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ganondoodle · 8 months

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more thoughts

big part of why i loathe what totk did with its story and lore is that it tremendously hurts botw in retrospect

i said that before and mentioned all of these points before as well but i just have to mention it again; how totk did away with all the little mysteries in botw, like the ancient hero looking kinda strange leading to lots of interesting theories- WHOOP its a sonau mix guy revealed through a collectable and its straight up said by purah/impa that that is the ancient hero .. like it was an always known fact ......

the sonau ruins in botw of a long gone group of people that lived in the forest of phirone - WHOOP those are just monuments built by hylians in memory of the sonau and actually their real architecure isnt rare and few but everywhere en masse and doesnt resemble the ones from botw at all, aside from some vague dragon motive; theres more stuff of the oh so sadly gone and not at all mysterious anymore sonau left than there was of the ancient shiekah in botw (and now it doesnt exist at all anymore, who cares about them, how important they were, or this worlds history, especially zelda, she never cared about shiekah or history that wasnt about sonau :)))) )

one of the biggest crimes, to me, personally, is what totk did with the dragons not actively mind you, but still changed my view of them and i hate it; i always saw them as these ethereal otherwordly spirits older than time itself (i liked the idea of them being like a final evolution of the dragons from skyward sword, tho of course i dont need that to be canon lol) and then totk comes along and .. the newly revealed -always been there super cool- race of people from the sky is heavily based on their designs ... and they have armor sets imitating the dragons ... and have ... magical never heard of before stones that turn people into .... dragons .... i get how that can be an interesting thing for people to connect but for me personally ... its a mystery that REALLY shouldnt have been solved, at all, or even touched, the fact that you knew nothing about the dragons other than they are here was what made them feel so much more divine and awe inspiring (i know you could try to think of it being the other way around, the sonau worshipping the dragons so much they dedicated all of their cultur around them ((but then again were is that anywhere, if they worshipped them so much then they sure didnt matter in any of what we say of them in memories..)) ... but the sonau designs, the armor ... the stones ... its all such an obvious connection ...) and its really hard for me to ignore it, i actively have to work now to keep seeing the dragons as these untouchable ethereal spirits instead of some sonau guy eating a fucking stone

and yet again its like .. can you really blame me for feeling weird about the sonau/dislike them when ... theres nothing that WASNT touched by the sonau, they already had tech way above the level of the shiekah, they were in the sky, the surface AND the underground all along, theirs is the actually important influence on the history of the world, they have been in every place that was once important, hell they were in every place were a settlement of people is EVEN THE FEW YEARS OLD TABURASA (tarrey town), their buildings look like they were abandoned 10 years ago, all their shit is still working, they founded (this) hyrule, they are the royals, they are the gods, they are the dragons, the ancient hero was a sonau mix clad in waht totk made out to be their signature design elements-

we had recordings from that time (tapestry) and even PEOPLE (the monks) and yet the sonau were a total mystery? even though their culture was literally still there when the shiekah built their tech?

what gets me escpeially is how .. they didnt NEED to erase anything shiekah, they didnt need to act like they never existed, they didnt need to make the sonau be the coolest guys ever and were so desperate to get that into your thinking everyone in the game is obsessed with them and tells you why you should be obsessed too

like am i just insane or is it a rather .. obvious connection to make that the shiekah found the tech of the sonau and built theirs inspired by what they could find, it was so old at that point that its non functional or even recognizable in the present, but when the shiekah found it they could still research it; given how the shiekah built multiple shrines and puzzles to them WITHTIN ruins that, in botw, were sonau ruins, i thought that was the logical line to draw and a good way to connect them while still leaving the sonau to be a mysterious ... mystery (this is what im going for in my rewrite btw)

also another thought, if the ancient shiekah could see the future to a degree they built stuff to prepare the next hero for the next calamity that would happen in thousands of years .. how did they never find out about gan? i know they were more about the future than the past but like ... were they really so stupid to see that the calamity will come back just the same from the same place and NOT investigate?? ESPECIALLY considering that the weird half sonau ancient hero was literally THERE when they saw the furture and built all of that for it???? the sonau werent gone gone in any sense and you CANNOT tell me that the shiekah jsut ignored this weird half whatever looking guy outfitted in an aesthetic and culture that wasnt obviously present anymore and clearly connected to somethign else, with probably clear scars were whatever buildings were lifted into the skies- SOMEHOW- and monoments LITERALLY STILL READABLE IN THE PRESENT that tells you about all theshit that went down?? even if you hid them with some weird mechanisms, are you realyl not gonen investigate?? also why hide it anyway?? if its supposed to be a monument to the sonau why the fuck would you built stuff to HIDE the information from it?? gan cant reach it anyway bc hes KINDA STUCK you are telling me the group of people with a vision of the future and high tech stuff that are famously obsessed with the stars and sky didnt see any of the sonau shit floating around there?? ohoho but it was hidden by magic uwu WHY bc you wanted to wait thousands of years for the "right" link to come around?? so you let thousands of people suffer and die just bc you wanted a specific guy? why not the ancient hero instead?? and solve the problem right then and there?? or would that mess too much with the history all of the sudden, you didnt care about messing anythign else up before either

its all just so messy if you start to think even a little bit about whatever the fuck happened in totk and i ahte it, it solves stuff that didnt need solving, ignores or even erases stuff that didnt need erasing and was all ready to go and be more explored, its infuriating

(also additional thought about the previous rant where i mentioned how characters, esepcially zelda, regress HARD in chaarcter development) someone mentioend this about link and ... YEAH, in botw the main thing was the connection between link and zelda, how they didnt like each other at first and at the end were THE brotp; in totk, aside from zelda mentioning how strong link is, theres nothing, the link that was revealed in botw to only be so silent and expressionless (not fully but like supressing everythign rly) bc of the immense pressure that was put on him is now just the most importanest sword guy who didnt even shed a tear when you get the memories of zelda basically killing herself; or did he know she will just be returned to normal with no harm or memory done no problemo in the end?? i dont WANT link to talk mind you, i never want to hear him talk tbh, i like him being mostly silent aside from his grunts when he climbs a cliff or soothes a horse (i go non verbal in high stress situations too) but you could have shown him be affected by it at all, or idk DO ANYTHIGN WITH THEIR RELATIONSHIP they are best friends whod die for each other but that doesnt actually matter in anything bc he just do what sword man does-

#ganondoodles talks #zelda #totk #ganondoodles rants #it really is a replacement for botw isnt it #might as well not have happened

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exiledelle · 4 months

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UNDERTALE YELLOW MERCILESS ROUTE SPOILERS

ive seen a couple people here and there be upset over how the route ends, but i want to give my two cents on why i actually really like it

