#Unveiled Love

[harunayuuka2060]

Twst Unveil Event: The goddess of love's blessing Part 3

Yuurin: *has been called to the headmage's office*

Crowley: Yuurin, your classmates have lodged complaints about hearing voices that appear to be criticizing them.

Yuurin: ...

The voices:

'This one has an ugly voice.'

'This one looks lazy.'

'This one will surely cheat.'

'Cross them all out from the list!'

Yuurin: Yes.

Crowley: This can't go on. The morale of the students are dropping because of this.

Yuurin: Headmage, I apologize for the disturbance caused by the voices. I kindly request your patience in handling this matter.

Crowley: ...

Crowley: You're one of my best students so I will let this slide.

Crowley: Nevertheless, I will grant you until next week to address this issue.

Epel: So you have until next week to find yourself a boyfriend.

Yuurin: Yes.

Epel: Can't you just choose someone you know? Someone to pretend to be in love with you?

The voices: ATROCIOUS!

Epel: !!!

Yuurin: Yes. It's extremely unacceptable.

Epel: O-Oh... What are you going to do now?

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: Am I allowed to recommend candidates myself?

The voices: Yes.

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: Then...

Floyd: Damselfish?

Yuurin: Hello, Floyd-senpai.

Floyd: ...

Floyd: *smiles* You look gorgeous today~ What happened?

Yuurin: It's a long story.

Floyd: Hm... Okay~. So~ Is there something I can help you with, damselfish~?

Yuurin: I'm here to ask you a question, Floyd-senpai.

Floyd: Ask right away~.

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: Will you be my husband?

Floyd: ...

Floyd: Sorry, damselfish. But I'm still too young for that. *smiles genuinely*

Yuurin: *smiles, satisfied with his answer*

Yuurin: Thank you for your honesty, Floyd-senpai.

Floyd: But I feel bad for rejecting you~.

Yuurin: No, I'm fine. I'll be on my way.

Floyd: Good luck finding a husband~.

Yuurin: *nods then leaves Octavinelle*

Azul: *approaches Floyd, seems to be in a rush*

Azul: Floyd, did Yuurin come here?

Floyd: Yeah. He was here a few seconds ago. Why?

Azul: Did you offer him a room to stay in?

Floyd: No?

Azul: ...

Azul: Floyd, I asked you to offer him a room.

Floyd: Eh, I forgot.

Azul: You little—

Kalim and Jamil: ...

Yuurin: *has asked Kalim the same question*

Kalim: Yuurin, you're a good guy, but um... I'm not ready for marriage yet.

Yuurin: That's fine, Kalim-senpai.

Kalim: Are you sure?

Yuurin: Yes.

Jamil: ...

Jamil: He doesn't seem offended at all. Could it be...

Jamil: He's expecting to be rejected?

Kalim: *tries to cheer up Yuurin*

Kalim: I'll find a good husband for you!

Jamil: Kalim.

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: I appreciate your offer, Kalim-senpai. But I must do it myself.

*In the Savanaclaw dorm*

Leona: ...

Ruggie and Jack: ...

The Savanaclaw students: ...

Jack: Is she proposing to the candidates knowing that she would get rejected?

Ruggie: Yeah. That seems her strategy.

Leona: *holding the list of students who were rejected by the voices*

Leona: I'm not liking this. Her last option now is people from Diasomnia.

The Savanaclaw students: ...

Savanaclaw student A: I think the nymphs preferred someone from that dorm.

Leona, Ruggie, and Jack: ...

Leona: Why?

Savanaclaw student A: One of them told me.

Savanaclaw student A: She said that they already knew who it was.

Leona: ...

Leona: What the fu—

#twisted wonderland #twst yuurin #twst floyd #twst kalim #twst epel #twst jamil #twst azul #twst leona #twst ruggie #twst jack #twst savanaclaw #twst crowley #twst unveil: the goddess of love's blessing

[ghostdrinkssoup]

something I find really interesting about hannibal’s character is how he uses people’s expectations and ingrained assumptions to hide himself. no one suspects he’s a serial killer because he doesn’t present as one. he’s elegant and refined and isn’t cruel to animals. he’s highly sophisticated, a polyglot and has a deep admiration for beauty and life. he appreciates saving lives just as much as he appreciates ending them. in fact, this particular aspect of his character is partly why it takes will the entirety of s1 to accept hannibal’s true nature. will saw hannibal save abigail and accompany her to the hospital in apéritif and he also saw hannibal save a man’s life by performing emergency surgery and taking over the operation at the end of sorbet.

this moment in particular is interesting because of how it’s framed to make hannibal look almost godly from will’s point of view:

1) hannibal is positioned immediately higher than will due to being in the ambulance, meaning will is looking up at hannibal, while hannibal is looking down on him

2) hannibal is standing under a bright light as he works to save this guy’s life, while will is standing in almost complete darkness

3) the usual orchestral, classical music is playing in the background, emphasising the apparent “holiness” of the act and framing hannibal as some sort of saviour

the impact of this scene is even more potent when considering the context of the rest of the episode, since will has already stated that the ripper is not the type to save people or enact mercy on anyone. his style of murders doesn’t suggest this characteristic whatsoever, and although will’s assessment is correct, hannibal’s personality and overall demeanour doesn’t match what we’d imagine a person like that might look like. I think will is confronted by this as well, because even if hannibal’s surgical skill means he matches the ripper’s profile (which makes him a valid suspect) his actions contradict will’s image of the ripper, while simultaneously affirming it:

it’s difficult to reconcile these facets of hannibal’s character. it’s inherently contradictory and defies our cultural expectations. nonetheless, hannibal’s inclination to save people is sometimes more insidious than his murders. he doesn’t save people out of altruism, he does it because he thinks he’s superior and enjoys deciding outcomes. he doesn’t view himself as insane, he views himself as god. this is most aptly explored in takiawase, through the acupuncturist/beekeeper killer. here we see a murderer who confesses that she killed a man to quiet his mind, and tells jack that it’s beautiful that she managed to protect him and her other patients. this is one side of hannibal’s character, the one who’s a doctor and therapist and sees death as a cure from disease, even if the ‘disease’ itself is literally just discourtesy. it’s ultimately an act of power.

and yet in this same episode he flips a coin and saves bella on a whim. this of course is framed to others as an act of mercy, however the reality is he took bella’s power away in an act disguised as kindness. once again, he hides in plain sight. this is the other side of his character, and it’s just as deadly.

it’s still about power.

but we don’t associate acts of mercy with monstrosity. when hannibal comforts abigail in trou normand we question whether he’s as bad as we think, because what negative connotations are tied to paternal tenderness? we miss that hannibal is fostering dependency, that he literally looks dead in the eyes as he holds her, and that he blatantly just told us that he’s using abigail to manipulate will:

hannibal often does this actually. he either directly says what he’s doing or suggests that he’s the culprit (often through cannibal puns, as we know) but no one ever interprets him correctly because doing so would contradict the image he’s carefully constructed for himself. it would cause too much dissonance.

