#you’re just “a human”

[the-great-papyru]

15 Days of Determination (Day 9: It was nice to meet you, human…)

This is absolutely one of my favorite moments in Undertale. I don’t think I could do this moment justice if I tried to draw it, so here’s a short fic instead.

Stinging heat singed the hairs on their skin as the human frantically dodged bullet after bullet. The mercy button was gone. Shattered. The only way they knew out, gone. They couldn’t even flee.

What to do? What to do? Frantically, they tried first to ask their narrator about the king. That had helped them figure out ways to spare monsters before! Surely there was some way…

“Asgore. AT 80 DF 80.”

The human listened for more, but their companion was uncharacteristically silent. And then the bullets started raining once again and they had no choice but to dodge and dodge again. The human panted from the heat. Sweat ran down their face.

They couldn’t keep this up forever. They wiped their brow and as they did a bullet took them off-guard. They winced. They still had health. They didn’t need to heal yet.

Maybe they could talk to the king! Talking had worked before! …when it came to smaller monsters that didn’t even know they were human. This was the King of Monsters. Sans had told them that this wouldn’t be an easy fight. He’d told them that someone had to die. But they refused to believe that.

Asgore’s turn ended and the human made up their mind. Mercy was the only option. They gulped. “I… I don’t want to fight you,” they whispered.

Asgore must have heard them, because he trembled softly before swinging his staff down in orange and light blue arcs. They were getting through to him.

Once more, a little louder this time. “I don’t want to fight you.”

Asgore’s breath hitched. He didn’t want to fight them, did he? They could win this! They could show him that he didn’t need to hurt people! They’d free monsterkind through peace and they’d get out of here while they were at it!

In their excitement, they bumped into a fireball and winced again, rubbing the raw patch of skin on their arm.

“STOP fighting,” they told him firmly.

The king gasped and something flashed in his eyes. Something shifted. The attacks didn’t get any harder to dodge, but they got… softer. Kinder. Still deadly, but less so.

The human smiled at him. “Please. Stop fighting.” Now he would listen, and he would stop, and they could fix everything, and—

A bullet hit their soul, and they collapsed.

That wasn’t supposed to happen! They were supposed to save him! But he… he wouldn’t accept their mercy. He wouldn’t let them talk. They’d been warned, and they hadn’t listened, and…

The human approached Asgore again, and the battle began.

“You’ve killed me, once,” they stated.

The king gave them a nod. 

Over and over and over they tried to talk.

Over and over and over they died.

“You’ve killed me more times than I can count.”

The king gave them a nod.

Maybe the human was crying. They couldn’t tell. Any tears they let out evaporated from the sheer heat filling the room. They couldn’t breathe. There was nothing to do. No matter how much they ate or healed, eventually they ran out of items and everything repeated.

“What’ll you do when you meet a relentless killer? You’ll die and you’ll die and you’ll die. Until you tire of trying.”

Maybe that flower was right. Maybe they should just give up.

But no! They’d thought Undyne was a relentless killer too, but they’d gotten past her. And they’d find a way past Asgore. There was always a way.

From behind them, a voice spoke up. Their narrator. “Seems talking won’t do any more good. All you can do is FIGHT.”

“You can’t be serious. I can’t just—”

“All you can do is FIGHT.”

“But—”

“ALL you can do is FIGHT.”

“…”

The human gripped their weapon. They’d just… beat him up a little. It was okay. 

They took a swing. That… wasn’t much damage. This might be difficult.

Bullets rained from the heavens. Heat numbed the human’s senses, made it hard to tell even where anything was. Faintly, they heard the words “Asgore has low HP” behind them. But by the time they processed that sentence, the weapon had slashed and a massive number appeared before them as Asgore’s HP dropped to a number that shouldn’t have been that low. How long had they been..?

The mighty king had fallen. It had been that easy. Tears still evaporated off the human’s cheeks as they fell to their knees in shock.

It really had been either one or the other.

