#this place is not meant for humans

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

Books of 2024: ALWAYS NORTH by Vicki Jarrett.

To me, the scariest place on our entire planet is the Arctic, partially because the scariest thing on our entire planet are polar bears, which have been stalking my nightmares since middle school. So, of course, when I saw a fucked-up polar bear on the cover of a weird and fucked up maybe mystery maybe thriller definitely apocalyptic sci-fi adjacent book that takes place in the Arctic, I thought, "Oh yeah I should definitely start reading that at nighttime IMMEDIATELY while winter still nibbles on the edges of the weather, this is foolproof."

Reader: I am the Fool™.

I'm 80 pages in, and so far we've got weird inexplicable shit going on that we're trying to ignore, and we've been warned about bears SO Many Times All Over The Place (yikes), and we're now being stalked by a polar bear who has a History with the captain (borderline Moby Dick but make it a vicious land-capable predator), and time is fake because it's Always Daylight and we are doing Science on a Boat but make it Evil Capitalism also, and there's some neat textual framework going on with chapter headers, and I'm excited to see where this all goes!!

[boar-cry]

Gear Station is not haunted. No, Gear Station is alive and well.

A bit of an explanation below the cut:

I had this idea at the end of September, and it has had me in a death grip ever since.

I've always had a fascination with stories about haunted houses, of which aren't haunted by ghosts or demons or monsters, but are instead deemed haunted because the House itself is Alive. The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, Anatomy by KittyHorrorShow, House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, just to name a few.

But after a while, it got me thinking; if a House could be Haunted, then what else could? What about other feats of architecture? How about ships or stations?

And if Houses learn to hate because they are abandoned by humanity, can other places learn to love because they are loved by humanity?

Anyways, this is a very VERY long-winded way to say that two of my special interests have combined into the idea of Gear Station itself being Alive and watching over the twins and its other inhabitants. Hopefully nothing bad happens after realizing an eldritch Being is possessing your workplace, and I hope nothing bad further happens after realizing it Knows you! 🫶 surely nothing can go wrong!

[akkivee]

they've been potentially changing a lot with the shadow manga, but since maria's final words to shadow were how she loves him and amy's conversation with shadow in the joypolis collab was about how he is loved, i like to think sonic team is still hinting at amy's ability to touch his heart lol

[mxtxfanatic]

Let’s talk Yi City Arc! I’ve seen a few posts since my time in the fandom that talks about the Yi City Arc as unnecessary or out of place in the whole of the mdzs narrative. I’ve even seen some suggest that the disconnect is because Yi City was originally a separate story to mdzs, a sort of prototype, if you will, to explain it away. I, too, after my first read questioned the significance of this arc to the overall story. However, the Yi City arc and its placement so early in the novel is actually just a huge and very clever spoiler to most of the important plot points of the overarching story… if you know what plot points to look for, which an un-spoiled first-time reader would not. So let’s talk about those spoilers:

1) The righteous cultivation clans’ refusal to stand against evil—and, really, their indulgence of it—leads to the wiping out of an entire clan and a monastery as well as the deaths of two powerful cultivators unaffiliated with any major sect.

The “righteous” cultivation clans happily ignore that fact that the Jin Clan is amassing power through unscrupulous guest disciples, and it is only when Xiao Xingchen, an outsider, brings the crime against the Chang Clan to light do they bother to pretend to do anything about it. However behind the scenes, the Jin Clan assassinates their only real opposition, and the other clans, great and small, continue to do nothing as Xue Yang is released to commit another massacre. The Jin are never held responsible for their actions. Likewise, all the clans turn away from Wei Wuxian, an outsider, when he calls out the Jin Clan’s crimes against the Wen remnants and accuses them of amassing power via poaching vassal clans and attempting to steal his tools. Behind the scenes, the Jin work to undermine Wei Wuxian’s reputation before joining in to massacre Wei Wuxian and the Wen remnants. The Jin are never held accountable for this, which directly leads into the Xue Yang situation.

