#and based on that singular piece of evidence

[raggydollsscreenshots]

Posting screenshots from The Raggy Dolls every day until ITV puts it on ITVX: Day 115:

[sarshles-cheescake-li]

Why's Lu Guang's hair white?

It has occurred to me that a lot of people on the English side of the fandom aren't aware of the Lu Guang white hair theory.

It's a very popular theory/headcanon on the Chinese side (I'd say maybe 30% of people believe in it?) of the situation. I have no idea who in the English fandom have talked about it and who haven't, so I'll just provide what I know of it. Full disclaimer that I wasn't the first one to make this observation.

The theory is based on this scene right here, episode 12 of season 2. Here, Qiao Ling has a singular white hair after receiving Xixi’s powers (and seemingly activating them for the first time). This can be either interpreted as her spontaneously gaining a white hair, or as just an effect of the lighting.

Lu Guang has (presumably) received and activated Cheng Xiaoshi’s powers before.

Lu Guang’s hair is white.

Are you picking up what I’m putting down?

It doesn’t help that his eyebrows are a different colour. In pretty much every piece of official media, they’re a grey a bit lighter than his eyes. Except for in the phone ad for OPPO (I think that’s what that was…?) where his eyebrows are largely black, except for one shot where they’re their normal grey, so I’m fairly certain that’s just a mistake in animation. I could’ve sworn to God there was one piece of media where his eyebrows were white, but I can’t find said piece, so I guess that was a fever dream.

Quite a few people have wondered how a naturally white-haired person would have darker-coloured eyebrows. Based on that, the argument is that Lu Guang’s natural hair colour is darker, and his hair turned white later in life. Of course, from an artistic standpoint, this evidence is… hard to work with. Characters with a light hair colour paired with a light skin colour often are drawn with their eyelashes and eyebrows being a darker colour for the purpose of contrast. It’s not rare for a white-haired character with fair skin to end up with grey eyebrows, since it makes their eyebrows more easily visible while still looking lighter. The problem?

Ouyang Bubai (how does the English fandom refer to him…? Do I use pinyin for him? Jyutping? Cantonese Yale? Is his Chinese name written in simplified or traditional???) has almost the exact same hair colour as Lu Guang. His eyebrows are white.

Paint tool sai version 2 colour picker (and visual examination) tells me his eyebrows are a slightly different colour than his hair, being a bit warmer and a smidgeon darker, but the point stands. Compared to Lu Guang’s eyebrows, you can definitely tell they’re drawn differently.

Other light haired characters like the Li siblings receive the same treatment as Ouyang Bubai, having pink eyebrows. It’s just Lu Guang who has his situation.

And no, it’s not a matter of convenience. Link Click’s eyebrows are always drawn with black lineart and a solid fill, usually one matching the character’s hair colour. Lu Guang’s eyebrows match neither his eyes nor his hair, something that would theoretically make drawing him more inconvenient because now you’ve got one extra colour in the pallet.

But if the point was that Lu Guang’s hair isn’t supposed to be white, then why make his eyebrows so light? Because now, what is potentially foreshadowing looks like artistic liberty. Was it for the sake of visual cohesion? To throw theorists off? Is it something about the character design process and Inplick?

Anyway, a few possibilities emerging from this theory.

How many times has Lu Guang went back in time for Cheng Xiaoshi if all his hair is white? Or does the process speed up the more you use another person’s powers?

Does his hair turn white all at once whenever he goes back in time, or is it gradual? Like, was there ever an attempt where Cheng Xiaoshi went to bed, woke up, and went “woah Lu Guang that was one mean mental breakdown you had last night if you bleached half your hair”

Does using another person’s powers affect you negatively in other ways? Is that why Lu Guang has limited attempts – not because he’s running out of photos, but because he’s running out of time himself? And, my personal favourite:

The white hair isn’t because of power usage. It’s because of stress. Lu Guang is just a lot more stressed than Qiao Ling is.

[avelera]

A few random thoughts about the comic issue of "Men of Good Fortune" in The Sandman and how they pertain to Dreamling as a ship based on the show.

I get the sense when reading MoGF that it's a... shall we say, "young" story? It's the sort of story that has its seeds in your high school creative writing class. You're learning about English history and you're also writing short stories and you think, "Wouldn't it be cool if two guys met every 100 years to talk about these events I'm learning about and it's the same guys because they're immortal?"

I say this in part because I wrote a similar story in high school without having read MoGF, but also because it's a very simple story with no actual plot arc, nothing actually changes by the end in the original comic. The addition of Dream "missing" the meeting adds a lot of weight and consequence that isn't there in the comic. The closest it gets is, "Dream says he's not going to come to the next 1989 meeting but then a bunch of stuff happens off screen and he shows up anyway, thus confirming they are indeed friends." That is barely a plot beat of any kind, nothing really changes, it just clarifies that they are friends, which we could have suspected the whole time.

Anyway, on that note, I've got a deep-seated suspicion that in the very earliest drafts of this story, Dream was Death. Because it makes sense. Death spares a commoner on the condition that he report back every century to tell about how his life is going. Also, Death is certain that this mortal will want to die at some point because of all the horrible things he's living through, but in the end he doesn't and they become friends.

Again, this is a very simple story, basically a fable. Then this story is lifted into a new setting, the Sandman universe, and the antagonist of Death is turned into Dream but Death is still there, because Death as a figure makes much more sense than Dream as the basis for this wager.

I've commented many times before that Hob has less than nothing to go on as far as guessing Dream's identity but that one very natural conclusion he could come to is that Dream is Death because Death is much easier and thematically consistent with what happens in the story than Dream. Dream even remarks in the show (paraphrased) that, "[He] is far more terrible than Death," which objectively makes very little sense other than in their personal mannerisms.

But Dream's curiosity as to Hob's will to live isn't all that consistent with his function as Lord of Dreams, can you really tell me that the Lord of Dreams can't conceive of a mortal that would want to live forever, who wouldn't dream of living forever? IMO this is one more piece of evidence that the story was lifted from an earlier draft where there is no Dream and Death, there is only Death and Hob, with Death left in as sort of a homage to the original premise and to explain why Dream would get involved at all in such a wager.

It also kind of explains why the implications of this centuries-long friendship get largely ignored until quite late in the Sandman comics. Dream would be Hob's only constant, at least that he can speak to and isn't like the Sun and the Moon or something, and yet our only nod to this is very very late in the comics.

Again, I think this is because in a fable about Death and A Normal Guy meeting over and over as a commentary on English history, it makes perfect sense that you wouldn't really explore the interpersonal implications of how Hob feels about this guy, if Hob cares about this guy, because it's Death, clearly this is just a fable.

But once it's not Death, once it's someone else, once Dream's interactions with this guy actually don't align with his function, actually rather glaringly doesn't align with his function such that his relationship with Hob actually becomes Dream's biggest singular point of individuality, the biggest piece of proof that he is an individual person and not just his function because watching this guy live has nothing to do with his function because he's not Death, then we also begin to wonder how important are these guys to one another, as individuals, because it's not a simple, streamlined fable anymore about Death and Just A Guy meeting.

