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nysus-temple · 1 year

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ULTRAKILL's references to Greek folklore

Wellp, here it is brought to you by a girl who can't shut up about a game she sucks at playing. ANYWAYS—

BEFORE YOU GO DOWN this is, to no one's surprise, filled with spoilers. While it's true that lore in this game is secondary, if you wanna learn it by yourself when playing it, then save this reading for later. Ultrakill is avaible at Steam, and there's for now an Early Access version in case you wanna try it before buying it. It's filled with blood, but it's still a masterpiece, me thinks.

!! - Guide of this thingy:

Introduction.

King Minos.

King Sisyphus (not full).

Honorable mentions ( mostly things that i'm probably imagining ).

1 - Introduction:

There's many people out there who have already talked about everything that reminds them of the Divine Comedy regarding the game, besides the fact that it takes inspiration in DMC too; but almost no one seems to notice the details that reference Greek folklore, and it's true that they are not THAT important, most likely i'm just imagining references in places where there are actually none, but this is what brainrot does to a girl. So wether they are true or not, i'll still will write this thing down or else i'll explode with my thoughts.

2 - King Minos:

To make it short, Minos was the king of the Lust Layer, he felt that the sinners of said layer did not deserve such punishment just for loving one another, and when God dissappeared and Heaven turned into chaos, he build next to the inhabitants of the layer a prosperous place. Sadly, when the council took control of Heaven back, they implied Minos' intentions had gone against God's will by freeing the sinners, and Gabriel was sent down to kill Minos.

Minos instead of fighting back, tried to find reason in the angel, but Gabriel didn't hear any of his words and ended him, imprisioning his soul.

"...Gabriel struck down Minos, his flesh torn asunder with torrents of crimson pooling at his feet as we all cried out for clarity. 'Justice,' Gabriel decreed to all, with our just ruler writhing in wailing agony, 'The Lord's Will be done.' We watched on in horror as Minos lay broken, now waning, screaming in defiance of God's Will, Gabriel."

Text from a book found in the second level of the Lust Layer.

Minos' corpse was now controlled by parasites and Gabriel was the new Judge of Hell. Oh, yeah, that's why thorns are blinding him. Justice is blind and Minos was, wellp, a Judge of Hell.

And here's when my shenanigan's begin!

So you see, it's true the first Minos we know from Greek folklore was a king, was made a Judge of Hell after his death too, and all the shenanigans... But can we see any of that in this Minos? While it's true that most of the things are original or coming from the Divine Comedy, here's this detail i spend some time thinking about:

"Despite once bringing upon the renaissance of the Lust layer, his corpse now only seeks sinners to punish."

Terminal data of The Corpse of King Minos from the game

While the Christian elements are heavy here ( Divine Comedy, WUH ) and we have the Father's name, God, therefore not many references to the Greek Gods ( specially knowing Minos was one of Zeus' sons ), this detail is what reminds me of him becoming the Judge of Hell in the original folclore.

Minos was so respected by everyone, even the gods, that they decided to make him a Judge of Hell. Meanwhile in Ultrakill, after Gabriel killed him and became the new Judge of Hell, they still kept his corpse searching for sinners to punish. Tragic and bittersweet, but apparently they still thought of his corpse as a Judge of Hell, even when no soul was with it. Just like Greek Minos was respected enough to be turned a judge in Hell, this Minos is respected enough to maintain his corpse as a Judge, just like he once was.

3 - King Sisyphus:

Since Sisyphus hasn't come out as a boss yet and we therefore don't have 100% his lore explained, I can more or less summarize it:

"King Sisyphus has acted in secret until now, amassing an army whose strength and numbers swell, but now there is no need to hide anymore. We have lived in the shadow of Heaven long enough to forget the taste of fear. Now the Sisyphean Insurrectionists prepare for war.

I have heard of Minos beginning a peaceful revolution, but our King Sisyphus knows such pacificity will gain no favor from our cruel captors. He knows that one can only fight power with power, and he shall lead us to freedom."

Text from a book found in the second level of the Greed Layer.

Minos decided to do a peaceful revolution, building his own shenanigans in the Lust Layer, but Sisyphus didn't think the same way; he decided to do a revolution too, but it was anything but peaceful.

Full terminal data of the Sisyphean Insurrectionists in the game:

"The Sisyphean Insurrectionists were an army of Husks gathered and trained by King Sisyphus for overthrowing Heaven's control of Hell, freeing the sinners from their eternal torment. [...]

Upon the establishment of the Council and subsequent return of peace to Heaven, Gabriel and an army of angels were sent down to crush the insurrection and subjugate Sisyphus' army.

Although their battle was well-fought, the inexperienced Insurrectionist could not match the educated strategy of the angels, who quickly descended upon King Sisyphus with great force, eventually overpowering and killing him, leaving the Insurrectionists without a chain of command.

Left scattered and disoriented, the warriors were easily picked off one by one, their bodies cut apart, leaving behind only the bare essentials to carry on their eternal punishment of hauling heavy boulders up the monuments of mankind's arrogance and greed.

Although the blood of their enemies still stains their bodies and their grasp still clutches their fallen foes, their will and fierce fury only serve as mental torment in knowing how close they were to freedom."

The Insurrectionists mantain Greek Sisyphus' original Hell punishment, carrying a rock up to the top of a mountain ( in the game, a pyramid ) that will eventually fall down again.

Now, more interesting details... Greek Sisyphus wasn't that much liked by the gods since he, wellp, cheated death a couple times, unlike Greek Minos who was so respected that he was turned into a Judge of Hell. So just like Greek Sisyphus was thrown into Hell with a punishment and Greek Minos was turned into a Judge of Hell; in this game, Minos' corpse is still used as some kind of Judge... more or else, as I said before. Meanwhile, Sisyphus corpse isn't used at all ( not yet, remember the game isn't finished ), it is just imprisoned with no head, even. Perhaps that has something to do with the Greek Sisyphus being punished instead of turning into a Judge of Hell, or similar, like the Greek Minos was? Or maybe i'm just imagining stuff. Hmm.

Oh, by the way, unlike Minos being blind being due to him being a Judge and Justice is blind; Sisyphus was blinded by greed, so he literally is blinded by gold.

4 - Honorable mentions ( mostly things that i'm probably imagining ):

You know I could just jump into Hakita ( developer ) and ask him "is this bullshit i came up with actual references?" but there are better things to do in life, I guess, sooooo let's leave them here, shall we?

THE ENTIRE LAYER OF WRATH is, for my stupid mind, an antire Odyssey reference. Except the last level i guess.

The entire layer is ambiented around boats and the sea. And while you can say 'odyssey' is a word used for 'really long travel' nowadays, my mind goes beyond that with this concept.

The first level of the layer is named "In the Wake of Poseidon", you have no idea how much i screamed when i first read it. Like, the first level, just like while in the Odyssey many stuff happens, before all of those stories are told, Odysseus is first thrown at the sea after leaving Calipso's island, by none other than Poseidon. If we go to the second level "Waves of the Starless Sea" we'll be, no shit Sherlock, in a sea. But full of broken boats, completely destroyed, just how Odysseus' small boat was left after Poseidon came at him. The third level is "Ship of Fools" and, okay, i'm sorry for saying this is Odyssey related too, but Odysseus' companions were, indeed, fools. ( The game has many DMC references too, so maybe i'm mixing things, but i'm no fan of DMC so uuuuhh ).

Also, the third level of Wrath, the boat, has an ost called "Death Odyssey" and it gets sinked down. If THAT doesn't ring a bell, what else does it?

The Ocean is literally called "Ocean Styx". Ring a bell? River Styx?

You can choose not to fight the Ferryman by giving him a coin. Ring another bell? Charon? The whole 'putting a coin in the corpse's mouth so that they could pay him in the Underworld to take them by the river' shenanigans?

Cerberus is the boss in the Prelude, who in later-game becomes a common enemy. Funny enough, he isn't shaped as a dog, but as a humanoid, and the explanation given in the terminal data of the game regarding that, is this one:

"Although they do not resemble the mythological three-headed dog, this name was chosen due to their nature as protectors of Hell."

Gotta love them for that.

WELLP that's all folks. Hope you had fun reading my ramblings, as usual. Feels good to be back into the essays world.

#this game makes me think about so many things. feel about so many things #Gabriel is still the big fave. but. sometimes i do think about those two kings......#Minos is pretty popular since he's been in the game for a while. hope Sisyphus eventually comes to beat out asses soon #it still surprises me they put names like Cerberus and Poseidon #in a game with God. Christianity and all that due to Divine Comedy shenanigans #pretty excited for the last act #this game has been my hyperfixation for a while and it's not even my fault #OKAY i'll go now. PLAY ULTRAKILL #greek mythology #essay #references

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hadescrow333 · 6 months

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As this is my first post, I find it appropriate to start off withe the beginning of creation (accourding to Greek mythology of course)

This portion of the myth will not be dedicated to the gods singular, those will be later posts where each god/titan/etc gets their own post

There are many different stories contradicting eachother, so I’ll try my best to either explain each one or just go withe the one that’s most popular

In the beginning of creation there was only khaos, whom was a great void of nothingness (so very chaotic right?). Then suddenly pop came Gaia, who’s basically Mother Nature earth peep, Tartarus, the deepest pits of the underworld (I love this word TaRtArUs), Eros (but honestly I think it means the personification of love instead of EROS EROS because most versions state Eros is Aphrodite’s child), then Erebus, Darkness (and an amazing name to name a cat), and Nyx, the night (another great cat name) (also the only peep Zeus fears, which I think is pretty cool)

So Gaia (without the help of male productivity) then gave birth to Uranus, who is the sky and I will call Ouranos because that is what I was taught when learning Greek mythology (books my peeps)

Though some accounts state that Gaia and Ouranos were both made from Chaos instead of Gaia birthing him.

Oh and cool little fact, the sky was thought to be a brass dome by the Greeks, and Ouranos was the personification to that brass dome. Brass you may ask? Why brass? Why so specific? That’s the same question I thought to myself, and therefore searched for the answer and actually there was a reason for this. The Greeks did not think of colour in colour, but in scales of brightness. And I guess the Greek thought the sky was shiny, like brass. (Think of that one piece of work where the ocean was deemed wine dark)

Oh I also should probably add that the family history includes Erebus overthrowing Chaos, and then Erebus being overthrown by his children, but that’s a long story I’ll dedicate to another post)

Gaia and Ouranos then became a thAng, and I could go all poetic about how oh the sky and the earth were bound for loneliness so against the odds given to them they became one together, but no I’m not going to because I’m such a good poet. I digress.

Oh and my dude Ouranos decided it would be cool to decree himself supreme deity, cool cool my(😬) dude.

Anyways, Gaia and Ouranos hit it off and had some premeditated children. (Yes. This wording is purposeful. No. I will not explain.)

Now to go into the kids of Ouranos, yay..

(There is no foreshadowing here folks!)

So Ouranos sired children withe Gaia, the first set being six sons. Three Cyclops (one eyed peeps), there names being Brontes, Arges, aand Steropes. And three (insert me staring at the google search of how to spell this) Hecatonchires, named Briares, Cottus, and Gyges. They were dubbed the One Hundred Handed Ones(I’m pretty sure if you’ve read Percy Jackson Briares is in a part of it(?))

Well, Ouranos was awfully concerned about how powerful these giants are, so he locked them away. There is some debate about where he locked them up, but it’s widely believed he locked them in the deepest pits of Tartarus.

Gaias, as most mothers would, did not quite agree withe this, and wasn’t all too happy withe him. This is fine, nothing is bound to happen right? (…)

Oh little fun fact about myself, while doing this I had my big ole mythology book that I love and have no recollection of getting (I just found out I stole it from my father, and he’s never getting it back), but do know it is a good flower press. And very informative (which is good because it’s huge and has a very decient portion that is deticated to Greek myths yay) My delicate dried flowers are falling (I mean, sorta, I would never actually let them fall but they are taking damage and potential destruction so it COUNTS) as I type this out, know I have sacrificed greatly to bid thee information I already know and honestly only need the book for spelling (yes I am proud of my useless knowledge of Greek myths) I DIGRESS.

So as this is happening (or maybe after, it doesn’t directly state, only specifically states that the giants were first created before the titans) Gaia also birthed the 12 Titans. Who are Oceanus, Tethys, Hyperion, Theia, Coeus, Phoebe, Kronos, Rhea, krios, Japetus, Themis, and Mnemosyne.

So Oceanus was the titan god of the great oceanic river that forever circles the world. (I. WILL. EXPLAIN. In another post this is getting long and I’m not even halfway done) His wife is his sister Tethys (if you don’t like it go away because you definitely won’t like Greek mythology, oh and they practically don’t have the same DNA or morals as us sooo)

Hyperion was the first sun god, and his sister Theia was his wife.

(You do not know how hard it is to not digress and spill facts and stories BECAUSE THERES SO MUCH THAT ISNT SAID ON HERE the only thing saving me is that I have other posts I can rant about them on)

Coeus, who isn’t very important other then his offsprings tales, wived his sister Phoebe.

Kronos, the youngest of the bunch, married to Rhea, who was the titan of motherhood, and other foreshadowing things.

Ok this is getting long the rest of them are Krios, Japetus, Themis (goddess of justice), and Mnemosyne (goddess of memory)

So let’s get back to Gaia, as I said before she was livid at Ouranos for ya know yeeting her giant children to the great pits of Tartarus, and then imprisoning her titan children in her womb, so she took her titan children and was all like “oh my dear lovelys please go kill your father for me?” And then committed one of the most famous divorces in all of mythology.

Gaia created flint to make a sickle, then once done making it she told one of her titan children to murder their father withe it. I like to guess all of them looked at her in bafflement, for none of them took the sickle from her offered hand, except for one. (Insert mic drop)

Kronos, youngest and seemingly weakest decided he was worthy and took the sickle.

Then they conspired a plan, the plan being several versions. The main version being; for Kronos to strike once Ouranos and Gaia are settled down to lay, and the some of the other titans holding him down (another post my friends another post). So this is what Kronos did.

Once Ouranos was laying down withe Gaia, Kronos went boo, and castrated Ouranos withe the sickle. He then threw the genitals into the ocean (where Aphrodite was created by the sea foam where the genitals fell, later on but that’s a story for another post) From his blood giants popped up, as well as the Erinyes, furies who tormented the criminal minds later on when humans were a thing, and ash tree nymphs.

It’s not stated clear what exactly happened to Ouranos, some versions state that he died, that he withdrew from the earth, or that he exiled himself to Italy. (Yes. Italy. Very specific right? And there. Is. No. Elaboration.) All that’s known is that as he deported he said the Kronos “you shall be punished” (very original)

Yup ok that’s all I’ll do the gods and that age later byeee

#greek mythology #kronos #ouranos #greek gods #greek posts #myths #factsdaily #interesting facts #fun (fun..?) facts #story #greek titans #cronos #other helpful tags #and some that aren’t all that helpful #greek myth retellings

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uwmadarchives · 1 year

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The challenging task of selecting a research topic

By Elisa Miller, Student Historian 2022/2023

As I step back and reflect on the work I’ve done over the last two months as a student historian, it’s incredible how much I’ve learned about UW. I’ve researched such a broad range of topics and experiences that I can’t even begin to list them all. I will share some of my favorite finds!

As an Asian-American, I immediately started researching the history of Asian-Americans on campus. One of the coolest things I found was an Asian Theater program. Founded by Professor A.C. Scott in 1963, it was the only program of its kind in the country. I should note that Scott was white and had no Asian heritage. He served with the Royal Air Force in World War II and spent much of this time in East Asia. This is where he was introduced to Asian theater. After publishing several books, he moved back to the states where he was eventually approached by UW to start an Asian Theater program under the Ford Grant. He put on several plays and brought in prominent PhD students and actors to teach his students. When the grant money ran out sometime after 1972, Scott decided to stop putting on plays and focused on teaching Chinese martial arts techniques to his acting students.

Scott left the university in 1978, and despite having a successor, the program seems to have died off sometime before 2000. All that seems to remain is a course, Theatre 351: Fundamentals of Asian Stage Discipline. Although Scott was essentially putting his white students in yellow face, as pictured below, he seemed to have great respect for Asian culture. He spent extensive time in Asia and got involved with the theater community in Hong Kong and Tokyo. I believe costume was a major part of these plays, and both Scott and the students treated the plays/culture with respect and reverence.

Image from "A Theater of the Senses," by P. Shaw, 1966, Wisconsin Alumnus, Volume 68, No. 2, p. 10.

I felt I had reached a dead-end with the Asian Theater program because there was a very limited number of results on the online collections at University of Wisconsin Digital Collections (UWDC) and general Google searches (more to come on this…), so I ended up talking with Kacie Lucchini Butcher, the director of the phenomenal Public History Project, to brainstorm some new ideas. She steered me in two directions: humor magazines and the International Club.

As a huge comedy nerd, I dove into the UW humor magazine collections. There were two: the Sphinx which ran from 1903-1913 and the Octopus which ran from 1919-1959. I spent weeks pouring through these magazines, but never found anything compelling enough to me to make it my research topic. Because I’m supposed to focus my research on underrepresented/under researched groups on campus, I tried to hone in on this when looking through the magazines. There was some grotesque stuff about minorities, but they were actually pretty few and far between.

