#crowned ━━━ ✦. ( ic )

[paxopalotls]

stressed about chem exams so I did a ghost king doodle to cope

[saessenach]

What is honor compared to a woman’s love? What is duty against the feel of a newborn son in your arms… or the memory of a brother’s smile? Wind and words. Wind and words. We are only human, and the gods have fashioned us for love. That is our great glory, and our great tragedy.

Jon Snow - and family that haunts him, because sometimes ghosts make for the best love stories.

[r0semultiverse]

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE ORIGINAL MARCELINE OF THE WINTER KING'S UNIVERSE!? 😨

Is the implication that Ice King took her out with all of the other oozers or did the oozers end up killing her?? Either way, it seems that this Simon was not coping well with any of what was going on in his life. Living a life of hypocrisy & ruling a false kingdom.

[cutter-kirby]

come on simon

[radiance1]

The Ghost Prince does not, under any circumstances, answer a summoning after it was made aware he existed. None know why he doesn't, some are bitter and hateful of it while others are thankful that it's one less bloodthirsty manic to deal with.

The Ghost King meanwhile hasn't been seen in multiple eons, so the magical community who wanted to use his power just, stopped, trying to summon him for a long time.

Most magic users knew that the Ghost Prince never answered a summons, and that the Ghost King just dropped off the radar.

So could you really blame Constantine for not taking it that seriously when some wannabe hotshot cultists try to summon both of them in the middle of a city to wreak havoc?

He'll give them some credit though. Points for doing it in broad daylight and actually being somewhat of a threat with not relying on just summoning the Ghost royalty and figuring out what to do from there.

The area they were in was somewhat destroyed, then the cultists manage to complete the summoning circle to summon both of them and Constantine, well he just light up a smoke.

It isn't going to work anyways so what does it matter?

...

Is that a fucking Ice cream truck he hears? Who the fuck is driving an Ice cream truck while their city is being under attacked with cultists trying to summon eldritch ghost royalty?

He'll give them some points for dedication, though.

Then he looked at the cultists and nearly had a goddamn heart attack to see that the summoning circle is actually fucking lighting up and working.

The Bat is so gonna give him a headache over this.

----

Danny Phantom, crown prince of the Infinite Realms. Does not answer summons.

For one, it is annoying as shit, whenever someone interrupts his day just to ask for infinite power (that he can't give), world domination (that he won't do) or infinite riches (which he also can't do).

It just got annoying being summoned all the time so. One day he just, well, no. And hey, it worked out well enough for him to not continue doing it.

Then he also learned that Pariah Dark is basically the same, after he got out the coffin and stopped trying to take over the world for whatever reason. He was actually a pretty swell guy!

He was just with him too, with him being not so swell at the time for making him go through lessons about Ghost etiquette, rules, stuff that's expected of him as the crown prince.

And don't even get him started on the engagement and marriage proposals.

Overall, he just wanted to find an excuse to leave. Then he felt the familiar suggestive pull of a summoning and, instead of rejection as he usually does in a second. He thought for a bit if he wanted to go with that or crown prince duties.

It was tempting, but dealing with cultists seemed worse than this so he was about to reject.

At least, before he heard an Ice cream truck playing in the background. He doesn't even know how the hell that popped up through the pull but by the gods has it been a while since he's had Ice cream.

So he answers and is gone with a pop.

Pariah Dark just stares for a good second or two, before breathing out and deciding to also answer. Fright Knight is just there, off to side, questioning what he should do now.

Danny wastes no time with the cultists on the other side and in fact, he pushes them out of the way and goes diving for that Ice cream truck he hears. Only to realize he doesn't, have any money on him.

Fuck.

Pariah Dark is less inclined to follow the rules imposed by humans like money, but he does know it can be important. Once in a while. Not that often, but it has its times.

So when he sees his adopted son being sad over being unable to pay for some kind of human delicacy, he digs around in his hair (yes, his hair.) and pulls out some money and puts it on the counter as payment.

The man inside the tiny vehicle had shrieked before getting what they wanted. Which is good. Fear is a good motivator, Pariah thinks.

Unknown to him, it wasn't out of fear (Well, mostly) but because the Ghost King placed down a coin made of pure, solid gold on his counter.

The two then go about their business in the human realm, completely forgetting about the fact that they were summoned here for something.

Constantine is both relieved and about to have an aneurysm at seeing Infinite Realm royalty only answering a summon because of Ice cream.

[synchodai]

HBO's Continued Insistence on Dumbing Down Westerosi Politics

So there have been countless thinkpieces already on how GOT simplified the feudalist politics of Westeros (by giving a lowborn sellsword lordship over The Reach, by having no consequences for destroying the Sept of Baelor, etc.), but I haven't seen a lot of people talking about that for House of the Dragon.

The worst being that the show presupposes that Rhaenyra is the lawful heir when the books showed there are plenty of lawful arguments why she wouldn't be.

Mind you that I've been enjoying the show a lot so far. This is just to vent out my frustration with the writers' failure to fully engage with the values and protocols of the Middle Age-inspired setting. The show seems uninterested in laws of the Realm in a story ostensibly about politics, save for when they're using it as an excuse to amplify depictions of sex and violence.

Blacks vs Greens wasn't a matter of misunderstanding of who each side thought Viserys wanted on the throne. It was the Targaryens' belief of their absolute authority clashing with the Realm's established traditions. Everyone always knew who Viserys chose as heir. In Fire and Blood, Grand Maester Orwyle said as much when he was parleying with Rhaenyra on behalf of the Greens.

