My Therapist: "American-Accent Caleb Isn't Real And Cannot Hurt You." Caleb C2e1:

if you dont have me on facebook you are probably not missing out on any posts but the comment section is important too lmao

There's something so bittersweet, though, about 'Seth Domade', sorcerer and archivist of the Cobalt Soul.

Something about Seth being from a tavern family, a place where you'd be surrounded by laughter and life; no pretension, no expectations, no loneliness. Something about Essek's mother being an Umavi, and Seth's being an ordinary tavernkeep. 'My mother has never made Kraft cheese' vs 'my mother can stop time with her ale!' Something about Seth being a sorcerer, a class that just gets their talent and doesn't have to work and work and work to achieve more, until you've shut out everything else but your studies. Something about Seth being in the Cobalt Soul, where he'd always have peers and where all knowledge is shared.

Something, too, about Seth being a human from a humble family who realised he had arcane talent, and went off and studied and was happy. Something about Seth being a combination of the life Caleb should have lived, and the life Essek never could.

look man. look

essek saying "bren" out loud, claiming a position on caleb's side as the mouthpiece of his regards to astrid, did something to me. i can't tell if it opened a wound or punched me or gave me a hug. all i know is that i am feeling so many emotions right now

more under the cut because i'm about to get rambly:

"bren aldric ermendrud" is a separate character from caleb widogast. he's a young boy learning how to make magic. he's a deeply traumatized and indoctrinated teenager. he's the boy who curled up with astrid and eadwulf in a freezing tower for warmth all night.

essek never met bren. he met caleb and he's never known him as anyone else. if i'm remembering correctly, caleb never even said the name "bren" to him during the campaign, and neither did any of the nein.

essek knows caleb widogast. he knows the man who held up the object of his worst crime and then kissed him in the bowels of a ship and made a floor of infinite stars for them to walk through together. he knows the person who healed over bren's wounds—thinly, but enough. he knows the man that the boy has become.

astrid knows bren. she barely knows who caleb is. she still calls him bren after hearing him referred to as caleb repeatedly. she can't know him as the man he is, she only knows the boy. there's some of bren in caleb, but there is no caleb in bren.

essek saying "bren sends his regards" is him gauging astrid's reaction, on one level—if she freaks out, which she did, she's in opposition to caleb's cause and thus a threat. on another level, it's essek delivering a very different subtextual message from caleb: "the boy who loved you is giving you one final warning."

because essek is a threat to astrid. their last meaningful interaction was slinging spells at each other in the blooming grove. and that's funny in a "current boyfriend vs ex girlfriend exclusively fight each other" kind of way, but it's also deeply tied to caleb's recurring theme of transformation. "bren sends his regards" also means "i have healed enough to love enough for someone else to know this name and use it with my consent. and this someone else is your enemy. what does that make you think i've become?"

it also does a fantastic job of communicating subtle offscreen discussions that have happened over the years since the end of c2. we don't have the details of when or how caleb told essek his birth name, but we know that he did, and we know from all of c2 that the name bren occupies a place of immense emotional weight for caleb. it functions similarly to a deadname in terms of who uses it and for what purpose. trent exclusively calls caleb bren to wound him and place himself in a position of power. astrid calls him bren to remind both him and herself of who they used to be—same with eadwulf, though obviously he's not here.

the first time we hear essek say "bren" is on caleb's behalf and confronting one of the narrative representations of caleb's trauma. it's four words that manage to communicate "i, your enemy on a hundred levels, can speak for both the man i love and the boy who loved you, because i know him in his entirety."

astrid knows bren and essek knows caleb, but only essek can speak for both. because at some point, caleb gave bren to essek. and we know this from four words. four IMPROVISED words.

god. this moment is just so fucking good

Hey everyone, I know it's going to be a busy day for a lot of people, but Google enrolled everyone over 18 into their AI program automatically.

If you have a google account, first go to gemini.google.com/extensions and turn everything off.

