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the-gateway-to-madness · 3 months

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It sorta bothers me that post-series people are still complaining about 3Below being disconnected from the rest of Tales of Arcadia. For me, it was a refreshing break from the densely-packed fantasy lore and an intriguing peek at the way the universe beyond Arcadia and Earth functions. I liked the character arcs and interpersonal connections. And there was ample room for me to come up with a bunch of my own headcanons, which I love! I absolutely love being able to slot pieces of my own mind and soul into an existing world! I don't like shows where I'm told how every little detail works, that's way too much to remember. Instead I want enough to create an idea of the rules and how things might have gone/might continue to go and fill in whatever else I want.

Also, I think 3Below was SUPPOSED to be a lot more connected before Wizards got cut down. Tons of ideas didn't make it into the limited series run- I remember hearing stuff about Mordred being involved, a lost Krel arc, and I'm sure a lot of lore that would have bound the worlds together more closely. When they mentioned Gaylen's core came from Earth, there was clearly supposed to be more to that, but it got cut out. I'm like 93% sure Gaylen was a being who was part of or similar to the Arcane Order, but was drawn to the cosmos rather than to a part of the Earth. That would indicate that Akiridion tech and magic are compatible because Akiridions' energy-based life was initially magical, but those roots were largely forgotten because of how old a civilization Akiridion is. They've been spacefaring since humans were cavepeople. If the Order existed from the primeval dawn of the world, and Gaylen left not long after that, Akiridion could be millenia ahead of Earth. Or, heck, maybe Earth was the first or only livable world, and Gaylen created the Order to look after it before going off to try to find or create life elsewhere. I always headcanoned that Seklos was more powerful than most Akiridions or even the Royals that came after her, given the fact her core alone was enough to stop Gaylen while in the modern era it requires two royal cores. Maybe she was created by Gaylen to be Akiridion's version of an Arcane Order type being, and she created normal Akiridions, which she then had kids with, diluting her power in the Royals that followed. There's so much ancient history to unpack from just the tidbits we were given.

As for the modern era, there seems to very distinctly be a major intergalactic connection. The drunk ship operator in episode 3 of 3b s1 that the Zerons interrogate talks about ship classifications, which indicates a universal or at least an interplanetary system of ship ratings. We also see interplanetary tourism, and signs that Akiridion is one of the most advanced and influential planets out there.

3Below doesn't need to continue the plot of Trollhunters to be a valid part of Tales of Arcadia. It brought an energy to ToA that was somewhere between Star Trek TNG and Babylon 5, and I love how it expands the weirdness of Arcadia. If it was supposed to be a continuation of Trollhunters, they would have made more Trollhunters. But it's not Trollhunters, it's 3Below. And Wizards isn't Trollhunters either! I honestly think that Camelot, Douxie, and the world of wizards could have been written such that the Trollhunters cast was much less focal, and that if they'd given the show the time it needed and deserved to tell its story, it would have been fleshed-out and fascinating all on its own, with or without the TH gang. Where are the magic users beyond the reach of Camelot? Are there merfolk, sirens, harpies, dryads, more dragons, or other sapient races living on Earth with their own civilizations and magic and cultures? There are so many worlds and so many potential stories out there, on Earth and beyond, in the Tales of Arcadia universe. Arcadia just happens to be the narrative meshing point of them all. And I think that's a really cool way to build a universe.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my TED talk, here's more Akiridion development as a treat for making it this far.

#Tales of Arcadia #3below tales of arcadia #trollhunters tales of arcadia #wizards tales of arcadia #toa #jim lake jr #toby domzalski #jim lake junior #toa trollhunters #claire nunez #hisirdoux casperan #douxie #toa wizards #trollhunters #toa 3below #3below #krel tarron #aja tarron

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konfizry · 11 months

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Nefarious, anti-Zelink localization choices in TotK

I would argue that they are not a thing.

So what I’ve been seeing, is mostly discourse around The House.

Mainly, that one line in Zelda’s diary, where Zelda refers to the house as “my house” in the English text as seen below:

The argument seems to be that she does not say “my house” in the original Japanese. I’ve even seen people go as far as to claim she wrote “our house”. Aight, let’s take a peek then:

So indeed, there is no trace of 私の家 (my house), but neither is there 私たちの家 (our house). It’s just 家 (”house” / “the house”).

As you know. Pronouns aren’t nearly as pervasive in japanese as they are in English. I do think it’d be strange for her to use a possessive here, like, you know. Given that we know that it’s this here house she’s referring to, y’know. And she’s writing in her own diary, there’s no need to specify. Like, It’s the house. This house. What other house is there that she had an extra room built at? None, of course, right. Right.

So anyway, what’s the correct translation then? ~I don’t know.~ If you wanna stick close to the original jp’s lack of possessive here, you’d say “the house”, i guess, but listen: “my house” is a perfectly reasonable option, as well. I know some of y’all hate that it makes it sound like she’s excluding Link here, and sure you’re allowed to feel that way but. I. don’t think it’s wrong tbh honest???

And “our house” would have worked, too, probably, but then it would have leaned a littttttle too heavily on the Zelink and I can sort of understand that they want to keep it at least a little nebulous. (because 1. that is what they do and 2. it’s more fun that way)

And unfortunately “our house” would have also contradicted another little piece of info found in the Japanese version regarding... the well, again. more specifically what the game calls the well.

In English it is referred to as Zelda’s Secret Well. And that is what it is. It is very much the well that was built for her own purposes, and it is a secret chamber. No complaints here.

The well is labeled a little differently in Japanese, tho. The game calls it ゼルダの家の井戸, which could translate to "Zelda's house's water well" or "the water well by Zelda's house" (or whatever else you can think of that has “Zelda’s house” and “well” in it, probably, im just giving examples so u get the idea).

(click here if you’re on desktop and can’t zoom in but want to)

So, in fact, you could say that in Japanese, the house is clearly stated to be Zelda’s house. Woops, back to square one it is, then.

But do you see? Are you seeing? While Zelda does call it “my house” in the English text seemingly leaving no room for Link, you could also argue that the localization team went out of their way to not call it “Zelda’s house” when they absolutely could have. By calling the well “Zelda’s secret well” instead of going for a closer-to-the-original “well outside Zelda’s house”, they recreated a little bit of room for speculation. Wow!!!! Cool!!

And this is just like. One little tidbit I decided to focus on, but my point is:

There is no secret anti-Zelink agenda in the localization team. Translating means making choices, you might disagree with some of them, but that does not make them wrong or vile, I don’t think.

And the siege mentality I’ve seen some people adopt regarding Zelink strikes me as very misplaced. We are eating good. There is food aplenty. Why are you digging for extra scraps that may not even exist?

Granted, comparing the original text with its translations can be super fun (heck I enjoy it, to an extent!), but try to think about your own attitude as you do so. Try to go into with curiosity and humility in your heart instead of righteous vindicativeness. You might find that more satisfying.

Now of course, sometimes translation errors do occur, and criticism is warranted, but try to take a step back and ask yourself if this really means the localization team are a bunch of buffoons who either have no idea what they’re doing or are actively trying to ruin your Zelda experice, or if, perhaps, instead, sometimes people fuck up. For various reasons that you may not be aware of.

(Rereading this i now realize that i am tone-policing and. Yeah. I am. deal with it)

One more thing, you don’t have to believe randos who claim “X is canon in Japanese and they censored it in English”, especially if they’re not elaborating or providing evidence. (You can choose to believe them if you want to, at the end of the day, but just be aware that you believed without seeing. So think before you spread the word around, right?)

One final, final thing, you can always set your nintendo switch to Japanese and experience the game in its original language, for yourself. Isn’t that the coolest? I wish this was possible for all games. Thanks, Nintendo!

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dballzposting · 2 months

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i feel inclined to add on to that ask abt movies (cuz i love watching movies).

Trunks to me speaks to me as a person who at one point expected the stuff he watches to change him a little. To help him think in a different perspective and challenge his preconceptions or. SOMETHING. hes the kind of guy to try to watch movies like 2001 space odyssey but by the end of it, just looks up the ending explained. he has to try to get anything out of it. I don't think he liked trainspotting. I don't think he knew what to make of The Shining. Trunks would almost certainly try to not get bored at the beginning of Pulp Fiction (the bulk of that movie is talking). But he'll still go see movies in theaters or watch whatever he's got laying around in the house though.

He thinks he's watching movies to gain something but tbh ? Trunks has been watching movies all his life, and it might just feel rly weird to suddenly. not to. If that makes grammatical sense. I think it just gets too quiet in his house. His mom's always working on something in her lab, vegeta's always in his training room, etc etc. so he puts em on to chill. Even if he doesn't really get them sometimes. Bulma seems like the type to do the same thing while she works, maybe he gets it from her.

That's probably why watching movies with goten is so interesting though. He can really get to the core of what it's trying to say, engage with the story and themes on a meaningful level and come up with his OWN well constructed analysis with an infectious enthusiasm reminiscent of the way Gohan talks about entomology.

And Goten, country bumpkin that he is, probably hasn't even seen more than MAX 30 movies in his life (ever) besides whatever soaps his mom leaves on. he's glad trunks invites him over to watch this stuff. At the end of analyzing whatever film they saw I think he'd be like Waow. That was so cool Trunks thank you for showing me this :-) can I borrow this dvd and never give it back and Trunks will be like yeah man thats cool I'm glad you liked it so much. I have a bunch more laying around it's whatever. (He found a lot of these movies in this "guest" room he's never really been inside of. It still has a lot of stuff from before he was born.)

I think that's so interesting.. that Trunks is familiar with the elements present in film but because it's familiar, it's harder to parse how or why these elements are meshed together to make the whole. he's just "watching" them without really thinking about anything and as such, doesn't gain anything.

But because Goten isn't accustomed to watching movies all the time, he can look with unclouded eyes. Not just watching, but observing and taking all of it in.

Its the difference between hearing and listening if that makes sense.

(One last tidbit which isn't super important. I mentioned earlier a guest room. It was yamcha's. When he moved out, he didn't really take a lot of things with him, choosing to leave some of his clothes and most of his movies behind. Bulma probably told him that he could just leave his stuff there in case he ever wanted to visit. The only movie he bothered to take with him was Caddyshack. For some reason. Why)

peace 🌷

I mean this as a kindly reminder and I'm saying this to everyone: you can always make your own post / reblog the post in question in order to add on to it. You can get your name out there. Look alive... It's showtime. I mean I will always faithfully post asks (I cannot guarantee in a timely manner) but never forget your options there.