For example: the ‘Fightin’ Irish’ cartoon pictured below. Obviously, the Irish are not really an underrepresented group, but I thought it was interesting to see that they were not truly considered white in the early 1900s.

Many of the discriminatory pieces I found were about women, like this piece “Ain’t Nature Wonderful” from a March 1920 issue of The Octopus. It seems like a normal enough story, until it takes a very violent turn for the “punchline.” This was just one of many pieces where the butt of the joke was violence against women.

For the most part, however, the magazines were actually quite tame. They mostly poked fun at professors, classes, majors, Greek life, etc. While the jokes about women and minorities were quite shocking and hard to read at times, I couldn’t really find a running theme to center a research project around.

I moved on to the International Club. It was founded in 1903 by a Japanese student, Karl Kawakami (Kawakami named himself after Karl Marx). Initially, the club was a place for students to debate international issues, but by the end of the decade it became more of a social club. It was actually the first International Club (also known as the Cosmopolitan Club) in the country. Many other schools such as Illinois, Harvard, Indiana followed suit. They had a national meeting of the club in 1910 in Chicago.

As UW had no formal support/program for international students until the 1950s, the International Club welcomed them to campus and introduced them to American culture. Almost every single international student on campus was a member of the club, but anyone was welcome to join. I went onsite to the Archives to look through documents and found tons of flyers, letters, and even a scrapbook.

One thing that caught my eye was a booklet recapping a year, 1947, of the club. One of the pages was a transcription of a debate between a few club members. I was fascinated at their eloquence and how well rounded their perspectives were. Even though the language is more formal than most students would use today, it felt like a modern conversation. It was really interesting to see a Russian student’s perspective who actually lived in the USSR and his perception of America. While disdain may be a strong word, the Asian and Russian students definitely had a bone to pick with America, which is interesting considering they had decided to attend school here.

Photo by Elisa Miller

After going through the archives and exhausting UWDC, I thought it was a fascinating club, but again couldn’t find the hook for me to make an entire project about it. I felt like there wasn’t really much I wanted to say about it or add to it. It also seems to have disappeared from campus sometime in the 1980s or 1990s and its prominence was in the 1910s and 1920s, and there wasn’t much documentation on the club from that time.

After finding that transcribed conversation between club members, I thought about what anti-Americanism has looked like on campus. I immediately thought of Communists, especially during the McCarthy era. So, over the last few weeks I’ve been researching Communism/Leftism on campus in the 1950s. I’ve found a lot of interesting information about tensions between Communist clubs and administration, as well as a slew of Communist speakers. One of my favorite finds was some articles about Joe McCarthy getting laughed off stage when he came to speak at UW. I also found a piece that directly contradicted the McCarthy situation about Joe Bollenbeck, a man who would attend communist speakers' events and essentially berate them.

Newspaper clipping from the "Daily Cardinal Comment," 1951.

Newspaper clipping by R.O.W., 1971, Insight and Outlook: A Journal of Conservative Student Opinion, Volume XI, No. 1, p. 5

While I was working on this blog, I went over it with my supervisor, Cat Phan. She gave me some helpful notes, but then she asked me about the Asian Theater program. She thought Asian theater on campus would be super interesting and would make a great topic. I agreed! We discussed why I had given up on it, and she helped me realize I may have tossed in the towel a bit too quickly. I had kind of forgotten about it until I was looking back through all my old research to make this post. It had always been a personal favorite of mine, especially because of the personal connection I felt to it. She encouraged me to give it another try and gave me some more resources. So, that’s where I stand now! With Cat’s encouragement, I’m really excited to dive deeper into the program and this is the strongest I’ve felt about any of these topics.

I have also only really researched online using UW resources. I want to start going onsite to the archives, like I did with the International Club, and reaching out to people on campus to get a wider breadth of information. There is only so much material that has been digitized. Although, I do think I reached my personal dead-end with most of my topics with just the material I found online, the Asian Theater program is something that I will have to go out and look into. It is recent enough, at least in comparison to things like the comedy magazines or communists on campus, that I am confident I can find people who have personal experience or firsthand knowledge of the program.

As this exhaustive post makes clear, I have struggled a bit with this research. This is my first research position ever and I’ve really had to learn as I go. I have definitely improved since I began back in July, but still have a lot to work on. I have loved the process, though! What’s great, but also difficult, about this position is how open-ended it is. Everything is completely up to us. The world is our oyster! Cat warned me that choosing a topic has historically been the most difficult part for the past student historians, and that has certainly rang true for me. I had so many ideas at first I just didn’t even know where to begin. I think I’m finally at a good place with my research. I have a clear idea of what I want to look at, and more importantly, why. The Asian Theater program at the University genuinely fascinates me and I would be honored to share more about this story.

#student historians #undergraduate research #uw-madison #campus history

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hyojongpromo · 4 months

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ELLE SINGAPORE: DAWN ON HIS “NARCISSUS” EP: LOVE, LOSS, AND FINDING HIMSELF

Author: Laura Sirikul

Date published: September 15th, 2023

DAWN knows a thing or two about his life being held under a microscope.

The 29-year-old artist, real name Kim Hyo Jong, has had his life in the media circus since the reveal of his romantic relationship with fellow Cube Entertainment labelmate and idol HyunA, which was seen as taboo in the K-pop industry, in 2018. Both DAWN and HyunA did the unthinkable and remained committed to their relationship, prompting the label to cut both of them out. The duo sparked support from fans domestically and abroad, solidifying their status as one of K-Pop’s most beloved power couples. They later signed to Psy’s P Nation label and released their solo EPs. For DAWN, he released his 2020 hip-hop album “Dawndididawn”, which marked his debut as a solo artist. Both DAWN and HyunA later released a collaborative EP called “1+1=1” in 2021, which was the first — and only — in K-Pop history for a couple in the industry to release one together. But DAWN and HyunA were known for their unconventional and unconditional love. After leaving P Nation in 2022, DAWN and Hyuna announced their break up.

Now working with producer duo GroovyRoom’s AT AREA, DAWN is ready to share his music in his own words. His new EP “Narcissus” tells the story of his life in his 20s as he experienced love, loss, and finding himself through it all.

“I prepared [this album] like it was my first album,” DAWN tells ELLE Singapore over Zoom from Korea. “For the first time, the stories I wanted to tell with those thoughts and good feelings. I really prepared it with a lot of effort like it was my last album.”

While many speculate that the album is about HyunA, DAWN doesn’t deny it, but he also wants people to know that it’s also a letter to himself about the trials and tribulations he’s gone through. While the world has known DAWN with HyunA as a duo, even throughout his Dawndididawn era, he is ready for that narrative to change. Just who is DAWN now — and without HyunA?

“It’s really hard to think of one word to describe who I am now,” DAWN ponders. “I am a person who enjoys adventures now. I’m very optimistic and think about a lot of things at the same time. I really enjoy this process of self-searching. I’m very adventurous now and I’m very happy about that.”

The title of the EP “Narcissus” stems from DAWN’s belief that when we fall in love with someone, we mirror ourselves to them in a way where we basically fall in love with ourselves and when the relationship falls apart, we lose a part of ourselves. He recalled the Greek story of Narcissus, a beautiful hunter who became entranced by a reflection of himself, and thought it greatly matched his concept.

“It’s quite simple,” says DAWN. “The tracks talk about different phases of what I experienced in my 20s through my love. When I first dated the person I love, and then during that love then the end before the farewell and then the love after the farewell. It’s the full story of all the emotions.”

In “Narcissus”, DAWN shows a more gentle, humble, and wise side to himself, one that has been through many challenges and came out with more poise and gratitude. It was also an opportunity for DAWN to tell his truth and not hold back on his emotions. All the songs in the album for DAWN felt like he was reading a 10-year diary.

“I’m still thinking about it now,” he says. “After I released it, it felt like I was publishing a book. I’m now feeling ‘Oh, that’s how I lived and that’s how I loved’. I wonder what kind of love I can [have] in the future? Will I be able to love? So there’s just a lot of emotions going back and forth right now.”

In the sweet ballad Star, DAWN sings about falling in love with a star and it not working out because they’re different people. He reflects he “doesn’t believe in who is wrong or right, but just their differences and acknowledges that is enough [to break down]”. Memory (featuring Kim Sawol) tells the male and female perspective of their memories of each other and their wish to erase their love in order to hurt a little less. DAWN describes this haunting melody as sci-fi meets fantasy “inspired by the film Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind.” There are some love songs Fallin (featuring pH-1)’ and Abyss, English tracks, that describe falling in love and the lengths they would go for their loved one.

Compared to “Dawndididawn”, which DAWN says established him as a commercialized idol, “Narcissus” is about who he is now as Hyo Jong rather than the character DAWN. For many years, DAWN has kept Hyo Jong in the dark and is now ready for the world to meet Hyo Jong.

“This album is [both] DAWN and Hyo Jong, the person,” DAWN reveals. “An album containing my story that shows me, the real me. That’s why this album feels different.”

As for the fans and people who are dissecting the album, DAWN says it’s natural for fans to be intrigued by his personal life. It comes with the territory of being a public figure but hopes that audiences will feel different kinds of love when listening to the album. Not just romantic love or the feeling of love, but the many aspects of love.

“There are so many different emotions of feeling loved,” Dawn explains. “It [could be] feeling nervous about meeting a person for the first time or feeling hurt because they’re going through a breakup. I just want people to listen to this album and feel their own emotions about love because this album is about that.”

source: https://elle.com.sg/2023/09/15/dawn-on-his-narcissus-ep-love-loss-and-finding-himself/

#dawn #던 #hyojong #효종 #e: narcissus #interview #elle singapore #230915

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nightfrostshadow · 3 years

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Teammate

The wonderful @amethystpath-writes wanted a continuation so here it is! :D

This is a continuation of- Behind The Mask

This has a continuation- Winner

Villain walked into class the next day and looked around. There she was. Hero. In her usual spot. Villain almost laughed to himself as he went and sat down at his desk. Hero sat one row away from him, exactly one seat separating them from being side by side. She had been right there all this time and he had had no idea.

Villain wondered what he should do now that he knew who Hero was. It was something he had always wanted to find out but now what was he supposed to do? Get close to her? Get her to trust him? Make friends with Hero? He corrected himself mid thought. Ava, not Hero. Here she was just Ava, there was no hero and no villain. They were classmates and just knew each other’s names. They weren’t exactly what you could call friends. Villain pondered on what he could do to change that.

When he drew a blank, he pushed those thoughts away. They just had to get through the school day for now. He brought out his books and focused on school since the bell rang signalling the start of the lesson.

After a very normal school day, instead of packing up and leaving, Villain headed to the basketball court. There were try-outs taking place today for the school team. He loved playing sports so as he was hurrying over, he was pleasantly surprised to see Ava heading in the same direction. Well there was his chance. He smiled at her and Ava acknowledged it with a wave. He walked over to her.

“I had no idea you liked to play basketball.”

Ava looked up with a smile. “Then again, I seem like a very quiet girl who just sits around the whole day in class don’t I? but believe it or not, this is the real me.”

Villain laughed and held out his hand “Well then, lets get to know each other better, shall we?”

Ava took his offered hand and with a firm handshake smiled “Alright then.”

Villain smiled to himself This was so much fun. She was so unsuspecting. This was going to be easy.

They both were the only ones from their class who had turned up for the try-outs so they were grouped together.

They were made to run laps, sprint, play one on one with each other, tested on dribbling skills, passing skills, shoot from different areas of the court. The normal baskets, three pointer and free throws while the coaches were trying to judge who to choose.

In the end after thoroughly testing the fitness and the basic basketball skills everyone present had, it was time for the selection. The coach called their names one by one. Villain as well as Ava made it. Villain smiled with satisfaction. He thought they both had done quite well even if he did say so himself.

The coach sent off the remaining ones who weren’t chosen and turned to look around at his newly formed team. He smiled at them. “Are you ready to be the best team ever?”

“YES!” they all cheered.

“Alright then,” he smiled. “We did enough for today. See you guys here tomorrow at the same time for your daily practice sessions! For now, go get to know each other better since you all will be a team from now on.”

They all headed over to where the water bottles had been kept for them and as Villain was heading over, he wondered How strange was fate? He probably would have made friends with Ava anyway since she would be on the same team but now, knowing she was Hero, it just felt different for some reason. Should he tell her now? That he was Villain. He scoffed. No there was no fun in that, she probably wouldn’t talk to him again if he did that. Besides, it wasn’t really lying to her was it? Since all he had done was not tell her he was Villain. Fair enough, no one goes around announcing their secret identity. Right now he was just Nico and not Villain.

“Nico!”

His thoughts were broken when he heard Ava call him. He looked up and saw that having reached the stand earlier, she was tossing a water bottle to him.

He decided not to worry about anything and just be himself.

For now.

“Why, thank you!” he said as he caught the bottle with a smile as he reached the stand and looked at her. “We made it Nico! We’re in the team!”

“Yes, yes we are,” he replied with a grin.

As they walked off in the golden evening sunlight to meet and get to know the rest of their team, Villain smiled to himself, he had a new friend. Ava, his teammate.

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yandere-sins · 3 years

Text

The Exception

My friend let me try playing Hades on her switch and well... I kinda liked it. Namely, I liked all the characters, so my brain went like “what if they were yandere” and I had an idea for this story that I threw together this morning before working on the Fox Wedding (: The latter isn’t done yet, but this sure is, so who knows, mayhaps some of you will enjoy it! Just tried to answer the question how we could get Thanatos to whisk us away.

Characters: Yandere!Thanatos x Reader Warnings: Yandere, Blood, War, Wounds/Impaling, Major Character Death (???) or well dying, I read into greek history for almost an hour but if I gotten something wrong then so be it

Thanatos had seen enough of the world to know that he didn't want to stay on the surface forever.

The current battle spreading before him was a mere reason to sigh deeply as he watched bodies fall left and right, their souls soon leaving to a better, or perhaps worse, place. It was mandatory he stayed, but Thanatos was well aware of which side was winning and which was losing. It was his duty and his work to know these things, even though it didn't make the fighting any less futile in his eyes.

Letting his gaze wander over the battlefield, he watched the red splatters on the ground, heard the crushing sounds of iron against iron and the cacophony of fearful and devastating screams. He still couldn't believe Zagreus would want to come to such a place. A place where there was futile fighting and too much light, but perhaps, it was a world that fit the Prince of the Underworld, as he was the same, even if Thanatos only recognized this fact bitterly.

Finally, the battle was closing in on its end, just like the hundreds of people that found their death because of it. The ones who weren't dead yet slowly but surely started to hesitate and retreat. Even as the personification of death, Thanatos reckoned that a pointless death was scary, even though so many humans chose it over desertion. Their death was inevitable, preordained by Thanatos sisters. Still, he had seen many hold on to the last sparks of hope that they could escape Thanatos' grasp.

And then, on the other side of the coin, were those that practically would have offered their life to Hades and fought to the end.

You weren't an exception. Yes, your quest and pride were your downfall, and by the gleam in your eyes Thanatos could tell you knew. You knew and recognized that you'd die. However, as if you were spiting him personally, you still continued to fight ahead of everyone else, gaining questioning glances from your comrades and contempt from your enemies, which you pulled to the ground one after another and sending them to hell.

Many before you had this overzealous compulsion to make that best out of their inevitable demise. Thanatos would admit that yes, most had a good reason for it, like saving their family or fighting for their own life. Others simply lucked out on the gift of pride and ignorance, forcing themselves and occasionally many more lives with them into the deep, dark pits of death.

What was your reason? Thanatos wondered.

He still had time before he needed to take action, he could allow himself a short - minuscule, really - different thought than his upcoming work, and you presented yourself so nicely to him as the incarnation of death waited for the end of today's battle. It wasn't often that he had the leisure to let his thoughts wander, so Thanatos intended to use these few seconds, which would fall under the radar, to still his curiosity.

By the looks of it, you weren't an inexperienced fighter. Or perhaps, you were just a farmer judging by your muscles. Surely, you seemed enthusiastic about your task, so were you fighting for something more significant than the glory of your country? Family? A loved one? Thanatos couldn't help but be curious about what your drive was, as he had seen so many reasons, yet they were all the same. Perhaps, yours was new?

Even so, you were graceful as you swung your sword around. What did he know about footwork, but at least, yours seemed to pay off as you weren't dead yet. When one of your foes managed to smack off your helmet, Thanatos believed that was it, but alas, you regained your strength, charging at the very same attacker.

In a way, fighting was like an elaborate play. The only difference was that neither of the parties knew the other one's move. The person reacting better was the winner. He couldn't find joy in watching wars, but even Thanatos had to admit that it was a joy watching you. Even if you lacked the enthusiasm as the heroic shades that lingered below, like Theseus, had, you fought a fight worth mentioning in the books as well.

Every move you made, Thanatos could see the calculations in your eyes, that keen shine reflecting in them. The sun seemed to break through the clouds just to reach out to you, making your armor sparkle in its rays. Yes, you were a formidable human, and Thanatos caught himself thinking that it was a shame you were fighting even if you looked so beautifully while doing it.

