Urius

°•he/void/they•° 21 INFJ-T || 9w1

[hairscare]

the way fandoms are desperate to make all aroace characters romance and sex favorable but then dont do anything remotely similar to any other identity is astounding. hmm i wonder why

PLEASE dont derail this about shipping characters of other identities please let this one post be about an aroace struggle

[feluka]

"Jumpy, have you ever heard the name, [Goncharov]?"

-Goncharov... Can't say it rings a bell. Is that some sort of scientist?

"It's a movie, actually. About the Italian mob. Goncharov is the eponymous protagonist."

-Hang on a second, Italian? I thought Goncharov was a Russian name.

"Well, yes. But the movie takes place in Italy. That's not important right now. What's strange about this movie is, although it was supposedly released in 1973, it only gained attention in 2022."

-Almost five decades later... marketing really flubbed that one, huh?

"That's not it. The movie doesn't exist."

-Wait, what? What do you mean it doesn't exist?

"It never did. There was never a movie called Goncharov. Only one day in 2022 the internet started talking about it as if it was real. As if everyone had already seen it."

-That... that has to be a prank, right? I mean it wouldn't be the first time the internet took a liking to spreading lies, would it?

"That's true. Especially on tumblr, where the phenomenon originated. But what if there's more to it? What if the knowledge of that movie was "plucked" from some alternative timeline where the movie was critically acclaimed, and "transmitted" to our timeline through fields invisible to the naked eye?"

-C'mon. That's insane. Isn't it way more likely that tumblr was, y'know, being tumblr?

"Maybe. But isn't it strange that the name of the movie, its director, its cast of characters, the actors playing them, and the year of its release was unanimously agreed upon by one of the most inconsistent and chaotic blogging websites out there?"

-Th... that's...

"I'm not done yet. Not only that, but the events of story, the relationships between the characters, interviews with the cast, audio recordings of the movie score, fandom discourse, and multiple gifsets of the movie footage started appearing on everyone's dashboards. And none of the information contradicted each other."

-!

-(Could that really be? A movie that was transmitted to the public consciousness from another timeline...?)

[rainbow-taishi]

Moon Carver and Mountain Shaper gijinka

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

When discussing or analyzing Dazai, one thing I hope you will keep in mind when reading anything I write about him is that from my perspective, he is always, always both.

What do I mean by this? Well, I find there tends to be a general split among people who hold the opinion that "he's a manipulator and will always be manipulative" and "he's doing his best to be good and helpful and live up to Oda's last wishes for him", of which, neither is completely right - because he is both. But even among the people who hold to this dual-nature interpretation, I find that his individual actions and motivations still tend to be thought of in a dichotomous manner - is it manipulative, or genuine?

Again, I think it's always both.

Dazai has a very pragmatic view on a lot of things - he is always looking for the usefulness of things and people so that the situation turns out in his favour. He's incredibly adept at this, and his prediction and placement and careful reveals are all manipulation tactics to get his allies and enemies doing exactly what he needs them to. I don't think anyone can contest this since we see it over and over in the series.

But that's not all there is to it. He's not solely manipulative and he does, to some extent, sympathize with others - I think there are several instances of this in the series, but I want to stress that this has been apparent since Chapter 1!

For context, Dazai is recalling what Atsushi said to him a few minutes earlier, but it's very interesting that it should be this specific part of the conversation. He could've flashed back to the part where Atsushi said he had nowhere to go; no money, no food - he is about to trick him into joining, after all, and this is the key piece he uses to basically force Atsushi into the Agency. But instead it's Atsushi's self-deprecation that catches his attention, and it really does, because even during the conversation, he turns to look at him after he says this with an odd expression.

You could say that this makes Atsushi easier to manipulate, if that's your angle, but that can't be solely it, because in the later conversation with Hirotsu, we know Dazai was planning to bring Atsushi into the Agency and set him up as one half of the new Double Black the moment he met him. The panel shown there is the riverbank, set much earlier in the day than this scene. He was already planning to pair him with Akutagawa since he figured out he was the tiger, so what's with this reaction?

