#WHY WOULD THEY FLESH HER OUT MORE 😭😭 IT MADE HER DEATH SO MUCH MORE DEVESTATING

[scootkiddo]

something about getting more screen time with Sarah made her seem to be more of a parent to Joel than vice versa. her individuality was just so striking when it came to flipping the script on the father-daughter dynamic that gave so much license to her own agency and maturity in the household. she prepped breakfast bright and early while Joel exhaustedly stepped down the stairs. she asked Joel for pancake mix which he failed to remember picking up. she handed him a glass of orange juice while conclusively stating he needed the nutrition. all these factors and more shined Sarah in this new light that showed HER looking after her father, or HER being the caretaker. all the while subsequently highlighting just how much of a walking disaster Joel was

[queenpiranhadon]

A/N: AHHH ONE MORE CHAPTER LEFT ARE YOU CRYING YET?? IK I AM 😭😭 Thank you @cashmoneyyysstuff for supporting me throughout everything. Here’s the masterlist!!!

Warning(s): Cursing, reader is the daughter of Aizawa, Shinso and Eri are biological siblings, reader is 20 years old, Reader uses "Cattus" as her alias, reader's nicknames are Cactus, Cattus and Cat, war, reader gets hurt and burned alive (a lot), reader runs away again, Kirishima’s just the best, character death, gore and blood, bad war descriptions lol what do you expect from me, reader is AFAB and female, ANGST, someone breaks into reader's house, Eri sleeps with reader bc she's traumatized, PTSD, mentions of burns

Pairing(s): Bakugou Katsuki x Reader

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴇɪɢʜᴛ: Retreat

When you wake up, you’re in Chiyo’s home - in the same bed you found your father in all those months ago. 

Your head feels like cotton, even blinking makes the world around you dizzying. Everything hurts, so much you feel nothing, pain so intense it’s numb. 

The last thing you remember was being burned alive. You mentally laugh at your predicament, feeling so out of it that you couldn’t bring yourself to physically do so. Why couldn’t you die?

Immediately, everything rushes back to you, but yet the answers brought forth bring too many questions for you to process. 

Was your family okay? Where’s Ejiro? Seriously, how are you not dead?

Just then, the door opens revealing your family rushing to your side, each with looks of either worry or relief on their faces. You smile weakly, but it lacks warmth. You’re too exhausted to show any form of genuinity. 

Eri takes your hand, sniffling softly, your heart breaking as you can do nothing but watch as your younger sister cries, in too much pain to really do anything. Hitoshi and your father stand there in silence comforting the young girl. 

Entering right behind them is Ejiro, who bursts in, with tears streaming down his face. 

“Cactus, you idiot.” he scolds, but you know he doesn’t mean it, choking on his own tears, enveloping you in his arms. You don’t realize you were crying until the rough pads of his fingers swipe across your face, callused skin felt scarily soft in comparison to your own charred flesh. 

“I missed you, Y/N.” he says, you want to respond, but your vocal chords were too damaged to create any noise. Your heart throbs, and more tears slip from your eyes. You were so glad Ejiro’s okay, but damn your head hurts, your body hurts, your heart hurts, it hurts to function at this point. 

Chiyo enters the room, shooing Ejiro and your family out, insisting that you need rest. You made a mental note to thank her later. You loved your family and Ejiro, but right now, you just wanted space to process everything. 

When they leave, you cry. Your life… it was gone, with these darn burns that covered your body, muscles weak and unusable- would you never be able to walk, run, fight anymore? The thought only makes you cry harder, heart aching from everything that’s happened, wishing that maybe, just maybe in another life, you could be happy. 

Maybe Bakugou would like you, maybe you never went to war and you could’ve happily with your father and siblings - you could’ve been Maid of Honor at Ochako and Izuku’s wedding, or judgmentally sit on the couch with your father and brother as Eri brings home her first boyfriend. 

You just wanted a chance to enjoy the mundane things in live, realizing with a sinking heart that you would never be able to - the chance gone before it was even presented to you.

Sleep overtook you soon enough, thanks to the sedatives Chiyo gave you, and you drifted off, finding solace in your subconscious. 

Why me?

***

It’s the dead of night when you wake again, with a pounding headache- a noise from somewhere in the room startling you awake. 

In the moonlight, you see two carmine eyes staring back at you. Immediately you think of Bakugou, body tensing up before you catch a glimpse of silver hair, realizing it’s your younger sister. 

She steps up to you, tears forming in her eyes again as she takes in your state, your skin black and pink at the same time- even a small gust on wind is enough to make you wince. 

“Hey Cattus.” she whispers, the old nickname turned new name startles you- given how much work you had put in to forget the name entirely, along with the memories that went with it. 

Eri gingerly brings her hand up to stroke your forehead, more tears slipping from her eyes. “I’m scared, Y/N. It’s just so terrifying seeing you like this, you always work so hard for us, I…hate that I never realized I took you for granted.”

Your eyes widened by a fraction, wishing you could talk and console her, telling her none of that was true, and that you owed it to her as her older sister - but you remained infuriatingly silent, frustrated by your lack of ability to do anything. 

Eri wipes her tears hastily and lets out a watery laugh. “Look at the irony- I’m taking care of you this time.” she takes your hand. “I’ve been working on something…before you woke up, I went to the markets and I found this mage…I got this vial from her. Well technically, I got two, but I wanted to make sure it worked before I gave it to you but anyways-”

Your sister cuts herself off, and looks at you, holding your gaze with determination. “While you were gone for those seven months, your garden died out, but I poured one of the vials over the roots- It grew back Y/N! Overnight! The only problem is they returned to their normal state after around two weeks, which was the night before you woke up. But the mage will be in town all month, so I can stock up and you can keep taking it until your body takes over naturally! I think… I think it’ll work.”

Your stare at her in disbelief. You were out for two weeks?! You couldn't believe it. You want to cry, you want to sing, you want to hug her, but you can’t. 

“I’ll make you better Y/N, I promise. It’s the least I can do.”

Eri gives you the vial that night, tilting your head back and tipping the concoction into your mouth, the liquid tasting strangely sour, but bitter as well. 

As soon as you swallow, you start to feel drowsy, falling asleep as Eri strokes your hair soothingly. 

***

When you wake up, your burns are gone. The hair that has been burnt off has grown to its normal length, and it doesn’t hurt to swallow anymore. 

Eri’s there by your side, curled up against you, asleep. 

“Morning ‘nana” you croak, tucking a strand of her hand behind her ear, unable to keep the smile out of your voice. It…worked?!

Eri’s red eyes blink open sleepily, disoriented before she realizes that you were speaking. 

“Y/N! It worked, oh thank the gods…” she whispers, holding you tight. 

You wrap your arms around her, and stare at the ceiling. The gods had given you another chance, even if only for a little over a week - but why? 

***

You spent the next few days relearning everything- from how to eat, walk, and eventually fight. Everything you knew was muscle memory, but with new muscles itself, you needed to adjust. 

Thankfully, Ejiro was there. That morning, after Eri left, your red headed friend had come in to stop by, already informed of the vial- and you explained everything. To say he was shocked was an understatement. 

After he got over it though, he did tease you the slightest bit about your crush, but left it alone for the most part, knowing that physical ailment and heartbreak were both terrible by themselves, but together they were terrible to deal with. According to him, the man named Dabi had escaped, but he and his men had fled after you had passed out- seeing Ejiro, Tenko, and the rest of his troop return, with the orders to protect the village after intercepting a message that was coincidentally meant for the troop that you had fought all the way back in the Chira Forest. Just the thought makes you think about Katsuki. 

First, he helped you walk, guiding you slowly around the room until you finally got the hang of it, laughing and jumping, and crying all at once as you slowly regained your life back. You’d never been more grateful for your best friend, helping you as he always had after your mother died, always being your rock. 

For once, you had hope. 

Slowly, you moved on from the mashed fruits and liquids, making your way to solid foods, starting with bread, to vegetables, and eventually you got used to using your jaws again too. It was funny you thought, getting so emotional over a loaf of bread, but the feeling of digesting solid food was so…liberating? At this point, you’d been healing your broken body for 9 days, feeling more like yourself each second. By the fifth day, Chiyo had decided to let you return home, the contents of the vial speeding up your recovery fairly quickly. 

And so, you started to train again. 

You found some more of the bladed stars your father had given you in your room, deciding that you should refresh on your aim. 

It didn’t go as you planned. You ended up impaling it in a nearby tree, one managed to get stuck on your roof, and another almost ended up killing your brother when he came outside to bring you a glass of water. 

But you couldn’t stop. 

By some miracle, your skills slowly improved throughout the day, your body remembering what to do- from stance to the smallest tensions your muscles needed to create.

It was sunset now, and you dropped your sword, falling into the soft grass below you and soaking in the coolness it provided, allowing yourself to let your body rest, sinking into the ground. 

