#women as our own entire human beings

[where-our-stories-start]

Little Women (2019) // Simone de Beauvoir // The Woman Who Rides Like a Man (Tamora Pierce) // The Color Purple // Persuasion (Jane Austen) // Catherine, Called Birdy (2022) // tumblr.com

[wilwheaton]

The GOP wonders why young people (and others) don't want to vote for them. Some wise scribe assembled this list.

1.) Your Reagan-era “trickle-down economics” strategy of tax breaks for billionaires that you continue to employ to this day has widened the gap between rich and poor so much that most of them will never be able to own a home, much less earn a living wage.

2.) You refuse to increase the federal minimum wage, which is still $7.25 an hour (since 2009). Even if it had just kept up with inflation, it would be $27 now. You’re forcing people of all ages but especially young people to work multiple jobs just to afford basic necessities.

3.) You fundamentally oppose and want to kill democracy; have done everything in your power to restrict access to the ballot box, particularly in areas with demographics that tend to vote Democratic (like young people and POC). You staged a fucking coup the last time you lost.

4.) You have abused your disproportionate senate control over the last three decades to pack the courts with religious extremists and idealogues, including SCOTUS—which has rolled back rights for women in ways that do nothing but kill more women and children and expand poverty.

5.) You refuse to enact common sense gun control laws to curb mass shootings like universal background checks and banning assault weapons; subjecting their entire generation to school shootings and drills that are traumatizing in and of themselves. You are owned by the NRA.

6.) You are unequivocally against combatting climate change to the extent that it’s as if you’ve made it your personal mission to ensure they inherit a planet that is beyond the point of no return in terms of remaining habitable for the human race beyond the next few generations.

7.) You oppose all programs that provide assistance to those who need it most. Your governors refused to expand Medicaid even during A PANDEMIC. You are against free school lunches, despite it being the only meal that millions of children can count on to actually receive each day

8.) You are banning books, defunding libraries, barring subject matter, and whitewashing history even more in a fascistic attempt to keep them ignorant of the systemic racism that this nation was literally founded upon and continues to this day in every action your party takes.

9.) You oppose universal healthcare and are still trying to repeal the ACA and rip healthcare from tens of millions of Americans and replace it with nothing. You are against lowering the cost of insulin and prescription drugs that millions need simply to LIVE/FUNCTION in society.

10.) You embrace white nationalists, Neo-Nazis, and other groups that are defined by their intractable racism, xenophobia, bigotry, and intolerance. You conspired with these groups on January 6th to try to overthrow the U.S. government via domestic terrorism that KILLED PEOPLE.

11.) You oppose every bill aimed at making life better for our nation’s youth; from education to extracurricular and financial/nutritional assistance programs. You say you want to “protect the children” while you elect/nominate pedophiles and attack trans youth and drag queens.

12.) You pretend to be offended by “anti-semitism” while literally supporting, electing, and speaking at events organized by Nazis. You pretend to hate “cancel culture” despite the fact that you invented it and it’s basically all you do.

13.) Every word you utter is a lie. You are the party of treason, hypocrisy, crime, and authoritarianism. You want to entrench rule by your aging minority because you know that you have nothing to offer young voters and they will never support you for all these reasons and more.

14.) You’re so hostile to even the notion of helping us overcome the mountain of debt that millions of us are forced to take on just to pay for our post K-12 education that you are suing to try to prevent a small fraction of us from getting even $10,000 in loan forgiveness.

15.) You opened the floodgates of money into politics via Citizens United; allowing our entire system of government to become a cesspool of corruption, crime, and greed. You are supposed to represent the American people whose taxes pay your salary but instead cater to rich donors.

16.) You respond to elected representatives standing in solidarity with their constituents to protest the ONGOING SLAUGHTER of children in schools via shootings by EXPELLING THEM FROM OFFICE & respond to your lack of popularity among young people by trying to raise the voting age.

17.) You impeach Democratic presidents over lying about a BJ but refuse to impeach (then vote twice to acquit) a guy whose entire “administration” was an international crime syndicate being run out of the WH who incited an insurrection to have you killed.

18.) You steal Supreme Court seats from democrats to prevent the only black POTUS we’ve ever had from appointing one and invent fake precedents that you later ignore all to take fundamental rights from Americans; and even your “legitimate” appointments consist of people like THIS (sub-thread refuting CJ Roberts criticisms of people attacking SCOTUS' legitimacy).

19.) You support mass incarceration even for innocuous offenses or execution by cop for POC while doing nothing but protect rich white criminals who engage in such things as tax fraud, money laundering, sex trafficking, rape/sexual assault, falsifying business records, etc.

20.) You are the reason we can’t pass:—Universal background checks—An assault weapons ban—The ‘For the People/Freedom to vote’ Act or John Lewis Voting Rights Act—The ERA & Equality Act—The Climate Action Now Act—The (Stopping) Violence Against Women Act—SCOTUS expansion.

21.) You do not seek office to govern, represent, or serve the American people. You seek power solely for its own sake so you can impose your narrow-minded puritanical will on others at the expense of their most fundamental rights and freedoms like voting and bodily autonomy.

22.) Ok, last one. You are trying to eliminate social security and Medicare that tens of millions of our parents rely on and paid into their entire lives. And you did everything to maximize preventable deaths from COVID leaving millions of us in mourning.

Source: https://imgur.com/gallery/e8DBZLH

[calder]

Released in 2010, Obsidian Entertainment's Fallout: New Vegas actively concerns itself with the realities of gay existence, and is widely recognized as a noteworthy work of queer science fiction. New Vegas extensively examines social attitudes towards homosexuality among the game's major factions, and primarily conveys this lore through gay and bisexual characters describing their own experiences. It also allowed the player to mechanically set the Courier's sexual orientation. By taking both available perks, the player character can be bisexual. By choosing neither, the player can opt out of seeing flirtatious dialogue options.

Uniquely, Fallout: New Vegas explores homosexuality in the context of wasteland societies, and touches upon related issues. The core theme of New Vegas is that the desire to recreate the past is driven by irrational nostalgia, and any endeavor to manifest past glory is dangerous and doomed. The social issue of homophobia is used as a demonstrative example. The resurrection of corporate and military power structures presents new avenues for Old World problems such as institutional homophobia to reemerge. One of the many issues that divide the New California Republic and Caesar's Legion is the latter's open persecution of gay people. The NCR is described as tolerant and even accepting of same-sex relationships, though acceptance tends to fall off the further one moves away from the developed, urbanized core of New California. In recent years, the Republic's rapid economic transformation has led to an unforeseen erosion of the humanitarian ideals which it was founded to serve. In practice, to recreate America was to take on its shortcomings and its sins. As subsistence scavenging has dried up, the people of the NCR increasingly turn to wage labor, entrepreneurial venture, or military enlistment to keep their families fed. Meanwhile, their government enacts morally corrosive imperialism (narrative verbiage), their dominion expanding indefinitely as their infrastructure crumbles from within. This has led to a profit-based imperial monoculture which must conquer, consume, and coerce to perpetuate. As personal politics and service labor grow in importance, people find themselves more inclined to present as "normal" in the interest of financial stability and political expedience. A loading screen visualizes this culture of artificial social normalcy: the portrait of President Aradesh on the NCR 5$ bill neglects to depict his unibrow, earring, and facial scarification, overall portraying the once-chieftain so cleanly-cut as to be unrecognizable at first glance. He also appears to be wearing a collared shirt or suit as opposed to the robe he wore in Fallout.

In the Legion, Caesar has mandated that every legionnaire take a wife and produce children, citing high infant mortality rates and the constant need for soldiers, and going as far as instituting child quotas. He treats human beings as a resource to be exploited for war. Ostensibly in this aim homosexuality has been declared a capital offense punishable by death. Historically, routine demonstrations of violence towards women and gay people are a deliberate feature of fascist societies, the only logical cultural conclusion of a government devoted entirely to war and control. In Forlorn Hope letter 9, an NCR soldier wrote wrote the following to his boyfriend:

Dearest Andrew, Writing this seems pretty morbid, but tomorrow we march into the no man's land between our camp and Nelson, which is crawling with Legion. The Major insisted I write this damn "if you get this, I'm dead" letter so here it is. What a crock. I have the luck of the devil and your love on my side, so I'll be home soon. Keep the porch light on for me. We'll party in New Vegas when I get back. I love you. —Devin

Devin believed he would prevail over the Legion because his love would keep him safe. He was found dying or dead on the battlefield, the letter was found on his body. In a post-release patch, the injured soldiers were removed from the battlefield for performance reasons, and never re-implemented. Driven largely in reaction to the Legion's hyper-masculine posturing and misogyny, rumors persist across the Mojave that gay male relationships are not only common within the Legion, but condoned. These rumors are repeated commonly in NCR society. A closeted NCR Major mentions that the Legion is "a little more... forgiving" about close male "friendships," speaking in a hushed tone to avoid suspicion. At the same outpost, the player can encounter Cass, a bisexual civilian woman. She may flirt with a male Courier, who may imply they are gay, prompting her to imply gay men are more common in the Legion. Even as gay men fight and die in the name of love under his command, NCR General Oliver may remark to Courier Six at the Second Battle of Hoover Dam: "If you think after all that's happened, I'm going to grab my ankles and take it like the Legion..."

This writing pertains to institutionalized homophobia which manifests in practice though power structures and social interactions without being written into law. Simply put, in his derogatory remark, the general expresses to his army that military surrender is gay, much like their gay enemy. From the brevity and bluntness of this remark, it's clear that this sentiment is already well understood among his ranks. Logically, to project strength in the eyes of such a leader, one might also project homophobia by scrutinizing and harassing one's peers and subordinates. In this atmosphere, the expression of homophobia is not only normalized, but materially incentivized. For the ambitious, it becomes a tool, and a way of casting shame upon rivals. For the closeted, homophobia becomes a survival tactic, hoping to throw scrutiny off oneself. This is why Major Knight is immediately frightened when a male Courier flirts with him. He is so profoundly alienated that he romanticizes life as a gay man under the Legion. The Legion punish homosexuality with death, and yet Knight characterizes them as more "forgiving" than the NCR. Through these apparently disparate events, the audience can trace how a distorted perception of gay people emerges among insecure men in a military environment, and subsequently becomes ingrained in the corresponding civilian culture. At the 188 Trading Post, a lesbian from the Brotherhood of Steel named Veronica also wryly remarks that she believes legionaries have gay sex about as often as straight sex. She also notes that this only applies to men, as women have no rights whatsoever in Legion society. In this aside, she conveys a pre-existing frustration with lesbophobic social norms. Veronica also mentions that the people of her bunker would rather she remain on the surface. The Mojave Brotherhood of Steel has no official policy prohibiting homosexuality, but an implicit attitude among its dominant members that their limited numbers require everyone to have children to avoid extinction. Numerically, this may seem logical on the surface, given their reluctance to recruit outsiders. However, given their tiny population, this is an ineffective countermeasure, as they do not have nearly enough members to maintain genetic diversity for more than a few generations. This approach is not universally supported by all family units within the Brotherhood, but every individual is ultimately at the mercy of the elder. Veronica was in a lesbian relationship, but they were quietly separated by Elder Elijah, due to the dominant culture of enforcing heterosexual pairing among their population.

Caesar's law has not ended homosexuality within his domain. Despite the obvious risks, some legionaries have continued to pursue relationships behind closed doors, especially given their access to slaves. So long as members complete their societal obligations and fulfill the child quotas, they are able to pursue romance with other men in secret. Homosexual relationships in the faction are noted as being relatively equal compared to the average Legion husband and wife, in a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" sort of open secret policy. Gay legionaries must always make sure to keep their activities hidden. A centurion was once almost caught fraternizing with the teenage boy he had chosen to tend his tent. Despite previous "romantic" intentions, he quickly resolved to dispose of the slave to dispel suspicion. Had they been caught together, the centurion would have been charged with homosexuality and sentenced to death. This story is only known because the enslaved young man, Jimmy, managed to escape execution. Further illustrating the cruelty intrinsic to Legion governance, it's stated that homosexuality was the crime, and not the rape of a young slave; in fact, it seems Jimmy was forced to contribute to the child quota despite being a gay teenager, and the experience left him traumatized. He has resolved to never have sex with another woman, as the very notion triggers memories which fill him with disgust, and (in his own words) makes him feel like a slave all over again. The Strip is indifferent to gay people, viewing them as another opportunity to make caps. Both the Gomorrah and the Atomic Wrangler are interested in maximizing profits, and their prostitution services cater to clients regardless of their orientation. The openly gay Jimmy works at nearby Casa Madrid, but there is some tension among his peers due to his co-worker Maude's blatant homophobia. She supposes he's "okay, for one of those," and if propositioned by a female Courier, Maude will direct them to Sweetie for such "perverted" services. Pretty Sarah must regularly intervene to keep the peace among her staff.

The Followers of the Apocalypse, well-read punks who seek to embody healing through anarchistic values, are not concerned with gender. Most are openly and casually sexually active. Upon meeting Courier Six, Arcade Gannon offhandedly makes his gayness known, unprompted. The audience must face the fact that Arcade's apprehension of the Legion is far from abstract; under Legion law, he would be put to death. One possible ending gives further insight into Caesar's hypocrisy: should the player sell Arcade into slavery and leave Caesar alive, he will keep Arcade as a personal physician and philosophical advisor. They intellectually spar at length, and Caesar grows singularly fond of him. Accordingly, Arcade imitates the historic suicide of Cato the Younger by disemboweling himself. The Legion's remaining medics attempted to save his life, but none were Arcade's equal. Caesar understood his doctor's final gesture of contempt, and mourned him for months.

New Vegas ventures further into themes of healing from the trauma of sexual violence, from the perspective of a lesbian character. Corporal Betsy, an NCR sharpshooter, is a rape survivor, and suffers with PTSD from the incident. Her unprocessed trauma has manifested as a maladaptive tendency to aggressively and explicitly proposition the women she encounters, in an effort to reassert a sense of control. This defensive hypersexual impulse has negatively impacted her ability to connect with other women. A male superior officer notes that her behavior is inappropriate for anyone of her stature, but abstains from disciplining her out of sincere concern for her mental health. The Courier can help her begin to recognize these problems, and convince her to seek treatment from Doctor Usanagi at the New Vegas medical clinic, which proves helpful to her as she processes and heals from her trauma.

In Old World Blues, the Think Tank are five floating brains in jars who express themselves by waving robotic arms bearing screens depicting facial features. Before the War, they were federal scientists who committed crimes against humanity in the name of weapons development. Each is stuck in some sort of neuro-bionic feedback loop which prevents them from moving forward with their projects, mentally binding them to their central laboratory. Walking through their homes at Higgs Village, it's clear each was deeply neurotic before they were transformed into floating brains. Now without bodies, they attempt to maintain the illusion that they are exempt from sexuality as purely mental beings, but each displays obvious interest in the human form. They have codified this shaming with the term "formography." Most of the men are obsessively defensive over their complete disinterest in penises, which they talk about constantly. However, the shameless Dr. Dala shows overwhelming interest in observing and recording any and all human functions. Already androgynous in her pre-War life, Dala has taken to self-identifying as a "gender neutral entity" (though she is not known to use they/them pronouns). Regardless of the Courier's gender, they may coquettishly scratch themselves, clear their throat, and stretch in front of Dala until her biomed gel decoagulates. Dr. 8 also responds positively to graphic masturbation advice from Couriers of either gender. The X-8 research facility is ostensibly a massive immersive shrine to Doctor Borous's hatred of Richie "Ball-Lover" Marcus, a long-dead child who bullied Borous centuries ago. He also clings to his resentment of one Betsy Bright, who refused to attend a dance with him, supposedly so she could "go smoke with RICHIE MARCUS." Clearly arrested in development, Borous has literally built a temple to the fantasy of torturing his adolescent romantic rival and feeding him to dogs. His frozen, static characterization of the jock Richie Marcus as a "pinko-commie" who "likes balls" reflects the shallowness, pettiness, and overall misanthropy underlying his patriotic identity. It remains apparent throughout Old World Blues that the Think Tank are all chronically sexually repressed, which is inseparable from the values of the violent and judgmental pre-War culture which created them. With time and isolation, this ingrained repression has manifested as various intense and deranged psychosexual behaviors, including rage-fueled homophobia, voyeurism, and the obsessive performance of puritanical pretense.

____

“Although I’ve been out for a very long time, I made a conscious effort to be out with relation to this project, as I wanted to be visible as a lesbian in the game industry. New Vegas itself is, I think, one of (if not the) best games out there in how we treat homosexuality – and all of that is very intentional.”