Taking another deep breath, he could see the swirls in the air left by it. While the winter wasn't affecting him, no matter how little clothes he wore, Thanatos felt a second of pitiful understanding for everyone who had to fight in those conditions. Undoubtedly, the cold armors, freezing hands and weapons, and frozen ground were another nemesis for every soldier out here. Even if their bodies stayed warm from adrenaline and running, it certainly was another reason many of your human bodies gave out quicker, merely submitting to their fate. It was fair enough for Thanatos. It meant his work was over faster, and judging by you being circled and the other soldiers at your side beginning to see the end coming towards them with long spears and sharp swords, it was all over soon.

You had fought bravely, that much he could give you. Perhaps you had impressed him enough to put in an unusual good word for you with Hypnos, who'd pass it on to Hades himself, granting you a shot on being put into Elysium. But your fate had long been decided, and as you fell to the ground, the battlefield erupted in victorious screams, announcing your time of death.

And also, his start of work.

As the winners retreated one after one, happy whenever they found a friend that survived too, Thanatos passed by them and onto the battlefield instead. Unseen by the human eye, he began his duty of reaping, one soul after the other, as mangled and frustrated over their death as they were, following his orders as he shushed them away. Usually, some pleaded and bargained with him for another shot of life, but even if Thanatos had wanted, there was no way for him to help them. But that day, everyone seemed awfully aware that there was no negotiating nor mercy waiting for them as they looked at his figure, frightened and frustrated. A pointless battle, with meaningless deaths, brought forth the self-pity in them, but this wasn't the first battle Thanatos tended to, so he felt nothing akin to that. It also wasn't his duty to take care of the souls gathered here, as it was Hermes' job to lead to them.

He had something very different on his agenda. You.

It was unfortunate for both of you, but when he reached you, you had yet to breathe your last breath. One eye slowly and in pain, opened, the other one damaged from the blow to the head you had received. However, as you looked at him, serene clarity laid in your gaze, and you recognized him, mayhaps by the giant scythe he carried around. Your stare was clear and less afraid than he expected you to be when acknowledging him, but you closed your eyes as a cough overcame you, hot, red blood dripping down your lips.

"Guess that's it," you croaked, and Thanatos could only stare. Conversing… wasn't his strong suit, and there wasn't exactly a reason to talk to you.

"Are you going to kill me?" you continued, undeterred by his silence, and Thanatos weighed his actions. "No, of course not," he eventually spoke, shaking his head slowly, the hood on his head shifting along to his movement.

"Ouch, that's cruel. You'll just wait until I die like this?"

Your words were nothing he hadn't heard before, and he didn't feel offended by them. However, he didn't expect your lips to briefly curl into a smile, adding a jesting notion to what you said. Even that wasn't new, but… it struck a chord inside the usual stoic bringer of death. "I can't end your suffering," Thanatos explained, hoping you'd simply know about the unspoken rule that he couldn't harm you.

"I think, I get it," you heaved, feeling worse by the minute. "You are just making sure I know I am supposed to die here."

That assumption wasn't wrong, even though there had been more playing into his service than just that. Too many kept trying to escape their fate, and sort of, Thanatos was just checking and cleaning up what would be left. You still had some time before your organs would fail and finally take you to the grave, different from the other souls that were already leaving for their new home.

"No, you will die here," he retorted firmly.

"I could," you chuckled, followed by another painful cough.

"Don't test me, Mortal."

In between deep breaths, you allowed yourself a short laugh. Just like him, you were probably aware that there was nothing worse that could happen to your situation, so his threat was just a way he hoped to shut you up with. In silence, he watched over you, until eventually, your eye opened up again. This time your gaze was searching for him - or something really - but your sight had already begun to cloud. No matter how proud and achieved you are in life, in the face of death, everyone looked the same.

"I think I did a good job. You know, fighting. Thought that if I already had to do it, I might as well give it my damn best."

More coughing. Thanatos watched the puddle of blood around you grow by the second. The spear inside your body must have been stirring up your insides the more you talked. Thanatos had expected something like this, you, young as you still were, had been led by the belief that doing your best could make up for the fact that you'd die. "But in the end, it was worth nothing, right? We lost after all."

Thanatos could only stare as he wondered what you expected him to say. He came here, knowing your life would end here, so really, the hope you had put into yourself didn't have the same disappointment to him now as it did to you. And yet, as he listened to you, seeing your body battered up with cuts and bruises, for the first time in centuries, he felt something akin to pity for you, and you specifically.

"Why did you fight then?" he asked, perhaps against your expectations.

"Why? Because they told us too. The King ordered us to fight this battle, and only he could have known how many soldiers our opponent would bring."

"You could have run." Thanatos tried to stay as detached from you as possible, though it didn't quite work, your words taking their influence on him. "Can you?" you retorted before letting out a long sigh. Death was near, literally as well as figuratively.

"Can you run from your duties? You don't have to do this either, do you?"

"I do--"

"Really?"

There was no immediate response this time, your question justified, despite your little mortal soul undoubtedly never understanding the burdens on the shoulders of Gods. The world would stop if they all decided to not continue their work and fulfill their duties and expectations. If Thanatos stopped, no one would die anymore, and but the suffering of everything would never disappear too.

"Dying sucks," you whispered, turning your head away.

"I reckon," he muttered indifferently. Not like he could talk about it from experience. It must be painful, dreadful, and, depending on the circumstances, frustrating too. Right now, though he couldn't imagine the extent, you must have felt so hopeless and so, so scared. There wasn't much other reason for your banter.

"Thanatos… I always thought it was a pretty name, even if everyone feared it." Regaining his attention after finding himself momentarily lost in thoughts, he looked down at you again, watching as your eyelid closed slowly. "Say what you want, but you can't blame them for fearing death, and alas, me."

"Perhaps if they talked to you, they wouldn't be so afraid."

"Meaning you don't feel so afraid anymore?"

A smile danced over your lips once more, a truly unusual sight for a soul so close to their end, and especially after talking to him. Hypnos often teased Thanatos with being too formal and dutiful to be amusing, and Hades beware, comforting. Though he didn't care for his twin's words, yours did make him feel... happy.

"Let's go then," you whispered, and Thanatos kneeled down, his hand falling to your wrist, listening to your pulse. Even with the feeling of your heart still desperately pumping blood through your body, only to lose it through your wounds, you didn't utter another word afterwards. You undoubtedly were dying, but perhaps, for now, you were merely unconscious as your lungs didn't stop reaching for air, and your heart used all your strength to function.

Once more, the sun broke through the clouds, shining down right at you two, bringing Thanatos into the predicament of being blinded as it reflected off your armor. Perhaps he understood it now. Understood how unfair it was that someone like you, innocent and kind, was doomed to die out here. How awful his job on this day was, forcing him to take you to Tartarus and put you before the judgment of the god residing there.

So what if... he didn't.

He couldn't heal your wounds, nor make you feel better. But what he could do is battle the fate, earn the scorn of many, but at least, even if he took out the spear from your bloody body, you'd live. You'd live to tell your tale, and who knew, even he could apply some bandages, so maybe you'd recover some.

It was a risk, and one Thanatos did not like taking, nor found pleasure in executing. But you couldn't refuse to come to this battle, whereas he, perhaps, after all these years, could refuse to do his job once. For your sake, and unbeknownst to him at that time, for his own even more.

His scythe disappeared in favor of Thanatos grabbing for the dreadful spear. Never before had he experience the kind of sound a wound could make from so close, and by the gods, he hoped he never would again. It was just your luck that you were unconscious, or the pain would have perhaps killed you faster than your wounds.

Leaning down, he scooped you up, his hand sullied with your blood and the dirt on the ground. The snow wasn't cold when he touched it, but your body was warm in his arms and still alive. Your threat of fade wasn't cut yet, and he wouldn't do it. With you in his arms, he stepped back, looking into your sleeping face before he retreated from the battlefield with a quiet, "Let's go."

No, the surface wasn't a place Thanatos liked to linger. It was too loud, too wrong, and too bright. But to see your smile, lively and happy, one more time, he didn't need to stay above ground. Where you were going, it was dark and, at times, lonely if you weren't a being born there. But you'd also be safe and alive for as long as you wished to.

And Thanatos would be with you, even if everyone would turn against him and his decision, for all eternity if he must.

#thanatos #thanatos hades #yandere thanatos #yandere!thanatos #hades #hades the game #yandere hades #yandere!hades #yandere #yandere imagines #yandere headcanons #yandere scenarios #yandere fanfiction #yandere writing #yandere oneshot #yandere drabble #yandere x reader #yandere x darling #Yandere TW

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gffa · 4 years

Text

I swore for about ten entire minutes that I wasn’t going to do a set of recs for THE OLD GUARD, I was just going to watch the movie, indulge in a bit of fanart, and then I would be done. But then I was like HOW ABOUT I HAVE SOME FEELINGS INSTEAD? and here we are. So HAVE SOME FEELINGS ABOUT ANCIENT IMMORTALS AND REASONABLY ANCIENT IMMORTALS AND BABY IMMORTALS. COME YELL ABOUT FEELINGS WITH ME, FANDOM. THE OLD GUARD RECS: ✦ An Unrecorded History by xpityx, joe/nicky, 1.1k Joe closed the book and dropped it none too carefully on the table. He would have liked to have thrown it away—to prevent anyone else from reading it—but it was far too easy to make copies of books in these times, so he knew it would be no use. He also could not quite bring himself to discard something as precious as a book, no matter how poorly written it was. ✦ keep yourself alive for me by retts, joe/nicky, NSFW, 1.7k Nicky grabbed Joe’s hand and pulled him towards the stairs, not that there was any resistance from Joe. ‘If I remember correctly, this one has two bathrooms, doesn’t it?’ ✦ let’s give them something to talk about by lacecat, joe/nicky & andy/nile, nsfw, 4.8k In which Nicky and Joe take liberties with recounting history, because it’s fun. ✦ Family Dinner by dadvans, joe/nicky & nile, 2.4k The only time Nile ever sleeps a full night and feels remotely part of herself is when she stays with Nicky and Joe, who shampoo brains out of each other’s hair in the shower and clean their guns on the couch watching Chopped reruns. ✦ one burning candle, one wind-whipped flame by Dialux, joe/nicky & andy, 5.1k Yusuf dies, and dies, and dies, and lives, as well, for a thousand years. Nicolo’s by his side for all of them, and it’s not quite the love story of eternity, but it’s theirs: and that’s enough for them both ✦ Future Days by maroon, joe/nicky & andy/noriko, 2.1k “Then why untie me?” The man grins, terribly amused, and awfully affectionate. Andromache wants to look away, but for some reason, can’t. Maybe because the look in his eye reminds her of herself, a lifetime ago. “Because my beloved is soft, and kind, and will flay me alive if he’d known I tied up a woman.” ✦ Islands of Hours by RC_McLachlan, joe/nicky, 1.5k There eventually comes a lull, and so they go to Malta. ✦ take out by j_gabrielle, joe/nicky & nile, ~1k It probably should bother her when Joe kicks the door to the flat open and promptly marches in to deposit their takeout on the living room table. All while he is tracking half-dried blood and mud on the shiny tile floors. “You, ah,” Nile says even as she hurries to pick through the night’s offerings. “They let you on the subway like that?” ✦ all a smooth plain, and the soil deep by inlovewithnight, andy & nile & joe & nicky, 2.1k After London, they all need to rest. ✦ we are golden by retts, joe/nicky, ~1k Joe lowers his gaze to the open page on his lap. The sketch is of a man on a charging horse, hair and beard whipping in the wind, sword in one hand and a shield in the other. The eyes in the drawing are the same eyes watching him now. His Nicolo. 'You were a hard fucker to kill back then, Nicky.’ ✦ An eagle’s old age, a sparrow’s youth by BakedAppleSauce, joe/nicky, 2.2k Joe comes shuffling back into the room, heavy footsteps that mean he’s either tired, or not really trying, or both. Familiar as breathing. Nicky’d recognize him anywhere, walking among a million of strangers. In which some people are laying low for a while, in more ways than one. ✦ A Most Forgetful Death by RC_McLachlan, joe/nicky, 1.2k “You’re an incurable romantic,” Nicky says, and though his expression doesn’t so much as twitch, Joe can hear the laughter languishing between the words, can feel it on his tongue and rubbing up against his teeth when Nicky meets him halfway to smear a kiss against his mouth. ✦ Luce e ombre by sheafrotherdon, andy & nile, 1.2k The discomfort is so new that it startles her, and she searches her memory to remember a time before she was immortal: a time when a cut, a scrape, a bruise hurt for longer than a moment, long enough to interrupt sleep. The memories don’t come ✦ When I Am with You by takethisnight_wrapitaroundme, joe/nicky, NSFW, 5.4k “You… would like to waste a thousand euros’ worth of champagne by pouring it all over me?” Nicky has to repeat it aloud to make sure he’s heard right. While spending some quality time together on vacation in France, Nicky has a surprise for Joe. And Joe, as it turns out, has a surprise for Nicky. ✦ the common tongue of your loving me by spokenitalics, joe/nicky, NSFW, 1.4k “It’s just— Do you ever wonder how much we’ve forgotten?” Nicky asks, eventually. “How many names and faces and places have just… faded away from our memory?” ✦ i have loved you for a thousand years by owilde, ~1k It’s him. Again. Yusuf shields his eyes from the blinding desert sunlight, staring into the near distance where a man is stood, alone, a harsh silhouette cut against the bright blue sky and peach-coloured sand. ✦ this is why by retts, joe/nicky, 1.2k Small as it was, they had their own room in the London safe house, which was a good thing because Joe was prying open Nicky’s mouth with his fingers. Not with his tongue, much as Nicky would prefer it, but with three calloused fingers sneaking inside his lips as if Nicky wouldn’t wake up from the intrusion. He was on his back, Joe pressed closer to him than his own shadow. The slant of moonlight from the window illuminated Joe’s dark eyes as he bent over Nicky. Joe sucked in the corner of his mouth, a tell that he’d never shaken off all these long centuries. ✦ I Found Peace in Your Violence by j_gabrielle, joe/nicky, 1.5k 5 Times Joe and Nicky kill each other + 1 (of many) times they killed someone together ✦ life is very long by kaydeefalls, joe/nicky & andy & nile & booker & quynh & copley, 7.1k Andromache tells him: “The Greeks used to have seven different words for love. Well. More, probably. But I remember seven.” She shrugs. “There are many ways to love one another, and life is long. We’ve time enough for them all. It’s the only thing that makes it worthwhile.” Nicky and his immortal family, over the centuries. ✦ take a breath by BeStillMySlashyHeart, joe/nicky & andy & nile & booker, 1k Once they are safe, Nicky and Joe take a moment together. ✦ Between the Hour and the Age by hauntedjaeger (saellys), andy & nile & joe & nicky, 2.5k “To the Art Institute of Chicago,” Andy echoes, “so that my breasts may be culturally appreciated in perpetuity.” She tips the bottle and lets out three drops. As they fall to the stone floor, Joe and Nicky rap their knuckles on the nearest pieces of metal: the other lantern for Nicky, the oxidized helmet for Joe. One rap for each drop. In another time, they might have struck their swords on shields. ✦ how we live by retts, joe/nicky, ~1k Life, though, brings pain. Goddamn pain. Bullets that struck his cranium and pelvis – the big bones in the body – are forced out. The rest went through him, carrying organ tissue and muscle with them. Those lost bits have to be regrown. Bones realign and the ribs in his lungs retract so they can breathe again. So Nicky can breathe again. And when he breathes, he thinks, Yusuf. ✦ Paradeisos by Enneara, joe/nicky, 2.9k Traveling through Greece with Yusuf after fleeing the Holy Land, Nicolò suffers a crisis of faith. ✦ The Language of Love by 1derspark, joe/nicky & andy/quynh & booker & nile, 4.5k Or five times Nicky hears Joe speak his language and one time Nicky returns the favor. ✦ Le Vite by ScribeofArda, joe/nicky & andy & nile & booker, 8k Nicky breathes out. “What did I miss?” he asks, staring out at the hills. “Why didn’t I see this coming?” After everything, after finding Nile and losing Booker and Andy’s new mortality, Joe is pissed off. Nicky is just tired. ✦ The god of my idolatry by Petra, andy/nile, NSFW, 3.4k “You said you were worshipped as a god.” “I was.” Nile steels herself and asks, “Would you like to do it again?” Andy laughs and throws back the contents of her glass. “They don’t teach you pick-up lines in the Marines, do they.” ✦ love is not over by retts, joe/nicky & andy & nile, 1.3k 'Babe, do you know what this reminds me of?’ asked Nicky. Joe licked his lips and tilted his head to the side, gaze intent on the mole on Nicky’s cheek. 'What?’ 'The first time you drew me.’ ✦ Case Analysis by skeeno, joe/nicky & andy & booker & copley, 3.4k It’s not totally out of the ordinary for the people Copley meets in his line of work to be extraordinary. But he’s intrigued by these four. ✦ compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience by Jack_R, joe/nicky & andy & quynh, 11.9k ‘You are a shame to your countrymen and the lowest of the low,’ Yusuf said, ‘and your mother copulated with a dog.’ ✦ Everything in moderation (even moderation) by BakedAppleSauce, joe/nicky, NSFW, 6.1k The novelty has worn off, of course, but it’s not the novelty that keeps anybody coming back, anyway. Novelty never sustains anything. ✦ What the Water Takes by xpityx, andy & nile & quynh, 1k Here is a secret she will never write down. ✦ Stracciatella by ScribeofArda, joe/nicky & andy & nile, 4.8k “None of us have any evidence of the ways we have died,” Nicky continues. “But you remember the fall, don’t you? You remember the first time you died, the way your blood spilled out as your throat was slashed. I remember the first time I died, when the love of my life drew his sword across my neck as I drove mine into his chest and we both fell to the sand.”

