#my other theory is that humans love categories

[cosmocreates464]

1/ Which category of alterhumanity do you belong to? Nonhuman, therian, otherkin, and well as transspecies

2/ What/who is/are your type(s)? (if you have any) Wolf therian, bearded vulture, possibly vultures in general? Angelkin, but closely related to stars specifically.

3/ Do you experience shifts? If so, can you tell us your most common shifts and your strangest cameo shift (if you've ever had a cameo shift)? Phantom shifts are constant, I've had them since I was a pup. Theres always (presumably) wolf ears, from the side to the top of my head, as well as occasional tail or wing shifts. I don't think I've had any notable cameo shifts?

4/ How do you experience your alterhumanity in everyday life? Like other have said, it's always there. I'm always feeling my ears, I wear my tail and my collar, because it feels wrong if I'm not. I laugh at 'tell your dog I said hi' stickers. And nonhumanity is common in the characters and art I create.

5/ What do you think of the community? Not always sure how to interact, but I like it! granted, I've only really looked at a few videos on youtube, and been lurking here, but It's nice to be around people like me.

6/ What are the things that make you most comfortable and euphoric in your alterhumanity? Sleeping curled up, wearing my collar/tail, keeping my nails sharp, making jokes about my species (responding to "tell your dog I said hi" stickers, "no dogs allowed" signs ,etc.)

7/ Are you experiencing species dysphoria? It's always there in some form, It's a bit better right now?

8/ What advice would you like to say to a young alterhuman who has just awakened? You don't have to be embarrassed about it, you aren't asking to much to be referred to correctly. Also, It's alright for your identity/ies to be chosen. It's alright if you're human as well.

9/ Do you have/want to have gears? I have several WIP masks, several tails, and collars :} I love them.

10/ Do you know/have any theories about the origin of your alterhumanity? If so, tell us! (all beliefs are legitimate) Mainly psychological. My alien kintype(?) might have some spiritual aspects due to being an alien in one of my other realities.

If you are a alterhuman, reblog and answer these questions!

(don't be afraid to write a lot, do what you want ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯)

1/ Which category of alterhumanity do you belong to?

2/ What/who is/are your type(s)? (if you have any)

3/ Do you experience shifts? If so, can you tell us your most common shifts and your strangest cameo shift (if you've ever had a cameo shift)?

4/ How do you experience your alterhumanity in everyday life?

5/ What do you think of the community?

6/ What are the things that make you most comfortable and euphoric in your alterhumanity?

7/ Are you experiencing species dysphoria?

8/ What advice would you like to say to a young alterhuman who has just awakened?

9/ Do you have/want to have gears?

10/ Do you know/have any theories about the origin of your alterhumanity? If so, tell us! (all beliefs are legitimate)

11/ Tag someone/a creature to answer these questions!ㅤᵕ̈

[mindfulwrath]

The Triaxial Theory of Horror

I have a theory that most horror fits into a volume of conceptual space described by 3 axes, which are:

Discrete--Diffuse

Mobile--Sessile

Wet--Dry

The Discrete--Diffuse axis describes the source of the horror. A Discrete horror has a physical, usually tangible form; is recognizable as the source of the horror; and takes actions which make it horrifying. On the opposite end of the scale, a Diffuse horror is one with no obvious source, center, or primary actor. Most of Steven King's work falls on the Discrete end of this scale; Silent Hill falls close to the middle; and The Others lands on the Diffuse end.

(As a note, any point on this axis can be done badly; hamfisted Discrete horror rapidly enters a space I call "Ooga-Booga Horror," where the object/entity/what-have-you is so cartoonishly scary as to wrap back around to being silly. Likewise, poorly handled Diffuse horror becomes "Vapor Horror," which is so completely sourceless as to be nonsensical.)

The Mobile--Sessile axis, meanwhile, describes the behavior of the horror. A Mobile horror is one that hunts, pursues, clings, reappears, or otherwise moves around; 80's slasher flicks being a prime example. Sessile horror, in contrast, stays put, and the horror derives either from the inability to escape its radius of influence or the inability to stay away; The Haunting of Hill House nearly exemplifies the far end of the axis.

(Here, too, poor handling can lead to the inversion of horror into comedy, on a scale from "Imma Gonna Getcha" to "Just Leave, Bro.")

Finally, the Wet--Dry axis deals with the effects of the horror, and is essentially equivalent to the gross-out factor. Typically, Wet horror is rich in blood, brains, and body parts, while Dry horror keeps its victims physically intact; however, this scale is not necessarily coupled to the presence or absence of viscera. For example, The Color Out of Space involves significant bodily disturbance, yet remains relatively Dry due to the elision of details. In the same vein (but in the opposite direction), Crimson Peak is an exceedingly Wet horror film, yet utilizes actual gore quite sparingly, preferring to shift the language of decomposition onto the inanimate house; yet its substitution of red clay for blood in no way lessens the Wetness of the horror.

(And as expected, this axis has its own hilarious pitfalls; over-the-top gore rapidly enters "Blood Fondue" territory, while excessively dry horror risks becoming "Totally Scary, Trust Me." Some would argue that The Color Out of Space indeed represents a plunge into the latter category.)

Some examples, then, of the triaxial scale in action:

NBC's Hannibal is Discrete/Mobile/Wet. Hannibal is the primary source of the horrifying events, he can and will chase you down, and when he does, it's going to get messy.

Saw is Discrete/Sessile/Wet. While the threat of bodily harm is similar, and its source similarly known, as in Hannibal, the texture of the horror is significantly altered by the confined setting.

House of Leaves is two horrors stacked up in a trench coat: the parts dealing with The Navidson Record are Discrete/Sessile/Dry, while Johnny Truant's narrative is Diffuse/Mobile/Wet.

Likewise, The Shining nests Discrete/Mobile/Dry horror (Jack chasing Wendy around with an axe) inside Diffuse/Sessile/Wet horror (the Overlook Hotel itself).

Silent Hill, as mentioned, is close to centered on the Discrete-Diffuse axis, and is also nearly centered on the Mobile-Sessile axis, although it is consistently Wet.

The Magnus Archives utilizes all three axes nearly to their fullest extents, but tends to cluster in the Discrete/Mobile/Wet octant.

To be sure, there are elements of horror not described by these axes--internal vs. external, active vs. passive, certain vs. uncertain doom--but as a system for interpreting and categorizing the main structural elements of horror, and particularly for describing one's preferences in horror, the triaxial scale functions well.

[bitethedevil]

The Science of Why Raphael Won’t Get Tf Out of My Head

It’s your local doctor in cambion physiology here. I’m going to take you through my theory about why Raphael is stuck in our heads. It’s all based on Science™, of course. Some of these carefully studied theories are dependent on the fact that you are the owner of a uterus. If you aren’t, then idk. I can’t help you. You’re a medical anomaly. It’ll all make sense in a moment, don’t worry about it.

There are a couple of things that I believe are necessary for prolonged focus on a specific character (Source: The Devil, Bite. 2024: Pulled it out of my ass):

Attraction: It helps if said character is hot.

Versatility: I’ll explain later.

A feeling of being able to relate to said character

Attraction

There’s this theory about how women’s attraction to men changes in accordance with their menstrual cycles (source and source). Basically the study says that when a woman is at her most fertile, she prefers more traditionally masculine looking men. However, the rest of her cycle she might prefer men who lean more towards the feminine (both in general qualities and physical attributes).

The whole point of this, is that at ones most fertile, it’s full on monkey brain genetics going “he looks strong and male, so he’ll make good offspring”, while for the rest of the time, it’s more attractive to find someone who actually has good partnership potential. Someone who is reliable and caretaking, and who would be stable in a longer relationship.

I suppose you could sum it up to one being a more romantic attraction while the other is more of a primal and carnal attraction.

Now I want you too look at this very educational graph that I used a couple of minutes to slap together:

Basically, my argument is that though Raphael is not stable or caretaking in any form, the difference between the two forms still visually fits into the two respective categories. His human form for the rest of the cycle, and his cambion form (the ascended form too if you’re freaky, I guess) that seems more traditionally masculine when fertility is highest.

That means that you can look at his dumb face throughout your whole cycle, but might feel a shift in which one you find more attractive (if all this science stuff is correct).

Even if the science behind all of this is bullshit, I still believe that different forms help when it comes to not getting tired of looking at someone.

Versatility

I’m just going to say it, even though my heart might disagree: Raphael would not have the effect he has if he was a more explored character with more screentime in canon. We would all love more Raphael, but I really think the reason for his longevity in our minds is that he is still somewhat mysterious.

Which parts are actually him and which parts are performance? What is he like behind closed doors? How much devil and how much man is he? We don’t really know. We have been given puzzle pieces, but there’s still a loooot of space free for interpretation, which is honestly what makes him great.

It’s been said before in this little corner of the internet: there are so many versions of Raphael, and the great thing is that people are never fighting over which Raphael is the “right” one. Some prefer Soft!Raphael, while others prefer Dark!Raphael. The versatility of his character’s representation allows for that, which I know at least has kept me interested for a long time when it comes to writing him.

Being able to relate

In much the same vein as above, people find different ways to relate to him. The thing on top of that is the feeling that we shouldn’t be able to relate to someone like him, which adds a certain level of taboo to it which is interesting.

