Jermaine Coleslaw

This reading of the steadfast tin soldier in his character teaser just irks me so bad each time i stumble across it because i feel like it couldnt be any more obvious that its about the gnosis. Its about his desire for a heart. The part of his character we’ve know of since the release of husk of opulent dreams. I dont care if you like this or that wanderer ship, but the story has nothing to do with romance in the slightest.

It just saddens me how much this part of his character has been kinda ignored and glossed over tbh. Its such an interesting part of his character for me. When the kabukimono comes to the conclusion that he is separated from the rest of humanity because of his lack of heart (gnosis), he starts to yearn for it. He starts doubting himself even with the assurance he gets from niwa because he knows that he could have already had it, his lack of heart becomes painfully obvious to him since he knows of what he could have had.

This desire for a heart becomes twisted in a sense after the nameless child’s death because now, he has decided to abandon humanity. His wish to be human is no longer, but he still wants a heart, just not in the same way he used to want it. The gnosis grants him the purpose he was born for. An important thing to remember is that ei’s and scaramouche’s relationship id more akin to a “creator and creation” dynamic, and scaramouche parallels ei in the sense that he also views himself as a tool to be used. Without his heart, he feels as though he is purposeless in this world, and the gnosis validates his existence.

But what does having a heart mean anyway? When scaramouche gets the gnosis taken away from him and later erases himself from irminsul, the memoryless wanderer becomes essentially a husk of his former self. He has none of his previous past experiences to solidify his identity and wanders as a shugenja monk. He admits that he’s been yearning for something he cant quite pinpoint, and thats why he trusts the traveler when he tells him he himself doesn’t truly know himself and accepts his offer to meet the dendro archon.

When he asks nahida if theres any difference between humans and puppets, she tells him that the experiences one has went through is what makes up their person. Even a puppet can become human, because you are the sum of your experiences, your past doesn’t define you, but it shapes you into who you are today, and that is what makes us human. He may not have the heart that he desired for centuries, but it doesn’t make him any less human than any other person that walks this world, even if he is a manmade puppet.

When wanderer accepts his past self and regains his memories of his past incarnation, he gains a vision as proof of his journey. It still may not be a heart, but you could say that it solidifies his humanity

The obvious answer is that well who wouldnt want an omega to have a natural vanilla scent but how would that work biologically? Wouldnt scents be the byproduct of a person’s environment? Wouldn’t it be genetic? I know characters get assigned scents with what the writer associate the characters (for example, if a character is associated with oranges) but then how could a human body naturally replicate the scent of oranges or leather or mint or other such scents? Would people describe scents with the closest equivalent of an already existing scent, or would people invent new terms for omega/alpha/maybe even beta scents? And in the case that the human body can produce already existing scents, then wouldn’t it be purely regional? How would the climate and geography impact scents? If, for example, someone were to smell like guava fruit, there’s no way someone from the scandanavian countries could have that scent, because guava fruit thrives in and originates from tropical regions, the only way that that would be possible is if a northern inhabitant gets with someone from that region, who also has some genetic link to being able to produce a guava fruit-like scent, could have offspring that also have that scent note. And how would scents develop over time? Since we have domesticated fruit, imagine if someone from ancient times had the scent of an ancient banana (did the even smell different?), overtime would their offspring keep the same ancient banana scent or would the scent develop alongside the modern day banana?