Sometimes it is very disappointing to be a Jin Guangyao fan in this fandom, especially as I continually see people miss the entire point of his journey and slander Wei Wuxian in the process.

They deliberately are introduced to us with reputations that are the opposite of their actual characters. At the start of the book we hear about how evil Wei Wuxian is and how he deserved to die and yada yada yada. We also hear (even from Wei Wuxian himself) about how Jin Guangyao is a pretty decent guy, done some good stuff, definitely a decent person.

And by the end of the book we get the reveals that we need to understand that both of these presented reputations are false. Jin Guangyao built himself a shining reputation out of blood, torture and lies and used it to place himself atop the jianghu. Wei Wuxian refused to stay silent in the face of malice and had his reputation torn to shreds.

The people who insist that Wei Wuxian is a villain and Jin Guangyao is a misunderstood hero are doing a disservice to both characters. Jin Guangyao has no regret for the blood he shed or the harm he did, only that he was caught in the end. Just like Wei Wuxian has no regrets for his actions in the end, he did what he knows was morally right in the situation and saw it through to the end.

Let Jin Guangyao be the villain he was crafted to be, he worked so hard for it, he killed his own damn wife and child in order to get what he wanted. Don’t make his sacrifices (of other people) worthless by calling him a sad boy who only wanted his father’s praise, cause he killed people for that.

Gandalf throwing his staff at gollum is what really makes this

Thank you for commenting because I was going to scroll past this. 

Free serotonin from Honey thr Italian greyhound

Maitimo with Elros

Do not use without my permission, please

jumping on the valar poll bandwagon in the club today

YES BECAUSE MANWE WAS KING OF ARDA. NOT AMAN. ARDA.

KING OF ARDA.

HIS FAILURE TO ACT WAS A CASE OF WILLFULL AND DELIBERATE NEGLIGENCE FOR THE DUTY OF CARE HE OWED TO LITERALLY EVERY LIVING BEING OUTSIDE OF AMAN.

idly thinking about an AU where the sons of Fëanor go east to hold against Morgoth and disappear; letters arrive infrequently and then taper off, scouts who go east of Doriath rarely if ever return, and those that do whisper of fire-spirits: not Balrogs, not evil, but definitely dangerous and definitely not elves

so it's concluded that whatever other power holds those lands killed (or imprisoned or…) the Fëanorians, and at least they're fighting Morgoth

meanwhile the sons of Fëanor have. uh. well. they might have reverse-engineered Melian's Girdle and used the power of the Oath to bind themselves to their lands. so there's a strong protection laid over the whole east, though instead of being a "no one comes or goes" it's just "no one goes" (though the Lords can give permission for people to pass through)

and in the process they changed, somehow. they're not Maiar, probably, but they're definitely not normal elves anymore…

which means that when Fingon goes a little farther east in Ard-Galen than he expected, he and his company find themselves being brought to Himring and their General, who is very glad to see him

#...in which maedhros pulls a melian#ALTHOUGH. If they've covered the whole eat that might also have implications for Eol (& Aredhel)#Hmmmm @shrikeseams

My thinking on this is: Celegorm is aware of Eöl being in Nan Elmoth, which is right on the border of their Girdle, and they Do Not Like Each Other. Aredhel, when she comes to visit Celegorm, gets stuck in the Fëanorian's Girdle. Their Girdle is such that the closer you get to the border the more you want to turn away and go back into the middle, but someone with sufficient determination could get past and leave. Aredhel, who is mostly aimlessly wandering while she's waiting for Celegorm, gets steered away from Nan Elmoth long enough for Celegorm to get back and meet up with her.

Maedhros's long-term plans are to expand their Girdle to cover all of Beleriand (they've already expanded further East to get the mountains and the dwarves therein, with Azaghâl's help) so he wants Eöl dealt with and Nan Elmoth brought into the fold…

#aredhel might get turned into a deer and chased by celegorm a bit#and then celegorm turns into a deer and she returns the favor#celegorm looks a *lot* more like orome than he used to  - @eleneressea​

No way Celegorm and Aredhel didn’t cosplay Orome and Nessa back in Valinor (both for fun and for ritual), so that must be thoroughly nostalgic for them. Turgon and Fingolfin wouldn’t be thrilled, but they also don’t know what the alternative was, SO.