#the old guard #yusuf al kaysani #nicolo di genova #andromache the scythian #nile freeman #fic recs #the old guard fic recs

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alatismeni-theitsa · 3 years

Note

Hi!!! I just discovered your blog and I am definitely getting a lot out of it. I hope you don’t mind answering my question - do you think it’s possible for someone with no Greek background to… I don’t know if “worship” is the right word, but worship Greek deities? (Or however you would put that.) I myself have felt some connection to one or two, and done a lot of research! I try not to make unfounded claims (unlike some on TikTok lmao), but I know I lack the cultural background to fully understand what it’s really like. (continued)

Like a lot of American kids I came into contact with Greek myth through Percy Jackson and my book fair and I know that’s not the end all be all of the mythology and I’ve got a few books on my shelves as someone who is generally interested in Antiquity, as well as Hellenistic faith specifically. I’ve always felt a connection to love goddesses in particular and while I don’t claim to be a PRIESTESS (that’s very silly), I can’t deny that Aphrodite in particular draws me in (and her other counterparts in Ancient Mesopotamia). But I know that Greece is a real place, and it has its own culture, and I don’t want to be disrespectful yknow? (continued)

(Thanks for your patience, I’ve definitely rambled a little). My question is this: is it possible for me to continue down this road? (I mean, I hope so! Having a relationship with the Divine has improved my whole life.) And if it is, do you have suggestions of where to dig in deeper and learn more?

___________________ [END OF ASK]__________________________

Hello! Greeks agree that anyone can worship the Greek gods! It's not a closed practice and any faith is supported by the right to religious freedom. As you read, you can't exactly reconstruct the faith, but that doesn't mean you can't reach the deities in the ways that are appropriate for you, trying to follow some guidance from the past. I wouldn't recommend calling this worship "Reconstruction" for that reason, but I am sure you can at least practice something. You can have an altar, idols, offerings, and say the translations of ancient hymns.

It's true that you might lack some background knowledge and that can be balanced by years of reading ancient original texts (translated in your language ofc) about the deities and analyses by different scholars. Additionally, observe the iconography and the statues or idols of these gods to get an idea of how they are. Even many modern Greeks are not well informed about our ancient religion (because they might innately know some things but there is a lot of material to cover). In both cases you can only learn by studying.

If you don't have that feeling of what the line of respect is, you can acquire it by asking some Greeks who are Hellenic Polytheists and, if you can't find them, random Greeks who are decently informed about the gods (someone who won't call Zeus "a d*ck" unironically, for example :P). Many modern Greeks can feel the bs and when someone disrespects a deity, even though they are not in the ancient faith.

And there are some Greek Hellenic Polytheists who are only that in name and for them the worship is magic vibes, cool names and candles. So, always check what the individual knows and ask more than one person. Cross-examine the info you take with what you read on the ancient texts and the scholars. Don't forget to check the reputation of these scholars and if their claims have been debunked.

Search keywords on Google scholar and you might find papers that discuss matters that interest you. (Don't copy the DOI of the paper and definitely don't copy it into SciHub so you can download the paper - or the book, or article - for free! 👀👀👀👀👀)

I don't have a list of recommendations ready (and most of my books are dusting in a distant village) and I am not sure if my suggestions would help you. I am not a Hellenic Polytheist and I think you might find more suitable reads if you ask other Hellenic Polytheists what they have read or what they plan on reading. There are some who have a big collection regarding the gods!

I'll also cover that scenario: in case you want to worship 4 different goddesses from 4 different pantheons, that won't be a very consistent practice. Legally, nobody can or should stop you from doing that, but it will not be the most respectful thing on your part. While gods can be "imported" to other pantheons, first one has to be devoted to one pantheon and then import one or two deities from elsewhere. That means that to do it, you will have to focus on one pantheon and recognize and worship all the gods there. Meaning, if you only worship Aphrodite, it won't do it.

I've also noticed that a large portion of Hellenic Polytheists call themselves "Devotees" and that's not what they think it means. Being a devotee is closer to being a nun than having a deity that protects you. If you have one deity that protects you and you want to have their altar, that's not being a Devotee. That's more like a Christian aunty talking to their beloved saint. For someone to be a devotee, at least from what I know, they have to dedicate their life to religious worship on the temple of this particular deity. (Whilst recognizing the power of the other gods in the pantheon). I am not sure there is any place in the modern era when someone can be a devotee for a Greek god.

Lastly, I'd advise taking a look at this post for better terminology use. I get that a foreign vocabulary is difficult to use if you don't know the language. For example, you used "Hellenistic faith" and, unless you mean the state of the religion in the Hellenistic period of ancient Greece, the phrase doesn't hold the meaning you intended. Perhaps you mean "Hellenic faith"? Although the standard "Hellenic faith" for the last two thousand years is Orthodox Christianity xD So you better specify this by saying "ancient Hellenic faith".

A Greek Hellenic Polytheist was calling herself "Hellenic Greek" for her foreign audience but if she were to say this to a Greek she would sound like saying "I am a Greek Greek." And the Greek would tell her "of course you are a Greek if you are a Greek. What else would you be?" So she is misusing her own language, for what purpose I am not sure.

P.S. visit my tag #Aphrodite

I hope I covered your questions and if you have more I am here! As always, the post is open to anyone who wants to offer some more advice!

#answered #hellenic polytheism

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rickriordanfandam · 3 years

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opinions on riordanverse ; my edition

a lot of people have been doing this so i decided why not right. probably gna lose some followers or smth but anyways. pls respect my opinions! if u disagree, thats fine, but please be polite. unless any of my opinions strikes u as morally wrong then pls point it out to me respectfully. thanks!

- i actually liked drew. im so sorry to everyone who hates her but full offence, why. think about it this way ok, first of all drew became hc because silena died. silena was the traitor, the one who betrayed chb, yet after she died campers celebrated her as a hero? and then drew suddenly has to replace her and live up to idk that legacy she left behind,, when all of a sudden this girl named piper swoops in and takes her place. idk abt u but i wld be salty abt that too. not only that, but as an asian, the chances of drew having faced racism/bullying as a child is pretty high (she studies at brooklyn academy). which means that when she finds out shes a demigod, and arrives at chb where most of the campers are white (this is an assumption btw), she’d obviously be scared of being bullied for her skin color right?? so the first thing she wld do before the campers get to bully her is to bully them before they can do so. (sentence structure here is wack i apologize) ofc this might not even have happened, drew could have had a perfect childhood && was a b1tch for no reason, BUT EVEN THEN HER ROLE AS A BULLY WAS PRETTY VITAL BECAUSE THAT FURTHER SHOWED THE CONTRAST BETWEEN HER AND PIPER,, HIGHLIGHTING PIPER AS A HERO//GOOD CHARACTER,, AND THEREFORE MAKING READERS LIKE PIPER MORE. anyway stop hating on drew please. ALSO WHY IS THIS SO LONGA SDFJHG

- jason isnt bland, the fandom just kinda erased his backstory (thanks to @pjohoo-memes for the phrasing lol)

- reynabeth wouldnt have lasted/would have broken up several times. idk i just see them as two extremely powerful characters who have firm opinions and will definitely clash at some point. in a platonic relationship,, i can see them as really good friends but as lovers? idk i just think theyll break up

- PIPABETH

- i dont really like jercy,, i see them as better friends than lovers. also idt jason and percy were that close..?

- the dam and not my type jokes are srsly cringey and were never funny. ik that seems hypocritical since my username literally makes use of the dam joke but honestly i dont actually like the joke. its not funny to me and has never been funny

- the seven were not best friends. they definitely argued,, and honestly probably werent as close as the fandom makes them seem. like ure dumped with 6 other people, out of which u only know a few. my introverted ass would have jumped off the argo 2 quicker than leo valdez could bomb camp jupiter up. also leo was a dick to frank. so what if frank is bigger sized?? thats not a valid reason to tease him

- the fandom needs to stop hating on octavian while worshipping luke. if u hate luke and u say u hate octavian too, then okay. but if u tell me ure a luke stan but u despise octavian?? imma disagree w u. luke was worse than octavian im sorry. first of all, octavian being a dick was kinda justified. hes been after the praetor position for so long, and everyone keeps saying to “wait for jason” when suddenly this dude, whos a son of NEPTUNE (neptune wasnt liked much by romans), and the camp decides to make him praetor?? dude i would be pissed off big time. and then afterwards, he finds out that greek demigods are real and the dude they made praetor is greek. AND THEN GREEK DEMIGODS COME TO CJ AND ONE OF THEM BOMB IT UP?? octavian has been told all his life that greeks are scum and this dude called leo valdez attacks cj. sure it was an accident, but did octavian know that? no. so it was honestly justified that he was such a salty prick im just saying. also some of yall be hating on octavian for cutting a teddy bear open and thats the funniest shit ive ever heard i swear

- luke didnt go to elysium

- travis and connor stoll r way too underrated. the two have been head counselors of the hermes cabin since luke was revealed as a traitor, can u imagine the stress? luke, the person they probably looked up to as a brother, betrayed them. and they didnt even have time to process this when they were thrown the roles of being hcs. that would have been so stressful and i would probably have broken down if i were them. the stoll brothers taking turns to wake up at ungodly hours because a new camper is crying and homesick and terrified, the stoll brothers having to comfort and take care of new campers, having to deal with the amount of people in that cramped space because not enough campers are being claimed fast enough. having to resolve issues between campers in the hermes cabin all the time. the stolls arent just comedic relief, and we need to stop treating them as such

- tratie shldve been canon idc idc

- demigods of the demeter cabin arent talked about enough and i love the fact that meg was demeters kid. like she isnt the child of one of the big three yet shes so powerful.

- we need to hype clarisse up more her character arc was phucking amazing

- rachel is overhated. sis found out greek gods exist and regularly come down to earth to fuck around and went “ok cool”. queen shit behavior methinks

- the floor 19 crew of mcga is srsly underrated. like do u even remember halfborn gunderson, mallory keen, tj, etc??? bc i feel like we only remember samirah, magnus, alex, and sometimes blitz and hearthstone

- sadie (tkc) was kinda annoying at first. i like her more now tho but i rmb not liking her for a phat while

- tkc and mcga need more love

- carter kane and jason grace arent boring. theyre just really sweet boys who are too good for this world and yes yes yes

- hazel and frank (especially frank) need to be hyped up more. i hardly ever see anything about them. also yall seem to forget that frank was literally made praetor and that even hecate admired hazel and was willing to fight beside her because of how powerful she was

- frazels age gap is kinda sketch but i still think theyre really cute

- nico definitely had trauma from going to tartarus on his own

- GROVER IS PERCYS BEST FRIEND

- annabeth isnt smarter than leo but neither is leo smarter than annabeth. ive seen a lot of discussions about who is smarter and heres my hot take on it: neither. theyre equally smart, just in different ways. leos a genius mathematically speaking. he has no issues solving math problems meant for people much, much older than him. annabeth on the otherhand, is great at strategies etc. she can make an army of 1000 more powerful than the enemy, even if theyre outnumbered. so in my opinion, both are equally as smart//u cant compare their intelligence, because their talents lie in two different areas.

- while i do agree rick riordan isnt a god and that hes bound to make mistakes,, AND that hes given us a lot of representation,, if the representation offends the people its sposed to represent, then theres a problem. im talking about piper as a poc and wearing feathers in her hair. im not a poc, so i cant speak for them on whether or not its wrong, because i dont know either. HOWEVER, i have seen multiple posts BY pocs talking about how they didnt really like rick’s representation of piper, and thats an issue. pocs have been and are still oppressed and discriminated against by many. as a white cis man, we cant really blame him for not knowing (tho he could have done a research,, asked some pocs,, idk), but by representing pocs in that manner, hes influencing impressionable kids/teens into thinking “oh pocs wear feathers in their hair all the time” etc, which isnt true. the pjo/hoo series is extremely successful, and kids who read the books will probably start forming inaccurate opinions on pocs. the amount of fan art that depicts piper with feathers in her hair dont help either. “but rick said so in the books, so its canon” yeah well rick isnt a god and he can get some things wrong at times. im not saying we should cancel him, im saying we should start educating ourselves and not spread false info like pocs wearing feathers in their hair all the time. also that snake song shit where she sang Summertime was just- yeah. bc heres the thing you can be racist, and still include minorities, but portray them in a racist way. And even then, ignorance isn't a thing to admire. Getting those facts wrong still has a major impact. It continues to perpetuate racist stereotypes.

“ With the feather thing, I looked it up myself; it takes less than five minutes to figure out that Cherokees don't braid feathers into their hair. I didn't grow up in the country where my parents are from. I have many other first/second generation American friends who have also been through that, with a bit of a disconnect from their culture. But something that most of us have in common is that when we didn't know something, and when our parents weren't that big of a help, we looked it up. We sought out resources online and through other people from our culture to be able to connect more with where we came from. Some of that took a Google search. So I find it hard to believe that Piper, a girl who Rick's trying to portray as someone who is attempting to connect with her culture and is totally against racist stereotypes, wouldn't know that eagle feathers aren't supposed to be braided into your hair casually. She may be disconnected from her culture, but she's also shown to want to connect back to it. Piper wouldn't be casually braiding feathers into her hair while also telling off people for being racist. It makes no sense.” - reddit thread (down below)

for those of yall who wanna know more please please read this, it has a lot of things i wanna add in here : https://www.reddit.com/r/camphalfblood/comments/gy3gl2/piper_mcleans_portrayal_is_innacurate/

as well as https://finding-my-culture.tumblr.com/post/189422373260/maxie-ratties-and-cattie-finding-my-culture

i will be posting screenshots of these in future posts so if ure viewing this on ig and u dont have tumblr,, dont worry

- the fact that most of the strong female characters in the series refuse to be “girly”, and ngl i dont really like that. just because ure girly doesnt mean u cant be strong.

- piper would have been a great way for him to start making the strong characters act girlier, but instead he went with the “I’m not like other girls” trope which is quite obnoxious to hear constantly, and I don’t think it’s necessarily great for younger girls to read that idea growing up. the closest we've ever had to a strong female character who was also into "girly" things was Silena. when I was younger I admired Piper's "I'm not like other girls" thing, but then I got older and realized that the whole mentality of "not like other girls" is super obnoxious, and a little bit toxic

i have a heck load more that i cant rmb rn but yeah feel free to add more

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passmeabook · 3 years

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Servamp Tarot Analysis: Kamiya Tsurugi

I’ve decided to do an analysis of the tarot cards in Servamp. Many of the meanings are taken straight from the books they were found in because I feel they explain the meaning of the trumps better than my own words could. I’m looking not only at the official tarot cards assigned to characters, but also headcanon unofficial cards that may have been quietly assigned by the author.

First up is Kamiya Tsurugi. The official card assigned to him in canon is The Hanged Man. In this analysis I will also share headcanons of how he has been unofficially assigned the cards of: Justice and Death.

The Hanged Man #12

Number: XII

Alternative Name: The Traitor

Numerology Link: III, The Empress

Astrological Sign: Neptune

Element: Water

Hebrew Letter: Mem

Symbol: Water and the Oceans

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The Hanged Man XII

The Hanged Man Key Meanings:

Transition

Waiting

Sacrifice

Enlightenment

Upright Meaning:

“Events are not moving with speed, but all you can do is wait patiently in the knowledge that the universe has its own plan. The card can also indicate that you may have made sacrifices just now and are eager to see rewards. Unfortunately, you cannot force an outcome that fits with your timetable. There are many other factors about which you can have no knowledge or influence. Therefore, you may also expect delays to travel plans and projects… On a creative level this card appears frequently when a person is feeling frustration with their progress… Another message from the Hanged Man is to try to see things from a new angle.” (Dean).

“In readings the Hanged Man bears the message of independence. Like the Fool, which signified doing what you sensed was best, even if other people thought it foolish, the Hanged Man indicates being who you are, even if others think you have everything backwards. It symbolizes the feeling of being deeply connected to life and can mean a peace that comes after some difficult trial.” (Pollack.).

Feeling trapped

Confined

Self-limiting

Uncertainty

Lack of Direction

Needing Release

Letting Go

Reversed Meaning:

“The Hanged Man reversed can be a sign of rigid thinking and martyrdom. You may need to revise your expectations; what you think you want may not be possible. In this position, the card asks you if you are hanging on to a fantasy that may make you a victim rather than a victor. Take another view and liberate yourself from a contract or other obligation that cannot offer you what you want.” (Dean).

“The trump reversed indicates an inability to get free of social pressure. Rather than listen to our inner selves we do what others expect or demand of us. Our awareness of life always remains second-hand, never a direct experience but only a series of stereotypes, like the person who models his or her behavior on the orders of parents and the actions of movie stars. The card reversed can also mean fighting your inner self in some way. It can mean the person who tries to deny some basic part of himself or simply the person who cannot accept reality and who in some way or other is constantly battling life.” (Pollack.).

