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Pre 2.0 wip I'm not finishing 👺

#omggg cool!!! #sunday hsr #hsr #art

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#love u king #prompto argentum #ffxv

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FINISHED MY LIST OF PROMPTS, GUYS

If anyone uses these, please feel free to @ me, I’d love to see how people interpret them. I guess you could also just use a tag. #piddermermay I guess? Idk. I’ve never done anything like this before.

#omg!!!! #i wanna do this #mermay 2024 #art prompts

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Pinterest is good sometimes

#CRYINGGGGG #ffxv

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Patreon | Ko-Fi

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Indridason

having to keep an injured teammate quiet while hiding

Keep reading

#DELICIOUS #ffxv #whump #art

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#GORGGGGGEOUSSS #hsr #aventurine hsr #art

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#palestine

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Brief Thoughts About Aventurine, Religion, and Colonialism

This isn't a comprehensive summary, just things I started thinking about. It's kinda funny how things just completely fly past you when you don't think about them regularly, cuz I'm a very not-religious person so it took reading someone offhandedly refer to aspects of Aventurine's backstory as his "religious beliefs" for me to realize how important those actually are.

(2.1 Story Spoilers + reading the Sigonia relic set description will help for some context)

Despite his employment in the IPC calling for Aventurine to help amass capital in the name of Qlipoth the Preservation, we don't really hear him talk about Qlipoth often and his backstory basically omits mention of his relationship to THEM; the focus is entirely about his relationship with Gaiathra Triclops and HER blessing of luck.

The present Aventurine has changed a lot from his young self due to the influence of the IPC, in direct ways such as his newfound wealth and ruthless business practices, and in indirect manners such as how the IPCs involvement in the inter-tribal relationships of Sigonia resulted in higher tensions between the Avgins, Katicans, and other tribes.

However, his belief in Gaiathra Triclops has remained intact into his adulthood. It has soured as he begun to view HER blessing of good luck to be more akin to a curse, but it feels like a very deliberate writing decision to have him still hold onto the belief system of the Avgin. It would have been reasonable if he had later turned to the protection of Qlipoth, as joining the IPC had resulted in the wealth and status he has now, but he doesn't really do this.

Even if the colonialism took much away from him, he still wishes to retain his culture. (The value he places in the items his parents left for him and sister: the charm, the necklace, and the shirt, is further testament to this, as examples outside of his religious beliefs.)

Prayer is also something that we rarely see depicted often in Star Rail, which makes the segments of Aventurine praying with his younger self and sister stand out a lot more. The only character I can recall off the top of my head with an extended prayer sequence is Sunday at the end of 2.0, which is also notable.

One thing that I was wishing the Penacony plot would at least lampshade is the irony of sending Aventurine, a slave working for the IPC, to retake a planet that had led a slave rebellion to escape the IPC's control. While I'm now uncertain if they will address that directly, I do wonder that as we learn more about Sunday, if his relationship with Xipe the Harmony will end up being used as a way to foil him to Aventurine and/or serve as indirect commentary on the situation between the IPC and Penacony. (This is pure speculation)

But yea anyways, it's pretty interesting seeing mihoyo try to incorporate other aspects of racism and colonialism that extend beyond displays of outright hatred, such as how Aventurine's retainment of his culture's religious practices is depicted in a positive light. (Another thing that stuck out to me is how they depicted the fetishization of racial traits negatively, with the way some characters remark on his eyes, how the Avgin's untrustworthy reputation partially lies within their physical attractiveness, and how his relationship with his own appearance has changed as a result, as this is something I rarely see fictionalized but I won't elaborate on this here bc its off-topic.)

Obviously, mihoyo doesn't have the best track record when writing minorities and there's still a fucktonnnnn to be criticized about their decisions in Aventurine's lore as well (the most egregious of which being deriving the name for his planet from an actual slur), but it does seem like they are at least trying to add more depth to their depictions.

#ooooo this is a great read #😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 #AHHHHH #hsr #aventurine hsr

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Current pet theory circa 2.1: Gaiathra Triclops is a variation of Ena the Order.

Have a look at the eyeball in the background and the dusty brown planet in the orb:

Now look at Aventurine’s eyes, which are very specifically called out as unique to his clan, as well as the planet in Sigonia Planar set:

Personal opinion: Aventurine’s “luck” is actually a blessing of Ena the Order under another name. It lines up with a lot of side-lore: The beads, the three part harmony prayers, the emphasis on hands as symbols of Gaiathra as well as the fate of a planet under Ena’s protection always being a period of splendour for the societies ending with total devastation.

