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little-tyrant-gortash · 8 months

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Oathbreaker

Pairing: fem!Tav x Enver Gortash, fem!Tav/Astarion

Tags: Emotional Manipulation, Manipulation, Manipulative Relationship, Paladin Tav (Baldur's Gate), Vaginal Sex, Penis In Vagina Sex, Drunk Sex, Unrequited Love, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Scars, Blood and Injury, Injury, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy, Miscarriage, Torture, Psychological Torture, Implied/Referenced Torture

Word count: 2,171

Ao3 here.

Chapter 1.

Chapter 2.

Chapter 3.

Chapter 4.

Chapter 5.

Chapter 6.

Chapter 7.

Chapter 8.

Chapter 9.

Chapter 10.

Chapter 11.

Chapter 12.

Chapter 13.

Chapter 14.

Chapter 15.

Chapter 16. ⬇

Chapter 17.

Chapter 16: Strike Two

Things could've been better.

Between trying to solve the murder in the Temple of Ilmater, the fights within her camp and the meetings with Gortash, she realised she had a problem, a rather huge one, at that: she didn't want most of this anymore.

There had been nights when she couldn't visit Gortash, and those nights took a toll on both of them. Tav couldn't sleep in the camp ever since Astarion left, and Gortash feared Orin would walk in his palace with Tav's head in her hand. She was staring at the ceiling of her tent all night while he was watching her through the slate as he was tinkering in his workshop; she'd always kept the Reaper's Embrace close to herself at night, at least, so he could've sent reinforcements if there was an ambush.

Worry made them desperate for each other every time they've met.

But the lack of sleep still wasn't the worst of it all for her. The worst of it was that when Wyll learned that she was way too close to Gortash to his liking, he started a verbal fight. A fight she didn't want to have.

"That man", Wyll pointed at Wyrm's Rock Fortress's general direction, "is responsible for the tadpole in my father's skull! In our skulls, too! He's responsible for making Baldur's Gate vulnerable! How could you do this to us? To all of the city?!"

Tav dropped her shoulders, defeated. She could thank her very life to the armour Gortash altered that day, as they've crossed paths with a few shape shifters, and she'd spent every waking hour wishing she needn't to be out there, seeking that damned woman, blundering in the dark for clues. She was rapidly getting fed up with everything that happened to her so far, and frankly, being an Oathbreaker and slowly making her peace with it was making it all worse.

…or better?

"I don't expect you to understand anything that goes on between me and Gortash", she said finally, her voice unusually cold. "But I assure you that my alliance with him has been nothing but a benefit to us."

"How so?" Wyll demanded, and when she didn't reply, he shook his head with a scoff. "You're not the woman I've once knew. You'd never deal with shady men like him. He reeks of darkness."

"Perhaps darkness is exactly what I need", Tav tilted her head. "Perhaps that could make me stronger."

"You don't need to be stronger, Tav, because you're strong already! You just need to listen to your friends who worry about you, who care about you, and believe me when I say: you don't want to get mixed up with that man!"

Funny. None of them said a single fucking word when they've learned she allowed Astarion to bite her. When she allowed him to toy with her, to make her fall in love with him through manipulation. When he was actively weaponizing her desires for him and tried to manipulate her to do what he wanted her to do. When she allowed him to ascend. They hadn't said a single word when he… when he…

"I've had it worse."

"If you're hinting at As-"

Wyll cut off the moment he saw the flash in Tav's eyes. The change was instant in her demeanor. She still wasn't ready to talk about him, and everyone at camp had doubts she ever will be.

"Don't you dare to say that name out loud", she warned him, and Wyll shifted backwards, his face scrunching up with shame and hurt. "If it bothers you that I'm working with Gortash, then leave my camp. I have no use of you, anyway; all you do is complain and whine and get on my nerves."

"Tav-"

She knew Gale was behind her the moment he addressed her, but she didn't look back at him.

"So, what will it be, Blade of the Frontiers?" She crossed her arms in front of herself, staring at Wyll with a look that told him she was ready to bite at any moment. "Will you stay out of my business or will you finally relieve us of your annoying attitude?"

Wyll stared at her for a long time before he looked away. After all she'd done for him – accepting him as he was, even after becoming a devil –, he knew he wouldn't be able to leave her in fear that she might get killed. And if he left… maybe he'd never get the cure for his own tadpole. Tav was the closest to the solution, and maybe, just maybe, Gortash could help them remove it. Who knew; he already helped Karlach, no matter how strange the deed was in Wyll's eyes. He'd dealt with people like Gortash before, and he always expected the worse from his type. But, if it came to that… he'd try and keep her safe from him, before it was too late.

"I'm staying", he decided quietly.

"Good. Then shut up and leave me to my devices. I know what I'm doing."

At Wyrm's Rock Fortress, Gortash smiled down at the slate that let him see Wyll's beaten puppy expression. Whatever happened between Tav and the person everyone tried to mention to her was interesting; it made him curious, he wondered what was that story she didn't want to revisit. But to hear it with his own ears that perhaps she needed his darkness in her life… that if she had to choose between the Blade of Frontiers or him, she'd choose him…

That made his day wonderful.

Which was why he was thinking about celebrating it at the end of that tenday. That was the third tenday they've started their relationship; on that day, thirty days earlier, both of them thought that it'd be just one night. Turns out, they both wanted so much more from each other, and Gortash had to admit it to himself that he really meant it when he proposed to her.

That'd be the proposal she wouldn't be able to turn down. In time, she'd say yes, and he'd have her on his side, permanently. All else will fall into place and then, he'd rule it all with her. Easy.

She presented herself, looking utterly exhausted, that evening. Gortash carefully chose the meals for that night; he'd told his servants what to prepare, knowing exactly which foods and drinks were her favourite. Warm chicken soup, for example; not hot, but warm. Thin slices of well-done steaks, mashed potatoes, grilled vegetables, sweet wines – all in her favour, to get her well fed and comfortable.

They ate in almost complete silence. He could tell she wasn't really there, but he let it go for now, in hopes that she would ease up and focus on the present.

Little did he know what happened that day. A shape shifter infiltrated her camp in his image, and upon learning that it wasn't the Gortash she knew, she had to eleminate them. It didn't make things look nice that she had to smash that face in with the Blood of Lathander.

She shivered. She had to tell him about this and the looming threat of Astarion. He must know that those shape shifters weren't the worst that could happen to both of them.

"How was your day?" She asked softly after she looked at him before she sipped her wine.

"Oh, you know, just the usual", he leaned back with a sigh and grabbed his own goblet to drink from it. "Busy as always."

Tav stared at him for a few long seconds.

"When the light meets the dark", she murmured quietly.

Enver looked deeply in her eyes, and smiled.

"The Absolute is the ark."

That was the moment when she finally relaxed her shoulders and closed her eyes, tilting her head back against the chair's headrest with a sigh. Saying one of the catchphrases they've agreed upon let him know that she'd ran into trouble earlier that day.

"Orin?" He asked.

"No. One of her lackeys."

"Did they hurt you?"

"No. I bashed their head in."

"Good."

Tav's throat tightened. Her voice became funny when she spoke again.

"They were wearing your face when I did it."

Enver wasn't sure how to respond to that, so he stayed quiet. She still didn't look at him, just pressed her lips together in an attempt to keep herself from crying.

"Our plan has a major flaw, Enver."

"And what that might be?"

"You'll die."

So much for his plans for tonight. He could've planned and schemed to get what he wanted if Orin obliterated it without her actually lifting a gods damned finger. Gortash closed his eyes for a moment and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"As all of us one day", he replied at last, glancing at her, realising she'd been staring at him with a look unknown to him. "You needn't worry about that right now. I am well guarded."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Tav, I have the Fist at my fingertips, along with my Steel Watchers and countless infected who will defend the one who gives them instructions." Alright, fine. If they were talking about their own vulnerabilities, he'd unveil one of his own. "If anyone is in danger, it is you."

"I have my friends who have my back", she waved him off like it was nothing.

"Is that so? Then how could that shape shifter get so close to you?" When she couldn't answer him, he tilted his head slightly. "Tav… be with me. Stay with me."

"You've given me the mission to get rid of Orin."

"Maybe I've changed my mind."

"Nobody would do a good job when it comes to her. She'd gut anyone else we'd send after her. No, I have to do it. I agree with you on that."

"Nevertheless." He ignored his racing heart. "Marry me."

Tav settled her goblet down. Maybe a bit harder than she intended. It wasn't about just Orin, but the timing wasn't right to mention and talk about Astarion either after Gortash proposed again. May the gods damn it all.

"Not yet", she snapped, annoyed, "we've just talked about how dangerous this all is."

"All the more reason, then. Perhaps it's a distraction what we need to get close to her – or to lure her closer to us."

Tav stared at him with a look that made him realise that perhaps he said the wrong words. She stood up.

"Thank you for the dinner, it was delicious", she concluded.

"Tav", he called out after her when she started to walk away. When he saw she wouldn't stop, he shot to his feet and hurried after her. "Come on", he grabbed her arm and pulled her back to himself. "Don't be like this."

"It's easy for you!" That was when he saw she was crying.

"Tav…"

"I'm just another plaything for you, isn't that right? Someone you can use until you get bored of me- you'll have countless others to entertain you anyway-"

"What the Hells are you talking about?" He grabbed her upper arms and pulled her closer to himself. "Do you think I'm trying to persuade you to live with me because I think of you as a toy? How can you think I'd ever get bored of you? Do you have any idea what the rest of the world means to me if you're with me?" She shook her head to every question and tried to pull away, sobbing, but he didn't let her leave. "The entire world can burn for all I care. I just want you."

It was true.

It hit him in that moment, so hard that it hurt. It caused him physical pain in his chest. The usual feeling of fear remained as far away as always; he couldn't get frightened from anything, not while he had his heavily enchanted attire on himself. But he couldn't keep the anxiety at bay. He couldn't keep the more subtle feelings away. She grabbed his shirt and buried her face in his chest, and he held her close to himself.

"Alright… let's stop talking about this for now", he rested his chin on top of her head, holding her close. He gently rubbed her back, his hands rubbing up and down to calm her down, to ground her. When she could get her crying under control, he placed a soft kiss on the top of her head. "There'll be a small ball for the nobles and patriarchs of Baldur's Gate tomorrow. I'd like you to be there with me."

"Can I say no?" She murmured in his chest, making him smile.

"No", he replied firmly.

Tav groaned.

"Fine."

"Spend the day with me tomorrow."

Tav wrapped her arms around him and held him close.

"Alright."

"You're not asking if you can say no?" Gortash chuckled quietly.

"If I can be with you, and you only", she murmured in his chest, "I wouldn't want to tell you no."

#Oathbreaker #little tyrant [enver gortash]#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #bg 3 #enver gortash #archduke enver gortash #lord enver gortash #fanfic #Oathbreaker fanfic

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cheri-translates · 3 years

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[CN] Gavin’s MQ: Moon Beyond the Curtain (Ch 2)

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a Mind’s Quest, 帘外月胧明, which has not been released in EN! 🍒

🌕 Ch 1: here

[ Chapter Two ]

The sword at his waist collides with his armour, releasing a frightening metallic clang.

Gavin’s head jolts upwards. He looks at me, disbelief and shock flashing across his eyes. When he sees my calm expression, those billows return to a controlled stillness.

Gavin: It seems that you’ve met many new people and gained a new identity during the years I wasn’t in the capital.

His scorching gaze lands on my official attire. Unable to avoid this, I simply display a forced, polite smile.

MC: It’s been three years, and Your Highness has become an important general who has fought many battles. Whenever I read reports in the capital about your successes, I’d visualise Your Highness’ heroic bearing.

Seeing my distant smile, a certain emotion flashes across Gavin’s eyes. When he speaks again, his tone is less sharp.

Gavin: Although the Yanzhou Army recaptured quite a number of lost territory over the past three years, the War at Yumen resulted in the Rong Tribe remaining in Dan Que and refusing to leave.

Brushing aside the topic that makes my heart feel tense, he changes the topic to the military situation before us.

Gavin: The vanguard and I have been testing the strength of the enemy these days. Even without the imperial edict, it’s time to put an end to this.

I’m left stunned. I have a vague feeling that Gavin is planning something. Before I probe further, his voice drifts over.

Gavin: Ten days later, I’ll be deploying the troops to familiarise themselves with the military grounds. I’ll ask someone to bring you over.

MC: ...I’ll comply with Your Highness’ arrangements.

I take half a step backwards, giving him a bow. With the most formal attitude I can muster, I put more distance between us.

Gavin pauses in his breathing. After a moment, I hear a deliberate emphasis in his words.

Gavin: You’re too polite, “Great Imperial Censor”.

I follow a soldier to the tent that was prepared for me, only to discover that it has been properly decorated.

Touching the Xuan writing paper on the desk, I’m left in a slight daze.

[Trivia] Xuan paper is a high quality paper made in Xuancheng, and is especially good for traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy :>

In the past, I used to love using Xuan paper in Hongwen Academy.

MC: Does Yanzhou produce Xuan paper?

Soldier: Yanzhou doesn’t produce Xuan paper. His Highness often uses it, and instructed us to prepare them.

After the solider leaves, I finally shed off the cold exterior that I’d been putting up, letting myself plop onto the chair.

I rub the Xuan paper on the table gently, as though touching that exceedingly distant face.

The evening breeze suddenly enters the tent, causing the Xuan paper on the desk to flutter. It brushes the back of my hand, leaving a short and shallow red mark in its wake.

It seems to glide over my heart as well, outlining an entirely different line.

My fingernails sink deep into my flesh. I know that the arranged marriage has extinguished all of my hopes in this lifetime, and that my affinity with Gavin will end with us being “old friends”.

I’m unable to cross this boundary - I repeat this in my heart over and over again.

As long as I can eventually witness him ascending the throne, that would be the greatest way to round off the friendship of our youth.

It has been ten days since I came to Yanzhou. Over the past ten days, Gavin allowed me to inspect the Yanzhou Army barracks without any inhibitions.

The soldiers cast angry glares at me whenever they see me, thinking that the memorials I prepare for the Emperor are filled with caustic remarks.

I don’t defend myself, and walk around as usual every day. However... something always happens whenever I bump into Gavin.

Gavin: Since Imperial Censor MC is endowed with great talent, could you write on battle strategies for me?

MC: ...whatever Your Highness asks of me, I’ll do my best.

Gavin: Based on Imperial Censor MC’s observations over the past few days, are there any areas the Yanzhou Army could improve on?

MC: ...I think the flat cakes for breakfast could be baked a little softer. That way, less time would be wasted on eating them.

Gavin: Imperial Censor MC, there’s an open martial arts competition. If you have nothing to do, why don’t you keep score?

MC: I don’t think the military barracks lacks soldiers who could keep score...

Gavin: Since the Great Imperial Censor is here to follow the Emperor’s orders in supervising us, it’s only right for you to personally experience everything in the barracks. Otherwise, wouldn’t you be disobeying the imperial edict?

MC: ...I’ll comply with Your Highness’ orders.

Each time Gavin looks for me, he doesn’t talk about the past. Instead he talks about official business, which leaves me unable to refuse.

Standing at the side of the arena, I watch as that person wearing a dark robe tussles with another soldier. My emotions are as torrential as the ocean.

