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#about his happiness or wellbeing
whetstonefires · 3 months
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See I don't necessarily disagree with what seems to be the primary reading that Yue Qingyuan's shifu fucked him over, caring nothing for his needs or preferences and only for whether he was useful. That makes sense, it ties into plenty of the generational and societal themes of the story. It fits.
But iirc we don't actually get enough information to know that's what happened.
And the thing is it would be so in-character and also thematically appropriate if Yue Qingyuan absolutely did not explain his goals or why he was working so hard, because it was private and shameful and he didn't expect any sympathy, and there was a high risk of losing everything if he blabbed.
And also if he engaged with the existing ruleset with which he was presented, i.e. 'can't go off on your own on personal business until you've mastered your sword,' in the most negative and controlling manner possible, as absolute commandments.
He's a different kind of guy but he comes from the same background as Shen Jiu! It fucked him up also!
He is very very very not a guy who trusts the system to make allowances for him--even once he has all the power he 'does what he wants' and 'makes selfish choices' as a conscious transgression; not something he has a right to do, just something he can get away with so he's gonna. (And ofc he spends almost all the latitude he grants himself on sqq.)
And even less is he a guy who opens up easily.
He isn't too proud to ask for help or pity, so much as he just doesn't expect to get any.
So in this interpretation, he understood that rule as a non-negotiable barrier in his path, the target to overcome, and focused all his considerable will and talent on overcoming it through the sphere of action he felt he had control over.
And fucked himself up bad.
Whereupon his teacher, possessing absolutely no context for this dumb shit their star pupil pulled, did the only thing they thought might work to save his life, paying in the process no attention to the raving of someone deep in a psychotic break.
Like, I feel like there should have been a better, kinder medical option, but I don't know for sure that there was, so I can't say with certainty this was the kind of cruelty that derives from not caring enough.
And it really would be kind of elegant and so typical of Yue Qingyuan's fundamental tragedy if the real mistake was 'not confiding in anybody' the whole time.
And he was just so deeply sunk into the understanding that explaining and asking were useless that, even looking back, it never really occurred to him that maybe his mistake wasn't 'fucking it up when trying too hard to solve everything on his own' but 'assuming there was no help to be had, and that he had to do it all on his own.'
Like. What if this really could all have been avoided if he'd just trusted and communicated with the adult in charge of him? But of course, of course his history of trauma (neglect, child abuse, exploitation, being the One Responsible for the younger kids whom he could not keep safe) meant he was absolutely not going to do that.
It was basically impossible. For the person he was, the person the world had made of him. And that's always been the core tragedy the whole novel circles back upon.
People can only ever be themselves, and so very often the elements of self that let them survive until now are that which dooms them, that means they need someone else to intervene if they're ever going to be saved. Because your personal doom is always the thing from which you can't save yourself.
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canisalbus · 3 months
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sorry im emotonal and going off of the other asks sent about machete and just i need to stress how beautiful it is to me that machete sees himself so undeserving of love and affection and feeling as if vasco's too good for him but despite all that he is so incredibly devoted to vasco and loving towards him (in his own way) but is so incredibly clear to anyone with eyes that just how in love he is with vasco. like it's not done out of a "oh god please never realize that you're too good for me here here let me overdo it with the affection" its done with the "i love you, and will always love you, no matter what happens to us or separates us, and i will give it to you as long as i am able, and if you ever leave, i won't be okay, but will still love you, and want you happy". like he doesn't use his own feelings of being undeserving taint his love or the way he loves for vasco, and it's so, so beautiful
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butchsophiewalten · 4 months
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Thought I had posted about this already whups. Martin made a really important twitter thread earlier:
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wolfsnooze · 1 year
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where does everything go when everything’s gone? / for my heart cannot break much more
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what would megumi’s life have been if he was actually raised by the zenin from day one? like either gojo lost the custody battle or they were able to scoop him up before gojo ever reached them. i doubt they would want to keep tsumiki with them so she’s not there for little baby megs.
i think it would be really cool to see a zenin raised megumi interacting with his fellow classmates when he attends the school, not to mention the contrast between him and gojo. like on paper they both should have gotten the same treatment-being pampered and spoiled rotten but we also know that the zenin think that hurting little kids makes them stronger so it would be super interesting to see megumi realise that the stuff that happened to him wasn’t normal and for gojo to have a guilt trip bc he wasn’t able to help megumi when he needed someone to help him the most.