(btw this is not at all me saying people HAVE to enjoy it, or arent allowed to dislike it, just sharing my own take on it)

if youve clicked the read more im going to assume youve played through the merciless route and seen its ending, or dont care about spoilers for it

otherwise what the heck are you doing here

but basically, what ive seen people get upset over a lot, is the fact that clover kills asgore and flowey instantly, takes the human souls, and then just waltzes out of the underground and beyond the players reach (which is my personal take on why resetting goes back to floweys control, and clover forgetting, instead of to when clover unlocks the save ability, is its not clover or flowey resetting, but us. the player IS a distinctly separate entity in ut/dr after all)

but honestly?? what else COULD have happened?? asgore couldnt handle frisk at level ONE. he didnt stand even a FRACTION of a chance against an lv 20 clover, who might i add, has a giant laser beam, a degree of soul magic not even frisk obtains. you COULD argue chara uses soul magic to "kill" our save file at the end of undertales merciless route though, i could see that, but still, clovers laser is a much more direct and obvious show of it. (and just to be safe, before anyone tries to say humans dont have magic, no, thats literally the entire premise of the setting is humans used magic to create the barrier, its just less present in humans than it is in monsters, who are made of the stuff)

and undertale yellows merciless route goes the route of deciding that undertales version already said everything there is to say on the meta aspects and the whole "you can so you need to" mindset, so instead it just calls it what it is: its a power trip. its mindless slaughter for the sake of getting stronger, whether its the player demanding a different ending (like deltarunes coldhearted route(im not calling it snowgrave, but this is entirely personal preference)), or again just wanting to see whatll happen. but either way its to feel strong.

and what happens at the end of that power trip? youve reached level 20. youve surpassed floweys control. you have as much power as you could ever hope to achieve. so, realistically:

whats stopping you from just killing asgore and leaving.

nothing. so you do.

and it leaves you wondering: was the power trip worth it. was the pain and suffering you caused worth it to get such a blatantly, not just non-canon, but ANTI-CANON ending? (EDIT: and i mean this in a positive way, its the same kind of self-reflection over your actions that undertale pulls, just communicated in a more indirect way)

and it being so anti-canon is part of why its such a haunting ending for me.

there really wasnt any other possible way for it to end. lv 20 itself and the way undertale and deltarune characterize that increase in power, in retrospect it feels obvious that it would be anti-canon in a prequel. monster souls are weaker than human souls, even at lv 1. so against a human whos lv 20, and who got there by constantly persisting and trying over and over to get past whatever obstacle is in front of them, and refuses to give up on their conquest, theres nothing anyone can do, and that alone rips the canon of undertale into shreds.

even SANS realizes theres nothing that can actually stop you, not even him, so the best he can hope for is that he puts up enough of a fight to make the player give up and/or reset, same reason his final attack is a turn that never ends.

and having to face that by helplessly watching clover blast an asgore-shaped hole in the story is TERRIFYING to me, in a way i really love the yellow team for doing. idk if its actually intentional or if im reading too much into it, but either way,

#undertale yellow #undertale yellow spoilers #elle rambles

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cyberdragoninfinity · 11 months

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ok it’s time for dana to hoot and holler about zexal

finished ygo zexal for the first time last week and i absolutely adored it and am STILL thinking so much about it (as i will be probably for. a While now if my relationships with the other ygo spinoffs ive seen are any indication).....time again for me to do my little personal rambly yugioh series retrospective post as the brainworms truly start to set in. kattobingu feel the flow high five the sky build the overlay network let’s goooo!!!

more under the cut. a lot more lol. spoilers for a decade old anime, naturally

GOD. YEAH. THIS ONE MIGHT BE MY FAVORITE YUGIOH SERIES IVE SEEN YET. HOLY SHIT. 2021 Dana was really out here thinking Zexal looked kind of annoying (based on mild DL characters/plot osmosis) and not terribly interesting and I want to go back in time and shake her shoulders and say NO. NO YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND. ZEXAL FUCKING ROCKS. every yugioh has some degree of Danabait to it (probably because. watching Duel Monsters as a child was the catalyst to what Danabait even is lol) but JESUS MARY AND JOSEPH Zexal is like being hit by one nuclear bomb of shit genetically engineered in a lab to make me insane after another.

THE ART STYLE. OF ZEXAL, FOR ONE. makes me absolutely rabid animal bonkers--I LOVE seeing the way the ygo art style has been honed and developed and evolved over time. YGO influenced my art style more than I can articulate, and then zexal comes in swinging with the ygo art style at its Most Zany. The EXPRESSIONS in this show!!!!!!!!! Fucking rule!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A MASSIVE CHUNK OF THE CAST DOESNT HAVE MOUTHS HALF THE TIME AND YET STILL ARE SOME OF THE MOST EXPRESSIVE YGO GUYS EVER!!!! Constantly making expressions I LOVE to draw!!!! and oh my god the COLOR DIRECTION OF YUGIOH ZEXAL?!?!? genuinely absolutely phenomenal and one of my all time favorites i’ve seen in any cartoon, western or anime. you mean to tell me we got a lighting and color budget now??? we get yugioh scenes looking like this??!??

THE BEST. THE BEST. THE BEST. OBSESSED WITH IT. ABSORBING ZEXAL’S COLOR AND EXPRESSION PROWESS. STEALING ITS POWER.

ANYWAY as usual with my ygo watching i was primarily watching the dub (absolutely thrilled to have a Completed Yugioh Dub to watch for the first time since DM, MAN.) but I did end up watching...over half of Zexal II’s sub; stuff just gets so absolutely insane with the Barian Emperors that I desperately wanted every possible inch of their lore so I ended up watching both (sometimes back and forth at the same type like an unhinged wild animal) for the full picture. I like Zexal’s dub a lot!! its comedic timing is ON POINT, EXTREMELY FUNNY DUB. and really like..all of the main dub VAs are so, SO good (as they usually are.) There are a lot of bizarre things they cut though, a lot of childhood flashbacks and little character moments and the like. It’s a shame! I can only imagine a lot of them were cut to leave more room for ad time which. Sucks a bit 🥴A lot of duels do whip a lot harder in the sub too, especially in the back half..... still though, enjoyed my time with the dub. there’s a remarkable amount of stuff i am SHOCKED they actually did keep in?!??! The car crash that killed Shark’s parents is just straight up presented as is with like one or two small cuts. A LITTLE GIRL’S DEAD BODY IS SHOWN?? ON SCREEN??? ZEXAL DUB!! KIDS LOVE IT SO!!! MY GOD!!!

ok enough on that. some breakdowns/specific points like I usually do with these roundups:

Stuff I Didn’t Like: always get this one outta the way first. There really wasnt a whole lot I straight up disliked with this one!! It’s extremely solid all around. It does, of course, have some...Choices, being made, like. Girag’s lips. and. Girag’s backstory. Love the guy but oh my god why did they do that to him 😭Yugioh Racially Questionable moments ride again!!! At this point it’s just par for the course, definitely not the first time a ygo has. Done stuff like that. Ah well. Worth mentioning though.

What’s really a shame is that Zexal has some of the COOLEST, MOST FUN GIRL CHARACTERS, and time and time again they just dont do anything with them!!!!!!!!!!!! IT’S SO FRUSTRATING. i LOVE rio but the poor girl is fridged for literally 2/3s of the series!! She’s in the hospital like five times!!!! Rio and Anna and Tori and Dextra and Kari are all like, some of my favorite ygo gals YET but they have maybe 5 duels between them. Konami let your girls DUEL CHALLENGE. PLEASE.

hm what else. I guess also the final showdown with the series “Big Bad” was. uh. kind of let down lmao. But to be fair I was positively spoiled last series with the Z-one duel lol. Can’t win ‘em all. As cool as the concept of “the protag and rival team up to duel the Big Bad” is, and as cool as Don Thousands Entire toxic manipulative dynamic with the Barian Emperors is for like the Entire Rest of Zexal II is, they just....don’t. Do much with him for that last Donny T duel?? Would have loved more backstory elaboration or just like. Anything. It was over so soon and I was like “...that was it??” HDFHGSDFG thankfully the last two duels of zexal whip like hell so we bounce back!!

i also kind of wish don thousand kept his sick as hell demon armor form but c’est la vie i suppose. sad! well there’s other guys.

