#I believe in both of them to get development

[shannoneichorn]

Ooh! Pick me! This is the path I've started down and want to get better at.

Both my churches have been participating in our city's Pride parade the last several years. I go with my roommate from a mission trip to our denominatuon's churches in Cambodia--and her wife. And one of my LGBT family members. And some allies from work. And meet up with my LGBT friends from work, who join different parts of the parade.

The longer I live, the clearer it's become that the public school sex ed I had was wholly inadequate. The US is actively harming itself by not investing in better.

I adore my atheist husband and atheist/agnostic/pagan friends. I know my denomination doesn't ascribe to universal salvation, but it's the only thing that makes sense to me.

God fashions variety. No reason we should stamp it out of cultures. I have a problem with trying to convert people instead of gently inviting them to join the community. My ideal church would be a gathering place for all with a subset of activities dedicated to spiritual support/worshiping in community, and I think both my churches are partway there.

It blows my mind that any Christian who grew up hearing about being stewards of the Earth would support environmental harm and environmental injustice. But you know, the church is full of all kinds of people, some of whom are great at cognitive dissodence and terrible at logic. (They're allowed to be wrong.)

I'm part of the second largest Protestant denomination in the US (at least in 2013--a lot has changed since then). On the one hand, it's the denomination I grew up in, and there's a certain amount of lazy comfort in just sticking with it. On the other hand, I also stuck with it because it explicitly acknowledges science and rationalism. God gave us minds and access to tools with which to explore Creation--like science and math and social sciences and literature (since we are part of Creation, too, and lit is great for exploring ourselves).

There is a documented history around how the Bible and translations developed. Many human hands were involved, and humans are limited not only by their own biases but also by the knowledge that was available to them at the time and the culture in which they lived. The Bible can be divinely inspired, but I keep thinking that its components were, first and foremost, written for the audiences of their times. It's amazing how it can still be so meaningful today, but not all the issues of today are addressed within--and they shouldn't be. An active faith requires synthesis of learning and applications to new situations in ways that are consistent with the Spirit of love and compassion that the Bible describes.

I...haven't encountered antisemitism at church...? Like Muslims, those are people we share a distant religious heritage with. They're like second cousins. Maybe treat everyone with kindness and respect, the way Jesus would? This...should not be hard to grok. (I feel like I could do better here, but at least it's a start.)

I'm jumping on this opportunity to shout about this, because it's been bothering me. Yes, we need to be louder, but also... There are reasons why I'm not.

Christians are doing so much harm right now, and I don't want to be associated with it. Churches have done so much harm, and I don't want to remind the people around me who have finally gotten out of it. (Part of me thinks, my church would never! But churches are communities of imperfect people, and at the very least, wherever people gather, there will be drama and hurt feelings. And denial when abuses do happen. And also, many churches haven't been on the forefront of all we've learned about psychology in the last 50 years, and there are also harmful cultural habits where communities haven't rooted them out.)

And also, I want my friends, neighbors, and acquaintances to believe I'm safe to be around. Evangelizing does not accomplish that goal. Caring for people has to come first, or what's the point?

Thank you for this call to be louder. I shall now go back to hiding under my rock/bushel.

In general, I think it's currently really important for progressive Christians to be very loud about being both progressive and deeply religious Christians, and for everyone else fighting for progressive values to be supportive of them doing just that. I know that's like, idk, counter-intuitive or cringe or whatever, but seriously folks, the alternative is that progressive Christians have to be quiet about their faith to be accepted within broader secular and interfaith progressive advocacy, which means that the regressive asshole Christians (a) sound that much louder and (b) dominate the USian religious landscape all the more. That's a problem, for all of us.

We need people pushing back within the faith as well as outside of it, because that destroys any edifice that this is about Christianity and religious freedom.

You can be a devout Christian and also:

Openly, proudly, and without being forced to remain celibate or otherwise limit your full expression of self, identify as LGBTQ+ or be a supportive ally.

Advocate for full reproductive autonomy and comprehensive sex education.

Love and support people of other religious groups, non-religious people and/or atheists, by choosing to believe that a truly loving God would not pursue anything less than universal salvation.

Stand against evangelism and proselytizing as they have thus far been interpreted and used, because there are ways to interpret the Great Commission that don't promote colonialism and cultural genocide.

A steward of the earth, protecting God's beautiful creation and lovingly tending to it as the unique and incredible gift that it is.

A believer in science, rationalism, and human progress as part of God's divine plan for humanity.

A believer in history and someone who understands that the Bible can be both divinely given and open to interpretation (no really)(if you're confused, please talk to a knowledgeable traditional Jew)

An ally to Jews, who stands against supercessionism and antisemitism in the church.

And in before regressive Christians come shouting at me that (1) what do I know, I'm a Jew and (2) no lol you can't because of ___ reason:

My source is that I've personally met and talked to Christians of great faith and integrity - people who embody the closest forms of kindness I've seen to what Jesus himself advocated - who are each of these things.

It is 100% possible; you just choose to believe otherwise.

[amadinan]

TADC episode 5 analysis

I will collect here my thoughts that appeared after watching the 5th episode of TADC. And there are many of them, the episode is really rich in revealing the backstories of the characters and even lore. But I will mainly touch on Caine and the lore of the circus.

But first, some small thoughts before I move on to the Intermission time.

Jax is an NPC?

To be honest, I never believed in this theory, it is interesting in a vacuum, but nothing more. However, at this point we have not one, but three hints about this: Jax's number in episode 4, which refers to the Blender program and how copies are named there, the fact that Caine was able to make Jax a vegan (although Caine stated that he cannot influence the minds of players) and the fact that Jax himself was sure that he had a tail.

This would already be enough to consider the theory probable, but perhaps this hole is a little deeper. In the end, Caine was also able to influence Ragatha, although not directly.

But what if we combine this with the main theory of the circus, that all people are digital copies of minds? Then, Caine can theoretically control them, because from his program point of view, they are no different from very complex NPCs, which Caine churns out himself, like on a conveyor belt. Let's remember that Caine deleted Gummigoo because he was afraid of confusing him with a person (after all, even then there were thoughts that Caine accidentally deleted someone) and probably Caine deleted the original Jax, and then replaced him with a NPC copy that differs from the original only in the absence of a tail. After all, even in the episode with the evil team, we were shown that Caine can easily create humanoid personalities by copying them from players.

Caine and Gangle

In the fifth episode, I noticed two actions between them and both were not entirely direct. First: immediately after exiting the portal, Caine noticed Gangle's broken mask and fixed it without a word. Second: Gangle was not on the evil team, she was replaced by Orbsman. I think Caine realized that Gangle almost abstracted at the end of episode 4, so Caine decided to be a little more attentive to her. And he did not add an evil clone, because this clone ... would have been Gangle from episode 4 herself, which could only upset her.

"Sarcastic eye-flying" after Zooble's sentence.

It's only one phrase, but it's clearly a lore bomb, although it is not entirely clear without context. For starters, Caine does not call Zooble by name, not "player", "guest" or even "human", he calls them "toy-box character". This may again hint at digital copies, but not necessarily. And then Caine says "other intelligent AIs" and this is even stranger, who did he mean? People like him and Bubble, simple NPCs or  like players? It's unclear, but interesting, and Caine seriously doesn't like this idea from Zooble and again it's unclear why? The overload on the system? A possible NPC revolt? Caine is afraid that if there are too many characters, he will completely get confused who is who?

And finally, The Intermission time.

Get ready, there will be a complete searching for meaning where there may be none at all.

To be honest, I didn't understand everything, but some things may well have a context, so I'd be glad to hear your thoughts.

So, right after the intermission there was a bar where almost all the characters shared their past, and what if Caine shared too, just before this adventure? But purely in his style.

Right after the  start scene, we are shown Bubble and how three jaws overlap each other, and then also three Caines, each larger one holding the smaller one. This may refer to his development, how starting with something simple like Bubble, he first became "jaws" (probably an alpha version), and then more and more complex, until he became what he is now. This also corresponds to the fact that at the end of the scene, Caine sort of folds himself, and then a small splash screen plays like in the 2000s games and the computer monitor turns on/off.

Why in the next scene Pomni is not clear to me, but here's why exactly cubes suggested by @poprocksriot. Perhaps there were three parts or even three AI that became a single being: two eyes of Caine and Bubble (possibly a third eye, as in the concept art).

Gangle, Zooble and Jax are sucked into the void: a metaphor for sucking people into the game.

