“ashiya douman is evil for the sake of being evil”

yes! but also.....very much no.

(heian-kyo and very mild out of context paper moon spoilers abound below)

i think what i find sometimes among fate/go players is treating ashiya douman As It Says On The Tin; they’re a nuisance, a monstrous soul, a giddy evil jester happy to spread their malice to cause harm to human beings. and yes, as it stands, that’s exactly their role. even nasu states in an interview that douman was created to be a negative force to push the lostbelt kings a little to serve the plans of the foreign god as her Apostle. the man was told “be amusingly evil” and boy, did they live up to the task!

but to stop at just the interpretation of “oh, guy is EVIL that’s all, time to wrap it up and go home boys” completely misses the true complexity lying behind the surface, and whitewashes a key point repeated time and time again in heian-kyo.

douman....or rather, limbo (and the distinction is important!) is an alter ego. limbo is a shadow. limbo is a part of the whole. limbo is an aspect, a silhouette of humanity, a piece, a caricature. xu fu even goes into detail of the nature of alter egos here:

limbo is an alter ego, which means if you take the whole of ashiya douman and write them off as “evil for the sake of doing evil”, you are more than happy to stare at the shadow at the back of the cave without wanting to turn around. heian-kyo is more than unsubtle about this point. for where, does it ask, that resentment come from? where does that malice originate? when guda and the others meet the living douman (even if it is limbo, hiding in plain sight), the man they meet is not a overly hammy evil clown but a mild-mannered, sincerely humble monk. and it is seimei....yes, that seimei, the great nemesis, the one limbo spits at and hates with every fiber of their being, who makes the distinction over and over again that limbo and ashiya douman are distinct.

“but living douman also wanted to do evil for the sake of evil!” are you sure? this is a man who we see in a brief moment want to end his own life with no real hesitation because he was deeply appalled by the nature of his own evil in the form of limbo.

and then, if we really want to go down to brass tacks, even if we make a distinction between limbo and douman, with writing off limbo as the monstrous form of a human’s resentment and evil, is LIMBO really evil for the sake of evil? time and time again, we see limbo do things that seem so contrary as to be suspect. douman finds and fixes danzou up, claiming that they are doing so as to make her suffer more by giving her memories of her son, but without limbo, danzou would’ve continued to be a cold unfeeling broken machine with no recollection of what mattered to her most. in nagiko’s interlude, guda even calls limbo out for acting as a nuisance to actually help her and raikou resolve their differences. is that “evil for the sake of being evil”?

this isn’t to say that limbo isn’t evil at all. this isn’t even to say douman, as tragic as they are, isn’t evil in his own way, either. but the truth is more complicated. in the end, limbo and douman are just....human. flawed and horribly human, even if one is an aspect of a person. to write them off as some grand evil with nothing more to it is to make the same mistake that history did. douman was the nemesis of seimei, so he had to be evil. of course he’s evil. there’s nothing more. ignore the man crying at the edge of a cliff for all his sins and vices and flaws, hm? there’s nothing more. there’s nothing more. there’s nothing more-

Fufu. Even if I am in the guise of a Heroic Spirit, I am still the shadow monk of humanity. But I suppose that's no different than what it means to be human.

Azir vs Banishment

(this is in the Azir's New Groove verse, not Azir the Exile verse)

Azir tries – oh Shurima, does he try – to start over.

Which doesn't just involve recovery from Xerath's torture and the loss of his family and Renekton, but also to forget about all the nasty etiquette he was force-fed all throughout his formative years and come to terms with the fact that yes, he was a victim of child abuse.

Akshan and Samira, who are the most used at socializing with different strokes and the ones with the least qualms, try to show Azir how non-imperial people work. They have these habits of not judging people for not being of royal blood, socialize at the same level just for fun, exchange favors for reasons beyond worship, and that things like caning your child for misbehaving, disowning them from your family and telling them not to cry is actually toxic.

