#we can read the text

[burning2know]

I've seen lots of fans point to the external conditions of Veilguard's development in defense of it. So, let's examine the external conditions that made this disaster possible.

Misunderstanding of Dragon Age's place in the market

Dragon Age's brand identity is dark fantasy that explores what being a hero means within various structures of power. Veilguard can be seen as a re-branding from this perspective (for reasons that @sandetigerrr talked about at length here). To the extent that effort is successful? Well, with every rebrand, you can expect some level of backlash, because generally people dislike change. Tale as old as time. But, we can know whether rebrands are ultimately successful or not. (Warning: my head canons about how marketing works ahead, I'm not a marketing expert.) Let's use an analogy, if you are a company that produces a soap that is primarily utilitarian, you know, it cleans things. You need to reduce costs. You decide to change the packaging to something less elaborate. The considerations are a) that your customers will still recognize your soap, and b) that the soap still does what the customer buys it for: cleaning. Yes there will be initial backlash "gee, this packaging is so ugly." But presumably, the cleaning power stays. Over time people get used to it, they still buy your soap for the reason they've always done. But say, you change the packaging so that it's less shelf stable, and the soap, in the new packaging, is less effective at cleaning compared to before the change. Not only will the customers think "wow the packaging is so ugly", they will also notice "wow it's not cleaning as well either." Over time, they'll stop buying your soap and look for another alternative, one of your competitors. For the soap, the brand identity isn't JUST "the package looks recognizeable" it's also "the soap cleans well". So you can change some of it while retaining your customers. Undoubted, for the customers who buy the soap for the packaging, and they may go to competition with a similar packaging. But, if you're the only soap on the market with that kind of packaging and that cleans... We're in a different world now. There's no competition. You can do whatever you want short of stop making soap, because the customers are stuck buying this shitty rebranded soap.

Speaking of competition, here's something interesting that was on the EA earnings call just before Veilguard released (transcript in the link),

"When we think about what we have with Veilguard right now, we have a storage studio in BioWare. We have a storied IP and Dragon Age.

We have a team that took extra time to make sure the world was rich and the characters were interesting and the story was compelling I think we're going into a market that has limited competition for this category of game given some of the moves that have happened across the broader industry."

To me, this indicates that at the very top levels, the company thinks that Veilguard is in that last category... They can make whatever changes they want to DA because there's no competition. But they got a crucial thing wrong. There is LOTS of competition for stories that have rich worlds and compelling characters (BG3 is the most obvious one). But there's nothing quite like Dragon Age, because there's no other dark fantasy RPG that explores what good and evil means within various structures of power (hard sell to corporate in the current political climate, so I can understand why they Corinne Busche? chose a different angle... but I'm also here critiquing the chosen angle).

This is a fundamental failure in identifying the brand identity of Dragon Age.

Furthermore, they forgot that their niche is intersectional at its essence. Gamers can still find excellent dark fantasy elsewhere. And gamers can find stories that explores what good and evil means within various structures of power elsewhere. Just not both at the same time. But see, it doesn't matter, because gamers won't find this in the Veilguard either.

For all the Veilguard proponents who said "like all previous games, 5 years from now the fandom will consider this a good game", implying that, this is like any rebranding (because DA does kind of reinvent itself every iteration, in that way it's like the Doctor Who of games and it is a precious IP for that reason). They're probably right. I for one, don't see my opinion of Veilguard changing 5 years from now. But I won't be on the internet yelling at people about it. That's just not healthy for me. And the people who are motivated enough to yell about it into the void 5 years after release probably liked it. Just my baseless guess (and other disingenuous hedging).

The game's tortured development cycle

It's been 10 long years coming. So word in the rumour mills is that lots of interesting ideas and intentions were the original single player iteration. Then it was cancelled and rebooted as a live service multiplayer Destiny copy. Then that was cancelled and rebooted again as a different live service game. Then THAT was dismantled and the pieces from these various iterations frankensteined together into what finally became Veilguard.

Do I feel immense sympathy for the devs? Yes. Imagine working on something for 3 years of your life only to have it be flushed down the toilet for one reason or another. Multiple times. Devastating. Getting paid for it all helps a bit. But still, devastating. And sure enough, there were waves of resignations at multiple points over the past decade. I don't blame them.

