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rotisserory · 5 months

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Reo Mikage is Actually Great BPD Representation- Some Thoughts

So I had the extremely unfortunate experience of being exposed to Blue Lock (unfortunate because it's all my tiny pea brain can think about now), and while it is absolutely full of silly guys whose brains I want to pick, this little bugger really stood out to me. The second he came onto the screen, I KNEW I smelled the borderline on him. As I watched the series and read the manga, I noticed he is actually an incredibly well-written depiction of someone struggling with BPD. Reo is a super layered character and my favorite hobby is picking apart those layers and yapping incessantly about them, so here we are. I want to write this analysis for a few reasons:

1.) Too many people misunderstand Reo and categorize him as dramatic or childish without any elaboration and he deserves a proper character deep-dive. I think him being borderline explains a LOT of his reactions/choices throughout the story.

2.) Borderline representation is extremely important to me. I'm diagnosed borderline and have struggled with this disorder for around ten years now, so I get really excited when I spy BPD-coded characters (especially if they're likable people and not just ghoulish irredeemable villains or manic pixie dream girl characters). This disorder can be so isolating, especially when the majority of people will never even bother to research or understand it. I know that some people like to chalk Reo's emotional reactions up to him being a moody 17-year-old, but I think I have enough evidence to prove that this is undiagnosed BPD that's festering in his noggin. Not to mention, literally nobody else acts like this in the series. Reo is incredibly unique and distinct in the way he behaves through this narrative and I think it's way past the point of normal teenage angst. Regardless, believe what you want. He'll always be my borderline princess tho <3

3.) I have a master's degree in English and what good is that if I don't write long, painful, pointless essays on anime guys? Not that this is exceptionally well written, I just like to laugh at myself for getting a whole M.A and then this is the shit I publish online lmao

By the end of this, I hope I can shed some light on wtf is going on inside of Reo's silly little head. (I'm also obviously not a psychologist, don't use any of this to diagnose yourself pls I don't need the scandal)

If you want to read, buckle up, because this is gonna be a long one!

First, let me define BPD- It's a personality disorder characterized by a long-standing pattern of instability in mood, interpersonal relationships, and self-image. At its core, it is a disorder categorized by emotional dysregulation (the inability to regulate one's emotional responses) People with BPD feel everything EXTREMELY hard. That's important to keep in mind IMO, because while their reactions may seem dramatic or extreme, what they're feeling IS dramatic and extreme. Everything they're feeling is amplified, so their reactions are amplified. Obviously from the outside, people assume it's an overreaction since they can't see what's going on inside the borderline's head. When you sit down and dissect the thought process of someone like Reo, it becomes a lot easier to understand why they react the way that they do to certain situations.

(Also, I'm not going to reiterate more than once that an explanation is not an excuse to treat people poorly. I cannot read ANYTHING on BPD without hearing every 2 minutes how the disorder isn't an excuse to hurt other people. We get it!! I'm explaining it, not excusing it. This enter essay is an analysis of why someone acts the way they do, not whether or not it's excusable)

So then, what behaviors/signs does somebody need to exhibit to receive a borderline diagnosis? The 9 diagnostic criteria for BPD are as follows:

1. Fear of abandonment

2. Unstable or changing relationships

3. Unstable self-image; struggles with identity or sense of self

4. Impulsive or self-damaging behaviors

5. Suicidal behavior or self-injury

6. Varied or random mood swings

7. Constant feelings of worthlessness or sadness

8. Problems with anger, including frequent loss of temper or physical fights

9. Stress-related paranoia or loss of contact with reality

Someone would only need 5 of these to receive a proper diagnosis. Just with the main story and the spin-off manga that is currently released, I think I have enough evidence to argue that Reo has 8 out of 9 criteria for a BPD diagnosis. For the sake of organization, I’m gonna group some of those together though, indicated by a + symbol. I also want to define a few important terms before I start yapping, so that y'all without BPD can understand wtf I'm even talking about.

Favorite Person (fp) - This is someone who holds massive significance in a borderline's life. They emotionally depend on this person a lot and to a certain extent, their worldview almost revolves around them.

Splitting- the change in perception of someone or something caused by black-or-white thinking or dichotomous thinking. It is the devaluation of someone who was once idealized and vice versa.

Mirroring (aka: the chameleon effect)- the constant, unconscious change in one's identity or sense of self by imitating another person’s behaviors, characteristics, or traits. It is common in people who have a vacant or distorted self-image which is a general symptom of BPD.

Now, time for me to break down the most prominent moments where Reo showcases borderline behavior. As I mentioned, I'm going to try and organize this under each criteria point (with some being grouped together)

Unstable self-image; struggles with identity or sense of self:

Before I delve into Reo's relationships, I want to start with his baseline sense of identity. It’s established early on that Reo is a very bored, empty, unsatisfied person. Nothing excites him, nothing motivates him, and everything is handed to him. He’s frustrated because his parents notoriously try and buy his affection even though he doesn't want anything. For most of his life up until the narrative starts, he's wandering through life empty and frustrated. That is, until he finally sets his sights on soccer and decides to dedicate his life to winning the World Cup:

The wording, 'proves my existence' is interesting here. I think this is the first instance Reo has felt alive. So far, the only notable thing about him has been his family and his money. He hasn't achieved anything exceptional for himself, but now he has that opportunity. With this goal, he can really build something up from nothing and make it his own. It's almost like he's clinging to this dream to prove that he has some purpose in his life other than being the family heir.

Now, this dream changes when he meets Nagi, of course. I'm not gonna focus too much on their relationship in this section, but I will mention that meeting Nagi shifted Reo's entire dream, and not for the better. Through the narrative, his dream went from:

Winning the World Cup

Winning the World Cup with Nagi

Proving to Nagi that leaving him behind was a mistake

Improving himself and becoming a good striker on his own

Being a tool for Nagi to become the best striker

Had Nagi not come in and ask for Reo to come back to him, I think Reo could have done a great job at establishing his own sense of identity without Nagi. But no matter how much he works on himself, with Nagi in the picture, he's never going to value himself more than Nagi. Reo lets Nagi cloud his identity to the point where Isagi calls him out and asks what he's even doing at Blue Lock in the first place, since he clearly can't survive on his own, he needs Nagi with him.

After dealing with the turmoil of being abandoned by Nagi, Reo goes through a few stages. He starts with wanting to become somebody worthy of being beside Nagi, somebody that Nagi would want to choose. Devoting himself to becoming stronger and more versatile, his end goal is to have Nagi realize he made a mistake by leaving him behind. After a few more matches, Reo starts to realize that he needs to grow and change and become a stronger, better version of himself for himself and not for other people.

He decides that the fight was all his fault to begin with, that he should have never forced Nagi to play soccer and now he is going to get back to what his dream was originally, combined with his new desire to be a stand-alone player (and person, for that matter). Reo accepts the mistakes that he made, admits that he shouldn't have forced his ideals onto Nagi, and resolves to become a better person for HIMSELF. That's excellent!

Of course, Reo can't be happy for TOO long. Nagi comes out of the woodwork saying that he can't beat Isagi on his own and asks for Reo's help. Reo does stand up for himself a bit, saying that Nagi is being inconsiderate of his feelings and mentioning how long it took for him to recover from Nagi leaving. Now, the BPD trait here is how Reo not only forgives Nagi and is jumping on him and hugging him THE NEXT PAGE, but he also just disregards everything he said in this sequence. In a matter of two minutes, he no longer wants to be a player that can fight on his own or improve for himself, he wants to improve for Nagi. He starts ruminating again about how hurt he was when Nagi left, but now he's saying all of it wasn't so that he could get stronger individually, it was so that he could be reunited with Nagi again. Nagi asking for his help and saying that now they can play together again motivate Reo more than anything we've seen so far. (Nagi notoriously throws Reo little affection crumbs like this that Reo eats up, but I'm not trying focus on that) Now, Reo's alright with being a tool for Nagi's success again. Everything that happened was supposed to make him stronger so he could be a better partner to Nagi, right? Reo also says as the chapter ends, to please let him be a part of Nagi's dream until Nagi becomes the world's best striker. That's literally so sad!

He's also immediately back to the 'our' 'we' 'us' talk as well. If he can master his chameleon style in order to keep Nagi above the rest of the players, he wont get left behind again. If he devotes his time and energy into being a solo striker like the rest of these guys, Reo knows that he wont be able to keep up. This was always supposed to be his role, right? Building Nagi up to his full potential! :*)

I also like the detail that Reo is back to hugging Nagi and holding him, but Nagi never really touches him back. I think Reo's love language is touch for sure, not that it's incredibly relevant, but I do think it shows that Reo is back to being 100% comfortable around Nagi as if their fight never happened. I hear a lot of fans asking how Reo could have forgiven Nagi so easily, and I say this with my entire chest, it's the BPD. The black-and-white thinking combined with Nagi being Reo's fp and the excruciating pain of being abandoned by him in the first place ?? Of course he's going to take him back. Also, I've seen people blame Reo for not saying no to Nagi when he asks for help and I have to say that is an absolutely insane take. How are we gonna look at a panel where Nagi asks for help and then blame Reo for helping him?? I'm not going to focus on it too much in this post but in my opinion, it is crazy how little accountability both the narrative + fans give Nagi. Reo is pegged as responsible for both of their downfalls and it's nuts tbh.

Currently in the story, I think Reo's identity is still centered around Nagi. It's really easy for borderlines to structure their entire lives and personalities around their favorite person, but I can only hope that these two keep having open and honest discussions with one another. Hopefully, Reo will eventually learn that he can exist without Nagi and that he's more than just 'his arms and legs'.

Unstable or Changing Relationships:

The most notable relationship in Reo's life is Nagi. They're both each other's first real friends, which already sets up a less-than-ideal dynamic. Nagi has no idea how to communicate and he has pretty weak emotional intelligence. On the other hand, Reo is great at communicating, but he isn't used to regulating his emotions. For a lot of borderlines, they can go a very long time without experiencing any symptoms when they don't have a favorite person. When you think about it, the bulk of the disorder is shown through those interactions with other people. If Reo has never had a real friend in his life, I don't think he'd be used to the emotional turmoil that comes with having a fp.

The minute Reo meets Nagi, he's attached. All his classmates notice it, too. They question why Reo is suddenly so obsessed with this random kid who has no interest in him. Reo is ignoring everybody that isnt Nagi.

Very quickly, Reo boils down his view of the world to being him and Nagi versus everybody else, and he makes that very clear. It also depicts something that I think is incredibly crucial to Reo’s character that a lot of people overlook; as Nagi develops to be Reo’s favorite person, Reo’s dream isnt ‘playing soccer’ anymore. It’s Nagi. It’s being with Nagi, playing soccer with Nagi, being useful to Nagi, taking care of Nagi, and being somebody important to Nagi. He doesnt teach Nagi the rules or how to actually play, he teaches Nagi how to play with him. He literally re-writes and re-structures the game so that it can center around him and Nagi. Nagi calls him out on this in the spin-off manga:

Reo doesnt care about the structure of the game, he cares about Nagi. The other people on the field don't matter. The other team doesn't matter. He also starts to unknowingly put Nagi up on a pedestal, which is another borderline trait. He starts reiterating that Nagi is special, he's different from everybody else, he's destined to achieve great things. The more he raises Nagi up, the more he isolates the two of them in his mind, reiterating the idea that it's them against everybody else. His language reflects this too: Reo exclusively talks with 'us' 'we' 'our', insinuating that they're going to do everything together.

When Ego says that there can't be two winners, Reo says that he'll make Nagi the best striker. His 'ego' will be making Nagi successful. Along with putting Nagi on this pedestal, Reo also very early on establishes the fact that he'd pick Nagi over himself any day of the week. He's the only person in Blue Lock who really couldn't care less about becoming a striker himself: his dream is to be a tool in Nagi's success. Or, in simpler terms, he wants to be useful and make Nagi happy.

These two were in trouble from the very beginning. Nagi is lazy as all hell, has 0 motivation to do anything, and his dream is to live a life of luxury and never have to work. Reo, being the borderline baddie that he is, is more than happy to do EVERYTHING for Nagi. Borderlines love extremely hard! It's one of our best traits and I think it's important to showcase that Reo is a massive sweetheart at his core. He clearly loves Nagi a lot and goes to extreme lengths to make sure he feels taken care of. To someone with BPD, NOTHING is too big of an ask for a person they love, especially if that person is their fp. I also disagree with the argument that Reo 'made' Nagi codependent. Nagi likes being taken care of, he says it all the time. If you ask me, I would actually argue that Nagi takes advantage of Reo a little bit because he knows that Reo will do anything for him. But regardless, I think that Reo starts to develop an unspoken expectation with Nagi that he'll provide him with everything he needs, and in turn, Nagi will stick around. I don't think he's doing this intentionally, nor do I think it's being done in a manipulative way. I just think that Reo has a dormant fear of being abandoned that he doesn't totally know he has yet.

It isn't just Nagi that Reo showcases having unstable relationships with, though. Zantetsu is another good example. Reo starts out disliking Zantetsu, he snaps at him a couple times, and calls him a moron more than once. He starts to warm up to him because Nagi tells him to. The favorite person has MASSIVE sway in the borderline's life. If Nagi likes someone, Reo likes them too. (This is, of course, on the condition that they aren't a threat, looking at you Isagi).

