Untitled

[cerastes]

do you think dorothy got into dm-ing before or after Silence made her realize the frenzied flame ending of elden ring is Not Good

Probably after! In Dorothy’s Vision, it’s mentioned that Dorothy practically lived and breathed her research day in and day out. Her laboratory was practically her world for the longest time, Astegnne even chastises her early on because Dorothy takes so little care of herself and subexists on coffee and willpower. She was doing nothing except work towards the Frenzied Flame.

After Silence Umineko’d her by Red Blue and Golden Truthing the shit out of her, and subsequently coming to hang out at Rhodes Island, her schedule frees up a little more, and I think that’s when she got into tabletop. I’d like to think Ifrit was like “hey we can kill dragons and shit in these games, right? You should do this gee emm thing for us, I’ll get the players” and Dororhy was like BET I can make a cool fictitious world! I almost made a REAL cool world anyways!

So they get together and Ifrit makes a Spellblade names Dildo Baggins because she’s not taking this Narrative Thing seriously, she just wants to kill dragons, or firescalebeasts or whatever goofy ass name they got in Terra, and eight sessions later, the whole table is CRYING their eyes out after Dildo Baggins’s heroic sacrifice to divert Vai’veatosh the Primeval Leech Fiend and Exarch of Gluttony’s deathblow, buying enough time for the party to charge the Lotus Eater Cannon super team attack and finish it off, concluding the greatest eight sesh campaign the world never heard off.

“Y-yeah, this nerd stuff is alright, I g-guess,” Ifrit declares as she’s sobbing and getting all sorts of flammable snot and tears on Silence, gently running a finger over Dildo Baggins (deceased)’s character sheet, meanwhile Dorothy is there with a smile choking back tears because she wants to let her revive Dildo, but, when someone is gone… They are gone.

The dress in the alt is an oath to Dildo Baggins, based on her outfit for the last battle. In my heart.

[amiya-shirou]

Arknights' deep and expansive worldbuilding often tricks people into expecting complete realism from it in every part of its setting which often leads to them feeling like the game isn't answering these expectations - as seen for example with the criticism to Masses' Travels and how it didn't really develop Laterano's body of faith and spiritual practices or how Terran countries and politics can feel exxaggerated in how they're playing up their specific traits too much - but in my opinion that's not really the intended way to approach Arknights. I see the game as far more interested in metaphors than it is in the verisimilitudeness of its own world & politics and its regions as set pieces that mostly exist as stages for specific themes more than an exercise in complex worldbuilding for its own sake.

Things like how Siracusa is played up so much as a country governed by the mafia to the point it didn't even have a police force before I Portatori dei Velluti, or how Ursus subsituted faith in God with faith in the State, or how Victoria as whole is an atheist country are all examples of this. These things are not strictly realistic, but they do their job perfectly because they're intended to work on the metaphorical level - again, they're better seen as stages than as perfect equivalents to real countries.

Nuance is added later by the interactions between the different regions and the individual characters' relation to them and the way they try to change their country into something better, thus making them more complex, and Arknights does spend quite a lot of words in narrating their history so I don't think it's strictly wrong to get interested in how everything works and be absorbed by the worldbuilding (we do have a very good big ass lorebook I'm quite insane about), and everytime the game does develop them more it's always a nice added bonus, but I don't think of that as the primary function and find it a bit unfair to what the story is going for most of the time to focus too much on its lack of realism. Masses' Travels didn't really need a deep and complex dive on the workings on Lateran faith for its themes to work because it's not intended to act like a real life religion does. Laterano is a metaphor (for many things, not just catholicism) and as such its faith only needs to be explored as much as it's needed to build that metaphor (compared to how Kjerag is more directly exploring a specific in-universe religion and how it affects every level of a country and as such it gains more from going in-depth).

