Hi, Yes, Im On My Shit Again Because I Just Finished The Adversary Route (aka Masochistic Dom Demon Wants

Hi, yes, Im on my shit again because I just finished The Adversary route (aka masochistic dom demon wants to rip me apart and maybe im in the wrong for getting hot off of it) and I have been swayed by my own mind into writing this sort of headcanon of sorts on the same vein as This other post I made, so go check that one out for full context of my insanity over this game.

(Basically this is me shipping the voices with their respective princess foils because if the gods they are variants of are in love then why wouldn't they be if they had the chance to have their own bodies? As always, characters may be out of character so be warned if that is not your style. This may also be worse than the last one, again im sorry.)

We begin with the Stubborn, waking up in the Adversary's dungeon. On the other corner of the room lies the demon in question, waking up just like he did. She seems to sense, in her confusion, his gaze examining her, and she turns her head to see him.

They look at eachother for a second... two... three... it feels like an eternity, the time they spend analizing eachother. The shade of their eyes, the shimmer of the skin or feathers under the moonlight coming through the window, the red marred scars on eachother's bodies. And from that, they understand:

Its over.

The narrator is gone, his control over their story relinquished. The voices are gone, too, and the silence is deafening.

That is until the jingling of chains breaks it, as the adversary rises from her position on the floor. Strong hooves move her towards her quiet companion, tail fluttering slightly behind her. Her expression remains emotionless, and she just so manages to get close to him against her restraints.

With a delicacy fitting for a princess, but strange for her new figure, she rises her unshackled hand towards the humanoid bird on the other side of the room. And then her face breaks into a wide, sharp grin, that which would seem intimidating to most.

But to the Stubborn? That might as well have been an invitation to share a romantic waltz. He takes her hand and shakily rises to his feet.

And dance they do. Over and over and over. Their music is the slashes of metal against skin, the grunts of pain and laughs of sadistic joy. Their "romantic mutterings to the ear" are the exclaimed insults towards one another's abilities. Their ballroom the basement to which they have confined themselves.

The Adversary refuses to escape her bindings, she finds the challenge exhilarating. The Stubborn insists that he doesn't need a weapon to fight her, but she refuses to land a single blow without it. He believes its because she thinks him weak.

(What she will never admit is that she still remembers when she beat him to a pulp and he kept rising. Again, and again, and again. How his body, his remains, were more and more twisted and deformed each time. She never wants to see that again, especially now that she cant be fully sure if he will ever wake up when he falls.)

Scars now litter their bodies, sihns that the apparent immortality that once revived them has been removed. The Adversary heals faster than the Stubborn, sure, but now each wound is permanent. To account for that, they decide on a pattern: they will fight until one of them collapses of exhaustion. They will take a break, during which they shall eat and rest. If a wound has been dealt that is too deep, they will rest until it has healed, no matter how long it takes (neither wants their onky companion to die and leave them alone once more). Once the wound has healed, the music shall start once more, and their dance continue.

(What remains unsaid, is that during the short rest, the other tends to patch down the hurt one's cuts and scratches. Were they both less guarded, they would call it "caring".)

One of those nights, as the Stubborn is wrapping up a deep gash in his leg, the Adversary calls for his attention.

"You don't need to go that far, you know?" She states, laying down on the floor, looking at the sky far beyond the bars of the window "During our fights, I mean."

The Stubborn smiles, ruggedly, almost in defiance, as if she meant it as a mere joke "What, you don't think me capable handling my own against you? Please, we've been doing this for so long, I didn't think you thought so lowly of me"

But the Adversary remains silent. She turns her gaze to him, her eyes filled with something dangerous... at least to the both of them.

A softness.

"I just... don't want to loose the only companion I've got. The only one who Gets what I am now." She sighs, softly, looking for the words, her tail moving agitatedly under her. Finally, she continues "...I don't want to lose You..."

Silence so thick you could cut it with a pair of claws extends itself throughout the dark basement.

The clicking of claws on the stone floor is the only sound that breaks it as the Stubborn kneels next to her head, and proceeds to carefuly and softly caress her scarred face. She lets him, strangely enough, and as the draw closer together, he murmurs...

"Well, then I guess it's good that we seem to have the same objective then, princess"

Does the tumblr side of the Epic fandom know the wholesome Antonious cover based on a snippet of a future song because I can’t get it out of my head

It’s interesting how both the Smitten and the Skeptic kill you.

If you kill the Princess, they both visit the same fate upon you, overriding your input. However, their respective motivations are very different.

The Smitten does it out of distraught, furious bereavement; he kills us as much out of rage and revenge as he does grief. The Skeptic, meanwhile, kills us when the Narrator traps us (the way he does in the good ending). However, the Skeptic is not like the Hero; he does not let us decide when he recognizes the circumstances we have found ourselves in.

