#theres a lot to unpack just with one character so i may not make sense lmao

[forlorn-crows]

Cumulus is always the dommy mommy.

Dont get me wrong shes hot as a dom but i dont really care for the mommy part if that makes sense. Let her be a mistress or sir or something!!

interestingly enough, i dont really ever see cumulus as dommy mommy? or rather, i should say she is most often 'mommy' coded but i feel like i dont see that dom aspect? i feel like the fandom assigned dommy mommy has been cirrus historically (we'll talk about that in a lil bit)

but, and you can correct me if im wrong, i think im understanding you here when you say 'mistress' or 'sir', because of the fact when she is more dominant, its paired with the 'mommy' thing. she doesnt typically get written with a hard dom edge. theres always some aspect of softness, is how im taking that.

which is true, ive seen that. and i might derail a bit from your personal point and maybe even the common theme that ive seen so far . . . but i dont know if anyone else feels this way, but cumulus and sunshine, to me, dont feel like ghouls who typically enjoy that hard edge (at least in my personal hc). i would group mist and aurora in that category, with cirrus somewhere in that middle ground.

i totally get wanting to see that from a ghoulette like lus, due to the fact she's not the type of character people would 'assume' would act that way. its very easy to say we should write characters in protest or in opposition to the roles most commonly assigned to them. but i also want to offer the idea that maybe we're just doing the same thing but in reverse. im of the belief that its perfectly okay to write feminine characters with feminine stereotypes, so long as those traits are balanced with other elements of their character.

again, i completely understand wanting to see her in different roles, especially bc people who look like lus are literally all shades of different from each other. AND that the prevailing characterization of lus tends to sway in one pinpointed direction, which isnt good either. AND AND that you could literally have all kinds of ideas about who cumulus is to you, and its technically correct. all we know is how these ghouls act on stage. we dont have actual plot and things to critique like a show or movie would. we're critiquing each other, which many a time ends up as a critique of the greater societal stereotypes and ideas about fat women. which is valid. and i know im rambling and this is more of what i specifically want to talk about in another (even longer lmao) post.

in the end, i agree. it would be nice to separate the dom and the mommy thing from being cemented together, because dom in itself has soooo many flavors and shapes etc. maybe lus doesnt want to be nice. maybe she does want that hardness. i dont know! but youre right, i dont see that of her much.

[eviclair]

I don’t know if I’ve ever heard of your actual thoughts(tm) on khr, so what’s your constructive review on the series as a whole? Like some positives and negatives w/ the writing, characters, etc. If u don’t feel like answering, feel free to ignore this LOL.

 tl;dr because this is 800 words of nonsense. i think you should know i would not know a constructive review if it bit me in the ass.

my guy i have not done a full read of khr in maybe two years and i know that does not sound like a long time but i have the long-term memory of a fruit fly. please bear with me. luckily for both of us i liveblogged the last time i read so i at least have my own sparknotes jdflaksjddaf

first off! khr is a satire manga!!! i cannot stress this enough, i can and will fight you to the death about this!!! “oh but it gets serious later” it grows a PLOT, thats not the same thing. khr is stupid as hell and that is both on purpose and my favorite thing about it.

i fucking love shonen man!!! its all about FIGHTING and LOVING YOUR FRIENDS and HAVING EMOTIONS and. bro im a water sign. my mars is in gemini, there is nothing i can do about this, god made me and said “get that bitch some found family and also some incredible violence” and we all just have to live with that. 

khr is so much all of those things that i did not realize they were being made fun of until very long after the fact so my current opinions are very much not the ones i started with jaldkhjdfhd but man. once i clued in i both loved it so much more and became 100% incapable of interacting with fandom in any meaningful way L M A O

i just. the main conceit is that theyve weaponized the deus ex machina eleventh-hour shonen power up. the “my dead family came back to life to kill me” trope is used three separate times. the big bad student body president is a delinquent. theres an entire subset of above magic god powers thatre just

the tyl bazooka was just ripping on the Timeskip Arc until the Timeskip Arc actually happened?? like fuuta’s special thing is that he can communicate with the Meta Planet to divine Character Rankings, i dont know what to tell you!!! the truth is out there!!! 

like DO YOU EVEN REMEMBER that time tsuna experienced a villain’s flashback sequence FOR HIM because i fucking do, i think about it every day,

so in the sense of “please critique the writing”, i cant do that because im pretty sure 98% of all the tropey bullshit is by design. do i wish people like the kokuyo gang got more characterization outside of being ride-or-die villain sidekicks?? of course i do but thats my own damn fault for seeing cool side characters and losing all higher brain function. on the other hand, hibari being the person he is and having absolutely no backstory or motivation beyond “get out of my school” is really fucking funny and keeps me warm at night, so. win some, lose some.

(the 2% of the writing that isnt tropey bullshit that i CAN critique is whatever is happening with kyoko. Bad Female Cast is definitely a shonen trope but its a shitty one and i want it to die. within maybe four minutes of kyoko being introduced she tries to body a man and then thats just never spoken about again?? wheres that energy queen?!!! let kyoko say fuck!!!!)

((this applies to haru too in the sense that all she really does is make moon eyes at tsuna but the way in which she does so is honestly so fucking funny and unhinged that it comes back around to being great. like yeah yep yes ma’am thats 100% bonafide Girl Who Throws Skittles In A Puddle And Calls It Potion right there please may i have another))

If khr took itself even 4% more seriously it could be really deep and compelling and i think that frustrates a lot of people, but i think i like it better this way?? half the fun for me is reading in between the lines!! the subtext, however unintentional it may be!!

examples: yamamoto is one of my favorites just because theres SO FUCKING MUCH to unpack about him!! canon gives us a lot of information about him just by virtue of the fact that he’s a Main Character, but paradoxically he himself is never really the focus. he just Does Shit and you have to figure out why on your own and i LOVE DOING THAT.

i dont love mukuro because he’s a fleshed out and nuanced villain, i love him because he says shit like “i went to hell six times” and never expounds upon that or “i can definitely trust the information i got from this magic monocle called Demon Spade’s Super Evil Murder Eye or whatever the fuck” and then expresses surprise when daemon spade is an asshole. he goes and willfully fucks up the only job anyones ever given him (impersonate 80 year old leonardo lippi) because he Just Has to shapeshift into a young hot dude and hand deliver byakuran, the boss of the Flower Family, the Family that names all its members after Flowers, a bouquet that means “i am in disguise ;) cant catch me bitch ;)”

like WHAT THE FUCK!!

i dont know man. i just like puzzles and khr is a gift that keeps giving.

