@tenspontaneite / tenspontaneite.tumblr.com
BOOps! You love 'em. Halloween brought you some spooky cat paws, and you all had a great time chasing those most ephemeral of joys. With the spooky BOOp-a-thon now relegated to recent memory, here's a retrospective of some of the fanart you made along the way. A soft boop to you all, and may we all blog to boop again.
We know that throughout much of the trailer, Callum has Ibis’ staff (I would say for the last 3 eps of the season at least, given that he has it at the Gates to Rex Igneous, on the Pinnacle, and with the cavern creatures - although that could pertain to Rex Igneous too). Which is to say: now having more access to Primal magic than ever, both in study and in terms of power (with a sky primal stone at all times), what the hell does Callum need Dark Magic for?
The last time he used it was for Rayla in 2x07, but that was when he felt like he couldn’t do anything else. Has he been made to feel equally helpless her behalf yet again, leading to a doubly dangerous act even now that he knows just what dark magic can do to him?
Also … the creators have gone through all the trouble of having him learn magic for a whole season, only to then give him back a primal stone? He probably needs the stone to have access to magic underground, but that is still a bit weird.
So even as a primal mage, access to magic is limited! Rayla says this in 1x04, “So that wind breath spell you did? You’d usually need wind or at least a strong breeze, but with that stone, you have all the power of the sky, any time.” So it means that Callum will be able to do sky magic whenever, wherever, in ways he couldn’t before even as a talented primal mage with an arcanum inside.
If that is the result of “eye drops” like viren tried when he looked at the mirror, could it be something Callum is using to try to see past illusions? (Maybe he ascribes to the FakeRayla Theory, too, lol.)
I thought that at first too (as Viren did that to see the mirror) but Callum is already wearing the scarf at that point, so it seems a bit later in the season (post-Rayla’s return) and it doesn’t look like mage study in the background when you turn up the brightness
It almost looks like the Storm Spire, or somewhere nature-y (if at night)
Can I offer the speculative hypothesis of What If He’s Possessed / Being Whammied By A Dark Mage? Like, what if the eyes are an effect of dark magic being done to him or on him, rather than him performing it himself? Could be in a fight or confrontation with a dark mage, or because he accidentally messed with something he didn’t understand and got backlash from a Dark Magic Thingy, or was waylaid by an intentionally placed trap.
Like, I’m not necessarily saying that’s what’s going on, but it’s an explanation. And temporary possession / mind control of main characters by antagonists is always a sexy trope, especially when those main characters have strong freedom / breaking chains symbolism all over them. Callum in particular has already had one big story moment where dark magic was strongly conflated with destiny / lack of choice or control.
I think it would be super thematically plausible for Callum to be literally mind controlled by dark magic in some way this season, very especially if Aaravos is involved in it. I feel that it would be a really great setup, if as part of Aaravos’ gaining freedom, some of Callum’s freedom is stolen, if only temporarily.
Edit: it would also work very very well with the puppet master imagery going on with Aaravos and other characters. Like sure it’s symbolic of him manipulating events and pulling strings, but no reason why it can’t also symbolise direct mind control of one or more characters too.
FUCKING CALLED IT
Bullied myself into rewatching TDP despite the powerful feels, because brain says I’m not allowed to begin my grand full edit of all piaj until I’ve done a full rewatch and read TTM.
I’ve been spamming my reactions into my discord, and I figure some of you might be interested in reading them because,,,, reactions fun.
Contains: references to novelization, S2 and 3, two of my fanfics, a reference to @raayllum ’s meta, a significant amount of me sobbing over the characters, a significant amount of random digressions, and a whole damn lot of analytic rambling. Reactions are for episodes 1 and 2. Told in 8 discord mobile screencaps.
Contains: speculation, digression, and opinions. Piaj, ass, and an unpublished WIP are mentioned. S2 and S3 events are mentioned. The name of the unpublished WIP and a future piaj content detail are censored in the screenshots.
I’m looking for different opinions, and this thought won’t leave me alone. Do you have any thoughts on some biases the different elves of Xadia may have towards each other?
So this is relatively hard to answer given we've only seen Sunfire and Moonshadow elves in groups in canon so far, and we currently have pretty much no idea of what Skywing, Earthblood, or Tidebound society is like in canon. I could answer you from my own worldbuilding, but I imagine that's not what you're looking for. I do have some points though:
1. Moonshadow elves are extremely insular, preventing anyone from visiting or even seeing the one settlement we're shown. They also hold their members to exceptionally strict standards of behaviour and comportment. That's a combination that would be an absolute hotbed for the growth of xenophobia, and I wouldn't be surprised in the least if Moonshadow elves tend to disdain the ways of other elves and sneer at them. I can see them viewing their own ways as the only right and proper ways to do things, which correspondingly leads to bad attitudes against anyone who does anything differently. This could range from emotional expression to honour codes. You might expect Moonshadow culture to look poorly on any culture more open and permissive than theirs, as a whole.