(For instance perhaps posting your own words on your own post stands to grant them more respect, rather than forcing them through the filter of somebody else's input in order to be posted - as is the reality of sending asks. I can tell when someone really cares, and I appreciate that, and I try to be faithful to that, but I also like to babble. Maybe some posts ought to be stand-alone?)

(Gotta raise my glass to this though becasue i found out today [I would have found out a week ago if I had bothered to check my email] that I may or may not be helping my school start a film club so TBH i gotta appreciate this ..... and I gotta respect the grinde.... It's funny thouhg because you know I actually hate watching movies. When the time comes I ought to come back to you and the other user for recommendations. Well anyway back to the ask)

OK Well this is some real shit you just said. I fully agree. It coheres with what was already said although with some extra sensitivity ...

Reposting this segment for a TL;DR becasue I thought it was an elegant conclusion:

Trunks is familiar with the elements present in film but because it's familiar, it's harder to parse how or why these elements are meshed together to make the whole. he's just "watching" them without really thinking about anything and as such, doesn't gain anything. But because Goten isn't accustomed to watching movies all the time, he can look with unclouded eyes.

I mean really it all comes down to Trunks being a Modern CityBoy; he's used to background noise, he's used to mindless entertainment. Goten doesn't have things in his life that are meant to be taken for granted, though, so that just makes him overall more attentive and appreciative.

That's the greater discussion here ... A veiled call for action for us all to try to look with fresh eyes upon our own lives ....

Really, If Trunks isn't taking to the creative storytelling aspect of it, he should at least take a shining to the technological artistry. Maybe he doesn't care why or when, but he does know HOW they do what they do. That'd be swagg. But then he'd have to do research on something that isn't Minecraft related. Sighhhh

BTW Thanjk you for addsing that Caddyshack bit in there for me. Mondo appreciated <3

#dballz posting #dballz asks

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isure-hopeso · 4 months

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12.31.2023

48 books this year. My hunger never ends. I am insatiable. Here's my reviews:

Five Classics by Agatha Christie 8/10 Started the year off strong with a handful of Christie's shorter classic mysteries

The Fortune Teller by Gwendolyn Womack 4.5/10 Super super cool story idea with very poor flow and had a cheating trope

Mountain Mama by Axsom & Pelham 6.5/10 A depressingly realistic look at life on the frontier for a single mom

A Well-Behaved Woman by Therese Anne Fowler 8/10 Alva Vanderbilt was so incredible

Followers by Megan Angelo 6.5/10 One of those books where you really don't care the first 2/3 and then you can't get over it for the last 1/3

The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien 10/10 my annual reading of one of the Big Four, as always

"Kitchen Princess" Omnibus 2 by Ando & Kobayashi 9/10 I'm pretty sure I learned my love languages from the Kitchen Princess series as a kid

A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas 5.5/10 A little tropey and the riddle was stupid easy, but I love me a Beauty & The Beast retelling

Homeland: The Legend of Drizzt #1 by R.A. Salvatore 5.5/10 It really didn't need to be that long, but Salvy loves his extra DnD context

The Black Poets by Dudley Randal 10/10 When I tell you how often I think about the poetry from this book. When I tell you.

Mansfield Park by Jane Austen 6.5/10 Witty and wild for it's time, like all Austen novels, but she's boring and falls in love with her cousin

A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas 7.5/10 Turning the Beauty and the Beast retelling on its HEAD and using tidbits from the previous novel to change everything - but also very very smutty

Tithe by Holly Black 7/10 Rereading an old book I love in high school and finding that I still like it quite a lot

The Big Four by Agatha Christie 8/10 One of her biggie Poirot heists, super thrilling

"Kitchen Princess" Vol. 6 by Ando and Kobayashi 9/10 I have dreams, actual dreams, about these stories for weeks after reading them. Good dreams.

The School for Good and Evil by Soman Chianani 7/10 Decided to read this after watching the movie -- it might not be incredible storytelling but it's a fun story-world, so I decided to read it all

A World Without Princes by Soman Chianani 4/10 S for G&E 2 -It had some good bits, but was overall way too clumpy

The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien 10/10 This was actually my first time reading it, and I LOVE getting all the universe context!!

To Weave a Web of Magic by Delacroix, Kurlana, McKillip, and Shinn 8/10 This series of short stories had some real bangers and some ehh

On The Incarnation by St. Athanasius 7/10 the deconstruction never stops, love that for us

Unfinished Tales by J.R.R. Tolkien 8.5/10 It was so cool reading some of his last unfinished works, it was really not cool reading a bunch of stories with no ending

The Viscount Who Loved Me by Julia Quinn 5.5/10 Where the first Bridgerton book was much better than it's season, the second book was exactly as whatever as the second season.

"The Tempest" by William Shakespeare 7.5/10 really very odd, but the overall vibe was so good and exactly what I needed after Quinn

The Last Ever After by Soman Chianani 6.5/10 S for G&E #3 Thus begins my attempt to finish the whole series because I bought them and they were sitting there

"Sophist", "Statesmen", "Parmenides" and "Philebus" by Plato 10/10 What's the difference between is and is not? Is 'is not' a state of being? lol I dunno

Quest for Glory by Soman Chianani 7/10 S for G&E #4 Okay finally these stories are getting interesting again

A Crystal of Time by Soman Chianani 6.5/10 Really pulling out some wackadoodle things for this one, but I wasn't against it too much

One True King by Soman Chianani 6/10 An alright wrap-up, but my boi Hort deserved a more thorough ending

In the Flo by Alisa Vitti 6.5/10 I learned more about my period in this book than in any health class, but it also got a little woowoo with moon phases

The Green Witch by Murphy & Hiscock 7/10 I had a late-night book buying stint where I bought like 7 witchy books and this was the first to arrive

Acting on Impulse by Mia Sosa 2/10 I have nothing particular against this author, but this was the book that convinced me that I could get a book published

A Court of Wings and Ruin by Sarah J. Maas 7.5/10 Hoo boy does a lot of stuff go down in this spicy, spicy book.

A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas 6/10 Just a fun little story about wildly traumatized characters

Save the Cat! Writes a Novel by Jessica Brody 9.5/10 One of the coolest things I've read, I learned so much about reading and writing

Walden and Others Writings by Henry David Thoreau 10/10 So much beautiful writing, this is going to be a regular reread for me

A History of Magic, Witchcraft, and the Occult by DK 8.5/10 Naturally one of my favorite books of the year was a literal textbook

A Court of Silver Flames by Sarah J. Maas 8/10 Apparently I didn't hate this book as much as I was supposed to, but also please mind your manners in shared eating spaces

American Brujeria by J. Allen Cross 6.5/10 It turns out Hispanic witches are super super Catholics, which I bet would make some non-Hispanic Catholics real angy

Magic Lessons by Alice Hoffman 7/10 Practical Magic #1 it was such a lovely writing style, like an actual witch telling a prophecy

House of Earth and Blood by Sarah J. Maas 8.5/10 A really cool story, standing ovation for Lehabah every day, but also weird that the big bad killer guy wears hats and watches basketball

Nevewhere by Neil Gaiman 9/10 Hadn't thought much of it while I was reading it, but this story had stuck with me like a bad cold baby

Bones of Faerie by Janni Lee Simmer 5.5/10 This one had been sitting in my TBR for too long, and it wasn't too bad

Well of Darkness by Weis & Hickman 8.5/10 Getting to read a fantasy story in the perspective of the bad guys? Heck yeah. So cool.

After the Funeral by Agatha Christie 6.5/10 This one had alllllllll the rich family drams

Ironside by Holly Black 8/10 my first time reading this finale of Black's trilogy, and I just feel like the main character could have been more logical or taken more action

A Writer's Notebook by Ralph Fletcher 2/10 I pretty much learned nothing, got nothing out of this

Search the Sky by Pohl & Kornbluth 8/10 Only took off points for misogyny, but it was from the 50s, otherwise a really cool story

The House Witch by Murphy & Hiscock 5/10 A follow-up from the first witchy book to arrive, this one didn't teach me as much about witches as I hoped it would

Approximately a 7/10 average for the whole year! I went out on a limb for a lot of books this year, and that was rewarding just about as often as it was disappointing, but I can at least say that I haven't DNF'd a book yet. I largely write these for myself, and I don't expect anyone to take the time to read it -- if you did, then you are a saint and a hero. May your pillows be cool, your blankets warm, and your eyesight always clear enough for reading.

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draagu · 5 months

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outer wildss agaibns

yello! back again!

first things first i conquered my fears again and went back to the dark bramble, thanks to the hints of a wonderful amazing cool fren, i found the 3rd escape pod! unscathed this time too!

despite the nomai leaving a light trail, i still managed to go the wrong way apparently and stumbled into a cave of many, many anglerfish:

managed to eject and make my way towards the red light i initially was aiming for, which was like a bunch of angler eggs or something, but pushed past and went through yet another seed

and hey! made it to the vessel even still!

cool tidbits there, its nice and also sad that its still receiving messages from other vessels

but! that control panel(?) passcode? thingy? i have some theories over what it does or how to mess with it! I don't even know if I can get anything inside the vessel to work anymore but hey worth a thought.

i've started to take notice to the reoccurring shape--hexagon?--and its like the shape of the nomai's antlers I believe, or at least the statues!

if or if not this is actually important, I think it's a neat detail nonetheless, very curious

anywho! after that i went to the sun station again! and made the cross! again thanks to the hints of wonderful fren :>

i kind of forgot if i had learnt anything about the purpose of the sun station beforehand, so learning that they were purposefully trying to supernova the sun was, something. not sure why, but hey it failed i guess

the mural in the station caught my eye though, the sun and the eye being equal on a scale was hmmm

also I found. multiple. ash twin projection stones today, I really need to figure out what is going on there, but that was another thing that sparked my interest in the hexagons, since they light up behind the glowing heads. also, what's the reason behind only three of the head glowing, if any?

nn then i managed to get into the black hole forge, some neat stuff here n there, mainly warp core things i sort of figured out on my own, still neat tho! forgot if it was here or not, but the ash twin center has a warp pad! wheres the counterpart warp pad so I can get there, I must find!

