#this man makes me feel some sort of way

[natasha-in-space]

High Enough

Unknown/gn!reader;

For day 1 of Mystictober: favorite character/dance. I will be doing only a handful of these this year around, depending on which promts get me inspired enough to write something! This one's very self-indulgent. I always thought of what would have happened if you got a chance to interact with Unknown in the game. What if he shows up at the party?

"I never would have expected to see someone as mysterious and broody as you in the middle of such a posh event, Mr. Unknown."

You only laughed as your dance partner tightened his hold on your hand in response to your little jab, his cold eyes narrowing at you in a silent warning. A warning that only encouraged you to get ever bolder with your relentless teasing.

It's common knowledge to avoid playing with fire, unless you want to get burned. Alas, you were never good at following this saying. After all, who in their right mind would listen to a complete stranger and go to some remote location with minimum fuss? You didn’t know whether you were really that stupid, naive, or you simply didn’t care about your own life anymore. Perhaps, the truth was somewhere in the middle, as it often was. Either way, your every choice lead you to this very moment: with you now swaying to the soft jazzy melody, a man you met face to face for the very first time as your partner.

And, despite all the glaring red flags, you felt oddly at peace with it.

It was hard to see any red when all your eyes could focus on was this beautifully harsh mint that pulled you in, like an enchanted lake would lure some poor traveler's soul in those old-timey tales you would read as a child.

You knew that you should probably try to notify Seven of the presence of the very same hacker that has been tormenting their organization for days now. You knew that what you were doing right now was stupid at best, and outright dangerous at worst. You knew that this wouldn't end in your favor, regardless of how much fun you were having in the present. But, you also knew that you wouldn't do the right thing here. You had every opportunity to contact Seven and relay all the important info to him, once Unknown contacted you again for the first time a few weeks ago.

Yet, you didn't. You never did. Not even once. Not a single slip of the tongue left your lips about your secret guardian angel who was watching over your every move and word. Or, was he a devil? His smirk was certainly devilish, in the best way possible.

Instead, you indulged in this mysterious man's attention, cryptic messages sent between you two leaving you reading in between the lines, hungry for answers you knew you wouldn't find. You were just a plaything to him. A tool. His eyes. And yet, something about that left your heart fluttering in your chest, much to your own bewilderment and curiosity. You were connected. What you saw, he saw. What you heard, he heard. Something was alluring about knowing that someone was watching over your every move with such precision.

Maybe, you just weren't right in the head.

You brought up the idea of him going to the party as a joke, really. In hindsight, you probably should have known Unknown doesn't do jokes. Despite everything, you were unsure if he would arrive up until the very last moment. That is until you got a message from him. In a classic Unknown fashion, it was something that would surely make chills run up your spine if you were someone of sound mind. Nothing but the short: 'I see you ^^', that left you looking around the ballroom, as if you forgot where you were for a second. He wouldn't reveal himself to you for another 20 minutes or so, pulling you along for a frustrating game of cat and mouse. And, despite you supposedly being in the role of a cat in this game, you never felt more exposed. Much to your disappointment, he didn't let you find him in the end. He came to you instead.

When it came to Unknown, the game was always rigged from the start. He was the one in control, holding all the cards, and he didn't try very hard to hide that from you. In fact, you were pretty sure he found your little games exciting in his own strange twisted way. He enjoyed toying with you, and you played right into his hands every time. Like a good little tool, you were.

