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casliveblog · 10 months

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Custom Toonami Block Week 157 Rundown

Spy X Family: It’s the season finale and you know what that means: actual plot progression! It’s time for Donovan to actually visit Eden and Loid gives a rundown of why he can’t just crash into the place despite being Lupin the Third on steroids. Now see this whole time I thought the plan was to assassinate Donovan idk where I got that idea but that’s what I assumed. But apparently it’s actually to just get in his good graces and ply him for info which seems completely unrealistic given the guy doesn’t step outside except for alumni shit, like this is why real operations usually gun for people a couple ranks down on the chain of command for info gathering given Donovan has Lupin Mask detection devices surrounding him at all times. First Anya tries to follow Damian and confront Donovan herself but she eventually has to dip out but not before reassuring Damian to have courage and face her father because she fucks up all the time and her father still loves her so even if he fucks up occasionally he should have faith in his dad too. This gives Damian the motivation to not back down on meeting his dad and keeps Loid’s operation going. He pretends to run into Damian accidentally while looking for Anya’s keychain she got last episode and luckily Donovan actually shows up to meet his son. So Loid gets to introduce himself and apologize for Anya decking Damian the first day of school (ironic that Anya’s very first fuckup is the only thing that gives him literally anything to talk about here) Loid vents about his frustrations raising Anya and Donovan’s like ‘yeah bro kids suck’ and Loid plays it off like ‘yeah they do but I try to talk to them on their level and meet in the middle’ and boosts up Damian as a good kid to try and draw them closer to each other while making sure Donovan remembers his name and face. It’s not much but it’s a foot in the door and outlines Loid and Donovan’s different perspectives on the prospects for the future, Donovan thinks only of how communication fails because you can’t really trust anyone and Loid is constantly seeking to understand everyone as much as possible (usually for spy shit but still).

Inuyasha: Naraku and Sesshomaru keep fighting and Naraku repeats his tactic of ‘If I let Sesshomaru beat me up enough then all my blood and guts will just eat him and shit’ from the last time they fought because Sesshomaru is OP and even the main villain can’t beat him really. Problem being Naraku’s blood is made of Super Venom and will literally melt anyone that gets within ten feet of it which is bad news because there’s three very squishy humans and one moderately squishy half demon who’re about to get soaked in the stuff. Hosenki tells Inuyasha he needs to cut him down to get his power and break Naraku’s barrier and there’s a cool parallel of Sesshomaru and Inuyasha both saying ‘nothing else matters’ but Sesshomaru’s saying it about destroying Naraku despite the fact it may cause Kagome, Miroku and Sango to die but Inuyasha’s saying it about saving them even if it means losing his chance to gain Hosenki’s power. Hosenki’s moved by Inuyasha’s compassion and gives him a pass on the ‘cutting through unbreakable adamant’ thing and busts himself open so Inuyasha’s Wind Scar to wipe away Naraku’s miasma also carries the adamant shards and just fucking IMPALES Naraku and it’s SO SATISFYING because he’s been so fucking smug since Mt. Hakurei but like between Inuyasha making 60% of his body adamant crystals by impaling him and Sesshomaru’s followup turning his body into what’s essentially a fine paste, it’s really nice to see. Kagome even gets to use Kikyo’s arrow to shoot the jewel shard and purify it so he can’t take it with him while he runs away. Even Narkau says if he had fasttraveled like a second later he’d be really dead. Honestly as a kid I remember thinking it would’ve been fine if it just ended there like even by Naraku’s standards that escape was weirdly marginal, like everyone important was there and got a good blow on him but we still have Hakudoshi and shit to deal with so of course we’re not done yet. Though I gotta say the Adamant Barrage is one of my favorite Inuyasha moves like it’s just so visually cool looking and it just completely no-sells the ‘no but stronger barrier tho’ arms race that’s been going on for the past like fifty episodes. Though I also gotta say this is where they start leaning into the Tessaiga gaining new powers from defeating demons as something the Tessaiga inherently does and I’ve always assumed this was a retcon made at this point because the Wind Scar and Backlash Wave seemed inherent to the sword itself and the barrier crystal seemed to be a special case tied to the properties of the bat demon’s blood jewel itself but apparently this is the point where they’re just like ‘nah it gets new abilities whenever it kills a strong guy but only when it’s plot relevant because we don’t want it shooting lightning after he kills the Thunder Brothers or some shit’ and I think it’s like an editorial mandate that Shonen series have mechanics to keep throwing new powers into the mix because that’s what happened with MHA and it’s just kinda strange despite me liking the Adamant Barrage and Meidou Zangetsuha (not the biggest fan of the Dragon Scale though).

Yu Yu Hakusho: This is a weird episode, just kinda gonna say that up front. So Yusuke’s been training with the demon monks for a year but Raizen’s on his deathbed and snaps and decides to try to eat Yusuke because apparently he’s demon enough for Spirit World to be mad about him being in the human world but human enough for Raizen to eat I guess. Still they fight a bit and he’s even with Yusuke despite literally being ten minutes from dying. Yusuke snaps him out of it and he gives his backstory about why he doesn’t eat humans and it’s legit the most half-assed ‘a girl healed my wounds and didn’t immediately want to kill me so I fucked her’ story like Togashi’s usually a lot better about these, it’s so paint by numbers and it’s legit a one night stand where she takes off her shirt and is like ‘btw I’m poison so don’t eat me’ and Raizen’s so struck by her boldness and titties he literally says he ‘had no choice’ but to fuck her, like don’t get me wrong I’m a sucker for some impressive titties and a confident girl too but he gives Yusuke WAY too much detail about how he fucked his great great great great great great grandma and then decided to never eat humans again because they sex was just THAT good, like there was no grand romantic development to their relationship or playing at having a deep connection like he fucked her and then fucked off and then she died giving birth to his demon baby like holy shit that’s such a paper thin excuse plot like I could get better motivations out of a filler story. Anyway now that Raizen’s unloaded his story about unloading into Yusuke’s grandma he tells Yusuke Yomi’s a prick and Mukuro’s probably the lesser of two evils and fucking dies on the spot. Ever the rebel, Yusuke decides that the first thing he wants to do is go visit the person his deadbeat dad told him was impossible to reason with and, meanwhile Kurama and Hiei are counseling their new masters about what a wild card Yusuke is and not to underestimate his dumbassery because it fucks everyone up in the end.

Jujutsu Kaisen: It’s time for a good old-fashioned flashback arc! The first part of the episode is a big semi-unrelated setpiece about young Utahime and Mei Mei going through their own PT/Eternity Devil shenanigans and it’s pretty fun and does that weird anime rotoscoping thing which I’m not sure if I love or hate but it’s all a setup for Gojo and Geto’s introductions which is pretty nice since last week we got a good bit of foreshadowing for their backstories with the movie. The interesting thing here is when they’re talking to each other they both seem to have the exact opposite opinion of their current day selves with Geto being the one vouching for protecting the weak and Gojo going for strength above all else so from the outset we essentially put in high relief that this is going to be a story about Geto’s fall and Gojo’s rise to meet where their standards come to by the time of the movie/series. The main plot goes down and basically as I understand it the dude that’s the leyline for all the barriers and shit has to get fed a specific human every few years so his immortality still registers him as human and doesn’t go ‘wait this fucker’s 2000 years old, better make him a buddha’ because enlightened people are notoriously shit at actually having empathy for the existing world or doing anything to actively help people since the material world is fleeting and all that. So it’s kind of ironic that a bit of ritualistic sacrifice keeps him away from enlightenment but they liken it more to something like Orochimaru taking on a new host (or Gojo’s Digimon example but I don’t find that quite as useful). But yeah the catch is the sacrifice is a young girl who I’m sure won’t inevitably change the outlooks of two young men at the crossroads of life, though she’s also being hunted by a group of evil sorcerers and another group that can’t actually do shit but has lots of money to pay people to do shit and also one of the guys they’re paying is Megumi’s dad who everyone’s simping for I guess? I really like how effortlessly quirky and lighthearted a lot of the writing for this part is, like it’s goofy and unique but not in a sweaty way like a lot of the bigger stuff tries to be nowadays, really sells the previous generation being just as big of dorks as the current one.

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off: So this is a weird series and I’m not entirely sure how I’m gonna go about breaking this one down considering it’s a lot more ‘vibe-centric’ for lack of a better word. There’s a lot of jokes that are probably better if you’re reading it as a comic or willing to stop and go back to read subtitles but I don’t have the energy for all that so I’m bound to miss a few. But yeah I think the premise for this one is fairly well-known already, it’s a quirky lovestory that gets all the people too isolated to be hipsters but too extroverted to be Goths going with its charming characters and unique/blatant references. It’s kind of funny that the romance between Scott and Ramona is the core because as far as I see it so far it’s a relationship where both people are the Manic Pixie Dream Girls which is kind of a fun dynamic, though it does fall into the normal romantic comedy traps of Scott trying to orchestrate a meeting and obsessing over a girl but it skirts away from being too stalkerish in the end. They kinda have like half a date and immediately almost fuck which makes me feel like a bitter loveless old person that hates romance because that seems unrealistic to me that they’re just randomly gonna hop in bed that quick, I’m from the ‘don’t kiss until the third date’ era of romantic comedies so like not saying it’s a terrible way to do things and it is nice they showcase both of them backing down and putting up and taking down barriers of consent but like I said it makes me feel old and bitter because this seems to be escalating WAY too fast. That’s kinda how I feel about a lot of this like I feel like I’m about a decade too old to romanticize being unemployed and mooching off a friend and being in a go-nowhere copyright-infringement named band but I am enjoying the vibe in general. But yeah now the actual plot comes in with the Gendo Ikari ripoff (because apparently every anime ever has to have one of those now) and the League of Evil Exes (I’m just kind of amused that they self-identify as evil, like idk why that’s so funny to me they’re so serious about it) and I do like how it seems like because Ramona herself is relatively closed-off we learn more about her through the path of each person she’s dated which is kind of a neat way to symbolize the path of truly connecting with someone which does kind of ease some of my worries about how quick they jumped into things. The first guy is just a random fleeting fling from middle school and I imagine there’ll be more progression and complicated relationships as we go (though damn Ramona’s 23 and she’s already dated seven people worth mentioning? Like that’s not too outlandish but that still seems above the norm at least) Anyway the first boss apparently has magic and turned Scott into tokens so… guess we’re going full magic next time… Also between this and Yuji in JJK and a few others there’s an odd number of anime that just have it like ‘oh yeah the protagonist was just kinda already good at fighting to begin with’ to get around them having to learn the basics of fighting.

Ranking of Kings: I’m kinda checking out on these honestly at this point, like I know I complained last time about this whole season seemingly being filler but yeah it’s just not as interesting retreading the small time lapses in the original story like making a Naruto filler arc but on purpose for some reason. This time all this is supposed to happen during the time Bojji’s heading back to his kingdom even though that was supposed to be a rush trip and they still barely made it back in time to save his mom, glad to know these detours almost cost Hilling her life because Bojji was fucking around with random bandits and spirit dogs. The first short is about Bojji and the Underworld Knights making camp in the canyon and ending up helping out a random family with a bandit problem while hiding from a giant t-rex like monster that just turns out to be the Underworld Captain sleepwalking and moaning. The second short is about them running into those spirit dog things they saw with the Big Lipped Alligator Moment guy from the start of Bojji’s journey (also Kage talks about it like he was there, like technically he was in Bojji’s bag but I can’t be bothered to check if he would’ve been in a position to see any of that shit but I’ll take his word for it) and yeah it’s the standard Avatar plot of ‘the spirits are angry but you gotta talk to them instead of fighting’ it’s fine it’s just really short and doesn’t go very far like a lot of these have been doing.

Vinland Saga: Season 2 starts off with the story of Einar, a young Englishman in the middle of a tragic backstory when JUST after he finishes rebuilding his village after it got pillaged, it gets pillaged AGAIN and his mom and sister die and then he’s shipped off as a slave. It’s kinda funny because when he says he’s from England I’m just guessing it was Vikings that did the pillaging given how the cultural climate of England was at the end of Season 1 it was basically free game for them, so it’s not Thorfinn’s old crew cause they’re all dead but it’s something very like his old crew that creates Einar’s origin story. Einar tries to take to heart his mom’s message about living well being the best revenge and always rebuilding after devastation but turns out living as a slave fucking sucks, who knew. Thankfully he’s at least sold off to people that while not exactly nice they are pragmatic and want the slaves treated well enough that they’ll look good enough to sell well to some rich assholes that probably won’t beat them too much which is probably better than being stuck in a foreign country with no food or money, like idk I assume Einar could at least figure out something to hunt but it’d probably be really rough and his escape attempt ends hilariously quickly when he runs out of food and tries to go pilfer some. He’s eventually broken in to trying to be a good slave just to stay alive and honor his mom’s ideology of trying to rebuild. He runs into Leif who’s looking for Thorfinn because apparently Thorfinn somehow got mixed into the slave trade after season 1 because I guess he’s just trying to go down the checklist of everything Thors was trying to save him from becoming. But yeah the sheer love that Leif is showing to try and save Thorfinn even now really gets to Einar and he puts in the last bit of effort to be sold off to a seemingly good-natured man with a HUGE farm. Like you know, owning people is never great but this guy at least seems like he’s not gonna beat the shit out of his guys for no reason and Einar is slowly starting to convince himself that he can live without his freedom and accept his fate. That’s when we find out Thorfinn WAS sold as a slave to THIS SAME GUY, and he’s fucking JACKED now, like it’s a big reveal of how old Thorfinn’s gotten given Leif didn’t look that much older and was still looking for Thorfinn as ‘short and blonde’ but the Netflix pic for Vinland Saga is legit older Thorfinn so that was spoiled a bit.

