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magicalgirlsirin · 2 months

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the elysian realm: well written, poorly directed

NOTE: this post is an elysian realm critical look by a relative newcomer to hi3, i dont really have the grace of having played it as it came out. i enjoy the elysian realm, but in my opinion, its absolutely a mess with regards to storytelling.

Part 1: so no theme?

When I titled this post, I meant it quite literally. There's plenty of stuff within Elysian Realm that is well written, I'm not here to argue that it isn't (with some small caveats). Most characters are interesting and engaging, and have a wealth of available text to further their depth. The real problem here is that all that detail and work isn't in service of anything. There is no theme to the Elysian Realm, no point of narrative, no common through line. Elysia introduces us to the realm, implies there's a point, that the 'unfinished lives' of these 13 trailblazers is going to go somewhere, and then waffles the plot all the way from the initial game mode through Elysium Everlasting, with a final cinematic which I will get to later for my thoughts on why it doesn't work.

The initial game mode that kicks off the story is just oddly paced. The first chapter is relatively fine, just serving as an introduction to the realm and its mechanics both in and out of universe. One of the first questions I had was just "why does kevin have a weird basement paradise with ai copies of his mostly dead friends and then also a version of himself and hua who are still very much alive" and I'm loathe to report that the realm never bothers answering this question or elaborating on why it exists. At risk of sounding like HoC, it really is a meaningless diversion with pointless people existing redundantly.

The second and third chapters, however, are unforgivably bad. I realized upon reflection they were probably heavy focus on Mobius and Aponia respectively because their suits were debuting at the time (or something to that effect) but it feels like such an agonizing detour to focus on them with seemingly no other motive. Learning about the two furthers my understanding of the Flame Chasers as a unit, I Guess, but doesn't illuminate anything about the realm or even Elysia.

I will get back to Elysia.

Part 2: No really, why is Mei here?

Another major problem with the Elysian Realm is that Mei pretty much ceases to be a character. Even though she's the point of view, she barely expresses any of her own opinions, thoughts, or even basic input outside of rebuffing Elysia's attempts to flirt with her. Sure, she still has some snark and sass to her, especially when interacting with Kevin, but outside of that I can barely remember anything important she does. Which is crazy! I could easily describe any other contribution she's made to various chapter sets/arcs within the game, but the Elysian Realm is absolutely dead air.

This ties into the fact that the realm has no theme, there's not a point, so Mei isn't going on a character journey. You could argue that Elysia is influential to Mei's arc for gifting her the power of origin, but that's not really... character growth. Mei becomes origin because she accepts the blessings* and ideals of the Flame Chasers, but because she didn't learn dick or shit in the actual realm, everything kind of just rings hollow. Mei functionally is meant to be a stand in for you, the viewer, to self insert into the realm and imagine that you're the one interacting with everyone, which is such a disservice to Mei.

*I want to briefly sidebar to curb the misconception that Mei was given the power of origin because she collected all the signets, or that the point of the realm was to find someone to collect them all to have that power passed along to them. Mei getting the power is unrelated to the realm's existence as far as I'm concerned, given that Hua says this:

I trust that Hua is telling the truth here, mostly because she has no reason to lie to us. What this does leave us with is, unsurprisingly, still no answer on the purpose of the realm. Vague handwaving of Kevin saying that Mei has earned the right to "seek answers" only for the narrative to do a weird slight of hand where Aponia goes "now you get to know Elysia's secret because you defeated me kyaaaaa" is not the point. I doubt Kevin allows people into his basement for the possibility of finding out some dead chick from 50,000 years ago that no one outside of WS would actually know by name was secretly a herrscher.

Speaking of which.

Part 3: The Elysia was always a herrscher reveal is dumb

I know this is the most contentious part of the discourse™ when it comes to Elysia, but I cannot understate how stupid it is. I can accept retcons of herrscher order, begrudgingly but yes I will concede if the game wants to commit to it. What I cannot concede to is the game saying that Elysia was born a herrscher.

All the Flame Chasers got MANTIS surgery. This is a fact. Elysia received it as well. Don't you think like, I don't know, literally anyone involved in the procedure would have noticed she has honkai radiation off her like a nuclear bomb? This is such a basic hole in logic and it feels like the game almost wants you to forget that this is a thing, but I didn't, I've spent the past 2 months digging through all the realm game mode text to come to this conclusion.

I also have grift with the fact that she was a previous era herrscher with sapience, since a lot of the tragedy of the previous era is because of the loss of humanity. Kevin was fucking devastated by the HoF emergence, because he hesitated. He saw Murata's face and thought she was still in there. But she wasn't. Kalpas lost Emile to the HoD. Mobius lost Klein, not only to her own over-ambition, but to HoL. Sakura lost Rin to HoC. All of these are essential to their stories, and it's because those herrschers were just mindless tools, godproxy emanators of destruction with no higher order thinking skills. Only a will to subjugate humanity.

Oh but actually Elysia is a sweet and special perfect girl who never did anything wrong, she didn't betray anyone, she was always the bestest girl who loved humanity and was a friend to everyone because she's so lovable and you should love her too ❤️❤️❤️

Yeah no I'm not doing that. I want to make it clear that I actually really like Elysia, and it doesn't take much to fix the parts of her story that have no logic or retcon themselves in the span of a chapter. She's very close to being well written, which makes it all the more frustrating that the narrative continually bends around her to make her have less flaws. Elysia is pushy! She's overbearing, and tends to needle at people whenever she notices something. She forces Mobius to try on clothes she likes but Mobi doesn't, she constantly flirts with Mei and calls their hangouts dates even if Mei doesn't seem interested, she's a little selfish and plays pranks, all of this stuff is very endearing! I just can't deal with the other things the game does to try and make me like Ely more.