Through my interactions with Gavin over the past few days, I’ve seen a vivacious Commanding General Gavin who is unlike the Gavin I usually read about in military reports.

Gavin truly attained what he said he would back in Hongwen Academy. He actually did better than I imagined.

Every day, he wakes up earlier than the other soldiers, and is never absent from training. Every night, I see flickering candlelight from the tent in the middle of the barracks when I go on a stroll after writing memorials for the Emperor.

Nobody knows how much blood and effort he put in to enable Yanzhou Army to make a name for itself after three years under his guidance.

While I’m in a daze, an icy glint sweeps past, catching me off guard. Closely after, someone grabs my waist and pulls me to the side.

The breaths of the person behind me brushes the side of my neck. Looking front, I see a short blade sticking out of a wooden stake I was just standing at earlier.

Gavin: It appears that people truly become weaker after becoming court officials. You aren’t as agile as before when you’d steal wine and hide from the school official. What’s on your mind?

Gavin holds me steady, and the hand on my waist leaves. Just finished with a fight, his eyes shine as he gives me a teasing look.

He’s raking up a past incident from Hongwen Academy, his tone just like back then. However, I don’t dare to touch such wonderful memories in front of him, and quickly change the topic.

MC: I was thinking about official business and wondering if you’d be able to formulate a strategy to defeat the enemy.

With these words, the temperature in the surroundings grow much colder. After a pause, I hear Gavin’s voice.

Gavin: Since you’re here, I won’t let you return empty-handed.

After saying this, he turns around to leave. The space next to me is left abruptly vacant, and a cold breeze blows into my robe. I can’t help but tremble.

My fingertips are icy cold, and I suddenly feel as though the cold exterior that I’ve been maintaining will soon be shattered by the cold wind.

Eli: What? A night raid on the rations?

It’s late at night. A warm flame illuminates the tent in the middle of the barracks, but the atmosphere has fallen to a freezing point.

After listening to Gavin’s plan, everyone is left in disbelief. Astounded, I look at Gavin.

Gavin: The Rong Tribe is defending Dan Que tenaciously, and they refuse to be lured out no matter what. With further delays, we will never be able to break into the city.

He sticks a tiny flag into the rear part of Dan Que - the place where Binghe is.

Gavin: Since it’s heavily guarded, we’ll do a lightning war. I’ll lead a light cavalry to attack Binghe at night. The cavalry is responsible for creating a diversion, luring the enemy troops to Binghe. I’ve found the location where the Binghe Army stores its rations. When the time comes, I’ll burn the stock. Even if they’re good at plundering, the soldiers will be uneasy once their food supply is cut. At that time, the rear troops will launch the main attack, breaking into Dan Que.

MC: No!

I frantically stop him.

MC: Relying on one person to go against the entire troop of falconers? Your Highness, have you forgotten the War at Yumen?

I watch as the other military generals’ expressions change abruptly at the mention of the War at Yumen. The temperature in the tent falls abruptly.

The military reports sent from 800 miles away flash before my eyes, each one dyed with the blood of soldiers on the frontline.

I know that this will always be a source of pain to the Yanzhou Army. But if I don’t advise Gavin against this now, there won’t be another chance.

With this thought in mind, I harden my heart and grit my teeth.

MC: Two years ago, there was an attack on Yanzhou Army’s rations. The vanguard was powerless in its counterattack, and fifty thousand soldiers died tragically that night. Your Highness intends to go against the entire troop of falconers alone. While you may break through the first layer of enemies, you’ll be a step closer to death. Plunging into enemy territory on your own... how much closer will you get to death?

I look at Gavin sincerely. The flickering candlelight illuminates his face as he watches me, a rare coldness on his face.

Gavin: Soldiers have always been taking risks in order to attain victory.

MC: Your Highness, do you not want to live?!

Gavin: Of course I want to live. However, the most important thing right now is to break the stalemate in order to ensure the completely stability of the border!

I’m starting to feel a little frantic. At this point, I couldn’t care less about our statuses as ruler and subject, and I raise my volume.

MC: Is the life of the Crown Prince the price to pay for the stability of the border? How long can such a peace last?! If Your Highness remains stubborn, I’ll make a report to the Emperor that the Crown Prince is willing to let the Yanzhou Army lose its chief commander for the sake of defeating the enemy!

Gavin’s expression is cold. Looking at him, my heart gradually sinks to the depths.

Gavin: If this battle is victorious, the border will be completely stabilised, and your mission will be complete. You’re free to write whatever you wish in the memorial. But the plan has been fixed.

MC: ...

Without a word, I turn around, lift the curtain, and walk out.

[ Silhouette: The Battle at Yumen ]

Enemy Commander: Kill Gavin, distribute the land, and harvest the rewards!

There’s blood everywhere. The setting sun is the colour of blood, the sand dunes are coated with blood. The rust-like scent of blood is bundled up in the wind.

Gavin grips his sword as he stands on a dune. The blood coating the sky and land consume his senses. He can’t even feel the wound from the arrow in his chest.

A solider staggers over to guard him from the front while wielding a knife, his tone filled with urgency.

??: Your Highness, leave quickly! Return to Yanzhou!

Gavin: No generals in the Yanzhou Army will leave any soldiers behind! Chen Yi, if we leave, we’ll leave together!

Gavin speaks in a low voice, but he’s filled with a sombre emotion when he sees the gaze of the soldier called Chen Yi.

Chen Yi: Your Highness! The Rong Tribe launched a surprise attack when my troop was caught unaware. Among the fifty thousand members of the frontline cavalry, I’m the only one left. If I’m unable to protect Your Highness, I won’t have the face to explain myself to my brothers who have died!

After saying this, he roars and rushes towards the enemies with the knife. Gavin wants to stop him, but steps on something. When he looks down, he sees a pair of widened eyes.

He recognises those eyes.

His name was Chu He, and he was a member of the frontline cavalry. Every time they met, he’d call him “Your Highness” with a silly smile.

Gavin lifts his head blankly. What lies before his eyes are mountains of corpses and an ocean of blood.

Those are countless Chu Hes, and countless soldiers who had fought till the end.

Blood rushes to his throat. He grits his teeth, forcing himself to grip his sword with his numb hands.

He can’t fall yet. Things are not over for the Yanzhou Army!

He suddenly closes in. With a metallic clang of his sword, he cuts down a crooked dagger behind Chen Yi that he doesn’t have the time to care about.

Gavin: You aren’t the only one in the fifty thousand frontline army. I’m here too. The Yanzhou Army has not been defeated!

These words cause the dull and defeated light in Chen Yi’s eyes to shine. The wind from his sword grows fierce once again. Just as he’s about to deal a vicious blow, a crooked dagger plunges into his chest.

Chen Yi: Your Highness...

Gavin turns around instinctively, only to see blood spurting through the air, along with a dull voice at his ear.

Gavin: Chen Yi...!

The rustling wind seems to clutch at his throat, turning his voice into a sorrowful whimper. Gavin feels as though all the energy in his body is being drained dry, and he shuts his eyes in despair.

Among the fifty thousand soldiers at the frontline, not even one survived.

The Rong Tribe surround him, but nobody dares to go up to him.

The setting sun is reminiscent of blood. When he opens his eyes again, he speaks intermittently.

Gavin: Someday... I’ll ensure that all of you are buried in the land of Dayu.

His words bring with them a fierce and bloodthirsty aura. Through the glinting and flashing of daggers and swords, he sweeps over to the horse of the senior general of the Rong Tribe.

In the next second, blood spurts out like a column, bringing with it a warm sensation as it lands on his face.

It’s as though he’s Asura who returned from hell. On horseback, he lifts the head of the enemy general and sweeps a glance at the soldiers before him.

Gavin [screaming which is meant to be fierce but I find it strangely hot]: WHO ELSE WANTS TO TRY?!

Nobody dares to step forward. Those in his surroundings shirk backwards instinctively.

Gavin detects a sense of defeat and fear in their eyes. He no longer looks at them, using the last bit of his energy to tighten his grip on the horse, speeding out of the sandy dune.

He bolts towards the direction of Yanzhou City on the horse. Behind that are tens of thousands of Dayu terrain, and thousands and thousands of common folk.

Blood flows down his chest, gliding along the arms which grip the reins. Slowly, the scene before his eyes turns blurry.

He has no idea where he is. His energy dissipates, and he can only hear the muffled sound of horse hooves.

In this blood-coloured dream, he wields his spear on the mountains of corpses, as though he doesn’t know the meaning of fatigue. He seems to be very tired, but he’s unable to stop.

“From the wastelands of sand, a sole plume of smoke rises. Past the long river, the round sun sinks.”

All of a sudden, a faraway voice rings in his mind, bringing with it a warmth akin to springtime and sparrows.

“Mobei has a beautiful scenery. If the Rong Tribe didn’t invade it, I’d really want to visit it.”

A blurry youthful girl passes through the sprigs of plants, smiling as she gives him a cup of aged wine.

A hand seems to pull him from the gates of hell, bringing him back to the mortal realm.

🌕 Ch 3: here

#mlqc #mlqc cn #mlqc spoilers #mlqc gavin

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bambiswriting · 3 years

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Consequence of Krell - Part 1

Part: 1, 2

Captain Rex x Tactician!Reader (she/her)

Summary: You have joined the 501st and 212th in the campaign of taking Umbara, and now you have to apprehend and arrest the turned Jedi, Krell. But what happens when Krell turns his sights and hurts you?

Warnings: Descriptions of heavy injury, strangulation, choking, vomit, blood, burns, lightsaber wound, head injury, angst, hurt, death. Not a light one!

Word count: 2k

The shield dissipated to reveal the imprisoned clones. You watched as Jesse and Fives took the blasters outstretched in Rex’s hands while you stood on the elevator pad with Tup and Kix. The nervous energy was thrumming from each of them. You were of equal mind. Fives, your best friend, glanced over Rex’s shoulder at you. He nodded and attempted a comforting smile. You dipped your head in a sedated reply. Your stomach sat heavy, a weight ready to pull you under. But… no. You couldn’t focus on it. Not now. You had to do right by them. The grief was already at a mounted peak, but there would be time to sit in it with them later.

You didn’t comprehend the sensation of the pad rising until a blaster bumped against your left side. On your right, Rex’s eyes casted sideways to search your glazed ones. Your pupils were involuntarily flicking left to right, searching the empty space between identical heads for a solution. Anything other than this - an alternative to the loss that would continue once you reached the upper level of the command station. Rex grasped your two fingers closest to him and tenderly squeezed. You squeezed back. A silent promise of companionship to one another.

The doors opened, a cruelty from the Force, and clones immediately filed out, surrounding Krell. The objective was to cut off each inconceivable exit, but every man in the room knew it would make no difference should the Besalisk ignite his sabers. Many of them would not leave the tower. And perhaps you would go with them. You took your stance between Rex and Fives, with a desperate plea to the galaxy to allow you to maintain their safety. A hologram by the door pulsated back online, and the noise made you jump, setting the lump in your throat deeper. You aimed your blaster at the fallen Jedi.

Rex straightened. “General Krell, you’re being relieved of duty.”

He turned, slowly, and somehow that was equally as terrifying as staring him directly in those sickly yellow eyes. His two pairs of arms persisted in a fold behind his back, with optimal access to his weapons. The pressure in your head was building. Rex hadn't yet raised his DC-17s. He was the most vulnerable person in the room. You unknowingly squeezed down on your trigger.

"It's treason, then." Those words carried the condemnation of a death sentence. He bared his teeth in such a way that it would have appeared he was smiling.

Finally, Rex pinned his blasters on the target. "Surrender, General."

If the situation owed to it, perhaps you would have laughed. The mere use of a title, still, was abhorrent to you.

Krell initiated a stalk towards Rex, centering himself in the room and widening his stance by the parting of his feet. Please, no.

"You're committing mutiny, Captain."

"Explain your actions."

The clones moved deeper into the room, cutting off the window at which Krell was just policing the Umbaran landscape.

"My actions?"

"For ordering your troops against one another."

"Oh, that." He raised his head, proud, and gestured nonchalantly. "I'm surprised you were able to figure it out… for a clone."

Your clench around the trigger was building.

Out of your left eye, you had identified movement from Fives. You assumed it was a gesture of advancement. But you didn't turn to confirm this. You couldn't move. Your limbs were paralysed.

“Surrender, General. You’re outnumbered.”

You felt the air around you turn stagnant. A rushing noise built in your ears, and then your feet tipped forward, toes dragging along the floor. The gravity shifted underneath you, and you were pulled towards the beast at full speed.

Quicker than it began, you stopped, making contact with one of Krell's fists. Nothing you had endured in this war thus far compared to the instantaneous pressure around your windpipe. Within seconds your eyes felt close to bursting. You couldn't hear the commotion around you, as your blood was pulsing rapidly in your skull.

Safety mechanisms released in every which direction. Rex pinned his pistols, now gripped in a vice, on Krell's skull. "Drop her."

Krell turned to you, talking steadily along the shell of your ear. "Your feelings for him - all of them - are strong, but they weaken you. They compromise your resolve." He raised you off the ground, your legs squirming as you frantically clawed at his fist.

"She intended to shoot me, for you," he squeezed again, sight tunneling on Rex. A noise like a whine escaped your mouth. “Half-breed."

Rex couldn't make the call. Krell's movements were quick and precise. Any one of his blaster bolts timed with a purposeful shove could hit you. His blood was turning acidic.

"Yes… I sense the fear in you. The anger. The fury. Take your weapon. Strike me down."

Your helpless wheeze cut through the rest of Rex's resolve like glass. Your arms had slowed their fight to return the stolen air to your lungs. You were going limp. Your heart was trembling. His hands shook.

"This is the art of war. Executive decisions must be made."

You felt something in your neck crack.

Krell bowed his head. "And you lack the ability to instigate them."

His arms at his back frayed and thrusted forward, sending the men hurtling to the ground. Rex hit the door and his blasters fell with him, skidding out of reach. He leapt with speed to his feet, in time to see the green blade of a saber come down against your back, splitting your armour, through to your jacket and then along your back. If you could breathe, you would have screamed in agony. The image of your eyes wide in torture would haunt his nightmares forever. Krell threw you carelessly across the room, slamming against the wall. Your head suffered the brunt of the contact, and your body collapsed in a heap.

Fives' voice broke into bottomless rage. "I'll kill you!"

The clones needed no instruction. They opened fire. A second double ended saber entered the battle. What followed was a myriad of needless lives lost. Krell cut down men with no remorse. His sabers spun and pivoted, deflecting blaster fire and creating a shield around him. The plasma shuddered audibly, sound reminiscent of gunship engines, faulting, stuttering and eventually declining in an air battle. He leapt between men, massacring war heroes. Most were fortunate, decapitated or impaled immediately and granted an instantaneous passing. Others were left with pieces missing and didn’t have such a luxury of a fast death. They bled out until painfully slipping away. Orange and blue chipped armour was diced and thrown every which direction, 501st and 212th assuming a role of puppets, and Krell was the master. The Besalisk sliced one clone through the gut, and kicked him at Rex, who jumped aside in a dodge. Krell ceased momentarily, just as the remaining men dragged themselves back on their feet, and his eyes bore into Rex.

“I will not be undermined by creatures bred in some laboratory!” His exit was open. He turned and jumped through the window, glass shattering around him and falling to the ground below. He spun in the air and landed on both feet, the shards from the tower raining around him. Then the clones below began shooting.

