That eldest child instinct

SAM AND MAX MERMAID AU1!!11!1!!!1

Ok this is an au ive been wokring on for a while now and im so so so excited to talk about it

SO obv this is like a mermaid au, i have more for it (like sybil granny ruth n papierwaite but this is the art i have 4 now) bc i love love LOVE mermaids!1!!!1 (i made sam and max mermaid pride art but i loved it so much i turned that /j into /srs) SO WITHOUT FURTHER ADO

So Sam and Max met at little guppies, like how they met in canon but in the sea, and after Max hospitalized Samʼs bullies with his natural toxins, he and Sam became best friends 4ever. Sam and Max lived in the outskirts of the biggest city in the merfolk kingdom, Samʼs parents left Sam when he was still an egg with Granny Ruth, who is one of the kingdomʼs fiercest n most respected warriors, to move to colder waters in Alaska, where Samʼs family partially originated from. So Sam was raised by Ruth, when Sam was just hatched, his grandfather Leo had died fighting against the humans to protect the kingdom. Max came from a family with loads and loads of kids, (some of which had been either kidnapped or eaten by predators :( ), and probably not a very good home life, so he hung out at Ruthʼs cave with Sam almost every night. As Sam and Max grew up, so did their love for one another. Once they were old enough they moved closer to the shore, where they take up cases for fun, and make sure humans dont get too close. They obviously got married as soon as they could, and spend their time adventuring and scavenging. Occasionaly they will go to human markets, selling fish theyve hunted for money to buy cool weapons and food, but otherwise they like to mess around with pirates and ships. They also like to hang out and have lunch with their friends who claim to be human, Papierwaite and his adopted child Sammun-Mak, who run a museum and live on the edge of the shore, easy access and all.

One day, while exploring a cool shipwreck, they found a little egg, Max, instantly infatuated by it, begged Sam to take it home, so they did. Eventually that egg hatched and they had a kid of their own :) (GEEK!!!) Max unfortunately wasnt allowed to touch her, as he might poison her. Though their baby was always ill and burned so easily, even though Max hadnt touched her! always squinting and shocking them. Confused, they went to Granny Ruth for help. under further investigation they deducted that their baby was an electric eel! Which usually live in freshwater, so she was extra fragile. Though as she got older, she grew stronger, and shockingly smarter, always researching and making devices.

Theyre a very silly family

I KNOW IM GONNA ADD MORE TO THE AU BUT THIS IS WHAT I GOT SO FAR

Tags:

sorry for the stupid question but it's about your commissions. by any chance would you be okay with doing a self-ship art commission (with an obv given being that inappropriate ships aren't allowed, which wouldn't apply in this case don't worry ^^')? 100% okay if you wouldn't be comfortable doing self-ship art, i'd completely understand /gen i wish you the best of luck with comms!

Hello! :) please don’t put yourself down for asking a perfectly valid question! I’ll definitely clarify this on my Kofi commissions page.

I have no problem with drawing most ships even if I don’t ship it in my everyday life, haha! Canon x OC, Self x Canon, Canon x Canon, as long as they are appropriate.

What I won't draw under any circumstances include things like NSFW, suggestive content, excessive gore- and I am extremely against inappropriate ships (including but not limited to, adults with minors, characters related to each other, or other similarly harmful dynamics/relationships between characters).

But you mentioned your idea is appropriate and that’s fine! Romantic or platonic positive relationships with consenting characters gets a big thumbs up from me!! 👍

And if I'm uncomfortable with something not explicitly stated above I will gently let you know. Just like if I show you a sketch that you want to change, let me know too! That way there’s open communication to ensure you’re happy and satisfied with what I make. Thank you for your interest!! :)

Guys no joke I just somehow accidentally made friends with somebody who just revealed they went to high school with Jack Quaid,,

Like ,, the probability of this happening was SO slim..,,,,

The story (under cut in case ppl don't care I JUST WANNA SHARE):

It was my IRL friend's birthday recently so I found a cute necklace on Etsy to have shipped to their place. There was an issue delivering the order so I reached out to see if I could pay for a reshipment with a new address.

I'll just share the messages here:

TL;DR they decided randomly to check out my Etsy shop, liked it, checked out my Insta, saw my Jack Quaid art, and then shared that they went to high school with him.