He is both the smoothest mf alive and the biggest cringefail loser behind closed doors. He’s obsessive, weird, and too fucking much to be near for a longer period of time. He writes his contracts as songs because he likes ‘whimsy’. He’s got daddy issues and makes that everyone’s problem. There’s a lot to him that someone would at least be able to relate to at some level.

In conclusion

He is without a doubt the character I have hyperfixated on for the longest time, and I know it’s the same for a few others. I genuinely believe it’s because there is so much to him. If you get tired of one aspect of him, there are always other aspects of him to focus on, both physically and psychologically, instead.

And there is some variation to the attraction that I atleast can feel myself. If I have written a lot of darker stuff about him for a while, I get the urge to write something softer, and the cool thing is that you can do that and it still makes sense with the character. My preference for his forms vary often too.

Even when I tried to focus on other characters, I found myself returning to Raphael, because those other characters were often too fleshed out canon-wise. It quickly bores me because then there is a limit to what you can do with them.

There is a lot to Raphael and he’s like a glob of clay. You can mold him into whatever you like.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

[cripplecharacters]

Hey so first off, absolutely love your blog. I have learned so much and I can hardly wait to implement it! My question is: I have a character with vitiligo (and’s Celiac’s and rheumatoid arthritis) in a comic book I’m working on, and I want to represent that, but the problem is the comic is abstractly colored to display the characters’ emotions rather than their actual physical appearances, and my art style is designed to be pretty minimalist so I don’t need huge amounts of time and energy to actually make the comic itself (I’ll attach a picture at the bottom for easier reference). My current plan is just make lighter patches of the abstract color in place of skin color, but while that works great in theory, in practice it doesn’t show up well in lighter colors, including his default color, and since absence of color indicates absence of emotion, I don’t want to just leave them blank for the lighter colors either. Do you guys have any suggestions for alterations so I can more clearly represent that?

Thank you so much in advance!!

This is the guy in his default color. This was also the drawing I first ran into the light color problem with

Hey!

So I don't really think there are other ways to draw it than “lighter skin” for vitiligo, as that's kinda what it is, visually speaking.

What I'd keep in mind is that vitiligo isn't always super visible.

[source for images: 1 2 3 4]

If the character's skin color changes, then the vitiligo patches will be less visible when it's lighter. That doesn't mean he suddenly doesn't have it, just like how people with pale skin still have their vitiligo, no matter how apparent it is at first glance.

Regardless of skin color, vitiligo patches will tend to be of a very similar color - it's not just lighter skin (an incredibly wide category), but loss of pigment.

However, if his skin isn't human-colored but instead gray or green (or anything else), the shade of the patches will slightly shift to be less saturated or have a different undertone. But if he goes between going dark blue and light blue, the vitiligo would still be the same shade of very light blue, rather than getting darker when the rest of skin is darker. I see this a lot with how people draw characters with vitiligo, and it just Doesn't Work Like That (top right on the image above, also featuring the trope of pale people never having vitiligo for some reason).

If his skin color constantly shifts, then his vitiligo will be more visible one time and less at other times - there's not much you can do about that, it's just how contrast works. That said, sharp-edged and larger patches will be more apparent to readers than smaller ones.

So basically his vitiligo patches should probably float at a similar amount of pigment regardless of how the rest of the skin looks like, with slightly different undertones depending on the skin color at the moment. Sometimes it will show up more, sometimes less, if you want to make it clear to the readers then you can first show him in a color that makes it more obvious.

Either way, he has vitiligo!

Hope this helps,

mod Sasza

[that-one-i-think]

So, a lot of the Shadow Knight lore regarding whether or not they age is very confusing because on one hand we did have a Shadow Knight who did die of old age (old lady shadow knight is season one, hinted to be dead in Season two) and immortal Shadow Knights like Vincent. Would make sense if we go with one of the Shadow Knight lores we were told which was that only fully formed Shadow Knights became immortal, but also, what about Gene? Sasha? Vylad?

My theory/solution to this blatant lore mess is this: Fully formed Shadow Knights are the truest way to immortality but there are loop holes and conditions for the others.

- Time spent in the Nether halts aging entirely. What is the point of building an army if they die before they can leave the Nether? While Shad could not give them full immortality without sacrifice, the Nether is a dimension that operates beyond the magic rules of the normal realm. (Gene partly in this)

- The more human you are, the more you age. Shadow Knights naturally have a much much longer life span, but the more you genuinely embrace your life, love, and happiness, the more human you are, the shorter your lifespan. It requires working out your trauma and fighting your new core nature, but it is possible.

- If you had no one truly close to you, you are almost immortal. Vylad is a bastard, an outcast who became a Shadow Knight with no love, lord, or lady, so he doesn't get the urge, but he hasn't fully turned to humanity. He is a weird grey zone of embracing his Shadow Knight nature without being insane. Gene also falls into this category, but due to the fact he died by a true (deserved) betrayal of everyone around him, he had no love to destroy.

Sasha isn't in a grey zone for she has Kenmur and has all of the feelings about it so she is just benefitting from the very slow aging. Zenix is fully formed in my opinion and permanently stuck at like, 19 because of it. Laurance is also in the same box as Sasha though, Season 3 he is just spending time in the Nether so thus, immortal until he leaves.

[acourtofthought]

can you genuinely say at this point in time, Elain wants lucien? I'm not asking for theories or headcanons. I am asking if you genuinely think that Elain in any way is secretly pining over Lucien, and what textual evidence supports that.

People have argued about her mentioning his name, but I don't think that has to do with romantic feelings for him, moreso basic respect for another. People have talked about a "half-step" which I must've missed bc I do not even remember that - but i don't think a "half step" necessarily conveys anything romantic.

I'm trying to form an opinion in this ship war, but its hard when I see a ton of misinformation from every side. The elriels have their own faults, but they can point to text now that shows Elain wants Azriel.

Can Eluciens do the same? I'm not trying to start a fight, I really just want to know what portion of each ship is backed by the current books vs. how much is just people theorizing they are end game and what they want to happen. And if the Elucien ship is purely just "SJM will always pair fated mates together" that's also fine and valid imo, I just want to know if there's anything in the books you can point to that shows Elain wants Lucien at this moment in time. I don't want to argue about hypotheticals and foreshadowing and what a rose symbolizes. I want cold hard words on the page.

Please note: I know just because it might not be there YET doesn't mean it's not going to happen. I want to evaluate the current standing of these books and the rationality of each argument. But to do that, I need people to be honest about what's there and what's not. I'm asking you because you run one of the more...logical shipwar blogs. But if you don't want to answer this - I also understand why.

At this point in time I don't think that canon supports Elain wanting anyone and that includes both Az and Lucien.

The only person Elain ever confessed having feelings for is Graysen. Real feelings. The "my heart belongs to you" kind of feelings.

Elain specifically said she did not want a male or a mate and those are categories Lucien and Az fall under, despite the almost kiss with Az in SF. It's been proven that a FMC in a SJM book can hook-up with a guy but not want a relationship with him (Feyre / Isaac, Nesta with fae who were not Cassian, Mor / Cassian, Mor / Helion) so Elain's actions in the Az bonus don't prove Elain wants him for more than a night of fun. In fact, the text in canon has her agreeing to "just a taste and that would be it". That's not a confession of long term commitment nor was there any to be found in any other interaction she's had with Az. Even crushes don't mean you're wanting forever with someone. Not to mention she was not written as looking towards either Az or Lucien in the 5 months after Solstice so absolutely no canon supports that she wants to hook-up with Az anymore. Elain's past actions from months ago (including those with Az) can't really be used as proof of canon of now, otherwise we should all be claiming she's still in love with Graysen since she never specifically stated she no longer has feelings for him. Nobody says that though, we use the canon of her no longer breaking down over Graysen to show she's moved past wanting to be with him and currently the canon suggests she's also moved past whatever she was about to do with Az on Solstice since there are zero signs to argue otherwise. There is also zero evidence of Az still wanting to be with Elain in any way now that we're 5 months beyond Solstice. 7 if you count HOFAS.

Right now I think the only thing canon truly supports is that Elain is showing no romantic interest in anyone, male or human. 5 months is a long time. Feyre left Tamlin then was mated to Rhys within 5 months and Elain was not mentioned as shedding a tear for Graysen in that same length of time, not mentioned as looking Az's way in that time, not having a reaction (good or bad) to Lucien in that time.

So to your question, canon does not support Elain wanting Lucien but it doesn't support her currently wanting Az. Canon also never supported her wanting to start a relationship with Az, canon doesn't support her wanting a mating bond with Az, canon doesn't support her having any desire to go forward with a forbidden love with Az.

Does that mean it's what she's actually feeling for Lucien or even Az? We can't say for sure because we don't have her POV but if we're truly basing this discussion off canon alone than Elain doesn't currently seem interested in anyone. It's not fair for e/riels to claim she still wants Az 5 months later as they have no evidence supporting it. It's only their headcanon that she does. Not to mention it's their headcanon she wanted to have a relationship with Az in the first place. They have zero evidence to show she'd be willing to seriously date him.

But as far as what I genuinely think (your phrasing)? I think Elain is struggling with the pull she feels towards Lucien and it scares her.

I don't think all Elucien's assume Sarah will pair Elucien together simply because they're mates. There are many layers behind what we feel.