In the immediate next chapter, Reo is acting like they're all best friends. He's climbing on top of them in their big bed, saying that the three of them are gonna win their matches, being a little pookie. He goes from not liking this guy at all to considering him one of his close friends super fast. Also on the topic of Isagi, when they're making up the teams for the second selection, Nagi doesn't initially want to tell Reo that he wants Isagi on their team bc he's worried Reo will be upset. But, when he does finally say it, Reo is literally fine with it because like I said, who Nagi likes, Reo likes! On the condition that they don't replace Reo, which clearly happened soon after.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, Reo also shows how he can go from loving someone to despising him very quickly. After Chigiri and Kunigami tell him to get back up in the game post-Nagi's abandonment, we can literally see the switch flip in Reo's head:

Suddenly, he hates Nagi. Nagi's a jerk who abandoned him; he never cared about him, and he threw him away. Dude literally says "Let's kill the bastards that betrayed us". This act of unintentional devaluing is called splitting. What Reo's essentially doing is going from one extreme to the other: if Nagi isn't his perfect treasure, he's the devil that broke his heart. There's no room for a grey area. The reasoning behind borderline's developing this black-and-white mindset is rooted in self-defense. If Reo devalues Nagi into being nothing more than a traitor, then he's stripping away the power that Nagi has to hurt him. If he looks at him like a rival or a villain, it's protecting him from being hurt by Nagi again.

That doesn't mean that he genuinely believes any of this, more so, he's trying to convince himself that it's true. We see that at his core, the reason he's acting like this is because he's hurt. I'll go more into it later on, but he's constantly thinking, what does Isagi have that I don't? What do I have to do in order to win Nagi back? This black-and-white thinking is an automatic self-defense mechanism that I think he's doing subconsciously. Regardless, the shifting he's doing here can cause a little whiplash, which brings me to:

Varied or random mood swings + Problems with anger, including frequent loss of temper or physical fights:

I can’t think of a better way to describe Reo's temperament than the wiki, so let me quote it: "Generally, he seems to feel every emotion with full force and is extremely aware of his own faults and shortcomings, which is evident in several instances of painful breakdowns shown in the spin-off manga. Due to his high emotionality, he can even get violent when he loses his temper."

Reo is characterized as being emotionally unstable. When he's happy, he's elated! When he's sad, he's miserable. There are a ton of scenes between the manga and spin-off manga that show how fast his emotions can flip, but this one was one of my personal favorites:

In this scene, Reo has developed a little scheme in the dining hall where the guys are trading their side dishes. At face value, a throwaway moment. But, I think it's worth looking at because not only does this show Reo's emotional response being triggered in an opposite, semi-extreme direction, but the root cause for the reaction was that he felt rejected by Zantetsu. In his own weird way, he's asking Zantetsu to come over and hang out with him. He's not being exceptionally clear with that message, but I can still pick up on it. "You wanna join in, don't you?" He's extending the invite, making himself vulnerable, and Zantetsu shoots him down by saying nah, I'm fine with my noodles. Reo JUMPS on him like YOU KNOW WHAT? I TOOK THAT PERSONALLY! lol. Jokes aside, I think this moment is a great one to argue Reo's BPD tendencies because it's such a seemingly mundane interaction. Even Zantetsu is surprised by Reo's random outburst. This also sets up the fact that one of Reo's most obvious triggers is being rejected/abandoned/betrayed, an extremely common one between those of us with BPD.

Other instances of Reo having a bad temper are a lot more obvious. In the match against teams V and Z, Reo straight up elbows Raichi in the throat, and then tries to go throw hands with Kuon for hurting Nagi. He only stops because if he gets into any more fights, he’ll get thrown out of the game and won't be able to play with Nagi anymore. He’s visibly pissed though and calls Team Z a joke. Hell, even Reo himself can recognize on a certain level that he can't control his emotions: they control him. They cloud his judgment and make him react in ways that he wish he didn't.

He is constantly plagued by these extreme emotional reactions that are out of his control. Not to say that people with BPD are unable to ever control their emotions, because we can! It takes time and therapy and practice though, which Reo hasn't had. His lack of regulation is also why he has such a dramatic and extreme meltdown when Nagi abandons him.

Fear of Abandonment:

Reo's biggest trigger and the cause of his inner turmoil throughout Blue Lock is his fear of abandonment. I mentioned before that I think he's had this fear dormant inside of him for a while as so many borderlines do, since he hasn't had the chance to experience it before. He alludes to it early on when they first arrive at Blue Lock:

The thought of leaving Nagi for somebody else? Reo considers that heartless. They came together, after all. They're going to win the world cup together. Nagi could break both of his legs and Reo wouldn't leave him, because again, Reo isn't there to team up with the best player and become the best striker in the world: he's there to play with Nagi!! And, like I said, in Reo's mind it's him and Nagi vs everyone else-

Reo exhibits a lot of signs early on of being jealous while they're playing in Blue Lock. I mean, as we discussed, everything should be focused around him and Nagi. When Nagi passes to Zantetsu in the team V and Y match, Reo pulls up like 'hey, why didn't you pass it to me?? ):' There are a lot of little moments like that, but Reo's jealousy is a lot more relevant to my argument after he gets abandoned by Nagi.

Let's talk about that word: abandoned. It seems dramatic, right? Reo uses that term constantly and exclusively. Every time he brings that moment up, he uses the word 'abandoned', or he'll say 'betrayed' or 'chose'. These are very definitive words. He’s not saying Nagi ditched him or flaked on him or blew him off, no; he has abandoned him. That word choice may seem disproportionate to the situation, but that's Reo's reality. This was the ultimate betrayal to him. The constant use of that vocabulary reiterates that in Reo's mind, there is no grey area. Either Nagi chooses him, or he chooses someone else. In choosing someone else, he abandons Reo. Reo is paranoid that Nagi isn't ever going to come back to him and it's because of something that Reo is lacking. How can Nagi like Isagi more than him, anyway?

Now, I do fault Nagi a bit for not communicating better at that moment. I understand that he's bad at communication, but I don't think Reo could have been more obviously upset if he tried. The dude was in TEARS. Nagi saw him devastated and then expected everything to be fine when he met him in the bathhouse? Idk. I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he didn't realize it would upset Reo to such an extreme: maybe he thought that they would miss each other, but Reo wouldn't take it personally. I'm doing my best not to harp on Nagi since this is about Reo.

Abandonment is detrimental to people with BPD. It causes extreme inner turmoil that we see with Reo as the story progresses because it is the only thing he can think about. If he isn't trying to cover up his hurt feelings with this idea of revenge, he's self-destructing over being abandoned. He becomes obsessed with wondering why Nagi chose Isagi over him. Was there something wrong with him? Isagi isn't that impressive, why would Nagi rather be with him? These thoughts torture him endlessly and fuel his desire to 'steal' Nagi back. He literally says to Isagi, that he's going to steal Nagi back. Much to his dismay though, Reo starts to notice that Isagi is bringing out some positive traits in Nagi. Nagi's entire vibe is different with Isagi. Nagi is having fun playing soccer without Reo. In fact, he's having more fun. He's making plays he's never made before. His face is visibly different; he's more excited than before.

This is heartbreaking for Reo. Not only was he right that Isagi did have something to offer Nagi that he couldn't, but Reo is having a massive self-hate spiral during this point as well, so he's internalizing all of his flaws and mistakes while the thought is sitting in the back of his head: did Nagi actually have a good reason for abandoning me? Was I not enough to satisfy him? Did I only drag him down? This gets significantly worse the longer he watches Nagi and Isagi play:

Everything is falling apart. Nagi is doing completely fine without Reo, and Reo is an absolute mess. We're circling back to Reo's lack of identity here as well. He's watching firsthand that he's losing Nagi to Isagi: what does he do? What happens to him if he loses Nagi, who is he without Nagi? He's overwhelmed during this match and at one point Reo literally screams that he's going to tear apart their connection. Jealousy is consuming him, but it's also those feelings of inferiority and wondering if he really did deserve to be abandoned. If Nagi is so happy without him, maybe he really did have a reason. These are the thoughts that are circling around in Reo's head. Not to mention, he is constantly tortured by the flashbacks of Nagi leaving him, which I think is a great detail. Some readers might say it's just pointless recapping but I disagree, I think it's depicting how traumatic that was for Reo. As a borderline, being abandoned by your fp IS traumatic. Reo relives that moment so many times because so many things trigger it for him throughout Blue Lock. He can't even look at Chigiri and Kunigami without thinking about him and Nagi. It's a really devastating experience that quickly deteriorates him emotionally.

Constant feelings of worthlessness or sadness + Suicidal behavior or self-injury:

One of my favorite things about Reo is the fact that he is self-aware that he's behaving somewhat irrationally, but he doesn't know how to stop. When we look at one of the several times that Reo is curled up crying over Nagi, he mentions how he really did want to tell Nagi to go and have fun, but he didn't. He couldn't. The visuals shift for this too:

Reo doesnt want to be acting this way, but he can't help it, and that's frustrating to him. It makes him start feeling ashamed of himself. His inner thoughts start to spiral and he feels weak and alone. He's reflecting here on what his true feelings really were at that moment, and how scared and lonely and weak he felt as a result of Nagi leaving him behind.

These feelings quickly evolve into Reo feeling worthless and falling into bouts of self-hatred. He's so ashamed of the way he's feeling and behaving but it feels so out of his control. He says, "maybe if I hadn't gone to Blue Lock in the first place, I wouldn't have to experience this feeling." As I said before, borderline's feel things EXTREMELY intensely; the disorder is described as living with third-degree burns all over your body. Everything hurts. His feelings are so intense and all-consuming right now, it's all he can think about:

I saw some posts in the fandom reddit asking why Reo is acting like this. One in particular reads: "I get that he is betrayed and stuff but he is acting like it’s the end of the world, is it explained later why he acts like this? Is it because he doesn’t think he can win without Nagi?" Not to call this person out, I just want to answer the question in this post-

It has nothing to do with winning; it was never about winning. It was always about Nagi.

If we're looking at Reo through the borderline lens, it IS the end of the world for him. Nagi was his world. What's worse, he's fully aware that he's not acting rationally and he doesn't know why, which is making him feel ashamed and weak and embarrassed. Now I know why he's acting like this, but there are no Blue Lock psychiatrists sitting around to wack him with the mood stabilizers or the DBT handbook, so he's gonna stay feeling like a monster.

He lets these thoughts, along with the resentment and anger from being abandoned in the first place, fuel him for the second selection match. As he's watching the game play out, as Nagi is about to score the winning goal, Reo's mind starts racing with intrusive, negative thoughts.

He's praying that Nagi fails, that he gives up, that he stops trying, anything to stop that solidifying moment where he scores the winning goal and proves once and for all that not only was Reo not strong enough to stop him, but Nagi doesn't need him anymore. He catches himself really quickly, because he realizes he's sounding just like his parents. Everything is spinning out of control so bad, Reo wants Nagi to end up in a vulnerable position so that he isn't the only one falling apart. As he catches himself thinking this, he's disgusted with himself. He calls himself 'utter trash', and as he watches Nagi score the winning goal, he falls to his knees, wishing he was dead.

As he sits there decomposing in emotional turmoil and suicidal ideation, Nagi's team chooses Chigiri to join them, and it's the nail in the coffin. This is probably Reo's lowest point in the entire story IMO. Nagi comes up to compliment him on his plays and Reo shows us another classic borderline move: he's anticipating how bad it's going to hurt to be abandoned by Nagi again, so he's trying to push him away before it can happen. We see the dichotomy of his spoken words and inner thoughts here, where he's talking big game to Nagi, saying things like 'you clearly don't care about me anymore, you're throwing me away, if you're going to abandon me just do it properly', while internally he's thinking 'I'm the worst, I wish I was dead, please take this bait and break my heart so that I can self destruct in peace'.

i LOVE the visuals during this moment. This is what Reo thinks is his last line of defense, the last thing he can do to preserve any part of his dignity is to make Nagi hate him so that he'll stop throwing these crumbs of affection at him. It's also really telling that despite his switch in behavior and the devaluing of Nagi, the root of all of that is STILL that he was so hurt by the abandonment.

I don't think I need to analyze the suicidal ideation because he just straight up says he wants to die like three times in this scene but, aside from that, the visual of his inner thoughts vs what he's actually saying is so powerful. Not to mention the chameleon imagery which i'll geek out about in a second, this is another example of his black and white thinking along with the reiteration that being abandoned was literally traumatic for Reo: he says they can never go back to what they were before. Speaking as a borderline, this is painfully true. When people break my trust even in a small way, I can never view them the same as I used to. I can forgive them and let it go, but I'll never be as open with them as I once was. In Reo's shoes, he had Nagi up on this pedestal that he was perfect and would never do anything to hurt him, but he did hurt him (in the worst way possible).

After Nagi tells him he's a pain in the ass and that he doesn't care anymore, Reo thanks him for 'finishing him off'. In his mind, they're done now and he can suffer in peace and quiet without dragging Nagi down anymore.