Discontentment

Apathy

Disinterest

Stagnation

Impulsiveness

Negative Patterns

Detachment

The Hanged Man understands that his position is a sacrifice he needed to make in order to progress forward. The time he spends dangling from the tree will not be wasted on his journey. The hanging is not death, but life in stillness. It could be a repentance for past wrongdoings or even a calculated step back to rethink the path he will take once he continues on with his journey. If an approach isn’t working then look at things from a different angle to gain a new perspective. This card is one that tells its reader that waiting and suspension are sometimes what you need to do in order to achieve success. Sometimes action is not needed, and one needs to wait patiently for the proper opportunity.

The Message of the Hanged Man:

Use your time wisely.

The Hanged Man & Numerology:

“TAROT SYMBOLISM: Key 12 The Hanged Man. The keyword for the Hanged Man is reversal. The corresponding symbol means oasis, sea, or water. According to the alchemists, water was the basis of all life, the fluid substance that solidified into physical forms… Water was the first mirror in which the reflection always appears upside down. The significance of this card is that things are not as they appear on the surface. You must look beneath the surface for true understanding. The man is suspended by his foot, like a pendulum at rest. His crossed legs form a figure 4, indicative of key 4 Reason. His elbows and head form a triangle with the point down which is an ancient symbol for water. The Hanged Man represents a person who is poised in consciousness and under perfect control… He sees trouble in the world--people unhappy in marriage, in trouble financially and lost because they have no goals--and he knows it is because they all see things upside down. Yet they look at him and think that he is the one who is crazy. The Hanged Man’s philosophy sets him apart from the crowd and, at the same time, brings him peace of mind and perfect contentment.” (Javane and Bunker.) [Emphasis mine.]

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Looking at these meanings and ideas I find that Tsurugi very strongly if not perfectly embodies the Hanged Man.

I speculate that for a majority of the C3 arc Tsurugi is in the position of the reversed Hanged Man. The lines that really stood out to me while researching this were, “Rather than listen to our inner selves we do what others expect or demand of us.” and “In this position, the card asks you if you are hanging on to a fantasy that may make you a victim rather than a victor.” because they seem to fit Tsurugi so well. Tsurugi clings to Touma and the idea of family he idealized Touma as being. Tsurugi also does what others expect of him, and before his breaking away from Touma just did what others wanted him to do. Even in the TAROT SYMBOLISM section that I highlighted the line about things not appearing as they seem on the surface resonated with me about Tsurugi because despite Tsurugi’s smiles on the surface inwardly he has a lot of trauma.

The symbolism the Hanged Man has with the connections to water, the oceans, and the planet Neptune also tie into together with Tsurugi. Water as an element is related to the Cups suit. Cups/Water has the meaning of “I feel”; the suit focuses on emotions and relationships. The planet Neptune, the Roman name for Poseidon the Greek god of the seas, holds the symbolic meanings of: dreams, intuition, and imagination. Which negatively connects to Tsurugi and his inability to metaphorically grow up, dreams and imagination being viewed as childish, but also to his magic Neverland. In the series we’ve seen Tsurugi be visually connected to water rather directly. Both in his drowning before being saved by The Mother/Freya in Ch. 56 “A Windowless Room”/Ch. 57 “Born” and also in the bonus chapter Ch. 57.5 “The Person Searching for the Key” where Tsurugi is underwater behind his locked door. Tsurugi is also an incredibly emotional person, and has worked on coming to terms with his emotions and what he really feels instead of just doing as other people tell him too.

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Tsurugi’s/The Hanged Man’s Dilemma:

A great showing of Tsurugi and his dilemma of choosing between the upright and the reversed meaning of The Hanged Man is in Ch. 52 where Tsurugi is caught between Touma and Junichiro in making his decision to follow Touma’s orders or to heed to Junichiro’s words.

In Ch. 52 we have the scene where Junichirou and Touma are asking Tsurugi to come to a decision. Tsurugi is physically in the position of the Hanged Man, but he’s divided down the middle into a black side and a white side. On the black side where Touma asks him, “Are you going to ignore what I say again?” Tsurugi’s hair follows the course of gravity as if he were standing up, his long length of ribbon does as well, and his hood lays flat against his shoulder. Compare this to the white side, Junichiro’s side: the background is white and Tsurugi’s hair, hood, and ribbon follow the path of gravity that they naturally would if Tsurugi were hanging upside down. This choosing of Touma, and of the reversed meaning of the Hanged Man, allows readers to see that Tsurugi is not following the upright meaning of the Hanged Man, and that his trump has yet to be flipped to the upright position.

In the side by side comparison Tsurugi’s collar is black on Junichiro’s side and white on Touma’s, but when Tsurugi chooses Touma the collar is black. The collar represents both control and Tsurugi allowing others to make decisions for him. The removal of the collar in Ch. 74 represents Tsurugi taking control of his personal agency and decision making.

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Headcanon Tarot Analysis:

Tsurugi is directly portrayed as the Hanged Man in Ch. 50 “The Hanged Man”. The closest version visually of the Hanged Man as it is as a trump card is on the cover page of the chapter. Then we have another section in this chapter later on which portrays Tsurugi as both hero and criminal. Right before this Mahiru has just asked Tsurugi if he has been fighting to protect people all this time. Tsurugi denies this and instead tells Mahiru that to humans he is viewed as a hero, but to vampires he is viewed as a genocider.

What is fascinating is that visually he’s portrayed as physically being in the position of the hanged man, only as both lauded hero and condemned criminal. As the hero of humanity he’s in a upright Hanged Man position. As the criminal he is in a reversed Hanged Man position with a noose. Looking at the two side comparisons I feel that they both represent #11 Justice & #13 Death more so than the Hanged Man, “In the major arcana sequence, the Hanged Man falls after XI, Justice, and before XIII, Death. We had our values on trial in Justice, and now we must hold on until Death, when we can figuratively let go. Death brings transformation, while the Hanged Man prepares to make the sacrifice Death needs so he can move on.” (Dean)

Justice XI

Justice Key Meanings:

Fairness

Balance

Perception

Objectivity

With Tsurugi wearing a cape and a sword I feel it represents a reversed #11 Justice. Tsurugi’s hero is in the upright position for the Hanged Man, but in the reversed position for Justice. Trump XI portrays the personification of upright Justice on a throne with scales and a sword. Important to see is that the Justice trump is not blindfolded, her vision is clear. The scales held in her left hand represent favoring the deserving with the scales of mercy, and the upright sword in her right hand represents seeking retribution for past wrongs with the sword of retribution. The scales also symbolize the thought process put into making a judgement, and weighing both sides of a story. The sword symbolizes the action that results from judgement. The sword, when it is held upright, symbolizes success.

Tsurugi as a reversed Justice fits in many ways. Tsurugi, as an instrument for furthering Touma’s and C3’s plans, is furthering the goals of those that use him via corrupt justice. Vampires are captured we've seen, but are they given legal trials and do they have protected rights? From what we’ve seen of C3 I highly doubt it. Hence why he is in the position of reversed Justice. Tsurugi has often been connected to a sword, and his name can even mean “sword”, look at the sword of hero-Tsurugi. It is covered in blood, but Tsurugi’s arms are held behind his back. The blood on the sword is not boldly in your face, and is even a bit hidden behind Tsurugi and a speech bubble. Tsurugi does not hold the sword in his hand showing that he himself does not actively choose to to make any decisions with the sword, and instead I feel it represents Tsurugi's passivity and his following what others want and will of him. Later on we also see that when Touma manipulates Tsurugi with his spell power Tsurugi becomes blindfolded, and this is perhaps a symbolism of justice being both blind (traditionally) and blinded (corruption hiding the truth).

#11 Justice Reversed

“Reversed, the card indicates dishonesty with yourself and others. It shows an unwillingness to see the meaning of events and shows especially that you are missing some opportunity for a greater understanding of yourself and your life. In outer life it indicates dishonesty and unfair actions or decisions. Sometimes it is others who are unfair to us. The reversed meaning can refer also to unjust legal decisions or to bad treatment from someone. On the other hand we must not allow the suggestion of unfairness to act as an excuse for denying our own responsibility for what happens to us… ‘Nothing can save you but yourself.’” (Pollack.).

“Life goes out of balance as work, relationships, and money issues spiral out of control. A decision may go against you, so there may be dishonesty or a miscarriage of justice. You are treated unfairly, which is compounded by bad advice from a trusted individual. You are not able to speak your truth and feel overruled by those who don’t understand your predicament. It is important to find your voice and stay strong to your values- if you are in the right.” (Dean).

Death XIII

Death Key Meanings:

Decline

Rebirth

Transformations

Change

As the condemned criminal Tsurugi is in the reversed position of the Hanged Man, but he’s also in the upright position for Death. With Tsurugi wearing traditional black and white striped prisoner clothing and have a noose around his neck I feel this gives weight to the idea of connecting him to #13 Death. Tsurugi in this side comparison is on a scaffold. He wears the clothes of a criminal and he seems to be a minute away from hanging. Yet, the noose around his neck is loose. As the Hanged Man trump has told us, the Hanged Man is not going to die. Instead he is merely hanging around waiting. The trump card Death arrives after the Hanged Man as death follows a hanging. Only in the case of the Hanged Man this is a spiritual death and rebirth after a time of contemplation. The black and white colors Tsurugi wears are associated with Death in the thirteen trump. In the trump Death wears black armor and sits astride a white horse while holding a black and white flag in his left hand. The thirteen trump is associated with change, an extreme change in your life to be exact. When I read this page I see Tsurugi’s Reversed Justice representing who he is right now, and that his Upright Death represents that he needs to and will undergo a great change. Especially since the manga is written in Japanese and we read the pages from right to left.

#13 Death Upright

“In diviniatory readings Death signifies a time of change. Often, it indicates a fear of change. In its most positive aspect it shows a clearing away of old habits and rigidness to allow a new life to emerge. In its most negative aspect it indicates a crippling fear of physical death.” (Pollack.).

“Death brings ending and beginnings-sometimes all at once. This is a time of fast and deep transformation and an opportunity to let go of whatever you no longer need. Unlike card XX, Judgement, which signals a process of self-examination, Death’s impact is sudden and may be shocking. You have little control over external events when Death looms, but in time you will be able to see this sharp change in circumstances as a blessing. A break with the past-from relationships and friendships to work that is no longer satisfying-is the only way forward. In this sense, Death can be a release and a relief. Death, after all, is the ultimate reality check, and he leaves you with the bare bones, the truth.” (Dean).

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These are the views I have on Tsurugi and his tarot cards. I also thought about him perhaps having reference to the Ace of Swords, him being C3′s Ace and his name relating to a sword, but just decided to focus on the major arcana for now. Maybe I’ll do another post about that at a later date. I had fun writing this. I hope to make more posts like this in the future, but if I do they will likely be very, very sporadic.

References:

Dean, Liz. The Ultimate Guide to Tarot: A Beginner's Guide to the Cards, Spreads, and Revealing the Mystery of the Tarot. Fair Winds Press, 2015.

Javane, Faith, and Dusty Bunker. Numerology and the Divine Triangle. Whitford Press, 1997.

Pollack, Rachel. Seventy Eight Degrees of Wisdom A Book of Tarot Part 1: The Major Arcana. Aquarian Press, 1980.

#servamp #kamiya tsurugi #servamp meta #servamp tarot analysis #tsurugi kamiya #servamp tarot

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dreamersleeps · 4 years

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Hawks and the Biblical Archangel Michael

(Another look at BNHA Vol. 27’s Cover)

This is my first attempt at writing an analysis/interpretation piece for BNHA and in general so please feel free to comment or add on to what I have written below. I hope I didn’t miss explaining something properly.

This post was inspired and influenced after reading through @/cutiesableye ‘s interesting analysis and interpretation of the cover of Vol. 27 which is linked here and looking at @/codenamesazanka ‘s post comparing the cover art to a painting called “The Fall of the Rebel Angels” by Baroque painter Luca Giordano which depicts the Saint/Archangel Michael defeating a group of demons (the original post is linked here). If we are comparing Vol. 27’s cover art to these paintings, then Hawks is in the position of the Archangel Michael while Jin is in the position of the demons.

By now, I’m sure that a lot of people are aware of the references of the Greek mythological character of Icarus in Hawks’ characterization. However I want to draw attention towards the possible allusions Hawks may convey with another winged figure: the Biblical Archangel Michael.

Despite the fact that Horikoshi is a Japanese author and that the story largely relies on contextualization that is based on Japanese culture, that does not mean that he can’t be inspired by Western ideas and faiths from outside Japan. When it comes to other Christian references, I think you can look towards All For One/Shigaraki and Ibara Shiozaki from Class 1B who have more explicit references to Jesus Christ and other Biblical references. If Horikoshi wasn’t inspired by this Biblcial figure, this piece or similar art pieces then please take this post as an interesting take on the cover. However I think this take on the cover adds to the narrative. There are some interesting similarities between Hawks and the Archangel.

After a quick search on Google, I realized that quite a few pieces of art of the Archangel from the 1500s - 1700s (not quite sure about the time frame) depict him triumphantly standing atop a pile of the enemy/demons/sinners, wings spread out wide, dressed in a red or blue robe and with his right arm wielding a sword lifted in the air, sometimes with the sun or a bright light shining down on him from behind his head.

Here are a few examples:

“Archangel Michael punishing sinners” by unknown Austrian artist (1700s)

“Saint Michael Archangel” by unknown artist (1490s)

So who is the Archangel Michael?

First of all in the hierarchy of angels, Archangels are those who are at the very top. The title comes from the Greek words “arche” which means prince, and “angelos” which means messenger and they fulfill a number of important purposes. I think which angels are considered an archangel is debated based on holy scriptures between the Abrahambic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) however because the paintings above were produced by those who were of Christian and Catholic faith, I will focus on looking at the Bible. In the Bible, Micheal is the only angel who is explicitly labelled as an Archangel. He is an angel of supreme power and the leader of God’s army.

Based on the information I found online and from my own knowledge, the Archangel Micheal had four main responsibilities based on what is found in the Bible and in Christian tradition:

Combat Satan.

Escort the faithful to heaven at their hour of death.

Be a champion of all Christians, and the Church itself.

Call men from life on Earth to their heavenly judgement.

For this next portion, I’m going to try my best to show how they connect back to Hawks.

First, the Archangel Michael is the enemy of Satan.

In the Biblical “end times” which is depicted in the book of Revelations, it is written that Archangel Micheal will lead God’s army into a final battle against Satan and his fallen angels and be victorious.

A hero’s enemy is a villain and the villain’s enemy is a hero. This current war between the heroes and the Paranormal Liberation Front is happening largely due to Hawks’ role in infiltrating the PLF and the information he gathered. It’s a great clash between the two major forces BNHA society deems as “good” and “evil.” Although Hawks may have not led the heroes into battle but he played a major role in starting it. We have yet to reach the outcome of the war.

Second, he comes at the hour of death and presents a last chance at salvation.

During a period of time before someone dies, the Archangel Michael descends to those who haven’t yet connected to God and gives them a last chance at salvation before their time to decide runs out. He gives them one more chance to essentially redeem themself before passing. After the individual dies, Micheal and other angels escort those who are saved to heaven.

In chapter 264, Hawks says that he believes that Twice/Jin is a good person and offers him a chance to leave quietly and have the opportunity to have a fresh start in life, telling him that he’d even help him. Very simply put, from Hawks’ point of view, this is a ticket out, a chance to be “saved.” Twice chooses to fight for his friends and the LoV instead and dies by Hawks’ hand shortly after Dabi comes to intervene.

Third, he is the Guardian of the Church.

His name, Michael, means “one who is like God.” Throughout early Church history, he has been called the “chief of Israel” and the “Prince of all angels.” One of his major responsibilities is to protect the People of God. To protect the Church, Michael leads angel armies into battle against its enemy, Satan and his fallen angels.

This one might be kind of a stretch but I think you can connect Hawks’ position as the Hero Public Safety Commission’s tool to this role. He is one of the Commission’s valuable weapons, and they will utilize him in order to achieve a certain outcome. Hawks views himself as someone who has the responsibility of protecting others. In this case, his infiltration mission forced him to bear the weight of the safety of Japan’s population on his shoulders. As a hero he had a duty to protect and save.

Fourth, he weighs people’s merits on Judgement Day.

(I could not find the title, artist or year for this painting.)

In the Christian religion, the Day of Judgement, is the day in the future when all people who are living or who have ever lived will be judged by God. In the Bible, the Archangel Michael helps measure people’s good and bad deeds on Judgement Day. In art, he is also often depicted holding scales and people often describe them as the “scales of justice.” Going back to the war during the “End of Times” that the Book of Revelations talks about, the weapon that Michael uses to defeat the enemy is often described throughout Christian history and tradition as “the sword of justice.”

The subject of Twice’s death is a touchy subject and I don’t have the ability to carefully word what I want to convey but harshly written, based on the situation that Hawks was put in and after assessing the possible impact/outcomes of Twice’s role in future events, he makes the decision to kill Twice. He acknowledges Twice to be a “good person” but in that moment he judges him based on where his loyalties might lie and on his past/history. Hawks kills Twice using one of his blade-like feathers that he fights with like a sword. Another interesting thing to note is that the sub-heading of Vol. 27 is “One’s Justice.”

