#i also love salem

[teddybeartoji]

18+ mdni; gn!reader

thinking about roomie!suguru, who steps out of the bathroom with just a towel hanging loosely around his waist. it's dangerously low and his happy trail is... leading your eyes to a forbidden place. water droplets cascade down his temple and his neck, his scarred chest and his toned muscles.

he finishes drying his hair with another, smaller towel before slinging it over his shoulder. he gives you a warm smile. there's still a bit of sleep in his tired eyes but he looks fresh, he looks good.

(he looks more than good.)

the morning light shines in through the small window of your shared kitchen and he hums at the smell of coffee. you're an angel leaning on the counter, hands busy with preparing your drink as he steps inside.

he chuckles. he asked you a question but you didn't hear it. he smells so fucking good; the smell of his shampoo and his fancy conditioner wash over your senses and it's easy to forget where you are. his eyes flick behind you before walking over to you with a smug little grin.

he bores his sharp purple eyes into yours – he loves how you react to him. he doesn't shy away from it, he's cockier than he looks. he loves the attention, he loves to be in your spotlight. he wouldn't care so much if you were a stranger, if you were a random person on the street ogling away, ut you're neither of those things, are you? no, you're something else.

he exudes warmth as he towers over you, his head tilted down to keep his eyes on you. he wants to play with you a little – he loves the way you're staring up at him right now. eyes big and wide, lip tucked under between your teeth. he's good with people, he can read them like a book and you're no different. he sees you swallow a dry lump, he sees you grace him with a flustered smile as you try to brush by the fact that he caught you admiring him red handed. he sees the way you're taking deeper breaths than normal, surely just to keep your composure. he can't wait to break you.

his arm reaches behind you to turn off the coffee machine with a small click.

"wouldn't wanna make a mess this early in the morning, now would we?"

melting. crumbling. falling down to your knees. you hate how much he teases (you love it), you hate how patronizing he sounds (it's hot). he's the only one that can get away with it – a charming smile that hides his deepest desires of sinking his teeth into little lambs like you, soft eyes that hide the need to watch them unfold before him.

his gentle hands long to hold, long to keep and covet. he thinks about you a lot; your shared mornings and afternoons, your exhausted naps and bitter rants about your days. shy gazes and lingering touches, stupid jokes and the cute little hidden sounds he keeps hearing from your room in the late hours. he's being patient, he's warming you up.

he's just as infatuated with you as you are with him. he's just more subtle with it.

or is he?

because you've heard him, too.

you don't know whether he's doing it unknowingly or he's actually trying to make you go insane – whichever it is, you are ready to bend at his will. soft groans accompanied by a steady slick pump; you didn't mean to listen in. you just wanted to make sure he's okay!

ear against the wooden door, you listened to him think about you. your name was on the tip of his tongue, but it was too early for that. he wants to smear you with his honey, he wants to drag you in but he needs to wait for it. this is perfect.

he did know you're were there.

he heard the floor creak, he heard the cutest gasp that left your pretty lips. fuck, you're perfect. his head was lolled back as he stroked himself to the thought of your wide, doe-eyes. how flustered you'd be, how flustered you were in that very moment. he imagined your trembling hands and your stuttered words and his dick twitched in his palm.

he thought about inviting you in and just making him watch as a form of punishment, for being a little pervert. he shuddered out a laugh and watched a glob of pre-cum cover his own fingers before mixing with the saliva and spit that's covering him already. he thought about making you sit between his legs so he could jerk off right in front of your beautiful face, he thought about your wobbly lips, your teary eyes. the way your thighs would press together.

your fingers would itch and twitch and he'd make you place them on your legs. he wouldn't want you to touch. yet. maybe he'd make you apologize and maybe he'd make you kiss the tip. he thought about how good you'd smell, how good you'd taste. another raspy groan crawled up his throat and you were about to cum untouched behind his door. like a creep.

he loves it. he's proud of you, he wants to push you even further. he wants to see what else he can make you do. this is exciting and he can't wait to devour you whole as a reward after he's done bullying himself into your body and your mind. utterly loved and corrupted—

— you're meant for him.