Favorite Season: I actually have no idea how Zexal is split up into seasons, so I guess Fav Arc would be a better term? Anyway I loved the World Duel Carnival Arc, I’m one of like 5 people who actually enjoy tournament arcs but i think theyre FUN and this one is a blast. There’s Arclight Family Agonies coming from every direction and there’s the INSANE DUEL ROLLER COASTER and Vetrix is bouncing around being a little freak, it’s GREAT

anyway and then Zexal II came in and grabbed me by the head and threw me into the drywall

LIKE. MY GOD. ZEXAL HAS THE FUCKING EMOTIONAL PACING OF MORAL OREL. YOU HIT Z2 AND SHIT STARTS GETTING REAL AND GOING HARD AS HELL AND IM OUT HERE GETTING MY BRAIN SCRAMBLED. I love like. All of the arcs of zexal II it’s hard to pick a favorite but I DO really like just that first third or so where the Barians are just starting to show up and the horrors haven’t quite begun and everything’s so silly and Ray Shadows is Very There. gives me gx season 1 vibes a little bit. it’s a delight.

Favorite Characters: oh right I should. talk about that. pained smile.

i joke about this a lot but usually every ygo series has like. A Character That’s My Actual Favorite, and A Character That Makes Me Absolutely Insane (syrus vs. zane, leo vs. aporia, etc.) but, uh. this time I GUESS THAT’S JUST. THE SAME CHARACTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SORRY. TO BE BASIC. BUT WHY DID THEY DO THAT TO ME. WHY DID THEY PUT A CHARACTER IN ZEXAL WHO ALREADY LOOKS LIKE MY ART STYLE. ALREADY LOOKS LIKE I DREW HIM. AND THEN MAKE HIM FUCKED UP AND SILLY AND A SAD LITTLE JACKASS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ABSOLUTELY NEFARIOUS!!!!!!!!! 2021 dana had no CLUE they were hiding this fucker in the back of one of the ygo spinoffs. never could have predicted it. vector’s genuinely one of the best ygo characters of all time to me. what if a yugioh character had the most absolutely bonkers expressions youve ever seen and he was constantly doing little bits and acting like a little funnyman and then the devil fucking Kills Him. he’s perfect. the madness has only just begun to infect me i fear.

ANYWAY other than The Carrot in Question, I fucking love like...all of Zexal’s cast; I think this is the first time for any ygo where a series just didnt really have any characters I straight up Did Not Like. it’s such a solid, colorful cast that just checks so many boxes for my fav kinds of characters. I didn’t think I was gonna like Yuma but I ended up LOVING HIM!!!! I LOVE SEEING A YGO PROTAG THATS LIKE..ACTUALLY BAD AT THE GAME, THAT GROWS BETTER AND STRONGER OVER TIME BUT STAYS SO SILLY. I love what Zexal does to “traditional” yugioh character archetypes--Shark and Kite are both such cool rival characters and the shit they do with Shark especially?!?! NEVER COULD HAVE IMAGINED THEM DOING THAT. WITH A YUGIOH RIVAL. KAIBA COULD NEVER.

Narrowing down a top five fav Zexal guys is so hard, they really came in swinging with Catostrophic Families AND insane alien guys, but after pondering I think I’d have to say rn it’s Vector, Shark, Nistro (my fuckin MAN!!!!!!!), Trey, and Alito. Immediate runnerup also being Tori. I fucking love Tori, new favorite main ygo girl. She bore witness to All That Shit and never folded. SHe’s Yuma’s FRIEND his CONFIDANT his EMOTIONAL SUPPORT!!!!! Absolute boss. Yuma would be dead in a ditch somewhere by episode 20 without her around.

Favorite Duel: BEEN GOING BACK AND FORTH ON THIS A LOT but I think my favorite duel was and still is the Trey vs. Yuma duel in zexal I, it’s just fantastic. The COLORS AND LIGHTING!!!!! The stakes!!! The SICK DUEL ARMOR!! Trey literally threatens a world-ending murder-suicide because he wants his family to be proud of him and well i’ll just explode into bits all up and down the road about it. Goes hard as hell. Trey and Yuma’s dynamic is one of my favs in Zexal but that’s it’s own post.

I also love all of Alito’s duels (especially the tag duel with Nistro, which is one of the most atrociously danabait duels ever (slash pos) and his last duel against yuma, which ALSO has some of the fucking coolest shots and lighting of any yugioh duel to me) and the last duel between Shark and Yuma. Shit rocks.

Zexal is also pretty unique to me in that it’s the first time i can really concretely say ive had favorite EPISODES as opposed to just favorite duels. There are so many episodes left and right that just make my fucking head explode. The BASEBALL DUEL FRIENDSHIP GAMES EPISODE. The EPISODE WHERE YUMA AND SHARK ARE IN THE HOSPITAL. The “VECTOR GETS STRAPPED INTO THE ALIEN GOD THRONE AND MR. HEARTLAND IS BEING INSANE AND THE ARCLIGHTS ARE IN A SUBMARINE AND ERAZOR IS GOING TO FUCKING KILL YUMA’S FRIENDS” episode. THE. UM. THE EPISODE WHERE THIS HAPPENS

^BROKE MY WHOLE DAMN BRAIN IN HALF. I AM STILL RECOVERING FROM THE DAMAGE zexal II comes in swinging with episodes that just knock your tits clean off and you LOVE to see it!!!!

Miscellaneous Other Zexal Gushing: IT’S JUST FUCKING GOOD!!!! THERE’S SO MUCH TO LOVE!!!!! I love the cast, I love Yuma and Astral’s dynamic and just how much love is there. I LOVE yuma’s friend group, they are SUCH perfect dweeby little middle schooler weird kids. I love the ways Zexal parallels Duel Monsters (and imo takes a lot of elements from DM and does them even better), I love Yuma’s grandma and Kari, ABSOLUTE REAL ONES!!! I fucking love Orbital 7. I love the Number cards and how theyre just completely thematically not related to each other at ALL (sometimes it’s a bug! sometimes it’s a guy! sometimes it’s an entire floating civilization!!!) I love the ABSOLUTELY BONKERS RELIGIOUS MOTIFS AND SYMBOLISM FLYING AROUND IN ANY AND ALL DIRECTIONS. THEY DID THAT FOR ME!!!!!!!!!!!!! ASTRAL CHRIST ALLEGORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And I just...adore how fundamentally Zexal is about kindness and hope and love, and also about how it’s so important to not lose yourself or your sense of fun as you grow up!! That theme absolutely EVISCERATED ME when gx came out swinging with it in its last season, and it’s GETTIN ME AGAIN HERE!!! IT’S ABOUT HAVING FUN!! IT’S ABOUT THE BONDS WE MAKE WITH OTHERS!!! IT’S ABOUT HOW CEASELESS KINDNESS CAN BE AN UNSTOPPABLE FORCE THAT MAKES EVEN THE IMMOVEABLE MOVEABLE. yuma has SO much joy and love and forgiveness in his body and it makes me WAIL.

