#idk. idk. i like it when characters care about each other and don't die

[my-thoughts-and-junk]

reading dungeon meshi

[chiocchi]

If you don't mind answering, why do you ship Tom Riddle and Harry Potter? Besides the whole issue that they are enemies, and the age difference, both characters are heterosexual. It's canonical fact. If it's the dynamic you like... Have you thought about Tomione's ship? They have a lot of potential together. And in the right direction, they would be a couple that could make it in the books.

JDKLJKLFJSDLKFJA This kinda feels like people knocking on your door and trying to get you to believe in their religion. It's pretty funny.

I don't know why are you calling issues to a part of the pairing's appeal lkajdsjfs (And Hermione is Harry's age and they are on the same side too?). And not sure about that canonical fact. Harry can be read as bisexual quite easily and Voldemort|Tom... idk he seems more obsessed with power, immortality, and Harry. But even if that's the case, I don't see why it should matter. We're in fandom after all.

I don't know if I'll be able to convey why I like this ship so much. For starters, I'm really into the unique connection they share. There was a piece of Voldemort's soul inside Harry's; they had a mental link; a whole language they're the only ones to speak (for the most part); Voldemort chose him and marked him; and there's even a prophecy that linked them together. There aren't two people more connected than them. They're soulmates, and the fact that Voldemort didn't intend it and Harry hates it adds another layer of complexity.

But not only that, they're like a broken reflection of each other, which I find fascinating. In his second year, Harry was worried about the similarities between them. Both half-bloods, orphans, raised by Muggles, they both considered Hogwarts their first real home. I feel like they would have really understood each other in other circumstances. They would have been friends. Because one of their key differences is that Harry found friends and adults that loved him while Tom was probably bullied and, y'know, the whole Dumbledore thing.

Not to mention that Harry would die for everyone whereas Tom would kill everyone. They're insane in their own way. I love their similarities and differences, but more than anything else, I love when they're together. The fanfics and fanarts are awesome.

And the whole thing of being enemies feels quite gay sometimes klafjdlskfja. Harry can't help but think Tom is handsome and, despite everything Voldemort did, Harry wanted to give him one last chance to show remorse. I have no doubt Harry is crazy enough to actually forgive him.

I've thought about Tomione and I've come to the conclusion that I don't like it. pinktom has a really good post about it and I agree with it. Besides, Hermione liked Ron and had something with Krum, and they're nothing like Tom. Just because she's heterosexual doesn't mean she's attracted to any man, y'know? klajdlfkdjs I don't think they would have been a couple in the books, no matter the direction. If it's the dynamic you like, have you thought about Tomarry? More believable, more intense, and a wider range of wholesomeness to fucked up in the fics. It's really interesting. Unless you don't like men being together? Hmm? Suspicious (just kidding. To each their own. So no need to go to other people's asks to try to change their minds :kek:).

Also Harry is my favorite character and he's not replaceable. I kinda don't care about any other character tbh. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

[jupiters-galaxy]

I've seen some people criticize how quickly Peter and Steph fell for each other (to the point of being the thing they treasure most), and while I do understand some of the criticism, I think there are a few key things that some people aren't picking up on.

-Treasuring each other IS NOT strictly romantic. While it's true that Peter is in love with Steph, and Steph with Peter, it goes deeper than their repressed love story. They ARE friends. They do genuinely like spending time together, although their connection is relatively new. They care about each other as people first; neither of them seem like they NEED to be in a relationship with the other. They seek each other out even when they're just friends.

-It's also important to remember that the lords in black only want treasured things in the metaphorical sense: they can't give up OBJECTS. It presumably has to be a person or a concept.

-It's important to remember that both of them have been through an unbelieveable ordeal. Peter's closest friends were murdered. Stephanie lost her DAD, and although they weren't close, that can't have been easy to stomach. I cannot stress this enough; Peter and Steph quite literally have no one else left. Peter has no other friends. It logically tracks for him to be attached to Stephanie, as she is someone who experienced the same traumas as him. From Stephanie's angle, she doesn't really like her friends, and since objects are out of the question, Peter is the only person who she feels truly knows her. He's really the only option for her, even if her feelings are confusing.

-I also want to point out that you can really kind of feel them falling for each other, although it is admittedly subtext. Peter is weak to Steph as early as the opening number. He does out of character things to make her happy; a compliment from her makes his day amazing; he faces his biggest fear in hopes of seeing her at Pasqualli's. Stephanie cares for him from the first day they meet, although her care is a lot more ambiguous. She teases him about how he's into her, but at the same time, she's protective of him, feeling horrible that he got beat up and wanting to stop it. Even beyond that, she's inclusive towards him, inviting him to hang out with her simply because she likes his company. Her attraction to him makes sense: we know that Steph has a thing for funny and smart guys, and Peter's geeky snarkiness ABSOLUTELY fits. Their relationship is one that just makes a lot of sense!

-Their relationship is actually portrayed really realistically near the end. They're not intense about their love, nor are they overtly sexual. In NPMD, they don't even kiss! The furthest they go is dancing close together and having conversations, cautiously stepping into a new relationship that they mutually want. Despite the heavy nature of their confessions in As Cool As I Think I Am (Reprise), the payoff is not drastic. The confessions were likely only so heavy because they both thought Peter was about to die. Of course he would go out detailing how he loves her, and of course she would say it back; their last memories together should be good ones. When faced with normalcy, they progress as most teens would.

-At the end of the day, they're two traumatized teenagers who already liked each other before the trauma. It makes sense that they feel like the other is the most important to them; after all, Grace is the only other survivor from their group, and they're thinking about her in a less than favorable way past Richie's death, if not sooner than that.

This is not to say they're perfect, but I think their portrayal was really sweet and a joy to watch. I think the implications are extremely interesting idk!! I love Peter and Steph, I think they're more nuanced than they're getting credit for. I love to see cringefail nerds getting badass and amazing girlfriends, let me have this!!!!!

Anyways yeah that's my hot take. One of many. NPMD is consuming me someone help

[callmefloryy]

Okay I just finished chapter 5 and I have some opinions about it so obviously there will be spoilers down below

FIRSTLY I like the chapter because it gives more into the dynamic of Hades, about how the characters interact with each other and everything

But there's one thing that I'm a bit icky about is that the characters in Hades don't care/ actually hurt the MC and the MC not really taking it to heart(even tho it's kinda a big deal because they could've died but eh I guess)

Don't get me wrong, I think this is actually good writing because they stuck with the concept of Hades being a country where it's people have no trust for each other or other devils from other countries, and doesn't make them all fall in love with the MC in first sight

BUT their actions and words actually hurt if you think about it from MCs perspective, barbatos poisoning them even though he's the only person to be nice to them in the early chapters and Leviathan basically saying minhyeok and MC deserved to die at Gabriel's hand because they were too weak (I am aware that he said so to spite them to fuel his kink or whatever but I personally think it has crossed the line for MC), but MC just forgives and forget if the character is "hot and sexy"

(I'm only saying this because I actually really like all Hades characters from their conversation in chats, but I can't see them as I used to now because I really started to not trust them lmao, and I used to dislike Bimet but suddenly I like him now after this chapter)