“If my work on FNV, if my being out has helped even one gay person, then I have succeeded.” — Tess “Obsidian’s Gay Cowgirl” Treadwell

____

written (with help from other editors) for fallout.fandom.com/wiki/LGBT_representation_in_the_Fallout_series criticism welcome

[milliebobbyflay]

paired with their often intimate and violent subject matter, i find the incidental way tamsyn muir frames women and their bodies throughout the locked tomb series to be refreshing bordering on radical

consider harrowhark; in the first book we see her as gideon sees her. she's a hideous ghoul with a flat ass and no tits, she's a delicate sopping wet beauty with a sharp face and angel bow lips, she's a triumphant and awe inspiring master necromancer screaming and fighting drenched in her own blood. the shape and condition of her body is allowed to take on meaning contextually based entirely on the situation and how gideon feels about their relationship in any given moment

she then spends the second book hobbling around with a sword twice her size, ripping apart her body to use as a weapon and passing out in her own vomit, struggling to eat and sleep – she and puts herself through absolute hell and never once thinks anything of it, and we're made to mourn this not as the desecration of a beautiful woman but as a manifestation of a human being's despair and self loathing, and we see this specifically contrasted against the care gideon tries to take when inhabiting her body during the last act

it's jarring, in nona, when we're suddenly made aware that her body could be perceived or valued as a commodity, when pyrrha is assumed to be nona's pimp. it feels strange and horrifying when we learn alecto's form was modeled for a doll, learn that she was given a woman's body as a display of ownership, an alternative to being consumed, and as we're processing this we watch gideon, paul, and ianthe, immediately setting aside their conflict in a desperate scramble to preserve harrow's body for no reason other than because it is harrow's and they love her

feminist fiction often focuses on women's relationship to a body which is valued more than the person within it – and that is a worthy experience to explore – but as a transsexual butch(ish) dyke, i have never really had the privilege of seeing my body as a precious commodity, never felt like it couldn't or shouldn't be a sight of violence and disgust, and as a result the locked tomb books have made me feel seen in a way that few other works of fiction have?

we as an audience are not made aware of how attractive any character would be outside of the context of our lesbian POV characters' perspectives, their relationship to patriarchal beauty standards is an utterly irrelevant detail we're never told and only occasionally glimpse through implication. the women in the locked tomb books are simply free to exist, to have experiences and feelings, to love and hate and grieve and suffer and die like anybody else, and to have those experiences reflected in their physical vessels

it's a perspective that's so fundamental and obvious that to praise muir for it for it feels almost patronizing, but i also think it's a huge part of what's made the series so resonant for so many queer women and i feel that that's worthy of highlighting and celebrating

[clanwarrior-tumbly]

HCs: Ken meeting a Human!Fem!Reader who owns a ranch

Wanted to write something for this movie bc it’s all I’ve been thinking about for the past two days. So enjoy, lovelies! 

I’m taking requests for this movie so don’t be shy <3 

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

...........

After going back to the Real World to find a purpose for himself, Ken runs into you, a country girl who left the Mattel company to take care of your ranch.

You just stopped in the city to find new outfits..and instead found him rollerblading through the park, immediately recognizing him as a Ken.

You may not be in the company anymore but you just knew (especially with his vibrant outfit giving it away).

You two hit it off right away and eventually you go shopping together.

He gets a new cowboy outfit and is bashful when you pay for it (to which you reply that you..really didn’t have a choice in the matter, as he had no money).

He’s like “ohh that happened before when I was with Barbie..we got arrested for the second time that day :D”

You’re very concerned and decide that he should stick with you from now on (not that anyone at Mattel would ever care about a Ken running around to begin with...you just didn’t wanna have to bail him out of jail).

On the truck ride back to your home, you mentioned owning a ranch and Ken’s in a w e

You tell him more about it, and he’s so intrigued and can’t stop staring at you the entire time, especially as you go on about how a lot of women in your world are cowgirls and how they aren’t represented enough.

He bluntly states that he once believed “patriarchy” was all about the horses and you nearly laughed, but he seemed sad about it, so you assure him if he wanted to see horses, he made the right decision coming with you.

You introduce him to one of your favorite steeds and he’s SO overjoyed to actually see one in person. Like petting its mane and asking dozens of questions like an excited kid.

“Are you sure Barbieland didn’t have any horses of their own?”

“No, we just have the ones on sticks and our imaginations.” He pouts, mimicking the way he rode invisible horses with his hands. “But this? This is WAY cooler!!”

He tries mounting your horse, envisioning himself riding off into the sunset, free as a bird while shouting “yeehaw” at the top of his lungs-

Only for it to rear its head up and nearly stomp on his foot, with you having to calm it down as he snaps back to reality, looking utterly distraught and stressed over upsetting it.

“Alrighty. Ken. If you wanna ride a horse..the first step is earning its respect. Thought you would’ve learned about that in those books....but if you’ll let me, I’ll show you how to properly mount one. Luckily this one here’s accustomed to double riders.”

His face lights up and he listens to every instruction you give him, from placing the saddle on its back to climbing on, and finally how to control the direction he wants it to go.

For this one time, however, you take the reins and let him sit behind you, hugging you a bit too tightly for your liking, but you allow it as you show him around the rest of your ranch.

He just likes the closeness fr and you.

By the time the day’s over, your horse got better acquainted with Ken and let him ride around for a little while before you gotta put it in the stable for the night.

Before he could worry about where he was gonna go, you tell him he can stay with you as long as he wants.

He’s so happy he just,,,,breaks down ugly crying into your arms.

Though he quickly apologizes, admitting he’s still getting used to crying freely and being more emotional and-

“It’s okay, Ken.” You reassure him. “We need more guys like that around here who ain’t afraid to shed a tear or two.”

“Th-Thanks...Barbie told me it’s an amazing feeling. And honestly..it kinda is.”

After that small heart-to-heart talk, he gifts you his horseshoe necklace as a sign of his appreciation, that dopey grin returning to his face when you take it and wear it right away.

Yeah, you’ve only met each other for a day and he’s smitten the moment you started treated him as an equal. You let him have his own room, bed, wardrobe, etc. (and in time he'll have his own horse too).

All you ask is that he helps you manage the ranch, but at this point he’s willing to do anything for you now.

Finally, he realizes this was his dream all along.

One that Barbieland couldn't provide, but that was alright.

Patriarchy is overrated, anyways. This was all he wanted.

[genderkoolaid]

re; your last post about cisfeminists going "what if men experienced misogyny?"

your points are exactly why i don't like the newest barbie movie. the ciscentric nature around kens being a second class citizen compared to barbies makes me really uncomfortable, since it wasn't handled with care or marginalized men's experiences in mind.

just this idea of "look! men are the oppressed ones here! isn't that so fucked, and unlike anything that's in the REAL world?" that they play with and make jokes out of.

Yeaaah I had similar feelings. I enjoyed the movie & honestly found the plotline about Barbie's humanity to be well done, but the gender thing was like. grade school baby's first feminism and people acted like it was groundbreaking just because it said literally anything about gender.

The whole Ken plotline could have been interesting if they did some sort of commentary on how the desire to reverse oppressive dynamics just recreates oppression. The whole idea of Barbieland was the its the inverse of how women are treated irl, but the movie never takes seriously the idea that, by this logic, the patriarchy is the Ken's Barbieland, and real-life women fantasizing about Barbieland is no different than the Ken's fantasizing about our patriarchal world. But the movie just.... does not take it's own creation of Ken Oppression seriously. The Ken's desire for the patriarchy is invalid and bad and obviously deserves punishment, but the viewer's desire for the oppressive matriarchy of Barbieland is entirely justified.

Obviously it's literally a silly movie about a doll lady but if they are going to try and Make a Point About Gender, then imo they shouldn't have literally made the Kens oppressed and treated it like it meant nothing. They couldve made some point about how what the Kens were doing was bad, but it was no different than what the human main character lady wanted to do in Barbieland– being so focused on escaping their own suffering that they don't actually care about oppression when its not affecting them. But instead they just... made a joke about how the Kens are being treated like women! They don't have voting rights and no one cares if they get them! This is fun and normal!

[darkdevasofdestruction]

Heart Sutra ~ Buddha x Goddess! Reader

Gate gate para gate para sam gate bodhi swaha...

"Your pronunciation is getting better, Y/N." King Jataka laid on the grass, underneath a tree, watching the beautiful woman besides him create various models of flower crowns with her magic. "Really? You truly think so?" her charming smile seemed to radiate as bright and warm as the Sun itself. "Yes, I think so. A little more, and you can sing the Heart Sutra perfectly." Jataka found himself smiling also. "Ahh, you are being far too nice, 'Taka." she waved her hand dismissively, returning to her idle work. "Y/N, do you mind if I ask you something?" she hummed, encouraging him to continue. "You are a Goddess. Why have you been staying at my court, disguised as a Bodhisattva?" he asked, deep in thought. Y/N turned her head to look at him properly. "Why, you ask?" Y/N didn't have an immediate answer. "I suppose because it makes me happy." "Does it, really?" he murmured, intrigued. "I think so, yes." she smiled kindly. "Every time I see the smiles of people that I healed, my heart bursts with happiness, and I feel lighter. In this prospect, I suppose that yes, being here, among humans, and aiding them does make me happy." "You are always smiling." Jataka nodded his head, pensive. "You have the most beautiful smile I've ever seen." "Jataka." she called out his name, placing the flower down and leaning back on the tree. "What is bothering you?" "Ahaha... Saw right through me, didn't you? No wonder you're a Goddess governing the nature, peace and serenity. Only someone pure and benevolent like yourself could understand my troubled heart." the King spoke softly. "I am nearing the end of my life, and through this, I have come to realise that although I have done my duty well, made my people happy and that my kingdom is flourishing... You see... I feel... Unfulfilled. I feel... Empty. Like there is something missing. I feel... Deep unrest and... Sadness. As though I am nostalgic over something that I have never had... And never will."

"Your reason for sadness is the very reason over which I took a leave of absence from home, up there." Y/N gently wrapped her arms around the King, placing his head on her lap. "There is no creature alive that can feel happiness over being controlled by a higher being. We blame destiny and duty, or even Gods for out sadness... But the truth is, Jataka... We are the masters of our own destiny, and only we have power over our own lives." Y/N looked away with a sarcastic smile. "If only that were entirely true, huh?" "Lavishing in all these material luxuries, being hidden away from any misfortune, I have been ignorant over what it meant to live." the man sighed deeply. "As I watched the starry skies one night, from the balcony, I realised how vast the skies are - And if the skies are endless, then so must the Earth be. I watched birds fly, unhindered by any restraint, and I realised that I was nothing more than a caged falcon, bound by a rope, never allowed to venture too far. Since my birth, I have been told that I must uphold my duties as a prince - As the future King - And I did everything as best as I could, out of filial love and duty for the people I am responsible for." Jataka felt a sense of relief, feeling the Goddess' hand gently caressing his silvery locks. "Do you think I am selfish, Y/N? For wishing for my own happiness, for once?" "No, Jataka. I do not think you are selfish. Truth is..." though Y/N smiled, it was bitter, and a tear escaped down her cheek. "I am just a little upset that you did not realise it until it was too late." a few more tears followed close behind, surprising the young King. "You are such a good man, Jataka. It always pains me, seeing young men and women like you, who have done only good in their life, and are repaid with only misfortune. I hate how unfair life can be, and I hate that I am unable of meddling with diseases that humans cannot conquer yet. If I were to keep every living being alive, forever, than it would only bring calamity and a disbalance of life." Jataka felt a pang of pain in his heart, realising the emotional woman before him cared so much for him and all the people she governed over - Despite all the births, deaths and rebirths that she's witnessed over the course of aeons, for as long as she has been alive - She still couldn't get over the suffering of loss. "But if I make an exception with you, then I would have to make an exception with everyone, as my heart wouldn't allow me to spare one over the other. A cruel fate, out of which I cannot escape. And you, Jataka, are correct, you are no different - A beautiful song bird, trapped in a golden cage, embellished with the most precious jewels, forced to sing the songs of the nobles, yet unable to break free and witness and experience the world in front of your eyes; Unable to spread your wings and feel the air brushing through your feathers."

Y/N felt two gentle hands cradling her face, wiping away her diamond beads of tears which created blooming flowers where they fell on the ground. Jataka smiled, and kissed her forehead. "Having your love means more to me than anything else in the world." he spoke in a soft voice which mellowed the Goddess' heart further into trembling with emotion. "Though I cannot live the life that I wished, nor live eternal in this mortal husk that my body is - I have a single wish, that only you may fulfill. It is the only thing that can bring me a little comfort. Can you promise me something, please?" "Of course. I will do anything." she placed her hands over his own, intertwining their fingers together. "Please, take care of Siddhartha for me. He is still young and naive, still fooled by the luxuries of the palace. He needs you, the same as I do. He is a good man. Please, care for him the same as you did for me." the two locked eyes, and their hearts came to a deep understanding. A vow was formed, for millennia to come. "I will."

Weeks passed by, and though Siddhartha had no clue that Y/N was actually a Goddess, he enjoyed his time spent with her and Jataka. Ever since she appeared at his Kingdom, quite a while ago, he felt that those two were kindred spirits, in ways that few could accomplish, as though they could understand each other simply through looks and smiles. Or maybe that's how mature adults think. One of the two, he wasn't quite sure. Either way, he often teased Jataka about taking her as one of his wives. He always got scolded when he did.

Y/N wasn't the most talkative, but he always appreciated her care for everyone, including him. All her kind words and sweet actions towards people made the young man want to spend more and more time with her.

At some point, he even came over to her, offering flowers - He had the most innocent, boyish grin - He was so adorable, really. Still, for some reason, Y/N only smiled sweetly at him, kissing his cheek and went away. Though he was flustered, he also felt... Rejected? Maybe his intentions weren't obvious enough? He wasn't quite sure - Not to mention, Jataka just laughed, but gave him no answer. Was he teasing him? Ha!

Jataka's time was nearing its end, and for the first time since they've known each other, Siddhartha was met with a confusing confession for his elder brother figure - The validity of his happiness. Was he happy, truly? Was the material world was the soul's fulfillment was? Or perhaps he was too shallow to realise... Or too inexperienced? Jataka said he realised how much he wanted to see the world and... Live. Alas, he couldn't, not only because of his illness, but because of his duties as a King, trapped in the comforting gold of his kingdom.

He panicked, seeing his older brother's bitter smile, looking into the horizon at the setting Sun, and he felt dread, watching the blood dripping down his hand as he continued to cough.

When the country went into deep mourning, he was shocked not to see Y/N anywhere. She must be glued to the coffin, no doubt. Everyone knew she was the closest person Jataka ever had. As Siddhartha rode towards the kingdom, he saw the people sobbing and weeping for their deceased King.

"The life I lived, who did it belong to, in the end?"

"Do you truly think I am a happy person?"

These questions rung through Siddhartha's mind, as soon as he heard that one assumption - "The king must have been truly happy."

But was he, really? Who's to say he was actually happy? The kingdom's prosperity? The people's well-being? No war, nor famine or plague in the lands he was governing?

At once, Siddhartha came to a revelation. He jumped off his horse, and weeping, he started cackling loudly, making people believe his grief drove him to madness.

As expected, as soon as he entered in the temple, he was met with sobbing people, lots of flowers, and a single woman glued to the King's coffin. Yes, Y/N loved flowers, and consequently, so did Jataka - Hence why Siddhartha gathered a whole basket of field flowers and strutted all the way to the coffin, throwing flowers around.

"Siddhartha...?" Y/N's sweet voice called out to him softly as she rose her crying face to look up at him. "You were right. I understand now, and I admit, you were right." he smiled at her. "I won't say it a second time though." "What are you talking about?" Siddhartha moved his gaze to Jataka, and offered a melancholic smile. "Hey, bro. You 'bout ready to go out of here?" with extraordinary strength, Siddhartha picked Y/N and placed her gingerly on his shoulder, as his other hand held Jataka's coffin. He was completely deaf to all the others yelling at him to stop his mad actions. "Piss off. Whatever Gods you're praying at today - My bro Jataka doesn't need their blessings. Because happiness... Comes from within."

Y/N gasped hearing his bold words - And she started crying. She was proud of him. Afternoon came, and the two knelt on the ground, gazing at the beautiful King amongst the flowers, having his coffin lowered onto the river sheen. "You are free, my friend. Now go and find your happiness yourself." they watched him disappear into the horizon, engulfed into the red rays of the beautiful Sun.