Part 4: Even if I try to fix it, the realm is broken

I could sit down and outline ways to fix Elysia's writing, the way the realm's story is structured, and it would be fine and dandy in service of smoothing over the stuff I didn't like about it, but you know what it wouldn't fix?

Mei.

Yeah I think we all just keep forgetting about Mei being in here. The thing is that because the Elysian Realm is such a dead weight in canon, you almost can't make Mei go through character development because it wouldn't flow into Transcending Finality in a comprehensible way, and this post isn't about the problems with the final chapter set of Part 1 (although I do promise I have some complaints about the writing choices in there too).

The realm treating Mei as a self insert, and not really serving her arc either, is seen most obviously in "Because of You", the ending cinematic. One that famously doesn't feature Mei at all in the fighting. The ender for this arc is Elysia, because all things start with Elysia. It's Elysia Impact all the way down, except for the part where it has literally no bearing on the main plot.

And that's the problem, isn't it? The only thing the realm really does is augment our understanding of Kevin, and only barely so if you want to split hairs about how Sim!Kevin isn't our Kevin, given that there's a few stray dialogue moments that actually go against Sim!Kevin and most other characters insistence that Kevin is an immovable rock of a man.

So at the end of it all, what do I even say? I love the realm, obsessed to death with it, all the characters are my favorites, well written, absolutely dogshit in terms of story direction. I find this contradiction to be reflective of Elysia, a character who exists only as a vessel for whatever the writer/story director thought would be cool, instead of making it mean anything.

#dazzling nova #honkai impact 3rd #raiden mei #kevin kaslana #fu hua #sorry to beat a dead horse but consider i casted revive #elysian realm

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pocket-luv101 · 2 years

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Genshin Impact has a lot of characters who parallel characters from Honkai Impact. I've played Honkai but I stopped years ago. I don't know the newer characters. With what we know of Kusanali, I question if she will have a similar appearance to Theresa.

There is a theory that Kusanali isn't the actual archon but a figurehead to hide the real one who lost their power. I think it's a cool theory with truth in it. Theresa is a clone but she has her own personality. It would parallel a possible plotline where Kusanali is the "green shadow" for the previous Dendro Archon who is in hiding or lost their power but still alive.

Other small things:

Sumeru is most well known for their ideal of wisdom and they have the Sumery Academia. Theresa is the founder and principal of St. Freya Academy.

We're told about the Sabzeruz Festival that celebrates the birth of Kusanali. Sabzeruz appears to be based on Nowruz and that falls on March 21st. Theresa's birthday is March 28th.

Each archon had a connect to a Herrscher (Venti/Wendy, Zhongli/Mei and Ei/Mei). Theresa's weapon, Oath of Judah, was created with the core of the Herrscher of Binding.

Most of the archons are known for their support and utility abilities. Celestial Theresa and Starlit Theresa are very strong support (unless they have been power crept after I stopped playing and I don't know)

When I played Honkai years ago, I was lucky enough to pull Celestial Theresa early in the game and I was able to clear the difficult floors with her. She's a pretty nostalgic character for me. Her fast paced and mid ranged attacks was fun to play. If she does make an appearance, I hope she is similar to Albedo. She has one of the traditional weapons but she can drop her cross for off-field damage.

Note: I know people want Mobius to be the Dendro archon because of her green hair. But I think she looks much more like an older Collei with longer hair. They're both connected to experiments that changed them too. Though, I hope Collei maintain her outfit style from the manga because it would fit Sumeru better than Mobius's mantas dress. (I also prefer Genshin's character design over Honkai's because Genshin has less fanservice).

#genshin impact #dendro archon theory #theresa apocalypse #kusanali #genshin

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herrscherbled · 3 years

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Lore dumps so far from what I’ve seen in Ely.sian Rea.lm:

- Mobius died several times and she cannot die a real death like others. Mobius did die in the Previous Era, but how she was able to do that is unknown.

- Klein was the 10th Herrscher and she killed Mobius when she transformed into a Herrscher. However, as everyone put it, Klein was the only one who could understand Mobius the best, so Klein killing Mobius is most likely when Klein was already under Will of Honkai rule. Su says that Klein’s mind was weak enough to let him hold her back before Mobius “resurrected” and the shadowy figure she turned into “consumed” Klein and her Herrscher core as an energy for revival, I guess? Her revivals seem to be limited, but it’s also questioned as she might’ve found a way to stop it and remain in this same form.

- Elf Klein doesn’t have any memories of previous human Klein. Mobius specifically did NOT include any memories of human!Klein into Elf!Klein.

- Grey Serpent was the first artificial life created by Mobius. She actually abandoned him at first because she thought he was a failure, but then she found him still alive and surviving in the dump, so she gave him a “chance at life.” But she didn’t intervene with his life and his choices, basically separating herself from Grey Serpent to give him full freedom to live or die.

- Grey Serpent created World Serpent. Not anyone else. Not Aponia, not Su, not Kevin, not anyone else. It was Grey Serpent who created the organization.

- World Serpent is related to Mobius.

