Aleph: Oh Keris.
Aleph: It's her Envy themes that make her so terrifyingly subversive, really.
Aleph: Because she understands that fundamentally, it doesn't
matter if someone was raised Immaculate and has mental defences if they also feel underappreciated and passed over and stuck in some dead-end job when they're deserving of more.
Aleph: Because they will value
feeling appreciated and valued more than they value the abstract purity of their religion, so all you have to do is phrase it in a way that doesn't put the two into
direct conflict and they'll doublethink their own way around the gaps.
Aleph: She's good at working out what people
want but don't
have.
EarthScorpion: Damned by Envy. Both its cause and its victim.
Aleph:
EarthScorpion: It's kind of funny. When you look at "seven deadly sin" themed villains, the leader is usually either Pride, or "Envy was secretly the real villain all along".
Aleph: Because Pride is the most able to build and maintain its own empire, Envy is the most able to stab the others in the back, and both are kind of the only two that really focus on improving themselves.
Aleph: Heh. Kerisgame falls firmly into the latter camp.
EarthScorpion: Of course, heh, from a certain point of view...
EarthScorpion: Well, is it possible to map her progeny souls to the other six sins?
Aleph: Hmm. I suspect it might stretch them. None of them really fit the apathy of Sloth, fr'x.
Aleph: Though... perhaps Vali, in how he doesn't care for any other people or societal norms outside his promises, as we saw with Kalaska.
Aleph: Haneyl makes a good Greed, as possessive as she is. Zanara touches on Lust in objectifying things for beauty rather than what they are.
Aleph: Rathan might be the overindulgence of Gluttony, leaving, hah.
Aleph: Wrath and Pride for the Adorjani sisters.
Aleph: And Calesco
does have a temper that tends to solve problems by doing verbal or physical violence to them, and Eko
does have a very high opinion of herself.
EarthScorpion: Hee. First Keris separates out her Pride, then her Gluttony, then her Greed, then her Wrath, then her Sloth, and only last her Lust.
Aleph: Lol.
Keris: "I'm a healthy and well-rounded person!"
Monk: "Healthy and well-rounded is meant to mean all the sins at 0, not grinding them all to max level!"
Keris: "Sounds like you're just envious of my spread of stats~"
EarthScorpion: God, Eko does work so well as Pride, in that weird way that Keris is proud.
Aleph: Right? It's not conventional arrogance because she's so much of a coward and has such deep insecurities, but she
is very chauvinistic about certain things to people she reads as weaker.
Aleph: Calesco as Wrath is an interesting one though.
Aleph: ... but then, heh, I guess Keris does... generally mostly get angry over Compassionate causes, really - and it's also where her anger is the most indiscriminate and uncontrolled.
Aleph: I mean, Envy gets her feeling
spiteful, but she only tends to get
furious when something jabs her in the conscience.
Aleph: Heh. And Keris is Envy while Pekhijira is Fear.
EarthScorpion: And yeah, heh, the thing about Haneyl is her Pride, her Wrath, her Lust and her Gluttony... they're all subordinated to her Greed. She'll scrape and bow and do anything if she doesn't have what she wants; she values her pride, but in extremis she'll simply discard it. Same as her Lust; she might be horny on main, but getting laid is just an entertainment to her and she won't lose her fortune because she fell for someone
Aleph: While Rathan's vengeance is Overindulgence of his feelings. Just as his love for Oula is. And his Sorcery nerdery.
Aleph: Huh. The big sign of why Calesco is Wrath is that one of her major themes is black-and-white morality. No room for shades of grey; you're either with her or against her.
EarthScorpion: Well, rather, it's very hard for her to be shades of grey.
Aleph: Yes. And god, Eko really, really is a good Pride. She nails how Keris shows it - split wildly between her severe insecurities that she tries to hide, and the things she's confident about where she doesn't boast or brag much, she's just kind of unthinkingly chauvinistic and dismissive of "lessers". With Eko it's her body image she's insecure about and her intelligence she's arrogant about. With Keris it's her mind she feels doesn't measure up to her peers and her physical abilities and raw metaphysical might where she dismisses those weaker than her.
Aleph: Pride isn't just feeling good about where you're strong or perfect. It's feeling crippling anxiety about where you're weak or flawed.