In Conclusion

The event portrayed in these paintings depicts a major clash between God and Satan, and ultimately what is good and evil. In the Bible, there is no gray area, only black and white. So if we take this into consideration, is Horikoshi saying that Hawks is the righteous, holy hero and that Twice is the evil, morally upside down villain? No.

If Horikoshi indeed was influenced by these paintings of the Archangel Michael and his enemies, I do not think he’s portraying the black and white themes the good triumphs evil message it boldly gives off.

In their post, cutiesableye points out that “In comics, a hero at the bottom and a villain at the top mean the hero is losing and conversely, a hero at the top and a villain at the bottom means the hero wins.” On the cover, Hawks is depicted at the top and Twice is depicted at the bottom. Then they ask an interesting question: “But who is the hero here?" I’d think that someone with no context of the story would find the cover to be somewhat ambiguous. Cutiesableye has a lot more great analysis and interpretation about the cover and especially on Hawks’ and Twice’s facial expressions and body language so I highly encourage you to go read their post if you haven’t done so already.

Anyways, back to the question: “But who is the hero here?”

Well on this manga page, Hawks looks more like the villain than Twice does. I think that grayness is what Horikoshi was going for. Both Hawks and Twice are gray characters. That is why so many people have their own strong opinions and interpretation about what happened between Hawks and Twice. Neither of them can be labelled comfortably as “good” or “evil” or in general, “hero” or villain,” and I think that is the point. I’m not going to go in depth about their character and morals but simply stated, Hawks is a hero who now has blood on his hands because he believed that the decision he made would save more lives and Twice was someone who was further categorized as a villain because he found community and family with the League of Villains and later died trying to defend them. However this grayness does not excuse any crimes that were committed on either side. It just makes the conversation more complex.

Another way you can portray this is that Hawks is not an angel and Twice is not Satan or a demon. Like you and me, Hawks and Twice are both human. BNHA is a story about humans and we are not perfect. Although we can show the best and worst in humanity, we can be very gray characters as well. On the surface level, you can say that the heroes represent the “good” side and the villains represent the “evil” side, however if you take a closer look that is not the case. It’s more complicated than that. Through the current (Paranormal Liberation War) arc, Horikoshi is really exposing the gray areas that lie between the black and white.

#bnha meta #bnha spoilers #takami keigo #bnha hawks #bnha twice #jin bubaigawara #mha meta #bnha volume 27 #hawks meta #luna writes #my post

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luthienebonyx · 3 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Friday's Child - Georgette Heyer, HEYER Georgette - Works Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Gil Ringwood/Ferdy Fakenham, Anthony "Sherry" Sheringham/Hero Wantage, Isabella Milborne/George Wrotham Characters: Gilbert Ringwood, Ferdinand Fakenham, Anthony "Sherry" Sheringham, Hero Wantage, George Wrotham, Isabella Milborne, Chilham (Friday's Child) Additional Tags: Friends to Lovers, Past unrequited love, Eventual Requited Love, Pining, Idiots in Love, just generally idiots, Friendship, Romance, Marriage, Pregnancy, Comedy, Romantic Comedy, a teensy bit of angst, The Season, Christmas, Road Trips, THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED, On Purpose, hedgerows, Jealousy, Hurt/Comfort, Regency, obviously, elaborate descriptions of clothing, Minor Original Character(s), Across a crowded (ball)room, What Happened After, Post-Canon Summary:

The tale of a memorable and eventful six months in the life of Mr Gilbert Ringwood, Esq., following the marriage of his friend, Lord Wrotham, to Miss Isabella Milborne in June, 1817.

Okay, so this is my YULETIDE AUTHOR REVEAL, and there is quite a story to this one. Fair warning, this is an EXTREMELY self-indulgent post.

Every single story I've written for Yuletide over the years is one that I probably wouldn't have otherwise written, and every single one of them has also wound up being amongst my personal favourites of my own work. I've loved writing all of them. However, the story I wrote this year is one I've been talking about writing for quite literally twenty years, but the history of it goes back even further. So, sit back, and I'll tell you the tale of the long path that eventually led me to writing That Greek Thing.

Some years ago (Shall we specify that it was the ninth decade of the Twentieth Century? Yes, I think we shall!) there lived a girl who was at that rather difficult age when she was no longer a child nor yet a young lady. This girl, whom we shall, for the sake of convenience, call Miss L, lived in a village by the sea in a far distant, Antipodean land. She was a quiet, bookish beanpole of a girl, almost a bluestocking - the sort of individual who lived rather too much in her own head, in fact. One day, as Miss L browsed the offerings on the secondhand book table at the annual fete of the local church, she chanced upon a volume, sadly dog-eared and with a long crease right through the front cover, titled ‘A Civil Contract’ by Georgette Heyer, which had clearly become surplus to its previous owner's requirements. Miss L had recently read and loved Miss Austen's ‘Pride and Prejudice’ for the first time, and it was immediately obvious to her that Miss Heyer's work was set in a similar time period.

So Miss L bought A Civil Contract, and read it, and laughed heartily at the various supporting characters such as Mr Chawleigh, but her youthful heart found the arranged marriage central to the story rather more serious and subdued than she had been expecting. It was not really the book she had expected it to be, but it tugged at her memory, so when she was next perusing the titles at her local library and she chanced upon another title by Miss Heyer, she resolved that she should give it a chance.

She loved this book - though which one it was, exactly, of Miss Heyer's many works is lost to the mists of time - and thus was born a great and enduring literary love.

Miss L noted the very long list entitled "By the same author" at the front of ‘A Civil Contract’ and embarked upon a most determined pursuit, proceeding to haunt fetes, book exchanges and other such faintly disreputable premises in which secondhand books were to be found, in search of Heyers she had yet to read. Dear reader, you must remember that this was long ago, and if it was not quite before the Internet itself, it was certainly well before the advent of the world wide web. One could not simply conduct a quick search and download a book into one's own hands in the space of a few minutes. One could not even easily order books, except through the auspices of an official bookseller - and Miss L was young, and sadly short of funds.

So Miss L hunted most carefully, and over the next several years amassed a collection of all of Miss Heyer's novels set in England during that period between 1811 and 1820 known as the Regency. However, Miss L never met another soul who would admit to having even once read any of Miss Heyer's works, though clearly such persons must be out there somewhere - for otherwise, where would all the books in Miss L's collection have come from? So Miss L continued, hugging Miss Heyer's works to her as her special secret. She read other works set in what was then becoming known as the Regency romance genre, but they were as pale copies of Miss Heyer's sparkling and beautifully researched originals, and she soon lost interest.

Miss L grew older, and assumed the life of a young lady, and other considerations took up much of her time and attention. However, she always returned to Miss Heyer's novels eventually, greeting them like old friends who would never fail to make her smile in the midst of troubled times.

Things continued thus until the closing years of the century - and, indeed, the millennium - when Miss L one day stumbled upon that wondrous community known as online fandom. The fannish life soon consumed much of her time, and she read a great deal of "fanfiction" while also, hesitantly, trying her own hand at writing and sharing offerings of her own.

And then came a most unexpected occurrence. Miss L was reading through the daily bulletin from her favoured Xena: Warrior Princess/Hercules: the Legendary Journeys slash Mailing List, when lo, she espied a most intriguing subject line. It proclaimed, very simply: "FIC: Regency Fuck (1/?)".

Here we shall pause a moment to explain that while, in these modern times, the genre known as the Regency AU is quite well-known in fandom, at that time, more than twenty years ago, this was not at all the case. AUs themselves were not near as wide-spread a phenomenon as they are today, and Miss L had never in her life even considered the possibility of the existence of such a thing as a Regency AU - and yet there it was, before her.

She read the first chapter of Regency Fuck most quickly, and then went to see what other members of the Mailing List might have made of it. The chapter had been received in a most positive light, but everyone else searched and failed to find exactly the right description to do it justice. Most compared it to Miss Austen's work. However, Miss L knew something that all the other members of the Mailing List (except ONE other, clearly) did not: Miss Heyer's very first novel set during the Regency period had been entitled Regency Buck. Miss L had squealed with joy upon reading the first chapter of Regency Fuck, for it was not merely a story set during the Regency but rather, and most clearly, one set in Miss Heyer's very particular version of that period.

So at last Miss L gathered her courage and sent an email to the author. Its exact contents are also lost in the mists of time, however the general gist was: SLASHY GEORGETTE HEYER?! - to which the author of Regency Fuck replied, just as ecstatically: YES!

Thus began a correspondence about gentlemen in tight breeches that continues to this very day. The author of Regency Fuck, whom we shall call Miss Damerel - actually, no we shall not, for as everyone with any proper understanding would know, Damerel is a title NOT merely a surname. Therefore, we shall refer to her henceforward as Lady Damerel. (In any event, Lady Damerel was not then yet going by the pen name Damerel, for in that case Miss L should have been left in no doubt whatsoever about which of Miss Heyer's heroes Lady Damerel numbered amongst her veriest favourites.)

So Miss L and Lady Damerel continued their correspondence as Regency Fuck grew longer and longer, and it was no doubt at about this time that first mention was made of Miss Heyer's 1944 novel Friday's Child, and in particular two of the primary supporting characters, Mr Gilbert Ringwood and the Honourable Ferdinand Fakenham, and how very easy it would be to slash them.

"Someone should write it," Miss L opined.

"Yes, someone should," Lady Damerel agreed.

"I should probably write it," Miss L continued.

"Yes, you should," Lady Damerel said, with great eagerness.

However, Miss L did not write it, though she continued to mention the idea of it every now and then in the years that followed. And a great many years did follow. Miss L and Lady Damerel drifted in different fannish directions, but their friendship remained true - for who else in the world could quite understand their twin mutual and abiding loves for Miss Heyer's works and gentlemen getting each other out of their tight breeches?

Some eight years after their first acquaintance, Miss L journeyed to Great Britain, where she met Lady Damerel in the flesh at last. They travelled together to Bath, and spent a most diverting time there, imagining this or that of Miss Heyer's characters walking the streets, taking Georgian elevenses at the Pump Room, and drinking rather too much of a mysterious white liqueur (which they had discovered in a local tavern) in the evenings at their hotel.

At the end of their time in Bath, they parted sorrowfully, knowing that it would be long before they set eyes on each other again, and went back to their lives. Of course, the correspondence continued, just as before.

At around this time, Miss L first took part in the great fannish holiday time tradition of Yuletide. She was quite overwhelmed to discover that asking for a Heyer story was an option open to her, but she gathered her courage and did ask for such a thing, and received a most delightful story based on The Foundling as her gift. In later years, she received other beautiful little Heyer stories at Yuletide, but she could not quite find in herself the mettle, or perhaps the presumption, required to offer to write Heyer fic herself - for what if she could not do it justice?

Miss L did write Regency AUs in a number of fandoms in the years that followed, however, and she enjoyed the experience very much. She then fell away from writing anything at all for a number of years, and began to wonder if she would ever write fanfiction again.

She was, naturally, quite in the wrong in making this assumption, and in mid-2019 a new fandom set her to writing great screeds again. However, the very first thing she had written that year was actually a drabble - a story of exactly 100 words - using characters from Miss Heyer's Frederica in filling a request for Miss @thisbluespirit, in a small fandom challenge in which they were both taking part. It was a small step, but a very important one.

That year, Miss L took part in Yuletide again for the first time in some five years. However, it was not until the end of the following year - that damnable year, 2020, of which we will not speak further - that Miss L finally decided that THIS would be the year that she would finally write a full-blown Heyer fic. She signed up for Yuletide, offering nine fandoms in all, but rather stacking the odds by ensuring that seven of those fandoms were Heyer novels. It seemed as if Fate must have taken a hand when she received her assignment and discovered that she had been matched with her recipient, Miss @afterism, for none other than Miss Heyer's Friday's Child. Upon investigating further, she discovered that Miss Afterism was particularly fond of Gil/Ferdy - and so, at last, Miss L embarked on writing the story that she had been considering for so long, some 35 (or perhaps even more) years after first reading Friday's Child.

Dear Reader, she ADORED writing this story. She did, of course, e-mail Lady Damerel posthaste to let her know that she was at last writing Gil and Ferdy's story. She was also anxious to share with Lady Damerel - because she knew that no other of her acquaintance would quite understand - how she had quite burst out laughing when, while walking her dog - who is, of course, named Lufra after the family dog in Frederica - one day she had realised that this story could only be titled That Greek Thing.

And so at last That Greek Thing was completed and posted and, on Christmas Day, the Yuletide collection was revealed. Very fortunately, Miss Afterism was very happy with That Greek Thing. Lady Damerel also squeed in a most unladylike way about it, and others also commented with words of approval.

Miss L ventures to believe that this story is actually the story that she wanted it to be, and hoped so very hard that it would be, and she still cannot quite believe that she has written it at last. Of everything she has ever written for Yuletide, it is the most special to her.

She thanks you very much for reading both the story - if you have done so - and this most self-indulgent narrative.

#yuletide #author reveal #georgette heyer #friday's child #fannish history

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janellion · 4 years

Note

HAPPPYYY BOKAY THURSDAYYYYYY!!!!!!!! *que air horns* Anyways would you like to write some 80’s AU Bokay head cannons?? Like how you first met??

TYSM FOR THE ASK BB!! i’m sorry it took so long for me to get to it! this ended up being,, WAY longer than i anticipated? i just went off on one idea so this is less general hcs and kinda how we met and got together! also i made a moodboard for no reason?

OK SO this is a college/uni bokay late 80s/early 90s au!!

bo is there on a sports scholarship (likely american football or maybe rugby) and also part of one of the frats on campus!!

so he’s not trying as hard as he could be on the academics side

THIS ISNT BC HES NOT SMART

i know a lot of ppl don’t see bo as smart BUT HE IS

he’s just focusing on other things and using his smarts to plan the best parties that campus has ever seen

so as a result of his scholarship, he has to keep his grades up

unfortunately, he’s slipping in a couple of his classes and gets told he needs to find a tutor and that’s where i come in!!

i work at the academic success center (i actually did do this in college!) and so he’s one of the students that i get assigned to work w

our tutoring sessions consist of a lot of him semi flirting but also blushing?

he’s embarrassed bc he’s here to get help even tho he could have done the work he’s just kinda lazy and gets distracted when there’s a million other things on his plate

like practice and workouts and training and the ton of frat events he attends

so the flirting is a lot of “you look different today, did you get a haircut or something?” “actually i slept like 3 hours thanks for noticing” and then awkward silences

bc im over here thinking ‘WHAT THE FUCK THIS GUY IS SO HOT HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO FOCUS ON SPANISH LITERATURE WHEN HE LOOKS LIKE THAT AHHHH’

at least at first?? but then he does all this cute stuff during tutoring sessions like chewing on the end of his pencil or doodling little notes in the margins of his books, or using cute photos of his family back home as a bookmark

and then it goes from just appreciating him as eye candy to ‘well shit i kinda wanna love him forever’

we go on with tutoring for a while, but eventually bo’s grades pick up and he doesn’t need the appointments anymore

both of us are a little too shy and awkward to say anything on the last session so we both go home at the end just kicking ourselves for not asking for a phone number or to meet up or anything

we don’t see each other for a while

or at least bo doesn’t see me for a while

i go to all of his home games and cheer him on but he doesn’t know bc i like to sit at the top and leave before the crowd heads out

but he’s always searching the crowd at games, trying to see if i’m there, and feeling a pit in his stomach whenever he sweeps the crowd and doesn’t immediately see me

one night some months later, after the season has ended, i’m waking back to my dorm through greek row bc i’m a slut for architecture and none other than bo is walking out of one of the large building wearing a toga, a crown of poorly painted gold leaves around his head, his face flushed, and a huge grin on his face

i stop in my tracks momentarily at the sight, wondering if i’ve actually passed out in the library and am dreaming

but then bo’s voice calling my name is ringing through the sounds of the party drifting through the open doorway behind him and he’s bounding over, the grin on his face growing

as he gets closer, i see the flush in his face and the slight stumble in his step and brace myself for impact as he crashes into me for a hug, his arms wrapping around my waist and lifting me up

“uh bo???” i’m blushing and trying to free myself from his grip ok i’m not trying that hard WHO WOULDNT WANNA BE IN HIS ARMS

but he’s just grinning and laughing before setting me down and grabbing my hand, pulling me into the brightly lit doorway and up the stairs of the house

“i’ve been kicking myself for not asking you out ages ago so let’s go out now!! we could get burgers or just walk around the city or get ice cream or go skinny dipping or —“ he cuts himself off, looking back at me with wide eyes as his smile drops for a moment while he lets go of my hand

“oh my god i mean if you want to of course i’m so sorry this probably seems so creepy and pushy —“ he babbles on, his facial expression now one of panic instead of excitement

i just laugh, still kind of thinking that i’m dreaming, and reassure him with a squeeze of his hand and a small smile, “bo no that all sounds amazing, i’d love to. i was hoping we’d run into each other too”

at this, his grin returns to his face as he continues bounding up the stairs and down a hall, before pulling me into a bedroom

“aren’t we moving kinda fast?” i tease him as i look around the incredibly chaotic room

bo turns around with a shocked look on his face before it melts into a grin and a hearty laugh as he sees the teasing look on my face

“i’m just getting changed! can’t go out on the town in a toga,” he calls over his shoulder as he walks to the closer. “don’t look,” he turns around and waffles his eyebrows at me with a grin, before pulling out a shirt and some jeans

as he gets changed, i turn around and look around the the room, not failing to notice the sticky notes littering his desk, little messages and reminders that i’d written for him during our tutoring sessions

i feel a tap on my shoulder and turn around to see bo, eyes excited and face still slightly flushed, but now fully dressed

he sees me eyeing the sticky notes on his desk and blushes even more, a hand going to rub at his neck before he’s laughing and grabbing one, looking at it affectionately before sticking it back down

“they help me stay focused, you know? remind me that i should be working hard. you really helped me a lot”

before i can respond, he’s grabbing my hand and pulling me down the stairs, out the door, and into the fresh night air

we walk around the city, getting to know each other better over burgers before getting ice cream and MAYBE SKINNY DIPPING IDK 👀

at the end of the night, we head back to my dorm, deciding to watch a movie and since “it’s close enough, and we might as well stay up to watch the sunrise”

we end up putting on a movie, something fun and light like hercules, and cuddle up on the couch, falling asleep just before the sun rises

+++

THE WAY I COULD HAVE KEPT WRITING I-- IM SORRY THIS GOT SO LONG AHHH

tysm for requesting this bb!! i rly didn’t think i’d be able to write much bc i don’t rly “get” decades aus? i think it’s bc there aren’t many POC in media from the 80s and 90s and so it’s hard to picture for me! but N E WAYS, this was my best attempt!! it was a lot of fun to write once i got into the mindset!! and thank yall for reading if you got this far?? I LOVE YOU

🌻 bokay taglist (also my faves): @deadontheinsidebut @stcrryskies @sstardusty @zoni @kuronekomama @anianimol @the-kool-aid-man-is-real @nekoma-hoe @sugacookiies @churochuu @shoyosun @achoohq @miel-meraki @dearest-kiyoomi and i’m tagging @strawberriimilkshake @yamagucciii bc i think y’all might like to see this as well?