#ooc #Toonami #Custom Toonami Block #Spy X Family #Inuyasha #Yu Yu Hakusho #Jujutsu Kaisen #Scott Pilgrim Takes Off #Ranking of Kings #Vinland Saga

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factorialsotherfandoms · 10 months

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Happy Ending AU Canon Divergences! This won't be all of them, it's just what I have to hand. And just bullet points. These are the bits I can immediately think of.

Things are staying preeeetty similar up until Pac gets kidnapped by himself in the water prison. There may be slight alterations for timing or me not remembering/knowing things here or there, but its pretty the same. Fit and Philza's conversation probably comes sometime in mid-August, but its not like that's a big earth shattering scene or anything.

Mike takes a couple of extra days to get kidnapped post Pac's kidnapping. This is both to help ease up the timeline a bit, and so with the Fit telling Pac and Mike scene the panic attacks can have happened a few times before but Mike is still there.

Mike gets to come back earlier! Congrats Mike! He's still away a while, but he comes back earlier and once he's back he's back. Also we haven't seen enough of him to know for sure what's up, so... I'm just ignoring the 'came back weird' thing. This is because I like Mike and also with the new plot he's kinda needed as one of like 3 people who might be able to make a specific item, and the only one of them actually entrusted with the info...

Eggs are still going to go missing, and still end up in the hospital, but the Federation is going to find them and drag them back much sooner. Partly because of something massively canon-divergent that's going to happen while they're gone and anyone who has read the fic with Philza and Forever can maybe guess at... Note - it will (like with Mike) be longer between events. Mike is probably gone for 2 weeks and the Eggs vanish about day 10.

Purgatory is not happening. Just. No.

Black concrete plot... Unsure. It's probably still going to happen, but differently. Them thinking its the eggs trying to communicate from another dimension is important for escalating plans, buuuuuut I don't know where the plot is going and I'm not using purgatory, so... It'll have a different resolution to whatever canon has planned.

Forever is still getting Nethered because I love that plot. But he's probably not getting infected, because what the black concrete is is being changed. Pac will also not get the chance to go after him. It's during this period that the big, probably predictable event occurs. This... May also come sigificantly later time wise because the events of this au are much slower than canon, and it needs time to drift along its solution.

Cellbit doesn't get his worker murder arc, sorry bro. He does get a different arc of horrible times, but doesn't snap /as/ hard thanks to having more support (not in the someone knows sense exactly but in the Forever is forcing Philza to be his investigation buddy way), the framework of another thing to try, and an actual future to strive for which isn't legalities loose him both his husband and his son and he's back to a shit job, a criminal record, a good therapist, and Felps' couch as the only semi-positive things in his universe.

The Rebellion/Revolution plot stuff may or may not be going on. It's not actually super important to how the story plays tbh, so it can probably be assumed at least as far as its gotten.

The new eggs! I hadn't planned for them but I haven't written anything that contradicts them, so the new babies will get to come along too! This isn't a way things are different, well their arrival is a little, but I thought people would like to know.

The probably predictable spoiler is below the cut. Aaand I got carried away so actual genuine spoilers too as this is a plot summary of the first "arc", which I may or may not ever get to write.

Forever is recruiting Pac and Mike to help him make a device to help Philza fly again. While Forever is in the Nether, Pac and Mike finish the wing supports, and giving them to Philza is the first he knows about it. The group reasons that they knew Forever entered the Nether, but it can serve as a portal to other worlds. As such, they beg Philza to go looking - mostly Pac. Fit is going to help him open the nether hole.

In searching for the eggs and Forever, Philza will find a suitable world for them to go to, and manage to get in contact with Kristin to get it set up for them. She will grab the other goddesses to also help out, as they've all been worried. She goes looking for the eggs - as a goddess she can reach much further - and in that time he speed builds very basic farms and "town centre", just so everyone has somewhere to live and food to eat and basic-ish medical supplies as soon as they get there. Also to mark it as claimed and inhabited so reasonable folk won't think it uninhabited and steal it. He notes the coordinates but, with Kristin confirming the eggs and Forever are still somewhere they can't reach, Philza will return.

However, the Federation know what happened, and are pissed. Sure Philza came back, but they're extremely unhappy with him. Tubbo has no idea what's going on but stumbles in on this, and ends up taking the fall for the wings - he can just looking quickly work out how they work well enough to convince Cucurucho they were his design and stuff. Of course the wings are destroyed and both Philza and Tubbo get torture hours, bailed out by their various allies - Pierre even steals the designs from Tazercraft just to copy them and 'prove' it wasn't Tubbo, so him arguing can serve as a distraction while others help.

Philza and Tubbo both obviously get out, and people close ranks hard. Thanks to Tubbo the plan is still safe, but like... they got to the end of the actual plan. Tubbo is folded into the net. (It may be more than Fit, Forever, Cellbit, Philza, Missa, Tazercraft at this point, but they're the ones with key plot roles. Cellbit would absolutely bring in Roier. Pierre probably will be folded in for his assistance, and I imagine Forever will bring BBH in as part of the 'try stop BBH's physical and mental decline' plan). Missa gets to come in clutch on helping Philza stay semi-sane as having been outside of the universe the 'unreality' shit gets a whole lot worse for him.

Philza's wings are going to get even more fucked up, because... the Federation knows. Not taken from him - they're not that /kind/, they want him to see their marks every day.

Like 2 weeks after this Cucurucho shows up with the horribly sick children, plus the new ones. And of course with the eggs so sick, the residents can't really... Think much about escape... Because even with more of a plan for the next phase, they'd have no means to treat the kids. Also now Tubbo and other potential problems like Bagi have new children to care for! And the Feds holding their kids over their heads!

While Tazercraft still have the original wing designs, Philza's wings are far too weak to function with them... I really want them to have to find a way to break into the End somehow, but better fakes is an option. At the very least Philza is going to be getting actual accessibility devices to help him in day to day life, not relying on the backpack alone.

There's a few possible plots at that point, depending on things go. However the end result is going to be thusly - yes they can get everyone to safety, buuut only those going via void can take stuff with them. So they have to carefully plan the necessities, enough of any mod shit they want to keep that they can regrow it (some mods, like create, are a function of the guardian gods [or other controlling entities such as the Duck] of a land shifting the rules. Others, like extra mobs and new biomes, can be introduced to a world by introdcing the animals/trees/whatever from elsewhere), and sentimental items such as photo albums and paintings and books and such. Only Philza can /safely/ void travel, as he's an ancient end-entity predating both hybrids and elytrians, but kinda considered the second maybe? Sophia would be confused. Long dead race, you know the style. TBH the elytrians are probably /also/ a long dead race, but the metaphysics is not so important here. If someone else wants to try come they'll get a suit and stuff, but they're probably going to die horribly in the void both on a 'they believe they will' and a 'i the writer will actually kill them' level. Kristin will grab them and they'll be scarred by it but safe, buuut yeeeeah. Lose all their stuff, and its probably the most painful death possible.

They are going to have to lay new tracks to get the train to the right nether portal, but Tubbo has a machine for that. They just have to go out and fix it or refil it every now and again. (Not sure why Nether travel wipes inventories but it clearly does so just shh I want them to have to pick what photos, what trees, what animals... It's probably a facet of godly influence and all. Chances are the train also can't actually pass back through the other side, even if they built tracks for it, because the world doesn't recognise it as belonging. Stuff Philza is carrying comes via end - void connects end realms, not overworld or nether. but because all of the void is the same while nether requires tricks and very specific manipulations to swap worlds - its just also the actually viable one for most people as being too far away from a landmass in the void basically means death by low vacuum without either being an End-species or having incredibly good tech. Even then the risks aren't worth it. Nether travel is reliable and relatively safe. Void travel is not. It's not within scientific theory that the void is even transversible, let alone you would use it to get places, especially when if you set your nether portals right you can connect portal to portal and not even need to go into the nether [because the gods are blocked from the island this isn't possible for the guys] - look at how Forever reacts to Philza mentioning going into the void, and Forever /trusts/ Philza and thinks he has some non-human skills already.)

On the way out they're totally getting Maxo to make a super-nuke and blow up the entire place. Maxo might still sacrifice himself to make sure it goes off properly, or might get onto the train. (If he does sacrifice himself, this is still a happy end au gdi so Kristin will grab him and let him respawn with Dan and Trump in another world entirely. Not the one where everyone else is, but one where they're safe and happy as a family and can come visit. Spreen and the other dead eggs have also been respawned to elsewhere but see further down.)

Everyone gets their safely and they crash in what becomes the town hall and slowly spread out to build their own town with their own homes huddled about the hall and the nether portal.

The main plot ends with everyone safe and in a new world, beginning to build out and explore it.

Aaaaand then there's the follow up, because a) we need the dead eggs back and b) of course not everyone's happy and c) I did mention the dissociation plot was back in play...

Getting everyone out and safe is a lot. Most people rest, Philza cannot handle it. He ends up drifting and slipping out of the new world more times than they can count, and now it's Missa hanging a lantern in the window and hoping his husband comes home - more worried even than Philza was, because at least Phil new Missa was travelling for work, while Philza has to those who know him visibly crashed following getting everyone safe - a lot have but Philza very very hard - and Missa has no idea where he's going.

It's in his drifting he finds his hardcore world again, where the godlike entities greet and embrace him and have him come home.

(It's during his wandering which takes so long some of his friends are begging for answers from the goddesses/god that he finds the dead eggs in other worlds, and brings them to the Nether portal. But knowing he's found one means he doesn't enter himself, just sends them through with the promise of their parents and goes to look for the others.)

All in all he's gone for weeks, if not months, and those who leave the safe world search desperately for him and wonder if the Federation got him. The kids back and mentioning him is a bit of a relief, but only partially.

Eventually they find him passed out infront of their own Nether portal. Wakes enough to grab them for hugs, the touch of even more gods in his eyes. Everyone ends up back in the hub he initially built for him, Chayanne and Tallulah closest to their dad, and his closest other people next, in one giant floor nest huddle. Which. Forms end of plot entirely. After that its just community fluff of people adjusting, such as the Fit/Pac&Mike or the Quackity bits I've already written.

(Others like Cellbit likely also have a hard time adjusting, but the bonus for them is that they aren't also being psychically called to by something forgotten in a previous life, and don't have the ability to just... drift between realities. So, it'd be oneshots involving what that looks like, not the massive chunk of writing Philza wants)

Of course the problem with all of this? Philza's epilogue, the initial escape looking for Forever up to getting kidnapped, maybe also the rescue, the actual escape proper? That's all probably chapter fic. And I /loathe/ writing chapter fic. Especially longform and plotty. So... If you do ever get to see it, you probably don't get to see it in its ideal form - you might get Missa's PoV of Philza's epilogue, or maybe the inital finding the world and contacting Kristin in disjointed oneshots, but... its never going to be in its perfect form, and it might not ever be written at all. Oops. And hence the scribblings here...

#happy ending au #qsmp au #might put them on ao3 as a readers guide sometime #might not #we'll see

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sshbpodcast · 2 years

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That’s what I call brain freeze: Cryostasis in Star Trek

By Ames

We’re due for our coolest blog activity yet! That’s right, we’re talking cryofreezing this week, the easy way for writers to freeze time for characters, so long spans of time go by in a snap! We see it in pretty much everything, from Alien to Aliens. On Star Trek, going into stasis can allow for people from the past to make it to the future, pause the spread of whatever ails you while your doctor logs into WebMD, and make long-distance travel without warp something survivable for someone with a normal human lifespan.

A Star to Steer Her By is digging into the freezer for some frozen snacks, so make sure to check out everything we’ve got defrosting on the counter below and listen to this week’s podcast chatter (frosty discussion starts at 1:07:29).

I’ll say this up front as well: I wasn’t expecting to have to include a minor spoiler for season three Picard after literally the first episode, but here we are.

Cool off!

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

“Space Seed”

The villain Khan is just too much for Earth of the past, so he becomes the future’s problem when he flash freezes himself and his augmented followers. The episode in which we first see cryostasis in Trek also paved the way for one of the most popular movies in the franchise, so we’re glad that the plot device opened up the possibility of dragging people into the future. For now.

“The Neutral Zone”

...and I’ve already eaten those words. The three frozen folks from this episode are mainly here to make fish-out-of-water jokes. They don’t understand that stocks and bonds don’t exist in the future. Isn’t that funny? Sure, some of the scenes with an overwhelmed Clare Raymond are a little more intimate and thought-provoking, but this whole episode was just unfocused and tiresome.

“The Emissary”

We all loved K'Ehleyr so much (see how much here!) that it’s easy to forget the rest of the episode in which she was introduced. You’ll remember that a ship of Klingons, all in stasis, is about to get their wakeup call and someone needs to be on hand to make sure they don’t attack the Federation since they’re pretty behind on the news. And who better than our girl K’Ehleyr? Worf helped too, I guess.

“The Perfect Mate”

Sometimes, your mail-order bride comes in a well-preserved package. In the generally squicky “The Perfect Mate,” Kamala is being kept in her little cocoon in the cargo hold until pesky Ferengi accidentally break it open earlier than it’s supposed to be opened. Why did the cocoon need to float in the air where it could easily be knocked down? Hey shut up, the episode needed to move forward.

“Relics”

Do we count being stored in the transporter buffer as an equivalent to being in stasis? Well, “Relics” is on this list, so yes, yes we do. It’s actually a really ingenious plan to effectively freeze yourself using the transporter, even if it seems to only be effective 50% of the time, that we’re frequently flabbergasted that we don’t see it used more often in Trek. You’ll see it a couple more times on this list though.