2) Xiao Xingchen has his reputation slandered by Xue Yang killing others using his sword.

After Xiao Xingchen kills himself, Xue Yang begins using his sword to enact “vengeance” on the remnants of the Chang Clan, who he considers as having “betrayed” Xiao Xingchen. Finding the signature of Xiao Xingchen’s sword on the slain bodies leads the cultivation world to believe that a disillusioned Xiao Xingchen is killing in revenge. In much the same way, Wei Wuxian is used as a scapegoat by the cultivation world whenever bad things happen, such as the presence of walking corpses or the mass digging of graves. In neither situation does any clan investigate the true events of the situations, happy to blame the easiest suspect and allow the unrest to continue. In both situations, Xiao Xingchen and Wei Wuxian are eventually found innocent of the crimes for which they are accused, and the true culprit is revealed.

3) Xiao Xingchen is betrayed by someone he considered close to him, which eventually leads to his death.

Xiao Xingchen, due to being literally blinded by his sacrifice, ends up running into, rescuing, and caring for his mortal enemy, Xue Yang. Taking advantage of Xiao Xingchen’s blindness, Xue Yang tricks him into murdering a bunch of innocents and his best friend, causing him to commit suicide. Wei Wuxian, similarly, is betrayed by a close friend he kept near, figuratively blinded by a former childhood friendship and the present debt he felt owed to said friend’s parents. This misplaced trust directly leads to his death.

4) Xiao Xingchen must give up his eyes for Song Lan to see again, because Baoshan Sanren is not magical.

This is probably the biggest spoiler of the entire arc, but by the time you get to where this information is relevant, you’d probably have forgotten that this was even said. Xue Yang blinds Song Lan after destroying his home, and to atone for this, Xiao Xingchen goes to his master, Baoshan Sanren, to beg for her help. However, Baoshan Sanren cannot make something out of nothing. Mxtx explicitly writes that tidbit into the narration. Song Lan goes up the mountain blind and comes down with eyes. Xiao Xingchen goes up the mountain with eyes and comes down blind. Song Lan was given Xiao Xingchen’s eyes.

Much later in the story, Jiang Cheng loses his golden core. Wei Wuxian offers the miracle solution of Baoshan Sanren “giving” him a new one. Jiang Cheng, obviously skeptical, questions Wei Wuxian up until the moment he must go up “Baoshan Sanren’s mountain” alone. Wei Wuxian descends, alone, looking pale and weak. Later, when Wei Wuxian is ambushed by the Wen, Wen “Core-melting Hand” Zhuliu touches him and is visibly shocked by a discovery that he then keeps to himself. Jiang Cheng emerges from the mountain with a new golden core, while Wei Wuxian emerges from the Burial Mounds with a new cultivation method wholly independent of the need for a golden core. The Yi City arc tells us why this is: “Baoshan Sanren” cannot make something out of nothing.

And these are just the major parallels I remember off the top of my head. However, while a reread makes a lot of these parallels directly applicable to specific plot points in Wei Wuxian’s own story, I would argue that the biggest role the explicit paralleling is meant to play for a new reader is to make you question the dominant narrative of the main story. The narration tells us that Wei Wuxian is a bloodthirsty man who may as well be a demon, known for cruelty and vengeance. We see none of that from his character when he is resurrected. Then we get a mini-drama where a man with attributes Wei Wuxian directly relates to, with a story Wei Wuxian directly compares to his own life, is scapegoated by society, killed, then eventually vindicated. If nothing else, the Yi City Arc is meant to make you, as a reader, stop and go “Hey, wait a minute, what if Wei Wuxian isn’t the bad guy here???” And once you understand that, you should start questioning everything the prologue told you, just like the juniors start to question what they were told about Xiao Xingchen post Yi City in their group debrief.

