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neo-my-geo · 6 months

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Hey gang, it’s your old pal Neo here. If you know me, it’s probably from one of the several very stupid TF2 comics I’ve posted to Tumblr.

However! I am also an English major (unfortunately). One who has read millions of words worth of fanfiction in their life. I have been part of the Sherlock, BNHA, Disco Elysium, and, of course, TF2 fandoms; I’ve been around the block.

The further I’ve progressed into my English education, the more I’ve noticed which mistakes are the most common in fanfiction. Many of them are easily fixable; writers just need to be pointed in the right direction.

“Neo! Does this mean you think people shouldn’t be allowed to post their works online without a background in formal English education?”

Of course not! I can explain why if you’d care to venture below the cut with me!

Yes, I will explain how to use commas.

It’s important to note that this is NOT a post about formal writing. You aren’t writing an essay. Please, for the love of god, do not write fiction like you’re writing an essay.

There are no stakes to writing fanfic. No one is going to get hurt if an author doesn’t know what a dangling participle is. One of my favourite things about fanfiction is that it’s one of the only art forms left that’s done exclusively for fun! You should write what you enjoy, and share what you make with like-minded people.

What I want to do is provide assistance as best I can to writers who want to improve their fundamentals without having to take the same university courses I did. Nobody is going to be getting a formal education to write fanfiction unless they’re ridiculously dedicated, and I’m not expecting that of anyone.

The point I need to stress is that knowing these grammar fundamentals can instantly improve the flow of your writing. Punctuation is a ridiculously important tool for writers, ESPECIALLY in fiction. Commas, semicolons, and full stops (including periods, exclamation points, and question marks) steer the pacing in the reader’s mind; did you notice how your brain stopped for a second after that semicolon? I can show you how to do that.

You may be wondering why I’m going through so much effort to teach all of this to strangers on the internet. The answer is that I enjoy sharing this knowledge with others and helping them grow. By seeing this, my goal is to help you become more proficient at self-editing. Showing this to people who actually want to learn will, hopefully, benefit the community as a whole, and I think that’s very worth it.

Also, while this post is obviously themed around TF2, the points I’m making can be applied to any fiction. Grammar is for everyone, and the church of the semicolon always has room for more initiates.

Also also, as an edit, I should clarify that this is meant to cover the more objective facets of self-editing, which is why I'm mostly covering punctuation. Maybe I'll do another post about using adjectives someday.

With that out of the way, let’s get going!

I’ve teamed up with several English teachers (real ones! One of which may or may not be my mom!) and an editor to gather a list of the most common problems we see in amateur fiction. This post is going to be split into three broad sections: apostrophes, commas/semicolons, and other common problems.

The apostrophe

This section is short, but it holds weight. Other than commas, apostrophes are the most typoed grammatical tool in any fanfiction I’ve edited. This is because, much like the rest of English, the rules surrounding them can be annoying and inconsistent.

Apostrophes have two main uses: possessives and conjunctions.

A possessive is a word that denotes the ownership of one thing over another. The vast majority of the time, this is done using an apostrophe and an S.

There is, however, one glaring exception to this rule, and it’s the bane of my existence.

When denoting possession of an object over something else while using the pronoun ‘it,’ you do NOT add an apostrophe before the S.

A conjunction, on the other hand, is when a writer uses an apostrophe to combine two words. The following are examples of common conjunctions:

What’s (what is)

They’re (they are)

It’s (it is)

Conjunctions are not often used in formal writing. Thankfully, we aren’t dealing in formal writing. Go crazy.

Time for a lightning round of the most commonly mistaken for each other possessives and conjunctions!

Your is possessive. You’re is a conjunction of ‘you’ and ‘are.’ When you can’t decide which one to use, imagine replacing it with ‘you are’ and seeing if it makes sense. If it doesn’t, use your.

Their is possessive. There indicates a location. They’re is a conjunction of ‘they’ and ‘are.’

The comma and the semicolon

You knew it was coming. I knew it was coming. It’s time to talk about commas.

Commas and semicolons are far and away the biggest grammatical hole in the toolset of fanfiction writers everywhere. They’re often treated like the rules surrounding them are complicated and difficult to understand, but the exact opposite is true!

The big issue I’ve heard time and time again is that the rules of commas are often explained through metaphor instead of example; this means that writers everywhere have slightly different ideas of how you’re supposed to use them. The fact of the matter is that, yes, there are correct and incorrect ways to use commas. Knowing when they’re appropriate and when they aren’t is easily the fastest way to bring your writing from looking amateurish to sounding professional and experienced.

In order to know how to use a comma, you must first understand the difference between a dependent and an independent clause.

An independent clause is a section of writing that functions perfectly well as its own sentence. It MUST have both a subject and an action/verb.

A sentence without an independent clause is known as a fragment, and they’re the bane of English teachers with highlighters everywhere.

A dependent clause is a section of writing that does not have both a subject and an action; it does not function as its own sentence.

Now, let’s say you want to combine the two. When joining a dependent clause to an independent clause, the order in which they are placed is crucial to whether you use a comma or not.

When joining a dependent to an independent with the independent clause first, you do not need to use a comma.

When joining a dependent to an independent with the dependent clause first, you MUST use a comma.

Keep in mind that, if one strives for total grammatical perfection, all narrative sentences MUST have an independent clause. This, however, does not apply to dialogue. Human beings do not think about whether what they’re saying is a dependent clause, and neither would the vast majority of fictional characters. Don’t be afraid to break the rules of grammar as long as it’s contained within quotation marks.

Alright, that’s the easy part. Time to learn about joining two independent clauses. It’s semicolon time, baby!

If you join two independent clauses without properly using a comma or a semicolon, it is a run-on sentence. You do not want these in your writing. They’re awkward to read and mess up the flow.

When joining two independent clauses, you can use EITHER a comma or a semicolon. You just need to follow these rules:

If you’re joining two independent clauses with a comma, you MUST use a joining word (and, but, so, etc.) AFTER the comma.

If you’re joining two independent clauses with a semicolon, you do NOT need to use a joining word.

Did you know that a sentence with a comma counts as its own independent clause? This means that you can make a sentence that includes a mix of both without it being a run-on! Just make sure that, no matter what, the semicolon is between two independent clauses.

Still, try not to write more than two clauses in a sentence too often. Sentences with a lot of punctuation are very attention-grabbing, but shouldn’t be overused. Full stops aren’t your enemy and variety is the spice of life.

It’s also important to remember that you should avoid using more than one comma in a clause (with the exception of the rule below). That part loops back to the 'avoiding run-ons' bit.

It’s really that easy!

Commas are also used in informal writing to inject a separate thought or descriptor mid-sentence without breaking the flow by adding a period. This is often used when describing the perspective of a character experiencing something in a story, but not (usually) when using omniscient perspectives.

The final issue I frequently see with commas in fanfiction is in regards to dialogue. Sometimes you end it with them, and sometimes you don’t. What gives?

Well, my friend, the answer is, thankfully, much simpler than the previous section.

When following dialogue with a dialogue tag, use a comma instead of a full stop. If you’re continuing the previous sentence after the tag, use a comma after it as well.

Note that a dialogue tag is a short phrase that identifies the speaker. It isn’t a complete sentence on its own.

When following dialogue with an action that does not serve as a dialogue tag, use a full stop instead of a comma.

Other common problems

This section is dedicated to putting specific grammatical errors into words, along with how to solve them.

Not sticking to the chosen point of view

Always choose your point of view before you start. Is it in the first, second, or third person? Is it omniscient or limited? Does the point of view switch during the story?

First person perspective is told as if the POV character is directly describing their experience to the reader. The character uses I and we to describe their own actions.

Second person perspective is told as if the reader is a character in the story and their actions are being described to them. This is the rarest, and the most difficult to write.

Third person perspective is the most common and the simplest to write. The events of the story are a separate entity from the reader altogether and the narrator uses they/he/she/it pronouns for characters.

Omniscient perspective means the narrator of the story knows all, including the thoughts and feelings of each character.

Limited perspective means the narrator of the story only knows what the POV character knows.

Past and present tense

When you decide between writing a story in past or present tense, it is crucial that you do not switch between them unless it is narratively intentional. Reading a past tense story that mistakenly switches to the present tense is like being pulled out of the room someone is telling a story in and suddenly taking part in it yourself. It’s disorienting and gives the reader unwanted pause.

Overly-long paragraphs

A common adage spread by English teachers is that most paragraphs should be at least eight sentences long. This is great advice for beginner essays. You’re writing fiction.

If you have a new thought, start a new paragraph! A concise and well-read single-sentence paragraph is infinitely better than one that drags a thought for too long. Aim to have a blend of paragraph lengths when you write, alternating between the descriptive and the punctual.

Dangling participles

A dangling participle is when a word is used to describe a noun that isn’t actually present in the sentence. Much like how a sentence without an action isn’t grammatically correct, neither is a sentence without a subject.

Malapropisms

A malapropism is when an author mistakenly uses one word or phrase instead of another similar-sounding one. I’m not about to list every single malapropism ever made, but these are the ones I notice most often:

To comprehend is to understand something, to apprehend is to arrest someone, and to be apprehensive is to be anxious or fearful of something bad happening.

Could care less means you do care. Couldn’t care less means you don’t.

A lot means a large amount of something. Alot isn’t a word and you shouldn’t use it.

The only real solution to using malapropisms is to make sure you fully understand any words you use in your writing. Never guess, and make sure you always google it. Having beta readers also helps.

If you made it this far, congratulations! You now know the most common errors in amateur fiction and how to solve them! Thank you for listening to me complain for two thousand words.

The most important thing to remember is that it’s okay to make mistakes. First drafts are always gonna be a little bad. The real key to success is knowing what your end goal is, and how you plan on achieving it. Here’s hoping this was a helpful tool for that!

Shoutout to @salmonandsoup for helping me think of the list of issues to address! You're a real one. Also shoutout to my mom, who doesn't have Tumblr. Also the third person. You know who you are.

#grammarposting #tf2 #grammar #educational shitpost #writing #fanfic #fanfiction #writing advice #fanfiction writing advice #team fortress 2 #tf2 fanfiction #bro your participle is dangling

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starker-raving-mads · 2 months

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For You: Part III

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It was two months since the day Peter Parker's life changed for the second - third - fourth time.

He'd gotten more sleep over the last month than he had in the previous two months. It was partly due to sheer, never-ending exhaustion. His life since taking on the mantle as 'the new Tony Stark' - a title he balked at, mind you - had become pure chaos. At first, it was a relief. The instantaneous knowledge that money was no longer a problem. May could quit her job and devote her time to FEAST, he could complete his honors-GED (which many of the Blipped teenagers had chosen to do) and immediately hop into online college courses at Columbia with Ned and MJ.

Immediately following that relief, though, was his face splashed across every newspaper, tabloid, blog, and TikTok page in America.

He would never say it, and he couldn't prove it, but he was 99% sure it was Pepper's doing. After her initial outburst at the lawyer's offices, he'd hardly heard from her. His lawyers - god, his lawyers - had advised that he shouldn't respond to any comments on the subject of Pepper Potts being snubbed by her husband for Peter's heir status. While she had no legal leg to stand on since Tony's will was air tight and definite, that didn't stop her from digging her claws into all the ways she knew would hurt him.

Every time he saw something outrageous with his face on it on an article somewhere, he had to remind himself that she was grieving and in pain about a perceived betrayal by her husband. Her husband, who was Tony Stark, who did not belong to him.

No matter that the man had figured out time travel for him, had risked the universe, had given him billions of dollars and the most coveted job in the entire world. Tony only gave him this because there wasn't anyone else better that he trusted, but Peter knew that didn't mean he was Tony's true first choice, and he had to squash every niggling feeling and whisper of a thought that said he was. It would only make it hurt more when all he wanted was the pain to stop.

He'd finally found a moment, though, where things weren't quite as bad. He'd recently reconvened with Bucky, Steve, Sam, and Rhodey and they had a steady if not solid pact. They were all unsure of the situation, still, and Peter didn't blame them. He'd been…questioned, more politely than Pepper had done, on how he and Tony's relationship had unfolded.

When he'd explained that he was 14 when he met Mr. Stark, Steve and Bucky both winced, apologizing for the disaster that was Germany but Peter shrugged it off. He really hadn't been hurt and it was a foundational moment for his and Mr. Stark's relationship. He couldn't bring himself to regret it.

After that, they'd had a few meals together, talked more about his life - and theirs, to an extent, though he was far more privy to them than they had been of him.

"He never mentioned you," Steve said, shaking his head, baffled. He held a cool beer in his hand, leaning back from the patio table they had gathered around at the newly rebuilt SHIELD headquarters in upper state New York.

"Oh he mentioned Pete to me all right," Rhodey disagreed before reaching over and ruffling his curls lightly. Peter liked Rhodey, liked how hands-on he was, how relaxed but also somehow by the book, liked his humor. He could see how he and Tony had been such good friends. "But he'd only told me about his 'brilliant new intern'," they all chuckled. "He really kept the whole Spider-Man thing close to the chest."

"I'd asked him to," Peter admitted, peeling the wrapper off of his bottle of lemonade. "First because I was still like so young, yo know? And then later, after a few - pretty major - mistakes I made, I guess he thought I'd proved I was finally ready to be an Avenger."

"Well I never heard Tony trying to recruit anyone," Rhodey commented and they all looked at him quizzically.

Peter let out a single huffed laugh. "Yeah, uh," he tried to keep down the blush rising on his neck. "You remember the day that Mr. Stark proposed to Ms. Potts?" Rhodey and Sam both laughed long and hard.

"Even over in Wakanda we saw that," Sam chuckled. "It was the Tony Stark special - a huge thing wrapped in a tiny, chaotic package. Not unlike yourself," he raised his eyebrows at Peter, who flicked his bottle wrapper at him.

"Pepper had no idea it was coming," Rhodey agreed before taking a long drink of his own beer.

"Yeah, well I don't think Mr. Stark had really…planned it," he grimaced. At their faces, he continued. "He'd taken me up to Stark Tower and gave me this speech about having graduated to the 'big leagues' after my last big wrap up," he shrugged. "He gave me the Iron Spider suit and said I was ready to be an Avenger." He frowned, rubbing at the glue and paper residue on his bottle. "And I told him that I just wasn't ready yet. That I needed to stay in Queens for a while more, be the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. Help the little guy, you know?" He raised earnest eyes up to the group and they all nodded, slowly. "So I asked him to just keep helping my identity to stay quiet," he shrugged.

"So, then what happened?" Bucky asked, long hair tilting with the rest of his head in curiosity. He didn't speak up often, but when he did, it was always because of something he really wanted to know.

"The next thing I knew I was being ushered downstairs to wait at the car for Happy," he shrugged. "I pulled out my phone and there on live broadcast Mr. Stark was proposing to Ms. Potts at a press conference." He chuckled. "It was - really, really weird."