A bunch of eyes in the void and Caine in the light in the middle. I think this is one of the most important scenes, which shows that Caine "came to life" and is no longer just a program. Firstly, the official music, secondly (thank you, @puddingandp1) he breathes in this scene, which may just mean that he is now sentient. In addition, the eyes. There are indeed a lot of eyes, but NONE of them are looking at Caine himself, which could mean how he became an "rogue AI".

Then we see the chessboard floor and the characters. Their world is literally turned upside down. A bowling ball falls on Pomni and Jax, which may indicate their condition as they were affected by getting into the circus. Moreover, we even saw Pomnis' condition in the first series. The situation crushed her, like a bowling ball. With Gangle and Ragatha it is a little more complicated, cakes fall on them. This means that for them the situation in the circus is "sweeter" than what was in reality. We heard about the abuse in Ragatha's family right in this episode, so in the circus, where her mother is not, she could get better. And with Gangle it is even easier. She worked at such a hateful job that even simulating these memories for just one day almost killed her. In the circus there is Jax, as a minus, but she does not have to work and she can draw as much as she wants. And Kinger. He catches the ball, which seems to say that the situation has not crushed him, but then he is not just crushed, but directly knocked off the board (mind) by a black figure, the loss of Queenie.

Then it is more figurative. Caine literally holds everyone in his hands. The characters in Caine's "hat" and they are clearly being watched, then a bunch of mannequins, which can also refer to the fact that Caine, as a puppeteer, holds them under control.

Then Caine stands on the floor and the camera approaches him. Note that this is the same chessboard floor on which the others were standing, and a bowling ball can approach it, as if the camera was attached directly to it, but Caine manages (for now) to not let himself be crushed.

Then a corridor and abstractions. Well, here it is quite clear, the attitude and the display of lost players.

Then Zooble interrupts Caine and he hangs. Perhaps we should have seen something else, from which even Caine hung, but alas.

Of course, there is also a mysterious mannequin that follows Pomni and is possibly Gummigoo, but little is known about him yet.

That's all for now, I really liked the series, I'm sure it will only get more interesting.

[bogwaterparasite]

Character Building!! (Saja boys edition)

Characters: Saja Boys (except Jinu)

A/N: Am I milking the fact that my HC’s seemed to be doing well? Yes. I’m also taking advantage of the fact that these characters don’t really have a storyline or anything of their own to sorta create their own personalities to use when I write fanfiction! Sue me, I love them.

Just fyi. I’m currently working on requests! So don’t fret, I haven’t forgotten about you

Previous post!! - SAJA HC’s

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Baby saja (Eun-young)

✮⋆˙ I’ve decided the name based off of the meaning that can be given to it. Eun-young can translate to both graceful flower or silver petal. I think it’s kinda fitting considering his soft boy sort of aesthetic, yet it serves as a good contrast to the personality given to him.

✮⋆˙ I believe that he got recruited by Jinu due to his musical talent. He’s a rapper, and a very good one at that, but unlike jinu? It isn’t something he’s been practicing ever since he was a human

✮⋆˙ Matter of fact, I don’t believe he was ever human. Despite Jinu saying that Gwi-Ma controlled the demons by the guilt they possessed, there is a possibility for some demons to just be summoned or created with the sole purpose of getting souls/defeating the demon hunters.

✮⋆˙ Eun-young’s talent developed from curiosity. He had always had a fascination for technology and the way things worked in the human world given that Gwa-Mi’s realm seems to be nothing but a void, and all of their entertainment is given by none other than Gwa-Mi himself. During the beginnings of the creation of cellphones, he most definitely stole one in order to take it back. While this action is suspicious on itself, he can always use the pretext of wanting to be connected in order to deceive the humans and collect souls with more efficiency.

✮⋆˙ While indulging in human media, he found himself drawn towards music, but not ALL music, rap specifically. He’d do most of his practicing down in earth, using it as a way to get closer with certain humans (and singers which I assume have more powerful souls) and developing his skills while still accomplishing the task given to him by Gwa-Mi.

✮⋆˙ Despite his gravelly voice, he was never truly into the stereotypical rapper appearance. The soft boy look seemed to be what called to him more than anything else, comfortable and colorful outfits that contrast the traditional dark appearance he holds in his demon form. It creates a sort of trustworthy character for humans, specially women, which he takes advantage of to the fullest.

✮⋆˙ Given that he is a made demon, he is rather devoid of emotion. Hes not a hateful person, but just holds little interest for things that he hasn’t developed an interest for, which is why he’s so willing to do pretty much anything. Even then, he will always go back to what he’s used to, which is doing nothing while scrolling through media.

✮⋆˙ He lacks taste buds, so his preferences of food come from the texture and feeling that they create. Colder things tend to have a thicker consistency than he finds rather enjoyable, which eventually developed into a liking of squishy and chewy foods rather than crunchy.

✮⋆˙ Even though he’s rather devoid of emotion, his vast interactions with humans and the human world caused him to develop more of a consciousness than other demons. This is what allows for Gwa-Mi to filter the voices into his mind, which although rare, still bother him just as much as the rest of the demons.

Abs Saja (Ho-Seok)

✮⋆˙ I’m not quite sure what the full name stands for, however, the translation for Seok is put as stone or rock. I think this kinda makes sense since I see abs as being sort of a reliable person? Idk how that makes sense considering he’s a demon, but yk.

✮⋆˙ I’m not too sure if All demons have formed pacts with Gwa-Mi or just Jinu? I’m running with the idea that not all of them were human, or have had to make a pact with him in order to become demons, but in this case? Abs did.

✮⋆˙ Born during the Joeson dynasty, about 80% of the families participated in agricultural farming(including his own), making it an incredibly competitive market. Due to increasing tariffs and environmental struggles, his family wasn’t the most wealthy. Unable to hire more workers, they used their 4 children to help around the farm, their pay being the fact that they got to survive another day. Ho-Seok was the oldest and strongest, which meant that majority of the tasks were handed to him in order for the farm to stay afloat. Although this was somewhat unfair, he did get a portion of the profits (although not much) which kept him quiet for the most part.

✮⋆˙ As he grew up, he became unsatisfied by the life he was living. Due to old age, his father wasn’t able to work anymore, which now meant that all the responsibilities (whether it was about the farm or the family) fell on him. This caused him to grow resentful of his family, the inability to provide for him and their children, while also having to deal with 3 children all at once began to take a toll on him.

✮⋆˙ There was one thing that he looked forward to however, a girl he had been crushing on for quite sometime. She frequented the farm for supplies, and she always served as a balm for his worries (even though she wasn’t aware of it).

✮⋆˙ In the end, all of these problems and responsibilities were what led him to create a pact with Gwa-Mi, becoming a demon in order to finally be able to live comfortably. He left his family to fend for themselves, slowly elevating his status by working with other members and eventually ending up as a chef in the palace. Despite him not thinking that he had any guilt about what he’d done, the marks were slowly consuming him.

✮⋆˙ What drove him to be at Gwa-Mi’s control for eternity was a simple mistake, at least he says it was a mistake. With his newfound status, he was going to confess his love to his beloved.. however, he was soon to find out she was betrothed to another.

✮⋆˙ This enraged him, as for now, even if he had gained more than what he wished to accomplish, he had lost everything that once made him who he was. In an attempt to salvage whatever there was left, he tried to consume the soul of her beloved, only to end up consuming hers by accident.

✮⋆˙ This served as a catalyst for his full transformation to becoming a demon, all his guilt consuming him whole and casting him into the life of eternal suffering.

✮⋆˙ He was scouted out by Jinu due to him being one of the strongest demons, he had no musical experience beforehand, so training him was sorta… difficult, but in the end it worked.

Romance Saja (Min-Joon)

✮⋆˙ Much like the other names, Minjoon can have a LOT of interpretations. Min can mean; quick, clever or sharp, and sometimes it can also be gentle or affable depending on the hanja characters used. While Joon means talented, handsome, or outstanding, which in my opinion? Is very fitting to him.

✮⋆˙ Unlike Eunyoung or Hoseok, Minjoon was a human up until recently, but he didn’t make a pact with Gwa-Mi, but rather made a deal with Jinu in exchange for his soul.

✮⋆˙ When Minjoon was young, his father left him and his mother to peruse a “better life” with his affair partner, leaving them to fend for themselves. His mother tried to make this transition as easy as possible for Minjoon, taking more hours in order to keep their income coming and still provide extra cash for whatever he might want, yet, this left little to no time to spend with her son.

✮⋆˙ He didn’t really resent his mother for this, quite the opposite really. Seeing her so driven to provide comfort to their lives despite their losses made him want to do better, to someday be able to provide for her the same way she was providing for him. In his search for ways to get rich, he came across the idol world. It wasn’t just the money that attracted him to it, but rather the musical aspect of it. They all seemed to have so much fun, doing something they enjoyed while inspiring others to do the same, didn’t that sound like the dream?

