Yes!!! Ya Boi Just Said "they Lost Control? Been There, Done That, Lived Through It, Ain't Nothing Gonna

Not to mention Jin Ling then trying to turn all of his hatred onto Wen Ning afterwards. He's a kid who's been reminded of his parents' deaths with every breath he takes, only having stories about them and being fed Jiang Cheng's unhinged hatred for all the love that was lost. If Wei Wuxian turned out to not be the monster he thought he was, then he...he has to hate someone else!

But then Wen Ning turns out to be even MORE gentle than Wei Wuxian, filled with guilt for what happened, flinging himself in front of Lan Sizhui and saying "I won't fight back, get your anger out on me if it'll put you at ease!"

That scene had me crying too yo. Everyone rallies behind Lan Sizhui and calls Jin Ling out for being too aggressive - no one takes his side, no one understands how much he's been affected by his life. Jiang Cheng's solution is to tell him to get angry, but now that's just turned all of his peers against him and calling him violent and unreasonable. So he just breaks down sobbing saying "Yes, I'm a horrible person!" even though NONE of what happened is his fault and he has a right to be angry and trying to find an outlet for his emotion. He just doesn't know HOW. No one ever taught him, everyone ridicules him for crying and distances themselves from his anger. People treat him delicately yet say he needs to toughen up.

I think the worst part is that Wei Wuxian's first scathing (accidental) comment, "Your mother never taught you any manners" is kinda really true. He never had a mother to teach him to express himself, to support him and be vulnerable with him. We joke about how many uncles Jin Ling has but I mean how many AUNTS does he have? How many mother figures does he have? Qin Su is basically traumatized by the death of Jin Rusong so is maybe not the motherly type. Nie Huisang, Lan Xichen, Jiang Cheng - unmarried, unmarried, unmarried.

Wei Wuxian is really the first one to A: tell Jin Ling to get over himself and doesn't treat him like some untouchable young master who no one has the right to lord over, B: openly admits when he's sorry and apologizes and teaches Jin Ling the concept of emotional vulnerability, C: stands by Jin Ling's side to teach him to be himself rather than scolding or threatening or guilting him to fit in better. The fact that Wei Wuxian is NOT a woman may even be better because Jin Ling is seeing that men don't have to fit into the unyielding mold of tough guys but can still have fun without being a pushover.

Jin Ling is such a tragedy because there really is no one left to blame. It's not that easy. Wei Wuxian and Wen Ning are responsible, but they're not maniacal villains laughing at the top of a mountain without a care in the world for the consequences. They cared, they had family who were lost, they suffered before and don't want anyone to suffer again - they hate themselves just as much for their part in what happened.

Even Jin Guangyao is such a complicated case for Jin Ling. It's the uncle who was always nice to him, who gave him his spirit dog, who was always putting on a smile. In comparison to Jiang Cheng, Jin Guangyao was a lifeline. And then Jin Guangyao turns out to be a villain who doesn't bat an eye at killing and threatening...but who also didn't WANT these bad things to be "necessary." He too was wronged by the world and lashed out at its unfairness.

This fifteen year old kid has gone through so much, simultaneously pampered into a spoiled brat and utterly isolated from his peers, filled with vengeance for his entire life but also trying to love and be loved. He learned from Jiang Cheng to pretend to be above it all, and he learned from Jin Guangyao to be kind and forgive, but all of it was lies and unhealthy coping. Jiang Cheng essentially taught him to argue with anyone who disagrees with him or looks down on him to assert his dominance, and Jin Guangyao taught him to suppress his desire to speak his mind and never start fights because of etiquette and self-preservation - to the point that he rejects who he is and wants to be.

At this age, Jin Ling's already having to learn the lesson that everyone's going to be throwing opinions around, no one is perfect, you can't easily sort people into categories. In the end, he can take advice from others, but it's up to him to make the choice of who he wants to be. And he's learned that unrelenting resentment makes for an easy path to walk in life, but it's not actually how life works. The cultivation world can turn on someone they worshipped unconditionally. That included Wei Wuxian, that included Jin Guangyao, and even to an extent Jin Ling himself.

