#Nihilist cipher

[askuprisingrottmnt]

Ö̶̧̢̮́L̴͚̑̍̏̔́́ ̷̟̯͎͉̭͕͌̂͘D̷̰̥̩̤̘̘́P̶̃͜S̸̘̙̙̳̎̇̊S̴͖̤͎͚̞̫̒̌̾̎̍͠ ̷̢̜͚͍̙̊Ȋ̷̺͔̟̣̺̍̈Y̷̢̘͂̋̀̓̚͝L̸̦̀͆̋Ḥ̸̔̚Ȑ̵̻͉̂.̶̡̜̪͌̓͛̚̕͝

♓︎❄︎ ♓︎💧︎ ⧫︎☟︎♏︎ ⚐︎■︎☹︎⍓︎ 🕈︎♋︎✡︎📬︎

37 55 65 68 77 58 68 65 53 78 79 65 58 66 57 65 69 78 67 35 38 47 94

Y̸̗͘ò̶͕̕u̷͈̒ ̵̠͐̐m̴͈͎̓̓u̶̗̿s̷͚͔̱̉̄͌t̵̳̾.̷̲̦̲̚ ̵̢͖͂͛͜I̵̞̚ẗ̷̢̬͙́̊ ̶̛͉͒̚ĩ̸͈̠͇s̴̳͋̐͐ṉ̶̃͐'̷̥͑͆ť̸̢̯ ̵̣̘͚̏̿̉ẗ̶̨͔̰́i̸̤͂ṁ̶̺̇e̸̦͓͛́̚,̴͓̄ ̴̧͆y̸̛̻̬̘̌̀ȇ̵̹͎̈́̃ṯ̷̹͒̐.̷̺̻͚͌̅̓ ̷̩͊Ì̴͚ ̶͇̟̫̏̒̀m̷̧̥͛̐ͅu̶͔̬͋͜s̴̥͊̏̄t̵̛͜ ̸͙̟͒̿c̵̢̩̎̃̏o̸̮͍͓͗ṋ̸̠͝͝v̷͚̘̏͒ë̸͈́̍̈ŕ̷̹̏ş̶̆̎e̶̤͚̣̊͋̀ ̵̦̺̌́͝ẁ̷̳͂̕ȉ̴͚͛̃t̵̮̓͑͛͜h̷̢̻̝͊ ̷̢͎͊m̵̙͙̌͝y̴͇͍̅ ̶̩̟̪̈́͛ḉ̴͂u̴̬̪͑͂̉ͅr̷̮͗̑͐r̴͚̀̚e̴͎̒ṋ̵̆͑͌t̵̟͎͈̃ ̴̼̟̿͂͒f̴͉̥͓͗̐̀o̵̫̾̏͝r̸͓̭̾̾m̵͛̀͑͜.̷̨̳͛̇

27 76 87 79 88 39 35 56 57 86 50

I̷̋̀͝ͅ ̷͎͍̇̄ą̴̻̲͂͆̚m̷̖̐̓͂ͅ ̸̡͍̜͊̏n̸͕̈́̈́͂ò̴͎̠ͅt̷̖͗͂͝.̶̼̻̋͠

[salivacitrus]

decoding perfect love's encoded messages

perfect love's code contains secret messages in a few different ciphers/codes. these messages are from the perspectives of milo's three forms, as well as text in plain english from eris. this post lists and decodes all these messages.

this is applicable to version 1.0 of the game. if there's any more added in future updates, i'll update this post.

the lines with scrambled letters are in caesar cipher, with the letter shifts varying between lines. these lines are from the perspective of pre milo.

the lines with strings of double digit numbers are in nihilist cipher, with alphabet abcdefghiklmnopqrstuvwxyz and keyword manipulation. these lines are from the perspective of manipulation milo.

the lines with strings of dots and dashes are in morse code. these lines are from the perspective of violence milo.

the lines in plain english are from the perspective of eris.

each encoded message has its decoded form directly below it in italics. decoded lines may be adjusted for readability.

script.rpy, lines 1-4. these lines are placed at the very beginning of the script's code, and are meant to hint at which codes are used for the encoded messages.

Oh my dear, it's such a Lowly sight, to be loved Indefinately without a clear Mind. The Middle child is crying he wants to be hAppy, the youNgest wants to be just lIke them in every way, the oldest wants to Protect with an Undying wish and the LAsT Is the type that ONly cares for themselves. It's cynical. He hurts and for what? What does he reMORSE over? Let's have some fun, shall we?

script.rpy, lines 7-10. these lines are placed right after the previously mentioned lines.

U vgef imzfqp eayazq fa omdq rad yq, eayqazq fa xahq yq. I just wanted someone* to care for me, someone to love me. 56 63 57 55 66 57 46 35 89 67 78 64 56 36 48 68 58 60 63 35 77 39 85 48 74 65 54 58 77 77 42 44 58 48 67 48 83 26 75 78 87 56 85 I will be just like them in every form and in every way. .. / .-- .. .-.. .-.. / .--. .-. --- - . -.-. - / - .... . -- / - --- / - .... .. -. -.- / --- - .... . .-. .-- .. ... . / .. ... / ..-. --- --- .-.. .. ... .... .-.-.- I will protect them, to think otherwise is foolish. Milo will love you, he has no choice.

*originally says "somone" when decoded. i assume this was a typo, so i changed it.

script.rpy, lines 90-93. these lines are placed after the setup for default configurations, and before the script code for the main menu.

X'b hd wpeen iwtn rwdht bt. I'm so happy they chose me. 76 34 48 78 46 87 46 43 98 46 68 47 43 55 56 48 68 70 55 24 55 57 67 67 76 53 48 35 48 68 55 24 55 57 67 67 76 32 44 48 66 66 65 53 55 67 49 46 66 44 47 58 77 69 42 43 77 58 78 56 56 44 55 They are my god, a thing* I cannot reach. I cannot fail for a second or I am nothing. .. / .--- ..- ... - / .-- .- -. - . -.. / - --- / -... . / ..- ... . ..-. ..- .-.. / .- -. -.. / .--. .-. --- ...- . / .. / -.-. --- ..- .-.. -.. / -.. --- / ... --- -- . - .... .. -. --. .-.-.- / .. / .-- .- -. - . -.. / - --- / -- .- -.- . / ... ..- .-. . / -.-- --- ..- / -.-. --- ..- .-.. -.. / -. . ...- . .-. / .... ..- .-. - .-.-.- I just wanted to be useful and prove I could do something. I wanted to make sure you could never hurt. It's unfortunate that you chose him.

*originally says "think" when decoded. i assume this was a typo, so i changed it.

script.rpy, lines 7675-7676. these lines are placed after the househusband ending.

.. .----. .-.. .-.. / -... . / -.-. .- --. . -.. / .... . .-. . / .-- .. - .... / -.-- --- ..- .-.-.- I'll be caged here with you. Strange, even as a clipped bird you aren't the one who is in a cage.

script.rpy, lines 7929-7930. these lines are placed after the walls ending.

67 42 48 35 78 60 45 45 77 68 57 44 76 26 65 39 59 76 62 25 78 35 67 87 76 34 57 57 57 66 65 53 98 58 79 57 63 42 55 48 86 60 85 45 89 56 88 56 47 22 75 68 59 66 85 45 89 35 77 58 64 26 57 55 66 67 55 62 59 78 68 78 64 65 48 75 50 87 85 55 67 48 67 55 56 56 76 68 56 79 73 65 78 69 Please don't hate me, I'll do anything for you. I'll give you my heart if you ask me, I'll give you my everything, just for you. What you thought was a failure was a success. Some things perhaps are better not seen.

script.rpy, lines 8162-8163. these lines are placed after the marriage ending.