You can even see how that metaphor is changed whenever Lateran faith is exported to other countries - other stages - as it's warped around their specific themes; it assumes a very different form in Iberia, Siracusa and Bolívar. Only thing the faith itself needed to do as far as each of these stories was concerned was to exist, because the conversation was about the impact of faith and the variety in how it's utilized and you don't really need to know its inner workings for that. The most extreme version of that is how Abnormal Spectrum was able to discuss faith in Ursus and make a perfectly good multi-layered metaphor without even needing religion or the idea of God to exist in it; that was such an insane thing to do and yet they nailed it so well that I've been thinking about that ever since. I guess I just love my metaphors #mymetaphors

[zeravmeta]

Ato is mostly a fun silly times event but I actually find it so interesting in the wider lore context of Arknights because I think it's fascinating that out of all the Sarkaz races, the Oni and the madness born from their inherited rage are the ones that connect the most to Amiya and her position as the King of Sarkaz.

Qui'lon is brought up only once in this event, his story long having faded into legend with its multiple conflicting accounts about whether he was a peaceful leader or a mad monster, but it's very clear that Hoshiguma is meant to be a similar 'inheritor' of that rage with her own blue fire powers and Oni madness.

Chi Xiao was the technique that Amiya inherited from Ch'en, but the Ying Xiao, based on the Wrathful Cerulean Flame that she manifests in her Guard form complete with the signature blue flames both she and Hoshiguma manifest, those are all pulled from Qui'lon. The rage and madness an Oni can manifest were born from Qui'lons own agony, whose tragic end of killing his own kin that betrayed him before taking his own life was what helped Amiya fight in Chernabog when she was just a child far out of her depth. What Amiya pulled from the generations of memories within the black crown to combat Kaschey wasn't justice or righteousness, but rage and suffering, emblematic of the struggle the Sarkaz have faced for generations and the source of what makes the Oni mad.

The Sarkaz story line in general is about the inherited legacies and connections made that transcend time, and what the Oni inherited wasn't just the suffering, but the rage born from the unfairness of their persecution. I think it's actually notable that the Oni are the only Sarkaz race to inherit this emotion as their unique superpower: The various Sarkaz races all inherit the names and generations of suffering from their history, but only the Oni have that madness born from endless fighting as their ability. It's an unfair inheritance, given that despite not being known as Sarkaz they still face the same prejudice of being barbaric killers useful only for war.

Amiya also had this unfair inheritance inflicted onto her, in a way quite literally back stabbed by her own mother into being the King of Sarkaz and forcefully inheriting that legacy of rage and suffering. Amiya's powers are centered around empathy Arts and calling upon the generational wisdom and tragedy from the black crown, being empowered by emotions in the same way. Amiya's goal as the leader of Rhodes Island and the King of Sarkaz is to end the curse of Oripathy on Terra and end the prejudice against the Infected and the Sarkaz, but while she might be a more matured leader in current canon, Amiya was once just a child forced to bear far more responsibility and blood on her hands than anyone should ever have to. The Ying Xiao, a sword literally modeled after and defined by the endless rage of the Sarkaz as always being fated to kill each other, was something born from her rage against the unfairness of the world and the responsibility thrust upon her shoulders to end it. It's quite literally the manifestation of Amiya's own version of Oni madness.

For a somewhat meta-read of this connection, I love that the two operators that always show up in operator showcases are Yato and Noir Corne, with both of them being mentioned as specifically the most dependable of Rhodes Islands old guard. It's obviously because they're 2* starting operators used exclusively for blocking, but from their profiles it's notable that they're old guard but not Babel old guard, instead being old guard for specifically Rhodes Island. Amiya's Rhodes Island.

[cerastes]

I’m still not over how the very first thing Specter does when she regains her sanity in Under Tides is swear at Bishop and complain about Rhodes Island’s food while cutting the shit out of things, and neither is CN, really, given there’s a good number of fanart with Specter just swearing at things

The game presents it as “Specter’s eyes opened and a storm of rude words came out of her mouth as she smashed her fist through her containment tank”, which is hilarious because her Files do detail her last moments of sanity in Rhodes Island, and in these, she’s said to be well spoken and eloquent, so everyone expected Specter to be a much calmer, rational person, especially since she was close with Skadi, who is very much stoicism itself. Cue the moment where she regains her sanity in Under Tides and, nope, actually, her violent streak was not caused by her insanity, she actually really loves fighting, is a rowdy sailor-mouthed brawler, and in general just loves shooting the shit, to which Gladiia and Skadi both react like “Oh, she’s back, alright, that’s the Specter we know and love” while she’s doing 19 hit air combos on sea monsters while telling them she fucked their moms. Specter wasn’t a Minecraft legend, she was a Call of Duty player all along.

