#child who has gone through what is considered some of the most brutal hardships within his publisher's catalog (Palu's guidance says so)

[arcticdementor]

The devout and observant Christian is undoubtedly aware of the precarious state of the faith in our modern world and is becoming increasingly open to out-of-the-box solutions. One such possible solution is to take a cue from our bearded Amish neighbors and form rule-based religious communities—but maybe without the horse and buggy.

A brief peak at the current state of American Christianity should disabuse anybody of the notion that this is unnecessarily drastic.

America’s traditional Mainline Protestant denominations are bleeding out so quickly they will likely be gone within 20 years. That is not my prediction, but their own. The ELCA (the main Lutheran branch) projects they’ll only have 16,000 worshippers by 2041; the PCUSA (the main Presbyterian branch) lost almost 40% of their members in the last decade, causing one analyst to note, “At its current rate of shrinkage the PC(USA) will not exist in about 20 years;” and data for the Episcopal Church shows the same 20-year timeline until the denomination runs out of people in the pews.

More conservative denominations used to chuckle at these headlines and say, “If only they preached the Gospel instead of liberal activism, they’d be growing like us.” But they don’t say that anymore. The Southern Baptist Convention, the largest of the Evangelical churches, has lost 14% of their members since 2006; the Methodists are losing members while in the middle of a brutal split; and for Catholics, according to Bishop Robert Barron while speaking at the 2019 bishops’ annual conference, “Half the kids that we baptized and confirmed in the last 30 years are now ex-Catholics or unaffiliated.”

There is one major exception, though: the Amish—a mustard seed that is growing into a large tree in front of our eyes. The Amish arrived in the United States shortly after their founder, Jakob Ammann, split with the Mennonites in 1693 for being too lax on enforcing their communal rules, as laid out in the Dordrecht Confession of Faith. For the next 200 years, the Amish were just a few eccentric families in Pennsylvania that spoke an archaic Swiss German. By 1920, these few families had grown to 5,000 people and since then have doubled about every 15 to 20 years, including between 2000 and 2020 when they doubled to 351,000.

Unless something changes drastically within their culture, this doubling is projected to continue. One demographer, Lyman Stone, showed that at their current rate of growth, they will easily make up a majority of the United States in 200 years. This means the current moment may mark the halfway point between them arriving as a small band of friends and their inheriting the most powerful nation on the planet. They may seem like a backwards remnant of the past, but in reality, they will almost certainly play a major role in the future. This will become more evident after they soon dwarf more well-known churches like the Episcopalians and Lutherans.

…

So, when virtually all other Christian groups are seeing plummeting, or at best stagnant, numbers, why are the Amish seeing growth like this? The answers people typically give are that they have a very high birth rate and an over 90% retention rate. But that’s like saying someone is wealthy because they made a lot of money and then saved most of it. It begs the question—how? How do they have such large families—with 6 or 7 children per woman—while the country at large has a below-replacement rate of 1.6 children? And how are they able to keep all those children within their communities?

I believe it all comes down to one thing—the Code—or as the Amish call it, the Ordnung.

The Amish Ordnung is different in each community, but if it strays too far, other communities will no longer associate with that community; so there are limits. While outside observers will just see strict rules about hats and beards and technology use, the Amish see the glue that holds them together as a people.

It’s very important to realize that each rule is chosen as a group and with the goal of strengthening individual virtue (especially humility), family and community ties, and their faith.

As an example, most Amish communities don’t allow phones in their homes, but it’s not because they think phones are inherently evil and ban them completely. They often have shared phone booths at the end of the street to use when necessary and at their places of work. They just don’t have phones in the home because they believe it will take away from the purposes of a home—things like family bonding, chores, and recreation. Nobody who has sat in a room of family and friends all silently swiping at their phones can tell me their concern isn’t warranted.

…

The success of this model was discussed by Eric Kaufmann, a political-demography scholar at the University of London, in his provocative 2010 book, Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth?: Demography and Politics in the Twenty-first Century. Kaufmann noted the growth of groups like the Amish and the Haredi Jews (often called the Ultra-Orthodox) and attributed it to their birth rates and strong communities. Haredi Jews, for example, who also live by strict community codes, were only a few percentage points of the Israeli schools in 1960 but are now about a third of students, and he predicts they will very soon eclipse secular Jews. Haredi growth in Brooklyn, New York, is seeing similar growth, with high birth rates and retention.