(sidenote that should’ve maybe just been the subject of the post but re:i cant shut the fuck up about anything ever, i love tsuna so much. so much. his personality!! his relationships!!! his growth!!! his growth!!!!! his growth!!!!!!! khr has its claws in me because i see tsuna do something cool or brave or even deeply stupid actually and my whole heart goes AAAAAAAAA bc thats him!!! thats my son!!!!! my baby boy whom ive raised since birth!!!!!! suit me up and call me a reborn kinnie, fuck!!!!!!!!!)

[macklives]

alright, im actually kind of in the mood to unpack some stuff regarding karkat's character and the way alternia works actually, so i dont mind giving this a go. and while act 5 isnt completely finished yet (so this is an analysis post for act 5 up until page 2305), there is still more to explore, and im pretty sure i have a lot more to read regarding both karkat AND alternia. until then, i will give a general layout as to what i know so far and how i can expand this in a psychological way (especially considering i did my psych exam so my mind is FRESH from studying)

alright, starting with what seems to be the deal with the hemospectrum, theres a total of 12 blood colors. HOWEVER, one of those blood colors is a "mutant" blood which is unwanted in troll culture as it is, well, "mutant", meaning whoever has this blood will get brutally slaughtered. hurrayyy. im guessing it is even lower than aradia's rust blood, as she is allowed to live but is the lowest on the hierarchy triangle. meaning karkats blood is not even ON the hierarchy triangle and simply buried underground where they hope he stays. so its not exactly pleasant to be living in a society where everyone is trying to KILL you or at least keep you away from everything.

from what i remember, troll reproduction is a vital aspect in their culture, that everyone is forced to mate and drones will come by each house to collect the genetic material. this is mandatory apparently, and if someone were to object, they will be “culled" as quickly as they could say no. alternia seems to be really keen on the whole "blood and carnage" thing, which means their probable solution to anybody breaking the law, is to kill them on sight and just leave them there to rot - regardless of who they are and what families they comes from or have. trolls are free to kill whenever or whoever they please without any governmental repercussions. which means revenge upon revenge happens without any policy.

however this is very important when looking at karkat, because karkat may not be able to do the whole reproduction process (not that we necessarily want him to, im saying this in terms of how its mandatory for every troll and there will be a time when the drones WILL come for karkat). but as he is already a mutant and if they were to "collect" from him, they would find out his blood regardless of how he hides it. they will either cull him for saying no, or cull him for his blood. karkat, in this sense, is doomed regardless. which makes his character much more interesting.

and keep in mind alternia kind of sucks, because from the looks of it, trolls are constantly tested throughout their lives to prove themselves to society that they are allowed to live and survive. but ONLY if they are the strongest among them. alternia wants to become this fearful planet where the weak die off and only those proven worthy can stay to grow up and slaughter more of their kind until the world is nothing but blood thirsty strong murderers. im not too sure who is governing alternia but they can suck a dick if they think this is how good morals work. alternia only really has one way to solve things which is to kill those who question/fight back, OR to kill those who CANNOT fight back essentially. which puts all the trolls through a double edged sword where they cannot do anything but follow the guidelines given to them by troll's society and government, and try to survive as much as they can until then.

if i remember correctly, when it comes to the law side of things. if you look at it from terezi's introduction where she explains prosecutions with her plushies (lemonsnout ect ect i forgot the term for them lol), she said "you are guilty until proven innocent" which is the polar opposite of "innocent until proven guilty” used in OUR own society today (tho i guess we are by far the "good guys" in this situation, but we are far different than how trolls live their lives). anyways, what this means is that everyone dies regardless unless theres literal proof that they have not done the crime. even so i wouldnt put it past them to do nothing about their case even WITH proof. terezi even goes to say that technically there is no way to deal with the law on alternia, and most of crimes get solved through death. she even demonstrates this by how easily she hung the "suspect" and flipped a coin to determine his fate. however, even with the coin landing on the side of safety, where the suspect were to be released, she said "im blind remember i cannot see this coin" and essentially "killed" him. while terezi may have just been playing with her plushies, theres something we can take from this which dictates how their actual court cases are actually solved.

NOW, vriska (yes ik pls bare with me here, i will not make it about vriska but i do have a point here), from the last few pages i saw, can basically kill her friends in an instant, without any remorse. i can tell she sees this as the most "necessary" solution for her problems. i wouldnt say its for survival, but she does do it as a way to provide some sort of safety on alternia. she is a higher blood, and apparently the high bloods are known to kill whoever they please as long as its convenient. and since trolls have this whole fad of "killing the ones who cause you trouble so the problem is out of the way", she is wired to think its the only solution when threatened or when you dislike a person. 

god, she killed aradia because she wanted "revenge", because she wanted to get back at aradia for tormenting her with ghosts EVEN IF aradia did so because she threw tavros off a cliff in the first place. this may have worsened their friendship, KEEP IN MIND THEY WERE FRIENDS, but NEITHER, and i mean neither terezi/vriska/aradia, had any remorse if the other dies as long as there was a reason. in the story, vriska didnt care what happened to tavros because she disliked him, therefore becoming pretty bias over his fate. because of this attempt at killing, aradia didnt care what happened to vriska either, and neither did terezi. terezi sold her out to one of the most powerful beings on their planet, solely because of their revenge cycle. as long as the troll in question did something "malicious”, then that plays a factor in their morals. vriska gave no second thought to killing both of her friends (or at least attempt to with tavros), terezi also tormented john in act 4 which led to his “doomed timeline death” and sold vriska out after she realized vriska wouldnt change. so no fucking WONDER karkat tries to hide who he is, he's overly cautious to not let it slip out because even the people he calls friends could backstab him at any given time considering theres LITERAL EXAMPLES OF THESE TROLLS HAVING DONE SO.