We're chatting now and I'm obv not gonna ask any questions about it or be weird but I just had to share this whole thing privately on this account because, again, the chances??

Also I checked their location and it checks out since they're based in LA. Absolutely wild lmao and they're so nice 😭 Wasn't expecting such kind words from what I thought was gonna be a purely transactional exchange

Hi Tenko! I have an "anti" you should keep an eye out for!

catgirl-izuru claims to be an anti but ships 11-12 year children together and made an animatic about it. They've also reblogged and posted art of a ship in their dni that they said was "commonplace" (which they also put on the same line as proshipping) and yet they don't delete the posts?

They harrass other proshippers and stalk their accounts, but call the people they stalk the stalkers for trying to interact with them calmly to get them to back off.

Just thought you should know about them if you haven't heard already. I know someone who's had to deal with their stalking before and Izuru made a big deal about it on their account bc the person they had been stalking wasn't falling for the victim act.

I've heard about this user, but they've either blocked me or changed their username.

Signal boosting this in case the moots want to block as well (don't harass, obvs.)

not to be one of those people who moan about CGI and say it's ruining cinema, but, it kinda is

I obv admire the amount of time and effort that goes into after effects, I acknowledge that it's a very skilled profession, however, overreliance on it is taking some of the charm and all of the character out of some things when its not needed at all

for example: star trek, and star wars

star wars is not my favorite series of movies, but I do respect them, and I know people who love them, recently, my mother's boyfriend got his hands on some 'de-special effected' versions of the original trilogy, and watching them compared to the new ones is light and day

you can see, with every ship and goofy looking alien exactly how much love and effort was put into every detail, models, props, makeup, everything was physical and it felt like it had weight, in the end it made for a more impactful experience, with the CGI changes, something was lost, irrevocably

star trek is much the same in that regard, you can see from series to series how special effects evolve and change, its fascinating, but in the new series a lot of that is lost in the pursuit of making it 'more realistic' it's set in space, it's not realistic, and I personally would prefer a show with a vibe more similar to the older series' than that of perfectly polished portrayals of aliens that were fine to be a little janky

of course, CGI is important, there should never be a halt of progress in the face of tradition, ever, and I would never willingly tell people to stop making art, because CGI is art, and it has the potential to be beautiful, it already is beautiful is some cases, I just don't think it should come at the cost of genuine puppetry and costumes

everything in moderation I guess

Sweet summer apple Trinity Glassfille for ask meme

favorite thing about them

Very cute character design/concept in general, she made the ps1 kazuma gauntlet worth it bc I like seeing her :)

least favorite thing about them

Nothing I can think of that I particularly dislike about her

favorite line

Not any specific line but I love how when she gets mad she kind of just goes on really long rants. Why didn't she do this in the c series.

brOTP/ОТР/пОТР

I don't do a lot of shipping with Trinity per se? Or at least not a lot of serious shipping. I will say it's very entertaining to see her be IMO the worst case of love loses woman of the three strong cases of BB. 100 years strong yearning for her doomed boything who pushed her down a flight of stairs last time she saw him even after she got shoved in the boundary and stabbed over it also. I will always stand with women who have extremely unfortunate taste in men. I also love her interactions with Nine and Celica obv those are always fun.

random headcanon

The personal hcs I put the most into my Trinity art is making her chubbier and giving her curlier hair. I need to draw actual art of her more often even though she is a frequent subject of mindless margins of paper doodles

unpopular opinion

Do I even have unpopular opinions about Trinity? I think it more just extends into the fact that I can tolerate and even enjoy the whole "woman with extremely unfortunate taste in men and also something kind of wrong with her" arc

favorite picture of them

the classic + idk i'm a fan of her bbdw portrait

um uh um uh um. hey. this is my official AO3 i guess. idk in case people wanted to stalk me or whatever kekw n e way let's do a little introduction

you can call me mama, mother, moist, or just m if you like, i use whatever pronouns make you gay, im an age, i have long black hair with red streaks and purple tips and eyes like limpid tears. um idk i might post sporadically here but slash doubt. mostly an interaction blog and a place to rb cool art.

i love hashtag problematique ships and content, im really horny for a bunch of youtubers but mainly jschlatt because i think i could make him whimper and cry and beg because im just that fucking good. other ppl i love r ted nivison n charlie slimecicle, obvs, uhh i haven't rpfed anyone else yet but im planning on it. they're all so chewable like polly pocket clothes. also still into some homestuck ships, love dbd, love resident evil, all that good weird shit.

yeah that's about it i guess seeya

my pin has changed a little bit- in case anyone was actually read the stuff below the read more lol. a little more clear on sending asks related to 'ship' things and headcanons- i have my own 'headcanons' and obvs even AU stuff, its free game to ask about those. i tag some interactions with ship names and im open to asks regarding my thoughts between pairs- im just not drawing 'blatant' ship art that is romantic really. but i like exploring general interactions.

