#but he is a good boy and people who think he is Evil are wrong and also probably only watched the movie knowing his characterization from
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Some Random Thoughts on the Nature of Free Will
Thinking about that conversation from the book that got put into The Resurrectionists. Aziraphale is explaining how he and Crowley are good and wicked, respectively, but they have no choice while Elspeth does. Bc humans can't be truly good unless they have the choice to be wicked.
(This is where I usually end up arguing with someone on Twitter lol bc they think Aziraphale is being Mean to Crowley by calling him wicked. It's just a brand name darling, not a judgment call. He literally said in the same breath that he's not TRULY wicked bc he wasn't given a choice.)
So I'm sitting here thinking about free will and the choices the celestials are given, which are not many. And I wonder if one of the reasons they were drawn to the Arrangement was to give them each the choices that humans were born with. One can't be truly good without the opportunity to do wrong, so perhaps being able to work both sides of the equation helped them develop into truly moral beings and not just extensions of their offices. We see in Uz how they're able to work together and bounce off each other to save Job's family, even though the Arrangement didn't properly exist yet.
I've also seen lots of takes and metas that indicate that people view Heaven and Hell as a class system: Heaven is the upper-class privileged majority, while Hell is oppressed, kicked out, downtrodden. I think people forget that the primary difference between the two is aesthetic. Hell has all the same powers as Heaven, and they both intend to burn humanity to the ground in order to prove their gang is best.
No, if we're going to talk about who's got privilege, it's definitely humanity over heaven or hell. We have free will and imagination, which are more miraculous than anything. Sure they've got all these powers and can work miracles and so on, but where's that gotten them? We can actually change things. All they can do is try and influence us to change things, and their success rate isn't high. Two of the most powerful beings in the universe couldn't convince an eleven year old boy to blow things up. That's. Pathetic, actually.
Which brings me back around to the ineffables. Because they actually DO have free will, but I don't think they're used to realizing that they do, which might be why they act a little bone headed sometimes. The show implies and the book comes right out and says that they picked it up from being around humans. And like I said earlier, I think the Arrangement played a big part. They were actually able to choose to do good or evil, a luxury that normally only humans can enjoy.
And the best part of this, for me anyway, is knowing that everything that they are to each other is a conscious choice. Aziraphale didn't want to be a fighter, so he gave his sword away and made the conscious choice to be soft and silly and get into scrapes. And Crowley chooses to come to his rescue because he likes it, not because he is obligated. It's a way for him to choose to do good without getting in trouble. They are each other's outlet to explore humanity in a way that would be impossible if they were on their own.
Aziraphale speaks French badly and flutters his eyelashes and plans elaborate Balls because he loves doing human things and he wants to do them with Crowley. Crowley drives a sleek classic sex machine with bullet hole stickers on the windows and goes on capers and performs daring moves because he loves doing things the human way and he wants to do them with Aziraphale. The way they interact and work together because they WANT to, and not because it's their Great Bloody Destiny or whatever, is so fucking beautiful to me.
#aziraphale#good omens#crowley#ineffable husbands#aziracrow#aziraphale my beloved#good omens meta#crowley good omens#free will#heaven and hell
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Here's the text that can appear in pop-ups when a sim watches the weather channel:
— Summer: —————————————————————
• When it's a really hot Summer day, sometimes I think about cold things, and my mind tricks my body into thinking it's cooler than it really is. Except one time I thought about too much ice cream and it made my stomach hurt.
• Sorry, but I can't help you today. I'm out at the pool.
• Why do they call us Meteorologists? I have never predicted a meteor in my whole life! They're scary. If you see one, let me know and I'll tell people. I'm on TV, you know.
• I'm having a bad day. Just go outside if you want to know about the weather. Stop bothering me.
• I've wanted to be a weather man my entire life. Sure other kids thought I was weird playing with my barometer during recess but I knew I was meant to affect people's lives.
• Weather prediction is a serious science. I have a college degree in it. At least I think it was a college. It was all done on the Internet, but I got a shiny certificate in the mail!
— Fall: —————————————————————
• My advice for today? If it rains, wear a jacket.
• I used to like playing in leaf piles. But not as much anymore. They're itchy.
• You know when people say things like "It's raining cats and dogs out there!" Well, that doesn't happen. Trust me. I've checked.
• Oh, what's the big deal? It's hot, it's cold, it's raining, it's snowing. Who cares? It still doesn't change the fact that my job is basically to look out the window. You know how depressing that is?
• I was struck by lightning once. It didn't feel so good. I put a lightning rod on my roof after that and it hasn't happened since.
• I just love playing in a great big pile of leafs. Burning them is fun too. Except when you accidentally set someone on fire. Poor grandma. Her eyebrows never grew back.
— Winter: —————————————————————
• It's Winter. Wear a sweater. Does that help?
• Sorry. Couldn't make it into work today. It's too cold out there!
• When I was a kid, I made up my own superhero. I was "The Boy Weather - Master of the Forecasters!" My mom made me a cape and a mask, and I ran around my house shouting things like "Chance of Showers: 50 percent!". I fought off evil tornadoes and powerful hurricanes with my powers of prediction. I didn't have many friends.
• I had the worst Nightmare last night. I dreamed I was being chased by a penguin and he wanted to hit me with a fish.
• Did you know Penguins can't fly? They also have a natural resistance to polar bear attacks.
• I always wanted a pet penguin but my mother said that I was too young. I asked her again yesterday, but she said that I should let it slide.
— Spring: —————————————————————
• Can you help me out with something I've always wondered about? If you're in the pool, and it starts raining, do you get more wet?
• It's allergy season out there. The pollen count is off the charts! I'm sneezing just thinking about it!
• I have the greatest job in the world. I can be completely wrong nearly all the time and never get fired. When I make a mistake, I can just shake my head and say, "What are ya gonna do? It's the weather!" How sweet is that?
• Don't look to me for all the answers! The knowledge you seek is just a small step out your front door.
• We've been hearing reports of lightning striking tall trees in the neighborhood, so be careful out there!
• Hello. You have reached the Weather Station. We're not in right now, but if you leave a message after the beep…
#each season has its own video but it's very similar barely inteligble pixels with a clip from the Seasons trailer so I combined them#sims 2 video#ts2 video#sims video#sims2 video#ts2#sims2#sims 2#the sims 2#sims TV
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wah
#posting An Opinion bc we're at a point in my day where things are their most inactive so people don't have to be subjected to my rantings#it's just me feelin sad about things with no real consequences lol#but good LORD i dislike the way many people in the fandom handle gregory or how they interpret him#and the way so much of it can be traced back to a single source!! the character assassination damage from that One Thing is crippling#i dont wanna write the One Thing's name i dont want it showing up in those tags bc those fans will rip me to shreds but anyway#i know fandom loves a gay evil twink but that is LITERALLY not gregory IN THE SLIGHTEST..... nor is he some pretentious asshole!!#the boy is a revolutionary and a martyr he wants to help the oppressed and voiceless so bad and die in the process#it's his whole THING so he doesn't know how to handle others who don't understand the importance of it which makes him come across as aloof#and he's got the vibe of a gifted kid expected to act mature beyond his years so he can't form meaningful social connections#but he is a good boy and people who think he is Evil are wrong and also probably only watched the movie knowing his characterization from#That One Thing :/ or they don't understand characters are not always clear cut tropes and so they pigeonhole him into one anyway#ok rant OVER ty to whoever read my tags. i have endless Hot Takes on this subject and similar tbh but i dont wanna be a place of negativity
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Oh God they’ve got banana fish on Prime video
#I COULD watch it#or I could keep my will to live#the manga fucked me up for like 2 years I’m not even kidding#I read it in 2021 and I’ve only just not stopped thinking about it#that is the one show I wouldn’t even reccomend my worst enemy to watch#I mean it’s good but WOW is it fucked up#ash lynx my beloved boy#he’s never done anything wrong ever#those people he killed deserved it don’t even argue with me#WHEN I CATCH THE MANGAKA- your days are limited#it’s on SIGHT with her#evil woman#saying ash deserved to die??#and she wanted to make blanca a woman so they could be together??#the grown ass adult who was the only safe person in his tragic life??#that says something real nasty about her considering the subject matter#ALSO SHORTER DID NOT DESERVE THAT#so mappa left the ending ambiguous so#im choosing to believe that max found ash and saved him#and ash moved to Japan and married eiji#and max and Jess bring their son to visit on Christmas#and they all lived happily ever after#THIS SHOW IS WHY I WILL ALWAYS ADVOCATE FOR READING TWS BEFORE CONSUMING MEDIA#IT FUCKED ME UP REAL BAD!!#the only thing I’ve actually screamed out loud reading#banana fish#me: haha a fun little anime about gangs in New York! what could go wrong!#*SEVERE PSYCHOLOGICAL DAMAGE*#I actually couldn’t finish the manga. usually I’ll finish something no matter what but I genuinely couldn’t do it.
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DPXDC: I wanna be like most girls ghosts.
or Danny: What should I do to make my mom happy?
or ~Danny deserves a little teenage rebellion as a treat~
Maddie: I just want this damned Phantom to stop pretending to be a hero! All ghosts are pure evil, who is he trying to deceive?
Danny: Oh, really?
And Danny took it personally.
It’s not Danny’s fault that he’s a good kid and wants to make his parents happy. But why would he have to be a monster to make them happy? Why must they hate him to be happy?
Danny’s obsession was going crazy.
Well, when your own parents call you a monster in the face, it hurts. Why do they always believe that only their opinion is the absolute truth? They have no idea how much worse things would be if at least some of the ghosts really behaved the way Maddie and Jack think they’re supposed to.
If he really is evil by nature, is there any point in fighting his own fate? They want to see him as a villain, he will become one. He will. He just needs a little help and practice. And not bring it to the level when Clockwork has to clean up his mess. Poor guy is without a vacation for how long? Couple of millennia?
Johnny 13: Sup.
Danny: F*ck off, Johnny, I’m not in the mood. Busy thinking about world domination. Get out of here or I’ll call Kitty.
Johnny 13: What’s wrong? You’re usually so grouchy only towards the end of the week.
Danny: Nothing. Just parents. Again. They are wonderful but I can’t help but feel sometimes that they, em…
Johnny 13: Suck?
Danny: Right…Damn. I’m a terrible son. Maybe something is wrong with me.
Johnny 13: What? No, no, dude. You’re just growing up. And you’re a little late, usually teenagers go through that stage before they graduate. Well, you’ve probably been busy with other issues, so just missed it.
Danny: I wonder whose fault it is. Aren’t there ghosts who enjoyed to ruin my life in the middle of school day?
Johnny 13: Oh, bother. Anyway, you’re entering a beautiful time of emancipation, where you’re going to shape your own view of life and, along the way, to get drunk on cheap alcohol at parties, maybe to go to jail and to become the greatest disappointment to your family..And then you will be ashamed to remember it for about the next ten years.
Danny: Well, it looks like I’ve already done two out of three additional things. Great success.
Johnny 13: When did you get drunk?
Danny: I didn’t.
Johnny 13: Oh. Want to fix that?
Danny: What? No. What an idiot wants to add a headache to his problems?
Johnny 13: Well, your loss, then I’ll go terrorize the bars of Gotham alone and no one can stop me. Let’s see what your boyfriend will say about it.
~~~~~
Danny: Bartender, another shot of Dead Man’s Fingers, please.
Red Hood: Babe, haven’t you had enough?
Danny: Have you ever felt that no matter how hard you try, no matter how many sacrifices you make, in their eyes you’ll always be nothing more than a monster? Nothing more than a mistake? Oh, Death doesn’t give people like me a break.
Red Hood: …I’ll have what he’s having. *gives the bartender a sign to switch the rum shots to a batburger milkshake for them, and starts talking to Danny so that he doesn’t understand Hood's scams*
~~~~~
Johnny 13: Other people’s kids are growing up so fast. It seems like yesterday he didn’t know how to shoot ectoblast, and now..
Kitty: Stop trying to make me feel bad, we’re leaving.
Johnny 13: But the boy needs our support, honey boo!
~~~~~
Danny: I'm fine. Really, I am. This isn’t the first time mom’s called me a monster. She often called me that when she was upset with my behavior in my childhood. Huh, it's even funny.
Jason: There’s nothing funny about that.
Danny: No, you don’t understand. Looking back, I was really a very active child and didn’t know when to stop. Not surprisingly that I often annoyed my parents. They’re very busy people, and Jazz couldn’t always keep an eye on me. And I was often afraid to go to sleep alone because there were shadows in the darkness of my room. Well, I used to think they were. But I pretended everything was okay to not distract parents from work.
Jason: Hey, it’s not your fault. You were a child. Obviously, kiddo requires a lot of attention, they must have understood that. You are the second child in the family, right?
Danny: Well, Jazz was different. I don’t know. Anyway, I thought if the monsters behind the curtain and under the bed were just like me, well, according to my mom, you know, then they wouldn’t want to hurt me. And since they look after me, they are friends. So I kinda greeted all the suspicious noises and howls. Huh, I was a strange kid.
Jason: If you smile at someone in the dark alley right now that someone is more likely to wet themselves or faint.
Danny: Rude! I’m not that scary. Admit that I’m adorable. Do it right now.
Jason: Stunning, darling. But still carry a gun and a knife, please. My childhood taught me that what's hiding in the dark is worth beating up.
Danny: Come on, what should I be afraid of? Death? Anyway, I want to try this shit. Like, the inevitable one. Being a bad boy, you know?
Hood *raises eyebrows*.
Danny: Oh damn it man, I'm talking about ghostliness. I want to try to be like most of dead ones. I want to unleash my side of the trickster and the villain. But only a little bit. I have to be supervised so that things don't go too far. Would you help me, honey?
~~~~~2 hours later~~~~
~~~~~
Goons used to expect a lot of weirdness from working with the boss.
Sometimes Bruce Wayne would go into their base and yell at the Red Hood like he's one of his kids. Of course Wayne's well-known as 'Gotta adopt them all' but the guy must really suffer from insomnia to count the Red Hood into his brood of chicks several times. Sometimes the boss would fight Robin or Nightwing over differences in morals…or for biscuits. It varied from moment to moment. Sometimes the boss caught the local street children, fed them and taught them to steal correctly. And most of the foundlings stayed with them under their protection.
To make a long story short, Red Hood is not the typical crime lord that some of them had to deal with before. Which is a blessing. Thanks Lord for the health insurance. But still the crime lord. Which means he's still scary, and sometimes deadly.
Anyway, when the boss brought in a guy who looked more civilian than any civilian in the whole Gotham and said he was going to be their intern, they thought it was a joke at first. Despite the fact that Hood was not in the habit of joking while working.
The teenager was too well-mannered and sweet to come from Crime Alley.
Phil thought the guy was gonna run when he saw the first murder, Jessica didn’t think the domestic boy wouldn’t chicken out at the sight of a fight.
But arguing with a boss’s orders in their profession is like asking for a bullet in the head, so these conversations were taking place outside of their boss's sight. God, how can they teach him anything? What do you take from a boy who’s only good to do the coffee run? Fenton will fall if they’ll give him something heavier than 10 pounds. And then boss will yell at them because he treats the new guy like a princess on a pea.
Well, at least that’s what they thought until the boss decided to give the new guy his own assignments:
~~~~~
Red Hood: So, what have you learned during your internship, my young Padawan?
Danny: Well, it looks like I’m gonna suck at being a criminal mastermind. I think I may have to find myself some other profession.
Red Hood: Come on, you just need a little more practice.
Danny: Thank you but I don’t think that’s fit my obsession that good. Don't misunderstand me, I wanna be like most ghosts. But I was wrong to go to hit that goal only base on human stereotypes about my nature.
Red Hood: What a pity. The newbies just learned not to flinch when you walk in. But, to be honest, I'm not gonna miss the adrenaline-boosting roller coaster of you at work.