He has to take over the Jin Clan after all these scandals and atrocities, but he's become the kind of kid who will answer an insignificant man's plea for help, who is making friends who won't judge him and will stand by him even when he makes mistakes, and by the end of the story he's matured, yet also finally learned to be a kid. Nothing's perfect, none of the tragedies of the past can be reversed (and Jiang Cheng's still gonna get into fights whenever he accidentally runs into Wen Ning), but at least now Jin Ling can choose how he decides to live, who he hates and who he forgives.

while reading the books, i remember wei wuxian’s relationship with jin ling hitting me especially hard. i was crying when the whole stabbing thing happened. but i truly adore what becomes of them and do you know why? because jin ling does something the others could never, something miraculous really––he actually unlearns the prejudice he’s been taught to hold against wei wuxian. he meets wwx, full of disdain, slowly learning about who wwx really is and it has nothing to do with wwx’s outward appearance. and when the truth is revealed, the internal warring for jin ling is plainly portrayed and even if he does give in to a hate intermingled with grief that he has internalised towards this one entity (wei wuxian was never a person in his mind, just the ‘killer’ of his parents, a phantom, before the events of the book happened), you can tell his heart has already turned, that it will keep turning and that’s what happens. you have jin ling, an orphaned child, who hated someone whom his mother loved dearly, because that man caused his parents’ death but it is such a commendable thing that wei wuxian was able to create a space in jin ling’s heart and jin ling was able to accept it. it’s the way both jin ling & jiang cheng blame the death of their parents on wwx but only the former was able to see wei wuxian clearly and actually forge a bond of love with him.

it’s the fact that if ANYONE in this story can actually rightfully hold a grudge against wei wuxian, it’s jin ling, but instead this teenager decides that wei wuxian is much too good and that having him as an uncle is lovely, after all.

Hope’s little foot stomp when he is venting at Snow is just adorable. Like this little 14 year old wants to be taken seriously and he stomps his foot, immediately ruining the effect. He is throwing his frustration and grief around–understandably–but he is also kicking a hornet’s nest by saying it is all Serah’s fault that they are l’cie. He’s a kid; he doesn’t have all the pieces of the puzzle, but none of them do. All Hope sees is this dude that got his mother killed, running around talking about saving Serah and all of Cocoon when this buffed up bastard couldn’t even save his mother. 

He’s been in a constant state of fear since getting off the train; then watching his mother walk away to join the resistance, watching his mother die, and then getting kidnapped essentially by Vanille, and talked into going onto a fal’cie vestige. He’s likely never seen half of the animals that he ends up fighting alongside Vanille; and we know that he’s never seen Cie’th or a Fal’Cie. Of course, he is terrified.  It doesn’t help that he is surrounded by strangers who have thus far: 1) failed to save his mother and keeps running around seemingly only consumed with his own self-interest; 2) attempted to help what he (and most of Cocoon even Sazh) believe to be the enemy of Cocoon and has at least once struck another person in front of him for saying something she didn’t agree with and then straight up attacked a Fal’Cie. 

He didn’t feel safe a second into that journey; he hid behind Vanille when things got bad and stuck to her like glue in the vestige. Instead of finding comfort in the adults’ presence, he latched onto someone he had just met that night who acts even younger than him and is the one that talked him into going on the vestige in the first place. Hope is adrift and is searching for any kind of substitute for a lifeboat that he can find.     

It’s not surprising that finding out he is now a l’cie himself is a last straw. He likely hasn’t been able to come to terms with the fact that his mother and he were in the Purge at all, much less dealt with his grief or rage over his mother’s death. It’s a lot for the adults to handle. To expect Hope to handle it the same as his older, non-riddled with hormones companions is completely unfair. Even Sazh asks “why me” about being turned into a fal’cie, even Lightning rages against her sister’s and her own fate. 

In short, Hope is fourteen, dealing with multiple stressors at once, cut the boy some slack.   

5000 likes!

And most of it is danmei at this point ngl

Middle one is better honestly, I don't need to see every individually rendered hair thank you, and like the fact that he's in the fire but his face is partly in shadows *chef's kiss*

1997- 2005 - 2024

The entire series is about Shen Qiao’s growing affection for Yan Wushi, just expressed in ways that are very specific to him as a character, and it’s freaking adorable the whole time.

Shen Qiao is very aware that Yan Wushi is a little messed up from the moment they meet, but in the end he has to admit that Yan Wushi is a very smart and more knowledgeable person. Shen Qiao is drawn to him every time Yan Wushi makes a very reasonable and intelligent remark - especially in regards to predicting how human hearts work. While Yan Wushi thinks evil is the root of all hearts, he’s not in denial about love and sympathy EXISTING; he just believes these things are not strong enough or always end up the reason someone is corrupted one way or another.

Shen Qiao is undeniably attracted to a smart man, especially one who is still fundamentally teaching him things about the world that he never knew. Yan Wushi explains things in terms Shen Qiao understands - good things exist, they can both agree on this, but bad things also happen, and they agree on this. Now the two of them get to debate the overall takeaway from these two points. They disagree on the conclusion, but they agree on the evidence presented.

Shen Qiao gets so engaged in listening to Yan Wushi’s advice that Yan Wushi can play around with him like "There's a lesson to be learned, find it" even when he just wants to play chess and see Shen Qiao’s serious expression and over-trusting nature. Shen Qiao knows Yan Wushi teases him, but he also loves to learn from him, and so trusts him again and again.

Shen Qiao denies Yan Wushi’s advances in the same way that he does when others flirt with him - Yan Wushi never stops but also rarely goes too far. Yan Wushi starts teasing and parading him around as a kept man and Shen Qiao eventually gets used to it and shuts him down whenever possible, but he never gets angry about it because it’s just a little dumb fun after all. Yan Wushi calls him A-Qiao and "my" A-Qiao and Shen Qiao protests before giving up and letting him have his way because it's just a name, where’s the harm? Yan Wushi kissed him so hard he passed out from the rage and indignation but Shen Qiao can’t really say it was harmful in comparison to what other things Yan Wushi could have forced upon him.

In all instances, Shen Qiao never or very tamely loses his temper, but Yan Wushi is also never losing his temper at Shen Qiao’s stubbornness, and it makes for a solid basis for their relationship that I really love. Yan Wushi never forces Shen Qiao into a physical relationship and is even seemingly averse to physical and/or sexual relationships (note his feelings towards Hehuan Sect and indifference to pair cultivation), seeing a kiss as his limit to forcing anything from Shen Qiao - and something he doesn’t think is special beyond a way to tease.

In essence, Shen Qiao recognizes that Yan Wushi WANTS him to have some level of hope and agency in his life, rather than simply micromanaging Shen Qiao until he gets what he wants. He wants Shen Qiao to make the final choice, to admit he’s wrong by his own open admission. He confirms that though Yan Wushi finds him physically attractive like the rest, it’s not his appearance that Yan Wushi is attracted to - it’s his mind and his mentality. This means their relationship’s primary development is entire romantic in nature, a mental game between their equally stubborn and tolerant personalities and how their minds end up very compatible even when clashing in deep philosophical debates.

Compare this to almost every other villain we have. People who try to force Shen Qiao to be locked up without agency like Yu Ai, people who hold others hostage like Chen Gong, and pretty much everyone else who thinks killing Shen Qiao or crippling him or physically/psychological abusing him to force him into submission.

Yan Wushi does beat him up a few times, but what’s his primary method of "torturing" Shen Qiao? It’s letting others do the work. It’s dropping him into an impoverished area to see what it’s like to fend for himself. It’s letting others who covet the Zhuyang Strategy hunt him down. It’s letting Chen Gong befriend and betray him. It’s actively escorting Shen Qiao to Xuandu Mountain to be betrayed by Yu Ai up close and personal. It’s letting others belittle and spit on his name and reputation while Yan Wushi himself treats Shen Qiao like he’s special and precious and saving his life over and over. It’s trading Shen Qiao to Sang Jingxing but leaving him with his sword and a demonic core - a way out, a means of still fighting back, even if it breaks him to do so.

Even in the extras it’s stated that Yan Wushi likes watching misfortune befall someone, whether it’s their own fault or just bad luck. He doesn’t have any aspirations of being an emperor, doesn’t care whether most important figures live or die. Despite wanting to be and then being the top martial artist in the world, he mostly just likes to WATCH. He knows nothing is permanent, not good or bad; he’s entertained by causing mischief, but he’s far from tyrannical. He’s just a massively powerful troublemaker, like a trickster god, and Shen Qiao ends up finding it charming because Yan Wushi ends up doing nearly as much good as Shen Qiao - they can’s save everyone, they can’t make everything perfect or prosperous forever, but they do try. And they do sometimes even suceed.

Yan Wushi will watch in amusement as Shen Qiao struggles, but ultimately what he really wants is to win the argument - not necessarily to make Shen Qiao die but to make his morals break. He’s flippant but patient, he’s powerful but not overbearing. He thinks very little of Shen Qiao’s physical presence and only thinks his mind is a worthy opponent.

Shen Qiao being at Yan Wushi’s mercy at the beginning of their relationship gives him a glimpse into Yan Wushi’s motives and true levels of evil, and he’s intrigued. Yan Wushi is all too aware of the evil nature of humanity, but in a way he rebels against it just as much as he denies all that is generous and kind. In the end, Yan Wushi’s misanthropy is also a deep hatred for the corruption that he thinks exists in every human heart. Shen Qiao and Yan Wushi are equally adamant about uprooting evil, just with their own personalities being what truly clashes.

