The Most Interesting Part With Leda For Me, Is That For All Of The Murder She Does, She Doesnt Seem To

i feel like a lot of the leda fanart leans wayyyy too into the whole "murderous religious fanatic" thing by way of giving her bugged out eyes and stuff but like. she's literally calm and nice in all her dialogue delivery. which is her charm point. in her eyes miquella is so self evidently worthy that she's more just confused than anything when seeing someone who doesn't see things her way. she literally thinks others just don't get it lol, like her conflict with the others in the band comes from questioning why their older vows/history remain with them *after* having met miquella. in her mind she is literally just fighting for a gentler world guided by love and goodness. it's less incensed "fear of god" and more frigid "love for jesus", i guess?

which for her does lead her to the same ends but. idk i love insane girl art as much as the next guy but that's not her...

Obsessed with Isshin:

Isshin knows about The Horrors.

He lives for fighting. He killed a tyrant, won a country, but his only real goal in life is to perfect his fighting style.

Yet, he is so full of life and joy, even in his old age.

He will see a young person, ask "Is anybody else gonna mentor that?" and then not wait for an answer.

He will make the same joke twice and laugh about it.

He used to throw legendary parties.

He outdrank Owl.

He will drink with Wolf even though Wolf kicked his grandson out of his own castle.

He will drink with Wolf, make his jokes, help him on his quest in what ways he can – and in the same breath he tells Wolf that he can see the shadow of Shura in his eyes and promises that he won't hesitate to cut him down should he give in to his violent urges.

If Wolf does betray him, Isshin will get up from what is essentially his deathbed to kick his ass.

He once cut off Orangutan's arm to stop him from going down that same path.

He allows Orangutan to stay in the dilapidated temple near the castle and hang out with his doctor.

He taught Emma swordsmanship because she wants to be able to kill a demon.

Isshin is known as the Sword Saint and has developed and perfected multiple fighting styles.

He is deathly ill.

He dresses up as a character from folklore to hunt down enemy spies and assassins and his grandson's allies. While he's deathly ill.

Emma and Wolf know that he's the Tengu, but they never bring it up. Let the feudal Japanese Batman have his hobby.

Isshin knows they know and he lets Emma tease him about it.

Isshin loves his grandson.

He also told his grandson's very important hostage about a secret escape tunnel at the reservoir. And then he let that hostage stay near that tunnel in a tower with half a wall missing.

He told Emma to rescue that hostage's bodyguard from a well.

The way he talks about Genichiro's plan to use the black mortal blade makes it's clear that Isshin has no interest in self-sacrifice, even for immortality, even for Ashina, and he is greatly disturbed that that's what Genichiro has in mind.

He tried to help Kuro escape for Genichiro's sake more than anything else.

Again, he hunts down Genichiro's allies – who happen to herald from a corrupt buddhist temple that has experimented on and killed countless children in their quest for immortality.

In a story about (im)mortality, Isshin's opinion of immortality is a clear "hell, no!"

In a story about things ending, Isshin is firmly on the side of letting those things die that must die.

He goes behind Genichiro's back to prevent him from using the Dragon's Blood or the forces of Senpou temple and their corrupted immortality. He holds no ill will towards Wolf for defeating Genichiro. But he WILL fight Wolf to the death, despite having no beef with him, not because he cares about Ashina or the invasion or being rescued from the underworld, but simply because it was his grandson's last wish.

When Kuro first formulates his plan to sever immortality, his first instinct is to ask Isshin for advice.

When the besieging forces draw nearer, Kuro tells Wolf not to worry about him, because Isshin visits frequently. Isshin frequently checks on Kuro to make sure he feels safe.

When Isshin finally succumbs to his sickness, you find him lying dead in Kuro's room, sword in hand. He was gonna go out fighting, defending this child his grandson had kidnapped.

Emma stays with him to the end, and remains at the castle, watching over his body.

The way Isshin mirrors this gesture in the Shura ending, gently holding Emma's dead body.