AND WHAT IM BASICALLY SAYING IS this is such good angst material if the MC absolutely distrust the Hades characters, like they're genuinely afraid of them because they tried to kill them multiple times and even almost succeeding (but Leviathan seems to like it when people distrust him?? Idk if it's just a kink or he genuinely wants people to hate him) AND I WISH THAT THE MAIN STORIES WILL TELL US HOW THEY GAIN THE MCS TRUST BACK and don't just gloss over what they did like it's no big deal

[harrowharkwife]

for the character meme: dulcie or cam or pal or a character of ur choosing!!! hehe

!!!!! ty lem!! im gonna do my girl dulcie...

favorite thing about them: honestly just the way she's written- it never fails to make me emotional that she *is* explicitly written as being brave and strong, but tamsyn neatly sidesteps the "inspiration porn" ableist stereotype of writing a character as being brave/strong *because* they are sick. dulcie isn't brave or strong because of her illness. her strength and bravery are explicitly positioned, IMO, as being in response to surviving *ableism* and other people's condescension towards her and mistreatment of her, rather than surviving her illness itself, if that makes sense. her health is just a fact of her life, it's not moralized. which i really, really appreciate. it's a small shift, but it's very meaningful to me.

ALSO deeply special to me: her intentional and careful commitment to boundaries re: The Palamedes Of It All. a refreshing change of pace, as far as these books go vgjtjxdjt

least favorite thing about them: i mean. houser. :/

favorite line: three way tie between "truly, wonderful news for my haters," "i am sick of roses and horny for revenge," and "oops, there i go again, never doing what i'm told"

brOTP: gideon!!!!! i think it's a crying shame they've never met. i think they'd get along tremendously. the whole cytherea gideon thing was Horrid and Awful in so many ways, but it always Extra stings (in an adding-insult-to-injury sort of way) when i think about what it would have been like if gideon had REALLY met dulcinea, and not cyth. dulcie would've been a great friend for her, i think. they'd have been so good at making each other laugh

OTP: honestly these days it's cam? @ palamedes ily but get outta here gayboy it's yuri time now. plus i just love chewing on the concept of cam + comphet, and cam + subconscious internalized misogyny, and cam + gender, and cam + her relationships and interactions with other women. i think there's lots to explore there. camdulcie has a certain "when i was eight i didn't realize i had a crush on the new girl in my grade so i just wrote her a note that said 'get out of my school'" energy about it, To Me

nOTP: idk if i really have one for her, specifically? idk. ianthe or something, fuck it.

random headcanon: stoner. on all levels except physical she is taking fuckall huge bong rips. on the physical level though her lungs suck so i think she'd be a tincture girlie. she's got chronic pain she deserves it. am i projecting? you tell me

unpopular opinion: idk if this is an unpopular opinion exactly, but i always see people referring to thee rejected proposal as being something born primarily out of love/out of romantic intent? and i don't know if that's necessarily how i see it. it was CERTAINLY, and obviously, a factor. but at least from my interpretation of pal's monologue to cytherea at the end there, i get the sense that he had already accepted her boundaries in that regard, because he says he "understood that he was a child." and we also get camilla saying that his motivations in proposing were primarily a means-to-an-end way of getting her off the seventh and letting her die with dignity. iirc her exact words were like "so she could spend what time she had left with people who cared about her." like, don't get me wrong, i think pal is lying to himself if he says that being in love with dulcie wasn't PART of the motivation there. but i find it a lot more interesting in a worldbuilding and social commentary way to interpret the circumstances there as him offering, essentially, to be a hospice doctor at age 19, and marriage being the 'easiest' way to get her off the seventh/planet medical malpractice. there's an imperial misogyny ownership-through-marriage throughline there that's nauseating, as well as the implications re: disability and agency and autonomy, and i think that's all very interesting to explore. i think this view is supported in part by the paldulcie interaction in TUG, where she alludes to the idea that she was cognizant about the impact that bearing witness to death and loss up-close and personal like that changes a person, and that she didn't want to do that to pal and cam, especially given their age. i think it informa dulcie's character and grants her additional narrative agency to look at things from that angle, of her "no" being in reference to *both* the age gap AND her intentional choice to continue suffering on the seventh, rather than put two kids through being hospice caregivers and/or widowers at nineteen– no matter how many times and how sincerely they kept offering, no matter that she would've absolutely had a more peaceful and comfortable end-of-life HAD she accepted his proposal and gone to the sixth to die. i think it says a lot about her as a person, that choice. there's a quiet and meaningful responsibility to her as a person that i find fascinating. and her character is just sooooo firmly rooted in and informed by disability politics, on every level, and i feel like people don't engage with that aspect of her characterization enough!

song i associate with them: ooooh SO many, i have a whole playlist. but i think the biggest ones are

-the drama by kesha ("friday night, get too high, keep checking my pulse, am i dead yet?" / "in the next life i wanna come back, as a housecat as a housecat! i'd sleep and play in the sun, i'd be a fuckin' cute son of a gun!")

-avant gardener by courtney barnett (the whole song really, but especially the lines "the paramedic thinks i'm clever cause i play guitar, i think she's clever cause she stops people dyin'," and "i take a hit off an asthma puffer, i do it wrong, i was never good at smokin' bongs." i just think she'd love this song.)

-honorable mentions include stoned at the nail salon by lorde, life according to raechel by madison cunningham, rose-colored boy by paramore (@ palamedes, lmfao), picture me better by weyes blood, extraordinary machine by fiona apple, rubberband girl by kate bush, last words of a shooting star by mitski.

favorite picture of them: oh man well it obviously has to be my icon... art made for me by the lovely @franzias-cave !!!! based on the concept of "the woman is dying, please do her the decency of allowing her to look the part in fanart." my girl... she's a malign fairy, she's a hot-eyed wraith <3

ty lem this was so fun! i love my gworl :')

[marley-manson]

Ask game! Trapper, 2, 5, 12!

Thank you!

2. Favorite canon thing about this character?

As a Hawkeye fan first, it's how ride or die he is for Hawkeye. Love him laughing at Hawkeye's jokes, trying to reel him in for his own good in his more manic episodes but still fully supporting his goals and maintaining solidarity (eg Adam's Ribs, House Arrest), and as Hawkeye says, being open and honest and able to be leaned on <3

5. What’s the first song that comes to mind when you think about them?

Now that I've vidded it, it's It Never Happened - The National.

12. What’s a headcanon you have for this character?

It's a little hard to make it work with that one single line in GFA lol, but it's not impossible, so I really like the idea that he's been corresponding with Hawkeye occasionally offscreen throughout seasons 4-11, and Hawkeye was just being characteristically overdramatic when he whined about the note again in GFA.

(I don't care either way if he went totally no contact after, if he thought Hawkeye was dead, etc, all fine and interesting in their own ways. But I like the idea of them writing each other offscreen.)

