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linkspooky · 1 month

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Ciel-Noel post

Revenge is bad, actually. Simple revenge in stories is boring and uninteresting and Kill Bill is a bad movie.

I dislike the idea of punitive justice in stories to begin with, at least in stories that don't look critically at it. However, I also think people often get punitive justice (a branch of moral philosophy) with the idea of narrative punishment (actions have consequences in stories). I'm not against narrative punishment at all, well-written stories should have direct consequences for all the important characters actions. If a character is a noble gas and no one reacts to their actions, then they are stagnant and unchanging. A character who is constantly reacting to other people, and provoking reactions in return, is a dynamic character.

Now that I've thoroughly buried the lead six feet under, let's get to the main event. Ciel and Noel is a tightly written tragedy in the horror genre. If you've ever watched a slasher movie before, horror operates on like, an extreme kind of narrative punishment. People always joke that if you have sex, or do drugs, or drink alcohol in a horror movie the slasher will kill you and yeah, that's basically it. Horror movies are relenting and unforgiving, you basically take one step out of line and get stabbed in the back for it. So, it's not at all surprising that in the same story where Ciel experiences a change of heart and goes from seeing Shiki not as a victim but another vampire to kill, to being willing to sacrifice everything to save him, Noel does not get saved. Doesn't that make Ciel a huge hypocrite going the extra mile to save her boyfriend, but putting a bullet in the head of the partner she's known for years to put her out of her misery? Why, yes. Yes it is. That's also the point.

Ciel (and Noel's) route in the Tsukihime remake are about two girls who are the victims of the same tragedy. One gets saved, one does not. One finds a person who will do anything to reach and redeem their humanity, the other does not. They both get worse and worse, but one is given a helping hand at their lowest point, and the other gets a bullet between the eyes. This is unfair, and cruel, and again the point. Nasu in the remake turned one of the routes with the happier ending into a bitter tragedy no matter which of the two endings you pick and it's great.

Nasu is a writer who understands the tools of storytelling and with Ciel and Noel, wrote a tightly constructed tragedy where both characters face a narrative punishment. Once again, narrative punishment means for every action the character takes in the story, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Characters don't get away scott free with anything. They reap what they sew. This gives the characters actions meaning, and feels like they are building towards an arc because there is an underlying point that the author is trying to make to us, by framing these characters actions in a certain light.

Nasu employs narrative punishment, sometimes even incredibly harsh narrative punishment (read every wrong choice in FSN where Shirou gets horribly maimed or just Shirou's life in general). However, Nasu does not believe in punitive justice. I mean, I made a joke about Oberon up above but like, Nasu literally wrote an entire FGO Lostbelt chapter showing how chaotic evil the fairies were, and then he still underlined it's wrong to punish people without a chance for redemption or atonement by making Oberon the final boss. Even Castoria who is an ultimate victim of the fairies who was locked in a barn and treated like an animal, and didn't even want to save them was still like "This is wrong, we should have given them some chance to redeem themselves."

That belief that punishment without the chance of redemption is wrong, is written into the core of Ciel and Noel's tragedy.

So anyway, let's get to the part where I start recapping the story with analysis so you guys have some frame of reference for what I'm talking about. Noel is a previous victim of Roa, a vampire that continually reincarnates by hijacking bodies. A victim of ROA slowly becomes possessed until the two personalities effectively merge, at which point Roa goes on a killing spree. This happened to Ciel in her french village, Ciel noticed intrusive thoughts of a voice in her head telling her to kill her family, kill her family, kill her family, and did her best to ignore and suppress them until she couldn't. She then tore out her parent's throats, and then went on a rampage only to be killed by arcueid a short while after. Not before killing basically everyone in the town except for Noel.

Ciel and Noel are the lone survivors of ROA's massacre, and both victims of ROA himself. Ciel and Noel are also the same person, so like, write that down. Are you taking notes? This is gonna be a long post you better be writing down bullet points. Big bullet point number one, Ciel and Noel are the same person this is going to be on the test later.

Is the massacre, and all the deaths that occurred Ciel's fault?

No, you'd think logically being possessed by someone else and only having your agency taking away from you would clear you from responsibility.

However, Ciel was taken in by the catholic church afterwards and they weren't having any of that forgiveness shit. Ciel after miraculously recovering from her death at Arcueid, no longer under Roa's possession, is killed repeatedly by the church, only to find she's immortal now. No matter how many times they try to torture her, or execute her to give her justice for the victims of the massacre it doesn't work. So, instead they eventually just recruit her to be a vampire hunter. Bla bla bla, metaphor for how punitive justice doesn't actually accomplish anything, bla bla bla, metaphor for how Ciel's way of redeeming herself by hunting down and punishing other vampires (which is also just revenge) doesn't work because there's no end to it, there's no forgiveness or absolution, it's just eternal suffering. Would a loving god who created the world and preaches about forgiveness really make a hell where all the really bad people get sent to, and never get any chance of redemption?

“A God who could make good children as easily a bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave is angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice, and invented hell--mouths mercy, and invented hell--mouths Golden Rules and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people, and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites his poor abused slave to worship him!” ― Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger

So, already we're touching on both justice, and also the hypocrisies of certain western religions, by Nasu demonstrating that justice without forgiveness accomplishes nothing. Ciel trying to redeem herself in the eyes of the church is truly the sisyphus pushing the boulder up the hill of redemption arcs, because there's no forgiveness, only hard labor for her sins. Ciel will just keep killing vampires to atone until she dies, but she can't die, so that boulder will keep rolling up that hill.

This is the underlying point of Ciel's entire arc, Ciel does not save anybody. She kills vampires. By killing vampires she hypothetically stops them from killing future victims, but that's not saving them. One of the most poignant things I've ever read from Nasu was from UBW where Shirou says more or less if there's a bank robber holding up a bank, and a cop comes in and shoots the robber through the chest, that might save all the hostages but the bank robber didn't get saved. You might say, well obviously, you can't save everyone. It makes sense that you'd save the innocent victims first. At which point I would say yes, I know, I have in fact consulted the ancient texts, UBW is my most replayed route.