The fact that Emma gets away with teasing Isshin about his exploits as the Tengu.

The fondness between them.

The faith Isshin puts in Emma, when he asks her to go behind Genichiro's back - who happens to be her childhood friend, on top of being the de facto leader of Ashina.

Isshin.

Reblog daily for health and prosperity

Man, I almost drank myself to death yesterday, I can't even remember my name, if only there was someone that could help me.

The the trustworthy and saint-like lieutenant:

Okay so we have this huge problem with forgetting about everything that’s happened by the time the next election rolls around so I’d like to keep a running list of things as they’re happening to help remind us when the 2026 midterms roll around. And please add to this if I’ve missed anything.

January 2025:

Donald Trump pardoned 1500 people who participated in the insurrection of January 6th, including those who violently assaulted and nearly killed police officers.

Donald Trump has declared that trans and non-binary people don’t exist.

Donald Trump is working towards firing everyone in the government who isn’t loyal to him.

Donald Trump has effectively fired everyone who he claims is an “illegal DEI hire” …whatever that means

Donald Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement and the World Health Organization

Congress are trying to pass the Laken Riley Act to, effectively, round up every immigrant in the country, including LEGAL immigrants

Donald Trump removed caps on prescription drug prices.

Donald Trump wants to withhold federal aid to help combat the LA wildfires and help the thousands of people who have been displaced and lost their homes.

The Department of Justice has put a hold on all civil rights cases.

Donald Trump has cut off aid to Ukraine.

Laken Riley Act has been passed by Congress and is awaiting being signed into law by the President. Here’s the breakdown of the votes: House Senate

Donald Trump purged a dozen inspectors general from the federal government and intends to replace them all with people loyal to him.

Pete Hegseth has been confirmed as Secretary of Defense. Here’s the breakdown of how the Senate voted. Note, it was a 50-50 tie that JD Vance had to break.

Donald Trump imposed a 25% tariff on Colombia after the Colombian government turned away two airplanes carrying migrants. Columbia has retaliated by imposing a 25% tariff of its own on US goods.

Donald Trump has also issued a travel ban for Colombian citizens and revoked visas from Colombian migrants coming to the US.

Donald Trump has now backed off the tariffs and other threats against Colombia. Note for future reference: this comes just hours after Trump made the threat in the first place and he and the Colombian president got into a big fight on social media.

Nearly 1,000 migrants were arrested mostly in Chicago on January 26th by ICE and ICE has been told to meet a quota of 75 migrant arrests every day.

Donald Trump rescinded an anti-discrimination executive order from Lyndon B. Johnson

Donald Trump signed an executive order banning trans people from serving in the military and also ordered that people who were discharged for refusing to get mandatory vaccines be reinstated.

Donald Trump has frozen all federal grants to institutions.

After pressure from state governments, activist groups, and the general public, the White House has rolled back some of the freezes on federal funding.

This.

Donald Trump is trying to fire all federal employees who don’t want to return to the office (work-from-home saves the federal government millions of taxpayer dollars in overhead). He also sent an email to federal employees saying that if they’re not loyal to him, they’ll be investigated.

Donald Trump has signed the Laken Riley Act into law.

Donald Trump has said he doesn’t think Palestinians should be allowed to return to Gaza but instead should be sent to Egypt and Jordan.

Also this.

Donald Trump has ordered undocumented immigrants to be sent to Guantanamo Bay

Donald Trump signed an executive order to expand federal funding for school choice programs. [x]

Donald Trump signed an executive order saying that he will deport visa-holding students who protest against Israel. [x]

Donald Trump has blamed DEI for the plane crash that killed 67 people in Washington D. C. [x]

Donald Trump signed an executive order that schools should no longer teach about racism and discrimination. And that schools should only teach history that is “patriotic” [x]

Florida Representative Anna Paulina Luna wants to add Donald Trump’s face to Mount Rushmore. [x]

Trump’s Department of Education has called book bans a hoax. [x]

I’ll keep adding to this list as new things come up and, again, please feel free to add anything I’ve missed. I know that in this world of constant news it’s easy to forget, so let’s give our future selves a little help!