✮⋆˙ What drew him in more than anything were the choreographies, there was something about the way they moved along with every beat, every move perfectly aligned with the lyrics, it just felt right, something he wanted to do.

✮⋆˙ It was during highschool that he started to act upon this, creating a social media account and beginning to train himself to dance and create his own style. Despite what influencers might make you think, gaining a following was quite hard, not getting many interactions often left him disillusioned, but it didn’t stop him. The more he practiced, the better he got, and slowly his confidence and following grew.

✮⋆˙ He usually kept his interest quiet from everyone at school, but once, while practicing in an empty classroom, he managed to find someone who shared a similar dream to him.

✮⋆˙ The two of them grew closer, and they slowly began working to get their dreams come true. Eunseong was a composer, and combining this with the dances Minjoon was able to create along those lyrics, they seemed like the perfect match. However, both of them lacked in the aspect of singing, something that set them back by a long shot in the world of idols and k-pop groups.

✮⋆˙ Even as they grew, and they were able to get a following from their creations, the dream of becoming big was still far from them. In an attempt to better their voices, they went to Dr. Ramune for his “amazing” tonics, but as we all know, it didn’t work. And that’s where Jinu came into play.

✮⋆˙ One unfortunate night, both met Jinu outside of a shop. He offered them what they desired the most, a group to succeed, the voices they so desired, all of their dreams granted, just for the price of their soul. Who would be able to pass up on that offer?

✮⋆˙ And that’s how things came to be. Now with a group, a fame so vast they got everything they wanted, what else was there for him to want? Well, it seemed that he had forgotten a tiny detail.. the mother which he had worked so hard for, who never heard from him again.

Mystery Saja (Eun-Seong)

✮⋆˙ once again with the names and the meanings, hopefully you aren’t getting too tired of them lmfao. Eunseong can be roughly translated to many great;abundant, flourishing. Eun meaning kindness, mercy, or silver. It can also refer to grace, favor, or gratitude. And Seong meaning success, accomplishment, or flourishing. It can also be interpreted as sincere, honest, or true. All of these names are just things I believe are fitting to their character.

✮⋆˙ Alike Minjoon, Eunseong was also a human up until recently, matter of fact, he knew Minjoon personally, as he was his only friend throughout school.

✮⋆˙ He was born into a wealthy family, a very detached one at that. Family dinners were usually spent silent, or talking about the successes/faults of their family or company. This type of family style caused him to grow rather quiet, he hated big crowds, as they were nothing other than means to gain status, so he didn’t really socialize much with others in school. Most of his thoughts and feelings were written down on notebooks, and those words slowly developed into poems, poems that eventually turned into lyrics.

✮⋆˙ As his love for music grew, so did his feeling of isolation. He knew he couldn’t talk about this with his family, as a career as an idol was seen as taboo. He had so many ways to earn a living and get rich, and he decided to do that? His father would never allow it. Not only that, but the kids at his school who said they wanted to follow such dreams were just.. idiots. None of them cared for anything other than singing already made songs, doing the same as every other group out there did, they wanted fame and money without working hard for it.

✮⋆˙ That was up until he met Minjoon. It was by accident really, he just heard a song coming out from one of the classrooms and he decided to snoop, only to find him dancing in there. From then on, their relationship grew.

✮⋆˙ Minjoon was unlike anyone he had met before, he didn’t mind his quiet nature, matter of fact, he sort of loved it. While Eunseong stayed quiet and wrote, he would yap his ear off, even offering some advice about the lyrics while beginning to create his own choreography to it. He was.. odd, but he didn’t mind, after all, when was the last time he had this much fun with someone else?

✮⋆˙ Eventually, as they grew up, he opened up about his wishes to become an idol to his family, and just as expected, they didn’t react well to the news. Considering they were well out of high school, his father kicked him out of their home, putting the ultimatum to not come back unless he rethinks his life choices.

✮⋆˙ This wasn’t much of a problem, as he had saved up enough of his allowance to get an apartment, and after telling Minjoon after the whole ordeal, they both worked together to rent a place of their own, beginning to work hard to accomplish their goals.

✮⋆˙ Despite all the effort they put into their videos, it seemed to not be amounting to anything. They had a few debuts, and a small following of fans, but no matter what they did, they weren’t accomplishing what they truly wanted. This made him slowly start to loose hope, seriously reconsidering his fathers offer, however, Minjoo wasn’t giving up so easily.

✮⋆˙ Tonics, some sort of witchcraft, doing crazy dares, whatever crazy idea his partner came up with, he would follow. Did he truly think they would work? No, but seeing him so determined to not let their dream die out made him share the sentiment. That was up until they found this.. guy?.

✮⋆˙ Jinu, a self proclaimed demon who told them he would make their dreams come true all in exchange of his soul. It seemed shady as hell, and he was highly against the idea of handing whoever the hell he was anything valuable of theirs, he was going to decline, tell this man to fuck off, yet, seeing the desperation in Minjoon’s face, he couldn’t bring himself to. In the end, they both agreed.

✮⋆˙ And that’s how things came to be. They succeeded in their dreams, gaining the title of idols, their hard work finally paying off, yet, in the process, they seemingly lost themselves.

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I had a lot of fun with these, AND ONCE AGAIN, these are all up for interpretation! The Saja boys have no canon names or personalities really, so I’m just making it up on vibes and whimsy. Besides, I will be using these if/when I write about them, so feel free to do so as well!! And if you do, please @ me or lmk because I would love to see what you guys create with them :>

Reblogs are appreciated!

[mothlillies]

❄️ || ND!Zayne x ND!Reader/MC

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- Zayne, who understands better than anyone your struggle to fit in with others as he shares the same struggle, even in adulthood.

- Zayne, who ever since childhood, would do anything to protect you from those who would treat you badly because you were "different".

- Zayne, who understands when your social battery is much too low to do anything, he would rather stay in too and spend time with just the two of you anyways.

- Zayne, who never minds if you don't look in his eyes when you talk, he tends not to either.

- Zayne, who becomes a little embarrassed if he develops what he'd consider a "silly" hyperfixation until you reassure him it's okay! (and you inevitably get into it too)

- Zayne, who conversely, never judges any of your interests, treating them all with the utmost sincerety, finding your info dumping calming as he loves listening to your voice and learning new things, it's the best of both worlds for him.

- Zayne, who's systems and routines help you feel more secure, giving you a sense of safety and stability.

- Zayne, who sometimes communicates nonverbally, as do you, the two of you could have an entire conversation that consists of no words.

- Zayne, who does everything he can to comfort you and make you feel safe when the world feels like too much, holding you in his arms and providing a gentle pressure that helps you calm down.

- Zayne, who worries about not being enough for you as the world has him somewhat convinced he's a little less human than most, but you always reassure him he's more than enough, and he believes it when it's you.

- Zayne, who feels uncomfortable unmasking around most people, feels safe doing so around you, and he hopes you feel the same about him.

- Zayne, who's expressions, body language, and tone most have a hard time understanding, you've learned to read like your favorite book, you can tell when he's happy or upset without him even needing to say it.

- Zayne, who's quick to defend you from others, while ignoring comments made about him (which you however, can't ignore).

- Zayne, who above everything makes sure you're taking care of yourself, and takes care of you as much as he can.

- Zayne, who usually flinches away from touch, doesn't mind so long as it's you.

- Zayne, who's got a constant eye on your health, often noticing when you're sick before even you do. Always making sure medical staff listen to your needs and take you seriously.

- Zayne, who finds the taste of something sweet grounding. While he wants to make sure you both have a variety of foods in your diet, he never pushes and always tries to incorporate at least one of your safe foods.

- Zayne, who loves being in the same room as you even if you two never even speak, sitting and working on two entirely different things, just being around you is enough for him.

- Zayne, who when the heat becomes overwhelming for either of you, will use his evol to create something to cool you both down.

- Zayne, who loves you no matter what, every single day. <3

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A/N: As promised my Zayne post :DD neurodivergent specifically autistic Zayne is so so canon to me, but I figured I should tag it au style just because it's not *technically* canon afaik. As with my last post, I tried to keep it somewhat vague so more people could find comfort in this, but these HCs are based on mine and the people I knows lived experience with neurodivergence so it might not resonate with everyone and I understand that ^^ let me know if you'd wanna see more LI x ND!MC and who specifically!! Sylus and Zayne are my mains so I'm not as confident writing for anyone else, but I'm willing to give it a shot!! Thank you for reading :D

[twinsarekeepers]

You know what? I’m going to respond to this after I’ve blocked you because it’s clear that you are not acting in good faith here at all, and none of this actually has to be explained to you, but for anyone who’s looking at this post and thinking “now why the hell does this look like you’re blatantly misrepresenting this kid’s character arc?” I’ll break it down slowly here.

