#truly my manifesto

[thepersonperson]

Sukuna’s Loneliness Part 4 (Sukuna’s Negative Rizz)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Some warnings before we start.

1) This analysis deals with sexual topics.

2) I will be mainly using the TCB scans because of their accessibility. Raws are from mangareader(.)to.

3) This was written as of JJK 262 266. (I'm just going to keep updating this until I stop finding things I should've noticed earlier.)

4) The raws broke me in ways you cannot possibly imagine.

(Click images for captions/citations.)

Fighting as Communication

Baki the Grappler. This is a manga where men destroy each other’s bodies as a test of strength. It’s poorly written but the art is terrifying and I love it so dearly. Between fights of extreme violence and body horror the characters eat. And that’s it. That’s the manga.

I bring Baki up because Gege is a huge fan of Fujimoto Tatsuki, the creator of Chainsawman. Fujimoto is a fan of Gege too, but more importantly, he is a huge fan of Itagaki Keisuke, the creator of Baki. (His daughter made Beastars btw.) In a way, this means Jujutsu Kaisen has been influenced by Baki. But that’s not a surprise, a lot of manga is.

Itagaki’s work is so massively influetial on Japanese media that it’s kind of hard to grasp since it’s not as popular overseas. When listening to interviews from various Japanese creators, Baki will often be cited as a major influence. And the thing is, you can tell when a creative has read Baki. There’s nothing quite like it. If you’ve read Baki and consume Chainsawman, you will see its bones everywhere. I feel the same about Jujutsu Kaisen.

The main antagonist in Baki is Yujiro Hanma. He is the strongest creature alive. So much so that he has no one to call a rival. He’s bored. He causes trouble. He kills his wife to motivate his son, Baki into becoming stronger. His son, Baki, who he grooms into becoming a fighter that might beat him in combat one day. Kind of sounds like Sukuna, right?

But that’s not my point here. My focus is how Baki doubles as a discussion about strength and manhood. It’s aggressively bisexual. Men love each other with their fists. Straight up the main character says having sex with women is the same thing as fighting men.

And it just doesn’t stop there. The homoerotic nature of the fights is never shyed away from. Here’s an example of my favorite.

He grabs his balls and compliments their size. That’s pretty gay, right? Well there’s this reanimated prehistoric caveman called Pickle that fights Baki’s brother Jack. And how do they fight? They kiss.

I didn’t call it a kiss. Itagaki did. I didn’t say they melded together. Itagaki did. This mangaka overtly calls attention to the homoerotic nature of men fighting men, and how men communicate their love for each other through violence. And yes, it’s sexual. Itagaki wants you to read it that way.

But sometimes he doesn’t want you to read it that way. Sometimes the fights are a dialogue, an emotional conversation. Like one between father and son.

Itagaki is a master of narrative framing. When he wants you to feel a certain way, you will feel it. He also tells his readers that there’s more to the fights than just fighting.

Those are the ideas that help me see the bones of Baki in other works. Men loving men with violence. Men communicating with men through violence. I see these ideas in Jujutsu Kaisen too.

Jujutsu Communication

I’ve gone over how Yuji commucates with other people on their own terms. And a lot of it is through fighting. A conversation without words, learning how someone works. Yuji is good at using fights as tool of communication.

But he’s not the one who tells you that there’s more to the fights than just fighting. Maki does in her spar with the sumo guy.

Just like Baki. Fighting is a means of communication. Gege has told you that there can be more to the fights than fighting. It's a tool used to understand the self and others.

With that in mind, I want to reexamine a particular fight under the lens of Baki rather than Umineko.

Sukuna vs Gojo

Baki tells you that homoerotic readings of its fights are intentional. If you ask me, this probably stems from historical stances on masculinity and homosexuality in ancient Japan. Men loved men and women differently, but both were ok. That’s how Baki can have a girlfriend and his gay fights. Peak bisexual optimization.

What does Jujutsu Kaisen have to do with this? Well it has been extremely queer friendly. We have a multidue of canonical trans characters, non-binary characters, and other flavors of queer characters not disparaged for their identities, Gojo Satoru included. It may not be stated outright, but Gojo and Geto do love each other in a gay way. The subtext is so persisent it’s basically text.

In other words, Gege has already told us, yes please have queer readings of this text. It’s the same way Baki tells you, yes this is straight up convoluded gay sex. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to reread the Sukuna and Gojo fight as some ridiculous mating display between two men who are fighting over can miscommunicate their intent the hardest.

Framed as Courtship

Let’s start with the framing. The pre-fight set up. How does text tell you queer readings are allowed?

Kenjaku does. It’s romantic. It’s a date. This reading has been made valid explicitly. And if there’s room for doubt because of the sarcasm? There’s still additional support for it.

We already know how badly in love Gojo is with Geto. The fight is on the 24th of December, the most romantic day in Japan. And in a fun little Geto parallel, who declared the start of war on this day, violence underlines this new romantic venture.

That doesn’t include Sukuna who recalls Yorozu’s words about teaching love in the context of marriage.

Gojo never heard that conversation which is why the next point is absolutely insane.

The outfit Gojo initially is in resembles that of a groom at a Shinto wedding.

Shinto weddings were implemented after the Heian era. Part of the ceremony includes a priest and a shrine maiden who respectively stand to the right and left of the altar. A purification ritual will occur, lead by the priest, to cleanse the shrine before vows are exchanged. Gakuganji is the priest and Utahime is the shrine maiden. To the right and left of Gojo respectively.

The bride at a Shinto wedding wears mainly white. After the 200% Hollow Purple cleanses the area, the dark shawl is removed and Sukuna remains in mostly white.

How interesting that this battle has been framed as one between groom and bride.

The thing is, marriage in the Heian era was far more lax. There were no major ceremonies. If a man was interested in marrying a woman, he would visit her for 3 nights after receiving approval from her father. Upon the passing of their 3rd night together, the family would have an informal celebration of their union in private. Even after marriage, multiple partners were allowed and sometimes encouraged.

Yorozu’s big celebration proposal to Sukuna and banning of concubines was quite improper by Heian standards. Though it is in line with modern marriages. If Sukuna did not consume any Shinto wedding literature, he probably didn’t recognize that Gojo was dressed as a groom.

But did Gojo dress this way for Sukuna intentionally? The Toji fit served an entirely different purpose. It’s the robes and pre-fight ceremony that catch my attention. So I propose the following:

1) Gojo dressed up as a groom to die and be wed with his one and only Geto in death.

