{I WILL CONTINUE IN PROVING MY GENIUS.}

/colored vers. of two recent sketches

#[ visage ]

/someone tell me to put the pen down 😭

#[ visage ]

#{ visage }#the riddler #edward nygma

/working on an Edward design for another blog of mine

itsblobross

Nosy questions ask game 👃

Send me a number and I'll answer. Reblog to play along!

Did you have an imaginary friend when you were younger? Describe them.

What’s your comfort show?

Whose podcast would you want to be a guest on?

What was your first ship/OTP?

What was the first fanfic you ever read?

Do you talk to yourself? How often?

When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?

What do you want to be when you grow up now?

Tell me a piece of gossip.

What is an act of kindness you have never forgotten?

What is a childhood quirk you never grew out of?

What is your favorite drink?

What is your favorite snack?

Describe your first crush.

What is your biggest pet peeve?

Do you have any phobias?

What’s something random/odd that you find hot/attractive.

What is your favorite flower?

What do you smell like?

Describe yourself how your love interest would describe you in a book.

If you were a main character in a romance book/movie/show, what tropes would you want associated with you?

If you could bring back an extinct species (with no major consequences) what would it be?

Do you think Atlantis was real?

What hobby/activity do you keep saying you’ll take up when you retire?

how many posts are in your drafts right now [*whispers* post one]

What’s an achievement big or small that you’re really proud of?

Do you have any recurring dreams? What are they?

What would be your death row/last meal? (no limits)

What is a book/story from your childhood that has stuck with you?

What are your top 5 most used emojis?

What celebrity do you feel like you could realistically be friends with?

If you could time travel what time would you go to? (And why? What would you do there?)

/riddler fanart -- one of the designs I was playing with for this blogs design

#{ visage }#{ ooc }#artists on tumblr #the riddler #riddler fanart #my art #digital art #edward nygma

So what are you in for this time?

Edward gives a soft hum, as though the question requires genuine consideration.

“Oh, you know how these things are.”

His fingers trace idly along the back wall of his station cell, his expression thoughtful in the way one might consider an especially forgettable inconvenience.

“A touch of trespassing. Some property damage. A regrettable misunderstanding involving several city officials and their spectacular inability to solve what was, frankly, a very simple sequence of clues.”

His lips twitch—not quite a smile, but close enough to unsettle.

“The public, of course, has a tendency toward melodrama. They so desperately need villainy to feel meaningful that they’ll inflate even the smallest correction into some grand moral catastrophe.”

He tilts his head, studying the cold concrete with detached consideration.

“And really, compared to my previous work? This was practically philanthropy.”

A beat.

“I didn’t even kill anyone particularly important.”

“Mm.”

The sound is low, thoughtful—not agreement, not quite. Something measured.

“Well… that’s already a marked improvement over your predecessors.” A faint tilt of his head, eyes narrowing just slightly. “Most insist on the delusion that I am broken.”

There’s a flicker of something there— satisfaction, perhaps—but it’s fleeting, quickly swallowed by something sharper. More possessive.

A pause.

Then—there it is—that smile again. Thin. Knowing.

“But now we arrive at the interesting part…” His gaze, now, fixes and remains fully on the other man, “You speak of fear, of rearranging, of unraveling—such confident little metaphors for a man who has yet to ask a single meaningful question.”

His head tilts the other way, studying him like a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit.

“So tell me, Doctor, what, exactly, have you observed that leads you to believe I possess anything so pedestrian as ‘fear’?”

“Or are you simply applying the same ideal to every mind unfortunate enough to sit across from you?”

"I don't see the point in trying to ask questions before the context of the answers has been established. These are all building blocks, are they not? Slowly finding one truth, and disproving another lie, and then stacking it all on top of one another until you have a complete house. Only then, can you sit down and begin to question the contents, or try to argue with the ceiling that is over your head."

"This? It is only an introduction. The careful unfolding of the board, and the quiet moments placing the pieces in their squares. I think of this- all of this- as less of an ideal that is being applied, but a simple acknowledgement that we are still playing chess. That the board does in fact have squares painted across it. That there is a table, and a chairs, and a clock, and a notebook to document who loses."

Again, his gaze lifts.

"Emotions, desires, aversions- compulsions- there are a hundred different ways to explain the phenomenon that occurs while making decisions. All these different labels for things that only truly exist in the corners of the mind."