2. Sunfire elves are proud, and seem to have a degree of ambition and expansionism that the Silvergrove Moonshadow elves lack. It might only be Lux Aurea, but they build grand cities, make them bright and ornamented and even gaudy, and flaunt their beauty and wealth in every way they can. They wear elaborate headdresses on their horns. Their armour is fancy and elaborate. Aesthetics and presentation are a big and obvious part of their culture, and for all that they're obviously discliplined and talented warriors, I can see this leading to some clashes. We've seen Moonshadow elves who tend to more elaborate robes, and certainly some of their architecture has its own style and complexity to it, but for the most part their fighters and attire and palettes are considerably more understated. I could see Moonshadow elves considering Sunfire elves pretentious, gaudy, and excessively flashy. In turn, I could see Sunfire elves considering Moonshadow elves to be reclusive and untrustworthy based on how fiercely they guard their privacy and refuse to let anyone in.
3. Skywing elves. I have almost nothing to work with here, except that Rayla seems to react to Nyx with a surprising amount of hostility. This could easily just be because she's in a terrible mood, so it's hard to say, but she does a lot of actual overt threatening with weapons that seems relatively unusual for her. If Nyx is an example of a trend of Skywing brigands flitting about rather than an isolated case, there could easily be prejudices against lone Skywing elves, or perhaps even small groups of them, with the impression that they may well be conmen or thieves looking for their next mark. This would make Rayla's intense distrust and hostility work a bit better for me, given that she can be threatening to the right people, but she doesn't usually behave that way with strangers even when she's in a bad mood or an urgent state. See: when she's trying to steal the sunforged dagger from that human dude, etc etc. If certain types of Skywing elf have a Reputation, this would mesh well with her behaviour towards Nyx.
Thank you so much! I love this! But yes, if you have anything about the others from your own worldbuilding, I would love to know!
Ahahah oh boy. Okay there's enough to be said about cross race interactions and relations in piaj worldbuilding to fill an encyclopedia, which it in fact has been, so I'll.....try to not make this too long. Try being the operative word.
1. Skywing elves have three main types of society: the nomad clans, the cities, and the temples. These view each other differently and can have drastically variable cultures. Nomad clans will interact with a wide variety of other races of elf and in many cases will dominate other races' impressions of what Skywing elves are like; given how drastically the clans vary in their culture and outlook, this means elves in different parts of Xadia will have very different impressions about Skywings. Temple elves are viewed as more serious, but also potentially annoyingly distant from the troubles of the world; city elves are viewed as generally sensible but pretty weird, given their cultural ideas have very definite impacts on their architecture and way of life. On the whole, almost all Skywing elves are social and community-focused to a degree that can disturb other races, particularly Moonshadow elves, who have a high level of investment in their communities but are considerably more private with their personal and inner lives.
2. Sunfire elves are very disciplined and organised, with some of the most advanced infrastructure and the largest cities in Xadia. They place heavy emphasis on military service, to an extent that may make other races of elf find them unusually militant and warlike. Despite this, many Sunfire cities are some of the most cosmopolitan there are, and will host higher numbers of other races than you tend to get in other races' settlements.
3. Earthblood settlements and society vary considerably, but it is well known that many of their greatest cities are underground in vast cave systems. This suits the Earthblood elves perfectly well, but is considered unthinkable by Sunfire, Moonshadow, and Skywing elves. All three races would grow very sick and weak from magic deprivation should they live underground, with the possible exception of Sunfires, if they were close enough to active magma flow. Skywing elves in particular find the idea of living underground to be anathema, and wholly unnatural. It is a widespread cultural attitude among Skywing elves that to live where the Sky magic cannot move - in the Barren Air - is to become cursed and die. Most will not extend this attitude towards the Earthblood elves who live underground, but the more religious and intolerant will; in some of the nomad clans, Earthblood elves will be referred to with honorific prefixes ranging from mildly disrespectful to the worst of all: 'sha'; cursed. This is pretty uncommon though.
4. Most Moonshadow elves live in seclusion and rarely interact with elves outside their settlements. Many of them hide their towns and villages, and emphatically do not welcome strangers. The majority of their contact with other races is generally for trade of luxury goods, which often ends up being with Skywing nomad clans. Given that few nomad clans have a culture requiring rigid emotional disclipline of the sort that Moonshadow elves value, they often end up viewing their trading partners in a relatively negative light. They respect Sunfire elves for their military disclipline and their efficiency, but dislike their overt gaudiness and directness of methods. Moonshadow elves favour precision over brute force, and 'brute force' is certainly how they tend to view the Sunfire militaries. Meanwhile, Moonshadow elves are pretty widely held as xenophobic, distrustful, unfriendly, and somewhat stuck-up by other races of elf. Sunfire elves, meanwhile, do respect their discipline and martial prowess.