For the first time in the many years since they've known each other, Siddhartha witnessed Y/N offering him her undivided attention. As soon as the silhouette of the coffin was visible no more, she threw her arms around his torso and sobbed like a child. Siddharta smiled, moved that someone cared so much for his bro, and he held her smaller form into his embrace. "Why are you crying so much, you little crybaby? Don't you know - Suffering is only a concept bound to the material world. One day, when we enter Samsara, our souls will reunite with Bro's, and we will be friends again, in our next life - Again, and again, until we reach awakening and attain Nirvana." his words sounded so wise, unlike the childish beliefs of yester-year. "It is alright to upset, the wound is still fresh and ablaze. But Y/N - One should find happiness in remembering the beautiful memories guiding your future, rather than mourning the past." "I am so proud of you, Siddhartha." her words were nothing that he expected, and the young man was taken aback. "You are right. Yes, you are entirely right. If only that life was kinder to benevolent souls like yourself and Jataka." she continued vaguely.

Y/N rose her head to look up at him, a wide smile through her tears. "But, Siddhartha, you see - That truth only applies to mortals. As a Goddess, seeing beautiful souls die so young... Beautiful flowers withering all around you, as the garden you tended with so much love and care dies upon winter... It hurts every time, and no matter how many thousands of years pass, I cannot get over the suffering that loss has on me." Siddharta frowned slightly, confused at her statement. "Goddess, you say? Ha! That's funny." he grinned at her. "You see, I have just come to the realisation that I absolutely despise anything that tries to control my actions. I am a firm believer that we seam the tapestry of our own lives through the choices we make. Now I understand why Bro was so upset last time we met. You knew all this, didn't you, you little minx?" "Of course I did." she huffed lightly. "Siddhartha - Do you hate me for not saving Jataka? Now that you know my identity, you must be very upset that I just let him die." The young man let out an over-dramatic hum, placing his hand to his chin as if to mock thinking, before he popped out a negative answer. At least he retained his childish vitality. "What are you Goddess over, anyway? You healed people. Goddess of Life or what?" "Nature, Peace and Serenity." Siddhartha let out a sound of understanding. "No wonder I and Bro felt so good around you! It's like everything was good around you!" he cackled weirdly. "Must be hard on you, huh?" his theatrical expression turned more gentle and kind. "Having to take care of so many things at once. You know, my wife told me once that she can feel what our child feels. I'm not sure how it works, but it must be similar with you and everything you create right?" Y/N nodded her head, albeit, bewildered at the accurate comparison that he figured out on the spot. "Having to feel the emotion of every living being must be a huge pain in the ass." Y/N giggled in amusement. "I love and care for every living being, Siddhartha. It is like a gardener tending to a flower garden. Every human, every animal, every tree. Everything has life, and their vitality, their energy surges through my veins." she explained, taking a step back. She rose her hands up to take his hair away from his tail, letting it swish with the wind. His hair was so long, that it matches her own. "You dig in the dirt with your own fingers, and you bury the seed of life. Every morning, every afternoon and night, you tend to this seed, and care for it - You water it and fertilize it, protect it from parasites and the harsher weathers. When it comes up from under the first, you see the cutest, littlest sprout, braving to live and grow more. You watch it get bigger, and stronger over the course of many days, until finally, it reaches maturity, and it blossoms into the most beautiful flower." she smiled widely, creating a gorgeous flower crown, which she placed on his head. "But once it reaches maturity, the risk of illness increases. It matures until it grows old. You watch it lose its vibrant colours, the petals fall off one by one, until only a frail stem remains, falling from the faintest breeze, until finally, the roots rot, and the flower is no more." Siddhartha's grim comment about life made Y/N's beautiful gem-like eyes gleam with emotion. "So is life, yes." despite being overwhelmed with emotion, Y/N continued to speak. "Out of all my flowers - Siddhartha, you are my most beautiful lotus flower, and I am most proud of you." the young man blushed in surprised. "Creating humans, creating life - It is the effort of the collective of Gods, not mine alone; But creating, and caring for, is different. I may not be able to look over every living being in this large, large world, but I am most honoured that I was able to meet you and see you grow into such a wise young man."

At once, Siddhartha pulled Y/N into a tight hug, swinging her around enthusiastically. "Awwww, you're the sweetest! You're making me blush!" Y/N was quickly beginning to get dizzy from all the twirling and swinging around from the awfully strong prince. "What did you promise Bro?" "Oh? You knew about that?" Y/N chuckled softly, trying to regain her balance. "I promised that I would take care of you, the same way I did for him." Siddharta grinned widely. "Nope!" Y/N looked at him, a little confused. "I've got a better idea, actually." he brought Y/N at arm's length, his hands placed firmly on her shoulders. "You knew I liked you, didn't you?" Y/N nodded her head. "But a mortal doesn't live long enough, so they can't hang around an immortal, huh?" Y/N's eyes lingered towards the river, before nodding again. "Welp, I've got an idea!" his dazzling smile was more charming than any God. "You see, I want to go on a pilgrimage, all by myself. I want to find myself, and my own happiness. I want to find my purpose. I need to do this alone - Though don't worry, if I am to encounter a like-minded friend, then we will travel together." he spoke. "Will you wait for my return, Y/N? Until I reach my Enlightenment and become an iteration of myself with which I can be proud of?" Y/N smiled dearly at the young man, glowing like the morning Sun. "I will wait for you for as many cycles it takes you to find me again. I hope that, by the time you return, you will have achieved true happiness, and I can see your beautiful smile again. Siddhartha."

The young man smiled brightly before pulling Y/N into a sweet kiss. "Something to look forward to." he gave her a peace sign before walking away. "See ya, Y/N! Laters!" "Have a safe journey, you little troublemaker." Y/N smiled dearly, waving at him. Though life as a God was long and tedious, and relationships were shallow, she felt a pure love like she's never experienced before. Whether she sees the young man again or not, she knew he was going to be just fine.

Since then, Y/N returned to the Gods, continuing her boring life, watching over the nature of Earth from above. Life truly wasn't all that exciting for deities living so long, but once in a while, something big happens - Big enough for the whole foundation of Valhalla to shake to the core.

If a human becoming a demi-God wasn't exceptional enough, considering the bravery and righteousness that Heracles displayed; A man had somehow attained supreme spiritual awakening, and ascended to the title of Buddha the Enlightened, the Wise. A human achieved Godhood.

Siddhartha Gautama

As soon as he saw the Goddess, completely frozen from shock of seeing him in Heavens, he let out a childish squeal and leapt on her, rubbing his cheek on her face as though he's a kitten or something. He told her how much he missed her and what not - Surprise! He even had his own brand of delicious lollipops to share with her! And lots and lots of chocolate too! Oh, and they had so much to catch up!

He told Y/N all about his journey and the people he met, those he guided on their path to achieving happiness, and all the sightseeing he did. Best of all, he reminisced all the awakening he did over the years - And how much he missed her! Haha, a joke - He is always determined to get what he wants, so of course, he was patient. Craving would only bring him suffering, thus the knowledge of knowing the Goddess was there, waiting for him, soothed his worried into a calm peace of mind.

Siddhartha - Now, Buddha - Still felt so giddy, being called by his name. Only Y/N could call him that, of course! No one else had that privilege. The more she spoke his name, the happier he was. Buddha ended up playfully pinning Y/N to the bed, kissing all over her face and tickling her, feeling his heart lighter with every sweet giggle she let. When she couldn't take the tickling anymore, the Goddess wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him flush against her chest; She took off his hair tie once again, and the pretty crown-like accessory holding it in a lotus-like style, and she caressed his locks soothingly. "I missed you." three simple words, yet they had the strongest effect on him. He felt compelled to engulf her in his strong arms, cuddling together, two hearts soulbound for an eternity of spiritual happiness.

Many, many years passed, and Buddha and Y/N were inseparable. Gods may argue, and so do humans, but never once did anyone even see them disagree on anything, let alone argue. Was it the endless patience and compassion of the Buddha, or that Y/N was always too kind to say anything that might upset someone, and detested confrontation; She'd rather walk away, or smile, instead of disagreeing with anyone.

That was their biggest similarity, but also, their biggest difference - Buddha was never one to back away from a fight against someone he couldn't stand - In his case, most of the Gods. Ironic, isn't it, he told Y/N so many times; How one can detest the very being they became, with the same strength that they love another just as much. He was a God who hated Gods, yet a God, who loved a Goddess as much as he loved the happiness and freedom he achieved.

"You have to find your own happiness within you." he told her once, watching Y/N dancing around the forest. Everywhere she stepped, flowers grew. "That may be so, Siddhartha - But my happiness increases whenever I see you." she bent to his side, grabbing his wrists and pulling him up to dance with her. Though all kinds of flowers bloomed wherever she stepped, hence why she always walked with no shoes on; Where Buddha stepped, beautiful white lilies grew. Together, they created endless flower gardens, more ethereal than any other God could make.

One would think eternal bliss was in store for them - Alas, one so connected to Nature as Y/N, was bound to suffer greatly, to the hands of the mankind she cherished so much. Buddha often saw how Y/N would try to sneak away into the forests, all alone. Though he hadn't seen her, he could sense her distress, her agony. After the third time that she refused to confide in him, preferring to keep the problem hidden, the newly Awaken God decided to confront her himself.

Instead, once he arrived at the edge of the forest, he found Y/N collapsed on the grass, writhing in pain. Panicked, he fell to his knees, cradling her in his arms, calling out her name; She seemed feverish and weak, but Gods couldn't contract illnesses, could they? Surely, they can't. He held her tight in her embrace, wishering the Heart Sutra in her ear over and over again, until finally, her breathing evened out, and the pain subsided.

"Pfeww, don't scare me like that, gorgeous! You're going to give me a heart attack!" he collapsed on his back dramatically. "Forgive me... I didn't want you to see me like this." Y/N sighed, rolling on the grass next to him. "I did not want you to see me cursing the humanity that I loved so much." "Humanity caused you this pain? What do you mean?" he turned to his side, his blue water lily eyes widening. "Take a look for yourself." she guided him to the edge of the floating forest. "Look there - They are at war. Countless people are dying all at once, the grass is drowning in blood, the animals are perishing." she sighed softly, before pointing to the opposite side. "And there - The deforestation, the excessive hunting - That whole hill is bare of life and decrepit, all so that humans may build and build and build some more." "Ahh, I see, so I was more right than I realised, though to think it would affect you to the point of being physically ill. My poor, poor baby Y/N!" he threw his arms around her, rolling on the grass with her dramatically. There was nothing that he could do to save her from this - It was the course that humanity took for itself, but perhaps there might be a way to somehow detach her, even by a little bit, from her connection with that which was created. Perhaps, that-a-way, the suffering may subside. Until then, however, he can only distract her with his love and playfulness. It was working wonders.

For thousands of years, humanity existed, with the will of the Gods, until that will was no more. Even Aphrodite herself, disgusted with the state of the world, agreed to decimate mankind. Shocked with the outcome, Y/N was the first to step forward and protest. Though she couldn't see Buddha looking at her, she could feel his presence and his lingering gaze. She wanted to fight for the mankind that destroyed her from within. None of the actions of humanity were directly affecting either of the Gods, except for her for the most part. She was the only one with the validity of voting, and if she wanted mankind to continue living, she had every right to vouch for them.

But they didn't care for her opinions - Instead, they laughed, saying her pain will disappear along with the humans, and she can achieve serendipity. How ridiculous. Thankfully, Brunhilde's plan of inducing Ragnarok worked, and thus, the thirteen fights were to take place.

Worried, Y/N quickly rushed out of the conference room, needing some time alone to regain herself. She was panicking and afraid. True, eliminating the humans was bound to relieve her heart of suffering - But at what cost? There were so many good people, innocent people out there, who did nothing wrong. Why should they perish, for the mistakes of others? Like how Adam and Even were cast away from Heaven, due to the disgusting lies and deceit of the Snake, so will billions and billions of other people suffer eternal Doomsday.

It wasn't fair.

A mother doesn't kill their own child for misbehaving. The Gods were being as selfish as always.

"N'aww, sweet-cheeks, don't tell me you're crying again! You know it breaks my heart seeing you like this!" though Buddha wasn't expecting to be pinned to the wall, Y/N's fingers digging deep into his shoulders. "We can't let them die, Siddhartha! We can't! They are innocent!" Y/N cried out, looking into his beautiful eyes. "Please, don't tell me you're on their side! We can't - We can't let them die! But what can we do? We are so few, against so many of them - And they're all so unreasonable and short-sighted." Buddha felt pain in his heart, listening to the distress of her voice, seeing the glimmering of her eyes. "I know! I'll... I'll fight for mankind! I... I've never fought in my life... But I am the Goddess of Peace. To know Peace is to know War; and to know War, is to know Peace. One must protect that which he holds dear. That's right, isn't it?" "Y/N." he called out in a gentle, calm voice. "Please, calm down." "Siddhartha...?" she found herself calling out his name. "You and I - We are soulbound, aren't we? We want the same thing. And you, more than anyone else in this world, know how much I hate being told what to do." he pulled her into a deep kiss. "And I'll be damned before I allow anyone to make you cry." Her distressed look turned into a content smile of relief, and she snuggled into his arms. "I love you so much." those words never failed to make his heart leap with joy.

Once Ragnarok began, Heimdall would call out the champions of the Gods, while Y/N would call the Mankind warriors to come over. It was the least she could do, apart from encouraging each of the fighters.

Mankind had a staggering two consecutive losses, and each time, Y/N took the short pause between matches to weep and regain herself. Staying in the ring for the duration of the fight, she used her magical powers to create a strong shield for the audience, so that none of the match-attacks would mistakenly harm anyone watching.

She felt sad yet emboldened seeing Lu Bu's tragic death, but also, his horse and brothers in arms asking for death, to be reunited in Niflheim with their General. She saw Thor smile for the first time in his life, after having fought with all of his mind against an honorable and strong member of mankind. Likewise, her heart shattered watching Adam's conviction is protecting his children from perdition, the very same she wished.

Thankfully, the great Sasaki was able to slash to death none other than Poseidon himself; Though not the most agreeable person, she still felt sad to see him gone forever. Alas. Y/N hugged the old man, thanking him for his resilience and strength before picking him up and bringing him to the infirmary.

The same happened with Jack the Ripper, a man despised by all mankind and humanity for being the scum of the earth. Y/N knew better - She knew all of their lives. In truth, though she disagreed with his actions, she pitied Jack, the poor man. He truly was a pitiable one. Unlike Poseidon, Heracles was wept by all, Gods and humans alike, whilst Jack got ostracised, ridiculed and insulted, even having stones thrown at him, despite already being injured. That angered Y/N.

"How dare you speak ill of the man who put his life on the line for humanity to keep living?! He has no descendants, he has no family - He fought for humanity, though he had nothing to gain out of it! He got the recognition of Heracles himself, and tied the score against the Gods with his shrewdness and wit - And yet you dare talk down to him? I don't see you in here, facing the wrath of the Gods who want you dead!" Buddha felt himself cackling from the stand, watching the Goddess pick up a grown man like he was a bride and actively healing him with love and care like none other before. What a darling she always was.

Unfortunately, Mankind lost the 5th match, with poor Raiden dying against Shiva, the God of Destruction. Still, the only good thing coming out of all the matches was that Y/N could sense the fighting Gods getting genuine admiration for the strength, selflessness and righteousness of humanity, beginning with Thor calling Lu Bu his friend, Zeus acknowledging Adam's strength in protecting his kin, Sasaki defeating Poseidon himself, Heracles loving humanity and Jack himself, and Shiva admiring Raiden's power.

And thus, the sixth match was to take place. The doors opened, and two rows of seven pink water lilies appeared - The familiar silhouette of Buddha appeared. Y/N looked at his unbothered face, blowing up bubblegum, his weapon lazily swung over his shoulder. He was smirking, winking at Y/N mischievously, reveling in the spotlight before he stepped by the Goddess' side and pulled her over into his side as he got to where the human representative was to stand.

He spit his gum in Heimdall's hand, snatching away his Gjallarhorn. "Excuse me. Testing. Testing." he spoke into the horn. "Uhhh... I'm gonna fight for Mankind. Ya dig?" the whole arena was in ecstasy. Numerous comments were thrown around, denigrating Buddha as he shattered the horn in his grasp. "Piss off." he pointed with his weapon towards Zeus. "Y'all made my girl cry. Screw you. If the Gods aren't going to save mankind, then I will. And if any God gets in my way..." he slammed the butt of the weapon into the ground, his expression now serious and devoid of any joy. "I'll kill 'em."

He truly is the kind not to take orders from anyone. Though Heimdall tried to press on that he can't switch sides, Zeus himself approved anyway. "Are you prepared to make enemies with all of the Gods?" "Dang, you're such a pain!" Buddha scoffed at Odin, pulling Y/N even closer to his side. "Remember what I said before? Whether you're allies or enemies, good or evil, Gods or Humans, none of that matters!" Buddha was glowing brightly with intense confidence. "In all universe, nothing else matters, except me!"