I don't think Zuko has a particularly strong sense of justice, atleast by the show's start.

It doesn’t really matter what you think because the show itself disagrees and actively hints at Zuko’s internal sense of morality and justice very early on in season 1. There’s a reason Zhao is set up as the main villain of the first book and Zuko is in more direct and violent conflict with him than he is with the main trio. Zuko and Zhao both have Aang in their custody at some point in the season and the way Aang is treated under Zuko versus Zhao is like a pretty explicit parallel because of how different it is. It’s why Zuko starts the season attacking the Southern Water Tribe and then retreating with Aang, having not actually hurt anyone while Zhao ends the season wanting to destroy the Water Tribe, as he likes hurting people. And guess who Zhao has to fight in the end? Zuko. All of this is written that way because it fleshes out how fundamentally different Zuko is from Zhao (the season 1 representation of all the worst parts of the Fire Nation).

Maybe you could argue the scene with his dad in the flashback but I don't think "murdering 'innocents' is bad" is a particularly strong stance. (Not that they're innocent they'll still violently colonising the EK but they didn't sign up to be sacrifices, so boohoo for them i guess).

So, I really dgaf about these soldiers either, for the same reasons, but 13 year old Zuko (who has been indoctrinated by propaganda since literally birth) standing up to all those generals during his first war council for something that he believed was morally despicable, that everyone else was perfectly fine with, is a pretty definitive strong sense of justice that the audience is supposed to understand as well. It’s aimed at the wrong things because he hasn’t been taught anything else, but it’s very much showing exactly how Zuko will not turn his back when he thinks injustice is happening.

His moral compass points in the direction of his own self interests

Well, no. Because if this were true, he would’ve shut his little ass up in that war room instead of opening his mouth to speak up for people nobody else gaf about. He would’ve threatened to torture or actually tortured Katara when he captured her in season 1 to get information about Aang (like Zhao would’ve done). He would’ve let his men die in that storm because finding the Avatar is in his self interest. He would’ve just stayed in the Fire Nation after he went back because fighting in a war against the rest of his family and giving up his claim to the throne is certainly not in his own self interests.

and his character development is basically just him discovering that he benefits more from being good than bad.

Mmmh. The first time he displayed empathy for Fire Nation soldiers, he got half his face burned off but his father and banished to find the Big Foot of the world basically. That was pretty much the moment he decided he had to push down all the things that made him good because he really actually didn’t benefit from it at all. His character development actually had to do with him understanding that the benefits of him being bad (being the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation and having his father’s “love”) was not something to strive for at all actually. He actually realized he’d rather be the Avatar’s prisoner (you know, significantly less beneficial to him than being a Fire Nation Prince) and a good person. Zuko stood to gain the most by staying loyal to the Fire Nation and he still switched allegiances, believing wholeheartedly that he would loose his crown and his family. Because despite actually being positioned to benefit the most from being a bad person, he didn’t want to be that. And he would rather lose all those benefits than continue being bad.

He never properly reflects or shows remorse for specific actions he just stops actively doing bad things an expects awards.

Katara, Aang, and Sokka all explicitly call out their grievances with Zuko and he apologizes and expresses that he wants to make it up to them in anyway he possibly can. He doesn’t expect rewards for “not doing bad things”, he actually says multiple times that he feels like he doesn’t deserve their kindness. He not only actively stops doing bad things, he does a lot of fucking good things. Teaching Aang firebending so that he can defeat his father, breaking prisoners of war out of a maximum security detention center (with great risk to himself), and tracking down a genocidal Fire Nation soldier to ensure justice is served (again, at great personal risk). At no point while he was doing these things did he believe himself to be worthy or deserving of “rewards” from anyone. He did this stuff because he knew it was the right thing to do.

And virtually every parallel between Katara and Zuko is cherry-picked and not unique to them.

Oh brother. What do we have here? Shocker! A ZK anti who misrepresents Zuko’s character and narrative arc and also his pretty fucking blatant parallels with Katara.

Justice? Aang, Jet, and Hama all have arcs about justice.

Well, considering that Aang’s arc is nerfed half way through its development, and also that he never actually confronts the depths of his grief and anger to understand how to get justice … this is a moot point.

Jet and Hama are both literally thrown away as characters and never given the respect they deserved from the narrative. The way “justice” was explored through them was absolutely disgusting.

You really can’t compare that to Zuko and Katara who had long standing arcs surrounding justice, which much of their characters core values are based on.

Dead/missing mom? Sokka, Azula, Yue, arguably Ty Lee.

I have to laugh. Like I just cannot believe we’re doing this. But okay.

I’m not even going to entertain the Yue and Ty Lee of this because you literally can’t be serious. Two side characters with minimal development in any aspect sharing one of the most common tropes in fantasy of “dead/missing mother” does not a parallel make.

Sokka’s dead mother is Katara’s dead mother. That’s not a parallel. They’re siblings. Their pain about their mother being killed is also very different because it was the defining moment of Katara’s life, it marked the start of her trauma with the Fire Nation and her subsequent parentification as a mother TO SOKKA. For Sokka, it was, of course heartbreaking, but it didn’t shape him like it did his sister. Which is why the Southern Raiders is about Katara facing the man who took her mother away from her.

Azula is Zuko and Katara’s foil. She is everything that Zuko could’ve been and everything that Katara isn’t. That’s like her function in the story as a character. So, notably, she also has a very different relationship and arc to her mother’s disappearance than Katara does to her mother’s death.

But, you know which other main character whose dead/missing mother marked the start of his trauma with the Fire Nation and shaped him as a person? Who had an episode also dedicated to facing the man who took her away from him?

Right.

All parallels aren’t made equal. Katara may have parallels about her dead mother with others but it’s never treated like this. She never connects with another main character over the death of her mother other than Zuko. She doesn’t confide in her most painful memories of losing her mother with anyone but Zuko. She takes Zuko on her very personal journey to enact justice on her mother’s killer. Hmmm, I wonder why that may be?

Prodigy? Zuko's not a prodigy but also Aang, Azula, Toph.

So, Katara also isn’t a prodigy. You know, she has this whole arc in the first season where waterbending doesn’t come easy to her and she’s trying to find a master to help her learn. Even when she finds a master, she has to fight to make him teach her. And only through her own hard work and perseverance is she able to truly master waterbending, not because she was born naturally gifted. Which is something Zuko himself notes. He puts them on equal ground and then immediately after that compared Aang to Azula. So, this example really isn’t working for you.

Rudeness? Toph, Azula, Mai, Ty Lee.

Again, Mai and Ty Lee are side characters with very little development so please never try and put them in the same category as Katara. It’s insulting, really.

I also don’t know if you can say “rudeness” is a parallel lmao. It’s a trait that almost every single character displays because it’s part of the human experience. It’s like saying happiness is a parallel.

Zuko and Katara have no unique parallels, no unique dynamic, they have nothing.

Well, this is just copium. They’re literally the yin and yang of the show and they’ve got a relationship arc that spans all of the seasons, culminating in the series finale with him taking a bolt of lightning to the chest for her and her healing him with the power of love.

Zuko and Katara having a strong sense of justice

[athena-the-undestructible]

Time to finally explain my new OCs

Well to start, I have a duo of characters

The first is a sniper who acts stoic at a distance, doesn't interact much with others and barely thinks about the fact that she's killing other people, it's just a job to her and she will rarely question what she is doing.

Up close she gets really nervous since she's not got any people skills and doesn't want to give the wrong information to the wrong person, plus her fighting style isn't very good up close so she prefers to stay away.

The second is a Knife Wielder with both stabbing and throwing skills. She's got great people skills and can manipulate them slightly and she greatly enjoys the act of killing others.

However she's very oblivious to anything that isn't immediately around her and in general is unable to grasp the bigger picture and of course her knifes are allergic to anything long range.

These two are supposed to be foils to each other although I still gotta develop them a bit like giving them names and more reason to dislike each other.

There is also a story I'm trying to construct around these characters although that's very work in progress and I haven't even got a proper idea of what the latter half or end looks like.

The basic premise is that these two kill each other at the beginning of the story, however both of them wake up the next day as if they'd only suffered a slight injury and a job listing they've both taken without remembering.

So they'll have to work together and it's not going to make them reconcile in any way, these two will still hate each others but in some different angles maybe.