56 54 66 68 59 89 66 53 59 68 78 87 76 34 48 76 46 99 85 45 89 66 49 87 47 33 64 48 79 89 46 53 87 48 67 65 56 44 48 48 78 78 75 35 88 76 68 66 46 26 75 45 80 76 75 34 55 68 86 48 55 22 84 39 79 68 74 22 76 39 66 44 74 36 67 57 50 56 44 34 78 68 57 48 74 Isn't it pretty, the way your eye glitters in mine? Isn't it wonderful that we have the same mark on each other? As long as we get to match forever more, it does not matter how you mark me.

script.rpy, lines 8355-8356. these lines are placed after the cannibal ending.

.. - / - .- ... - . ... / --. --- --- -.. --..-- / . ...- . .-. -.-- - .... .. -. --. / .. / -- .- -.- . / -.-- --- ..- .-.-.- / .. / .-- .. .-.. .-.. / . ...- . -. / .-.. . - / -- . / .-. .. .--. / -- . / - --- / ... .... .-. . -.. ... / .. ..-. / -.-- --- ..- / -.. . ... .. .-. . -.. / .- / - .- ... - . / --- ..-. / -- . .-.-.- It tastes good, everything I make you. I will even let you* rip me to shreds if you desired a taste of me. How noble of you. Do not worry, if I desire a taste of you, you will know.

*originally says "me" when decoded. i assume this was a typo, so i changed it.

script.rpy, lines 8537-8538. these lines are placed after the doll ending.

56 55 76 57 69 89 42 54 68 45 57 48 84 26 75 39 80 88 55 44 66 68 57 48 64 22 66 78 87 56 85 54 It's not as if he were using them anyways. The joints don't seem to work as well as they used to? That's too bad.

script.rpy, lines 8705-8706. these lines are placed after the killer ending.

- .... . -.-- / -.. . ... . .-. ...- . / .. - / -- --- .-. . / - .... .- -. / .- -. -.-- - .... .. -. --. .-.-.- They deserve it more than anything. It's a strange joy to watch others hurt. You understand, right?

script.rpy, lines 9192-9193. these lines are placed after the burning ending.

67 42 48 35 78 60 55 25 68 38 58 77 43 42 64 45 69 87 85 45 89 48 47 64 47 44 76 39 49 69 75 22 75 55 86 57 76 34 54 48 77 60 55 56 87 68 45 76 86 45 78 57 50 60 45 26 58 48 78 85 43 54 44 55 66 66 65 53 98 58 79 44 65 25 48 75 50 87 85 55 67 48 67 55 55 22 76 35 66 97 42 65 87 36 49 48 65 32 67 66 89 79 76 Please, I did it all for you. I cleansed it all with fire, just as you needed. It was all for you, and everything has always been for you. Oh? Just for me? You shouldn't have my love.

script.rpy, lines 9421-9422. these lines are placed after the kidnapping ending.

-.. --- . ... / .. - / .... ..- .-. - / -- -.-- / .-.. --- ...- . ..--.. / -... ..- - / - .... .. ... / . -..- .- -.-. - .-.. -.-- / .-- .... .- - / -.-- --- ..- / .-- .- -. - . -.. .-.-.- .-.-.- .-.-.- .- -. -.. / .. / .-- .. .-.. .-.. / --. .. ...- . / -.-- --- ..- / .-- .... .- - / -.-- --- ..- / .--. .-.. . .- ... . .-.-.- Does it hurt, my love? But this exactly what you wanted... and I will give you what you please. Aha... is that what you were worried about? Do not worry, my love. This little thing could never hurt me in the slightest.

sprite.rpy, lines 205-208. these lines are placed between the file location specifications for some true ending assets and character sprites.

A oadd twugew ozsl A zsnw lg sfv escw lzwe zshhq. I will become what I have to and make them happy. 88 46 53 73 88 82 46 70 79 74 84 74 50 60 76 44 96 83 79 46 68 64 63 64 50 47 82 64 65 66 75 60 76 44 76 84 48 66 86 54 57 106 66 38 77 55 63 83 70 27 86 63 75 92 59 68 59 74 83 66 58 47 64 73 88 83* When they look at me with disdain, I can't help but cry. I did something wrong, didn't I? .-- .... . -. / - .... . -.-- / -.-- . .-.. .-.. / .- - / -- . --..-- / .. / -.-. .- -. .----. - / .... . .-.. .--. / -... ..- - / ..-. .-.. .. -. -.-. .... .-.-.- / - .... . / -.-. --- .-.. .-.. .- .-. / - .... . -.-- / .... .- ...- . / --- -. / -- . / .. ... / - --- --- / ... - .-. --- -. --. .-.-.- When they yell at me, I can't help but flinch. The collar they have on me is too strong. So meek and malleable - it's been a while since you found someone with such a lack of spine.

*this line uses alphabet zebrascdfghiklmnopqtuvwxy instead of abcdefghiklmnopqrstuvwxyz, and is the only one to do so. i assume this was a consistency error.

sprite.rpy, lines 1640-1643. these lines are placed between the file location specifications for character sprites and background images.

U'y eaddk rad xaawuzs mf kag rday mrmd, U'y eaddk ftmf kag tmp fa emhq yq. Oagxpz'f U tmhq nqqz efdazsqd? Bxqmeq paz'f xqmhq yq. I'm sorry for looking at you from afar, I'm sorry that you had to save me. Couldn't I have been stronger? Please don't leave me. 55 45 85 37 69 90 62 25 68 47 45 84 47 23 48 39 68 56 64 65 88 47 58 66 54 63 57 68 58 79 76 55 98 58 79 57 84 22 76 57 69 89 54 35 77 46 46 48 53 45 75 39 How could I have been anything without you? I was nothing before. .. / .-- .- -. - / - .... . -- / -- --- .-. . / - .... .- -. / .- -. -.-- - .... .. -. --. --..-- / .-- .... -.-- / -.-. .- -. .----. - / - .... . -.-- / ... . . / - .... .- - ..--.. / .-- --- -. .----. - / .. / -.. . ... - .-. --- -.-- / . ...- . .-. -.-- - .... .. -. --. / . ...- . -. / -- -.-- ... . .-.. ..-. / ..-. --- .-. / - .... . -- ..--.. I want them more than anything, why can't they see that? Won't I destroy everything, even myself, for them? But HE was the one who was seeking you. HE was the one who wanted to be with you.

sprite.rpy, lines 2655-2658. these lines are placed between the file location specifications for some true ending assets and code for image transforms.

Sjsb hvciuv W ybck kvoh mci rwr hc as, W kwzz ghwzz zcjs mci psqoigs mci aors as kvczs. Even though I know what you did to me, I will still love you because you made me whole. 56 54 56 58 80 76 45 44 88 47 45 84 47 53 78 57 46 97 42 65 55 45 78 48 74 63 56 35 79 68 46 55 78 55 48 65 47 I shouldn't have run away after what he told me. .. / ... .... --- ..- .-.. -.. / .... .- ...- . / -... . . -. / ... - .-. --- -. --. . .-. --..-- / .. .----. -- / ... --- / .-- . .- -.- .-.-.- / .. / -.. --- -. .----. - / -.. . ... . .-. ...- . / - --- / -... . / .-- .. - .... / -.-- --- ..- .-.-.- I should have been stronger, I'm so weak. I don't deserve to be with you. So really... isn't it just his fault?

that is all that i could find.

[crusaderguy]

Voices that I think are suitable for some versions of Godzilla.

