crouching_sin | [Video]

[Today's video finds Naoya sitting and drinking a cup of coffee. He's bundled up in a green sweater, and he looks fairly amused.]

I thought I'd tell you a story today, for those of you who care to listen. This is a story about the Norse gods, and mistletoe. Let me define a fe things before I begin, for those of you who do not know those terms.

Gods are like… very powerful beings. Think of them like very rare, very powerful Pokemon. Gods in most traditions are similar to humans in the sense that they live out their lives, look similar to people, and have relationships. Generally, they're thought to have certain domains of power.

Mistletoe is a plant with white berries that looks similar to this.

[He pauses to lift up a picture that he's drawn to illustrate it.]

There's a tradition to meet under it to kiss people.

'Norse' refers to a people in my world that lived in the far north. Their culture is mostly known these days for being one that was full of warriors and raiders.

Now, on to our story. One day, the queen of the gods, Frigga, had a dream about her son Baldur - the god of light - dying horribly. Baldur had the same dream, and Frigga set out to see that it didn't happen. She traveled all the realms, making each and every object swear that it would never harm Baldur. Every object swore an oath - except for mistletoe, because Frigga thought it too young and unimportant to swear an oath.

The gods heard of all of the oaths sworn, and played a game where they threw things at Baldur and watched them bounce off. However Loki, god of fire and mischief, heard of this, and found out that mistletoe had not sworn that oath. He took mistletoe and made an arrow of it, and handed it to Baldur's brother, the blind god Hod. Hod threw the arrow at Baldur, which killed him.

Frigga went to Hel, the mistress of the dead, and pleaded for her son back. Hel agreed, on the condition that every living thing in the world weep for Baldur. She went to every living thing and begged for them to weep, and all did - except one. That was the giantess Thokk, and because she would not weep, Baldur did not come back to life.

[He takes a sip of his coffee, before speaking again.]

It's unclear whether Thokk was Loki in disguise or not. Certainly, he'd never tell one way or the other, god of mischief that he is. The fact remains that, though many see mistletoe as a symbol of love, it's in fact the reminder of a dead god.

... Though said god did reappear recently, though that's a story for another time.

I hope you all learned something today.

[Aaand the video clicks off.]

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does it suck as much as it sounds like it sucks

Pretty much. It's a literal and metaphorical headache.

sorry that happens to you then
and keeps happening
id be pretty pissed off at god too if i believed in that stuff

He'll pay for it eventually.

uhh
how...so?
i mean
isnt god by definition pretty much unassailably omnipotent

All gods can be defeated. They're powerful, but not insurmountable. The King of Demons is the only being with the power to stand up to Him.

that kind of sounds like a bad thing though

Why? Oh, the King of Demons thing? It depends who's got the title, doesn't it?

i guess????
arent some things just bad news no matter how you slice them though like
i dunno i wouldnt feel too secure about anyone titled destroyer of souls and im pretty sure king of demons lands in the same category
unless im misinterpreting something

He's my cousin. This incarnation's cousin, at least. And he was supposed to fight God or do anything but what he did which is what I told you above.

ohhhh
ok
so the king of demons is
also the messiah

that seems sort of unfair i mean what if other people wanted some badass titles ahead of the apocalypse

Well I hear the four horsemen are looking for assistants.

You could be the courier of pestilence or something if you really want.

hahaha shit
ok if we had to translate that into my worlds terms i think thatd come out to something like the page of doom
but im
i was the knight of time so im already covered

Knight of Time, hm? That's a pretty impressive-sounding title. What are the perks?

ignominious death mostly
but also i could go back in time

Oh that's fun.

How far back could you go?

im not sure actually
i never tried going more than a day because everything i needed to do had to get done within a short timeframe
i could maintain a whole fucking lot of loops simultaneously though
at one point there were at least thirteen of me running around at once

[Um.]

That's... rather impressive, actually.

meh
it got shit done
anyway i cant do it anymore obviously

I can't cast magic here anymore, so I think there's a lot of people who don't have their abilities here.

what kind of magic did you do

I knew a lot, but I mostly kept a healing spell, a shielding spell, and a 'blow everything up' spell equipped.

oh yeah the fuck shit up spell
always handy in a crisis
that was more my sisters area though

It's very helpful, considering it's like dropping a small nuclear bomb on something. It doesn't always kill demons, but it tends to cut through most elemental resistances.

What sort of magic did your sister do?

uhh she had sort of general dark magyyks at one point
like she looked too long into the abyss or something and the eldritch gods living there poured their space lobstery business into her brain so she talked gobbledegook for a while and leaked smoke
apart from that she just sort of shot light at things with her knitting needles and they exploded

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