[ruporas]

hello there, angel

[ID: Digital illustration in color of Vash and Wolfwood from Trigun Maximum. Vash is sitting facing the viewer and holds a rose between his clasped together hands, but he’s looking to the left, upwards, at Wolfwood, with an awed expression. Wolfwood hovers over him with wings sprouting from his back. He has a cigarette lit between his lips, his arms and legs are crossed, and he looks back at Vash with a neutral expression. The both of them are covered in a blue shadow, casted by Wolfwood and his hovering form, while warm light hits the back of his wings and over Vash’s legs. Small feathers sits next to Vash. End ID]

[whatudottu]

Combined with the mortifying realisation that loopified Odile (now named Nokosu) took me multiple hours to draw the first time, I decided to try and make one speak in Japanese :) :) :)

The Japanese sentences will be under the cut plus a more literal translation and some research notes-

自分は遺残の神である。「遺す」と呼んでもいいし、「残」の字を使ってもいい。お前 の草白鳥は、すでにお前 の小烏から 「イサ 」という名前を取っている。二人の人間に同じ名前を使うのは混乱しないか？ヴォーガルド語の「サ」の発音は「ザ」に近いので、特に必要である。そうだろう？

or in Romaji

Jibun wa izan no kamidearu. 'Nokosu' to yonde mo īshi, 'zan' no ji o tsukatte mo ī. Omae no kusa hakuchō wa, sudeni omae no ko karasu kara `Isa' to iu namae o totte iru. Futari no ningen ni onaji namae o tsukau no wa konran shinai ka? Vu~ōgarudo-go no 'sa' no hatsuon wa 'za' ni chikainode, tokuni hitsuyōdearu. Sōdarou?

Literally translated Nokosu says;

I am the god of remains. You may call me “Nokosu", or you may use the [Chinese character] for “remain". Your grass swan has already taken the name “Isa” from your little crow. Isn't it confusing to use the same name for two people? It is especially necessary since the pronunciation of “sa” in Vaugarde is close to “za”. Wouldn't you agree?

And for the explanations of a monolingual English speaker with barely even surface level understanding of Japanese.

Throughout my entire journey, Jisho.org kanji dictionary has been my saving grace and backbone in my choice of Nokosu's name and what first and second person pronouns one uses. My initial goal was to find a name for survival or persistance which lead to me finding terms like; 存続 (sonzoku) meaning survival, 存 meaning exist and 続 meaning continue; 耐久 (taikyuu) meaning endurance, 耐 meaning the affix -proof (of bulletproof or soundproof), 久 meaning long time; and finally 遺残 (izan) meaning persistence, 遺 meaning bequeath, 残 meaning remainder.

To kinda help expand my knowledge of the terms I was using, I also used a combination of google translate (primarily for the pronunication of words less the actual translations) and DeepL to kinda get the sweet deets and found that izan had meant - a more common definition - remains. It. Was. Perfect.

Perfect save for one thing... Isa- Sure, Isabeau is his full name and written down Isabeau and Izan are unique enough, but technically functionally the 'sa' in French (and thus in Vaugardian) is more voiced than the 'sa' in Japanese and sounds more like the 'za' in izan, and to have Odile refer to Nokosu as Izan when "only [Siffrin] call[s] him Isa" is an in-game quote; to say I was miffed was an understatement.

But then... I turned to words that use those individual kanji and hoped to mix and match to find what I wanted.

My first direction was to turn each kanji into hiragana to find their pronunciations and piece together a word from that; 遺 in isolation is noko, 残 in isolation is zan. Finding the term no ko zan-kiri (のこざん切り) on google gave me 'chopped into pieces' which well- look at my design that's a lot of pieces! のこ残 or nokozan (turning the first character into hiragana of course) lead me to 'remnants of a servant's body' as it's main translation on DeepL, but it also provided 'backbreaking exertions' as well as 'remnants of a defeated soldier'. Plus using DeepL again izan itself full kanji gave me 'vestiges' 'bequest' 'afterlife' and the ever present 'remains'.