However, Ciel and Noel's conflict gets that same point across because there are no innocent victims between the two of them. Ciel and Noel are both victimized, robbed of their agency, and go on to do terrible things, but one of them is saved and one is not. Noel isn't the bank robber in that metaphor, she's the hostage who was cooperating with the bank robber because the robber had a gun to her head, who the swat team decided to snipe through the window.

Noel is introduced as an entirely new character in the remake, she is the only other survivor of the massacre. While Ciel has memories of herself committing the crimes and feels guilt for that, Noel watched everyone die and was tortured for days on end by Roa in Ciel's body for their amusement (someone who was so insignificant to them, that Noel refers to herself as just one chip in a bag of chips Roa was snacking on. That's right, Noel is a cheeto in the grand scheme of things). There is one quote I love from John Dies at the End where John talks about how they're not chess pieces, they're not pieces on the board, they're so insigificant that they're just a cheeto sitting on the outside of the board. That's Noel, she's a cheeto.

The thing is Noel seems to be somewhat narratively aware of the fact that in the grand scheme of things she is a cheeto. Noel and Ciel are both victims of the massacre turned vampires, Ciel is a vampire killing machine and Noel sucks at it. Ciel despite being some rando apparently is born with enough magic circuits to make ancient magus families jealous, and on top of that is the only one who ever survived Roa's possession (and got immortality to boot). In every generation there is a chosen one, she alone will stand against the vampires and the demons and the forces of darkness. She is the slayer. So you've got Ciel the Vampire Slayer, and Noel who's just a cheeto. The cosmically ordained protagonist of reality, and just some guy. Noel has to basically beg and scrape to get by, no matter how hard she works she doesn't get stronger, she doesn't get any cool super powers from the night roa burned down her home town she just gets trauma. She also doesn't get a special boyfriend who will do anything to try to give her a normal life. This is illustrated in true tragic irony, by showing that Noel had a crush on a japanese foreign exchange student who's clearly meant to foil Shiki and he was basically the support she leaned on for the entirety of the tragedy, he dragged her away from danger multiple times, only to find out the reason he saved her was to use her as zombie bait so he could make his escape.

Here's where Noel starts to shine because in a typical narrative, Noel would be the more sympathetic character. People like rooting for the underdog. However, Nasu dares to be different by making Noel extremely difficult to empathize with. For one she's extremely predatory in the way she makes constant uncomfortable advances on Shiki the main character. She's also predatory in the sense she enjoys preying on things weaker than her. She says it line for line, weak people have to pick on those weaker than them. Noel goes after small fry vampires for revenge, and to vent her frustrations, however, she doesn't just kill them she rips them to pieces and tortures them in the most inhumane way possible until they're begging for death.

Why would anyone sympathize with the weak, predatory, pathetic noel who only ever makes excuses and blames others to run away from responsibility, over the stoic, strong ciel who is willing to hunt vampires forever to take responsibility for her actions.

Well here's the thing, *gestures for you to come closer, and then whispers in your ear* all the shit that Noel pulls, Ciel does that too. Ciel and Noel are either the same age, or around the same age, so if Noel is a predator for hitting on Shiki than so is Ciel. It's almost like something happened to them in their youths that stopped all their mental development rendering them both like mentally 16. Noel mercilessly slaughters vampires for revenge, and so does Ciel. She just does it offscreen. We don't know if she tortures them or anything, but remember when Ciel hunts Shiki, how she knows that Shiki is a helpless victim in all this and still goes out of her way to twist the knife, hurt him both physically and emotionally in every way possible before making the final blow.

The reason she acted that way during her and Shiki's confrontation isn't because she was stoically forcing herself to kill Shiki because that was the right thing to do, no she was projecting herself and her survivor's guilt for not killing herself before Roa went on his massacre all over Shiki. She was getting her revenge on a helpless victim because projecting on Shiki was a way for her to punish herself. Noel hates herself for being weak, Ciel hates herself for not being strong enough to slit her throat before everything happened (ergo being weak). They both deal with this self hatred by projecting that onto vampires, even vampires who were turned against their will (especially those ones tbh) and slaughtering them. They were both taken in by the church and taught to do that, so the church could get two child soldiers to send to die fighting vampreis. Ciel is Noel, and Noel is Ciel.

Not only does Noel project her past self and her weaknesses onto vampires, she projects herself onto Ciel. In that Noel really wants to be Ciel. Which is understandable, would you rather be, a girl who's only super power is... having an axe, or a girl with like seventeen million cool weapons, has more mana circuits than most mages, and is fucking immortal.

That's just the surface though, Noel is on like fifteen levels of projection with Ciel. Noel's identity is incredibly tied up in her complicated feelings towards Ciel, both because Ciel is the face of the person who committed every atrocity to Noel, but also because they are the two lone survivors of the same tragedy. Noel and Ciel both try to make themselves into tools for killing vampires to cope with their survivor's guilt, and their inability to conceive of themselves having a normal life after what they have been through. They also were both denied any chance at healing, because the church swept in and fashioned them into hunting dogs to sick on the vampires, and fight those vampires until they die. They are also both convinced that the church is right for doing this, and that deep down they either cannot have (Noel) or do not deserve (Ciel) normal lives while they both secretly pine for it anyway. Both of them are denied the chance for recovery, (because revenge does not heal), and Noel takes that one step further by deliberately driving a wedge into Ciel's recovery.

To quote you Comun, even though you're the one that sent this ask:

And Noel is a character inserted in Tsukihime to thwart Ciel's steady recovery. A constant reminder of what she lost and how the blood is in her hands. To cope with the sins Roa used her body for, Ciel chose to be the Holy Church's most professional extermination machine. Noel is the only survivor of her village because Elesia also died that night, being replaced with Ciel, who is fueled not by emotions but by a vampire kill count. And while Noel is a petty bitch at heart, she genuinely believes Ciel's post-trauma life choice and respects her capability to pull it off. There's no sabotage to their partnership not because Noel is afraid to defy someone a million times stronger than her, but because Noel wholeheartedly agrees with Ciel's choice to never recover and to pay blood for blood for the rest of her potentially eternal life. As long as Ciel stays Ciel, Noel's vengefulness is directed solely at Roa. But then Shiki enters Ciel's life bringing with him semblances of normal happiness. The murder machine began to regain emotions. And to Noel, that's a problem.

