Hello and welcome! Bi, fly, and ready to sigh. I’m 30+, under 18s please don’t follow. You’re valid at any age, but this blog isn’t for you. | I always fancied it should have a placard at its borders: "Welcome to Casnewydd-Bach, the town you have just passed."
So, "okay" is a word that doesn't appear much in DA dialogue through the first three installments, though it's become quite common by Veilguard.
Likely not an intentional evolution, but a symptom of the fact that the language used in DAV is generally more contemporary than the other installments. Still. Let's play in the space. Because it's not that no one uses "okay" before then. It's actually a relatively common Varric word -- he says it in both DA2 and DAI.
Obvious conclusion: "Okay" is dwarven slang.
(Corollary headcanon: Increased contact with the surface has spread dwarven slang more widely. Perhaps even helped by the popularity of Varric's books...)
Over my breakfast this morning I stared into space wondering what the origins of "OK" could be in the dwarven context. Orzammar is the obvious O. So... Orzammar Kingdom? Orzammar King?
Of course. "OK" is the seal that Orzammar's king uses to express that a document has his approval.
I got about one page of (mostly suggested) doodles done since yesterday, based on;
Though I did only get like... 1.5 Spites in there (I count the glowing eyes as .5)
Also I am no good with wings oops
(Sidenote; I literally named my Rook 'Rook' because I'm bad at coming up with names and it does sound cool. Also her design was literally just me going 'What do I want to draw? Pretty elf lady.' Also yes, I love DA2 elf noses don't judge me.)
I was tagged for this picrew by @rookamell and @serensama!
Canon Lucalma (don't mind the violet eyes, there's no option to make them brown T_T):
Alma & Spite because he deserves flowers in his hair, too <3
A couple more under the cut not to clutter your dash!
Lucalma in a "meeting before the Ossuary" AU where they encounter each other in Antiva before Trespasser (snippet). The worm (?) creatures represent their steeds, because I envision them travelling (Lucanis on a contract, Alma searching for unclosed rifts out in the wilds) x)
And a little something for Abduction AU :'D
Something something masquerade~ To me, the image on Lucanis' armour looks like a bird (a crow?) spitting fire, and the colour scheme of Alma's dress reminds me of the garb of a Divine. Hm... are they cosplaying Cassandra protecting Divine Beatrix from the dragon?..
Another lovely day of daydreaming about Dragon Age…
This mug was gifted to me for Christmas. BlackCatUnicorns on Etsy if you’re interested in getting one yourself, or any of the other DA merch in their store.
OBVIOUSLY, I understand why Lucanis and Spite aren't written as a polyamorous route for Rook. The romance was supposed to focus on Lucanis, it just so happens that Spite is… also there, ALL of the time, inside of his head. A situation the devs just handwaved with "he just leaves to go read a book" (which is hilariously bad).
Sure, I understand we were never meant to feel attracted to Spite, and somehow I'm the weird one for wanting to fuck him. He's reduced to a sidekick even in canon. I get that a lot of people who romanced Lucanis wouldn't be interested in ALSO dating the spirit possessing him, and forcing them to would turn players off his route.
On the technical side of things, a polyamorous option would be far too ambitious for a game that was already cutting off chunks of content. Lucanis being a "solo" route makes the relationship more streamlined and easier to write, although you do need to keep dancing around the fact Spite's watching him fumble Rook in the pantry.
Not to mention you don't even have to get into the intricacies of what it means to date a spirit! You can just tell him to fuck off to a different room, however THAT'S supposed to work. Like, whatever, that's how it was always meant to be. Bioware was never going to let me fuck both of these dudes, because they probably didn't mean to write one of them as fuckable to begin with!!! (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻
BUT I LOVE SPITE DELLAMORTE, and here's why I'd be invested in pursuing a relationship with him WHILE romancing Lucanis (because they're items frequently bought together, do not separate):
So, I've briefly touched on the logbook entries, and mentioned the potential in exploring Spite's unique way of interacting with the "real" world. I'm going to leave discussing Inner Demons for last, since it's arguably the most important piece for this puzzle. I'll start off with the stuff that speaks for itself in a series of bullet points.