He expected everyone else to laugh with him, but he was met with contemplative silence. He looked around at each of them before Rhodey finally met his gaze. "What?"

"I think," the older man said slowly, "that press conference was meant to be for your reveal as Spider-Man."

"No way - I mean," he shook his head as the rest of the guys started nodding their heads, agreeing thoughtfully. "He wouldn't propose to her just because - just because I said no to - "

" - to his proposal," Bucky finished.

It was another revelation that Peter could hardly bear the weight of. These things kept stacking and he wasn't sure how to balance all this knowledge he had, about the things Tony had done - and undone - for him. This one, though…this new information didn't hurt, not like the others did.

It actually made a strange amount of sense. At once, it both stung to feel like he was replaced with Ms. Potts so immediately, but also it was like the first fresh breath after being buried underground for so long to know that Peter's answer that day was so important to him that the only thing he could possibly trade it out for in equivalency was getting engaged.

Did this mean that if Peter had said yes Mr. Stark wouldn't have gotten married? It made his head spin, but it also made his heart lighter than it had been in weeks.

Light enough to finally enter the last bastion of refuge that Tony Stark ever took comfort in.

His lab.

Despite being uninhabited for who knew how long, when the familiar glass doors slid open the air wasn't musty, stale, or any such thing. It was as fresh and crisp as it ever was. Off in the corner the long L shaped couch that he and Mr. Stark had often collapsed into opposite ends of, exhausted, lay half-made with fluffy pillows. The coffee pot was empty but clean, and every other available surface covered in notes either figuratively, having been decorated with papers scribbled on with hundreds of lines of equations and code, or literally, like the side of Peter's work station, where he'd dropped to a crouch to finish writing something out when he ran out of paper, mid-idea. He knew he could've just kept writing mid-air thanks to the lab's complete holographic setup, but it wasn't the same as having something solid under your hands.

There was pain in the familiarity of the lab but there was also a feeling of home he hadn't quite gotten the first time he stepped back into his and May's apartment. Plus -

"Hello, Peter."

"Friday!" He exclaimed, smile breaking wide across his face. With a pang, he didn't realize just how much he'd missed the AI until this moment.

"Yes, Peter?" the AI asked, voice warm and if he dared to think it, amused.

"Nothing, nothing, I'm just excited to see you again," he chuckled, hand rubbing at the back of his neck. He started walking around the lab, taking it all in for the first time in what, to him, had been months. The longer he thought about that the more his brow furrowed. "Hey Friday?"

"Yes, Peter? Or would you like me to call you Boss as Tony had?"

"Oh! Um," he shook his head. "No, no Peter's fine, or whatever."

She hummed. "Would it be all right if I picked a name for you, Peter? Being able to distinguish between Boss and Others by a more specific title helps me with my internal hierarchy and understanding of individuals. If you would prefer I do not, though, merely say such."

"I mean if it helps you then, yeah, sure I guess."

"Thank you, Mini Boss," she said. He laughed again.

"You might wanna work on that," he smiled wide.

"Yes, I think it might take me some time, Father."

His eyes widened. "Father?"

"Hm, you're right," she said. "Boss was more like my Father, I suppose."

"Uh, yeah, definitely," Peter nodded. He gave her a beat to let her figure out what she wanted to call him as he walked over to his desk. He'd let her go through her process before he started asking the questions that sat burning in his mind.

"Would you be opposed to me calling you Mother, Peter?" Friday asked. He spun in his chair, smile wide again.

"If Tony was your Father, wouldn't he also be your Mother?" he asked, amused. "You know, having done 100% of your coding, and all."

"If one were to look at my original codebase as the only part of what makes me, me," she agreed. "However, would you not say that those that raise you are more worthy of such a title rather than just those that created you?"

He immediately thought to May and how, if he'd been younger when he came to her, he'd be calling her by that name.

"That's true enough, sure."

"And outside of Boss," she went on, "you are the individual most involved in my growth. So it stands to reason that if Boss is Father, then Peter is Mother."

"I - " he really didn't know what to say to that. It had never occurred to him that outside of Mr. Stark he was the one who interacted with Friday the most.

"If you would prefer I find a name not so closely connotated with females," she continued, "I can endeavor to do so."

"No, no, it's fine, Friday," he replied, quiet and in his head again. "You can - can call me Mother if you want." A not-so-small part of him felt absolutely, transparently happy that Friday considered him her parent. More than Mr. Stark leaving him the company, more than having all this financial security and ability to mess around with Tony Stark's labs, more than all of that - this meant something profound to him.

"I also thought," she said and that amusement was hinted at in her lilting Irish, "that it would be a nice subversive reference to the spacecraft from Alien."

He laughed out loud at that. "I love that movie, that's perfect."

He could feel her smile, then. "I know you do, Mother."

He slumped onto the stool at his table in the lab and finally asked his question. "Friday, can you tell me - why isn't the lab more different?"

"Different how?"

"Well it's just," he struggled to articulate the sentence, the feeling he was pulling at. "I was - gone - for five years. But it almost looks like this place never really changed?"

"I see," she said. "Boss spent a lot of time here after the Blip first happened, once he was home from Titan. He slept primarily on the couch in the corner and had me refill his coffee orders more than anything else. However, he never touched your things, Mother."

Peter frowned. "Why?"

"I could not say," she replied, tone ponderous. "Based on his patterns of movement, he seemed to specifically avoid your work areas. Though he did take a jacket you had left at her table to the couch. From my archival footage, he seemed to sleep with it, perhaps for warmth?"

It occurred to the teen, then, that Friday probably had thousands and thousands of hours of Tony on video and he could pull it to watch them at any time. The feeling of want was a fever in his blood and he asked, "Can you show me?"

"Of course, Mother."

Faint blue light lit up the couch and Peter walked over to it, seeing that more than merely just show him the video, she played it out in holographic projection. His breath hitched as Tony walked into view, Peter's hoodie in clutched in his hands. Staring down at it, he slumped onto the couch and brought the fabric to his face. Less breathing it in and more suffocating himself with it.

"I'm sorry," he heard muffled through Friday's speakers. "I'm so sorry, Pete."

Tony then curled up onto the couch on his side, face pressed to the hoodie, back toward the room. The projection cut off.

Peter didn't realize that he was crying until Friday asked, "Mother, are you okay?"

"I - " he tried to say, throat clogged with tears. "No," he admitted, jacket-covered wrist swiping away at his tears. He sniffled and sat where Tony had, finding his hoodie wedged between the cushions and the back of the couch. He pulled it out and, like Tony, smashed it to his face, breathing in the faintly lingering spicy scent of Tony Stark.

"I'm sorry, Mother," Friday said, speakers low, tone regretful. "I did not mean to cause you pain."

"You didn't, sweetheart," he shook his head, voice still clogged with tears. "I'm just sad."

"Why?" she asked, her natural curiosity shining through. Much like a child, she did not always know when it wasn't the right time to ask questions. But Peter had always liked indulging her and feeding her curiosity. The first few lab sessions they played 20 Questions back and forth until Tony would tell them both to shut up, though the amusement when he said it always shone through.

"I'm sad because Tony's dea - " he cleared his throat. "Because Tony - "

"It is okay, Mother," Friday cut him off. "I understand."

At that, he let himself fall back into the couch like Tony had. Above him, Friday dimmed the lights and stayed quiet, letting him cry out his grief in silence.

#starker #ironspider #peter parker x tony stark #tony stark x peter parker #iron man #peter parker #tony stark #peter x tony #spiderman #peter parker/tony stark #for you fic

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yuurei20 · 4 months

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When Jade corners Kalim with his UM in book 4, Kalim admits he knows who's been mind controlling him, but promised long ago to never tell. Has this been brought up anywhere else yet or is Jamil's history with his own UM still a total mystery?

Oo this is a great catch! Thank you for the question!

We have yet to hear the origins of the majority of the cast's unique magics, and Jamil's is one that has yet to be explained!

He touches on its limitations in Book 6, comparing it to Jade's, but I think that is the most we have heard as of this post.

I believe the only unique-magic manifestations we have learned about, in detail (on EN), are Deuce, Epel, and Azul?

As all three characters were in desperate situations (life-threatening, for Epel), it raises a lot of questions about what exactly was happening to characters like Riddle, Leona and Floyd when they learned how to do what they do.

Whether or not the details in the novel can be considered canon to the game is a point for debate, but in the novels it is insinuated that unique magics can sometimes be something that mages decide for themselves (part of Leona's post-overblot-monologue covers his bitterness at the assumptions of those around him that King's Roar is an ability he fought to obtain when it wasn't, so that might be a common assumption about mages with unique magics, even if it's not true: that their power was a goal they set and achieved).

Riddle says (in the novel) that he learned Off With Your Head from studying, but it is not specified if he decided for himself what his unique magic would be and then made it happen, or if his UM manifested of its own accord during his rigorous education.

While we see Azul craft his own unique magic from scratch (which requires a magical artifact, and that introduces many questions), we don't technically know if he was consciously creating a unique magic or if he just wanted a spell, any spell, that would take people's talents away from them, and it ended up manifesting as his UM.

To return to the initial question: not only have we not heard very much detail about Jamil's magic, there is a lot of room for interpretation when we take everything above into account!

Did Snake Whisper appear on its own to help him to adapt to a situation he was in at the time? Was he studying magic in general and the ability was born of his efforts? Was it something he actively desired and pursued? Did he have it prior to NRC, like Riddle and Azul, did it manifest during his first year, like Deuce and Epel, was he born with it, like Leona and Idia, or was it a yet-unknown fourth pattern?

We do not even really have a timeline, as Jamil could have discovered Snake Whisper, used it on Kalim and made him promise not to reveal it anytime between when his magic first manifested pre-NRC and the middle of Book 2 (when Kalim nearly reveals it).

Delving into the origins of the various unique magics is certainly one direction that Book 7 might go in, and I hope we might learn more one day! :> (worst case scenario, maybe in the fourth novel?)

#twstask #twisted wonderland

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xjulixred45x · 9 days

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OKAY! I HAVE SUCCUMBED TO THE VOICES OF MY LATEST HYPERFIXATION: LEGO MONKEY KID! UNTIL I SATISFY THEM I WON'T BE ABLE TO WORK ON ANY REQUEST! Get ready for the most absurd rants you've ever heard about Jttw, lmk AND EPIC THE MUSICAL! YOU ARE WARNED!

I find it somewhat funny how the vast majority of adaptations of Sun Wukong leave out that the Monkey King HAD A WIFE. a fucking wife that he KIDNAPPED AND FORCED TO BECOME HIS BRIDE.

She literally appears singing about this :'D before Nezha and his father rescue her.

and while I was learning about this, I couldn't help but think about the songs from Calypso, from Epic: the Musical (another recent hyperfixation) and in some way relate it to Monkey Kid.

after all, LMK's Wukong knows that the things he did when he was young were QUESTIONABLE to say the least (he literally said it) and that he regrets many things, and I wondered what his dynamic would have been like in that case with Jiaozi (his "wife ").

and that is precisely why I relate it to Love in Paradise in a certain way.

Like, we know that this Wukong definitely had good intentions, which were initially driven by good reasons, but which became more and more selfish, so here perhaps he could have brought Jiaozi to Flower Fruit Mountain as a direct response to 1- monkey logic + 2- after his trip to the west he needed a way to deal with loneliness and 3- demonic courtship is WILD.

Anyway, I can see this more (ONLY IN LMK) as a response to mourning and handling loss (the Brotherhood? Macaque? is up to your interpretation) and that he really doesn't know how to manage/communicate his emotions in a healthy way.

Imagine being Jiaozi, being taken from your comfortable princess life overnight, waking up in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE with a monkey man who is too... friendly to be a kidnapper?

Like, lmk's Wukong acts just like Calypso, with a lot of familiarity, his normal confident post-trip to the West self, explains the situation to Jiaozi (but in a much friendlier way than it really is) and she's like "uh HELL NO" but there really isn't much to do against the literal Monkey King, THE SAGE, THE EQUAL TO HEAVEN, and poor Jiaozi is having a full-blown crisis while Wukong doesn't understand why she's so distraught, don't she understand him? They have everything they want and need in the mountains!

Ironically other texts also described Wukong as a "spoiling husband who gave a lot of clothes/food/things to his wife" and that was probably the route he took after the beginning, Wukong has a lot of trash, but he was more than willing to share with Jiaozi as long as she was happy, that she wanted him back...love him Back.

He JUST doesn't understand the seriousness of the matter that KIDNAPPING YOUR SPOUSE REALLY IS...until Nezha and His Father come along.

Now, I don't think Wukong is stupid even before that happens, he would see Jiaozi's clear anguish, her sadness, the desire to return to her old life with her family, and although he consoles her and such, he is having a crisis, This is supposed to be normal, right? So why does he feel so bad when he sees her so distressed?

The glass fills slowly but surely.

I don't think he was a bad husband Per se, like I said, he was very pampering and such (maybe even Jiaozi sees him in a certain positive light, even if not as a husband, because of his good deeds of the past), but he had a big problem with taking things too lightly and not dealing adequately with his emotions.

so when he receives the ultimatum from Nezha and company, he has a very Im not Sorry for Loving You moment.

in which he does just that, he explains to Jiaozi that he let her go with Nezha, that he regrets having made her go through all this just out of selfish fear, and he very much regrets not regretting loving her even so (many years of being alone screwed him up a little head, so this type of interaction definitely marked his isolation even more in the future).

Even if in lmk Jiaozi doesn't keep track of him or anything like that, she makes it clear to him that she couldn't love him the way he wants her to love him. and it hurts, but it hurts good. because he learns from it.

(PS, it would be quite ironical if this Jiaozi marry Nezha of all people lol)

waaaaaaa I just love finding parallels between my hyperfixations, I will soon publish another one, but it will be much fluffier and from this same fandom.

(the songs that give the idea)

Shares, reglogs and comments are very welcome!

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onomatopagu-et-cie · 8 months

Text

Some other theories and observations, part 3

First impressions after re-reading DGM Some theories and observations, part 2 Notes on Link, part 1 & part 2

Again have a nice week!!

(SPOILERS UP TO CH248!!!!)

▶ Allen's curse

Will the manga elaborate more on Allen’s curse? The pentacle reappeared on volume 28’s cover again and D is an integral part of the title. (Btw, I can’t wait to read the copy I got of volume 28 as it’s now out in France! The cover is so beautiful, Hoshino outdoes herself every time with the new format, the back cover is pretty!!!)

This is the only piece of information we’ve got on it, apart from its evolving abilities. How can Komui be 100% sure a curse can only be inflicted on humans? Given how the majority of the Order didn’t know about the Noah and Apocryphos, I wouldn’t be surprised this could be false too.

