#i'm fascinated by how other people use discord

[semiotomatics]

#discord #i'm fascinated by how other people use discord #for me it's almost exclusively private servers #followed by a few very small public servers but i'm only occasionally active on those #i'm *in* some big public servers but i barely check them and almost never actually say/do anything #i have a personal server but i rarely use it lol #but i like. *never* use private chats/dms/whatever you want to call them on discord #only in very very specific instances #i don't have any like. ongoing private chats #just curious how i compare to the majority #this has been an original post #discord use poll #my polls

[russanogreenstripe]

So many good moments in Ep 5 of Burrow's End, but this is the one that sets my mind buzzing the most. The idea that community predates identity. We know mama, dada, and baba before we know not only their names, but our own names. And in the season all about family, community, in-group versus outgroup? This feels like such an important idea, and it was came up likely on the spot. It's fascinating to think about, and touches on such big themes about Burrow's End in general.

My mind keeps trying to read "name" as "self," and come up with something like "we have to know others before we know who we are," but I think there's a fundamental error in that idea. Neurologically, we just start off with just "Me" - one of our basic senses is what is "Me" and what is "Not Me." That's fundamental to further categorization, and faults in that sense is where things like depersonalization / derealization come from. Names are just labels, and they're not even the first labels we have for them.

This ties into another point that a lot of people had when watching the trailer at the end of Ep. 4 and during the live reaction of Ep. 5 - the idea that because Sybil was so reluctant to say her brother's name after he died, that it was the result of some top-down oppression within Last Bast and further proof that it's not as idyllic as it seems. Now, Last Bast almost certainly isn't a utopia, and I'm sure we're going to learn more about that in the next episode. And it's possible that it is a top-down enforcement that Sybil, having been raised in Last Bast, has internalized. However, there's a chance this isn't the case.

Less than 30 seconds on Google turns up several cultures that have taboos around speaking the names of the dead - Aboriginal mortuary rituals, the Apache of the Southwest US, the Tolowa tribe of California, the Yanomami on the border of Brazil and Venezuela, certain Romani/Irish Traveller groups, and almost certainly more. While it initially seems unfathomable to Western cultural mores around remembering and memorializing the dead, it's just as possible possible that instead of a method of social control, it's simply a cultural taboo.

https://scholarblogs.emory.edu/gravematters/2017/04/18/aboriginal-mortuary-rituals/

And as Aabria has commented both during the live discussion and general discord channels,

Aabria's a smart cookie, and I trust that she's done plenty of worldbuilding and put tons of thought into how Last Bast's society works. We've seen she's great at her cultural analysis while in the DM's chair in both Misfits & Magic and in A Court of Fey and Flowers. Culture and society are interwoven in all of her games, and where does all that start? With family.

#dimension 20 #d20 spoilers #d20 #burrow’s end #burrows end #d20 burrow's end #erika ishii #surprise anthropology #damn this series is good

[titleleaf]

so many words about historical men's corsetry

(This got way too long to send via Discord -- Dangimace in the Renegade Bindery server asked about men's corset sewing/resource recs so here is my half-assed and non-exhaustive rundown. Most of my historical sewing is focused on fashions of the UK, US, and Europe for the second half of the 18th century and first half of the 19th century, so that bias is reflected here; also disclaimer overall that "menswear"/"womenswear" are socially constructed categories and real people's bodies have always looked a wider variety of ways than fashion and other social forces would dictate. I sew historical garments with enthusiastic disregard for the historical gender binary and I'm barrel-chested, thick-waisted, and narrow-hipped no matter what I'm wearing.)

Onward, lads!

Ok wrt men's corsetry: there's a whole lot of fogginess around how historical men's corsets were constructed for a bunch of annoying reasons but that means there's lots of possibilities to explore in pattern drafting and project planning. Stays and other stiffened body-shaping garments have a whole complex conceptual relationship to the body basically as soon as they start appearing. 16th and 17th century garments do a whole lot of shaping (both compressing and building up) for men and women alike, but things really kick off in the 18th century in terms of the symbolic weight placed on stays and (later) corsets. Whole lot of stuff about gender, social class, race, fatness, morality, etc. getting projected onto these garments. So I'm a little leery about people taking obviously satirical illustrations of fashion-victim dandies or Gross Corpulent Libertines getting laced into corsets as truthful and indicative of the way men were really dressing -- scurrilous gossip and exaggeration are both a pain to sift through if we want to know which men wore corsets, what kind, and why.

In the very late 18th/early 19th century corsets were part of the repertoire for achieving highly fashionable shapes in menswear. (Along with a whole lot of padding.) They weren't mandatory for all dudes, but for fashion-forward dandies and equally fashion-forward military men, male corsets/stays were definitely a thing. The whole Romantic-era pigeon-breasted, narrow-waisted silhouette can be emulated by shapewear worn beneath the clothes, pads in the garments themselves, or both; in addition to waist reduction it helped to maintain smooth visual lines underneath close-fitting garments.

(look at these minxy 1830s dudes and their tiny waists)

As the century goes on the desired menswear silhouette becomes boxier and less fitted, and male corsetry recedes into the background; we start to see patents and advertisements for men's corsetry, so they still seem to have been worn, but there's a lot more language around vigorous manly athleticism and supporting the structures of the body. It can be hard to tell whether a particular piece is intended to be worn primarily for some medical purpose or for its perceived aesthetic benefits. This is giving me such flashbacks to trying to find post-surgical compression garments.

(Side note: there's also a vigorous tradition of fetishist writing about corsetry all through the 19th century, in fairly mainstream channels, which is fascinating. Due to the relatively private and deeply horny nature of fetish tightlacing we don't necessarily know as much about what those same letter-writers may have "really" worn at home, but I hope they were having fun.)

I've seen very few specifically men's corsetry patterns from historical pattern-makers-- not even really big names like Redthreaded. I sewed my 19thc menswear corsets from the men's underbust pattern in Laughing Moon Mercantile #113 which afaik is speculative rather than reproducing a specific historical garment, but it's not too different from the women's late-19th-century underbust patterns in the same pattern pack.

(image credit: LMM)

However, a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns from more general historical patternmakers could be made suitable with some minor alterations. Here I'd also rec books like Jill Salen's Corsets: Historical Patterns And Techniques and Norah Waugh's Corsets & Crinolines, though their focus is definitely on womenswear and you need to be relatively comfortable scaling up or drafting from pattern diagrams.

The structural features and desired results for a man's corset are pretty much the same as any other corset (back support, compression in some areas, etc.) even when the desired silhouette is different; commercially-created patterns are drafted with the expectation of certain bodily proportions so like with all corset-sewing it's important to make a mockup for fitting purposes. (I ended up liking one of my mockups so much I finished the process and made it a whole separate corset.) I don't know much about this area but I seem to see a lot more belt-and-buckle closures and criss-crossing straps in corsets designated as being for men -- this might be a byproduct of gendered differences in how people got dressed, but it might be nothing.

There's some weird and wonderful historical examples, both extant and in images -- I appreciated this post at Matsuzake Sewing, "A Brief Discussion Of Men's Stays", and its accompanying roundup of images on Pinterest though the tone wrt historical fetishwear corsets in the blog post is a little snippy. I really want to make a replica of Thomas Chew's 1810s corset (which you can read more about here at the USS Constitution Museum) but it incorporates stretch panels made with a shitload of metal springs and I'm not ready for all the trial and error trying to replicate that.

(image credit: USS Constitution Museum Collections)

There's a pretty rich vein of modern men's corset patterns which seem like they could be easily pattern-hacked for historical costuming purposes, like these with shoulder straps from Corsets By Caroline or DrobeStoreUpcycling's waist cincher which also looks like it could be altered pretty easily to cinch with straps and buckles like some 19thc men's corsetry does. This pattern for a boned chest binder in vest form by KennaSewLastCentury is also really cool but I didn't get a chance to sew it pre-top-surgery. (I think I've also seen someone who made a chest-compressing variation on Regency short stays, but I can't find it now.) 

In general a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns should work just fine for silhouette-shaping without much bust/hip emphasis -- my usual resource for free corset patterns (Aranea Black) recently took down all her free patterns but they're definitely still circulating out there. For general fashion purposes the sky is the limit and there are a lot of enthusiastic dudes in corsets out there. This Lucy Corsetry round-up shows a variety of modern corsetiers'  styles designated as being for men or more masculine silhouettes (including a SUPER aspirational brocaded corset with matching waistcoat made by Heavenly Corsets that I'd love to sew a historical spin on) and you can see some commonalities and possibilities for body-shaping.

I can also give some more general corset-sewing resources but I'm very much in the learning process here and I'd love any recs or input from people more experienced in pattern-drafting and corset-sewing.

#historical sewing #more information than you perhaps require #long post

[anomalymon]

[Essay] MissingNo Therian: An Exploration in Identity, Labels, and the Fictotherian Experience

We've seen a few posts of people wanting more personal essays in the community, so I thought I would write this and crosspost it to Tumblr. -Rex

I am a MissingNo. My exact form is one that's been fluid throughout my life, with Kabutops and Aerodactyl fossil forms having preference, but occasionally switching to the Lavender Town Ghost. I identify as a Pokemon therian or Poketherian for my species - or fictotherian for a broad term. This identification is one which can confuse people - after all, therianthropy is more traditionally associated with animals, and I identify as Pokemon that isn't real. My species only exists in four games that are well over two decades old and is a failsafe the game spits out. Why should I identify as a therian? Despite how strange it can seem, I still prefer therian over other labels such as otherkin and fictionkin. My therian identity is deeply intertwined with my hyperempathy, created by a bias of my animality, comes from viewing a MissingNo as a type of animal, and from experiencing common therian traits.

Therian over otherkin, fictionkin, or fictive

Some may be saying "why don't you call yourself fictionkin?" or even "Isn't otherkin for mythical species, while therian is for earthen species?" To address the later point, there have been better written essays dispelling this. I would highly recommend Therian: Dispelling the Earthen Animal Myth by The River System for a well written and researched essay.

To address the former point, it is personal preference. I did use "otherkin" for years and still do identify as both otherkin and fictionkin, but the term "therian" is more in alignment to how I experience identity. I am an animal, I experience shifts, and I experience instincts.

I don't perceive MissingNo as sapient on the level of elves or some dragons. For me, being a MissingNo is also a "real" thing, as tangible as a dog, bird, or dragon. I don't consider myself glitchkin despite being a glitch, nor conceptkin. I am like the theriomythics who label themselves for being an animalstic gryphon or phoenix.

When it comes Fictionkin and fictive, to me they can be too focused on identifying yourself in the framework of being a character, which I'm not. I'm not a creepypasta character anymore than one of the Hypno species would be. I still do identify as fictional - I can comfortably identify as "fictherian" or my preference "fictotherian" (Which comes from "fictotype". I believe I started this term usage - since when I started using it, I could find no results to it, but I did use it in forum posts, Discord servers, and other methods).

Fictive falls under a similar problem - but with slightly more alienation. While the term is open to me, my identity history makes me feel out of place in a community of walk-ins and introjects when it was one that developed later in life.

How I became a MissingNo and the grip of hyperempathy

My identity as a MissingNo came later in life. I began existing in my system as a canine pup - which I know from behaviors and mannerisms that I later connected to me in the present, and genuinely expressing feeling like a dog as a child. Years later, I identified this species as a manned wolf.

Then at around the age of ten, my identity shifted to a glitch Pokemon. What at least contributed to it was developing a special interest in Glitch Pokemon around this time. This combined with our natural hyper-empathy and perhaps being conceptum to subconsciously alter my identity over time.

These interpretations can cause me to be out of place. While I still love glitch Pokemon and I am fascinated by them, I rarely find anyone who also has an intense interest and fascination while having this level of hyperempathy - even if I encounter others who have some alterhuman or even gender or sexuality connection to glitch Pokemon. Almost uncontrollably do I see glitch Pokemon as genuine Pokemon. I might grow attached to certain Pokemon in the way I would a pet.

The overall psychological influence means that this identity comes down to personal interpretations and personification. I'm not a natural animal and you cannot read about me in a textbook or find any bits of lore within the games, but rather, I am an animal that came from the mind of a mentally ill person.

MissingNo the animal

What defines "animal" varies. Humans are biologically animals and primates, but not all humans identify with those terms, with some taking offense to it. To someone with hyperempathy, a stuffed animal may be as much of an animal as a living one, or even a car might be a type of animal to certain minds. This connection is what makes me feel a MissingNo can be a type of animal.

Additionally, Pokemon are their world's equivalent of animals, and this is how most of my system views Pokemon due to one of our deepest parallel life connections being a humanlike Mewtwo. This sentiment is also one I've seen many Poketherians have. In the world of our origin, we are animals. For another essay on a similar experience, I'd highly recommend "The Fire Burns Bright" by Jasper, an Alolan Marrowak therian.

Within the contexts of the games and many interpretations - including my own - MissingNo is also a bird. It is one of few Pokemon which use this glitch beta typing. Being a bird can be equally as much a part of it and I'd consider birds as a paralleltype and one where I may confidently call myself a bird. Albeit a very odd bird.

The wolf and animal bias in my core

In addition to the bird of the MissingNo, the manned wolf at my heart is still important to my identity. It's in between otherhearted and therian on a sliding scale, and I identify it more as manned wolf-hearted for convenience, but it's closer to "kinth". I don't know why I am or was a manned wolf, but it doesn't quite matter to me either way. What matters is that there is the manned wolf.

To me it feels as if despite my core being or "soul", my mind became a MissingNo while the core remained the same. To my soul, a MissingNo is a type of dog. Then, to my mind, a manned wolf is a type of Pokemon. Both of these identities came about and exist in harmony rather than opposition.

Another comparison that the heart and soul makes is being "feral". Glitch entities in video games to me are almost like an animal which can't be domesticated. They may act fine, but every so often you'll encounter something that reminds you that at their core, they're wild. MissingNo still scrambles sprites and Hall of Fame data - and you can't have a "normal" experience with it. MissingNo is to Pokemon as a wolf is to a dog.

The instincts that made me tear apart playsets when playing house pretending to be a dog are still present in the instincts that make me want to tear apart meat when I eat it.

The Experience of a MissingNo Animal

I fit into many traditional therianthropy experiences and unto a hybrid canine/avian experience - just perhaps with more twists towards the bizarre.

I am a contherian when it comes to mental shifting and almost always feeling like an animal. However, I do experience phantom shifts. I get the sensations of skeletal fangs, claws, and a body that's far heavier and taller than my tiny, human form. Though the bizarre comes when during these shifts, I don't feel like I have skin and much of my body feels transparent, I feel like I should be able to stick my hand through my lower jaw.