So I have a fanfic that I’ve half written (no idea if I’ll ever finish it—I’d love to, it’s just hard to find the time) about EXACTLY THAT that I talked about in this post for an ask game.
That being said, that entire thing happens from Tsumiki’s perspective, and I agree with you—I don’t think the Zenin would have ever actually taken her too. They don’t want her. She’s not Zenin. She’s not a sorcerer. They only bought Megumi. For the most part, Megumi is absent from that post, and you asked about Megumi. So this is what I think would happen on Megumi's side of that post I linked.
It comes down to two things:
1. He is never, ever happy with the Zenin.
2. He never lets go of his sister.
Megumi’s old enough to remember Tsumiki when the Zenin take him away. He's old enough to love her. And I think that Megumi loves very quietly, but he also loves very violently. He wouldn't let his sister hold his hand on the walk to school, but he would sacrifice himself for her future.
I think the Zenin took him from his sister, and I think he kicked and screamed and wasn't strong enough. I think they thought he would forget her eventually.
And then I think he bit most of the Zenin Clan.
At the end of the day, what Megumi wanted was the one thing the Zenin were not willing to give him. They were never like the Gojo clan, they were never going to pamper him, but there are a great many things in this world that they would give the Ten Shadows finally returned to them. But they would not give him a non-sorcerer, non-Zenin sister who would only be a weakness to him. They refused to let him have any contact with his sister, and that was the source of a lot of what soured.
Any Megumi that was taken in by the Zenin would have been taken in to Naobito's household directly. He would be announced as the one who finally inherited their most cherished technique, and he would be declared heir, and the Zenin would call him beloved for it.
They would keep him in a room that was large and empty and almost always dark, and he wouldn't be allowed to decide when he slept or woke, and the door would always be locked from the outside. They would give him a wardrobe of expensive clothes that he hated, and he would never get to pick which of them he wore.
Megumi would hate them. He would hate all of them.
He's just not the type to be comfortable with or enjoy the adoration of others--especially when it's not backed up by genuine love. Megumi is someone who very much values sincerity and depth to emotion--it's one of the reasons why he seems to respect Yuuji so much. Yuuji is a good person who follows through with what he says. He's not just going to talk about wanting to save people--he's there making the sacrifices as he does it.
The Zenin do not actually love him. And he knows it. He's experienced love before, and this isn't it.
They love the idea of him. The fantasy of him that lives in their heads. He has no interest in being their little god prince to contend with the Gojo's own. He knows who he is, and it's not this. He wants to go home. He wants to find his sister again. He doesn't want to do this anymore.
And I think that's a feeling Megumi never escape: he just didn't want to do this anymore.
Megumi would feel like a bug pinned beneath glass in the Zenin compound. He would constantly have people managing him--when he ate, what he ate, what he wore, when he slept, when he woke, when he trained, what he did. Having to become a jujutsu sorcerer signified an inherent loss of control, but it's nothing compared to the sheer objectification that he goes through when the Zenin have exclusive control over him.
He has no power of what clothes he wears. How his hair is styled. His schedule, his diet, the people he speaks too--he's suffocating and the Zenin are just increasing pressure on him.
I don't think Gojo ever thought that would be Megumi's life.
We’re gonna just have this imagining exist in the same world as the Tsumiki centric fic described in the linked post, and in that, the reason why Gojo never took him in was because he didn’t know Megumi had a sister. He showed up, saw the divine dogs, realized Megumi had the Ten Shadows, and decided he couldn’t do this. He was a mess. He was grieving Suguru and Haibara. Megumi looked just like the man who killed Riko, and apparently inherited the fucking Ten Shadows of all the goddamn things. The Zenin would lose their shit, and Gojo didn’t have the energy to fight and told himself he didn’t need to, because if Megumi was the Ten Shadows he’d be cared for like a prince with the Zenin. He turned around and left and spent the rest of his life with Megumi in the back of his mind, always nagging him with whether he made the right decision. It wasn’t until Maki got there and made a few worrisome references to Megumi's standard of living that he started to really worry that he had made the wrong one, and it wasn't until he found out about Tsumiki that he knew it was the wrong decision.