#✨bokay thursday✨#bokay 🌻#bokuto🌻 kayla #bokay aus!!#i love one (1) man #and its bokuto koutarou

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argylemnwrites · 4 years

Text

Fight or Flight - Chapter 6: Next

Pairing: Drake Walker x MC (Riley Liu)

Book: The Royal Heir (canon divergent from the end of book 2)

Word Count: ~5500

Rating: PG-13 (rare language)

Summary: Eighteen hours since The Walker Absconding

Author’s Note: Sorry again for the delay on this one! I know PB has basically turned the laws of Cordonia into whatever they need them to be for plot reasons, but that’s not sufficient for me, so I am trying to construct some sort of framework based on what we know from TRM, ROE, and TRR/TRH. We’ll see how it goes...

This series follows the Walkers, their friends, and Cordonia as a whole after they flee the country with their daughter during Barthelemy Beaumont’s attempted coup. To catch up on this series, check out it’s masterlist. (link can be found via my bio - sorry, Tumblr is once again not putting my posts with links in tag searches)

“Riley… Hey, Riley.”

Riley’s eyes fluttered open as she felt a hand on her shoulder and heard Drake whispering her name, tugging her awake. It took her a few seconds to place herself as she glanced around the room. She reached for the nightstand with a fumbling hand before she remembered she didn’t have her glasses. She squinted at Drake. Thankfully, he’d crouched down in front of her, so he was at least in focus, even if the rest of the hotel room was a giant blur.

“Is everything okay?”

Drake nodded, running a hand over his chin. He was already showered, shaved, and dressed in a grey t-shirt and a pair of jeans. “I am going to go to the bakery across the street and see if any of the locals can point me towards a cheap, used car dealership.”

“Okay. I don’t think I’m going to be much help.” She’d always meant to learn Greek since moving to Cordonia, but she’d only ever gotten around to learning a handful of words. After all, official court business was always conducted in English, and most of the citizens of Valtoria were bilingual, so there had never really been a need. Until now apparently. It’s not that no one in Ioannina spoke English, but it wasn’t as common as she was used to. Even last night, she’d been utterly dependent on Drake to discuss what they needed in a hotel room with the man at the front desk.

“Yeah, that’s why I thought you might want to just stay here with Bridget.” At his statement, they both instinctively looked down at their daughter, still sleeping soundly along Riley’s side. Riley knew it wasn’t ideal that they decided to let her sleep in the same bed with them last night, but they didn’t really have any other options when the hotel employee told Drake there were no cribs available. And truth be told, Riley hadn’t wanted to let Bridget leave her side. Things were still too raw, too fresh.

“You don’t want me to come along?”

Drake shook his head slowly as he gently placed a hand on Bridget’s head. “I just figured it might be nice for her to be able to crawl and play and all that. Try and make things a little more normal for her, I guess.”

He did have a point. Normally, Bridget was able to crawl around and explore while they were taking meetings at Valtoria. Even on days where they had to go to the palace, one of them usually stuck with Bridget in her room there while the other handled all the official business. And Bridget was definitely at an age where she wanted to move about her environment. She didn’t like being restrained for too long.

“Okay. So you’re just going to get us a car then?”

He paused for a moment. “I think we need more than a car, Riley. I’m gonna try and find somewhere that sells outdoor supplies and camping gear. Plus a travel crib and a car seat for her. Maybe some toys, too.”

“You think we’re going to have to camp out to stay safe?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a shrug. “I would rather have a tent and some sleeping bags and not need them than have to panic and hide out with nothing.”

She swallowed roughly before she responded, staring down at their daughter, still passed out and oblivious to everything that had transpired in the past day. “How bad do you think things are going to get for us, Drake?”

He didn’t answer her right away, so after a few seconds she looked up and found him staring at her intently. “I have no idea. This will probably all just be a wild story if Liam keeps his title, but if Barthelemy succeeds… fuck, Riley. Every law enforcement agent in the EU will have the right to arrest us for kidnapping and send us back.”

“This is insanity. She’s our kid. Why would other countries recognize us traveling with her as a kidnapping?”

There was another pause as Drake glanced down, staring at the floor. “Because she’s Cordonia’s kid before she’s our kid. And kidnapping is one of the crimes that doesn’t require criminality verification in the arresting country under a European Arrest Warrant.” She just stared at him, wondering why this was yet another piece of random trivia he knew. As if he could read her thoughts, he glanced up and continued, “I did some research when I couldn’t sleep last night.”

“So another country would really just send us back for taking her out of Cordonia?”

“She’s legally Cordonia’s child.”

Riley sighed, trying to keep tears of frustration from forming. She’d cried enough yesterday, she didn’t need Drake thinking she wasn’t up to this again. But it just was a shitty situation. One they never should have been in at all.

“It’s not right, Drake.”

“No, it’s not. But it’s a little late to change that fact now.”

A wave of guilt washed over Riley as his words hung in the air. She could have put a stop to this bullshit long ago. She should have put a stop to it. And now everything was teetering on the edge of disaster. But she had to get a grip. She was not going to be an emotional mess today. So she took one last deep breath before responding to Drake.

“I think your plan makes sense. Can you stay with her while I get cleaned up before you go?”

Drake frowned just slightly, clearly wondering about the slight redirection of their conversation, but he nodded slowly, scooping up Bridget laying her across his chest as he settled down on top of the covers while Riley dug through the bag of clothing, trying to find something to wear.

As she showered, the lukewarm-at-best water pelting over her hair and skin, she tried to keep her thoughts from spiraling. Things were bad, but they could have been worse. They were together. They were able to withdraw money yesterday, so their accounts weren’t frozen yet. And they had some of their basic needs covered, thanks to Ray.

Ray had bought them several changes of clothing, some basic toiletries, more diapers and formula, and a few days of food before returning to Cordonia. He hadn’t let them pay for any of it, which was far too kind considering they’d lied to him and possibly made him an accessory to kidnapping. But he’d remained helpful and unfazed when they’d confessed that Lythikos was supposed to be their destination, not Greece. And he’d gotten them fairly well set up before he got back in the town car to return to Cordonia, a much appreciated kindness.

She wondered how things had gone when he spoke to Olivia, how pissed off she was about it all. Olivia hadn’t called them since they told her they were committed to staying away from Cordonia, so Riley had no idea how she was handling everything or how the hearing went. Hana had called again last night. She was alone at their home, trying to pack up a few of their personal belongings in hopes of getting them to them at some point if needed. She’d been kind and gentle, asking if there were certain items of clothing or specific toys that should be a priority. Riley didn’t know how Hana intended to get those belongings to them, but it was a sweet gesture. Even though she knew Hana wished they’d stayed in Cordonia, she felt grateful that her friend was trying to help them, even if she disagreed with Riley’s actions.

So there were some silver linings. But overall, things felt overwhelming and out of control. Riley had known somewhere in her mind that things were going to be horrible and stressful and mad difficult when she’d decided to get Bridget out of Cordonia as quickly as possible yesterday. But after a little sleep - admittedly very little given how upset she was about everything - things felt like they could quickly become insurmountable.

But she just couldn’t bring herself to head back for Cordonia. No matter how many worries she had about how the three of them were going to get through things going forward, there was a better chance of them being together through it all outside that country, and she just felt safer, knowing there would at least be more difficulties for Barthelemy and any of his posse to get their hands on her daughter. Nothing about Cordonia was safe. And while she wished she’d been able to recognize that earlier, she couldn’t go back now. Not when it finally felt like her eyes were open.

Stepping out of the shower, she quickly dressed and ran a comb through her hair, brushing her teeth and popping in her contacts before leaving the bathroom. She heard Bridget’s giggles and babbles right away. Turning into the main part of the small hotel room, she saw Drake sitting on the edge of the bed, bouncing Bridget on his knees as he held her in a standing position. She loved being stood upright like that, and it seemed like she’d be pulling up to stand on her own any day now.

When Drake saw Riley, he scooped Bridget into his arms and scooted off the bed. “She only woke up about 10 minutes ago. I can feed her before I head out if you want.”

“No, I’ve got it,” Riley said with a little shake of her head, taking Bridget as she got out a bottle, the formula, and a bottle of water. She was a bit surprised to see Drake digging through the diaper bag, pulling out all the money they’d managed to withdraw from their accounts yesterday. They’d both hemmed and hawed about pulling funds from the accounts tied to Valtoria, but eventually decided on doing it. After all, compared to kidnapping and treason, embezzlement charges were really just a drop in the ocean.

“You’re taking all the cash?”

“We haven’t heard from Olivia or Hana since last evening. Either things are still in progress, or they can’t safely get in touch with us. If it’s the latter, our accounts might be frozen now. I need to be prepared.”

Riley didn’t like the thought of being left without any money, even if she knew Drake was right. It left her feeling vulnerable, or rather even more vulnerable. She couldn’t help it, and a small, shaky little sigh escaped.

Drake pivoted to look at her, his eyes intense. “I’m trusting you not to take off with my kid while I’m gone. It seems like the least you could do is trust me not to take off with the money.”

There was just a hint of bitterness in his voice, but mostly he just sounded tired. Riley knew she was being callous with him. It was just hard to not let all her fears and worries spill over into everything she did and said at this point.

“You’re right; I’m sorry,” she said as she shook up the bottle of formula.

Drake let out a sigh, tucked the money in his wallet, and dropped a kiss on both her and Bridget’s foreheads. “Hopefully, I’ll be back in a few hours. Call if you need me, okay?”

She nodded and gave him a small little smile, but then he was off, hopefully to pull more cash and to get them some transportation. It was just her and Bridget, and even though that was her initial plan yesterday, it felt very lonely at the moment.

“Oh, Peanut. Mama has turned Daddy into a fugitive,” she cooed, giving Bridget the bottle. Figuring she should probably put this time to good use, she grabbed her phone quickly while Bridget actually had a good grasp on the bottle and sat down on the end of the bed, pulling up “How to run from law enforcement” as a search. At this point, they were going to be able to trace their ATM withdrawals anyway. If they somehow got ahold of her digital records from this phone, well, this search wouldn’t tell them anything they didn’t already know. Better to be at least a little prepared when Drake got back and they had to plan their next steps.

After reading for a few minutes, Riley swiped open her contacts list and tapped Drake’s name at the top of her favorites list. He answered almost instantly.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, we’re fine. I just have something else you should buy.”

“What?”

“Burner phones.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was almost like deja vu, sitting in the same seat in the same courtroom as once again everyone rose to their feet except Barthelemy and himself. This time, Liam knew that staying seated would probably not be an option when the justice left the courtroom. He probably should have risen now, to be honest. The no-confidence vote that happened this morning was almost certainly going to stand. But Liam wasn’t ready to look defeated. He would wait until this hearing concluded before deferring and recognizing that anyone else might hold the power of the crown.

The parties present today were almost identical to last night, with the addition of Hakim and Kiara on Barthelemy’s side and Hana on his. Normally, a different High Court justice would have been assigned since High Justice Questa had literally just ruled on an emergency hearing, but given that the same parties were named, she had volunteered to see this through. The usher waited until she sat down before once again announcing that all parties had been sworn in. As soon as he was finished, the justice looked from desk to desk, annoyance clearly written all over her face. It wasn’t surprising, but it didn’t bode well for either legal team.

“Not even 24 hours later, gentlemen? You really are determined to not let me have my weekend, aren’t you?” High Justice Questa said with a sigh and a shake of her head. “Did we manage to actually legally call the Conventus Nobilis today? It looks like it was all in order based on this documentation from both parties,” she said as she flipped through stacks of paper, “a no-confidence vote that passed with a margin of three to two and installed the patriarch of House Beaumont as king-regent, so I’m not sure what your case is, Mr. Rys.”

Liam fought to keep his face steady. He’d been expecting it, mentally preparing for it, but hearing his surname used instead of his title, a surname that he almost never had needed in his life still burned inside him, a deep pain and sense of failure, both on a personal and public level.

“Your Honor, my client is not challenging the loss of his power. He is now acting as a concerned citizen who believes that the transfer of power to the defendant was illegally performed,” Diana stated calmly as she rose and leaned in to the microphone.

“A concerned citizen? Right, I’m sure that’s his only motivation. Regardless, the brief you submitted is compelling. There obviously isn’t a large amount of precedent for me to base my decision on, so I am going to carefully listen to oral arguments to supplement and clarify the briefs both parties submitted. Additionally, depending on the intricacies of how different historical and modern laws intersect with this… unusual combination of circumstances, I may just offer a provisional ruling with a formal hearing scheduled in front of the full High Court as soon as possible if I feel this is too complex and unprecedented to be decided by just myself. Do both parties understand?”

Both Diana and Charles acknowledged her statement, then Diana delved into her arguments.

“Your Honor, if a reigning monarch is removed from the throne, the law clearly states that next in line for the throne should assume a role of king- or queen-regent until a Conclave can be held, at which time the major noble houses will determine the new royal line. Additionally, Cordonian law states that any direct heirs to the throne who have not come of age should have at least two regents recorded in case of their ascension to the throne before they reach adulthood. Given that these two laws are clear, I do not believe that the results of the Conventus Nobilis vote can legally do any more than remove my client from power. The major houses do not have the power to name anyone they’d like as regent.

“Bridget Walker is the clear queen-regent at this point, Your Honor, and the documentation submitted with her anointing named the Duchess and Duke of Valtoria as her regents. Therefore, it is our contention that one of them should serve as regent until a Conclave can legally occur. It seems like the most logical conclusion from the laws on file.”

“The issue, Diana, is that both the Duchess and Duke of Valtoria were named in the no-confidence vote as well. At least, that’s what I assume you are going to tell me, Charles,” High Justice Questa said as she turned slightly in her chair to face the defense desk.

“Indeed, Your Honor. The results of that vote clearly indicate that the majority of the major noble houses fear for our country’s well-being and prosperity if either of the Walkers are allowed to serve this country as regent. My client has graciously offered to step into that role, seeing as the Duchess of Valtoria was sponsored by House Beaumont and is therefore an honorary member.”

“Your issue, Charles, is that your client can’t legally do that,” High Justice Questa added, tilting her head and raising her eyebrows. The fact that she was tearing through Barthelemy’s team’s arguments just as quickly as she had their own was a small reassurance.

“He may have offered his services, but the majority of the noble houses support his regency as well.”

“Yes, but they don’t have that power either. They only get to name a new monarch, acting or otherwise, during a Conclave. And the vote today was not a Conclave, was it Charles?”

“No, Your Honor. A Conclave has to occur at the end of a Social Season.”

“Exactly. The regents for an heir who is too young to rule are decided by the reigning monarch at the time of the heir’s anointment, not by anyone else. In this case, since our new Queen-Regent was not born into the royal bloodline, but established in her position via Royal Decree, it is a noted precedent to allow the child’s parents to have a say in who is named as his or her regents. Why your client has decided he can just sidestep all of that is concerning. He’s claimed the power of the law for himself while being ignorant of our country’s laws at best, or with a willful disregard for them at worst. And quite frankly, the fact that the actual head of House Beaumont, his elder son, voted against him is not exactly a ringing endorsement.”

“Your Honor, someone needs to act as Queen-Regent Bridget’s regent!”