His appearance definitely blended well with the party. No one would suspect that the young man the party coordinator chose as their dancing partner for the night was of any threat at all. Truth be told, the moment he finally revealed himself to you fully, you found your breath getting caught up in your throat as you took him in, no physical barriers or mind games stopping you this time around. Unknown wore a captivatingly dark tailcoat adorned with mint patterns, and, if you squinted very hard, you could make out an eye or two between the thin intertwined lines. It was somewhat funny. As if he just couldn't help but make a point of him keeping his eyes on you at all times. The captivating mint accents on his black tailcoat certainly brought out his eyes of the very same odd color, making it that much more easier for you to get lost in them. You wondered if he wore contacts. Such eye color didn't seem natural. Then again, Unknown was always unpredictable, full of mysteries you would never solve, unless he let you. The plain white button-up he wore underneath his tailcoat was unbuttoned at the collar just enough for you to see a slick black choker around his neck. You certainly didn't have any naughty thoughts of hooking your finger under it to pull him closer to you, until he was pressed flush against you. Not even once. His white hair with pinkish ends was messy, not at all styled to look neatly combed like the rest of the guests here, and you couldn't help but marvel at the way his slightly curly locks would sometimes fall over his eyes, making the desire to reach in and brush them aside almost unbearable. He was simply exquisite to look at. A lovely treat for your eyes. Or, was he more like poison? Luring you in with this irresistible facade, only to capture you in his claws once you were too close for comfort?

No matter what he was, you hoped he felt the same way about your party outfit as well. Maybe it was just your wishful thinking, but you swore you caught him occasionally looking you up and down, the intensity in his gaze increasing ever so slightly, as he would then swiftly pull you close in your dance, making your body brush up against his ever so slightly. Judging from the low chuckle that would rumble in his throat whenever he did that, he knew exactly what he was doing to you. So, is that really such a crime to pay him back a little?

"You sure have a lot of sass for someone who's supposed to be so seemingly perfect, party coordinator." Unknown hissed just loud enough for you to hear, suddenly dipping you as you gasped and stared up into his eyes, completely taken aback by this unexpected move. He didn't have to do much to leave you breathless. And you didn't really try to conceal that fact from him. Just as quickly, you were brought right back up, with him now twirling you around, your back pressing up against his chest. His hands playfully slid down your sides, until they gripped onto your hips, leaving you trembling in place, your face suddenly growing too hot for comfort. You barely managed to suppress a choked whimper as his breath ghosted the shell of your ear in such a delicious way. "You're in no position to tease me, Y/N. But, I admire your boldness. Makes it that much more tempting for me to tame you. Oh, but you probably would like that, wouldn't you? That's why you left those bastards in the dust without a second thought. You know your place."

Fuck, what are you even supposed to say to that? In fact, it was becoming difficult for you to even think straight, not with the heat of his body against your back making you feel all hot and bothered. You gulped. "...Is it too early to take you up on that offer of yours?"

Both of you were well aware of what you were referring to. It was the very first message he sent you after you foolishly stepped into Rika's apartment at his request, essentially sealing your fate.

'It'll be really fun from now on. Enjoy your time with everyone. I'll go get you soon.'

Your chin was tickled by a gruff chuckle as his thumb caressed your hip. God, this man was driving you wild. "Patience, dear party coordinator. The end will be the same either way. But, if you do a good job for me... I might consider giving you a reward once that time comes."

"A reward?"

As his chapped lips briefly brushed against your cheek, you could only gasp, trembling in his arms like the silly butterfly you were. Except, this butterfly landed into the spider's web willingly. You wondered what that meant for you.

"I'll personally welcome you to our eternal party. Consider this your personal invitation to paradise, prince/ss."

[theswedishpajas]

Based on my favorite gif lately

[fantasykiri5]

Fabian and Riz to me are like. They’re like the definition of “a secret third thing” to me but not like in a qpr way. Their thing is just Their Thing, like they’re inseparable they drive each other fucking bonkers they care so deeply and they’re stupid teenagers and I don’t think they would even really think about it at all. I don’t think either of them can imagine a world where they’re not at least around the other, and like whatever their thing is definitely isn’t allo but it’s definitely not regular besties shit. They just like being around each other, I don’t think either of them would really even think to put a name to whatever it is they’ve got going on, and I definitely don’t think either of them would ever put enough thought into it to even figure out what a qpr is, much less label themselves in one. They’re just Fabian and Riz. The Ball and Captain of the Owlbears. They’re just them I think. Idk man.

