#pls ask for clarification

[ladykf-writes]

Ardyn’s Kingship and Somnus’ Rulership: an Exploration of FFXV Lore and Etymology

This was not the meta I expected to be dishing out today but here we are. Buckle in folks, this might not be what canon intended, but it is indeed what just exploded from my brain.

(If it’s not clear or you have questions, please come ask me!)

FACT: Aera tells Somnus that Ardyn was to be king

FACT: Ifrit provides the same information to Ardyn

FACT: The Crystal rejects Ardyn as the one who is to be the Founder King of Lucis

Bad storytelling, or is there something more here? A common theory -one I’ve worked with myself- is that the Six are not in fact omniscient and chose Ardyn as their king without consulting the Spirit of Eos, represented by the Crystal, which either chose Somnus from the start or rejected Ardyn because of his corruption by the Starscourge and then chose Somnus as the next best thing. I tend to believe it chose Somnus from the start, because Ardyn gained that taint doing what he was supposed to be doing - curing people.

So, it could be that simple, Ardyn was the Astral’s Chosen, Somnus was Eos’ - but I would like to propose something different, and it hinges around three more facts.

FACT: Aera and Ardyn were engaged to be wed

FACT: Ardyn is Somnus’ older brother

FACT: The word “King” has some very interesting etymology

Let’s get nerdy, folks.

The word “King” comes from a contraction of the Old English word cyning meaning “king or ruler” - the source for all this is HERE if you’re interested, but I’ll be hitting the high points - so far, this isn’t a surprise. But here’s where it gets interesting because cyning doesn’t actually have clear origins. But the best guess currently is that it  is at least related to cynn - another Old English word meaning “family or race” that, as you might’ve guessed, led to the modern word kin.

Now, assuming they’re related this means one of two things might be true - that “king” was either "a leader of the people" or "of noble birth.”

The second of those, we’re going to discard. One, because there was no King in the area prior to Somnus founding Lucis and so it would have been... difficult for Ardyn and Somnus to be of noble birth. The first one though... a king as a leader of the people... could that be?

There’s a lot of Ancient Roman vibes in what little we see of Ardyn and Somnus’ era, but enough that it feels reasonable to build from that. While not of noble birth as we think of it (though likely privileged) Ardyn was the older brother. Whatever their family did have, he was set to inherit and Somnus likely would have struck out on his own.

To be more clear here: Ardyn was the next leader of House Caelum. He was born to lead the family, and Somnus was to go out and establish, not only his own lineage, but a kingdom. This would not conflict with Ardyn, however, because Ardyn was also set to marry Aera Mirus Fleuret of Tenebrae which  would have gone one of two ways: either the Fleurets were established as matriarchal even then, making him the Prince Consort to her Queen - or whatever equivalent terms they had in Tenebrae for “male married to the female ruler” - Or. Or he would have been King, which... well, I do have theories that suggest he could have been back then. If he was King of Tenebrae, though, that would certainly put him more as Somnus’ peer than necessarily competition.

Regardless, Ardyn remains the father of a very important lineage, and not just because they are the rulers of Tenebrae. Remember, there were two tasks given by the gods: 1) create a new nation 2) cleanse the world of Starscourge.

Establishing a nation seemed to go smoothly enough for Somnus to have succeeded - how much moreso without strained relations with Tenebrae at the start? But curing a WORLD of Starscourge? Two people even in a lifetime cannot possibly manage.

But if two people of exceptional magic, capable of passing it down through blood, had children.... say they had two. And their two children had two children. Etc etc. You’d have had over a thousand in the eighth generation, assuming no one had more than two at a time. And that’s not accumulative - the eighth generation alone would have over a thousand people capable of healing Starscourge, a solid 500 and some change in their parents in addition. Things weren’t dire until Noctis’ time as the one hundred and fourteenth.

They could have done it. Not without cost, no, but together, Ardyn and Aera’s family could have healed the world.

To make brief acknowledgment of the attempted Biblical themes in FFXV, I think it would be closer to the truth to say that he wasn’t meant to be Eos’ Jesus: he was meant to be Abraham, the father of a nation, the father of a race of healers whose descendant(s) would save mankind.