None of these however were getting me closer to an ample replacement for izan however, not until I returned to jisho.org to pick out words from a list using either kanji.

Turns out, both 遺 and 残 can be pronounce 'noko' so long as it is followed by the hiragana す or su. And guess what either spelling of the word translates into? The 遺す version meaning to leave (behind), to bequeath, and the 残す version meaning that same thing but more, to leave (undone), to save/to reserve, to stay (in the ring).

SO! SO! That is how Nokosu came to be named! But- what about the Japanese phrase I wrote?

Well- let's stay on the Nokosu theme now that any Japanese readers in my audience have already processed the meta-joke that can only really exist in Japanese writing (or maybe not a joke but like... a fourth wall acknowledgement). Nokosu already introduces oneself as 遺す though doesn't mention how to spell it (since it's already spelt out to the reader), then introduces the second variant of the spelling exclusively referring to the second kanji of Izan 残 as zan. Maybe it's not really a joke but it'd kinda be like the 'you use he/they, it's in your profile' equivalent.

I suppose an attempt at a joke was Odile thinking 'a very wordy Expression', but that's mostly from observing that translations through DeepL stopped run on sentences occuring from English to Japanese so... I have no idea if constant uses of commas isn't particularly Japanese, at least the joke would be that Nokosu is particularly more chatty than Odile might normally be.

And once again, people who know Japanese may have noticed the use of jibun (自分) and omae (お前) for Nokosu's pronouns. Lowkey I was thinking initially of making Nokosu's first person pronoun oira a la sans undertale 'country bumpkin' but found more interesting things with jibun and omae that I settled on those versions. jibun, a neutral formality pronoun literally meaning 'oneself', when used as a personal pronoun (like Nokosu does) it's with a sense of separation of distance to the self; I also found out in my translation hunt that jibun can be used as a second person pronoun which is very fucking fitting given who Nokosu talks to, but that's specifically from in the Kansai dialect and - well - I can't say for certain where Odile hails from especially since Japan in ISAT is Ka Bue, but she'd be well educated enough to connect the dots that Nokosu lays down. On the other hand, Nokosu's second person pronoun is omae (Fist of the North Star fans will remember it from the very iconic 'omae wa mou shindearu'), which is incredibly informal and very rude when said to elders (though in age technically Nokosu is older) as it's meant to express the speaker's higher status in non-casual relationships.

To note, though omae can be used by both genders, it and jibun are mostly used by men and in the case of omae it's more commonly used to refer to their wife or lover. This has a little extra significance to background headcanon where Nokosu calls Odile Nanafushi (七節) or literally walking stick AKA a stickbug as ones version of 'Stardust', but sometimes Nokusu would split the word in half and refer to Odile as 'Nana' which in English sounds like one is referencing a grandma but (BUT) I'm specifically using the French term which translates to 'chick' 'babe' 'girlfriend'. So when I saw that omae can also be used for that purpose, it really goes to show that at some point Nokosu had the time to perfectly craft a version of oneself that does get on Odile's nerves and has the gall to get away with it at least initially under the assumption that one is an Expression.

I've been trying to make this flow from one point to another but I don't know how to jump to Japanese nicknames, at least not the metaphorical ones that I used here (and took inspiration from the Word of God Odile nickname for Siffrin 'Little Crow'). What little I do know about Japanese nicknames is that they may take alternate readings of single kanji as a nickname or repeat a character, though that is in reference to Japanese names in the first place. I did see something about the metaphorical sort of nicknames that have connotations in the language itself but- honestly this is my most monolingual English moment yet. I will explain however what I did decide.

