#wondering if this is a dream or reality

[kikker-oma]

Poor Four, he really has no idea what's happening to him 🥺

[tiredcowboyy]

Merlin connecting to arthur through his dreams: arthur morgana has a secret plan to attack you, heres how to stop her!!

Arthur who wakes up and doesnt even question how merlin told him or weather he should even follow what he says since it was a dream: leon!!!! Ive got a new plan!!!!

Also merlin a few hours later: arthur I have magic

Arthur, who followed what dream merlin said and it turned out to be right: WHAT??????

——

I genuinely cant get over it like??? I mean I guess he could have forgot bc he was in shock of being stabbed and merlin actually saying it but still cmon arthur bffr. Like does he just listen to everything dream merlin says in hopes that its true?? Or does he think he managed to figure it out himself and that his brain simply chose to project the information through merlin? And the implications there speak for themselves really.

[thesilliestofgals]

I hope Komugi and Yuki have the type of relationship you'd expect a dog and a cat to have... maybe something like this:

Komugi: OH MY GOD YUKI!!!

Yuki: komugi.

Komugi: HI HI HI HI HI!!!!!

Yuki: hi.

Komugi: YUKI YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED YESTERDAY SO I WAS OUT ON A WALKIE WITH IROHA

Yuki: ok.

Komugi: AND THEN THIS BIG HUGE THING CAME OUT OF THE WOODS

Yuki: ok.

Komugi: AND IT WAS REALLY MAD AND IT WAS GONNA HURT IROHA SO I GOT REALLY MAD AND THEN MY BODY FELT WEIRD AND STRETCHY

Yuki: ok.

Komugi: AND THEN I TURNED INTO IROHA!!! BUT ALSO NOT IROHA!!! AND THEN I GOT ANOTHER NEW BODY AND THEN I DEFEATED THE THING AND TURNED BACK INTO THE FIRST BODY AND EVERYTHING WAS SO DIFFERENT!!!! IT WAS WONDERFUL!!!!

Yuki: ...cool.

Then Komugi just gets a case of the zoomies and Yuki continues lounging around on the floor or something like that

[the-sweetest-g1rl-in-town]

Tbh i wish that shifting realities was real

[martianbugsbunny]

Had the world's most realistic dream last night that involved Zeb in the Ahsoka show with like a wedding ring tan line (no idea why he wasn't wearing it at the time) and he was talking about how he and Kallus spent a lot of their time in their garden at home and Dream-Me was like "man, I can't believe nobody else is talking about this scene, I should double check and make sure it actually happened" and then I woke up and I wanted to cry a little

[swallowerofdharma]

What Guts is for Griffith

a dispassionate analysis written for a better understanding of both characters and of Berserk

Part 8: You were the only one who made me forget my dream

Image: Berserk, chapter 366

Last year I started writing down my thoughts about Berserk, with some difficulty I must add, in part because I am writing in my second language. Clumsily, I started putting out some ideas in a series of meta, a work in progress for a manga that isn’t finished. I was rereading Berserk because, after Miura’s passing, when publication restarted, I decided I really wanted to know how the story would have ended. Devilman without its final chapter would be a very different manga. I am fully aware that every assumption I have made about Berserk could be completely rendered false by its ending, but nevertheless by trying to understand better what is going on at the moment I hope I will able to understand any eventual ending [and I have some predictions, but today I am just lying down a little bit of ground work].

The character arc most developed at this moment seems to be Griffith’s story:

The Golden Age saw his rise and fall as a remarkable but ultimately common man that was chasing an exceptional dream;

The Eclipse saw his transformation into something no longer human but existing on a separate plane, let’s call it the dream reality, that will progressively begin merging with the reality known to the other human characters, let’s call it historical reality (or material reality);

The Conviction arc brought Griffith back into the historical reality as a reincarnation, able to interact again with the world from inside and outside the dream reality, the separation between planes becoming thinner and thinner;

The Falcon of the Millennium Empire arc saw Griffith carrying out the dream he had when he was human to its completion, causing the merger of the dream reality with the historical reality into a new world called Fantasia.

This is where we are at now, and any analysis becomes more difficult because we don’t know which direction the story will take from here.

What can be noticed about Berserk is that Griffith’s ability and his willingness to dream has been the driving force all along, transforming him into a demiurge, responsible for the reshaping of reality itself.

I believe that every time an Eclipse happened in Berserk, the same reshaping and recreation of the world followed: but the dreams and the will, that were the motor of the shifting reality, have always been arbitrary and tied to the particular, egotistical and impulsive nature of the dreamers that came before Griffith. His predecessor could either be Void or Skull Knight: many people have said it’s Void, but that would mean that, in the millennium previous to the start of our story, none of the members of the God Hand was reincarnated. I prefer the hypothesis that Skull Knight is a reincarnation of one of the God Hand like Griffith is and that he went rogue, going against the God Hand and the laws of causality connected to it.

