#marble speaks

[marble-writes]

I miss Midra, Lord of Frenzied Flame and Bayle the Dread but like, I do not want to go through essentially 3/4ths of the base game and then the entire DLC just to fight them

[lordmarble]

Manifesting this morning's news' energy to extend to every crooked and bigoted politician. I wish every single one of them to die very soon.

[marblespinkpalace-blog]

I wish I had more little friends ; x ; when i age regress i get lonely bc i dont got anyone to talk to or give me little tips!!

[marble-writes]

Probably one of the funniest things to me about Bloodborne's lore is that Iosefka's Blood Vial is... Clearly just serum/plasma

"Refined blood" Iosefka stuck it in a centrifuge for 5 minutes at 2000 rpm lol

But for real tho, the plasma/serum contains our naturally-produced antibodies. These antibodies, specifically in the context of blood transfusion, are the reason why we can only receive certain blood types based on our own (ex. Someone with type A blood who has A-antigens occurring on their red blood cells naturally produces anti-B antibodies, and thus they cannot receive any type B products, with some exceptions like platelets. This is why type O blood is considered a universal donor, as they don't have any antigens on their RBCs).

Whatever the case is in Bloodborne, it implies that the Healing Blood's serum is the real healing factor, not the red blood cells. That makes sense, considering that RBCs do not carry antibodies or anything to fight pathogens. I wonder if the serum is also the part that triggers beasthood, or beasthood itself is a transfusion reaction of the recipient's body to the donor RBCs?

It's interesting to think about, but I doubt anyone who actually crafted the canon lore for the game has a Medical Laboratory degree lol

[marble-writes]

Very special announcement to my Djura Finds a Really Weird Dog readers uuuuuh next chapter is dropping on October 29th American time (it's basically the only day I've got this month for myself)

[marble-writes]

Anyway, to the masc women, to the fem men, to the tall queens, to the short kings, to the women with body hair, to the men who can barely grow a stubble, to the fat people, to the skinny people, to anyone who doesn't feel "normal" or accepted because of their body: I accept you and I love you.

[marble-writes]

Oh my God this is insane, 99 kudos for a rarepair fic I can't believe my fic has gotten this much acknowledgement, let alone love 😭

Whenever it hits 100 kudos, I'll post the next chapter as a little celebration (⁠ʃ⁠ƪ⁠＾⁠3⁠＾⁠）

Thank you all for reading!!!!!!

[marble-writes]

hey marble would you like to talk about the bloodletter and what it means for brador's character

Oh, the Bloodletter. The S rank scaling in Bloodtinge. The fact that basically nothing in the game strongly resists Bloodtinge damage, not even Lady Maria. The fact that it mirrors real life bloodletting in history by getting rid of "bad" blood. Let's talk about what it means for Brador, my sopping wet blorbo, though. First, my favorite anecdote about it: the in-game description.

"This is the only effective means of expelling tainted blood, or so Brador, isolated in his cell, continued to believe."

That tells you everything you need to know about Brador: Just like Alfred, he is a victim and perpetrator of the Healing Church's propaganda and dogmatic teachings. They probably knew/figured out the Bloodletter is not effective at staving off beasthood, and yet, they never informed, or more likely lied, to Brador about its effectiveness. It makes me wonder why he's so loyal to the Church in the first place, but that's more for speculation/headcanons on another post.

However, let's assume the Bloodletter actually does what the description says, and draws upon blood from the inner reaches of one's body and soul. Of course, for gameplay reasons, the Bloodletter takes the same form for everybody... But this is Bloodborne, and everyone has some signature weapon tailor made just for them, and we can assume everything was modeled for him. Brador's blood is fucked up, and he as a whole is fucked up. If you've read my fic, you'll see just how many ways he's fucked up. I think this fuckedupness is representative of his hypocrisy and corruption rather than something like beasthood. He taunts you for wanting to kill you to "right your wrongs", complains about how mankind will never change, yet all he does is kill! He is aware of how fucked things are, and he isn't going to do a thing about it. He has no faith in this world, nor himself. The world can't change, and neither can he, and he's taunting you for making a change and bringing an end to the Nightmare. The Bloodletter's "true and terrifying form" is simply Brador's soul worn on his sleeve.

Yet I don't believe he's just outright a selfish bastard, no, far from it. The weapon, in order to be relevant in the meta, needs to be transformed. He always transforms it, and to do so, you must stab yourself, gruesomely and violently. The Bloodletter requires self-sacrifice to be used. Someone who is truly corrupt and an asshole wouldn't risk their life to protect, even if what they're protecting is the ugly truth. I think at some point before the Nightmare, Brador had a heart. He is, or was, capable of love, of selflessness, he is willing to give up a part of himself for those he cares about even if the Church is an institution that clearly does not care about him back. He is not a flat, comically evil villain! He would not have been able to mercy kill those who transformed if he didn't have a heart, after all. Hell, that heart might have been the reason why the Healing Church was able to manipulate him, like they did to Ludwig in feeding him the idea that he is a radiant hero. This aspect of the Bloodletter is another reason why Brador is one of my favorite characters.

Lastly, the Bloodletter is just... like... not an assassin's weapon. It is not subtle. It is not the Assassin's Creed hidden blade, it's not the Blade of Mercy. Brador doesn't use poison or anything like that. He is not sneaky, he loudly announces he is going to kill you via ringing his stupid fucking bell every. Single. Time. The Bloodletter is a big fuckin' hammer. I think this accomplishes one of two things for Brador's character: One, he intends to maim his targets. I think to cover the Healing Church's tracks, he made every crime scene look like a beast just came in and completely tore the victim apart. He knows what he's doing, even when he's leaving a mess. Two, he doesn't give a fuck about conventions. Other than his obedience to the Healing Church, he does what he wants, however he wants, in a rather brash and straightforward way. Maybe he's stubborn and stuck in his ways. Maybe he's an unga bunga meathead lol. I love that for him.

As for the weapon's design itself... In my rather limited research, historically bloodletting was accomplished via lancet blades or leeches, nothing of which resembles the Bloodletter. Brador's Bloodletter appears to be a Fromsoft original :) of course if anyone has anything to add on to that, feel free to reblog!

Thank you for letting me ramble about one of my favorite Bloodblorbos. I love this little scrungle. Despite having like three lines of dialogue, it turns out he's quite deep!