I feel the sense of freedom and flight when I ride a bike downhill. For a few minutes when I bike, I can imagine myself flying. I sit in rivers and ponds among the wading birds feeling like I belong. I treat the chicks and chickens we raise like a part of my flock.

I still want to hunt. Sometimes I need to fight my instincts to recognize chicks as flockmates and not food. I like to eat wildly and I like to taste blood and fat in my food. When I eat, I feel like like the blood should dribble through my skinless jaw bone. Skeletal claws should be typing this essay instead of fleshy human fingers.

Conclusion

I am an animal, and despite doubts, I am a therian.

This label fits my experiences better than the alternatives. I don't feel as much alienation or out of place compared to other communities even though my species isn't an "animal" in the traditional sense. Hyperempathy has created this experience for me in that I feel more comfortable saying I am an animal than I am from fiction.

My center being is animal and always has been, it's just how its presented through my life has shifted. The animal instincts have only developed as my species has.

It is my hope that more unusual therians might come forth and be encouraged to examine their experiences - and for both earthen therians and potential theriomythics or fictotherians to explore what exactly "animal" means to them. I want others to also examine where their mind's biases may lead them, how that can impact their identity, and use it to feel more at peace in what the heart wants.

#I was reluctant to post this because it will still show up in search results for MissingNo but oh well #alterhuman #therian #fictotherian #fictherian #fictionkin #alterhuman essay #therian essay #rex's posts

[cosmerelists]

My Top 10 Favorite Cosmere Characters

Today is my birthday, so it's time for a purely self-indulgent birthday list! I thought I'd just share my own personal Top 10 Cosmere characters, which will just prove once and for all that I am SUCH a Stormlight girlie.

[Spoilers for Stormlight, Mistborn Era 1 & Era 2 and Shadows for Silence]

#10: TenSoon

I think I almost like TenSoon better in Era 2, when he's, like, an immortal quasi-divine figure who also happens to be a big, fluffy puppy. I like it when characters from different eras interact, so I was quite taken by having Wax meet TenSoon. I was also a fan of TenSoon back in the original series though, especially as his loyalty to Vin developed. And I'm one for a tragic sacrifice, so the kandra trying to kill themselves to avoid getting taken over by Ruin--that was a powerful moment (and I'm big fan of the fact that they did not, in fact, die. It was still a heroic sacrifice!).

#9: Silence

It's hard to say how much my love for Silence is part & parcel with my love for Threnody which, for whatever reason, is my favorite Cosmere planet. I like how Silence interacts with Threnody--the sheer horror and fatalism of living right on the edge of that forest, being a mother and a bounty hunter, keeping your dead grandmother in a back room...

#8: Adolin

I think Adolin is one of those characters I like because of his relationships with other characters. Especially Maya--I really love the relationship Adolin has with his sword, and when he and Maya fight back to back using the kata...that's one of my favorite scenes. I think he and Shallan are cute, and that he and Kaladin are cute, and that the three of them are a triad in their hearts. Also, and this will be a theme throughout this list, I love competent fighters and good fight sequences, so Adolin's duels really put him near the top for me.

#7: Navani

Rhythm of War really made me love Navani, I think. And not only because of that unhealthy yet somehow alluring relationship she had with Raboniel. We'll see throughout this list that I just like really competent characters, and Navani is such a smart and cool inventor of stuff, from watches to pain management devices to flying ships. And knowing what she went through with Gavilar and how she was made to think she wasn't smart or worthwhile only to have Dalinar and Raboniel recognize that yes she was smart and good at things and now she's cracked the code to make god-killing weapons and has bonded the Sibling and she's just so cool.

#6: Sazed

Honestly, I really love Sazed both before and after his ascension. I heard that people aren't always fans of Harmony, but I find him just as fascinating, if not more so--the idea of trying to balance such discordant shards in one being. But Sazed is, I think, my favorite character from the Mistborn Era 1 books. He is so sincere and smart and competent and deals with so much shit all the time. And I think he's doing his best.

#5: Jasnah

Like, Jasnah is just cool. She's so polished. So competent. So deadly. So smart. I think seeing Jasnah through Shallan's eyes for so long really made me respect and fear her as much as a reader can respect/fear a book character. That moment that she and Dalinar bonded over the book after Gavilar's death--very sweet. Kinda disappoited that we didn't get much with Jasnah & Elhokar--hard to remember they're siblings sometimes. In conclusion, I am both excited and scared to get more of her tragic backstory soon.

#4: Leshwi

Listen, I like cool fight sequences and enemies who bear a deep respect for each and duel a lot but never from a place of hatred. So, I was basically made to like Leshwi and how she interacts with Kaladin. But I also just like Leshwi's interactions with everyone. Leshwi and Moash? Awesome. "Hey you killed me once. Respect." Leshwi and Venli? Heck yeah. "I am slowly feeling you out and trying to see where your loyalties lie because they might intersect with mine." Once I am thrilled that Lewshi is joining the Listeners now. I want her to form a Radiant bond SO BAD.

#3: Steris

I seem to recall Brandon Sanderson talking about Steris as a character you don't like at first, but later you grow to love her. But if I remember correctly, I feel like I always liked Steris? Like yes, the marriage contract was a lot, but it was also so thorough and honest (and, honestly, funny). And then she just grew on me from there. As someone who makes a lot of lists, I also feel a kinship with Steris.

#2: Shallan

The first two times I read through the Stormlight Archives, I was all about Kaladin. But the third time, I really started to realize just how much I like the Shallan chapters. I think Shallan is a great character with a great arc--and I love the way she sort of grows into herself and her powers. Plus, I enjoy the slow reveal of how much she's already done--she already has a shardblade. And two spren bonds. And many murders under her belt. Quite the resume. And I really love Veil and Radiant, but especially Veil. The scene during the Oathbringer climax where she holds hand with her alters while constantly creating other alters to let them be killed legitimately makes me cry. She holds back a whole army by herself! She's amazing!

#1: Kaladin

Kaladin was my favorite character pretty much from the very moment I started reading Cosmere books (I started with Way of Kings), and he has never been dethroned in my heart. First, there's the simple fact that I love good fight scenes and fantasy heroics and people who gain the power they need at the very last second...and Kaladin does those things like every other chapter. But also, Kaladin is just such a good character. I love how he's not just a shallow fantasy hero--he has depression, and invents therapy, and struggles with guilt, and doesn't always make good choices. Sometimes the Kaladin chapters are tough--Rhythm of War was downright painful sometimes with just how much Kaladin was suffering--but even so. I will always look forward to the Kaladin parts the most, and like many, I deem Kaladin my #1 Cosmere Blorbo.

#Cosmere #Cosmerelists #TenSoon #Silence #Adolin #Navani #Sazed #Jasnah #Leshwi #Steris #Shallan #Kaladin

[iviarelleblr]

Genuinely fascinated at the showrunners of live-action ATLA misunderstanding the purpose of a character arc so badly. Like, I don't live in that fandom, I'm not super emotionally invested, but it feels rather on the same level as the guys who made Game of Thrones saying "themes are for 8th grade book reports" and Disney trying to shoehorn extra modern feminism into the Beauty and the Beast live action adaptation. In this case, characters need arcs, and sometimes that means a good character does bad things at first so they can learn to do better, because it's REALLY IMPORTANT ACTUALLY that kids get to internalize that doing bad things now doesn't mean you're bad forever.

Meanwhile we've got the Wheel of Time adaptation over here saying "The first books were written with only a loose outline of the series arc and for an audience more than a generation removed from today's sensibilities. We're going to tighten up the story structure, avoid repeating some character beats to death the way the books did, and generally make this a smoother journey than the books are, as well as shorter, but still with all the satisfaction of an arc trajectory well executed. Also make it queerer." Like, legitimately, I'm in Discords with people who Know Their Shit, and even the costume department read the brief and had a professional costumer predicting book 14 plot points just from embroidery on an outfit and a certain camera-cut in episode 1x02. In season 2, some other authors were analyzing the story beats and showing us in full-spoiler channels exactly how the changes being made are setting up the endgame in some ways better than the original author was equipped to when he thought the story was going slightly different places.

Good adaptations are possible, but you need someone at the helm who understands why a story is doing what it's doing. Rafe Judkins's team is doing incredible work on WOT but he also hired a book consultant, who read the series dozens of times, and can help balance the needs of the original story against the needs of the television medium. You can't adapt a story unless you understand the story, and it seems like the ATLA people are doing a lot of the same things that Disney's live action adaptations of their former animated hits have been doing: adapting the superficial layer of the story without understanding its underpinnings and why those resonated so much with audiences.

#atla #avatar the last airbender #wheel of time #wheel of time on prime #i know i'm risking Being Perceived and getting attention #by saying and tagging anything on a hot button topic #but i can't help wanting to make this comparison #and also i really want literally everyone who can to try the wot show #it's not gonna hit with everyone and i know that but it's SO GOOD #so much better than we had any right to hope it might be #murder milfs and sad wet cat boys galore

[leavemebetosleep]

Not to write an essay, but something I find really fascinating about Fluttercord is how, despite being a enemies to friends to lovers hero/villain pair, is that is doesn't really follow some of the usual tropes you associate with that sort of thing.

Like, I think this is why a lot of fanworks tend to make them out of character. Because those tropes are popular, and fun to write, and they're fine in fiction. Hell, I'm not even against them in fluttercord fics, if used in the right context. I'm not judging anyone for liking them, they just don't really apply here.

For example, a popular villain romance trope is "big bad powerful villain who doesn't care about anyone, except that one person, who he'd do anything for". And at first that sounds like Fluttercord, and maybe it starts that way to be fair (hindsight is 20/20, and it's easy to say this as someone who started watching AFTER the show ended, so I can't hold it against older works. They were going off what they were given), but it isn't that by the end of the show at least.

The show itself deconstructs that trope. Fluttershy does not like that she's the only thing tying Discord to the side of good. It puts a lot of pressure and responsibility on her, and strains their relationship at times. It's not healthy. For anyone involved. It's why it's such a big deal that he needs to make other friends. That trope is fun in fiction, but it's horrifying in real life, and this is a show for children to teach them friendship.

But people still like these tropes. It's a popular fantasy for a reason. So they continue to use it anyway, even when it takes away all the little things that make their relationship more unique.

#fluttercord

[clarabosswald]

on philip pullman's approach to analyzing human nature vs jack thorne's

(posting here per request since the conversation on discord got, uh, distracted before i could put my thoughts into words)

bbc/hbo's his dark materials has expended on a lot of characters and plotlines that were only hinted at - or did not exist at all in many instances - in the his dark materials book trilogy. one of the characters that was impacted by that a lot - if not the most of the whole cast - is mrs. marisa coulter. and while many media outlets and fans alike have been very pleased with the show's version of marisa in comparison with the book version (and i'm referring specifically and strictly how she was written, not how she's portrayed by ruth wilson), many of us on the discord server have felt that jack thorne's spin on the character resulted in major changes to her personality, to the worse. it's a huge topic (which i love discussing but don't want to focus on too much in this post) but in short, many of us are in opinion that jack thorne's marisa coulter is significantly humanized and mellowed compared to philip pullman's, more palatable and more relatable... and thus considerably less fascinating and captivating than the books' version.

the thing about this is that i don't think this is something that's exclusive to thorne's interpretation of marisa. i think it's a trend that you can see in nearly all of the characters in the his dark materials tv show - especially the ones that were explored more deeply than in the books. i can see it with lyra, asriel, boreal - even will. and i think you can put it all down to a very basic approach to exploring and writing basic human nature that's vastly different between pullman and thorne.

with pullman's writing, i think he finds fascination in how different humans are from each other. pullman says: humanity is so varied; there are so many types of personalities; people can be really extreme; it's so interesting to explore the human nature in its weirdest and most unlikable, looking directly at the aspects people would rather not expose. lyra, the protagonist, possesses many traditionally unlikable characteristics: she's a liar, she's rude, she's arrogant, she's blunt. asriel sets out to save humanity but he's far from a good person. he doesn't see all humans as equal; he sees roger as a tool to reach his means rather than a living person; he resents his daughter for being a unruly street urchin rather than an elegant scholar like himself and her mother. he berates marisa when she obtains traits he sees as inferior (her love for lyra, which he can't understand). and marisa herself... powerful and power-hungry and ruthful and remorseless. slick and skillfully manipulative. she knows the games in the society that she lives in and she plays them masterfully. those are the characters pullman writes and explores. and not one of them is more or less human than the other. they're people; and "good" and "bad" are names we give to the things they do or the choices they make.

thorne's approach is no less thoughtful, but is significantly different. characters start off as having seemingly polarized traits, yes. but as thorne digs deeper, he finds that they have a lot in common with the perceived idea of an everyday person, and you can see that very early on in the show. asriel sincerely apologizes to lyra for not being able to spare more time and attention for her, and (infamously) declares that "everyone's special!"; marisa seems to form an emotional bond or attachment to lyra nearly as soon as the girl hugs her in jordan college (because who doesn't feel touched when being hugged by a grateful kid, right?); as she watches the severed children being rescued and shown affection in bolvangar, she looks stricken by remorse; she refuses asriel's offer to cross the bridge together because she feels committed to their child, not because of the magisterium. then in season 2, thorne invents a new side of marisa - a woman oppressed by a patriarchal society. she was oppressed as a scholar due to being a woman (in the books, female scholars were far from unheard of; marisa was a member of sofia's college, an all-women institution); she stares with longing at a woman working on a laptop while caring for a baby in a stroller; she's obviously jealous of mary. what woman can't relate to that, in this era of fourth wave feminism? then, as she faces lee scoresby - beaten and shackled and still gaining the emotional higher ground by appealing to marisa's (the master manipulator, the skilled torturer) emotions for her child - and he deduces that she was endured parental abuse as a child (which wasn't hinted at in the slightest in the books - in the book of dust we meet her mother, who's a terrible person but adores and idolizes her daughter to a fault). and of course that would tug at the audience's heartstrings - because how can you not understand marisa's vulnerability? how can you not feel bad for her, learning about the abuse she endured? this is jack thorne's way of exploring characters and filling up gaps in their stories. this is his way of exploring humans. "deep down, we all have shared experiences and feelings." the more you learn about his characters, the more relatable they are. they become more palatable to the average viewer.

these are the two approaches, and neither of them are inherently wrong or bad. but they're profoundly different. and they create different characters.

and what we keep coming back to and complaining about on the discord server - specifically in the context of marisa but i do think other characters suffer from it too - that, compared to pullman's characterizations, the result is just... well, boring. or at least disappointing. because what draws many of us to marisa, what makes her so magnetic and unique and unforgettable, was never her being relatable. in the books she's very unapologetically a horrible person; the show feels like it keeps making up excuses and apologies for her horrible deeds (so much that it even neuters just how terrible some of them were). the uncompromising extremes in her personality and her choices are exactly what make her so utterly fascinating and unusual. without excuses or explanations that would make her actions make more sense to the average reader. you rarely ever think "i'd have felt exactly the same! i'd have done exactly the same! i can perfectly understand her motivation here!" yet thorne tries to make you think exactly that. and it's not wrong. i'd have loved it a ton if i were a show-only fan. but when you compare it to pullman's version - its intensity and spectacle, the heights and perils the story reaches with characters that are masterfully created as both extreme and human without compromise - thorne's is just ever so... dull.

and i honestly think the show would've been better and more successful if thorne didn't shy away from letting the characters be unrelatable. there seemed to have been intense concern in making the characters more easily digestible to as wide an audience as possible; and ironically i think that has caused the story to lose a ton of its initial appeal. and i think the same worry was applied to thorne's handling of the plot; and the show suffered massively for that too; but that's a topic for a different post.