Basically, I think that as is often the case, the inconsistencies are what give some of Gaiman's juvenilia works the charm that they have. They raise more questions than they answer, because they're not rigorously plotted and the implications of certain story decisions aren't explored, for example even how magic like immortality works in this world doesn't really make consistent sense (ex. Orpheus and Hob have very different immortalities within the same story despite both being gifted by Death, one can't choose to die whenever he wants and there's no explanation as to why this is other than The Story Demands It, which is rather clumsy but does lend to a sense of myth).

It's not until much later in the author's career in the comic and (retconned with) the show that the narratives begins to inquire into things like, "What do these two individuals mean to each other as people. Does Hob mourn Dream, or think of him when he's not there? Does the singularity of Hob in Dream's life matter to him, or give him pause?" all questions that would be absurd in a simplistic fable about Death and Just A Dude but once lifted from that original context, create fascinating inconsistencies that begin to matter and become fodder for deeper explorations as seen in fanfiction and shipping these two characters.

[queerfables]

This came up in my recent discussion with @indigovigilance, but for my own reference, I wanted to make a dedicated post about it.

Fandom speculation in the wake of season 2 has pointed to the themes of deception, sleight of hand and memory tampering to suggest there's an unsolved mystery woven through the season that we can piece together with the right evidence. I think there's a solid case for this, but I also think it's possible we've been deliberately lead into overthinking things.

Crowley and Aziraphale's conversation about Clues-with-a-captial-C is a reference to Terry Pratchett's iconic Discworld detective, Samuel Vimes. Vimes is skeptical about Clues. He considers assembling a singular, intricate explanation that accounts for every available piece of evidence a great way to end up with a theory that is enormously clever and completely off base.

From Feet of Clay:

Samuel Vimes dreamed about Clues. He had a jaundiced view of Clues. He instinctively distrusted them. They got in the way. And he distrusted the kind of person who’d take one look at another man and say in a lordly voice to his companion, “Ah, my dear sir, I can tell you nothing except that he is a left-handed stonemason who has spent some years in the merchant navy and has recently fallen on hard times,” and then unroll a lot of supercilious commentary about calluses and stance and the state of a man’s boots, when exactly the same comments could apply to a man who was wearing his old clothes because he’d been doing a spot of home bricklaying for a new barbecue pit, and had been tattooed once when he was drunk and seventeen and in fact got seasick on a wet pavement. What arrogance! What an insult to the rich and chaotic variety of the human experience!

From the Fifth Elephant:

Mr. Vimes had told him never to get too excited about clues, because clues could lead you a dismal dance. They could become a habit. You ended up finding a wooden leg, a silk slipper and a feather at the scene of a crime and constructing an elegant theory involving a one-legged ballet dancer and a production of Chicken Lake.

Coupled with the conspicuous barrel of red herrings in the opening credits, I have to wonder if the show, while teasing the possibility of a mystery, is explicitly telling us not to look too hard. I'm not ruling out some kind of twist, but I'm inclined to think that for this story, theories are strongest when they rely on only a few pieces of evidence and follow a clear, straightforward narrative. If there is something still hidden in season 2, maybe it's not an elaborate puzzle but a simple misdirect.

[artifacts-and-arthropods]

Bronze Age Libation Vessel from Crete, c. 1600-1450 BCE: the body of this 3,600-year-old vessel was carved from a single block of rock crystal

The collar of this libation vessel is decorated with discs of gilded ivory, while the handle is formed by a length of bronze wire and fourteen beads made of rock crystal. The vessel itself is about 16.5cm tall (roughly 6.5 inches) when measured from the base up to the rim.

Libation vessels such as this were widely used to pour ritual offerings, such as wine (or other alcoholic substances), water, honey, olive oil, milk, or grain, usually in honor of a deity or in remembrance of the dead. These ritual vessels are also known as rhyta (or the singular rhyton). They were especially common among ancient cultures, but have also been used by many other peoples throughout history, and similar libation vessels are still used within certain religious/cultural traditions today.

This particular vessel was crafted and used by the Minoans -- a Bronze Age civilization that once flourished on the island of Crete. It was unearthed from the ruins of the Central Palace of Zakros.

According to The Heraklion Archaeological Museum:

This small libation vessel, a true masterpiece of Minoan art, is one of the most valuable ritual vessels of the Central Sanctuary of Zakros. The body and neck are made separately. The body of the rhyton is carved from a particularly large block of rock crystal. The vase was found shattered into hundreds of tiny pieces, which were restored with marvellous skill by the conservators of the Heraklion Archaeological Museum. The collar around the join between neck and body is decorated with gilded ivory discs. The tall, curved handle is formed of fourteen crystal beads threaded on bronze wire and was found almost intact during the excavation, with the beads still in place.

The skill of the Minoan craftsman is evident not only from the decorative details of the rhyton but also from the fact that he was able to create such a fine-walled vessel without cracking the particularly hard raw material. The aesthetic perfection of the rhyton is as impressive as the technical skill required to produce it. Its symbolic value as a ritual vessel is heightened by the precious ivory and the metals, all of which were imported to Crete from distant parts of the East Mediterranean.

Sources & More Info:

Heraklion Archaeological Museum: Rock Crystal Libation Vessel/Rhyton

World History Encyclopedia: Minoan Rock-Crystal Vase

Minoan Crete: Zakros

[joyce-stick]

Good evening,

I am contacting the team in relation to the current policy of the tag wranglers on "All Media Types" tags. I have heard from various community members that the policy of the tag wranglers is, as of this moment, to remove these tags. I am writing primarily to express my opposition to this policy, as it is not clear what problem it is intended to solve, and broadly has the potential to cause more harm than good (if any good at all).

You have likely already heard about the impact this policy has on anime and manga fandoms, as many Japanese media franchises exist across mediums and installments that share a singular continuity, and many adaptations are 1 to 1 transpositions of the source material's narrative to the target medium with no meaningful narrative deviation. Bang Dream, the Monogatari series, and virtually every manga with an anime adaptation (such as Bloom Into You, Bocchi the Rock, and My Hero Academia) all fall into this. There are counter-examples, such as Fullmetal Alchemist's manga, and its 2003 anime adaptation which takes a drastically different narrative direction, but these exceptions are few and far between.

Anime and manga fanfic writers often tag both the anime and the manga of the series they are writing about, because the fandom for both is often one and the same. Removing the All Media Types tag makes the act of searching for fics in any anime/manga fandom more difficult, as well as making it harder to filter out crossovers, because the option to do so removes any writers who have tagged both the anime and the manga for the reasons of fandom continuity mentioned earlier.

