#the weapon; the tool to be used

[theotherrichardpapen]

david levithan

[yutaan]

Lightning whip LIGHTNING WHIP!!!!

[pinkd3mon]

Gardening pals

[anjian]

(desktop size, please fullview)

[transformer-hardlyknowher]

Designs for wheeljack, brainstorm, and perceptor! Blurb time!

Wheeljack: the autobots jack of all trades! Hehehe. He's an inventor, an engineer, sort of a doctor, and a great fighter! Long before the war he was a racer and stunt driver! His inventions constantly blow up in his face, despite that, he still tests them out himself. Ratchet has started taking bets on how long it will take wheeljack to end up blowing himself up again. Wheeljack is the happiest bot in the autobots! Constantly chipper and always in the mood for a good joke, he's the only one who can stand Road Rash. He also sometimes helps Skywarp with a prank every now and then. Back when he was a performer, he would do stunt collabs with Spotlight, but during one of those performances, wheeljack messed up, and spotlight had to make up for it. They crashed. Wheeljack hasn't done much stunt stuff since.

Brainstorm: ex-decepticon, and ex-autobot, brainstorm is Preceptors Conjunx, and the lost lights weapons and demolition expert! When the war first broke out, he and perceptor (who were only uh do they date? Dating at the time) were separated, and Brainstorm joined the decepticons. He built the bombs that Megatron used to blow up Iacon. Brainstorm left immediately after he found out about it. He reunited with perceptor not long after leaving the decepticons. After about two million years of them being a neutral party, brainstorm and perceptor joined the autobots. For protection. Neither talk about it. After Optimus died and then came back, Brainstorm went with Perceptor, Rodimus, and Ultra Magnus on the lost light. Missing and assumed dead.

Perceptor: Ex-autobot, twice over. When the war broke out, perceptor and brainstorm were separated. After spending all his time trying to find his partner, he got hurt when iacon was blown up. The autobots helped him, and he joined up with them to stay safe, but one day on the battlefield he found brainstorm. So they both left Cybertron as neutral bots. After two million years of this, Perceptor had to rejoin with the autobots to get brainstorm medical care. Both refuse to talk about what happened. When Rodimus became leader he started becoming increasingly paranoid, with Perceptor and Ultra Magnus being the only ones he trusted to go with him on the lost light, Perceptor convinced him to let Brainstorm come with. missing and presumed dead.

Bonus, perceptor and brainstorm hanging out!

[aguineapigcouldntdothis]

if you've ever been to someone's home and they have a gun openly displayed where children or literally anyone else can reach it, do not underestimate the power of the phrase "I've seen better". try your best to act like it doesnt reasonably scare you when they have a deadly weapon just chilling out in the open. you arent visibly impressed, you aren't visibly afraid, you're not increasing their ego in any way. then steer the conversation away from the topic of guns. make their gun the least interesting thing about them, whether that's true or not, and they're more likely to realize that they can use better things to impress their guests than deadly weapons.

never, ever, ever ask if they know how to shoot. best case scenario you get invited to a controlled shooting range and you might have a fun day out. worst case they take then gun down and without checking if its loaded they point it straight at you as a "joke". neutral scenario they're just kind of a pompous ass. assume that unless you have actively seen them shoot said gun multiple times that they dont know how to use it because they clearly can't store it.

[ratwithhands]

Hi Hello apparently I didn't empty my tank yet.

So fun general headcanon: Emmet likes to cook. He makes most of the meals in the house and often brings homemade food to special events as a way to show his appreciation of whoever he has over. It's how he relieves stress, shows affection, tries new things, it's one of his key interests beyond battling.

This has slightly different connotations in Battle Addict. See Emmet studies the physical properties of pokemon, how they tick and how to make them stop ticking. A key part of his studies is sketching pokemon and outlining their internal structures, but there's no teacher like experience. His favourite way to improve his knowledge is dealing with the subject hands on, and cooking is a very good way to do that. He specifically practices butchery, breaking pokemon down section by section, noting the musculature, skeletal structure, and organs inside. This information helps him to find weakness in an opponent's pokemon while knowing how to cover his own.

This also serves as bonding time for him and Ingo because Ingo gets to be sous chef while Emmet turns a monster into mincemeat. He hands him the different tools he needs and they converse while Emmet slices and picks apart the carcass. Emmet also gets to explain the inner workings of the pokemon, which both of them enjoy analyzing and discussing.