…

Laurence R. Iannaccone’s 1994 study “Why Strict Churches Are Strong,” which has been frequently cited and confirmed since, gives more detail on the success of certain community codes.

Iannaconne found that groups can be strict on items as long as they provide a “close substitute.” Think, for example, of banning social media but then providing a lot of new in-person social opportunities to make up for that sacrifice.

“Strictness works,” he says, but the rules can’t be so strict they make people miserable and drive them away, or as Iannaconne says, “Arbitrary strictness will fail just as surely as excessive strictness.” The rules do have to be strong enough, though, to keep “free-riders” from claiming the benefits of the community without participating. He called these rules “costly signals,” like the sacrifices the Amish make by limiting their clothing styles and technology use. A person would be very unlikely to go through all of those costly steps for community benefits they could get more easily elsewhere. By eliminating free-riders—whose “mere presence dilutes a group’s resources, reducing the average level of participation, enthusiasm, energy, and the like”—they see the reverse, very high levels of participation, enthusiasm, and energy.

It’s not just Amish and Haredi Jews that have seen success with following a community code beyond the laws of the state—think of the monastics who survived in far-flung places relying on The Rule of St. Benedict; knights that followed the Codes of Chivalry; bands of cowboys on the American frontier who stuck close to the Code of the West, which gave detailed guidance on passing strangers on the trail, when to tip your hat, and with which hand you should hold your whiskey; and the tribes along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border who have followed the Pashtunwali code since pre-Islamic times.

…

Modern Christians interested in starting a rule-based community would need to create some real benefits that are harder to come by in society at large. I’d suggest the basic benefits of a traditional community (help with childcare and schooling, coherent customs on dating and marriage, providing purpose and companionship to the elderly, cultural celebrations and gatherings, friendship, and assistance during hardship) would be plenty.

Then, they could agree together on some basic rules that are costly enough to separate the serious from the free-riders while not being arbitrary or unnecessarily strict. Targeting the rules toward areas that are particular downfalls for modern Americans (promiscuity, pornography, social media, screen-addiction, substance abuse) would be a good start. Agreeing to forego these in this time and culture would almost certainly be a costly enough signal.

Also, many of the rules should take into account issues like abuse of power, cults of personality, convenient personal revelations from God, sexual abuse, and a host of other issues inherent to tight-knit communities (and larger ones for that matter). The ability for a trusted leader to turn out to be an evil psychopath should never be underestimated, so rules should take that likelihood as a given and guard against it. The Amish, for example, draw straws to choose their leaders to avoid jockeying for power.

One last consideration is to what extent “walling yourself off from the modern world,” as Kaufmann said, is appropriate. Kaufmann said that was the best strategy for growth, but growth is not the only thing to weigh. There are also things like loving your neighbors, having an influence on the greater culture, and not stifling curiosity and creativity. Some walls are necessary, like between a teen boy and pornographic websites or between a child and an activist teacher, but a balance between walls and open spaces should be carefully pursued as a group. For example, language is used as a wall for the Amish (who speak Pennsylvania Dutch) and the Haredi Jews (who largely speak Yiddish), but that would likely be a step too far for most communities, as would their highly-detailed clothing restrictions.

…

Out-of-the-box? Sure. But with the exponential growth of the Amish and similar rule-based communities (and our own failure to find a workable model for modern Christian life) it may be a paradigm to consider. Even without our participation, it will certainly be how a fair amount of future Christians will live.

[seekersoflore]

Flight Rising Timeline (In-Depth)

Super recently (like, earlier today), I drew a rough timeline of my own accounts of Sornieth’s history. (You can find it here!) That timeline is.... super roughshod and messy. I kind of wanted to detail or list out in better depth some of the things on that timeline. Or just, y’know. Write it out in general! Some inspiration also came from @hungrytundras so thank you to him for that - y’all should check out his lore. It’s super hella, and super in depth.

My events of Sornieth’s history also differ a bit from canon. There’s a lot of overlap, but a lot of things changed, too. And as always, this is all just my personal headcanons for my lore, and it’s in the sake of fun! Feel free to use it, or share it, or talk about it - or don’t! It’s up to you! Also... this might end up entirely defunct as I continue to create and expand. But it’s here for now, so- ...