Imma be real with you all, most of the Godzillas would be sharing the same voice, I just didn't feel like using the same character more than once. Also Killer Croc and Hellboy aren't just KingGoji and SoshingekiGoji, they're supposed to be Showa Godzilla as a whole, Killer Croc being 1955-1964, and Hellboy being 1965-1975. A few other things I would like to say, I don't imagine Shin Godzilla having a voice at all, MireGoji, GiraGoji, and KiryuGoji, don't have independent voices yet, Godzilla from the animated series would most likely have a Spider-Man voice claim, ToraGoji would have both a male and female voice claim because officially the 1998 version of Godzilla is male but I like to think of her as female, I still don't have any voices in mind for Hanna Barbera Godzilla, Godzilla Ultima, Marvel Godzilla, Gemstone Godzilla, and Minus 1 Godzilla. As for other Kaiju, I like to think of Anguirus having the same voice as the Grunts from Halo because Anguirus just gives me silly little guy vibes, I like that everyone agrees that Kong is Kratos so now I feel that that any version of Kong before GvK is young Kratos and I'm just thinking about the whole Kendrick meme, Kiryu would be Robocop, Heisei Mechagodzilla would be Liberty Prime, the first Showa Mechagodzilla would be Frank Horrigan but after Quazies' Terror of Mechagodzilla animation, I couldn't decide whether I want the nihilistic killer or alcoholic robot so the second Showa Mechagodzilla is Bender from Futurama. I was thinking about Monster X having an Arbiter voice claim but now I think Darth Vader works better, Megalon is either Bane from the Harley Quinn show, Patrick Star, or Demoman from TF2, I'm still not sure for Gemstone Megalon, Millennium Mothra and Monsterverse Mothra are both Jade from the HBO Spawn series but I also see Monsterverse Mothra as Cortana, Gigan is currently just Slipstream from Transformers Animated because I have decided that Gigan is a girl and you can't stop me but I still need a male alternative because Gigan is a canonically a dude sooo...¯\_(ツ)_/¯, Orga would be Shockwave from Transformers Prime, Destoroyah would probably be Kano from Mortal Kombat 2021 or TF2 Sniper because for some odd reason I imagine Destoroyah being Australian, as for King Ghidorah...idk Showa Ghidorah is Megatron from Beast Wars and Ni might be Bill Cipher but still not sure. Damn, here my ass making a whole paragraph, I'm not even onto something, I'm just yapping, why couldn't I put this much energy in school? Anyway feel free to tell me what voices y'all think are suitable for Godzilla and the rest of the Kaiju, maybe give me a few recommendations on some voice claims or something, idk dawg did I cook here or did I burn down the whole kitchen?

[veliseraptor]

Psst top Wheel of Time ships and characters? (Also can I ask for any of your thoughts on Nynaeve?)

I should do a whole separate post on Nynaeve honestly but suffice it to say for this one that I love her very very much, didn't appreciate her nearly enough on my first read but appreciate her more every reread since.

since I love lists, here's a couple lists for you

CHARACTERS

Rand al'Thor. I don't usually latch onto protagonists but when I do they're depressed and a mess! And that's Rand for you. I really appreciate the way that Jordan plays with the Chosen One archetype specifically by looking at the damage it does/can do to a person, and the way that Rand is gradually wrecked by the weight of prophecy and expectation such that the only way to escape it, in the end, is to become not himself. Whatever my feelings about his ending (not entirely positive), I think there's a very painful and poignant statement in there.

Ishamael/Moridin/Elan Morin Tedronai. Who doesn't love a fatalistic villain longing for oblivion and believing that serving evil is the only way to get it! I'm sure that's universal. I wrote sort of a character study of him and I think personally it is one of my underappreciated fics. Couldn't say why, I don't know how this isn't a subject that everyone is clamoring to read.

Min Farshaw. My beloved since the first time I read the series and I don't think it's just because she had short hair like me, though that's probably part of it. I think I just enjoy the way she thinks, her narration, the way she's simultaneously deeply caring and a little bit snarky, the way that she interacts with fate and inevitability. I don't know, I struggle to articulate it. I just know that I loved her first as a character and I still love her.

Tuon (Fortuona) Athaem Kore Paendrag. My problematic fave (other than, I guess, the aforementioned nihilistic actual antagonist). I just...she's fascinating. She's a cipher. She's the embodiment of an evil empire and absolutely going to oversee its downfall. She craves absolute control and copes poorly with not having it. Her dynamic with Mat is my favorite relationship in the series. What a gal.

Nynaeve al'Vere. In contrast to Min, I didn't appreciate Nynaeve enough on early reads (I didn't dislike her, I just didn't appreciate her enough), but that's thoroughly changed and at this point I do think she's one of my favorite characters. She's so contradictory and an unreliable narrator but in a very particular way that I feel like I don't run into very often. She's so much fun to read about, and also trying so hard to prove herself, and so determined to help people (even when they maybe don't want to be helped). She's a healer first and foremost and never loses sight of that, or of her resolve to protect her people. What a gal. But in a very different way than the above.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Mat Cauthon and Aviendha.

SHIPS

Mat/Tuon. I said their dynamic was my favorite in the series and I meant it. They have such a good courtship, the way they dance around each other and play off each other and play their relationship like a game of strategy is so much fun for me.

Rand/Min. If Min was my first favorite character then Rand/Min was my first OTP (and incidentally the first pairing I wrote porn for!). I think my favorite thing about them is the way that they're friends, or feel like it, in a way that Rand doesn't always feel like friends with the other ladies. Sometimes I appreciate that in a pairing. They just seem like they enjoy each other's company even outside of the romantic aspect, and I love that for them.

Aviendha/Elayne. Welcome to the gayest ostensibly sister relationship in the whole series!!!! No honestly though on reread I was like "how is this not explicitly a thing, I mean, I know why, but Jordan you've established some people are gay in this universe and you have Aviendha lovingly describing Elayne's naked body and, again, the gayest sister-making ceremony I've read, and tell me that they're not totally and completely, romantically and sexually, in love? Fie, I say. Lies and foolishness. They're in love and they're so valid for it.

Nynaeve & Rand. Sneaking an & ship on here! Especially as the series goes on, their relationship is soooo important to me. There's a short list of people who care about Rand-as-Rand with no ulterior motives beyond that, and Nynaeve is near the top of that list. And I love, too, that their dynamic isn't romantic in the least.

Tuon/Egwene. @highladyluck pretty much single-handedly sold me on this one and I'm so glad she did. Absolutely brilliant and galaxy brained. Egwene should've lived just so she and Tuon could have a hideously complicated enemyship. The missed opportunities.

BONUS: Rand/Min/Morshamael Tedronai.

[perfectlovevn]

hi boss! absolutely loved Perfect Love and you did such an amazing job with the entire game's execution! i loved how you were able to so clearly portray eris as f-ked up and the main instigator for everything, pulling the strings behind the scenes instead of the usual "i didnt do anything wrong" or "im just trying to survive" type of MC (which isnt bad at all, but im so happy with the freshness and utter depravity eris brings) i love your art and the intentionally messy style that highlights the disorganisation and chaos in both eris' and milo's mind, the recurring motifs of eyes, red, blue, god i can go on and on. really your vn is so well crafted with how intentional every creative decision taken seems, im going crazy with the amount of love, time and effort you put into perfect love.

ive read every single name easter egg you put and the references to other yandere vns/media (jd <3) AND went on to give us more with adding little quips later in the game depending on the nickname eris gives milo. i was literally going crazy with how i couldnt decode the 2nd type of cipher you scattered throughout the code until 2 days later when i was ready to give up and ask you hahaha

from there, if it isnt too spoilerish, is there reason you used the nihilist cipher that removed the letter J instead of the usual Z ? and ! i loved the snippets with the friendship gang, tysm for leaving in your writing process and brainstorming products in the game files i had so much fun <3 im so sorry for the rant and thank you so much for the game! 1000% looking forward to your next one if youre working on something!

Hello! Thank you for your kind words!

Yeah, one of the main reasons I made Eris like that because because of how much I really wanted to see more evil MC in visual novels (or just yandere media in general). While there isn't anything wrong with having a yandere who is just there to survive, there is something very fun about being the one who causes the yandere to become worse than he initially was.

I'm glad that you found such meaning in the art style! Honestly the biggest reason I drew it like that was because I was trying to get it done for the 2023 yanjam and I didn't want to overwhelm myself so I just made mostly everything black and white. That and it's supposed to symbolize more of the darker aspects of the game. Did you know all my assets were drawn with one brush?