Rhaenyra heard his terms in stony silence, then asked Orwyle if he remembered her father, King Viserys. "Of course, Your Grace," the maester answered. "Perhaps you can tell us who he named as his heir and successor," the queen said, her crown upon her head. "You, Your Grace," Orwyle replied. And Rhaenyra nodded and said, "With your own tongue you admit I am your lawful queen. Why do you serve my half-brother, the pretender?" Munkun tells us that Orwyle gave a long and erudite reply, citing the Andal law and the Great Council of 101. Mushroom claims he stammered and voided his bladder. Whichever is true, his answer did not satisfy Princess Rhaenyra.

(For non-F&B readers: Munkun is the Grand Maester who served Aegon III, the king who came after this civil war. Munkun's book, The Dance of the Dragons, A True Telling, is one of Fire and Blood's source texts. Mushroom is the King Landing court jester from Viserys I to Aegon III's reign. One is a source written with academic rigor but is secondhand at best. The other is a firsthand eyewitness account but is from a literal fool who will take every chance to make things more scandalous and sexual to please the crowd.)

In House of the Dragon, they replaced Orwyle with Otto and Orwyle's discussion of legal precedent with Otto handing Rhaenyra a book page from Alicent. It's quite evident here that the writers, much like Mushroom, thought a discussion on the actual laws of the Realm were negligible in this story about a succession war.

Even Alicent made no pretense that Viserys chose Rhaenyra over her children and I have no idea why the HBO writers decided to make her mistakenly think otherwise. Maybe they thought a queen regent pushing her son to take the throne over another woman made her appear unsympathetic as a character, but if anything, this only makes show!Alicent less politically savvy and more delusional than her book counterpart, fully believing an addled king's vague muttering on his deathbed was sufficient grounds to change heirs last minute.

Book!Alicent following Andal laws instead of her husband's wishes makes sense given her Andal upbringing, her devotion to the Faith of the Seven which enforces said laws, and her desire to protect her children from Rhaenyra given that Rhaenyra has shown she's not above murdering family (see: Laenor).

In the books, there was a long discussion between the former king's council on who should succeed Viserys.

Here are the arguments for Rhaenyra:

Rhaenyra was older than her brothers and had more Targaryen blood

the late king had chosen her as his successor, that he had repeatedly refused to alter the succession despite the pleadings of Queen Alicent and her greens

hundreds of lords and landed knights had done obeisance to the princess in 105 AC, and sworn solemn oaths to defend her rights.

Here are the arguments for Aegon II:

many of the lords who had sworn to defend the succession of Princess Rhaenyra were long dead [...]

Ironrod, the master of laws, cited the Great Council of 101 and the Old King’s choice of Baelon rather than Rhaenys in 92

the hallowed Andal tradition wherein the rights of a trueborn son always came before the rights of a mere daughter

Ser Otto reminded them that Rhaenyra’s husband was none other than Prince Daemon, and “we all know that one’s nature. Make no mistake, should Rhaenyra ever sit the Iron Throne, it will be Lord Flea Bottom who rules us, a king consort as cruel and unforgiving as Maegor ever was [...]”

Should the princess reign [...] Jacaerys Velaryon would rule after her. “Seven save this realm if we seat a bastard on the Iron Throne.”

Once again, the show chose to cut out this long political discussion. Instead, the council had already made up their mind and decided to stage a coup (when in their perspectives from the books, it would definitely not be a coup).

For all their marketing how two sides are equally grey, HotD is actively delegitimizing Aegon II. The strongest argument for him is how his claim follows the laws of the Realm, but the show doesn't seem to care about the laws of the Realm or the political need to maintain a more predictable/tested transfer of power.

Instead, the show focuses on Viserys's relationship with his daughter and the mysticism of the Targaryen bloodline. In doing so, they emphasize Rhaenyra's strongest arguments for succession — that she's more of a Targaryen than her half-brother and that her father prefered her.

And what for? Because in our modern-day, we don't have male-prefered inheritance and people can only imagine misogyny as the only injustice here? What about the injustice of a monarch exercising absolute control, thinking that his "superior" heritage makes him above the established laws of the native people?

This is not to say Aegon II is unquestionably the heir. But this is to say that the show removed the political nuance of why people are questioning in the first place. Precedence isn't the end-all-be-all of succession, but neither is "because daddy said so".

[pencilofawesomeness]

So, I've been reading a lot of Ghost King AUs recently and... my hand slipped.

[sugarandspicer]

ok I need to know: has Eliot Spencer tried the curly girl method and how did it go? because I am convinced that his hair is naturally curly and I need them to stop straightening it/brushing it out. every time it gets wet, it gets wavy and I just… ::fans self:: imagine if his hair looked like this ALL THE TIME

FURTHERMORE, what am I supposed to do with the knowledge that sometimes this man puts tiny little beads in tiny little sections of his hair just because. he likes to feel pretty.

[amoratearte]

“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red.”

—Macbeth (Act II, Sc. II)

Daemon and Rhaenyra, the sword and the crown

[kaneidae]

The Ballad of Betty Grof

[8-0mph]

Crownswap petrigrof + Vampire world bubbline

[pcktknife]

IQ

[r0semultiverse]

Hey um I'm concerned...

"Is this true, fellow Petrikov?"

Something something about the cycle repeating. 👀

[amanitacurses]

Request: I'd like to see Blue Link in your style more :) no pressure ofc

I know you only said Blue Link, but I don't really draw the other colours (negating Vio) all that much, so I decided to just draw them all in fun outfits as fairywrens!

[oldschoolfrp]

"A noble and mysterious race, Dragons are among the most potent and terrible of all creatures. They are huge yet agile, bright but vain, enchanted but physical, and learned yet savage beasts. Dragons are the embodiment of all natural elemental force, knowledge, motion, strength, and magic, be it for defense or offence." From the Elemental Companion by Mike Carlyle, Roger Raupp illustration, supplement for Rolemaster 2e, ICE, 1989.

[melinoyart]

The King in the North