#blacken

[elvishprincess25]

Finally finished the Darkening version of Jai'da I started before I left for vacation. tried to better depict her blackening on her hands and hair and skin but still didnt find a way to pull off the horn foliage from this angle....so another time XD

[everyth1ngandnoth1nghauntsme777]

I hopped into your silver Pontiac

The seats leather peeled and cracked

Fine Italian, dashing stallion

Though no Mustang you treated it as such

Painting pictures through fixtures

The ornaments you’d make bobbled whether they were wind chimes or of baseball players who’s names never came to mind

Harkening to the past was always your crutch

Checking over to the back of the Pontiac

Taking record of your cassettes

You said it’s ok to light a cigarette

With you I felt no regret

That was the summer where you tore a ligament

Two people alone in the lone star state

a musician without a metronome, wearing vetiver cologne

Cruising towards a future unknown

Stargazing through the windows, not through telescopes as we only ever thought about ourselves

I asked you if you’ve ever cried

You asked why

I told you it never seemed like an emotion you’d never wear

That question brushed off without a care as you moved on to comb your hair

I hopped inside the silver Pontiac

The fifth track playing as your lips smacked

We hopped into the gas station for a quick snack

That silver Pontiac you drove it as reckless as if you were a horse on the race course

You got a ticket as you went over the speed limit

As the paper felt the touch of your pen

Messy indents leaving traces of illustrations

I chased your chain of letters to the weather vane on that house we’d always pass while drinking saint germaine

Soon enough I realized it said your name

I left with the satisfaction that you had finally found a place to stay

[unfortunatebassist]

You know, the solar eclipse is bringing out something in humanity that I always love to see. Humans making a big deal out of something we can't change, celebrating and laying picnics out to see a giant rock pass in front of our light source, passing around special glasses so we can all observe the sky being different for a few hours together...

The cuteness of it all, the child-like wonder of it all, the feeling so small of it all...

The world isn't perfect but humans try their best to enjoy what we can when we can.

[the-upper-shelf]

"The intruder"

[funstealer]

The Blackened Teeth The Skeleton Floor Lamp, Gold Edition

[scre6m]

THE BLACKENING (2022) written by Tracy Oliver & Dewayne Perkins

[hellboys]

THE BLACKENING (2023) dir. tim story

[blue-mood-blue]

I have been thinking about the blackening (as one does)…

…and it’s so interesting to me, the penalty Shen Qingqiu is faced with should he not decide to yeet his disciple into hell.

Account termination. Instant death. Sent directly home to his already-long-dead body, and that’s it for the villain of the piece who outright refuses his villainy. The protagonist needs a blackening for the story to continue, and Shen Qingqiu is going to provide it or get written out of the narrative. Either way, Luo Binghe is going to lose him. Either way, this is a turning point.

I wouldn’t claim that this is the intent of the penalty, but it fascinates me that the System has, potentially, backed the plotline into a corner - because Binghe still stands to be blackened even if Shen Qingqiu took the other choice.

Think about what that would look like, to him. He’s at the Immortal Alliance Conference, and everything is going wrong. He’s been outed as a demon, and not just a demon - the top tier of demon, as bad as it gets from the perspective of a righteous cultivator. His beloved teacher, the person who has been kindest to him and opened his home and heart to him, is standing there with his sword in hand, deciding what he’s going to do about what must look, to him, like a horrific betrayal. Binghe is apologizing. Binghe is begging for his life.

Shen Qingqiu hears him. Maybe it shows on his face, or in his voice, that he already knew; maybe there’s no hint at all, but Shen Qingqiu is suddenly talking quickly with an abrupt sense of urgency that Luo Binghe is having a hard time keeping up with. Telling him he’ll be wonderful - telling him he’s the best. Telling him the world will be his, with emotions cracking through that aloof mask that Binghe has never seen on Shizun’s face before, and it’s terrifying for reasons that Binghe cannot identify.

(He will, later. When he has time to think, he’ll realize it sounded like a goodbye.)

And then Shen Qingqiu is bleeding. And then Shen Qingqiu is on the ground. And then Shen Qingqiu is dead. There’s no countdown for Binghe - there’s no System, there’s no warning, there’s no answers.

Luo Binghe is a heavenly demon in the middle of a conference sabotaged by demons. Luo Binghe is alone. His fellow competing disciples are scattered, some dead or injured. The Peak Lord of Qing Jing Peak, the second in command of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect, maybe the only person he loved and who loved him back, is dead at his feet. No one will believe him if he says it isn’t his fault.

(He can’t believe it isn’t his fault.)

What choice does he have but to run? The last heavenly demon the cultivation world went up against has been sealed under a mountain for years, and one of the people responsible for that is probably looking for Shen Qingqiu already. They’ll be looking for him, too. There isn’t anywhere to hide; there isn’t any time to mourn.

There isn’t even enough time to ask why. Why again.

There is no closure waiting for him, because there is nothing to explain what happened. It just is.

It would be a different kind of blackening, certainly - less intense, probably, less of a warping, desperate thing. But how many times can one person have all the love and safety in their world torn out from under them before it starts to show? Before they just don’t allow things like love and safety to touch them, because that’s the better option?

Interesting to consider that, simply by offering the choices it did, the System rigged the story to guarantee that Luo Binghe would end up in hell (deliberate or not).

Interesting to consider that, even if Shen Qingqiu made what might have seemed like a kinder choice, there was every chance it wouldn’t have been.

[vebokki]

legend has it shen yuan never approached the kitchen again

[fadeintoyou1993]

It's true True, it follows me around Nothing to lose Wouldn't miss it anyhow

THE CURSE OF THE BLACKENED EYE — ORVILLE PECK

[splashesdarling]

Celebrating Black History Month

Favourite Black Led and/or Focused Films

[claudiaeparvier]

[daily-deliciousness]

Blackened shrimp and cheese ravioli

[mrs-trophy-wife]

[pocfiction]

DEWAYNE PERKINS as DEWAYNE The Blackening (2022) dir. Tim Story