lets be fr tho, scara would never do anything pride related, nahida would have to send him to parade to "monitor it" and hes like Ah, the lord of dendro sends me, her secret agent and prisoner of war, to do her dirty work once again, anbd its gonna take him like a week to realize her nefarious plan was to get him to socialize

speaking of being adopted, you know what would solve all of Bennet’s problems? Meeting Itto

like from Bennett’s hangout we know that the only way to negate Benny’s curse is to ignore it, treat him just as your friend, include him without prejudice. only then you could get treasure

and like imagine if Itto, an orphan himself who was shunned by society and formed a “gang” that is actually just a found family of losers so they’d have each other to rely on, met Benny

who is another, smaller teenage orphan shunned by others for reasons out of his control and who takes care of his twenty elderly gay dads, but keeps a positive attitude and never gives up. whose only dream is to be included in a team

he would be adopted SO FAST asdfghjk. also Kuki would immediately be on board

and like Itto would have the exact right attitude to break the curse, he would never blame Benny for any misfortunes

like he would stand next to Benny and be struck by the lighting, and Bennet would be like “omg I’m so sorry thats my bad luck :( :( :(” and Itto would go “Nah bro, it has nothing to do with you, Raiden shogun has a beef with me, but she’s too much of a COWARD to meet me face to face”

Alberich clan putting terrible burden on their children with no explanation other than "you are last hope of our people" just to use them as sacrificial tools for their schemes, they really kept family tradition alive through all hundreds of years 👍

spoilers 4.7 i guess, so loom of fate can create new ley lines. idk why they were like oh but what would it be for?? like how is that a question??? clothar told us long ago, to change the fate?

ley lines are the roots of irminsul tree, they accumulate memories and experiences, this is why you can get ghosts from them if they leak, and artifacts, which are concetrated memories of strong personalities. basically, through ley lines, irminsul absorbs data.

Now, constellations is how celestia controls people's Fate. and constellations are the FRUITS of irminsul tree. Irminsul grows them after processing all data absorbed by ley lines. so logically, if you can create new ley lines that contain data you want, irminsul will absorb it and change the fruits it grows, i.e. you can change the Fate

mb they can also inflict it with abyss corruption this way, but i think it'll be more boring if they do that instead of playing with fate

i keep seeing posts about how furina was Actually Competent As A Ruler, which i think are misguided, even if they are coming from well-intentioned place. like, ppl love furina, and so they have an impulse to advocate her good qualities, which is v understandable, but where it derails i think is in assumption that agency = power, so ppl feel the need to prove that she was Actually Good At Power.

This also shows bc these posts *always* bring up neuvi, to either compare furina to him and say that he Did Her Dirty By Stealing Her Power, or to be like, actually they were Dual Rulers, and even if he was running the government, she was Girlbossing Too, like she was handling diplomatic relations or smth else, we just never got to see The Girlbossing.

both Stealing Power and Girlbossing Off Screen takes, I think, are not only textually incorrect, but also miss one of the central points of Fontaine, which is that its government was a hot mess and NO ONE there was Good At Power. Neuvi was absolutely not Girlbossing himself. Whats the point of like trying to prove furina was in charge of More Things, when all of the things were in shambles. The only efficiently run institution in fontaine is autonomous prison.

like, Furina is Marie Antoinette coded for a reason. She is a critique of monarchy, literally a divinely appointed monarch, that shows that putting in power a random person just bc of their birth circumstances, while they are not qualified at all, and then forcing them to be a figurehead under intense scrutiny of society that expects them to somehow be More Divinely Special than normal ppl, will be horrible no-good for both that person AND society. We had to watch her cry every day for 500 years cut scene for a reason. losing archonhood *frees* her to be what she actually wants.

Neuvi on the other hand, is a thesis of how impartiality for a ruler turns into indifference and inaction. Yes, he was incorruptibly fair in his judgements, but he was judging using the flawed laws inside of a flawed system, and this lead to tragic cases like Navia's dad' death and general bureaucratic and inept government. Like we had to listen to Navia yell at neuvi about it for like 5 minutes straight, come on. He realized that the system was flawed (his stories mention his disdain for courts being run like opera performances), that laws were often nonsensical, but he didn't try to change it, because as a dragon, it was basically not his circus, not his monkeys. only when he started to care about humans and forced by a crisis, he challenged the system, and his final ruling as he ascended to the power of god of life again, is markedly NOT impartial, but made with favor for humans. The thesis is that the judge should rule from a position of caring FOR the judged.

these two are explicitly not Cool Divine Bosses Ruling Together or Neuvi Stealing Furina's Importance As An Archon, but two sides of one miserable coin about how badly run fontaine actually was.