#his dark materials #marisa coulter #mrs coulter #philip pullman #jack thorne #the golden compass #the subtle knife #the amber spyglass #cozcat #(because you've asked me to post it #it turned out even longer than my message on the server daslghsdoighasd #i'm sorry i just find the topic so fascinating and intricate #and i could talk about it even more #but this will do for now)

[anghraine]

ncfan-1 replied to this post:

so apparently I'm blissfully ignorant, because I have no idea who either of these people are

James Somerton is a previously fairly popular Canadian YouTuber who "made" videos dealing mainly with the intersection of media and queer issues.

The videos were heavily plagiarized (very, very heavily plagiarized) and the original content seemed to mostly involve tacking on extraneous, inconsistent misogyny (often directed at things/people he now seems to have made up himself—he tried to obscure his misogyny by specifying "straight" and/or "white" women/girls, but this was a very obvious smokescreen for just hating women/girls in general). One of his (or "his") more notorious takes was that the boring, non-artsy, assimilationist gay people were the ones who survived the AIDS epidemic and that's why they care so much about marriage equality.

Another YouTuber, hbomberguy, recently posted a video about plagiarism that dealt a lot with Somerton's mixture of theft and bad takes, and it went viral (currently over 9 million views). So there's been a lot of conversation about that over the last few days.

Personally, I knew that Somerton was a plagiarist, misogynist, and generally annoying person because the YouTube algorithm kept throwing his videos at me and I dug around a bit, but I had no idea of the scale. And I find plagiarism itself interesting, esp as someone who has been plagiarized, so that's been a kind of fascinating trainwreck. (I keep saying "was" because he deleted everything.)

I only just found out about Cait Corrain's existence via a truly remarkable attempt at sabotage.

They are (or were) a debut author who was bringing in a lot of good reviews, a strong marketing push from their publisher (Del Rey, I think), etc—basically everything that could go right for a debut author was. Except the part where they'd made a bunch of sockpuppets on GoodReads to attack other debut authors, including authors represented by their own agent, nearly all of them people of color, while simultaneously using the sockpuppets to prop up their own novel.

They first tried to blame this on "Lilly," an unhinged Reylo friend they made up (to the point of doctoring Discord screenshots of them nobly standing up to Lilly). This was obviously a lie and they've since admitted that much. Their current explanation is that it has to do with their mental illness. I'm sure the explanation of how racism is a side effect of mental illness and/or medication is fascinating but I'll admit I didn't bother reading it. The whole thing mostly struck me as a sort of halfway-to-MsScribe situation, only with the stakes involving major publishers instead of Harry Potter websites.

As of yesterday, I think they've been dropped by their agent and by Del Rey.

#ncfan 1 #respuestas #general fanwank #not really an accurate tag for this but the closest one i have!

[dedalvs]

Hi, welcome back to Tumblr! Your Trigdasleng posts back in the day were fascinating, even though I never watched the show they're from. Keep on keepin' on.

Thank you! It's good to be back, and this is as good a place as any to talk about why I'm here and what I'm doing.

First, I left Tumblr when many others did when they instituted their infamous "female-presenting nipple" policy. It's not as if my Tumblr was ever a nsfw blog, or as if I had any female-presenting nipples, but I felt it was the wrong response to the difficult situation they'd been put in. It was something that hurt a lot of people who had a lot less of a voice and not much of a platform, and so I felt it was my responsibility to use the platform I had to take a stand, even if ultimately it didn't change anything.

As it happens, years later, Tumblr has finally reversed the policy (well done, @staff!). Tumblr may not be the wild west it used to be, but at least they aren't targeting anyone presenting a specific gender unfairly. I've missed my time away, and the people I got to know here, so I'm happy to be back!

As I see it, I'll probably be reblogging stuff less here, even though that's how I made my name way back when, and instead responding mostly to asks in my inbox.

To give myself a fresh start, I have deleted all 3,999 of my asks. I'm starting fresh—with this one, which was the first! My inbox got too overwhelming, so this was needed.

To answer some questions some may have, if you haven't followed me elsewhere recently:

I'm most active on Instagram, where I am @athdavrazar.

I have a YouTube series with partner and significant other Jessie Sams, who is @quothalinguist on Instagram. That series is called LangTime Studio, and we create a language from scratch together live on camera (we work on two hours a week every Thursday at 2 p.m. Pacific).

Jessie and I work together almost exclusively now, and we've done work on Freeform's Motherland: Fort Salem (which I hope you loved, Tumblr!), Peacock's Vampire Academy, the second season of Shadow and Bone (forthcoming), Amazon's Paper Girls (though you can blink and miss our stuff), and the second Dune film.

I worked on HBO's House of the Dragon, and got to create a writing system for High Valyrian, which I'm very excited about.

I created the Sangheili language for Paramount+'s Halo with Carl Buck, who is on Instagram as @tlacamazatl (he's on Tumblr as @tlacamazatl too!). We are presently working on season 2.

I worked with Christian Thalmann on Shadow and Bone seasons 1 and 2. The breakdown is this: Christian and I jointly created the Fjerdan language; I created the Ravkan language and orthography as well as the Kerch and Zemeni orthographies exclusively; Jessie Sams and I created the Shu and Zemeni languages jointly; Christian created the Shu orthography. I can't wait for you to hear and see our work in season 2!

Yes, I left Twitter (quite a bit ago). I'm now more active on Discord, where I'm on a few servers.

I created a wiki for all my languages, and am unevenly working on all of them, and some languages have a team of people working on them (in particular High Valyrian).

Despite being double-vaxxed and getting not one, not two, but three boosters, I got Covid in June, and that PoS hasn't completely left me alone since. (Note: I'd only had one booster before I got it; two have come since then, including the new one, which will hopefully be the last!)

I am traveling again, so I hope to announce those here when they happen.

If there's anything I missed, you let me know. I look forward to answering asks again, and joining in the general silliness of Tumblr! <3

#conlang #language #motherland #vampire academy #motherland fort salem #hotd #house of the dragon #valyrian #halo #sangheili #shadow and bone #ravkan #shu #kerch #zemeni #paper girls #dune #chakobsa

[fumifooms]

do you have any character analysis posts you're working on? i'm currently mulling Daya/Dia over in my head right now. In general, I'm thinking a lot about Kabru's team because they don't show up much in the manga and won't be in the show much longer as noticeable players, but have quite a bit of outside-the-manga content to comb through. Personally, I like the idea of Rin and Dia becoming friends with Marcille post-canon, but I want to know them better first. I know Rin pretty well already. 1/2

(for example, Rin/Dia/Marcille seem to like clothes, and i want to draw them clothes shopping.) And I ask this not to put all the work on you! I want to discuss these characters with somebody, and you're one of the only ones I can think of who enjoys doing in-depth dives into the side characters of Dungeon Meshi. You, summerboletes, shisurus, and ambrosiagourmet are some other blogs i can think of that made great meta posts. You can reply to this privately if you want! 2/2 (think about it. daya has a boyfriend and marries him post-canon. marcille loves romance and loves clothes. it'd be adorable if she helped daya find a wedding dress. like kabru introduces them and dia (god i'm so used to writing 'daya') mentions her wedding and marcille immediately pounces on her with eyes sparkling in excitement. i plan to write this fic one day)

This idea is so cute! I’ll also check out those other blogs you mentioned when I have the time to hehe~ I do latch onto minor characters easily but it doesn’t mean I have much to say about everyone. Dia (agreed btw, the situation with Daya vs Dia is confusing)… I do like her, but I feel like her Adventurer’s Bible profile sums it all up quite nicely and straightforwardly honestly. You’re right though her reaction to the treasure bugs was so cute and honestly surprising considering her appearance and demeanor, she does like pretty things and jewelry I could def see her going shopping. More content of her would definitely be fun, I’d read your fic!! I do love imagining how everyone’s relationships are like in Kabru’s party, the intricacies of it… I haven’t mulled it over enough though. I’ve been thinking of Mickbell more because of recent posts though, also Rin… If you’d like, the dunmeshi discord I’m in would be a good place to brainstorm about it I think! Hmu for an invite if you want

Summing up the posts I’m working on was long so here’s a cut out of mercy

I have 78 drafts on tumblr currently oh boy… The thing about my process is that I ramble easily but then I need to compile panels to illustrate the points and that’s real tedious… Character analysis wise - I’m most hyped about a Falin one on the topic of if she’s a people pleaser, how much does she care, what’s her way of thinking etc etc, also her differences with Laios because I hate seeing people seriously say they’re the same person. - Also a Cithis one that I just need to streamline at this point. I want to analyze her demeanor, poke at her psychology and analyze her relationships, she’s fascinating. - Oh I’m so stupid I almost forgot to mention the one I’ve been working on currently about Thistle, the age shenanigans but in an in-world way where yes it’s wonky and it means something. He hauntssss me I have so many thoughts on Thistle & Falin lately. Like, offtopic for the analysis but… Falin loves nature and Thistle is named after a flower… Imagine her post-canon coming across wild thistles and feeling a rush of fondness and she doesn’t know why… Thistles have thorns but they taste sweet… Peel of his thorns and eat him pls.

I have more Chilchuck & family thoughts coming, and more Toshiro & family, but these will have more of a casual brainstorm & speculating tone to them, I also just need to streamline these… Like I am obsessed about Toshiyuki and Chilchuck’s alcoholism I’m sorry

Beyond those the topics of the character analysis become more specific, like - How much social awareness does Laios have? Not none, not a lot, but the specifics can be blurry in ways I think are interesting, he was sensitive to people’s judgements in his hometown after all, and he does worry about others’ perception of him… He does know that buzzcut guy was taking advantage of him, etc etc. - There’s an extensive one I want to make on how the winged lion reflects abusive relationships, like how he targets all his ‘meals’'s specific weaknesses and draws out the worst in each of them. A lot of Dunmeshi is about unity and overcoming prejudices & differences & flaws and forming deep and long-lasting bonds despite it all, and amongst all of it it’s like… How flawed relationships with flawed people can still be made into somehing good and healthy that make the world brighter… Except the winged lion there to represent abusive relationships which you need to fucking DITCH, lol. - And on the topic of Dunmeshi & relationships I want to talk about it and queerness, especially in the queerplatonic sense of blurring lines, and Izutsumi + Laios’ relationship to touch should feature in those.

And my crown jewel but I’m soooo hyped about the Marcille & Chilchuck’s arcs one I’m working on it’s gonna go over so much stuff I’m obsessed about, like the importance of books in Marcille’s life, what the succubi reveal about the characters in what ways, the theme that’s so prevalent in Dunmeshi of idealization, Marcille’s imagery as a dungeon lord, a shepherd a general a princess a monster a damsel a woman in mourning…

But that’s enough for heavy ones, side characters wise: doing quick posts like for the gold-stripper characters has been great, but those usually come to me on the same day that I post them. I might make some analysis posts on say Mickbell or Holm or Otta, but I don’t have the thread I want to follow yet. Flamela’s been on my brain so much too…

Mostly though there’s just a lot that I wouldn’t write analysis for, but that I’d love to explore in fanfics! For example, the hienbeni I want to write the most rn is about the surges of anger that Benichidori gets, impulsive and stressed out. I haven’t made a post on my Izutsumi & Benichidori brotp and all the interesting parallels I think I have, but I’ve written a fic on it! Same about Chilchuck’s daughters and their relationship with his alcoholism, etc. I explored the guilt and confliction he may feel about his wife in my fic Enough as well, etc etc. You can see my fics here! For Kabru’s party lately mickrin has been having a chokehold on my brain, I’d love love love to explore Rin’s and Mickbell’s characters and issues through fics for them. As I think you might have figured, I love to explore characters through the lenses of relationships they have with others (Cithis & Mithrun and Pattadol, Thistle and Falin, etc), and that’s why for example I love to make posts that pitch ship ideas, I think specific dynamics can really have a lot to say about either characters. Oh another one’s toshimari, I want to make a fic about them and their feelings of being foreigners and not being able to integrate well to The Island, through the plot of them going to a restaurant as coworkers and the food they eat there~

These are only the ones I have at the top of my head though………. Someone help me Hopefully this post wasn’t boring lol, but yeah those are my wips rn. Need to make posts on toshimari, kabushuro, cithaios, cittadela and ships like that I think have interesting potential too. Many of these I’ve mentioned here I’ve had in my drafts for like 6 months btw gdvd 😭

#Fumi updates #Rinsha fana #marcille donato #diamond of sadena #Ask #wips #I like to have a ‘narrative’ of sorts when doing analysis posts so things feel like they have an aim #which is why finding an angle or focusing on specific scenes or a dynamic is important #Like i might make a dia x holm post that details what i think their personality traits and life experiences are and how i think that could #explore their characters in interesting or fun ways but a dia or holm analysis on their own eh idk. I do think Holm’s more cryptic though #What do his spirits mean to him? How does his religion affect him? He freezes up when there’s too much going on… I love you #I’m just rambling now though save me

[mirror-imaged]

idont think anybody understands sheffbrien the way I do (insane) I'm sorry they're literally so bad for each other (affectionate) I could go on and on forever. I will actually. sheffbrien post be upon ye. thanks to ashe for talking about this w me on discord. this is a kinda obrien centric post bc of that loll but I'm obvi getting into sheffields whole deal too

having reread tc22 again and done some literary analysis a few days ago on a plane at 2 in the morning (I'm out of the country rn helloo ^_^) I picked up on a lot of thematics for them I find very interesting. long post ahead!

