANTASY VII is not your game. However, we are still being fed with how Zack and Aerith gradually get to know each other. They went for a walk-turned-date, and Zack learned that Aerith loves pink ribbons and scolds people who stepped on flowers. She opened up about being scared of the sky. Zack also learned that Aerith is actually people-smart when she told him that the kid who pick-pocketed him didn't do it without reason. Aerith learned that Zack is actually troubled beneath all the jokes he cracked. And how he was willing to listen to her insecurities when she mentioned her fears. Subsequently they spent time together, getting to know each other better. They also called each other frequently to the point that she interrupted him pre-fight amidst missions. You see, Aerith didn't fall in love with Zack because he was cool, or because he was a perfect prince charming. She fell in love with him because he was a messed-up goof, non-judgemental, and way too caring for his own good. Zack fell in love with Aerith not because she was a Cetra or a Gainsborough or whatever privilege she possessed. He fell for her because she was a quirky girl who likes flowers and ribbons who empathised and helped around the kids in her sector. They chipped off the outer layer of each other and dug deep into their most vulnerable selves—Zack when he opened up to Aerith during his lowest point in his life never caring about being a cool guy, and her with her fear of sky and her insecurity of being different. That's when they finally fell in love. Aerith did not wait for 5 years and wrote 89 letters because of a guy she had a crush on. She did all that for a guy she had learn to love over the course of 18 months, whom she finally revealed the most vulnerable wish she could bravely entrusted to him; her 23 tiny wishes, all so that she gets to spend more time with him.

3. Emotional/internal conflict that build the tension.

Conflicts are important in story building. This includes hinting at any emotional wounds or baggage, and showing how falling in love might heal them. In romance, there are two main conflicts that make up good stories. One of them is Internal Conflict in which would build the tension between the two partners. Aerith and Zack are not normal people. Aerith is a Cetra. Zack is a superhuman SOLDIER. They both had eccentricities, Aerith probably more than Zack. But it was her Cetra heritage that held Aerith back. Her traumatic experience of watching Ifalna getting suspicious drugs and doing shady things to get them out of Shinra had her built up a defence mechanism to avoid the glaring problems right in front of her eyes. It manifested in their relationship in a way. There was this awkward push and pull on Aerith's side the first time they met because she was hesitant if Zack would accept her for who she is. It was a highlight of Aerith's insecurities that made her long for Zack but wary of his attraction at the same time. But she grew out of it while being with him. Slowly but surely, she expressed herself more, she gets bolder; her fears, her kind of wagon she wanted while still being mindful of him. She attempted some carefree conversation for a bit when Zack cried—her usual defence mechanism—but they showed how she knew him enough to recognise that wasn't what he needed, and she proceeded to give him a hug. They supported each other through their fears and lows. Their love healed each other. She was the best version of herself when she was with Zack. Caring, outgoing, sassy, but still empathetic. Zack, on the other hand, found out about Aerith's internal conflict from Cissnei. Aerith never told anyone about it, because she had been lying to herself to seek comfort in normalcy. Interestingly enough, she didn't need to. The minute he found out, he was only like "okay, so, anyway—". For Zack, she was still one of a kind, Cetra or not. It is the kind of scene where, in the case if Aerith finds out about it, her love for him would only deepen. It is his understanding and acceptance that makes their love that much sweeter. If this reveal happened earlier in their relationship, it would probably create a wedge between them. But their bond had been cemented, no ancestry was relevant to how they view each other by this point. Behind those walls, they were just Zack and Aerith, two ‘normal’ people who love and support each other unconditionally, giving comfort and hope for freedom and future, with no ulterior motive. And that was how their relationship grew as the game progressed.