to karkat, he sees this as dangerous, which is why he even CALLS vriska dangerous to begin with. she might not even hesitate to kill him herself or maybe sell him out to the drones, because 1. she may not want to be a witness to something society actively seeks to destroy and 2. she cares more for her survival than karkats. EVEN if they were friends (re: aradia and vriska and terezi). so it just shows. 

on that note, i find it funny how karkat indirectly distracted vriska after she baited him with the question of his blood in a past conversation, which prompted karkat to monologue about troll romance. he was, yes, VERY interested in this topic to start with, but it was a nice little bonus for karkat as to not be found out by the one person who would most likely kill him even if it wasnt on purpose. however, we do not know how this will play out IF she does find out, we just know karkat is in the right to be scared of the theory.

and, alright i do have to mention this, while karkat may have been an angry fucker to START with, who spites the world and throws out insults every chance he gets, i feel he does this as more of a survival instinct as well. he doesnt care what he says to people no matter what they rank on the hemospectrum. they dont know his blood color so he feels he has some sort of immunity, but he just needs to keep it hidden. it also may just be his personality, as he IS a character who was given specific traits and andrew went along with it without so much thinking about plot. yet if you look at this from more of the metaphorical route, think about it with uhhhh lets say the perspective of how dogs work. for example, when you put a chihuahua next to a doberman, a doberman is more of an excited, energetic dog whereas a chihuahua will rain hell down on anybody who so goes near them. sometimes this is to make up for their size, to seem as menacing as the larger doberman, as they have nothing else to fend themselves with. another way to look at it is, if you see a bear (i forget if its black/brown or grizzly) you make yourself seem like the bigger person by scaring it off with sounds and eventually it will leave you alone. these sort of tactics work in the sense of survival. this is sort of what karkat could be doing, he uses insults and a defensive shouting to not really "hide" himself, but to have some sort of way as to not be found out if people start to question. someone asks him "hey karkat whats your blood" he goes "FUCK YOU, FUCK OFF, END OF STORY" which could make a person go "yo sorry dude forget i ever asked". so this could be a factor as to why he is so crabby, however on the other hand, he is crabby because that is also his character. andrew probably thought yo cancer = crab = crabby. however i do like how he is perceived and the whole "mutant blood" really made me do a double take on how he views life himself. he has to always hide who he is or he will get physically killed. alternia would take joy in finding out he does not belong there because lets face it, alternia is a bitch of a planet.

this also brought me to ask the question, why does karkat want to be a leader if hes so scared of what would happen to him if he were to be found out? which then, at first i said lol this is just karkat, he wants to a leader because he just wants to be the leader, he likes when things go to plan and that he the most say in their sburb plans considering he thinks everyone else is a "dumbass". to which, i then thought about it more and went ouch what if hes a leader because he knows hes not valued enough in society, that he somehow wants to feel some sort of importance in the world, so he wants to become a leader. i imagine younger karkat, not knowing why his blood is so undermined, finding out he is not wanted and suddenly on the most wanted list without having even DONE anything. even TAVROS said he was on that list, but only because he was weak and had no back-bone, here karkat may have been strong but no matter what, he was to be culled BECAUSE of his blood. something he cannot change no matter what. imagine a little kid knowing he will die at any point because of who he is (rlly sounds familiar if you think about it). so of course, he hides himself from the world, but do you think for an instant, little angry karkat wants to simply be FORGOTTEN about? i doubt that, he wants to be heard, he doesnt necessarily want to be rejected as he knows he will be, so while he does hide his blood, he wants to have a voice no matter what. when being a leader, people dont reject you, they LISTEN. they all may not want to because karkat is just a fucking ticking time bomb, who can lash out at any second, but i feel theres now a reason why he has this superiority complex. he wants to sort of become the person he knows he never will become (if you put it into that perspective). so thats kind of why im giving him the benefit of the doubt here.

i would also like to point out a sort of.... comparison?? not with the dogs but with unwanted children in a family household. this doesnt necessarily apply to karkat, but sub in family household with society and it might as well. (on that note, a warning/viewer discretion, if you have any problem with this kind of discussion, i wouldnt read further into this paragraph and skip to the next one) alright, the unwanted child psychology basically deals with the process of a child which is neglected by their parents, and/or know that they were never wanted in the family. i read an article a while back when we were discussing this in a lecture, we were browsing multiple people's perspective on the matter, and one said "An affective relationship may be suffocating to [the unwanted/neglected child]: it’s a defense against intimacy of which they know nothing. Normally they fluctuate between egotism and deep feelings of inferiority. They don’t understand what a balanced and healthy self-esteem looks like." it explains how the child who grows up in an unwanted home admits great emotion deprivation, because the child's bonds of affection are extremely fragile, and this can lead to both egotism and feeling like they are inadequate. and it really strongly shows karkats personality. we havent gotten that much from him in general, but considering how he uses this egotism to cover up the fact that he may be doomed, really shows the similarity. i liked this short article so i want to give some points to take into consideration, specifically this part: "It will be very difficult for unwanted children to build healthy relationships of affection in their adult life. Love is a foreign language to them. They don’t know how to decipher the codes and much less how to build them. It’s very hard for them to need and to be needed. That’s why, more often than not, they completely shirk their conflicts with peers and superiors, or do nothing but generate them. They speak incessantly about the broken relationship that marked their arrival in the world. A person with such a background will need help to get through those abysses of love that live in their heart. The most important step is that they recognize that their discomfort doesn’t depend on who they are, but the circumstances that led to their being." it may not be 100% tru for karkat but theres a small portion of it that can link back to karkats view on life and how being this mutant can really change who he is as a person. and i hope you can see the similarity between karkats character and this form of psychology. yet i also do not fully know the depth of karkat vantas. however i do hope it continues to build up in this way, as it would be both interesting and make us feel more for him as a person.

alright, i think if i write any more i will never stop aghjsk, which is a bit too much for a sunday afternoon, basically to sum up this post, trolls are violent and karkat will be killed if hes found out, even by his friends if it comes down to it. so karkat cannot really trust anybody, hes alone and imagine the thrill he had when he saw jack cut his hand to show the bright red blood? that he finally has someone LIKE HIM. imagine when he finds out about the kids. so i believe in his growth, while he needs to get a better vocabulary, i do get why hes so defensive all the time. because hes both scared and unwanted. and he wants to make up for it.

and i guess with all that being said, you can tell i now have a slight soft spot for the kid lmao

[wearevillaneve]

Age Ain’t Nothin’ But A Number (Attempted Murder Is an Issue).

