"My dear, why don't you go for a little taste of death?"

The queen offers you a boon, how would you respond?

Stephanie's (aka Sephira's) overblot, which takes the form of the queen of the underworld.

[Additional info below the cut ^^]

Behind the design

Flowers - I tried to emulate both daffodils and cherry blossoms in her design. Daffodils, also known as narcissus, are said to be the flowers that the spring goddess was drawn to. The flower itself represents rebirth and new beginnings. On the other hand, cherry blossoms represent spring and the fleeting nature of life.

The dress - This more on leans to Sephira's interests. She is a huge fan of the lolita subculture. This dress takes heavy inspiration from gothic lolita. Another thing to note is that there is some blot incorporated with the dress.

Pomegranate - Fun fact, those jewels on her collar are meant to mimic pomegranate seeds. There are 6 in total, which references the 6 seeds the spring goddess consumed. The pomegranate in her hand is a mere homage to the tale of the seeds as well.

Skeleton hands - I honestly thought it was just cool. But you could say it's a reference to her unique magic. Golden skeleton hands go brrrrr

7 of Swords. Mystic Spiral Tarot

Themes and Keywords. Astrology/Element Aquarius decan III combines a Saturn (and Uranus) ruled sign with a moon-ruled decan in a Venusian sephira. Like the five, the 7 of Swords is another flavor of imbalance. The moon and the sevens are known for instability and approaching change, so the steady effort required for saturnine success isn’t being easily supported. Vacillation—and passive insincerity—struggles with sustained exertion and tends toward compromise, if not outright victimization. If victory is to be won, it will be through shrewd surprise maneuvers. Like in the 5, Picatrix also mentions a man with a mutilated head, perhaps an indication that there has been an attack that involves state of mind. This time he is with an old woman, which implies feminine infirmity and could be an indicator of Venus or the moon associated with a dissipating decan. The significations do mention “will accomplished” but also somehow giving offense. Agrippa’s image is wrathful; the man is described as black and angry. The significations are of improper attitudes: insolence and impudence. Mythology/Time of Year Trickster and shape-shifter figures of mythology and folklore like Loki, Coyote, Puss in Boots, Puck, and Brer Rabbit exemplify the sly craftiness associated with this card. Greek mythology has Odysseus, The Odyssey’s eponymous hero, known as “Odysseus the Cunning” for his guile and strategies. The Greeks respected his wiliness, but the Romans, with their sense of honor and virtue, considered him reprobate, degenerate, and deceitful. Whichever moral opinion one holds, he was known for repeatedly escaping situations through last-minute, devious scheming. But in the tale that started him on his long odyssey, he was unsuccessful through vacillation, though his hesitation was understandable under the circumstances. When Helen of Troy was abducted, her husband called upon Odysseus to help wage war upon the Trojans. Odysseus, wishing to avoid involvement, feigned lunacy. He hitched a mismatched team to his plow and began sowing his fields with salt. His strategy was exposed when someone put his infant son in front of the plow. Susan T. Chang

@ervaurem replied to your post “ok but how much debt is Jude in……….. in this...”:

Tales of debt help shskd will jude be able to escape this timeline!??? Stay tuned 😂😂😂

But then, he realized... He wasn't just in debt in this timeline, but in others, too. Was this simply convergence, or something more...?! [CLIFFHANGER INTENSIFIES]

@iirvings replied to your post “ok but how much debt is Jude in……….. in this...”:

I have a dragon that drops like 2k and then respawns, a sephira, and a blue sephira if you want to borrow them

"Respawns.....?" RIP the fourth wall. Wait, 2k? And two sephiras?! That can't be real... could it?!

Farming for just 14 more sephira stones and it's already a pain. And I'm only trying to reach a total of 30. Out of 280. Lord knows I'm waiting for the next tales event before I try to farm the rest of this.

I'm starting to work for harder challenges in gbf and I have a question for you because you seem way more experienced than me...is Tales of Arcarum always this hard?? Even the first monsters are so hard!

oh dear. Hi!! Good luck 😭

Sandbox in general is pretty annoying, Tales itself just basically increases the drops on preexisting bosses and adds challenge to them. Idk if it's going to reassure you at all, but personally i just couldn't clear those challenge:

i should retry it again with a good burst team but i'm too lazy to work through this one.

for the rest though, i admit i genuinely didn't have much problem, but it's basically a question of having a solid grid/charas without having to rely on support summons. It takes time though, when Sandbox came out i was genuinely struggling against most of the bosses as well :/ nowadays i'm doing far better but yeah.

My wind is one of my most powerful element and i have had a lot of gacha luck so i'm having it way easier in general, i don't know how much i could help... but in case, here's my set up:

(if you have the additional weapons tab unlocked, do use them, i didn't bc i'm an idiot lol, but you can slot sephira weapons or your bahamut weapon there and it'll give you some more boost elsewhere.

but yeah i have a really specific wind set up to start with :/ my backline improves my defense and my dodge by a lot, my frontline attacks very well and regularly, my summons being max uncapped are doing me wonders, so yeah... yeah.

and for the bosses of each region (Baal and... whatever is the name of the other one), they're V2 so you need to figure out what are their omens in order to fill the "cancel 3 omens" missions from them. I don't really remember the omens, i know for one of them it was skill dmg, delay, and debuff 5 times, but i didn't keep notes. I got lucky bc my general set up actually could cancel the omens just fine so i didn't get to think too hard about it.

i don't think it is as much of an help as it could be ;; but sharing in case anything helps out a little.

good luck for the rest though. Tales are an unique opportunity for grinding because the drops and rewards are genuinely fantastical but do remember to take it easy.

good luck!!!

Kiss meme 41 for Gladio and Isla, please ? =)

41. …because the world is saved.