You guys don't even know how desperate am for any and all Leda content

Yeah you're probably right tbh

I originally read it as a means to somewhat preserve their culture out of some begrudging respect for them, but the british museum allegory is much more evident after second thought

Thanks for the feedback !

After a bit of time and a hefty amount of thinking abt the lore, SOTE really brings this post to my mind.

It's like. Miquella did love Malenia and Godwyn, but couldnt cure them the way he was. He did want to better the world, but it didnt help him as he retraced his mother's footsteps.

Midra did love, and was loved, he endured for ages in memory of the love he shared with Nanaya, and her entreaty. This didnt stop the inquisitors from ramming the sword of damnation through his throat.

Messmer did love his mother, and he obviously cared for her people. He cared for his knights, even when they betrayed him. He even seems to have cared about the hornsent in some capacity, judging by the amount of hornsent culture that remains preserved in the storehouse. And yet, despite all that, he still is responsible for the slaughter, and utter genocide the hornsent suffered. He still couldnt save the jar saints. He still couldnt get his mother to answer his pleas.

Marika did love Messmer. The amount of blessings she gave him is proof enough. She did love him, but it didnt prevent her from sending him on an endless crusade.

Marika loved her people. It didnt matter.

"Marika bathed the village of her home in gold, knowing full well that there was no one left to heal." "What was her prayer ? Her wish, her confession ? There is no one left to answer, and Marika never returned home again."

By the way, small addendum that is only somewhat related bc i dont want to make a full post abt it

The shaman village ost is the elden beast theme with only the harp, without the grandiose melody.

"Only the kindness of Gold, without Order."

Uhhhhh- so anyways-

Age Headcanons for SOTE NPCs; A Senseless List

A reminder that this is purely for fun and makes no claim for or against canon. This is merely a collection of headcanons and vague vibes, enjoy.

Leda: For this post, let's count biological age and not weird-resurection-ages. To me, Leda seems to be around 25-28. Old enough to have lost her naivety for the world, but young enough to keep the pedestal she's placed Miquella upon. She's an adult, sure, but I'd hardly say she's reached her full abilities. If Miquella had succeeded, she certainly would have matured into a vicious killer with decades of battle experience.

Freyja: This redmane has left her years of doe-eyes and frilly bows long behind. She's an easy 38, cool and confident in her body and her lifestyle. Sure, she's noticed the faint lines that have started to form on her brow but- eh- who cares? She'll keep doing what she's always done. To her, age really is just a number.

Dryleaf Dane: The martial arts know no age limit. 20, 30, 60- only the dedication of the mind and body matters in the pursuit of perfection. Dane has seen it all in his eventful 50-ish years of life, and his fighting style reflects that. It's his reserved demeanor and silent loyalty that make him a perfect balance for the cynical Leda. To whom he likens himself as both a friend and mentor. Honestly, he appreciates her youthful fervor and often finds himself considering her something like a daughter.

The Hornsent: He's 40. 40 what? Just 40, as far as he'd ever tell you anyhow. A trusting man he is not, even with the simplicities of sharing one's true age. Such pointless talking points are for truer friends and family, of which the hornsent has none. Perhaps under the guidance of Kindly Miquella, he might one day celebrate another year of life lived in vengeance. For now, however, the memory only fills him with a deep and singular loneliness...

Igon: Drake Warriors aren't known for living long lives, and hunters of all kinds are known for it even less. Igon is the exception. Without the magics of the land of shadow, he would be about 42. An impressive age to reach, for one in his line of work. Although the lack of care he gives to his own appearance would lead one to believe he was much older.