cyno has no memories of the temple and doesn't worship hermanubis, yet somehow he is the one dressed as hermanubis and not sethos. the only explanation is that cyno got hermanubis' fashion sense soul shard, which his whole life was influencing his subconsciousness like "you want to put a hat with bigass ears on and also you want to take off this ugly robe and let your tits out"

ok i love furina's quest and there is a lot to talk about in it, but i think the way she received vision is a poetic cinema moment that is easy to miss if you don't think about context

first of all, her vision is given by neuvilette, it even has tiniest fangs added to signify belonging to a dragon. in his profile stories, neuvi explains that apparently visions are not given by the archons freely, instead gnosis is what takes piece of archon's power and gives to humans. we know from ei that she's not even aware it's happening. archons are bound to "grant" visions by celestia, without their actual knowledge or consent. but neuvi is not bound by celestia, instead, he says he purposefully set away parts of himself to gift to humans, like treasure.

second. all hydro users are mimics, all of them have a theme of performance, of pretending to be someone else, and it's almost always when they feel they HAVE to play a role. Barbara who pretends to be cheerful and happy for her fans while being depressed, Ayato received his vision the night his father gave him responsibility for their failing commission and he realized he will have to play for the politics, Kokomi keeping up role of priestess for her people even though it literally drains her, Xingque hiding his passion for writing behind facade of commercial heir for his father, and so on. They struggle with having to hide their real selves for the role, which is exactly what Furina went through. But she didn't have vision when she was playing the Archon.

Instead, she received vision when she freely decided to step on stage to express herself instead of being forced like before. when the lines between role and her herself are clearly marked and known to both her and the audience, and the performance was made to bring joy to both her and other people, instead of a lie meant to fool them.

and tldr idk, i think it's very poetic that one of the first, if not THE first vision that was ever given by a god freely, as a gift instead of being forced by the gnosis, is for the wish that was also finally made freely after so many years of not having a choice.

ppl in genshin tag are fighting whether neuvillette is a dragon or an otter... fools, expand your vision... dvalin is a pigeon shaped dragon.... azhdaha is a toad dragon.... why can't a hydro dragon be an otter dragon???? he can still have his fur like dvalin has feathers.... he holds his lil cane in his hands like other otters hold shells.... love and peace on planet earth

ok spoilers but we all clowned on furina for being useless helpless archon and her being oblivious and obnoxious about it, and this whole time she knew. she was literally doomed by the narrative to be a failgirl. pretending to be a cringe instagram celebrity to save the very people who laugh at her. never having anyone at all for hundreds of years while dissociating 24\7, not even allowing herself to lower her guard inside of her own mind. poorest baby, protect furina at all costs

first trans melusin comes out and neuvi updates his Anti-Misgendering Law to say like. All melusines should be addressed only as she, except Jimmy, who should be only addressed as he.

Enjou is like "horrors are endless, but i stay silly :3" and he's one of the horrors

wait WHAT CAVALRY COMPANY. you had horses this whole time??? HUH???

you know that post thats like you need to understand the rules of something before you can meaningfully break them? you need to understand the rules of classic tragedy to understand how genshin is purposefully breaking them with furina.

i've seen ppl complaining that furina doesn't have agency and should've stayed an archon when like. first of all, thats the point, tragic heroes don't. doomed by the narrative, all that shit. this is why a lot of tragedies use prophecies, which genshin references as well. like not even getting into how furina is playing off little mermaid narrative, its hard to miss that she's opera themed.

but where it starts subverting the genre, is that furina KNOWS she is a tragic hero. she is given the choice at the very start, focalors told her that she will need to suffer and PERFORM in order to finally save fontaine from the prophecy. Furina is a tragic hero who is given knowledge that she IS IN TRAGEDY PLAY and also given AGENCY TO CHOOSE TO PERFORM. bc it's not a single choice at the start, she has to keep choosing it again and again every day, the game focuses heavily on her distress and she could break the role at any moment, but she doesn't. there are so many moments of game showing her conflict! her confrontation with neuvillette, her grief in Poisson, her wavering at the traveller's offer bc it can be a loophole, then the trial, where she went all the way, where she put her hand into primordial water, thinking it will dissolve her. like! she had so many moments where it would be understandable for her to break, but she didn't, she stayed true, and it was not easy for her at all. that was a choice, a dedication that she had to make again and again, and it only became harder and harder

but where genshin really gets into breaking tragedy rules, is that it lets its tragic hero cheat death using the rules of tragedy itself. this is why i referenced an essay on classic greek tragedy here, because in tragedy, gods have absolute power, but they are also immutable, unable to change, while humans are weak and fickle, but they CAN grow and change. as an essay says, tragic hero achieves something like divinity in a moment his face solidifies into an unchangeable mask, and that moment is death.

fontaine arc is breaking the tragedy rules without disrespecting them, because it does not diminishes the sacrifice and heavy price of death, but instead allows furina to escape bc in the moment when she should have died, focalors put herself into spotlight instead, and she already had an unchangeable death mask of divinity. and her death, her sacrifice allowed furina to achieve greater agency to choose to live how she wants. she escaped the tragedy! she was saved from the narrative! she's a little mermaid who didn't have to die to receive a human soul.