So part of this is you know, buying church propaganda. Ciel and Noel are both victims of the same church that does not heal or save people, and only doles out punishments on the guilty.

Part of this is an interesting twist that adds complexity to Noel's character, because like she could blame Ciel for the massacre like the church does, and like Ciel does herself, but as you point out Noel clearly wrestles with that. Noel feels a mix of envy for a twisted respect, one could even say love for Ciel's strength. Noel shows a much more nuanced reaction to Roa wearing Ciel's face and killing her entire family and torturing her for days on end, when she could take the church's approach, or even Ciel's approach towards Shiki. Noel even talks about at length how her and Ciel used to bond together by talking at night about how they were going to get revenge for everyone who died that day. Noel can't just see Ciel as the villain who took everything away from her, because they are the only two survivors of the massacre.

As you said there's no sabotage to their partnership, because despite Noel being the most petty bitch ever she never does anything to hurt or betray Ciel. The reason their partnership falls apart is entirely Ciel's fault. Sure, Noel was dancing on the edge of a cliff and not the most stable person to begin with, but it's Ciel's actions that push her off that cliff.

Not only does Noel drive thwart Ciel's recovery, she also makes Ciel look like a terrible person. Because, Ciel is a terrible person. In the same route where Shiki constantly lovebombs Ciel and constantly talks about all her good traits and what a hero she is, and Ciel gets several very cool action scenes making her look like a cool vampire slayer, we also witness to Noel's soul and heartcrushing downward spiral that is caused in part by Ciel kind of not really giving a shit about Noel's feelings. Noel's downfall could have been stopped at any point by Ciel simply lifting a finger, or just noticing her partner's obvious distres but instead what Ciel does is Noel completely out of the loop (like not telling Noel that she was waiting for Roa to reveal himself before attacking Shiki) .

Like, the scene where Noel turns into a vampire is directly caused by Ciel's actions. Noel reveals to Shiki that he's currently possessed by Roa. Ciel stands up for Shiki, in what we think is Ciel not wanting to believe that Shiki is possessed by Roa. However, what we learn instead is that Ciel only approached Shiki in the first place because she assumed he would be Roa's first target, and has been keeping by his side constantly waiting for Roa to appear so she can murk him.

So, all Ciel needed to do was TELL NOEL that she was playing the long game and ask Noel to wait a little longer before showing their hand, but apparently basic communication with her partner is too much effort for Ciel.

This leads into a scenario where not only does Noel think Ciel has broken their partnership (i mean she kinda has) but Ciel directly injures Noel pretty badly and leaves her alone. When Arach shows up to prey upon Noel, Noel can't even fight back by that point. Arach is the bus that hit Noel, but Ciel sure did throw Noel under that bus for no real reason.

I mean there is a story reason - it shows that Ciel may be an instrument of justice but she doesn't save people, in fact she does not give two figs about whether or not people are saved by her actions. Ciel obsessively hunting vampires, is not really that far off from Noel torturing vampires for her own sense of petty vengeance. However, Ciel hunts vampires offscreen so we as an audience don't see really the way, she treats the vampires she kills, but from the way she both foils Noel and also the sadistic way she draws out killing Shiki possessed by Roa as long as possible you can infer that she's not all too different from Noel. That's good actually, that Ciel seems like a good heroic person, but if you squint at her she's not much better than Noel, because like that's the entire point of her character the good, altruistic senpai never existed in the first place. All of Ciel's words about atonement and forgiveness are empty platitudes, just her regurgitating the words the church fed to her.

So finally to conclude, we have the culmination of the moebius strip, where Noel the apparent opposite of Ciel, slowly morphs into Ciel. Noel's flaws in a narrative sense led to her downfall, but let's be clear Noel had no fucking agency in her transformation into a vampire. She was hysterically begging for Arach not to do it. She was pinned and helpless to escape when it happened. It is Arach and Ciel's fault what happened to her.

Noel does make choices, but her choice amounts to not immediately killing herself the moment she became a vampire. She does take like 500 shots to become an ubervamp, but like, the story clearly states that once people become vampires their moralities and personalities are radically altered. So if that's a choice it's an influenced choice.

Therefore the only choice in that moment Noel is truly responsible for is not killing herself while she was still lucid. Irony upon ironies because that's exactly what she yells at vampires to do, bow down and let their heads be cut off by the executors. However, if Noel is guilty for not immediately offing herself, so is Ciel, so is Shiki. Both of these characters get saved while Noel gets old yeller'd. This is unfair and also, you guessed it, the point. Ciels revenge against vampires accomplishes nothing. Noel giving up her humanity for the shot at revenge against Ciel accomplishes nothing. It's almost like revenge doesn't heal, it just puts more pain and misery into the world. No one is saved by revenge.

Noel is fridged for Ciel's arc, and neither Ciel nor Shiki ultimately save her even though she's not all that responsible for her own downfall. This is not the narrative playing good victim and bad victim. If anything it makes Ciel look way worse as a person. The narrative even goes out of its way to say that both Ciel and Noel have a right to their revenge and in a situation like this the winner wasn't determined by who was right but who's stronger. Ciel has no moral high ground she just happens to be stronger, that's it. She doesn't take the higher road with Noel even after Shiki went to such great length to try to reach her emotionally and tell her she was still human, no Ciel makes no attempt to talk to Noel or take a third route she just murks her.

Noel is my favorite character for this route probably second favoeite overall behind Kohaku and I one hundred percent agree with fridging her, because it makes Ciel's character a hundred times better by giving her consequences for her flaws. It's one thing for Ciel to break down crying about how much she hates herself for being a cold merciless machine. It's another thing to have this demonstrated by Ciel letting her partner fall to the wayside by just not giving a shit about anyone's feelings or anything except for her personal quest against vampires.

Noel is a victim of the cycle of revenge, a pointless and harmful cycle. In a story that's thoroughly anti revenge as evidenced in the true end of hisuis route where Kohaku having achieved absolute perfect revenge and having her plan gone entirely right, takes a knife and gouges out her own heart with it. If that's not on the nose I don't know what is.