Duel Monsters really ends on this note of “goodbye” with Atem leaving, and it works well for that story’s themes of grief. Meanwhile I think it’s very special that while Zexal also ends on a goodbye with Astral leaving, it feels so much more like a “see you later.” That hanging note of “we’ll meet again.” It’s so sweet. The themes of past and future at play really just make you root for these kids and hope they grow up into the best versions of themselves.

Also it’s so fucking funny that like All of the Cast That Died and Went to Hell Came Back Except Mr. Heartland Who Definitely Died For Real. gay WRONGS.

God. what else. I’m sure I’ll think of 8352389 more things I love about Zexal immediately after I post this. It’s just that good. So thrilled I gave it a go. I love you Xyz Monsters I love you Dyson Sphere I love you Vector’s dub and sub voices I love you Duel Monster Based Off of the Titantic I love you Dr. Faker’s absolutely insane character design I love you Barian World I love you Arclight family I love you Zexal II Dub Opening Song That’s Sung By Bruno 5D’s VA I love you YUMA AND FRIENDS!!!!!!!!!!! ZEXAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

cant wait to port all these kids to the college AU. it’s already happening. I love them so much

#ygo posting #time again for When I Do This #SORRY for writing 2k rambling words about zexal but i fucking loved every second of it and im so happy i watched it #THEY GOT SO MANY GOOD KIDS IN THIS THING. THEY GOT COLOR AND LIGHTING THAT BLASTS YOU TO BITS #THEY MADE A YGO EVEN MORE DANABAIT THEN THOUGHT POSSIBLE AND IT WAS SUCH A TREAT

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gale-gentlepenguin · 9 months

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ML Fighting Game Arcade endings (Part 2)

Carapace's Ending:

Monarch really underestimated the power of the Resistance, but having the turtle miraculous back was the one thing Carapace needed to finally take down the Tyrant.

It was a shock to find out that Monarch was Gabriel, Carapace couldnt believe there was yet another traitor in the midst.

Nino made sure to accurately capture the events, afterall. This would make one heck of a movie script. Maybe he could even work with Spielberg.

Rena Rouge's Ending:

Monarch's defeat at the hands of Rena Rouge was indeed quite the scoop. But the reveal that he was none other than Gabriel agreste. It was the scoop of the Life time!

Alya wrote down the events and posted a tell all on the Ladyblog. All of Paris got the inside scoop on the defeat of the Monarch. Alya's start on being a renowned reporter was taking off.

Though the spotlight wasnt so kind to everyone, The agreste manor was taken down and Adrien had to leave for London with his aunt, Sometimes the truth getting out has some consequences.

Vesparia's ending:

Vesparia stunned the world by taking down Monarch, the New bee really proved herself. Paris cheered the bee that was better than the last.

This new confidence would serve her well, nothing was going to slow her down from going after what she wanted. Her family wouldnt be controling her anymore.

Marinette was still devastated with Adrien going missing after Monarch's defeat, but Zoe would be there to help her through this tough time.

Viperion's ending:

All the pieces fit together too well, once Viperion realized that Monarch was Gabriel Agreste. it was not that surprising in retrospect, but it did shake things up in Paris.

Luka decided that things would still be best if he kept on the move, but this time he would be going on tour with his band.

Kitty section would rock the night, and fight crime during the day. The Miracle Force was on tour and ready to rock.

#miraculous ladybug #ml fighting game au #ml fighting game #arcade endings #ml au

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thephantomcasebook · 2 years

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i think if there was ever going to be any question on if daeron wasnt viserys’ child it wouldve happened by now because the baby is already born right? why have this major plot line and then not even include the child the plot lines about in the season.

I kinda very briefly talked this out with @fandom-mix-16

And we're both in agreement that 1x09 is really sink or swim on this theory/rumor of A+C=D.

If Alicent and Criston don't have solid scenes together that gives their relationship depth, than I'd say that the over-under on the theory is 30/70 that Daeron is nothing but Visery's son.

However, from a writing standpoint - as a writer myself - I feel that that A+C=D is straight rocket fuel that explains a lot of Alicent's behavior of trying to expose Rhaenyra and her children and will give a ton of depth and nuance to the conflict that is still really lacking.

Even if Daeron isn't a bastard, the insinuation that he is a product of a decade long courtly affair by Alicent and Criston is still a gold mine of character motivation.

I know it's an unpopular opinion here on Team Green, but rap with me a moment.

If we throw out the definitive if he is or isn't Criston or Visery's son, you still give a ton of motivation for Alicent being relentless in her pursuit of Rhaenyra.

Imagine, if you will, that Rhaenyra has Luke and everyone notices that he's not Valaryian colored - dark haired between two silver haired parents. Rhaenyra, suddenly finding herself cornered, openly starts accusing Daeron of not being who everyone thinks he is - a Targaryen that has Alicent's coloring and likeness.

She publically announces that Daeron is not Targaryen and then starts spreading gossip about how close, how familiar, Queen Alicent and Ser Criston are. Isn't it strange that he murdered Ser Joffery at her very wedding, yet, Queen Alicent not only defended him passionately, but then swore him to her for life ...

Who does that?

A pious queen?

a lover?

Suddenly, all of Visery's court is talking, casting a doubtful eye on the youngest prince who spends far too much time with his mother and Ser Criston ... as if they were a family on their own. Rhaeynra knows that she can question the Queen's virtue and get away with it, because, Viserys will protect and forgive her. It will also force the crown to proclaim that Targaryen's come in all colors - Daeron being the spitting image of Alicent - making sure that her son Luke is protected for all time.

However, the damage is done, and even though Viserys proclaims that Daeron is his son, the rumor persists - Harwin Strong openly mocking Ser Criston and Daeron in the yard. Eventually, to squash the scandal, Lord Strong convinces Viserys to send Daeron away.

This would shatter - absolutely shatter - Alicent's world, because, Daeron is her last child and her baby. But Viserys order's the boy away, to stop the talk against Alicent. So, Otto comes to King's Landing and formerly takes Daeron as his ward and they leave for Old Town - Alicent, Ser Criston, and Aemond standing together in the rain watching him go. Alicent turns and glances up to see Rhaenyra and Ser Harwin looking smug together from a covered balcony.

Now it's war for Alicent and Criston.

See! Right there!

Perfect motivation for why Alicent and Criston are so anti-Rhaenyra. Because it was Rhaenyra's politicking and scheming to protect Luke that got Daeron sent away - a small boy that gave Alicent, Ser Criston, and Aemond a great deal of joy ... it could also explain why Aemond is so depressed and dragon obsessed in 1x06.

A storyline like that, told in retrospect through Daeron and Alicent's prospective, years later, adds depth - a ton of it - to every character. Why Alicent is head hunting in 1x06, Why Criston is bitter, and we see the length's Rhaenyra will go too to either protect her child or get what she wants ... including making another child's life - her own brother - a living hell.