Bonus Point: The Chameleon Effect

I LOVE THE FACT THAT HIS THING IS CHAMELEONS AHHHH

The chameleon imagery with Reo makes me INSANE dude. As I mentioned towards the beginning of this post, a part of borderline that is seldom talked about is the tendency to take on 'the chameleon effect', or mirror the people around them. REO'S ENTIRE THING IS CHAMELEONS LIKE BFFR ?? That image where he was trying to get Nagi to hate him, was before he even started using his chameleon style, it was just something the authors thought was necessary to include during Reo's mental breakdown. Aside from the cool imagery, his chameleon style is a reflection of his relationship with Nagi. He gets called a jack of all trades and a master of none early on in reference to how when he’s without Nagi, hes not really exceptional at anything. He never really took the time to master one specific thing because he was always so concerned with helping Nagi. This rings my BPD bell for a couple reasons: first of all, when you have no sense of identity and you’re worried it means you have no real personality ?? Steal one!! Take the closest person to you and copy that one. That’s something us baddies know VERY well. Also, think there’s something about you that your fp doesn’t like? Change it! You can morph into anything they want as long as it means they won’t leave you !! :*) Before he makes up with Nagi, he copies moves in hopes that it'll make him stronger and appear more desirable to Nagi. After they make up, he copies whoever he has to so that he can get Nagi to that goal and make himself useful, make himself somebody that Nagi wants to have around. It is a literal direct metaphor for him changing anything and everything about himself for Nagi and graaaahhhh it’s so cool

Reonagi ?? Some thoughts-

I want to close this yap session with my thoughts on Reonagi as a ship. I do think that they can work and I want to make that clear. I'm not on board with the 'borderlines arent capable of having loving and fulfilling relationships' crap. That being said, they both have to put in a bit of effort. Reo has already recognized a lot of his own issues. He admits that he was wrong for pushing his ideals onto Nagi, that he needs to let Nagi grow and be his own person, etc. Nagi really hasn't accepted any fault. I stand by the fact that Nagi needs to be more sensitive with Reo. Way too often when a relationship like this fails, all the blame is put on the one with borderline. I'm gonna be the outlier here and say that if Nagi cares about Reo, he needs to learn about Reo's triggers and be mindful of them. I'm not saying that since Reo is sensitive to abandonment that Nagi should just isolate himself from everybody else, but what I am saying is that when he's going to do something that doesn't involve Reo, he needs to learn how to communicate that he still loves and values Reo. "I'm gonna go play soccer with this person right now, but I haven't forgotten about our promise. When I come back, we can play together. I still love you and I'm not going to leave you for whoever tf I'm playing with rn." (sneaking that 'i love you' in bc like..they're literally canon at this point asdfghjkll) But, I do think that Nagi loves Reo and cares about him in his own way. The two of them just have to keep working on their communication skills. Nagi has the potential to have a hot rich husband who will literally bend over backward for him and buy him all the robux he could ever want, he's gotta put in a shred of effort!

I also like to think that Nagi didn’t totally get the fact that Reo doesn’t gaf about just playing soccer. Nagi thinks soccer is what they do together, it’s what makes reo happy, right? He’s always pushing him to train harder and take the game more seriously because he likes the sport, RIGHT? It would make perfect sense to go play with isagi so that he can get better at soccer and come back to reo a more improved player. Maybe that’s why he was surprised when Reo was so mad in the bathhouse, bc he wasn’t making the connection that Reo cares more about him than soccer. That Reo puts all that energy into him playing soccer because he thinks it’s something that they can have as their own, and once Nagi notices how good he is, he’ll start enjoying it and the two of them can hold hands and run around the soccer pitch!! I think Nagi missed that part tbh, and I don’t think he know that even now in the story. Maybe Reo doesn’t even notice it.

Anyway, a shameless plug to my reonagi playlist if that's your thing (i cooked with this one, i fear) https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5CsvSqmuI4cxOl1nTaV4GJ?si=737a0f21e0bd482a

Closing Thoughts:

Reo is a bpd baddie and I love him very much. I think he's a sensitive guy with a lot of feelings who would benefit from taking time to work through his trauma and his emotions. I hope that he eventually is able to build an identity for himself that doesn't involve Nagi, but baby steps, I suppose. I think Reo is a great balance of positive and negative borderline traits and he reads as a really believable and sympathetic character. He is, however, definitely that friend that you have to slap to stop them from running back to their ex.

Jokes aside though, BPD can be extremely hard to live with, even more so when it's undiagnosed and untreated. If someone you love has BPD, take the time to read up on it and do your best to understand them. I promise you, it will mean the world to them.

If you managed to get this far, thank you for reading! This was a messy stream of consciousness and I appreciate your support by listening.

#blue lock #reo mikage #reonagi #nagireo #nagi seishiro #bpd

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barrenclan · 2 months

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I don't want to overly challenge the anon who criticized the decision to blind Ranger and damage Hacksaws wing, but I think reading it has me wondering: What would the alternatives be?

Before I go super into this, I want to acknowledge that while I am disabled, my disabilities aren't connected to visual impairment or losing a limb, so I want to make it clear that I'm not trying to speak on behalf of that experience. That's not really my place, yeah?

But I think something about Warrior Cats, especially when extended to something like this, is also a story about exploring pain. Death and disability are as synonymous with this story as they are with most warrior cats fiction, for the better or worse, because the themes of the story revolve around what it means to suffer. The main distinction between the living and dead of this story is that the living get to see another day, as physically or emotionally damaged as they are. Barrenclan and the Defiance are ruled by this concept, even though the defiance perverts the idea into something grander than it actually is. Hacksaw and Rangers fate is kind of just an inevitably of the lives of all defiance members: They fight, and they either die or live to suffer another day. I don't really see it as a moral to their lives so much as just a consequence. The defiance can hurt and kill and maim, but it can't escape the fact these things can and will happen to them. The defiance is just a way for characters to trick themselves into thinking they're above that fate.

As for a writing perspective... If you have things you want to do with the characters after this, then yeah, I understand the decision. Otherwise they kinda have to die, since they wouldn't leave Barrenclan alone. It's always good to keep in mind things to avoid for the future, but it's also okay to tell complicated stories that leave messages that are hard to digest. Art isn't going to resonate with people all the time, and it shouldn't. I respect that you've responded to the criticism with humility and openness though!

I'm not gonna post any more about this after now, but I wanted to share this ask both because it's very well written and I think it does bring up some big themes in the story that I didn't mention but think are important!

And a general thank you to everyone for keeping a Warriors fancomic about incredibly intense topics on Tumblr so vastly chill and normal. My inbox and my brain appreciates it.

#ask #anon #analysis #ranger #hacksaw

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ask-the-prose · 5 months

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Writing Mental Health With Compassion

I've gotten a few questions regarding depicting characters with mental health challenges and conditions and I wanted to expand a little more on how to depict these characters with compassion for the real communities represented by these characters.

A little about this guide: this is, as always, coming from a place of love and respect for the writing community and the groups affected by this topic at large. I'm also not coming at this from the outside, I have certain mental illnesses that affect my daily life. With that, I'll say that my perspective may be biased, and as with all writing advice, you should think critically about what is being told to you and how.

So let's get started!

Research

I'm sure we're all tired of hearing the phrase "do your research," but unfortunately it is incredibly important advice. I have a guide that touches on how to do research here, if you need a place to get started.

When researching a mental health condition that we do not experience, we need to do so critically, and most importantly, compassionately. While your characters are not people, they are assigned traits that real people do have, and so your depiction of these traits can have an impact on people who face these conditions themselves.

I've found that reddit is a decent resource for finding threads of people talking about their personal experiences with certain illnesses. For example, bipolar disorder has several subreddits that have very open and candid discussions about bipolar, how it impacts lives, and small things that people who don't have bipolar don't tend to think about.

It's important to note that these spaces are not for you. They are spaces for people to talk about their experiences in a place without judgment or fear or stigma. These are not places for people to give out writing advice. Do NOT flood subreddits for people seeking support with questions that may make others feel like an object to be studied. It's not cool or fair to them for writers to enter their space and start asking questions when they're focused on getting support. Be courteous of the people around you.

Diagnosis

I have the belief that for most stories, a diagnosis for your characters is unnecessary. I have a few reasons for thinking this way.

Firstly, mental health diagnoses are important for treatment, but they're also a giant sign written across your medical documents that says, “I'm crazy!” Doctors may try to remain unbiased when they see mental health diagnoses, but anybody with a diagnosis can say that doctors rarely succeed. This translates to a lot of people never getting diagnoses, never seeking treatment, or refusing to talk about their diagnosis if they do have one.

Secondly, I've seen posts discuss “therapy speak” in fiction, and this is one of those instances where a diagnosis and extensive research may make you vulnerable to it. People don't tend to discuss their diagnoses freely and they certainly don't tend to attribute their behaviors as symptoms.

Finally, this puts you, the writer, into a position where you treat your characters less like people and story devices and more like a list of symptoms and behavioral quirks. First and foremost, your characters serve your story. If they don't feel like people then your characters may fall flat. When it comes to mental illness in characters, the people aspect is the most important part. Mentally ill people are people, not symptoms.

Those are my top three reasons for believing that most characters will never need a specific diagnosis. You will likely never need to depict the difference between bipolar and borderline because the story itself does not need that distinction or to reveal a diagnosis at all. I feel that having a diagnosis in mind for a character has more pitfalls than advantages.

How does treatment work?

Treating mental health conditions may appear in your story. There are a number of ways treatments affect daily life and understanding the levels of care and what those levels treat will help you depict the appropriate settings for your characters.

The levels of care range from minimally restrictive and minimal care to intensive in-patient care in a secure hospital setting.

Regular or semi-regular therapy is considered outpatient care. This is generally the least restrictive. Your characters may or may not also take medications, in which case they may also see a psychiatrist to prescribe those medications. There is a difference between therapists, psychiatrists, and psychologists. Therapists do not prescribe medications, psychiatrists prescribe medications after an evaluation, and psychologists will (sometimes) do both. (I'm US, so this may work differently depending where you are. You should always research the specific setting of your story.) Generally, a person with a mental illness or mental health condition will see both an outpatient therapist and an outpatient psychiatrist for their general continuing care.

Therapists will see their patients anywhere from once in a while as-needed to twice weekly. Psychiatrists will see new patients every few weeks until they report stabilizing results, and then they will move to maintenance check-ins every 90-ish days.

If the patient reports severe symptoms, or worsening symptoms, they will be moved up to more intensive care, also known as IOP (Intensive Outpatient Program). This is usually a group-therapy setting for between 3-7 hours per day between 3-5 days a week. The group-therapy is led by a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) or Licensed Professional Social Worker (LPSW). Groups are structured sessions with multiple patients teaching coping mechanisms and focusing on treatment adjustment. IOP’s tend to expect patients to see their own outpatient psychiatrist, but I've encountered programs that have their own in-house psychiatrists.

If the patient still worsens, or is otherwise needing more intensive care, they'll move up to PHP (Partial Hospitalization Program). This can look different per facility, but I've seen them to be more intensive in hours and content than IOP. They also usually have in-house psychiatrists doing diagnostic psychological evaluations. It's very possible for characters with “mild” symptoms to go long periods of time, even most of their lives, without having had a diagnosis. PHP’s tend to need a diagnosis so that they can address specific concerns and help educate the patient on their condition and how it may manifest.

Next step up is residential care. Residential care is a boarding hospital setting. Patients live in the hospital and focus entirely on treatment. Individual programs may differ in what's allowed in, how much contact the patients are allowed to have, and what the treatment focus is. Residential programs are often utilized for addiction recovery. Good residential programs will care about the basis for the addiction, such as underlying mental health issues that the patient may be self-medicating for. Your character may come away with a diagnosis, or they may not. Residential programs aren't exclusively for addictions though, and can be useful for severe behavioral concerns in teenagers or any number of other concerns a patient may have that manifest chronically but do not require intensive inpatient restriction.

Inpatient hospital stays are the highest level of care, and this tends to be what people are talking about when they tell jokes about “grippy socks.” These programs are inside the hospital and patients are highly restricted on what they can and cannot have, they cannot leave unless approved by the hospital staff (the hospital's psychiatrist tends to have the final say), and contact with the outside world is highly regulated. During the days, there are group therapy sessions and activities structured very carefully to maintain routine. Staff will regulate patient hygiene, food and sleep routines, and alone time.

Inpatient hospital programs are controversial among people with mental illness and mental health concerns. I find that they have use, but they are also not an easy or first step to take when dealing with a mental health condition. Patients are not allowed sharp objects, metal objects, shoelaces, cutlery, and pens or pencils. Visitors are not allowed to bring these items in, staff are not allowed these items either. This is for the safety of the patients. Typically, if someone is involuntarily admitted into the inpatient hospital program, it is due to an authority (the hospital staff) deeming the patient as a danger to themselves or others. Whether they came in of their own will (voluntary) or not does not matter in how the program operates. Everyone is treated the same. If someone is an active danger to themselves, then they may be on 24-hour suicide watch. They are not allowed to have any time alone. No, not even for the bathroom, or while sleeping, or during group sessions.

Inpatient Hospital Programs

This is a place of high curiosity for those who have never been admitted into inpatient care, so I'd like to explain a little more in detail how these programs work, why they're controversial, but how they can be useful in certain situations. I do have personal experience in this area, but as always, your mileage may vary.

When admitting, hospital staff are the final say. Not the police. The police hold some sway, but most often, if someone is brought in by the police, they are likely to be admitted. They are only involuntarily admitted when the situation demands: the staff have determined the person to be an imminent danger to themselves or others. This is obviously subjective, and can easily be abused. A good program with decent staff will do everything they can to convince the patient to admit voluntarily if they feel it is necessary, but ultimately if the patient declines and the staff don't feel they can make the clinical argument that admittance is necessary, the patient is free to leave. It should be noted that doctors and clinicians have to worry about possibly losing their licenses to practice. They don't want to fuck around with involuntary admittance if they don't have to, and they don't want potentially dangerous people to walk away.

Once admitted, the patient will have to remove their clothing and put on a set of hospital scrubs. These are mostly made of paper, and most often do not have pockets, but I have seen sets that do have pockets (very handy, tbh). They are not allowed to take anything into the hospital wing except disability-required devices such as glasses, hearing aids, mobility aids, etc. Most programs will require removing piercings, but not all of them, in my experience.

The nurses will also do a physical examination, where they will make note of any open wounds, major scars, tattoos, and other skin abrasions that may be relevant.

The patient will then be led to their bed, where they will receive any approved clothing items from outside, a copy of their patient rights, and a copy of the floor code of conduct and rules, a schedule, and any other administrative information necessary for the program to run efficiently and legally.

Group sessions include group-therapy, activities, coping skills, anger management, anxiety management, and for some reason, karaoke. There is a lot of coloring involved, but only with crayons. A good program will focus heavily on skills and therapeutic activities. Bad programs will phone it in and focus on karaoke and activities. Most hospitals will have a chaplain, and some will include a religious group session. I've never attended these, so I can't speak for them.

