#the way they live is just incompatible with me and my needs really | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

onyourowndaisymae · 10 months

Text

unicorn bandages - alt. version

this has been sitting in my drafts awhile. someone requested some lucifer hurt/comfort (that i haven't got around to yet) and i wrote this, only to realize this didn't exactly hit the mark when i finished. but i figured it's cute, so i might as well post it

word count: 1145

content + warnings: playful/smartass lucifer, general fluff, minor physical injury, general mentions of embarrassment

you need to learn to be more careful.

that's what you think as you walk the rest of the way home to the house of lamentation, lost in your own thoughts. the gentle searing pain of your skinned knee was enough of a punishment-- did you brain have to keep replaying the memory of you tripping in the middle of town, too? being clumsy and wearing shorts were both incompatible with your plans today, yet here you are, looking foolish and feeling exposed from your mistake.

the blood had long since dried against your skin. you felt sticky and gross, yearning now for a shower and a place to hide from your lingering embarrassment. did anyone from RAD see you eat shit outside that shop. ugh, and they way nobody helped you up, how you awkwardly stumbled to your feet and-- ahhh!! please, no more!!

the familiar creak of the front doors announced your arrival to the house of lamentation. you shuffled inside awkwardly, head hung, staring at your feet to avoid another tumble. even the book you bought on your day out couldn't console you enough to block out the invisible judgement you felt.

"what is that?"

you lifted your head to find lucifer stopped in the archway to the living room, eyes narrowed at you.

"huh?"

"what is that?" he repeated. "what happened to your knee?"

"oh. i, uh, i fell on my way home and scraped my knee. i don't-- i'm fine. it's just a scrape."

you felt the urge to shy away from his stern gaze, to hide your little scrape from his prying eyes and pretend it never happened. he looks at the wound for a few moments longer before meeting your eyes.

"will you sit down on the stairs for a moment, mc?"

"it's not that big of a deal. it just need to be wiped off, nothing special."

"then surely you'd be okay with me cleaning it for you? since it's such a minor injury."

you couldn't think of much else to argue. he gave you that smug half-smirk he saved for minor victories such as this and disappeared from sight. you shuffled to the stairs and sat, slumped in defeat, as he presumably went to fetch some first aid supplies.

the avatar of pride returned as quickly as he left, this time with a small black box in his hands. a small gesture of his hands urged you to stretch the injured leg out to give him better access. gloved hands busied themselves digging through unidentified supplies.

"what happened?" he asks, quietly, as he pulls out what looks like a cotton pad and some sort of cleaning agent.

"i was... i went out to get this book satan recommended. y'know, because he always wants to talk about what he's reading." he nodded and you continued. "so i decided to grab it while i was out. apparently there's a hole in the sidewalk out front, because as i was walking out, my foot got caught and i-- ow!"

your cry of pain was almost indignant as lucifer interrupted your story by cleaning the wound. the sharp sting of something akin to but not quite isopropyl alcohol lit your knee on fire. had the scrape really been that bad?

"the bacteria in the devildom is a bit more aggressive than in the human realm," he explained, softer look on his face than a moment ago. "we wouldn't want our favorite human getting sick from an accident like this, would we?"

as if he was trying to apologize, lucifer brought your knee closer by the back of your leg and gently blew on the wound to alleviate some of the pain of the cleanser currently working its magic. it was nice. for a moment, he was lucifer, big brother, not the avatar of pride he embodied in public. his fingers fiddled with pulling and stretching your skin to ensure each inch was properly wiped clean. there was a certain level of sincerity to his movements that made you smile.

"did you do this a lot when your brothers were growing up?"

"you have no idea."

that makes you laugh. he smiles, just a little, before continuing.

"angels are supposed to be resilient. their skin is thicker than a human being's, so they shouldn't get hurt as easily. and yet training my younger brothers was-- well, it was quite the event."

"i'm gonna guess mammon was the biggest pain?"

"definitely mammon." a fond smile. he wiped a cotton pad across your busted knee before continuing. "every time i saw him, he was always covered in bruises and scrapes. i could never quite get him to admit that he'd got them wandering off in pursuit of his younger brothers."

"that sounds a lot like him."

lucifer picked up a small tin containing the bandages. these must have been picked out by asmodeus-- instead of the usual plain design lucifer always grabbed, these were bright and colorful with unicorn designs. the avatar of pride only offered a small sigh before pulling an adequately sized one out and applying for you. in a few moments, what was a terribly embarrassing memory had been sealed from the world behind two unicorns hopping in unison over a rainbow.

"aren't you going to kiss it better?"

your sarcastic question was followed by your mischievous little smirk. maybe you shouldn't have teased him while he was in such a good mood. his eyes narrowed a bit before, to your surprise, his smirk mirrored your own.

you open your mouth to play off your joke, but lucifer's already lifting your knee to his mouth. your whole body is sliding uncomfortably off the stair step-- karma sure is efficient-- as his lips hover above your knee. lucifer's lips brush the top of your bandage. he makes an obnoxious kissing sound to honor your request before unceremoniously dropping your leg, leaving you sprawled in an odd position on the steps.

"i was kidding," you whine.

"my apologies. i just wanted to make sure you healed correctly."

"yeah, yeah, whatever you say."

the avatar of pride is quick to repack the first aid kit and rise to his feet. you reach out for his hand to help you up. in a bout of playfulness, he instead high fives your open palm, small smirk dripping with sarcasm. of course you had to catch him in a good mood. you sigh dramatically. this time, his offer to help you stand was genuine. a quick tug of your hand and lucifer had quickly pulled your fragile human body off the steps.

"careful, mc. wouldn't want you to fall again."

"i think you'd enjoy it, actually. sadist."

"... you're probably right."

"huh?!"

your cry is indignant as he begins to exit. you chase after him without hesitation. that smirk on his face meant he was joking, right?

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me swd #obey me nightbringer #obey me nb #obey me lucifer #otome #obey me fluff #obey me x reader

385 notes · View notes

libbee · 1 year

Text

Marry a Venus in 8h or Scorpio

While Scorpio and 8th House have some similarities: need for transformation, interest in deep and dark matters, intensity of emotions; they are still different as in 8th house deals with other people's money, a secretive life, lots of secrets, dealing with partnership, death and rebirth.

What is seen with these natives, especially ladies, is that their relationship or marriage is never "stable". You see how ladies like to flaunt their husbands, post pictures and how much they love their partner to social media and be in public eye? But these natives are the kind to hide their relationship. As if it is not true love if it needs public approval. Also, we see how couples stay the same way 5+ or 15+ years later as if nothing has changed; but for these 8th houser couples, they reborn so many times that they don't even know who they were 5 months back. Two different types of lives!

Here, the wife and husband/girlfriend and boyfriend are both cynical type, suspicious, reading people, their intentions, behaviour, motivations, emotions. They never relax until they get to the root of any matter and then pick another matter and question, question, question everything. Trust is important to them, even more than euphoria of love.

Why Trust?

Their life theme is usually that their childhood and relationship history are such that it is twisted, confusing, as if they were sleepwalking through a relationship and never really there. For this reason, when the relationship finally breaks down, they begin to realize how it was all just a delusion! Here, a relationship or situationship is the catalyst to bring all childhood memories to the surface and healing is a prerequisite to a better improved relationship. But all this is not easy! When they awaken from the state of "sleepiness" then their reality is shifted! Oh, I missed that red flag! Oh-he was keeping secrets from me! Oh, that was manipulation tactic! Oh, he was just like my father!! Their reality is shattered and results in cognitive dissonance, chaos, breakdown, obsessive rumination, ego dissolves, problems with self concept come to surface. "Healing" for them means to work on their Self Concept, that is, identity, confidence, self respect, boundaries, getting rid of emotional brain fog, learning what a relationship is supposed to look like, learning individuation.