Fluff/angst... I guess, set just after the end of the game when the light has returned. @ffxv-ocs-unite @mp938368 @ffxvhoe   @sephiratales

Meet me at Galdin Quay, tomorrow. x

The past twenty-four hours were a blur of confusion and sudden, dramatic changes. The constant darkness was gone, sunlight breaking through for the first time in years. Daemons that hounded the world all over, gone in moments dissipating in clouds of black particles as the sun rose.

It took time to adjust to the bright light of day again. People in Lestallum murmured and talked, excitedly, among themselves feeling the beams hit their skin. Children who were born during the years of darkness cautiously stepped out into the light, feeling it for the first time and were warmed by it. The atmosphere of excitement and joy was infectious. Isla left The Shield’s Respite in the hands of her staff and left Lestallum to meet Gladiolus as he requested. 

She stood on the shoreline, the soft waves gently lapping at her bare feet while the wind around her whipped up her hair and the skirts of the dress she was wearing. The once beautiful resort was a mess of fallen in roofing and collapsed beams, but it would heal under the hands of skilled builders in time, just as the rest of Eos would. 

For the first time in years, Isla relaxed. There were no daemons to worry about. She could hear the sound of seabirds calling overhead, smell the salt of the spray. For the first time in ten years, she could think about the future and actually believe there was one to be had. Her shoulders felt strangely lighter and as the sunlight warmed her skin, the feeling of fear and dread she carried in her chest was nowhere to be found.

Isla listened to the waves, breathed deeply, and wondered how she could have ever taken something like the sun for granted. She vowed she never would again, not after ten years without it. Her mind was calm and still as she thought of everything, and yet nothing. Free for the first time in years to simply just be. 

“Sunshine,” the soft call of Gladiolus’s voice was just loud enough to pull her from her peaceful trance-like state. She turned to look over her shoulder, and there he stood no more than thirty feet away. His hair pulled back, a small, unreadable smile on his lips, sporting the familiar black tank top that somehow survived ten years of intermittent wear.

She started running, her feet sinking into the sand with every step, but she pushed herself forward. Gladiolus walked a few steps, arms open and extended, catching her and spinning her on the spot when she all but launched herself at him. Isla braced her hands on his shoulders, peering down while he held her aloft, his hands sturdy and strong beneath her arms.

“You came back!” Isla beamed at him, unable to keep the broad smile at bay.

“Said I would,” Gladiolus replied, with a smile just as big as her own. 

“And you brought the dawn with you...” 

Slowly, Gladiolus lowered her to the ground. “...Yeah.” His smile faltered. When she touched the sand, his hands lowered to her waist. 

“What’s wrong?” Isla asked, brushing the fingers of her right-hand back through Gladiolus’s hair.

For a moment so brief she would have missed it if she hadn’t been standing so close, Gladiolus’s eyes grew distant, his expression passive, as though he was suddenly somewhere else and seeing things beyond Isla’s realm of vision. Then, as quickly as it came, he returned to her and his smile lit up his face.

“Nothing.” He bent towards her, pressing his forehead against hers. “The dawn is back. The world is safe. That’s what matters.”

“Gladio...?” Isla wanted to question him further, but a voice at the back of her mind told her now wasn’t the time. She shifted closer, claiming his mouth in a soft, heartfelt kiss while winding her hands back around his neck. Gladiolus cupped her cheek, his thumb resting in the hollow of her throat. Each time Isla went to break the kiss, he pursued, keeping that connection with an almost tangible desperation in each brush of his lips. 

From the way he kissed her, Isla could only assume something bad had occurred and that the defeating of the darkness had not been free of casualties. 

“Hey, hey...” Isla pulled away enough that Gladiolus couldn’t simply keep kissing her. “You saved the world...” she brushed her nose against his, a sign of reassurance between them since the beginning.

“Noct saved it.” Gladiolus rumbled back, his voice tight. He swallowed, hard and Isla’s stomach sank. He didn’t have to say anything, she could gather from the tightening of his jaw that Noctis would not be celebrating the victory. Wordlessly, Isla wrapped her arms around Gladiolus’s middle, squeezing him as tight as she was able. He buried his face in the curve of her neck, his shoulders shuddering and a low, strangled sound escaping his lips. 

The world was safe... but the cost had been a great one. 

This kind of goes really nicely with this commission of Gladiolus and Isla I bought in Dec ‘17 from @sarahmillercreations

I hope this was okay, @sephiratales Might not have been exactly what you expected. I tried to keep it short. I always imagine this moment of them reuniting is full of conflicting emotions for Gladio. Maybe I’ll do a piece from his point of view eventually.

I am not part of the fandom you wrote in for my fake title ask can you do something else. It was lost little fairy and of the wild and winds.

Fandom: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!

Summary: Tsuna’s an odd child, always running around barefoot, with leaves, twigs and feathers in his hair. His behavior paired with the eerie orange eyes, plus the fact that his mother was widely known to be a local Namimori residence, yet no one has ever seen her husband- if she ever had one.

So the rumors around the existence of Sawada Tsunayoshi were thus:

He was a fairy. A youkai, an Earth spirit, but obviously he was only partially human.

Regardless of the scoffers that denied such fantasy, a great deal of people believed it, especially the children. Even the adults were not unaffected. After all, one couldn’t deny the way the very air around Tsunayoshi seem to radiate warmth and comfort as if the child existed in perfect harmony with the world.

Many Namimori residences took to protecting the child, keeping him away from out-of-towners, and to their relief, the Hibari quickly took to doing the same.

Their son, Hibari Kyoya had obviously manifested the demon blood very strongly and spent many hours in Tsunayoshi’s presence as the comforting aura he put out soothed even the most violent and bloodthirsty personality quirks of the young Hibari.

The people were even more pleased when Tsunayoshi gathered some of the brightest and unique friends to him, forming something of a quite large group. They had no trouble playing in the forest, running through the streets playing pretend games.

Truly, they were the pride and joy of Namimori.

And one day, when a man marched into their home, loud, rude and entirely convinced he was dear Tsunayoshi’s father….