It’s gonna get long, so we’re under a read-more for the actual content! Whoosh!

Age of Origins

Encompasses the canonical First Age, from the creation of Sornieth, up until the creation of the Pillar of the World.

From the depths of endless Void, magic writhes to life, and creates on a barren child planet the first dragon gods of history: Earth, Fire, Water, Wind.

It is from these Grand Wyrms that other deities arise. There are many more than the eleven we know now, but between all of them, there are Eight grand deities.

These deities war with one another endlessly. Their terrible magical wars result in the near destruction of the new world they were born in. This unending chaos attracts a very old entity - the very Void from which Sornieth took form from. As we call it now, it is the Shade, and intends to reclaim the space stolen from it and misused.

The deities wage war not with one another, but with the Shade, until it has been beaten back from Sornieth’s skies. The toll is heavy; only the Eight eldest deities remain.

In their grief and loss, the eight form a pact to come together, to prevent the Shade from returning and incurring more cruelty and loss. The Pillar of the World is formed on the Earthshaker’s spine, and the eight fall into a (presumed) eternal rest.

Age of Reclamation

Encompasses the canonical Second and Third Ages, from the rise of the unknown tribes, to the creation of the first of dragonkind.

With the Eight wyrms settled in sleep, the war-torn world of Sornieth begins to reform, heal, settle, and grow. With it, a new people arise - humanoid tribes whose faces have been long lost to history and calamity. These tribes grow in culture and reverence to magic, and much like the dragon gods before them, they turn to war against one another.

The global wars of these tribes end with the Magi during what was known as the Firebringer Uprising - where an oracle of the people foretold the coming history that would unite the tribes. From here, technology, the arts, and civilization as we know it begins to boom.

Eventually, it also physically booms, when during the opening phase of a great new reactor... it goes into meltdown and a catastrophic nuclear explosion that results in an extinction event across the planet. A new dragon deity grows within his nuclear egg.

The same blast leaves arcane radiation across the planet. From this radiation, extreme levels of life and decay begin to grow, until two more deities form from the ashes of an extinct people. They come to be known as the Gladekeeper and Plaguebringer, and for the rest of their days are at eternal war.

The nuclear egg hatches, and intimately curious about the world, the Arcanist explores the Magi’s constructions, history, and remaining culture. He holes himself up in the Observatory he finds until he causes the next planetary catastrophe.

As fauna and flora, life and decay, spread across the entirety of Sornieth during the Sister Gods’ eternal combat, a few vestiges of the Magi poke their head out of their refuges. They themselves have been changed significantly from the arcane radiation, and from this point in history, are a new people known as the Beastclan. They reclaim the abandoned cities, and tear them down to begin anew. The history of the Magi is frowned upon, and so they lay forgotten to history and hardship.

During this time, a few folk who still revere the old ways of magic build monuments to the Sister Gods who they live in fear and awe of, as well as to the Pillar of the World, the wellspring of all magic, and to the Magi long gone. One such place lays deep within the jungle home of the Gladekeeper’s origins - the Hall of the Ancients.

Eventually, the Arcanist finds something unusual within his telescope. An unnatural chill begins to settle over Sornieth, and the Arcane Wyrm is curious enough to travel to the top of the Pillar of the World in an attempt to explore and document. His curious folly leads to the revitalization and revenge of the Shade, coming down with enough force to destroy the weakened barrier - and the Pillar - almost entirely. Once again, the beastclan are nearly destroyed, though not nearly as completely as the time before. They will rebuild.

Left in the hull of the crater left from impact, the Eight are spat back into existence, and awaken to a world reclaimed by magic, flora, and fauna. The Shade twists through the air, free to infect the land as it meanders. Much power was lost in the expulsion of the barrier... but enough is left to cause entropy untold, if left unchecked.

The Eight decide to go their own ways. If they could not stop the Shade together, perhaps they could apart. And, of course, they are dragons. They have territory to reclaim. New challengers to beat back into their lanes...

Age of Ancients

A lost age. This age encompasses history modern dragons are only beginning to learn... that of the first dragons - the ancient breeds who were engineered for the purpose of reclaiming lost territory, and eradicating the remnants of the Shade, up until the creation of the eleven Flights, and relatively-modern Flight Rising.

