brightchrysaor

[brightchrysaor]

📚 final fantasy, your choice of numerical!

cracks knuckles

Okay let's imagine, for a minute, about Noctis who didn't manage to escape the fire in Tenebrae. Regis lost his grip, Noctis tried to squirm out of his hold to get to Luna, something. And for the next eight years, Noctis is raised as a ward of the Empire alongside Luna and Ravus, with all the gristly details that implies because Niflheim finally has their hands on the crown prince of their hated enemy.

The story starts with Noctis' long awaited return to Insomnia at the hands of Lieutenant Drautos when he's sixteen, eight long, long years after the tragic fire that took Queen Sylvia's life. There's been some paper thin excuse about Noctis staying in the Empire for "goodwill" but everyone knows that he's been a hostage, and the kingdom is ecstatic to have their prince back.

The big reunion between beloved father and son, and it's shattered when Noctis, in a polite, quiet Tenebrae accent, asks, "Do I know you, sir?" (Because that's not what his father looked like. That's not the dad who abandoned him, is it? He's too old, surely--)

The prince that's returned to them is a stranger. Neatly combed back hair, a fondness for Tenebrae white colors, soft spoken lilting accent and impeccable manners that betray nothing of what he thinks. It's only in private, when Ignis and Gladio desperately try to get him to open up and maybe talk to them that Noctis admits that he wants to go home, to his brother and sister. The best he can do is send letters with the Messengers, a small, fluffy black dog that Ignis swears wasn't there yesterday.

We cut between Ravus, Luna, and Noctis as the letters pass hands. Ravus, having been pressured into being in the military at eighteen so he could no longer protect his little siblings, traces over the harsh stroke of the pen in Noct's letters in the privacy of his tiny cabin. Luna scribbling out her loneliness and exhaustion over being the world's youngest Oracle for four years now, saying how much she misses the comforting weight of her little brother following her around during her duties.

The Ravus we find here is harder on the outside, but fiercely protective of Luna and Noctis. His hatred for Regis is even more intense, because how dare that man abandon his own son, yet banked even further down because he cannot afford to let these emotions show when he needs to protect them. It's not just that Luna is his precious little sister -- their mother wasn't done healing Noctis before she perished, and Noctis could only rely on them. Ravus is the only one who knows that the Empire was going to kill the boy, and it was only his quick thinking that convinced General Glauca to spare Noctis as a hostage.

Luna is more tired, more worn down. Not only is she the youngest Oracle with an impossible task, she did everything she possibly could to make sure Noctis traveled with her retinue so she could keep an eye on him and make sure the Empire didn't touch him. And now that he's gone, whisked away back to his "home", she finds herself working even harder just to cope with the loneliness.

Noctis is... well. He copes, as best he can, being a stranger in his own 'home' with chronic pain and no one knowing what really happened. Even his magic is different, leans more towards healing and the like rather than traditional Lucian faire, uses a rapier like his older brother when he goes to spar. Spends time with his dog, with Ignis trying to get him to want to meet with his father, training with Gladio in the ring and trying not to flinch at how big he is (not his fault, he's just. Big like Glauca.), tentatively making friends with Cor's hyperactive blonde kid named Prompto...

It isn't until Gladio sees Captain Drautos 'checking in' on the Prince that things start to change. Drautos now has sway over the Glaives and the Crownsguard, the gratitude of the King Himself, so long as Prince Noctis keeps his mouth shut about what happened while he was being "rescued" from General Glauca. Except Noctis talks back to the Captain now that it's just him, he doesn't have to worry about his siblings getting hurt, just himself really.

Gladio charges, because even if that's a little shit of a guy that's his Prince who's being slapped around. He doesn't have a hope in hell against someone like Titus Drautos, let alone General Glauca, being only eighteen and new to the whole 'shield' thing. Gets his shit wrecked, his eye nearly cut open, and his life held against Noctis to scare them both into keeping Drautos' secret.

Gladio, while he's being patched up on Ignis' bathtub, is adamant that they tell the king and the council, while Noctis pleads that they can't or Glauca will find a way to punish Luna and Ravus. Ignis informs him that it will be happening, because this is no longer just a threat to them but a threat to the whole kingdom.

We cut to the chocobros watching as Prince Ravus and Princess Lunafreya are welcomed into Insomnia, only to have their introductions interrupted by Noctis' excited shout of their names and practically warping over to them to hug them stupid. Drautos is imprisoned now, things are starting to look up for the first time for the Fleuret siblings in ... so, so long.