He should have run straight to the elevator and pursued the fallen Jedi. But the stability of what would normally be his auto piloted instincts had fragmented. The smell of your burnt skin crippled Rex's mind. You were face down, and the wound across your back was glowing as it continued to melt the area in its circumference. Kix ran over then, seemingly directing his focus to you. Unbeknownst to Rex, the medic had already done a sweep, and concluded that no one else in the room who had been on the end of Krell's sabers had survived. He hadn't registered that Kix was speaking to him. Everything sounded muffled. "I've got her, go!"

"Rex, come on!" bellowed Fives.

He staggered on his feet, bile threatening to spew over his lips. Rex clasped a hand over his helmet, shaking his head violently. Damn it, snap out of it! He just… needs to see your face. He needs to see that you're alive.

"Rex!" followed Jesse, taking a large step forward and tagging him on the arm. Rex finally jolted, and cast his eyes to the elevator. The men stood, waiting expectantly for his lead, all of them far worse for wear. He picked up his fallen weapons, ran in and spun to face the door, casting another pained expression on your failing body as the level ascended out of view and he went below.

The 501st and 212th sprinted out of the command tower, Rex in lead. They followed the trail of broken glass, passing by a cluster of Umbaran ships. Just then, Dogma stepped out from behind one of the transports, blaster trained on his brothers. "Hold it right there!"

Rex whipped out his DC-17s. "Lower your weapon, Dogma," he commanded.

He hesitated briefly, shaking his head. "I… I can't do that, sir."

Rex's patience was already worn into the ground. "That's an order!"

“It’s my duty.” Dogma flicked his aim between them. "You're all traitors!"

Rex deposited one of his blasters into its holster, then removed his helmet, an attempt to show some relation and find a common ground. "I used to believe that being a good soldier meant doing everything they told you. That's how they engineered us,"

Tup lifted his blaster to Dogma.

"But we're not droids. We're not programmed. You have to learn to make your own decisions." He stared intently at Dogma, his brow pinched.

Dogma switched his barrel on Tup. "Dogma, don't do it."

"Damn it, we don't need this right now!" Fives threw his arm down and scowled. "He hurt (Y/N)!"

That broke something behind the tattoo across his eye. "Is… is she alright?"

"We don't know," Jesse said dejectedly, angrily stuffing his blaster into his other hand.

Tup shook his head. “He just… cut her down. A civilian.”

“He’s the traitor, not us! (Y/N)’s not a clone. She wasn’t made to die this way!”

“That’s enough.” Rex’s words weren’t meant to come out as pained as they did. It was like there was a thick wad of sandpaper in his throat, grinding his voice down to a pained shadow of his usual resonance.

The truth is, you were no longer a civilian. You made the choice to enlist in this war, to try and make the galaxy safer for the future generations. It’s one of the things that drew Rex to you - your selflessness and willingness to join a battlefront, to do the right thing, where others would turn and run the other direction. You were hands on like that, believing in doing it yourself, or not at all. Others would have called you mad.

As much as he admired that about you, it was also his downfall, because he knew you wouldn’t walk away. You wouldn’t leave his brothers. You loved them like family. Hell, they were your only family. And they loved you. Perhaps that would mean he would lose you to it all one day. Perhaps he had lost you already.

Rex squeezed his eyes shut and drew his brows tightly together. He sucked in a breath.

Dogma lowered his weapon, and he was tackled by troopers without any protest. He stretched his arms out in front of him and released his blaster. They pinned either arm behind his back and secured his wrists together with binders.

Rex hesitated. "Take him to the brig," he ordered, pulling his helmet back over his head, then pointing to a couple clones.

"You two, get up there and help Kix! The rest of you, don't let General Krell escape!"

"Yes, sir!" They shouted as Rex and the others ran into the treeline.

#captain rex x reader #captain rex #501st #arc trooper fives #Jesse #Medic kix #Tup #Dogma #Krell #General krell #The clone wars #Star wars #Captain rex x female reader #Self insert #Umbara #TCW fanfic #my writing

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thefirstknife · 3 years

Note

Help, I ran Garden of Salvation with some clan mates and i'm Experiencing Great Sadness about the Kentarch 3 again.

I haven't been following you since shadowkeep, and was wondering if you had some theories about what happened, because a lot is left unexplained, specifically about Lisbon-13's motivations. The story from Yardarm-4's perspective shows that something is influencing them before they accept power (stasis teaser?) from the darkness. Do you think they really had a choice? Do you think he was influenced in his decision to kill them? If so, why? As a test just for him? Presumably he's still out there somewhere, and I can't tell from the lorebooks whether Rekkana let him kill her first or not. I just feel so bad for them, they all loved each other. Yardarm probably took the power in the first place to help get them out safely. Do you think it'll ever get concluded? The whole lore series seems interestingly close to what happens with Shayura, just sort of in reverse.

Kentarch 3 fireteam and the whole story on the Garden of Salvation armour and the associated weapons and equipment is amazing and very interesting, I agree. I haven't talked about it before but it's a good thing to revisit every so often! I think there's still a lot we don't really understand, mostly due to not fully understanding the power of the Black Garden.

In short for the general audience, Kentarch 3 was a fireteam that consisted of Yardarm-4 (Titan), Rekkana (Warlock) and Lisbon-13 (Hunter). They went to explore the Black Garden at the behest of the Warlock order called the Cryptochrons which Rekkana was a part of. This order got exiled some time after Osiris for dabbling in prophecies. Cryptochrons were formed around a Oneiromantic Circle and led by a Sibyl (or multiple sibyls; or Sibyl was just a name of one member, it's unclear). Oneiromancy is the practice of interpreting dreams to predict the future and sibyls were ancient Greek female prophets and oracles.

I didn't think this would get long but it did so the rest under the cut:

The Cryptochron order continued operating after its exile and Rekkana received a prophecy from them that revolved around a fireteam learning about the Black Garden and retrieving from it a Vex relic of some sort. The relic is the exotic weapon Divinity and the lore tab on it details the prophecy they were chasing:

"And after any other Cryptochrons they learn of. But your path is more dangerous than most. The Circle has foreseen many fireteams following in your footsteps. You can find the knowledge the order seeks at the Tree."

"Can? Not will?" For the first time, Rekkana sounded concerned.

"The Circle has had limited success in piercing the veil that surrounds the Black Garden, so the order offers no certainties. They say that a group of Guardians will discover secrets about the origin of the Black Garden at the Tree. The Oneiromantic Circle foresees no reason why it will not be the Kentarch 3."

"Nor can I. But…?"

"There is another thread in the tapestry, entwined with this one. The Vex, or some fractal faction of them, worship or honor a… divinity there."

"The Black Heart? It was destroyed."

"Yes, but this is something different. An object. Something like a sacred relic. It is important to the Vex for reasons that we have not yet fathomed. The Circle has determined that it is dangerous—"

"A Vex weapon?"

"Perhaps," the Sybil sounded annoyed at the interruption. "Rekkana, the Circle concluded that it is a danger to you."

"To me? But then, why send me on this mission?"

"When the Circle dreamed of the object, you were beside it."

They agreed that, should they find this object, Lisbon should be the one to carry it. They did find it and he was indeed the one to carry it, as is shown later in another lore tab detailed below.

We know that Lisbon-13 killed the rest of his fireteam because they got corrupted by the Black Garden, something happened to their Ghosts (they all just dropped down and started losing their Light) and then turned on him. He was being hunted and he really had no choice. But he couldn't live with it. In Beyond Light, he's shown trying to kill his Ghost in order to stay permanently dead because he couldn't bear the burden of what he did to his fireteam, even though his actions were justified and he acted in self-defence.

But before he managed to do that, he was faced with his own doppleganger, just like the YW at the end of Shadowkeep. In the end, Lisbon didn't kill his Ghost because the doppleganger offered him power and Lisbon (presumably) chose to take it: his wish was simply to make himself forget about his fireteam (and Rekkana specifically, whom he loved). It's implied that he accepted and after that, we have no formal information what happened.

The outcome of what happened to Kentarch 3 is somewhat known, as detailed in this ship lore. The Vanguard knows Lisbon killed the other two, they're not sure when they lost their Ghosts and they have not found anyone's body, not even Lisbon's. But we know from the lore that came out after that Lisbon accepted the deal with his doppleganger and we have no idea what that entailed. Is he still in the Black Garden? Was he killed? Replaced? Just memory-wiped and sent back? Something else entirely? We'll explore at the end.

I'm pretty sure the voices they heard talking to them were also their own dopplegangers. And it's somewhat implied that they made some sort of a bargain and accepted "new powers" that came "from the wrong side." There's only one description of it:

Her fist glimmered and quaked with an unfamiliar power. She only had to release her grip, and that energy would rip through him, burning without fire.

That's Rekkana attacking Lisbon. It's never fully explained what it is, but it could very well be some sort of prototype Stasis in my opinion. Or some other Darkness power. Not sure why the Black Garden would give them this, which is why I think they simply harnessed the power of their dopplegangers. This is something that's been mentioned a few times in regards to Darkness: duplication. Same is present with the Taken as well (Taken psions duplicate). I mentioned the duplication theme being discussed in Clovis' journal before too.

Honestly, I can't make any definitive conclusion, but Kentarch 3 definitely found something horrifying in the Black Garden and fell to its influence. They also reference doing the puzzles to get Divinity, which they got and Lisbon used it to kill the other two.

Garden of Salvation raid ends with a Pyramid scale opening up and leading us down into the area with the Darkness statue. I think this could've easily been some sort of a lead into the future of Destiny and the powers of Darkness. Kentarch 3 may have accidentally received this power early on or were perhaps some sort of a test the Darkness did on Guardians before offering them Stasis for real.

It's an interesting story and yep, it does mirror Shayura's fireteam and how the story is told! Each member of the fireteam tells the same story from their own POV on armour for that class. I'll link all of them in order, roughly how I think it's best to read each POV:

Rekkana: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Yardarm-4: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Lisbon-13: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

I like how the armour follows the same name pattern: Righteousness, Exaltation, Transcendence, Ascendancy and Temptation.

Associated Garden of Salvation weapons also have some tidbits of lore that might help, namely:

Ancient Gospel Hand Cannon:

"These forces have existed forever, but only one of them speaks to us." —Rekkana, Warlock of the Kentarch 3

Sacred Provenance Pulse Rifle:

"These gifts were not made for us, but we were meant to have them." —Rekkana, Warlock of the Kentarch 3

Zealot's Reward Fusion Rifle:

"Why not use these gifts we've been given?" —Yardarm-4, Titan of the Kentarch 3

I would really like to learn more about them, and specifically Lisbon because he might be able to actually tell us what happened. He or his Ghost, Piri, who managed to survive last we've seen her. I think the Ghost might be able to give the most accurate version of events. It's interesting that Lisbon was very much against whatever power they received and that was the reason he abandoned his fireteam, which made the other two consider him a traitor to their friendship.

Very intriguing lore story that could possibly be mentioned again in some form. Also as a brighter note, yes, Yardarm literally flew into the Black Garden with an entire ship and crash landed inside. On a less brighter note, we've never seen the remains of a ship in there (to be fair, Black Garden is huge) and it's somewhat implied that they entered through the Vex Gate on Mars which puts the timeline of when they got there into question. The Vex Gate on Mars that led into the Black Garden was destroyed in the Red War. The new gate showed up on the Moon in Shadowkeep (and you can't fly a ship into it because it's in a cave).

An additional note which answers certain things when it comes to Lisbon's fate that I hinted at before: in order to acquire the quest for Divinity, you have to go to the Moon to the Vex Gate for the first time. The gate will open up and a Vex mind will come out. This giant Vex minotaur is called Zeteon, Redemptive Mind. Upon killing this minotaur, you receive "Divine Fragmentation" quest. Details of the quest here. You pick up a Vex core that has strange readings coming from it and you have to decipher it by running it through various Vex technology. Once fully completed, you have to go into Garden of Salvation, do the Divinity puzzles and the weapon will drop from the extra chest at the end.

Why am I mentioning this? Well. Zeteon, Redemptive Mind drops a core that contains information about how to get Divinity. Lisbon was the member of the fireteam that held Divinity and used it to kill his fireteam. There's a quote from Lisbon on the weapon called Accrued Redemption:

"I should never have let it come to this. Now each arrow is a penance." —Lisbon-13, Hunter of the Kentarch 3

Divinity's perks are called Judgement and Penance.

Basically, I believe that whatever deal Lisbon accepted that made him forget his fireteam, free him from the suffering and redeem him ended with him being converted into Zeteon, Redemptive Mind. It's the reason why this Vex in particular had the pieces needed to construct Divinity again. Lisbon was the last person who had it. Becoming the bearer of parts needed for Divinity was both his Judgement and his Penance.

Final note because I love ancient languages being used for the names of things in Destiny: "Zeteon" most likely comes from Greek "zeteo" which means:

to seek, search after, look for

to inquire into, examine, consider

to strive for, desire, wish

Probably tied to Lisbon's search and desire for redemption for what he's done. I think that wraps up his fate quite nicely, although tragically.

#destiny 2 #kentarch 3 #lisbon-13 #rekkana #yardarm-4 #garden of salvation raid #black garden #darkness #vex #ask #long post #anon if you've been wondering what's taking so long for your question to be answered or if i've received the question #this essay is the reason shfksjfhskjfhks

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pndnj · 3 years

Text

Cathartic- Yellow Metal Lyrics

Heres where I am with the lyrics, I referenced @25Goldenn on twitter for some of it that I couldn’t comprehend.

*music*

0:23

Dark matter, like painted splatters, they fit better, the old saying, the way it goes, better the devil you do then you don’t know. I hit pedals and switch levers, my heart metal, I can't settle, im part trouble, they are not subtle. I fuck good so fuck cuddles, burst bubbles the thrist levels at new heights, i down doubles, and got baked til I felt high, my face puzzled, felt muddled, far strung and your floors woodent, the thought might but the fit wouldn’t. A fortnight

0:46 - 1:00

And I thought right, it’s all bark and no bite, I’m Tony Stark still embarking on a dream, took a bit of time to take darkness from the team. Seen what I saw. Heartless on the sleeve. Tried to burn my wings, so I put them in a piece on my chest , at peace no rest.

1:00-1:15

Flipped this on it’s head. Rip the script up now, flip it don’t pretend, slipping shit again, Fakers all around me, I’ve been living in pretense. Fake friends won’t make amends. There’s no need, these mean comments control the scenes. Attentionseekers, the spine is weakened

1:15-1:24

This family needs, what a family needs, and the planet bleeds, the damaged trees. It’s never leaving til we ascend so fuck the fence, and until they stop killing colour it’s fuck the feds.

1:22 - 1:44

You must be off it, I mean it, you know you ain’t never get with the judging and I used to dread growing my beard too long, never felt I belonged, but it's really long like a minute I ain’t looking to no mans for the limits, They’re feeling timid, I’m telling them who they mimic, why they don't look like a clinic …. Why they don't get no women, Still, we’re just fucking girls, Lost in the wrong world, Jurassic, now to this vermin

1:41- 1: 50

Kicking the game I’m serving, these losers are never learning, my fire is forever burning, adding it to my fuel, seems like I’m always focused on never becoming you, These locals that rob us feeling … was for a reason.

