#vaud evil

[wildflowerwoodsworld]

So, I figured I should finally get around to doing a post on my four main OCs, bc they keep popping up in fics and I'd like to have a visual reference that's easily accessable.

Starting with my oldest OC and the one that's technically a canon character, my version of Finral's mother, Fiona Roulacase! I've done a Fiona character study here

Fiona is a nice person. That being said, her view of the world is very much "as long as me and mine are safe, I don't care." to save her family, this woman will burn the world.

Not only is she a Spatial mage, one of the rarest types of magic there is, she is a Roulacase and has the family ability of walking/portaling through most wards like they aren't there (this power comes with the price of never being able to use offensive Spatial magic). If she has been somewhere before, there is absolutely nothing anyone can do to stop her from returning there. This shows itself in her personality; she's cocky and her confidence borders on arrogance. She's impatient and finds listening to other people's personal problems tedious if they aren't part of her circle.

Fiona's main spell is her portal spell; Spatial Magic: Seraphim's Gate

Tondra Sturm is, in a word, ruthless. She is Fiona's best friend/girlfriend (depending on the story). I've done a Tondra character study here

She is based on the Evil Scientist/Chessmaster/smartest person in the room archetype, generally five steps ahead of everyone else and she knows it. She often forgets that people are, in fact, people and not just numbers/figures on a board because sometimes the fastest way from Point A to Point B is to just kill everyone in your way (this is generally the point where Julius steps in to stop her from committing mass murder).

She has weg from messing around with forbidden magic "just in case we need it." This woman's backup backup plans have backup plans. She's also the sort of person to put lightning booby traps after water booby traps so if you don't down you get electrocuted.

Tondra has trouble understanding other people and things like emotions. She can come off as cold and even heartless to people outside her circle but does try to listen to the advice of her friends.

Tondra's main spells are Lighting Creation Magic: Thurderer's Spear and Lightning Creation Magic: Lightning Wheel which create a spear and a shield respectively.

Lana Vaude is the least developed of my main ocs, but I love her all the same. She's Finral and Langris' little sister, a Silver Eagle and has a rival in Solid Silva (she has punched him in the face so many times). I've done a Lana character study here.

Lana Vaude as a character is fueled by spite. She's not good enough for her father, her magic is completely the wrong type for him to bother with her, and she's second in her mother's attention after Langris. Finral is definiately her favourite brother, but she and Langris are closer than it might originally appear as Lana wasn't foced into the same competition the boys were and Liliane didn't want either of her children interacting with Finral any more than necessary.

She spends a lot of her time in the Silver Eagles outpost on Raque beach because every time she is in the same room as Solid Silva, they get into a fight and Solid always loses despite A) having the attribute advantage and B) being a year older than Lana and Nozel is tired of listening to his little brother whine.

Lana's main spell is Fire Magic: Starburst which creates lots of tiny fireballs that go flying in every direction

Last, but definitely not least, we have my most recent OC; Lia Bardsley. She started out as a DnD OC (you can find her in @/thoughtfullyrainynightmare's incorrect DnD quotes) who bullied her way into the main story for my Everybody Lives au and expanded from there. I've done a Lia character study here.

Lia is, in a word, chaos. Almost constantly chattering at a speed of five hundred words a minute, this woman cannot sit still and will talk to anyone who so much as stands next to her for five seconds. She has a gift for getting people to tell her their life stories without her giving them a single bit of information about herself; this is very useful in her job as her job is literally to talk to people and catch the problems before they can become problems. This doesn't earn the Green Preying Mantises any stars, but it does mean that the area of Clover they oversee has the least issues out of anywhere in the country.

She's a prankster by nature and her favourite victim will always be Jack, even though he nearly always throws her out a window for her pranks when he's not involved in planning them (the one time he didn't throw her out the window, he threw her off the roof). That being said, Lia has about as much respect for Jack as Yami has for Julius, even if she doesn't always show it. If he tells her to do (or not do) something, then she listens.

Lia's main spell is Air Magic: Chrysalis which creates a platform or barriar made out of air in any shape she choses. She regularly uses this in her day to day life to hover in the air so she's at Jack's eye level when they're talking.

[veveisveryuncool]

art trade with @camachine!! here's evil madonna, puffball edition <3

fun fact my storage is now filled with renaissance angel wings. also vaud himself is overlayed with "the fall of lucifer" which. idk. probably fits in a convoluted way somehow.

[vilandel]

For your salty asks, 1, 6, 9 and 20 please? Also, I salute your bravery, dear 🫡

Hi, Acacia, good morning and thank you for your asks 🫡

1 - Which OTPs I just don't in my fandoms? You know, this is actually a good question. There are ships that I don't like romantically, but still respect and understand why the shippers love them. If there are anything, certainly incest and problematic ships, but that is of course normal.

Funny story though, there is a Fairy Tail ship that I didn't get at first, but I came to like under certain circumstances, which only works with them. Jellal x Ultear from Fairy Tail, during their time at the Magic Council. And you know who made me ship it? One of the biggest Jellal x Erza shippers I know! Ironic, isn't it? And only during the council times, during the Crime Sorcière times they are a Brotp for both of us. What interested the Jerza shipper about Jeltear was "what if they have some kind of affair during their time at the Magic Council?". She found that they have that kind of vibe and I have to say, why not? Not only has she wrote interesting stories about them during that time, but it somehow also adds to Jellals guilt to start anything with Erza, because his only relationship he ever had was an affair during his "villain time", during which he and Ultear thought that they controlled the other. We know how it went truly, but still. It makes good stories if you like drama and if you want to try writing a problematic relationship. I understand that it's not everyone's cup of tea, but if anyone is interested about more details why my Jerza shipper friend and myself are liking Jeltear, feel free to ask^^

6 - What fandom made me enjoy a pairing I previously hated? Not hated at first, but in Black Clover it was Asta x Mimosa. I found her crush cute and how she took inspiration from Asta, but I was neutral towards the ship at first. But then the haters came, Mimosta haters and Mimosa haters, and just to understand why, I got interested in the ship and then I was... excuse me? There is nothing wrong with this ship (and with Mimosa in general), so the haters are one of the reasons why I started to like this ship. I prefer Astelle of course, but Mimosta is a cute ship too. And to be fair, never forget that there are many characters in Black Clover who would get angry at any kind of Mimosa bashing.

9 - Most disliked characters? Dante, Vanica, Zagred, Lucius for sure. Oh, I LOVE to hate them and I love them as villains, but I would never love them for their personalities and actions, that is for sure. Also, king Augustus, obviously. When I write him, I always have the feeling that if I want to punch him while writing, I got his character perfectly. Ledior and Lillian Vaude as well, heck why I made Langris cut ties with them too and give the brother's children not the Vaude names. As for other fandoms... There are many villains, that I love as villains but hate as the people they are. So any villain for the sake of being evil, probably. Like Shiro in Assassination Classroom or some villains in Fairy Tail, like Brain for example. I'm otherwise very open about characters and I love most in any fandom I am, but of course I have some characters I don't like.