“Face of the Enemy”

Like in “The Emissary,” it may be easy to forget that the driving force of “Face of the Enemy” is cryo-related, but we get too distracted by watching Marina Sirtis actually getting something really great to do for a change. But the main thrust of the episode is about transporting Romulan defectors out of Romulan space, and that’s achieved by putting them in cryo and moving them around like luggage. Go Troi!

“Vortex”

This mostly forgettable episode from early DS9 also had a mostly forgettable cryo scene. Croden’s daughter is being stored in stasis on some rock or other so that he can go pick her up when he’s escaped his shitty, shitty government. It’s a rather small inclusion, but as we’ve said before: when you’ve got this technology, you might as well use it!

“The Abandoned”

This one’s just a tiny little inclusion in an episode that veers hard in another direction once the sleeping pod element is done with. After Quark buys up a whole bunch of products and he’s started sorting through his wares, he discovers a small pod containing what turns out to be a Jem’Hadar baby. Why was he being transported in a cryochamber? The better question is: why not transport ALL babies in a cryochamber?

“Empok Nor”

We see a lot of “The Emissary” in this horror episode of DS9, especially in that “if someone wakes up, they might wreak some havoc on us” kind of way. In this case, it’s a couple of drugged-out Cardassians that have awakened from their slumber on the space station Empok Nor and the episode turns a little into Jason X: The One in Space. Which we should totally cover on the podcast one day.

“The 37s”

Boy, did we have a lot of shitty things to say about “The 37s” when we wrapped season two of Voyager, and so much of it is because of the very forced and highly unnecessary cryochamber plot. There was already too much going on in this episode, and adding unfreezing Amelia Freaking Earhart to the mix was not only convoluted, but just agonizingly bad as well. Let the poor thing rest in peace.

“The Thaw”

We talked more about this one when we discussed dreams the other week, but it has the added bonus of being a cryosleep episode as well! Like many gimmicks in which the idea is for the characters to get woken up from cryo at an appointed time, something goes terribly wrong for the sleepers and they get stuck in their worst nightmares: dreaming of clowns and not being able to wake up.

“Resolutions”

This is another brief scene, but we do get a moment at the very top when we’re dropped in in media res to see Chakotay and Janeway waking up in their pods on some paradisiacal planet. They were only in there briefly to be transported to the surface without dying of their incurable illness (score one more cross promotion to our diseases post), and then we never see the pods again.

“One”

One of our favorite Seven of Nine episodes so far has been “One” and there’s so much cryostasis that I’m feeling a little freezer burned just thinking about it. It’s such a good premise: the whole crew needs to go into cryo because they can’t survive a span of deadly nebula or other, so Seven has to pilot her sleeping crewmates to the other side without succumbing to cabin fever! Excellent!

“Counterpoint”

Well, we included “Relics” on this list because being stored in the transporter buffer is akin to being stored in a cryopod, so here we are doing it again with “Counterpoint.” Seriously, they really don’t use this technique often enough in Star Trek, but since the telepaths kept in the buffer start to suffer from cell degradation from constant use, maybe that’s a good enough reason.

“11:59”

One of the good things about this otherwise deplorable episode was the story we get from Harry Kim about his uncle Jack. The account goes that Jack was on a sleeper ship (we really don’t see enough of those!) back before space travel was quite so fast, awoke at their destination to find nothing there, so he turned the ship around and went home again. It’s quite a cute and funny little anecdote!

“Dragon’s Teeth”

The episode we covered on the podcast this week hit a lot of the same beats as previous instances from this list. A warlike race gets woken up from their slumber only to try to take over the ship, a la “Space Seed.” Their pods had been scheduled to wake them and failed like in “The Thaw.” And we had nearly no motivation to open the pods in the first place, as has happened a whole bunch!

“Precious Cargo”

An even more egregious retread comes in Enterprise when they basically try to redo the super cringe TNG episode “The Perfect Mate” that you just scrolled past, and somehow continue to be fairly cringe. Same deal: a gorgeous Kriosian woman is being transported while in stasis. Her pod gets damaged and she wakes up and eventually falls for the hunkiest guy in reach. We’ve done all this before.

Into Darkness

Since Into Darkness is just “Space Seed” / The Wrath of Khan but with more lens flare, the movie obviously has to use the cryostasis plot device since it would actually be more trouble NOT to include it and anger the fans [more]. But finding Khan’s crew in cryo inside torpedoes is at least a good touch, and the chilly resolution to the film is somehow kinder than stranding him on Ceti Alpha V.

Rukiya’s story arc

One last one that’s from the transporter buffer loophole that we’ve decided we’re using for this list, but it’s also a really good and quite sweet characterization for Doctor Mbenga to put his daughter into stasis to prolong her life. We ask every so often on the podcast why the medical staff doesn’t put patients in cryo all the time, and it took until Strange New Worlds to really make good use of it.

“Preludes”

Learning Jankom Pog’s backstory in this Prodigy episode really helped shed light on his character in a way that we didn’t realize we needed so badly. It’s a fascinating addition – especially for a kids show! – to have this Tellarite be a blast from the past who awoke accidentally from cryo to find he needed to maintain the ship. And it’s crushing to see him get no credit for it!

“The Next Generation”

Literally right after we recorded this week’s episode, the season three premiere of Picard came along to taunt me. It too contains a scene related to cryostasis. We don’t know much yet about what’s going to come about from this turn of events since, at the time I’m writing this, dear Doctor Crusher has just entered the deep freeze, so watch along with us to see what happens, I guess!

—

Let’s get you thawed out so you can enjoy more blogtivities! You should also be keeping up with our watch-through of Voyager on SoundCloud or whatever your podcast application of choice is, hanging out with us on Facebook and Twitter, and just generally chilling out.

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wonderlesscomics · 9 months

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Batman/Catwoman (Tom King & Clay Mann)

Issues # 1-12

Read January 2024

Story: 5/10

Respectfully I love Tom King. Of my top 10 favorite comics of all time he has multiple on the list but this is truly not one of them. I love Tom for his unique take on story telling, playing with the readers and trying new things but honestly this book is a fucking nightmare to read. The three different storylines being told 2 1/2 pages at a time with little to no differences between the past and present timeline literally sharing multiple characters and plot points between them makes it a nightmare to try and read and care about. The joker is flat out annoying in this book, he just comes in every issue and yaps about nothing and is used to throw a wrench into the relationship I’m trying to care about after the first 50 issues of his story kind of failed the relationship. This is the epic conclusion to his mixed Batman run and he chooses this story telling device and plot to tell it. Baffling. To his credit I think by themselves a lot of these story elements are awesome. I love the phantasm storyline in this book and the future catwoman/batwoman story is also fascinating. Both of these deserved their own mini series and could have just been this story but instead they are combined and mushed together in the most awkward and unorthodox way. This was a massive disappointment, and I hope it’s just a small hiccup in an otherwise stellar career.

Art: 8/10

Let’s start this the right way; Clay Mann is my favorite comic book artist of all time. No debate. However, The art like everything in this book is just… a confusing choice of squished together elements. When Clay is on the book, the art is flawless. Stunning character design, lighting, colors, and page layout are incomparable to the rest of the industry. His art makes me flip pages in awe. But just like the story randomly we just switch to another piece that confused everything and makes it worse. Respectfully I don’t know him and I don’t know his work too well but Liam Sharps art in this book is not cutting it. They switch to him halfway through for several issues and the art declines so sharply in my opinion especially when book ended by Clay’s art. It might just not be my style and many people may like it but I truly thought it was awful and didn’t fit the book at all. I can’t believe how much I hated the scratchy lines and twisted looking features in a book that had been so clean and tight the whole time.

Special Notes:

- I’ll always support a phantasm storyline and I really appreciate their inclusion into the story

- I’m baffled by the choices in this book and I can’t say it enough

- I wonder if there is a cut of this book that is just told in timeline order and how much better it actually might be

- Helena is actually an awesome character and I would legitimately read that book

Overall Rating: 5.5/10

I’m so, so disappointed in this. I remember in the first couple issues overlooking the weird story telling device and just being in awe at how cool it was. But it just kept going and by the end I felt defeated. I truly didn’t enjoy this read. The story doesn’t justify the awkward telling, and even the art gets hijacked and can’t carry this to a stronger score. I’m immediately going to read another Tom King book to reassure myself that this is just a symptom of a problem plagued Batman story that’s finally concluding in this book.

#dc comics #comics review #batman

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futurefind · 1 year

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//smth smth re: last post on Sa's tankiness, and also calling back to the 'curbstomping' Tomas gives her in the OshiplotTM ? While I don't remember Why baby Nori decided on those exact wounds (besides nebulous wump enjoyment), they nonetheless PREFECTLY work out for their intent—

Not just winning in a fight against Sa, but getting her out of the way, non fatally, for the immediate future (and it is for sake of immediate plans, due to Sasume being able to physically recover as fast as within a month).

Aka: have a crude run down of the "template" for that curbstomp fight, including the Injuries 8)

(major, if surface level, discussion of injuries ahead!)

0. Tomas trauma jumpscare?? Tomas trauma jumpscare!!! Important not just for ~drama~ reasons, but because it throws Sasume off so severely, its critical to how (horribly) the fight ends besides his own nebulous & suspicious power acquisition

1. A gash across the left thigh. Simple, yes, but it's a chip towards what's most important against Sa — her mobility. (Moreover, it also forces her to lead/rely on her blind side's leg.)

2. A deep stab to her right shoulder — specifically, underneath and along her collar bone. This fucks with her entire arm and her primary hand, meaning WHICHEVER side she tries to rely on, she can't.

And then, specifically BECAUSE Sasume is not being deterred in any capacity? And just slapping some ice on it and keep going? Is where the Real yikes ouch shit comes in.

3. Tomas pins her hands together and stabs through both of them (at approx "45°" angle, from thumb to pinky), meaning on top of everything she can't use her fucking hands.

Except... she can and she does, or rather she TRIES to— coats her uninjured fingers in ice and brutes force an attempted grip by controlling that ice.

4. She gets stabbed in the gut, through and through, more towards her left side. Because, despite Aiming to kick her down with minimal injury, NEAR fatal seems to be the only option (and does, This Time, actually work).***

Bonus round/"FAQ" wrt that slew of asterisks on no. 4:

"Usually", if one wanted to find her/'interrupt' and save her? This is where it'd be done. Except... nonzero chance that may be how and WHY Sasume gets skewered, since while Tomas gets distracted with the cavalry, she tries to sneak up on him — and Tomas's reflexes combined with multiple parties now being involved means he takes her for a newcomer and goes near fatal FIRST before Realizing (For extra Angst points, he may have reflexively stolen Shinrei and stabbed her with that — or perhaps he stole her 'savior/s' weapon instead...? 8) )

If you wanted to go even more extreme / angsty (and even more of a curbstomp): Sasume Is indeed found... strung up and impaled on her own sword. HOWEVER in these such cases, rather than being a message For Sasume, this fight/end result is a message VIA Sasume. I.e. to her allies or those who frequently employ her for their plots, etc. If Tomas is still involved, he only did and was aware of the actual FIGHT (and did not do the display), and his nebulous antagonist/villain allies are wont towards being far more public and overtly villainous than in other cases

Tomas does not NEED to be here. He's the default, sure, but if the whole Oshiplot can't fit or the specific antagonists who'd do so in xyz plot don't fit HIM? Yeah make it an npc. Tomas cropping up is just a plot device for sake of Sa-related plots, anyways — and she's OP enough to easily become a thorn in anyone's side

"Why is Tomas willing to curbstomp her if he doesn't want to kill her" Shhh 🤫spoilers! If your muse/s have reason to know any deeper lore on the Oshiplot I'll share, but!! By default? Who knows!! she knew him as a kid (pre orphanhood) and he knew her parents and chances are betrayed and killed her mom, after all

#mun babbles //#about // sasume #about // tomas #oshima plot //#injury mention //#hand trauma mention //#parental death mention //#the funniest thing abt theorizing 'oh bby nori just liked angst-' while yes TRUE #is v funny in hindsight since like. she heals w.in a few WEEKS an doesnt need horribly long for pt #ask to tag //

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tossawary · 2 years

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I've reread PINTWILF a few times now—amazing fic, thank you so much for writing it, I genuinely loved it and it felt like a complete world even though I don't actually know much about svsss—and I'm still a little unsure as to what exactly the world update after sy's appearance changed? definitely the basement under sqh's house appeared, as well as his requests to duan tianyu to look into the weepers eye.

sy also got given his backstory, but how much of that was fabricated? as in, did you intend on the sxy ressurection attempt always being a thing, and sy just got slotted in as a victim of that out of convenience? or did the update insert that WHOLE ressurection plot? did I miss anything that got added by the update?

Thank you! And, ha, I've heard that I few times now and somehow it keeps surprising me, though admittedly I have also read fic for stories I haven't actually seen or read before.

The World Update was the result of Shang Qinghua's accumulating Canon Divergences. One thing that you may notice is that before the World Update, Shang Qinghua was struggling with having points taken off him for messing with the plot, which he was (unwisely, perhaps) straight-up ignoring by the end. After the World Update, the System is no longer taking any points off him (I think, I can't remember exactly), though it does threaten to.

The World Update mostly just stabilized a lot of the changes that Shang Qinghua had already made. This was actually the System having his back, though it was terrifying about it.

Shang Qinghua isn't actually all that great at hiding that he's a transmigrator, especially when he's comfortable around someone. One of the biggest problems is that he went to go find Luo Jiahui and Luo Binghe, even though he shouldn't have known they existed, and brought them home with him, even though Shang Qinghua (the character within PIDW) should have no reason to know Binghe is going to be that important. He then proceeded to start telling Binghe ABOUT THE FUTURE disguised as BEDTIME STORIES.

Every time he talks about Binghe's future as someone super important, the System is basically going, "WHAT THE FUCK, DUDE, THIS ISN'T SUBTLE. IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE."