But this only makes her Files funnier in retrospective because she was TRYING VERY HARD to not say “what’s popping my good bunny bitch” to Amiya before going insane with every last shred of her mental power. “Be polite, be polite, be polite, you stupid shark” over and over in her head until she eventually went insane and transformed into someone polite as a result.

[cerastes]

I can't stop thinking about Kristen, or some say, Kirsten's trap hole working on Saria, it's funny, sure, but it's deep in a sad way. It's a Zhuge Liang vs Sima Yi situation, the famous anecdote where Zhuge Liang had basically no one to defend a city against Sima Yi's sizeable army, but when he learned that it was Sima Yi that lead the army, he simply opened the doors and welcome them in. Sima Yi immediately looked at this and said Absolutely The Fuck Not, He's Got Irons On The Fires, Plans Upon Plans, and retreated. This was a bluff that would only work on Sima Yi, and only if Zhuge Liang would use it. It's such an obvious bluff, which any other general would call out, and no general in their right mind would use. But, because it was Zhuge Liang using it against Sima Yi, because of their shared story, Sima Yi got mind bamboozled into a "He knows I know, he knows I know he knows I know" bluescreen loop, because Sima Yi would never fall for such an obvious bluff, but it's Zhuge Liang using it, and Zhuge Liang KNOWS that Sima Yi would never fall for it, but then, that in itself could be a trap, but but but but but.

And so he left. He did not take his chances. It was a bluff that could only work on him, if used by exactly one person.

To me, the trap hole scene is kind of like this. Kristen knows Saria. Better than anyone else. To the point that she knew exactly where and when she'd say something, and when and how exactly she could catch her with the oldest trick in the Acme playbook. Saria. The woman who couldn't be stopped with the Kristen-designed Anti-Saria Wall, which possessed Screw Saria Particularly effects. You could hit Saria with a warhead and the warhead loses that one in all likelihood.

But Kristen doesn't need a wall or a warhead. Kristen knows Saria. Better than anyone else. She knows her so well, she can topple her with a flap on the floor.

And yeah that's hilarious and all, but also, so deeply sad, because it's basically an acknowledgement of just how much Kristen has paid attention, how well she knows her, how immensely knowledgeable Kristen is about Saria.

It's sad because Kristen does not care. She ultimately decided she doesn't value this. She knows. She observed. She lived the most beautiful moments of both of their lives together. And she decided it was worthless in the end, and that she didn't care. She saw all of this as nothing more than a weapon to make a trap door on the floor work. All of that.

This is what makes Kristen so immensely fascinating and chilling. It's not that she doesn't care in terms of ignoring the world around her. Oh, she's observing, alright, she knows exactly what and who surrounds her. She simply doesn't care even if she knows all of these things. She doesn't care. Kristen Wright simply does not care. A level well above not noticing: She knows and observes and is aware, she simply decided those things are worthless.

That is the next level of indifference. I like her so much, she is awful.

[cerastes]

I love that unless you are Doctor, Platinum is so utterly uncooperative that her Files mention that Kal’tsit herself took over making her internal RI profile,

and even then she couldn’t get her to actually say anything.

This is funny in and of itself, but it becomes doubly hilarious when you consider that Kal’tsit IS incredibly charismatic and persuasive. She has the tacit respect of Gladiia, Ascalon, and numerous other very proud, very imposing figures. Even the members of Alive Until Sunset seek her out specifically to have Incredibly Important Conversations Regarding Lore. We see various characters, playable and otherwise, be smitten by her charisma or at the very least have nothing but respect for her. Even Lucid!Specter/Laurentina, known troublemaker and rowdy swashbuckler, will graciously comply if it’s Kal’tsit asking.

But what is a god, or a supersoldier, or a veteran Sarkazian general, to a very tired office lady-slash-assassin who hasn’t had a day off in months and who hates her job and her superiors?