Idk if this is a headcanon or a proper interpretation since it's based on a couple of lines here and there that seem to imply it, but I also think he's an ex-catholic (canon) atheist who hates his parents and is pretty much entirely estranged from them. And part of what drew him to Hawkeye was how easily Hawkeye rebels against authority, something Trapper admires.

ask meme

[akatsuki-shin]

"If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking"

Sunday's heart is already broken since long ago 😔

Okay, I know I'm probably biased here because he's one of my favorite characters in Penacony but 2.2 ending really left me with a bitter taste, especially after that extra quest with Robin. 😔

People's first impression of these siblings was probably "Robin is the pure and naive one; Sunday is the perceptive and cunning one."

But after finishing the main story, I am personally more inclined to believe that Sunday is actually the pure and naive one instead of his younger sister.

The siblings were born in a disaster-torn world, so they promised each other that they would create a paradise free of suffering.

Robin pursued this dream by looking at reality straight in the eyes and pushed on ahead to the best of her ability, often with no regards for herself. She was the free bird fated to soar high in the sky, never to be placed in a cage.

Sunday was the bird who longed for the sky but was trapped in a cage. He desperately tried to build the paradise he and Robin promised to make but in the process, he was crushed by the weight of reality and responsibility, so much that he ended up thinking living in a cage was the better choice.

He tried to help others by doing things he thought was the best, but no matter what choice he made, it never ended up right.

The little bird they rescued ended up crashing to the ground and died, but had he chose to build it a nest in the open, it would still die a painful death due to the predators in the vicinity.

The stowaway he tried to save ended up lying about his misery and turned out to be a bad guy who used pity to gain sympathy, but had he chose not to save him, the guy would die from delirium because he entered the Dreamscape through unconventional means.

He told Robin to become a star so she could spread happiness to the world but she was almost killed when visiting a war-torn world to help the people there. But had he not allowed her to go, wouldn't he be hindering her from achieving her dream?

Idk how many choices like this that he had been faced in his whole life, how long he had been conflicted over this until he was finally broken enough to conclude that "paradise is to let everyone live in a happy dream, away from the painful reality" while he alone stays in that reality to make sure the dream stays "happy."

Literally his goal was to make everyday a Sunday so that people don't have to wake up and go to work on Monday. :'))

Tbh, at this point, I no longer care if he's going to be playable or not, I just hope we'll see him alive and well in the next patch.

Give me back my chicken wing boy 😭😭😭

[atla-confessions]

Hi, it's the Rozin anon. Crawled out from my w40k obsession back into my ATLA phase because of Roku's novel. I love that little twerp, what can I say to justify myself? (Sozin too, mwah *throws him into a blender*)

Came here to complain again. Shocker, I know. And I think I figured out why so little people actually took Rozin seriously and haven't reduced into a fandom joke, like 90% of the fandom did. It's because ATLA fans don't see Roku (and Sozin) as characters of their own too. They don't take them seriously and even had shown their clear dislike for the characters. It's understandable in Sozin's case. A bad guy, an imperialist, a traitor, a closeted bigot. But I, to this day, had never understood the hate surrounding Roku.

Seriously, what did this guy do? Left Sozin alone after threatening him? Killing Sozin would've brought disastrous consequences, because he is a fire lord who, presumably, has already earned nation's loyalty to him. Killing him would've caused so much pain in the ass to the future avatars as well. Besides, this is literally exactly what everyone's beloved Kyoshi did with her fire lord problem. "But Chin the-!" She literally didn't do anything until he came to her land. How many people had Chin's army killed before she stepped in? How many villages and towns had he pillaged before she stepped in? I know the avatar is a human and literally can't be an omnipresent beacon of justice, stopping evil no matter where it is, but... Come on, girl! Also, I don't care what you say, but, that's not murder. I played Ace Attorney, I can prove Kyoshi's innocence whatever she likes it/agrees with me or not.

The volcano death? Volcanoes are fucking terrifying, man! The Yellowstone Volcanoes used to give me NIGHTMARES when I was a kid. Often times, the lava is not even the worst part. The ash fall, which would lead to food shortage and therefore massive famine, the lava coming into contact with water producing toxic gases, the area being a hell on Earth in the foreseeable future, the earthquakes, the tsunamis! And Roku had to keep track of ALL OF THOSE THINGS AT THE SAME TIME. Even if people were already on the boats, they could still had been hit by a massive wave generated by another eruption. "But Aang-!" His volcano was on land and a bit smaller. Also he had to deal with only one. Roku had to deal with two at same time, that were in the close proximity with each other, all on the same small island. No wonder Sozin came to help.

And, okay. All of the points I mentioned had already been brought up by other people when defending Roku. But, now we finally have the Roku centric novels! Yay! Finally, Roku fans won't have to read dumb shit being said about their favorite charact-

Aaaaaand people are now freaking out over the leaks! I'm not going to spoil anything here, but just... Guys... Can we PLEASE not gatekeep fucking BENDING??? Your fave won't die or become irrelevant just because another character can do what they can. Maybe focus on something actually unique and important of theirs, like, idk, their personality??? Their relationship with other characters??? How pretty/sexy they are??

Anyway, I'm pissed off and now I'll go and draw young Roku in a cow print bikini. Femboy Roku agenda, idc anymore, I'm anon, what are you gonna do to me?

X

[randomnameless]

Genuine question, not trying to start a fight, why do you get so upset about gods and churches being presented in a negative light in fictional works?

No pbs!

I guess it's a mix of being too common, too forced and having, in general, the cast use common tropish arguments to fight /defeat them.

I rant a lot about this game, but take TS where we have three sort of factions opposing each other, and each are supposed to suck. Who is the faction who never receives any "positive traits" or "pet the dog" moment?

The game force fed us a scene where an Aesfroti soldier - when Aesfrost is depicted as a highly militarised nation with a cult of personality towards their current ruler, that invaded the protag's home and slaughtered several civilians and NPCs in the process - say goodbye to his wife and kids before going to "war" to defend his land against, well, the protags who are invading it to kill their warmongering leader.

As force-fed as this scene was, it, I believe at least, tried to tell us that even the Aesfrosti who pillaged villages and killed their inhabitants are humans, and care about their loved ones, sure it's corny, but it's all about not deshumanising any party.

When we attack Hyzante? Niet, zilch, nothing. No similar scene where random soldiers, or NPCs, worry about what is going on and if they're going to die when their wall has been breached. They just, don't exist in this context.

I think the cherry on the cake is the Golden Route scene, where, apparently, nationalists Aesfrosti decide to turn back against their ultra charismatic leader because, uh, he "lied" when he declared the war and used a false pretense, so the soldiers and people who were butchering babies and invading a city where people were preparing a marriage apparently now have morals and rebel.

There's no similar scene for Hyzante when the cast reveals that the teachings of their Goddess were made up and salt wasn't exclusively given to them by divine intervention, because rock salt exists everywhere. Sure it would be a bit weird and forced that people thinking they're chosen ones and looking down on everyone else suddenly, hm, don't break down when their entire system of belief is shattered, but hey, if the Aesfrostian Gregor can have morals after washing his hands of all this Glenbrookian blood, why shouldn't religious npc #55 not make the same heel face turn?

And then, we have the slavery/human experimentation plot - in general, when TS tries to give nuance, they more or less explain/justify why something that "sucks" is done, it's basically Silvio's character.