草白鳥 or kusa hakuchou is the character for grass 草, and the kanji combination for swan 白鳥. In DeepL however 草白鳥 translates to grasshopper and though I signifcantly lack the cultural context to know what grasshopper symbology has in Japan, I do know in English you call someone a 'grasshopper' because they're tall. But why start with grass swan at all? Well- maybe it's a stretch for whatever fantasy time-period ISAT takes place in to use an internet term but, 草 has been used in internet slang to mean lol or haha since 'w' is also a version of lol or haha, and when spammed like so - wwwwwwwwwwwww - it looks like grass. The reason for swan would be because of I guess this idea of beauty? Less due to Odile specifically considering Isabeau beauty and more so taking note of his care to his appearance - whether it be how he presents his perception of his appearance or how he makes people belief a different thing about what his views about his appearance are, white swan or black swan - and that whatever the case is, he does take pride in maintaining that appearance; a retroactive meaning to the nickname, especially when Isa starts more casually bringing up the fact he *had* Changed, would be an incidental reference to the ugly duckling, who ended up not being a duckling at all and was a swan all along. Whether the nickname actually works or not I don't really know, but what it boils down to Odile's nickname for him (and thus Nokosu's only title for him beyond fighter) would really mean 'funny (tall) beauty' which would probably fluster Odile to admit it as Isa would hearing it.

An interesting thing I found while finding kanji for little crow (specifically 小烏) was that there is actually kind of already a word for it already, Kogarasu Maru or 小烏丸, AKA "Little Crow" which is a unique tachi sword rumoured to be crafted by a legendary swordsmith like-! I don't know if that was at all intentional on Insertdisc5's part (and if I should change the pronunciaton of the romaji version of the original text to kogarasu), but beyond Siffrin's little habit to collect every little thing that shines and doesn't, what do you mean there's a unique tachi sword named 'little crow' that's like literally so Siffrin-coded I SWEAR TO GOD!

Oh, and I played ISAT in Japanese to get the correct spelling of Vaugarde and 語 (go) is just the suffix for language AKA the difference between Nihon the country and Nihongo the language okay BYE!

[triglycercule]

horror is so BLESSED he's the only one out of the murder time trio that has actual good people trying to influence his story 💔💔 dust and killer were both driven to INSANITY because of the choices of their respective humans but horror??? every time without FAIL the polls for horrortale's plotline have always ended in a good place for aliza (either by bettering her relationships/reputation or for her to just. not DIE)

horrortale's potential alternate timelines my beLOVEd🙏🙏 they're SO lucky that we're being kind and benevolent hehe (≧ω≦) now where are the aus based off the possible different outcomes that could've happened in horrortale HUH???? (like how aliza couldve killed toriel or chosen horror's puzzle or gone with undyne to the core........)

[ribbononline]

Howdy just wanted to let you know how much I love your fantasy AI and how cute the designs are!

Assuming you meant Fantasy AU haha- Thank you! Ive admittedly been playing with their design a little in the background (And it hink I posted some sketches before? though im unsure if I tagged them) since some of them looked. a little too human ((sorry archie i LOVE selkies but untransformed it truly is just a fur coat. which. isnt great for a more tropical setting)) but the core of it has never changed lol I love modern fantasy

The designs are half inspired by Pokémon now, though not tooooo intensly.

Max is still mosty faun, but leant a little more into full furry for him I guess. Cope old man.

Archie has been changed from selkie which HORTS but alas i lacked the skills to draw him cool. He's just a general mercreature now. He has legs but he's half fish in design he can breathe underwater. You get it

Others I've had thoughts on:

May gets to be torchic in harpy form. She's a rare case, as she can naturally do some magic! She can Breathe Fire. Very fun for her parents. She can't fly, but she can kind of flutter- which is great for parkouring around! Active kid. Due to lacking arms/hands she uses her legs/talons for most things instead

I want Courtney to be Meowstic inspired, probably with some/devil/demon inspo for the monster part? But I admittedly haven't thought of a design Im happy with yet. She also has some natural magic! Again, not supposed to be very common. She can levitate stuff and throw around psychic shockwaves if she's mad. She tried studying to be a witch for a little while, but she didn't really like it.

