Latest Posts by aspecofdust - Page 2

BROTHER! I AM PINNED HERE!

Reblog if it’s ok for people to give you $599.99

Reblog if think trans people are neato

why he ate that

She would marry Stenluke if she could. That woman is for the battlefield.

Angelica getting engaged:

hits trans women with the full of delicious yummy food blast

transgender

transgender

fuck this one carbon atom tbh

“average person eats 3 spiders a year” factoid actualy just statistical error. average person eats 0 spiders per year. Spiders Georg, who lives in cave & eats over 10,000 each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted

Finished a major Lancer commission batch a couple months ago

We live in a parody of a country.

The state of Georgia did what with voter registrations?!

Reblog if you think fanfiction is a legitimate form of creative writing.

What’s your thoughts on Delicious in Dungeons Character Designs?

Ryoko Kui is the best to ever do it.

People have so many reasons to like the things they like

seen this meme go both ways so im just going to go out on a limb and say this

Temples are built for gods. Knowing this a farmer builds a small temple to see what kind of god turns up.

I take things very face-value and often don't recognize flaws in the things that I like. It's a flaw that I have. Reading your posts about Bookworm hasn't made me like the series any less, but they have grounded my view of the series a bit. You are very intense. It is good to read a harsh dissenting voice when the fandom is so full of soft and agreeable tones.

Smth smth a fan of a story abt literature lacking any respect for literature smth smth—

No, actually, you misunderstand.

AoB is not a story about literature. It's about books. Making books. The contents of said books has never mattered. Not to Myne, not to any of the characters, not to the author.

We never get to hear any of Effa's stories despite it being the first thing Myne makes into a book. Not even a summary. It's as though the narrative doesn't care about the actual story, only that Myne has material for book-making!

Nevermind that storytelling is a rich art that has existed for as long as we've been human, nevermind that stories have been a companion to humanity since the dawn of time, nevermind that oral history has been dismissed and looked down upon by scholars but is so so so rich with information and value and—

Nevermind, of course. It doesn't matter. It's never mattered to Kazuki.

The titles of the books published and distributed also have like. Generic-ass titles. Royal Academy Love Stories. A Ditter Story. Nothing is said of their contents, except that Boys Like Ditter Books and Girls Swoon Over Romance. Nobody in the fandom ever talks about any of the books in the story because there's nothing to talk about. What can you gush about in A Ditter Story? It doesn't matter. Doesn't matter at all. Never has, never will.

Tell me again how this is a story about literature? Nay, nay, the art of writing and storytelling is given no significance or weight in this damn story and trying to pretend otherwise to give it more credit is... disingenuous, in my opinion.

For all that fucking Pandora Hearts isn't a story about literature, it's about so many things (a story about a story a story about love a story about imposter's syndrome a story about realness and the human about a story about so many things but about literature it is not— even if it was based on Alice In Wonderland wait I'm getting sidetracked), anyways it has an in-universe novel series that's published by the volume, Holy Knight, and we get little glimpses into what goes on in the story! One of the characters, Edgar the valet dies in an act of self-sacrifice for his lord Edwin who cuts his hair in mourning after losing Edgar in the end.

Now, why does this matter? Because the novel was actually narratively relevant to the story of Pandora Hearts— Mochizuki Jun is a meticulous writer whom I really look up to— Holy Knight became the connecting common ground that let Oz, the protagonist, befriend Elliot and Leo (master and valet duo) when they first met as they are avid fans of the series (well, two of them were, Leo wasn't to my memory but I digress). It is not only a nifty little tool to give these characters a common ground but it also becomes relevant to their characters in other ways— it sheds light on their characters, Oz who has the self-sacrificing Edgar as his favorite character values his own life so little, is suicidal to some degree, and views himself as expendable. Elliot on the flipside is the opposite— he very notably said “People who think so lightly of their own lives do not have the right to protect anyone!” (which is also a major theme in Pandora Hearts but shush, me, shush, I'm not here to proselytize about an actually well-crafted story here, fuck). Normally I'd avoid spoilers for this kind of series (full of mystery and plot twists and everything good) because it's so good you should experience it yourself but I know that nobody in the AoB tag will give a shit about checking out a well-crafted story (if they think AoB is the height of literature, do you blame me for thinking so?), I'm gonna spoil it. Elliot dies! In an act of self-sacrifice! His last words were directed to his valet: “I'm sorry, Leo.” HOW FUCKING IRONIC IS THAT? And Leo cuts his hair in the aftermath/fallout of Elliot's death— where his grief leads him down a self-destructive spiral. A role reversal between Edgar and Edwin.