But you couldn’t shake off the feeling that there was something you needed to do, something that you were missing. 

***

You invite Kirishima, Ochako, and Izuku over for dinner that night, and it’s almost like you’re taken back in time, to the night before your life changed. 

Your two childhood friends greet you with crushing hugs, a tearful reunion as they fret over you, checking for injuries. 

Ushering them all to the table, Hitoshi serves the food, bowls of salads, assorted fruits, and a plate of chicken - Kirishima’s favorite. 

You can’t bring yourself to eat though, picking at your food with a fork, and deciding that there was no point in sitting at the table and not doing anything. 

Excusing yourself from the table, you stand up and place a bowl over your food- intending to eat later. 

“I’m going to go over to Chiyo’s and ask for some pain medication.” you lie, smiling as you leave the dining room, a chorus of “Bye!”s heard from the table. Putting your boots on, you leave your home, sighing as fresh air fills your lungs. 

What’s wrong with me?! You think, as you walk down the cobbled stone path that leads to the center of town. You should be happy, you have your life back- what was happening? Why wasn’t everything back to normal- why couldn’t you go back to being who you were?!

When you reach the town square, you see a small boy huddle next to his sister, both most likely around Eri’s age, with tears streaming down both of their cheeks. Your older sister instincts kick in, and you rush to their side immediately. Their names come back to you, remembering how Chiyo used to babysit them, eventually ended up living with the Midoriyas after their father left to go work for King Nezu in the capital. 

“Katsuma, Mahero, is everything alright? Where’s In- Mrs. Midoriya?” you asked worriedly - before noticing the paper in their hands.

“Papa…he’s going to go fight the bad guys in the capital because all the troops are being sent there…but Papa can’t fight!” Mahero trembles, the worry evident in her voice. 

“I’m scared…” is all Katsuma says, barely a whisper.

Bad guys…in the capital?! How did Inimicus manage to infiltrate Vitoris?! Anxiety gnaws at you from the inside, but you push it down, knowing that your own worry would only agitate the children more. 

“I promise everything will be alright. Our army is strong- and your papa will come home safe. Now, let’s go find Inko.”

***

After returning the kids back to their parents, you finally assess the situation. Bakugou, Denki, Hanta, Genken, hell- even Fern Bat, they’d all be in the capital soon - with no way to know what they’re getting into. Dabi…he’d burn everything to ashes. You feel sick to your stomach at the thought. Your friends…dead? Bakugou may have broken your heart, sure - but you didn’t hate him enough to wish death upon him. 

Shit.

You knew what you had to do.

***

You really hated lying to your family - considering the first time you left without warning it didn’t end so well. 

How ironic is it, that for the second time in a row the night after having dinner with your friends and family, you decide to run to fight for your kingdom?

You get back home late that night, packing a small bag with a week’s worth of food - bread and some dried meat - slipping into your brother’s clothes and putting your hair into the same knot you did when you first left- the experience felt almost like a hallucination, as if you were sent back in time, relieving such a pivotal moment of your life. Except this time, you were prepared. You knew what you were getting yourself into. You had your sword, and your stars, and you knew what was coming.

It felt unreal- all the progress you made, finally coming home, getting your life back, only to go back to square one. 

You sighed. This better work.

***

Sneaking out of the house, you make your way down the cobbled path again, heading to the fields where you knew the horse you had rode here on all those months ago would be - having seen the steed galavanting around happily. You felt guilty, taking it away from its new home so soon, but you had to go, soon. 

However, you couldn’t find him, his distinctive white coat should’ve been a stark contrast to the darkness of the night, and yet he was nowhere to be seen.

In the midst of your anxious searching, you don’t realize the figure approaching you. 

“Where are you going?” 

You might as well have been scared shitless, hand on your sword- whirling around to meet a troubled pair of red eyes. 

“E-Ejiro…” you ask in disbelief. “How…”

“Y/N, you’re not that discreet.” He sighs, running a hand through his hair. “You’re going to the capital, aren’t you?”

He phrased it like a statement, not a question. Were you really that easy to read? Or was it just because he knew you so well?

You can’t bring yourself to look at him, staring downwards. “Ejiro, I have to do this- they’re not going to stand a chance! You know what Dabi’s capable of, the whole future of Bellorant is in danger here!”

“Well what about you?!” Ejiro snaps, his voice low in order to not wake up the entire village, but it was deafening all the same. “What about your life, about your safety?! You were burned alive, Y/N- you’ve almost died, twice! You’ve only had a week to recover, you need rest!” 

You can only stare at him blankly, feeling your heart snap in two. “I need to do this, Ejiro. What’s the point of staying safe if this will eat away at me for the rest of my life?! I can’t do nothing- yes I’ve almost died twice, but I’m still alive right? That has to mean something.”

Ejiro sighs, and you can see the conflict in his eyes. Running his hand through his hair again he looks at you with a sad smile. “I can’t stop you, can I?”

You shake your head, returning your gaze to the ground. 

“Then I’m coming with you.”

Your head snaps up at that, opening your mouth to retaliate, but Ejiro beats you to it.

“You’re not the only one who's had to fight before. So if I can’t stop you, at least let me protect you.”

You feel the tears build up in your throat as you wrap your arms around your best friend, hoping the action is enough to convey your gratitude. You’d both come home safe, you promised to yourself, for Ejiro’s sake.

***

Due to last minute changes, you ended up buying some more food at the next village, letting your horse rest before continuing on your journey to the capital, using the map Bakugou had gave you when you made your way home seven months ago. 

“Hey…are you scared?” you ask, breaking the comfortable silence that settled between the two of you.

Ejiro looks at you, weighing his words before sighing. “Yeah.” he admits “I don’ t think I’ll ever not be.”

You appreciate his honesty, and yet - you can’t help but feel the knot in your stomach twist with uncertainty, subconsciously rubbing your index finger against your thumb.

Retreat. 

***

It’s been five days now, the sun sinking below the horizon as you approach the gates of Vitoris, dismounting your horse (that Ejiro now has affectionately named Samantha, even though your horse was a male) and setting him free, Ejiro following suit as you realize with a sinking heart that the gates are demolished, charred holes burnt through the once durable metal and the gated entrance blown wide open.

Shit.

Running past the gates, you see masses of soldiers, Inimicans and Bellorans alike. It’s a massacre, you see familiar faces from your own troop dead- and it’s horrifying. 

Drawing your sword, and Ejiro doing the same, you charge, fending off the black clad soldiers as best you can.

You try to formulate a plan, attempt to find out the easiest way to figure out how to end this quickly, but your mind is filled with thrust, parry, dodge, and so on, your mind trying to keep up with your body. Striking the last of them down, you spot a flash of bright yellow hair in your periphery. 

Denki! He was alone, fending off at least five men, and was bleeding from his torso. Shit!

You bolt for the blonde, leaving poor Ejiro to catch up with you, catching the five Inimicans by surprise as you slash at his back. 

One down. 

Four to go. You and Ejiro each take on one, while Denki takes on another, a deadly dance and a challenge too. Luckily, you knew this dance. 

You bring the butt of your sword crashing down onto the top of your opponent’s head - the impact strong enough to cause him to stumble back, giving you the opportunity to kick him in the chest, sending him flat on his back. He’s unconscious, the impact of the stoned pathways knocking him out. 

Wait. There were four soldiers you had to fight. Not three. 

Whirling around, you realize with a pounding heart that it’s too late - watching just as the fourth soldier impales Denki in the abdomen from behind. 

“DENKI!”