I love them, they're funny Mans,,,, funny (queer) Mans,,,,, huh what ? Me shiping them pfffft no way ahha i mean i am,,,, Uuuuuuuuh *looks at my hand* H-hOomo,,,, homopotit ?

Again sorry for bad quality ahhahahahah

10 Anti LO Asks

1. i honestly have to guess the reason the anatomy is just SO bad in LO now is that the team gets such rushed sketches from rachel (youd be shocked how many series do this to their teams of assistants) and are on such a time crunch that yeah with a little more time they could fine-tune it to look better but they just go "fuck it" and follow exactly whats on the sketch and it just ends up looking like ... that. its not really the fault of the team but more rachel doesnt give them a lot to work with.

2. idk how you guys claim lo persephone has no personality?? she has big boobs and ass and does whatever hades wants her to do, thats all the personality she needs! (/s obviously)

3. LMAOOO EROS IS BANNED NOW?? love you terrible tumblr staff, never change

4. I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT CANVAS COMIC YOURE TALKING ABOUT and you can check the creator's instagram and see the majority of their page is just LO fanart. they maybe could have claimed arrogance if this wasn't the case (tbh most of the character, story, and visual tropes LO uses are super common place that an accidental overlap is very possible) to give it more leeway, but the fact they're an admitted LO fan who just HAPPEN to have all the same exact elements is ... very sus.

5. the athena/hesita ship is also bad bc theyre framed as hypocrites for not letting the poor straight girl persephone bone her near retirement age boss and theyre just?? stupid?? like they never get rid of their no sex rule? also rachel's past comments of hestia "getting over" being asexual (as if asexuals dont have sex? its a spectrum?) and the fact athena has to look like a Man™️ while Hestia looks like a Woman™️ so it's also a gendered gay ship too. It's just bad no matter how you cut it.

6. this is such an annoying thing about RS's "character designs" but why do NONE of them have even some distinct accessories to show who they are? Give Zeus a crown of lighting streaks. Give Hera peacock decals on her clothes. Have Poseidon carry his trident on his back. Give Hades a jewel skull tie pin. ANYTHING! The only one who has any is Persephone with blobby flowers which often aren't even there and lack any sort of rhyme or reason to them (other than blue for horny 🤨). It's so lazy!

-----FP Spoilers/Mention-----

7. FP Spoilers//I wish Persephone had come by her wrath honestly instead of it being "blessed" by Eris. Like. Heaven forbid the sweet precious cinnamon roll has dimension and feels wrath because that's natural and just part of her? Maybe I'm not making sense. Idk it just feels like RS is doing everything in her power to make Persephone perfect rather than a well rounded character. Maybe I'm wrong. Idk I just hate that it's not *her* wrath it's a blessing from Eris. Smh. 

8. alright im not spending coins on it, what cliffhanger did the mid season finale end on this time. (//fp spoilers obvs)

From OP: I’d recommend just going on youtube tbh. The panels kinda add to this weird mid season finale.

9. //FP SPOILERS

OH MY GOD YESSSS I'VE BEEN WAITING 12 YEARS  WHOLE SEASON FOR THIS. Persephone's finally getting the punishment for all her deeds(and a pretty fair one, per se), she and Hades will finally be apart and Zeus being an actual ruler who makes big decisions and not some clown. Like yeah, there is also ugly art, plot twists out of nowhere, but this is just season 2 you can't do anything about. All and all this is the best chapter in the season so far, can't wait for LO stans to read it, ooh boy this is going to be fun

10. Fp- yep so Perse is all uwu, her "ambitious" side and aow wasn't even hers. Wanted character development? Now you have downgrade. Thanks Rachel. At least we are getting Minthe back

POV: You’re the new guy in Maintenance just realizing why nobody is ever scheduled in the GFS Xibalba’s AU chamber... and that the Xibalba doesn’t have an Aurora Unit...