8th house Venus is natural shadow worker. She intuitively knows the traits, flaws, faults, motivations, darkness and morbidity in other people. But her tendency is to integrate those dark parts in herself which is why 8H dissolves the boundary between right and wrong, bad and good, moral and immoral. To understand herself, she understands other humans. Not just the light and positive parts but the psychopathic, criminal, morbid, terrifying, scary human psychology. It is like food to her soul, to know the suffering and pain in the world. A sadist or a spiritually awakened being?

Since cognitive dissonance is a big thing for her, her no 1 priority in relationship is someone whom she can trust. Someone who will maintain her reality, will be honest, give her emotional security and keep her mentally stable. A dishonest or deceptive lover is her nightmare because the chaos of "figuring out my boyfriend" will drain her. She needs someone who is transparent and self aware so that her emotions are stablized and fears under control.

Husband

Like attracts like. Boyfriend/husband himself is mirror to these ladies. He is also suspicious, cynical, peeling layers of emotions, craving depth, has unstable self concept unless he is actively working on it, jealousy and possessive are not cute things, they are symptoms of weak Self concept. Since both parties are similar in nature, they understand each other. But not every marriage is that fulfilling! Sometimes partners are really incompatible or the awakening never happens, 8th house never activates. So, just 8th placement is not enough but the timing and dasha will determine how spiritual, healer, psychic they are.

Partner may have this past history, all or any of them:

Man with trauma, dark childhood

Loving a man with dark past

Scapegoat of his family

Fragile masculinity, emasculated by society

Emotionally neglected by his parents

Her man needs healing, security and understanding

He is a hunter type, fears abandonment, controlling

Mommy issues, his mom was a dragon, devours him, he is afraid of his femininity

Man is psychically penetrating, hyperalert, always reading the room, sensitive to energy, psychic types

Most Important

If Venus is in 8th house, this marriage is life changing. Transformative. Significant status difference between maiden life and married life. "Woah! She married that gentleman! He is so rich." Like in Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennett marries Mr. Darcy who is high class, wealthy and royalty type. There is something luxurious, old money, typical about this marriage. A typical politically connected or socially prestigious family. Sometimes people say 8th house is Karmic, fated, to let go control, money owed to them. I wonder if it is their husband who is paying back her debts to her? Is that why marriage transforms her life? Is marriage a karmic contract to pay back her loan given to husband? Perhaps it is.

Forced to Inner World

At some point in her life, she realized that her life was not quite same as others. She got aware of "psyche" something which has no evidence and is not scientific or physically seen. But for these natives, they are intuitively aware of psyche and how it surrounds us everywhere. In Man and His Symbols, Dr. Carl Jung says how the primitive people were so unconscious that they simply acted on their impulses and the images they saw in their head. They even thought that the animals and trees were their soul/spirit and were deeply submerged in the unconscious. 8th house is like that state of unconsciousness and then you come to awareness with a shock and again go back to unconsciousness. We are living in a flow state and only when something crisis, emergency or catastrophic happens that we awaken and soon go back to the flow state. That "awakening" is the hallmark of this house.

Another thing to be seen here is that these natives are forced to live in the inner world. They do not choose spirituality but have no choice - are forced to choose it. Since their emotions and conscience are quite sharp, they "feel" their way through life. (Trigger warning death) Let's say you killed your parents' dog accidentally and hid it in their own backyard and then lied about it to your parents when they asked where dog is. As the days go by, you feel that regret growing larger and larger. It creeps on you, eats you from inside, feels heavy in your body. That "I did something wrong" feeling never goes away. Imagine living with that feeling 24x7, that is your conscience.

For these natives, their conscience is just hyperactive. It is their guide through life. If they dismiss their conscience, they are faced with external consequences in physical life. There is a saying "As above, so below" which fits to these natives, which means that the inner life and outer life are just the reflection of each other. If we sit back to think about the past, we realize how everything is connected to everything else. That nothing was random. Self-reflection and pattern seeking are highlighted in this house. Any planet that is placed in 8th or 12th house is partially submerged in the underworld and the only way to maintain a life is to dig that "hidden" something. Occult tools, psychoanalysis, reading people, meditation are really helpful to make the unconscious comprehensible. This way they can even avoid the unnecessary unpreditable sufferings of this house.

I have seen how native if lives absent mindedly, without thinking of their actions, they always face instant karma in physical life or the psychic life. In psychic world, they feel guilt, unexplainable regret, negative emotions, shame, depression, etc. If they ignore these symptoms for too long, it will all explode with a blast BUT the healing will finally begin. For the sake of your mental stability, keep doing self reflection and avoid unnecessarily events and suffering.

It takes some time and understanding to realize what Self awareness means. The society we live in, cultural and social behaviours are contrary to self awareness. We live in an extraverted, materialistic, narcissistic society; you have to just be opposite of that -- introverted, spiritual and empathetic. These natives are not born healers, they are wounded healers. They may even feel external locus of control and surrender to psychic forces because their life is just so stormy.

My only advice is: To keep your eyes open! Just because your friends or some celebrities can indulge in behaviours and get away with it, it does not mean that you can too. Instant Karma is something that happens in 8th housers life a lot. Once you identify it, you can then change your behaviour and language to avoid these suffering.

#astro community #astro notes #astro placements #astro tumblr #astroblr #astro observations #astrology #astrology blog #astro #astrology community #astrology notes #astrology observations #astrology tumblr #astronotes #sidereal astrology #vedic astro notes #vedic astrology #Venus in 8th house

541 notes · View notes

bsd-fan · 1 year

Text

Chuuya´s analysis part 2: Humanity and contradictions

Stormbringer is by far the most important piece if we want to understand chuuya because this is the moment his view of life is challenged. We follow chuuya through stormbringer, we get to see how doubtful, scared and confused he is about his humanity and we also see a side of him that he constantly hides.

“I told you, Chuuya”

He looked up in the direction of the sudden voice. It was a familiar voice, one that belonged to the person he hated most in this world.

“Your birth itself was a mistake. We´re the same. Is there really a point to suffering through all that pain for a life that isn´t even real?” - Hallucination of Dazai. Stormbringer

Dazai and Chuuya constantly claim the hate they have for each other. A lot of that hate is because their history of them being assholes with each other, a lot of it is just posturing but a lot of it is because of this. They share the same problem but the way they face it is incompatible. Especially on chuuya´s side. During sb we learn that Chuuya /understands/ Dazai, not because he tries to but because deep down he thinks the same. But he /never/ lets himself think about this, because if he does he will drown and he can´t do that.

You can ignore most of this analysis because the only real important thing to understand is that chuuya is a figher.

That´s his core as a character.

Chuuya fights every godamn hour of every day. He fights with himself, he fights against his ability, he fights for his humanity, he fights for the people he loves, he fights when everyone already gave up. He has lost /so much/ through his life and never complains about it, he keeps going on because that´s what he was taught to do. He has gave up so many things. He can´t say that he is tired, he can´t be afraid, he can´t stop because he was conditioned to be the last man standing not matter what and that´s what he does. Because he has people he cares about and that depend on him so he can´t fall, he can´t ask for help and damn sure he can´t let himself sulk and think about the futility of all, he can´t go with dazai´s nihilistic mentality not matter how much of it he secretly shares because he can´t stop fighting. That would ultimately break him. Chuuya´s outwordly drive to keep advancing despite all the horrible things that happen to him is only possible because he never stops to think about this.

