#ancestor moth

[elderscrollsconceptart]

"The original concept for The Prophet from the intro to the game."

Concept art for The Elder Scrolls: Online

Art by Mathew Weathers

[luna-the-cat]

Different insects from Skyrim

[crybabyboyscout]

[bonestrewncrest]

warmup

[t3-art]

Houndwhistle: I resign myself to my fate in the dark forest for killing our leader... My actions were just and true, at least my husband will understand that I did what had to be done and will join me there, surely... Spotears rolling up from cat heaven: YOU DID WHAT!!!

AKA CicadaClan's #1 dark forest murderer gets screamed at by his ex-mate for killing said ex-mate's closest friend and then lying about it for the rest of their lives! Poor Spotears only found out his husband was a murderer when he died himself and met up with his bestie to learn the truth!

cat drama simulator never fails to deliver, i swear...

[joelletwo]

way too late to be articulating this thought but every time i loop hayloft and see the goofy utsuro!takasugi->oboro!takasugi noooo lil sibling dont kill sensei by killing sensei. kill sensei by killing ourselves. convolution. i am more and more fueled into getting as stupid as i can in my gntm postcanon lol. takasugi's eye has always been fine and he crawled out of that tower miraculously alive. so did oboro. separately. bc they. separately. uno reverse took over shouyou and utsuro's bodies respectively. all the other altana bodies in the terminal died for real tho so shouyoutsuro did as well. so whos that baby? why its my good friend shouyou(tsuro. theyre integrating.) the fourth :)

and the shouyou body takasugi took over just had a normal ass stab wound thats easy street hes fine now. but the utsuro body oboro took over was 1. largely metaphorical 2. also stabbed 3. more importantly underwent ego death something bad. so oboro's still on borrowed time he just gets enough to hang out with everyone until they get bored of him after a month and then he goes crawls in the woods and dies. one more time

[nerevar-quote-and-star]

aren't moth priests blind too or did I make that up

No, you're right! ✨

The Order of the Ancestor Moth is the primary — and only authorized — faction that handles Elder Scrolls. Moth priests will spend years training to read a scroll. However, even with all their precautions, they do go blind. The book, Effects of the Elder Scrolls, explains it this way:

Alone in Tamriel, it would appear that only the Cult of the Ancestor Moth has discovered the discipline to properly guard one's mind when reading the scrolls. Their novitiates must undergo the most rigorous mental cultivation, and they often spend a decade or more at the monastery before being allowed to read their first Elder Scroll. The monks say this is for the initiates' own protection, as they must have witnessed many Unguarded Intellects among their more eager ranks. With appropriate fortitude, these readers also receive blindness, though at a far lesser magnitude than the Unguarded. Their vision fogs slightly, but they retain shape, color, and enough acuity to continue to read mundane texts. The knowledge they gain from the scroll is also tempered somewhat -- it requires stages of meditation and reflection to fully appreciate and express what one saw. (para. 4).

Blindness is usually inevitable for anyone who reads an Elder Scroll. The only deliverance between a trained moth priest and that guy over there is that the moth priest has trained to read the scroll and has taken precautions for its effects. That guy over there is reading it cold turkey and will quickly begin to go blind and probably mad.

Now, these rules don't apply to individuals like the Last Dragonborn, but for the reason why, I refer you back to the above book.

[catman-draws]

Chapter 5- Page 14

First- Previous- Next

[the-tharns-speak]

How are the moth priests doing, does the government control them?

Moth priests are doing fine, they filled in a form for a partial tax refund for the last year - actually a very sensible motion on their side, given the impromptu crater in their backyard.

Does the government control them? Not any more than any other citizen of the Empire. The Council has a very limited influence on the going-ons of the officially recognised churches within the Empire. Technically the Emperor counts as “the high priest of any of the Eight Divines you need in the moment”, but practically it gets used only for ceremonies.

However, legally speaking, the Cult of the Ancestor Moth is a sect (also known as: cult) - a religious body with nothing enough following to be actually recognised by the Imperial Council as an official church whose faith citizen can follow.

