Reminder That I Made A Ns/fw Sideblog Over On My Mumu. You Can Find Said Sideblog @icewindafterdark <

reminder that i made a ns/fw sideblog over on my mumu. you can find said sideblog @icewindafterdark < there.

"seriously kami, why do you even bother with ren? he's rude, cold and lies to everyone. it's pretty obvious he doesn't care about anyone other than himself. the second you say something he doesn't like, he just cuts you out of his life like that? after everything you've been through? talk about cruel. you're better off without someone like that hanging around."

kami agrees. HE AGREES. ren has a very short fuse, he's always had one. kami knows that all too well ― he's LIVED it before.

part of his entire journey now is to find some sort of recovery, no matter what form it takes. he should have expected the bumps in the road; kami and ren are too similar in some aspects. they both take hurt and offense way too quickly ― ANYONE would butt heads with either of them.

"you're right," kami says coldly, rooted in place, staring out into the distance from whence he came. "ren has a sharp tongue that's going to land him in trouble. and his dishonesty is going to land him in even more. he needs to curb that temper of his if he's going to make any meaningful progress with the people in his life."

he stops there. because as much as kami agrees with the words thrown his way, he also, at his core, still cares deeply for ren. there is NO ONE ELSE who could even attempt to understand or share his pain.

even now, subtly and just barely unseen, kami is holding out his hand, absorbing the breeze and wind, letting it swirl menacingly in a circle. a small funnel that's he's staring at with narrowed and hate-filled eyes.

"but if you think i'm going to stand here and let you talk about him that way, you're dead wrong. it doesn't matter what i did or what he said, he's still my brother, and you have not earned the right to speak about, or even think about him."

he's never caused a tornado before. perhaps he's learned this trick by watching kaedahara from a distance, wistfully wishing he'd been allowed to have friends. but he could still learn by watching and hearing about what other visions can do, and he's applying that knowledge to this situation with a level of malice that only the balladeer could conjure up.

with a swish of his hand, the tornado grows in size, gaining speed and becoming far more deadly. it's not quite big enough to be a STORM, but it's enough to cause plenty of damage. it's headed straight for the accuser.

"now do me a favor, and die."

@windsfavored

so i woke up from a nap with an epiphany about kami, and some lasting results--

so kaminari never went through irminsul, right? the pain he suffers from trying to find redemption isn't just emotional, but physical too. BECAUSE he never went through and erased himself, he still has all the marks on his back from being attached to the mecha. though, i imagine that with nahida's help and help from some of the others in sumeru, those marks are cleaned up as best as possible with surgeries done to keep them closed up.

but regardless, kaminari still feels the constant pain on his back from them. should someone put their hands on his back, they could feel the tiniest little ridges from where the openings were inserted, and kaminari would wince at each touch from anyone.

he regrets it so much. kaminari hates the reminders that are permanently on his back, unable to ever go away in this lifetime. but at the same time, they're also a reminder of how much he loathes dottore and what he almost went through in order to get them in the first place! he's aware it was mostly self induced, but kaminari's anger and rage and quest for redemption and vengeance are all inside those little circles on his back. without them, he'd certainly lose his way a second time, he's sure of it.

is change a matter of time or a matter of will?

the wanderer does NOT enjoy this line of questioning. he doesn't enjoy these questions that force him to think, to contemplate his own past, compared to where he is now. kaminari especially doesn't want to face the changes he made in his own life.

because the answer is, he really doesn't know. his own anger and grief had been shaped by perceived betrayal, then fostered and grown into full hatred by outside influences. kami does not know how to separate the manufactured anger from his own, natural anger.

but on the flip side, time IS changing him for the better. there's no denying that the longer he stays in sumeru, the better off he's becoming. kami isn't sure if it's will, either. he would have staunchly refused to believe there was any kind of help for someone like him.

but ― aren't they both getting something out of this? kaminari can't deny for a second that lumine's company isn't enjoyable. part of him is almost EAGER to seek out her company. would that count as will, too? it's hard to say, and he doesn't want to spend forever contemplating this line of thinking, either. kami will table it for now, and wait until later when the question DOESN'T give him a headache.

"there is never any right time for anything." he scoffs. "i don't like who i've become in my past. but that doesn't mean i'm fully content to leave it alone either." he's still alluding to his act of revenge. he knows lumine well enough by now to know she'll understand, even.

"i'm also aware that change isn't always negative. it's a positive, for those who want it. i'm not sure what camp i fall under yet." he doesn't want to talk about himself anymore. they already spent way too long talking about him. from his initial defeat, to his new name and new partnership with nahida, to now.

"let's talk about you for once," he says abruptly. "you speak of change like you're not somehow effected by it. i remember you used to ask around constantly for your brother, and now you barely speak about him. what changed that?"

The scarves hanging from his hat moved, the ornaments ringing softly the moment his face disappeared under it, where she could barely see through the shadow casted on his features. Even then, her eyes still averted away from his figure, somewhere lost in the horizon before them.

Her whole existence had been bound to change; the same way shooting stars never stayed to the same place, her journey was followed by constant changes; civilisations falling and arising, stars rising and dying. There was no consistency to it, but it was almost inevitable to avoid mutation. And the same way the world had changed around her, the same way it had crumbled under her feet the moment she had awakened by herself in Teyvat- she had to adapt herself to that new existence where there was no more Sun to light her path like he always had for her.

However people's minds were not as simple as that constant flow, it could not be compared to the Sun rising and hiding every day as per its habit. People's emotions, their ambitions and desires, their lives... A river could follow a similar path, but its waters never stayed the same for how similar they would look with the naked eye.

"Is change a matter of time or a matter of will?" she had waited for Kami to complete his thoughts out loud, her gaze drifting away from some birds she had been following in their flight. Did she believe people could change? It would be foolish to either deny or agree to it. "It does not matter what I believe in, as long as actions prove one's words of will to do so." she was not deaf to the resentment that still tainted Kami's tone around her, and yet here they were, standing by each other's side even if she had promised herself to take responsibility for Teppei's fate herself. Perhaps even Ei herself had been looking for anything, someone to drag her out of her own broken existence, a hand to cling to so she could overcome her own fear of change. Where there was change there was gain and loss after all.

"Perhaps there will never be a right time for you to face more of your past, however you should do so when you feel ready to. You have the opportunity to choose, which is not necessarily a negative thing."

some spoilers, but i want to make sure everyone understands this:

it was the abyss itself that caused the war. this has nothing to with the abyss twin. apparently people on other sites are blaming the twin for this when I isn't them.

abyssal order is not the actual abyss. the twin is innocent in this.

"we'd be more evenly matched if you used a weapon you could actually master."

　"I'm quite sure we were fairly matched, now."