#notanon

In an au where OG Penelope fake her death and run away with Eckles.

Would Derrick "know" peace? Bc I see him going mad. There is no Penny but in his mind, she lives rent free...and well, hard being a good husband if you are losing your mind thanks to unrequited lust.

The noble lady is losing the a "dead" woman with low birth as background.

I do think he would snap...either end his life to follow Penny or use some dark magic to bring her back.

Either way, Derrick cuases his own downfall as well for the family.

The version of Derrick that's in my head is basically if you put Frollo and Humbert Humbert into a blender, reduced the creepy age gap and replaced it with incest guilt and increased his yandereness by 120 %. Were noble children allowed to sing in a Boys Choir? Well, my new headcanon is now that Derrick had a gread singing voice and received vocal lessons. He'd slay it in a priest robe as Claude Frollo in Hellfire.

Suicide? I have a different perspective. Derrick is not the type of person who would end his life after losing the one he loves. That sounds more like Iklies or Callisto. Derrick would find suicide emasculating. It might sound strange, because Derrick's character is so strongly defined by his guilt from the loss of Ivonne but I cannot imagine him feeling genuinely guilty about the pain he inflicted onto Penelope. He would regret it that his actions had caused her so much distress that she would have chosen death over him but I feel like if given the choice to go back to the start he would do it again just slightly differently. It would take him countless failed attempts to fix the timeline until he realizes that he is the problem.

I'm unsure about Derrick using magic to bring her back. For once he's not the wizard kind of person, second he doesn't have the connections (yeah Vinter is friends with his dad but Vinter is super secretive about his wizard guild and Derrick acts quite frankly like a cop who would rat him out to the authorities), third he looks like he has been swallowing imperial propaganda (including anti wizard media) for two decades and is perfectly happy to keep doing it for another. Maybe Derrick would lose his mind little by litte until one of his knights gave him the coup de grace to release their master from his suffering. Or his lady wife finally tires of hiding her husband's condition and loosens his saddle before he goes on a hunting trip, hoping he might fall from his horse and break his neck before he could drag her family down with him. Perhaps he'd be declared insane and anonymously committed to a lunatic asylum or sent to the countryside to recover (under surveillance, of course). Everything he accused Penelope of being and everything he planned to do to her happens to him.

What do you think Derrick really wants from Penelope. If he just wanted her to love him bach he would have been nice to hear, i think. Does he want her to be completely dependent on him and does he like seeing her miserable.

What about the Duke and Reynold. Do you think they enjoyed seeing her suffer. Why didn't they try to help her. Or maybe they just don't care. Though they seem to care a great deal in the manhwa.

How do you think they would react if they saw Penelope enjoying herself with someone, might be a friend or a long lost family, and Penelope is just laughing like crazy and she's totally ignoring them. Would they be jealous. Sorry if this ask is too repeatitive 😅

This is more of a headcanon. I think Derrick seeks relationships where he can exert control, foster dependency, and provide protection and care. His type would be vulnerable people. Little girls, orphans, foreigners, sex workers, servants, slaves etc. Anyone who could make him feel a sense of superiority. That is not to say he wouldn't feel disgusted by his own nature and try to fight these feelings. What Derrick subconsciously wants is a relationship with a huge power imbalance, where he has all the control and his partner none. An equal marriage with a noblewoman would not appeal to him. For the sake of maintaining his image he would marry a highborn woman but sexually he would feel no attraction to such a person. Someone like Derrick, who never allowed himself to make mistakes or indulge in teenage vices for fear that it might taint his family name, could only feel free if he was with a person whose status was so low that their opinion did not matter to anybody else. A person he could treat however he liked without consquences.

I found it curious that Derrick gave Penelope a bracelet with disguise magic claiming it would make her appear to be a young boy around her age but when she uses it she appears to be a child to Vinter. Not only that but she also starts resembling a younger version of Derrick.