Such a narcissistic comment, added to the intense frustration of the Gods, made Y/N burst into laughter along with him. Two weirdos. "So, who am I fighting?"

The Seven Fortunes stepped into the arena and fused into a single deity. Vaisravana was no more, and instead, one called Zerofuku appeared. The Eight Gods of Fortune were actually a single entity. This Zerofuku guy was a real weirdo, even for their standards, and he confessed his intense wish to slaughter Buddha with all of his might, as he created his sinister weapons which got bigger and bigger the more misfortune he encountered.

Though Y/N didn't know of Zerofuku's past, he knew Buddha. He was able to take the misfortune of the humans into his own body, until he couldn't any more, only to receive discontempt and realise that those he tried to help were in no way less misfortunate than before. Material luxury and sinful indulgences did nothing to appease the soul. Instead, Zerofuku had to witness strings of people following Buddha in his path to Enlightenment. He got jealous, unable to understand his teachings - Yet somehow, no matter how cryptic or enigmatic Zerofuku found Buddha's words, the other people - Including those whom he helped previously - Began following the Awakened One close behind.

The more Zero attacked, the bigger his weapon grew, for Buddha could see the flickers of his soul and evade all the hits before they even happened. He was even taunting the God, intentionally or not, driving him into a mad frenzy. The few attacks that Buddha threw all landed with tremendous effect, earning cheers and applause from the audience.

Though he couldn't see Y/N reaction, Buddha was sure she was a worrying mess - That's her caring nature, after all - Yet seeing Zero's weapon growing as large as the whole arena, and him not moving from his spot, well - He feared she might be fainting on the spot, like a poor damsel in distress. Well, he'll just have to sweep her off her feet and protect her like the chevalier of light that he is!

Y/N knew, in theory, that Buddha's weapon transformed in each of the Six Paths identities depending on his emotions, and with his being a master at controlling his moods, he could form anything at will, more or less, so she wasn't all that surprised when the weapon transformed into a Shield to block the huge weapon. Still, she almost wished she could see all of the Paths.

Next, he used the Spiked Club of Nirvana, trembling to charge in an attack - And so he did, sweeping to the ground and causing lethal damage on the demon's side. The demon's weapon turned into two swords, to which Buddha made his weapon turn into a large halbert, easily countering every one of Zero's attacks. His misfortune was increasing, and his weapon turned into a multitude of hooks acting like snakes - He retaliated with a Vajra, running around and cutting them away to bits.

"Love yourself!" Buddha encouraged the poor demon. "I actually like you quite a lot, Zerofuku." that comment made the misfortunate one start sobbing and staring at the graceful God, shining brighter than the golden Sun. Zero's anger subsided and he finally understood who he really is, and what he wants from life. His weapon disappeared, and Buddha also threw his own to the ground, proposing an outright fist-fight. What a child, Y/N giggled, watching that playful smirk on his face as he intentionally allowed the pitiable demon to strike him back. Y/N could never image ever letting herself feel physical hurt just for fun - Alas, men were weird, and Buddha especially, was one of a kind.

Zerofuku was on the ground, sprawled, with all his misfortune and anger seeping out of his in a cloud. His purple hair turned pure white, and his blissful grin, that childlike innocence and glee were sparkling in his eyes. Buddha, also, was happy to have helped another worthy person achieve spiritual happiness - Until the horns on either side of his skull penetrated deep into his brain, worming their way inside his body. Zerofuku was engulfed by two dragons, one blue and one red. Buddha could do nothing to safe his new friend. Instead, he was forced to watch Zero disappearing, and a true evil appearing in his stead.

The Demon King of the Sixth Heaven, Papiyas, was reborn.

Buddha immediately leapt back, afraid for the first time, for there was a creature of pure darkness, whom he couldn't read. He hadn't an inkling of brightness in his soul which he could read. Y/N, like everyone else, was trembling from the sheer malevolence of the demon. Terrifying, Y/N ran in front of Buddha, standing protectively in front of him - She knew, if need be, her defense magic was second to none in Valhalla.

There goes this legend about a terrifying foe from Helheim - Hades told her this story once, dating before he was ruled of the Underworld - That this enemy destroyed half of the realm... Or rather, it was lucky enough that even half of it was left intact, to some degree.

Once Papiyas turned his arm into a weapon, Y/N summoned her polearm into her grasp, parrying the attack. The Gods all gasped - It has been thousands of years since they've seen the Goddess of Peace fight. In truth, it was only during the Titanomachy that she fought - To protect her Peace, one must go to War. It was an irony that she had to accept as a true axioma.

"H-Hey, Y/N, it's not your fight! Two people can't fight for a single side!" she heard Heimdall's shaky voice call out. "To hell with your rules, Heimdall! If this freak doesn't die, we're all screwed!" Y/N growled, struggling to push him back, counter and block all of his strikes that came at the speed of lightning. "If Zeus accepted the intervention of the Valkyries for all the other fights, then for goodness' sake, there's hardly any difference, is there?!" "I SHALL ALLOW IT!" Zeus' amused voice called out from the stands, as Y/N leapt back, just a step in front of Buddha. She was breathing heavily from the effort. "Siddhartha, stand back." her overprotectiveness was taking over her senses. "I will fight with my fullest power." Papiyas glared at the two. "THAT WAS YOU HOLDING BACK?!" Y/N cried out at him. "Gosh... Buddha, come over." quickly, Y/N placed a few flowers in his hair. "This will protect you from harm... I hope." she muttered the last bit, watching as Papiyas was preparing a drill-like strike called the Pandaemonium Cycle. Before she could react, Buddha dragged Y/N behind him, pulling his shield up - But the drill was capable of penetrating through it, gouging his left eye out.

"S...Siddhartha...?!" Y/N started, shuddering in distress at her lover's injury. He protected her, while he got his eye drilled into mush. "Don't worry about me, worry about that monster!" Buddha transformed his weapon into the sword away, engaging in an exchange of slashes that barely left a scar on the demon's neck. Buddha had to make adjustments to his attacks, because of his blindspot. fighting with one eye only as he was gradually being whittled down.

"Judgement." Papiyas smirked, impaling Buddha's foot, urging him to leap back once again. Y/N couldn't believe there were idiot Gods out there, begging for Buddha's death - Idiots. The Demon King pointed out Zerofuku was no more - He ate him - Shocking both Buddha and Y/N. What a monster, they thought, and the Enlightened one was feeling even more angered, enough to curse at him. "I've made up my mind. I'm gonna KILL YOU!" Y/N, nor anyone else, ever saw Buddha's wrath. Hopefully, it will serve him and humanity well. His staff transformed into the Hatred Emotion which created a weapon he's never seen before, the Warscythe of Salakaya, which had a menacing head of a roaring lion on it. "Preposterous." Papiyas spat. "For a piece of trash such as you, to defy a supreme being like me... I will waste no time passing judgement! And nothing could be more pleasant than that!" his laugh roared through the whole arena. "Stick that judgement up your ass, you sick fuck!" the audience gasped with the curse of the Goddess as Buddha attacked first with his blade, before unleashing an infernal fire towards the demon.

Blood spilled to the ground, though Buddha was the most confused of all. He was the one who initiated the attack, and it was his blade that cut away at Papiyas' arm. It was him who was supposed to get impaled by the enemy's weapon - So why the hell was Y/N standing before him like a meat shield, while he was unscathed?! "Y/N...?" his single remaining eye was wide with shock, staring at the blood splattering to the ground, and the soft tremble of her body. "The flower protected you." Y/N smiled weakly. "That is my happiness in life. Caring for those I hold dear to my heart." she giggled softly. "How pathetic. Any last words?" Papiyas grunted menacingly. "The whole world shall freeze over before I allow a pathetic little shit like you hurt my children. You, and all the Gods that oppose us - All who wish for mankind's erasure - I will fucking burn you all to death until there's nothing left of you to commemorate your wretched existence." Y/N smirked, grabbing Papiyas' arm and forcing herself through the weapon, sticking her own blade into his shoulder. That pissed the demon enough to kick her into the God behind her, toppling them to the ground. "Never do that again!" Buddha briefly scolded her. "Sorry, love, but I will do that, for as many times as my body keeps holding me. I am not strong, but I am resilient. It is you who can kill him, not me. If you are alive, we can win this. Together." Buddha got up, glaring angrily at the demon. "You have twice more, Siddhartha. That is my limit. After that, you're on your own. Use my power wisely." Buddha understood the implication well enough without any explanation - If he gets careless again, Y/N will die, protecting him. Similar to the story of the Moon Rabbit, so is she; Whilst the monkey, the fox and the bird gathered fruit, mean and nuts for the traveler to eat, the rabbit, knowing it could only gather some grass, threw itself into the fire for the man to eat him. Moved by the selflessness of the rabbit, the traveler, who was actually Sakra himself, made it so that the fire did not burn the rabbit, and instead, created the moon in its liking, and the fumes that would have burnt it, the fog surrounding it.

Still, Siddhartha did NOT want to see Y/N actually killing herself like that; Though an admirable and selfless act, he did not want to mourn her, the way he did Jataka long ago. He had to win. He MUST win.

"You're weak. Way weaker than Zero." Buddha taunted the Demon King into attacking him, and he parried all of his hits for as long as he could, before getting kicked away again. His continuing of the mocking caused the Demon King such rage, that he managed to find the perfect opening through his attack, impaling him again - Only, it wasn't him, but Y/N, much to Buddha's dismay. "Damn it, Y/N! Damn it, damn it, damn it!" he wanted to destroy the last flower in his hair, but he didn't have the strength. "One last chance, Siddhartha. Don't waste it." Y/N felt so weak as she got thrown away to the other side of the arena, rolling to the ground like a used ragdoll. "Y/N!" she heard her lover called out, afraid for her life - But as long as the flower of life was pulsating energy within him, he was reassured she was still alive and continuing to actively heal him.

Buddha continued his plan of mocking the enemy, causing him uncharacteristic fright, to the point that he tore off his arm to create a mighty weapon.

Buddha attacked again, though surprisingly, the blade of his Scythe got cut off and shattered to the ground. "Seriously...?!" he gasped, not having expected his Divine Treasure to break, of all things. He tried to defend with his staff, but that, too, broke, sending him away. He was sent to the ground, crashing down with such force that he couldn't move. "SIDDHARTHA!" Y/N cried, crawling to his side and holding him in her arms. She tried desperately to heal him, but he was unconscious, thus nothing she could do. As Papiyas was menacingly approaching, Y/N used her weapon to hoist herself up, creating a shield to protect the two until he woke up.

Thankfully, Buddha achieved enlightenment once again, and he got up, holding Zerofuku's old weapon. The crown holding his hair together shattered, and his gorgeous hair was shown for all to see. "Thank you, Y/N, Zero. Let's fight together, yes?" Y/N smiled sweetly, seeing him confident once again. "Yeah. Let's." despite her bloodloss, Y/N smiled, preparing her weapon. "Samavadhana Volundr!" Buddha and Zero together created a Divine Weapon that only Buddha could attaint through sublime enlightenment. A gorgeous and strong weapon, containing the strength and feelings of all the Gods of Fortune.

Ready to fight, Buddha kept up perfectly with the Demon King, parrying all of his attacks as strong as never before - And he was grinning, confident and self assured, even managing to inflict massive damage, at the cost of some minor injuries on himself. Still, he had to finish things fast, before either he or Y/N perish. He managed to slash away perfectly at his chest one again, though it wasn't as deep as he'd have liked. The climax was approaching fast. Y/N stepped by his side, holding his hand to transfer the last bit of energy into him, so he could keep going - At this rate, he'd only get more injuries, so at least he must keep his vitality and strength, for as long as it lasts. The one sided exchange of life that only Y/N could gift to another.

No matter how Papiyas continued to attack, Buddha was so fast and accurate that no more hit grazed him. The last ultimate attack of the Demon King - All thought landed, but instead, it was a clone, crumbling in an array of petals. Y/N grinned impishly, pointing behind him, as Buddha was ready to kill the foe.

Just as he turned, the last thing Papiyas saw was Buddha's Godly form, perfect beyond boundaries existent to Godhood, and the sword of light, love and compassion shined bright through the dark arena, slicing down the Demon King in two or three. different parts. It didn't matter that Papiyas tried to attack again, for Y/N slapped his hand away, watching as Niflheim was crumbling him to dust.

Somewhere in the sky, the light of heaven showed the happy soul of Zerofuku and the other Seven Gods of Fortune, ascending to Nirvana - Together, in friendship. Buddha couldn't contain his tears of glee, as he brought Y/N into his side, holding the sword dearly into his grasp. Everyone was chanting Buddha's name as he reveled in his win. The sword disappeared, but a bird that loved Zero sat on it, weeping for the loss of its benefactor.

Barely able to stand up, Buddha used all of his strength to drag Y/N out of the arena - Somehow, he was rather sure she was in a far worse shape than he was, having taken two direct hits like that. Not only that, but the refreshing feeling of the gentle caress that Y/N's energy felt, healing him, was keeping him very much alive and giddy. "You were so cool, Y/N. I didn't know you could do all that." Y/N smiled enigmatically. "They say true strength can be found when protecting that which is dearest to you. The truth is, Siddhartha, that I love you more than anything else is this world. You make me the happiest I've ever been." "Ha! Hear you, all sappy and sweet! Y'know you're gonna make me melt!" he cackled, pulling her into a gentle kiss, afraid of causing her more pain. "Let's get all better and continue rooting for humanity, yes? We've done all we could. The rest is their burden to bear - And I think they've done a pretty damn good job so far, don't you think?" "Hella." when she lost strength in her legs, Buddha immediately reacted, picking her up and cradling her in his arms like a princess. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you did that intentionally." he teased her, kissing her forehead. "If most of my blood was inside of me, and not out in the arena, it would have been intentional." she smirked back at him just as comically.

After getting the much required medical care, they continued watching the matches from the comfort of their chamber, laying on the comfortable, fluffy bed, cuddled in each other's arms. Y/N had tied his hair up again, and instead of his golden crown, she replaced it with one made of flowers. He, in return, caressed her hair until she relaxed completely, singing softly the Heart Sutra for her, for as long as it took for her to achieve a much needed peace.

All things are empty: Nothing is born, nothing dies, Nothing is pure, nothing is stained, Nothing increases and nothing decreases. So, in emptiness, there is no body, No feeling, no thought, No will, no consciousness.

There are no eyes, no ears, No nose, no tongue, No body, no mind. There is no seeing, no hearing, No smelling, no tasting, No touching, no imagining. There is nothing seen, nor heard, Nor smelled, nor tasted, Nor touched, nor imagined.

[she-is-ovarit]

I'm over the term "gender equality", and the way in which it is being used and advocated for by the mainstream, status-quo left.

"Men and women are equal" operates under the bias that men are the default standard of equality, which women are then sometimes required or expected to meet. Usually statements like "women are just as strong as men", "women are just as capable as men in sports" act as support.

It intentionally is meant to be cheered on as liberating, but the reality is it's a derivative of "I don't see race I just see people", "no race but the human race", "not disabled just differently-abled", etc. It's a form of sexism that ignores sexism. It's "I am going to ignore biological differences based on sex" when the reality is being of the female sex shapes both my material and lived reality in extremely complex ways and can have dangerous consequences when ignored.

The average woman is not is strong as a man and it often takes a deliberate amount of persistence, training, and/or testosterone injections for us to come close to or meet the male default. "The muscle strength of women indeed, is typically reported in the range of 40 to 75% of that of men". The average man could easily kill and overpower me, and if I were an athlete a man who trained equally to me would defeat me in competition.

Women are 47% more likely than men to be injured in a car accident. Cars were designed for male drivers. In 2011 was when "female" crash dummies were introduced into measuring car safety in the US, however sometimes organizations in the US and UK just used "scaled down male dummies" to test car safety for women. As this article explains, we are not scaled-down men. We have different muscle mass distribution. We have lower bone density. There are differences in vertebrae spacing. Even our body sway is different. And these differences are all crucial when it comes to injury rates in car crashes. And what about pregnant women?

We have different needs and different experiences than males and the world around is us designed with males in mind - from housing to automobiles, to entire economic systems. 85% of women will eventually be mothers. When women take maternal leave to care for a newborn while the man continues to work (or returns shortly later), he effectively advances his career and over time earns more promotions and pay. His schedule is to focus on his career growth and then come home for a few hours in the evening to play with their child (or play videogames). Mothers pay a significant wage penalty for having children from being months out of the labor market.

This list could really go on.

"Gender equality" is utilized by men to distract women from focusing on only women's rights and needs to men's rights and needs. It's used to shoehorn in arguments of "men too" and sympathizing with men on "men's mental health" (while neglecting the fact that men are overwhelmingly and in shocking numbers responsible for violence done to both sexes - and are additionally unlikely to want to work on themselves mentally).