"I have one rule", Samira says. "I do what's best for me. If I want to cry, I cry. Who's going to judge? And why would I care?"

"You're not of royal blood", Azir argues. "An emperor must conduct himself in a poised manner. Be like a statue of stone."

"Ugh. Blood is all red when it's shed. And I feel like a queen when I'm in battle, does it count?"

"We're not statues, my lord. We're people", Akshan intervenes. "And people, even Emperors or Ascended... are soft."

*cue Samira giving him an elbow shot and quipping "not me, I'm as tough as my blade", but Azir is too busy pondering*

Still, there's one thing that itches against Azir's mind: the perspective of banishment. With the mess he's caused... maybe he does deserve to go. Erase his name from history, just like Xerath had said. Remove the shame. And there’s a lot of rules an emperor must abide to when it comes to his conduct.

Azir doesn’t ever want to go. He loves Shurima and cannot fathom existing anywhere else. He wants to make it right and build a splendid new kingdom that will bring it back to the glory of his days. He wants to feel safe and calm and… back how things used to be, when his biggest pain was the death of his entire blood family.

“I’d go with you, if need be. I’d accompany you wherever you’d go”.

Nasus’ voice is a safety raft in these trying times.

“I have nothing left here. My brother is done for. You’re all I have left. All that matters now is that you’re safe.”

You shouldn’t have ever stepped foot into Shurima, Xerath’s voice whispers instead. If you left forever, they’d celebrate.

“But my lord…” Samira intervenes one day. “You being the Emperor and all that, can’t you just… undo this rule? Say it’s not valid and you’re set.”

being a romani fan is knowing that we actually don't know anything at all about what he got up to most of the time. all we know is that he had known shut in merlin risking his safety to help him, leonardo da vinci dropping her perfect smile while worrying about him, and that he moved gilgamesh enough to receive kindness the king typically only showed to enkidu. he may have had everyone else fooled, but not those three. their actions tell a lot about how tough things really were, and after the lostroom bit especially i think the title "dr. hero" might've been even more accurate than everyone thought. what else do you call somebody whose "guilty pleasure" at least half of the time was likely just using secret tech to reaffirm that his basically kids were safe and having fun in the future?

I KNOW RIGHT anon im so glad i saw this ask when i got home or else i would have started crying in the middle of the street XD

Yeah like we are SO LUCKY EVEN to have the babylonia anime to display what happened in the ten years he was given to end up at Chaldea! honestly, everytime the narrative in the game mentions (directly or indirectly) romani it just makes me feel so happy that nasu hasnt forgotten him. that nobody hasnt forgotten him. whether it be a rerun or a new event, im just so happy about the implications and everything

For Gilgamesh himself, a fellow king and clairvoyance-wielder, a person who understands what he had to go through, what he did, what he will do, Leonardo Da Vinci, a fellow scholar and a friend for years, a person who cared for Romani a lot, the person that Romani trusts enough with his secret, and Merlin, Merlin oh my god he’s been secretly helping Chaldea since the start, because without his help none of what Chaldea had been doing would have happened, he created MagiMari solely to help Romani daily too because losing his own clairvoyance had affected him severely, and the internet idol was some sort of horoscope that helped him during Grand Order. And for him to step out of that tower so the fight against Tiamat could succeed???? just ksskfeodndjdjrjdjddndnd TvT

everytime i look up at the chaldea family official art, it just BREAKS ME that its canon in a way TvT from that kotatsu hang out, romani bandaging gudao, the four of them looking out together at the facility’s windows, THE SNACKS THEY CARRIED FOR MAYBE A FAMILY PICNIC my HEART?!!?!?!?!!?!

what i would give for an OVA for grand order….maybe animate at least one of the events with romani in it? TvT yeah grand carnival is fun it made me really happy because of the memes and shenanigans and that theres no singularity but its different if its the heart warming type where you get to witness another banter between the beautiful inventor and chaldea’s beloved doctor, to see an ordinary master and a girl who loved the blue sky, enjoying the current moment between them….