In this hypothetical scenario, Skull Knight isn’t a sacrificial witness that survived Void’s Eclipse ceremony, like Guts and Casca, but he was the one who sacrificed the people at the bottom of the Tower of Rebirth in Midland, or he sacrificed his beloved, the Lady Priestess of the Cherry Blossoms, among them. He was part of the God Hand, in the dream reality, until, like Griffith, he was imperfectly reincarnated as the ambiguous being of today, able to interact outside of the dream reality the Hand of God is normally confined in. His interactions with the historical reality could have been limited in scope, if we consider Griffith’s achievements, or he could have built his empire after his ceremonial, until Void became a new member of the God Hand. We don’t know how it went, how Skull Knight’s reincarnation happened, only that Flora was involved in a ritual and she had to break fundamental rules to do it. At the Conviction Tower many elements have converged to remake Griffith as he is now, including the dream, the will and the body of an Apostle, Egg of the Perfect World, and the corrupted fetus born from Casca. As arbitrary the dreams of the people who used a Beherit are, the circumstances of Griffith’s reincarnation have a degree of abnormality and risk outside of the control of the God Hand’s domain. That could be why only one of five members of the God Hand goes through a second ritual.

But if the Egg dreamt of a perfect world, Casca’s baby would have a dream too, probably of being a normal child and be reunited with his parents. Consider how Casca and Guts are also anomalies in the world post Griffith’s Eclipse: they are surviving despite being marked by the brand of sacrifice. The protagonists of Berserk since the early chapters are those who are exceptions to the rules of causality, those who are doing something outside of the control of the Hand of God.

I have said that I think that Skull Knight has gone rogue at some point after his reincarnation: he is facilitating a series of abnormalities and diversions in order to unmake or divert the course of causality as dictated by the darkness of human desires and fears. I am interested in his motivations, since something similar might happen to Griffith. And Skull Knight is shown to remember and maybe have regrets about losing his beloved.

A detail that immediately caught my attention: before Skull Knight could take Guts and Casca to safety, from inside the dream reality of the Eclipse ceremony, Griffith had a chance to kill them or to try to get to Skull Knight, and stop him. He raises his hand but doesn’t do anything.

Having Casca and Guts alive isn’t irrelevant at all to Griffith. They are the two people who were the most important for him before and we know that he isn’t indifferent to them. After his reincarnation, Griffith’s heart beats heavier in front of Guts and he is unable to stand Casca’s touch after their reunion on the Hill of Swords. Whether the new connection with Casca is built around her having mothered a part that is in him now or guilt or regret raising from underneath a careful construed detachment, whether other feelings for Guts are still there, it is still interesting to see that the survival of the people marked by the brand isn’t of little consequence.

Image: Berserk, chapter 180

With the creation of Falconia, Griffith seems to have succeeded, but since the beginning of the story, his dream was nothing more than an illusion: the illusion of equality, the possibility of scaling up the social hierarchy. And Falconia seems to offer the same kind of illusion, of opportunity, of wealth, of progress, for those who inhabit it, but not for those who are outside of it. [I’ll leave the multiple parallels to the real world outside of this analysis, but they aren’t difficult to see].

When Griffith was alive and human, he was able to doubt himself, almost forgetting his dream: jumping into danger to rescue Guts, asking for a second opinion, uncertainly and unsuccessfully looking for warmth and human connection. Until the most recent chapters, that ability to feel, doubt, regret, anything at all, was seemingly gone or hidden and buried so well that those residual emotions wouldn’t have mattered. But Griffith indulging the Moonlight Child - voluntarily or not doesn’t make a huge difference, because he is the Moonlight Child - going back to spend time with Casca and Guts: those actions that occur during the Full Moon, imply that a part of Griffith is still vulnerable or reachable. [At a later time, I’d like to write about all the symbolism of the Moon in Berserk].

I started this article with the images of Schierke trying to look at Griffith’s projection in the astral plane: a dimension that exists outside of the dream reality and outside of the historical reality [all things are projections, remember Skull Knight’s speech to Guts?]. That sequence, that came out after Miura’s passing, is one of the most interesting of the Fantasia arc, in my opinion.