“Indeed, but not your client. The High Court does not recognize Lord Beaumont as acting regent at this time. Now, Diana,” High Justice Questa continued, not missing a beat, “your client was the reigning monarch at the time of Queen-Regent Bridget’s anointing. I see in your briefs that he has offered up two alternative regents for Queen-Regent Bridget - Lady Hana Lee or Lord Maxwell Beaumont.”

This had been part of their strategy, devised wearily sometime after 2 am and numerous cups of coffee. Since it was unlikely that the no-confidence vote was going to go their way, Diana had suggested naming alternate regents for Bridget, ones that would both be more sympathetic to his cause and that would be believable as alternate choices from Drake and Riley. Picking Hana and Maxwell had been the obvious choice.

“Your Honor!” Charles called out upon hearing those names, but he immediately quieted and sat back down when High Justice Questa raised her hand. She nodded at Diana, indicating she should continue in spite of the outburst from the opposing legal team.

“Yes, Your Honor. They are Queen-Regent Bridget’s godparents, indicating that the Duchess and Duke of Valtoria would have approved of either of them for this role, and my client is in total agreement.”

The justice didn’t respond immediately, but started flipping through a briefing, skimming a section when she arrived at the part she clearly wanted to discuss. Liam knew this was going to be their largest issue. They’d attempted to word the briefing carefully, not making it immediately apparent that Drake and Riley hadn’t actually been involved with the decision to name Hana and Maxwell up as alternative regents. But Questa was quick, and she had a great mind for details. The fact that this was the point in the hearing that she was explicitly referencing the text did not bode well for them.

“Diana, I’m looking at your wording here, where you mention your client’s reasoning for naming those two as possibilities for this role. Neither in your statement just now nor in this document do you ever quote the Walkers to indicate their approval. Is there a reason for this?”

Diana tried to be subtle, but Liam noticed her taking a deep breath before she responded, “Your Honor, we didn’t have a chance to speak to them directly. However, their-”

“I’m going to stop you right there. You didn’t have a chance to talk to them? Really?” Whatever scorn Questa held for Barthelemy, Liam felt it directed his way now, but at least doubled or tripled. She’d seen right through their little bluff.

“Everything has been so rushed, Your Honor,” Diana tried to justify, but Liam knew there was no salvaging this situation at this point.

“It seems like talking to the Duchess and Duke of Valtoria should have been high on your priority list to me. Common sense would indicate that if your argument was that those two individuals, in addition to your client, are responsible for naming a regent, actually getting them to name a regent would be pretty important to your case. So tell me, why haven’t you spoken to them regarding this matter? In fact, why aren’t they here in person? Last night I figured they had already put their daughter to sleep and were reluctant to leave her, but it’s-” she glanced quickly at her watch “-not even 5 pm. This seems like an important hearing for their family.”

“I haven’t been able to get in touch with them, Your Honor.”

High Justice Questa’s shoulders sagged slightly before she asked the question Liam was dreading. “Does your client even know their location at this time?”

Diana leaned over to him and whispered, “How do you want to play this, sir?”

He’d pulled Diana aside last night and informed her that Drake, Riley, and Bridget had likely fled the country, and that he had been choosing to stay ignorant of any information that would confirm that fact. She’d encouraged him to report his suspicions officially right then, insisting that he was her client, not them, but Liam didn’t feel throwing them to the wolves was the correct call. He was frustrated and personally hurt, but he knew there was no malice behind their actions. Besides, it wasn’t likely to improve his situation. So, he’d insisted on sticking to his technical ignorance then, and he had no intention of deviating from that plan now.

“As we discussed, Diana”

With a little nod, she returned to her microphone. “He believes that they headed to Lythikos at the invitation of Duchess Nevrakis for some privacy, but he hasn’t spoken to them since they were on the road.”

Questa’s reaction was immediate, her eyes closing and a hand rubbing roughly over them. She looked completely done with the actions of everyone in the room. Liam honestly couldn’t blame her. He was well aware that from an outside perspective, both he and Barthelemy looked like bumbling fools at the moment. On the other side of the courtroom, Liam noticed significant whispering and chatter. Clearly, Barthelemy’s camp was speculating on what that statement meant.

“Well, you all have decided to make this as messy as possible, haven’t you?” High Justice Questa mused to the room, interrupting all the side conversations. “Alright, this is what we’re going to do. I’m calling a recess until tomorrow at 9 am to allow the prosecution time to produce the Walkers. No statements, no hearsay, no speculation, they will be here in my court. If they are not present, sanctions will be issued, and the standing of their house and titles will be subject to review.

“As for the matter of Queen-Regent Bridget’s regent, that will be decided with or without their input at that time. If they are not produced, Mr. Rys will make the determination on his own. However, I would urge Mr. Rys to reconsider his choices for that role, because based on the reaction to the names you provided from the defense desk, I envision yet another summoning of the Conventus Nobilis if either of them get installed as regent. And if you think I’m impatient now, you do not want to see me if I am forced to preside over another emergency hearing.”

She paused for a moment, giving both desks intense, meaningful stares before continuing to issue her decision.

“Now, as we are currently left with no clear agent to act as monarch, I will defer to several old Cordonian statutes. First, a king or queen who is too young to rule will be overseen by a regent who is the next in line for the throne over the age of majority, unless otherwise specified. Given that the Walkers are not eligible anymore due to the vote of no confidence, we will proceed through succession. Seeing as Mr. Rys is the last in his family line and our new queen-regent obviously has no heirs, based on the foundational statutes, Cordonia would revert to Nevrakis rule. Good news is the head of House Nevrakis is here and now knows she’s Queen-Regent for the next handful of hours. This is a provisional appointment only, as it is customary to allow a few days to establish a regency, and a new regent is set to be named tomorrow, so the powers of the monarch will only be enacted in emergency situations. Is that clear?” she asked, staring past Liam to where Oliva was seated.

“Yes, Your Honor.” Liam heard Olivia say from behind him, loud and clear even without a microphone. Olivia gaining power was an obvious victory today, but only a temporary one. If they attempted to leave her in power, Barthelmey would undoubtedly call for another vote from the Conventus Nobilis.

Upon hearing her response, Questa turned slightly towards the defense desk. Barthelemy was clearly fuming, but she continued speaking before that legal team could get a word out. “And before you get all outraged, Charles, I would encourage you to use this as motivation to urge your client to strongly consider letting the regent presented tomorrow stand instead of challenging yet another leader. Because the longer it takes for these two parties to reach an agreement, the longer she-” High Justice Questa said as she gestured to Olivia “-retains provisional powers of the monarch, something I’m guessing your client does not desire. Is everyone clear of my expectations?”

Murmurs of assent came from both desks, following which Questa gave a curt nod and tapped her gavel, bringing the hearing to a close for the day. Liam rose to watch her leave. He had now officially lost the right to stay seated. Oddly, he felt almost numb about that fact. There were so many other things happening that required his attention.

He was expected to bring Drake and Riley to court tomorrow, and he was fairly certain that would not be a task that was possible for him to complete. This meant he needed to find another possible regent, one that Barthelemy and his allies would not attempt to remove from the throne but who would also be unlikely to bend to Barthelemy’s whims and schemes. Realistically, he needed to figure out Barthelemy’s endgame here. It would help him better plan for his next steps, including a bid to retake the throne at the Conclave, and if he was lucky, in the short term, it might even help him determine someone to suggest as regent who would be willing to show leniency to Drake and Riley. Allow him the chance to convince them to return to Cordonia, although the fact that Bridget was now the queen-regent did complicate matters more.

He saw Barthelemy approaching him, but Diana stopped him. “I’m sorry, but since this hearing is still pending, I’ve advised my client to not speak to you directly at this time.”

He let out a little huff, but went to rejoin his lawyers, allowing Liam to turn to Olivia, Hana, Maxwell, and Bertrand, all huddled in a little cluster behind him.

“How are you, Liam?” Hana asked, patting his shoulder gently with her hand, her eyes full of concern and worry.

“It is all a lot to process at the moment, but today could have gone worse, I suppose,” Liam responded, trying to keep his voice calm. Any emotional response on his part needed to wait until they were someplace private. “I guess we need to find a place to reconvene now that the palace is no longer an option.”

Olivia frowned, “Who says it’s not an option? If I’m the provisional regent, I think we can easily return for tonight.”

“Are the optics of that wise? I wouldn’t want it to look like you were abusing the temporary powers Questa granted you.”

She just shrugged. “I honestly don’t care. They can’t touch me in any way that matters, and it’s not like I’ll be making a bid during the Conclave since I’ll be sponsoring you.”

Her nonchalant statement gave Liam pause. Although the Rys lineage could be traced back for hundreds of years, House Rys wasn’t one of the five major houses and therefore could not put up a candidate. He hoped she was comfortable with that offer and didn’t resent him for taking away her chance to be queen. The tone of her voice was just so matter-of-fact and resigned, and it made Liam wonder. But for now, he needed to focus on the short term, not the long term.

“I suppose it might be nice to clean out my office,” he said, soft enough that he was sure no one but the people right next to him could hear. The last thing he needed was Barthelemy to somehow get his hands on all sorts of official documents and start combing through them.

Olivia gave him a crisp nod of agreement before spinning to face Maxwell and Bertrand. “Alright you two - Ramsford first. Bertrand, repeat after me, ‘Documents detailing my father’s incompetence are more important than heirloom cutlery.’”

“Lady Olivia, I hardly-”

“It’s now ‘Your Regency, Bertrand,” she said, throwing in a little wink and chuckle as Bertrand started to sputter out apologies. “Seriously though. Maxwell, you need to keep him focused. Preventing your father from gaining control of House Beaumont is imperative.

“After you’re done at Ramsford, head to Lythikos. Now, Maxwell, repeat after me. ‘Literally anything I want to touch will probably maim or kill me, so I will touch nothing but my pillow.’ Bertrand, I’m counting on you from stopping him from causing serious bodily harm to himself or others.”

After the brothers expressed their agreement and left the courtroom, Liam noticed Olivia and Hana shooting glances towards each other. There was no one left in the room but Diana and the junior attorney with her today, Nicolas, so whatever they were silently communicating must be something that they wanted to keep from the legal team.

“Diana, Nicolas, we are meeting back at the palace. We can probably use the monarch’s office for tonight. But starting tomorrow, we will likely be relocating-” he glanced at Olivia, who nodded deeply “-to Lythikos. If you two wouldn’t mind heading back to the palace and determining who on the team is still willing to serve as my legal counsel now that I am no longer king, that would be a helpful next step. Say we meet up again in one hour?”

The lawyers agreed to the plan, leaving Liam alone with Olivia and Hana. “Alright, what couldn’t you bring up until they left?”

Hana passed him a sheet of paper. On it were two phone numbers, written in perfect cursive.

“What’s this?”

“Since you no longer are king, we thought maybe you would not want to be left in the dark anymore.”

It only took him a second to realize what Hana was saying and what the phone numbers implied.

“They got burner phones?”

Olivia let out a little sigh. “Yup. And if you want to talk to them, our next step should be getting you one, too.”

Permatag: @walkerswhiskeygirl @riley--walker @bebepac @ravenpuff02 @oofchoices @octobereighth @drakewalker04 @kimmiedoo5 @mfackenthal @thequeenofcronuts

The Royal Romance/The Royal Heir: @ao719 @mskaneko @katedrakeohd @jovialyouthmusic @marshmallowsandfire @axwalker @kingliam2019 @sirbeepsalot @texaskitten30 @princessleac1 @ladyangel70 @dcbbw @yaushie

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#drake walker #drake x mc #trr fanfic #trh fanfic #trr au #trh au #trr au fanfic #trh au fanfic #king liam #choices fanfiction

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ultraclairedg · 3 years

Text

Weaponised Magical Musical Instruments

Imagine you are a warrior, out on the battlefield, in full armour ready for the fight. You draw your great sword and prepare to let out a terrifying roar of defiance when unexpectedly you hear the sounds of a flute being played. A flute! You think, what the hell? Why are you hearing flute music on the battlefield? The music gets louder and louder and suddenly you are on the ground, writhing in pain, holding your head in your hands while your bowels evacuate involuntarily. All your comrades around you are in the same condition. Battle over!

Music is powerful. It has the ability to make you feel happy, sad, joyful, melancholic, amorous or terpsichorean. Musical instruments, whether magical or not, play a huge role in all forms of fantasy and science fiction but they are not often thought of as weapons in their own right. But, there are many examples. Below are just a few that I’ve come across from various sources.

Possibly the oldest, and one of the most fantastical examples of the use of a musical instrument as a weapon of mass destruction comes from the Bible. In the Old Testament book of Joshua, the Israelites use their rams’ horn “trumpets” to bring down the walls of Jericho, after which the only creatures left alive, including horses, donkeys, cattle and sheep, were the spy/prostitute Rahab and her family. As there is absolutely no archaeological evidence that this ever happened, we should certainly call it a work of fantasy and put it as our first example.

Another of the oldest and most famous examples of the use of a magical instrument is the flute used by the Pied Piper of Hamelin to entice the rats and then the children away from the town. While this is not a weapon in the traditional sense it is certainly a powerful instrument of control and is interesting in that the player seems to have the ability to decide who/what is affected by it. First only the rats follow the music until they drown themselves in the Weser River. Then the children are affected but not the adults. In one account the adults are said to be in church because it was a holy day but as most children know if you are a member of a religious family there is no way adults will let you stay at home by yourself on a holy day. This all supposedly happened in the year 1284 – a pretty exact date for something that is clearly fictional so it could be assumed that something quite awful did happen to the children of Hamelin around this time, plague possibly as it is carried by rats, and the Pied Piper represents death. What is interesting is that there is a street in Hamelin called Bungelosenstrasse or “Street with no drums”. It is believed to be the street where the children were last seen and dancing or playing music is still not allowed on this street even today.

Science fiction/fantasy books often feature music being used in some form, though not usually as a weapon. One of these is “The Crystal Singer” (1982) by Anne McCaffrey. In this book, the planet Ballybran is the only place where special crystals can be mined which are used in a variety of technologies and are therefore very valuable. To mine these crystals, the miners use the perfect pitch of their voices, so it is clear that some kind of sonic frequency comes into play. It wouldn’t be a far-fetched idea to use these perfect voices, amplified to a great degree, as weapons, much like a very high note breaking a glass.

Another more recent book in which music played a very central role is “Ready Player Two” by Ernest Cline. If you’ve read the book or seen the movie “Ready Player One”, you’ll know that the main character, Wade Watts, plays a virtual reality game to win a massive prize. I don’t want to go into details here in case anyone doesn’t know it and would like to read the book or see the movie at some point. “Ready Player Two” picks up Wade’s story, and, like “Ready Player One” he has to use a variety of virtual tools in his virtual world to continue playing the game. Prince’s music (the artist formerly known as) plays a central role in the story and one of the tools that Wade has to pick up happens to be one of Prince’s famous guitars, which is used as a weapon in an arena battle. I have to admit I’ve never been a huge fan of Prince so the fact that events concerning his life and work are so central to the plot meant that I wasn’t as engaged with this book as Prince fans would be.

Another genre where using musical instruments as weapons is a major feature is Chinese wuxia. Never heard of it? Well, if you’ve ever seen “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” or “Hero”, you’ve seen wuxia. Wuxia (loosely translated as martial hero) is a genre of traditional Chinese film, series and manga where the central character is a martial arts expert who follows a code of ethics to right wrongs and deal justice. Wuxia includes the use of fantastical kung fu techniques such as flying and levitation and also the use of the flute and the guqin and guzheng (traditional Chinese zithers, although the guqin is most often used as it is smaller and easier to carry than the larger guzheng) to overcome enemies. One of the most popular Chinese drama series from 2016 was “Love O2O”. This series used an interesting mix of live action and anime as the characters played the very popular RPG game “A Chinese Ghost Story” – a real game that can also be played by players outside China is you are so inclined. At the end of the clip below, you can see the main character using his guqin as a weapon.

(youtube clip fan made connecting real game with Love020 series)

While “Love 020” shows a Chinese MMORPG, there are a number of other RPG games that allow the player to multi-skill up to Bard class, a character that uses magical music and instruments. If you want to find out which ones, just do a Google search. Here’s a link to one I haven’t played but as the Mabinogi is so close to my heart (See previous posts) I’m posting it here.

Think that all this is too fantastical to have any bearing on real life? Think again! The LRAD (Long Range Acoustic Device) has been described as a “sound cannon” and “sonic weapon”. It is used for crowd control in the US and is extremely dangerous for human health. Depending on the length of exposure and decibels used, LRADs can, at the least, cause tinnitus, at worst, vomiting and blood and/or mucus from the ears with lasting effects on hearing. LRADs were first used by a US police department in Pittsburgh in 2009 to control protests during the G20 summit held there that year. Since then, a number of US police departments have used LRADs for crowd control.

So, once again, what some people have dismissed as pure fantasy has become reality. Gotta love that about sci fi and fantasy.

Linguistic Phun

Terpsichorean – pertaining to dance. From the name of the Ancient Greek Muse of Dance, Terpsichore, who also invented the harp and education.

(I do not own the rights to the images shown in this post or the Youtube content.)

#Magical Musical Instruments #Jericho #Hamelin #LoveO2O #Ready Player Two #LRAD #Sonic Weapons

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