aheartfullofquestions

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Reading a book about slavery in the middle-ages, and as the author sorts through different source materials from different eras, I am starting to understand why so many completely fantastical accounts of "faraway lands" went without as much as a shrug. The world is such a weird place that you can either refuse to believe any of it or just go "yeah that might as well happen" and carry on with your day.

There was this 10th century arab traveller who wrote into an account that the fine trade furs come from a land where the night only lasts one hour in the summer and the sun doesn't rise at all in the winter, people use dogs to travel, and where children have white hair. I don't think I'd believe something like that either if I didn't live here.

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A scenario where Wei Wuxian went to Koi Tower to hand himself over instead of the Wens, trying to prove that he had nothing to do with Jin Zixun’s curse….. Support me on Ko-Fi? <3

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Dick asking if Damian's got a crush:

Batman: Streets of Gotham #3

Superman/Batman #77

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all too familiar

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I don’t agree with bullfighting morally, but I’ve been looking at certain pictures of matadors and their poses for a couple of months…

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BIG fan of this design choice

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Y'all know how Edward canonically doesn't do the state alchemist reports properly and just makes up some bullshit 36 hours before he has to turn it in. I bet y'all it looks like this-

Like I imagine this is after everything happens. World is saved, governments destroyed. And Mustang just pulls out one of Ed's old reports and grades it like this just to send it to Resembool to fuck with him.

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i miss the progressiveness of 80s batman comics, i miss leslie and her anarchist pacifist framework being considered a legitimate counter point to batman, i miss villains like the wrath targeting bruce’s commitment to the law, i miss selina calling bruce a cop, i miss that brief moment when jason’s background was a challenge to bruce’s flawed understanding of class, i miss when jason wasn’t a stereotype, i miss when comics both took themselves seriously and were self conscious enough, thus not afraid to introduce nuance and criticise the subject matter (and do so without malice)

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Hey just read your lovely hands fanfic and the concept of the blood pool being a prison for malevolent entities barred from the cycle of reincarnation is so COOL , is it a thing implied between the lines and we western audiences lack the cultural context to recognise it ?, or is it something you came up with if so can I have permission to incorporate the concept into my own fan works?

It is a cultural thing. It's not even implied in the novel. It's just outright stated. But it's one of those hundreds of tiny cultural details that probably fly over the head of the international audience.

Remember when the Wen people came back as bloody corpses to protect Wei Ying and fought back the fierce corpses riled up by the repaired Yin Hufu?

In this part, the novel describes the events following the first Sige of the Burial Mound. After the hundred cultivator houses slaughtered these defenseless elderlies, women, and children, they threw their corpses into the blood pool, thus forever barring them from reincarnation.

The phrase the novel uses is 永不超生 (lit. to never again be reborn, to be barred from the cycle of reincarnation forever). That's not a figure of speech. The novel is being literal. The Burial Mound itself is already a prison for all kinds of undead and ghost wraiths. The blood pool, by the novel descriptions, amounts to a maximum security cell. A ghost in the Burial Mound can eventually let go of their grudge/resentment and enters the afterlife/reincarnation. But anybody thrown into the blood pool doesn't have this option.

永不超生 is commonly portrayed in Chinese culture as a punishment by the authority of the underworld. That's not a judgment that a mortal is allowed to make.

The fact that the Hundred Houses carried out 永不超生 on the Wen is a detail that speaks of both their arrogance and their awareness of their guilt.

The Hundred Houses are well aware what they did to the Wen remnants is a sin. The custom of the time is, if you profess yourself to be the righteous side and slay someone seen as 'evil/villain,' it's customary to hang their corpses up for all to see.

Remember Nie Mingjue beheading Wen Xu and hanging Wen Xu's head at the gate of Uncleam Realm for all to see? NMJ is not doing that just because he has a vendetta against the Wen. He's doing that as part of ancient customs to declare to all that 'his kill is righteous,' that he doesn't need to hide it, and that Wen Xu and the Wens are villains that need to be put down.

That's the principle. Justice has no need to hide.

But not only did the Hundred Houses hide the corpses of the Wen remnants, but they also imprisoned their souls, hoping that would keep the Wen from coming back as grudge wraiths or for the karmic cycle itself to snap back for this sin.