There was a Reddit discussion about why isn’t the age difference between young Villanelle and Eve “old enough to be your mother, but I’m not” Polastri a subject for debate.  I didn’t write this particular response, but it’s witty enough to make me jealous.  Fortunately for the giggles I got from it, dreadnot84 did and has graciously allowed me to share Eve and Villanelle’s first couples counseling meeting with you.

I just feel like as characters V and E break so many molds in terms of their agency and ability that the thing we should be the LEAST worried about is their age difference.

Like no one is talking about how their unhealthy yet super sexy obsession is turning to love even though these bitches have SO MUCH unresolved trauma from life and each other.

 I would love to be a fly on the wall in their couple counseling session.

 Therapist: would you like to talk about your dynamic and... the uh...age difference?

 V: No. She’s beautiful and beauty has no age. I thought she looked glorious when she stabbed me. So full of life.

 Therapist: you stabbed her.... like with a knife...intentionally?

V: yes! She broke into my apartment and trashed it. And then when we were in bed I went to woo, and she makes stabbing gesture such passion. I fell in love then.

T: You FELL in LOVE after being STABBED? OK...I did catch that correctly...Eve you’re being quiet what do you have to say to all...this?

 E: she shot me and left me for dead. I did not fall in love then

 V: not even a little?

 E: not even for a second. Something about BEING SHOT really dims the shine. I mean I was starting to get into it before the murder and manipulation but something about a bullet in the flesh REALLY changes perspective.

 V: But I am yours! I have the scar to prove it. I wished they matched. Can I shoot you again?

 Both eve and the therapist look horrified.

 V: I kid I kid. you two have no sense of humor.

 E: fucking nerd. Anyone tell you your cute when you’re annoying?

 Therapist: soooooo.... maybe we could do three times a week because THERES A LOT to unpack here...and do you two maintain separate residences? It seems you may need to work on healthy non-lethal boundaries

 V: no, I am little spoon. We are packaged set. We stay together. Always. This is stupid! (leaves)

 E: just put us down for next Thursday same time (shrugs) she gets like this when she feels her feelings. See you then. (illustrations by chenckino from the Monster x Demon collection)

[terramythos]

My commentary on October Daye #10 or "Whodunnit: non-Electric Boogaloo" OR "Golly there sure are a lot of references to book 3 in this one. For some reason. I'm sure it's just a coincidence and theres no reason for that at all".

This is the first one that's just a liveblog, not a reread. And there's 2 more after this one. Which I'm told are just devastating. Woo!

-Holy shit, 10 books in and we got a map!

A map!

An honest to God fantasy map!

-Quentin/Dean is.. cute. Again, I like that Dean will probably get more development now that he's more relevant to the plot.

-So. Yeah. Last book introduced the goddamn cure for elf shot, which is A Big Deal Gamechanger. So this whole book is dedicated to like.. the political implications of that

-High King Aethlin Sollys: *shows up*

Me: well crap

-Aethlin: how dare you go behind my back and use the elf shot cure after I expressly said no

Toby, dear toby, literal changeling street rat: I mean, this whole situation IS technically your fault

Everyone in the room:

Aethlin:

Toby:

Aethlin: that's fair

-Oh yay The Luidaeg is going to be involved in this one. I missed her last volume. And since this is about the whole elf shot cure thing, Walther will ALSO be involved :>>

God I love The Luidaeg.

-Interesting backstory re: Quentin's parents. Which explains why they're so cavalier about a changeling training and raising the fucking crown prince 🤔

-Aethlin: I met the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life

Maida: I had pox scars on my face and chicken shit in my hair

Aethlin: you hit me with a broom

Maida: I hit you with a broom.

-Lol @ Colorado being called Highmountain

-its interesting to see monarchs and characters from other parts of the US, since we've pretty much only experienced San Francisco and Portland.

-Power move is Arden acknowledging Tybalt as a King and unsettling all the racist fucks in the audience 👀

-think I found some retcon? Cause according to book 5 connor died to elf shot because he was shot in the heart. But this one is saying that elf shot is fatal to all selkies because they're basically human. Whatisthetruth.png

-The Luidaeg just consistently protects and helps children, huh. Here she's super kind and gentle to Karen even though it briefly cracks her badass intimidation facade in front of a bunch of people. She personally carries one of the kidnapped Undersea kids back home. She uhhh literally helps Toby kill her brother Blind Michael, a literal child predator, way back in book 3. And she rescued Toby when she figured out what Amandine was doing to her. I mean. It all makes sense based on her backstory but BOY is that a consistent trait.

I took this pic on a plane but omg

Ashdfkulzeutsgk

-King Antonio: *dies*

Oh no... I uhhh hate when assholes I just met get killed off suddenly

-That being said, getting a glimpse into what it's like to be a Candela with those Merry Dancers as constant, loving companions. Definitely interesting enough that I hope we get more Candela in the series.

-Night haunts night haunts NIGHT HAUNTS their scenes are always cool.

-And Antonio's disoriented "where are my girls?" Talking about the Merry Dancers, when he emerges as a night haunt. That's pretty oof. :(

-OK so night haunts keep the form of the person they eat for as long as that person was alive. So imagine if The Luidaeg had perma died in book 8? The lucky sonofabitch night haunt that got to eat her would have a solid form for tens of thousands of years? That's bonkers. That's bananas.

- That's assuming Firstborn even get eaten @ all. I mean, Blind Michael got killed in book 3 and we haven't seen him with the flock.