2) Gojo dressed up as a groom in part as an offering to Sukuna. And because Sukuna is from the Heian era it went over his head entirely.

3) Gojo intended for both of these things at the same time and left who he would end up with to fate.

Regardless of what Gojo was going for here, it’s a visual cue combined with the knowledge of it being Dec 24th that encourages the reader to perhaps consider the fight as something other than just a fight. A date perhaps? Kenjaku made the connection and neither Gojo or Sukuna really denied it. Gojo gave the weak excuse of a death anniversary confusion. But much weirder, given how hostile he was to Yorozu, Sukuna did not object to the romantic framing in any capacity.

Am I reaching? Is this reading intentional?

When I start getting this confused by how a translated work wants me to read it, I try to refer to the original language text and anyone who knows it for missing context. Sometimes localizations add things that weren’t there or push readers towards one interpretation. So for the rest of this analysis, I’m going to be focusing on the raws.

I’m going to be honest. My Japanese fudging sucks. I can barely read kanji and can’t reliably translate anything. Feel free to correct me if I got something wrong. That being said, with what little I do know, I have discovered something interesting.

In this post I talked about how weird Sukuna’s manner of speech is. I focused on his you pronoun usage of お前 (Omae) for everyone else and 貴様 (Kisama) for Gojo since this is a strong indicator of how a character views their relationship to someone.

Here's a summary of the two points I made in that post:

1) Omae is informal and either a casual thing amongst peers or indicates the speaker's higher status. Since Sukuna is arrogant, we can reasonably assume he's talking down to people.

2) Kisama historically was a formal show of respect, but in modern times it is a hostile insult, much more rude than Omae. Since Sukuna is 1,000 years old and hates Yuji (who he uses Omae with), we can reasonably assume Sukuna was being friendly to Gojo when he used Kisama.

With that pronoun usage in mind, while examining the raws for the infamous “You Cleared My Skies” speech I found this:

Kisama. Sukuna is very happy and lavishing Gojo with praise. The assumption it was formal from the start seems to be correct. It's hard to read this any other way.

Though Japanese can easily be dubious in its interpretation, there are instances where context can cut off all other readings. I truly believe this one of those cases.

Now, to confirm Sukuna is still only treating Gojo this way I started looking at his you pronouns as he got excited post-Gojo death. Maki is the person he seems to admire the most.

He’s still just using Omae. What does that mean? Gojo is in his own fudging category for Sukuna and he has been there since the start of the manga. (For more on why this is significant, refer to this post.)

Wow ok. That’s pretty intense! We’ve got Gojo dressed up as a groom on December 24th and Sukuna treating Gojo different from anyone else. I read their fight again under the lens of explicit courtship and focused in on these specific panels.

Satisfaction. Now that’s a word that can easily carry a sexual connotation. Love as well. The parallel syntax fascinated me in English. So I decided to look at the raws and see how close they are.

Pretty much the same except for "the one who will teach you love" and "the one satisfying him now". Since the one being satisfied is Gojo by Sukuna, it really seems we can assume the one being taught love is Gojo by Sukuna.

Time to learn some Japanese again!

Kanji has multiple readings. Most have at least two. The Onyomi (Chinese) reading typically used for nouns and the Kunyomi (Japanese) reading typically used for verbs. (This is not always the case but it’s the basics.)

That’s probably why 満 is read as まん (man) when Gojo and Geto are talking about “satisfaction” using the On version and み (mi), the Kun version, when the narrator is talking about who “satisfies” who.

However 満 on its own does not mean satisfaction. It means full. To be filled. Or fullness. 足 (zoku) is added as a modifier after 満 to be read as satisfaction 満足 (manzoku). 足 usually means feet, but it can also mean to be sufficient. Manzoku therefore has a direct translation of being sufficiently full. It’s not a surprise a lot of food places in Japan use Manzoku in their names or advertising.

But what’s this? Why is this sentence written as 満たして or Mi(tashite) instead of 満足して or Manzoku(shite)? The addition of Zoku is what transforms Man into "satisfying". Without the Zoku, it’s just "fill". The means this sentence can be read as “The one filling him up now is—”

We’ve already established that the blank is Sukuna. The new problem is that he’s filling Gojo up. And boy, does that sound homoerotic to put it lightly. But perhaps I am reaching.

So I did what any sane person would do in this situation. I read hentai.

Surely if the phrase 満たして (mitashite) can carry a sexual connotation I will find it in hentai.

...

I immediately found a yaoi doujin called Fill me with your Big Love aka おっきな愛で満たして (Okkina Ai de Mitashite). Honestly, I found too many doujins about creampies specifically. (You have internet access verify this yourself.) When you search Manzokushite the results are much more in line with life satisfaction than sexual satisfaction. ...So Gege decided to use the more frisky phrasing.

Manzoku is also the name of an active sex toy manufacturer (I’m not linking them use a search engine.) and a discontinued adult entertainment news company. So the satisfaction Gojo and Geto talk about, along with Geto using 妬 (ya), the jealous kanji often used between lovers, is definitely probably carrying a sexual connotation too.

So, I’m not reaching. What the fudge did Gege mean by this?

Now that we've established that I am NOT reaching. What do we do with this information?

Well, we ruminate on the fight with the knowledge that Sukuna, of his own volition, decided to get Gojo off, probably.

I have forgiven Nanami for calling Gojo a pervert. If I watched someone bust a nut after being cut in half by his sworn enemy instead of saving the country, I too would be like what the fudge.

Anyways, the typical phrase used for an orgasm in Japanese is 行く(iku). It translates as to go. And yes it can mean to die, as in going to the other side. To die and go to heaven if you will. Which is what Gojo did with a big old smile on his face.

There’s also the term 心天 (tokoroten). It refers to a dish were a semi-opaque white substance is pushed through holes to create noodles. Literal translation using the kanji for heart 心 (kokoro) and the kanji for heaven 天 (ten). (Don’t ask me why them being smack together turns the Koroko into Tokoro. I don’t know.) Which in slang refers to prostate orgasms. This has nothing to do with this analysis I wanted to drop this fun fact in here. …And this image of Sukuna clutching his heart while looking at someone he sent to heaven.

(This is a reach but the idea of this being an elaborate gay pun amuses me greatly.)

I have another fun slang term: 賢者タイム (kenjataimu) which directly translates to sage 賢者 (kenja) time タイム (taimu). This refers to post-nut clarity sending someone into a meditative-like state.

Oh that’s a bit familiar. Sukuna was giving sagely advice to Kashimo and reflecting on satisfaction and love.