It's like this: The Zenin hurt Megumi in every world.
It would be bad no matter what, but it really gets bad because Megumi refuses to stop trying to get back to Tsumiki. She's his sister. They didn't have anyone or anything in this world, but they had each other, and he couldn't let these people just take her away. He’s feral about it. He refuses to fit the mold they keep trying to cram him in. He’s trying to scale the walls to escape. He’s increasingly desperate and angry and the Zenin are getting more and more frustrated the longer he fights them. He’s the heir to the clan, and he can’t stop trying to leave it to get back to some random girl who isn’t his real sister and isn’t someone they’ll ever allow him to have.
It gets bad.
They put him under increasingly strict levels of control. He’s constantly being trained, which means he's constantly being hurt. He’s not allowed to speak to anyone without the clan head’s approval. He is under absolutely constant guard after he manages to get over the wall and halfway to his old neighborhood before they catch him again. Tsumiki’s name is not allowed to be said aloud, or his old name. He forgets his name used to be Fushiguro, but he doesn’t forget Tsumiki. He doesn’t let himself.
I think it escalates until it hits a breaking point. Megumi becomes increasingly self-destructive and non-responsive to everything they try. They push him to extremes that start risking permanent damage.
I think Megumi would try to hurt himself, eventually.
He wouldn't be in his right mind. He's in the most shit situation possible. He's undergoing pretty severe abuse. He'd be at the end of his rope from the lack of control over his own life, and he'd be spiteful as hell towards the Zenin. And the only thing he has to hurt them with is himself.
As a character, Megumi has always considered his own sacrifice as an acceptable means to the end of getting back at someone. Mahoraga, intrinsically, requires him killing himself as a way of killing someone else. He'd hurt himself if it was the only way he had of hurting them.
Naobito would cover it up. He'd never, ever want the rest of the clan to find out that it happened. It was already bad enough that Megumi openly hated them--he couldn't have the Zenin seeing any vulnerability in what was meant to be their most powerful member. He'd put Megumi in total lockdown until he could make it all go away.
Then they'd make a deal.
A binding vow. Megumi could never purposefully hurt himself again. He could never again try to leverage his own safety against the clan.
And in exchange, Tsumiki would be taken care of.
The last time Megumi saw his sister, she was on a sinking ship. They were running out of food, money, options--he doesn't know if she even has food anymore. He doesn't know if she lost the apartment or if there's still running water.
They're not letting him see her. But they are letting him take care of her. He can sacrifice another piece of control over himself, and she'll never have to worry about money again. They'll pay for her housing, her food, her education, for her every desire for as long as she lives. The trust the Zenin set up for her will be a generous one, and it will be managed meticulously by a trustee who can make sure she'll be provided for until she's old and grey. And Naobito will vow to never hurt her or send someone else to hurt her. She'll be safe. She'll be taken care of.
Megumi makes the deal.
In the end, the deal's what sort of breaks him.
Because he doesn't promise to stop looking for her, but the Zenin manage to make it a part of the terms anyway. When they approach Tsumiki's mother with the offer to be her family's beneficiary, they include a requirement that Tsumiki be moved to another city entirely with no forwarding address given. She needs to be somewhere that Megumi can never find her again.
The Zenin keep the old apartment. They pay the rent every month. And the next time Megumi manages to make it off compound, they let him make it all the way there before dragging him home. They let him see the empty apartment with all its empty rooms.
Naobito wants him to know that Tsumiki's gone. He wants him to know that he'll never find her again.
He tries to run a few more times after that, but he never makes it very far. He doesn't have anywhere to go.
In the linked post, Megumi finds Tsumiki, just once. She's on a class trip. He's on one of his very few and far between allowed excursions off the compound grounds, and he sees her in the crowd and recognizes her, and he ducks away from his escort before anyone can stop him.
