The Ultimate Maasverse Holiday Special & 2025 Recap (ft. ThreeFacedGoddess)

0:00 The most surprising book I read this year was without a doubt Kiss the Basilisk. Like without a doubt Kiss the Basilisk. Like literally what? Literally what was that? And I'm going to leave it there. That's all I'm going to say about it. If you know, you know. And if you don't like, maybe you don't need to. All right, listeners, first of all, we're wearing matching Christmas we're.

0:34 Wearing matching sweaters, we did buy them together at the same store. Actually, I think I forced us to buy. You did, you did. So a couple of things just happened off mics that we feel we need to share with you all. So I signed on wearing my Christmas sweater and Ronnie said, Oh my God, wait, should I wear my Christmas sweater? So now we're in matching Christmas sweaters. Which I think is perfect because this. Is a little bit special.

0:58 A description Because they're Christmas lobster sweaters. They're Christmas. Lobster sweaters. They have the lobsters on them. I guess there's nothing that specifically makes them Christmassy, but. They're actually not Christmas sweaters at all. Feel like Christmas? Sweaters, I will tell you. We bought them in the summer. We saw them at a store.

1:16 We left the store. Ronnie said we have to go back to that store and buy those sweaters. So I think we went back two days later. I wore this to my boyfriend's company Christmas party. And his company is based in Annapolis, which is why I wore it. I'm like, oh, it'll be perfect for getting that. Annapolis is known for crabs, not lobsters. And then like half of his company was from Maine. So they all saw me wearing this sweater. And they're like, oh, you must be from Maine. And I'm like, I am not.

1:41 I am not really. I'm so sorry. I feel like I've misled everyone here. It wasn't on perfect. Yeah, that's tough. Yeah. So first we bonded over the sweaters, and then Ronnie said something crazy that I let her say. First of all, my bagel came late. My bagel came right before we started. So then I was wolfing down a bagel. Then I had to reapply my lip stain, which I have to apply every single time we record this podcast because my lips don't have any colors to them.

2:10 So my lips don't look like lips. My lips don't have pigments. So I asked Abby jokingly, rhetorically, what is it like to have pigmented lips? To which she said, I don't know. Which is ridiculous because you have pigmented lips. You do lips. The same. Color as my skin. I actually watch our videos back and I'm like, I look like a fucking corpse.

2:30 But actually Derek and I had this conversation the other day. He's like, do middle school girls learn how to do their makeup when they have sleepovers? And I said, I don't know. I never learned how to do makeup, so I don't. I wasn't invited to those sleepovers, I guess. So like I do think that the youth. Has really learned how to apply makeup much earlier. I think YouTube has made the youth so much more knowledgeable than I was at my age.

2:55 But I I still haven't. I still haven't watched those YouTube makeup tutorials. So like, I don't fucking know. I feel like I I think my lips look too pale but I just roll with it because I don't know what the fuck else to do. 13 year olds now are doing makeup better than I currently know how to do makeup. And hair and hair and hair.

3:11 Oh my God, I did my nails last night. They're so bad. Good. No, no, no, no, no. They are. I mean, on this camera they look excellent. This is why I haven't gotten an HD camera yet, because I'm. Like. Blurry might be OK. Blurry might be OK. I mean, whatever this camera's doing looks great. My nails are undone as per as per usual. I know that it's usual because the one time that I had nails done, you were like, Oh my gosh, I love the black nail. Well, and then you inspired me.

3:41 And then I did that and I painted my nails and I went home for Thanksgiving and my family was like, Oh my God, you have your nails. Nails paint. Yeah, I love, I love a Lincoln Park after Dark nail. I mean my toenails are always Linkin Park after Dark. I mean, the reason I'm my nails are painted is because we went to my favorite place in the whole world yesterday, HomeGoods, and they had this for $3 and I was like, it's the holiday season. Got to paint the nails red.

4:02 Got to be festive. Yeah, yeah, and it matches the lobsters. I know I didn't even plan that, but it doesn't. I mean, it matches most things during December, to be clear. Yeah, but it's just. It's a Christmas, Fred. Yeah. Cool. Anyways, you have pigmented lips, but we'll argue about another time.

4:19 And. Pigmented nails now too. Anyway. Hi, I'm Abby, I'm Ronnie and this is Dragons in the Details, where we pick apart our favorite fantasy series over the course of an undetermined number of episodes. We are currently covering a Court of Thorns and Roses series, also known as Acatar by Sarah J Maas. Disclaimer These episodes will contain spoilers for the entire Acatar series.

4:42 Will announce any other masks for spoilers ahead of time and we keep them to the second-half a second. Disclaimer This podcast is rated R. Do not listen to it with your children. That being said, this is a very special episode. It is our holiday sweater, hence our I just said holiday sweater sweater. That's what it is that's what it is everyone. It's also early in the morning and this is not usually when we record, so bear with us.

5:08 Bear with us. I'm sorry I'm all over the place today. All right, this is our holiday special. So what we're going to do this week is we're matching lobster sweaters and we are going to start with some cozy chats, just me and Ron. And then for our Mass first section listeners, we have a very exciting special guest who is going to join us later.

5:28 This is the first time we're doing this. We're very excited to have her on. She does her own theories and she has some fun theories for everyone. And we're going to talk about some of her favorite theories for the mass first. Unfortunately, it is going to be mass first only. So for our actual listeners, we're very sorry, but we hope you enjoy our cozy chat section. We will still not spoil anything for the Mass First for you in our cozy chat section.

5:47 And that that is all. We and our guests, as always, are coming with receipts. We will have quotes to back up any theories so you can follow long if you're skeptical. And sorry. That is all. Ronnie, any announcements for this week? Few deep dive music as always brought to you by Schwoodley SCHWOODLEY real artist. Check them out on Spotify.

6:07 If you like our deep dive music. We you tried to tell me to announce this last week. I just did not even pick up on it. But you're right. We hit 1000 subscribers on YouTube. Yay. So thank you those of you who watch us on YouTube, thank you so much for subscribing to us there. If you do watch us on YouTube and you do not subscribe, it would be great if you did.

6:29 And for those of you who listen to us on other avenues and you want to watch us on YouTube for any reason, just know that we're on we're on YouTube. So if you feel like seeing our lobster sweaters or our. Unpigmented lips. For any other reason our pigmented or unpigmented lips depending on who you agree with we are on YouTube and you can follow us there you can also follow us on Facebook if you're into that so Abby created a Facebook for us thank you Abby and we are now on Facebook so that's very exciting by the way, if. Anyone out there knows how Meta Business Suite is supposed to fucking work, please let me know. This thing's a goddamn disaster, OK? But if you know, let me know.

7:09 Yeah, full disclaimer, I personally have not participated in Facebook from a personal perspective in quite some time. I keep Facebook for the birthdays. I think a lot of people that we know keep Facebook for the birthdays. I think that's a pretty common sentiment. However, keep it for the birthdays. I keep it for my parents and now I keep it for our podcast. I feel quite confident and I'm not talking about the content on Facebook, I'm simply talking about from a technology point of view that Facebook is worse than the last time I used it, which is probably 8 years ago.

7:42 Like this thing has gone way downhill, but that's for me and Mark Zuckerberg to argue about. Yeah, take it up a book and then final announcement and really just a plug because we love it and we think it adds to the experience. Read the mass first. It adds to the experience. That's it, back to. You the mass first.

7:59 But well, yeah, I mean, I guess this week it does really matter. Yeah, read the mass first. That's our plug. Yeah, we'll always be here for the ACOTAR only like we, we will make sure that we've got content for you always. And we'll always do our little split section for whatever series we're covering, whether it's ACOTAR, Crescent City, Throne of Glass, when we finally get when we finally get there.

8:18 But we will also always have our mass first section. And we always think it's a bundle of fun. So read the mass first. It's fun. Do we want to do an off the cuff question real quick? Because I've been getting this question a lot, like what order do you recommend reading the mass person? I think it's so dependent on what motivates you as a reader, honestly. Like I have a perspective, but I also think that it's so personal.

8:40 So I'm happy to provide a perspective on it, but I also like don't think that any answer is right. And I know that's annoying so. No, I agree with you, but explain. Explain why. And that's what I've been saying when people have been asking me to be. Clear. Yeah, I mean, I think so. For me personally, I think Akatar is the easiest read to get into.

8:59 I think it is for everybody here. You probably are the people who have read a guitar first or have already read a guitar, right? So you get it. It's like it hooks you. It's a romance. So like, if you are hooked by romance plots, but you also appreciate fantasy, it's like such an easy kind of gripping greed that just carries you and you don't have to work very hard to understand anything, but you could if you wanted to.

9:25 So I find it very easy to start with ACOTAR. And then I think in my opinion, Throne of Glass is the logical next step, but it's also a lot of work. And it's the kind of thing where if you appreciate, like, epic fantasies, it's worth the work. But if you want to just keep building on, like, the Aqatar world, then maybe you would like, just rolling into Crescent City.

9:51 But I think Aqatar Throne of Glass, kind of like, go through the Throne of Glass adventure and then loop back to Crescent City and, like, continue building on that. Like lore is fun, yeah. I would, I would agree with that. It totally depends on what you're looking for. If you're like us and if you're looking for theories and if you're looking for a little Easter eggs, then it makes sense to go to ACOTAR, Crescent City, because there's a lot of that type of stuff in between those two, two books, 2 series. But that being said, if you were looking for the full expanse of the world, if you're looking to kind of fully understand everything, that Throne of Glass I think is the logical next step.

10:31 So it depends. It's a choose your own adventure. We can't make that choice for you. There is. It's no wrong answer. That's a good news. So cool, yeah. But I will say that Throne of Glass is like, you have to really appreciate, you almost have to be, in my opinion, willing to be a fantasy first reader for a bit because the romance plot feels like AB plot for a period of time. And I think we can say that we are both in agreement about this.

10:54 Do not read Assassin's Plague first. So. So this is an extremely, extremely hotly debated topic. I'm not saying when to read it, I'm just saying we both probably agree. Don't read it first. I think it's, again, I think it's super dependent on what you were like as a reader. There are people out there and neither of us are one of them, which is why we both feel this way.

11:15 There are people out there who like things laid out linearly. I am the type of person who loves to basically read something and then read something later and have things click for me that I didn't understand previously. Like I love that, so I didn't. I don't recommend reading it first. I. Don't recommend reading it first.

11:34 I'm not going to tell you when to well, I think we can I don't recommend reading it first because it is a collection of short stories. It is not a single story. So it's not it's not going to hook you the way that starting with Throne of Glass with that's that's all I'd say. It's it's novellas. It's kind of meant as these little vignettes of the main characters lives.