▶ Allen/Neah’s (?) hidden ability

(thisoneislongsorryyyy)

Note: I wrote this BEFORE ch248 came out in July: it revealed the Allen we know was entirely remade by Apocryphos, and this could finally explain Neah, Road and Wisely’s confusion over Allen’s strange powers ; however, this doesn’t explain Apocryphos’s own confusion over Allen when he first encountered him nor exactly to what extent Allen was 'remade', so I kept these notes as is since we still don’t know more!

At the beginning of the volume 25, Wisely addresses Road as his brethren, probably because of the similarities of their powers. Wisely worries over Neah’s powers because he can’t read his mind somehow. At the end of the volume, after saying « Allen » is dangerous to Neah and them, Road states that she can’t connect her dream realm to his at will for some reason.

The two scenes mentioned sort of answer each other: both take place in Wisely/Road’s realm, one is at the beginning and the other at the end of the volume. And while Wisely thinks it’s Neah that outweighs his power, Road believes « Allen » (edit after reading ch248: Allen as he's remade by Apocryphos) the true danger instead.

Road’s inability to do as she wants might then involve a power we have not been officially introduced to when it comes to (past?)Allen besides his Innocence. And I don’t believe it’s about Neah at all, since she deems Allen dangerous (and also other people/things she refers to as ‘they’), and wants to warn Neah. If it was about Neah’s ability, this scene wouldn’t even happen and Road wouldn’t have questioned it since she knows him fairly well (while the other Noahs don’t because of the memory gap Neah caused).

In this chapter, Road also says « they’re using us », suggesting they could be the reason Allen is that threatening. She uses 奴ら (yatsura, plural) to refer to ‘them’: 奴 (yatsu, singular) is a derogatory/familiar pronoun.

EDIT: It's actually Cross, not Road, who says this specific part ('Allen is dangerous', 'They're using us.')!!!! She only speaks in the next page in her mini form, about her dream realm! This also means Cross and Road might've been communicating (and it's not only Road one-sidedly using him like I thought initially eg. manipulating him to lead Allen to the mansion), working together because they share some common goal (eg. protecting Mana and Neah)!

The only subjects triggering that pronoun and hatred from the Noahs (essentially, their memory crying out ‘I won’t forgive/I hate’) so far were:

→ Innocence (eg. Skinn Boric’s awakening as a Noah) → the exorcists (eg. the Earl when the Ark was saved by Allen) → Neah (eg. Wisely as he talks to Road) → the Pillar (eg. as Cross mentions it to Road)

Maybe Allen’s power is something close to what both Wisely and Road have since that sort of power can equal theirs to the point that both can’t stay omnipotent against that, just as they usually are eg. Wisely with supposedly all the Noahs (and also when he forced Alma’s memories with Allen and Kanda) or Road with Lavi.

And we have already seen (but without any real explanation yet) that Allen experiences « visions » (夢, yume, which we usually associate with Road, the Noah of dreams, can also mean vision):

→ Lenalee and Allen's respective apocalyptic dreams

→ Allen sensing Lenalee is drowning while facing the akuma Eshi

→ having a kind of out of body experience and seeing Krory and the ghost after being KO’ed in the Destruction of the Black Order Arc

→ his second dream in which what we now know as the Pillar talks to him ; Mana calls out to him in the original version by « ••• » (which is weird in itself since Neah is supposed to have no Noah memory??? Since Mana and Neah were two « halves » of the Earl, and we don’t know exactly what each half covers, could there have been some sort of mix-up between the two along the way?)

→ a glimpse of Kanda’s past when Marie talked about it

→ witnessing Cross’s ‘death’ through Apocryphos

→ whatever was happening when Allen and the Earl shared the same vision of Road protecting Mana in volume 24 was never explained (I put it here but it simply could be because Mana and Neah were revealed as the two halves of the Earl in the next volume)

→ seeing Johnny reaching out to him in the inn when we know it was Neah who sleep-talked after having a dream about the Campbells and woke up (idk if I should count this in bc it could just be Allen’s semi-consciousness fighting Neah)

But when Allen saw Cross’s ‘death’ through Apocryphos, he called that a consequence of the « parasitic » influence over « Allen ». According to him, it went on for many years. He then proceeded to merge with Allen in order to « erase that influence and suppress the 14th’s memory »: this might suggest that Apocryphos deemed Neah as the parasite of the exorcist Allen.

If he’s really talking about Neah, what Apocryphos says could contradict Road’s assumption that this power comes from Allen, not Neah. So, between Apocryphos and Road, who is right? ????????

Let’s consider for a moment that whatever is going on is due to Allen’s ‘long’ experience with a ‘parasitic’ Innocence and that Apocryphos never meant Neah when he talked about a parasite. But we know from Cross that Red’s arm didn’t show any sign of activating at all. Moreover, Neah wouldn’t have been shocked by the Innocence’s influence over past!Allen’s arm after awakening 35 years later if the latter synchronized with it when they knew each other, it wouldn’t make sense. So where does this long influence fit in? Are we talking about the parasitic-type Innocence or is Apocryphos referring to something entirely different?

It doesn’t help that the type of Innocence Allen has is called a ‘parasite-type’ in the original version and the English localization.

It helps even less that Apocryphos uses the same terminology as Komui when he first introduced the parasite-type: 寄生型. Except for Komui the furigana reads 型 as the loanword ‘type’ (kisei-taipu) and for Apocryphos it reads ‘kata’ (kiseigata) as the kanji should be pronounced.

Note: in French they chose to call this type of Innocence a ‘symbiotic-type’: it emphasizes the close association between the accommodator and the Innocence more and suggests the bond is mutually beneficial, but we know after all these chapters that it’s a totally one-sided control led by the Innocence over the accommodator’s body. It’s anything but mutual in retrospect. Parasite suits the Innocence more!

Interestingly, the word used for Allen’s role as a host is 宿主 (shukushu). I didn’t know the word ‘host’ could refer to the organism affected by a parasite!

Both Neah and the Innocence are parasites hosted by Allen. The imagery is also carried by the Fallen Ones’s design. When Allen witnesses Suman’s suffering, he uses the verb 蝕む, ‘mushibamu’:

What looks like giant worms pierce his body and tinier worms gnaw at his heart:

And also, I never considered it but 寄生, kisei, ‘parasite’ almost sounds like 犠牲, gisei, ‘sacrifice’ with just one letter difference: if intentional, these paronyms ironically bring out Allen’s sacrificial role even more. Ch240’s cover illustrates this dimension even more:

I might be missing something or this doesn’t really add up.

It’s also interesting to note that ch222 is titled « Hypokrisis ». Cross calls out Allen’s selflessness once again:

The noun ὑπόκρισις (hypokrisis) meant 1) answer & 2) role (on the theater scene, the masked actor was called an ὑποκριτής, hypokritès, separate from the chorus) in ancient greek. But its meaning became morally (and religiously) loaded, now suggesting a duplicity in someone’s behavior (their personality, qualities, principles, opinions, …).

This chapter shows Allen in a dream staged by Road that leads him to the Campbell mansion. Facing Cross offering him to stop his search for the truth, he gives his definite answer to once again fulfill his vow to Mana and « keep walking » even at the cost of his own existence and the bond to his home. It’s also a call back to « Mana’s mask » during the Phantom Thief G arc.

Behind the scene, Road now understands she made a mistake she should have realized sooner: she’s being manipulated herself (along with Neah and perhaps the other Noahs) by someone else and Allen is dangerous, a reality that was concealed to her eyes until now.

The phrasing also parallels Cross’s late realization:

Were they making the same mistake on Allen’s true nature? After Red’s flashback, at least we know one mistake Cross made: Red didn’t say he was « Allen » (thinking Cross asked about the dog) ➾ even though he didn’t want the Innocence close to Mana (as it could 1) destroy him, being a Noah and 2) call forth the Earl, I guess), Cross didn’t monitor Red enough to see the influence of Apocryphos ➾ Red synchronized with an Innocence and the Earl was called back.

So far, Road (and the other Noah) benefits from these consequences: she wanted the Earl’s awakening to destroy the present world in order to take revenge of the Pillar. So either Cross and Road talk about two different things or there’s more to it than that to the point that even Road considers this a mistake despite the advantages at first glance.

At least, I guess it’s (kinda?) safe to assume Allen’s body = past!Allen as Neah knew him. Allen wouldn’t have been able to move the Ark otherwise:

Another lead to whoever past!Allen was might be linked to THIS in volume 27:

????? Who was this? And also what kind of situation were they in? It looks like the mystery person held past!Allen right before parting (before he lost his memory maybe?)/dying. They look as though they’re stuck in a tricky situation: their clothes look torn to shreds, and particles in the air look the same whenever there’s action in the manga? OH. Perhaps the transfer of Neah’s memory into past!Allen would be successful if and only if the memory of his past self was erased? Because two memories maybe can’t safely coexist in one body: we know even the Noahs, described as « superhumans », struggle with their memory and it threatens their sanity if they don’t suppress it. So this could be worse should a human unrelated to the Noah experiment the same thing.

But could one erase their memory in the universe of DGM? It doesn’t seem that far-fetched since:

Neah’s memory was successfully transferred in Allen,

magic is a thing in this universe,

Skulls can ‘reprogram’ a human’s brain to transform them and Apocryphos can easily rewrite memories,

in ch209, when Johnny was searching for Allen, Crows (who use sorcery) coerced him into drinking a drug that would supposedly erase his memories of the Order??? (now I know it could be a lie and it was poison instead since the Central and the Crows’ methods are rather radical):

Heck, past!Allen could even be from another timeline/from the previous/future world destroyed by the Pillar! Which could explain Allen’s recent dream of the Pillar? It could even be linked to « ••• » in this dream eg. his ‘real’ name or role (since the syllables don’t even match Neah’s even though it triggered Neah’s awakening once he woke up)??

▶ Road and Apocryphos

It’s more apparent in the original version but Apocryphos wavered, looking almost surprised/bothered to face Road as it’s accentuated with the ツ. Compared to his confidence in taking down Tyki, calling himself their Reaper and so on, this looks like Road could be a bigger threat than the other Noahs. (Perhaps it’s only random but Road stabbed Apocryphos in the left eye, just as she did to Allen in the rewinding city!)

It’s also interesting to note he recognized Road as the 9th Noah only once Tyki shouted her name. It could mean:

Road took another appearance we don’t know of 7000 years ago, and it’s confirmed in the manga: she’s stayed like this for 35+ years. We know that since Wisely awakened as a Noah and met them.

Either Apocryphos didn’t meet her since she took on this appearance (so in this 35+ year span)

Or he did meet her but didn’t recognize her as the 9th Noah

If he only recognized her after his punch, how could it have badly hurt Road? I thought you had to know her true ‘identity’ to harm her, which was why Allen couldn’t hit her with his sword.

Allen could harm Tyki but not Road, and only Apocryphos could???? Since he was present 7000 years ago and most likely was responsible in whatever happened then, it’s safe to say he should know about the Noah and the world they lived in enough to be able to harm Road.

▶ Chapter 219: Butterflies, the souls and the Earl

(thisoneisevenlongersorryyyyy)

When the Earl vanished before Katerina and split into Mana and Neah in ch219, two butterflies are seen flying above them.

My best guess would be they’re respectively male and female white cabbage butterflies (pieris rapae, or the great white butterfly, pieris brassicae, a close relative to this species), pretty common butterflies:

I also found that pieridae caterpillars often PARASITE cruciferous plants (they often eat cabbages, broccoli, kale, mustard) ie. plants with flowers that have CROSS-arranged petals (yes, it’s a detail that’s probably irrelevant but it was fun to find that randomly, I live in overthinking and reach-land haha).

In Japan, butterflies often symbolize the souls of the living and the dead. It’s also a symbol of spirituality (the cycle of life, birth, death, metamorphosis, reincarnation, immortality), as the cycle of a butterfly embodies it in its four stages (egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, butterfly).

As the later part of the manga focuses on helix magic and its principles (the body, the soul and the spiral of life), the ‘death’ of the Earl makes way for Neah and Mana, a ‘rebirth’ of some sort. Which makes me believe that what we saw as the Earl against Allen in volumes 24-25 (and perhaps even the rest of his appearances in the manga with the suit) was actually his ‘body’, which takes the shape of his suit (we even see the costume ripping in half with what looks like a zipper). According to past!Allen, a body is merely a vessel that needs a soul for life to exist. The costume of the Earl might be in desperate search of its lost soul (Mana + Neah), which is why it endlessly devours human souls (through perhaps the making of akuma?): Hoshino said there’s a reason why she draws the Earl plump, it’s just a theory for posterity haha! Is this the same mechanism that turns Timcampy this big?

Note (see the end of this point for more on golems and DGM!): I read on Twitter that at the exhibition held in honor of DGM, it was explained that Adam was the name of the ’skin of the Millenium Earl’ and Adam was the first golem (just like in the Bible, Adam was made of the dust of the earth and was animated by God’s breath)! (With their poison, Akuma turn humans to dust………… Timcampy also turned to dust once touched by Cornelia’s bark…………. Innocence also turns to dust, just like Mugen when Kanda left with Alma or just like Allen’s did at the Asian branch…………)

This is pure speculation, but perhaps the Earl decided to forsake his tragic millenium role once he finally witnessed the beauty of this world (be it his meeting with Katerina and/or something else). After all, according to Neah’s words: « Seven thousand years of life… yet the Earl’s heart is stuck in that scenery. » Maybe he realized the Three days of Darkness were meaningless, that they would feed an endless cycle of atonement, hatred and vengeance? It could also be why he gave life to Neah and Mana. Neah holds the power to destroy the Noah while Mana seems to be able to devour the Noah: perhaps the Earl intended Mana to first devour all the Noah in order for Neah to finally destroy them all and put an end to this all?

However, something ruined this project: the Noahs probably disagreed, determined to see their vengeance through (by sacrificing the Earl, summoning the Earl and destroying ‘this world’ they created). It could also be the Heart, or both the Noahs and the Heart working with each other. In one way or another, they managed to persuade/compel Mana to devour Neah (perhaps that’s where Joyd played a significant role in all this?).

On the subject of the souls, since Neah describes Atuuda’s power as the opposite of Mana devouring him (and we now know the Earl feeds on human souls), it certainly works as the partial transfer of the owner’s soul to another to ‘heal’ them (or is it something like ‘rewinding’ their state to before they got injured? Does this have something to do with whatever rejuvenated past!Allen and aged up Mana’s appearance??). Before Link healed Neah in ch221, Allen’s jacket was pierced ; Atuuda mended his injury and the hole in the jacket was also gone.

Zuu only described it as Atuuda exhausting his own ‘life-force’ to transfer it to someone else, he was not specific in his explanation so it’s only guesses here.