Try as she might, Kal’tsit could not get a single truth out of Platinum. 

And what’s Platinum’s next move, after Kal’tsit tries and fails to get ANYTHING out of her, even mundane info like weight or other such sundry morsel of information?

Platinum opts to work closely with Kal’tsit after giving her this much trouble. The absolute balls on this horse.

Kal’tsit put it down on paper: “I have no fucking clue how to reign this horse in the long term besides to bank on her being besties with Doctor, because she sure as shit doesn’t really care about Rhodes Island in general”. And, should it surprise anyone? By chance, Platinum, who had been running like two or three days nonstop from the assassins sent to kill her, comes across Doc and company, bracing herself for a really, really unfortunate end, and Doctor, who did end up not only having dealings with the Armorless Union but also having some tea with Platinum prior to this, instead says “alright team, impromptu overtime, but we’re getting this horse OUT of here and to RI” and this was pretty much the first time in forever since anyone treated her in any way more dignified than “disposable tissue” plus so of course she’s gonna put her trust on the hooded hero that saved her life twice over instead of anyone else, let alone the weird green cat that hates their guts. Platinum’s Operator Files even confirms that she really wants to go on a vacation with Doc somewhere, and also to get paid leave, and her Potential tokens are tickets for the amusement park for herself and Doc.

I don’t know about you, mate, but Platinum and Doc being super besties not only makes sense, it’s about the only way I can see them. Putting aside the fact that Doc has an incredible talent to earn the trust and friendship of assassins (Phantom, Schwarz, Manticore, Gravel), it’s funny that Doctor went to Kazimierz this one time for Actual Rhodes Island Business and to support their pal Margaret Nearl with her things, and came back home with one retired decorated knight (Whislash), one very enthusiastic mechanic (Blemishine), and two assassins that REALLY like him (Platinum and Gravel).

[cerastes]

what'd u think is the most important bit of info to come out of the updated arknights artbook?

Lots of good stuff in the back, but my favorite so far is definitely Platinum's page:

First of all, we can FINALLY make logistical sense of that outfit, and the result is incredible: Single garter, on the right leg, transparent poncho on the back of her... I would call it a jacket, but it's more like a cape-jacket thing, loose, that exposes the tummy and the left hip specifically. And apparently her garter connects directly to her spats? Or is it going under? Which option sounds less comfortable? She's also a rail. Thin as a line. Zero percent ass or tits in this horse, all volume is concentrated in her long mane and silhouette-expanding garments. It may be a choice to show her outfit segmented, but that second pic also MAY suggest that the right sleeve is worn separately from the rest of the outfit. It's likely not the case, but I want to believe.

I love every part of this. This is why she's my favorite horse.

[cerastes]

Tangentially related, but I think Platinum has definitely fucked, she’s just god awful at it. Just straight up dogshit. Worst you’ve ever seen. It rolls back to superb sex simply because of how funny it is. She’s the Ed Edd n Eddy sfxes of sex. She’s gotten better after some experience but originally her pussy game straight up goofy. One time after sex, the Troupe’s Mouthpiece swung the doors to her room open because he thought he’d finally found the best clown in Terra to induct into the Crimson Troupe.

First time after getting her Shine Blemished, she’d confide with Doctor about the experience like “Oh yeah so I finally got some of that pastrami” and Doc is like yooo hell yeah girl how was it, and Plat’s like “I think it was good, she was laughing the whole time”

And Doc kinda grimaces like “Laughing? Like, content, pleased giggling or like laughing laughing?”

“Full on belly laugh. Couldn’t even breathe afterwards. That’s good, right?”

“Centaurea, that ain’t it.”

[cerastes]

Man, Invitation To Wine is, much like certain parts of Who Is Real?, very Wuxia, but way WAY more Wuxia. 

Ok, first of all, I need to explain a little something: Wuxia and telenovelas are literally the same thing, except latinos like love triangles and figuring out who the baby’s true father is more than sick kung fu, which, as a latino myself, I’ll take the L for, I think China’s on the right here, hence why I watched Wuxia practically every day when I was a teen. But essentially, if you put aside that specific difference, Wuxia and telenovelas are the same damn thing: “We have underlying drama, everyone’s connected, and there’s twist after twist”.