From this example provided, you can very clearly see the singular in-universe novel Holy Knight fulfilled multiple narrative functions: reinforcing/establishing the manga's themes, establishing characters, and foreshadowing.

Have I mentioned I love Pandora Hearts to death?

And it's not even! A story! About literature! As many claim AoB is!

How fucking cool would it have been to have something similar with AoB's in-universe novels, something to foreshadow events, stories bringing characters together (no, the library committee only half-counts bc it's books that brought these ppl to gather, not a love of literature and storytelling specifically), stories affecting characters and giving them hope or solace or whatever, stories being used as a narrative device by Kazuki to push certain themes and such?

I could go insane over the utilization of Holy Knight in Pandora Hearts but there's just cricket noises for the novels in AoB bc. I'm. Given. Absolutely fucking nothing! Nada! None! And I'm someone who's like a bloodhound that hunts for symbolism and symbolism only! I have a whole tag dedicated to my character design sheets where I cram in symbolic shit in the designs and over-explain every aspect! (Here's the tag if anyone's interested, probably not but hey, shameless self-plug) If someone like me can't find anything to go insane over about an in-universe novel or story, that's dire! That's so fucking dire! I'm someone who looks at smth ppl say “isn't that deep” and grabs a shovel to make it That Deep. Do you fucking realize. How bad it is that I can't find any narrative significance for stories and storytelling. In a series about making books. Do you understand. Do you fucking understand.

On the note of grabbing a shovel to make things That Deep, yeah let's talk about that. People wish I was actually talking about the themes of the story, engage with them, instead of throwing it all in the trash. Which, yeah, fair!

Except it's not because that's literally what I'm trying to do.

What the everloving fuck did you people think I was doing when I published that post? I was trying to talk about it, from the perspective of someone whose country was colonized by Japan, trying to engage with it from my perspective, trying to get people to critically think about and engage with it too instead of blindly accepting the story's biases, trying to offer my perspective which is of someone who doesn't worship AoB and doesn't immediately shut down criticism of the stories I like because I can't pretend people ever disliking it for legitimate reasons. What is this if not me talking about it? Also, to tell one critic to not just chug the entire thing into the trash and to tell another critic to just stop reading... Pick a lane, y'all. Pick a fucking lane. (In the first place you could've chosen to not read the anti-FerMyne post, yeah it wasn't tagged but there's a summary above the cut that said “IT'S BAD” like what did you think the content under the cut was gonna be. What the fuck did you think it was gonna be.

In the first place people kinda seem self-admitting that they care about nothing outside of the romance-not-romance in AoB, as it doesn't occur to them that someone could be continuing to read the series for other characters they liked, other plot points, anything at all outside of the main romance— The romance only became explicit in the last two volumes, before that it's completely possible to think that the series is not going to end with them getting together if you have an entire fandom gaslighting you into thinking Myne is aro.)

(But then again maybe it's not so out of left field that these people cannot fathom anyone staying for anything outside of FerMyne— people have loudly admitted to hating the version of Myne that existed before she met Ferdinand— since there really isn't much to sink your teeth into except if you like ranting your tongue off about the characters canon either neglects or retcons or tries so hard to make hateable)

(Like I said, not a speck of respect for stories in “a story about literature”)

Anyways, I have never once seen a fandom so resistance to criticism, critical discussion, and anything of the sort like AoB fandom is. Well, except for Moriarty the Patriot but being compared to that fandom isn't a favor because they would aggressively try to chase dissenters out. I would know. I was one of the targets for a mass Twitter campaign. AoB fandom... is shaping up to look like that.

Like, my Naruto mutuals and I have been talking about financial abuse holding supplies hostage dehumanization sexual exploitation misogyny in the narrative etc and the FMA poc community is in a corner discussing narrative framings of Scar and the importance of named characters and individual wrath vs justified anger at the system and how the series mishandled Ishvalans and AoB is just here incapable of understanding that any of it is bigoted, or that AoB has racist/classist/xenophobic themes going on. Beyond a token acknowledgement of there being a “sprinkle” of racist/classist themes in AoB, nobody here ever openly talks about those themes, never criticizes them profusely like there exists thriving critics communities in other fandoms— probably for fear of being ostracized, lol.

To that, I borrow some quotes from the ever lovely Dr. Bret C. Devereaux, an ancient and military historian who currently teaches as a Teaching Assistant Professor at North Carolina State University:

George R. R. Martin: The Dothraki were actually fashioned as an amalgam of a number of steppe and plains cultures… Mongols and Huns, certainly, but also Alans, Sioux, Cheyenne, and various other Amerindian tribes… seasoned with a dash of pure fantasy.