This policy, if applied consistently, also has the potential to have an incredibly destructive impact on the searchability of any fic for a media franchise split across a large number of installments and continuities, which can potentially number in the dozens, and in some extreme cases, the hundreds. The Transformers franchise, in particular, has numerous spinoffs across many mediums and continuities, as do many other popular franchises such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Gundam, and a litany of others. There are also the obvious examples of franchises such as Star Wars, Marvel, and DC, many of whose installments also share continuities or other elements. Removing the All Media Types tag makes it difficult for people who wish to search for fics from any of these franchises generally with no interest in any particular spinoff, and solves no apparent problem.

The child tags already exist for readers who want to search for media based on any specific installment, as well as for writers writing a fic not based on any spinoff or continuity in particular. Someone writing a more general interpretation of a popular character may have to pick a single piece of that franchise to tag the story under, where they might otherwise simply use the general "All Media Types" tag. This is a serious oversight, as while the wranglers may claim that the removal of these tags is to make the search easier, it in fact makes it more difficult for writers to reach their audience, and audiences to find stories they might have otherwise discovered more easily.

I would strongly encourage the wranglers to observe the following posts, and the response to them, which should be ample evidence that many in the community are not in favor of this policy and that for many fandoms it does not have the intended impact of improving the website's ease of use;*

[1] [2]

If there are no plans to reverse course on the policy, I would strongly implore the staff to publicly announce this change and open a dialogue with the community on how to handle this. I personally am opposed to it, but I am obviously not the only one. Right now the general perception seems to be that this practice is of no convenience to anyone except the tag wranglers themselves, and that they are ignoring the voices of anyone contacting them to say that it is not appreciated. At an absolute minimum, I believe transparency from the team about why and how this policy is being implemented is required, because right now, there is no open communication on this that I have observed and the only way this became openly known was by people on social media passing around screenshots of individual email responses from the Archive's support team.

You can rest assured that I will be doing the same if the response to this inquiry proves unfavorable. Regards, Joyce Celeste Silvia Fisher

*I put a plain colon rather than a semicolon in the original message but tumblr didn't like that for some reason.

Proof:

[cloevr]

1 of the most horrifying and enraging things i've read recently, i didn't know this was such a widespread issue, they literally steal babies and children away from women based on false positive drug tests and fight as hard as they can against them when they try to get their kid(s) back, prove them wrong, sue etc.

[iwasmadetobeasoldier]

you made a lot of points about god and queers. you cannot base these (fucking ridiculous) "facts" on something that probably doesn't even exist.

//(completely out of character)//

Okay, dragons probably didn't exist. At least not the way we see them in ligature or films, but we know dinosaurs exist based on the past evidence and physical fossils we have dug up and assigned them to specific dinosaurs, proving such existence.

If we take this same logic to God and the Bible, I can, in fact prove something happened that caused the Bible to be written.

The Bible is not fiction. 66 separate books, all written at different points of time, at least 3/4 of it written by separate men, all corresponding to each other with Jesus, cannot be fiction. The odds would be impossible for it to be fiction. Leaving us with the obvious conclusion that the Bible must be fact.

The Bible was physically written by human men, but as stated in 2 Timothy 3:16: "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness." Therefore, God must be a real deity in order to give humans the material in the Bible.

Genesis 1:1 is one of many evidences presented that God has always been. "In the Beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." God must have had to existed in order to create this universe.

So far I've given you past events, with the only source as the Bible. But let me ask you something; have you ever had a hallucination? Or been in delirium and saw something that really wasn't there? Okay, usually those cases are singular, only one person sees it or if more than one person sees it, the testimony differs in major parts (timing, shape, etc etc). But it is physically impossible for 5000 people to have the same hallucination at the exact same time. It's never happened. Why am I saying this? Well, in Acts 1:1-11, Jesus ascends back into heaven after the Resurrection, in front of possibly hundreds of people.

"The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, 2 until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, 3 to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible (or unmistakable) proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.

4 And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, “which,” He said, “you have heard from Me; 5 for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” 6 Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 And He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. 8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

9 Now when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, 11 who also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.”

Another piece of evidence is the feeding of the 5000, a mass miracle performed by Jesus before his journey to the cross. Actually, there was more than 5000 people there, based on Luke 9:13-14:

13 He replied, “You give them something to eat.”

They answered, “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish—unless we go and buy food for all this crowd.” 14 (About five thousand men were there.)

This speaks of just men, not their wives or their children, if we assume they had children. If each man had a wife, thats 10,000 people plus possibly two children apiece, thats 30,000 people all fed by Jesus. 30,000 people do not have the same exact hallucination. And this mass miracle is recorded not only in Luke, but also in John, Matthew and Mark.

Recorded 4 times, over 30,000 people witnessed it. It must have happened.

Listed above is just a hint of evidence I could give to show God's existence. But let me ask you something else.

Can you prove God doesn't exist?

Sandy

[zac-yang]

Recovering the maternal in art

Thoughts on Hamlet #1

A crazed rant on Hamlet, art in modernity, Susan Sontag, and female power in Christian theology

The feminine urge to be daddy's mommy. — — Natalie Wynn, Contrapoints

This is the first of my series of meditations based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which I have been studying as part of English literature A-level. It is the basis on which I expand into wider general reflections on culture and philosophy, linking to other things I’ve read or watched recently.

This piece begins as art criticism about excessive author presence in modern art, with allusion to Hamlet as an embodiment of such modern artist. But then it kind of diverges into a theological tangent and ultimately an argument about gender and female power in Christian myths.

It doesn’t really neatly belong to any specific literary category. It is essay-like, but is full of poetic logic. Perhaps just read it as a kind of unhinged diary entry or notes app notes that should have stayed in the drafts.

— — Z

1

Modern authors, perhaps due to their peculiar awareness of themselves as authors, have felt this exceeding sense of self-inflicted obligation, that they have to force their authorships onto the audience, to make them aware that what they’re seeing, is in fact, created by them. And not just by the world.

‘What a piece of work / Is a man!’ Hamlet, II, ii, 301–302

What I mean by this could be seen most obviously in the attempt that modern authors try to push “message” into their works, or simply the conscious attempt to have any message at all. Consciousness is really the crime here. There is a kind of forcedness in modern art, a lack of the grace, the relaxed effortlessness that is so prevalent in classical, canonical art. Modern art is always agitating, in a permanent state of anxiety and uncertainty in whether it has “correctly” communicated its message to its audience.

Notes: Hamlet is seen by many as Shakespeare’s most philosophical play, his most message-heavy work, with deep contemplations on the nature of existence.

The long soliloquies of the eponymous prince has long been described as rigorously academic in style, perhaps most famously, in the ‘to be or not to be’ soliloquy. It is the most decontextualised soliloquy uttered by the prince, in which he solely speaks on the conceptual matters of life and death.