Its poignant comun that you told me that Nasu stated there's no good ending to Ciel's routes just a normal and a true because a good ending would have saved Noel. It might look like Ciel got off scott free but if you look at it, by killing Noel and denying Noel the chance at salvation Ciel damns herself too. Ciel has not escaped the cycle in the true ending, she's still hunting vampires at the behest of the church the only real change is she has a boyfriend now. I'd compare it to the ending of UBW vs Heavens Feel. In one Shirou has Rin's support but it's implied he'll eventually leave Rin anyway and become Archer, he just won't regret saving people as Archer did. He has not escaped the self destructive cycle. Whereas in Heaven's Feel, Shiro dies and is reborn and has to you know live as a person from now on.

Ciel did not end the cycle, she perpetuated it by killing Noel. You don't end the cycle of revenge with more revenge. Since Ciel did not end it she's still trapped in the cycle herself, and she still has support in the form of Shiki but the cycle will probably consume her the way it eventually consumed Shirou. She even broke out what was essentially the UBW with black keys when fighting against Vlov. It's just like that one post on Twitter said every few years or so someone reinvent the unlimited blade works!

#Ciel #Noel #Shiki tohno #Tsukihime

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shuttershocky · 5 months

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What do you think of Nasu basically spoiling Mahoyo 2 in FGO, even though Mahoyo 2 doesn't exist (yet)?

lol

lmao even

I will make an even better call.

He did not stop at spoiling Mahoyo 2, a VN that doesn't exist in any way, shape, or form yet. No. In fact, Nasu has gone above and beyond, also spoiling a critical new story element for the Tsukihime Remake's Red Garden, hidden inside the Mahoyo event.

Why do I say this? There's a scene in the collab event where the gang discusses the matter of reviving the dead. Aoko's little incident at the end of Mahoyo inevitably gets brought up, but Alice shuts down the notion that Aoko can revive the dead, because what Aoko does is time fraud, essentially running a scam, and therefore does not count.

If you are killed, but Aoko makes it so you don't die, she does so by taking the time you were killed and propelling it into the far future, way after you would die of old age anyway. In Mahoyo, Touko is aghast at the methodology because messing with time would absolutely incur some kind of terrible debt to the fabric of reality that will have to be paid eventually, while in FGO, Alice believes it doesn't count as reviving the dead, probably because you never died (because the time that you died is far, far sway).

What does this have to do with Tsukihime?

Now, in the original Tsukihime, Shiki was basically a dead man walking; his body was animated by Akiha's life-force / soul after saving her from an inverting SHIKI, and while it's never explained beyond "Akiha has powers no one else in her oni family has", no mage has been able to revive the dead, or keep a body that can no longer live on its own moving by making it a parasite on their own life. Others that cheat death such as Touko or Roa (or Meltryllis in FGO) move bodies instead, they cannot save a body that has been damaged beyond saving.

Only Aoko and Akiha have done that.

Now, we know due to some bad ends in the Tsukihime Remake that Shiki is still unknowingly dependent on Akiha, because she's able to control his life and even make him pass out by cutting him off (at least until he gets possessed by Roa), BUT we don't know if the accident with SHIKI was the only thing that happened in the past.

The Tsukihime Remake no longer takes place in Misaki town like the original did. This means that Shiki no longer encounters Aoko walking around her home town. She would have had to go to a hospital in Souya town, and coincidentally run into 9 year old Shiki terrified of seeing death everywhere.

I don't buy that their meeting was a coincidence anymore. I think Aoko knew he would be there.

There is now an unexplained gap between when Roa was Elesia, and when he was SHIKI. In the original timeline, Elesia would have been born around 1975 and fully overwritten by Roa when she was 16, or at 1991. If Arcueid killed her quickly, Roa would have had to find a new host fast, and the incident with SHIKI happened in 1992, 8 years before the events of Tsukihime. No gap.

But now, Arcueid defeats the possessed Elesia in 2001, and the incident with SHIKI doesn't happen until 2006 (8 years before the events of the Tsukihime Remake in 2014). There's now a 5 year gap.

Now, Nasu might just be really bad at mathing out his timeline, but based on entirely no evidence whatsoever, I'm gonna say the 5 year gap between Roa's victims is intentional.

Roa had one more victim in between Elesia and SHIKI, which would be Shiki himself, way before Shiki would gain the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception.

Roa got confused. He meant to target Tohno SHIKI, heir to the powerful Tohno family, and instead got Tohno Shiki, their child slave whose family name got replaced. Roa goes wild inside a Nanaya's body, but ends up running into Aoko (who we know due to Melty Blood Type-Lumina that she has orders from the Clock Tower to defeat and interrogate Roa), who gives him the fuck you laser and incinerates Roa in an instant. Roa gets told by Dr Arach (who is obviously a fucking vampire) that he had the wrong Shiki all this time, while Aoko uses her bullshit to restore Shiki himself.

Unlike with Ciel, whose soul is now "Roa" and thus became immortal because she cannot die while Roa is still recognized by the World as alive, Aoko's method of reviving the dead doesn't heal them of death, she just magics all that shit away.

This makes Shiki avoid the magic loophole that Ciel gets trapped in, becoming an ordinary boy again with no vampiric connection (because Aoko made the whole incident never happen).

That distinction is important, because not dying when being killed is why Shiki has the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception in the first place. He experienced death and his mind now comprehends its true nature. Aoko reviving him doesn't trigger it because like Alice says, Aoko doesn't revive the dead.

Akiha on the other hand, triggers it because Shiki was mortally wounded and his life can no longer move his body, instead relying on Akiha's life force to survive. This makes Shiki dead but functionally alive, manifesting the mystic eyes of death perception.

When Aoko heard that the little boy she unkilled somehow managed to die again just a little later only to reawaken at the hospital, she had to come and see him for herself, leading to that fateful meeting outside the hospital.

TL;DR - Mahoyo event spoils that Roa in the Remake timeline switches it up, possessing Shiki first before ever touching SHIKI, which Aoko deals with.

_____

I have zero proof about any of this by the way which is why it sounds like complete bullshit, because it is. I just saw an opportunity to post Tsukihime Remake speculation on a barely related topic and ran away with it.

