#history does not exist without the harsh
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Chapter 1: From Tradegy to Fantasy - Awakening in Another World
Pairing: Gojo x fem!reader
Warnings: reader's death, language
Genre: Isekai, Romance, Fantasy
Synopsis: Your life takes a tragic turn as you perish in a car crash, only to awaken in a whimsical world of fantasy with none other than Jujustu Kaisen characters as its main protagonists. But as if that wasn't enough, you're about to marry the prince version of Gojo Satoru. How will you navigate through this world of history and fantasy? Does your life take the same sudden twist of fate as that of your favorite characters?
Next Chapter ->
„Are you reading those strange stuff again…What was it called? Manga?”
“I’m only watching the anime because of that hot blindfolded guy.”
You don’t even try to look up from your phone, currently reading the newest publication of the Jujutsu Kaisen manga over some sketchy site online. That hot blindfolded guy…You’ll never understand why some girls are only watching Jujutsu Kaisen because of him, Gojo Satoru. This world has so much more to offer, so much more than this overpowered character not even Gege himself likes.
“It’s not exactly reading”, you mutter, so sunken into the drawn fight in front of your eyes that you simply can’t look away.
“(y/n), come back to reality. We have some classes to attend.”
Out of instinct, you roll your eyes. You’ll probably have to listen to that one professor who always talks about himself and simply reads through his presentation for three hours straight, not even allowed to look at your phone and do something useful instead. Urgh, being an uni student sucks.
“Give me a minute, I’m just finishing this chapter.”
When your friends start walking, you follow them without paying attention. This is it, the fight you’ve been waiting for. Maybe this time someone is able to defeat Sukuna, maybe this will be the day you’ve been waiting for. Fuck plot armour, fuck all the horrible things that happened last, all the beloved characters that had to die. Damn, you still miss Geto to this day. If they would have noticed sooner, he might be still alive-
“(Y/N), WATCH OUT!”
You always wondered about how death must feel like. Getting consumed by darkness, getting dragged into sheer empty space. Does it hurt? Will you die right on the spot and feel absolutely nothing? What about that myth about reminiscing your own life shortly before your death?
The second you looked into those blinding car lights, you knew exactly that you are next, that there is no way you’ll survive the hit that will sweep you off your feet, that throws your body into the air like a plastic bag.
How pathetic to die like this. Getting hit by a car while being glued to the sketches of fictional characters on your phone. What will your parents say, your family, your friends? You don’t want to die like this, but still…
You allow your eyes to rest against your harsh light, your phone dropping to the phone. You can’t escape the hit. Maybe, just maybe, you will wake up in a better world.
If stuff like that even exists.
When you open your eyes again, you brace yourself for an immense wave of pain hunting down your body, for getting greeted by those way too harsh hospital lights. But instead, your eyes open with ease. Instead, you get greeted by the dim light of a golden chandelier in and a well-painted ceiling in all different shades of purple.
“Where on earth…Am I?”, you mutter to yourself.
The second you look down on you, your heart drops to the floor. You aren’t wearing a pair of leggings and an oversized tee like you always do. No, you are covered in the softest white fabric you ever felt from head to toe, an elegant lavendel ribbon tied around your waist. And that delicate jewellery...
Immediately, you yank out of bed and almost trip over the hem of the white dress, coming to a stand in front of a mirror.
This isn’t possible. No, this has to be a feverish dream. Maybe they put you into coma after…
You swallow hard, reality hitting you with full force. You died. As soon as the car hit you, you were dead right on the spot and you knew it instantly. But why does everything feel so damn real? Frantically, your hands wander around the sweaty face that looks back at you in sheer horror through the mirror, stare at the lavendel eyes that don’t look like yours at all. But those facial features, the way your hair falls.
Is it…you?
A violent scream escapes your lips before you’re able to stop it, guts turning so uncomfortably that you feel like puking every minute. This can’t be true. This can’t be your reality now…Just before your feet give in, you grab the cool golden frame of the mirror, allow your spinning head to rest for a second.
“Lady Zenin, are you alright!?”
That distant voice, who is it talking to? Lady Zenin…Like Toji, Mai and Maki Zenin? Maybe you didn’t die but got kidnapped into a pervert cosplay party. Slowly, you turn around, face sticky in cold sweat.
But the man standing in front of you doesn’t look like a creep at all. No, he’s a truly elegant man. Maybe in his 50s, but it is clear that he’s taking care of himself. His eyes look at you worried, his gloved hands stretched out in order to help if you fall.
“Where…Where am I?”, you press out.
This isn’t your hometown. Fuck, this isn’t even your home country, not even your timeline. The stuff in this room looks so old and somehow magical, let alone that dress you’re wearing.
“I don’t understand, Lady Zenin. You are in your room”, the man replies visibly worried.
“What country?”, you probe.
“My lady, we are still in Avaloria…Are you feeling unwell? Shall I call the doctor-“
“In Avaloria. And I’m Lady Zenin…”, you mumble to yourself.
This doesn’t make any sense. You didn’t pay that much attention to geography, but you know for a fact that Avaloria isn’t a real country and that your last name definitely isn’t Zenin. But oh that last name is definitely familiar to you, so familiar that it’s frightening. Suddenly a shiver runs down your spine, dark foreshadowing letting your fingertips shake.
“What is my father’s name?”
You don’t want this answer. No, all you want to do is waking up from this dream, from this nightmare. You aren’t a lady, you aren’t a Zenin. You are nothing but plain (y/n) who adores anime and manga a little too much and still goes to university. You are nothing but a normal young woman.
“Your lordship…Your lordship is called Naobito Zenin, my Lady”, he stutters.
“And my brother’s name is Naoya, huh?”, you huff out.
This has to be a bad joke, right? What is this man, a stand-up comedian, maybe? You cross your arms in front of your chest, force your body to stop shaking. You need to put this madness to an end right now.
“Yes, exactly my Lady!”, the man in front of you literally cries out in relief while the ground is pulled underneath your feet.
No, nothing about this is right. These men, their names…They are nothing but an invention by Gege Akutami, nothing but drawn figures in a book adapted into an anime. They are nothing but fantasy, nothing but fiction.
“B-But…”
Your voice fails as your mind can’t process anymore. Is it really possible that…You were reincarnated into a world like this?
“Are you causing a scene again, sister?”
You don’t recognize the voice speaking behind you, but something inside you tells you that if you turn around, you will be greeted by…
Cold, sharp brown eyes.
Your very own orbs widen in sheer horror. Those dark green roots, the annoyed look on his face, his tall muscular frame. He looks exactly like the manga made him appear. But instead of wearing a kimono, he is dressed in a black uniform with golden and purple details.
“You’re looking like a fucking prince…”, you breathe out.
“Are you trying to upset me, (y/n)?”
“Master Naoya, the lady doesn’t appear like herself today. Shall I call the doctor?”, the older man speaks with low voice.
“Did you have a bad dream?”
He grabs your chin before you’re able to stop him, his cold glare hitting you with full force.
Naoya just touched you. Fucking Naoya Zenin is standing in front of your very own self, his fingers wrapped around your chin, staring at you so intensely that you feel like fainting any given minute.
“Don’t you dare to mess today’s meeting up because of your weird acting. It took father and I months to arrange a meeting with that lousy prince. Let’s hope that he finds liking in you or else I’ll marry you below your status”, he hisses into your face.
“You can’t just arrange my wedding. Who the hell do you think you are?”, you spit into his face out of instinct.
“All the attention must have gone to your head, (y/n). Who do I think I am? I am your big brother, father’s right hand. And you are nothing but a woman. Your only worth is to marry into a wealthy and influential family. I will never understand why the prince of our country found a liking in you. Apart from a pretty face, you have nothing to offer.”
He yanks your chin away roughly, forces you to take a few steps back and almost sends you onto the floor with the sheer force of his fingertips. Your body quivers in anger, hands balled into fists so tight that your knuckles stand out white.
“I don’t need a prince, I know my own worth you fool!”, you demand.
“Who taught you to talk like this? You are a lady, (y/n). Finally start to act like one or I will tell father about your behaviour. Maybe a venesection will cause your mouth to finally shut, what do you think?”
“A vene-what?”
“Urgh, just be quiet and get yourself ready. You will meet the prince as soon as you are presentable. And don’t you dare to disappoint us”, he hisses through gritted teeth.
And then he’s gone in the wind while you stand in the middle of the room, still unable to catch your shaky breath. Who the hell does this guy think he his? Where exactly are you, what world is this? Your head begins to spin so violently that you fear to lose your balance, your whole life crashing down on you like a house of cards.
This isn’t 2024 on mother earth anymore. This…this is something completely different. And that man who introduced himself as your brother made it all too clear that there’s no way you’ll survive here if you don’t play along. Maybe it’s like in that anime you just watched, the one with the girl names Raeliana. If that’s the case…
“Please call in my maids. I wish to be dressed”, you speak out monotone.
“Of course, Lady (y/n).”
You will play along. But there is no way in hell you’ll let him force you into a marriage with some strange prince you don’t even know. Your eyes are fixated on themselves, the new lavender color gleaming back at you being so unknown as well as all those women who scurry around you.
Who is this prince, anyway? If you’re really in some strange jujutsu kaisen verse, it must be another character. Maybe Geto…Oh, that would be nice. But what if it’s Sukuna? You shake your head, haunt away your stinging imagination. No, you won’t marry the king of curses. Actually, there aren’t many men you’d like as your husband.
How is this supposed to turn out good?
-at the salon-
You feel like fainting any given minute, heart pounding so roughly against your well-dressed ribcage that every beat sends a shiver down your spine. If the man standing in front of you isn’t called Geto or Nanami, you don’t want him. And apart from that…Aren’t you too young to marry anyway? Why does your family want to get rid of you so badly?
“It is so nice to finally meet you in person, Lady (y/n).”
Your heart drops to the floor.
That voice.
Fuck. It’s no doubt that it’s him.
“Let me introduce myself properly: I’m Prince Satoru, the future king of Avaloria.”
The second your brother steps aside, you get greeted by bright blue eyes and a cheeky grin.