Yet this intellectual aspect of the play might perhaps what Shakespeare precisely is trying to satirise here. A tormenting, self-cannibalising, painful intellectual interiority, emerging in the early modern West, with its deep Christian moralism and inhuman rationalism, is here presented as precisely what drives the main character, and those around him, into misfortunes.

‘O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!’

Hamlet, II. ii. 538

The dramatic forcedness of Hamlet's messaging is perhaps most evident in the almost ravage-like scene in Gertrude's chamber (III, vi), in which he almost embodies the incestuous and murderous Nero. 'Let not ever The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom. Let me be cruel, not unnatural.' III. ii. 366-368

Susan Sontag said that art should be flirtation, not rape. Well, many modern art feels like rape to me. They feel like rape in the way that they try to force one singular thing onto its recipient. It refuses a defused, tender sensuality that slowly transmits and triggers desires through a landscape of polyamorous tenderness. Instead, it is strictly patriarchal, scriptural, the word of the Father, of God, Author The Creator. There is a violence to it. But more so there is a naivety to it.

The violence is in the naivety. In its brutal attempt to not appear naive, but rather adultly, scholarly, fatherly, like the son who resolves the Oedipus complex by identifying with the father to escape the fate of castration. The dwarf dressed in the giant’s robes.

‘But two months dead — nay, not so much, not two-

So excellent a king, that was to this

Hyperion to a satyr, so loving to my mother

That he might not beteem the winds of heaven

Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth!’

‘My father’s brother, but no more like my father/ Than I to Hercules’

Hamlet comparing his father to his uncle, the current King Cladius, and himself, I. ii. 138–142; 153–154

This is the modern author. The anxious son, boy, fearing castration, if not already castrated, living in the shadow of the father, haunted by him, resenting his mother, the wanton, the whore, the true artistry of the world.

Hamlet (1949). Laurence Olivier

True art is always promiscuous. She is the Saint of All Sins. The Virgin in the Brothel. The Whore in the Church. The Holy Witch. The High Priestess of Filth. She is a woman. She is mother. The Oracle (whose words are obscure because they’re divine, not to Him the God, but the real, hedonistic god of music and joy, through whom she is enlightened in darkness). The Sea. Shall I moor tonight in thee.

Twilight, Contrapoints, Natalie Wynn

He, the God, and Her, Nature, whose fundamental battle is once again reenacted in this.

Genesis 1:2, the Spirit of God moved upon the face of waters. God moved on top of the sea, God on nature, man on woman, reason on art, this is the fundamental violation, the real original sin, the forbidden fruit of knowledge, brought forth by Himself through his very presence. The fault of the Fall is not in us. It is in Him. For to be holy is to be aware of the profane, as the opposite is equally true. Therefore to be profane, to be sinful, is precisely to be aware of the existence of the hallow. To learn about it. To aspire to it. Without sin, there would be no God. Like there would be no man without woman.

‘Whatever is the subject of a prohibition is basically sacred’.

‘The taboo does not banish the transgression but, on the contrary, depends upon it, just as the transgression depends on the existence of the taboo: “The transgression does not deny the taboo but transcends it and completes it”.’

Georges Bataille, Eroticism: Death and Sensuality

‘That discourse one might call the poetry of transgression is also knowledge. He who transgresses not only breaks a rule. He goes somewhere that the others are not; and he knows something the others don’t know.’

Georges Bataille, Story of the Eye

Notes: St. Augustine of Hippo wrote that original sin is transmitted by concupiscence and enfeebles freedom of the will without destroying it. But isn’t will also what precisely drove one (Eve) to the origional sin? Perhaps the will is much like Kant’s conception of freedom, a thing that creates its own limits.

Without an elusive ideal to aspire to, we will never be aware of our skin-felt wretchedness. The fruit is not only planted by God, it is God, it is God who eats the fruit, it is God who is the fruit being eaten, and it is God who is watching all of this.

I find it interesting. The closeness between the angel and Satan. Almost mirror images. In Michelangelo’s painting of the sin of Adam and Eve from the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

The decision to have the woman be the one to eat the fruit therefore, is interesting, on multiple levels. She is the original sinner, but also the one closest to God. For the fruit is God, but the fruit is also sin, and it is through the death of the man that she (gives birth to) achieves salvation. She is sin, but she is sin in grace, the glorified sin, the sin made divine, the virgin who gives birth, saved from stoning (here she also mirrors the other Mary, the other permitted sinner, Mary Magdalen), who gives birth to the man who is going to die, through which she successfully redeems herself. She is the mother, and she is the sinner, the original in both, and in both she is holy.

Eve is Mary and Mary is Eve.

The tree of death and of life in the Salzburg Missal: Eve gives the representatives of the old covenant the fruit that brings sin and death from the tree of paradise. Mary, on the other hand, gives the faith hosts, the bread of life. — — The New Eve (Latin: Nova Eva) is a devotional title for Mary, the mother of Jesus. Since the second century, numerous Eastern and Western Church fathers have expressed this doctrinal idea as an analogy to the biblical concept of the New Adam.

The man is essentially an accessory to her, a passage through which she penetrates through to achieve her eventual goal. He is only a thing that she decorates herself with. The baby in her bosom. The man on her laps (Pietà). The feminine urge to be daddy’s mommy. The gravedigger, whose death goes unmentioned, outlived everyone. Her blue robe is serene, like the halcyon sea.

Sandro Botticelli’s Madonna and Child, painted in 1480, shows a reflective Mary in deep blue.

Z

17.03.2024

(with notes later added 24.03.24)

Source:

Susan Sontag, Against Interpretation, On Style, The artist as examplary sufferer

Natalie Wynn, Contrapoints, Twilight

Georges Bataille, Eroticism: Death and Sensuality, Story of the Eye

Janet Adelman, Man and Wife Is One Flesh: Hamlet and the Confrontation with the Maternal Body

I have also posted this on Medium.

[angeltheirs]

I'm a sucker for anything Titanic so I'm watching the new documentary on Netflix. My favorite thing is that they keep presenting these as though they're facts but they're only just more people's assumptions on how the Titanic sank.

"oh, based on this singular simulation, we know that what sunk the Titanic was no more than two pieces of paper." Girl, no you don't. The actual evidence of the wreck is buried under mud, it's but one more assumption in a long line of them.

"well, we now know that Mr. Murdoch was actively helping people into lifeboats as the water was rushing up to meet them because his davot was up in the retracted position." Okay and? So was the one on the other side of the ship? They were using the lifeboats, you can't assume that it was because of his actions up to the very last second of his life. Idk maybe just believe Lightoller I'm the first place that Murdoch didn't shoot himself and was actually swept overboard? Like hello

[ten-cent-sleuth]

A Galling Yoke, Part 7

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for the Teacher/Teacher or Both Single Parents square on my July Break Bingo card

See this post for main info, including a masterlist and synopsis. See this post for warnings.