She remembers him. He didn't think she would do that.
She tries to save him. He didn't think she would do that either.
She still loves him. And he was always too afraid to hope she would do that.
It goes the same way it did the first time. There's a car, and the Zenin shove him in it. She's on the outside, and he's trapped within, and he wishes she didn't scream so loudly when it happens. The sound never seems to leave his dreams.
His sister still loves him. Naoya hits him in the back of the head. He wakes up, and it was like she was never there at all.
But they hit him harder, after. Like they're trying to beat the memory of her out of him. He has even less freedom, when he already had next to none at all.
But he still has a sister. He has a place to go that isn't here. He just has to figure out where that is.
He wouldn't really have anyone in the Zenin clan. Most people are just... weird about him. Naoya's violently abusive. Naobito's weird and violently abusive. Everyone wants him to be someone he's not.
Maki would be his favorite.
He doesn't care about whether she's got cursed energy--his sister didn't have any. And she's obviously strong. She doesn't treat him like a divine blessing or try to force him to act a certain way. I think they would have genuinely liked each other, but kept each other at a distance. They're both trapped in an abusive situation and keep themselves safe by keeping everyone else at arm's length.
He would have been happy to see her get out, though. He would have told her that she could have his spot as heir or head or whatever when she came back if she wanted it. She would have told him that if he ever got out... well, fuck it. They could be something then. Family. Whatever the fuck they weren't allowed to be here.
She would have told him she's sorry, and she would have meant it. The only one she she regretted more than Megumi was Maki. He would have told her not to be, that if she dared to be sorry for getting out that he would never forgive her, and he would have meant that too.
I think his relationship with his own techinque would be very different in a world where the Zenin raised him. In canon, his issue is that he doesn't view himself as someone who could be powerful or win in the long run, but in this world, all he ever hears is how powerful he is. Pride of the fucking Zenin. The most powerful of them in centuries. Meant to rival Gojo fucking Satoru himself.
I think his real issue would be controlling it.
His technique would be a source of negative associations for him. It's the reason why the Zenin took him away. Most of his interactions with it have involved getting beaten and hurt by either his family or a high-level curse they shoved him in front of. I think he'd have a lot more firepower under his belt than at the start of canon, but he'd have less of a fine tuned control over it.
He lost control over his own life because of his shadows. It think that would manifest in struggling to control his own shikigami at times. he's not as in-sync with them as he is in canon.
Eventually, he'd go to Jujutsu High. He would be the only one in the first year class at the beginning, just like in canon. And he'd finally meet Gojo Satoru, the man he's supposed to topple.
He looks at Megumi really goddamn weird.
He's... enthusiastic. About. Teaching. He guesses. And constantly asking prying questions about the Zenin, but not in the sort of way he'd expect from a rival. In the sort of way he'd expect from someone concerned about him. Which is stupid. And annoying. And weird. He keeps a distance from everyone. They've all heard about the Zenin clan heir, and he has no interest in having to fit or break whatever mold they've already cast him in. He's better off on his own.
Maki's there. She's cordial where other people can see it, and in private, she takes care of him in a way that's terrifyingly close to familial. He's not sure if he likes it. He's not Mai, and she's not Tsumiki, and they both want someone they can't have.
She isn't sorry she left. She is sorry she left him. He can hate her for it all he goddamn pleases.
Of course, if this is in the same world as the linked post, Megumi finds Tsumiki again. He finds her in Sendai.
He gets to keep her, this time.
Gojo Satoru, of all the goddamn people, intervenes and becomes his sister's benefactor. It's super fucking weird. He won't stop looking at Megumi strangely. He won't stop insisting that he didn't know he had a sister, like that matters.
That would sort of be the first time in a long time that life actually gets better for Megumi.
I think he would ask to go by Fushiguro again, once he asks Tsumiki what his name used to be. He'd ask her if she minded it, him taking the name again, and he'd ask the rest of the school to call him Fushiguro instead of Zenin.