20 - Purest ship in any fandom? I don't know what is meant with purest, so I go with the ships that are the most innocent for me, I guess. Astelle, Mimosta, Mars x Fana, FinFin and Luminero in Black Clover, Chendy and Loke x Aries in Fairy Tail, Deku x Uraraka, Kamijirou, Kirimina and my a lot of ships in Assassination Classroom, like Meg x Isogai or the Chiba x Hayami. I probably forgot some^^'

[loosesodamarble]

Hmm…since we can ask about anything; tell us about an AU (or a couple of AU’s) that you have with your OC’s and/or ships 🤔👀😏?

Ooooohhh hoo hoo hoo~! Asking about AUs, eh? Ah! My brain is so full of aus rather than trying to write within the canon universe of Black Clover! Kjhdfiuashrt!

Alrighty then! Lemme share!

..........

Golden Dawn Josele AU

A very new au for me which simply asks, what if William offered Josele a place in his new squad instead of Yami? Because William and Josele are friends and he'd feel a certain kinship with her with both of them being cursed.

Josele would be the vice captain of the Golden Dawn when the canon timeline roles around, even though she's not particularly good at it.

Small but important detail. Due to my belief that Finral only pulled away from House Vaude and took up his mother's maiden name after Langris became a vice captain, he's still going by Finral Vaude and very much actively in the running to be Finesse's husband.

Oh, and this means that Josele and Langris are just not going to see eye to eye. Josele is an obstacle in the way of Langris' progress.

Yami kind of holds a grudge in this au due to stealing Josele away. He (correctly) believes that the Golden Dawn isn't the right environment for Josele.

And it really isn't. Her commoner status is the main sticking point with the whole squad. Even if the Bulls found her emotionless state weird/creepy, they didn't really hold it against her and got along with her fine. The Golden Dawn though, can't stand her.

Until Yuno. Once Yuno joins the squad the others are like "at least you're not a gross, backwater peasant."

Josele ends up being quite defensive of Yuno because in her cursed heart of hearts, she doesn't want him to suffer under the judgement of others.

...

Ballroom AU

I watched an anime about ballroom dancing once and so now every so often, my brain wants to think about it.

Josele, Morgen, and Nacht all participate in dancesport.

Morgen dances International Standard (which consists of waltz, Viennese waltz, foxtrot, quickstep, and tango).

Nacht dances International Latin (which consists of cha-cha-cha, samba, rumba, paso doble, and jive).

Josele dances both styles (she's very active after all).

Josele's likes the dresses for Standard more than Latin but the movements of Latin are so much fun that she just feels like she needs to do both.

Josele actually used to dance the role of leader in her youth. But once she met Nacht and Morgen, she finally got to be in the role of the follower!

Nacht and Josele often compete against duos like Fuegoleon and Charlotte, or Vanessa and Zora at the Latin competitions.

Meanwhile, Josele and Morgen would face off against people like Nozel and Nebra, or Finesse and Finral during Standard dances.

Yami kinda laughs at Nacht for being into dance but when he goes to watch him compete, he kinda glares daggers at Fuegoleon for being lucky enough to dance with Charlotte.

...

Role Swap AU

On the spot au: Josele is a noble woman while Nacht and Morgen are her commoner friends.

Morgen is more a hunter like the father, because he likes to be out in nature, with the plants and beasts. He likes the freedom of the wilds.

Nacht is the one who becomes a tailor, preferring the peace of the indoors and finds a little fun in threatening to prod unruly customers with his needles.

Josele's favorite thing in the whole world is a fur cloak made from a deer pelt that Morgen hunted for and Nacht sewed together.

Josele also picks up swordsmanship from Morgen because it's so elegant (also, I can't have Josele without her swordsmanship, I'm sorry!).

As for Josele, she becomes a devil host. But she and her parents don't use devil powers for any nefarious plots. Rather, the witch lineage from Gwenith's side of the family came into custody of the devil relics and protect them from true evil doers.

Nacht's immediate thought is asking Morgen to skin the devils, for how dare they claim Josele's soul for themselves.

Morgen is pretty scared of the devils but after learning about why Josele contracted with them, he calls her very brave.

Josele and Morgen still become part of the Grey Deer squad in this au. Nacht is a little less angsty about it here because he gets more chances to fix up Josele's clothes after missions.

There's definitely some... tension whenever Josele had Nacht retake her measurements and make adjustments to her clothes as she's wearing them.

And when Morgen and Josele become engaged, Nacht offers to make their suit and dress. He cries as he works, from joy and sadness.

...

Shadows House AU

I posted some little things for this au a while back.

Nacht is the Shadow Master and Morgen is his Living Doll (essentially personal servant). Nacht loves Morgen as his Living Doll but also as his own being.

Josele is the Living Doll of Jocelynne. Jocelynne isn't the nicest of Shadow Masters and rarely even calls Josele by name, usually referring to her as "my Doll" or "my Face."

Josele meets Nacht and Morgen by chance. While cleaning the window of her master's room (on the second story), she ends up toppling out and to the garden outside. Morgen notices Josele while cleaning Nacht's room and with Nacht's help, they construct a sheet ladder and get her back inside.

Josele doesn't stay long since she needs to return to Jocelynne, but they do exchange names and Josele takes time to get some dirt and twigs she got from her fall off of her.

Nacht is mischievously excited at the forbidden idea of meeting another Shadow's Doll without the other Shadow present, especially since Josele is such a sweetheart right off the bat.

Morgen and Josele secretly chat when the Dolls are out doing cleaning in the main building. Some nights, Josele sneaks out of her little chamber to visit Nacht and Morgen.

Nacht is self conscious because he's a Shadow. Sooty and faceless while Morgen is the one who has a handsome face that Josele can see and be charmed by. Also, him as a Shadow Master developing a crush on a Doll is very much not supposed to happen.

Jocelynne is actually very infatuated with Nacht and is incensed that Nacht would give attention to Josele and not Jocelynne as the Shadow Master.

Other pairs in this au include:

-Fuegoleon and his Doll Fuego -Willam and Patry -Mereoleona and Reona -Liebe and Asta (one of the younger pairs in Shadows House in this au) -Peter and Yuno (another young duo) -Nathaniel and Nozel -Charlotte and Charla

Mereoleona is a member of the Star Bearers (basically the leader of the children) by the time Nacht, Morgen, and Josele are present.

The other Star Bearers are... there (ocs that are really just there).

Morgen is a sweet tooth and very bitter coffee being a big thing at Shadows House has him very upset. But also means he vomits the stuff out and prevents him from being brainwashed long.

Oh yeah, there's brainwashing in this au because it's Shadows House.

[nextwarden]

Evil

They'd liked her smell. It was sour and musky and it reminded them of birth. Some might have said home, but theirs felt here, now. The vast yet deserted expanses of the undergrowth were familiar to them, yet that of the plains arounds the house, and the beach, and the sea, were growing ever fond of them. Or perhaps was it the other way around? They couldn't really say. It had not been an immediate process, being far from birth had found them lost and weakened at first, confused too. They'd come for the blood, finding their way through the mist of life had always been their specialty, but things had gone south. The squadron had found their target. They had simply not taken time to check what that target was exactly. They felt them fizzle out one by one, after arrogant displays of weakness. All by the hand of the mistress. They had recognized her immediately of course, they had tried to warn the others, but the one they called Quizz - apparently because he asked much, they found out -, the one who was supposed to be their guide while they were the fangs and the claws, had ordered them silent. They had obeyed of course, it was their duty. Obey, be faithful to their guide, and attack mercilessly once given the order. They had obeyed despite all their instincts telling them of the dangerous truth that awaited the rest near the lone house on the shore.