What I don't feel sympathy for is why there were these series of cancellations and reboots in the first place. How is it that an ostensibly AAA studio backed by a publisher as massive as EA can't get its shit together enough to rally behind a single vision? Corporate bureaucracy? Office politics? Blind ambition? No matter what you call it, these were management failures that had little to do with actually Making the game, but that has a disproportionately large effect on the final product. The devs made the game DESPITE the poor management, management that was supposed to support them doing their work. Management failing the one, albeit complicated, job they have. Absolutely disgusting.

But this shouldn't excuse the final product being what it is. It doesn't somehow make it acceptable or good. This is like receiving a C+ grade for an assignment that you rushed the night before, and saying "Well, yeah, I wrote it the night before. I could have gotten an A if I spent a month on it." The fact of the matter is, you got a C+, not an A. You can still pat yourself on the back and say "I'm not stupid, or bad at assignments, I was just rushed. I'm an A student really!" That's all fine for you, but nobody else is obliged to believe you unless you start turning in assignments that gets As.

In this analogy, us fans are the grader of the assignment bioware just turned in veilguard. And we should really grade the game based on the quality of the work presented, not based on how long it took the devs to make it. One because there's contention about how much of that 10 years time should be counter. And also because time spent and quality are two separate constructs. There's a special category of people who can spent a single night and output an A assignment, and another special category of people who can spend 10 years putting their best efforts into an assignment and still get C+. We can't know which kind bioware is as a studio given the kinds of changes that has taken place in the studio over the past decade (and given veilguard, it wasn't the former).

This, to me is really tragic, because I KNOW bioware writers can write brilliant games. They have previously! This is why I like DA so much. But clearly something about this team comp leading up to Veilguard did not work. We don't know exactly what it was. And making up stories in our heads about the things we don't know isn't likely to get us anywhere that's close to reality.

We should do our best to understand the reality in which everything is operating. Not the least for the sake of supporting the improvement of labour conditions in the games industry. That's the only way that we can rally behind efforts that make effective change. Changes that, you know, make sure that the types of things that made all those bioware veterans leave (apparently without proper severance compensation, to boot) are not likely to happen again at other studios.

(this is just the rumour mill, I wait with unbated breath for a jason schreier exposé sometime down the line)

But it's all there if you look for it!

First of all, it's not. It really is not all there. Because a lot of it was cut. Check out the art book for Veilguard. The things that those creatives have planned shows that they know what effectively telling those stories would have needed, and there are some hints of them that made it into the game. But only hints. I wonder at the sheer amount of information in the art book. It's WILD. It's exceptional. It's a massacre on the cutting room floor. I weep for the brilliant, lost ideas that will never see the light of day outside of concept art form. But man, does that book ever NEEDED to be published.

Secondly, we can find evidence for anything if we look hard enough. That's the power of fandom. In a way, it's why I'm here. I'm a big fan of untethered tinfoil-hat fan theories. But, it's important to distinguish an interpretation from the actual text. Because we can read the text, but we can't read minds.

[drumlincountry]

If your life is horrible and you need a new source of meaning and direction.... Do NOT find religion. Learn to identify plants.

[bruciemilf]

I think Bruce's anti-murder philosophy would translate better if it wasn't portrayed by writers who obviously want him to kill someone lol

[hinamie]

yuuji smiling and sukuna making a face like That did u really think i wouldn't do a panel redraw

[devotion-disorder]

just saw a reddit post about the saddest looking cat ever im laughin so hard and it makes me think of kuuya so much im cryin

[hoshiina]

— a guy asks for your number ft. hoshina, narumi, reno

warnings: mentions dick and profanities in hoshina's

[authenticity2025]

We can't change people. But we can love them in a way that helps them grow. And sometimes that means letting go.

[katabay]

”—ah. seems like mother goose has been playing around in your egg salad. if you won’t dance to that tune, I got others.”

honestly, the would you kindly scene is whatever to me*, code yellow is the more interesting violation/betrayal of the body because of how beautifully it escalates the Fontaine reveal/betrayal and shows how ugly some of those ‘locks and keys’ that Tenenbaum mentions are. not only have you been a tool in another man’s hand this entire time, it goes deeper. your body is not your own.