Unspoken rules are the hidden pieces of the inpatient programs that patients tend to find out during their first visit. There is no leaving the program until the doctor agrees to it. The doctor will only agree to it if they deem you ready to leave, and you are only ready to leave if you have been compliant to treatment and have seen positive results in the most dangerous symptoms (homicidal or suicidal ideations). Noncompliance can look like: refusing your prescribed medications (which you have the right to do at any time for any reason. That does not mean that there won't be consequences. This is a particularly controversial point.), refusing to attend groups (chapel is not included in this point, but that doesn't mean it's actually discounted. Another controversial point.), violent or disruptive outbursts such as yelling or throwing things, and refusing to sleep or eat at the approved and appointed times. All of this may sound like the hospital is restricting your rights beyond reason, but I've seen the use, and I've seen the abuse. Medications are sometimes necessary, and often patients seriously prefer having medication. Groups are important to a person's treatment, and refusing to go can be a sign of noncompliance or worsening symptoms. If someone is too depressed or anxious to go to group, then they're probably not ready to leave the hospital where the structure is gone and they must self-regulate their treatment. Violent or disruptive outbursts tend to be a sign of worsening symptoms in general, but even the best of us lose our tempers from time to time when put into a highly stressful situation like an inpatient hospital stay. The hospital is supposed to be a place of healing, for many it is. But for many more, it is a place of systematic abuse and restriction.

Discharge processes can be long and arduous and INCREDIBLY stressful for the patient. Oftentimes, they won't know their discharge date until the day of, or perhaps the day before. Though the date can change at any time. The discharge process requires the supervising psychiatrist to meet with the treatment team and then the patient to determine if the patient had progressed enough to be safely discharged. Discharge also requires a set outpatient plan in place, such as a therapy appointment within a week, a psychiatrist visit, or admittance into a lower level of care. This is where social workers are involved. Patients are not allowed access to cell phones or the internet. They cannot make their own appointments with their outpatient care providers without a phone number and phone access. Some floors will have phone access for this reason, others will insist the social worker arrange appointments and discharge plans. Social workers are often incredibly overworked, with several patients on their caseload.

The patient cannot be discharged until the social worker has coordinated the discharge plan to the doctor's approval. Most often, unfortunately, the patient rarely receives regular communication regarding the progress of their discharge. I've been discharged with as much as a day's notice to two hours notice.

Part 2 Coming Soon

This guide got longer than expected! Out of respect for my followers dashboard, I will be cutting it here and adding a Part 2 later on.

If you find that there are more specific questions you'd like answered, or topics you'd like covered, send an ask or reply to this post with what you'd like to see in Part 2.

– Indy

#writing advice #writing tips #writing resources #writeblr #amwriting #asktheprose #ask the prose #writing mental health #mental health #writing with compassion #writing mental illness #writing compassionately

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enemywasp · 5 months

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Alright so someone on tiktok sent me a link to a compiled list of arguments against proshippers and so I wanted to put a sort of brief response of my own thoughts of each point.

Long post warning!

"Proshippers are non-offending minor attracted people in a fresh paint of coat"

What a start, am I right? Okay so first off this is a huge generalisation, not every proshipper engages with or is even comfortable with anything that sexualises fictional children, or ships them with adults. And of those that do ship adult/minor ships, it doesn't always mean they're attracted to the character themselves or gains any sexual pleasure from that.

They then went on to say that although they might be non-offending, they still fantasise about and romanticise children- in the case of proshippers by creating art and stories. And I am not personally educated enough on how people's minds works to go in depth here, but I do know a lot of pedophilic thoughts can be intrusive and unwanted. And I would much rather people engage in this and deal with their thoughts through fiction where no actual children are harmed, than actually go touch a real child or engage is any form of CSEM.

“People can draw and ship whatever they want!”

Here they went on to say that surely to ship and create content you must justify these things in some capacity regardless of them being fictional. And immediately I'd argue, the justification it that they're fictional. And that sometimes you want to read about things you'd never approve of in real life, it's a natural curiosity. And again, regardless of what the dark content is I would take someone engaging in fiction over harming a real person any day.

They compared this to alt-right groups and dark humour justifying racism and transphobia, etc. And whilst I think something we should always be aware of in fiction is stereotypes and how we may be representing people. Youtube videos like this are usually a type of propaganda that AIM to change people's mindsets and turn them against groups. Whereas fiction tells a story, some may have meanings and connections to real life, be a political piece, etc. Not everything is that serious and has a clear distinction from reality.

Think for example, reading/watching about murder and gore. More on that in a second.

"Fiction doesn't affect reality!"

I'm going to be honest I rolled my eyes at this as their main example was slenderman. If you don't know about that, those girls were schizophrenic. Anything could of set off and caused delusions, it just so happened to be fiction. Those girls needed help- not to just read purer content. They also basically brought up propaganda again, which is again deliberate and designed to warp peoples perceptions. Its based of lying and spreading misinformation and passing it as facts. The only thing I strongly believe can be directly harmful is stereotypes if not handled with care. But I think that's something for anyone who writes and consumes content should be aware of regardless of their stances.

Again here they implied that all proshippers are peodophiles. And that they normalise abuse of children. I'd also like to point out that most proshippers I've interacted with online have age boundaries to avoid interacting with minors depending on how graphic or sexual their content is.

"What do you think all stories about murder should stop existing?"

Here they basically argued that killing in media isn't the same as its not romanticised or condoned. YA Novels disagree- mafia stories being the most immediate example to spring to mind. Furthermore, morally grey villains. One of my favourite films is Mr Right. It's about a hitman killing people. Anna kendrick falls in love with him and its framed as a romantic comedy. Funny how its only fanfiction that's criticised like this? I actually have more thoughts on this if anyones interested.

Again they bring up kids not knowing adults pursuing children is wrong, and I'm questioning why children this young are unsupervised on the Internet. How young were you when you were allowed to watch anything with graphic blood or violence? This content isn't made for kids! Especially not anyone so young they can't seperate fiction from reality as most sites have a specific age you have to be to join. And I'm sorry to say it, but on websites and social media where adults can interact with kids, anything can be used to groom kids. (The real thing you should be mad about here is how there's no websites aimed just for children and safe spaces on the Internet anymore cause it can't be monetised as easily)

"Artists are allowed to draw and write about dark people"

They basically said, yes but it's not the same as promoting. Writing something under a romantic light and not saying "Don't do at home!" Isn't promoting. No ones encouraging these things in real life. Or rather, if they are its not because they're a proshipper but rather who they are as a person and their intentions.

The trans example they used is very extreme and honestly something I agree with a little more, fiction can definitely be used as an excuse to say and act out hateful and discriminatory things. Whilst I do think it's something we should discuss and unpack more, I'm not certain of my view on how I would fix this without risking silencing people talking about their experiences.

"Its not my responsibility to look after other people, just block me and the tags"

Here they threw all kinds of accusations. And says that we're making traumatised people jump through hoops to avoid getting retraumatised. I hate this argument, you know people have actual triggers they may not be able to avoid in real life? The world can't bend around you. And I am very sorry if any content online is traumatising to you, but someone could also be traumatised by a certain breed of dog and not want to see it. Should no one post dogs online ever again? A bald man reminds you of an abusive ex? Bald men get off the Internet! You see how this thing can just keep escalating? The tags and warnings are important because they're the best you can get. You can't control the world to protect everyone from everything ever. No ones forcing you to interact, and if you're on any algorithm based content that will encourage that content on your for your page more.

The only thing I think we should take from this is the reminder that warnings and tags are always important.

"You only care about censoring creativity"

Here they defend themselves that oh wouldn't you want freaks out the community! Which again immediately makes me lose respect for you, if you're just going to brand us all as freaks as an argument and generalize us.

No comment on that first line when you can easily argue antishipper do the same.

"Proshippers are not remotely innocent of targeted harrasement" Neither are antis. There's people who take things too far both sides and I'm not going to defend either for that.

"Real kids get assaulted and all you care about is censoring people online!"

Here they shout "oh I can care about both!" But what I don't think they realise is censorship can make it difficult for kids and to learn about how to speak up and to look for signs, or to speak up about their experiences. How do you plan on removing the topic from the Internet whilst also letting victims speak up? And people may want to write fiction based off their experiences. Who are you to go through it and proclaim what is too far, what romanticises it too much? More on this later.

"Antis are reducing my trauma"

They compared this to saying "date rape victims are reducing my trauma because they weren't taken advantage of in the same way as me" which is a disgusting parallel?? Date rape is still rape. Someone writing about something isn't the same as it happening. Although it can be used as harrasment, grooming, etc if directly addressed to you or being constantly sent to you, written about you. But the content existing in general? No.

"I'm coping"

Compared it to self harm, and such. Poetry and diaries are also used to write about your experiences and unpack trauma. Some of which may write it in an unrealistically positive light cause that's how they want to unpack it or explain those thoughts. And yes these things get posted online.

I can't imagine a single therapist or professional psychiatrist of any kind disapproving of creative writing because, again, it's much better than any alternatives of doing real harm to yourself or people around you. Although I do agree that if something is traumatising for you to read about and just upsets you further, be aware of your own boundaries but not everyone is the same so how are you going to police people's own thoughts and emotions.

Also I can't remember who or where as it was years ago now, but I have heard of people who actually realised they were being groomed or abused and just how bad it was through reading about it in a fanfic and seeing it in an outside perspective.

They also say to do it in private, but doesn't everyone on the Internet now have an understanding of finding a community and looking out for eachother and sharing experiences?

"There's more nuance here than just calling proshippers peodophiles"

Here they say no matter what it still comes down to whether it's ever okay to sexualise minors in certain contexts. And again, not every proshipper does this or is even comfortable with engaging in this kind of content. And further, no one is sexualising real minors in this context.

"I'm a proshipper and a minor tho!"

I'd agree minors should be wary of the spaces they're in but proship spaces aren't always necessarily sexual, graphic or 18+. Saying they're being groomed feels like you're watering down that term. I was a proshipper at age 13, I didn't interact with anyone online about it though, I didn't even know that was the term. I just came to the conclusion that it's just fiction all on my own. Minors aren't idiots.

At then end they talk about their own experience being groomed and I'm obviously not going to nitpick or criticise their experiences. I will point out that one person being bad and taking advantage of you and using content to do so doesn't mean everyone is like that. I am sorry to anyone who has been taken advantage of by someone who claims they're a proshipper though. There are people who have turned out to be horrible on both sides.

I am ill and it's late but I want to get this up sooner rather than later so please ask for clarification on anything. I'm always up for a discussion on this topic as I do believe some of these points do have merits at times and that this whole topic is not black and white

#proshipper #profiction #proship #anti anti #proship positivity #ship discourse #ship discussion #tw grooming #tw harrassment #tw trauma #anti censorship #anti harassment

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sweet-as-an-angel · 8 months

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Hello there! I've been a fan of your work for a while now and let me just say, your original works and characters have me absolutely captivated! (Your yandere outlaw is one of my top favorite fictional characters! And your yandere cult leader is rapidly rising in the ranks 👀) You put so much detail into all your writing and you really delve deep into the psychology and personality of every one of them so beautifully, not to mention how diverse they all are from one another. Each and every one has such dimension and they're so believable in their actions and reactions! (And can I just say I think it's very clever that your yandere!Milf/Dilf's names start with the acronym's initial)

And your MCs are also quite vibrant and while they remain easily relatable they still have distinct traits that the characters get attached to. Thank you for making and sharing these amazing stories and characters with us, it really makes my day whenever I see you've posted something new.

Now, I know this ask is getting pretty lengthy (sorry about that ^^" I tend to ramble) but I was going through your Yan!Dilf works again and I wanted to ask, how would Dominic react if his darling was someone who's maybe dealt with manipulative people in the past or is highly emotionally intelligent and observant who could tell he wasn't being entirely genuine? But instead of pulling away from him they try to understand what he wants from them and was open about it? Would he ever even become obsessed with someone like that or allow that kind of situation to happen or is he too cautious for it to be possible?

I know you've had a lot of asks so please don't feel obligated to answer this! But in any case thank you again for sharing your works and I hope you have a wonderful wonderful day! 💖💫

My Lovely, you have positively touched my soul with your endearing sentiments ! Truly, you have made my day and I cannot thank you enough for being such a loyal enthusiast of my work, your time is valued more than I can ever hope to express <3.

Your question is an incredibly fascinating one, my Dear; thank you for sharing it with us ! I wish you the happiest and most prosperous of days, Sweetie ^^

TW: Manipulation, Dominic Being Dominic, Vulnerability, No Pronouns Used For Reader Except 'You'.

♡ Dominic is, as you suggested, initially extremely cautious around you. However, he knows he can't just drop you like a sack of potatoes; it would be far too obvious to the people around him, which would surely cause others to find him out as the serpent he is if they ever went digging around his character.

♡ But, when you show him, gradually, like a keeper feeding a feral animal, that your endeavour is not to oust him as an un-human but rather to understand what made him like this in the first place (and all the lace and frills that come with such a monumental task), he regards you...differently than he did before.

♡ Sure, he thought you were very attractive and that you could offer him something other than the resplendence his life is steeped in, but now...

♡ He feels exposed. Seen. Vulnerable.

♡ All things he tries to push back against. Things he tries to bury beneath a grandiose tale of a childhood spent in the most accommodating of educational establishments, lavish mansions and the lap of luxury.

♡ He tries to lead you a merry dance down a version of his life that he wants you to see, rebuttaling your attempts at making him crack.

♡ You tell him you can see past that. He, feeling his eye twitch, believes you.

♡ It will take a long, long time to get Dominic even close to admitting a scintilla of how his psyche works. Or, rather, doesn't work.

♡ And it's only if you manage to grind away at his need to hide his most precious secret - the parasite that wears his skin and controls his mind - that he'll open up.

♡ Fractionally. Piecemeal. But he opens up, nonetheless.

♡ He'll grow to love you in ways unfathomable even to him.

♡ If you thought he was bad without having a background in combatting the manipulation of others, he is insidious now.