Shen Qiao himself doesn’t recognize his attraction for Yan Wushi for a long time, but as a reader you can absolutely see how he falls in love with Yan Wushi as a mental opponent as well - someone who makes Shen Qiao really THINK, who challenges him to be an even better version of himself, and whose misanthropy being in his life only further solidifies his own empathetic beliefs in ways he could have never managed on his own. Yan Wushi may love teasing Shen Qiao, but Shen Qiao very much loves arguing back against Yan Wushi.

I'm not going to make a fanfiction, I'm not going to make a fanfiction, I'm 300 pages in but I'm not making a fanfiction or anything -

Hey! I found the "cut it off so you have to click a button to see the whole rant" button! How many made it this far down? Be honest.

I notice people tend to only focus on Yan Wushi's affection towards Shen Qiao cause it's the more obvious one of the two Yan Wushi doesn't tend to feel any need to hide his emotions like. At all but I absolutely live for the little moments in the extras where Shen Qiao shows his fondness of Yan Wushi. The small, subtle smiles, moments where Shen Qiao laughs at something Yan Wushi says. He's a reserved person already, and while Shen Qiao does get flustered, he also doesn't generally startle easily when it comes to come ons (see his calm rejections of other people who have liked him) but since Yan Wushi does happen to be a uniquely infuriating person - it's quite sweet to see when Shen Qiao's affection does peak through, rare as it is.

Give me glimpses of the Shen Qiao that is so outwardly exasperated on the daily, but would go to the ends of the Earth for his partner. Give me glimpses of the Shen Qiao that can't help admiring the tenacious, stubborn, confident arrogant aspects of Yan Wushi, despite them believing in such diametrically opposed ideologies. Give me glimpses of the Shen Qiao that marvels in their similarities and differences. Give me glimpses of the Shen Qiao that's so exasperated by Yan Wushi's nonsense that he just has to laugh. Give me glimpses of the Shen Qiao that fell in love with Yan Wushi, against all odds.

I love it.

Look, I love the Castlevania series and the Netflix adaptation made 3 great seasons ("Um there are 4 seasons" LIKE I SAID, 3 GREAT SEASONS), but we have got to talk about how disappointing it is that the main trio never met or even knew the existence of Hector and Isaac - or honestly, that entire half of the plot. I will forever find it weird that the show set up two related but never intersecting plot threads (and arguably a third, go figure during the worst season).

It's sweet and empowering that both of them found their own ways to live before and after Dracula's death, with Isaac being a total badass and even progressing to a better person despite seeing how unfair, cruel, and rude the world is - to the point that he defeats Carmilla not JUST because she was partly responsible for Dracula's death but because he actually wanted to make the world a better place. But even though Isaac could arguably be founding an entire empire and generation of peace, he and Hector don't even seem to know about Alucard's existence or contributions, let alone Trevor and Sypha.

We can debate Hector and Lenore's fucked up relationship all day, but in the end the two of them DID end up bonding through all the lies and deceit. They were able to actually talk to one another and have the other listen; in the end, both of them were just born in different worlds on different sides. Lenore genuinely seemed to want to settle things peacefully, but she got left behind in a world that valued only overwhelming strength; she decides she can't live as a prisoner even though Hector was no doubt stronger than her for enduring his own imprisonment and subjugation, but I think Lenore was already on her way to losing herself. Despite what she did to Hector, she wanted to at least believe she understood him; even though she was a sympathetic vampire, she still believed knowing enough to control someone was the only way they could be friends - so when it turns out Hector was plotting the downfall of Carmilla and her buddies, unfortunate Lenore had to be betrayed as well. Even if Hector wanted her to live, she was a living contradiction. A vampire who is physically very strong and intimidating, but a woman who other male vampires have looked down upon, and even male humans. A creature who feeds on humans, but one who wants to settle things peacefully. She absolutely had a role in Carmilla's gang of women just surviving, but in Carmilla's mad conquest, she was useless at best and a hindrance at worst.

In the end, Lenore was one of the few vampires that might have been sympathetic to the human side of the argument, but she physically couldn't live like that. I believed Lenore genuinely wasn't capable of turning her whole worldview upside down and aiding humanity in any way - being beneath them. Dracula opened himself up to one human and it destroyed him; he saved Hector and Isaac, but he also sacrificed himself and forced Isaac away, that was the extent of his personal affairs with them. I think it's fundamentally difficult for vampires to adopt human ideologies and empathy, making Alucard the only vampire ally we really have in the series - because he's only half. Unlike Alucard, she is a full vampire. She has a divide that she can't just bridge like he can.