[littlemut]

[novelconcepts]

A thing I find really important about the way Kevin Can Fuck Himself goes about its job: Allison is kind of a mess. She’s self-centered, she doesn’t put other people’s needs first, she makes reckless choices that endanger herself and others. And the show says: yes. Right. She’s flawed as fuck. And she still does not deserve any of what’s happening to her. It could be argued that she is, in fact, this flawed as a direct product of her trauma. Her self-absorption, unlike Kevin’s, is actually self-preservation. It puts Patty in danger. It tunes out Diane’s pain. It capitalizes on Sam’s relationship problems. And still, the show says: yes. Right. She’s going about this in fumbling, worrying ways. And she still does not deserve any of what’s happening to her.

Know how we know this? How we really know this, outside of our own objectivity, our own awareness of the abuse she’s enduring even to the soundtrack of laughter?

Because Tammy is the one to find her. Because Tammy is the one holding the cards at the end of the game. Tammy, who does not like Allison. Who sees so clearly the complicated, messy, dangerous person Allison can be. The mistakes she is prone to making in the name of desperation. How imperfect she is at every level. And Tammy, who is the character most explicitly set to call Allison on all of her shit, to drag her before a court of law, to lean on that hot-button of whether or not she’s a “good person” until it breaks—lets her go. Folds the cards up, puts them in her pocket, and leaves.

Because Tammy, like the show, like the thesis statement of abuse is never earned, never deserved, never warranted, understands. This is a world that so often sanitizes women after it’s too late to save them. A world that insists she should have done more to get out. A world that insists you should be kind and moral and perfect, or maybe you got what was coming to you. This is a world that sees fighting back as an equally heinous crime. As punishable, if not more so, than the actions of the instigator.

But this show doesn’t want to play that game. This show doesn’t want to fuck with it at all. Allison doesn’t have to be perfect and moral and above reproach. Allison has blood on her hands, and a DUI neatly ignored, and knowingly has an affair with her married boss. Allison hurts her friends sometimes, and she makes awful decisions out of desperation, and she doesn’t always pay attention to other people’s plotlines. And the show says: yes. Right. She’s making choices you probably should not agree with.

And she still does not deserve any of what is happening to her.

[lizaisdrawing]

Some more of them 👁️

[astearisms]

may you find peace 🌾

[bruciemilf]

Anyway. Frustrated reminder that if artists pour time, energy, passion, thought, and skill into their piece, it’s their right to do whatever the fuck they want with it. Fandom is a playground and you can do what you want always

[an-ivy-covered-summer]

i know this will be a controversial statement for some people on this website, but you guys need to understand that being a radical communist with zero awareness of the nuance of living on planet earth is really not very different from being an alt-right extremist.

if you’re past the point of using logical thinking and understanding that societies and politics are complex and can be wildly different from one place to another, you’re just a fanatic, in spite of the place in the spectrum you place yourself on. you’re too swayed and brainwashed by propaganda. you’re just a blind fanatic, and your agenda becomes dangerous for real people living in the real world.

[idontmindifuforgetme]

I hate to be that one person who’s like when ur so busy ur not consumed by other people or being in a relationship blah blah blah …. But truly when u have ur hands full you could fucking care less and it’s so liberating

[mxtxfanatic]

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[fizzamess]

Keep the aroace positivity flowing (day 4)

What’s your favorite thing about being aroace spec? 🧡💛🤍🩵💙

In my own aroace experience, which may not apply to yours, mine’s not having to go on “first dates” bc they’re so freaking awkward, I never knew how to flirt, and I hate when people flirt with me bc it’s so cringy.