Oooh, I love the idea of Eol being caught between TWO eldritch fairy kingdoms, both steadily pressuring him to choose them. At least Melian doesn’t seem to have any interest in expansion (although encroaching Feanorian borders might change that...)

And there’s also a question of how far south the borders push. If I assume it went to at least Amon Ereb... Would they push all the way to the Sirion before the Helcaraxe Noldor figure out what’s going on? How long until Finrod feels them leaning on Nargothrond’s borders?

#I'm aggressively spilling politics all over your ravishment fantasy. Sorry not sorry! @shrikeseams

um Excuse all the best ravishment fantasies have carefully-constructed worldbuilding and political ramifications. why would anyone be sorry about that?

They've definitely expanded to Sirion; the Aros is their border with Doriath and I figure the Ambarussa have claimed as far south as Adurant and Taur-im-Duinath, and Nan-Tathren and Arvernien are uninhabited, so Finrod would probably find them pushing to the south of him as much as from the east. (obligatory map link for reference)

Also if they've claimed Arvernien they've probably noticed/been noticed by Círdan in Eglarest, which is bound to be Interesting…

#feanor and celegorm saved the falas from morgoth back in the day#so cirdan might well be considering accepting the protection of their girdle#actually looking at the map i think nan elmoth would basically be a little enclave of non-girdled land within their girdle?#because they have himlad and estolad - @eleneressea​

My gut instinct is that bodies of water that Ulmo is still actively managing could offer some natural resistance to Faerynorian expansion. So at least the Narog should make it difficult for them to expand, and I bet their influence would also be weakened on the coast. (Was Ulmo explicitly active with the Sirion? I cannot recall.) And even assuming seven high-powered, motivated calaquendi elves can achieve as much as Melian, there has to be a practical limit to how far they can expand their borders.

...So really, if they want to expand into the lands of the Helcaraxe exiles, they probably need their willing consent and cooperation, and to enfold the other Finwians at least into whatever fuckery they’ve done.

#i love the fuckers but we can't let them have it all their own way#...wonder how angrod and aegnor are handling their increasingly weird cousin neighbors#ALSO#if Fucking Spider Valley is a result of Melian's magic clashing with Morgoth's#How much worse is nan dungortheb with#probable feanorian fuckery encroaching from the himlad side?? @shrikeseams

Ulmo was particularly present at the Sirion, good point, although given the Third Kinslaying he doesn't seem to have that much ability against the Fëanorians. To get anywhere inhabited they definitely need the people there to agree; hence they have the Ered Luin through Maedhros's friendship with Azaghâl. Most of the lands south of the Andram are deserted, so what if the Fëanorians consider them theirs and under their protection, but since there's no one there to protect, the Girdle doesn't really reach that far? Their actual Girdle stops at the Fens and Andram.

Nan Dungortheb is definitely even worse, and the Fens of Sirion are probably also pretty bad where Melian's magic hits the Fëanorian's magic. (For that matter, the whole course of the Aros is probably also fucked.)

As the original idea was that no one knows what's happened to the Fëanorians, and since there's a big mountain range between Dorthonion and the Fairynorians' territories, I'm going to go with "Angrod and Aegnor aren't handling them at all." The not-Maiarin power in the East is not allied with Morgoth but isn't allied with them either, they don't fuck with it and it doesn't fuck with them. Every so often they get an offer of alliance or protection, which they turn down because they're 90% sure it's a trap.

#now i'm thinking about the haladin because they're going to cross into the girdle#and i think i've accidentally averted that orc-raid that killed haleth's dad+brother by way of the girdle#also i know i'm calling it a girdle but it's probably at least partially reverse-engineered from eol's enchantments as well  - @eleneressea​

I mean, at this point which canonical events haven’t been changed? Gondolin is off-course, and there’s no reason for C&C to end up in Nargothrond. at a minimum the Bragollach is seriously curtailed in the East, if not altogether prevented. And the politics are going to be all wonky just by virtue of Fingolfin & Co not being able to call upon the Feanorians, or have to negotiate with them..