Dr. Bret C. Devereaux: But at the same time, a ‘dash’ only goes so far; if I ask you to add a ‘dash’ of pepper to a recipe and the end product comes back 51% pepper by mass, we need not debate semantics to understand that something has gone really rather wrong.

Dr. Bret C. Devereaux: It seems that our ‘dash of pure fantasy’ has turned from a little bit of salt to flavor the meal into a barrel of salted fish with with all the fish removed.

Dr. Bret C. Devereaux: We might say he has added ‘dashes’ of pure fantasy until the ‘dash’ is the entire soup, but the truth is clearly the reverse: Martin has sprinkled a little bit of water on a barrel of salt and called it just a dash of salt.

To read this wonderfully graceful and eloquent episode of this historian shredding GRRM: here ya go, tis the link.

I wish I could be as eloquent as him. Oh, well, one day.

Forgive me if I seem condescending or haughty by dragging in other better-written stories or a historian but AoB fans have been condescending to us in the first place— equating us to children, sweeping over our words and cultural backgrounds and experiences with “well yeah I need to check what the Experts say first” and trying to de-legitimize any of our arguments with “well clearly you're just not paying attention because Japan is culturally different and you're just ignorant on How Things Are Over There” well newsflash asshole the only two critics in this entire fandom tag are both Asian too! Japan wrecked our countries! I brought up something Japan did, something that it continues to deny to this day and something that many Asian countries are still affected from, shouldn't that count at least on some level as paying attention to whatever mystical “cultural differences” y'all insist we're willfully ignoring? Aren't y'all the ones consistently ignoring and trying to shut up our voices and criticisms? “Is it racist to have your only prominent foreign country be a mishmash of Asian-coded brown people whose only traits are being violent killer rapists and who your white protagonists kill all of before sealing off the border from the foreign invaders” is absolutely entry-level “Can you recognize xenophobic sentiments in media” critical thinking! I can't believe I'm having to say this! What Japan did isn't even some niche distant mystical “Asian history”, it's World War II history. The fact that people are so willing to excuse ableism and xenophobia and anything like that with “b-b-but cultural differences!” is xenophobic in of itself. Is Japan a fucking alien planet? What makes you so vehemently defend the idea of Japan while trying to kill the voices of other Asians? Are we not Pale Enough for you or something?

What in this god damn novel series is so good, so worthy of these people stooping so low?

holy fuck.

Adelheide Tochter Kirschnereit

Age 15

I imagine her hair is kept in a loose ponytail, with fringe similar to Matthias'. It's a darker sea-green color.

Her eyes would be sharper, but colored light pink.

She's a trans girl

In a modern setting I imagine she goes with the dress shirt with rolled up sleeves + pants with suspenders fit. Something classy but practical enough.

Her patron deity would be Verdrenna, Goddess of Thunder and Lightning and subordinate to Flutrane.

Nobles have to keep up facades, but if she's being allowed to show emotion she would definitely be on the more intense side. Girl is full of generational anger towards Hauchletzte and would show it if she could.

On the tall side.

Her favored weapon is a halberd, and prefers to meet opponents either on even ground or with mana blasts. She's not a bad rider, she just enjoys the benefits of footwork and body-enhancing magic. She enjoys cartography, Gewinnen, and playing the pipe organ. She prefers her tea sweet and accompanied with many cookies. She is the fourth in a set of five siblings, and strives to become a Knight Commander to support the next Aub. Or if they all spontaneously combust, become an Aub with no fear of war. She wears a twisted silver and gold bracelet with a green feystone embedded in the center, a family heirloom.

To confess my sins, I had actually deleted her bio with the intention to rewrite it... a couple of months ago. So this was actually a good motivator to really think about what's going on with her. Apologies if I yapped too close to the sun.

I just had an idea to add to my most current Ascendance of a bookworm project. So if you have a OC in the aob universe, I can add them into the project as a personal Easter egg.

If you want to join, here's what I need (*required):

Name

Age (max. 17, you can just alter it)

Haircut + hair colour (dark/light)*

Eye shape + eye color (dark/light)*

Gender*

Dress (modern style)*

Patron Deity (eternal/subordinate god/goddess) [please don't use the 2 supreme gods]*

Expression (looks angry, confused, happy, ...)*

Height (tall/short)*

Hobbies/accessories/fav weaponry

You can either DM me or reblog this.

y'all ever think about how insane the sauropods were

Dragons are the strongest....... don't let anyone tell you otherwise.......

Monster Tidbits - Green Dragon

I haven't watched the show yet but I hope these bitches gay.

Going actively insane about how they picture each other

I'm not looking................

HAHAHAHA HELP ME I LOVE THIS MEME

A world without books would be torture

A world without this book specifically would be nothing at all

(from Ascendance of a Bookworm #15 (4.3))