#but he's gone so does it really matter?

[aviatrickss]

*takes a deep breath and leans in so close that my lips touch the microphone*

the tragedy of dick and jason’s relationship as brothers is not that they hated each other and then jason died, or that they were super close and then jason died. the tragedy is that dick did not know enough about jason to know how to mourn him. were they brothers? were they rivals? dick sure doesn’t know, and jason doesn’t either! but it’s fine bc they have plenty of time to figure that shit out, they don’t need to know each other right now bc there will be time to know each other later.

except.

[deus-and-the-machina]

I think an underlooked part of what shaped jin’s mindset was how even back in Torna, he was considered “property”. He and Lora spent their whole lives avoiding the authorities of Torna because they believed would straight up execute Lora to get Jin back, and no one ever denies it. and this has seemingly been a fear since Lora was a child. Jin had to hide his face everywhere he went. Maybe Torna wouldn’t have been cruel enough to execute a child, especially since the king seemed decent(?) enough, if not a bit distant. But the fact it was even a fear at all for Lora since she was so young is just awful to think about. 

According to his past self’s journals, Jin and his old driver fought in a war of independence for Torna, perhaps what made him a hero to begin with. and because he’s a war hero for deeds he doesn’t even remember, the kingdom considers him owned by them. Which is on the nose in two different ways ngl. Both in how the Blades are seen and a wider metaphor of soldiers/state. idk it’s just very sad to think about

[artheresy]

Yingxing Appreciation 🎉🎉

hi, hello, it's Yingxing appreciation time and I'm dragging you into it bc he is my baby and I need more ppl to talk about him

Y'know I see a lot of people like in awe and hyping up DF and just giving him tons of appreciation while analyzing him specifically as an individual which is all so so valid, DF is amazing and very intriguing as a character and I love him sm, but I sadly don't see the same for Yingxing despite him I think also being so interesting. I also see him more so dismissed in the "literally God and some guy" kind of fashion sometimes

So I'm here to rant just a little bit about Yingxing, why I love him, why he's epic and why he ruins my day every single time I think about him! This is for any of my fellow Yingxing lovers who are also starved of any content of him

Firstly, this man is a genuine genius, like lest we forget this is from Baiheng's travelogue in which she met a young Yingxing who was still a child by this point.

He was a young boy but had already become a craftsman, a sign of his ability to learn exceedingly quick under Huaiyans tutelage. And his ability to work and progress incredible fast continues into his time as a young man on the Luofu.

We know he arrived probably somewhere around 18-21 (in my personal estimate) and by the time he saw Jingliu again (which itself was likely early into his stay on the Luofu given HCQ ages and timing), he had already impressed the Master Craftsmen of the Luofu's Artisanship Commission and earned himself a title.

There are also multiple things in game that emphasize his achievements and creations he crafted, some offhandedly mentioned in a readable or item while others are emphasized with importance.

Casually mentioned in the Discarded Ingenium Parts is his feat in the Great Trial of the Furnace (perhaps that trial is for gaining the furnace master title? Once again signifying an earlier achievement in his legacy) where it took him only a day and night to create a whole mechanical lion that moved and looked just like a real live lion from a bunch of defective parts and waste.

More recently in 1.5, they released a readable, the Ten-Lords Criminal Directory, which mentions an imprisonment method designed by Yingxing that keeps “Mirage” in a perpetual state trapped within a hallucination of their own making. Utilizing it’s own powers in order to keep it imprisoned. Something that with proper maintenance seems to have lasted for around 700 years so far.

And of course, how can we forget his most famous creations

The beautifully crafted weapons of the High Cloud Quintet, from Jingliu’s incredibly heavy sword remarked as being as heavy as three thousand catties, to Dan Feng’s Cloud Piercer with the ability to even cut through dragon scales, and the Devastator Glaive as well as Baiheng’s recurve bow. Each impressive in their own ways and seemingly crafted pretty early as well into his time on the Luofu with the HCQ given the distinction of Jing Yuan who (even if he likely was more a teen than a boy) still wasn’t an exact adult yet. So once again, let me emphasize this man’s skill here. With how many things he managed to do so so early into his time on the Luofu. A genius craftsman who deserved all of the praise he had garnered with his works.

Additionally, I know they keep harping about “ugh arrogant craftsman, ugh he’s so full of himself” but every single time we’ve seen his personality, he just seems like a genuine joy to be around. Bright, charismatic, sure he’s cocky but he also gives the impression of being incredibly fun and a bit silly if you ask me.

His behavior as mirrored by the mirage echo in Scalegorge Waterscape is distinctly playful even in what might be a more tense situation, lightly bantering with Dan Feng and even chuckling in certain languages.