Aesfrost' Gustadolph manages to push his "freedom" mentality because his land is a harsh place where people are desperate to survive, salt smuggling is reprehensible, but it's the only way to give some to the ones who cannot afford it. Of course is everyone is free, no one is because, as Gustadolph puts it, they're basically free to die for his ambitions.

Hyzante? Follows a racist creed where Rozellians have to pay for some great sin, and are slaved away in a lake to recover salt until they die. It's, later, justified by Hyzante wanting to keep its salt monopoly else they don't have anything, and wanting to curb down the Rozelle people because they know about the exitence of rock salt (and I guess getting free workers to harvest salt from the lake + having state enemies make his own population docile/not willing to rebel ?).

And then, we have the human experimentations, that are just done for, uhh, Idore's lol. When Hyzante is known for its "advanced medicine" and we could have had the usual dilemna of, idk, having those humans experimentations used to develop this medicine that is reknown in the world (idk, sacrificing a Rozellian to save someone else's life?) - it's not the angle the devs picked. Rozellians are sacrificed to power up an idol, Idore wants to control the world through his idol and soft power (compared to Gustadolph's hard power) and manipulates his people (just like Gustadolph) to do so.

The two are very similar, but who is the final boss? Complete with a transformation in an eldritch monster? The war-mongering imperialist or the jaded old man who is leading de facto a religion?

Hopefully there's the entire "human experimentations for no other purpose than the lols" to settle them apart.

---

I recently watched Dune, and even if I have some issues with the adaptation, the Bene Gesserit isn't portrayed as "comically" evil-er than the Harkonen Empire, I reckon the comparison isn't adequate, because Dune is multi book series when I'm mostly talking about video games.

Symphonia's church of Martel is a font for the Big Bad (tm) to put in motion his nefarious plans, and yet, through the game, we see how random clergymen use their, uh, religious buildings to help people around. Ultimately Martel herself is reincarnated through plot device and tells the big bad to stop being an ass and the story is less about "church and gods evil" but "big bad distorts Martel/church's teachings and role for his plans because he has a tragic backstory"

(but then Symphonia ends with the biggest whitewashing from every Tales I've played for its big bad so I'll stop talking about it because otherwise I'm going to be salty).

Abyss' church is more or less the same thing - the Church is supposed to help people deal with the fact their verse has "predestination stones" where the future is already written, and in the course of the game, we see how it has several factions and one opposes the group (who has the pope as a NPC!) - but it's not a story about "gods bad church BaD".

I remember playing Suikoden Tierkreis a long time ago, and while the game seemed to go through familiar "church bad gods bad" route and we end with defeating a god-like entity... I pretty much loved the twist that, in a game that relied on alternate dimensions/universe, the god-like entity was actually the protag if he made different choices!

In those games, if you fight a religious body and someone pretending to be a God or what not - it's not because people fight against an eldritch creature who wants world domination and to erase puny insects, or is the reason why everything goes wrong, but because, at the end, the conflict/fight is ultimately caused by someone, generally a human or at least a non "god like" entity, wanting to destroy the world.

I don't remember if FE was my first JRPG series or not, but I always liked the idea that if the world is doomed in those games and the heroes must prevent said doom, it's not because a god-like being wants to destroy the world, but because people, humans/randoms are the most shitty ones out there.

---

As for the "tropes" often used to deride fictional churchs and religious people, well, I will again point to TS - which did a splendid job in the Benedict Route where you smash Hyzante after allying with Aesfrost.

There's one battle where out protags diss Hyzantese because they worship a goddess and have no free will, listening to Her teachings and Her says (the traditional "religious people have no free will and listen to their churches who tell them how to think!") - which is immediately countered by one of those Hyzantese characters asking Serenor if he's not the same, but instead of blindly listening to a Goddess, blindly follows Benedict. And it ends with the final chapter title referencing automatons/puppets : who is that title talking about ? The fake "idol" Idore created, or the fake "king" Benedict created?

Anyways, the usual "religions people have no free will because their church/religion tells them how to think" trope reeks of r/atheism and the double standard - bar in this route of TS, but I guess, in TS itself in the Roland route! - is never called out, blindly following a charismatic leader is okay, as long as charismatic leader isn't religious?

Regardless of my IRL thoughts about religion, usually those tropes are presented as a "gotcha!" when they are... not at all, but the games/books leave it at that and we're supposed to roll with it.

I'd say it's lazy writing or, as we saw in Naruto, a quick way to end a story without having to dwelve in characters and their motivations : "you're a god/alien/other being and you're bad, so let us do what we want!" - end of the story.

Hopefully some fillers and to an extent, Boruto gave her more meat bar being the 11 hour villain we had to defeat quick and who manipulated the previous sad'n'lonely antagonists - but it still felt rich from Naruto, known for his famous "talk no jutsu" and trying to understand people he's fighting against, to drop the ball with Kaguya, calling her pure malice and ending with some "let us live the way we want" to wrap up the plot so he can wrestle with his boyfriend later on.

In the end, we often end up with "religion bad bcs the big bad manipulates people through it", as if those mangas/animes/vg never have other examples of charismatic people not using religion to manipulate their randoms/people or "gods bad they should let humans do what they want" when we've read/seen/played through various, uh, really fucked-up shit humans did - but on their own! and ultimately, but it's more in fandom spaces, with have Projection 101.

TLDR : church/religion/gods are too often used in those works as the ultimate scapegoat to either wrap up a story in a rushed ending or to pretend to have "nuance" but still have a common enemy where all the "nuanced" characters can grow/be whitewashed and side together against that "common enemy".

Just like in all things I guess, I prefer when something isn't painted as purely negative and all of the positive traits are erased because there is a need for a perfect scapegoat - sure, bring out too much "nuance" and writing/designing a game/manga/anime becomes harder because there's no "clear cut" antagonist, and yet, the one who always gets fucked in this scenario is the religious/church side.

Want a generic stock villain who will destroy the world so the heroes have to fight against them? Just create a "religion" in your setting, and have the big bad either hell bent on resurrecting Chtullu to destroy the world because Chtullu BaD, or have them be the most corrupt piece of shit who manipulate everything in the shadows, so the rest of the world, even the ones who slaughter others bcs they feel like they must start a war, can be whitewashed at the end.

I mean, there's a saying about diverting attention from a fire by starting a bigger one near, or a trope of "aliens made them do it" : who cares if Madara started a continental war and targeted a village full of random civilians he swore to protect because he lost the elections? Did y'know he was manipulated by a woman, I mean, an eldritch thing created by a woman, regarded as a God, who ultimately wanted to get out of her fridge to kill everyone?

Roland must get over his hatred for Aesfrost for barging in his kindgom and killing hundred of his people while they were preparing for a wedding, because hey, Idore is evil and plans on ruling the world through his sham religion!

I'll forever be salty at TS for not giving Kamsell the occasion to rise against Idore, or not even have minor NPCs get the same treatment as Sycras suddenly going all "u lied to me gustadolph so i won't listen to u anymore + sad goodbyes to my wife'n'kids".