Predictably enough, Naobito loses his shit when he finds out, but it's not nearly as big of a pain in the ass as he thinks it is? Because Gojo intervenes.
Gojo keeps intervening.
It drives Megumi nuts, because if anyone was supposed to hate him, it was this guy. If anyone was supposed to be against him, it was this guy. This is the guy he was supposed to rival. This is the guy who killed his shitheel bio dad.
Gojo's just... good to him. He keeps him safe. He keeps him safe from his own goddamn family, and that's--no one's ever done that. No one's ever protected him from the Zenin.
The Zenin try to remove him from the Tokyo campus and move him to Kyoto the second they find out Tsumiki's there, and Gojo just... says no. It causes an uproar, and he doesn't fucking budge. It's treading dangerously close to him kidnapping the Zenin clan heir, his refusal to let them remove him from the Tokyo campus, and he doesn't care about whatever problems it causes him.
Megumi's his student. He doesn't want to leave. So Gojo won't let them take him.
He personally goes to Kyoto and collects him, the one time the Zenin force him into a car and move him when Gojo's off on a mission. He tells the higher ups to get fucked. He changes Megumi's student I.D. to read Fushiguro, and he causes problems for Yaga and the assistants until they start calling him Fushiguro as well.
Megumi's different with the other students once his sister is there.
He's more connected with them. He becomes best friends with Kugisaki and Itadori. He gets closer with the second years. He's visibly happier, and it sort of casts in sharp contrast how unhappy he was before this.
And Gojo? Gojo's so goddamn sorry. He didn't know megumi had a sister.
The thing is that now that both Tsumiki and Megumi are on campus, it sort of haunts Gojo with what could have been. They're both fantastic kids--funny, smart, resourceful. And it's painful watching them try to rebuild what was taken from them. And it could have just. never happened. Because he could have saved them both. He could have been their family.
It's sort of painfully obvious the Zenin abused Megumi, and it fucking haunts him. He doesn't even have to read into Megumi's behavior--he sees it happen, right in front of him, with how they try to control him and push him around. He wants to kill them for it. He wants to hate himself for it. He could have saved Megumi and he just. He didn't.
He wishes he did.
#jjk#fushiguro megumi#fushiguro tsumiki#gojo satoru#zenin clan#zenin maki#also featuring in this au: itadori absolutely torn because his best friend's long lost brother is extremely pretty and he HAS to be in#violation of some kind of bro code. the boy is in crisis. there he is. enrolled in fucking wizard school. his best friend tsumiki finally#found her long lost brother. said long lost brother proceeds to give him his gay awakening. he's fucking sweating. kugisaki stop laughing#gojos latent desire for fatherhood has been violently awakened in this and no one is safe. he's everyone's dad now. no one wants this.#yuuta in africa: sensei it's three am why are you calling is everyone oka--what do you mean what color do I want you to paint my room. what#room. what are you talking about.#yuuta keeps getting the weirdest goddamn updates from japan and he thinks he's having a stroke. what do you mean zenin-kun is fushiguro-kun#and he has a fucking long lost sister and gojos possibly going to gently kidnap him. is it kidnapping if he wants it too but the people who#has custody of him doesn't. what do you mean he needs to come back and help maki kill her entire family. maki explain your words explain#yes word of god megumi is also yuutas boy in this one i decide this for no other reasons than i want this#it's not the same way as in sea glass gardens. Maki just said some worrying things when yuuta first met him and he decided to keep an eye#out for him. he didn't seem all that happy. and he seemed alone. yuuta didn't want him to be.#megumi's sort of blindsided because he went from being raised in a clan where he was barely a person to having a bunch of medically insane#people decide that his wellbeing was their personal crusade. like. no one ever cared about /him/ before this. they just wanted their idea#but not who he really was. he felt like he was screaming and no one could hear it. then suddenly these people he barely knows are like#okay so we're going to punch your shitty bio uncle and also set his car on fire. yes we will call you by the name that makes you most#comfortable. yes we will help you get a new wardrobe full of clothes you're actually comfortable in.#he hadn't heard his own name in years. he's just been the ten shadows. never fushiguro. only rarely megumi.#everyone calls him fushgiuro at the school. his sister calls him megumi. he sort of wants to cry about it but he doesn't.#his shitty uncle shows up and makes a big stink about him being called zenin and inumaki and panda keyed his car. is this what love is.#is it a keyed car.#Low key he does NOT know what's going to happen the first time the school goes on break because gojo keeps making comments about how#megumi's not going back to the zenin compound and he says it like a joke but. he may not be joking. is he not joking. is. is megumi being#kidnapped. again. this is getting statistically improbable. did gojo just. decide. to keep him. when did that happen.
