POV: You came out as trans🏳️⚧️ to the cast of Cradle:
Lindon: “Oh! Uh… congratulations? Actually, now that you mention it, I think I have a pill somewhere that could help with that… though now that I’m thinking of it there’s a couple of elixirs I picked up a while back with Eithan and- do you mind sitting here a moment? I have to draw a quick script circle.”
Yerin: “Cheers and celebrations for you. Want me to take it off?”
Ziel: After staring silently for more than a minute, “Huh… I have some self reflection to do…”
Orthos: “Excellent! A dragon does not concern herself with the circumstances of her birth! She knows what she wants and she takes it! This reminds me of a tale my mother told me of my ancestor Ansasha’rexkalia she ruled during the age of…”
Eithan: “Good for you!” Somehow managing to convey in three words that he has known for years, has been subtly guiding you towards this moment the entire time, and is insufferably smug about it.
The Sage of A Thousand Eyes: “Good for you, dear.”
Emriss Silentborn: “You know, I turned into a girl once… twice actually! They had me assassinated…”
Akura Charity is my favorite supporting character in the entire series.
Introduction to the story? Immaculate.
Spending babysitting duty in an artisans smock carving statues? Immediately identifying the cop and letting your doorman rough him up while you talk to his prisoner? The casual twenty-story flipping of a chisel while you take a break and talk to your nieces friend?
Flawless. Perfect. I suspect she had babysitting duty because it's the closest she gets to actually relaxing. She's the straight man to her father's wacky shonen-protagonist-post-series-nonsense.
And they're both immortal so this couple months a decade where you don't have to send Dad through a portal because he's trying to start fights with randos out of boredom, or trying to keep people from throwing themselves at your vicious wine aunt grandmother.
Her friendship with Min Shuei? Delightful. Charity is the perfect foil Min Shuei and once again is the one brain cell keeping the world together all through the mid series.
Her relationship with the freshly powered up Lindon? Easily slips into addressing him as an equal despite their previous history.
Her sacred arts are cool as fuck.
She doesn't hold back on sarcasm.
She offers lessons in cutting people with words.
And she seems so down-to-earth for one of the world's most powerful beings.
Plus the sculpting outfit. So hot to see a powerful woman with a healthy hobby
Dokomi 2025 or How I Visited the Biggest Anime Event in Europe and Ended Up Farming Aura (light novel title)
I posted Ziel quite a while ago. As with every other costume, Ziel deserved a photoshoot and what better place it was for it than Dokomi.
It was my first time there and the sheer scale of the event still beggars my imagination, genuine frog in the well moment if you read progression fantasy. I also met other Cradle fans!
On the second day of the convention I had a photoshoot set up with my good friend @eugene.art_
We chose the peak sunset hours, for maximum xianxia/wuxia aesthetics in the Japanese gardens.
And as I arrive to the convention, all fully ready, the sky says "no sunset". We decide to start taking pictures either way, because the location itself is amazing.
And then it starts drizzling. And then pouring.
So me and @eugene.art_ and friends are standing under a photo reflector as if it was an umbrella while there's a storm on par of one caused by Weeping Dragon (Read Cradle) and at that moment @eugene.art_ goes:
"Dude, turn around".
I turn around and the entire Japanese garden is empty. Now here's the deal, during the convention it is FULL of cosplayers and you have to manage your space and background.
"My equipment is not afraid of water. You are NOT ever getting a chance like this again".
I'm like "let's go".
And that's how we managed to get the entire Japanese garden for ourselves and farm aura in the rain xianxia style and pay a proper tribute to Cradle series.
It was wet, it was fun and it was absolutely amazing. I am most definitely coming back to Dokomi next year and bringing Ziel again.
_____
Character: Ziel of the Wastelands
From: Cradle series
Costume by: me
Photo and edit: @eugene.art_
3d printing: @gear_up_productions
Character by: @willwight110
Event: @dokomi_expo 2025
There are a million paths in the world, but any Sage will tell you, they can all be reduced to one. Read Cradle.
_______
I am finally done with Ziel and it has been an adventure. Much like Cradle.
For the Dawnwing Sect coat I went with dark grey wool and used a simple male hanfu robe as the baseline, albeit with a hood as seen in numerous fanarts. As an iconic piece of the character, I chose a high quality fabric and went for size and drama. Much like Cradle.
Dawnwing sect emblem embroidery was designed by the amazing @_ymntr_
Horns turned out to be a headache (pun intended). I ran into numerous issues with making them stay on and had to juggle between two designs, loads of runny glue, fall damage and several designs until I found what was passable. I always imagined Ziel with big horns instead of small prongs I see here and there. Horns by themselves are a tiefling horn design I found on Cults3d.
And then I airbrushed it all. And then did it again. And again.
So all in all, I am done for now.