Ancient Dragon breeds are created; Sornieth’s first relatively mortal dragons. They are apexes of their element, designed for war, and for capture, containment, and eradication of the Shade. They are not designed to intermingle with any other breed or element but their own.

For a long time, these dragons fight wars waged by deities to beat back and reclaim territory to call their own. These territories eventually expand and settle into what we know as the Eleven Flights.

After land is staked, and war-forged clans begin to settle and grow, the next order of business is to hunt down and eradicate the Shade. The original thought was much how the many deities of primordial times had once beaten back the shade before - as a unified force of elemental might. Taskforces were created, made up of eleven dragons, one of each elemental breed. These teams were very secular, and it was perhaps because of this that they did not last.

The second attempt was the first intermingling of clans and breeds, in the formation of more loosely open Shade Hunting Guilds. They were intended to share information and allow through less restrictions, better mobility and longevity in their success. One such guild was known as the Pillar’s Claw - based in Earth under the watchful eye of both Earthshaker and Icewarden.

Some deities however, did not take the failure of the taskforces to mean to loosen their grip. Instead, they tightened it significantly, and deigned to handle the Shade Problem themselves. This led to formations of the Gaoler Orders, and especially the Seekers.

The Gaoler Order spreads massively, and as it works to contain the Shade, also works to contain anything not deemed ‘justified’ or worthy in the Icewarden’s name. This leads to a conflict in the border of fire and ice that is as brutal and cruel as it is quick - the extinction of the Fire Ancients in the Banescale Conflict. The elemental territory of fire is devastated.

It is not long after the destruction of the Banescales that, for still many unknown reasons, the Ancient dragons begin to disappear from Sornieth as if they never existed, and the hunt for the Shade crawls to a halt, before also vanishing.

Age of Flights

What most consider the ‘modern age’ of Flight Rising. It encompasses the Rise of Beastclans, current site lore, up to the Bounty of the Elements. Going forward is where the majority of my personal lore comes in, be warned!

In the wake of the first dragon’s disappearance, the Beastclan make a second resurgence in culture and territory of their own. They take advantage of the settled state of the world, and settle permanent roots. These roots will be partially uprooted once again, very shortly.

A new breed of dragon emerges. Many, actually - with the fight against the Shade seemingly over, and in light of the terrible conflict of Gaoler and Banescale, there appears to be no need for the Ancient dragons anymore. Heads turn once more to the establishment of territory - and these new dragons, who are built not for fighting and hunting, but for building lives and communities, spread and thrive. This becomes the establishment of the Eleven Flights.

Beastclan are quickly overrun in their own homes, and it becomes a bigger point of contention than ever. Eventually, this leads to the rise of the Harpy Queen Talona, and the Beastclan emerge as a notable force, united to rise and stand toe to toe against - or with - dragonkind.

During the Rise of the Beastclans, dragons across Sornieth begin to interbreed and spread, founding more permanent homesteads, cities, and places of trade where elements intermingle and species are not homogeneous. One of these great hubs is formed in Shadow, in the visage of a coastal trade town called Emporiki.

Around the same time, one of many to come courier services are created. One of the older ones and amongst the first to offer service on a very wide continental basis, is the Wind-based Praesidium Postal Service.

As generations pass and the boundaries between elements muddies further within dragonkind, adventurers and explorers who are curious about the world before them begin to crop up. One such group rediscovers the Hall of the Ancients deep within the Rainforest Jungle, nestled on a plateau overlooking a massive glade centered by a giant hollowed tree. A clan forms here, originally created to study the temple, known as the Duskhallow Shire.

While Shade hunters no longer exist, until history and unfortunate local corruptions bring up forgotten information leading to the formations of new Guilds, bounty hunters and mercenaries surely do exist. The Venatore are one of them - a group of mercenaries who eventually unite under one gold-earning banner.

The expansion of territories and disputes with the Beastclan also leads to upticks of crime and cruelty amongst dragonkind, and the oracles of the Water Flight were not immune. An age of piracy brewed, and new rivalries and wars could be found over the open seas. One ship very late to this arrival is one very confused to its purpose - to be justice, or pirates? The flag this crew flies under is that of the Winged Doubloon.