after that I triieeed again on the quantum moon to get it to the 6th location, no luck though. I am able to get the shrine to the north pole, or at least I think, I shoot my little scout in and let it teleport till I see it at the north on the map and snap a picture, but what I do after that I unno. I think I'm missing something or just not realizing something, but it's definitely not moving to the location in the first place ;-;

still have some theories I can test out for next time though! not losing hope yet. currently thinking I can do something with making everything dark, if possible, but we'll see

I only realized today that the quantum moons land correlates to the planet it orbits, guess I had it at the twins each time before, is there new things on each land?

also only realized today that the moon also shifts the nomai body pose around when you look away, so I may have messed around with that for no good reason

ended it off by telling chert that modern nomai knew the galaxy was dying, so uh, sorry chert

to do: go back to bramble again for stuff I missed, and go the safer way if possible, figure out quantum moon, figure out anything about the ash twin project center, and a little less to my concern but also the lakebed cave on the ember twin

#outer wilds spoilers #dragugames

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desiresign · 5 months

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tell me about kasen annnnnd yuuma and enoko :3

KASEN!! is gods favorite hypocrite. shes often a character that comes up when i think of characters i consider among my top faves. however, im thinking i should really reread her manga. it is really good but also really long...

i think about yoshika x kasen a normal and reasonable amount. (lie) graaaa the tragic yuri

also i think some people are kinda annoying about her but touhoublr's been kind of annoying with a bunch of characters lately.

enoko. enoko is new but also has interesting lore that she knew marisa when she was a little kid comforting her crying in the forest all the time. which is so sweet! i hope more characters come in to give up tidbits about characters backstories by having someone else know them.

other than that though, enoko is actually my least favorite of the th19 cast. its ironic because when the cover was leaked, the whole "holy crap, is that one with bear traps on her hands!?" was really cool and i looked forward to. but now...shes just doggy.

yuuma meanwhile is a true raymondcore creautre.

she got TWO new potential yuri candidates in touhou 19.

we got lazy and chill yuri. if you pair her with chiyari. just two bums doing fuck all.

we got tragic and furry yuri. if you pair her with ran. which im most interested in exploring, ebcause its so interesting for both characters. a professional, no nonsense shikigami like ran, who is technically like, not even really her own person anymore, whose animal self/true self once had conenctions with those in the beast realm, with yuuma, with all of those we now know as the leaders of their factions. just me typing about it you can tell i prefer this one. like you meet your old partner after so many years and they literally arent themself anymore and yet the deepest part in them of their remaining self sees you, recognizes you...

#*#asks

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voltrixz · 1 year

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Then do Auditor

Show us your thoughts

Ty for this wonderful opportunity

However,Woopsies this one took a while, had to condense my thoughts here and there because I don’t wanna share everything just yet (I want to talk about them more later down the line)

First Impression: I seem to have a trend of not paying much attention to one character at first and then becoming obsessed with them the next time. Anyways I just thought of the Auditor as the silly flame guy. Who had a whole agency to kill one single guy (what a loser (affectionate) Idk i just thought they looked really cool (gender envy) (another factor of me realizing I wasnt cis)

Impression Now: MANY MANY THOUGHTS, several discord messages with my friends are just about me rambling about Auditor, hell I have like 2 or 3 docs with hc’s/analysis’ about Auditor. But basically, I like to think that they’re the youngest of the employers (yes they’re all siblings, i love the employer siblings hc so much) and i think that sorta facts in with how they’re like rlly stupid and just kinda incompetent (like have you seen how much he struggled to fight hank in his mag form?) plus its been mentioned that they’re the only one of the employers to actually interfere directly with Nevada, which kinda gives me that “younger sibling that wants to prove themselves to the others but ends up messing up horribly as they’re very impulsive and kinda foolish” Also think they’re like secretly very interested in nevada and the people there, sorry i just kinda think they fit the like ‘sheltered disney royalty’ trope. ALSO!!! I think they rely too much on just how much command and how they’re like a literal god, and they just rely on that sorta status when really it weren't for all that, she would be almost powerless i think, Which i think rlly factors into how we seem him struggle a lot in fights against hank and why like in project nexus they just make people take care of everything for her. Also ermm I think they’re also like rlly into flashy entrances like the whole pillar scene thing where it rises and theres like flames everywhere, what a showboat (affectionate). So in conclusion, secretly very curious and a bit foolish while also thinking they’re above everyone else and having a really really short temper. Also ermmm took the lil tidbit of Auditor liking sugary things as a secret soft side, which I will talk about later and also ermm also gets embarrassed easily. Sorry I'm all over the place woopsies.

Favorite moment: FAVORITE MOMENT IS DEFINITELY THE WHOLE LIKE UHHH AUDITOR RISING ON THAT PILLAR AND WAVING THEIR SWORD AS LIKE A BUNCH OF FLAMES CAME UP. THAT SCENE WAS SO SO SO GOOD!! ALSO WHEN THEY TURN INTO A LITTLE BLOB AND SLIDE AROUND!!!

Idea for a story: MANY IDEAS, like one that explores the sibling dynamics in the employer family + Maker (yes i think Maker is the “father” of the employers) (he just created them from thin air and went “My kids!!! I love em!!”) anyways a lot of stories for that, sorry I love family content. For other stories, I have a bunch of au ones like the one where Auditor and Phobos temporarily took care of the knight in my madcom x hk au. Also have a few ideas of how I think Auditor views humans/nevadas and all the things that confuse them. Also a few on his day to day and like her decreasing mental state (sorry they’re my fave character ever and that means they have to suffer through the horrors) oh and a lot, a lot, a lot of Auditor/Phobos ideas, love these 2 sm. Yet also ermm will put them through the horrors (I have several solo fics about Auditor dealing with Phobos death and post fall of Nexus time) but also just a lot of stories exploring their dynamic and how i think it would develop

Unpopular opinion: Ummmm not sure here honestly since I havent heard too many people talk about Auditor sadly but ermm I guess just like a lot of people kinda brush over Auditor a lot and ermmm it makes me so sad because they’re actually so so so interesting, idk it that counts as an unpopular opinion or whatever but like eh

Favorite relationship: If you’ve been on my blog for a while, I think we all know what I'm going to say. AUDITOR AND PHOBOS!!!!! Love love love these 2 so so so much. Guys I need more people to like this pairing so I can ramble about it more. LIKE GRGHAHH love these 2 evil bastards being in love. So many hc’s about them (I have dedicated doc for them) (and a bunch of short ideas) (might share some them here tbh…) But graghhh love thinking that Auditor decided to interfere with Nevada and ended up having to work with Phobos’ annoying ass only to slowly fall in love with him. Sorry, I just really like to think about how their relationship would develop. Phobos would go from teasing and joke flirting with Auditor for Auditor to turn it around on him, until the Auditor deemed it “far too unprofessional” and called a truce. (they still hated each other but they decided to might as well try to put up with each other for the sake of this “business” relationship (ended with them growing closer and learning more about the other) (which led them to find solace in each other’s company, and enjoy their little friendship until they realized wait a minute I'm like actually in love with you, how is this happening) LIKE GRGAHHH love these 2, their dynamic is so silly.

Favorite hc: All of mine (/hj) but tbh the good thing about having a favorite character that isn't talked about, is that you get to make all the hc’s yourself. And oh boy do I have a few (MANY) but we’re doing favorites so I’ll keep this as short as possible. Auditor has a more dragon like form, which he just has large wings, a tail and horns, which means he can fly around YIPEEE!!!Also its very easy to tell Auditor’s emotions just by looking at their flames, flames will like flicer much more slowly and droop a bit when stressed/tired, when they’re furious, their flames will rise and spark violently, when they see something they like (or someone (hi phobos), little heart shaped sparks will emit from their flames, etc etc. Also like I mentioned before, very curious about mortals in nevada, despite seeing them as below them, Auditor finds them very interesting especially Phobos (they’re gay) ALSO!!! An awful cook, they just summon food they like out of thin air and will set the kitchen on fire if they try to cook anything. Also of course the usual touch starved and attention craving hc, this guys craves some sort of affection. Also!!! Definitely gets teased about her crush on Phobos by their employer siblings. Oh and woops angst jumpscare but Auditor would pick up Phobos’ smoking habit (yes I hc that he smokes) after Phobos dies as a coping mechanism. Couldnt let you guys off that easily. (evil little grin)

#ask #voltrix rambles #long post sorta

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lil-ms-dipst · 7 months

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I know I don't reblog a bunch or talk a bunch about Minecraft, but honest to god it's like the thing that raised me. But it's like Pokemon for me, or DnD, where I kinda just.. avoid really watching videos/series/stuff about it. I don't know why.

Back in the yee ol' days I watched folks like DanTDM, Ssundee, and PopularMMOs, but uh you know how that last one turned out :x. I think Ssundee is still on good standing?? and then DanTDM got his diamond minecart rode so now he's a dad. The shit that changes over the years is really interesting.

And besides that, when I first discovered Minecraft when I was 8, it became my like.. everything. I own shirts, I just bought the fucking crocs, I have bedsheets, figurines, plushies, socks, hats, a watch that I will never use, posters, a cup, a lamp, etc. Even my parents know if I spot anything Minecraft-related it's over for their (or mine sometimes) wallet.

I just never really talked about it because um.. I dunno. For how much I love Minecraft there just.. isn't much for me to talk about. At least anything I could talk about in an interesting way I suppose??? Like I could go on about the Warden, or other things or just random fun facts and tidbits. Like did you know you have to drown a Husk twice for it to become a drowned?? Endermen also see everything inverted. Creepers see everything in shades of green. Despite the Warden being blind when you spectate one they "see" just fine (probably just devs too lazy/not thinking its worth to add a thing for it??). I know so much random fucking bullshit because I either find it out myself or just come across it online somehow.

Anybody remember the Minecraft Handbooks? I had those. It was either 1.7 or before then, I don't remember acacia trees in there but I do vividly remember there were no guardians, which were 1.8. I'm such a Minecraft nerd that I can identify the time period/update period a poster came out depending on the stuff in it. It's so fucking stupid. I also know random tiny lore tidbits because guess who also played any spinoff game that released. That's right, me :)

Vindicators (or I suppose just.. illagers in general?) originate from some villagers that finally decided to stand up for themselves. Why did they suddenly grow to hate what they used to be? No clue.

I've also thought about making a whole fucking like.. lore theory. No, I haven't watched any of Matpat's theories on MC, and I prob won't. Nothing wrong with him just kinda grew out of caring about him.