Well. Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best.

He manipulated Atsushi into joining with the intention of utilizing him in his future plans. He also helped him and gave him a place to belong, and importantly, he likes this kid! It's both.

I think much of it might be that his brain just kinda works way too fast - he's such a natural at crafting these elaborate plots and seeing how things connect and gathering useful people like resources that it's practically automatic - though this is not a great means when you're trying to be a kinder person. There's an omake, I believe, that has him saying "I like using my head for justice", i.e. using these underhanded means to act for the better. Not great, but those are the kind of gifts he has. He's way more suited to exploitation, but is choosing to use these tactics to save people now, which is quite reminiscent of what he tells Kyouka. Kyouka's talents lie in killing people - when what you're good at isn't who you want to be, what do you do? Well, I expect you use what you have, even if it's not ideal.

Now, about the current situation with Sigma - I think he definitely likes him, and is intrigued by him and his situation. We did get a little thought bubble where the guy amusedly compares him to Atsushi, and you can't tell me he doesn't care about Atsushi (listen to the onsen drama cd, or read 55 Minutes if you somehow don't believe me). But also, it's undeniable that Sigma is in a very vulnerable position of being homeless and having had no one be genuinely kind to him before. His trust is very easy to earn, and with the latest chapter, Dazai has now saved his life multiple times. There is, as always, a practical purpose he needs him for. And I have to be somewhat amused because Dazai is quite literally telling Sigma everything he ever wanted and needed to hear. It's a brilliant means of quickly endearing himself to Sigma - but I don't think that's all it is.

Look. The most honest moments we get in this series from Dazai are, interestingly for an expert manipulator, when people are at their most vulnerable. In spite of every pointlessly cruel act he inflicted on Akutagawa, his first meeting with him was open and transparent; much like the orphanage director, it seems he thought this treatment would make him strong and adaptable (he's wrong but that's not the point of this). He cuts Kyouka off in irritation and says "don't give me that" when she implies that she would fail the entrance exam. He tells Atsushi it's normal to cry after losing a father figure and to feel however you feel, even if that person caused you nothing but incredible pain and cannot be forgiven. He refuses to entertain Sigma's assumptions that Dazai sees himself as a superior being to him.

Selective honesty can also be utilized to great effect; Mori does this, and undoubtedly it serves this purpose for Dazai too. But I want to stress that I do sincerely believe this is all still honesty from him. Manipulation, or genuine?

Both. It's both.

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

When I think a little too hard about Teruko telling Tachihara "It's like you were born for infiltration missions!" compared to Hirotsu telling him "You are Mafia among Mafia... all should model themselves after you." and how Tachihara wanted to become someone with his own individuality separate from merely a shadow of his brother or his brother's polar opposite, I think it makes a lot of sense that he ultimately chose the Mafia, despite his attachment to both them and the Hunting Dogs.

It's not that Teruko said anything wrong in this scene (in fact, her rationale is extremely pragmatic), but being told he's born for infiltration implies he's born to "shift" into whatever his orders command him to become, and so he does not have a definable sense of self. He's constantly under orders to be someone else. But in the Mafia, even though he was supposedly acting, he became so assured in this persona he took on and developed such strong bonds with Hirotsu and Gin and Higuchi, that not only did he grow more secure in that position, but he also became a person that others in the Mafia should and would aspire to be.

In a way it's kind of a neat twist on the "becoming the mask" trope, where Tachihara became his mask because it was probably the most stable sense of identity he's had.

It's intriguing also, in that it somewhat defies Fyodor's assertion that detachment makes the powerful - he's adamant Sigma is such a formidable opponent because Sigma is the furthest you can get from the rest of the world, ostracized even further than himself and Dazai. But Tachihara was distanced from the Hunting Dogs during his infiltration, and from his reactions to the team's shenanigans, he obviously isn't as used to their antics as he is to, say, Higuchi's. He spent more time with the Black Lizards. He developed deeper bonds with them.