The Hundred Houses built up the Wen remnants to be this evil army at Wei Ying's beck and call. So they need to be put down. But the truth is that they were just a bunch of elderlies, women, and children who spent all their lives being doctors (as they belong to the Qihuang branch, with their own pacifistic philosophy).

Had the Hundred Houses performed the custom and showed their supposedly righteous kill to the world, then the truth would out. That they were either liars or stupid, and that they best be prepared to repay for their transgression on both innocent Wens and on the authority of hell itself.

And that, my friend, is why the second Burial Mound Siege ended the way it did, and why the vast majority of those same cultivators left Wei Ying alone afterward. What do you think those same cultivators think when their victims break out of the supposedly unbreakable maximum security cell to save Wei Ying (another of their victims)? And then those same Wen souls entered the afterlife?

The Western vernacular for this part is: Karma is a tenacious bitch with a long memory. It doesn't matter how much they lie about their crime and act like they are righteous or how good they think they hide the proof of their deeds. Heaven and hell itself are watching.

....Sorry, I have some strong feelings about the treatment of the Wen remnants.

That is to say, feel free to incorporate it in your works.

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... who?

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The fact this was Damian's go-to fake name is killing me

"Quick think of a fake name!"

"my brother's first name and my other brother's last name. I'm a genius."

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Stephanie: "Did you get it?"

Tim, scoffing: "Of course I did. *unwraps the vase from bubble wrap* It's the exact same, one of the three original vases made."

Stephanie: "Wait. The old one had a nick, right there on the shoulder. *uses a Batarang to recreate it* There."

Tim, setting it down carefully and smiling: "Perfect. I think we just got away with it."

Jason, reading on the couch: "He'll know."

Stephanie: "How? You'd have to--"

Alfred: "Is there anything you guys want for dinner?"

Tim and Stephanie, immediately: "No."

Alfred, frowning slightly: "Very well." He walked over, both Tim and Stephanie trying to play it cool as the butler adjusted the vase on the table.

Jason looked up from his book.

Alfred: "I'll remind you again, Master Timothy that skateboards are not permitted inside the house."

Jason cackled at the expression that Tim and Stephanie made.

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Bruce: "How did you know? Technically speaking, it's the same vase."

Alfred: "I have a contact at the auction house where you bought the second one years ago."

Bruce, clearing his throat: "Yeah, Jason accidentally kicked a ball into it."

Alfred, raising an eyebrow: "He threw a Batarang at it because you wanted to make him more comfortable."

Bruce:

Alfred: "I do wish you'd all stop adding that nick back."

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Barbara Gordon is so overqualified for the bat family its hilarious. She has a PhD. She was elected into congress. She passed the bar because she was bored. She has been tech support and logistics for basically every superhero team at this point.

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idk who needs to hear this but when your english teacher asks you to explain why an author chose to use a specific metaphor or literary device, it’s not because you won’t be able to function in real-world society without the essential knowledge of gatsby’s green light or whatever, it’s because that process develops your abilities to parse a text for meaning and fill in gaps in information by yourself, and if you’re wondering what happens when you DON’T develop an adult level of reading comprehension, look no further than the dizzying array of examples right here on tumblr dot com

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Tim: So, and for what reason was I 17 years old for the last 15 years?

Damian: That's what you're complaining about? They couldn't even bother to give me a proper characterization until much later on. And then it is one that does not align with my upbringing!

Stephanie: At least you weren't killed just because of misogyny

Dick: Yeah, I wonder how anyone let that through. But then again, I shouldn't expect anything else from writers who made me stuck as Ric for two years and all the, you know, Tarantula stuff

Jason: It's honestly like they just spin a wheel every day to figure out if I'm a villain, hero or anti-hero

Duke: Forget about the writers, the fans also have some... wild assumptions

Stephanie: Yeah, like that you're the normal one!

Cass: Or that I'm mute. Just there to give emotional support

Barbara: Or that the most traumatic thing to ever happen to me is framed as something good just because I became Oracle. I barely had one page of dialogue in that entire story!

Tim: At least they get one thing right.

Dick: And that is?

Tim: Bruce.

Jason: Yeah, what is up with that?! It feels like I've become his punching bag! Why is he considered a hero again when he is just plain abusive at this point?

Duke: Patriarchy

Barbara: And male power fantasy

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worst part about getting angry is how much it makes you want to be mean

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when people who want to be vaguely progressive say 'nature' all secular style but it's painfully obvious they mean 'god' while thinking they don't mean god