And Shang Qinghua JUST! KEEPS! CHANGING THINGS! He makes Mobei-Jun fall head over heels in love with him! He accidentally set up the House of Rejuvenation situation, then he took out Madam Hu (OC) AND Elder Lady Xia (OC), who were supposed to be future villains! He also set another future villain, Doctor Xu (OC), into the clutches of Huan Hua Palace, where the Old Palace Master could take advantage of him! He stole an incredibly dangerous and useful plot device from another future villain, the Garden Master in the Abyss (OC), and in doing so accidentally set up Zhuzhi-Lang freeing Tianlang-Jun and giving him all his powers back! And then Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang go back and kill the guy!

(Shang Qinghua's System: "Bro. What the fuck.")

HE SAVED LUO JIAHUI! He loves Binghe like a son! The protagonist of the world is now well-adjusted with a happy childhood! Also, he took Binghe to the House of Rejuvenation and failed to protect him completely, requiring OBVIOUS SYSTEM INTERVENTION. That was NOT Su Xiyan's work there.

(Shang Qinghua's System: "BRO. WHAT THE FUCK.")

And it's not just him! He gives Mobei-Jun way too much stuff! So Mobei-Jun can make all sorts of plot-altering movements, including the death of the future Xifeng-Jun (OC) and therefore replacing him with his younger sister (OC), kicking out Elder Lady Xia (OC), and making himself powerful enough early on to make his father jealous enough to crash the Immortal Alliance Conference! At the same time that Shen Qingqiu is out there with his new disciple, Fu Qiang (OC) from the House of Rejuvenation, kicking all kinds of corrupt, noble ass!

All this at the same time that Shang Qinghua is thinking to himself, "Oh, I wish I wasn't a transmigrator! I wish there was an explanation for why Shang Qinghua would know all these things! I wish we could just get the barest bones of a plot out of the way so that I could just live my life without worrying about that!"

(Shang Qinghua's System: "FUCK YOU. I'M GOING TO GIVE YOU EVERYTHING YOU WANT, BRO.")

And then Shen Qingqiu's qi deviation happens. Originally, the System was going to solve the instability of the Shen Qingqiu character by just replacing him with Shen Yuan. But then Shang Qinghua swoops in, tells Shen Qingqiu a bunch of things he hasn't established actual reasons for him to know, and kicks off a Qijiu confrontation (a necessary beginning to any sort of Qijiu reunion). Now, it LOOKS like Shang Qinghua nearly killed Shen Qingqiu there by stressing him with emotional revelations, and maybe he nearly did, but because Shang Qinghua told the truth, Shen Qingqiu demanded to see Yue Qingyuan and realized Shang Qinghua was telling the truth.

So when Shen Qingqiu deviates, he's not alone. Yue Qingyuan is RIGHT THERE to call for medical attention and to help, and Yue Qingyuan is a spiritual POWERHOUSE. And Shen Qingqiu doesn't actually want to die just to spite Yue Qingyuan now. So when Yue Qingyuan clings to him, he clings back and allows Yue Qingyuan (and Mu Qingfang) to help him, and QIJIU fucks up Shen Yuan's transmigration so badly that everything kind of breaks.

And Shang Qinghua's System is kind of like, "FOR FUCK'S SAKE!!!" But it's also kind of like, "FINALLY! Now I have an inarguable reason to FIX EVERYTHING (and blame it on the other guy)."

The System stabilizes every change Shang Qinghua has made, reworks the new plot Shang Qinghua has already been building, and dumps three new intertwined missions on his head to force him to get everything he wants. "The Lines That Cannot Be Crossed", "The Demonic Alliance Invasion", and "Death of the Author" are, honestly, all the same big mission, just divided into different parts. They all end up at the same place.

Calling it "Death of the Author" is perhaps a bit mean, but the System is more than a little frustrated by Shang Qinghua's denial, so it wants to wake him the fuck up to this new world.

"The Lines That Cannot Be Crossed": Gives Shen Yuan a backstory. Stabilizes the Doctor Xu and Huan Hua Palace situation. Takes Luo Jiahui's assumption that the seals on Binghe's demon side aren't just Su Xiyan's work, but ARE Su Xiyan, and runs with it, retroactively blaming the System's work on Binghe's birth mother.

If you asked Su Xiyan (and she answered truthfully), she only regained any sort of consciousness after the World Update (not that she knows about it) and that was slow-going. She was doing something unprecedented, but she was fully expecting to essentially destroy her own soul to fuel the seals. The System brought her back in and attached her to Luo Binghe, like, "HERE. FIXED IT."

To be honest, I didn't fully decide on how much of the Doctor Xu and the stolen golden cores business was the System's invention, because when I wrote it, with everything being from Shang Qinghua's POV, it didn't really matter. But looking back on it, yes, Doctor Xu was at least up to something very, VERY similar, given that Shen Qingqiu and Fu Qiang were already investigating him through his former patron, Lady Dan (OC), and the former patrons of the House of Rejuvenation. Given the Old Palace Master and the Holy Mausoleum in SVSSS, I think that the possibility of resurrecting Su Xiyan, the "one who got away", probably at least passed his mind, and then having Doctor Xu delivered to him was too much to resist.

I decided on Su Xiyan being the explanation for Binghe's seals somewhere around the House of Rejuvenation storyline, when I pulled the System intervention scene, and I knew before that that I at least wanted to do something with her ghost. Su Xiyan's future role developed into a full-blown potential resurrection when I finally firmly decided that I didn't want Shen Yuan to transmigrate into Shen Jiu, shortly before I wrote the World Update chapters, and I needed backstory for Shen Yuan's new role. (Seriously, Shen Jiu came pretty close to being killed off in PINTWILF. And I didn't know whether to leave Su Xiyan as a ghost or bring her back completely until, like, right before I wrote the chapters where they find her body.)

"Death of the Author": This one was about SHANG QINGHUA knowing too many things he SHOULD NOT KNOW. It dumped the basement and all that fortune-telling gear on him to explain to everyone else why he knows so much.

It was also meant to help him follow up on the Tianlang-Jun storyline and give him the Weeper's Eye so that he could find Su Xiyan when Tianlang-Jun inevitably popped up looking for her.

Looking back on it now, having Duan Tianyu and Yu Chaonan help him find the Garden Master's Abyss may have accidentally caused one of the Old Palace Master's minions to look more into that part of history, and Shang Qinghua could have accidentally pointed the Old Palace Master to the Weeper's Eye. So, it could also be a "DON'T LET YOUR ENEMIES GET THIS SUPER OP PLOT DEVICE" fix-it.

"The Demonic Alliance Invasion": Basically the System just straightened out the mess Shang Qinghua was accidentally making of demon politics, like, "I put all this work setting things up to throw Binghe into the Abyss and it's not NOT HAPPENING!" And it used this mission to force everything together and get that bare bones plot over and done with, like Shang Qinghua was begging for.

I think that's pretty much everything.

So, like, all in all, the System didn't actually... change that much? Shang Qinghua freaked the fuck out about it all, rightly, because it was terrifying. But the System was basically just smoothing out things that he'd already done to the world and changing the plot requirements to give him what he wanted.

(Shang Qinghua: "WHAT DID YOU DO???"

Shang Qinghua's System: "The question is: 'What did YOU do???'"

It's not clear in SVSSS how much control Shang Qinghua has over the System, but though it doesn’t seem to be especially conscious, it's definitely implied that Airplane Bro's desires for his story are actually being taken into account. He transmigrated first, after all. While the System might take some of Shen Yuan's desires into account, it does still force him to push Luo Binghe into the Endless Abyss. I would argue that it's when Airplane Bro finds out that Shen Qingqiu is another transmigrator, after the Immortal Alliance Conference, that the System finally throws the original plot being mandatory away completely. (And everything is complete fucking chaos after that.)

I put a lot of effort into trying to make the World Update feel seamless, with all the foreshadowing work I did for various plot elements, and inevitable. I feel like the System is a little more insidious and the world more natural if its manipulations aren't transparent.

#ask tossawary #anonymous #tossawary commentary #pride is not the word #tossawary svsss #spoilers

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larathia · 2 years

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*deep inhale* so chapter 91. May I humbly share my thoughts with you?

I am very excited about this “God” character that has been mentioned since the beginning to FINALLY be a plot device to ‘solving’ the problem that is Nene’s lifespan.

However, I'm fairly uncertain if that is the big problem here. I do adore Nene as a protagonist for being a fresh take as neither being strong nor skillful as another protagonist commonly in shounen series, yet (same with Kou) having a strong moral despite the world being against them.

But the ‘big problem’ or rather obstacle is this ‘God’ themself for the characters. Yashiro is planned to die because of fate and cannot be with Hanako in life or death because he is supernatural. The same goes for Kou and Mitsuba as Mitsuba has stayed off the path to be human where the ‘only way’ the two could be together is for Kou to die. Hanako and the other mysteries are as they are because they were chosen by God to serve as protectors of Kamome. After all, it is its ancient grounds. The Minamoto brothers could not have a normal life because they were tasked to eliminate supernaturals that harm humans and for all we know about this God they intend to set correct relations between the dead and living.

This is a fragment of what I’ve been thinking about for the past months to now have the urge to express it thanks to the new chapter. (plus I don't want to make this ask too long) Tsukasa possibly wants to change the way God rules being I vaguely remember a chapter where after Mistuba’s wish was granted (I'll paraphrase) he wanted a world where supernatural and human coexist. Why? We don’t know that either and could speculate until the next chapter comes but we know he needs Amane and Yashiro to get him there to God.

My questions in general.

1.) Did God pick the mysteries specifically on their connections with humans?

2.) Will God play a figure as Hanako’s growth and possible future being Yashiro has influence on his humanity or will it not being Tsukasa calls bullshit for using his power for selfish reasons?

3.) I doubt Yashiro will want to continue to destroy the Yorishiros but I can see her turning the tables and wish God for something else and as, it’s been hinted, what relation does she have with God?

4.) Mitsuba???

If you read this, thank you www- I appreciate you taking the time

Wow! Okay, I wanted to wait until after I did my 'analysis' post to really dig into this but I did all that, and now it's your turn!

My first real thought here is that we've only ever heard of one being referred to as 'god' by the Yugi twins. The thing we generally call the Red House Entity, or what Tsukasa called 'the god under the house'. There are probably others! Logically, there are probably at least two gods in this series! But we've only actually got solid evidence that one of them exists.

Understand a hell of a lot is dependent on the nature of as-yet-unrevealed lore. Do the Mysteries serve someone? Are they something that the Minamoto clan set up in decades past, as an alternative to the sacrifices? We don't actually KNOW.

(Fun bit of speculation: What if Yorimitsu Minamoto is the power behind the Wonders? From what Six says, he certainly had the power to do that if he wanted to. And hey, SOMEONE had to recruit Six to the job... but you get my point. There's not a lot we know.)

So let's go with what we DO know.

The RHE is connected to 'the pit', where the kannagi were sacrificed in centuries past. The RHE grants wishes in return for sacrifices; the bigger the sacrifice, the bigger the wish that can be granted.

A severance is basically 'sacrifice a special human to temporarily block off the mortal world from the supernatural world'. It's...a wish. Like any other wish.

Tsukasa is very, very tied to the RHE. And may well want the entity to be free to do as it pleases, which may well be 'let supernaturals run rampant so that the locals offer it The Good Sacrifices again'.

Hanako is to all appearances afraid of the RHE. (Given how his family died, he may well have EXTREMELY good reasons to be.) But he's also very, very pragmatic. If the RHE is the biggest game in town, I could see Hanako going along with it.

But I'm speculating.

What's hanging on my mind just now is how much of the entire plot seems to hinge on the fact that Amane and Tsukasa are identical twins. They don't necessarily want the same things, but if asked to plot out how to GET what they want, they seem to think along broadly the same lines.

Case in point: At the outset, Hanako says he wants to atone for murdering his brother. Tsukasa says he wants supernaturals to be free to be however they want to be. Tsukasa drives Two crazy; Hanako unseats her. Because Tsukasa did that (proving he COULD do that) Hanako then moves on to 'unseat all the Wonders' - which in turn means that when Obon rolls around, the supernaturals can rampage just like Tsukasa wants. But oh! Six is in the way of a rampage! Tsukasa plots to remove Six - and when Hanako and Yashiro get entangled in Six's boundary, Hanako very nearly does Tsukasa's job for him, but Yashiro won't destroy the yorishiro. But Hanako uses Six's sacrifice to extend Yashiro's lifespan, and that brings the Minamotos raging across a Severance to take Six out and undo Hanako's work...doing Tsukasa's work instead.

You see? They're not working together, and yet at the same time both of them have gotten a lot closer to what they WANT by pinging off whatever the other one's doing. I can at present only attribute this to them being identical twins, and thus thinking in similar ways even toward different goals.

And now they seem to have the same goal, even if it's for different reasons. Tsukasa still wants rampaging supernaturals (which means No Wonders) and Hanako wants to save Yashiro (meaning he's got to win the Wish from God). But both of them need to destroy yorishiros to get what they want, and Yashiro's the only one so far who's proven able to do that.

I am very, very curious as to whether she'll take that step onto the slippery slope in order to live. In theory she could swing Hanako back to absolutely opposing his brother by simply genuinely accepting her death and heading to the Far Shore - meaning the only way Hanako ever sees her again is if he fulfills his original duty, lets go of his guilt and regret, and passes on to join her there.

I don't think that'll happen. At the same time, I just can't see her leaping to rip the seal off Sumire, depower Three, or depower Akane either. Yashiro's never had to make a hard choice of this kind before. I can't really predict what she'll do.

