#while I'm just

[singswan-springswan]

In a happy world where Jason is legally resurrected and gets to go to college like he's always dreamed of

[perfectlyripeclementine]

calling my lover "mine" but not in the way that my toothbrush or notebook are mine, mine in the way my neighborhood is mine, and also everybody else's, "mine" like mine to tend to, mine to care for, mine to love. "mine" not like possession but devotion.

[snarkspawn]

based ofc on this

[lotus-pear]

soukoku as one of my dearest renaissance paintings

[artist-rat]

fine dining at the blushing mermaid. with the boogieboys

[shadowtraveled]

"mithrun is the only real monsterfucker in dungeon meshi" is objectively the funniest bit you can get out of his everything, but in all seriousness i think his attraction to his love interest is deliberately overstated—and that makes sense, because romantic jealousy is a classic and digestible motive, which is explicitly what kabru was aiming for in condensing mithrun's backstory, and also because until chapter 94, mithrun wasn't willing to admit to the true nature of his desires.

but because romantic envy is both classic and digestible, it probably isn’t a unique enough or complicated enough desire to tempt a demon’s appetite. mithrun’s wish, as far as we can figure from kabru’s reduced retelling, was to have a life in which he had never become one of the canaries, and that carries like 3857 implications and desires within it. that’s delicious. his love interest acts as sort of a red herring to his motivation for making it, though. (side note: i'm saying "love interest" here because, keeping in mind that i barely speak japanese on a good day anymore, "想い人" is something i'd usually take as just kind of an old-fashioned and romantic way to refer to a lover, but in context i wonder if both the connotation of yearning and the vagueness are intentional, and i think this phrasing gets those aspects of it more effectively. anyway.)

mithrun considered his love interest to be untrustworthy. there was a minute where i thought that comment might be about a similar-looking elf (yugin, one of his squad members), but comparing the two…

the "sketchy" arrow is definitely referring to the elf we know as his love interest—the bangs go toward her right, she only has the one forehead ornament, and, most notably, her ears aren't notched.

every time she’s given a full-body depiction in his dungeon, she’s drawn as a chimera, with the body of a snake from the waist down. (side note: the “what if a dungeon has chimeras before reaching level 4?”/“then the dungeon lord is unstable” exchange just being mithrun grilling his past self alive is so funny. he’s so. but anyway) there are a couple things about this.

first, the snake part of the chimera appears to be modeled after some species of coral snake mimic

which, in the biology-for-fun manga, i… doubt is a coincidence, especially with the added context of the “untrustworthy” comment. the dungeon’s conjured illusion of mithrun’s love interest was a harmless copycat of a venomous original. for whatever reason, he felt this person was a threat and made up a "safe" version of her to be in a relationship with, and while it’s definitely possible to be attracted to or even love someone you find to be toxic and/or intimidating, when you take that into consideration alongside the configuration of her body, you get some interesting implications.

which brings us to our second point: if we assume that mithrun was not in fact fucking a snake, then sexual attraction, at least, was so far removed from his idea of a relationship with this person that he did not even bother to keep her dungeon copy human enough to maintain the illusion of the option of a sexual relationship. this is somewhat echoed in the depictions of their interactions, which also imply a frankly unexpected romantic distance. she kisses his cheek and he doesn't seem to react; she's at the edge of a narrow bed with only one set of pillows, on top of his blankets while he's underneath them.

the kiss is particularly interesting because it seems to contrast the text. kabru's narration tells us this was everything mithrun could have asked for, but mithrun is there looking unreadable to pensive, likely because this is right before the panel that makes it clear things in the dungeon are beginning to go wrong.

walking through this backwards for a minute, we have the physical barrier of his bedding and the spatial separation inherent in a bed made for one person, the emotional barrier of his mounting anxiety getting in the way of his ability to enjoy the affection he sought, and... the snake, which historically carries the connotation of temptation, yes, but also mistrust, barring physical intimacy. okay. ok. if a dungeon reflects the mentality of its lord, all of this might suggest that mithrun was not able to have any real desire for a relationship with this person. his unwillingness to be vulnerable or let another person in was insurmountable. but in that case, why was she such a focal point that she remained to the end, after his dungeon had stopped creating iterations of his friends to come and visit him? why would he get so upset over her meeting with his brother that he became lord of a dungeon about it?