1 - the dynamics in their relationship are so wildly interesting. I think their characterization in tc22 does wonders for them. firstly, there are a lot of false differences id say? they seem so different, but when you boil it down they have a lot in common. sheffield is affluent and intelligent but has a spiteful and hotheaded side, obrien is seen as angry or rude but is taken for granted with his intelligence quite often by others. he got into an ivy league school at 17. there's also how sheffield seems so charismatic while obrien is abrasive and lonely, but they both really have no other friends when you get down to it? and last example for now, sheffield sees himself as divine while obrien seems to have renounced religion, but he really hasn't done the work of removing his mindset from a catholic(?) framework. expanding on that,

2 - obrien has religious trauma and this is heavily established. he doesn't actually ever move past religion as a concept though, he just moves on from God. he replaces his concept of God with his concept of his sister. more on this later. sheffield also has a relationship with religion, but more in the sense that he inherently sees himself as something unlike humanity, something greater and to be revered. he refers to himself as an angel in a way that doesn't strike me as being ingenuine the way he does in other places. I need to draw art about this it makes me abnormal

3 - for obrien specifically, there are some insanely interesting threads left about his trauma creating a savior complex within him. obviously shown at the start of the story with professor harris, but there are also the times he mentions going into genetics due to his guilt and wanting to entirely eliminate the disease that disabled his sister and when he says he feels an involuntary sympathy for stella when he found out she didn't mean to kill harris. it also makes me wonder if that plays into his protectiveness of sera later on.

4 - obrien has some severe internalized ableism going on that I wish more people actually picked apart. I know tc22 is a small scale story and a lot of people haven't read it, but it's fascinating stuff. he obviously grew up with the mindset that his sister was somehow contagious and describes how he felt he would somehow fall ill because of this, and that sort of mindset does a lot to dehumanize somebody in a person's mind. after eventually passing on an illness to her that results in her death, he is driven entirely by guilt as a character. he becomes certain that if God were fair and true, he would have died instead of her. but, like I mentioned before, he never really renounces religion in any specific way aside from this. he even mentions how he now prays to his sister instead of God, which I think is so fascinating. he never saw his sister as a person, and by elevating her to this status of somebody he needs to grovel to or even just uses as a holy figure in his life, he continues to see her as inhuman. he recognizes his past ableism, but he never does anything to deconstruct and rebuild from it. much like with his relationship with religion!

5 - obrien is treated by dds2 as the morally virtuous character, but he's really not (if you get the context from tc22). my boyfriend put it as him being just on the right side of history, which I absolutely agree with. I know tc22 was probably written after dds2 and doesn't necessarily inform the writing decisions for the games, but it definitely adds juicy layers to me. obrien is seemingly not motivated by any true desire to help sera or the nameless sufferers of CATCH22, he is motivated by the guilt from his sisters death hanging over him like a shadow. not to say he doesn't care at all, but it seems more like a quest to make up for his sins in the eyes of his sister than a desire to do good, which seems awfully catholic to me. this is absolutely the most interesting part of his character presented by the narrative. God I wish they did this better in the games.

6 - moving on to sheffield, sheffield is actually one of the most interesting and real depictions of a character with NPD traits I've ever seen, hands down. I know I talk about this frequently, but it's especially strongly done in tc22 and one of my favorite parts of his character. to start, he's mostly presented with extremely minor and often-masked aspects of the disorder a lot of people don't really pick up on. vouching personally. he quickly becomes passive aggressive and seemingly personally offended when challenged, like by inspector Harvey for instance. he is a practiced and seemingly compulsive liar, able to make things up on the spot that nobody but obrien questions due to his confidence. he seems to get along swimmingly with people he doesn't know well, charismatic and understanding. he pays exceptionally close attention to other people's emotions, expressions, and demeanors to adjust and match theirs. he also is debatably depicted with real delusions of grandeur. he only seems to be able to let his guard down around obrien, actually. and my absolute favorite moment of his, really relatable for me, is that when he stops masking he does not become dangerous. he does not go into a rage, he just goes blank. entirely and visibly unable to express emotion "normally", and obrien is initially scared, but realizes he just doesn't understand sheffield as well as he thinks he does. this is incredibly accurate to real life for me. it's actually insanely well depicted. and what I really appreciate is that sheffield is never presented as truly malicious [IN THIS STORY]. with dds2 context, he can be seen that way for sure, but he isn't actually shown being morally reprehensible. he's dubious and seems to have trouble understanding where he crosses a line, but that's also very true to real life for me. he isn't necessarily trying to be evil, he's just nosy and invasive of boundaries on occasion. they also never actually label him as or call him a narcissist, which is so good?? props to tadashi for once?? I think he is one because I have the disorder and can more accurately assess this sort of thing, but labeling every character who's like Abusive as a narcissist is so tacky and distasteful to me. it diminishes the harm they inflict on other people as being something born of mental illness, which isn't necessarily true. he is definitely abusive to sera, but that is not related to his narcissism.

7 - sheffield is just such a good character in this. I raved already about his npd stuff but I want to get into other things a little too. firstly, he does seem to genuinely view himself as inhuman, which is something I also believe contrasts obrien a little. obrien has this deep internalized self hatred, while sheffield has this genuine belief he is on a different level from other people. despite this, he sees obrien as being his Equal in some way. as being worthy of his presence, his assistance, his friendship. the pizza scene really really drives this home for me. (that's another subtle npd ass trait but I've said enough). in addition, sheffield tries so desperately to present himself as worthy of something more, maybe backed by doubt, or maybe even just true belief. he tries to appear intimidating, has knowledge of how to get into people's heads, etc. maybe this is because he's young and people see him differently for being so ahead of his grade, but I also see it as a display of insecurity in an implicit way. his delusions of grandeur also play into this characterization, because delusions of grandeur are often born from extreme and severe self doubt (at least in those with mental health disorders, which I've already mentioned I believe he strongly aligns with). him coming from a wealthy background in Portland of all places would not help any of that kind of thing.

8 - i don't even know what else I could say about them. they make me so abnormal. not even a toxic romantic relationship between them (which I do like think about but obviously post tc22 I don't like their age gap) but simply their dynamic as two characters. sera is a figurehead for their conflict, really. all the things we learn about both of these characters really makes me question how much BOTH of them care for sera, not just sheffield's two-faced lies. she is representative of their ideological dispute. she is a small child who has the potential to save the world, but obrien is too scared of letting another child die as a result of his inaction and sheffield is too focused on his end goal of getting what he believes he deserves, divinity and becoming a revered savior of the world, no matter who falls along the way. they are built to contrast each other. you even see this through heat and serph to a degree, with how sera mixed them up. heat declares he is on the same level as God during the jp text of the vritra fight, while serph inevitably sacrifices his own life for the sake of sera.

9 - what happened between tc22 and the dds2 flashbacks? I actually need to know what caused their relationship to split so heavily. I'm fucking obsessed with them. post over please join my sheffbrien Island there's like 2 other people here

#digital devil saga #shin megami tensei #digital devil saga 2 #ddsat #sheffbrien #analysis #thats catch 22 #ok sorry i actually really worked hard on this post i hope you guys like and or read it. thx #i think about them so much

[beatrice-otter]

Fic: Amber

fffx has now revealed authors! I wrote a fic that was, er, exactly in my wheelhouse, I would not be surprised if people clocked it was me. I feel people on the TGE discord especially are likely to have suspected, because I've brought up "given the technological level, they really SHOULD have trains, why don't they?" on more than one occasion. And then I couldn't resist writing a fic that is (partly) about that. And partly about politics and 'soft' power, and Csethiro and Maia's relationship.

Title: Amber Author: beatrice_otter Fandom: The Goblin Emperor Length: 11,698 words Rating: General Audiences Written For: swingandswirl in fffx 2024

Summary: "The Ethuveraz has been trapped in amber for a very long time. Preserved, beautiful, but … not useful. Not able to go out and do things. Not able to grow or change. Not like the rest of the world has."

On AO3. On Squidgeworld. On Dreamwidth. Rebloggable on pillowfort and cohost.

The Ethuveraz was a backwards place. That was obvious to anyone with a modicum of education who wasn't a hopeless chauvinist.

"Which is why, of course," Vedero said dryly when Csethiro said it, "that much of the Untheileneise Court believes us to be the height of modernity and the center of the world."

Csethiro snorted in an unladylike fashion and leaned back, tucking her feet under herself. She hadn't been a part of Archduchess Vedero's set before her engagement; Vedero was just enough years older to make an awkward gap when Csethiro had been a girl, and her friends were more likely to read academic treatises than adventure novels, as Csethiro's friends were. But she had cultivated her new sister-in-law's favor since the engagement, as she had cultivated Arbelan's, so that the Drazhadeise women might have a united front.

"I should invite thee the next time Maia has a family dinner with his Aunt Nadeian," Csethiro said. "Her description of daily life in the Corat Dav Arhos was … well. She was very good at not being too obvious that she thought us all backward country rubes, easily dazzled."

"Considerate," Vedero said, "since Edrehasivar is one, no matter how he tries to hide it."

Which was true; but Csethiro was most definitely not one, at least not by Ethuveraz standards, and it had been somewhat galling to have her nose rubbed into the fact that she might be by Barizheise ones. "Maia was fascinated with the idea of railroad trains from a mechanical standpoint," Csethiro said. "Apparently they make models of them, much like his model Istandaärtha Bridge. I've no doubt he'll get one as a present from his Aunt or his Grandfather at the next suitable opportunity to give a gift."

"Those are very hard to come by, in the Ethuveraz," Vedero said. "If he'd be willing to put it on public display for a time, I have several friends who would love to spend hours studying it. Not to mention playing with it."

"And why are they hard to come by in the Ethuveraz?" Csethiro asked. "We have craftsmen enough, and my husband can't be the only one who'd want one."

Vedero shrugged. "I am not one to study mechanics, nor the flow of trade; I have friends who might be able to answer that question, if thou art truly interested?"

Csethiro thought about it. "I think Maia would like to know the answer more than I would. He likes to know things, but is always afraid of being censured for the dreadful state of his education, so he hides both his ignorance and his curiosity."

Vedero nodded; she had undoubtedly noticed that herself.

"What I would like to know," Csethiro said, "is why we don't have the real thing. Models are all well and good but they serve little purpose beyond amusement. Real trains would be a boon to trade within the Ethuveraz. I'm told that some Ethuverazeise cities have little trains called trams for people to ride from one side of the city to the other. The technology exists; we can build the rails and the engines to run on them. Why don't we have trains outside of cities? It would seem to be much easier to build a rail line in the countryside than in the middle of a city."

"I suppose," Vedero said thoughtfully, "it's because we have such an excellent river network, and also because we are the best in the world at building airships. We don't need trains to go from city to city."

"The rivers are all well and good if you're trying to ship something down to Barizhan, or in the eastern half of the Ethuveraz," Csethiro pointed out, "but there are no great rivers in the western half—especially not up in Thu-Evresar. And from what Merrem Vizhenka was saying, railroads are faster than river travel or airships, cost less to build than canals, and can ship a great deal more cargo—or people—than an airship. While also being significantly safer to build, maintain, and operate." She shrugged. "At least according to Merrem Vizhenka. We are, apparently, the foremost manufacturers of airships because nobody else considers them worth the expense and danger; there are cheaper and safer ways of moving people and cargo quickly overland."

Vedero thought for a bit. "Assuming that Merrem Vizhenka was being completely honest and not, say, shading the truth to get the Emperor to favor railroads for the benefit of Goblin merchants, I do not know."

"She could have been doing both, of course," Csethiro said. "Being completely honest and trying to get Maia to favor the railroads for the benefit of Barizheise merchants." Merrem Vizhenka was a soldier's wife, not a diplomat's wife, and her husband had been chosen for his post at least partly because she was Maia's aunt. Still, if she weren't canny and loyal, she wouldn't be here.

Vedero dipped her ears in acknowledgement. "I do not know why the Ethuveraz does not use rail, but there are several people in my circles who are interested in steam-powered machinery; perhaps one of them will know."

"I would appreciate an introduction," Csethiro said.

***

Csethiro had expected the introduction to happen in Vedero's apartments over a ladies' tea, the sort of thing the Court took little notice of. If not that, perhaps at a salon Vedero hosted, which were becoming more and more fashionable as Vedero's position solidified within the court.

Instead, Maia received an invitation to view an amazing automaton of a horse (which had apparently been a unicorn at one time). And given how few places the Emperor went, it was sure to be noticed and gossiped about. Which was probably the point, when Csethiro thought about it; it was a way of signaling the Emperor's favor without directly saying anything. She took note of the tactics.

Dach'osmin Tativin was a short, plump woman with a button nose and lilac eyes. She wore a dress that did not fit the current court fashions, or any other fashion Csethiro was familiar with. She was also shockingly tactless, which was something Csethiro had not thought it possible to be at Court. After a half-hour's conversation, instead of being astonished that a daughter of marriageable age was allowed to live away from Court for most of the year, she began to be astonished that Dach'osmin Tativin was allowed at Court at all.

The horse was interesting, though; Csethiro had never seen an automaton of that size before, and though it would be more impressive if it could walk, it bowed its head and pawed the floor in a manner very similar to what a real horse would have done.

The horse was merely one of Dach'osmin Tativin's toys, and Maia and Csethiro were given a thorough tour of all of them before they were allowed to sit down for refreshments. Maia was enthralled. Csethiro would have been a bit bored, honestly; she did not need to see them all demonstrated and explained in quite that much exhaustive detail. But Maia's delight was contagious, and it was a rare treat to see him lose his self-conscious reserve. It was something Csethiro seldom managed to achieve. Unfortunately, not being a maker of novel devices, she could not try Tativin's methodology. But at last they were all sitting down to tea and pastries, and Csethiro could ask her question.

"It's the land rights, of course," Tativin said, nibbling delicately at a cheese puff. "And the question of tolls. And we don't have enough engineers. But mostly it's the land rights."

"Oh," said Csethiro. She had—quite naively—assumed that the problem would be a technical one. She tried to think through a possible route—say, from Csedo to Cevezho. Two towns with resources and a growing proportion of craftsmen, but no large rivers nearby to transport the goods they made to distant markets. Ideal for a railroad, to get their goods to the Istandaärtha and the cities that dotted it. Csedo was an Imperial town, and neither beholden to the local prince for governance nor required to pay taxes to him; they regularly had conflicts with the Prince of Thu-Istandaär. He would need to approve any such route; would he allow it, for such benefit to a town he was jealous of? And Csedo was near the border with Barizhan. Surely they would wish a railroad south to their Goblin neighbors and the larger markets beyond, and the Prince would like that even less. Such goods would pay tariffs at the border but not any taxes to the Thu-Istandaär. If they chose a route which led only through lands the Prince did not directly own, it might be possible to force it through against his will, but only if the Corazhas decided that a road with rails was not like any other kind of road between cities, which were automatically under the jurisdiction of the prince of the province. "We see. Who would own the rails themselves? Who would govern them?" (Who would profit from them?)