4. External conflict that separated the lovers.

External conflicts work as the actual reason the lovers became separated. A realistic obstacle outside of the relationship that keeps them apart, driving the actions and plot of the two characters. The factors that keep the characters apart are important to make people root for them to get together. Most of this external conflicts for Zerith came from Zack's side, in contrast to their internal conflicts which mostly were Aerith's. Angeal's death, Zack reprimanding Tseng for tailing Aerith after knowing she was a Cetra, that foreboding when Zack had to be deployed to Nibelheim... Aerith asked when he'll be back and if she could call Zack during that mission even if it was constantly her routine in previous missions and it had never been a problem. The foreshadowing of their tragedy; building flower wagons and selling flowers, as if to savour every last seconds they had together. We have this bittersweet but equally heartbreaking scene when Aerith told Zack that she had fun even if they weren't selling well because he was there with her. Zack, too, entrusted Aerith to Tseng despite his vocal complaint about it before. The build-up of their separation was imminent. And then it happened. They were separated for good. What's unique and beautiful about Zerith's external conflict though, is the fact that neither of them were at fault for the separation or miscommunication. Aerith tried to reach out to him. Zack tried to get back to her. They both did their parts to their very best. It's just that their external conflict was too huge, it prevented their message from reaching each other.

5. Happily ever after.

This one is a bit tricky. Because we all know that Zerith is a tragic couple. However, here's the thing. Even a tragic romance has some sort of a happy ending—something to follow through the 'Downfall'. It is called the Perspective/Reflection. The story needs to put the tragedy into perspective, not let the Downfall go all the way down. The best example I could think of is Nicholas Sparks's romance novels, such as "Best of Me", when they had spent the time they lost and had their closure, the hero accepted the fatal fate he should've gotten earlier. And the heroine, despite heartbroken, becomes a better mother, better partner, and she moved on with a bittersweet memory. There is a hopeful glimpse of the character moving on or a montage of memories as they reflect on the loss. It should not end by making the living lover go around flower fields to take commemorative photos endlessly—okay, that referenced joke was uncalled for, sorry. But this is what Zerith had in spades. The Downfall of their romance was their separation, the failure to reunite, the grief that Aerith would never see her lover again. But what is the perspective after their tragedy? What is the resolution or reflection of their relationship? And this had been answered beautifully in Advent Children, bringing the romance story between Zack and Aerith into full circle, completing the criteria of writing a love story. The fact that they had reunite, walking out of the church together, with a full knowledge that they accepted their fate, and they stayed by each other's sides in the Lifestream, always. Later accentuated by Aerith’s yellow flowers blooming on Zack’s resting place, and Zack’s Buster Sword placed in the Sector 5 church where they spent the most time together, as if to tell us they have the eternity together.

Conclusion

In a way, Perspective/Reflection is the tragic romance's version of happily ever after, not in a fairy tale way, but more convoluted that leaves us satisfied with the culmination of the romantic relationship, in an odd way. The type that wrenches our hearts and keeps us thinking about them for days even. Ending on this note however, I do believe that the developers are not actually done with the Zerith's Perspective/Reflection. They had their Downfall—their fate was predestined to be separated, to be star-crossed. But such is the mystery in Remake, something they enunciated to be something to look forward to in Rebirth.

So is Zerith poorly written?

I'd say, according to the standards of the New York Times Bestselling Authors, they're pretty damn well-written considering FINAL FANTASY VII is not a love story, and they're not even the main pairing. But the important plot points and pivoting events to bring their relationship forward are included. They got their own beginning, their own conflict, their own dynamic, and their own ending. Their love and passion are explored from the superficial attraction down to the deep subconscious connection that made us turn our heads just by having them passing by each other.

In short, they ticked the boxes of romance recipes authors go for.

And with that, I wish a Happy Zerith Week 2022 to all Zerith nation. With Crisis Core Reunion and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth coming soon, let's rejoice and celebrate this well-written romance and buckle our seatbelts for more of their tear-jerking adventure!