Taglist: @andysdrafts @starieq @nemisimp @missa-archdevilme @coquettefoxxy

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[averys-nightmare-zone]

since landing is closing down soon, i decided to take a quick break from SUPERSTRUCTURE (although i will be back don't you worry two fans) and made some fashion moodboards for the 14 fears from the magnus archives to accompany this post there will be some notes and insight on each collage under the cut.

the buried: the buried was really underutilized in the podcast imo. some of my favorite episodes revolved around the buried like lost john's cave and we all ignore the pit. i really hope this did it justice since jonny sims did not.

the corruption: oh my god this one was so hard to make. my google search history is full of terms like "bug infested dress", "moldy clothing" and "yucky fashion" the corruption girlies really seemed to like my last post so i felt obligated to get it right. i think i did okay.

the dark: making a black on black collage look decent is really hard 😭 I was originally going to go victorian for this one but ended up doing nu goth instead since I thought victorian fit a lot better with the end.

the desolation: this is one of my favorites. there's somthing so satisfying about combining ashy greys and black with orange it just tickles my brain. other than that, i don't really have any notes

the end: as mentioned earlier, i went with victorian mourning wear for the end. i mean queen victoria herself was in mourning and only wore black for forty years. that era is so synonymous with death it only felt fair to work its customs and fashion into my end board.

the eye: eye avatars are legally required to wear academic fashion. it just comes with the job description. i don't make the rules. have fun being jonathan sims

the flesh: this one really took me down a rabbit hole. first:, i could only find those anti-vegan shirts that your unemployed uncle wears to the family barbecue and then i came across this fashion designer and spent like an hour on her shop trying to figure out how she got her clothes to look like that. after that it took me another two hours to find all of the accessories. pinterest has been both my best friend and worst enemy over the course of this project.

the hunt: i am so sorry the supernatural gas leakage returned to my home when i made this and I age regressed into being 15 again. when i was making this i pictured it more as the trevor and julia flavor of the hunt instead of say, daisy. god breast america.

the lonely: this one was pretty easy to make once i got a handle on the color scheme. the aesthetic of the lonely has always striken me as a romanticization of the melancholy. think wanderer above the sea of fog. So i gave this one all the things i would romantasize about my life at my loneliest, which is why there's a teacup and a heart locket. the book was also a part of that, but it also doubles as a recreation of a leitner by theponderingalpaca on reddit.

the slaughter: yeah yeah i know the slaughter is supposed to be about war as well as murder, but forgive me for not making a fashion collage about military uniforms. that's really boring. i had just watched woodstock '99 before i made this though and decided to go more for that angry punk/metalhead fashion that korn was wearing in that concert. them and limp biskit are the closest we'll ever get to irl grifters bone.

the spiral: i made this moodboard twice. i know its crazy that the fear meant to represent insanity is hard to pin down, but i think i did it better the second time around. the first one read too much as regular kidcore/decora for my taste.

the stranger: i had to do this one last. i could not for the life of me figure out how to make a circus/uncanny fashion board without just doing clown fashion. i'm still not entirely sure how i feel about how it turned out, but at least the masks are cool.

the vast: vast avatars rise up!! this is a mike crew fan blog and i only wanted to base the fashion around him. he's in the top three list of guys i'm autistic about with elliott stardew valley and daniel powell from archive 81.

the web: not much to say here except if you are a web avatar you have to wear a cunty dress. it is simply non negotiable

thank you to @artmadval for giving me the idea to do this with your amazing fashion archives art, along with everyone else who went through all my yapping to get here. love yall!

[unclassedguy]

I don't think I really enjoyed the latest chapter, and honestly from the way things are looking I'm probably not going to enjoy Jujutsu Kaisen's ending either....

I obviously like the characters, I like Yuji, I like Nobara, Megumi is alright.....I get wanting them to be happy. A lot of the stuff I draw in fact involves putting characters I like into silly situations as though they aren't in constant suffering in the source material (I'm immune to being serious 💔).

However, I feel like I'm not really vibing with this 'the trio is alright and they'll all be happy together' ending it seems Gege is setting up. I think part of it stems from the way Nobara and Megumi have been handled these past chapters. There was so much hype for Nobara's comeback.....I get it, she's a badass and fun character who's time in the story was cut awfully short.....I really do understand why so many people would want her back, but I just don't really like how close to the ending her return was and also the fact that up until that point it seemed pretty heavily implied that she had died. Not only that but her 'death' was such an important moment for Yuji and part of what made Shibuya and Yuji's story so tragic and Mahito so reprehensible as a villain. Nobara coming back so suddenly without even proper time dedicated to her (as in actual hints that she was alive and more chapters to explore the dynamics of her return and her contributions to the battle beyond one move) to make it feel even a smidgen satisfying just didn't sit right with me. The first thing I thought of upon seeing the chapter of her return was that it felt like fanservice. It felt like the type of thing a fan of the story would write for the 'hype' and not a choice that made sense. It was the same thing as Yuta returning in Gojo's body. People like Gojo, and having a chapter make it seem like he was coming back of course got the fans' attention. But in the end the story could've still worked well, maybe even better, without Yuta-jo's addition to the fight. It was unessecary.

Then we have Megumi who's been through so much for a good chunk of the story now. His body was taken over and used to hurt people he cares about, most of all his sister who is pretty much the center of his world, the person he loves the most. He'd given up, he'd sunk to the lowest depths submerged in Sukuna's evil. I feel like he sprung back pretty quickly......I don't think I'm as iffy about Megumi's return as I am with Nobara's considering Megumi actually at least got some pretty good and decent scenes with Yuji getting through to him and now also a talk with Sukuna.....but I dunno, I still don't know if I enjoyed how it was handled, particularly the fact that he just kind of comes back with no consequences after all the shit Sukuna's put his body through. I mean, he has a couple of scars sure but is that really all you'd expect after the world class beating he just got?????

Then we have Sukuna, reduced to glob of flesh. I don't mind Sukuna getting a pathetic death. After all he's done I think he deserved getting flung off his high horse and trampled on the ground. It still felt really abrupt though and like it didn't get enough time considering he's been such a big pain for months now and is one of the major antagonists. He's just suddenly gone and it felt anticlimactic and unsatisfying. I would've also liked to see at least a bit of what he was like in the Heain era.....

Hakari and Uraume too 😭. We really got none of their fight and when Sukuna is gone Uraume just....evaporates???? It honestly felt like Gege was just trying to get them out of the way so the series can end already and not an actual conclusion to their character. I wish they could've gotten more depth beyond being just Sukuna's loyal servant.

Them there's of course all the things Gege still hasn't touched such as Jin being Sukuna's twin, Kenjaku being Yuji's mom, the merger etc. Those things I guess I'm not as sad about because I'd already come to terms with the fact that Gege isn't going to get into them, at least not to the extent I would've wanted. It still sucks though.

Maybe I'm just a hater, maybe I don't understand what Gege was trying to do, maybe it's just a matter of preference. I think Gege probably tried his best with jjk using what he had and I don't think it'd be right to hate on him. And even if I am kind of dissapointed in where this story is going I don't blame anyone for liking it.

I may just not like 'happily ever after' endings or something. Not to say Jujutsu Kaisen is some super uplifting story even if the main trio has survived. There's still characters who have died and stayed dead, but it's still definitely a happier ending than what I expected.

At the end of the day, I like stories that put their characters through the wringer. I like stories that destroy everything their protagonist has ever had and turn their world upside down and accept no half-assed reparations to the damage they've caused. I like stories that fuck up everyone involved but still let at least one of them be smiling by the end, even if they're alone, because life is still worth living. Honestly, I would've preferred Yuji move on by himself than for a happy ending to be squeezed out of jjk's remains in a way that didn't feel satisfying. Though maybe I wouldn't be so sour about an ending where the trio gets to live together if we had just had more time to make it feel right. To make it feel emotionally impactful and like it wasn't just hype. I'd take a bittersweet but well-done ending over a half-assed good ending and a well-done good ending over a bittersweet ending....y'know?

Well, that's just my opinion.

[yournextflame]

Elden Ring Theories: A Retrospective

So, enough time has passed for me to form my opinion on Shadow of the Erdtree and revive this blog. But before posting new theories based on the DLC lore, I decided to take a look at my old speculations and see how well they aged.

Does the Greater Will even exist? ✅ In this post, I compared the Greater Will to the Big Bang and suggested that it might not be an actual deity, but rather an attempt by the people of The Lands Between to explain the world around them: the creation of the universe, the fall of meteors, evolution, and the natural order. The Shadow of the Erdtree continues to present the Greater Will as a scientific concept described by the inhabitants of a fantasy world, allowing players to decide whether it’s a god beyond the microcosm or just an empty circle in Count Ymir’s hat, a mere projection of human imagination

The outer gods are natural forces. ✅ 🟡❔While the Greater Will's cosmic origin was emphasized even further in the DLC, the motives of the outer gods were tied even more strongly to earthly concepts. I have many thoughts about the outer gods and godhood in particular, but one of my ongoing ideas is that they manifest human emotions, given how perception and sacrifices shape reality in a material way in the Lands Between.

Elden Ring and Color theory: ✅🟡❔ While I disagree with some points I made in this post, many of my observations were quite accurate. One clarification I’d like to make is that the scroll sigils indicate the heritage of magic rather than its source of power. I also appreciate the DLC narrative that suggests all the differences are actually man-made.

Translation of Marika's echoes from JP, ✅ The DLC gives Marika such human and deeply personal motivations that reducing her to a mere puppet of an evil outer god feels like an insult to the collaborative work of GRRM and Miyazaki. I must admit that my initial reading of her character was too harsh; I even questioned why FromSoft would write such a one-dimensional character. However, I’m very glad that The Shadow of the Erdtree gave Marika awesome depth without depriving her of agency.

My musings upon Helphen's Steeple design and DLC predictions ✅ 🟡 Well, the Shadowlands are described as a place where all kinds of death come only to be suppressed, and the Shadowkeep, as pointed out by the community, very much resembles the design of the Helphen. You can even find Tibia Mariners' boats here. It’s not the exact version of the spirit realm I predicted, but it’s very close.