And all of this also ties back to Kou - if he wants to be a supernatural, well, he's been handed a golden opportunity. But will he take it? Akane and Teru still seem to be down for the count. But consider Hanako's warning; becoming a supernatural changes you, sometimes in unpredictable ways. If Kou does take that step, he may no longer be one of the Toilet Trio.

Nene and Kou have been saved, thus far, from making any truly serious decisions. Other people always took up that gauntlet for them. But now they're going to have to choose for themselves, and the story's going to hinge on what they do and how.

#saigeofspades11 #toilet bound hanako kun #tbhk analysis

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adlbeay · 3 years

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I wanted to talk about the themes in the Walk in the Dust event. The story of Arknights has always had a high level of thematic consistency, but it’s especially prominent in this event. I feel like a lot of the discussion of the story in certain places comes down to “lore” and surface-level plot details, so I wanted to get this out there somewhere.

The two big ideas that are covered in Walk in the Dust are that of revenge and the homeland. Let's talk about revenge first. Long post and story spoilers under the cut.

In the beginning, we are introduced to Elliot, aka Passenger, who by the time we meet him, is an aimless husk of a man. He is utterly empty inside despite being the most powerful figure in the Reefsteep black market, with vast wealth and political influence under his thumb. Having completed his decades-long quest to slay everyone who was involved in betraying his teacher, he has no more goals for his life. After killing the Lord Ameer of Ibut, the last of his targets, he realizes that the revenge he had been pursuing was ultimately empty, that the weapons he built and the schemes he engineered to that end no longer moved him. Even the death of the Lord Ameer didn't matter one bit in the political landscape of Sargon.

As for the Sargon army... We live in different times now. The ruling Padishahs simply care not about what is happening here in this barren wasteland. My guess is that it matters not to them whether it's the father or the son that's in charge. Actually, to tell the truth, it hardly matters to me either.

Ultimately, no one cared if the Lord Ameer was murdered or simply died in an accident, not even Elliot himself. Sargon continues to be exploited by the Columbian military and the ruling Lords. Professor Thorne remains dead. His research, once entrusted to Elliot to prevent it from becoming a weapon of war, has nonetheless been used by Elliot himself to bring even more death. Now, 22 years later, Passenger sees finding Kal'tsit as his only path to salvation, so that she can once again give him a purpose like she did when she rescued him the first time.

Folinic's mom, Lillia, also shares the same kind of story. Her husband was killed in Chernobog when the count decided to purge the researchers working on the sarcophagus device. Among the children of the families broken up by this incident are Lyudmila (later Crownslayer), Alex and Misha (later Skullshatterer), and Luisa (later Folinic). Lillia finds Kal'tsit after months of searching, intending to take revenge on Grand Duke Vanya not just for her husband, but also for Luisa, who never got to know her father because of it. Kal'tsit tries to talk her out of it, even during the final phases of the plan, but Lillia's mind is set. She entrusts Kal'tsit with taking care of both Luisa and Lyudmila, as she knows she won't be able to come back to live a normal life after this. And... she succeeds. Although it is Kal'tsit who ultimately administered the poison, their plan works flawlessly and Duke Vanya is finally dead.

Except it still ended up being completely meaningless. The Grand Duke was in a glorified nursing home already near the end of his life, and if Kal'tsit didn't kill him then some other conspirator from the Ursus political backstage would have done it anyway. He was already crippled and blind, and as we find out during the confrontation with the Emperor's Blade, even Kal'tsit only agreed to Lillia's plan because it defused the conspiracies of other powerful figures who would have used the Duke's death to spark another rebellion. The only thing that Lillia ended up accomplishing was making sure that Louisa would grow up without both a mother and a father, and Lyudmila would never get the answers she really wanted about her family's death. And, although she ended up not doing it, she was even also planning to go back to Chernobog to kill Sergei, Alex and Misha's father, for his betrayal.

And this carries on through the future outside the event. Crownslayer ends up joining Reunion because she thinks it will give her the answers she wants and avenge her father. Folinic almost lets her anger at Atro's death get her into a confrontation with Wolumonde. In the end, Crownslayer is stopped by Kal'tsit and Folinic is calmed down by Suzuran, but we might be able to imagine what would have happened if they managed to carry out their vengeance.

The theme of homeland is one that's intrinsically tied to Kal'tsit and has at least a bit of relation to the broader story outside of the event. It's harder to talk about since it's not clearly split into individual stories like previously, but there's at least one character that exemplifies this theme the most: Old Isin.

Old Isin is appropriately to his name, old as rocks. He remembers being a servant to some lord of a long-lost city that very few even know once existed, and spends his time telling fortunes while trying to seek out people who, like him, also share that past. According to Kal'tsit, the city's people were scattered when it was destroyed, and now only Isin even remembers the origin of the name "Reefsteep". Even then, Isin only has vague memories, and believes it to be his unforgivable sin that he has forgotten so much about the city.

Old Isin originally helps Kal'tsit and Elliot because he hopes that she can help him remember about the lost city, and thus absolve his "unforgivable sin". And Kal'tsit indeed does help him. Isin begins to recall the conquests of armies a thousand years ago, something even with his age he should not have been a part of, much less remembered. Kal'tsit dispels the illusions clouding his memory, and reveals that what Isin remembers is only the stories that the padishah recounted to him, that the glory of his old city was only a memory of another memory. In truth, the city in Old Isin's memory was merely a stepping stone for the padishah's ambition to conquer the uncharted deserts, and was abandoned just as easily when that campaign failed. His homeland's glory was just an illusion created in his mind by the padishah's charisma.

Which brings us to the Emperor's Blade. Wherever he stands is the dominion of the Empire of Ursus. Whatever he does carries out the Ursus Emperor's will. Or at least, that's how the Royal Guards imagine themselves, single-handedly carrying out their homeland's legacy. Kal'tsit lays it out clearly:

Kal'tsit: Tell me, what does the current Ursus Emperor think of the Pine Valley affair? Or do you mean to tell me the seeds of that uprising, the origins of the crisis were all the will of the Emperor? Feel free to keep deceiving yourself, but the truth is the young emperor is unaware of the events that transpired there. You believe he has no need to know. You... all of you seek a bygone era. You are just caught up in the former emperor's grand vision!

As does Patriot in Chapter 8:

Patriot: I fought with your fathers. Your strength and tactical acumen are no less impressive than theirs. But you look at the Ursus of those times with rose-colored glasses. What you see is nothing more than your wild fantasies.

The Royal Guards are described in not too unclear words as soldiers who probably believed too much of their own grandiose affect. They are unparalleled fighters, to be sure, but it isn't hard to infer that those words about executing Ursus's will and each Royal Guard being his own nation are words intended to strike fear into their enemies rather than statements of any real truth. Indeed, if you know anything about the internal politics of Ursus, the idea of "Ursus's own will" can be seen as more of a nostalgia at a bygone era when Ursus was, or at least seemed, united in conquest under the previous Emperor. The perceived glory of their homeland is what motivates the Emperor's Blade, but like with Old Isin, the truth behind it is shaky at best.

We also have the contrast between the retired veteran at Pine Valley and Grand Duke Vanya. While talking to Witte, the veteran cuts off one of his own fingers, claiming that the scars he has suffered in Ursus's wars, once considered symbols of his glory and honor, were ultimately meaningless, and he wants this self-inflicted wound to be his only legacy to Ursus. At the same time, the Grand Duke is postulating about how the seeds he had sown in the winter would give birth to beautiful flowers. Even though his actions and the crimes he committed never bore fruition, he is convinced even in death that Ursus's soil will bloom.

The issue of a real or imagined homeland, and its loss, is also shared by the Sarkaz as a whole not only in this story but in the main story and many other events. It's even arguable that Rhodes Island's mission to help the Infected was originally inherited from Babel's goal of establishing a stable homeland for the Sarkaz. After all, as pointed out in many places, the Infected and Sarkaz share much of the same discrimination.

Sarkaz Mercenary: Home...? How could us devils... us Infected possibly have one... Kal'tsit: The Sarkaz have tried to rebuild 'Kazdel', their home for centuries, though they have never succeeded. Everyone has a different idea as to what the term 'homeland' means, but as it stands right now, Kazdel is perhaps as close as you can get to the term's original meaning.

And in Twilight of Wolumonde:

Armed Infected: We’re going home? To what home?

Mudrock: Kazdel. There may be no place for Sarkaz outside of Kazdel. But in Kazdel, there is a place for you. Not because of tolerance. But because there is... nothing there. Kazdel... is where the homeless go. A land of rootless people.

So what does all this have to do with Kal'tsit?

In the ending cutscene, Passenger asks Kal'tsit whether this "Rhodes Island" is yet another passing persona to be used to accomplish a goal and discarded when it's complete. Like the persona of the Trusted Advisor, or the Servant, or the Laterano Cleric, will she abandon Rhodes Island as well? Kal'tsit initially puts up a front saying he has no right to ask, then bluffs about having thousands of answers, but is pushed by Passenger saying he'll even accept a lie. In one of the only times we get to see Kal'tsit faltering, she actually has no answer to this.

Unlike the other characters we see throughout the story, Kal'tsit has no homeland. No matter how fake or illusory it is, Old Isin and the Royal Guard have something to believe about a place where they can belong. The nobles in Victoria, as incompetent as they appear from the outside, are dedicated to defending the peace of their home despite having no ruler. Even the ostracized Sarkaz can ultimately go back to Kazdel, as unpleasant as that might be. But while Kal'tsit wanders the earth to keep the homelands of others from falling into chaos, she has no homeland of her own to go back to.

In one of the trailers for Chapter 9, we hear a recording from Theresa, addressed to Kal'tsit: "I hope this Rhodes Island can be a place to call home, a place you can always return to."

#arknights #arknights spoilers #kal'tsit

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alltheworldsinmyhead · 4 years

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ON FEYSAND’S PLOTLINE IN ACOSF

!!!!MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE WHOLE ACOSF!!!!

Let’s be honest for a while, okay?

ACOCF had potential to be SJM’s best book, if not for any other reason then because of the sheer idea of it. Coming-of-age, healing story of the most complex and polarizing character she has ever created set in the time of peace, away from the familiar setting (according to the later changed concept which still remains in the snippet at the end of ACOFAS), development of her arguably most feisty and angsty love story... It could be her absolute trumph. Even with the change to stick to Velaris instead of exploring the Illyrian culture of the Mountains and with the added conflict of the Mortal Queens and Koshei, it still could work quite well.

It didn’t. For many, many reasons, but the most important one, in my opinion, being the feysand pregnancy plot.

Nothing about this plotline made sense. Not a single thing. From start to finish, it was an absolute disaster from the character-writing POV, from the narration POV, from every single context of it. It broke the rules of real-life logic, it broke the rules of this fantasy world setting and it completely exposed that Rhysand, while not a bad guy, is a pretty terrible partner, even worse ruler and an absolutely terrible contender for the High King title.

Let’s break this whole mess down (and expect this post to be mammoth-sized. it’s not my fault, though, write to SJM if you have any complains):

1) Feyre, 21, decides to get pregnant, even though less than a year earlier, she expresses the delight with not being forced to bear children to her new mate and told him herself she wants to wait a while and enjoy her life with him. Feyre decides she wants a baby though and Rhysand goes along with it, even though he is aware how young Feyre is and how hard her life has been up until this point. He wants a baby too much to have an honest discussion with Feyre about it, to stop and wonder what is the reason for her sudden change of heart, to reassure her that they have a lot of time ahead of them and don’t need to rush. No. She mades a sudden decision to have a baby after A YEAR OF MARRIAGE and not much more of being turned fae, JUST AFTER having her whole world put upside down, having received a completely new title and responsibilities, surviving the wat and being mated. Great.

2) Feyre decides to get pregnant and Rhys goes along with it less than a year after the end of the bloody war. It is politically a delicate time, everyone is still not sure how the balance will shift, some countries don;t want to sign the peace treaty, etc. There are a lot of enemies and a lot of turmoil remaining. But sure. Let’s have a baby. Perfect time to add yet another target, another weakness that can be use by the Mortal Queens, Beron or whatever else with malicious intent towards the Night Court.

2) Feyre gets pregnant after approximately a year of trying. I know healthy people of reproductive age for whom it takes ages more than this. Fae’s pregnancies are rare af and precious and happen once in a blue moon, but ofc SJM broke the world’s rules for her darling Feyre. And again, for Kallas and Vivianne who are also expecting the baby, even though it has been a maximum of 3 years since they’ve mated. 3 years is also not a particularly long time to try to have a baby for those who have issues with their reproductive systems like Fae women. Thank you, next.

3) Rhys has unprotected sex with Feyre in her Illyrian form when she conceives, even though he knows full well having a winged baby would kill her. He does it anyway, for shits and giggles apparently. They probably have sex in the sky above Velaris, for all we know.

4) The baby has wings. Now, the whole explanation with Illyrian wings being bony (bc they resemble bat wings) and Seraphin ones being more flexible (bc they resemble bird ones) is so insanely stupid that it takes around 3 seconds to wikipedia this shit and find out it’s exactly the opposite. But okay, the baby has wings and Feyre will die while giving birth, along with the baby. Madja forbids Feyre from turning into an Illyrian to carry the pregnancy because it MIGHT hurt the baby. Now, remember, Feyre conceived while in Illyrian form and then turned into High Fae. The baby survived it just fine. The baby MIGHT be hurt by Feyre turning .... but it will FOR SURE die if she stays High Fae and Feyre will too. Idk about you, but I would take the risk of MIGHT instead of FOR SURE. Especially when she is already in labour and dying. Cauldron or Nesta or idk who alters Feyre’s pelvis after the baby is cut out of her for no apparent reason but to allow feysand to make exactly the same mistakes later on. How convinient. And Nesta also alters her own pelvis bc god forbid she won’t be able give Cassian babies like the little useful mate she is now. She should’ve probably done it with Elain too, just in case she decides to fuck Az in the future, because fuck consequences and fuck the stakes in the story that make the readers actually CARE about characters bc they know the author may actually kill them and not save their life every fucking time.