Actually, with all of the East presumed out of the picture, if you assume the western forces still get a Long Peace, then Fingolfin may get his grand offensive, after all. Depending on when Fingon goes missing, anyway.

...I think one thing I’m not clear on is why the Feanorians would have dropped out of contact with the western forces. It’s not like they’re politically semi-independent in canon, and it the ultimate goal is to slorp up all of Beleriand like a well-armed amoeba, then keeping in touch with previous political allies just makes sense.

#tolkien#really what I am asking is:#if maedhros souped himself up into a state of semi-maiar. would he not be using that to send fingon fun presents?#...Fingon wanders into faerynorianland and one of the things maedhros offers him is a chance to hunt a dragon#because glaurung wandered in and got befuddled#not sure yet if celegorm should keep him as an overgorwn hunting hawk and fingon only gets a mock battle#or if galurung is still fightin' mad and maedhros has been specially saving him for fingon some day @shrikeseams

Much like the Problem Of Gondolin and the Problem Of Beren & Lúthien, this problem is because I'm sticking a ravishment fantasy back into the political drama, and as always isolation doesn't fit in well with that. They're not in contact with the west because then that's less conducive to Fingon getting surprise rescued/kidnapped, or to Aredhel and Celegorm having their deer-transformation-based courtship rituals.

Realistically a) they probably are still in contact for diplomacy reasons (and "eventually ruling protecting all Beleriand" reasons) and b) if they aren't, Fingon is going on rescue missions for Maedhros, so in conclusion they must be in some contact, albeit maybe less than in canon. At the very least Fingolfin and company know the Fëanorians are alive and roughly where they are.

Maybe…in the initial period of raising the Girdle they dropped contact for a while so that they could figure out what they'd done and gotten used to being Weird, and then resumed contact carefully not talking about what exactly they did to themselves, partially because they don't entirely know either. There's still all kinds of crazy rumors, but the Fëanorian messengers do get letters out to Fingolfin at least, so everyone is assured that the Fëanorians are alive.

If the disappearance (or semi-disappearance) was not that long after the Aglareb—the Fëanorians were spending the years before preparing, and the Aglareb convinced them this was a good idea—the West is still getting a Long Peace. And since Morgoth is still very aware of the Fëanorians being right there, and since their Girdle is one-way, you can enter but not leave, his orcs would still be getting through and just not be able to retreat, which means that Morgoth might be even more distracted from the West by trying to kill Maedhros specifically, since all he'd need to do is get someone in there (easy) to kill Maedhros (hard) and half of the Northern front of the Girdle goes down, allowing him access to all of the East…

If we circle back around to ‘this shouldn’t be too easy’, another option would be for the engirdling process to fuck with the feanorians’ memory. Especially if it incorporates the Oath somehow, you could do something with them just. Having a very difficult time remembering things that aren’t Oath-related if they aren’t right in front of them. So correspondence just drops off gradually because they don’t actually see the western forces often. (And the western forces aren’t visiting because they know something’s gone wrong and they can’t risk getting tangled up in it.) Celegorm and Maedhros are so excited to suddenly see and remember their favorite cousins! they knew they were forgetting something important!

Another option would be that shortly after the engirdlement, they realized that they literally physically could not leave their lands. Like, they can visit other encircled parts of east beleriand, but not leave their own designated bounds. Which gives them a good reason to go quiet while they try to find a solution (Fingolfin’s used to them coming to visit HIM, and he’s going to get antsy if Maedhros puts him off too many times, and also they literally can’t lead war parties outside of their own territory anymore. Also their cousins WILL laugh at them if/when they find out.) So the steady expansion is... a temporary solution. Maedhros is trying to pretend that he’s not more seriously considering world domination as a long-term solution with every passing year.)

oooh, yes, I'm going to go with "they can't leave"—they've bound themselves to their lands to get this power, so Maedhros can't really get too far for too long from Himring, Caranthir needs to stay nearish to Thargelion, etc., and leaving the Girdle entirely is right out.

