Thinking About How Essek Is, Like, The Elven Equivalent Of 22 At The Time Of C2, And Imagining Him At

idk if anybody did this before

Here's a CAT

So far my favorite bit of re-watching C2 is Caleb being asked about the Academy and immediately deflecting by summoning a cat. "My backstory? HERE'S A CAT, ASK NO QUESTIONS."

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

Everyone who doesn't speak German, I want you all to understand just how good Liam's German accent is.

Especially compared to for example Matt's (as the Zemnian guy in the bar) - that's what I'm expecting an American guy to sound like when he's doing a half-decent German accent; like, well that's not reeeally what I speak like, but sure, I get what you're going for.

Liam tho? This is genuinely how we all sounded in my highschool English class. Hilariously authentic. No notes from my part.

"and genuine hot boi!"

Ludinus your ex correspondant traitor / grooming victim and Ikithons runaway protege are in love now. yeah they're making out. they live in a cottage with cats and have a couple portrait.

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.

Man, if I had a nickel for every time Essek Thelyss's disguise was dispelled via Anti-Magic field in a situation somehow related to Ludinus Da'leth, I'd have two nickels.

Which isn't alot, but it's weird that it has happened twice.

My Therapist: "American-Accent Caleb isn't real and cannot hurt you." Caleb c2e1:

Just a small DM-Moment, but I REALLY like how when Caleb is trying to manipulate Toya a bit in the boat/ensure her cooperation and Liam has to roll Persuasion and rolls like dogshit (RIP that 6™ XD), instead of taking an easier route of having Toya merely dismiss his words (ofc there are times and places for a players words to genuinely be ineffective!! But it can feel bad if you're trying real hard/speaking with alot of thought and you just roll real bad), Matt has it so that Toya is simply. . Very, very understandably distracted by the presence of the scary lady who choked her to unconsciousness just an hour or so earlier XD 😬 😂

Feels like such a good choice that opens up further roleplay (esp. since Beau/Marisha hadn't spoken up too much in the convo w/ Toya thus far), without discounting Liam's really good speech (unfortunately weighed down by that 6™ XD 😂)