And Invitation To Wine is quite damn literally that and I love it. The synopsis to it has you thinking “oh boy, Ling is gonna do some crazy shit…!” but then the event is Mr. Lee coming across like three different Wuxia movies, concluding in him being dragged in the middle of a deathmatch involving a retired swordsman and a pole-fighter consumed by revenge, Mr. Nothing (a Wuxia protag from another story altogether) practically getting in a fistfight with an earth-bending cop, and Miss Du trying to make her dad (the retired swordsman) fail at a job, but only a little, ALL the while the lord of the area, a taciturn man and good friend of Mr. Lee, courts another high-ranking court member in the most ancient of manners as they flirt with all the enthusiasm of teen with a Red Bull addiction yet all the initiative of a bear hibernating, so they sit there, smoldering in the most polite sexual tension possible, ALL THE WHILE Miss Ning, the high-ranking official, realizes something is up so she hires an Australian bounty hunter to steal from him to help him, which is as Wuxia as it fucking gets (sans the Australian bit, they hire Korean mercs instead). It gets SO WUXIA at one point that Dusk steps in and just puts them in timeout for like five days (painting time) because she’s more of a telenovela person I guess.

Mr. Lee was supposed to deliver one damn cup and instead ends up in the middle of a Venn Diagram of three different Wuxias, and the moment he gets SOME breathing space thanks to Dusk’s Spell Of Stop Fucking Fighting, the damn cup turns out to be cursed and takes over his body, but ONLY in the dream realm, and then they play Go (known as Weiqi in China), and Lee fucking sucks at it, and loses so bad he wins, so the evil god in the cup loses, and when he comes back to the realm of the living, the Wuxia (triple) sort of resolved itself, but THEN the super evil dragon god awakens, but not really, so they beat it, but not really, and then Ling is like “hey what’s up man” and Nian is like “hey man we gotta do something about that” and Ling is like “really?” and Nian is like “yeah” and Ling is like “fuck, man, you make a great point, let’s do this shit” and THEN some old dude shows up and he’s the Oldest and Dudest so the sisters actually listen to him, and what does he have to say? “Nian, I need a civil engineer so work I’m gonna commission you” and she’s like “shit alright man” oh btw he casually mentions there’s some dude that’s 738 years old fighting superdemons in the north of Yan? But that’s irrelevant, anyways, Nian is a civil engineer now.

So in the end, Mr. Lee, like Luigi, wins by doing nothing (the action, not the dude). He didn’t even fight once. He’s one of the damn 6 stars in the banners! We know he’s got hands! And he was involved in three Wuxias and one god-possession at the same time and didn’t even show off a single move! What a legend.

What I’m trying to say is that Invitation To Wine is the golden standard of writing.

[cerastes]

Legitimately can't stop thinking about the brilliance of Degenbrecher's introduction as a playable character.

We've known Degenbrecher for a long, long time before this event, and even before Break The Ice, actually: Before Arknights even released, Gnosis and Degen can be seen in this pre-launch trailer at 0:14.

Degenbrecher existed for years as this larger-than-life figure shrouded in rumor and fame, with an almost supernatural countenance to her presence in the corner of the narrative she inhabits: The three-time Grand Champion of the Kazimierz Major, the dreaded Black Knight, the peerless warrior, who has the strength of ten knight companies on her shoulders alone. Spoken of in equal parts awe and fear, her stint in the knightly competitions were legendary in how one-sided they were whenever she took to the field, and Platinum even comments that her portraits on the gallery of champions all make it seem like she doesn't even age, adding a supernatural element to her legacy. All we know is that she's currently SilverAsh's bodyguard and no doubt part of why his faction is so formidable, as it would be for anyone who has a one-woman army on their payroll. When we are finally introduced to her formally in the narrative, she's all business, no non-sense, in the middle of her job, and boy howdy is she good at it: We know the kind of juice Rhodes Island Elite Operators have, they are really, really strong, and yet all Sharp can do is stall for time against her, with tacit understanding that no matter how much he tries, he is NOT overcoming her.