Extremism of all kinds can lead to wars/tragedy/fucked up shit - Sure I don't want to get my History lessons in video game medium when I play lol, but what I really don't like is how it feels like depicting "they're extremists because they're religious" feels like the default/easy answer : want a bunch of brainwashed people the heroes must fight against and can't talk no justu their way out of this fight/will fight without looking too BaD? Depict those people as "misguided" members of a corrupt church/believers of a religion, no one will givea fig. If they are instead supporters of a charismatic leader who throws them through the meatgrinder to further their goals? Well, there's no automatic loyalty so either you have to show/depict it on screen, else it can be challenged at key points to demonstrate how those people - who follow the charismatic leader - aren't completely "mindlessly listening to their leader" or how their leader "isn't that bad after all".

[daisychainsandbowties]

Idk, I just don't see Shin being 30 years old??? Ivanna Sakhno is 25, & Shin gives off even younger vibes. If she's in her early or mid 20s, she still would've been a kid during the height of the Empire & a teen when it collapsed, so there's plenty of angsty backstory to mine. Though as far as how an age gap plays out with Wolfwren... well, older women are sexy, yes? ;)

see this is the thing about characters who don’t get to have a childhood. i’m obsessed with the idea that shin hati is in her twenties, somewhere, but she behaves like a much younger person. part of it is the darkside, how it drives you and you end up lacking the composure of most jedi. how the spitting bright anger makes shin so violently luminous, untethered and lost and therefore childish.

because, in the same vein i think that sabine doesn’t feel settled into her life. there she stands, at the end of a war that really wasn’t supposed to end before she did. rebels all little self-sacrificial lambs who don’t know how to exist when they’re not clawing for every breath of air.

everything sabine cared, fought for, for has shattered around her. she won and lost it all.

her best friend is gone, things with ketsu are too complicated, always too many sharp edges for her to hold. and she’s just… stuck. watches her family die on mandalore and then loses her one chance at being something - a jedi, because she is no longer a rebel. not a traitor to her people but still not truly mandilorian. sabine with her boxes of keepsakes, her mother’s hairpin, the pain of death clutched to her chest and that promise she made to ezra to find him again. rotting inside her.

and i picture shin having been made a padawan around the same age as anakin skywalker. both of them too old too broken for it but. nowhere else to go. chosen to be better, stronger. beaten into the shape of destiny, ambition, want want want want

shin rescued, made important, but it was already too late for her not to be scarred by her life and yeah. for sure it can’t have been good, or soft, or safe. you don’t hand a kyber crystal to a child and watch her turn it red unless she’s seen and experienced terrible things.

but i also imagine that she was isolated in those years with baylan - it’s why she’s so taken with sabine!! because here is an equal to her, finally. it’s why she’s at first so smug and then so angry about winning. this blunt creature is the padawan of ahsoka tano?? how dare she be? so like, why not have her be late twenties and just messy messy messy? same as sabine who just… never was a child. first a soldier a weaponsmith and then at FOURTEEN she was a traitor, she watched her weapon kill her own people and she ran, became a bounty hunter. sabine who is young because when you lose your childhood you claw it back in later days. you never escape from the wreckage.

it really speaks to me, actually; they’re the same sort of thing that always washes up in the wake of a war. children who only know rubble and blood and hunger and death. they’re reflections of each other and also so different. shin who just wants to belong to something and sabine who knows that belonging doesn’t save you.

[esther-dot]

Idk how to explain it in better terms but the fact that Jaime focuses more on wanting to be perceived as good than actually doing good is a huge turn off for me and the reason why I don't believe grrm is writing a redemption arc for him.

So, here's a definition of redemption arc,

What exactly is a Redemption Arc? It's a type of character development in which your protagonist starts bad and becomes good in the end, often culminating in a heroic act that atones for their past

And I agree with you. His story won't fit the above. Jaime is bitter that doing the right thing is viewed the way it is by Westeros, and we can understand why he's angry, but I haven't seen any genuine regret about trying to kill Bran, for example, and kid killing is a big no-no, so imo, the flow of the story hasn't been to move Jaime from morally bad to morally good the way that expression implies.

In fact, in AFFC, he's talking about how he would have killed Arya and threatens to trebuchet a baby. When we have Ned's horror over Elia and her kids' deaths, over how the Hound murdered Mycah, his refusal to participate in the assassination of Dany, and his decision to risk his life/jeopardize his family by committing treason to protect Jon, I think we know Martin hasn't moved Jaime over into his "good" column. Our perception of his infamous act evolves, but that's not the same thing as Jaime changing.

What I think is so often perceived as a redemption arc is merely that Martin engaged our sympathy for Jaime later in the series and fans equate understanding/caring for a character with moving them into the "good" category rather than accepting that Martin routinely does this. The Hound, Tyrion, Theon...he calls them all villains, but at one point or another, we get tragedy and suffering in their lives That leads fans to conclude that the Hound and Tyrion are actually decent people, when by any objective standards, they aren't. The point isn't to move them from villain to hero, it's to offer believable explanations for why they are who they are, do what they do, and make them dynamic characters. Embracing the idea that good and bad impulses can exist in the same person, that the same person can be brave and kind as well as murderous and cruel, that's not too big of an ask. And imo, it's a shame fans want to use one to negate the other.

Even Jaime killing Aerys which kinda seems heroic is shaded by not only his greater loyalty to his family, but his own feelings about Aerys, and part of his memory is how he stood by while Aerys committed other cruel acts. In killing Aerys, he saved countless people, familial loyalty or no, it was the right thing to do, but we have all the rest of the series showing us, doing what is right really isn't of the utmost concern to Jaime. His loyalty is to his family of origin, he has an obsession with Cersei, and doesn't even seem to care much for his own children which again, I think indicates that as layered as he becomes with each new book, it's a misread to settle on the idea of redemption/good guy.

Fans think he's gonna kill Cersei as that final redemptive act, but to me that feels like looking at things from a Cersei hater perspective, not Jaime's. The man has been written as rather, disinterested in acting on a right/wrong spectrum, and is generally more concerned with family, it seems a little unreasonable to think a suitable ending for him is to reject that because how would such a man continue? He needs peace with his decisions, what he does has to flow from the essence of who he is, so it seems more likely to me that his end is dying with Cersei. That isn't redemption in the eyes of the fandom, but I think it could very well be redemption for himself. He has that nightmare about Rhaegar blaming him for Elia and the children's deaths, his own children may all die, there is nothing he can do about that, but going to their mother, the person he was faithful to his entire life, who is essentially his life partner/wife, it allows him to be truly loyal when all others think him faithless, and as annoying as some will find it, I think it gives him his own form of honor.

I wrote once about thinking he would die with Cersei:

I'm ok with Jaime deciding his fate is to be with Cersei, in birth, in life, even in death. As I thought it worked in the show, returning to Cersei in the books will likewise mean he is able to have some self-respect. I don't think you can read his, I mean, I would say Cersei obsession and believe he'd ever have any peace of mind if she died alone while he had to go on living. (link)

In that post I linked to meta about that and a great write-up on Jaime that I think you'll enjoy!

[serialadoptersbracket]

Round 4, Match 5: Shōta Aizawa vs. The Fix

Submitted kids:

Shōta Aizawa: Class 1-A, minus Mineta, plus Shinsou Hitoshi (total of 20 kids). Mainly Eri, Shinsou, and Midoriya

The Fix: Conrad Schintz, and then he adopted like, an whole orphanage, named Madam Loathings home for wayward interests

Propaganda under the cut! (Spoilers ahead!)