Small bonus: Even though I insisted that the DLC should be centered around the spirit realm, I pointed out that exploring Godwyn's story beyond what was shown in the base game is pretty unnecessary.

What's wrong with Ranni's Two Fingers? ✅🟡❌ Right direction of thinking, wrong conclusions. One of the biggest reveals of the DLC is that everything is wrong with the Fingers and their mother, Metyr.

Children of the Erdtree 🟡❔I'm not sure what to make of it. The DLC continues to toy with the Empyrean connection to plants, from the special properties of Marika's people's flesh to St. Trina being a literal flower, but it never makes any direct conclusions.

Bells and Bell bearings ❔ The connection does exist, but it should be explored in greater detail.

Candletrees, Miquella, Death and Sleep 💡❔✨ Now that the DLC has revealed Miquella's plan to replace Marika all along, it’s astonishing to realize that my earlier discovery about Necromancer Garris — who likely collaborated with the Black Knives — had Miquella's butterfly and candletree in his basement is actually quite wild

What is Crucible? 🟡❌❔Although the nature of the Crucible is still a mystery, I think my old theory that it was a different tree is not exactly right. I’ve even started to wonder if the Crucible and the Primeval Current are just different names for the same thing.

Some of my old takes haven't aged well, but if anything, I'm glad that Mohg isn't the "walking uooohh 😭💢 joke" I used to call him. However, my opinion on Miquella was surprisingly accurate. For two years, the fandom preached that Miquella wanted to abandon his godhood, making me seem like a major contrarian for insisting that godhood was still his ultimate goal (at least because it would be pointless from a writing perspective to create another Ranni).

I still believe that characters like Marika and Miquella are primarily vehicles to deliver Miyazaki's and GRRM's ideas regarding civilization development, human nature, religion, and philosophy. So, whatever faults they have are the faults of the concepts they represent. Nevertheless, *Shadow of the Erdtree* did an awesome job of elevating these characters from mere ideas to something more human and relatable.

My old description of Malenia is so relevant, it hurts.

Mohg, Radahn, Rykard and Snakes 🐍 Honestly, I'm not sure if Messmer was initially planned by FromSoft or created specifically for the DLC, but looking back, it's pretty funny that I noticed something weird going on between the demigod brothers and the serpents.

Elden Ring lore is a disaster 🤡 Elden Ring story is such lackluster that it was rewritten with the first day patch on top of the giant mountain of cut content. I’m not sure that DLC, if there will be any, can fix this mess or give any proper answers as it seems that writers got too much carried with the idea of making story as vague as possible.

Someone was overdosing on doomium.

To my surprise, the DLC managed to address most of my old frustrations. While I do wish certain things had better foreshadowing or were explored more, it still did a good job of filling many gaps in the base game lore that were making me frustrated. Looking back, I think some of my grudges over the lore were no less important than my theories because they served as a good indication that something was intentionally left unexplained. It seems that the gaps and ambiguities were not oversights but deliberate choices.

As I explore the new content in Shadow of the Erdtree and revisit my old theories, I will also share my thoughts on the new lore and its impact on the narrative. This fresh perspective has already sparked some intriguing insights, and I am eager to see how these revelations will reshape our understanding of the game’s world.

[citrus-cactus]

There are NOT!!!!! enough posts on this webbed site talking about Antiope and Alesand. FRIENDSHIP OF THE MILLENNIUM, I am LIVING!!!!!!!!

Dark Ages issues 5 and 6 highlights (plus some very narrowly-focused musings and speculation) under the cut.

I did NOT expect two new characters (who are really only fleshed out in the last three issues) to be my favorite part of this miniseries, but here we are. This series scratched a very specific itch I’ve always had about Gargoyles regarding the “on-screen” relationships between female characters, and between these two kiddos and Sacrifice’s mentorship of Desdemona, we FINALLY made some headway into where I always wanted to be!

First of all, SHE GOT TO FLY FOR REAL!!! Congrats, Alesand, you did it. You’re living 10yo Citrus’s ultimate fantasy and I’m SO INCREDIBLY HAPPY FOR YOU! Out there living the 10th century dream, fr fr 💛💛💛

Antiope’s FACE!! Sorry, Brooklyn and Broadway, but you aren’t getting any credit apparently, bahahaha XD

Antiope always being the one to tell Alesand how to be careful in the cave (around a bunch of stuff Alesand doesn’t understand) and just generally looking out for her safety and well-being, with Alesand trusting and heeding her friend’s warnings without question 🥺 Plus, the way she tries to shield Alesand from the dragon’s view for just an instant longer with her wings to give Alesand as much of a head start as she can is such a fantastic detail 🥺🥺🥺

The way that both Brooklyn and Antiope remain (relatively) calm under pressure and are the ones to have the most common sense when trying to reason with Wyvern, plus them being the ones who shape the quintet’s exit strategy from the cave 🥺

“I swear I’ll let no harm come to, friend Alesand!” GIRL!!!!!!!!! 🥺💖😭💯

ANTIOPE IS QUICKEST TO SPEAK AND COVER THEIR TRACKS WHILE SPECIFICALLY LOOKING AT HER FRIEND, PLUS THAT LOOK IN THE LAST TWO PANELS, I’M!!!!!!!

The last speaking lines they have, second to last panel of the miniseries. I love Alesand’s exhuberance, it’s clearly not something that Antiope is used to. Their relationship dynamic is gold, A+ no notes.

~~~

Ok, so Watsonian speculation time! I know it’s foolish to hold out hope that the friendship between these two will last, as-is, until 994 (or beyond… hey, I can dream, can’t I?!?!!). Even if they were the same biological age at the time of the miniseries, this is just a snapshot in time for them, since they age at different rates (absolutely heartbreaking information that I’ve been keeping in the back of my brain this whole time, thanks I hate it). Even more heartbreaking is that we know what Robert will do, how disillusioned he is with the inhabitants of the castle by 994, and of the cracks and fissures in the human-human relationships and human-gargoyle alliance that began forming long before the day of the massacre. I have to think that Alesand’s death at some point before Episode 1 would be a huge catalyst, if not the primary motivation, for Robert’s betrayal of the castle, under the right circumstances. Assuming that is what happens, I would predict that the gargoyles do what they can to help/save her, which is why he really digs in to the “humans are not my kind” sentiment, but my latest hypothesis is that the sympathy(/lack thereof) he receives from either Prince Malcolm or Catherine/the Magus is such that the man he once was, the man who was so unwaveringly loyal to the crown, dies at the same time she does.

It’s even possible that the Archmage is directly/indirectly responsible for her death, and part of the reason he’s banished. Maybe Robbie wanted to execute him for his crimes, but Prince Malcolm refused? I don’t want that story to be told because I would be emotionally wrecked if true, but it also seems incredibly possible… not to mention a potential path for the villagers to arrive at the point where they call the gargoyles beasts and monsters to their faces. What better reason for open hatred, fear, and bigotry than the death of one of your own? :(

That, or Alesand and Antiope really do disappear to join the theater troupe Illuminati, and everyone just thinks they died. I would prefer that by a mile, but I won’t explicitly count on it (surprise me, Greg. Let them survive somehow, I double-dog dare you) ;)

~~~

A couple more wrap-up thoughts:

- I’m absolutely gobsmacked that Lex knows how to read already. Whom did he learn from?? I had previously assumed Demona was going to be the literacy vector for everyone in the clan who was interested in learning (since, iirc, word-of-God stated she taught Goliath) but clearly that’s not true! I still love that Alesand is going to learn from Lex, though. Did Brooklyn learn from him as well? 🤔

- I am absolutely not normal about widower Hudson. The last two-page spread stabbed me right in the heart.

- I feel like there’s a lot more to say about Verity, since her attitude was so very, very different from the stated origins of her clan, and none of the other gargoyles really even acknowledged Wyvern’s opinion of humans as they fended him off. Is “human problems become gargoyle problems” a philosophy that the clan had adopted decades before the alliance with Prince Malcolm that Verity was merely reminding Hudson of in Issue 1, or was it a belief that was primarily only held by herself, which became part of Hudson’s guiding principles as he was forced to carry on without her, and thus he made a conscious effort to make it part of the clan’s common culture only recently? What did “protecting the castle” mean to Hudson before there was an actual castle to protect? Their home along the cliffs? Wyvern’s cave? The rookery? Did he literally make up the saying “a gargoyle can no more stop protecting the castle than breathing the air” as the castle was being built? There are SO many little Wyvern-gargoyle-culture questions to chew on here. 🤔🤔🤔

- Looking back at the TV series, I find it interesting that Demona places such a significant amount of blame on Goliath’s leadership/philosophy specifically, when their clan throwing their lot in with humans was a decision made by Hudson during his leadership tenure. You’d think she’d have way, way more to say to him about that in hindsight… but maybe it’s yet another example of how incredibly short-sighted she can be.