Word Count: 2.4k

Pairing: Sherlock Holmes x f!Reader

Rating: Teen

Within the hour of your arrival at Sherlock’s flat, the board he used to lay out cases was filled. Sticking to the efficiency of paper notes and adhesive tape, he had placed the deduced or revealed aspects on the left side of the board and the unfilled gaps on the right side; opting for the fun of push pins and colour-coded ribbons, you wove a bright web across the board. 

Purple connected the yet uncategorised ideas and deductions: pieces of the puzzle neither of you knew where to fit, which meant many of Sherlock’s deductions, as “seeing connections is a murky task with so little firsthand and therefore transparent evidence,” as the detective explained.

Green outlined the general facts about the situation with which you two were working: from your scribbled “Edmund had no close confidants but large ton presence” to Sherlock’s “Coltidge hired me”.

Pink bridged each detail of the timeline, with Miss Algar’s recounted beats going on the left of the board and a desperately scrawled “What happened after she lost consciousness? How did S end up with a phaeton and A end up on Cable Street?” on the right.

Yellow highlighted aspects of the perpetrator’s modus operandi that could lead to identifying him, including the meagre but appreciated descriptions Miss Algar provided of the man’s physique and movement.

Red strung together all of the considerations and possibilities of motive—theoretically. At the moment, the red ribbons only connected three pieces of paper on the right side of the board: “For money??”, “For revenge??”, and “For passion??”.

You tilted your head at the little triangle and wondered, “Money is the greatest likelihood, is it not?”

From a few feet away, where he was leaning over his desk, his head bent over a new piece of paper, Sherlock replied absently, “That was certainly my first direction in this case, but I have backtracked. The money Sulyard was skimming from your and his bank account was not to pay off debts: based on Miss Algar’s description of their arrangement, that money was to put up a mistress. The discrepancies were minor but regular, you recall, which would be unusual for debts of honour but fit perfectly with a single woman’s establishment.”

“That does make sense,” you mused. “Edmund would have had to sneak the money out so that Lord Pittford, my father by marriage, would not find out. Edmund still allowed his father to manage his more boring affairs, including his bank account, you see.”

“Singular,” said Sherlock, though he still sounded only half interested. “Ultimately, that means the other common motives for murder are to be equally considered. After all, somebody wrote an incensed letter to Sulyard about ill usage and misrepresentation—a demand, really, to do better or else—and that becomes quite the unanswered question if there is no other sign of substantial debt.”

“Yes, where is that letter? I ought to add that to the board.”

Sherlock waved a hand over his shoulder in a very unhelpful over there motion, concentration remaining on whatever he was pondering at his desk. The gesture reminded you so strongly of being a little girl growing up alongside a little Sherlock—your childhood friend poring over some book and forgetting you were even there until whatever you were messing with to occupy yourself inevitably crashed to the ground—that you almost, almost, refrained from roving your eyes over his now not-so-little form. The chiselled jaw, the wide shoulders, the strong hips, the deft hands, all very well flattered by a smart and confident selection of cut and cloth… No, those you certainly do not remember from your youth.

Shaking yourself, you made a note to self to find the letter later then left the board in favour of seeing what had Sherlock so distracted. “‘What is the maid…hiding?’” you read off of his paper. His penmanship too has certainly improved—er, not that his physique has improved, only developed! “Mrs Kinley? Sir, what do you mean by this?”

At last, Sherlock turned to give you his full attention. “Surely, you also found her dissatisfied with her home and work with Miss Algar. I cannot believe she has not sought fulfilment of some sort on the side: humans are not built for long-term unhappiness, it is only individual tolerance that varies.”

“If Miss Algar is safe and healthy, and the post so unsatisfactory, why must any surreptitious moonlighting on the maid’s part be suspicious?”

“It is more than that; she seemed quite anxious to get us out the door.”

“She did not wish us to come in at all, if you recall,” you reminded him with a teasing smile. “Calling that early is far from the done thing, Sherlock.”

“Why do you fight me, my lady?” he sighed.

“Fight you?” Laughing, you patted his hand in mock consolation. “I do not wish to fight, sir, only to make sure you do not get too accustomed to everyone bowing to your will.”

His nose scrunched in the most adorable fashion, as though he’d swallowed something sour. “I thank you for your consideration, but I believe that is what Enola is for.”

You smiled, remembering your new young friend. “Oh, yes, I can imagine she keeps you on your toes.”

Rubbing his face, he dropped into his desk chair. Your smile wavered as you realised your words had somehow weighed on him, and your concern—and curiosity—was such that you forewent prescribed ladylikeness to move closer and lean against his desk to be near him.

“Sherlock?” you prompted. “What troubles you?”

“Enola.” He closed his eyes and brushed his forehead with tense fingers. “That is, the state of my relationship with her—my being her guardian.”

“Indeed? What of Eudoria?”

After explaining his mother’s disappearance and his brother’s agreement to give up custody, Sherlock said, “I do not doubt that I made the right decision then, but I fear making grievous errors now. On my toes indeed! I know naught about raising a teenage girl!”

“You need not raise her,” you told him with a shrug. “When one’s ward is already six and ten, quite independent, and quite strong, one needs only guide and protect her. Be there for her, Sherlock—be a support and a fallback, and you shall be enough.”

“I know naught about doing that, either.”

Your heart leapt to his defence, then plummeted with the stony reality that you could not disagree with that. If made to choose right now, would you trust Sherlock to be your primary support and fallback? After what happened last time?

Pushing past unpleasant memories, you laid your hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “You can inquire and learn. Surely the great Sherlock Holmes is not opposed to that?”

“No, indeed, my lady,” he said, smiling up at you.

With a solid nod, you let go of him and clasped your own hands tightly to ward away the tingling sensation of loss in your palm. “Meanwhile,” you added, “you may confide in me any doubts or complaints. I know that it feels shallow to bemoan parental anxiety and frustration that one could have left to another, but in truth, such burdens are just as heavy on the shoulders of the one who took them upon themself willingly as on those of the one who had them thrust upon them.”

“Yes…” He watched you sharply. “That you knew one of my great concerns without my breathing a word of it astounds me. How…?”

“William,” you said with another shrug, this one with a weaker bravado. “Our mother having died when we were young and our father being…himself, I endeavoured to be the caring presence and upright role model in my brother’s life. I could not voice my hurt when he railed against me or my worry when he seemed in danger of going down the wrong path, however, for someone would have silenced me for involving myself in what was not my business.”

Sherlock’s gaze was keener than ever, yet it sparkled with realisation, which you could not understand: what had he newly noticed, did he newly comprehend? “Just as I could have left Enola’s care to Mycroft, you could have left that of young Pashbroke to Lord Coltidge. You did not, despite the difficulties, and—I am glad.”

You jolted back ever so slightly. “Glad?”

“Quite glad. I have long wondered at the compassionate gentleness at the core of Lord Pashbroke’s docility, at how he did not end up a fatuous sycophant instead. Evidently, I have your undying courage and your ever-impressive empathy to thank.”

