#in every tomb they go

[babydarkstar]

it makes me really insane that gideon doesn’t believe harrow could ever love her. insane. like i get it i get that the only way she knows how to be loved is to be objectified and useful and turned into a weapon and harrow has never treated her well, the ninth has never treated her like a human and she’s an animal in a spiked cage but then to get harrow’s perspective and witnessing the last thread of what was holding her together snap because she lost gideon. gideon having been so assured of her worthlessness not believing that harrowhark ‘you are my only friend. i am undone without you. gideon. gideon. i cannot do this. i cannot conceive of a universe without you. if i should forget you let my right hand also be forgotten.’ gideon’s-name-was-the-last-thing-her-body-said-before-death-even-when-her-mind-couldnt-process-it nonagesimus feels even slightly attached to her. it makes me feel like tearing my hair out actually

#horrible evil wretched femme loves the easygoing malleable happy go lucky butch #and it goes horribly wrong in every way imaginable #theyre so stupid😔 #tlt #griddlehark #tlt spoilers #gideon’s fucking. kicking rocks about ALECTO meanwhile harrow’s lobotomizing over gideon #These Dykes Are So Dumb #harrow literally Saving The Last Dance for gideon and gideon’s moping about THE FROZEN BITCH IN THE TOMB

[dendroculus]

at this point the house should just go for a new record. how many did they have to do in 1856? 133 rounds? we can beat that. it would be hilarious

#talking to myself #us politics #faq about this post: #1. i am not a locked tomb/gideon the ninth fan. i barely know what it is and those aren't my tags #however i don't mind a little bit of post hijacking every now and then so enjoy your stay ig #2. the person who reblogged with the tags isn't deactivated. they are pretending to be for reasons unknown to me #3. i think this actually happened in 1859 my bad #4. this isn't going to happen and not gonna lie i'm a little disappointed!

[fleshadept]

part of the reason the locked tomb characters are so memorable and complex is because they are very, very weird in the way only writers who understand that every human being is a little freak in their own way. harrow is the standout example of this—she is unnerringly pious to the rites of her religion in a way that to others comes across as zealotry but once we get into her point of view is revealed to be both, yes, because she is a zealot and also because the rituals and safety of painting her face, praying, etc calm her down. she eats penitently because she actually hates strong tastes. she is both schizophrenic and quite literally haunted, facts that recontextualize her behavior in gtn in an important way.

gideon is a butch and this universe’s version of a jock, and the first thing we see her do is try to escape harrow and the ninth and join the army (something that’s forgotten a little too often when people talk about her being “out of character” in ntn) because she wants to have a purpose, but we also come to learn that despite being raised in the literal dreariest place in the solar system she’s funny, sometimes even on purpose. she doesn’t know what a salad is. she reads sleazy porn magazines. she’s a talented swordswoman but is head over heels for every pretty woman she meets, to her own detriment at times.

every character is like this! they feel so real and complex because they have contradictions and weaknesses and opinions and incorrect beliefs and correct ones that are hard to tell the difference between.

#this is all to say you could do a homestuck intro for all of them. #cricket chirps #tlt #the locked tomb #gtn #gideon the ninth #htn #harrow the ninth #htn spoilers #i could also talk about how the gradual expanding of the zone of our awareness works to make the world more complex #because every book it feels like you have at least a significant part of the picture before realizing that what you thought was the most #important was actually a small thread in what’s actually going on

[tiffanyachings]

btw it's incredibly juicy to me that dulcie says she thought "maybe camilla, at least, would figure out something was up" when in reality palamedes was the one suspicious enough to test 'dulcinea' with the tea while cam was absolutely blinded with hurt

#esp in context of the theme of knowing and recognising each other theyve got going on (that's a seperate post) #that i am fascinated by every misjudgement #camilla hect #dulcinea septimus #palamedes sextus #the locked tomb

[silentwalrus1]

if i have to read one more published fantasy book that uses irl memes and online vernacular in its dialogue i’m taking away the toys until y’all can learn to respect yourselves. Not only does it break immersion in your world and detract from your characters having their own voices, it also makes you, the author, seem like a dim parrot incapable of neither original thought nor basic understanding of the passage of time

1) due to the timeline of publishing, any meme included will automatically be hopelessly dated by the time the story reaches readers and

2) it’s literally the same thing Ready Player One did. Hey look i’m pointing at a thing in pop culture. Did you get my reference? Did you get it? Let me list some more colors and shapes you recognize. Did you get it? And then Gideon Nav hit the dab or whatever. Hashtag Relatable!