And what’s this? Mitashite has made a reappearance! Sukuna is saying “I’ve never thought about needing another person to fill me up.” Which 1. further supports the 'The one satisfying/filling him (Gojo) now is—Sukuna.' reading and 2. suggests Sukuna is a top suggests Sukuna really doesn’t have sexual interest in people. (Since the context of this convo is relationships and love.)

By the way. Acts of eating in Japanese can be modified to carry sexual meanings. It’s a bit more suggestive than English, but it carries over pretty well I think? 肉食系 (nikusokukei) refers to someone who aggresively pursues romantic or sexual relationships. Composed of the kanji 肉 (niku) for meat, 食 (ta) for eating, and 系 (kei) class. If you noticed, 食 isn’t usually read as Soku. It becomes Soku when paired with Niku for some reason. (I don’t know why someone please help me.) Side by side the kanji 肉食 (nikusoku) means meat-eater.

食 is still interesting on it’s own. The 食べる (taberu) reading is normal eating. The 食う(kuu) reading is an innuendo. It can mean to devour someone, like a cannibal, or devour someone sexually.

Sukuna has made it very clear that his eating of people is literal. There’s no innuendo. In fact, if you read into it, he’ll kill you (rip Yorozu and Kashimo).

Gojo, however, appears to be his sole exception to this rule. When Sukuna tells Kashimo not to spoil his pleasure he uses the kanji 興 (kyou). This of course can be directly translated as pleasure, but the Chinese reading of it can also indicate intense excitement or sexual arousal.

Sukuna is pretty good at double-entendre wordplay if his earlier stunts with the kanji for Enchain doubling as Megumi Activities if read a different way is anything to go by. He's a fan of Chinese literature. It's not a stretch to assume there's more going on here.

And if notoriously homophobic Reddit dudebros are posting things like this. Maybe there's a lot more merit to this reading than I can currently grasp.

I’m still pretty convinced Sukuna is aroace. That of course doesn’t bar him from pursuing romantic or sexual relationships. Sometimes there’s the one exception. Sometimes the desire to be with and please an allo partner allows for engagement of activities they aren’t into. Sometimes the actions are pursued without the emotional attachment because they physically feel good. There’s also the gray-scale and demi labels to consider.

With that in mind, I want to emphasize this all points to how important Gojo is to Sukuna regardless of sexuality. He tried to engage with and understand Gojo on terms he won’t for anyone else. And he’s been pursuing this connection relentlessly since the start of manga.

Sukuna’s Negative Rizz

Ok I established that reading the Sukuna vs Gojo fight as unhinged courtship is supported by the text. That doesn’t really say anything about Sukuna sucking at it.

But, my dear reader, that in of itself is proof of his negative rizz. I had to sit down. Learn about Heian era and Shinto wedding rituals, learn more Japanese, splice seemingly unrelated manga panels together, read hentai, and know that Gege is into yaoi to come to this conclusion. I had to rip every little shred of characterization and context apart and rearrange it into something comprehensible.

You know who can’t do that? Gojo.

As far as Gojo is concerned, Sukuna hates him. Kisama is an extremely hostile you pronoun in modern times. And if Gojo can’t tell Shoko (his closest friend after Geto) is stressed over him being used like a meat puppet by her visibly falling back on her addiction, he’s going to default to the assumption Sukuna hates him just as much as everyone else.

And Gojo does just that. He assumes he failed to reach Sukuna. Despite how often they did hand to hand combat and weaponized their knowledge of each other, Gojo believes they never had proper conversation through fighting. He dies not understanding Sukuna, convinced the other was not trying to communicate with him at all.

And if you recall, all of this fight occurred while Sukuna was wearing Megumi’s face. That boy is pretty much Gojo’s adopted child. From my experience, most single parents do not go looking for clones of their kids as partners.

If someone wore the skin of my family member I would assume they were trying to torment me. And torment Gojo Sukuna does. He draws attention to Megumi’s soul being used as collateral and attacks him with the 10 Shadows. We as the audience know this is all for the sake of getting past Infinity using his Shrine. Gojo doesn’t know that. He’s fighting an evil dude who is puppeting the body of his son for god knows what reason.

Seriously, Sukuna sucks at communicating intent.

In Part 3 of my examination of Sukuna’s loneliness, I said Dismantle is a tool Sukuna uses to understand. And that him upgrading it by making Gojo the center of his world was indicative of his desire to reach him. I also said his refusal to use it on Yorozu was him expressing how little interest he had in her.

Yorozu is pissed by this. She sees it as Sukuna rejecting her and I don’t think she’s wrong. Sukuna saved his special Cursed Technique (CT) for Gojo while turning Yorozu down. If we’re considering all the wedding imagery and references that started with Yorozu, I’m certainly allowed to read that as him saving himself for Gojo. (Think of how he lied to Gojo about being the first one he killed.)

There’s also the fact that Yorozu saw their battle as an expression love and lust—that the usage of CT is a type of foreplay under certain circumstances since it is an extension of the self. Combine that with the established premise that fighting is a type of a communication thanks to Maki vs Sumo Guy and you can start to see the courtship logic behind Sukuna’s treatment of Gojo.

If we are to read “The one who will teach you love is…Sukuna” there’s another adorable caveat. Yorozu uses the you pronoun あなた (Anata) for Sukuna.

It’s an informal you pronoun used by people learning Japanese. Native speakers try to avoid using it as it can come across as rude. But in the context of love? This is colloquially called the wife pronoun as its often used by a wife to her husband.

If you wanted to localize its usage in the way Yorozu means it, Anata might become “you, dear”. So here we have Sukuna dressed in white, like a bride to Gojo’s groom, thinking of him as Anata.

The problem is, Gojo doesn’t know that. Sukuna never bothered to open his mouth and say this was an act of love. Sure he told Kashimo in the most roundabout way possible, but Gojo was the one who needed to hear that. If a courtship is going to be this diabolically complicated, there has to be clear hints for the other party. JJK is not Umineko where there’s a witch that can revive the dead over and over until the idiot finally understands this was all for them.

Gojo also doesn’t have access to the kanji Sukuna uses to describe certain techinques or words. He hears the phonetics and runs with whatever best fits the context. This means there’s no way for him to catch the double-meaning unless he’s a certain type of lingust, which he is not. His manner of speech and personal interests don’t line up with the flowery language of the Heian Era. The types of written works Gojo is into are historical war politics from the Sengoku period (known for violence more than the fine arts), Shonen manga, and physics/math.