Minecraft is just.. so fucking cool I think. And a little random fun fact about myself :) Um. If it wasn't for Minecraft Legends I probably wouldn't have picked up Pikmin. I saw Vinny Vinesauce play Pikmin and I was like "wow that looks like Legends where you got little guys and have them do things.."

#dipstick rambles #yea Im making that a tag now fuck you #minecraft #rambling #fuckkkkkkkkk #ALso I want that official Minecraft mini-fridge.

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ashanimus · 11 months

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Ash Liveblogs MTMTE #4-#7

This is just really nice sci fi writing. I'm coming into this very cold and for all me yelling and screeching about What X or Y is the text and visual and dialogue does a really good job of communicating those things without going into he exhaustive detail I hassle out of my friends

FPFFFffFFF

Well Thats a horrifying question. Why are your hands so irreplaceable, Ratchet?? Rod just got new hands! I'm enjoying these little cultural tidbits about bodies. What can and cannot be replaced, what's considered worse than a mortal wound vs the way that exile and punishment is externalized--like Empurata. Huh.

OH OKAY THIS ONE IS ALL ABOUT BODIES I GUESS

AAAAAAAAAAAA

Huh. I'm just. Really impressed with how these artists get these characters to emote, the very very creative and interesting and compositional solutions to communicating emotions and feeling on these challenging character models

AESFHLDSAFSKJGD

ANCIENT JACKASS

TAILGATE IS EXTREMELY RIGHT TO BE MAD AT YOU.

I am living for this cool ridiculous alien mechanical biology.

Yikes. That's...that may not solve the problem of belonging for you, Tailgate. These are banners of a war thats ended...and that he's being enabled here is quite sad!

This is also fucking devastating. I was, for some reason, NOT expecting grotesque body horror in the robot comic! SILLY FUCKING BAT.

I havent enjoyed a traditional comic in a while and I really love how the medium is used to its fullest to move reveals like this along, this is delightful

Okay @fernacular I see the appeal of old man boyfriend now, this is fucking great

OH OKAY. YOU WANNA GIVE ME COOL COMIC, BODY HORROR, BITTER EXES, HEARTBREAK AND BODY PART SWAPPING AND MAKE ME FUCKING CRY OKAY

@polyhexian @fernacular FUCK YOUUUUUUUUU SCREEEECH IM CRYING IM NOT CRYING aDLFJDAJGk]'

Ah yes. Whirl. Whirl is my favorite so far. And also um. Sir??? Are you actively suicidal right now??? SIR???

All of these robots, ALL OF THEM, have the personalities and socialization of brutalized wolfdogs all stuck in the back of a Volkswagon but DEAR GOD Whirl??? Everyone smacks the shit out of each other! And you out here talking like this!

HOW ARE YOU STILL ALIVE

aEFJADSLJGLJG

WHIRL ISNT WRONG BUT HOLY FUCK

WHIRL. HONEY. YOUR GUTS ARE ALL OVER THE FLOOR. THEY'RE ALL OVER THE

Okay even the hostage taker is confused enough to demand explanation and Rung you are so useless and also bad at improv

Whirl is a theatre kid.

I'm laughing so hard I can't fucking breathe

And now I'm crying again. I'm just. Drowning in snot over here. Okay. Okay. I am genuinely blown away how this, out of context, would be damn near illegible, but with a little context is horrifying, touching and heartbreaking. He's speared through, Rung is over here genuinely a little touched, jesus christ on a pogo stick.

Okay, not that this is ever relevant to anything and there is more transformers stuff to watch than I could finish in a month of vacation, if I was in charge of anything I'd probably pull Whirl audition sides from this scene--or at least some of them--because even just meeting the character through my friends and these early issues, one of the most compelling things about him is that really interesting tension between his sincerity, humor, gurgly dying delivery and cold intensity. It's really interesting. The artists here use a lot of composition and context and light to make whirl emote and it's such a cool artistic challenge they solve over and over again.

Although in that vein if I was doing any casting of voice stuff for a MTMTE anything I think it'd be essential to cast a bunch of weird character actors, shakespearians and people who had video game experience.

Tarn is a funny name for a robot? Thats a lake?

So pretty...so horrible. What a moody, cold, image.

Huh. Brainstorm has an interesting vernacular

This comic is so insane. Like very little about this seems to pretend to be anything like the stuff that spawned it. It's a transforming toy! And now, fast forward, were talking about the Horrors in an depressing, fully grounded way from the voiceboxes of colorful robits languishing in the post-horizon of a war that destroyed their whole worlds.

Im obsessed with these colors. And the image of all these damn robits around a PYRE. It's so weirdly, awkwardly human and this all just looks so vulnerable and lost. All their weird boxy shape against the organic swirls of fire.

Who TF Is Grimlock--

#ash liveblogs mtmte #inconsolable shrieking

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novantinuum · 5 years

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On the corrupted!Steven theory...

So, originally when I mused on this yesterday I was just playing around with random possibilities.

After combing the series for info about corruption, though, I’m mildly spooked at the increased potential for this to... perhaps be a thing? I’m not saying that this is what I for sure believe will happen- to be honest, I’m not even sure Crewniverse would go this direction at all- but just for funsies, let’s see what kind of “evidence” or “foreshadowing” exists that might support this potential story path in the context of canon.

(EDIT: 10/7/19

I honestly no longer think this creature is a worm at all whatsoever, it’s either more akin to a horned caterpillar or potentially has limbs. Either way we can see so little right now that it’s hard to tell. I’m not editing the rest of this post because I want it to exist in its original form- but do keep this in mind reading the rest! XP)

1) The design of this worm creature.

Let’s start simple. Let’s start tangible.

For future reference and simplicity, I will be henceforth be referring to this creature as... “Wormy Boi.”

So, let’s see what we’ve got here. I’m definitely not the first person to point out this fella’s pink nature, and the jarringly human-like nose they’ve got. (Compared to other corruptions, which have had distinctly non-humanoid features.) In the photo above, we also have Wormy Boi sporting glowing pink eyes, which then send out a flare of pink light/energy. So, seemingly a powerful entity.

If you watch the short segment before they sit upright, you’ll see that Wormy Boi is super, super big. They’re in the background, but BOY do they loom. The shadows cast upon them especially push that sense of size. They’ve also got a whole bunch of spikes on their back and framing their face.

So, then. What evidence could be made for this being a corrupted!Steven, as opposed to some other run-of-the-mill monster?

Steven Universe Future is a limited series, described as ‘tying up loose ends.” To me, as a viewer, it would make far more sense for the antagonists/conflicts to deal with big concepts that have already been established since there’s such a limited amount of time we have left with this world. Introducing a completely alien species in the last act of the show would feel offbeat from both a writing and a viewing perspective. Corruption- on the other hand- is something we don’t have full answers to yet.

We don’t see any gem, yes- but Steven’s gem is- of course- on his belly. If this theory were to be true, that would translate to the gem being on Wormy Boi’s underside, far out of our sight in this shot, due to how massive they are. As an addition to this, not showing the gem gives an air of mystery to this creature’s true nature- which makes it seem like there’s something surprising to discover here.

A corrupted diamond would surely be MASSIVE. Also, very powerful. The beam of pink light hints at Wormy Boi being quite a powerhouse.

The spikes on Wormy Boi’s back and around their face highly resemble rose thorns. We all know how much the Crewniverse loves their rose symbolism, and design wise, this aspect would make a lot of visual sense for a corrupted Steven. Running off of that:

The face/nose shape and the five horns on this creature’s head give off a very Steven-like silhouette.

The nose, of course. The face has a very Steven-like shape to it, overall- although noticeably more angular and sharp. The mouth is reminiscent of the Watermelon Stevens’ mouths. And as for the horns, there’s five of them positioned equidistant around their face, just as Steven’s hair is always formed from five lil’ bumps at the same positions.

Okay, moving on.

(Read more under the cut!)

2) We do not yet understand the true nature of corruption.

“I guess it’ll take more than a kiss to heal damage from the Diamonds…” -Pearl, Monster Reunion

Corruption is still- bafflingly- a huge mystery. The Gems we’ve watched the CGs bubble since season one have been healed, yes, but there are still many gaps in our understanding of it. With Steven Universe Future’s promise to address some lingering story threads, it would make sense if corruption was on the plate for further discussion. So, what DO we know?

We know it’s something the Diamonds can do. Interestingly, it doesn’t seem to require all four diamonds. Three of them together were able to cause all the damage to Earth. There’s also no statement made that more than one Diamond is required to cause effects like that.

In Legs From Here to Homeworld, Blue and Yellow Diamond weren’t actually aware the corruption was something they were capable of producing. They seemed to assume they obliterated the Gems on Earth. Corruption is then, even a mystery to them. That’s... odd, isn’t it?

Pearl states that it’s “something nearly impossible to describe.” Garnet goes further to say... “It’s sorta like... if MC Bear-Bear didn’t tear the fabric of his arm, but the fabric of his mind.”

"A sound… A song?” There’s a lot of association between corruption and music.

It causes Gems to lose touch with their usual forms, instead warping into a more outwardly "monstrous” version of themselves that appear to be “just a bundle of fight-or-flight reflexes and survival instincts.” As seen by Centipeetle in Monster Buddy and Monster Reunion, it appears as if corrupted Gems try to regenerate with their original forms if unbubbled, but are simply not in a state where they can maintain that.

As seen with Jasper in Earthlings, extreme emotional distress very much seems to speed up corruption’s effects. This is less of a stated fact and more of my read on that episode, but I believe it to be an important tidbit, especially since Garnet states that corruption’s damage is mental rather than physical, at least at its core. This can also be seen in Monster Reunion with how Centipeetle’s partial healing backfires when she remembers the trauma of being corrupted and reacts strongly.

Now, when it comes to healing corruption, Steven tries to heal Centipeetle himself, and does make some nice progress... helping her regain a hold on herself as he treats her with love and compassion and understanding... but it’s ultimately not a healing that can occur in isolation, helping her on his own. She needs more support before she can heal from this corruption to a state where she can truly be herself again.

And that eventually comes in the form of the other Diamonds. So, all four diamonds can help relieve the corruption if they help these Gems all together.

3) How could this theory potentially fit into the story anyways, you nutter?