Then you need to go to myactivity.google.com/product/gemini and turn off all Gemini activity tracking. You do have to do them in that order to make sure it works.

Honestly, I'm not sure how long this will last, but this should keep Gemini off your projects for a bit.

I saw this over on bluesky and figured it would be good to spread on here. It only takes a few minutes to do.

Thinking about how Essek is, like, the elven equivalent of 22 at the time of C2, and imagining him at like five or six hundred looking back at his youth floored by how reckless he was/the stupid stuff he did.

I'm not even talking about everything with the Beacons and the Assembly, but like: "Shit, how did I EVER think it was a good idea for Me, a Wizard, who relies solely on magic, to travel to Aeor, -alone-, with only my Wizard lover, who -also- only relied solely on magic, in a place WELL KNOWN to be brimming with Extremely Deadly Anti-Magic Creatures, Anti-magic Fields, and a surplus of Anti-Wizard Traps???"

So I just listened to the first ~40 minutes of c2e4 while doing somethings, just to get a headstart on tomorrow's (Today's, when I post this XD) episode. . . And I have a Many Post Ideas™ about but this one first.

(EDIT: Bsjsksk it was SUPPOSED to be first, but my schedules posts didn't work right - Please know I typed this up first XD)

!! Spoiler Warning for people who don't know PC Backstories/Caleb's History yet!!

Let's talk about Caleb talking to Toya in the boat.

Cause like, at first he's trying to get information (very wizard™ of him, imo, but also very 'on the run' wizard where knowing information and the keeping of certain strains of it are very important) - I feel this is not only to get a more full picture, but also to feel out how to proceed w/ Toya - How innocent is she in this? Was she mind-controlled? Was it more mundane manipulation?

He allows the others to explain the situation, he asks how she grew close to him after she says 'he was my friend'/the most emotional response thus-far in this point in the conversation, 'What did you talk about?', all with a sympathetic pained expression as he listens.

Alot of early-Caleb from what I've seen so far is trying to suss things out and decide best courses of action at almost every given turn - Carrying this on, his next part I feel is partly manipulation; The sympathy may be real to one extent or another, but what they/what he ultimately decides they need is for Toya to cooperate and I feel he's usin' that Charisma stat to try and secure her for that purpose (RIP that 6 tho XD)

This is all fun and good, but It's What he says at the start that brings me the most pause - He says, 'People we feel we know. . can be someone else.' - He continues on more towards manipulation, pushing gently to the forefront what he feels she needs to focus on (staying with the rest of the circus), but at that line I wonder. . .

What is he thinking about, when he says that? At first I stopped what I was doing and was like, '!!! His Parents? Does he mean his Parents??' Cause like, Yes, he knows now that those memories were false. . But still, it musta been something to 'realize' your parents were against the very country you are giving up so much to protect and serve.

But then I wondered. Is he thinking of his Parents, or perhaps Ickithon, who he thought of likely as a strict but ultimately Good teacher who also wanted the best for the Empire, wanted the best out of him for this noble cause?

Or was he thinking of himself, seen by his parents as their little spark, who was moving up in the world and loved them dearly. . . Only for him to mercilessly trap and burn them within the very home they raised him in?

there's something so funny about how the early Nein talks like Fjord has a high charisma but only took intimidate and lie as his skills and also only talks when it's clear everyone else has fucked the situation so bad he has to step in. Jester, Molly, and Beau all have proficiency in lie but all three of them have +0/+1 to Charisma and prof bonuses aren't that great at early levels and also none of them will shut up. Sam has a negative to charisma and cannot stop trying to talk because he hasn't really registered that he's not Scanlan any more. Caleb has both a decent charisma and also has a proficiency bonus to lie but he really only uses it in PVP. the ONLY person who took persuade was Jester.

Me, trying to find ways to connect my favorite song’s lyrics to whatever characters I’m currently obsessed with: