Seto pursuing interaction in dueling while not fully understanding the full depth of the emotions driving him through his duels and interactions, and as he seeks interaction through the vector he understands and that he understands in others he also sabotages himself in making connections with aggression and unkind comments to simultaneously try to keep people at an arm’s length so that when/if his efforts to connect fail he can feel justified in his feelings of loneliness, sense of strength, and how he tries to live even as he also craves to interact and understand another person, even as he doesn’t know how else to reach out to others.

The fact that Seto defeated Gozaburo in their Duel with his Blue Eyes, the card that Mokuba drew for him as a symbol of their bond as brothers..........and it was something that Mokuba dreamt would save them and fly them far away from their step-father's abuse..........

Fic: A River in Egypt, by @nenya85 Fandom: Yugioh!

[kaiba voice] MIRU KA II! ENDPAPERS FROM JOANN'S!! WAHAHA!!

Nenya is an icon in Yugioh fandom - and an adored friend <3 It was time she got to hold a hard copy of all her hard work in her hands. Working on these books over the past few weeks has brought me insane joy, and I'm so proud of how these turned out - they are #5 and #6 in my current book tally, and I learned a pile while working on them.

The covers are silk moire in black, gold, and a sandy white, while the blue is Japanese book cloth. The body of this text is set in 10.5 point Perpetua font, with accents in Skandal and Aquifer.

Some additional details below the cut:

@giantpacific-octopress Thank you so much!  I’m beyond speechless by the time, care and skill in these books!  I’ve been poring over the details and admiring the books ever since I got them.  Here they are on my bookcase, keeping company with The Lord of the Rings and some of my favorites - just under my Yu-Gi-Oh! shelf!

Thank you an infinite amount!

"Samwise is the real hero-" "Frodo alone had the power to resist the ring-"

Neither Frodo nor Sam could have made it to Mount Doom alone, and they would have been caught if Aragorn hadn't been pitching a giant futile distraction battle in the west which wouldn't have succeeded if they hadn't recruited the Ents, Rohan, and the Dead Men of Dunharrow, Lord of the Rings doesn't *have* a hero, it has many flawed, imperfect individuals all doing what they can and knowing on its own it won't be enough, and trusting other people to do the same.

"I have found that it is the small everyday deed of ordinary folks that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love."

Like the Waves Kiss the Shore

A prideship mermaid AU

Like the Waves Kiss the Shore

I'm not sure if people have seen this, but this is Kazuki Takahashi's afterword from The Comiq where he discussed how he felt he was drawn to the theme of "freedom."

Crab Day

okay, so here's a new info post from the top.

the problem: tumblr is extremely extremely in debt. the current model is not profitable. this is why they are trying to turn the site into a shit clone of every other social media site, so they can attract new users and their money.

solution: not a ton of people can afford a long-term subscriptions like ad-free. however, many of us CAN afford $3 to inflict crabs on another unsuspecting user. (and those that can't, can still enjoy crabs everywhere)

the idea: in the grand traditions of mishapocalypses and goncharovs and tumblr users' obsession with [random inconsequential thing] Days, we create a fund drive/holiday on July 29th, dubbed Crab Day. buy your friends crabs. buy your enemies crabs. blaze posts. post memes. change ur icon. whatever. actually put your money where your mouth is and show @staff that there actually IS profit motive to listen to the current users about what we want this site to look like. (and yes, that means accessibility features too. we currently have zero leverage to demand these features. let's change that.)

i don't know if this will actually go anywhere. worst case scenario, a few of us have fun, tumblr gets a small amount of money, and nothing changes. best case though, we actually provide incentive to keep our stupid hellsite unique.

okay so I was talking with a friend about writing, and I was about to infodump about an au of mine over discord to them because I can't actually write out the ideas rn since ao3 is dOWN-

and they freaked out??? Apparently I'm weird for writing my works *in* ao3? Like I know people usually write in docs or something but I only feel motivated to write when I'm in the ao3 textbox HJLGFJGDH

So now I have a question for fellow writers on ao3:

The movie dialogue could never measure up to this:

“But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Éowyn I am, Éomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him.”

How could anyone cut this?! How?! How?!?!?!?! These lines are so incredibly stirring, so powerful, so moving. “I am no man” doesn’t even come close.

First of all, I like that the negative statement of “No living man am I” is followed by the positive statement of “You look upon a woman.” It’s direct and definitive. She’s been disguised as Dernhelm up until this point—another thing that was cut from the movie—but now she’s revealing who she really is.

Second, in a similar way, I like that she says, “Éowyn I am, Éomund’s daughter.” It’s like a challenge. It’s like announcing one’s identity before a duel—which is in effect what she is doing.

Third, “You stand between me and my lord and kin.” This reminds me of one of the most poignant quotes from the book: “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.” It’s very important that Éowyn did this brave deed out of a desire to protect Théoden.

Finally, “Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him.” THIS IS LITERALLY SO AMAZING! THIS IS SO COURAGEOUS! I CAN’T EVEN EXPRESS HOW THIS MAKES ME FEEL! I don’t know which part is better—the fact that she threatens him, or that she gives him the choice to forfeit and flee the battlefield.

There’s an incredible heroic resoluteness to the final line, “For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him.” This, right here, is the essence of the courage of mortals in Tolkien’s books. It’s the acceptance of death, but the desire to go down fighting—the knowledge that death is inevitable, but the one thing we have control over is how we meet it.

Éowyn is facing Sauron’s most powerful servant, who is almost a personification of death itself, and she is declaring that no matter what he is, and no matter the outcome, she WILL fight him. When she says these lines, she doesn’t know that she and Merry will vanquish him. It’s sheer determination against impossible odds, it’s extraordinary courage in the face of death—and THAT is why this scene is so powerful.

Prideshipping is fucking insane they're like What if I tormented you what if I saw in you something I could never have what if I destroyed your mind and gave you the chance to rebuild your heart anew what if I deemed you the only person worthy of killing me what if I was willing to do it what if I chose this over and over again what if you were my only friend in the world what if I want you to hurt the way I hurt what if I could never ever ever accept that you're gone. And their only way of communicating any of this is by playing card games

given all the commotion lately around AI and programs that, on their face, "act" and "speak" in human ways, as well as the looming threat of AI replacing artists and writers, i was thinking again about Kaiba's Atem hologram in DSOD... and how despite his detailed recreation, and his ability to control every aspect of the hologram, the hologram is ultimately less satisfying than the real Atem.

on one level, it points to a change in Kaiba's character - a character who finds it extremely difficult to trust anyone, who has been taught it's safer to be alone and keep other people out, abandons a version of Atem he can control from top to bottom, from algorithms to pixels - in other words, a "safe" version of Atem - in search of the real Atem - the Atem who is human like him, an Atem who is Other in relation to Kaiba's Self, and therefore ineffable, mysterious, unknowable, and "unsafe." An AI chatbot/digital avatar is safe; it will never hurt you. Your best friend is a full person with thoughts and feelings of their own; they might or might not hurt you someday, on purpose or on accident. Kaiba choosing the dangerous and the mysterious over the safe and controllable - for a relationship - is a step forward for him, a step that takes him further down the path he started on at the end of battle city, when he chose to put his faith in #friendship to help Yami win against Yami Malik. DSOD kaiba is deliberately and purposefully exposing himself to the possible pain of the Others - by pursuing a meeting with the real Atem, instead of a fake Atem.

in addition, "actually, technology isn't good enough to replace the real" is SUCH an interesting direction for a character who's made his mark on the world via science fiction tech genius inventions like lifelike holograms and neural networks and such. like. what other "tech"-y character! none lol!

Okay I wanna know

It’s for science

Giving Up The Ghosts By Nenya85

Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh! Word Count: 266,598

The front cover of both of these is inspired by the swirling gold pattern on the back of the Yu-Gi-Oh! cards. And we have the Millennium Puzzle on the back of the cover as well as holding the chapter numbers for each chapter.

I found fonts inspired by the cards to use for titling and the block quotes at the start of each chapter.

These books were my first time working with HTV and I ended up having to make a new case for the first attempt as I proved a bit overzealous in my application of heat.

I loved the marbled mauve paper that I found for the end pages of these it fit perfectly with the color scheme I had come up with for the books and it gave me something to color match with when picking my thread for the headbands.

Holy shit - @nenya85