Griffith’s image of impassivity and detachment is contradicted by his astral projection, as Schierke and Farnese note: Such terrible power. Its very being is like a maelstrom, consuming all. All Griffith’s human emotions are part of the raging vortex. This opens up a world of possibilities for Griffith’s further development, that in my opinion hasn’t reached a conclusion. And he certainly hasn’t achieved anything of value: Griffith’s story is one of the most appalling tragedy I have read. It is inevitable that it continues to hold up and is the most powerful force driving the manga. He has never been a god, or a devil, and only the readers able to see and keep in mind the full humanity of Griffith, can maybe agree with my interpretation of this complex world of illusion and delusion that is in Berserk. I am open to the possibility that a part of Griffith is aligned with the original dream of the Moonlight Child, to be reunited with Casca and Guts in a warm embrace, that when he was alive he had longed for too.

Concepts used:

[The dream reality is a vast landscape born of human emotions, fears and desires].

[The astral plane is the level in which all things interact and all energies are moving and there isn’t a substantial difference between humans and all things and creatures of the natural world].

[The historical or material reality is the world where humanity operates and that humans shapes for themselves].

Image: Berserk, chapter 372

This panel showing Zodd in Fanconia is impressed in my mind for a few reasons. One being, has he always been attractive? Another, I wonder if he is starting to get suspicious or doubting Griffith’s reasons for bringing Casca back with them.

Casca in Fanconia is shown as living in a dreamlike state. But Falconia is the result of the Griffith’s dream reality merging with the human world. The mark of sacrifice might let Casca and Guts see the interstices.

[hauntingblue]

Gear 5 luffy's laugh is so contagious I just hear the drums and go insane how does this work. What did he do to me

[seafoam-taide]

Absurd that dreams can just play pretend at being memories. Me when I have to actually take a moment to go 'no, that's insane, there was no point in the real world where several small spiders made homes in the gaps between your fingers. Why did you think that was real and why did we have to think about it this long.'

[starteas]

I feel kind of silly for worrying if Lumi won’t reach it’s next crowdfund goal despite how much people have shown that yes, they do want to see this and my anxiety is just mean to me in thinking that they won’t.

At the same time it’s still a very real worry to have, but it also lead me to severely doubt myself last time and I feel if starting to creep in all over again…

[miqo-tia]

Vierapril 2024 - 07, Celestial

I don't yet know the specifics myself, but I do know that Healingway felt inspired by the Loporrits and their yearning to help, and ever since then I've kept doodling Healingway with themes of Hydaelyn. I really want to explore what exactly happened.

[lunaetis]

eden doesn't trust anyone in penacony. not a single person. i wanted to say that she trusted firefly, but even her i feel like it's something more of a tug than trust. very much like what the dreamscape is supposed to represent. meeting firefly was like a fever dream. i think eden was drawn to her because it was the first time she's treated like a normal person. everywhere she had gone to, everyone is aware of the stellaron to a degree. they had known or heard of her one way or the other and have her associated with the stellaron or aeons in some way, shape, or form. meeting firefly was like a glimpse into what it's like to be normal ( as in meeting someone and bonding naturally / normally ), that's why eden quickly grew attached to her to the point that witnessing her death caused her to disassociate for a moment ( more on this in a different post. )

all in all, no one she had met gave her a reason to trust them. all of them have their own roles to play, their own agenda to accomplish, and eden felt like she's being used one way or the other despite being offered the truth. it's a similar feeling to what happened in xianzhou luofu where kafka and the stellaron hunters orchestrated everything according to the future they saw. in penacony, eden felt like everyone already knows what part they're going to play and the nameless ( including her ) being there is yet another puzzle piece for the story / destiny / truth to play out, and she doesn't like that feeling. even when she felt familiarity or connection with firefly, at the end of the day, eden still feels rather isolated from the planet itself and its people. she doesn't trust anyone's words, to the point that she's even doubting her own memory and experience at times. there is no guarantee if what she's seeing or remembering is even real, after all.

[ahecktonoffandomsinoneblog]

i just finished reading Phillip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and i was trying to get my thoughts in order, so I decided to do a bit of background research.

I am now staring at the wikipedia page for theodicy and wondering how this man lived for so long. someone broke into his house and blew up his file folders. a neo-nazi group allegedly tried to involve him. he wrote most/all of his works before 1970 while under the influence of amphetamine. 21 books in 10 years. he wrote a letter to the FBI about Thomas Disch and said a covert anti-american organisation attempted to recruit him. i can't tell if its the same one as before. a woman came to his door, a beam of pink light imparted wisdom and clairvoyance. the beam came back later and told him his infant son was ill, which turned out to be true. he was married five times.

this is not a little bit of research. how did this happen. how did i end up here. i'm questioning if the world exists, and that's exactly what he would have wanted

[talyayet474]

Kate Winslet

[vaalthus]

And all it took was a giant hole leading to the planet’s mana core to finally find one of its kind outside of a dream and outside of time.

[namcelestial]

nctzens of all units please wax poetic in the tags about YOUR nct song. what's bringing you out of a month-long coma

[bunnihearted]

❄️🐇❕