[smolgay-bean]

Weed-induced gossip sesh with Fawna (my sona, SHE/THEY) and Salem ( @wolfertinger666 ‘s bunny boy, HE/HIM)

aka I wanted to draw them in cute pj sets :3

[charlott2n]

i love my fat thighs i love themmmmmmmm

[woof-squiggles]

lilith :)

public u. art club is by @shencomix

[ca-d]

Harmony Grove // Salem, MA 🖤

[pink-octopede64]

the full cast of indigo park but as closely to the general style of 1960s saturday morning cartoons as possible

[j-rye]

bun ny bunny bu nny bunny ? @wolfertinger666

[laracrofted]

a lewis matchbox collection

[salemoleander]

Pearl's new ep has me like 🥺

In addition to just being so impressed & delighted by Wordle, it's incredibly heartwarming to see the amount of inspiration that cycles through the Hermits

The aspect ratio change during her montage feels very inspired by Bdubs. Calling it a montage like a tongue-in-cheek callback to Mumbo's last ep, where he insisted that despite technically being a montage, he'll always call what he does timelapses. Tango coming and helping add extra musical feedback to the game, an aspect of minigame design that Etho really focused on a few seasons ago. She plans on adding custom Cub fireworks to celebrate wins.

To be clear this is entirely Pearl's achievement, this isn't meant to give other people credit for 8+ hours of work and design. It has just really reminded me that Joe Hills' description of the Hermits as an artists' collective is Extremely Accurate. I'm eternally delighted to see the echoes of artistic inspiration every Hermit takes & gives back to the server

[wis-art]

Hoppas ni får en glad påsk!

[bestworstcase]

Your post re: Salem's attitudes towards magic got me thinking about "Why spend our lives trying to redeem these humans, when we can replace them with what they could never be?" from Lost Fable again. I'm finding it a little difficult to blame people for believing she thinks the current crop of humans are just inferior when the only subject on offer in that sentence is "these humans." Of course when you stop to think for two seconds why Salem says or does anything she does it makes total sense that her hangup is with the gods, but that just makes me wonder even more why write the script like that? How unreliable is the direct dialogue in Jinn's vision supposed to be taken vs. her narration? (The simplest read of that episode seems to be of course the narration is biased per the question asked, but otherwise it's a frame narrative for the flashbacks which may or may not be more objective portrayals of events. The fact that the characters are also physically witnessing these scenes means they can't be 100% objective I think, but still leaves open the question of what's skewed and by how much.)

Unreliable or not, it's just a surprisingly absolute statement to put in her mouth considering how often we're invited to question her motivations everywhere else.

i do take the dialogue in the lost fable to be accurate to what the characters said, perhaps with some smudginess if what we’re seeing is ozpin’s memories exactly – in which case the dialogue in scenes he wasn’t present for is suspect because it’s what he imagines was said based on what salem told him, and the rest is probably closely accurate paraphrase because no one could be expected to remember the exact wording of conversations from several thousand years ago! but even then i would expect the parts he was there for to be reliable enough. 

so much rides on the lost fable and specifically this one line that it would be beyond cheap for the resolution to be “she didn’t say that at all, actually.”

the first time i watched the lost fable, i did intuitively interpret that line as salem alluding to the gods – so i think there’s probably some degree of her statement reading as ambiguous or not ambiguous depending upon how one habitually uses the word “redeem.” specifically: how precise one is about the verb requiring an indirect object. 

to ‘redeem’ something means to take some action to settle a debt, or redress a wrongdoing, which—inherently—implies the presence of a creditor or wronged party. in some contexts, the implied creditor is only an abstraction (think “the city’s robust public transportation is its only redeeming quality”—redemption is used here in a figurative sense to mean that the one making the statement dislikes everything but the city’s transit system); and in casual speech it’s fairly common to leave off the indirect object if it isn’t necessary to identify the wronged party (think the common phrasing of “so-and-so redeems themself”).

but while it isn’t incorrect to drop the indirect object, necessarily, there always is an indirect object; it isn’t possible to redeem a debt or a wrong that doesn’t exist, nor to have a debt without a creditor or a wrong without someone wronged. (as an aside, this is why redemption arc discourse tends to always be arguments about forgiveness—redemption does, inherently, definitionally, necessitate forgiveness—and this is also why i’m pedantic about differentiating ‘redemption arc’ vs ‘atonement arc’ vs ‘villain-to-hero arc’ and dislike the popular usage of redemption arc as an umbrella term.)

anyway, in simpler terms: when salem says “redeem these humans,” the apparent meaning of the next clause depends on whether or not one is predisposed to hear that phrase as a clipping and mentally append the implied indirect object, which makes her complete statement “why spend our lives trying to redeem these humans [from my sin in the eyes of the gods] when we could replace them with what they could never be?”