Special thanks go to:
@gear_up_productions 3d printing
@freeda.m_cosplay for sewing on the embroidery during that one crunch
@squirrel_sanahi for helping me figure out the slippery lining and finding the right fabric
@foxtail_craft for the ideas on painting the horns and the knowhow of airbrushing
Anyone and everyone who listened to me as I was hyperfixating on hanfu and xianxia robes
Imagine being some old ascended monarch from ye old pre-dreadgod times after Waybound.
You rose up through grit, spit, and sheer fucking determination until the very heavens themselves bent before your will and you joined a group of champions even greater than you! The price was that you could never return to your home again. You could only watch from afar as your mark on the world of your birth faded. Eventually, everyone down there has forgotten you ever existed, but you still have the heavens. You climb the ranks for centuries and earn a place of respect. You made enemies and rivals on your climb to the top, but that was only natural. You didn’t need anyone but yourself.
Then, in walks the five-fold fucking DREADGOD!
He’s already stronger than you AND the universe scale hitman that your bosses bosses bosses bosses boss has locked in a box thinks of him as a son AND he gets to go back HOME sometimes (to your home) AND he actually has friends who LIKE HIM!
Oh damn has it really been that long since I’ve posted? Whelp *cracks knuckles* time to go have some strong opinions on the internet!
Cradle is anti-capitalist and anti-conservative and I’m tired of pretending it’s not. I’m sure I’m not the first person to say this, but it’s my blog so fuck you.
(Leftist ramblings below the read more. You have been warned)
Set in a world where strength is the measure of wealth in a very literal sense, the thesis of the Cradle Series is that there is a certain level of wealth that cannot be obtained and maintained without actively and continuously harming the world around you. More than that, each of the monarchs represent different flavors of conservatism.
Regan Shen is your typical billionaire, throwing scales at problems until they go away. He is obsessed with legacy as wealthy men often are, and strives to be remembered as the greatest monarch to ever live (*cough* Elon *cough cough*). Like his muskrat counterpart he will willingly align himself with whatever movement serves his goals at the present moment and then discard them as soon as their usefulness has ended. He has no real values or principles beyond building his own legend.
Seshethkunaaz very overtly represents the “social Darwinist” a la Senator Armstrong. His whole thing is the strong eat the weak. The other monarchs don’t actually disagree with him on a philosophical level they just don’t like that their group is that one getting eaten. He’s a libertarian through and through, but at least he’s honest about it I guess?
Akura Malice is the “family values” conservative. Malice is a being of spite and bitterness, someone who demands not just love and respect but control. Much like a conservative patriarch much closer to home, she doesn’t love her family so much as she owns and controls her family. This control is supposedly “for their own good” but Malice has demonstrated a willingness to kill her own children and grandchildren to maintain her control, completely undermining her whole argument.
Northstrider is the “anti-authoritarian” conservative, with all the hypocrisy inherent to that idea. He fundamentally rejects the idea that others might know better than him and refuses to be beholden to anyone. He claims to have no ties to the world and yet leads just as many people as the other monarchs. He refuses to participate in the society that he has so much control over except to get something for himself and denies responsibility for the problems he his actively perpetuating. He may have started out wanting what’s best for the world but he let his fear and inferiority complex drag him into stagnation anyways.
Sha Miara is the “old money” conservative. She’s not really “evil” per-say, she’s rich and lacks perspective. Also, she’s like 16 (kung-fu memory transfer technique aside) so it wouldn’t be very fair to judge her for her opinions just yet, but she’s definitely that one girl everyone knew in high school who doesn’t understand that poor people can’t just go get food from the fridge if they’re hungry.
Tiberian is a demonstration that the system is self perpetuating. Even one at the top, ostensibly one of the ones running the whole thing, can’t overturn the system on his own. His attempts to change the world for the betterment of the common people are met with instant and violent rejection by the first person he approaches. There’s an argument to be made that if he’d approached one of the other monarchs it would have gone differently, but I suspect the result would have been the same. Each of the monarchs are so entrenched in their own ideologies that there would be no reasoning with them, with one exception.
Emriss Silentborn is a socialist/communist (she’s not actually in the books that much so I’m not certain) and got assassinated for it. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that given her desire to “freely distribute the secrets of the sacred arts” in a world where sacred arts = literal money. We don’t get much of her character, but she seems to care deeply about sustainability which, given that she’s a tree, makes sense. A world in which the strong eat the weak and nothing else simply isn’t sustainable in the long term.
Then along comes the Reaper Division, a group of people with enough strength (read wealth) to overturn the whole damn thing and the strength of character to actually do it. They force the other monarchs to either give up their power or have it taken from them. Lindon then sets up a system to ensure that no individual can horde power (wealth) to that degree again for the foreseeable future. Inequality still exists on Cradle, but at least the billionaires aren’t melting the icecaps anymore!