I do think Elucien's use logic based on Sarah's writing and that logic tells us that characters don't simply ignore a mating bond. In canon, the bond creates a tug to the other that can never be truly forgotten. Based on that canon we hypothesis that there is a lot going on under the surface which is why she's hidden Elain's thoughts from us. She's the only main side character from the original cast who has never been given a POV and there's got to be a reason for that. Sarah was willing to share her almost kiss with Az but never her actual thoughts for Lucien who she suddenly began ignoring in ACOFAS after the events of ACOWAR and that seems a bit purposeful doesn't it? How a kiss isn't a secret but what she feels about the bond she says she doesn't want is?

While we've got no proof showing she wants Lucien, we were given so many examples of the author making an effort to show their compatibility. We were given a bunch of crumbs as to where Elain's future journey could take her and many crumbs placing Lucien in those same places. The author wrote Lucien (not Az) meeting Elain's father. We were given a bunch of scenarios where we're left wondering WHY Elain behaved a certain way towards Lucien especially after she defended him to Graysen, after she took a step as if she'd stop him from searching for Vassa, after she did follow he and Feyre instead of staying behind at her father's grave, after they were left together to wash up after the war, after she invited him to come back to Velaris but only after all that she began completely ignoring him for unexplained reasons. Based on Sarah's writing that pull and push typically means a character is struggling with her pull / desire for the other person and things aren't so one dimensional as "she doesn't like him!" If she didn't like him then why take a step as if to stop him? Why follow him instead of staying with her father's grave? Why peer up at him? Why invite him to Velaris?

We've been in this place before with a Sarah book. "Why did the character do that only to do an abrupt 180?" We saw it with Nesta, who was willing to die with Cassian in ACOWAR only to do the most 180's of all 180's by giving her virginity to someone else in the novella. To telling Cassian she wanted nothing to do with him though we knew she did. So Elucien's are only waiting to see how the author deals with Elain and her inner thoughts of Lucien. We don't think Elain's setup is going to be any less complex than Nesta's was. We believe the author is going to tell a story that is deep and meaningful. And while Elain's current setup doesn't prove this to us just yet, it is canon that Sarah has given that exact treatment to every single one of her mated pairs, whether the FMC was struggling with what she felt or the MMC (as we saw with Rowan and his bond with Aelin), so it would be silly for us to think Elain would be the only one who isn't given that same complexity.

While the textual evidence does not necessarily prove Elain has feelings for Lucien, I think it's valid for Elucien's to use textual evidence of Sarah's past writing patterns to predict the direction she's taking them.

I have no problem admitting that current canon doesn't prove Elain wants Lucien but I've never seen a e/riel admit that current canon, by the end of SF, also doesn't prove Elain wants Az. That canon never proved she wanted a relationship with him at all. Canon doesn't even prove she called his scars beautiful considering Feyre said she wasn't sure if she was referring to his Siphons yet they still hold on to that one.

Canon proves Elain loved Graysen though he was an asshole, canon proves that she was willing to hook up with Az with no proof of anything more, and canon proves that she shares a mating bond with Lucien that she'll never be able to completely forget ("it will be a bond that will trail her for the rest of her existence") though she's currently trying her best which results in weirdness for everyone. That is all the canon proves.

From a romance standpoint, only one of those storylines typically has staying power.

[americasfavoritelesbian]

i prefer the term “advanced”

kaitlyn chen x booksmart!reader (( fem!reader )) (( storrs , conneticut )) (( uconn team being haters until they realize you’re that girl intellectually ))

—

you’re the quiet one on the team. not because you're shy — just focused. you keep your nose in a book on the bus rides. annotate in gel pens. finish problem sets during shootaround. sometimes even correct the assistant coach’s math during drills.

kaitlyn thinks it’s cute. the glasses. the way you mouth facts under your breath. the way you roll your eyes when the others joke about “nerd squad.”

“what are you even reading?” jana teases once, plopping down beside you at the team hotel. “calculus for fun?” “no,” you say. “quantum theory in modern chemistry.” silence. she blinks. “…you good?”

the team always has something to say. sarah: “okay she’s cute but do you ever turn your brain off?” aubrey: “i feel like you’d correct my essay with a red pen.” paige (who doesn’t like you to begin with): “she’s probably calculating how dumb we all are.”

and kaitlyn just shrugs, wraps her arm around you, and says, “she’s calculating how many points she’s gonna drop while tutoring our coach.”

—

and then one night, during team trivia night (sponsored by geno, reluctantly), you let it happen. let them laugh, let them clown. ashlynn’s like, “we got this. reader, just sit there and look pretty.”

but the category is renaissance literature. then anatomy. then world history. and suddenly you’re sweeping. you buzz in before the question’s even done. you quote shakespeare, drop stats about the human brain, casually throw in a correct pronunciation of voltaire. the final round is logic puzzles.

you crack all of them in 90 seconds.

aubrey leans over and mutters, “bro. are you an AI?” sarah: “she just speedran that like it was a 2k game.” jana’s jaw is on the floor. kaitlyn? smug as hell.

“told y’all,” she says, resting her chin on your shoulder. “my girl’s smarter than all of you combined.”

—

you just smirk. “maybe next time,” you say, “you’ll let the nerd answer first.”

and no one clowns you again. except kaitlyn. but she does it with kisses.

love yall alienators

☆ ~ talula

[moonandstarsandnavyblue]

I’ve been nervous to post this.

I mean. What if…. What IF…. The truth is that Luke WANTS to be out of the spotlight, enjoying time off without cameras or social media? He has said this in several interviews; that he’s made a calculated effort to make his SM more career focused, that he enjoys just checking out from it all and hanging out on a beach with friends. I mean, what if LN WANTS to just hang out with Antonia? Whether she’s his girlfriend, his fiancée, his place holder till he figures something else out (which like, that could be an agreed upon situation between him and Antonia. All relationships are unique,) both of these humans are adults.

I don’t think that anyone is making this adult human man do anything he doesn’t want to do. I mean PR is whatever and Nondisclosures- yeah those exist- but Luke has taken A to events, both he and Nicola have talked about how they care for each other, that their relationship is a beautiful one. When they have interacted (like at the SAG awards) they seem genuinely loving and supportive of each other which is aligned with the type of close and special friendship that they’ve described and admitted to.

Luke seems happy. Nicola seems happy. If you watch videos from outside of the echo chamber of the Lukola fans who seem like they just are wanting to maintain their “place on the ship”, (not trying to shade, I just don’t find I fall into this category …) there are plenty of photos and videos of Luke and Antonia looking happy and content. I don’t ~love~ it either because my heart wanted Luke and Nicola to be true. I really did. But like… I also don’t think that there are wild and intense conspiracy theories happening… if it sounds like hoof beats I think horses not zebras. Luke says he’s doing what he wants to be doing. So for now, unless something changes, I am going to just believe him. 🤷‍♀️ Anyway. I get the feels and the fandom mania. But it also seems like… a lot of wild and intense emotions about people we don’t really know in real life. Just… these are my thoughts for what they’re worth. I love all the folks I’ve made friends with in this fandom. I love Bridgerton, Polin, Colin, Penelope, the whole Bridgerton cast! I enjoy writing and reading Polin fanfic, and having fun with the fandom and the ship. I just want everyone to have a good time. Anywho, love you all.

xoxo Midnights

[catboxcoffin]

On Furniture

(Apologies for discursive definition-talk..)

I believe the label of ‘furniture’ itself, like anything that isn’t given a complete answer, to host a catbox of meanings, so I’ll list some thoughts and categorize them by factual/thematic v.s. (meta-)fictional. I am separating these categories based on the word’s two ‘origins’: [1.] the ‘in-universe’ coinage; and [2.] the first usage within the episodic structure.

Regarding/defining categories:

Factual/Thematic:

The canon, chronological storyline [1.] underneath the story’s presentation tends to connect more to the Factual—I use this term to refer to the material events upon which everything else is built (‘Prime’) because Umineko likes to play with the word ‘Truth.’ Extra-gameboard events are as close to ‘factual’ as we can hope for, as they should occur outside of the Catbox. I willfully ignore the gestures pointing otherwise, as that would completely ruin the entire game’s truth-search, but I will concede differing ‘perspectives’ as a means of obscuring, and stories told by catbox pieces to be dubious. Literal and Thematic are not oppositional here; all metaphor/hyperbole/concepts in this category are rational extensions of the in-universe ‘reality’ because they remain as such—by this I mean that they are not visualized as chairs or rabbits, but instead concepts as intuitive as love and evil that exist among the world's inhabitants. Although these themes are delicately woven into the meta-fiction, they are born from ‘reality,’ not personified from a third source or a tool within the game.

2. (Meta-)Fictional:

The story’s presentation [2.] aligns more with the subjective, fantastical elements within the story. Considering the nature of an ‘endless witch’ and voyager witches in general, the Meta-World falls into this category as well (Also... take my usage of 'Meta' lightly—I am referring to fiction-within-fiction and the common term for the worlds, not asserting that Umineko is an effective work of MetaFiction). The gameboards in their entirety cannot logically exist without Meta interference, because their planes often (arbitrarily) merge. To simplify the discussion I’m treating the layers somewhat like this: —> (Note: it would take me ages to map out a consistent meta layer system for Umineko, so bear with the simplicity)

Prime - Umineko’s ‘real’ universe. The fragment of authored message bottles and (pardon my presumption) Ange/Eva’s survival. + What can reasonably be gleaned chronologically from the following layer (2) along with flashbacks.