Danny: Oh, and I guess to hold on to the concept of humanity was really stupid too. I clearly no longer fit in and I’m finally ready to accept that. So, hopefully, if you get into trouble, you can rely on my ghostliness and call for help. I am the spirit of many talents and of my word. I can haunt your enemies or walk through the walls of Arkham Asylum. Whatever you need, I’ll be here.
Red Hood: I’ll bear that in mind.
#dpxdc prompt#dpxdc au#dpxdc memes#dpxdc crossover#dc x dp#dp x dc#dpxdc#dcxdp#dead on main#dead on main ship#alcohol
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Robin Dick Grayson Characterization
I'm not sure how or where this started but there's been a rampant misunderstanding of Dick Grayson as Robin.
For some reason there have been posts upon posts that dick was some kind of angry robin and I don't know where this is coming from because in every single comic Dick is said to be the happy one. It seems to be a Covid craze because such defamation was not even in existance before 2020. Every one of the comics - Justice League, Batman, Detective Comics, Nightwing Comics, Jason's comics, Tim's comics, all of them! Talk about Dick being the happiest of the robins.
Some people say that he wanted to avenge his parents death by killing Tony Zucco. However Dick could never do that. John and Mary raised their son better than that.
Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight Issue #100
Where do you see a raging blood-soaked boy fanon makes him out to be?
The biggest supporter of happy Dick comes from Alfred so if you're going around claiming Dick was angry, you're literally spitting on his grave because Alfred ADORED Dick. He thought of Dick as the sole reason for Bruce's happiness which made him love Dick even more.
Alfred is Dick's biggest advocator. When Bruce is hesitant in his initial days of Robin - Alfred says
Detective Comics (2016) Issue #1000
"They will be easier than they ever were for you."
Detective Comics (2016) Issue #1000
"He will see excitement and adventure...and he will help you see it, too."
Detective Comics (2016) Issue #1000
"He's gotten a taste for it, Master Bruce. He has the natural skill and talent. Do you really think you could stop him at this point?"
"He could make you better. He could BE better."
"A hero forged in the LIGHT."
And Dick feels this too.
Detective Comics (2016) Issue #1000
"Then WE help them find the better path. Together."
Detective Comics (2016) Issue #1000
"Let's show them how to do it right."
Calling Dick an angry robin - that's an insult to Dick, Bruce, and Alfred. It's an insult to who they are as characters and it's an insult to the very creation of robin.
Dick wasn't made for vengeance. He was made for the light.
Dick is the embodiment of hope and a brighter future. He's what people look forward to on their darkest days, their shining light. He's the hero of all heroes that came after him. There is no one like him.
There are tons of comics on Dick's journey as Robin but here's a clear one as to his thoughts before he became Robin.
Robin & Batman Issue #3
Dick wasn't angry. He's was sad, lonely, and scared.
But.
This good boy doesn't deserve what you call him. This small loving child. Don't you dare push your evil agenda onto him.
"I don't need to be the next batman. I can be something else. Something better."
"And you know the best part?"
"Now I know I don't need to be alone. And I don't have to be the dark."
"I can be the light."
"I can be Robin."
Batman (1940) Issue #687
Dick was an excitable, brilliant, and over-excelling child. He was a ball of sunshine and happiness who loved laughing, playing games, and being crazy. He was a hypercompetent, crazy child who lived for the love of living and adventure.
It's the loss of the original dynamic duo that Alfred grieves over.
Batman (1940) Issue #687
Just look at this adorable baby!!!
Batman/Superman (2019) Issue #16
"Hey, Batman! You took down one of 'em and I took down three! I told ya I've been practicing!"
"Good work, Robin."
What the heck you cute adorable baby.
"Holy--! Is this a warden's office of a museum of horrors? Look at that old rocket ship!"
"Ew. There's a skeleton inside!"
LOOK AT THAT BABY FACE!! THE PURE ENTHUSIAM IN THE WAY HE TALKS - HE'S JUST A HAPPY BABY BOY!!
Batman/Superman (2019) Issue #17
IT'S A CRIME TO CALL HIM ANGRY.
Love this sweet, adorable child.
Another issue with the “Dick Grayson was an angry Robin” take. It’s not just a different perspective, it’s just blatantly wrong.
How wrong?
In order to fight the Batman who laughs, Bruce creates a machine that will emulate the joy of the happiest person he has ever known-who?
Robin Dick Grayson.
"Happiness is seeing the world though the eyes of children."
The Batman Who Laughs Issue #4
"Dick was the first robin. He had the happiest eyes. Circus eyes. Weightless - leaping, never falling."
Bruce drives himself insane from the joy he feels by looking at the world through Robin Dick's eyes.
Every comic. In every. single. comic. All of them talk about how Dick was a happy child and a happy robin. Dick's talk about it, Jason's talk about it, Tim's talk about it, the Justice League's talk about it, the Batman's especially - all the batman comics - talk about.
I would've actually added about 50 more panels but I ran out of image space because posts only have a 30 image limit.
I'm not kidding when I say it's IMPOSSIBLE. ABSOLUTELY, INCONCEIVABLY IMPOSSIBLE to say that Dick was angry Robin. Dick, Jason, Bruce, Tim, Damian, Alfred, Barbara, the JL, the titans, the Gotham villains - they all talk about Dick was a symbol of hope, joy, and light to Bruce and Gotham.
Not only that but if you read the comics, you would know that Dick was a happy robin because all the following robins had a cascade effect on their personality based solely on the fact that Dick was a happy robin. Jason's personality was the result of Dick being charcterized as happy, and Tim's personality was based off Dick's being happy.
But you know what the biggest piece of evidence against this blasphemy that Dick was angry robin is?
Secret Origins (2014) Issue #8
"...Becoming a much needed FOIL to the batman, whose own grim obsession with revenge could easily have caused him to cross the line..."
Explain something to me. It canonically states the Dick was a foil to Bruce Wayne who used to be revenge obsessed and grim. A foil in literature means a character who contrasts with another character to highlight the differences between them.
So if Bruce was dark, gloomy, angry, and revenge filled and Dick was the foil, then how on earth is it possible Dick to also be dark, gloomy, angry, and revenge filled?
On top of this impossibility of Dick being angry and full of hatred, can we take a step back for a minute and think about Dick's position in all this? Dick is the very first child hero, the one countless heroes after him look up to because he, Robin, was the embodiment of light and goodness. He single-handedly dragged Bruce out of his pit of self-destruction merely by existing because of his charming and playful demeanor. How, then, is it possible for every single character in the entirety of DCU along with every single writer who has ever written a comic - to be wrong?
Let's be clear. Bruce's personality, is written to be the opposite of Dick's personality. And Dick's personality is the opposite of Bruce's. Furthermore, Jason and Tim's personality were written to be a response to Dick's. There's also Alfred waving a massive banner about how Dick is a literal godsend front and center. So. If you still believe, that Dick was not a happy robin, then you have effectively mischaracterized every single person in the entire batfamily aside from Kate.
Congratulations. It's truly an accomplishment to be so wrong.
So no, Dick was not in fact, ever, the angry robin.
Dick was a happy robin and that is the FOUNDATION of understanding the batfamily.
#dick grayson#robin dick grayson#bruce wayne#batman#jason todd#robin jason todd#tim drake#robin tim drake#damian wayne#robin#alfred pennyworth#justice league#batfamily#clark kent#superman#lois lane#nightwing#red robin#red hood#helena bertinelli#huntress#matron#thank you#batfam
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"Anya, are you... feeling okay?"
Anya stared at Becky with with big, blank, buggy eyes. "I don't understand," she said in a monotone.
Becky squinted at Anya. Anya was usually weird, but Becky knew her well enough to discern Anya's different types of weirdness. "Are you trying to be like Damian's creepy older brother?"
Ewen and Emile heard and quickly turned around to defend their best friend's brother. "Oy, don't insult Demetrius!" "He's not creepy, he's a genius! His mind operates at levels we cannot understand!"
"You guys are talking about my brother?" Damian's voice came. "What's all this fuss?"
Becky sighed, then deadpanned, "I think Anya's trying to be like your brother. For some reason."
Damian jumped and instantly scowled. Anya continued to silently stare at Damian with her buggy eyes. Damian backed away, weirded out (and oddly jealous) by Anya imitating his own brother. "Ugh, what's wrong with you, Forger?" he spluttered out, cheeks turning pink.
Upon seeing Damian's distaste, Anya blinked, dropped the act, and looked normal again. "Super Sy-on boy is a genius so I'm going to be like him until I become a genius. I wanna get stella stars like Super Sy-on boy."
"But Bossman also has stella stars," Ewen said innocently.
"But Super Sy-on boy has more stella stars," Anya interjected just as innocently. Damian's face instantly darkened.
Becky noticed and nudged Anya. "You didn't have to rub it in his face!" she hissed to Anya.
"Rub what in Sy-on boy's face?" Anya might not understand the saying, but now she knew she shouldn't had compared Damian with Demetrius even if it was unintentional. Anya gulped and nervously glanced at Damian, who was looking solemn and suddenly older than he was.
"Of course my brother is always better at everything. Even an idiot like her can see it. I don't like how she's imitating Demetrius (hah, a commoner like her would never come close to us Desmonds) but I see her point. Maybe I should be more like Demetrius too..."
Anya blinked. Becky's earlier words of "rub it in his face" came back to her. Face, face... Sy-on boy's face? In her mind, she superimposed Demetrius' buggy eyes and slicked back hair on top of Damian's. Hmph, a bit off-putting, but this was actually fine because Damian still looked stupid and snot-faced as he always did.
But then Anya imagined Demetrius' complete lack of expression on Damian— no more taunts, no more temper tantrums, no more of his silly red faces, but also no more smiles, no more tears, no more of that unadulterated fear she saw during the bus hyjacking, no more of that determined face of his when he shielded her from the dodgeball, no more of Damian being his annoying, crybaby, sometimes heroic self. A Damian with barely any thoughts. A Damian who didn't understand people and didn't bother with anything at all. No more Sy-on boy being Sy-on boy.
... And Anya didn't think she liked that.
"You don't have to be like Super Sy-on boy," Anya blurted out. She felt bad for making Damian feel down earlier, because she was supposed to be friends with him, and friends didn't make each other feel bad.
Damian looked at her, bewildered and somewhat taken aback. "Huh??"
What Anya thought was "your mom is weird and your brother is weird and your dad is an evil super boss. You're a jerk sometimes but you're not weird like they are, and I feel bad for you", but obviously she couldn't say that, so she simply said, "Sy-on boy is Sy-on boy. You're not Super Sy-on boy and you don't have to be like him (because I need to read your mind for the mission)."
Damian blinked, his heart warmed by Anya's unexpected sincerity. Anya wanted him to be himself? And not like his brother? She... didn't expect that from him?
Becky, intuitive as always, chimed in. "Damian, you're a bit of a brat, but don't turn into a creep like your brother."
Damian scowled. "My brother's not a creep!!"
"I'm just making a honest statement! It's for your own good!"
Anya stepped aside to let Becky and Damian bicker. Her eyes flitted over to Damian— Damian without those buggy eyes, Damian with long eyelashes, Damian with anger and scowls, Damian with thoughts and feelings and fears and likes and affection.
Then she thought of Damian's mother and brother with the odd, mysterious, and almost chilling darkness in their heads. In some way, Demetrius' apathy was easier to stomach than Melinda's tornado of chaotic and contradictory thoughts, but both of them threw her off. Damian, despite being Damian, despite being the son of the evil boss, was still... relatively normal. He smiled. He loved his dog. He was protective of his friends. He wanted stella stars. He threw temper tantrums. He wanted his family to love him. (He was scared of being abandoned.) Despite everything, Damian was still like Anya.
... Yeah. Anya hoped Sy-on boy would stay Sy-on boy for as long as he could.
#spy x family#damianya#damian desmond#anya forger#spy x family spoilers#fic snippets#<3#quick little fic
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GREAT TEACHER, GOJO
For my final commentary on chapter 236, I thought I'd talk about this panel the starter of a million flame wars on twitter dot com. The big controversy is Nanami stating that Gojo fought only for himself without mentioning his students which a lot of people thought was a last minute reversal on Gojo's character, or character regression.
I'm not going to call anyone stupid, or say if you have good teacher Gojo headcanons you're wrong. However, I'd like to point out that Gojo's always been more complicated than most shonen mentors. He's not Kakashi, and he's not Aizawa, and I'd argue the fact that he's not the standard "I'd die to protect my students" mentor we see in shonen manga is what makes him interesting.
The Springtime of Youth
Jujutsu Kaisen is a shonen jump manga that is very aware of the other manga that are running in the same magazine and uses that awareness to play with audience expectations.
To put it simply if you don't want to use words like Deconstruction - if you're reading Jujutsu Kaisen then things are probably not going to go the way you expect them. It's not Naruto, it's not My Hero Academia, it's a little bit like Bleach except characters actually die.
If you expect things to go one way in Jujutsu Kaisen, then you're going to be thrown a curveball. To name some examples briefly before diving into Gojo.
Yuji Itadori is a normal boy protagonist suddenly dragged into the world of the supernatural.
However, everything goes wrong from there. Jujutsu Sorcerers are not heroes. Yuji is told that much from the beginning by Megumi within the first thirteen chapters. The world of Jujutsu Sorcery is not a good place to be, Yuji is initially excited to be a sorcerer and to be a part of this world and then learns that lesson fast. I mean, imagine if Deku was accepted to UA, and then he immediately learned that students at the school die on the regular and all the adults are either terrible selfish people, or if they're not they die too like Nanami because being selfless means sticking your neck out for someone else.
Yuji's not really special in the narrative. He's just a kid who swallowed a finger. He doesn't have a secret technique. We're hundreds of chapters in and he's still just punching people. If he's cornered in a fight he doesn't unlock a secret technique either, he just loses.
Yuji has a superpowered evil side, like the nine tailed fox, or Hollow Ichigo except it's not really his super powered evil side. It's an evil parasite attached to his soul with a will of its ownt hat will manipualte him. Hollow Ichigo and the Kyuubi can escape temporarily and there's usually no consequence. Sukuna escapes twice, the first time he nearly kills Megumi, the second time he kills thousands.
Yuji is kind of like a main character who is not a main character.
If you still believe he's the main character, then you can agree he's punished for thinking he's the main character and therefore things are going to be easy, because nothing is ever easy in Jujutsu Kaisen.
Megumi is a riff on the chosen one. He's supposed to be the Gojo Satoru of his generation, born with the strongest technique that ca even surpass the limitless and he's nowhere near the level he's supposed to be. This is because Megumi has been continually failed by every adult figure all his life, starting with his father who sold him, then Gojo the man who SAVED* him techically but with a big asterisk that he needed to become his student and do jobs for Jujutsu High School otherwise Gojo would just let the Zen'in take him or let them starve I guess. Megumi has no adult figures to rely on, and has been given very little freedom about who or what he wants to be in his life, and therefore he's a very passive, repressed individual who's riddled with insecurities. Megumi doesn't want to be the strongest like Gojo, or like many hero / rival characters in shonen manga. Megumi doesn't even know what he wants to be, because he's never been given any choice in life.
If you don't think Megumi's a deconstruction of any sort of character type, look at those posts on twitter that are like "Look at the black haired depressed shonen boys" and then look at Megumi, he's never actually like any of these boys because he's much deeper and probably closer to being the main character than Yuji is.
Then we get to Gojo who is very unlike all the other mentors in shonen manga.
If Yuji and Megumi are both riffs on a main character, a hero in a world so cynical he's not allowed to play hero and actively punished for it, and a chosen one who doesn't want to be the chosen one then you have Gojo as the mentor who's nothing like the classic mentor.
The problem with mentor characters in fiction is that number one they die a lot (spoiler warning Obi Wan Kenobi dies in Star Wars just so you know) and number two they're not usually the most complex character in the cast.
What is the mentor there for?
