#verkarin

the awesome thing about vervain’s post-veilguard downward spiral is that his city is destroyed and his nation is falling apart at the seams and dorian is in power but not for long because he tries to change too much and faces a large-scale violent opposition from the established ruling class as the imperium is picked apart like a jenga tower that finally collapses into civil war and vervain is the de facto head of intelligence on his front who has to turn off all his feelings to be a tactical machine and still carries out the riskiest assassinations himself because he refuses to sit idle so he’s constantly in the highest level of danger he’s ever been and he has no time to think or feel anymore until this is all over. and emmrich is in the necropolis giving lectures about wisps

the energy on that recruitment mission is genuinely so awful i can’t stop thinking about it. emmrich keeps trying to make small talk. vervain keeps immediately rebuffing every attempt at small talk with a one- or two-word answer if anything, sometimes just a grunt. he’s looking at emmrich like he’s insane anytime he asks a question because this man will not stop talking and doesn’t seem to understand that vervain has no intention of engaging in conversation. emmrich is hanging onto politeness by a thread and kind of wants to throttle vervain but he just smiles and gets passive-aggressive about it, which pisses vervain off even more. bellara is stuck dealing with the absolutely rancid vibe between them and keeps trying to talk to emmrich about his research or ask vervain about the venatori but anytime it feels like she’s getting somewhere they get into combat and as soon as the fight is over it’s back to square one. it’s a miracle she didn’t kill them both before they left the necropolis