11:53 So I think it's it's really tough to start an 8 book series with that is just from a practical point of view, it's well done. I enjoyed it. It's not a bad book, it's just, it's just the novella aspect of it makes it a little challenging. But yeah, cool. All right, that's our opinion. We're now on record and as always, we reserve the right to change our mind at any point in time.

12:13 Yeah, I did not feel prepared for that. I'm sorry. Hard feel about keeping that in. I spread that on you. We'll see how we feel about that. All right, moving on. All right. We are doing our cozy holiday chat now, so we have a couple questions we're just going to ask each other. All right, so we are just going to do a little year review. We're going to talk about our best of At one point we had our worst of, but we decided to get rid of that. We're going to talk the best things that we had, the best things we watched what?

12:39 We're going to be positive. We're going to be positive, yes, it's the Christmas, it's the holiday season. Debbie texted me when she saw the initial outline, which I originally had best and worst, and she was like, I don't trust myself to not bash, to not bash things. Look, if we're just, if we're going to talk about the worst books we read this year, I'm going to talk about a book that many people love. And I don't want to do that.

13:04 I don't want to do that to the author. I don't want to do that to our listeners. So we're just going to not talk and. It's so fair, it's so fair. So here we are. We're being positive. Being positive. All right, Ronnie, what was the best book that you read this year? So. This one I still feel like somehow I'm going to end up with a controversial response here, but I did read Kingdom of Ash this year. Oh to every other book I've read this year, I'm sorry I love you. Well to every other good book I've read this year, I love you But I am.

13:32 The best book I read this year I think was Kingdom of Ash. It is a tome. It is switching between a bunch of PO VS. But especially on, especially on a reread and especially when you are rereading and you're kind of feeling more comfortable putting together PO VS that you previously worked separating because you were reading the book chronologically. Yeah, I loved Kingdom of Ash and I read Kingdom, Kingdom of Ash very close to Onyx Storm and I loved Onyx Storm, but I am saving the flowers for later in the series. I'll put it that way.

14:06 Yeah, to keep things kosher and spoiler free. So I loved Kingdom of Ash. I think that was the best book I read this year. And I will also say I've not finished Alchemized so. I totally agree with you on Kingdom of Ash being great on a reread. The first time I read Kingdom of Ash I wanted to throw it out a fucking window though. You were also Sergei Mass saturated. I was, I was, I was, I was, I was. I took like 3 months to read the entire Mass verse and I was like, OK, I'm like kind of losing my mind here. Yeah.

14:37 But it had to be done. Yes, I totally agree with you that on a reread and obviously as the last book in Throat of Glass, it is. It is fucking wonderful. It is a masterpiece in the moment. I was very frustrated by all the the POV switching but. I know that you were. I know you were as well. I think we pulled together things that I did not expect her to pull together and I was so impressed contextually.

15:05 I was also so impressed by like how early in her career she pulled this all together. As well, Yeah. Not that that really has any like, standing and how good the book was, but like the characters, the number of characters that she developed, the number of characters that I cared about, the plot overall, and the fact that it was such a well pulled together plot without feeling too well pulled together without saying too much.

15:36 I realize we're trying to keep this, yeah. Yeah. It is, it is so dark. It goes so dark. It gets so brutal. And I love that. I do. I fucking love when fantasy books go dark. Like, yeah, which is going to make my best book of the year. Not surprising to people. It's a brave book. It's a brave. It's a really brave book.

15:55 I totally agree with you. It's a great book. You should read. You should read the Mass first. Read the Masters. Yeah, all right, my best book of the year and I put in parentheses and I read the whole mass verse this year twice. But my my best book of the year is definitely Alchemist by maybe not a mile, maybe not a mile, but it it is alchemist. I just, and it might be some recency biased. I recently read it.

16:17 I'm currently rereading it. I literally just restarted it after I finished the last page. Yeah, but that book is just so I, I, I still like struggle to talk about it because I don't want to give it away because I want people to read it. But it is a book that does the the love story is so good. The plotting is so good. I'm not going to say it's perfect. I definitely think there's I'm I know that she had a plan, though.

16:42 I know that she had at least one white board and she planned it out. And like I it's so clear that this was like well thought out and well plotted. And the structure, the way she writes it, the in the with the three parts and the way that they all foot to fit together is just like so fucking good. Just so fucking good.

16:59 I'll. And I know you haven't finished it, but I just can't Like I will just like find my mind wandering in the middle of the day and just start thinking, just be thinking about alkalis. And I'll just have to like snap back to reality. I'm like, Oh my God, remember when that happened? That's yeah.

17:13 I mean and people when this doesn't surprise me like people went wild for manacled. Like. Wild for it. So this does not, this does not surprise me. And again, like if I finish, if I finish in the next 9 days, 10 days, which would not surprise me, then maybe it's my maybe it's my favorite book of the year, but I also, are you enjoying it more recency biased?

17:36 Yeah, I have been enjoying it. I think from what I have heard, and this may be inaccurate, there is like a point at which, and I'm not there yet, there's like a point at which everything kind of turns and I don't think I'm I'm there yet. I'm still, I'm in like Part 2 or something like that. So I am enjoying it, but I'm still taking it relatively slowly, not by choice, just because I have too much else.

