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you wouldn’t last an hour in the asylum where they raised me

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So I picked this up a while back

And because I’m a heathen dark urban fantasy (demons, vampires, witches, etc) is my favorite type I hope I really like this. Fingers crossed!

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And last but definitely not least for now

Kallia is a bit clueless on how easy it is for him to do this, but it’s literally because he was trained for it for most of his existence. It’s pure instinct and muscle memory.

This is awesome though. Kallia does feel bad about what they’re having to do to survive, and doesn’t really allow Herold to be super cruel to Jack. Even though he couldn’t fight back. Even though he hurt her. Even though threatening the guy Roth sent to spy on them could compromise their disguise.

I don’t specially ship them but I love the dynamic.

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As a continuation from last post- heavy spoilers from “when the night breaks” by Janella Angeles.

Again with the theme of obedience. Perhaps Roth was also afraid of what his little experiment would do to him if he ever went rogue?

My poor blorbo :( I mentioned yesterday how I’m glad this was YA and here is a good reason why. It seems Roth kept him as a bodyguard, which is just what Kallia is doing now. It’s no wonder why he falls into the role seamlessly.

This is very interesting. He was conscious of himself from the start, so I wonder if “I couldn’t use it” meant Roth’s mental grip on him was that tight, or if he couldn’t emotionally handle rebelling against Roth, as obedience was ingrained into him.

This part makes me think it was emotional. Once he was safe where Roth couldn’t touch him, he allowed himself to exist.

This otoh makes it seem like the grip was magical and wore off. Perhaps both?

Kallia is super tone deaf for laughing but this is super sad. In the mirror world all they do is party and that’s the one thing he couldn’t have. And it clearly left scars.

Backhanded comment. Ouch. But him giving her his brass knuckles is huge. It’s the object he used to distance himself from everything he was supposed to be. He’s resigned to his fate now, and hoping to make amends.

Again with magical control. Losing parts of himself. How terrible it must be to know you might be in control one day but not the next.

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Let’s talk about Jack a bit further because I still have brainrot a week later.

So (heavy spoilers for when night breaks, book two of where dreams descend) as we understand Jack was an illusion/magician mix made only to obey. Except he developed into something far more whole.

But mainly I want to discuss how the only thing The Dealer wanted from Jack was brainless obedience. No matter how ridiculous, or whether it would come at his own expense.

The quote above only really tells me Jack was never just a mindless slave. In being part magician (human) he could question and feel and hurt.

The last line… ouch.

We know at some point he grew strong enough to question and even push back, but this here is pure resentment.

How many times did he pay for the dealer’s mistakes?

This one just makes me sad. Because he was never seen as anything more than a tool, even his name wasn’t special as far as Roth was concerned. But Jack clearly got attached to it, and it makes perfect sense. It’s the one thing he was allowed to have.

This part just makes me glad this is a YA book. We don’t know what things Roth had Jack doing, but we know this is a demon world that thrives on pleasure and magic. It’s not a stretch to do the math on the possibilities.

We do know he is very defeated by the idea of having to serve someone again, even though he likes Kallia.

This part I enjoy because it shows he was never as unfeeling as he was supposed to be. Even before he was allowed to roam freely, during the time where all he knew was Roth’s training.

And then the admission he would quite literally rather be trapped forever at hellfire house than come near Roth and his abuse again. Again, we don’t know what went on between them, but we do know The Dealer intended to train him into mindless obedience. And he needed it because of this.

Having to exist in a strange in between where you are demanded to obey but still have just enough freedom to exist must have been torturous.

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It really bothers me so much of the caraval fandom ignores (or perhaps misunderstands) the actual storyline in order to take digs at Dante and Tella.

When Julian says things like “my brother can’t love” or “he’s never been there for me in the way I have been for him”, that’s only Julian’s POV, not a fact of the caraval universe. This entire book leans on the idea of multiple POVs and multiple truths, and to toss it away is to throw away key points of the storyline.

I have blogged about this before but I see it so often I feel the need to say it again:

Julian believes these things about his brother because he suffers from the same younger sibling syndrome that Tella does re Scarlett. He believes those things because Dante shuts him out emotionally the same way he did to Tella in finale, and we can get into why on a different post. But under no circumstance does that make it a hard fact.