"In Barizhan, there are a variety of privately-owned rail companies," Tativin said. "They buy up land—or in some cases merely the rights to use it—for every new rail line they put in. They own the land, they own the rails, they own the engines and hire the people to run them. Then they get all the profit from the cargo they move and the tickets they sell."

"It must be very expensive, to buy up that much land," Maia said thoughtfully. "As opposed to airships, which do not take any more land than is needed for mooring masts."

"And of course most of the land in the Ethuveraz either belongs to the Emperor or to the noble houses or to itself with a witness to steward it," Csethiro said. "It cannot be sold, only inherited or gifted by the crown."

"It could be leased, which given a long-enough term would be as good for the purposes of most companies," Tativin said. "It's getting the nobles in question to agree to it, is the problem. Half of them disapprove on principle, think it would just encourage their peasants to run off to the city instead of staying home and working the estates. Or think it would let in foreign ideas. Or think that the merchants are getting too influential already. The ones that would be inclined to lease their lands all want the rights to put tolls on the railroads just as they would on a tributary river flowing through their territory. Which quickly adds up to enough money to make the project unfeasible."

"We do not think that putting a vital link of commerce under the sole power of the nobles would be a good idea," Maia said. "And we do not know that putting it under the power of a company would be any better. There is a reason the Istandaärtha belongs to the Crown."

"You mean besides the fact that the tolls on cargo moved along it are a significant part of the Drazhadeise purse?" Csethiro said.

"At least in theory, an Emperor should be working for the good of the Ethuveraz as a whole, not merely the profit of a part of it," Maia said.

Tativin snorted. "Not historically …" she muttered.

"The Istandaärtha belongs to the crown because it is too vital to be prey to petty squabbles," Maia said. His ears twitched as he thought it through, earrings shivering delicately. "Trade and messages cannot be held hostage to local problems. Surely, if there were to be railroads connecting cities that cannot reach each other by river, the principle would be the same."

"You would want any railroads to belong to the Emperor, as the Istandaärtha does?" Tativin said. "That would solve some of the land rights issues…."

"But it would greatly offend the princes, since roads without rails belong to them," Csethiro said. "And besides. You are both getting far ahead of yourselves. The Wisdom Bridge is barely started, and it required a significant amount of political capital to achieve. And it is much simpler a project than building an entire road network made out of rails. You'd need the Corazhas on your side, and probably the Houses of Blood and the House of Commons. They are unlikely to be very receptive to a second massive building project when the first is only just begun."

Maia's eyes lost their animation, though his ears held steady. "You are right, of course," he said. "We should not become caught up in cloud fancies. With the bridge, there already existed a large and diverse group of people who wished ardently for it and had all the plans ready. We merely ensured that they were heard, rather than ignored."

"You did quite a bit more than that, Serenity," Csethiro pointed out. "And it was more than your father ever managed." She was gratified to see that Maia smiled at her; she hadn't meant to douse his fire, merely channel it before he committed himself prematurely.

"There's an even larger faction that wants railroads," Tativin said. "Even many people who wanted the Istandaärtha bridged did not support the Clocksmiths, because they did not believe it possible. But railroads cannot be dismissed as a cloud fancy; many countries have them. And even, on a smaller scale, many cities in the Ethuveraz."

That might be true, but it would be some time before Maia had the political capital to bring another ambitious building project before the Corazhas. And while the Wisdom Bridge had been of a novel design, the principle of bridges was well-established: who owned them, who had the right to use them, who had the right to put tolls on them, who had the responsibility to maintain them. For railroads, all of those questions would have to be ironed out. "You mentioned other problems besides the political," Csethiro said. "A shortage of engineers?"

"Oh, gods, don't get us started," Tativin said. She heaved a sigh. "We don't really have any in the Ethuveraz, not the way Barizhan does. No places to train them."

"We beg your pardon," Maia said. "But what, exactly, is an engineer? Do they run engines?"

"No, Serenity, an engineer builds engines," Tativin said. "Designs them. And designs other things, too; any large mechanism, for example. Or the railroad itself—there is quite a lot of specialized knowledge required to figure out how and where to lay the tracks. As we discovered when we tried to build a railroad between two of our father's estates."

"What happened?" Csethiro asked.

"Oh, any number of things went wrong, and a great deal of it had to be ripped out and done again," Tativin said. "And our father thought it the greatest waste of time and money imaginable. Then there was the engine itself—we bought it, and had it shipped in at great expense. And then we had to train people to run it and maintain it, no small feat. But it works now, and saves a good deal of time and money when things must be shipped back and forth."

"And has it made up the cost in making it?" Csethiro asked.

"Of course not," Tativin said. "May not ever. If we could extend it to the nearest city and use it to ship our grain and things to market, then it probably would. But we were mostly interested in proof of concept, and in seeing it work." She sighed. "We wanted to build the engine ourselves, but our father forbade it. Too dangerous, he said, and we are not sure whether he knew enough about steam engines to know they can explode if made incorrectly or handled wrong, or if he knows so little that he thought they are as dangerous as making airships. He's not a stupid man, our father, but he'd not notice if the rest of the world disappeared, as long as his horses and his dogs were spared."

This being far from the worst thing Tativin had said about someone in the time they'd been in her apartments, Csethiro merely wondered how much similarity there might be between Tativin and her father; she suspected that Tativin wouldn't notice if the rest of the world disappeared, so long as her steam engines were spared.

Tativin continued in her response to Maia's earlier question. "But a real railroad—one between cities, not merely between two neighboring estates—would require a lot of engineers with more training than we have managed to cobble together. Then there would be the manufacture of steel for rails, and the manufacture of the train engine and cars—the design and manufacturing would take far more people with specialized training than the Ethuveraz currently possesses."

"How does one train an engineer?" Maia asked.

"In the Ethuveraz, one doesn't," Tativin said. "Architecture and mathematics are taught in the universities, but not engineering. The Clocksmiths' Guild has been experimenting with steam engines for quite some time; many clocksmiths these days spend very little time working on clocks and mostly build other things. But there aren't enough of them, and most masters only have a handful of apprentices and journeyman at a time, so the guild grows very slowly. And of course the military trains men to build and design things using similar principles, but they only work on projects for the Army. The airship companies and others that need engineers usually either train them in an apprenticeship program, or import them from Barizhan. Railroads are not the only thing we could do if we had more of them." She sighed.

Beshelar checked his watch, and cleared his throat portentously. "Serenity, Mer Aisava charged us to remind you of your other appointments this afternoon."

Csethiro started at the interruption. It was not that she was so wrapped up in the conversation that she had forgotten their surroundings, but rather that her subconscious tended to forget that nohecharei were not servants. She was used to being surrounded by servants and attendants who faded into the background until they were wanted, and were supposed to be ignored by their betters; she was not used to people who worked just as hard at being unobtrusive … but had the right and responsibility to interrupt and give opinions. It had been quite shocking to her, how much they talked with Maia, when she was first getting to know him—and them.

"Thank you," Maia said, climbing to his feet. Csethiro joined him.

Tativin scrambled gracelessly up and bobbed a curtsey. "Serenity, we thank you for your time and hope you were entertained by our hobby."

"We were, your creations were quite marvelous," Maia said. "Thank you for taking the time to explain them to us, we learned a great deal."

"Yes, it was quite informative," Csethiro said, politely but with less enthusiasm than her husband.

***

Maia had audiences that afternoon, and Csethiro had no public duties or engagements. She retired to her apartments to write letters; some were to personal friends who were not currently at court, but many were to people that she needed to cultivate. An empress' duty, besides bearing heirs, was to weave together the social threads that bound the upper classes, so that they would all form a tapestry in support of her husband.

Or, at least, that was the theory; in practice, the nobility of the Ethuveraz hadn't been united in one cause for at least the last few centuries, and Csethiro strongly suspected that the histories which claimed that they had been united and harmonious in the past were not entirely accurate.

Csethiro's goals were more modest: build up enough tolerance of her husband that nobody else would try to kill him. And, if possible, encourage support of his policies.

To that end, she had begun exchanging letters with every Princess, Duchess, and Countess not at the Untheileneise Court, whether she liked them or not.

The next letter in her rotation of correspondence was to Naraino, the Princess of Thu-Evresar. Csethiro sat at her desk in her solar, tapping her pen on the ink bottle, as she considered what to write. She had a store of gossip and news and politics ready to be shared; Csethiro didn't know the lady at all well, given that Naraino was forty years older than her and rarely came to court, but that would come in time, if they kept writing.

"Your grace, is there something troubling you?"

Csethiro turned in her chair to look at Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran, one of her ladies in waiting. She had several, of course, but was in the habit of giving most of them the afternoon off when she had no public events or pressing business in need of assistance. They rotated which one stayed with her, and today by chance it was Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran, a sensible older lady whose advice Csethiro had come to value. "Not troubling, exactly. But we were considering whether we should hint at our husband's new enthusiasm."

"New enthusiasm?" Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran asked.

"He is much taken by the idea of trains. Roads made of rails, with great steam engines pulling many wagons, that could carry more cargo and passengers than airships can," Csethiro said.

"We have heard of them," Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran said, cautiously. "But … surely he is not going to attempt to champion another mechanical wonder so soon? Before we even know if his first works as the clocksmiths have said, or if all the money is wasted?"

"He understands the need to be politic," Csethiro said, "and that his political capital for new projects is currently low and will not be replenished until we see whether the Wisdom Bridge is as wise as it seems like it should be." Or, at least, if he did not understand, he trusted her and Csevet when they told him. "This is merely an interesting idea that may bear fruit in the future, not a current plan of action."

"Ah," Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran said. "Very good." She flicked her ears. "Then why would you even consider bothering people about it now?"

"We would like to lay the groundwork," Csethiro said. "We have not his enthusiasm for gadgets, but we want the Ethuveraz to be modern and not lag so far behind the rest of Osreiath … and it would be good for trade and so on."

"Mm." Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran looked down at her embroidery. She thought all the world outside the Ethuveraz barbaric, Csethiro knew, and didn't care what foreigners thought of the Ethuveraz. But she was loyal and would not gossip. "Well, if it will be years before the Emperor can openly press for it, you certainly shouldn't be doing it now. If you think it important, what you should be doing now is laying the groundwork for it."

"Well, yes," Csethiro said. That was obvious. But asking what their thoughts on railroads would be too direct, and she hadn't come up with anything else. She spread her hands, hoping Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran would have a more explicit suggestion.

"So ask them questions about the things that make you think the Ethuveraz should have railroads," Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran said. "What things do they have trouble importing, or exporting? How much do they care about keeping up with Barizhan? How confident are they in the safety of airships, after what happened to His Serenity's father and brothers? That sort of thing."

"That is an excellent point," Csethiro said. She knew several people who were hesitant to travel by airship, even now that they knew the Wisdom of Choharo's destruction was due to Eshevis Tethimar's treason rather than accident or a peasant's grudge. Now that such sabotage had been proven to be possible, surely someone else would try it—and everyone knew the airship workers and manufactories were full of violent radicals. They might not need a treasonous duke to prod them into action next time. "We wonder if we should open the topic of railroads now," she mused. "After all, Varenechibel's death will not be so immediate a tragedy by the time the Wisdom Bridge is finished. People may have forgotten their mistrust of airships."

Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran shuddered. "We shouldn't think so, Your Grace."

Csethiro turned back to her desk, and the view out the window to the gardens. Thu-Evressar was historically the poorest and most backwards of the principalities. It was scarcely populated, grew grain and cattle and sheep, and exported wool. Until the discovery of gold in Ezho, it had had few mines or other natural resources except for the portion nearest to the Istandaärtha. Its longest river was the Evresartha, which fed into the Istandaärtha but was itself too shallow and narrow, along most of its length, for the movement of large cargos. And it was too far north for direct trade with Barizhan. Like Thu-Istandaär, Thu-Evressar was beginning to produce goods that were worth marketing elsewhere; unlike Thu-Istandaär, Thu-Evressar had few good ways to get those goods to market.

"Do you know what Naraino thinks of the Wisdom Bridge?" she asked. "Or her opinion of the rising prosperity of tradesmen, manufacturers, and merchants?"

"No, Your Grace, we do not," Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran said. "We have only met her a handful of times, and none of them were in places where such conversations would have been appropriate. Her husband has been silent on the matter, as well; he was not of Chavar's faction, nor any other." Dach'Osmerrem Eshanaran paused, biting off her thread and sorting through her box of embroidery floss for another color. "Naraino was from Thu-Tetar, and her family has many connections in the silk trade, but there was some falling-out a short while after their marriage. We have heard that she declared she would rather walk naked through the court than ever speak to any of them again. We do not believe she has any fondness for the society she was raised in."

"Which, since Thu-Tetar is so conservative and stratified, would probably influence her to be in favor of anything which challenged the power of the ancient silk merchants and the nobles they are beholden to," Csethiro said. "And then there is the potential profit to her domain, if the rising class of Evressaran merchants can get their goods to market faster and cheaper." Though that wasn't a factor she could count on; many Ethuverazheise nobles would prefer their peasants to stay poor and in their place, even if that contributed to their own impoverishment.

"Thank you, Osmerrem," Csethiro said. That had given her some ideas, and she began to write her letter. All she really needed was the gossip she had already collected for the letter, appropriately slanted; she did not need to win Naraino's approval now, merely open up the possibility of future discussion.

After all, she was playing the long game.

***

"How goes thy wooing of the absent noblewomen?" Maia asked over luncheon. They usually ate together in the Alcethmeret, when neither had another engagement. It was private, so they could relax, and Maia's cook was excellent. Today's spicy sour soup was delicious.

"Oh, as well as can be expected," Csethiro said, dipping her bread in her soup and nibbling at it. "I have little enough in common with most of them, but they all of course are quite prompt in their correspondence; Csoru did not trouble herself to keep in touch with any other than her own set, and thy mother of course could not even if she had wanted to. I've no idea what Leshan and Pazhiro's habits of communication were. So the opportunity to correspond with the Empress is an honor and a novelty."

"But if they have nothing in common with thee, how long can thy correspondence last?" Maia asked. "What canst thou have to say?"

"A great deal!" Csethiro said. She shouldn't be surprised; he had never been taught how to converse or build bridges with people of differing characters and tastes. But she was so used to living at Court where everyone could do it that she had trouble remembering that the art of conversation was not something everyone knew.

She took a sip of her tea. How to explain it? "Most people like gossip," she said. "And for nobles, knowing who has done what can be vital to any political plans they have, or any financial dealings. It wouldn't do to try and make an alliance with someone who had just been disgraced, for example! And living away from court means they do not receive it first-hand. There is always some amusing or scandalous story I can tell them."

"But what about the people thou gossip'st about?" Maia said. "Are they not harmed by the spreading of tales?"