Well, here’s the part of this post where I make some broad conjectures. I honestly am shooting fish into a barrel here because again- we know barely anything about how corruption actually happened initially, and my thoughts are very jumbled. Please forgive me.

"I don’t really know how the corruption works. It’s like they’re sick. They don’t remember who they used to be.” -Steven, Gem Hunt

So, corruption seems to be a mental ailment of Gemkind, turned manifest. It also seems to have a deep connection to a Gem’s emotions, with Centipeetle growing smaller and slightly calmer upon feeling more secure in Steven’s presence, and corruption speeding up as Jasper grew more and more emotionally overwrought and self-deriding about herself.

When it comes to the Diamonds and how they perhaps caused it originally- without fully realizing- we know that at least Blue and White have abilities focused on causing others to act in certain ways. Blue has sway over one’s emotions, and White has a knack for forcing her thoughts and self upon others. (I’m not sure how Yellow’s ability would play in here.) Mayhaps, mixed with their grief and guilt and anger, their power simply pressed all of that hurt emotion onto all the Gems on Earth in one whole fail swoop...? Tearing their minds in the process of it all?

The question I still have, though- is whether a single diamond could produce effects like this. And whether a diamond could turn that ability on themself.

Could Steven accidentally corrupt himself? Why might that happen?

Well, let’s look at our boy here.

He’s got a wide circle of support at this time in canon, but notably, he’s notorious for bottling up his emotion and not letting others in to help him- instead dropping everything to help them with their problems. Just to name a few examples (a few):

The Test. He feels betrayed and hurt at the Gems for a moment about the way they’re babying him with the rigged test, but instead of admitting the hurt he feels about the scenario, bottles that up to help them feel more like good guardians.

Joy Ride. He opens up to the Cool Kids about deep, incredibly troubling stuff that’s long been on his mind, but he’s never once talked about it with his family.

Mindful Education. The perils of bottling one’s emotions is literally the whole plot of the episode. The kid has a full out sobbing breakdown while he’s plunging to his death. Connie gets through to him a little here, but later episodes show that the resolution we see here is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Steven’s internal issues.

Storm in the Room. Externally, Steven tries so hard to put on a guise of content and positivity, but once alone in Rose’s room feels safe enough to let the full brunt of his emotional trauma come out in an almost explosive manner. Geeze, get this kid some hugs.

Gemcation. Steven actually fails bitterly on putting on his customary smile in this episode, simply because the weight of his problems have become such an impossible burden to him. When the other Gems are trying to help him open up, he isn’t immediately responsive to their efforts.

What’s Your Problem? Amethyst spends the whole episode trying to cheer Steven up and find out how he’s doing, and instead Steven downplays his own feelings on the matter and ends up helping her sort out her own emotional issues.

So to sum: Many an Emotional Issue, a chronic tendency to avoid outwardly addressing said issues in favor of helping everyone else instead... and to avoid accepting other people’s help.

Even if he’s surrounded by all these people who love him, the fact of the matter is that Steven still feels as if he has to face his own inner demons alone.

Now, let’s look at the lil’ teasing synopsis that was given for Steven Universe Future:

“After saving the universe, Steven is still at it, tying up every loose end. But as he runs out of other people’s problems to solve, he’ll finally have to face his own.”

Blatantly sounds like we’re gonna finally get some addressing of Steven’s emotional state, now doesn’t it?

4) A concept on what could, theoretically happen

“Maybe… it IS a guy in a monster costume. I don’t mean literally, silly! What I mean is... there might be a conscious Gem still inside there, somewhere. What if the monster is turning back and forth into its original form? If it is, it might not be as corrupted as we think! There might still be a chance to save it!” -Steven, Gem Hunt

Suppose Steven- by some as-of-yet unknown means- ends up accidentally corrupting himself. His sorry emotional state only further amplifies the effects of this corruption, and makes it really hard to retain control. Wormy Boi as a form could be like... all his inner demons made manifest, a metaphoric mirror into his current mental state. But- as he is half-human- he’s not entirely unaware of what’s happening. Perhaps... as the quote above could be sneaky foreshadowing for... how he’s turning back and forth between this corrupted form and his normal form.

He likely wouldn’t want everyone to see him like this, doesn’t want everyone to visibly know the sheer depth of how much he’s hurting. But just like the corrupted Gems were only able to be helped in community, with the support of the CGs and the Diamonds in preparing the fountain, Steven can’t fix this on his own.

He can no longer face the dark alone.

At some point, everyone has to take a brave step. Reach out. Accept help.

Steven’s helped so many people, and surely he deserves that same love and care in return, too.

And perhaps, when he’s eventually healed from this- and has gotten the opportunity to be open with his family and friends about the hurt he’s facing- he’ll be left with “corruption scars” as well. I think it’s an important thing to address, that no one goes through experiences like these without lingering effects. Stuff stays with you. Healing is not always linear. But life is a continuous journey, and with the support of people who love you surrounding, you too can make a change... can continue to live to the fullest at every moment possible.

I think the above would be a lovely moral for Steven Universe to tackle in its last run of episodes, no matter how they approach it- daft corruption theory or not.

Now, in the end- a reiteration. This is just a wild theory. I’m not trying to be any authoritative voice saying that this is for sure what will happen, because in reality I have no idea what Crewniverse is cooking. However, I do think it’s fun speculation, and I am kinda spooked at how well things fit.

Whatever happens, I’m sure it will make me weep like a baby, though. Hoh boy. Grant me sanity in these coming months as we wait for answers.

#su #steven universe #su future #steven universe future #su theory #corrupted steven theory #my post stuff #long post #the mighty 500 #1K #2K #3K #4K #5K

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bleachbleachbleach · 3 years

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I saw that one post you had, your headcanon about Hitsugaya's grandmother. You said Hitsugaya and Hinamori had baller names, and I was wondering what you meant by that? I mean I love both of these characters, and I'm always interested in any tidbits I get to know about them. I'd love to get your perspective. Thanks! ^^

Omg! This blog’s first ask! ToT <333 Thank you, and it’s def a pleasure to meet someone who also loves these characters! Please allow me to express my love via a time-honored Tumblr tradition, the Enthusiastic TL;DR:

#PeasantLife

"I’ve never met anyone with that name before" might be my definition of baller here, haha. But at the same time, like, all the Rukongai characters have pretty baller names considering there's no real reason they would have family names at all, because 1) peasants, and, to add to that, 2) no families. (Except Hisana and Rukia--I assume they are genuinely blood-related and Hisana didn't just pick up a baby she thought looked like her, LOL.)

SS seems more-or-less modeled off the Edo period, a time where only fancy people could have fancy things like swords and surnames. It was only in the last 150ish years the peasant class not only could have names but had to, and suddenly people either had to make one up or have someone make one up for them and all these priests were suddenly like, fuck, oh no, gotta make up a bunch of names!! lol. But anyway, my point is, I feel like Rukongai would be even more like that because there'd be even less reason for the souls there to have family names.

What’s in a name?

Like a lot of Japanese names in general, a lot of these characters' names are locational: @littleeyesofpallas has a ton of very cool posts about everyone’s names, and they are much better informed than me, so I recommend their whole blog 9000%.

But at the same time like, I know Matsumotos and Ichimarus. I’ve never met an IRL Hitsugaya—nor a Hinamori, though I feel like I’d be less surprised to meet a Hinamori in the wild. Momo is a normal name, and Toshirou would be, but as far as I know Toushirou is not. (I mentioned this in the original post, but there are lots of different potential kanji for to or toshi, but Hitsugaya’s name uses tou, specifically the tou (冬), for winter, which I think is neat/clever.) Also, Hitsugaya’s name is six characters long, which is certainly above average and definitely seems real freakin’ long for a peasant kid, even for the Fancy Peasants of Junrinan.

Indulgent Junrinan Grandma HCs

I love the idea of part of, like, Grandma’s occupation/pastime being the imagining and assigning of names. She has the capacity to house and clothe and feed (! which feels special since this is not an expense most Rukongai people would even need to deal with) so I feel like she’s gotta have some kinda hustle goin’. And she’s clearly good at it, since Hitsugaya and Hinamori’s names fit them so well. Plus, for a name to fit you so well, and to express so deeply your nature, also feels pretty baller. It means someone cared to know you, or to see who you might become.

I remember once someone important came from Japan and was bestowing Buddhist names to people in my Buddhist church, so my mom signed us all up to get one. Mine had to do with like, wisdom and flowers (and my given name also has to do with flowers). But then my little brother got DRAGONS in his and I was like, HEY NOW. WHAT IS THIS. WHY IS HIS COOLER. XDD So, anyway, I’m imagining Grandma in a similar role, but whereas that Buddhist person was Important and had some kind of institutional authority, Grandma is more maverick. Like, this woman who’s been in Rukongai for ages and ages and has acquired, in this long and fairly monotone Rukongai life, literacy and a lot of imagination. And what are you going to do with these skills in a crappy peasant village besides give the people around you some baller-ass names?

And I’m kind of into the idea that like, you probably need to sign your Shinigami Academy entrance exam with your name―and in order to do that you need to HAVE a full name in the first place, and if you haven’t acquired one by the time you’ve journeyed through the rest of Rukongai, then there are people you can go to to buy one/have one given to you. And if you’re in the west, well, maybe that person is Grandma.

日番谷隊長だ

I think it adds another layer to why Hitsugaya would want to be addressed by family name and rank, too. I still think the biggest reason is the need to assert some kind of authority, because otherwise that authority would go unrecognized/erode quickly, because he’s a pretty new captain and certainly a young one (and honestly if your division is on its third captain in under 150 years I imagine that might raise some questions about the whole division, irrespective of who Hitsugaya himself might be. XD I WOULD HAVE SOME QUESTIONS). But he seems largely well-respected within SS without the need for an overabundance of arm-twisting. And he doesn’t need respect from Hinamori, nor distance, so insisting on titles with her seems more like a way of having moved through multiple stages of life and wanting to mark the differences, acknowledging the new while also recognizing what you’ve had to leave behind. Not in the sense of like, "oh, we’re fancy now, that’s behind us" but in the sense of there being people you don’t often get to see anymore. Why did you need this name? What did you take on with it? Who gave it to you? Why is that important?

But anyway, I’d love to get YOUR perspective, too! I wanna hearrrr everyone’s hcs!