It's a bit strange. Why would the clerk sell a disguise bracelet to Derrick that would only change his age but not appearance? Assuming Derrick was the one going to wear it, it would be of little use if it changed almost nothing about his physical features. It's also disadvantageous to look like a child since it would restrict your movements in the city, prevent you from doing business with adults and make you an easy target of street thugs. That's why I'm wondering if there could be a deeper psychological reason behind the bracelet's magic that is influencing the illusion. The magic makes her look what? 14/15 years old? Is that his ideal age?

You could interpret it that way: Derrick wants Penelope to be eternally <17, which is impossible because you cannot stop the flow of time. The older she got, the more he felt her slipping through his fingers, the less he could control himself, the more unforgiving he turned when she fought him on anything. At that time he didn't need to possess her in every sense, he only needed her not to be possessed by anyone else. So if she just remained in the gilded cage and listened to his every word he wouldn't lay a hand on her. I think that would have been enough for him. But Penelope isn't an object that you can put behind a glass case and expect not to move. Besides he knew she was being abused by the staff. Perhaps he had hoped that she would lash out in such repulsive ways his feelings for her would decrease with every time until one day they were no more and he could get rid of her without regrets?

I view Derrick as a very emotion driven person full of contradictions. Derrick has many different desires that are incompatible with one another. He wants to uphold his outstanding reputation that would surely get damaged if he were to court a girl like Penelope. He lusts after Penelope, but the only way he could obtain her (lifelong confinement) without risking his reputation was if his father were to die making him the next Duke, and as horrible as Derrick is I have to give him that he cares for his family and wouldn't wish death on anyone belonging to the Eckart duchy. Doubtless he wants his father's approval too. Lasty I have the impression that from the day he lost Yvonne he imposed impossible expectations on himself and didn't allow himself either distraction or amusement. In short his guilt prevents him from seeking happiness. Derrick was still living in the past. They all were. He sabotages his chances with Penelope because accepting the fake might mean to him a betrayal towards his real sister. It'd be like losing Yvonne a second time, but this time also killing her and desecrating her grave.

Derrick disobeyed his father once when he took Yvonne to the festival and lost control of the situation when she was kidnapped. That's why he might have devoted himself entirely to his family to atone for it and it could serve as one of the reasons why he needs to be in control of everyone and everything. He doesn't have it in himself to tolerate Penelope's childish behaviour. Derrick worked so hard to make up for it, wheras Penelope can make so many mistakes and still get his father's attention like when she stole the necklace allegedly, but was rewarded instead of punished (her father called a jeweller to the mansion and Penelope wasted a fortune on accessories). There might be guilt, shame, but also anger, even a little bit envy and feelings of unjustness too. Derrick has never learned to cope healthily with negative emotions, he only represses and bottles things up. As a result his "love" got twisted.

If he just wanted her to love him bach he would have been nice to hear, i think. Does he want her to be completely dependent on him and does he like seeing her miserable.

Was he aware that he fell in love with her at first sight or did he only realize much later on what those feelings meant? He and Reynold have already build themselves up as a bullies, it's too late to take back everything that was said and done. If he tried to make amends and were to confess his feelings, he wouldn't be able to take the humilation of the rejection. Additionally I think of Derrick as an extremely prideful man who is severely allergic to the display of any form of vulnerability. Denying mistakes means an inability to reflect their own actions and no growth. The only option he saw was hiding behind a familiar mask and carrying on with the things he's started, while turning worse and worse with each day, because with the time being Penelope got used to the insults and his usual threats and punishments probably didn't have the same effect anymore. He cannot have her love, but he can have her attention. If he becomes the bane of her existence, it means she's at least thinking about him and he's haunting her just like she's haunting him. Maybe he hates himself a little and uses Penelope as an outlet for his frustrations, maybe he hates Penelope for hating him back when he has successfully convinced her how much he loathes her. He hates her even more, abuses her even more when he has just gotten the result he wanted.