1:52-2:02

I’m seeing my new beginnings, watch out this loser’s winning, and no water is too deep to swim in Like I’m about to see a killing, I’m all the way that and living, flawless and feeling lawless, the prison now to the gimmicks, my vision is set to something,

2:03-:2:20

I’m watching you bitches plummet, no matches here for my cunning, you rappers are feeling done in, switching your genre, running and Running your jaw, stunting, pulling at straws, something I think you’re a poor effort, deaf and tone deaf and I ain’t treat you separate. Living, I’m in my element, riding it like a … never lose me to fentanyl, scared when I take a benadryl. Keeping it green in general

2:20- 2:46

Think that you remain irrelevant. Look at yourself with reverence, hoping to always elevate. Celibate of these thoughts, killing themselves with sedatives. In comparison to eminem, you’re feeling feminine. Impolitically correct, still dropping on my dick. And I never gave a fuck about what they say abt my shit, I’ve been moving things in my mind like it’s this mountain dew Memories have made me wonder if one day I’m after you. What’s the purpose that you do, is what you're hoping that they learn, i’d like to say i’m done but it’s getting up on my nerves

2:46 -2:55

I’m looking at my life, saying what do I deserve. It’s hard to say I know when I’m walking through the dirt. Talking while you’re nothing I can see for what it’s worth. I’m tired of feeling hurt and I’ve tried enough but nothing works.

2:55-3:40

I’m racking up excuses while I’m slacking off on work. Chit chatting is the usual, talking to this clerk, i beg you don’t include me. I might write it on my shirt so everytime they see me, the oldest know to swerve. SWERVE Life is potent, bits of fucked shit… till they took notice weren’t no hocus pocus, it was hard work that got me heard so i put in the graph like google maps but the whole earth

… around my door mat, taking over like the drones, rolling dirt up in miles like the water, and exploding like Annas hematoma. Don't need to see a slammer to know that I don't want to go man

I’m a showman. I’m just focused on the drama… like i’ve got my own insurance, show myself the pain, like i boxed it in the frame, if we’re about to talk greatness im great, the way you have to say my name like beyonce

“Say my name”

4:00-4:46

Just a bum with a cigarette, sun coming up, all my thoughts on the internet. Feeling deep, I’m just bored with the silhouette single sec, get fucked up for the thrill of it . killer streak playing Pacman. Like I came from the Philippines vanilla bean still a thing for the thrill of scene,

Theres a beam, UFO, Leave it well alone I aint moving, stood still on the peloton, telephone and its always on the dial tone, it's been a while since i’ve smiled at a milestone, seen a big pile in my mind stone, me against the world on my Jack Jones, Like I’m John Jones, With pictures in the condo, far from John Doe, in the ___, like I'm Johnny Bravo, got pravado, with a small dick sitting in golados, feeling far gone, cuz that last hit was the good shit, was that stay lit

4:48-5:02

You can never take my shit come and get me. On the top floor, cloud 9, fading, never bailing, felt amazing, inhaling, til my lungs two guns blazing. Overcome all the stunts that I pulled. A suit of just skin and then wool

5:02- 5:17

This life doesn’t give you no armour, a lot of myself can harm ya. I swear on what’s good, that I’m here till they take me. I pray that I’m wrinkled, at least over 80, and start moving like a ruler, ?damaged? Like a computer going fast, bars from the jeweler, bring the songs to the beach in hopes of finding tuna

5:18-5:36

…

5:36- 6:16

Grab a bat, lose my rag. Couple things got me mad, a couple people got me wrong and now I’m changing up the swag. Coming in and stealing it, I might take the whole bag. Feeling undefeated, I’m a beast with a reason, and imma lead the whole pack. Fearless like I’m Caesar, I’m just waiting for a chance to fill it up with diesel, and all I've been achieving is clocking miles in its region, moving like a legion.

Promise that I made to myself an allegiance. Do you still believe I’m a fool for ever leaving, staring at the ceiling, can never put a cap on achieving. I’m just here for the rap, then I’m leaving.

I’ve had about enough of being my own enemy, it’s time I grew up, a long way from 17. Always went against the grain, struggles in my life. Got some things to say when I stand up on a mike.

6:16-6:32

I ain’t dropping this for fame, I need this time, like therapy, it’s just to keep me sane. The truth is on my medicine, can’t put that on your plate.

Speeding into everything, bout time I fixed the brakes. Don’t say I can’t communicate , you know I conversate with you in several different ways. And I know you know it’s references, looking at your face.

6:33- 6:53

Can’t justify mistakes, like every man that made them, seems I ain't the one to blame. Lying to myself, only had so much to gain, so now I’m switching up the plate, see if that affects the place, im at on most days

I ain’t going with the usual so they looking at me strange. Confused, I can feel it all, I’m here to make a change. It’s cold at 3am outside, I’m walking with the dog, thanking god that you don’t talk at all, my mind is switching off

6:54-7:12

Driving down to find myself, cuz I’ve been getting lost, lived this selfless life and found I can give a toss. Lessons that I’ve learned I’ve tried teaching to myself. What I’ve learnt from certain people is that they’re better than myself.

So I surround myself with real ones, and you feel the plastic melt. Like burning toy soldiers that used to go up on the shelf. Recycle the ideas, conveying on the belt

7:14-7:29

.. circus, always hurting the way we felt? Embarrassed that we dreamt of bigger things and letting go of notions till we feel them in cement

Tired of only hoping, we feel broken men. Cuz the gravity is weight and has kept us to the ground, see the only people speaking with favors in their mouths

7:46-7:58

Got killer rhymes… no fillers, like godzilla, eating clouds cuz my smokes thicker, throat licker, my dope sicker, bringing people their hope like im the pope slicker, i hope you’re getting the point cuz i walk quicker

I thought my city was shit bcs I want bigger like my zipper couldn’t zip up fed up with the…my love is fickle.. Residual age has a primitive face

I see demise for your limited ways, Left it to simmer, simmer away…a fake glimmer in the haze

8:09-8:11

Feeling trapped this industry is a cage

8:34-8:50

Nobody’s speaking the truth, I’m offended by the State. Look at the state of the news, I’ve decided the argument, reciting my views, while they’ve been sat in their chairs, I’m feeling pressure to choose.

Standing here as one man, how can I do half when you’re half the person I am. If it wasn’t in your life, you didn’t choose it. It’s the funny thing about music. It’s the pain and beauty of it.

8:52-9:11

Don’t give a fuck what my suit is, it looks good so I wear it, better than the shoot that People’s wearing, changing the whole narrative for these basics and scarcity

Been facing the racists from back when i were a kiddie .born up in in 93’. been living in Bradford City..kicked me out of the schools, they had a problem with me hitting the kids that would call me p*** still sitting in the classroom chilling, and i'm angry now that I’m older I see they treat us different

9:12-9:25

got me thinking I’m the problem cuz they never dealt with those issues.

20 years later I’m still in the same boat, tryna treat me like my grandpa, say I came up off the boat. Came to tell you what I stand for, man I think you’re shit, a joke. How can I be civil, when they got me by the throat

9:25-9:35

Pushing my feelings down, you ain’t got it like them

‘Boy your skin is so light’, ok motherfucker take my name up on a flight. Try to convince immigration that your bloodline’s half white.

9:35-9:45

I don’t know how that’s acceptable, when life is more susceptible to perception, be the death of them. I’ve been looking at the sky saying where’s that day of reckoning, you had your prophets right when they say that you would speak to them.

9:45-9:55

I need justice in this life and I trust that it’s my fight, cuz when I’m writing it feels right to have them focused on the facts again. Focused on the rap again, hoping for the change, gunna put this on the map again

9:55-10:16

Writing in all caps again, the pain, it goes through me so I write the letter. All the shit that could have brought me but made me better.

I’m at home with a pain in my soul , yeh rap… cuz you know I was too real to contest it, my time was invested. Now I look at the industry, I see it infested, looking like kids who would write on nesquik.

10:17-10:29

My name ain’t on the list unless they label it ethnic.

I ain’t never gave a fuck about these jokers and jesters. Ain’t no answers for these things, so just save us the questions, man allowed of violence, cuz my silence is deafening, your opinion stinks, somebody get him a breath mint.

10:30- 10:42

Start to understand why they think that I’m threatening, I move in certain ways, couldn’t slow me with ketamine Now they all wanna hear me, got a table at letterman. Direction changed, like I changed up the lettering. Don’t believe the age ,bcs I move like a veteran.

10:42 - 10:47

Raised on the benefit for whose benefit, they’ll never learn shit, man, if the shoe fits.

…no words coming out when you open your mouth

And to be honest, it’s insulting, offensive to my wounds that have been salting. Tryna ask me questions that they know I never answer. I’d rather sit online and reply to the fan art

11:00-11:06

Fuck a sports car, coming through when i rapped

tell you what I like, farm life and the tractor

11:06- 11:17

Fake life, 'sup online, suck a fat one. You don’t wanna buy into that, none of that son. Sitting in the garden 98’ in the Datsun, seen some hot summers but I still remember that sun.

*music*

11:51- 12:34

I make millions off of my pain, cause I know a few millions still living that way

Dealing with the hurt, they should know cause they don’t deserve it, it hit deep cause i hit the nerve. Only way that the sheep learn if the street firm, in my ways I don’t wanna change, everything just stay the same

Who you tryna convince you understand, cant maintain, let the lights dim some, get the Chow Mein, flex, get the tape, right up at night

Why these men be nice to my face, be nice, i ain’t tryna be a gangsta ruins my vibe

Rather be low-key and on my phone. Never need the trophy or the show piece

Never show peace in a North Face fleece. Show kids this like i wrote my flip

Cause the sign might fit till the start i’m sick

12:37-13:05

Now you see where I come from, the world don’t. Only achievement in this life is the Jordans. Committing petty crimes out of boredom, we can’t afford them. So I stole it, need a rolex

Go make sense, get yourself a job, It’s a poor man’s game tryna sit and pray to god, he ain’t sorting out your problems, gotta sort them out yourself

Used to tell us fables, now I’m writing them myself, Cause we raw like animals we all just need some help

Cathartic, I’m an artist, trying to put my heart in

Felt double crossed like Leo in Departed

13:05- 13:27

For the knowledge i’m not charging see I got it all free

But my hunger kept me starving like i’m feening for the feed

I just Need a reason to see me bleeding for my creed. Trick you with the words like I keep em up my sleeve. Picking where I fit, I see me sitting with the queen

I ain’t doing it unless you’re used to saying please

Let me flow a bit, before I sting 'em with the bees, They tryna kill us with disease

(Music)

13:34- 14:12

Why does it feel like they had the same notebook and the same four looks

Like the rain won't touch on their face, so sus when they lie don’t trust not a minor

Please no fuss, I just move through the game like must

Something in the way i adjust till i stick, Free falling like the ship, free fall till i bust

Remember 21 brother gave no fucks. Trying to project when they give them looks

In the projects, in the objects us

In my own way, never gave me love, shoulda never started this, broken hearted kid

Dried up the feeling till I stole the lid

Don’t wanna relish in the fame but I can’t resist

14:46-14:58

I like the way we feel, I like the way, I like the way

Ain’t no mistake, i am a being

I ain’t tryna be a leader, been selling out since Jesus

All my rhymes are for the readers, between the lines, like Father time, I fuck Mother Nature

14:58-15:40

That’s what they get, the connotations. Tell 'em I lived a life, and then I lived a life of adjacent? like its…. and played it patient.

Alone on my own spaceship, always tryna find greatness, still defying lines, but I’m fighting in my prime.

Shining light like Kylo while imma kill it all the time. Aging like I’m wine

Asian in my face, but still my race you can’t define. Focused on defiance, imma fight it while it’s life.

Started something sick and on my mind is what’s next, just became a dad so now I’m taking all the cheques. Better know I’m staying and paying like it’s debt. Imma get it done, if it’s taking all my breath, sweat, and down I ain’t messing around til I’m the best

Speaking in full sentences, shoulda thought about a strategy before you went at the stratosphere about this… rings around Saturn, this ain’t a battle, I’m sat, I’m here

15:40-16:22

Catch me doing magic, hired and sounding tragic I think you could use practice and until that you get the blacklist and pull like a … actress? Fooling them like a catfish, schooling like a legend, happy to be the reference, fusing like iridescence, leaving them all guessing, leaking out of my brain like a pipe I aint fixing, shining like a star you can see it from a distance

Aint many of me around p*** I’m just different Certain stages to this level aint here because fame is to the devil fuck a label, imma do this from the ghetto, clean up like Im Dettol

I’m the man to put a bet on, sight smart like a weapon, this is my kind of setting, i write the world I’m sat in, while these others live on hype, i see them fight in how they type, the fruit is ripe for the taking, i think i might

16:22-16:57

Let me take you away from here, Let me take you away from here, Let me take you away from here

16:58- 17:47

Eccentric things are mentioned like a kid stuck in detention tryna escape im just spitting what is written on the next page, spitting image of my dad in his young days

Born sinner when i’m livid i say fucks sake

Don’t worry i’m too cunning with no plumbing, the waterworks, i sung something that resonates, i thought it first like giving birth to the parrot perch

They see me do it and they know it works

Don’t know what’s worse: the way that you live your life or the way that you write a verse

You’ll be nervous, you don’t deserve it we’ll scratch the surface ill leave a crater, lift the dirt up to find the hurting

Can’t know for certain nothing is guaranteed, tryna be a better person than the world deserves to see cuz i see a lot of sharks still swimming in the sea

Cease and arrest what’s the reason.. And these the kinda kids we bringing up next

Distorted reality, all they needed was family, too hard to face, to see what the damage is

17:47

*i don’t wanna be, i don’t wanna be, a part of this, no, i don’t wanna be, i don’t wanna be, a part of this, *

18:04-18:38

Sometimes they ask the questions too deep to form a sentence, to disform, is this the norm, is this the sentence i feel defenseless i played the setlist, and all my sweat blood and tears, forgot to mention feeling lost, going off into different sections i feel like love wrecked it

If it’s not a drug why am i waiting for the next fix, affected, i cant believe that you left this

I guess I leave for the best wish, moving on like im fine for the lectures

We see it all from spectrums, cuz if we’re falling down we can fall down together

Staircase to heaven, mirror down the middle like 11, resentment on one side it won’t settle

18:38- 19:14

Mind fried but taking sense, they aint got a sense of themselves in the rich ends

Need to spell it out for them.. Made for them so witness

I know you feel afflicted but you always love it with me while im laughing at you, ya think you’re laughing with me

I try to (i love you) but im grown so they don’t fit me, my body thrown from the new to this old city so Im sick of sitting on my own, feeling so shitty, i’ve been on roads where its cold and the snow hitting

Its okay to be yourself, sit and talking to myself

I’ve been walking for the longest, just need a little rest, know i ain’t the strongest, I can feel it in my chest, talking about my feelings and of me, they get the best

19:14-19:59

They aint leaving, seeing breathing in my breath

Till death do us part is just seeded in my heart, like a work of art

Never winning,im just scared

Cant begin from the start, do i play a part in the rhythm of the night

I guess i’m onto something cuz the dark is feeling right

Every cloud got a lining, put my own miles in, like moralis, figured that they’re jealous, that they could just never tell us to change because the weather never made me question whether or not i’m not that level

Got rid of all the bullshit sitting in my way, most of them are full of shit i see it every day

I do hearing the same things that i do, maybe that shits hitting like haiku

How much do you pay for them to hype you

Recycle your flaws but they aint like new, leaving and conceded and full of diesel like engines that need a cleaning, the ending will be revealing. Even though we ain’t raising the facts, now we been facing.