#LET'S HEAR IT FOR JUNRINAN GRANDMA #what a stellar lady #junrinan grandma #hitsugaya toushirou #hinamori momo #bleach headcanons #rukongai #bleach #asks #longpost #hitsugaya's grandma #bleach sociology

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loverofallthingssmart · 3 years

Note

hi hi eesha ily and invading your ask box to talk abt modern wuko with desi wu because the thought of mako going to a bunch of those indian parties and all the aunties pinching his cheeks and telling him he’s too skinny while wu laughs in the background is living in my head rent free💖

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH maya you dont know what you’ve unleashed i LIVE for desi wu AND wuko?? you’ve done it for me ilysm

ok SO wu is actually like pretty nervous to ask mako to accompany him to an indian function because he knows how bad the aunties can be (ESPECIALLY because he was their favorite and eavesdropped on all their judgmental conversations)

regardless he asks mako by distracting him through cooking and just blurts it out “willyougowithmetothisthing? like i know that it’s probably not your scene and it’s totally ok if you say no but Pooja Aunty were asking i didn’t want to like straight-up refuse so but again, totally cool if you--” and mako is like “wu, its okay..i’ll go”

and so they’re there and wu gets dragged off by the kids and he’s laughing and mako thinks that he looks at home here and how when wu smiles, literally everyone should watch because it lights up the room and then is like “oh shit i have to mingle now umm” and he turns to the aunties who are currently whispering about him as we speak because when mako is in doubt and alone he turns to the adults to mingle (case in point: lin, tenzin, etc.)

and so he watches them making food and sits at the table and he’s there all alone and awkward (✊🏽😔) until he notices that one of the sweets on the table (gulab jamun) is somewhat like sata andagi and that reminds him of his mom cupping his face in her hands and laughing and kisses on the forehead when he would watch in the kithcen so he’s like slowly sliding over and being like “so..how’s that made” and suddenly all the aunties are crowding around him and he’s like talking about stories about him traveling to japan when his parents were alive and they’re finding this to relate to like how the aunties when they travel to india and mako’s grandmother both wear slippers to the bathroom, and how no shoes are permitted in the house, etc.

soon mako is opening up and talking a lot about japanese cultures and customs to aunties who want to travel the world and here’s mako telling them about the history of their sweets (because mako only likes japanese sweets which is a hc that i just thought of and adore) like how daifuku is made and the aunties interjecting with little tidbits of information like how to make rasgolas and mako is really pleasantly surprised because he’s never actually met people who heard he was japanese and didn't immediately ask him about sushi so now they’re bonding..

the aunties are protective of wu because he’s their favorite (which i have gone into detail here!) and now they love mako and they’re telling him stories of when wu was a child and how wu would literally devour all the biriyani and mako is smiling because wu 🥰 and also he’s in with the auntie crowd!

“bolin is going to be so mad, it took him weeks for opal’s family to warm up to him..i do it in one sitting”

then its lunchtime, wu comes down with kids attached to him, visibly tired and smiles when he sees mako helping the aunties with distributing the food and when they sit down, he’s whispering quietly to mako and trying to explain all the different types of curry and paneer and “yes there are 3 types of chicken curry i know and yes they’re all spicy but it’s ok because i know you adore spice which is great because the last guy i brought could not handle spice..and well we all know where that went “but the aunties see their child and his bf bonding and theyre like :)) ok maybe this is fine

so the function ends and wu and mako have to leave and the aunties go say bye to mako first which wu is absolutely gobsmacked and offended by but deep down he’s happy and they’re like “next time you come, you have to teach us how to use chopsticks ok? and we’ll make you mango lassi and feed you, you’re too skinny you know that? we’ve tried with wu but he just seems to be skin and bones but you? you need nourishment ok beta?” and mako laughs and agrees and wu is like smiling and clapping his hands excitedly because look!! theyre getting along and that makes him so happy!!

and for future functions, now all of the young adults are mad because “come on wu, you were already the favorite you couldn't just have a shitty boyfriend and give us a reason for our partners to get into their good graces?”

wu sitting there like ¯\_😌_/¯ “get better partners ig” while mako and the aunties laugh in the background

yeah...this got out of hand but this made me happy so thank you, i love you and i love them and you're the absolute best for putting this in my mind because now it lives there rent free.. anyway i hope you like it!! <3

#lok #legend of korra #ask me anything #2 am ramblings #wuko #mako #wu #ilysm you know that right maya #i literally adore this omg #headcanons #desi on main ig??#desi wu

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dragons-and-yellow-roses · 3 years

Text

I'm gonna talk through my project for a second because I love it and it's consuming my life, and also it's gonna take a lot of effort and time and I'm incredibly nervous about it and it's so important to me and I can't stand the thought of it not working, but also maybe it won't work and that would break my little heart. So if you have it in you, maybe send some encouragement.

At the camp I work at, there's a legend of the origins of camp called the Bear Story. It's told at every closing campfire, it's a huge part of camp culture, and it's super important to camp and most of the staff.

It's really fucking important to me because I absolutely fell in love with it, and the woman that told it before me passed it on to me to continue telling. I am so passionate about this fucking story you have no idea.

It is oral tradition, it's never been copied or memorized. Some of the magic of it is that it changes with every new storyteller. I completely respect oral tradition and that's why I was hesitant at first.

But the woman that told it before me gave me a transcript, as well as hints and tips and parts that were important to her. It wasn't so that I could memorize it or anything, it was so to preserve it and keep her little changes recorded, and so that she could officially pass it on to me.

So I thought "Huh. Maybe it would be cool if I could have a bunch of versions from different tellers written down. Then the story could be better preserved, and passed on to the new tellers, like the transcript that was given to me."

I was nervous because this project could be seen as kind of an attack on the oral tradition, and I fully understand and respect that opposing point of view. But as I said, it's for preservation and camp history, and it'll kind of be to start a new tradition. New traditions are difficult to start and to welcome though, and I recognize that.

So on the camp FB page I wrote a little blurb about my project and asked for people to come forward and to help me.

One gentleman, a very nice father, said he'd look through his photos and videos for any documentation of it, which was super spicy and I love him.

But the next comment... shook me a bit?

Apparently, five years ago a different staff member tried a similar project. He wanted to make a CD with a bunch of different tellings. Cool, right? But he did receive a lot of criticism because again, it would go against the oral tradition. Therefore, he didn't continue pursuing the project.

However, I checked the comments on the FB post that the old staff member made for his project. Many of the first comments were criticism, yes, but once you got past that there was a lot of support. There were a lot of people saying they thought it's a cool idea, and they recommended people to reach out to. Older people that had told the Bear Story.

So now I have a list of people I can reach out to.

There's one man, and old teller that's very well known for his telling, that doesn't have an FB account, but my gf happens to be spending the weekend up at camp with him! She told him about my project and asked him to please help me? He said he thinks it's interesting and he'll try to type it up and send it to me.

Now, I know that man. I know he's obsessed with camp and he'll almost definitely send me a copy of his. So I'll have my version, the version that was told before me, and then his. Not a lot, but it's getting somewhere.

I'm not one to give up easily, and that's a threat. Especially on something as important as this.

There was an older story about camp, one that used to be well known. The Mist Story. However, it was oral tradition, and once it stopped being told (because it's a fucking scary story), it disappeared. Luckily, an older staff member had written it down so that it wasn't lost forever. And in the comments section of an old post, I read that there was another story, the Hermit Story, that had gone missing because the oral tradition had died out. That's what I don't want to happen to this story. I don't want it to be lost to time, I don't want it to fade out of camp culture, I don't want to come back to camp in ten or twenty years and realize that these new staff members don't know the story. That's why, while I respect the sanctity of oral tradition, I also believe that it needs to be preserved in a more permanent way than solely through memories.

That's why I'm fighting for this. I'm going to reach out to every person I know to try and gain more information. I have a list of people I know told the story, I have a list of old staff members that may be able to help. I'm not going to give up because the original idea received some backlash. I'm going to push and make sure that this story remains an important part of camp culture. It will not be lost, not if I have anything to say about it. It's tragic that old camp stories have already been lost, but I will not allow that to happen to this one.

Sorry I got so aggressive in that last paragraph, but I kind of have to keep myself heavily motivated through this entire project. I know it's going to be difficult, I've known that since the idea originally crossed my mind. But I can't stand the idea of giving up on this, even though I know that at some point I'll be tempted. But I'd regret it for the rest of my life if I gave up.

So I have my idea, I have my list of people to reach out to, I have an open Google Doc ready to be filled with this tasty tidbit of camp culture.

I can already tell that it's going to be hard on me. Reaching out to this many unfamiliar people is going to take its toll on me, mentally and emotionally, as well as dealing with the very likely backlash from people that believe in preserving the story solely through memories.

But even if it kills me, I swear to god I'm going to do this.

I'm just gonna need a lot of help along the way.

And I know that all of this anxiety and toil and trouble is going to be worth it when I have a document full of history that I get to pass on to someone when I leave camp. When I decide that my time of telling the story is over and I get to pass the story on to someone that I choose, someone that will love it like I did. When I get to see one more story added to the document and know that in the future there will be countless more. Little changes, little bits of personality added to it, and now it can all be tracked.

Christ on a cracker, I'm getting lightheaded just from thinking about it.

I need to keep up this energy, that's why I'm going at it so enthusiastically now. I know it might be hard to keep up this enthusiasm In the future.

Anywho I just wanted to talk this out to an audience, thank you for your time, have a beautiful day and I love you all.

#I'm terrified as all hell that this project will flop #that not enough people will remember the story or be willing to share it #I know this could be such a beautiful thing #but it relies on other people wanting that too #oof #with me all the luck that you can muster #either tonight or tomorrow night I'm going to start reaching out to the people on my list #and I'm going to hope and pray that something good comes out of it #because my original fb post didn't get much attention #and no one has reached out to me #i know it hasn't even been 24 hours but still #holy shit this is anxiety inducing #have a nice night everyone #im going to go back to obsessively checking my FB and email now in hopes that someone will have contacted me

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wardens-stew · 3 years

Text

The Mask Falling Hints MASTERPOST

Clearly I have wayyy too much time on my hands!

I have compiled a list of information Samantha Shannon has divulged on social media about The Mask Falling, mostly paraphrased from her Tumblr and Twitter. Some of it dates back as far as 2016, so it’s not certain that all of it will happen - I’ve included an asterisk for the tidbits in which Samantha explicitly mentioned that it was pre-editing. I didn’t include a link to the original source because that would be too much work, but if anyone has questions I can probably find it pretty easily! The recent ARC reviews also include some hints, but I haven’t included them because that would be a crap-ton of text. Feel free to add anything I missed! Anyway enjoy the fruits of my obsession!