Design-wise (and reachland-wise haha), the six spots on the female white butterfly could be a recurring motif related to the soul, like the six dots on Link’s tattoo 8D

(Also noticing just now but dude Link must have a lot of gloves in stock, he came back with a glove when he saved Neah haha)

I can’t decipher what Zuu wrote to summon Atuuda but they’re replacing the dots here. Atuuda also has three spheres on each mustache-thingy!

I found a retelling of a Japanese legend of a white butterfly (in Myths & Legends of Japan, by Frederick Hadland Davis). I found it narrated on Japanese Folktales: The Butterfly Soul – Under the influence! if you want to check it out! A white butterfly visits an old man at his deathbed. It was the soul of his beloved that died when they were young, the old man never left her alone and would keep tending to her grave. The butterfly didn't leave until his soul left with her.

The butterfly in ancient greek was ψυχή (psyche), which holds several meanings: the wind blow or breath and by extension life force or breath, life, soul, butterfly and Psyche (essentially known from the myth of her love with Eros/Cupid and its trials). Interestingly, « psyché » in French also refers to a piece of furniture with a window-frame in which a great mirror was mounted. It was a great Art Deco symbol and was a motif depicted in paintings. It reflected its owner from head to foot, just as the mirror reflected Mana, Neah and the Earl’s souls in volume 25.

It’s also a symbol of (tragic) love sometimes eg. the chinese legend of the butterfly lovers.

Final note on golems: the word ‘golem’ was used once in the Book of Psalms to refer to Adam when he was what was translated as a shapeless mass, an embryo out of clay lacking a soul. The Talmud sometimes calls Adam a ‘golem’ when referring to the first twelve hours of his life: it was still only an inanimate body without God’s breath of life.

Golems also have a mystical origin, created by magic spells. The methods of creation and destruction vary from a tale to another eg. dancing and chanting the hebrew alphabet in different combinations ; using a pure mass of dust, water, sand, earth or flour ; prayers, fasts, purifications ; engraving ‘emet’ (truth, God’s seal) on its forehead and erasing the first letter alef to call its death (met means death).

In ashkenazi hassidic traditions in the 15th century, the golem became a real creature, serving its masters and fulfilling the tasks it was given. This tradition became really popular in the 17th century, and was linked to the ancient belief in the possibility to resurrect the dead by putting in their mouth (or on their arm) a piece of parchment marked with the tetragram. Following this belief, it could turn into an evil being that had to be destroyed to prevent terror and death from spreading.

The golems embody both the figure of a protector/servant but also of a creature of destruction:

→ Golem | Jewish Museum Berlin « A golem is a creature formed out of a lifeless substance such as dust or earth that is brought to life by ritual incantations and sequences of Hebrew letters. The golem, brought into being by a human creator, becomes a helper, a companion, or a rescuer of an imperiled Jewish community. In many golem stories, the creature runs amok and the golem itself becomes a threat to its creator. (…) Originally, creating a golem was a way for medieval Jewish mystics to come closer to God. »

I don’t know why, but these two pages of ch231 comes to my mind when I read the last sentence:

I wanted to know more about golems in general, and I came across this conference of Ada Ackerman, an art history specialist that dedicated a great part of her works on the golem and its representations through time (religion, myths, books, cinema): YouTube

She quoted a yiddish play excerpt and it was really reminiscent of the creation of Akuma. The golem in the play pleads with a voice (which is unusual, since it is mainly represented without a voice and genderless) its creator to not create them. It is already conscious of its potential for destruction, and asks to remain into nothingness:

I tried to translate it very roughly: « I have a voice that is not yet a voice. I have a heart that is not yet a heart. (…) I will say it again and I warn you, please do not create me! See those stars dying! And so will the light of every eye laying on me. My footprint will only leave desolation, and from what my hand touches only ashes and dust will be left. »

Interestingly, גּוֹלֶם in modern hebrew designates both the pupa and the golem, as well as a dummy, a mould or a fool.

▶ Chapter 219: Poppies, puppets and myths

Flowers also grow at the foot of the tree Cornelia. When the Earl disappeared, Katerina was plucking those flowers. It could be poppies, that often bloom in wheat fields. These flowers are also on the chapter’s cover.

In hanakotoba, poppies can symbolize peace of mind, sympathy, presentiment of love, sorrow of parting, comfort or consolation, rest or relief. This is pure speculation, but like I said above, this could fit with Katerina and the Earl meeting and whatever he found in the mansion, making the latter realize his war against the world is meaningless.

Poppies in Japanese are 芥子, keshi. I remember seeing on her ig account that Hoshino wanted to emphasize the meaning of flowers in her story. For example, the lotus held a heartbreaking significance to Kanda and Alma’s arc. She also focuses a LOT on the puppet/staging/dramatic imagery in DGM (Lala, the exorcists controlled by the Innocence and Apocryphos and the Noahs by their memories, Crown Clown, the circus, …)

And funnily enough, poppies can be phonetically associated to a kind of japanese traditional wooden dolls, こけし, kokeshi. Kokeshi doesn’t have a kanji writing people generally agreed on: I read that before an exhibition in the 20th century, dolls were referred to by many names. Artisans and collectors agreed on ‘kokeshi’ in hiragana only.

Therefore, you could have various combinations to write kokeshi:

→ the ‘ko’ in kokeshi could refer to ��child’, ‘small’ or ‘wood’ (then deriving from 'ki') → the ‘keshi’ in kokeshi could refer to the verb ‘chisel’ (削る, kezuru: kokeshi are wooden pieces chiseled on a lathe). It could also correspond to ‘poppy’. But most interestingly in DGM’s story, it could be linked to another verb, ‘erase’ (消す, kesu eg. an eraser is a 消しゴム, keshigomu): Neah said the Earl disappeared only once off the face of this earth, Mana ‘devoured’ Neah, and Allen is now facing the risk of disappearing himself.

Kokeshi can be made with cherry wood, japanese maple, but also dogwood. Dogwood’s variety is also known as cornus in latin, that Cornelia’s name could also originate from aside from cornix (raven).

One of the kokeshi features is sometimes the lack of limbs, just like the Innocence and the Fallen Ones.

Note: Poppies and crops (just like the Campbell mansion landscape) are also symbols of Demeter, the greek goddess of the harvest, the fertility of the earth. These flowers are also associated to Nyx, the goddess of the Night, Hypnos, the god of dreams and sleep, and Thanatos, a minor god of death, who are her sons. The abduction of Demeter’s daughter, Persephone, by Hades also involves poppies. In some tales, as the poppy was cultivated for the sleep-inducing and anesthetic properties from its sap, it is said that Hypnos gifted Demeter the flower to find sleep as she grew desperate at her daughter’s disappearance and left the earth barren. Other tales explain that poppies would grow to announce Persephone’s return to Earth, symbolizing the nature and Demeter’s rejoice.

▶ Mana or the Earl’s destruction?

I’ve been wondering about this since Allen’s escape from Apocryphos & Cross’s involvement with the plot: what real difference does it make whether Mana/the Earl is destroyed by Neah or the Heart?

Ch237 introduces these two paths clearly as opposites in Cross’s pov: « Right now, Mana has forgotten that he is the Millenium Earl. For the Innocence… The Heart, this is an opportunity like no other to destroy the Millenium Earl. Neah must be the one to destroy Mana. I have wandered this world for decades for that very reason. Searching for Neah’s host. Anything else that draws near Mana, I eliminate. And by that, I mean anything. Anything at all. »

Dude was hellbent on this mission to the point of 1) killing a kid should he come too close to Mana & 2) making a deal with Luberrier to ‘protect’ Neah (and eventually use him as a weapon)??? And THIS makes me wonder (when I read the trivia on his wikia character page):

What was his relationship with Neah? He was dragged in this mission by him. Which is interesting since Cross was introduced in the story as Neah’s supporter by outsiders ; we now get to see a more nuanced relationship. I wonder what differs from his relationship with Mana.

So, in addition to what it carries emotionally (to have Neah destroy Mana to save him from his misery), the consequences must be different depending on who (Neah or the Heart) kills who (Mana or the Earl) somehow. It must be the same consequences for Allen as overcoming Neah’s memories by himself and letting Apocryphos fuse with Allen to get rid of Neah. In ch236, Apocryphos witnesses Mana and Red embracing each other, saying Red will destroy the Earl so that the Heart will be reborn????? (First of all, it is a loophole in the Heart’s description by the Order: it is an Innocence that presumably holds an absolute power over the others, its destruction by the Noah would be fatal to the Order. Since it will be reborn, how come the rest of the Innocence still exist, eg. Cross’s Judgement and Maria were both seen, idem for the exorcists experimented on for the 2nd gen. project before that alleged rebirth?)

What if (see my theory in the previous points): → the Heart destroys the Earl (after destroying Neah) ➾ perpetuation of the cycle, the Pillar is again summoned since the end of the world is also « God’s » will: the Earl must forever be God’s sacrifice in atonement of his past sins. The manga suggests → Neah destroys Mana ➾ the end of the Noahs, set free from their vengeance and the Pillar

At this point I’m even starting to believe the Heart is a Noah haha (I was thinking about Road but what if it was Joyd 8D? He was perhaps not yet ‘reborn’ when Apocryphos changed Mana and Red’s fate because Neah killed him, and he was the only Noah seen destroying Innocence in the manga when he destroyed Allen’s)

In volume 25, we learn through Neah the Earl disappeared only once, dividing into Mana and Neah (so prior to the Heart’s rebirth). After Apocryphos mingled with Red and Mana’s fate, we see one of its direct consequences is the Earl’s awakening. And in ch202, we learn the Earl (or a piece of Mana’s consciousness) asked the Noah to protect Neah from the Heart even at the cost of their lives?????

The first time we learn of the Heart’s existence is from the Order’s point of view. With the search for the Heart from the Order's perspective, we take it for granted that the Heart is a single human being synchronizing with this special Innocence. Since the story revolves around the possibility it might be told by an unreliable narrator (the existence of Apocryphos and its ability to rewrite entire pans of memories, Innocence — a false ‘God’ the Order is fighting for, Noah’s hidden truth, the other side of the war …), who is to say the Heart comes in a shape no one expects?

In ch111, Lavi states the Heart should only be one. But should it, really? The original version of this panel puts accent on ‘one’:

For example, the Heart could be two halves forming a whole, just like … Mana and Neah form the Earl … Mana and Red were also needed for Apocryphos’s plan to succeed … I don’t believe the Heart is the Earl, at least not alone (why would it first want the awakening of the Earl and then his destruction?), there must be more to it than that.

▶ Joyd

I never paid attention to this bit in ch226:

I get the feeling that whatever made Mana ‘eat’ Neah was also urged by Joyd. Especially because Joyd appeared grinning as soon as Tyki set out on destroying Neah’s bond with the Earl, the obvious bad blood between Neah and Joyd (+ the fact he reincarnated with an uncanny resemblance to Neah, and his peculiar existence apart from other Noahs was hinted at by Road since ch93) and these panels:

Mana sounds helpless here, overwhelmed by whatever made him do this.

#dgm spoilers #dgm meta #d gray man #allen walker #mana walker #neah campbell #road kamelot #tyki mikk #link howard

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analoghorrorexplained · 11 months

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Every single plot inconsistency and error In UrbanSPOOK in order.

This covers the first 6 episodes. Content warning for just about everything. As for why I am doing this? I hate bad writing that relies on shock value.

EDIT: apparently Urbanslug is Swedish which honestly explains the lack of understanding of American gun culture and some of the bizarre logistical details. Either way, I take back nothing. If you googled enough to describe murder in this much detail, you can google enough to understand the setting of your story.

These uploads are digitized versions of the tapes in question so we can assume they were found recently. However, the number at the end of the tapes is a 985 number which is an area code that used to be used in Lousiana for the areas outside of New Orleans. However, it was only used from 2001 till Hurricane Katrina. After the hurricane hit most numbers were switched back to a 504 area code which the 985 one was meant to replace. This means the murders had to have taken place between 2001-2008 when the code was switched back to 504. While this might not seem like a big deal since VHS was still around in the early 2000s, DVD had already outpaced VHS sales by 2001 and by 2008 VHS tapes themselves stop being produced on a wide scale. Given these taps are implied to be a method of locating victims and or the killer, it seems like a pretty bizarre way to go about doing that since the format these tapes were made in was already beginning to die when they were made. And given how the internet was becoming more popular around this time, its strange how the person making these takes did not use that format instead given it was both available and made more sense to get the word out there.

Speaking of the tapes: they are formatted in a very bizarre way. If the person making these tapes wanted to bring the killer to justice why is a majority of the focus placed on how the people in the tapes were murdered and the paintings left behind? Why would the focus not be placed on clues left behind by the killer like fingerprints, camera footage, personal effects, or anything that might point people in the direction of where the killer is? Why are there VERY FEW exact locations mentioned? Why are the details so vague? If this is meant to raise awareness or find answers why are all the details that might do that so vague? If these tapes were meant for the police like as a "this is what is going on" kind of way (like what we see in the first episodes of Mandela cataloge regarding the alternates) why does it have a contact phone number at the end? If a PI made this the same general "why would you graphically describe the murder but not include any other relevant information" issue still applies. And if this is a recording of, lets say, a true crime type show: where is the host, B-roll footage, or anything else to indicate this is a show? And if the killer made these: why add the number? I get the killer is cocky since he is leaving paintings behind: but this is a bit too much "suspend your disbelief"ey for me if we are going by the rules of normal reality, which it seems we are. These tapes seem to not have any reason for existing other to provide a backstory to the paintings. They serve no in-world purpose.

Why were the police in a random abandoned warehouse and why were all 3 paintings stashed in that 1 specific place. Was this where the killer was camping out? Where were these other 2 paintings found? Why Is the tape leaving out so much relevant detail?

While 2 of the first victims are women which implies this being sexually motivated, the last victim out of the 3 initial victims isn't. Along with this, there is no pattern between the parts taken/mutilated nor a connection between any of these people. Since we are not shown dates or locations there is no way to know how connected these victims are. Why is the killer going after these people?

If this has gone public, why is more not being done to stop the killer or at least track him down? Why are people not on higher alert? What police department is investigating this? And since "2 days ago" is mentioned in the episode: ONCE AGAIN WHAT TIME FRAME ARE WE OPERATING ON HERE?!

Why is the killer targeting cops? It makes sense from a "haha fuck you, you cant catch me" perspective but it does not make sense for the painter to target bill specifically and deviate from the "pattern" already kind of set by episode 1 unless Bill was somehow the head of the investigation, which was not ever stated.