You chuckled first at the picture he painted of what, you were sure, William could never have become, then you giggled at the barrage of compliments that, you were sure, Sherlock could not really mean. Doubt only crept in when the corners of his eyes crinkled with hurt.

“I…” Abruptly, he stood from his chair, and your breath shook in your throat at how much closer he suddenly was. “I hope you know, at least, that I am grateful for your offer of someone who understands the circumstances. I shall appreciate having a fr— No, having you to turn to, when I am uncertain whether I do right by Enola.”

“I was happy to make the offer,” you said, awkwardly but not insincerely. Eager to untangle yourself from this heart-to-heart that you had not expected and were even less prepared for, you scooted to the side until you were no longer leaning against Sherlock’s desk—no longer stuck to it, effectively, by how close he stood and how closely he watched you. “Well, then. Shall I add this piece of paper to the right side of the board?”

He blinked a couple of times, then looked at his desk, picked up the note, and handed it to you in one swift, sudden movement. “So you agree with me now?” he questioned.

“I always did,” you retorted as you searched for a space for the slip of paper. “Did you notice how Miss Algar did not reveal that she could see and understand us until Mrs Kinley had left?” Sighing, you punched in the pin for the new note. “If only our one lead in the flesh did not communicate so limitedly. I feel that we are missing something, that we neglected to ask the one yes-or-no question that could crack this case wide open, and there is no way for her to tell us that.”

Sherlock appeared at your side with unspooled purple ribbon. “There is nothing more stimulating than a case where everything goes against you.”

With an arched eyebrow, you watched him tie the ribbon around the push pin and work the addition into the colourful web you’d been weaving. Once he’d finished and stepped back to take in the board and its dozens of notes, you remarked, “You must be enjoying this case, then.”

“I suppose I must. The case of indirects. Twelve years between witness accounts or physical evidence and us. A middleman between the identifiable victim and the individual with identifiable motive.”

You turned towards him. “What do you mean, a middleman?”

He stared at you for a moment. “Did I not explain that?”

You gave him your most acerbic look. “No. No, you did not.”

“Right. Forgive me.” And how could you not when he looked so boyish rubbing the back of his neck like that? “I have deduced that the character Miss Algar described was a hired killer. The first clue was that the man obtained Sulyard’s schedule so that he could decide his best opportunity to end his life; an educated and cultured gentleman the likes of which wrote that letter—the education and the culturedness are evident in his penmanship and diction, you must have seen for yourself—would not have been able to follow Sulyard to the Younges’ lodgings or other shady parts of town without drawing attention.”

“The gentleman could have hired someone for the investigating, then done the killing himself,” you pointed out.

Sherlock nodded. “The second clue was the restraint and the efficiency apparent on the night of. A first-time killer could not have spirited away a witness and set up an almost perfectly convincing ‘accident’ for the intended victim without so much as a gossiped report of suspicious activity in the shadows. Even before the clean-up of the act, however… The murder weapon was a hammer—a hammer, my lady: the vessel of a man’s blunt force, the symbol of crude brutality—and the letter writer had quite strong feelings about Mr Sulyard. Yet in the dark of night, riding on the inevitable high of power that comes with standing above a person entirely in one’s power, the killer struck his prey only once, and not even particularly violently.”

The intensity in Sherlock’s voice had swept you up into his accounting of events, and you remembered breathlessly what it was to be let into—to be welcomed into—the thoughts of such a brilliant mind.

“All in all,” he concluded, “whoever delivered the killing blow was too professional for me to think he is anything but a professional.”

You smiled at him. “Yes, I see now. I thank you for explaining it to me, Sherlock. I know you do not take the time to do so with everyone.”

“With you, I could do no less.”

Heat rushed to your face, but Sherlock didn’t seem to understand the effect of his words and he rambled on, “Considering the contemptible lack of motive available to us, I believe the direction of this case is to find the hitman in order to identify who wanted Mr Sulyard dead, rather than my wont of discerning why someone was killed to identify who killed them.”

You giggled at the consternation on his face, but when he did not look any less put out by this inconvenience, you stifled your amusement and steered him towards the kitchen.

“Perhaps you only need a small break, dear sir. Shall we see what can be scrounged up for lunch?”

“Hmm. Yes, that may prove helpful. My lady, you have the brightest ideas sometimes.”

“Ha! And I suppose the rest of those times, the brightest ideas are yours?”

“Well…naturally.”

“Quite good fortune that we are a team, then.”

“I would even argue that it is the best of fortune. The very best.”

Thank you for reading. I hope you all appreciated the (sort of) focus on plot this chapter because the next one is going to be completely about the romance—or, rather, the romantic angst hehe… Until then, another cookie to anyone who can point out the Arthur Conan Doyle reference. ;P

[thepsychodump]

Alright everyone I’m gonna need you to hear me out really quick. Cuz I’m about to make a theory based on one singular piece of evidence.

So if you’ve watched Sonic 3 or don’t care about spoilers, please consider

They’re gonna make Amy basically Trunks in Sonic 4

Why do I think this?

The post credits theme is called Green Hill, *Good Future* which already has enough implications with both CD, and how Metal Sonics literally come out of nowhere.

So I think Amy is going to come from a Ruined timeline that was destroyed by whoever is going to be the villain in 4, and I also think this is where they’ll use Chaos Control’s Temporal powers like time travel.

[strawbfieldz]

there are a lot of relationships that are interesting to explore in Welcome Home like Wally and Home, and Frank and Eddie, but by far the most important is Wally and You. And I don't mean you, I mean the collective 'You' (because there is a difference).

so here's my big theory about why You matters and how You can lead to Wally changing his perception on Home:

also: I am posting this right before the update so if anything changes or stuff is added to go along with this I'll add on to it later.

first, this post heavily stems from @/carnivalcarrion's post about Wally and Barnaby's friendship but TL;DR because Barnaby and Wally were made to be friends, Barnaby doesn't have a purpose beyond that, which could put a strain on their "friendship."

anyways, I think a similar point could be made about Wally and You. this has to be the most important relationship in the story since it is implied through the clues on the Website that Wally is trying to communicate with us. it's obvious we have a role in the story as the viewers but I think You is actually a character. the most damning piece of evidence is the hidden page that looks like this:

You are given a bio just like the rest of the neighbors are. that is because You are a part of Welcome Home, especially to Wally who is aware of your existence and talked directly to You during episodes of the show. You are the tenth neighbor to him and thus a character.

plus, there are multiple instances of Wally talking directly to you like "I know you're there," "I can't see you," etc. and as shown above, the only information we know about You is Wally is their best friend. the wording of this is essential. it's not "Wally and You are best friends" or "Your best friend is Wally," it is "Wally is your best friend." it's very one-sided seeming.

but You isn't actually you in the sense you might think. You is a character based on the collective audience--I think of both of the Website and the past audience of the Welcome Home show--and that's the you "Wally knows" ...and Clown has worded it like this multiple times, here, here, and here!

so, Wally doesn't know specific people, not from the audience viewing the Website and the project as a whole now, and assumedly not from the viewers that used to watch the Welcome Home show during its airing. he has a knowledge of a collective audience with only one purpose: he is their best friend, much like how Barnaby was made to be his best friend as well.