Reframing and enfolding "violence against women", "women's rights", "male violence", "female liberation", and "women's oppression" into the vague language of "gender equality" is a deliberate act of obfuscating the power dynamics between the sexes - in which men globally exploit and oppress women on the axis of sex.

And as vague language, carves a place for people to have the opportunity to shift the responsibility and blame onto women and girls for the suffering that men wield onto their own sex.

Women and girls do have advantages and strengths over men and boys due to our biological differences - yet this, too, goes ignored under the vague concept of "gender equality" and the cultural belief system it evokes, which treats man as the mold that women should fit.

[haggishlyhagging]

Waiting is part of the stereotyped role for women—a large part. Waiting to grow, for breasts and hips to fill out, to wear lipstick, perfume, brassieres: waiting to star in the big role—man enticer. Waiting to be asked for a date. Waiting for the phone to ring. Waiting, waiting for the phone to ring. Waiting to be asked to dance. Waiting to be asked to go steady. Waiting to be asked to marry. Always waiting for someone else to act. Passively, miserably waiting.

And if the phone doesn't ring? If no one asks? If you wait, and wait, and wait, and Prince Charming doesn't come riding up? What can you do?

In the fifties, when I was a young woman, there was nothing you could do and still be considered decent. Being able to choose and act on that choice was a privilege reserved for men. That should have told me something. I think it did, but I didn't want—or didn't know how—to deal with it at the time. So I put it away in that deep unconscious filing cabinet reserved for matters which must have frightened me with their too-clear implications of female servitude and subordination. It took me forty-two years of gathering such data unbeknownst to myself before I finally accumulated more than my file could hold and it burst open, forcing me to look.

Waiting is one of the earmarks of subservience. As Milton truly says, "They also serve who only stand and wait." Waiting is a service. The words waitress, lady-in-waiting, waiter are all service titles. Waiting delineates rank. Sergeants don't keep colonels waiting, but generals do. Teachers don't keep principals waiting, but superintendents do. Those in power can make their subordinates wait, can expect them to wait. To keep someone waiting is manipulation, a method of maintaining control; it is a way of announcing and wielding power.

My unconscious servitude to Rick began early in our courtship. I remember sitting on a bench by the service station for several hours while he fixed his car. It was an unspoken assumption in my youth that girls loved to keep boys company during such times, liked to hold things for them, enjoyed watching them clean the points, or change the brake shoes. Having their girl hovering around must have been like having their own private cheerleader. Girls did it because we wanted to be with them more than they wanted to be with us. We were more emotionally dependent upon them, as we had been trained to be. We needed to be around them, and though they liked having us around, they had other interests in their lives. We had been trained to have only one major interest, despite all the other things we might do, and that was them. Not because it is any more natural for us females to be dependent and to base our entire lives upon some male's approval and presence, but because patriarchy socialized us thus. It is great for male egos. It is catastrophic for ours.

But I didn't get a real taste of the despotism of waiting until Rick discovered the computer at the University of Minnesota. The next ten years were one long struggle against the humiliation of being constantly rejected for the computer—Rick's "iron mistress," his "three sexty." Ten years of being completely forgotten for whole days and suddenly remembered apologetically, of my putting the uneaten supper away and going to bed at midnight or one or two A.M., not having heard from Rick since morning when he promised to be home by six.

That he should have thought it natural to keep a human being waiting for six, seven, twelve hours without word made it clear to me again and again how he thought of me, how not completely human I was to him, how much just a part of himself—not a separate or real person to be taken seriously, or about whose esteem he needed to worry. He would never have kept any male friend whose friendship he valued waiting so consistently for years. No peer would have put up with it.

At the time, I thought it was all my fault. If I were more interesting, more sexy, more something, he would want to come home to me. I blamed myself, when the fault lay in Rick's patriarchal world view.

Part of the unwritten definition of wife is: the one who waits.

I tried to tell Rick over those long years how often I felt rejected and figuratively slapped in the face. I couldn't help but believe he secretly enjoyed the idea of my waiting for him, the constant service of wondering and worrying about him in his absence. Surely there was something more behind his making me wait than mere forgetfulness. He was an extremely intelligent man, but I couldn't get him to understand how deeply he wounded me by showing disdain for the hours of my life I wasted in waiting for him and for the hurt and rage and erosion of love for him this brought about in my heart.

And through it all, I must never make him wait for me. I must never reverse the sadomasochistic game. Yet by calling it that, I admit my own collusion in it. Years ago I should have ceased to care unduly when he came or went, should have planned my life as I wanted without consulting his. Should simply not have allowed him to tyrannize and manipulate me. But I knew that the moment I refused to supply this apparently necessary ego support, I would lose him.

And I did. When I became interested in the ERA, he often had to wait for me—to get off the phone, to come home from meetings, to come to bed. I ceased to pay much attention to when he came and went. I no longer cared a great deal when he was hours late or rejoiced overmuch when he was early. My life no longer centered around him, as his had never centered around me. I began to live an independent life, such as only men are entitled to. That's when I overstepped my bounds and it was all over.

And I've thought since, with considerable wryness, how for nineteen years I waited for him, and how he couldn't wait for me for one.

-Sonia Johnson, From Housewife to Heretic

[wisebeth]

“Sakura is toxic because she made fun of Naruto for being an orphan–”

She regretted it the second after Sasuke rightfully called her out and even opened a therapy center for war orphans.

Ino fatshamed Choji, Shikamaru was a misogynist, Neji misplaced his anger at Hinata, but no one ever calls them out. They were all kids, they all made mistakes.

“Sakura is abusive because she constantly punches Naruto–”

She only hit him in the manga when he did something perverted or disrespectful, it was heavily exaggerated in the anime.

It's called slap stick comedy. If you think it's aBuSiVe, I hope you have the same energy for Jiraiya who peeked at the women's bathroom without consent and gets brushed off as ‘comedic purpose’, double standards much?

“She has Stockholm Syndrome because she loved Sasuke after he tried to kill her–”

They're shinobis. Unlike our real world, it's the norm there to fight each other to death and then make up. Don't get it mixed up.

Naruto forgave every single villain in the series, including Pain who killed his master and destroyed his village. Obito, who killed his parents, started a war, was the reason for the deaths of countless people such as Neji, and Shikamaru & Ino's fathers, formed a terrorist organisation (which was responsible for multiple war crimes) yet no one bats an eye. Lee forgave Gaara who attempted to kill him, Hinata forgave Neji who tried to kill her for something which wasn't her fault. It's the norm there, deal with it.

Sasuke also tried to kill Naruto, Kakashi & Karin and they all forgave him but for some reason only Sakura gets shit for it? Double standards again.

“Sakura is a bitch who loves Sasuke and ignores Naruto who loves her–”

Sakura cares for Naruto, as a friend and her teammate. She's not obligated to return her feelings if she doesn't want to. Naruto doesn't ‘love’ her. He had a childhood crush on her, and it used to be mentioned less frequently than in the anime. SP exaggerated his feelings.

Kakashi didn't return Rin's feelings. Sasuke didn't return Ino, Karin and Sakura's feelings (until ch. 699 in Sakura's case). Naruto didn't return Hinata's feelings until The Last. Tsunade didn't like Jiraiya back. Then why is Sakura hated for something so ridiculous? She's allowed to make her own choices.

“She is shallow, she only liked Sasuke for his looks–”

If her feelings for Sasuke truly were shallow, she'd have moved on after he left the village, she'd have moved on after he became a criminal, like Ino did. She saw Sasuke at his worst and still chose him with all his flaws.

A ‘shallow crush’ wouldn't last for so many years. If her feelings weren't strong or deep, Sasuke wouldn't choose her in the end. If her feelings were superficial she wouldn't risk her life to save him against Gaara. If she didn't love him, she'd not be able to stop his curse mark. If they were superficial, she'd have moved on to date some other handsome man instead of crying over Sasuke.

“Sakura is useless as a main character–”

That's not her fault. That's a criticism for the author. None of the female characters in the series have as much complexity, fight scenes or power as the male characters. It's a shonen centric more to the male characters.

Sakura IS a main character because she contributes more in the manga than other female characters but she's not going to contribute as much as Sasuke or Naruto because the series revolved around men more than women.

Take Attack on Titan for example, it's a shonen where the contribution of male and female characters were distributed equally. In Naruto, it simply wasn't distributed equally.

“Sakura is selfish because she tried to lead on Naruto–”

I can agree here that she was entirely in the wrong and made a very stupid decision. But that's exactly what makes Sakura a realistic character. She's flawed. She makes mistakes. She can be irrational. And that makes her human. She didn't lie to him because she thought it would be fun, she did it to protect. She had good intentions even if she took the wrong approach.

Sasuke, as another of the main characters, did more harm to Naruto than Sakura's confession did but everyone understands and forgives him. Obito started a war and killed people and was forgiven. Itachi killed his entire clan and traumatised Sasuke but the fandom forgives because of his reasoning. Nagato killed people, and was still forgiven.

Then why can't you all be more understanding of Sakura? She did not even half of the terrible things which other characters did but gets more hate for it.

“Sakura is a bad friend to Ino–”

Sakura was SEVEN when she announced Ino as her rival. I'm sorry y'all are morally uptight who's never made a single stupid decision as a kid that you feel the need to accuse a child of being a villain for acting like a child. And it has been implied very clearly Sakura wanted to get out of Ino's shadow and only used Sasuke as an excuse to do so.

And if Sakura was this horrible bitchy friend you guys think she was then I don't think Ino would immediately jump to protect her during chunin exams. Sasuke did more terrible things to his best friend than Sakura did but once only Sakura gets shit for it.

And they never stopped being friends, only their dynamic changed, it included friendly bickering and rivalry. Ino never was mad or bitter with Sakura and even proudly told her she bloomed into a beautiful flower, this doesn't sound like a person who's been unfairly betrayed by a best friend over a crush?

In short, Sakura Haruno is fucking amazing and maybe if y'all didn't hold female characters to such a ridiculous high standard and bothered to understand the manga instead of watching filler episodes, you'd know.

[guacamoleroll]

𝖙𝖍𝖊𝖗𝖊 𝖎𝖘 𝖓𝖔 𝖘𝖜𝖊𝖊𝖙𝖊𝖗 𝖎𝖓𝖓𝖔𝖈𝖊𝖓𝖈𝖊 𝖙𝖍𝖆𝖓 𝖔𝖚𝖗 𝖌𝖊𝖓𝖙𝖑𝖊 𝖘𝖎𝖓 「𝔣𝔶𝔬𝔡𝔬𝔯 𝔡𝔬𝔰𝔱𝔬𝔢𝔳𝔰𝔨𝔶」 ༉‧₊˚

content. f!reader. discussions of asexuality (implied), fyodor dostoevsky character study, not-safe for work content (heavily implied), brief mentions of prostitution, discussions of religion and sexual immorality, fyodor is secretly whipped

author's note. wanted to post some quick little headcanons to interrupt my short hiatus. wrote these on a complete whim, but i will never pass up the chance to talk about my husband ♡ can you tell i currently have the worst hozier obsession imaginable?

would you like to see more? join the taglist or comment under this post!

No masters or kings when the ritual begins. There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin. In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene. Only then I am human. Only then I am clean. — Take Me to Church, Hozier

Fyodor has never had romantic or sexual attraction to anyone before you. Despite being raised in the worst parts of Moscow, where prostitution was rampant amongst the working folk, he had never been attracted to the half-naked women that paraded outside on the streets.

But you made everything different. Your entire being — body, mind, and soul — devours his every waking thought. There is something so divinely imperfect about you — so human and flawed but genuine and true. He never thought it possible to be enraptured in someone, too forlorn by the visages of his youth to consider the possibility of romance or desire. Without anything to break his fall, he slipped deep into his yearning. 

And he may be a charming man, undoubtedly able to flirt and captivate if required, but not to the point of total seduction. Any faux dalliance would cease before it met physical intimacy, not even a mere kiss left on the unsuspecting fool's cheek. But to him, you are not a fool. You mean so much more than that, proven through his rare but deliberate touches.

There is no doubt that Fyodor is a pious man dedicated to living a life in dedication to the workings of a perfect world — for better or worse. And while he does not follow every doctrine to the letter, he would stray away from sexual immorality. For him to indulge in sexual pleasure, he would have to be married. But that doesn't mean he won't bend the rules.

If you ever did have premarital sex, Fyodor thinks of it like this: you are already his; you were destined for one another, so you are already married in the eyes of God.

He wouldn't indulge in sex for his own pure pleasure, despite any he may receive. Instead, he seeks the gratification of bringing you to your knees, literally and metaphorically. The expression of delicate bliss on your face as he, and he alone, brings you to the edge. The sweet, almost sacrilegious pleas that spill from your lips as you beg him to break you more. And, of course, he is more than proud to oblige. 

taglist: @imhandicapableofmath @seisitive @hauntedsol @ruru-kiss @ishqani @zyilas @lovesick-fairy @fedyascoffin @squigglewigglewoo @kelperspelt @thesilvernight0wl @s1eepybunny @kotysluny

© 𝗚𝗨𝗔𝗖𝗔𝗠𝗢𝗟𝗘𝗥𝗢𝗟𝗟 2023 — 𝖽𝗈 𝗇𝗈𝗍 𝗰𝗼𝗽𝘆 𝗈𝗋 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗆𝗒 𝗐𝗈𝗋𝗄 𝗈𝗇 𝖿𝗈𝗋 𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗋𝖾𝖺𝗌𝗈𝗇. 𝗁𝗈𝗐𝖾𝗏𝖾𝗋, 𝗿𝗲𝗯𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘀 𝖺𝗋𝖾 𝖻𝗈𝗍𝗁 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾𝖽 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖾𝗇𝖼𝗈𝗎𝗋𝖺𝗀𝖾𝖽!

[transmutationisms]

I read your review of Poor Things and I was wondering if you had any thoughts on the section in Alexandria? It was horrifically executed on many levels but narratively, that part of the film is about Bella learning about class structure. She rebels against the cruelty of society through charity then by working as a prostitute, during which time she has cruelty inflicted upon her instead. Finally, she realizes that God’s creation of her was ultimately cruel, and then she runs away with her ex-husband-father only to realize that her prior self-mother was fundamentally characterized by cruelty, especially to her “lessers.” She then decides once again that she does not want to be cruel, but then she achieves this by taking God’s place as the doctor-patriarch and ruling his household with a new pet goat. The entire film is also about Bella learning about feminism: the arbitrary oppression of women is not only nonsensical, it’s bad! But then the ending has her reproduce almost all those power structures and cruelty she claims to reject, and has the unfortunate consequence of positioning her as ultimately equally cruel/callous as God, the guy she meets on the boat who shows her all the starving people, and her former self-mother, etc. I was wondering if you had any thoughts on why this is or like, what the director’s message was beyond self-contradiction and taking cheap shots at starving people?

so i would quibble a bit with the idea that bella's experience in the maison-close is exclusively or even primarily portraying sex-for-pay as a site of cruelty. i think it's more depicting paid sex as work, and work as unpleasant and repressive, and that's why the maison is the site where bella gets involved in socialist politics—if moral philosophy is the arena by which she responds to the injustice of the poverty in alexandria, then labour politics plays the analogous role where the maison is concerned. her problems there aren't inherently with the idea of being paid for sex, but with specific elements of the work arrangement (eg, she suggests that the women should choose their clients, rather than vice versa). ofc she has some customers who are cruel or thoughtless or rude, but i didn't read the film as suggesting that was universal to sex work, and the effect of the position is more to demystify sex, for bella, than to convert it into being purely a site of trauma or misery. now i don't think this film offers a particularly blistering or deep analysis of sex work or socialism or wage labour, dgmw, but i do think the function of the maison is different narratively to that of the alexandria section.

anyway to answer your actual question: yeah so this is really my central gripe with the film. lanthimos (slash his screenwriter tony mcnamara) spends much of the film gesturing toward bella's growing awareness of several hierarchical structures that other characters take for granted: the uneven nature of the parent/child relationship (god took her body and created her without asking); class stratification (alexandria); the 'civilisation' of individuals and societies via education and bio-alteration (bella's talk about 'improving' herself; her 'progression' from essentially a pleasure-seeking child to an educated and 'articulate' adult). these three dimensions often overlap (eg, the conflation of 'childishness' with lack of education with inability to behave in 'high society'), though, most overtly, it's in that third one that we can see how these notions of improvement and biological melioration speak to discourses about the 'progress' and 'regress' of whole societies and peoples, and voluntarist ideas about how human alteration of biology (namely, our own) might produce people, and therefore societies, that are better or worse on some metric: beauty, fitness, intelligence, morality, longevity, &c. this is why i keep saying that like.... this film is about eugenics djkdjsk.