They will also work with two others during these jobs.

The first I'll mention is a woman who wields a revolver and dressed like an MiB agent. She's been doing these mysterious job listings for longer and believes in some overall grand scheme that connects all of these.

She's initially supposed to give off mysterious vibes like maybe she did used to be an agent and she knows more than she lets on although this is supposed to be torn away as the plot moves forwards.

She doesn't have any more information than the other two but unlike them who don't think much further than what's happening to them, she's trying to piece together the grand scheme that she believes she's part of .

Her intense desire to be part of something important and her idealism is also why she has the secret agent theme despite never being part of any secret services.

And then we have the other one, the transgender robot I mentioned in a previous post.

So her cover "story" is being an assassin so dedicated to her career that she invested in cybernetics to improve her skill and become more efficient.

This is a total lie and quite the opposite, she's really a combat android who's been using her earnings to gain the appearance of humanity (hense the whole transgender part since she definitely wasn't a girl before).

She's also the total opposite of agent in that she has zero stakes in these missions and her enthusiasm goes as far as her payment.

This includes her inability to die like humans do which will be relevant and means she can just fuck off at any time.

Anyway that's all of them, I still haven't come up with their names (Once I can't make puns, I start to struggle) so maybe people could suggest them but I hope you enjoy these character concepts and would like to see me develop them.

My brain is also currently falling apart so I may have got something wrong, anyway that's all for now.

[somewheres-woods]

I feel like T'ainkui is more curious of the little human than anything, I have no doubt we would see him develop feelings for her, but for now, he's slowly accepting her existence in the clan, mfker is both arrogant and prideful, he would rather fight a queen alien rather than be honest with himself . Down the line, I can imagine him fighting another yautja for having any interest in her. Like, he would yell at her for going out and about and demanding her to stay inside, but that's because he cares for her and doesn't want anybody, especially the males, to get too close to her. His methods are questionable, but that's just him not being honest with his feelings for her. Also, the mentor's just watch their relationship blooms on the sidelines. Also, getting some gossip materials with the other older yautja females

*Them ! I prefer to use they/them when referring to the reader.

I respectfully disagree with this interpretation! You do raise some points I generally agree with, but I'll explain it, don't worry!

Your first point about T'ainkui slowly accepting their existence in the clan is correct. He takes a while to warm up to others, and Reader is no exception. But despite being arrogant, he can accept that others do have strength in certain areas of expertise.

It's not that he is incapable of being honest, he's actually too honest sometimes. When he does eventually come around to the idea of feeling things for Reader, it'll be slow and hesitant.

Think of it like Beauty and The Beast!

You need to be slow and patient with him, or else he'll reject the idea of entertaining his "feeble curiosities".

As for how you view the relationship with him down the line... I completely disagree.

T'ainkui, for all his aggression and arrogance, is not controlling. Possessive? Yes, but not to the point of trying to isolate Reader. In order to be in a relationship with him, he needs to respect you. He won't be mates with someone he doesn't respect.

In yautja culture, I personally believe that relationships are generally seen as open until shown otherwise. If two are in a relationship and they only want to be with each other, that's fine. Respected even. However, if another comes along and is interested in one, fighting for their affection is seen as an acceptable challenge.

Yautja value strength in their society.

Some get annoyed by these challenges, and others understand that strength triumphs.

Very few yautja stay with the one they were originally mated to if they lost. They only stay if there's a deep bond between them. But those who have a deep bond in the first place will reject the challenge directly instead of entertaining it. Unless the two are looking for some cruel amusement or for a chance to show off to their mate lol.

So, no, T'ainkui would not yell at his human mate for speaking with others or try to lock them indoors. That behaviour isn't healthy! Even for yautja standards.

As for Reader's mentor, she's not the kind of warrior to be in gossip groups. She's actually considered the clan weirdo, often keeping to herself simply because she enjoys her own company. The relationship she sees between Reader and their chosen yautja partner, is more of an amusement to her than something she's heavily invested in. She's a loner, but she's respected as an Elder and the clan's Witch Doctor.

[yannaryartside]

About not respecting your audiences intelligence and time

It’s so fucking funny that the show is failing and getting dragged.

I mean it. It’s so funny to me. Not out of spite (well kinda) but this is not a shipper note. It’s about author intention vs audience.

This show was praise by critics and audiences. The dialogue, the themes, everything was raw and interesting, but mostly, intentional. I’ll say both in s1 and s2 there is not a second waisted

But this last two seasons could have been one. Definitely.

There is also the shipping component. I was talking to @alwaysshipping1 about the possibility of sydcarmy being created later in the development of the show. I do think Sydney was introduced like a possible love interest. But I think storer was not planning having Carmy end up with anybody when he pitched the show, the idea of sydcarmy could have come from executives as a way to bait audiences into watching such a emotional heavy show (it definitely feels like baiting right now)

Let’s pretend for a minute Claire is supposed to be Carmy’s endgame. I don’t believe it but lest go with it. She maybe have been written badly and then acted awfully by Molly. I liked her previous work so if she is not indeed playing Claire as insufferable as she comes across, then…

At some point and author has to be mature enough to revise their capacity of delivering the message they intended. If is not clicking, rubbing it all again is always gonna feel like betraying your audience intelligence. You cannot make fixes to a character after having them for almost 20 episodes, unless you address the things that were previously misrepresented by your writing, that has happened. They stir into making Claire feel shallow/sus for two seasons and then they make her a lot more human (at least to me) this season, and still feels wrong because the things that bothered me about their relationship are never address as bad things. And yet, they only managed to make her more human by her expressing her hopes and fears about their relationship, her personality is still shallow as fuck.

But lest pretend there is Claire twist coming. Maybe she hooked up with Michael idk. Maybe she is indeed a narcissist and that’s why she sometimes displays lacks of empathy (seeming shallow) and has this need to be pleasant with everyone out of the need of being praise.

Even though, this show took the indulgence of waisting people’s times. Maybe the network got greedy. Maybe Storer wanted to display more symptoms of cptsd or complete what I suspect is a “suicide arc” in the sense Carmy had to loss all the parts of himself that he used to hide from his issues, the job, his skill, the relationship, his family. I have more thoughts in that but to get to the point…

Mental health arcs are incredibly difficult but they are manageable. This show is not failing because is about mental health, it’s because things that have been set since s1 and s2, the cleaner in writing, have still not been closed or properly address. Blaming the shippers for hating the show is bonkers, is not like Ted lasso was bagged because tedbecca didn’t happen, The Punisher was still top tier even when the main ship was set as platonic for a fourth season.

Mr Robot was a show about a hacker with extreme mental issues and a victim of CSA, and the show was fucking excellent, also without delivering on a promised ship. Plenty of sydcarmys have said: coupling characters doesn’t have to be the point

You are supposed to give payoffs and promises constantly. Again, this last two seasons could have been one. And the audience must be respected, if you had to rewrite Claire, you had to do it fully. All the things that the audience loved were eliminated or disorganized and the things people disliked are getting even more featured.

Even if all the issues with the character do have payoff, THEY ARE BASICALLY LEAVING IT ALL to the fucking last minute. A whole season of all payoff. How was the audience ever gonna be willingly invested in that?

[meear]

But what Ryukishi portrays in ep8 does isn't acceptance, it's erasure. The battle in the golden land is an example of this. The goats are right to call out Rosa for being a neglectful mother who'd prioritise her dalliances with men over her daughter. Her writing wouldn't be half as good if that wasn't true. But instead, Ryukishi urges you to focus on the genuine love she did harbour for her daughter. Ryukishi is telling you "whatever else Rosa did is not the point right now and you should only remember the good things about her", and the other perspective is presented as villainous for refusing that.

He's not accepting both, he's framing her family' flaws as a side of themselves that wasn't as important and that Ange shouldn't focus on too much, for her own happiness. He can describe it however he wants to make it sound better ("believing in her family", "having love", etc etc), but it is ultimately running away and the fact that the Trick ending is obviously presented as the bad choice (despite being simply the truth) is another proof of that.

to R07, you either accept magic as a coping mechanism or you become Erika. Love and truth are fundamentally opposed. There is no world in which Ange can just accept her family as shitty people and still live happily. So no matter how many times she does it, Ange is doomed to always freak out at finding out the truth, even after knowing about it and preparing herself, because the point is she'll never be able to handle it.