Hints:

We will find out how badly Warden was affected by Paige’s torture - there’s a lot about the effects of her torture in the book

The non-binary character is a free-world spy, pretending to be French

Paige has issues with drinking water and showering

Paige will make another valiant effort to get Warden to talk about his feelings

Paige’s demisexuality is clarified - she reflects on the way she wants in comparison to the way the allosexual Nick and Eliza do

Paige gets slammed into the wall by someone, but not Terebell (also not Warden, because then she would be very dead)

The grey market storyline continues

Etymological connection of Arcturus meaning bear-guard and Mahoney meaning descendant of the bear is worked into the books

Paige cries

Paige’s PTSD is a thread throughout the book

Paige has mental and physical difficulties following her torture

“The scope of everything gets bigger, there's more focus on the free world and how it interacts with Scion, and you'll find out more about Rephaite history and the origin of clairvoyance.”

You may figure out what happened to Procyon

Warden’s aura type is mentioned*

Paige starts calling Warden Arcturus. They have a discussion about it. But she keeps calling him Warden in front of other people.

The prologue begins about an hour after The Song Rising

Warden asks Paige to teach him Irish

Contains clues as to the big secret at the heart of the series

Warden does a few very sweet things

We’ll find out a reason why Nashira considers Warden a possession rather than a partner*

Paige is at her most fragile

One of the characters eats an orange

There is a distinct Priory parallel in one section of the story

Paige asks Warden if Rephaim can get drunk

We will find out if Rephaim can get physically ill

We’ll get a piece of information that may help us understand the Rephaite logic behind Warden feeding on Paige’s aura

More about the golden cord

Paige’s feelings with her father will be explored

We will find out why it was common knowledge amongst Rephaim that Terebell and Warden were once mated

Warden might tell us what would happen if he tried to eat

More about voyant-amaurotic sex will be explained

We will learn more about the Rephaim’s internal politics and conflicts

We get to see Paige’s birthday

We we’ll find out how Warden knows how to develop Paige’s gift*

Paige and Warden butt heads over right and wrong

We’ll find out why Warden said that Sargas are the only Rephs who choose their mates

We’ll find out more about the half-urge

We’ll find out more about the complicated history between Warden and Terebell

Warden is planning to learn Gaelic (pre-editing)

We’ll find out two of the reasons why Warden hates Nashira so much*

We’ll find out about the promise Warden made to Nashira that she alludes to before the Bicentary

Warden says something with an exclamation mark

Warden will tell us more about the memory of Terebell, and how it was a prelude to one of the defining moments of his existence

Paige visits Warden’s dreamscape a few times, but we only see it once

Paige addresses the author directly

Nick isn’t in the book at all

The plot takes place only in Paris

Paige dies her hair red

A character Samantha did not originally plan to be in TBS4 now is

There’s a big scene in the Sainte-Chapellle in Paris

The book is shaping up to be the darkest book in the series, but also contains the most jokes

Paige feels really ill for most of the book

Samantha starts hinting at the Grand Backstory of the series

Paige is under strict orders to stay inside for a month, but she breaks the rules to explore Paris

The main antagonist was born in “the burning summer of 2019”

We’ll find out about two of Warden’s past relationships

Paige and Warden have to get food deliveries from a guy called Albéric because they’re not allowed to go outside

There’s espionage

Warden uses the super unnecessary word “sennight”

A lot of the book takes place underground

We learn if a non-polyglot could ever learn Gloss

There is a Very Awkward Conversation*

There is a time skip between the fourth and fifth books

Warden smiles a lot… with his eyes

The ending will change everything

Scion must change its public face due to an event that happens at the end

People who liked The Mime Order will love it

TBS4 picks up when Paige is resting.

It will go into more detail about how Rephaim emerge

It marks the beginning of Beautiful Dresses in The Bone Season

It introduces a Rephaite character Samantha absolutely loves, with her favorite Rephaite name

There’s a scene Samantha has wanted to write for years

The ending is very dark

There’s a cute priory reference

There’s a character Samantha loves - “she’s so cool that I don’t know how a nerd like me invented her”

“The relationship between Warden and Paige gets deeper and more complicated in this one, and you get to know Warden a little better.”

“[Paige and Warden] are together a lot in this book, as they’re sharing a safe house in Paris. It’s the first time they’ve spent a significant amount of time with one another since they escaped Sheol I. You’ll actually glimpse the ways they both react to being stuck inside in The Mask Falling, as they’re meant to stay hidden in a safe house for a month so Paige can start to recover from her ordeal.”

“It’s a love song to Paris in the way The Mime Order was a love song to London.”

“[Paige and Warden do have some happy calm moments.] Although there’s a lot of action in the book, there’s also quite a lot of downtime. Paige is still recovering from her ordeal in the Archon, so she can’t always be out in the world kicking ass. She’s resting as well, trying to get her strength back.”

“I won’t lie, The Mask Falling is a book to fear . . . but there are some nice bits. Including some coffee-drinking.”

“[Paige and Warden] do so much in this book. So much.”

“Most of the characters who didn’t go to Paris are absent from TBS4.”

“Paige and Warden do so much in this book, I just couldn’t cram any other storylines in. However, several old friends do turn up in it, as well as a bunch of new characters I hope you’ll love as much as I do.”

“Paige [experiences the messiest-most-intense emotion in TBS4]. She goes through the emotional wringer in this one.”

“The second ‘arc’ has the same main characters and the same antagonist. The difference has more to do with the setting, the scope of the narrative, and the type of battle being fought against Scion. You’ll have a better idea of what I mean when you read the end of TBS4.”

“This book puts both [Paige and Warden] through the emotional wringer, but there are lighter parts as well.” “Nick meets an old friend while he’s in Sweden and Paige and Warden will be staying in central Paris, on Rue Gît-le-Cœur. You can see some of the locations from Book 4 here: [x]”

“TBS4 is basically just a long Hurt/Comfort piece with occasional and reluctant splashes of Action/Adventure”

“THE MASK FALLING leans a little more Adult than the other BONE SEASON books. The whole series is officially classified as Adult, but the first three aren't far off YA in terms of sexual content, violence etc. THE MASK FALLING is . . . maybe a tiny bit sexier.”

“Doing my final reread of THE MASK FALLING and naturally I've noticed a recurring phrase that I have used no less than thirty times in the manuscript.”

“It blows the world of The Bone Season right open. It’s where everything changes. It takes place in a brand-new setting and forms the bridge between the two ‘arcs’ of the series. I hope the ending will show readers get why I really do need seven instalments to tell this story.”

“Books 1-4 is what I call the “Scion arc”, but Scion is still a threat in Books 5-7. Book 4 is kind of in the middle, with more of a focus on Rephaim than there currently is in Book 3.”

“He’s in Book 4, he’s French, he’s voyant, and I’m writing his introduction scene now. I think I love him?”

“The draft is about 140 000 words long – a little shorter than The Mime Order – with a veritable tonne of action, espionage, international politics, eerie catacombs, old enemies, new friends, and messy, intense emotions packed into that word count.”

“This one combines my favourite elements of The Bone Season (Warden and Paige chats), The Mime Order (syndicate weirdness) and The Song Rising (heists and angst)”

“The fourth Bone Season book is well underway, and things are about to take a very dark turn for Paige.”

“It’s mostly focused on Paris, but you’ll find out bits and pieces about what’s happening in both England and Europe.”

“She’s suffering from PTSD and aquaphobia following her water torture in The Song Rising, so she’s pretty much in the ringer for the whole book. There are a few light moments, but she’s under a lot of stress from the start.”

“While I wouldn't call it spy fiction, TBS4 is delving into espionage territory as Warden and Paige, still exhausted from their tremendous efforts against Scion in The Song Rising, attempt to navigate the convoluted political and criminal networks of Scion Paris.”

“Book 4 is a touch more political, laced with subterfuge”

Lists:

Things you’ll see:

The carrières of Paris

A masquerade (ofc)

A mysterious character you haven’t seen in a long while

Arcturus Mesarthim saying ‘hm’ about 18 times

Five words:

Revelations

Politics

Water

Heartache

War

Three adjectives:

Macabre

Emotional

Seismic

There is a lot of:

Warden and Paige

Rain

Classy interior decor

Angst

New characters include:

A spy so fashionable and icy cool I’m unsure of how a nerd like me created her

A tall, irritable Frenchman with a bit of a God complex

A terrifying new Rephaite with an uncomfortably sexy voice

It has:

A Parisian underworld

A demisexual MC

A masquerade ball

Catacombs

Forbidden, angst-stricken desire

Verbal consent

Acknowledgement of periods

I can promise:

Parisian buildings TOURISTS LOVE. Notre-Dame? It's there, there's a masquerade INSIDE IT. Sainte-Chapelle? Oui. Versailles? Naturally. The Eiffel Tower? Oh, we're climbing it

Getting DOWN and DIRTY. (By which I mean literally, down, into the catacombs.)

People who arrive in Paris SPEAKING FRENCH because they have been given a job for which they have the correct SKILLSET *bangs table*

No crêpes (#OhCrepe), but CHAUSSONS AUX POMMES

ROOFTOP PICNIC

Not everyone is STRAIGHT

Chic OUTFITS, all quite filthy by the end

Locations:

The beautiful Sainte-Chapelle, my favourite place on Earth.

Rue Gît-le-Cœur, a major location in the book and previously home to the Beat Hotel.

The famous doorway in the Paris Catacombs. The inscription translates to 'Stop! This is the Empire of Death.'

Rue Montmartre, where we may or may not encounter an old face.

Preview in gifs:

Originally posted by cinemagraphs

Originally posted by queeniegoldtsein

Originally posted by cumlelerinruhu

Snippets:

Out-of-context chapter title: Chapter 3: Gloomy Coffee

Part names*:

1. To Pay Thee Free

2. Turn the Anchor

3. Eurydice

Quotes:

“What the fuck is that?” she whispered to me. “Looks like a frozen rainbow.”

“The horizon was as red as if the fire still burned. I watched the sunrise from the roof. Fog breathed into every nook and alcove of Paris, laced over the dark crests of the river, blanched the skin to the pink of salmon. I was sure the air was still spiced with the tang of smoke.”