I find this post the most important when talking about You, though. Clown answers the question "what would happen if someone stumbled into or got lost and ended up in the Welcome Home neighborhood?" with "You! If they arrived? They’d feel right at Home!" there isn't any confusion or worry, You would feel right at Home, almost like you belong there. (and, I find it funny that Clown labels this random 'someone' as You, even though the question-asker wasn't talking about anyone specific.)

but You isn't a puppet that was made with the sole purpose of being Wally's friend, You is just a collective of people, humans that have lives outside of consuming Welcome Home (in whatever sense that is). but what if Wally doesn't see it that way? I don't think Wally is egotistical in the slightest but his knowledge is very limited, especially about the world outside of Home. from his point of view, Home is everything and thus You are just an extension of Home and they belong in Home, possibly to serve Home the same way he and his neighbors (unknowingly) do.

I think Wally's viewpoint of the world is very cold in this sense. everything is the way that it is because it is supposed to be. assuming he is the only sentient of the puppets (besides Home), he sees his friendships as existing because they are supposed to, people existing to serve their singular purpose, and all of it surrounds him, Home, and the Welcome Home show. this can be quite metaphorical when you take into account that he's a puppet so it only makes sense to live for a specific purpose, having someone pull your strings for you and serving them, and have very little capacity to care about much else.

except something has to resist those ideas because it is a story and there must be conflict. this has already probably taken form with the cancellation of the show which likely broke Wally's ability to communicate with You until the Website. I imagine there will be something else that puts a strain on Wally's relationship with You that puts into perspective for him how You weren't made to serve Home as a puppet for it like he was, or that Wally isn't your best friend, in the way that he says he is.

Clown has said before that Welcome Home is a story about what it's "like to live in a decaying Home" and perhaps this will lead to Wally realizing there is purpose and life outside of Home. I think this could manifest itself in several ways through the story but with Wally and You's relationship being the most important, there will hopefully be a bigger plotpoint surrounding Wally, his ideation of what You are, and what You really are to him and Home.

[titleknown]

HELLOWEEN #9: GENTIFLACCIO

-GENTIFLACCIO is a Great Mesne-Lord of Hell, with 144 Buroughs and 1,285 individual dwellings to his name. He may create mansions and fotresses in a night, and may be called to extract unpaid debts and transmute the flesh of others into gold piece-meal.

He appears as an ugly giant with a mouth in his chest, a great castle sprouting from his back and siege engines jutting from his upper body. He requires blood for his summoning, freely given by its owner as payment for a debt, though this blood may be taken from the summoner and given to Gentiflaccio to pay their debt to him-

...The author of the Final Testament seemed to struggle to understand the appearance of Gentiflaccio, as rooted in modernity as his construction-equipment arms and horrible McDonalds-Mansion-meets-post-modern-skyscraper acme may attest. Though, at least they tried, which as an author who is also a book is an effort most appreciated.

One might make the joke that "Of course there are landlords in Hell," but that would perhaps undercut the true gargantuan nightmare of Hell's land-lords. There are depths of rent-seeking depravity that would chill you to the bone, innovations that break the very laws of life itself. I have seen a streamlined biomechanical demonic Human Centipede as a rooming arrangement. I have seen a potential tenant call it "a good deal, for this side of town"

In that respect, the horror of Gentiflaccio's operations might seem superficially tame. But the scale of his operations and the gaudiness of his actions was evident in our conversation. 

His office was gaudy in a way that went past charmingly tacky into grotesque, not helped by the majority of the architecture being the bodies of certain tenants transmuted into gold, twisted and screaming. This was apparently common enough that he had developed a process for warping them into the positions he desired as they coagulated "A great asset to any showcase" he said.

The place was at once gargantuan and lonely, containing only him and me and the ugliest furniture excessive quantities of money can buy. He was easy to speak to, as my superficial flattery convinced him this was a puff piece, but the casualness with which he spoke of atrocities was in itself revealing. 

He spoke of tenants forced to give up their limbs to afford increased rent, leaving them crawling like worms to offer their tongues in exchange, of homes flattened (Perfectly legally according to the laws of hell) with the tenants still inside in such a way that their flesh was perfectly preserved to sell or; of course, transmute, of the efficiency of the boxes he built where "nobody knows anybody, so they don't have anything to distract them," and spoke elegaicly at the violence over two individuals eating each other alive over a singular apartment that he was offering.

He in particular was proud of the innovative home system he had based upon his own crainium. At the lower-level (As is considered the acme of Hell) was a simple suburban pseudo-mansion, which he described in the most glowing of terms in a way that boiled down to it being bloated, tacky, soulless, and built for the semiotics of wealth without any purpose therein, then ascending to the apex of skyscrapers as designed by a worm-ridden mind, studio-apartments into cubicles into pods, in an inverted pyramid that both conveyed excess and blocked out competition.

In particular he was proud of the rental arrangement where, at random, one individual studio was given to the dweller in the pseudo-mansion to do with as they wished, tenants included, "It's like they get to be little landlords" he said after describing something done by one bottom renter that was so profoundly hideous that I do not dare share it here.

He spoke with pride at the violence at which accompanied his housing plans, oblivious to any veiled criticisms I spoke of, thanking me whenever I voiced them. I recall him saying "The thing you oughtta know, and I say this as a gift most people don't get this for free, is that business is violence! And If i can inspire one person to go into business, I know I've done my part."

As he spoke to me, he was shoveling money into his gullet. Just, eating money, right in front of me. His mouth was full as he spoke as well. At one point he broke a tooth eating a particularly large jewel. He ate both the tooth and the jewel.

Expected, but unpleasant.

-Xavier X. Xolomon , Monsterologist and Understudy to The Librarian Of Babel

----------------------------------------------

So, I had that brainworm of the castle-headed guy Wayne Barlowe previewed in his old Guide to Extraterrestrials, and I figured I might as well combine it with the horror that is McMansions for this guy.

I will say, I may re-write this later, or at least further revisit Xavier's meeting with this character, as I feel unsatisfied with it in terms of conveying what a big deal this guy is and how his operations hurt people, at least with it rushed on this deadline. Even if I did include a little dude next to him for scale.

The buildings I used for the skyscraper part were actually mainly from PD/royalty free pictures of Frank Gehry's work because... God I hope I don't come off as reactionary for this, but his buildings look like if skyscrapers had tumors and then those tumors were extracted to become their own buildings. 

They look like if Everywhere at the End of Time was a Dr Seuss book. They look like if Cool World underwent gentrification and Barry Jackson was always  offscreen weeping a single tear like in a political cartoon.