So in a lot of ways, Dazai is like a punch in the face. it´s his worse fears and hidden thoughts in a human form. Dazai, especially 15-18 year old Dazai represents everything he fights about himself. So yes, when I say that chuuya makes a constant, conscious effort to avoid understanding Dazai I´m talking about this (and that´s like half of it, because Dazai´s coping mechanisms also directly clash with chuuya´s whole ideology. Honestly is kinda impressive how Dazai manages to trigger chuuya to that degree)

Now, going back to the analysis I want to say that Stormbringer doesn´t really bring anything new to chuuya´s character, it just consolidates what was already there. It´s when chuuya finally realized something we´ve known all along and it´s because of this that he can finally solve his inner conflict.

“I can feel their lives burning right here, inside me, and till those flames die down. I can´t just do whatever I want. I´m gonna do what I need to. That´s who I am”- Chuuya, stormbringer

“-Why don´t you get it? There isn´t anything you need to do! Live how you want to live! Destroy what you want to destroy! Because there´s only one thing we needed to do, and that was to not be born!(...)

-Just shup up- Chuuya´s eyes burned with fierce determination. -Maybe that´s what you wanna do, but don´t shove your belief down my throat. Cause that ain´t ´t how I feel at all.

Several shadow ran thorugh the light in his eyes.

His friends in the sheep.

His friends in the Port Mafia.

The light in his eyes was determination. It was the powerful brilliance of humankind, something gaines only through encounters and partings with other people.

-You´ve been completely wrong from the very start- Chuuya spat in disgust- “Being born was a mistake”? Sounds like the kind of garbage Dazai would spew, and no way in hell am I ever gonna think the way he does!”- Verlaine and chuuya, stormbringer.

This scene is so important to chuuya´s development as a character because this is the first time he defines himself as an individual in his own terms and independently of his origin. He is a person, and he is the kind of person that will do what it needs to be done and he will do it for the people that is important to him. That´s simply who he is. That´s his identity as a human being. That´s why I get mad when people are fighting about chuuya´s humanity. Yes, at the end is really hinted that he is the original one but that´s not important. Because the whole point of the novel is that humanity is more than origin. It doesn´t matter if chuuya was born as a human being or created in a lab because at the end of the day he is human because of the ties he has with the people around him.

Different from Dazai, Chuuya gets this solution from existentialism. Existentialism is a form of philosophy that explores the issue of human existence. Existencialism basically says that purpose and meaning in life doesn´t come from external forces such as God, fate or a bigger power but instead is entirely determined by ourselves and that´s exactly what chuuya does. It doesn´t matter that life in senseless, it doesn´t matter if he was created only as a weapon, it doesn´t matter if he shouldn´t have existed in the first place. None of it matters. Because he is already here and he will give himself a purpose. And God, I´m gonna stop here to say that this is such a chuuya thing to do. He fights what everyone around him is telling him and he fights himself, yes, he may understand Dazai and verlaine´s nihilistic mentality but he ultimately decides to reject it. Chuuya will fight even the absurdity of life, in a way is fucking hilarious and as a Dazai kinnie I can wholeheartedly understand how this is so annoying for him. Because here we are needing sense, getting paralyzed because of the ucertainty of the world and just trying to keep living despite being constantly overwhelmed because the aburdity of all and then there are people like chuuya that realized the same thing but they keep going, people like chuuya that just push their way through life like it´s not a big deal, people like chuuya that never give up even when is the logical thing to do. And as maddening as it is, maybe this is the real reason why Chuuya is my favorite character, he can do something I don´t. His will to fight despite everyting? How he gets up every single time? is not something I can do.

Okay so sorry for the projection in the middle of it. Let´s continue with the analysis.

The whole point is that Chuuya doesn´t care if his reason to keep going is not trascendental, he doesn´t care if it´s illogical, he doesn´t care if in the great scheme of things it doesn´t mean anything. Because it´s important to him, it´s enough to him and that´s all that matters. Chuuya has people he loves, he has emotional ties with them and Chuuya clings to them with desperation because it is what impulses him to keep going. I need you to understand this, every single character is bsd have people they love and appreciate but for chuuya? it´s a whole different deal. They are so much more than that. They are not only people he loves, they are the direct representation of his humanity (which I remind you is the most important aspect of his characterization) he finds a purpose and a sense in this bonds, he finds an /identity/ thanks to this bonds. And that´s why he will do absolutely everything to preserve them. Yes, the biggest difference between Chuuya and kunikida is that when chuuya says that he will do what needs to be done, he is not talking about ideals, he´s saying that he will give everything of him for the people he loves.

Now, everything should be fine, right? Chuuya learns to accept his humanity to a certain extent, he gives himself a purpose, everything is /fine/ except it´s not and this lead us to the second and biggest contradiction about chuuya and this is which ultimately brings another thousand contradiction in his character: Nowadays his biggest conflict is not the original problem anymore, it´s the solution he gave to that problem.

And it´s the most tragic contradiction in earth because his relationships with people is what makes him keep going but at the same time it´s also what keeps him stuck (I´m discussing that later). And it hurts so much because yes, they give them an identity, a purpose but he also sacrifices /too much/ of himself in the name of this relationships.

He is conventionally brave, he is not like atsushi, he never hesitates, he never doubts but it´s not in a healthy way. Chuuya is not brave for the sake of being brave. He is brave because there was never another option to him, he doesn´t let himself feel afraid. During stormbringer he experimented more suffering than most of the characters in the story, he went against a giant beast, he was tortured, freakingg hell, his biggest fear all along was to discover that he wasn´t human but he decides to know because the flags investigated his past. He was terrified but he forced himself to ask because “I have an obligation to know for their sake” not for him, for the flags.

And let´s not talk about how corruption is his worst fear turned true, let´s not talk about how it represents the lack of humanity and how that may affect the character whose whole main arc revolves around seeking humanity, let´s not talk about how he goes against his worse fear once and once again to protect the city and the organization he loves. There is only one thing that chuuya wanted, all this time he only wanted to know if he was a human or if he wasn´t and in stormbringer he gave up even that. He decides to use corruption fully knowing that he will lose his opportunity to know and he doesn´t care if by doing it, he can save people.

He has a moral compass but he sacrifices it in the name of the people he loves. He cares about people but he also mass murder if that benefits his organization. He appreciates life, but he´s so ready to die and destroy himself if by doing that he can be useful for the people he cares about. His pathological loyalty is also explained by this, it doesn´t matter if they betrayed him or hurt him, he will still be there for them because he puts this relationships over everything. He even sacrifices his emotions, I´ve said it before but chuuya didn´t even let himself cry after he saw his friends in pieces because he put albatross needs over his own pain. He got into an organization he didn´t even wanted to be in because by doing it he could save the people that stabbed him in the back. To this day I´m haunted by the fact that in the entirety of stormbringer, chuuya only let himself be vulnerable once, he only screamed once. When he was being tortured, and in agony, he let himself scream but he only did it because no one there cared. If a person he loves had been there, then chuuya would´ve hold it in, he would never let himself cry because he will never let himself be a worry for the people he cares about. His whole ability is a reminder of everything he went through, of everything that makes him different, of all his pain but he doesn´t resent his ability because he can protect the people he loves with it, that powerful ability is just another responsibility he needs to carry. He is powerful so he needs to protect those that aren´t.

Chuuya is so selfless that it actually is a fucking flaw. From all the characters in bsd, he is the one who sacrifices the most and the craziest thing about it? He doesn´t even notice because in his mind he´s doing what needs to be done. In the CD drama he says to akutagawa that self sacrifice is a pathetic excuse for weak people but he does it all the time, except that he doesn´t think about what he does as self sacrifice, for him is just the natural thing to do. Chuuya constantly makes pyramids and he puts himself at the bottom of them. He is ready to give everything for the people he loves but he never expects the same of them. He loves unconditionally, but he doesn´t think that he can be loved in the same way. He needs to push himself, he needs to be useful.