[ye-oldroderich]

Hi i saw a friend of mine do art of ur wiz ocs and kindly i wpuld love to hear more about them. Nonhuman ocs in wiz r so fun

OMG YAAAAAY i love talking about my ocs so bad ..... WAHH. prepare for a long yap sesh

More art of them from last(?) year's art fight by my friend @mister-geuse <3 ily tutt

I love Insaf and Rund they're my little guys im so glad so many people like them too 😭 when i make ocs for media i like to try and explore things that help to flesh out the world more and wizzy has SO many nonhuman peoples and there's just so much you can do ... no shade to people with human ocs of course. but personally i like exploring different things with each character i make

Krokotopia is one of my favorite worlds because i'm old and i like lizard people. it isnt without criticism (LOTS of criticism) though. i dont think ive ever seen another mander oc before (although i havent looked *that* hard, theres probably some out there!) so they were my go-to when making an oc from that world.

Insaf loves history! especially the history of magic in her world. she's often frustrated after she comes to wizard city and the library doesn't have much information on krokotopia's history, let alone things about her culture or anything before the krok dynasties came to power. after being Alhazred's student, she finds Arthur Wethersfield's teaching suuuuper lackluster in comparison. she corrects things he says about Balance magic in her mind. Insaf would be an "um, actually" girl if she wasn't nerfed with a severe anxiety disorder LMAO

she's actually really easy to anger but is just so adept at bottling it that she never shows it. this girl wants to rage so badly. magic is her outlet. she's a bit of a wildcard during duels since shes small and unassuming but VERY quickly becomes very aggressive with lots of offensive spells. she got a broomstick when she moved to wizard city but sucks at riding it and is pretty embarrassed about it (her tail throws her off-balance). she also has a pet chameleon in her dorm! its name is Sheba.

Now for Rund. i love birds and dinosaurs and corvids so a raven was a must-have for me as an oc. also its fun to put your characters through the horrors (ie a cult) and Rund definitely gets the brunt of it lmao. i haven't really ever made a character dealing with amnesia because its such a cheap plot cliché and its never done accurately to how amnesia actually works as like. a nuerological condition. so with Rund i've been really researching how it actually works so that i can portray it well.

amnesia is still not very well understood because the brain is so silly and complicated but if i were to label her with something it'd be pure retrograde amnesia. after her head injury, she can't really remember much at all about herself, and isn't familiar with ravenscar or anyone there. she CAN remember how to use runes, though, and other "muscle-memory" things. after she's sent to wizard city to recover, she starts getting some memories back over time (mostly information she got while reading, and some personal details) but memories specifically retaining to the Coven are much harder for her to remember.

Rund is also autistic (both she and Insaf are) and has some other underlying conditions that were exacerbated by both her head injury and the traumatic stress she was under. she has both motor and vocal tics, and doesn't speak much outside of echoalia. she's very easily overwhelmed so she sticks to less crowded and quieter places, which are hard to find in wizard city ... its why she and insaf hang out by the death school LMAO. no one else is ever there.

Rund uses runestones instead of a spelldeck, just like a lot of people in Grizzleheim traditionally do. she likes to shake the bag and hear them clinking together. her mount is a Death Vortex, and i rationalize it as like ... her turning into a cloud to zip around (usually so she can get on top of something and perch up there). she likes having her hood up so she can block out stimuli. Rund knows people look at her differently, which is part of why she avoids most people. she doesn't really know how to feel about being sent to Ravenwood, but supposes its better than the alternative ... though she misses Grizzleheim's snow.

Rund and Insaf met when they were assigned partner on a death class project. neither of them really had friends before that at ravenwood. Insaf doesn't expect anything of Rund or judge her for things she can't control. Likewise, Rund doesn't judge Insaf for having "unsightly" feelings, and can relate to it. they both like yapping about magic and history, and take turns talking at eachother. they have library dates where they go and point out flaws in the literature (hater activity). they're their own best company.

[atopvisenyashill]

9, 12, and 25?

9. worst part of canon

okay let me dig into the dothraki thing - what annoys me the most is that he compares the dothraki to is ~great plains horse riding tribes~ but there is NOTHING of them culturally in the dothraki or even in their setting!! the apache comanche navajo and other plains nations have such a rich history and i get george probably didn’t have access to that sort of information in the 90s but god he doesn’t even try!! i don’t know a lot about mongolian history but i would hazard a guess that the dothraki bear no resemblance to the actual khans that existed in the mongolian empire. there’s like an attempt to characterize dorne. there’s not even a tiny attempt to flesh out the dothraki or the lhazareen as cultures.

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

okay i think this series has been around long enough that there’s not really unpopular characters bc everyone has their own mini fandom. i think you can find like a good hundred stans of every character in the series atp and i think that’s a fun change from when i first entered the fandom and people would make metas with lines like “sansa the bitch in the north begging for scraps” and this got reblogged by ~serious people~ in this fandom without comment. i think the fandom blowing up in size made some things worse, bc sometimes the h particles in this fandom go crazyyyyy but i also do like that when i say “i think sansa and theon are gonna be in love” while at work, i get taken seriously now.

that said, obviously it’s joffrey. idk what it is about this kid that makes people unable to see his complexity, despite his death being seen through the eyes of arguably his two biggest victims in tyrion & sansa, and both of them only feel grief and anguish at his death! he was born into an awful situation and it turned him into an awful person and he is dead before he’s had two decades of life.

i think cersei also gets this treatment, this refusal to engage with her complexity, which is why you get so many people who will call her ~jaime’s abuser~ when it’s just so much more complicated than that, or the guys on reddit who think robert should have beat her more. i think they both make people uncomfortable bc a lot of people know if they were in that situation, they’d absolutely crack up under the pressure too. they would not stay good people and they don’t wanna think about it so joff & cersei must simply be born evil! i feel like in the Fandom Right Now, they’re the two that really get that the most in several places and i think it’s crazy, cersei should be winning “best character in all of history” awards man!!!!

25. common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing

don’t love the idea that brienne shouldn’t fuck jaime bc shes ~too good for him, i think this is flying too close to madonna whore stuff and the jaime/brienne/cersei triangle is RIFE with this it’s like catnip for people, and this is bc jaime himself idealizes both women as madonnas and whores BUT for brienne it’s like. her story is about learning she’s allowed to be a woman in however way she wants to be, and she can be a knight and also crave sex and romance, she’s not a freak in a dress for desiring fine things like any other woman of her station. finding a sexual and romantic partner who looks at her and feels LUST and feels LOVE is imo a very important part of her character arc and i think the idea that she has to settle for someone like connington is crazy and also like, mean 😭😭 it just forces her back into that mold of the madonna to cersei’s whore and i don’t like it!!

[askamnesiamoonjumper]

edit: HEY EVERYONE LOOKING AT THIS POST GO READ AAU FIC RIGHT NOW BC IM TIRED OF THIS POST BEING IN MY NOTIFS 24/7💥💥💥💥

Ok sorry about that now back to your regularly scheduled program: A!au toh au when??

Yeah hi I was bored n thinking about this idea and also wanted to do a style study for toh, (ignore that I had to use bases for the bodies I couldn’t draw them😭 my lines where too shaky I’m not the best at tracing stuff so I cheated a tiny bit) I had originally thought of this idea ages ago in a doodle where they all went to hexide and it was more a high school au if anything but now that the show is further along I thought of a more fleshed out idea for this hypothetical au!

Technically this could count as just a regular Ahit toh au BUT I based it off of ideas and hcs in aau so yeah I’m sticking with that

Also the characters aren’t one to one with toh characters it’s more just a “how would these characters and their story translate over to toh universe” thing but most characters can be tied to a toh character as being based on/in the role of if that makes sense like I said it’s a bit of a mixing pot with the characters

Uh yeah info about the basic idea for the characters/story:

The whole story with prince and Vanessa instead of prince getting locked in a cellar to die van curses him instead, but somehow idk how yet he ends up turning the tables and splitting the curse with her. I like the idea that prince is from his respective time period as Ahit and falls through a time pool so we get the same concept of this guy is old and from a long time ago just with skipping over the death ghost part so yeah he gets sent to present Snatcher is basically the eda character he has the curse and takes elixir (which I hc is blue bc haha Ahit reference)

If it’s not obvious from her design Vanessa is the belos of this au lol Probably instead of the emperors coven it’s something like the Queen’s court? I think it’s got a neat ring? Anyway yeah uh not much to say about her she’s basically the same lol, also I like the idea she uses illusions to hide her appearance and also to manipulate mj and the citizens 👀

mj is basically a combo of s2 Lilith and Hunter! He’s a grimwalker made by Vanessa to replace prince basically he’s made to be her perfect fairy tale Prince Charming that loves her and would never ever betray her <oblivious But yeah same idea as Hunter of being made as a clone of someone else BUT they’ve got a more similar role to Lilith in which they end up befriending the main cast and living with them Also included their “golden gaurd” design not sure what to call it? Moon prince? Moon something idk lol you guys might could help with that but yeah that’s the fit they got when with van also we got blood Amy too in which Vanessa gives her curse to mj after finding his palismen (she eats them belos style ofc lol) speaking of I still need to draw the palismen but I have some cool ideas!