It had gone rather as they had expected, not that they had expected much or anything extraordinary. The surprise had come in the form of the other one, the bright one. He was the shining to her shadow. They had felt him more than anything and this time Quizz had felt them too, guiding them to retreat. Unfortunately, or perhaps not, the deathly crack had come far too fast for either of them to react. They had been lucky to be them, Quizz was not so much. They'd felt his breath quicken and his life slow down to a cold stop in a matter of seconds. Had they been a blood wisp perhaps they'd have been able to respond to the uncertain light before it had faded away from his globulous eyes. They were but a 'poor stupid mutt' however, and that had been that. They were tempted to flee but towards where? The way to birth had been lost with Quizz, only his palm held the secret. Yet they couldn't remain or they would be found out by either the mistress or the bright one - they'd rather not if they had any choice. While they'd never encountered one or the other, the mistress's aura was simple to read and perhaps their connection to her would be able to help. He, on the other hand, was a different story. He was on the opposite end of the spectrum and their compatibility could not be ascertained. Why both resided together, they had no clue. Their auras seemed to clash only slightly and none was yet dead, meaning they must have either been unable to rip each other's throat out… Or perhaps found some sort of accord? They wouldn't remain to find out its exact nature however, that was far too dangerous, danger they were sure they would not enjoy. They decided a slow and discreet retreat was the best option to follow.

…

Perhaps it was the fact that they had no way to return, or perhaps they found their new liberty quite interesting, but the desire to see birth again had somewhat faded from their mind. They roamed the plains and the forests, explored the mountains and padded along the endless beaches on the coast, but always gravitated back towards that strange lone house. Whether it had something to do with her scent and the pull it had over their memories of familiarity was not the point.

…

"Hello there."

They'd felt her aura too late. The drowsiness of sleep dulling their senses. Immediately on guard they rose and prepared to react if need be, sensing the air around but finding no trace of the other one. Only she was there.

They'd gotten closer to the house earlier that day, while night was still deep and dark. They'd settled on the large rocks of a near promontory not far away from the forest. It was far enough away that they could conceal their presence well enough and close enough to discern the faint scent of the mistress. They'd watched over the silent house for the most part of the morning with a half gaze until she'd come out to tend to the garden. It was unfinished but already quite exquisite; they couldn't say for sure about the colours but the shapes were neat and the smells blended well with her own. They'd watched as she went from one plant to the other, slowly but surely, trimming with care where needed and making sure all were in good shape. It had become a ritual for them to come by at intervals not always regular. On days of good weather such as this they found her at her usual spot. Sometimes the other would come out too to take advantage of the sun or to train, which she would sometimes join. They couldn't help the shiver at such sights, both were powerful beyond what they could believe, in raw power as in technique or cunning. They had felt that way some time ago but now they measured their luck in having survived the encounter. Not to say they were weak, they would rip out a heart in less time than it took to beat if most creatures dared even to believe they stood a chance. Those two were on another level entirely.

Once, another came. They recognized the smell to be that of the little fiery one. They witnessed the fight and its outcome. Even one of the thirteen could be downed, they stood little chance if ever confrontation were to occur. Not that they planned on it, watching from afar felt fulfilling enough. Half because they could answer the pull which tugged at their soul because of her presence, half because they had the freedom to decide, for once. The fiery one had seemed to agree to interact otherly than with her fists, a rare occurrence for her they'd thought. What must have transpired in that conversation must have not pleased her however, despite coming from the mouth of the mistress - they'd not been able to hear exactly what but rather the tones of voices which had floated to their ears. They'd seen the uninvited guest almost let run her rage once again before the indomitable aura had permeated the air with such mass they'd let out an involuntary whimper. It was not their fault that their tail would retract between their legs and their ears would placate themselves on their head. They managed to resist the urge to run away thanks to that, which was a nice achievement in itself. Intimidation had never been their strong suit anyway despite their imposing size and features. The small one had had a very similar reaction, yet, to her credit, had kept her position, if only lowering the level of her intent. In the end, the mistress had had the last word and the visitor had turned heels in a huff, promising a return menacingly before storming off as the sun had begun setting behind the high peaks. They'd felt the discharge of power as she probably vented her frustration and then nothing. The two inhabitants had remained for a while before entering the house. They almost thought the mistress had shot a look towards them but although possible it was highly improbable she'd noticed them.

Now, however, as they enjoyed the warmth of the afternoon they realized maybe she had in fact noticed them. It had been a while since then, they'd been careful not to get too close nor to come back too soon. But the damage must have been done. She was standing a few meters away, by a tall old tree that had grown at an angle. They noticed she was wearing the same dress, it had small traces of dirt and green from her activity of the day. Her eyes were warm and calm, almost friendly yet they knew this mustn't be. As quick as they could they jumped away and ran into the distance. The night had come and almost gone when they stopped. The presence of the mistress had long faded away but they'd decided to keep on going so as not to compromise their chance, pushing away the thought that danced in their mind. The one that whispered that maybe it would have been okay. Once more they revised their plans, resolving to stay away for a while, and to take more care in hiding their presence when the time to go again would inevitably come.

Twice more they were found, each time she was alone. Once on a cold morning and the other on a rainy day. They'd managed to escape again into the mist the first time, the second time they'd not been so lucky. They had not heard or felt anything, simply rain on their fur one instant and a lack of, the next. Before they'd even had time to react, her voice, strangely melodious, had come to their ears.

"Aren't you wet?"

They'd seen the shadow of a smile on her lips and the twinkle in her eyes. She was holding a large leaf, large and thick enough to cover their whole body, and yet she'd remained in the rain herself. She'd traded her usual light dress for a thicker and surely warmer leather coat and pants. Yet she remained barefoot - something they would later realize was a preference of hers, her claws making it awkward with most footwear.

"Am I so scary you must run each time?"

She sat down next to them as she asked in the birth tongue when they showed no reaction. She knew they could understand her. They could also feel the genuine yet gently playful nature of the question.

"I don't mean harm."

They were unsure of what to do next. Running away was possible, she would very probably not pursue despite easily being able to, she had not the previous times. But that was an occasion to be near her, which the pull would not let them forget. Their unsease must have transpired somewhat.

"I speak truthfully. I merely want to understand," she paused for a moment to rummage in her bag. "Here, it's for you, if you want it."

They'd not noticed the smell of dried meat before it overpowered their nose. Suddenly they were quite hungry, indeed. She smiled as she placed it on a smooth rock in front of them. They hesitated a second before grabbing the slab of meat and munching on it, she'd given him an encouraging nod.

"I guess you came with the group that time. I've never seen a hellhound without a guide before. Was it the one in the forest?"

Their momentary pause must have answered her question as she nodded again.

"I'm sorry for that, but we couldn't let anyone go back. They'd have sent more…"

They noticed the look in her eyes and gulped the remains of the meat before offering a tentative nudge of understanding on her knee. They'd never quite bonded with any of the group anyway. They heard her scoff.