#House of the Dragon #Daeron Targaryen #Alicent Hightower #Criston Cole #alicent x criston #alicole

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turtlemagnum · 5 days

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now that my childhood is definitively over and has been for a while, i'm feeling compelled to write a little about it in retrospect. warning, long, and likely not very pleasant at times. specific warnings include discussion of child abuse, domestic violence, sexual assault, racism, ableism, medical abuse, and pissing on my enemies (god typing that out really made me think about the depths of this shit. christ)

as far as i can remember, my earliest memory is noticing the condensation on the outside of my cup and being amazed at how the outside could've possibly got wet even though the lid was sealed tight. even then i could tell that it wasn't the same as when you spilled it, leaving me with a lot of questions but without the language to express them. this is a soft memory, one of the few i have of then due to how i started forming memories about 2 weeks before my dad left, at least according to my parents recollection of little things i told them about remembering. now, my parents... they were definitely too young to be parents, i think; and regardless neither were particularly well adjusted individuals. my dad undoubtedly moreso, the fact that i have more trauma surrounding my mom most certainly being a matter of sheer exposure since she's the one that mostly raised me.

my parents splitting is also one of my earliest memories. i still remember it being late at night, i couldn't sleep so i was watching the VHS for one of the aladin movies repeatedly. i was about 6 at the time, if memory serves. i don't know why, but eventually i felt like trying to see my parents in their room, but when i got to their door i was filled with an overwhelming sense of dread; one i couldn't quite comprehend at the time. it was quiet, i could hear nothing. or at least that's what i remember, it's all very fuzzy. next thing i know, i inch open the door and it bursts open. my dad, with some sort of hold on my mom; i interpreted it as a choke but she says it wasn't. i can still remember the looks on their faces, especially his. i'd never seen rage like that in someones eyes before. next thing i remember, we're out in the living room. dad has a knife in his hand, and i don't quite understand what he's saying. i keep asking mom why he has a knife in his hand, she's panicking and insisting it's just a newspaper in an ineffectual attempt to keep me calm. i'd later learn that in that moment, he was threatening to kill himself. that was the last time i'd see my father for a long time.

a short while later, i was playing outside. i don't quite remember why, but a group of siblings started attacking me, throwing rocks the size of my head and hitting me with sticks and the like. i was trying to run away, but i was slower than them. luckily, i've always been a bit big relative to my age range, so when i saw i had no choice but to fight back, i was equipped to. i remember literally seeing red, and grabbed one by the neck. the rest scattered like a bunch of little pissants, and i'd later find out that they were going to get their dad. now, their dad was a rather large man. one of unimpressive fitness and even less impressive mental faculties. but he was an adult, and i wasnt. he said he was going to kill me, and my mom, and when i ran he yelled "yeah, get your daddy". i likely needn't say why that line particularly hurt. my mom came out to protect me, and the police arrived. the cop said to him, something to the effect of "if i were in your shoes, i'd have done the same thing." thus beginning a lifelong distrust in the police. i'd also later find out that he shared a last name with the cop, though due to some phrasing i'd later hear from one of the dude's daughters there's reason to believe that they might not actually be related. regardless, this unequivocally sticks out as one of the times i felt most utterly powerless in my childhood. my mom didn't allow me outside on my own until i was big enough to defend myself from trash like him. needless to say, that was the most formative years of my childhood flushed away spent alone inside a shitty apartment. years later, given how he was a neighbor at the same apartments, he'd act like nothing ever happened. he'd try to act all friendly, and i'd have to restrain myself from trying to get revenge. i'd later find that his wife was a kind soul, and the one who actually worked a job, with the kids actually seeming to grow not only to be decent people but to hate him just as much as i did. so, i can't bring myself to blame them in all of this, even if i unequivocally did at the time.

i'd start going to school soon, about 1 to 2 weeks later? the first day didn't go so well. i was in an introductory gym class, and the gym teacher was being kind of a condescending prick. so, i pissed on him and ran away. that's just kinda something i did, back then. probably the only funny thing about this story, at least at this portion. they didn't manage to catch me for about a half an hour according to my mom, but by my reckoning at the time i avoided the teachers for what felt like an eternity. regardless, i was placed in a special ed school from then on for my behavioral issues, and would be in some kind of special ed for the rest of my time in school.

at around that same time, i don't remember exactly when but i could at least form memories by then, i made a "friend". his name was christian, and he was a mean little fucker. but, since i had no other friends, and i'm pretty sure our moms got along well, we hung out. i think he might've been the first in a long line of people i sought companionship in and shouldn't have; or ar least one of the first. regardless, i forget the context but he was being a prick one day and i'd finally had enough of his bullshit, so i pissed on him. he started crying, which made me laugh. luckily i think this was the last time i had done this, so if this grosses you out then be happy that there's nothing piss related left.

school was mostly uneventful. a fight here, some work there, usually nothing special. my first teacher, i loved her at the time, ms. h. now, as a white person it's very much not my place to call her an uncle tom. at the same time, she very much taught us that we had moved past race as an issue, and unprovoked she at one point mentioned how the black panthers were, and i quote, "the black KKK" (one of the few things from back then that i remember the specific wording of). again, i'm white, she was black, it's not my place to call her an uncle tom. but i'll let you come to your own conclusions. wasnt the end of my grade school teachers putting their own stupid political beliefs into the classroom, though i will say it was somehow probably the least stupid. in middle school, i had a mrs. messina as my main teacher. at one point, while teaching us about the american civil war, she said something to the effect of "now, the book says it was fought over slavery, but it was really about state's rights". at the time, i could tell it was absolutely bullshit she was pedeling there, but i didn't know the history behind that specific brand of bullshit and i didn't have the ability to meaningfully challenge her on that due to the fact that i was a fucking middle schooler and she was my teacher. was still somehow one of the better ones i had overall though, somehow. probably more of an indictment of the system if anything. the one i was very much most impacted by at the time was in high school. i don't remember her name, but she was one of the aids in class (which, if you dont know, in special ed are the people who do little supplementary things to help the actual teachers), and during a slow part of class she just kinda went on an unprompted rant about how PTSD and related mental illnesses are "stupid". in a special ed classroom, with at least one student who had PTSD (me). said some bullshit about how things were so bad for the people who went through the world wars, and how they didn't have PTSD and this and that (clearly somebody never heard the term "shell shock"), and my actual teacher, bless his soul, actually pushed back a little on it, but god damnit did i want her to have been through even a little bit of what people like us have. i remembered at the time, back in middle school. one of the aids was a veteran, real soft spoken guy, shaved head, pretty buff, i never learned how his name was spelled but if i had to guess it was mr. garo. i remember at one point saying that what i went through was probably nowhere near as bad as what he did, and you know what he said to me? "you've got PTSD too, kid." that stuck with me, it really did. and here i heard this dumb bitch talking about how back in her day men were men and all that bullshit, and i couldn't help but think about mr. garo at that time, and wonder if she'd have the balls to say that shit to his face. at a different point she also came out as a climate change denier, so, y'know. wrong side of history about a lot of shit, really.