To Mentor (duh.)
What this means is they are usually a fully formed adult who can teach a lesson to the main character, who in shonen manga is typically a teenager.
I say they're usually less interesting because stories are about characters changing, or characters learning lessons. A teacher presumably already has learned his lesson. They are usually at the end of their journey and not the beginning, that's why they can offer wisdom to the main characters. They're not usually their own separate characters because of this - a narrative doesn't have time to waste on a character that's not going to change.
Jung had a term for this character, it's called the Wise Old Man.
In Jungian analytical psychology, senex is the specific term used in association with this archetype. Examples of the senex archetype in a positive form include the wise old man or wizard.
In the individuation process, the archetype of the Wise old man was late to emerge, and seen as an indication of the Self. 'If an individual has wrestled seriously enough and long enough with the anima (or animus) problem...the unconscious again changes its dominant character and appears in a new symbolic form...as a masculine initiator and guardian, a wise old man, a spirit of nature, and so forth'.
The role of the wise man archetype is to help other people along with their ego development, because usually they are already fully developed individuals.
Obi Wan is the most typical of typical mentors, and he dies in Star Wars because after he finishes teaching Luke he has nothing to do. This is Luke's Hero's Journey. Obi Wan's already happened offscreen, he's at the end of his journey there's no room for change or growth in him because his story purpose is to exist to advise Luke and to do that he needs to be a fully grown adult figure.
The subversion to this when the mentor has their own agenda (Gandalf), or the mentor is as flawed as the main characters themselves and so therefore he has something to learn.
Gojo is kind of a combination of both, like Gandalf he is the mysterious but seemingly all powerful wizard (er... or rather sorcerer) with his own agenda, and he's also practically the fourth member of the main cast who are otherwise all teenagers. In fact, Gojo spells out his agenda in the same panels that everyone uses to constantly assert that Gojo is a good teacher who only wants to protect his students.
He wants to make the Jujutsu World a better place (good) which is why he is raising students so he can turn them into his political allies to make a regime change (hidden agenda).
It's a means justifies the end type scenario. In Gojo's mind the means (raising kids as tools in support of his political agenda) justifies the ends (a better jujutsu world for those children). His motivation is still the same. This is what I think people most often get confused about with Gojo's character. I think he is one hundred percent genuine about wanting a better world.
"I have a dream, I want to reset this crappy Jujutsu World" is his motivation, but not his means. He uses his students as a means to achieve that end. Even if it's purportedly for their sake, he's still using them. I don't even think this is subtext it's text, both Megumi and Yuji call themselves cogs.
"But senpai, what's your function...?"
You could say in this case that the ends don't justify the means. Is Gojo really protecting these kid's youth, if Yuji and Megumi are going around calling themselves cog and acting like they don't matter in the grand scheme of things? In fact the narrative is inviting you to question if Gojo's ends justify his means.
Gojo's ideals can be one hundred percent real, but he can also pick faulty ways of choosing those ideals that fail to live up to them. In fact most people fall short of ideals, that's why they're called ideals. Gojo is taking these kids in because they have strong potential as sorcerers and he wants to recruit them, that's his hidden agenda. It's confirmed in databooks in Yuji and Yuta's case, and even if you don't trust databooks as canon then look at how he treats Megumi.
Megumi is explicitly Gojo's student, not his son. He only intervened in Megumi's situation on the caveat that Megumi work for him. Presumably, if Megumi didn't want to be a sorcerer and just wanted to be a normal kid, Gojo would have either let the Zen'in have him or do nothing. The option of just calling child services and getting someone to foster Megumi until he was older didn't even seem to cross Gojo's mind. There's the help he gives (Food money, rent, protection from the Zen'in) and then the hidden agenda (Don't work for the Zen'in who are my political rivals, you're my student now).
Yet at the same time Gojo is shown going to find Megumi after Geto's defection, probably because of the words he said to Yaga "You can only save those who want to be saved," when he realized it was too late for Geto. Was he intervening earlier for Megumi because he learned from being too late with Geto? Did he think Megumi needed guidance, or did he think Megumi needed protection in his youth so the Jujutsu World wouldn't corrupt him like it did Geto, or did he think he just needed to make it so Megumi was strong so he wouldn't fall behind him because Geto fell so far behind him once Gojo became the strongest. There's ambiguity there, because the hidden agenda is you know... Hidden. That's what I mean with Gojo though, you can look at him from multiple angles, he's not just (I love my students I'd die for them) because that character would only have one purpose in the narrative and that'd be being the perfect mentor who teaches them all the right lessons.
Gojo's not like other mentors, and in fact he's a commentary on the mentors that everyone is always comparing him to and expecting him to be like.
Literally everyone who reads Naruto has the exact same response, "I hate how the manga never talks about how it's a bad thing to send these child soldiers into war, and nobody breaks the cycle."
There are a lot of people unhappy about the same thing in My Hero Academia, "Why does nobody talk about how wrong it is that the adults make these high school students fight on the battlefield."
Well there you go. That's Gojo. His dream is to make it so Jujutsu Society is a place where teenagers can survive until adulthood. His method of doing so is to... raise those teenagers to be stronger than the previous generation, but you know still letting them be child soldiers on the battlefield just stronger ones. He does this because if he's working within the system the his two choices are raise a group of people who can age out and replace the old regime, or just kill everyone at the top.
Everyone complains about how no one talks about the child soldiers in Naruto or My Hero Academia, but here you go, we have a manga that is centered around how messed up it is to send high school students to continually fight these curses before they even turn eighteen. Gojo's sending these kids out there still even if he wants to change things, and it's supposed to be a little messed up and also a contradiction to what his ideals are supposed to be.
Because in My Hero Academia you have characters like Aizawa and Kakashi who are "I will die for my students" but then they just send those teens out to fight in a war, and seem totally fine with that. It's a hole in the writing, but this time it's done on purpose, to ask why these adults are always comfortable sending teenagers out to fight for them?
Jujutsu Kaisen provides two answers, number one the system is inherently corrupt and it sees the youth as cogs because the system is rooted in traditions that keep the elderly in power. Number two, in Gojo's case at least this is exactly what it was like for him growing up as a child. Gojo is just repeating with his students what was done to him, subconsciously.
The reason Nanami said this, and then repeated it in this most recent chapter is Gojo was born to be a Jujutsu Sorcerer. Being a Jujutsu Sorcerer is a highly deadly occupation for everyone else, except for Gojo. Not only that but because he's so good at it, and he's so lauded for it he's built his entire identity around it. Nanami's not just saying that Gojo is selfish, he's also saying that Gojo thinks being a sorcerer is a good thing. It is the end all, be all of Gojo's existence.
He doesn't want to make it so sorcerers don't have to fight, or make it so all cursed energy is gone for the world like Yuki Tsukumo, his dream is actually kind of limited in scope he doesn't want the school days of his students to be destroyed by the outside world the way it was for him and Geto.
Gojo looks at the symptoms and not the cause. Geto defected, Haibara died, Yaga wasn't really able to do much for his students in both scenarios. Gojo deduced it was because the elders and regressive policies were holding people back in favor of keeping the regime in charge (correct) and that because of that the sorcerers in Gojo's high school years just weren't strong enough to keep up (this is just what Gojo thinks).
His words to Megumi are encouraging him to be strong so he won't get left behind, which as I speculated above might imply Gojo thinks that part of what went wrong with Geto was that he simply wasn't strong enough to keep up with Gojo or stay on his level. If not then he still encourages Megumi to get strong before everything else, he's not taking care of these kids emotional needs, he's pushing them to get stronger because in Gojo's mind that's the be all end all solution to every problem.
"Nanami's line was not saying that Gojo doesn't care about children, it's saying that "You live for Jujutsu." It is the lens through which Gojo sees everything, and so therefore he doesn't think of breaking kids out of the Jujutsu World, just making it a place that's slightly more safe for them. Gojo's ego is so strong that he only ever sees things from his point of view, being a sorcerer was fun for him, his high school days were the happiest time in his life before they got ruined by outside forces.
He's trying to protect those days for his children, but he's not arguing against the existence of an institution like Jujutsu High in the first place. He's not saying the teenagers should never be sent out on missions, he's saying we need to make the teens stronger. If they're stronger than they won't die (that's probably true but they'll be even safer if they don't have to go on missions in the first place).
Now we have a reason! Why do Aizawa and Kakashi send out child soldiers into the battlefield if their goal is to protect their students? Because it's a shonen manga and the main characters are all teenagers.
Why does Gojo send out teenagers to fight for him if he wants to protect them, well I just explained it.
In fact, the entire purpose of Nanami in the story is to give us a character who explicitly treats children like they are children and not miniature adults. Who acknowledges that this is emotionally hard for children to deal with and they shouldn't have to do that.
Nanami's lines of "I'm an adult you're a child" and "Being a child is not a bad thing." would not have the weight they carry if they weren't so different from the way that every other adult in the story (including Gojo) treats children.
Nanami and Gojo have the same goal of making being a Jujutsu Sorcerer easier for children, but Nanami practices what he preaches. He tells Yuji to stand back and that he doesn't need to fight if he sees an enemy that's too strong, to let the adult on scene handle things first.
When he sees that Yuji is disturbed by the idea of killing former humans that Mahito had changed with his technique, he consoles him. He knows that Yuji is a sensitive kid and tries to spare him as much of that grief as possible. When he leaves Yuji behind he tells him explicitly that he's the adult in this situation, he shouldn't be forcing a child to help carry that burden if it's not necessary.
He also explicitly tells Yuji that being strong or jumping into life threatening situations =/= as growing up. Nanami is a character aware that the problem isn't that the children are not strong enough, but that too much responsibility is being thrown on these children. That there is a difference between what children and adults are emotionally capable of. Gojo doesn't see that difference because he reached enlightenment as seventeen. He even explicitly chose Nanami because Gojo knew he wasn't good at that stuff.
Nanami was not saying that Gojo doesn't care about children, Nanami was saying Gojo lives to be a sorcerer, Gojo who loves sorcery doesn't understand why being a sorcerer is too much of an emotional burden on a child. He just doesn't. He literally says his students are flowers.
Now, here's the kicker. Nanami dies.
Nanami wanted Yuji to not take on too much responsibility, and he died leaving Yuji with more responsibility than he could ever carry. Nanami failed in his goal, despite the fact he is the most responsible and well-meaning adult in the story who treats children like they're children.
The reason he dies is because this is what happens to people like Nanami in Jujutsu Society. The whole of society is built to condition people into being cogs and Nanami who's just one person can't overcome it on his own. I can write a whole meta on how Nanami's way of dealing with children is way better than Gojo's and yet they do essentially the same thing, throw way too much responsibility onto Yuji even though he's just a kid. They're both too ingrained in the system to make any sweeping changes, and that's why the child soldiers keep on child soldiering.
Gojo as a Character
The second reason as eluded above that Gojo is not meant to be read as a perfect teacher, or even a good one really is because he's the fourth main character of the cast. If you are a main character, then you need a flaw, and an arc where you either improve upon that flaw or you succumb to it in tragic fashion.
Gojo's not the perfect adult mentor, because he's kind of in the same place as the kids themselves. I think there's a reason we never learn anything about Gojo's backstory, we know nothing about his parents, the Gojo clan, because those details aren't as relevant. The most important thing about Gojo is the three years he spent at high school, because that was the only time he felt like a person, and also because he is trapped there mentally.
There's a reason that Gojo's dying dream is him imagining everyone reset to seventeen years old, because that was where the clock stopped for him in his youth, and that was where all of his regrets as an adult come from. His motivation to help teenagers today only comes from his own youth being ruined, and the adults in his life failing to protect him.
It's very likely that Gojo who lives for Jujutsu probably would never have realized the problems in his current society, if his youth wasn't ruined by those same adults he's now fighting against.
The reason most mentor figures in fiction are not main characters is because as adults they don't really need to grow up anymore. The obvious solution is that you just need your mentor character to just fail to be an adult in some glaring way.
To show how Gojo falls short as an adult, especially in regards to these children and how he treats them is to drag him down from all powerful, all knowing wizard, and make him struggle with the rest of the main cast. Gojo is not a positive adult figure in these kids lives despite having the best of intentions, because he's not really an adult.
I guess if you were already the best and strongest person in the world at seventeen, smarter and more capable than all the adults around you, you wouldn't really feel the need to grow up. Coupled with the fact that you are alienated from other people and do not relate to them on a personal level that's not going to help with your identity formation.
I mean I constantly compare Gojo to Superman, but to be fair to Gojo instead of bullying him like I usually do Clark Kent was raised by parents who raised a boy not a superman, and who constantly tell him that he's just a normal person, his powers don't make him great, it's his heart.
Nanami says that Gojo only fights for himself that ""You don't wield Jujutsu to protect something, you use it solely to for your own sake. What a weirdo" it's likely Gojo only fights for himself because he's never ben told that's he's more than just the six-eyes and more than just the limitless.
The best way to make a mentor a part of the cast, is to make them through some way or another have failed to grow up properly in their youth and therefore they need to do it while the story is taking place. We know how Gojo failed, his springtime of youth ended early, it ended the day he couldn't stop Geto from leaving, the day he can be the strongest sorcerer ever and still fail because sorcerer society is too corrupt for one person to handle alone. We also know he didn't really grow up past this point, because he still thinks the solution is to make people be stronger. Why does he not do anything about Geto for 11 years? In story terms he's basically suspended in time unable to grow past Geto. Kenjaku literally uses the trauma from his youth and the memories that seeing Geto alive would provoke in Gojo again, to trap him because he knew it would make him freeze up. Gojo is frozen in the past, he failed to grow up in story terms and must now grow up while the main story itself is taking place along with the children he's trying to raise.
This is how you make a mentor interesting. You have to make them flawed in some way that makes it worth having them onscreen, because a perfect mentor only serves one purpose to teach a main character and then he's gone.
Dazai Osamu from Bungo Stray Dogs is a character that's almost as massively popular as Gojo. Similiarly, he is a teenage genius who found trouble relating to other people who is now as an adult attempting to mentor two children.
However, Dazai's faults as a mentor are made much more explicit.
Dazai suddenly punched Akutagawa in the face, preventing him from finishing his sentence. Akutagawa flew back onto the ground, his head bouncing off the stone flooring with a thud.
"Perhaps I made it look like I wanted to hear excuses. Sorry for the misudnerstanding," Dazai said while rubbing his knuckles.
"Urg..."
Akutagawa moaned. He'd hit his head so hard that he couldn't even stagger to his feet.
"Give me your gun," Dazai ordered one of his men. The subordinate was hesitant but nonetheless handed over his weapon. Next, Dazai removed the magaine from the automatic pistol, took out all but three bullets, then put the magazine back in. He immediately pointed the gun at Akutagawa, who was still on the ground.
"I have this friend who's supporting several orphans all on his own, you see," he continued his weapon still drawn and aimed at the boy. "AKutagawa I'm sure Odasaku would've been patient enough to give you the guidance you needed had he been the one who'd found you on the brink of starvation right in the slums. That would have been the 'right' thing to do. But 'righteousness' doesn't take very kindly to me. And there's only one thing people like me do to useless subordinates."
Dazai mercilessly pulled the trigger the moment he finished his sentence.
(Don't worry, Akutagawa lived). Dazai is a character who had a troublesome youth he never grew up from. He was too smart for the world as a kid, and because of that joined up with the mafia because he wanted to feel like he was more connected to life and other people by getting closer to death (weird dazai logic I know) and was the best of the best at it, but it only drove him further away from people. He makes one friend, and loses that friend similiar to Gojo. Just like Gojo too, that friend is the one who gives him his purpose as an adult that drives him to mentor young people.
"Odasaku.. What should I do?"
"Be on the side that saves people," Odasaku replied, "If both sides are the same, then choose to become a good person. Save the weak, protect the orphaned. You might not see a great difference between right and wrong, but... saving others is something just a bit more wonderful."