Imagine if Nasu wrote a story where, maybe years from now a random person picks up a book, a note book filled with countless tales of love and hope, of pain and sacrifice, of living and dying, of choosing a decision no matter how much it will hurt or how much it will break you, a story where stargazers paved the way for humanity. All because of that desire to live. Their desire born of hope. Like passing down the torch.

Said person is absolutely bewildered at the stories told. Can you imagine living under the same roof as famous historical figures, gods, beasts, legends throughout history? I sure wouldnt. But everything in the book is detailed and life-like it felt like it really happened. Imagine the person being curious about the man who is fondly called after what people always sought, what people always experienced. A doctor of romance and emotion who was once one of the greatest kings to exist? A renowned genius helping an organization save the world? A human fused with an Arthurian legend? And a plain, ordinary human able to summon extraordinary heroes in their quest for humanity? Really absurd.

Also with the legend surrounding Miss Crane it just absolutely breaks my heart too TvT JUST IMAGINE THE SHEER PAIN IT WOULD CAUSE US ALL IF THEY PUT ROMANI WITH A BUNCH OF CRANES AROUND HIM BECAUSE (red crown i think) CRANES SYMBOLIZE LONGEVITY DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT WILL HURT TvT

Anyways everytime i remember what happened in the lostroom app, the urge to just yank our doctor to the present through that tablet is so strong we might really do it XD ( that time i downloaded i was so happy UNTIL I FOUND OUT THE ENDING WHICH IT WAS LIKE GRINDING MY HEART TO FINE DUST WHICH WAS ALREADY SHATTERED SEVERAL TIMES FROM FGO EVENTS AND FGOGO) also i got off topic people who send me romani analysis/realizations always make me rant so yeah XD

Dr. Hero… Dr. Romantic…. Dr. Roman….To see you once more…. I hope it would be when we all smile again just like old times

Problem is, Extra Archer ain't F/SN EMIYA. Or so the lore nerds I know claim. Apparently the difference is that EMIYA contracted with Alaya, while Extra Mumei made the dealio with the Moon Cell. Supposedly. Got anything to refute their pedantry?

It's been a long while since he played Extra, and I actually dont remember the details of his heroic spirit contract and whether he contracted with the Moon Cell or not, but let me take a stab at this.

He both isn't, and is. It doesn't matter.

Let me explain. The problem with Type-Moon lore has always been that Nasu plays fast and loose with it, changing backgrounds, world details, character interactions, etc as he goes. This means that contradictions inevitably arise, and Nasu's not particularly interested in explaining those away beyond his favorite "multiple timelines" handwave.

Extra Archer undeniably has backstory that makes him appear to be different. Downing a plane for example, is Kiritsugu's story and not Shirou's. That being said, he has had prior interactions that would have been impossible in the Extra timeline. He, Cu, Medusa, and Artoria are all familiar with each other, and even when Extra Rin is canonically a different person than Stat Night Rin, Extra Rin's virtual appearance looking so similar to Stay Night Rin startles Archer and he barely stops himself from talking about the Rin he knows.

With the Extra timeline featuring the decline of mana in the 1970's to the point of magecraft being unusable, this makes the 2004 Fuyuki Holy Grail War impossible within the Moon Cell timeline. The Emiya Shirou of the Extra timeline should not know these people, and yet Extra Archer does. This would mean Extra Archer is not from the Moon Cell (wouldn't be so weird, Astolfo in Extella Link recalls going to the Moon but it wasnt the Moon Cell) but from one where he met Saber, Rider, Lancer, and Rin.

An easy handwave would be to say Extra Archer comes from a third theoretical timeline where Shirou's story after the Fuyuki HGW matches Extra Archer's, but there's an even easier one: it doesn't matter.