[cyrodiilvampyrumorder]

(insert swooshy sword noises)

[msfcatlover]

Further research has shown the Ailanthus moths I’ve given Damian have a lifespan maxing out ~75 days. Females will lay ~200 eggs, but I cannot find the viability percentage of those eggs (searching “hatching” with any word combination I can think of is only getting me cocoon hatching times.) However, google says the average egg-to-butterfly in general ratio is ~1-2 out of every 100.

It is worth keeping in mind that Jane Prentiss’s swarm was purely larval (she stuck her arm in a wasp nest, and her “worms” do match descriptions of wasp larvae.) But I want Dami to have moths too, so let’s say that lack of pupating is a Prentiss thing; John Amherst was described as having both flies & ants following him around, so clearly adult insects are possible, though whether they were his swarm or just creepy-crawlies that liked to be around him is vague as Amherst is more associated with disease than insects. (I personally believe his aspect is the dangerous grossness just barely out of sight; the disease that shows only hints before it kills someone, the house infested with vermin barely noticeable from the outside, that sort of thing.) (Amherst is even more protective of his little friends than Prentiss is, weirdly enough. She doesn’t seem to care if a few worms get squished, but if someone calls pest control to Amherst’s house? Oh, you better watch out…)

(Also worth noting: Corruption-influenced creatures often have atypical behaviors compared to their non-supernatural counterparts. Wasp larvae aren’t normally that aggressive, mosquitoes can’t work together to escape from captivity, etc. So anything I come up with that is just objectively wrong for Damian’s silk moths isn’t me, guys, it’s the Corruption! I swear.)

Anyway. I was doing this research to try to figure out how badly the Lazarus Pit would have influenced Damian’s swarm, and how long it would take for it to become obvious what he was. Let’s say all the adult moths & larvae were killed off by the Pit, and most of their tunnels healed, leaving only a small network in Damian’s chest where most of the eggs were (let’s say ~1000.) Assuming Talia shipped Damian straight to Gotham after saving him, the first larvae would hatch within a week of getting there. Damian would probably eat a lot more than most boys of his size & age, but would never seem to put on weight. He would also be tired and probably in a lot of pain as the larvae borrowed new tunnels throughout his body, though he’d definitely try to hide that. I don’t think the 1st generation of adults would be ready to leave his body, so those first ~4 months wouldn’t be terribly obvious (though that’s still ~10 moths with 5″ wingspans wriggling around inside him for about a week. Maybe a couple less, given the stress of the situation? Though, I’d imagine Corruption critters are probably a lot hardier than their normal counterparts, so maybe a couple more. That is still going to be unspeakably unpleasant.)

So it won’t be until the 2nd generation reached maturity that Damian would need to start worrying about people noticing what he was. I was going to have Bruce “die” at the 8 month mark after Damian moved in, but maybe it would be better to make it ~6 months, so that Damian has an excuse to hide just how sick he is.  Then Dick becomes Batman, Damian becomes Robin, and Tim goes off for the Red Robin arc. Scarecrow escapes, and Dick finds out what Damian is. Damian’s swarm is cut down again after he pukes up a lot of his caterpillars (and probably transplants them to a proper Ailanthus tree, since I doubt Dick would let Damian hurt himself just to put them back.) So Damian has another 3 generations before it becomes a serious problem (~7.5 months) which give Tim enough time to complete his arc, get back on good terms with Dick, and start to get along with Damian. At which point, Damian asks Tim to “lance the wound” so to speak, putting a single deep puncture for the swarm to enter & exit Damian’s body without hurting Damian even worse (which Dick would not understand the necessity of, possibly, given his own relationship with his patron is almost purely adversarial. And the Hunt requires much less personal sacrifice than the Corruption does.)

The wound does not bleed (at least not long,) because it is coated in silk like a second, internal skin. It will always ache, but is considerably less painful that the swarm building up inside of Damian or even vomiting them out. It will never heal, but unlike the wounds Damian had before the Pit (which largely served the same function,) it will never get infected as on every level possible, Damian’s become a much healthier person. (Scientifically, he no longer has to tend to his hurts alone, so they get better treatment. Socially, he has a much bigger support network. Psychologically, he no longer feels quite so self-conscious about his true nature, no longer having to hide or feel shame over himself or his swarm. Metaphysically, his relationship with the swarm itself is healthier, as he has found healthier ways of living with it than bottling it up or letting it nest in open wounds he received in training, and Damian is no longer so dependent on it for emotional fulfillment.)