18:01 Yeah. It is a it is a book that reveals itself as you go, which kind of all books are, but it is is non linear storytelling on multiple levels. Like obviously we don't start at the beginning of the story and then. And. You don't even realize how in the middle of the story you are until you until you're kind of there at that point.

18:21 So I would totally agree with that. Obvious throughout the book, without giving too much away, like you realize that you don't know. Yeah. The story, yeah. You are supposed to feel disoriented. You're supposed to say what the fuck is going on. I don't understand. Yeah. So I'm like excited for when that comes, but also the books, 1000 fucking pages. So you're just like, OK, well, I'm going to be sitting in this confusion for some time.

18:46 Yeah. And I will say, and I think I said this on record, the first time I read it, I was like, OK, come on, let's go. Like, like we don't need all this. And now going back and rewriting it, I'm like every page is important. I have highlighted every single. Fucking page. I believe, I believe that every page is important because I'm reading like obviously I'm reading the like amount of information we're being given. And I'm like, this is like we are being given a lot of information.

19:13 Yeah, yeah. So I'm, I'm just, I know that I'm not going to process at all on 1st read. So I'm debating like whether I'm really whether reading it at this pace is actually really doing anything for me, to be honest. Yeah, I would read it quickly if I were you, but you got to do what you got to. Do I know? Yeah, and just for this to be their first book, I mean, I know they wrote Manacled before, but like, I, it's just like, I'm, I'm blown away that this could be someone's first book, you know, just like totally knocked it out of the ballpark. I will write anything.

19:40 I will read anything they write from here on out. Just like totally amazing. Cool, cool. All right, you want to ask me this one? What is the most surprising book that she read this year? All right, so this is a mass first one. It's Tower of Dawn. Tower of Dawn was by far the most surprising book I read this year.

19:57 Interesting making. Me care. Here, Yeah, you read. You read like the whole mass verse this year I have read. I've read every Imperium, I have read every Mass first book, all of these twice, by the way. I've read so many books this year. Tower of Dawn by a mile. I don't want to get into it too much, but making me care. I mean, I have gone on record saying I care about this character, and I did, but I was very mad at him. Like winning me over again.

20:25 Yeah. And it was great. It was a great story, like it was. So again, I don't want to give away, but everyone expects to hate Tower of Dawn. Everyone goes into it being like, what the actual fuck is going on here? This has to be a huge mistake. Yeah, I loved it. I came out loving it like I truly, I truly love that book.

20:43 Yeah, so there's Tower of. Dawn. I just have a run around context for everyone because I realized we did not make this clear at all. Kingdom of Ash is the final book in the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J Maas and Tower of Dawn is the penultimate book. Yes, the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J Math.

21:01 And I do not just As for keeping this this thread of recommendations for Mass First, I don't recommend the tandem read in Empire of Storms. There are so many POV's already. Let Tower of Dawn be something else. Let it be its own thing. Enjoy it as its own story. It works. It's really important to the overall plot. We've talked about a lot on this podcast. Just just enjoy it and absorb it on its own. That's my official recommendation. And then I have a runner up, which I've also talked about on this podcast, which is this is how you lose the time more by Amal El Motar and Max Gladstone.

21:36 And the reason why this is one of my my most surprising. But so first of all, it's not a hugely popular book, right? I don't think it's very, I mean, I think there was a little bit on like book talk social media about it, but it's not like hugely popular, which is always nice. It's really short. I think it was like maybe 150 pages. I don't know.

21:52 But it was really short. And it really, really hooked me right from the get go. The characters are named Red and Blue. Like we're not given a ton of, like, back story. We're not given a ton of information. There's a time we're going on, but we really don't know about it. It's written. What's it called?

22:07 Epistolary. Like it's letters back and forth. That's probably not the word for it, but yeah, like it's literally letters back and forth. Like you are given almost nothing. Like you just have to put all the pieces together. And it's really short. And I totally fell in love with it. And it was such a good story and I highly recommend it to anyone.

22:24 And that was actually a book that my boyfriend wanted me to read. Which was also a nice surprise. Yeah. That's fun. Yeah. So it was good. What about you? Most surprising book I read this year was without a doubt, Kiss the Bass List. Like, without a doubt Kiss the Bass List. Like, literally what? Literally what was that?

22:43 And I'm going to leave it there. That's all I'm going to say about it. If you know, you know, And if you don't like, maybe you don't need to. All right. Right, Ronnie, what was the best movie you watched this year? This one was really hard because frankly, I don't watch that many movies. That's why this one was hard. I did watch, I did watch Frankenstein last night. Everyone was pretty good.

23:04 But I still think probably the best movie that I watched this year, like in terms of like best cinema was Rear Window. That Hitchcock movie that I told you about. That was basically the whole movie took place from a man's rear window watching apartments in New York City and basically witnessing kind of, well, what he thought was a murder.

23:24 That's not a spoiler, that's marketing content. What he thought was a murder unfold and tried to figure out whether it was murder. I still think that was the best movie I watched this year. I really did like Wicked Part 2. We have not discussed that on the spot, Guest. I don't think that you liked it, but I also know that you didn't really know the plot of Act 2, of Wicked the musical ahead of that, which makes for a different.

23:47 It's different to process Wicked Part 2 as the movie versus Wicked Act 2 as the musical in my opinion. So yeah, I would say Rear Window. I thought Cynthia crushed. What's the song? No good deed. Oh my God. Yeah, of course. Oh my God. Of course. But yeah, it yeah, you, you've you've guessed correctly, but that's OK.

