olive: is your muse prone to feeling envious of others? if yes, what is it that they typically feel envious over? // vermillion: is your muse courageous, or would they consider themselves to be more of a coward?
✩ Colorful headcanons | Accepting!
Olive: Is your muse prone to feeling envious of others? If yes, what is it that they typically feel envious over?
This is hard to answer, mainly because Ace isn’t one to compare himself to others since he couldn’t care less what others do. If any feelings of envy were to blossom, that would be when he grows close to someone which again, it’s a rare thing for him to do. He’s quite recluse for many reasons, which makes it hard for him to establish bonds.
Now, when he does have feelings of envy for someone, I’ve come to realise that it’s always related to sentiments which might be quite ironic, granted that Ace himself is a sensitive individual. Most of the times, he doesn’t feel like a human–– but like a weapon, something effective to use in battle with the heavy expectation of the world upon his shoulders that aren’t below success and perfection.
Both given the way he was raised and the heavy manipulation his soul suffered over hundreds of millions of cycles, his feelings–– what makes him human, have been muted considerably to the point that Ace doesn’t identify them anymore. Far from doing him a favour, this proved to become worse given that he still feels intensely and it’s even worse to be unable to understand why or what’s triggering this in the first place. This makes him feel powerless, unable to move forward. He’s stuck in one place, completely terrified of even showing himself vulnerable to one single person without feeling the chill in the bones that Arecia might find out in some way and punish him for this, or even see the disappointed look on her face.
What he envies from others is the spontaneity with which they allow their feelings to spring free, let themselves be carried by them as long as they last even if these same feelings might make lead them to err. But it’s okay, because it’s human to err. Nobody is a weapon or a robot, it’s feelings what carry humans instead of logic. Ace finds bravery in whoever displays their feelings freely.
Vermillion: Is your muse courageous, or would they consider themselves to be more of a coward?
Without a doubt, Ace is courageous. Although it might come across as recklessness, he isn’t fearful at all of throwing himself in the fray even if he might die for doing something. Given that he can be revived over and over, it’s his wish to fight in the war until is over for those who can’t be revived, so they won’t have to fight or be deployed in such dangerous missions like the ones he’s thrown into. He’s been trained to fight all his life, he’s confident of his own abilities and his limits and limitations and acts consequently as he sees fit to not fail or put himself in danger, even though accidents might happen sometimes.
However, his perception of himself varies considerably. While when it comes to anything war-related he’s nearly infallible, he sees himself as a coward with what matters much individually: himself. His feelings.
Again, given the way he was raised and the manipulation, he finds himself unable to cope with them even if it’s something that will haunt him in a daily basis. He’s afraid of the unknown, of not knowing what these feelings are. Instead of facing them, he runs away. He leaves them behind, seeks something–– anything to distract himself with so he can forget. It’s just a fleeting solution, but a long shot from something healthy and restorative like it should be.
As a cadet, he might be one of the best acquisitions someone could ever have and Ace isn’t one to sell himself short when it comes to this because he knows how capable he is. But it’s when his own identity is being compromised that he thinks of himself as a monster, especially when he comes to learn the values of others who had kinder lives than his own. He doesn’t know what he is, but he knows that there are many things that make him heavily inhuman and he loathes that with every fiber of his being.