20:01-20:52

The cactus with spikes, needing spaces. Different faces, the same story. A full body like straight body direct to your system.

Could never tell 'em we missed’ em. Not even with the thoughts, we gift them. Cuz they just take advantage, guess we are caught in a system.

My soul pouring out details of borrowed time, had enough of a fill, this is for sorrow time. I’m seeing visions of Heaven, I seen the severed line, between the gospel they speak and when theyre telling lies.

Remember telling a friend of mine, you’d sent of mine, identified like a 3rd eye. Got a habit of knowing now where the dirt lies. So benign. I ain’t sober after 9, so I fuck their minds. Why you flipping out, see another

Try to rep it from the city, fuck a chiller crew, repping for the nittys, trying to keep us down, raised on the social, don’t want to let us out of the system. Me, I insist we assist them, me alone putting shifts til I lift them

20:53-21:12

I know it’s hard, that’s why I like it, I’m fit to fight it, I’m from the North, I’m backing Tyson, it’s been decided, don’t see no light. They needing guiding, just redefining, realizing, I’m realigning, in full finance, they stay silenced.

Can’t be louder, I’m juiced up with no powder. I fix shit like a slick spanner. Gone green like Bruce Banner. So free Gaza on my banner

21:12-21:51

The real McCoy, I ain’t nothing to toy with, signifying peace like a Japanese Koi Fish. How did this happen, we’re moving backwards in our timeline, killing us with cyanide, Right up for the freedom 'til we transform like Ironhide

This is bout my feelings, the way that I move affects the fate that I’m sealing. Can’t say nothing, with that something being on the page, kept inside the pen like the bars that have been kept caged. See I always had a plan, since I was young, we had nothing man

Now it’s been a few years since I ain’t seen the fam, on foreign lands. Bout to climb Everest in the avalanche. Right into the riddles as soon as you were born. Never asking the question cuz it’s the norm. See I’m in a questionin’ session

21:52-22:03

Like the manner got a method to teaching a lesson, listen to MF Doom, he taught me like Ra’s Al Ghul. Felt like living in Gotham, the people were rotten. Still we play cartoons so it’s never forgotten.

22:03-22:15

Chilling at the top but we came from the bottom. Writing and jottin for them life by, spotting the difference

*Dreams, was growing out of me, sun promising that tomorrow it will rise, time playing games with my mind, I swear it will pass us by

Train goes on the tracks, smoke, I’m tired to hide my thoughts, so blinded in flames, Don’t know where we’re going, I have no way of knowing, only see what’s in my head

Can’t we wait a minute, so we can savour this, It’s on my brain again, these days, It on my brain again these days”

23:10-23:46

They’re hating on Palestine ways, The oh no Palace playing Prince on the Steinway, Sending out mind waves, stop them like crimewaves, Freedom fighter, Yellow Metal is my name

Like vipers, I see the sly ones, the snake that’s called Biden, none of them abiding what they might put in writing

We should be used to it by now, say whatever for the vote and then just choose another route, say they’d never kill another unless that brother’s skin is brown

I’m just telling you the facts, if you can’t take it, the truth naked, to bare bones and my thoughts lately, spitting politics.. Done ain’t it, Shit just gets me vexed, and now I’m sitting that I think of it

23:45-23:59

Feeling on the brink of it, whatever it is, Figure out some shit at least it feels that way

talk about my feelings and I don’t feel so strange, finding solace, that’s a promise, in Metropolis but being honest, can’t write a sonnet, without some pain

24:00-24:40

Can’t fade away, away so we can savour this, been on my brain again these days

Can't find a way to be so you can savour this, been on my brain these days

Singing the song for another, singing a song for another

#zayn #yellowmetal #cathartic #feel free to correct me pls #cathartic lyrics

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lochsides · 3 years

Text

Yellow Metal - cathartic Review

Here’s something I did not expect to be reviewing this week but when Zayn drops a 24 minute rap track, you fall in line. I had to listen to it a couple times through before I could even begin to make sense of my thoughts because my brain sort of malfunctioned. I have never been prouder to be a Zayn fan. He’s such a nuanced songwriter and there is so much to unpack here.

I think this is the most unfiltered version of Zayn that we have ever been exposed to (and possibly will ever be). I am grateful that he said his piece in this because it needed to be said. As a brown woman, I felt so seen by this and I cannot explain what that means to me. Thank you Z, for your unvarnished truth in addressing racism and various forms of discrimination.

I’m doing a short lyrical analysis below the cut, but the TLDR is that this is a fantastic piece of art that deserves to be heard.

I wish he had released this as an EP because that would be easier to review than a single 24 minute song, structurally speaking. So instead, I have picked out some key lyrics, going from top to bottom, that really spoke to me and decided to study the song that way. His lyricism is hard-hitting in this track. It is beyond anything he has ever released before.

“The planet bleeds, the damaged trees. It’s never leaving until we ascend so fuck the fence.” — I have not seen this lyric being talked about in the fandom, because the lyrics that follow this steal the show, rightly so, but I wanted to give this line a moment because it’s important too. To me, this lyric speaks to where Zayn is at with his relationship with the physical world. He’s out on the farm (about which he even goes to say “tell you what I like, farm life and the tractor”) and I believe he’s happy in his space and he feels connected to nature (also see River Road). So it is a poignant and slightly jaded, but valid perspective that he shares on climate change. It’s never leaving until we ascend. The damage human beings have done to the planet won’t be undone until there are no humans left to do damage. It’s a single sentence that says so much about the depth of the climate crisis. I’m doing my PhD on urban air quality so this is something I care really deeply about and I resonated with.

“And until they stop killing colour, it’s fuck the feds.” — Yeah, agreed Zayn. The systemic racism that he calls out here is echoed throughout the song, in equal parts anger and boldness. I love that he isn’t glossing over it with metaphors, which he could easily do and it would be beautiful in a totally different way, but this makes it harder for racists to overlook. There is so much power in calling it like it is.

“Never lose me to fentanyl, scared when I take a Benadryl, keeping it green in general.” — It frustrates me to no end to see Zayn painted as this drug-addicted lazy musician that doesn’t care about his work, because we know how untrue that is. This narrative is tired and simply boring too, and I won’t get into the racist connotations of it when you consider it against his white colleagues who smoke as much as him but that isn’t one of their defining traits in the media.

“I’m racking up excuses while I’m slacking off on work … it was hard work that got me heard” — I love the juxtaposition in this verse. The public/media perception on his career is that Zayn doesn’t put in effort or that he doesn’t want it. This obviously stems from his leaving the band. It goes back to what I was saying before about narrative, when in reality, as Zayn has said on various occasions, he fights to make his own choices. And that doesn’t have to look the way everyone else expects it to (“I beg you, don’t include me. I might write it on my shirt”), he has his own struggles that have helped forge his path, but it is his path that he paved, himself. He works hard to be heard. He has to. It reminds me of something my parents used to tell me when I was younger about being immigrants: you have to work 10 times harder for the same opportunities just because of the colour of your skin or your name on the cv. It’s a harsh truth to grow up with but it was my reality, as it is for most POC.

“This life doesn’t give you no armour, a lot of myself can harm you. I swear on what’s good, that I’m here ‘til they take me. I pray that I’m wrinkled, at least over 80…” — There is something about the simplicity of these lyrics are the messaging that I love. He isn’t trying too hard to sound poetic but he still manages it perfectly.

“All I've been achieving, clocking miles in this region, moving like a legion. Promise that I made to myself, an allegiance. Do you still believe I’m a fool for ever leaving? Staring at the ceiling, can never put a cap on achieving. I’m just here for the rap, then I’m leaving. // I’ve had about enough of being my own enemy. It’s time I grew up, a long way from 17. Always went against the grain, struggles in my life. Got some things to say when I stand up on the mike.” — This is the only 1D-related lyric I’ll make reference to because this song is about so much more than that. That said though, we cannot overlook Zayn’s experiences in the band because that is part of his story. The tongue-in-cheek of “I’m just here for the rap, then I’m leaving” is hilarious to me. The line about not wanting to be his own enemy anymore and growing up from 17 reminds me of that quote Taylor (Swift) mentioned in Miss Americana about celebrities getting stuck at the age they got famous. I think this verse is similar to that. None of them ever wanted to be in the band and I don’t care what anyone says, Zayn leaving and proving success outside the band gave the rest of them the courage to follow their own solo careers. Sure there was drama surrounding the split but he did it for himself, to tell his stories the way he is now. Whatever else you have to say about him, you cannot deny his authenticity.

“I ain’t dropping this for fame, I need this time, like therapy, it’s just to keep me sane.” — I think this line tells us 2 things, the first being that this song was not leaked. Z knew what he was doing and his twitter likes tell us as much. He didn’t release it for any sort of attention, otherwise it would be widely available on streaming platforms and for purchase. Which leads to my second point, he released this song to get everything he talks about on the track off his chest. Its referenced in other lyrics too, like “now you see where I come from, the world don’t.” This was for whoever cared to listen, not the world. It’s inaccessible for a reason. I love that he threw those lyrics in. It makes the song feel more like a private conversation or listening to a friend rant. It creates a different form of intimacy between himself and his fans.

“Lessons that I’ve learned, I’ve tried teaching to myself. What I’ve learnt from certain people is that they’re better than myself. So I surround myself with real ones, and you feel the plastic melt.” — This one is for anyone that buys into conspiracy theories surrounding Zayn’s personal life. He surrounds himself with real people, real friendships, real connections. I have never bought into the bullshit that he has zero autonomy over his personal life. I love the use of plastic melting as a metaphor for ridding his life of fakeness.

“Feeling trapped. This industry is a cage.” — Zayn is obviously not the first person to say it. Many artists talk about how suffocating the industry is ( which he further comments on in the sung portion: “I don’t wanna be, I don’t wanna be, a part of this, no, I don’t wanna be, I don’t wanna be, a part of this”). Fame is such a wild and unnatural concept and the exploitation and politics of the music industry only feed further into it. The industry being a cage makes me think of zoos and how celebrities are animals on display, when they should be free in the wild. I also really like the musical interlude following this part.

“Nobody’s speaking the truth, I’m offended by the State. Look at the state of the news, I’ve decided the argument, reciting my views.” — Zayn toes the line between keeping to himself and speaking out on important issues, sometimes not very well. I am his biggest cheerleader, but I’m not up his ass. There have been many occasions where he could’ve done better. But I cannot fault him for being offended by the State because same, Z, same. I love that he took this song as an opportunity to real speak out, no punches pulled.

“See I’ve been facing the racists from back when I were a kiddie. Born up in 93’. Living in Bradford City, they kicked me out of the school. Said they had a problem with me hitting the kids that would call me p***, still sit in the classroom, chilling. I’m angry now that I’m older cause I see they treat us different. Got me thinking I’m the problem ‘cause they never dealt with these issues.” — See what I meant about no punches pulled. He said that! He said it like that too. There is so much in this verse that I relate to, it hits a little too deep. I grew up as a brown in predominantly white communities where the colour of my skin was the reason I was outcasted. We know when that’s happening, clear as day. The lyric “got me thinking that I’m the problem cause they never dealt with these issues” says it all. I have many racial traumas that I’m dealing with as an adult because the adults around me when I was a child didn’t deal with racism in the classroom. They do treat us different!

“20 years later, I’m still in the same boat. Tryna treat me like my grandpa, say I came up off the boat. Came to tell you what I stand for. Man I think you’re shit, a joke. How can I be civil when they got me by the throat? // Pushing my feelings down, you ain’t got it like them. ‘Boy your skin is so light.’ Ok motherfucker, take my name up on a flight. Try to convince immigration that your bloodline’s half white.” — Zayn talking his shit is my new favourite art form. How can I be civil when they got me by the throat? Something that I will always be enraged by is that POC are expected to de-escalate situations of racism. We have to push our feelings down, as Zayn says in the verse, because the institution is against us. All of the institutions are against us. The fact that he takes it a step farther to say that his name makes him a target for racism, even though he is half-white just nails his point home. Also, can we please quit the whole ‘Zayn is white-passing’ bullshit. He alludes to it again later in the song (“asian in my face, but still my race you can’t define”). Its not a compliment to erase someone identity in favour of white-washing them.

“My name ain’t on the list unless they label it ethnic.” — Oh, the amount of times we have heard that age old (v. racist) saying ‘{celebrity of colour} is the new [insert white celebrity here]’ as if POC aren’t allowed to succeed in their own right. It is wild to me that Zayn has to deal with this given his level of success.

“Start to understand why they think that I’m threatening. I move in certain ways, couldn’t slow me with ketamine.” — There is a subtle nod to racism (and Islamaphobia) in this line, because of course the brown man is a threat, but I like the way Z turns it around. I also like the rhyme scheme.

“Raised on the benefit for whose benefit? They’ll never learn shit, man, if the shoe fits.” — Okay I might be reaching here, but this is just my interpretation. We all know the benefit system in the UK sucks. Being raised on benefit implies a lack of money growing up, but the benefits aren’t really all that beneficial to the families that rely upon them.

“Dealing with the hurt, they should know cause they don’t deserve it, it hit deep cause I hit the nerve.” — Well, okay then, just call me out. It’s fine. I seriously feel like he’s talking to me directly with this line. I imagine a lot of us do. Its one of those lyrics that are a bit too honest but that why we love them.

“Cathartic, I’m an artist. Trying to put my heart in” // “Freedom fighter, Yellow Metal is my name.” — So do we have an alternate persona for Zayn now? Alright, I’m down. I think these two lines are tied together, because both are mentioned in the song title. (I think of the song as cathartic, by Yellow Metal, aka Zayn, or Yellow Metal as the name of the EP if this was officially released). The lyrics that accompany both title lyrics, along with the subject matter of the song as a whole, suggest that his heart is in standing up against injustices. I said it earlier, this is the most unvarnished version of Z that we have ever been exposed to. Almost like the complete picture to the puzzle pieces we’ve been putting together over the years.

“They’re tryna kill us with disease.” — Why did this line scream out ‘COVID-19 outbreaks in developing countries’ to me? Again, I might be reaching, but there is a disparity between how COVID is treated amongst minorities, along with many other diseases, and not to mention rich, primarily white countries hoarding vaccine supplies while places like India (and my beautiful Bangladesh and I’m sure Pakistan too) suffer needlessly.

“Started something sick and on my mind is what’s next. Just became a dad so now I’m taking all the cheques. Better know I’m staying and paying like it’s debt. Imma get it done, if it’s taking all my breath, sweat, and down I ain’t messing around ’til I’m the best.” — I think this lyric shows off Zayn’s sentimental side more than it does his ambitious side, because we know he’s in this for the long haul. Others may doubt that but his fans never have. But hearing him talk openly about being a father on a song is something else. It’s like Khai added this whole other layer of meaning and purpose to his life and it’s beautiful to watch. I’ve been here since the X-Factor auditions guys!! It makes me so emotional to witness him like this.