The book Emmet is holding is his "butchery book", which is really just a collection of different biology textbooks he uses as guides to best break down carcasses. They always end up getting messy and after a certain point, he just stops caring and uses it, dirty as it may be. They have to be stored in a sealed container away from their other study materials, and are only ever brought out for processing. Emmet is probably the only person who can stand to be next to the stench of the concentrated dried blood throughout the pages, Ingo usually wears some kind of face cover when Emmet is working.

And for those who want to see the real mess of the work:

Washing up is half the labour of studying through butchery.

[papermonkeyism]

Our DnD party hit level 4 yesterday (fuck yeah, Sentinel!) and I love how my fighter kitty seems to be on track of becoming one of my favourite tropes.

I'm just waiting for the in-game moment when we're required to leave our weapons outside when going somewhere and doing the whole routine of:

"Put all your weapons here."

Puro: *puts a hoard of weapons on the table*

"I said all of them."

Puro: *sighs, and unloads even more weapons*

"...Puro. All of them."

Puro: *groans, and somehow produces one more knife from somewhere*

(We had a moment in game where we met a blacksmith who offered to take a look at and fix our gear for free, and my character just piled a whole armoury worth of stuff on his desk.)

[landoffreaksandfrogs]

POV: you are eridan

[ofthebrownajah]

I am curious how they're gonna handle Cads in the show. Cause like it would track if they gave her more nuance like they've been doing with the other AS in the show but at the same time if show Cadsuane isn't abusive then she's not really Cadsuane to me

And I feel like her actually being abusive towards Rand is important to highlight how much she isn't Moiraine

And with them making Rand and Moiraine's relationship arguably more positive than in the books that will stick out a lot more

[taikanyohou]

“Immortal Ye, you overpraise him. He is just a child. He only did what he should do. You flatter him.” WORD OF HONOR (2021). Episode 17 / Episode 32.

[xlmibby]

'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger' except xiao doesn't feel like anything he went through - that endless agony and suffering that sill haunts him in the middle of the night when he closes his eyes - made him any stronger. if anything, it made him wrecked. broken. tainted with blood and pain that he doesn't seem to be able to erase.

as he's panting heavily after defeating monsters full of bad karmic energy, he can feel it, almost. that disgusting sensation etching its way deep into his bones - so deep that he slowly starts to think it's impossible to erase it. to erase all the ugliness of this pain and karma and his own past actions from the depths of his shattering heart.

darkness only sinks in, deeper and deeper. wrapping around his heart, choking his throat until he can't breathe, can't think about anything other than how much easier it would be to be erased from this world. or better, die while protecting mortals. this way, he will fulfill his oath but also erase another dangerous being full of karma from the world - himself.

lumine is nothing like him, he thinks.

after losing everything - her wings, her only family - she held closely to her heart, and going through all the pain this world has to offer, she still hopes. her eyes gleam when she helps people, the corners of her lips curl upwards at the sight of pretty sunsets. she skips a few steps when she's excited and she acts like happy small bunny who is happy to explore the world and it's mysteries (recklessly, sometimes. or at least xiao thinks she is a bit foolish - in an endearing way but still, it makes him a bit worried sometimes. it makes him want to be better so he can stay by her side and fiercely protect her heart with all his might as it was more his than his own.).

in the pale moonlight, in xiao's eyes–in the spaces bettwen his racing heartbeat and trembling exhales, she looks almost like the personification of love herself.

....how can she be so soft despite it all?

xiao knows he shouldn't dare to get closer to her, to long for any semblance of her light and presence around him... to yearn for her love, for her... he isn't sure whether he deserves it, anyway... the closure he's able to offer her might hurt her in the end, he's all too aware of that possibility and it's scaring him - just like the want for her does... lumine deserves better than to deal with someone who's more akin to a monster than to human, so unlike her...

and yet, his heart lingers there; with a girl as gentle as the moonlight and as radiant as the sunlight, whose heart is pure gold and her smile lights up his world just a little bit and makes him wish he, too, could be soft. just like her love is.

[spocks-kaathyra]

characters who are swords being beaten into ploughshares

[moonlight-stalker]

# 15 Mha x Dp

Danny is in the MHA he was in Japan he had been exploring when he witness a small green-haired child being chased by other children, Danny follow he watched as the kids ran into a playground and caught the green head boy he watched as they beat them up and no one tried to stop them.