“-Why- A flash of uneasiness briefly colored chuuya´s expression- Why would you go through all this (...)

-It´s nothing particularly serious- Said Lippmann. Baffled by chuuya´s reaction, he eyed the rest of the group- If we had to come up with a reason, though...it´s because you´re our friend. Were things different in the sheep?

They had been. That was what Chuuya flustered expression was saying. Everyone in the sheep depended on him. The contrary was unthinkable”- The flags and Chuuya, stormbringer.

Chuuya doesn´t know how to accept kindness, he doesn´t know how to react to people caring about him. Because that´s his job. He is never in the opposite side of it. And when he finally was, he lost it and even then he never thinks about all the shitty things that happen to him, he never complains about the unfairness of it. He just keeps going, he takes every single blow and he never let himself make a sound.

Do you see the contradictions now? The love he has for his people may be the foundation of his identity, but he also sacrifices a thousand of things about himself to protect them. No one can live like that. He lives in a perpetual state of contradiction. What he believes in, what he feels and what he does never fucking allign. And honestly this is part of what makes his character so fucking good, because this contradictions narratively speaking make perfect sense. Is not that he is lying, is not lack of self awareness, is not a hole in his characterization. if you stop to analyze the character this contradictions make perfect sense for him. And this trait is why chuuya gives this impression of being predictably unpredictable.

During the first light novel Dazai describes kunikida like this:

“I´ve got a good idea of who you are now, so nothing you do will ever surprise me. I mean, compared with me, you´re just a simple man with a simple mind, after all (...) See? You wear your heart in your sleeve. You don´t hide how you´re really feeling”- Dazai, Osamu Dazai´s entrance exam

And you´ve probably noticed by now, but a lot of this description somewhat applies for chuuya too. But Dazai´s reaction to chuuya is usually this one:

Even knowing Chuuya better than anyone else, Dazai has consistently been surprised or doubting chuuya´s actions. During stormbringer he didn´t know if chuuya was going to use corruption, because a normal person don´t go through life sacrificing their most wanted thing. During fifteen, he was extermely curious about his relationship with the sheep, because chuuya´s arrogance doesn´t make sense with the way he lets himself be used. He thought that Chuuya was going to kill N because that would´ve been the normal reaction to have but he didn´t. At 22, he hoped that chuuya was going to use corruption to save him but the whole point was that he could never be 100% sure because a normal person won´t go through life facing their worst fear just because of trust. And Dazai is not the only one unbalanced by chuuya, the flags were constantly surprised by him, rimbaud didn´t know what to do of him. Verlaine thought that after all the suffering, chuuya would grow up to hate the world just like he did, but chuuya didn´t. There is this whole scene in which Adam and shirase are facing verlaine and he knows that they will die, he goes through all the possibilities but there´s no way they make it but then chuuya appears

“The 169 outcome. An unthinkable possibility

-Unbelievable- I instinctively muttered”- Adam, stormbringer

Adam is an AI, he was made to think about all the logical options and he never thought of that one. Because no normal person will go and fight when all logic is saying that they will lose. But Chuuya does it, he goes and fight expeting to win, giving his all because he will not let his friends die.

Kunikida is relatively easy to predict because he will stick to his ideals as much as possible and because of that is easy to read his actions and the way he will act (to a certain extent, of course) Chuuya is as easy to manipulate as kunikida is but he is far more difficult to accurately predict. Chuuya may be as genuine and honest as kunikida is but he doesn´t stick to anything. He will go against the very basis of himself for the people he loves. Worse than that a lot of his actions and decisions are incredibly complicated because he does a thousand of mental mallabarisms that somehow make sense for him. He will kill, steal and blackmail but outside of job? He respects the traffic laws, he thinks that kids shouldn´t drink alcohol and help grandmothers cross the street. Does that make any sense to you? He will die and kill a stranger no doubt if by doing that he can protect the mafia but sacrificing a friend? Yeah, that´s not gonna happen. He simply can´t do it. So chuuya is fine with killing but only under specific conditions and that applies to everything he does. He lives in constant contradiction and that´s a problem because he won´t be able to keep it eternally. Every single time he goes against something he believes in, is a hit, even if he doesn´t let himself see it. And is fucking terrifying because we all talk about what´s gonna happen when Dazai breaks down, but I´m asking what´s gonna happen if chuuya is the one who breaks down? Because it´s gonna be fucking catastrophic, Chuuya doesn´t know how to bend, he will just keep going until he breaks. He will just keep going until he completely destroys himself.

Now I feel like this is a good time to answer the first question. If chuuya has so many hero-like qualities then why is he in the sides that kill people? why is he a morally grey character? By now I think is pretty evident that Chuuya is not a violence oriented character, he may be agressive and blunt, he is bad tempered but almost every single time he attacks is because he is trying to protect his people or in benefit of them. Yes, he is impulsive and he enjoys a good fight but he never attacks just for the sake of it. He may be arrogant and powerful but none of that is the answer. The real reason Chuuya is a morally grey character is because he chooses.

For him, some people are more important than others.

And just like I´ve been saying in all this analysis, chuuya is ready to do /everything/ for the group of people he chooses. He will kill and die for them. He will go against his moral code a thousand times for them. This certainly doesn´t excuse chuuya´s behavior though. The reality is that no matter his motivation, his actions are still bad by the moral code but just like Dazai, Chuuya is not a moral oriented character. And honestly I will forever find fascinating, that Dazai have all the attributes that we would expect of a bad person but he is in the side that saves people, he is doing his best to protect. Meanwhile, chuuya is an almost text book definition of a hero and still is in the side that kills people. The most fascinating thing though, is that they´re both morally grey characters just in completely different ways. Dazai still does a lot of bad things, it just happens that the ultimate result is a “good” one. Chuuya is constantly doing horrible things, but he also sacrifices himself constantly for the city he loves, and he has saves lots of lives by doing it.

Now going back to topic, yes chuuya chooses but that this is not a mafia-only thing. People in the light does it as well.

Tanizaki is the most obvious one, it has never been a secret that he would burn the world for Naomi and he is the only ADA character that actively has risked (and potentially killed) a complete innocent person in the name of saving Naomi. Ranpo did it as well, during the cannibalism arc he is the first one to suggest killing Mori because he priorized Fukuzawa not only over Mori´s life (which is natural) but also over the whole moral code of the ADA. And later in the story, he is the only one who wants to refuse the job that we now know that ruined the agency. The whole point of it, is not that the ADA didn´t believe in ranpo, is that if they didn´t took the job innocent people were gonna die and that goes against everything the ADA believes in, but not for Ranpo. He was perfectly fine with letting those people die if he could save his family, if he could save the ADA by refusing the job. Tecchou is a hunting dog, his whole character revolves around justice but he was ready to go against that because Jouno was lost, and that was more important for him than the fucking world. Yes, chuuya actively kills but all of this characters have proved that they would do it too under the right circumstances.

And with this I can finally write the last part of this analysis: Chuuya nakahara shouldn´t be in the mafia, his coping mechanisms and how his character is stuck.