If he hadn't been sent to infiltrate, then it is very likely he would've found his identity with the Hunting Dogs, but because that wasn't the case, he reasserts his position as a mafioso.

Our connections with others strengthen our sense of self. Sigma was desperate, but ultimately, he was lost. The moment it became apparent he couldn't save the one thing he had, all the fight went out of him. It's Tachihara who found himself and his drive in that chapter, through the bonds he made with others, and a new resolve.

[deadnaoya]

the manga hunting dogs uniforms in bones color omg 😭

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

Chapter 105.5 Thoughts: Control, Manipulation and Partnership

Or, how Chuuya is actually the most qualified character to land a victory over Dostoevsky.

I just want to preface this with: I think Chuuya has woken from the brainwashing. We can't see his eyes, he's holding his hat again, and look at the progression of his face and expression from the last few chapters with him (these are in order btw from left to right).

I'm not completely sure how he did this, but I chalk a lot of it up to sheer stubborn determination on Chuuya's part, mostly because it's funny and he was clearly fighting back before Dazai's speech. However, I find it likely the speech did contain some kind of code - others have pointed out how "Goodbye!" might be a reference to the original author's last unfinished book and we know skk's codenames for things generally are based off their real counterparts' works so, maybe he'd already broken out of it, maybe there was something in there that gave him the final push - who knows at this point honestly? Either way, it means Chuuya had the capacity to break out of the vampire curse on his own and that's incredibly funny to me for many reasons but mostly:

Fyodor: "Bold of you to assume Chuuya's ability can't overcome flooding."

Dazai: "Bold of you to assume Chuuya's personality can't overcome brainwashing."

But really, this highlights something interesting here, both in what Chuuya's role is ultimately intended to be in this arc, and in the way Fyodor and Dazai manipulate and value others in very different ways.

I've said it before but it bears repeating: we already know that Fyodor is an excellent long-term planner, while Dazai is effectively able to counter him because Dazai shifts into thinking like his opponent. They're foil characters for a reason; they're both highly intelligent, manipulative, and willing to play the long game for the sake of winning against their opponent.

Thing is, I also stand by the idea that personality-wise, they're not similar at all - and that has serious implications for the people they are connected with. The build-up to the prison escape arc really highlights this. Some examples:

Chapter 46: Fyodor believes that all people are sinful and foolish and that his goal is to remove sin. Dazai believes that all people are sinful and foolish but asks what's so wrong with that.

Chapter 64: They decide to have a "super-happy chit-chat" about their problems. Dazai's solution to Fyodor's issue with his lazy subordinates is to get them to think lazing around is a bad thing so they will put in effort of their own. Fyodor's solution to Dazai being unable to woo the waitress is to isolate her from her job, house and family so that she can only rely on Dazai.

Chapter 77: Fyodor believes god is perfection and harmony, and thus that the people capable of change are the superior ones with most control. Dazai believes god is the accidental and illogical and believes it is the ordinary people who fight and live in that uncertainty who create the greatest change.

So, what's happening here? Fyodor's manipulation is shown to be very exacting and direct. He leaves no room for error and regards people on a hierarchy - God above all, himself as a servant of God's will, and the sinful and foolish humans he has little regard for. Dazai's manipulation involves manipulation of the situation, and is often indirect. It involves people coming to the conclusion he intends for them to on their own. And from his later dialogue with Sigma, we see he doesn't regard the world in that same kind of hierarchy.

Now, look at the way Fyodor picks an item and Dazai picks a person when starting the game. Look at the way Fyodor refers to Chuuya respectfully but brainwashes him entirely and mocks Dazai for not being worthy of "using" his ability. Look at the way Dazai is a complete ass to Chuuya but ultimately lets him make his own choices (begging people to take note of that moment in Stormbringer where Dazai cuts himself off to correct his referring to Corruption as Arahabaki's true power to Chuuya's true power).

So, the actual strength Dazai has over Dostoevsky then, is not really his strength at all, it's the strength of others and their choice and willpower to act in the way they believe is best. It's the only means of getting a leg up on Dostoevsky, otherwise they will continue to go around and around in circles forever.