[dont-offend-the-bees]

Anyone else just not feeling like a real person much lately?

[fumifooms]

You’re the resident chilchuck expert, so I was wondering about it there’s any canon evidence that he did smoke or drink alcohol when the kids were younger. I always thought it was something he picked up due to the strain of long jobs, when the kids were already older, but you seem to think differently and I was wondering if there was anything in canon that made you think that way!

Now that you mention it I guess it’s true there’s no evidence he did. Smoking we literally only know he does at all because of one post-canon panel where he has a pipe, so no, maybe this stick-looking thing in the panel below too though, I’m not familiar with medieval blunts eh. We’ve only gotten one panel of him and his daughters interacting when he was younger so that’s not too insightful on that end, and every time we see him young and freckled it’s in a job context so again not really where we’d expect him to be drinking. The earliest proof (/heavy implication since we don’t see inside his cup I guess) is 3 years before canon when Laios hired him, where he’s at a bar, classily placed in front of all the bottles ✨

Yes alcohol is almost certainly a way through which he copes especially with stress, so if we go with the theory he started around when work got stressful, well… Chilchuck started working as a dungeon diver ~10 years ago so when he was ~19, making Mei, Fler and Puck ~6 and ~4 respectively, so from that draw the ‘stressful enough to start drinking’ line wherever. We don’t know what he did before that with any certainty, and it could be he did odd jobs, lived off mostly mutual aid and community work, or just focused on only raising the girls. Half-foots tend to be poor and I see a lot of that in Chilchuck specifically so I don’t think he could have afforded to not have some paying work though.

Alright, so then why do I think he did drink when the girls were younger?

I give a more complete rundown of the info we do have on his alcoholism & his family with panels and references + all the speculation I make from it here. But the most targeted and objective answer I can give is:

Of course there’s just very very little we know of Chilchuck’s life with his family, and I think that’s by design too. I think the details being up in the air is to allow more nuance of the topic, like, will trying to reconcile go well, is their relationship salvageable? We don’t know, because we don’t know. So the message of giving hope a chance even if it’s a long shot, that things could truly go either way, is more relevant, impactful and meta in that way. How long was he usually away for work travels into dungeons here and there? How did he act with them? All we can really do is "it’s likely that", it’s a game of which way we think it’s more implied. There’s no right and wrong answer, it’s all Marcille-like larping the events out.

My main reason for thinking he did is that his father died from overdrinking and Chilchuck is very aware of that. He mentions his death casually in the extra about their stance in alcohol and in his Adventurer’s Bible profile, etc. He acts towards the alcohol presumably the same way his father did: with abandon, uncaring for the health effects, probably happily too considering Chil says "dying doing something you love is a good way to go". Very nonchalant. So you see what I’m saying here right, wether he started early or late, his view of alcoholism is very influenced by what he saw of his father growing up, it’s something he’s always been aware of and saw in a mostly positive light, something that was inherited you could say. It’s something that was normalized to him from a young age. Regardless or where it goes from there I do think this part is pretty inarguable. If he views it positively and we know that in the present alcohol is his favorite food that he loveees, why would he have held out on it? Personally that all makes me think he started drinking very young, especially since I don’t think they limited alcohol to age as much as modern standards (and I mean, teen drinking is obviously still a thing). And here you could argue, maybe his father only started being more alcoholic later when Chilchuck moved out, or something! And to that there’s nothing I can say except I think that’s a strained theory, and that Chil might even have largely cut contact with his family after moving out (since he and siblings are listed as almost strangers and he doesn’t seem to have much emotional attachment to his parents, but also we know he rents out his place to "a relative"), but it’s true we have no evidence. "I’ve picked up the same unhealthy substance abuse as my father haha! No big deal right haha" repeated several times to me just reeks of intergenerational trauma, & the alcoholism gene as they call it. Like effortless sliding into drinking as if it’s second nature, it’s natural after all, it’s normal after all, it just makes sense, it makes you feel good and that’s what matters.