And what's this? According to CFYOW (the canon light novels): JJK Thorny Road at Dawn, Chapter 3 Asakusabashi Elegy, Gojo doesn't even like ancient poetry. You know, the thing Sukuna enjoys and tries to communicate with.

The Kokin Wakashu Gojo off-handedly disparages is a compilation of Hiean Era poetry known as Waka. This was the primary means of communication amongst the noble class and spiritual leaders at the time. And the thing is, this poetry is supposed to be read into. Down to the quality of stroke and paper, not just the kanji written. Especially for courtship.

It’s not that Gojo is stupid. He just doesn’t specialize in the studies that would give him a more critical ear to Sukuna's words. And Sukuna doesn’t seem to understand that no one in the modern era communicates like this anymore.

If you didn’t know, this is why Japanese characters introduce themselves they often describe what kanji their name is spelled with. Take for example: Satoru. He uses the kanji 悟 meaning enlightenment. This kanji can be read as Go instead of Satoru. Additionally, the name Satoru can be written in kanji as 聡 for smart, 智 for wisdom, 知 for knowledge, 了 for understanding, 哲 for philosophy, 聖 for virtuous, or 暁 for daybreak. That’s 8 different kanji possible if you hear the name Satoru.

This is why Sukuna’s wordplay for everything else can be easily missed by other characters. They hear the words and cannot read the kanji like us. Context decides what Sukuna means for them. And since Sukuna’s context for most is violence and insults, it’s very hard for them to think about his words in any other way.

And boy howdy does Gojo miss it. Sukuna straight up calls him his husband and it took me several rereads to catch it. While mocking Gojo for being unable to open his domain, Sukuna calls him "painfully ordinary". This is localized from the word 凡夫 (bonpu) which can also be translated as unenlightened. (A layered insult! Sukuna is pretty much saying Gojo's sorcery is so boring he shouldn't even call himself the Honored One.)

The thing is...Bonpu is comprised of the 2 kanji 凡 for mediocre, and 夫 for husband. (Please note that there are many other ways to call Gojo a ditz without using the kanji for husband.) And an update from the Replies: Turns out there's layers to the gayness too.

It's come full fudging circle. Gojo came dressed as a groom for a wedding and Sukuna thinks they're already married. The miscommunication is off the rails.

But wait! There's more...

Earlier I mentioned that the kanji for Enchain doubles as Megumi Activities. Let's break that down more. (Unfortunately the Twitter account of the person I referenced may or may not be nuked so here's this screenshot I've doctored.)

So we have the translation of Enchain from 契闊 (Keikatsu), which might be better localized as Separation.

This term comes from a Chinese poem about lovers who are husband and wife in The Book of Odes, Section I (Lessons from the States), Chapter 3 (The Odes of Bei), Poem 31 (Banging the Drum). (Here's a link to the full poem and context of it.)

In summary, it’s about a soldier who is on the brink of death, having lost nearly everything after being abandoned by those in power, lamenting the happiest days of his life with his love are ones he can never get back. (Hey that sounds just like what Sukuna did to Yuji!)

Keikatsu specifically comes from this passage:

“Our vow is beyond death and life”, I and you are together I always remembered. I will hold your hand, And together we grow old.

Too pitiful we are faraway apart, The distance separates us to meet again! Too miserable this takes forever, And it does not let us fulfill our vow!

Keikatsu is used to exemplify how the physical distance between the husband and wife prevents them from fulfilling their wedding vows. And that's just what Keikatsu/Enchain does to Yuji and Megumi, it causes painful separation neither of them wanted.

Keikatsu also tells Yuji exactly how Sukuna plans to do it. 契(kei)闊(katsu) can be written as 恵(kei)活(katsu). The kanji 恵 can be read as Kei or...Megumi. (It's the literal kanji used for his name.) The kanji 活 (katsu) can mean "activities", which is how we get Enchain=Megumi Activities.

A two for one special! Sukuna mocks Yuji for being so close with Megumi while telling him exactly how he's going to destroy their relationship.

It seems this has nothing to do with Gojo until you consider the 3rd possible reading from wordplay with 契闊 (Keikatsu). The kanji 契 when read as Kei refers to a promise, pledge or vow. When 契 read as Chigi? It can refer to sexual intercourse, especially between husband and wife.

So we have 契闊(keikatsu, separation), 恵(kei Megumi)活(katsu, activities), and 契(kei chigi, spousal sex)活(katsu, activities). It's no wonder he erased Yuji's memory of it.

Keep in mind, that when Sukuna uses Keikatsu, the only vow that he has made at this point is his promise to kill Gojo. He eventually does that using Megumi's body during a fight framed between groom and bride. And for reasons beyond their control, Sukuna and Gojo have been unable to fulfill that vow through lengthy separation.

Notes from poem "Banging the Drum" Sukuna references include the following:

"And during the operation, he lost his horse, which was a desperate situation (horses in ancient time carried soldier supply and weapons, are life companion for soldiers in advance or retreat), he lost his horse, his supply, maybe his armor and weapons, and the road he was facing that we may lose his life so he may never go back. In all these mess, he started searching, and somehow at this hopeless moment he started to revisit his happiest moment, when he together vowed in marriage ceremony with his wife, and he was even afraid that he might never see his love again."

"And His last statement for his true value is his home, his love, his fulfillment of his vow is his true duty. Hero's duty is to pursue love."

In Buddhism, which JJK is heavily influenced by, horses are a pretty big deal. Horses can represent the path to enlightenment, especially since The Buddha's horse is what takes him on this journey away from his wife and children. They separate in the end though, the horse dying of a broken heart.

Remember how Sukuna called Gojo unenlightened? He sort of guided Gojo to enlightenment using Mahoraga, whose Eight-Handed title is a reference to the Eightfold Path to be followed for enlightenment. Buddhist enlightenment is centered around liberation from suffering. (Just check the wiki entry to verify this.) Infinity was the source of Gojo's suffering and Sukuna cut right through it.

Sukuna has been running around with a broken heart for a good chunk of the post-Gojo fight. And if you take that into consideration with this poem and all the other symbolism, he's somehow a Buddha, a Bodhisattva, the dying husband, the widowed wife, and the heartbroken horse all at the same time. Not unlike his wordplay taking on every possible meaning at once.

But my point here is that Sukuna might’ve seen his fight with Gojo as consummation of their marriage. (There's probably a joke in here about the husband reaching climax while leaving his wife unsatisfied.) Remember in the wise words of Itagaki Keisuke, "Fighting and sex are exactly the same!"

In Conclusion?