And for the record, yes the money-eating was inspired by a very specific ProZD sketch, and yes the use of a McMansion as a base was inspired by the great @mcmansionhell

As per usual the whole descriptions, designs, ectcetera from this project are free to use as you see fit under a CC-BY 4.0 license so long as I; Thomas F. Johnson, am credited as their creator!

[jortschronicles]

Of Belt Favors and Letters

The Queen's Champion tournament of Nicolette Deuville II is this coming weekend (November 11, 2023) and for it, I have created two gifts for my inspirations. First, a belt favor for my wife. Second, a letter of intent for my queen.

This isn't my first time making a belt favor, but it's my first time making a sizeable belt favor for my wife. I made it for the Queen's Champion tournament of Nicolette Deuville II, in hopes that it brings my wife luck and glory. <3

It is embroidered on a leftover piece from my first dress I ever made for reenactment and the first dress I ever wore to an SCA event. The text is based on the Setre comb inscription dating to about 600 AD. The text on the comb appears to read

hal maR mauna alunaalunana

Ever since I came across it, I've been entranced by Ottar Grønvik's translation of this inscription:

Stone-maiden may thrive achieve everything, enjoy everything

As my wife's SCA name is Halldóra, I've always wanted to interpret this poem into a gift for her. I used a single strand of cotton-wool blend yarn rather than using embroidery floss to call back to the embroidery texture of the Bayeux tapestry. As I did not have any large blocks of space to fill with the Bayeux couched satin stitch, I did this project in split stitch and a single couched line for the center line of the A section of the inscription

For my letter of intent, I wanted to do something that felt more appropriate to the persona of Áshildr Inn Hárfagri, so I decided to try my hand at carving leather. First, to draft and translate my letter itself.

While my letters of intent are usually rather wordy, since I would be trying a new craft for the first time I wanted to keep it short and sweet. I decided upon "My queen, my sword is yours" and began researching an appropriate sign off.

I came across the Einangsteinan inscript on the Einang stone, which is typically interpreted to read "ek (gu)dagastiR runo faihido" or "I Gudgæst wrote these runes." Substituting my own name for Gudgæst's, I now had a signoff of "ek ashildR runo faihido."

I wish past me did a better job of copying notes down somewhere present me would find them with regards to spelling my own name in runes as I've done this before for the Letter of Intent for the QC tournament of Toryn Sevenstitches II.

Make note that the "d" in Áshildr is spelled with a teiwaz rather than a dagaz. I thought that was interesting and not a choice I would have made casually, so I re-researched this difference. The Vatn Runestone, pictured below, appears to read rhoaltR ...something. rhoaltR is commonly interpreted in this case to be Roald, from Hróaldr. With the inverted algiz used as the R following the hard consonant at the end of the name, I consider this sufficient evidence of how to appropriately write a -dR name in runic inscription.

Then came the translation.

My Queen > dróttning mín (first person singular feminine possessive) > drotning min

My sword is yours > sverðsins (singular def. gen declension of sverð) mín er þín (second person gen. posessive) > swerþsins min er þin

I Áshildr carved these runes > ek Áshildr runo faihido > ek ashiltR runo faihido

As my queen's arms include a wolf in chief, I also carved a wolf into the leather. I used a pencil to sketch the runes and wolf onto the leather, then carved with an Xacto knife and a scalpel. I have found I prefer the straighter lines I accomplished with the xacto knife and found the ergonomics superior, but the scalpel produced clearer, easier to read marks against the undyed leather.

While this was meant to reflect the runic inscriptions in stone, this is obviously not stone. I chose to do this in leather rather than on paper or canvas because the three dimensional nature of carving, how runestones such as the Jelling, Einang, and Vatn stones were carved, is better represented in a thick material such as leather rather than painted on to canvas or drawn on paper. Carving these runes and this design gave me a greater appreciation for the straight lines of the Futhark runes and for the artistry, skill, and patience of those long-dead runewrights. Gudgæst, Roald, though long gone from this world, live forever in the carvings they left behind.

"Deyr fę, deyia frǫndr, deyr sialfr it sama; ec veit einn at aldri deýr: domr vm dꜹþan hvern."

[grimalkinmessor]

Any thoughts about an Inked sequel? I'd love to read it! Or any ideas about it 👀

L going "fuck fate. I make my own soulmate" must be scary but sort of flattering to Light.

I'm working on it! :D Slowly but surely! We're getting there!

And yes it very much is both of those things lmao. Light getting caught is never something he'll take to quietly, of course, but L's singular obsession with him is definitely something he preens about in the sanctity of his mind lmao.

Have a mildly disturbing snippet ✨

.

.

The door slides open, grating metal across metal. A soft pair of footsteps pad inside, before it clangs back shut.

"Man of the hour!" Ryuk crows, but Light knows even before he says it.

L pauses a bit away from him, and Light can practically feel those bottomless eyes raking up his pitiful form. "Hello, Light-kun. How are you feeling?"

Light can't talk, and the bastard knows it. L is just taunting him. It makes Light bristle, but he forces himself to remain calm. He still doesn't have all the pieces yet, and if L wants to play dumb, well...

Light has more experience with it than he does.

"Oh, of course," L says, tone almost absent. He steps forward and unbuckles the strap of leather from around Light's jaw. Spit drips down from the corners of his lips, involuntary, and Light internally cringes at the messy feeling of it.

Outwardly, he makes a show of breathing hard, a whimper seeping into his voice. "L? W-What's going on? I thought that—"

"You can drop the act," L drawls, and oh, he sounds a bit annoyed now. What, did he think he could tie Light down and immediately get him to confess? Light thought he was smarter than that.

"I don't understand," Light cries, indignance and anger and fear singing into his voice. Though Light was hibernating for most of their cohabitation, he still remembers his own thought processes during that time. He can play himself very convincingly. "We caught Higuchi, and you let me out of the cuffs yourself! What is it now? I haven't done anything!"

"You know, Light-kun, I've been pouring over the Death Note for the past day or so, and I found something interesting." L ventures closer, the belt still dangling from his hand. "Several pages from the front of the notebook have been ripped out. A suspicious amount of pages, really. Almost as if something on them would've been incriminating towards Kira—but it couldn't have been the names themselves, no, we already have a log of those Kira has killed, so it couldn't have been that." L leans down, and Light knows that he's staring at him, examining him. When he speaks, Light can smell strawberries and icing on his breath. "You have very elegant handwriting, Light-kun. It's very distinctive."

Flexing beneath his ribs, Kira purrs at the compliment. Light licks the backs of his teeth.

"So now you're accusing me of being Kira based on a lack of evidence?" Light bites out scornfully. "Your insistence on my being Kira is getting a bit pathetic, L. You just can't stand to be wrong, can you? Oh the great detective, brought so low!"

A hum. There's a smile in L's voice when he says, tone almost sly, "I've missed your teeth, Kira-kun. You just weren't the same without them."