Ultimately the point is this: Ardyn Lucis Caelum was NOT the King of Lucis. He was never intended to be except possibly by misinformed Astrals. He WAS “King” as in the head of House Caelum, his right as firstborn. He was also “king” as a leader of people, his family first and foremost but likely a whole school of mages if things had gone on this more favorable route.

Ardyn was supposed to be a king, Aera had that right. But not of the nation of Lucis.

Unfortunately, no one told Somnus that, so we’re unlikely to ever see it play out.

....I might have to write this.

[sunsetserenade]

so im sure this has bugged a few people and it tripped me up for a while too, but i understand this now.

so you know how mike does say he loves el in season 3, but now he can’t say it?

mike loved the idea of being in love with her. he’s spent his whole life getting bullied and taunted, and suddenly this girl shows up who doesn’t think he’s this freak. he latched onto that fast because it was a change of pace.

he loves her, but he isn’t in love with her.

the reason he was able to say “i love her” in s3 is because she wasn’t face to face with him.

and, it was still indirect even then. it was an “i love her” and not an “i love you”, because as we saw later in the byers’ house before the move, he couldn’t say it to her face.

do you ever imagine having a conversation with someone, but when you’re actually with that person, you just can’t bring yourself to say anything? that’s kinda what this is. but a little to the left.

the idea of loving someone romantically is really appealing to mike, but he can’t say it to el’s face because when she’s there with him, he realizes he just doesn’t feel that way. whether or not he has come to terms with this is still up in the air, but it’s what’s happening.

he could say it in the cabin because he wasn’t saying it to her.

it’s not that he’s afraid to say it now; it’s that somewhere along the way he realized it was just deep concern and not romantic love.

it’s not easy to lie to someone’s face when it comes to something like that—like love. so instead of lying, he’s adopted complete avoidance as a means of coping, dodging the question with “i care about you”

it’s easy to say something behind someone’s back only to realize you where in the wrong when you face them head on—whatever the circumstance

i hope this is coherent bc the more i type the more i confuse myself

[herbeloveve]

hello!! I’ve seen you post a lot about the idea that butch and femme relationships come with roles that both butches and femmes have to fulfill, and thought off the top of my head that you might be a reliable person to ask to elaborate slightly on that concept? Like, what defines these “roles” and how are people meant to interact with them?

I feel I may fit into one of these categories, however I am relatively “newly liberated” in my self expression so I havent really navigated either one. That’s mostly irrelevant, but just for context in case it helps. I’m fully aware you’re most likely not a walking historical database so if you’re not up to answering, (obviously) absolutely no pressure!! It seems to be a very important aspect of femme/butch identity that’s being erased to an extent by modern discourse and expression, and I don’t want to solidify my external identity in a way that participated in that kind of erasure. Though, again, feel free to ignore this completely.

Cheers!

it has been way too long and i am so sorry for not answering this sooner, i really wanted to get this Right, yknow?

First of all, I just want to say thank you for coming to me about this, I feel very honoured that you trust me with your questions — with that being said I feel it is important for me to tell you that I’ve only identified with the femme role for around 3 years. I by no means consider myself a ‘baby femme’ but in terms of longevity, I am still new and learning and coming to terms with what femme means and what it means to identify with that role. Alongside this, I recognise that butch/femme is not necessarily lesbian-exclusive, though I am coming at this through the lens of being a lesbian myself.

Another thing- this might get long, and I may also come back to add anything I think of later, so if you would ever like to DM me, please feel free. 🩷

For ease, I will be referring to butch-femme as BF. 

While there are no criteria in terms of set ‘rules’ for being butch or femme, there are general ideals and roles that are typical within BF relationships and their respective individual identities. Not only that, when experiencing these roles and living them, they’re not supposed to feel restrictive; and they do feel that way, then these labels might not be for you- which is okay, but I’ve recently seen a lot of comments suggesting that BF culture is restrictive and doesn’t feel freeing. This isn’t the case for those who are BF- I found such freedom when I learned and grew into the femme identity- and I know this is the case for the majority of butches and femmes I see online. 