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soldier-poet-king · 11 months
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Cemeteries of amalo bk 3 isn't out til next year but maybe I'll reread the first two again just to ruin me bc thara is The Most Of All Time for me in every single way imaginable and I know I say that about a lot of shit on this web site bc I love hyperbole but it really is true about thara. Top 5 Fran coded characters of all time bc it's in literally every single dimension of his being
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eyedelater · 1 year
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there is an argument to be made that because the age gap between tsukishima and tsurumi is significantly less than the age gap between tsukishima and koito (34 to 41 vs 34 to 21, estimated), the former would be a more appropriate ship. i think that's a perfectly fair opinion to have; however, i want tsukishima to actually be happy, so i want him to be with koito. there can be exciting dark manipulation and mixed feelings of horror and attraction if you ship him with tsurumi, and that can make for some titillating material for you the reader, but in the end, tsukishima will not be happy. so it is not so titillating for me. also i think it's clear that in a tsukishima/koito scenario, koito will be happy too. i think the fun dynamic of their relationship is like, you would think tsukishima is the one who lucked out because his lover is much younger, taller, good-looking, higher-ranking, and from a rich family, but in fact, koito is the one who is really, really into tsukishima, and he's not subtle about it at all.
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leatherbookmark · 1 year
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unrelated, but when i say lxc should get to bite people/go apeshit/start killing, i don’t quite mean literally! it’s a mix of fandom frustration with everyone and their grandma and her cat accusing lxc of being too soft, too trusting, too easily manipulated into forgiving jgy everything, etc, etc, when he wasn’t like that at all but just wanted answers that he would have gotten If Not For Certain Events That I Won’t Mention Here, and Some Circles criticizing him for being “mean” to wwx (a cardinal sin) -- and... well. frustration with wgxn fucking off to fuck in the bushes for months and delighting in the lack of information about what’s happening in the jianghu. when lxc was Like That, and then, when wgxn were back, Still Struggling. and i obviously know he wouldn’t, not before being absolutely forced to, but god sometimes i do wish there was a fic in which he got a chance to just go... Hey Wangji But You Know That It* Wasn’t Cool, Right
*all of the above, plus wgxn withholding jgy-related information from him post-guanyin, plus wgxn urging him not to listen to jgy in the temple and acting as though jgy has manipulated lxc like a child with no mind of his own, plus wgxn barging into his life like “hey we think your friend killed your other friend. source: trust us. why aren’t you trusting us? cmon zwj be reasonable”, etc, etc
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mydemonsdrivealimo · 1 year
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i think the funniest thing to me is that i actually completely agree that ethan would be better off leading the diagnostics team rather than becoming the cheif of medicine, but i just do not give a shit at all
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amazinglyegg · 2 years
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Headcanon: Danse wears his power armour so often because he can't wear his chest binder while working
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lsvow · 1 year
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Protecting my peace and prioritizing me💗 Balance your nervous system through nature, Your health is not limited to the physical—it includes the mental, emotional + spiritual. This is a reminder to create and live with intention, do what inspires and fuels you because It’s all just as important.
I am actively trying to be present and embrace the now! I’m so excited for what’s to come, although sometimes doing the hard work and the unfamiliar can be discouraging— I’m allowing myself to get comfortable being uncomfortable.
I’m showing up and doing my best every single day. Im being present and enjoying the now! I do hope to find my people so if you come across my page and any of it resonates with you connect with me. I’d love to chat about your journey & the things that you’re doing to show up for yourself.
