#this is deeply unhinged

[eilinelsghost]

The Ring of Felagund/The Ring of Barahir

I confess that (despite mostly enjoying the films) I hold onto several longstanding and extremely petty beefs with Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy. And, surprising no one, my pettiest and fiercest grudge is their design for the Ring of Barahir.

I think (besides the One Ring) it's the most clearly described piece of jewelry in the legendarium:

two serpents with emerald eyes, one upholding, one devouring a crown of golden flowers

And yet! When you look at the film's design, there is a) no crown of golden flowers, b) the serpents do not seem to be either upholding or devouring anything, but kind of just chilling there, and c) the serpents do not have emerald eyes, but rather a single, giant emerald that's plopped in the middle, presumably in place of the golden crown.

It's a lovely ring! But it's not the ring Finrod gave to Barahir.

Anyway, all that to say I finally caved and drew the one that has lived in my head for 24 years. Please clap.

[cryinglookingatsoulages]

gotta respect how in the beginning neil was so paranoid he went coocoo over nicky speaking german and slept with his face to the wall so he can put his lenses on first thing when he wakes up in case of emergency but then we he actually started receiving a fucking COUNTDOWN to (the most certainly) the day of his untimely demise he was like pheeew don’t care i just wanna do my exy thing and be kissing boys one (1) boy 🥰

[starry-bi-sky]

mmmmmm read a disciple shen yuan/shizun luo binghe fanfic about two days ago where the first chapter was the Immortal Conference arc, and SQQ was the one who had to be pushed into the abyss (he was still the villain) except Luo Binghe was refusing and was like, lowkey losing his mind about SQQ being so close to the edge. SQQ ended up having to be the one to fall in himself because of the system's punishment system. The rest of the fic is leading up to that moment. But like, MMM i've been obsessively thinking about that first chapter for DAYS ever since.

now i've been in svsss for a grand total of *checks watch* a week. but god obsessed with that. I want to write/read a fic where disciple SQQ goes a little nuts down there. Like keep all of the things that make SQQ, SQQ, but just. Throw in a little bit more trauma in there. A little bit of a mental break. Let him go a little nuts as a treat. Just a tad unhinged. I wanna see him go, just a little, "god fuck it, i've tried so hard to change this shitty story's outcome and it feels like everything i've done has been for nothing. I'm going to die in this world no matter what I do, I've been doomed from the start, so might as well die the way I want to." and he just, breaks a little! Under all the stress.

He still retains the traits that makes shen yuan, shen yuan, like his overwhelming kindness. But he's just! yk. A little less patient. Paranoid. Jumpy. Colder. A little more aloof and closed off. A little more Shen Jiu. He's no asshole child abuser, but he was a Number One Hater in his past life and he's leaning into that old habit a little more now.

(On a totally coincidental not-at-all related note, there's not enough SJ-and-SY-are-the-same-people fics out there that i've found. This is totally unrelated...)

The Endless Abyss turns the mind into an over-sharpened blade, and SQQ is both fascinated and perhaps a little excited to explore a place that doesn't have a lot of info on it in the mortal realm, but still terrified out of his mind. And he's no Luo Binghe, he doesn't have the sheer brute strength and power to just bulldoze his way through, so he has to be a lot more sneaky and cunning if he wants to survive.

The fic itself role-swapped LBH and SQQ so that SQQ was the half-demon (which lowkey fucks) and LBH the human, but I'm equally-if-not-more obsessed with the idea that LBH remains the half-heavenly demon and SQQ the human. If only because I keep thinking about SQQ befriending some demons (particularly and specifically a group of succubi) and they grow very attached to this Human Cultivator so through magic plot stuff they create some kind of seal/illusion/talisman that makes SQQ appear as a demon because a human cultivator in the endless abyss may as well be the equivalent of putting a giant neon target on your back.

And iirc Shen Jiu was taught demonic cultivation by that one guy(?? i've only been here a week so im not caught up in ALL of the lore yet) so that could totally happen here.

(On the other end of the realms, poor Shizun Luo Binghe is just. losing his fucking mind over losing his most precious and beloved disciple. About .5 seconds from burning down the peaks himself. somebody sedate him.)

The Endless Abyss sucks and SQQ is having a really terrible time and can feel himself going lowkey mad, but also holy shit look at all this WORLD-BUILDING. look at all this flora and fauna, and oh if he had the equipment for it he'd be writing all of this down. ALL OF IT. He was kinda-sorta-already planning on never leaving the Abyss as some sort of fucked up self-exile and self-preservation thing, but now he might? actually just?? never leave if he can help it, like he lowkey likes it down here.

anyways the next time anyone ever sees SQQ again he's got hair so long its almost touching the ground and he's either in rags and half-feral or he's been completely dolled up by his adoptive succubi sisters and still about three seconds from biting anyone who tries to touch him. (he's also lowkey trying to book it back down to the abyss even if he has desperately missed all of his friends and shizun)

[rowanisawriter]

various situations

[bakuliwrites]

Archduke of Baldur's Gate? Oh, you mean my big tiddy goth girlfriend? My Final Fantasy villain reject? My 40 year old gamer who subsists off of mountain dew and doritos? My skrunkly little tyrant? My struggling actor in an early 2000's hair product commercial? My ride-or-die Durge simp? The man that proposed to me with a Taco Bell hot sauce packet? My precious Gorty? My wife? My-

[plaguedocboi]

Monsters vs Aliens really is a wild movie. Like imagine you get abducted by the SCP Foundation but the only other things there are Seth Brundle, The Blob, an Innsmouth Fishman, and Godzilla. And then you have to save the world together. Who came up with this plot and can we please do a collab

[normalfem]

HELLO??????