- Any Flame-Chaser could’ve ruled World Serpent as people want a “god” that represents the ideal of Project Stigma. Meaning that it’s possible that in another bubble universe it was Fu Hua who ruled the World Serpent but it could’ve been a different name there. Basically, it didn’t have to be Kevin. He is a MANTIS, this is what World Serpent needed as a leader. They needed a FAITH SYMBOL sitting on the throne that underlined and empowered their religious/cult-ish belief in Project Stigma and the future.

- Eden says that out of all people who she thinks had the power to send Kevin into the Sea of Quanta would be Elysia without a doubt, but she wouldn’t do it to him.

- Su feels that he “killed” Klein and he feels guilty about it, saying that it’s Bad Karma as he wasn’t able to save her.

- Mobius doesn’t know what happened to Klein after her death. She doesn’t know that she herself have consumed Klein and the Herrscher core. Su specifically asks Mei to NOT mention any of that to Mobius or Elf!Klein. But he does apologize to Elf!Klein upon meeting her.

DO NOT REBLOG. DO NOT REPOST. THIS IS A ROLEPLAY BLOG. PERSONALS BLOCKED ON SPOT.

#∴∵ 🐍 ∴∵ 「 DECODED LOGS OF DR. MOBIUS. 」 analysis.

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 1 year

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If I rewrote the last part of Honkai (with the self-imposed rule of keeping the lore/endgoal relatively intact, my thoughts would be different if I’m allowed to do anything tbh) I would add an arc between ER/EE and the moon arc.

We deserved a proper WS arc. Instead of Suddenly, Stigma Is Done, we could’ve had a build up to make us suspect not everything is at it seems. Get Mei to breathe, cope with losing THIRTEEN friends to a Herrscher, and re-evaluate what she’s doing in WS— her leaving in the epilogue and Kevin going yeah you can go xoxo was anti-climactic as hell, I feel so blueballed 💀.

So basically (and keep in mind I’m making this up as I go, it’s a first draft type of idea)

First off I hate the last two acts of EE so I’m throwing those out. Reconstructing Elysia doesn’t magically revive anyone, it basically just gives Mei admin power over ER as its heir (you know? what they intended for her. No because of you the player bullshit. It’s all because of Mei, it’s always been HER arc.)

Mei fights HoC herself, complete with the FCs fighting by her sides as signet hallucinations and symbolism of “they finally were allowed to fight all together through her”. Mei pins down HoC, sees the FC hallucinations all smiling at her, telling her to do it, they were happy to have met her, they bless her etc… and Mei deletes ER herself. Her enemy and her friends melt away, destroyed permanently. The epilogue is Mei finding passed out but intact Klein and picking her up, and Kevin showing up at the exit but remains stoic (taking Klein from her?). We can even keep the bit of why he didn’t step in, but nothing about STIGMA or quitting.

After that we get to see some Mei downtime in WS, she gets a visit— Raven learns what happened with ER from her, they get to mourn and reminisce about the people they both knew properly before moving on with the plot.

WS hides its plans from Mei, which she starts suspecting, and she gets sent in a mission that lets her actually CLASH with the good guys— maybe with Fu Hua, to give her some much needed screentime? It could be interesting as well to have them ACTUALLY TALK, and to show how things have or haven’t changed after Mei got to hang out with a much younger Hua. Hua tries to get her to defect but Mei refuses, saying she still needs answers— and Hua admits her memory has too many holes for her to give her what she wants. Only WS, MOTH’s heir, has the answers.

Also, Mei mentions the Realm, confusing Hua, and Mei realizes she forgot that. It hurts. She shuts up because it’s gone, and she feels guilty for taking Hua’s chance to meet her dead friends again away. Kevin doing it was such an an afterthought in canon it was dumb.

We get some scenes of the main gang as well, Kiana keeping up with Durandal’s training, since I don’t have the CCP to worry about have Bronya and Seele secretly wonder if Durandal has a crush on Kiana because she’s acting so weird. (the truth is stranger than fiction, girls). Some clashes between SS and AE now that they have to work together, which Theresa tries to manage. Since I said I’m keeping the lore mostly intact, have Bronya and Seele bring up Bronya’s harsh childhood and talk about what they know of their biological parents. Dark Seele admits she only started waking up regularly when Seele was at the orphanage so she actually has zero idea. They talk about Cocolia and Sin a bit as well, where they stand with them etc.

Meanwhile! After that mission, Mei gets called out for not doing her job right because she was soft on her old friends, and she starts thinking about leaving for good soon. She interacts with a Gray Serpent, who is cryptic as usual but commands her for being their most promising agent despite her soft heart. She briefly bumps into Hare (the real one) and gets a weird feeling from her, thinking she looks a bit like Kiana, and she basically exudes depression. I want her to also have a talk with Jackal, and mentioning Mobius (maybe she assumed Klein would try to find work in a familiar setting but she’s not there, she’s already on the moon preparing things) just so we can close ER ch2’s plot thread of Jackal causing Mobius to go stir-crazy by saying they never found the real Mobius in reality.

Some time passes, more regular gang shenanigans that starts foreshadowing the moon plot and AE’s plans to deal with Finality (like Kiana asking about the battleship onscreen instead of just telling us she did later). The events for them can be jumbled around a bit, it’s just to avoid them getting completely sidelined and get the more secondary characters some scenes to shine in.