This is Gojo Satoru, that “hot guy with the blindfold”, one of the last men you’d like to marry even if he’s dressed in a fine suit with red and blue details. Out of instinct, you cross your arms in front of your chest, narrow eyes staring him into the ground. You will never understand the hype behind his smile and eyes when it’s all too clear that he’s a player, a womanizer. A man like Gojo Satoru isn’t the husband you were imagining, not the man you were looking for since you were a child.
“I’m not marrying that man”, you announce into the silence of the room.
Soo, this was the very first chapter of my new series and it makes me beyond excited! So please, if you enjoyed it, it would make me beyond happy if you like/comment/reblog that work of mine and let me know what you think. Thank you guys so much for your constant support, it means the world 🤍
Tags: @m0k0k0 @lees-chaotic-brain @sanicsmut @risuola @fire-loving-siren @sunshine7queen @gatitam @kentocalls
#jjk#jujutsu kaisen#jujutsu kaisen x reader#jjk x reader#gojo x reader#gojo satoru#jjk gojo#jujutsu gojo#gojo saturo#gojou satoru x reader#jjk romance#jjk fantasy au!#jjk fanfic#jjk story#jjk fluff#jjk x you#jjk angst#jujutsu kaisen gojo#gojou x reader#gojo satorou#satoru gojo#satoru gojo x reader#gojo x you#gojo x y/n#naoya zenin#jjk naoya#zenin clan#zenin reader#isekai reader#isekai
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Yeah, the desire to fit Hank and Connor into romantic or familial roles, regardless of which ones those are, often results in erasing canon traits of both of them being snarky cynical assholes with no actual authority over one-another. Hank is not an “adult” of the two, he doesn’t even have his own shit together to teach someone else how to, and Connor doesn’t exactly respect Hank as an authority, never did, but he does however put his customer service smile for pretence of being just another polite service android (totally without the capability of breaking a law or hurting a human), but even this is optional as he can be mean right from the beginning. He will make sure to find what you care about not only in order to make you like him, but also to ensure to find the exact words that will get to you in order to hurt if he finds that to be more efficient. He’ll make his insults as personal as he makes his compliments (which are, let’s be honest, mostly quite shallow in both cases), but for some reason this fandom takes first ones as genuine (even when they’re extremely obviously fake and only there as a manipulation) and the existence of others prefers to just ignore completely. Even though they are as genuine (as in potentially not at all) if not more.
Connor didn’t start liking Hank right away, frankly his honest description of him was “an unpleasant and dysfunctional” BUT also “intriguing”. He developed a sentimental attachment for Hank over time, but in no way he began to respect Hank on a level of authority, not more than Hank himself started to respect Connor, which in both cases is “as a person”.
Hank himself is highly opinionated cop who sees nothing wrong with taking some bribes here and there. In no way he’s holy. I doubt he craves power as much as he craves reinforcing his own definition of moral justice, which, in no way means that he’s always right and isn’t one of many corrupted cops in a corrupted system, it just means that he doesn’t have respect towards the law and rules he “should” follow and instead has his own (Do you think he’s always “fair” and never cuts some slack to those who don’t deserve it (*cough* a place with a history of food safety violations *cough*) or instead harshly punish those whose biggest crime was just being annoying and pissing him off when he’s not in the mood? We know the man is fucking reactive and real quick to throw hands. We often point out that Gavin suggested to “roughen up a little” but I don’t see no one talking about how unnecessary harsh Hank handles Rupert in case he and Connor happen to catch up with him. Do you think Rupert is the first one or Hank is only acting this way because Rupert is an android? I doubt it.)
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Psych Kick
saiki k x reader (wc: 1k)
intrusive thoughts won on this one lads. [also, little reminder that saiki k is canonically asexual but coming from someone who’s on the ace/aro-spectrum who sometimes enjoys sex, i made it a little suggestive.] college au, duh.
“What? Big hotshot can’t join his friends for a hangout?”
“Hot-?” Saiki blows a short breath out of his nose as he adjusts his glasses. “Like I said, let's do it later.”
Nendo frowns. “Whyyy~”
“Must have another meeting with the president this time.” Hario you too?! “It’s best we let him go save the world again.”
“Why are you all being so bitter about this-“
“Come on! What could possibly be so important that you can’t hang out with your pals for once?” And now Kaido’s talking like Nendo. It’s best to cut this short. “We haven’t seen you in forever since that whole meteor thing! Do you really think you’re too good for us now?”
Saiki sighs.
There’s no way to go about saying this without getting haggled immediately afterwards. Especially given the extreme circumstance. He’s not stupid. He’s not shallow but he’s not blind either. Ever since this whole thing came about he’s been chiding himself on picking so outside of his current dispositions, making himself so open to attention and fighting that pesky feeling of being so okay with it. His first idea was to keep it a secret, but now with his feelings - new feelings in the way; he has to stop himself from making a show of it like someone he knows would. For a second he wonders if this was the kind of path that drove his parents to madness.
His cheeks grow hot as he thumbs over his phone in his hands, and at the very least, he can be thankful it’s just these four for now.
He wants to turn his head. “My… girlfriend-“
“Stop lying!”
He didn’t even let him get it out!
Torituska pouts from his chair across the room, sitting backwards on a computer seat that turns his expression mushy as he leans against it. “Seriously, if you’re gonna make up something, at least come up with a more believable lie.” Now you’re just being mean.
“Hah? What’s so unbelievable about me having a girlfriend?”
“You can hear yourself when you speak right?”
He’s gonna start scowling at this rate.
“Wait, hold on.” Hario repositions his back against the bed as he but’s in, raising his hands to interject. There’s a look on his face like he’s trying to placate the two. “Let’s not act like Saiki isn’t a spirited guy! He’s helpful and faithful to his ideals! And his personality isn’t even that bad.” You’re not helping.
“He doesn’t even own a porn mag. - And his search history is squeaky clean.“ What does one have to do with the other?
“If you have a girlfriend, why haven’t we met her yet?”
That would be a pretty good question. Had one quick glance along the room not make him shiver at the prospect of introducing them to his pride and joy. God, he’s starting to sound like his dad.
“Is she in our lectures? Does she go to this university? Does she know you exist?”
“Does she belong to the Dark Reunion?”
“Do you own a pair of her panties?”
Do you know what you’re asking him right now? Aside from a quick flick of his finger and a harsh eraser mark on Torituska’s forehead, Saiki turns his head toward the door in favor of a response. He can barely think under these conditions to begin with. No better that he knows his friends don’t plan on going anywhere even after he leaves his dorm for the night, and with his luck might even be here by morning. But that’s beside the fact. If these guys don’t believe he has a girlfriend, they’ll never believe what he’s leaving so prematurely to do.
Does he keep that box of condoms in his closet or his bathroom?
“What’s her name?”
Saiki’s lips twitch up as he reaches into that black box tucked near his extra blankets, half inclined to hum it as it rolls over his tongue. “_____.”
Hario’s mouth shapes into an astonished little “o” as Kaido tilts his head, too preoccupied with that foreign shade of rouge on his friend’s face to notice Torituska’s gone pale. “Sounds foreign?”
Saiki glances at Nendo’s puzzled expression and follows it to Torituska’s ghostly body. Decidedly he should leave before things get loud. “It is.”
“W-Wait you mean,” Hario blushes. That’s appropriate. “______ from the-“
“I’ll kill you!” That’s not.
The pointed finger keeps Tori frozen in the air but his strength is enough to make Saiki start to strain. Maybe it should stay a secret. He sighs at what’s sure to be some psychosis driven tirade that he really doesn’t have the time to sit through.
“What does a guy like you get off on trying to call dibs on my precious, _____?! Peon’s like you shouldn’t be able to speak her name let alone spread lies about being her boyfriend! What are you some kind of stalker or something?! A pervert?! Were you gonna stalk her outside of her house and steal her used gum out of the garbage near the gate?!” Why was that last part so specific…?
“______’s really smart and cool and beautiful…” Hario scratches behind his pinkening ears. “And she’s really good at fighting despite looking so soft all over. - If you’re really dating ______ then…. Well it’s certainly hard to believe…”
Saiki’s brow twitches a little. “I didn’t know you were all such big fans.”
“I don’t know her. But she definitely doesn’t seem like the type of person who’d date Saiki-kun.” Kaido adds.
Saiki’s phone buzzes in his hand as he sighs. And he doesn’t even have to look. He was supposed to be there minutes ago and knowing you you’ve probably gotten needier by the second. Although, that might not be so bad.
“I gotta go.” He pockets his phone.
Torituska knocks him back with a hard push as he breaks out of his bind. “You’re probably using your telepathic abilities to trick her into dating you! You sick-“
His condoms fall out of his pocket.
The silence that falls over the room is deafening as the five men freeze in place, eyes immediately pulled to the golden wrapper making waves on plastic as it's illuminated by the ceiling light overhead. And he’s sure that they’ve all collectively stopped breathing. Never mind that his friends now know what kind of heat he’s packing in his trousers, but there’s multiple of them. If the whole group was here he’d be half considering the most appropriate way to ditch town after something like this, but in this case he’s only considering the best way to get out of this situation before all hell breaks loose.
He’ll teleport. Like he should’ve minutes ago. Though this time with likely less precision.
Saiki reaches for the grouped up squares and staches them in his pocket, phasing his overnight bag into his hands as he does. “If I’m not back by noon, push the mail in.”
He glances at a lifeless Torituska. “Bye.”