On the flipside, they have even more control over their lands than most: Maedhros is, on some level, Himring, and so is very aware of everyone nearby, and can (say) cause a rockslide or two, or convince the plants and animals there to cooperate with him…

the Valar seem pretty content to primarily punish the ringleaders and let their followers go, so the Fëanorian followers probably get re-embodied well before their lords do

thus when Elrond shows up Formenos is not so much a lone fortress of exile as a bustling city where all the Fëanorians live, as most of them don't really want to swear loyalty to Finarfin and also don't tend to get along with the various other factions in Tirion

#finarfin is frankly just glad he can make them someone else's problem#namely elrond and celebrimbor#namo would LIKE to make them someone else's problem they keep petitioning him for feanor and his sons#and say what you will about the feanorians they're certainly persistent#any feanorion getting re-embodied would be met with an entire parade because the feanorians know how to put on a show#celebrimbor returning to life: i will quietly re-integrate into society#an army of feanorians: hi :)#here is your parade we have been waiting for thousands of years and got very bored#would you like to hear the song about your bravery and heroism#or the song about what we'll do to sauron for hurting you if we ever get our hands on him#celebrimbor: please no why -@eleneressea

thankfully, Celebrimbor can throw them at Elrond when be shows up. Eventually.

i could also see Celebrían feeling out of place in Tirion and being taken in by an army of kindlayers who are scarier than her nightmares and loyal to her husband

Maedhros and Maglor's last order to their host was to look after the boys, and this extends to the boys' wives and descendants. probably. they're pretty sure, anyway, and in lieu of anyone who can supersede the order they're going to follow it as best they can.

they do let Finrod know (as Celebrían is staying with him) that they're here to protect Celebrían and don't mean any harm, and so Celebrían has some red-cloaked bodyguards who call her 'Princess Celebrían' and a standing invitation to come to Formenos any time she wants to

#feanor is their king so his sons are their princes and they've decided that elrond is maglor's heir probably#so that makes him a prince and his wife a princess. their logic is flawless#also they're maybe a little desperate for anyone even vaguely feanorian-adjacent to lead them#(vaire gets regular packages addressed to 'queen miriel')#(nerdanel threw a chisel at the last feanorian she saw but they just put their sneakiest on guarding her)#(and she doesn't throw out their care packages either! progress!) -@eleneressea

absolutely flawless logic, clearly celebrían is a princess of the house of Feanor and needs to be served and protected and gifted all sorts of jewelry that is totally not enchanted! (you can't tell me the house of Feanor doesn't have gifted jewelsmiths among their followers who can put in a protective charm or a healing spell or something) Finrod is a bit wary about the Feanorians, especially the ones that used to follow Celegorm or Curufin, but they do seem to cheer his niece up, so.

Celebrían's bodyguards: oh, we didn't follow Celegorm or Curufin

Finrod, much relieved: oh!

Celebrían's bodyguards: we followed Maedhros!

Finrod, significantly less relieved: oh.

#celebrian likes them so he can't complain too much (they remind her of her sons)#but actually i figure her guard were angband escapees who went to himring and died pre-doriath#so they did no kinslayings and can also understand her fears the best

see, i love that idea, but also throw some angband survivors who followed maedhros till they died in the war of wrath in there - i just want some people who knew elrond as a kid and get EXTRA OVERPROTECTIVE of celebrían

@jaz-the-bard ;www;

Big and gentle

I'm pretty sure the sigil of Himring and Maedhros was a red right hand. First, because it's a hand joke, second because Maedhros can be interpreted as "red-hand" which is. also a hand joke.

It's hand jokes all the way down, is what I'm saying

Maglor And The Boys ,

,

Beloved Dust

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

And you as well must die, beloved dust, And all your beauty stand you in no stead, This flawless, vital hand, this perfect head, This body of flame and steel, before the gust Of Death, or under his autumnal frost, Shall be as any leaf, be no less dead Than the first leaf that fall,–this wonder fled. Altered, estranged, disintegrated, lost.