Back to Mei. She’s already gone through the database, ER is a bust, she’s missing her final answer because of HoC’s bullshit— but Hua was right, there’s still someone at WS who can give her answers. She’s been mulling it over and she’s going to do it today.

Mei confronts Kevin one on one (yes she booked a formal meeting). Mei knows him well now; she has his signet too, she spent time together with his sim, and she realizes that after everything she can try and force the answers out of him, since she’s now proven herself. What is Honkai? What is the Will? What really happened to Elysia? What is he hiding?

Kevin is reminded of Dr.MEI, contemplating how utterly different they are despite looking alike— and he actually starts talking. I’m gonna think harder about the exact content but for now here’s what I think he says.

First he tells Mei about the samsara they’re in, and how she’s got Dr.MEI’s spot in this samsara, emphasizing that each iteration is different but starts on the same basis, much like how Mei and MEI’s lives took radically different turns and they became extremely different people, despite being born with the same face under similar circumstances.

Mei shook (1) but she remembers that one eyes closed photo she saw of MEI, and how they indeed looked alike.

After Kevin reveals how Finality turns back time, he broaches that this is their last cycle, their last chance, because Elysia broke Fate and they traded passing down extra knowledge and strength to the embers of the new civilisation against Humanity getting more tries to survive Honkai, so they’re not going to be able to bunker down and try again with their civilisation revived.

Mei asks how Elysia managed it, and I’m gonna change her death back to what it was built up to be because I don’t like what we got. Elysia was a Herrscher the entire time, infiltrated MOTH and revealed herself as the 13th, becoming the common enemy of Humanity. Five of her closest friends came to fight her off— Kevin, Eden, Vill-V, Aponia and Mobius.

(I’m confident they only removed Mobius because they couldn’t give her a green flower, which is stupid. She was stated to have been there in earlier ER convos.)

From this point on, the tale becomes Kevin’s memory projection, so Mei gets to watch it play out.

Elysia ran away from the base after a very public “eruption”, and they believed maybe it was a sliver of sanity left in her before she completely lost it— but soon she would come back because after the three last cities got nuked there was virtually no human left to kill besides MOTH staff. So they had to strike first.

There’s an epic fight where Elysia seems to have completely lost her mind and they finally manage to pin her down— and Mobius reveals to Elysia they came to capture her alive, claiming it’s for her experiments on a live Herrscher but it’s pretty obvious it’s because they’re all completely worn out emotionally and they just want their friend back.

Elysia is shocked, because she has been acting this whole time hoping that she would be able to restore Humanity’s confidence and unity when they beat her without horribly cruel collateral, in preparation for HoFin who she can feel is going to descend extremely soon— and she was also going to use this to return to the Cocoon to give the humans a chance to survive.

This makes her break character and they realize she’s ACTUALLY for good conscious and has been acting and they’re not too happy about that, feeling she’s betrayed them, and she spills the beans.

She reveals she’s not the 13th, but the Herrscher of Origin who has been walking among humans before the Herrscher of Reason even descended. She joined MOTH so Humanity wouldn’t lose too early, hoping that, given some extra help and time from her, they’d surpass Finality.

Elysia apologizes for picking RIN as a Herrscher, wondering if Sakura would forgive her, expressing grief about finding someone compatible enough with Honkai not to go crazy, only for her to die and then take Sakura and so many humans with her. It turns out she’s been sporadically intentionally influencing the Cocoon, hoping that it would bring a more optimal outcome— but picking a MOTH Soldier didn’t work, splitting the core into 1000 pieces to make it easier on the human mind to utilize didn’t work, making the Herrscher an anti-energy type was a complete and utter disaster…Despite the relative success of the MANTIS program, the Honkai’s embrace never led to coexistence.

In her eyes, every Herrscher’s violence is a “choice” of humanity, instincts amplified by Honkai’s embrace (so like what happened to RIN in the end), as much as the response to fight them was… and here they are.

This little italics conversation that they changed occurs.

They question whether everything about Elysia was a lie, but she denies it, saying that she (and by extension, the Honkai) loves each and every one of them sincerely, and that she always wanted to create a paradise for Humanity, even if she never really was worthy of being called a human.

Mobius is big mad— telling her that she’s just as human as any of them, she laughs and hides her pain and plays pranks and loves others, and all she did was betray both herself and them by “letting nature take its course”.

Surprisingly Elysia says she’s right. The Honkai is arrogant to play with Humanity’s fate like this, even out of love, and as an extension of it she made the same choice… but it was never fair. Humanity should write its own story, and evolve in the ways they like, not the ways the Honkai wants.

And so Elysia tells them she’ll do what she should have done a long time ago, and returns to the cocoon, rearranging the stars and breaking Fate.

It’s the end of the memory, and Mei is stunned and a bit emotional (even here you can’t escape watching Elysia die multiple times, sorry). She asks Kevin what exactly, then, is Honkai.

“You heard her didn’t you? You got to know her. You already know.”

“It’s that love of hers. What we know as “Honkai” is her embrace.”

(to be continued…)

Feel free to send asks or reblog/reply with feedback, questions etc. I wrote this all in one shot.

#honkai impact #hi3 #fanfiction #sorta #rewrite

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 1 year

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What are your opinions on mobius?

*stares at current icon, which is Mobius in a santa outfit, drawn by my friend @cloud-ya*

She’s my favorite character

To be a bit less meme-y and more detailed, her chapter in ER is my favorite part of Honkai— she’s hyped up JUUUST right, painted as this deranged mad scientist and villain, and then you peel back the story through upgrading the vessels and talking to other characters more and you realize there’s more to her.