Dragonkind will continue to expand and lairs grow and thrive for generations. Small disputes and civil wars come and go, politics expand, an Exaltation System is implemented in reverence and assistance to the Eleven, and crime rates rise and fall. New breeds are discovered, hidden in shadowy boughs, and birthed through accidental mutagens. This growth will continue until a new surge in magic appears, creating a new cycle of history repeating itself, as Sornieth heaves forward in a new chapter of history and excitement...

Age of Bounty

The Current Age of Flight Rising, in my lore. This encompasses the Bounty of the Elements up until the present day. I thought that with as much lore and huge updates like the Ancient breeds that we’ve gotten since that day, it was deserving of a new turn, and an age of it’s own.

As the Flights enter an era of unprecedented magical presence and growth, stories begin cropping up of unbelievable happenings: miracles, disturbing tales, historical discoveries, and horror stories.

New eyes are discovered upon Sornieth’s hatchlings, thought to be an aftereffect of constantly evolving and growing magic.

Discoveries of ley lines and new magic appears. These ley lines, long dormant, bring about quite a few problems of their own when dragons try to harness or manipulate them.

In miraculous events, an ancient breed of dragon is rediscovered within the Southern Ice Fields - the once powerful orders known as the Gaolers, reduced to hidden clans and secretive missions. Once they are outed, they begin to crop up around the world as the relic breed is reintroduced to society with open wings.

Stories about dragons going missing on archaeological digs begin to crop up. Fascinatingly, the opposite also occurs when on a job, the Venatore mercenaries dig up a living gaoler deep within stone, where he was presumably petrified within a many years’ spell. This Gaoler, known as Dante, claims to be a shade hunter from a guild nobody has heard of. He quickly commandeers leadership of the Venatore - disbanding them, before reforming and rebuilding them from the ground up, into a rebirth of one of the Shadehunting Guilds of ancient times - the Pillar’s Claw.

The most disturbing knews of this bounty of magic occurs. For unexplained reasons, two deities disappear from the face of Sornieth. The Tidelord’s prophecies cease, and his flight continues to mourn as they desperately search. The Windsinger too, vanishes, and with him the Twisting Crescendo. The air stagnant around Sornieth causes a surprising amount of environmental damage, and leaves the air nearly unusable. It is only by happenstance that the deity of Wind is rediscovered at all - and now the Crescendo blows the wrong way, leaving even more destruction as clans adapt.

One clan who was forced to adapt was the old established Praesidium Postal Service. Never built on the most solid ground, the renewal of the wind god’s hurricane tore the entirety of the structure and surrounding architecture from its foundations entirely - and now the clan is entirely airborne like many other ancient clans, suspended in the air and orbiting slowly around the Flight’s territory.

Things grow heated in Fire Flight, both physically and politically. While civil unrest fully blooms in the Magmablood Rebellion, a surge of lava and magma forms new islands... and also unearths the last surviving Banescales of all Sornieth. They take to the skies in song and fire and flight, and quickly spread across the globe. 

In the Rainsong Jungle, in the midst of brewing civil war, the Hall of the Ancients begins to unseal itself. The magic keeping the temple unexplorable and closed off is beginning to weaken - two of the halls have opened thus far, and within them, surviving members of an ancient taskforce trapped two Ages prior; a Gaoler of Ice, and a Banescale of Fire. It is unknown why they, and possibly others, were trapped in such a godly spell of stasis, but now the entirety of Duskhallow is on edge.

Within the last months, something unknown appears to have happened to an old gang of dragons. Only one member of the original Blackspine Marauders’ crew is left in their territory, and the group now is infinitesimally small, but the fate of the other Marauders remains shrouded in mystery.