He’s gone in a blink.
reblog if you personally have been targeted by Torituska, you may be entitled to compensation
#this is so niche#do his friends know about his psychic abilities? who cares you’re in my world now#saiki k#kusuo saiki#saiki x reader#saiki k drabble
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imagine being a god who scaramouche worships and respects and admires greatly (to the point of unhealthy obsession). he is so devoted to you because you’ve been with him throughout every stage of his life. he met you as kabukimono, and you were a guiding light amidst all of the gloom that soon befell him. you showed him beauty amidst death and despair. you smiled at him when others looked upon him with fear and horror. you extended your kind hands in forgiveness, washing away bloodshed and grime, informing him of the worth of a mortal’s life. a fleeting, precious span of time in which they exist as flesh and blood—moments that are easily snuffed. you tell him, wise and understanding as ever, that he is not truly bad. that is he simply grappling with difficult concepts he can’t yet comprehend. that his mourning does not make him monstrous.
though this doesn’t justify all the villainous deeds he has done as kabukimono, it does leave quite the impact on him. and for once he thinks the gods are not so bad. you aren’t so bad. but then, when he was kabukimono, he was always so willing to explore, to trust and learn, to see and taste. to live unapologetically.
when he’s scaramouche, he hunts you down and captures you for himself. time has not been kind to a god such as yourself. you’ve grown weaker and are hardly worth any devotion now, which makes it quite easy to confine a poor, defenseless god such as yourself. but like you, time has also not been well to scaramouche. he is cruel and cold, hardened by the passage of decades. he is shattered glass that has been repaired with the glue of fallen enemies. he has no true allies—only fatui allies by circumstance, but even then these allies are not to be trusted or relied on. he is all alone, a being without hope. a being who shrouds himself in hatred and darkness so that he will never look or feel weak or “human” again.
he constantly reminds you that you are nothing. that your era has long since faded and that there’s no one left (aside from himself) who will remember you. even when he’s scaramouche, you still treat him kindly. even when he cuts into you with harsh remarks and insults, you smile at him. even when he tells you he could end your pitiful existence right here and now, you hold your hands out and ask for his permission to sing a lullaby. if his mood happens to be good, he may allow it. the first time you sung him a lullaby was your last. you’ll never know why, but scaramouche does. it’s because your sweet voice and the stories you weaved into song were enough to bring forth buried emotions. it was enough to make him feel human. it was enough to bring him to tears.
as shouki no kami, he requests that you be present for when he finally becomes a true god. he will never admit to it, but one of his reasons for seeking godhood was so that he could be closer to you. or perhaps even above you as a being of divine power. maybe then he could restore some of your weakened powers so that he could ensure you would never wither away into nothing. shouki no kami does not seem to hate you as he did when he was scaramouche. rather, he seems confident in himself and his abilities. he will sculpt a new era with you at his side. when he’s a god, perhaps you will finally recognize him as someone worthy of disapproval and frowns, for you’ve only ever shown him sweetness and smiles, even when he was at his most dastardly. for once, he seeks not your love but your scrutiny.
when he emerges into the world as wanderer, he meets you once more. this time you greet him with a smile, but you can’t recognize him. you don’t recall the bloodstained history you’ve shared with him, for it no longer exists. yet you still smile. the one who subjected you to such cruelty stands before you and even though you don’t recall him you still smile. you take his hands in your warm ones as you had done in the past and you smile.
wanderer isn’t sure why this is enough to have tears forming at the corners of his eyes, but oddly enough he lowers to his knees, pulls your hands closer to where his vision rests against his chest, and he asks you to sing him a lullaby. you have always been a selfless, caring god, so you lower into the grass with him, embrace him firmly, and you sing a familiar melody.
lesser lord kusanali has told him that all beings are worthy of second chances. wanderer thinks this is both a second chance and a punishment, for the emotions that overwhelm him hurt. but it’s a pain that’s special. it’s a pain that reminds him of his sordid past.
it reminds him that even he, a wanderer without a name or a background or a home, is worthy of divine acceptance.
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The Evolution of Aloy
This time around, I want to talk about Aloy herself and how she's changed over the course of the two games.
It's funny how some characters in gaming franchises never change even after decades. World views, personal growth, temperment etc. They stay the same for better or for worse. Often, even after cataclysmic, world changing events, they remain the same.
In Horizon Forbidden West (PC) this does not seem to be the case. Yes, other characters have changed but I want to focus on our protagonist.
It seems to me that in HFW, Aloy has exponentially changed and not in completely positive ways. In what I believe to be a conscience choice by the writers to show this evolution, there are some things she has said where I found myself cringing and saying things like "Hey, easy now" or "Whoa! Come on. Don't be like that!" when she's addressing various characters during interactions that involve spirituality and belief.
I've found myself, without giving spoilers, thinking "Shit. That was a bit harsh!" as she intentionally or not, crushes someone's feelings either by indifference or action/inaction. As someone with Autism, I can very much relate to being perceived as indifferent or uncaring/unfeeling when that is not the case at all.
I also feel like she has become a bit of a chest puffer (gotten a tad full of herself) like when she threatens death to a highly respected Chief. Saying she could just kill hiim and take, instead of waiting to be given; what she wants. These aren't particularly likeable aspects of her growth but they are realistic and understandable given the unimaginable stress of being everybody's "Savior" when all she wants is to be Aloy.
As her knowledge of AI and technology, science, history etc. has grown, she has, as typically has been the case in humanity's evolution, begun to show a sometimes not so thinly veiled contempt for cultures that still practice spirituality and make a lot of decisions based on their beliefs and/or societal hierarchy.
There exists now, at least as I have perceived it, a new aspect to her very complex personality not just in her verbal communication but also in terms of subtle looks of exasperation, eye rolling, and an outright dismissive attitude towards spiritual practices by new cultures she's encountered.
When she meets a character that has far more knowledge and understanding of science, technology and history than her, they in a very Aloy way of doing things, make sure she's aware of that fact.
This is, to me at least, when she (to use a bit of a cliche) suddenly realizes she is no longer the smartest person in the room and she does not like it.
Now, since AI is a huge part of the story, I decided to ask one about this change/growth/evolution that has happened with her and here is what it said:
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"Aloy’s character development in “Horizon Forbidden West” reflects her growing knowledge and understanding of the world’s history and technology. As she uncovers more about the ancient past and the true nature of the machines and AI, her perspective shifts 1. This shift may lead her to view the spiritual practices and beliefs of other tribes through a more critical lens, especially when they conflict with her scientific discoveries.
In “Horizon Zero Dawn,” Aloy is an outcast seeking the truth about her origins and the world. Her journey leads her to challenge the dogmatic views of her tribe and question the world around her. By the time of “Horizon Forbidden West,” Aloy has become a figure of significant importance, and her experiences have made her more confident in her knowledge 1. This confidence might come across as dismissiveness or intolerance, but it’s rooted in her deep understanding of the world’s workings, which often contradicts the tribal myths and beliefs.
Her character’s evolution is a complex interplay between her personal growth, the revelations she uncovers, and the responsibilities she shoulders. It’s a narrative choice that adds depth to her character and reflects the tension between tradition and progress"
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Again, the section in quotation marks is the response from an AI and NOT something I wrote. Just making this extra clear.
This is pretty much the point I wanted to make. As an Anishinabe (Ojibway/Chippewa) living on the Rez, because of my people's complex, elemental, natural and spiritual belief systems, I have a good understanding of a lot of cultural practices portrayed in the game.
As a reasonably intelligent, compassionate and empathetic human being, I've also learned that I have to balance my cultural beliefs and practices with the realities of living in "modern" times and that means being respectful of not just my own culture, but to others whose belief systems may be perceived to be less enlightened than others.
This does not make me dislike her or playing as Aloy. It actually makes me enjoy it even more because it makes me feel and accept a lot of things few games do. Like, how we're not infallible. We are flawed. We can get our asses kicked. We have an ego that can get the better of us. it also makes me respect the writers even more for not letting her be a one dimensional, "White Savior"
I like the discomfort I feel playing as Aloy when she's constantly being put on a pedestal as if she had saved the world all by herself when she keeps telling people she was just one of many.
I like the annoyance I feel when someone makes a snide comment as I'm walking by them and I literally stop and turn around thinking "Say that to my face. Yeah, that's what I thought"
I like the frustration of wanting to scream "I HAVE A NAME FFS!" every time someone calls me "Outlander" and wanting to just get on my Charger and fuck off into the wilds and leave the world to it's own devices.
Yes, as she grows she develops some not so great character flaws but that's what is so great about it. It makes her even more real and relatable. After all, she's only human.
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I have the flu. I Crave Death (Thirteen) So it is time to post my fav Thirteen cards!
Double Hide and Seek
The outfit I would sell a kidney to see again 😫 She may be a punk rocker, but she wears Goth so beautifully! The thigh high lace ups fuel my fire and nourish my soul. This artist without compare draws the most beautiful Thirteen 🤌
Diavolo's Diner Dash
THE BOOB WINDOW!! I did not have optimism about fanservice even though Thirteen was specifically included to appeal to the audience who want to date women! She is the most flirtatious and only newbie who actually like likes MC and wants to spend time with us. NB fed us well and you can view any of her interactions as platonic, but in my opinion they are unambiguously her asking us out on dates and even though she's a harsh woman, a bit of a drama queen with a short fuse she is kind, protective and cares about supporting us. Characters who are mean or "mean" to everyone except one special person are my thing. She also equipped us with an item that could oneshot Lucifer. Why else would the guys get huffy and jealous if they didn't feel like she was a threat? 😂 I'm disappointed we couldn't return to the scene at a proper time and promise her our soul the way that MC can make promises with other characters. :/
Matching Costumes
MY FAVE OF FAVS!! The cutest of all! I pretend the men don't exist and that she is holding her skirt up and flashing her thighs like a showgirl. You literally cannot stop me.
Western Showdown (Not my pic, I don't have the access to my side account anymore 😭😭😭)
THE CORSET. THE CORSET. The worst plotline with Thirteen. MC behaves jealously and Thirteen serves as an "antagonist/rival." WHY. WE SHOULD HAVE BEEN ABLE TO HAVE FUN WITH HER NOT BE PETTY AND JEALOUS. I can't think of any other card where MC could be 💩y to a character and behave possessively over their preferred partner. I like him, but I would have thrown Diavolo under the bus so fast if it meant I could choose Thirteen. The cute artwork and Yeehaw!Thirteen save it for me though hehehe.
Thirteen Thoughts
I think they messed up the opportunity to give Thirteen a navel ring. She has her midriff exposed and with her style, piercings and tattoos it makes NO SENSE for her not to have a belly button ring. I headcanon she does and has other body piercings.
I hope we get Candy next season. I have so many unanswered questions about Thirteen and her sister. It feels like they just scratched Lilith off the list, but I thank them with all my heart for fleshing her out more and giving her a non-passive personality. That she wasn't just attached to a brother the whole time or her human lover and that she had a bold, outspoken personality which is what I treasure about Thirteen too. Thirteen is allowed to be dumb, make mistakes, be rowdy and rude just like the male characters are which I ALSO treasure! I believe that too often women are othered as "too good to do any of that so let's leave them out of the fun". Thirteen and Mammon and Thirteen and Barbatos have some of my favorite interactions, she is far from boring and that she includes us and thinks highly of us despite being such a standoffish loner who prefers solitude...man she is TSUNDERE.