I love that.

Mobius is undoubtedly fucked up. She’s lacking a bunch of morals, and the ones she does have, like specifically ensuring consent to her experiments (the Sim didn’t but the real one reportedly did) can be very… contractual. Like how she gets Hua to agree to experiments by pushing her— sure, she said yes, but she said yes because they’re desperate and Mobius is insisting, and agreeing to retrieve the box didn’t mean agreeing to get possessed for science. Obviously this isn’t true consent, but on a technicality it respects Mobius’s moral code. It’s like a kid getting asked whether they ate yet who pops a single candy in their mouth then says yes. Honestly I relate to that dhdhdhf

I like this contrast, though!

Another fun thing is that she’s probably the eldest of the Flame-Chasers, and the one who’s worked with MOTH the longest, and she absolutely does not have the patience to be. She’s also super autistic? I relate to her a lot. Did you know that when she gets mad she just plops herself on her couch and pops bubble wrap for hours. Iconic work ethic. I love her.

Her stubborn fascination with life and death leads her to subvert some mad scientist tropes, for example her insistence to humanize the MANTIS. There’s also the way she treats her assistants and creations, very unusual for the archetype which tends to be all SCIENCE and no time to raise anybody.

If you paid attention, for all that she can troll them or punish them a little, she’s never cruel and nurtures them properly.

When she hears Fuxi and Nuwa messed up and tried to hide it she makes them copy the lab safety rules, this was very much a pedagogical decision with their safety in mind, not her taking her anger out on them. In fact I don’t think she really does that at any moment?

Even the Sim (more morally dubious already) attacking Mei is doing it with a set purpose, nothing personal. For such an overtly malicious character she… doesn’t actually act on malice very much lol. At most she’s very selfish, and her curiosity drives her to perform cruel actions, rather than an intent to harm. The rest of the time she’s quite serious, wants what’s best for everyone, on paper that’d be quite pleasant uh?

When there’s interpersonal friction it usually comes down to what you can easily read as neurodivergence; Elysia and Hua observe that Mobius makes no difference between herself and others. In other words, she assumes that what SHE can tolerate, anyone can or should be able to, which isn’t true. Struggling with that stuff is very autistic coded. I relate. It makes her struggles and everyone demonizing her more tragic, too. I’d wager that everyone calling her names and alienating her greatly contributed to her cynical ways, making the issue worse.

Despite all that though, she treats her creations well, and instead of trying to control them she makes a point of giving them the freedom to be themselves and supports their choices, even if she doesn’t agree with them (like trying to push ELF Klein away by showing her what working together would be like, because she thought Klein wouldn’t be able to handle it, but since Klein could she gave up and accepted both that she had projected her anxieties and Klein’s own choice).

Big subversion to mad scientist tropes there! This leads to pretty much all of her creations adoring her (aside from the Sim but like, self-hatred go brrrr).

It makes lots of sense when you keep in mind that she’s also a child abuse survivor. She claims she throws her creations to the wolves because even humans are only left to themselves, but she’s lying.

The sim sacrifices herself for Klein’s sake (both of them lovingly protect and raise Klein), the real one leaves a loving message for her sim, to the Gray Serpents of the early days she was so important that they dedicated themselves to understand what it would mean to follow her wish to be free by CREATING MULTIPLE CULTS, and they still lowkey worship her as their creator after 50 000 years…

Yeah she cares a lot. She cares a lot about Griseo too, as well as other Flame-Chasers, like Eden, Vill-V or Elysia (despite being annoyed).

Her relationship with Vill-V is also interesting, because when Mobius realizes she’s similar to herself, her first impulse is to kill her immediately. Ultimately she doesn’t, but it was really a “recognition of the self through the other (derogatory)” moment. She also warns Vill-V multiple times about the weight of failure, and I think she pretty much sees herself fifteen years younger in her— a brilliant neurodivergent scientist with a few moral screws loose about to get smacked with the reality of the Apocalypse. Really can’t see this as romantic but ymmv.

TLDR

My opinion is that she’s just full of interesting character depth and I just eat that up, especially since I have a particular fondness for morally dubious mom types that care very much deep down.

#honkai impact #hi3 #asks #mobius #I support women’s wrongs

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 1 year

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ya kno ive been thinking abt elysium everlasting’s shift from depicting elysia as a “mysterious but mostly benevolent anomaly w unknowable motives,” to “she was the best of us, perfect in all the ways that matter,” and i realized; that is an awful lot like how people start talking abt someone at their funeral.

given that ee is a memorial built outta aponias memories of elysia (and supplemented by the sims memories i assume) in the wake of her death, i dont see it as much of a stretch for that being the reason for the shift in tone. now if that was the interpretation of the text intended by mhy, they should have been more clear on that (if i remember correctly, there were a few allusions to rose tinted lenses, but nothing to indicate that the reader was looking thru them); but as a fix-it headcanon, i think it works quite well.

so the er sims would be more true-to-life to the people they were, while ee is more abt the lasting impact elysia had on the rest of the flamechasers.

You see. I would love that. If they ACKNOWLEDGED IT.

So full agree with you really, it would patch a lot of the yikes and be angsty and I love the concept, but... they just. Didn't do that. They never acknowledge that the Elysia Mei brings back isn't the real one, and none of them admit grief might have warped their memory of Ely. Nothing. Even in the birthday event, they're just cheesy about her.