"I do not spread those sorts of stories, of course," Csethiro said. "Only the harmless ones. Or the true ones. Not the cruel ones or the false ones. I'm not Csoru." That last was said with some tartness.

Maia's ears lowered. "Of course," he said. "We did not mean to imply thou wert inappropriate or cruel."

"Of course not," Csethiro said gently. She ate some soup, but Maia did not say anything, perhaps out of fear he had offended her. He was so sweet, but she looked forward to the day when he had more confidence in her and their relationship, and did not retreat when he felt he had made a mis-step.

"Aside from the gossip, well, most people like talking about themselves," Csethiro went on. "If one asks them about things they care about, and are willing to honestly listen and appreciate their thoughts, they will be very pleased to share. At worst, one has spent a few boring minutes; at best, they will go away from the conversation quite well-disposed to one."

"Like at Marquess Lanthevel's party," Maia said thoughtfully. "I asked him about his wall-hanging, and his studies. I asked many questions that night. And by the end of the party, Lantheval helped me convince Pashavar to allow the Clocksmiths their hearing."

"Yes," Csethiro said. "Showing genuine interest in their opinions and things they care about probably helped a great deal."

"But is it not … impolite to pry?" Maia asked.

"It can be," Csethiro said. "The trick is to ask leading questions on subjects thou dost not think are particularly sensitive, and allow them to say as much or as little as they feel comfortable with."

"Ah," Maia said. "I see." He pondered that for a bit, and Csethiro had to nudge him to eat his soup.

"And of course, if all else fails, people generally love to give advice, especially to young people," Csethiro sad. "Though I try not to use that very often; sometimes they become offended if one does not take the advice."

"That one wouldn't work for me, though," Maia said. "Emperors are supposed to give advice, not take it. At least, not from anyone but our advisors."

"True," Csethiro conceded.

***

Orshan was a minor goddess, not part of the Five-Fold Harmony; and yet despite being unfashionable, two of the major festivals of the year were in her honor. The first, Bel'Orshonei was a planting festival, in the spring, and as it was a traditional occasion for gift-giving, Csethiro spent many hours with Csevet planning out lists of who should receive a gift from the Emperor, and what they should be given.

"That seems to be a rather long list," Maia said dubiously, when they consulted him on the final details.

"It does not do for the Emperor to be stingy," Csethiro said. "Rich gifts are a traditional way to bind the loyalty of the nobles to the Emperor. The two Orshaneisei festivals are a customary time for such gifts."

"We believe the custom of gift giving at planting and harvest-time sprang originally from a belief that it would bring the goddess' favor and bounty," Csevet said.

Maia smiled at Csevet. "Thank you." He turned his attention back to the list. "We see many things on this list that were gifts to us on our birthday. Will they not think it … ungrateful of us, to give away what they have so recently given us?"

"Most gifts to the Emperor are not for his personal use, or not in perpetuity," Csevet said. "The ones that seemed more personal, or exceptional, such as the clock, will not be given away. But the rest—no, Serenity, they would think it odd if their gifts were not passed on, eventually."

"Empress Leshan was once given an exquisite dress made entirely of lace," Csethiro said. "She only wore it three times, and I believe a court painting was made of her in it, and then it was taken apart and the lace given to ladies whom she particularly favored. Even for an Empress, it was too extravagant a gift to keep."

"Ah." Maia frowned and thought for a few minutes. "What makes a gift good to give? That is, what political messages are we sending with these gifts? There must be something besides wealth."

"Oh, many messages to be sure," Csethiro said. "Gifts that you have commissioned specially for someone are much more highly valued than those which merely come from the Drazhadeise vaults and store rooms, for example."

"And the relative value of the gift given now with that of past gifts, and the gifts they have given you, must all be calculated," Csevet said. "If there is an imbalance, it will be noted. If they have given you something much more valuable than you have given them, for example."

"Nobody would say outright that we owed them, but they would think it," Maia said. "We knew that from Tethimar's gift of the silk bedchamber set." He bit his lip. "If we give a great many of a certain kind of gift, would it then become popular? That is, would people think it was something we favored?"

"It depends on who you gave it to, and when, and how often," Csethiro said. "If it was, for example, known to be a set given you by a person now out of favor—or executed for treason!—and you gave it only to people who were associated with him but not closely enough to fall with him, and never gave anything like it again, it would be taken more as a sign of your disfavor than anything else."

"Oh!" Maia smiled. "Then let it be done with Tethimar's sharadansho silk set, by all means. We think it a cruel trade, which enriches people like Tethimar, while the artisans who make it suffer for it."

"That can certainly be done, Serenity," Csevet said, making a note.

Csethiro had never thought much one way or the other about the silk-makers, but she supposed Maia had a point. She did rather think he'd look lovely laid out on a sharadansho silk coverlet—it would set his complexion off to perfection—but it wouldn't be worth it if it made him uncomfortable. Maia was so reserved, he was so easily distressed by the cruelty of the world, and so self-conscious of his own awkwardness, that she had to take constant care not to trample him.

It wasn't that he would not or could not speak up for himself; his sharp tongue was one of the first things she had learned about him as a person, and not as the Emperor. It was that he did not trust himself to know when to use his voice.

Maia had a few other notes and concerns about the gifts being sent in his name, and then left the matter in Csethiro and Csevet's care.

***

By the time Csethiro and Maia entered the Tortoise Room on the morning of Bel'Orshonei, the servants and secretaries had their gifts sorted and catalogued. The majority of them had already been taken to be displayed or stored as appropriate, and both she and her husband were presented with lists of what they had been given and by whom. Csethiro handed the list off to Osmerrem Mevaran, and sat down to open and examine the more personal gifts.

First was, of course, an envelope with Maia's cat-serpent seal on it. She broke the seal and extracted the letter. It was a promissory note for a horse—and a horse of her choice, at that!

"Oh! Thank thee, my dear," she said, giving him a kiss and smiling as his ears twitched with embarrassment. They went out riding when the weather was good. His horse was excellent, a gray gelding named Velvet that Csethiro had been envious of since first she saw him. Her own mare, Lady, was a fine animal … but she had been selected by Csethiro's father and perfectly suited his ideas of what a young lady should ride. She was pretty, reliable … and slow. Csethiro had never complained to Maia, but he had paid enough attention to notice her discontent. Csethiro sighed happily, joy at the horse and at his attentiveness vying for pride of place. "And wilt thou come with me to the Horsemarket?"

"I'll not be much use or help," Maia warned her.

"Oh, I know better than to ask for thine opinion of horseflesh," Csethiro said with a laugh. "But at least thou hast been to the Horsemarket; I have not, for my father did not deem it ladylike enough, to go to a common market."

"I found the Cetho Horsemarket to be a very uncommon market," Maia said.

"Yes, that is what I have heard," Csethiro said.

Maia opened her present for him; it was a set of novels she thought he would like. Nothing weighty or serious—he got enough of that day in and day out—but amusing and interesting tales. The Alcethmeret library had a wide and varied selection of works, but only a handful of novels published in the last fifty years; Varenechibel IV had apparently not cared for them.

"I thought we could read them aloud together," Csethiro said. "I'm very good at doing voices and things."

"Really?" Maia said. "I have no idea if I can do the same."

Csethiro waved a hand. "The stories are interesting regardless."

None of the rest of the gifts for either of them were surprising; all were within the range Csethiro and Csevet had expected. Maia's Aunt Nadeian had indeed sent him a model railroad.

"It seems part of the fun is putting it together yourself," Maia said reading the letter. "The track comes in segments that can be configured in many ways, and she chose a size that is approximately the same scale as the model of the Wisdom Bridge, so that if I choose to incorporate it into that model or display it next to it, it will look right."

"Interesting," Csethiro said. "And a very good thought, too; having it out on public display with the model of the bridge will mean people will see it, and begin to associate trains with the bridge as something possible to build in the Ethuveraz. And possibly stir up interest in both model trains and the real thing."

"But it is my present," Maia said. "I don't want it to be kept where I would have to go visit it."

How much time was he planning to spend with it? Csethiro wondered. "If it is only on public display for short periods, that will give it notoriety and interest. The rest of the time, it can be here in the Alcethmeret. And if thou truly canst not bear to part with it even for a short time, of course it is thine; I only mean that it would be a political coup for Barizhan to have the set on public display, and it might ease the way to future railroads in the Ethuveraz."

Maia nodded, turning his attention to the letter and the large box it accompanied. He opened the box, and bit his lip. "There are many parts," he said, taking a booklet from the top. He looked from the booklet to the array of gifts on tables lining the room. These were the ones that were either personal or from a giver of sufficient status to require Maia's personal attention to the gift. "But it would be rude to spend so much time on this when there are so many other gifts to look at."

Csethiro waved her hand. "Don't worry about it, my dear; Mer Aisava has already organized them, and we have time for thee to enjoy thy present; 'twill not throw the day off kilter. Is that not so, Mer Aisava?"

"It is, Your Grace," Csevet said.

So Maia sat down to read the booklet that came with his set, eventually declaring that the Tortoise Room was not suitable for his railroad. A footman was called to carry the box to the Jasmine Room, Maia leading the way, and Csethiro started in on the presents that would need thank you notes written in her own hand. First, of course, was one to Maia for the horse. Csethiro smiled as she contemplated what qualities to look for.

***

By the time she was finished with her notes (though she had not yet glanced at and signed the thank you notes that her ladies and secretary were writing on her behalf), Maia had still not reappeared, and she went to go look for him.

She found him—and Prince Nemolis' children—arrayed on the floor of the Jasmine room. Ino was lying on the floor under the watchful eye of her nursemaid, watching the train that had been set up. The tracks were laid in a figure eight, and the train was long enough that it almost hit its own tail, and Ino crowed every time it missed itself. Maia, Idra, and Mireän were sitting at a table with the box and a variety of little buildings and trees and people and animals made out of porcelain. Mireän was playing with the figurines, and Idra and Maia were poring over various papers, deep in discussion.

"I would have thought it would be rather more elaborate than that," Csethiro said dubiously, eyeing the train.

"Oh, that's only the simplest layout that we set up to test that we knew how it worked and to keep Ino occupied," Idra said. "We have enough track to cover the whole room with it, if we wanted to."

"It seems that before one can set it up, one must decide how one wants it to be set up," Maia said. "Aunt Nadeian thinks that half the fun is putting it together, and she might be right. In Barizhan, each of the rail companies has its own crest and colors, and you can buy different ones and different styles of buildings to show what part of the country you are in. But of course they don't have Ethuverazeise ones. Aunt Nadeian had the trains painted with the Drazhadeise crest, but if we want buildings that look Elvish—"

"—like the Alcethmeret—" Mireän interrupted.

"—like the Alcethmeret," Maia continued, "we shall have to have them custom-made."

"Cousin Maia has said that if he has custom figures made, we can paint some of them," Mireän said excitedly.

"Oh?" said Csethiro, who was fond of drawing and painting. "That sounds very interesting." Perhaps she could help with that. She hadn't had much time for such pursuits since she was married, and she missed it.

"We are also trying to decide how large we want the initial layout to be," Maia said. "And if we want to put it on the floor, or on a table. The floor would allow for it to be much larger, of course, at least until something of sufficient size can be built. But it would mean the room could not be used for anything else in the meanwhile."

Csethiro's ears raised. "How big are you planning on making it?"

"We have enough tracks that we could cover half the room, depending on how closely we put them together," Idra said. "I think, that since it is so easy to change how it is put together, we should just start building and see what we come up with."

"And I want a plan before we start, and it is my present," Maia said.

Csethiro sat next to him, and he showed her the various example diagrams in the booklet, and they debated amiably over which one they liked best until Csevet summoned Maia for his next appointment.

***

Social events were a fraught proposition for Maia. Although he was a much better conversationalist now than he had been when he came to the Untheileneise Court, he was still not at ease in social situations. At first Csethiro had thought that hosting small, intimate parties where he was not on display might be the answer, but unless he was with people he already knew and trusted, Maia actually preferred the larger court functions, where he did not have to talk as much.

At a formal dinner, he only had three people to talk to: the people to each side of him and across the table from him. And at a dance or concert, he could sit on his throne and watch the court, and no one would be offended that he did not speak to them. Those who did approach him did so one at a time. Maia was on display, but his conversational skills were less noticeable.

At a small, private gathering, he had to talk with everyone, and there was nothing to distract from any awkwardness.

Still, he was getting better, and there were some matters of politics that were simply not possible to handle any other way than sitting down with people and getting to know them. Thus it was that, once they were married, Csethiro had started hosting various gatherings where Maia might socialize with key members of his government and court.

Today's gathering was a quiet one: a few of Vedero's friends, the Witness for the Universities, the Chancellor, and their spouses, gathered for lunch.

About half-way through the meal, once all of the formalities were done and there had been enough wine and enough conversation to relax things, Maia turned to Lord Isthanar, the Witness for the Universities. "When we first put forth the Clocksmiths' Guild's proposal for the bridge on the Istandaärtha, Lord Pashavar asked a question for which we did not have the answer, and we think it a good question. We do not wish to accuse or censure, we are not looking to cast blame, we only wish knowledge."

This did not, in any way, reassure Lord Isthanar, who was looking more alarmed with every word. Csethiro kept her face serene and her ears still; they had discussed how to breach the subject, and though Csethiro thought the approach was good, Maia's manner was not. He was too stiff, and though she knew it for social anxiety, others took it for censure.

"Why was it the Clocksmiths, and not the Universities, which produced the advances necessary for the Wisdom Bridge?" Maia asked.

Lord Isthanar sighed. "Serenity," he said in some exasperation, "we do not, as yet, know whether the Clocksmiths have indeed produced what they claim to have produced. We have checked their math and found it good; but there is a difference between plans and reality, and between a scale model and reality. They have not even broken ground yet! It will not be a quick construction—nothing that complicated ever is, even without considering the newness of so many of the mechanisms. It will be some years yet before we know for sure."

One of Vedero's friends snorted; Csethiro was not sure which one.

"Nevertheless, the question remains," Maia said.

Isthanar spread his hands. "Serenity, universities are places for study thought and learning the higher truths of life and expanding the sum of Ethuverazeise knowledge. Not for tinkering."

"We should think the expertise that led to the design of the Wisdom Bridge is far beyond mere tinkering, whether or not it actually works in practice," Vedero observed dryly.

Isthanar bowed shallowly to her. "As your grace says. However, that is only obvious when looking at the final product. There is a group at the University of Cetho studying the design of the bridge, and it is obvious that it was not a single great leap forward in terms of materials and function. Rather, it is the culmination of a series of smaller advances over a long period of time that, when added up together, became a monumental difference in what might be achievable. And that is the problem. Each of those small advances was the result of tinkering with things that were already known, and judged of no great intellectual rigor. And now we are shown up—" and here his ears drew back, and his voice lowered "—by a craft guild." He said it in the same tone other men might use to speak of intestinal parasites or perhaps a venereal disease.