….well, they would quickly dissuade him of such fooling nonsense before Tsunayoshi found out.

It would do to upset him, they quite liked the prosperity he brought. No one wished to see his wrath.

Description: Either flames stuff, or actually supernatural, who can tell? But Tsunayoshi is special, especially in a world where Iemitsu couldn’t be bothered to visit his wife once every ten years.

Tsuna’s not sealed, he gathers his elements and in general he’s a happy child who may or may not believe he is indeed the son of some sort of powerful fairy/youkai/spirit and thus tried very hard to honor his father.

Iemitsu may have married his mother, but truthfully, his real dad probably magicked him so he just thought Tsuna was his son. Because obviously his real dad loved his mother very much and he was obviously a prince- no, a king who was doing his best to keep them all safe from a wicked queen! Or an evil spirit!

Misunderstandings (or are they) abound and by the time Reborn shows up….well. Mafia? Tsuna’s never heard of that, but what he does hear is throne. Obviously, this is a gift from his father to keep him safe in his human life so when he goes with his father, he’ll be strong enough to take that throne! 

Or something.

The magic fire doesn’t help things.

Neither does the curse. Or the Vindice. Or the box animals, or the time travel or literally all of this.

Naturally, everyone believes Tsuna over this random interloper who is obviously affected by his curse, so sad. Talbot’s on Tsuna’s side too, this is the most fun he’s had in centuries and if the myths and legends of fairies and spirits were based off Kawahira, Sephira and their people, well, the children are right in some ways, aren’t they?

Relationships: Ten Gen Vongola- friendships abound, maybe Tsuna/Kyoko, some father/son Reborn & Tsuna or at least mentor/student. 

Tags: Supernatural Elements, Fairies, Spirits, Mother Earth, Magic Fire, is it real or are they misinformed, who really knows, Not!Sealed Tsuna, Iemitsu non-existent parenting, BAMF!Nana, Fairy Queen Kyoko, but is she summer or is she winter, is it reality or pretend, who can say, certainly not me

RITA LEARNED TIDAL WAVE, BABEY

Interview with developer of Lobotomy corporation

1.Hello, i'm the Blinkraven, from russian translation team (Tales&Stories Team) , you can call me Blink or Roman. What is your name and what your role one Project moon company?

Hello, I am Kim Ji-hoon, who is the director of ProjectMoon.

2.Can you tell a bit about the company? How did you all gathered and found the company? What is your main goal in foundation Project moon game studio?

At first, I gathered friends from university game production clubs and formed a team. I started with four people, but I felt the shortage of art and programming through the project (LobotomyCorp). So I took part in university events, festivals, and various other places to gather other members. Lobotomy Corporation was finally developed with 10 people.

I always want to make a work with the theme of "human hymn(人間 讚歌)". As the light shines most strongly in the darkness, I think that human beings shine in despair. The goal of the ProjectMoon is to make the content of the subculture series continuously. I want to try various contents such as comics, novels, animations as well as games one day.

3.What inspired you to create Lobotomy corp. ? Did you already have experience in making games on Unity or is it your debut?

Lobotomy Corporation was inspired by SCP Foundation, Cabin in the woods, Warehouse13, and many other institutions that deal with monsters and supernatural tools. Originally, When I saw the works mentioned above, I wanted to play a game of monster management, however, there isn't the game like that so I made it.

There have been many attempts to make games, but Lobotomy Corporation is the first finished game.

4.What do you think is the main key feature of the game? What should the game reveal with it stoyline and gameplay?

I think managing monsters and suppressing them are the most important features of game play. In the story, we paid attention to the wounds that each character had and the process of accepting them.

5.As we know, as basis for the plot of storyline contents were taken many elements of relegions and mythologies and others. Why Kaballah in the first place?

As mentioned earlier, it was clearest to convey the theme of human hymn through Kabbalah. I wanted to show through Kabbalah that a human being follows the path to becoming fully self. Likewise, we wanted to show the limits of seeing the world only through the perspective of Kabbalah.

6.Contrary to the established stereotype that almost all Korean games are focused on the grind component, there is also a thoughtful game world in your game, details of which are revealed when communicating with the sephiras, who are responsible for departaments. The question is: how often did the storyline changes during development? How much cardinally? I still remember those days of  Beta-version, when Angela was an old AI-computer that uses perforated tape.

From the very beginning to the beta version, and until now, the topic of the story has not changed. However, 'Sephira' characters were added in the process of storytelling. When I wanted to communicate the story, I felt the limitations of the dialogue between the player and Angela. So I decided to make many changes in the summer of 2017.

7.Where did the ideas for the abnormalities come from? Did many of them personify human sins, is it really so?

It is hard to say that Abnormalities come from a variety of materials and are specific to one thing. Memes, original sin, urban legend, fairy tales, legends, and social phenomena. However, they have a common interpretation to match the story of the game.

8.The game has a hidden mechanics, forcing the player to "accidentally" re-play the game again and again, to uncover all the story plot twists, to study all the abnormalities. How much in your opinion the game is replayable?

If the players have seen all of the stories and unlocked Abnormalities' information, I think they really enjoyed all the content of the game. And I was intending to make the player try multiple retries in this process. Because the company turned into a mess through the Abnormalities and watching the situation was also intended to be a fun factor, I wanted to make the watching the situation in the retry of the game was also worth.

9.Approximately in July 2017, you decidet to radically change both the UI and gameplay in general. What was the reason for this? What did not suit in so-called [Legacy]-version of the game? Although the storyline also moved from "dead end", sephiras (visually they weve very interesting), the entire visual part of the game changed at all. And then closer to november, you changed again the visual part, making the game to look like as it is now. Was it hard to make that decisions?

The biggest reason for the change was 'it was not fun and it did not fit the intention'. This was a difficult decision for us, but the decision we had to do at the same time. I thought the pre-change game was just mimicking the western art style and indie game style. I thought I have to change the game style to what I can best create and the style that I like, in order to make a game that is sustainable in the future. So I decided to change everything. The process of changing was very painful, but after the change everything became clear how to build and develop the story.

