#(sorry for referencing a bunch of shit in th tags pls pls pls ignore my rambling to myself about characters that are barely ever on page

[frodo-of-the-nine-fingers]

i think the actual disconnect between nie mingjue and jin guangyao is that nie mingjue is dying and knows he's dying and has to stick so so so closely to his morals and virtues or else it'll have been for nothing and then he'll have to come to terms with the fact that maybe he didn't actually have to die after all vs jin guangyao who wants to live, he wants to live and be safe and have all the things he was told he could never have-was told he was never good enough to have-and will do almost anything to make it so. and these are two like irreconcilable point of views right (and both Correct and Wrong at the same time) and so they can't understand each other because they aren't even having the same argument and neither of them can see that

#nie mingjue #jin guangyao #nieyao #it's good!!! #i think nmj never expected to survive the war against the wen too maybe so after he's both floundering and STILL dying #characters that didn't HAVE to die like that but did anyways because societal/family/narrative pressure etc >>>>>>> #⚰️ #I've been told it's real sweet to grow old #i think there's also this disconnect between the two of them in the story as a whole re that steinberg quote i posted earlier about kleos #nostos (glory seeking vs home coming) #where jgy is the kleos or glory seeker and nmj SHOULD be the nostos (@ #(and he IS to an extent) but also he ISNT because again he is dying-he knows hes dying you cant extract that from his character #and so there SHOULD be this conflict here from that but there just isnt because nmj isnt filling that role properly and i think that's part #of why jgy cant understand him #jgy is the kleos but nmj isnt a glory seeker (not outside of like the war and he's not doing that for glory etc) but he's also not nostos #he's theseus in the king must die #(sorry for referencing a bunch of shit in th tags pls pls pls ignore my rambling to myself about characters that are barely ever on page/ #screen and so we can never actually fully contextualize them because we dont actually know them but oh boy oh boy can we try) #so like what does a guy who will (allegedly) give up anyone and anything domestic to gain/retain status do against a guy who otherwise #would be the opposite and unwilling/unable to sacrifice anyone for these things do when said guy does neither 🤷‍♀️ #mine