They also blatantly lie about her past actions (example: Elysia claiming she's only ever told one lie, when she lies multiple times through recollections....... girl) and they stop acknowledging how outrageous she can be. In ER, you have Elysia asking Raven to forgive her, and if you say no, she asks it again, but with both choices saying yes. She will not let you say no to her. Your free will is an illusion.

❤️❤️❤️❤️ You love Elysia forever.

That's creepy!! And it's great!! It's the game acknowledging her forcefulness!! Elysia in ER, at times, is the :) emoji. And that's something I love about her. "Mysterious but mostly benevolent anomaly with unknowable motives", indeed.

Meanwhile, in EE, they give a little nod to her stealing Mobius's badge, make a little joke about it, but if you haven't read the recollection you won't realize it because they do NADA to acknowledge it, explain why she did it etc. They just confirm that they didn't retcon that happening and Mobius is the butt of the joke, but Elysia smiles throught it, :D, wow!! Okay so what was the purpose of that?

Deafening silence. Will we ever know?? Is it a dropped plot thread about Elysia mind controlling everyone into knowing her like MEI's meeting seemed to imply???? Like, they even insist that she totally passed the test in a legit way, when it was implied before that she'd snuck in with that very same badge (to bypass background checks?).

What's the POINT of all that setup if the truth is that she's a perfect little angel who was so pure and could never do any wrong?

They didn't! Even! Let! Her! Cry!! COME ON!!!!

I'm not mad because I hate Elysium Everlasting— I had a lot of fun for most of it, actually. No, I'm mad because I love Elysia and I feel like they were cowards and tried to veer off her intended characterization at the last minute because they were scared of backlash.

This is me right now. EDIT: Also her theme is called Sweet Trap. Where is the deception!!!! I THOUGHT YOU HAD TWISTED ANGSTY FOOD FOR ME

#elysian realm #honkai impact #hi3 #asks #it's me i'm the backlash

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 1 year

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oh do you associate ship in a bottle with Mobius? Out of curiosity can you elaborate on why?

This is gonna be a mix of quick character analysis, an actual explanation, and my mental AMV.

The song is about someone who's self-isolating and putting up a strong front as everything falls apart around them. I think it fits Mobius's arc in PE very well.

The singer (who is really talking to themself in second person) started with a hard-earned self-built space, the glass bottle ("glass ceiling, walls, and floor", doesn't that imagery remind you of her lab?). This ship in a bottle was built by their own efforts, as somewhere walled away from pain where they demonstrate high skill— just like Mobius and her lab, which she has earned through her hard work and the subsequent recognition, which also becomes the place where she's respected and, well, where she uses her brains.

In particular, "But nothing can touch your happy thoughts anymore" matches up how confident Mobius is shown to be early on, especially with the "picking apart your brain" image. Despite being widely disliked on a personal level, look at how she's completely dominating the conversation when she recruits MEI into MOTH (Mobius: Good News): Mobius was happy and comfortable with her competence in her line of work. The Honkai wasn't that bad yet, it was a challenge (the "blue waves crashing into it", present but not yet threatening), a humbling challenge but a challenge she was thriving off of, eager to uncover its secrets.

"Pick your brain apart and build it again" can also be seen as building the Elysian Realm, but I'd say at this point in the song that's more foreshadowing. The premise is simply: The ship is Mobius's lab, and her lab is her safe space, where she is respected and content to pursue her work. She has earned this place alone, with her own efforts and skills.

Emphasis on alone and self-made for that second stanza, I think it's fairly evident where the metaphor is getting at once we've established the parallel. She's striving to transcend the gods on her own.

The chorus, however, peels off her mask. Things ARE falling apart. In the first round, I'd picture adult Mobius and her actual child self, the one who was abused and decided to make humanity evolve past the weaknesses of flesh as a result.

If the first few stanza are set early on in the timeline, after the chorus we find ourselves after Klein's death. The singer admits to crying, the water rising (can't cope anymore), the glass protection of their safe space is cracking. The ship is leaking water now, and there are many more that have sunk— despite this, the singer carries on.

For Mobius, things are seriously fucked now, and her demeanor has begun to break down. People leave her, either by dying (Klein) or out of disgust (Nuwa and Fuxi) but she still sets out for her goals. She'll do it even if she has to do it alone. That's how she's always done things, but now she carries the weight of those who can't carry on, too.

I'm not factoring ELF Klein here because 1. obvious the song wasn't written for Mobius, and more importantly 2. Mobius never meant for Klein to follow her all the way, she wanted her to be free. She would've LIKED that, but I don't think she DESIRED it, so she left her behind with the Realm. Mobius is very into "if you love them let them go", and I believe she was always planning to set off alone to an extent...

The song points out the singer is losing what kept them sane, and that's absolutely true for Mobius, she started out playful (some of the time) and became much more sullen and cold after Klein's death.

Then the chorus is back, but this time instead of actual child Mobius, I'd see the Sim talking to the real one, trying to tempt her into committing suicide and letting her be the "real and only" one. Instead of the tethering of denying trauma, it's a beckoning towards the abyss, it's turned malicious...

I could see the final chorus as specifically the background to Mobius's goodbyes and the hologram messages Mobius leaves for her creations.

And in the end, has the sim won...?