10.Oh, and earlier in [Legacy]-version of the game, for normally walkthrough it was required to monitor a lot of parameters and key features, but during development, some functions were removed, some - simplified. Was this done because of fan complaints, or did you find these systems reduntant and uncomfortable for the game?

The values, genders and final observations of the Abnormality that were in the "legacy version" have been removed. Employee values and gender were changed to construct gameplay more clearly. The final observation of the Abnormality is something that has been removed due to the difficulties of realistic development. It was difficult to develop the final observation while adding various stories and scripts of Sephira through the changes, due to time and financial problems. I am sorry for this part too.

11.As I remember, earlier you had financial problems during game development. How did you manage to raise money for development? Did you have to lose something, or try to economize on something for the sake of further development?

We have not overcome financial problems using special methods. Thanks to the translation teams in Russia, China and Japan, we were able to make more sales in different countries, and as a result, we only got enough money to keep the team for a while. And now, after the development of LobotomyCorproation, only 4 team members are staying and developing. Other team members are seeking another job or going back to school. Although the size and speed of development can be reduced, I think we can keep the team longer.

12.Have you thought at the stage of development - of choosing a platform to make the game cross-platform of just PC-exclusive? For now it's very popular to make games on mobile devices, and your game with small edits of the interface could go well on mobile devices.

I focused on PC from the beginning. And Lobotomy Corporation is not going to switch to other platforms. Because the UX of the game is focused solely on PC, I thought that there would be a lot of changes if we were going to change to another platform. But the following work will consider expanding to other platforms, including PCs.

13.From the point of view of the Korean game developer, is there a great competition among your collegues in the game development industry of indie gaming? How populat are indie-games in Korea, that oriented on single player play?

There are also many indie game developers in Korea. Most of them are mobile-based indie games. So I did not see any other team in terms of competition. Compared to the indie game sector, Korea has a small sector of single-player games.

14.How, from the professional point of view, do you think that the opinion that in Korea games play only in online games is not exaggerated?

Korea is focused on mobile games and online games. But I do not think this is unconditionally bad. Because there are a lot of players in the world such as a person who loves a single game, a person who likes online games, and a person who likes mobile games. So I think it has its own meaning.

15.Has the game paid off since getting into Early access on Steam, and until now? What was your mood when you learned that the game was so popular in the world (well, and in particular in Russia)?

As a creator, there will be no greater joy. It is hard to find the driving force that makes our work world fun in many countries and expects what will happen. I want to create interesting stories and games that only we can show in the future!

Let's talk about future plans:

1.Since the release of version 1.0 (and the came out from Early Access), many players have already been able to find all the storyline endings that are hidden in the game. What do you expect the expected percentages of finding endings to be?

I think 80% of the players who have cleared up to Day50 have seen a hidden ending. If the player went to Day 50, wouldn't they want to fill in 100% of the encyclopedia?

2.In the so-called "true ending" or 100% of the Seed of light, Angela takes the complex under her control and came out from the facility to the surface for herself. Do you already have storyline sheets for the sequel and will somehow "bad" endings influence or somehow be mentioned in the sequel?

Yes. The ending of Lobotomy Corporation has had a big impact on the world, and the results will be shown in the sequel.

3.By your calculations, how much time will it take to develop a sequel, so that at least the first pl15.Has the game paid off since getting into Early access on Steam, and until now? What was your mood when you learned that the game was so popular in the world (well, and in particular in Russia)?

The development period is one year and six months until early release. We plan to spend about six months in the Eary Access period. But it always didn't go as planned. ;) I do not know if we will release the demo version, but I think I could show the gameplay within a year.

4.As for now are popular tactical turn-based games in various variations, whether it will affect the sequel or its gameplay will be like the first part - in real time with an active pause?

I'm not going to make a turn-based game as much as possible. I want to create a game that is played in as real-time as possible.

5.As I know, you monitor the appearance of content on your game on the Internet. Do you know about different memes, video parodies, etc.? What do you think about it?

Yes. We monitor videos, pictures, streaming, etc. uploaded by various fans. We are gaining great strength through the watching of enjoying the gameplay and delicate creation. In addition, problems with bugs and balances are also monitored through monitoring the world community.

6.Well, finally, your opinion about indie-game industry as a whole? What is the future of indie-games in game-development?

I think indie games are something that is unique and interesting. There are so many indie games coming out every day. What I think will become more important in the future is the unique universe of the work itself. Each game, even if it is individually, can survive in a number of indie games if it happens in a gigantic connected world. But most importantly, it has to be an attractive world, and the game must be fun.

4, 8, 11, 15, 30 for anyone you like

thanks!! i’m gonna do it for uhhh my girl sephira cause i love her very much and i miss working with her :(

ask me some oc questions

4.What type of discipline was your character subjected to at home? Strict? Lenient?

she was an only child, and had a lot of medical issues in infancy, so her parents were very doting. they did set a lot of rules, and were very strict about where the line was drawn, but she had a lot of freedom within those bounds.

8.How does your character feel about religion?

she generally rolls with the whole spirits thing, and she knows all the tales and observes most of the traditions. the concept of loved ones staying with her as spirits beyond the veil watching and waiting for her to join them is comforting to her, so that’s what she puts the most stock in.

11.How do they see themselves: as smart, as intelligent, uneducated?

honestly she sees herself as the smartest person in the room in most situations :/ which i mean when it’s a room full of people in her field it’s a fair assumption but

15.Did they graduate? High-School? College? Do they have a PHD? A GED?

i haven’t really thought abt how the turians would do college degrees but she’s top astronautical propulsion engineer in the turian engineering corp’s cipritine branch so that counts for something right

30.Are they holding on to something in the past? Can he or she forgive?

she lost a very good friend in the relay 314 incident, and she’s very bitter about it. she tries to be tolerant and accepting of other races, but she hates how pushy and entitled humans act. she has to work with them on the normandy project, and she’s willing to put up with them, but she makes it very clear that she’s the boss bitch in tec-cipritine and the visiting humans better stay in line.