"A few miles" is a long distance for corpses to be dragged or for people to be taken on-foot (which they presumably were). If the collins family was still alive when this happened, given Bill was a cop, why did he not fight back? And if not, how was the painter able to get them from point A to B without being caught (unless the car was ditched after)

If some of the paintings were found BEFORE the events of the lighthouse (including the ones featuring Jennifer and the bunt kid) why did the police not cross-reference the missing person's names with the names found on the paintings?

If those photos shown are supposed to be in-universe photos of the Collins family before they were murdered, they were either turned into something (other than mush) by the painter or those are not actual photos. They look too much like the paintings for me to think of them as in-universe photographs.

Why did the painter rip the twins in half and sew them back together again? While his mutilation of Cory's genitals and the stuffing of a brick down the throat of his sister (in a manner similar to a blowjob) seems consistent given the fact the painter is more or less a sex offender: the sewing people together does not. Unless you want to look at the parts which... given Cory was mutilated from the waste down and his sister's torso was sewn onto his legs... you cannot make the argument that it was for the intent of making a "futa". It is just brutality for brutality's sake.

If that cabin is implied to be the home of the painter just like the lighthouse is implied to be a body dump WHY ARE POLICE NOT LOOKING INTO IT FURTHER

How was the painter able to get into Tom's 3rd-floor apartment via the drainage pipe on the outside and manage to encase him entirely in wax? Was Tom a candle enthusiast? Did the painter have a vat of hot wax with him? How was this logistically possible in the time frame we are given. Along with this, given how Tom is neither a child nor woman (or police from what we know), why was he targeted? Further more: since wax does not always dry the fastest, especially when there is that much, how was Tom not able to free himself/why was he in an upright position? Unless Tom was drugged, even with the lack of arms he could have still moved.

Sean is a PI helping the police with a series of violent murders. He also presumably lives in Louisiana, AKA the South. This is presumably post-9/11. Why was Sean not armed and why did no neighbors come to actually help? How was the dog also not able to do anything either? If he got Sean by surprise I might be more understanding but for a PI investigating a violent serial killer in an area of the US known for its gun ownership: I feel like the fact the Painter has not been shot either by the cop, Sean, or ANY of the neighbors or victims is impressive

Assuming Sean installing a security camera was motivated by the painter, why does Sean only have 1 SINGULAR CAMERA. WHY WOULD SEAN NOT HAVE ADDITIONAL CAMERAS? And furthermore, why would nobody else have additional cameras around Sean?

This part about Tina' and the "south coast" road trip is confusing since the "South Coast" is apart of California which is on the other side of the country. If they meant "Gulf Coast" (which is where Louisiana is located the murder location would make more sense. However, due to it being named strangely, I am not sure if they meant California or Louisiana given other named locations (IE Tiger lake) is in Louisiana. Once again, I have no idea where things are happening.

If the cops found Tina so shortly after the attack, why was the painter also not found then either?

Why did the painter inject her with something? It does not seem to alter her mental state, she is still totally conscious, and I do not think the painter is using anesthetics before he amputates her ENTIRE ARM and her feet or is attempting biological warfare. What was the point of being injected in the first place?

Tumblr got mad at me so I need to break up the list.

18. Why is the painter so angry Tina lived if he really did not do anything to kill her in the first place. He might have had more planned, I am not sure, but all the painter did was inject her with something that does not seem to be important given we are never told what it is. If its medicine that is wildly out of character. And besides amputating body parts, the bodily damage done to Tina is nowhere near what has happened to other victims. The fact Tina lived is not surprising, at all. Tina would have bled out after awhile but it is not like the hammer to the face, the lighting on fire, or the stabbing in the taint.

19. The painter looks like Riff Raff from rocky horror picture show. This is not a plot hole I just thought it was funny.

20. Once again how is a retired cop who LIVES ON A FARM not armed or able to defend himself from a singular person?

21. This is never addressed but why is the horse skinned in the photo? It died by heart failure due to being pumped full of viagra. Where did its skin go? I get it is supposed to be implied that the horse SAed the wife to death, but I am wondering why the skin being gone is not being acknowledged or if its just from the fact the artist made the horse itself too red.

22. How was the killer able to live in that milk house without ANYBODY noticing.

23. So the painter now have several gimmicks. He seems to target women and children to sexually assault and then mutilate, the people living with them as collateral, and current and ex-police. The painter is also "the painter" so they paint twisted portraits of these people. BUT NOT ONLY THAT, THEY ALSO WEAR THE SKINNED FACES OF THE VICTIMS. So they are a pedo-zoophile rapist who hates cops and skins people that also paints their victims at some point before they die. This is a lot of shit going on. This is also why the victims seem to be all over the place. This serial killer targets too many groups at once.

24. So it is now implied that the painter is making the tapes which,... again, why? Why would the painter have an incentive to do that? They are already taunting the police enough.

25. This is Louisiana WHERE ARE THE SWAMPS. WHERE ARE THE GAITORS, WHY IS THE SETTING NOT USED AT ALL

So in short:

The victims in relation to each other make little sense due to how many "targeted groups" the painter is pulling from. Most serial killers have a type. The painter seems to have several.

The VHS tapes make no sense since they do not really do anything other than info-dump for the viewer of the series. They serve very little in-world purpose and we never see any other media from this universe outside of the paintings left behind or these tapes.

The details regarding location, time and character relationships are extremely vague at best and do not set up a good timeline for us to follow.

The painter being 1 person or even human is really questionable since its kind of implied there is either more than 1 person behind the painter (like a killer and the painter are separate people) or the painter is a demonic/paranormal entity.

For being such an in-universe threat the police seem to be doing fuck all (minus the one PI who is now dead) to stop anything. Its implied we found the painter's lil hideout, why is fuckall being done?

The lack of guns in post-9/11 America, specifically a post-9/11 South.

Why is nobody able to overpower or harm the painter if he is "just a guy"?

Why is there no other in-universe worldbuilding or even testimonies from still living family?

WHERE ARE WE, WHY DID I HAVE TO GOOGLE THE PHONE AREA CODE TO KNOW THAT? WHAT YEAR IS IT? WHY IS THIS EVEN IN VHS FORMAT

#analog horror #analog horror explained #urbanspook #urbanSPOOK

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prettycottonmouthlamia · 6 months

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Arknights Analysis: Chapters 0-4

So I want to start this off by stating that I'm going to analyze these chapters in two separate fashions. The first will be analyzing the chapters as if I had booted the game on launch and experienced the story without any of the surrounding events and story chapters that give these chapters additional context. The second will be analyzing these chapters from a retrospective angle, looking at how further chapters and further events have provided new information that re-contextualizes a lot of what happens and is said in these four chapters.

One of my primary theses when it comes to Arknights is that the episodic storytelling often hurts Arknights more than it helps the game, and I want to illustrate that through these two styles of analysis.

So without ado:

Part One: The Bad and the Evil Time

Now, there's a relevant question that needs to be answered from the beginning of this analysis: why am I analyzing all four chapters together instead of splitting them into four separate posts? There's an argument to be made that splitting up the chapter discussion would allow for each chapter to breathe individually. But I want to explain my reasons for not doing that.

First, these chapters were not released individually. They were released all at once, and unlike say, the first four chapters of F/GO, they do not form four separate stories plot-wise that share some connecting themes. They directly relate to one another and are basically contiguous with one another. If you wanted to, you could play and get through the first four chapters of Arknights all at once. While newer players likely would have gotten stuck on a boss like Skullshatterer and not been able to progress, I want to emulate that experience of reading all four chapters at once.

Second, these chapters do not have a lot to them in terms of actual writing and I do not intend to merely summarize the events of each chapter ahead of time. You can read them here to get an idea of what I mean. They're short chapters all things told.

Third, they share pretty much all of the same themes and messaging between the three of them, and characters do not make a ton of meaningful progression through the story. These four chapters flow into each other really well, which suggests to me they were written roughly all in a row from each other, but this results in an initial four chapters that have a lot of overlap with each other.

So that's why this analysis is going to look at all four chapters together. To give a quick one sentence overview of the plots:

Chapters 0-1: Rhodes Island's extraction operation for the Doctor and their conflict with Reunion Chapters 2-3: Rhodes Island's pursuit of Misha and their confrontation with Skullshatterer Chapter 4: Rhodes Island's rescue operation and their meeting with Frostnova

Despite the fact that these chapters span between three different locations and concern themselves with three separate events, broadly speaking, they're very tonally consistent. There's no clear separation in terms of how these chapters meaningfully contrast with each other.

In terms of the major players, Rhodes Island is the protagonist and Reunion is the antagonist, and are written pretty diametrically opposed to each other. Rhodes Island is a pharmaceutical company that is looking for a cure to oripathy and generally condemns the violent measures that Reunion takes in these four chapters, which is often spoken quite strongly. In particular I want to note that Dobermann in particular is heavily critical of Reunion, and this sets the tone for how Reunion is portrayed and generally looked at in these chapters.

Reunion as the antagonists for these four chapters are basically not portrayed sympathetically at all, and this can be pretty easily seen from the antagonists that are initially introduced to the player: Mephisto, who delights in causing harm and toying with his opponents and is named after the fictional demon Mephistopheles; Crownslayer, who is ruthless and whose name invokes regicide; and W, who is enigmatic but mostly cruel and seemingly only let's Rhodes Island go on a whim.

This image does a lot to establish the tone of Reunion: they're draped in darkness and shadow, stand atop rubble and carnage, and their leader, Talulah, is associated with dramatic heat and consuming flame. It's a very strong message to send to the player.

Reunion's job in these four chapters, outside of being the antagonists, is to act as a critical foil for Rhodes Island. The prime question of Reunion towards Rhodes Island, time and time again, is "What do you do to deserve to fight for the Infected?". Reunion is repeatedly stated to embody the rage of the Infected, calling back to the idea that "Riots are the language of the oppressed", and they repeatedly criticize Amiya for not recognizing the anger the Infected feel.

This, at least in my opinion, is not actually a bad way for narrative tension to develop. Violent and non-violent movements do tend to have some tension between each other, and importantly, are both needed to compliment and keep each other in check. However, the problem here is that these chapters are not interested in interrogating these facts. These chapters are not interested in interrogating basically anything it puts in front of you.

Amiya never really has a response for why she's acting in the way she does, and as a result, neither does the narrative. But because Reunion needs to be the antagonist, their anger is not merely limited to the authority figures behind oppressive policies or the primary people who exploit them. Reunion oppresses and kills innocent people in Chernobog, using a Catastrophe that decimates the city and infects a large portion of its populace with Oripathy, using their anger as justification, and there is never a competing viewpoint shown in opposition with that. So when Reunion is marching on Lungmen, there is every reason to believe that a similar occurrence will happen there. This is reinforced in Chapter 4, where Mephisto has created a literal flaming display of Reunion's symbol at least partially fueled by civilian bodies.

Rhodes Island being the defacto protagonist means that their actions are given an inherent justification. It creates a lot of weak writing in the chapter where, for example, their cooperation with the L.G.D. is never given any kind of moral depth, despite Lungmen's own oppressive policies towards the Infected and the attitudes of L.G.D. officers towards the infected.

The only character we see some meaningful change in is Ch'en, and unfortunately, it's part of a chapter she's not really present in. Chapter 4 shows that Ch'en is capable of some humanity and connection with the Infected that the others in her psuedo police force weren't willing to show, but it's not made particularly clear why and Ch'en quickly exits the chapter.

If you came away from these four chapters feeling like this is a RWBY situation, I really wouldn't blame you. The chapters are weak and not particularly well-written. There are points of intrigue made for example in Chapter 2 with Kal'tsit and Wei Yenwu that do not really go anywhere. Probably most importantly, despite being the protagonists, Rhodes Island's, and consequently Amiya's, moral position is never really defined. You don't get a clear sense to know why Rhodes Island is taking the actions that it is.

Now, to a certain extent, a bit more of the moral backbone of RI is revealed in the character files for the launch operators. I do think it is worth discussing these for a bit here because most of them are very brief and not well detailed, but they help to highlight what is, in my opinion, one of the central conflicts and messages in this early part of the arc.

The difference between Rhodes Island and Reunion is identity. That is, what is expected out of the identity of the Infected underneath them. This can be seen in a couple of the operator files and, most importantly, with Misha. For Reunion, the Infected and Reunion are considered one and the same. When Rhodes Island kills Reunion rioters in Chernobog and hands over Reunion prisoners to the L.G.D., Reunion makes the criticism of what Rhodes Island is doing to the Infected. Misha remarks that what else can an Infected be but Reunion. It is a continual point that many of its members are whipped into fanaticism in part because Reunion presents itself as the only option.

Rhodes Island, on the other hand, allows its Infected personnel and Operators to take back their identity as people. The Operators of RI are all unique people with their own goals, wants, and dreams. They do not, fundamentally, become Rhodes Islanders. It's why there is such an eclectic group of people working for RI.

To summarize, these chapters are invested in portraying a very black and white board to the Infected struggles, with the correct Rhodes Island contrasted with the violent, arguably evil Reunion on the other hand, and does so without really performing the necessary labor to justify Rhodes Island as the protagonist. While there are interesting messages and ideas in these chapters, it's let down by overall very weak writing.

Part 2: Separated Hearts and Arcs

So you know what the fuck a Kaschey is at this point and you're looking back. Here's the thing that kind of fucks me up: these chapters don't read nearly as bad in a retrospective lens. There's a fair amount of reasonably subtle storytelling and foreshadowing going on that hints towards things revealed in later story chapters, and a lot of its awkwardness can be forgiven with the better writing down the road for pretty much all of the characters involved (except for Skullshatterer, who basically disappears from the narrative entirely, and doesn't even show up typically in flashbacks).

In truth, I think the writers knew these chapters weren't very good, and something very interesting happens from this point on which I will cheekily call "the Reunion Arc Redemption Arc". A number of things happen in fairly quick succession with each other: the first is the release of Chapter 5, which does a lot to add additional moral depth to Rhodes Island's relationship to the L.G.D. as well as to Ch'en herself. This is followed by Grani and the Knight's Treasure which gives us our first, sympathetic Reunion character in Big Bob, and then perhaps most importantly by maybe one of the single most important vignettes in the game.

The Anonymous One's War.

This Vignette is a much, MUCH needed stitching of the various problems with Reunion. Patriot, the disorganization of Reunion, and the condemnation of the acts against Azazel do a tremendous amount of work in redeeming a lot of the previous writing. It's arguably a retcon in many ways.

This REALLY highlights a big problem with the episodic approach. I think part of the reason Chapter 5 is often lumped in with Chapters 0-4 is for a while, you were stuck sitting and ruminating on Chapters 0-4, and then Chapter 5 releases and its a chapter whose primary POV is Ch'en and the L.G.D. With episodic writing, it's easy for writing flaws to sit and fester, and it's easy for a lot of fandom voices to get together and make things worse.