Dels idk what to say besides uh she lives with snatcher n we still got the qpr going ofc lol sorry I don’t got much on her 💔 though I DID consider making her a star child to go with the twilight god thing but I also considered making eclipse a star child because the design is similar plus gives an excuse for him to be here without the fusion plus I think Vanessa using eclipse sounds cool it makes sense he’s prince in canon so like ofc she’s drawn to him but yeah still thinking about that

Time twins are our luz stand in, hc timmys jacket is snatchers like luzs jacket is eras bc I think it’s cute lol dont question why he has it idk I didn’t have the time pool idea at the time and bow is kinda like the willow/gus of the group and mu is the amity? Mu being a bully at first until joining the friend group n stuff and bow being the sweet straight man to the rests antics

Drawing time twins with round ears was cursed Anyway mu is a hybrid still, She’s half witch half eberwolf species! Cooking cat and Sam get to be her bio parents here instead of adopted so that’s cool

Shapes is the Vee stand in and omg they where really fun to design

I like the idea of the changelings/council being titan trappers? Considering they’re a cult? I think it sounds cool so maybe like shapes sneaks in with a disguise or like the trappers take them in or the trappers are basilisk in this universe? Idk considering no one in the cast is a titan it wouldnt really make sense so like maybe they are basilisk or basilisk hunters? Still chewing on the council lol sorry

Sorry I’ve been putting it off BUT curses!: basically same logic as canon they go by eda and belos logic respectively so van is a creepy skeleton cryptid ass monster and snatcher is a animal beast! BUT he’s not a bird like eda or Lilith ,and also not a snake though that would fit in being a more obvious choice, he’s ACTUALLY a ferret! Mostly bc I thought it was funny but it stuck lol they are furry and noodly so it works, plus I’m a sucker for the monster has innocent name but is actually terrifying trope lol, also idk about blood moon? They get cursed yeah but I don’t think they get transformed into anything mostly bc I have no ideas for them lol plus it’s more focused on the illusion hypnosis whatever abd not the curse itself

Anyway on to covens/magic specialties! The kids are obvious because they have the uniforms lol but I’ll still list them anyway: Time twins: Oracle/illusion Bow: beast keeping Mu: constructed Prince: Oracle/bard Snatcher: Oracle/potion Delilah: plant/healing Mj: bard Vanessa: illusion Shapes: abomination

But yeah that’s kinda it lol I do plan to add more doodles or ideas later but yeah hoo boy these took forever but it was a fun style challenge plus fun to design everyone!

Sorry if these notes are kinda all over the place oof I didn’t bother to double check them so sorry if it sounded rambley

[marshmallowprotection]

Hii, could you please clarify the timeline for the whole v and rika twin meeting and such? Like their age differences.. and specifics of how it all came together bc if there’s anything that confuses me more than certain dramatizations for this games story, it’s definitely the details of the timeline😭. Like at first Rikas official age was 23.. then it was changed to like I think 28 was calculated in the wiki..? Uhmmm… plus V’s age gap with Saeyoung isn’t even THAT big.. it’s like 5 years, no?? When did these people meet… Ive been a player since 2016, so a lot of dlc’s or secret endings I played have left my memories super fuzzy as I replay this game but omg. It’s so confusing to me ab Rika and V’s ages when they met, how long they’d been together as they ‘rescued’ or attempted to bring salvation to the twins by becoming their guardians without a legal procedure (which was understandable for their case bc of prime minister… i guess?). They’re made out to be these parent figures to saeyoung and saeran but idk kinda hard when they aren’t that much older.. or maybe it’s more than that and I just can’t really come to terms w how they’re portrayed cuz it’s such an icky feeling knowing how it plays out in the end for them when they entrust these people with their safety and full trust only to later have it crushed 💔💔 UGHH. sorry I kinda made this too long. I read a lot of rants before writing this, haha…. The twins story makes my heart ache a lot.

Rika's age is all the place. Do not try to gauge Rika's age or you will cry yourself to sleep. Her official age in the RFA Package was listed down as twenty-three at the time of her death.

However, there are many factors that lead people to believe she's older and it has everything to do with Rika Behind Story and as most people don't bother to read it, they're not aware of why things appear to make her seem older than what she was officially stated to be at debut.

tldr; CHERITZ RETCONS A LOT.

Rika fights her church and family over Sally when she is sixteen years old. Two years pass and she sees V's debut photography on display in a gallery. He is about seventeen at the time as mentioned. Another year passes and she meets Saeyoung Choi, which means she meets him when she's about nineteen years old and he is twelve years old.

Saeyoung comes to the church at an irregular rate, but she spends her time talking to him and helping him learn about math and other such subjects during this time. We can assume that since Saeyoung left his brother at around the age of fourteen or fifteen, that he had a few years with Rika before she encountered Jihyun Kim in the flesh. She also met with Yoosung for the first time during those years.

Her adoptive mother mentions during this time period that she will throw Rika and Sally out in two years since she won't be obligated to do so after that. The legal age in the Republic of Korea is nineteen, so I'm not quite sure why they would let Rika stay with them behind that since she would've already been an adult here, but hey, as far as I am aware of, she had a kick-out date of twenty-one.

She took Saeyoung to an exhibition that held multiple different works, he ran off to a science showing and Rika ran into Jihyun. That's the start of their partnership since it begins as an artist and model before it becomes romantic.

He takes her in as a model at first, but then their relationship builds into something more than that. She was kicked out after two months of doing work for V, so I can only assume she's turned twenty-one at this point.

He comes to her church to find her after her adoptive mother told him that she'd run off. Rika reveals a lot to him after that, talking to him about her demons, her fears, and more. They grow closer, and during that time, while the details we already know about the two of them dating, they were also trying to help Saeyoung and his brother.

So, if Rika was nineteen when she met Saeyoung and he was twelve, that means there is a seven year age-gap between those two. If V is meant to be seventeen when Rika is eighteen, that means he's about one year younger than she is. Which means, when Rika and V come together to help the twins, she's about twenty-one years old, give or take, and Jihyun is twenty, give or take. Which means that Saeyoung is fourteen.

He goes into the Agency at around the age of fourteen or fifteen. We know that he does some jobs on the side before he's pulled into that damn agency, so I work with the assumption that he's fifteen by the time they yank him overseas to study computer science.

Jihyun mentions in a phone call during Saeran's After Ending that he met someone who worked for the agency who convinced him that it would be safe for Saeyoung in the agency... and he believed it. That's tough to think about, you know? As someone who started this game back in 2016 when I was younger than Yoosung by a year, I just can't imagine being in Rika or V's position.

Yes, you're an adult at twenty and twenty-one but my God, there are so many experiences you've got ahead of you in your early twenties that by the time you get to the other end, you see that time as being a tall child. The me at those ages would not know how to help those twins, much less myself.

If Saeyoung is 21 in Casual and Deep Story, that means Rika would've been 28.

Where this can get perplexing is the fact that Jihyun is supposed to 26, which is two years younger than Rika, while some of this math is implied to state that there should only be a year between the two of them.