the issue with the alexandria section to me is, first, it's like 2 minutes (processed in the hollywood yellow filter) where the abject poverty of other people is a life lesson for bella. we're not asking any questions like, how is that poverty produced, and might it have anything to do with the ship bella is on or the fantastical lisbon she left or the comparative wealth of paris and london...? secondly, everything that the film thinks it's doing for the entire runtime by having bella grapple with learning about cruelty, and misery, and the kinds of received social truths that lanthimos is able to problematise through her eyes because she's literally tabula rasa—all of that is just so negated by having an ending in which she bio-engineers her shitty ex-husband, played as a triumphant moment. i don't even inherently have an issue with the actual plot point; certainly she has motive, and narratively it could have worked if it were framed as what it is: bella ascending to the powerful position in the oppressive system that created her, and using her status to enact cruelty against someone who 'deserves' it—ie, leveraging her class and race within the existing social forms rather than continuing to question or challenge them. if that ending were played as a tragedy, or a bleak satire, it would at least be making A Point. but it's not even, because it's just framed as deserved comeuppance for this guy we were introduced to in the 11th hour as a scumbag, so it's psychologically beneficial for bella actually to do the sci-fi surgery to him that literally reduces him to what's framed as a lower life form. unserious

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

Amazing news on the 129th day of the war: Israel's army has rescued 2 hostages from Gaza, 70 years old Luis Har and 60 years old Fernando Merman (they're two of 5 family members who were all kidnapped together, including Clara Merman who I mentioned before. The women were released as a part of the hostage deal, roughly 2 months ago). The rescue operation was started at roughly 1 in the morning, lasted about 1 hour from the first to the last bullet fired, and took place in Rafah, the last city in Gaza under full Hamas control. That Israel managed to do it in Hamas' last stronghold makes this operation (which required a lot of forces and VERY accurate intel) even more impressive, certainly when you consider how the difference between success and tragic failure in such complex operations is SO small. The IDF spokesman said that from the moment the soldiers broke in, they physically embraced Fernando and Luis to shield the hostages with the soldiers' own body (we've heard from released hostages that the terrorists told then in case of a rescue operation, the orders are for the terrorist to kill them, them themselves. I'm gonna admit, that's when I started crying. I was so happy to hear these two men are okay, but being reminded that young men, with their whole lives ahead of them, physically put their bodies between these elderly men and the terrorists' bullets got to me. It goes against every evolutionary instinct that human beings are supposed to have, and yet... And the truth is, that's what all of our soldiers are doing, they're putting themselves between us, all Israeli citizens, and the brutal violence of the terrorists.

On the left and Luis on the right:

Hamas has made its own announcement about this operation, of course not saying a word about the freed hostages, and instead blaming Israel of committing a massacre. Hamas, which started this whole war by massacring over (at least) 1,200 people, most of which were civilians, and kidnapping over 240 human beings, is accusing Israel of committing a massacre because Hamas says dozens of people were killed (according to the soldiers who engaged in fire with them, there's no question that most of the people killed weren't "uninvolved civilians") during the rescue of the civilians kidnapped by Hamas. Make it make sense. Soap opera logic doesn't make my head hurt as much as that of antisemites.

Yesterday, there were two stabbing terrorist attacks in Jerusalem and near it. The first one happened in the Old City, ending with one person wounded and the terrorist neutralized. The other took place outside the town of Beitar Illit, no one was wounded, the terrorist was neutralized. On a personal note, there's an expert doctor who I've been going to in Jerusalem, and he called me back on a very specific date, but when I called his secretary, it turns out he's fully booked for an entire month past that day. My one option to see him around the date he mentioned, is to go see him at his Beitar Illit clinic. We're talking about a clinic that's 15 minutes from my home, yet right now I feel terrified of going there. It feels like if I go, I may pay for it dearly, and if I don't go, I may pay for it dearly. It's my own country, my ancestral homeland, a place my ancestors, who lived in the same place as I do, weren't scared to travel to. This is not a normal reality, and anyone calling this "resistance" just means they're against Jews having a normal life.

Once more, a Gazan journalist was revealed to be a Hamas terrorist. This time, it's a man who has been reporting for Al Jazeera (which has a long history of antisemitism), and has now been determined to have been a Hamas senior, developing anti-tank missiles for the terrorist organization. I just wanna point out that anti-tank missiles were fired at homes in Israeli civilian communities, including on Oct 7. Please keep in mind these countless journalist who are also linked with Hamas when you hear the lie that Israel is targeting journalists just for reporting.

A 21 years old Palestinian, convicted for terrorist acts, who had been released as a part of the hostage deal, was arrested yesterday after trying to infiltrate Israel using a stolen Israeli ID card. This is the third released convicted terrorist I've heard of to be arrested since the hostage deal in December 2023. There might have been more that I missed. This is a reminder that a terrifyingly high percentage of prematurely released terrorist end up returning to terrorist activity in one capacity or another.

On the same day that Israeli IDF troops courage and willingness to self sacrifice made me cry, we also learned that two soldiers were killed tonight, in a separate (earlier) fight to the one where the hostages were released (in a different part of Gaza). Still, while they might not have been standing physically in front of Israeli civilians, but protecting them is exactly what they did. Every operation that saves a hostage is made possible by the army's presence and progress in Gaza. If soldiers were able to free hostages in the southern part of Gaza, it's thanks to each one fighting (and dying) in the northern parts, too. So today, I'm gonna remember that, as we say goodbye to these two 21 year olds. Our hearts bleed with their families for this loss. May their memory be a blessing.

These are 32 years old Eynav Levy and her 33 years old husband Or.

On Oct 7, they arrived at the Nova music festival just minutes before Hamas' attack started. Eynav was murdered, while Or was taken hostage to Gaza. They have a 2 years old baby, Almog. He doesn't understand, and there is no way to explain to him, where his parents have disappeared to. May Eynav's memory be a blessing, and Or return, so his son will still have at least one parent.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[vampyrsm]

‣‣ COR UNUM: CHAPTER FOUR | IZANAGI

‣‣ Synopsis: Our tale continues once again with blood that taints the water, and a name is revealed in the midst of battle. Who will win, the forgotten Shogun's daughter or one of the most powerful Samurai of Japan?

‣‣ Main Masterlist | AO3 ‣‣ Pairing: Sukuna x Reader ‣‣ Word Count: est. 8k ‣‣ Warnings: Blank blogs & Minors DNI. Dead Dove: Do Not Eat. Cannibalism, set in the Early-Heian Period, trueform!Sukuna, graphic descriptions of dead bodies, descriptions of murder, gore, lots of death, era-typical violence & views, reader knows how to use weaponry.

It had been another week since you were allowed to live with the other women of the shrine. It had been going somewhat smoothly, despite the hiccups that occurred. You had found out the morning after your bath in the hot spring that you were to be assigned to cleaning.

It wasn’t unexpected, in fact, it was one of the jobs you knew you’d most likely be getting. It was a lowly job, even for a servant, and Sukuna must’ve found great joy in the idea of having you clean up the mess left behind.

However, you hadn’t banked on the idea of the cleaning being more than waxing the floors and sweeping away dust. You were subjected to cleaning Sukuna’s own personal shrine. 

It wasn’t as grandiose as the one the Buddhists had once used in this very shrine, not nearly as golden but it was fearsome. It was a separate building on the temple grounds that he had occupied as his own, the floors were made of cold stone and the walls were tall. Within those tall walls, sat the centre of the shrine. It was a typical shinto shrine, but instead of honouring the Gods; it was honouring the demon that hunted women for fun. 

It was surrounded by skulls and bones, some animal – like bull skulls, and some most definitely human. You didn’t need to wonder if they had been put there for decoration when you saw the abysmal state of the floor. You were thankful for the stone floor, blood was terribly hard to get out of wooden floors. It soaked it up like a sponge, but with stone, it simply sat atop as water would.

It took you four hours to clean the shrine on the first day, and the same the next few days until you were tasked with it today. 

The stone floor was still coated in blood, but instead of finishing his meal, Sukuna had left the corpse where it was. Half-eaten, shredded skin and muscle sprawled across the floor and splattered against the paint of the Shinto shrine. 

You stood motionless in the doorway into the shrine, the light that you had let in illuminates the face of the woman who had come to her untimely demise. You recognise her, she was one of the cooks of the complex. An older lady, perhaps in her thirties – definitely one of the oldest in the entire place, and she was kind to you. Maybe she had been a mother at some point with the way she mothered you with sneaky portions of extra rice.

It feels surreal to see her now spread thin across stone floors, it almost makes her not seem like a human anymore. Did Sukuna do this on purpose to torment you? Maybe he had seen the way she was more lenient with you, he couldn’t let you feel any ounce of joy here. 

Your water bucket is heavy in your hand before you set it down on a clean patch by the door. With steps through the blood that splashed against your socked feet, soaking into the material until you felt it between your toes and under your nails, you crouch down towards the body. 

Her eyes are open, and it’s like second nature for you to reach across and close her eyes to stop her from looking at you like that. Her skin is cold, no doubt having been here throughout the night whilst everyone slept. A quick survey of the surrounding area shows no scraps of her clothes, and the parts of her body that still remained somewhat intact were most definitely nude. 

You don’t realise you’re staring at the body in front of you until her face morphs into your own, and it’s you who is laid out on the stone floor before the shrine with your body ripped asunder. 

No. You couldn’t end up like this, you wouldn’t end up like this.

Moving the body itself was easier said than done, even with half of it presumably eaten. You’re not sure if it would be wise to remove her from the shrine, perhaps Sukuna had plans to return to his half-eaten cold meal later tonight so you set her aside. 

Then you get to work on dragging your sponge through where she had been last laid. You never quite grasped the concept of just how compact the human body was, and all the organs within. Not until it was laid out before you in a messy pool of blood. You sweep shredded intestines and part of what you think might be the liver to the edge of the shrine where you had put the corpse.

You weren’t sure if Sukuna liked to eat those parts, you assumed he must if he never left anything behind most nights.

Once clear of the body parts, you return to the water bucket. You ignore the blood that coats your hands when you grab the sides of the bucket, and you have to ignore the rippled bloodied reflection of yourself when you catch a glimpse of it. It’s like second nature now for you to tip the water bucket over, the splash of cold water is loud in the otherwise silent part of the complex.

You watch as the water rolls towards you, down the natural slope of the building until it creates a small red river that flows down the steps and into the courtyard. At first, you had questioned why the shrine in the first place would be sloped in such a way until you realised it was for the ease of cleaning out blood. 

“This is how you clean my shrine?” The voice is close behind you, and suddenly you can feel the pressuring presence that follows Sukuna around like a breeze. It sits heavy on your shoulders, grasps at your limbs until you’re stuck in place. 

You hadn’t even heard him approach. Most predators didn’t alert their prey of their impending doom, instead opting to sneak closer and closer until it was too late for the prey to realise they had been caught. And Sukuna continues to loom over you, his large frame blocks out the light of the outside world and shrouds the shrine in an eerie darkness.

“You throw water at it and call it a day?” 

You want to bite at him, snarl your own words and tell him that you hadn’t even finished yet — and it would’ve been done more efficiently if he hadn’t left his food lying around. 

“No, Master Sukuna.” is the words you settle on biting out instead, and his response is to hum in an unconvinced tone. 

“Then show me how you do it.” 

He shoves you down onto your knees in front of him, the crack of your bones against the stone is muffled by his low laugh. He steps around you, ‘accidentally’ kicking your empty bucket away from you before he’s standing in front of his shrine — in front of you. 

Your eyes are glued to the floor, evidence of the blood still present but not quite the bloodbath you had originally walked in on.

“I need to get fresh wa–”

“No. Use what you have.” 

The cloth slides through the pink-tinted water, brushing it towards the natural slope of the stone floor. Sukuna is silent as he watches you agonise over the fact the small white cloth is not quite catching as much water anymore, and when you wring it out it only adds to the bloodied water that seems endless. 

With each useless squeeze of the blood-sodden rag, you feel a slip of your resolve. 

“Master Sukuna,” you address him, eyes not once leaving the bloody red cloth in your hands. He stays silent for a moment, you briefly wonder if perhaps he somehow left without you realising it.

“Speak.” He demands.

“May I go and fetch some more water?” You wait for a second, his silence is palpable. “Please.”

You can feel Sukuna’s eyes on you, inspecting the state of your clothes no doubt and the blood that taints your skin. It makes you want to squirm under his scrutiny, that unwanted feeling that bubbles in your stomach and up your throat until it threatens to spill itself onto the floor. His presence has always had an immense feel to it, and it’s oh-so suffocating.

“Fine.” You scramble to your feet, a quick bow of thanks thrown his way before you move as fast as you can to retrieve your tipped-over empty water bucket. You’re thankful for the fresh air when you step a foot outside of the shrine, and the lungful you gulp feels like your first breath in a very long time.

You’re one step down from the shrine when his voice calls for you again.

“If you touch my food again, I will make you eat it. Then, I will eat you.” 

You don’t think he’s bluffing, he wouldn’t bluff. A demon like him would never lie about such a thing, he lives off of your fear and torment. He was telling the truth. So you nod your head once in understanding before you run as fast as you can away from the shrine.

The more distance you put between yourself and Sukuna, the more you feel like you can think clearly. No longer is his darkness creeping on the edges of your brain and your heart beats at a slower, more calm pace. His idle threat still lingers on your mind, the reminder of the heart you had been forced to consume still makes your stomach turn uncomfortably whenever you think of the texture. 

It was one of the worst experiences you had ever gone through, and you can only imagine different parts of the human body would be worse. 

You don’t realise you’re at the well that lingers at the edge of the complex until you’re stood over it, the bucket in your hand smeared in stains of blood from your dirty hands. You dunk it down into the well, the freezing cold water stings at the tips of your fingers. 

It was oddly quiet for the time of day, you realise. When you take a look around, you realise there is no one in the courtyard tending to the flowers or airing the fresh linen. The next thing you realise is the large gate that otherwise encloses the complex is wide open, a winding path that’s covered in golden leaves leads down a hill to the unknown. 

Your heart quickens. Your blood races with the realisation that you could leave. Right now. You could run, maybe even run into a village so that they could get you to safety. But were you faster than an apex predator who was designed for the thrill of the hunt? He had more arms than you, you don’t doubt he’d rip the village apart just to find you. 

The bucket falters in your grasp for a moment, water spilling onto your sodden socks. The cold shock is enough to cause you to gasp, breaking your gaze away from the path that could lead to either your freedom or the demise of innocent people who don’t know what lives in the shrine nearby. 

No. You wouldn’t have more innocent lives destroyed because of you. You had a plan; a goal. You were going to ensure that the monster that feasts on bones would not terrorise another village.

You feel a familiar burning gaze upon your skin, and when you turn to see who or what was staring at you – you’re met with nothing but the empty courtyard. But that feeling of being watched is still ever present, so you hurry back towards the shrine. The path to your presumed freedom dwindles away. 

Sukuna thankfully isn’t in the shrine anymore, and neither is the body of the older lady you had moved earlier. There isn’t any new blood either, something that has you heaving a heavy sigh of relief. You do the same as you did before, but more strategically with a zig-zag pattern you draw with the water bucket to ensure you get it between the nooks and crannies of the stone tiles.

Once the shrine is returned to its previous state of cleanliness, the sky is dark and the stars have come out to play. The moon hangs over the sky, it’s late — that means it should be time for you to be allowed food. That alone has you hastily sliding the doors to the shrine closed, a silent prayer to whatever may be watching that tomorrow there’ll be no dead body for you to clean. 

Dinner that night had gone by relatively quietly, there were no arguments among the women who all lived in the same room. There was an odd feeling in the air; like an impending doom of some sort. You couldn’t put your finger on it exactly, but there was definitely something that was causing a few of the younger newer servants of Sukuna to appear very antsy. 

On the way back to the room that was your new bedroom, you were cut off by Uraume. They stood before you, hands tucked inside the sleeves of their kimono and an expectant raise of their eyebrow had you bowing at the waist to greet them.

“Master Sukuna has requested you to join him in his chambers tonight. You will bring him his sake.” Uraume is curt as always, not waiting for you to acknowledge or question why Sukuna wants you of all people to bring him his sake. They turn, leaving down the corridors of the large shrine until they vanish behind a shoji door.

You make the turn back towards the kitchen, finding the tray that you were to serve for Sukuna already set. It’s small, one small saucer-like cup and three flasks of what you assume to be sake. Years of practice with the sword has your arms firm enough to not shake the tray as you venture away from the safety of your bedroom and towards Sukuna’s.