Present Day

[idryusan]

part 8. entangled.

solo, detail your parent’s initial and current thoughts on your career choice ( development prompt, +5 exp ) 

san’s relationship with his parents, with that added element of fame is somewhat complicated. his father? well, truthfully his father has never played a large part in san’s life. stoic, traditional. he’d let his mother take the reigns of san’s life and pull him wherever she’d wanted to. she was like that. all bigger than life, and he was content to work his way into obscurity. they clashed, he thinks. but there had never been room for arguments. san got turned into her hobby, a pet project, and it occupied her time. he was left to his own devices, and his own devices didn’t include san. the man feels like a stranger to him, but he can’t bring himself to mind.

san’s mother though? her thoughts haven’t changed. they’ve remained constant throughout the course of his life. from when he was still a trainee, to debut, to becoming a veteran. she’d always wanted it more than he did. he’s not even sure she’d ever really wanted a son. she just wanted a body to toss residual dreams on top of. that idealization of fame, of having something she could point to, declare was hears. stir up jealousy, or wonder. capitalize off of it. there’s a cafe in seoul, now. inSANiTEA, and it’s something she markets toward the fans. overpriced teas and espressos. memorabilia of olympus strung across the walls, his own signature scratched across the majority of it. pins and travel mugs for sale lining the shelves. 

she was the one who turned him into the person that he is. she was the one who forced him into taking dance, acting, piano, singing lessons. she was the one dragging him along to photoshoots as a child. barely five and getting tucked into toddler-sized outfits for clothing shops and campaigns. he had a pretty face, he always had, and she’d taken advantage of that. was hell bent on turning him into a package deal. was hell bent on getting his name strung up in lights, and it didn’t matter how. san, as a child, did what she wanted. of course he did. he wanted his mother to love him. he wanted her to pay attention to him. and that really only happened when he did a good job. when he sat still, when he didn’t whine and cry about itchy fabrics or clips poking into his back. when he wasn’t being dragged off into a hallway, fingers curled tight around his arm and half-stumbling on over-sized shoes shoved onto his feet so that she could lecture him away from the staff. you’re humiliating me. you’re being embarrassing. at four, five, six, seven, he felt bad about that sort of thing, would squirm underneath the pressure of her fingers against his bicep. would blink in a harried fashion when she would get even angrier at the threat of tears. you still have pictures to take. what are you doing. are you a baby? he’d shake his head no. but he sort of was. was at least young enough to be overwhelmed by everything she expected out of him.

by the time he hit eight he had gotten better at sitting pointedly patient between takes. curling fingers in against the underside of his chair and playing boring games by himself. counting cameras, or floor tiles. if he was good enough, she’d buy him a mocha and let him take big gulps in between pictures, lick whip cream off the end of the straw. it’s probably twisted that san considers those moments, of her hand hovering just in front of him, leaning in to suck at a neon colored straw to be some of his favorites. a mother’s love, and she always showed hers through chocolate and caffeine. even now, when he realizes what she’d been doing. keeping him awake, he still can’t manage to paint over those days in a bad light. even now, it’s something he indulges in if he wants to feel better, even if he’s moved on to americanos. but that’s the thing about it, their relationship is odd. it’s cloying, and at times overwhelming. she was a force, one that shoved him toward his future. but without her and san isn’t sure who he would be. he hates her and he loves her all at once. 

by the time he was eleven, twelve it was apparent he was skilled in dance. that was where he shone. mediocre in singing, alright at piano, abysmal at playing the part of an actor. but dancing? he could do that. it was decided he’d walk the path to becoming an idol when his instructor imparted this fact onto his mother. and that was how it began. when midas decided that they’d take him, his mother had been overjoyed. san took to trainee life better than most. he was used to the constant criticism, the verbal abuse that got hurled around and masqueraded as advice. was used to working himself to the bone, and used to failing to meet expectations set too high. thirteen, fourteen year old’s probably shouldn’t be. but maybe that was why he succeeded. maybe that was why they stuck him in olympus before his voice even finished maturing. they figured he could take it. and he could. his mother made sure he could. she’d tied a red string of a fate around his neck and forcefully dragged him, choking and struggling toward the checkpoints of his life.

he didn’t like his concept within the group, but she would chastise him if he brought it up. don’t be ungrateful. midas is a big company. do what you’re told, san. do you know how much money they’ve spent on you? and he has, hasn’t he? always done what he was told. at times it feels like his body is covered in hives. that he wants to itch his way out of it. he’s never constructed anything by himself, not entirely, but part of him feels grateful for that. he’s never been given the tools, and at this point he doesn’t even know how. where to begin. he’s been conditioned into depending too much on everyone around him, and it’s left him in a vulnerable position he doesn’t quite understand he’s in. doesn’t quite realize that it’s overwhelmingly difficult, at this point, not to turn and look at someone else. wait for them to make the end-point decision for him. asking for permission on a grand scale.