Imagine if Alucard got to meet the only other humans beside his mother who genuinely looked up to and cared about his father. What would Isaac and Hector have to say to the son of the man they had admired and then lost as well? Imagine Alucard meeting another human who may have even fallen in love with a vampire, but who understands how far their worlds pulled each other apart. Or maybe Sypha can relate to having her eyes opened to a world outside her Speaker family. Imagine a discussion with Lenore about what it means to be caught between wanting to make peace with humans and knowing how much harm they cause - her actually getting a sympathetic vampire perspective from someone like Alucard who wouldn't look down on her.

Imagine the tension that could come from Trevor meeting a Forgemaster, Isaac trying to explain his control over Night Creatures and his ability to even make them fight for a sympathetic cause. Both Isaac and Trevor have experience being the outcasts, understanding how awful humans can be, but they both found their way to still fighting for the right thing. Trevor understands why killing Dracula's wife would make him want to purge the world in retribution, but he still knows humans are worth fighting for. Isaac fully abandoned his faith in humanity and believed in Dracula completely, and even THEN he managed to find the good amongst the rabble. Is it right to make Night Creatures from the dead, even if they were bad people? Even if it's to champion a good cause? Even if Hector and Isaac have full control over them without a potential for any sort of rebellion?

What I'm saying is, I love the idea of a new Castlevania series, but nothing will beat the OG season 1 and 2, and season 3 should have been answering questions and tying up loose ends - not going off on at least 3, 4 tangents that were just meant to come out of nowhere and make things shitty again after our happy ending and I guess they're kinda related but not really, so now we can fix the new shitty stuff and have ANOTHER happy ending and avoid showing anything resembling resolutions, just teaser after teaser for the fanfics to finish up.

Anyway so I'm going to the fanfics and if I don't come back, tell the Final Fantasy rants I love them-

Yes! A big portion of Laurent's character is that he uses the fact that his looks make him seem incompetent on purpose! He's trained in secret to become strong enough to kill Damianos, and I think it's "But Green for a Season" that reveals how Jord discovered Laurent had gotten very good with his discreet lessons.

Even though he loses against Damen during their fight in the third book, he still proves himself to be a challenge; what he lacks in raw power against an enemy, he makes up for with his tactics and dirty fighting. He'll use the environment to his advantage, upset and anger his opponent, and he's not above a knee to the groin if it'll give him an edge. When Laurent is fighting Kastor at the end, Damen even considers that if Laurent hadn't been both injured from Govart and his mind clouded with rage - if he were actually focusing with his greatest strength, his mind - he might have even beat Damen in that very fight! Laurent had been on the defensive and a victim for so long that it's often easy to forget that the guy has been training and pushing himself to make up for anything he lacks in order to escape his underdog position.

The only weakness Laurent has is that for most of the books, he thinks he has to do everything alone. The idea that Damen would ever want to help him, wouldn't betray him the instant Laurent didn't have something to reign him in, and that anyone would actively believe in him - it's almost too much for Laurent to fully wrap his head around. He can't compete with his uncle, that's what's been drilled into his head from the most vulnerable point of his life. He's younger, and he can't do anything about it. He's smart, but the Regent will ALWAYS have more experience, will always have the advantage, and Laurent has had every person who might support him and believe in him either abandon him or be killed with every tiny misstep.

The second book, Laurent would have never managed to beat his uncle in this ONE maneuver had Damen not been there to A: stop him from trying to go off on his own and "play along" with his uncle to the point that he basically admits defeat, and B: has a partner who is offensively able to teach him everything his uncle refused to teach him when it comes to being a leader. The only reason Laurent even brought him along was because, begrudgingly, Damen could be temporarily useful. He knows Damen is Damianos from the very beginning, and so he uses their nights going over strategy to learn both the limits of his own people and how Akielons think. Laurent needs to learn how to be a king, something the Regent wouldn't have been keen to actually teach him while trying to outst him from the Veretian throne.

At the end of that book and the beginning of the third, Laurent plays like he's fully prepared to work independently of Damen - or if he is going to work with him, he'll not be reliant upon Damen in any way. He knows Damen a little better now, but that can't instantly erase the confrontation six years in the making when Laurent wants to lash out and beat the shit out of Damen to prove that he didn't spend all this time trying his hardest and it still wasn't enough. It wasn't - Laurent had to painfully confess that he knew he could never beat Damen, and if Damen hadn't been such a good person, he would have lost.