and what’s fascinating is that on a subtextual level this is largely what the show is about. the story is an exploration of societal roles and the struggle to fit into stiff categorisation and expectations. will parallels hannibal in this regard because he’s desperately trying to repress his identity by taking on certain roles. and the audience is lured by this persona the same way the characters are lured by hannibal because will defies our understanding of certain tropes. on a genre level, will assumes the detective archetype, meaning we are primed to think he’s inherently good. when we see him say he wants to save people we believe him, even though he often only does so to prove to himself that he’s a good person. will is indeed righteous, a characteristic we often view positively, however he’s violent, wrathful and actively enjoys murder due to how powerful it makes him feel. he’s not dissimilar to hannibal, we just don’t see this straight away because doing so would disrupt our understanding of good and evil.

will hides the same way hannibal does, except will hides from us as well

#ghostie once again goes on a tangent #but it’s so !! I really love how the show fucks with everyone #and uses our expectations to do it #even on a narrative/genre level #the key to unveiling it is letting that conditioning and urge to categorise everything go #also wow I’m back to writing meta hello there #nbc hannibal #hannibal #will graham #hannigram #hannibal meta #ghost speaks

[petricorah]

lee from the tea shop boutta get it (wip) [id in alt]

edit: completed illustration here

#zuko #zukka #i wanted this to be a guiding hand #encouraging or like he's surprised it's happening but holding sokka's hand comfortingly #but something about the expression and the mouth makes it seem like he doesn't want it or he's afraid #i don't know i'll workshop this #mywips #i also havent read any ba sing se zukka fics but i do wonder how they'd work #like i totally buy that zuko was SO tunnel visioned to the avatar that he literally wouldn't know what sokka looks like #but i don't know how Sokka couldn't Not know who he is #unless maybe they met as blue spirit vigilante and sokka falls for him and this is the unveiling moment and zuko's afraid of his past #but sokka's like it's okay you're changing you've helped people as the blue spirit and i care about you. those feelings are real #even now #and zuko almost decides to change for the better right then but he gets scared and turns back and canon happens idk #mistaking his father's approval for love and his love for sokka as wrong #whatever. idc. something something i just wanted to draw short haired zuko

[kentopedia]

❝𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐫𝐮𝐞 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐫𝐮𝐧 𝐬𝐦𝐨𝐨𝐭𝐡❞

comm by @/puri42a ♕₊⊹

#kento & rylie but it’s royalty version <333 #tehehe 🤭🤭🤭 #been holding onto this one for a bit but #it’s time to unveil !!! #LOOK AT US !!! #it turned out so gorgeous #& is inspired by my current wips #and my collab 😜 #i just love it soooo much #cries for hours and hours i adore him he’s beautiful

[fairweathermyth]

It only took 60 years but Fitz has finally become a vocal ally of the gender nonconforming. Bless!

#the fool’s gender finally unveiled: very private person #we knew! #rote reading updates! #realm of the elderlings #robin hobb #fool’s quest #i love to drag fitz but let it be known i love him wholeheartedly

[thebiscuitlabryinth]

Faerie Cookies are born with a song on their tongue, and a tune in their hearts – a gift from the trees, and the wind, and the moon. Music is baked into their very dough, which is why it is considered the purest form of communication, and why all their records are scribed in sheet music.

It is natural for a Faerie Cookie to hum their own melody when idle, almost compulsive, as if it cannot be contained by their body. Even Elder Faerie Cookie, wise and great, cannot resist the pull. When he serenades the sky, everyone stops to listen and harmonise, his voice strong and breathtaking even among the perfect tones of the voices of the Faeriewoods.

The only Faerie who doesn't sing is Mercurial Knight Cookie.

Really, in all the years Silverbell Cookie has known him, he has never heard a single note from him. He's always found it a little strange, compared to the neverending symphony that is the rest of the kingdom. Even compared to the other Silver Knights, who are more careful about following their songs' urges but still tap the rhythm along their weapons, Mercurial Knight is unique in his absolute lack of music.

Silverbell has only ever brought the topic up with him once, in a moment of pure impulse when he thought it was just the two of them.

"Why don't you sing?" He had asked, words blunt but softened by the sweet harmony of his own tune, melting into the sentence from his earlier humming. His bells had chimed along with it, stopping abruptly when he realised he had spoken aloud, with a little tinge of embarrassment. Still, he hadn't backed down, simply smiling sheepishly. "I've been meaning to ask. I don't think I've ever heard you before."

He hadn't said that it was strange, because that wouldn't have been very nice, but he had still heard it beneath his own words, despite his best efforts.

Mercurical Knight took no offense, though he rarely does with Silverbell. Instead, his expression had pinched slightly with confusion, glancing over at him. "Because there isn't any need for me to. My duty is to the Guardian. I cannot allow myself to be distracted by something trivial like singing."

It had been an earnest answer, and exactly the sort of answer Silverbell should have expected, but he had still found himself surprised. "But how do you ignore the call of your song? I know your oath is your highest priority, but I can't imagine always resisting its call."

Silverbell, himself, feels the pull of his melody at least once a day, if not more. To constantly resist it, he had thought, would surely drive him crazy.

"I don't have a song." Mercurial Knight had replied easily, as if that hadn't immediately shook Silverbell to the core, disbelieving. That was even crazier – no melody at all, not a single note floating within his head? Wasn't that lonely?

Mercurial Knight, who had become very familiar with Silverbell by that point, seemed to read his mind, the slightest amusement in his eyes. "It is as I always say. On the day the Silver Blessing was bestowed upon me, I cast aside everything. My flavour, my scent, and my song. Whatever it may have once been matters very little to me."

Silverbell had been unable to respond immediately, trying to fathom it. During his stunned silence, another voice had arrived to answer in his stead. "Does that not simply mean that the song you now carry is that of the Silver Tree instead?"

Silverbell had jumped a little, startled by Elder Faerie's appearance, and had hurriedly fixed his posture, well aware that he was still on duty. Mercurial Knight adjusted his posture too, though considering it had already been perfect before Elder Faerie's arrival, it hadn't made much of a difference.

Mercurial Knight had hesitated for a moment, before inclining his head in a slight nod. "If you say so, Your Majesty, then I must believe that to be true."

Elder Faerie, in all his brillance, had approached them with grace, a knowing look on his face. Of course, if Silverbell could tell Mercurial Knight had been doubtful, Elder Faerie certainly could.

"You may have not felt the urge yet, but not all songs surface frequently. Even I only feel mine on rare occasions." Elder Faerie had explained, almost gently. "The Silver Tree's song will surely come to you when the time is right."