In Jingliu’s character stories, it even furthers this bright, playful attitude he gives off with his distinct cheekiness shining through especially with that “toothy grin” of his. And if you listen to Jingliu’s (at least her English) voice lines during Clouds Leave No Trace when she speaks about Yingxing before getting into his transformation, there is a distinct fondness or amusement in her voice as she speaks of him especially that cocky nature of his despite her distaste for it at first.

While Baiheng is hailed as this kind figure in the High Cloud Quintet, perhaps their sun even casting light upon them, it doesn’t seem too far off to say Yingxing was a shining star among them in his own right. His easy going nature with them bringing about a bubbly playfulness similar to Baiheng given their closeness from when he was young. I could go into way more especially in regards to the casualness at which Yingxing seems to speak and treat others allowing for a more equal formation of relationships especially with Dan Feng but I’m saving that for another rant.

And all of this about him especially how expressive he seems at certain points he’s been mentioned, really just makes me so incredibly sad when thinking about Blade now. How severely separated he is from this identity. A division that exists from not only his death but from the way his mental state has been severely warped from his time with Jingliu and being affected afterwards by the mara.

The sheer dehumanization and lack of a personal identity in place of seeing himself as a solely a weapon when put next to Yingxing, with such a clear bold individual identity, really makes the transformation of one into the other all the more jarring and tragic. Especially with the emphasis on how Yingxing hated the abominations of Abundance only to become one himself, something that is still implied to have not been by his own hand. Blade is an immensely tragic character, but that tragedy only holds weight because of the life and identity Yingxing had. It is only with Yingxing’s light which shined despite the circumstances of his life that his descent into darkness hits harder, and it makes me so sad that I haven’t found many others talking or expanding upon this despite my searches because he really is such a well written character with so many details in his story that are both interesting and utterly heartbreaking.

And additionally, I want to say that I think there is a lost potential in examining the Xianzhou through Yingxing. Specifically in the way he is treated as a short life species. We know how the relationship between the Vidyadhara and the Natives, especially as it’s changed after Dan Feng, but there is a very interesting relationship to be explored between the Xianzhou and the Short Life Species the end up there, especially through Yingxing’s relationship to the different Artisans guilds whether on the Luofu or the Zhuming.

In the end, it becomes another sad element to Yingxing’s story. Yingxing managed to change his attitude regarding how the Zhuming masters treated him and even grew more of a confidence, but even in the Luofu's Artisanship Commission, he can never truly get as far as he deserves. Just as Jingliu says

Even with his work impressing the master craftsmen of the Luofu, even after more than showing his skill and earning the title of Furnace Master for that skill, he still would be denied higher positions and could only prove his true worth by the High Cloud Quintet.

And just let me say it again, him being a short life species allows for such an interesting examination of the world and people around him based upon that. While we don't know exactly how they met, we do know that Yingxing was Huaiyan's personal disciple and the only one he mentions of the celestial masters to treat him with respect and believe in his capabilities despite knowing he's a short life species. Through his treatment of Yingxing, we learn quite a bit about him. Through Baiheng's treatment of him as well, we learn a lot about her, more than anywhere else.

He's just UGH I need more exploration from Yingxing's perspective, the lack of it feels as if I'm being starved. He's so interesting, he's so fun, he's incredibly tragic, and he makes me cry every single time he crosses my mind. Please do yourselves a favor and think more about his character so you'll end up as sad about him as me. Or don't maybe. I dunno. All I know for sure is that you absolutely need to read Views of the Universe From a Starskiff: The Zhuming if you haven't. Anyways bye, thanks for listening to this rant, I gotta go cry over him.

Peep the tags also for a rant about my own characterization of YX if you wish to witness my insanity

[carefulfears]

thinking about how expectant of her own death scully always was, but how completely struck by shock she was in mulder’s, despite how clear it had always been that he would one day die for the cause. tragedy in the x-files as something you should have been prepared for, but never could be, in scully standing at a funeral, as her mother had stood at her father’s, and barely being able to speak. she should be able to do this? bred to be a war widow, attached to an endless line. but no matter how many times she saw him put that gun to himself, or run off in front of another, she really did believe that he would always come back. she really did believe that there would never be a day where he didn’t just appear in the doorway again.

[fluffs-n-stuffs]

Under suffocating depths... would it have been easier to just swim down?

>>> Next <<< Previous (Destiny Bond; a Pokémon fancomic --- pt.1, pt.2, pt.3, pt.4, pt.5, pt.6, pt.7, pt.8, pt.9, pt.10, pt.11, ???)