<- and then the question becomes, which “them” is she referring to? “these humans” or the gods who will judge whether redemption has been earned? her elision of the gods is entirely within the realm of common vernacular, and salem is a character who regularly circumlocutes (and earlier in the lost fable itself we have ozma’s quizzical “what are you saying?” signaling that salem’s speech is cryptic or confusing – because ozma doesn’t understand her; this is an intended trait versus the writers fumbling), and she says this in a moment of emotional distress (which she mostly bottles up, but while ozma is explaining all of this to her she’s leaning on the desk with her arms folded, listening intently – this is the same posture she has when she’s huddled in the shadows making herself miserable with conjurations of her children in 8.4).

so there’s quite a bit of weight here on the side of, “salem just discovered that her partner has been manipulating her into serving the gods she abhors throughout their entire relationship, she’s deeply shaken, she isn’t awesome at clearly articulating her thoughts in general; is it really surprising that she might misspeak to the tune of saying ‘them’ in reference to an (elided but necessarily implied) antecedent of ‘the gods’”

it (clearly) isn’t going to occur to most viewers as an obvious interpretation of the line, but i think it’s well within the bounds of what is reasonable for the narrative to later reveal that salem really meant this, particularly given how deliberate and how clear the storytelling themes are. definitely a risk, because some section of the audience is undoubtedly going to feel lied to and cry retcon, but rwby takes creative risks all the time.

and then there’s the ‘fairyales of remnant’ piece of it – the anthology is very much in dialogue with the lost fable across the board (on this see also ‘the two brothers’ presaging the thematic treatment of the brothers in v9, and ozpin’s paired commentaries on ‘the infinite man’ + ‘the girl in the tower’ being discussions of truth, propaganda, and forgiveness). so why does ‘the shallow sea’ begin like this:

Long ago, before the fish had scales, before the birds had feathers, and before the turtles had shells, when our god still walked and crawled and slithered the earth, there were only Humans and animals. (And Grimm. There have always been Grimm. There will always be Grimm. But those creatures don’t figure in this story, so just put them out of your mind, if you can.)

and end like this, after a story about the god of animals leading their chosen people to transform by submersion in magical waters, to the horror of those humans who refuse to change: 

From that moment on, there have been animals, Humans, and Faunus. And the descendants of the Humans who turned away from our god’s great gift have always carried envy in their hearts. To this day, they resent us for reminding them of what they are not and what they never can be.

humans and animals (and grimm) -> animals and humans and faunus, and the last line – the mythic explanation for human hatred of faunus – is a nearly direct repetition of the last thing salem says in the lost fable?

now obviously not everyone can be expected to read ancillary material like the fairytale anthology, and that’s why the shell game with the implied indirect object matters; but it is interesting that ‘the shallow sea’ is stated to be a very old oral tradition (one which “contains deep truths,” no less) and that it repeats that line in a context that is quite plainly not about genocide – but rather cultural pride in the face of intense, often violent, persecution. 

this story also 1. explicitly belongs to a closed tradition, and 2. is (obviously) one ozma knows despite there being no indication that he’s ever reincarnated as a faunus. which – together with the story’s age – adds up to at least the implication that it is possible he heard this story from salem, because the reasons she might be conversant in ancient faunus oral traditions are. well. obvious. 

…and if that’s so, then ‘the shallow sea’ as written in the fairytale anthology completely recontextualizes salem’s last statement in the lost fable as salem quoting from a faunus creation myth both she and ozma knew in order to express her rejection of the brothers’ mandate, which would 1. neatly explain why ozma seems to have understood exactly what she meant even though none of the lost fable witnesses picked up on it, and 2. provide an elegant and very simple opportunity to ease the general audience into this revelation by having a character in vacuo retell this myth, using that same closing line. you don’t even need to mention salem directly – the turn of phrase is memorable enough that a lot of viewers will go “…why does that sound eerily familiar” and that plants a seed for later. (or if you’re going for more of a sudden record scratch moment, salem is the one declaiming.)

from a character standpoint, it also makes a lot of sense for salem to respond to ozma in this way – his liking for stories is, one presumes, not a new thing that developed after the ozlem kingdom’s collapsed, and he also clearly isn’t just cynically using fairytales to deceive and manipulate – else he wouldn’t have apologized to the kids by referencing ‘the girl who fell through the world’ and comparing himself to alyx. stories are just important to him and part of how he communicates.

so if salem heard everything his god told him and then said “no, none of that matters, why spend our lives trying to redeem these humans when we could [paraphrases the conclusion of a story where the hateful envious people who refuse to change are simply sent home and not allowed to live in the harsh but free new world with the people who chose to embrace change]” – she made an effort to say what she meant in his language, and what she meant was either 1. figuratively associating the brothers with the envious humans who were sent home and “these humans” with the faunus who were now free to determine their own fates, or 2. “okay yeah these humans aren’t great, have you considered more faunus as a solution” (<- this would be extremely funny if it turns out the shallow sea is a more literal story than i think it is, but i think it’s much less likely).