Chapters 0-4 just do not hold up on their own, and honestly they do not really hold up with additional context either. The additional context softens a lot of the blow and provides a lot of closure to the issues in these chapters, but the issues still remain. You didn't necessarily need more writing in order to make these chapters work. Chapter 5 isn't that much bigger than Chapter 4 is, but I felt like there had been a sudden shift towards stronger writing in Chapter 5.

This seems by and large to be a real problem with gacha game development. Early story chapters are neglected because the time and effort needed to actually make a gacha game seem to eclipse the desire to have a strong and functional story. It feels like Chapters 0-4 were pushed out the door to make sure the players had something.

But in comparison to other gachas I've played, the turn around on Arknights is very, very quick. F/GO notably takes four additional chapters until it finally hits a good, well-written chapter in Camelot, and it's events are still very lackluster. In comparison, the only dud event that happens at least imo is Grani and the Knights' Treasure, and the next three events (Operational Intelligence, Heart of Surging Flame, and Code of Brawl) are all quite good.

What the turn around at least tells me is that Arknights from the beginning had competent writers, but that they only really got to shine once the game got on the ground.

#arknights #this is fucking LONG im very sorry #ana's arknights story analyses

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thecameronchronicles · 1 year

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Whatever It Takes For You

TW: Smut. Language.

SUMMARY: Your decision to flirt with Austin has consequences…

WORD COUNT: 1300

REQUESTED:

helloo ik you’ve done stuff similar to this but i have a twist, so like reader did sth to drew and he’s like super mad at her and wont talk to her for the whole day. so its rounding night time and she gets into their bed and she tries to hug him but he acts like shes not even there. so she whispers (practically moans) in his ear like im sorry drew, ill let you do anything to me for you to forgive me, ill let u use me however. and he still doesn’t budge and as she rolls her eyes and turns he grabs her and it leads to rough sex

Whatever It Takes For You

It never took this much to garner his forgiveness. But then again, you'd never pushed him quite this far. Simply for the sake of a reaction, you had flirted with Austin a bit too far. His hands managing to learn the sway of your body in a way that Drew felt was reserved exclusively for him. To make matters worse, you would then proceed to tease your actual boyfriend as some form of consolation. This would only leave him half cocked and angry, prompting him to give you the silent treatment now as he turned away from your attempts from tonight. Even as you reached to hug him, peppering kisses down his shoulder and arm, he was completely stationary. Even though his skin chilled to your touch, it wasn't enough to leave him to respond.

"I'm sorry, Drew...won't you kiss me goodnight?" You whined as you felt him clench beneath your arms as you draped yourself over his side. Yet, he remained still.

"Please baby...I can't go to sleep without your kisses..." You continued to speak, needy and nearly whimpering. When words no longer held any effect, you slipped your hands down his arms and side before teasing the hem of his boxers.

"I need you, Drew. I'd let you do anything you want....any position...any angle...however long...please just touch me..." You moaned as you now found the infantile game to be a means to alter your arousal. It was one thing to prove a point and play a game, but another to deprive someone. Which he had done the last week, unintentionally in majority due to work, but having made you act on such taunts to begin with. Due to this frustration, you rolled your eyes and shifted to try and gain some sleep, untouched and in need of that release you wouldn't get.

"You think it's funny to make me THIS hard," His voice was hot against your ear, his words nearly spat as his hand came to your neck, pulling you against him enough to feel that strong erection pressing against your ass.

"Think you can act like that and not have consequences?" He wouldn't allow you a response before you were forcefully removed from your shorts, his cock at your folds as he scoffed to how wet you already were for him.

"Then you are in for a long night-" He explained while initiating that first thrust. One of his hands found the space between yours, pinning your hand into the sheets below with a grip as the second wrapped tighter around your neck. The beginning of breath play ensued just long enough to raise your pulse as he would retract and replay such pressure before ultimately returning to your ear.

"This what you wanted all night baby? Wanted me to fuck you like this? At dinner? In the club? Right in front of Austin so he knew how you like to take it from behind?" With each question came a brutal thrust. No kindness or compassion as he continued. "Wanted him to know how you felt? How you sounded moaning? Answer me-"

"I just missed you..." He slowed.

"You missed me?" He seemed to consider your words. "You missed how soft my hands touch you? My lips kissing your skin?" He asked, producing the display of what he spoke as you nodded, basking in the return of his sweetness.

"But you don't deserve that. You deserve to be fucked." You were held by the back of your neck, taken into a position to where you saw the passion behind his eyes, but remained with your back towards him.

"You want to act like that...you're gonna be treated like that-" His fingers came to your clit, a contrast to the torture you were hinted at receiving. But with this as a result, you didn't dare question him in fear of having it retracted. Because of this, you simply produced a series of moans as your body climbed to that orgasm, him having allowed you to feel it, before setting you on your knees just before withdrawing his touch.

"Drew!"

"You're Not the only one who can play games baby, and you know I know just how to work that little clit..."

"Please...I'm sorry!"

"You will be. Now shut the fuck up and take my cock, just like you've wanted to all fucking day." He spat, pounding into you from behind, your hair wrapped in his hand as he pulled tighter with each thrust, until you were left looking at the ceiling.

"He's not gonna help you now, baby..." He teased as you called for God, the only thing you were able to utter as he took you in swifter repetition.

"Fuck! You feel so damn tight when you're edged...shit!" He grunted, your bodies having been well acquainted and stained with sweat as he replaced his cock cock his fingers, pumping into you as he pulled you to that edge.

"You wanted to come baby? Then you're gonna squirt for me...come on. Come on!" He ordered, your body merciless to fight him as you found wave after wave of pleasure to leave you nearly catatonic. You weren't allowed a second's reprieve before feeling him back inside you again. You would fall forward in being spent, his hand collecting yours at your back as reins as you rode you to his own edge.

"THIS what you want?" He asked, hand moving from your clit to your neck as he has continued to edge you for what seemed like an eternity.

"Wanted me to come inside you? Forgive you for acting like that with my best friend?"

"Yes!"

"Then make me come. You want to show me how sorry you are. YOU make ME come. YOU do to the work-" He stopped all motions as you worked back into him. He would only last a few thrusts however before he had you on your back, dominance returned.

"Fuck!" He choruses.

"Next time you want to act like that and I'll fuck you in front of him. Just like this. And then I'll make you clean up the mess you make, like always, so he knows you're mine. Apparently something YOU need a reminder too as well." You nodded as he kissed you deeply.

"You understand? Tell me."

"I understand, Drew."

"Yeah?"

"Does she?" He asked, pointing to your sex. "Because she seems to be getting ready to come again, isn't she? I can fucking feel it!"

"Yes Drew!"

"Then fucking come. Come with me one last time. Because it will be a while until you will-"

"DREW!"

"Don't whine. Not like you already didn’t squirt. The sheets are covered in you..." He scoffed. "Just. Like. Me." And with this, he was given his release that ended in yours. Your eyes pulled to a roll as you collapsed into his arms.

"I mean it. Pull that shit again and I'll do whatever it takes for you until you remember just who makes you come like this. So I hope you got it out of your system."

"For now." He smacked your ass, kissing your cheek, and falling asleep in your arms.

Taglist: @hopebaker @iovdrew @penny4yourthoughts @magnificantmermaid @pickingviolets @lovedetlost @trikigirl271 @maybankslover @slut4starkey @slvtherinseeker @obxiskewl @obxxrxfes @bluesongbird @slut-era @ailee-celeste @rafesbae @camilynn @sweetestdesire

#drew starkey x reader #drew starkey smut #drew starkey #outer banks #outerbanks #obx

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kujakumai · 2 years

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please give us the Ishtar siblings paper please please I live for lore and theories

I have tried to write this specific meta like eight times and it never comes out how I want it but now I'm just going to give up and make the attempt. yeah fine.

Yami Marik is made of hate; specifically 10-year-old Marik's hate after he was put through the carving ritual. The real question is who that hate is directed at, and it's one Marik explicitly asks--his first question, after he comes out of it, is word for word "Who should I hate?"

The most obvious answer to that is "Dad Ishtar," but the fact that there's a question in the first place means that he is not the only one on the table. Yami Marik wants to kill Rishid, too. A lot. He only shows up in the first place when Rishid's not awake. That is not a coincidence.

So let us backtrack real quick: Marik Ishtar is 10 years old, really isolated, and in an abusive home (it's not clear if, outside the ritual, Dad Ishtar was physically abusive to anyone besides Rishid; but even if Marik is the favorite, regular exposure to that level of violence and control would have messed up all three of them). He is about to go through something horrible at the hands of his father, and he knows and dreads it; he doesn't understand why it has to happen, is so scared of it he's depicted as explaining it while in tears.

The adult he does see as source of safety amongst all this is his big brother Rishid. And he asks Rishid to save him from it. The anime switches this, and has Rishid offer on his own accord, but don't get it twisted--in the original, Rishid taking the ritual in his place was all Marik's idea. It's not an order, either--he pleads for it (again, in tears), and Rishid says yes.

And Rishid does try! And fail. His appeal is firmly rejected. What happens next is that Marik gets dragged off kicking and screaming and pleading for help and experiences a painful mutilation while the person he asked to protect him does nothing.

It's debatable if there's anything Rishid actually could have done to prevent this, save kidnap Marik and run off to surface or something, or if he can really be held at fault. The objective facts don't matter here, though. What matters is that Marik is 10, and his ten year old traumatized little brain isn't processing who actually controlled this process. He just knows he asked his dad not to have to go through this, and had to anyway, and that he asked Rishid to save him and he didn't.

So Marik stumbles out in horrible pain, and asks--"Who should I hate?" Who's fault is this? Who should he direct his anger at? His dad? Rishid? The clan? The pharaoh? The gods? Who let this happen?

The reason that the reveal of Rishid's carvings act as a temporary seal on Marik's hatred is because they answer that question with "Not Rishid." They're a "Look what I've done, look how bad I feel. I still care about you, I'm suffering too, I accept fault."

Marik's reaction to this is really interesting, too. He's initially horrified, and then recovers, and proceeds to laugh about it and affirm Rishid's inferiority.

This is a REALLY NOTICABLE CHANGE! A big one! It's a big deal! Because up until now, everything we've seen about little Marik and Rishid's relationship is that despite what Dad said, Marik thought of Rishid as his brother and was eager to have him accepted into the family. This is a major act of love and penance by Rishid, and Marik is reacting to it by basically saying "Good, I hope it hurts. Maybe Dad was right and you are supposed to serve me."

Marik does hate Rishid! At least, ten year old Marik in excruciating pain does. He's a terrified little kid, he asked for help, was told he would be helped, and didn't get any. He hates him as least as much as the guy who did the carving.

But the scars are enough, for now. They're not brothers anymore, that relationship has a giant crack in it, but it gets a band-aid. Rishid may have hurt you, but he cares enough to be hurt with you, and to feel bad about it, which nobody else seems to. So the scars seal the hatred. Somebody still wants to protect him.

Marik's relationship with Rishid after this is interesting and complicated. I don't think it ever fully recovers. He still loves and trusts him a lot, but it's not like the Marik we see in BC is treating Rishid very well. Rishid doesn't stand up for himself, either, because he fears reprisal; Marik doesn't trust him so much that it's no longer necessary to play shadow. And could he, really, after Rishid failed so horribly the first time? Keeping Rishid as servant-not-brother defends you from the pain of another betrayal.

So we circle back to Yami Marik, who is all defense mechanism, all hatred. Yami Marik never recovers from anything. He is operating, always, on the delirious, excruciating, hurts-so-bad-you-have-to-laugh concentrated rage of a grade schooler who has just experienced the worst thing he'll ever go through in his entire life, punishing the world around him.

Yami Marik hates his dad, because of course he does; he's the one that did this. He skins him alive, since skin seemed so important to him.

Yami Marik hates Rishid, too. He wants him dead. Really dead. So that regular-Marik can't come back, sure, but that's really an aside. He wants Rishid dead because he's still trying to answer the question. Marik, at first glance, might have let Rishid off the hook, but there's still things unaccounted for, boiling under the surface. And Yami Marik is here because the band-aid is coming off.

#i barely proofread this. its so long. pls take it #that said the actual paper i was writing was on like interstate commerce law regarding pork production #and u don't want to read it #so here's the ishtar dump #meta

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blood-starved-beast · 2 years

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On the topic of Piltover’s Finest being parents... unpopular opinion but I think Vi would be more the “strict” one when it comes to the law than Caitlyn would be. It seems counterintuitive and yeah it is, but I can explain.

Yeah Vi doesn’t give a shit about breaking laws and Officer Vi’s whole schtick is the “bad cop” to Caitlyn’s “good cop.” But it’s one thing that she’s the one doing it, and another one when it’s her kids. Cause Vi the “bad cop” has already been to prison once. She knows the horrors there and experienced it first hand. Nothing scares her (at superficial glance). But her kids? They theoretically have never experience prison, maybe not even struggles. They might not have it in them to take it. And that’s not including the tangible Adult Fear parents have when their kids are at risk for whatever reason. A good parent would take any evil if it means sparing their own children of it. They want things better for their kids than it was for them. Vi would be that way.

So if their kids get into big trouble that cops could be called? That’ll put the fear of the Law into her unlike anything she does. It’ll especially trigger her trauma over her initial arrest (and the events surrounding that including the lost of her brothers + trauma of her sister), especially if her child in question is around the same age. It’ll remind her exactly what went down in Stillwater, what she saw, her experience and what she did there to survive. Heck, I don’t even think she’d need to experience it to give her that fear. I could see Vi preemptively forbidding her kids from getting into any major mischief in Zaun especially if it means avoiding a potential disaster like That Day at the Cannery or Stillwater. If not banning them from Zaun outright.

Caitlyn, on the other hand, her whole deal is her childhood and number of young adult years were spent being overprotected and micromanaged by her parents. It wasn’t until she made that choice to pursue the case over the shimmer business and corruption in Zaun while breaking the law on her own that she was able to get her life into gear. Yeah it cause inconceivable waves of trauma (and indirectly, the loss of her mother) but it also 1) allowed her to do things and get to where she is 2) Caitlyn isn’t one to dwell on the emotional anyways and 3) if we must dwell, it got her Vi. And she’s the sheriff now. If there’s trouble, she’d be there to fix it.

As a parent then, Caitlyn would be the “less strict” one in the legal. Granted there is a good excuse for the mischief. Or not even then. I mean, Caitlyn never does arrest Jinx in League lore. I’m pretty sure if her kids got into some big mess in some bid for exploration/independence in Zaun (or Piltover or wherever she has jurisdiction) she’d facepalm, give them a firm talking to, and then throw the arrest warrant into the chimney fire and leave it at that. I could see her being stricter if there’s a very pertinent danger afoot in the area (something akin to Urgot showing up) or maybe sympathizing a bit with Vi’s point-of-view (even if not entirely agreeing with it). She isn’t gonna police (heh) them around like her parents did for her that’s for sure.