and tbh saying that furina should have stayed an archon is first, conflating power with agency, and second, disrespecting her own choice, because the game goes to excruciating length to show that she hates ruling and being a movie director makes her happy. furina wanting to self-actualize through art is not somehow lesser than her being a ruler.

anyway, 4.1. SPOILERS, but lets talk about a dragon in the room. a popular consensus i've seen a lot says that traveler's powers are mini-versions of archons of element's region. like anemo's tornado is similar to venti's storm black hole bc it sucks ppl in, for geo you bring the rock down from the skies, kinda like zhongli's meteorite.

but this kinda starts falling apart at electro, bc electro travelers abilities don't look like raiden's. but you can still make a case that part of raiden's kit is energy restoration for other party members and electro traveler has it too, so its eeeeh a stretch but ok. tho energy restoration is just overall electro mechanic but ok ok

where it completely falls apart is dendro. dendro travelers kit is nothing like nahida. dendro traveler has shotgun blast on E and like mushroom spores growing out of the ground on burst, dendro application on limited static spot, while nahida has her radish death mark for all she can get in her selfie. they are not similar neither in function or visuals. you know who does grow grow mushroom spore thingies in set area during fights tho? Apep. Dendro dragon.

hydro is the strongest case, because we now have a confirmed playable hydro dragon and there is no denying that hydro traveler is a bargain bin neuvillette, the pew-pew water pistol is too unique and similar to his hydro beam. i've seen some leaks of furina kit, i'm not going to spoil anything, but it's nothing close.

and if we look at other elements from this angle, you know who has an actual tornado just like traveler? dvalin. And who both throws rocks from above like geo traveler E AND grows spikes from the ground, like traveler burst? Azhdaha. we never met electro dragon, so we can't compare there, but the pattern i think is obvious. traveler powers mimic not the powers of an archon, but dragons of the element. archon powers just sometimes happen to share similarities, but mostly based on element's theme, like most of anemo shares the grouping trend.

i think traveler is a dragon, who traveled for so long and teyvat changed so much that their memories erased. their backstory is that their kingdom was destroyed by the invaders and they traveled the galaxy with their sibling for thousand of years, which tracks with how teyvat is initially was inhabited by dragons and then first throne invaded, destroyed them and humans ruled. traveler is a descender, but also somehow their sibling is part of this world, according to nahida. abyss sibing talks about "restoring homeland", and ppl take it to mean khaenriah, but we know for sure they're not from khaenriah originally. traveler can manipulate elements without a vision, like dragons do, and from neuvi we now know that "archon's authority" is based on power that was taken from sovereign dragons, which means when traveler resonates with archon statues, they resonate with vestiges of dragon powers. wake up sheeple, travelers are princess and princess of the defeated king of the dragons

EDIT post Act 5 AQ: now that it was revealed that gnosis are made out of remnants of third descender, it means that traveler is probs not actually a dragon, because apparently all Descenders have natural ability to absorb elemental powers. Which is interesting, bc like why?? Or maybe not all descenders, bc primordial one is descender too. If any descender could absorb dragon powers, then why gnosis is made out of specifically third descender? is it just bc they had his corpse sdfghj?? anyway, interesting.

i started using duolingo bc i need to learn german and like. I have criticism on their gamefication and monetization models

like for doing lessons u get XP that gives u nothing, except like position on leaderboard and they want me to spend money to do more lessons bc some rando beat me on that fake leaderboard?? like?? why should i give a fuck?? their only way to get u back is green owl nagging u. duh.

listen to me duolingo. implement gacha. you get coins for lessons and u can gamble for png of pretty characters with these coins. then, you can spend XP to upgrade character, unlocking more vaguely flirty interactions. in the language person learns, ofc. u’ll get billions on waifus duolingo and language fluency in nerd population will skyrocket

all of Neuvi's lines finally unlocked and there is a lot of great stuff in here, but the constellation one took me out. there is all this talk of fate and his disdain for celestia's puppet-lines, and then turns out he doesn't have one and made it up bc his adopted abomination daughters were excited about astrology asdfghjkl

"Of course, he was born in the form of a human. But why, then, is his name the image of the great leviathan? Well, this leads us to a more mundane explanation for the situation, one quite separate from grave matters of the world's fate: As the one named "Neuvillette," he would often be roped by Melusines (especially Sigewinne) into a bit of astrology via The Steambird's constellation columns or astrology guides from Sumeru. Would it really do, at that point, to tell them that he "didn't have a constellation" or that his own constellation was just "Neuvillette"?

I LOVE HIM, it basically went

Neuvi: Constellations are nothing but leashes that usurpers use to impose their rule, they have no power over me and they will be rightfully burned

Melusines, info-dumping at him about astrology for hours and then asking with stars in their eyes: What is your constellation?

Neuivi: Oh, right. The constellation. The constellation for me, constellation that exists specifically for me. My constellation. Of course I have a constellation, and it has a very cool name that is definitely not just my own name. It's called Leviathan. Judicator. Leviathan Judicator.