And Chuuya is the best candidate for finally throwing Fyodor off his game.

Firstly, let's just establish something: no matter how mad he is at Dazai, he's not going to side with Fyodor, not willingly. Fyodor threatened the Mafia in the Cannibalism arc by attacking Mori, first of all. I doubt he's forgiven him for that. Secondly, Fyodor embodies everything Chuuya can't stand about Dazai, at the very least, younger Dazai - the manipulation, the lack of consideration and connection with others, the callousness and lack of regard for life.

Well, perhaps he's not quite as irritating. +1 point for Dostoevsky I guess?

But lastly, it is more advantageous for Chuuya at this point to help fight against Fyodor, especially since most of the Mafia has been vampirized by his organization. Helping the Agency stop the terrorist plot will help the Mafia by extension by undoing that. And we know from Stormbringer that no matter how much Chuuya is personally hurt, he considers taking out the threat to his people a higher priority. Always.

(You could make the argument that he was told whatever Teruko told Atsushi and decided to join, but not only do I find this wildly out of character, but if that was the case then there would've been no reason to brainwash him.)

That said, I don't think this was preemptive "Dazai's master plan #3057", and in fact, I stand by the idea that Dazai had no idea Chuuya was going to be in the prison. It is very, very important to me that for the rest of this arc, no matter what Chuuya does, that his actions are his own. Not Fyodor's, not Dazai's, but his. And not just because I hate that he's being controlled right now and that freedom of choice has always been important for Chuuya.

But because it makes narrative sense.

The vampires are a bit silly, yes, but they represent the way Fyodor and Fukuchi think - humanity will commit atrocities. They cannot be trusted to make their own decisions. They want to make a world that is free by... mind-controlling people so their plans work without a hitch. In short, they choose, on behalf of others, to sacrifice human autonomy for peace. So, if we are going to turn this arc around, we need to have characters breaking out of that control and thinking for themselves, in spite of the uncertainty of the outcome.

We already see this with Atsushi in the last chapter! He finally takes initiative and makes that choice to leave the room when he doesn't exactly know what the right thing to do is. And this is also why I don't think Teruko is wholly convinced by the DoA either - she lets him go. She gives him the freedom to choose what he does with that information.

Another one of the focus characters here is Sigma. Sigma is a guy who has no past, whose humanity is questioned, who keeps being used by organizations for his valuable ability, who has no home but desperately wants one... oh wait. Remind you of anyone's younger self? This could go one of two ways: Chuuya fails to assert his autonomy, leaving Sigma to learn from that failure, or, Chuuya succeeds in asserting his autonomy, leaving Sigma to learn from his success.

I think it, by necessity, has to be the latter. Sigma's at a tipping point right now, and I think seeing someone try to assert their freedom only to fail would damage him greatly. And I think it's a waste of Chuuya's character honestly.

Chuuya needs to assert his autonomy in this arc. Not just for thematic reasons but because I can think of no one else who can effectively break the "super-genius stalemate".

I keep hearing "Dazai knows Chuuya" in response to Fyodor calling their bond shallow, and that is absolutely true! But Chuuya also knows Dazai. Incredibly well. Odasaku knew Dazai's soul, but Chuuya knows Dazai's mind, knows his strategies and ways of thinking without even needing words. What's more, Chuuya has thrown off Dazai before and done what he didn't expect him to.

Which is nifty, because Dazai and Fyodor think a lot alike. Chuuya is in a unique position to thwart Dostoevsky because he may actually be able to predict him to a degree. Chuuya can absolutely land a victory against him, and it's excellent because it would be completely unexpected to Fyodor, who apparently thinks Chuuya's strength lies only in what his ability has to offer and not much else.

But listen. This also can't be skk's plan. I need Chuuya to sideline both of them. Both for the sweet, sweet catharsis of putting those two idiot geniuses in their places and also because I need Dazai to have screwed up. He wasn't wrong about people making their own choices in uncertainty. People need to assert their autonomy to create change. Dazai can't be wrong in this regard.