#bsd chuuya #bungou stray dogs #bsd meta #chuuya analysis #bsd analysis #soukoku #skk #the fangirling is strong in this one #he is my favorite and it is obvious #hundreds of words just to say that I adore him #stormbringer spoilers #fifteen spoiler #bsd spoilers

365 notes · View notes

shadowtraveled · 1 month

Note

what TMA entities would you assign the dungeon lords, esp mithrun? was discussing this (bc marcille is sooo End) and consulting your Seminal Mithrun Meta when i remembered you also went here!

anon i want you to know i was thinking about this nonstop like two weeks ago oh my god. i’d love to hear your thoughts on this if you’re so inclined 👁‍🗨 (and wheeze thank you i don’t know about seminal but i’m glad it passed peer review)

putting a readmore here for spoilers

to preface this, i understand the fears aren’t really separate and it’s all just fear etc but they function as distinct in the way the demons do and in the sense that they each had to mark jon to come into the world. so. distinctive facets of a unified whole. anyway i have two criteria for assigning someone a tma entity: it has to be something they deeply fear, and it has to be something they choose anyway.

and with that being said, marcille is SO end-aligned in a very gentle and chill way i think fits the end so nicely… her intense fear of death is sort of a fear of loss, which would typically be considered the desolation’s domain, especially when coupled with her aptitude for explosion/fire magic and the part of her arc where she tries to expand the dungeon, but she wasn't choosing destruction or hopelessness in either of those cases—there’s something to be said for the carnage she was willing to leave in her wake, but at the end of the day she was trying to eliminate loss. she's fundamentally incompatible with the desolation because she continually rejects it, and the loss itself doesn't form the core of her fear. the inevitability of death, though, does, and she accepts it when she gives up the dungeon and lets falin go. absolutely the end.

i think thistle is another easy designation. he clings to control to the point it corrupts him, and he creates an environment that forbids death, but his desire is not for control and his fear is not of death or loss—those are delgal's. instead, his fear that he won't be able to measure up to the too-large too-heavy responsibility placed on his shoulders is what drives him, and because we know it drives him, we know that he takes it on anyway. he even brings melini underground. extremely the buried.

laios, meanwhile. is difficult for me to assign. his fears (rejection, ostracism, that he isn't able to connect with people, that he hates people) feel very lonely, and he does withdraw from people a fair amount, but he has connections he does not and would not choose to sever. you could make an argument for the hunt (he's drawn to not only monsters but the concept of the food chain itself and his place on it as a part of the natural world, and he ends the series with the object of his fascination out of his reach), but i don't think there's enough fear there. in laios' case, the lack of strict definition between fears and the idea that they're all just muddled subcategories of a singular thing is actually really helpful, because i think i'm assigning him to the vast. it was said at some point that the vast and the lonely aren't too dissimilar—you won't realize how alone you are without distance, and that sort of mental/emotional distance and disconnect is what has haunted laios his entire life. and i think that's, in part, what makes the cosmic insignificance of seeing yourself as just another part of your environment so comforting to him. his choices... definitely make him cosmically significant lmfao but even though he chooses to be the one to go up against Infinity Itself and its endless hunger and even though he chooses to be king, he fits himself right back into the position of being a single piece of a much larger puzzle. he became lord of the dungeon to become a part of the food chain that would stand a chance to preserve it (via eating the demon's hunger). he's king because there was a gap that needed to be filled. even then, he wants his body to be scattered after death, so that he can be devoured like any other living thing would be. god i love this manga. anyway, tentative but i think the vast is the only thing i can justify at this time. actually, accepting the hunger of the infinite could itself be seen as accepting the vast into himself…….

and finally, mithrun! surprising absolutely nobody given my take on his backstory, i'd give him to the lonely, with the caveat that he does eventually sever his connection to it. prior to becoming lord of a dungeon, we know he thought the worst of people (and again i think this was intentional of him), but we also know he put up a front that was undeniably kind. milsiril says that everyone loved him for the front, but its very existence acted as a barrier between himself and others: milsiril had no idea how miserable he was, and neither did anyone else. he'd already begun choosing isolation, and he chose it ultimately when he became lord of a dungeon, literally cutting himself off from everyone in a pocket dimension where he surrounded himself with facsimiles of people he loved until... they dwindled. and they did, until he was alone again, with only the demon and the unresponsive chimera construction of the person he considered to be the one he loved. after he was eaten, we see themes of emptiness typical of the lonely coupled with his disconnection from his team—in one of the extras it says they don't really know how to approach him, and i think it shows. so in a way, he ends up back where he started: surrounded by people who care about him and who he ostensibly cares about in return, but emotionally alone. as for fear, i think a lot of his are tied up in the concept of insignificance, but that insignificance isn't cosmic—it's personal. that's why watching himself be replaced was so unbearable for him and why the thought of being left unfinished was so horrific.

as an aside, i did also consider the corruption. the idea of leftovers abandoned carries the connotation of rot and i love the concept of 'the rot within you' etc. it gets me every time, and i think there's something to be said about that with regard to the way mithrun views the person he once was. furthermore, the... eating... scene... is framed as sexual and extremely invasive (and, as a result of the combination, is very evocative of disgust) in a way we see most often with the corruption (though imo tma would never see something like this as it toes the line of jonny's "no sexual trauma horror" rule too closely), and we have to remember that for all that it terrified mithrun, he was trying to get it to happen again. but i don't think disgust is enough of a factor for him. most of his disgust is aimed at himself, and while he doesn't shy away from it, he isn't really drawn to it either. rather, i think his dialogue in the extra comic in the complete edition of the adventurer's bible ("there's nothing so kind as a demon. suddenly losing that kind of love opens a hole in your heart[...]") goes a long way in terms of defining what being eaten meant to him. the corruption focuses on a feeling of belonging and community. mithrun wanted to disappear forever knowing that in the last moment he lived he was loved. ultimately, the fear of being abandoned coupled with his attraction to being unknown and eventually entirely gone read as lonely-aligned to me.

anyway i'd LOVE to hear where you're at with this please come chat literally whenever this is the most excited i’ve ever been about anything

#anon #ask #dungeon meshi spoilers #the magnus archives spoilers #tma spoilers #dungeon meshi #marcille donato #thistle #laios touden #mithrun #mithrun got an entire extra paragraph but in my defense this does say 'especially mithrun' and i do play favorites #and the corruption is just fun to talk about

55 notes · View notes

olderthannetfic · 10 months

Note

/724781513472868352 I resonate with this on a deep level. I get told at college all the time that I don't look LGBT+ (they refuse to say queer, respectability politics is a helleva drug), I don't act it, no queer person is into my major or my hobbies, and it's weird that I'm queer but not into astrology or dressing more aesthetically ("are you a cottagecore or a dark academia gay?" I'm neither I'm a me) or playing Pokemon because outgrowing Pokemon is for cishets. People talk about gays/LGBT+ not being able to drive or do math or sit normally and then act like I'm some kind of ridiculous weirdo for not laughing at what they assure me is a true statement that does not apply to them or to me. People encourage me to experiment with my style or hair and "come out of your shell". I am informed I need to listen to certain musicians because all LGBT+ people are into them. It's weird that I'm not. It's even weirder I don't like The Owl House or hate Steven Universe or keep up with Heartstopper like the good queers do.

Basically it all boils down to, "Why can't you be more normal? Why can't you be like us?"

Because I'm not. My dad is a Pashtun Muslim and my mother is a Bukharan Jew. I have lived in the Deep South half my life and Wyoming the other half. My media interests are unrelated to queer rep and wholly based on liking the plots of things. I grew up on oldies and TV shows like Starsky and Hutch that my parents loved, pirated and played on repeat. I don't believe in astrology, I'm not a witch and I'm not an atheist with a Christocentric worldview who assumes all religions are Christianity Lite. I don't listen to the correct musicians mostly because I discover music entirely by accident and have a mishmash of genres and bands in rotation. Pokemon fell off and I'm not into it. I would sooner die than dye my Pashtun red hair that people made fun of me for as a kid. I like wearing button downs, clean shirts, nice jeans and my Magen David. None of this is incompatible with being queer. No one is going to kick me out of a gay club for not having played Pokemon Violet or listening to Tracy Chapman or trusting in science over crystals for healing.