He follows the tilt of Edward's head, the two of them now locked into a staring contest, as Jonathan's eyes flicker between Edward's right eye and his left. One of us is lying, while the other is telling the truth. What question might you ask, to figure out who is who?

"But, we still must recognize that it, however nebulous it is, that thing does exist. There is something that drives all of us forward. There is something that holds us all back. I simply choose to label that something as fear."

Edward does not so much as blink beneath the stare.

If Jonathan means it as a challenge, it is a poor one. If he means it as scrutiny, poorer still. Edward has spent a lifetime being watched by lesser minds desperate to convince themselves they were seeing something profound.

They rarely do.

A faint rise of one brow is his only acknowledgment.

“So that’s your theory, is it?”

His fingers drum once against the armrest before stilling completely, his expression settling into something politely analytical.

“How disappointingly reductive.”

The words are not cruelly spoken. If anything, they are worse for their calmness.

“To reduce all human action to fear—dressed up in prettier language, perhaps, but fear all the same…” He exhales faintly through his nose, almost amused. “How terribly efficient. And how terribly lazy.”

His head tilts another degree, gaze sharpening with something almost scholarly.

“I feel you’ve mistaken universality for depth, Doctor.”

“Tell me… when a mathematician solves an impossible equation, is it fear that drives him? When an artist ruins himself in pursuit of beauty, is that fear? When a man tears apart the world simply because he cannot tolerate an unsolved problem…”

He lets the implication hang there for a moment, almost as if to study the man in front of him.

“...is that fear?”

A slight lean forward now, his voice lowering into something almost intimate.

“I believe you are focusing on the wrong part of the theory, doctor. It seems you are caught in the bigger picture, rather than those... smaller moments which formulate it.”

#{ ic }#edward nygma

GAYYYY

"This is the quality of questions that you are capable of coming up with? There is nothing else in the world that might fascinate you more than my sexuality? Truly? You will be disappointed, then for me to report that I am not, and I feel nothing in my heart for any men, aside from the same, polite acknowledgement, that I offer to all living things."

"I would say that I am disappointed, but I suppose this is something that I did see coming. You lot seem to have a particular interest in asking the more shallow questions, picking my brain for idle gossip rather than meaningful information."

"Arkham Asylum is a dangerous place, either because of its patients, its staff, or the mold collecting underneath the floorboards- and you still think that this is the most important aspect of our lives here?"

#{ visage }

~ A message from @crowsinthecornfield, an important announcement- please read.

There has been a lot of back and forth over on my end on if I wanted to make this post and, if so, how. But, watching this blog continue to get new followers, activity, and dms from people wanting to write with me, I felt like it was unfair to just leave everyone in the dark. As you might have noticed, all the other sideblogs for this account have been deactivated, and crowsinthecornfield hasn't been active in several months.

Everything is fine. Quibble is alive. I, clearly, am not Quibble. Nice to meet you, my name is Artemis, though, some of you have already been chatting with me for a few months. Crowsinthecornfield has been a joint project between me, Alice, and Quibble since June or July of 2025, regardless of anything as that has been said or implied. I wrote the majority of the lore posts and longer rp threads, Alice mostly stayed to worldbuilding and the general story direction, and Quibble wrote the shorter threads, any rps that I was uncomfortable with, as well as being the outward facing "person" for the blog. This arrangement was Quibble's idea, which we followed along with.

While we appreciate all the connections that have been made, this story, and this character, neither Alice nor I have ever gotten the credit or the recognition for the work that we put into this project. I think that I would have allowed for that to continue, however, due to some personal factors that have caused strain upon the blog's creation, development, and our friendship, the blog will be deleted and I will be moving onto a project that I will actually be getting credit for.

I would like to apologize, sincerely, for being misleading. After a lot of consideration, I wanted to come on here and finally clear things up. After all the love and support you have given us, and all the time that I have poured into it, I think that you deserve to know. If you have any further questions, please feel free to send an ask. While Quibble and I will try our best to answer them, Alice will be MIA until further notice. Thank you, again, for your time. I truly appreciate it.

~ Find Artemis at @jcphd

~ Note that all private DM's sent to the crowsinthecornfield, including private RP's, were handled by Quibble, not the others involved. Nor had they or ever be read through. What was sent in private, stays between the two parties involved.