This is possibly one of the most bizarre and elaborate expressions of love I have lost my mind over. Sukuna gave everything Gojo ever wanted from Jujutsu violently. He did it in such an unpleasant and cruel way that the target of his affection thought there was nothing between them. Sukuna also hid his intent under social norms that no longer exist. Unless Gojo happened to be into ancient literature, there was never a scenario where he would catch onto this. Sukuna's failure is critical on multiple levels.

It’s impressive. It really is. No one knows how Sukuna’s strange little brain works so he’s stuck being loner without anyone that fully understands him. (I’m still thinking about how Uraume didn’t know Sukuna was a twin for over 1,000 years.) He’d have to let people in and tell him outright, but he’s just like Gojo so I guess that’s never happening.

[wlwcatalogue]

Valentine's Special ~ Aerith/Tifa from Final Fantasy VII: Remake (Compilation)

Since today is Valentine’s Day, and FFVII: Rebirth is releasing at the end of this month, it’s the perfect time to get caught up on Aerith/Tifa, a.k.a. Aerti, a.k.a. possibly the most unexpected F/F ship in gaming! Here is what I consider to be the most comprehensive compilation of Aerti scenes from FFVII: Remake, prepared by yours truly for your viewing (and shipping) pleasure :)

Quick sales pitch: While Aerith is famously The One Who Dies and Tifa is known for her sexy character design, they are also popularly remembered as main character Cloud’s two equally appealing love interests, as attested to by one Robert Pattinson. However, just as the elements present in the original 1997 game Final Fantasy VII were expanded on and added to in FFVII: Remake, the relationship between Aerith and Tifa was also fleshed out… to the point where it became very, very easy to ship them together. To put it in Tumblr terms, it’s like Betty and Veronica, but taken in a different – but still (subtextually) gay – direction compared to Riverdale. Check out the video above, it's just 1.5 hours!

(Longer sales pitch / commentary below the cut)

Originally from the hit 1997 Japanese role-playing game Final Fantasy VII, Aerith and Tifa, along with the main character Cloud Strife, were one of the most famous love triangles of video games at the time, and arguably even now. (Note: Think Betty and Veronica (Archie but pre-Riverdale), or if you’re more familiar with anime, Rei and Asuka (Neon Genesis: Evangelion) or Saber and Rin (Fate: Stay Night).) Although they barely had any interactions together and really were primarily love interests for Cloud in the original game (and subsequent related works), the relationship between Aerith and Tifa was significantly more fleshed out in Final Fantasy VII: Remake (2020), going beyond your standard box-ticking “look, girl power!” exercise. There seems to have been many a fan who walked out of playing Remake who found Aerti (i.e. Aerith and Tifa’s relationship) memorable – whether read romantically or platonically – resulting in many GIFs, fanart, and even compilations of memorable scenes of their “friendship”.

Not only do they interact with each other outside of speaking about Cloud or other male characters (scraping a pass in the Bechdel test, yay!), Remake gives the relationship space to develop from “strangers who hit it off” to “individuals who care about and trust each other”. Significantly, Aerith is the one who seems to take Tifa’s concerns the most seriously and comfort her, and Tifa is also able to see past Aerith’s cheery façade and reach out to her at her times of greatest need. In my opinion, each of the pair offers the greatest emotional support to the other out of all the characters – even more than what they do for Cloud (or what Cloud does for them).

So what makes their relationship romantic rather than simply platonic to me (other than sheer force of will)? Even though there isn’t really any direct flirting or explicitly romantic lines, there are a number of moments which are framed romantically or parallel romantic moments between Cloud/Aerith or Cloud/Tifa. Perhaps the most obvious of this is when Tifa protects Aerith from falling (twice), which is animated and shot in a way which suggests that it’s just as swoon-worthy as when Cloud protected Tifa from a fall in a prior scene. However, another notable example is how the high-five gesture is linked to Cloud’s opening up to Aerith (as he has to be persuaded over the course of several scenes to do the high-five), but Aerith also high-fives Tifa in other scenes later, effectively appropriating the gesture. So while I never expect it to ever become canon, Remake’s Aerti has been a wonderful surprise and I hope to see even greater developments in their relationship within this subtextual space as the FFVII: Remake trilogy progresses.

Let's all hope for the best-- in the meantime, please enjoy this compilation!

[essektheylyss]

"Please let me help write a manifesto, I'd love to write a manifesto!" —also my conscience's best friend

[happi-tree]

swiftli :]

SJDBGJSBGJDVGJVS hi Kai :]]] You already know. You already KNOW how obsessed i am w these guys 🧡🧡🧡

Ship It (!!!!!!!!) / Don't Ship It

What made you ship it?

Points through the screen. @kaseyskat YOU. YOU DID THIS TO ME. In all seriousness, though, when I was listening to the first episodes of s2 A YEAR AGO (wtf), Nyx pushed the Swiftli propaganda at me alongside the Oakworthies (they even came up w the Swiftli ship name! In our discord dms! WILD). They also mentioned that they expected Lincoln/Taylor to be much more popular based on their canon dynamics, but it only had one fic to its name at the time on ao3. And I was just like. Huh. I wouldn't have thought abt them together, but only having one fic of them is criminal,,, guess I'll write sth just to see if I can understand them more,,, and that wound up being my first dndads piece! And now. A year later. I'm. This. 🤡🤡🤡

What are your favorite things about the ship?

I am OBSESSED with their dynamic. Forever. I'm a huge sucker for the friends-to-lovers trope but Swiftli in particular also just feels. Dialed up to eleven bc both of these guys are so New to the concept of having Close Best Friends (since Lincoln spent most of his life homeschooled and Taylor, while "popular", didn't really appear to have many true friends before s2). That aspect combined with the sheer levels of devotion they have for each other (episodes 9 and 10 are stuck in my brain forever) and the general homoerotic bullshit that has happened with them makes for a pretty compelling pairing imo!!!

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

I don't think this is particularly unpopular but. I absolutely ADORE qpr-flavored Swiftli! As much as I like to picture mushy little romantic scenarios for them, I also happen to be an aroallo Taylor truther and an asexual Lincoln truther (whether or not he's also aromantic depends on the day for me personally). I just think that these two lend themselves to being qpps really well - having a relationship that kinda defies the both the typical friends and boyfriends boundaries feels very in-character for them imo!!!