so, over the course of my adolescence i was in and out of the mental hospital more times than any of us can remember. i sure as hell can't, and by my mom's recollection it was about 7-12 times all in all. i barely remember the first times when i was very young, i don't think anything all too important happened despite a prevailing sense of death pervading over the whole experience. most of them happened when i was very, very young. luckily, we were poor enough that we actually had free healthcare, which if you know much in depth about american healthcare that should tell you something about where we were at the time. the last time i went was in middle school. just recently, i had burnt my leg pretty severely. they didn't give me the ointment to treat it while i was in there. i had lost one of my favorite shirts in there and one of the staff said "yeah, i'll see if i can get it", lying to my fucking face (bastard never even checked where he said he would), and according to someone who previously worked there and quit because the staff there sucked, there's a good chance it was stolen. i had a headache once, and the staff wouldn't let me just stay in my fucking room even though they let at least one other person stay in their room and sleep in, and at one point one of the nurses threatened to burn the book i had with me with a demonic fucking grin on her face. the worst thing that happened in there, though, wasn't to me. i didn't even realize the depths of how fucked it was until i remembered it in high school. warning, this next part is about sexual assault, you can skip to the next paragraph if that's enough for you. one of the girls i did group therapy was in there for being drugged and raped on camera. and the psychiatrist she was talking to? he said that she was just doing it for fucking attention. i swear to god, if hell exists he's going straight to depths of satans dick.

one time, when i was very young, i was playing with some cards that belonged to my grandpa. this is blurry but my grandma told me to stop, and when i didn't she beat the shit out of me with a belt. y'know, for being a kid, playing with cards. my grandpa and mom would later find me with my bed pushed up against my door. i don't believe i was punished for it because i told them exactly what happened. in talking to my mom about it, she said that she made sure that i wasnt alone with my grandma for a while. i wonder if she never tried anything like that again because she knew what she did was wrong, or if it's because she knew that by the time we'd be alone again next, i'd've been able to fight back, and unlike her if i went down i'd be able to get back up.

i never really had friends growing up, at least never for long. there were the people i went to class with, and that's only assuming i didn't fucking hate them. never really stayed in touch with people, and while a couple of times i met some again after the fact, i'd come to kind of fucking hate them. one of my best friends in middle school, garrett. loved the dude at the time, made the busrides actually goddamn enjoyable. i think he was probably my first time having romantic attraction to a another guy, even if i didn't quite have the capacity to understand the specificities of it all. my first morning in high school, i was overjoyed to see him again. and, since he already had two friends, that was two people i had a foot in the door to becoming friends with already. over the next two years, we'd be friends in the way that only teenage shitheads could be. and by the end of it, i realized that i hated them, and more importantly, myself for how we acted. so, i started to isolate myself, and luckily for me that's around when covid hit, so i would've been isolated as shit anyways! i think that's around the time i really started to mature as a person, funnily enough. i still sucked, but i was well on my path to sucking a lot less, like i do now. of course, i'm not perfect, but i'm definitely a lot better than i was as a high schooler, that's for damn sure.

growing up all alone, my two main sources of entertainment were books and video games, setting aside the VHS player. aside from my gameboy advance, the first actual console i could call my own was my N64. i used to think it was probably the newest piece of functional technology in the apartment, but in retrospect the fridge probably beat it out by a few years. that damn thing got me through a lot, especially the zelda games on it. the other main gaming device i had throughout a significant part of my childhood was the computer my dad left, and there were significant parts of that time where it didn't function at all, much less the functional but without internet it would later come to be. one of the games he'd install on it when he came up to visit was oblivion, i remember requesting it because i figured out that it was a game i remembered him playing when i was really young. there were a few games like that. ones that i mostly remember watching him play while i sit on his lap. spore was one of them, one of the earliest i remember really. but oblivion... it's still unequivocally one of my favorite games of all time, even if i have grown more and more critical of it as the years have gone on. growing up, the first job that i ever wanted was to be a warrior, like vegeta called himself in dragon ball z. as soon as i realized that wasnt gonna work out, the main thing then became games, and while i've definitely grown a lot more focused on writing as time's gone on, i still remember the desire and wonder i felt over imagining a game that had open world exploration and first person perspective like oblivion but the stellar dungeon and puzzle design of zelda, as well as a mixture of the immaculate vibes of both. i think the closest we've gotten was botw, but that's still not quite what i had in mind. i sincerely hope i'll be able to show you all, one day

eventually, i'd get a fully functioning computer. one that was basically an overpriced prebuilt office PC, but it had good enough specs to play oblivion and could connect to the internet, so even before i was able to get a new copy of oblivion on steam i was able to play flash games and such. the first game i ever got on my steam account was TF2, because it was free and somebody i knew from middle school had recommended it to me. i later friended him when i gained full steam account usage, i remembered his steam name even though he had been in high school for a while at that point. he was also the reason as to why i eventually got discord, too. a fair amount of time had passed, and i had come to find that i had basically nothing in common with him, but i think i might've been an adult by then. regardless, i had somebody to play TF2 with, and i was a happy kid. i would eventually rig up this broken bluetooth headset to work as just a mic over discord, it sucked but hey, i'm not the one who had to listen to it. i remember my first major TF2 update was, and get ready for this... jungle inferno. good timing, i know. got in just in time to see the last major content update! it was pretty early on, so i didn't even notice much different aside from the fact that i had to wait significantly longer to find a game for a while, so i just didnt play for a while lol. over the course of about 2017 to 2018 or so, i put the vast majority of my hours in TF2 in. 554 hours at time of writing. i don't see that changing soon, given the state of the game and lack of friends to play it with. i actually met a longtime friend over a niche little hightower server, one that's no longer up. i actually saw it being played in a pretty popular TF2 youtube video at the time, albeit for a short bit. i'm not friends with her, anymore. she's one of the many people i've realized i'm better off without, even with the pain in my chest as i write that. there's a certain kind and degree of irony poisoning that kills you even to interact with, and while hers was subtle in many ways it was also to her core. talking with her left me with an overwhelming feeling of not being cared about, like i meant nothing to her even though i cared so much about her. i'd be lying if i said a part of me doesnt miss her.

through the guy i met in middle school, i met who in retrospect would be my highschool girlfriend. online, of course. gods, it pains my heart just to think about her. they had such a profound impact on me, from my sense of humor, to my music taste, to my taste in games. she's the reason i have such a love for half life, you see she was pretty involved in the source modding scene when i first met her. she actually had me do a bit of voice acting for one of her mods, if memory serves. unsure if it ever got finished. god, she even bought me the microphone i currently use. well, not like i've even used it this year. all our little spoonerisms, our stupid little jokes, the games we'd play together, it all makes me want to cry in retrospect. by the time we parted, things had changed. she'd grown distant. cold. i couldn't even talk to her anymore. i still feel so bad for it, but i had to break up with her. on some level we both still loved eachother. but we had grown apart. and the things i had put her through... i couldn't continue to have done the things i had done. from what i've been able to ascertain about the lives of normal people, i was... relatively not that shitty, for a teenage boy. but god did i still fucking suck.

i remember, all my life, everyone always insisted how smart i was. my parents insisted i was smart because they were smart, my teachers all insisted i was smart for some goddamn reason, everywhere i turned i had adults fellating me over my own perceived intelligence. it gave me a complex, to put it lightly. if i was so smart, then everyone around me must be such a dumbass, and therefore i'm better than them, and... you see the problem here, right? and the thing is, i wasn't smart, i just knew big words because i read a lot of fantasy and that's just what our society thinks smart is. honestly, i'm not even sure intelligence is a wholly valid concept, even if it makes instinctual sense. there's a reason i try not to use intelligence as neither a compliment or an insult anymore. honestly, at this point my stance on it is that everyone's a dumbass and the difference is on what. it's taken me a lot to unlearn my own sense of superiority, it's very hard to unlearn something that you had instilled into you as long as you've been making memories. i think another thing was my own attractiveness.

growing up, people always told me how much i look like my mom; my mom especially. i don't really see much in the way of similarities, but i still internalized that to some degree. now, imagine hearing that as a kid, and then hearing your mom crying about how ugly she thinks she is. that's pretty fucking damaging, even if it took me into adulthood to be able to properly articulate it. there's a lot that it's taken me into adulthood to fully articulate. y'know, you absorb a lot, as a kid. that's what you do, generally speaking. so, speaking as an adult now... i just hope i can make a better world for the next generation of little shits, so they dont turn out with as much bullshit as i did, y'know? even if i don't think i'm ever gonna want to have kids, it's just... important. y'know?