5) I don’t even want to comment on the fact Rhys hid the true danger of this pregnancy for Feyre and their family went along with it. It is absolutely disgusting. And Nesta telling her and that being condemned as the act of the ultimate cruelty which is a final straw to break her self-loathing back.... is abhorrent. It made my sick, actually, phisically sick. There is no justification for it. No at all. And the fact that they did not even consider abortion sends a message that I really don’t want to think too much about it. Feyre was 2 months along when they learned the baby is winged. 2 months. 8 weeks. It wasn’t a baby yet, let’s be honest. They could’ve at least discussed it. She - oh my god, I cannot believe SJM wrote it this way, I’m gonna be sick.

6) For the entirety of Feyre’s pregnancy, they have no plan to really help her. Labour plan? Haven’t heard if it. They have money and power and access to the healers of the whole land. And did not figure out how to stop her from bleeding out after a fucking C-section. THIS WORLD HAS MAGIC AND THEY COULDN’T STOP HER FROM BLEEDING OUT AFTER A FUCKING C-SECTION. Didn’t even ask Thesan, the High Lord of Healing, to be present. Cassian had guts hanging out of his stomach and survived. Az was fucking slashed apart in Hybern and survived. But yeah, Feyre was on a brink of death after a C-section. Great, Sarah. Keep it up. Let’s force the thought into young girls’ heads that labour is the most lethal thing ever, why not.

7) Also, for the entirety of Feyre’s pregnancy, Rhys keeps quiet about this idiotic bargain. He, as far as we know, doesn’t make any plans for the moment when him and Feyre and possibly their baby are dead. If they died and baby survived.. who would take care of it? Does Rhys have a conversation with his family about it? NAH. Doesn’t write any sort of plan how to keep the Court going, doesn’t inform even the closest of his co-workers how they should proceed to act after he’s gone and his and Feyre’s power go to god-knows-who. Their deaths would mean a sure chaos for the weakend and fragile Prythian and the Night Court especially and yet nor Rhys nor Feyre make any sort of preparations for it. Rhys doesn’t tell his brothers or Mor or HIS SECOND IN COMMAND they will all soon have to somehow manage without him. He was about to just leave them to their own devices and told them in the last. possible. moment.

And this man - this man is, according to Amren, the best candidate to handle the whole country? To unite it? This fool who makes idiotic bargains, who thinks first about his cock and his own selfish desires and considers his subjects and his responsibilities as a High Lord last and least important of all? Who has so much trust in his wife, in his High Lady, the mother of his son that he doesn’t tell her she will almost surely die on a birthing bed because it MAY UPSET HER?

This plotline was the straw that broke my back. ACOTAR, at it’s heart has always been a ya fantasy with added ‘spice’ and I was willing to bend my critical-thinking skills in many cases and forget and forgive many smaller idiotic issues in this series. But this? It is not idiotic. It is massive and stupid to the point when it becomes insulting to the reader. It was a plot straight out of a bad fanfic, not something that should be in a published book written by someone who writes for a living. You could even argue that Twilight has handled this toxic trope better. I have wasted my money on this book and thinking about it will always be painful for me. So yeah.

ACOSF could be great. Ended up quite pathetic.

#acosf #acosf spoilers #a court of silver flames #rhysand #feysand

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twisted-leader-of-something · 3 years

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Alot of theorist like to talk about the Loop Theory happening on Twst. Can you tell me all about it?

Ah! The Loop Theory, I think you're speaking about the Time Loop Theory!

It's basically the theory that all of the characters are basically either in a time loop, or time has been restart to a certain point!

It's severely depends on who you ask to details of the theory, because, well, the theory is pretty easy to come to the conclusion to because of all the evidence supporting it but also pretty fluid in its' details specifically, because the details can have another reason for it.

But, it basically come down to this: Yuu at one point went through the events of the game, but was sent back, either because of a certain event (the very beginning is the general consensus, because it's believe the monster at the beginning as an Overblotted Grim that couldn't be defeated or something else really bad happened) or because of someone's Unique Magic. It's either Crowley or Malleus who sends Yuu back to the past to hopefully fix the future. And possibly, there are some people aware of it, like the ones who sent Yuu back, Crowley, Malleus, and I've even seen theories saying Rook, Vil, Jamil and Leona may know about it.

Where's the evidence?

At the veeeeery beginning of the game, like within the very start of playing it, we are treated to Crowley speaking to someone he calls "my beloved, beautiful flower of evil" and asks who is the best of all. We then see a person coming into Night Raven College via a coffin, and then Crowley says, "Guided by the mirror of darkness, if you desire, take my hand that lies within the mirror." which then shows us the main cast of boys in their ceremonial robes all speaking about needing to start an event with urgently, then we are introduced to the three elements of the magic system, that are described very interestingly. "Fire that can turn the moon to ashes." "Ice that can freeze time." and "Earth that can swallow the sky." and we than cut to a battle with a monster that looks like a giant monster-cat with various parts of other things, like a human's hand, a snake as a tail, a pair of wings, and fire around it's neck. Which, is a battle we lose, and then Crowley says, "Come, show me your power. We only have little time left. For me, for them, for you, We are all running out of time. No matter what, never let go of my hand." and then, the prologue starts.

What people generally take away from this really strange beginning scene is that, Grim Overblotted (as the monster and Grim look really close in appearance) that Crowley mat or may not have been involved with, and the main cast couldn't beat an Overblotted!Grim, so, as a last ditch effort to either try and change the future or just to get MC out of the situation, MC was sent back to the past, repeating basically all of what they've already experienced again.

It might explain why MC's very sassy and not very sympathic at times, and to some, it even explains the cutscenes we get with people's backstories, because MC has already been through all of this before, and knows what will happens so has something to say about it. It could also explain their amnesia at the start of the story, because something may have gone wrong with the spell.

It might also explain why Crowley is purposefully not very active in the story despite his job as the headmaster and very conveniently has lots of items and information in the story that makes him seem like a plot device that overwise doesn't make any sense at all how on Earth he would know about if he's so not involved with the story, he knows about the time loop and knows his part in it.

It could also explain why Malleus is so attached to Yuu. Malleus might know that Yuu, to a certain degree, Yuu isn't from this timeline and is trying to either figure out why, or he's the reason MC was sent back, and is basically trying to make sure MC will do their job correctly without interruptions.

It might also be the reason for some of the character's strange behavior. Like Rook, whose obsessed with how people will react to certain situations is particularly fond of MC, or why Leona's depressed through the game and only really seems to brighten up after his chapter, because either both, or one of them is aware of the time loop.

And there's probably some evidence I missed, but this is what I can remember off the top of my head. But basically! The proof is there! It's hidden in implications mostly, but it's there! And there's millions of variations on it! So, it basically is a very flexible theory and lots of people have their thoughts and opinions on the topic! It's really fun, actually! But that should be the gist of it for you, Anon!

#twisted wonderland theories #twst theories #twisted wonderland theory #twst theory #[ mun speaks ]#[ twisted wonderland theories ]

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worldsover · 4 years

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Judgement to the Desiccated ft. Karina

length ✦ 5573

genres ✧ sm type future; asphyxiation; blackmail; virtual_servant!Karina;

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Air did a poor job of not being polluted so Lee Soo Man flooded the world instead. The man himself certainly must be long gone and could not have been in charge of that decision but the legacy of his company far exceeds the legacy of any other human collective in history. Once on this planet, gas was the fluid of choice for respiration and breathing was an unconscious reflex. Now there’s Aether by SM. How very on-brand of them to have the liquid air you breathe follow perfume naming conventions.

Open your eyes and exit the sleeping chamber. Aether has you work for each inhalation, it desaturates the color of the bedroom—maybe there’s a subtle but uncomfortable tinge of yellow—and it makes your nose itch. Your muscles wield much less force than they used to because of the lack of resistance the fluid provides. Moreover, it smells like hairspray as though the ozone layer is taking sardonic revenge.

Screens impersonating windows track your eyes to ensure realistic parallax, playing the scene of divine blue heavens that could not exist. An azure sky is a reward for those planets that have an atmosphere and a sun for light to scatter. Your walls are either chrome or drywall white and your whole bedroom is plainly decorated just like the day you moved in.

“Etymology of bedroom,” you think out loud, though it falls on no ears.

“Bedroom is a compound noun consisting of bed and room. Bed goes back to Old English bedd ‘sleeping place, plot of ground prepared for plants,’ which goes back to the Germanic-”

Plants and sleep are both strong words to use nowadays. The former doesn’t exist in nature and it seems you’re the only one who bothers with the latter. Faint buzzing distracts you from the AI’s response and signals you to the nano drones that swim throughout the liquid to process carbon dioxide from your lungs. This whole ordeal could’ve been much worse if you didn’t have brain interfaces doing the hard part of controlling your diaphragm. The most you need is a purposeful thought. Still, it gets tiring having to think the same thought every three seconds. In. Out.

Was the metaphorical Soo Man teaching a lesson in perseverance? You love K-pop and imagine it’s how trainees used to practice dancing, singing, being charismatic. Being an idol had to be as natural as breathing air. Inhale and exhale. Right now with any antiquated programming language you clung on to, you could write a single for loop that did the same job. For every three seconds: breathe in, breathe out.

“What’s for breakfast today?” Not loud enough. “What’s for breakfast?” you think it louder.

“Welcome, master. Ae-Karina is ready for service.” It’s quite a kindness for SM to blur the bland dystopia you live in by augmenting reality through your neural device. A bosomy woman in a gold-lined but otherwise modest maid outfit appears from the corner of your eye and she bows. Ae-Karina is bewitching and almost becoming of her basis as its graphics have gradually upgraded over the rotations but you wouldn’t misconstrue the avatar as human.

“I said, what’s for breakfast!” It feels impolite to scream in your head, there’s other residents there, but finally the fridge lights up.

“Of course master. May I remind you eating is unnecessary?”

In. Out. Every day, she does remind you, yes. How kind of the company to put all your nutritional requirements in the new air. Aether goes in then Aether goes out. You wish the thoughts of breathing could fade into the background but they’re just like your cravings for food. Always hungry but never starving, whole though not once satisfied. Your eyes pause at her gorgeous face and she tells you there’s bacon. Take it from your fridge. Bacon goes in. Well, the drones take care of the out.

Your assigned living space is the entire 207th floor of a tower. Two hundred and seven floors below the surface. The neighbor a few floors upstairs says that he thinks living deeper is a sign of status. What a luxury. That guy should check the status of his facial muscles, maybe improve his code that lets him tell lies while he’s at it. A couple hundred flights of stairs to swim up is a useless skeuomorphism of skyscrapers in the days of the sun. In fact they were more than useless, you would've preferred a single vertical hallway as it would have let you propel upwards unimpeded. Each floor is the exact same, a glass door that affords no privacy for its residence, a false tree on each side. At the upper levels, malls, convenience stores and other gaudy retail, but it’s the gyms that mock you that you mock in return. They’re always empty.

Finally reaching the top is no true break even if it is a change in scenery. Inhale. Aether tastes a little different up here. Exhale. Can’t say you like it.

Countless satellites form a parody of the star from which the planet flew away, the false image refracted by the upper boundary of Aether. They can’t take away your memories of this star. Looking up at the sky once blinded you with ultraviolet radiation, burning your cornea. It was beautiful. Now everyone’s decided that if they’re playing the part of corporate dystopia, they might as well fit the aesthetic. In a way, it’s self-fulfilling. They wouldn’t have chosen a neon pink sun to compliment the blue and metallic gloom of the cityscape if it weren’t so ingrained in popular media already.

Still, you would’ve expected Google or Walmart to become the megacorp responsible for the state of the world, not a Korean entertainment company. Must’ve been quite the red paperclip scenario. Instead of material design or utilitarian architecture, tacky artistic structures line the streets. The same advertisements for albums that they’ve been selling for the past however long. It's all so obvious, the city could've been designed from scratch to accommodate new forms of travel and goddamn liquid air but instead they went with futuristic Tokyo.

Dubstep permeates your inner ear implants. A notification informs your thoughts that it’s “Hip-hop EDM dance pop with a strong jungle house groove and urban influences.” It’s dubstep. Liquid carries barely any sound so SM affords the option for implants if you're nostalgic for one of the senses. Even though it’s a slower form of communication than direct neural transfer, the noise comforts you. Of course the company would choose dubstep as their background music, but maybe they make money off refunds somehow. It switches to Ice Cream Cake. Much better.

You walk the not so busy roads towards a short brick warehouse in the distance and heavy rain soaks your clothes. No such thing as weather without the sun and water but it’s all simulated anyway.

A warm Seulgi adlib and you know it’s Psycho that starts playing. No, none of your senses are real. The most you could trust is your vision but even that’s being lied to. You could be living in a vat and fed all these thoughts, but then why make it so mediocre? Not paradise, nor torture but a lukewarm in-between. Guess that's what happens when SM Entertainment manages the post-apocalypse. Good on them for trying. The alternative would be a frozen hellscape without solar radiation. Can’t deny their work with geothermal and nuclear energy to keep the Aether warm so that you didn’t have to live underground for the rest of human history. It’s quite great PR to save humanity.

“Hey now, we’ll be okay,” repeats a few more times than you remember.

The Idea Factory Alpha White Delta Green says the neon tubes lighting the front of the brick and mortar building. Your ID card bears a name but it’s not yours, not until they approve your name change. Those usually get processed faster with how often people liked changing their names.