The fact is, Laurent's greatest weakness is being in the mindset that he has to be strong enough and smart enough to do everything alone. Laurent became extremely self-sufficient, deadly in both body and mind, but being with Damen and even falling in love with him was doubly painful because not only is Damen a reminder that he isn't strong enough all on his own, but now his greatest asset is someone who he's spent all this time trying to overcome. It's a really awful struggle for him to accept that maybe someone can actually understand him and support him and be strong enough not to be hurt in the process.

A person? Being on his side?? Willingly??? Someone he doesn't have to protect 24/7???? But someone he WANTS to protect????? AND IT'S FUCKING DAMIANOS WHO HE HATES?????? BECAUSE HE'S A GOOD PERSON???????

In the third book, Laurent actively gives himself up to the Regent, and by Damen’s account, he fully believes no one was going to come for him. He didn't have a plan, he knew he could save Damen maybe but not himself. It's a bit of a weird final move for Laurent to have been saved by a plan that wasn't his own and barely Damen's, but it does showcase his weakness of giving up when he doesn't have a definitive plan in his uncle's domain - by contrast to Damen who never gives up hope even when things around him seem hopeless and he doesn't know what to do, YET.

And to the next point, Damen. We see everything (except one tiny chapter) from Damen's POV, and so by necessity, Damen has to be behind in most of Laurent's plans so that he can figure things out at the same time the readers do. In the first and especially the second book, Damen really is Laurent's slave. Laurent is in charge, Laurent calls the shots, Laurent's the one fighting this civil war with everything to both gain and lose. Laurent is the one to go somewhere, with Damen demanding to follow and help, and proving himself useful in the process. Damen really is just reacting to things happening around him, with the point of that book being him growing Laurent's trust to actually be allowed to do shit.

Damen's only "dumb" quality is that he simply recognizes things as facts, rather than hypothesize about what could be done in the future. He really is a reactive character, but it's entirely realistic if you think about how Akielons are compared to Veretians. Akielons think very straightforward; they take in what they know, work out something from it, and then conclude with a plan to execute - take in the new information gleaned, then rinse and repeat. Veretians think five steps ahead, ensure every action has at least two different purposes/meanings, make sure that even when they lose one thing, they can still gain another. Damen has the problem-solving and experience to react in the moment to Laurent's actions, but only when he sees the plan executing before his eyes.

Ever heard that symbolic thing about their culture designs? Akielons are very stripped down and simple with their clothing, Veretians have complex ties and strings that Damen complains are overly and unnecessarily extravagant? It's like that.

However Damen spends SO much time keeping up with Laurent's patterns that he actually starts to think like him. Damen is good at taking what he knows and making use of it. To be the King of Akielos, he had to know how war worked, how people worked, what customs and traditions and practices were common, what could be weapons and what could be problems. He simply adds Laurent's new perspective on life and the ways of the Veretians to his list of examples to pull from.

To be fair, Damen BEGINS the story slightly naive and spoiled. The whole reason Kastor shipped him off to Vere as a slave was because he refused to believe Kastor was anything more than the brother he had known. Before that instance, Damen didn't believe people could be more than they appeared on the surface. That's just how Akielon culture is. Heck, Damen even admits that he blindly followed his own father's perspective on life - he was the shining king, who could never do wrong, who fought and won battles with glory and grace, and always with honor. He beat back the slimy, conniving, distrustful snakes of Vere who could never be trusted to keep their word or worry about anyone other than themselves.

It's really good worldbuilding, because it's true that's how Veretians can be - not all of them, certainly, but it's also just a human thing, not exclusive to any culture. Some people are good, some are bad, and it's just normal for some people to have built a society where outsmarting others and building a reputation is the way you survive.

But after all his time actually getting to know Laurent and his people and their culture? Damen admits that though he would never speak ill of his father, he can't agree with the kind of king he was; Theomedes was a king who conquered, rather than tried to understand. Damen's father would have never tried to think like the enemy did, to differentiate one Veretian from another. Damen was only forced to see the differences when he saw Laurent and the Regent - Laurent was ultimately a good, kind person, but he was crushed under the weight and expectations and attacks from all sides, forced to become someone else entirely to play their game.

And it's ultimately Damen who has to convince Laurent that playing the game under his uncle's terms is always going to be how he loses. Laurent is thinking five moves ahead to try and keep up with his uncle who is six moves ahead. Instead, Laurent needs to forge his own path, not to be a piece on his uncle's board, but the king of his own. Where Damen is forced to learn Veretian cunning just to keep up (and he does so successfully, if not as good as Laurent who's been doing it much longer), Laurent is forced to learn Akielon straightforwardness and the simple fact that if he wants to win, he has to go into it believing he will - however delusional it seems to barge in, acting first, thinking later.