BUT, consider this: I correctly predicted that in the Remake Arcueid route, Roa would see a skull staring at him when he finally realizes Shiki is "Death". I know what Nasu plans for Tsukihime, it is all revealed to me in my dreams.

#Tsukihime

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studentofetherium · 3 months

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i got about halfway into listening to Believer before it hit me what it really means to have an officially recorded english version of the Tsukihime ED... we've come so far...

#tsukihime

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uponawhitehorse13 · 13 days

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Hisui SFW alphabet

A = Affection (How affectionate are they? How do they show affection?)

Definitely defaults to acts of service as a love language while also not accepting acts of service from others.

B = Best friend (What would they be like as a best friend? How would the friendship start?)

You probably met through Akiha. You got invited over by Akiha and as you were having tea Hisui was compelled to actually join a conversation for once. From then on you kept getting invited over to the mansion despite not spending that much time with Akiha.

C = Cuddles (Do they like to cuddle? How would they cuddle?)

She’s incredibly stiff but gets better at relaxing into it when she’s tired.

D = Domestic (Do they want to settle down? How are they at cooking and cleaning?)

She excels at cleaning but cooking is a particular weakness of hers. If you cook she can help by doing basic things like chopping up vegetables or cleaning shrimp. It’s very hard for her but she insists on doing it. If she doesn’t help with the cooking she will take up cleaning the kitchen/dishes.

E = Ending (If they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?)

It would make her incredibly sad. Making her feel very guilty about even trying something.

F = Fiance(e) (How do they feel about commitment? How quick would they want to get married?)

Very unsure about it. Never even dreamed about having a relationship based on equality. She is totally wife material though.

G = Gentle (How gentle are they, both physically and emotionally?)

Incredibly gentle. I honestly don’t think she could bring herself to be mean. Except when…

H = Hugs (Do they like hugs? How often do they do it? What are their hugs like?)

Do not surprise her, you will be smacked. Even after some time in a relationship touching her without warning will lead to her pushing you away. It’s just a reflex. If you ask her or simply open your arms and wait for her to get closer you’ll have a much nicer time. Her hugs are incredible she really has a comforting touch.

I = I love you (How fast do they say the L-word?)

She’s always very serious when she says it. Doesn’t use it often but it makes it more meaningful when she does.

J = Jealousy (How jealous do they get? What do they do when they’re jealous?)

She doesn’t get jealous. She completely trusts you and expects you to trust her.

K = Kisses (What are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?)

Same thing as hugs. You will get headbutted if you try to surprise her. But when she does kiss you it’s very sweet. Her standing on her tiptoes trying to get to your face. Also a big fan of goodbye / welcome back kisses.

L = Little ones (How are they around children?)

Out of all the characters in Tsukihime she is probably the best equipped for parenthood. She would honestly be amazing with children.

M = Morning (How are mornings spent with them?)

She always gets up first. She has a very rigid routine and it’s gonna be very hard getting her to break it.

N = Night (How are nights spent with them?)

Going to bed with her is a lot more enjoyable. When she’s tired she relaxes a lot so it’s far easier to enjoy the silence with her.

O = Open (When would they start revealing things about themselves? Do they say everything all at once or wait a while to reveal things slowly?)

The relationship would have to get pretty serious for her to start revealing things about her past. But when it gets to that point she would tell you all of it as she doesn’t really believe in a relationship built on lies. She would probably keep the supernatural stuff to herself unless you’re already involved in those shenanigans.

P = Patience (How easily angered are they?)

She will not get mad at you. She cares for you and knows you can improve.

Q = Quizzes (How much would they remember about you? Do they remember every little detail you mention in passing, or do they kind of forget everything?)

She wouldn’t go overboard but she wouldn’t forget important things either.

R = Remember (What is their favorite moment in your relationship?)

The first time you two held hands. It’s a very simple thing but it’s a sign of great trust for her.

S = Security (How protective are they? How would they protect you? How would they like to be protected?)

She’s very open about telling you when she’s worried and doesn’t want you to put yourself in danger but she doesn’t really stop you.

T = Try (How much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?)

Doesn’t really know what to do for dates or gifts. She finds doing things that you don’t directly ask for hard.

U = Ugly (What would be some bad habits of theirs?)

It’s sometimes hard to have conversations with her since she still has a habit of only speaking when spoken to.

V = Vanity (How concerned are they with their looks?)

Hisui is completely dripless. Akiha really needs to take her shopping.

W = Whole (Would they feel incomplete without you?)

Depends how far along the relationship is. If it’s beyond the point of you knowing her past losing you would incredibly hurt her.

X = Xtra (A random headcanon for them.)

Kohaku is very supportive of your relationship. She’s often teasing Hisui about your relationship. She will fuck you up if you hurt her though.

Y = Yuck (What are some things they wouldn’t like, either in general or in a partner?)

She won’t stand for you not taking care of yourself. She finds self love very important.

Z = Zzz (What is a sleep habits of theirs?)

Incredibly calm when sleeping. Like so peaceful you’d feel horrible if you woke her up.

#x reader #sfw alphabet #tsukihime #melty blood #melty blood x reader #tsukihime x reader #hisui #tsukihime hisui #hisui tsukihime

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typellblog · 7 months

Text

We need to stop, making 'its okay to ask for help/murder is ok' memes where Shiki tohno tsukihime is in the 'murder is ok' position

Like I get why one might be inclined to do this but you have to understand he is very much not a believer in the idea that murder, is okay

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kaibutsushidousha · 1 year

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Thoughts on Kiara and the CCC Sakura's?

Kiara is a character that took time to warm up. I played CCC and loved Kiara and Anderson as a pair but didn't like either character individually. SE.RA.PH also impressed me very little, but she got a fun part to play in Paradise Lake so that's one contribution from FGO. But it was with her part in Tsukihime, literally just two lines of dialogue, that I got to think back and realize that I like Kiara, actually.

Anyways, the central idea that defines the whole of Kiara's character is that she doesn't know how to read. She's an unstoppable force that reshapes the world with her genius of religion, sexuality, psychology, programming, and magecraft, but literature is her weakest subject. She's blind to themes and symbolism, dull to metaphors, and unaware of subtext.