♡ You become to him what he could never be for himself; a safe haven. The only person from which he does not hide.

♡ Sure, he keeps the more...dangerous aspects of his personality hidden for a lot longer than others, but you can topple these columns, can shake Dominic from his perch forged from the ivory of a devil's horns.

♡ You can tame him in ways unimaginable. You have only to see him for who - what - he truly is.

Reblog for more content like this! It helps creators like myself tremendously and it is greatly appreciated :-)

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#sweet as an angel #yandere #male yandere #yandere male #original yandere #yandere x reader #yandere x you #yandere x y/n #yandere x darling #yandere oc #yandere oc x reader #yandere dilf #yandere dilf x reader #yandere writing #yandere blog #tw yandere #original writing #writers on tumblr

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dailyadventureprompts · 3 months

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hey! was wondering if you have some ideas/tips for running a dark fantasy campaign? ive been running one for about a year now and while ive included horror elements im a naturally silly person and i feel like i go a couple sessions without including something strange and off-putting. i do wanna be distinct from grimdark, i want my story to have hope and moments of levity, but still feel scary and like the world is against the pcs.

hope ur day is well :]

Genretalk: Dark Fantasy

Maintaining a consistent tone at our d&d table is a notoriously hard thing to accomplish. Partially it's because it's a collaborative game and not all of our players might be as dictatorially inclined as we are, there's also the dice to contend with and those little polyhedral bastards don't care about dramatic consistency or the wrath of god.

So it falls to us as dungeon masters to do most of the work, but luckily I've found that evoking a specific genre can be pretty easily done through keeping a few ideas in mind while we're running scenes and building out our worlds.

First, a meditation on loss :.|:;

What makes dark fantasy dark? The surface level is aesthetics; dirt covered fauxmedivalism, horror imagery, gritty "realism", a lack of smiles and rainbows and happiness. These are all too common but they only reflect the feelings the genre exists to convey, specifically ones related to both the fear of loss and the suffering caused by it.

If people are going to lose something (whether they be players or npcs), you're going to need them and your audience to care about it, which means learning to build connections and evoke sympathy. Having those moments of levity is SO important because they're the point of attachment for your players, the thing that makes them care about this sometimes rotten world you've crated that they've taken on the responsibility of saving. If you skipped this step you'd be going into grimdark, which is one of the reasons I dislike the genre: death and suffering lose all meaning if there's no alternative.

Likewise, as easy as it is to lose hope, people are going to try to make the best of bad times. There's good food and the warmth of a fire and the company of friends and the chance of something better happening tomorrow. People are going to want these things no matter how turbulent circumstances get, so it's important to focus on them to give contrast to the darkness of your story.

Bad things happen to good people and there's (probably) nothing you can do about it

One of the central conceits of playing D&D is that the players are heroes, characters with a unique power and agency in the world and the ability to shape the outcome of events, specifically to beat the odds and save the day. However we can still lean into the dark side of dark fantasy by highlighting that while the players are privileged by their protagonist status, most other people aren't.

Most NPCS the party end up getting to know should have something tragic in their backstory; a war, a famine, a plague, a loved one's death. This will have affected them deeply and have coloured their outlook on the world and will set up their later dramatic arc. The town magistrate is going to have opinions about adventurers after her sister befriended a passing gang of sellswords and ended up dying in childbirth after being seduced by their charismatic leader. The townspeople are unlikely to rebel against their petty and sadistic baron since they remember his military acumen that saved them during the last border war. This also sets up the unexpected moments where the party can fight against the darkness of the world by getting people to see past the lifetime of cruelty they've been forced to endure.

A centeral part of the players having agency is making choices, but sometimes things go wrong, and sometimes there's no good options. Innocent people get hurt, there are costs that we end up having to pay that may or may not be worth the price. Keeping the young lovers apart and letting the unpleasant political marriage go through is the only way to avert war. There's a murder demon stalking town and the only way to banish it is for someone innocent to be ritually sacrificed, none of the heroes count, they've all got blood on their hands.

One of the best tricks I've learned to highlight the "no good options" approach is to present the party with a status quo that needs to change, but characters they like who are reliant upon it. It's easy to justify toppling the evil empire, those guys are jerks and are actively making life worse for everyone, but things get messy when doing what needs to be done involves making life worse for a lot of generally good people.

Messy decisions are what we want in dark fantasy because it really gives the party agency over the story. Are they willing to give up something they care about to perform an act of heroism? Are they willing to let the world tip further into chaos for the sake of seeing justice done? If there is no right choice, then what choice will you make?

The universe trends towards darkness

Worldbuilding is an important part of establishing your tone, and while you don't need to constantly keep ratcheting up how dreadful things are it pays to be mindful while thinking up new details for your setting.

Living in the world is a bloody business and people are all too often accepting of awful things if it makes their lives easier. On the base level it's the "kill people who are different monsters take their stuff" angle of self enrichment, but it gets more abstract as you venture into the non-adventuring levels of society. It's stuff like religions venerating painful martyrdoms as miracles, joyous feast days and festivals to commemorate some bloody event, national or family pride over participation in historic slaughter. A dark fantasy world is one that celebrates it's hypocrisy and compromises because it has long given up on good actually winning out.

To really hammer in that "fighting against the odds" feeling, stories/legends/songs about other heroes should either be tragedies or well known falsehoods.

Change (to say nothing of actual improvement) comes at terrible cost. It isn't fair that the world/narrative/universe is set up this way, but now the heroes have to deal with it.

Artsource

#genretalk #heavy topics #dark fantasy #writing advice #prompt postage #dm advice

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balanceoflightanddark · 10 months

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As requested by @cobra-diamond. I hope this makes you happy.

If you know me, then you probably know that I have a habit of talking about problematic characters like Azula. You know, the ones who have to have an inordinate amount of hatred attached to them that boggles the mind. It's just Azula is one of the most notorious of this...I guess you can say club.

The thing is...she's not the only one out there.

Spoilers for Fire Emblem: Three Houses below.

This is Edelgard von Hresvelg. Crown Princess to the Adrestrian Empire. Leader of the Black Eagles House in Garreg Mach. And quite possibly the most controversial character in the entire Fire Emblem franchise. She's been called a lot of things over the years. A fascist. A tyrant. The old "worse than Hitler" comparison. Needless to say, she's had it rough.

And to be fair, there is a reason for that. Traditionally, she's the "villain" of the story. She's the face of the enemy faction, the one you encounter the most if you don't side with her, and she ends up the final boss on the most traditional of the Fire Emblem routes. Her design is crimson red with devil horns, and she turns into a literal monster at the end of one of her routes. So by all accounts, she's the bad guy.

Except...she isn't. Not really. Let's back up a bit.

Three Houses takes place on the continent of Fodlan, which is broken up into three distinctive factions. We have the Adrestrian Empire that Edelgard is from who used to rule all of Fodlan. We have the Leicester Alliance which is ruled by a class of nobles who are only loosely united. And then we have Faerghus, a proud people with armies of knights and ruled by a king. Above them all are the Knights of Seiros who basically run things in Fodlan, keeping stability and maintaining the balance of power between all three factions from their monastery of Garreg Mach. Here, noble children from all across the continent are enrolled to learn combat and how to be a faithful servant of the Church and its Archbishop, Rhea.

Fodlan also has a strict caste system dictated by Crests. Think of them as bloodlines that grant users special abilities and the power to wield divine weapons. Those who inherit Crests are practically seen as chosen by the Goddess and enforce her will on the earth and are on top. Everyone else essentially gets trampled on, with families doing pretty underhanded things and constantly squabbling in order to make sure their family has Crests.

Enter a mysterious faction lead by their enigmatic leader, the Flame Emperor. For most of the game's first half, they serve as the ultimate bad guy. They're the face of Those Who Slither In The Dark, (TWSITD), they're the ones who hired the mercenaries who attempted to kill the student heads at the beginning of the game, and their identity is one of the driving questions at the start.

Turns out...the Flame Emperor is actually Edelgard.

Before now, Edelgard had been one of the class leaders and one of your students should you choose to teach the Black Eagles. She's...not exactly the most open person, but she's also dutiful and dedicated to succeeding her elderly father, the Emperor of Adrestria. So it comes off as a shock to many that she's revealed to effectively be the bad guy for the first half of the game. An indeed, there are people in-universe who genuinely want her head and blame her for absolutely everything that TWSITD pulled.

The thing is though...Edelgard's position within TWSITD is less of leadership and more of a weapon. You remember those Crests I mentioned earlier? Well it turns out, Edelgard actually possesses TWO which is unnatural in Fodlan. The reason for that is...well, it was the result of torturous experiments that left her in a disgusting prison and was forced to watch the rest of her siblings die. Leaving her the sole survivor. And going back to my Azula comparison, she too was conditioned to effectively serve TWSITD to bring down the Church and tear Fodlan apart.

AKA: she was set up in-universe to be the villain.

The thing is though at the end of the day...she ultimately isn't.

Her trauma isn't brushed away. It's treated with as much respect as it deserves. And she's not treated as some monster either since all of her traits established before the reveal are still present after the timeskip where the war starts if you decide to defend her from being executed by Archbishop Rhea. Mainly, she cares a lot about her allies and forces. Even giving them an out of what is certain to be a bloody path she embarks on.

And it IS a bloody path. Edelgard's ultimate goal is to dismantle the Church which seems villainous...until you realize that the Church was responsible for the oppressive Crest system that resulted in her experimentation and a ton of backstabbing and suffering in Fodlan. As bad as TWSITD are, they wouldn't have gotten as far if the Knights of Seiros practically didn't create every opportunity for them to cause chaos and destruction. She doesn't even like TWSITD too much, and only allies with them cause they're the lesser evil in the grand scheme of things, and she needs their support to stand a chance against the dominant Church. And she already HAS plans to bring them down the moment the war is over. That seen of her in the of the routes where she turns into a monster? That's her choosing to become a monster when her back is to the wall and her last ditch effort to secure a better future for Fodlan.

What's more, she actually shows more clemency and mercy to her enemies than her rivals. Imperial troops are said to be more accommodating to citizens and captured soldiers than Faerghus who have been known to torture their captives. Edelgard is willing to show mercy and is perfectly willing to let Rhea stand down, showing the same mercy that her enemies don't since Rhea was willing to execute heretics over their rebellious attitudes (practically justifying the war). And the less said about Dimitri, the King of Faerghus, the better...

So while Edelgard is coded as a villain...she doesn't really act too villainous. She shows regret over her actions. She isn't as brutal as a lot of people make her out to be. Hell, her ending where she wins the war is arguably the best for Fodlan since the oppressive Crest system is dismantled with the only resistance coming from nobles who their claims to power are challenged. Not to mention she IS willing to let territories like Brigid peacefully secede and is going to step down from her position as Emperor once things are stabilized and she finds a successor.

Sadly like Azula, because she's seen as the villain in-universe a LOT of people think she's some power-hungry monster. Even when a closer examination of her actions and character show that it is NOT the case. Which...honestly makes her special to me and a lot of people. She's the kind of character who would be demonized elsewhere, but is given a chance to tell her side of the story and NOT be the monster everyone makes her out to be. And ultimately if you play your cards right, she does get that happy ending denied to so many characters like her.

It makes it all the sweeter that after so many years of being conditioned to be the villain, presenting herself as the villain, Edelgard gets recognized as the hero and person she actually is.

#edelgard #edelgard positive #edelgard von hresvelg #fire emblem 3 houses #three houses #crimson flower #black eagles #and now you can expect more 3 houses posts in the future #*evil cackling*

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byemambo · 3 months

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The Beauty of Subtlety and Change: A Deep Dive [We Are EP. 12]

As more episodes come out every week, I fall more and more in love with this series. I know when the trailer came out, there were some people that we off put by "another university/engineering student" series, or weren't as enthusiastic about the comedy being present in the series, I think that's fair since everyone has their own preferences and qualms with how past series have approached this genre, but I truly believe once people give it a chance and start to watch the further episodes, I start realizing how intentional and well crafted the character development has been with each introduction of a new story arc or group dynamic. Eventually I want to dissect more parts of the series that I resonated with, but the first definitely has to be Tan and Fang's development as the series progresses.

One thing I appreciate about the handling of these two characters, which I continue to give my flowers to Aou and Boom. This is my first time watching them in a series (I was only familiar with Pond and Phuwin from Never Let Me Go, as well as Tee when he played a supporting role in Only Friends), and I instantly fell in love with their on screen characters, but eventually the actors themselves as the series progressed. Both actors do an amazing job portraying the personalities of their characters and their distinct differences between their past and present selves, where the performance is well thought out without being too over the top which is what the sound effects are for hahaha.

In episode 12, the conversation between Tan and Fang caught my attention the most, especially when I rewatched episodes in my free time while waiting for new episodes to drop. When Tan shares his story with the gang about how Fang and him met during episode 9, you wouldn't have even thought both of them would be as hot headed as they were in high school versus how we were introduced to them as university students in the first few episodes.

These exchanges with Fang reflected Tan's past self well: a smart ass, condescending, provoking. I think the juxtaposition between past Tan and present Tan really shows itself when we see how Tan speaks about Fang in private now that they're an established couple: compassionate, attentive, loving. Aou does an amazing job with his microexpressions, saying a lot without saying anything at all.

Episode 9 vs. Episode 12

What was even more of a shock to me was the introduction of Fang's past self, completely opposite of how we were introduced to him in the first few episodes. High school Fang was also just as condescending and hot headed, which was later revealed by Tan that he only punched Fang back to save face on the field with other people around. But can we please address how much of a menace Fang is from that expression alone?

Episode 9

To think that present Fang, someone observant, reliable, and introverted, used to be someone blunt, confrontational and spiteful only reinforced my belief in the evolution of individuals: that a person of their past is in fact, the same person in the present, that not everyone should be tied down to the person they used to be and to make room for the person they're aiming to become. I noticed the shift in their perception of one another when we watch the second half of the flashback after Tan helps Phum and Fang escape an ambush.

