#so we did get something out of the deal

[randomlywanderingmoth]

The thing about Faerie Britain is that, when we entered and where we entered, there was literally nothing we could do to save it. Morgan was the lynchpin holding the whole mess together.

So, entreat and curry favor with Morgan? How exactly? She’s run the country fully competently in our absence, our presence isn’t going to give her anything. Warn her about the Calamity? She outright says she’s game to let it happen as long as her Britain is safe. [Cut for length and also in depth spoilers]

Could Mash have done anything back in time? Could we, if it had been us instead? No and also no, Aesc’s loss of faith is predicated on Uther’s betrayal and death- without metaknowledge there is nothing we could have done, and even with metaknowledge the best we would’ve done is stalled his death by a short few years. He would never be king, and likely his people would have been slaughtered. Again, Aesc would lose faith.

Back to the present then. Let us assume we have some metaknowledge, here and there. Could we stop Aurora from plotting Morgan’s downfall? Not particularly. She won’t listen to us, she’d turn on us if we turned on her, and her death would activate Melusine- or at the very least make her very intent on killing us, and a Melusine out for our heads would make saving anything extraordinarily difficult. If Aurora was dead, Melusine would expressly require the name of Tam Lin Lancelot to remain even remotely stable- failing that the Calamity of Fire would kick off.

What about stopping Barghest and the Calamity of the Beast? There, there is literally nothing we could do. As far as the story depicts it, her Adonis is dead, she ate him some time before we ever turned up, and her hallucinations of him are the only thing keeping her stable. She’s a time bomb and there’s nothing we could practically do about it.

So, saving Baoban Sith then. Stopping her from going wild with the curses, stopping her from turning into a lump of cursed flesh that gets unceremoniously dumped into the Pit to awaken Cernunnos. This one is not expressly impossible, unlike every other item on the list- but it might well be. Beryl Gut has her ear before we even meet her, and he’s driving her down the path of reckless play with curses before we get the chance to ever play party to her conscience, and in order to prevent that we would need to neutralize Beryl Gut as soon as humanly possible. Practically we would need to do that prior to the defense of Londinium, before he teaches her the altered Mors curse that would start to rot her soul- and you’ll note we never get anything even resembling a clear shot at Beryl as such. So, we need to curry favor with her, independent of knowing that Beryl also has her ear.

Even then, we would need to drive Baoban Sith away from Beryl’s methods as early as possible- which would require she be less in tune with curses- which would be difficult, given the thing she wants is Morgan’s praise. Baoban Sith got that by way of violent murder, and she wants to learn Magecraft- a point of order, those are both topics Beryl Gut has us beat handily in- and again, without metaknowledge, we’re playing a game of tug-o-war with someone we don’t even know who it is.

So, let us say, purely for the sake of theory, we somehow succeed. Congratulations! You stopped Baoban Sith from getting turned into a lump of easily hostage-able curse flesh! Now Morgan will kill the traitors, sit back on her throne... and kill us all, because we’re necessarily working alongside folks that are trespassing on her city. Unless we swear off the Round Table Alliance, which translates to cutting ties with Oberon and Percival (and a lot of other people), we’re under her crosshairs- and even if we do cut ties, there’s no guarantee she won’t just oust us as a generally threatening faction.

But let’s say that, somehow, for whatever reason, we save Baoban Sith, and don’t get blasted by Morgan. There’s no guarantee that Cernunnos won’t wake up on his own- and we saw how Morgan’s defenses handled Cernunnos- they weren’t enough. Granted, he had a Divine Core formed from Baoban Sith at the time, but it would be an ugly affair all around.

So, let’s say in theory we could save Baoban Sith. We could save Baoban Sith, we could keep Morgan from killing us. Let’s say that somehow Cernunnos was neutralized. Great, cool. We’re not friends enough with Percival for him to stop Albion, who will definitely turn up when Morgan decides that Aurora’s Wind Tiding was doing her no favors- and we’ve burnt bridges with Oberon. So, Morgan’s supply is exhausted, and the Pit is no longer plugged. Cue Wyrm of the Pit, Vortigern, succeeding in his plan to devour the world because all he needed to do was not care about us enough to stand close enough for us to duke it out with him.

And again, this is all predicated on us having the foreknowledge to do everything in our power, logic at the time be damned, to save Baoban Sith, and a long list of other convenient dominoes lining up.

So what if we never turned up in the first place? What if Mash never became the Knight of Sheffield, what if we never accompanied Castoria?

Well then Vortigern would just find another sucker, and events would proceed largely as normal but without us there.

Saving Fae Britain was a mission doomed to fail from the start.

So what about the reverse? Was there anyone we could save individually?

Also not really.

We couldn’t save the humans because of the nature of the Lostworld phenomenon, so we could only save faeries, and there aren’t many of those that we could save. Furthermore, on any second inspection, all these faeries were also doomed to die, because of the nature of faeries in Fae Britain. They need a purpose, a driving goal, to live. No driving goal, they turn into Mors. They could never survive just sitting in the Storm Border while we try to solve the Bleached Earth problem.