- ....... 😳 UH. WAIT. Hold up. Hold the fuck up. No. I'm not exploring that line of thought.

LMFAO SYLVESTER.. *WHAT*

-Neeeeew MONTH NAME! September, Sylvester's dead sister, just got mentioned. I know she's shown up/been mentioned in some of the short stories, buuuuut...

-month names so far: January, April, May, August, September, October

Not introduced (yet): February, March, June, July, November, December

And we still dont know what is with the FUCKING month names. Only connection is they are all female characters and they all seem to be related in some way to Sylvester slash The Torquills. Some (like May) are a stretch there, but...

Oh lore?? OH LORE?

- Simon and Patrick were BFFs? 🤔🤔

-That.. had to have been introduced for a reason. Come on.

-Of course Raj likes romantic comedies. Of course he does

I LOVE the Luidaeg. Have I mentioned. This bit is even funnier knowing she can't lie. Which means she has an actual hierarchy of how much she wants to stab everyone she knows

BIG LUIDAEG LORE.

This is gonna take some unpacking. Most notable here is IS THIS THE SAME RIDE FROM BOOK 3? You know, Blind Michael's Ride, the Halloween horror show where he kidnaps kids and forcibly turns them into monsters? What is this flashback supposed to imply? The Ride used to be something else? The MONARCHS of ancient Faerie actually did kidnap kids like in the stories and Blind Michael took it over when they disappeared? The Ride maybe CAUSED them to disappear? What the fuck?

(Also my vampire crack theory gains more ground. Just look at that first paragraph. And then a couple pages later Toby sees the room covered in her blood and mentions feeling hungry looking @ it. Come on.)

-Support for my theory that this reminds me of: both the Dochas Sidhe we know of have the smell of blood as a part of their magical signature. Toby is initially "cut grass and copper" but as she gains power it becomes "cut grass and bloody copper". Amandine is "blood and roses" (which, interestingly, is what Toby tastes when she wakes up in this scene?) August and Gillian are the only other two characters we know of that have Dochas Sidhe heritage, and who knows what their magic smells like...

-The Luidaeg calling Shakespeare "a fucking dumbass" in a series full of Shakespeare references and motifs is, in fact, hilarious.

-Tybalt getting (basically) mortally wounded, so Toby tastes some of his blood. And sees herself from his perspective and how much he loves her. BIG OOF.

-Also interesting that the more powerful Toby becomes as the series progresses she's now the one saving Tybalt's ass. Was the polar opposite for the first 6 or so books.

-Colorado rep -- Highmountain are the big bads. Lmfao

-Well Toby is *actually* immortal. Like how else do you explain the shit that happens in this series lmao. (Also, turns out being that hard to kill is the shittiest superpower)

-Aw Toby forgave Sylvester... we will see if he actually redeems himself, I guess.

-You can tell Toby is embracing the "hero" role with that whole rousing and surprisingly coherent speech at the end.

This is just a real good character development vignette. We've come so far ;-;

-And of course the cure gets greenlit cause.. of course. But The Luidaeg's line "none of those assholes wanted to think about how confused they'd be if they missed a hundred years of internet memes" is, shall I say, Iconique

-multiple people have asked toby and tybalt to get married @ their house. And now the high king and queen fucking asked. Lmfao

-So this book was... interesting. I liked the political drama aspect. It was another whodunnit which we pretty much got a fill of with book 2. The conflict seemed to just kinda be.. there? I'd call it a filler book, but a lot of like.. lore got established, and we got some of what I assume are big hints/setups. Guess we'll see.

-to be fair books 1 and 2 also seemed like filler and turned out to be Super Fucking Important actually. So

-also there is just straight up a 70 page novella starring Arden at the end so I'll see if anything major happens in it.

-it's mostly a character study of Arden, turns out. But we DO learn that Cassandra, Karen's sister, is also a Seer, which... could be relevant (also I mean come on of course she is, did you see her name). Also Walther and The Luidaeg show up so thats fun.

-And it's funny to see what other characters think of October. Mostly she's a train wreck/practical joke that's somehow become extremely relevant to the surprise of literally everyone

-me seeing the total page count is 420: nice

-Anyway. The next two books sound like a gut punch conga line so let's get reading them

[sea-bea]

I said I was gonna probably talk abt Deltarune, I’m talking abt Deltarune

ALSO. THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FOR THE END OF THE GAME. LOTS AND LOTS OF SPOILERS

theres a whole lot to unpack from the ending, and I have a few headcannons in mind. I’m also going to focus on Kris, Frisk, Chara, Asriel, and Ralsei and the connections between them. It’s a lot of word barf too, so be warned.

(also I haven’t seen any theories from the deltarune fandom, this is all what I got from deltarune. I’ve kept it blacklisted bc I’m not going to have it tainted like undertale was.)

as we know, this universe is one where monsters never went underground. and as we know, everyone (keep this in mind) from the previous game is alive but living very similar, but different lives. And then there’s us. Kris. A new character presumably not from the last game Here’s what I think so far:

Chara was most definitely the voice talking to us in the beginning. They have the same kind of speech patterns and the same kind of thinking. “Its kill or be killed” “You can’t choose who you are in this world.” Both Chara and the voice have a very pessimistic view of the world, mostly about how people are naturally very cruel and will hurt you any chance they get. (and honestly, considering Kris’ life in the upper world, it would make sense that they too would have the same thought process).

As for the end, what happened in the end scene has happened before, multiple times before. It wasn’t because Kris went to the dark world. The birdcage they (or Chara) throws their soul in the cage is significantly damaged and the cage shakes with the force of it. It would explain why Kris always wakes up late for school, because they go out and do, whatever it is they do at night, and their body gets very tired. The ending scene also suggests that Kris isn’t pulling their soul out willingly, or even getting out of bed willingly. And since that’s supposed to be Kris’ soul, that means their soul isn’t in their body anymore, which suggests something else. 

also, I think the “incident”, whatever it was, that tore the family apart and outcasted Asgore has something do with Kris’ specifically. The first time there was an incident in the family it was when the Chara and Asriel fusion died, and the second time Asgore killed a bunch of kids. It doesn’t seem like Asgore killed some kids because he’s not in jail or anything, but it was definitely something that upset both Tori and Asgore significantly, so it might have had to do with the kids. That was also the turning point for both Asriel and Chara to become flowey and murder child so this universe’s kids must have changed significantly too.