Gameboards and the pieces within them. Were written with an intended purpose & elements of reality. In order of importance: 1, 2 > 3, 4 > Chiru

The Meta-World 1. Where Battler and Beatrice fight & the presentation/narration of the board. Seems to seep into every other layer somehow. Hypothetically contains Yasutrice as-author

The Meta-World 2. Whatever the hell was going on with Featherine and Ange reading about MW1. Arguably any extra-catbox people (voyager&endless witches of the future) contribute to this layer.

My Factual-thematic category focuses nearly entirely on layer 1, with extrapolation from persistent themes/discussions in 2. My (Meta-)fictional category encompasses layers 2 & 3. 4 can be relevant but I largely dislike using it for theories. In other words, category 2 is everything that is non-factual, meaning mostly presentation and interpretation.

I. Factual / Thematic

The in-universe coinage of ‘furniture’ is only disclosed in Reqiuem. I find this to be an interesting choice considering the inverted ‘answer sheet’ theme of EP7; Ryukishi is handing us a short, retrospectively logical explanation, but its brevity leaves much to be interpreted.

"This body that isn't even capable of love...!! / What's...what's the point in living like that?! / This isn't a Human's life...!! / It's like being furniture!! / That's right, I'm...furniture...!!"

The term is suddenly flipped on its head. Prior, furniture was presented as unable to love because it was furniture (implied to be status-based, seemingly just an effect of inferiority). However, it’s the other way around: one is furniture because it cannot love. The condition of the body precedes & defines worth. Unlike the dramatized, bodiless nature of Beato’s fantasies, this solution is grotesque and earthly. Being physically alienated from the universe of two makes one sub-human. Yasu-Shannon-Kannon’s—I’ll use ’YSK’—mutilated organs make ‘them’ (collective, not gender-neutral) unable to form a sexual union with any of their respective partners. Shannon cannot fulfill the marital duty of motherhood or even sex with George, Kanon is literally impotent, both physically and emotionally/volitionally in his pursuit of Jessica, and Yasu is so alienated from the feminine ideal that she cannot allow herself to ‘exist’ without performing through the former two (&Beatrice). None of them are sexually ‘complete.’

Continuing the material interpretation, its application to Genji is obvious: He loyally serves Kinzo as a friend and confidant, possesses a flamboyant, flirtatious fictional counterpart, and remains unmarried with a certain sterility towards women... He is gay. Blatant subtext aside this answer also ties up some of my personal qualms with his characterization. His senseless, sociopathic dedication to the head and his successor, complete unwillingness to intervene regarding Kuwatrice, and legitimate desirelessness can at least partially be humanized by lolgayforkinzo… If anything, a possible envy of Beatrice(s) could have solidified their doom. This unrequited love makes Genji too ‘sexually incomplete.’ While not literally mutilated, there is metaphorical castration in being a sexual minority. Kinzo would never love him, and I doubt Genji even respected himself enough to wish for it. He is the other half-universe that complements YSK, and possibly the only one who could begin to understand them. Their dramatically fatalistic tendencies can be narratively justified by their banishment from (yet proximity to) the world of love. There is no purpose in ‘living’ without the single element of life.

On a simpler note, we can also reverse-engineer the label simply based on those excluded. On my first read, ‘furniture’ initially, obviously seemed to be a hyperbolic representation of servitude. Being barricaded from the rest of society by class would certainly render one ‘sub-human.’ This, however, is self-eliminating by exempting Gohda and Kumasawa from the label. My immediate conclusion then was that the basis was not physical status, but psychological servitude. KumaGoh always felt far more human to me, which I chalked up to abysmally poor writing of ShKaGenji—a belief I still hold to an extent, but have found ways to cope with. Kumasawa and Gohda are distinctly rebellious, obviously thinking little of their status as servants. They are petty, greedy individuals who fit in well with the Ushiromiyas despite their class differences. Kumasawa is a pathological slacker, and Gohda is a skirt of responsibilities, but this doesn’t make them 'bad' in any sense. They have a passion for and qualms with their employment because it is their job, not their identity. The same cannot be said for SKG, who literally embody their vocation. I could never take their little spats with Beatrice seriously because of how bizarrely complacent they were in the face of reality; to this day I get irritated with searching for satisfactory answers in EP2. Thus, ‘furniture’ can be taken to mean a lack of humanity constituted by a lack of will & individuation.

In a similar (& more personally satisfying) vein, ‘Furniture’ can represent a debt and unbreakable tie to Kinzo. ShKanon and Genji are closer than anyone to being his property, yet they obtain strange respect from him, bearing the One-winged eagle as both a brand and honor—prized possessions. The magical perspective refers to them as his ‘creations,’ which works literally with Yasu/Lion as his paternal creation and Genji-as-servant as a circumstantial creation. Genji owes Kinzo as his savior, his remaining existence eternally devoted to paying back the favor of being spared from death in the seizing of Taiwan. Serving for so long, and so absolutely, definitely degraded his sense of humanity and began to merge his identity with his master’s.

(GEN): ”......We must continue to return the favor we received from the Master...until our final moments."

YSK, on the other hand, are tied to Kinzo by blood. Even in their ignorance and physical distance, and much to their personal detriment, they cannot escape him. They merge with projections of Beatrice without even meeting him, they come to work in the mansion without knowledge of their ancestry, and they become treasured servants seemingly by coincidence. Both ShKanon and Genji have a sense of being Kinzo's above all else, to the point of being distrusted as servants by the rest of the family, an unfortunate state since neither has families of their own. I think of this as a semi-intended and enforced alienation by Kinzo, furthering their already lonely situations for the sake of dependence and loyalty (I do not find this entirely loveless, though…). This loneliness could explain the affective resignation felt by furniture, and their inability to ‘love.’ YSK’s case is cemented in youth due to special treatment both inciting bullying and cultivating a strange relationship between them and Kinzo—Kanon’s mention of shooting with Kinzo and participating in pranks tugs on a heartstring I can’t explain. I am particularly fond of this interpretation…

II. (Meta-)Fictional

There is a stupid amount of facets to furniture in the 'fictional' portion of the story, to the point where it’s difficult to speculate on a cohesive definition. 50 new characters now fall under the label, and they must be encompassed as well. Is the term simply an extension of its connotation in reality, or is it morphed by meta-context like many of the other themes? My vote? Entirely Meta.

As I did earlier, I will begin with the first usage—this time, the coinage within the episodic structure [2.]. Doing this, I found something interesting:

The first use of furniture is Self-Referential and used as a reason to not do something: Kanon not giving a real interactive greeting, or accepting sweets; Shannon not fighting off Battler’s assault. It actually takes a while for the term to be used by non-furniture, making it appear entirely self-imposed. The word is persistently used despite the discomfort and intervention by others. It’s not self-deprecation or knowledge of one’s place; it’s a rule—a rule seemingly ingrained into the fabric of their existence. This is what I assert in this section—it is.

Shannon, Kanon, and Genji to a lesser extent, are wholly pieces owned by Yasu as their author. Not in the sense that Piece-Maria or Piece-Eva are pieces—I mean literal fiction. SKG are Yasu’s characters. Their differentiation from ‘humans’ all hinges on what can be ascribed to their fictionality.

They have an unchangeable position in the world because they are born with a singular practical purpose: to facilitate the gameboards’ culprit. (The strife that appears down the line is due to the conflicting purpose of creation) They cannot obey promises, only orders. Furniture does nothing but rot with the passage of time (…due to the triumph of new truths, I presume). Furniture is a reliable ‘tool,’ aptly fitting for characters who exist to fit neatly into the logic of murders, allowed meta-sentience but not autonomy. Writing about Humans is inefficient; you must cater to their flaws and desires, bound by what they Would or Wouldn’t do. What they are shown to be like is what they are like; the room for duplicity is small in stories corroborated by the Truth of the outside world. To surpass this—to create the perfect culprit without constraints, morals, or ties to reality—one only must ensure they are embodied. Embodied, they must be, by someone who could feasibly be them, due to an intentional lack of information. The benefit of the ambiguous identity is the excusability of multiple identities and secret motives. Yasu, with the least history, is the default, practical culprit for such a scheme. It would be entirely possible for Yasu to have no motive against the family at all, and through a simple desire to write the most effective story possible, just happened to write herself as the villain (though I obviously do not believe this, based on… well… everything).

Genji is not quite ‘fictional’ in the way that I’m claiming ShKanon are, but his nature makes him the perfect culprit-tool. Little can be known regarding prime-Genji aside from his undying loyalty to Kinzo and his successor (and how this makes him starkly morally bereft). Without family or distinct loyalties aside from the aforementioned, he too becomes a motive-mystery, and can be written to feasibly facilitate and assist almost any act if dictated by the ‘Master.’ The role of Master is pretty significant regarding Genji’s utility, considering that if the boards are chronologically honest (which they must be), Kinzo is dead and Yasu is ‘the Master.’ This aggressively recontextualizes most of Genji’s references to being furniture:

(GEN): ".......I believe everything has proceeded as the Master has hoped and arranged for. ...To distrust that would exceed my role as furniture in service to the Master.”