Less seriously though, I could see Caitlyn being a lot more strict in more “household” things. She might throw away the arrest warrant, but she will get on their case if these adventures are affecting their grades or something. Or over how someone (her hyperfixating about a case and not noticing, Vi, another one of the kids) tripped over a toy in the family room cause there was a mess there. Or getting upset over ruckus if it breaks something (especially if important). You know, not that major stuff.

Vi I could see being much more lax about stuff like that. Kid broke a super rare, super expensive vase chasing their sibling down the hall? No problem, just let cool!Mom Vi talk to angry!Mom Cait over that. Got a bad grade on the midterm? Aw man, at least you tried (and finished it! that’s good at least.) She’d be a lot more chill about those things.

#Vi #Caitlyn Kiramman #Piltover's Finest #arcane #speculation #kinda #also #my meta #in a way

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gritsgigabits · 1 year

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YUH i love ur Laughing Jack dating headcannons and was wondering if u could do headcannons of fem!virgin reader and LJ? Take urtime and stay dehydrated! Eat snacks and spoil urself cause u deserve it >:]

Thanks sm for your message and request! I’m sorry it’s taken me forever to get to it >.<

TW: NSFW (obvs) and derogatory language.

PSA: Do NOT let anyone think or talk about you or your virginity the way Jack thinks about Reader in this (without your explicit consent).

Jack is essentially made up of malice, (terrible) humour and pure lust. He is a creature that navigates through life following whatever amusing stimulus he comes across if the stimulus in question has something to do with the aforementioned three things.

When he came across you, he was instantly convinced that you could keep him occupied for a while – you were amusing, willing to tolerate him, and could offer him pussy regularly. He initially saw you as someone who could satisfy his desires and offer him company.

In short, he assumes sex will happen in your relationship.

When he found out that you were in fact a virgin, Jack was intrigued. He thought it a great privilege to be the one to break you in, so to speak.

He considered your virginity as a fruitful opportunity for him to train you to fuck him the way he liked to be fucked.

The mere idea that you’d never slept with anyone else was a major turn on for Jack. He has an old-fashioned-ish way of thinking that virginity equals innocence and purity and, being the chaotic devil he is, wanted to be the one to ruin you.

When he told you about this, he explained that he meant ‘ruin’ in a good way, although he didn’t specify what the good way actually was.

Jack isn’t one to talk about how your first time is going to be like. He just expects it to happen, and will probably not take your feelings or needs into account.

That said, if you decide to have sex with Jack, you’re going to have to stick up fir yourself and demand that the situation progress at the pace you set. Jack will get grumbly when you tell him these things, but he will comply.

He can be a terrible person at times, but he doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable.

If you’re not ready to have sex (or don’t want sex at all), Jack will stick around for as long as you can offer him something else that he considers to be worth his time.

Over time, if you’re the adventurous type who likes to live on the edge and laugh in the face of danger etc., he might come to the conclusion that your relationship doesn’t need to get any more intimate.

As long as he is having fun with you, Jack is content.

#laughing jack x reader #lj x reader #laughing jack #laughing jack creepypasta #creepypasta x reader #laughing jack headcanons

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angel-eyes05 · 1 year

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i remember his hands - preview

PAIRING: kang the conqueror x fem!reader

SUMMARY: after a scientific experiment goes horribly wrong, you've been transported to the quantum realm and have been stuck there for the past decade. with no company, aside from janet van dyne, your life changes forever when a mysterious man in a golden ship crash lands next to your settlement. startled with his initial presence, you two have a rocky start. but as time goes on, you two find each other slowly drawn to one another. you have secrets though, and he has a past he refuses to bring up. can you two make it through navigating an unknown world together, discovering any ulterior motives, and stand the test of time in a place where time has no meaning at all?

INFO: slow romantic burn, pretty fast sexual burn, kinda enemies to lovers????, takes place during that little flashback janet has during quantumania, idk how accurate this is gonna be to canon stuff cause i get very confused about the quantum realm lol, reader is in mid to late 20s while kang is in his “early 30s” (ik he like technically doesn't age or whatever idk the lore but i just made it accurate to jonathan majors age and wanted to give an accurate age range/gap/count), y/k is very fleshed out like i give her everything lol

WARNING: implied su!c!dal thoughts

CHAPTER WORD COUNT: 570

NOTES: hi there!!!! did i make an account just so i could post this? yes, yes i did, and what about it. I was looking for quantumania!kang fics and turns out, theres like 3-4!! so i was like, hey why not. please don't judge my writing cause this is the first fic i’ve written…like ever lol. also, please suspend your disbelief for this, like don’t question why they have working appliances or whatever or that i made up names for the monsters or something, cause 1) idk how to explain that stuff and 2) that's not the main focus sooooo yeah. but, nonetheless, i hope you guys enjoy, if anyone even reads this at all even though this is mainly for my sake lol.

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It’s been ten years. Ten years since it all went wrong and you landed in this wretched place. Ten years since you’ve had a decent meal and been able to sleep soundly without having to worry about the creatures of the quantum realm getting you in the night. It got slightly better around seven years ago when you found Janet Van Dyne, someone who had experience in navigating this strange world. About 30 years of experience in fact. The thought of you being down here for that long made you nauseous.

Every day was the same. Wake up, check the settlement perimeter, help Janet with breakfast, hunt surrounding mites, occasionally go into town to trade for parts, eat dinner, then go to bed. Thank god Janet was there or else you might’ve gone insane by now. All this repetition was not your style at all.

You missed life up above. You missed going out with your friends. You missed running into people at the grocery store you haven’t seen since elementary school. You missed your yearly trip to New York during Christmas and seeing everything so festive. It sounds pretentious but it was the truth.

But what you missed most of all was San Francisco. It sounds stupid but you loved it there more than anything. You loved how the flowers would bloom during the springtime. You missed feeling the wind through your hair, as aggressive as it would be at times. You missed going to the beaches. Being in the cool water, feeling the sand in between your fingers and toes, being kissed by the sun. God, you missed the sun. Everything was so dark down here. So…hopeless. Thank god Janet was there or you might’ve…

There wasn’t any point in thinking like that anymore. You had accepted life the way it was. It wasn’t like you had a solid plan for making it back home anyways. As much as you did miss it, it wasn’t like the power of hope, love, and friendship would make a quantum tunnel appear out of thin air. Even if you could find someone selling the necessary pieces to power the tunnel, they would probably be listing it at way too high of a price for you to apprehend it. So for now, and probably for the rest of your life (however long of that left you had, time was strange down here), all the good you can do is try to protect yourself, keep Janet company, and stare at the stars, or whatever you wanted to call them.

That's exactly what you decided to do before heading off to bed. After checking the surroundings of the settlement for mites, you sat next to the closest thing you could call a creek and just stared up at the engulfing darkness. The tranquility this activity brought you allowed you to sleep soundlessly, without an unknown creature coming out of the shadows to attack you. While staring up at the twinkling lights, you see one of them in the distance that appears to be moving closer to you. As it gets closer, you can make it out as a circular, golden ship. It crash lands about 300 feet away, causing the earth around you to shake. Curiosity takes over you as you decide to start heading over to the crash sight, unaware about how much the repetition of your life you always complained about was about to dissolve.

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NEXT PART

A/N: hiiiiii, so that was the quick little preview, i hope you liked it. i’m gonna be honest im very nervous about posting this lol 😭. but i hope you enjoyed it. chapter 1 should come out shortly after i post this so i hope you’ll stick around for the rest of the series!!!

#i remember his hands #kang the conqueror #kang x reader #kang the conqueror x reader #marvel mcu #mcu fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic #mcu phase 5 #quantumania #ant man #fem!reader

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autumnslance · 2 years

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I've been hunting around for the answer to this question, and got pointed to you by a couple of friends, so I hope this doesn't sound too weird, but I've been trying to figure out how Y'shtola shows affection (particularly for the WoL) as truthfully up until ShB, I... uh... thought she didn't like the WoL at all or as a coworker at best? So, I'm trying to figure out what cues I've missed, and playing through again hasn't helped much... again, sry to bother!

Y'shtola's tough to read, so I totally get where you're coming from.

And as I got rather long (No surprise! It's me!), below a cut it all goes.

I have to note that many in fandom see the adult Scions and twins in earlier parts of the game as not caring about the Warrior of Light due to the initial surface level interactions and hard to read behaviors that were 1) hastily written (I feel ARR texts needed another few editing passes and VA takes they had no time for) and 2) are meant to be open to interpretation.

If one is reading the canon text with an open mind to seeing how characters grow and change (not to mention the shift in writing style as a new lead took over from Stormblood on) it’s harder to say after ShB and EW especially that the Scions don’t care, when community and love (in any and all forms) is a major point of this story of hope and how the day is saved multiple times due these friendships.

Not to mention how often through ARR, HW, and StB the adult Scions are often sidelined or sent off on other missions by the narrative to deny the WoL their aid while also explaining why they can’t help in combat situations against non-primals before we had the Duty Support system. Y’shtola vanishes post-Titan until after Garuda, after the Banquet is gone for much of HW MSQ until late 3.0, is nearly killed by Zenos in early 4.0 so out of action, and then is among the first Scions to fall to the Exarch's Call and is the last of the core group we pick up at 5.0’s midpoint.

Despite how often she and some of the others are gone, or the unevenness of some of the writing over time, I wouldn’t say she or any of the Scions dislike the WoL ever, nor actually do treat WoL as a servant or as a weapon of destruction; in fact, that attitude is specifically given to Alphinaud, and to some degree Alisaie, as part of their coming of age stories in ARR/Coils and HW as they transition from spoiled noble brats to conscientious young adventurers.

Also, clicking on everyone before, after, and in between quest steps comes in handy; it’s a habit to get into early in this game and especially in replays, as a LOT of characterization, background, and lore moments come from those optional dialogues that are easy to miss. There are a lot of great moments with all the doomed Scions in the Waking Sands, for instance, that are easily skipped if you ignore the common room and just rush in and out of the Solar for missions. It adds to play time, but it can be highly worth it to get extra on each character (in ShB it’s necessary with Emet-Selch and all the lore he offers).

But to get at Y’shtola and how she shows affection for everyone—not just WoL but in general—we’re actually going to have to start with our grouchy cave witch: Master Matoya.

Y’shtola’s amazing magical talent was realized early, and as such she was given directly to Matoya to raise as an apprentice when Y’shtola was only seven years old. In 6.1 quests, when accompanied by Y’shtola around Sharlayan, she specifically notes neither she nor Thancred ever attended the Studium as youths, as they were under the care of masters of their respective fields. Matoya is also credited, according to Alisaie on her first meeting the elderly archon, that Matoya is the one who’s said to have “tamed” Y’shtola.

So let’s look at Matoya. If you visit her cave after 6.0 to find Y’shtola hanging around, Matoya says:

“Like old Louisoix, you lot set out to save the world. Like him, you believed your cause with all your heart. And like him, you succeeded. The spineless wretches of the Forum could stand to take a cue from your example. Now, as Shtola would tell you, I tend to be sparing with my praise. But for what you’ve accomplished, you have my respect and admiration.”

And in all of our interactions with Matoya, that “sparing praise” is true; she’s caustic and grumpy and acts as if she is imposed upon every time we visit. However, if she really didn’t want anyone in her cave, well, we couldn’t get there. She’d change the magic lock. Throw us out. Overwhelm us with brooms and poroggos.

Instead she lets Alphinaud come and go freely to study throughout Heavensward’s patches as he seeks a way to help Estinien, keeping an eye on him, but letting him figure things out on his own as she lets him have run of her library and resources. She aids during the Alexander questline (though is never seen). Time and again, through MSQ and sidequests, Matoya is there for sharp, clearcut, logical advice and magical knowledge and resources. Even in Stormblood’s Namazu Tribe quests, you at one point take your fishy buddy to Matoya for information. Her response to the WoL is one of my favorites:

“Had anyone else shown up on my doorstep with a Namazu in tow, I would’ve had my poroggos deal with them. I’m still not quite sure what you’re about, but if it gets you to stop fighting every other god or dragon for a spell, it can’t be all that bad.”

Coming from Matoya, that is close to a declaration of care for the WoL’s well-being as we’re likely ever going to get.

Especially when you consider the sidequest available from one of her poroggos. It starts as an aether current quest inside the cave, but the chain continues until we discover a hidden broom under a ruined bridge, a broom in which Matoya has locked away all of her most precious memories and feelings for Y’shtola. Matoya tasks the poroggo that when she inevitably dies, his final act of service shall be to lay her body to rest alongside her hidden broom.

This is the woman who raised Y’shtola from the age of seven.

I said a lot already in my Ultima Thule post about the similarities and differences in Matoya and Y’shtola; where one is a misanthropic hermit, the other goes out into the world to help people and protect the star from dangers, even as she seeks knowledge of life’s mysteries. It’s a rather important difference, though the influence of Matoya’s caustic upbringing is writ in Y’shtola’s every ilm.

The first meeting in the Limsa Lominsa introductions, Y’shtola is labeled as “Cultured Conjurer.” In her early interactions with the WoL, and other NPCs such as the young pirate who gets in trouble, she acts as one would expect an adventuring healer to; friendly concern and relief when one is uninjured, making sure folks know Sevrin and the WoL are OK. She is certainly interested in WoL’s abilities, both combat and aetheric, but even in these early interactions she’s outwardly pleasant. If anything, she’s less brusque and sharp-tongued with strangers and new acquaintances.

Some of her easy irritation is seen in the infamous Feast preparations on the way to Titan; Y’shtola is irate at what the Company is putting the WoL through to test them and all the fetch quests they impose. She praises WoL for their patience and stoicism and humoring the Company, realizing only a bit later the WoL isn’t familiar enough with these heroes to understand why they did all this.

But Y’shtola is not effusive in her praise and compliments; though freer with them than her Master, she is still reserved and understated. Her wit is very dry commentary. She is not afraid to be stern when needed, but that would again be due to the influence of her upbringing; it’s easier to be forthright and caustic than it is to shower affection. But Y’shtola obviously tries to do the latter more often than her teacher.

The most effusive praise I can think of is in Heavensward, as the Excelsior prepares to leave for Azys Lla, when she says the WoL is “the beacon of hope towards which all men drawn” after all the WoL has accomplished so far in Ishgard and Dravania (and even in that verbal spar with Estinien, she tries to warn him of the Eye, and as you escape the Flagship upon Midgardsormr, Y’shtola is the one to ask “Where is Estinien?”).