“Aint many of me around, p***, I’m just different. Certain stages to this level aint here because fame is to the devil, fuck a label, imma do this from the ghetto.” — God, we’ve been waiting for a fuck the label moment in this house, haven’t we? I won’t get into my theories on his label or his team, but none of us deny the fact that they should be doing more for him than they are. He has the potential to be the biggest thing with the right team and promo because he has a built-in fan base that would go the mile for him. Obviously, there’s also his aversion to promo to contend with and that’s his decision. Even without it, he could shatter every ceiling. Another thing I want to mention about this verse is the nod to the complete lack of South Asian representation in contemporary Western media.

“Don’t know what’s worse: the way that you live your life or the way that you write a verse.” — I’m just putting this in here because it made giggle. Also going to take this space to say how much I love his energy in this song. He knows he’s the shit, as he should!

“Can’t be louder … so free Gaza on my banner.” // “They’re hating on Palestine ways.” — I love that Zayn has always supported this movement, years ago, before being ‘woke’ was a thing. But now, he has a daughter that has Palestinian heritage and I’m sure that makes this hit that much deeper for him, personally. The apartheid in Palestine is heart-wrenching. It’s so strange to me to watch it happen, because I never thought I would witness something like this happening in 2021, yet here we are.

“Like vipers, I see the sly ones, the snake that’s called Biden, none of them abiding what they might put in writing. We should be used to it by now, say whatever for the vote and then just choose another route. Say they’d never kill another unless that brother’s skin is brown. I’m just telling you the facts, if you can’t take it, the truth naked, to bare bones and my thoughts lately, spitting politics.” — This verse is straight up savage and I am living for it! I find it hilarious that he called Biden a snake. This verse addresses the truth about politics, that even electing a left-wing leader doesn’t fix the system.

“I’m Tony Stark, still embarking on a dream” // “Gone green like Bruce Banner” // “He taught me like Ra’s Al Ghul. Felt like living in Gotham, the people were rotten.” — And to tie it all off, I wanted to take a goofy moment to mention all the superhero lyrics Z added in this song, really showing his personality because I’m such a nerd when it comes to this stuff and it makes me wish that we were friends so I could annoy him to death about it.

#reviews #zayn #yellow metal #cathartic #zayn malik

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baeddel · 4 years

Text

reply to @dialectrician, long

Well for starter it probably has to do with the fact it was Irish vanguards when this really would have been the job of a British socialist party ( since NI is part of the UK) to formulate an analysis of British society and a strategy to unite the struggle of workers and opressed people in the UK.

I dont know about this... It does not seem to me right that there should be, in a colony, an ‘indigenous communist party’ and ‘settler communist party’. Why can’t the party move in both neighbourhoods? I feel like that would be a precondition for overcoming sectionalism, anyway.

In terms of the history of NI communist parties, generally they were ‘cross-community’ and contained both protestants and catholics. These days they are not very welcome anywhere because they have poor relations with both republican and loyalist paramilitaries (who have authority over who gets in and out of the housing estates). I have no idea how anyone organizes here, I have never seen it and I know that if I tried it in this estate I would be killed. This is probably the biggest hurlde post-70s. An organization capable of movement in Northern Ireland has to arrive already fanged and armoured, but also be capable of avoiding becoming a paramilitary authority itself; no one has thus far been capable of this (it may be impossible and ‘the lever must be pulled elsewhere’).

Anyway, the other thing is that, there are protestant parties... A number of former UVF guys formed an organization known as the PUP (which has a relationship to the UVF on the order of the relationship Bahamas have to K-Group) which is a socialist organisation (if not a revolutionary one), and the BICO (British & Irish Communist Party) infamously became a sort of loyalist communist party (that supported the occupation as a progressive force, etc.) & were denounced by all international leninist parties as ‘revisionist’.

One thing I’ve learned since our last conversation is that there is kind of a nuance to the ethnic situation; the protestant settlers were once divided into two sorts, mainstream protestants and Presbyterians. The Presbyterians were generally renters and labourers & were specifically excluded from the Protestant Ascendancy (1691-somewhere in the 20thc). By the late 1700s it was everywhere forgotten that presbyterians were settlers; they believed themselves to be Irishmen as did Irish catholics; everyone believed this until somewhere in the 20th century where the facts were uncovered by mature historical research. In the 1700s and early 1800s, Presbyterians (ie. settler proletarians and small peasants) were active in the movement against the British occupation; they made up the majority of the United Irishmen. At this time they actually seemed to see themselves as somewhat oppressed by Catholics (perhaps they even were?).

There was, obviously, a transformation of society during the 1800s when Ireland became a big farm for potato exports and then a pile of wreckage; then the land war, etc. By the partition protestants were hegemonic and it was no longer possible to speak of big landowning protestants and presbyterian irishmen. Thus, I think we have to consider things a little differently than we have been up to now. While protestants are settlers, they were at one stage enemies of the occupation and fought against it alongside the others. [As a child of the troubles, learning this blew my fucking mind, js]. So, 1. what happened that made their interests sectional? and 2. I’m not sure its possible to really talk about protestants in Northern Ireland as British, who the British communist parties have ethnic jurisdiction over. The extent to which protestants actually consider themselves British varies a lot; there are many situations where they will consider themselves Irish instead, and most will self-identify as ‘Ulsterman’ or whatever instead of British if given the option. Also, ethnically the situation is kind of complicated; there is some nontrivial degree of French ancestry because many settlers to Ulster were refugee Haguenots! If we regard nationality in ‘material’ rather than genetic terms, it’s not clear to me why the British communist parties should be involved with Ulstermen and not Irishmen in Northern Ireland; the civil rights movement was after all demanding ‘british rights for british citizens’, etc. The Republic and its citizens have never shown any responsibility for those of us asphyxiating up here and most catholics don’t even support a united Ireland. In this way, strictly Irish communist parties have never really been involved in the North.

But to my understanding, Official Leninists largely stopped paying attention to the national question in the UK in the early cold war (don’t quote me on this, this is from second-hand sources). This in turn probably has to do with the international communist movement increasingly serving the diplomacy of the Soviet Union instead of the opposite, which led to Western communist parties getting increasingly conciliatories with capitalist states. And unofficial revolutionary parties probably had trouble emerging in the meantime because USSR-affiliated parties got the brand-recognition and funding so wannabe activists tended to gravitate toward them.

huh thats interesting, yeah that makes sense. A lot of communist parties in the North split from the ‘official’ ones. In fact, the Trotskyist parties are probably the most successful (although that isn’t saying much). But in the North the paramilitaries absorbed a lot of the energy that would normally go into labour organizing; emigration is also enormous, the population is actively declining and almost everyone leaves the country to work in England at some point. Because it is so easy to leave (it’s practically expected) the radical intellectuals who, “unable to rise within the system, rise against it”, as the cynical Sam Moss put it, generally leave Northern Ireland before they give up on finding satisfaction. The only people who remain here are those of us too lumpenized to leave (I dropped out of my cooking class at tech due to disability; if I could have completed it I’d be anywhere else but here right now).

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the-good-reader · 3 years

Text

C1: Heaven Official’s Blessing

800 years ago, there was an ancient country called Xian Le nation in the Central Plains.

Xian Le had 4 treasures:

Delicate beauties

Thriving arts & literature

Treasures of gold and jewels

Their renowned Royal Highness the Crown Prince Xie Lian [XL]

XL had no interest in his position.

He just wanted to save the common folks. ---

When XL was 17, Xian Le held a big Offering to the Gods parade.

A martial artist, in a golden mask, performed a show to please the gods, in a platform going in laps around the city.

He performed the role of "Martial God Heavenly Emperor Jun Wu." [JW]

That year XL was selected amidst the strict selection criteria

While performing, a young child fell from the top of the city gate tower.

Just when the child was about the hit the ground, the XL caught him.

But now XL performance had been interrupted

Each lap represents a prayer for a year of the country’s peace and prosperity.

Now ministers are worried as this means incoming disaster.

They ask him to show repentance, but he disagrees, saying there's no need.

XL justifies that “Saving people isn’t something bad. How could the Heavens fault me because I did the right thing?” …And if by chance the Heavens do decide to blame you? “Then the Heavens would be the ones who are wrong. Why should the people who are right apologize to the ones who are wrong?” ---

On the south side of the Yellow River existed a bridge called the Yi Nian3 Bridge, where a famous ghost wandered for many years.

Every few years, it would ask travellers 3 questions:

Where is this?

Who am I?

What will you do now?

If answered incorrectly, the ghost would swallow them.

XL heard this and went there and encountered the ghost. (this happens in the same year - he is 17)

XL answeres the questions as such:

"This is the human realm" ...This is the abyss. (ghost) (that was the wrong answer) XL already knew that, so he anyway fights the ghost. XL wins.

XL plants a flowering tree at the foot of the bridge.

A Taoist sees him do this, and asks what he is doing (XLs famous 8 words) “Body in the abyss, but heart in paradise.”

XL Taoist smiles, and transitions into a General Diety, clad in white armour.

CP had actually encountered the Martial God Heavenly Emperor [JW] himself.

The gods were already paying attention to JW after he descended to earth on the day of the Offering to the Gods parade.

The immortals meet him at the foot of the Yi Nian Bridge and ask the emperor, ...What do you think of this Royal Highness, the Crown Prince? ...This child’s future is limitless, impossible to measure. (JWs 8 words)

That same evening, XL ascended into godhood. ---

As long as someone ascends, the Heavens would always quake once. When HRH the XL ascended, it immediately made the entire Heavens shake three times.

To achieve immortality through one’s efforts and insights was truly hard. To be reborn as a respected god was an endless, lifetime journey.

XL became even more beloved/popular with his people, and they made temples in his name.

The more believers he had, the more shrines were built, so XL lived longer and became more powerful.

Thus, in a few years, Xian Le's XL reached the peak of his power.

Until three years later, when Xian Le descended into chaos ---

The emperor became a cruel gorver, prompting a rebel army to rise.

Heaven’s Godly officials could not meddle according to their wishes.

Unless it was a result of demons and ghouls violating their bounds, what happened must be allowed to happen

But XL didn’t care about that. He told Emperor Jun, “I want to save the common people.”

JW was angry, but he only said, ...You cannot save everybody. “I can.”

And so XL descended to the human realm with no second thoughts.

Xian Le celebrated, but as ancient folk tales warned, the event of an unauthorized immortal descending to the human realm would absolutely not bear a good result.

And so the fires from the war did not die down, and instead began burning even more wildly.

The more XL strived, the more complicated the war became.

The people of Xian Le were beaten til their heads fell and their blood flowed, suffering disastrous casualties. Finally, a plague swept throughout the whole Imperial City and the rebels broke into the palace, ending the war.

The country was wiped out and people realied that XL was not as formidable or perfect as they had imagined.

The angry subjects covered in wounds rushed into the Crown Prince’s palace hall. They pushed down his Godly statue and burned his shrines.

When people said you were a god, then you were a god. If they said you were sh*t, then you were sh*t. Whatever the people said you were, that was what you became. It had always been like this.

XL couldn’t accept this fact.

What he could not accept even more was the punishment given to him: banishment; he was thrown into the human realm.

This was the first time XL experienced starvation, poverty, and the feeling of filth.

It was also the first time he did things he had never imagined himself ever doing: pilfering, robbing, violently cursing, and abandoning himself to despair.

Prestige entirely lost, self-esteem completely gone, he became as ugly as one wanted him to be.

Even the most devoted attendants were unable to accept him changing in this way, and thus they chose to leave.

Body in the abyss, but heart in paradise. These eight words were carved almost everywhere in the stone tablets and boards of Xian Le country.

Had they not been almost entirely burned away in the war, if His Royal Highness the Crown Prince were to see them again, he would be the first to rush up smash them.

Because the one who personally said the phrase had already proved that when his body was in the abyss, his heart was not in paradise.

He ascended quickly, and descended even quicker. ---

Many years passed when one day, a loud sound shook the Heavens. XL, ascended to Godhood for the second time.

Angry, he beat up and murdered everyone in all directions.

He was kicked down again.

If one said that his first ascension was something to be praised, then his second ascending could only be called a farce.

After this, everyone in Heaven turned their backs on XL.

But they were still on guard.

But XL didn't turn into a demon.

He just performed on the streets.

Alll the gods were astonished.

It became an insult to say “You gave birth to a son who is Xian Le’s Crown Prince”.

He had become a laughingstock of the realms.

His ancient country was destroyed, with not a single believer left.

Slowly, he became forgotten by the world.

To be banished once was already extraordinary shame and humiliation. To be banished twice, no one could ever climb up again. ---

After many more years, there was suddenly a day where the Heavens was once again disturbed by a loud noise

The mountains shook- this time it was stringer than before.

That famous weirdo, the laughingstock of the three realms, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince from the legends, he he he —— he f*cking ascended to godhood again!

#Heaven Official’s Blessing #tiān guān cì fú #tgcf #loved the donghua #so putting my summary for the novel

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mikaelsrose · 4 years

Text

sun maiden

pairing: Tyril x human!MC (Selene)

word count: 1200+

warnings: generally none, but i guess it is the tiniest bit of angsty

a/n: i thought that i could try to fill in the two-day gap the team spent on sun maiden, waiting for the storm to pass soo... this is me trying. just a chill, sunny, short fic.

tags: @lxdy-starfury @tyrils-star

“We’ll make history,” Mal mumbled as he plopped down on the Sun Maiden’s floor, playing with his dagger. “We’ll be the first to die out of boredom.”

“I can’t even look at the cards any more,” Selene sighed, crossing her arms on her chest.

“I, for one, enjoy this little break from the adventures,” Threep said as he stretched on Nia’s lap, enjoying her scratches on his belly. “As well as the free access to fresh fish.”

“My opinion of nespers abates with your every word,” Tyril sighed.

Selene slumped down next to the mage and grinned, seeing him instantly tense up.

“I won’t bite if you touch me, you know,” she nudged him, chuckling. “In the bunk. The position you sleep in must be uncomfortable. Besides, I’m a much better cuddling candidate than your sword.”

Tyril blushed and averted his eyes, fixing them on the captain of the ship talking to his crew. She could see he was fighting a smile.

“You take up a lot of space.”

“That’s my sneaky way of making you hug me,” she winked and Mal whistled.

“Why didn’t you say you have such adventures on this wreck?” he commented, engaging the whole group in their conversation. “If you wanted to snuggle, you could just say so, kit,” he winked.

“I’m sorry, Mal, but I’m trying to figure this one out,” she chuckled, teasingly placing a hand on the elf’s thigh. Tyril gulped.

“Alright, I had this stashed for a sad, rainy day, but I think the time has come,” Mal sighed as he uncorked a bottle of ale and offered it to Selene when Nia declined.

“Saviour,” she groaned and emptied half of the bottle at once and then offered it to Tyril who also declined.

“We’re stuck with two prudes,” Mal teased, taking the bottle from Selene. “Even better for me.”

The conversation died down pretty quickly and the group was again engulfed by the sound of the sea.

Selene busied herself with not-so-subtle gazing at the stoic features of the mage’s face while Mal and Nia talked about some of his adventures. There was no denying that Tyril was handsome—beautiful even. She knew that elves are generally easy on the eyes but Tyril’s appearance kept leaving her speechless. His piercing gaze, full lips, those cheekbones, that sharp jaw line. That, the aura of mystery around him, and the fact that so far she’s been the only one to make him smile made her heart flutter whenever he spoke or laid eyes on her. Selene was thinking about the way his thick black hair glistened in the sun, how soft it must’ve feel and how much she wanted to run her hand through them, when the elf spoke, startling her.