He shook his head. "You may depend upon it, Serenity, we do not intend to have it happen again. You are not the first to notice, nor indeed was Lord Pashavar. We'll not allow ourselves to be pushed aside for long, of that you may be sure."

"May we enquire what measures are you taking to prevent it?" Csethiro asked.

"Of course, your Grace," Isthanar said. "We've already decided to add engineering to the courses a university should properly have to be worthy of the title. The question is, how to do it, and about that there is much debate. The schools of architecture and design argue that it should be placed under their jurisdiction, and the natural history schools claim the same, but we are of the belief that it is a distinct enough discipline to merit its own college."

He was well-used to explaining things to the Emperor, apparently, for he elaborated. "Each university, you see, has several smaller schools within it. Each has its own specialty: philosophy, mathematics, theology, history, literature, languages, though of course there are many areas that overlap and so each college will also have offerings that overlap with those of others in the same university, and students regularly take classes outside their own college. There are common resources, such as a shared library, but in general each college can be quite insular. Its own classrooms and faculty, its own specialty library, its own refectory, its own dormitories. And, most crucially for our present discussion, its own hierarchy of professors. If we slot engineering as a specialty in some older, more established college, we are sure you can imagine what will follow."

"It will be forever coming second in its place to the more established discipline," Csethiro said.

"Exactly!" Isthanar said. "And that is not good. It would open the possibility to the Clocksmiths showing us up again."

Csethiro took a sip of her wine to hide her smile, and the conversation then turned to what would be needed to establish a new college at Cetho University. For that was where Isthanar was a professor, and had the most influence.

It turned out that it would be quite simple for the Emperor to achieve, for it was mostly a matter of finances. A suitable gift of money to build such a school and land to put it on would achieve it. There was a short digression into names—the expectation was that it would be named Edrehasivar College, or something similar, but Maia nixed that. "Chenelo Zhasan, perhaps," he said. "Or Archduchess Vedero." He lifted his glass in toast to his sister, who blushed prettily.

From there, conversation moved on to other educational needs in the Ethuveraz, and the possibility of copying the Barizheise system of trade schools. "For there are many trades, you know, that would benefit from a wider variety of people trained to them," said Osmerrem Lathevaran earnestly.

"Hm, suppose so," Isthanar huffed, once it was made quite clear that such institutions would in no way have the same prestige as the universities he represented. He brightened. "And they would be a place for some of the more practical disciplines to conduct their experiments—the natural historians do not only do history, for example; many of them study current plants and animals, and some work to breed them for specific purposes, or discern better ways of managing them. And they are always complaining that the gardens and greenhouses of the university are not sufficiently large for their purposes. The university obtained a farm for them a decade or so back, but it was not sufficient, either. And as for the school of architecture, they would benefit from the experience of designing and building the new schools …"

Osmerrem Renshavaran had some words to say about developing better-quality or hardier crops and animals, which could then be given to farmers and herders to improve their incomes and the taxes the sale of their produce would bring. And from there the discussion moved on to where, ideally, such schools should be located and how they might be funded so that the sort of people who farmed or went into the trades could afford to go to them.

It was all a cloud-fancy, at the moment, of course, except for the College of Chenelo Zhasan (or Archduchess Vedero, whichever they ended up calling it). But the ideas were interesting, and Isthanar went away very thoughtful, and who knew what might come of the seeds planted at that meal?

And, once the conversation got rolling, Maia was free to sit back and listen and did not need to lead the conversation, which helped him relax and enjoy his food.

Inviting Vedero and her friends to a meal with the Witness for the Universities had certainly been an inspired choice. Csethiro pondered what other such combinations of people would result in similar ease of conversation and take pressure off Maia.

***

Csethiro painted the figurine with delicate strokes—it was small enough that the embroidery at its collar was a mere squiggle, but she wanted it as precise as possible nonetheless—while Maia pondered the design of his train set.

"I wish I had thought of this earlier," Maia fretted. "It would be so perfect—but the table is all wrong for it."

The table he had ordered made to fit his original design. But Maia had found he liked planning out where everything would go, and had made several designs in the intervening months. Not one of them had been completed before some new idea had come to him, and he would take up all the track to start again.

Idra was annoyed by this, despite the fact that each version had been at least finished to the point of being able to run the trains on it.

Csethiro had decided to find Maia's enthusiasm charming. It was something he took genuine delight in, and as it was confined to the Jasmine Room it was no inconvenience to her. And she liked painting the little figurines even though none of Maia's plans had gotten far enough for them to be emplaced. "Couldst always commission a new table."

"I suppose I could," Maia said. "But then I would have to wait to start on it."

"And by the time it was finished, wouldst have had at least three more ideas, yes, that is a problem." Csethiro finished and set the figurine delicately down.

Maia's ears drooped. "I—yes, that is likely."

"Thou couldst finish this design, while thou wert waiting," Csethiro said.

"I would have to rip it all up when the new table was done," Maia said.

"Or thou couldst have two train tables," Csethiro said.

"But I have not enough track for both designs!" Maia protested. "Nor enough train engines. And I could use more cars …"

"All of which can be purchased," Csethiro pointed out. "And given that thy Aunt Nadeian and thy cousin Merrem Gormened know thy love for the train set, it is very likely that thou wilt receive additional pieces as gifts on the next suitable gift-giving occasion. And if thou displayest this set—completed, and with figurines hand-painted by thine zhasan—" she gave a half-bow from her seat "—it is quite likely that others will realize 'tis a gift thou wilt truly appreciate."

Indeed, in the long run, the problem was more likely to be that he was inundated with more train equipment than he could use. As difficult as that might be to imagine now, given his enthusiasm.

"Oh," he said, as if it had not occurred to him that people would be overjoyed to know that there was a gift they could give the Emperor that he would specifically appreciate as more than 'another lavish present to be passed on as appropriate.' Something that might actually win his favor and notice, instead of merely being part of the appropriate exchanges.

"And I suppose Idra would prefer it, if we simply finished this plan," Maia said thoughtfully.

"He would," Csethiro said.

***

Idra was suspicious when Maia told him his plans, and even when the last figurine was in place he did not quite believe Maia was not about to rip it all up and start over.

It was a very cunning design, and they all enjoyed controlling the trains and watching them weave through countryside and city and back again.

Maia hadn't gotten any more train sets by the time the second table was delivered, but Csethiro was beginning to suspect he enjoyed the planning more than the actual running of it; he had a catalogue of model train sets and pored over it, contemplating which pieces to purchase and what architectural and decorative pieces he should commission from local artisans. When Csethiro suggested he put the model on display in public, it was actually the children who were most disappointed at its temporary absence.

***

"You are quite a gifted painter, Zhasan," said Ashedo, Princess of Thu-Istandaär. She examined the figurines on the model railroad. "If you had not shown us which were yours and which were not, we should never have been able to guess. Your eye for detail is … remarkable." She glanced up at Csethiro and flicked her ears, then back down to the figurine.

"Thank you," Csethiro said gravely. If that particular figurine was—almost—a caricature of a certain lady of the court who was proving very intractable, well, there was enough doubt that Csethiro need not admit to it.

"The Emperor seems to have taken a great deal of care with his model," Princess Ashedo said, stepping back to view the set as a whole.

Csethiro nodded to the page boy whose job it was to run the train for viewers—and, in certain select cases, allow people to run it themselves—and he turned the knob on the controls. The train began to move on its course.

"Edrehasivar is quite taken with his trains," Csethiro said. "He is planning a newer, larger model; we have commissioned a replica of the Alcethmeret for it, as a birthday present."

"Indeed?" Princess Ashedo said. She stood contemplating the tiny train winding its way through hills and over a river before coming back in to the city.

"And it runs on ... electricity? A battery?" Princess Ashedo said.

"Why, yes," Csethiro said in some surprise. Most people assumed it was some sort of mazeise trick … though in that case, they would have needed someone with maza gifts to run it. But electricity was not common in the Ethuveraz.

Princess Ashedo hummed thoughtfully. "There is a proposal to convert the trams in Choharo to electricity. Currently, they are drawn by horses, and it would be too expensive to put a steam engine in each tram, not to mention requiring too much coal. But if the system were electrified, then the trams would be faster and we would save the cost of the horses."

"Indeed?" Csethiro said. "Edrehasivar would be very interested to hear about it—and to see it, if it should end up happening. Where do you get the electricity from?"

"They have several water-turbines along the rivers," Princess Ashedo said. "They were put in place to power factories; but they produce more power than the factories need."

"What is a water-turbine?" Csethiro asked.

"We are not entirely sure," Princess Ashedo said. "They get power out of a river like a water-wheel does, except they are entirely below the surface, and they are not a wheel."

Csethiro mentally added that to the list of things to look into.

"Perhaps His Serenity would be interested in a tour, when next he visits Choharo," Princess Ashedo said.

"We are certain he would be quite fascinated," Csethiro said with a smile. There were no such visits scheduled, but the Emperor did travel around the Ethuveraz as needed to attend various events and show himself to the people. Perhaps Choharo should be given greater weight, in deciding which events were worthy of Edrehasivar's notice.

***

Summer had turned into fall, and Maia was sufficiently practiced on Velvet that he was comfortable joining Csethiro and her new gelding Lightning for rides out into the countryside near Cetho.

They were attended, of course; besides the nohecharei, there were both Untheileneise and Hezhethoreise guards, her ladies, and Csevet. But the pack of attendants rode at enough distance to give them some privacy.

"Art discontent, Maia," Csethiro said. He had been reserved for a few days, so it was probably not an issue with the ride or the day.

He twitched an ear. "'Tis nothing. I am sure it will pass."

"I am sure you are right," Csethiro said. "But will it pass easier for being shared?" Maia got quiet when he was upset or uneasy; and the worse he felt, the quieter he got. Nor was he like to ask for help or reassurance, even on things she or others could very gladly and easily give.

"Perhaps," he said, but was quiet.

Csethiro rode next to him and enjoyed the day. If he chose to speak, she would listen; if not, well, he would be a poor conversationalist, but the ride itself was pleasing, and perhaps on the way back Merrem Renshavaran would indulge her in a race. (Lightning was very aptly named, and a joy and delight to ride.)

"It is stupid," Maia said at last.

"Not if it bothers thee," Csethiro said.

"It is only that I feel very … ineffective, at the moment," Maia said. "There is the bridge, yes; but that was approved months ago. And the college, but that could have been done by any number of nobles; all it required was wealth and the will to do it. It did not require the Emperor. In the meantime, I have sat through many meetings of the Corazhas and though I have learned to understand what they discuss and comment on it intelligently, truly, they could do their work very well without me. I have adjudicated many disputes, and virtually all of them are petty squabbles that should never have needed my attention. We have talked of schools and railroads and other ways to improve the Ethuveraz, and strategized how best to accomplish them, but none of them have come to the official notice of either the Parliament or the Corazhas. Model railroads are like to become very popular, but the question of real railroads has advanced not one bit. What have we done that a figurine such as adorn our model railroad could not have done?"

Csethiro snorted, a most unladylike habit neither her mother nor her stepmother had ever been able to break her of. "Oh, yes, thou only achievedst something thy father tried for years to bring about. That is certainly nothing worth mentioning or celebrating. Dearest, thy first few months wearing the crown gave thee a terribly skewed vision of what thy role may achieve. If thou measurest political change on what happens immediately after thou beginst to think on it, wilt be terribly depressed thy entire life. Even were it possible to simply dictate policy to the government, it would be horribly unwise. Taking time to listen and build support gives time to adjust policies as they are planned, before they are put in place—for nobody can ever truly think up all the possible outcomes and account for them on their own."

"I suppose," Maia said. "Even when it is a good idea, there is so much I still don't know."

"Couldst know everything thy father and all of thy forefathers knew, and would still not know all that thou needst know," Csethiro said. "'Tis not a slight on your ignorance. Take the question of the technical schools—everyone at that luncheon knew a great deal about education and how schools work. And yet, as the conversation has moved out from that first one, many people have brought forward challenges to be solved … and opportunities nobody there thought of. If such schools ever become reality, they will be much different than the speculation that day, and be the better for it!"

"True," Maia said. "I just received a letter from Prince Orchenis, with suggestions that were very interesting."

"Ah?" Csethiro said. "I didn't know he was interested in education." She tucked that away for her next letter to Dach'Osmerrem Clunetharan. "Consider thy father."

"I try not to," Maia muttered.

"Even so," Csethiro said. "At the time of his death, he was in his seventies, and still hearty and hale. Presuming thou dost not fall to an assassin, thou hast every likelihood of equaling or exceeding his life. That is fifty or sixty years to rule and shift the government's policies more to thy liking."

Maia started so hard that Velvet became jittery, and the next few minutes was taken up by soothing him back into good temper.

"Sixty years," Maia said. "That is three times as old as I am now. I can't even really conceive of it."

"Nor I," Csethiro said. "But 'tis true nonetheless. There's time. And I think it is better to take the time to do it right, to find allies and move the opinion of the government and the nobles and the merchants and everyone, so that they will support thy policies rather than oppose them." She made a face. "'Tis easier said than done, I know—my parents have always been counseling me to do the same with my relationships at court, and I never have managed. But I think this is more important than whether to trade the immediate satisfaction of hitting Csoru with the more long-term and lasting victory of persuading people that she is unpleasant, and so I am trying harder to remember it."

Maia laughed, as she had intended him to. "I suppose thou'rt right."

"If the rest of thy reign is even one tenth as productive as this first year has been, wilt be the most effective emperor the Ethuveraz has ever had," Csethiro said. "Edrehasivar the Reformer, they'll call thee."

"I could not do it without thee," Maia said. "'Twill be thy legacy, too. Csethiro the Modernizer."

Csethiro waved that off. "Oh, they never consider the legacy of the Empress, unless something truly dire happens which leaves space for her to take an unusual role. A regency, or a war, or a great disaster or something. And even then, not always."

"That's not fair; all my political acumen and strategy comes from thee and Csevet, and as a secretary he'll not be remembered, either."

"Oh, I doubt he'll stay thy secretary for the rest of his life," Csethiro said. "He's done too good a job, and been noticed. No, someone will hire him into one of the ministries—the Chancellery, perhaps, or the Treasury. Then he'll be promoted, and perhaps end up on the Corazhas."

"Thinkest thou so?" Maia said. "Nobody could deserve it more, only I wouldn't know what to do if he left me."

"He'd not leave until he was satisfied thou wert well enough served," Csethiro pointed out. "But I do think so. It was an impossible job, and yet he did it, and did it well, with no training and experience. Give it time, for him to train his undersecretaries, for thee to gain experience as Emperor, and for him to mature, and he'll be off to a job that will allow him the possibility of promotion."