24:08 I thought Booked Part 1 was so good. All right, so I have two favorite movies from this year. And when I realized when I was putting this list list together is that they're both Irish films and they're both about Catholicism. I don't know what that says about me. Interesting. So the first one is a film called Small Things Like These, which I might have told you about, I don't remember, but it stars Killian Murphy. It's like a movie he made himself after he won the Oscar for Oppenheimer.

24:36 He plays like a cold delivery man living in Ireland in the 80s. And he lives in like a small town in Ireland. And in this town is a convent. And it's kind of like an open secret that the convent is like abusing women, young women who have gotten pregnant, like, because it's Ireland in the 80s and it's like heavily Catholic.

24:55 And that's kind of like an open secret. Again, that's not really a spoiler. And it's about it's kind of about like how the town responds to that and like what choices you make. And it's like when bad things are happening, do you look away or do you like, stare it in the face and do you confront it?

25:10 And like, what's it's like? How complicit will you be? It's a stunning movie. I think it's a great movie. I don't think that many people have seen it. It's not a fun, happy movie. That's fine. I mean, it's like Frankenstein quite a bit. Frankenstein too, it just it wasn't quite as good as these.

25:26 And then the other one which I have told you about is called The Wonder, which is also takes place in Ireland this time in the 1860s about I realized. I had seen that. Did I tell you? You have seen it on a plane? God, really. Did you like it? Yeah. I just did not know the title of the movie. Yeah, yeah, it's so good, really good. Yeah.

25:44 So I've. I've talked about it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He crushed it. It's. Florence Pugh plays a nurse from London. She gets called up to the small Irish town to observe a young girl who claims she hasn't eaten for four months and is surviving off of mana from heaven. And she's basically brought in as a medical professional to see how this could, could possibly be true.

26:06 Yeah, I'm not going to give it away. I'm not going to spoil it. But it is, again, it is about the Catholic Church, and it's about a small town in Ireland. It is about what to do when you're beacon being confronted with something very terrible happening right in front of your eyes. Very similar films.

26:21 I highly recommend them both. They are by far the best movies I've seen this year I think. Yeah, I love AI, love A haunting. I love A haunting watch. It was haunting. I mean, Florence Pugh is so. Good, she's so. So good and everything she does. Actually, and she also just like attracts you to her performance, no matter how major or minor. Like, I mean, she had a major role obviously in that film, but I just I'm thinking of like even in even in Dune, like she was barely.

26:47 I know. Like barely in in the film, but I like think of her. Yeah, in that movie. Absolutely. And I'm like, that's crazy. She's so good. Incredible. Did we? Did we cut Best show? We did cut best show. I was ready to sub. I was ready to take to take liberties and the term show and sub in play. Oh.

27:09 I don't need to. It's fine. OK, all right. I just actually hilariously consumed more stage art this year then then shows, then like TV shows. But basically, guys, the summary is we originally had best show you watched this year in this outline. And then we both realized we didn't watch any TV because we were too busy reading books, which I think is a fine way to live our year.

27:30 It is a fine way to live our year. I will say Derek and I have been watching Pluribus on Apple TV. It was, it's a classic Vince Gilligan in that in the 1st 4 episodes, you're like, what the fuck is going on here? This is so slow. Is anything going to happen? And then it gets so fucking good. Yeah. So highly recommend Pluribus.

27:50 I'm definitely going to keep watching it. And then we also started watching Heated Rivalry. I did not like it. I did not like it. We'll just leave it there. OK, it was. It's you know what heated rivalry is, right? Nope. You haven't seen any ads for that I. Live under a rock when it comes to TV shows, I have Oh my. God, OK, so it's based off it's based off these romance novels called oh fuck, I just need to look it up. Hold on because I'm going to get yelled at. OK, so it's based off these Game changer novels and it's these two male hockey players and they like fall in love. One's Russian and one's Canadian. And apparently I didn't know this, but apparently this is a true stat.

28:26 There are no out hockey players players professionally or maybe just in the NHLI don't know, but there are no gay hockey players like who are out of the closet, which obviously is not true. So she wrote this the author. I read a like little article on her yesterday. She wrote this because she loved hockey, but she really didn't like the homophobia that like went with hockey and like type the bad cultural things.

28:49 So she wrote this story. It's about these two hockey players who have this like 8 long year like closeted like romance. I don't know how it ends, obviously, but this show has been all over my again, my social media, maybe not your social media. So I was like, oh, Derek, we should try to watch this show.

29:05 Obviously didn't. It didn't go that well, but. It didn't land. It didn't do I'm like I'm learning. I like a slow burn, I like AI, like a yearning, I like a long plot. So it didn't do that. And I was like, OK, we're 20 minutes in and we're getting like a lot of sex here without much build up. And I don't know, I'm not like super feeling it, but maybe I'll give it another shot.

29:25 Or if you think heated rivalry is good, let me know, maybe I'll try it again. You the listener. Not you, Ronnie. But it's all, it's everywhere. I'm surprised you haven't seen it. I again live under a rock. Yeah, I can't stress enough. And maybe this is bad to say out loud, but like, other than the TikTok for this podcast, I'm not scrolling, I'm not scrolling YouTube, I'm not scrolling Instagram.