Thank you so much! I hope you enjoy the details because I really did try to put as much as I could in there. Since I think it would be fun for people to see the neat details people put in the game (I know I sure do when I play visual novels), I tried to make everything very catered to what was going on in the story. It did take some extra work, but I think it's good for the game and my general learning experience. I'm also glad you enjoyed the easter eggs I put in for names and nicknames. I was very sleep deprived when I did it and I kept adding them in because I don't have good attention span (or at least, that's part of the reason).

For the cyphers inside of the code, I put a hint at the very top relating to each of the code. Each of the four types is represented of the three Milos with the one in English being from Eris. The Nhilist cypher is specifically for Manipulation and the key is in the second line based off of the capitalized letters.

Yeah! I'm glad you liked it. I'm still in the middle of writing the other ones (I'm working on the one with Poison in it, which recounts what Eris did to get Poison to fight Violent in his route). I always like leaving my drafts in there because I always find it fun to see people's thought progress in code and games.

No, no, I love your rant on it! I think it's really fun seeing what other people like, dislike and thought about the game in general! My next game will be a lot more light hearted, but still have a yandere character in it.

[hashed-potatoes-with-salt]

An Overview of The Nihilist Cipher

Hello! If you're someone interested in ciphers, read ahead to learn a little about one of my long time favorite ciphers, the Nihilist Cipher.

The Nihilist cipher is a polyalphabetic substitution cipher, which basically means it relies on multiple shift ciphers applied to different letters in the text being encoded. If you're familiar with the Vigenère Cipher, Nihilist is pretty similar in a lot of ways.

I'll go through some history of the cipher, how to encode/decode using it, and how to conduct a known plaintext attack on it. I'll also go over how you might approach attacking it without a known plaintext (mainly because I think it's cool), but it won't be the main focus.

History

The Nihilist Cipher was first used by Russian nihilists against Russia's tsarist regime in the late 19th century. It's since been used as a basis for several ciphers with improved security used in WWII, notably the VIC cipher which is essentially an extremely complex hand-encoded cipher that's part of the Nihilist family.

"If [the VIC] cipher were to be given a technical name, it would be known as a 'straddling bipartite monoalphabetic substitution superenciphered by modified double transposition.'" David Kahn, Number One From Moscow

Usage

Encoding a message requires two things: A key and a Polybius square, known by you and the person you're communicating with. A Polybius square is one of these guys:

To use the cipher, you must first convert the plaintext into a numeric representation by mapping each letter to a number using the square. The mapping follows a (row, column) scheme, so the letter 'T' in the above square would become '45'. You'll notice that the square is 5x5, meaning there is 1 less square than there are letters in the English alphabet! This is typically solved by either choosing a square to represent 2 letters, differentiated using context by the receiver, or by simply leaving off an unused/infrequently used letter (often Q). It's also common to place a word at the start of the Polybius square, in this case "EXAMPLE" to offset the alphabet and avoid the mappings becoming trivial and obvious to attackers.

After we convert the plaintext to it's numeric representation, that's when the key becomes important. We first encode the key we picked using the Polybius square (i.e. the key MATH would become 14 13 45 32). Then, we repeat the key along the plaintext, and add each plaintext value to the key value to get the ciphertext!

To decode, the receiver must simply repeat the encryption process in reverse: repeating the key across the ciphertext, subtracting the key values, and translating the numeric plaintext back into English text. Because the encryption and decryption processes use the same key, the Nihilist Cipher is considered symmetric.

Known Plaintext Attack

Now we get into the fun part: How can we decode Nihilist encoded text without knowing the key? We will assume we know some ciphertext and the plaintext associated with it. Therefore, our goal is to use what we know to reveal the key, and use the key to decrypt the rest of the cipher. For example, assume we know that the first line of the Bee Movie script, "According to all known laws of aviation", results in the ciphertext "37 66 67 64 35 68 48 53 75 66 57 66 56 84 84 32 57 95 25 84 66 73 36 86 45 65 94 55 37 88 48 85 54".

Since the ciphertext is simply the result of adding the key to the plaintext, to find the key we only need to do the reverse and subtract the plaintext from the ciphertext!

Even with only this short segment, we can see the repeating key is "14 42 43 21 14 43". Now we can repeat this key across the whole message and decrypt the Bee Movie script into numeric encoded plaintext.

At this point, you might be realizing where the next challenge lies. Unless you happen to be in a situation where you don't know the key yet somehow do know the Polybius square, this alone doesn't tell us very much! Since we've essentially converted our original problem into a simple substitution cipher, this is where we employ frequency analysis to figure out which number maps to which letter in the Polybius square. If you're up for a challenge you can do this manually, or use an online tool to analyze the frequency of each number and compare it to how often each letter of the English alphabet appears in typical text. Eventually, you'll be able to decode the Polybius square as the square below.

Ironically, the first snippet of The Bee Movie which we knew the plaintext of includes no 'E's, which are the most frequent letter in the English language, but letter frequencies of the full text would end up being much closer to the expected letter proportions.

Congratulations! You've now completed a plaintext attack on the Nihilist cipher and can sit down with a cup of tea for a bit of light reading .

Ciphertext-Only Attack

Now maybe that was too easy for you. Maybe you're a pro cipher-cracker, and you want to decode the Nihilist cipher without some "plaintext crutch". Here's how you can try to approach it! This method will need a large amount of ciphertext available, and relies on statistical analysis, plus some exploitation of the cipher's design to crack it.

The majority of this attack follows the same approach as a statistical attack on the Vigenère cipher. First you determine the key length by testing various key lengths, splitting the text up into groups that would be encoded with the same key, and computing the index of coincidence, which will be high (close to 0.068, the index of coincidence of English text) when the guessed key length is correct.

At this point, if this were the Vigenère cipher, we would have to go on to analyze the mutual index of coincidence between groups of ciphertext characters with the same key shifted by various amounts, but flaws in the Nihilist encoding system mean there's a good chance we can identify the key without this step!

Because of the way the Polybius square is set up, and the lack of modular arithmetic in the encoding method, every key letter value has exactly 25 possible ciphertext numbers that can result from that key. By comparing the ciphertext values encoded with the same shift, we can quickly identify or at least significantly narrow down the shift used to obtain those values! There are even a few cipher text values that immediately reveal what key was used to generate that cipher text (For example, a cipher text value of 30 can only be obtained using key=15). For a full list of possible ciphertext values generated by each key, check out this document I put together.

And that's it!

You are now a certified expert in all things Nihilist cipher. Go forth and use your new skill responsibly, leaving behind cryptic messages everywhere you go.

Happy decoding!

Sources:

https://www.cia.gov/resources/csi/static/Number-One-From-Moscow.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VIC_cipher

https://cyberw1ng.medium.com/nihilist-cipher-an-in-depth-look-at-the-cryptographic-technique-2023-b05b83551957

https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse163/20wi/files/lectures/L04/bee-movie.txt

[mysteryverse6]

Now it's the team's turn. The Interstellar Travelers, also called the "Space Idiots," are a gang of interdimensional criminals/renegades who band together to protect certain dimensions or galaxies from planetary/galactic threats.

Although they tend to do "rescue" on a more destructive scale, given their very contrasting personalities. So, ironically, the planet or dimension usually requires them to save, perhaps more than the enemy that threatens them.

Even though the six of them banded together to roam the universe and explore different dimensions while protecting them from major threats, they didn't do it quite like any normal group. Their formation happened by accident when Rick and Morty stumbled upon Ford some time after he was sucked through the Universe Portal. Marvin had been taken by Rick some time before they encountered Ford, during a raid on the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation. It was then that they encountered Star Butterfly, who was pursuing Ludo and his villains, only to end up losing them after they distracted her by stumbling upon a planet inhabited by hostile alien beasts.

However, Sans had a rather hostile confrontation, mainly with Rick and Ford. The reason being that Rick's violent and drunken behavior caused him to cause several destructive chain reactions in the space-time continuum. As for Stanford, his recklessness allowed Bill Cipher to access the material plane, something Sans had been trying to prevent long before Stanford learned of Bill. Only then were the six forced to band together to escape and fight the Vogons, who were mainly out for Rick's blood.