Remember how I said everyone is living similar yet very different lives? In the last game, we played two characters: Frisk in pacifist and Chara in fight, but Kris is new, presumably one of them. Initially it seems like Kris is in Frisk’s place If Asriel is cannonly around the same age as Chara and is in college, I’d pit him around his early 20’s, maybe still 18. Considering the school looks like it was made for younger students and there are already stereotypes in the school (Susie, obviously) I’d pit Kris somewhere in middleschool, in sixth grade at the very least and eighth or ninth grade at the very most. Probably 12, or 13? 15 at most (which was around the age Frisk probably was when they fell). So they’d be more than four years apart, and that's a conservative estimate.

At the same time though, both Chara and Kris (other than share the same sweater) also share a personality as the weird kid that doesn’t talk that much. They naturally do very weird things that frighten other people, but they seem like pranks at worst. And they’re also naturally very aloof and don’t talk a lot and likes to keep to themselves (but will make an exception for Asriel). What Kris does with Asriel is also similar to what Chara did with him (Asriel’s final form was referenced by one of the characters, where they say that Chara and Asriel were too busy focusing on the wings). Then again, Frisk doesn't talk a lot either.

But then it came down to the name. I was originally confused why Kris had such a normal name, but if Ralsei is just a rewording of the name “Asriel” and is supposed to represent a version of Asriel, then “Kris” may be “Frisk” without the “F” (it also may be a stretch but I think there is no F because you probably shouldn't fight. Either that, or putting an F in that name is kinda hard to do). Thats what I initially thought that was. But If you pronounce Chara the same way you pronounce the first part of the word “Character”, then the name sounds like “Kara.” Add the K of Kara and the ris from “Frisk” and you get “Kris”. Not only that, but the regular spelling of Kris is Chris, “Ch” from Chara, “ris" from Frisk, and the “Ch” is disguised as a K from Frisk (also to make it more gender neutral, I think)

So maybe Kris isn’t just Chara or isn’t just Frisk, they’re both, a mixture of the two angels that fell down to free the monsters from the underground. But then why is the Chara part of them so prevalent here? 

I think that’s because Chara’s possessing Kris. Since characters like Chara can break the fourth wall and don’t follow the laws of reality, as well as know of alternate universes and endings, Chara could have crossed from the Undertale Universe into the Deltarune Universe, and then influenced their “Chara” side more.

Here’s what I think happened: An incident occurred where Kris and Asriel were put in danger that almost killed them. They lived, obviously, but Kris became very vulnerable. Because Kris was very vulnerable at the time and is also the version of Chara here, it was easy for Chara to possess them.

It may be very easy for Kris to be possessed frequently. When we first meet sans and he greets you, you have the opportunity to say “good to see you again” or something like that, to which sans replies that he’s never met you before. Either Kris was joking around or that was actually Chara saying hi to him. Plus the phase “It’s only you.” when you look in the mirror is a bit....ominous, and can imply there can be another person there sometimes.

Kris isn’t possessed all the time though, they still wake up late, and it’s implied they still have control of themselves sometimes —when you visit Rudy, there’s a card on the table that “you” have never seen before, even though you wrote it.  And Chara has to store the soul in the birdcage frequently, implying that Kris can fight them, to some degree.

So if Chara has been here the whole time, and has been possessing Kris frequently, what exactly are they doing? Honestly, I really don’t know. As Undyne says, the town is really boring. Of course, considering the shit that went down at the end of the game, that's probably going to change. Still though, I have no idea what they were doing before the whole “dark world” business.

I’m not going to go into much detail into Ralsei but I do want to point out one thing that stood out to me. He seems like a pretty cut n dry character, and his purpose as Asriel’s reverse is pretty obvious. He is the dark opposite of Asriel, he’s the dark prince living in the castle, while everyone in his universe is alive except for him, all of his subjects are gone and he’s the only one left. His name is literally a respelling of the world Asriel, plus he’s a goat. A goat. 

But if there’s one thing that concerned me the most was how insistent he was on making sure you “acted” instead of “fought”. what stood out to me the most was when he was talking about the consequences of fighting, he said something alone the lines of “You may not like the outcome/ending you get.” Which makes me wonder what exactly happened to him and his entire kingdom. And since he’s technically a version of Asriel (who is still Flowey in the undertale universe), maybe he knows about the old resets from the Undertale universe. 

The other theory is he went through his own fight route which honestly sounds pretty intense. Really intense. Considering that flowey too did many routes, especially fight routes, the idea that Ralsei here could have done a kill route too can be very possible. also, the way Ralsei tells Kris to act sounds less like “dont do this because I saw someone else do it”, and more like “don’t do this because I did it and now I live with the consequences”. 

finally, to tobias fox

im not forgiving you for what you’ve done to mettaton

that is all

[fantroll-purgatory]

@rice-22

AU Chinese Zodiac session

Name:Niu,chinese for buffalo

Traditionally this Chinese zodiac space is occupied by the Ox, but the Vietnamese version of the zodiac uses the water buffalo, so I’ll accept this change to the buffalo. We’ll need to pick a better name, though.

Bubali is a better pick for the first name, it’s a reference to Bubalus bubalis, the Asian Water Buffalo. Bellis for the last name, as a reference to Teressa Bellissimo, the inventor of buffalo wings.

Age:6 sweeps

Strife Specibus:pan kind

You could use an oilkind instead and have him sort of fling the oil on people, portcullis style (even if that wasn’t actually all that common, it’s fitting for him!)

Fetch Modus:fry modus,he must fry the item and wait until its done,if the item stays for too long it may be destroyed,same if it stays for too short

I want to trrry to give this character more depth. He’s pretty just One-Note Buffalo Wings when there’s a lot else you can do with such a character! The oxen zodiac is associated with hard work, Backbreaking work in fact. You could give him a Beast Of Burden modus where he has to drag something heavy a certain distance in order to unpack his item?

