#verse; Keep On Believing

[proverbs31girly]

[pandadrake]

Big backlog at the Go Home Machine.

Was drawing a different idea and it spun off into this doodle of the effect of all-nighters on teenagers vs. people in their late twenties.

[walkswithmyfather]

“And the God of peace will crush satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.”

‭‭(Romans‬ ‭16:20‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)

[misstrashchan]

So. What's the opposite of a sacrifice?

With the final episode looming it's a question we've been turning in our heads, so I wanted to give my best guess/analysis as to what it might be before Jon and Muna come to tear our hearts out in the final episode.

This is the question Hayward asks Paige, and later Carpenter, and it seems to be the underlying thematic statement of the series, in response to Carpenter's exposition in the first episode of the Silt Verses that introduces us to the fundamentals of the world and system they live in:

CARPENTER:

A god must feed.

A god must be fed.

This is a fact agreed upon across every territory in the Peninsula. And so, really, the only difference between the people born to the water and the people born to the land...

...is the precise nature of the sacrifice we need to make.

There is a God for anything in their world as long as there is someone believing in it. But all Gods need human sacrifices. A god must feed. A god must be fed.

These simple rules have been used as fascinating and horrifying metaphors of our modern society, and to explore themes of faith and sacrifice throughout the story.

And so the final question the last season proposes is if we can find a way to make something better, that can exist outside of this ultimately unsustainable exploitative system and the harm it inflicts upon ourselves and the world, when it has come to define so much of the way we live and how we think. And that means figuring out the opposite of a sacrifice, if they want to kill the idea, the lie, that is at the heart of their world.

At first I thought the opposite of a sacrifice, of offering up to the gods, was about killing your gods. Starving them out. Refusing to offer up anything. And that is part of it, I think. I mean it's literally been a repeating mantra of multiple characters this season once they've reached they're breaking points. Violence in revolution as a tool to overthrow oppresive systems is sometimes needed and necessary. But what about after? What kind of future or vision for a better world can there be? There needs to be something at the heart of that movement that isn't just about violence against their opressors, because you then define yourself in relation to them.

This is even illustrated in the Many Below god Paige created having predator and prey emeshed together, a movement defined by their resistance against the predators of the world, the beasts, cannot seperate themselves to meaningfully create a better future that exists outside of that dichotomy. I think Hayward realises that even earlier in S2:

HAYWARD:

There’s a hare in the grass, half-buried and bloodied.

A barn owl has latched onto its back, its talons driving deep into the flesh of the hare.

Both animals are dead.

Familiar black stone veins protrude from the carcass of the victim, twisting like branches, driving upwards into the predator’s skin.

Hare and owl are locked together, inseparably.

The god must have struck just as the prey died.

White crocus is flowering up from the two entwined bodies.

(Unhappily)

And suddenly I begin to feel deeply afraid.

It all makes me think of a dormouse, dead in the dirt, its ribs showing. Of rabbits, teeth chattering, hungering from their cages

I kick dust up over the corpses. Nudge them aside into the long grass so they can’t be seen from the path.

Paige doesn’t need to know about this, I tell myself.

There’s no sense in worrying her. Not yet.

Which then makes sense why he's the one proposing the question of what the opposite of a sacrifice is to Paige (and Carpenter), for this very reason.

I think the answer is pretty simple and yet, like most simple truths in this world, it's forgotten and overlooked or twisted as naïve.

Preservation. The opposite of a sacrifice is preservation. To better explain this let me use an example:

If someone who cared about you tells you you're working too hard at your thankless job, sacrificing your sleep, your time, your personal relationships, your physical and mental wellbeing, far past the point considered sane, they'd tell you to stop. To make sure you take care of yourself. Instead of endlessly feeding yourself into a machine to justify your existence.

Applied to the world of the Silt Verses, it's not just self preservation and caring for yourself. It's about caring for, protecting, and preserving the lives of those around you, that is the ultimate act of rebellion and political warfare, the first steps forward towards a better world. Caring for humanity.