The ep7 tea party is kind of like that too. The red flashbacks about KuwaBeato and Kinzo actually trying to steal the gold from the Italians are framed as Bernkastel "tearing out the guts". The villain defiling the sanctity of the story and showing you something you're not meant to see, something that was kept hidden to preserve the dignity of the corpse. Sometimes r07 has good takes on abuse, but sometimes it's obvious he buys into the "why are you mentioning it now/we don't need to know this/this should stay private/this is inappropriate/we're in polite company and you're airing out the family's dirty laundry" mindset (which might be even more prevalent in Japan, I don't know).

The red flashbacks are essential to understand what Kinzo really is and how much he embellished his own story to make himself look better, and they should be exposed, because the extent of Beatrice Ushiromiya's abuse shouldn't be something that you hush up to protect Kinzo's privacy. Kinzo's true backstory in the army is a fundamental part of his character. But by having it exposed by Bernkastel, the obvious villain of the story who only does it for her own sick pleasure, Ryukishi makes it very clear he thinks the very act of revealing it is pointlessly voyeuristic. "Good" truth-seekers like Will let sinners have their little skeletons in the closet out of respect (incidently KuwaBeato never gets any respect or even her own perspective, and her rape is entirely about developing Kinzo's character and how bad that made him feel, so the very narrative is validating her treatment as an object, but I digress)

Basically it's exactly that kind of thinking which is pervasive in ep8. I don't see Ange simply accepting her family as humans, both good and bad, because episode 8 doesn't show her actually doing that work (the manga does make more of an effort to depict this though). She just goes from one extreme to the other (not that she was even wrong originally). She's not reconciling their flaws with the possibility of happy memories. Instead she stops addressing the flaws entirely and they're just slander from the outside world' Instead, there is one way to remember them which is overwhelmingly presented as more correct than the other . Ange made very valid points about not wanting to comfort herself with illusions, and then she suddenly drops all of these points without ever addressing them. She's framed as wrong for wanting to know the truth, even after reading Eva's diary. In the VN, she is very apologetic about reading it - about seeking something that was supposed to be forbidden knowledge. She had every right to read it. Yet when she does, she finally "sees sense", Battler's mindset becomes the correct one in the eyes of the narrative, and even worse, she shares the blame with everyone for the way things turned out (despite ep4 addressing the flaws in Japan's collective responsibility culture, through Ange's character). All of her negative perspective becomes her "irresponsible imagination", and she tells Battler that the truth "wasn't that important" because she should've just believed in her own truth. That she should've just accepted what Battler was trying to show her.

There is way more weight given to the positive side of the family (for Ange's sake because she needs something to hang onto) and that's what makes it so cheap and hollow. There's admitting that abusers are people outside of their abuse, that they can show warmth, play pranks, have fun, act sympathetic, etc. of course, and I enjoyed Umineko because it knew how to that in the first place. And there's choosing to depict Kinzo's last appearance in the story like... That, and having Ange say she should've called Eva Mom.

The manga version is at least a bit better in showing a more balanced perspective between the family's good and bad sides and the dangers of using magic as a way to cope, so I guess R07 did have some changes to make... but the trick/magic dichotomy is still there and I'll never approve of the idea it's somehow voyeuristic and immoral to reveal the truth behind a mass murder just because there are some true crime freaks who want to find out for the wrong reasons. Not when the memory of innocents is being tarnished because of that selfish choice (and it's even worse because Virgilia clearly addresses this in ep5, that Ange is an idiot because keeping the box closed just enables more people to speculate about her family), when Gohda can be treated as a potential killer despite not doing shit, and not when the victims have loved ones who are very much alive and who are still suffering (Nanjo's son, Kumasasa's grandkid, along with many other people who might've cared for the dead and might like closure as well, such as Jessica and Battler's friends, Maria's teachers, etc. But Ryukishi has a funny definition of reading with love which doesn't include characters he doesn't care about). All because of ep8's asinine ideas of not letting the truth taint your own, and of a serial killer needing to have their identity protected for some reason

Is it ACTUALLY possible to solve Umineko on your own? Like, realistically?

This article contains no spoilers beyond chapter 2, which is the bare minimum you need to read to even understand what Umineko is about.

As I was reading the answers arc of the Umineko no Naku Koro ni visual novel, also known as Umineko When They Cry, also known as Umineko no Naku Koro ni Chiru, I wondered:

Can this mystery actually be solved before the story explains the solution? And by “actually” I mean “being an average reader that spends a couple hours thinking really hard about it”, since I assume that it is solvable if you are a die hard fan with 4.000 free hours that is willing to re-read each chapter 10 times and write a book full of notes.

Also, by “possible” I mean that the solution makes perfect sense and can be reached by following logic steps.

I feared that looking up the answer on the internet might produce an accidental spoiler that ruins the whole experience. Still, I took a peek, since I needed some guarantee before committing the time to try and solve it.

I found some threads on reddit where everyone agreed that it was in fact solvable. Some people going as far as claiming they solved it all by episode 4.

So I tried to solve it. I spent some hours on it, rereading some chapter and competitions of red truths. I had some theories, but nothing that neatly explained all the murders. It didn’t look like I could get any further, so I kept reading.

After having finished the whole visual novel, reading over the manga, watching 8 hours of video on youtube, and reading old forums for even more hours, this is my red truth:

It is impossible to properly solve Umineko.

But then, how come that all those people claimed to have solved it themselves?

The truth about those people is that they did not solve Umineko, not by a long shot.

What those people did:

- Figure out a certain twist in the story that heavily implies who the culprit is and assume that’s the solution.

What those people didn’t do:

- Actually go through every murder and provide a proper explanation of how that character could have done it, supported by clues in the game and without contradictions.

Why is it impossible to properly solve Umineko?

- Most of the actions that the culprit must have taken are not hinted at all. - There is no limit on how many culprits/accomplices there are. - There is no guarantee that the accomplices or even the culprit are the same in all the games. - There is no guarantee that the culprit is not killed. - Anything that is not a red truth can be disregarded as “lies of the narration”. - Red truths are valid as long as they are technically true in any possible context or interpretation, which makes them worse than useless (more on this later). - It’s never explicitly stated that the Umineko mystery follows any of the “rules of a good mystery” explained in the story.

So, basically, there isn’t nearly enough information and rules to find the truth. Even if you reached a solution, you could never be sure it is the solution, and coming up with a solution given the listed conditions is unsatisfactory and trivially easy.

Before proving that, let me quickly address the riddle of the epitaph.

Is it possible to solve the riddle of the epitaph?

No.

Why is it impossible to solve the riddle of the epitaph?

Because the solution requires:

- The map of a certain country during a certain time period (none of which are mentioned in the first 4 chapters, I think, and I doubt you could even find it on the internet). - Expert knowledge of Japanese kanjis and a some Chinese. - Solving metaphoric riddles of questionable logic. - To be actually present in Umineko’s world so you can examine and interact with “the door to the golden land”.

However, the riddle of the epitaph is possible to guess.

This is what anyone who claims to have solved the epitaph actually did. They guessed the answer using these 3 steps:

1- Ignore the most convoluted parts of the epitaph and assume the location of the door to the golden land based on what would make sense for the narrative of the story. 2- Solve a play on words by interpreting it in the only way that would fit the description of that place. 3- Roughly guess how opening the door to the golden land could work.

—-

Now, let’s go back to the solution to the murders. I claimed that coming up with a solution given the listed conditions is unsatisfactory and trivially easy.

Let me demonstrate. Here is the solution for all the murders in Umineko assuming the culprit is whatever character you want:

- All the servants, Nanjo, and all the members of the family required to make it work are accomplices. They are either bribed, threatened, convinced or tricked. - Every death is being faked unless stated in red. - Every scene not directly witnessed and described in a literal fashion by Battler is a “lie of the narration”, so it never happened. - If it is stated in red that your chosen character is not the culprit, it is because the word “culprit” is not being used to mean “the mastermind behind the murders” but “the responsible for some particular action” that your chosen culprit is not directly responsible for. - If it is stated in red that your chosen character is not a murderer or did not kill a particular person, it is because while carrying out the murders they were roleplaying Beatrice, so the red truth is considering that the actual murderer is their Beatrice impersonation, not their actual self.

Easy, right? Completely unsatisfactory too.

You would assume that the actual solution is elegant, doesn’t require twisting the red truth so much, and is completely supported by hints, but you would be wrong.

The VN doesn’t even explicitly confirm who the culprit is and it doesn’t go into detail about how each murder was carried out either. However, the manga does. I will refer to this as the “official solution”.

The official solution is so bad and full of holes and contradictions that a lot of people think it’s actually a trap set by the author for “people who stop thinking”.