[maximumqueer]

You ever have stages of obsession and depravity when it comes to a character you enjoy? Because that has been me with Gideon Coal of Once Upon a Witchlight fame.

It started with like, oh a himbo built like a brick shithouse, hell yeah. The character art goes hard, the chains are a fun design that makes the silhouette interesting! His dynamic with the other characters is really fun!! Then I read the little character blurb about his back story (as well as just the small comments about his backstory in the actual campaign), and its like ok, that's depressing as hell, but also very interesting!

Then not a second later i get punched in the face with the fucking IMPLICATIONS of Gideon choosing to keep the fucking chains and manacles as his weapons. How they became an extension of his body that only work because he made of fire. How he literally took back his power - which was being used for the train - and have it instead power his weapons, which shackled him to the train. Something something using the objects of your imprisonment as the gateway to your liberation, and then KEEPING them both of a reminder of that imprisonment and as a promise to never let yourself be caged again.

AND THEN in the most recent ep. I watched (ep. 19) with the way he interacts with Twig, who is a deeply lonely character, who was so excited to have guests at her inn because she had been alone for so long that she just immediately attaches herself to them. And for Gideon to just immediately return that energy, for Gideon to just immediately become friends with her (basically adopt her) because he relates to that loneliness, because for a good chuck of time all he knew was pain and loneliness because of the fucking train GAHHHHHHHHHHH

Add to that what he said about Torbek, and him being hurt and vulnerable, and how he needs to be with them so that the people who tortured and experimented on him do not get ahold of him again (because he can relate as he too was tortured and - while not experimented on to my knowledge - was dehumanized and used as a living power source for that FUCKING TRAIN) It has me gnawing at the bars of my enclosure. I am so deeply unwell about this fucker it's not even funny.

Like, idk what the wonderful people down at Legends of Avantris put in the characters they make (because while this is mainly about Gideon, all of the characters make me go feral), but it is some potent stuff, because I already have an (unfinished) 18 page coalecroux fanfic in the works and I've only been watching for like, a week.

All this to say, I love Gideon Coal ( and all of the Witchlight characters). This is the hardest I've been hit with a hyperfixation in a long ass time. It's been rotating in my head 24/7 since I started it, and I don't think it will be stopping soon.

[waterandsilver]

it always amuses me how late tyrion's specific flavour of Lannister Sexual Neurosis is introduced is AGoT because by the time shae appears you've spent almost a whole book in his head and you're thinking wow this guy is actually very chill and reasonable considering all the awful things that have happened in his life

and then you watch him give this random teenager he just met a full list of conditions for her new role as his full time live-in fake girlfriend and you're like.... oh........ there's the Mental Illness <3

[ingravinoveritas]

Just thinking about these three things together for no particular reason at all...

[notbecauseofvictories]

man, I love when writers get weird with it. I just finished Big Swiss by Jen Beagin, which is mostly about unhinged people getting therapy to very little effect; now I'm reading House of Rot by Danger Slater, and the two characters being colonized by malevolent, otherworldly mold had mutual orgasms to the sound of Eine kleine Nachtmusik. In short, the English language is a triumph, and people should use it to write their fucked up stories forever.

[flymmsy]

Genuinely believe Gortash saw Karlach as his protege.

The amount of respect he would’ve had for her as a poor kid who literally brawled her way out of poverty is unreal.

And the admiration he had for her is mentioned multiple times, even from other characters who knew them both.

But what would trouble him is her indomitable goodness. He would see it as her weakness, believing her to be delusional to protect herself from the realities of the world.

So he slowly starts to expose her to the more heinous sides of his business. And every time, Karlach still goes right back to her sickeningly bright spirit no matter what.

So he sells her to Zariel. Why not? As much as he despises the devil, Raphael made him who he is. Perhaps a devil is what Karlach needs.

And then Karlach comes back an even better person in the ultimate show of how she was never like him. She was better (and though he’d never admit it, a part of him knew that.)

[the-real-list-of-ominous-threats]

I'm going to make you wait for the bus in the rain (where's the bus? bus is late. oh here comes the bus-- oh shit it's a different bus)

[amaranthsynthesis]

meeting araj oblodra for the first time in act 2 vs running into her again in act 3

thanks for kickstarting some personal growth in the gayest disasters to leave the shadow-cursed lands this year but we’ve figured out consent AND commitment AND been honest and vulnerable and horribly intimate so fuck off, nyehhh

[littleglasselephants]

Journey’s End really is so devastating, the Doctor goes from having all his most beloved people around him flying the TARDIS together and he’s found Rose and Donna is on top of the world and then within 15 minutes Rose is gone and Donna’s memories are gone and he is just completely alone like Jesus Christ did they have to go that hard???

[scribz-ag24]

It's still so unbelievable to me how extreme Dusknoir can be. He's a guy who will impulsively decide to rescue a pair of explorers he has never met for no reason (except maybe some superficial after-the-fact justification like "oh this will make me look even nicer", which doesn't count) and his first instinct when his temporal ally is about to get hit by falling ice is taking the blow for him, but he still lies and manipulates with ease, relishes flaunting his victory over his enemies at the cost of efficiency, decides to let the planet rot and decay as long as he keeps his own life and plans a horrible scheme where he will murder someone and puppet his corpse to attack his closest friends.

what wanting to survive does to a mf i guess.