Hong Lu's EGO analysis n⁰4: Roseate Desire
Hello, everyone, once again! And today we shall attack another EGO of Hong Lu and this time, it's Roseate Desire, and interesting EGO which is retrospect does foreshadow a lot of things for the two sinners who have this EGO, Hong Lu and Ishmael!
If we talked last time about Hong Lu's role as the Jade of Hongyuan multiples times through the lens of several EGOs, now we are going to talk about another facets of his character, themes such as autonomy and the self.
I think those are extremely important themes around the character of Hong Lu and Ishmael as well.
Now, let's start this analysis!
To begin with, the Roseate Desire EGO is extracted from the abnormality Pink shoes. As the name suggests, Pink shoes are a glossy pink pair of high-heeled slippers who possesses those who wear them. It also targets its enemies with pink ribbons that are said to be alive as well.
Its risk level is unknown, and based on the EGO and other possessed people, Pink shoes seem to have a sin affinity with lust. So, this abnormality ties with the sin of lust...
As we know, lust can have many definitions. Inside the game, it is said that it is "an obsession to spread a fragrnent of what forms the self. A desire to propagate, to breed" and the idea of sharing "one's knowledge, one's ideas, to invite others into gaining the understanding of a sliver of oneself. " Of course, it doesn't strictly limit to that, and that was exactly what Hohenheim said, too.
So lust can also be described as the loss of self-control due to seeking out positive experiences. It is a craving that someone can have and that begins to rule that person because of its intensity.
And that's basically what's Pink shoes is about, right?
Despite not having much information about them, we do know that they possess people with their pink ribbons which are alive according to the observation log. They instill desire into people to wear them and control them through that desire, never letting them go.
Moreover, Pink shoes is related to the abnormality named Red Shoes who acts similar to Pink shoes but in a more violent way as it has sharp teeth which bites into the skin of the wearer. And Red shoes comes from the fairy tale named identically.
"In that story, After her mother dies, Karen is adopted by a rich old woman and becomes vain, especially about a pair of red shoes. Though told not to, she wears them to church, and after a strange soldier praises them, they begin to compel her to dance. Later, when her adoptive mother dies, Karen chooses a dance over the funeral, and the shoes fully curse her, forcing her to dance without rest. An angel condemns her, and in despair she has her feet cut off, yet the shoes keep dancing before her. She tries twice to return to church, but each time the red shoes block her way. At last, she stays home, sincerely repents, and prays for mercy. The angel returns, forgives her, and Karen dies in peace, her soul going to Heaven."
So, what's about it? Now that we presented this abnormality, how does it correspond with Ishmael but most specifically Hong Lu? That's what we're going to see next
To start with, for both Ishmael and Hong Lu, the EGO's risk level is TETH, indicating the same degree of importance for both. Of course, the sin affinity is lust for both once again, which is not really much surprising given the abnormality this EGO comes from. Now, what's surprising is what their sin ressources, well for Hong Lu.
If wrath seems logical for Ishmael as wrath in-game is described as "the nature of fire is to burn and burn until there is nothing left to be burned", with Hong Lu completing it by saying "I see. So they're quite literally burning with rage." Of course, wrath can mean something else, as it lies on an injustice that one wants settle by his own hands, to stand up and bring justice to what one would consider unfair.
Which is the case for Ishmael, who from the day Ahab led everyone to their death, manipulating each one of them to willingly sacrifice for Ahab's conquest against the Pallid Whale which resulted poorly, she felt an injustice and so a vengeance. Ishmael refuses that reality and wants to enact vengeance on Ahab.
But for Hong Lu, it is envy, which is a bit surprising, so how do you analyze that? Well, we did so back then with Soda Hong Lu so, here it might be similar to what I wrote which was the desire and envy of being free, of being able to escape the grasp of the Elders. Or, it can be that Hong Lu's character underwent slight changements since season 1 but major ones because the important foreshadowing and twists are already present in Roseate Desire Hong Lu, and it's the same for Ishmael
When looking at both, we can see that Ishmael has her right eye covered by the pink bandages while being trapped by them as well. Her left eye is pink, showing some kind of possession from the EGO. It symbolizes her blind obsession with her being trapped in by her own desire of vengeance.
That desire is overwhelming her to the point that she is being controlled by it, and so controlled by Pink shoes, and she is becoming blind to it. Interestingly, she still has her feet on the grounds
While Hong Lu, instead of human hands, seems to have a sort of mechanical gauntlet resembling the hands of a bear? He is also tied up by pink ribbons around his legs, arms, and stomach. But what's more interesting is the fact that his mouth is covered and that his left eye, the camera, the jade is not pink like his right one, strange, right?
