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A Little Vice (Trans Magical Girl fic)

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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RiceRockRekt said:
THEY'RE SUCH GOOD PEOPLE AND THEY'LL KILL C'S DAD IN THE CUSTODY BATTLE.

MAYBE BEFORE THEN WITH KNIVES TOO.
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Nah, better to have Michael do it. She isn't subject to Earth law. She's small, which could be good for stealth. And known for using a sword, apparently.
RiceRockRekt said:
You have such a clear idea of the kind of person Inessa is until it gets in the way of your "Oh Inessa doesn't have any sort of problems she still desperately needs help for" malding C.

Are you uh. Disappointed you didn't see Lupin, or disappointed Lupin didn't undercut Inessa's confidence again.
Like that's the thing. This is really mean.

This is really mean about the things Inessa lets herself be vulnerable to you about C.
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The C grindset. Be kind, refuse to be helped even as your pain hurts others around you. Resent others for your pain and loneliness.
It is understandable, but really shows how fucked up C's kindness is.
Linkstore said:
It looks like, in this story, sin and virtue both revolve around the same core feeling or emotion, and sin is when you let yourself be consumed by that emotion, and virtue is when you master it and achieve balance.
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Yeah, it seems they're about specific desires and how you relate and view them. So the tree of knowledge, upon giving the ability to understand their actions, gave rise to the many perspectives humans have on themselves. And so I wonder if Superbia's plan would change all of humanity at once, or just a specific section.
There is just too much we haven't seem of the supernatural side. The Abyssal Forest seems to posses a will, and be loyal to the Beasts. It also has an old castle, those being used by rulers or military. Also, Superbia is a squatter, I realized. He just broke into this old castle and made himself king of sin, but is shit at it, lol.

Also, I like this fic too much. I just keep thinking on ideas for Ira and Acedia, and might actually read about the Book of Revelations just for ideas.
 
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Superbia is a Jordan-Peterson-esque motherfucker, who terrorizes his subordinates and has to be TRICKED into not being actively transphobic. Ey apparently had to do the, "I'm so greedy so I want all the pronouns" deal to be accepted by him. And sure it's funny that it worked on him and makes him look really fucking stupid, but Inessa on the other hand instantly goes into a spiral of, "Am I a terrible transphobe for misgendering em? I need to be better" despite the fact that Avarita had also revealed that ey were an evil mastermind causing vast suffering.

She didn't need to be told it's actually secretly Evil and therefore Good. Similarly, no doubt Invidia will have a relatively free rein (at first at least) by just going, "It's all about envy, see?"

But, like, again, she shouldn't have to do that? Your identity shouldn't be predicated on being broken/flawed any more than it should be invalidated by being broken/flawed, something the Saints notably don't do, so it's not about finding a compromise between two extremes.
 
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I am very happy to have found this story. As a note on the most recent chapter, to me, it seems like the difference between the sins and virtues is more defined be the way they do engage with it, rather than just the desire itself. C's transformation is not just about embracing what she does not have, it is about entirely denying what she used to be, throwing it all away and pushing away anyone associated with it. The way I understand it, her form has nothing at all in common with previous C, it is entirely puzzled together from other people, a material manifestation of self denial, giving up on truly ever becoming better as herself. Looking at this, I suspect that Temperance may have struggled with an eating disorder in the past, considering how the cycle of overindulgence and shame fits that and the Gula title.

On a funnier side note, I couldn't help but imagine how the Bat must have progressed from the perspective of the show audience and the protagonists. She started out just copying one, but over time, with how these shows go, may have had different fights of copying different powers, followed by the berserk fight. where she uses all the powers close to the series finale. Then, she graduates from half formed status and finally gets a final visual design. The whole thing about not perceiving dialogue in the dreams also made me wonder whether the bat ever talked from that perspective, whether she was silent or an in between case, where she looked like she was talking, but no words or only noise came out. In my headcannon, it's the third case and the show's audience has been trying to deceipher it for a while now, with some people trying to figure out which voice actress voiced the clips that got garbled, only for them to later find out (post transformation) that it's the same VA that did the voice for young C every time there was a flashback.
 
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Linkstore said:
Yeah it is quite interesting. It's neither the traditional "sin is bad and virtue is the thing you do to not sin" nor the contrarian "sin and virtue are both extremes and you need to have both to achieve balance". It looks like, in this story, sin and virtue both revolve around the same core feeling or emotion, and sin is when you let yourself be consumed by that emotion, and virtue is when you master it and achieve balance.
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Though judging by Ida, Michael is less stringent about balance than Superbia is about letting the darkness consume you.