more broadly, to the question of why the line is written that way – i can only speculate based on what i would be thinking in the writer’s shoes, and the overall structure of the narrative around salem – but i imagine the absoluteness is sort of the point. it’s meant to be a really shocking and frightening thing to hear coming out of her mouth, while also being, if you pause to think very precisely about what she said, quite plausible as a verbal stumble – the alternative antecedent of “the gods” for “them” is implied and eliding the indirect object of “redeem” is common vernacular – and then there’s this other possibility hinted in an ancillary text that she might have actually been quoting a story as a verbal shorthand both she and ozma understood. 

there’s a narrative expectation that the viewer will be right there with the kids making the same snap judgment about what salem meant – because i think the kids all absolutely did take this at face value as a statement of genocidal intent. the story itself is structured like a nesting doll such that each new revelation appears at a glance to be the whole story, but isn’t and in fact has large gaps and details that don’t add up which become glaringly obvious as soon as you reach the next layer and look back, but if you’re paying careful attention as you go it’s also quite possible to piece together the missing pieces. 

delivering information this way trains the audience (…mostly) to expect that the information we’re given is incomplete and maybe not wholly accurate. the advantage here is that even if the vast majority of the audience is completely blindsided by a specific reveal, for most viewers that’s going to feel really exciting – this happened in v9 with the lore reveals about the brothers, massive overnight reversal in the mainstream fandom views of darkness with the general mood being that it was cool – as opposed to feeling tricked or lied to by a “retcon.”

and that builds up a certain kind of trust, that the story is a puzzle but it isn’t going to cheat. it’s also a bit of a challenge or an invitation for the audience to try to figure out what’s coming, like a mystery.

with salem, i’d bet that one line in the lost fable is supposed to seem weirder and weirder the more you think about it, because… why doesn’t it track with anything she says before that point in the lost fable? why does the story begin with salem waxing poetic about humanity’s virtues? why does the narrative make such a big deal out of nobody knowing what salem wants AFTER the main characters witnessed a seemingly open-and-shut declaration of her “true” intention?

at the same time, the amount of explanation required to argue for an alternate interpretation – even if it’s really not complex or a reach – compared to the ease of just taking the statement exactly at face value, in and of itself is both a misdirection (most of the audience will take the path of least resistance, and hopefully enjoy the journey the story takes them on while leading them to the eventual right answer) and sort of the thesis with respect to the storytelling themes. salem thinks coolsville sucks!

but i am also very willing to consider (because of my own intuitive reaction to the line) that the writers perhaps did not mean for it to seem quite as unambiguous as the general audience and most of the fandom ended up taking it, because if you’re spending a lot of time immersed in a specifically theological context regarding redemption (which the writers probably would’ve been, given the importance of the religious narrative in the lost fable and in relation to this line in particular) – and if you’re also in the habit of being very precise and careful about how you phrase things (which is true of how rwby is written in general) – and if you’re writing what might be the most critical episode in a complicated puzzle box story, whose fulcrum is a red herring that is also meant to provide a clue to anyone who thinks to look at it more closely and with an open mind — then yeah i can see a scenario where the writers may have felt that the specific wording of salem’s statement was more ambiguous than it actually is. in which case the echo in ‘the shallow sea’ might have been a bit of an effort to correct course by giving the subset of fans invested enough to read the fairytales (<- the cohort most likely to be keen to unravel the puzzle) an additional hint. who knows.

[ask-indigo-park-swapped]

Mollie, how did you meet Lloyd and Rambley?

Ooh, there's a bit of a story to each of them... I'll try to tell it quick so I don't keep you here forever.

Rambley's been workin' on the tracks since forever, but I met him back when we were both just startin' out. We got to talking while I was riding out somewhere far, and we just couldn't stop! We just clicked so well together we kept in touch.

Lloyd has always been a part of the community of explorers, so when I first started out and started asking around on how to adventure he took me under his wing and taught me a bunch of what I know now! I kept in touch since he was so much more experienced and knowlegeable, and we've been friends ever since!

Salem arrived in Aviary Station one day and never left. They run a niche market, selling really high quality potions; we started talking 'cause I bought so many potions that one time - we became friends after they decided to treat me to dinner as thanks!

[tecnestheim962]

A Rating & Scathing Review of RWBY Characters:

Done by: Me (surprise!)