“You’re staring.”

Embarrassed, she averted her gaze and bit her lip. Caught.

It physically pained her that she couldn’t touch him. So far, they’ve touched twice, accidentally. Selene hoped that he would touch her eventually as they shared a bunk, but he slept with his arms crossed on his chest, with the sword next to him.

His touch was electric. Addictive. Forbidden. She felt drawn to him. Whether it was his magical energy or the aura of mystery was yet to be discovered.

“I think I’m gonna hit the sheets early today,” Selene announced when a series of yawns escaped her lips, making Nia chuckle. She scratched Threep before getting up and took a last look at the orange sun mirrored in the water.

Despite the overwhelming tiredness, Selene couldn’t fall asleep. She kept tossing in the bed for a solid hour, growing more and more anxious as her mind began to travel down the locked path, bringing up the memories of her brother. Guilt was the feeling that dominated her mind since Kade was sucked into the Shadow Realm. Guilt and grief. Although she didn’t want to admit it, a part of her knew that she might never find him or that she would, but too late.

She felt like a burden to the group. Nia was about to ascend to the Priestess of Light, Mal knew how to fend for himself and could pull off almost anything, and Tyril would be completely fine without any of them. She was terrified, even more with every day as their journey grew more serious and dangerous. All she could offer was the rage and the determination to rescuing Kade that motivated her every day.

A lone hot tear spilled from her eye and she cursed, wiping it angrily. “Don’t be a baby,” she murmured, clenching her jaw.

Selene took a few deep calming breaths as she heard someone’s footsteps and turned to her side, facing the wall.

“What’s the matter, Selene?”

She cursed in her mind. Of course, it was Tyril.

“I’m good. Just can’t sleep.”

“I have eyes,” he continued and sat down on the edge of the thin mattress, his armour creaking quietly. “You might’ve fooled the rest, but I’ve been watching you and I can tell that something is bothering you since we boarded the ship.”

An angry sigh escaped her as she turned to face the elf, looking at her with a stoic, but a little concerned look on his face. She was angry because he figured her out just like that. And she was angry because she was tired.

There was no fooling him, she knew that. Selene appreciated the fact that he actually cared and was bothered enough to go and check on her. She knew all of that but she was just so sad that she couldn’t think straight.

“Do you really think we can save him?”

“I have hope,” he answered without hesitation. “I will do anything to help you find your brother, Selene. You have my word.”

After looking at him intently for a while, she slowly nodded and mumbled quiet thanks. However, she was still on the verge of tears and all she wanted at that moment was for someone to hug her tight and lie that everything will work out eventually.

“The truth is... I don’t want to set back our mission. I can’t help feeling like a burden to you. I don’t have anything to offer,” she chuckled sadly and sniffed. “Nia’s got magic, Mal is good at pretty much everything, and you’re an amazing warrior and a mage. How can I compete with that?”

Selene shook her head and wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. “I’m sorry; it must be the booze talking.”

“What strikes me the most is that you don’t see your potential,” Tyril spoke up after a while when she composed herself. “You’re a quick thinker, passionate and stout-hearted. You find a way out of every situation and don’t give up when things don’t work out. And if you’re half as good a fighter, then you shouldn’t worry about being a burden,” he stated, looking straight into her glassy eyes. “It’s not a shame to feel scared, Selene. I would be concerned if you didn’t feel that way.”

Having weighted his words for a while, Selene nodded, a faint smile playing on her lips.

“Thanks, Tyril,” she touched his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “So what about the hugging?”

#blades of light and shadow #tyril x mc #bolas fic #yall this was sitting in my notes since december #choices tyril #tyril starfury

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honourablejester · 4 years

Text

GOOlock Character Concept: Alcyone of Carcosa

Going from my aesthetic 5e spells post, I wanted to build a warlock around them, particularly Crown of Stars, because it’s just the most gorgeous spell. Great Old One Warlock, because we’re going for a star theme, and I wanted something nice and eldritch. Fallen Aasimar, just to follow the post, for the skeletal wings and doomed aura. And I’m here for Crown of Stars, so we’re skipping straight to Level 13 for the 7th level mystic arcanum.

I was looking up names linked to stars, and stumbled over Alcyone, which means kingfisher, but is also one of the Pleiades star cluster. This linked me to the Hyades star cluster, which reminded me of this verse of Cassilda’s Song from The King In Yellow (Robert W. Chambers):

“Songs that the Hyades shall sing,

where flap the tatters of the King,

must die unheard

in Dim Carcosa.”

Which is perfect for an eldritch star themed warlock, yes? So. Great Old One Warlock from the lost Lovecraftian city of Carcosa? Could go Hastur (King in Yellow) for the patron, but we’re here for Crown of Stars, and stars are plenty eldritch in D&D, so let’s make the Hyades themselves the patron. And we’ll go with lost Carcosa, fallen aasimar, tragic background, eldritch destruction of cities. So we might pick spells/invocations/feats half from eldritch influence and half from remorse and a desire to mitigate the damage she causes.

So …

Character Sheet: Alcyone of Carcosa

Name: Alycone of Carcosa

Race: Fallen Aasimar

Background: Sage (Astronomer)

Class/Level: Great Old One Warlock (Level 13)

Patron: the Hyades Star Cluster

Statistics: Strength 8, Dexterity 14, Constitution 15, Intelligence 12, Wisdom 10, Charisma 20

Skills & Languages:

Skills: Arcana, Deception, History, Intimidation

Languages: Common, Elvish, Celestial, Deep Speech

Feats, Racial, Background, Class Features: Inspiring Leader (feat, level 12), Celestial Resistance, Darkvision, Healing Hands, Necrotic Shroud, Researcher, Pact of the Tome, Entropic Ward, Thought Shield

Eldritch Invocations: Book of Ancient Secrets, Misty Visions, Ghostly Gaze, Sculptor of Flesh, Ascendant Step, Gift of the Protectors

Spells:

Cantrips: Light (racial), Eldritch Blast, Toll the Dead, Mage Hand, Minor Illusion

Spells: Armour of Agathys, Dissonant Whispers, Phantasmal Force, Invisibility, Hunger of Hadar, Fly, Enemies Abound, Counterspell, Sickening Radiance, Shadows of Moil, Synaptic Static, Far Step

(I considered Dream, but under the circumstances I figured she’d be a bit phobic of eldritch dreams ...)

Mystic Arcanum: Eyebite, Crown of Stars

Book of Shadows: Guidance, Message, Mending, Detect Magic (ritual), Alarm (ritual), Feign Death (ritual)

Ideal: Knowledge is the key to everything: freedom, safety, power

Bond: I carry the destruction of cities inside my mind, and I have to make sure that it never happens again, and that I can mitigate any damage I cause

Flaw: In my curiosity, I accidentally brought madness and destruction to my home city of Carcosa

Description: A tall, slim, ethereal young woman with unnaturally chalk-white skin and hair, and a vaguely bookish look about her. Generally seen wearing grey half-robes with an archaic academic look over white leather armour, with a brown leather satchel of mostly books over one shoulder.

History: A fallen aasimar sage from the lost lakeside city of Carcosa. Once a radiant young astronomer, Alcyone caught the attention of the Hyades, an eldritch star cluster that she had made note of in her studies. She believes they were drawn to her because she noticed them, and perhaps also because she was aasimar, marked as blessed by the gods. Whatever the reason, the Hyades came to her one night in her sleep, and showed her strange and terrible visions. When she awoke, after what she initially thought was only a single night, she found her beautiful city blackened and destroyed around her, filled with eldritch creatures and the wailing ghosts of the slain inhabitants. Horrified and bewildered, she wandered the city in a daze, and gradually realised that she could still feel the Hyades in her mind, and that the eldritch stars were satisfied by the sight of this destruction. A terror dawned on her, that they had somehow used her, their foothold in her mind, to somehow bring down this madness upon her home. Before she could do anything with this realisation, try to … destroy herself or anything else that might have occurred, she felt a terrible pressure on her mind once again, and fell unconscious once more.

When she woke up once again, she found herself alone by a strange lake that she recognised not at all, under a strange sky, with only her old robes and a fistful of notes, and no one she has met in her travels since then seems to have ever heard of the lakeside city of Carcosa …

#d&d #character concepts #warlocks #great old one warlock #lovecraftian #aasimar #how to randomly scrape together a character from a spell

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honestsycrets · 5 years

Text

What’s Gotten Into You II: The Royal’s Prayer

❛ pairing | alfred x reader, aethelred x reader, implied!canon pairings

❛ type | multi

❛ summary | after falling pregnant, the reader goes to the only place she knows is sacred: the chapel. it isn’t so sacred for everyone.

❛ warnings | adultery, cheating, implied character death, judith being judith.

❛ sy’s notes | requested by @florenceivy. my gif.

“I pray, Lord Jesus Christ, be armour around my womb.

That whatever qualms are brought against me may be put out

Defend me on all sides with your strong shield.

Cover me, therefore, from the Queen-- that… that we might make a covenant.

A covenant of falseness? I ask, I am sure that it was your will.”

“I heard you,” Queen Judith grasps your elbow, pulling you free from the chapel. Your head covered by a veil, your head bows as she makes the others leave the stone room. Prayer was a private thing and so, you thought the words uttered under your lips were unheard. Yet, they were. “You are with child. His child.”

“I— It’s Aethelred’s.” You say, looking down your fine fitting dress. Your stomach swells behind the fabric.

“Do not lie to me,” Judith pads around the room. “Your child is by Alfred. That is why I have found you here. Praying for absolution.”

Her words have an annoying ring to it, but you know she speaks true. You are full of a child that is… well, Alfred’s. That night in which he came to lay with you. That was the night. A chill ascends your spine, and where you fear the words that come to your lips… you must speak them to her.

“It was not…” you whisper. “It is not what I intended. You must believe me. I never meant to fall with a child.”

She doesn’t seem to mind. She settles you upon one of the rows of seats and lackadaisically approaches the altar, her hands in front of her as she speaks. “You know, I too fell with a child in the same manner.”

“Of the priest,” you acknowledge. “I am well aware.”

“Yes.” She acknowledges. “Of that conception, I have learned the only duty a woman has is to her child. Everything else is of no importance.”

When you look up, Judith peers at you. As if to say-- that child, in your womb, is meant to be there. You pull the veil around your body as Judith turns around you. Her steps are measured and slow. In her presence, you feel less of a woman and more of a child. “You will keep that child. It is a gift from God and your king.”

“The Queen is pregnant--”

“I’ll care for Aethelred. And her.” Queen Judith cuts you short, leaving an obvious question hanging unanswered. What was she about to do? You know she has had questions about the paternity of the child in the Queen’s womb. That would make for two of you who had engaged in adultery-- though you consider yours less grave.

After all, you had not been one to lay under a boorish Norse prince.

“Thank you.” You quickly pay your respects and skitter out the room. If there was anything you learned of your uncle’s lover, Judith, it was that you should not, could not, and would not piss her off. And so any thought of abortifacients is thrown far from your mind.

Aethelred tightens his boots at your bedside. Your stomach distended, and yet, he did not speak of it. It is impossible not to know that you were with child, and yet, Aethelred settles his necklace under his tunic. He never addressed it-- not since that initial night.

You look up at the swirling threads of the canopy, remembering the screams that emitted from Judith’s room. When I think I’ve something, you take it. It’s your brother’s child. She’s my wife. On and on, you remember them shrilling at one another.

Then, at last, a silence when he padded into your room. The movement woke you. The dawning realization that he was fixed upon your belly, but instead brought himself between your legs to eat of you, and you wondered if it were frustration or anger as you lay caressing his hair with a full mind.

“When will you return?” you ask him.

“Soon enough.”

His words are cropped short. He has not forgiven you. It is not as if he should not have-- but you wish that he would have known that this would happen. How could you resist love? You wonder if he had loves the other woman. If he did-- he had grounds for divorce. Much more than that, you think.

Aethelred stands upright, his palm over the sword fixed at his waist. His steps tap close to you. When he stops, it is with a certain pause. Words lodge in his throat, forming a bolus deep in his throat. Yet, there’s nothing of substance. In its place, he sets his hand upon your stomach.

“The battle will be short lived. I will see you when we arrive,” you say, sliding out of the bed to stand upright. He allows you to kiss him upon his cheeks.

“I am sorry,” you say. You study him for some great few moments, the tension of his eyebrows pressing together.

“Take care of my child,” he breaks apart-- and there’s a word lingering there. Maybe it doesn’t really matter. But something bids you to speak when the door slams shut. Even if the guards stand by it as if they were two long black wisps of metal.

“God preserve you, husband.”

Outside of the castle, there was a great outcry of the likes you had not heard. Your time here has not been long. Only since Alfred married you off to keep you close. Still, you know the people of Wessex to be busy people. They do not often have time for emotions, raw and wild.

“What is happening?” you push through.

There, laying on the ground is a coffin. Not the one that you expect. Not the great bishop Heahmund whose sword is buried alongside him. Rather as Alfred’s voice booms over the death of the poor bishop, your eyes center on a jeweled coffin. On the ground. With great splendor.

“(Y/N),” Judith calls, reaching for your hand.

You ignore her and drop down, caressing the side of the casket. It’s dark wood, and beautiful jewels, and-- you shove the lid. Alfred, who has caught the noise, turns his gaze down toward you. His sermon dries on his lips.

“Amen.”

The lid. Your fingers can’t lift the lid. Mainly because Alfred shoves it back into place on the other side of the coffin. You tense, almost as if in surprise, and your body goes rigid. Alfred’s eyes are sharp and sure. You’re not opening it, Alfred seems to say through those eyes. If you were to look in, you would regret it. That much has been made true. In there, you know, is your husband.

“Come, (Y/N).”

Judith drops beside you.

“Where is my husband?” you ask as if by those words, it would breathe life back into his lungs. Alred knits his teeth together. “Where is my husband? Where have you taken him? Is he inside-- tell me he is inside the castle, Alfred. Tell me.”

“No,” Alfred grates out with a harshness that could sheer your skin. “He is not inside.”

He is not inside because he is here. Lifeless. Unmoving and unapologetic.

“Judith, Judith,” you reach out, grasping her arm. You breathe air forcefully in through your mouth and yet all you could taste was the acrid scent of death swirling through your lungs. “I can’t breath.”

“I have you. Come.”

“I can’t breathe.”

“I know.”

Your bed is big. Cold and lonesome. There is no Aethelred to stand at the edge of the bed, shrug off his robe, and climb in beside you. There are no stories to tell like a brother and sister rather than husband and wife. You can’t appear at his burial by your uncle’s body. You wish that you could, but the darkness of your thoughts hold it from you.

There is no warning before the door opens. The guards shift to close it behind your king, whose exhaustion wears on his eyes, and who looks as if he may drop at any given moment. You frown at the sight of his eyes, lined by bags.

“Today, I put my brother to rest.”

Alfred reaches out with a soft hand, pulling your blanket down from your belly. He flicks his blanket to the side, slow and harsh breaths break free from your lips. You feel the tension like a cord, drawing your shoulders up when he elevates his hand to your stomach in gesture.

“All the while I was sleeping with his wife.”