"Time," Maia said. "We do have time." He sounded surprised, and after the tumultuous year he'd had, Csethiro didn't blame him. They rode on in silence for a while, as they thought of what the future might bring.

"If they did remember empresses and their legacies, what wouldst thou want thine to be?" Maia said.

"Beyond supporting my husband's causes?" Csethiro said. "Thank thee for choosing ones I can wholeheartedly support, by the way."

"Art welcome," Maia said. "But truly, I am curious."

"I've never much thought about it," Csethiro said. "It's never seemed … relevant." Idle dreams of running off to join the army, or perhaps running away to the sea and signing on to a ship and becoming a captain and having adventures, those she had had in spades. They'd seemed more interesting—and no less plausible—than the sort of question Maia was asking now. "I think … I think the Ethuveraz has been trapped in amber for a very long time. Preserved, beautiful, but … not useful. Not able to go out and do things. Not able to grow or change. Not like the rest of the world has." It was a metaphor she had most often used—in her own head—for her role as a daughter of the Ceredada. But it fit the Ethuveraz as well. "I want that to change. I want us to change. Not that I want us to become a second Barizhan, but—"

"You want the Ethuveraz to be what it could be, not merely what it used to be," Maia said.

"Yes, exactly," Csethiro said. "And if we could do that together, it would be well worth those fifty or sixty years' effort. Don't you think?"

"I do," Maia said. Lightning and Velvet were very close together, and he reached out for her.

She took his hand and squeezed it.

#fiction #fanfiction #fanfic #the goblin emperor

[blapis-blazuli]

Now listen up

I am obsessed with this man. He's got so many weird details about him and I love (almost) all of them.

First, Slim's original concept fucks. Being an undead cattle rustler out for bull's blood due to being trampled to death is fascinating. I don't know how long it took before someone at Disney cried "too dark" at that backstory, but I'm surprised it was even in consideration given the mostly lighter tone of the final product. More than that, Disney could've had a literal ghost rider among their villains! Had that movie been any good, he might've joined Disney's popular villain lineup, or maybe we could've even gotten a boss battle with him in a Kingdom Hearts game. That's not what we ended up with due to Reasons, though, which is a bit disappointing, but not much you can do about that.

Anyway, onto what we did get.

Before Slim makes his formal appearance, he's only seen in silhouette, on a wanted poster, then in disguise, and is finally fully revealed when he rides in on a bison. He is huge, and I don't mean because he's fat, I mean he's a good deal taller than most of the other characters. He's set up to be someone threatening, to be taken seriously.

And then comes his yodeling villain song.

The moment it's revealed that Slim's yodeling can hypnotize cows, the music picks up and there's a literal rainbow of colors for the rest of his number. As I said, he's a big man, but he's also light enough on his feet to dance and jump on and off any of these cows while not missing a beat in his performance. When the men who got knocked out beforehand come running after him, he doesn't threaten them, he just throws his spurs at a precarious bit of rocky landscape with such force that it falls and blocks the pathway to him. That's more badass than if he did draw his gun on them.

Actually, I wanna talk about the music he performs. The movie's set in Wyoming during 1889, so obviously Slim's not gonna be yodeling A Cruel Angel's Thesis or whatever. They could’ve come up with something original for him to yodel to (which, I mean, they kinda do), but they chose music by composers such as Tchaikovsky and Beethoven, which aren't exactly things you'd associate with the wild west. The obvious out-of-universe answer for why those pieces were chosen is "they existed before the year this is set in, and they're recognized even today," but we've no in-universe answer for why he chose them or how he knows them. Regardless, it's kinda amazing that he knows them well enough to yodel them.

His lair in Echo Mine has an area with some nice furniture in it. How'd this shit get there? Who knows. Anyway, this is where he reveals that he disguises himself to buy up the properties owned by the people he's stolen cattle from, which includes his former employers. Why doesn't he work for any of them anymore? He never directly says. According to him, they didn't "appreciate [his] talents," which means they probably hated his yodeling. I don't blame him for being mad about that because why the hell would you tell someone that? If he's doing the job right and well without hurting anyone, then who cares? The idea that he's moved on to use a skill against the former bosses who didn't like it is kinda great though.

(Side note: a nice, small detail about this part of the lair is the faded branding on the map, which shows that Slim has been doing this for quite a while. Shame that it's not more consistent from shot to shot though. I can't take credit for noticing this myself: my partner pointed it out after I posted a screenshot as a joke on Discord. She's so cool.)

Slim doesn't like it when someone calls his yodeling "singing": he thinks singing is beneath him given the disdain in his voice when he says that's what birds, saloon gals, and children do. No, he considers what he does to be an art. He's not entirely wrong, though: it is an impressive skill, especially since he can yodel to certain classical pieces like The William Tell Overture, Ode to Joy, Ride of the Valkyries, and The 1812 Overture. (Also Yankee Doodle, because, well, American. Also maybe Largo al factotum from The Barber of Seville, but I'm unsure of that one: unlike Slim, I am no classical music expert.) There's no need for him to be quite as defensive about it as he is, but his nephews calling it "singing," saying that might be why his bosses didn't like him, and calling yodeling "silly" is enough to make him get violently angry at them. Man's got issues.

Oh yeah, Slim has nephews. They're triplets named Gil, Phil, and Bill, and they're collectively known as The Willies. Unlike their uncle, they're all blond and thin, so god knows what Slim's unnamed and unmentioned sibling must look like.

Slim also has a bison named Junior. I'm not fond of the whole "he's too fat to ride anything else" angle of that, but I do like that they chose an animal that people are constantly told to not mess with because of how dangerous they are. Slim's not afraid of him: he's got this creature trained to listen when he calls for him. I can only guess that Slim is the one who named Junior, so maybe he also raised him. It would explain why Junior appears annoyed with him but still puts up with having Slim jump on his back and the like.

You know what Slim doesn't have though? Kids. Putting together the disdain in his voice when he mentions children, his seemingly low opinion of saloon girls, his big villain number turning the landscape into a rainbow of colors, the queer history of cowboys, and the prevalence of queer-coding in Disney villains... well, I think you get where I'm going with that.

Moving onto his disguise. Don't ask me why nobody figured out this was Slim sooner, given that his wanted poster shows they have the same facial hair, bushy eyebrows, and bags under the eyes. My best guess is because it's in black-and-white and he's in a different outfit, and unless someone's encountered him before they probably don't know what he sounds like. Anyway, His alias is Yancy O'del (yeah, I know), but the one sign we see him with has both "Mister" and "Esquire" in there.

Having looked this up, I learned a few things. First, having "Mister" and "Esquire" together isn't something you're supposed to do, yet nobody in-universe caught this. Second, in the United States, "Esquire" is a title only used for lawyers, so maybe that's why nobody questioned him - fear of a sudden lawsuit for something or other. Third, "Yancy" was not really a name used back then, or at least not a common one. Why'd he choose that name (besides for the pun)? I dunno.

(Also, where the hell does Junior stay whenever he goes to one of these auctions? The world may never know.)

Slim's final defeat at the hooves/wings/what-have-you of several farm animals is pretty pathetic, even by silly Disney villain standards, but I got to give him credit for not wanting to give up even after his disguise is (literally) blown and while he's stuck in a train's smokestack. I have no idea how he planned on getting out of that one, and whatever it was most likely wouldn't have worked anyway, but I admire his refusal to back down in the face of obvious defeat.

Even in his very last scene we see him struggling with the ropes they tied around him while he's carted off to jail. He does not give up.

Anyway, here he is picking up Small Black Market Dealer Steve Buscemi one-handed like it's nothing. (His name is Wesley, but Slim keeps calling him Mister Weasley. That's right, this movie used that joke before Frozen did.)

And here he is lifting three full-grown cows off the ground before tying them up faster than they can react to it. (The cows have names too, but this post ain't about them.)

He uses his left hand to write and aim his gun and seems just as adept with using it as much as his right, which is cool. (There's no frame with both his face and the gun, so you'll have to trust me on that.)

Speaking of his hands

Look at this huge-ass man and his pinkies, I can't with this dude

Look at that smile, sir, who gave you the right

If there were a whole movie about just these two, I'd watch it, I won't even lie.

I've gone on about this guy for probably too long by this point, so to sum it all up:

Babygirl

#Alameda Slim #long post #I tried being coherent but that slipped away from me towards the end lmao oh well #''Blapis are you done being mentally ill and gay for Slim yet'' not in the slightest have a nice day #I mean I'm trying to with a tropical storm and an earthquake warning at least #I'll try adding image descriptions later when my brain is working better sorry #shut up Blapis

[championdaigo]

free space to say anything you want about steven im so interested in your thoughts

This ask has been sitting in my inbox for a while now because I've been unsure about how I want to go about attacking it (you've given me such a gift, anon)

But I think I'll use this as an opportunity to publicly share a long line of characterization thoughts I discussed one day in the steven stone appreciation discord server (compiled below the cut, it's going to be kinda messy)

Personally i like to see Steven as someone who has everything to lose. He’s smart, rich, educated, handsome, a skilled battler, and a regional darling. This is going to be controversial but I think he had a loving family and a fulfilling (albeit very sheltered) upbringing. He seems like the kind of guy who could very easily get anything he wanted. But i also see him as someone who’s aware of that and puts in genuine effort to see reality outside of his bubble.

I see him as someone who never really experienced personal tragedy growing up, and as someone who a few members of the general public could get frustrated with for “privilege-blindness”. Like he’s someone who was basically placed on a high rung at birth but still needed to climb upwards. Most people love him (rightfully so) but others are more than ready to have a reason to throw rocks at him. I think I take this approach mainly because I'm really fascinated by IRL celebrity culture from an outsider's perspective

But, in his core, he's a good guy with healthy morals who has much to learn about the world around him.

and now for some shitpost headcanons

beldum was a devon corp invention originally intended to be a smart can opener. it accidentally gained sentience and became the president's young son's best friend

steven's mother isn't dead or even absent. she just happened to be visiting kalos during the events of the hoenn games and had the shock of her life finding out about the weather crisis through buzznav's emergency alerts (steven had twenty-seven missed calls from mom during this time)

steven's perception of money is very much the "it's one banana what could it cost 10 dollars" meme. this is both a positive and a negative

steven has a relatively sharp sense of style except when it comes to casual wear (that summer outfit is divorcecore)

#pokemon #steven stone #ask #anon #characterization thoughts #feel free to disagree with me of course (many already do) #i'm a picky eater when it comes to tropes but i like characters coming in different fandom flavors #i assume this was in response to my nepo baby poll reflection? #i genuinely love having any excuse to discuss steven pokemon

[ceterisparibus116]

Is it canon that Foggy grew up poor? I see the sentiment from a lot of people, that he pursued a job as a lawyer because he saw his family struggle as butchers. I don't know if it's a misconception on people's parts, but just because you run a butchers doesn't mean you're poor? It's like farming. Yes, there are poor farmers, but where I live, you can tell someone is a farmer because of the way they dress and the fact that their wallet can barely fit all the notes shoved into it.

This is an excellent question. I see it come up a lot (particularly to excuse Foggy's less-than-selfless professional choices).

And right off the bat, the common belief that Foggy grew up poor worries me, because it seems to equate "blue collar" with "poor" and that's very...yikes.

I'm not sure how you're defining "poor," but I'm defining it as "financially unstable." In other words, the question isn't, "Could Foggy and his family afford all the things they might have wanted?" but is instead, "Were financial concerns a consistent pattern in the Nelson family?"

And no, I can't think of any canon evidence that Foggy grew up in an environment of financial instability.

Here's what we know, that I think is relevant to this conversation:

Foggy is very motivated by money (he initially wanted to go into defense because there's "money" in that; he was willing to stay at L&Z despite admitting that he didn't think what they were doing was right; he wasn't going to represent Karen because she couldn't pay him; he was (initially) willing to take Healy's case without any research due to the zero's on the check; he ended up working for Hogarth despite admitting that he didn't care about his clients; etc.);

Foggy is motivated by status and nice things (he wants elevators and ergonometric chairs, and even as a kid, he went around telling people he owned his parent's store);

Foggy "hates being broke" (which we see him talk about in the present tense, since at that time (as an adult), he was poor while he was working with Matt);

Foggy's family is predominately blue collar (hence his comment about "breaking from the ranks" as a lawyer);

Foggy's parents own their own business;

Foggy's parents are too old to continue maintaining their business;

Foggy's brother can't carry the shop alone;

Foggy's family is seems to regard Foggy's career choices warily; and

Foggy's mother specifically seems to regard Foggy's career choice as abandoning the family.

Also, consider some pieces of evidence we don't see:

We don't see Foggy talking about how he "hated" being broke (past tense); and

We don't hear Foggy talking about being poor as a kid.

From this, I think we can infer that while Foggy didn't grow up wealthy, he didn't grow up poor. I especially don't see any evidence that Foggy grew up as poor as Matt (when he lived with Jack, and certainly when he was at St. Agnes).

Instead, Foggy grew up longing to be more than what those around him were. He wanted not just enough money but more than enough money. He wanted status.

In talking with some friends in a discord, some of them pointed out that Foggy's fascination with money seems to be less about survival, and more about justifying his choices to his family. He needs to be successful as a lawyer (ideally with easily recognizable indicators of success, such as fancy elevators) because it proves to his family that he made the right choice.

In other words, I actually think Foggy is less motivated by money per se, and more motivated by what money represents.

I think the way Foggy gravitates towards obvious symbols of wealth/status is especially interesting because his family doesn't seem interested in understanding how he can help people as a lawyer.

Contrast this with how Jack raised Matt: Jack never seemed to doubt for a second that Matt could use his brain to help people. Matt is seen openly talking to Jack about Thurgood Marshall. So even if Jack wasn't personally interested in law and justice, he made an effort of understanding Matt's passions.

I don't see that Foggy's family ever did the same for him. I don't know for sure, but I wonder if that contributes to his desire to have those obvious symbols of status and wealth. In his mind, how else can he convince his family that he made the right choice?

This is why Foggy's arc in S2 is so good...but so incomplete. Foggy comes to a point of recognizing that he's good at what he does, and that could have brought him to a point of recognizing that he doesn't need his parent's approval (or anyone's approval) as long as he's doing the right thing.

But instead, he turns right around to work for Hogarth, where he admits he doesn't care about his clients. It seems that his growth in S2 was, in fact, limited to him becoming confident in his skills as a lawyer, but didn't extend to giving him the confidence he apparently needs to justify a decision to make less money in exchange for helping people in need.

#foggy nelson #meta #daredevil #asks #ask me things i'm friendly