Her history and the Reaper Realm are overdue especially since she's not just an active member of the cast, but one who seeks MC out. She crosses paths with us way too often and "coincidentally" to be anything but intentional since Reaper Realm is described as far from the Devildom. A rant about Michael and Raphael is for another day though. 😒
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I don’t mean to sound harsh with some of the people upset about his tattoos but I have to genuinely wonder how some people actually thought there would be a day that jungkook would say to thousands/millions of ARMY on live that his J stood for his band mate, one that a sizable amount of people think he is dating, I mean let’s be for real. Too many people expect them to act like a couple that isn’t in some pretty wild circumstances. I know we miss them but I would hope that main thing we got from his live was that he is genuinely resting for the first time in probably his whole time as an idol. He has grown his hair, something he has always wanted to do and kissing his dog and just being his adorable self. I could only watch the first hour before I had to go to work so I have about 3 hours to catch up on lol but like I do wish some jkkrs could just be happy with whatever content we get lives or prefilmed and enjoy content regardless of jikook crumbs or not. I mean we got a Vibe cover by JK how can we be disappointed.
I think many were really devastated by him debunking the army are the members theory, and are clinging to his J is for JK like super glue.
Because they know, deep down, that there is no way that JK could come clean if it was put there over the M for JM. And at the same time they also know very well there is no real logical explanation for JK to put the J (meaning JK) over the M if not for the JM.
So they play dumb on the one hand, but turn aggressive toward us for saying it as it is:
That JK ain't no dumb ass that does things without thought, and happened to place the J above the M without noticing the JM all loud and clear.
Yeah-nah.
This constant underestimating JK and his intelligence, ugh.
The man that showed us loud and clear what JM stood for for him.
He's the one that wouldn't notice it on his hand, when he decided to place it in that exact place (his ring finger above the M), on the special visit he made to the tattoo artist to add the J to the already existing ARMY on his hand...
Me taking a big breath and moving on to the next infuriating thing...
JK was adorable talking about Vibe, singing it, knowing JM's lyrics to a T. And yet every single thing this man does is twisted.
He just can't do right by this fandom.
And the latest joke I heard today was those so scared of admitting JK knew Sam Smith's Unholy, like knew the whole song and 'unholy' clip, that they stoop to convincing themselves that he doesn't actually know the song, not really, it's what he's seen on Tiktok, that's it.
So, for those jokers, if by any chance they are here in my space reading these lines, a gift from me to you:
youtube
Enjoy!!!
I can assure you that JK sure did!!!
Enjoy it, that is.
Stop underestimating JK.
Stop insulting his intelligence.
JK knows the song.
He knows who performs the song.
Sam Smith, who identifies himself as non-binary and genderqueer, and Kim Petra, a transgender woman.
Kim Petra, who happens to be the first transgender woman to ever win a Grammy.
I was so sad BTS didn't get that coveted prize, but if to lose, well there is NO ONE else I would have rather lost to.
To sum it up:
A big chunk of this fandom is ugh.
JK is adorable and intelligent and knows what he's doing.
We love him to bits.
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in defense of thranduil
hello! so you know how i occasionally do “in defense of” meta posts about unpopular characters ( X X X ) ? well, i’ve been thinking for a while about doing one for thranduil, but i wasn’t quite sure how to go about it since tbh, i don’t think anyone could call thranduil unpopular. his ao3 tag is very well-populated, and, ahem, a good portion of it is smut lol. he even has a ton of “x reader” stuff about him on tumblr, which to me is usually the hallmark of a popular character. but i’ve felt the urge to defend him anyway, and i think it’s because... well. i do think a character can be both popular and misunderstood, and for all the thranduil enthusiasm i’ve seen, i’ve seen just as much thranduil hate and criticism, so clearly something about him has people at odds. specifically, a lot of people seem to think he’s a bad dad, and/or that the peter jackson movies totally butchered his character, which is really interesting to me because i actually believe neither. so i’m going to try to illustrate why! i’ll be primarily discussing movie-verse thranduil in this post, with a few references to the books as a secondary source. so without further ado, here is why i think thranduil is A Good Dad Actually, and the movies are not a “butchering” of but a compelling darker/grittier spin on a character who - since he exists in tolkien’s written works only in a book for children and in the margins of a sprawling and very bloody history - only really works if you reconcile those two things.
under a cut because as always, this is LONG!
let’s first talk about what seems to be people’s main grievance with movie-verse thranduil: the fact that he’s “turned into this greedy character whose only motive is getting back those gems” when that’s not what he’s like in the book. while it’s definitely true that there are a few key differences between book thranduil and movie thranduil, i actually don’t think that the two versions are so incongruous with each other. the areas where they differ, i think, flesh out movie thranduil into a character who compels beyond his simplified, kid-friendly presentation in the hobbit book and who makes sense within the larger historical context of his world. it’s true that the elvenking in the hobbit isn’t explicitly interested in material gain. he mainly seems to get involved in the battle of the five armies to help out bard, since mirkwood is allied with laketown. and there’s also no mention in the book of the elvenking having lost his wife, even though that’s a key part of his backstory in the hobbit movies. in the movies, those gems that he’s so interested in getting back from the dwarves are actually a necklace that belonged to his wife before she died. he’s still motivated by wanting to help laketown - which is why he shows up before the battle with wagons of food and supplies for the starving people - but he’s also motivated by grief - something deeply personal that none of the other characters (except gandalf, because gandalf knows everything lol) are even aware of, and this, i feel, gives depth to his character.
the thing is, thranduil seems greedy because none of the other characters know of, and thus inherently cannot understand, his real reason for pursuing the gems. and it’s true - at face value, it doesn’t make sense why he’d seemingly put his people at risk for a random necklace. a pretty harsh reading of thranduil’s motives could even align him with thorin’s dragon-sickness. but remember how the battle of the five armies started? thranduil and bard pulled up with their forces thinking it was gonna be all of them against twelve dwarves and a hobbit lol. they probably thought there’d be no casualties and it’d be over in twenty minutes! they had no way of knowing how many other forces were going to get involved. and when thranduil does see the first elves laying dead on the ground, he tries to draw out. he never wanted to spend his people’s lives like that. he realizes he had been blinded by his grief for his wife and had acted selfishly - and personally, i like this a lot better than the book’s sort of handwave-y explanation for why the elvenking is even bothering to involve himself and his kingdom in the (petty, by his standards) affairs of dwarves and men. because... movie thranduil is not just Like That for no reason. he has a whole history, going wayyy beyond his wife’s death even, that makes him the way he is - and that is what is so satisfying about his portrayal in the movies, because it actually attempts to acknowledge that deeper context.
we have to remember that thranduil, at least in comparison to pretty much every other character in the hobbit, is old as hell. he reminds us of this multiple times in the movies: “a hundred years is a mere blink in the life of an elf. i can wait.” for a character who presumably shouldn’t need to worry or think about death, he’s unusually fixated on his own immortality in the movies, a trait that is missing from the books. and while i do get why some readers are charmed by the idea of an elf who doesn’t seem to perceive himself very differently than the men and dwarves he’s surrounded by, i’m a lot more drawn in by the idea of an elf who just can’t forget about how different he is. because if you actually think about where thranduil fits into the bigger history of middle-earth, it’s sort of hard to turn the page back from this darker, more scarred side to him - because yeah, he might live forever if he avoids conflict, but he also knows death in a way that someone like bilbo baggins would not even be able to conceptualize. thranduil was born in doriath in the first age, making him old enough to likely have been involved in not one but two kinslayings against his people. we know nothing about his mother, making it likelier than not that she was lost in one of them when he was still a child. his father, oropher, the original elvenking of the greenwood, was killed in the battle of dagorlad in the second age - the “last stand” of elves against sauron. thranduil, fighting alongside him and the silvan elves, had to watch his father die and then be crowned as the new king right then and there. (also, oropher died in the very first charge of the battle, which then continued on for months. imagine how hard it’d have been to stave off that creeping hopelessness.) and finally, thranduil’s wife was killed in battle at some point not long after their son was born. thranduil’s dragon fire scar on his face is an invention of the movies, and it’s unclear when exactly it happened - at the same battle where he lost his wife? some time earlier? but anyways. i’ve been going on and on about his life for a reason, and that reason is Thranduil Has Seen A Lot Of Shit. it’s easy to look at him in the movies and critique him - why is he so cold? why is he an isolationist ruler when in the books he’s more welcoming (after initially chucking the dwarves in jail, lol)? but the hobbit isn’t really thranduil’s story, so exposing all of this context in the movies wouldn’t have made much sense, would it. and i actually like that there are some gaps, because that’s what makes him so interesting. no one knows his history, and why should they? when it comes down to it, thranduil is just a side character in someone else’s adventure.
the last thing that i really want to address is thranduil’s relationship with legolas, his son - partly to refute the idea that he’s a bad dad, but also partly to talk about how despite all the griping that i’ve seen about how stupid it was to “randomly” insert legolas into the hobbit movies, it actually made so much sense for both of their characters. obviously, while it’s confirmed elsewhere that thranduil/the elvenking is legolas’s dad, legolas is not actually in the hobbit book. but this, i think, is more so to do with the fact that tolkien wrote the lord of the rings (and invented legolas’s character) after he wrote the hobbit, and less so to do with the idea that legolas is inherently “irrelevant” to the story of the hobbit. because if legolas is irrelevant to the hobbit, then is he irrelevant to thranduil? i really don’t think so, because even though tolkien gave us no clues as to what their relationship might’ve been like, even the fact that they’re father and son is really important. for thranduil, the fact that he has a son adds dimension not just to who he is in the movies - and yes, we see a fraught side of his dynamic with legolas as he has to reconcile with legolas growing up and wanting a freedom that thranduil with his too-deep understanding of the world’s dangers doesn’t want to give - but also to the concept of his character. thranduil has lost so many people he loved in horrible ways that now legolas is all he has left, and consequentially there’s so much talk about him as an oppressive parent, so paranoid of losing him that he keeps him imprisoned inside the always-closed kingdom gates. but at the end of the hobbit movies, thranduil also gives legolas his blessing to go on the quest to destroy the one ring. when it comes down to it, he is willing to let legolas do what's best for him, even knowing that this could be how he loses him. i know thranduil isn’t a perfect parent, that’s pretty obvious lol. but i don’t see how people watch these movies and their takeaway isn’t that he’s at least trying his best and that he does genuinely love his son. also, look at legolas! legolas is clearly proud of his identity as a wood elf. and he’s happy, he’s caring, he’s adventurous, he’s even pretty wise despite being one of the youngest elves. i don’t exactly see a traumatized victim of horrible parenting in him (and believe me, there is no shortage of victims of terrible parenting in the silmarillion/elsewhere in tolkien’s works) - i see a strong and well-adjusted young adult who wouldn’t hesitate to threaten anyone who spoke ill of his father’s kingdom with his bow lol.