*there used to be a meandering thought here about the would you kindly scene, but it was really just talking around the fact that I spent way too many years seeing people discuss it in the most insufferable and reductive ways possible when it’s a combination of three or four other things that make that moment compelling lmao

collage credits: heart one/heart two

⭐ places I’m at! bsky / pixiv / pillowfort /cohost / cara.app / tip jar!

[anemonet]

pro tip: you can always put the bugs in little outfits :thumbsup:

[elfcollector]

DRAGON AGE: ORIGINS (2009) — developed by bioware.

[givemedamage]

ultimately!

[charlesemersonwinchesteriii]

The real fujoshi throne, of course, is Hodgson's cabin on the ship, perfectly situated between Little's and Irving's such that he can hear both of them jerking off and softly moaning the other one's name, each unbeknownst to the other.

[veliseraptor]

"we all hate [x]" quite an assumption there that an entire fandom - or worse, just fucking everyone - agrees with you

[cyrenescreams]

One thing fannon Batfam fanfics don’t include enough in my opinion is Tim absolutely milking the shit out of the titans tower incident, I mean he’s not as traumatized about it as fandom likes to pretend sometimes so let him get the younger sibling experience out of it. Like one time several years ago when I was much younger and learning to ride a bike my brother who is only slightly older and slightly better at biking than me ran into me and made me fall off said bike and sprain my wrist and I still use that to get out of stuff to this day. Like they should just be siblings about it. Imagine

Bruce, getting an alert in the Batcave: Condiment King is attacking the financial district. Whose turn is it?

assorted Batkids minus Tim, looking at a clearly homemade chart hung on the cave wall with each of their names listed in glitter pen and a magnet stuck on Tim’s name: Tim’s!

Tim: hey Jason-

Jason: no fucking way

Tim, in the fakest sad voice ever: remember that time you tried to kill me in titans tower with the shittiest homemade robin costume. Well this is how you make up for it

Jason, visibly caving: do you know how hard it is to get mustard out of this leather jacket? Who’s gonna pay my dry cleaning bill? You?

or

Oracle: someone needs to go help Robin. He’s taking down a drug shipment but there are more guys than he can handle and he’s mad about it.

Jason, opening his mouth to say ‘not it’:

Tim, faster: hey Hood. Remember that time you tried to kill me? This is your chance to be better for Robin by making sure you or no one else kills him.

Jason: can you shut up about the murder thing! Oh my god fine I’ll go.

or

Alfred, visibly mad staring at the result of yet another family dinner that ended in a food fight: Master Tim you will be helping with the dishes

Tim, whose fault it definitely is: you know I think it’s kind of Jason’s fault. I mean family dinners have just been so hard since he slit my throat.

Jason: I wish I finished the job. Fine I’ll help but your still doing some fucking work

Tim: I’ll take it.

or

Jason, going down to the Batcave to check on a test sample, a grilled cheese he grilled himself in hand:

Tim, who suddenly remembered he forgot lunch and damn is that grilled cheese looking good: hey remember that time-

Jason, throwing the plate with the grilled cheese on it at Tim’s head hoping it will hit him and being very disappointed when Tim catches it: Fine! Fucking fine! Have my damn lunch! Is that what you what? Asshole.

Tim, watching Jason storm off while eating the sandwich: yeah kind of.

[asarigg]

Inside the Character's Mind: Part 1

mentions of physical, psychological and sexual abuse towards both Koujaku and his mother

SELF DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR

Let’s go back to the beginning. Or rather, what Koujaku tells us. He also talks about himself, of course, but usually when he talks about his past, most of the time he talks about his mother: because that’s what hurts him the most. He barely mentions the abuse towards him other than the tattoo and that one time his father punched him. But he always talks about all the hardships that his family put his mother through. And I’m sure you’ll agree with me that it is hard to believe that was it.