IDK I just like inflicting existential angst on Adam and had some minor techno-gore stuff on the brain. I wanted to do more complex machinery in the background initially but didn’t have the patience. Rambly thoughts under the cut. (Also full-view for better quality obvs)

(colour set from @color-palettes - “Out there in the universe”)

I get a lot of these half-baked AU ideas (in the “alternate universe” sense) and never really know what to do with them. They’re rarely enough to write about and never usually worth even naming, so they just kind of make the rounds in my head for a while before fading back into the mists. So have some notes about this one!

This would be, oh, maybe 50-100 years post-canon? Adam is somehow still going, though his extended “lifespan” is taking a bit of a toll on him. He doesn’t emote much outwardly anymore (even less so than usual, anyway), not that he has many people to talk to directly at this point. He’s been shuffled around a lot to various ships, outposts, etc. since his expertise is still valuable even if he’s getting... weird... in his “old age.” His current position is replacing the Aurora Unit aboard the GFS Xibalba, the flagship of the supposedly “cursed” 13th Fleet.

The 13th is a GFMC Fleet that patrols the very furthest reaches of Federation territory. The fleet spends a very long time in standard flight between outposts, and sees a lot of strange phenomena in the wilder parts of space, and as such attracts a particular type of individual. Just about every crewman from the ensigns and mechanics up to the Admiral herself are some brand of eccentric. Due to their distance from major outposts, the 13th doesn’t have access to the supplies needed to support the nutritional demands of a proper Aurora Unit, but their friendly(?) neighbourhood computer-ghost Adam fits right in as a replacement. (There are some rumours among the Xibalba’s crew that the AI is either out here looking for something, or dead set on keeping something out of Federated space. Though nobody’s worked up the courage to ask him, and the Admiral certainly wouldn’t divulge that information...)

Over the years Adam has changed up his physical presentation a lot. He’s variously been totally digital, used a projected avatar, an actual android frame, and now this... construction. At some point just before or early on in his assignment to the 13th Fleet, his android frame took some pretty severe damage. He was resigned to being fully digital again until some slightly twisted individual was able to salvage most of the frame and rig it up to the machinery in the Xibalba’s AU chamber. Nobody’s sure exactly who (or how they got a hold of one of those ancient GF Police uniforms to slap onto it, those things are artifacts!) but Adam seemed thoroughly pleased with the solution, and uses the setup as his main method of physical interface with the crew.

Although “the crew” in this case is really just the 13th’s Admiral, as the rest of the crew (and especially the Maintenance team) find him extremely creepy to be around. Adam seems to cope with his situation by leaning into how uncanny he’s become, possibly for his own amusement but it’s extremely hard to tell. Only the Admiral finds his presence enjoyable let alone bearable. The Maintenance team especially dislike being around him as he’s become oddly territorial about the tangle of machinery that makes up the AU chamber and prefers to do his own repairs. 

A handful of the older Maintenance team refer to his attached partial android frame as the “sock puppet,” but only amongst themselves. If the Admiral overheard them, there would be hell to pay! There’s also a hazing ritual  custom on the Xibalba of scheduling new Maintenance workers a shift in the AU chamber, so they can get acquainted with the ship’s AI.

As to the art itself: I’m gradually learning Clip Studio as it has a lot of variety in tools and some very convenient features my ancient copy of PS lacked. I used a pre-made colour palette for this one, mentioned up top, because I’ve been hoarding them and need to use them for something. Took some inspiration from the Nightmare’s sprite and some of the concept art for the Aurora Units. Like I said up top, I wanted to do a more tangled, mechanical background originally but just... didn’t have the brain for it. Maybe I’ll add one in later when I figure out how not to ruin my attempt at composition with it.

Hey do you want to talk about your FFTA OCs?? I want to hear about them...

OKAY i've had this ask sitting for a week and im so sorry abt that! I admittedly do not have... much for my FFTA OCs buT what i do have I really really dig so I hope that this interests u too, anon! gonna put this under a cut just cause it might get a little long!

this is all based on characters I had during my last FFTA run and I kind of want to develop them as FFTA2 OCs as well cause I like the class selection in the second game much better. But for now here's my current somewhat developed members of Clan Nutsy!

all of their names are subject to change of course, and I do have other clan members in mind but I just haven't really drawn them at all yet FHLSD.

