omega4omega rabbot….just thinking about omega4omega rabbot….
imagine jack in the army as an omega. he had to prove himself every day. and then there was robby, who had to defend his status as adamson’s protege, and eventual successor, every single shift. they both hadto justify every decision, every reaction, every emotional moment.
after a couple of months of working together, they realized that they both go up to the roof to breakdown. they can’t do it on the floor. everyone would smell it. everyone would know. everyone would judge.
neither had ever been close to another omega their age before. male omegas weren’t exactly common, and especially weren’t prevalent in the fields they chose. they assumed their closeness came from that.
only omega friends didn’t scent each other the way they did. omega friends didn’t touch each other’s necks. omega friends didn’t wind up at each other’s homes in a heat-fogged frenzy.
robby helped jack through the worst of it, knowing how painful it could be alone. he didn’t know if it would all be ruined after this, so he took his time, really enjoyed it.
jack knew he was overstepping demanding robby’s company like this, but his instincts carried him closer to the man nonetheless. he tried to burn the memories into his mind, because surely this could never happen again.
only it happened again when robby went into heat the following week. and then it happened again when they were drunk the next month. and then it happened when they were stone cold sober and completely themselves.
I hope the studio execs at Netflix decide to drop the "a Knives Out Mystery" cause it doesn't make any goddamn sense and at this point everyone knows who Benoit Blanc is. It should be "a Benoit Blanc Mystery" like God (Rian Johnson) intended!
Pantalone Analysis II: The Abyss, a Devil’s Mask, and Mora as a Catalyst for Alchemy
A short while ago, I theorized that Pantalone’s “unique understanding of wealth” stems from the fact that he's more interested in Mora as the catalyst for alchemy than in Mora for money's sake. The visuals in his new countdown video have me more convinced than ever.
The card explicitly aligns him with the Hanged Man reversed, which is connected to alchemy, transcendence, and action (i.e. catalyst)
The Mora in the animation looks molten; it seems liquefied, like the lifeblood of the world or gold within a crucible
The Globus Cruciger connects Pantalone to antimony, used in alchemy to purify gold, and we see his eye overtake the coin
Then there's the coin toss itself, which recalls the Disenchantment in Deep Shadow set. Discussing an ambition "greater than the world" amidst a clash between primordial venom and primal light, it says:
It was almost as if someone had stayed the hand of fate itself, forcing coin toss after coin toss until the desired outcome was reached. Or perhaps, only through upheaval at the periphery can certain possibilities pass through layer upon layer of constraint, and be captured and brought into being by a plan most absurd.
The Disenchantment set is about forbidden alchemical experiments and the search for the secrets of the world. I think this set establishes a parallel to the partnership between Dottore and Pantalone. Where the former uses the primal power of the Light Realm, my sense is that Pantalone will harness the primordial resentment of the Abyss. Two sides of the same coin, joined in their effort to overthrow Fate.
Pattern Impact
The Hanged Man, alchemy, and hands reaching upward are motifs that have recurred all year. Given that all three appear in Pantalone's new short, I'm increasingly seeing a connection between these themes and the partnership between Pantalone and Dottore.
With the Globus Cruciger essay, I wanted to highlight how Pantalone is more than an extension of Dottore. He has his own ambitions and their partnership is based on mutual benefit. As Pantalone tells the Traveler:
Neither he nor I are tolerated by the rules of this world. We were both searching for a new order... Our ideas of the final form that should take may have differed, but our journeys took a shared path.
I'm wondering if alchemy is their shared path and light versus abyssal energy is where they differ. If Pantalone provides the catalyst of Mora, perhaps Dottore provides the Elixir that protects him from the side-effects of tampering with the Abyss. Hard to erode yourself when you're literally fixed in time, after all...
The Hanged Man
In Qiqi’s recent Witch’s Homework, Barbeloth tells us the Hanged Man:
symbolizes transcendence and waiting, and also detachment from the everyday world.
I've rambled about Dottore's connection to the Hanged Man, but this is the first time we're seeing the link explicitly extended to Pantalone.
The deliberate inversion of the background on the end card makes me fairly confident that my reading of Pantalone as being inextricably tied to alchemy is not entirely out-of-pocket.
Once again, the game sets Pantalone up as Dottore's mirror. As in the commedia dell'arte, they are foils for each other. Given that Pantalone is upright while his background is upside-down, we can read his card as The Hanged Man Reversed, which can signify:
awakening
a change on the horizon
action after a long period of being stuck or paused
One reading is that the upside-down background represents the end of Pantalone's suspension of time with the Elixir. But Dottore made it a point to produce extra stock of the Elixir before his planned "death." So I'm more inclined to read it as the end of a moment of cessation.