This usually reserved praise remains true through much of the MSQ; again, she seems to allow her snarkier side and dry wit to come out around the Scions, because among her closest comrades, she is understood to be straightforward but still caring. She challenges people to do and be better (such as her argument with Merlwyb that Yugiri spies on in the ARR patches), and she challenges her Scion family most of all. In ShB there are her snappy comments at Thancred about his ward, but after, in speaking to her she is certain of his heart and willpower; the man she knows is a good one, who needs to confront his feelings and is refusing to while also not talking to his friends about his struggles. Y’shtola was trying to help in her own way—effectiveness and timing aside—and it is reminiscent of how her own Master would have done it; the comparisons to Matoya are strengthened not just by Y’shtola borrowing the name under the Floodlight.

EDIT: Speaking of Rak’tika, some other friends noted: If Y'shtola didn't already care, her first meeting with WoL in Rak'tika wouldn't have been so horrified when she was told it was WoL and not a sin eater she was seeing. She's notably upset, and then works to solve the issue, demanding answers of Urianger (who stonewalls), and then does in fact tell WoL her concerns, once Plot has been dealt with; people forget that scene as it’s not in the Unending Journey.

It does take Y’shtola time to show her vulnerabilities to the WoL, to entrust them with some secrets or take them into confidence. But that all comes rather late, for her to loosen up, to joke more, to be openly vulnerable, after everything the Scions have been through together.

It also does not help that Y’shtola’s more reserved interactions can be read as bids for reciprocation; if one were to meet her at the same level of energy, friendly coworkers it is. If one shows more friendly interest, her own level of interaction would also change—but that works in games with interactive dialogue paths that an on-rails MMO like FFXIV can’t provide as easily as a single player like Mass Effect or Dragon Age, where interactions with party members change their reception of the PC character, even to the point of OCNPC romance.

It all depends on how one reads it and feels about these characters. What clicks and what doesn’t. And for many, Y’shtola is harder to click with than others due to her reservation and sharp wit.

So if in ARR, HW, and StB she reads as a cordial coworker, that’s a valid reading; she’s as polite and friendly and concerned as one would expect a healer to be. She’s also dry, prone to understatement, and not afraid to be sharp-tongued when called for. She praises, but reservedly, as that’s her upbringing.

She doesn’t have Thancred’s snarky charm, or G’raha’s enthusiasm, nor the interplay of Papalymo and Yda. Each of the Scions are given very broad personality archetypes meant to be interpreted openly. One can even read Thancred as not caring about WoL as more than a coworker at first despite his effusive praise and honeyed words, as so much of it is a front he puts up, and his actual affection for WoL as a friend also arguably shows later (or, if going back to “bids for interaction”, it’s easier to exchange favorable energy with Thancred, but I don’t think that he’s actually much more open and able to reciprocate than Y’shtola, given his emotional stunting under the charm that takes him until ShB to work out, hence my own wolnpc ship with him taking so much time to sort).

I did present this question to my FC for some input, as Y’shtola IS a tough cookie to crack, and unlike some Ancient scientists I could name, I am willing to ask for outside ideas and perspectives to help me examine my own as I draft. One thing noted by certain multi-cultural friends is the cultural context one can read Y’shtola in; in an American context, she does seem very reserved and professional early on; polite, but very much how one would see a friendly coworker. In a British context, one friend considers her rather “chummy” in her pleasant politeness and dry, understated humor when interacting with her throughout MSQ.

For those of us who read the Scions as Found Family, we see Y’shtola as the poised older sister of the group, the supposedly responsible adult in the room who is really just as prone to shenanigans as the rest, in the right circumstance.

And there are many who make the Mom jokes about her; some because they find her desirable and she is actually among the older Scions (despite her claims), but also because she does, as a healer first, have that Mom Friend demeanor, though it is more evident in ShB when she can joke back at the WoL’s silly responses to her concerns.

Anyway. Y’shtola isn’t a social showoff; with magic, sure, but in personal interaction, she holds quite a bit of herself back for awhile, and her ingrained responses due to her upbringing are to be reserved with affection and praise, while quick with wit and straightforward in her speech, not pulling punches. She will be cordial with acquaintances and new people, and shows the concern for others one expects of a healer, but she’s not going to gush the way others might.

This is a lot of words. I like Y’shtola, and get her lowkey approach and humor, so always considered her friendly, but was glad to see her caring clarified in ShB and EW, alongside the other Scions. But if her and other Scion friendships with WoL don’t quite gel for others until arriving on the First, that’s perfectly understandable.

#Final Fantasy XIV #Y'shtola Rhul #Master Matoya #Character analysis #Scions of the Seventh Dawn #lore #backstory #A Realm Reborn #Heavensward #Stormblood #Shadowbringers #Lyn Prompts

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yourvirtualgoddessforlife · 1 year

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Hello and happy new year! If your requests are open, can you please write for Primis Edward Richtofen and his s/o reader who wants to take him stargazing? They do it to help his mind relax and it slowly evolves into accidently falling asleep under them (thank gosh Nikolai was on watch duty). P.S. Edward is the little spoon

All of the stars

Primis Edward Richtofen x g/n reader

A/N: I'm screaming you don't understand how much I love this man 😍

Most likely spelling mistakes as I'm writing on mobile right now (I'm at home sick) but I'll spell check and edit tomorrow

Thank you for the request!

~~~~~

It was an unusual request. Certainly not the strangest he'd heard but that didn't stop him from being thrown off guard. If any of the others had of asked he would of laughed at them and checked them over to made sure they were still rational but when you asked.

"Edward! Come and join me, I want to stargaze."

He laughed and took a moment to process. "Is now really the right time? The others--"

"When else do we get time?" You scrutinised him, noise scrunching. "Nikolai is on watch so we can sneak away for at least a couple of minutes."

He wasn't surprised that he relented. Part of his mind is convinced he'd stop everything and steal the moon for you if you asked. Smaller requests like spending time with him? Of course he'd follow you.

There wasn't anything around where the group decided to stay, hunkered down in a ruined farm house far away from any towns. There wasn't many places to go from here except from a hill by the edge of a forest on which you had already laid a blanket, of course you had planned this out.

Richtofen watched as you sat down crossed legged on the blanket and stared up at him expectantly. He imagines how odd he must look from your perspective, standing there with a confused expression. He was confused. You always confused him. He couldn't deny it. After a moment and a quick shake of his head to clear his mind he joined you on the blanket. He was stiff still unsure of how to act and not to mention he decided to sit across from you, the action making you laugh quietly.

"Here, Edward." You said patting the spot on the blanket next to you. He followed your instructions but slowly. By the time he'd sat where you'd asked, you decided to take the initiative and grab him around the torso and dragging him to lie down on the blanket, laughing as you land on top of him.

It took a moment but he wrapped his arms around you. In that moment of peace his mind ran wild. Why did you ask him to be out here and is he ruining the moment with his uncertainty? You didn't seem to mind, contently resting in his arms staring up at the sky. As time ticked by he settled, placing a kiss to the top of your head while trying to remember what each constellation he could see was called.

"Ah ha! I knew I knew it!" he leans up, triumphantly.

"Knew what?" He noticed he pushed you off when he leaned up and yet you still asked him questions entirely unbothered.

"Err, sorry." He apologises while you lie back down, pulling him down to lay on you. "Those stars over there, I was struggling to remember what they were called. Großer Bär"

"Großer Bär?"

"Ja, Ursa Major."

"Oh! The bear one!" You laughed as you realised which he was referring to. "The great bear is Callisto, one of the lovers of Zeus."

"You know the stories?"

"Yeah. Mythology is fascinating." Mindlessly you begin stroking his hair while you explain the myth of Callisto and her son. He's ashamed to admit he wasn't listening. All Edward could focus on was your hands holding him close and the continual beats of your heart.

He doesn't know when he fell asleep but when he woke up he was still in your arms face pressed against your chest as he tries to remember why he woke up.

"I told you to wake up, German." The voice addressing him held a thick Russian accent. "You've both been out here for far too long."

"Nikolai, mein Freund, thank you for covering watch tonight."

#call of duty x reader #cod x reader #cod zombies #edward richtofen x reader #edward richtofen #nikolai belinski #primis richtofen #~vivanilla's personal faves

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someobliviousgirl · 1 year

Text

A tragic love story

Hey, this is the first fic that I post on tumblr. English isn't my first language, sorry in advance for the mistakes.

Wanda x fem!reader (reader has wings)

Wanda has been sick for the past three weeks but maybe your abilities could explain why...

(Recently corrected)

WARNINGS : blood and violence, major character death, sad fic, some fluff, pregnancy, gun, heavy angst, don't let the summary fool you.

Wanda and you have been a couple for two years now, you met when you first joined the Avengers six months before the incident in Lagos. You were one of the only people to try and comfort Wanda after the incident and you grew closer because of it.

You were able to join the Avengers thanks to your powers, you had wings, could fly, and had a vision overdeveloped. In fact, you had all those abilities because you were from another planet where everyone is like you. But after a civil war half of your home planet found refuge on other planets including earth, you left with your parents at the age of 10 and grew up on earth. After years of hiding who you really were, S.H.I.E.L.D found out about your abilities and asked you to join the Avenger initiative.

From then on you’ve been helping them with worldwide threats and made a new chosen family with the team. After Lagos, tensions started to rise between everyone but you choose to focus on Wanda who arrived on the team just a few months after you. Since then you’ve developed romantic feelings for the witch and she did too, you officialized a few months after the sokovian accords were signed much to the surprise of the remaining avengers on the team.

Two years later the sokovian accords have been ripped and all of the team returned. You were happy to meet again your best friend the Black Widow and to finally stop hiding from the word with Wanda.

But all of this couldn’t have prepared you for what would happen to you two after that.

***

Wanda was sick for the past three weeks which made you worry about her, “Babe, maybe you should go see Dr. Cho. It’s been three weeks and you’re still not getting better” you said to Wanda while she was vomiting over the toilets “It’s probably nothing y/n don’t worry about it” she responded while walking toward the sink. Not letting her go so easily you grab her by the shoulders when she finishes washing her mouth and turn her toward you.

“You have to go check with a doctor my love, vomiting for three weeks straight is not normal. Please at least promise me you’ll see Dr. Cho today” you asked her softly.

“Okay, fine I’ll go now and she will confirm what I’ve been telling you for weeks, it’s just a bad stomach bug” she complied and you kissed her on the lips happy that she agreed. “Thank you, my stubborn girlfriend.” she pushes your arm playfully and you both leave to find the doctor in her office in the compound.

***

“What?” Was your first reaction to the news Dr. Cho gave you, as for Wanda she remained speechless.

“According to the blood tests that I ran on Mrs. Maximoff” she turns towards Wanda, “You are pregnant”

“No, it’s impossible, I’ve only been with y/n! Baby, I swear I didn’t cheat on you” Wanda looked at you with worried eyes but before you could respond the doctor interrupted “Indeed, if it reassures the both of you, the DNA of the baby is in fact 50% Mrs. Maximoff and 50% miss y/l/n” You were indeed reassured even if you knew that Wanda would never do that to you, some insecurities never die…

“How… how is this possible?” you asked. “Well it seems that your powers are far more extended than we thought, we don’t really know how but it is the only reasonable explanation, you impregnated Wanda thanks to your magic.”

“How far am I?” Your girlfriend asked Cho “You are a little over three weeks into your pregnancy. I will let you two discuss, if you have any questions I will be in my office” she leaves you two alone while Wanda silently tears up.

You take her in your arms murmuring softly in her ear “It’s okay my love, I’ll always be here, whatever you decide” you kiss her on the forehead.

After a few minutes Wanda calmed down and said “I...I want to keep it, are you okay with that?” “Of course I’m okay with that babe… We are going to be parents” you replied just realizing how both of your lives would change. Wanda kisses you on the lips “Yes, we are.”

***

You announced the news to all the compound the same day, all but Natasha your best friend, to whom you talked just an hour after knowing you were going to be a mom. You were so excited to meet your and Wanda’s child.

After three months you both discovered that you were expecting twins. This was another shock but knew that your chosen family would always be there to help if you needed it, especially Natasha who you chose to be the godmother.

***

Wanda was now in her last trimester, you two were heading to the mall to get the last furniture for the twins’ room. You were holding hands while walking, you didn’t take the car because the mall was 5 minutes away from the compound. “What color of paint should we choose for the children's room?” You just brought a house for the four of you but didn’t move in yet. “I don’t know maybe light yellow” you said “'Light yellow'?? No y/n, that is a terrible idea” Wanda said while laughing slightly. “Why? Don’t you like yellow as a color?” “Well yes but not on walls baby, could you imagine the lighting in that room?” she replied still laughing “Okay okay, no yellow, what about-” but just before you could finish your sentence you heard someone shouting your girlfriend’s last name.

You both turned around and found a man in his 40s looking slightly nervous. “Hi, can I help you?” Wanda said, on her guards, while you stepped a little in front of her by instinct. “Actually yes, do you remember your little incident in Lagos?” before she could respond he continued “Well my son was in the building that YOU blew up! The least I could do would be to repay the favor...” before you could do a thing the man got a gun out of his jean jacket. In your desperation to keep your love safe, you pulled out your wings and enveloped her with them, turning your back on the man.

You heard two loud bangs, at first nothing happened but then you felt all your body on fire. “No.” Wanda said, not fully understanding what happened in her shocked state. It’s when she saw the blood leaking from your mouth that she realized the gravity of the situation. She lost control of her powers and blew the man out with a shock wave and shouted your name.

Your legs started to give out under you and Wanda accompanied you to the floor as gently as she could with the weight of your wings in addition to your body. “No, no, no…” She repeated while applying pressure on your wounds and crying. “Green.” you said in a murmur, too weak to say anything else, “What?”, “Gr- green for the...the room” you repeated, your eyes closing slowly. “No, no, keep your eyes open for me baby, please.” Wanda said while shaking you, you reopened your eyes with difficulty. “That’s it babe… a green room? Yes of course love, but you have to stay to see it okay? Nat is on her way.” you nodded your head knowing that she pressed her emergency button as soon as she saw your bloody mouth.

Wanda hears the quinjet in the distance and reassures you “Do you hear it baby? The team is coming, just hold on please” She was fully crying now, not sure the team would land in time “You have to meet our twins y/n okay, just hold one more minute” she was begging you but your eyes were starting to unfocus you put a last effort and said, “I- I love you Wanda, tell the twins th- that I love them too…”

While Wanda heard Nat’s boots on the floor she was focusing on your empty eyes looking through her. When Natasha arrived near Wanda the first thing she heard was a heart-wrenching scream. She rapidly understood the situation when she saw your bloody wings laying on the floor and a man knocked out against a wall probably dead too with a gun near him.

In a brief instant all of your lives changed and she didn’t know if Wanda would ever get through this trauma.

Thanks for reading!

#wanda maximoff x reader #wanda x reader #wanda imagine #marvel #the avengers #reader insert #pov #fem reader #one shot #wanda angst #fluff #heavy angst

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