5. I've basically completely refrained from worldbuilding Tidebound elves until there's more info on them so can't really say anything there.
Ok I recognise this will mean nothing to people who don't play Flight Rising, but I've been working on my Callum fandragon breeding project for a while now and I'm having the weirdest luck when searching for stock parents.
This is the project target:
I.e. what the Callum dragon will look like when he's done. The current objective is to have him be born on his actual birthday, this year in July, so he'll have the right age gap with the Rayla dragon I produced on her birthday last year. So ahead of time I'm stocking up on as many pairs likely to produce the right colours as I can, to increase my chances. This means I'm continually searching the for-sale dragons for potential parents with the right colours. This is pretty standard for a long running breeding project on FR.
What is not standard is that I have found not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR first generation dragons with correct colours!! Like, excuse me, what.
First gen dragons are ones that come directly from parentless dragon eggs. There's a certain prestige to them, their colours are completely random, and the odds of me finding four entire G1 dragons with or adjacent to the correct colours are frankly astronomical.
This is the prettiest of the G1s I found. She was also pretty expensive since she came pre-gened and breed scrolled, but eh, worth it.
You play Flight Rising in hopes you get something that will look like a tdp character too???? That is awesome!
This is my Rayla.
She’s not done yet but she will be... someday.
I just can see her being an imperial for some reason....
I don't play FR specifically for making tdp fandragons - in fact, I've been making fandragons for other fandoms since I joined a few years ago. It's fun though! And since the hibernal den expansion I've been able to keep my fandragons in their own separate section.
I actually have uhhhh six finished tdp fandragons, so far! The only other one currently planned is the Callum, which I'm actively working on.
Without further ado...
Rayla, with and without scene:
(bonus Callum's scarf edition)
Nocturne was my breed of choice for Rayla. They have the right vibe - they're the sneaky and reclusive dragon species in FR lore, and their lore in general fits Moonshadow elves really well.
Aaravos, with and without scene:
He's my most recently completed fandragon, having been born on his birthday late last year. The breeding project was Pain, because I did not want to shell out the gems for constellation and starmap, which meant I had to breed for them instead. I was at this project for well over a year. This Aaravos is technically trans, because the only one born on his birthday with the right genes and colours was thus. Thank god for the silhouette scroll honestly. (skydancer is a good breed of choice for Aaravos. They're supposed to be very talented at magic, and also the M Skydancer art has very much the right feel.)
And now the archdragons:
Azymondias! Complete with scroll of eternal youth. I'll de youth him if he ever grows up in canon.
His mother Zubeia. Given she was his actual mother, her wing colour is wrong for her, but that's just how it had to be. Close enough.
Avizandum. Pretty much identical to Azymondias. In an ideal world I'd have been able to get him with Light eyes, but he was just a project parent so I couldn't be too picky.
And finally:
Sol Regem. Also technically trans. I much prefer the F banescale art for him so haven't bothered to use a silhouette scroll. This dragon is actually first generation! When banescales were released and g1 banes were flooding the auction house I saw him and couldn't believe my luck.
And that's all my currently extant tdp fandragons!
I've started blocking out the documents for chapters 23 to 26 and god let me tell you it is so satisfying to be able to just cut prewritten scenes from my big massive document into there. It's like I can physically feel the blank page syndrome being gleefully murdered.
(the tags, for reference:)
So how it works is I've got a giant document arranged by section, with in-document links to every section. There is also a section 0, called Undetermined. Usually when I write a future scene I have a decent idea of what section it belongs in, so I'll write it in there. If I'm not certain, it goes in undetermined.
Like this, see?
Once there's nothing left in the section and it's all chaptered up, that section gets crossed out. (There are still bits originally allocated for thundersnow that didn't get used and might be incorporated elsewhere).
When I reach a new section in chronological chaptered content, I take a census of every scene I've written in that section so far. And then I sit down with my timeline and decide which day each scene should go in. Some of these are already fixed, but a lot of them are relatively flexible, and just have stipulations like 'evening camp scene' or 'morning non kids scene' and such.
(Sometimes, it turns out there aren't enough 'timeslots' available for a scene's needs within the timeline and then I need to wrestle with my story for a bit. This is going to happen for basically the entirety of section 4, because I have about 60k written for that taking place over like three days, and that's probably only 60% or so of what needs to go in there.)
I use a combination of my existing timeline and my allocated-scenes census to build the detailed focus timeline for writing a particular section. Which I then refer to heavily throughout the writing process. Sort of a checklist, but also a tool that allows me to relatively easily reorganise and fine-tune the narrative flow in a focused section of the story.
Here's an extract from the Thundersnow focus timeline:
(italics generally mean the point has been written/incorporated)
And that's how I write piaj!
