thinking abt one of my favorite dotto headcanons today. that being, of course, how incredibly much he has physically changed since his academia days, and how much of that change was just entirely unintentional.
of course, as a young poor trans kid trying to make it in a professional setting, dottore had a lot he did not like about himself and did intentionally try to change about himself in the academia that he later came to recognize wasnโt a product of his own wishes at all and rather that which he felt he had to conform to in order to be respected, but truly if you saw him now, many people couldnโt (even with a reference picture) identify him as who he was in the academia. this is something he really enjoys, given it lets him have some respite from his rather notorious past as it is known in the academia and in sumeru at large; he can walk around and only be known as il dottore, not as the boy from the academia.
so that begs the question: what do i think he looked like when he was in the academia?
for one, he was a lot shorter. likeโฆ a lot shorter. dottore was malnourished as a child and didnโt grow a lot until much much later than his peers. he barely scraped over 5โ0โ until he was in his mid to late teens, and while he isnโt particularly happy about having stopped growing at 5โ7.5โ (he will tell you heโs 5โ8โ, he is a liar), heโs fine with it because he wears PLATFORMS. dottoreโs shoes are never flat. usually, they have some heel or platformed sole on them on top of an insert, so while he may only be a little under 5โ8โ, he usually cuts a figure at 6โ0โ-6โ1โ depending on the shoes.
hand in hand with that is the fact he used to look much frailer. in academia, dottore neglected his own health for myriad reasons, by and large as a method of control over himself and because he thought he could just โpower throughโ any sort of pain to continue doing his work. this meant he never gained back the weight he lost in the year he was homeless and wandering. dottore isnโt a heavy or a strong-looking man now, but he has put on a lot of weight since he joined the fatui and most of it is muscle. heโs not toned necessarily, but thatโs more due to being built like one of those car lot wavy guys than due to an actual lack of muscle; heโs mostly leg and that once again adds to the illusion of him being taller than he actually is.
he also actually used to bind his chest, and on occasion still does, but generally only on his own terms. if someone misgenders him now, he can literally just kill them. it doesnโt matter what other people think of him in such an inconsequential thing as gender; refer to him as he isโ lord dottore, the third harbinger of the fatui.
his eyes are the most similar thing about him, and even then if you had not truly known him before, they too would be unrecognizable. they have always been red, catlike pupils that spent far too widened to broad almond-shapes in fear. and yet theyโre brighter now, dancing with light even in the darkest of nightsโ they glow, yes, but more so even is the fact he does not try to dampen the fire of progress that burns behind them now. in the academia, he kept his head down, he would not meet your eyes. now, he does so with vicious defiance to the gods and disdain for the natural order.
the most striking difference is his hair. when a young boy, dottore had long hair, a deep bluish-black that started to go pale blue midway through his academia experience; it wasnโt particularly noticeable until he was 16 or so, and upon joining the fatui he cut off all the dark hair and grew it out again to its current length which he has been roughly maintaining his hair at that length for the past three or four hundred years with a few exceptions (i do think he tried to grow it out once and scaramouche cut it off as payback for the WORST haircut known to man and thats why the back is eternally lopsided) by cutting it himself. he doesnt have a method he kind of goes ham with a scalpel the same way normal people use a hair razor.
the thing that really makes dottore as near-unrecognizable as he is, is the fact he just exudes such a different energy than he did before. dottore was a good studentโhe was an excellent student set to be the youngest recipient of the kavikavus prize for his work on ruin mechanisms before his presumed โdeathโ (a coverup by the academia to prevent the bad publicity that they had a dangerously intelligent student defect to the fatui after the academia did not support his research)โ but he was veryโฆ watered down. the only way he could survive in the academia was by reducing himself to a point of being near-unrecognizable to himself for his safety and continued education, as we must keep in mind dottore has always been a godless child and the sumeru academia is also called the sumeru institute of religious decree.
dottore is confident now, and much, much crueler. and that alone is worlds away from the desperate and destitute child he once was, clawing for anywhere to feel safe. he is sharper-tongued though not any sharper-witted. he is violent and he delights in the violence he causes now because why shouldnโt he? heโs carved out his place in teyvat and he will do whatever he has to to keep it. heโs a little evil, yes, but in a cool sexy autistic way so i think he should be allowed to do what he wants.