So there’s 2 possibilities here:

- Umineko is a disappointment and is not solvable. The author did a poor job shoehorning explanations that were not hinted and forgetting details that contradict them. - Umineko is a hidden masterpiece. The author committed to a master trolling and pretended, even during interviews, that the flawed official solution is the truth, all just to hide the proper solution for those who don’t stop thinking. Let’s call this the “hidden solution”.

Why is the official solution so bad? Short edition.

I’ll go into more detail later, but in brief:

- The solution requires fairly ridiculous “anime logic”. - The solution doesn’t follow the rules of a proper mystery that Umineko itself explains. There are no clues to figure out how most of the murders where carried out or by whom. - The are as many clues pointing to the culprit as there are red truths contradicting it. - The solution is willing to disregard basically everything that is not a red truth as “lies of the narration”. - The red truth directly contradicts this solution, unless we interpret it in arbitrary and twisted ways in order for it to mean something else. - The logistics and details of the murders are ignored. Corpses are moved around like pillows. The culprit is never stained by blood. Shots are not heard unless the plot requires so. Etc.

Is it possible to reach the official solution?

It’s possible to figure out who is the official culprit. There are heavy hints for it, hard to see initially, but sorta obvious in retrospect. Since it’s a big twist, you should be fairly certain that you found it when you do.

However, for the reasons listed before, finding the culprit doesn’t allow you to find the solution to the murders, since anyone can be an accomplice, any narration can be a lie and any red truth can be interpreted as something else.

So, what about the hidden solution?

Is it possible to reach the hidden solution?

I’m not saying a hidden, elegant solution doesn’t exist, but for the reasons listed under “Why is it impossible to properly solve Umineko?”, you would never know if it is elegant enough to be the actual truth. It would also certainly require 4.000 hours if not more. Such a hidden truth would require you to disseminate and analyze almost every single word of this 120 hours novel.

However, I don’t see how you can make sense of all the red truths without twisting their logic and meaning so they don’t contradict real facts or one another, which makes me think that the actual solution being bad is more likely than a hidden, perfectly logical solution.

Up until chapter 6, I would have totally bought that the whole story was perfectly thought off up to the last detail, but chapters 7 and 8 are so bad I don’t believe that anymore.

Why is the official solution so bad? Extended edition.

Since I don’t want to spoil it, let me give you a fictional example of a solution that is roughly as bad as the official one, with the same kind of justifications.

The following are not spoilers, just a completely fake theory I just made up that not only appears to fit perfectly as a solution, but also appears to be heavily hinted through the game:

The culprit is Maria. She is actually not 8 but 20 years old. This is the big twist that makes people think they have solved Umineko upon realizing it, regardless of whether it completely fits or not. Then they reinterpret everything as needed to make it look like it’s supporting this truth, as I’m about to do.

This truth is right in your face the whole time, as Rosa is constantly scolding her for not acting her age. It makes no sense that she would be that bothered by it if Maria was actually 8 years old.

This is also heavily hinted by the way Rosa abuses Maria in front of other people while they all allow it. Hitting a 20 years old is not nearly as abusive as hitting an 8 years old.

All the characters agree to treat Maria as an 8 years old since that’s the way she acts and they don’t want to be mean to her, unlike her mother. This is also the reason why she is visually depicted as a little kid; as far as anyone is concerned, she is a little kid. “Without love it cannot be seen”; because they love Maria and respect her personality, they can see her as a kid.

This is all a facade maintained by Maria to trick everyone. She’s such a fanatic of the occult that her mask slips when talking about the topic and she starts acting like the creepy adult she actually is. Another massive hint that’s in your face the whole time.

She’s also shown to know Hebrew and have the whole Bible memorized. There’s no way she could be a little girl.

Even her appearance reveals the truth: She’s the only one who wears a crown, signaling that she’s the queen of the chess game.

If you have read up to chapter 5, you should recall a scene in which a certain character seriously confronts her about the existence of magic as if she was an adult, to the surprise of everyone else, who think this character is being rude. This is another massive hint that she’s actually an adult and everyone is pretending for her sake.

The reason she carries out the murders is because she truly believes Beatrice exists and will be resurrected with the ritual depicted in the epitaph. She is always saying so openly and being unaffected by the murders no matter how grueling they are or if the victim is her own mother.

The kind of person who claims to have solved Umineko would have stopped here and decided the mystery is solved. The twist is obvious in retrospect and it seems like Maria could actually have carried out the murders if she was an adult. It’s obvious that this is the solution, so there’s no need to think it further or go through every murder to check if it actually fits and is supported by clues. This story is a masterpiece!

But now we are on the internet and there are idiots who claim this solution is bad or contradictory, so let’s prove them wrong:

First chapter, first twilight:

Maria enters the parlor with a gun and kills everyone.

Yes, she kills 6 people by herself without missing a shot, even though in later chapters it’s said that the guns in the mansion don’t shoot straight and are very hard to reload for an amateur

She then carries 6 corpses to the storeroom at the other side of the garden all by herself, without getting blood stains on her clothes or on the path to the storeroom, and without anyone hearing a thing.

Later on, Natsuhi also has a gun. This confirms that there are guns in the mansion, so Maria could also get a gun, making this crime hinted and solvable.

First chapter, second twilight:

Maria goes to Eva’s room. Eva has no reason to suspect her, so she lets her in, then Maria kills her and Hideyoshi with the gun she carried hidden on her purse (another big hint; she’s the only one who can carry weapons around without being noticed).

The chain on the door was never set, that was a lie of the narration. This makes sense since Battler himself didn’t witness the scene. Genji and Kanon find the bodies and go tell other people.

While they are out, Maria somehow draws a giant magic circle in blood on the door, without moving the bodies or staining herself, the floor, or the bed where the corpse of Eva is laying. She had drawings of the same circle on her notebook, making this crime hinted and solvable.

You get the point, so let’s skip the rest of the murders and assume they can be explained by Maria somehow.

Let’s assume that in later chapters it is said in red that Maria is dead and her death was a homicide. This might seem to contradict our theory that Maria is the culprit, but it actually doesn’t. The sentence is referring to “Maria the kid”, which is treated here as a different entity from “Maria the adult”, in a similar way as how Maria treats her mother as either her real mother or “the evil witch” depending on whether she’s angry or kind. “Maria the kid” being dead means that she has discarded that facade and won’t use it anymore*. This can be considered a homicide since “Maria the adult” is the one who decides to “kill” her facade.

*She will actually use it one more time when it’s convenient for the plot, but this is treated as a resurrection and doesn’t contradict the truth that “Maria the kid” was dead at that point in time.

All of this makes sense and is solvable.

This is what the official solution apologists believe.

Umineko completely betrays the player.

Umineko is constantly asking the player to solve its mystery, going as far as to insult readers who don’t try hard enough, and seemingly assuring you that the game is perfectly solvable and follows the rules of a good mystery.

All of this is a lie.

I take particular issue with the red truth.

The red truth is introduced in a way that requires trust and cooperation from the player. It is not realistic to think that Battler (or you, the player) would be convinced that a lying witch that is trying to trick you would be trustworthy when explaining the rules of the game or the nature of the red truth.

However, you do the concession because you are, in fact, playing a game. You understand that the game is challenging you to solve it, so some rules must be laid out.

The red truth is accepted as a shortcut to avoid having to read through 2 hours of explanations for every minute detail. You accept that when “character X is dead” is said in red, the purpose is to tell Battler (and you, the player), that you should not waste your time trying to find ways in which the death of character X could have been faked, and for the story to not waste time either trying to deny every possible way to fake that death (which would be futile anyway since you can’t believe anything the witch says).

Red truths are sometimes used for misdirection, but that’s all good and part of the fun as long as they can still be taken at face value and interpreted literally. “Character X didn’t exit the room” tricks you into assuming that character X was inside the room to begin with, but the solution here is to take the red truth literally and don’t make any extra assumptions, not to change the meaning or the context of the red.

Eventually, however, the game provides consecutive red truths that directly contradict each other. The official explanation is that a red truth is valid as long as there is a way in which it could technically be interpreted as true. For example, if you and I are in the same room, I can claim in red that “there’s only one person in the room”, because I’m speaking out of context and by “the room” I’m not referring to this room, but any other room with a single person in it, or because you did cruel things in the past, so I consider you to be a “monster”, not a “person”. Therefore, the red truth “there’s only one person in the room” is no truth at all.

You might think it’s a cool twist that the red is not reliable and the witch was tricking you all along, and I agree that from a narrative standpoint it is.

However, from the point of view of a player being encouraged to try and solve the mystery, it is a complete betrayal of the truth you placed in the game.

The ending of Umineko is awful and the whole “solvable mystery” is a hurtful lie.