It was Mecurial Knight, then, that had been at a loss for words, blinking slowly. He had glanced away a moment later to regain his composure, in a way Silverbell would dare say was shy. "...Thank you for your kind words, Your Majesty, but it truly doesn't matter to me. Silverbell was asking me about my song, that's all."

Elder Faerie had hummed in understanding, looking towards Silverbell for a split second, before returning his attention to Mercurial Knight. "Well, that doesn't make my words any less true." Then he had smiled, an elegant, mysterious curve. "There's no rush, of course, but I do hope to hear your song someday. You know, I have a feeling both of your voices would harmonise quite well."

Mercurial Knight had, somewhat helplessly, declared that he would be honoured to share his song with Elder Faerie if it ever arose, and that had been the end of it.

Or maybe this was the true end of it, because the opportunity to share his song with Elder Faerie had now been swept away by the winds of time, never to return.

Faeries do not mourn. To return to the soil beneath the Silver Tree is what awaits all of them, eventually, so they do not mourn. They only celebrate and honour the lives that were lost, and to do that, they organise a grand feast.

The atmosphere is light and jolly, a celebration of Guardians both new and old, and Silverbell is lingering by Mercurial Knight's side, a cup in his hands. Usually, he would have flitted off to mingle with the others by now, but after everything that has happened today, he feels like he should stay with him, at least for a few moments more.

The Silver Tree stands tall behind their backs, the evils within trapped securely once more, and its shadow falls upon Elder Faerie's final moments. Silverbell's eyes linger on the place where they watched him disappear. Inexplicably, it does not feel like he is gone.

A melody, low and stilted, imperfect, begins to drift in the air, curling around them. It takes Silverbell a moment to realise it, and when he does, he lets out a tiny gasp.

Mercurial Knight is singing.

He turns to watch him with wide eyes and, mortifyingly, they feel damp as he does. Silverbell doesn't cry – his voice is too high, and his eyes naturally dewey, so he hates to makes himself seem any weaker when he is a perfectly capable knight – but it almost feels like a near thing.

After all, music is the purest form of communication, and he is hearing Mercurial Knight's song for the first time.

It takes Mercurial Knight a moment to find his footing, but when he does, his voice smooths out, running rich like liquid silver. All Faeries have voices designed for song, so it is no surprise that it is beautiful.

Mercurial Knight does not look at him as he sings, steady but still quiet. Instead, he holds his glaive perfectly straight, his gaze lingering on an invisible grave. It is bittersweet, a gift come too late, but the song itself is not sorrowful, because the Faeries are not in the habit to mourn.

No, the tune is powerful and majestic, determined and confident. Before long, Silverbell finds himself drawn into it, his bells tinkling on beat as he sings along.

As it turns out, Elder Faerie was right, as he always is. Their voices blend together wonderfully, slotting atop one another as if they had been waiting endlessly for the opportunity. They sing, and sing, and sing, and though they barely look at each other, Silverbell feels closer to Mercurial Knight than he has ever been.

He hopes, somehow, Elder Faerie is hearing their duet. It's dedicated to him, after all.

#disappointing lack of faeries content around here so i am taking a quick break from pv and sm content #to unveil myself as a Faerie Enthusiast #i love these guys <3 #and i also love making up faerie cookie lore <3 #silverbell cookie #mercurial knight cookie #elder faerie cookie #crk #cookie run kingdom #the biscuit library

[placentaeater999]

My friends. Put your lobe fins together for...

PlacentaEater's Autism Fish Paper

This is 8 pages of absolute glory (not written very academically, i wanted it to be a bit more accessible and better formated for a random ass social media thing) that took me about 5 hours to make. There might be some grammar or spelling or punctuation mistakes, idc, im having a fun time and that's what matters. This isn't the most serious paper ever written.

Thanks you all for your patience, I know this has been long awaited. I'm really excited to share this with you all. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. <3

NOTE: The longer parts have TL;DRs on them if u dont wanna spend a ton of time reading it ;)

#trans #autism #fish #autistic #fishes #marine biology #mr eater speaks #placentaeater's autism fish form #placentaeaters autism fish paper #the unveiling #autistic spectrum #i love fish #special interest #the placenta files

[250318]

© 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙨𝙞𝙙𝙚 𝙡𝙤𝙫𝙚. | preview

#stray kids #hyunjin #p:preview #e:rock star #fs:one side love. #231021 #5 star dome tour #unveil 13

[quotelr]

We think you'll find that every woman in her heart of hearts longs for three things: to be romanced, to play an irreplaceable role in a great adventure, and to unveil beauty. That's what makes a woman come alive.

John Eldredge, Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul

#John Eldredge #Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul #quotelr #quotes #literature #lit #inspirational #life #love

[pinkniz]

Me when the Dislyte OST:

#dislyte #ehnnehegnegb #i love this game's music so much #soulmate fight for all that i am refuge and all of brewster's themes my beloved #DONT EVEN GET ME STARTED ON THE TRUTH UNVEILED THAT ONE IS SOOO GOOD👹

[ricopop]

Sharing the contents of these documents with unverified personnel, including unenlightened members of the study, uninvolved strangers, faulty/post-experimentation fellow employees, or any unrelated persons by any means of duplication, word of mouth, or otherwise, is strictly prohibited and as such, offenders of this rule will be dealt their consequences.

@superbellsubways @cephalonheadquarters hi :3

Bonus doodles below cut 🐀

Honestly, he should know better than to Share highly confidential information with someone he barely Knows . Bend him into shape .

#lore related post uugghhhhh IM KIND OF LIKE HOW IT TURNED OUTTT IDKKK #rico art #virtual assistants #virus #oscillo #unit 586 #rico ocs #ocs #uhmmumum what else do i tag my art with i forgor 😭 #I HOPE SOME OF THE SHIT IS AT LEASY SLIGJTLY LEGIBLE ... #if not i can provide a transcript if any of u want uhmmmmmmm grins #i love oscillo! !!! more lore related things soon maybeee i wanna slowly unveil whay i have planned for him giggle #anyways yaaaaaaurr ok bye guys :3

[harunayuuka2060]

Twst Unveil Event: The goddess of love's blessing Part 2

Yuurin: *in this dress and hairstyle*

The Savanaclaw students: ...

Leona, Ruggie, and Jack: ...

Savanaclaw student A: L-Little sis? You're gorgeous and all, but are you going to class looking like the goddess you are?

Yuurin: To be honest, senpai, I don't want to.

Savanaclaw student B: Then why not change to something else? We've got cooler outfit for ya—

Yuurin: The nymphs dressed me.

The Savanaclaw students: ...

Savanaclaw student C: Shit. We can't do anything about that.

Leona: ...

Leona: Looks like we have no choice.