Koujaku’s father has proven to be an extremely violent piece of shit and a zero-empathetic person. I don’t doubt that Koujaku’s mother, because of her nature, was his favorite toy. What’s more, he did every cruel thing he could think of to her, his wife too, she had fresh wounds every day and she couldn’t even eat, and although it isn’t said nor implied I wouldn’t be surprised if Koujaku was a product of rape. I mean… most likely. We hardly know anything about his mother, not her appearance, not her name, not what she liked, not how the hell she ended up in that place, if there was any love involved in it or if it was something about debt, we only know that she was the perfect victim.

She was always saying sorry to her son, for everything Koujaku’s been witnessing, she feels guilty and responsible because he tries to stand up for her, and because she has brought him to a world where the one that decides for them is a criminal. She keeps a deep pain inside for everything that’s happening and she tries to hide it, especially from Koujaku, and seeing her son suffer doesn’t help. Smiling to him so he doesn’t worry, and saying sorry to try to comfort him. That’s why the last thing she repeats over and over to her son when she’s lethally wounded is “I’m sorry”, feeling sorry that it’s because of her that he has lived like this, because she wasn’t able to protect him, to give him a proper life.

Obviously all his father did was also psychological abuse towards Koujaku, even blackmailing him with hurting his mother. But I sincerely believe that his father would use physical abuse to teach the boy a lesson, nothing could stop him anyway, because Koujaku as a child complained and rebelled, he didn’t care if his father hit him, he would defend his mother regardless. This is why I sometimes give Koujaku more scars to his body, and besides defensive cuts I also give him cigarette burn marks. Lore expansion better known as adding trauma.

I think he just doesn’t talk about it that much because the abuse towards him isn’t what has hurt him the most. We ourselves often don’t give it much importance if someone tries to insult us, but maybe if it’s someone close to us, that does piss us off, some logic like that. Moreover, throughout the game Koujaku’s personality is just like that, always worrying about others and giving little importance to himself, to the point of being tremendously negative for him.

Don’t you think those scars would make him look more masculine, intimidating, as if he’s survived dozens of dangerous, tough fights? It seems the perfect image for an environment like organized crime.

Despite all of Koujaku’s feminine traits, the perception of him both in canon and in fandom (usually) is that of a stereotypically masculine, super straight man who fucks a different woman every night, always joking with “no homo, bro” (which, mind you, I’m not saying I don’t like these jokes, I make them myself too). But in reality that couldn't be further from the truth.

With that image that we have of him, sometimes it would seem that he is someone with prejudices or that he really had a hard time accepting that he’s not straight, specially when in the scene where he confesses to Aoba he says the following:

The reasons he tries to hide his feelings is a mix between the fact that they are friends and he doesn’t want to ruin the friendship they already have, that he wants to hide his past and that he doesn’t want to be a burden on Aoba, so he keeps all those things to himself. (And he’s also been educated a certain way and has always seen things one way, never gave it much thought so when it crosses his mind, of course he’s confused)

When he first met Aoba he thought he was a girl because he had really long hair, and after all, when we’re kids we don’t have very developed features anyway, it’s a pretty androgynous state. When Aoba corrects him and tells him he’s a boy his behavior is exactly the same, nothing changes. He corrects himself and never treats him as a girl.

He is someone who has no problem showing his affection for Aoba, neither in private nor in public, he’s very comfortable with his bisexuality, the only one who is reluctant to do so, either out of shame or fear, is Aoba.

What I’m trying to get at with all this is that all that “gentleman” facade and the “always accepting women who want to have something with him” that makes him look so stereotypical in a first impression has a much darker origin, although underneath all that there’s a much more sentimental, vulnerable and open Koujaku about his true feelings, expressing them even if he feels embarrassed, as we see on some occasions (touching his hair nervously when he confesses, of when he explains why Aoba's hair is so important to him).

The relationship he has with his mother is the most direct connection, or course. Being the son of an abused woman has made him hyper-aware of his position as a man (so much that sexism in this game almost goes full circle like the Bourbon family tree, but this is NC’s problem and it happens everywhere, it’s so obvious it’s a writers problem and it’s a shame it affects Koujaku so much because he’s basically the only one who isn’t scared of a bad bitch). We’ll talk about this in particular some more later, but let’s focus on what concerns his father for now.

Being the family of criminals that they are, abusers and… almost slavers, the most logical thing to assume is that they are specially conservative. It could very well be that his father, once he decided to make him his heir, wanted the image of his kid to be as intimidating and masculine as possible. A criminal, a murderer who could run his business in a world like this.