Is this not what Nanami said just in different words. Odasaku tells Dazai point blank, I know you're selfish, I know that you don't really have any concept of good or evil but you can choose to save others anyway.
Isn't this what Gojo does?
He is selfish. He doesn't really consider the morality or his actions or get hung up on the idea of protecting the weak like Nanami or Geto do, but he still does go out of his way to live for the ideal of saving children.
Both Gojo and Dazai are characters who are struggling with this ideal of saving the children, because while their ideals are good they themselves as people are morally gray. Adding onto that, they're also children and a good deal of their backstory is devoted to showing why they never really grew out of the mindset that they held as children.
The story doesn't call them horrible monsters for it, it's just saying that they need to grow up or face the consequences of not growing up.
"I have one regret," I said. "I never got to say good-bye to my friend. He was always there for me as 'just a friend.' He was bored of this world and always waited for death to come for him."
"That man was in search of a place to die just like me?"
"No, not exactly," I answered. "I thought you were similiar to Dazai at first, rushing into battle and wishing for death without even considering the value of your own life. But he's different. He's sharp-witted with a mind like a steel trap. And he's just a child - a sobbing child abandoned in the darkness of a world far emptier of the world we're seeing."
He was too smart for his own good. THat was why he was always alone. The reason why ANgo and I were able to be by his side was that we understood the solitude that surrounded him, and we never stepped inside it no matter how close we stood. But in that moment, I kind of regretted not stepping in and invading a little.
Does that sound like the narrative is condemning Dazai for being who he is? No, it's Dazai's best friend offering empathy and understanding for how lonely it must be, and how if Dazai made real connections with people then he could have a chance of growing up like everyone else. That's what the narrative challenges Dazai to do while empathizing with why it's harder for him to and why he's still trapped in his youth, because to take care of children you need to be an adult yourself. Otherwise if you're a child, and I'm a child, then nobody's driving the plane.
Rupert Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer is another mentor who faces the same moral dilemna that Gojo does. In fact his entire character revolves around the fact he knows deep down he's sending a kid to her early grave.
Buffy is the Chosen One TM. One girl in all the world is chosen to fight the vampires. Much like sorcerer society, there is an entire bureaucracy dedicated to identifying the chosen slayer and then raising her up and guiding her as a weapon to be used against the threat of vampires and demons.
The watchers are all adults. The slayer is a teenage girl. The slayer slays. The watchers watch. Just like in Jujutsu Kaisen, there is a necessity for the Slayer to exist, because the alternative is just letting vampires eat people. Yet even if the slayer needs to exist, at the end of the day a bunch of adult men are sending a teenage girl to fight for them.
All Slayers die young. All of them without an exception. No matter how good of a mentor is, no matter how much he cares about her, Buffy is going to die one day, and Giles is going to watch. Because that's what the watcher does, they watch. Sending her on missions means Buffy's in danger, not sending her means innocent people are in danger.
It's a scenario that's pretty much like Gojo's, and the narrative of Buffy makes it explicit that Giles really can't be a father figure to bufy in this scenario. A father would have to choose to put their child above the world and keep them safe, not send them out straight into danger.
It is a choice that Giles makes over and over again. He is always her watcher and never her father. There's a season 3 episode where Giles literally drugs Buffy as a part of a test to prove she is "worthy" of being a slayer. A test that deliberately puts her in harms way that he complies with - because the system told him to. A choice to be her watcher and act according to what the council of watchers wanted and not what Buffy wanted. A choice that shatters the illusion that Buffy had of him, showing her that Giles is only there to teach her to be a Slayer, not to take her to the iceapades or buy ice cream with her.
In this scenario Gojo is very much like Giles as no matter how much he may personally like these kids, he is not their father, and there is only so much he can do for them when he's still feeding them into the same system. Giles loves Buffy, Giles wants to protect Buffy, Giles is a part of the system that exploits Buffy. Giles is an adult asking Buffy to risk her life to save the world.
Gojo goes out of his way to recruit Megumi, Yuji, and Yuta among others. Gojo still doesn't let them be anything other than sorcerers, and as sorcerers they're still guaranteed to one day die and probably die young. Gojo wants to revolutionize the system he is, but he still sends out his students to do missions as part of that system. He's not letting them escape it, he's just making them be stronger sorcerers.
Not only is Gojo not a father figure to Megumi, he is exploiting him more or less. The option of Megumi not being a sorcerer isn't on the table. No matter how well-intentioned he may be, or how good his ideals are he's still an adult telling a child to make a sacrifice for the world.
So, there are two character conflicts with two different mentors that both reflect Gojo. Gojo cannot grow up because he's still trapped in the tragedy of his youth. He himself is not an adult, for various reasons (lack of connection to other people, trauma in his youth) he's egocentric like a child but there are children in his life who need him to be.
Gojo also cannot be a proper adult, because he is part of a system that exploits children. We see what the system does to proper adults like Nanami, he shows us just how much well-intentioned adults struggle to help kids under sorcerer society so how about Gojo who thinks being a sorcerer is really fun. A proper adult would never send kids on those missions, they'd find some way to shield them but Gojo cannot do that. Because sorcerers are short staffed and innocent people will die if he doesn't. Because Gojo isn't the sorcer-king of Jujtusu Society and is working within it to affect change. There are reasons, but still Gojo is failing to live up to his desire to protect children because he's not doing what a responsible adult should do in this situation.
Gojo's failures are two-fold, and yet it's because of those failures that he was a main character who got as much special plot attention as he did. If Gojo was a perfect teacher he wouldn't be a character. After all, we relate to the struggles of other human beings we see onscreen in television and in movies so why would we care about a perfect character?
Gojo has a lot more to say about teachers in shonen manga, and also about childhood vs. adulthood as a bad teacher struggling to be a good one, then a teacher who's already perfect. Nanami said those lines because he wanted us to understand the audience that this is who Gojo is, he is a selfish and egotistical person who nonetheless was trying to do good things.
#jjk meta#gojo satoru#satoru gojo#nanami kento#kento nanami#jujutsu kaisen meta#jujtusu kaisen#jjk spoilers#jjk 236#jujutsu kaisen spoilers
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Goddess of the Luo River ~ Qin Shi Huang x Reader
She is lightsome as a startled Phoenix,
And he, as graceful as a roaming dragon;
Her lovely complexion outshines the autumn chrysanthemum,
Whilst his radiance surpasses the springtime pine.
She is as nebulous as the moon concealed in light clouds,
Gracefully gliding, as snow spun by a flowing wind.
He is gazing at her from afar,
She shines like the sun rising above the rosy mists of dawn;
Observing her close by,
She is as luminous as a lotus emerging from clear ripplets.
What lies behind the mask of the 'King Where It All Began' ...?
He... Was the most cursed prince in all of History.
It is held that in the year 260 BC, at the end of the battle of Chang Ping, Bai Qi, General of the Qin Army, had the captured soldiers of the Zhao army buried alive en masse. According to the records of the Grand Historian Shi Ji, the number of men killed was over four hundred and fifty thousand.
The following year, a member of the Qin royal family being kept as a hostage in Zhao, Zichu had an affair with a Zhao dancer. Their child, born in enemy territory, was the boy who would one day become Qin Shi Huang, the First Emperor of the Unified China. Ying Zheng.
However, in 257, Zichu returned to Qin alone, and his mother, Lady Zhao, abandoned him. At just two years old, he was cast away by his father, his mother... And his country. King Zhaoxiang of Qin invaded Zhao and laid siege to its capital, Handan.
Five years later, when the little prince was merely seven years of age, living on the outskirts of Handan, he would return to his small and secluded home, having to see the insults and hostile drawings on the walls made by the citizens, and endure the ostracising and death threats from the guards.
Ever after Qin's siege of Handan, Zhao continued to hold Ying Zheng hostage. They placed him under harsh supervision, keeping him alive but never allowing him to live, all while he bore the scorn of the Zhao people.
One day, however, he will experience the foreign feeling of joy for the first time in his life; As he went to buy some groceries, receiving the hatred of the people, a young lady around his age, wearing the simple clothes of a commoner, jumped in defense of him.
"This boy did nothing wrong! Why do you continue beating down on a child who had nothing to do with the massacre? You hate on him, though you should be hating on the evil general Bai Qi, and the King of Qi who committed such atrocities! The sins of the father shouldn't be passed down on an innocent child!" the prince's heart throbbed in shock and flatter, watching someone actually protecting him, let alone say such words about him!
"Shut your mouth, wench, what do you know about war and politics?!" one of the men surrounding them spat at her, grabbing her by the neck of the dress. "This child is the reason your father and brother were buried alive by the enemy, along with hundreds of thousands of other good men who protected our country!"
"It wasn't this child who gave the order. It wasn't this child who killed my family, nor anyone else's. Your hearts are filled with malice and scorn from loss and poverty, but that doesn't give anyone the right to use an innocent child as a scapegoat for the evil-doings of the higher ups. It's the fault of them and the constant civil wars happening throughout the country! This country will never heal unless we show compassion and understanding!" such beautiful words, such a progressive and revolutionary thinking from someone as young as her! The prince was highly impressed, but he couldn't find any strength in his body to move, he was rooted to the spot, watching the adults throw the girl to the ground, kicking her mercilessly.
"If your father heard you, he'd have disciplined your rudeness until it all bled out! How dare you, a stupid, uneducated woman, speak back to a man? Your father would have beaten you until you learnt to bite down on that vile tongue of yours." she hadn't let out a single yelp, nor did she curse or complain until the punishing was over and the crowd dispersed.
"What do they know of my father, anyway? He was a kind man, he'd never hit me for speaking my mind." the girl scoffed, getting up on her feet and patting her clothes. "Are you alright, My Prince?"
But the prince felt like crying; He wanted desperately to throw his arms around the girl, thank her for standing up for him, for defending and protecting him, but at the same time, she was bleeding and bruised after her feat, and it was all because of him. "F-Forgive me... Forgive me... Because of me, you... You got hurt... I'm so sorry..." he wanted to cry... He wanted to cry so badly...
"Aiya, don't say that. It wasn't you who hurt me, you are innocent in all this mess. It is the evilness that hurt me, along with these wars and crimes that keep happening." she sighed softly. "If only there was one man who could unite the country and stop the civil wars, the people would be living in peace and harmony, and the seed of hatred would rot." she shook her head dismissively, before smiling at the boy. "My Prince, I can see you are desperately trying to bite down your tears - You needn't, not in front of me. If you wish me to, I can be your shoulder to cry on, or a reason to smile. You are a kind child, you don't deserve everything that's happening to you." the girl held his hand, squeezing it comfortingly. "Let me show you a special place."
Thus, the girl dragged the little Prince to some part of the outskirts where he's never been before; An abandoned garden that though unattended to, still retained its beauty and grace, with green plants and colourful flowers as he's never seen before. Truly, this must be the prettiest part of all Zhao, the boy thought.
From a hidden spot inside a thick bush, Y/N dragged a chest filled with the most expensive silk clothes and beautiful accessories - And even a pipa lute and make-up! "I've always loved dancing, you see. This place is my special place. Mum showed it to me, and grandma showed it to mum. Since when this chest has been here, or when did the garden get abandoned, I do not know, but I am happy regardless." she giggled softly, discarding the ratty outer layer of her clothes and putting on a lovely pink dress. "My dream has been, since I've seen mum dance for the first time, to become a dancer at the high court. I love the pretty dresses and all the accessories, and the music also. Alas..." she smiled sadly, trailing her fingertips softly across the melodious strings of the pipa. "Men with wealth and status care little that a dancer is not a courtesan, and there is no one to protect us from their lecherous hands."
Ying Zheng could only sit down and watch the girl before him transform into the most graceful fairy, and with elegant moves, her body flowed like the river through a flower meadow, and the orchid fragrance in the Spring wind. He was completely mesmerised by the beauty in front of him. "My grandma danced for grandpa only, and my mum for my dad. I, too, hope to one day marry the love of my life, and bewitch him with my dancing." her smile was so carefree and filled with glee that the prince found himself completely enchanted. "But... I like to dream big. I may be just a simple, common girl, with no family, no money and no status... In spite of this... I do hope that somehow, I would be able to dance in front of people and make them happy, and smile, with my dancing." she glided around the flowers like a peony nymph, her pink skirts flying around her like the rich petals of said flower. "Until then, I suppose I should just continue perfecting my choreographies."
"Y-You dance beautifully." the prince managed to stutter out, still under the afterglow of the dance, and the stunning pose she ended in. "If it matters, you made me feel very happy."
"Hao!" she giggled sweetly. "You have a gorgeous smile. I hope to see you smiling so genuinely all the time when we're together."
The prince continued to blush deeply, though his heart was throbbing with joy as never before. A single day, however, only has so many hours, and with the afternoon gone, the Sun was setting and the starry skies were reflected in his gorgeous eyes.
"W-Would it be too rude and daring t-to ask you to please be my friend?" the boy bowed down humbly at her, only to hear a sweet giggle.
"Y/N. Call me Y/N. And I will call you by your given name - Zheng." she quickly took the jade pendant from her sash and tied it to his own. "There, a token of my care and friendship for you. Now that we call each other by our given name, we are soul bound."
"B-But... I-I don't have anything to give you..." the boy's lips trembled with emotion.
"Hmm... Let me think..." her sweet smile turned mischievous, as she placed a kiss on his cheek. "Remember what I said about the wars? That only the King of all Kings can unite our country and bring peace?" he nodded silently. "When you become Emperor, don't forget about me. That's the only thing I wish from you. To be friends forever, no matter what the course of time may bring for us. How's that sound?"
The little prince looked up at her, his starry eyes sparkling with joy and love, and a soft blush painting his porcelain cheeks. He grinned widely, like a happy child, and he repeated the single word that she adopted from her - A word that will become his most favourite word. "Hao!"
Many days passed, and the friendship between Zheng and Y/N only grew stronger, and so did their crush on one another. Y/N became even more protective over the boy, thus receiving even more scorn and disciplining - The adults could afford disciplining an orphan girl with no status, but they couldn't beat the Prince. Even his deep sorrow dissipated when he saw her dance.
That is, until Y/N walked him home one afternoon, and there, waiting for him, was a woman, blowing into a spinning windwheel. "Are you Ying Zheng?" the stern-looking woman asked.
"Who asks?" Y/N frowned, stepping protectively in front of him, glaring at her viciously - But the boy was mellow and didn't want to upset anyone, nor incur another's wrath, and he simply bowed and affirmed that it was him, the prince.
"I didn't think you'd be so young. Tsk." she frowned, rolling her eyes.
"Who are you and what do you want with the Prince?" Y/N's loud and firm voice made the woman's eyebrow rise.
"I'm Chun-Yan, his new live-in caretaker and bodyguard. Which means..." she jumped off the stone lamp and though she could tower over the prince, as the girl was right there, shielding him, she still felt intimidating. "I can roll you, fold you, or do whatever the hell I want with you."
"Yes, ma'am, it's a pleasure to meet you." the prince bowed deeply, only for the girl to hiss at the woman and close her fan, bonking her in the head.
"Who do you think you are, threatening a child like this? I'll kill you if you even look at him the wrong way." Chun-Yan was rather amused by the braveness of this peasant girl, and she scoffed, straightening up and walking towards the humble home of the prince.
"Well, whatever. First things first, show me around this place."
As she opened the doors, she noticed the dilapidated state of complete disrepair that the small home of the hostage prince was; A complete dump filled with broken windows and walls, and furniture, mold growing everywhere and everything was shit.
"God, what a dump this is! Though, I guess it suits a reject from the Qin royal family." the nasty comment made Y/N yell at her again.
"Fuck off, will you?!" the woman stared in shock - A little girl cursed like a sailor man! "You are just as evil as all the others around! We don't need you here! Go away! You're only going to hurt him, you evil, nasty woman!"