[elderscrollsconceptart]

Ancestor Moth

Card back art for The Elder Scrolls: Legends

*Artist Unknown* If anyone knows the artist comment below

[activatingaggro]

sayyid and the boneseer

Today is a writing day. Can I jam this out? LET’S FIND OUT.

Context: As a child, Liyiji’s ancestor, Sayyid, was separated from her liegelord/boss after the dragon lusii of a rival bard attacks their carriage. She wakes up to find herself in the forest with a broken leg, being cared for by a mysterious yellowblood..

.. in the point of the République l'êtrefleur Bleu’s history where the average caste is still blue, and no one’s quite clocked on the existence of anyone lower than teal yet. Shenanigans ensue.

“My lord raised me,” she said stiffly. It was impossible to tell exactly where those strange eyes fell, but the witch had turned their face to watch her, the vast wings of their ears just barely afloat. “There is nothing queer about that. It’s the way of things, is all.”

“Is it?” Had she ever heard such doubt caught only in two words?

“Yes. Who raised you, then?” An idea struck. “Did no one raise you?” Sayyid asked. How was a witch hatched? “Oh. Oh, did you - were you - have you always been alone, then?”

She didn’t expect the witch to laugh.

High, high above them, the light rippled. There was no breeze, no rustle of movement, but the branches of the trees shielding them must have stirred all the same. For there were leaves falling, lazy little tufts of white that spun as she watched.

The witch lifted a hand. The leaf fell on it, as neatly as if it had been called. “What are you doing?” Sayyid demanded, leaning forward. The second leaf had landed on her palm, as nicely as the last, but the witch’s mouth twisted. They looked up towards the sky, and they sang a high note, so much sweeter than anything she’d ever heard from them before.

“Are you going to sing?” she asked. “My lord --”

The witch paid her no mind. The leaves were falling in earnest now, as thick as if they had called them down. Their spin through the air was no longer so lazy. They moved like they had a purpose, almost. When the witch spread out their arms, it certainly seemed as if they knew what to do; they landed on their skin, on the cloth of their shirt, layer upon layer piling on until they began to look frostbitten from the heft of them.

There was a leaf drifting past Sayyid. It was the first that had come near her, but perhaps it had been pushed by the weight of the rest falling - propelled from its path like bubbles escaping an anchor. She reached out to grab it, but there was no need. Perhaps it wasn’t the witch’s magic that had drawn the leafs to her, for it landed on her palm as easily as if she’d called it.

“I’ve never seen a white tree before,” she said, lifting her hand. “What type of -”

The leaf moved.

It wasn’t a leaf. What she had thought to be the plant’s paper-thin skin had only been wings, with a membrane stretched thin and pale over an impossibly small frame. There were half a dozen legs, all scratching gently away at her palm. It had eyes, large, vapid ones that watched her carelessly as she tried not to shriek.

Her lord would never scream over an insect. He hadn’t even screamed when the dragon had taken him!

“Art thou frightened, girl?” the witch jeered. The flash of their arms, their shoulder, their nape had all been hidden under the ripple of moths. Perhaps they’d grown tired of stillness. Perhaps, Sayyid thought wildly, she had scared them - because now they were moving, shifting, a pulsating mass as alive as any river. “And one thought thee did wish to see mine own parents. But nay! Instead thee quake, and quail - over what? A mere bug, a leigeman of our air? Doest thy lord save thee from every vermin, lest thee fucking weep?”

There was heat in her cheeks. There was heat in her eyes, Sayyid realised with a flash of horror, settling in the corners like a promise she would be shamed. The moth still sat on her palm, unbothered, as the witch laughed again. It wasn’t like her lords’ laugh, or even his ladies’ - it was a cruel, wretched sound, colder than the blood that ran in any of their veins.

“One was raised by the sun, and the sky, and all that live in it, girl,” the witch said. “Dost thou find that answer fucking enough?”