[r0manceplanet]

MATCHUP EXCHANGE W/ @assembly-onslaughter

FANDOMS: Forsaken & The Robloxia: Until Dawn (TRUD)

A/N: Thank you for doing an exchange with me! This was very fun to write for and I hope you enjoy it after a while C:

𓂃 ࣪⋆💿˚ ༘ Your life in Forsaken

I match you with… Guest 1337!

Headcanons:

• I feel like you and Guest are a match made in heaven while being trapped in an unknown place that’s basically hell for everyone else, I feel like guest also has this urge (that he can’t resist most of the time) to help you with whatever you want, he’s the most protective towards you than any of his other peers (which leaves them to suspect he may have catched some feelings for you!).

• Whenever you have mood changes, especially if it’s when you get mad at someone when they pushed your buttons far too much, Guest is right behind you to help you, and have you calm down, and oddly enough, he is able to, it’s like his magic power, you also have the same affect on him when his teammates are goofing off, you both calm each others storm down, you both are the suns.

• I definitely feel like he would find it so adorable how you can’t tell jokes and teases apart, not in a bad way of course, he is always there to tell you the differences if you happen to get stumped whether someone was messing with you or not, and if it hurt your feelings, just go to Guest and he’ll take care of it, he would do anything for you, you are the only person that truly matters to him in this hell you both are in.

• You both share cabins together, and you both make it look cozy on the inside so it feels like you both are at home and feel safe, he would get you whatever you wanted, and i definitely think that he brought(or bought) blankets, books, games, etc just for you! And you were able to choose what you wanted, you guys would also have movie nights whenever there wasn’t gonna be a round happening (which happens rarely) so you both take the time to spend your entire day in your cabin together to watch movies and cuddle.

• He knows that you don’t like insects, like spiders, cockroaches, you name it. You won’t see them anywhere, and if they are anywhere near you he makes sure that you don’t see them, so he’ll stomp on them with his shoe and kick them to the corner or somewhere further from you, somewhere where you won’t see them so you don’t get freaked out.

• No matter what kind of person you are, he will always protect you, way more than the others, you are important to him as he is important to you… he will make sure nothing keeps you separated from you, not even the spectre can keep you both apart for long.

Killer or Survivor?

You would be a… Killer!

Your Abilities: You would have 3 different types of abilities, one of them would be for slashing the survivor, you would most likely have some sort of sword, perhaps a samurai or two, the second ability you would have the ability to bring minions… similar to c00lkidd and 1x1x1x1 but you would summon them by shoving your swords into a survivor and once they’re dead they turn into minions that’ll attack survivors, the third ability you would have is where you can give hallucinations to the survivors where there would be a fake image of you that they would believe is you, and once they touch/stun the fake image you would be able to teleport and then instantly kill them. You would be extremely powerful in the game compared to the other killers.

Dynamics w/ other characters:

John Doe is one of your best friends, you both met when you got forsaken at the same time with him, before you met Guest 1337, even when you get together with him he was the most supportive person when you told him.

And Jason is another good friend of yours, you both are teammates together, and you guys click together so well, you spend a lot of your time with him as well, he even developed feelings for you but his mother said no, so he couldn’t really confess but he was still allowed to be your friend!

You are also pretty good with Two Time as well! You both are similar in many ways so you both were able to bond together easier than most people.

However with Elliot, you both are enemies, he’s never liked you since he first met you, you don’t really understand why, so you don’t really bother with him much, and you make sure to kill him at the start or somewhere in the middle of the round.

Ship troupes:

• Idiot (you) X Loves their idiot (Guest 1337)

• Mine only

• Painfully Obvious

Song troupes:

• Gabriela by Katseye

• This night has opened my eyes By The Smiths

• Back to Friends by sombr

𓂃 ࣪⋆💿˚ ༘ Your life in The Robloxia: Until Dawn

I match you with… 1x1x1x1!

Headcanons

• I just had to ship you with him 😭 And I have so many reasons why I did, firstly, you would be new to the entire game, so when 1x found this out he made sure to go after you, and after that, he mostly targets you, and it leaves you pissed off but for some reason, he enjoys it every single time to annoy you.

• He doesn’t like it whenever you “dehumanize” yourself just to please other people, and when people keep expecting you to do it, he’ll take care of them for you, he doesn’t like how you would just do anything for anyone, especially when they don’t deserve it.

• He would most likely be annoyed at first when you don’t take him seriously, but after dating you for a while, he understood why you didn’t take him too seriously at times since you couldn’t tell the difference between when someone was joking to them being serious, he helps you see more clearly after that, which is a really big help for you!

• He probably helps you with controlling your anger, he knows what it’s like to be angered, you both share that together a lot, it’s one of the main reasons you both are dating. I feel like he would love watching you write and draw whatever your doing, and he loves it when you ask him to see if it’s good, bonus points if you draw or write something with him in it.

• I feel like he also doesn’t like crowded places, he seems like someone who likes to be in a quiet place with a few people, I feel like you guys would just hang out somewhere privately and read together, with you laying your head on his shoulder, he enjoys it whenever you hug him.

• I feel like he can easily get used to you, you’re one of the people who doesn’t annoy him as much as others do, and he’s finally happy to know that there’s someone who will understand him when others couldn’t.

Killer or Survivor?

You would be a… Survivor!

Your Abilities: You would have 3 abilities almost like the rest of the survivors, your 1st ability would be to heal other players, you would have a med kit with you at all costs, and whenever a survivor is injured you throw the midkit their way, your 2nd ability is to stun the killer, you would most likely have a gun, but you would get two bullets so if you missed the fist time you can shoot the second time before it goes in cool down for 20 seconds, the last ability you would have is to heal yourself, you would have something to eat to bring your health back up whenever you were struck by the killer, and you can run while you eat. You’re one of the rarest survivors ngl, and you are extremely useful as well.

Dynamics w/ other characters

You would be good friends with both John and Jane Doe! They are both good friends to you, even though they are killers, so while there aren’t rounds that are going on you usually hang out with them, and they’re arguments are so fun to listen to, and all three of you do the most craziest stuff ever.

I feel like you wouldn’t interact with c00lkidd as much, since he looks like a spider, he creeps you out a lot, and he likes it (😭), whenever he gets the chance to see you he tries to put an actual spider on your head, and you would run away before he could, and if he keeps trying to come at you, you stun him with your gun LMAO.

You would be good teammates with Builderman he always has your back during rounds, and he even protects you from c00lkidd as well, you both always succeed whenever you are paired together.

Ship troupes

• Sweet Baby (you) X literal demon (1x1x1x1)

• Idiot who won’t admit their feelings (you) X “did I fall for this idiot..? Damn it!” (1x1x1x1)

• “LISTEN IM GONNA—“ (you) X “peace…” (1x1x1x1)

Song troupes

• She wants Revenge by Your Love

• Never be alone by Shadrow

• Cookie by Newjeans

[charredmallows]

I like LDA so far it’s cool these guys are my favorites right now

btw I’m only caught up with weeby’s stream (day 17) so please don’t spoil!

[m0thlegs]

rereading the luxury liner arc after I just got back into my hyperfix recently and I wanna make sure I have a fresh understanding of the characters and. Guys I’m slowly being convinced of dadbastian now. I’m a changed woman

[gayofthefae]

Queer ships are universally different and not comparable to straight ships in ship wars because without the ship/feelings/reciprocation all characters involved would still be queer because their queerness exists and is represented in them independently from specific romantic feelings and that queerness would still deeply affect their characters' relationships to themselves.

Queer ships are not the same as straight ships because queer ships are inherently indicative of something deeper in the individual that is affects their character arc to the core and straight ships are love stories.

Basically, the queer experience and the straight experience are not the same. I feel like people should know this, and I feel like people do, so I assume they just don't realize that that's what the conversation is. But I'm not fighting for the ship. I'm fighting for the characters to be queer. Your characters were already straight. You get what I'm begging for regardless. You think we'd have equal things - love stories - taken away but you're wrong.

If two people don't get together I don't have a love story to live vicariously through anymore. If two people aren't queer I'm not in the story anymore.

Hope this helps.

[sarellathesphinx]

Both square enix and other players can take the idea that Cait has his own personality and sense of will separate from Reeve from my mummified hands

[nonsensechemicals]

crying whenever i talk about Cookie9 because all my friends have these interesting and unique theories on them while i take everything too literally and they all just stare at me like “dude… uuugh we r TIRED” <-they dont actually say this they are very kind to me but i can Feel It

[crystalkitty1220]

Man I wonder where the leader of the fear realm could've gone, it's alMOST LIKE NEVIN HAS AN