There is not a single thing anyone present on Doc's side can do to actually overcome Degenbrecher during Break The Ice, so the very best thing anyone could do was stall her. THAT is the winning move, or at least as close to one. She's that formidable, and then some. We only see her in business mode here, with a small glimpse to her more noble nature in that she is nothing but non-self aggrandizing compliments for Sharp for being able to even fight her, even if there is no chance he can beat her, because most people just take a single swing from her. When Doc's plan succeeds and we reach the climax, she simply sheathes, says "Well played", SA recalls her back to her pokeball, and we are left letting out a sigh of relief that we made it in time.

Then, for some more years after that, that's our impression of her: Unsurmountable. We don't know much more about her other than she is simply not someone you measure up to. This, by itself, isn't particularly unique, both as a concept or in the cast of Arknights, but it leaves you to wonder exactly what is she beyond being Unsurmountable. Who is she, actually?

Then, The Rides to Lake Silbernherze happens, where she is the main character, and after all those years of mystique and grandeur, of guessing and wondering, we finally can see her not as a plot device, but as an actual character: The very first scene is her covered in blood and raw jumping on a moving train for some mysterious purpose. Oh god, oh no, why is she soaked in blood already? Is she already in Terminator mode?

Then, in the best possible payoff of years of mystique and build-up, we learn that Degenbrecher, the person, not the plot device, the person, is fucking hilarious.

She's covered in blood because she stopped by a nearby farm to help farmers deliver a farm animal, which covered her in blood given how messy births are. She apparently didn't have to do this, and just opted to because, well, she was there, they needed help, and she's in a perpetual state of down to clown.

While pursuing possible dangerous elements to Kjerag later, she stops by to talk with tourists and recommend good spots to sightsee and eat before resuming her chase Looney Toons style.

She looks the same in the three champion portraits because she didn’t like the photoshoots so she skipped them. They were just reusing her photo.

She'll have the single most mundane conversations with the simplest people in midst of off-handedly mentioning that she quite enjoys fistfighting avalanches -- in a setting where this is not at all normal or feasible -- just to test herself. Reactions to her saying this vary from "hey is this a bit" to "oh, Degenbrecher, you card, we saw you do that the other day, next time I'll bring my camera".

She's a combination of Bugs Bunny, Sakamoto-kun, and Broly, and her main gimmick is that she's a reasonable, normal ass person in terms of personality sans the more overt feats of power like fistfighting avalanches. She's just Someone, who just happens to be mind-bogglingly strong and skilled with the greatsword and with swordbreakers.

This is doubly hilarious when you compare her to other one-woman armies we know: Nearl's dialogue is entirely composed of flowery promises for a better tomorrow and heroic declarations, Saria has woman pain 9000 and hasn't had a good day in years, Skadi is afflicted with survivor's guilt which in turn lead to a potent-self loathing and rationalizing her mere presence is what causes tragedy to those around her. Degenbrecher, in comparison, is just happy to be here, enjoys a good fight within reason, loves challenging herself, and honestly is quite content with stuff like paperwork or small talk. She's the friend you call to help you move or when your pipe busts or when you need someone to take care of your kid for a few hours if you're going to be late home due to work. And she puts her entire god damn pussy into it, too, you bet your kid is going to have the time of their life if Degenbrecher is on babysitting duty. Degenbrecher chips in for pizza night. Degenbrecher helps you change your flat tire.

The essence of Degenbrecher is that the rest of Terra is going through some really dire, really interesting times, to say the least, but she's on New Game+ just sort of doing side quests, overleveled as hell and with her shit figured out, and she decides to be as funny as possible about it.

[cerastes]

It’s been brought to my attention that in Degenbrecher’s witch costume you can actually see the wires connected to the “floating” books and pages, and it’s easier to see them when the lights go dim.

What a phenomenal detail, as expected from the funniest woman in Terra.

[cerastes]

Pozyomka is a splendid character, god damn it.

[cerastes]

This is nothing I don't think about daily because she's one of my favorites in Arknights but this particular instance is because I'm still living rent free in the pocket universe of her recent Module.