[autisticandroids]

sastiel

i actually do enjoy a certain amount of sastiel but i don't generally enjoy sastiel as it is enjoyed by sassies. like obviously i do see cas being in love with dean as a core element of his character so that's an impediment, but lots of sastiels enjoy a bit of tragic semiunrequited sastiel.

but i'm more talking about like... i enjoy sastiel that's toxic on its own merits. because i think that sam and cas could never really have a healthy relationship with each other, platonic, romantic, or otherwise, while dean or even the ghost of dean hung over them. like he's been so destructive to both of them in entirely different ways, and they would need to unpack that before they could even vaguely understand each other. cas being in love with dean is a part of this but it's only one part.

also i love like. toxic midseasons bunkerfamily, and i think sastiel would add a lot to that dynamic. like first of all i think sastiel would make dean so happy, because he's weaving the web of his family tighter. if sam is invoolved with cas, sam can never leave; if cas is involved with sam, cas can never leave. and then also the aforementioned toxic dynamic re: them both still centering their lives on dean.

then also i enjoy a certain amount of sam sexuality crisis because i think the shape of his realization that he likes men would be shaped primarily not by the fact that that makes him queer but by the fact that he's terrified of men. which is fun to me.

also there's a sastiel fic that i'm never going to write but love thinking about sometimes where the premise is that dean is dead and jack is god (but functionally dead, whatever he is is in no meaningful way "jack" anymore) and sam THINKS that cas is dead and so sam just like. kind of runs away. he changes his name and moves to a new city and gets a real job and starts... uncoiling. he deletes all his contacts and stops speaking to anyone he knew before dean died. it's not rational, but it's something about the combination of grief and freedom. he makes a life for himself. but he also doesn't really have like tools to make new relationships. there are people he says hi to, and he's cordial with his boss and coworkers, but he has no clue how to involve anyone in his life. so he has no real relationships.

anyway, like five years after dean dies, there's a knock on sam's door. and sam opens it thinking it's the postman, but on the other side it's cas.

so it turns out that jack resurrected cas from the empty as soon as he became god. he also resurrected all of the other angels, told them to figure out governing themselves but NO apocalypses, and left them to their own devices. the first thing they did was throw cas in the heavenly dungeon, to await trial for war crimes. that trial has now been completed. the angels were going to execute cas, but a few pled for mercy on cas' behalf, suggesting permanent banishment from heaven instead. the angels accepted this, since a lot of them realized, correctly, that this would probably actually be a more torturous punishment.

anyway cas shows up on sam's doorstep because he really has nowhere else to go. like, he's still an angel, he could go sit in a cave for a few milennia, but sam is his friend. he's lonely. he's alone.

so sam listens to this story. sets him up in the guest room. and then doesn't hear much from cas. he knocks on the door about once every two days, and usually gets a polite answer. a couple times he thinks he hears cas going out while sam is in bed, but he doesn't check on it. when curiosity finally overwhelms him, he sticks his head in the room to check. and finds cas just. lying on the bed. eyes open. staring at the ceiling. big blown up kinkos printout of a photo of dean on one wall, the same of jack on the other.

and sam just. flinches back.

because here's the thing. sam loved dean. he did. but sam's life began when dean's ended. he's so much happier now that dean is gone.

and sam cared about jack. he did. but he was okay with jack becoming god, he didn't worry about it. didn't miss him too much.

and the guilt of all that just hits him like a truck, seeing how disabled cas is in his grief.

sam leaves cas alone a lot more after that.

a few months later, sam wakes up to find cas making coffee in the kitchen. when cas is done, he doesn't drink any himself, but he does hand sam a mug. sam is overjoyed. maybe cas is healing a little.

cas still doesn't talk much, not that he was ever a chatterbox, but he does start emerging from his room and trying to complete small domestic chores for sam. doing the dishes, scrubbing the sink, unclogging the shower.

eventually, they're spending time together. cas isn't all there, but he is someone to talk to, someone to be with, and sam is so terribly, deeply lonely. he's free now, but he's lonely.

over the next few years sam and cas end up like. boybestfriends, basically. but they don't get together mostly because it hasn't occurred to sam that you can be gay yet. and cas is at this point too utterly passive in his life. like cas was already a deeply passive person but grief and the extreme depression it brought on has left him with a pretty extreme lack of interest in Doing pretty much anything. like he does what sam asks and what he thinks sam wants, because sam is his friend and also sam gives him company and affection which he craves. but he doesn't make any decisions on his own.

anyway sam gets cas to go help garth or somebody on hunts sometimes, since he's an angel and all. sam's out of the life, but cas doesn't have to be. but on one of these hunts, cas doesn't come back. the hunter he was with says there was a big burst of light and then cas' vessel was empty on the ground. so obviously, sam thinks cas is dead.