[daeluin]

ok but really the part that always gets me the most about miss missing you is the second verse:

"now you're gone, but I'll be okay / your hot whiskey eyes have fanned the flame / maybe I'll burn a little brighter tonight / let the fire breath me back to life"

and the idea of patrick of working on this song during the hiatus and shelving it because it's not *his* solo song. of the imaginery of meeting someone else when you're a kid and them igniting a passion in you just by being there and believing in you so fiercely. of drifting apart of that person but that passion, that fire remains and maybe it's enough to keep you going on your own. because they may have feed the sparks inside you enough to turn them into a wildfire that can sustain itself without them. you don't need them anymore, you never did (except you did, maybe) because that fire is all yours but you miss them. and you miss missing them. and you hope maybe you can burn bright enough to keep yourself alive

and then in a funny twist of fate or a well constructed story you can't finish your song because it's not yours. not really. it's not finished until you get back together. and finally it's that burning passion that gets you back together and it's only when you're with your band that finally you can burn as bright

[queeraak]

i must confess that fall is the worst season in my opinion and i don't know why people like it. everything bad about the world is represented in october - november

[charlesemersonwinchesteriii]

If you already got this from someone and you just haven't answered yet pls ignore, but if no one else asked i want to add klinger+charles for the relationship bingo ask meme

ok I’m getting to this late as FUCK but PLEASE nobody ever hesitate to send me something for an ask game if I get one ask on a topic I will go YIPPEE and if I get 20 asks on the same topic I will go YIIIIIPPPPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Anyhow you're indeed the only one around here who shows outside interest in our rarepair insanity, a boon I will remember as long as I live btw. Mx. Smoking Marlene Dietrich I owe you the WORLD

TRIPLE BINGO because they are EVERYTHING. to me.

It’s funny. This is the one duo where I almost do just want to post the bingo and leave it at that. Part of me wants to tell people about this ship SO bad, to give novel-length explanations and justifications and theses. But the other part of me is like you know what. You either Get It or you don’t.

Anyways there are 10000 things to say about Them but one is: I specifically did not fill in “gay af to have a sworn rival” even though it cost me another bingo because one of the most fascinating things about the interactions between these two is that they actually do not have a mutually adversarial relationship--even though that’s what writers usually do with two characters on diametrically opposite ends of the socioeconomic spectrum. 

I’ve been thinking about this a bit because I’ve seen people say things like, “It’s great what a funny duo they turned into when they started out hating each other, haha.” And I get why one would think like this but IMO it’s actually not the case! Charles acts more familiar with Max over time because he does that with everyone--

(Though he’s racist towards Max throughout, of course. Because Charles’ racism never goes away. You know that right. MASH fandom I am putting my hands on your shoulders and asking: You know that, right? I keep seeing people talk about Charles having a character arc and a redemption arc so I’m just. I’m just making sure.)

--but Max has actually been pretty nice to him right from the start, back when Charles’ relationship with basically every character was antagonistic. As soon as s6e13 he tells Charles how similar they are, how they should work together to try and get away from the war, how they’re “soulmates”. Even after Charles insults him, he straight up says, “I’m on your side, Major”, which I’m pretty sure remains one of the nicest things someone canonically says to Charles, ever. Just one scene, but emblematic of a greater whole, of quite a few future scenes where Max gamely engages with Charles even when it puts him in unpleasant situations.

And of course, the motivation the show usually gives, on those occasions when it thinks about Maxwell’s motivations at all, is a simple throwaway “Well Charles is paying him / giving him some other material benefit, so obviously Klinger will be his kicked dog! You all know how Middle Eastern people are! We are a groundbreakingly progressive show btw.”

But man. Fuck that shit. This is far afield of my original point but the thing is, Max’s interactions with Charles are often the most egregious exempla of every way the later seasons fucked over my girl here. It almost seems useless to try to analyze any of Max’s actions after a certain point from a Watsonian perspective, when the Doylist reading of the show being too racist and stupid to do anything coherent with him is the ultimate explanation, and sometimes the only explanation you can even come up with, because shit just makes NO fucking sense in-universe. 

But unfortunately I’m a stupid cringe ass fanfic writer/reader, and I love this character, and Max already gets so little screentime compared to the main protagonists, and I don’t want to just ignore him because of the decisions of writers who didn’t care about him.

(That’s the entire reason I started shipping this stupid thing in the first place, btw. I just wanted to read some fanfic where Max is the main character and idk if you’ve noticed but if it weren’t for AO3 user stateofintegrity and their ~problematic cringe ship~, the pickings would be pretty fucking slim.)

So I like to pretend there’s a better reason for Maxwell going from “Major Burns I hate you so fucking much I am going to kill us both with this fucking grenade” to the equivalent of a tumblr blog responding to pathetic anon hate with “are we about to have sex”. After all, if you’re going to write Maxwell yourself, get inside his head and all, then you also have to account for why he tolerates all the OTHER characters’ racism towards him in later seasons, too. 

And the messy problematic reasoning I come up with is that Max is at heart the kindest and also most emotionally intelligent character on the show, and even the liberalized version of the 1950s our story is set in is a systemically bigoted universe that is all he’s ever known and experienced, and he’s certain these are good people, really, when it matters. And being emotionally intelligent, and generally intelligent too for that fucking matter, and observant and insightful, he can tell there’s a big difference between Frank and Charles, and perhaps less of a difference, even, between Charles and Hawkeye. Maybe when you watch things from Hawkeye’s POV, the ideological and moral differences between him and Charles are huge, but maybe if you were in Max’s POV instead there wouldn’t be quite as much of a distinction between them. I don’t know! I don’t know. Just some ideas, I don’t know. 

Of course getting into fucking. internalized racism and such is pretty uncomfy and exhausting shit. And that’s not even touching all the gender stuff my girl has going on. You start to see why nobody wants to get into this character’s head much. But I do :3 And I do honestly think sometimes the most effective way to do that is to look at the Messiest Ship In All Of MASH (TM). As I’ve talked about before from the Charles angle, I love this ship precisely because of its Problems, because they’re problems that exist anyways for both characters, and having the two of them interact makes the problems impossible to ignore, so they maybe finally get to be dealt with. I mean, I just don’t think the optimal resolution to Charles and Max’s racism-laden interactions is that Charles goes back home to a big opulent house and Max struggles to save up to buy a used car in After M*A*S*H. That is not super satisfying. to me. 