The Laurent said:
She didn't need to be told it's actually secretly Evil and therefore Good. Similarly, no doubt Invidia will have a relatively free rein (at first at least) by just going, "It's all about envy, see?"
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That would require Invidia to actually act on the things she wants and admit that it's okay for her to be happy. Which seems unlikely, since Invidia is kinda consumed by her feelings of envy and the attached self-loathing.

I know Avaritia thinks that letting sin consume you would be liberating, but in C's case her "sin" is just a different angle on the emotions she needs to be liberated from. I want good things for C, but I don't expect them. (Yet.)
 
To be fair, she is super cursed by being confined to the form of a cute 'lil magical girl mascot.

They're not quite contractually forbidden from being competent or resolving a plot point on their own, but they come close.
 
LampWitch said:
eah, it seems they're about specific desires and how you relate and view them. So the tree of knowledge, upon giving the ability to understand their actions, gave rise to the many perspectives humans have on themselves. And so I wonder if Superbia's plan would change all of humanity at once, or just a specific section.
There is just too much we haven't seem of the supernatural side. The Abyssal Forest seems to posses a will, and be loyal to the Beasts. It also has an old castle, those being used by rulers or military. Also, Superbia is a squatter, I realized. He just broke into this old castle and made himself king of sin, but is shit at it, lol.

Also, I like this fic too much. I just keep thinking on ideas for Ira and Acedia, and might actually read about the Book of Revelations just for ideas.
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There definitely is a lot more to wonder about the Forest and the Castle, yeah!
As for Acedia... well, we know a lot about Ida, right? Her backstory lays out a little bit of what it would have to look like. An Ida who doesn't think she can measure up to others, who doesn't think it's worth trying, who has kind of given up.... but presumably when she does do things, hits as hard as she can now.

So Acedia Bear, basically - a hibernating but very dangerous force of Sin, who is simply not usually motivated to try.
 
NemoMarx said:
There definitely is a lot more to wonder about the Forest and the Castle, yeah!
As for Acedia... well, we know a lot about Ida, right? Her backstory lays out a little bit of what it would have to look like. An Ida who doesn't think she can measure up to others, who doesn't think it's worth trying, who has kind of given up.... but presumably when she does do things, hits as hard as she can now.

So Acedia Bear, basically - a hibernating but very dangerous force of Sin, who is simply not usually motivated to try.
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Also, Where The Wild Things Are, the book C liked reading with her mom, might have some connection? A place of monsters you enter after putting on a costume, and it welcomes you.

On Acedia, I was going with someone who isn't Ida. I thought of "counting sheep" + Belphegor, the demon of sloth, is associated with invention + "electric sheep" for an electricity and tech focused character. As the disabled are often called lazy, I had thought of a disabled person desperately trying to be functional while suffering from pressure. They have stuff to automate and help manage tasks, drones to help fights, while feeling awful for not doing things "properly". Maybe feeling too stressed about something to do it, or sleep, losing performance. So a complicated fighter who goes down easily once you reach them. The anime could make nice designs for stuff for the character to use, and do a mech episode. Though this idea feels less fitting than what you said, specially because the Beasts don't seem to mesh with a tech aesthetic. Maybe a bunch of magical plants and animals? Could make for cute plushes.
There's also the first Rambo movie, in which the protagonist is a drifter who can't hold a job because he can't wind down, the war didn't end for him, and so he can't do normal things. His inability to relax ironically makes him unable to work, and the villains judge him for it. So there's another angle.
 
LampWitch said:
I think she is just bad at managing the kids' issues. She knows shit is wrong with C, but didn't do anything, maybe because she thought she'd make it worse. And couldn't deal with the even younger forms.
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I mean, that goes without saying. But there's no sign that Michael subjects Ida to anything like what Avaricia worries would happen if she displeased Superbia, despite that failure.
 
Oh no, I meant "Michael doesn't punish imbalance".
Michael is less punitive about imbalance than Superbia is about...um...not being consumed by darkness. (Felt more natural to phrase it the other way.)
 
Some thought raven, some thought snake, but nope: C is actually a sky pupper!
Potato Anarchy said:
bat!invidia can see in the dark and loves singing! this is definitely not a metaphor for coping with depression
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A love of stuff involving their voice fits a bat well, given how their sonar works.

What a case of Disaster Dominoes Lupin/Avaritia caused! Caused C to be absent from school one too many times and the school sends a note to his father, which drives him across the boundary from neglectful apathy to outright malice, which in term pushes C over the edge into seriously contemplating suicide, which is averted only to see him go full villain mode.

RiceRockRekt said:
"is it transphobic if I have a crush on em" GIRL YOU GOT VILLAIN MONOLOGUED AT AND THIS IS THE ONLY THING YOU'RE GIVING ANY GRAVITY???
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Perhaps she's latching onto this and the pronoun thing because "possible violation of Good Progressive Behavior" is the one aspect of that wild encounter that she's used to having to process. The rest is rather out of left field and I expect the full implications will hit her... next episode or so?
 