29:48 I'm I'm consuming nothing except for. Reading. Mendel and whatever I'm doing for what? I think that's good. That's it. So so yeah, yeah, it was the year of reading. That is OK. I did watch, I watched The Diplomat, which I enjoyed, but I feel like unless you've watched an abundance of shows, you can't really say best anything Great. But I enjoyed the Diplomat a lot and I really enjoyed Terminalist on Prime as well.

30:20 OK, that was basically about, it's based on a novel by, I believe his name is Jack Carr. And it's basically about like a, a Navy SEAL whose squad is targeted and he is like unsure whether he has brain damage or he's actually being targeted. And it's like kind of like a mental thriller, which I enjoy.

30:43 I enjoy books like Alchemist. So, all right, Ronnie, what is the best album you listened to this year? This one. Was hard for me because the one I re listen to a lot of music and don't listen to as many new releases as I as I should and to a Taylor Swift album came out this year. So that's tough.

31:00 So I mean I will start by saying my most listened to new album this year was definitely the life of a showgirl. I love shellback, I love Max Martin, I love Swedish production influence, ABBA style. So that would probably have my vote. The life of a showgirl. But also my runner up, my honorable mention, I really liked Virgin.

31:19 By Lord, I didn't fully appreciate it until after I went to her concert. So that's kind of like, I don't know what that says about the album standing on its own, that I had to like, see it live and be like, immersed in it to fully appreciate it after the fact. Yeah, but I loved it. Like after I went to that concert, I could not stop listening to it. Yeah, I really liked Man of the Year. Yeah, but nothing else live.

31:46 It wasn't really grabbed me necessarily, but yeah. And I didn't really listen to the no, that's not true. I like Elizabeth Taylor. I thought that one was good. I'm proud of you. I mean it was, it was very controversial. A lot of people took took serious issue with it. So I acknowledge that, guys.

32:06 I acknowledge it. I still thought the production was great. Everybody relax. Big fan of Scandinavian music. Yeah, what about you? And what was the best album you listen to this year? So again, this might be some recency bias. I'll do what you did. So according to Spotify, and I do agree with this, my most listened to album of the year and you won't be surprised by this was off with her Head by Banks, which I totally think is fair.

32:28 If you guys don't know who Banks is, she's an American singer. She does really kind of dark emo pop. I would call her. I really fucking love her. I think she has an amazing voice. Her production is so good. Highly recommend checking her out. She came out with an album this year called off with her head. I don't think it's my favorite Banks album, kind of similar to your Taylor Swift, but I did I did love it. And she has a song in there with Samfa, who I absolutely love that I couldn't stop listening to. And then she did some acoustic covers that I really love. So I was a big year of Banks.

32:57 We love a big year of Banks. I love a big However, I just texted you about this album, The art of Loving by Olivia Dean Olivia Dean Holy shit, Olivia Dean, I love you I love you. I can't stop listening. Discovered. Her Yeah, yeah, her voice is insane. My God, I love it, both young and old. Yeah. Quote Sarah.

33:19 Yeah. I love it. I can't stop listening to it truly. I just like every day I find a new song and I posted this on Instagram. She does. So I heard this live version of the song first, the song UFO. She has a live version of it. Have you heard it? It's good. I don't know if it's one of her best, but her live version, I fucking cry when I listen to it like every time because like the whole audience is singing along with her and it's a really like quiet, subdued song and it's like just so clear that they know all the words and that like it just it's like it sounds like success to me, right?

33:54 It's like, you know, like she's at this like huge arena. Everyone is singing along knows everyone word to this song. I'm like, Oh my God. And how old is she? Like 20 fucking two. I'm like, it's heartwarming. Yeah, I feel like she's got to win something this year. My God, my Grammys. I just love her.

34:09 I love her sound. I love what she's doing. It's like Amy Winehouse for this generation, but like, it's obviously also her own. Like, I just love it. I think what she's doing is so good. Yeah. Love it. It's. Amazing. She opened for she opened for Sabrina Carpenter and my sister saw her live and was like, and my sister is not.

34:31 My sister is really good taste of music, but she's not like typically moved and she would like moved. She was like, I cannot stop thinking about Olivia Dean. I'm like, yeah, I know I can't either. I can't. I know, right? Didn't Florence come out with something new this year? I admittedly did not pay enough attention to it.

34:48 I think she. Don't know. I think she did, yeah, but I don't think I listened to it. But yeah, this is a lesson for me. But like, I need to pay more attention and that's going to come up in our New Year's resolutions. All right, with that, Ron, everybody's. Dream chamber version. Chamber version.

35:05 All right, I need to listen to this one. All right, Ronnie, other than listening to Florence and the Machines new albums, what are your New Year's? Resolutions, yes. So I have a lot of New Year's resolutions, but the ones that I highlighted were more around like art, art consumption. My first New Year's resolution reflecting on how kind of this year when #1 is always be reading a new book despite the podcast.

35:28 In my opinion, it is really easy to fall into like only researching for the pod rereading, which is what I did with with the Empyrean and I ended up like really, really fatigued. Yeah, on the Empyrean and fatigued of of reading because I was only rereading 4th Wing, Iron Flame, Onyx Storm, researching for the podcast, not really reading anything new. And that was really like tiring and I didn't like it. And then I kind of started the the guitar season the same way and just was not was not having a good time, frankly, reading. But then when I started actually reading new books, like we read Quicksilver and I read Brimstone and like, regardless of how I felt about the books necessarily, it was still just like invigorating reading

36:11 something new. So I always want to be reading a new book. I also want to be better about attending concerts. I want to be one artist in concert in 2026. I say one artist in concert that I really, really like because I think it's actually really hard to time life so that you're seeing artists that you really, really like. Like.