HIATUS — OVER [✓]

Apologies for the unexplained absence, things in real life have prevented me from posting as frequently as I would have liked. However, now I should be able to get back to my daily uploads! Send some asks, bother Edward- if you want to plan an RP, my dm's are always open! :)

“Mm. So—you’ve read the file.”

A faint tremor of laughter passes through him— not warm, though for a stranger with less experience than Jonathan it very well could be mistaken as such, but thin and clinical, like something being observed rather than felt. His fingers tap once against the armrest before going still.

“How diligent.”

His head tilts, cocks, just slightly, as though deciding his view of Crane.

“Yes, it is a rather tiresome little pattern, isn’t it?” His hand lifts again, restless, carving an idle shape through the air. “In, out, in, out… Arkham does so hate to let go of its favorites.”

An easy smile lingers, but it sharpens ever so slightly as his words continue falling.

“Though I must say, you phrase it so… optimistically.” A pause. A flicker of his eyes toward the notebook, the pen, the process. “Rehabilitation.”

The word sits in his mouth like something distasteful. He leans back further, settling in as if the room—and the man in it—exist purely for his entertainment.

“How reassuring. Tell me,” His gaze snaps back, focused now, intent. “Do you genuinely believe you’re here to fix me?”

This makes him pause. Not necessarily the words themselves, he's heard this same taunt a hundred times before, but way that he says it. Like its another thing to be dismissed. Like Nygma might simply roll his eyes enough times to completely remove the problem from existence. It is the tone of an arrogant man, self-assured man.

Or a stupid one.

He lets a little smile of his own finally settle into place, his mouth twisting upwards to convey his quiet amusement at this interesting little fact. Jonathan sits forward, resting his elbows on the table as he speaks, his posture casual. Relaxed.

Like they are nothing more than friends gossiping over cups of poisoned coffee.

"Oh, it is not optimism that has me saying the things that I do. I'm afraid you might have misunderstood my intentions, and my job description. I'm here to rehabilitate you, not fix you, and those are two very different things."

He gestures with the pen, waving it back and forth like a magician hypnotizing his audience, drawing vague shapes in the air to outline his point.

"I have a particular talent, you see. Of finding the core of each patient that is placed into my hands, and dropping that core into something they can let out onto the streets. But there will be no stitching, no stapling, no nails laid out- there will be nothing done to fix what you've become. If I believed such a thing where possible, they would have to drop me into a cell right next to yours."

"But things can still be rearranged. Things can still be unmade and undone. That's my specialty- pulling on threads until they unravel."

He twirls the pen around his fingers once, before turning his attention back to his notebook and writing something down.

"Your fears are holding you together, Mr. Nygma. The same goes for everyone else. I'm going to use them to tear you apart."

“Mm.”

The sound is low, thoughtful—not agreement, not quite. Something measured.

“Well… that’s already a marked improvement over your predecessors.” A faint tilt of his head, eyes narrowing just slightly. “Most insist on the delusion that I am broken.”

There’s a flicker of something there— satisfaction, perhaps—but it’s fleeting, quickly swallowed by something sharper. More possessive.

A pause.

Then—there it is—that smile again. Thin. Knowing.

“But now we arrive at the interesting part…” His gaze, now, fixes and remains fully on the other man, “You speak of fear, of rearranging, of unraveling—such confident little metaphors for a man who has yet to ask a single meaningful question.”

His head tilts the other way, studying him like a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit.

“So tell me, Doctor, what, exactly, have you observed that leads you to believe I possess anything so pedestrian as ‘fear’?”

“Or are you simply applying the same ideal to every mind unfortunate enough to sit across from you?”

Edward Nygma does not carry himself like a man in need of therapy—no, that particular indignity is reserved for lesser minds, the broken and the banal. To suggest he belongs among them is not merely incorrect—it is insulting.

The escorts he received is excessive. Laughably so.

As the door begins to shut, he spares one of the guards a thin, knowing smile—all from the purest intentions, of course. The snarl he receives in return earns nothing but quiet satisfaction. Predictable. They always are.

His tongue presses idly against the inside of his cheek as the door clicks shut.

So this is the solution Arkham has devised.

A new doctor.

How… uninspired.

At the voice, Edward’s gaze lifts—not immediately, but with deliberate delay, as though granting attention were a privilege to be earned. He studies the man behind the desk in fragments first: posture, hands, the glasses. Filing details away. Measuring.