"D-Don't worry, Y/N! It's really okay!" Yin Zheng forced a wide smile on his face. "Would you like something to drink? If water is alright, I'll go fetch some." he bowed again.
"... Are you really seven?" she muttered in disbelief before slumping down on the table. "I DON'T LIKE YOU!" she yelled, pointing a finger at him. "A kid your age oughta be crying or throwing a fit at the drop of a hat, but you've just been grinning ear to ear this whole time. It's givin' me the creeps." Y/N didn't even have the time to yell at the woman again, for the prince started dancing around like a monkey. "Are you makin' fun of me?!"
"WILL YOU JUST LEAVE HIM ALONE ALREADY?!" Y/N's anger was through the roof. "Who do you think you are, treating him like this?! I bet you lost someone to the burying, didn't you? Well, that's you and EVERYONE ELSE IN THIS CITY! INCLUDING ME!" she glared up at Chun-Yan, who looked flabbergast at the girl. "I lost my dad and brother! My mum killed herself from grief! I've been all alone to survive and fend for myself since I was barely four years old - But I don't go around blaming a child for the evil-doings of those warmongers! Why is it so hard for adults to understand that Ying Zheng did nothing wrong?! That you should be blaming THEM, not a child who was barely a BABY when it happened!" the woman was stunned. "You are a woman! Women are supposed to be gentle and caring towards children! You are a disgrace to all of girl-kind!"
The woman remained silent for a few seconds, staring down at the gleaming eyes of the girl who started crying from the deep rage she felt - And suddenly, Chun-Yan felt guilt and remorse. The girl was right, she wasn't any different than everyone in Handan, or Zhao itself. To think a child would have more wisdom than a rage-blinded adult...
"Let's clean this place already. You can't expect me to sleep in some dingy hut like this." Chun-Yan scoffed, taking the broom and beginning to clean this place properly - Though no amount of work could properly make this run-down home into a beautiful and safe haven.
Regardless, Ying Zheng and Y/N helped in the cleaning up, and though the boy felt incredibly on edge around a stranger, Y/N and Chun-Yan were constantly yelling at each other. The place was... Pretty loud and tense - Yet thus began their unusual pseudo-familial life.
Chun-Yan took the two children for grocery shopping again, only to see the true horrors of the prince's daily life, as one of the merchants threw the food on the ground, urging the prince to eat the sand-filled meat - At the same time, Y/N quickly jumped to shield the boy, as the people around started glaring at him, accusing him of killing their children or relatives. They all wanted to kill him, while he could only force a smile and bow at them humbly.
Anger. Curse. Hate. Curse. Kill. Curse. Evil. Curse. Grudge. Curse. Sad. Curse.
When they returned home, Chun-Yan stopped the lone boy from going to rest, and revealed the many injuries on his body. Apparently, whenever he saw someone getting injured, his own body started getting scars in the same place, and feel the pain of said person. Y/N knew, and that's why she tried her best to protect him, but it wasn't always working. It was all because of the constant hatred from the people of Zhao that he developed such an accursed condition.
It was just a little pain, he'd say. The wounds will heal, eventually... Though his body said another thing, and he almost fainted. Ying Zheng's smile had been instinctively learned by him at the mere age of seven, as a way to allay, even only slightly, the hatred constantly searing his body. "Some day, maybe they'll forgive me... Won't day?" a most pitiful armor.
"Forgive you...? Who do you think you're kidding here?! Huh?! How the hell can you just keep grinning like an idiot?! Why don't you get angry?! Why don't you hate them?!" Chun-Yan started crying - She was now fully understanding Y/N's angry tears and the frustration she felt at the way Zhao was treating an innocent child. "What happened back then... At Chang Ping... HAS GOT NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU! IT ISN'T RIGHT THAT YOU'RE GETTING HURT! SO STOP FORCING YOURSELF TO HOLD BACK! IF YOU WANNA CRY, THEN CRY! IF YOU'RE FEELING MAD, THEN LET IT OUT! STOP KILLING YOURSELF FROM THE INSIDE AND LYING TO YOURSELF ABOUT HOW YOU FEEL!" she yelled at him, falling on the ground weakly, watching the still forced smile on his face.
"G-Get angry...? Cry...? I-I could never do that... B-Because I'm... I'm the child of a nation that kills people. I-I'm a cursed child... Th-That's why, I..." for the first time in his life, Ying Zheng felt the embrace of a mother.
"It doesn't matter how awful your parents are - Their kid doesn't deserve to be punished! You haven't done anything wrong, nothing at all..." tears were drenching her face, all the guilt and regret overwhelming her. "Y/N was right... Y/N cares so much for you, she only wants the best for you." she found herself speaking in a milder voice. "You're a kind person, who understands people's pain. Your wounds are proof of that, not some punishment or curse." the boy's body was trembling violently. "Ying Zheng. You can live however you want to live."
For the first time in his life, Ying Zheng allowed himself to wail out all of his distress, all the pain, the agony and suffering he's been feeling this entire time, and his mother figure encouraged him. "Why me?! I haven't done anything! Nothing at all! I hate them! I hate everyone! DAMN IT, DAMN IT, DAMN IT ALL!!!!!!"
It was the first night he slept peacefully, and when he woke up, the woman offered him a pretty scarf to cover his eyes. If he can't see the pain of others, then maybe he won't be feeling it? It was worth a try. She made it herself, after all. When her child was still alive, this used to be a piece of cake for her to do.
The boy, with the most beautiful smile in the world, tied the scarf over his eyes. "HAO!" he joyfully exclaimed. "Thanks, Chun-Yan! I'll take good care of it!"
"Hao? I like that word too!" the woman grinned at him. He truly was adorable.
Since then, Y/N and Chun-Yan became the only persons Ying Zheng could be around and not feel any pain. Every day he spent with them, Ying Zheng was able to smile and have fun from the bottom of his heart. They would clean up the graffiti and even learn martial arts - Sometimes, they'd even prank the people who used to bully him; And his smile became more and more cheerful. Ying Zheng was truly happy.
However... King Zhaoxiang of Qin, and soon after, his son, King Xiaowen, passed away - And so, in 250 BC, the man who abandoned Ying Zheng, Zichu, ascended to the throne, and thus... Ying Zheng unexpectedly became the crown prince, the first in line to the throne, and was permitted to return to Qin.
"Ha! To think that some silly words I said would actually come true. I must be a Seer or something." Y/N grinned at the crying boy. "Crown Prince Ying Zheng. That sounds very good! Hao! I like that!"
"Won't you come with me?! Please?! Please?! Don't leave me alone, I need you! We are friends, aren't we?!" the boy was sobbing, holding tightly onto the girl.
"Forgive me, I cannot." she sighed, embracing him. "Not only am I a Zhao citizen, but... I am also a peasant. I would never be allowed anywhere near the Crown Prince." she kissed his cheek, patting his hair. "But when you get older and ascend to the throne - If you still remember me, and want to see me again, then you can always send for me. I will wait for you a thousand lifetimes, if needed. Just to see you again. The beautiful boy with the starry skies in his eyes."
Before he left, Y/N stole a quick peck on his lips, and waved him goodbye; Whilst Chun-Yan was laughing copiously, she had to drag the stunned boy away, his face burning fiercely from a blush. "I'll make you my Empress, Y/N! Wait for me! I'll keep my promise!" they truly were adorable, the woman thought, as the carriage left for Qin.
Thus, however, not only Y/N, but Ying Zheng would remain alone for so long, as Y/N had no one else in Zhao, and with the scorned people of Zhao no longer holding the prince as a hostage, they sent mercenaries to kill him. As a last motherly act of love, Chun-Yan used her martial arts to battle them all, though she would be fatally injured. "YOU STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM MY KID!" she yelled, killing the last one.
As she lay dying in his arms, she told him the truth - That Y/N was right about her all along. She was a scorned, grieving parent, with her child, similar in age to the prince, having been buried alive. Her beloved Chun-Ou. She could do nothing to save him, for she dug in the dirt with her nails desperately, but couldn't even find him to give him a proper send-off. She wanted too see the prince, to scold him for being a useless, evil brat... She wanted to vent her anger and resentment... But she couldn't.
If a kid like Ying Zheng could become the King - Someone who could understand people's pain... Perhaps someone like him could change this fucked-up world a little, the very same way he changed her. "Become the greatest king of them all." it was the same promise that Y/N also bestowed upon him.
Before she died though, she didn't see Ying Zheng, but Chun-Ou. "I didn't know you were there, Chun-Ou. Let mama get a good look at your face."
"Mama..." the prince held her dearly in his arms, placing her hand over his face, and he smiled at her, watching how vitality swiftly dissipated from her eyes.
"Hao." she lay lifeless in his arms as he wept for her.
Afterward, Ying Zheng arrived safely at Xianyang, the capital of Qin, and on July 6th 247 BC, following the death of Zichu, Ying Zheng became the King of Qin, at the mere age of twelve.
"Let's walk my--..." Ying Zheng smiled, tying the scarf around his eyes. "No. Let's walk the Path of an Emperor. Together. Y/N. Chun-Yan." and true to his words, at 37 years of age, Ying Zheng became Qin Shi Huang, The First Emperor in History to unite all of China.
On the day Ying Zheng was crowned as the King of Qin, he also began being pestered by his advisors and elders to marry soon and produce an heir; After all, every King must have a Queen and concubines to perpetuate the royal lineage.
Of course, the Prince didn't care for such things, nor did he want to think about anyone else that wasn't Y/N - But they were still so young! Life was fully ahead of them!
On the other hand, it could be a great pretext to bring Y/N to the court and start lavishing her with all the luxuries that the palace has to offer.
Though the King of Qin had room for surprise, along with all the people at the royal meeting, as the large doors of the palace were pushed open, and a beautiful young lady resembling a flower fairy, dressed in rich silks, pink like the petals of a peony stepped on the golden rug that led towards the throne. She had a long spear in her grasp. As she started singing, the King ripped the scarf off his face, and those starred eyes gleamed with glee, his smile wide like never before. They truly must be soulmates, if Y/N could do exactly the same thing that he himself intended to do!
Two loving souls, so cruelly parted
In madness and grief, a dark path started
Calamity was drawn, rituals subverted
But by her lovely dance, was sadness averted.
Ying Zheng didn't think it humanly possible, for a human to glide even more gracefully than he first saw her dancing, a few years prior.
The Phoenix returned to a home without luster;
The cobwebs overgrown, the grave-shrouds a-fluster.
But one bond upon her,
This world could not muster.
"Thus does the tale of the Auspicious Phoenix end - Yet today, a new melody I have to append." the King was truly mesmerised by her lovely voice, and the way she lit the spear on fire and twirled it around so masterfully, kicking it and rotating with it, throwing it in the air, creating the image of a dancing Phoenix.
"Hao! Sing me a happy story, Y/N!" he grinned, leaning forward in his throne.
From the world she seems apart
But there is one who knows her heart
With graceful swaying and a flaming spear
To still the raging skies and the shattered hearts
Y/N's smile was so enchanting that it bewitched the King - Her dancing was as she hoped, a means to grow the seed of joy into people's hearts, replacing the darkening hatred.
The Phoenix once returned,
And at once, she was spurned.
She turned, and left alone...
Y/N, in a swift move, extinguished the flames from the spear, and stepped up the stairs leading to the throne. "Though now, she might be found to whom she is bound - Her love."
Ying Zheng's face was split by a wide, cheerful grin, and in an unexpected move, he threw his arms around the girl, pulling her into his lap and kissing her cheek. "Hao! My Phoenix returned home!"
"Just in time to see her beloved dragon soaring the skies." she replied tenderly, only multiplying the excitement of his heart.
"The only dance I love above all is that of the Phoenix and the Dragon amongst Heavens." he declared boldly.
"Y-Your Majesty, who is this woman?! And how did she even manage to get inside the palace? With a weapon, no less!" having escaped the charm of the beautiful maiden, the elders started murmuring amongst each other.
"She is the Empress, of course!" Ying Zheng laughed merrily, loving the unrest amongst his advisors, telling him he couldn't just marry anyone. "I am the King! I can do whatever I want!" and true to his words, Y/N had a most beautiful coronation ceremony, and her red and gold robes truly made her look like the Phoenix that she was.
Not only the Kingdom of Qin, but the whole Empire of China was going to prosper greatly under the rule of Emperor Qin Shi Huang and his Empress, Y/N. She was there to help him rule, with equal power as his own, and a fantastic wisdom and benevolence like no other. She was there to guide him as he walked the path of killing the demon Chi You. They lived a good life, along with all the people of China.
The two would love each other and live in perfect harmony until their eventual death due to mercury poisoning, at an age before even reaching half a century.
In the afterlife, just like in reality, Qin Shi Huang would have to fight to protect his people, as he was chosen as a human representative fighter in this mess the Gods created, Doomsday, the wish to eradicate mankind. He already killed a demon, and now, he was ready to kill a God.
He couldn't wait for too long in his own room, and with how directionally challenged he was, he walked through walls until he found the Gods' private balcony where Ares and Hermes were, and he flipped the God of War out of his seat, getting comfortable on the cushy seat, even causing the Messenger God to pour him honey mead.
"You know I can't walk fast in these clothes, you little menace." a feminine voice, very much amused, took the attention of the two Gods. "Oh, that's a lovely view of the arena!" the regal looking woman shamelessly sat on his lap, her arms around his neck as he offered her his drink. "This is really good! Can we get more?" bowing, the butler looking God poured some more.
The doors were slammed open again, and the little Valkyrie, Goll, yelled at them, followed by the elder one, Brunhilde. "Goodness! Even after I'd expressly told you NOT to leave your room - And what's more, you've left the corridors FULL of holes!" the elder one was more amused than scolding.
"Mou mantai!" the two laughed, free of any care. "The road is where I lead!" he grinned, holding onto Y/N's waist, clingy like a child.
"Come on, we have to go." Hilde spoke.
"I refuse! We've taken a liking to this place! And besides, we definitely won't grow bored here." the man exclaimed.
"In case you weren't aware - YOU will be fighting in round Seven." Hermes and Ares gasped in shock, as the Emperor, holding his love in his arms, jumped on the backseat of the couch.
"HAO!" he grinned confidently. "Finally! I'd grown tired of waiting!"
"Now, let's head to the entrance gate, shall we?" Hilde sweatdropped at the unhinged behaviour of the bratty Emperor.
"The dragon soars the path of the Emperor! The road is where Qin Shi Huang leads!" Y/N declared boldly, unfolding her fan dramatically.
From underneath the Gods balcony, all of China's Emperors after Qin Shi Huang unraveled a large red and gold rug, making way for the very first Emperor to lead the way to victory - Covering all the minor Gods from the stands. None mattered, except for Qin Shi Huang.
"Hao! That's how the Emperor has to be treated!" Y/N hopped from his arms, and off the balcony, waltzing ahead and leading the way forward - From her sleeves, butterflies would flutter, and where she waved her fan, red flower petals burning like cinders would breeze in a majestic dance, matching her own enchanting one.
She is lightsome as a startled Phoenix,
And he, as graceful as a roaming dragon;
Her lovely complexion outshines the autumn chrysanthemum,
Whilst his radiance surpasses the springtime pine.
She is as nebulous as the moon concealed in light clouds,
Gracefully gliding, as snow spun by a flowing wind.
He is gazing at her from afar,
She shines like the sun rising above the rosy mists of dawn;
Observing her close by,
She is as luminous as a lotus emerging from clear ripplets.
She sang the song that Ying Zheng loved the most, resembling the Goddess of the Luo River - The Beauty of China, Luo Shen. Though the Emperor hated that she ended up so heart broken over her husband's death, going so far as to drown herself in the river - He couldn't help but admire the pure love between her and her husband, mutually intertwined, just as he and Y/N were;
Truly, all his life, he admired everything about her, and strived to become a man worthy of her lover. He wanted to be the man she could depend on, the man who could prove for her.
And thus, he became the Emperor.