It’s akin to the walk of shame, perhaps better suited to be named the walk of death. Maybe he’d grow hungry and gnaw on your bones tonight with a side of sake. Maybe he was still angry at you for touching his food without permission earlier today in the shrine. 

Your thoughts cloud your mind until you’re standing before the large sliding doors that lead into Sukuna’s room. The artwork on the door is all hand painted, you can tell from the individual brush strokes and you briefly wonder who he may have gotten to do it. It’s a gruesome picture, bloody and violent, and there’s no doubt who is in the centre of the fire and chaos. 

It’s a self-portrait, and that thought alone has you wanting to smash the delicate china on the tray against the door. 

But instead, you lower down onto your knees and knock on the door. It’s silent for a moment, and then you hear it — a loud clap of hands. 

The door slides open easily enough, and you slide in the tray first then yourself. You focus on the task at hand, closing the door and bowing as low as you can get to the floor. You can’t tell where Sukuna is in the room but you know he’s watching you, the hairs on the back of your neck stand at the attention of the predator that watches you so closely.

“Bring it here.” He demands, his voice low and yet still commanding. You raise from the bow, delicately taking hold of the tray before you rise back to your feet. Your footsteps are muted against the soft tatami floor, and finally, you take in the image before you.

Sukuna is sitting in a corner, surrounded by scrolls and literature. The table he’s using is low to the ground, and he’s perched upon a large Zabuton cushion. He’s leaning his lower right arm on the separate armrest, the upper arms are crossed over his bare chest and he’s not quite glaring at you as you approach. 

He almost looks like he’s got too much on his mind to conjure up the effort to scowl at you.

You lower down into a kneeling position once in front of him, carefully sliding the tray towards him. You don’t wait for permission to pour him a drink, you’ve come to understand from the other women that he doesn’t like to ask for things — he prefers things to be done automatically, without thought.

The sake sits in the small saucer, waiting for him to pluck it from the tray and drink it in one go. But he doesn’t move yet, and you take the chance to glance up at his face. He’s not even looking at you now, only two of his eyes are open whilst the bottom set rests as if they were closed for sleep. He’s scouring over the scrolls on the table, the brush he was using to write his own letters sits waiting in a pot of ink.

“Master Sukuna,” and he hums in response quite quickly to you, “May I ask you a question?”

One of the lower set of eyes opens just enough to glance at you, and he huffs out a sigh that’s quite unbefitting of the monster you know him as. 

“One question.”

Well. That certainly makes you want to second guess the question you wanted to ask, your lips twist a little in thought and Sukuna seems to be put off by the wait for your question. His head turns towards you, and that scowl he often sends your way is making itself present. 

“What’s plaguing your mind?” You ask, and you bitterly regret it when he frowns so much that you think it may be the last thing you see before your head is removed from your shoulders.

Instead of answering, he leans forward to swipe the saucer with the sake in and swallows it in one gulp. The small saucer that looked like it would still fill your palm was far too small in his, his index and thumb were delicately holding it — it was odd, to see a creature of such mass destruction holding the fine china with care.

He places it down, and you move to automatically refill it. This repeats four more times before he settles into his position once again, the arms crossed over his chest reaching over to the table to pluck a scroll from the collection he had opened.

He flicks it towards you, the paper bounces off of your chest and into your hands when you fumble to catch it. You look down, reading over the painted black letters. 

The Shogun moves north. The Shogun’s army is in search of a four-armed beast, said to eat the souls of women and children. The demon is rumoured to be residing in an old Buddhist temple. Kill him and everyone there.

It’s not signed by anyone, a simple mark in the corner shows it was approved by the Shogun. You weren’t sure who gained the title after the passing of your father, but you knew the number of Samurai that were within the Shogun’s army. That number was excessive to deploy on a singular temple… they must know who Sukuna was and exactly what he was capable of. 

The words trouble you, however. They wanted to kill both Sukuna and whoever else was within the temple. Did they think you were all sympathisers? Followers of Sukuna? They didn’t know that all of you were plucked from your homes after he slaughtered your families. 

Your hip feels awfully empty without the weight of your sword, you had no defence if they were to strike at some point. Could it be soon? You have no idea how old this letter was—

“The gate.” You mumble. The unease that fills your stomach is suffocating, your heart thunders against your chest more and more with each passing second. The gate. Someone had opened it to the outside world.

“What?” Sukuna rips the scroll from your hand, eyes scouring to see what he may have missed to make you say that. “What gate?”

“The gate on the east side of the temple. It was left open.” 

You meet his gaze once you glance up from the sake set before you, and for the first time, you see a new emotion on Sukuna’s face. He looks concerned. His eyebrows are pressed together in thought, all four eyes are wide and alert. He didn’t know about the gate. 

“They’re already here.” He summarises, sharpened claws shredding through the scroll. The air around him intensifies, the suffocation of such a dark presence causes you to recoil away from him when he starts to stand. “They’re already in my fucking shrine.”

“I’ll kill them all.” He marches past you, ripping open the shoji door with such ferocity that it’s ripped from its sliding mechanic and left awkwardly hanging. “Stay here. Do not move.” 

You’re left to watch his figure disappear further down the corridor until he turns a corner and he’s gone. It’s awfully quiet, and that same antsy air that had settled upon the women at dinnertime is back once again. Something feels off. How did the Shogun know the exact location of the shrine? As far as you were aware, Sukuna had gone to great lengths to secure this place as his own sanctuary.

There’s a clatter in the distance that sounds like a door being broken through, and then suddenly there’s an uproar of voices. A lot of voices. Not women, but men. The Shogun’s army was here. Immediately you’re up from your kneeling position, and you turn on your heels to survey the room.

Your weapon must be here. It must still be here, he had brought it with you – so surely he must’ve kept it close to him, somewhere you could never get it back and use it against him. But each turn of your head reveals that his room is empty of any sheathed sword until you turn towards his futon. 

Above the bed is a long-handled spear, a Naginata. It’s three-pronged, something so rare and odd that you’re not sure if it would even be good to use in battle. However, a weapon is a weapon and you move across the room. Climbing across the platform that houses Sukuna’s futon to swipe it off of the rack it was on. 

It’s heavy in your hands, as your fingers slide along the black hilt towards the end of it – it’s got a hoop, as if it could be connected to a chain of some sort. What kind of person would use this when it was attached to a chain? The arm length you’d need— Oh. This was Sukuna’s personal weapon.

“What do we have here?” An unfamiliar voice speaks from behind you, and you spin fast enough on instinct to slam the blunt end of the hilt into his temple…

…But it never connects. In fact, it hovers just a few inches from his face and you stare in horror at the fact you’re frozen in place. Whatever you’re hitting feels like a brick wall, but you can’t see what you’re hitting. 

“Foolish woman. Swinging around a weapon that’s not befitting of your station.” The unknown Samurai tuts, lifting his head enough to reveal his face from beneath the Jingasa hat he wore.

You’re met with the brightest blue eyes you have ever seen. White lashes frame them, and that feeling from before returns — something is terribly wrong here. You had to get away from this man, away from whatever invisible barrier was surrounding him. 

He doesn’t try to grab you when you back away, pulling free the weapon from its invisible prison and spinning it in your hand until it’s lined with your body. The blue-eyed Samurai tilts his head at the stance, an eyebrow-raising – he recognises that type of stance. Of course, he would.

“Who trained you?” He asks. 

“My father.” And the man in response hums in response, his lips set into a thin line. 

“Tell me your clan name.” 

Your lips move to form the name of your late husband but your tongue stops, the word dies and instead, your family name rolls off your tongue. 

“Zen’in.” 

Most people would perhaps laugh at the futile attempt to use a former Shogun’s name as a way to worm their way out of a situation, but instead, the blue-eyed Samurai just tilts his head for a moment and flits his gaze over you. But it’s different from when people have looked at you; he’s looking through you, into you.

“So you’re the Shogun’s niece.” He huffs out something that sounds like a scoff, disbelieving that he’d stumble across you of all people in a place like this. 

Niece. Your uncle was the new Shogun, having been passed on by your father to him no doubt. You had no brothers, you were never to inherit the title – a woman had no place with the title Shogun. 

“A shame. I’m sure your Uncle would’ve loved to know you were still alive, but he’s very certain you had died alongside your husband a few weeks ago.” 

“Who are you? My father had never mentioned a Samurai who could stop attacks with… with sorcery.”

“Sugawara Michizane.” He offers his name, a slight up-tick of the corner of his mouth as he finds amusement in your confusion. You don’t recognise his name.

And then, in the midst of your thoughts, the Samurai moves fast, maybe faster than Sukuna had when he first attacked you. He’s across the room in a blink of an eye, there’s the click of a katana being unsheathed. You react out of instinct, the hilt of the spear you hold clangs with the metal of the sword and the Samurai doesn’t relent. 

He brings his sword back and attempts a strike on your opposite side, your fingers tighten around the spear – you’re not going to make it, he’s going to hit you. But there’s another clang of metal hitting your spear, and you find that you had moved the spear to meet the blow. 

Blue eyes widen at what he witnessed before they narrow at you. “So you inherited your father’s technique.” 

Technique? You had inherited his swordsmanship, yes, but his technique with a sword was far superior to your own. He moved faster than any man you had seen, he wiped the floor with his opponents when they said he was too busy with politics to be a real Samurai. 

You’re pulled from your thoughts when the Samurai backs away from you, his katana sits sheathed once again and this time he raises his hands at you. His arm is outstretched in your direction, an odd glow illuminating the contours of his face in a blueish light that seems to be forming around his hand.

The hairs on the back of your neck and arms stand on end, the feeling that came from his hands was something similar to Sukuna’s. It was a powerful energy. So you move. You move faster than you ever have before in your life, it’s as if time itself slows down to allow you to sprint across the room with your spear brandished. 

The eyes of the man follow your movements, but his body is too slow. You lower down onto one knee once you approach, below the outstretched hand that has a slow-growing orb of blue energy starting to form at the very tips of his fingers. And you strike with the tip of your Naginata upwards into his chest.

It passes by the barrier surrounding him, a buzzing sound that hisses at the foreign entity that passes by and then you feel the familiar wall of what it’s like to strike a body. The spear makes quick work of cutting its way through muscle and organs alike, lodging itself into its resting place next to his spine.

The world seems to spin back to the correct time, and the blue light that had been aimed at you fires regardless of having no target. It comes with a loud bang, the sound of walls being shattered and dragged along with whatever had come from the Samurai who’s staring down at you in disbelief. 

His blood curls around the three prongs of the spear, around the handle until it sullies your hands. 

“How?” He splutters, blood staining his teeth and filling the cracks of his lips as he glowers down at you. “You shouldn’t—... Nothing can…”

His hand raises once again, and this time instead of the blue glow, it’s a vibrant red that nearly blinds you with how bright it is in front of your face. This one feels much more different to the blue energy that vibrated around his hands, this one feels more destructive and more violent. 

You square your shoulders and push all of your strength into your arms and legs as you grab ahold of the spear before running it upwards through the man's body. The red glow falters until it dims completely, the spear rips free of his shoulder with a vicious spray of blood that coats your once pristine white kimono. 

He crumbles to his knees, hands uselessly turned upwards in his lap and his head tilts back to stare up at you. His once vibrant blue eyes seem dull now, blinking sluggishly up at you. 

“You’re a disgrace to your family…” He mutters, words wet with the blood on his tongue and yet he manages to say them loud enough that they strike deeply at your already wounded heart. “A Curse User's whore.”

You want to ask him what he means by that, ask him what a curse user even is but there’s the sound of fighting in the distance. You glance down at the Samurai, his head now dropped downwards until his chin presses into his chest. He no longer moves, his heart ceasing its sluggish attempts of keeping him alive.

You had killed one of the Shogun’s samurai. You were a traitor. 

The sound of fighting grows louder, yells of Samurai as they get no doubt ripped to shreds by clawed hands. You leave the body of the samurai known as Sugawara in his final resting place and dart down the corridor towards the room that should have all the women inside still – hopefully, they had kept together, huddled for safety. 

Yet when you rip the door open, you’re met with the kind of silence that accompanies death. In each of the beds, there is a body. Faces of women you had gotten to know and even shared food with, the young faces of women who had washed your hair and in turn, you had washed theirs, all of them are lax. 

You would’ve assumed them to be asleep if it wasn’t for the growing pool of blood that seeped into the wooden floors, into the cracks. Each of their necks was slit. All at the same time. This wasn’t Sukuna’s doing, he would’ve shredded them no doubt. This was organised, most likely by Shinobi that had slipped in through the shadows and slid a knife across each of their throats so they didn’t awaken.

You could’ve been one of them, you realise. If you hadn’t been summoned to Sukuna’s chambers by him. You could be dead and by the hands of the army that had once served your father; and in turn, served you. 

Men are monsters. Monsters are men.

You have to find Sukuna. Why? Perhaps to kill him, none of this would’ve happened if he didn’t exist. You couldn’t undo the past but you could right the future—even if you were classed as a traitor, maybe it’d be for nothing in the end. The Naginata no longer weighs anything in your hand, as you let it roll in your hand until its hilt is positioned between your bicep and ribcage for safekeeping. 

The halls are easier to navigate once you narrow down the sounds of the fighting, it leads you to the entrance where you had seen the open gate just earlier that day. The doors had been ripped off, and immediately you’re hit with the smell of tangy copper that sticks to the roof of your mouth.

It’s a battlefield, swords are snapped and buried into the ground where they had fallen from the hands of the Samurai who had dared to approach Sukuna. And the monster himself is closer to the gate, a large figure doused in blood as he swipes at thin air to only have men a few feet away splinter into three parts as if he had used his claws directly on their skin.

You can only stand and watch, in both horror and amazement to see him in his element. He clearly was designed for such chaos, he strived off of it. His muscles moved perfectly with each move he made, each of them calculated and precise. He didn’t quite move like a monster would; a monster was often frantic in its attacks. Instead, Sukuna moves with a sense of regality, an air of superiority and you can only think of one thing.

He looked like a King at war.

There’s a movement on the sidelines of the ongoing fight, and you spot one of the Shogun’s shinobi climbing up into the shadows of the night atop the roof. Sukuna doesn’t see him. His eyes laser-focused on all the Samurai who come at him head-on, he’s going to be caught off-guard. He’s going to be taken down by a ninja belonging to the same army that had slaughtered innocent women.

You glance at the ground quickly, spotting a long bow that had been dropped by an archer who had thought it would be wise to attack from afar — that clearly didn’t work out. You swipe it up, the Naginata being placed on the floor next to your feet. 

There had been times when you were trained with a bow as a child, something your father had actually said yes to when you were younger. Often it was just for hunting, a hobby that you had partaken in quite often to catch game for your husband. Your form is no different this time as you aim your arrow at a man, you suck in a harsh breath and hold your form steady. 

The ninja from above exclaims something as he leaps from the roof, and Sukuna spins around last second to see where the noise is coming from but instead, his eyes settle on you. His gaze is burning through you, no doubt cursing you for even stepping foot out of his chambers and disobeying his order.

But he remains in place, watching as you release the breath you were holding and the arrow soars through the air like a knife through butter. The ninja is hit directly, a clean arrow through the throat, falling to the ground with a loud crunch of bones against a stone path.

You can feel that same burning gaze as you pull another arrow from the fallen archer's quiver, nocking and drawing it to release it into one of the Samurai who raised a sword to Sukuna’s blindside. You don’t dare meet Sukuna’s eyes, you’re unsure if you’ll like what you see as you continue to prove yourself a traitor to your own country and kill those who served the Shogun; your uncle. 

Eventually, that burning crimson gaze is ripped away from you, and you lower your bow to find that you had killed the remaining Samurai in the courtyard. But you’re unable to relax or find solace in that they were dead. There’s the distant sound of marching footfall, another wave of Samurai no doubt coming. 

This time you watch as Sukuna flexes two of his hands in front of him, an orange glow starting to form between his fingers before he then draws his arms up, a direct mimicry of your own stance when you had drawn a bow. He releases the fire arrow, and it soars through the night sky like a shooting star until it plants itself into one of the leading Samurai. 

And from there, it explodes into a larger flame that bounces from man to man until they’re a distant flame filled with anguished screams and the slowly approaching smell of cooked flesh. Sukuna stands there silently, watching the scene from afar and you can see the tension loosen in his shoulders for just a moment. But then he turns abruptly towards you, a feral snarl resting on his face when he meets your gaze.

A hand grasps at your jaw, squeezing so tightly that you can feel your bone pop uncomfortably. Sukuna glares down at you, his own face is covered in blood similar to your own. 

“Did you know this would happen?” He growls, claws starting to pierce through the flesh of your cheeks. “Did you know that we had a spy living here?!” 