[sea-jello]

wouldn’t it be fun if the squip not only optic blocked michael but also made jeremy completely forget about him

[fabledteeth]

yeah i really don’t know how to feel about the bg3 ending. maybe i Chose Wrong but like.

[bionicbore]

Y’know I kinda wanna elaborate on the HC I mentioned, where I said that if Donald hadn’t found out what Douglas was doing and intervened, Douglas would’ve eventually cracked and fessed up

Mostly I wanna elaborate that he wouldn’t have fessed up because of ethical guilt (though I do think he may have something somewhere inside him that would give a damn about ethics. He did seem pretty excited to do good things after all) but more because he’s got the emotional strength of a wet tissue and would feel personal guilt after getting so attached

I’m gonna put most of it under a cut ‘cause it turned into a full on Douglas study I guess

Like... obviously I’m prefacing this with it being my own interpretation of the guy, but Douglas was a pretty emotional dude in the show. His entire redemption was rooted in his emotional attachment to his family. His morals never 100% improved, and the growth we did see was almost entirely motivated by “My family won’t like me if I’m a bad guy :(”

And while he’s not a particularly GOOD dad, he is a dad. Literally every kid Douglas gets more than 2 minutes of screen time with, he goes into some kind of Dad Mode

So, the way I see it, I don’t think Douglas would’ve lasted if he got to keep the Rats for longer than he did. It’s never actually said how old the kids were when Donald found out, but they couldn’t have been older than like... 3? Tops? Possibly even younger, technically. If Douglas actually got to watch those kids grow up in whatever messed up environment he had them in to keep them hidden (Which, I’ll be honest- based on comparing the brothers’ lab quality, was probably a worse environment than Donald’s lab) I don’t think he would’ve been able to commit. Not with the original trio, anyway

ALSO. I wanna bring up Donald, ‘cause he’s also a factor in of himself

Yeah, the brothers fight a lot, and did fight a lot. But I think it’s worth remembering that despite that, these two founded a company together. They invented things together. They work together seamlessly when they get in the zone. Douglas, despite all the animosity, was ecstatic at the prospect of getting to work alongside his brother again, and was genuinely sad when Donald didn’t feel the same, but chose not to fight Donald’s decision

Douglas cares what Donald thinks of him, and I bet he cared a lot more before Donald discovered what was happening and made his own judgement call. The two of them had to have been incredibly close, and that probably would’ve weighed on Douglas, too

But Donald found out on his own, and he didn’t waste time. He saw the children, he saw the conditions, the plans, the schematics. There was absolutely no way to rationalize what was happening here, Donald had to get these kids out and away. His little brother was using their assets to make deals with terrorists regarding the creation of bioweapons in the form of children

And Douglas was left ghosted by the most consistent presence in his life for the past 20+ years, locked out of the company he helped build from nothing, and separated from these kids who have also been a consistent presence in his life for entirely different reasons

And Douglas is notorious for deflecting and pushing back when someone else decides that he’s in the wrong. All that potential turmoil means the time between Donald finding out and Douglas “dying” was probably like. Intense. To put it mildly

All this to say: Douglas is still a DICK lmao and the point of this post is NOT to be like “Douglas deserved better” or even “Donald is to blame.” It’s more about how Douglas is a notably emotion-driven character and how it affects his dynamics and actions, both positive and negative

It’s also my favorite kind of angst- where technically, things could have turned out okay, or at least better than they did, if everyone involved hadn’t been such a mess

[and-stir-the-stars]

I'm still thinking about Plush Mike trying so desperately to fill the void left by 'real' Mike and being so confused and scared and sad that nothing he tries works. Growing more frustrated but trying his hardest not to let it show so he won't upset Evan. But sometimes it slips out, like when he asks Evan why he even misses his brother in the first place, he was horrible, is real Mike even someone worth missing? Evan lamenting the fact he's alone and Plush Mike saying in a soft voice, "I'm here."

this reminds me of something I've had in my notes app forever (actually it's been in there so long I deleted it at one point, but thankfully there was still a few days left before it vanished forever and I managed to retrieve it, lol)

(In my head, this dialogue took place after Evan started crying and scratching at his arms or hitting his fists against his head because he was overwhelmed by his feelings. Or, however a ghost might hurt themself to deal with overstimulation, since... they, yk, probably don't have bodies that respond to pain... idk, that's why I deleted it).

I liked the idea of (plush) Mike saying/implying bad things about Evan’s older brother because, like you said, he doesn't view himself as someone worth missing and Evan would be way happier if he just forgot him (Mike). But Evan *snaps* at him because that's HIS brother, and this stupid little plush doesn't get to talk about his Mikey like that because Evan still loves him so much and he really is guilty that Mike is dead (even if that guilt is greatly over shadowed by the agony and frustration Evan feels about being abandoned and hurt by Mike again, and by his lack of awareness of HOW he hurt/killed Mike).