As the song ended, Qin took out the bamboo flute and, stepping into the ring and playing the tune that harmonised perfectly with his Empress' graceful moves. Her dress, a deep shade of red like fire, flew around her like the Auspicious Phoenix that she was, and with her golden Dragon, they danced the Celestial melody of Heavens.
Heimdall, as well as all the rest watching, were mesmerised at the elegance displayed in their bonding, true love like no other radiating strongly from their smiles; He couldn't even begin the introductions as he watched the Emperor pick his lady in his arms, two fates intertwined, dancing coiled around each other eternally - And ending with a kiss. Their fairy-tale like love made all those watching deeply envious.
As the two lovers kept gazing into each other's eyes, the God announced the Emperor's great deeds, before calling out his title as the humans all chanted his name; the Gods boo'ed, angry that he was so arrogant, even going as far as too show off his love-life like that. As Y/N kissed him shamelessly, in front of the whole Valhalla, a young lady, Alvitr, had rageful tears in her eyes for being left forgotten at the Mankind gate.
"Mou mantai! I'm an Emperor, after all." he waved dismissively, before picking her up carefully in his arms. "Come a little closer." she was blushing so bad. "No need to be so rough, my boyish young lady." he chuckled lightly.
"Don't worry, little lady. Zheng is going to take good care of you." Y/N patted her hair, watching her completely fall in love with the handsome man, and in one burst of lightning, the Volundr was formed.
"Hao! This fits me nicely!" he grinned, showing off his Almighty Spaulders.
"As handsome as always, my darling." she kissed his cheek again, though she felt a chill shiver down her spine as the God of the Underworld, Hades, walked forward.
Not only was he ready to avenge his brother, but he was also feeling envious at the way Y/N so openly loved and pampered her husband, the same way he wished his beloved Persephone would.
Before this battle of King vs Emperor could begin, Y/N gladed towards the stands where the Emperors were standing - Right where Chun-Yan and Chun-Ou were, and she got helped up in the stands. An Empress shouldn't have to find her way around the maze-like corridors - The First Empress of China had every right to walk the shortest and easiest road to where she wished to.
As the fight began, Hades thrust forward a single strike, loaded with tremendous power - A single thrust meant to kill. He continues to attack with one heavy-class jab after another, but the Emperor never once got hit; And even when he used one of his strongest attacks, named after his wife, Qin Shi Huang only had his body nicked.
The next straight thrust, the Emperor deflected, easily catching the handle of the bident before throwing back the attack - His own power added to that of Hades, sending him sailing backwards painfully hard - It was Qin Shi Huang's Chi You - Armor form: Sword, Armor, Spear, Crossbow, Halbert - Heavenly Hand of Defense.
As they say, the best offense is a good defense. The reverse is also valid. "Hades, King of the Netherworld... Was it? Let me tell you a thing." as the dust evaporated, the God's form was slumped to the ground, a large crater in the wall where he hit it. "There can only be one Emperor in the world, and that man is I!" he confidently declared.
He didn't fight for six whole days against the Demon God Chi You for nothing. He didn't raise above all the other so-called King for nothing. He didn't become the first unifier of China, the first Emperor, the King where it all began - For nothing!
Ying Zheng - Qin Shi Huang - Was the only man worthy of being called The Emperor!
Hades managed to stand up. He was bleeding from his head and his torso was injured. "Qin Shi Huang, was it? Tell me one thing - What in your eyes makes a King?"
"A king?" he grinned. "One who never doubts! Never yields! Never relies! And always stands as the leader of his people! That is what makes a King!"
Hades was awestruck by the answer, and even started laughing merrily. Nobody alive ever heard the Lord of the Underworld laugh so boomingly. Ying Zheng joined in the laughing. "You remind me of someone I know... All too well. He was more noble than any other God, more steadfast than any other - And the God most worthy of the title of King. My younger brother, Poseidon, King of the Seas." he extended his arm forward, showing off the weapon. "And I swear by his name, as his elder brother, I shan't give in to a mere King of Men!"
Thus, with a weird stance, Hades unleashed an attack, the proper way of fighting with a spear; With all his might, he delivered a crushing downward swing. The Emperor shielded himself with his arms. "I AM THE KING OF THE UNDERWORLD - HADES! FALL AND BE CRUSHED!"
The King of Men was slammed face-down, flat onto the ground. "ZHENG!" Y/N yelled his name, watching his spit a bunch of blood, struggling to stand up.
"Ahh, it's sticky, all soaked with blood. Buhao." he groaned, hanging his head. "Mou mantai..." he sighed, a little disappointed as he took off his cherished scarf. All Emperors bowed down in his honour, gazing his handsome face for the first time. "Now then - Shall we continue, King of the Netherworld?" he grinned confidently. despite the blood painting his face.
"So you can take one of my attacks and still smile. I would expect nothing less from a King!" Hades grinned, launching into a ferocious flurry with his rigid spear.
Qin Shi Huang has no choice but to roll with the thrusts; He was waiting for an opportunity to use his special technique.
As Hades used the Smasher of Earth down on his head, the Emperor had to shield himself again; But this time, he didn't fall - Using his breath to weaken the attack, he grabbed onto the blade of the bident, and slammed the wielder into the ground, breaking it.
But just as before, any wound that Ying Zheng sees, he receives also - And though he managed to injured Hades, he also felt intense pain.
Even in a direct combat, Qin used his breath onto Hades' chest, and with his claw-like fingers, he used the Mount Tai, Dragon Claw technique, delivering an intense strike, leaving an awful mark onto his abdomen.
Ying Zheng's starry eyes weren't just beautiful - They could actually see the stars of living beings. The flow of Qi. Qin could see the cruxes as stars. The double edged gift that served him as both a blessing and a curse. "Ahh, this is why I hate fighting with my eyes." Qin grinned, baring through the blazing pain in his abdomen. "Aw man, that really hurts."
"Don't make fun of me... Do you call yourself the Greatest King?" Hades chuckled light-heartedly.
"King of the Underworld, you are strong - But I promised two special people that I would become the Greatest King - So I can't lose to anyone!" to get the most out of his fantastic martial arts, Qin Shi Huang was given a Divine Weapon specialising in defence - Alvitr; The secret ability behind her name is - Army Guardian!
"You are strong, King of Humans. A promise of never losing, right?" Hades clenched his fist around his own blood. "I also have something I want to protect. My oath."
Thus, Hades advanced again, spinning his bident like a windmill, destroying the air bullets coming his way - Qin could barely defend himself against the attacks coming his way, though even when he struck, the two were equal in power, and Hades' forearm was mauled. "Even though you're human, you made it this far, huh? I'm going to kill you... But first, I wanted to say that you were magnificent." Hades declared boldly.
"Hao!" Zheng grinned at his opponent.
From the stands, every human was cheering for the Emperor. Y/N especially was the loudest, along with Chun-Yan and her little boy, Chun-Ou.
Once again, Hades did something remarkably unusual - Not only did he begin to whistle the tune of his dear younger brother, Poseidon, before self-inflicting a large gash on his chest and splattering not only himself, but his weapon in a shower of crimson life essence. Drenched in blood, Hades rushes Qin, changing mid hit his thrust into a downward swing - He managed to find a way to counter his disruption of Qi. "You pose no threat to me."
Hades' blood wasn't SIMPLY blood. "Assemble!" the King of the Underworld ordered his weapon to transform into a mighty strength to be reckoned with; Any Divine Weapon that his blood, the Pluto Ichor, spills upon harbors the God's life force and becomes even more powerful... But the longer he keeps it up, the higher the risk of death. "King of Men, this is my trump card." he got in a battle stance with his new weapon, the Four-Blooded Spear of Destiny - Ichor: Desmos. "Tear at his flesh - Desmos!" this almighty thrust managed to break through the powerful armor of the Emperor. "I cannot lose. As their elder brother, I shan't be defeated!"
The Valkyrie Alvitr made herself seen to her human, worrying over him - Not only half of his hand, but his shoulder also were heavily destroyed. "Mou mantai. Compared to the pain of others, my own pain is scarcely anything to bear." he declared selflessly, like the fantastic leader that he is. "Alvitr... If we don't do something, we stand no chance at winning. I think we should bet everything on this next strike." he spoke, more seriously, only to annoying the young Valkyrie.
"THAT WAS PATHETIC!" she yelled at him, as a scold. "SAY WHAT YOU WANT LOUD AND CLEAR, LIKE AN EMPEROR! YOU SHOWED OFF WITH YOUR EMPRESS LIKE THAT - AND NOW YOU WANT TO LOOK UNCOOL AND DIE IN FRONT OF HER?! IN FRONT OF EVERYONE BELIEVING IN YOU?!" she huffed like a brat.
"How haughty of you, my boyish young lady." he smiled, looking up at the stands where his most cherished people were cheering on him. "I WANT TO WIN NO MATTER WHAT!" he yelled, loud and clear, as he should have.
"Haha, I know! Really... You Kings are so stubborn!" she giggled, reinforcing their bond even further. "Let me give you all the power I've got!" thus, the Almighty Spaulders were recast into the Shi Huang Goujian Sword. The best defense truly is a remarkable offense.
"I am EMPEROR! King among Kings! And a King only takes pride in protecting his people!" Ying Zheng's starry eyes shone brightly with hope and power, whilst his dazzling smile remained as confident as ever before.
"Excellent, O, lofty King - Now let us tear at his very heart, Desmos!" he, who bore the pride of the Gods and laid down his own life; The King of the Netherworld -- And he, who knew the pain of others, and fought for the sake of his people, the King Where It All Began.
Only a King can understand the mind of a King. And these two Kings could both tell that the end of the match was nigh.
Hades went forward, using Desmos: Eos once again, and Ying Zheng retaliated with Chi You: Sword Form; Shi Huang Yan cut. He was driven back, his already damaged left arm ripping clean off from the shoulder and flying across the arena. "ZHENG!" though the Emperor could hear his wife's desperate voice, calling out to him - He simply laughed merrily, seeing Alvitr's worried expression, looking down at him.
"It's beautiful...! What a beautiful star I see!" surprising everyone, the Emperor managed to use his sword to stand up once again. "A king never doubts. A King never yields. A King never relies." even with his arms ripped off like that, and the awful injuries sustained, Ying Zheng kept standing tall and ready to fight. "And a King never surrenders!" he was standing up through sheer willpower. "I can't let my wife see her husband dying, you know? I promised to only ever make her happy - So I can't cause her tears of distress now!"
He could hear them - The voices of the people. He's been fighting all this time to keep his promise to Y/N and Chun-Yan; To bring the people not hatred, but happiness. Everyone was cheering for him. The Greatest King of All Kings - Qin Shi Huang.
"Look, I know you don't wanna give up, but what are you gonna do exactly?" Alvitr asked, a little confused but ready to fight to the bitter end by the side of this worthy man.
"I'm going to use Heavenly Hand of Defense once more." he spoke weakly, watching her distress and worry. "Trust me - I am THE Emperor!"
Alvitr smiled, filled with hope and confidence thanks to this man. "You're just... Haha! No need to ask!" she, too, got in a fighting stance next to him, supporting him from within his soul.
"HAO!" the Emperor exclaimed, thrusting the tip of his sword forward, to mit that of Hades' spear.
"I consider myself proud to have been able to fight you." both the Gods and Mankind, and every eye upon the arena could sense that this very next clash would be the final one of Round Seven.
And the first to make a move was the King of the Netherworld, with a fearsome thrust from Desmos, loaded with all the Ichor that Hades could give; Against this gully-powered attack from the King of the Netherworld which seemed as though it could kill with a simple graze, the King of Men, without hesitation, caught it. Chi You Armor Form: Heavenly Hand of Defense.
Everyone had braced themselves for the end, save for the King Where It All Began... Who managed to use Tortoise Ripple to hit Desmos' Qi Star. It got weaker. Desmos was alive, not a lifeless weapon, and Hades hadn't taken that into consideration - He brought his spear to life, his most powerful advantage, but also, his most fatal disadvantage.
Ying Zheng had never forgotten, not even for an instant, that his own life began from the end - When the woman he loved most, his wife, along with his cherished mother-figure, Chun-Yan, showed him... That a King is one who arises from the end, and brings about the Beginning.
Desmos was shattering in his fighter's grasp, and the Human representative managed to impale his sword through the God's torso. "Magnificent!" Hades praised. "Nothing less...!" though he tried to use the broken handle of his weapon to kill Qin Shi Huang, he failed, for the Emperor sliced him open. "... from a King." Hades was unable to make good on his vow. He failed as an elder brother, but the Emperor managed to keep his oath to all the people that relied on him. "Forgive me."
As Hades lay dead on the ground, Heimdall announced Emperor Qin Shi Huang as the winner of the Seventh Round of Ragnarok, and with it, Mankind was in the lead, 4 to 3. "I am grateful that I could speak with you, King of the Netherworld." the Emperor clenched his fist to his chest, in honour of the admirable and honorable fight between two Kings. "Pengyou." through this battle to the death, the two Kings became friends.
Gods and Humans alike were showing their respects to the King of the Netherworld as he was shattering into glowing shard of green soul and ascending into the skies. In under 13 minutes, the King of all Kings defeated a God.
Just as before, the Emperors watching the match helped the Phoenix Empress descend into the ring so she could run to her husband, supporting him and the little Valkyrie lady up. "You were fantastic, you two. Now you may rest. I will take you to the infirmary at once." both of them, like a happy family, smiled at each other.
"Don't push yourself too hard. You look even more banged up than me." Alvitr joked.
"Mou mantai!" he chuckled at her reassuringly.
"Mou mantai? You sure don't look it, silly man. Let me support you two." Y/N giggled, getting in between them two and holding onto them with all her force.
"Honestly, it's a miracle you're even alive right now." Alvitr scolded him lightly.
"That isn't true, Alvitr. Did I not say it before? Trust me!" his reassuring grin made the girl emotional.
"You really are stupid." the Valkyrie's smile trembled.
"H-Hey, can't you keep standing up?" Y/N released Alvitr from her grasp, supporting the Emperor as he lost consciousness. "Alvitr, if you have any strength in you, please help me hold him!"
The Valkyrie yelled for the paramedics to rush already - He needed urgent, intensive care. The nurses quickly brought the table and put the Emperor, rolling him quickly towards the Intensive Care unit where he will be taken until his condition is stabilised.
Ying Zheng and Alvitr also were kept in capsules to better their vital functions, and in between them, sat Y/N, smiling softly at the two. The Valkyrie was already a divine being, she was going to be alright... But Ying Zheng is still a human and was in a particularly critical condition - Whether he survives this or not, depends on his own strength to live.
"Ying Zheng and Alvitr. The Emperor of Heavens and his protector White Tiger." the Empress spoke gently, each hand laying on one of the glass capsules. "Alvitr, thank you for protecting my beloved Zheng. I will forever be indebted to you. My sweet child. Alvitr." Beautiful and divine, strong and courageous." her voice trembled softly. "My boyish young lady." her gaze turned to her Emperor. "Qin Shi Huang. The Emperor of China. The King Where It All Began. The First Unifier of China. The Golden Dragon of China. The Eye of Heaven." a few tears escaped softly down her cheeks. "Ying Zheng, my beloved husband, the beautiful boy with the starry skies in his eyes. The love of my life." her tender tears turned into heartbroken sobs. "I am so proud of you. So, so proud. You have always been a true leader for our people, and you were always such a wonderful husband, a partner, a friend. My confidant. My heart. My soul. My everything." though Goll and Brunhilde left, the Emperors whose paths were pathed by Qin Shi Huang were all standing outside the room, watching with heavy hearts, the shattered cry of the Vermillion Bird. "If the tears of the Phoenix could truly heal any wound, I would drown you in my cries and save you. If I could give my life to save you, I would transfer all of your wounds to mine own shell of a body, rip my flesh apart with mine own teeth and claws, and give you all of my blood, just to see you alive once more. My most precious sweetheart." the people watching all began to shed tears. "Just like the Goddess Luo who drowned herself in the river, so will I, out of grief, should you depart from this world before me." for one last time until her beloved would flutter his sparkling eyes open again, Y/N dried her tears and smiled brightly at Ying Zheng and Alvitr. "Hao! Mou mantai! Listen to my voice as I sing for you a beautiful melody. May you have sweet dreams and rest peacefully - And when your strength returns, please, return to me. And if not... The Vermillion Bird will burn to ashes, for the last time."