7 of Cups. Mystic Spiral Tarot

Themes and Keywords Apparitions. Delirium. Imagination versus illusion. Magic and glamour. “Fantasy Island.” Dreams and indulgences. Enchantment. Corruption of purity. Fairy favors. Elusive visions. Distortion versus reflection. Being enamored. Sirens and succubae. False lights. Fertile imaginings. Ensoulment of images. Shameful secrets. Creative work. The magic lasso. Compost. Astrology/Element All Scorpio decans have a potency caused by doubling planetary influences. Scorpio is ruled by Mars, but both decan and sephira of the seven are ruled by Venus. Scorpio Venus is a siren, glamorous, deep, and dark. Here she’s a debased courtesan decadent to the point of degeneration and debauchery. Venus’s function is to attract. Her magic mirror shows what you wish to see, compelling illusions that draw you toward her. When you awaken will they be fertile visions or fantasies? Mythology/Time of Year Lethe (“Oblivion”) was both a goddess and a river that traversed Hades through the cave of Hypnos, god of sleep. The shades of the dead are given the waters of river Lethe to forget their earthly life. The Orphics taught initiates to instead drink from the adjacent pool of Mnemosyne (“Memory”), to achieve omniscience. Glamorous Aphrodite, goddess of beauty and laughter, also has a dark side revealed in some of her epithets: Skotia “Dark One,” Melainis “Black One,” Anosia “Unholy,” Androphonos “Killer of Men,” Tymborychos “Gravedigger,” Cloacina “of the Sewers,” and Apaturus “Deceptive One.” The 7 gives us old and new tales of sirens and succubae. Famous femme fatales beguile; Miss Havisham and her wedding cake decay. Ignus Fatuus, foolish fire, leads travelers astray. Whether it is Roman Black Sea wars won with poisoned honey, the debauchery of Venus and the satyrs, spirits in the Dead Marshes of Mordor beckoning, the spells of Circe, or Satan tempting Eve in the form of the will-o’-the-wisp, the common theme is of sweet, dark ensnarement. Susan T. Chang

A monster is a person in your neighborhood: Satire vs. acceptance on Sesame Street= Netzach/Hod She b Malchut

Super-hero cartoons are arguably as rooted in gangster literature and media as they are in any epic heroic tradition. It's only very recently that there's been a move to return Star Heroes to military legitimacy, as The Avengers become an official S.H.I.E.L.D project... we'll see how long that moment lasts. Because since World War II, the super-heroes have tended strongly to be identified exclusively as private citizens, defined by, if not their hostility to government, a certain amount of government distance from them, manifest as either fear/hostility, or dependence, as in the case of Iron Man, or Superman or Batman.  None of them are government stooges, or instruments, but the local or national state tends to come to them in need of help with some regularity.

The relationship between the state-- Malchuth and the heroes-- Zeer Anpin, is fraught with tension, as is the way of serious long term relationships. One is the stability, the other is the agent of justification.  One just wants to serve, the other just wants to feel good, safe. Gangster literature is what, in many ways, first developed this relationship in the context of the modern city itself. The functional agency of drawing and circulating satisfaction vs. the frustrating maternal Law, defending some kind of innocence at the expense of functionality-- the end of the story is a covenant drawn between the two, making them agent facilitators of each other. It's like every good marriage, until it falls apart perish forbid. The distinction between one and the other demands mediation, and a third emerges naturally in the polarity between the two: The infant is to become the Tzaddik. Trusted somehow by all, and ultimately the most vulnerable, his/her death is the epic tragedy that lets everything fall apart.

Gangsters, like babies and deities, are folk heroes stripped of the conceit of altruism.  What their most selfish values begin to describe are the truest essential concerns of any individual, and any nobility, loyalty, or pragmatic intelligence they express become relatively ennobled, and their folly is only that of the most traditional of ruined heroes: hubris, intoxication, and foolish obliviousness to the consequence of their failed confidence. Scarface dies much like Achilles and Balder, once they've climbed to the top of the world to become the most beloved and feared of the gods, a war god and a sun god all at once-- that's when it's over. A failed hero is the beginning of all cautionary example.

What is Count Dracula if not another of these failed heroes, but cursed with unending success? See the ultimate horror of Dracula in the later films-- frustrated by the nature of what he is, yearning so great that satisfaction and victory cannot satisfy? The vampire hero, redeemed, must overcome even the yearning for satisfaction in order to become profoundly trustworthy. You'll observe, this is also the lesson that creates Spider-man, Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, Wolverine, and many other Marvel heroes: only by giving up on personal satisfaction, be it in the form of love, revenge, wealth, or even divinity-- can they become what's trusted as a hero, and then they can overpower anything and everything, even death itself.

Frank Miller's neo-pulp heroes in Sin City take this a step further, rejecting even the appearance of even nobility itself in order to be heroes, and Chris Nolan's Batman is very influenced by Miller's version of gritty austere virtue-beyond-beauty. Here is the point where a Pop/super-hero remains distinct: he does not have to ever, give up his integrity. Pulp heroes, later day post modern comic icons, like John Constantine, Wolverine or any of the Warren Ellis Authority indy heroes outside of the mainstream mold. Their virtue is, partially, willingness to step past even needing to feel whole about their actions in order to do what needs doing. This is why Garth Ennis ultimately prefers to write war comics: that pragmatism is taken as a given, and the super heroic idealism is understood as a decadent privilege, at best.