Stitch (Minimalist) is reading through Avdotya's (Pozy's) newest draft. Instead of her usual sordid tales of the frozen wasteland, she instead wrote a joyful story with a Durin as the protagonist. The thing with Stitch and Avdotya is that they are both certain degrees of wet blankets and serious people compared to the usual very carefree, very happy Durin, they show up and drink and hang out, but they Have Their Moods, they work together, both with their frustrations towards Gavial as well as their own idiosyncrasies within a carefree culture that they nonetheless adore.

Avdotya notices Stitch has read the story twice now, and is starting a third round, with a furrowed brow. He explains he's looking for the snowfields, and the sordid tragedies, and the cold, and anything that says "Avdotya", the same way he leaves marks or signatures in his constructions. She explains that she wrote this one because she wanted to remind Durin of home back in Zeruertza, to which Stitch explains, Avdotya, we don't read your stories because we want to see our own joy in it, we happily read and enjoy your stories because they are yours, they are made by you, they speak of something in you, even if we don't really understand the deepest sorrows you are putting on paper.

And that's the part that absolutely wrecks me because Avdotya, Pozyomka's biggest pitfall is that she's constantly a prisoner of the past. She cannot let go, and if it's not her past torturing her, it's the past of others. Aloof as she is, she clearly loves all the Durin that gave her a home after she escaped Ursus within an inch of her life. She understands the ache that comes with the loss of home, the way the Durin just experienced with Zeruertza, so she sees it as a duty of hers to provide for them, the way they provided for her. It's her turn.

Her Files explicitly state that this extremely protective behavior towards Durin needs and quality of life aboard Rhodes Island is new and wasn't something she showcased back underground. When she fled home, they saved her, so now it was her turn. But the thing is, the Durin don't expect or want that from her. Because love was never transactional to begin with, they weren't investing in a favor for her, they saved her because she needed it, they gave her a home with them because she needed it, and she's their weird giant pink woman because she's really one of them, not out of courtesy.

And to express this through what's dearest to Avdotya, writing, is a killer blow, it gets me watery eyed, because Avdotya clearly uses writing to process her feelings, she writes about all these wastelands and tragedies in the snow and the cold fates of those within because her previous life was violent and cold and terrifying. But she puts this aside to write a warm and comforting tale of hope and joy because if it's helped her, it can help them, right? But that's not what they want, because it has a cost in her own mental health, it's akin to her paying a debt she doesn't owe. They just want to read her cold, snowbound tragedies because they let them know her better, the same way getting drunk and partying until the sun rises lets her know them better.

Stitch saying they are always happy to read her stories because they contain so much of her in it got me fucked up.

it's goooooood!!!!!

[cerastes]

Man, Invitation To Wine is, much like certain parts of Who Is Real?, very Wuxia, but way WAY more Wuxia. 

Ok, first of all, I need to explain a little something: Wuxia and telenovelas are literally the same thing, except latinos like love triangles and figuring out who the baby’s true father is more than sick kung fu, which, as a latino myself, I’ll take the L for, I think China’s on the right here, hence why I watched Wuxia practically every day when I was a teen. But essentially, if you put aside that specific difference, Wuxia and telenovelas are the same damn thing: “We have underlying drama, everyone’s connected, and there’s twist after twist”.

And Invitation To Wine is quite damn literally that and I love it. The synopsis to it has you thinking “oh boy, Ling is gonna do some crazy shit…!” but then the event is Mr. Lee coming across like three different Wuxia movies, concluding in him being dragged in the middle of a deathmatch involving a retired swordsman and a pole-fighter consumed by revenge, Mr. Nothing (a Wuxia protag from another story altogether) practically getting in a fistfight with an earth-bending cop, and Miss Du trying to make her dad (the retired swordsman) fail at a job, but only a little, ALL the while the lord of the area, a taciturn man and good friend of Mr. Lee, courts another high-ranking court member in the most ancient of manners as they flirt with all the enthusiasm of teen with a Red Bull addiction yet all the initiative of a bear hibernating, so they sit there, smoldering in the most polite sexual tension possible, ALL THE WHILE Miss Ning, the high-ranking official, realizes something is up so she hires an Australian bounty hunter to steal from him to help him, which is as Wuxia as it fucking gets (sans the Australian bit, they hire Korean mercs instead). It gets SO WUXIA at one point that Dusk steps in and just puts them in timeout for like five days (painting time) because she’s more of a telenovela person I guess.