Before we hit Penacony, Argentina’s seemingly random interruption introduces the concept of dead and missing aeons and the swarm persistingz. Why?

Penacony is all about the Xipe the Harmony and Qlipoth the Preservation factions (i.e The Family and the IPC), and both those Aeons were involved with Ena. In the Swarm Simulated Universe: Qlipoth struck a pact with Ena to deal with the Swarm before Xipe ganked them. Meanwhile, Ruan Mei was running around reviving the Swarm emanator ~for science~ just a few patches ago. Something, or someone, to do with Ena would very much complete the callbacks to the Swarm.

Aventurine? He acts like he’s YOLOing but he always has strategies and they end neatly in his favour despite the complexity. Imo he’s not so much lucky as he is… putting everything in order.

#OMG. WAITTTTTTT i see the vision #omg this is so cool!!!!!!! #banger analysis #hsr #aeons #aventurine hsr

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HONKAI STAR RAIL - Aeons

Lan - Hunt / Nanook - Destruction

Xipe - Harmony / Yaoshi - Abundance

Mythus - Enigmata / Fuli - Remembrance

Aha - Elation / Qlipoth - Preservation

Nous - Erudition / IX - Nihility

#obsessed with them!! obsessed with their designs! #so fucking GORGEOUS #hsr #aeons

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Self-Indulgent Xipe, Aeon of Harmony (Honkai Star Rail) stimboard featuring various holographic stims, nail stims, visual graphic stims, slime stims, and crystal stims!

🎶 - 🪩- 🔮

🪩 - 🎵 - 🪩

💿 - 🪩 - 🪄

#hsr #xipe hsr #stim

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Kinda haphazardly throwing things together and probably overthinking it but I'm wondering if the god Avgins worshipped that is independent of the aeon system might actually be Ena the Order, an aeon who no longer exists and was absorbed into the Harmony.

This might be baseless but Ena's form included what looks to be a puppet and a giant eye behind them, which counts three eyes. Most notably the eye looks familiar

Aventurine has the same eye color. He was born on a day of rain and is considered to be blessed by the goddess. If this is the case, it's interesting that his eye color matches Ena's eye.

But Ena is also gone. We don't know what happens to aeons when they are absorbed into other aeons but i wonder if even after their disappearance, their existence still affects the universe. Much like how stars still shine millions of years after their deaths.

Here's some more info about Ena

The planet Aventurine is from has a harsh environment, constantly at threat of asteroids and solar winds. If at some point, his planet worshipped Ena then their decline and eventual collapse would align with what happened to other civilizations that worshipped them.

And if Aventurine is indeed blessed by Ena, his good fortune would come from the Order.

Another interesting thing

Ena was by no means a small or weak aeon. How Xipe devoured Ena is still a mystery. Being so enormous, I think that is why Ena would still have influence on the universe. It would also explain what's happening in Penacony; the Family suspects that the Harmony is being tainted. What if that's Ena? Bits of the Order are slipping through and affecting the dreamscape.

I also wonder if this is why the Harmony affected Aventurine like it did. Of course, I have no other instances to compare to so Aventurine experiencing hallucinations and talking with his past and "future" self could be how the Harmony punishes.

I'm excited to learn more about the aeons, especially the ones that no longer exist. Again this is mostly baseless speculation but i thought it would be an interesting concept to explore.

#okg.... i never realized the eye in ena's art matches aventurines eyes! that is a neat detail #this is a v interesting analysis #!!!! #hsr #aventurine hsr

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The Aeons of Honkai Star Rail

"Countless shooting stars streak across the night sky... If you can pick the right one, it will carry your wish to thousands of distant worlds."

#im absolutely in love with the aeons!!!!!!! #WOWWWWWW #hsr #aeons

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IT'S ALL ABOUT ENA (ft. SUNDAY WAS THE BAD GUY ALL ALONG)

After the v2.2 trailer I'm really starting to think the events going on in Penacony are somehow deeply tied to Ena the Order. At first I thought all the Order motifs (i.e. the eye symbol of Order being all over) around Penacony were just cool worldbuilding details about how the Harmony must've adopted the Order's symbology on top of THEIR Path, but now...

Like the thing that's really tipping me off here is all the goddamn puppets. The final boss of which is religiously-themed.

