One Who Quees

We know the Brimmed Hats are infecting people with the Silverwood Tree parasite. Ininia has many of these seeds and is really cavalier with handing them out, and she might not be the only one. But at the same time, it seems like they actively don't want these people to actually turn, which means they need them for something else. The intentional human incubation of these seeds presumably started with Qifrey well over a decade ago, presumably as a test, and it must have been successful if they're scaling up the operation.

What we know of Qifrey's time with the Brims is limited, but we know that one of Qifrey's eyes was taken and replaced with the Silverwood Tree seed. His eye was then used by someone in the Brimmed Hats. It's pretty clearly alluded to that the person responsible is Iguin and it is also implied that Iguin did a similar spell that Sasarin did to transmute his body into looking like Qifrey, using his eye, because we know Qifrey is specifically looking for a Brim that has his countenance. Of the brimmed hats we have met, we can clearly see their faces except for Iguin's.

We have also seen Iguin do blood magic and cast teleportation spells without drawing seals. We assume it is forbidden magic, but maybe it isn't drawn or tattooed... I think the Silverwood Tree infection does something to the blood that infuses the inherently magical properties of the woodcruor ink into the person, making a physical, biological distinction between a human and a witch, where right now there isn't one. And it would also enable the witch to cast without drawing.

We have seen that Qifrey can do HUGE works of magic using proportionally small seals. I think this has everything to do with the magic ink circulating with his blood. I think that him drawing at all may be a performance because we know there are limitations to what palm quire spells can do - and the seal Qifrey drew to cast that water dragon was maybe the size of a dinner plate, yet it affected the whole area of the fake town. It's giving the same Staircase River scaling issue, which we know is directly correlated with Iguin's blood also.

So, I think that Iguin took Qifrey's eye to use it as a kind of vaccine-like measure so that he isn't directly infected by the seed, or with it he gained an immunity to the seed taking root, where he can still access the benefits of magic blood. This goes hand in hand with the whole Pointed Cap's vs Medical Science issue - the Brims don't care about that separation of church and state, so bringing medical theory into their spellcrafting makes sense. It is Iguin's mission to open magic back up, in terms of reversing the purity standards the Pointed Cap's enforce, as well as broaden accessibility and give magic back to the people (for better or worse). Being able to give people 'the gift of magic' without enduring the training, ethics lessons, or needing necessary technique to draw seals, seems right in line with that goal.

I think Iguin may even be working with King Dean already. We know Dean wants magic for himself, and he seems to be doing medical experimentation. If the way to bring laypeople magic is to transplant (or graft) living, human-Silverwood tissues/organs, then having someone well versed in the surgical arts would be necessary for Iguin. And I found it rather suspicious that the Western Medical Spire is so far away from the Castle's anti-magic field. If the point of the field is to protect royalty from magical harm, you would think with how much time the King spends with his medical practice, that said practice would be relocated to the grounds. But, if it was, then the magic transplants might not work at all? (Although, I am also considering the fact that Custas was able to bloom directly in the castle, which has its own ramifications. I guess the woodcruor only has magical properties upon death/withering, so that may be why??)

The above is a video shared by smrchildsadness on Twitter, showing a person participating in a pride parade exchanging a pride flag with a person standing on his (am using his pronoun based on the TikToks/Tweets of what happened) doorway who had a Portuguese flag. There are sounds of cheers and crying and the two people hug each other as they exchange the flags. The man at the doorway then waved kisses to the crowd within the pride parade.

The Tweet says: "NO YOU DONT UNDERSTAND HE WAS WAVING THE PORTUGUESE FLAG BECAUSE HE DIDN'T HAVE A PRIDE FLAG AND THEY TRADED FLAGS AND HE'S SO EMOTIONAL TO GET HIS OWN PRIDE FLAG I'M EMOTIONALLY RUINED"

For context, apparently they were worried that maybe he's a nationalist because he was waving the Portuguese flag and some nationalists opposing the pride march were waving that flag. But upon interacting with him, it turns out he didn't have have a pride flag and he wanted to wave *a* flag in support of the pride march. So they had an exchange and now he has his own pride flag 😭🥹.

The image above is a Tweet by kunwara_ladkaa that says "I'm crying so much right now (Image taken by Manuel Fernando Araújo/Lusa)". The image shows the same man from the pride parade crying as he hugs his new pride flag.

The above image is a Tweet by dudz_zZzz that says "ainda não parei de pensar nele," which according to Google translate from Portuguese to English is "I still haven't stopped thinking about him." The image is a drawing of the person from the pride parade, crying as he hugs his new pride flag.

I finished this brushbuddy art doll earlier this week and he is very cute. It's got a wire armature inside and is fully posable, including the leather fingers and toes. (There are also magnets in the feet to potentially stick it to things later.)

wordle in 2: misleading. you may think that this is the highest achievement, but it suffers from the same disappointment of a lucky guess that wordle in 1 causes. your second guess is a strategic choice, but ending the game this early just isn't interesting

wordle in 3: the peak. your starting word gave you some information and then your second guess contextualized that information into a solvable position. your sharp intuition and restraint is what truly separates you as above average.

wordle in 4: statistically average, par for the course, the baseline against which all other wordles are compared.

wordle in 5: you're sweating. you made a mistake at some point, or your starting word was effectively useless, and it took an extra guess above average to close things out. wordle in 5 comes as a relief.

wordle in 6: crushing humiliation. you have technically succeeded but at what cost. your thirty square grid will stare back at you like barrels of a firing squad. a failure in all but name.