This post got derailed to hell but I think what I was trying to say is that Max treats Charles SO much better than that bastard man deserves and I would at least like to see something come of it, for the love of--

[roobylavender]

this isnt really an ask but im surprised tim is your favourite omg maybe its in my head but i feel you talk about dick and jason a lot more

oh it’s definitely not in your head lmaooo 😭 i talk about tim less bc i think up until the point i read his canon i was pretty much satisfied with it. obv i have issues with chuck dixon’s textual conservatism and bigotry but i don’t have issues with how tim generally existed as a character at least through the very early 00s, which is conveniently where i stopped following bat canon at large. dick and jason on the other hand present so many problems for me in terms of ill maintained characterization with respect to what i’ve read so they’re way more on my mind jdbdjdkd

[bifurious-rex]

nobody asked but one of my main gripes with the whole "appalachian english is actually the closest dialect to elizabethan english so all shakespearean era actors would've sounded like modern day rednecks" (which has been debunked. so.) is that the implication is that appalachian culture and dialect has not evolved in centuries. yes, it's a culture that holds its past close to the chest. yes, there are direct influences that trace back centuries (see songs like knoxville girl that can be linked directly to specific events 400+ years ago, food that's been cooked and eaten by generations, instruments like the banjo that have evolved directly from west african music traditions, etc.) but it isn't stagnant. the culture and language has changed over time. geographic isolation or no, appalachia experiences cultural evolution like every other community.

and while it's usually a good-natured attempt to legitimize appalachian dialects as Real English and civilized, it directly references the idea that we're stuck in time and unevolving. appalachian english does not have to resemble elizabethan english to be beautiful and culture-rich and worthy of recognition. we don't have to lower ourselves to simplifications meant to make close-minded people stop demeaning the accents so many of us have been made to feel ashamed.

[nazghoulz]

Do you ever read something you wrote and go, “hey. Wait a minute. This actually rules and might be my favorite thing I’ve ever written” but it’s the rarepair smut oneshot set in your elaborate au that nobody who even likes the au read. Yeah.

[agentromanoffsir]

neocities guide - why you should build your own html website

do you miss the charm of the 90s/00s web where sites had actual personality instead of the same minimalistic theme? are you feeling drained by social media and the constant corporate monopoly of your data and time? do you want to be excited about the internet again? try neocities!!

what is neocities?

neocities is a free hosting website that lets you build your own html website from scratch, with total creative control. in their own words: "we are tired of living in an online world where people are isolated from each other on boring, generic social networks that don't let us truly express ourselves. it's time we took back our personalities from these sterilized, lifeless, monetized, data mined, monitored addiction machines and let our creativity flourish again."

why should I make my own website?

web3 has been overtaken by capitalism & conformity. websites that once were meant to be fun online social spaces now exist solely to steal your data and sell you things. it sucks!! building a personal site is a great way to express yourself and take control of your online experience.

what would I even put on a website?

the best part about making your own site is that you can do literally whatever the hell you want! focus on a specific subject or make it a wild collection of all your interests. share your art! make a shrine for one of your interests! post a picture of every bird you see when you step outside! make a collection of your favorite blinkies! the world is your oyster !! here are some cool example sites to inspire you: recently updated neocities sites | it can be fun to just look through these and browse people's content! space bar | local interstellar dive bar creature feature | halloween & monsters big gulp supreme peanutbuttaz | personal site dragodiluna linwood | personal site patho grove | personal site

getting started: neocities/html guide

sound interesting? here are some guides to help you get started, especially if you aren't familiar with html/css sadgrl.online webmastery | a fantastic resource for getting started with html & web revival. also has a layout builder that you can use to start with in case starting from scratch is too intimidating web design in 4 minutes | good for learning coding basics w3schools | html tutorials templaterr | demo & html for basic web elements eggramen test pages | css page templates to get started with sadgrl background tiles | bg tiles rivendell background tiles | more free bg tiles

fun stuff to add to your site

want your site to be cool? here's some fun stuff that i've found blinkies-cafe | fantastic blinkie maker! (run by @transbro & @graphics-cafe) gificities | internet archive of 90s/00s web gifs internet bumper stickers | web bumper stickers momg | gif gallery 99 gif shop | 3d gifs 123 guestbook | add a guestbook for people to leave messages cbox | add a live chat box moon phases | track the phases of the moon gifypet | a little clickable page pet adopt a shroom | mushroom page pet tamaNOTchi | virtual pet crossword puzzle | daily crossword imood | track your mood neko | cute cat that chases your mouse pollcode | custom poll maker website hit counter | track how many visitors you have

web revival manifestos & communities

also, there's actually a pretty cool community of people out there who want to bring joy back to the web! melonland project | web project/community celebrating individual & joyful online experiences. Also has an online forum melonland intro to web revival | what is web revival? melonking manifesto | status cafe | share your current status nightfall city | online community onio.cafe | leave a message and enjoy the ambiance sadgrl internet manifesto | yesterweb internet manifesto | sadly defunct, still a great resource reclaiming online social spaces | great manifesto on cultivating your online experience

in conclusion

i want everyone to make a neocities site because it's fun af and i love seeing everyone's weird personal sites that they made outside of the control of capitalism :) say hi to me on neocities

[enochianforest]

i really would 250k word a post finale fix it with doom patrol. i truly would

[copperbadge]

National Clean Your Home Month, aka NaClYoHo or "Salty Pirates" month, is soon to be upon us!

Each November, I "host" NaClYoHo, where participants work to make their living spaces more comfortable and pleasant. The full manifesto is at the link, but the basic premise is that each day in November you put on a podcast, tv show, playlist, or other media, and clean or organize some aspect of your home.

It's meant to be a low-stress way to both do a yearly cleaning and also participate in an intensive project like National Novel Writing Month without having to write a novel. I'll be posting about it again before November kicks off, but I thought I'd link to the manifesto well ahead of time, so people could brace themselves. :D

This year my big goals are to figure out how to keep my floors truly clean, replace at least one rug, and clear out the storage nook where I have a bunch of stuff that needs sorting through. I am also going to try to dedicate some time to researching those "bathroom refresh" companies that basically just put a shell over your existing shower/tub/walls and see if it's feasible for my bathroom, which desperately needs it.

