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icerosesummerbracket · 1 year

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Radiance Ideas, From Zero!

Some things before I get into it,

None of this is canon... yet. What I mean by that is that I was thinking that it’s a little unfair if I can just automatically put anything I want into the doc while also shooting down other ideas. So, ideally the way this works is these ideas have to be mentioned in an ask in order to become canon. Basically, if you like a particular idea, send an ask bringing it up

And as for the rest (my ideas), under the keep reading button it goes!

I Guess the best starting place is that to begin with, what got me thinking was this ask I answered with the idea that Radiance never gets any blood on her white clothing, compared to the other more complicated morally gray character who get stains on their white clothes

An idea I was thinking of but didn't know how to articulate there is that I see Radiance as a character who doesn't personally get her hands dirty. She doesn't get messy because she makes other people do her bidding for her, because they're there to be tools for her to use.

Like, we've established that Roscuro was her right hand man, and he dies in book 1. This tells me that even whoever she makes her right hand man is disposable to her, just like everyone else. Roscuro isn't incredibly powerful, or immortal the way that Radiance is- and operating under the assumption that immortality is something that Radiance did to herself rather than her just having naturally always been immortal, the fact that she wouldn't make her right hand man immortal is the main thing that communicates that even that role is disposable to her

I imagine that being Radiance's right hand man is a role that's like the in between of "If you want something done right, do it yourself"- it's important missions she wouldn't trust to anyone else, but again, she doesn't like getting her hands dirty because she doesn't have to. Why put herself into danger doing it herself, when she can use a pawn that, while valuable, can be replaced.

That said, I don't think she was expecting Roscuro to die as quickly as he did- hence why there seems to be a handful of characters she's been attempting to mold into the perfect replacement for her right-hand man (most of the antagonists mentioned who want Radiance's approval)

So as for who she makes her right hand man after Roscuro dies- I don't think she does give that position to anyone right away. Instead I think her plan is that she's told them whoever is the first to bring her Rose will get the "honor" of being appointed.

At the same time, she's also keeping them competitive with each other for the position by making sure they get plenty of progress updates about how the others are doing. They can't work together because, to her, 1; if they can't achieve it on their own then they're no better than any of the other hundreds of pawns at her disposal, and 2; she doesn't want individuality or unique ideas out of them, they're meant to be tools who do exactly what she wants them to

Now, as for the "pawns" in question...

Isabeth: I think it makes the most logical sense that she was originally planned to be the one to replace Roscuro. Maybe she even does, for Book 2, but then after her failures she gets demoted. But either way, Radiance doesn't want Isabeth to feel secure in her place, in order to drive her to more action. Additionally, with everything rambled so far this could actually once again explain the discrepancy between Radiance fans and Isabeth fans- while it's Radiance's ideals that Isabeth acts for, Radiance never gets her hands dirty and always makes other people do things, and Isabeth is the one trying the hardest to fulfill her wishes

Etienne: While established that Etienne is a morally gray character, I think that complexity isn't from her working with Radiance- at least, not sincerely. I think she's technically working for some anti-Radiance group (presumably Currant is also a part of the anti-Radiance group) but is undercover pretending to be one of Radiance's group. The thing is- I think Radiance would still know that, she's just also trying to see how far she can make Etienne bend to keep up the act, and perhaps also trying to manipulate her into joining the light at the same time. Based on other points about Etienne being helpful, I think the timeline works out like this; she's undercover working for Radiance in the first 2 books, she does something to help Rose's group in book 3, and after that knowing Radiance, she's probably Displeased with Etienne to say the least, and more than likely it's a "Etienne barely escapes her wrath" situation and Etienne remains with the protagonists for the remainder of the books

Lux, Belladonna, Fennel: Given these characters have all been said to be in the 14-18 age range, I don't think any of them were really meant to immediately graduate to being Radiance's right hand man. Rather, I think they all showed promise in different ways, and Radiance planned on molding them further to be more like Isabeth, and ultimately one would be planned to replace Isabeth after something happened to her, after she replaced Roscuro after something happened to him. With Roscuro dying faster than she was planning though and Isabeth failing her, more pressure is forced upon these characters despite being so young. Now, individually,