36:30 Yeah, artists that I really, really like are not always touring. OK Yeah. To like time this year so that that I was able to see Lord who I love. That was hard. The artists that you love aren't always touring. OK. So I want to see one artist in concert that I really, really like and then also see a few artists in concert that, you know, I'm either neutral on or maybe just like don't even really know.

36:51 Like just go to see more live music in general which you have an easier time with because I don't. Like day one I was like, there's so many reasons why this is easier for me. Which ones do you want me to say? You day one, Yeah. So that's another one I want to see. I said 2 Broadway shows next year.

37:11 I'd really like to see one a quarter. That's my stretch goal. I live in New York, guys. So like seeing a show 1/4 is not like unreasonable for me, but I just like feel better when I'm seeing the art that's like on the scene. Like I just feel better about life. I'm like, aware of what's happening when things are getting accolades or like people are being recognized for performances.

37:36 I didn't feel like I'm able to appreciate work that's that's really good. And that makes me feel like I'm living more. Yeah, if that makes sense. So in total, New Year's resolution is to consume more art in general. I love art, visual, musical, all of it. And I think when you work, which like a lot of people who are listening to this podcast, probably work like full day jobs that consume a lot of their life, whether it's like a typical desk job or whether they're like a full time parent who is like watching their children day in day out. It's like hard to dedicate time to actually do that. And so I want to try and dedicate time to do that more intentionally.

38:18 I really like that. It's not like passing you by. Yeah, I think I like that, both for what you said and for the opposite reason, because as we mentioned, I've been reading all these books. This here, which is great, but that also means I've kind of been spending less time with people, right? So like Derek is like, oh, well, you're always reading all these books now, which is great.

38:37 But like we don't chat as much as we used to, you know? So it's like, I think it's a really good thing to carve out this time both for yourself, but also for like the people around you, you know, so that you can have dedicated time to hang out with your loved ones as well. Yeah. And obviously, like, obviously I'm extremely privileged that I'm able to even like do all of those things.

38:58 So I'm not going to waste it, yes. I, well, you just made me think of one. I'm not good at New Year's resolutions, but the one I did come up with is I do want to read more books by smaller like indie authors, like not Sarah J Mas, not Rebecca Yaros, not, not the big ones on TikTok. Like I want to find smaller books that not as many people have read.

39:19 And I want to read them and I want to hopefully enjoy them and I want to talk about them. And I want to just do more of that because of the, as you saw here, for the most part, the best books I read this year we're not by the huge authors like they were by the smaller ones. So I want to, I want to do more of that.

39:34 I want to just walk into a bookstore and read a book description or see a book cover that I like and just buy it and not be like, oh, I don't know if I'm going to like this. You know, I haven't heard anything about it. Like I just want to be kind of bolder in my book choices. I also have a library card. So I could just do it at the library instead. And then what you, you just made me think of is I want to consume more types, different types of art, right? So I'm good on books.

39:58 I'm pretty good about watching movies, but I don't, I want to go see more art, right? I want to go to more museums. I want to go to more plays. I went to one play this year. I want to just kind of expand the type of art that I'm consuming. And I'm with you. I want to reading this year has been so good for me.

40:13 Like I feel so much better this year than I did at the end of last year. And I just want to kind of keep that appreciation for, like, art and for reading because it is a type of art right in my life. And yeah, that's what I want to do. Cool. And I want to grow the shit out of this podcast. That's my second resolution. Yeah, yeah, that goes that thing and you guys can help us, can help us.

40:35 Tell your friends. Keep listening. Keep listening. Tell your friends. If you hear somebody talking about actually one of our friends was telling me she's like, I heard some of my coworkers talking about a Qatar and I told them about your pocket. She was like, she told them she was like, they go a little off the wall, but maybe you'd like, I was like, thanks for the vote of confidence.

40:56 This is a mutual friend of ours. Who's Jenna? This is Jenna. She's like, it's a little much for me, but you would like it. It's like, okay, Jenna, cool. Well, I think those are good resolutions. When I'm up here over the summer, I always see people reading Sarah J Mass books and I'm like, should I just walk down the beach and be like, hey, I see you're reading, I see you're reading a guitar. I see you're reading Tower of Dawn. Can I recommend a podcast?

41:21 But I'm not going to do that, obviously. One thing, this is like adjacent New Year's resolutions. I don't really know that this is a resolution so much as it's just like something that I just want to do more. Every time I see and I think it's this podcast that made me sensitive to it. But every time I see book adjacent small businesses now, I'm like, I want to buy from them. I literally just want to buy from them. And that's, I saw, yeah, this vendor at the Bryant Park Holiday Market and it actually has the website on the back of this.

41:54 I'll show it to the book page, art book page W if you're listening, www.bookpageartnyc.com. Yep, book page art. They sell online. They sell the prints online. They were, they were selling at the market. The prints like mounted on these wood blocks and it's really cool. They basically take they, they upcycle old books and like print art on pages of the books. And so every page that they print art on is different. This page that they printed this like 4th wing art on was, well, I'm not going to it's spoiler, so I'm not going to read it, but it's a good page.