This is an insane idea but what if everything that's been going on in Penacony has been the result of somebody trying to re-establish contact with Ena and/or the Path of Order? One of the major discoveries we made in v2.1 was that something's wrong with the Harmony, so what if the Harmony on Penacony is being corrupted in such a way that it aligns more with the Order? It's not even hard to see how.

The Harmony should be about cooperation, resolving differences, mutual understanding, but on Penacony that's not remotely the case. The Family's main tactic to keep the peace has been robbing people of their memories and emotions - keeping them in control not necessarily so people can heal, but to keep them in line and serve their designated functions. The Family on Penacony has already been debasing its population into obedient puppets, doing everything possible to maintain the facade they've created.

There's also the fact that Penacony used to be a prison, a setting that embodies the kind of control and forcible penance that Order represents. Xipe's attention was drawn to it because its prisoners began uniting together in the dreamscape but what happens if Penacony reverts back to a prison?

There's a lot of things that click neatly into place with one extra assumption, that the person ultimately behind this distortion is the most Order-adjacent character in the Penacony cast: Sunday.

He's the most outwardly religious person on Penacony in terms of his faith and he's straight-up covered in the Order's eye symbol, even having them on his halo, plus his major character trait is being a control freak. Circumstantially, he fits.

At this point it's been hammered in that there's a traitor in The Family - as the person in charge of the Family (only answering to the unseen Dreammaster) he's literally pulling the strings on Penacony and in the best position to manipulate its environment, so him being the literal puppetmaster behind everything would be a neat turn of phrase.

While he's outwardly devout to Xipe it could be the case that his appeals are specifically to those aspects of Xipe that THEY absorbed from Ena.

Sunday's ultimate goal is to create a truly perfect paradise in Penacony, but his idea of that could be reliant on the complete control of its population to stop all conflict, hence why he's going to such lengths to get Ena's influence.

It's been stated that a lot of the Dreamscape exists thanks to blessings from Xipe the Harmony, leading to its relative safety, but if the Harmony starts getting corrupted and weakened, then that would weaken those effects and that could be why the deeper dreamscape is starting to flood into Penacony. (This would be an unintentional side-effect of trying to bring about Order, or at least one Sunday thinks the influence of the Order could resolve in its own way.)

Sunday's been putting more resources into finding the serial killer than he is into the Charmony Festival, upsetting other Family members. If he's the one behind everything, he should already have a plan in mind for the Charmony Festival and so it's not a concern to him but the serial murders act as a chaotic element upsetting his attempted Order so stopping them and restoring Order is his higher priority.

On the subject of the serial murders: one detail we got in v2.1 is that the victims seem to be entirely random with no correlations or similarities between them. It could be that we just don't know the underlying reason but what if it is random? Intentionally random because doing it like that means there's no order to them. Something chaotic to disrupt the mastermind's plans to re-align Penacony into the Order. If they're Enigmata-themed like Gallagher, the random killings serve the double-purpose of obfuscating their true intent by making people try to find reason where there isn't any.

(I want to emphasize here that Sunday wasn't behind Robin's murder. This idea only works if he and the killer are on opposing sides, plus when he confronts Gallagher about her death I believe he's genuinely upset about it. Her investigation into the Harmony on Penacony is probably why she was targeted but I still believe Sunday would've tried other ways of getting her onto his side if she found out.)

Now, Robin did presume he was innocent, but we can excuse that on the basis that it's unlikely she would assume her own brother had ulterior motives, and his "death" at the end of v2.1 could simply be a narrative red herring to make us think he's only a victim in all this.

The last point I want to make here: the main event of the Charmony Festival is supposed to be Xipe's incarnation descending (in this case Dominicus, who was referenced in v2.1). If someone is actively trying to tilt Penacony away from Harmony and towards Order, then by the time the Charmony Festival actually arrives it might be not be Xipe's incarnation we see descend, but instead an incarnation of Ena. Hell, we might have actually seen that exact situation happening in one of The Great Septimus' attacks:

#INTERESTING.... #hsr

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i need him carnally

#sunday hsr #hsr #art #that game sc of him looks so stupid (affectionate) #this damn Angel #hes so pretty

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"Want the answer? I'll give it to you. The whole thing is just fate playing a cruel joke on us "

#LOOOOOOOOVEEEEEEEE #galladay #gallagher hsr #sunday hsr #art #hsr

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#LOVE #hsr #galladay #art #sunday hsr #gallagher hsr