"I guess I can feel your intent," she replied as they offered a quizzical look. "Similar to how you can feel my presence, I believe."

Oh. That was news. What to do now? They couldn't just-

"Don't worry. As I said, I'm here as a friend. I came to offer just that."

She took out another slab of dried meat. They gladly took it. A friend, then? Why?

"Your guide being dead, you are rather free now, aren't you? And I believe you want no master."

It was true, the appeal of being assigned a new guide, one they had to learn to know once more, learn to obey too, was not quite what it had once been.

"You are also stuck here, it seems. So, as I am able to, I offer to help. I'd like you to become my companion, if not my friend. You can choose to refuse, you are free after all. I could even send you back if that's what you want, I know the way still," she paused, perhaps to let them mull it over a bit. "But from what I've witnessed, you seem to enjoy life here."

They saw her glance at them and once again that shadow smile.

"This is the last one. I'll leave you alone now," she stood up and made sure the leaf was well in place, covering their body, "Do know you don't have to run away from me, you are welcome any time."

With a pat on the head which they did not resist, she walked away leaving them in the quiet rain with a third slice of delicious dried meat. They realized they hadn't even offered to scoot over to let her sit down in the dry…

They did not agree immediately. Not outwardly so. Deep within they must have, yet the mind still had to consciously go through the process. It was slow, over the course of a number of days. Each of which they pondered the implications of that choice. The situation was peculiar, the mistress, supposed dead by many, was now sharing a table and more with the one who had done the deed, unbeknownst to anyone else. Well, until now that is. They did however reduce their efforts to conceal themselves and in return received friendly gestures from her each time she saw them. Not always a treat, but a wave or a smile. Even good ruffling of the fur, once, when they had assisted in a hunt. It sufficed.

It had not been greed which had prompted them to agree, but the realization that whatever they would choose, they had to make one, it was their duty now, not that of their guide. They were their own. The fact that they had thought of leaving for good so as not to disturb the inhabitants of the quiet house in case one tried to trace their presence and that it had pained them had contributed to making them realize they might indeed want to remain by her side. So they had, padding up to her one day, a branch of a rare breed of fruit tree which grew near the desert border in its maw.

The first interaction with the hero, whom they would soon learn was named Lug - a strange name for a strange man - had gone quite smoothly. He'd understandably raised some concerns, concerns which she had shot down, arguments at hand, in her unrestrained brilliance. The hero - or rather, former hero - had warmed up to them rather quickly, and they had found in him a game partner rivaling the hunting prowess of the mistress. Despite having half the limbs he also gave very good pats. They had offered their bond through a contract only to be refused.

"You are not mine. If we are to bond it will be by choice, yours and mine."

They'd been content with that reply, insisting on a simple bond of link if ever either needed help. They'd offered Lug the same. They had chosen to abandon birth, duty and path. In return they had been gifted a home, a guide and a name, all their own.

…

The rain had begun falling for a while when they'd found her in the middle of a nightmare. The girl had been silently crying again. They could see it in her shaking shoulders. She looked so small and frail. She'd been smaller when they'd found her, yet she was still so in their eyes. Or perhaps was it them who were too big? A question for another day. For now they'd make use of that size of theirs to do some good, or so they hoped. Carefully, they lied down besides her. Her ears were placated against her head; they knew that feeling very well. She wanted to be strong, they knew it, but strength sometimes came in other forms than simply putting up a front and relinquishing one's emotions. And had not all the great heroes had to face their grief one day? Being sad was useful sometimes, crying was good to expel the shadows from within, even if only for a time. They felt her stir besides them and an arm extend over their fur as she buried herself within with a whimper. Mistress was aware, he too, both did their best to help as they could yet sometimes the heart only needed time. They knew it, a lesson hard learned. She sobbed silently, her shoulders shaking in a broken rhythm. They had been gone for a while now. Surely they would return, but when? Neither she nor they knew, they'd seen him off three rests prior once she'd informed him of the situation. He'd left everything in their care and they'd promised. Family meant to care for one another, and they'd do just that.

Dawn came as a surprise when they opened their eyes. The night had been loud and full of strong rain, now the quiet of the morning was almost disconcerting. The little one was still fast asleep by their side, her head buried in the thick fur. Their body was warm by nature, they had to regulate the temperature however so as not to burn too hot. Looking down they saw the lines of her face were now faded and relaxed. She'd gotten some sleep which was good. They turned back towards the window. It gave view on part of the garden and the beach, plunging in the sea, a beautiful sight to have in any weather but especially gorgeous after a storm like the one of the previous night. The stirring must have woken her however as she rolled on her back with a groan.

"Good morning…" She seemed to hesitate a moment. "Vaud? What are you doing here? Were you scared of the storm?"

They nudged her gently with their nose and huffed. She laughed which made their heart swell.

"I'm hungry," she passed her hand on her stomach. "Do you want something to eat?"

Another huff.

"Alright, come on big lad!"

She nudged them slightly before stretching her limbs. They followed suit, noticing with relief her ears were back to being perked up as usual and her eyes big and shining with curiosity and wit. They grabbed her by the collar once stretching was over and guided her to the kitchen without her feet touching the ground, much to her loud protest but, they knew it, her secret enjoyment. She still had a ways to go but maybe, just maybe, they, all of them, could walk with her along that path and make it just a tad less dreary…

---

PREVIOUSLY | NEXTLY

A Hero’s Retirement

[starsontheceilingcomic]

The Abigail Pitch

New comic,"The Abigail Pitch", is up. Click the comic to see the final.

[loosesodamarble]

Langris, noooooo!

This style is fun to do.

[solaris-winery]

Explaining away the (large) amount of mana Yuno posseses by him being royalty / prince of Spade doesn't make sense in the context of Black Clover, since Yuno isn't Cloverite royalty.

In canon, do they not make it a point to explain that the reason behind the mana disparities between classes (in clover) is a direct result of the Elven genocide? The royals stole the elves' mana to themselves, which is why they and then their descendants after them have such high levels of mana (as magic and mana are hereditary). But Yuno does not belong to the royal houses of clover, and this does not apply to other kingdom's royalty and hierarchical systems, because that simply would not make any sense. We know the reason the Heart Kingdom's queen is powerful, is that she receives the power and knowledge of all other previous queens before her in addition to contracting the water spirit. We don't know much about Diamond. However in case of Spade, as far as canon goes, we are not led to believe that there is something special about their royalty. It would also not make sense to apply Clover rules and conditions on them.

Not to mention, canon itself points out (in case of Clover) mana being hereditarily fixed by status, "is not an absolute rule, however, as even a noble born from two powerful mages could be born with little magic power and a commoner born from two weak mages could be born with high magic power." (taken from the wiki), then how about in a society where those disparities do not exist in the first place, because they didn't concoct their own version of the Elven genocide. Magic power (and Mana) would not have to do with status at all.

I would like to believe that Nozel saying, "It makes sense" for Yuno to be royalty owing to his magic, as if it explains things and this 'commoner?? with many mana??' comes from his own background, however it really feels like it's been put there for the audience's benefit. Which to me seems faulty due to the reasons above.