Veretians can be good people, use their cunning minds to do good things, to fight their enemies and maintain good and evil even within their own kingdom. Akielons can be loyal and headstrong, and if pointed in the right direction, they'll be paragons who'll fight for what they believe in even against all odds. Regardless of the kingdom, there are good and bad people inside it. Both princes need to learn it if they want to be kings, and though it takes a lot of pushing, they ARE willing to learn for their own survival.

Damen is a seriously strong warrior, that can't be argued, but he has EVERYTHING that makes him a born-leader. He recognizes strategies, opens his mind to new ideas, and in turn opens Laurent's mind as well. Laurent is cynical but extremely intelligent; he isn't lacking in any kingly quality beyond his own self-confidence, the belief that he can win after years of thinking all he could do was lose. The two of them really do work with one another, brains and brawn, as well as the potential to help the other recognize the benefits of their different ways of life.

TL;DR it's like this:

"My size," Laurent said, "is the usual. I am not made in miniature. It's a problem of scale, standing next to you."

What I feel the CaPri fandom sometimes fails to understand is that Damen only looks stupid compared to Laurent and Laurent only looks weak compared to Damen.

Damen is one of the few people who pick up on Laurent's schemes - sure, he picks up on things more slowly than Laurent, who has an insider's view of the situation and is actually the person in control of his schemes (in addition to his godlike intelligence), but Damen sees through what Laurent is doing more quickly than anyone else, even people who have known Laurent for years, and manages to keep up with his logic most of the time when no one else does. In book 1 he always manages to read a situation pretty accurately based on the knowledge he has - he can see what Laurent's options are and where the political lines are drawn, he just doesn't know how to mess with them as creatively as Laurent does.

Similarly, Laurent is one of the most competent fighters in the setting and only looks weak compared to Damen, the God of Warfare, who is like 2 meters tall and 2 meters wide. He's not some helpless uwu smol bean, he can hold his own, gives Damen a damn good fight even though he's been recently injured and fucks up several other people described as very strong fighters during the course of the series.

Perfect description of tgcf's first kiss(es)

Contrary to popular belief, he’s trying really hard to prevent this old man from getting pregnant right now

Just finished book 3 and feeling 🤪🤪

Okay I read unofficial translations but of course I bought the official translation of Thousand Autumns and I just gotta say - does anyone else think Yan Wushi’s entire battle with Hulugu was a setup?

No, not like he was faking the duel and set something up with Hulugu. I mean he KNEW he could defeat Hulugu and the only question was how badly he’d be hurt in the process. Like if he’d be walking it off or if he’d actually collapse. Even that, he had a pretty good idea of how it would end.

Because rereading the whole series, once he becomes determined to win over Shen Qiao, Yan Wushi’s already confusing personality becomes even more misleading now that he knows he’s teasing Shen Qiao into the inevitable. We’re stuck primarily in Shen Qiao’s mind, and whenever we get a glimpse of Yan Wushi’s mind, it’s almost always to say "He was saying this, but actually he felt this and was having so much fun seeing Shen Qiao be so easily tricked." Once you’ve reread his actions multiple times over, you realize...like, he knew.

He knew he would beat Hulugu. Whether it was because of the power of love or just because of his own arrogance, he never went into the battle thinking he might lose. Any and all of his suggestions that he might actually die were for Shen Qiao’s sake, to taunt the man into realizing that he was worried about Yan Wushi - to actually admit he didn’t want Yan Wushi to die.

He joked about making bets only when he didn’t know the outcome because that was the only way things were fun, which may have had some truth to it, but then he also set up the massive betting pool to not be in his favor so that when he DID win, he ended up getting a massive payout. Like we call that illegal in our modern day, like manipulating the stock market.

Yan Wushi has been a terrible pessimist and misanthrope since he was very young. He has never trusted anyone (until Shen Qiao) to ever do something honorable or noble when they thought they could control him. Therefore, Yan Wushi very rarely EVER goes into anything without knowing his odds and his escape plan even when if he does fail (see the epilogue story "The Past" for an example). I think the only time he really bet his life was the 5-1 fight where he genuinely didn’t think Shen Qiao would survive his betrayal, let alone rush to his side to save his life.

Compared to that, even against Hulugu? Pfft, it sounds like he's just playing with Shen Qiao from the very beginning.