And I really hate that after years of being avoided and pitied in high school by jackass backwards rednecks for being weird, I got to my dream university, the university in the most liberal city in Montana, and get the same fucking treatment.

Commenters like the one anon mentioned remind me of all the people who act like I'm doing it wrong. What is 'it', in that sentence? Living my life. Being queer. And when it crops in fandom - and I've gotten it sometimes for writing queer characters who are like me, Southern and into uncool shit and not sharp dressers and religious - it just makes me want to start screaming.

I am queer. I am not incorrectly queer. I am who I am and therefore, because I am queer, that is a correct way to do queerness.

Some gripes about Gen Z are overblown but this weirdly narrow view of what queerness is allowed to look like or be is 100% as awful as other generations say it is and it's fucking exhausting to live through. I don't have to sit differently in order to be doing queerness right or be unable to drive. I exist and I am queer and that is all I need to do and be.

I wish fandom was different from real life. I wish it was more open to the reality that queer people have a multitude of backgrounds and lived experiences. We're facing enough shit IRL, can't we just have one place where we're NICE to each other?

As a 40+ queer, I'm laughing myself sick at the current crop of "required" queer interests.

In my day, it was oldschool cis gay male culture for the men (think being obsessed with Bette Davis) and But I'm a Cheerleader and Dykes to Watch Out For for the women or something.

Not that you have to like any of those things either. It's just hilarious how clueless people are about what's a temporary trend that will probably be different in 5 years.

148 notes · View notes

mixelation · 10 months

Text

some itachi + romance meta for reborn au ->

so, my personal headcanon for itachi is that he has a lot of little idle romantic fantasies about a nondescript fantasy partner, but it takes a pretty big push for him to go "oh, i love this person." he's open to sex if his partner wants it, but he doesn't really care about it otherwise. in other words, he'd be into a romantic partner if he happened upon one (and, like, he didn't have four thousand other high-priority problems the relationship would be incompatible with), but he's not actively looking and he doesn't really need one to be happy.

in an AU where the massacre didn't happen, I think he'd be open to dating. but in mutagenicity, he DID live through the massacre and being in akatsuki, and he IS mentally 20+ years older than he looks, and oh my god, please don't make him talk to children. especially uchiha children he killed in previous life. please.

i don't think all ninja clans necessarily cling to old fashioned traditions about marriage and bloodlines, but i like the idea of some of them hanging around for Shenanigans. like no one would really care if itachi were gay, as long as he quietly kept his boyfriend as a boyfriend and married someone capable of childbirth and made that new heir. they don't even care if the heir is female! progress :)

but also itachi has a mysterious genetic disease so they're like. hmm yeah okay you may marry outside of the clan. (desperately start researching if there's some sort of Test for sharigan babies)

mikoto has of course Noticed itachi just like.... isn't interested? in even talking to other teens?? so she wants to get him started kind of early. listen itachi, marriage will be SO much easier if you've dated your bride and figured out someone you actually like. also if you don't find one i will simply find one for you at some certain age and you will have no say in the matter.

the first few times she sends him on dates she just socially manipulates a situation where somehow he ends up alone with a girl mikoto likes. the girl is almost always very accomplished for her age, polite, pretty. literally nothing is wrong with her except she's 16 and itachi hates strangers. like, he's fine with them. he can put on a smile and be polite for a limited amount of time. but Inner Itachi is so fucking mean and fucked up, getting socially close to people almost always makes them hate him (for valid reasons) and then also his date is 16. so mikoto keeps putting him in a position where he's inevitably going to make a poor teenaged girl cry because he told her she'll never get promoted to jounin because her mission completion rate is mediocre, which he does often feel bad about, but also he cannot do anything about his horrible personality and cannot help himself. and then even if he likes her, what is he supposed to do? be like "yeah i'm just going to tell you my opinion and it will come out blunt and mean and also i'll be right and refuse to apologize, it's because of my deeply fucked up past life where the state told me i had to pick between murdering my entire family or letting my family destroy everything i care about, sorry about that." no! obviously he can't do that!!!

and his feelings about mikoto in general just, like, insane. she had her hand in supporting the coup in his previous life, but she raised him and loved him, but also she let him kill her so he'd see it in his nightmares constantly, and this mikoto didn't do any of that but he still sees her in his dreams and she is EQUALLY socially manipulative in this timeline, and honestly this is sort of making his feelings about her even more insane, but obviously he can't talk to her about it. so he needs to figure out way to dodge this whole dating situation in order to avoid uchiha massacre #2

so one day he's stealing dango right off tori's plate while she's in the bathroom, and he's like. holy fuck. tori is a girl, and she's not even going to get upset i'm about to do this to her. and then she comes back and is like "why the fuck did you steal my food" and he tells her it's because she did a disproportionately low amount of substandard work on the mission and hence deserves less of the mission budget. and she DOES rub the inside of his sleeping bag down with poison ivy but she also doesn't fucking cry.

itachi, flipping his sleeping bag inside out: perfect. we're dating now. <3

tori is NOT mikoto's top pick because she's a wild card and not the easily controlled nice girl mikoto was aiming for, but. at least itachi seems to actually like her? and she hasn't come crying to mikoto about how her son horrible yet, so. she's even got a decent amount of social clout for (checks note) a defector from another village who seems to go out of her way to be annoying and unlikable. mikoto isn't really thrilled but she backs off

dating is basically nothing like itachi's idle fantasies because tori is also deeply messed up, and also itachi spent a VERY long time in the other timeline convinced she was going to blab his secrets and Ruin Everything and he really wanted to kill her, but also that DID translate into a weird sort of respect pretty early on in this timeline, and they can have actual conversations about stuff. she helped him kill danzo, no questions asked. they like watching bad movies and dragging them to pieces together. she willingly reads his favorite book. they say mean shit to each other and it's fine because they've mutually accepted the other is just like this. it's comfortable. also pointing tori'a ability to ruin everything for everyone is so nice when pointed at someone itachi doesn't like

so even once itachi is old enough he can date Actual Adults, tori is like, "hey are you going to break up with me?" and he's like, "........no?" and she's like "okay." and they move in together and have separate bedrooms and tori attempts to kill him at least twice over burning food so bad it won't come off the pot, but it's comfortable and they're both happy

(and also itachi realizes tori fucking loves going along with bits, so if he tells her he wants to do some stupid romantic thing, she will just go along with it and have fun. wild)

i think they get married kind of late For The Setting (like very late twenties) because it takes tori years to figure out their illegal test tube baby and they just don't really see the point without the baby. mikoto finds this immensely frustrating. but at least they're on the same page, even if it's the WRONG PAGE

#reborn au

112 notes · View notes

erikatsu · 1 year

Text

kitchen sink — kaveh

cw: gn!reader. hurt/ slight comfort. leak/lore spoilers for kaveh's character story. more a character study than anything (perhaps also me projecting). not edited or proofread. probably not my best either.

wc: 680~

it was rare, that kaveh would ever cling to you. but nights like these— the ones where he'd had a little too much to drink— he couldn't help but let the thoughts of you leaving creep into his mind. even after getting him home from the tavern and crawling into the bed with him, he'd curl into you and he wouldn't let go. sometimes the soothing beat of your heart as he laid against your chest would lull him to sleep. other times, he couldn't settle his thoughts or his demons.

you hated when he was like this. not because he needed the reassurance, but because he refused to voice it. he'd always been that way, you supposed. never getting things off his chest the proper way, shutting others out as a cry for help, hiding the pain he felt behind smiles that never quite reached his eyes and good deeds. he was a man who was hurting deep down, yet he never let it disturb his heart of gold. because what would people do if they knew the truth?