Clover Kingdom's hierarchical system of magic and status was manufactured 500 years ago, and does not apply to other kingdoms unless they were complicit in the Elven genocide, which as far as we see they aren't. Nobles of other kingdom's do not have to have higher levels of magic, this isn't set in stone (although it alludes me how nobles in Clover seem to have higher levels of mana and magical power comparatively, how was this mana 'shared' by the royals to perpetuate and maintain Clover's current aristocratic society? The nobles didn't seem to be present during the genocide in and of itself for the mana to be directly transferred to them, and to me the royalty who've been clouded by greed do not seem to be to keen to share their power and would've been content to keep it and perhaps make themselves some sort of 'absolute' rulers through it — that seems like a more natural progression. Though from the text, I suppose we could infer, especially so through Finesse's engagement to the Vaude's, that this likely occurred through royal-noble intermarriages, but did they marry into every noble house? Was there even enough time for that? 500 years is long, but not that long).

(Although this whole thing of royals stealing mana from the elves to increase magic power on it's own seems fishy when you take Kirsch's explanation into perspective: People's bodies as vessels of mana have a predetermined capacity to how much mana they can hold, and this cannot be changed whether for less or more, no matter what. That capacity is fixed. According to Kirsch, at least. Do take this with a grain of salt though as we've been exposed via canon to attempts at increasing mana via magic items or spells, namely Lumiere's research and Charmy's attempt at finding a way to cook mana-increasing food. So this information could be born from a still incomplete understanding of mana and magic, or royal 'propaganda' similarly to how the elves were refered to as evil fiends in passed down stories).

Rambles aside, Yuno being prince of Spade should not have anything to do with his mana levels, unless further canon evidence is provided to specify that Spade royals' had special circumstances in regards to that, much like the royal houses of Clover and the Queen of Heart's mana is explained.

[uarmyhusband]

Posting this as a seperate drabble from my RP blog @fn-devilles

After seeing the battlefields and wreckage:

Vaude stared, eyes wide and beak agape. He shook himself back to his senses.

“Actually, I change my mind. F*ck this, I want out of this hellscape.”

Vaude quickly turned on his heel and jogged back down the hill. He returned to his sister and braced his hands on his knees, out of breath.

“Lizzy, we—“

Vaude wheezed and held his chest.

“We need to find a safer home. I don’t know where, but Condo Canyon isn’t it. Too many IO forces.”

Elizabeth marked the page of the book in her hand and placed it beside her on the large rock she sat upon. She folded her hands neatly across her lap as she looked up to meet Vaude’s panicked face.

“I suppose this means you’re officially on our side, one hundred percent?”

Vaude nodded. He wobbled to Elizabeth and plopped beside her. Tears brimmed his eyes.

“There’s no use staying here. All I wanted was a happy, peaceful life with Dom, but it’s not going to happen in the loop. I was foolish to think otherwise, all those years.”

Vaude wheezed again as he tried to hold back his tears. Elizabeth reached into the bag that was settled against Vaude’s back. She pulled out a canteen of water and a rag and handed them to her brother.

Vaude gulped down half the contents in the canteen, then blew his beak into the rag. Elizabeth rubbed circles on his back as they sat on the rock and looked out over what was once a promising place to call home.

“You’re not foolish, Vaude. You’re strong enough to have dreams while everything crumbles around you. I’ve seen it myself. No matter how many times your hopes are crushed by catastrophes and the evil of this world, you still manage to pick yourself up and keep pushing forward.”

Elizabeth smiled and patted her brother on the head.

“It’s one of the things I actually like about you.”

Vaude squawked with indignation as his sister burst into a fit of laughter. When she noticed him pouting, Elizabeth quieted down. She softly smiled and pulled Vaude by the shoulders into a side hug.

“No matter what happens next, we can get through this. We’ve been through worse.”

The twins rested their heads together and watched as the sun descended on the destruction that spanned across Artemis.

[all-my-friends-were-glorious]

5 Songs For Relationships - Ague/Greer

Soap - Melanie Martinez

Evil - The Vaude Villainz

Thick as Thieves - Dashboard Confessional

Jerome - Zella Day

Every Man Knows His Plague; And You Are Mine - Tiny Little Houses

@southxparkxafterxdark

[one-leaf-grimoire]

Kinktober Masterlist

so uhhh yeah here’s the list. I chose the characters via random number generator with repeats allowed. I went back later and added in 3 particularly evil characters hehe ;) . Julius gets special treatment bc this is my blog and I make the rules. I’ll be updating this every day with the links!

Warning: Spicy 18 + stuff under the cut...

1- body worship // Licht x gn elf reader

2- dry humping // Zora Ideale x gn reader

3- face sitting // Nozel Silva x female reader

4- cum // Langris Vaude x gn reader

5- over stimulation // Luck Voltia x female reader

6- edging // William Vangeance x female reader

7- degradation // Vanica Zogratis x gn reader

8- massage // Marx Francois x gn reader

9- toys // Magna Swing x female reader

10- cock worship // Jack x gn reader

11- praise // Zenon Zogratis x female reader

13- cockwarming // Dante Zogratis x female reader

14- pegging // Rhya x gn reader

15- fingering + public sex // b-day boy (Julius) x female reader

16- male submission // Mereoleona Vermillion x male reader

17- shower sex // Fuegoleon Vermillion x male reader

[glorianas]

We have to ask ourselves whether these literary portraits coincide with reality or are merely apart of a literary tradition which maintained that witches are female, old and foolish. Greek and Roman models began with Circe and Medea, neither of whom were depicted as either old or stupid, so the more likely literary source for such a picture may be found in Lucan or Horace, both of whom delineate vivid images of old, ugly, malicious women living on the margins of Christian society. Christian writers of the early centuries AD, however, often saw magical workers as male-Arnobius, for example refers to them as men, as does Lacantius, while the historian Sozomen tells us that when Julian the Apostate died, professional philosophers discarded their distinctive fringed cloaks in case they were mistaken for sorcerers. But these, of course, were not 'witches' in the later sense of someone who was able to manipulate the laws of nature to her or his will and advantage by entering into an agreement, tacit or overt, with an evil spirit. This notion, and the assumption that the majority of such individuals would be female, emerged gradually during the Middle Ages, partly by a series of incidents centered the Dauphine, the Pays de Vaud, Piedmont, Savoy, western Switzerland and Geneva. These incidents provided material for the formulation of theological and demonological treatises, and thus with the picture of the became fixed and tradition began.