He announced his challenge when Shen Qiao went to Xuandu Mountain - implying it's for Shen Qiao’s sake, tugging at his heartstrings.

He tells or lies to Bian Yanmei to convince Shen Qiao that the flaws in his demonic core haven’t healed and his battle against Xueting weakened him. Oh no! Now Shen Qiao is even more worried! (Shen Qiao can’t tell just by taking his pulse alone, mystery, is he really okay???)

This also makes us all completely gloss over the fact that both Yan Wushi and Shen Qiao had gained access to the final volume of the Zhuyang Strategy thanks to Xueting’s defeat - if we count them battling one another as exchanging the volumes they never see in person. The Zhuyang Strategy. You remember that thing? That thing whose true qi kept Shen Qiao alive after getting poisoned and beaten to near-death on numerous occasions? Just that thing, no biggie.

Yan Wushi denies both of the former points and says "No I challenged him for my own amusement actually, it has nothing to do with you, and also Bian Yanmei doesn’t know what he’s ralking about I’m fiiiine see?", but Shen Qiao thinks he’s downplaying or lying to spare his feelings - something Shen Qiao would believe he’d do only if he believed for a second that Yan Wushi DOES in fact care about him.

He takes Shen Qiao out gambling to further emphasize that he enjoys leaving things to fate (making us *Shen Qiao* forget the fact that he’s a meticulous planner and intelligent strategist who puts the odds in his favor and always gets what he wants even when he loses). Funny detail that Shen Qiao was (unintentionally or not) rigging the game so that he won, because his natural personality likes having control over things even if his entire journey losing his power demonstrated that he’s very competent at just dealing with misfortune without overreacting. Though they believe different things, the two really are cut from the same stubborn cloth.

Yan Wushi also makes Shen Qiao see the gambling dens where people are betting against Yan Wushi, thanks in part to a certain Yi Pichen’s comments on the matter. Shen Qiao is NOT having feelings or anything, what are you talking about, he’s not worried about this guy he absolutely does not feel attracted to, but uh...those people don’t know you well enough to place their bets correctly, am I right?

Yan Wushi KOs Shen Qiao to make him miss most of the fight to terrify Shen Qiao into thinking he might MISS Yan Wushi’s potential death match, oh no! Come on, I don’t believe Yan Wushi wasn’t skilled enough to have precisely sealed his sleep accupoint or whatever so that Shen Qiao has JUST enough time to catch him near the end of the duel.

Yan Wushi was definitely injured by Hulugu, there’s no denying it. Even when he fights other powerful characters, he’s not a Mary Sue, he still does take damage and admits that he has to push himself to actually kill other grandmasters like Yuan Xiuxiu. However, after the battle with the 5 guys, Yan Wushi absolutely knew his odds and how much it actually takes to crack his skull open. He also knows that Shen Qiao has seen him nearly dead before and will absolutely be using that to freak him out further and convince Shen Qiao he might actually be dead.

He probably DID need Shen Qiao’s medicinal pills to help him, but Yan Wushi was basically guaranteed to have survived and just waiting for Shen Qiao to say he’d "Do anything" before he woke up again. Like does that not sound like a Yan Wushi thing to do? I’m half convinced he stopped his own heart and breathing with a technique (there’s a turtle-breathing technique in the Donghua, something like that to fake it for JUST long enough for Shen Qiao to freak out) or was planning to do so if Hulugu didn’t manage to fuck him up enough for it to be convincing.

The fact that he’s still able to joke around kissing Shen Qiao then loudly complaining about how much pain he’s in automatically tells us he’s not doing as bad as when his head got cracked open. He’s fiiiine.

Then we get the gambling reveal where Huanyue Sect made a few casinos go bankrupt and he sends a fifth of it to Yi Pichen and the Chunyang Monastery as a thanks for essentially rigging the bets.

Yan Wushi tells Yu Shengyan that Shen Qiao already loves him, he’s just too prideful to admit it, and then later sets up the whole scenario in the epilogues - YES IT'S ALL A SET UP - just to get Shen Qiao to have the courage to confess.

In conclusion, Yan Wushi knew what the fuck he was doing, he fought Hulugu primarily to fuck with Shen Qiao and just also happening to get some other things out of it too on the side. Ya boi wanted to force Shen Qiao to realize how much he cares about Yan Wushi in return. And kill a bitch while earning some street cred, but that’s beside the point.

I had no pictures to add for this rant, maybe I’ll add them later, it’s 2am thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

I imagine this is the portrait of him hung in the palace tho

Dion Lesage