-Him punching Lucanis because "he wants to talk to Rook" is very hot, and the fact Lucanis just stands there and takes it is also incredibly hot;
-"Spirit of Determination" (aka how he's introduced in the Hall of Valor) might be the sexiest title ever, along with "Demon of Spite" itself;
-I love that he's a little freak that just goes around sniffing people and wanting to eat candles or set stuff on fire. He's such a creature. Spite's who I immediately think of when I read words like gremlin or scrunglo;
-His unique speech pattern and the cartoonish voice he has. I remember the first time I heard him I immediately thought of a moustache-twirling villain tying me to the train tracks and going "GYAHAHAHA";
-I love to hear his opinions on other spirits, it really sets him apart from just embodying the concept of "spite", if that makes sense. His reaction to Manfred stands out to me, since Spite doesn't seem to recognize him as a wisp at first ("WHAT IS. FOLLOWING?"). One of my favorite things about their dynamic is his reaction if Emmrich turns into a lich. But I also love his apparent disdain for Compassion, and how both he and Lucanis aren't fond of the Great Necropolis or Keepsake and Curio;
-In a party banter between a Hardened Lucanis and Bellara, he pulls out the banger "We ate. A prisoner's nightmare. He dreamed... a bloodthirsty tree... with ten thousand branches." which is also incredibly hot to me;
-This is more of a joint reason to love both Lucanis and Spite, but the fact Lucanis orders for him at Café Pietra (during the quest A Moment's Peace) even though Spite can't drink it while non-corporeal is very cute. It quickly becomes a ritual for them, too, as evidenced by the banter with Emmrich in which Spite says "We. Have. An agreement. And coffee.";
-And just the whole "first non-mage with a demon" situation??? The characters don't acknowledge / talk enough about how they're forced together in something that was unprecedented and should've been impossible. One of the party banters that stuck with me the most was actually one with Bellara where Lucanis explains how it happened:
Bellara: You don't have to answer this if you don't want to, Lucanis, but… how did the Venatori stick you with Spite?
Lucanis: They fed me something. Like he was a parasite in uncooked meat.
Bellara: You know, I've spent lots of time around demons, but I've never heard of them being used that way.
Lucanis: Zara said she got the idea from some cult in Orlais. They used it on Seekers. Who are immune to demons.
Bellara gets a bit too curious about Lucanis's personal affairs regarding Spite, sure. But I can't deny how fascinating this is to me. Of course, it doesn't stop at how the connection was made, but the aftermath: Spite isn't interested in taking over or killing his host, like "demons" often are.
Harding: The wing thing, do you do that on purpose?
Lucanis: I don't. Why?
Harding: So you just naturally look amazing when Spite helps.
Harding: Some people get possessed and become mounds of pulsating flesh. You get wings.
Lucanis: Lucky me. My demon has a sense of style.
I've seen the argument of it being a survival instinct of self-preservation (which also applies to him controlling Lucanis to sleepwalk to "safety"). But where it falls apart for me is that... to be blunt, it's not like Spite's getting anything out of sparing his vessel?
From what I can remember, demons are shown to keep their hosts alive for two main reasons: 1. they need a physical vessel to use as conduit for their own purposes (Vengeance needed Anders to enact his righteous ideals); and 2. the demon is trying to incite their respective emotion on the person so they have something to eat. You see the issue, right?
Lucanis isn't even FEEDING HIM WITH SPITE but rather SHUTTING HIM OUT IN A LITERAL MIND PRISON. Spite gets nothing from this other than eternal torment of wandering a grayscale Ossuary. Yes, he takes over Lucanis at the end of Bloodbath, but other than that? He seems to be very patient. The most he will do is "throw a tantrum".
Now, in regards to my personal approach to the(ir) romance route...
I know people have found cut content (see x, x and x) in which we'd be able to romance Lucanis without saving Treviso, a choice that pivots his character quest from forming an alliance with Spite to wanting to get rid of him by any means possible. Lucanis is, as expected, opposed to the idea of "sharing" Rook with Spite. And it makes sense, because in this scenario, he doesn't even want to share his mind!
However, don't forget this is cut content. You can't romance Lucanis if you pick Minrathous, now. I personally think this choice by the devs (no matter how incidental) ended up being really cool to distinguish how Lucanis and Neve differ as characters, but that's a Veilguard positive rant for another day. @dandyboyandy said it best, so I'll quote him:
"[If the developers didn't mean to include Spite in the relationship] then they shouldn't have included him so heavily. He is the literal catalyst for Lucanis's healing [in his route]. Lucanis stays jaded, hurt and spiteful if you save Minrathous to the point that you can't romance him.
His not being romanceable is directly correlated, story-wise, to him not accepting Spite. Lucanis would still be in his head and ultimately would not open himself up further. Yes, Rook helped, of course. But Rook didn't even know Lucanis had SUCH an immense mental block, and wouldn't have gotten past it in their budding relationship if not for Spite."
I'm about to make an insane comparison, but to me? The ideal route to take Lucanis and Spite would be how they handled Eddie and Volt in Date Everything!. In my own, perfect little world, you'd have to spend an equal amount of time with both of them, and prioritizing one over the other would land you in a "bad end" where you don't get to date either.
You can't romance Eddie without Volt and vice-versa, they're a package deal. And to me, personally, you should have to romance Spite in order to date Lucanis. Despite what some character interactions might make us believe, Spite isn't a child, or a pet, or a purple guy in the cuck chair.
HE'S MY HUSBAND AND I LOVE HIM!!! >:[
(disclaimer for the piss on the poor website: this is just my opinion and personal preference, I'm not saying you have to be attracted to Spite to romance Lucanis)
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