[truevedicastrology]

Jupiter's Blessings

A Journey Through the Houses

The mighty Jupiter, king of the planets, showers its benevolent influence upon each area of life depending on its position in your birth chart. Let's embark on a cosmic expedition, exploring the unique gifts Jupiter bestows in each of the twelve houses:

1st House: The Charismatic One: Your presence radiates confidence, attracting opportunities like moths to a flame. Your ever-evolving style reflects your inner spark, and your optimistic outlook paints life in vibrant hues. Physical well-being and financial fortune seem to follow you effortlessly.

2nd House: The Affluent One: Financial security and a love for life's finer things dance hand-in-hand. Your sharp wit and insightful conversations win hearts and minds, while early financial success empowers you to build a secure future.

3rd House: The Connected One: Warmth and understanding define your relationships with family and friends. Communication flows effortlessly, and your sharp intellect paves the way for academic achievement and success in travel endeavors.

4th House: The Rooted One: Familial harmony and a sense of belonging are yours to cherish. A peaceful home environment, possibly in a dream location, nourishes your soul. Your connection with your mother is a source of strength and solace.

5th House: The Expressive One: Your talents shine brightly, propelling you onto the stage of life. You excel in sports and possess a diverse skillset. Romantic encounters are filled with joy and shared passions, while your adventurous spirit thrives on taking risks.

6th House: The Harmonious One: Health and well-being are your birthright. Your work routine is a source of enjoyment and discovery, leading to financial abundance and promising opportunities through supportive colleagues.

7th House: The Sociable One: Serendipity guides your relationships, leading you to soulmates and fulfilling partnerships. Your magnetic personality attracts admirers and opportunities for social recognition, while legal endeavors find favor under Jupiter's gaze.

8th House: The Resilient One: Inheritance and investments are blessed with fortunate outcomes, shielding you from financial hardship. Deep connections flourish, bringing happiness, and your emotional resilience ensures swift recovery from setbacks.

9th House: The Wanderer One: The world is your oyster! Frequent travel, exposure to diverse cultures, and encounters with inspiring individuals broaden your horizons. Your insatiable curiosity and enthusiasm for life's adventures make every journey a treasure.

10th House: The Achiever One: Career success comes easily, often fueled by the support of family or ancestors. Leadership roles and recognition become synonymous with your professional journey, and your wanderlust fuels your exploration of diverse cultures.

11th House: The Networked One: Dreams manifest effortlessly, surrounded by loyal and intelligent friends. Your social circle is a tapestry of diverse backgrounds and languages, and influential connections propel you forward.

12th House: The Intuitive One: Even adversity holds unexpected blessings, deepening your spiritual connection and highlighting your moral compass. A contemplative nature and a keen awareness of life's subtleties guide your intuitive decisions. You travel to destinations chosen by your soul, seeking profound connections.

Remember, this is just a glimpse into Jupiter's influence. Delving deeper into your individual birth chart will reveal the unique ways this benevolent giant shapes your life's journey.

Follow our Facebook page Mage Magic Touch for personal consultations https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61565561190268

[knifecalledlust]

ancestor moths

this is actually a redraw of a fanart from 2019, I'll put the original under the cut because i'm not too happy with it now...so check it at your own risk

feels like it was forever ago...well, it kinda was, wasn't it?

[hellsitegenetics]

this might be a stupid question, but if theres a protein that multiple organisms need, wouldn't the a t g c genetic code for it be the same for different species? or at least closely related species? so theoretically some prompts/sequences should have multiple fitting organisms or closest fitting organisms

(i know it isn't this simple, but im wondering what the exact reason it doesn't work like that is, or what im missing)

not a stupid question, i'll try to answer it to the best of my understanding, but if anyone has anything to add, please do.

put shortly: you're right! if multiple organisms need a certain protein, the code in their DNA is generally the same in that region.

from a genetics perspective, all organisms are actually extremely similar. i'm sure you've heard that we humans share more than half our genetic information with bananas and such.

this is just a factor of how evolution works. every so often, a mutation occurs in an organism's genome, which has a chance to increase the fitness of that organism, which allows it to have more offspring, which changes the mix of alleles in the population. and this is how we get different species of things.

but, because we all share a common ancestor from a long, long, long, long time ago, we do maintain some similarities, especially in regions that code for things essential to life.

those regions where things are *different* is where we're able to tell one species from another, differentiating moths from trees and such. but, overall, all living organisms have a whole lot in common.