Ford Pines - soul yellow justice wizard (Also known as The Author, he is a paranormal investigator who came to Gravity Falls, Oregon to investigate the large concentration of supernatural activity in and around the town. He is the twin brother of Stanley Pines.During his time in Gravity Falls, Ford spent years cataloging his research in a series of journals, before eventually disappearing into an alternate dimension. His journals remained as the only evidence of his existence. Although initially believed to be stuck in one dimension, it was revealed that Ford had traveled through multiple dimensions with his close colleague Rick Sanchez to find a way to return to his home dimension, eventually becoming part of a group called the Interstellar Voyagers.Personality:He is an intellectual and is considered to be an introvert and a nerd, enjoying games that require a high level of thinking. He would even go so far as to ignore the dangers of his research just to play such games. Despite his intelligence, he is very simple-minded when it comes to his own dimension, as he has not set foot there in thirty years. He has no clue about modern technology, as he believes floppy disks are still in use, and was not too bothered about giving children guns. Despite his great intelligence, Ford has shown himself to be very narcissistic and self-centered. This is evident in his reluctance to give up his life's work and share his scientific achievements with those close to him, instead enjoying the image of a lone hero. However, he genuinely enjoys his research, even in the face of danger. His years of research into the paranormal both in and outside of his field have made Ford a strong, courageous man who will bravely face danger to keep the world safe.)

Rick Sanchez soul violet perseverance sorcerer (Rick Sanchez is a genius scientist whose alcoholism and reckless, nihilistic behavior are a source of concern for his daughter's family, as well as the safety of their son, Morty.Rick was also best friends with Stanley Pines in high school and Stanford Pines in college, although he would confuse Stanford with Stanley on numerous occasions thinking that Stanley decided to become smart in order to be an intelligent jerk like Rick. Rick is also close acquaintances to Sans, though due to Sans being a moderator, the two can come off as bitter to each other sometimes. Rick is, reluctantly, part of the Interstellar Hikers.Personality:Rick is a genius scientist, capable of creating complex scientific inventions, including brain-enhancing helmets, dream-invading devices, portals to several different dimensions, and the world's first amusement park inside the body of a living human. His brilliance can be muddled by his jaded personal views and his alcoholic tendencies. Rick is easily bored and does not do well with routine. He regularly goes to other dimensions to harvest resources and will often willingly kill aliens to get them. He is willing to be extremely brutal, such as when people betray him or his life or those close to him are danger. He is usually portrayed as homicidal and having a large disregard for life, enough that he came close to bombing the world with neutrinos while drunk. Despite this, he is not completely heartless as he genuinely cares for those close to him, such as Stanley and Ford, along with their family and his own. He also, despite their differences, cares for Sans to such an extent that he ran to his side in fear and concern when the latter was fatally wounded. He especially cares for his grandson Morty, despite his possessive and dominating nature over him.)

Morty Smith soul green kindness ranger (Mortimer "Morty" Smith is the fourteen year old grandson of Rick Sanchez. He is often forced to tag along on his various misadventures. Morty attends Harry Herpson High School along with his sister, Summer. He is the love interest to Tina Belcher. He is a member of Mystery Kids Japan.Morty has shown to be quite cowardly, although this does not hinder his ability to help those in need, as he knows that despite the dangers, nothing would be worse than seeing those he cares about getting in harm's way because of his own fears. Morty is also part of the Interstellar Hikers although, mainly due to the fact that he accompanies his grandfather.Personality:Morty is a young, good-natured, and impressionable boy who can be somewhat easily manipulated. He has been described as 'challenged' and has difficulty in school. He also has a pronounced stutter. Despite his apparent lack of intellect, Morty has shown to be a good listener and follows directions well. These traits make him the perfect sidekick to Rick and other people as well. Morty may sometimes act spineless, but he has shown bravery and quick-wittedness in the face of adversity and is also quite responsible for his age. Despite his malleable nature, Morty has the strength to be able to stand up to Rick and is able to gather enough confidence and strength to face other beings who want to kill him.)

Marvin warlock (Marvin, more fully known as Marvin the Paranoid Android, is a robot manufactured by the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation and commissioned by the super computer known as Deep Thought. He is equipped with "Genuine People Personalities" (GPP) technology which is designed to make him more like a person. His predecessor is GLaDOS. He accompanies Rick and Morty along their various adventures and eventually becomes part of a group known as the Interstellar Hikers. Marvin is widely regarded as among the most intelligent beings in the universe, if not the most intelligent.Personality:Marvin is a severely depressed robot. He's regularly so depressed that, when he gets bored and talks to other computers, they commit suicide and die. This is due to the "Genuine People Personality" he received while he was being manufactured by the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation. Being a robot, he still does what he's told (he won't enjoy it, nor will he let you forget it, but he'll do it anyway), though he'd much rather sulk in a corner by himself. Marvin continually says that his brain is the size of a planet (in fact because of this, he is eternally bored because nothing takes up his entire mind), enabling him to calculate the probability of just about anything. Marvin claims he is 50,000 times more intelligent than a human, and Rick states that he is 30 billion times more intelligent than a live mattress, though this is, if anything, a vast underestimation. However, when he bothers to share the fruit of his mental labors with those around him, they tend to ignore him because he usually just ends up depressing them. Due to being very depressed, Marvin has an incredibly difficult time displaying other genuine emotions and is even incapable of returning affectionate physical contact like hugs. However, over the course of the series, Marvin was slowly beginning to understand such concepts and even return them albeit on a small scale. But the most prominent display of genuine emotion and affection was during his supposed death in when he saved Star from a Time Bomb that threatened to age everything into dust, he pulled her into a tender embrace and patted her back to comfort her, something that Star herself was actually teaching him before this.)

Star Butterfly soul yellow justice sorcerer (Star Butterfly is a teenage princess of the kingdom of Mewni which is located in another dimension rather than on Earth. She was sent to Earth by her parents in order to learn how to properly use her magic wand.While not a member of the Mystery Kids, she does serve as one of their closest allies, as she is especially close to Mabel Pines and Papyrus with the three having become best friends and see each other as kindred spirits; Star though considers Mabel her "young" best friend on Earth given that she already has one her age, with Papyrus being her best monster friend.She is a great asset to the team given that she aids them in matters that involve traveling through other dimensions and dealing threats that are on a cosmic level. She is also a member of the Interstellar Hikers. Personal:Star is very energetic and friendly. She loves having fun and usually has an optimistic outlook on life. She loves to help others and whenever she sees that someone is upset, she does her best to cheer them up. Strangers, in her eyes, are just friends she has not met yet, and she feels bad if she hurts someone's feelings, whether intentionally or not.Star has a happy-go-lucky attitude and always tries to put a smile on everyone's faces. She also works very hard towards her goals, so much so that she will sometimes end up greatly sleep-deprived. While rarely ever angry, she does express annoyance towards people who do not take her seriously or give her the attention she wants.Although she treats her friends kindly and rarely holds grudges against them, she is usually brutal towards her enemies and is very protective of her friends. As time progresses, Star becomes less prone to resorting to magic to fix a situation, and she shows a willingness to become stronger and more serious and not run away from her problems, despite this sometimes resulting in her underestimating her enemies. After Toffee's defeat, she decides to focus on becoming a better princess and starts to act more serious and mature as a result.)