anyway, if you’ve made it this far through my rambling, i hope you can understand at least part of what i’m trying to say lol. it’s hard, because i have so many things i’m kind of trying to say all at once, but: tl;dr i actually think the hobbit movies did thranduil’s character right, not wrong, and that they do the opposite of proving that he’s a bad dad. :3
#tolkien#thranduil#the hobbit#tolkien meta#the hobbit meta#the hobbit movies#mirkwood#legolas#legolas greenleaf#king thranduil#cat's meta#trying out a new tag lol let's see if i can go back and add it to my other meta#the silmarillion#silmarillion#lord of the rings#lotr#lotr meta#silmarillion meta
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The Star-Eating Serpent, The Hyperhydra (speculation)
With the release of the most recent inn bosses this month, we now have confirmation that the Hyperhydra faced in the Forgotten Beasts challenge board is not the serpentine creature being referred to in the Empress' recounting of Atealan history and is instead a very ominous single-headed green snake entity.
If I'm being honest, I find this design of the creature to be rather appropriate as the color of its skin, along with the greenish gas flowing out of its nape, would seem to suggest the entity's scales are either coated or made of Trithril, the mineral that was present on the homeworld of the Atealan people.
The genius of this design is that it explains why and how such an otherworldly creature is capable of devouring stars to begin with.
As explained by Ra'Ta and Eirn, Trithril is capable of acting as a protective layer for things traveling through environments that produce magical radiation or harsh magical conditions such as the rifts, the Void, and the Mana Core.
Being either made of Trithril or coated in it would offer the protection this otherwordly beast would require to travel space and devour stars without having to worry about the danger those stars pose. I imagine it would also make traveling space easier as well.
My confusion in trying to piece the mystery of how this animal operates is that I can't begin to picture the reasoning behind its feeding. The Empress tells that the TSS was a devourer of her children, yet this seems to only have taken place after the beast took notice of them sometime after they established their people's culture, possibly meaning it hasn't been hunting and devouring them since their infancy as a species.
Furthermore, the serpent is known to be a devourer of not just stars but planets as well. Now admittedly, this designation of being a 'world eater' could just tie back to the fact that the snake was eating the life on worlds that the Atealan inhabited and therefore them as well. However, I would like to posit a theory that the Star-Eater wasn't eating the Atealans, as well as any other life that existed alongside them, specifically but rather the actual planets.
In the objective card for this otherwordly creature, it is outlined that it fed upon the power of both stars AND planets.
The implication here that the planets it consumed had a power worth devouring to begin with. The question here is what? I believe the answer to that is simple: it's Trithril. You see I believe that the serpent was seeking out worlds rich in minerals potent in Trithril so that it could devour stars safely afterword, as well as be protected by other forms of magical radiation. As a consequence, it's scales would be either coated in Trithril or eventually turn into Trithril as it continued to eat more planets that contained the mineral.
Now a terrifying theory here is that Trithril is a mineral only the Atealan's were capable of producing which leads back to the Empress' claim that the serpent devoured their children, the Ateala. Meaning the snake was specifically eating Atealans or at least seeking worlds where they were present.
How exactly Atealan do this I'm not sure, likely ties back to their connection to cosmic energy and the stars, but if so it kind of means they would have always been in danger of this serpent hunting them throughout the cosmos no matter how many worlds they fled in the past, until its recorded defeat by Unael Anohrin of course. Unless of course the death of Atealan can lead to formation of Trithril which if so, well that's kind of dark.
On a side note, I find it curious that the serpent has the same exact golden ornament attached to its head as the Atealan Standard helm:
Not sure if it means anything but it is an interesting detail.
Speculation on what the Star-Eating Serpent was consuming exactly and why, it's existence does bring up one important question:
WHAT THE HECK IS THE STORY BEHIND THE HYPERHYDRA!?!?!?
No seriously for the longest time this three-headed monstrosity was like the only candidate to point to when guessing what serpent was being referred to in the Empress' song, but now that thought-process is dead in the water.
At the time, I could see why it made sense to make the connection to the Ateala, what with the title of being an Eater of Stars alongside that all too familiar blueish starry theme its got going on but now I'd like to make a new guess.
I now believe that this forgotten beast may have been a creature that was or is present in the overall Elemental Plains. Now that seems like an odd guess to make until you look at the background behind it.
I can think of only one other place where we saw two celestial bodies, one black and the other white, orbiting one another.
The very top of the Exaltia Tower where we face off against the Engineer and see the Exalted Artillery cannon. A place that was very much present in the Elemental Plains.
However, if this true, what then are the small stars being referred to that the Hyperhydra apparently consumes?
Normally, I like to not be so presumptuous that gameplay completely translates to lore, at least as far as the inn is concerned anyway, but I do wonder if the hydra's ability to cycle through all eight prime elements to attack could or does answer that question given that the prime elements have been referred to as "stars" before and have even been given that imagery, at least symbolically anyway, in the Engineer fight. But again rough speculation at best.
Ah but I believe that concludes my thoughts on these serpentine beasties.
#dragonfable#dragonfable lore#dragonfable theory#Star-Eating Serpent#Hyperhydra#Curious that the SE serpent objective card said it was brought low by the Unael#that has many meanings but the one I'm particularly familiar with is forcing someone or something into subservience#I wonder if by chance Anohrin didn't kill the beast but rather forced it to serve to protect the 'stars' as the Empress put it#giving clarity to the “and with them protected as one” line#Unlikely possibility still because like why would you risk something like that eating your people again?#Atealan
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*bounces back* hi hello so! mystery dungeon au. You're my notes document apparently. This is just like. So much angsty hours for the Brazilian mystery dungeon pokemon guys. There was supposed to be fluff in here somewhere but nah. The redeeming feature is that this is multiple years before actual plot happens (well bar the glowy Pac thing, that's still the case), and literally everyone involved is in much better places in their lives now.
Firstly. Shinx glow when stressed? Pac is just constantly glowing. People who don't understand shinx think when he stops glowing he's sick, but then they comment and he gets stressed again. No, no the glowing isn't a normal state of things, it's constant muscle tension from anxiety and trauma he's pretending he doesn't have making excess electricity. If on the occassional times he manages to get peaceful enough sleep to stop glowing (or otherwise gets a break) and you wake him up, Mike will just scratch you to death. He gets less glowy (more lower intensity than less often but hey still progress) when hanging out with Fit, so its allowed. (Mike does not know just how bright - to the point he can't hide it even in the sunshine - Pac gets when he's missing, as he's not there to see it).
The following is um kinda angsty even by above but I've been infodumping it a friend but he's busy now so you get it too! Backstory!!! Fit's the MC but brain not there rn also he doesn't have as much backstory what with amnesia and all.
Bagi is incharge of bounties for collecting criminals (she did used to be a cop in canon), but there's a much lower focus on prison and higher focus on rehabilitation and like. Actually helping. Most people still move into the city where her bosses are and better resources, but sometimes people who were arrested stick around. This is kinda how the Brazilian exploration team happened? After they were arrested and had healed Bagi arranged for Pac, Mike, and Cellbit to join the exploration guild, where they ended up teaming up with Felps. Shared language and also history between them.
Prior to getting arrested! Pac was abandoned as a kid in a dungeon, Mike hatched there without parents, Cellbit was kidnapped as a kid and put in an illegal pokemon fighting ring (please remember the characters are all pokemon, but humans do exist and are talked about) which he escaped. The three were part of the same gang causing minor level trouble in a dungeon, living outside of society (well, societies - most settlements are autonomous and have all their own rules and all). However one really harsh winter the rest of the gang ditched them. Mostly they had stuck to their territory so people just avoided them, but when things got hard and they needed to steal food and resources often violently that's when bounties were put on their heads.
Mike was fine. As a sableye he could eat the rocks. Pac the shinx and Cellbit the cubone though? Not so fine.
Things happen, Pac passes out, probably combo of injury and getting sick and hunger. And Cellbit... Cellbit is really *really* hungry. You don't get just quite how hungry - they were already doing survival theft before this and barely not starving, now they're 2 months into a snowstorm.
And well... You know how canon goes. This is so, so much more desperation and starvation than canon was. But Mike comes back from in on Pac getting a bit chewed on. As the only one who has eaten properly in the last 2 months he manages to get Cellbit off him, and just. Leaves Cellbit dazes on the floor as he decides getting arrested is better than Pac dying (while Bagi and her organisation are on the lets actually try help people build lives side of policing, a lot of towns its really, really not like that at all. And being random teens from a gang? Horror stories of bad places kept them in line). He can stop the blood, but its bad injury. Plus, yk, all the other problems rn.
So he ends up dragging Pac and trying to find a town to hand themselves in.
Meanwhile, Felps is a young adventurer, who has taken out the bounty on Pac, Mike, and Cellbit mostly because Guildmaster Foolish is looking at him like a tasty snack for having not done any jobs recently. Foolish gets to be lazy, the others don't. It's rated as a pretty simple job because, like, the rest of the gang were caught and taken to one of the cities, and three teenagers who have been starving for months. Honestly Bagi posted the bounty herself and with her money because she worked out her brother was involved, but that's besides the point.
Felps ends up finding Pac and Mike at the midpoint of the dungeon, and kinda. That's someone covered in blood. So abandons looking for all three to just teleport them out and to whomever does healing here. Not worked that out yet. Mike is... extremely confused to be just. Left with the healer while Felps teleports off again to get Bagi, and even moreso when Bagi is far more worried about her brother left behind and *eating people* than the two criminals right there. She is also very appreciative that Felps took them to the clinic then came to get her. She doesn't want dead suspects, she wants people to actually get fairly judged and get the help they need as opposed to just throwing them in a cell.