Whenever our characters reach a breaking point of turning against their gods, there's a common thread of wanting to save their fellow man, and realising the inadequacy of a god's ability to do that. Whether that's somebody close to them (like Faulkner and Paige):

Or humanity as a whole (VAL and Shrue):

SHRUE:

Use them, pass them on, do not forget the suffering that keeps the engines of this world turning, forget the name of your god and cherish the name of your neighbour that was swallowed up by it-

Cherish your neighbour. Be kinder to one another.

This can even go back to Carpenter's rejection of the Trawler-Man back in S1, her fury at the fact those she loved had been eaten (her family) and would continue to be eaten (Faulkner).

CARPENTER:

(Yelling to the river)

It's over between us, you twin mouthed prick!

Do you hear me?

Does that stir you from your torpor? Pry the barnacles loose from your sodden ears?

My father and mother were Gregory and Sandra Glass. My grandmother was Adalina Glass. My brother was Em.

They died for you.

Every single one of them died for you and they thought it meant something.

My name is Carpenter. And I am still alive!

I have loved you for so long. I have tried to know you for so, so much longer.

And I'm done with you. Here and now. I'm not laying down my life for you.

I'm not dying, do you hear?

The same breaking point for Faulkner at turning against his parish and finally snapping is the idea of Carpenter being offered as a sacrifice, an offering returned, begging for her to live.

I must clarify this is my own interpretation of the question and themes the story proposes. I'm

I'm not sure we'll actually get a hard answer so much as different characters offering their own answers and us as the audience encouraged to think for ourselves what it might be. I think this is what Hayward's answer might be at least, anyway, because like me he's a corny motherfucker:

If a sacrifice is the idea that the most meaningful and transformative thing you can do is to give up your life, your sense of self, to die, then the opposite of that would be to try to keep on living, and finding meaning and transformation in that, surely?

[ae-cha08]

Realize how much you are cherished by God. You are indeed loved by Him. As you go through your day, rejoice knowing that God has woven every detail to continually work out for good! He has your back!

[ivalice-tifalucis]

With the release of From The Rehearsal Room - Tokyo to Ramin's youtube I finally, finally, continue and finish this side project I'm doing.

Initially, I used AI to mastered it because the first version I got from bilibili were not in good quality but I wasn't satisfied and I found the much better quality. But with Ramin uploaded it to youtube, I re did all the mastering just with audacity for both Part 1 and Part 2. The Part 2 is still from the better version I found from bilibili, by the way.

What you need to do is just download the file and put it on your music player. The metadata is all completed as if it's whole legit album. Enjoy, guys!!

And I'm being weird so all the lyrics that are put there are from my listening although I still use what I found online but I still listened and compared. They made few ad-libs and changes and I notice because for the songs that I wasn't familiar, the lyric that I found online and what they sang was slightly different. Perhaps they sing the newer version of the lyrics or mistakes? Even each Sheytoons songs they sing one in both parts differ from the ones I found online.

Another sample from my favorite:

Source and Credits Part 1 | Part 2 (Ramin's upload) Album cover Photos

Vocal & Guitar: Ramin Karimloo, Hadley Fraser Piano: Ryohei Mori

[melien]

I don't wanna look at anything else now that I saw you I don't wanna think of anything else now that I thought of you I've been sleeping so long in a 20-year dark night And now I see daylight, I only see daylight

[juliareed]

Mr. Sark has assumed control of your mother's operation— Please stop referring to her as my mother. Therefore, Ms. Derevko must know what he's looking for. // You were hired to kill me? Who hired you? Who put a contract on my life? Derevko. Irina Derevko.

[condemnedsouls]

@radiiosugars whispered a line ; UNPROMPTED ( ALWAYS ACCEPTING ) " Princess Charlie, I used to be mortal you know. But I'm a saint, hence Saint Peter, so now I'm a saint angel and, they told you they don't know what gets a soul into heaven? I certainly know how I got here, I earned my status after all. "

❝ WAIT - REALLY? you have an idea of what actually works? ❞

well, this could be a game changer, couldn't it? peter seemed the kinder sort, at least out of all of the angels ( emily, vaggie && her own dad aside ) that she had met so far. sera might have come off as polite, professional, but there were so many issues there, she wouldn't even think of it right now.

but she did remember him from the gate, && didn't that make sense? he was a saint, wasn't that basically the highest you could get as a human soul? devotion && faith, virtue - related && all?

her knowledge of human requirements when it came to faith was elementary at best.