And that's here that I said that Hong Lu's character was not as much changed as one might think. The twist with his jade eye seems to always be there with how her left eye is not pink and still jade, showing its importance but also its weirdness and specialty, foreshadowing the twist of her left eye being a camera.
Moreover, the fact that his mouth is being covered, shows how Hong Lu was trapped and forced to only watch, to only witness and not stand back. It also symbolizes his role of being the Jade of Hongyuan. He is not able to defend himself at all, being trapped in all those pink ribbons.
As we know, in hindsight, Hong Lu is a victim of the abuse of the Elders and Jia Mu, who caused him so much harm. Mainly a victim of non-contact csa (child sexual abuse), which is sexual abuse of a child without physical touching.
It can include many things such as making a child watch sexual acts, which is the case for Hong Lu with the Kong's family massacre with the Cuckoospawns Humans...
So, the fact that his mouth is covered also symbolizes how often victims are silenced or forced to be shut by their abusers, to not say a word. Worse, the victim itself decides to just not say anything because they feel that it is worthless and no one will help them or hear them, and it's once again the case here.
Hong Lu has been forced to shut and accepted that no one will come here to save him, no one will hear him and if someone comes to try help him, it will only be useless (Xiren). He has been forced to see the entire Kong family be massacred, and Cuckoospawns forced their eggs into the wombs of humans.
To be more exact, "Black-feathered cuckoos pecking humans apart, seizing their nests, forcing their eggs inside… and newborns, tearing their way out to the world through their stomachs" like said by Lord Lu
So, because of that, desperation came, and he simply gave up on putting up any resistance, standing up, and even talking, hence explaining why his mouth was covered. Isn't it why he is wrath fatal, like Ishmael? If Ishmael is getting overriden by wrath to the point it rules her, Hong Lu lack of resistance shows an absence of that wrath that he simply gave up.
To add on to that, the pink ribbons are also attached around his stomach, which is different from Ishmael, where those ribbons aren't there. They represent Hong Lu's trauma, as we already mentioned Hong Lu seeing people raped by Cuckoospawns Humans whose offspring tear through the stomachs of people. That trauma is SO intense that it reverberates in many of his EGOs...
Finally, unlike Ishmael who stands on her two feet, Hong Lu is off balance on one feet which stands for how he isn't in control, rather he is being manipulated with, controlled while Ishmael isn't totally in control as they are external factors to her wrath, she's still have some autonomy that she also ends up losing control due being blind to her wrathful desire.
Indeed, autonomy and the self are important themes of this EGO, and that's on what we will have to focus now with explaining in more depth the sin affinity lust.
As a reminder, while there can be other interpretations of the sin of lust, what game said about it are this, so what I said previously:
"An obsession to spread a fragrnent of what forms the self. A desire to propagate, to breed."
"To share one's knowledge, one's ideas, to invite others into gaining the understanding of a sliver of oneself..."
Which does describe perfectly how Hong Lu is entangled by lust, not willingly but forcefully. Isn't that how Jia Mu and the Xianren did to Hong Lu? Just look at his name, Jia Baoyu, whose in-game is said to be "a culmination of wishes" of not only those of his parents, but those of many more.
Since his childhood, Hong Lu has been forced to be that "culmination of wishes" to have external desires (Xianren & Jia Mu especially) imposed on him.
Not only that, the Xianren and Jia Mu do have a certain obsession with spreading a fragment of themselves in Hong Lu and share their ideas and knowledge into him. Especially how Jia Mu wanted him to be indifferent to the notions of life and death and fulfill his worth...
To suffering altogether as well and only witness though the Xianren did enjoy seeing Hong Lu crying...
In doing so, they share their self into Hong Lu through their perverted wishes and hedonistic pleasures that they formed, forcing Hong Lu to become the jade of Hongyuan.
Therefore, Hong Lu is losing his own autonomy. He does not control himself anymore and is rather possessed by those external desires without having any control or any way to retaliate.
But that loss of autonomy is not only forced but also voluntarily from the victim because Hong Lu decided to surrender completely, abandoning his emotions while wanting to simply float away, to escape from this world. And so, there is a form of pleasure, not hedonistic, but to be able to simply let go for Hong Lu, to simply float away.
That pleasure is like a sort of freedom, in letting go of everything, in not caring at all. He sees it as a positive and seeks it. So that behavior can be considered as lustful, though relatively...