P.G. Maxwell-Stuart, The British Witch

[perception-de-ambiguity]

my top 111 first viewings of 2017

(pictured films in bold)

1) Reality's Invisible (Robert E. Fulton, 1971)

2) 화엄경 / Passage to Buddha (Jang Sun-woo, 1993)

3) 河童のクゥと夏休み / Summer Days With Coo (Keiichi Hara, 2007)

4) E V E R Y T H I N G (David OReilly, 2017)

5) Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch, 2017)

6) Path of Cessation(?) (Robert E. Fulton, 1974)

7) Gambling, Gods and LSD (Peter Mettler, 2002)

8) "Short Films by Robert Fulton" (Robert E. Fulton, various)

9) 边走边唱 / Life on a String (Chen Kaige, 1991)

10) 50 Feet of String (Leighton Pierce, 1995)

11) មុនដំបូងខ្មែរក្រហមសម្លាប់ប៉ារបស់ខ្ / First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers (Angelina Jolie; second unit director & director of photography Alexander Witt, 2017)

12) the KILLING of a SACRED DEER (Yorgos Lanthimos, 2017)

13) 百日紅～Miss HOKUSAI～ / Miss Hokusai (Keiichi Hara, 2015)

14) Nazar (Mani Kaul, 1990)

15) Ад / Põrgu / Hell (Rein Raamat, 1983)

16) Manoel dans l'île des merveilles / Manoel on the Island of Marvels / Manuel on the Island of Wonders (Raoul Ruiz, 1984)

17) Odchádza clovek / A Man Leaves Us / The Man is Leaving (Martin Slivka, 1968)

18) 風月 / Temptress Moon (Chen Kaige, 1996)

19) Krisha (Trey Edward Shults, 2015)

20) Christine (Antonio Campos, 2016)

21) Sudden Fear (David Miller, 1952)

22) A Reflection of Fear (William A. Fraker, 1972)

23) mother! (Darren Aronofsky, 2017)

24) Le tout nouveau testament / The Brand New Testament (Jaco Van Dormael, 2015)

25) Une femme a passé / A Woman Passed By (René Jayet, 1928)

26) Good Time (Josh and Benny Safdie, 2017)

27) Le pays des sourds / In the Land of the Deaf (Nicolas Philibert, 1992)

28) Munchsferatu (Julien Lahmi, 2017)

29) Silent Snow, Secret Snow (Gene R. Kearney, 1964)

30) માટી માણસ / The Mind of Clay / Mati Manas / Maati Manas (Mani Kaul, 1985)

31) Zardoz (John Boorman, 1974)

32) Rekni mi neco o sobe - René / Tell Me Something About Yourself: Rene (Helena Trestíková, 1992)

33) L'amour à la mer / Love at Sea (Guy Gilles, 1964)

34) सिद्धेश्वरी / Siddeshwari (Mani Kaul, 1990)

35) The Passing (Bill Viola, 1992)

36) 霸王別姬 / Farewell My Concubine (Chen Kaige, 1993)

37) Play for Today: "The Lie" (Alan Bridges; written by Ingmar Bergman, 1970)

38) 另一種教育 / Lessons from a Calf (Hirokazu Kore-eda, 1991)

39) उसकी रोटी / Uski Roti / His Daily Bread (Mani Kaul, 1970)

40) Simon Killer (Antonio Campos, 2012)

41) 金刚经 / The Poet and the Singer / Diamond Sutra (Bi Gan, 2012)

42) 青梅竹马 / green plums and a bamboo horse / Taipei Story (Edward Yang, 1985)

43) Docteur Jekyll et les femmes / The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osbourne (Walerian Borowczyk, 1981)

44) "Leighton Pierce - short films" (all the ones I've watched)

45) Elsewhere (Nikolaus Geyrhalter, 2001)

46) I Do Not Know What It Is I Am Like (Bill Viola, 1986)

47) No Man of Her Own (Mitchell Leisen, 1950)

48) Without Memory (Hirokazu Kore-eda, 1996)

49) Pointilly / Le château de Pointilly (Adolfo Arrieta, 1972)

50) Otello / Othello (Sergei Yutkevich, 1956)

51) The Fourth Dimension (T. Minh-ha Trinh, 2001)

52) Deadfall (Bryan Forbes, 1968)

53) En kärlekshistoria / A Swedish Love Story (Roy Andersson, 1970)

54) Code Blue (Urszula Antoniak, 2011)

55) ...Geist und ein wenig Glück (Ulrich Schamoni, 1965)

56) Mulholland Dr. - Pilot (David Lynch, 1999)

57) Vital (Shinya Tsukamoto, 2004)

58) Dawn of an Evil Millennium / Dawn of an Evil Millennium: The Trailer (Damon Packard, 1988)

59) The Pursuit of What Was (Huang Ya-li, 2009)

60) Фабрика / Fabrika / Factory (Sergey Loznitsa, 2004)

61) カラフル / Colourful / Colorful (Keiichi Hara, 2010)

62) Mysteries of the Unseen World 3D (Louie Schwartzberg, 2013)

63) Cruel Optimism (Paul Clipson, 2017)

64) A Woman's Tale (Paul Cox, 1991)

65) Chargez ! (Johanna Vaude, 2017)

66) 시 / Poetry / Shi (Lee Chang-dong, 2010)

67) Eastern Avenue (Peter Mettler, 1985)

68) Nothing Personal (Urszula Antoniak, 2009)

69) High-Tech Exploration par Johanna Vaude (Johanna Vaude, 2016)

70) The Reflecting Pool (Bill Viola, 1979)

71) Retour en Normandie / Back to Normandy (Nicolas Philibert, 2007)

72) Les films rêvés / Dreaming Film (Eric Pauwels, 2010)

73) Dream Enclosure (Sandy Ding, 2014)

74) 白い朝 / Ako / AKO: 16 ans japonaise / White Morning (Hiroshi Teshigahara, 1965)

75) The Unnamed (Huang Ya-li, 2010)

76) Twilight's Last Gleaming (Robert Aldrich, 1977)

77) Dzieje grzechu / The Story of Sin (Walerian Borowczyk, 1975)

78) Liebelei (Max Ophüls, 1933)

79) 달마가 동쪽으로 간 까닭은 / Why Has Bodhi-Dharma Left for the East? (Bae Yong-kyun, 1989)

80) The Wheel of Becoming (Bill Viola, 1977)

81) Abendland (Nikolaus Geyrhalter, 2011)

82) Frost (Fred Kelemen, 1997)

83) Arrière-saison (Jean-Claude Rousseau, 2016)

84) 海よりもまだ深く / After the Storm (Hirokazu Kore-eda, 2016)

85) 幻の光 / Maborosi (Hirokazu Kore-eda, 1995)

86) Look Inside The Ghost Machine (Péter Lichter, 2010)

87) Chez moi / My Home (Phuong Mai Nguyen, 2014)

88) दुविधा / Duvidha / Indecision / In Two Minds (Mani Kaul, 1973) 

89) Emperor of the North Pole (Robert Aldrich, 1973) 

90) Le roman d'un tricheur / The Story of a Cheat (Sacha Guitry, 1936)

91) Le convoi / Fast Convoy (Frédéric Schoendoerffer, 2016)

92) Deserts (Bill Viola, 1994)

93) Charles Manson Superstar (Nikolas Schreck, 1989)

94) 空山灵雨 / Raining in the Mountain (King Hu, 1979)

95) Voda a práca / Water and Labor (Martin Slivka, 1964)

96) Impressions: A Journey Behind the Scenes of Twin Peaks (Jason S., 2017) 

97) Контакт / Kontakt / Contact (Vladimdir Tarasov, 1978)

98) Fountain of Dreams (Jordan Belson, 1984)

99) Les perles de la couronne / The Pearls of the Crown (Sacha Guitry, 1937) 