Functionally, Extra Archer is written to occupy the same spot in the audience's heart as Stay Night Archer. The whole appeal of his route stems from his already being familiar to old Fate fans, who get to see the grumpy, self-loathing Archer loosen up and come to terms with his trauma thanks to Hakuno and being summoned to a setting where nobody knows who Emiya Shirou even is. He doesn't have to be guarded, he doesn't have to agonize over the pain of his existence and how he will kill himself; he only has to be a standard heroic spirit in a battle royale and that's such a goddamn relief. That's why he recognizes Lancer and Rin, and later in Extella, Rider and Saber. That familiarity is there so that old fans of the character feel some continuity, that their time spent with Archer in Stay Night wasn't for nothing because his relationships to the other familiar characters weren't reset despite the vastly different setting. Extra Archer is essentially meant to be Stay Night Archer placed in a different setting regardless of the changed bsckstory.

P.S This is one of the better things FGO has done for the Nasuverse: its existence has meant there's a lot more reason to keep recurring characters consistent instead of constantly reinventing them. Before, you got the likes of Vlad Extra and Vlad Apocrypha or Zero Fionn and FGO Fionn, which FGO had to explain away by saying they were different aspects of the same spirit, and yet in the Apocrypha anime appearances by Medea Lily, Fionn, and Artemis were consistent with the FGO designs.

*cracks knuckles* I always said: if you don’t know how canon magic works, build stuff based on your own interpretation.

present day human verse!!

so everyone knows of the big bad sun disc that was the “MAIN” one in the capital, right, but little do people know, that the targonians actually made two – the first one was a prototype, placed in the city significantly closer to the mountain Targon, the city now wildly known as Nerimazeth.

and that’s not even the reason why the city is famous among ascended and darkin, this reason actually being (say it with me) an ascended murderer who wiped out the entire empire with one explosion. that’s right, Xerath was actually born in Nerimazeth, which makes everything even more ironic.

currently in canon he’s actually proclaimed Nerimazeth as the new capital of his own empire, and he’s been fighting the solari there too (insolent fools, why would you march on a living god? Pantheon didn’t help them either), but it’s safe to say that it wasn’t sentiment (or only sentiment) that forced him to choose that city as his capital. of course, with how unstable his magic is, he needs to find a way to deal with these amounts of energy before he goes out with a huge firework, which would probably result in yet another wiping of the continent. now, he doesn’t want that – because, obviously, he wants to rule and live on, so the only opportunity to do something about it AND keep all of his energy would be… the actual ascension. the one that would be meant for him and him only, and not just disintegrate his body into a vortex of arcane power again.

so he did just that, and, as it’s supposed to happen, it… didn’t go well.

no, he didn’t die and he didn’t get reverted back to his human form – his arcane form just got stuck in the center of the runic circle needed for the ritual, and his consciousness was divided from the sarcophagus and placed into a projection of himself. quite physical, as far as touches go, but still not living in the full sense of this word. he can feel things, but he doesn’t need food or air, he’s just magic, but shaped better, than the blue spiral.

he can actually go back to the sarcophagus and break the runic circle to break free and go back to his real form, but he decides against it for the time being. the sarcophagus is protected with a lot, and I mean A LOT of magic, in case someone finds out where exactly it’s placed – which is highly unlikely. yes, if anyone tries to do something to his real form, they will get burned immediately. as a “human” he still has a lot of power, but it’s not all of his power – meaning he wouldn’t want to fight, say, Nasus again. you can kill this form, but be wary, because that would mean in a few days you will have a very angry stone levitate menacingly towards you with the intention to fry you alive.

TL;DR: a physical projection of what he looked like long, long ago. can actually feel things, like heat/cold, also pain, also taste, but doesn’t actually need food or air, because he’s quite literally the living sentient energy. a result of a failed experiment with the sun magic. looking pretty much like here and here. just less sparkly when he’s not using magic, obviously. and, of course, only the Ascended/ Darkin can actually realise who that is on sight - because they can at least remember what he looks like. other mages might feel something weird about the guy, but that would be about it.