Lisia is Mostly Just Regular Lisia except the cloud fluff on her outfit is part of her lol. She's a combination of Swablu inspired and a full on wind spirit. She looks normal most of the time but if a strong wind catches on her physical form literally temporarily blows away into clouds. She can control the condensation in the air around her- which is almost entirely useless, except she can use it to create rainbows behind her. Great idol trick

Zinnia gets some fun dragon traits, and also lives up to her Lorekeeper title. While there's plenty of common spells written down and going around, Zinnia has access to and protects a lot of more powerfull forgotten stuff. Most imporantly Delta Magic, which... Functions via Totally Not Mega Stones, and allows the user unlimited access to type magic for as long as it's active. It's pretty draining, but it's the only time that actual world changing magic can be made to happen, rather then more mundane or minor stuff

[venomouslilith]

.

[scrawnytreedemon]

While I intend this blog to remain a largely news-free space due to the constant hellstate of the world, let me be clear that I stand in full support of both the Palestinian and Jewish peoples who are currently experiencing relentless hate and suffering in these horrid times.

I am disgusted at the number of people, especially "progressives" on this website who have used this situation to spread both Islamophobia and Antisemitism. This goes double if you dared to reblog those "punch nazis/fascists <3" and "[x] are welcome here!" posts while in the next breath spreading dangerous fucking narratives that kill people.

So many people in online political spaces evidently see this as nothing more than a case of picking "sides", when ultimately what matters is supporting the oppressed against fascist governments and militias, wherever they are.

Common people will always have more alike with each other than their leaders. This is not a novel concept. Your activism should always be motivated by love and compassion first, and hatred second. If you use your beliefs as an excuse to find an acceptable target to vent your hatred towards regardless of the actual material outcome, you are no fucking activist.

You're a bigot.

[sneaky-snake-907]

Why are you focusing on cracking ciphers when you could be focused on Cipher's crack?

[edwardwonghaupepelutivrusky4th]

wah i looove their designs and animation...

[jamiethebeeart]

47th (?) coloring submission for @green-with-envy-phandom-event with lineart by @foxyteah

.... was i thinking up a whole plot for this au while coloring? yeah. yeah i was.

[bleue-flora]

I don’t think I’ll ever get over how Sapnap just jumps to the book as if his friend’s suffering meant nothing, as if the Revival Book not the torture was the big takeaway (even though he should have known about the book already)…

[clip] SAPNAP: “Dream, I told you to stay in there, didn’t I?”
DREAM: “…What are you saying”
SAPNAP: “I told you to stay in there. Why did you get out?”
DREAM: “What do you mean, ‘why did I get out?!’”
SAPNAP: “Why did you get out?!
DREAM: “Oh, you want me to rot?!—I was getting tortured. You want me to rot in prison forever?!”
SAPNAP: “You’ve been tortured?—Who is torturing you?… You were getting tortured?”
DREAM: “Yeah, Quackity was torturing me.”
SAPNAP: “Quackity was torturing you?… What do you mean he was torturing you? Like literally torturing you?”
DREAM: “Yes!—He was trying to get the revival book and so he was torturing me.
SAPNAP: “The revival book?…What revival book?”
DREAM: “It’s a long story.”
SAPNAP: “Do you have it on you now?”
DREAM: “No, I don’t…”
SAPNAP: “Where is it?”

Not Purpled’s reaction of ‘that couldn’t have happened because they don’t let anyone in there’ not Foolish’s reaction of ‘is that true, Sam?’ but ‘what book? do you have it now? where is it?’ not shock or concern for his friend but greed for the very thing Dream was tortured for…

[kingofanemptyworld]

are we in agreement that this is a downgrade in terms of character design or am I delusional?

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...