I wish I could find the full quote, but I once saw someone refer to butches as being ‘the helpful one’. Which, in my opinion, is absolutely true– to me it feels adjacent and much alike to the concept of butch chivalry! 

". . . a butch is someone who has taken on the best gendered characteristics of both woman and man, left a lot of the stuff born of misogyny and heterosexism behind, and walked forward into the world without apology." – S. Bear Bergman, "Butch Is a Noun"

I am femme. I find comfort in butch lesbians and protecting them. I love being on my butch’s arm. I love being confusing to cis and straight people because they look at me and don’t understand me. Exploring my femininity through being femme has brought liberation in a way I didn’t know was possible.

I think a big misconception about BF identities is that only butches can fall into ‘gender non-conforming’ and femmes only fall into it because of their relationship with butches, this can be the case for some femmes but, certainly not all. While femmes are typically feminine presenting, we can and are still be gnc, non-binary, trans, etc. Many femmes will present feminine, but it is often a different kind of feminine and one that is rooted in their gender and sexuality– we will choose not to shave our armpits or legs while wearing our skirts and dresses. Femme is exaggerated and rooted in queerness and LGBT identity.  

You are right, in saying important aspects of BF culture have seemed to be erased; I don’t know if this is solely due to modern discourse, but I feel a part of this is a lack of BF-specific spaces. I find this, especially in smaller cities and areas where BF culture - and lesbian subcultures as a whole - are virtually non-existent. For example, my country, and by effect, my city, has very limited BF-specific events, clubs, etc. Whereas if you went to NYC, you might find more of the culture there. 

In my experience, a lot of the BF subculture has been found online, through literature, and through art. If you haven’t already, I really do urge you to read the likes of Stone Butch Blues, The Persistent Desire: A Femme-Butch Reader, Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme. I haven’t read Boots of Leather, Slippers of Gold: The History of a Lesbian Community by Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy, but I hear it’s also a good introduction on the history of BF identities. 

I think what can be daunting about BF identities is there are more identities within them - Stone Butch, Stone Femme, High Femme etc. and exploring these are also quite scary- especially when it comes to trauma and past experiences. I don’t want to get into this too much, but if you have follow-up questions, I will absolutely do my best to answer, though, Stone Femme [tops] and stone butch [bottoms] exist and are loved. 

Final thoughts before I go on separate tangents… There is no one size fits all when it comes to BF identities. You are well-within your right to try different labels and see how they fit, and if they don’t fit then that’s okay! It’s all a learning experience.

[thenixkat]

Black Superpower Breakdown Re

Considering redoing that Black Superpower project but a bit more detailed/properly broken down. While it will definitely take *awhile* for listing shit and even longer for crunching the numbers and making graphs I’d like to get suggestions for characters to include.

For the purposes of this project, any Black character from a work of speculative fiction where there are people with supernatural or superscience powers/abilities are in it are viable even if the character in question does not have powers (the absence of powers is also valuable data). And Black means any group racialized as Black which is not limited to people of indigenous African descent. This includes Melanesians, Blackfellas, Torres Straight Islanders, and more folks than just Black Africans and their diaspora. 

There will be 4 major categories for characters: Confirmed Black, Ambiguous Brown Bitches, Visibly Nonhuman, Claimed by the Community.

- Confirmed Black- there’s characters are unmistakably visibly Black. Confirmed to be Black by the creator. A openly bigoted white bitch would look at them and go “Nigger!” with zero modifiers.

- Ambiguous Brown Bitches- Characters who are visibly brown but, especially in nonlive action media, are not actually given any specific visibly ethnic features. The kinds of bitches that any medium to darkskin bitch of any race could look at and go ‘That Me!’. Those kinda bitches.

- Visibly Nonhuman- Fuckers who do not look human but ... you know they Black. Whether its b/c the actor wearing the makeup is Black, or the voice actor is Black and gives the character a Black voice, or the design aspects invoke/reference Black stuff. 