BUT from my interpretation then we have a whole other layer: Alcohol is of course not all bad always. I think he’s always liked alcohol and drank it on occasion and it brought him joy etc etc, but I think here the implication in the question is, how much effect did his drinking have on the family relations and how early? And that isn’t so much about when him drinking started but when the alcoholism started. Addiction is defined by a habitual need, that has negative effects from filling that need (physical, psychological, social, etc) and negative effects from withdrawal. If Chilchuck drinks to cope and he can’t not cope without it, that’s addiction, if it affects his relationships, if it’s a need he has, it’s addiction. Addiction can be very insidious or look very casual, and how much people around the person are affected by it is case by case. Cheerful drunks can be sooo annoying and uncomfortable though let me tell you. Drunks are drunks. And this sounds harsh, but even if people around them don’t mind drunks it’ll still have some effects here and there, living with one can be such a challenge, ily drunks good luck with everything much like Chilchuck you deserve good things 🫡　

Ok so with the dad thing and the "ok well maybe he’s always drunk casually but it grew worse with time around when he started working as a dungeon diver" precision made, the other bit of info we have that can inform this is that Chilchuck is on a harsh diet and that alcohol is a hunger suppressant. We know Chilchuck "used to be fine not eating for two days", that literally on screen to quench his hunger so it doesn’t keep him awake he goes to drink water, drinking is his instinct to hunger. Again alcohol is a hunger suppressant and if you want info on that the internet has a lot of research and anecdotes about it. He diets to be light enough to not trigger traps, so it’s something he’d have started after dungeon diving most likely. Between the stress and the diet, yes it’s extremely likely he started going harder on alcohol after he started working in dungeons. There’s arguments on wether two days without eating is less bad for half-foots than humans, but apart from smaller portions there’s nothing that indicates half-foots should get less than 3 meals a day. They need less food but that’s because their bodies are smaller: the need is proportional to the body, not smaller than others’ races, the % of need is similar even if the kg amount of food isn’t. There’s also a popular headcanon with support basis that half-foots run hot and have a faster heartrate and whatnot, and that points towards a faster metabolism rather than a slower one: a bigger need for eating rather than a smaller one. He has the same bmi, 18, as Mickbell, but perhaps because Chil is much taller he’s less intensely visibly underweight with ribs showing than Mick during the bath extra, it’s most apparent when he becomes tallman.

Alcohol is something so important and omnipresent in his character that I have trouble believing it’s something that was part of only a small fraction of his life. It’s his immediate go-to, his no-brainer solution to a good time, I’ve sort of always assumed especially after looking at his family that it’s something he discovered decently young. Like he just acts like someone who’s always had alcohol to fall back on and started young idk. Alcohol is one of his 5 keywords. Alcoholism is very ingrained into his world view and life, his "it doesn’t matter" stance his ‘work hard play hard’ mentality his idea that the world is harsh so you get relief where you can, so it just makes sense to me that it’s always been in his life, if not actively then at least looming.

So yes, in summary, my take: Alcohol was always something he wholly enjoyed to an unwise level, but it could have been considered casual until he started working into dungeons and his need for it on a regular basis intensified. Alcohol has always had positive association to him as far as we see, so when it started being a problem he didn’t see it as such. To quote him, "I drink anytime I get the opportunity to". Why always? Approval of father’s alcoholism. Why alcoholism at all? Diet + stress & coping mechanism & emotional stunting + relationship issues, and she decided she had enough after they went out for drinks.