He wants her to hate him, he wants her to love him like a slave loves their master, he wants her to depend on him with the helplessness and naivity of a child, but when she's in need he lets her down every time. He wants her to be shallowed by the earth never to be seen again, yet he panicks when she does disappear and searches high and low for her. He wants her to live as quiet as a mouse and never come under his eyes again. He wants her to never leave his sight and would chain her up in his basement if he could. Derrick would be revolted if she tried to touch him, hug him but he would want to fuck her and mark every part of her body as his. He can never be satisfied. There's no end, it just escalates until someone dies.

Derrick wants Penelope to be isolated, dependent, weak, in pain, completely at his mercy with only himself to help. Does he want her to love him? Ehh...probably? At the same time I keep thinking that if Penelope had a childhood crush on him, he would have pushed her away, shamed her for her feelings and acted disgusted. Honestly it probably would have driven him even more insane. I don't buy it that this 18 year old actually fell in love with a 12 year old. Just like in many cases of incestuous abuse, I would imagine Derrick acting on his desire for power and control. His love is an amalgam of obsession, lust and sadism. Ergo he doesn't necessarily need her to love him back, although he would like it, because her loving him back would increase his hold over her and would make her less likely to fall for anyone else, seek help and flee from him. Fear? yes. Obedience? yes. Love? He has such a negative and distorted view of her I'm not even sure he believes she's a human being capable of love (quite ironic).

I'm a bit torn about that topic. Part of me thinks it doesn't matter to him. As long as she hungered for his affection like when she was a kid and she was trapped with him, he could convince himself he would, with time, make Penelope come round to his way of thinking. Then there is a part of me thinking that a very dark side of Derrick wanted to break og Penelope. Turning her into a vile creature that no one could ever love. Someone who would seek him out and want to be dirtied by his love, because it was the only kind of love he permitted her to have. A nasty little girl that was hated and hated everyone in return and only had eyes for expensive dresses and jewelry. If she were to grow up to be a villainess who hurt innocent people, he would not have pangs of conscience about the things he did to her. Had Penelope become a person deserving of his punishments, he wouldn't feel like a bad guy anymore. And with the blurring lines of victim/perpetrator there would be not enough guilt stopping him from acting on his urges.

You are right he could have been nice to her and she would have loved him (I doubt in a romantic way but whatever), but that's not the only thing he wanted. Gaining her love by acting nice would mean the loss of many things he valued and a betrayal of his principles. Along with that who could guarantee him that his sacrifice would be worth it and she would love him back romantically? Penelope could mark his affection as brotherly, which he would hate to see. Should the first-born Eckart son treat her right, soon the rest of the staff would follow and so would his family. The duke treating Penelope like his daughter would make it much more awkward if Derrick were to collect his courage to ask for his stepsister's hand. Lastly a Penelope who learned self-love and became more confident with the support of her family would make friends and could steal the hearts of many men.

Taking advantage of Penelope would have been easier if she already had a reputation as a thief and liar, and had no one on her side. Even if she was not in love with him, a person who was starved off love since their childhood would do anything for a few crumbs of affection. That kind of person would cling even tighter onto the hand that was offered to them. It'd be easier to sell her obsession as pure love and pressure her into doing things she doesn't feel comfortable with. He ensured her standing as an Eckart would be on shaky ground whilst reminding her that he was the one who could make her life better or worse (like when he temporary took the Eckart name from her). Og Derrick preferred the path where he would have absolute control of her at the price of her sanity over the path where she could be happy but would never belong to him.

(I don't think Derrick was thinking too deeply about it. He just acts on the emotions he feels at the moment. I believe he barely understands himself.)

see also: why I think Derrick liked her (anon ask)

What about the Duke and Reynold. Do you think they enjoyed seeing her suffer. Why didn't they try to help her. Or maybe they just don't care. Though they seem to care a great deal in the manhwa.