Blood color:bronze fried “wings”!!

Symbol and meaning:chinese for buffalo

As with the other one, I’ll be switchin this up, but I’ll try to incorporate elements! 

Trolltag:hmm

How about cayennePurveyor? Cayenne’s a common seasoning on buffalo wings and a purveyor is a seller of a particular good!

Quirk:}{e writes wi}{ wings

Special Abilities:he can understand the animals,thats why he doesn’t make wings and instead he makes “wings”,its unknown where does them come from

Th… that’s ominous. Is he… is he killing trolls and selling them as food. 

Lusus: something like tinkerbull,but instead theres an wild chicken winged buffalo

I think a good and fun idea would be using a Sky Bison instead. It could still fly, but without Physical Wings. 

EDIT:  zeysir said: This is kind of a funny suggestion, but his lusus could be like a water buffalo version of the bullfinch monster from Dragon Quest since it looks like a plucked chicken that’s also a bull

This suggestion was so good that I had to add it in!

Love this weird fellow.

Personality:hmm im not so sure,he must be pretty charismatic to get all his “wings” sold

I like the idea of him being charismatic. I think I want him to… maybe be someone who built a sort of business from the ground up. Buffalo, NY is known as a great ski resort. So he could be something a restaurateur and a resort-keeper, a humble little cabin aesthetic that he built and maintained and made famous himself with his Delicious Food and Hospitality. But he’s hardheaded and a sly-talker and he’s very friendly and warm seeming, but he also… has a bit of a temper and a bit of a hatred for the entitled highbloods who come to stay at his resort, and… sometimes they just…. kind of vanish. But it’s fine. He can blame the mountain. 

Interests:animals and “wings” fried with oil from plants

I think I’ll also add Skiing/snowboarding, Hospitality, Hotel Services, and Self-Sufficiency.

Title: ???? of hope

I think it might make most sense for him to be a blood player. The ox is tied to the land and is also associated with the earth side of the chinese zodiac. Blood players are natural leaders and have that sort of draw and charisma that this character displays. He just has to learn to like… actually value his bonds instead of exploiting them if he wants to become a more acceptable person. So I’ll say… Mage of Blood, maybe? The active understander of blood bonds, responsibility, etc.

Land:land of lack and soil,a land where everyone is poor and hungry,but the dirt is good for farms

I do kind of like this premise, but you can’t just say the consorts are starving while there’s good soil without explaining it. So here’s my idea… There used to be an underclass of farmers who were all wiped out, and now the rich elite are starving because those entitled brats don’t know the first thing about farming. In order to accomplish his quest, he’ll have to teach the bastard consorts how to farm like reasonable people. You could call it the Land of Fallow and Opulence.

Dream Planet:prospit

Design:

Horns/hair: I added more waterbuffalo-y horns just to give him more of that aesthetic. For the hair, I changed it to black but otherwise kept it the same. Brownbloods are too low to have access to hairdye the way mid/higher bloods do. 

Face/top: I gave him some teeth, because brownbloods are a pretty toothy bunch, but I kept them relatively subdued so he wouldn’t look intimidating. I gave him a winter jacket and a frying apron- the winter jacket because of the ski lodge backstory And the fact that the ox zodiac is associated with winter. 

Bottoms; I gave him big puffy pants meant to be remniscent of snowpants and some snow boots. 

Symbol: I added the integral brownblood circle, but kept the line coming down and the split lines coming off the side!

I hope my feedback helped!

-CD

[terramythos]

Thoughts/reactions master post for October Daye #13 “The Unkindest Tide” or "major deja vu" 

Excellent Start: it fuckin opens with The Luidaeg showing up and dumping a bunch of lore

-There are some things to unpack here after thinking on it. The Roane predicted that Toby would bring them back. We knew already that they were seers and could predict the future. But this implies they did not predict their savior being Toby SPECIFICALLY, just someone from Amandine's line.

This is interesting for a couple reasons. First, it's a solid explanation for why The Luidaeg, the oldest and one of (if not the) most powerful Firstborn took interest in Toby, who's a changeling and thus beneath the notice of most of Faerie. On a related note, it's also an explanation on why Amandine was so keen on turning Toby into a human. The character who prevented this happening was, no surprise, The Luidaeg.

But while it appears Toby will indeed fulfill this prophecy, it's been implied if not outright stated that Amandine's line is also prophesied (probably by the Roane) to bring back Oberon. This is a wild guess, but I feel it makes more narrative sense and would be an interesting twist if we set Toby up to fulfill that prophecy, only to ultimately have August (or both of them as a team) do it. I'm pretty sure August is redeemable, unlike Amandine, and her character arc so far is based on trying to bring Oberon back and FAILING, so...

-I could be reading too much into this, but hey. I do think I should go back and read (1) The Luidaeg's short story where she confronts Amandine and (2) the scenes in book 5 where Toby talks to one of the few surviving Roane. Said Roane predicts Connor's death, but she says so much cryptic shit there may be something else hidden there relating to this.

...OH. OK. You know that makes a lot more sense. All the setup for this (which has been going on since book 5 lmfao) pointed to The Luidaeg being morally questionable and possibly evil in this one but like, this is way more in line with her character lmfao

Though I guess theres plenty that's morally questionable about forcing an entire race of people to turn into another one whether they like it or not

-Side note: The Luidaeg and Quentin's friendship remains adorable

-Gillian's magical signature is officially fennel and primroses.

-OK but like, we have to approach the fact that Gillain's skin is still basically sentient in some way? Like Firtha's consciousness is a big part of the short story. And can glean from that that the others probably have something to them. So uh, what happens to the souls (if you can call them that) when we fuse the skins to the Selkies?

New Firstborn?? New Firstborn! New Firstborn.

-ok so like correct me if I'm wrong but practically every Firstborn we met has been female. I think the only dude we've met is Blind Michael, who was a basket of crazy and Decisively Killed Off in book 3. Otherwise we've got The Luidaeg, Evening, Amandine, Acacia, and now Captain Pete.