Nor shall my love avail you in your hour. In spite of all my love, you will arise Upon that day and wander down the air Obscurely as the unattended flower, It mattering not how beautiful you were, Or how beloved above all else that dies.

christians: what could possibly be in that evil book…. what horrible spells does it hold within its pages… what black magic does it propagate….

the talmud: so if you send your kid off to Torah school but he has a really hard time with it, send him back home and go to school yourself instead so that once you’ve learned Torah you can go and teach your entire family. in fact, once some rabbi went out to go to Torah school and do just this, and on his way he came through this town and he asked if he could stay in the synagogue for the night. and of course the rabbi said yes but weird enough no one was in the streets and something was kind of off about the whole place. so our hero went into the synagogue only to find a seven headed demon just hanging out in the library!! our hero is terrified and prays super hard and because of this the demon is vanquished. he goes back to the rabbi and is like “dude wtf” and the rabbi was like “listen i know this is unorthodox but you’re well known for how good at praying you are and this demon has been terrorizing us for well over a month and we were desperate. we knew you wouldn’t die” and the guy was like “i didn’t know that!” who do you think is in the right? hm. tough question. anyway. what were we talking about again? oh right. what if you make your sukkah doorway 1/7 of a cubit too short. would that be fucked up or what

look up Bavli Kiddushin 29b <3

you know what’s a trope that never gets tired is when theyre bouncing around in the plot and suddenly an important name crops up- it’s blorbo bleebus. and some dude is like who the hell is blorbo bleebus. and we immediately cut to our new friend blorbo bleebus pulling the most absolutely buckwild shit you’ve ever seen

enhanced edition of this trope is when they cut to blorbo bleebus doing something entirely contradictory to how they were just introduced, like “i know a professional, someone discreet who can handle things quietly” cut to blorbo bleebus in the wildest fucking bar brawl you’ve ever seen, screaming their own name and stopping to down shots while still holding some dude in a headlock

We need a Dracula movie where they do this with Van Helsing.

#jack: i just contacted… professor van helsing#arthur: whomst?#jack: a genius an expert in every field of knowledge you could possibly imagine#he has five degrees he is one of the most respected academics in europe#*cut to van helsing running out of a church with a priest in pursuit and communion wafers spilling out of his pockets*

via @eleancrvances

You get it!

Shen brothers but make it as embarrassing for Shen Yuan as possible

AU where Airplane becomes more financially secure at some point and so starts to write extras where he details things like Shen Jiu’s background and motivations, along with how the majority of accusations against him were false. This makes Shen Yuan so angry at how things went down in canon that he enters a rage fugue state and writes a self-insert fanfiction where he’s Shen Jiu’s younger brother and Luo Binghe’s best friend and manages to soften Shen Jiu’s outlook and therefore give Luo Binghe a nice disciplehood.

And then it becomes one of those fanfics that’s so popular people write fanfic in the world of the fanfic rather than canon, and Shen Yuan/Luo Binghe becomes a hugely popular pairing.

Shen Yuan gets big mad about it because ‘LUO BINGHE ISN’T GAY >:{’, so he writes a bunch of angry comments on the fics. (there’s some fics where Shen Yuan is a woman and those are suspiciously void of Cucumber hate)

And Airplane finds this so incandescently funny that he writes a new extra legitimizing Shen Yuan into canon and detailing his death at the hands of the Qiu family. Even more motivation for Shen Jiu to hate everything! *jazz hands*

Long story short, when Shen Yuan transmigrates he does it into his own Mary Sue OC. I think it’s what he deserves.