this... isn't great for sam. he freaks out. because cas is still pretty much his only friend (and maybe something more) at this point. he has a big breakdown.

and then two days later there's a knock at the door and a strange woman is on the doorstep. and it's cas, of course. he wasn't killed, just ripped from his vessel. and he can't get back in, because jimmy is dead and can't give consent. so instead he approached a terminal cancer patient. promised her a painless death where she wouldn't be struggling to breathe every moment. took her body, and let her soul fly to heaven.

anyway, the combination of the thinking cas was dead and the vessel switch make it so that sam asks cas on a date no more than a month later. so they kind of... fall into a relationship.

sam feels like intensely guilty over the fact that he only wanted to date cas once he was in a female vessel for a while. especially since cas already at some point admitted to sam that he was in love with dean. that that was his greatest secret. that that was how he died. it's kind of irrational on sam's part but there you are. this is actually a big barrier for him in terms of asking to date cas at first. but then he does some self-examination and is like wait. i actually was into cas before i just had heteronormativity brain. guess i'm bisexual? anyway.

sam also starts feeling weird about the fact that cas does all these domestic chores now that he has a female vessel but it's not like sam asked him to do them, and if he doesn't let cas do chores cas just sits and stares into space (cas refuses to leave sam's apartment under any circumstances).

anyway sam and cas have this relationship. eventually they decide to have a baby.

and name it dean.

obviously.

cas remains listless and absent but is still the baby's primary caretaker. but he's still like obsessed with grieving dean and jack. additionally, cas is tormented by guilt because he feels like he replaced jack, so the baby makes his depression even worse. baby dean is extraordinarily well cared for physically but kind of gets shafted in the emotional department. sam tries to make up for it but he has, like, a job. he can't be there for little dean all the time.

sam has had the job of being cas' emotional caretaker for most of their relationship, but little dean starts sharing in the burden. which isn't great for a kid.

anyway, the thing about nephilim is that, like angels, they're immortal. and they go to the empty if they do die.

the final beat of this fic is sam, in heaven. there's been a certain amount of opening up, but not as much as in canon. you can see other people sometimes, but you're still trapped alone with your soulmate 98% of the time.

so dean says, i heard you got yourself a girl. a kiddo, too! even named him after me. i can't wait to meet 'em. and sam just... grimaces. him and dean are gonna have eternity together. he's gonna have to explain this to dean someday.

down on earth, little dean is trapped with cas. neither of them will ever be able to enter heaven. neither of them will die. cas is still an empty shell.

eternal torment for everyone.

[heavymetalchemist]

I think it’s easy to forget that Wei Wuxian is strongly villain-coded. We see the story from his perspective, we know his reasons and justifications, if you’re watching CQL and paying attention you can figure out the core transfer before the reveal. We know that Wen Qing and Wen Ning are good guys. We know that the Burial Mounds gang is a bunch of tired uncle/aunts trying to grow some stupid radishes, a four year old, and the Disaster Bi Gang (none of whom have swords, even!) We know that Wei Wuxian has his heart in the right place, that he feels an incredibly strong debt to the Wen Siblings and by extension their remaining family, that he has no golden core and has no choice but to forsake the sword and cultivate the demonic path, that he defects from the Jiang sect in a fake fight with his brother so that the Jiang sect won’t suffer the consequences of his actions, even though they have Secret Soup later.

But if you’re not us, the audience? If you’re, for example, Sect Leader Yao?

Hey did you all hear about how Wei Wuxian got kicked out of the Cloud Recesses for violently lashing out at the Jin sect heir?

Hey did you all see how he doesn’t carry his sword any more and claims it’s because he’s so badass that he doesn’t need it? And he has that Stygian tiger seal, so maybe it’s not bullshit? Can you even fight against that with a sword?

What kind of power does this guy even have? He’s a teenager! He drinks all the time and he’s moody and surly and holy shit did you hear what he did at that Wen outpost? He tortured all of them to death! Ugly stuff, man. Gruesome way to go. Maybe even worse than what Wen Ruohan did, at least a hot poker doesn’t make you claw your own eyes out.