Her story is that she was born with the saintly nature of a bodhisattva, but confined to a bed in an isolationist Tachikawa cult. It was a harsh childhood where she was sick and objectified but she had the company of books telling her the teaching of the Buddha and heartwarming tales like The Little Mermaid.

Her life changed at age 14 when she was introduced to the internet. Thanks to it, she learned her disease was easily treatable and fixed herself, but most importantly, she discovered no one in her village healed despite it being super simple. Remember this is a Buddhist devotee who sucks at reading. She grew up reading that the sattva defines sentient beings as any life capable of compassion, and with her abysmal interpretation skills, believed this was completely literal. Therefore, the people around her weren't sentient. By Kiara's dumbass definition, was the only human being she knew.

What makes Kiara is the fact that her dehumanization of others and the power her talents give her over people's lives often lead to megalomania. People kill themselves en masse over her and her reaction is thinking that's hot, actually. People confront and checkmate her and her reaction is to kill herself before the hero who took so many innocent lives to reach can have the satisfaction of doing it. (Amazingly timely with the new SE.RA.PH chapter that came the day after I received this ask)

But despite her pride consistently getting the better of her, that pride is still derived from the fact she is sentient, therefore capable of compassion. She's a natural-born bodhisattva (mostly) always extending the hand of salvation to those beneath her. Just... the functionally illiterate Tachikawa Buddhist way, which involves making the entire world nut into moksha. But hey, at least her heart is in the right place. I can fix her. (Note: this does not mean you can fix her. I'm talking specifically about myself because, at least on paper, I'm a licensed Japanese literature teacher)

CCC is the story of her attempt to cheat the Holy Grail War in order to reach the Enlightenment necessary for this, and her partner there is Andersen, the author of her favorite childhood stories. Andersen's Noble Phantasm can reshape fate to ensure her plot goes as intended but under the condition it must be true to the themes of Andersen's stories. And understanding the themes just happens to be Kiara's greatest weakness.

Kiara hacked the ability to fall in love into a Mooncell superior AI to she could seduce Sakura into giving her early access to the Grail, but when Hakuno shows up for Sakura's help first, Kiara decided it was hotter that way and left Hakuno to do the brunt of her work. At this moment, her loss is already decided. No matter how many times she lovingly read Andersen's tales, she's a poor enough reader to never have realized he's a writer that punishes his protagonists for short-sightedness. The Little Mermaid and The Girl Who Sells Matches died for this.

The type of protagonist Andersen rewards are the ones like The Ugly Duckling, who never have it easy until they reach the discovery that changes their lives. And Kiara just made Hakuno into The Ugly Duckling of CCC instead of her.

In reality, Kiara could never get what she was asking for out of Andersen. Her win condition under his literary themes was for Sakura's love and Kiara's interactions with the rest of the CCC cast to make her find compassion in others, grow out of her messiah complex, and find ordinary happiness in the company of her fellow sentient human beings.

And that's all from CCC, but Kiara is one of the most recurring characters in current TM, so we have FGO and Tsukihime showing different facets of Kiara under the circumstances of different timelines.

FGO ultimately hijacks its Kiara with her CCC counterpart, but before that, she has a quite fascinating set of circumstances. Here we have a genuinely saintly Kiara. Unlike in CCC, here she was visited and cured by a wandering doctor instead of finding the solution to her illness on her own, so she never had the opportunity to arrive at her "I'm the only human being" mentality. After leaving her hometown, she still became a qualified therapist as usual, but this time earnestly dedicated to the benefit of her fellow sentient beings.

But the curious thing about this deviation in her backstory is how it relies on the FGO timeline having some wandering doctor in 2006 who somehow didn't exist in any other timeline to help Kiara there too. Unrelated picture of Dr. Romani Archaman (2004-2016) during his initial years of globetrotting before he returned to Marisbury.

Anyways, the transplanted CCC Kiara is defeated and drops her Alterego in Chaldea out of curiosity. Her next main story role is in Oo'oku, she gets to find her opposite in Kama and ultimately drags her to a new home where the two of them can find the simple happiness they lacked, preferably far away from each other. Lastly, her summer in Paradise Lake shows off a more balanced Kiara, still kinda high on the messiah complex and still the bad reader demanding a sequel for the sake of a sequel, but knowing where the draw the line. The AnKia fluff is also sublime as always.

Then Tsukihime is technically Kiara's latest appearance. She only gets two lines to explain her backstory, and it's honestly the funniest thing ever done with her megalomania. Tsuki Kiara is completely successful in her ascension to the rank of Maradeva but learned how much of a small fry she was compared to the True Devils of the Buddhist universe and noped back to Earth where she was still almighty (does that make her a tengu or am I being as literal about Buddhist definitions as her?). Tsuki Kiara has no excuses left to pretend this isn't about her ego first and foremost, but at least she found a place in the Burial Agency, where she can still offer others some kinda salvation.

Anon is also asking about the Sakuras, but I think I'll leave that for another time in another ask because this has already gotten really long just talking about Kiara. Sorry for delivering only half the answer.

#type moon #fate extra ccc #fate grand order #tsukihime #sesshouin kiara #hans cristian andersen

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moss-selfship · 1 year

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im very curious about neco arc. what is she from?

Funny enough that question in it of itself is a tad complicated

See her first appearance is in the tsukihime visual novel (a adult oriented visual novel released in december of 2000)

She is a parody of one of the main characters, a character named Arcueid Brunestud (a powerful vampire woman seen here)

You see, neco arc is a parody of her that shows up in the scene that comes after a bad ending where they teach you how to not get a bad ending

Here she was just a parody character purely for gags.

However it was in the later fighting game melty blood re act (a remake of the first melty blood fighting game...yes the visual novel became a fighting game.)