Mac is a White Mage, but spent a lot of his time in Clan life as a Black Mage. His last Clan before Nutsy was a rogue-ish group that hunted down bounties and targeted other Clans in Jagds, so a real nasty crew.

I have a headcanon that Black Magic affects Humes differently than Nu Mou or Moogles, who are also proficient with it. Which is why Black Mage Humes look so like... weird in comparison? Because Mac spent a lot of time involved with Black Magic and he was committing evil acts, his hands became permanently "scarred" and look all weird. they dont hurt or anything, but people would probably be super uncomfortable with seeing them.

Because of this he covers his arms in bandages, and he left his old clan on bad terms. he's kind of on the run from them because they really dont like when people leave!

At this time I like to think of him as the de-facto leader of the clan! personality-wise he's wise but hot-headed, and intelligent but absolutely stupid in some cases. His experience with various magics, though, make him a strong force to be reckoned with. He's absolutely the definition of the "I'm a healer, but-" meme

Roker is like the clan's second in command, and i ABSOLUTELY ship him and Mac. Roker is kind and strong, and wants to support his clanmates with his own two hands. He has simple motives but he has pure feelings. genuinely the best person.

My idea for him is that he used to be a part of the Castle Guard as a Templar, but abandoned that once a corrupt king came into power. He spent time as a sword-for-hire before joining Clan Nutsy as a Gladiator. both he and Mac get along in a lot of ways because they have somewhat similar backgrounds, but they butt heads since they have different approaches with most problems. They balance each other out and I love them.

Roker's dream is to someday retire and live in the country or something. he's a lovely guy and MAN i just love Bangaa in general. I have more in mind besides him but nothing really fleshed out.

Finn my BOY is a Mog Knight with a lot of Gunner abilities, so I like to think of him as having a Gunblade (even tho like obvs thats not in the game). He drinks, fucks, and overall is kind of just a fun guy to be around. But he's definitely a hard hitter on the team. I don't have much else for him but i love him.

Odonel is my Moogle Juggler! He has some Tinkerer skills as well, and he's kind of just a chaotic little fella. I adore his design a lot and I wanna draw him more and flesh him out but he's probably got the least out of this whole group in terms of concepting and stuff put into him.

and lastly my two Nu Mou! Kief is the one on the left here (art colored by my lovely partner btw!) and Elaine is the one on the right! Kief is relaxed and peaceful, a real chill guy. He specializes as an Illusionist with some interest in Beastmastery, even though he SUCKS with monsters. Elaine is transfem, and i like to think she was closeted when she joined the clan and then came out to her found family and everyone was like "fuck yeah" because that makes me happy. She is an Alchemist/Sage and she is also pretty darn powerful. I think i like the idea of her getting close to Kief, admiring his open nature and then kind of opening up to him about her gender experience and stuff. idk idk idk all very early concept stuff but it makes my heart worm.

but YEAHH thats all i rlly got so far!! if anyone has ideas im always open to them but also KJFLHDSF dont be sad if i dont go with ur ideas or smth im just here to have fun

ty for listening to me ramble if u got this far i love u

I honestly don't hate nh

I used to as a kid (annoying to see her faint every 0.5 seconds, and her fainting again in Shippuden made me lose any respect I had from the confidence she displayed during the pain arc.. like kishi.. could've actually made me ship nh if he treated her better following the pain arc by having her maintain confidence around him, drop the flustered, fainting act and have her act her age, and ofc give her a personality, dealing w the hyuuga situation with neji etc. - basically... make her a different character not routed in mysogyny lol) But when i knew it was gonna be canon (right when Naruto rejected sakra I knew that was the direction kishi was gonna take it bc shounen logic requires this) so I made a conscious effort to stop hating it lol but besides that, I don't hate it bc I think hinata is 'nice, not pushy, etc' (but ofc as soon as I critically think about hinatas character i hate her (privilege, being a slave owner and not doing anything about it etc))

So anyways, point is, at face value, I don't hate nh. Even art of them I don't vomit. I just treat it as a crack ship, like shikanaru etc. Like there's obv a friendly and caring dynamic bw them. If ppl wanna add sex .. ok do whatever u want.