It’s so painfully unfunny and uncompelling every time. We can do better. Apply some creativity to your own work

#writing #i love fantasy and every time i buy yet another newly published book i’m SO excited and hopeful #and then it’s just. garbage #the fourth wing is my latest DNF like my god how did this get published #every so often i’m like okay maybe the locked tomb series surely can’t be THAT bad? #and then i’ll see another excerpt or screenshot of the text and go ah. never mind #the use of meme slang has now become like the number one red flag of a truly stupid book #extremely frustrating. ah well be the change you want to see in the world #yap yap

[necessarymeanstoanend]

spade represents the tip of a pike; an implement for killing

alex’s

white void of doom

sketch and background element/scribble that isn’t really visible but i’m sharing just in case anybody did notice it.

other details

#now i have to draw one for alex *sobs* #how tf do you guys come up with backgrounds for EVERY DRAWING?! oh my god. i’m not creative enough for this bullshit #two things i discovered with this drawing: 1) birds are hard af to draw. 2) wet black hair is hard af to draw #you guys have no idea how many purple hues are actually in this art piece #this is like if dream and jessamy happened to have met under way worse circumstances #anyway let me know if you guys have any ideas for alex’s (i have no idea when exactly i’ll actually get around to it but still) #bones and shit #a majority of this one was inspired by The Locked Tomb fanart and symbolism #6 hours and 34 minutes but i’m gonna guess that roughly an hour and a half of that was me trying to figure out a background #tom sturridge #like minds #murderous intent #like minds 2006 #nigel colbie #art #fanart #drawing #digital art #nigel colbie fanart #artist of tumblr #like minds art #nigel colby #<- including the old tag bc why not #somebody get this movie out of my brain #scoop it out along with all the other useless shit i keep in there #i was thinking maybe alex’s should be the complete opposite of this #like instead of his head being turned down it would be turned upwards #maybe he should be wearing the clothes he did when we first saw him with sally rowe (or maybe his school uniform) #i ​definitely want both of them to be side profiles and the theme is going to have to be somewhat consistent as well #<<‹ these tags are mostly so i remember my own thought process but feel free to leave your two cents

[krillgarden]

it's so awful that ianthe has blue eyes. she's like a dog in that she shouldn't

#ianthe tridentarius #tlt #the locked tomb #tw suicide #just a little. given the noose imagery in the bg. u know how it is when u view a girl as ur undoing and have A History #harryanthe but like implicit. with every time i draw ianthe #tried to go a for a porcelain doll cutesy blush -> necromancer grime look in the face. the eyes are bad. but that's good. she sucks so bad.

[nav-ix]

the planet earth gave john the tremendous power to save her and by doing so put him in a position where he was uniquely equipped to destroy her utterly. and then he was like ok cool now what if everyone in the whole galaxy replicated this dynamic forever

#if someone is powerful enough to save you then they r also uniquely equipped to destroy you #and unfortunately because of that it means u cannot let them leave you ever #like i think at his heart john is a man who fundamentally cannot let go #and i think in a lot of ways so is almost every other character? with their Special Person that is #i also think thats why paul and jod are gonna end up existing in an interesting dichotomy with each other. #because cam ALSO couldnt let go. it was her one thing #idk im kind of rambling now anyways #ntn spoilers #nona the ninth spoilers #the locked tomb #tlt

[mayasaura]

When it comes to John, I have zero interest in condemning him. First of all, it's boring. You mean destroying the world and lying to your friends about it is bad? Shocking. Groundbreaking character work.

Second of all, I'm just not all that comfortable with condemnation in general, not when it comes to whole-ass people. Actions, for sure. I am ready to wholeheartedly condemn pretty much every decision this man has ever made, but I'm only comfortable doing that with a side of compassion for the man himself. Tamsyn said once in an interview that some of the discussion she's seen about Harrow is unintentionally very cruel to people with mental illnesses, and I feel similarly seeing a lot of the discussion around John. If I'm going to try to figure out where he's coming from, why he did the things he did, and what he thought he was accomplishing by doing them, I'm not at all interested in coming at those questions with contempt or disgust.

To me, the main question when it comes to John is: What do you do when you feel that you're unforgivable? That you've fucked up so completely no one will ever love you again, unless you lie and trick them into it? How do you deal with shame? And while part of the answer is definitely "Holy shit, not like that," what I'm most interested in is: what should he have done instead? At what points in his narrative could he have changed his course? And at what point, if ever, did he become right about it being impossible for him to dial it back and turn around?