As we would later see... no, she didn't. The captain kept sailing on her own. Mobius always had her eyes set no closer than the horizon~

ANYWAY I'm very tired because I did hard things with people all day and woke up stupidly early so I hope this is coherent. Other people feel free to add to this. Would love to see a lyricstuck of this someday... Or hear about other songs people associate with her??

Full song lyrics below the cut~

You can fit everything you know In a bottle for you to show Pick your brain apart and put it in (pick your brain apart) And build it again With needles and pins Everything you have earned is a ship With blue waves crashing into it But nothing can touch your happy thoughts anymore (nothing can touch your happy thoughts anymore) With your glass ceiling, walls, and floor

Sailing on a ship in a bottle Anchor all your thoughts to the bottom Pulling ropes and pulling your head back To see what is breaking the foremast You set sail alone there is no crew No one on the deck who can help you This is all your own battle to win This is your ship and you are the captain

Oh, captain, let's make a deal Where we both say the things that we both really feel I feel scared and I'm starting to sink And I only sink deeper the deeper I think Oh, captain Oh, captain, deal Oh, captain deal Oh, captain deal Oh woah

There are red spots under your eyes From when you cry Into the sky Ocean waters rising above your neck, mmm You feel the glass Start to crack

Sailing on a ship in a bottle Water's leaking through holes in the bottom Flying flags of ships that have long since Sat at the floor of the sea, but in defense You set sail alone there is no crew No one on the deck who can help you This is all your own battle to win This is your ship and you are the captain

Oh, captain, let's make a deal Where we both say the things that we both really feel I feel scared and I'm starting to sink And I only sink deeper the deeper I think Oh, captain, make up your mind Before the salt burns your eyes and you run out of time 'cause you're popping the cork You get lost in your brain And you lose touch with all the things that made you feel sane Oh, captain Oh, captain, deal Oh, captain deal Oh, captain deal Oh woah

Woah-oh-oh-oh-oh Woah-oh-oh-oh-oh Woah-oh-oh-oh-oh

#asks #honkai impact #hi3 #mobius #lyricstuck #one day......#for now it's in my brain

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 2 years

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wait what do u mean we recently learned a lot about gray serpent? haven’t caught up on er yet

basically he’s Mobius’s creation so he’s technically one of the Pioneers (just an unofficial one), we get a bit of his backstory, Mobius and Klein talk a bit about him with Mei, and he gets a surprisingly sweet scene where he says farewell to SAKURA after her tragic death.

For more specific info:

Backstory wise he’s the first sapient being Mobius created. She realized he was sapient (she found him fighting to survive waste disposal acid) and was touched by his wish to live. She wanted to see how he’d evolve on his own— so she saved him and then set him free

He went on to try and understand what Freedom actually entails by… using the scientific method and founding a ton of cults to understand humanity better. which Sakura got in the way of like eleven times.

Gray Serpent respected Sakura a lot even though (because?) she killed him a bunch of times, which is why she gets fifty gray serpents with their one black umbrella each to bow at once in her honor after she dies

Klein notes he has some abnormally strong human instincts as a consequence of how he was created (which seems to be sentience transfer tech) but Mobius was unable to reproduce that so Mobius didn’t risk it and Klein doesn’t have them. Also he never worked at the lab but seemingly visited sometimes.

The sim notes that she’s proud of him for finding his way after Mei describes him as a gentleman, so you can infer that the real Mobius felt a similar way, especially considering that she’s also pretty maternal towards the Sim herself

#honkai impact #mobius #gray serpent #hi3 lore #asks

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 2 years

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That was a glorious and informative answer thank you. I met Su finally, so I'm happy. I kinda want to see you describe the relationship Mei has with each of them now heh

Mei & Elysia:

Elysia’s growing on Mei. Like fungus. Kind of a stray cat she reluctantly got endeared by. Sus as hell though. Why does she keep showing up. Raven judges Mei so hard for rejecting that “it’s because you’re so cute” line. and Raven is right

Mei & Eden:

Mei likes Eden! Eden isn’t sussy. Her voice is beautiful. She’s kind and beautiful and helpful. She gets scammed out of diamonds really easily? If only all the Flame-Chasers could be as helpful as her

Mei & Sakura:

Mei likes Sakura, her past is tough but she’s still a kind person. No ulterior motives detected, so Mei trusts her, except Sakura actually has underhanded plans just not against Mei. Look out for your ass Aponia! To me, the most memorable thing about their relationship is Sakura noting that despite her frigid exterior, Mei is quite kind. Mei goes ouch you could have left out the first part

Mei & Kalpas:

Mei starts out antagonistic with Kalpas. “I’m not here to make enemies” *Kalpas opens his mouth* “But I wouldn’t mind making a few more enemies”. Despite this hilarious convo she doesn’t hate him. She tries to be professional when they talk.

Mei & Hua:

Hua is a friend to Mei, and they get along really well. While she recognizes Hua isn’t Fu Hua, she’s still precious, and Mei wants Hua to be happy— Mei tries to tell Hua how much the real her has accomplished to boost her confidence, for example. They should cuddle. I bet it’d get Mei to relax. Like giving her a knickers but it’s petting your local bird

Mei & Kevin:

Kevin once remarks that he can tell Mei really wants to beat the real him’s ass. Otherwise their relationship is basically “I’m uncooperative” “Can you give me an example?” “No”

Mei & Su:

They get along well! Mei appreciates how chill he is. Mei also suspects him of sleeping on the job

Mei & Mobius:

While she finds it curious that the real Mobius seemed to be more “human” than the Sim, and generally spent a lot of time investigating her, Mei does not like or approve of anything Sim Mobius does. After failing to kill her, Mobius says she’s mean and has started to troll her in retaliation. It’s hilarious.