Sir Ansbach: GILF lovers rejoice, this man is easily the oldest npc on our list today. I would say Ansbach is dutifully vague about his true age. While it may amuse him to give the true number, and watch the flicker of awe for his agility cross his companions' face, he remains aware that giving his real age is a disadvantage should things turn south. On one hand, it may cause him to be targeted by those unaware of his skill. An easy problem to solve, if not overly tiresome. On the other, it endangers on a more... emotional level. He cannot risk his allies putting his safety over their own on such a baseless reason as his advanced age. He is SIR Ansbach, after all. What sort of man, as both mentor and knight, could abide by such an obvious danger to his juniors? Not he, that is certain, and so his many decades remain a mystery (although they certainly number more than Dane's)

Thiollier: Awkward, skinny, and chronically anxious. Thiollier reads as young, very young. He's most certainly the baby of the group, even if most of the others don't treat him differently for it. After all, they must likely assume him only a few years younger than Leda. They all began their lives as warriors, scholars, and missionaries at a similar age. So to them it matters very little how old their resident perfumer is. Freyja assumes he is 22, the Hornsent suspects him little older than 17, and only the Tarnished and Sir Ansbach know he is - truthfully- somewhere in between.

Moore: It is difficult to place Moore, since he is kin to the Pests and therefore likely a different race/species category for biological age. However, I would say that Moore is somewhat youthful, based upon his naivety. Likely, he is in between Thiollier and Leda in age - when the years between Pest kin and Tarnished are converted. Mid-20s seems an appropriate range for Moore.

Aaaannnd that's all I have for now! If you have different headcanons on sote npc ages, or npc headcanons in general, pls feel free to share! I love reading comments and seeing different (and similar) perspectives on Elden Ring characters!

Anyways, thanks for reading! This was a fun way to kill time lol >D

lets hear it for transgenderism and faggotry. can I get a round of applause for transgenderism and faggotry

The Professor Case - Three Sad Faces and Three Dead Men

There is a man in your life you love, admire and respect more than anything. Your greatest desire is to follow in his footsteps, and to eventually make him proud. However, before that can happen, he tragically dies under obscure circumstances. You’d do anything to know what happened; to give him some sort of justice. But the more you know about the truth, the more you realise that maybe he wasn’t as noble as he always appeared. Before his death, he left you a letter that you didn’t receive.

Are you Barok van Zieks, Asougi Kazuma or Gina Lestrade?

The heart of the drama of the Professor case is made up by this series of cascading tragedies, where each is both a repetition of and directly caused by its predecessor. The cycles of betrayal, disillusionment and grief play out in delayed motion across time, the same story with different characters wound to different speeds so they all come crashing to their endpoint at once. The spiral of repetitive continuation joins the three tales both into one continuous history, and also the same tale interposed three times upon itself. Kazuma’s story cannot begin without Barok’s coming to its first temporary end, just as Gina’s cannot without Kazuma’s catalysis. Yet as we line up Gina, Kazuma and Barok, we see the same face, displaced across time – tearful and shocked, furious and vengeful, bitter and resigned. In the same way, we see Klint layered over Genshin layered over Gregson: deeply loved, sharply fallen, and dead.

This triangulation, more than anything else, emphasises the game’s thematic throughline that the past cannot be put to rest without the truth. Klint’s lies become Genshin’s lies become Gregson’s lies, just as Barok creates Kazuma creates Gina. Past, present and future collapse into a grief that endlessly reproduces itself. The impossibility of moving forwards when the threads of bewilderment and doubt remain manifests itself in the literal reiteration of the event, again and again. Time loops between the courtroom and the graveyard. The years pass. The years do not pass.

In this temporal overlap, Gina articulates the grief that wells beneath Barok’s bitterness and Kazuma’s sharpness, while Kazuma’s single-minded vengeance is a warning as to how easily that grief might be shaped into a sword, and Barok shows by example what lies at the end of that path: ten years later still unhappy, still chained. As they come together in the courtroom, Gina in the witness stand, Barok in the dock and Kazuma at the prosecution’s bench, it is a symbolic trial of not the self, but the role. To leave one of them still trapped in the morass is somehow to leave all of them – their shackles, after all, are the same. The question that passes between them, from corner to corner is this: is it a crime, to have grieved so deeply that your grief became a weapon? The outcome of the trial doesn’t quite answer this question. It asks another instead: is grief grounds for justice? And crucially: who was holding the weapon that grief made of you?