- Claimed by the Community-  those characters that you’d be hard pressed to actually define and defend what makes them Black but a good number of Black folks claim the bitch for the community.

Still working out what specific powers and nonpower abilities will be termed as. But for character suggestions pls include: - Real Name and Code Name if applicable - Media of origin - Their powers and if they don’t have powers what technology/weapons/bonds are they using that makes them stand out from the average joe (ie. supersuits; cybernetics; pet monsters; martial arts; shit tons of money; etc) - Gender - Age/Life stage - Ethnicity if known - Species

[solarpire]

Lgbtq+e

[solipseismic]

ok why not let’s do this again. mutuals put an emoji ur fond of in my askbox and i’ll make u a web weaving :)

[noxexistant]

From what I've read, you usually imagine Alex JH as Oscar and Mike F as Morris when you write?

How does your characterisation in your head work but I'm constantly changing between pairs, alex and george - mike and brendon - anthony and devin - kinda weirdly attached to them all and their distinct personalities.

Do you ever go between them? And what separates them for you?

hi there :D

i tend to lean into the uksies brothers! george crawford as morris and alex jh as oscar, but there’s definitely notes of mike faist and brendon stimson in there too for how i write them. a funky little mishmash. i tend to imagine morris as looking more like mike faist - some blend of him and george - and oscar more like alex jh, but their personalities are kind of cobbled together from details i like from all the actors.

the devin and anthony details are a little more subtle, since those two’s portrayal feels very distinct to me, but there’s lil bits from them that i especially love and like to include - devin’s fidgeting and coldness and confused lil face he does, anthony’s idea that the brothers grew up in the refuge and his interactions with the newsies and his expressions. and there’s a fair amount of alex prakken in my oscar too! he’s fantastic and very underrated.

everyone brings such interesting and new elements to the characters, and i find it easiest and most rewarding to find bits i like from each of them and create my own thing out of them, so my characterisation is kind of my own rather than following one strict version - and that’s totally because i love all of them, and wouldn’t be able to decide if i was to portray strictly one pair lmao. although, i probably could write them as distinct characters between versions if i was, say, writing strictly for uksies for whatever reason.

so yeah, i definitely can go between them! particularly the obc/uk brothers and the livesies brothers, which have the most distinct separation to me. i’d only seen obc and livesies when i first started writing for them, and then uksies totally overtook me because i absolutely fell in love with their portrayals. the difference in tone between the three affects it as well, i think - livesies can feel quite cartoony, it’s very animated and bright, whereas uksies especially feels very dark and much more honest. so that’s maybe where the distinction sits for me, in how real things are and how seriously they’re taken.

and, well, physical appearance. devin lewis feels Big (like them brooklyns) - he’s broad and strong - whereas mike faist feels a lot scrawnier but taller, and george crawford is shorter with an athletic build (and a sweet face. big brown eyes). anthony norman is a little too small and sweet-faced to really bring the scary to oscar when he isn’t actively glaring, but brendon stimson and alex jh are scary, and they’re bigger too. alex jh in particular is Cold but so soft for george/morris, and that’s the blend that i adore.

[napoleon-maxwell-sowachowski]

ok i might post art at some point ( probably involving my source material ) and i don’t feel like making a carrd atm so !!! temporary pin

to anyone seeing this uuhhf. my only hard boundary is i am VERY uncomfortable with being separated from my source to the point it’s like … physically painful unfortunately HAHA.

( example : “ i love how u draw ____ !! “ “ ____ looks so good in ur style ! “ etc. abt drawings of what i see as myself / identify with )

and like !!!! it’s totally appreciated and i get that they’re compliments and most ppl don’t even think abt it ^___^. so ofc i’m not gonna get mad if someone just randomly comments it

but if u see this just pleaaaaase keep in mind 2 avoid things like that !!!

also any posts involving my source will be tagged with something to show that it’s from my source media so it’s not like i expect any1 to guess !!