100) Fassbinder: at elske uden at kræve / Fassbinder - lieben ohne zu fordern (Christian Braad Thomsen, 2015)

101) Adventure Time with Finn & Jake: Food Chain (Masaaki Yuasa, 2014)

102) 海街diary / Our Little Sister (Kore-eda Hirokazu, 2015)

103) Metachaos (Alessandro Bavari, 2010)

104) Love's Refrain (Paul Clipson, 2016)

105) Le bercail (Marcel L'Herbier, 1919)

106) Never Let Go (John Guillermin, 1960)

107) 오아시스 / Oasis (Lee Chang-dong, 2002)

108) Hounds of Love (Ben Young, 2016)

109) We hear the distant ring of Saturn (Dalibor Baric, 2016)

110) Faisons un rêve... / Let's Have a Dream (Sacha Guitry, 1936)

111) 蝴蝶夫人 / Madame Butterfly (Tsai Ming-Liang, 2009)

[melancholyflower]

“Point me out the happy man and I will point you out either egotism, selfishness, evil - Or else an absolute ignorance”

“Point me out the happy man and I will point you out either egotism, selfishness, evil – Or else an absolute ignorance”

(“Montrez-moi un homme heureux, moi, je vous montrerai la suffisance, l’égoïsme, la malignité… à moins que ce ne soit la totale ignorance”) Graham Greene – Setlist de la tournée The Holy Bible 20 Extrait du Fond du problème

Henry Graham Greene, né le 2 octobre 1904 à Berkhamsted, dans le comté de Hertfordshire, en Angleterre, et mort le 3 avril 1991 à Vevey, dans le canton de Vaud, en Suisse,…

[discitemori]

The New Paganism

A definitive answer to today’s “neo-pagans” by the inimitable Hilaire Belloc:

We call paganism an absence of the Christian revelation. That is why we distinguish between paganism and the different heresies; that is why we give the name of Christian to imperfect and distorted Christians who only possess a part of Catholic truth and usually add to it doctrines which are contradictory of Catholic truth. Moreover, the word "Christian," though so vague as to be dangerous, has this much reality about it, that there is something different between the general atmosphere or savor of any society or person or literature which can be called Christian at all and those which are wholly lacking in any part of Christian doctrine. For a Christian man or society is one that has some part of Catholicism left in him. But when every shred of Catholicism is lost we call that state of things "Unchristian." Now, it must be evident to everybody by this time that, with the attack on faith and the Church at the Reformation, the successful rebellion of so many and their secession from united Christendom, there began a process which could only end in the complete loss of all Catholic doctrine and morals by the deserters. That consummation we are today reaching. It took a long time to come about, but come about it has. We have but to look around us to see that there are, spreading over what used to be the Christian world, larger and larger areas over which the Christian spirit has wholly failed; is absent. I mean by "larger areas" both larger moral and larger physical areas, but especially larger moral areas. There are now whole groups of books, whole bodies of men, which are definitely pagan, and these are beginning to join up into larger groups. It is like the freezing over of a pond, which begins in patches of ice; the patches unite to form wide sheets, till at last the whole is one solid surface. There are considerable masses of literature in the modern world, of philosophy and history (and especially of fiction), which are pagan and they are coalescing—to form a corpus of anti-Christian influence. It is not so much that they deny the Incarnation and the Resurrection, not even that they ignore doctrine. It is rather that they contradict and oppose the old inherited Christian system of morals to which people used to adhere long after they had given up definite doctrine. This New Paganism is already a world of its own. It bulks large, and it is certainly going to spread and occupy more and more of modern life. It is exceedingly important that we should judge rightly and in good time of what its effects will probably be, for we are going to come under the influence of those effects to some extent, and our children will come very strongly under their influence. Those effects are already impressing themselves profoundly upon the press, conversation, laws, building, and intimate habits of our time. . . . The New Paganism is the resultant of two forces which have converged to produce it: appetite and the sense of doom. Of the forces which impelled it into being, the appeal of the senses to be released from restriction through the denial of the faith is so obvious that none will contest it, the only controversy being upon whether this removal of restriction upon sensual enjoyment, declining every form of reticence and exercising the fullest license for what is called "self expression," is of good or of evil effect upon the individual and upon society. The Christian scheme is still close enough even to the most pagan of the New Pagans to be familiar, and the social atmosphere which it created still endures as a memory, or as a rejected experience, in their lives. That social atmosphere insisted on a number of restrictions. Of course, no society could exist in which there were not a great number of restrictions, but the restrictions imposed by Christian morals were severe and numerous, and most of them are meaningless to those who have abandoned Christian doctrine, because morals are the fruit of doctrine. It is not only in sexual matters (the first that will be cited in this connection), but in canons of taste, in social conduct, traditional canons of beauty in verse, prose, or the plastic arts that there is outbreak. The restriction and, therefore, the effort necessary for lucidity in prose, for scansion in poetry and, according to our tradition, for rhyme in most poetry—the restrictions imposed by reverence for age, for certain relationships such as those between parent and child, for the respect of property as a right—and all the rest of it are broken through. A license in act and a necessarily more extended license in speech are therefore the mark of the New Paganism. But to this negative force must be added a positive one to explain what is happening, and that positive one is a philosophy which may be called monist, or fatalist, or determinist, or by one of any number of names all signifying either the absence of conscious will from the universe or the presence of only one such will therein. The true origin of this attitude of mind in modern times is the powerful genius of Calvin, though those who most suffer his influence would most strenuously deny their subjection to it, partly because they have never read him, much more because they do not see it in their daily papers, and most of all because Calvin is vaguely mixed up in their minds with an interest in theology, which science is thought to have exploded—there is also perhaps some little distaste for Calvin because he was a Frenchman, but as that deplorable fact is never emphasized it cannot count for much. Calvin, then, is at the fountainhead of this new sense of doom. But behind Calvin the fatalist attitude is an attitude as old, of course, as the hills. It is a temptation to which the human intellect has yielded on important occasions from as far back as we can trace its recorded experience and definitions. To the mind in that mood all things are part of an unchangeable process following from cause to effect immutably. A direct consequence of this philosophy, though again it is a consequence furiously denied by its victims, is the elimination of right and wrong. Our actions do not depend upon our own wills; those who think that they proceed from an act of the will suffer an illusion; human action, from what used to be called the noblest selfsacrifice to the basest commercial swindling, is the inevitable result of forces over which the perpetrator has no control—or, as Dean Swift has admirably put it in that great masterpiece, The Tale of a Tub, "It was ordained some three days before the Creation that my nose should come against this lamp post." It is true that the professors of this creed are illogical; for no one gives louder vent to moral indignation than themselves, especially when they are denouncing the cruelties or ineptitudes of believers in moral responsibility, but then, as the denial of the human reason is also part of their creed, or, at any rate, the denial of its value as the instrument for the discovery of truth, they will not be seriously disturbed by the incongruity of their outbursts; for what is incongrnous or illogical is not to them blameworthy or ridiculous—rather in their mouths does the world "logical" connote something absurd and empty. Now, it is with this element of monism that there enters a highly practical consideration in our survey of the New Paganism. It is this: The New Paganism is in process of building up a society of its own, wherein will be apparent two features novel in what used to be Christendom. Those two features have already appeared and will spread each in its own sphere, the one in the sphere of law—that is, of coercive enactment—the other in the sphere of status, that is, in the organization of society. In the first sphere, that of positive law, the New Paganism has already begun to produce and cannot but produce more and more a mass of restrictive legislation. It is a paradox, of course, that such restrictive legislation should be bred from a mood which proceeded originally from rebellion against restriction, but the fact is undoubted—it is before all our eyes. With the denial of the will there necessarily appears the questioning of any content to the word "freedom." In a Christian society you were free to do a number of acts, for some of which you could be punished under Christian laws, for others of which no state or other authority could punish you, but which were opposed to the social atmosphere in which you lived. But the New Paganism will tend, not to punish, but to restrain with fetters; to prevent action, to impose coercive bonds. It will be at issue more and more with human dignity. It has already, in certain provinces (the Calvinist canton of Vaud in Switzerland is an example), enacted what is called "the sterilization of the unfit" as a positive law. It has not yet enacted, though it has already proposed and will certainly in time enact, legislation for the restriction of births. Not only in these, but in many other departments of life, one after another, will this mechanical network spread and bind those subject to it under a compulsion which cannot be escaped. In the sphere of social texture the New Paganism must also inevitably and of its nature, wherever it gives its tone to society, reintroduce that status of slavery from which our civilization sprang and which only very gradually disappeared under the influence of the Christian ethic. . . . In the form of security and sufficiency for the men who labor to the profit of others, and in the form of registering and controlling them in the form of an organized public supervision of their labor, slavery is already afoot. When slavery shall succeed it will succeed through the acquiescence of those who will be enslaved, for they will prefer sufficiency and security with enslavement, to freedom, responsibility, insecurity, and the threat of insufficiency. As yet, during the transition, there is an illogical, and therefore an ephemeral mixture of the old and the new. The old freedom sufficiently survives in the mind of the wage earner to give him the illusion that, while accepting insurance and maintenance from the capitalist state, he can still be a full citizen. He thinks he can have his cake and eat it too. He is mistaken. The great capitalists who procured these regulations from the politicians knew what they were at. They were catching their proletariat in a net, and now they hold it fast. The New Paganism will then, I say, give us, in those societies over which it shall obtain the control of the mind, increasing restriction against general freedom and increasing restriction against the particular freedom which left some equality between the man who worked and the man who exploited him under a contract—it will replace that idea of contract by the older idea of status. In saying this, my object is to point out that the discussion of the New Paganism is not a mere academic discussion, but, as I have called it, one of immediate practical importance. If we adopt it we must be prepared for its consequences; if we abhor those consequences, it is our business to fight the New Paganism vigorously. And here I have, as on so many other points, a quarrel with those moderns who will make of religion an individual thing (and no Catholic can evade the corporate quality of religion), telling us that its object being personal holiness and the salvation of the individual soul, it can have no concern with politics. On the contrary, the concern of religion with politics is inevitable. Not that the Christian doctrine and ethic rejects any one of the three classical forms of government—democracy, aristocracy or monarchy, or any mixture of them—but that it does reject certain features in society which are opposed to the Christian social products, and is opposed to them because they spring from a denial of free will. The battle for right doctrine in theology is always also a battle for the preservation of definite social things (institutions, habits) following from right doctrine; nor is there anything more contemptible intellectually than the attitude of those who imagine that because doctrine must be stated in abstract terms it therefore has no practical application nor any real fruit in the real world of real men. Contrariwise, difference in doctrine is at the root of all political and social differences; therefore is the struggle for or against true doctrine the most vital of struggles. . . . [T]he idea of pagan antiquity as a model runs through the whole new movement. With a few scholars it is at firsthand, with most people at second, third, fourth, or fifth; but it is there with everyone. There is a general knowledge that men were once free from the burden of Christian duty, and a widespread belief that when men were free from it, life was better because it was more rational and directed to things which they could all be sure of and test for themselves, such as the health of the body and physical comforts and pleasant surroundings, and the rest. To direct life again to these objects, making man once more sufficient to himself and treating temporal good as the supreme good, is the note of the New Paganism. Now what seems to me by far the most important thing to point out in this connection is that the underlying assumption in all this is false. The New Paganism differs, and must differ radically, from the old; its consequences in human life will be quite different; presumably much worse, and increasingly worse. The reason of this is that you cannot undo an experience. You cannot cut off a man or a society from their past, and the world of Christendom has had the experience of the faith. When it moves away from the faith to return to paganism again it is not doing the same thing, not producing the same emotions, not passing through the same process, not suffering the same reactions, as the old paganism did, which was moving towards the faith. It is one thing to go south from the Arctic towards the civilized parts of Europe; it is quite another thing to go north from the civilized parts of Europe to the Arctic. You are not merely returning to a place from which you started, you are going through a contrary series of emotions the whole time. The New Paganism, should it ever become universal, or over whatever districts or societies it may become general, will never be what the Old Paganism was. It will be other, because it will be a corruption. The Old Paganism was profoundly traditional; indeed, it had no roots except in tradition. Deep reverence for its own past and for the wisdom of its ancestry and pride therein were the very soul of the Old Paganism; that is why it formed so solid a foundation on which to build the Catholic Church, though that is also why it offered so long and determined a resistance to the growth of the Catholic Church. But the New Paganism has for its very essence contempt for tradition and contempt of ancestry. It respects perhaps nothing, but least of all does it respect the spirit of "Our fathers have told us." The Old Paganism worshiped human things, but the noblest human things, particularly reason and the sense of beauty. In these it rose to heights greater than have since been reached, perhaps, and certainly to heights as great as were ever reached by mere reason or in the mere production of beauty during the Christian centuries. But the New Paganism despises reason, and boasts that it is attacking beauty. It presents with pride music that is discordant, building that is repellent, pictures that are a mere chaos, and it ridicules the logical process, so that, as I have said, it has made of the very word "logical" a sort of sneer. The Old Paganism was of a sort that would be open, when due time came, to the authority of the Catholic Church. It had ears which at least would hear and eyes which at least would see; but the New Paganism not only has closed its senses, but is atrophying them, so that it aims at a state in which there shall be no ears to hear and no eyes to see. The one was growing keener in its sight and its hearing; the other is declining towards a condition where the society it informs will be blind and deaf, even to the main natural pleasures of life and to temporal truths. It will be incapable of understanding what they are all about. The Old Paganism had a strong sense of the supernatural. This sense was often turned to the wrong objects and always to insufficient objects, but it was keen and unfailing; all the poetry of the Old Paganism, even where it despairs, has this sense. And you may read in those of its writers who actively opposed religion, such as Lucretius, a fine religious sense of dignity and order. The New Paganism delights in superficiality, and conceives that it is rid of the evil as well as the good in what it believes to have been superstitions and illusions. There it is quite wrong, and upon that note I will end. Men do not live long without gods; but when the gods of the New Paganism come they will not be merely insufficient, as were the gods of Greece, nor merely false; they will be evil. One might put it in a sentence, and say that the New Paganism, foolishly expecting satisfaction, will fall, before it knows where it is, into Satanism.

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-new-paganism

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