(KAN): "...............I wonder if this means the Master's ceremony has already begun." / (GEN): "...Probably. However, that has nothing to do with furniture like us.”

Obviously, we could read this as commentary on Yasu literally carrying out the murders, but the passivity and strange sentience regarding the ceremony leads me to believe this comes from a character aware of his narrative function. He was Yasu’s original ‘piece’ in reality, remaining her greatest asset in fiction as well. His loyalty was not just feasible, but real. Like ShKanon, he functions as a limitless Queen. Unlike SK, though, he does little to ever interfere or reject his status. Although, there is that scene of him knifing the butterfly…

Before I discuss the other(s)’ fictionality, I have to preface: I will not suspend my disbelief—I do not think ShKanon was a ‘thing’ in prime. I don’t doubt the mental manifestation of Kanon as an ideal, and am even open to a Kanon ‘alter,’ but I cannot accept that YasuShannon regularly dressed up as him or that anyone knew of a Kanon (besides maybe Genji, and even that’s tenuous). I honestly don’t mind the impracticality of performing Kanon, more so the meaninglessness. Within a gameboard ruleset where absurdities being ‘technically possible’ warrants its writing as truth, why would Kanon be real? Wouldn’t that be stripping Yasu of her hilarious authorial tricks? His existence as “extra person without extra body” is the perfect tool for a game, but totally worthless in reality. It’s not unreasonable that he ‘existed’ at Jessica’s school festival as a favor, but I wouldn’t push further than that. Besides, he was 90% covered and still considered strikingly young and androgynous, which only confirms the difficulty of genderswapping in reality. Plus, most of the ‘confirmation’ of PrimeKanon exists among swaths of half-truths (i.e. Requiem stating that a whole separate kid is being summoned out of thin air and Yasu is doing magic). Don’t take this as discrediting his significance, though; Beatrice also isn’t ‘real,’ and she’s more interesting for it.

As for Shannon, she is also largely fake. Yes, the servant named ‘Shannon’ exists in Prime. That is Yasu (or, well, what was left after the Clair-trice fragmentation [Ironically enough, I do actually take this absurd plot point at face value. Because it’s interesting]). However, I truly believe that Gameboard Shannon (GS) is a fictional entity born to serve (exempting murders) the desire for conformity and traditional femininity as much as Kanon was born from loneliness and repression. Again, these facets and desires absolutely existed in reality, I just don’t see them as being sustainable, performed identities. The fact that Battler’s memories of his first love aren’t remotely jogged by GS, and the fact that such memories would make the culprit obvious, insists upon the idea that GS is an intentional construction for the sake of the story. Battler isn’t an idiot, his androgynous intellectual gf just morphed into a moeblob tradwife over 6 years…

I feel like there’s a sticking conception that either: 1. Shannon is literally mentally Beatrice le evil culprit mastermind and is just inhabiting a servant body; or 2. Shannon is completely disconnected and the evil witch is hidden in her head as a separate consciousness and possesses her and seriously fights her alternate personas. I find these neither compelling nor reasonable. As for the first, I really do not feel like labeling a character’s entire real-world existence as a facade, no matter how boring they may be. Besides, it would be quite difficult to earnestly repress your true self enough to love not one, but two other people on the side. As for the second, a split personality is meaningless and nigh impossible when within the board’s logic you can literally kill, resurrect, and swap identities at will. They’re all fiction. That’s it. They’re all Yasu’s characters. Granted, they each contain large, separate amounts of herself, but none are uniquely her. As Zepar and Furfur said, “Their soul is less than a single person.” Existent, in a sense, but not fully ensouled.

It should go without saying that I reject Prime!JessiKanon or and ShaGeorge (for the most part). I think their inclusion in the story is a mechanic to solidify just how disconnected Yasu’s desires and ‘selves’ are, and to provide ample commentary on Love. It’s entirely likely that Yasu fantasized a romantic pursuit of George to distract herself from Battler, but I have a hard time reconciling her character with that sort of activity unless, again, Shannon was a literal split identity. Besides, the love square serves to soften the absolute disingenuousness of ShKanon for being what they are—tools.

However, Shannon does have an undeniable centrality, a ‘Heart’ that the others are not afforded, including Beatrice. My answer for this is that she is the only one truly Embodied outside of the board, pushing her into a strange half-furniture, half-human category. Kinzo is said to have made her by hand without a demon and to have given her a heart. This alludes to her being a child born from flesh, not contrived by circumstance. As always, Kinzo is paralleled by Yasu, who has a similar (meta-)relationship to Shannon.

Gameboard-Shannon does not ‘exist,’ but she surely contains the most real rudiments of Prime-’Shannon.’ Though less than human, she is Named and privileged with a body the others could never have. Her higher existence can also be explained by her being the simplest to potentially ‘exist’ (no gender-bend, no blonde witch). The conflict between her narrative role as Yasu’s piece and the narrative constraints of her ties to reality affords her a special rebelliousness, manifesting as a stronger Heart. Shannon’s bindings to Prime are a hindrance from an authorial perspective, narrowing culpability, but a privilege to the piece herself, who may circumvent fate with her ‘humanity.’ This is why she always precedes Kanon, and why she wins the love duel (Yes, I think the duel was identity>love). I also believe that Yasu envied the conceptual GS (The Beatrice/Shannon clash is enough to evidence this) and that Shannon’s internal strife is a consequence of Yasu’s teetering consideration of embodying her completely—hence the “heart that can know love.” By abandoning her Self and personifying this ideal, she could pursue a love beyond Battler, but it would be a charade. Thus the ‘Shannon’ character was trapped in a dream she wasn’t allowed, with a new purpose outgrowing the old, fighting her own authorship.

“…Burning with infatuation and worried by love, being tempted constantly and eternally with a way out was truly a cruel trial.”

This could easily be read as Yasu’s conception of Shannon—her last way “out.” However, her piece is not allowed to transgress its role, or the catbox games would shatter.

Though I have agonized over it, I don’t think my thoughts here ignore the heart. To understand the nature of furniture, one must deconstruct each character and what makes them human. Metaphors & representation are crucial to Umineko and, by extension, Yasu. The motive compelling one to author iterative ‘selves’ containing neuroses invisible in reality yet contained in one body for the sake of their nature being solved is far more bittersweet than reverse-engineering a split personality because it’s the only way to make the Logick Work. Applying the sentiment of Eva-trice and the black witch, internal conflict may be made comfortable through literal bifurcation, but the mind in reality is painfully united. The possession of multitudes can justify the inability to understand or accept yourself; to love yourself. Many but one.

I consider the Golden Land’s ‘liberation’ of furniture into love & bodies of their own to be the opposite of what it seems—instead of external fabrication, the identities unite cohesively within the single mind, thus allowing them ‘each’ a body and the capacity to love.

TLDR; Furniture in the meta-perspective is the role of a character & narrative tool. Furniture in ‘reality’ is a physical, psychological, and relational condition.

[utilitycaster]

I think my grand unifying theory of the vast majority of fandom, media literacy in fiction, and social media with strangers interactions really comes down to a lot of people either don't understand or don't accept that once you add humans emotions into the mix there's no such thing as a consistently reproducible result.

Some of this is that two characters' reactions to the same or similar events will not necessarily be the same (this is like 99% of Neve and Lucanis discourse). Some of it is that some characters fuck around and lethally find out and some merely experience unpleasant consequences (this is 100% of Liliana and Essek discourse). Some of it is that a particular type of character is popular within the fandom and a similar one is not, and while you should do a sanity check of whether this is due to prejudice, oftentimes it's the circumstances of the specific character's story, or they're actually quite different but have a surface-level similarity and are being treated as interchangeable when in fact they have wildly different appeals (Fjord and Laudna being a strong example here).

And outside of that, the most vicious anon hate and discourse I've received and that I've seen friends and mutuals receive is a response to one of the two below categories:

Why do you like what you like and not what I like (ie, an inability to accept that some people can see precisely the same show as you do and understand it and dislike things you love or vice versa)

How could I have known that my question would be something you didn't care for (ie, an inability to accept that other people have different feelings and preferences than you)

And really, it's not terribly hard to get past all of the above! But it does require that you accept you're not the center of the world and that other people have feelings that aren't yours and that there's no cosmic universal justice and that people can dislike something without it being bigoted and if you can't do those things it really is a sign you're not ready for, frankly, life as an adult.

[vlly-of-despair]

Ghosts in the Computer? It’s not what you think…

Ok I have very little to back up most of this BUT (spoilers for The Magnus Protocol so far)

I don’t think John/Martin/Jonah are stuck in the computer at all. I think they are stuck in the FEAR WORLD. Think about it, when John got sucked into the rift with Martin, he already became the Pupil and was bound immeasurably to all of the Fears, which mind you, are simply ONE being which can be extended to different ‘categories’. By the end of TMA, John wasn’t human at all. Martin even asks him,

“How much of you is even left now?”

“It’s still me, Martin. I’m still here.”

Yeah, John. Your consciousness and personality are still your own, but make no mistake my sweet man, you are full Eldritch horror now.