“It was not you alone.”

“I know this,” Alfred says. His eyes seem to gesture to your stomach. Alfred sits upon the edge of the bed. It hurts, your mind supplies. What he’s done-- because Alfred is a good man, with a good mind, and he feels bad for what he’s done. “I have seen your condition.”

Your condition, you repeat after him. After a healthy span of heartbeats, you run your tongue over your lip. It’s such an easy thing to say for him as a king. He chose your husband, and now, he chose what would become of you.

“Are you going to send me away?” you press.

“I could never,” Alfred replies. “Not to you.”

You find comfort in that sentiment for only moments. He speaks true-- and yet, he’s torn on his own words. Alfred has always been someone that carried his worries on his face. You wish he wouldn’t. A cracking of the door breaks your focus. His too.

“Alfred? May I speak to you?” In the shadow of the door, you see the glitter of a crown. The old queen Judith.

@tephi101 @alicedopey @supernaturalvikingwhore @tootie-fruity @titty-teetee @queen-see-ya-in-valhalla @ethereallysimple @deathbyarabbit @deathbyarabbit @readsalot73 @natalie-rdr @lol-haha-joke @lisinfleur @hissouthernprincess @marvelousse @dangerous-like-a-loaded-pistol @vikingsmania @wish-i-was-a-mermaid @lif3snotouttogetyou @gruffle1 @cris101071 @gold-dragon-slayer @babypink224221 @wonderwoman292 @naaladareia @beyond-the-ashes @generic-fangirl @chinduda @laketaj24, @peaceisadirtyword, @ly–canthrope @cris101071 @daughterofthenight117 @unassumingviking @ladyofsoa, @inforapound @winchesterwife27 @feyrearcheron44@readsalot73 @squirrelacorngliterfarts @gold-dragon-slayer @medievalfangirl @sallydelys @bluearchersstuff @affectionrabbitt @whatamood13 @notyouraveragegirl17 @igetcarriedawaywithyou @unacceptabletatertots @ivarandersen @stra-vage

#Alfred x Reader #Alfred/Reader #Alfred the Great/Reader #alfred the great x reader #Alfred imagines #alfred the great imagines #vikings imagines #vikings imagine #vikings/reader #vikings x reader

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bthump · 4 years

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as you mentioned, i think the spaces where apostles/godhand make their sacrifices are specific to a person, since they're all different from each other. then yeah, i think that dimension of human faces are meant to be specific to griffith. i already imagined that but i couldn't be sure since we hadn't seen another eclipse happen, but i'm also not sure that last panel was an eclipse and not just gaiseric's own sacrifice, so i guess we'll see. also, if it was gaiseric, i wonder what was his sacrifice? i know the woman had a brand on her shoulder, but there also was a giant glowing brand on the background. oh man this new chapter answered some things but only made me more curious djskssk maybe hoping for another chapter this year is hoping for too much but oh well

ibb.co/jkc9ygP // 1) this is insane, the whole chapter is. feels like miura is finally back to form and we're in the endgame 2) any theories about what's happening here, about void, about anything really?

I don’t think it's likely to be Gaiseric’s sacrifice bc the memory is specifically of when the berserk armour takes over, and while I don’t think there’s any in-universe reason someone can’t turn into a monster and then have magic armour take them over, storytelling-wise it would be redundant and kind of weird imo.

wrt that giant glowing background brand, I was assuming that it’s Gaiseric’s city which Void sacrificed in its entirety, on fire in a brand shape bc the metaphysical world of Berserk is really on the nose sometimes with its symbolic imagery lol. So Gaiseric’s gf is just one of thousands, in that case. That said, we didn’t see a big brand during Griffith’s sacrifice - the only other time we saw one was during the reincarnation ritual at the end of the Conviction arc, when the refugees’ bonfires made a brand shape iirc. But then, we also didn’t see people with individual brands then, and it’s still in another dimension with the Godhand actually there and not just shadows, so I’m inclined to think that it’s still a crimson-behelit Eclipse event, and Miura basically threw in a burning brand-shaped background bc it looked cool and he already established that the world arranges itself into symbolic images sometimes.

My previous theory about Gaiseric, based on his whole ‘appearing out of nowhere to unite kingdoms and create an empire about a thousand years previously, which Griffith resurrected into Falconia’ background was that he’s Griffith 1.0, a former Godhand who was incarnated back into the world. And that’s like... maybe less likely now lol, since he doesn’t rly need 2 majorly significant backstories, and what does an incarnated godhand need magic armour for anyway, but still not impossible imo?

(Actually idek if it’s less likely since I did think Void sacrificed his city while he was an incarnated godhand before, the only difference now is that he already had the armour and a gf i guess)

Like I’m coming at this from an extremely biased pov bc if it was true it would fit perfectly into a bunch of my other theories about Berserk and hopes for the future of the story, but still lol, ~I want to believe~

I mean first of all, to be fair, someone’s got to be the previous incarnated godfinger, like that seems like a pretty important figure in Berserk’s time-is-cyclical worldbuilding, and it’s probably not Void bc he’s still on the astral plane, and it should be someone we’re already aware of so it doesn’t feel like an asspull out of left field so it’s probably not any of the other 4 random godhand members, and Gaiseric has been v explicitly positioned as the Griffith of a thousand years ago, including Guts thinking he sounds like Griffith while Judeau and Casca are telling him the history.

Also it seems that he can sense fate, he knows an awful lot about how mock-Eclipses work and how the godhand operates in general, and lbr everyone already kind of expected him to be Void’s surviving sacrifice so this flashback didn’t come as a big surprise, but revealing that he’s also a Griffith would be a great twist.

Plus since the other 4 Godhand are gone but Void remains maybe he wasn’t the 5th like Femto, maybe he was the first of a new cycle, which would mean the 5th was already incarnated when Void ascended.

And if Gaiseric was an incarnation ruling an empire when Void fucked him over by sacrificing it all, that has some pretty interesting implications going forward. Like

a) godhand incarnation not emotionless, which we already know lbr, but it’d be good foreshadowing for Griffith

b) possible that incarnation can be sacrificed, assuming Gaiseric was sacrificed along with his city which we don’t know for sure but is kind of implied with his “dead man stalking the night” comment, which is great news for my niche specific ‘casca sacrifices fetus/moonbaby and griffith along with it, which he survives but which complicates his existence’ theory

b2) also could explain why skull knight isn’t as invincible as ngriff seems to be and doesn’t have apostle charming powers

c) I’ve theorized that Griffith could be fated to turn on the rest of the godhand and destroy them so a new cycle can begin, and Void might be trying to circumvent this to preserve his existence, so yk, Void big bad and enemies teaming up plot

d) I like the idea of Skull Knight representing both Guts and Griffith just bc it’s more interesting to me than a rote SK = Guts and Void = Griff, and on a world building fate-y level it’s got some satisfying ‘G+G both being necessary to fate, taking the place that was held by one person last time, and inadvertantly working together to do whatever fate needs to be done’ implications. yk, it means they come as a pair even moreso

Like okay it could just be that Skull Knight is just a Guts 1.0 who picked up a lot of knowledge in his thousand years roaming the earth killing godhands and apostles, and Void was the incarnation who dipped down to earth for a while, fulfilled his humanity’s desires mandate by doing something other than founding an empire before peacing back out to the astral plane again and starting a new cycle. But that’s just not as fun.

#ask #a #b #berserk spoilers #ch 362 spoilers #theme: speculation #character: skull knight #tl;dr i'm stubbornly sticking to my old theory lol #Anonymous #chapter 362

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everyaccentthesame · 4 years

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What is it to be a Dragon?

(This post contains some musings I’ve written to give me mental inspiration for a ‘Tyranny of Dragons’ campaign I plan to run. I wanted to get into the head of a Dragon, and understand what would be required to compel such a being.)

What is it to be a Dragon? To the two-legged smallfolk that cower in fear or desperately flee from the winged behemoths, terrors of the skies, dragons might as well be gods. Many have fallen to worship such beasts- Dragon cults, entire religions dedicated to one or more of these incredible creatures have sprung up across the ages. It has been remarked by many sages and observers, not least among the Dragonkind themselves, that should they so choose, Dragons could claim dominion of the lands, natural lords of the material plane. That they do not is something every mortal should be thankful for. Dragons make for terrible kings. Why they do not requires a deeper understanding of their nature.

What is it to be a Dragon? Imagine, if you will, being entirely self-sufficient. On your own, through the strength of your talons and the terrifying assault of your breath, you can provide yourself with any food you need, relying on no-one. Your thick hide protects you from the elements. Your wings give you mastery of the air, no far-off land or ocean is barred to you. Spears break against your skin, armour melts, swords shatter, men die when you exhale. The natural world is yours, no mortal creature, barring your own kin, can match you, can claim mastery over you. Imagine all this power, all this freedom. Imagine it not being enough.

What is it to be a Dragon? All Dragons hoard. Even the ones that the smallfolk mistake for being ‘good’. Some hoard wealth, great mountains of it. Some hoard knowledge, guarding grand repositories of it jealously. Some hoard history, hiding away ancient relics of great significance. Some hoard magic. Some hoard friends. Some hoard subjects. Some hoard slaves. How each Dragon hoards is unique. Some common trends appear based on the Dragon’s hue, but there is no clear rule. One might favour coins minted in a certain kingdom. One might like scholars trained in the art of combat. Another might favour the paintings of a certain artist and her apprentices. One thing is clear however- Dragons hoard what others create. They desire what beautiful things mortals create, because in truth, Dragons can only create one thing of any significance. Destruction.

What is it to be a Dragon? All Dragons are alone. A Dragon is fiercely independent, and indeed, they can supply all their base needs on their own. But this has another consequence. Save for those rare incidences where a Dragon might cohabitate with a chosen mate, Dragons are intensely solitary creatures. There is good reason for this, unlike more fragile creatures, Dragons do not need the support of a community to survive. Indeed, the only real threat to an individual Dragon, are other Dragons. This is an oversimplification of course- many things can kill a Dragon, and many things have. But from a Dragons perspective, such creatures are usually easily avoided, lacking powerful Draconic wings, or if the Dragon misjudges the capability of a foe, easily fled from. When a Dragon does die to a mortal or monster, others of its kind view this as an aberration- that creature must have suffered from some flaw that they did not. Weakness, stupidity, slowness- the arrogant draconic minds dismiss any possibility that they might share these traits with the deceased. The only thing a Dragon fears are other Dragons.

What is it to be a Dragon? By default, Dragons are Atheists, by the D&D definition of the word. They know that the Gods exist, they just don’t respect them. A Dragon has no need for prayer, or divine intervention. The Dragons don’t need the Gods, and usually the Gods can’t affect them, residing in planes far from the prime material, so the Dragons simply ignore them. This does, however leave us with a question: If the Dragons do not worship the divine, why are there gods of Dragonkind? Tiamat and Bahumut, alongside other, more obscure deities, claim to be gods of the draconic pantheon, yet few Dragons indeed worship them, and such Deities have turned to the mortal races as their emissaries and agents in the world. Dragons respect the strength of the Draconic gods, as they would the strength of another drake, but long ago abandoned them, when their Empire fell in a millennia long war. It is telling, perhaps, that the Dragons were the ones to abandon their gods, rather than the other way round.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons are proud. They exult in their raw physical and magical power over others. A Dragon might destroy a townhouse with a beat of its wings because it wishes to demonstrate that it can. Another might incinerate a Forest because it enjoys the thermals that such an activity creates. A Dragon might dominate a town because it enjoys the terrified mewling of the subservient folk or save a town from a marauding group of monsters because it desires their applause and adulation. Many ‘benevolent’ Dragons, even metallics, act as they do not due to any moral compulsion, but because they enjoy the praise that is heaped upon them for their acts. Some Dragons even seek to gain worshippers, believing that it is only right that they, the most powerful and deserving of beings, receive treatment normally reserved only for gods.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons possess within them the spark of the divine. Most never realize this, and never cultivate it, but under the right circumstances, these creatures can enter the ranks of the gods. Most famously in Toril, Tchazzar ascended to become a god-like entity, ruling over a city state and with designs upon a nation. Perhaps the draconic gods are just particularly powerful examples of their kind, and this, perhaps is why Dragons don’t worship them. A dragon does not seek to submit itself to another, it seeks to rule.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons do not share power. A Dragon is not content to exist in a subservient state. They seek to either be left alone, or to rule. When Draconic empires have existed, Dragons have competed for power and influence, acknowledging no-one among themselves as King or Queen. Unable to rule over each other without significant risk (a dragon that appears subservient is merely waiting for a moment to strike and claim its authority), Dragons that wish to rule, rule over humanoids.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons are smart. Some act as if they are little more than beasts, it is true, but such creatures typically do so by choice, spurning what they view as the ‘pathetic trappings of civilisations’ and embracing their feral side- the barbarians of dragonkind. They are smart enough to recognize their shortcomings as a species- though they rarely reflect on how they can apply to this analysis to themselves. Instead they have developed ways of working with other members of species without risking conflict. Ancient games that simulate conflict, such as the Xorvintaal, allow dragons to use the lives of others in games of intrigue and open warfare to settle disputes, without coming into open conflict themselves.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons have life-spans far longer than most humanoids, exceeding even that of the elves. The lives of most creatures appear short and inconsequential to them. When dealing with smallfolk Dragons tend to focus more on lineages or organisations than individuals, which become replaced so easily. It takes an exceptional humanoid to be remembered as an individual by a Dragon, much less respected. Dragons slumber for long-periods, guarding their hoards for many years as their bodies and abilities grow and develop, letting the rise and fall of nations and empires pass them by. A Dragon might not care for the individuals of a local township or city, but care deeply for the place itself, even if only for the entertainment and treasure it provides it. A Dragon may come to know a human family well, as it treats with successive generations of individuals, even if it fails to really distinguish the different family members from one another.

What is it to be a Dragon? Dragons are vulnerable. Dragons are the arrogant lords of the world. They are beings of blistering power and fury. They cannot create, but they can influence the rise and fall of nations, they can compel others to craft great works in their names. Yet for every Dragon of legend, there seems to be a Dragon slayer. A Dragon might be mighty, might be arrogant, but they know these legends too. And they fear death. So, a smart Dragon avoids causing undue trouble, and ensures its subjects or neighbours, while kept fearful of it, do not feel unduly burdened by its presence. Similarly, they avoid provoking more powerful Dragons, and may even make displays of respect or subservience to them. There is no true hierarchy amongst Dragons, but they do respect strength, and theoretically a might Drake, godlike in power, or even a god brought to the mortal plane, could compel them to serve, if only through fear.

It would take an exceptional humanoid to gain a Dragons respect. Think then, on what it would take for one to gain a Dragon’s service. Bribery, perhaps, could work, for a time. Magical compulsion is always an option, though risky- dragons have a ‘legendary resistance’ to spells such as Dominate Monster. Gaining a Dragon’s fear is perhaps the most difficult, and most reliable option then. Consider the Cult of the Dragon. Consider their leader. What could they have done to gain the allegiance of so many great drakes? What power could they wield? What wealth do they command? What promises have they made, and which can they keep?

What sort of being could a Dragon fear?

#tyranny of dragons #dragon #dragons #d&d #dnd #d&d5e #dnd5e #tiamat #the rise of tiamat #hoard of the dragon queen #everyaccentthesame

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