[apollos-boyfriend]

i would love to hear about indie horror rpg number 957!! i adore indie horror rpg games

WELL since u so kindly asked. it is now time for one of my Many corpse party rants ^_^ and yes ik corpse party is not as like. unknown as like, jimmy and the pulsating mass or smth (which is something i REALLY need to get around to playing, actually) but with the recent sequel announcement i have been spinning it in my head much more than usual. more accurately, how bad the writing got by the end and how disappointing the ending to the heavenly host arc was, because it had SO much potential!! the initial game was such a hit for a reason!! (initial referring to the like, DS version era, which feels weird to say but you get my point. initial full version of the main story.)

book of shadows highlights this issue the most for me, because like. it has Such a good concept. the idea that everything is contained in a horrifying time loop in which these characters slowly regain the memories of their past loop, including their gruesome deaths. that’s fucking terrifying!! having to face the fact that not only have you done this before, but you didn’t survive, and maybe you’re fated to never make it out of this alive, no matter how hard you try. that your fate will actually worsen the deeper you go into the loops. that nothing you do matters. it never did and it never will. (it also does some other things i like, such as delving into the alternate endings/realities and fleshing out more characters, dynamics, and backstories. that was good!! i enjoyed that!! largely bc the new stuff they introduced was actually yknow. new. and not characters from a novel they just threw in and acted like you should already be acquainted with them.)

the issue with book of shadows for me is that like. the characters are SO stupid. like. fucking mayu?? she REALIZES the marks on her body are there because that’s how she dies, then just. never fucking tells anyone?? and SPLITS UP??? i don’t care how self-conscious she is i will never excuse that choice. she recognizes the room that killed her. she makes a conscious decision to not enter it. and then enters anyway!!! because fuck you!!! if she’d ended up there again in any other way i wouldn’t have cared so much because like. again. they’re fated to always die in exponentially terrible ways yadda yadda. but the way they got her there is SO stupid. had she not ran into i THINK ayumi and yoshiki(???) it would’ve made everything a hundred times better. have her panic over her situation and not pay attention to where she’s going. running into others and not saying anything just makes it all so frustrating to play through. the concept is fun but it just becomes annoying instead of horrifying because you’re forced to sit through these characters being idiots and get distracted by that instead of the actual horror of the situation.

book of shadows just has gameplay issues as well, like jesus christ did we need such insane completion goals 😭 having to spam click through 30+ endings is more torture than anything they ever put their characters through. it’s not even worth it considering how much the ending sucks either. you had a good premise!!! an amazing one even!!!! why did you do her like that!!!

anyways. mods are asleep post mayu splatter dot jpg

[jackstheprinceofhearts]

my review of "last violent call" by chloe gong

(side note from the future, i forgot to make part 2 and i will at some point but idk when 🧍‍♀️ i have been distracted lately so idk 😭😭😭 i'm sorryyyy)

spoiler warning for:

these violent delights duology

foul lady fortune

last violent call (obviously)

alright so let's talk about "a foul thing" first!

some things i found to be a bit odd:

why did they keep saying how worried they were about being recognized but kept their appearances pretty much the same (besides Juliette's long hair) Benedikt and marshall's hair is the same from what I remember, and their faces still look the same (they're obviously older) and all of this other stuff but I'll get to more of that when we talk about "this foul murder"

also, why tell pretty much everyone EXCEPT rosalind and alisa who are family?? like yes I get that they are trying to protect them but now rosalind is carrying this guilt for a super long time and that made me pretty sad 😭 I can't imagine the betrayal rosalind is gonna feel when she finds out celia didn't tell her. same with alisa, I bet she'll feel pretty bad that she didn't know.

but that's enough about that, for now, let's get on to stuff I liked :)

JIOGVFDRJIDOFFDVVDSFKJVFDSJMKOVDSFKI I LOVE ROMA SO MUCH HE'S SO SWEET AND KIND AND HIS BANTER WITH JULIETTE WAS SO FUNNY AND SATISFYING AND DIDN'T SEEM FORCED

sorry, i really needed to say that omfg they were so cute in the entire novella. rdbmbbb I just love them they are so precious to me 🙏🏼no ship will ever hit as good as they do (ofc evajacks because come on it's evajacks and they are my otp) I love the way chloe wrote them in this novella as well. they were still the old roma and juliette but you could tell how they'd matured and how everything had affected them in so many ways and just fdfdkvfdk,dvfl, i loved it, man, i live for fluff but MARRIED COUPLE FLUFF??? AFTER BEING ENEMIES??? HELL YEAH it was everything i wanted it to be and more fluff and romance-wise!!!

alright, now we need to talk about roma and juliette's death, and also the connections with foul lady fortune.

so it is said in the first chapter that this takes place in 1931, the same time as the beginning of foul lady fortune, shown here in these two pictures

(top is a foul thing and the bottom is foul lady fortune)

so as you can see they start at the same time. so the start of "a foul thing" takes place while rosalind is on the train in the first chapter after the prologue. i found this to be interesting since i thought "foul lady fortune" was spread out for months but at the end of flf (foul lady fortune) Rosalind receives this letter:

and at the end of afl (a foul thing), we get a page of juliette writing that same letter.

(also side note but i really appreciate this, isn't it so nice how chloe gong managed to tie both books together SO WELL in only 117 pages???)

So because of this, I found the timeline confusing because this takes place in September in afl BUT it seemed like way more than a month in flf?? if anyone has answers on why this is or corrections for the timeline, please comment them cause this confused me quite a bit.

this might've been just me but i also think I missed a lot of important information and how flf connects to the novellas because I am really REALLY bad with names 😥 I am trying my best guys ok 😭

i also liked the introduction of new characters in this and also how much chloe was able to get done within 117 pages like god damn, she got a lot done writing this. new characters and a new plot, answers to roma and juliette's death??? angst??? fluff??? it was all there and did not disappoint.

also, i would like to say that I KNEW it was very likely they couldn't be dead because there was no body, no leftovers, no nothing. like yes i know they were supposed to be exploded or whatever but even in explosions there's gonna be uhh leftover flesh 👁

anyways, let's move on to my favorite quotes and then we can talk about "this foul murder"

alright here are the pictures i have >:)

uh oh, i have come to the startling realization that I can't add any more images 😭 and I need to send some pictures to talk about "this foul murder" and the rest of the quotes... alright I guess I'm gonna have to add a part 2 to this post 😭

let me close this by saying that "a foul thing" was so amazing and up there in my favorite books definitely!!! more authors need to write novellas taking place after the couple is together, it just hits different. but overall for this first part of "last violent call"?? 5/5 stars!!!

[arthurmargon]

Now im imagining how cute that moment between Arthur and Mary would be when things would get heated and she would say no to sex and Arthur would immediately back off since he’s so respectful and gentle. I can imagine him apologising and get a little shy with Mary 😆 Which also makes me wonder how he was while in relationship with her which is another thing that makes me mad at Rockstar because we only get to see Arthur being a sassy and mad at Mary for what she did to him which only shows how much he loved her and even in that time he still treats her with respect. The fact that he writes “A ❤️ M” at the end whenever he writes in his journal about her speaks volumes!!! But yea im mad that we didn’t get to see him in his fully in love era😭 I bet he was such a gentleman 🥰 If you just think how kind he is with Tilly, Mary-Beth and Karen i can only imagine how great he would treat a woman that he romantically loves. Which is why i want Rdr3 to be even later in the game while Arthur is younger and the gang is in their prime because i just want to see the story between Arthur and Mary😩 How they met, how they fell in love, how they later made their relationship sort-of-work (because we knew she joined the gang for a while) and then what ultimately happened that caused their break up.

omg this is such a late response i’m so sorry but i’ve been keeping your ask close to my heart like it’s a flower i’m pressing into my favorite book bc it’s such a heartwarming, lovely concept 🥹🥹

this might be controversial rip but if we get rdr3 i would much rather find out more abt his story with isaac and eliza bc i know rockstar would skimp out if it was more mary/arthur. they barely fleshed out his backstory and most of it is abt him and mary, i would really love to see arthur as a dad struggling (and ultimately failing) to fit this newfound parental responsibility into his life as an outlaw. i strongly believe isaac’s death was a major catalyst to arthur hardening up as a person and it affected his relationship with everyone else, especially john, tremendously. seeing arthur trying to make it work with eliza romantically or platonically and seeing him change before and after their death would be so so incredible and rewarding.

but anyway 😭 i’m glad we agree that arthur is horny and respectful. he channels his eternal blue balls into respecting women 😭 and do NAWT get me started on how gentle, supportive and open he is with tilly, karen and mary beth bc we will be here until 2032. he’s the best big brother there’s no competition

[rosenecklaces]

Nesta for the trivia game

Ohh this one is interesting let me activate my brain

First impression: It was kind of... weird, how I felt with nesta because I do not hated her and even felt she had some internal range/frustration that she just didn't know how to manage accordingly ( or sjm didn't bothered to flesh out more) but she was verbally abusive of feyre indeed and while reading i wished we knew of the why, why feyre, what happened to make her say things to her like that?