“So,” he said, “we are choosing larceny.” “Always so surprised when his criminal friend commits crimes.”

“I wouldn’t usually care who you’re riding at any given time”

“I sensed all of this was very important, but I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about”

“I picked up the floundering ribbons of my dignity and started over”

“His home was in decay, and mine lay in the shadow of the anchor. Scion had made wanderers of us.”

Current opening line (circa Dec 18, 2018): “The sun had been climbing over the cliffs when our ship had pared away from Dover.”

“Someone who had heard of me and whose first response had not been to try to kill me. What a treat.”

“A hollow ache stretched out within me. It started in the chambers of my heart, in a place that reached eternally for Ireland.”

“‘I promised you we would stay together,’ he said. ‘In the absence of other options, I will follow your lead on this matter.’”

“‘I’m fine.’ ‘Your attempt to mask the darkness under your eyes serves as compelling evidence of that. As does the full bowl of coffee.’ I cocked my head. ‘Did you just master sarcasm?’ ‘Paige.’ ‘It’s a cup of coffee. With… no handle.’”

“‘There’s no fireplace,’ I stated. ‘No.’ ‘But how are you-‘ A wild laugh was bubbling up. ‘How are you going to cope without one?’ ‘Cope,’ Warden repeated. ‘You need one. To stare into, pensively. Did you know,’ I said to him, ‘that you do that a lot?’ He tilted his head, which only set off a fit of silent laughter. My ribs ached in protest.”

‘I mustered all the breath I had left and screamed, until I folded on myself and my voice burned to nothing.’

‘Who can break you now, Black Moth, now there is nothing left to break?’

#the mask falling #the bone season #masterpost #hints

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shatterstar · 3 years

Note

Please tell me about shatterstar's Childhood

oh my god anon okay I’m assuming in context of what I’ve recently posted you want like... my version of events rather than what’s canon but just in case I hope you know that there’s basically zero canon material that actually describes his childhood/young adulthood beyond “I was a warrior born” or whatever the fuck. if you want to know about that idk go on the fucken... marvel wiki page or something

also--I hate that I have to put this out here and I doubt anyone would actually do this but just in case--I have spent like 1 million hours thinking about this because I have brain disorders and it is very close to my heart so please do not A) use this in fics, etc without letting me know/getting my permission in advance or B) reblog this post

anyways. this is a can of worms so I’m going to do a cheeky lil

first we have to get something out of the way: I hate the “shatterstar’s his own grandpa” paradox. I am sorry if this angers people but it makes me mad so I ignore it. the reason it bothers me is because it means alison blaire essentially married her grandson, which is A) weird and B) bad from a genetics perspective.

in my version of canon ‘star IS the biological child of longshot and dazzler but longshot wasn’t cloned using ‘star’s DNA because..... oh god... another whole separate post can be made about this but... in my head, on mojoworld the way genetic engineering works is not really the same as it is here. here genetic engineering generally means taking an existing genome and inserting or deleting genes. this is how they make, for example, animals that glow, or confer pesticide resistance to plants.

but on mojoworld I think the way they genetically engineer is more like... the way we mechanically engineer. like the entire organism is built from the ground up. there’s a master genetic blueprint which is essentially the “minimal genome” required for a functioning humanoid. this was created by study of Earth humans by arize and the other genetic engineers. they can then go in and customize by adding elements to the genome that code for the signals/building blocks that control things like height, strength, hair color, eye color, having hollow bones etc. so in my head longshot was sort of... designed with ‘star as the inspiration, but not directly cloned. that wouldn’t even make sense anyways because A) different hair color and B) LONGSHOT HAS 3 FINGERS ON EACH HAND and shatterstar has 4!! thats NOT HOW CLONES WOULD WORK!!!!

(side note, the concept of a minimal functional genome is a real thing in biology! some scientists have taken a bacterium that already has a small genome and reduced it to the minimum size required for viability. here is a wikipedia article on it and here is the original paper (DOI: 10.1126/science.286.5447.2165) which I can explain in more detail because I took a class on synthetic biology which this technically falls under and I had to read this paper very closely).

fuck I’ve written 4 paragraphs and not even talked about his childhood yet. I am so sorry. anyways. so the way I think they raise the gladiators on mojoworld is they create them in batches of 5 to 10 identical copies of a certain “model”, place each copy in a different “class” with a set of 2-3 mentors/teachers, and train them to fight until they are 13 or 14. until this time the only names they have are the names that identify the “model”--like for shatterstar that would be gaveedra-seven where the model identifier is “gaveedra” and he is (in the lore that I have come up with) the 7th of 8 total.

the reason they create multiples and put them in different classes is each mentor is going to have a slightly different style of teaching which is going to work better for some and worse for others, so it allows them to have more mass production while increasing the chances of creating a truly great champion. it’s classic nature versus nurture--the genetic engineers create your nature, but you don’t end up exactly the same as others of your model. maybe you get an edge, maybe you don’t.

another thing that happens is different mentors believe in different ways of raising the kids in their care. shatterstar specifically was raised in a class where there was absolutely zero emotional development at all and no attachments allowed beyond fighting alliances. that’s not the case in all classes, and it also had the effect of making him somewhat of an outsider even within the other gladiators as he got older.

at 13 or 14--and yes I realize this is very fucked up but dude its fucking mojoworld idk what you expected--they start participating in fights. the first ones aren’t to the death and they’re as teams and they’re not usually televised they’re more like high school sports games that are attended by scouts (here, they’re “sponsors”--I think that’s a canonical term but I honestly can’t remember) and if you get sponsored you leave your class and join a new “team” that’s really just a bunch of people who all have the same sponsorship. this is where things can get interesting because they’ve all been raised with slightly different fighting styles but more importantly, slightly different degrees of Personhood.

also at this point I should mention that by this time, there are usually only 2, maybe 3 of each model left. either they died or were recognized as not having talent so they were sent to eventually fulfill other roles in the network. in ‘star’s case there was just him and gaveedra-five. once you get to the stage where you’re sponsored and you’re actually fighting to the death one of the first people you’ll fight is any remaining members of your model group.

by the time you’re the only one left of your group, you’re also eligible to earn a stage name. this usually happens if you have a particularly epic fight with a lot of viewers, you win and the commentators will typically say something like “Let’s give this crowd a real name to cheer!” and they’ll have a few candidate names and they’ll kind of just pick one. AUGH I actually have this scene written out in story form but its too long so I think I’ll save it.... :)

after you get a name you also get a cool outfit and usually some kind of mark or tattoo that serves as a brand. this brings me to another important point--shatterstar inherited the X-gene from alison and therefore he IS a mutant. his mutation is the swords vibration thing and the glowing eye. the star mark is a tattoo and teleportation is benjamin russell’s mutation (how he fits into all this is... for another post). basically after he got his name the costuming department guys were like “hey your eye glows, you look like the Legendary Warrior of Old, Longshot, we’re gonna pattern your look after him” so they gave him the star tattoo and the outfit that’s literally inverse colors of longshot’s.

also this brings me to another aside: you’re probably wondering “if he’s the biological kid of longshot and alison how are there 8 gaveedras?” when the genetic engineers got a hold on him as a baby they were like Sick! free baby! free genetic material! thats our job done for us! so they cloned him (in the traditional sense) and made 7 copies. this was also to kind of conceal his identity as technically being from outside mojoworld, which would make him stick out and thus be a target. they DID edit out the x-gene in the other gaveedra models though. this wasn’t a problem for ‘star because his mutation didn’t manifest until he was already sponsored.

I think that’s .... pretty much it for macroscopic lore on what it was like to be a kid gladiator on mojoworld. now let me give you some Tidbits of his life specifically:

like I said he was raised in a particularly cold and ruthless class. the mentors that raised him are like well-known by everyone to produce some of the best warriors but also there’s discourse on mojoworld because some people say perfectly emotionless killing machines aren’t as fun to watch. when he was sponsored there were 4-5 others in the same sponsorship and they were like Theres Something Wrong With You LOL

they speak earth languages on mojoworld because they’re imitating the broadcasts they (the spineless ones) used to hear from earth. however, most of the lower-class as well as almost all arena fighters and other television personalities speak cadre or other languages which are native to the planet. the stage names are all vaguely in english, but the gladiators don’t really understand them at first.

shatterstar got his name before he got the glowing eye, and when he learned what stars are, and saw his eye as a little star, he was like wow :) this is Me :) which is why that name is so important to him. it’s also one of the first things that wholly belonged to him.

(you can’t see stars on mojoworld because of light pollution and also because it’s a pocket dimension and there just aren’t that many stars to see)

I hate to bring up the s**ley miniseries but I do think it would be interesting to have him have a sort of ... mentor/first friend, similar to the concept of gringrave but they were NOT in a relationship. it was more like... another kid who was a year or so older than him got a soft spot for him and helped him not be so clueless. she didn’t make as much progress as xforce did, obviously. but they were.... something like friends.

unfortunately she was used by spiral to get shatterstar to murder the first rebel guy who tried to get him out of there. then she got switched sponsors (this can happen) and he had to kill her, and he was like well I will simply never develop any kind of attachment to anyone ever again.

he almost didn’t make it out of the first training session with his sponsorship group (this is semi-canon--there’s a reference when he’s teaching terry to swordfight to almost not surviving the first time he was in a gladiator class or whatever it was).

the closest he ever came to losing was the day he got the name. that’s why the crowds loved it so much.

the double-bladed sword was a gimmick weapon but when he got his mutation they realized it works way better if there’s resonance between two parallel blades so they redesigned it as an actual weapon.

(forgot this but I feel like I should include it) at 17 he escaped the arenas and joined the cadre alliance. two years later he came to earth and joined xforce.

I think that’s going to have to be it for now because it’s literally almost midnight and I have work tomorrow and I did NOT intend to stay up this late but I did. thank you for this opportunity anon :) feel free to ask me any other questions and also I realize a lot of this probably makes no fucking sense and that’s because I am not a writer or anything I’m just a biochemist with brain problems that cause me to obsess over stupid shit

#answered #shatterstar #GHKDJFDKHGRJ I KNOW THERES SOMETHING WRONG W/ ME THAT THIS FEELS LIKE EXPOSING MY SOUL....#Anonymous #long post #NSCU #<-thats my new tag since other people have asked about this #it stands for nadine shatterstar cinematic universe

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