Shōta Aizawa:

1. “This grumpy teacher pretends not to care about his students, sleeps during his own classes and why talk when you can also make annoying children silent by (harmless) force? Yet he loves them and they love him while he doesn't show it all that often.”

2. “He didn't mean to adopt them yet he did and he is grumpy about it. If he goes "those are my kids, damn it" it's not to someone else, it's to himself, with the damn it being a "fuck, why". Yet he is so 100% willing to risk his life for them. Because they *are* his kids now.”

3. “Idk the man is so tired what can I say. Harsh as australias wildlife but bc he doesn’t want them to actually die in the field so he’s trying to make them give up on signing up to risk your lives every day. I just submitted kiryu and I think that kiryu, bruce, and aizawa are soul sisters. They are all very special to me”

4. “Oh he tries so hard to stay scary and detached, keeps threatening to expel students, keeps saying he hates kids, and look at him now. Missing several pieces and risked death multiple times to protect them, at least 3 classes of ~20 students each lowkey adoring him, and literally canonically (not said out loud but it's basically official come on, they live together) adopted a little girl that was found by the protagonist and saved from the mafia. Also personally took the matter in his own hands when another department's student (so not one of his) showed a desire to change course, so much that even if this kid has living and loving parents he's often Aizawa's adopted family in fanfiction.”

The Fix:

1. “Ok ok so. Spoilers for mentopolis: First some context that mentopolis is a show that takes place inside one guys brain, all the characters represent something in the brain, and the guy whos brain they are in, named Elias Hodge, is so so very sad.

Ok so, The Fix, the personification of hyper fixation, is like is someone who has spent most of his life working for people, where his job was to 'eliminate distractions' (He kills people, basically). Then one day he is told to eliminate a child. His name is Conrad Schintz (Or the Conscience, due to an accident that happened to the guys who's brain they are in when he was a child- Conrad stopped thing he was useful, aka Elias stopped using his conscience, so his conscience has not grown since the incident, leaving him a small child)

The Fix has never had to hurt a kid before, and he doesn't want to do that, so he instead goes into protecting Conrad. Conrad kind of hates himself though and also kind of thinks he deserves to die so that's not good.

The Fix gave this like, beautiful speech to Conrad once about how hes important, I wont give the whole thing but something along the lines of ""There is a butterfly who has a tail that is there for if a bird was to grab on to the tail, it would break off and the butterfly would escape. I don't think you are the tail of the butterfly, I think you are the butterfly."" (its better in the actual show). I cry. There is another speech about eagles he gives Conrad when Conrad offers himself, to basically die, but i don't remember it that well.

Other then Conrad though! So There is this orphanage, called Madama Loathings home for wayward interests. Basically its a bunch of kids that represent past interests of Elias. Its run by this women called Madam Loathing (represents Elias' self Loathing)(she is very mean to the kids). The Fix donates a lot of money to this place, and visits a lot, the kids there love him and think he is so so cool. There is this one kid named Ronnie Reptile. He loves reptiles, and The fix gives him reptile facts, its cute. In the first episode, The Fix tells Madam Loathing how any of those kids/interests could be rediscovered by Elias at any time, and madam loathing sort of taunts The Fix, sort of saying how ""Oh I'm sure I can tell the kids they will call be adopted by The Fix soon, but that would be kind of cruel, wouldn't it?"" Implying that that won't happen. (cause, The Fix is hyper fixation, and hyper fixation adopting an interest would be good, you know.).

Note that Conrad used to live at madam loathing's, because he was mis identified as just a simple interest and not Elias' whole sense of conscience, but Corad ran away with his best friend, a dog named Justin. He lived on the streets after that.

So a bit later on in the series The Fix and Conrad have to go to to madam loathing's together (and another character is with them but he isnt relevant for this). When they get there Madam Loathing asks The fix if he is here to drop of Conrad here, and The immediately is like "Absolutely not, shut the fuck up." (I think that's the direct quote). I just really like that scene.

At the end, end of the series. Some plot stuff happens. The Fix met a women named Pasha N (She represents Passon), and they are in love, The fix proposes to her, its sweet, but then madam Loathing, who got some like, character growth I won't really go into here, and she says to The Fix how, she needs to go on a trip to find herself, and then she offers the entire orphanage to The Fix and Pasha, which is accepted. So in the end of the show, The Fix has basically adopted, that entire orphanage, so thats a lot of kids, along with Pasha, but she isn't in the show as much so I wont submit them as a pair. I didnt mention it before but The Fix is known for knowing a lot of facts and saying "Did you know." before saying a fact, which a lot of the time, it is a fact that is truly terrifying but thats a lot, and The narration at the end of the shows, says how The Fix and Pasha spend their lives with kids around them, constantly saying "Did you know? Did you know?" and it is very sweet. Conrad sort of had his own ending away from The Fix, but I still head cannon that The Fix adopted him too and Conrad comes to the orphanage sometimes.”

2. “listen. i don't know if this really counts as propaganda but just saying, mr. the fix thinks you're not the tail of a swallowtail butterfly. you are the butterfly.”

[c6jpg]

natlan 5.0 brain dump

i did this in a lot of small chunks so i already forgot all of my detailed thoughts so i'm gonna try to keep it brief

general environment/exploration:

first off music and scenery is 💯💯💯

i particularly like how much wildlife there is and i really love the saurian gameplay (for me its hydro > dendro >>>> geo)

i feel so awful every time i accidentally kill a capybara they should be immune like the rhinos

it makes sense that there isn't "one huge city" like the other nations since natlan is composed of tribes, and each tribe looks like it gets a decent amount of attention, but i was still kind of disappointed by how small the stadium of the sacred flame feels in comparison for being the "main" area. i feel like they could have done a lot more with it

archon quest:

tldr; it was... not good? or at least very underwhelming? especially coming off fontaine/sumeru which had incredibly strong opening acts

act 1 was particularly like. whatever. felt more like a kachina story quest that rolled right into a mualani (but npc-focused) story quest

like for how important the pilgrimage is it just felt so. underwhelming and anticlimatic. yes yes i know kachina is precious and everyone loves her but i wish we spent less time doing kachina support group and focused more on the pilgrimage itself like can we at LEAST see some of the other playable characters participating instead of just hearing about it in passing

literally was soooooooooo fucking annoyed with the entire atea plotline. i wrote a whole rant in my first write up but basically that entire arc only existed so that they could bring back the purification plot device which WE HAVEN'T SEEN SINCE MONDSTADT

i was just incredibly annoyed with how that was all handled lol atea is also just such a non-character how am i supposed to care about her. she didn't even die in the end!!!

also mualani's tribe's whole thing being super stereotypical hawaiian tourism left a really bad taste in my mouth i wanted to get out of there as fast as possible

act 2 was weird because like. i felt like they were saying a lot of things that were like "this is a serious national crisis" but it didn't... feel that way? and a lot of the lore itself was pretty glossed over

i think a problem with the natlan story is that you need the first acts to set up the stakes but we just spent the first act gallivanting around with kachina/mualani and then when they DID get to the "main problem" in act 2 it just info dumped so hard to the point that i. didn't care?