Reading about two people in love, able to flirt with each other, in the comfort of my own house tho >>>>

[can-of-w0rmz]

Enough gender and pronouns I want to be an eldritch monster beyond human comprehension

[seashellronan]

so depressing i was shopping and saw a child no older than one and a half clearly not even walking or talking yet in a pram with a phone in front of their face watching cocomelon or whatever the fuck, like your child cannot even comprehend language they do not need to be stimulated like this they should be looking around at the world and learning!!!!! some people are just so terrified that their child might make a noise or ask for something so they plant them in front of a screen to be seen and not heard. do you not realise that a child crying or making noise is them attempting to learn to communicate with you???!! if every time they do that you instantly distract them and overstimulate them you are going to seriously hinder their development like please just don’t have kids if you’re not prepared to actually let them be children this makes me so sad

[scarlet-cookie]

Sometimes I wonder about Azik pre-deal-with-Klein-to-help-recover-memories. Like for some years this sequence 2 angel just worked in a university while just assuming “oh yeah I have something special going on with me I wanna know what but I can’t figure it out yet” like does this man ever question why he doesn’t feel hungry?? Does he know hunger?? Has there ever been moments where his colleagues are like “aughhhh I’m starving hey Azik let’s go eat” and Azik is like “nah I’m good (wdym starving)” and they’re like “wtf dude you haven’t eaten in two days how are you not dying” or after meals does he just not go to the toilet for so long that his workers get concerned. Or if one day they’re just strolling through a market and Azik gets mugged and stabbed in the stomach and his colleague is like “AZIK YOU NEED TO GO TO THE HOSPITAL” and Azik while clearly bleeding is going “ow um but it’s ok it’ll go away it doesn’t hurt that bad economy these days haha you know”. I know eventually Azik would common sense it out that this is the natural way people should be reacting or do something but just imagine being one of Azik’s colleagues during the first years of his “reset cycle”. You just know this man is not a normal human being in every sense of the word but hey he’s trying.

[folfar]

A scientific consideration of cultural preservation in Gideon the Ninth

HYPOTHESIS: the Venus de Milo is in Canaan House

REASONING: John is keen on decoration (the rest of Canaan House, the Mithraeum, his fancy baby-bone crown). John has strong opinions on preserving things he considers ‘worthy’ (the earth, his friends, Shakespeare). Why not famous art? Canaan House is filled with old and rotting portraits - they can’t ALL be of Cyrus and Valancy.

EVIDENCE:

There was a single statue at the end of the corridor where it turned left. It must have once been a person, but the head and arms had been lopped off, leaving only a torso with beseeching stumps. - GtN p130-1 (when Gideon is looking for Harrow)

beseeching stumps?? It’s simply got to be the Venus de Milo. No stumps plead more tenderly:

But she has a head! I hear you protest.

Aha! Now we come to Palamedes and Camilla doing psychometry to figure out the age of Canaan House:

"Fiat lux! If you want to talk improbable, let's talk about this"-a scrape of stone on stone-"being three thousand and some years older than this." A heavy clunk.

About 3000 years older than another part of Canaan House? Hmm! And what’s that Camilla is holding?

“Standing next to him holding a big wedge of broken sculpture and the flashlight was a tall, equally grey-wrapped figure with a scabbard outlined at her hip.”

“The cavalier narrowed her hooded eyes, fidgets gone and absolutely still; then she exploded into action. She dropped the wedge of sculpture with a clonk, drew her sword from its shabby scabbard before the wedge had bounced once, and advanced.”

SCULPTURE!

CONCLUSION: the Venus de Milo IS in Canaan House! However, it was decapitated by known practical thinker and simp Camilla Hect so that Palamedes Sextus could do his carbon dating easier without tiring out his necromancer noodle arms

SECONDARY CONCLUSION: Camilla was going to use the head of the Venus de Milo to bash open the laboratory hatch

[abaroo]

I… may or may not have started an AU…

I was thinking about how Clover and Starlo are so similar and… BOOM!! They switched places. Also I didn’t have an (original) monster Clover design so I just went with my basic furry base… I hope he turned out ok! I really loved his poofy tail.

I actually have a lot of ideas for this AU so let’s hope I don’t burn out on the way…

I’m calling this AU Cowboy Swap for convenience…

Cowboy Swap Masterpost

[podcast-hemocytoblast]

Shitty concept: tma au where Jon avoids the “losing his humanity angst” by finding about the concept of kinning and just going “fuck it, I’m humankin now”