she’s here for his name value. she’s here to try and push him toward more. suggests acting, suggest chasing after higher acclaim. moves into his apartment for months at a time when he finally has one. pretends it’s like bonding, but it usually consists of more lectures. she has a way about her, a way of making him feel like he’s a child all over again, doing everything wrong. not living up to expectations. san might be hard now, indifferent, angry and stony to the world around him. but all she has to do is level him with a look and it all crumbles away. he’s ashamed, lacking once again. he’s not working hard enough. not listening well enough. wasting space, wasting his life, wasting everything all at once. he’s not sure how anymore, it feels like he’s given every single piece of himself away. what’s left of there to waste? but when she sits him down on the couch and starts in on one of her tirades he believes it. lets his mood sink down deep until all that self-hatred bubbles back up to the surface. everything ends in apologies from his own mouth, mumbled out, nearly apologetic sounding i love you’s before he leaves for a schedule. words that he means. genuinely. 

he feels pathetic, sometimes. 

he has memories of her watching his rehearsals as a trainee. throwing out barbs of criticism. of her catching him sneaking out of practice early to swallow down ice cream with his friends before he debuted. of getting berated about it for so long, so brutally until he cried. and san had already given up on the concept of crying at that point. he has memories of her ignoring him for three weeks after midas gave him bad feedback to a showcase she’d sat in on. he’d been fifteen, would come home after practice to their shared apartment and sit himself down on his mat. pick at his fingers and occasionally glance up at her profile as she read. hopeful questions, quiet and uncertain that would tumble from the tip of his tongue. do you want tea? or else, i did better today, i worked hard. that would go unacknowledged. until he got thrown into a dance project rehearsal and had wrung compliments out of the evaluators. then she’d decided to stroke his hair back from his face, lay compliments over a tired body, take him out. buy him sugar-laden coffee. tell him she was proud to have him for a son. hot and cold, and san had always been in a shocked state of trying to figure out how to handle that. trying to figure out what constituted as love. he’s learned it’s conditional. if he does well, he’s allowed to have it.

she doesn’t want to hear about his hardships. she doesn’t want to be witness to moments of defeat. doesn’t want to hear about how he collapsed after a concert. just says it was a smart decision when san admits that the article midas put out about him having anemia is fake. not to worry. a silly notion, she doesn’t worry. not about that. she knows san. she knows how strong he is, how far he can go. or that’s what he believes. because what is there left to, if he can’t believe the best of her? if he can’t believe that one day he might hit a point where all that judgement disappears? eight years into a group and it feels like he’s constantly running toward the end of a rainbow, something that’s gone by the time he makes it there.

but one day. one day he’ll find that gold. paint himself with it, a reflection of what midas wants to make him into. 

golden. perfect. 

it’s warped, what they have. she’s happy to pat at his back, his hair, when she appears on a variety show, in front of a camera. he’s all of seventeen and sobs when he sees her, for the first time in a year after a string of debut schedules, a constant flurry of activity. he’s embarrassed and choking back sobs and crouches in the corner upon the surprise visit of olympus’ relatives. she swipes away the tears on his cheeks, heartwarming captions appear underneath the screen. genuine. and it had been. he’d hugged her, and he can’t remember ever doing it before. ever doing it again after. there’s a discomfort found in physical affection for him sometimes. it feels wrong. he’s not sure why. but it does. maybe because he’s never really had it offered to him.

so san loves her. he does. and there’s a part of him that hates her, too. hates being an idol. hates being apart of olympus. hates having his entire life robbed from him. hates what people have turned him into, have done to him. what would have become of him if she had been just as placid as his father? he can’t even picture it. he was never allowed to opportunity to come up with pipe dreams. he was always in a race to impress. to reach those prescribed milestones. 

so his mother says she loves him back. but sometime’s he’s not so sure if she loves him, or the concept of him. the image of san that gets plastered on billboards, the name value of olympus propping him up. shiny, manufactured. known. 

maybe she just loves the fame. but it’s hard for san to bring himself to blame her. he’s not sure what else there could be left in him to love. if there was ever anything much to begin with.