Leona: Ruggie, Jack, and I will accompany you.

Ruggie: Nope. Jack and I will accompany Yuurin.

Ruggie: You stay here.

Leona: Why?

Ruggie: You're going to beat up every student who looks at her.

Leona: Oh yeah? And what's the problem with that?

Yuurin: Leona-senpai, I'll be fine. After all, not everyone knows I'm actually a girl.

Leona: ...

Leona: Yuurin, people are already hitting on you even though they believe you're a boy.

The Savanaclaw students: *nods in agreement*

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: I've got the strength of Hercules.

The Savanaclaw students: ...

Leona: ...

Leona: Promise me that you'll punch them hard in the face if anyone tries to be funny.

Yuurin: Yes, Leona-senpai.

Riddle: Y-Yuurin?

Yuurin: Good morning, Riddle-senpai.

Riddle: ...

Riddle: *clears throat* What are you doing here?

Yuurin: The headmaster hasn't allowed me to attend any class today.

Riddle: Is it because you're not wearing a uniform?

Yuurin: Yes.

Riddle: Hm. Yuurin, you're not the type to violate dress code. So I assume there must be a reason why you're wearing a dress today.

Yuurin: *nods*

Riddle: I see. Anyway, I'm glad you decided to visit Heartslabyul.

Yuurin: It's one of places I know where no one will bother me.

Riddle: Then... How come you didn't return to Savanaclaw?

Yuurin: ...

Yuurin: My godmothers are preventing me from going back to my dorm.

Riddle: Godmothers?

Yuurin: Yes. They are nymphs.

Yuurin: They're urging me to go to other places instead.

Riddle: ...

Azul: So Yuurin can't go back to Savanaclaw dorm because of his current state?

Leona: Yes. And not only that, he can't be accompanied by anyone from Savanaclaw. That includes me.

Vil: Oh dear. You must be really annoyed by that, Leona.

Leona: How would you feel if Epel is not in your sight, huh?!

Vil: ...

Idia: Okay, mom, dad. Let's not fight here.

Leona and Vil: Shut up!

Idia: ...

Azul: Anyway, Leona, are you here to ask us to accept Yuurin into our dorms just in case?

Leona: Yes. Although Yuurin has his own money, I'll be the one paying for his accomodations.

Vil: I don't need your money. Yuurin can stay in Pomefiore anytime.

Idia: Same thing in Ignihyde.

Azul: I'm running a business so I'll be accepting a payment. Thank you.

Riddle: Where are you planning to go now?

Yuurin: To Pomefiore. Vil-senpai has a room for me there.

Riddle: *sad frowns* I'm sorry. I wish I could offer you a room, but Heartslabyul already has too many students.

Yuurin: Don't worry about it, senpai. I have enjoyed chatting with you.

Riddle: *chuckles* Please come again whenever you have a free time.

'He's cute.'

'But he's short. Cross him out.'

Yuurin and Riddle: !!!

Riddle: Wh-What was that?!

#twisted wonderland #twst yuurin #twst riddle #twst leona #twst ruggie #twst jack #twst savanaclaw #twst azul #twst vil #twst idia #google image #twst unveil: the goddess of love's blessing

[petit-papillion]

Charles 💙

Livery unveiling | Miami | 1 May 2024

📸 leclercsletters

#love this photo! #charles leclerc #also thank you clara for the hp erasure #miami gp 2024 #miami blue livery unveiling

[science-lings]

AU where Phoenix is just slightly more spiritually sensitive so instead of just being able to hear Mia's ghost, he gets to hang out with his great great (x?) grandfather Ryuunosuke who imprinted on him the moment he decided to become a defense attorney for gay reasons.

Also if anyone could magically be there for Pheonix while Edgeworth is fake-dead it would be Ryuunosuke.

I'm also a staunch believer in both Phoenix and Ryuu having rough/distant relationships with their family so it's funny to think that the only biological family member you can stand is the one that haunts you and looks exactly like you if you time traveled and cut your hair unevenly with safety scissors.

#i do think that ryunosuke judges pheonix so hard for his taste in men #oh you want a condescending european man with gray middle-parted hair and vampire fashion? oh you're defending him in court? #falling into the gaa/dgs side of aa #some of my favorite things about phoenix are mirrored in ryuu and it's making me so happy #oh you seem to be really open about your emotions but you push down all the messed up stuff so no one notices? you can't stand being alone? #I love them i love seeing them go through mental anguish #i like how phoenix is the crybaby one and ryuu is the one with severe baby face disorder #they're so pathetic but will absolutely destroy the legal world in any place they step foot in #whoops accidentally unveiled decades of corruption and government conspiracies bc I was being too nice to a stranger #ryunosuke naruhodo #phoenix wright #naruhodo ryuichi #ace attorney #going crazy stupid over here don't mind me

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

WAIT SORRY, I just sent a ask a second ago BUT IM PRETTY SURE ITS MERCH, the fact that howdy was on there is probably meaning its to be sold in a store of some kind, like his shop. definitely a stretch tho

no no i'm with you on that. my first thought had been "physical howdy puppet?" but then i thought about it for more than one second and came to the Merch Conclusion as well for the same reasons. it might be a Wally plush! that's my guess!

#im gonna have to check my bank account and see what my Possible Budget is #what id be willing to spend... #what amount i can Part With.... #but yeah the way it seems 'marketed' in a way #clown saying that its a big moment for him #them setting a specific drop time.... a Curtain signifying an Unveiling.... #its almost certainly merch yeah! #we'll see we'll see! #whatever it is im excited and im gonna love it merch or otherwise #rambles from the bog #if its merch im glad clown is able to do this! he deserves the income! #and also id be absolutely fucking Delighted - beyond delighted! - to have wally In My House #we could hold staring contests! #i can put him with my crocheted Home that i havent made yet unless you view time nonlinearly in that case yes i have!

[thefirstknife]

The Witness and the Unveiling

I've been processing the new cutscene for days now and had a lot of good conversations with other people. A lot of people are interested in figuring out what this cutscene means for the lore book Unveiling, which is also my big interest. I'll talk about the lore book itself and how it related to the cutscene and what that possibly means for our understanding of the setting.

A LOT of the text will be super speculative, very long, often abstract and ultimately not conclusive. I'll drop absolutely everything I can think of to discuss about this to try and gather every possible question and possible answers in one place. But the truth is that we don't know the answers to these questions and maybe we never will.

What is the Unveiling lore book?

First things first. The Unveiling is a lore book that we started uncovering at the end of Shadowkeep. Shadowkeep campaign ends with us acquiring a strange artifact: an orb that we recover from the Lunar Pyramid, in front of the statue of a veiled figure. As soon as we touch it, we are transported into the Black Garden and the cutscene with our clone plays.