#this is what im speaking in reference to when i say that i'm surprisingly well adjusted considering the circumstances btw.#i didnt even cover everything

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ghoulodont · 5 months

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I haven’t even done it yet. But… I know you have 10 facts! But also you can also just list 10 facts about anything you find interesting!

Ghost Mutuals Tag Game 🦇 Send this to the last ten Ghesties in your notifications, then reply here with ten facts about yourself! Let's get to know each other!

okaaaaaay ill try to come up with 10 facts...

1. i have a wonderful little elderly cat who i love dearly even though she bites me every day. shes my dewdrop muse. she has a water ghoul name too

2. i wont say exactly what i do at work because its kind of specific but the general idea is i make computer programs that are used to modify peoples teeth

3. i almost got a minor in something so specific i feel like it would reveal what school i went to, but its stuff about light and color and vision and perception. i took all the classes but was too lazy to actually do the paperwork. my major (and the subject of my masters) was computer science

4. during college i did an internship at a company everyone ive ever told the stories to says is basically a knockoff version of theranos (i.e. a huge fraud). it was miserable but so funny in retrospect

5. im not a vegetarian but i barely ever eat meat. i was a vegetarian for maybe 5 years as a teenager but i became too obsessed with checking for secret meat products in things and had to stop

6. i lived in australia for 6 months. i arrived there with more organs than i had when i left

7. i can move my clasped hands from in front of me to behind me over my head without letting go and without doing any specific trick with my elbows

8. i drive a purple car (but its really dark and looks black unless its in the sun). i found it by going on a car website and seeing the option to filter by color and immediately clicking purple like some sort of child but its actually a great car

9. i wear almost the same clothes every day like a cartoon character. black t shirt + black sweatpants or jeans depending on the situation + black denim jacket when going out unless its too hot

10. i died (or rather, became dead) when i was 24 years old. it wasnt very exciting i just suddenly realized i could feel my organs liquefied inside me. i dont think i ever came back to life. this has been very influential on my identity

#thank you this was fun actually #a little scary though #i keep telling myself theres nothing truly incriminating on this blog if someone happens to find me #implicit age reveal too maybe based on other things ive said #it literally does not matter i know this but im paranoid in weird ways

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uniquezombiedestiny · 7 months

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10, 24, 7, 1

for owen and vera :3

1. What memory would your OC rather just forget?

vera - hmmm... the million memories of her friends deaths. whether they be corrosion, abnos, mechanical failures, or like. really anything in the corp. anything could kill you. she's probably learned to be vigilant all the time bc of it, and hates the paranoia she's developed (even if death is meaningless, it still hurts :()

owen - t589. what do you mean only one? thats all one to me

actually i got it. when he has to escape breaches in t589 with bella. they were terrifying + in retrospect just. fucked up as hell, considering a) owen and bella were kids and b) sometimes the breaches were corroded kids. not to mention the more gory ones and the memories of bella just losing her shit/breaking down/etc etc. same goes for him ofc, but he'd rather forget seeing bellas pain more.

7. What's one way your OC has changed since you first came up with them?

vera - her hair! it began as 2 buns, then became the pigtails. they always had those little tails though. + the estra back hair she has sometimes wasnt there originally

owen - he and bella used to not be siblings until around like d25 where i noticed they were similar (hair color and ppodae gift), now its a big part of their stories

10. What's an AU that would be interesting to explore with your OC?

vera - oooohh... maybe a sephirah au. ive been thinking of it a bit but i think itd be genuinely inch resting to see how they react to their new circumstances (robot body, new job, cant die, The Horrors). she does have one already but she's not very developed so. yeah. and ofc she'd take malkuths place.

owen - slaps him into dnd. go, my boy. cause a tpk

but i think thatd be pretty interesting. he and bella would be half-elves or humans corrupted by some kinda monster like they had been originally. would make for some interesting attacks and combat. and The Lore :3 and party interactions too.... man. dnd is fun

24. What is an alternative life path your OC might have gone down? How different would their life be if they'd made those decisions?

vera - not leaving the index, and becoming a proselyte or messenger. she'd wind up like her mother - someone whose empathy and stubbornness and such - the fire in them - being curbed in order to survive the index, with regrets she cant pursue. stuck in a middle ground until something breaks - she either gives into the index and loses herself, or gives up on the index and dies/leaves/etc. if she left, she'd likely join an office and become a fixer from her previous experience.

owen - not joining t589 and never getting into l corp (vera doesnt either in this scenario but still). they'd have to fend for themselves on the backstreets, which is. hard as fuck i assume. they'd turn out more ordinary, working whatever jobs they can to get into the nest. either that or they'd join an office or syndicate - maybe turning to one to survive.

#owen #vera #bella #lc ocs #asks #facingfearbuildingfuture #ty for the ask!! this was an interesting one #had to come back after a bit bc it was a challenge in some parts #but then bam. creative mood struck me #now we're here! hi! :) -malk

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trekkele · 3 months

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You mentioned in one of your tags that you'd like to write a fic where the batkids find out Alfred wasn't so awesome a parent to Bruce and I wanted to ask if you'd like to share some ideas and directions where you could imagine it going?

Would it change the way the kids think and act around Alfred? Or Bruce? And what are some Major Mistakes Alfred made that in retrospect make a lot of sense regarding Bruce's parenting? And what sent the boulder of realisation going in the first place?

I know it sounds like I'm asking for spoilers or the actual, complete plotline which you probably haven't thought out yet, but I'm just curious about various versions of situations and realisations you think could happen. Or things that you'd like to work into your fic but it just wouldn't fit.

Basically, I love your writing and I love this kind of DramaTM within the Batfam and I'd cherish any crumb of information you would like to share.

Thank you and have a wonderful day! <3

Ok so this premise does rely on good dad Bruce, not because shitty parents cant come from shitty parents (they do, usually) but because i think seeing Bruce not do the things Alfred does would be how the kids (specifically Dick) realize what kind of parent Alfred is.