That she appeared again and is where she actually got character development and lore (as well as showing off other neco spirits like neco arc chaos)

And since then she has been a staple in the melty blood games up to the newest one.funny enough the recent fames is where most neco arc memes spawn from

She also was in the 2011 (i believe?) Melty blood anime called carnival phantasm.here she is working the counter of the Ahnenerbe coffee shop (super cute)

TLDR. She technically is from tsukihime but her actual personality and lore starts in the melty blood fighting games. If you are curious about the stories, the lore is so fucking insane and deranged i cant explain

#melty love #neco arc

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derekscorner · 2 months

Text

Fated Rantings: El motherf**kin Melloi

I'm back! I don't even know how many this makes but by hell welcome back to my trip through Fate! I've been looking forward to this one for a while now. Ever since I finished Fate Zero (click here <-) in fact. (-> here's part two)

The "why done it" in this case being due to Waver Velvet and Iskandar. When I sat through Fate Zero I absolutely loved their arc and dynamic as the story progressed. Iskandar is one of the best bros I've seen written within Fate which is a praise I also give to Astolfo from Apocrypha.

Of course, with Astolfo I was also shocked by the sheer dissonance between the meme and the actual character. In Iskandar's case, I was shocked by the sheer misinterpretation of the Banquet of Kings scene.

I'll fight any of you on that scene and his character. It left me questioning the critical thinking skills of many given what I had heard vs what I actually saw.

But that's for another post, I linked the part two of the fate zero post if you're curious about my feelings of that scene.

What's most important for this post is just how much Waver changed after Fate Zero or more specifically the 4th Holy Grail War.

Multiple Histories, One World

Now, as with nearly every post these days, I do feel the need to preface the multiverse nature of Fate and it's Type-Moon cousins. This multiverse has fed a lot of the complicated reputation for these stories and many movies are adapting a specific route or ending from a novel.

Fate Stay Night, Fate Hollow Ataraxia, Tsukihime, so many have multiple routes and endings. FSN in particular has had two anime and three movies depicting each main route.

This is relevant because the El Melloi Case files are based on actual light novels rather than visual novels. The anime is only 13 episodes long and it by no means has the time to truly adapt every novel in that series.

This should also be kept in mind because events and terms are shared among the various stories but that does not mean each story is connected.

For example, in most stories where Waver Velvet exists usually depict him as a participant in the 4th Holy Grail War but this does not mean that every Waver you see lived through Fate Zero.

Fate Zero is a specific retelling of the 4th Grail War but not the universal depiction. A good example of what I mean is with Saber (Artoria) from Fate Stay Night.

In the original visual novel as well as the UBW anime (and others) Saber references the 4th Grail War and Kiritsugu. Even though servants aren't supposed to remember previous summons she does but the war she remembers in those stories is not the same story from Fate Zero.

Fate Zero is just one alternative version of the 4th Grail War. The war itself happens in several alternate worlds but none of them are exactly the same series of events.

In other words, you'll see Waver cameo in many stories but never assume they all had the same history. They probably had similar histories.

With that out of the way let us focus on the version of Waver we did see, the boy from Fate Zero that's grown into a lord of the Clocktower.

What a true life changing experience just meeting someone can be

l've said it before but it's entirely possible to see the anime from the 2010s as their own pocket continuity. I won't claim that as 100% accurate since even 'ol Nasu said Fate Zero is it's own timeline but I do fully believe it can apply here.

El Melloi calls back to Fate Zero often and while the anime leaves out a lot that the novel covers it's still worth seeing. It focuses well on what became of Waver after Fate Zero and how Iskandar changed him.

It's even a plot point that he's obsessed with Iskandar and that war. Waver wishes to see Iskandar again and aims for the 5th Grail War. This obsession is often seen as a dangerous thing as well by those around Waver and for good reason.

Iskandar is a heroic spirit, he is dead and within Type-Moon it is the livings job to move forward not the dead.

What I mean is that Waver is seemingly chasing the dead, running towards an end to prove himself to his king. Waver is not suicidal or the like but he's missed a bit of Iskandar's message.

In Fate Zero Iskandar does his damnedest to get the, then impatient and temperamental, Waver to enjoy the journey. Iskandar loves life and new things and pushes Waver to experience new things.

But as El Melloi Waver has come to a stand still. I saw this as sad but not unbelievable for it is very human to find yourself stuck as an adult.

l see this as Waver "missing the forest for the trees" in a sense because;

A) He knows that servants typically do not recall previous summons. His desire to see if Iskandar remembers or approves of him is moot from the get go. He is effectively chasing shadows. B) Waver's entire personality as the tired teacher El Melloi was shaped by Iskandar. Waver has already changed in a positive way but does not reflect on that. He remembers their time together fondly but doesn't think of his present much.

Waver only regrets or remembers a past, he's not living life to the fullest like Iskandar would push him to do. It is a very believable fault to have and a very real rut that many of you will experience once as you age.

The beauty of Waver's time as El Melloi is seeing him learn to let go and live life with an attitude more akin to what Iskandar spouted.

The man vs the Boy

Even then, even with that focus on Waver's obsession with the past, the story also shows just how much Waver changed after the 4th Grail War. They're not things Waver speaks up about himself but they are things both the viewer and cast take note of.

The first big change is seen in the flashback of how Waver became the lord El Melloi II. It is a few years before the first episode but a year or two after Fate Zero. After borrowing money (beginning his perpetual debt) Waver bought the nearly defunct classroom of his mentor Kayneth, the previous lord el Melloi.

The very man that Waver stole his relic from, the same man that was dealt a death so shameful by Kiritsugu that I found him more disgusting than Saber in that moment.

This not only took mage society by surprise but he shocked everyone still by making the class successful. Waver moans his lack of talent but he's proving Iskandar right by putting his head to use.

Within Fate Zero Iskandar pointed out Waver's problem solving skills and how solving something simpler than others is a talent to be proud of.

It's obvious that others recognize this talent as well since he's often called to solve cases. He uses the money to pay off debts but the very fact that a society as prideful and traitorous as the Clocktower would even call him for help is a feat that I do not think Waver even considers.

The fact that he'd even buy Kayneth's class to keep it alive also shows a sharp change. As a boy he was irresponsible and was partly the cause of Kayneth's death but as a man he accepts that responsibility.

He's not making excuses as he did when you saw him in Fate Zero. I do not feel that my words are doing this trait justice because so many people grow up and never learn to accept the responsibility of their actions.

Let alone go out of their way to amend the issues they cause.