Mostly because she knows some of the crimes her brother has done and wants to believe her brother can still have a life but you know. If she believes there's hope for him, she can believe if about a lot of people.
Unfortunately, Cellbit eating people means she does have to increase the pay and danger level of the bounty, meaning Felps is no longer qualified to finish it. Another team take it, Felps gets to take some time off but does visit those two as curious. And like they stole stuff. They stole a lot of stuff. But also. They're kinda interesting. And they're curious about what he does too. Especially the the guild just gives him a room and pays for all his food yes even with weird diets like Mike has to eat gemstones.
Double unfortunately, the people who pick up Cellbit's bounty... Look. He's horrified at probably killing Pac and Mike (he's killed before, but these two kinda liked him, but he ate Pac and drove Mike out into the snow with what was probably a corpse and was absolutely a corpse in his memory), he's also sick, and starving, and sure he's kinda feral and absolutely resorts to violence first, but if you scruffed him you could probably drag him to town like a naughty puppy.
The team... Do not do that.
They don't even ask for him to surrender before beating him to within an inch of his already tenuous life. And then drag him back to town. And dump him on Bagi's office floor. Rather than, yk, taking the now seriously injured, starving, teenage cubone to the clinic (Bagi is also young, but... it's a small town, she trained apprenticeship style most of her teens, and as the explorer's guild is there if there are problems help is right at hand). Bagi is *not* impressed. Their pay gets docked, and she takes her brother to get help. And wrangles a lot of paperwork to be able to keep him in the village rather than sending him to her superiors in the city who... Have much better resources to help.
But.
Bagi wants her brother, and she's not giving him up.
Recovery from those sorts of injuries is a lot, and also gives all three time to come around to the idea of maybe trying something other than crime. And therapy. Therapy takes some convincing. Honestly having stability in their lives is a lot of a start, though takes a lot of getting used to.
Given time and help getting lives together and all that, the three of them end up at the Guild, because, well, they were interested, and Foolish was willing. And all guild members get bed and board whenever needed (though more senior crews tend to get their own houses with time).
As of Fit showing up they've been with the guild for a few years, and mostly settled in now, and people around town have mostly forgotten the somewhat harrowing nature of them arriving. The scars physically and mentally are still there, but newcomers tend to assume its because exploration work is dangerous, not... yk. Horrific backstory.
They also teamed up with Felps, because he kidna did need a team, and language shared, and Mike liked him and Mike and Cellbit at the time they were teaming were on unstable enough footing Cellbit had to say yes. These days its Cellbit and Felps are besties, though, once Cellbit warmed up to the idea of having friends.
The four of them mostly work in item finding. Pac and Mike were like what do you *mean* we can get paid to legally steal shit from dungeons for people? They get a roof, and food, and no problems with cops, and get to steal shit?! This is like. A dream. And all dungeon explorations involve some fighting, just because of how dungeons go, so Cellbit has somewhere to work out stabby tendencies. They do also do rescue missions (people trapped in dungeons) when needed, but do *not* do bounties on criminals. Its a bit... traumatic for 3/4 of them. Honestly likely 4/4 of them as Felps took one and ended up with some guy a year or two younger than him nearly bleeding to death during the teleport to safety. Just. Different trauma flavours.
Also!!! After searching egg groups, Bagi is a Nidorana (Nidoran both genders matches to Cubone, even if Nidorana can't egg group breed)! It's... Okay yes Cubones do evolve at a higher level than Nidoran, but it is notable she is evolved while Cellbit isn't, despite both being a fair bit into adulthood now. Same with Pac being a Shinx (Felps is mostly just still an Abra as he doesn't see any pressing need to evolve and is just vibing. Some people naturally just chill as their pokemon and this is fine. Someday he'll get around to it, but he doesn't *want* to be bigger and stronger and more able to protect himself and his like Cellbit and Pac). Cellbit did not get the same opportunities as Bagi in life, and so it is taking him longer to get there. Also. Bagi did everything she could to force herself to grow early, to prove her maturity so people would give her what she needed to find her twin.
~Factorial
Factorial, you're really out here writing a novel in my inbox /pos!!
God, they hurt my heart physically in every universe!!!!! There's so much wrong with them. They all need a nap and a hug, I think.
#asks#qsmp#qsmp pac#qsmp mike#qsmp cellbit#qsmp bagi#sorry for not responding to anything in particular factorial </3#i just- they make my heart so much#factorial's mystery dungeon au
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This article was published in 2005. It is scarily relevant and if certain excerpts had been taken and presented to me as a description of what is happening today, I would believe it without a second thought.
"The Only Good Jew is a Dead Armenian"
The old woman was telling a tale of massacre. She had just heard of another Israeli family murdered by terrorists, and there were tears in her eyes as she remembered back those many years. "I had luck," she said in Armenian. "I hid from the Turks behind a trellis. I saw my mother and father shot down, my baby sister spitted on a scimitar."
The old woman, who'd been a young girl in the year Turkey slaughtered several million Armenians under the cover of World War One, understood the link between Armenian and Israeli corpses. Because Armenia, the first Christian state in history, whose prosperity was a reproach to Turkish squalor, and whose high culture was an insult to their ignorance, was, like Israel, an infidel island in a sea of Islam. And for that there could be no forgiveness.
The Arab complaint today against Jews, while wretchedly tired, is identical to their excuse for murdering them in their beds: failure to provide Palestinian statehood, refusal to relinquish occupied territories. For the murder of Jews to appear plausible, though, the victims must be stigmatized. Epithets like Zionist oppressors and Fascist murderers are used incessantly to browbeat hearers and achieve that purpose. This is a tactic taken straight from the Ottoman Turks of 1915.
Then, the Armenians were accused of all manner of crimes, from rebellion to robbery to kidnapping Muslim infants. Exactly how a civilized people who had peacefully existed for centuries in their ancestral lands, and whose Christian conversion predated Constantine, had suddenly become rebels, thieves, and pedophiles, was never explained. Just as in Germany of the 1930s, libel preceded genocide. The allegation of babies skewered on bayonets is a much favored emotional trigger of slanderous propaganda, which outrage upon truth and trust is more felt than believed.
Armenians did not help themselves by their passivity in the face of destruction. Says Vahakn Dadrian in his comparison of the Armenian and Jewish predicaments, "Jews and Armenians developed an ethos of submissiveness intended to mollify the agents of persecution. When the victimizers are not held accountable, that becomes a source of new incentives for victimization." In other words, radical Islam, then and now, thinks it can get away with murder.
Today, one of radical Islam's goals is to despoil the Jews of the land of Israel. In 1915, the plan of the Young Turks led by the mass murderer Enver Pasha – a model for Heinrich Himmler – was to rid Armenia of Armenians by butchering them all and resettling Muslims there. The Arabs of 2005 would be content for the Jews to pack up and leave Israel for the Diaspora. And so they kill them to drive them out. The Ottoman Turks, on the other hand, would have exterminated the entire Armenian Diaspora if their reach had been long enough, so deep was their feeling of inferiority and so rabid their hatred. As it stood, three-quarters of the Armenian population was destroyed.
The key difference between the two countries is that despite historic occupation by Romans, Seljuk and Ottoman Turks, and Bolsheviks, Armenia is today unwanted by anyone. No longer does it serve as a bridge and invasion route, since the wars of East versus West have ceased in that part of the world — at least for the foreseeable future. That war, ongoing in one way or another since Xerxes invaded Greece, is now transferred to the Middle East, Israel being correctly perceived by Islam as The West. And the land of Israel, a harsh, bony spit of desert, is lusted after by Islam as a woman who is not to be shared with another suitor.
In the long run, Israel might not be able to prevail, to continue to exist as a forward-looking, non-Muslim Western state. Unless the United States continues its massive moral and material support, beginning under Truman and continuing under the Bush Administration, sustained through every crisis, the Jewish island could eventually sink under the heavy weight of Arab populations and constant assaults — even as Israel gallantly fights a long slow defeat. Jews could neither conquer their enemies nor assimilate them, and so would be forced to return to the Diaspora from whence they came.
Before that occurred, however, there would be many acts of heroism and valor by the Israelis, and, sadly, many deaths among them. They would certainly not go gentle into that good night, but would rage, rage, against the dying of the light. Therefore it is imperative to the maintenance of freedom and peace in the world that the rabid, highly dangerous, but growing anti-Semitism in Europe and America be denounced and combated by every means and at every opportunity.
The old Armenian woman, my grandmother, having witnessed the slaughter of her people in the past and the continuing murder of Israelis in the present, had a foreboding of the future. She slowly and somberly shook her wizened head. "For Muslims today," she said, "it seems like the only good Jew is a dead Armenian."
by Christopher Baldwi
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Opinions in hemp cloth/fabric? I saw one of your post talking about polyster vs cotton/wool/linen
Hi! Thank you for the question! When I was writing that post/addition, I actually forgot the existence of hemp (not that it's among the most important natural fabrics today (sadly)). And when I went to check some sources to make sure I didn't get things wrong, I learned that cotton also gets stronger when wet, which I had previously learned the other way around. (I had gotten it wrong in that post too.)
Hemp is an amazing material. It's very similar to linen in it's properties, in some regards even better. Like linen it's extremely breathable, so great for hot weather, and antibacterial, so it doesn't smell easily and when against skin, keeps it cleaner too. It has even better water absorption abilities than linen, which is why it doesn't feel wet even when it has absorbed a good amount of sweat or water in general. Like linen (and apparently cotton) it gets stronger when wet too, which makes washing and sanitizing it without damaging it easy. It's also even before getting wet super strong, the strongest plant fiber there is. It even has one ability linen doesn't have (nor most plant fibers) it's UV resistant, adding to it's great abilities for summer use.
One thing I didn't mention in that post about linen, which makes it still very relevant, is that growing linen is so much more ecological than growing cotton, which requires a ton of fresh water. Flax (the plant linen is made of) grows very easily in fairly harsh conditions and doesn't need fertilizers, which are often damaging to the ecosystem. However, hemp does the same and better. It's very resistant to pests, so doesn't need extra pestilence that could have adverse effects to the ecosystem, and unlike most other monocultural farmland, it even enriches the earth, keeping the earth resistant against erosion.