We shall, by whatever means necessary, become the heart that pumps money around the world. And, when the moment comes, that heart shall cease beating by our will alone.
In other words, it's time for Pantalone's part of the plan to unfold. And I think the way he will do that is by using Mora as a catalyst for alchemy.
If we represents the Harbingers, and if the Tsaritsa's goal is Ragnarök (discussed in the reblogs here), then this is the beginning of the end of the the world and its rebirth into one free from Fate.
Alchemy
In the 7.0 Livestream, the devs strategically reminded us that alchemy is banned in Snezhnaya, but we also learn this information from the Disenchantment sands:
It was a time before the Tsaritsa, who now rules Snezhnaya, had ascended the throne in Zapolyarny Palace, a time when the land of ice and snow had not yet, due to the Harbingers, forbidden all practice of the art of alchemy.
The name of this sands is Moment That Ceased Upon Waking From Grand Dreams, which sounds suspiciously similar to Pantalone's Pale Flame sands, Moment of Cessation.
I'm almost certain the Tsaritsa didn’t ban alchemy from Snezhnaya because the Harbingers committed some unspeakable crime. I think she banned it so they'd be the only ones practicing alchemy, meaning all Mora could be invested in catalyzing their transformative projects.
Pantalone's constellation is the Globus Cruciger, which is the symbol for antimony in alchemy. Antimony was thought to purify liquid gold. And what do we see in Pantalone's short? Liquid gold.
Moment of Cessation tells us, "Money is the lifeblood of the world, and the pathways along which it flows are the world’s arteries." And, in the Prithiva Topaz description, Morax says "The currencies that flow through this land are my flesh and blood."
Genshin continuously highlights the connection between blood and alchemy with Mora as its fulcrum. Where Rex Lapis only intended for Mora to serve as the bedrock for trade, it became central to Teyvat’s alchemical system. All crafting requires Mora as part of the exchange.
So I think it's very interesting that the Geo Gnosis is the only one still in play on the Tsaritsa's chessboard apart from her own in a game she’s playing against Rhinedottir aka Gold, the premiere alchemist of Teyvat named for alchemy’s ultimate material output...
... in the Transcendence Trailer
Hands Reaching for...?
We've seen reaching hands a lot lately. In the context of the Harbingers, we see them with Arlecchino, Capitano, Dottore, and now Pantalone. But they're also a visual motif for Rerir and the Wild Hunt.
I'm not the only one to make this connection. pepper-demon has also pointed it out, and viruviwold previously asked if I thought Pantalone might be connected to the Devil Lunar Arcanum. Back then, I said that, while I didn't see the parallels visually, I did see a connection to some of Pantalone's themes in the card's description:
The "Devil" is merely a mask,
Through which the power of darkness is revealed.
The god who creates and maintains,
The abyss that consumes and destroys.
That infinite, boundless, perpetual "Age of Enlightenment."
Well, I sure see the visual parallels now. I wonder if that fiery skull might be the Devil's mask. And look at those hands reaching up from the bottom of the card. Even the purple is Abyss-flavoured. But the biggest one to me, is that the gold makes the shape of the dragon.
On the surface, the card is about Rhinedottir, the Riftwolves, and Durin. But it can also be about Gold, Fenrir, and the Blood of a Dragon... as in Mora, Zhongli's blood. This would also fit Silvy's brilliant Koitar = Tsaritsa theory because Fenrir sets the world on fire in Ragnarök...
Disenchantment in Deep Shadows
So, with all this in mind, I want to suggest that the Disenchantment artifact set might offer a parallel to the ambitious plan Pantalone and Dottore developed to further the Tsaritsa's goals.
A bit of context on the set: it tells a story of forbidden alchemical experiments which had the goal of uncovering the bruied truths of the world and bringing forth a vast embryo long hidden in Hyperborea. The principle character is Aksinya, a silver-haired survivor from Hyperborea put in a time capsule as an infant and found by the Belyi Tsar.
If we recall from Durin's creation, the embryo is part of the alchemical process. It is the body, representing one of three key components alongside the soul (Mini Durin) and the blood or life force (the remains from OG Durin).
That aside, the first five lines of the Goblet stood out to me, because I see a clear parallel to what Pantalone and Dottore are doing.