But with going ahead with the trap to drown Fyodor despite also having to drown Chuuya when he promised not to let him get killed... this needs to have been a mistake, otherwise the value of Dazai's emotional speech to him is diminished.

I want Dazai to try to laugh it off. I want him to say he always knew Chuuya would escape and then for Chuuya to deck him because "no, the fuck you didn't".

I really think Dazai hoped Chuuya would make it. Do remember that Chuuya was one of the first reasons young Dazai decided to try giving life a chance. The fact that he flashbacked to all his key memories with Chuuya says a lot. But his survival was no guarantee and it seemed very unlikely.

So, Chuuya is faced with the fact that Dazai nearly sacrificed him to kill Dostoevsky and save his new Agency friends.

And I hope he finally gets mad. I hope he finally expresses hurt on his own behalf for once. I hope they are forced to break their status quo that they have carefully maintained by not talking about anything ever. I hope they are pushed to uncomfortable places and that it is Chuuya who finally spurs this development.

Let Chuuya break the stalemate between Dazai and Dostoevsky. Let him shatter the status quo that him and Dazai have kept going for year after year.

Autonomous action in the face of uncertainty is necessary for change.

[psodtqueer]

this is so amazing oh my god I love this and I need this to happen RIGHT NOW

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

Genuinely don't think I've seen anyone talk about chapter 25 as a pivotal moment for Dazai so I'm gonna put this out here because I think his reactions here kind of negate that whole omnipotent Dazai interpretation which I hate with every fibre of my being.

Firstly, he's like, clearly caught off guard here. And don't try to tell me he wasn't, because this is just one instance of his genuinely horrified reaction to Q's release and when he realized what was actually going on with Atsushi, Naomi and Haruno.

Him being caught off guard carries significance here because you'd never catch him screwing up this bad later in the series - which is exactly my point.

I wrote a post earlier about how I don't think Dazai really is very much like Mori or Fyodor at all, and I stand by that, because their motives are different. Tldr for that post: Mori and Fyodor are ambitious and proactive, while Dazai is empty/numb and reactive.

What this leads me to believe is that Dazai is less a chess master like those two and more of a contingency planner - he's so good at "predicting" because he is uncannily good at thinking like his opponent and then planning for literally any possibility under the sun he can come up with. He's no gambler. Everything and everyone is practically (and unknowingly) micromanaged. It's almost paranoid in a sense, and I definitely think it's a trauma response to something he went through that we don't know about yet - after all, he was more than capable of this before he even met Mori.

...which brings to me to Mori's influence here. It's straight up like Dazai forgot how willing Mori is to gamble huge risks for a good outcome. It's like he forgot the mafia could be a real threat to his best-laid plans.

Going to throw out a wild claim here that I don't think is actually all that baseless - I think it's widely assumed that Dazai molds himself to what he needs to be (true!) but I think this misses the idea that he is also easily influenced by the mindsets of the people around him (see: the difference between Entrance Exam Dazai and early manga Dazai, the whole "the longer he was in the mafia the darker and more incomprehensible he became" thing from Stormbringer, how dark his eyes get in the prison sections with Fyodor, etc.). I could go on, but for the sake of not making this post too much longer, let's assume this is true because it suddenly makes sense as to why he failed to predict Q but predicted other events much later that were inherently more difficult to predict:

He was in the wrong mindset. He was thinking like an Agency member, and dare I say, he even got a little complacent. He started to get used to not having to manipulate every last variable - he was removed from a toxic environment - only for Mori to pretty much instantly fuck that up in one scene.

Let's also not forget what happened the last time he miscalculated Mori's intentions.

The consequences of this blunder could've been a lot worse and he knows it.

In his mind, thinking like an ADA member wasn't good enough to stop a potentially awful outcome - awful outcomes that could bring him pain. So, he goes back to what he knows - think like the demon prodigy. Think like Mori. Later on, think like Dostoyevsky. Because it seems to me that he believes as long as he is still working for the light that it doesn't matter if he uses these horrifically manipulative and inhumane methods of getting there. But he is wrong. Darkness within the context of good intentions is still very much darkness, and it hurts people all the same.