Danny decided to put a stop to it and scared the kids a little, he came up behind the green hair child and slowly let himself become visible he did not bother trying to look like a human Instead he looked more like a corpse with no eyes patches of burnt and decaying skin, and the lightning scar that he let glow, he had sharp teeth and pointy ears with unusually long limbs his fingers turned into claws as he stared down at the children he dropped the temperature and growled.

The children took off running leaving the green kid behind as Danny look down he expect the kid to scream but instead, the kid got this spark in his eyes and started to ask so many questions.

After turning into a more human apererns, Danny learns the child's name is Izuku he was 6 and he had a lot of questions about his quirk and if he was a hero. When Izuku finally calmed down Danny was finally able to ask his questions like where he was, what's a quirk, why were the kids bullying him, and why does he think that he is a hero.

It seems like Izuku was surprised that he did not know about heroes or what a quirk is.

[horizon-penblade-art]

they forg! :)

I got really excited about the bigb redesign and almost immediately got to work brainstorming a nosy neighbors fusion. This is mostly just what i could come up with at 8-10 PM for the moment but i'm surprisingly happy with it

gemcyt AU, pearl design, and bigb design by @chrisrin

[maagicmushies]

Naruto is a bad ninja. That's like baby’s first Naruto criticism. This is supposed to be a manga about ninja, yet its main character is a loudmouth clad in bright orange who has never even heard of the word subtlety. There are even large stretches of the manga where he is one of the weakest main characters, so he’s even failing at the manga’s specific definition of a ninja. He is just horrible at it. But one thing that I never hear a lot of people mention is that Naruto is a bad ninja by design, he needs to be.

The Land of Waves Arc serves two main functions. The first is easing the reader or viewer into the world of shinobi on a very “scientific” level. You learn what chakra is, what the three main types of jutsu are, what chakra control is, how ninja rank works, what kekkei genkai is and so on and so forth. Everything that would be in a textbook to be studied by entry level ninja is in this arc. The second function is a look into the world of shinobi on a more “ideological” level in the second half. Ninja take on jobs, but rarely do they take on jobs for other ninja. They mainly take on jobs for local feudal lords or crime lords who wish to use these strengths for political purposes. In this way, Naruto’s ninja are sorta like mercenaries. Ninja are expected to kill the people who they have culture and shared experiences with for the sake of people who really couldn't care less about them. Their intelligence is their most valued aspect and emotions can compromise that so a trained ninja can’t even cry. As Zabuza says, a ninja is just a tool to be used by their employer and anyone who cannot do that, is a bad ninja.

One of the most genius things about this arc is that almost every named ninja we see ends up breaking a vital rule of the ninja code. Haku and Sasuke sacrifice their lives for loved ones, compromising their mission in the process while Sakura, Naruto and Zabuza are reduced to blubbering crying messes by the end. They all failed at being ninja because to be a ninja is to cast away your humanity, something that isn’t really possible. By the end of the first arc, the series has planted the idea that being a ninja isn’t something to be desired. Ninjutsu and throwing stars are cool, but this ideal of a “real” ninja is so cynical and cold that anyone who could pull it off perfectly would be as miserable as they are abhorrent. Trust me, we’ll get back into that. The arc ends with Naruto deciding that he’ll find his own ninja way. A way to be a ninja that is not synonymous with pain and cruelty.

Following the Land of Waves we go to the Chunin Exams, the stock tournament arc of the series. One thing that sets Naruto’s tournament arc apart from a more standard one is that winning isn’t the primary goal. Anyone who has watched the show or read the manga might say “Of course winning isn’t the primary goal, Shikamaru lost, yet was the only Konoha genin to promote”, but becoming Chunin isn’t even the main goal of the Chunin exams. The main goal of the Chunin Exams is to show off a nation’s talent, both as an advertisement to would-be employers and as a flex to rival villages to show what they have in store for them if they try to start a war. It was created as a form of deterrence, a ninja equivalent to broadcasting a video of your nation’s rocket capabilities. Ironically, this “mock war” ends up turning into a real war as Orochimaru uses it as a smoke screen for his real invasion. Naruto comes into the exams pretty unprepared as a fighter, but very prepared emotionally. He speaks to the demons inside of Neji and Gaara, desperately wanting to ease the pain that they’re going through. He can’t stand the idea of losing them, just like he lost haku so he talks to them like they’re people and not weapons and it resonates. The two would end up becoming lifelong friends with Naruto as a result and it had jack shit to do with his skill as a ninja. He succeeded with them because he was a person to them.