I think the primary fic would end there, but I'd probably want to have oneshots set after, about the adjusting period, and how things wrap up. Something something the abuse that the kids were subjected to gets to light and has the Empire's citizens up in arms over the treatment of the beloved Oracle, Lucis uses it as a way to force Niflheim into a peace treaty. Another oneshot from the pov of someone who only knows Ravus as a battlefield commander, seeing him turn all soft and doting on Luna and Noctis. Maybe dig into how Noctis and Luna traveled around under the guard of Glauca, how it's just as much threatening as it is teasing the Lucis spies who can't get close enough to set Noctis free...

I think about this au often, if you can't tell,

[Put "📓" or some other version of a book emoji into my inbox and I'll explain the plot of a fanfiction that I haven't written but daydream about.]

[brightchrysaor]

on worldbuilding, and what people think is going on

there is one facet of fantasy worldbuilding that is, to me, the most interesting and essential but i don't see it come up in worldbuilding guides or writing prompts or anything, and that is the question of:

what do the inhabitants of your world believe about how the world works, and how are they wrong? a lot of fantasy media will set up their cosmology, gods, magic systems, planar systems, concepts of the afterlife, &c., and proceed as though the inhabitants of the world know and understand them.

from someone whose entire academic career is focused on studying human culture in various regions and time periods, with a focus on belief systems (religion, occultism, mythology, folklore): that sort of worldbuilding is unrealistic and missing out on so much fun.

people are always seeking new understanding about how the world works, and they are mostly wrong. how many models of the solar system were proposed before we reached our current one? look at the long, turbulent history of medicine and our various bizarre models for understanding the human body and how to fix it. so many religions and occult/magical traditions arise from people disagreeing with or adapting various models of the world based on new ideas, methods, technologies. many of them are wrong, but all of them are interesting and reflect a lot about the culture, beliefs, values, and fears of the people creating/practising them.

there is so much more to the story of what people believe about the world than just what is true.

to be clear: i think it's fine and important for the author to have a coherent explanation for where magic comes from or who the gods are, so they can maintain consistency in their story. but they should also be asking what people in the world (especially different people, in different regions/nations and different times) think is happening when they do magic, or say a prayer, or practise medicine, or grieve their dead. it is a rich vein for conflict between individuals and nations alike when two models of the world disagree. it is fascinating how different magic systems might develop according to different underlying beliefs.

personally, i think it is the most fun to spawn many diverse models of the world, but give none of them the 'right' answer.

(bonus points if you also have a thriving academic system in the world with its own theory, research, and discourse between factions! as an academic, it is very fun to imagine fictional academic debate over the topics i'm worldbuilding. sometimes i will be working out details for some underlying mechanic of the world and start imagining the papers being written by scholars researching it)

[brightchrysaor]

May I submit the entirely fandom-created Batfam fic concept:

cuddle pollen

sex pollen is OUT, honesty pollen is IN. Expose your characters to alien chemicals that make them actually talk to each other

[brightchrysaor]

The problem with having a child with an attorney that has spoken to the child like an adult since birth is that she's 4 years old and she's negotiating the order in which we're going to complete tasks as a family to best suit her idea of an ideal day.

[brightchrysaor]

dragon made out of text in mspaint

[brightchrysaor]

someone say a yuri ship . first one u think of

[brightchrysaor]

[brightchrysaor]

Are you still writing gifts without hooks? because it is so so so so good. Like screaming, crying, throwing up over it.

I DO plan to get back to it, Citrinne is just fighting me on her chapter. I'm so glad you like it!!!

[brightchrysaor]

tiktok from rushadicus

gang what do we think, is this folkpunk?

[brightchrysaor]

I’m picturing a girl (loser) who is also a legendary sword master (unbeatable in combat, none who draw steel against her live) but who remains unemployed (came out, got on estrogen, lost job) and vaguely wandering from city to city every few years (bad polycule drama, mostly her fault) and who (most important part) remains a huge loser with baggy black clothes and perpetual subway mayo stink and painfully negative riz despite, again, being literally god-killingly good with six feet of cold steel.

[brightchrysaor]

Randomly curious:

Everyone I know would know of these, and many would have some in their kitchens. So now I'm curious how far that knowledge goes.

[brightchrysaor]

tiktoks with vine energy pt. 5

[brightchrysaor]

[brightchrysaor]

CAN SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME THE DISTANCE BETWEEN THE EMPEROR'S CASTLE AND THE TITAN'S SKULL???

It's for a writing thing.

[brightchrysaor]

anne carson interviewed by kate kellaway for the guardian