Regarding the Hunter plotline of this ep, can you imagine if weād gotten a whole season of human realm adventures? A whole season of Hunter being gradually taken over by Belos?
Like, in the beginning, everything is fine. The Human Realm is new, and scary, but itās also exciting. Belos is gone, and he canāt hurt him anymore. For the first time in probably his whole life, Hunter can actually relax.
Whispers, faint and uncomfortably familiar, when heās alone at night. A shadow in the corner of his eye that skitters away when he turns to look. Nightmares of a monstrous figure standing over him, eyes gleaming with malice, talking to him in Belosās voice.
Hunter swears up and down that Belos is back, that heās there, right t h e r e, but nobody else sees him. Nobody else hears his chilling laugh echoing endlessly within his head, the cruel whispers of how heāll never escape Belos, how he was such an easy pawn, and why would he betray him? After all heās done for Hunter, why would he be so ungrateful? The others canāt see Belos, canāt hear him; they donāt say it, but Hunter knows they pity him, think him paranoid and delusional. They wonāt help him, whispers that voice again. Why would they?
And episode by episode, Hunter begins to change. He snaps at the others more often, gets this uncomfortably cold glint to his eyes, face twisting into a condescending sneer that sounds almost uncomfortably familiar in its cadence when he says what should be innocuous things like āWhy havenāt you found a way to get us back yet, Luz? I thought you wanted to stay in the Demon Realmā or āSurely you can figure this out, humanā.
Everyone around him grows more and more worried as they start to notice these changes. They talk amongst themselves, wondering how to best approach him and help him, because heās clearly growing more and more stressed and paranoid, and they want to help him, but Hunter canāt accept their help, canāt trust that they wonāt hate him for what he is. And when the voice in his head tells him that heās better off away from them, that they must be plotting against him, because why else would they be talking about him in hushed whispers, it becomes uncomfortably easy to just nod and accept it, to isolate himself more and more.
His questions slowly begin to feel less like genuine concerns and more like taunts, accusations, hitting Luzās insecurities right on their respective nails, but she canāt confront him about them because that means telling the truth to everyone, and he reminds her that ātheyāll hate you for sure; after all, youāve been lying to them for monthsā, so she tells herself itās fine, itās nothing, because heās right, isnāt he?
And then finally, Belos takes over, strong enough now to use him as nothing more than a literal puppet. The guilt as everyone realizes he was right, of course Belos was back, how could they have been so stupid? They knew he was acting strangely, so how did none of them realize what was happening until it was too late?
The desperate struggle as he tries to wrest control of himself away from Belos, to claw and scratch his way to freedom once again, but all he can manage are short, brief bursts of control before heās squashed beneath his thumb yet again, reduced to a mindless puppet for Belos to manipulate because āthatās all youāve ever been, Hunter. Stop trying to change what you areā.
And then the swell of anger and downright self-love as he forces Belos out of his body, regains control of his own self. He tells Belos he refuses to go back, because he knows he has worth, and heās done listening to Belosās lies, and for a few, brief moments, heās finally, finally free.
And when he finally wakes, revived by his first ever friend, he cries. A cathartic, body-wracking screaming sob as he swears heāll make Belos pay for what heās done.
For Flapjack. For Luz and the others. For all the other innocent witches and demons of the Boiling Isles. For Caleb. For the other golden guards, his fellow unwitting pawns in Belosās game.
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