Xx,
S
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obessivedork · 1 year
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Elnor in my fanfic, realizing he actually has empathy for Narek and his current suffering despite what Narek did to Soji (aka Elnor’s BFF who is more like a sister to him): 😠
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waywardfeathered · 27 days
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really want a thread/threads where team free will (term used freely, anyone who's friends with cas and might need protection against angels) are only just developing weapons and traps to use against angels, and cas is offering to be the test subject for such with no qualms whatsoever, just trusting. test angel proofs cuffs on him, test arrows laced with powdered angel blades on him to see if he can heal from the cuts, he will let you, no questions asked, if you're his people.
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queenofinys · 11 months
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sorry to continue full-time ted lasso blogging on my swiftie blog but WHY did they have the opening of the episode highlight the community and sense of belonging ted has cultivated in richmond if he’s just going to return to kansas where the only thing he has is his son
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chuluoyi · 6 months
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✎ protect
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- gojo satoru x reader
the word “protect” now means so much more to him
genre: soft and playful gojo, sugary dump fluff, pregnant!reader
note: anyone craving some soft gojo? :3 based on a suggestion by an anon who needs a soft gojo a while back, thank you!
a part of gojo's love entries
series masterlist | oneshot masterlist
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When he was 16, Gojo Satoru thought that protecting other people was a pain, and didn't take it seriously.
Later, when he realized that even non-sorcerers deserve to live their lives in peace, he dedicated himself to becoming stronger so that he would be capable to protect them more. However, even then, he didn't perceive their worth as significant.
But when you entered the picture, that measly, glorified word suddenly became so much more.
Usually people would only care about whether he had succeeded his mission or not. His formidable reputation as the epitome of strength means no one is genuinely interested in his wellbeing—no one after Suguru, to be exact—until you did.
After a whirlwind romance of attraction and banters, Satoru reached the conclusion that he wanted you, the only person left who actually made him feel like a human, to stay happy and safe. He would do it with his own hands, even if it meant reshaping this cruel world to be kinder for you with him as your shield.
And the word “protect” gained an entirely new meaning years later, when he rested his head on your swollen belly—the place where his new cherished treasure was growing.
“When will he come out~?” he asked in a whiny tone and a blissful smile, even though he clearly knew the answer.
You shook your head with playful resignation, unable to conceal your smile. "In three weeks. Now help me get comfortable, you dork."
He helped you turn over and fetched a pillow to place under your aching spine. Then, with a mischievous grin, he lightly poked your belly with two fingers, eliciting a yelp from you.
"Don't poke me! You're poking your child!"
To that, Satoru merely threw his head back and snickered like the dumbass he was. He then tenderly rested his hand on the taut skin of your belly, gently massaging it, smiling with ardent happiness.
"Can't really believe it," he sighed, brimming with the purest sense of contentment. "A mini Gojo, huh... You're really doing a honorable work."
A child of his and yours. He had always wondered how he would be after seeing him firsthand—would he laugh just like he had been doing now, or will it be the first instance that move him to the point of shedding tears? One of the reasons he eagerly anticipated his son's birth was just to discover how he would react.
Seeing the weight of his baby growing within you, making you rounder and fuller, stirred a deep well of warm emotions in him with each passing day though.
"I am," you retorted cheekily, rolling your eyes. "In fact, you should be revering and worshipping me for carrying your spawn."
He merely hummed in a childlike manner, feeling his baby move around under his touch. You were about to roast him again with something funny when he leaned down and planted a kiss on your tummy, whispering to it.
"Please come out already~ Papa wants to meet you!"
Your heart swelled with warmth at that moment. Gojo Satoru was many things, but he wasn't typically known for his softness—he was often seen as this all-perfect being, and so witnessing him acting purely on his human emotions brought you a sense of happiness.
“Who do you think he’ll take after?” you mused.
“Hmmm. Me, obviously. He'll be hot just like me!” he quipped proudly, and you playfully smacked him on the arm.
Satoru caught your hand and kissed it tenderly amidst his grin. "But I want him to have your personality. I'd hate to see him be a show-off."
"So you do realize that you're actually a menace."