pacing in general just felt all over the place

the only investment they gave us is through caring about kachina and i guess hating the abyss/not wanting a nation to be destroyed on principle but idk. especially with the "nah we gotta wait for the last 2 heroes first" the stakes are Not there for me

reminded me of when nahida was like "yeah i needed you to figure this out for yourself bc if i told you directly your head would explode." but at least that one was fun/could just chalk it up to nahida being cheeky and didn't like. prolong the plot for too long

SHOW US DON'T TELL US DAMN IT. i might just have recency bias but i genuinely feel like natlan might be one of the worst cases of telling and not showing as far as archon quests are concerned

also capitano's appearance felt so random LMAO he really showed up, said some cryptic shit, got his ass beat, and then left. at least the cutscene was cool?

chasca girl i'm shaking crying throwing up somebody get that girl a full pair of pants and brown contacts PLEASE

i find it interesting how detailed/fleshed out chuychu (chasca's sister) is, both in terms of design and personality/character. it kind of felt like they originally intended for her to be playable but turned her into an NPC instead

also citlali is definitely some kind of faruzan situation where she's old but young looking

night kingdom was cool i guess nothing really to say here. i am very interested in the wayob lore though especially in regards to how it ties into the rest of teyvat/why natlan has particularly weak leylines

i feel like mavuika's younger sister might also become relevant in the future... in a bad way. like the insistence to not being forgotten/seeing mavuika again, the fact that mavuika doesn't "really" know what happened to her. also she also got a pretty unique npc model. or maybe she won't be brought up ever again idk

in general that whole reminiscence sequence with mavuika was like. fine but again you just info dumped the shit out of me i have no emotional attachment to feel anything about whats going on right now???

also we all know that was fucking ororon at the end with capitano like lmao come on. but im willing to bet both he + chasca are the last two heros bc like. who tf else do we have left LMAOOO

capitano was supposed to be cool but he's just giving goofy villain right now. sorry capitano fans they flopped so hard with him in this act

[wutheringheightsfilm]

I'm wondering how the progression of wx will look in odd geometry compared to canon (as in, they get together sooner? different dynamics?), and if/how the elemental magic is used in complementing each other. sorry this is super specific im just like. what about the wangxian 👀

HOT DOG. well :) let me crack my knuckles here this is gonna probably be a long answer!! i'll go bit by bit here...

to be honest, odd geometry is a huge divergence from canon. i have four fundamental things that change the story in absolutely huge ways, being:

elemental magic (obvi)

wei wuxian wasn't raised in lotus pier/as part of yunmeng jiang

wei wuxian doesn't die at the siege of the burial mounds thus isn't dead for 13/16 years and have to be resurrected

i have the sunshot campaign begin later than it does in canon. at the start of the story, all of the characters are slightly older; as in, i've aged all of wei wuxian's generation up to be closer to my age (most of them are in their early 20s) and adjusted their older siblings/the older generations accordingly (so, for example, jiang cheng is 20, wei wuxian is 20, and jiang yanli is 22)*

*so this means that classes at the cloud recesses still would have happened when everyone was 15, but the sunshot campaign just doesn't begin until jiang cheng, wei wuxian, and lan wangji are 20

which, it is so fun to play around with the implications of all that but it's also challenging. SO, how all of this impacts wangxian...

so just by virtue of what's going on here (namely wwx not being dead for over a decade) they definitely do get together sooner. since wei wuxian wasn't raised in lotus pier, he doesn't attend the classes at gusu when everyone in his generation were teens, he doesn't meet lan wangji until they're both 20 at the wen indoctrination camp (which through a series of events, wei wuxian gets roped into sneaking into attend).

as for their dynamics, there's layers to this!

because of how wei wuxian has grown up, there are two things: 1) his personality is not the exact same as it is in canon--how could it be, when he's grown up in such different circumstances?--however, his core traits are the same: he's still inventive, clever, and creative, he's still extremely compassionate and cares deeply about justice, especially for those who are disenfranchised, he still has an extremely strong (to the point of, at times, it being debilitating) sense of duty and a habit of putting others before himself, and being secretive and at times repressive about his emotions. he just doesn't act as...idk, childish? as he might in the show or the novel. he's a bit more grounded, a bit more serious.

because of that, i think it's maybe a bit easier for lan wangji to be more open with wei wuxian, or to accept his friendship sooner. they aren't such polar opposites as they seem in early in the show/in the novel.

2) there are slightly different class dynamics here that actually make a huge difference: wei wuxian didn't grow up in lotus pier and was not raised within polite cultivation society. no matter how much of an outcast madam yu made wei wuxian feel by trying to alienate him from her "real" family, he still was generally accepted by Society at large and was looked at and mostly treated with respect. he still gets called gongzi, and within yunmeng jiang called da-shixiong,--though, of course, coming from some people it can be read as sarcastic... i highly doubt wen chao was calling him wei-gongzi out of any sort of respect--and is overall accepted. of course, people still try to ostracize him for his status, but the cultivation world at large doesn't actively bully him much (and in all honesty, they don't really bully him at all while jiang fengmian was still alive) until he does something they don't like. apart from a few scenarios, wei wuxian wasn't given the disdain that you might expect the son of a servant to receive---honestly, i sort of wish class was talked about more in regards to mdzs and cql because it really does fascinate me. wei wuxian occupies such an interesting space within the cultivation world and i wish people discussed it more.

in my fic, though, since he wasn't raised within lotus pier and was never brought into the yunmeng jiang sect, he doesn't have the fallback of jiang cheng and jiang yanli being able to officially call him their brother--not yet, anyway. he doesn't have a sect leader to point to and be like, "i've been accepted by someone of experience and reown" and have the support that can come from that. he and lan wangji have been raised in very different spheres, and it changes how they interact with each other. there's an extra layer of formality that they now have to chip through. it's no longer lan wangji being extra formal towards someone of exactly equal standing towards him, there's now an extra layer that they have to reckon with. of course, wei wuxian is still lan wangji's equal in every way that matters--they are still the same age, they are still both incredibly talented with their areas of cultivation and respective fighting styles, they both have a mutual respect (and eventually love) for each other etc etc, they just don't belong to the same circles of society and this has to be dealt with.

of course, when the sunshot campaign is over and wei wuxian will have assisted the rebellion against the wens in winning, his status changes. he will be respected, if not feared, because eventually the cultivation world will figure out what he's able to do and fear it being used against them.

which brings us to their elemental magic and how that affects their dynamic as well !! AHHH!!!

so, wei wuxian can control qi (i can clarify any questions you or anyone else might have about this if needed) and lan wangji's affinity is water. at the beginning of the story, wei wuxian pretends to also have an affinity with water, and claims he heals with it--this backfires on him hard during xuanwu cave, when he has to heal lan wangji's broken leg and obviously, as someone with an affinity for water, lan wangji would know what healing someone using water is like and this is not it.

ultimately, wei wuxian is a healer. that is his favorite thing to do, it is what he prefers to do---despite having the powers he does (which, for a while, even he doesn't fully understand), and the demonic cultivation he will be able to do, he doesn't actually enjoy using his qi controlling abilities negatively on people much. he will do it if he has to, and will definitely enjoy using it to enact revenge on people who deserve it, but at the end of the day, he just wants to help and heal people.