Super-heroism rages, by it's nature against this criticism. This is most overtly expressed in Joe Kelly's Superman vs. the Elite storyline, notably adapted to animation in 2012. Don't call it naïve, don't call it juvenile-- call it simple, elementary, iconic. The hope of approaching moral depth and the implied darkness accepted in that is more resonant and literary, but betrays the purity that the heart yearns for from it's mythology. Maybe i'm exaggerating-- traditional religion and mythology tends to accept, even embrace, moral relativism and the challenge of dark nature and betrayal of ideals as a certain form of ideal-- but as civilization becomes more sophisticated and self aware, the antidote demands to be more pure, hence the progressively more senseless and emotionally immature nature of super-modern pop music, during any era that should be finding depth and collective appreciation of that capacity to acknowledge the disturbing range of what's clear about being a person, all the more so does the simplest, most even offensively naïve of narratives become resonant. Witness the victory of Christianity over both Roman paganism, Norse Aesir worship and folk Gnosticism-- why did the cruelest of all empires go with the religion that ultimately, theologically, justified its excesses the least? Because they needed the purest of purification to move on and be the kind of bad they were going to become from then on, in order to rule themselves all.

This is the degree to which satirical anti-heroes are central to the maturity of a culture. But once satirized effectively enough they can no longer be national icons-- they must either respond to the satire, and become better and more whole mythic heroes, like Krishna after Buddha, or Elijah after The New Testament critique of his fiery piety in the tale of the good samaritan. The choice becomes ironic pandering, ignoring the critique in search of more naïve audience, or better yet, some sophisticated refinement of character, and ideally a mythic defeat of the criticism. In this, the hero's ideals themselves defeat the villain embodying the critique. This is much of where the Batman vs. Joker conflict has gone in recent super-modernity, where Batman's commitment to protecting, or at least not killing, the monstrous grizzly and willfully chaotic murderer is justified as an ideological triumph-- not defined as a virtue by dint of dated calvinist “commitment to ideal”-- because no one respects that kind of ideological commitment as being authentically virtuous anymore. The triumph instead has been defined in specific contrast to the Joker's preference-- the Joker would like Batman to kill him, ostensibly, because that would prove the virtue of killing problems, and by NOT killing him, Batman proves his virtue and commitment to the legal process, in some strange sense, which strips batman of the danger of being a social terror.

The real reason for this hang-up is much more narratively practical-- the villain is too precious to kill off. The Joker, like almost every other villain of grace and note, is divinized by his meaningfulness. He was actually killed off in his second appearance, but to no avail-- the editors commanded the writers to find a way to bring him back to life only a short time later, and so it has been his practice ever since, much like Dracula or Moriarty.

The degree to which villains are different than monsters is the degree to which there is no reward in slaying villains-- only an end to the great narrative.  Monsters, on the other hand, must be slain, as this is the original sin of demonization-- insisting that violent annihilation is the only solution to the needs of another “human.” A villain is preferred to be captured, and maintained in controlled captivity. This mystic clarity about the reincarnation of the slain enemy into distant freedom, as opposed to the power of sacred captivity, to keep one's enemy close, accessible, and monitored, like the very id itself. As indestructible and precious as the self itself, the moral of the story is Overcome, but never destroy.

Dracula's special and refined thirst is for the Moon, the untouched mother-- and his slave wife is the Venus, although the point where they meet is close. The early evening- But Venus is his weapon, while the Moon, ultimately, is his weakness, what gets him killed, even as much as he lives from nursing at it's behest and it's throat. This is the secret of the two “ה"'s in the four letter tetragrammaton “YHWH”.

One of the profound psychological innovations of Sesame Street is to reclaim the monstrous as synonymous with the human, thus overcoming at the most viceral and accesible level untold generations of demonization.  Where traditionally Dracula and all the monsters represent the repressed and feared aspects of basic hungry humanity (“hell is other people”) Sesame Street takes Dracula and reframes his hunger as simple passion for the abstract and inherently unlimited satisfaction of numbers themselves. Whereas Count Dracula himself is the first amongst modern pop-monsters, The Count falls parralel to the sephira of Hod, sensetivity and co-dependance, the aspect of the god who gives numbers to the stars already created, unthreatening, although perhaps slightly nagging tho graceful and charming. Contrast this with the muppet I would consider his opposite number in rank and value, the Cookie Monster, who I would consider an expression of Netzach/Dominance, his hunger unavoidable and creepingly inquisitive, his pallette insatiable although still somehow respectful of some kind of engagement and personal limit in the context of personal need, reflected in his rectification as a vegetable eater who just appreciates the cookies as a “sometimes food,” even as his monstrous appetite remains intact. The villification of Venus/Innana is that of an insatiable lover who does not care much at all, but cannot long be resisted, or even resented, as the defeated visage of Ernie-without-cookies testifies.

A monster is just another person in the neighborhood; a reflection of our own normal needs and hungers, respected, honored, and safely sociably satisfied. Grouches and Satyrs are just themselves, and honored for and despite this-- what more radical message can civilization aspire to offer? This is, ultimately the great difference between Babylonia and Egypt: Egypt sought not (generally) to assimilate it's monsters and enemies, although there were periods where the Sethian was more integrated-- the foreign was somewhat inherently anathema-- and this nativist impulse endured until the Greeks overcame it, as was the nature of Greeks, to overcome nativisms with a glorious and all-consuming universalism. Rome's innovation was just to weaponize the Greek syncretic clarity, and apply it more aggressively, taking it's perfection for granted as much as was reliable.  Once, to end wars within an empire, polytheistic pantheons were assembled, as a kind of a symbolic senate of the different priorities of different city-states within an empire. Egypt may have innovated this, if Babylon did not, it doesn't matter.  Babylon's aspiration was not just to be an empire, but to be a great city, where things worked-- and it became clear that unless there was co-identification, and cathartic expression, of the different elements within their society, there would be conflict. The great Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh reflects this ambivalence, between the slaying of monsters and their integration and the acknowledgement of their humanity. The hero starts the story as a hated villain, an oppressive king resented by the populace he rules. A hero from outside of civilization comes to confront and slay him, this force of cruel and selfish modernity-- but instead, thanks to the intervention of certain gods, they become friends instead, and go on an adventure to slay another more monstrous monster. This conflict is greatly debated and engaged, before and after, and leads to conflict with greater forces, goddess and her pet cosmic bull. Our heroes slay the cosmic bull, and for this, one  of them must die. A similar narrative is kept by the Greeks, when Kadmos slays the wrong dragon, the beloved of Hera, and so must lose his beloved sister Europa, forever. The moral is clear-- the more you can integrate, and not kill, the less threatened you will be. This is the purest moral of all civilization.  