One of the most generous ways to read the Smitten/Damsel relationship is that it represents the honeymoon phase. Smitten and Damsel have just met, think the world of each other, will do anything for each other, want to make each other happy, and dismiss each other's flaws when the Hero or the Narrator voices them. They are driven not by what they know but by their initial impressions and emotions.

This perspective leaves them both oblivious or apathetic to the Narrator’s machinations; they can ignore or overpower him. The shackle slips right off the Damsel's wrist. The locked door swings open. Even murdering the Damsel is not enough to dampen her love for you; all that does is turn it murderous again via the Burned Grey.

On the other hand, information drives the Skeptic and the Prisoner. They do not know each other. You took the blade when you went to meet her, and she killed you. These two can’t trust each other. Not completely. Because neither trusts without verifying first. And because, besides all that, there’s another factor in play: the Narrator.

Both the Skeptic and the Prisoner are aware of the Narrator. Both know that no matter what they want or do, something outside of them has the power to interfere. And their weapon of choice against him is information. The Prisoner plays dumb unless you “-give away the game,” and even then, she doesn’t reveal her plan. Not even to you. Instead, she hopes you take the hint and figure out what she wants you to do. Likewise, when you try to give her the knife to enact the plan, the Narrator tries to stop you as he did before, and the Skeptic thwarts him by pointing out how well that went the last time.

In contrast to the Damsel/Smitten pair, these two have one of the least emotionally charged dynamics of any Shifty/Quiet duo but have mutual respect and an understated sense of partnership that few other pairs start out with. Though the Drowned Grey’s motivation is not the explicit love of her counterpart, she’s still dressed like a widow to parallel the Burned Grey’s wedding dress.

And speaking of the Greys, they bring home the contrasting yet parallel dynamics between these Princesses and their Voices: one is fire, one is water. One has a passionate affect, the other a flat affect. One leaves behind only bones, the other a fleshy corpse. One is a bride, the other is a widow. Killing the Princess you defied the Narrator to save results in a Grey, a ghost dressed for marriage (future or past), that leads you to the basement of a dilapidated cabin that serves as your gruesome tomb.

The Damsel/Prisoner/Greys have many superficial differences that highlight how similar they are once you look beyond them. If played straight, the Damsel/Prisoner is a route where you continue to defy the narrator. The Damsel wants to leave? Pull off her chain and escort her out. The Prisoner wants to escape her chains? Give her the knife and take her head with you. Both are routes where you've established the best report with the Princess you could; you've literally died to protect her. Following this, you can take advantage of that goodwill and use it against the Narrator.

And in the case of the Greys, while the details are different (rain/desert, widow/bride, bones/corpse, drowning/burning) in both cases you're lead to your doom by a betrayed ghost of a Princess in a neglected cabin.

Various Voices and Princesses serve as foils and mirrors to each other (Rivalry and Submission, Terror and Longing, etc.), but none more closely than the Damsel/Prisoner Smitten/Skeptic. It makes them especially interesting and I'm excited to see what their future third chapters have in store.

Telemachus complains about a headache and Athena flips her shit because God damn it she's already trying to make sure this kid's dad gets home in one piece she CANNOT try to guide him through a teen pregnancy on top of that

The new Pristine Cut announcement trailer is so cool... I've watched it at least a dozen times at this point. But there's this one part I can't get out of my head: that final line from the Narrator.

"I—I refuse to let her get the last word in."

Banger voice acting and accompanying music aside, it's also an interesting character beat for the Narrator imo. He's framing the situation like a debate that the Princess is getting the last word in, and not as a situation with a single correct answer (Slay the Princess) the way He usually does.

I think it shows a little more self-awareness from Him than usual: a moment of hesitation and a quiet admission of His lack of control over your opinions and actions. If He really was able to convince you, it wouldn't matter if she got the final words, because you'd choose to slay her regardless.

It's also such an specific thing for him to focus on... He's not just stopping you from freeing her or stopping her from ending the world, He's stopping her from getting the last word in. Because that's usually what happens, right?

The game starts with His narration, His perspective. You need to slay her, or it will be the end of the world. But then you get her perspective, and as the game progresses, inevitably the Narrator falls behind as you and the Princess go through more and more loops that He can't remember and can't meaningfully respond to. You and She build a vastly sprawling dialogue across a network of lives, and meanwhile He's struggling to get his first words in.

And even when you discover your true identity and talk with him openly through the mirror, He inevitably shatters, and moments after that you talk to Shifty, who has much more space to argue her position. The Princess always gets the last word in.

...except for in this trailer. The sentimental moment with the base princess cuts abruptly to the Narrator. Usually when He talks about stopping you in-game, you have the power to resist or outright ignore Him, but here? The video just ends. He gets the last word in.

I just wonder, what does this mean for the Pristine Cut? Will there be a point where the Narrator really does get the last word?