The Duke and Reynold were ignorant of her suffering because plot™. Reynold felt schadenfreude whenever Penelope was punished but that was because he lacked context and thought it served her right. If anyone was a sadist and secretly enjoyed seeing Penelope suffer after actively contributing to her pain and triggering her it was Derrick.

How do you think they would react if they saw Penelope enjoying herself with someone, might be a friend or a long lost family, and Penelope is just laughing like crazy and she's totally ignoring them. Would they be jealous. Sorry if this ask is too repeatitive 😅

Do you think Reynold harboured any feeling for og Penelope since he was a capture target. How would their relationship grow

I've already talked a bit about this scenario here. I can see it go two ways: 1. Derrick is relieved to be rid of her only to regret it when it's too late, 2. Derrick would be against a marriage citing Penelope's immaturity and lack of education as a reason. They can't hand Penelope over when she hasn't yet learned how to run a household and host parties as it would only embarass the family name if she were to fail her basic duties. He would have enough reasons to suspect an ulterior motive for any advances made at her (the Eckart's wealth, the noble family name) and would investigate every suitor throughly in hopes he could dig up dirt on him and prevent a marriage. That means he might stalk their dates and harrass Penelope. I can image Derrick trying to make Penelope believe her fiance doesn't love her back and is obvously just using her/going to abuse her once he has married her. Penelope needs her father's blessing for her marriage and the Duke isn't likely to give it to her if Derrick makes him believe that she isn't safe and treasured by her fiancé. The only AU where he would support them was if a marriage would be the only thing saving her from an execution, but even then he might want them to divorce afterwards. Tbh I see Derrick more as a "if I can't have you, no one can." Claude Frollo type of character, so he might prefer for her to die rather than marry someone else.

Personally I don't think Reynold harboured romantic feelings for og Penelope and I'd prefer it if he didn't. Penelope deserves one brother who isn't lusting after her. Nothing like that has been hinted in the story. I really do view him as the most brother coded character (not in a good way mind you). If he had bullied her because he was secretly in love with her, it would have just been a repitition of Derrick's trope. I headcanon Derrick and Reynold as two different sides of abuse. Derrick is emotionally abusive and Reynold physically. Derrick can only love Penelope romantically, he is incapable of loving her in a way that doesn't involve lust, that doesn't objectify and dehumanizes her as his possession, while Reynold could've loved her platonically if not for Derrick. Wheras Derrick's abuse is much more subtile and harder to spot it's actually much more dangerous and damaging, because it poisons every relationship around Penelope. Derrick can only "love" her as a lover and Reynold can only "love" her as a replacement of Ivonne. What both brothers demand from her is incompatiable with each other. There is no winning. She's being punished either way. If she fullfills the expectations of one brother, she is met with hatred and disgust by the other brother.

I assume this ask must have been send in response to the Reynold & Penelope post I made. Let me elaborate on this idea a bit. It wasn't really meant as a shippy post where Reynold would have developed a crush on Penelope or vica versa. It was me speculating how Derrick's manipulations would have affected Penelope's worldview. How Penelope would pay men with her body when she wants something. How she thinks it's okay to initiate something sexual with Reynold because that's how her relationship with Derrick functions. Penelope will give Derrick kisses, lets him touch her etc, and in exchange he must shower her with gifts and the love that she knows deep down doesn't exist. At first she isn't even aware that it's sexual, she just understands that when she does this and that Derrick will be pleased with her and reward her. It makes her uncomfortable at times but it doesn't hurt her that much, so she thinks it's a kind of suffering she has to endure to get her compensation. Over the time she gets used to it and expects this method to work on Reynold too. She does it when she feels lonely, when she wants attention, gifts, it's also a trauma response that she displays when she needs to diffuse a situation.