❝ if you'd be willing to discuss it that would be amazing! ❞

[tvrningout]

we're kicking things off with a starter call! the length may range from one-liner to a paragraph, depending on my inspiration, and specifying a muse is preferred but not required if you don't have a preference!

[calamitys-child]

Flint is Highwayman by the Highwaymen and Madi is Highwomen by the Highwomen but unfortunately Silver is The Pilgrim by Kris Kristofferson

[edrurysz]

ooc.

me, delusional, still barely on here as Hel and High on Life: What if I made a Lucerys

[pretty-dianxia]

There is this state, in my country, that has the most beautiful bodies of water, rivers, and oceans; there, in the open sea, a statue of the Greek God of the oceans was placed.

Most of us looked at it not with disdain, but thinking that we have our own god of the water and that a statue of our god would make more sense. (We have two pantheons, and that region has specifically their storm-rain god)

Guess which state is now flooded and destroyed.

[ae-cha08]

[mythvoiced]

“Fancy party we have, uh, here.” Nervous laughter. Of course Nell laughs nervously before taking another generous sip of her punch. And of course the supermodel has to be in the vicinity while Myungdae and Alfred are busy carrying out their part of the plan. And of course the model had to recognize Myungdae earlier. And of course Nell now has to distract make small talk to said model while playing the waiting game as the Black Knight sets up the connection between the mainframe and her iPad.

How else could this possibly go wrong?

Another sip of the punch. “Uh, this is pretty good…punch? I can…I’ll get you a glass if you want.”

( also more nell vs small talk content...this time she gotta go lie to hyun since hyun already probably knows myungdae is up to no good JKFLSDJF :'D )

@stillresolved | NELL OH GOSH MY LOVE

Hyun's initial reaction is, unfortunately, instant displeasure and latent distrust. The displeasure isn't even all too misplaced, not in her field, not with her notoriety, and sadly enough, not with her social standing.

She has no idea who this foreigner is and while her Korean is perfect enough to suggest she may not be one at all, to Hyun and her world she may as well be. Her face is completely dissociated from any magazine covers and brand deals Hyun had memorized throughout the years, bombarded by her agent with 'this could be you's and 'this should be you's and whatever other phrase was supposed to function as incentive to get her to make them more money from yet another angle.

No actress. No model. Beautiful, yes, but natural, not as expensively pronounced as Hyun is.

The appropriate response for someone of Hyun's status is to, well, lift her chin, meet the woman's eyes solely to show and underline herself turning away again, and move on with the rest of her night.

Unfortunately for her marketing and fortunately for herself, Hyun only understands 'appropriate' as an adjective attached to morals that are actually morals... and not the rules of this little game.

"Do you speak English?" is the counter-question Hyun poses as she steps closer. There's some bias here, potentially, to pose the question just because her sudden conversation partner doesn't look traditionally South Korean, so to speak, but she shall continue to merely yearn the answer is yes.

"A lot of powerful girls here tonight don't, so...," she steps one final step to rest her hand on the woman's upper arm and lean in. "If you think this is fancy, then you must allow me to tell you how ugly it is," she smiles, and glows in perfect make-up, expensive Aeri clothing, and the sparkle of bejeweled earrings that annoy her every time they brush against her neck.

She looks around, conspiratorial.

"Also, I saw a suspicious looking person earlier and wanted to keep an eye on him, but I completely lost him in the crowd," she looks into the woman's startled - and admittedly stunning - dark brown eyes and chalks up her nerves to an environment she doesn't seem particularly used to.

She plucks the glass she's holding out of her hand. "The punch is mediocre at best. Allow me to lead you to a table with better alcohol. Now, as for that person, did you see anyone who looked out of place? Came with a cane, weird look in his eyes. Suggested I break into Samsung."

[andsotheuniverseended]

Silt Verses office comedy about the gods