We know that the tattoo is an experiment by Toue, and it wouldn’t be strange if his father knew what was behind it, because after all it would also be beneficial for him to have a way to control him, to mold him to his liking and to make him obedient, unlike he had been behaving, refusing to be his heir and trying to defend his mother. The image of an effeminate, soft, sissy man was not exactly ideal for the future leader. For me, Koujaku’s father either already intended to name him heir before agreeing to the tattoo being an experiment with Toue and Ryuuhou, or he ended up deciding to name him the heir precisely because they had already talked about the tattoo and its possibilities beforehand.

His father would want to break him, drive him to despair so that he would stop resisting, take away his will and, although this is mostly headcanon, “make him a man”. Be a man, be strong, tenacious, learn to fight and find a woman to continue the family with, etc. So it is not surprising that at first he didn’t even reconsider his sexuality and thought that the affection he had for Aoba was just friendship, which over time, with such strong feelings, he realized was not the case. I sincerely love that he is shown to be so nervous and that he confesses to be kinda confused about it and in a state of denial, without having any external reference and too busy hating his father and Ryuuhou to even think about it, it’s normal that it took him so long.

He was trained to be a gangster, while his father insulted him, hit him and threatened him using his mother, on whom he took it out. This training also implies not only fighting but also for doing business, how to talk to be well-received, how to negotiate, how to give the best impression of himself at any given situation. This pack of skills seem to resonate with those that he uses to flirt and run his own business, even if he does it on an unconscious level, he just knows what to say to strike the person he’s talking to in their weak spots. His father’s physical treatment would not only be a punishment, but also to teach him a lesson, to learn to endure the pain, just like he endured the pain of the tattoo. If he cried, it would be shameful, he would be punished. He had to hide his pain, his feelings, his thoughts, for the sake of his mother’s safety and his own. Practically becoming a puppet, thus evolving into the life he carries in Midorijima as an adult.

Him not wanting to open up to Aoba wouldn’t be just an “oh he’s going to hate me”. It’s also what he learned would be the best, having a charismatic appearance that everyone likes. After all wouldn’t it be logical to not want any confrontation with anyone after all that? A tough guy, with people around him who admire him, who never gets tired or cries, because nothing’s wrong. In a way it’s also a shield, a protection, a defense mechanism. To be a man.

Now, the way he behaves that almost everyone without exception associates with his mother. And this, for sure, is the intention, his desire to protect his mother and therefore take care of the women he meets. But it’s also him actively wanting to be the opposite of his father.

What kind of relationship does he have with women? The contact he has with them is mostly through all his female fans, who are crazy to say the least. We’re not going to get much into the subject of sexism but first of all it’s a huge mistake that his fans are only young women or the way they make them all act.

Koujaku spends all his time building a character that he considers perfect, someone gentle, who never says no to a woman and is always available to entertain them, it would never occur to him to deny anything to any of them, as his mother was denied so many things. Unlike that hard and tenacious masculinity that he was taught to have in order to take on his role as the heir or the bestiality of his tattoo, he presents a gentle and chivalrous masculinity on the outside. What he does is pamper them and give them everything they ask for (almost, because has never really had serious relationships. Which makes sense because he would be telling them pretty big lies, right? That wouldn’t fit with his own code). He doesn’t think very highly of himself, he has a low self-esteem as he thinks he is nothing better than a worthless monster that should have probably died a long time ago.

Sometimes people who are abused go through abuse again, in a cycle. I think saying that Koujaku is a playboy is incorrect. (He acts flirty and likes playing around, sure, but there’s something deeper). That perception of him is natural, of course, because the way he behaves and how he is presented to you, is the image they want to give of him after all, in a basic and cliche way, so artificial that it is unsettling. I could believe that it sounds artificial on purpose, referring to that shell of how a confident and strong man should talk, if it weren’t for the fact that they do this kind of cliche and artificial situations quite often with other characters as well, and it makes it kinda hard to remain immersed. I honestly think that the foreshadowing could have been done a little better, but it still serves the narrative. Also this is practically almost all you see of his character the two first interactions he has with Aoba. Considering the structure of the game and how rushed everything is, it’s not very positive, but for the sake of your mental health it's better not to think too much about it.