And this is really a reaction to the “Alfred is a saint for putting up with Bruce” fandom attitude because if you, as a parent or a guardian, are incapable of parenting a kid, no matter how difficult that kid is, it is your responsibility to either find a way to become what your kid needs or find someone who can. I know a lot of us had shitty parents but a traumatized nine year old shouldnt be “put up with” or “handled” they should be parented. At the very least they should be loved, and they should know they are loved. (Gets off parenting soapbox, climbs onto fandom soapbox)

Also every time i think about this fic i start thinking “maybe Alfred deserves some more grace” because he was put in a pretty impossible situation immediately after losing two people he deeply respected, if not loved, and lets be reasonable the 80-90s were uh, not an ideal time for difficult parenting, and the therapy available for children back then would have probably made things worse if not outright given Bruce ptsd (if he didnt already have that), so theres that. On the other hand, Alfred is also fairly consistently shown as being deeply unkind about idiosyncrasies, and unwilling to admit when he’s wrong.

And theres only so many times you can call your adult child an idiot, and imply that you believe every one of their choices to be invalid or wrong, before it turns out that you are Part of The Problem, or at the very least, A Bitch.

Anyways.

The thing is, i dont think it would change much. I think they might stop taking Alfreds word as gospel, especially in regards to Bruce, and i think they might be more forgiving towards Bruce when he messes up in the long term, but the truth is that whats it going to change? How do you apologize to someone for that? What are you apologizing for?

Because ultimately i dont think Bruce is ready to admit that Alfred is, or was, wrong. Bruce knows he was a bad kid, a difficult kid. His teachers and his family and the newspapers, and even Alfred, have admitted that Bruce was a hard kid to raise. Probably harder to love. He’s never surprised when people leave him, after all.

He does know his own kids don’t deserve that style of parenting though. But thats because they’re better than him. He has to do better because they deserve better, because he chose to be there for them. Alfred never really got that choice, did he? Bruce’s parents trusted Alfred, and Alfred stayed out of his respect for them. Not the bratty kid who cried for a year and refused to speak and would hide under the bed instead of sleep.

And thats another thing - if Bruce admits that Alfred wasnt a good parent, if he admits that Alfred made some terrible mistakes, does that mean he’s betraying the trust his parents placed in him? Is he casting blame onto two people he can only idolize, because to do otherwise is to admit he doesn’t remember much of them anymore?

As for how the kids find out, i think Dick realized in his own. I think Jason realizes because Dick stops him from walking in and interrupting a conversation between the two and before he can ask whats going on he hears Alfred slap Bruce. Im not sure about the rest.

*i started answering this, got distracted, finished writing it in my head, and then forgot i never answered it in reality. But i think thats most of what i wanted to say.

#asks #but feel free to ask me something specific #i think hitting your adult child is a Big Deal #i think hittinh your child child is a Big Deal #but the batkids wouldbt be around to see it #and to answer this before it comes up #no i dont think alfred hit bruce. i think the slapping is a. like once a year thing #but it does display a level of comfort with that behavior that Jason would recognize #also once is too much lbr #i love alfred i do but WOW fandom refuses to engage with any of his more complicated behaviors #that man did a decent job with bruce but he absolutely fucked up in some way #cw abuse mention

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iiudex · 6 months

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Hallo I heard I can ask questions about your f/o's SO

I'm super interested in Neuvillette, tell me more!! How did you first meet? What's the relationship like? Any special headcanons about him/your ship? (I feel like I don't know anything bc I don't follow you for too long but I wanna know everything!)

~ anemoflower

@anemoflower EHHEHE HELLO HELLO (dont feel bad abt not knowing anything bc tbh i havent posted a coherent thought abt them ever but NOW I GET TO >:D) also i get really in the weeds of referring to myself directly so. i use lyam as my stand in (ik thats what they’re there for but whatever)

ANYWAYS. UNDER THE CUT BC ITS A LOT!

okay so small lyam backstory bc thats important to know for their first meeting!! they’re not actually fontainian (they were born there, sorta, but they’re not ethnically fontainian). & they were actually born underwater! their parents were explorers, so, they were exploring this place ↴

then they had a baby & forgot to bring said child with them when they eventually left (ik it sounds sad but dw lyam like. barely knew these people they dont gaf. ANYWAY); SO. LYAM GREW UP IN THAT PLACE YADA YADA. WELL ONE DAY. AFTER THEY’D BEEN THERE FOR UPWARDS OF 20 YEARS, ONE OF FONTAINE’S DIVERS NOTICED THEM AND WAS LIKE “erm??? i dont think this is legal hello are you supposed to be here????”

cue lyam being put on trial & boom technical first meeting with neuvillette. gotta be honest the entire thing was kinda boring bc it was all blown out of proportion just for lyam to be like “well i was born there, & none of you said anything till now” kinda thing. ANYWAY. since they were technically not guilty of a trespassing crime, they weren’t sent to meropide, but they were guilty of reading old documents that no one was supposed to see. (which wasnt what the trial was for so its not like anyone could do anything but whatever. anyways) instead of sending them to prison, neuvillette gave them a job :3 “work off your crimes” and all that. they’re technically a general investigator, bc they’re way too observant for they’re own good, but what they were really there for is to research this place ↴

which is within the former institute’s walls. only bc it might give them some hint to prevent fontaine’s prophecy & neuvi AND furina wanna be more safe than sorry.

ANYWAY THATS THEIR FIRST MEETING. BASICALLY A SILLY MISUNDERSTANDING TRIAL TURNS INTO A CONSENSUAL WORKPLACE RELATIONSHIP.

as for their dynamic, its so simple in retrospect but actually very hard to word. but it’s basically like?? rather than a relationship that was initially built on friendship or whatnot, its built solely on trust and understanding. both of them feel outcasted, despite technically having a place within fontaine’s borders. so its like “if you and i are outcasts together, its less lonely”

plus both of them have a stronger connection with hydro than other people. neuvillette because he’s literally the sovereign. & lyam bc they grew up in the water (probably too close to the primordial sea but they’re not from fontaine so its fine). so they also have that natural pull to one another.

they’re also very quiet individuals, but lyam also does have wriothesley’s exact sense of humour, but they just have this perpetual seriousness about them so everyone thinks they’re actually insane. (it makes neuvillette’s days a lot more interesting though so it’s okay :3)

ANYWAY. they’re a comfy couple. always got each other’s backs, even when the other doesn’t realise. always aware of each other. bc hey. they’re each other’s person. they gotta.

ALSO IF I CAN GIVE A HC ON THEIR WORK RELATIONSHIP REAL QUICK— lyam is kinda like neuvillette’s shadow :3 (im still working on their kit, but hypothetically speaking they’d be a buffer/support & a sub dps for him. & any other dps really). no one ever really sees them unless they have to, or unless lyam just feels like it. but they don’t want neuvi taking on cases himself, bc he’s too important for that 🤷 so they do it 🤷 (bro’s the grim reaper /j)

ANYWAY (x2) SPECIAL HC TIME

i hc neuvi to have VERY sensitive hands (sorta why he wears gloves, apart from just gen appearance). so he rarely lets people actually hold his hands, but lyam gets to have that privilege :’3. they give himb small hand kisses & cradle them so gently. plus, they just love holding hands in general, so they’re grateful that he trusts them sm T_T

THIS IS ALL FOR NOW BUT ALWAYS FEEL FREE TO ASK ME QUESTIONS IM ALWAYS THINKING ABT THEM

#— asks #— f/ovember 🩵#{{ HEHEHHEHE THANK YOU FOR THE ASK }}#{{ this makes absolutely no sense to no one but me but i hope this gives you some insight SKSKS }}

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