This could be the only conceivable way John could have survived being stabbed, then sacrilegiously torn throughout time and space. I mean, the spooky happenings and Avatars are described as this ‘Somewhere Else’ (🤨) bleeding into our world. But nobody has ever entered this other world, it’s beyond the human comprehension. Unless… perhaps you were to be the closest thing to a Fears’ grubby little Jesus and entwined further through tapes that stretched itself within this realm then ripped you through this passage…

Here is my current suggestion. Perhaps John is in the Fears layer in reality, the ‘Somewhere Else’ as I shall call it, by virtue of himself being in a sense, an extension of the Fears. As the Fears were categorized as different vital organs as a whole being, John may be an extension of this said being. The fears made manifest in a human-ish form; the fears brought in a sentient avatar. But make no mistake, John literally is fear now.

And perhaps this is what [ERROR] is as well, this mysterious creature ‘cloaked in whispers’ is John just… kind of body hopping into people (or even past Archivists which didn’t go as far along as he did in his lovely little Becoming) and trying to communicate with others who could understand him, maybe why he has recorders with him. These whispers are literally fear, he is wearing fear. He IS FEAR. And when he tries to speak, or speaks through another’s voice, he compels others to vomit up all their fear in incoherent ramblings because that is ALL THEY CAN SEE. The fear.

Fr3d1, or ‘Freddie’, on the other hand, is a device connected to the Somewhere Else long before John arrived there. My theory is that objects bound by Alchemy can act as conduits to the Somewhere Else and the Fears, such as the Fr3d1 program, and other cursed objects found throughout the series. And just as John could know into the truth of his world through the Eye, the land of the Fears can touch the minds of all worldly beings of this layer of reality, like a vast ocean… one in which John is fully submerged in.

The Magnus Institute program may have also been a program designed to seek out children who can nurture an ability to psychologically enter the Somewhere Else (as Hans Burger did in Ep 22 in his dream). Sam is being specifically targeted because HE can possibly have that capability to tap into that world and speak to John. It could also be an explanation for the act of ‘meditation’ causing reality jumps, specifically close to the Magnus Institute. Your consciousness briefly enters the Somewhere Else, and because this place resides in a world outside of the material world, you may fall back into reality misplaced. Slightly off center from your reality, and usually this journey is deadly…

Freddie, by its ability to touch the Somewhere Else, was a program designed with supernatural abilities to garner intell tied to this outer dimension. But now that John is in this dimension, he can manipulate the system to try to steer it in a direction which can ‘speak’ to the OIAR crew, try to explain his situation. You know, without the compelling, drowning, or scaring away the closest thing to allies he could have.

Now why are Martin and Jonah there? Well, for Martin, he was dragged with John and is only been able to stay alive this long because of him. He is an extension of John, and John is trying his darndest to keep him alive. The only problem is that Martin is mortal, or at least a hell of a lot more human than John. He probably can’t psychologically take the ‘I am living in fear’ quite literally, and this may be why all of the statements in Norris’s voice are about lost love, being lost in liminal spaces, or in hearing your beloved, only to be terrified by them as they are irrevocably warped into a horrific phantom of themselves. Perhaps that is all that Martin can see; that he is somewhere where he can’t escape, and John is terrifying. So very very terrifying, and wrong. He is incapable of comprehending anything else, he may even be in the Lonely state much like in MAG 170: Recollection. John can bare the weight of all of that perception, of fear, or knowing and seeing. He wished it could be horrible, but it feels ‘right’. Not for Martin though.

As for Jonah, my best approximation is that by virtue of being the previous Pupil and also being connected to the Eye so prolifically, even when dying, small remnants of him remained in the Somewhere Else as a figure of Fear much like John. However, he is much weaker on account of John both defeating him in their original universe and plain of existence, and the fact that ‘the Eye chose John’. Nevertheless, he’s still kicking around, his evil embers also fighting to communicate, albeit less so (his statements being infrequent). Perhaps the JMJ errors are the boys fighting for supremacy in the horrors mindscape. Jonah is losing, but he won’t go down and let John win without a fight.

Where does that leave us? Well, my guess is that our lovely Son of Fears needs to rise again, be called back to the material world through some sort of Alchemical ritual. Maybe by a dangerously curious guy whose life went downhill ever since he was rejected from the Magnus Institute for having a little too much empathy, but always knew his calling to tap into that power…

Hopefully he can unleash his judgement day, smite a few less than pleasurable Externals. And while he’s at it, return his boyfriend to the living world, and get rid of an annoying old man who just refuses to die.

[ender-nogard]

What if all the characters from ride the cyclone represent the 7 deadly sins?

Ocean - pride

• She is an overachiever

• She sees herself on top/most important in the human pyramid

• She tries to be the center of attention every chance she gets.

•She tells everyone that she is the best no mater what.

Noel - lust

•He sings about being a sex worker

•He makes a few innuendos when he's on stage

•There is no good way to phrase without it sounding off, but most representations of the sin of lust tend to be attracted to the same sex, Noel is a gay man.

Misha - Wrath

• "meet Misha, the angriest boy in town"

• "I only have 2 emotions, rage, and passion"

• He cusses the most

• He is the most defensive about almost everything (example: when he kisses Noel and says it's normal, when he is defending his girlfriend)

•He yells at the choir

•He's mad he'll never meet his fiancee in life

•He's mad at his life is unfair (his mom died, and his adopted family shuns him)

Constance - Gluttony

•Her song is "sugar cloud"

•Her family runs a bakery

•She looks back on the food she ate (cupcakes, pizza night)

•She was over consuming 18+ content

•She wanted to experience sex before she died because she saw so much porn she wanted to experience it and even though it didn't hurt her physically it hurt her mentally

•remember gluttony is over consumption, it doesn't always have to be food.

Jane - Envy

•She comes off as extremely jealous about other people's life

•In her song she asks god why she had to die without any memories, and without any loved ones

•The other members got what she didn't, a proper funeral.

•When she gets the name Savannah she asks for the greenest eyes, green represents envy ( @zhemchuzhina-x said this first)

Karnak - greed

•I have no other reason to say this besides that he is extremely expensive, he is a novelty fortune machine, those get expensive.

•In order to use Karnak you need to insert money, because he is a carnival machine.

•Carnivals are very expensive in general, they raise the price of food, they use cheap materials to make money and it works 99.9% of the time.

•Because of the negligence of the carnival, probably because they didn't wanna pay for professionals, the main 6 died.

Ricky - sloth

•Ricky could make make friends, and did, but he was off in his world

•Obviously Ricky couldn't help being the way he was, but one could assume he was at home/ watching movies more than other kids his age, which is reminiscent of the sin of gluttony.

•Ricky is chill af, he lets bygones be bygones, and he doesn't care what people do until they become dicks, but besides that Ricky is mellow af.

Virgil - angel

•Virgil was the name of the angel in Dante's inferno, a story about a man going through all the circles of hell.

•Virgil kills Karnak and himself, which could be a typical sin, but also seen as selfless because he kills a "sin" (Karnak), plus Virgil was a rat so he didn't really mean to kill both of them on purpose.

Obviously I could be wrong, nobody fits perfectly into just one category as humans are complicated creatures, Ricky and Noel could be switched along with Constance. I just noticed things while watching RTC and wanted it to fit my OCs. Add whatever you want, or switch around characters to make this theory fit how you see RTC.

Edit: thank you all for the interaction, it means so much to me 💜

[bitethedevil]

Why does Raphael hate Mephistopheles and why does he live in Avernus?: Raphael as an outcast

(It has been a little while since my last analysis post. I would like to remind everyone that what I’m talking about is purely my own theories and I always love to hear other people’s thoughts on them no matter if you agree or not <3.)

As we know, Raphael lives in Avernus and not in Cania where Mephistopheles rules. All devils essentially somehow serve an archdevil. The Nine Hells is a super hierarchical place and everyone below the archdevils are basically little worker bees who live to serve their respective archdevils in one way or another.

Raphael collects souls, so one can expect that his job is to some extent to harvest souls for whoever is above him. One would expect that the archdevil he serves is Mephistopheles, but he indirectly helps us rob his father of quite a lot of souls by telling us about Cazador's ritual. That seems like an incredibly stupid and risky move if he worked for Mephistopheles, so I am not quite sold on the fact that he serves his dear old papa.

We know from the Archivist that Zariel’s people keep a bit of an eye on him and comes and goes in his house. Given he also lives in Avernus, it would make more sense that he is forced to serve Zariel at least to some extent. My money is on the idea that his official superior (or his boss, if you will) is Zariel and not Mephistopheles, though I think he might have once served Meph.

Here is a super interesting piece of information that I found about Avernus (this is from the Fiendish Codex II):

“Avernus is home to the outcasts of Baator, also known as ‘the rabble of devilkin.’ Few lesser devils survive more than a few moments as outcasts, so this group is composed almost exclusively of unique devils who are equals of any duke.”

My theory is that Raphael is an outcast and that’s why he’s in Avernus. Perhaps his father got tired of him and got rid of him, fully thinking that he would not survive. I am almost certain that cambions would fall under the ‘lesser devils’ category, or at the very least they are not on the level of dukes. I feel like it’s also often said that Raphael is pretty OP compared to a simple cambion, which is most likely the only reason he has survived (I’ve also heard people talk about him as a duke, which fits into this little theory as well).

There’s more though, and this is where it gets really kind of speculative:

“Some outcast devils, such as Azazel and Dagon, have been stripped of their original names to reduce the chances that they will be summoned to the Material Plane.”