Impression now: Boyyy is even more weird LOL, ACOSF was so messy my god and I hate we kind of lost what the other books gave us about her and hinted at. But ok, coming back to Nesta, I like her a little more (surprisingly) and I do felt for her in some occasions (the way she handled her trauma, the sleeping with strangers without taking care of herself, the alcoholism, the spending money holding a grudge) it was very raw in that part and it was an interesting take on her and how mental illness/low self worth affects someone. That being said, im still waiting for her apology to Feyre and Elain ( her comments of their dad and she being a dog where heavy as hell), im glad she saved Feyre but they 100% still would have this tense bond if they don't fucking talk and Nesta explain to her + elain how she felt all those years knowing she couldn't provide for them and recognize aloud the damage she made on her hatring wage

Favorite moment: I hate how most characters think she was the one who attacked hybern and proceeded to kill him BUT I loved she beheading, loved this kind of team effort with elain it was so good. Also when she used the golden mask, I tought I was gonna get tired of all the girlbossing warrior moments but that was A Moment okey. Gonna say her soft side with cassian got me, they had this wild sex driven attraction but when they cared for eachother and she said "my mate taught me well"? That's the good shit I came for + The "never again, never again" scene

Idea for a story: TO HER TO BE LADY DEATH AGAIN GOD. why the hell she lost so damn cool powers I hate it here give me necromancer nesta again sjm. Also I would love reading something about her and her sisters traveling together for a good while, just getting away from velaris and other people and spending time together, would like nesta collecting books from everywhere

Unpopular opinion: The valkyries thing... it was so cheap tbh, it could had be handled better or you know, not make nesta a warrior but a diplomatic character, I think she would had learned more fluently and manage night court exterior affairs, it would also helped her connect more with feyre, making her see that it is not easy to direct and take care of a whole court and maybe getting the animosity and hate for rhysand dissappear or be presented as them not settling down with their opinions and what each thinked of how things should be done. I also don't understand how she viewed emerie and gwyn as her new sisters like girl you barely know this girls and wherent you wary of everyone who gets close to you not long ago? 😭 it was kind of strange to me, same with her friendship with azriel, it came of thin air with the strand being "they both see eachother and don't judge and they are both feared" nesta wasn't feared like he is??? But ok sjm weird flex

Favorite relationship: as much as I have my complaints about how nessian was handled, I'll give it to them when they have a moment to shine they shine, that's why I can't hate nessian even if acosf was imperfect, she is lady death and him lord of bloodshed he is her knight and she thinks she doesn't deserve him while cass fears to lose her and idc I love it I can excuse their messiness because the good stuff was enough to keep me hooked. I also like some nestaemerie, I feel their friendship was way more genuine than gwyn/nesta, and as I said I hope we get more of archeron sisters bonding we had too little of them but I still root for this dysfunctional sisterhood (I also crackship her with vassa, it could be interesting seeing them interact)

Favorite headcanon: I think nesta can heard/comunicate with the deceased even after losing her powers, I like to think some piece of it is still there deep inside her. I also think she wouldn't marry, I don't see her as the type ( maybe if cassian ask her and seem excited for it? And still I doubt that) I can see her with one child or adopting. Even if I preferred she wasn't a warrior, I think Nesta would be General of NC one day, I see her alongside Cassian directing troops + the Valkyries, she could also be a "professor" in the library for future Valkyries that wants to learn more of battlefield planning, maps, nurses in battle, sword crafting etc. I wanttttt short haired Nesta so bad is a NEED, like I really think she would be the one pulling a sick as fuck haircut. I also think she would win more scars as time passes and wears them with pride, be by training and in battles ( a scar crossing her lip/eye could be sexy)

[pinkpantherjam]

"Tell it to the bees"

Back then, every Sunday Morning Lola would always remind me to water her most loved flowers, clean the yard, make some coffee for her constant visitor who's just our neighbor and her best friend ; her sister. Part of me hated doing it because I know for a fact that I'm also the favorite target of the bees that hive in her mini garden. I do not know why but it's always me who gets a bee sting. Not my sisters, not anyone, not even Lola herself.

When I was four, it was the very first time I got bitten by a huge bee. I was crawling my way out to follow grandma in the kitchen and my feet accidentally stumped on a bee. I had high fever the entire week plus my feet swelled in redness during that time. As I qoute Lola's narration,

"ang kulit mo kasi, mataba ka na nga gusto mo pa ng gatas. Gusto mo pa lagi kang binubuhat"

It was followed when I turned six, I had it at my butt. When I turned 7 I had it at my legs, when I was 9 I had it at my left eye, when I was eleven I had it on both arms. Until the following years that even till college, I had it in different portions of my flesh. And believe me, these bees are not just from Lola's yard. Some of them are just simply from nowhere. Either when I walk on my way home, at school, when I go to a friend's house, and almost in every place I go. I happened to be a good hatch for them. I wanted to be somebody's favorite but please, not the bees!

I would laugh so hard when I remember it and whenever I see a bee, my inner child would still panic. I sometimes even wonder, are my blood that sweet? Do I look like a petal just because I was named after a flower? Did my mom do something before during her pregnancy that made me become the constant favorite of bees? All these funny thoughts would just sink in and I'm still processing it. On a serious note, I realized how much I spent my entire life playing hide and seek with the bees. They have became part of my existence in this planet. At least they saw me teary eyed, they saw me protecting their favorite flowers, they saw me at my happiest innocent and pure childhood days. Despite of the fact that they are insects I continuously hate, I happened to also love and appreciate their presence.

Fun fact about them: Europeans have a traditional custom which they call "Tell it to the Bees" wherein they would tell their important events in their keeper's lives, such as births, marriages, or departures and returns in the household. Following a death in the household, there were several ways in which bees were to be informed and, therefore, put into proper mourning.

This is more of an appreciation post for all the bees that sting. To the bees that witnessed the stubborn girl in me, those who were grateful that I water the flowers of my late grandma. Those who hold a core remembrance as I left my beloved hometown. To all the bees that pollinate to make another flower become fertilized and yield fruits & seeds. To the bees that produce my favorite honey, You are all naturally and biologically made to sting hard but I have loved you so .

(Special Thanks for Lia. A multimedia arts major who created these GIFs for me because bees reminded her of me 😭.)

[disco-tea]

The scene where diego gets to hug Ben in Klaus’ body was so wholesome and made me smile :) diego looked at him with so much love. But then I remember that five hasn’t been shown the energy AT ALL from any of them...and I just, sigh. It makes me wonder if their relationship with him as kids was different than Ben’s, that would be a plausible explanation. If so, I’d love to see more of when they were kids. Because it’s just a bit weird, and I feel like the writers are doing it on purpose.

Honestly I loved that scene so much. The hug was so lovely and Diego just went instantly soft. Definitely a highlight of the season.

That’s really one of the things I love about Diego, he’s got his crafted persona and attitude but he’s actually such a softy and is honestly very affectionate. He’s hugged Ben and Klaus and leaned on Vanya. Human or robot, he cares about Grace so much and wants the best for her. I would actually seriously melt if he were the one to finally hug Five...

Like I have this scene idea in my head where Five gets taken to Hotel Oblivion and the siblings have to rescue him and they finally find him and Diego is the one that goes for the hug first. He just sees him and immediately pulls him in like he did with Ben, and Five is so shocked and a ton of other emotions because it’s really been 45 years. 😭😭

But yeah, anyway, before I make myself cry anymore...it definitely sucks that Five hasn’t gotten that same energy. S1 I can understand...they weren’t really *that* huggy in S1, but everybody was so much more open and affectionate in S2 bUT FIVE RECEIVED NONE OF THAT AND I AM LOW KEY A BLOCK OF SALT HE EVEN GOT A TON OF NEGATIVITY FROM VANYA OF ALL PEOPLE. It’s kind of mind boggling because it really makes no sense to me?? Like, even if they had a rocky relationship as kids, so did Diego and Luther but they worked past it and were actually so caring to each other in S2. So did Allison and Vanya but legit the first thing Allison does in the pilot is hug Vanya. I just??? WHY??? I mean... I get the reaction with Ben. He died a brutal death that Diego was probably there for. That was the perfect reaction and I’m so happy we got that little moment. But yeah, Five was as good as dead for 17 years and every one is “meh, okay. He’s back and he’s still an asshole🤷‍♀️” 

Five legit would’ve had to have been horrible to deserve the amount of indifference, and I truly don’t believe that a literal abused child (they all were) who panicked and ran back home yelling his family’s names (and also are those tears??) would be capable of truly being so shitty that no one even cared.

I just...it doesn’t click for me. Yeah, Five acted out during one scene (and Luther said he acted like he thought he was better than them. But that comes down to issues with numbers and ranks that they all had as kids) but it doesn’t really seem like he was just that horrible. I mean it’s the same Five that was nice to Vanya even when others weren’t. It’s the Five that apparently listened to her play while she was learning new pieces. The one who gave her a reassuring smile (in the script) even though he was actually very scared about getting the Umbrella tattoo. The Five that (according to Extra-Ordinary) Diego helped with his “technique.” The Five that was running around with Diego’s holster and various mementos to remember his family by and immediately befriended a mannequin because he was all alone. I mean this is a kid with robot posters and legos in his room and had such a smile during so much of the academy exposition material????

Idk. Maybe I’m reaching and biased but he doesn’t seem like he was just that horrible of a kid. No worse than the rest of them. Maybe it just comes down to personality. To being too strong willed. Or just how his personality is now and the writers never really thought too much about fleshing out his early relationships with his siblings. Or maybe it’s because of the front he puts up. Because it’s Five and he’s always okay, right? It makes me big sad. Idk, I think he’s pretty great and deserves love. But :/