(also please picture his face when he finds out Binghe is in love with him. Like, the fangirls were RIGHT?? he’d never recover)

No you see it's like! Bilbo says "there's always been a Baggins living here under the hill in Bag End, and there always will be." Then he says "Frodo would probably come with me if I asked him, but I think in his heart he's still in love with the Shire-- the woods, the fields, the little rivers." Bilbo knows that he doesn't belong in the Shire anymore but he's so confident that Frodo does-- that he can protect Frodo from the outside world, so that Frodo will have the quiet life of contentment in the Shire that Bilbo can't. Bilbo's quest has made him restless and unable to enjoy life in the Shire; he's attempting to prevent Frodo from also feeling like the Shire is no longer is home. And that's why the scene in Rivendell, when Bilbo gives Frodo his old sword and armor, is so devastating.... Bilbo starts out trying to be kind, cheerful, and encouraging, as if trying to convince Frodo that everything will be fine and that he himself is proof that you can come back from a journey like this. But after the Ring drives him to nearly attack Frodo, he breaks down and tearfully apologizes. ("I'm sorry that you must bear this burden, and I'm sorry for everything.") Because Bilbo's goal was to prevent this from happening to Frodo, but he failed utterly. Frodo doesn't know that he'll never be able to leave peacefully in the Shire again, Frodo doesn't know that he'll never truly be able to 'return home'-- but Bilbo does.

tianlang jun is such a fucking simp i see where luo binghe got it from jesus christ

#do you know#do you know how much i love tianlang jun#not only is he a DILF#but hes so fucking funny oh my god#genuinely one of the funniest svsss characters#“oops haha sorry dont mind me peak lord shen please just continue topping my nephew or whatever ir was you were doing”#“while i sit here and watch ahaha kids these days”

(op's tags)

there's nothing more precious in the world than tianlang-jun in love

tlj got the pathetic act on point from the start. no one's doing it like him

Elrond be like: I am 4/8 human, 3/8 elf, and 1/8 angel. My mother is a bird and my father is the North Star. My twin brother was the first king of Atlantis but somehow I seem to be more famous than him. I am one of three ringbearers, the other two being the female version of Feanor and a guy who loves fireworks. My foster father is a crazy homeless guy who likes music and his whole family is dead. My many-greats grandnephew is in love with my daughter. No one can tell my sons apart. I like waterfalls and am both a glorified innkeeper and a top-notch doctor. I am the voice of reason no one listens to.

fun fact: hes specifically 9/16 elf, 6/16 human, and 1/16 maia! also fun fact: due to the maiarin ancestry on elwings side of the family, earendil is the only (iirc) literal half-elf, as in 50/50 elf/human heritage, in the history of ever.

king i think it is not fucking sufficient at all. wolftopia or bust

Also Wolftopia is gorgeous by the way

Wolftopia is nearly the size of Saturn and orbits two stars that closely orbit each other!

Wolftopia is OPALESCENT are you KIDDING ME

dog literally saying “woof” (via)

“don’t woof”

“… woof 🙄”

When you are used to the no-nonsense, no-context approach of medieval Irish stories, trying to read Old Norse saga literature does feel kind of like you're being told a medieval story by Uncle Colm from Derry Girls.

#you know young thorgrim as it was #ah this wouldn't be the thorgrim who was thorstein's son #THAT thorgrim lived on the other side of the fjord #or WAS it that thorgrim? #no it was the other thorgrim #his father was thorstein too you see but he was quite a different man #although you wouldn't know it to look at his farm #a mess of a place it was #i said to him thorstein i said you need to start asking thorgrim to help you more #and he said they've a haunting #would you believe it! #a haunting! #it would have been around then or was it the winter after that when they had the famine #no i think it was that winter #and a young man arrived. a warrior he was. #i never knew his father but his father's uncle— (via @trans-cuchulainn)

If this were a medieval Irish story, it would be more like:

"There was an excellent warrior, Thorir his name. He was fostered by Thorstein, who had a son called Thorgrim, but it was not an auspicious time for their farm, because there was a haunting there. When Thorir saw the dead man, he tied a withe around its feet, but it pursued him anyway. Then he performed the sword-feat, and cut the man into many pieces. He took his head and went back to Thorgrim mac Thorstein. 'O fosterbrother,' he said, 'I have killed the man who was haunting you, that is, the revenant.' Thorgrim said, 'This is a great deed.' And that is why that place is called Hill of the Dead Man."

And we will never find out who any of these people are or what was up with the revenant or what Thorir was trying to achieve with the withe -- or even who the revenant was before he was dead.

Meanwhile in the Norse saga we're still learning his family tree and Thorir hasn't even shown up yet.