#I'm not sure I ENTIRELY grock where the series is going with this #because the philosophical framework centering forgiveness is a little strange to me #but I can roll with it #it seems like the same assumption that people are generally by nature neutral to good and always capable of change #just with an external actor providing an extra step #the locked tomb #ntn spoilers #john gaius #emperor john gaius #anyway maybe it's a strange distinction to make but I'm absolutely down with talking about how incredibly fucked up he is #how outright evil most the shit he does is #and how it's poisoned the cultures of the Nine Houses from the top down #but when it comes to like.... reading him as if he's incapable of human feeling that kinda skeeves me out #and when it comes to how he fails to live up to every single one of his ideals #and destroys every relationship that's ever meant anything to him #I can only kind of pity him y'know #sooo long story short I promise to never claim that being unable to relate to other people or not feeling empathy makes you evil #pinky swear

[fool-for-luv]

oh my god it's about love. It's all about love and the infinite different forms that love takes. nona is asked do you love and she says yes-no-yes i don't know what it means, i say it and i don't know what it means, did i ever know what it means? but she loves so much and so hard, she falls in love with everyone she meets but she doesn't know what love means!!! gideon does not care if harrowhark is in hell but she needs to know, she needs to KNOW, she has died for her and she is willing to die again to save harrowhark's body (take it from anywhere, take it all). Camilla, we did it, didn't we? we have had something nearly perfect. the perfect friendship, the perfect love. Palamedes yes, my whole life, yes. yes, forever, yes. life is too short and love is too long!!!!!! we are the love that is perfected by death!!! pyrrha "i'll keep loving you, my problem is I don't know how to stop" dve!!!!

#the locked tomb #nona the ninth #i'm going absolutely off the walls bonkers #tamsyn i am in your walls #are you KIDDING ME #how does she do it every time i am a wreck!!! #this is incoherent sorry i'm experiencing the full spectrum of human emotion #gideon nav #harrowhark nonagesimus #camilla hect #palamedes sextus #pyrrha dve #tlt spoilers

[babydarkstar]

i just. i just…FUCK. i just really want harrowhark to go sicko mode when she realizes john has the power to resurrect whoever he wants he just chooses not to and even after learning about his own blood daughter he still doesn’t resurrect her he just makes her a construct. i would be alecto-levels of grief-stricken-enraged if my childhood nemesis/guard dog/whipping girl/codependent lesbian situationship that i lobotomized over/suicide-pact soulmate/only friend was suddenly here but not here haunting her own dead body and the only reason she’s present is because she was made into a fascist killing machine for a man with a power kink, and she’s not even happy about it but she’s going through the motions because all she knows of love is to be useful. (forever your sword.) and if i was harrow and i died and then came back to myself after switching bodies with the human cage holding the earth’s soul and realized all of this, i think i too would be accompanying the earth’s soul on her shoulder to go kill a man with eclipse-eyes and criminal levels of nonchalance. y’know. the one who guarded g1deon but not me, lord. the one who was so sure i had never seen that which lies insensate and with stilled mind, lord, who did not realize i was a lock and there was a key in the shape of a girl, lord. the one who looked me dead in the eye and told me i could never have my cavalier back, lord. the cavalier who came back haunted and empty and incomplete by your hand, lord.

i’m so team ‘harrowhark saves gideon for real this time not because she wants her cav but because she wants her other half’ i might lose my mind about it

#the locked tomb #griddlehark #im going crazy if im being honest #like sorry if this doesnt make sense im losing my mind #also i think so much about kiriona’s jealousy when alecto swears her fealty to harrow #and so many people talk about how theres a chance harrow chooses alecto over kiri/gideon #and yeah. she probably will choose alecto. but not as a supplement to gideon #bc once harrow realized the price to pay she never wanted it to happen to gideon #which is why she was so so upset she literally threw up every day for like a month about it #and lobotomized to stop the soul-bleed from being finalized. #she couldnt swallow one more soul as sacrifice for her own life #let alone gideon?????? she said it all in the pool scene ok. and then the iron fence scene #‘i can’t conceive of a universe without you’ #something something abt making gideons life miserable bc she wished she was dead #and would mever forgive herself for it #etc etc etc #ultimately i think harrow wants gideon. not as a cav or a servant. just as herself #one can dream

[starrybong]

guess who has a new hyperfixation album

#i go feral every time #descending lives in me #sleep token #this place will become your tomb #tpwbyt

[greatandquestionablecontent]

Thinking about the permeability of the soul and what if Paul was inevitable? And they just made it happen faster?

Chewing glass etc

#the locked tomb #every evening i go nuts reblogging tlt meta #paul tlt #nona the ninth spoilers #kinda

[harrowing-of-hell]

One day I'm gonna go through HTN and point out all the moments that show that the Body is not just a hallucination and is actually an aspect of Alecto's soul. Because there are so many moments that hint at the Body knowing information that Harrow wouldn't know but Alecto would, and at one point the Body even looks at John with something resembling recognition.

One thing I cannot explain is why the Body has golden eyes now, but didn't before. I speculate that this has something to do with her proximity to John since John has a part of her soul and vice versa.