The new one, then.

Oh, how disappointing.

A soft, audible sigh slips free as he finally turns fully, crossing the room with casual familiarity—as though he owns it, as though this is merely another stage arranged for his benefit. He lowers himself into the chair without invitation, one leg crossing neatly over the other.

“Good day, Doctor.”

The greeting is polished. Pleasant. Yet it seems that, instead of making eye contact, Edward is keen to let his gaze flick towards his own nails instead, admiring them, almost.

If there is annoyance- and there is- he likes to think that he does a good job of hiding it. Of carefully folding whatever flash of emotion threatened to cross his features, and tucking it away to be forgotten. He has grown used to this kind of situation, that kind of stare. In a hundred different contexts, and with a hundred different kinds of people, the general messaging is aways the same. Everyone likes to believe that they are unique. Special. Either through sitting above the rest, or kicking themself down beneath them.

And Jonathan has met all sorts of people all with varying levels of being able to hide that. To some, their uniqueness is just a fact of life. To others- especially those that gravitate towards the padded cells and blank uniforms of Arkham Asylum- that uniqueness is a weapon to be sharpened and wielded and waved around.

His eyebrow twitches. Of course, out of all the doctors in this facility, I would be the one to get you.

"Well, it is a good as day as any."

He takes a few moments for a categorization of his own, following Nygma's gaze down to the man's hands, and then up again to the eyes studying them. Having found whatever it was that he was looking for, Jonathan turns away, not bothering to give Nygma any more attention than what he is legally obligated to give. He picks up his pen again, and flips to a blank page in his notebook.

"My name is Doctor Jonathan Crane. I'll be your psychiatrist during your stay with us, and throughout your rehabilitation."

"Typically, this would be the part of the introduction where I would ask how the asylum has been treating you. But, it is my understanding that you've been a patient here several times before, so I won't continue to stomp through grounds that have already been well treaded."

"Instead, I suppose we can skip to the more interesting parts. Like why you're here..."

His eyes flicker upwards.

"...again."

“Mm. So—you’ve read the file.”

A faint tremor of laughter passes through him— not warm, though for a stranger with less experience than Jonathan it very well could be mistaken as such, but thin and clinical, like something being observed rather than felt. His fingers tap once against the armrest before going still.

“How diligent.”

His head tilts, cocks, just slightly, as though deciding his view of Crane.

“Yes, it is a rather tiresome little pattern, isn’t it?” His hand lifts again, restless, carving an idle shape through the air. “In, out, in, out… Arkham does so hate to let go of its favorites.”

An easy smile lingers, but it sharpens ever so slightly as his words continue falling.

“Though I must say, you phrase it so… optimistically.” A pause. A flicker of his eyes toward the notebook, the pen, the process. “Rehabilitation.”

The word sits in his mouth like something distasteful. He leans back further, settling in as if the room—and the man in it—exist purely for his entertainment.

“How reassuring. Tell me,” His gaze snaps back, focused now, intent. “Do you genuinely believe you’re here to fix me?”

Starter for @i-will-always-remain

Doctor Jonathan Crane sits in his office, staring at the newest arrival on his ever-growing list of patients on his list. This one. Edward. The Riddler. Or whatever it was that he called himself.

A small newton's cradle taps away on his desk. Back and forth. Back and forth. Tap. Tap. Tap. The sound is in time with the clock that he had just recent fine-tuned and reset. Tap, tap, tap, in sync with every second that ticked by. He knows that, at some point, one will run out of momentum and the other will need to be tuned again. Because there is no such thing as perpetual motion, and Arkham can only afford to give its doctors shitty clocks.

But, for now, they are in sync.

And, for now, all of Jonathan's problems are small ones. Like the paper work that he has yet to file. Like the annoyance that is slowly creeping into every aspect of his life. Like this new patient who he does not have the time nor the patience to entertain. Small things. Things that don't matter.

Slowly, as he watches the guards close the door behind them, Jonathan sets down the pen he had been fiddling with. He never understood the point of the guards, aside from allowing them to pretend like there is something of value in their lives. Aside from waiting the asylum's money and time. Aside from...- he pushes up his glasses.

Tap tap tap.

He reaches out to stop the swinging, dropping the both of them into silence.

"Welcome in, Mr. Nygma. Please, do take a seat."