1. There was a time when primordial venom and primal light clashed in a corner unseen by the heavens' gaze.
The Wiki glosses primal light as the Light Realm, but doesn't provide an interpretation of primordial venom. I'd like to suggest it's the Abyss.
In Variations on the Song of the Dragon and Freedom, we find out that according to Barbeloth, "The essence of the Abyss lies in the hatred carried by all the fates that will not come to pass." Sounds quite a bit like primordial venom, a foundational resentment over what could have been if not for the imposed order of Fate.
2. If a love, a fervor, and an ambition just greater than the world itself were to take shape—they had to be born and kindled in a place unseen by any eye.
I read love here not as romantic or platonic love but as being connected to The Lovers' Lunar Arcanum, which says: the path to understanding and beauty, Love, or the smelting and separation that signify it...
Smelting and separation are two of the seven steps of alchemical transformation, and the final secret wedding at the end of the card is a direct reference to transcendence. So the love taking shape here can, besides other things, be enlightenment.
The place unseen by any eye can be the Shadow Realm, the Mare Jivari (which are arguably the same place) or perhaps Segment Domain Tau given that its ostensible overseer isn't present. Either way, it's a place where two Harbingers could conceivably hatch a plot...
3. It was a design that could not endure the slightest deviation in its course, and an experiment that stood but a hair's breadth from world-spanning madness.
I feel like experiment and world-spanning madness kind of speak for themselves in the context of Dottore.
4. It was almost as if someone had stayed the hand of fate itself, forcing coin toss after coin toss until the desired outcome was reached.
And the coin toss speaks to Pantalone. Here he is, is forever frozen at 72-years old, living for centuries longer than he should to stubbornly pursue his ambitions, as though fate's hand was stayed.
5. Or perhaps, only through upheaval at the periphery can certain possibilities pass through layer upon layer of constraint, and be captured and brought into being by a plan most absurd.
Tell me that doesn't sound like Pantalone and Dottore hatching their experiment, a perfect partnership materializing at a crucial moment. Not to mention, we just saw Dottore messing with the border of the world, a literal upheaval at the periphery.
Dottore's entire aim has been to pursue infinite possibilities and free the world from constraints imposed by Fate. He and Pantalone discuss their resentment of the Rules at length, but Pantalone's involvement has been obfuscated—quite deliberately. He often pins the blame on Dottore to be able to move freely and secretly himself.
Which brings me to my theory that Pantalone is about to use mora as a catalyst for an Abyssal alchemical weapon that can bring down the Gods. Perhaps this is even Project Stuzha itself...
Dottore has already laid the groundwork by decommissioning Irminsul and issuing the Tsaritsa’s declaration of war against Fate. Now, it’s time to ready their weapons, pointed to the Heavenly Principles. And if they are still following the Tsaritsa, which I do believe they are, then this could be the catalyst to Ragnarök.
Primordial Powers
To return to the Devil, I think the aim of alchemy is to transcend the duality of good and evil, light and dark:
The god who creates and maintains,
The abyss that consumes and destroys.
All these things have meaning because of each other. They are create the cycle—day and night, life and death, beginning and end.
When ran these ideas by Silvy for peer review, Silvy said:
Funniest possible endgame lore-reveal: Dottore is the reincarnated HP and Pantalone is the reborn Nibelung
Which is a bit of a joke but also... not.
We've already seen that Dottore wears the inverted crown of reason, the artifact associated with the Heavenly Principles. Pantalone has multiple visual parallels with dragons, as noted by Millionwaters here.
While I ultimately believe they're both human, I think they're meant to allude to the Heavenly Principles and Nibelung in their alignments with Creation and with the Abyss. Dottore creates gods over and over. He's a Doctor, a maintainer of human beings. Pantalone consumes. He talks about "the private law of the hoarder" in Cashflow Supervision. He has a hoard of Mora like a dragon, which he can use as a catalyst to overthrow the gods.
The Heavenly Principles and Nibelung did eventually work together to bring us to where we are now. The Gnoses are the result of their partnership. So why wouldn't it take an equal partnership to undo all that harm and remove the fetters of Fate?
Incidentally, 400 years is how long it takes the Primordial One to create a sacred plan for humanity aka Fate and then Nibelung comes back. So the fact that Pantalone and Dottore have been partners for roughly 400 years trying to dismantle Fate... the parallels are paralleling is all I'm going to say.
Okay calling all obsessive ghosts of female authority figures I have prepared myself to what I am led to believe is your liking.
Either form an orderly line or begin to haunt me bit by bit till my mind falters and falls away in the translucent fingers striving to remember the warmth of your past