A spy? Did he mean one of the girls? Surely not… How… How would that work? Sukuna shakes you from your thoughts, a loud growl ripping through his throat. “Answer ME.”

“No!” You yell back, a hand coming up to grab at his wrist uselessly in hopes of peeling him away from your face. “I swear to you I didn’t know! I only knew the gate had been left open when I was cleaning your shrine!”

Sukuna is quiet for a long moment, or it feels like a long moment but perhaps no longer than a few seconds pass by before he releases your face.

“One of those whores escaped, a signal for the Shogun to make his move.” He reveals, running a bloodied hand through his already blood-soaked hair until it’s slicked back. His chest is heaving with the effort he had put into slaughtering men as if they were nothing but sheep. 

“Pick that up.” He points with one of his lower hands at the Naginata, and you quickly bend down to grab it. You figure he may want it back, and when you go to offer it to him he instead grabs at your bicep and you’re pulled along behind him. 

It’s hard to keep up the pace behind such a gigantic man, his single footsteps were about five of your own. Your socked feet drag along stone uncomfortably, cutting into the heel when you try to push off of your feet to keep up. 

Sukuna doesn’t speak again as he drags you away from the shrine through one of the back gates and into the forest. The stench of death and burning wood grows fainter and fainter with each scrape of your now-bloodied feet through the undergrowth of the forest. Sukuna doesn’t seem to care that you’re hissing in pain with each stumble over hidden rocks and sharp prick of nettles. 

You have no idea where he’s dragging you, or why he was even dragging you away from the shrine in the first place? Surely it’d be easier for him to kill you, or even just leave you there to be discovered by the Shogun. Who knows what the Shogun would have in store for you if you were found alive amongst the slaughtered.

You’re abruptly stopped, however, much to the relief of your feet that still sting when you put weight onto them. You look up at Sukuna to see him wordlessly staring ahead, and so you follow his gaze. You’re at the foot of a farmer's field. 

It looks like a regular field, more of a pasture of sorts for animals. And you seem to be right when Sukuna’s head quickly lifts and shifts his gaze to movement in the farther end of the field — horses. 

“Wait,” you tug back on his wrist when he starts to move again and you’re surprised to see him turn his eyes back down to you, though he looks very displeased at the order to stop. “You can’t just steal a farmer’s horse.”

Sukuna stares blankly at you, lips that were turned downwards are now a flat line and you can see it’s taking every ounce of his dwindling self-control to not shout at you. 

“Murderers don’t get a say.” He shoves the words at you instead, and you’re back to stumbling behind him. You suppose he does have a point, a very good one. You were by all definitions of the word; a murderer, a traitor. You had killed not just one but a dozen Samurai… and in turn, saved Sukuna’s life. 

It wasn’t something you planned on doing, in fact, you’d argue you only retaliated because of what they did to the innocent women you lived with and Sukuna surviving was just an unfortunate consequence. Or at least that’s what you tell yourself. 

You couldn’t have possibly done all that for Sukuna. You wouldn’t. He was a monster, nothing more and nothing less. He feasted on human bones and forced you to eat your own late husband's heart. He wasn’t worthy of saving…

And yet.

“Stay here.” He orders, before turning back to you with a long finger pointed at your face. “And I mean it this time. Do not move or I’ll have your fingers for breakfast.”

This time you don’t move from your spot, awkwardly moving from foot to foot to relieve the pain as you watch Sukuna slink off into the darkness of the field. You wonder if a horse would even trust him. When you had worked with the horses for the army they had all been temperamental around people with less than good intentions.

They often loved you and hated the men who’d ride them into battle. You can’t imagine a horse's reaction to a four-armed, two-faced, bloody monster approaching. They probably would think it was a predator, which he was, that was coming to eat them. 

Maybe he still will. He didn’t seem to have a specific need to eat women, but rather a preference. You wanted to ask why he did that, what the difference between a man and woman was when it came to consuming their flesh — …but on second thought, perhaps it was best to be left in the unknown on that one.

“Here,” Sukuna calls to you through the darkness, and much to your surprise he had managed to wrangle one of the larger workhorses. It’s giant compared to you, but next to him, he stands level with the horse's head, if not slightly taller. You watch as he climbs up onto the horse's back first, steadying the reins he somehow snagged and wrangled onto it.

He moves the horse effortlessly, before leaning two hands down for you to grab. You take the upper one and the lower arm loops around your waist to rip you through the air and force you onto the horse in front of him. It’s an uncomfortable squeeze, and you’re forced into the warm embrace of his chest and arms as he readjusts the reins. 

Sukuna doesn’t say anything, however. Opting to keep his lower arms by your sides to ensure you didn’t slip off and vanish in the night, his upper arms guide the horse back towards the forest; away from the farmer’s house and away from the shrine.

“Where are we going?” You ask after around ten minutes on horseback, and Sukuna huffs out a heavy sigh on top of your head. 

“You’ll find out when we get there.” He offers bluntly, it had hardly been ten minutes and he was fed up with this predicament already it seemed.

So you huff out your own sigh, crossing your arms over your chest like a petulant child and you think you feel the rumble of a low laugh in his chest from where you’re pressed into it. The night is quiet except for the hooves of the horse that keeps up a steady pace despite the two people it carries, the forest surrounding you is silent. 

There’s no feeling of eyes on you, not like the forest that surrounded the temple. Instead, it feels very lonely, was it survivors' guilt perhaps? You were the lone survivor of an attack on the shrine, and Sukuna had kept you alive, but for what purpose? Was he still going to kill and eat you? Or maybe he’d find a new fun game by keeping you alive to torment you about what you had done? 

“What about Uraume?” You ask after some time, the uphill climb has you leaning more into Sukuna’s chest but he doesn’t seem to care by his lack of comment on the weight you press into him. 

“They’ll find me. They always do.” 

“Will the Shogun find us again?” Sukuna hums in response to that question at first, his fingers twitching at your sides for a moment. 

“Probably. Especially after they find the aftermath of their attempt to kill me.”

You nod your head at that, not quite sure if Sukuna can even see you from your place beneath his chin. Your fingers itch at your now dried bloodied clothes, picking at parts of the flaky red to watch it crumble and fall away into the darkness. 

“What happened, after I left.” His question catches you off guard, enough to keep you stunned in silence for a moment. He prompts you to speak again with a rough jab of a finger into your ribs. 

“A man found me. A Samurai, I guess. But he wasn’t like any Samurai I’ve met before.” 

“Met a lot of Samurai, have you?” 

“...Some.” You offer, you didn’t quite feel like offering up your name and heritage to a man who seemed hellbent on killing the Shogun’s army for whatever reason. 

“Continue.” Sukuna gruffs, and the now downhill climb has him pressing you forward and his breath blows hotly against the top of your head. 

“He could stop my attacks before they even hit him. I didn’t understand it. And then he could… make light appear from his fingers? But it wasn’t light. It was more like…”

“Energy.” Sukuna finishes your sentence for you. 

“Yes, energy. But somehow I managed to catch him off guard, and stabbed him with your Naginata.” 

Sukuna hums quietly again in contemplation. You suspected him to be angry at the fact you practically stole and used his weapon but he doesn’t seem to comment on it.

“His name. Tell me it.”

“Sugawara Michizane.” 

The growl that rumbles through Sukuna’s chest vibrates aggressively against your back. It sounds like distant thunder and it spooks the horse into bucking a little on the spot before it’s soothed with a gentle brush of your hand on its neck. Why had that name caused such a reaction from Sukuna?

“...Did you know him?”

“Did? You killed him?” He sounded so incredulous in the way he said that, as if he didn’t quite believe it to be true.

The reminder makes you squirm a little in your spot, prompting Sukuna to huff a breath of annoyance into your hair. “I think so.”

“He’s most definitely still alive. I’ve been trying to kill that bastard for years. Every time he seems to just pop back up, like a weed.” 

The silence washes over the both of you again, and you’re thankful to be back on level ground as Sukuna leans out of your space and you can finally breathe again. It felt odd to be conversing with him like this, maybe it was just the forced proximity that was allowing you to speak so freely. You can’t imagine he would’ve entertained it back at the shrine, he would’ve most likely removed your tongue and had you eat it. 

“Rest,” Sukuna says after some time, your head lolling uselessly backwards against his shoulder only to pop right back up when you realised you were falling asleep. “We’ll be travelling for quite some time. Rest.”

His voice is a deep rich sound, something that sounds like silk against your ears. Maybe he was doing that on purpose, lowering his voice so you could feel the deep timbre of it until it turned your brain to goop. You don’t fight your instincts this time when you lean back into him, the back of your head finding a resting spot against the muscle of his chest. 

The rhythmic beat of hooves on the ground and the heartbeat behind you soothes you into a slumber, your eyes slipping closed slowly until you’re plunged into a dreamless sleep. With your guard lowered so much, you hardly pay attention to the arm that loops around your waist to hold you firmly in place whilst you rest.

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[radfemverity]

Andrew Tate is the perfect test, and women should use him to vet men.

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a better demonstration of how an umbrella fear of all men is justified, than in the support millions of men have given to Andrew Tate these last few years. At the end of 2022, every claim about he and his brother were vindicated when they were finally arrested for sex trafficking.

Both have publicly admitted to preferring when women stay like young girls, beating women in the bedroom, tricking women into making degrading porn, and ploughing ahead in sex whether the woman is ready and willing or not. There have also been leaked footage of Andrew Tate filming himself frightening a woman to humiliate her. @CrayonMurders on Twitter is a living breathing archive for all of this.

Yet his fanbase grows everyday. Very high profile commentators on the Right who the Left have been warning about for years (eg Elon Musk, Tucker Carlson, Tommy Robinson) have actively endorsed Tate, and his tweets regularly surpass tens of thousands of likes. He has a cult of personality amassing millions of men.

He is the textbook example of everything women have been warning about, it’s almost comedic. Andrew Tate isn’t like most sexual predators. He’s not discreet, he doesn’t use vague language or dogwhistles. He’s not a Jeffrey Epstein, a Jimmy Saville or a Harvey Weinstein, he’s too reckless for that. In caricature Disney villain style, he has been so brazenly unapologetic about his lifestyle of rape, pimping and violence, that unlike many before him, he has given himself absolutely no path to plausible deniability. His fanboys preaching “innocent until proven guilty!!” falls flat in the face of hours of footage and hundreds of tweets of him bragging about being a sadistic monster.

Andrew Tate is so addicted to flaunting his evil, that he inadvertently exposes the sheer number of men who are pro-rape and human trafficking, in a way that more careful predators just don’t. We can all use him as a test to vet any man we consider letting into our lives, and provide other women with the information to do the same.

Ascertain a man’s opinion on him early on. Don’t show your own bias, don’t interrogate, just ask casually and feign ignorance. Say something like “Oh I saw the whole drama on the news, but I don’t really know what to make of it all”. Listen for his answer, and then enquire further, no matter what it is. Even if he says he doesn’t like Tate, ask why. Because while “he’s an insecure beta masquerading as a big man”, and “he’s a bad role model” are true, it isn’t enough.

If you’re going to trust any men, especially in this neoliberal hellscape where they’ve had access to millions of clips of women being raped in every position and every hole since they began puberty, just please wait until they’ve demonstrated an unshakeable empathy for the female sex. Andrew Tate isn’t just a dickhead, or a funny peanut man, or a beta narcissist. He is a monster.

I cannot remember the last time there was a yardstick by which we can so easily measure a person’s humanity (or lackthereof). And while I would never blame a woman for just pointblank avoiding the entire male sex, associating with men is quite the game of Russian Roulette, most women – even radical feminists – would never be willing to do that. So to the 95% of us who wish to have at least one man in our lives, this is the easiest, most perfect test.

[guerillas-of-history]

Thomas Sankara

In his 1984 speech before the UN General Assembly, Thomas Sankara spoke out on behalf of all those suffer.

We swear that in future in Burkina Faso nothing will be done without the participation of the people of Burkina Faso themselves, nothing that has not been decided by us, that has not been prepared by us. There shall be no more attacks on our honour and dignity.

Strengthened by this conviction, we want our words to cover all those who suffer, all those whose dignity has been crushed by a minority or a system.

Let me say to those who are listening to me now that I speak not only on behalf of Burkina Faso, my country which I love so much, but also on behalf of all those who suffer, wherever they may be.

I speak on behalf of those millions of human beings who are in ghettos because their skin is black, or because they have a different kind of culture, those whose status is hardly higher than that of an animal.

I suffer, too, on behalf of those Indians who have been massacred, trampled on and humiliated and who, for centuries, have been confined to reservations, so that they do not have any aspirations to any rights whatsoever, so that their culture cannot become enriched through contact with other cultures, including that of the invader.

I speak out on behalf of those who are unemployed because of a structurally unjust system which has now been completely disrupted, the unemployed who have been reduced to seeing their lives as only the reflection of the lives of those who have more than themselves.

I speak on behalf of women throughout the entire world who suffer from a system of exploitation imposed on them by men. As far as we are concerned, we are willing to welcome all suggestions from anywhere in the world that will help us to promote the full development and prosperity of the women of Burkina Faso. In return, we will share with all countries the positive experience we are now undertaking with our women, who are now involved at all levels of the State apparatus and social life in Burkina Faso, women who struggle and who say with us that the slave who will not shoulder responsibility to rebel does not deserve pity. That slave will alone be responsible for his own wretchedness if he has any illusions whatsoever about the suspect indulgence shown by a master who pretends to give him freedom. Only struggle helps us to become free, and we call on all our sisters of all races to rise up to regain their rights.

I speak on behalf of the mothers of our poor countries who see their children dying of malaria and diarrhoea, unaware that to save them there are simple methods available but which the science of the multinationals does not offer to them, preferring to invest in cosmetics laboratories and engage in cosmetic surgery to satisfy the whims and caprices of a few men and women who feel they have become too fat because of too many calories in the rich food they consume with regularity. That must make even members of this Assembly dizzy – not to mention the peoples of the Sahel. We have decided to adopt and popularize the methods that have been advocated by WHO and UNICEF.

I speak on behalf of the child, the child of the poor man, who is hungry and who furtively eyes the wealth piled up in the rich man’s shop, a shop that is protected by a thick window, a window which is defended by an impassable grille, the grille guarded by a policeman in a helmet with gloves and a bludgeon, the policeman placed there by the father of another child, who comes there to serve himself or rather to be served because these are the guarantees of capitalistic representativeness and norms of the system.

I speak on behalf of the artists – poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, actors and so on – people of good will who see their art being prostituted by the show-business magicians.

I cry out on behalf of the journalists who have been reduced to silence or else to lies simply to avoid the hardships of unemployment.

I protest on behalf of the athletes of the entire world whose muscles are being exploited by political systems or by those who deal in the modern slavery of the stadium.

My country is the essence of all the miseries of peoples, a tragic synthesis of all the suffering of mankind but also, and above all, the synthesis of the hopes of our struggles. That is why I speak out on behalf of the sick who are anxiously looking to see what science can do for them – but that science has been taken over by the gun merchants. My thoughts go to all those who have been affected by the destruction of nature, those 30 million who are dying every year, crushed by that most fearsome weapon, hunger.

As a soldier, I cannot forget that obedient soldier who does what he is told, whose finger is on the trigger and who knows that the bullet which is going to leave his gun will bring only a message of death.

Lastly, I speak out in indignation as I think of the Palestinians, whom this most inhuman humanity has replaced with another people, a people who only yesterday were themselves being martyred at leisure. I think of the valiant Palestinian people, the families which have been splintered and split up and are wandering throughout the world seeking asylum. Courageous, determined, stoic and tireless, the Palestinians remind us all of the need and moral obligation to respect the rights of a people. Along with their Jewish brothers, they are anti-Zionists.

Standing alongside my soldier brothers of Iran and Iraq, who are dying in a fratricidal and suicidal war, I wish also to feel close to my comrades of Nicaragua, whose ports are being mined, whose towns are being bombed and who, despite all, face up with courage and lucidity to their fate. I suffer with all those in Latin America who are suffering from imperialist domination.

I wish to stand side by side with the peoples of Afghanistan and Ireland, the peoples of Grenada and East Timor, each of those peoples seeking happiness in keeping with their dignity and the laws of their own culture.

I rise up on behalf of all who seek in vain any forum in the world to make their voices heard and to have themselves taken seriously.

Many have already spoken from this rostrum. Many will speak after me. But only a few will take the real decisions, although we are all officially considered equals. I speak on behalf of all those who seek in vain for a forum in the world where they can be heard. Yes, I wish to speak for all those – the forgotten – because I am a man and nothing that is human is alien to me.

Sankara speaks in front of the United Nations on 4 October 1984. Credit: Getty Images