General_Urist said:
What a case of Disaster Dominoes Lupin/Avaritia caused! Caused C to be absent from school one too many times and the school sends a note to his father, which drives him across the boundary from neglectful apathy to outright malice, which in term pushes C over the edge into seriously contemplating suicide, which is averted only to see him go full villain mode.
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"Yes, but she's embracing her true self, so it all worked out in the end!"
"I still kinda want to die."
"We can work on that."

(Also, I think the catalyst is more accurately described as "Lupin convinced C to actively ditch class". They probably wouldn't have called C's dad if Charleton had just been kidnapped again, or at least C's dad wouldn't have flipped out so badly about it.)
 
I think that, dickhead though he is, C's dad at least conceptually grasps that "I was literally kidnapped by a monster" is a valid reason to miss class.

He's a horrible person, but that doesn't mean he hasn't got two brain cells to rub together, and presumably he patches together SOME kind of inner narrative that lets him tell himself he's something vaguely resembling a good person.
 
I think it's safe to assume that either or both of:

  • The school doesn't bother to contact C's dad when C misses class because monsters.
  • C's dad doesn't hold it against C when C misses class because of monsters.
Just because until C got hit with the seed of sin, C was constantly missing classes because monsters.

So at least one of those two things basically has to be true for C's dad to have not done this sooner.
 
It could be the first one, but the first one just expands the callous bastardry into a second-order callous bastard plot, so the second one seems like it might be the true one.
 
GreatWyrmGold said:
"Yes, but she's embracing her true self, so it all worked out in the end!"
"I still kinda want to die."
"We can work on that."
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Invidia: Pain, this is what I fight for. This is my normal, my nature.
Saints and Avaritia: Oh...ahn, hmm.
Avaritia: Okay, this is concerning.
Superbia, who was going to say something transphobic or accuse women of having privileges: What the fuck. I'll, uh, just stay out of this.
On a sidenote, I'll have to accept the fact Invidia is likely going to live with Superbia Dragon and we'll see all his awfulness.
 
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LampWitch said:
Invidia: Pain, this is what I fight for. This is my normal, my nature.
Saints and Avaritia: Oh...ahn, hmm.
Avaritia: Okay, this is concerning.
Superbia, who was going to say something transphobic or accuse women of having privileges: What the fuck. I'll, uh, just stay out of this.
On a sidenote, I'll have to accept the fact Invidia is likely going to live with Superbia Dragon and we'll see all his awfulness.
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I get this is probably true, but I think the funniest possible outcome would be for Inessa to simply let Invidia continue to live with her.

Off the clock is off the clock, and C can't exactly be expected to live with her dad or Avaritia's shitty uncle!
 
veteranMortal said:
I get this is probably true, but I think the funniest possible outcome would be for Inessa to simply let Invidia continue to live with her.

Off the clock is off the clock, and C can't exactly be expected to live with her dad or Avaritia's shitty uncle!
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It would be hilarious yeah. Sadly Invidia is still too self hating to accept such an offer. I can totally see Inessa still saying her house is open to her.
 
veteranMortal said:
I get this is probably true, but I think the funniest possible outcome would be for Inessa to simply let Invidia continue to live with her.

Off the clock is off the clock, and C can't exactly be expected to live with her dad or Avaritia's shitty uncle!
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Invidia doesn't want to impose...and also Avaritia probably wouldn't let her, she'd worry about the Saints trying to pull something. Superbia's castle is plenty big, it has nice rooms for her to hide in.

(Invidia still lives in the rafters—it's what she "deserves," nobody can stop her, and hanging upside-down is surprisingly comfortable.)
 
I had a sad realization a while ago, thinking about the castle, and so I must share it - Avaritia is exactly the type of person who has probably kept Temperance's room exactly how it was when she left. Superbia might be the type to destroy it in a petty fit, but he also doesn't seem like he pays a ton of attention to where people live or what they have there, so I would bet he didn't.

Which means there might be a room Avaritia still keeps clean, in an otherwise empty castle. Probably still full of stolen clothes and blahaj and everything.
 
Next time: temperantia congratulates invidia on her transition. Invidia denies this congratulations because she's just pretending to be a girl. Temperantia attacks in sheer furious frustration.
 
NemoMarx said:
Which means there might be a room Avaritia still keeps clean, in an otherwise empty castle. Probably still full of stolen clothes and blahaj and everything.
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That makes me wonder,
Gula probably kept a lot of food in her room.
So if Avaritia is replacing what is there to keep the food fresh.
if it is not just thrown out how do you think Avaritia justifys donateing the food?
 
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