By hell his acceptance of responsibility even takes the characters in story by surprise. The whole reason Waver is 'lord el melloi' is because the family was put on the cusp of ruin by Waver's actions and Kayneth's death.

They chose Reines as the next head out of political logic and necessity. When she kidnaps him (as a small child mind you) she fully expected Waver to throw a fit and go into denial because that's the personality he had prior to the war.

She was joking in earnest (probably plotting something bad too) but no. Waver accept all her demands and only asked they add the "II" to his title.

Both because Waver does not think he's worthy of the el melloi title and because his station is temporary.

It may seem like minor rambling to you but I found this shift rather interesting and praise worthy.

Waver's mage family is new, he essentially had no father, so when I see this change I see a boy that learned a sense of responsibility from Iskandar. Perhaps not a father-figure in the truest sense but he was an example Waver needed.

Iskandar was a king and accepted all that it brought and from his words you see that he did consider his men and their view of him.

Even if by a fraction Waver emulated that and I consider that beautiful in hindsight of Fate Zero to here.

As a teacher

To the shock of the Clocktower (and me tbh) Waver is a damn good teacher. He may lack power and potential as a mage himself but his problem solving mindset and his experiences have made him damn near prodigal as an instructor.

By the end of the anime he had at least 3 students of "pride" rank. I won't go into the whole detail but the best way to sum that up for you is by saying mages have ranks.

To have students who achieved a "pride" rank at such young ages is basically like a teacher in our world having three kids skip their way to college.

All of Waver's students have more talent than him but his class tends to draw the unwanted or odd so few of them have the actual mentality to put that power to use.

The Clocktower essentially throws problem children at him and he turns them into respectable mages much to the higher ups annoyance.

Sadly the anime only showed a few of his class but I loved it when I got to see him being a teacher. The cases he solves are fun as well but the class draws out the easily annoyed aspect of Waver.

The parts of him that is still the young Waver which becomes a funny contrast in a way. I'd even argue that Waver draws annoying people to him unconsciously.

His "best friend" Melvin, the overly fond Flat, or actually talented/respectable mages like Luvia who wants him to be her tutor.

Hell, he's even on a list of people that female students wish to sleep with. No, I am not joking. One of them is even in his class. Her name is Yvette and I am certain that she's unhinged.

His social circle is endearing and it draws out a bit of young Waver and I love it.

Sorry, I lost my own plot there. I don't really have a structure to my rambles since my brain just does not work that way but I hope that I got across how much I love what this story has done with Waver.

He was one of the best parts of Fate Zero and I loved seeing how Iskandar changed him. I see it almost like a man adopting an unruly kid and making them into a better person.

Only for that same person to do the same for his students. Of course, I also just genuinely love to see the Fate world in motion outside a Grail War.

You hear a lot about Clocktowers, mage society, and so on but this is a story in which you see it. You're getting the backdrop of the Type-Moon universe and I'm sad this anime didn't get more seasons to explore it.

However, before I finish up what has become a part one I have to mention a foil to Waver. Not another mage or case but his foil as a subject to Iskandar.

I found you, FAKER

Hephaestion was an interesting character to me. I was interested in her prior due to lore but actually seeing her in action made me more interested in her dichotomy to Waver.

Both are heavily shaped by Iskandar himself but while Waver is a subject of the king Hephaestion was a body double. It's a bit more complex than that of course but she's essentially a body double he had in life.

Due to the magecraft used that let her play such a role she had no name of her own and her mark on history is odd compared to actual heroic spirits.

Thanks to this and the way in which she was summoned she manifested as a new class "pretender". Or as this anime called it "Faker".

However, all things in Fate have a grain of truth. No matter how fantastical the spirit or spell there was something real it was based on.

This "faker" was a real woman and her hatred for Waver is a foil since he sees himself as a subject to Iskandar. She respects her king as much, if not more, than Waver but she hated his army.

For Waver to call himself a subject, for him to mention the Ionioi Hetairoi and her absence in it, these things anger her.

She saw that army as a detriment that lead to Iskandar's death. She even counts among the Ionioi Hetairoi by technicality but refuses to appear when Iskandar uses it due to her hatred of the army.

There's likely more there as well but I sadly lack knowledge on her as of typing this. I do know the basic gist of Dr. Heartless' plan and her role in it but her personal history I know little.

But her foil to Waver I do find interesting because both were shown Iskandar's kindness yet she views herself apart as special confidant while Waver wishes to be a subject.

It is like they gained two opposite lessons from the same man. She even rejected Iskandar's numerous attempts to name her due to her respect for him. She was fine being his double while Iskandar saw it as horribly inhumane.

She hates the army, Waver would happily join it. She is a warrior and strong, Waver is weak. Yet Waver is the only one that can say things to get under her skin. On some level she knows he's right, on some level he understands her thanks to their shared experiences with Iskandar.

To be honest the anime doesn't explore them as much as I wish it did. I'm rambling, hoping to stretch it, but in truth the anime ended before I got to see this truly explored. It's a neat parallel to see but an incomplete one.

Thanks to lore videos I watch I do have a grander scope than most whole watch the anime. A very similar situation to when I watched the 2006 Fate anime, I have context.

I won't spoil it but do know that Hephaestion and Dr Heartless' plot does lead to a proper build up and resolution to Waver's lingering feelings of Iskandar and the war.

I do think the anime did a good job, I truly wish it had more, but knowing what I do about these novels I wish they had gave it another season.

The dynamic of Iskandar to his two subjects also plays a greater role and one day I hope we get to see it.

For now I think I'll stop this here and make that part two. I know I rambled a lot with no direction and it fell thin toward the end there so I appreciate you reading regardless.

Hopefully you'll enjoy part two more where I can talk about other things aside my obsession with Waver and his character.

I'll leave my other better written Fate posts linked below as well. Bye~

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El Motherf**Kin Melloi pt2: https://www.tumblr.com/derekscorner/757996566277701632/fated-rantings-clocktowers-business-hours

For my other experiences with Fate click here: https://derekscorner.tumblr.com/tagged/fated-rantings

#el melloi #lord el melloi ii case files #fate series #fated rantings #waver velvet #fate gray #magecraft #fate zero

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