This is a serious review where I seriously analyze each character and rate them all seriously!!

If I hurt anyone in this, I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s me. It’s nothing personal.

That being said, let’s get on to the ratings!

Ruby Rose:

Can I just say:

I really just love Ruby. Isn’t she awesome? Like. Man. What a lovable, strong, caring, amazing person! Had the weight of the world thrown onto her, and she didn’t care, she just kept doing what she thought was the right thing. And when she broke? It was still selfless. She thought she was doing the world a favor after all her mistakes. Then she came back because she knew she could do and had to do more for everyone. She needs a hug and all the love.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Weiss Schnee:

Weiss??? The way she opens up and goes from being all, “friendship? Who needs it.” To, “I! Love! My! Friends! Friendship is magic! I will fight tooth and nail for them! They are the most important people in the world!” And the way she became so open minded after learning from different perspectives? Gotta love her.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Blake Belladonna:

Oh my gosh and another of my favorites: Blake! She learns to let herself be loved by those around her! She learns that letting people in isn’t a weakness, but a great strength! She is a fierce protector and a whole civil rights activist taking the world by storm! She finds a way to show love now in any scenario when beforehand she didn’t because she was scared to get hurt. Gosh. Spectacular.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Yang Xiao-Long:

Don’t even get me started on Yang. Protector Supreme. The way she used to let her emotions control her to controlling her emotions??? I’m in shambles. From learning how to live for herself and not just her sister??? It’s important even though she missed rubys pain she’s only human and she’s beautiful!! The way she loves through her actions and defends through her words??? Just kill me now.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Jaune Arc:

Oh yeah and Jaune??? The character development??? Wowza. The way he’s always there for those he cares about??? Fantastic. The way he would throw everything away just to be there for his friends?? I am deceased. His fortitude and determination to keep pushing through?? Ugh.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Nora Valkyrie:

Nora??????? My Queen????? With her heart a beautiful storm that she projects to all those around her??? Her protective nature over everyone??? How she learns that she needs to love herself and know herself before she can truly dedicate herself to another???? Literally puts me 6 feet under.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Pyrrha Nikos:

Pyrrha??? Don’t think I’m leaving her out of this! Her heart was so strong with her convictions and her love for her friends that she literally did everything she thought she could to protect them. She wanted to define her destiny and save the world in the way she thought only she could. I will literally never recover.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Oscar Pine:

Oscar???????????????? My baby???? My precious little prince??? Innocent farm boy who keeps getting slapped in the face by literally everyone (seriously crwby this poor boy needs a break and a hug) literally losing his soul but wants to spend every second he has doing everything he can for remnant???? He didn’t ask for this???? And yet here he is??? I haven’t stopped crying since V5 thank you very much!

Rating:

Infinity/10

Lie Ren:

Ren????? My boy??? Who feels like he always has to be the strong one emotionally??? Who always has to mask his own emotions to take care of others???? Who literally developed a semblance, a manifestation of his SOUL that is empathy??????? Like what???? Who would literally rather be dead than without Nora?? Who tried to take up the mantle of Jaunes emotional support humanness???? Orkcmekwkqo.

Rating:

Infinity/10

I could go on for the rest of my life for these people and literally every other character.

Also, how come tumblr doesn’t have more colors available??? Truly a tragedy and quite rude if I might say! Hmph!

I really hope someone gets some giggles out of this like I did!

Let me know if anyone wants me to do another HIGHLY critical review (ahem) and rating of these characters.

Gonna go cry now bye-

[maahtigor]

RRRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHHH NEW SPLATOON OC‼️‼️‼️🗣️🗣️🗣️🔥🔥🔥

*drops this and runs away at the speed of light*

Lately I've been working with @sebboh-webboh and making a team of competitive OC players called the Inkopolis Krakens. I'm still working on coloring Salem's teammates, but expect 3 more guys and some loredropping coming soon :D

[woof-squiggles]

hand🤝shake

[please give credit if used! edits are fine, but please ask before reposting to other sites!]

[kentucky-daisey]

Strongly recommend going back and watching shows you loved but never finished. Currently watching Motherland: Fort Salem (didn't watch the last season the first time round) and going from "there's my babies!" to "holy shit, past me was stupid, the final season is wild! I'd die for these women" is truly a trip.

Final thoughts:

Raelle: The scrappiest of babies.

Scylla: The cutest terrorist that ever was.

Tally: My favourite fifth wheel.

Abigail: Using that stick up her ass for good.

Just finished the last episode and I already know I'll be rewatching again in the near future.