Episode 9

This becomes one of my favorite Tan moments so far (as of episode 12): the defining moment of his innate character as selfless, courageous, and heroic. That despite how Tan felt about Fang after their first encounter and the many other arguments and fights to come, that never crossed Tan's mind when he first witnessed the confrontation: that his natural instinct was to help. He further reinforces this value when Phum asked him why he helped them, Tan answering: "I don't believe in dirty tricks."

Episode 9

After Tan's true character redefines itself in Fang's eyes as this asshole that instigated an argument with him for no reason actually has a heart of gold? We also see this shift in perception between Tan as he witnessed Fang's brotherly nature helping Phum with his injuries, later creating a core memory between the three as both of them let their guards down and mutually accept: "You know, this is all turning out way different than what I expected and...I'm not mad at it." In my humble opinion not that I find helping people/aiding people to be an extremely attractive trait in someone, this planting of the seed that leads up to their own way of flirting and eventually becoming a couple makes sense and as Q says: "You're totally rivals-to-lovers". The ability to protect and help others is a strong trait to have, and this makes sense once Fang begins to open up to Tan about his home life.

When Fang seeks out Tan during episode 12 after seeing his brother and father argue, the best way I could put Fang's complicated feelings into words: survivor's guilt. Fang reaffirms this idea through sharing:

"The moment he returned from abroad, I could still remember the look in his eyes clearly. It has remained my trauma until today."

As someone who identifies with Phum and his upbringing in being the lesser favored child by our parents, having a sibling grow up alongside you being raised by the same-but-different parents is a difficult pill to swallow on both ends, especially as we get older and begin to realize how intense and traumatic that experience can be when we reflect back on childhood, often times manifesting into resentment as we see with Phum and his parents currently in the story. On how real those discrepancies become when intervention and self reflection occurs, on quite frankly, how shitty it is to finally see the ugly truth after disregarding reality or protecting (intentionally or not) those who are the root causes of the pain and suffering.

I resonate with Phum and his journey in learning how to express himself in effective ways that can be heard through the ears of others, even though our childhood made us believe that we're not worthy of bare minimum love and attention, that we're bound to be misunderstood. A lot of Phum's tendencies at the beginning make sense for someone dealing with childhood trauma and abandonment issues cause same here, resulting in isolation, disconnection, and eventually waking up surviving every day instead of living every day. Something I personally battle with in my daily life that I'm sure Phum can relate to: "If my own parents can't support and love me unconditionally, who can and who will? Will I even experience that one day? And if I do, how long will it take until it's taken away from me?" Fang also brings up this same insecurity when opening up to Tan:

"Though I act unreasonable and don't behave well sometimes, if one day you feel you no longer want to be with me, just tell me straight. Because if you disappear, I would be in so much pain."

I'm sure once Fang really understood the effects of Phum's treatment by his parents, his need and "role" to protect and care for Phum intensifies, the conflict between pleasing his parents while also pleasing and helping his brother becomes burdensome to the point where he disregards his own feelings in order to "keep the peace." Although these methods seem rational and effective in the moment, it's only a matter of time before the methods become obsolete and unsustainable, and the foundation built on sticks and desperation to remedy the pain and chaos collapses. Then what finally remains is someone who's scared of the unknown, scared of reentering the same detrimental period of preparing for peace time and war time, someone who regulated themselves through adapting hypervigilance and eventually, general anxiety (as someone diagnosed with anxiety, Fang's moments of overwhelm and "dramatic" all or nothing statements are clear as day to overthinkers), someone who realizes that he can't save everyone, and that's a horrifying feeling to accept once you subject yourself to being the peacemaker.

Episode 12

Being able to see how Tan eases Fang's anxiety (which is well depicted in Boom's acting cause I know that feeling of wanting to be brave and express the truth and trying not to cry through it) was incredibly sweet and became one of my favorite moments the two share. That outside of Tan's go lucky, hyper, and expressive self (who used to be this closed off person that only began really changing once his friends gave him an ultimatum to quit fighting or their friendship ends and poor Peem having to find out the truth of Tan's injuries that wasn't from a bike accident LOL) is an emotionally intelligent, understanding, and aware individual that only wants what's best for his loved ones in the moment. Rather than only hearing Tan's reassurances, which is a result of losing faith in other people and dealing with their lack of credibility in their words versus their actions, we see this during Phum's argument with his father when he double downed:

"I'm paying attention to you now. Everything I've done is for you."

When you hear everything in the book and fail to not only see real action, but accountability and seeking of forgiveness through apologizing is like pulling teeth with some generation of parents, so I truly believe the reaction Phum exhibited was expected. When there's no true understanding of the effects a parent's decision had on a child, there's no foundation put in place to accept and move forward. Skipping steps such as reflection, apologizing, and accountability and getting straight to what you think your child wants is not only disregarding: it's insulting. Given that Phum experienced many iterations of this throughout his childhood, I can only imagine Fang experiencing this secondhand or through witnessing his younger brother dealing with these hardships. When words stop having meaning, the weight of people's words can only hold so much value for individuals that deal with anxious tendencies. In my words: "I need to see it to believe it."

Not only does Tan verbally reassure Fang and telling him not to overthink, he also extends this same sentiment through physical touch. Hand holding, grabbing him by the shoulders, poking his nose, hugging, any moment to be playful with Fang. Growing up with an absent parent usually means an overall lack of physical affection, which can feel unfamiliar or foreign and become even more meaningful to those to express their love and adoration through physical touch, which you can see throughout the scene as Tan's reassurance is calming Fang down and finally bringing him to smile for the first time during their conversation.

For all the people who believed that Fang wasn't showing affection enough for Tan and that he didn't like Tan as much as Tan liked him: I will defend Fang like no other because I identify with him. I'm not one to have a track record on expressing my love for others through physical touch (which doesn't mean I despise it, I just simply forget that's another form of affection I'm allowed to express), which doesn't discount Fang's expression of love and writing him off as unaffectionate simply because Tan has established his primary love language to be physical touch. We see Fang's affection and reciprocation of affection most through quality time and acts of service, such as him allowing Tan to help him with his architecture projects or keeping him company, or Fang trying to reach Tan through phone to see him after a rough time with his professor and ready to beat up whoever upset his babe, or Tan waiting for Fang to finish class for them to go eat dinner together. Fang has also exhibited his love and affection through buying Tan little treats or making him his only mastered recipe spaghetti which Tan will never complain about because it's the thought that counts.

It may not seem as overt and obvious as Tan's expression of love, but we can't deny Fang's love for him that's simply a quieter version of love. Just because it's different, it doesn't make one invalid versus the other, look at his smile from him being around his silly little boyfriend. But as time goes on as these two strengthen their bond as a couple, we can already see how Tan's habits and antics rub off on Fang through playful exchanges. Although Fang is more shy about expressing his feelings, it becomes a beautiful balance of your ideal golden retriever-black cat relationship and a wonderful representation of how successful couples become with candid communication, understanding, and reassurance.

Ok I think I got everything out on the hill I'll die on now, so if you've made it this far, I hope I entertained you enough and left you with from food for thought, but I also appreciate your engagement if you have any thoughts! All is much appreciated <3 As you can see, I'm very normal about this series hehehe

#we are #we are the series #tanfang #aouboom #aou thanaboon #boom tharatorn #thai bl #thai series #bl series #mambo.speaks #usermambo #it's literally 4am so everyone say thank you to my adhd #i have too many thoughts so have fun with the rest of my long yet detailed posts

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balioc · 6 months

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I have a beard, of a particular slightly-distinctive style. I've had that same beard for the entirety of my adult life.

This is, obviously, the most contingent kind of fact about me. If I wanted to shave it off, or to style it differently, I could do so right now with zero difficulty. It's not a cultural signifier, or a marker of group belonging, or anything; even to me, it doesn't really mean anything other than "this is a symbol of me-the-person because it is associated with me because I have it." I started cultivating it in mid-adolescence for ephemeral irrelevant reasons, and kept it going basically out of inertia.

Nonetheless: it is really important to me. Like, really really important.

I basically cannot use character-creators or avatar-generators of any sort unless they have appropriate-enough beard options. When I contemplate getting rid of the beard...well, based on the way other people use the term, I think that the appropriate word for the feeling I get from that is dysphoria. During a brief period when I thought that I might have to get rid of the beard for medical reasons, I seriously considered wearing some kind of full-face leper mask whenever I left the house, because the thought of hiding my face from the world forever made me less unhappy than the thought of having people see me clean-shaven.

And, crucially, this affects my ability to Identify With People in literature and media. I am about 900% more likely to have an "it me" mental reflex if the character in question has a Beard Like Mine, regardless of whether there's any actual substantive commonality or grounds-for-sympathy there. I can control this with deliberate effort, but -- it takes deliberate effort. This phenomenon has probably had some measurable effect on my personality and philosophy, simply by causing me to identify or not-identify with potentially-high-impact characters in a subconscious (or conscious) way.

For example: I basically always see elves as Other and Not-Me, because elves are usually portrayed as the Beardless People, even if there are all sorts of obvious reasons to map myself onto a particular elvish character or elvish culture. Which there often are!

You might be inclined to say that this is, uh, stupid. I wouldn't blame you. It is, at the least, definitely very irrational; it's an aggressively hypertrophied bit of mental DNA, the sort of thing that you might fairly-if-uncharitably call a "psychic cancer." But of course it's never going to change, because the phenomenon operates deep down on the level of appreciative impulses and happy-buttons, which are mostly impervious to reason. (Assuming that you're inclined to try and alter them through reason, which is usually not worth the effort even when it can work.)

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It's not actually a problem for me that beard-related neurosis prevents me from identifying with elves. Not much of a problem, anyway. I guess I lose out on some cool Line of Feanor feels.

But I can imagine it being a problem. I can imagine the world in which the cool resonant myth that everyone cares about, the thing around which you want to build big chunks of your identity, has only elves with whom to identify. I can imagine the world in which all the cool smart people I want to be my friends are endlessly talking about their elfsonas.

And, y'know, in that hypothetical world, there's a few different ways I could react. I could say "fuck you, fantasy myth is for losers." I could be a mythic entrepreneur, and aggressively push my own homegrown stories featuring dwarves and ogres and other beardy folk. I could try to [shudder] map myself onto a beardless elf in my mind, and let that image occupy space in my fantasies, and hope that the revulsion and dissonance don't tear me apart. I could just be kinda sad about it all.

Or I could say: Hey, guys, could we maybe just agree that elves can have beards? Since they're made up and all, and their beardlessness doesn't even really matter to the myth anyway?

If I were so inclined, I could even follow that up with: Look, this is a really big deal for me. I'm pretty sure it's a much bigger deal for me than it is for any of you. That would be 100% honest.

And I imagine that many people would respond: What? No. Ew. The elf stories have clear lore and a well-defined aesthetic, and you're proposing to shit all over them with your weird beard nonsense. You don't get to do that; you don't get to make the akashic commons worse for your own private benefit; it doesn't matter what your reasons are. Play by the rules, or go play another game.

I would have a lot of sympathy for those people.

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(Yes, yes, I know, Cirdan the Shipwright, don't @ me.)

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There are, of course, lessons in this. Perhaps I will spell them out in another post, soon, if I find myself feeling less tired and cranky. But for now: he who has ears to hear, let him hear.

#conceptual vagueblogging #media analysis

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carionto · 4 months

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Pressure and Release

Human: *hmm-ing at a set of dials and gauges*

Alien: What seems to be *translation unit catches up with the information they're displaying* OH MY GOD IT'S GOING TO EXPLODE!!! GET TO THE ESCAPE PODS NOW!!!!

H: Shh, it's fine, I'm just experimenting.

A: OH MY GOD WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE HORRIBLY!

H: Hey! Rude. *turns a dial causing a loud hissing noise* It's just air compressors and hydraulics.

A: *due to not dying, is beginning to relax* Why do you need up to 200 atmospheres running through these systems. We have invented alloy-specific magnetization mechanisms. Please, why do you keep insisting on these volatile and explosive means?

H: *turns the dial up* Because... *releases the pressure again, loud sudden hissing sound again* That's a cool sound.

A: Just because you think something is 'cool' doesn't make it-

H: *interrupts with another air build up and release sound without breaking eye contact*

A: *leaves*

H: *continues to play around*

_________________________________________

Okay, so I wanna get this off my chest. I find myself now for the fourth time starting a fun little activity, doing it for months on end, having a blast, and then almost suddenly dropping it entirely. First time I wrote some short stories or something every day for about six months and put it on deviantart. Then some longer form stuff started cropping in, sort of continuous narratives or whatever, and I stopped. Second was running a open D&D campaign with a persistent world but ever changing party, each session a sort of one-shot with a decision that would impact the whole world and what future sessions would exist. Not even 10 sessions in I felt under pressure to continue and build upon what I had already and just couldn't and stopped. Third was another kind of TTRPG, this time running my own server for Lancer. Again, open one shots, but less connected and I would hopefully get some of the players to want to run their own games within this freeform framework that I directly lifted from a D&D server I was in, even had some of the same people join as players. Few months later, I felt this massive pressure from myself to run games and come up with new scenarios that I just froze up. I cancelled game after game and just eventually abandoned the server and the resources I had made. Fourth time was here on tumblr itself. Back to writing some short form stuff on a fairly regular basis, almost daily for some time even. Had a blast, and then longer form content started creeping in. I thought I wanted to write some stories with an overarching plot and recurring characters and connected storylines, build up and pay off, that sort of thing. Again, I created this massive pressure by myself for myself of myself to do something I apparently can't. I created this sense of expectation of myself "Well, I started this, I should finish it, but where do I go, what do I do, how can I connect this?" And then this self-inflicted pressure got to me, again. And I stopped.