All of these properties are why it was used for sails and ropes for millennia. Its very long and strong fibers allow it to be made into very thick canvas excellent for sails. Hemp canvas was also used for stiff interlining. But it got me thinking, why isn't hemp often talked about in clothing history (except in the fact that it was the first plant fiber to be woven into fabric)? It has such obviously excellent properties, which surely would have been attractive to pre-industrial people with limited resources. After looking around I found couple of explanations.
Hemp was indeed used widely for clothes, especially in rural setting. Since it became the first plant fabric in central Asia, it was the primary fabric for clothing in China till the introduction of cotton around a millennium ago. It was used in Europe too since the Goths introduced it in antiquity. However in historical texts (at least in 16th-18th century) hemp cloth is also often referred to as linen and it can be hard to distinguish if the fabric written about was actually made from hemp or flax, since they did make fairly similar cloth. There was a limiting factor too for more widespread use of hemp, since it's processing into fabric was labour intensive, which got better in Industrial Era, when some of the most labor intensive parts were able to be mechanized. It was though very easy and cheap to grow, and needed especially little attention in summer, when farmers had most work. Because of it's enriching properties it also could be grown in the same plot year after year. For these reasons it was often grown in small quantities within small-scale farming even when large scale farming was becoming more common. It's perhaps where the rural association came from, as it was likely grown for personal household textiles and not for selling.
Though there was of course larger scale farming of it and records of selling it by merchants after feudalism started fading, even if the labour intensive processing made it less profitable. Apparently one of the most popular usages for hemp in clothing was men's shirts, for upper and lower classes. Sailors also often wore hemp clothing as it was so excellent and durable in all the conditions that would come across at sea. Hemp also was not as fine as linen, and while very fine hemp was soft and as linen softens in use and with every wash, it still wasn't quite as soft and fine as linen could be. So especially upper classes, who wouldn't need the maximum practicality and durability, would opt into linen, which was still very practical and durable, but also a bit more comfortable against skin.
At the time, when labour was plentiful and relatively cheap compared to land, hemp was still profitable. Entering the Industrial Era this started to change as industrial production requiring less human labour was much cheaper and therefore left more profit margin, so the capitalists now controlling production would greatly favor materials that could be produced industrially. While the processing of hemp became less labour intensive with mechanization, it was still much more labour intensive than cotton for example, which was the first thing that was industrialized. Hemp production was still fairly wide through 19th century and to early 20th century, even if declining in it's share of the clothing production like all the rest of the natural fabrics (except cotton).
But then the war on drugs happened. Now the hemp typically used for clothing is not exactly the same used for weed (there's different strains and then male and female and it seems complicated and I don't know that much about plants), what I read it doesn't have at least very strong psychoactive qualities unlike those used specifically for weed (though there was some overlap). Of course that didn't stop growing hemp being banned very widely, leading the hemp fabric production to plummet in the latter half of 1900s. Growing hemp has become easier now, but the prohibition still create hurdles for farmers. Which sucks a lot because it's such an amazing material and with modern mechanized processing it's cheap to make (and can be made to be really soft) on top of being excellent quality and gentle to environment.
So I guess my opinion is hemp is great we should make more of it instead of cotton and especially synthetic fibers and legalize weed.
#answers#history#textiles#textile history#fashion history#fashion#clothing history#dress history#fabrics#hemp
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𝚂𝙷𝙴 𝙱𝙸𝚃 𝙷𝙴𝚁 𝚃𝙷𝚄𝙼𝙱 𝙰𝚃 𝙶𝙾𝙳 𝙰𝙽𝙳 𝙲𝙾𝙽𝚂𝚄𝙼𝙴𝙳 𝙷𝙴𝚁𝚂𝙴𝙻𝙵 𝙸𝙽𝚃𝙾 𝙱𝙴𝙸𝙽𝙶.
… BIRTH NAME … salomé atreides.
… NICKNAMES … none you'll say to their face.
… AGE … assumed forty.
… GENDER … demi woman.
... PRONOUNS ... they & she.
… SEXUALITY … bisexual. kinsey scale 3.
… CIVILIAN OCCUPATION … ceo of anunnaki pharmaceuticals.
… CRIMINAL ALLEGIANCE … the highest bidder.
… NOTABLE ATTRIBUTES … vaguely unidentifiable accent, lightly french. voice claim: marion cotillard as talia al ghul. symptoms of perfection that turn the corner to unnatural: poreless, glowing skin, free of wrinkles; facial symmetry; hair that does not fall flat; a perpetually unnamed, tempting scent. a ringlike scar centered between her breasts.
… CHARACTER INSPIRATIONS … talia al ghul ( dc & the dark knight rises ). catherine tramell ( basic instinct ). lady trieu ( hbo's watchmen ). sévérine ( skyfall ). lady jessica ( dune ). amy dunne ( gone girl ). cersei lannister ( game of thrones ). pamela isley ( dc ). medusa ( greek mythology ). scylla ( greek mythology ).
( + ) ingenious, persuasive, patient, charismatic, intuitive, eloquent, sensual, observant.
( - ) cunning, resentful, possessive, anarchistic, enigmatic, manipulative.
PLEASE BE AWARE THE FOLLOWING BIOGRAPHY CONTAINS TRIGGERING TOPICS.
𝚂𝙿𝙰𝚁𝙺𝙽𝙾𝚃𝙴𝚂.
trigger warnings: murder, poverty, prostitution, age gap, implied sexual assault, trafficking.
your father comes from a flat place: all ice, too hard to dig through. his world, unlike yours, is a wide one, his pain centralized to the fact that it is endless but empty. you learn later that the name for his wound is RED EYE, the name passed off with all the grandeur of a fatal diagnosis. and what is that you, bled for his sins, should care for the pinkness of one single vestige? the ritualistic stripping of the body, the drowning and remaking, is nothing in comparison to the informal breaking of one: your father's pain was in service to a purpose. yours was punishment.
your home has no name. so few places in this world that have escaped cataloging, geographers and mapmakers, and yours is one of them: if it ever bore a title of possession, you cannot say it because your mouth is too occupied with choking. the name of your home is nothing more than a scream. a guttural cry. in the place without name you're born to shaking grounds, your birth tied inexorably to bombs dropping. you, the child of a woman who knows these lands and the man sent to pillage them, do not exist without war. you would not exist without the promise and execution of brutality.
she dies in front of you. that's another way to say they kill her in front of you. that's another way to say they let you cover your siblings' eyes only because yours stay open. for association with the disruptor. they point to the body & tell you its kindness that you do not meet the same fate, that they banish you to the outskirts instead. your eyes, the same colour as your father's — the mark, the evidence — stay blistered open for years. sleep is little and rare, delicate and costly; with mother gone you are the provider and the shelter both, your brothers & sister tucked under your arms. it's called tooth & nail survival because that's all you have left in the end, bared fangs and a single, measly weapon in your pocket. you do what is necessary, thieving food of tables & allowing men to play graverobber with your body. your father, remember, was bled for a purpose. you were skinned for pleasure.
let us revisit: the cry, the guttural scream. the name of your home and the sound of your history. that's what life is, for some time. the throat grows raw at some point, the sound dimming when you meet him. a french diplomat, enamored of your gamine body, the harsh wonder of your electric eyes. he takes you and he keeps you, a mistress shelved in the back of his garden in the red marble house, hidden among the rhododendrons. it is not the happiest part of your life because you are never happy, but it is the most important: money enough earned for the siblings who have survived, and lessons in ascension for yourself. black velvet dresses that sweat in the wet country heat, meals at his cool long table, hair done up in a bow, learning to eat off fine china. a favoured pet, a smothered lover. a novelty to his visiting friends, who marvel at your grace and the bite that follows. you are not happy. but you are learning: your strengths, and their weaknesses.
all that knowledge on how to cross the pit, and still not enough to avoid when it gapes open beneath you. your lover smuggles you across continents under his arm, tucked into the suffocating folds of his jacket. a new life, he says. it's only your last one redressed. he's paid, you're told, a substantial amount for your acquisition: an exotic, gamine creature unlike the others. he has either the grace or the audacity to look embarrassed when you realize what's happened, the moment you recognize you've been sold as the pound of flesh and the bow around it.
a third act, the scream muffled now, lodged in a pocket of the throat where no one can find it. you learned long ago that thrashing against fate does no good, so instead you go still: placid as the doe drinking from a river, they imagine, forgetting what other creatures go undetected at the side of the water. yellow eyes in the dark, thorny scales, rows of teeth. in the organization that holds your leash you become indispensable, a favourite of the gods and the ones they serve.
the loosening of your puppet strings takes years, and you ripen all the while. higher bidders, horrid tastes. medusa didn't grow snakes till she was wronged, and your serpents bellow like twine around eden's first branches. in russia the scissors find you, the colour of your electric eyes lighting the way. the eyes, you've always known, of your father's. a comrade of your father's they say, his own eyes pink with familiarity. red with guilt. the escape takes several more months because you refuse to leave emptyhanded: when you flee, it's with jewels filched from the crown. it's with fangs sunk into the ankle of the one who put you in a basket.
salomé is not your name but it is your story, the daughter baring seven veils and the head of a man in your fist, clenched by the hair. america is soft as yarn, stretched in your hands, turning into the shapes you make it. men similarly unspool like guts for your blade, spilling what you demand in exchange for your touch. the one you will call husband is a conscious mark, as they all are. you've lived too long under the crosshatch of others to live now without aim.
philomene atreides, the ceo of anunnaki pharmaceuticals ⸺ a genius, perhaps, and certainly a fool. others might have called his wings wax when he tried to fix the world, but they only melt in the the attempt to correct you. his product, inserted into your heart. an ownership. another leash. we know what is to be done with leashes.
philomene atreides, the ceo of anunnaki pharmaceuticals ⸺ murdered in his bed. you, they say, spared the same gruesome fate by luck alone. you, with a severed rope in your palm, your neck barren and lovely.
you, after some months spent in mourning, voted unanimously as the new head of the snake. all you've ever had, all you've ever needed: electric eyes, tooth and nail.