I want to be your love for ever and ever,
Without break or decay.
When the hills are all flat,
The rivers are all dry.
When it thunders in winter,
When it snows in summer
When heaven and earth mingle,
Not till then will I part from you.
Thus, a melody was sung, through the cries of the weeping Vermillion bird, burning bright as the Sun, for her celestial Golden Dragon of Heavens, and the almighty White Tiger, shining silver like the moon.
#record of ragnarok imagine#record of ragnarok x reader#record of ragnarok#qin shi huang#qin shi huang x reader#qin shi huang imagine#ying zheng#ying zheng x reader#ying zheng imagine#ror#ror x reader#ror imagine#qin shi huang ror
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Din Djarin and Luke Skywalker are both two men who get progressively scarier the more you watch them.
Like, Luke in A New Hope was baby af. He was a child. Even in the Empire Strikes Back, what a little guy. A tiny fellow.
Then boom, Return of the Jedi, and Luke is smiling and like “Tell these Ewoks that you are their God and that if they do not release us, you will be Angered…” He is in all black, he is missing a hand, he has gone off the rails conpletely. He’s like “How will I tell Leia that we’re siblings? …Oh! I know! Riddles!” Luke Skywalker gets struck by Force Lightning like nine times and still gets up and drags his dad’s lifeless body out. There were moments one might look at him and think, “no, ur wrong, he still babie” but you are the wrong one! He goes into Jabba’s Palace and straight up stands there smiling and threatening him the whole time. He’s standing on a plank over the Sarlacc and he’s still like “So this is how you’d like to play :)” Luke straight up snapped, he got spooky by the end of the og trilogy.
Din Djarin, straight off the back, is kind of intimidating. He is a man in full armour who hunts people and freezes them in carbonite and appears behind their shoulders when they least expect it. But, after Grogu shows up, you probably think “this man is weak to this baby, he will become soft” but no! The opposite happens!
I’m talking about episode 6. The Prisoner. I have wanted desperately to talk about this for days, but have only just found the words to do so. Let me explain.
Din Djarin is filmed and edited like a horror movie villain. Like a supernatural force of evil who stalks his prey. Straight up like a slasher villain out of the eighties. There’s hints of this beforehand, what with Din appearing behind a guy in the very first episode, and the fact that he has been shot point blank (many times) but no matter how many times he falls, he always gets back up. Okay, that’s all fine and good.
But episode 6 goes beyond that. He stalks a bunch if assholes through flickering red lights. He splits them up, he takes them out one by one, and the last person standing manages to get out, thinks they’ve escaped, only to die (technically) at Din’s hand anyway. He is straight up a horror movie villain I don’t know how else to explain it, he is a horror movie villain.
Don’t take this the wrong way. Being spooky and intimidating isn’t a bad thing, especially not in Star Wars! Luke Skywalker and his ability to say terrible things while smiling, Din Djarin and his predilection for appearing right behind someone, these ar egood things. I like these things a lot. I love these. I love that Luke is the cutest little scary fella in the galaxy. I love that Din is the most awkward little scary fella in the galaxy. I think it’s great.
Why do I bring this up?
Well, for one, I have been trying to word my view on Din Djarin for days now. I love this man, I have to mock him or I’ll feel incomplete. And I think it’s a disservice to pretend that Luke isn’t a person who most people in the Star Wars universe think about and shiver. Don’t get me wrong, I love sunshine boy Luke, but he isn’t really like that, at least not by this point in the series. He just strikes me as the type of person to say incredibly dark, deranged things with a blank face, then smile at cute kittens. Luke is messed up, and we should talk about it more because it’s very interesting to explore the various ways he’s messed up.
But for another, I am a big fan of Din and Luke being buddies who go absolutely anywhere and scare the shit out of people. A Mandalorian next to a Jedi Knight? Two people who eat Storm Troopers for breakfast?? Can you imagine how much the fragments of the Empire that are still left are quaking??? Those two would go absolutelu anywhere and the anyone on planet who ever sided with the Empire would give themselves up or run, immediately.
Like, Din singlehandedly took out that whole troop on Nevarro. All by himself, he shot out all of the Storm Troopers and everyone inside and I like to think there are whispered stories about him similar to the ones about the Boogeyman.
Now, I know Luke didn’t actually kill the Emperor and Darth Vader, but does anyone in universe know that? Or does everyone think that Luke not only blew up the Death Star, but he also murdered the two head honchos and came out completely unscathed? Luke is definitely a boogeyman.
I don’t know. Something about two terrifying men walking into a bar full of Imperials only to walk out five minutes later of a bar full of dead Imperials just really fills me with joy. Something about the mental image I have of Storm Troopers fearfully sharing increasingly terrifying stories about these two makes me happy. I like bad people being scared shitless, all right? Sue me.
#star wars#original trilogy#the mandalorian#din djarin#luke skywalker#dinluke#this isn’t really dinluke#but can you imagine if these two ever went on a date?#the restaurant would blow up#these two are magnets for trouble#who would both think the other is the magnet#i just want the bad guys to be scared#i want them to shake#i want them to quiver#i want them to fall to their knees#i want them to tremble and gulp and beg for mercy#is that too much to ask#the inane ramblings of a madman#long post#i should’ve written star wars
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General Headcanons with DOA Boys
Headcanon: General headcanons of stuff I think they will do
Pairing: Fyodor x reader, Nikolai x reader and Sigma x reader
Genre: Fluff, lowkey crack
A/N: Thank you dc person for that one fyodor headcanon.
→Masterlist
Nikolai
He probably likes to eat mud for fun and force everyone to eat it
You both secretly sneekout of the hideout and visit beaches at night, having deep conversation which would end up with him filling your shorts with sand
he likes to place insects and rats in your closet stating it is a harmless prank. Not even Sigma is excused from his pranks
Nikolai irrespective of being a prankster would gift you with ice-creams and bakery goods [to lactose intolerant ppl, he gives u popsicles]
that was until he decided to prank you once day and put hair in your food
Never fell into his 'get in hole' game. You got stuck in it for 40 days without food and water. No kidding.
The mysterious hole is filled with nothing but junk.😭😭 very questionable junk
You both love to prank others though.
"Let's plant the bomb under Sigma's bathtub"
"Extra points make it filled with pink glitter"
Sigma was covered in pink glitter for thirteen days.
But! Personally Nikolai would be one of the best cuddlers in the manga/anime
The first time he wore normal clothes instead of his usual multi layered buisness clothing, you were in tears. How could someone pull such simple clothes so fashionably?
You like to braid his hair. Even if you suck at it, he would wear your braiding loud and proud.
"Ahh quiztime! Who braided my hair?"
"Sir this is-"
"Wrong answer," boom "it's my love YN who braided it, you are no fun"
And that's how the city's McDonald's got blowed up.
overall he is a good insane boyfriend, so 10/10 cause I love him 😋
Fyodor
This man
I swear he is fine asf but would probably learn all the instruments you like so he can play it to you when you are kidnapped by Dazai most prob.
he is a Lil more insane then Nikolai so he would probably boom North Korea cause he was bored. [NK people i am jk-]
"what did you have for breakfast"
"I don't know"
"wrong answer"
And the next moment you know, South of Yokohama got blowed up
He is the most broken richest man you ever met.
he can't buy clothes for himself or even upgrade the doa office but will gift you a wholeass country as a Birthday return gift.
you force him to wear dresses and paint his nails, 😭 but my man is so down bad that he is sub in this relationship.
"Sir we have bombed the tunne-"
"Good verywell"
"🧍🕯️"
😭 nah cause they are hella scared when he wears makeup.
He would probably take you to fireworks only for you to realise he is bombing the area again.
"fyodor, we talked about this"
"No"
and he proceeds to boom everything
he isn't much of a hugger and probably tries to runaway when you try to even touch him, but mf would suffocate you in his sleep with his hug
He probably had tried giving those evil laughs, but the moment he did that, he choked on air.
Me and a person on my server were having a convo and they said
"He probably bites his nails to much and they are really short"
he owns a pet rat but denys it
honestly, he is a 10 but he is a terrorist who likes to bomb everything up. But he is your boyfriend and he is hot.
Sigma
-Are you the man of the relationship or he is?
he is more of a 'please don't kill anyone sweetheart' rather then supporting your actions and being a 'lets commit arson dear YN'
Mf is rich asf. He would deny it ofcourse and then proceed to shower you with silk clothes, Gucci , prada comfy…..such a sugar daddy
😭😭hear me out, he is a ball full of sunshine and anxiety but he wouldnt hesitate to kill anyone who does wrong to you or his casino.
-"Sigma am I your first priority?"
"Yes-?"
"Is the casino your first priority?"
"Yes-?"
"Me or the casino?"
"Yes"
He probably cries everytime you ignore him.
HE REMEMBERS EVERYTHING ABOUT YOU.
once Nikolai kidnapped you for fun and man did Nikolai end up being half bald.
Sigma wants you to stay away from fyodor, because the last thing he knows is that he want to give fyodor a bombing partner.
Atp he doesnt want you to interact any of the DOA members, because little did he know, you will grow more insane with them.
I like to imagine you knowing Dazai and mentioning it to Sigma on occasions, and oh boy Sigma wanted to kill the man when he first met not because you talked a lot about him, but he would probably be the reason why you pull questionable strunt
10/10 Mama Sigma
He also doesnt allow you to run away freely in his casino, for all he knows is that you will cheat and win all the games.
He is so restrictive
You both probably or possibly may have this convo:
"BUT FYODOR GIFTED HIS S/O A WHOLE ASS COUNTRY, WHY CANT I GET THAT PLUSHIE??"
"You cant cheat everytime to get the plushies"
"BUT-"
"Fyodor is a terrorist, we are not like them"
"LEAST HE GIFTED HIS S/O-"
Your arguments probably never make sense to others, but its for you and Sigma to know.
Also he gave up on scolding you every time you try to eat casino coins.
He is such a 'I am trying to keep my S/O mentally sane' boyfriend, even if he needs to go to therapy. 8/10 bf material
Guys get a Sigma. Sigmas never disappoint.
A/N: Btw the discord server if you wanna join is here.
#bsd#bungou stray dogs headcannon#bsd fluff#bungou stray dogs scenarios#bsd scenario#bungou stray dogs fluff#fyodor x reader#bsd headcannons#nikolai x reader#sigma x reader#doa x reader#doa#decay of angels#decay of angels x reader#bsd x reader#doa bsd#sigma#fyodor#nikolai#nikolai is silly#fluff#bungou stray dogs#bsd fanfics#nikolai gogol#gogol nikolai#bungo stray dogs nikolai#nikolai gogol x reader#gogol x reader#bsd s5
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saw that ur reqs r open, and i love all ur work sooo here i am lol
what would the tf141 boys be like w a reader who’s into horror? (i was thinking reader is like rlly sweet but loves playing horror video games or smth, but u can interpret it however u want!)
i can js imagine johnny freaking out when he sees reader playing like,,silent hill or smth. or resident evil 7 (can u tell im a horror game nerd lol)
but yeah! js a silly little idea i had, feel free not to write it if u don’t want to! have a good day, ily!
TF141 Watching a Horror Movie With You 🎃
hi omg this is such a cute concept!! thank you so much for the support, you have no idea how much i appreciate it!
i have so many ideas for them with someone who loves horror movies so that’s what this post is about (i hope that’s ok :( ) but i’ll try to write about horror games another time because that’s such a cute concept! i just have lots of ideas for this one rn so i thought i’d do it first
female reader, fluff, not proofread <3
Simon "Ghost" Riley thinks it’s cute that you love horror movies. He spends half his life in a real-life horror, he’s seen things that you could never imagine. Teasingly calls you a ‘psycho’ for just sitting there happily, cuddled up to him as you watch something absolutely terrifying go down on the screen.
Simon is a pain in the ass to watch certain horror movies with, because if guns or fighting are involved then he will make sure to point out to you exactly what the directors got wrong.
"He’s holding it wrong… if I even… Price’d never let me hear t’end of it," he mumbles, not talking to anyone in particular.
When you cuddle on the sofa, if you’re laying face down on his chest, he loves to keep one hand on your ass. Sometimes, if something does make him jump, he’ll squeeze it out of instinct.
People don’t usually expect it but you’re very good with scary stuff, you rarely ever get spooked out. But sometimes you do, especially if you’re tired and it’s late.
Once, after you’d watched a film, you went to get ready for bed and Simon went ‘to eat something’. Even when you were all changed and ready for bed, he still hadn’t returned, and so - twiddling your fingers together for reassurance - you peeked out into the darkened hallway.
Only for a 6'4" soldier in a skull mask, wielding a cup of tea, to jump out at you from behind.
You screamed, stumbling back in a state of panicked confusion, about to cry out for Simon when you came to your senses and realised that the masked intruder was Simon.
He stood there, laughing his ass off, until he realised that you were obviously very on edge and a little bit teary eyed.
"C’mere…" he sighed, placing down his tea to take you into his arms, "i’m sorry, baby girl, please don’t cry…" Your heart was racing and you were debating whether or not to slap him, but you knew he didn’t mean to upset you. And you were happy so long as he made up for it.
Soap Mactavish claims that he’s not scared of anything. Nooo, no way, he’s not scared. He’s so not scared that he’s looking away and squeezing your hand.
Poor guy is so easily jumpscared, it makes you giggle.
"You sure this i’nt going t’be too scary for you, bonnie?" he coos, placing an arm around your shoulder as he half-watches the film that has plunged into a strange silence. He’s definitely trying (and failing) to be subtle as he flexed his muscular arms a little bit, in an attempt to show off.
"Oh yeah, don’t worry," you nod sweetly, smiling up at him.
"I’m just saying, angel, if you need to bury your head into my chest, or if you can’t look, then that’s okay, you just go ahead and make yourself comfortable. I’m a soldier, I could easily take on any- Shit! Fucking hell!" he jumps, squealing and then clearing his throat in a poor attempt to disguise it.
"You sure this isn’t going to be too scary for you, bonnie baby..?" you tease, kissing his cheek.
"Lay off it," he pouts, blushing a little bit as he nuzzles his face into your hair.
Alsoooo Johnny is a fiend for feeling you up when you’re watching a film together. He sees it as a perfect opportunity to get to know his pretty lass a little bit better.
Kyle "Gaz" Garrick’s favourite part of movie night is the food. He loves takeaway (he’s definitely a Nando’s lover) but his absolute favourite food is your home cooking. When he was asked his favourite food when he was younger, he was always the one kid who would say "whatever my mum makes!" and now he’s an adult it’s just the same, but "whatever my girlfriend makes!" Whenever he realises you’re going to watch a film, whether you invited him or not, he will call out to you from the other room to "HOLD ON!" as he grabs snacks and drinks for the two of you.
Gaz isn’t too easily creeped out, but it happens. He’ll never admit that it’s because he was scared, but you’ve definitely noticed him ‘accidentally’ leaving the hallway light on. If it wasn’t an ‘accident’, then he obviously did it so that you wouldn’t feel scared in the night. He probably realises that you can see right through him, but you always say you believe him, just to make him feel better.
Kyle’s favourite horror movie series is Paranormal Activity, because it’s a so-bad-it’s-good kind of thing. He loves sitting in bed, eating popcorn, with you in his lap, laughing til you cry at all his jokes about how horrendously made the films are. Once, he was taking the piss out of how bad the film you were watching was and then immediately got jumpscared. He even let out a weird noise in shock - he didn’t hear the end of it for weeks.