What I have known for a while, but couldn't put into words is that I don't want to tell a big long epic story or anything like that. I don't have one of those in me and forcing something like that only makes me shrivel up and run away. I have a world, several in fact, in my mind. Entire continents of a low fantasy character driven political intrigue and drama based world with tons of rules and restrictions, thousands of years of history, strong personalities for the main actors and so many individual scenes with them and the supporting cast, and a timeframe for when the overarching story happens and how it ends. But no story itself. Just scenes. I have a high fiction sci-fi world, again, with very distinct factions and races, most of the details I have written out back when I was a teen in a physical notebook with pen and pencil. Lots of historical points and events, how the races work, their domains if you will, near magical powers I try to explain with plausible science. Tons of specific details. Even drew each of their common symbols, how one of the languages is structured, schematics of how their cities are planned, and details on other planets in the system and how those might be important later. But, not a single individual character or story. Just dry facts. And then we have the loose sci-fi world I've created here. Bunch of different angles and perspectives, some comedic, some more serious, even put Cthulu in there. Many short and mostly self-contained stories and episodes of various humans doing things an exaggerated version of humanity would do. There is potential for a number of expanded and longer form stories here, some I attempted, and as mentioned, what ultimately made me stop. I don't have a book in me, and I don't want to write one. I just like to write little snippets and I want to get myself to accept this idea that, no, it does not need to become more than that. Because every time I start going down a path where it feels like it should be more than a one page thing, I seize up, start thinking that I need to do this, panic when I can't come up with anything, go silent, and give up. It just does not work for my brain. And that's fine.

#humans are space orcs #humans are space australians #humans are space oddities #humans are deathworlders #humanity fuck yeah #carionto #introspection

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voxofthevoid · 5 months

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Alright, top!Yuuji fans, come click a button:

I've been getting comments expressing varying degrees of shock, outrage, disgust, and disappointment about my top!Yuuji fics (i.e., literally all my JJK fics) from when I started posting for JJK. They're not many, proportionally, but I wouldn't be able to count them on both hands. And honestly, even one is too many. It's 2024, and some people's loud and obnoxious inability to accept a character topping someone bigger/older/stronger is getting on my last nerve.

To be clear, I'm not criticizing people for having preferences. I'm pissed that they're trying to impose their preferences on me and my stories. I'm extra pissed because these motherfuckers already have plenty of fics to read (seeing as 95%, probably more, of shippy Yuuji content is bottom!Yuuji) but still come bitching at me.

With last week's "Sukuna would kill us all if he saw you writing him bottoming" dickhead, I've officially snapped✌️

I'll write a oneshot featuring Yuuji fucking whoever wins this poll. I have distinct scenarios in mind for all three. I'm not setting a word-count limit, but I will stick to just one(1) sex scene. The plan is to do this once a month till I run out of steam, assuming there's enough interest from the reader end.

Y'know, I typically don't write non-goyuu stories; even when there are other pairings involved, goyuu is also there. But fuck it, this is for a good cause.

#poll #jjk #I was already running on spite; now i have become spite

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lotus-tower · 6 months

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Why do we talk like that about Gintama?

So this is something I've already talked about a lot here and there, but I thought I would condense my thoughts on the topic in its own post.

We've joked a lot about math zeitgeist, but why in the world are we furiously mathposting about Gintama? Why did I write 28 pages of actual essay for it? Where does kraniumet get all those images from? (I've always wondered this.) Essentially, what's driving us to analyze these themes and motifs over and over again... and why can they be analyzed over and over again?

When I first wrote My Orochi Stood Up, I made it clear that this was an original framework made for the same purpose as all analytical frameworks and models: to enable me to gain certain key insights about the series, to account for all of its innumerable bits and pieces, and to arrange their relationships to one another in a cohesive, legible way. In short, as I wrote in my essay, it provides me with symbolic technology.

In the same vein, when I wrote my spontaneous math post, I said that so much of math is about things that don’t exist and yet become real, not just because they help you articulate something but because they help you arrive at a solution. This is the purpose of things like imaginary numbers--or negative numbers for that matter.

I know that we should never live life in accordance with the fake hater in our heads that we imagine saying stupid things to us so that we can respond to them in smart, cool ways. I'm sure Zura lives like that though, and we all think he's charming, so maybe we should reconsider this idea. What I mean to get at is that I've never once tried to claim that Sorachi literally intended any of what I describe in my ouroboros framework. I don't think he sat down one day and planned to make his motifs compatible with western alchemy, I don't think he had the creation myth of the island of Japan in mind, and I don't actually think he read Barthes.

But what's undeniable is that there is something so bizarrely consistent, coherent, and plentiful about Gintama's thematic flourishes--even though in many, many ways, Gintama is filled with bad, and worse, mediocre, writing. What sets Gintama apart from other series isn't the inherent quality of its writing (which has stark ups and downs). If you'll forgive the confusing and somewhat contradictory wording, what makes Gintama distinct isn't a quantitative difference (as in, more goodness), but a qualitative difference. What does this qualitative difference boil down to?

First is structure. This part we've gone over a lot, so I'll try to keep it brief (or novel?). Gintama is a series with basically just one favoured literary technique, and it uses it again. and again. and again. and again. and again. Parallels upon parallels upon parallels--and there are only a few key thematic ideas that Sorachi is interested in exploring. You can describe it as consistency, or, if you want to be uncharitable, repetitiveness. But it is, frankly, absurd the amount of parallels--or rather, the degree of parallelism--this series contains. What's interesting about it is its effects on how we engage with the story.

By making it obvious that this is a conscious and explicit writing decision (through various means, mainly dialogue), any characters with suitable parallelism to a prototypical character A are all connected to one other--let's call these the A-sided characters. This holds even if they're all a bit different from each other. Imagine all these A-sided characters spread out in line, like hostages tied to each track of a train track or the rungs on a ladder. They lose similarity with each rung, like loss of clarity in a game of telephone--let's call this "reflection lossiness." Even though characters in the top rung and the bottom rung may not have much in common, they may both be within "lossiness range" (<- I just made this up) of a character in a middle rung, and therefore able to communicate indirectly with one another.

Moreover, because the prototypical character A has a foil in prototypical character B, all A-sided characters are also connected not only to any individual foils they may have, but potentially to all other B-sided characters. Since it's easier to identify characters' thematic affiliations through their interactions and dynamics with other characters, the consistency of the A-B foil formula, when combined with the fact that animanga foils are generally made very obvious, helps us perceive these diagonal relationships. Thus, the reader can squint at the interactions of almost the entirety of Gintama's enormous cast with valid suspicion, with less difficulty than in other works with more complex structures. The series' sheer length also ensures that there is an abundance of material to comb through, so much so in fact that this careful inspection, through rereading again and again, becomes necessary.

For instance, the interactions between any given pair of characters may not seem directly relevant to our protagonist at first glance, but once you know the magic A | B schema, you may notice that that pair's interactions resonate with that of a different pair, one involving an A-sided character with less reflection lossiness from the top and who therefore reflects much more of what happens to them onto Gintoki. In this way, the original pair, who are probably just a couple of minor side characters who appear once in a weird arc and then never show up again, can make you go, "hey wait a minute. what if?"

What if?

Let's look at a concrete example. Housen and Utsuro don't seem to have much to do with each other at first glance. However, because we know that he parallels Kamui, and that Kamui | Kagura parallel Takasugi | Gintoki, who in turn can be mapped onto Utsuro | Shouyou, we can arrive at a Housen-Utsuro connection that wasn't previously obvious. What is the utility of this connection? For one, it sharpens our ability to articulate how the hole-sided flee from the things they fear and yearn for by adding Housen's infamous avoidance of the sun into the analysis. It also provides new ground for exploring potential ideas comparing, say, Kamui choosing to leave with the Harusame and walk in Housen's footsteps, with Oboro's resigned embrace of the Naraku and Utsuro. Additionally, since Housen was defeated in Hinowa's lap, this also helps us draw a Hinowa -> Kagura connection, which helps us arrive at a Hinowa-Shouyou connection, which helps to reify that Shouyou is a milf.

By inserting one or two blatant instances of foreshadowing and parallelism early on in the series, instances that are impossible to pass off as coincidence, Gintama primes the reader to suspect that similar nuggets might be hiding anywhere, to check every garbage can we encounter from there on out like in the Pokemon games.

Whoops. In attempting to explain the math zeitgeist I succumbed to using math in my explanation. It's irresistible.

But that's structure. Let's move on now to something arguably even more important: motifs.

It's undeniable that for a shounen series that's half gag-manga, Gintama has a strange amount of analyzable motifs, and a clear loyalty to them. Regardless of how extravagantly people on tumblr dot com may want to overanalyze their favourite Shounen Jump series, their efforts are usually restrained to theme and characterization. Their ravings do not usually resemble the ravings of the Gintama Salon. If you've read this far, I don't think I need to explain this to you, or what Gintama's most prominent motifs are. But why is Gintama so motif-ful? The sword's importance is obvious, expected even, but what differentiates Gintama from, say, Bleach, where the characters' swords also literally represent their souls in a way?

In the end the answer is what I already discussed in My Orochi Stood Up, the foundation of my entire framework, in fact its very title: the dick joke.

Sorachi's immature sense of humour is the glue holding the entire thematic and narrative structure of Gintama together. Why do we search obsessively for meaning in the flotsam of Gintama's less narratively charged moments? Because, quite frankly, many things are phallic. The sword is no longer simply a sword--by being imbued with the spirit of the dick joke, it becomes not only valid but textual to associate it with the head of the nation (shadow juice squirt), the motif of the dragon (thank you Elizabeth), and castration. What I mean is not whether the sword can be read as a dick--obviously, phallic logic has been prominent through all of human history--but the way in which Gintama's sexual humour gives us--and itself--an impetus to equate motifs in the first place.

Comparing very serious things to dicks is funny--the more abrupt, the more shocking, the more mood whiplash, the funnier is. Therefore, for Gintama's toilet humour to be as effective as possible, tone dissonance is ideal, pushing it towards the intermingling of comedy and tragedy that we know it so well for today. This in turn validates and reinforces the meaning-making role that these phallic jokes play in the story as a hole. It is not only that we cannot separate the dick jokes from the serious delivery of the plot, but that in many arcs important information is given to us through ridiculous gag devices (ball gags?).

The logic of basic sex jokes is extremely simple, intuitive, and easy to understand. The prominence of the pole necessarily implies the presence of the hole. I've talked about that enough in my essays, so I won't go into detail here, but the reason that I wrote my essays in the first place is because of how easy it is to map a procreative framework onto a series filled from beginning to end with phallic gags. As much as I may joke about it, the underlying logic of "the pole and the hole" is powerful and compelling, providing connective tissue to seemingly disparate motifs with ease. When combined with the "sorting" power of the A | B structure, the ability to associate any particular character with any particular motif easily gives us the ability to analyze how a given set of characters interacts with a motif; equally, where the motif sits in Gintama's playing ground of phallicism can inform a given character's dynamic with others.

I've already written at length about the role that wordplay plays in this as well. To save on time, I'll just quote from My Orochi Stood Up:

Gintama’s insistence on wordplay enables interesting meaning to be derived from these dirty jokes and their interaction with other motifs in the story. After all, the name of the series itself elevates the spirit of the balls joke, even if unintentionally, to the same level as the other metaphor in the title: “silver."

But perhaps the singularly most important example is the -tama in Gintama, with its plethora of potential meanings, each of them just silly and dirty enough that you have to take it seriously. Beyond the obvious joke on kintama (balls) and the “silver soul” meaning, we’ve seen that tama is also easily conflated with atama (head), and even with tamago (egg). This is clearly demonstrated with the series’ fixation on beheading leading to the salvation of the soul, and the bodyswap arc hinging on the pun between soul and egg.

In short, it is the comedic aspect of Gintama that fuels the series' own willingness to conflate and play with its motifs, and that validates--provokes--our mad efforts as readers to draw unlikely connections and dig through dirt. Though it may seem more ridiculous on the surface to be taking such a magnifying glass to such a profoundly silly series, it is in fact more justified for Gintama than it would likely be for a more serious series, one where the paths between motifs are not pre-paved, let alone lubricated with shadow squirt juice.

I was recently introduced to a theory of comedy where comedy was posited as an interplay between excess and lack. How this maps on to Gintama is obvious; but one thing that comes to mind now is how easy it would be to characterize our scholarly efforts in examining Gintama, a series one could humorously characterize as "lacking", as a kind of excess. Which is to say, I think Gintama has pulled its penultimate trick on us (because it's still coming out with more stuff for the anniversary. I believe it.) by making us part of its comedy.

#gintama

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fairytale-poll · 10 months

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ROUND 1B, MATCH 1 OUT OF 16!

Propaganda Under the Cut:

Book:

She's had a "gift" of obedience placed on her, and her quest is to figure out how to get rid of it. I love her

he's under a curse that makes her obey any order given to her. She met her Prince Charming (Char) when they kids, and they became friends. Her stepsisters found out about her curse while they were at boarding school, and because of that (and some things they made her do) she ran away to try and find the fairy that cursed her. When she does, the fairy says that she doesn't do magic anymore, because she realized her gifts were actually curses, and refuses to remove it. Ella goes back, and is eventually demoted from "lord's daughter" to "maid". She still writes letters to Char (currently in a foreign kingdom, but before that, when he came to try and talk to her, her sister forbid her from leaving her room so she would have all his attention), but eventually stops and even writes a fake letter from her sister to convince him that she never cared/doesn't care about him, because she realized it would be too dangerous for them to be together; with her curse, she could easily be made to hurt or kill him. Flash forward, and Char returns home. The king throws balls, and she goes, because even if she can't be with or let him know who she is, she just wants to see him again. Char is drawn to her, and for a lot of the three balls, they're together. At the end, her stepsister gets jealous, and right as Char proposes (because Ella, despite having to lie about her identity, is the most honest person at the ball and a friend already), she grabs her mask, revealing her identity. Char reaches her home before she can leave, and there's a whole scene where he finds out she's a scullery maid, that the letter was a lie, and says that she doesn't have to be Ella if she doesn't want to be, and she says she's not, and he asks if she loves him, and she does-- and then it's all ruined because he accidentally orders her to marry him, and then her stepmother tells her to, and all the while she's fighting the curse, because she doesn't want to endanger him and their nation, and doesn't want her step family to be rich and powerful, and finally-- she says no. She gets so excited to say no, to refuse, that she didn't even fully realize she broke the curse until Mandy (her fairy godmother) tells her. Anyway, they all lived happily ever after. Ella is one of my favorite Cinderellas ever and I really hope I did a good job of explaining her and what her story is about (it's been a while since I've read the book)

I was so enraptured with this book as a kid, it had such an impact on my young mind. Got me into fantasy.