But when i think of them actually getting together that just makes me sad. It's just sad BC naruto Loves sasuke more than life itself . Like let that sink in. Naruto would throw his life away, his dream to become hokage that he proclaimed every second sentence, just to be with sasuke. Because sasukes safety and friendship and bond /was/ his dream... Theyre soulmates who defied fate, transforming hatred into Love. They yearned for each other since they were kids. They shared what was in each others hearts and saw /each other/. Alone in an empty world of white, reaching for each other to hold hands... And like, Naruto and Sasuke don't need to be sexual or anything. Just as they are in canon is clearly the highest form of Love there is (in a spiritual, religious?? sense)

But I always had this idea that your spouse is your before anyone else, your best friend, your lover your everything etc. But that's just not the case here. Nh is a for children (read: capitalism) storyline (and this is actually such a generous word, BC there wasn't a storyline lmao) Its not passionate, it's not 'risk your career, your everything for this person' kind of relationship. Like, it's just a very surface level relationship of Naruto playing house BC those are society's expectations.

And that's just sad. To see Naruto conform like that .. where's the Naruto that defaced the hokage monuments and addressed his seniors without respect and fought against hardship and injustice and vowed to change the shinobi world with sasuke so that what happened to them didn't happen to other kids?? Like.. where is he? :(

Two tarot for the price of one! Ardyn and Ifrit as the Devil (of course) and Aranea and Garuda as the six of swords. More about these choices beneath the cut:

So first, Ardyn. I was not super drawn to Ardyn on my first time through the game, I was busy yelling at the characters (specifically Iggy and Gladio) for making such bad decisions. Why on earth would you trust him even a little bit?!?!?! He is practically carrying a sign saying ‘I’m a bad guy’! You’re protecting the primary leader of your government AND your only hope of salvation! Obvs I’m still frustrated.

But moving past that, I think the connection between Ifrit and Ardyn is interesting. It’s probably the most obvious connection, as they appear together often, and Ardyn can control him through the Scourge. But I think they mirror each other well on a story level -- Ifrit was originally a kind and benevolent god, who gave humans the gift of fire and uplifted them (like Promotheus). Ardyn was originally a kind and benevolent healer/king, who wanted to save humans from the Scourge. But like Prometheus, they both end up in chains and tortured for millinea. In the end, they both decide to destroy humanity.

They also tie into the Devil nicely. Upright, the card symbolizes oppression, addiction, obsession, dependency, excess, powerlessness, limitations. Reversed, it’s independence, freedom, revelation, release, reclaiming power, reclaiming control. The card itself shows the Devil front and center, with two smaller figures enchained at his feet (in this case Somnus and Aera). I originally had something more complicated in mind, including both Scourge Ardyn and Healer Ardyn to emphasize the upright/reversed sides of the card, but between the additional two characters and the flames, there was just too much visual chaos. And I had to include the Bone Throne, of course. :)

Aranea! This card took F O R E V E R, mostly because I decided to be clever and create Aranea’s canceled DLC look and Solara, who used a few existing elements but needed a lot of customization. I really liked Aranea’s character in the game, but I feel like the chopped story between Aranea and Solara is a major missed opportunity. There are a growing number of video games that focus on fathers and their children, and I would love to see something similar with a mother and her child. Aranea and Solara traveling and training together during the apocalypse, with Solara’s potential destiny as the Empress of Niflheim, would have been a fascinating mirror to the Witcher 3.

My original idea was to put Aranea and Garuda together, even though Garuda isn’t one of the Six. They’re both linked to air and the sky, Garuda as an eagle and Aranea as a dragoon and airship commodore, and they both have a tendency to drop in and save Noct’s royal rear when he’s in danger. FFXV Garuda is a counterpart to FFXIV Garuda, who is screamy and tyrannical, which mirrors Aranea’s role as counterpart to invading and conquering Niflheim.

Given the air connection of the characters, I focused on the suit of swords, and the six of swords really captured some elements of Aranea’s character. Upright: moving on, departure, leaving behind, distance, accepting lessons, and reversed: stuck in past, returning to trouble, running away from problems, trapped. Aranea isn’t loyal to the Empire, although she does care about her country and countrymen. In DotF, she is very aware of how she is exploited as a mercenary and commoner, but also how the MTs have it worse. Underlying that is the reality that, despite how badly she and her men are treated, as Niflheim subjects they benefit from the exploitation of the MTs -- and we know that the MTs are just regular humans whose growth has been accelerated and who have been systematically abused by Niflheim. So the card’s themes of running from problems captures this element of avoidance of responsibility, and the themes of transition and accepting lessons capture her rejection of the Empire and its military and taking on a role as a leader.