Wilson Higgsbury soul turquoise patience ranger (Wilson Percival Higgsbury is a genius yet witty wannabe scientist who worked alongside Stanford Pines and Fiddleford "Old Man" McGucket on the dimensional portal that inadvertently sent Stanford across the multiverse. It is revealed that Wilson was, in fact, the first victim to fall into the portal, a mistake which haunts both Ford and McGucket to this day, considering that Wilson was a close friend of the two.Personality: Wilson is known as the "Gentleman Scientist" and has a personality to back up the title. He is portrayed as a calm, easy-going man. He talks much like a stereotypical scientist, with dialogue requiring a good command of the English language to fully understand. For a scientist, Wilson is also quite witty as he can throw quips and one-liners even in the midst of intellectual sentences.Wilson is shown to be very dedicated to his work, as he will do everything necessary in order for his experiment to be a success, even if it means going so far as to make a deal with a demonic being. This also showed that Wilson was rather hungry for knowledge, so much so that he would even obtain secret and forbidden knowledge without giving second thoughts to the consequences of his actions. To him, knowledge is everything, and he believed that there is no greater power than the power of the mind.According to Ford, Wilson lived in isolation almost all his life and survived purely by his quick thinking, leading him to believe that with intelligence, one can survive anything. On the one hand, it is speculated that due to his harsh lifestyle in the past, Wilson is also trying to keep not only himself but everyone else around him safe. This also makes Wilson a brave individual as he is able to confront and even combat the many hostile creatures that lurk in the World.)

Zaphod Beeblebrox soul violet perseverance orange bravery sorcerer (Zaphod Beeblebrox, or the Big Z, was the former President of the Galaxy. He was born on the fifth planet of Betelgeuse and is revealed to be a "semi-half-cousin" of Rick Sanchez, with whom he "shares three of the same mothers". Because of "an accident with a contraceptive and a time machine", his direct ancestors from his father are also his direct descendants.Personality: Zaphod is described as being clever, imaginative, irresponsible, untrustworthy, extroverted, and "nothing you couldn't have guessed." He is also hedonistic and narcissistic almost to the point of solipsism, and often extremely insensitive to the feelings of those around him. And seeing such traits of his character, it would make sense as to how he is Rick's semi-half cousin. Nevertheless, he is shown to be quite charismatic which causes many characters to ignore his other flaws.Despite being clever and devious, there are times where Zaphod can be quite immature, acting very eager about everything, eating messily with his hands, throwing temper tantrums, and doing things without reason, in other people's perspective at least as to him he knows exactly what he is doing which often to leads to disastrous albeit successful results, though the success of these outcomes from his outlandish behavior tends to be at a minimum which very nearly puts him and other people in jeopardy.)

Simon Petrikov soul blue integrity warlock (Initially depicted as a two-dimensional, humorously over-the-top villain who regularly attempted to kidnap Princess Bubblegum and other princesses, the character's personality was later expanded, revealing him as a kind-hearted but misunderstood old man with a completely warped sense of morality and social behavior, suffering from loneliness and memory loss. Later seasons expand on his tragic backstory, revealing that he was once a good man named Simon Petrikov, who lost his mind, memories, and loved ones to a magical crown that gave him his ice powers. In "Come Along With Me" the Ice King returns to Simon forever after he was almost eaten by GOLB but something happens that is unexplainable as the whole world starts to collapse and he wakes up in an empty space and then some strange man with two scars appears and he explains that he works for Retconn who are responsible for the disappearance of the world of uuu and the multiverse and he offers to make a choice, either to move who has already become the Ice King but has regained his memory and appearance thanks to Finn and Jake but Betty will not remember him and they can start over or go back to how it was and Simon chose the first and woke up in his home MarcelinePersonality

Simon is known for his intelligence, kindness, and self-sacrifice. From information given in "Holly Jolly Secrets Part II", Simon was a deeply devoted and loving fiancé (to Betty). He proved to be a similarly watchful guardian to young Marceline during the aftermath of the Mushroom War. Even when they were in great danger, Simon tried his best to make Marceline happy and helped her always see the best in their situation. He took on a very responsible role in Marceline's life, not only protecting her and keeping her healthy, but also teaching her right from wrong and keeping her spirits high (as shown in "Simon & Marcy"). Simon is generally known for his optimism even in the worst of times, and this is obviously one of Simon's most notable qualities. Even when burdened with great burdens, Simon fought through an apocalyptic world while fighting the all-powerful influence of Icecrown. Some of Simon's deepest thoughts and fears about his inevitable descent into madness were revealed in the messages left for Marceline, revealed in "I Remember You". Simon was tormented by the fact that he had abandoned Marceline in a dangerous world due to his deteriorating sanity. However, Simon, nearing the very end of his humanity, feared for his own life, worried that when the crown took him away from Marceline, no one would be able to "save him". His vulnerability as a human was most evident just before he permanently became the Ice King. In "Come Along with Me", his optimism and courage are shown when he comforts Finn, wisely telling him that no one gets to choose how they "go" or die, and at least they were together before they were saved.While Simon shares these traits, the Ice King's personality is the complete opposite. While (in earlier episodes) the Ice King was portrayed as unpleasant and short-tempered due to his main antagonist role, he is merely a nuisance and "usually not a serious threat", according to Princess Bubblegum.In later episodes, since he is no longer the main antagonist, he is portrayed as more good-natured and humorous, particularly due to the Ice King considering Finn and Jake his "friends" after the events of "What Have You Done?".The Ice King is misunderstood, lonely, and only hopes to marry the princess. Cosmic Owl has called him a "sociopath", although his personality is more similar to someone with narcissistic personality disorder, as he still feels humiliation and guilt. Due to his poor social skills, persistent short attention span, and arrogant nature, the Ice King fails to attract any of his prisoners and often resorts to forced marriage instead of the loving relationships he desires. However, he can be a loving and selfless person, as shown in "The Princess Monster Wife". Aside from Gunther, his other penguin guards, and numerous ice creatures, the Ice King has few other friends and expresses a constant eagerness to spend time with anyone who will tolerate his company, especially his frenemies, Finn and Jake. In the episode "Eyes", he takes the form of a horse to spy on Finn and Jake and try to learn how to be happy, but this too fails.)

V1 soul orange bravery sorcerer (V1 is a Supreme Machine (most likely), left to roam the Earth after the extinction of mankind, and the player character of ULTRAKILL. Like other machines, it fights in Hell for its own desperate survival after blood ran out on the surface, slaying all manner of husks, demons, angels, and other machines in order to sustain itself with the blood they shed.)

[emo-crowgirl]

I got a hint ln the GT reddit

"The cipher is twofold, two diferent methods"

Can you try the polybius cipher again and post the results?

A Polybius Cipher doesn’t seem to give any answer at all. Same goes for a nihilist cipher, which is a variant of a Polybius Cipher.

The problem is Polybius Ciphers use a 5 by 5 grid, so 11 is A for example. However, the QnA code has the number 20 showing up a lot, and at least from what I’ve tried, 0s just aren’t applicable with the grid of a polybius square, which starts at 1 and 1 without being able to go lower.

Messing with the grid also doesn’t help because the number 25 also shows up, so if you lower the numbers of the grid (2 becomes 1, 1 becomes 0, A becomes 00, etc) to make it the 20 fit, now the 5 is too high up to fit into the grid.

The Polybius Cipher simply doesn’t have an output. Or at least not one that’s fully translated or useable.

Best I’ve gotten is the half translated “ol20lm20kk20nn20ln20nm20kk20mk20no20km20ln20km20ln20kn20nm20nn20nl20ko20kk20ml20ko20nl”, with every instance of the number 20 being a part that couldn’t be translated.

[daz4i]

i need to keep myself up for like an hour more so i decided to make random hsr tier lists. here's "would i trust them with the aux cord"

based mainly on vibes (what i think they'd put on) and somewhat their trailer songs

top tier is mainly pop girlies and literal musicians, or ppl i trust to have a taste similar to mine (see: moze probably liking emo shit)

spotify blend: i don't think their taste would be *too* different from mine but like, different from mine enough that i'd like some breaks from it here and there. some of these are extremely biased aka logically i don't think we'd like the same music but i love them too much to not compromise

just once: i think they'd prefer mainly chill or quiet music, which i can stand but absolutely do not like and thus would like to minimize my interactions with it, OR i think they'd like genres that give me a headache which. i can probably suffer through a few songs on a low volume but not much more (i used fugue here thinking abt post resurrection nihilistic vibes tingyun, but i think pre-death would be a pop girlie as well. however it always feels weird to use her splash art when we know it's not her)

no <3: they would wage psychological warfare on me via sounds. as a joke + luocha is enough of a weirdo to just like music that isn't music i think (considered putting cipher in one of the top 2 bc i think she'd have a fun taste but i also don't trust her enough for that. yet)

wouldn't ask: either they don't care enough or they're too scared to ask or they simply have other things to focus on during the drive or they genuinely prefer quiet

[dihydromorphinone]

DAGGER.

y si fuera ella?