Now, Raphael is a cambion, so he can move between planes regardless, but it would still be a very shitty and dehumanizing thing to strip someone of their name. Mephistopheles being Mephistopheles probably would do something like that if he was pissed at someone.

I have always thought a lot about his name. “Raphael” is a name that we would mostly associate with angels, and not devils. It furthermore does not really sound like any other devil names I’ve come across. It literally means “God’s healer” or something along those lines.

Wouldn’t it be so in character for his dramatic ass, who loves to play human and to play benevolent savior, to choose an angel name for himself? At the Last Light Inn, he literally says that Mol would not believe that he’s a devil because of his “angelic complexion”.

Finally, there’s this:

“Treacherous and scheming, the outcast dukes constantly seek ways to either reclaim their former positions or ranks in the Nine Hells or to destroy or displace the current order. […] Either way, they serve as important pawns between feuding archdukes and dukes.”

Now that definitely sounds like someone we know. I would very much say that wanting the Crown of Karsus to take over the Hells falls under “destroying or displacing the current order”. However, Raphael still has mentions of his father around his house and he has a portal to Cania.

It would not surprise me that Mephistopheles started to show interest in him again after he survived and thrived in Avernus. It would also not surprise me if Raphael, despite all the hate for what his father has done to him, licks Mephistopheles boots to gain favor with him behind closed doors (or at the very least to gain information to give to Zariel behind his father’s back).

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

[princelylove]

Dearest Prince,

After your totally telepathic call for more of my ideas I am once again here in your inbox. We all know that Leone is a unique yandere as in he doesn’t make his affections known and even goes out of his way to visible hate on his darling. I ask you to share with us which others would play “hard to get” with their respective loves.

Should you not be satisfied with just this, a follow up i have is which of them would crack first should their darlings clearly show that their intentions with them are of the romantic nature? (gift giving, compliments, checking up on them often, etc)

With much love and adoration,

Samantha

Leone, Leone. My sweet Leone. Plenty of yanderes put up a facade for their darling, or are just constantly masking, but none quite play hard to get like Leone does. Usually yanderes will act nicer, take Bruno or Narciso for example. I have a sort of mental category that I have my dear old man in, and I have a few others in that category, but none quite act like... that. Pannacotta, Yukako, and Narciso are all of the same caliber (to me, at least), yet they don't put on an act for their darling. Well. That's not quite true. They do, in their own ways. Just not in the way that Leone does it. Perhaps I'll talk about this mental category at a later date. When prompted. Prompt me.

I'm tempted to include Pannacotta, as he can be standoffish and cruel when he first meets someone, but I just don't see him like Leone. He can sort of be, he'll scoff and call his darling all sorts of names out of embarrassment and even sometimes long for her to do things to him, seek him out or touch him some sort of way, but he only likes that in theory. He doesn't truly want the things he fantasizes about because there's no safe way to do it. Usually those who are playing hard to get want someone that will see through it, it's a game that will get them what they want, attention or affection or otherwise. Pannacotta would likely freak out, to put it gently, if his darling thought he was playing hard to get and pushed him. Not the type of boy- oh, so sorry, young man- to be pushed. There's also the fact that Pannacotta can possibly, genuinely, loathe his darling. Is it really playing hard to get if he wants her pretty little head on a stick? Is it truly? Is it playing hard to get if he just hates her, and yet can't get her sweet, stupid face out of his head? Perhaps it's not something to ask him about. Her Highness loves questions, however.

So who does act hard to get, and actually wants something to be done about it?

Well, let's give the old man some attention, and really look at his psychology, first. Leone longs to be chased. He huffs, and he flips his hair, and he scoffs, and he scowls, and he wants to be wanted. As all yanderes of this niche do. Leone's mood swings kind of, sort of (See: Sarcasm) ruin his life. It can be very jarring to deal with him at times. Hot-and-cold. He's the type of man that will play with Narancia early in the morning, let him hang from his arms like a he's a sort of human jungle gym, but when the afternoon rolls around he's back to scoffing and huffing and bitching about how loud he is. When it comes to his darling, one day he'll be attentive and the next he'll walk out of a room the second she comes in. She saw you. Why would you do that.

The answer is for attention. He's attention seeking. It's all for attention. He's deeply obsessed and needs a small little hit so he acts out. So, to answer your question, attention seekers who do not care about attention being positive, or prefer it to be negative. My histrionics and my borderlines, my obsessives and my possessives.

And where does that bring me to? Well, the prince of British horse racing. Diego.

His pride blinds him, at times. Well. Often. Diego seeks world domination and yet he himself craves being dominated. Average brat, really. He's the type of man that requires a handler, yet the idea frightens him, so he becomes flighty the second someone actually wants him. I often find myself thinking that Diego is the type of traumatized individual that thinks "If you love me, you'll sexualize me" and "If you love me, you don't sexualize me" at the same time. He's never happy. He gets that attention he acts out for, it frightens him, he avoids his darling yet still feels strongly for them. He doesn't get that attention, he continues to act out and will become aggressive to receive anything.

He'll insult his darling, harass them, demean them, anything that will get him a reaction. He'll flirt, and peacock, he'll give all sorts of things a good try. As long as Diego makes a mark in his darling's memory, it's all going according to plan. When Diego spouts his usual pompous nonsense, all he's really saying is "Look at me! Adore me! Love me!"

And God, is he screaming it. Diego has the audacity to out perform his darling and then dream sweet dreams of them on the same night. He's better than you, you need to accept it, okay I love you goodnight where's my forehead kiss. I'm not even covering his random mood swings and his tendency to

It's more bearable when Hotpants is reigning him in, but since that relationship isn't romantic in nature, he'll continue to seek out what he really wants regardless of his hindrances. Once his heart belongs to someone, his tail only wags for them. It's only good if it's you.

[marimayscarlett]

31 Days Rammstein songs challenge 🎶🤍

Day 5: A song that puts you to tears

In this category I two songs in mind: one I can barely stand listening to and one I of my favourites.

The former is "Zeit", most likely a song which is hard to stomach for a lot of people, since it quite clearly addresses the passage of time, the certainty of death and the inability of us humans to accept this. As this song reminds me of a various personal situations where time with a loved one was cut short very suddenly/was gone in the blink of an eye, I can't bring myself to listen to it often. It's incredibly beautiful and yet utterly painful, especially this simple yet profound line:

So perfekt ist der Moment

Doch weiter läuft die Zeit

Augenblick, verweile doch

Ich bin noch nicht bereit

The moment is so perfect

But time keeps moving on

Moment, stay awhile

I am not ready yet

Tiny thought on the music video: There's the theory that the masked entities represent the norns (deities from Norse mythology, talked about them here), and even though I don't watch the music video often, I think about this theory frequently as it is very fitting I think.

The other one, which I do love a lot, is "Schwarz". A deep melancholy resonates in this song and the lyrics remind me partly of 19th century romance poetry. A song which you're not only hear but could feel if you're open to it.

Hat sich der Tag im Mond verkrochen

Steigt uns ein Fieber in die Knochen

Und kein Gebet und keine Kerzen

Heucheln Licht in unsere Herzen

If the day has hidden in the moon,

A fever rises in our bones,

And no prayer and no candles

Feign light in our hearts.

Song challenge:

[kaigarax]

Sleeping Willow

Or This is How to Endear Others

Iguro Obanai x Reader

Quote: "Fall in love with an unexpected moment of gentleness."

It is of the utmost importance, regardless of someone’s age, gender or race, to be excellent in at least one thing. One must not merely excel at this single task but be fundamentally better than anyone else within similar circumstances attempting to accomplish that very same task and in a location relative to yours.

Of course, this entire theory can be ultimately tossed out and entirely forsaken if one does not wish to become important (in any way whatsoever) and hopes to maintain an ordinary life. It should be noted that by choosing to ignore this most radical and sensible piece of advice you are outright denying oneself of all human pleasures that fall into either category of dreams or desires.

This piece is, of course, only one of seven different instructionals to help guide you into a world of excellence. One should hope to not just entertain themselves with these pieces of work but look to apply them into their everyday life. Once again, it should be noted that all pieces should be read and thought on for a maximum absorption of the materials.

Now, without further ado, this is how to endear others.

---

“You’re not very likeable, huh?” You tease, walking ever so slightly ahead, your hands behind your back as if you’re an old woman.

Iguro Obanai scoffs, “what’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re not very good at getting others to like you, Iguro.” You answered. Obanai has half a mind to smack you over your head with the back of his hand (lightly of course) for your disrespectful attitude. You didn't even use honorifics when addressing him. At least, this time, you used his last name so he holds back.

“Oh?” Obanai raises a brow, “and you are?”

“Of course.” You answer as though it’s a matter of fact rather than an opinion, “have you met someone that doesn't like me?”

Obanai grins beneath his mask, “I don’t.”

“My heart!” You exclaim, bringing a hand to your chest as if you’ve been mortally wounded.

Obanai, still grinning, rolls his eyes, “don’t be dramatic.”

“Sorry.”

“Ugh,” Obanai’s never been a fan of overly emotive people but even more he hates someone while they’re down in the dumps. He knows, of course, that you’re playing around but prefers not to take the chance, “don’t worry too much about it.”

You perk up, “oh, we should do things around town together today.”

“What? Why?”

“You have the time off, don’t you?” You smile, “you should do something instead of staying cooped up all day.”