Fae Britain was doomed from the start. There was never anyone we could save. We can only save the rest of the world, from its implosion.

As with every part of our missions since departing Chaldea, all we can do is save our world from the Lostbelts.

[knockknockitsnickels]

I think this is one of my favorite lines from the Wraith route because of (imo) how much the meaning changes depending on if you got there via Spectre or Nightmare. For Spectre, it honestly strikes me as a genuine question. Why are you doing this to her? If you're on the Spectre route, you presumably already know the Narrator can't really be trusted, since you had to reject his reward to get here. What are you hoping to gain from continuing to hurt her? For Nightmare, it honestly just makes me sad. As the Shifting Mound describes her, "She desires only companionship, but the only thing she knows is how to hurt." This line feels like a plea from someone who genuinely doesn't understand why you keep rejecting her. She wants to be with you, but she just can't understand how to do that in a way which doesn't hurt you.

[kelocitta]

What a worthless animal

[eddiegettingshot]

with a show that goes out of its way to emphasize having a partner to sit with you in your mess and be there for you no matter what you’re struggling with it BOGGLES my mind that people think eddie has to be Cured tm to be deserving of a happy relationship let alone one with buck. thats so fucking weird

it kills me because THIS IS LITERALLY THE THESIS OF ROMANCE ON THIS SHOW!!! this is WHY all the beloved couples have made it together!!! what the fuck does anyone think is happening with bathena right now? she's in his mess with him! what the fuck is anyone talking about at this point, genuinely!! and what makes it even more ridiculous is that BUCK AND EDDIE LITERALLY ALREADY DO THIS FOR EACH OTHER, the way EVERY OTHER COUPLE DOES. it is actually a significant part of what establishes their partnership as being on the same level as bathena / henren / madney!! buck wouldn't think that eddie needs to go and Fix Himself or Heal because HE ALREADY UNDERSTANDS why eddie does what he does, he UNDERSTANDS why eddie hurt ana and why eddie hurt marisol and why eddie cheated and he UNDERSTANDS eddie's pain and trauma because he's been there! this whole time! this "eddie has stuff to figure out" idea is just some shit people made up because they cannot stand the idea that buck and eddie are willing to do the work together and they also can't stand the idea that they might hurt each other - specifically, that eddie might hurt buck, even though we ALSO just saw how buck ACTUALLY hurt eddie in 7x04! that doesn't matter though! maybe the ONLY thing that eddie actually needs to "figure out" for buck is not being straight. beyond that? they have it guys! they'll make it through!

[novella-november]

Is this fanfic friendly? I feel like an outlier.

I guess this is my sign it's time to throw together a FAQ post to link to lol.

Yes, every event for this blog is fanfic friendly :D

Though as I mentioned on my Ominous October post, for events that include multiple short stories, I encourage everyone to flex their creativity and take one of their planned short story fanfics, and at least *attempt* to turn one of them into something entirely original; rebuilding a character and story from the ground up to stand on its own two legs is no easy feat, and that is what makes it so fun!

It really gets your creative gears turning, to make an "au of an existing material" to be something entirely original, and you can be pleasantly surprised about the things you come up with!

As a few people say, its not just a matter of "filing the serial numbers off" -- you have to add in just as much *or more* as what you take out when you are turning a fanfiction into something that is original and completely divorced from its original source material / inspiration, and that is a hard, but very rewarding challenge!

Obviously, this is not a requirement (there's no hard requirements for any of the challenges, other than no cheating, including no using AI),

but if you would like an extra challenge for the short story events and you're planning on doing entirely fan-fiction, I highly recommend trying it out at least once, and seeing where it leads you--

you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by what you find down that rabbit hole!

[cementcornfield]

the way i know it's taking everything in him not to say some ridiculous comment to the press rn 😭

[skunkes]

the way I've been raised has shown itself in a recent awful experience I had and the realization won't leave me because I'm not sure what to do about it.

I don't like feeling anger/upset and it's rare for me to feel it anyway but it's led to me being unable to tell what's worth getting upset over anymore. If my wants upset somebody, then, well, maybe I shouldn't have them? What is so serious that I need it to go completely my way...? What desires am I allowed to have. It's not that serious, it's okay if not, you can't always get what you want....

every time I feel Upset I am later wracked with guilt because it wasn't a big deal and I was just being selfish... What IS a big deal then? How can I tell? Its admittedly never a big deal... But I keep being upset. And stepped on....