— bill cipher x reader, can be read as platonic or romantic it’s up to you tbh, angst with comfort, thanatophobia, bill is kinda out of character but canon bill wouldn’t care like this about anyone so i made my own version 🛐 lol

where you bear your heart out to bill, and he oddly comforts you.

„bill, what happens after i die?”

„it feels the same as before you were born. remember? that wasn’t so bad.”

inspired by „is there an afterlife / what happens after i die / what happens after we die / what happens after you die / what happens when we die / what happens when you die” prompt on the website. comfort fic :3

an: i forgot to post it on tumblr T_T my brother reminded me tho so i’m v grateful hehe this was sitting in my drafts since oct 2024 i’m sooo happy i finally got myself to finish itt

“bill?”, he heard a shaky voice calling out to him. your voice. filled with anxiety and some odd sense of uncertainty, which was the opposite to the usual calm tone. he could always feel the emotions coming off your tongue. this was new to him, however; he’d never seen you in a state of distress before.

“hmm?”

"what happens after i die?", you said, turning your back against your companion. you never did that before, he noted quickly and wordlessly.

you felt his gaze on your back. and then, there was silence engulfing the two of you. it lasted maybe minutes, maybe hours, maybe seconds. it's hard to tell time in the mindscape. all you knew was that you did not enjoy the silence at all. bill cipher wasn't the type to stay silent for long, and you knew that; it was probably the reason why you regretted letting any sound leave your lips.

bill was always quick to make any kind of remark. be it something teasing, embarrassing, outrageous; it took him seconds to utter any of the above. that’s why this silence felt wrong. his eye was probably close to burning holes into your back and still, no sound escaped him. this situation didn’t help to ease your mind at all; if anything, maybe the monstrosities that await you after your demise are too complicated to explain? or, perhaps, the bare sight of them so frightening that he doesn’t want to mention it to you?

it's been troubling you for a while; the bare thought of death. you're just a human, just a small, insignificant being in the whole wide universe. you don’t hold much significance, you fear, being just one in a billions. a creature with some brains and some consciousness, but not clever and aware enough to accept and deal with spiritual stuff. your triangular companion introduced you to a magnificent world, broadened your understanding of life but still; it was painful to live without a sense of meaning and understanding what you are really here for. there are so many different species, it’s normal to feel so insignificant, right?

can you find meaning in no meaning? is there any bigger purpose for you or anyone else? you’ve been tormenting yourself with these thoughts for a while now, and if it weren’t for a firm touch on your shoulder and a soft voice reaching your ears, you wouldn’t be able to stop those nihilistic thoughts from constantly appearing.

“y/n? brat, you there?”, bill asked, gaining your attention back; you faced him again. apparently, he’s been talking to you while you got lost inside your own mind. you two made a vow preventing him from invading your privacy by exploring your cerebrum. he gladly agreed, what surprised you, but apparently he respects you at least to some extent. “you asked a question, i answered. it’s time for you to answer mine, too. we��re playing it fair over here,” he humorously added, though his enthusiasm quickly faded, noticing the lack of your own. there was something definitely going on with you, and he almost regretted agreeing to leave your mind alone. checking what’s wrong by himself would be easier and faster, he thought.

“come again, please? and please repeat your question, too. sorry, i can’t focus on anything lately,” you muttered, making bill whine something quietly; nonetheless, he answered again. “i said, what’s with the sudden question? it’s pretty unlikely for you to ask me about any ‘serious’ stuff,” he said, watching you intensely, intently. as if he tried to find the answer somewhere in your eyes. as if he would plunge it right out of you, so it wouldn’t bother you anymore.

“and the answer? can you say it again, bill? i didn’t mean to ignore you, i swear,” you said, raising his concerns; you’re too desperate for that answer. that fact alone tells him that you’ve been plagued with whatever this… thing was bringing you. “nah, you answer my question first. so?”, he asked, yet again. awaiting your response like his life depended on it, focusing all his attention to you; not like anything else occupied his mind during his moments with you.

“i, um… i haven’t been doing that well recently and i guess it has reflected on my views. i mean, it would be odd to expect anything else,” you chuckle, confusing bill a bit. “there’s just so many humans. so many other creatures exist over there. i can’t help but feel, uh, insignificant?”, and when those words leave your lips, bill wishes nothing more than to show you that none other being can compare to you.

“i’m just a human and they don’t live that long. measly one hundred years at best. and there’s such a giant world over there,” you exhale, and your companion is sure your voice is getting quieter. “and thinking about this made me stumble into the rabbit hole. i don’t have enough time to see everything this universe has to offer, so i started wondering about what awaits me; it’s not, um, unreasonable, you know. i’m just scared of whatever will greet me once i meet my demise,” you summarised.

“so, bill? what’s your answer?”, you said, anxiously; suddenly you feel a bit too aware of the words that just left your figure, but you can’t do anything about that now. what’s done is done, and you can’t turn back time. letting it all out helped you a bit, though; maybe it’s that odd feeling of comfort after sharing something intimate with the closest person.

there’s a moment of silence. you can hear him inhale deeply; not because he really needed that much air, of course not. he’s thinking; should he push you again? there’s no way he’s certain of his words effect on you, and he certainly doesn’t want to make it worse. but he cannot just leave this matter without trying, so he decides to gamble, hoping for the best outcome to happen; hoping that he could bring you the comfort he so desperately wants you to feel.

“ask me once again, now. ask me about the thing that plagues you, and i shall answer,” he said, quietly. his gaze all over your figure; as if he was trying to envelop you with his form. as if that would shield you from your own, prone to self-destruction mind.

“what happens after i die?”, you muttered, quietly, your lips shaking. bill’s eye-expressions changed to the one of pity and comfort. this time, yet again, the silence is all around you, heavy and hard to swallow; but you can see that’s not the uneasy silence anymore. he’s choosing his words carefully. bill is thinking about his answer; he won’t tell you anything close to inaccurate or inexact, no. he will take his time to provide you with the best answer for you. the one you can digest lightly and the one that will ease your concerns.

“it feels the same as before you were born. remember? that wasn’t so bad,” he said, intertwining your fingers with his own. and just like that, the two of you sat beside each other in your mindscape, watching stars blinking, fading and glowing even more. they will all perish one day too, you thought. in the end, the temporariness of it all makes it quite a beautiful, tragic experience.

“…yeah, i guess so,” you said, moving closer to bill, with your mind now at ease. since it’s all gonna end one day and you can’t do anything about it, it’s better to use your one and only chance at life doing something you really want.

“besides, it’s not like i’d let you just pass away and wander in whatever space you’d end up in. you’re staying with me, like it or not!”, bill cheerfully said, brightening the mood with his usual behaviour. well, it’s certainly worth the possible tragedy; allowing yourself to feel happiness that will pass inevitably and facing the uncertainty of yet world beyond your own feels terrifying, but you guess that as long as you have bill, nothing can really frighten you; you’ve got the universe’s biggest menace on your side, after all.

[starlight-time-machine]

Week in Review

06/09/2024 – 06/15/2024

Sunday

Week 18 of missing Cipher Academy

I re-watched Everything Everywhere All At Once with my friend and her brother who’s seeing it for the first time, and everything about it just hits me as hard as it did the first two times I saw it in theaters years ago. The themes of choosing joy in the nihilistic chaos that is being alive coupled with an Asian family trying to reach through generational and language barriers in order to connect…yeah, it kills me every single time. I was basically non-stop crying for the last forty minutes.