In the very next chapter, Dazai arranges Ango's car accident. And he only gets worse and worse throughout the series as he regresses back into his paranoid darkness that manifests as this omnipotent facade - his safety net that ultimately prevents him from developing in a positive, more human direction.

[linklethehistorian]

“The Storm” — A BSD Manga Chapter 95 Theory

Alright, so…this little meta article is probably going to be a lot less professional and more ramble-y than my standard fair, because I’m doing this off-the-cuff and not writing it and re-writing over a matter of days or weeks or months, as I usually do, but nevertheless, I want to talk about it because, although some might find it unlikely, I personally feel there is more than enough merit to the idea to put it out there, even if it later turns out to be wrong.

The rest of this will be under the cut due to spoilers for the manga up to Chapter 95 (and maybe a few chapters after that, just to be safe?) of the BSD manga, along with spoilers for the light novels Fifteen and its sequel, Storm Bringer (and maybe a small bit of 55 Minutes), so yes, bare that in mind before you proceed. 

Lees verder

[nostalgialied-deactivated202301]

The Project Arahabaki; Analysis/Theory

“In basic terms, you could say that only the human soul can use the energy of a skill. That’s where a French researcher decided to use a cloned body combined with a persona model to make the skill think it was human and had a soul. […] They were successful—terrifyingly so. And born from their research was the spy and skill user Verlaine: a skill with a personality and the ability to manipulate gravity from a singularity. A few years went by until those of us in Japan got our hands on the French research paper and tried to create a skill singularity using the same method. And that was Project Arahabaki.”

First let’ts start with the information we got in Fifteen: the military facility was researching “how to combine skills with living beings”, “artificial skills”, and the Project Arahabaki was called Prototype A-2-5-8. When the Arahabaki incident occurred the whole facility was destroyed. Then comes Stormbringer and we discover that Arahabaki is actually a singularity, but not only that, because as N repeats several times, Arahabaki is a mere copy of Verlaine’s singularity.

“This is The Secret of the Gentle Forest! This is what Rimbaud removed from the files to protect you! It’s how we turn you back into your true form! […] Even the god Arahabaki is a mere knock-off of you. You are the first living singularity to ever exist. You are the mythic beast that came from this world’s very origins. Your creator named you after the mirror image of the malevolent god, the original demon: Demonic Beast Guivre.”

So Japan managed to get access to the files regarding Verlaine’s creation, a singularity weapon, and tried to do the very same thing by following the manual left by Verlaine’s creator, Pan, even without knowing what was written in the last chapter (it’s implied that N only got access to the information regarding the Secret of the Gentle Forest because he got his hands on Rimbaud’s diary (that later got stolen by Dazai. Who ripped the page? Probably N because he is that petty), but that would only be possible after the Arahabaki incident that destroyed the whole military facility).

“You should know the title The Secret of the Gentle Forest. It was the title of the last chapter in Pan’s manual for creating artificial skills.”

And that’s where it all goes back and around Pan and his mysterious and honestly terrifying ability.

Lees verder

[videogamelover99]

One theory going around is that Sigma is based on Sergey Nikolaevich Syromyatnikov, a Russian journalist, whose presudonym was "Sigma". I know all the info on him is in Russian, with no English sources in sight, so if anybody wants me to recap his wiki page, idk, yell at me.

[psodtqueer]

YELLS AT YOU SO HARD please recap his wiki page I need to know who this man is

[evercelle]

i feel my heart shake, come ease this ache

[dl4draws]

we’ll meet again

[xingqiusleftearring]

another one (no thank you)

[runescratch]

“Should the day ever come where we are not together, you will continue to shine like gold in my memories.”

my entry for the heart of bedrock contest on twitter!! 

[ceniwen]

Guardian Yakshas, family.

[wes-laye]

Big Brosacius and Xiao