Bonus Round: Raven and Klein

Raven & Mei:

They tease each other mercilessly but they’ve gotten quite close. Raven is always claiming she’s keeping favor tabs but we never see her cash in. Mei is rude as hell but she’s definitely caught feelings for Raven. (The feelings are friendship but she’s not going to admit it anytime soon.) Mei is also trying to wingman Raven and Elysia together. Good luck Mei. You’re going to need it

Mei & Klein:

“Are you okay? Do you live in hell?” Mei can’t understand why Klein loves Mobius and doesn’t hate her job. Lots of pity. While Mei can be put off by how blunt Klein is, she’s growing on Mei.

#asks #honkai impact #hi3 #elysian realm

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 2 years

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was Aponia's "prophecy" real or just a test? i want to be sure i'm understanding correctly. what was her actual goal? why has she been waiting all this time for someone like Mei?

It seems to have been a test set up by Elysia, to see how Mei would react to impending doom, the same she went through.

That said, Aponia's powers were real— she just lost the future sight part of them after Elysia died, though whether Elysia truly destroyed fate or if Aponia's just blind to it now she isn't fully certain. (It seems to be the former, though, since Aponia foresaw that there would be no do-over, and CE happened anyway)

APPARENTLY, the purpose of handing out signets is secondary to something else that Mei's gonna find in the Deep End. I suppose that once that's done, Aponia sees the Realm as pointless and intends to let it die with her (?) but honestly it's hard to say how that's gonna go.

Between Sakura and Kalpas wanting to murder Aponia, Mobius and possibly a couple others wanting to leave the Realm, and the sims who don't know anything caught in between, the next few chapters are going to be a riot.

#honkai impact #hi3 #asks #hi3 lore #it's kind of obscure even to me sorry

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phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing · 2 years

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I've been playing more ER partly due to your answers lol. I have to experience this for myself and have discovered some golden interactions. When the update drops, I wonder if we'll be able to see more characters interact with each other. What would you want to see?

for old characters:

I want Mobius to interact with Eden more. They’re friends give it to me. Mobius trolling Mei is funny but long term I do want her to learn and grow for the better in the end. Also i’m begging for a pink dress moby. and more info on what happened to Real Mobius augment? Real Mobius Augment? Please?

I want Elysia to show up and be gay and actually talk to Raven some. They should be insufferable around Mei… together.

I want Kalpas to tell more about his past and also for him to have fun!! he deserves good things.

I want to know whether Su can actually see with his eyes closed or not

for new characters:

honestly just excited to meet them, and to see what kind of relationships they have!

also if Aponia is really a Kiana lookalike i’m dying to see Mei’s reaction to that

#honkai impact #hi3 #asks

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herrscherbled · 3 years

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Plot please for Captain Makoto and Elysia :) and also for Chev Makoto and Mobius

@dekirukoto

CAPTAIN MAKOTO & ELYSIA.

1. Embarrassing Captain Makoto becomes Elysia's hobby and she doesn't stop. Imagine her finding different ways to tease him like approaching from behind and giving a hug, things like that. The thread taking part after she did this several times and imagine if Makoto thinks what she'll do this time only for her to simply drink tea as she greets him like usual... but it's a trap, she gives him a false sense of security before hitting with a line of her own just to see him blushing.

2. Captain Makoto and Elysia speaking about Bubble universes and different timelines. Specifically, what she knows from what Su told her and what they were able to discover with Dr. MEI and Dr. Mobius. Also, Ellie asking Makoto about what he had seen before she came here and what he can tell her about.

3. Imagine Elysia jokingly asking if Captain Makoto wants to rest and be the vice-captain while she takes the role of the captain. Just like she teased Kevin about it being good for her resume. But for real, it's mostly teasing since she says that she wasn't really good at "leading" people and being the "leader" aka "lacking leadership abilities." But also Ellie is actually super helpful in his job as a leader, giving him advice on how to get along with some people and how to make sure that everyone is alright. Like Makoto calling her out on how good she is with people and actually she's good at connecting/uniting people? And Elysia praising Makoto's acceptance and how much better he is as a Captain, as a leader, and as a friend. I need them both to praise each other and help each other out.

CHEVALIER MAKOTO & MOBIUS.

1. Mobius will act nice to Makoto at first, luring him in with a cute face and her appearance as a young girl akin to a snake luring the prey into a trap. I can see Mobius - upon encountering Makoto - being interested in him because men who can fight Honkai are rare, making her wonder how Makoto is and what makes him special. Not only that, but if he is a Herrscher by the time they meet? Oh, she will be very interested... Perhaps, her plan can be used on him instead of Mei...

2. Mobius will certainly offer Makoto to be freed from the Herrscher's consciousness. She will offer him to become a normal guy once again without a problem if he assists her with experiments. There's a lot she can offer in terms of making him comply with her wishes. Knowledge for assistance, surgery for assistance, help for assistance... All of that to make him sway towards her and seek her out like every single successor who came around.

#i still need to learn more about mobius so that's why it's pretty short and similar #dekirukoto #∴∵ ϟ ∴∵ 「 MIHOYO PLS STOP HURTIN’ 」 out of character.

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