Obanai raises a brow, “and why should I spend that time with you?”

“I’ll teach you how to endure others.”

“Why would I care to do that?”

“Who doesn't like being liked?”

“You’re insufferable.”

You grin, “and right.”

Just what had he gotten himself into?

---

“So, step one to getting people to like you is smiling.”

Obanai gives you a look that says “really.” It also happens to be what he says.

“And no,” you say, “you don’t need just your mouth to smile. So yes, this is easily something that you can accomplish.”

“How so?”

“Your eyes.” You give him a smile, your eyes beaming into his own, “even if people don’t know it themselves, their subconscious determines how they should feel about someone by how you look at them. If you’re glaring at someone they’re obviously going to be wary of you even if you don’t have any bad intentions.”

“Right…”

“Try it out!”

Obanai tries his best to soften his eyes. Moves his mouth upwards in a smile too, in hopes of it spurring on his own ‘eye smile’ but only works to frustrate him further.

Obanai sighs, “it’s not working.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean ‘why’?”

“Why don’t you think it’s working?”

“Because there’s nothing for me to smile about. Nothing here worth smiling about in the first place.”

“So, why don’t you think about something worth smiling about?” You ask, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

Ha!

As if it was that easy!

Why did he even agree to this in the first place? It’s not as if he wants to spend time with you in the first place. But… Being around you is better than being alone. No one ever wants to be alone in this world, right?

You are… fun to be around. Sure, you usually end up making him do crazy or weird things but it’s not as if you’ve ever forced him into doing something he doesn't really want to. In fact, a lot of the time he actually ends up enjoying the kinds of things the two of you do together. At first he only tolerated your presence because Mitsuri was so fond of you. He isn’t exactly sure when he started to like you in the first place? Maybe some time during the third mission the two of you had gone on together?

When he first noticed how pretty your smile was?

“What’re you smiling about?” You ask.

Obanai huffs, “who says I’m smiling.”

“Oh boy,” you sigh, “looks like we’re back to square one.”

“Can we try something else?”

“Sure. What’re you thinking of trying?”

Obanai’s gaze wanders around the room, his eyes lingering on the window, “maybe we could head outside? Wander around the town and find something interesting to do? That was the original plan, right?”

“Yeah,” you smile, “that sounds nice.”

Huh, you really did have a pretty smile.

---

“What’re you doing?” Obanai asks.

The young girls that had been sitting around you scamper off, running towards the other tables of the room as Obanai takes a seat beside you. You don’t bother looking up but scoot closer to him and hold up a series of woven together strings. He imagines there’s a design there of some sort but he can’t make it out since you’ve decided to only use white string.

“What’re you doing?” You ask, repeating Obanai’s words back to him.

Obanai sighs, leaning his head on the table in front of him, “just looking around.”

“So wasting time?”

“As if you aren’t also wasting time.”

You bring a hand to your chest as if you’d just been mortally wounded, “you wound me. I was here making gifts for my sweetest Tsuguko.”

“A bracelet?”

You smile, “of course! I always try to bring her something small when I go off on trips without her.”

“You’re quite fond of her, aren’t you?”

“She’s a sweet thing and a nice girl - at least beneath that hard exterior she tries her best to put up. Experienced more loss than anyone her age should have so I try my best to show her little acts of kindness.” You explain, “show her this world isn’t just chaos and pain.”

“Huh.”

“What?”

“That’s rather…” Obanai ponders for a moment, as if trying to pick the perfect word, eventually settling on, “admirable of you.”

“Surprising, huh?”

“Yes,” Obanai looks away, “and no.”

Obanai has never once in his life considered himself a man of indecision. He did sometimes choose not to act when he should have but never has he been torn on a situation before. Right now though seemed to bring up a part of him that he was painfully unaware of until today.

Even you seemed surprised at his sudden change in attitude.

Decisiveness isn’t something that Obanai prides himself over. Making the decisive choice is held in high regard in their culture but that doesn't mean he doesn't absolutely loathe being indecisive, like right now. Being indecisive leads to the worst possible decision being made at the last second. It leads to consequences that you’ll be forced to accept simply because you couldn’t make a choice.

But right now it's different.

It’s different because it’s you.

“Have you ever been in love, Obanai?” You ask, fiddling around with the ends of the white bracelet.

Obanai looks at you, surprised at your sudden use of his first name. No, he’s not surprised at your use of his first name but rather that he doesn't mind it. It sounds almost… pleasant when you say it. Doesn’t have the same mocking atmosphere as the other times. It’s friendly and almost…

“I think I have.”

Obanai raises a brow, “you think?”

“People often speak about love and how it should feel. Talk about it so much and placed it upon a pedestal so high that I wonder if anyone ever really felt it in the first place. And,” you pause briefly, your fiddling suddenly halted as you finally turned your head up to look at him. “I don’t know if that kinda love I’ve felt for someone is actually the kind of love that people are talking about or if it’s just something else I’ve thought of. So, have you ever been in love?”

“Well, when you put it like that…” Obanai trails off.

Love. Such a strange thing to speak of. Funny almost. Now, what is funny is that you’ve chosen to speak to him about this rather than Mitsuri, the love piller herself. Though, he supposes he can see where you’re coming from. It’s hard to understand a feeling when you’ve never felt it yourself. It’s hard to feel something when you don’t even know what you should be feeling for in the first place.

“Yes.” Obanai smiles beneath his mask, though he’d most certainly deny it if you pointed it out, “yes, I’ve been in love before.”

Obanai, of course, hasn’t had that issue.

Your eyes seem to brighten at that, “and did you ever tell her?” You pause, “him?” There’s another moment of silence, “them?”

“No.”

“What? Why not?”

Obanai sighs.

This isn’t a question he wants to answer. Not something he’s ever even thought about - or maybe it’s something he’s thought about too much. He’s almost insulted at how you could even have the audacity to ask something like that in the first place. But he’s also intrigued. Your bold and brazen attitude was what set you apart from others. What drew people to you.

It isn’t something that works for most people either. Not something that works for him.

Huh, must have something to do with the fact that you’re pretty. Or at the very least because Obanai thinks you’re attractive.

Obanai sighs again, “because no one could ever love someone like me.”

Your eyes soften.

He isn’t bold enough to ask - nor is he brazen enough to assume.

---

Eventually, after watching you attempt to weave together a bracelet Obanai decided to try his hand at the task. You made it look mighty difficult but you did have a tendency to struggle to accomplish simple tasks.

Okay, that was a lie.

But you did struggle with making a bracelet.

At first, Obanai’s hand hovered over pink and green trying to tie the two colours together. Then he added a black and white. It was an alright combination, or at least you seemed to think so. Obanai wasn’t all too inclined to accept your compliment though considering you chose to only use white.

Eventually, the young girls that were sitting around you earlier stumbled back to surround you. They smiled brightly as you told them stories of your adventures.

All of them, except for one girl, kept their distance from him. Likely scared.

Obanai tried his best to soften his eyes.

The young girl seemed to take it as an invitation, moving to sit beside him and hold up a blue string.

“What’s this for?” Obanai asked.

The young girl giggled, “I think you should start over, Mister.”

“Why?”

“Because the way you weaved the strings together won’t hold together very well. It’ll probably fall apart after a day of use.” She explained.

“Great.” Obanai huffed.

The young girl flinched back, her sudden bout of courage gone.

You’re quick to save the day, wrapping an arm around the girl’s shoulders, “don’t worry about him, you Missy. He doesn't mean to be mean. He’s just got a grouchy look to him.”

The girl smiles warily.

“So,” you say, “how do you think this grumpy mister over here could better improve his bracelet making skills?”

She grabs an orange string, a green string and a third blue string. A strange combination of colours. Then, holding it up so that Obanai can see, she ties the ends of them together before moving them back and forth over one another in a braid motion. Obanai isn’t all that familiar with different weaving patterns but is familiar with the braid. It’s simple enough and holds strong. Stronger than one might think.

She hands it over to Obanai, a bright smile on her face.

Obanai accepts it, his eyes softening. This colour combination is worse than his own.

You smile.

Obanai smiles too.

---

With the winter season quickly approaching, the sun was up for less and less hours of the day which meant that demon attacks would begin to become more common. Which then meant that there would be less time for demon slayers to have for themselves.

So, he’d make the most of his time.

Or at least the time he got to spend with you.

Obanai walked behind you, watching as you skipped forward. Eyes darting between all the different people on the street to the various coloured signs hanging up on walls. Obanai had never been a big fan of large cities like this but it wasn’t so bad in the evening.

Suddenly you stopped.

“Are you okay?” Obanai asked.

You were silent.

He was quick, moving up to see your expression, “did you see something?”

You weren’t shocked like he expected, but neither calm. Somewhere between flight and freedom. Stuck between the choice to make a claim or run away to never again be seen. You’re quick to make a decision as your resolve hardens.

“I love you.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry,” you smile, “you don’t have to love me back. I just wanted you to know. You’re not unloveable, you know.”

Obanai’s rendered speechless.

You don’t seem to mind as you hand him a bracelet.

It’s the white one you were fiddling around with the other day.

“I thought you were making this for your Tsuguko?”

“I thought you’d like it more,” you shrug, turning away, “besides, I can always make her something else.”

Fall in love with an unexpected moment of gentleness.