The narrative of Finale itself makes sure to challenge Julian’s assumptions. Why?

• Dante takes Julian’s feelings into consideration and listens to him re letting Tella go (for reasons we can get into on a separate post as well).

(Julian is hinting at himself and his brother in that highlighted line. Just FYI.)

• Because we see Dante absolutely refusing to allow Julian to get in harm’s way. Even to save Scarlett.

• Because we see how desperate Dante is when Julian is captured.

Straight up spelled out for you all in that last sentence.

• When Dante actively goes out there and sacrifices himself to save Julian, which is the exact moment in the narrative Julian realizes he was wrong about his brother.

• When everyone realizes how much Dante was actually willing to sacrifice for his brother.

So please. For the love of god. Read and understand the stories before making posts on them. Thank you.

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I want to k n o w. I want to understand literature references, I want to lay on grass in the summer and recognize constellations, I want to read books from all around the world, I want to know how history affects our everyday life, I want to learn how to play the piano, I wanto to learn diffrent poems written by diffrent authors and be able to recite them by heart, I want to learn diffrent languages. I want education to be accessible. I want to fall in love with every single day.

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No but there genuinely there’s so much goodness in seeing how Jack went from a “servant” (read that as slave in this universe) to making his own decisions, even if they weren’t necessarily in line with what a human would do. And then just when he started slowly becoming more human over time, against all odds, getting flung back in that first universe.

I am a Daron and Kallia girl myself but all of Jack’s gears are turning so very wildly as he tries to navigate living his old life with the way he is now and it is very entertaining to watch. Even more entertaining as he asserts his autonomy against Kallia. Love her, but she can be self centered as hell sometimes.

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This is foul and I am loving all of it.

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Historical fantasy turned dark fantasy so good we're in the underworld and the MMC is being forced to serve the FMC while her actual love interest is back in the real world finding ways to rescue her

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“Where Dreams Descend” was fun and all but “When Night Breaks” is giving me brainrot so thick I read 183 pages in 2 days.

I am especially loving the expansion of Jack’s arc. I didn’t like him much in book one but this is making him so much more interesting!!! I am having a lot of fun but also afraid of heartbreak ooops.

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🧿 to keep you safe from people who want to do you harm.<3 🧿

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Still stuck on how Andrew Dabb had Trump and Lucifer have a child and then proceeded to make the most democrat actor of their show obsess over trump’s son for three seasons straight.

Is it really any wonder Misha wanted Cas to die after all that?

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im having a stefan breakdown again but i feel like this is broadly and generally applicable

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Are you planning on doing more "echoes of the past"? that's really good

Thank you!! I have one more part in mind, which would cover basically the whole Annalise plot (plus Elantine and Esmeralda) and most importantly how Julian adjusts to Dante’s change but that would be a lot longer than the other ones, so I am still working up the courage.

I am working on a Scarlian Harrow Faire inspired thingy

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Do you like Julian at all? Or is it just Legend?

I absolutely like Julian! [redacted] is just more interesting to me, because I like my whiskey neat Stephanie flexed him out a lot due to him being Legend, and so she needed to build the core character of her universe.

The one thing I dislike about Julian is he has this strong little brother syndrome, and claims to understand Legend's actions despite that not really being the case. Other than that he's great.

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Fanfic is a free hobby.

It's one of the last few things we can have as a society that's free. You can engage, for free. People give you things (art, stories, etc), for free.

Don't buy into the consummerism just because it's everywhere else.

You don't have to consume everything you interact with. You don't have to use things, just because they exist.

You're allowed (still, for now), to have things that are enjoyable for free.

Do you realise how insane the world is? We don't have many places where we can just be, for free anymore, but ao3 is. Did you notice we don't have ads in ao3? We don't have pop ups? Where ELSE do we not have that?

Where else can you just go and not have to wait for a commercial to be over or for ads to be on the sidelines?

I don't think the younger people understand, but the whole of internet used to be like this. YouTubers would do Youtube for free, just because. You couldn't monetise your internet presence before.

Ao3 is like a little preserved corner of the internet where the old internet used to be, and it's being attacked by people who do not understand that free things are allowed to exist without judgment.

Please don't ruin this for us.

Some of us need it.