well. mithrun's brother was also interested in her, probably genuinely. and mithrun had to win.

you have an older brother who your parents completely ignore, probably in part because he is chronically ill/disabled and almost definitely in part because he received a ton of recessive traits that resulted in rumors that he was an illegitimate child. you are aware, most likely because those same parents fucking told you, that you actually are an illegitimate child. but they keep you around because you had the good fortune of looking just like your mother. what can that possibly teach you but that you, like your brother, are disposable?

it's utterly unsurprising that mithrun, under these circumstances, developed a pathological need to be better than everyone around him. people don't keep you otherwise. i'd argue this is also why he says he looked down on everyone he knew while milsiril claims his dungeon reeked of feelings of inferiority—he sought out people's worst traits and prioritized them in his mind to protect his already extremely fragile sense of self-worth, and all the while he tried to be as likable and high-performing as he possibly could be. his parents disposed of him anyway, but even then he tried to keep up the performance. he was kind to everyone. he never once lost to a dungeon.

when he saw his "love interest" meeting up with his brother, what he saw was himself being replaced by a person his parents had always treated as worthless, and if that was what they thought of the child they'd kept, what value could anyone possibly see in the bastard they'd given away to die? mithrun and kabru tell the story like he wanted to win this unnamed elf's heart, but it was never about being with her. it was about cementing his worth, proving that he didn't deserve to be thrown away.

and so it's particularly cruel that his demon discarded him, too. but maybe it's also particularly gentle that, in the end, there was someone who refused to even consider giving up on him.

kui laid it out in three panels better than i could hope to.

yeah. it's love. you wanted to be loved, even when the only way you were able to understand it was through the desire to be wanted, and you wanted that so badly that the idea of being consumed felt like the promise of finally mattering to someone.

[gummi-ships]

Kingdom Hearts 3

[mando-chicken]

Excuse my rant in the tags djalkmsfakml

star wars is expansive enough of a franchise that you do not need to make every star wars story about Society or History. the mandalorian could have remained a fairly small stakes show about a world-weary guy learning how to care for a force-sensitive baby in a galaxy that is either hostile to or confused by said force sensitivity. this would have actually worked great with the “no planned ending” trajectory of the show, allowing for a serial adventure style narrative with a nearly infinite amount of possible self-contained stories, but instead it’s become so rapidly bloated with absurd political maneuvering that involves half a dozen cameo characters that din is now just a vessel for plot to happen around

[swordsonnet]

i'm sorry but i don't think we should call this the "autism website" when there's still posts with tons of notes mocking people who:

struggle with social skills / have anxiety around social settings

are unemployed / unable to work certain jobs

have intense or "age-inappropriate" interests

haven't had certain life experiences that are deemed universal/essential

struggle with personal hygiene

don't have any friends or dating experience

don't go outside much or at all

take things literally / don't get sarcasm/jokes

have unusual ways of speaking

generally aren't "normal"

[allysketches]

"I loathe him. And, despite myself, I respect a worthy opponent...Which he isn't because he's a demon and I cannot respect a demon. Or like one."

decided to draw a small part of the bookshop opening deleted scene bc not one day goes by where I don't think about it 🥺 we lost so bad by not getting this one 😭😭 especially bc it contrasts the season 2 finale so well… I could write entire dissertations about it 🤧

[egophiliac]

was this anyone else's first thought, or

[inkskinned]

we were sitting on the floor and i was cutting out tiny pictures to make a collage for a friend's birthday. you were on your phone and you laughed about something, and i was still in love with you then, so i asked what had you giggling.

"sorry. i was just..." you took a moment and went back to texting. "i was telling someone about how you're afraid of the dark."

i'm afraid of the dark because something bad happened. "oh." i felt a little slinky of shame crawl down my throat.

you glanced up, and maybe it showed on my face, because you rolled your eyes and held the phone to the side casually so i could see the group chat. "what? was it a secret?"

i looked down to the scissors in my hand. "i just..." no, it's not a secret. it just felt like something private, something serious. saying why would you tell someone that just feels like an accusation. it's unfair. i honestly am not even ashamed of it, it's just a fact about my person that i don't usually share.

what a strange experience. is this a human thing or a generational thing? for our grandparents: did they need to worry about how quickly someone can just... share your personal information? again, i didn't even really have a true objection. what could i say? i want any person in my life to feel they can be honest with their friends. it's not like i said don't tell anyone this.

i cut out another letter to complete the rainbow happy birthday, started hunting for the exclamation mark. i heard you sigh dramatically.