Fennel: I imagine Radiance had at least decently high hopes for Fennel, given that he was the son of her previous right hand man. Unfortunately for her, he's nothing like his father. Unfortunately for him, he has other uses as a tool- like striking fear into the others by making it clear what awaits them if they disappoint her. Also I think in the first ask with him I vaguely mentioned that Radiance kills him but I'd be willing to overturn that canon because it was a very brief mention and I didn't even put it directly on the google doc info form

Lux: Rather than having any connections, I think Lux just showed a lot of potential power from a young age and so Radiance did what she could to manipulate him so that he would trust her as he grew up further. I think his arc is something like; Book 1, he's working stuff in the background, oblivious to Radiance's true nature; Book 2, Roscuro is dead and now that Radiance expects more of him he's starting to learn the kind of person she is and he doesn't like it very much; Book 3, he is no longer oblivious to Radiance's nature, and in equal amounts follows her because he's afraid and because he doesn't want to lose the positive attention; in Book 4 he kind of crashes and that's when his redemption arc really starts I think- that or the later parts of Book 3

Belladonna: Okay so minor "waiting in askbox hell" spoilers; this poll about siblings was because I have an ask that says that Belladonna is Roscuro's daughter- which would mean Fennel and Belladonna are both Roscuro's children (to avoid another set of twins, I'm thinking they're half-siblings). Anyway. I'm still thinking about that one so there's two possibilities with her: A, Radiance has interest with her for the same reason as Fennel, but with more success / B, if not, instead she's more like Lux but less oblivious about Radiance's true nature. With her starting out less oblivious, I think her arc is more like at first believing that she can live up to Radiance's expectations but as things go further it's more and more clear that she can't stomach this. If the "Belladonna and Fennel are half-siblings" route is canonized, it could also be that Radiance is using Fennel as leverage against Belladonna to keep her on the light side. + there's this og ask about Radiance mind controlling and manipulating her- while at this point it's clear manipulation is Radiance's go-to, it also seems clear that Radiance does have literal mind control- this was canonized with Marni. I think bringing out mind control is like Radiance's last resort for when someone just won't obey her- so it's possible that Belladonna turns away from the light, only for Radiance to mind-control her into following orders. I don't really have a concrete timeline for how this goes in my head, though

Sunrise and Sunset: Did you think I forgot about them? No, I just was waiting because they appear later. Anyway, since it's been canonized that they were villains in book 4 and redeemed in book 5, here's my pitch; Radiance is losing picks for who to make her next right hand, and so "this one girl" is brought in who also shows promise. Cause remember- in the first time they were created on this blog, it was mentioned that they pretend to be the same person up until the final confrontation with them as villains. I think that (let's say both of them are pretending to be Sunrise) Sunrise "shows promise" because she's able to do things "so quickly and efficiently" (if no one knows it's a pair of twins and not one girl, they could make themself seem like one impossibly efficient person). Then there's the detail about how their plans always spiral out of what they originally intended, and I think they're horrified by it but then basically speedrun Lux's arc when they realize that not only is Radiance not displeased with what they've done, she's proud of it. They want to pretend they're in control so the twins agree to act like it was what they planned all along, but when given the chance they split ways with the light quick

Okay NOW I think I'm out of the light party

And also of course, there's a blanket "Radiance mom theories" thing where obviously in any case if a character turned out to be her kid, it would explain her interest in making them her right hand- she believes in their potential because she knows her own power- but ultimately they would still be a disposable tool to her. She's not very motherly.

"Is that the end of the post now?"

You know what, originally I was gonna branch off to "but what about the Rose of Ice" and "what is it about Rose that interests Radiance" but this post is. So dense already. That I'm gonna save that for another time, I think

#out of character #ice rose summer #radiance aroiis #radiance

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