i honestly think this suits lan wangji's temperament quite nicely--they would make a very good team, what with lan wangji's habit of going "wherever the chaos is" and helping people out with resentful spirits and night hunts.

even in the original odd geometry from 5 years ago, they were never opposing elements--though that would certainly be interesting LMAO!!!

as a reward for getting thru all of that... i shall leave you with... A SNIPPET <3

(from chapter 5, time is the movement of grief. context: this is at lotus pier, post xuanwu cave) He looked up, and saw Lan Wangji. Wei Wuxian moved over on the dock to make room for him to sit, which he did, cross-legged so he wouldn’t get wet. They sat in comfortable silence for a while, listening to the crickets. The golden light of the setting sun made Lan Wangji look devastatingly beautiful. It took Wei Wuxian’s breath away. When Lan Wangji turned his head and met Wei Wuxian’s eyes, there was nothing Wei Wuxian wanted to do more than kiss him in that moment. It was a startling thought. He looked away as calmly as he could. 

THANK YOU FOR ASKING COR I REALLY LOVED ANSWERING THIS!!!!!

[lazaruspiss]

sladedicktalia??????? i am LISTENING

there's like. 5 fics. im so starved. i think theyre so hot and funny together!! im obsessed. also this got long so im adding a readmore. whoops.

SlaDick: classic enemies to lovers. they may try to kill each other half the time but they respect each other more than anyone else. OBSESSED with each other, Slade knows he's weird about Dick and couldn't care less but Dick is so in denial about it. they could both give explicit consent but be so antagonistic about it that it becomes unclear if "yes i want to have sex with you" is actually code for "die right now" and i think that's beautiful.

SladeTalia: they fucked! in canon! there was some bullshit plotline where Talia tried to give Slade Damian and pretend he was his son instead! ex fuck buddies who show up just to make each other's lives harder bc they wanna fuck so bad it makes them have stupid brain. also they're both hot as hell. i'm weak for big strong milf/dilf idk idk.

DickTalia: LISTEN TO ME. TALIA WOULD TREAT HIM RIGHT. THEY BOTH KNOW HOW EMOTIONALLY DEVASTATING IT IS TO LOVE BRUCE. LISTEN TO M- ok aside from that. Talia is someone who tried so hard to be good, to choose to be kind. She loved Bruce because she saw how hard he tried to do good in the world. Her character has gotten considerably colder over time, in huge part due to a certain writer writing about her despite knowing nothing about her, but in universe i try and rationalize it as a growing cynicism stemming from both her father's gradually increasing cruelty and Bruce's failure to support her or commit to her or to even just respect her. She hasn't been shown to have very many people in her life who she can really trust and be close to. She used to have a good relationship with Ra's, she used to have Bruce, she's even lost Damian at this point. She feels like such a lonely character to me. And I think Dick would be able to see that, be able to understand it better than most. He's always had people who loved him, people he could turn to, but he's also ended up perpetually isolated for one reason or another. Dick and Talia both feel to me like characters who are so lonely the further they get in their lives. I could see a silent understanding there. The kind of people who would be able to find solace in simply sharing a space with each other. Neither of them like to talk about what they've been through, I think they'd like to have someone who just gets it. Trauma for trauma, you know?

SlaDickTalia: several angles available here.

1) Dick deserves some sexy older lovers who would wine and dine him and also rail him within an inch of his life and also kill for him. i am not immune to the aesthetics!! to the allure of a hot older duo double teaming their young spitfire partner!!!

2) corruption arc. u know u wanna.

3) Dick's fear of abandonment x the 2 most devoted people on the planet. if they were dating nothing bad would happen to Dick again, Slade and Talia just wouldn't allow that. smth smth, couldn't get rid of them if he tried <3

4) Bruce would hate it and that's always fun :3 not that that's hard tho, Babs is like the only one of Dick's partners that Bruce liked and that's bc he wants to keep it in the family.

5) healing.... sobs...... esp when it comes to feelings around parenthood. Those three have shit to work out and i think having some company would help.

6) They all need more people time but 2/3 of them don't get along with anybody so they're kinda stuck with Dick. that kid will forgive anybody if u bat ur eyelashes and behave well enough. He's also more likely to still see them as people despite everything they've been through, and when you're a military experiment and a semi immortal daughter of an immortal terrorist... It can be hard to find someone who looks at you like you still have a chance at humanity.

7) Slade and Talia playing a Cat Vs Dog type game with Dick in the middle. I think it's funny.

[lemon-ren]

Okay, quick question.

Would you be interested in reading shin soukoku fan fiction? I've been in a writer's block for a while so my supernatural fic is on hold, but holy fuck does the bsd fandom lack proper slow burn 100k+ shin soukoku fics that aren't straight up smut or have smut in it and I wish to write a fic for Atsushi and Ryuunosuke, but idk if anyone is interested and now I'm rambling...

Okay so who is interested in slow burn shin soukoku multi chapter no smut and mostly story based with in character characters?

Also question: if the answer to the previous question is yes-

Options:

1. Time travel (no not the MC is a baby, but like a fix it of sorts where Aku and Atsu accidentally travel back in time)

2. Right after the 6 month deal (6 month period of Atsushi and Akutagawa being frienemies and despising themselves for falling for each other)

3. Beasts AU (based on BSD Beasts where Akutagawa and Atsushi become friends and are sort of mutually pining but both of them refuse to acknowledge it since they are on enemy sides and Akutagawa has beef with the PM)

4. AU (where Atsushi and Akutagawa end in an alternate reality (possibly created by the book) in which neither of them exist and the PM doesn't exist and ADA is not ADA, but a regular police/detective agency since abilities don't exist and Aku and Atsu keep forgetting that major fact so they are being hunted by the government for being "potential escaped experiments" and no matter how much they despise each other they know that they can't get out of this alone)

5. AU 2 ( Atsushi starts developing difficulty controlling the tiger in his sleep after the headmasters death and the ADA can't keep an eye on him all the time, so ADA and PM collectively decide to look over Atsushi on missions so they don't get an actual man-eating-tiger on the run, of course Akutagawa would be the primary babysitter ;p)

6. AU 3 ( Akutagawa has undiagnosed Autism and Atsushi is the first to figure it out, of course the ADHD were-tiger thinks Akutagawa knows this fact about himself and he just keeps asking Ryuu weird questions on missions and carrying noise cancelling headphones because he doesn't know if Ryuu will ever need them and he is so in denial of his feelings he says it's nothing but him being a caring business partner, it doesn't work because everyone in ADA and PM thinks he is madly in love (he might be) but in reality he is just really caring and doesnt want his PM partner to die)

7. AU 4 (Akutagawa sleeps during the day because of his job, until three months into the deal with Atsushi when the were-tiger appears half dead on his (very not publicly known about home) doorstep and he has to stay up for an entire week because Atsushi's heart keeps stopping and the healing isn't working properly while Ryuu just tries to keep his partner alive telling himself that it was all because he is the one meant to kill him)

I like all of these but can't decide which one to write first, so... Help?