Sesame Street is in the unique summit between commercial and civil. Concieved, unlike most pop-cartoons, not for profit but for some kind of educational, civic or edifying purpose, specifically bound up in the grand project of universal education for all children, its excesses as far as violence and indulgence of children's affection for sugar and noise compel parental forgiveness and toleration, in light of the hope that the kids would enjoy this educational pop-media over less trustworthy and more commercially pandering tv shows. In it's early episodes, it could get away with a lot as far as puppet violence and questionable exploration of tantalization and titillation of kindergardeners, as it at least had positive tacit integrationist and educational function, about the nature and character of assorted letters and numbers(!). Once Sesame Street became established and somewhat universally successful, and thus, functionally institutionalized, it also became more sensitive to moral criticism, and able to be overtly responsible for the values and graces it would introduce, rather than assume were already part of children's paradigma. Cookie Monster introduces children to consumption, rather than just satirizing a hunger already observed, and becomes a certain kind of role model, now responsible to amend his own nature, so that the lesson of moral clarification become the implied arc of his journey, even as older episodes exist only in archive, except of course for classic routines, which are continually re-integrated into new episodes. The earliest Ernie and Bert routines remain in circulation and translation forever, because they are so fundamental and accessible-- a good omen for pop-longevity. Many classic figures are integrated into Sesame Street, but eventually used less and less because what they meant historically becomes less and less relevant. I was introduced to the character of Charlie Chaplin's “Tramp” in the context of Sesame Street, but they don't use even the Maria who played him so much anymore. Instead, is Mr. Noodles, the incompetent mime in Elmo's world who children joyfully correct as he manically tries to complete the most rudimentary of tasks, to no avail, until the advice of a quorum of offscreen children are able to get through to him, with the help of Elmo's omniscient voice. Elmo is the aspect of Malchus, in that he became the main character of Sesame Street, despite being a later addition to the cast. He is a monster child, like the once central Grover, but unlike Grover or Chaplin, he is defined by his absolute competence. His lessons are those learned after doing everything right, not wrong. He is the aspect of the wise child, not the fool, and so he is given an entire third of every episode of the final few seasons of Sesame Street-- until he himself, that is, the actor who played Elmo exclusively, was implicated in the hubris of the successful, and the good name of all that Elmo and Sesame Street are associated with became suddenly embedded in sexual impropriety. Such is the downfall of kings, specifically: fear of their appetites and preferences, because of their absolute power.

Sesame Street is too big to end because of an underage gay sex scandal or two, but not too big to need to be a bit castrated because of it. Pop-cartoons depend on grace, and the impression of trustworthiness

before both parents and children. As cool as we all want to be with what actors do on their own time, it was a bit more of a problem with Sesame Street, because the actors, especially in the case of Elmo, are so deeply and truly associated with the show itself. Not since Jim Henson himself was alive and available to make Kermit the Frog a celebrity, available for interview and all manner of guest appearance, was a character so genuinely and improvisably identifiable with the actor giving him voice.

It's not that “we” found out that Elmo himself was a chubby older black man with a thing for 17 year old men, it's that Elmo is such a naked expression of erotic power male power, easily identifiable as kind of Libyan Satyr; a naked, red wildman. Identifying THAT cartoon Id with an actual person, might just be a little hard to reconcile for long. So they appear to be phasing him out a bit, making the Elmo's world segments less personal and more theatrical, so that the distance of seeing him as more of a stage muppet that an intimate and eponymous pop force, like the great god Pan himself, kept alive only in Elizabethean chains, taken from the wild forest onto the city stage. A smaller King Kong is a loveable King Kong, unless and until he creeps you out. Then what're you gonna do?

The Sesame Muppets are monsters of the greatest virtue. They will not eat you, and don't even have to promise not to; the question dare not come up. They want to share and play responsibly, learn and help us learn. In this, they are a tikkun on the respective terrors and traditional issues with their respective forms. The Great Eagle, the “Big Bird,” hangs over looking patronizingly down for prey-- but Big Bird on Sesame Street is utterly without guile or threat, taking as much responsibility for whatever goes on as is possible, in his dreamy ignorance. This is the level of the great dove, divinity herself, rather than the predatory eagle or trickster raven-- the hawk coming to bring things to you, rather that to eat the eyes out of your head. Dracula is reduced to counting passionately only numbers and not bride-victims. The unconquerable hunger behind Dracula, the oceanic kraken come asurface, hungers only for cookies.   Grover is something tragic, a hero partially defined by his constant failure. Through him, children learn the grace in not being good at something, and still trying because you care, and the effort is cute. But Elmo informs of the possibility of being inherently right at everything, and STILL being cute, and this is the different between the Messiah of Joseph and the Messiah of David. This is one of the strongest subplots in the old testament, and endures through the entire post Pentateuch bible, when the kingdoms of David and Ephraim (Joseph's son) literally split because of conflicting priorities.  Modern scholarship identifies these two voices as representing conflicting political priorities involved in the bible's construction, Kabbalistic tradition prefers to assume that it's an internal expression of fundamentally complementary models. Joseph, identified with the sphere of Yesod, is identified with unyielding righteousness, and keeping of rules. He must die and fail at some point, if not in every generation, to make the point of the limitation of perfection in this world. The Davidic model, introduced in his forefather Judah, for whom the Jews are named, is about the triumph of earnest imperfection, bound up in a will to constantly do better, in a manner unbound by law or principle, although still beholden to the purpose and meaning of law and principle, and whose life, triumph and clarity can only come after being built by adherence to law and principle. The Davidic Messiah is the one who brings clarity to true purpose and divinity into the already formed Josephean structure. As such, he never dies, and cannot fail, but can only be disgraced into some degree of dismissal, as was the way with Elmo and King Solomon.