[carlyraejepsans]

I’ve started watching Utena because of you. What. Is going on

HI. WELCOME TO THE CLUB, watch the trigger warnings. but yeah, revolutionary girl utena veers more and more towards surrealism the further you get into the series. it often and voluntarily forfeits narrative/logical consistency in favor of visual storytelling, metaphors and symbolism. i was just talking about it with nic the other day, and if the story weren't so harrowing, i would recommend it to everyone who wants to get into literary analysis, because it is SO packed with symbolism EVERYWHERE that it actually encourages you to try to decode it.

whatever you think utena is about, it is NOT. you can't go in and treat it like your 49293th classical shoujo. utena is a firework show of visual symbolism and it very rarely, if ever, explains itself to the viewer. it refuses to handhold you, but it never berates you for trying and getting it wrong either. there is SO much handholding in modern day media, but utena trusts its viewer to take away something meaningful from itself and to piece its message together on their own. it's one of my favourite pieces of media of all time just for that

[puppyeared]

what if i snapped and made an oc carrd

[famewolf]

speaking of ocd, I think I'm realizing that I truly don't have anxiety and it's literally just my ocd. im not anxious about anything until it involves me and suddenly I'm spiraling

[padfootastic]

Ahaha thank you for the nice comments in tags <3 i love Remus but he seems bit like a spineless people pleaser and after dating somebody who would rather lie about their feelings than have people be mildly upset with them..... I chose violence 🗡

no but ur so right because!!! i’ve been sleeping on this for a while but let’s talk about remus’ personality traits and how they have the potential to make him a bad/absent partner, at best, and an abusive one, at worst. everyone wants to turn him into this image of perfection just bc he’s such an ‘uwu victim’ figure in fanon but that’s SO far from the truth omg

(i am…just gonna put this remus character analysis under a cut bc it got unnecessarily long and i wouldn’t want u to read it if u didn’t want to lol)

so, for one, he’s manipulative. he has no combinations in twisting the truth or dodging it entirely for his own benefit. like, the man could stand in front of his dead best friend’s orphaned son & not even allude to the fact that he knew his dad. he had no problem bringing james & lily up in the most twisted ways possible to guilt/emotionally influence harry. so remus in a relationship would have the capacity to either knowingly or unknowingly manipulate his partner. the definition of gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss except more sinister.

next, his spinelessness. either as a defensive measure to deal w anti-werewolf hostility or as an innate personality trait, remus has the habit of just—not standing up for things. he looks away when his friends act like assholes, even when he’s in a position of authority (which yes, u can argue that he’s afraid of losing them but atp they’ve literally risked life & magic & azkaban for him so either way, he comes off badly—either he doesn’t mind himself, or he doesn’t fully trust their friendship, or it’s just easier to look away). in a relationship, this can manifest as bottling everything inside u until it makes u bitter or u violently unload on the other person in an entirely disproportionate manner. the dynamic would also be a bit skewed. the people pleasing u mentioned is also such a big thing that people usually overlook. when ur constantly trying to make the other person happy and don’t want to rock the boat, that is a cocktail for miscommunication and breakdown of relationships. ur also constantly putting the emotional burden of constructively dealing w issues on ur partner instead of doing it urself.

connected to his cowardice is his habit of running away when things get tough. remus is conflict avoidant; he does not like to put himself in a position where he has to take a decisive stance, especially if it’s against what others around him believe in. he runs away when things get tough, and tbh, for me, this comes from a constant spiral of self hatred & self victimisation, both of which stem from his experience as a werewolf. in every difficult situation, he centres himself & his discomfort and instead of dealing with it and moving forward for a constructive solution, he decides that stepping back from it altogether is better. which, yeah, works well for him bc he can temporarily put a pin in it but it’s kinda terrible for everyone’s who’s left behind. so i also think that remus is a profoundly selfish character who doesn’t look beyond the end of his own nose. u can imagine how those traits might manifest themselves in a relationship.

and his people pleasing!! so this might be verging on fanon but his gratitude and/or devotion to dumbledore sets an…interesting tone. it’s also another example of how he cannot conceive himself in any other term except as a victimised werewolf. the marauders did a lot for him, arguably even more than dumbledore’s token representation formula, but he never felt indebted to them the way he did for D. dumbledore also kind of makes him feel needed? validates his feelings? and that just speaks to a very twisted sense of self for me. which, again, won’t bode well for his other interpersonal relations.

also, on a very hc note, i also feel like remus just…does not have any significant capacity to love. he takes and takes and takes but doesn’t give much in return. this doesn’t even have to be an actively malicious decision, tbh, just a very self-centred one. he doesn’t realise how much he’s taking bc he’s only thinking about his own circumstances.

all of these are also just why i can’t see r/s working out in any healthy manner. remus is exactly antithetical to everything sirius is/believes in, and not even in the fun ‘opposites attract’ way. but that’s another rant no one asked for lmao

[uselessgaywhovian]

the problem with playing D&D is you have ships 'n' blorbos that only 4 other people know about

[starpros-sunshine]

Sometimes I wonder why cold symptoms always get worse in the evenings there has to be a logical explanation for that

[rubiesintherough]

.

[kyuala]

SOOOOOO hard to go through everyday life trying to ignore the never-ending feeling that im just irreparably fucked up and therefore should just give up on everything

[autumnrory]

woooo my niece took 5 of my 13 lego sets, one of which was one of the three larger ones, so that's one huge box out of the way and i'm just glad she wanted them because like they ARE twenty years old and they look fine ofc but sometimes kids aren't gonna want stuff that isn't new and shiny ya know, but she did seem to want everything which would've been fine with me but i knew there was no way they would take all that with them, and at least i still have stuff of my own to sell, plus should get at least a cut of my brother's stuff for doing the inventory and putting together that stuff that wasn't already done