The only reason I don't think it has anything to do with Gideon at all is because Harrow (from what I can remember) does not hemorrhage, pass out, or bleed from her ears at the sight of the Body with golden eyes, but she does those things with everything else that even alludes to Gideon (like how she reacted to seeing Naberius's trident knife since she watches Gideon fight him in GTN).

I think the biggest thing that supports the Body actually being an aspect of Alecto is that the Body leaves Harrow just before Varun arrives at the Mithraeum, and I assume that she's doing this protect Harrow in some way. But regardless of the exact reason for why the Body leaves, there is quite literally no other logical explanation for why the Body would do this if the Body is not actually an aspect of Alecto.

#the locked tomb #tlt #the locked tomb spoilers #tlt spoilers #the locked tomb meta #tlt meta #harrowhark nonagesimus #alecto #i can't say for sure that every scene with the Body is for sure not just a hallucination #but there's a lot of evidence to suggest that more is going on #it's just crazy to me that a lot of people seem convinced that the Body is just purely a hallucination?? #but that's the interesting thing about HTN #Harrow isn't a reliable narrator #and neither is Gideon experiencing the world through Harrow #because Gideon would just see and hear all of Harrow's hallucinations #reminds me that i also need to revisit the scene with Ianthe and Harrow talking about Wake in Cytherea's body underneath the bed #because I believe Ianthe's behavior in that scene was uncharacteristic enough to suggest that Cytherea's body wasn't actually there #anyways i'm rambling but i have SO many meta post ideas #i love unraveling the mystery in these books!!

[landgraabbed]

sometimes you gotta take in the lil details

#non sims #i'll come up with a skyrim tag #in my tes era again #(always i just go sleeper agent on it ig) #still in my modding skyrim era i'm sick so that's not v conductive to me actually playing morrowind so this is what i've been doing #sad bc nammu made some good progress he joined house redoran he's actually level 3 and somehow keeps invading every vampire tomb #(i run away bc i cannot deal w that right now) #his slave bracers finally broke off <3 #i'll compile some screens and post tomorrow maybe #i truly am the people todd coward thinks about when bethany esda is concocting the latest installment of weird ass lore told through #environmental storytelling and esoteric books and an open world crafted with meticulous detail cursed with bugs up the wazoo #but yeah modding skyrim is being surprisingly fun after i figured out mod organizer #i have bookmarked some mods that require me to regen lods dyndolod or whatever it's called but i'll do that at the end #at least in morrowind that's how i do it #i did my engine fixes my bug fixes my graphics and sounds overhauls my model replacers enb landscapes and now my cities and locations mods #armor next and then i'll start overhauling combat #i'm gunning for dark souls like bc that combat style suits me rly well and i always hated melee in skyrim #(re: armors sforz i looked at your imitations previews and i'm in love i'll have fun experimenting w/ them i owe u my life) #but yeah...... 99% of my skyrim experience has been in ps save for a brief moment i pirated it on release on my shitty laptop i had then #it's been wonderful to actually mod it

[ivypond11]

i've been obsesing over a tlt twilight au solely because of the silly edit with harrow seeing alecto alla bella seeing edward and.

it's so silly and dumb but gideon being the vampire and ianthe being the werewolf and they both obsessively pin over the weird loner wet rat harrow that just moved into town. i wanna say camilla, palamedes, dulcinea (the real one), protesilaus, jeannemary and isaac are part of the same family, all vampires, with abigail and magnus being the parental figures (basically the cullens). the third and second houses i'm thinking are all the werewolves, maybe the eight too. i just love the idea of ianthe and coronabeth being raised to maybe one day both take over the pack until they find out coronabeth is in fact not a werewolf. john and all the remaining of the first would be the volturi ofc but all the cavaliers would actually be alive? i haven't thought that far.

#the locked tomb #the locked tomb twilight au #nevermind me and my silly ramblings i have just been thinking about this too hard lmao #i just want harrow being like ugh i hate you griddle but the moment she and the rest of her family leaves she is miserable for months #seeing gideon at every chance she gets but instead of adrenaline induced it's just her being delusional #ianthe looking at this girl that's talking to herself thinking she is seeing her girlfriend that's like maybe on the other side of the worl #and being like “i'd tap that” #actually what's making me more insane is thinking about ianthe and corona and their relationship its making me insane #the moment ianthe transforms for the first time but corona doesn't and corona doesn't know how to deal with not being an equal to her siste #they've both been raised their whole life to take over the pack but corona is going throuhg an identity crisis right now #meanwhile ianthe is drowning in power and thinking she can do whatever the fuck she wants #babs is just there #judith and marta are both part of the pack #i like the idea of judith seeing how this whole mess is afecting corona and bonding with her and corona getting so attached #the only other person corona ever befriended was ianthe and now that ianthe has pushed her to the side she is so lost