For example I can picture a situation where Reynold is angry and Penelope climbs on his lap, kisses him and starts unbuttoning her blouse to "calm him down" and Reynold would be horrified and disgusted at her. His face would turn scarlet red, he would yell at her, push her away or slap her face and call her a pervert. Derrick would use this incident to justify what he is doing to her. He can't ruin her if she was never pure. Unlike those delicate noble girls whose virtue needs to be protected, Penelope is a dirty commoner girl with no known father, a war orphan who leeches of his father's wealth and only causes trouble. She doesn't deserve any rights. Such a girl can only be inherently rotten. It's in her nature. That Penelope's hypersexual behaviour might be caused by his grooming doesn't even cross his mind.

Reynold might panick when he sees Penelope and Derrick in the same room together. He would make a rude remark to make her angry and leave the room, he would play cruel pranks on Penelope to scare her away, he would in the evenings often lean in her doorframe to complain about her existence. If he's always around her and putting her in her place nothing weird can happen, right? In a way that would be his version of protecting her. Reynold would lack empathy for Penelope's situation but at some subconscious level he would understand that his elder brother is hurting her althrough he can't name why. It's easier to blame the victim, because it wouldn't force him to question his beliefs. At some point he might have even believed that this 12 year old is abusing his 18 year old brother and not the other way round. That by hurting Penelope he is protecting his brother and vindicating him. This might be where he got the idea that Penelope must have seduced the duke in order to get adopted. Penelope was harrassing him, so who's to say this isn't how Derrick got dragged into this mess? Penelope stole his sister's place, she tried to steal his father's love and now she has stolen his brother away from him just like she has taken everything else.

I think Reynold would be in denial of the situation. I also think Derrick would gaslight him like crazy about it. Eventually when Reynold brings up the topic, Derick would make him look like he was out of his mind. He'd say something like "If you see two siblings spending time with each other as inherently sexual, perhaps you are the one who has secretly been desiring her all the time. / Should I be worried about your relationship to Penelope? If you hated her so much why do I often see you walking up and down next to her door in the evenings? Suspicious."

In summary I don't view Reynold as someone who would fall for his stepsister naturally, but I don't find the idea that Reynold could start a relationship with Penelope impossible if other factors were involved. As I mentioned before, I think that both Reynold and Penelope are ridiculously easy to manipulate. In this AU Penelope would have learned that getting brotherly love is impossible if it doesn't also come with sexual love. And she's very desperate to be loved. Reynold might adopt Derrick's attitude..partly. 14 year old Reynold might've looked up to Derrick and copied some of his behaviour. When Derrick and Penelope enter a relationship, it might cause him to feel left out. Reynold's mother died, his sister was kidnapped, his father became emotionally unavailible, his brother is well...Derrick. They didn't seem particulary close. Ivonne might have served as a bridge between them but now that's she's gone and not even their hatred for her replacement can connect them anymore, he has nothing. He would want to be let into their secret until he realizes in horror what this secret entails.

I once read a story where a brother coerced his twin into sleeping with their little sister after their twin discovered their relationship and wanted to tell their parents. The twin might have had romantic feelings for her as well but held back because he knew it was wrong or his brother's manipulations made him doubt himself and he believed that he was just like his brother since he "enjoyed" it. Either way he started to believe he was an awful person and tried to hide what they did from their parents because now he thought of himself as a criminal too. This is the only way I could imagine Reynold x Penelope to happen actually. That to secure Reynold's silence Derrick would have to resort to making him an accomplice.

Derrick would hate it the whole time and he'd be insanely jealous, but it'd be the only way to get Reynold's absolute compliance. In the long run gaslighting Reynold, invocating his authority as the heir and convincing him to keep quiet to maintain the family peace and protect their family's reputation wouldn't work.

Og Penny running away and getting a GOOD FAMILY!!!!!! Like she's around 12 when she does it. She needs one DAMN IT

No one wants to be her family? Fine, she's gonna make her own. And it's filled with social outcasts just like her: war orphans, bastards, cripples, runaway slaves, girls who escaped an arranged marriage with a man twice their age, boys who didn't want to fight an unjust war and deserted, fallen women.

Calliope fucks. She fucking rules.