Mr. Lee was supposed to deliver one damn cup and instead ends up in the middle of a Venn Diagram of three different Wuxias, and the moment he gets SOME breathing space thanks to Dusk’s Spell Of Stop Fucking Fighting, the damn cup turns out to be cursed and takes over his body, but ONLY in the dream realm, and then they play Go (known as Weiqi in China), and Lee fucking sucks at it, and loses so bad he wins, so the evil god in the cup loses, and when he comes back to the realm of the living, the Wuxia (triple) sort of resolved itself, but THEN the super evil dragon god awakens, but not really, so they beat it, but not really, and then Ling is like “hey what’s up man” and Nian is like “hey man we gotta do something about that” and Ling is like “really?” and Nian is like “yeah” and Ling is like “fuck, man, you make a great point, let’s do this shit” and THEN some old dude shows up and he’s the Oldest and Dudest so the sisters actually listen to him, and what does he have to say? “Nian, I need a civil engineer so work I’m gonna commission you” and she’s like “shit alright man” oh btw he casually mentions there’s some dude that’s 738 years old fighting superdemons in the north of Yan? But that’s irrelevant, anyways, Nian is a civil engineer now.

So in the end, Mr. Lee, like Luigi, wins by doing nothing (the action, not the dude). He didn’t even fight once. He’s one of the damn 6 stars in the banners! We know he’s got hands! And he was involved in three Wuxias and one god-possession at the same time and didn’t even show off a single move! What a legend.

What I’m trying to say is that Invitation To Wine is the golden standard of writing.

[cerastes]

This is incredibly in line with Saria, the character, Saria, the person we’ve come to know and understand. Not once has she ever been defined by her Arts.

It is no exaggeration to call Saria blessed: She is not Infected, and yet possesses incredibly strong Arts, both in concept and potency. Not only that, she is clearly very intelligent and an expert hand-to-hand combatant. But there’s a difference between those factors: Her Arts, she was born with those, her superior physical strength, it’s part of her being a Vouivre, but what actually defines her is what she has attained by her own merit: Channeling that strength into martial prowess, diligently studying to become a scientist and researcher, and her “diamond-like” rigid personality that aims to overcome everything logically and decisively.  Her Files even indicate that even though her Arts are incredibly powerful, Saria seldom truly uses them, solving her problems through other means instead. She was born privileged, yet seldom relies on her innate abilities, resorting to what she has attained extrinsically instead.

Kirsten thought that finding a way to undo Saria’s powerful calcification Arts would be a way to contain her, were she ever to go rogue, and this precise moment establishes both of them perfectly:

Kirsten has strayed too far off the road. She sees everything in a vacuum, everything as it is on paper, even her ‘best friend’, and thus, concluded that “disabling Saria’s Arts somehow will make her stand down”. That’s exactly how you know Kirsten truly has detached herself from the rest of everything and has become obsessed with her own research: Saria is not defined by her Arts, or by anything given to her, Saria is defined by what she has built for herself, by herself.

It is not the least surprising that Saria’s immediately reaction would be to punch the barrier bare-fisted instead with absolutely everything she’s got in order to quite literally break the walls of Kirsten’s own delusional world to pieces. This is completely in line with the Saria we know. This surprises Kirsten, and this in itself immediately tells you, tragically, everything you know about her, because it shouldn’t surprise her in the slightest.

So, who truly is diamond-like here? Saria is of rigid behavior and strict demeanor, yes, but it is precisely because Ifrit and Silence changed something in her to understand how emotion has a place in science that she’s done this. Kirsten is more diamond-like, truly, believing herself the crown jewel that will bring salvation to humanity and eradicate war, oripathy, and hunger, one immoral sacrifice at a time.

Kirsten sees an agenda, a checklist.

Saria sees a world that wants nothing more than to be saved, and its people wanting nothing more than to eke out a living with dignity.

Who truly is diamond-like here?

[autarch114]

Love the explanation here....