In short, Koujaku is a very accommodating and attentive person. He listens and encourages others with their problems but doesn’t let anyone worry about him with his own, taking on everything himself. He even ironically tells Aoba that if he’s worried about what happened with Mizuki, he can blame him, and that he can always count on him to tell him anything. It’s a very lonely way to live, even though he has so many people around him.

Knowing this, it’s more than reasonable to think that more than him flirting with women, it’s simply him agreeing to give what those women ask of him. They come looking for something and he gives it to them. He’s a toy. It’s often joked that he’s practically a prostitute, and pretty much that’s what it is. And it’s in the balcony scene where we see a more personal side of him, where we can observe that in reality all this burden tires him, it’s not natural. It’s not like his character isn’t extroverted and charismatic, but that’s not everything, and in public he doesn’t allow himself to be “less”, so in private and in confidence is when he can afford to relax, with Aoba or in his own house.

Somehow, even though he is no longer with his family, the way he interacts with other people, or how he lets himself be used, be it consciously or not, even if there is a different intention behind, is not that different from before, people still use him.

BODY FOR SALE (child sexual abuse)

I’ve sometimes wondered if there was some sort of sexual abuse on Ryuuhou’s part towards Koujaku. Nothing is implied canonically, at least physically, but the erotic connotations of the story of the tattoo artist he’s based on, the sadism, the drugging in order to do something non-consensually, and his constant references to love make me think of it happening on a symbolic level. I think it’s obvious that Ryuuhou loves Koujaku, in his own way, as his creation, and he’s talking about love at first sight and the similarity of love and hate. Besides, the way Koujaku acts can be easily associated with it.

Even though he appears to be charming and flirty, he actually has a very low self-esteem, seeing himself as worthless, dirty, and constantly self-blaming for what happened. His tattoo being his shame and filth, something he doesn’t want to taint Aoba with, works just as an allegory of victims so commonly feeling guilty and dirty (causing them to. He shows unconformity when Aoba wants to touch him in bed (something that with time and the support of a loved one gets a little better), and when he tries to touch and wash away his dirt, his shame, his tattoo, Koujaku jumps at contact, which could also be interpreted as having a flashback or part of his ptsd.

All the anger he feels inside could also be part of the consequences. He mostly shows his hatred towards Ryuuhou, even though his father is supposedly still alive and was the one who did the most damage to them, especially his mother, whom he cared about the most. At the end of the day Ryuuhou “just” did the tattoo and his father has been treating them like that for years. So why does he tunnel all his rage only to him? Budget and time limit reasons? Maybe, but in this essay we’re not taking that. Obviously Ryuuhou was the one that made him lose it, torturing him ever since the beginning only to anger him, ultimately causing the death of his mother. But it can also be read as the response Koujaku had to a possible abuse. Ryuuhou took advantage of his situation, to stop him from resisting he could always use his mother. We’ve already seen Ryuuhou being referenced as male and Koujaku as the female counterpart, being lovers and enemies at the same time, with the female being associated with the powerless, abused victim, submissive, and being controlled by the male, as disgusting as it sounds. Ever since he was tattooed his body did not belong to him anymore, Ryuuhou made sure to mark his body and mind so that he could never forget him. He could have found refuge in his religious practices as well.

There’s always stigma around these cases, and the stigma around male victims makes it especially harder for them to speak about what happened to them. That sense of powerlessness, of losing control, of being less of a man, causing them having trouble with their identity, all of it is wrapped in toxic masculinity. All of this is seen in Koujaku. He keeps all his feelings for himself, feeling distant from other people and engaging in a lonely way of life.

There are people that report having trouble with their relationships with others not only because of the trauma that happened to them, but also out of fear of doing that very same thing to someone else.

This traumatic event usually makes victims apprehensive of any sexual activity, but there’s a considerable large number of victims that, opposite to this, develop hypersexuality. Sexuality is more important to Koujaku than it may seem at first, he sees his body as a tool for the pleasure of others, meanwhile his own pleasure is not important. He developed an unhealthy way of interacting with others, therefore he developed unhealthy sexual practices. This view of him being sort of a prostitute isn’t so far away, Flame Willow, the part of Platinum Jail they end in, pretty much looks like a red light district. It’s introduced as a palace for “passionate folks to get their thrills”, an euphemism.