He laughed out loud, patting the generous swell of your belly again with a smug look on his face.
"I know, but I'm your menace, and that's all that matters."
And when his adorable son was born less than three weeks later and you passed out due to sheer exhaustion, Satoru vowed by everything in the heavens and the earth that he wouldn't spare anything to protect you and his child from this curse-filled world.
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Epilogue - on the night of the birth -
“Satoru—” you panted, grimacing, head jerking back as your womb throbbed and pulsed in order to bring forth your child into the world. “I… feel like I’m going to faint…”
Worry etched his face as you leaned on him. “Hey, hey… Calm down sweetheart, relax and catch up on your breath, okay? Don’t worry, he’ll come out soon.”
Somehow his words rubbed you the wrong way.
“Hahh—this… is because of you! This happened because you shoved your stick into me! You horny bas—aahh!”
“Well, hey! Last I remembered, you begged me to put it into you! And I'm not—pfft—”
“Then what are you?!”
“Hmmm, nothing but a man who got you pregnant, sweetheart~”
“If I bleed out and die, it’s going to be your fault, you evil, wretched sorcerer!”
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undiscovered-horizon · 6 months
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[It’s considered good etiquette to ask a man about his wife’s wellbeing. Except if the man in question is Dracule Mihawk.]
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Garp hates having to call Mihawk, mainly because of the warlord's attitude. Used to the usual "yes, sir!" of the Marines, a man with his own will and agenda is not something he entirely knows how to navigate. Especially since both of them know that the World Government needs the warlords more than they need the bureaucracy. And that doesn't exactly help in exercising power.
His attempts at diplomacy have burst into flames each time and today isn't going to be much different:
"How’s the missus?" Garp asks in the nicest tone he can force although he's aware that Mihawk knows how much the vice admiral hates asking for Dracule's assistance.
Mihawk only scoffs. "Are you calling just to spoil my mood or is there another reason for your impertinence?"
"I was just trying to-"
"Don't," he cuts him off in a stern voice. "If you have business with me, speak fast. If you're interested in my wife, I know where you live, Garp. I'd suggest losing your unwelcome nosiness before you lose something else."
Little did Garp know at the time but his little question was possibly the worst strategy he could think of. Dracule Mihawk is not like most men and the mere mention of his wife by acquaintances only enrages him. Work and private life do not ever mix. And he'll be damned if someone tries to breach that, even in the form of a courtesy. Therefore, the rest of the call was filled with openly insulting answers that were bold even for Mihawk. A veiled threat or two also found their way into their rather tense conversation.
You know he's done with Garp when he lets out a frustrated grunt. Sometimes you wonder if this grumpy, forever dissatisfied version of him is the only side of Mihawk his acquaintances know. Maybe he really is two men in the form of one.
He's sitting at his desk, thinking about something and not bothering to get up for now. Considering the fact that his hat is lying on the table and not on his head, Mihawk is probably not planning on going out anytime soon. Then again, judging by his spoiled mood, his homestay is a blessing for the first poor sods that would cross his path.
In slow steps, you stroll to his side, letting your hand brush through his hair. He doesn't say anything, only leans his head further towards you. The thing about Mihawk is that he loved to reject and decline but he never does so to you. No, in your case it's the opposite - he revels in allowing you whatever you want.
So intimidating and combative, yet soft and looking for intimacy. Truly, two men with the face of one.
"My mother used to say that each grey hair is one thing we worry about," you say quietly. "At this rate, love, your whole head will be white by noon."
"Your mother also says that milk goes sour because gnomes piss in it," he retorts. Yes, your mother and her strange folk beliefs... She's probably the only person Mihawk can force himself to be nice to despite his dislike.
His response earns a hearty laugh from you. Clear as day, you can see his posture relax as he listens to the music of your happiness. If he even thinks about the possibility of Garp or any other of his acquaintances hearing it, he might just get furious again.
"Well, nobody's perfect," you say between chuckles.
Then, Mihawk gently grabs your hand and lowers it to his face. With softness and passion that hardly befits a man of his infamy, he kisses the inside of your hand. "You seem to be doing so effortlessly."
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