The Luidaeg is such a fascinating character. One of my favorites from literally anything. This scene really exemplifies why I think. Seemingly cruel yet compassionate, coping with horrific tragedy, yet also a supernatural and terrifying monster. SORT OF. it’s complicated

-There's a scene after this where she verbally takes down an adult man, then is so kind and patient to a child who approaches her. And that contrast really hits. She has been consistently kind and protective of children through the whole series. It makes it more brutal when she says she doesnt even like them much because she misses having her own, and you know she can't lie. She's kind to kids because it is the right thing to so.

-Shit goes down in a bad way (seemingly unrelated to the main premise?). Like Dianda gets kidnapped by her evil brother whom we have not met before

SIMON TORQUILL REDEMPTION ARC IN THE FUTURE...... 2!

-Not to be rude October but like, werent you already planning to rescue Simon ANYWAY. That one's basically the freebie of those 3 favors you just promised

-ok I'm writing this part WAY LATER cause my dumb ass forgot that Simon returning is CONTINGENT upon bringing Oberon back and now this line makes way more sense. 

-little lore tidbit on why it's so easy to transform October and not the other characters... its the whole Tam Lin thing we figured out last book. Guess that should have been obvious

Not to be het rights on main but oh my god. Oh my fucking shit oh my god. (Its not really het rights cause tybalt is bi but oh my god holy shit)

-I am laughing at the fact this is a tense moment with lives on the line and an obvious time limit and Toby and Tybalt just go "time to make out a little in front of everyone"

-Lmao right after I typed that the Luidaeg basically said the same thing

-lmaoo she fuckin slices Tybalt's finger for his part of the spell then just does a tiny pinprick for Quentin because she likes him more 

-random interlude in the Undersea where toby rescues Peter

Ok Quentin's reaction here is funny

This scene's got a little bit of everything

Explanation on why Gillian can talk to her skin, since it's a "lost" one and hasn't been worn much. Also sort of an explanation for the Luidaeg calling the skins by name.

-anyway it's pretty obvious that Dianda's brother is the one behind Isla's murder, right? Like, why else introduce him at this point

-"maybe sending The Luidaeg to find Pete has been the wrong call" I'm starting to feel that way to be honest

-Yeah Torin being responsible is confirmed. There’s a scene where Toby gets badly injured and it’s borderline torture porn, which seems to happen once a book now. There is a cute somewhat angsty scene with her and Tybalt, which is always fun.

-There's some fun bits when they take down Torin but nothing particularly noteworthy. The interactions with Pete and The Luidaeg are fun when both return to the scene. I'm trying real hard to like Gillian but she's been pretty ineffectual this book, and every time she shows up it seems to be whining about Toby, which is a shame.

Luidaeg feels and The Moral, which is pretty good! Found family is a reliable weak point of mine.

-They do find an alternate solution (splitting the “dead” skins), and everyone who wants a Selkie skin gets it. They also let some of them stay Selkies for a few more years, but most get turned into Roane. And happy Luidaeg! 

-Though the whole “Gillian has a sentient selkie skin” is not addressed again and she’s the first one who gets turned. did Firtha/her ghost just get annihilated from existence? i don’t know man 

-Overall I'm pretty lukewarm over this entry. Like Once Broken Faith, it feels like a book made to Address a Big Lore Change but doesn’t have a solid conflict to support it. Torin is some one-off Merrow dude i’m pretty sure is never mentioned until he suddenly shows up and is the bad guy here, and the whole kidnapping Dianda and long interlude in the middle where they go to the Undersea to rescue Peter seems just... really random, considering the setting (Duchy of Ships) and the Selkies are supposed to be the center of the story.  

Nothing wrong with one-off villains, but ones like Blind Michael and Rhys were way more memorable/interesting than Torin. This just felt way too much like the randos from Once Broken Faith who were just villains cause someone had to be. can’t even remember their names or their motivations 

It's a shame cause there are some things I did really like in this novel. There’s some good character development. Captain Pete was cool (even if the conclusion basically writes her back out of the story). But imo this book should be a big Luidaeg entry and she's absent for like 70 percent of the book, which doesn’t help 

I guess what I'm saying is this would have been fine as a novella if there wasn’t a big novel-defining conflict to use. January’s resurrection was done in a novella and that’s pretty damn major, Lore-wise. 

I cant complain too much, cause the last 2 books knocked it out of the park. But I hope the next one feels more relevant.

-One thing I do want to mention (which I didn’t picture anywhere) is there is a lot of cryptic shit in this entry surrounding... Marcia of all people? Captain Pete and The Luidaeg both seem inordinately interested in her. And she seems very nervous when they speak to her and ask her questions and says a bunch of weird cryptic shit. I think this is setting up for something with her, but I’m not sure what. We basically know none of her backstory, which is unusual for a character who’s been in the series since book 1, so it wouldn’t be out of place to explore her more. I do think there’s something up with her birth/heritage. We know she’s a mostly human changeling (like only 1/4 fae?) but she’s very involved in the fae stuff, which is unusual. We don’t even know what the 1/4 is and the main character is literally a bloodhound for that sort of thing. 

-Anyway, there’s a novella at the end of this one called "Hope is Swift" starring Raj. So we'll see how that is!

-I like it so far. Lots of Cait Sidhe lore. The premise is that Raj gets hit by a car in cat form and then taken in by a vet and mistaken for an actual cat. There's also a they/them nb side character named Cal. 

-Overall I did enjoy the novella. Not a lot goes down but there’s good Cait Sidhe lore and character development for Raj. We also got to formally meet Ginerva, who was a character in name only to this point. I liked it more than the base novel i think 

-and not to drive more on my point in previous reads but BLIND MICHAEL. IS MENTIONED A LOT. mostly re: trauma and recovery, which is nice, but still. 

-I hope book 14 throws us back into the meat of the story. i mean, 10 was probably the weakest entry but it was surrounded by good ones, and since this one was preceeded by 2 of the best books in the series i hope the pattern stays true