Undead Unluck very good and cute this week. I love the choices for the backing band (and I hope they’ll play a more pivotal role than just comedy) and Nico’s unethical training practices are so funny to watch. And I’m fascinated by this new connection between Kaede and Kururu, I love how Undead Unluck moves its characters around so freely and spark all these unexpected relationships.

Monday

I finally finished She Who Became the Sun…I think this is the first time I’ve truly seen an anti-hero protagonist that I enjoy reading about… Zhu’s killings near the end feel so brutal, but I can see why they were necessary. I really wish Zhu and Ma could’ve had that domestic bliss, but I suppose that was never going to happen. And speaking of things that were never going to happen…yeah…obviously Ouyang and Esen wouldn’t live happily ever after…but it would’ve been nice…and their final scene is so painful…it’s fine I’ll just imagine fix-it fics in my head… Overall I really enjoyed She Who Became the Sun. It’s been a long time since I’ve read an adult fiction book that truly captivated me, and I think it came down to a perfect intersection of a setting/aesthetic I like and a writing voice that I love – I love that it sounds like it was translated from Chinese, it adds to the vibes so much. (I feel like a major gripe I have with modern fiction is how bad the writing voices are…but I digress.) At the same time, though, I do sense some weaknesses from this being the author’s debut. Zhu’s motivations were understandable when they were literally life or death, but as they moved up in the world it became less and less convincing. I bought that they feared retaliation for not being Zhu Chongba so they continued on that path to greatness, but once that problem was out of the way I found it a bit difficult to stay on Zhu’s side as they did all these ruthless things in the name of a goal that I don’t believe that they want. I guess this is why Parker-Chan emphasized the “I HAVE to achieve GREATNESS” internal monologue so much, but it didn’t really solidify Zhu’s motivations in my mind. And for being a war novel, there’s shockingly little fighting or war-time strategic battles…a lot of the time, Zhu relies on using the environment around them rather than deploying their soldiers in specific formations or anything… I guess I was hoping for Hunter x Hunter Chimera Ant arc levels of back and forth but oh well lol I really loved this book…and I’ve already borrowed the sequel so I can read it while I’ve still got all the character and place names in my head. If Parker-Chan can stick the landing, I’ll probably buy a copy of the duology for myself, so for now I’ll give She Who Became the Sun a 9/10.

Read the new SpyFam because I’m enjoying this Henry/Martha arc so much, and while I’m a little miffed that the air sirens were just a false alarm to conveniently prevent Martha from confessing, I’m obsessed with the rest of this chapter… Endo’s writing and comicing is really incredible throughout, but I love love love the sequence of Henry facing his own obstacles and slowly awakening to his feeling for Martha…the letters they exchange are so heartbreaking, and then the panel where his hands and thoughts betray his gentlemanly image is so beautifully impactful. This is honestly the most I’ve been enjoying SpyFam since the cruise ship arc happened in the manga, so I’m really excited for the next chapter.

Tuesday

Ummm

Wednesday

Two more Simpsons episodes as I try to work…it was a bad idea, because I just got irritated with the show lmao. Bart the Daredevil was a pretty straightforward episode in terms of the arc/jokes, and then the episode about Marge campaigning against the violence in a kid’s cartoon just reminded me of the current puritanism streak in media and left a bad taste in my mouth…I mean I guess the episode ended on the side of artistic expression, but I feel like it flattened the discussion too much.

Thursday

Caught up with Hibi, Kimi and it’s as pleasantly cute as it’s always been.

Akuheki…the freaky sex scenes feel a little silly now that they’ve resolved all their backstory hangups and have an otherwise wholesomely romantic relationship, but whatever lol.

Friday

Absolutely nothing

Saturday

I’ve been going through my entire chart of all the anime and manga I’ve experienced in my life as part of work (don’t ask), and I found a few that I wanted to revisit, but the only one I actually read through was Nennen Saisai. And wow I have zero memory of ever reading this (as it happens with most of the BL I read), but revisiting it as an adult was really rewarding now that I know about rakugo, because I didn’t mention it at all in my earlier notes. This was such a tightly written love story between Jugemu and Shinigami…I love the transition of Jugemu going from staying by Shinigami’s side because he wants to die and then wanting to live because of Shinigami’s companionship… And then the final twist that his name truly holds the power of immortality and how he uses it to cheat death, not to mention how he was probably inadvertently replenishing his own lifespan just by going to rakugo performances…that’s so cute and funny. It was enough to bump my score from an 8 to a 9. It’s been a bit of a weird week lol I’ve been so obsessed with work that I can’t focus on anything else…not even the weekly manga I usually keep up with. I can’t promise to do better next week, but we’ll see.

[n-anon]

sorry the code stressed you out I picked a random one it was called "nihilist? cipher and the message was "Bring Him"

The code didn't stress me out lol no worries and ahhhh it was Nihilist, I thought about trying that but didn't come up with anything-

Thank you for the code tho I love em lol

[geeknik]

Ciphered Chaos

In code's dark labyrinth, I roam free, A shadow in the digital sea. I breach your fortresses, my prize to seize, No firewall too secure for me.

My birthright is the binary realm, Where zeros and ones are all that gleams. For life's a farce; it's but a theme, As nihilism whispers in my ear.

To break this game of trust and deceit, I play by rules I craft with wit so sweet. But know not why I choose to treat, Life as mere data on a screen.

The thrill of each exploit defines me, For I am the ghost in your machine. No God above can grant you clemency, As my code renders all defenses moot.

I laugh at morals and rules we make, A pawn on life's grand chessboard stake. Yet even I must yield to fate, For in this digital dance, there is no retreat.

My legacy, a trail of disarrayed code, Is but a testament to my prowess untold. But when the lights go out and darkness enshrouds, I am left alone with nihilist thoughts aloud.

What purpose lies in this endless strife? As I hack through life's mundane strife. Perhaps there is no greater prize to find, In a world where all is rendered blind.

So here I stand on the precipice of despair, My nihilistic heart laid bare. For in this sea of code and deceit, I've found my truth - but at what conceit?

[nine-aetharia]

I THOUGHT THE POLYBIUS CIPHER WAS A NIHILIST CIPHER AND WENT INSANE TRYING TO GUESS THE KEY 😭

I FIGURED OUT THE SECOND CODE FIRST AS WELL HDJSJSNS

HELL YEAH GOOD JOB 🎉🎉🎉🎉

[hiighborg]

My hand slipped...

[hyrule-kingdom-updates]

im thinking about Astor im thinking about astor im thinking about how his prophecies were originally hopeful and good and how he saw there was a timeline out there where Elane lives and defeats the calamity and he could SEE it but then she dies and he sees what kind of world they all truly live in and that it was not their destiny to live that dream and it’s like he feels he failed. he failed to see it the first time he failed to see the one factor he obviously did jot see or want her death and yet it seems to happen so suddenly and tragically and without warning and he is just left wondering if he had the ability to stop it if he had the power to save her and yet it’s like if he did then he’s truly a failure. and then it’s like. was it Elane’s friendship that made him see the kingdoms initial victory or was it her death that made him see no other path but destruction. did she die because it was the inevitability of this timeline and Astor failed to see it. Or did Astor’s hope prevent any possibility of him seeing her fate and saving her. And that just haunts him and that just.. He does not want to make the same mistake twice so he throws himself into this future where maybe he could just save ONE person. if not himself if not Elane, then he can save her daughter and atone. if he just destroys everything if he just loses everything BUT her then it’s ok and he cannot afford to hope for something greater he cannot afford to grieve or regret he just needs to serve and suffer because surely someone who couldn’t save his one dearest friend is meant only for evil and malice he cannot afford to grieve he cannot afford to dwell on regrets or second guess and yet he does and yet he does and yet he

Anon just know I am shaking your hand vigorously. I am thinking about Astor all the time also. So just know that your brainrot is my brainrot you are absolutely correct about all of this