However, of this unhappy triangle, Barok is the only one to have actually completed the climactic, mistaken, mistrial of justice. He is the only one to have received closure at the cost of integrity, and to have lived with the aftermath. He is the only one to not only have believed he knew the truth, but also that he had delivered justice. While Kazuma stands on the cusp, and Gina is literally at ground zero, Barok has both the advantage and misfortune of hindsight. Hindsight – and reflection. He hasn’t escaped his story. But he has walked out the other way, into what he believes is the long epilogue, when it’s in fact just the sagging middle. It’s what allows him sharp, pointed insight into the other two: he recognises himself in their faces.

Van Zieks: I say nothing of whether or not I'm the Reaper. That's the task of this court to decide. But there is one thing I can say unequivocally: That girl is no detective.

Gina: Eh? Wha...? Nah, that's right, I ain't. I'm an inspector!

Van Zieks: Repeating rumours heard around the Yard... Reading entries from a notebook of unconfirmed origin... That's not testimony. It's practically a script. No doubt the rest of this trial will go exactly as you've clearly planned.

Kazuma: .........

Van Zieks: Your hatred of me is understandable. In your mind, I'm sure I am the Reaper...who sent your father to the gallows all those years ago.

Kazuma: ...!

Van Zieks: But you're in danger of becoming a far more sinister Reaper yourself... ...by attempting to have me condemned with this feeble excuse for testimony.

The ease with which Barok identifies the truth is striking. This is a scripted trial. Gina’s grief is causing her professional integrity to fall apart, a fact that Kazuma is using to indict Barok. Kazuma’s anger is causing his professional integrity to fall apart as he treats the courtroom like his personal arena for revenge. Kazuma’s anger, Barok demonstrates, is something he understands, deeply. Gina’s grief is something to this day he mirrors. Yet, Barok harshly points out, emotion is no excuse for a miscarriage of justice. It’s a show of both deep understanding and scathing judgement. The cool-eyed detachment with which he evaluates the situation is admirable. It is also something Barok from ten years ago would not have been able to do.

However, there is a fatal flaw in all this, which is that it’s much easier to recognise when an accusation is false from one end than the other. As ever, Barok stops just short of applying the same tier of insight into the events of ten years past, looking just to the left of the gaping wound that the trial left. Even as more and more irregularities come to light, it is only at the final push that he truly faces to the idea that this one trial could have been a massive pile of lies. This is an incredible blind spot, coming from the man who espouses he ‘trusts no one’, who has the both the suspicion and the deductive ability to find out Gregson’s position as the Reaper. It is an incredible blind spot, coming from the man who had the clarity to suspect, even for a moment, his own, dear, brother.

It's here that we see Barok’s true weakness – and the damning piece of evidence of how deeply he is still chained to that moment, ten years ago. Can a prosecutor of Barok’s calibre truly never have suspected, if not at the time, then ten years later? Even as Sithe’s lies came to light, even as Gregson’s involvement in the Reaper became apparent? But as Barok rejected Klint’s guilt, so he rejects that the events were not as he believed them to be: on the basis of evidence, to be sure, but evidence given disproportionate weight for how much he did not want it to be true. Even as Kazuma desperately links every piece of evidence, no matter how unfitting, into his certain conclusion that Barok is Gregson’s killer, so Barok takes what evidence he receives and slots them neatly into the narrative he most wants to believe: this man died so my brother cannot be guilty, the ring was found so Genshin must have committed the crime. He refuses to entertain alternative pathways, even as doubt creeps in. Even as things stop fitting. Until the very last moment, when he is forced with damning evidence to change his stance, he clings to his brother’s innocence. Within him grind the cogwork of his truth-seeking logic machine mind against the bloodied flesh of his heart. After ten years, that flesh is wearing thin.