After this cutscene, we return to the Moon and we give the orb we collected to Eris. At the time of Shadowkeep's original release, Eris worked on the orb for weeks to come, revealing 1 lore tab per week. Every page of this lore book is narrated by an unknown entity who told us about the time before the universe existed and then about the creation of the universe. It also told us about the Gardener and the Winnower, their struggle, their philosophies, what we (Guardians) mean to them and ultimately what might be coming in the future. It's one of the fundamental texts for Destiny.

Is the Unveiling now retconned with the new cutscene?

This is a question that gets both asked and claimed a lot. The answer is no. First and foremost, if we're talking about a hard retcon (Bungie saying that this lore book is no longer considered canon or Bungie simply ignoring to mention it ever again), that is literally impossible. Unveiling is the culmination of a non-vaulted campaign that's considered a big part of the Light and Darkness saga and it will never be removed from canon. This text is not only the ending of a campaign, it is referenced in-game; characters have canonically read it and commented on it, most notably in Witch Queen Collector's Edition and it's directly referenced in the lore book Inspiral from the newest raid which I'll touch on later. But the point is, if they wanted to quickly push Unveiling under the rug, they wouldn't have told us "hey remember Unveiling?" with the Lightfall's raid lore.

If people are talking about a retcon in the sense of "we believed that certain things from this text are true, but now new information is challenging that, does that mean that the original text is being retroactively changed or rendered pointless?" The answer is also no, though with a big caveat. (super long post under)

The thing is that the Unveiling was never 100% proven true. We have always known this. We've received this text from a Darkness artifact and the narrator of it is very clearly both biased and unreliable. The Unveiling is not telling us objective truth, it's telling us a biased interpretation of something that may or may not be truth. There is probably some truth to the Unveiling, which I'll get into a bit later, but it is largely a propaganda piece, meant to sway us to the side of the Darkness and reject the Traveler (Gardener). It uses a familiar and casual language to make it more relatable while it talks about how the Gardener made a fundamental mistake by wanting to introduce complexity and unpredictability to life.

So if new information comes out and says "Unveiling was all a lie or wrong or simply a myth with little connection to reality" it would be perfectly in line with what we know about Unveiling right now. I expected that at some point we should learn directly if Unveiling was just a biased tale filled about something incomprehensible that may never be fully true. The new cutscene does nothing to Unveiling outside of simply giving it a new context and a new way to interpret it. This is not new for the Destiny setting which is actually filled with unreliable narrators, characters who lie and characters who are wrong. As a matter of fact, that's what any setting should be like if it strives for realistic storytelling.

The fact that the Unveiling is directly referenced in the newest lore from the newest raid means that Bungie didn't magically forget about this lore book. They literally basically added two extra pages of it with Root of Nightmares. But we never knew the true meaning of the Unveiling so any new information that confirms or denies certain parts of it makes full sense in the story.

Unveiling and the Witness cutscene

So, what are the issues and contention between these two things? Well, there's a lot. A lot of little details from the Witness cutscene are now putting a lot of original interpretations of Unveiling into question. Did we blindly believe in this origin of the universe myth that the Unveiling told? Is it a complete fabrication? Is there at least a kernel of truth to it? Who wrote the Unveiling?

The biggest divergence comes from the fact that Unveiling claims there are incomprehensible entities that created the universe called Gardener and Winnower; the Gardener becoming the Traveler and the Winnower being completely unknown. The cutscene explicitly calls the Traveler "Gardener" but it's revealed that was a name given to it by the Witness' species when they stumbled upon it on their planet, covered in dirt. How can this be the entity that created the universe?

When the Witness was officially introduced at the end of the Witch Queen, the immediate assumption of many was that the Witness was the Winnower. This is now categorically untrue, at least on some level (will get to it eventually later); the Witness is not an entity that fought the Gardener in the allegorical garden that predates the existence of the universe. So does the Winnower still exist as that entity that fought in the garden?

Let's summarise the Unveiling piece by piece first. First page is an introduction with a lot of grand claims about the nature of existence. It immediately makes it clear that the narrator is selling us a worldview:

But imagine the abomination of a world where nothing can end and no choice can be preferred to any other. Imagine the things that would suffer and never die. Imagine the lies that would flourish without context or corrective. Imagine a world without me.

Pages two, three, four and five claim to detail a time from before the universe existed presented in an allegorical tale about a Gardener and Winnower that live in a garden and play a game. The allegorical language is not subtextual, it's very much explicitly told that this is an allegory.

Once upon a time,* a gardener and a winnower lived** together in a garden.*** * It was once before a time, because time had not yet begun. ** We did not live. We existed as principles of ontological dynamics that emerged from mathematical structures, as bodiless and inevitable as the primes. *** It was the field of possibility that prefigured existence.

The story goes: before the universe existed, Gardener and Winnower played a game of life. They were able to configure the game board with starting set pieces and then let it play out and see what comes out of it. The end of the game was always the same; the same pattern would always win and the game's ending would always be predictable. This bothered the Gardener who wanted complexity and freedom. It didn't bother the Winnower; the Winnower prefered the clean and clear cut outcome that always follows the same principles and always leads to the same conclusion.

Page six is an interjection with a philosophical question about the nature of a specific protein. The page explains it to us and asks if this protein is an agent of Darkness or the Light. This is not entirely relevant to the topic at hand, but it's important for the understanding of how Unveiling is trying to exert its bias onto the reader by presenting some sort of a gotcha. It wants us to come to the conclusions that benefits the narrator.

After that, page seven resumes the origin story of the universe. They fought together in the garden about their differences and about the Gardener's decision to make a new rule for the game. Their fight was so fundamental that it led to the creation of the universe. The chapter title is "T=0" which means "time equals zero" and is a part of understanding how the universe was made out of nothing.

The garden had given birth to creation, the rules were in place, and there would never be a second chance. We played in the cosmos now. We played for everything.

Page eight returns to trying to sway us to its side by telling us that the concept of predation is what made all of life possible and that it is the narrator who is responsible for our existence.

It was the first defector—the first predator. It changed everything. Now the oozeballs needed sensors to watch for danger, and brains to integrate those senses and generate plans of survival, and swift neurons and muscles to enact that plan. This was the Cambrian Explosion, the great birth of complex life on your world. I caused it. I, the defector, the destroyer, the one who takes.

It's selling us a worldview again. It wants us to believe that the reason we have everything we do is because of the sword logic; everyone fighting for the right to exist. When everyone fights, everyone has to evolve to defend and survive, therefore the reason we've evolved is because we had to fight. This is a huge contrast with how the Gardener works. The Gardener jumpstarts and uplifts species by gardening, terraforming, evolving them without the need to struggle. The Gardener also doesn't pick and choose when it comes to terraforming; everyone is equally important and you don't have to justify or prove your right to exist. An ant's value is the same as a human's. To the narrator, that simply cannot be. If the ant can't prove the right to exist by being stronger, then it should not exist. This always showed bias and the way this ideology works on the misinterpretation of the "survival of the fittest" phrase; survival of the fittest isn't "survival of the strong" it's "survival of those who are best adapted to their environment."