Conclusion

Chilchuck having drunk from a young age makes sense to me and it’s the strongest narrative angle I see on the table, but that’s objectively a me opinion, yes! There’s no evidence, moreso there’s canon basis and supporting info, but it’s all very left up to interpretation. I’ve made my own interpretations of things from the scraps we see, like everyone else making Chilwife and daughters content. Wether you have a stance on the topic or prefer to leave it vague in your takes, it’ll be a matter of what you think makes most sense, or what you’d rather believe I suppose (which is literally fine)

There’s a lot of subjectivity in even just setting up causal links like you probably noticed during this and I was careful with my word choices, because we’re just extrapolating from what we see and unless Kui states it explicitly from a reliable mouth all we can do is have informed opinions on most things. This particular interpretation is influenced by other details I’ve come to form about my interpretation of Chilchuck too, the more psychological and emotional sides of him and the timeline and how his marriage even happened, unplanned pregnancy imo. Like I hope you see what I mean, this wasn’t supposed to be a speculation post just a quick simple answer but there’s sort of just no other and concise but complete way with the subjectivity nuance to put "maybe it could be yes because of this but maybe it could be no because of this" haha

Edit: Wait the phrasing on this… Interesting. "In recent years"— This does imply that if not just his alcohol consumption increasing then the diversity and quality of it did, so either he indeed did start drinking more (not necessarily meaning he didn’t drink before) assumedly because of his wife leaving, or he started drinking other/more different kinds of alcohol maybe due to the union he formed + his experience gave him greater salary than he had previously (and no wife and family to provide money for), a mix of both perhaps.

[lupins-hehim-pussy]

I wanna know ur Fontaine msq criticisms 👁️👁️👂I’m all ears

I'm not sure if you wanted me to talk about this secretly or publicly but! Here I go!

The TLDR: Fontaine MSQ aestheticised prison, poverty, child abuse, the justice system/court and didn't properly address any of it.

More:

Focalors/Furina has way too much of a sympathetic angle for a dictator who's lets people drown with her inaction.

Neuvillette feels Bad for sentencing some people to death/prison, but that's it. He's one of the most powerful people in Fontaine. If he felt like there are systemic injustices, I.E sending an abused Child to prison, he should be the first person to DO something about it, not just cry and be sad so the audience can be like aw, that's complex character writing isn't it? No it's not! And guilt doesn't absolve you!!!!!!! (These are stuff we deal with in OTCOJ read my fic now /j)

Meropide has children in it, both Sentenced there (Wriothesley) and BORN THERE (Lanoire), and this is just a quirk of the place. Not only that, Meropide accepts prisoners of all genders and crimes. There are abusers and abuse victims in one place. Do you know how bad that is? How much potential for crimes to happen in a place like that— oh wait, Meropide isn't under Fontaine's jurisdiction. If you are assaulted as an inmate it literally means nothing to the court.

Wriothesley had no qualifications when he took over. Depending on how long he lived on the streets, how old he was when he killed his parents, how old he was when he was first taken in by the orphanage, etc, the man might never have more than 4–5 years of formal education. Sigewinne probably had to teach him how to write reports. And do Meropide's spreadsheets. Edit because I forgot to elaborate on this one: This isn't a point brought up anywhere, which is bad, because when poverty and incarceration robs you of a proper education (and the rights to vote in many places too, too, by the way), it reduces your prospects for jobs, reduces many people's ability to get a home etc etc. Wriothesley was just, narratively, Given his position.

Meropide is an industrialized prison, and they portray this as a good thing. Prisoners are paid in coupons for their labour, and this is also portrayed as a good thing.

The One-Meal-A-Day reform was something Paimon gushed about being so great of a perk, that people might want to go to jail for food (could be interesting and reflective of systemic poverty if MHY had brains, but they don't, so I was just Pissed because essentially all Paimon wanted to say was "Prison isn't so bad, but still don't go to prison guys! Prison labour is really hard!"). By the way, in most real-world prisons they are obligated to feed you three meals a day. Because that's how much food a human needs. MHY went with one meal just so they can say "if you want to eat more, you have to work." And then the welfare meal is a goddamn gacha. So imagine you're a starving child who's too weak to work in the fucking robot assembly line, and you wander up for your first meal in 24 hours, only to luck in with a shit one. I'd kill myself.

