dungeons and dicks

He came from nothing, he studied his ass off, worked any job he could take, and magic was the one thing he had to his name.

And through no real fault of his own, he doesn’t get to see it through, to reap the benefits. And it’s not fair.

Sure, a diploma is just parchment. Sure, growing into adulthood is an entirely different thing from simply graduating. But there’s also something real about holding the proof of your labors.

Demodus deserved to graduate. To finish his thesis. To be himself. And that got robbed from him.

The Pariah blades are no longer hidden away in a museum. They’ve been soaked in the freed blood and spirit of the people who forged and wielded them.

They are in the hands of Rungjani, clanging in the streets of Dol-Makjar, calling the people to witness a story.

The Hallowed Round is also covered in the liberated blood of Rungjani. Blood held captive for centuries now shapes the forms and faces of Rungjani, captives who strove and died, but did not fail, because their rebellion was a step forward on the path toward freedom.

The play is going forward, with no influence from the Creed. Everyone in the city will see it in its true form— a story of rebellion.

It makes me think of the Falconer’s Rebellion, another failed rebellion. Two rebellions that failed with the fall of a single great man.

But there were nine blades used in the Rebellion that succeeded. Decades later, the Lloy name is held in highest honor as the creators of the Blades, not the wielders.

It makes me think of Uli saying, “I know now that those who sang songs in this place, even if the words were meant to soothe [Azgra’s] wrath and keep our lives in propitiating his fury; the melody, the dance, the fury and the passion, that was always for us.”

It makes me think of Demodus, saying that things have to start as an illusion first.

It makes me think of Thaisha, speaking a Rungjani blessing, blessing the Conqueror, “for in his appetite, he saw Aramán forever changed from what it was to what it might be. A blessing to him, then, that the Rungjani reject peace in favor of a dream.”

Why do we tell stories?

Like, it really vibes with Wick being a Clockwork Sorcerer instead of Divine Soul.

The celestials of Aramán were all divine constructs, built with parameters and rules and a rigidity to what they could be. Made to serve the Shapers and upkeep their order. And that construct of the divine nature is what they can pass on to their sorcerer/aasimar bloodlines, their power and purpose to keep (the Shapers') order.

Thimble and Thaisha being the ones who defended Thjazi against Bolaire is also bolstered by the fact that they both knew Thjazi best in the context of his current work as a revolutionary.

Hal, and even to some extent Azune, seen to have largely been kept out of the loop on Thjazi's current activities. So they know Thjazi as a person but they were kept separate from his own actions and activities in the interest of keeping them both 'clean'. Murray largely knew him as a fence. Occtis was doing him a favor because Thjazi helped get him into magical school etc.

This was happening with everyone Thjazi was close with to some extent, as demonstrated by the cold open where he and Thimble agree to seperate their spheres of knowledge and influence, and in the fact that no one in the room had known about The Cloak and Thjazi being a part of it.

And yet Thimble was still his partner in crime. Thimble was able to arrange payment for the paints which means she had access to a substantial amount of their shared finances. They had stolen the Stone together recently.

Similarly not only was Thaisha tapped to aid Occtis in retrieving the coffin from Venatus, Thjazi also mentioned her as already moving to take action in the Fang brother's flashback right before the Rebellion. The two of them have kept in contact even through Hal and Thaisha's changing relationship and he clearly saw her as someone he could rely on, and I believe as someone with very similar goals and priorities (albeit on a different scale).

Which is all to say that I understand why the rest of the table had reasonable doubts about Thjazi's motive and methods.

But the people who knew him the best in the context that we're talking about- is the Thjazi of today someone who would sacrifice not just 5000 people in general, but a substantial portion of the Rungjani? Is he a person that would sacrifice his allies without warning, who would burn them on pyre for his own vision? Is he a person who would work with the Sundered Houses to any extent?

The people who knew Thjazi the revolutionary the best and most recently said 'No.'