Sit at a desk with a sterile white keyboard and slick new monitor. Type and empty words appear on the screen: “Think for the many, not for the one. We need to think ahead.” A thumbs up. The company appreciates the input. That’s probably enough work for one day. Some SNSD live stages help the time pass, SM certainly appreciated the streaming numbers and it would net you some social points.

It’s hard to say what comes to mind when they ask you to envision a world without the sun and air, especially since it’s what you’ve known for... Two hundred years? There’s no frame of reference, that much you can tell from when you counted seconds to see how often the satellites completed their orbit. SM really took time to have them propel at random speeds, they love withholding sensitive information like that from citizens. To be fair, time is sensitive. Guess the meaning of that phrase changes like all parts of language.

Look around. Dozens of employees at identical workspaces all try to answer the same questions. Naturally, there’s no need for manual labor anymore but there will never be a replacement for human ingenuity. Nice slogan but you know you’re only here for data. Can’t see a need for customer retention though—what’s the alternative, skip Earth? See you on another planet?

“Hey bro, you come up with anything new?” Dave says. Two desks away, you see the enthusiastic, surprisingly spry man play around with a Newton’s cradle. The balls at each end bounce back and forth, not slowing down their rhythm any time soon.

“I think I got something,” you say, “Earth is not the answer. It can’t be, long term.”

“Ooh, I like that. Actually, I really like that.”

“What are you gonna do, copy me?”

“Of course not. You know how much SM hates plagiarism.” Click. Clack.

“Ha. As if there’s a single original thought left in the world.” Click. Clack. The imaginary sounds of metal spheres bouncing play in your mind. They got the volume wrong, no way it’d sound that loud from that distance. “You’d think with all their resources, they’d have figured out space travel by now.”

“I don’t think they want to leave, bro. Wouldn’t be great for profits.”

Your mouth opens to laugh and causes laugh8942.mp3 to play in Dave’s head. “I love it. SM probably hates that sass too,” you say.

“Oh no, they’re gonna arrest me for thoughtcrimes. Nah, they love creativity, just when it suits them. Also, if they actually did bust you for wrongthink like rumors say, I wouldn’t have this on me.” Dave twirls a finger and points at you and you thank his absurd flair for the histrionic that keeps you amused with such drab work.

“NewDrug.mp6. Would you like to play it?” the dry system voice notifies you.

“Woah woah there tiger, hold on.” Dave must’ve noticed your intrigued eyes and holds his hands up. “You might wanna experience that at home. But if you’re interested in more, ask for chicken parm at the vegan place. You know the one.”

Dave leaves his desk. He doesn’t return. You finish your work. Inspire. Expire. You’d rather not.

In contrast to your commute to work, the roads fill with others on your way home. You have to know. Take solace in the comfort of a bench where a huge McDonald’s arch bathes the surroundings and its people with a yellow glow. Really shouldn’t watch it now, especially if Dave says it’s a home type of watch but you have to know. A family of five watches you pass out. They, along with every other passerby, ignore your still body draped over the chrome outdoor seating as you look like yet another junkie. The title is correct after a fashion, the simulation is some sort of new drug. The details of the exploits that happen in the immersive replay wash over you but you don’t need them to know that it’s the sort of lewd that SM would not allow—at least not publicly and not without the right exorbitant payment.

Suit pants and underwear go straight to the laundry. That must’ve been an embarrassing sight but no one bothered to stop you, so it doesn’t matter. Look up where this vegan place was that Dave so presumptuously assumed you knew about and you find that it’s about four Avengers’ stores down from work. He must’ve eaten there before.

“Yo Dave, just wanna make sure, what’s the name of the vegan place called?”

“What are you talking about, man? You telling me there’s some secret underground farms that SM wouldn’t know about?”

You can’t tell when you got to work, a lack of standardized timing would help as well the haze of living in a monotonous dark. “Nah, I mean, for the-”

“I have no idea,” Dave emphasizes each word, “what you’re talking about.”

“I see.”

Work flies by, unusually.

“Hey, can I get a chicken-”

“Uh, this is Maron’s Veggies Only, it clearly says on the sign.”

Clear your throat. “Parm.”

The shifty part-time worker looks around and rubs his fingers gesturing for money. “No digital.”

Over the counter, you pass him a gold coin stamped with a holographic 1 and he hands you a USB stick and a laptop in return. How old-fashioned.

“It’ll sync with whoever you have set as your avatar experience aspect,” the worker says.

“Thanks.”

Ever vigilant as the patrol is, the alleys are the last place you want to go to hide with the obvious criminal element within them all but you head to one anyway. Dump the anachronistic technology in your storage pocket dimensions. Looking at its contents, you’d have to clean that mess up later, but the more you look like an average slob the better. The biggest problem with the inventories is all the people squatting in them. Inspectors wouldn’t care about the archaic ruins you left in yours.

“Welcome, master. Ae-Karina is ready to service.”

“I’d like to go on a date. A special date.” You highlight the key word special and sit on your living room couch. No one’s going to look in your glass door and regardless, you wouldn’t be the pervert for glimpsing into someone’s home.

“Ah yes, master. Ae-Karina is ready to fully service,” she says with a provocative tint in her tone, her sclera disperses to black to match. A pole drops from the ceiling while parts of her maid outfit dissolve which reveals more of the silky skin of her thighs, her lissom arms and most importantly her overflowing breasts. Ae-Karina wraps her legs around the pole and spins around, teasing fingers trace curves on her body to harden you. Her dance is precise but sultry regardless. She pulls up her short skirt to flaunt more of her ass beneath white panties and then pulls down to flourish her cleavage, not trapped by a bra. “Are you enjoying your maid’s show?”

“Very much so, yes,” you say.

Half of a smile forms before a glitch occurs and she teleports next to you, fully nude. It doesn’t pull you out of the illusion however. You just stare and drink in the splendor of her created body.

“You’re not going to touch?” Ae-Karina says.

A feel of her tits and you find it softer than pillows you used to rest on. Soft isn’t much of a character that exists anymore when the whole world is engulfed in liquid. No one has beds, especially with the rarity of sleep. Therefore, her mounds are a consummate dedication to the texture as you squeeze and pinch at her cute nipples.

Her maid outfit rematerializes as she straddles you. It provides more friction to your pants as she begins her lap dance. The weight of her body dragging across your legs and clothed erection induces your carnal impulses further. If only you could fuck the virtual idol. You have to make do with the imprint of her pussy lips on your bulge sliding up and down. Breath in. Breath out.

Ae-Karina pulls down your boxers and spits on your erection. It's not real but her hands so slick on your cock and you let reality slip. Real is for the past, you have desires gratified in the present. There is no real person nibbling at your neck but your nerves activate in sexual desire without discernment for truth. No, she doesn't love you, but when the voracious mass of ones and zeroes says it loves its master, you say it back.

"I love you."

ILOVEYOU infected ten million computers in 2000. An explosion. Calibration engaging. It’s 1:21 PM, Sunday, July 18, 2286 and hypothetically the sun would be out in its full rage. At this latitude and longitude, you’re at what was once the epicenter of all—Seoul, where a fountain caused a chain reaction allowing the hopeful remnant of a world to exist. It lasted a surprisingly long time without the sun and without Aether but the dying planet would succumb inevitably to the ever-increasing contamination so SM of all corporations took charge. A different kind of chain reaction occurred when they acquired a restaurant chain that discovered the recipe for liquid air. The law is on its way and prepared to punish you to its full extent.

You reel while your ears ring. An even sexier version of the woman you already fantasized about appears from your peripheral vision in the crater of your floor. A skimpy cop outfit, striated with reflective material that seems to wane black at different angles, outlines Karina’s curves. She has a tool belt with absurd gadgets, such as a knife baton hybrid, a taser combined with a spray bottle and a Tamagotchi. None of this is necessary. They could just immediately arrest you, impose limitations on your devices. Sure, SM cloned people to deal with underpopulation, but why Karina would be the enforcer is a whole nother issue. Maybe the entertainment company loves their irony?

“Halt. You’re under arrest. Any resistance will be penalized according to the combined Terms of Service of all SM and SM associated products.”

Fucked anyway, you figure you might as well go for it. Escape into your inventory and only seconds later you’re forced out. You manage to get what you need regardless.

“Violation of access rights will be charged to your account.”

It’s so obvious but there’s a reason you kept so much gold in physical storage. As you swim away, the sides of your apartment start to bubble. Bubbles? Already, your limbs feel unsteady. Something’s wrong in the Aether.

“This is standard procedure for escaping suspects that are indoors. Again, this is all agreed to under the Terms of Service.”

“When the fuck did I ever click accept to that shit?”

“When you were born in this world and decided you want to stay in it,” Karina says out loud. You hear her say it. Your physical ears process the vibrations in the air that come from her mouth. Gravity thwarts your desperate escape as your limp body floats on the limit between liquid and air. The atrophy of your muscles becomes apparent within the gaseous atmosphere. She watches you sink down as the room drains of all the false air though her eyebrows crease when she inspects you closer. Your breaths are involuntary. Despite your muscles shorting out, the force of gravity and the pressure of the gas bearing down on you, you’re breathing and you don’t mean to. Her eyes wander farther down. On your pants, a concrete rod stamps the fabric.

“Oh, you like what you see?”

“Shut up, criminal. Anything you say can and will be used against you.”

“Your pussy,” you say and she scoffs.

“Original.” Karina bites her lip as your erection continues to grow behind its prison. You use all effort to put your hands up.

“Please, miss Karina. I’ve been bad.”

“I could punish you even more for sexual assault.”

“Then do it.”

Heat radiates the room in a way you haven’t felt in a while and droplets of sweat form on each of your bodies, especially on the thighs that her revealing outfit parades. Her facial features contort in deliberation and the wait kills you. You bat your eyes at her before Karina takes off her tight shorts and drops herself into your anticipatory face. This makes no sense but none of this life made any sense so you decide to go with the tides.

Centuries of training your respiration has led to this moment, but when you finally have real air to breathe, you spit at the opportunity and choose to suffocate. Then you spit at her pussy and lap it up. Karina’s nectar transfixes your olfactory glands, for once a smell that isn’t the sterile Aether. Your eyes are mesmerized in parallel because of the perfect design of her pussy, a single crease that leads into her hole that your tongue emphatically explores. Karina spreads her thighs wide to reveal a small nub that craves attention. So give it. Suck and swirl and flick your tongue, and the woman provides you the tight clench of her legs as a gift. And the sounds, rediscovered glorious noise. Loud, almost too loud, and clear is how they assault your ears, even surrounded by the flesh of her thighs. Muffled by the weight of her legs, you hear Karina moan in approval but she’s still clearly in charge with how she chokes you with her legs. This is not about your pleasure but hers, and any satisfaction that you derive is not only incidental but probably punishable by SM copyright law.

Karina squirms her hips subtly on your mouth. Her eyes are sharp and she’s just about to stop your hands from moving but she notices them clasp together.

“I’ll do anything to make you cum, please.” you say sloppily as her pussy juices fill your cheeks and drip down your chin.

“God. I can’t.” She takes deep, contemplative breaths. ”That’s more time added on for inappropriate behavior.” Her groaning and brief squeals make her words sound incogent.

You give her a concluding lick and a kiss on her slit. “So what have you been doing right now then?”

Point to a corner of the room and a subtle red light indicates a recording camera. At once, she pulls out a hose from a pocket that could not fit it and the vacuum submerges the room with noise. Her expression shifts quickly to serious.

“We don’t play games here in SMTOWN unless it’s SuperStar so don’t fuck with me.”

“Look who's trying to be a comedian. How about you fuck with me any further and the video gets released.”

“That’s funny, you think you have any sort of power-”

“Yoo Jimin, I suggest you don’t push me more.”

“Where do you know that name from? Right now.” She weighs herself down on your neck.

“You think I don’t have contingencies for if I die too? Karina, we can make this a win-win scenario. We both get to cum, we both get to walk away unscathed.”

“Fuck you.”

Your weak arms wander between her thighs. At any moment, a feeble punch towards your face or another ten seconds of asphyxiation and she could call your bluff. Even if you did have the ability to expose her perversions in any way, there would be no permanent recourse, not as long SM was in charge. So it surprises you when Karina takes off her shorts.

“Goddammit. Your cock just looks too good. And your mouth, how are you so good with it?” Put up five fingers when she motions to remove her top as well, and instead she opts to take off your clothes, seizing your pants and throwing them to join the rubble in the room.

A finger slips in, then two and a third dares. Her flawlessly architected pussy lips clings to your digits and Karina shudders in reply. You explore her wetness and find it’s smooth to the point of having no faults, but her juice inside is gloppy and causes your fingers to stick more than the liquids she spills from her slit.

“Who said you’re allowed to have more?”

You lap up the nectar on your fingers. “Then why’d they make you taste so good?”

Your thumb teases her sweet tight asshole and puts just the slightest amount of pressure on it while you finger her with more intensity. The mass of her butt burdens your torso the closer she gets to orgasm. Her eyelids squeeze close and you see her body ripple in anxious pleasure. Karina shows off her pearly whites, teetering on the cliff of hysteria.

“Yes, yes! I’m so close,” she screams.

"Not yet."

“Fuck." Karina sobs, "God. Damn, fuck I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Just fuck me.”

“My pleasure,” you say. There’s no need for you to grab her since she brings herself down to your groin, which you’re thankful for as your arms are as good as jelly now. Fortunately, your cock throbs as hard as ever while Karina’s slit rests on it.

“Say you’ll delete it all, all the evidence, promise me.”

“You’re gonna fuck me first or what?” Your breath hitches while she makes a strangled noise as her velvety walls swallow your cock whole to leave no room for comfort. Her tightness is stifling and you have to start counting just to breathe again.