SUMMARY: salomé is the daughter of a red eye mercenary and an occupant of a small country he was sent to destabilize. their mother is later killed violently for associating with a disruptor, and salomé & her half-siblings are ostracized as punishment, often met with violence. salomé assumes the role of provider and caretaker, engaging in everything from petty thievery to prostitution to make ends meet. this is how she meets her benefactor, a french diplomat who takes her as a secret lover. it's him who gifts them their first learnings in elegance, and the first time she starts crafting herself into a new person. the benefactor-lover sells her to an international organization, and she spends the years with them building trust & reliance, instituting herself as a favourite of the heads. like the mythic woman she names herself after, it's by getting close that she eventually takes his head on a platter. in their eventual escape, aided by a red eye defector close to her late father & a russian operative, she topples much of the organization and absconds with their money. in america they remake once more, a high class escort that grifts their way to new york's elite. she consciously pursues and then marries the founder & ceo of anunnaki pharmaceuticals, a union that lasts only four years, until his murder in their marriage bed by her hand. after several months, salomé is named unanimously by the board as the next ceo of anunnaki.
𝙷𝙴𝙰𝙳𝙲𝙰𝙽𝙾𝙽𝚂.
per the main's location page, salomé is something of a mythical figure within the city ( "as insane as the stories surrounding them are. a god among mortals, a suspected killer, a widow" ) and they do absolutely nothing to dispel the mist surrounding them.
had a congenital heart defect that worsened in her thirties; their heart is now something between tony stark little blue core and jason statham in crank - an implant created by her late husband or commissioned by him (stone inc? DETAILS IN PROCESS!). the only one of its kind. incredible and vastly imperfect. her late husband was, initially, the only one who knew how to keep it going - a threat of possession that he held over her until he. well. oops.
the first to take trial-approved drugs before they're released to the public, but still there are some she saves exclusively for themselves. skin glows, hair never falls flat. there's something almost eerie about the perfection
throws outrageous, outlandish parties, but ur probably never invited
actually, have you ever seen salomé age ? mm..
red eye is not aware of their father being one of their mercenaries<3
bathes in an unusual concoction & wears pheromones bred within anunnaki for various purposes. ever smelled
deeply deeply good at figuring out what you need and offering it, in herself or in her palm
often mistakes as being ms. atreides, but sal never took her late husband's name officially
𝙲𝙾𝙽𝙽𝙴𝙲𝚃𝙸𝙾𝙽𝚂.
bane to her talia; private security.
salomé has officially been exonerated for the death of her late husband, philomene atreides. but whose to say a new development couldn't occur<3
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A thing I drabbled while trying to finish this dang final chapter of the Bodyswap au. It went nowhere and solely exists to braindump words. enjoy? i guess?
What does Mondo think of him?
What does he think of himself?
In this theoretical universe in which nothing is wrong. In this universe in which high school is normal. One is the enforcer and the other the antagonist and yet they mesh together. Mondo sees an innocence within Kiyotaka that mirrors an inane discomfort within himself. A strength he was forced to take on like a burden, yet does not project an infantilization onto Kiyotaka, but rather a wish of a simpler life than his own he received. From Mondo’s own perspective, Kiyotaka is the normality. The representation of a perfect classmate and a perfect, moral high ground. His execution is flawless and his attitude, while poignant and sharp, is well-meaning with good intent. Aside, there is indeed a kinship within the two specific opposites. The desire to hold those close within a safety. To take the metaphorical bullet. And like two folding upon each other to receive the pain in another's stead, it comes with a herding of a flock. Harsh hand when it necessitates, but a general understanding and love for those close enough to receive it.
But then, what does Kiyotaka think of himself? No doubt there is a high standard to reach. A peak, of sorts, that is desired out of himself. Drawn from within his understanding of the world, forced, of course, by a familial history he is well aware of. In such, there is not just a desire for perfection but the need for it. A specificity that could drag him deep into a despair if he dared let himself go so far as to crumble underneath the pressure he puts on himself, one that is also, in some cases forced upon him. One he accepts with grace and a wobbly smile. Because it is all he knows how to do. Here, however, there are buffers. Exceptions to these laws of Ishimaru’s nature that refuse the perfection. Friends, such as Mondo, whom while motivate him to reach that peak, force his hand in understanding that he is only a person and nothing more. He may see himself as said enforcer, an embodiment of the laws in which he upholds, the rules, if you will. Yet with his connection to others, his friends, there comes a messier understanding of himself that does not have the chance to show elsewhere. Without negative influence, there is room to harbor emotion. Allowing a flourishing of oneself that may only appear in the right conditions. Unisolated, comforted, happy.
#longsheepfic#danganronpa#ishimondo#danganronpa trigger happy havoc#kiyotaka ishimaru#mondo owada#idk if this makes sense#it wont but whatever have it anway the chapter should be out soon and THEN it'll be other chapter stuff I SWEAR#Ive got an exam the DAY i leave to go to MWFF and will be there for the whole weekend#plus im joined in the dance competition so be on the lookout for that on glareandgrowl if i post it#(HINT I WILL IM SO NERVOUS_EXCITED)#and THEN!!!!#I'll probably do the next chapter of assassins before Cigarettes... sorry.#I WANT to write im just busy busy busy BUSY
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thoughts on the relative utilities of a monolingual/multilingual society? intuitively i'm inclined to think societies should subtly nudge towards monolingualism because having to learn multiple languages seems like it'd be a big headache, like having to use multiple currencies or multiple directions on the road. "subtly nudge" because being too harsh about it would suck, but nudge nevertheless. the converse seems like shoveling work on ppl for personal taste. but I have a feeling you disagree?
I’m not a utilitarian. People should be allowed to do whatever with respect to what language(s) they speak, and we should make it easy for them to live pleasant lives while speaking whatever language(s) they want. Translation is pretty effective; whatever efficiency losses exist due to people speaking different languages are not worth worrying about.
I have made a post before, which I will try to dig up for you, on why moving towards global monolingualism would be bad. The same arguments apply on e.g. a national level (well, for sufficiently large nations, at least). The gist is as follows:
Because language changes constantly, a policy of monolingualism implies a policy of constant maintenance. That is to say, your policy options range from continuously punishing people in minor-to-middling ways for speaking wrong, for the rest of time (I believe this is the “slight nudge” to which you refer), to (on the more extreme end) massive restrictions on freedom of speech. Both of these are fundamentally authoritarian in nature and I am against them.
I am doubtful that “minor nudges” would even work—language changes very fast and very vociferously. That is, such a policy would be nothing but a continual drain on human wellbeing, leaving the only effective options major authoritarianism or major economic discrimination based on language. These have both been tried before, they both work, and they are both horrendous.
I am deeply committed to pluralism. The point is not to produce a utility maximizing society, the point is to tend to everyone’s needs sufficiently while allowing them to live the way they wish to live. State management of culture in the name of utility maximization is precisely antithetical to this and I am basically against it a priori.
As an addendum to point 3: remember, many people care about their language a lot. This is an important aspect of how many people wish to live. As such, you can’t support pluralism unless you support linguistic pluralism. I think the degree to which language matters to people would be obvious if you read, e.g., pretty much anything written by indigenous Americans (in the US, Canada, Latin America, whatever) on the long history of their cultural suppression. People want to speak the language they want to speak! And by god, in a just (a fortiori truly pluralist) society, they should be able to do so, without fearing social or economic repercussions! I think this would possibly become more obvious to you if English was dying, if you had nobody to speak it with, there was no English language art or literature being made, there was no place to obtain such art or literature outside of niche academic contexts, and indeed you were constantly worried about the stories and discourses you grew up with and which you treasured most being lost forever. If you know about the inherent difficulties of localization, you know that language death means story-death, experience-death, nuance-death, idea-death. Of course this happens naturally with time due to entropy, but we should not be helping it along!
From a more personal perspective, linguistics as a science becomes impossible if all the languages die. It’s not nearly as important a consideration as the whole “it would require massive authoritarianism” thing, but it does matter. We’d be throwing away the chance to understand something very fundamental about the human mind in exchange for minor efficiency gains. Bad, imo.
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I saw a question about whether the first season Charmed couples should have been Piper/Andy and Prue/Leo instead of what we got and have to say that idea doesn't work for me at all but was curious to hear your take. (I think this question was based on the assumption that Prue/Andy had no prior romantic history together in this hypothetical universe, so sisterly betrayal is not an issue---we know Piper and Prue would never date each other's boyfriends!) I mean none of the male Charmed characters have that much of a personality, but based on what we know, I don't think Andy would put up with Piper constantly snapping at him, criticizing him, and complaining about every facet of their lives all day every day the way Leo does. He also definitely wouldn't have been as patient with her dithering about Leo vs Dan for all of S2. Andy's got more pride than Leo and couldn't deal with Piper's constant nagging, criticizing and insults from S3 on. People think Prue is harsh but actually Piper is a lot more negative, insulting, and perpetually irritated than Prue is, and I just feel like Andy would get understandably impatient with it while Leo is more passive and super tolerant. And I don't see Prue/Leo working either - she needs someone more action oriented, direct and proactive than pacifist, laidback Leo. I also feel like Prue would intimidate and scare Leo without even trying to lol---he was totally subservient in his relationship to Piper, but with Prue it would be even worse. I'm guessing the person who brought this up was thinking about the natural affection between Piper and Andy in episodes like Wendigo, and Piper in general was a lot softer and kinder back in S1. But I just can't see Piper/Andy or Prue/Leo even if Prue/Andy and Piper/Leo had never existed in canon and if Piper had stayed her S1 self. Just curious what you think since you're the Charmed expert!
Gosh, this view that so much of the fandom has of Piper becoming some negative, domineering and critical shrew in the later seasons genuinely baffles me, because I know she gets a little bitter and a little more pragmatic in the later seasons, but I've never views her as "constantly nagging, criticizing and complaining".
Also, calling her very hard decision to choose between stability and safety (Dan) or follow her true emotions (Leo) "dithering" feels a little reductive. I know we all hated that particular storyline, but I don't think Piper's actions and emotions should be judged too harshly, she was grappling with a hard choice and it makes sense that she would struggle in making it.
As for whether Piper/Andy or Prue/Leo would work, I honestly don't see either pairing working, or even getting together in the first place. Andy is too adventurous for Piper. His job would stress her out too much, and I don't think their personalities match either. In a similar vein, Leo is too "calm" for Prue and his more passive and low-key personality doesn't suit Prue's more active and A-type persona.
Also, thanks for calling me the Charmed Expert! <3
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