#furiaei

"I-- Hang on... Who...? Oh."

The Mourning Actor considered the Fool with a sigh, realizing he'd been without his mask in that moment. The redhead simpered with a bright, puckish expression that reminded him of a fox. Vulpine, swift, sneaky, and with enough wit and charm to displace the composure of an Actor like him. Perched atop a rooftop in New Londonium, the lights of the cityscape sprawled and twinkled like a tapestry of stars, the atmospheric tolling of the clock tower they'd stolen away in still causing his tapered ears to ring. Dan Heng regarded the Crimson Mistress skeptically, plucking his mask from the edge where the two had been occupying.

ⵉ߮ 𐄁᠇𐄁 ߮ᜢ . — An arm encircles her waist, golden gaze looks into the pair of stormy moons. Lightning and clouds lurk within, circling... telling him to quell them. Valko is a lot more observant than he seems. And while, he is not one to pry— he understands that one should be allowed peace, or even... just a single night without the tempest of inner machinations within the mind.

❝ I'm not one for subtlety. ❞

His lop-sided smirk bares a singular fang. Valko uses his other hand to take hers in— rugged fingers curl tenderly, intersecting between the gaps of her digits. The animalistic features eventually emerge for her to see.

❝ So, here's my honest piece: You should do whatever you want to do. And that includes, things with me. ❞

He leans in close, wolf ears twitching happily. A light-hearted temptation would do no harm, right?

deepspacing with @furiaei. 🐺

A mask was an escape, a way out. Through the glittering, golden ballroom filled with sumptuous appointments and scintillating chandeliers that glistened like countless stars above their heads. Couples waltzed across the ballroom floor as polished and reflective as a mirror, voluminous skirts swirling like blossoming flowers as a passionate orchestra filled the air with grand, gamboling melodies. Dan Heng waited among the margins of the elegant dancers, where revelers with flutes of bubbly, golden champagne gossiped and laughed merrily among themselves. 

A sea of masks, satiny and bronzy, gold and silver, shimmery and gauzy. If there was one benefit to being a Mourning Actor, their soirees tended to be far more elegant and refined than the clownish affairs the Masked Fools preferred to occupy themselves with. Behind his own scaly mask, bright teals scanned through the crowd and bristled at who he saw. 

He knew the woman who commanded her own ring of admirers and gossipers, men and women crowding around like crows before a bird of paradise. The Crimson Mistress was a vision of maroon silk and satin, her luxuriant gown flowing down the contours of her body like a carafe of spilled wine, rubies glistening at her throat and stitched into her mask. Painted lips pulled into a cordial smile with her interlocutor, and Dan Heng silently thanked his lucky stars that no Fools had found this disgruntled Actor.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have noticed her at all. 

The redhead laughed into her hand and glanced at him with a puckish look, excusing herself with smiles and gentle touches before the throng of people parted, her scarlet heels clopping intentionally on the lacquered wood as she strode towards him, already earning strains of gossip; rare was it for Fools and Actors to indulge each other, and that crossover seemed to be transpiring now. He half expected her to ask for a dance, to which he might have indulged her, yet as a small hush fluttered over the crowd, what she did blindsided him. 

"You don't see it, do you? What should've made me human."

Humans were, at their core, defined by their relationships with others. Every one of them was a node in a complex web where everything was interconnected, like the networks between mycelium or the roots of trees entangled together. Ana Maria Lupu was no different. This was another person, another woman, who had been carved by thousands of knives and made into a million shapes. Was she a diamond with countless scintillating facets? A marble sculpture sanded and flawed? Or was she that and everything else? Frankly, he doubted it mattered. Humans could recognize that transformation, the metamorphosis borne of the lived experience. In him, she couldn't find that.

Instead, he was water. Endlessly shifting, always changing, always there. It could become mist, vapor, a waterfall, a river, and a stream, solid and cold as ice. But, it was always the same in its changes.

You could toss a pebble in a pond, and it would ripple, but after a time, the ripples would cease, and serenity would return to the pond once again. He was the pond, she was the sculpture. No wonder he confounded her so much.

Mya & DH: Given the fact that we may never know which Masked Fool gal DH met way back when, I think Mya should be the one. I am supremely tempted to lean into the theme of escapism through Elation, especially since some past interactions of theirs did tilt into that, and I love that for them both.

Mya & Ashveil: This may be a little simplistic, but between the worldliness between them and how many times they could cross paths, I love the idea of them meeting again and again. The Crimson Mistress & La Mancha? It's so poetic, please. They'd be fascinated by each other, I bet.

Lingsha & DH: I think DH's High Elder AU would be perfect for this. With DH as the villain in this story, Lingsha being contested against him as a prominent Vidyadhara among their people would be such an electrifying game of fire and water.

Acheron & Ashveil: I really think they need to really just tie the knot and Ashy should induct her as a fully-fledged GR. I also love the idea of them meeting in the Sea of Nihility and saving him and Loretta with Tiernan volunteering to stay behind, as icing on the cake.

JY & Ren/YX: Give me Shuhu Upheaval Period & Sedition-era angst, please. Anything HCQ-related would be so baller, too, but especially this.