what would people think if they found out the hands that could craft such beautiful buildings and sculptures were also hands that could destroy everything just as easily?

what would you think if he allowed himself to fully open up? if he bared his heart to you, would he once again ruin the good things he had? he wasn't sure if his heart could handle that, and he was not ready to find out. however, he was thankful you never pushed him for answers you may regret hearing.

there was no way he could tell you of the guilt he carried or the weight that constantly pressed against his shoulders. he'd caused too much pain to his own family, turned a home into cold walls and a shell of a house. he didn't want to do the same to you. which is why he tried so hard to give as much of his love to you as possible, only only took a little bit of yours in return.

but if you knew how he truly felt— about himself and the things he'd been through— you would know nothing was his fault and that the shame he lived with was gratuitous. nobody had ever told him it wasn't his fault, which was why he'd been so stuck even as time went on. you would tell him everything that he needed to hear, like his mother leaving was not because he couldn't spend as much time with her, or that his father's accident was not due to kaveh encouraging the man to partake in that competition. you'd tell him he needn't compare himself to others, and that his achievements were bountiful, even if they weren't the biggest.

you would tell him he deserved just as much love as he gave, and that even though his edges may be frayed and torn, he was still a masterpiece.

he didn't think so. not yet. he believed he deserved his bad hand, and that if he didn't do good he should be punished. if you were to tell him now, he'd never believe it. just as he would rather think alhaitham purposely pushed his buttons and got onto him because their personalities were simply incompatible when really... all his roommate was doing was trying to get him out of that mindset.

one day, when kaveh was ready, you could tell him what he should've heard years ago. for now, he's blurred mind soaked in how you gently ran your fingers through his hair, and tried to take comfort in you even if it was hard. luckily for him, some of his unrest was put to ease as you whispered that you loved him, and that you weren't going anywhere. he may not remember it in the morning, but that small reassurance was enough to have him visibly relaxing. maybe now he could do what he usually did, and fall asleep to the sound of your heartbeat and forgetting that he doesn't deserve to be comforted by your loving arms.

#kaveh x reader #genshin x reader #kaveh x you #genshin x you #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact x you

398 notes · View notes

akechi-stole-my-heart · 1 year

Text

no more what ifs - a goro akechi meta

Inspired by a meta I reblogged a bit ago. It was really good and you should read it, as it serves as a good companion piece to this analysis, but it didn't analyze the song through the specific lens I personally believe it's meant to be seen through--that is, the Third Semester/Maruki's reality. Don't get me wrong, I think the song can be applied to Akechi in general, just that we can't truly understand the depths of its meaning unless we view it through the lens of what Akechi is feeling in the Third Semester. Needless to say, that's what I'll be doing here.

People come and they go Some people may stay with you though I am all alone tonight and I kept on Asking myself questions

Akechi has lived most of his life alone. People have come and gone temporarily, but no one has really stuck until Joker entered his life. (I don't think I need to make the case that it's Joker he's talking about when he says some people stay with you, I think it's pretty obvious it has to be him.) Joker, someone he can't comprehend, the only person he's let in. Akechi can't understand Joker, so naturally, he's constantly thinking of him, and why he's stuck with him when so many others haven't.

Conceited I was at time I never really doubted myself But tonight got me thinking about it all If I am the fool or what not

All Akechi can do in the Third Semester is think about his choices and his mistakes and wonder if he did the right thing and what led him here. He's been forced to live (for now) after everything he'd worked and lived for fell apart under him. He's reflecting on his past arrogance and how that blinded him.

"If I am the fool or what not" holds a double meaning. Akechi is doubting if he was a fool in the general sense, if he was made a fool for his plan of revenge. But he's also wondering if he was the Fool in the Persona sense of the word (something that will have a payoff at the end of the song).

I do not Regret with my choices I'm rather proud Ooh I know I won't change Anything Because I can only be me so

Akechi can't afford regret. To regret would be to admit that Maruki's ideal reality, where his choices were erased, has any hold on him. To regret would be to let go of the person he is and the person he has become.

Who Akechi really is is another topic that can be elaborated on ad nauseum, so I won't do that here. Maybe I'll do that another time when I finally write the meta about Akechi and agency that's been living in my head for a long while.

Suffice to say, Akechi believes his choices, his actions, his revenge, all define him. He refuses to let Maruki erase them just because they don't fit with his ideal reality. Akechi is fundamentally incompatible with everything Maruki stands for, and he knows it.

How can I be so sure? At a crossroads I'm afraid too But I can't let fear get the best of me Someone once said burn my dread babe

"Burn my dread" is a reference to a song from Persona 3. I haven't played the entire game as of yet, but Persona 3 is a game all about facing and accepting death. "Burn my dread" is a lyric that points to this theme, and the theme of facing one's fears head-on.

Akechi is dead. He knows this perhaps from the very moment he comes back to life. He certainly knows it for most of the Third Semester. He is dead, and to reject Maruki's reality, to embrace himself, is to face that death for the second time, and accept it. But Akechi can't let his fear of death stop him from making his choice. He will die on his own terms and "burn his dread."

Who knows what tomorrow holds? Just wanna live my life the way I want What fills up my soul is passionate Music that makes me want to sing

This is, yet again, Akechi asserting that he will be himself, that he will find meaning in life on his own terms, and that he will not let anyone other than himself define who he is or what he wants. Music is dynamic and complex, something that can express deep truths of one's soul. The Jazz Jin, a place of music, is Akechi's in a way very little else is. It's not Shido's puppet's, not the Detective Prince's, but Akechi's place of solitude and self reflection. It is the place he decides to share with Joker--in a way, he is baring his very soul to Joker. Letting him into his heart.

My story will be starring me just like yours ooh ooh Who knows when will it end What matters most is how you bring joy to life so

This is paying off the beginning of the song. Akechi is asserting that the world doesn't revolve around Joker. Goro is the Fool, he is the main character, he is not defined by anyone but himself and himself alone.

And the last two lines simply restate themes running throughout the song. Akechi is himself. He will accept his death when it comes, and he will not live by anyone's rules but his own.

No More What Ifs shows us the doubt that Akechi rarely expresses that runs deep to his core. Wondering if he made a mistake in isolating himself, wondering if Joker was right all along, wondering if and how things might have gone wrong.

But Akechi can't let himself doubt for long. He always comes back to that certainty that he can't be anyone but himself. He can't let anyone change him. He can't let go of who he is, not for anything. The song is full of him reassuring himself of his path--that no matter what, he will not regret. He can't afford it. He will not waver from his path.

Now, more than ever, after being faced with the consequences of his mistakes and being offered an out, Akechi has to assert his free will and defy Maruki. And that's what this song expresses.

#sera posts #goro akechi #akechi goro #p5r #p5r spoilers #akeshu #shuake #sera talks goro

150 notes · View notes

pyreo · 8 months

Text

I know there's people who like their fantasy storytelling to take a few steps away from reality, you know. Nothing that verges on allegorical to the stuff we worry about in real life. And I think I'm on the opposite team to that and y'know, the further away we get from gw2's original core story the more I see The World Summit instance as more pivotal than it appeared.

It's the part in the middle of Season 2 where you bring the world leaders together to try and insist that they need to aid you fighting Mordremoth, a primal force who's only just now awakened and started causing disruption and deaths. Mechanically, it serves to show the various cultures being made aware of the upcoming antagonist for mostly the first time.

But there's something that grips me to this day about the realism in that segment. You know full well that this thing is beginning its warpath and will kill those around you. You and your guild know that you need to take action immediately before it gathers itself together to a point you cannot fight it any more. I don't think the scene serves much more than obligatory scaffolding in a narrative sense but it echoes the way I feel in real life all the time. It's the focal point where I've never felt more aligned with my Commander.