The Search for Tsunade arc is not too important for this analysis, but does introduce an idea that will become important later where Jiraiya purports that a real ninja is “one who endures”. This isn’t just fancy waffling but how the literal kanji for the word “ninja” can be broken down. That’s why, in Jiraiya’s eyes, being a ninja is not about being the most efficient or knowing the most jutsu. It’s about never giving up even when everyone else wants you to. It is what he has done his entire life and what he teaches Naruto to do. However, this is far from the only interpretation of “one who endures”. Sasuke’s flashbacks of how he remembers Itachi is massively important to our understanding of ninja because Itachi is the perfect ninja. Remember that “One Who Endures” thing? Yeah, Itachi takes that to the extreme because he thinks that it is a viable path for a shinobi to be hated by all. If that lets them do their job to the best of their ability, so be it. That’s why he handles the Uchiha coup like he does. He becomes hated by his entire village, the entire world and hated most of all by the person he loved the most. But Itachi got his job done. He did it so well that no one ever knew he was doing a job at all.

If Itachi is what lies at the end of all shinobi, if all of them got to be "perfect", we’d have entire clans and communities getting slaughtered by well meaning people just wishing to prolong the existence of the village by a couple of years. Itachi’s partner Kisame has a very similar backstory. In fact, you could argue that all of the Akatsuki are perfect shinobi. All young prodigies who were allowed to exercise cruelty because that’s what their job called for and simply got cut off by the people who weren’t able to handle the monsters that they created. It’s no coincidence that this group of ninja who were all able to be better ninja at the cost of their humanity all show some form of body horror or inhumanity in their design.

This pertains most to Sasori, one of the main villains of the Kazekage Rescue Arc. Sasori was clearly traumatized but no one in the sand cared because he was able to channel that trauma into his incredible skill with puppet ninjutsu. And then when he became more and more broken over time, creating human puppets and assassinating Kazekage, they tried to act as if they had no hand in that. However, just like Zabuza and Gaara before him, Sasori could not fully discard his humanity. He tried to replace so much of his human body with puppetry but he was never able to get rid of his heart, poetically. The same goes for Sai in the next arc, who has been trained from birth to kill off all individuality. Even before his big turn, Sai constantly laments over the fact that despite trying so hard, he can never get anyone to truly like him. It’s natural that as humans we crave connection and want to love. The more you try to act like this is a lie, the more you end up like a Sai. And no one likes Sai.

A similarly unlikable character would be Kakashi during the events of Kakashi Gaiden. Another ninja capable of putting the job above all his personal connections and he constantly disrespects his friends and own father. Sakumo Hatake was incredibly strong, but far from the perfect ninja I’ve been describing. He decided to abandon a mission partway, which saved his allies but inconvenienced his employer. The derision he faced was enough for him to commit suicide. In Kakashi’s eyes, his father was a coward, but to Kakashi’s best friend Obito? Sakumo was a hero. He might have been a bad ninja, but if caring about people you love makes you a bad ninja, then good ninja do not need to exist. Obito holds this opinion not as a villain, but as a rather heroic child with shocking similarities to Naruto. When he later fights Naruto, Naruto ends up appealing to Obito by empathizing with his beliefs about the ninja world. It sucks! His best friend’s life was ruined by a “perfect” ninja, he spent his entire life being hated and used because the ninja code for Jinchuriki was to roll them out as weapons during war time and then shamefully hide them during peacetime. Naruto knows why Obito would want to tear it down because he also wants to. They just have differing methods of how to.

The same goes for Sasuke when he rises up to become the final villain of the series. Sasuke recognizes the poison on the ninja world, what it does to people like him, his brother his best friend, Hashirama and Madara, every ninja in existence. That is why he wishes to forge a new path, killing off the ruling class and uniting all against him. It’s essentially what Itachi did, but on a global scale. Sasuke’s plan is bad and fails because it relies on embracing a ninja truth and the antithesis of the series - severing one’s bonds. Every single arc time and time again we come to learn that this idea of “severing bonds” does not work, it cannot work. The pit of loneliness you’re left in will kill you or warp you to a point where you’re no longer human. Naruto’s answer is forming an unbreakable bond between all people. Disrespecting and blurring the artificial line between class, between village, between civilian and ninja. The Great Naruto Bridge from the Land of Waves is a little cheesy, but emblematic of his final role in the story. Through his kindness he becomes able to link all together and he didn’t do this by being a good ninja. He did it by being a pretty bad one.