"don't make a big deal about this," you said.

this entire conversation was a pattern for us, and this was when we got to my least favorite part of the pattern. i would get my feelings hurt in some oblique not-technically-terrible way, and then it would be making a big deal about something. you'd get frustrated for me for being soft, but i was born soft. you knew i was soft when you pierced me. it's one of the things that made controlling me so easy.

"i'm not," i felt my voice crack. the question came without my wanting. "why are you guys talking about me?" and why are you saying that thing? why not like - i'm telling them how you're generous and kind and pretty.

you let out this low, tragic groan. "oh my god." you tossed the phone away from your body. "there, see? i just won't talk to them if you don't like it."

the rest of the hour went the way it always went, between us: i said i don't actually mind if you talk to your friends but -, you found a way to call my minor expression of discomfort "being dramatic." you got upset that i had been offended. i ended up apologizing, even though i hadn't actually done anything.

afterwards, you picked up the phone again. after texting for a little bit, you snorted. "okay," you said, "but it is kind of funny you're afraid of the dark. i mean, when you think about it."

[technically-human]

Bisexual crisis Crystal edition

[bixels]

I watched Starship Troopers tonight.

[lotus-pear]

HAPPY 114‼️‼️ take these silly doodles i did

[found-pham-ily]

I love supportive parents Fentons. We're they good parents? Not always but they are trying. More so now that they knew how they'd failed Danny. They did a 180 on their research going from Ghost are evil to ghost are just people. Though some ghost wish they still just acted violently rather then stalking them to ask so *so* many questions.

Danny is happy, his parents are trying and while the GIW are still around as a nuisance he doesn't see then as actually a threat. Everyone in Amity had started treating him better both in and out of Phantom form. He is thriving.

Enter Constantine, there on league business. That business is decommissioning the GIW. The acts had been repealed and the group was supposed to cease activity. But they kept those things from Amity park and everyone there. How the league found out about it was just superman overhearing the agents brag about how they still worked in Amity.

Constantine had a fine time with the civilians there until he mentioned working for the league. Suddenly everyone turns on him. They don't harm him but they ice him out, over charge anything he buys, and hurl insults. He was also pretty sure his string of bad luck was caused by them too not just the obvious things.

So the hellblazer has no choice but to ask the local heros. Phantom tell him to leave, that he had it all covered. Red huntress is luckily more forth coming. If by forth coming you meant telling the truth while insulting a person and group so bad it makes him want to retire. Seriously he knew teens could be vicious but this is special levels of vitriol.

Once he finds out the situation, he can feel a migraine coming on. Not only did the league not answer a call for help repeatedly, but the local heros were two teens who think the league was for the anti-ecto acts. Plus neither of them were *good* at hiding their identities. Phantom was a palate swap and used a pun on his own civilian name. Red huntress Aka Valerie was *proud* of being red huntress and saw no real reason to hide it anymore.

The town is shocked when the league member in town starts taking down the GIW. Even more shocked when he told everyone the acts were repealed. They don't warm up to him though. Well things are better priced again at least.

As he finishes up and prepared to leave, he is stopped by the town mad scientist. They're smiling at him but he just knows this was about to be bad. Which is only proven when the lady pulls out a note pad and pen and he is being given the third degree on how magic works.

Constantine tries to leave he really does. But the man Jack has him body blocked via side hug he can't escape from. They wouldn't take his non-answers as answers and he felt his day get *worse* when they ask him to teach them.

The Fentons want magic only so they can figure it out. Magic doesn't exist so what ever power the hellblazer has has to be ecto based! And they need answers! It could help their son master his own powers and they could finally join him in fights on equal footing. A family that fights evil together stays together. Danny would be so proud of them!

Constantine doesn't want to deal with possible future magic rogues so he hits his s.o.s beacon in his pocket as he goes for a cigarette. He'd get shit for it later but he could handle a Bat lecture not what ever this was.