For one who wasn't a Masked Fool, the common thought was that someone like him wouldn't be welcome in the World's End Tavern. Claiming a barstool in the corner, he hunkered like a brooding crow among the shocks of color, watching the revelers with leery eyes. Device IX, as the eyes of the universe, kept vigil on these places where the world threatened to end. When the Lord of Silence watched from the shadows of the universe, it was Clear who operated from its inverse. But, even he knew that he wasn't invisible; not really.

Unprompted.

@furiaei asked: ”nu mi-a fost niciodată drag să vorbesc despre viață și creație. consider că, dacă există zei, sunt niște copii cruzi și indiferenți. căci, dacă zeii ne iubesc, atunci de ce suntem mereu abandonați? de ce ni se cere să îi venerăm, în timp ce ei ne asupresc cu doctrine absurde? dacă zeii creatori ne-ar iubi, noi nu am suferi astfel.” ( pentru Subj2 )

❝ Zeii există. ❞ O declarație fermă, rostită cu o placiditate ca atare. Complet lipsită de ghidușia sau exagerarea care ar fi putut sugera vreo dorință de a o tachina sau vreo regretabilă stare de delir. Blondul vorbește lin, ca și cum ar fi devenit de mult un specialist în domeniu. Ca și cum ar cunoaște mai multe secrete decât îi este permis populației acestei planete. ❝ Însă scopul lor nu este de a iubi sau proteja omenirea. Este posibil ca acțiunile lor să se suprapună cu diverse exemple de „bunăvoință” care să îți ofere o asemenea impresie, dar în realitate zeii există pentru un singur motiv, iar acesta este de a menține un status quo. ❞

Poate că furnizarea de informații confidențiale unei persoane necunoscute de pe o planetă îndepărtată nu reprezintă nimic mai mult decât o conversație fără rost pentru homuncul, o modalitate absurdă de a-și petrece o parte a timpului său aici; dar chiar și așa el continuă, nu din dorința de a estompa influența zeilor pe această planetă, ci datorită rarității unei astfel de întâlniri. Majoritatea pământenilor par a fi mulțumiți strict cu ceea ce le este acordat, iar oportunitatea de a sta față în față cu o persoană care nu își dorește ca întreaga sa viață să îi fie dictată de o soartă scrisă în stele este una la un milion. ❝ Te-ai întrebat vreodată cine a creat zeitățile pe care omenirea le venerează? ❞ Cine a creat, nu dacă zeii ar avea la rândul lor un creator. ❝ Cu ce ar fi ele intrinsic mai spectaculoase decât membrii rasei umane? ❞ Răspunsul natural al oricărui individ ar face referire la ceea ce lor le lipsește, precum diversele abilități considerate supraumane de care zeii dau cu ușurință dovadă. Și totuși, homunculul este de părere că orice ar fi posibil pentru un zeu, este la fel de realizabil pentru un om determinat.

❝ De ce doar aceștia au autorizația de a crea viață oricând și oriunde și-ar dori, pe când umanității îi este permis doar să își asigure supraviețuirea, în ciuda faptului că datorită intelectului pe care îl posedă, omenirea ar putea crea viață într-un mod aparte? ❞ Pe planeta din care alchimistul provine, întrebările și dubiile de acest gen au fost semănate de o singură națiune: Khaenri'ah, unica țară nedirijată pe vremuri de către zeități. O țară a oamenilor, guvernată însuși de acei oameni. Una care, pentru sacrilegiul de care a dat dovadă, a fost smintită de zei până la extincție. ❝ Dacă ai ști că zeitățile există pentru a garanta o ierarhie în care omenirea va rămâne întotdeauna subordonată altora, ❞ Așa cum s-a întâmplat pe planeta Teyvat. ❝ De ce tip de reacție ai da dovadă? ❞ Una de mâhnire? De depresie? De apatie? Sau pesemne, de omologul lor comparativ mai reactiv, una de dispreț?

"forgiveness is no liberating gift. it will trap you, it will bring about unnecessary guilt for carrying the righteous anger towards those who have hurt you. why should you carry the guilt, when they don't even acknowledge the shame of what they've done to you?" ( for Hugo Vlad )

Unprompted Asks ★ @furiaei ★ Accepting

Hugo Vlad Ravenlock was an angry, unlovable man. Insides poisoned by a bloodline so vile. Playing so diligently the part of a bringer of justice as to conceal the shameful child he'd pushed to the back of his mind. Instead of confronting the justified fury at the cruelty he'd suffered and desire for retribution for himself, that vitriol was directed outward, at a world rife with injustice. As if each smudge he cleansed was done by that same child he once was, vying for a microscopic scrap of control, an indirect way of fighting back against his past. It was easier, easier to disguise himself as a thief in the night. Wearing that role like a second skin. Impossible to shed without significant effort. If he were to look inward and see the utter destruction there left by those who should've loved and trusted him, that would be the point of no return. It would be too ghastly of a sight, too ugly.

Forgiveness? Oh, he felt a great urge to laugh. Such a word was never in the equation. They all deserved death in his eyes. If he were the one to deliver such a fate? He'd do so gladly. "I don't plan on giving those monsters such a thing." Voice laced with bitterness sharpening every word. "They will never earn it. Not from me, not ever." They all still felt so above him. His family sitting so high and mighty ever after all these years. While he lurked in the shadows they'd forced him into, left to simmer in his anger. Anger he expertly hid behind a charming visage. His past dragging behind him like dead weight, a collar of thorns keeping him leashed. One he cannot free himself of, lest he prick the skin of his hands.