Even if he’s not cuddling you as close as possible, Gaz loves to rouch you, usually by holding you with one arm as you rest your head on his shoulder. He is a serial thigh-squeezer.
John Price is a total dad, and that extends to when you can convince him to watch one of your favourite films with you. He wants to watch the movie, it’s not his fault if he falls asleep 15 minutes in every single time.
He lets you lay on his broad chest, that’s warm and rises and fall under your head, while he rests his hands behind his head and closes his eyes. He’s prone to snoring, too - in past, you’ve had to rewind the film because you missed part of it while you were trying to get him to wake up and shut up. The only sureproof way to wake him up is to try and move off of him - he’ll open one eye and grumble at you, as he pulls you right back into him.
"You’re not even watching the film, you’re asleep…" you whine, looking up at him.
"’M watching, love. Shhh," he mumbles, eyes still closed as he softly pats your hair.
"Are not," you pout.
"Shhh. ‘M trying to watch this," he hushes you, eyes closed and totally ready to go back to sleep. You’re almost annoyed at him but he makes that very hard, breathing softly through that moustache as he presses you against him, like you’re a teddy or a weighted blanket.
In terms of the films himself, Price isn’t easily scared (partly helped by the fact that he spends half of the time asleep). The first time that you two watched something scary together, he was almost expecting you to be terrified, but he was pleasantly surprised when you weren’t. He thinks it’s funny how you can sit in his lap perfectly happy and watch something that would have any ‘sensible’ (as he puts it) girl screaming.
He either gets very irritated by the main characters making terrible decisions and getting themselves into trouble, or finds it hilarious. He also loves to rub your feet while you watch the movie, literal princess treatment.
i kind of want to watch a horror movie nowwww
all pictures are from the game or from pinterest as far as i’m aware
i hope this was ok for you!!! i know it’s not exactly what you wanted but maybe we can just consider it part 1 of the horror obsessed reader saga >:)
masterlist
#cod mw2#cod#simon ghost riley#ghost#fluff#ghost x reader#ghost x you#simon riley x reader#cod x reader#headcanon#simon riley fluff#ghost fluff#soap fluff#cod fluff#gaz cod#cod headcanons#ghost cod#cod mwii#call of duty modern warfare#cod modern warfare#call of duty#soap cod#call of duty x reader#ghost call of duty#tf 141 x reader#tf 141#task force 141#141 x reader#cod 141#mw2 141
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Hazbin Hotel Episode 5-6 Hot Takes! ~
Lucifer doesn't really seem like a necessarily "good" dad or "bad" dad. He's definitely not the greatest at all but it really does suck that Charlie was pretty much isolated from him. Not completely his fault I'm sure.
I know it's obvious at this point that Lucifer & Alastor don't like each other...but you can definitely tell Alastor HATES him. His face was just stuck on stink the entire time.
To follow that up, I wonder why Alastor doesn't like Lucifer so much. Maybe it has to do with Lilith or Eve?
I like Lucifer's personality despite being the literal Devil he's actually very goofy. I don't think this was even a hot take. Lol.
Alastor saying fuck is the funniest thing in this show so far. It was actually gold. Bless him.
I hate that there was actual discourse surrounding episode 5 regarding Charlastor, and that people who hate the ship took the opportunity to either be pissed about their interactions, or celebrate that the ship is dead.
Hell's Greatest Dad was a nice song I really enjoyed it. Alastor and Lucifer sounded great.
A lot of people have already said this, but I think it's pretty obvious that Alastor was only trying to piss Lucifer off with the daughter comments. I don't think he actually sees him & Charlie as family.
Saying that Charlie can almost call Alastor Daddy was jaw dropping lol. I don't get how the ship is dead. It's definitely revived.
I fucking hate Mimzy. She's just an awful friend. She's literally that fake friend that only hits you up when you need something. I don't get how Alastor has been (hazbin) friends with her for so long. Christ.
I would've just thrown Mimzy to the Lone Sharks.
I wonder who "owns" Alastor? Most likely Lilith, that's what everybody has said. It could also possibly be Eve tho. He's definitely been working with someone.
Alastor's monster eldritch form kinda looks how a lot of us expected.
I don't get how Charlie is going to tell Lucifer, the first fallen angel EVER, and God's actual former favorite, what Heaven would say or think. He's already been there before. He knows how they work.
"More than Anything" was actually a pretty sweet song. It kinda hit close to home. Lucifer really sounded like the Angel he is.
Cherri & Sir Pentious are actually really cute. I kinda saw that one coming. Idk how they'd fuck tho. Ewwww.
Something is weird about Charlie not being on that list when they got to Heaven. Some people have speculated that she's in the wrong place. Hmmmm.
I don't really care for Sera or Emily. Idk I just don't. Sorry y'all.
"Welcome To Heaven" was such a weird gay ass song. 🤣 Why was that white ass twink priest practically moaning lmao...but the song was giving some type of backstreet boys or NSYNC.
I didn't think Lute or any of the exterminators actually had faces. That was a shock.
Even though it was already obvious to so many I was still gagged when the Vaggie Angel theory was finally confirmed. I love the way she met Charlie.
Not a hot take but I fucking hate Lute & Adam for doing Vaggie like that. She definitely didn't deserve it. All she did was spare one fucking child. They're evil.
The blackmailing Vaggie thing was very anticlimactic and dumb as fuck especially since they made Vaggie avoid being questioned. It would've been more interesting if Vaggie did what Adam said and spoke against Charlie at the meeting.
I've come to realize that Heaven is just shit and nobody knows what they're doing. The fact that they have a piece of shit like Adam up there and he himself doesn't know why he's there in the first place is very telling.
I don't think Cherri is a bad friend at all, but it was very off putting for her to constantly peer pressure Angel Dust when he's been trying to have a good streak. I get that she's a party animal and don't give a fuck but she could at least be mindful of her friend that's trying to stop their bad habits.
Angel being protective of Nifty when she was drunk was so cute. I'm happy he saved her from Val even if she didn't need it.
"You didn't know" was meh. It had some good parts I liked the overlapping of "Hell Is Forever" but thats really it.
I feel like Charlie is going to forgive Vaggie pretty quickly. I don't think this dramatic revelation of her past is going to cause that big of a rift in their relationship at all, especially with how quick they made up in episode 3.
#hazbin hotel#vivienne medrano#vivziepop#hazbin charlie#hazbin vaggie#chaggie#vaggie x charlie#vaggie#hazbin alastor#alastor#charlastor#charlie x alastor#charlie x vaggie#charlie morningstar#lucifer#lucifer morningstar#hazbin angel dust#angel dust#husk x angel dust#husker hazbin hotel#hazbin hotel husk#huskerdust#dad beat dad#welcome to heaven#hazbin hotel spoilers#sir pentious#cherri bomb#hazbin cherri#sir pentious hazbin hotel
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Llamaaaaa, I’ve got major brain rot over the Maifia babes! Would the situation/ romancing of reader change much if she were the daughter of a rival, Don or a straight and narrow police captain?
oooh... the daughter of a police captain? It might change a few things
Sans: He lies to everyone. Her dad is no exception. He's dedicated every aspect of himself to ensuring she belongs to him- what's one more person to lie to? Though staging her father's death was certainly an option, Sans draws an oddly specific line at killing family (wonder why?).
Sans is charming, in the way many stereotypical sociopaths are. He plays the safe, stable, polite boyfriend that wins her family over with bad jokes and good manners. His facade of having a boring and safe (yet very successful) banking job means Mc's dad might even actively prefer Sans over her past partners, because he believes she'll be safe.
And... well. He's not wrong. The only times Sans has ever been honest with Mc's father was when asked if he loved her, and if he'd keep her safe.
Red: Fuck cops. Red's gonna be the irresistible bad boy with a heart of gold, the attractive and dangerous side of life that she's been denied until now. Power and glamour and parties and all the wild luxuries and freedoms his protection brings- what's her dad gonna do, arrest him for taking a consenting pretty lady on expensive dates? Red likes subtly gloating about how the cops have absolutely no evidence against him for anything.
... He's also going to show her the reality of the police. He'll show her just why he's so antagonistic toward a captain. Things are a lot more complex than her 'straight and narrow' dad has lead her to believe, it's never been as simple as the good cops vs. the evil monsters... why do you think he got so powerful in the first place, doll? Here's a clue; it wasn't because the cops were well liked.
... Cop or not, though, Red gets antsy at the thought of her losing someone she loves. So for the time being, Mc's dad is unaware that Red's 'family' have designated him completely off-limits. Red may despise everything her father stands for, but he's not going to let the man die.
Skull: It doesn't change much about his wooing method. He's still a mess, he still tries to win her over with classical romance methods and pretty things. Who her family is has absolutely no meaning to him. Though... he might start deliberately targeting people who pose a threat to her, considering her dad is most likely well known.
Honestly, if it gets to the point where she's bringing Skull home to meet her family, I can see Mc's dad taking something of a weird shine to Skull. Not knowing about the giant's crimes, obviously. Skull might be physically imposing, but her dad has met a lot of imposing people, and when Skull is around Mc he just seems so... harmless. Like a puppy following her around, waiting for a pat. Skull's total adoration is so clear and untainted that it shines through his terrible appearance.
Her dad gets the strong feeling that no matter what Skull does, he will always put Mc first. He approves of that.
#llamagines#sans is 'yes sir ill have her home by 9pm'#red is 'your daughter calls me daddy too'#skull is......... a secret third thing
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TW: racism
I think the way that comic book media has uncritically pushed anti-Arab racist propaganda (among other kinds) for decades upon decades is an important thing to acknowledge. Like it's not just a couple of bad apples here and there, it's always been pervasive. So many stories, so many villains, so many Arab coded fake evil countries. That kind of thing desensitizes people, dehumanizes entire groups. The politics of media designed for young men and boys (and not just them but for years that was the only audience that mattered, thanks sexism) has consequences.
Seriously, what was this:
As far as I'm aware this never even got an explicit retcon.
I was a little Muslim boy in the mid 2000s reading a Death in the Family because I wanted to know what happened to Jason Todd, and I didn't understand the depths of the propaganda that was being fed to me. I was so desensitized to hearing about terrible things happening in the middle east, and evil terrorists that I didn't question it. And my parents talked to me about what was going on and how it was wrong. But I was still a little kid and I loved Batman and I wasn't at the point where I could really look at the narrative critically, to realize that the authors have worldviews that are biased. I don't think I even grasped that different people wrote the characters. Iran electing known super-terrorist-serial killer-baby eating clown The Joker to represent them because he understood their values is yes, notably crazy, but most of this stuff isn't so loud and obvious, and we didn't leave it in the 80s. Just look at what happened to the depiction of Talia and Ra's post 911 and how they progressive became less human. So just think about the generations of kids reading this crap who had no counter messaging at all. Where does that leave their empathy?
I'm not saying that everything we're seeing is the fault of comic books, that's stupid and reductive and insulting to the complexity of the reality. But what I'm saying is that a lot of these narratives are actively complicit in the kinds of inhumanity we're seeing. Marvel thinking it's appropriate to throw Sabra into a movie in current day is a glaring transgression but it's not some kind of strange outlier. Lots of those films are actively funded by arms of the American military, just look at Captain marvel and Iron Man. And if anyone likes imposing an agenda onto the narrative, it's the military. A lot of this is baked into the fiction, and we owe it to ourselves and others to actively contend with what that means.
I dunno I'm just mad, and disappointed and maybe a little guilty that it took me this long to really realize the full state of things. I spent a lot of time blindly consuming. Like these books were created to be aspirational, to show good people trying to make a better world. But as always happens when art is completely beholden to money, they still serve the politics of the ruling class at the end of the day.
#dc comics#marvel comics#marvel mcu#batman#captain america#iron man#dehumanisation tw#i/p#imperialism#tw racsim#talia al ghul#ra's al ghul#reposted with better formatting
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A drabble on what if Arthur repealed the magic ban while Merlin wasn't there. I like the idea of Arthur thinking Merlin will be mad, he said magic has no place in Camelot afterall. And Merlin being like shit I'm gonna have to start telling the truth.
A fic where Merlin goes to visit his mother for a few weeks. It's Yule and he misses her.
While he is gone a child comes to trial. Hardly 12 and clearly terrified. She had been caught using magic.
She swears she didn't mean to, that it just started happening one day and she was so scared of what was happening to her.
The law says she is to burn.
But Arthur just can't seem to make the call. He can only think of the girl Morgana used to be when he looks at her.
He speaks to Gaius and Geoffrey about what Camelot was like before the ban. How people square magic. He learns, for the first time, more than his father had ever let him.
He's thinking of......well not reversing the magic ban. But this girl can't be evil surely.
He wishes Merlin were here, his advice is often quite sound. But Arthur is unsure if Merlin, who has been so outspoken against magic in the past, would agree with such loose laws.
But it comes down to this. Arthur cannot in good conscience kill that girl. And he can not have her as an exception. So he changes the law.
Merlin hasn't spent this long in Ealdor since before he left. He finds it quite lonely without Will to cause trouble with.
But he finds he is not ostracized like he was when he was a boy. In fact, more often than not he has to dodge mothers pushing their daughters onto him as prospects.
He is in his mother's house trying bundles of herbs to be dried and taken back to Camelot when his mother rushes in.
She stairs at him for a moment. Eyes wide, something clearly about to spill off her toung.
"Mother?" Merlin says moving closer, " What's wrong what happened? Has goodie meridan gone into labor?"
"Merlin. My boy. We just received news from Camelot. Gaius sent a letter. I....." Her face is flush. She doesn't look scared but Merlins heart drops anyway
"Arthur...." Merlin starts
"He's fine, he's fine" Hunith walks towards her son, cupping his face in her hands.
She laughs. Full belly and full of joy, her hands on his face strong, they almost hurt.
"He repealed the magic ban Merlin. Oh my boy by royal decree"
Merlins knees nearly give out.
"Surely you aren't serious....." Merlin gasps. "Do you have the letter?"
She hands it over and he reads frantically.
My good Hunith.
I write you instead of Merlin for reasons that will become obvious.
I also just request more of that dried lavender you sent last time, it does not smell the same from the north.
How is your neighbor Gregory fairing with his leg? My tonic recipe helped I hope, I would like to hear how it went.
There is news from Camelot. You might have heard, it will make fast news I'm sure.
A girl was brought to court for magic. Hardly 12 summers, she swears she did not train for magic, that it came naturally and she has no control.
Arthur was hesitant to burn her, despite the law, and tasked me with examining her.
I explained my findings, you know my friend how truly common it is to have magic as the girl does. Arthur listened well, and I sent the king off with what recommendations I could.
There are few books left on the subject but he spoke to Geoffrey. I assume he found some enlightened reading.
The next day, his verdict was as follows.
"The law of the land, as set by my Father King Uther, is that magic has no place in Camelot. I quite agree. Magic is dangerous, it has raveged my family.
But I can't help but think these laws might create more enemies. I cannot kill a girl for a crime she did not willingly commit. But I cannot banish her and create an enemy."
The council spoke on formal matters and specifics but Hunith, it is looking well. I feel hope I haven't had in decades.
Arthur has repealed the magic ban, in part. There are specifics to be worked out, and it is unclear if it would apply to Merlin. It certainly wouldn't apply to myself.
I will write again when I have more details.
I wish I could see the boy's face when he hears the news. Give him my love
Gaius
Merlin reads it. Than again. The third time he skims it he is tearing up. Looking desperately for any sign that Gaius tells a lie.
When he finds none, and there is no answer but that Gaius's words are true.
Merlin weeps. He falls to his knees and weeps.
Hunith cradles his head, spilling some tears of her own.
"oh my boy" she says. "What news. I knew Arthur would be a good king." She presses a kiss to her son's head.
Merlin cries, and wonders why he feels more scared than ever.
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