I have a soft spot especially for young Calliope

Did you know that you are the reason why I ship them? The First to Fall RUINED me. I swear it changed something about my brain chemicals. Thinking about them every waking hour of the day and going a little bit more feral every time I reread your fics.

Anyway seriously WHERE is all the fucking CONTENT? Did all the incest shippers just latch onto the Todoroki family and never let go? Guys, you know there's other fucked up families out there, right? Open your third eye to AFO's replacement brotherism and his necrophilia adjectant corpse keeping Saturn esque tendencies. "The babies only had each other." "I named you Yoichi because you are my gift" "If I can't have you [no one else can]" "You will be mine, little brother." AFOFA is such a treasure trove for dead dove eaters, I was actually expecting an upsurge in fics when their backstory dropped. AFO should get weirder and grosser about his brother (Yoichi also deserved to have one codependent freak moment. IDK try to possess Izuku's body for the greater good or smth. can we talk abt Kudo's resemblance to AFO? Suspicious). They are DIVORCED. To me. Yoichi initiated their relationship out of curiousity and because he hoped showing AFO physical intimacy could reduce his aggression and violence, and fix him but instead he just made him more insane. Good job, Yoichi! Now your brother doesn't murder people for fun, he murders them because you refuse to fuck him merge souls with him.

I mean you seem to have vast knowledge when it comes to historical manhwhas and you know the nuances of these kinds of stories

Sorry if this is confusing since it's hard question

leadership skills: assessing people, being able to assess the situation, empathy, charisma, recognizing potential, ability to deal with criticism, diplomacy, time management (set deadlines, single steps that have to be fulfilled by a certain date), ability to maintain an overview, to reduce narratives to the essentials, compromise and balance without betraying own values

foresight: keep track of the consequences of the events of your own decisions over the years, which results and which resistances you have to pay attention to

moral recognition

become a role model to the younger generations

promote the arts and culture -> strenghtens social cohesion

be able to communicate a vision

centering power into a collective centre of power

gain credibility by keeping promises, holding yourself accountable for your words and actions

just in rewarding and punishing

formulate clear unambiguous laws that are really enforced for all, must abide by these laws themselves

write a constitution, protect fundamental rights that even a state ruler cannot cross under any circumstances

highly educated (STEM subjects + foreign language & culture + social science, understanding regularities of social developments)

generalist, business management

tough on property crime as it destroys the entire social structure

free healthcare

implenting educational reforms: free of charge, availible to children from all classes and any ethnicity, banning corporal punishment

build schools, train teachers, get kids off the streets into homes

fighting corruption, corruption in higher education such as bribery, embezzlement, fraud, extortion, favoritism, nepotism etc. etc.

don't lower the level of education and make cheating easy, this is how you get doctors who make diagnostic errors, professional negligence and medical malpractice.

a good spy-network (secret service)

win the respect of the military. It is much harder as a female ruler in a patriarchial country. There are extreme ways such as participating in the war by yourself just like a male ruler would, symbolic participation, power through father or husband, impress through a brilliant military strategy during meetings while also listening to the advice of the elders or arranging a clever marriage to the commander of your army/ a powerful man respected by the military

keep the peace while maintaining the strength of the army. involve the army in disaster assistance, send military observers / elite groups to certain hot spots in the world so that they won't miss out on real war experience, military drills will never be a substitute for a fight between life and death

create sophisticated infrastructure: a vast network of roads, aqueduct (water supply), public baths, sewer system

has ideally lived a while among the commoners to understand the soul of the common people and their most urgent needs

alternatively travelled

forms connections and maintains relations with allied countries: marriage arrangements, warding of foreign noble children, gifts, military support, trade, academic exchange...

protects legacy: mentor the heir + create a safety net of trusted advisors + establish social institutions that are responsible for specific structural tasks and operate independently of private interests. So that what you have created in your lifetime will not be destroyed in another lifetime. For example if there happens to be a tyrant born into your family.