[brongusthearcanist]

I think everyone has been a little nervous about the release dates for the next cosmere books because there's supposed to be a little bit of a drought. Stormlight 6 won't be seen until the end of the 2020s and mistborn is supposed to be written all at once which makes the initial release date farther away. But after this new secret project was revealed I think it's clear that we aren't going to have a drought. Sanderson somehow spat out a whole new extra novel while revising the 4 secret projects and finishing and revising stormlight 5, which truly seems impossible to me especially when you keep up with his YouTube updates. This isn't going to stop, Sanderson has a legitimate problem at this point, and I am perfectly happy to exploit this for the sake of my escapism. He's not gonna stop, I almost guarantee we will get 2 more secret projects while era 3 is being written. I just don't think Sanderson is capable of releasing less than 2 books a year. It is against his nature, you can't ask a storm to stop blowing, and I guess you can't ask Sanderson to slow down his writing. At this point it is becoming obvious that he has an incredible amount of anxiety attached to the idea that he won't be able to write all the stories he wants, and rather than processing this as a midlife crisis, he has decided to make this an ongoing crisis to conquer. I honestly think he keeps a blank page over his desk to taunt him while he plays video games into writing more. Y'all saw that blank page speech and thought it was cute, it was a manifesto. Sanderson intends to use all the paper in existence. One day he will disappear in a staples warehouse, leaving no trace but several drafts written on the bales of blank paper. But he didn't title or number them, and for the next 16 years we will try to assemble them into 16 separate books, but all along it was actually 1 giant book and we put it in the wrong order.

[knickety]

doing some digging and reading of lore for my yaoqing trio manifesto (which is leaning slightly feiqiu heavy at the moment BUT I AM determined to do Moze justice as well. part of the reason I am yelling about this here, because it is so fascinating)

When Feixiao first meets Moze, he tries to attack her, angry with her+her troops for routing the Disciples of Sanctus Medicus who had been experimenting on him. Despite the experiments, he had considered them family, not knowing the broader details of their operation but only that they had 'saved' him (for their own purposes) after he was orphaned and abandoned by his previous home. We don't know any details about his life prior to the Disciples, for now.

Back to Feixiao! It seems that she had initially planned to have nothing further to do with Moze after freeing him- after his initial first lunge at her, she deflects, telling him that "Someone will come to plan a home and life for you. Just follow them and you will be fine."

Moze does not listen, and continues trying to attack her. She dodges, holds him back, tells her soldiers not to react or punish him- and admits that he reminds her of herself, freshly escaped from the borisin war camp where she grew up. And this similarity prompts a change of mind:

First of all, hilarious that part of the deal was Feixiao being like "you can try to kill me... but you need to learn and grow and take care of yourself first." okay mom

Second of all:

We see this odd transaction they've got going- Feixiao, who says her only enemy has ever been herself, places a guard who has a vested interest in killing her close to her side- to keep her on his toes, to (presumably- this is my own speculation) train him to be the best equipped to take her out, should she ever actually become a threat.

She trades his attempts on her life for missions carried out on her behalf- and it is through those missions, which Moze at first only carries out to earn more 'forgiveness'/attempts at trying to revenge himself upon her, that he begins to question his loyalty to the Disciples of Sanctus Medicus, and realize the extent of the harm that they did- but doesn't think about it, because to question that would be to throw this whole tenuous balance into question. If he no longer feels loyalty to the Disciples, and no longer wants revenge on Feixiao, what does that leave him with?

And in his E6, which I've seen people refer to as the character represented in their purest form, we see this:

Moze, clutching one of Feixiao's strales so tightly that it cuts him. Clinging to the fascimile of vengeance, of her transactional forgiveness- even if he has stopped truly wanting to kill her, and even if there is nothing to forgive.

[captainkirkk]

✩ WEEKLY FIC ROUND-UP ✩

All the fics I’ve read and really enjoyed in the past week-ish. Reminder: This list features any and all ratings and themes. Please look at tags and warnings on ao3 before reading.

Merlin

The Walls of Camelot by spqr

"Camelot will fall tomorrow,” Arthur says, on the first day of the eighth month of the siege.

DC

IRIS Log #1548 by deadchannelradio

Disclaimer From Your Friendly Neighborhood Oracle:

The following is a transcript of Patrol Communications Audio written by state of the art transcription technology, IRIS (Interpretation of Recorded Intelligence Software). IRIS was created to provide easily searchable records, automatically, and eliminate the need to transcribe each patrol audio log manually. That being said, IRIS is still experimental, and may not always be entirely accurate. - (01:25) Red Hood: (Mild static) (Out of breath, slurred) You motherfuckers. Put some fuckin-

(01:25) Batman: (Shaking) Red Hood-

(01:25) Red Hood: Shut up. Put some fucking respect. On my name. Start fucking copying me. I just got thrown fucking. Um. 40 feet. Into a fucking uh. What's it. Ditch. I'm still fucking conscious.

(01:25) Batman: Red Hood, do not move, we're en route-

(01:25) Red Hood: What'll I win if I stand up.

(01:25) Batman: (Loud) Do not stand up.

we shall be free; we shall find peace by mediant

Clark has accepted what it means to be Lex's prisoner - the pain of the Green, the experiments, the hands on it. The long years buried in its containment cell, let out only to act as Lex's weapon, as Lex's tool. It had fought back at first, but years have ground it down and away to almost nothing.

Then Lex hands it a baby. And Clark realizes that while it may have hurt humans, and lied about what it is, and it may deserve to be locked away - Kon deserves to be free.

Untamed

The Absolutely True Story of the Yiling Patriarch: A Manifesto in Many Parts by aubreyli (+ podfic)

Wei Wuxian’s hand jolts, spilling a drop of wine onto the tabletop. “Love?” he croaks, then clears his throat and tries again. “Lan Zh— uh, Hanguang-jun, in love?”

“Have you not heard the story?” the other young woman asks, looking pitying. “You must, it is a truly heartrending tale of star-crossed romance and mutual pining — go to any storyhouse in town, everyone has been requesting a reading of this book.”

“There’s a book?” Wei Wuxian says blankly.

-- In which the junior disciples (namely, Lan Jingyi, Ouyang Zizhen, and a reluctant Lan Sizhui) turn to RPF in an attempt to rehabilitate Wei Wuxian's reputation so that he and Hanguang-jun can get together and get married and live happily ever after. It's... surprisingly effective.

Clone Wars

patron saint by spqr (+ podfic)

Funerary practices? Master Ti writes back. I’m not sure what you mean, Master Kenobi. Used biomass is the property of Kamino and thus is recycled into the cloning process.

So that’s how the revolution begins—with dead brothers, but not the way you might expect.

Miraculous Ladybug

drowning (in plain sight) by buggachat

Everybody had expected Monarch's defeat to be a moment of triumph. Nobody had expected Gabriel Agreste, unmasked and mind frayed from continual abuse of the miraculous, crying out to all who would listen and making Paris certain of one thing:

His son, Adrien Agreste, is one of his sentimonsters.

And now he's missing.

Nobody can find him— not even the superheroes, and not even his closest friends. But Marinette, Nino, and Alya aren't ones to give up so easily. They'll find him, no matter what it takes.

(But, geez, would it kill Chat Noir to lend a hand?)