They wrote Wriothesley, who's a victim of the system, into a guy who's say shit like "I'm the Duke I can do whatever I want" for a cool moment where he choke-slams an inmate (I know he was a bad guy. But also, in copaganda when cops are violent/disregarding protocols, they are always only portrayed to do that against bad guys, so what does our critical thinking tells us about this one?) They wrote Wriothesley, who was an inmate of a prison so bad, so notorious that it is the literal boogeyman of Fontaine, that has a legal (???) fighting pit, with an administrator who abuses his position to be unreasonable, to willingly stay in the place and become an Administrator who would choke-slam an inmate while saying a cool line about how he has the power to do whatever he wants. They wrote him, the guy who had to be fed on the streets by melusines, to think one-meal-a-day was a good enough reform (while he spends god-knows how much on his boat). This wasn't a victim-turns-into-abuser narrative either, they want all this to be seen as positive character growth.

And then, the final kicker is, they gloss over his entire abuse. You can only read about these shit in his profile, which most people don't because they don't Have Him or doesn't care to unlock it/read it online, and they jammed his entire backstory into a flaccid info-dump at the end of his character story quest. This man isn't Allowed to feel abused and neglected and show any reaction to it within the narrative of Fontaine itself, because if they actually Gave Weight to what happened to him, they'd have to confront THE FUCKING JUSTICE SYSTEM they had NO PLANS on criticising. I don't think they ever explicitly said the fucking Crime-Theatre nonsense was Bad either.

I could go on, but this is already so long. But yeah, I hope this gave you an idea.

[sylphwing]

hm. i do not like chilshi 🤔

[longagoitwastuesday]

Kusakabe, dear, you're too beautiful to be saying that kind of stuff

[spaghetticat3899]

ADHD stop making me easy to upset challenge: impossible

[triglycercule]

thinking about mtt literally physically dragging eachother down and being restrained to eachother because theyre genuinely that fucking ass for eachother but then it means i'd have to decide which of them to humiliate by putting a collar on them. and i can't choose. if they dont all equally suffer than whats the point man 🙁🙁🙁

[dont-offend-the-bees]

Fuck I hate being an adult. I need a more adult adult to help with the volatile emotional situation.

[aaami]

Okay yeah demiguy feels correct atm

[wereshrew-admirer]

conflicting desires for lyke and duvall in sangfielle season 2:

-duvall low-key resenting lyke over the chine thing

-lyke high-key resenting duvall over the oratorio thing and EXPECTING duvall to resent him over chine but instead it's the same one-sided tension that they had on the jade moon

i want them to be involuntary friends. I want it to look like a huge 8ft tall straight* guy calling his obviously gay best friend a wretched bitch and everyone is a little uncomfortable about it except for duvall, who may or may not be behind lyke's bizarrely bad luck when it comes to flies landing in his drinks.

(*i don't think lyke is straight but i do think he's the type of bisexual man that people assume is straight)

[dent-de-leon]

every day I am in Agony over the fact that widomauk is the first kiss of the campaign, Caleb kissed Molly back in the very end, the literal last scene between King and Caleb is them flirting and King is still so utterly enamored with his Magician, and I just wish...there was any mention of those feelings in the wrap up or a q and a or anything. Absolutely begging Taliesin to tell us what Molly/King feels for Caleb--why he chose to make King's last moments on screen him being explicitly attracted to Caleb, and whether we will ever get to see him revisit those feelings one day...

[lunatic-pudge]

I do love I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream. I truly do. But I cringe inside every time I see people being down bad for Harlan Ellison. Like, guys, please, he wasn't a good person when he was alive. You should NOT be worshipping that man. I know you wouldn't be doing that for someone like H.P. Lovecraft, so WHY are you doing it with Harlan Ellison?

[keeps-ache]

trying to get my creative gears running again !!