He also smokes and drinks, which are not talked about a lot as an addiction to cope with his pain. In the Drama CD though they do talk about it as a way to escape the stress he’s facing because of the Tamaokuri, so we can assume that he uses these two and possibly developed an addiction, wanting to drink until blacking out to forget for a moment.

Even if the sexual abuse didn’t happen canonically, the metaphor is as close as it can be, so it’s in your hands how you want to see it. Even if it’s hard to talk about something like this, I really like how this was built, because something that isn’t sexual abuse (at least canonically, and I wonder if the allegory was intentional or not) actually feels like it, something that changed a person’s entire life, his perception of himself and the people he interacts with, an event with an actual weight, something I missed from literally any actual SA scene that we got in the rest of the game.

[welcometoteyvat]

if genshin ever releases the liyue bow that has lore of azhdaha POV (unlikely, pretty sure it's been sent to the abyss), I will pull for it

"in his sweet dream the dragon king saw again the little comrades it once followed" "—Why did he say such things? He had loved the land where he had shared fond memories with that person."

you can't just say that I'm in shambles now. his little comrades T_T. and his fond memories of morax contrasted with morax's cold eyes and retuo's heartrending agony. in other news, zhongli bow user alt when, he literally wears that archery thumb ring

anyways, this has also got me thinking about a rezhong animatic to water melody/但愿人长久, mostly because the "palace on the moon" stuff and the angst of them separating bc erosion reminds me of it. poem + annotations below

When will the moon be clear and bright? With a cup of wine in my hand, I ask the clear sky. // zhongli POV, perhaps? visiting the tree at nantianmen with a flask of rice wine, on lantern rite or on midautumn In the heavens on this night, I wonder what season it would be? // azhdaha POV, half awakened from his underground dream, thinking about (more like hazily, instinctively recalling) the past, and the adepti gathering on mt aocang. "the heavens", the adepti in the mountains and the prosperous harbor, contrasted with the dim crystal cavern he's sealed in

I'd like to ride the wind to fly home. Yet I fear the crystal and jade mansions are much too high and cold for me. // insert the line from the bow "If we ride on your back and cross these mountains, we can reach the palace on the moon, right?". btw the "crystal and jade mansions" in the poem is referring to the Moon Palace Dancing with my moonlit shadow, It does not seem like the human world. // cut to azhdaha's sealing away, zhongli's cold eyes. the warmth in his gaze is gone and he's unrecognizable, like a stranger, and all the memories of their past become warped and distorted in retuo's failing eyesight

The moon rounds the red mansion, Stoops to silk-pad doors, Shines upon the sleepless, // cut to the battle between morax/adepti and azhdaha in the chasm amidst the red cliffs. idk not much to say Bearing no grudge, Why does the moon tend to be full when people are apart? // erosion. bearing no grudge is giving zhongli sealing azhdaha away because of his duty to liyue, as part of their contract. probably insert an image of azhdaha (or the zhongli in retuo's memories) slowly being erased, bit by bit and piece by piece, as retuo's eyes close underneath nantianmen. gratuitous use of a flurry of ginkgo leaves floating in front of the viewer as screen fades to white

People experience sorrow, joy, separation and reunion, The moon may be dim or bright, round or crescent shaped, This imperfection has been going on since the beginning of time. May we all be blessed with longevity, Though thousands of miles apart, we are still able to share the beauty of the moon together. // straight angst lol. "May we all be blessed with longevity" makes me think of erosion, but also "When you reach the end of time, those people, those past and future relationships predetermined by fate… they will be waiting for you" said by kun jun/azhdaha in no mere stone. when zhongli goes to meet them, he'll be waiting too

a fic set to the song/poem would also fuck. i simply think that more retuo content is neat!!! hes literally a blind rock given vision, a rock that can sing and dream, and zhongli is retuo's tiny god with a heart of stone, a heart nonetheless. arent they so interesting can we have another azhdaha mention in game soon