The card itself is a really striking image of a woman and child on a boat, with six swords stacked in front of them. There is a man pushing the boat, but to me, he always reads as an outsider -- he is standing well above the woman and child, and is separated from them by several harsh lines. To me, the card symbolizes the act of fleeing from hardship into peril, and being surrounded by danger and bleakness on all sides.

Which led me to creating Solara’s model! I stuck to her concept art as closely as possible, and also gave her a stuffed Cait Sith. I started with an unused child mesh from the game and rigged it with Talcott’s armature and using the Data Transfer to get most of the weighting correct. It was definitely a learning experience! It’s not perfect, but for a simple pose like this it worked.

For the rest of the card, the six swords became a six-legged spider demon (also chosen because ‘aranea’ means ‘spider’). The boat is symbolized in Aranea’s ship, approaching in the distance with a little help from Garuda. I’m still not completely happy with the final image, especially the wheat and how busy the composition is, but eh. I do like how Aranea’s jacket and Solara turned out, so I’ll have to find a way to use them again.

//I can’t go into the Butters tag because all the top posts are just Anti-Butters and I’m a spiteful Butters fan, but for anyone saying his physical transformation was impossible, army boot camp before deploying can go up to/just about 5 months before they potentially do advanced training for specialized combat, and his athletic ability as a runner was pre-established in Dead Beat. JB wrote about how good Butters was at running way back when, with all this in mind. In fact, a lot of this was established with little asides and observations sprinkled over a lot of books.

Butters getting more athletic when he’s starting from a decent baseline with an athletic background (probably ran track/cross country as a sport) as opposed to a heavy set one, and learning enough martial arts not to die, is pretty doable I think. Is he going to actually beat Sanya or Micheal or Charity if they were genuinely trying hard? No. But is he going to hold his own? Yes. And is he smart enough to make up the difference? Yes yes.

Also... Shiro was like. 70-80 when he died, and still kicking ass. So. Probably the Spoilers Ahead: 

swords also physically imbue the carrier, kind of like the Denarius do, but the difference between the swords/coins is ultimately choice. The being in the sword imbues the wielder with a certain power if they are the right aptitude, and if they break the very set terms (ie, wielding without faith in Fidelacchius’s case, or turning a blade to an enemy seeking mercy) then the sword just switches off rather than risking becoming a Fallen. They have a very tight set of rules. So between the training and the sword bolstering Butters’s ability, it makes sense to me that he was able to keep up like he did for a night.

... I really need to like. Write out my essay on how Butters’s arc was a Luke Skywalker parallel with the Hero’s Journey, and why it makes sense for him to get the sword because of Murphy’s and Charity’s pre-established character traits, but eh.

Also don’t even @ me about the Andi and Marci thing. It’s not my ship by any means, but they’re both in their thirties and werewolves and deserve a bit of frickin’ autonomy rather than ‘ew Butters is an old man clearly he pressured them.’ Like no, Andi would remove anyone’s hand with her teeth if they tried to pressure her or anyone she loved. And obviously they had a lot of pre-friendship build up when he helped her study her medical school and played Arcanos. Like. Please. I may not like the ship, but it’s an example of a healthy polycule/triad and we deserve that in fiction.

And don’t @ me either about that White Knight thing, Harry was more than creepy about Molly for a Lot Fucking More than one scene, and Thomas started dating the mentally ill Justine when she was sixteen. Butters was creeped out and upset he had a reaction to it.

And it’s not like Butters probably isn’t going to die to fucking Nicodemus one day and satisfy most of the fandom’s desire to see him dead (like Butters hasn’t been one of the most compassionate and caring and selfless fucking people in the entirety of the book series). Like thematically yeah it’d have made sense for him to get killed, but. Letting him become a Knight and atone for his fuck ups and do some good in the world as an active player and not a ‘look out/go to healer guy’ isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And as much as I hate to say it, Karrin losing her plot armor wasn’t necessarily a bad thing either (not touching Battlegrounds, obvs. Just looking at Skin Game).