Page nine is very important and is one of the things that makes Unveiling possibly true in some aspects. Namely, this page called Patternfall, is about the Vex. The narrator describes the Vex and how they existed in the allegorical garden from which they escaped into the universe with the Big Bang. Before the battle between Gardener and Winnower, the Vex, this pattern, always won the game. The Vex were the winning outcome of every game played, the source of Gardener's frustration and Winnower's elation.

Given that we know that the Vex are real and that they have a... tenuous relationship with time, this part of the story feels correct. It would make sense that the Vex predate time itself, which would explain why they are able to navigate it and manipulate it as easily as we manipulate any other force; the Vex already existed when all of time was a singularity before the Big Bang, this is known to them. Not only that, but the Vex can't understand paracausality, which was added to the game as a new rule, a rule they've never seen before. The description of the Vex in this chapter is also on point so it's has to be correct or close to correct.

They propagated in the saline meltwater of comets orbiting the first stars. That broth of chemicals became their substrate, and they learned to catalyze impossible chemistry with quantum tricks. Then, they rained from the sky into the steaming seas of fallow worlds, and there they built their first housings from geometry and silica.

We know that they are linked to first stars because of Clovis Bray's expedition to 2082 Volantis, an impossibly old star dating back to the beginning of the universe that the Vex have kept artificially alive ever since by refuelling it.

In all their transformations, they retained that kernel of ultimate self-sufficiency that had made them victors in the flower game. But they are not incontrovertibly destined to rule this cosmos. They were made before Light and Darkness, but the rules are different now, and even this pattern must adapt.

Patternfall also makes a note about the Vex that are alligned with Darkness: Sol Divisive of the Black Garden.

They are not all mine, not in the way that admirers such as my man Oryx are mine: utterly devoted to the practice of my principle. But some of them have, nonetheless, found their way home.

This specific page tells us that at least in some way, some sections of the Unveiling must be telling an objective truth, or at least be as close to the truth as possible. Barring any new reveals about the Vex, this seems to fit with what we know about them so it must be correct. The Vex are the way they are because they predate the universe and their existence in the universe right now is the only remnant of a time before time. They used to be the final shape, always, until paracausality was introduced and now they must fight with the rest of us to reclaim their position. This means that the allegorical garden where the Gardener and Winnower lived and fought must be in some way real. Remember, we are talking about a time from before the universe. The word "real" is a very loose description of that place, but the Vex must've come from there and possibly have a memory of being there so it there must be a "there" before the Big Bang. Mind boggling stuff going on. (As an aside, the Vex HAVE to be the core of The Final Shape expansion. They gotta. Also note that there is a weird metaphysical space on the other side of the portal)

Speaking of aspects that have to be true or at least reflect truth; there is the Tree of Silver Wings. This is mentioned throughout Unveiling as a tree that existed in the garden that was toppled when the Gardener and Winnower fought. The Tree is clearly real because we've seen iterations of it several times now. A completely new Tree was grown in the cradle on Io and now we can also see the Tree in Root of Nightmares, growing at the cradle on the Witness' Pyramid. The seeds of the Tree are also real; Osiris had one and so did Calus and we've seen both. How does the allegorical Tree from an allegorical garden from before the universe existed relate to the real Trees in a very real universe is completely unknown.

Page ten is a lot more attempts to convince us that the narrator is the correct choice to follow and that its philosophy is the winning one and that we should abandon the Gardener and join them. The narrator also tells us that we don't have rush with our answer because it is coming over to meet us anyway. This was the end of Shadowkeep so it was quite an ominous message. The Shadowkeep year ended with the arrival of the Black Fleet to our system and then was further expanded in Beyond Light where we gained a more direct contact with them and their gifts of stasis.

The final page, eleven, is Eris' message to us about hope and resistance to the allure of Darkness. Mind you that she's not talking about using aspects of Darkness as tools, but more about the philosophy of it as it's presented in Unveiling; you can use the Darkness without entertaining the Darkness and the philosophy of the extreme version of the sword logic.

Okay, so what's the issue between this and the Witness cutscene? Well, before the reveal of the Witness in general, we believed that the narrator of the Unveiling, the Winnower, is the big bad. The entity that is the origin of Darkness, the entity that made the Black Fleet, the entity that controls our enemies. This was never confirmed, but it was a reasonable conclusion to Unveiling, until further notice. Now we know that some parts of this aren't true. The Witness is the big bad and the Pyramids are just the remains of its species' technology. And while the Witness does fulfil some of the roles of the Winnower, we now know that the Witness is not the origin of Darkness so it cannot be the Winnower that's spoken of in Unveiling, not the Winnower that existed before the universe.

The Witch Queen and some hints here and there before that (mostly in the Presage mission where Savathun more or less explicitly told us that the Darkness is not the same as the entity that we're fighting against) introduced the Witness directly without any metaphors or vague language. We finally saw this being, in full glory, as it emerged, moved and spoke. From then until now, we've tried to understand the Witness but we really knew nothing substantial.

A lot of conversations were about the nature of the Witness and the Winnower, the narrator of Unveiling. Were they the same thing? Or are they separate entities? Is the Winnower even real or is it literally just a metaphor for a philosophy, an idea, that the Witness represents? There's always people who will immediately clamor about "retcons" but once again, the Unveiling was never an objective truth. We made assumptions about the Unveiling and its narrator, but none of those assumptions were ever confirmed in any way. This is also reflected in-game with characters discussing the meaning of the Unveiling in many different ways. Unveiling being unreliable and unclear was intended. The Witness existing does not contradict or remove Unveiling's significance. It just recontextualises and already unreliable text that was never objective to begin with.

And it continues to do so. The Witness cutscene first and foremost shows us the Traveler, curiously covered in dirt and depicted almost as if it's rising from the ground. The Witness' people are described as discovering it and naming it "Gardener." It then uplifted them, terraformed their world and gave them a golden age which is familiar to us.

But wait. If the Gardener is from a time before the universe, how is it now suddenly a dirt covered orb on a random planet? This is where the Unveiling being interpreted literally becomes a problem. If the Gardener (and Winnower) aren't from a time before the Big Bang and that whole allegory of a garden that existed before the universe is a lie, then what is the Unveiling and who wrote it and for what purpose?

I've seen a lot of good discussions on it that I'd like to highlight here. This post discusses things in a similar way to what I'm writing here, for example. Just a little while ago, I reblogged this interpretation of it which I really like which differs from this. There's been a lot of various similar theories in which the Witness has simply created this idea of the Winnower and the associated philosophy after it went through an existential crisis of catastrophic proportions; the Unveiling is simply entirely a lie, an attempt to make people believe the winnowing philosophy.