Oh shit, he just stormed into this banquet and just SAID “if I want to kill someone who can stop me” and he still has that tiger seal I think we should be worried???

He just busted a bunch of Wen cultivators out of prison! And then he ran off to the Burial Mounds??? And his sect leader didn’t even know anything about it? Is he going rogue? Is he starting an uprising? This demonic cultivation stuff really seems to be corrupting him!

Oh man he got kicked out of the Jiang sect? You mean even the man he grew up with, who he was raised with practically as a brother, can’t control him any more? Did you hear about his fierce corpse? They call him the Ghost General! He’s unstoppable! What are we going to do if he comes for us?

He could be building a whole army in there, Sect Leader Jin said so! Who knows what kind of sick, twisted stuff he’s getting up to! Don’t forget all that horrible shit in the Sunshot Campaign, remember when he was raising the Wens’ own dead to turn against them? He could do that to us! He’s working with the Wens now, even! He’s gone totally crazy!

We can’t let some outlaw have all this power. It’s putting the safety of all of us at risk. What if it’s just another Wen Ruohan waiting to happen? (especially applicable if you’re thinking he’s using Yin iron as in CQL!) If we let him consolidate his power too much, then he’ll be unstoppable!

HOLY SHIT he murdered the Jin sect heir and his cousin with his fierce corpse! That’s the man his former shijie married! The one he punched in the Cloud Recesses, remember when the Lans kicked him out because he was so unruly and disrespectful? Yeah! It was probably revenge! Have we done anything to him? Oh gods what if we’re next???

A major point of MDZS/CQL is how important reputation is, and how that affects everything. Wei Wuxian’s reputation is straight-up villainous. We, the audience, know that he’s trying his best, that he’s a traumatized teenager with a shitload of emotional baggage trying to do the right thing and repay a colossal debt, that he’s made choices that he now has to try and live with, etc. But to the rest of the world this guy has fucking lost it, he’s gone off the deep end and he has an incredibly powerful weapon and a mode of cultivation that seems to corrupt you and turn you into a monster, and frankly, they’re not wrong! It does affect his temperament and he does end up killing a lot of people and he is out of control!

MDZS/CQL is interesting precisely because we’re getting an entire Villain Apology Story. A long time ago I read a post by someone on here saying they find Jiang Cheng challenging to write about because he’s the protagonist of a different story, and he really is. He’s the guy whose former shixiong turns into a villain in pursuit of power, the Obi-Wan to WWX’s Anakin, the one who sees how incredible power corrupts and is obligated to fight against it. Having to fight against a former ally who was seduced by “the dark side” (in this case, demonic cultivation) is a story that gets told over and over, but always condemning the one who went to the dark side. He’s the blackened protagonist, the aren’t you tired of being nice, don’t you want to go ape shit power fantasy, where we as the audience can justify his actions because we know he did it to save his brother, his sister, the Wen remnants he owes a debt to. He isolates himself from the people who love him to protect them, he refuses Lan Wangji’s help because he’s convinced he just wants to lock him up and stop him from using demonic cultivation because he’s a righteous upstanding Lan (totally unaware of LWJ’s intense crush, obviously). He jokes about it but he knows he’s being painted as the villain, and he’s in denial about how much that will affect him, because after all… he’s the Yiling Laozu, and he knows his power. But so does everyone else, and they’re rightfully terrified!

And yet? When he comes back, LWJ still wants him, still cares for him, will move heaven and earth to protect him. JC cares about him so much he’s having a Constant Crisis about it. And WWX has not forgotten his shijie or shidi, immediately cares about Jin Ling, and still is the man who really just wanted to be free and grow some goddamn radishes. He accepts that he paid for what he’s done with his death, and just wants to start over.

It just drives me nuts when people pretend like WWX was an angel who did nothing wrong because the whole POINT is that he was a villain-coded gay (well, bi) and the man you had to really watch out for was the polite, thoughtful, soft-spoken one that worked his way up from a tragic backstory. It’s a whole subversion and it’s awesome!