BEST CINDERELLA!!! please use the picture from the book cover and not the movie 🙏

She breaks her curse spell in such a magnificent way. Like yes she embodies the whole “kindness” and “courageous” characteristics that Cinderellas are known for, but for her she’s been forced to be obedient as well. And while she thinks can rise above anything she soon learns she will just hurt so many more people that way. She chose to be self-sacrificing because it was the one way she could express her love that wouldn’t harm anyone (then). But! But! She also ends up getting to be selfish! And that is also a great kindness! To herself and to those whom love her and she loves in return. All that after she breaks the curse.

She can mimic languages. :) She refused to marry the love of her life and thus broke her curse. :) She fell in love via letters. :) She lied to the royal family that orange carriages are very popular in a nearby city.

brave, smart, a linguist, a nerd, she evolves steadily and beautifully throughout the book, with a sharp voice that never stops being distinctive and fun to hang with.

complex character coool as fuck premise and also. the nostalgia of it all

Movie:

Ann Hathaway singing Somebody to Love was phenomenal.

Anne Hathaway. It’s a great blend of fairytale and modern day styles. Imagine early 2000s vibes but in a filter. Fan girls and Escalators right there with giants and elves. Plus, it’s got all the musical numbers and Hugh Dancy and Cary Elwes too. This Cinderella is strong, independent and don’t need no man! (Unless one tells her not to move and she’s stuck in the middle of the road as a cart comes racing towards her…)

complex character coool as fuck premise and also. the nostalgia of it all

#cinderpoll #round 1 #round 1b #cinderella #fairytale #ella enchanted #gail carson levine #anne hathaway #ella of frell #ella enchanted 2004 #poll tournament #poll bracket #character polls #polls

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sadnymi · 7 months

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"My Dreams Are Just Dreams... Until They're Not" modern Mattheo riddle × reader [ chapter three ]

[Previous chapter] [Next chapter]

Warnings: SMUT18+, strong language,childhood trauma ,abusing, cheating ( not the main characters)

Please understand that from this chapter onwards, the story will delve into darker themes. I urge you to pay close attention to the trigger warnings provided.

words: 2,216

Reading Time : 8mins 26sec

Summery: A week at my best friend's beach house, surrounded by our friends as we meet her soon-to-be fiancé's companions, marks a turning point where the very fabric of my beliefs begins to unravel. It's during this week that I encounter the boy who incessantly appears in my dreams, blurring the distinction between the world of my subconscious and the tangible reality before me. Matthe Riddle emerges as the poison I willingly imbibe, a curse that feels akin to a dream, weaving its tendrils into the very essence of my being.

[ Gif is not mine ]

Red – the hue of blood, the symbol of power, the embodiment of pain. All I could see was red, engulfing my vision in a swirling, crimson haze.

“ you can’t hide forever princess “

Close your eyes and breathe he can’t hurt you- if you can’t see him that’s mean he won’t be able to see you

“ comon , daddy hates waiting princess, he’s going to punish you when he finds you “ shut up - shut up - shut up

Then I hear it—the sound of his steps, each one drawing him nearer and nearer.

“ he’s not coming you mean nothing to him you know? Why would the heir of the most powerful house care about someone insignificant, someone so worthless like you “

“ liar “ I screamed and then it was red all over again all I saw was red

I jolt awake, gasping for air as the tendrils of the nightmare slowly release their grip on me. My heart pounds erratically in my chest, echoing the frantic rhythm of my dreams. Sweat beads on my forehead, and I take deep, ragged breaths, trying to ground myself in reality.

I sit up in bed, my body trembling with the aftershocks of the nightmare. I run a hand through my disheveled hair, trying to calm the racing thoughts in my mind.

" must not fear," I repeated

" | must not let it consume me, fear has no power if he did not find a body to take “

I rush to the window, desperate for a breath of fresh air to quell the turmoil swirling within me. But as I peer outside, my heart lurches in my chest at the sight of him, his gaze locking onto mine. A wave of uncertainty washes over me, leaving me paralyzed with indecision—uncertain if this encounter is real or merely a continuation of the haunting dreams that plague my nights.

Fingers trembling, I hastily pull on my hoodie, seeking refuge in its familiar embrace as I make my way downstairs. Each step feels heavy with apprehension as I navigate the familiar path to the spot where I last saw him standing outside my window. My mind races with questions, my emotions tangled in a web of fear and longing.

As I reach the spot, the air around me feels charged with tension, thick with unspoken words and unanswered questions. I stand there, searching the darkness for any sign of him, my heart pounding in my chest as I grapple with the overwhelming rush of emotions that threaten to consume me.

"Please, tell me I'm not dreaming," I implore, my voice trembling with fear as I search his eyes for reassurance.

He appears bewildered but responds softly, "You're not dreaming, love."

The weight of his words offers a brief respite, but the turmoil within me refuses to be quelled. "What's wrong with me?" I whisper, tears threatening to spill over. "Something is wrong with me."

The floodgates open, and I succumb to the overwhelming wave of emotion, tears streaming down my cheeks in front of him. I despise my vulnerability, yet I cannot suppress the torrent of fear that grips me—the echo of the monster's voice from my nightmare still clawing at the edges of my consciousness.

"I... I don't know what to do," I manage to say between sobs, my words barely audible through the tears.

Suddenly, and with surprising swiftness, he enfolds me in his arms, drawing me close until I can feel the steady rhythm of his heartbeat against my chest. The warmth of his embrace offers a fleeting sense of familiarity, a small respite from the overwhelming flood of emotions threatening to engulf me.

As I bury my face in his chest, the tears continue to flow, unchecked and unbidden. Despite my efforts to maintain composure, I find myself crumbling under the weight of my fears and insecurities.

But he holds me steadfastly, his presence a comforting anchor in the storm raging within me. With each gentle stroke of his hand against my back, I feel a measure of the tension begin to ease,

In the safety of his embrace, I allow myself to release the pent-up emotions that have been consuming me, to surrender to the vulnerability that lies at the heart of my fear. And as he continues to hold me, offering silent reassurance and unwavering support

Stepping back slightly to meet his gaze, I find his hands still wrapped around me, offering unwavering support in the midst of my emotional turmoil.

"I... I think we know each other," I begin, my voice trembling with uncertainty. "I know you said we don't, but I can't shake this feeling. It's as though I've known you before, as though we're connected in some inexplicable way. I can't explain it, but I feel it deep within me. Maybe it's from another life, or maybe there's something more at play here. But I know you—I feel like I always have."

His touch is gentle as he wipes away my tears, his eyes filled with a tenderness that takes my breath away. For a moment, the world fades away, leaving only the two of us standing together in the quiet intimacy of the moment.

And then, with a softness in his voice that sends shivers down my spine, he responds, his words carrying the weight of unspoken truths and hidden desires.

He gently suggests, "You should go back to sleep and rest. Let me take you to your room, love. We can continue this conversation when you're feeling better."

Feeling vulnerable, I murmur, my voice barely audible, "You think I'm crazy, don't you?"

He meets my gaze with unwavering sincerity. "I think many things about you, but questioning your sanity is not one of them."

With his reassurance echoing in my mind, he guides me back inside the house, his steady presence a source of comfort in the darkness. But as we reach the doorway to my room, I hesitate, a wave of unease washing over me at the thought of being alone.

"I don't want to go back to my room," I admit, the words tumbling out in a rush. The thought of being alone in the darkness fills me with an overwhelming sense of dread, and I cling to him, desperate for his presence to chase away the lingering shadows of fear.

He pauses, gently brushing the hair away from my face before speaking softly, "Would you prefer to stay in my room instead?"

"Can I?" I ask softly, my voice barely above a whisper, unsure if I'm crossing a boundary by accepting his invitation.

"Yes, you can," he replies with a tender smile, his voice a gentle caress that soothes my nerves. With a grateful nod, I acquiesce, allowing him to lead us both to his room.

His room is a sanctuary of simplicity and cleanliness, a haven of tranquility amidst the chaos of my thoughts. The soft hues and minimalist decor create an atmosphere of serenity, wrapping around me like a warm embrace.

As he guides me to the bed, his touch is tender and reassuring, his fingers lingering against my skin as he tucks the blankets around me with care. With delicate precision, he begins to play with my hair, each stroke sending shivers of pleasure down my spine.

His touch is intimate yet gentle, his fingers threading through the strands with a tenderness that speaks volumes. I close my eyes, losing myself in the sensation, allowing myself to be carried away by the warmth of his touch.

"I feel bad, it's your bed," I murmur softly, a pang of guilt tugging at my heart as I acknowledge the intrusion.

He chuckles softly, his breath warm against my skin as he leans in closer. "Don't worry about that, love," he murmurs huskily, his voice sending a shiver down my spine his lips brush against my cheek with a feather-light touch, eliciting a soft sigh of contentment as I close my eyes.

As I finally begin to drift into a peaceful slumber, cocooned in his embrace, I feel his lips press against my forehead in a gentle kiss. "Sleep well, my love," he whispers softly, his words a promise of comfort and security.

In the hazy borderland between wakefulness and sleep, I feel his lips tenderly brush against my forehead in a gentle kiss. catch the faint echo of his words something that sounds like how he’s going to fix everything whispered into the stillness of the night..

As I wake, I find myself enveloped in a sense of peace that has eluded me for far too long. There's no lingering fear, no remnants of the nightmares that used to haunt my sleep. It's been a year since I last woke in terror, a year since the darkness of my dreams consumed me

"You're awake," he says, his voice breaking through the fog of my thoughts.

I turn to him, the memories of what I said to him flooding back, and my smile fades as I blurt out, "I'm so sorry, Mattheo. Oh my God."

He sits beside me on the bed, his presence a comforting anchor in the storm of my emotions. "It's okay, love. It was just a nightmare. You were terrified, but it's just the fear talking. There's no need to apologize."

I take a deep breath, trying to calm the rapid beat of my heart. "I'm sorry," I whisper, feeling ashamed of my panicked reaction.

"Don't apologize, it’s okay “

"I must have scared you," I murmur.

He smiles, his eyes warm and understanding. "Believe me, it will take more than that to scare me."

I glance at the clock and realize how late it is. "Oh, God," I mutter again , feeling a surge of panic at the time.

"You looked so peaceful sleeping," he says softly, his words tinged with affection. "I didn't want to wake you up."

I want to tell him how grateful I am for his presence, how his calming influence eased the terror of my nightmare. "It's been a while since I slept like that," I admit quietly.

"I must go and get ready if I want to go to this party," I say, reluctantly tearing myself away from his comforting presence.

I rise from the bed, casting a shy glance towards him, my lips curving into a smile. "Thank you," I murmur softly, feeling the warmth of his nod and the softness of his smile drawing me in.

As I make my way back to my room, butterflies flutter in my stomach.

Relief floods over me as I reach my room, grateful that no one witnessed my departure from his room. Yet, as I settle in, anxiety grips me, threatening to overwhelm my senses. I try to distract myself, my thoughts wandering to someone with black hair and captivating eyes.

Closing the door behind me, I lean against it, closing my eyes and savoring the memory of his soft lips against my cheek. It's a fleeting moment of solace in the midst of my tumultuous emotions, a reminder of the undeniable connection that binds us together.

After a quick shower, I begin to prepare for the day ahead. Deciding on an off-shoulder, short red dress, I carefully slip it on, relishing in its vibrant hue. Sad started to put some makeup on couldn’t help but wonder what mattheo would thought about my look

I heard a knock on the door, and Sarah entered, concern etched on her face. She inquired if I was alright and mentioned that I had missed breakfast.

“ you sure you’re okay baby ? “

I smiled “ yes , never been better “

"You look amazing," she remarked with a smile.

I returned the compliment, "So are you. Green is definitely your color."

Sarah grinned, adjusting her emerald dress. "Thanks! I was a bit hesitant about it at first, but now I'm glad I chose it."

"It suits you perfectly," I assured her, admiring her confidence.

As we continued chatting, Sarah's presence brought a sense of ease to the room, and I felt grateful for her

“ I will be waiting for you downstairs “ I nodded with a smile

I frantically searched for my small bag before making my way to join the group. Suddenly, I heard it—a sound that chilled me to the core. It didn't sound like a dream; it was too real, too sinister.

Driven by an inexplicable force, I followed the sound, my heart pounding with fear. It led me to a door I hadn't noticed before. Hesitating only for a moment, I pushed it open, plunging into darkness so deep I could scarcely see my hand in front of my face.

And then, I saw them—three monstrous figures from my nightmares, lying in wait for me. Their eyes gleamed with malice as they fixated on me, sending shivers down my spine.

The pain and terror I thought I had escaped flooded back in an instant, threatening to overwhelm me. Among them was the source of my deepest nightmares, the embodiment of all my fears—my stepfather.

"You kept daddy waiting, princess," his voice echoed through the darkness, dripping with menace.

Paralyzed with fear, I could do nothing but stare at him, the realization sinking in that my nightmare was far from over.

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