I imagine it would be really weird for the epitome of self-loathing that is Michael Afton to hear Evan so vehemently defending him, especially after Evan was the reason he died. Mike's fear (of Evan hurting him and of himself somehow hurting Evan again) really does have to be strong to overcome his need to keep Evan safe and happy and the temptation that is Evan defending him is a good sign.

Now I'm imagining Plushie Mike trying to give Evan "human lessons" as a way of ensuring that he can eventually be safe to reveal himself to Evan if Mike can ever manage to trust himself enough to not accidentally crush Evan again. Mike trying really hard to get a being that doesn't understand physical pain anymore and died too young to get a fully developed sense of empathy (on top of being driven basically insane from trauma and isolation) to understand what things will and won't hurt a human.

"Actually, Evan, if you rip a human's arm off like you just did to me, it hurts, and it'll make humans lose a lot of blood. Humans need their blood INSIDE of their bodies, okay?"

"Okay, you can't throw someone against a wall if they don't want to play a certain game with you. Like, do you remember when I asked if you wanted to play hide and seek yesterday, and you said you didn't feel like playing something that requires a lot of moving? I didn't know you were feeling really tired when I asked if you wanted to play. Sometimes, people have needs and feelings you don't know about. You have to respect that; it doesn't mean that they don't like you anymore."

"okay you definitely CANNOT lock someone in a cabinet drawer if you don't want to listen to them talk anymore. No one other than me would fit, first off. Second, that's just rude. I don't care if your brother did it to you sometimes; that doesn't make it right. It was WRONG."

[orcelito]

I always get so angry but then I play video games and I'm no longer so angry

This is a problem when it comes to wanting to leave my shit ass job

[hylialeia]

still thinking about it and I’m increasingly more convinced that the changes GOT made to Shae were ultimately only compelling by accident (well, by accident and by Sibil Kekilli’s performance) because they ultimately stemmed from a misunderstanding of Tyrion’s storyline and a desire to give him a tragic love story, to the detriment of both his AND Shae’s show characters

[mirrorhouse]

tags on one of my posts reminded me i STILL don’t understand how snake’s chest scar in PW is meant to be fake. i know what the game tries to tell me but it doesn’t make any sense!!! “he needed to keep a jigsaw blade on him at all times and somehow made it look like a very realistic scar” ok BUT

how was it attached to him? how did nobody notice it was fake when he apparently walks around with his shirt off often? and when strangelove’s up close she doesn’t notice anything off about it either? the most important question is WHY am i trying to apply logic to metal gear

[thelostboys87]

this post really is the blueprint for RR felix vs lover boy felix 

[my-thoughts-and-junk]

Me writing animal crossing lore in my head while falling asleep: I am about to craft a narrative that is so convoluted

[be-good-to-bugs]

AAAAH forever stress is going to kill me one day

[dredshirtroberts]

listen. I know my family is bad at communication and acknowledgement of receipt of Thing but when the one thing that consistently happens semi-annually is that I get fussed at for not confirming I received something, it irks me a smidge.

Like if I'm expected to always confirm "Hey I got your [communication/gift]" then why aren't they doing it back? Especially considering the communication in this instance has really actually very important information they will want to know if they want to stay in contact with me.

Like????

Even if I'd just gotten a "K" in response, like. at least it would have let me know they got the damn thing. I sent this email TWO WEEKS AGO and only one person responded - and it was practically immediate too. Like... i know folks are busy, i know shit's going on. I get it. But it would help me feel so much less like I'm suddenly a pariah in the family out of nowhere if like one of the people I'd sent this to had just responded in some way shape or form.

I'd have answered a phone call - i wouldn't have liked it, but i'd have done it. A letter in the mail to my current address even. a message in a bottle probably wouldn't get to me because i'm pretty far from the beaches of the great lakes, and also they're even farther, but like. something right?

my sister at least confirmed she got it and just forgot to respond. i imagine that's what happened with everyone else because we have the same mental illnesses and look. i do it too. but also? also?? i was hounded to respond quickly to things, i was told off every time i wasn't responding within a half hour of any communication. I was asked instantly the next time they saw me if I'd gotten it, even if i hadn't had a chance to see the thing yet.

So forgive me, family, if I'm a little peeved off that all y'all are allowed to "forget to respond" for two whole fucking weeks and then a few extra days (because it's been 2 weeks, 3 days exactly) when i can't let something sit in the mailbox for 2 days because i couldn't get to my mailbox easily while living on my own without getting a phone call or text or email that there should be something waiting in there for me.

*enraged screeching*