Smodur: They're plant creatures! How hard can they be to fight. One good flamethrower and…

Knut: Mordremoth is not yet as close as the Sons of Svanir. They press in around our homesteads. That is more important.

Phlunt: Are you saying we should put ourselves on the line to protect all of you? We are safe in Rata Sum.

Jennah: I'm not ashamed to admit that I don't see how this will work. What are you asking of us?

It's not easy to ask the Main Five Peoples to get anything done together - they do come from legitimately incompatible cultures and there's bad history between humans and charr, and sylvari and asura. But you have to present an argument to each one to convince them this is the most important thing to devote resources to.

It's been about ten years since this was written and it still feels exactly like every conversation that deflects from the reality of climate change. The 'we have bigger things to worry about', the 'it's not that bad', the denials, the giving up, the ones who have enough to feel secure individually and don't really care.

That and the way the narrative turns from 'you're the hero, slay the dragon' to a domino effect that cannot be stopped, wrenching the planet off its hinges and it was all down to you. There's a big difference in changing the threat from ancient dragons awakening to devour all life... and it being the Commander's fault that the stabilising effect those dragons had is unplugged. The allegory becomes undeniable - you doomed the world. You have to chase down that tether and pull the weave back from unravelling even if it'll tear you apart. And even if nobody realises how close their lives are to ending, even if nobody respects you for it.

You have to look the most powerful people alive in the eye and plead with them to fucking help you for god's sake knowing it's a crisis and if you don't take action right now instead of waiting for it to get worse... being able to tell them 'I told you so' will be no solace at all.

And fuckin.... if fantasy stories are there to give us hope for ourselves, nothing hits as directly as the journey from "It's not that bad, why should we put anything on the line for you?" to

That hope means something very real to me.

#guild wars 2 #gw2

58 notes · View notes

extremesocialoutcast · 25 days

Text

Hot take:

(not to start fueds, but just to throw my viewpoint into the ring)

Being autistic has its unique challenges, especially when it comes to where you land on the spectrum, but labeling autism as a "disability" is both misleading and it's highly reductionist of the overall "autistic experience".

Autism, to me, is just having a different mind, suit for different situations and conditions.

The only reason how autism can look "disabling", I argue, is because of two factors:

-Incompatibility with neurotypical thought, as well as conditions that suit only neurotypical needs

-Landing on a specific spot on the spectrum, which in turn becomes disabling, as the individual's mind is wired for higher support needs and extra accommodations (i.e. an "autism disability")

Because the latter is much more rare, and the former can create the illusion of the latter if autistic-appropriate conditions aren't met (e.g. autistic child; neurotypical parents; difficulties between the two), autism's status as a "disability" seems more socially constructed, rather than the product of a serious physical or neurological impairment.

Now, I live in a household where almost everyone is autistic. Autism, in of itself, only seems to be a problem in the context of interacting with neurotypicals, and adjusting to their social cues. But in that case, is autism really the problem, or is it because of the incompatibility? In the end, meltdowns are rare for us, and so-called (by allistics) "behavioral issues" aren't really a thing.

Besides, why reduce autism as being about its socially-constructed shortcomings? Autism is a way of thinking, it's a way of understanding the world, we've got social norms and culture that is unique to us, we get weirdly obsessed with specific things that become our greatest passion (no matter how weird or mundane it is), we stim because it's comfy/soothing and think nothing of it. Some of us draw some of the most bizarre, "cringe" things imaginable, or maybe some of the most oddly-specific crossovers between universes that initially look completely incompatible, and we smile at it. Isn't that beautiful?

Autism is just who you are.

Be proud of it.

#hot take #autism #autistic #autistic things #actually autistic #autismcore #autism core #autistic culture #autism culture #autism pride #autistic pride #autism positivity #autism is not a disability #(in of itself)

17 notes · View notes

k-s-morgan · 11 months

Note

Hi. It's probably a silly question but I can't help thinking about it. It's not exactly about ATLWETD just Tomarry in concept.

Tom is a really smart boy/man and he is the sort of person to love mind games, riddles, and playing people (maybe like Ciel), so how do you picture his relationship with Harry? Tom needs intellectual stimulation. Not to say that Harry is stupid and doesn't have common themes to talk about with Tom, but he is not that interested in books, toying people, politics, etc. So what does Tom see in Harry? What fascinates him? I know that Harry can offer Tom deep understanding and acceptance, but these two things alone do not make a long-lasting relationship

Sorry for rambling. I'm just a bit new to Tomarry fandom and I really try to understand all nuances

Hello! Welcome to Tomarry part of the fandom! Here's my take on this.

Tom and Harry are the kind of characters who can be described as different sides of the same coin. Both orphans, both unloved, both abused in one way or another, both having to survive on scraps and seeing magic as their salvation. They are both strong and stubborn, and very determined, but while Tom represents darkness, Harry represents light. Tom’s circumstances contributed to him being cold and full of hatred and bitterness. Harry kept his purity and his love. Because of it, Harry can understand where Tom is coming from, and in canon, he empathizes with him as a child despite everything Tom/Voldemort has done to him. This is something Tom can’t understand, which just makes the dynamic all the more interesting. They are so similar yet so different; they can relate to each other in some aspects and are prepared to fight to death over the remaining ones. There is passion, there is reluctant empathy and admiration.

Harry has the power to shake Tom exactly because of their similarities. A small personal example: if someone who never lived through the war tells me how I should perceive it, I'm just going to scoff. But if I hear it from someone who experienced what I did, I'm going to pay attention. Tom will never be able to relate to people who grew up in the wizarding world, who knew who they were from the start, who didn't have to fight to survive. But he can relate to Harry, and Harry is brave, stubborn, and strong enough to keep fighting him to get his point across. This kind of passion can lead to shouting matches where an unexpected middle truth emerges; it can result in attraction, which will lead to reluctant understanding and compromises. The struggle and the opposing moral values make their relationship challenging; the similarities make it profound and unique. Everyone likes being understood and seen, and there is no one better who could do this for each other than Tom and Harry.

Interestingly, you mentioned Tom and Ciel, and when I thought about pairing them, I felt like they'd be a terrible fit :D I think they are similar and different in incompatible ways. They are both cold and rigid - they'd freeze each other to death. Ciel needs some playfullness in his life to remember that existing is actually fun; Tom needs fire to burn him and to push him out of his self-created superior comfort zone. Ciel has some morality and Tom doesn't, so I think Ciel would see him as just another intelligent psychopath. Tom, in turn, would see Ciel as another spoiled heir of a rich family who never had to fight for anything and who's nothing without his butler.

Tom and Harry are the people who can stimulate each other to be better, to try harder; they have the power to influence each other and make each other view things from a perspective they wouldn't have considered otherwise. Harry might not be Tom's equal in intelligence or magic, but they are still both big league players. Harry can think on his feet; he's a leader and a sport-star, which equips him with skills that can come in handy and which Tom might lack. Harry doesn't seem to be interested in politics in canon, but I think he would be if he felt like he has a chance to change anything. He can give Tom unconditional love without losing his sense of self-worth. Tom, in turn, can give the kind of biting, fanatical, absolute devotion that Harry needs, which would keep him feeling loved but grounded.

These are the foundations of a potential life-long relationship. Depending on the circumstances, Harry and Tom can get attached to each other and start bickering over the small, less relevant things; they can study and admire magic together; they can work on changing the society in a way that they both would consider good; they can duel for fun and just enjoy the quiet. They have a huge promise - the rest depends on a world they are thrust in.

#tomarry #harry potter #tom riddle #shipping

76 notes · View notes