It's this that brings him to the exact same level as Kazuma and Gina, who fight for Genshin and Gregson’s innocence respectively. However, it cannot all be true at once. All three cannot be innocent together: something has to give. As each of them beseech Ryuunosuke for comfort, they find instead the truth.  

But let’s step back a little. The similarity between Gina, Kazuma and Barok make the differences in how they are treated startling. Barok, on displaying a lapse in professional integrity following the worst events of his life, receives full prosecutorial authority from Stronghart to go head-to-head in the trial of his brother’s death. Meanwhile, Stronghart allows Kazuma to slide in sideways, using Gregson as a cudgel to pin Barok for Genshin’s death. But Gina, when she breaks down in court and cries out that Gregson is innocent, is harshly reprimanded and told to hand in her badge. Why the difference?

The answer is obvious: a noble young prosecutor is a much more useful tool to Stronghart than a barely literate pickpocket from the streets of East London. The debt Barok owed to Stronghart protected Stronghart from suspicion for nearly ten years, while enabling Stronghart to centre an entire conspiracy around Barok in the blind spot that debt created. Similarly, Kazuma is a useful tool to wipe out the Reaper conspiracy’s last members and exonerate Stronghart once and for all while being easily disposed of as a foreign exchange student. But what’s Gina got to give? What value does Gina have that Stronghart might find useful? The answer is: nothing. Gina has nothing, and so it’s her that Stronghart lets loose on his distaste, his condescending dismissal. It’s her that he belittles and talks over – that his true feelings for those he has used comes out.

Barok is the first and most perfect paradigm of the narrative that the other two emulate. Immediately after his brother’s death, he seeks out the culprit (so he thinks) and prosecutes him successfully in court for the crime which he seeks vengeance for. Kazuma is a little shakier: ten years after his father’s death, he seeks out the culprit (so he thinks) and prosecutes him on the basis of an unrelated crime while barely hiding that his real reason is his father’s death. It’s with Gina that the real tears in the fabric show: disoriented and grieving, she’s dragged into court and gives emotional testimony that implicates someone she’s not even 100% sure is guilty. She isn’t even the one doing the prosecuting. These are different stories, with the difference in perfection scaled primarily by how perfect a tool Stronghart sees in them. But they are also the same story, dressed better or dressed worse. And they reach the same ending.

When the dust finally begins to settle, we zoom into how each of them react to the momentous change in their understanding of their own lives. Standing before Klint’s portrait, Barok takes the painful step to acknowledge that his brother is truly ‘no more’, even as he wears his prosecutor’s badge with mixed feelings to the complex legacy left behind. Kazuma entrusts Karuma to Ryuunosuke with the promise to retake it after mastering the violence he suddenly realised he was capable of. But Gina, surrounded by her friends, takes back Gregson’s pocket watch and vows to uphold his legacy by becoming a great detective herself.

At first glance, this raises a lot of question marks. Has everyone forgotten that Gregson was involved in a double-digit number of murders? Well, to some extent, yes. However, from another perspective, while Barok has to grapple with the person he became in upholding a false legacy, while Kazuma has to grapple with the person he felt the potential of being in chasing a false vengeance, Gina had not yet taken the steps towards becoming an upholder of falsehoods herself, wittingly or unwittingly. It is with this uncomplicated sincerity that she can take on Gregson’s legacy, since it never yet had the chance to twist her into bitterness or hatred – as it did to Barok, and as it did to Kazuma. While she may have to grapple with Gregson, she does not have to grapple with herself. In the worst time of their lives, Barok had Stronghart, who plunged him into a ten-year long darkness and scapegoated him as the Reaper. Kazuma had no one, only memories, and anger enough almost to kill. But Gina had Ryuunosuke, and through him, the truth – for all.