#and the Tsaritsa is evil until proven by the game to not be so I don’t want it to be her

[notthemonthbutmarch]

I’m thinking about Natlan and I just need one thing off my chest

If the theories are right and the Pyro Archon is currently dead and will be resurrection like the title of the chapter suggests, I want her to be a strong and respected woman.

Like, I know we’re already getting Murata and she’s gonna be a Murata Himeko expy (which I kinda don’t like but sure whatever Hoyo) from Honkai Impact 3rd, but idk I just feel like we need a single female archon that doesn’t have a bad relationship with her people AND is powerful.

Right now I think it’s safe to say that the power scaling of the archons is Zhongli, Ei, Venti, Nahida, and then Furina (I know she’s not an archon anymore I’m just including her bc I like her and I’m bias). Also, as an aside, this got to long so I’m putting it down here. I ranked Venti over Nahida not because her powers are weaker than Venti’s but because Venti has more experience. He can fight and knows the full extent of her powers and survived the Archon War; while Nahida would outsmart him no problem, Venti would overpower her physically I just wanted to clarify

Zhongli and Venti are from the OG Seven and have positive relationships with their respective countries. They’re both powerful and well respected.

Ei is hella powerful, but she did steal everyone’s visions so I don’t think she’s respected exactly. She’s more feared in my eyes. Like, absolutely, they respect her because she’s their archon and is powerful and is trying to change, but the people of Inazuma are very aware that Ei is capable of hurting her people if it means achieving her goal. OBVIOUSLY Ei herself doesn’t want to hurt her people and that was the puppet being tricked by the Fatui that did all that, but the people themselves don’t necessarily know that, so they just think Ei had a change of heart.

Nahida’s whole storyline in the Sumeru Archon Quests was reinstating her as the highest and most respected authority. Everyone loves her and for good reason! She’s great, and she’s doing her job as an archon really well. However, she is possibly one of the weakest archons due to age and experience. I can see her being a MIGHTY archon when she’s older, but how long is that gonna take? We’ll probably never see Nahida at her peak.

Then there’s Furina. Her storyline was AMAZING, I think we can all agree the Fontaine Archon Quests were great. However, Furina was seen as a joke or mascot by her people rather than an actual mighty archon. They just followed her because her voice was loud and she played the role well. Furina was never strong or respected, not until AFTER she lost her divinity for good.

Ei is strong but not respected, Nahida is respected but not strong, and Furina is not strong nor respected.

And this isn’t me trying to say Zhongli and Venti are bad or anything. There’s absolutely a discussion for misogyny in Genshin, but I’m not really opening that can of worms right now.

I’m just looking at the dynamics we have for the Archons and am hoping that we get a strong and respected female archon at some point.

It could be the Tsaritsa for all we know! The Tsaritsa is incredibly badass and there’s some indications that the intentions behind the Fatui aren’t that bad but their actions are, so it could be that the Tsaritsa is our strong AND respected Archon.

Yet, Childe’s line about her makes me think that people have their doubts, so is she really that respected as we think?

That just leaves Murata, and I am hoping that if the resurrection thing is about her, then I hope Murata is very strong and highly respected.

But if the resurrection is about someone else, say,the Pyro Sovereign, then I am BEGGING Hoyo to make the Pyro Sovereign a woman. We lost a female archon to a male sovereign I don’t want it to happen again.

[otverzhennyy]

Are the Fatui really the Evil™ organisation ? (Viktor edition.)

The answer : YES ! They really are the evil side and not our dark academia fantasy ! I know it sucks I hate it too !

The Fatui are the token villains of Genshin Impact. In every region, the second something even remotely evil could happen and anyone could have done so, the Fatui are thrown in there to be like “Oh so those characters were not evil IT WAS JUST THE FATUI !”. Whenever a quest plot is gonna be too boring because it is just gonna be exposition, JUST PUT AN EVIL FATUI IN THERE.

And that is not me complaining, absolutely not. It is just the way I personally see it. And I love it. Like Team Rocket, like Slytherins, they’re so damn entertaining. One can talk all they want about, oh, how the Tsaritsa’s great plan is to change the world and that she must be morally grey but ultimately chose an evil path for her ambitions, that the Harbingers have this tragic backstory, but... really, the average Fatui is petty, villainous, stupid, dense, one-dimensional and just a downright bully. With Childe, who is written as a literal anti-villain, the only exception... to the attitude, but in terms of actions, he’s definitely in the worst. They are the easy antagonists to an anime game aimed at children and teenagers (and adult otakus so basically hairier children and teenagers) in a narrative which is just an excuse to play cool anime characters in very cool fantasy zones to explore and solve sudoku puzzles.

With their dark and punk (really cool and hot) type of clothing, Fatui can easily be taken as like. Cunning, opportunistic and ambitious, but the reality is that they are all either bigoted preps or simplistic jocks (and honestly the jocks are just muscular preps, skirmishers and all). Including the Harbingers. And any nuance comes from reading too much between the lines or pure headcanon territory.

The very few times Fatui characters are sympathetic are when you do not know anything else about them but this one thing you know of them or are in a situational moment that is as small as do you open the door to someone who is behind you going in the same building or not and don’t represent any deeper morals in critical situations and more like common decency or sense.

Viktor is no exception to this case. Because, as the latest weekly boss drop mentions in its description, the Fatui leave their name and face behind when enrolling to become one, reinforcing the concept that they lose all sense of individuality. Fatui are most likely formed to have that specific evilious mindset (and/or are recruited when showing signs of it) and wouldn’t pass the training if they were to break out of that mindset (aka “omg we’re the bad guys”, just from Viktor and Childe’s dialogues, they are fully aware that they are “bad guys”).

Viktor’s actions in quests just show that he is less gratuitous into posing actions that are seen as villainous. He is still very rude towards, well, anyone, until they are proven useful to him (aka the Traveler with who he has a “healthy” transactional relationship), Lily being a sweet kid being the only exception.

Why is Lily an exception ? Viktor says that “ [the other agents are] probably spinning their wheels here, just like [him]”, meaning that he doesn’t speak to the others or are close to any of them. Viktor is extremely homesick and away from any contact that is not hostile from the locals. As the days become weeks, weeks become months and towards a full year, this weighs incredibly on his psyche. And as he is only human, a warm presence like Lilly was able to slip through the cracks of Viktor’s “shady Fatooey” behaviour.

Viktor is still a Fatui through and through. Only he might sounds less devious than others. This would probably come from the fact that Viktor has no ambition whatsoever, making his point of view, let’s say, more grounded (read : possibly cynical) than the most ambitious Fatui who puts the whole organisation on a way higher, idealized pedestal. Whereas Viktor still acknowledges the incredible power of the Harbingers and the Tsaritsa, he still describes them relatively as individuals and, ultimately, his bosses and just, his nation leaders who are individuals just like him in the end.

Just like his peers, Viktor derives pleasure from the suffering of others in general, entertainment from them struggling, is greedy, proud, arrogant and mainly focused on his self gain above all else atop of taking advantage of the diplomatic immunity and Fatui military pressure to just be an asshole in general with no tangible repercussions. I do think that unlike certain characters in the Fatui, Viktor is one who is not inherently evil at his core, but not a good person either, with the way the organisation is having either genuinely malicious individuals or those on the darker side of the greyer area. He is very flawed and inconsiderate. With most of how people see as “positive” interaction is him actually being dismissive and passive aggressive due to him just not finding the effort to speak up his WHOLE mind of how much you’re a nuisance worth it. He is a bored, tired man who enjoys the path of least resistance.