“One two-”

“Be quiet.”

But there is no quiet when pleas for your cooperation intersperse her excessive profanities when she seats herself into your cock and ricochets up and down. Sweat emanates from her creamy skin while her legs widen to find a better angle for her supporting knees in her cowgirl position. Grapefruit and other citrus mingle with the scent of the sweat, fruits you haven’t seen except on billboards in music videos. As much as your mind crackles and your blood roars for every atmosphere of pressure Karina’s walls provide on each thrust in and out, you can’t help but reminisce on sweeter, more innocent times.

The white fluorescent lights in your apartment sputter. For all the advancements in technology, some among many things never change. Light refracts differently in air, less bright, but you can see the pure enjoyment on Karina’s face no matter the luminescence. Karina slows her ride to pull her hips down harder instead and she jolts when your cock finds the most tender spots inside her pussy and it interrupts her babbling.

Karina almost hyperventilates when she gets up to spit on your cock. She pulls out some kind of meter from her tool belt and sighs when there’s no beeping and you recognize it having to do with carbon dioxide. She gets back to dribbling saliva and the filament trailing down to your shaft mesmerizes you. This spit is real, not simulated, and it wettens your erection in a mix with her pussy juices to paralyze you further in your already listless state. Her bare thighs jiggle and you can’t exert much force with your hands but her buttcheeks are firm with just a bit of give.

“Thank you for this cock, thank you for being bad,” Karina says as you watch her ass sink deeper while her pussy holds your dick taut. She’s frenetic when bounces up and down to play an unadulterated orchestra of slick noises between your groins.

“You’re welcome,” you accomplish getting out the words between planned breaths. Your hands cup her buttcheeks but you fear they may break with how she strikes her ass into you.

Karina turns around once more to give you the spectacle of her facial expressions as she fucks herself into you. Knead her calves laying on your torso and they take no energy to spread them though she brings them back together, compressing your hard shaft within her pussy. A new game you play with her, a separate rhythm of loosening and tightening. Her feet press on your chest to help her bounce, but the way they bear down on your lungs against the timing of your breathing causes you to fumble. Your cock bends straight forward as she plunges herself into you and it sends prickles to your entire skin, making the new angle difficult but worth it. Karina takes your hand and starts sucking on your fingers.

“You want my promise that bad?” you say.

“Yes, as bad as I want your cum. I swear, I need it.”

She draws her knees up to her torso and hugs her legs to keep thighs as tight together as possible. Karina couldn’t keep her word, she was trying to kill your cock with constriction.

“Fuck, your pussy is so fucking tight. God, Karina, fuck. You’re so good.” Even if good isn’t the word you want to use to describe her.

“Do it, please, please. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, baby. Karina can be a good girl, a good maid, a good cop, whatever you want. Just don’t get me in trouble, please.”

Karina’s mouth stops saying words though her lips writhe, drunk in increasing lust. Her cheeks flush, before the rest of her skin joins in redness while she grapples your chest and whatever spare limb she can find. You still struggle wresting control of your body but nature seems to take over when you drive yourself into her and match her needy cadence. The air in the room is replaced by a new air but it isn’t Aether. Passion, sweat, heat and all fluids that you both exude join squelching sounds, slaps and moans in harmonic bliss when her body tenses and she screams. As her body tightens, her pussy especially holds your cock for dear life and endeavours to wring out all your semen as her wetness throbs and spills. Karina starts counting to three repeatedly and you laugh though your amusement quickly subsides when you feel her juices become more viscous and she continues her ride, even in the dying pulses of her climax.

“Was I good?” Karina asks.

Just a moment goes by before you mentally send her a screenshot of all the recordings being deleted. Karina hasn’t stopped fucking you yet so at least it wasn’t a ploy.

“Thank you, thank you, I love you.” The flexion of her pliant legs brings them all the way back to rest on top of your legs. Karina lays prone above you and finally give you a kiss. The citrusy flavor may be closer to lime than grapefruit but it’s been so long that you can’t remember which scent is which. Lips crash and her tongue lashes out at yours trying to establish dominance. Keep still to let her investigate your mouth while her pussy does the same to your shaft.

You savor the way Karina’s top emphasizes the bouncing of her tits synchronous with the rebounding of her waist on your cock, but your mouth waters when she frees them. Take the shortest moment to relish in the sight before Karina smothers you with her plump globes. You wriggle your face to try to breathe. Inhale, up and exhale, down, but all you inhale is the scent of her orbs’ sweat. Her hips undulate with a pace at least double yours breathing and the echoes of slapping flesh resonate throughout the air-filled chamber. The loudness is unlike any you’ve experienced in a long time. It’s almost a flashbang every time her ass slams into your lap, especially as you start to see white when orgasm threatens to overload you with preludial pulses.

The last words you hear infected ten million computers in 2000. Fade to black. Cut. You’re slammed out of existence back into existence as a sun rebirths both within you, heating your core to a dangerous high, and from your eyes, dazzling you in an unforgiving white light. In the throes of unconsciousness relapsing to consciousness back to tenebrosity, your streaks of semen suspend in the Aether like a dead tree resting from the wind. What flashes your mind in its orgasmic state are two things only you would remember, plants and weather. Your hyperventilation is unconscious but not unwelcome, as it’s the first time in a while your breaths were reflexive even in the liquid air. However, basking in your newfound power, you start to choke. Right. You breathe in and out again. In and out. In. Out. In. Out. Back in.

“Replaying KarinaArrestsYou.mp6.” A hint of vexatious glee in the system’s otherwise dry voice. You don’t stop for it.

✦✧✦✧✦✧

AFF, AO3

It’s pretty silly but the idea danced around in my head ever since I saw the absolute Black Mirror concept that SM had for aespa and I concur that Karina is insanely hot.

As I’m writing this, this Kurzgesagt video on the idea of a rogue Earth comes out and now I have to rewrite stuff to make it at least a little consistent. I’m obviously already going nuts with all these ridiculous sci-fi concepts but this video almost feels too targeted to me writing this for me to ignore it.

#kpop smut #aespa smut #male reader #reader insert #title tracks

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0aurelion-sol0 · 3 years

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Yo~

What's your opinion on the Will Byers DID theory? If you like it, which version do you like better? Both interpretations seem cool to me, though I personally like strangertheory's version better ^.^

Hi!

That's a very interesting question. I want to start by saying that I am a singlet, so I don't have DiD or OSDD. My knowledge of this condition is primarly known through medias I consume or some more "advanced" psychiatric documents or researches.

DiD is a condition that hasn't been always best represented or accurately represented since this condition varies from people who have it and so while there are similarities, the experience of it is very much unique and personal. It is also something that in a fictional setting with different genres, themes and tones is very hard to pull off or represent unless you go for the very realistic take on it.

It is bound to be, like many other things in fiction, dramatized. And speaking from a singlet perspective, who also had particular problems represented in fiction, I think it's okay as long as it's done right, in the setting, tone and genre it is in.

For example, we have today a lot more LGBTQ+ representation and like everything, unless you go for the fully realistic route, it's going to be simplified and dramatized. There's so many gender identities and sexual orientations today, you have to simplify it. And that goes for many other things that people care about in media, it has to be done right, but the writers still have a story to tell and unless that subject is the focus of the story, they're not gonna always spend their time talking about that. There is a story to tell.

Secondly, if it is the main focus of the story, that is where people have to do their research and really represent what they are talking about. Not some half-baked representation with dull arguments and points that come from a capitalist and conservative worldview. (Looking at you Disney.)

Now what you are referencing are @strangertheory 's and @kaypeace21 's theories which are about the show being about a DiD system where we see different alters evolving in said story with the host being Will Byers.

There is a lot of evidence pointing towards it, I'm gonna let you go see their posts and read it.

But their theories are very different in the way that they see the show portraying DiD, I have actually find quite a great way to describe the two takes.

@kaypeace21 's take is that elements of the DiD system have been externalised through science-"fictional" or supernatural means. Similar to Legion from the Marvel universe.

(David is a powerful mutant with DiD where each alters, if I remember correctly, has a different power or powers. (Which to this day is still one of the most BADASS thing I have ever come across though it must be quite terrifying for David.))

@strangertheory is an internalised POV on the DiD system existing in the show. She believes that what we are seeing right now is what is exclusively happening INSIDE the DiD system and that what we are experiencing is not our standard definition of the "real world". As in the physical world we all know. This would be in very vulgar terms happening inside Will's self, head, mind or brain. In a sense, it would be a more accurate representation of what DiD is about. A Shyamalan twist if you prefer.

(Though right now I don't have any word for word examples of such take, there is a show called MR.ROBOT that fits a bit of this description since there are moments in the show that we are seeing are only happening in the DiD system itself.

I recommend this show A LOT. It still is a bit dramatized but from what I know the DiD representation is quite accurate and pleased a lot of people with DiD. Also some people on the Stranger Things crew worked on that show.)

Now do I love the DiD theory ?

Heck yeah, I fucking love it! And with a big L! (Am I right "The First I love you?").

And I Love both of the takes and I think each one works at explaining the mysteries of this story. I even think that in some ways both could work well together.

I believe that DiD can be, without the meaning of being used, like many things a powerful storytelling "device" since it is connected to so many themes and other writing tools and is linked literally to the psyche, emotions and personalities of the characters.

I can understand why some people like both or one or respectfully and logically dislike both or one of the takes. But it is close to my belief about what the show is about or were even before I came into this fandom or on the internet, not as complex and thought out as the theory itself but pretty close in the overall themes and aspects of it.

(Though it bewilders me how much people lack imagination or are scared of such twist when I have seen so many of those types before whether it's done well or not, accurate or not.)

Now both @strangertheory and @kaypeace21 are intelligent people with very nuanced takes. And they had their fair share of completely unjust controversies coming from either rabbid ignorant shippers, far too sensible people or downright ignorant stupid people, most of the time 16 year olds. I am not saying that they are perfect, no one is, but the hate they have received is completely unjust.

And I am gonna lay it down right here, they are begging for an accurate representation here, they are not doing this because it just sounds cool and is edgy, they are actually wanting that The Duffers pull this off well. They would be very mad if they use all the imagery just to make it look cooler or scarier.

They are not bringer of truths, they are just like us. They are theorists, they believe in something that they think can explain the story they love and are experiencing. And so far, they have a pretty damn good track record.

They are analysing, dissecting the show because it's what they want to do and they believe in it and they believe the Duffers wants them to do that (I mean how come no one believes it when watching a show like that set in the 80's with so many references ?).

It is also supposed to be fun. Have fun for God's Sake! You can disagree with it but calling names and being disrespectful because somehow they don't agree with very basic, lazy and cliché theories (and no it's not being hypocrite, a lot of people barely do the work.) or are not on board with your creepy projection over the characters IS not okay.

And no, they aren't supporting p*d*philia as some people have claimed. How can you read these theories and come up to that conclusion ?

Most people haven't even read the DiD theory or have gone all the way through with it because they are lazy, easily bored people who don't have the time to just relax, process and think.

Stranger Things is not a kids show, some dumb teenage romance drama show with cool monsters! It's a very mature show, with real problems that are treated, out of which is trauma and mental health. Kids are killing people and even dying on this show. There is sexism, racism, abuse both physical and psychological.

It is a very mature and dark show. And you are being disrespectful to the Duffers when you say they are not that smart or that isn't that important. They are putting a lot of thoughts into this and the fact that no one really recognises this annoys me.

Or people only think it's important when it is only about the things they enjoy in the show. (Which is more hypocrite to me.) OR people are very stupid if they truly think that or are just jealous, bitter that two women have more imagination together and individualy than all of them or that person alone.

Color and costume choices, subtext, context, camera angles, directing, VFX, music, editing, sets, props, script, acting and editing are very important. All must be carefully done or you get very bad or generic stuff if you don't. If you love and you are passionate about the work, you put all the details you can into it.

And the Duffers and all the people working with them have already referenced those sort of things AND the practice of what we do on the internet. They are aware, they know because they have been in the same place too. They grew up with stories too, they made theories too whether it's on the internet or not.

At the end of the day, it is just a theory. An explanation of what is unfolding, may unfold or may have unfolded. I believe in it, I think it is reasonable, it has logic and it makes sense. It also has a lots of elements backing it up.

And the Duffers don't even have to go with DiD or mention it. Will creating some of the characters and supernatural events from his trauma is also similar and more accessible to the masses. But a Shyamalan twist can also work if it is done well.

And I am also open to other possibilities and theories, if they make sense and have enough elements IN THE SHOW and everything connected to it backing it up.

If the Duffers write something completely different but it is as good and also explains even better than this theory than I'll be okay. I love being wrong, it makes me learn new things and enhances the way I approach stories in the future.

If the Duffers only used this as some very inaccurate and disrespectful scary/abstract subtext without commiting to it. That is where I will have a problem.

Or write something completely incoherent with the rest of the show with a bad plot twist catering to the main public masses to sell the story even more and just make money so that they are safe with a fallacy of a work of fiction. Because they are cowards who didn't know how to manage themselves and baited entire audiences or listened to some crappy executive who didn't understand shit about the story. (wink wink, looking at a certain something...)

So yeah, I do love the DiD theory and both of it's takes and if it happens and is done right, with of course my perspective on the thing and PRIMARLY the perspective of people who have DiD or know a lot about it, I'll be pleased with it and I think it could be something very important for stories, people, the world and "art" in general.

Thank you for the question it was really fun! I hope I described the theory and the condition in the right way @kaypeace21 and @strangertheory and also the people who are concerned or know about it if I didn't let me know. Also, if you disagree with what I said, the way I said it or the subject itself let me also know IF it's respectful of course.

#stranger asks things #stranger asks #did theory #the did theory #will byers #will the wise #willel #stranger things

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