#at face value

while i don't expect everyone to play RD and pick up on the nuances of characters it makes me sad to see how many people just see micaiah as "a groomer". i love both sothe and micaiah and don't think you can hate one and still fully appreciate the other

"he ruins her character" FEH ruins her character. they don't understand that his character centers around her while hers doesn't center around him. it adds a layer of depth to them both and illustrates how far ahead they each think and where their priorities lie. and that's part of why they make each other so interesting.

i think the view of her seeing him as a little brother makes sense narratively as he IS the little boy she rescued long ago who decided to dedicate his life to her and she still does not understand why (rafal bond convo). why did he continue to search her out when she abandoned him? in his eyes, she's practically all he has, while micaiah's selfless nature leads her to involve herself with the needs of others. on top of being a protagonist, her attentiveness towards others leads her to have a much wider variety of relationships in RD and i wish FEH would focus on that instead of assigning 1-2 prominent characters to protags (like ephraim and lyon for eirika). and i wish people wouldn't label her as a creep when it's clear that this is FEH taking that one aspect of micaiah, framing it as problematic, and running with it every chance they get

sothe is an important part of micaiah's character but she's so much more than that and if by some miracle FEH didn't reduce the dimensionality its characters there wouldn't be twitter riots each time she got an alt

It's quiet as Hiccup sits on his spot at the table. He holds a mug in his hands that he's been staring at as it remains untouched. He's tired and should really be heading to bed now. The sun has set a while ago and he's taken some painkilling herbs given to him by Gothi, which are making him a little bit drowsy.

Toothless is present, too, as they rarely leave each other's side. The dragon would've chased him upstairs himself if he wasn't napping near the fire burning in the fire pit. The flames the only thing making any kind of sound in their living space. Well, that and the dragon's soft snoring.

His dad isn't here yet. He must either be running late or is being held up by something or someone. And with how late it is, Hiccup figures his friends must be home already. Astrid might already be asleep, as a matter of fact.

This leaves him plenty of time and quiet to think.

A couple of days ago, he's gotten hurt during some stupid experiment of his. He got the bright idea to create small canisters that can hold a certain amount of pressurized Zippleback gas or an amount of Nightmare saliva. If he could pull them off right, it would've done wonders for his Inferno. Whenever its fire would inevitably die down, he could refill it and ignite it again.

But alas, one of his prototypes has failed, again, and with painful consequences as a result.

He was testing one with Zippleback gas and something had caused it to go off. He doesn't know what sparked it, everything about that particular memory is quite vague to him now. He just knows that his face, hands, and shoulder took most of it. He's lost three of his fingers. One on his left, two on his right.

He screamed. A lot. The little that he does remember is that Gobber had come running when he heard him and that Toothless had been sent into a panicked frenzy, wanting to help and having no clue on what to do.

He had curled up against the workbench he was working on, bleeding profusely and blinded by both the pain and the smoke and heat affecting his eyes.

His father reached the forge just seconds later, having already been in the general area when he heard his son screaming bloody murder.

But in the end, it really isn't all that bad all things considered. Gothi has taken expert care of his injuries, has told him that he's fortunate he still has his hands and face at all after an explosion from such close proximity.

In the past few days since his accident, Astrid, Fishlegs, and his father have been taking care of his wounds.

Some shrapnel has cut into his shoulder. The wounds aren't deep, though they are probably going to leave some scarring. Hiccup counts himself lucky that it means he won't lose any functionality in that part of his body.

As for his facial injury...

Hiccup supposes it isn't too bad. It had become clear that same day that there was nothing wrong with his eyes. A good thing. And then there is the wound his face did sustain. It starts on the side of his head and goes all the way down to his jaw. It's a jagged line that breaks off into two branches near the bottom of his face, the much shorter one nearly cutting into his upper lip.

It's an especially painful injure. It pales in comparison to the phantom limb and chronic pains he frequently suffers from in his stump, but it's certainly up there. Hiccup already knew the face is one of the more sensitive parts of the human body, he knows the same counts for dragons. But he never knew how much a facial injury could actually hurt until it happened to him.

It made him feel some sympathy for Dagur. The former Berserker Chief now turned Consort-prince has his own scars on his face, which are uglier and look like they were once far more painful than his.

And unlike him, Hiccup is surrounded by a whole team of loved ones willing to help him heal and keep his injuries from getting infected. Snotlout and the Thorston twins haven't needed to do it yet, but Hiccup knows they will volunteer if they need to.

Honestly, Hiccup feels bad for just feeling bad about his own hurt. Dagur has suffered far worse than he did and the main reasons for being so down now are rather shallow.

It's a first for him and he should much more upset that another one of his inventions turned out to be a grand mistake. He will always admit to his flaws, but he never considered himself shallow before. But apparently, that is a side to himself that he hasn't discovered until his accident.

He hates this blemish on his face. He didn't used to worry about his looks or how attractive he is to other people. Whenever he did worry about his appearance, it was more about the scrawny nature of his built. But he worries about his looks now.

People often comment on how much they like his face. It never fails to catch him off guard or even make him feel embarrassed. They tell him or even Stoick that the Gods were in a very good mood the day they decided to give humanity Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third. Sometimes, he catches his own friends staring, too.

He has seen his reflection before and he never thought he saw anything special, but after the accident, he worries.

Astrid has reassured him that it isn't as bad as he's making it out to be last time she helped change his bandages. She even stated how sure she is that it's going to him look badass, rougher.

Not that he cared much before, but hearing her say that still helped him feel at least a little bit better about his situation.

The other Riders try to make him believe he looks better now. That this future scar will give him more credit as a Viking and Dragon Rider, but Hiccup can see them cringe whenever they see it.

At least the swelling is going down. And the wound didn't go through his eyes, which could've cost him his sight on that side if it did. He should be grateful for all of this!

And yet...

It has taken him so long to feel any kind of confidence with his own body. It's taken him years for those berating voices in his head to finally become nothing but inaudible background noise. Now that his face is sure to scar, by his own fault no less, those voices are quickly growing louder again.

After years of suppressing them, they are there, they are as loud as ever, and they are given something else to yell at him about.

Hiccup lets out a deep sigh. He would've hung his head if it didn't make his wound pound so much.