[spookykestrel]

KESTREL. KESTREL. KESTREL. there are SO MANY BUGS in arizona. and every time i see one i think of you :)

i saw a cockroach for the first time (!) the other day, and also found a cool moth that i got a terrible photo of but here it is

and also i met someone at astronomy club and their favorite insects were centipedes and i immediately though of you (actually i thought of you way before bc they were wearing a green crop top w bugs on it and moth earrings and it looked so cool and so slay and so kestrelcore)

anyways ramble over ily <3

Wooaoaogh I love sphinx moths that’s so coolio

^my lockscren lollll

Also you should become best friends with the astronomy club person bc they sound super sexy and cool

Ily have a goodnight take care of yourself and learn lots about space

[werewolf-girlfriend]

are you awab or ahab

im sorry anon im neither the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists nor the seventh wicked king of israel

[gay-jewish-bucky]

honestly the second i see someone put anything supporting the horrific response to that character+actor announcement for cap4 on my dash i will unfollow you, even if we're mutuals, i can't go through something like last spring again i just can't

[afishcalledwanda1988]

idk if this is a cold take or w/e but like the whole thing of women being expected to dress conservatively to avoid like turning guys on dovetails w this push against sexual attraction in general (specifically like implying that being sexually attracted to someone is predatory, and largely in a Terminally Online LGBT Community context) to rlly hurt lesbians n bi women*. like maybe its not good to act like straight men being turned on by women is a problem even if they dont be a creep abt it. it feels like an aspect of modern feminism that rlly requires an awareness of intersectionality but also it doesnt bc thinking someone is hot is literally not an issue whether u r a dykefag or just some rando cishet. does that make sense.

[xx-vergil-xx]

so not to fish for spoilers for the next 20 (?!) chapters of hounds, but uh. will the archive warning change? cause at the moment it's set to "no archive warnings apply" but your posts are making me Very Concerned and i want a small hint on how emotionally prepared i have to make myself

uuuh i mean okay so i will most definitely be updating the archive warnings when we get there bc i too don’t wanna spoil things — but there are Several chapters to go before anything gets Wild and Crazy like that. so for now i’d say dw abt it? i just spent two hours today writing an aggressive treatise on like the inherent adoration of knowing the names of bones like they’re in love your honor and that shit is gonna be the focus for a bit here.

i’m rlly tryna find a way to talk around it without giving it away but also i mean it’s not like the major point of the plot (it’s a major plot point but it’s not like The Point™️ man i’m sorry this is inarticulate) but okay alright i will say that i’m obeying a few of the major comics canon elements (i feel like u can guess which ones) but in a sense those events won’t be the whole deal?? uuuh fuckin this is decidedly useless my b <3

tl;dr yes i’ll be updating the archive warnings but like not until we get there. and i will say it’s arguable the ending is happy

[theunsubtleknife]

Genuinely doing fine 👍💕

[starberry-skies]

something something... the ideology that one *must* be opressed to be part of a marginalized community is something t//rfs, transandrophobes, and aphobes all share.... something something

[divorcetual]

I have a question about ids if you were doing one for a comic you’re making would you make a separate id for each panel, for each page, or just one id for the whole thing

the way I usually do it is I make one ID for the whole thing, but seperate every few panels with a space (A lot of screenreaders dont have a setting to change where it reads from so if its all in one block it makes it hard to re-listen to certain parts if needed)

Specifically I do [description for the major visuals] [diologue] [expression change (if notable)] [diologue] [repeat]

This is what I mean:

[ID: the first page of the Chainsaw Man manga. It shows Denji, a teen with light skin, blond hair, and an eyepatch, standing on top of the corpse of a Tomato Devil, holding Pochita, a dog with a chainsaw. He talks to a yakuza member. A heading on the side reads "exterminating devils for pocket change?!"

Denji says "Got your tomato devil right here, it revives from its seeds so you have to burn it" and the yakuza replies "Good work, Denji. This guy's corpse'll fetch a pretty penny on the black market. The reward's 400 grand."

Denji smiles as he says "thanks!" until the yakuza member continues "I'm taking out 170 grand to cover your loan and interest payments, and then theres the commission for referring you and associated fees..."

Denji then looks glum, looking at the money and saying "Only 70 grand left..." /End ID]