It's a good question to ask what of the story of the Vex and the Gardener if Unveiling is fully a lie. A really important note here is that we've known from other sources that the Traveler is the Gardener. Both from other characters, most notably in Lightfall from Osiris, but also from the Traveler itself and the Unveiling. So if Unveiling is bullshit, what about the Vex and the Gardener? Why did the Gardener even appear on the random planet from the dirt?

My theory is that Unveiling is partially correct. Something incomprehensible WAS happening before the universe existed; it involved forces that would end up becoming the Light and Darkness, the Gardener, the Vex and probably the Veil. This period of time is so abstract and unfathomable that we cannot physically understand it through anything but allegory. Some believe that the Veil now fulfils the role of the Winnower which is possible, but I'm not sure how likely; we will need even more information on the Veil to make that judgement call. Either way, Unveiling's myth about the origins of everything could still hold true in some regard. If that's true, we know that the Gardener made the new rule for the game (paracausality), caused the Big Bang and inserted itself into the new game (aka into the universe). The Gardener thus became the Traveler which it has refered to as being its body.

It feels like lead and neutronium and electroweak matter fashioned into a moon-sized ball that you must carry as you move.

The time before the universe wasn't physical, but the universe is. This body, the Traveler, had to have been made and it's possible that it was made on the Witness' planet. Perhaps that was one of the first planets in existence, a place where the Gardener forged its body and emerged into the existence as a physical being capable of terraforming. The Light is the domain of the physical so it makes sense that the Gardener has to utilise this physicality to be able to do its thing.

The Darkness is psychic; it's emotion, consciousness, the mind. It doesn't have to be physical. Perhaps the Winnower IS real, but it's simply a metaphysical idea that exists in the universe, but cannot be seen. It can influence others; everyone who ponders on the nature of existence runs the risk of being exposed to the idea of winnowing. It's inevitable. Every conscious being can be influenced by Darkness and it's many possibilities; some perfectly neutral or even good and some bad.

And the Witness' people went highly in-depth in their research of the Gardener and then later the Veil. If they were looking for answers to meaning and purpose, they would've likely come close to understanding the origin of the universe. Perhaps from the Gardener (who was there, before the Big Bang) or perhaps by exploring the Veil (which is, as of now, still fairly unknown as an entity) or maybe even the combination of their investigation into both of those. There's some credence to this in particular, given the memory from Ahsa in week 3, mainly this part:

Two halves of a whole... long divided. A... schism between them. Reunited. [exhales in joy] A glimpse beyond... to the beginning...

This most certainly refers to the Traveler and the Veil being reunited and connected as the Witness' people attempted the connection for the first time. And it offered them "a glimpse beyond to the beginning." Beginning of what if not the universe? The connection was never fully realised and the two were never fully reunited. But they were in Lightfall and in Lightfall, this created a portal to an incomprehensible realm into which nobody but the Witness can enter (for now). This realm acts as if it exists somewhere outside of normal spacetime, somewhere beyond, and it resembles... well, a garden world, like a garden from the allegory of existence before the universe.

If the Witness' people saw how the universe began as explored in the Unveiling, they would've absolutely come to the conclusion that everything is meaningless and that the Gardener did something that led to untold suffering, basically on a whim to seek more complex, but ultimately pointless life. Instead of this perfectly ordered garden world where every outcome is known and there is no deviation from the rules, we received a universe that is seemingly random, chaotic and meaningless. At least that would be the interpretation of it in their mind.

The Gardener could've just let things play out infinitely in the game with the same outcome, with the same pattern, but it didn't. It made the universe instead, filled with infinite mysteries and infinite possibilities and you will never know which one of those possibilities are "correct" and which choices are better than others. You will never know where to go and who to follow and what to do and there is no inherent value to any specific choice you make. Countless species will live and die "without meaning and purpose."

This was terrfying to the Witness' people, possibly exactly because they've seen how things were before. Before the Gardener's actions, everyone would have a specific purpose to fulfil in service of reaching the final shape which is always the same. Now, there is no goal, nothing to work towards, nothing to specific to strive for. So they decided to follow the philosophy of an entity that fought the Gardener and take up its job; to winnow in search for the final shape. To reshape reality, reset existence, "free" the Gardener from its own creation.

In that way, Unveiling is still very much true and it's the same as ever; it's a subjective interpretation of the origins of the universe told in a biased nature by a being that learned to despise the chaos of existence and would want to return to the way things were before.

So who wrote the Unveiling then? Again, many theories. Since the Witness' reveal in WQ, a lot of people speculated that the Witness wrote it and that the Witness is same as the Winnower. That could be true now, in a way; the Witness took up the mantle of the Winnower so it might as well be it. The Unveiling is written with a tone and voice that differs from how we know the Witness, but now we also know that the Witness is a being of billions; perhaps there is a voice in there who writes text and who speaks that way. It could also be just a ruse; the Witness is a manipulator who lies constantly. It could've written this text in this way to deliberately confuse, manipulate and coerce us; the Unveiling "tone" is fake and it was also fake when it spoke to Oryx.

Another option is that Unveiling was still written by the entity we know as the Winnower. If the Winnower is the origin of Darkness, coming from the garden from before the universe, then it is metaphysical; it's in the mind and consciousness. It doesn't need a body or to be fully physical. It can influence and talk and BE simply by being the origin of consciousness. Every conscious being can access the Winnower. The Winnower is every idea that leads to predation and killing and death. It's every thought and dream and memory and pain. It could've touched the Witness' people and pushed them to adopt its philosophy when they went too far with their research and especially when they connected to the Veil. It could've tried doing the same to us, when we connected to the Darkness artifact in a Pyramid at the end of Shadowkeep.

There is also the angle that the tale from Unveiling is literally entirely untrue. There was nothing before the universe existed. The description of the Vex was the Witness' attempt to understand how they function, or a piece of truth added to make the rest of the text seem correct to those that read it. The myth of the garden and the two entities fighting could be an attempt to give meaning to how everything started, giving a reason to pursue the Traveler and feel justified doing it.

The main point here is that we don't know and we might never know given the incredibly allegorical and mythologised way that Unveiling is talking about something that is incredibly hard to conceptualise in the first place. An interesting bit to add here is the concept of egregore:

Egregore (also spelled egregor; from French égrégore, from Ancient Greek ἐγρήγορος, egrēgoros 'wakeful') is an esoteric concept representing a non-physical entity that arises from the collective thoughts of a distinct group of people.