On another unrelated note: I had 200 sephira stones sitting in storage specifically for Nier. And then I promptly forgot I was saving those up. Now I have 80. The tales shop only has 60, so in other words I live in pain.

Astana la capitale degli Illuminati ... Altri interpretano asserendo che si tratta dell'uovo dell'uccello Samruk (leggenda kazaka) al cui interno sono presenti le aspirazioni umane. Altri ancora che si tratti del Sole. Rappresenta Kether, la Corona, la prima Sephira da cui la divinità si manifesta dalla sua dimensione a quella più cosmica più vicina all'uomo. Entrando nella camera sferica al vertice della torre è possibile riscontrare la presenza di una scultura dalla forma triangolare, dorata e con al centro impressa la mano del presidente kazako. Ricondurre il triangolo equilatero alla simbologia degli Illuminati è quasi immediato. Ma credo sia giusto che conosciate anche altri significati di quella particolare figura geometrica. Da un punto di vista esoterico, le società segrete si rifanno alla geometria di Pitagora. Il geniale studioso si accorse che il numero 10, ottenuto sommando i primi 4 valori della normale sequenza numerica, ossia 1+2+3+4, disponendo 4 sfere alla base, e al di sopra, di livello in livello i valori 3, 2 ed 1, otteneva l'immagina pareidolica di un triangolo equilatero. Tale figura si chiama tetraktys e simbolizza la perfezione. Ma torniamo al Palazzo della Pace e della Concordia di forma piramidale. Come vi ho anticipato è diviso in tre parti. Ebbene quella piramide vista frontalmente e privata della tridimensionalità appare come un triangolo diviso in tre sezioni che dal basso abbiamo detto essere: 1) la tenebrosa ~Underground Opera House~; 2] la sala di conferenze religiose, più luminosa della precedente, ma ancora abbastanza buia; 3) la sala dell'illuminazione, inondata invece di luce. Ebbene, corrisponde ancora una volta alla concezione che Pitagora aveva del pianeta Terra da un punto di vista sociale, cui si ispirò Weishaupt nel redigere i suoi piani eversivi finalizzati alla creazione di un unico governo mondiale che ponesse per sempre fine ai conflitti. Secondo la visione pitagorica il Cosmo stesso è diviso in tre aree. FINE OTTAVA PARTE (Pag 276/277 Tratto da <<Lux Tenebrae Illuminati Il volto occulto del Nuovo Ordine Mondiale>> di Adam Kadmon Priuli & Verlucca Editori) https://www.instagram.com/p/BqwwMgzALU2/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=dwjzapi05lpk

From the Heavens We Dive into a Storm of Blood

Whew boy. -blows dust off of character blog- -incessant coughing ensues-

I always sucked at keeping blogs, tumblr being no exception.

This is my obligatory send off post to Heavensward. I’m writing this an hour and a quarter before SB’s early access launch--mostly to keep my hands busy and my mind focused on something and not on say, the rationale idea of just going to bed and waiting for semi-reasonable queue times in the morning. (Spoilers we’re going to be fucked all weekend.)

I first started playing FFXIV back in 2.55. I’m pretty sure I joined the week the Gold Saucer was released. A good friend and RP partner of mine played (still does) and always talked about it. My exposure to MMOs was limited to a brief stint of WoW back in junior high where I never reached endgame and a smattering of free to play WoW clones that were just not great. Oh and I guess Runescape. I was skeptical about playing XiV, especially after it’s initial legendary 1.0 launch fiasco. My friend started playing in 2.1, 2.2, and he could only sing its praises. Between him and some favorite youtubers picking up the game, I was worn down and I bought it.

And so started a two year journey I’d chose to do again if given the choice.

I can safely say I accomplished everything I ever wanted to do in an MMO over these past two years. I experienced the launch and life cycle of an MMO’s expansion. I got into endgame raiding and, I still can’t believe I get to say this, completed a raid tier on content. As someone who was really bummed out that he couldn’t raid with his friends on WoW because they had zoomed so far ahead, this was a really huge milestone. It was pretty much everything I wanted and more. Me and a party of 7 other chucklefucks conquered the hardest content the game had to offer. Even though Creator is slated as the easiest of the Alexander tiers, it was still a major accomplishment for everyone involved, and I look forward to doing it all over again in Omega.

I enjoyed the MSQ storyline, hotly debating its merits and criticizing its faults in equal measure. Say what you will about it, but by MMO standards, FFXIV has some of the best writing I’ve seen. Even if they hit some stumbling blocks and make questionable moves, I love that the game makes me feel like the hero of a grand, epic tale as opposed to some lackey of the NPCs that actually push the story forward. 2.0 Hildibrand remains as some of the best writing in game. The lore of the world just feels so rich and expansive. From a roleplaying perspective, it was a rewarding experience creating a character in this world and embedding her within the already rich tapestry. I look forward to telling more of Sephira Freemantle’s story as we move into Stormblood and head to Doma. Though first I need to get a lot of set up posts done >.>;; 

Lastly, and certainly by no means least, this game only because so special to me because of the amazing people I found myself surrounded with. The friends I’ve made through playing FFXIV have truly become some of my best friend period. In a lot of ways I even consider them family. I’ve even met a couple of them in real life, and they welcomed me into their home and open arms. Our group has had its ups and downs (a LOT has happened in these 2 years) but every trial, every tribulation only made us stronger as friends. I don’t know what I did to deserve them, but I can safely say I know some of the most generous, kindhearted people ever. These were the friends I went through HW with, and these are the friends I hope to continue having fun adventures with in SB.

Posting this with a half hour to go. See you all in game!