It's not an accident that egregore in Destiny is a physical manifestation of psychic connections that links points of Darkness together. It comes from this originally; basically if enough people think about the same thing or believe in the same thing, they will create an "egregore" = their thought or belief will spawn a non-physical entity associated with that thought or belief. In that sense, the Witness' people may have created the Winnower when they all united in thinking about how the universe is meaningless without a Winnower. The Winnower is an egregore created by the Witness' people and the belief in this egregore manifests physically as the egregore fungus which infests and links everyone who believes in the Winnower. Perhaps, even, if the Winnower is that egregore, something created by the first beings that ventured that far into metaphysics and then it retroactively became tied to the universe. Once the Winnower was created, the Witness' people tried explaining where it fits into the universe, constructing an origin myth around it. Perhaps they weren't aware that they manifested the Winnower, and believed that they simply discovered it and that the origin myth they constructed was them learning some bigger truth.

There are issues and questions with any of these explanations and they all go into super abstract possibilities and options. If the garden before the universe is entirely a myth, then what of the Gardener and the Vex and the Tree of Silver Wings? If there's truth to how the universe began, what about the Witness being simply a species that got uplifted and went mad with horrors of knowledge? Was the Winnower real in the garden before time or is it merely something conjured from the minds of a people who wanted purpose and meaning?

Furthermore, what about Inspiral, the raid lore book whose last two pages are very reminiscent of the Unveiling, reference it and function almost like extra two pages for it? Inspiral is particularly strange because each page starts with a description of a being that left its memories in the book. First of the final two pages, Meaning, describes its narrator as:

A dream of a metaphor made starkly, an allegory discussed in study of ontology, in Darkness not unkind. It leaves behind a warped, barely-real data fragment to mark its passing.

And the second, Winnowing:

A dream of a friendly conversation with someone impossible to see, cloaked in shadows. It leaves behind an impossible data fragment to mark its passing.

Neither of these descriptions fit the Witness. The Witness is not a metaphor or an allegory, nor is it "barely-real." It is also not "impossible to see" nor does it leave behind "impossible data." The Witness is very much real, though clearly ascended into a state of being beyond our comprehension, but we can very much hear it and see it. The cutscene very clearly explains that the Witness began as just another species and achieved a higher existence; it's not some weird mystical energy that originated before the universe began. Most of all, the Witness is neither kind nor friendly.

The only metaphor and allegory is the garden from before the universe and the Gardener and the Winnower that fought in it. The Gardener manifested as the Traveler, but the Winnower is unknown to us. These two pages read, again, almost exactly the same as Unveiling and they bear no resemblance to the Witness, neither in tone nor in the description of their narrator(s). Obviously, it could be lies and manipulations on purpose which is something to keep in mind in general.

But the page Meaning very clearly makes a distinction between two entities:

There is a voice that echoes across the Darkness, and it asks this question: what is the purpose of it all? And there is another voice that calls back and says: listen, I will tell you a purpose. I will tell you of a Final Shape.

After seeing the cutscene, the first sentence could obviously refer to the Witness' people. They sought purpose and meaning. The second specifies that something answered, something else, when they dug deep into the Veil. Did that something exist on its own, predating the Witness, or did the Witness create it, like an egregore? Either way, the Witness inquired and something returned the call OR the text is referring to a generalised idea of anyone exploring the Darkness, asking that question and then getting a reply from the Winnower, which is a creation of the Witness.

On the other hand, there's the issue of the Darkness being a much more complex phenomenon than we've previously believed. If the Winnower is the origin of Darkness, then would it not represent ALL of Darkness? As of right now, both Unveiling and Inspiral pages that we might be able to attribute to the Winnower are distinctly focused only on the sword logic aspect which fits more with the Witness. The Witness and its pawns have extermined species that also used the Darkness, in different ways. Would the Winnower not acknowledge the entirety of Darkness? This issue can be better solved if we insist that the Witness is what invented or manifested the Winnower and its ideology. Darkness is more than winnowing, that's for sure, but the Witness and its manifestation of the Winnower are focused only on winnowing.

Some more concrete answers may lay in our understanding of the Veil. We're beginning to gather more information about this entity and the cutscene itself shed some light on it as well. The Veil was connected to the Traveler, always, even before the Witness' people found it. It was not near the Traveler, but instead somewhere far away where the Witness' people had to fly to in order to bring it back. Some already believe that the Veil is the Winnower or a product of it; that the Winnower and the Gardener were these abstract entities in the garden before the universe and then became the Veil and the Traveler post-Big Bang, but still connected.

The truth is that this is a highly complicated concept to think about, explore and explain. The Unveiling could be one being's attempt to explain how the universe began and it could be true or it could be false. Nothing in the cutscene explicitly tells us either way, nor does it render the Unveiling useless (and it also doesn't render it a word of god).

The science and philosophy about the origin of the universe are unknown in real life and will probably remain unknown in Destiny. To expect a fictional story to accurately and unambiguously tell us how the universe began is to expect A LOT. The only ones that could truly maybe tell us are the Traveler (Gardener) and the Veil. The question is, would we be able to withstand knowing something like that. Many who peered into the Veil have lost their minds and the Traveler does not speak of things like that because divulging such information would inevitably put someone on a set path. To know everything is to lose choice. You know exactly where to go, how, when and why, as well as what will happen when you get there. The Gardener wants us to make our own fate and it wants the universe to not lead into any specific outcome.

This is some of the most bizarre and wild high concept scifi stuff we've ever had in Destiny. I don't expect us to solve it so quickly after major new information has been revealed and there's still a lot more to find out. This is a really exceptionally long dive into some of the theories and options. A lot of people don't like this type of unreliable philosophical conundrums and would much rather just prefer to be told the facts. And I don't think we'll ever know facts about these topics in a way that would make them easy to digest. Unveiling might one day be fully explained in a way that will allow us to construct the true history of the universe and its origins, but it might also not be. Perhaps it will remain a perpetual mystery to force to wonder about these concepts.

I'd personally prefer a little bit of mystery to remain; for both us and the Witness to forever wonder what was the meaning of it all, what was our purpose, have we chosen it "correctly" and what our choices could've led to if we've done things differently.

#destiny 2 #destiny 2 spoilers #season of the deep #season of the deep spoilers #witness #unveiling #lore vibing #long post #i did say this cutscene made me insane #and then also it brought up questions about the unveiling and unveiling makes me super insane #long rambling post be upon ye #i really enjoy reading thoughts on this so if anyone would interpret something differently or has better evidence feel free to share #also btw don't feel bad if this is all super confusing #i believe the story around it very much intended to give us a headache and require like 4 degrees in philosophy #i myself am also confused by a lot of the points raised by this whole thing #being confused is not a inherently a bad thing. we are moved to learn by confusion #it pushes us to want to explore and understand #i love this incomprehensible eldritch scifi shit that makes me question existence and reality #no wonder people go insane when they start unraveling the knowledge about the universe