42:33 It's a good page of 4th Wing. Do you think they did that on purpose? No, I think they take every page of Yeah, the book and print art on it. Yeah. Lovely. That's very cool. Cool. All right everyone, we are about to dive into our mass verse only section. We have a special guest with us. We have Morgan, the three faced goddess from TikTok fame joining us today. We are very excited.

42:58 She has described herself as the podcast auntie, but we've not actually had her on. So she will be joining us shortly. But just to give you guys a heads up, we're heading into our mass verse section. So there will be full spoilers for Acatar, Crescent City and Throne of Glass. So if you do not want to be spoiled, then we recommend you stop listening.

43:15 And AS as always, we hope you enjoyed our cozy chat this morning. Happy holidays, we love you all. Thank you so much for listening along with us. And if you're not sticking around for the master section, love you. Bye. Love you. Bye. Happy holidays. All right, OK, so we have Morgan with us, which is very exciting. I will share with you all that I found Morgan on. As you guys all know, I run our tick tock. Abby runs our Instagram.

43:41 All of you know this at this point like people literally message Abby on our Instagram just hi Abby. So I run our Dick dog Morgan came up on my for you page, our free page, the podcast for you page talking about we're in mass for spoilers reminder go away if you've not read the mass first about a crazy theory, crazy, but really cool theory about Lydia servos from Crescent City and a theory about how ultimately her son, her son Brandon, I think he goes by brand also might be her her ancestor. Like super cool video.

44:14 Go like I'm going to tell you now, like go look her go look at her profile. Obviously, like that's part of why she's here. We've already told you this, but I this video comes across my for you page. I'm like, who is this woman? It's like she might be like us. So I went, I clicked, I clicked her profile and her handle is you guys know this already 3 faced Goddess, which everybody here has read the mass person. You know that this is arguably like the deity right of the mass verse, like mother made and Chrome 3 faced goddess and her bio is mass verse crash out.

44:44 So I was like, you might be like us. I'm going to follow you. And so she's here. She's agreed to join us today. She is our special guest. She's going to talk about some of her favorite mass verse theories. If you're in our Discord, you definitely know her because you've shared some of her videos there. So we're very excited to have her. Morgan, do you want to introduce yourself and talk about how you got into the mass?

45:07 Verse Yes. Hello, my name is Morgan. I'm from the East Coast and I am a mother. I have three young boys and I homeschool them. And so I am really wrapped up in motherhood. And I used to read a lot and I I always enjoyed like my my grandmother, my grandparents raised me. And so she was a heavy reader and I always enjoyed reading, but I never found a genre that felt like I want to live in this book. You know, it was more like just the story thing. So I was really not drowning because I love motherhood, but you kind of need to reattach yourself to something that is you.

45:42 And I met I'm not from from where I am now and I moved here after college with my husband and I was meeting new friends and being a mom. And so then I had one of my new my friends was like, you have to get into back into reading this book. She introduced me to ACOTAR and she was like, you have to read this book trying to tell me about, you know, when, when you're outside looking and they're like wolves and shifters and you have no idea.

46:05 You can't even imagine. So she was like, here's my book, just read it. She got let me borrow hers and and the rest is history. I read ACOTAR, I flew through it and then I went into Throne of Glass, which I was. That is sort of an abrupt change because one's more like romanticity and like I'm seeing you to the last one.

46:24 You're like, oh, this is an old. This is like, yeah, some things. And then you get into Throne of Glass, which is obviously a different kind of burn. But that book, that series is everything. Obviously, I finished with Crescent City, but I cannot get out of it. I'm like a puzzle lover. Yeah. I want something that's going to test my brain and make me think.

46:45 That's what I like the most about this series is that it feels never ending. It feels like a grown up puzzle. Oh, yeah. I like totally. Just like an answer at the end of it. You can't flip it over and be like, oh, here's the answer. We're we're all like cracked out really this out. And so that's just how I got on TikTok.

47:04 I, my husband, my husband knows so much about these books because I do not stop. He'll come downstairs in the morning like I was thinking about were saying about and he know like at this point he there, it's just been fun. And so he was like, you should take this to tech talk And that's where I am now. So I'm really fine.

47:22 I just started in September. Amazing. It's been so much and I loved just relating to you. We both were like, I don't want to look. I'd like to keep it in my own wheelhouse too, where I'm like, I wanted to kind of be like, did I think this through? Not that I have claim to the idea, but it's like I don't want to plagiarize your work as my own work.

47:41 Right, totally. I mean, the first time we shouted, we shouted you out, we were like, I followed you immediately, but then I was also like, hi, so TikTok has does a nice job kind of delineating right? Like they're like you're for you page and then you're following page. And I was like, I actually avoided your videos and kind of continue to because we, we actually think and I'm excited for I'm super excited for this one because your theories are so, so cool and so well thought out. And you you pull threads that I would never think to pull, but also your mind operates in a really different way. Actually, I think then either mine or Abby's operate. And so I avoid and I think Gabby avoids to your videos and other kind of theorist videos because

48:23 we don't want to like accidentally, yeah, osmosis anybody else's theories into our own brain. And so we're so excited that you can just share with our listeners directly some of your different cool creative theories. That you're here, that's the biggest compliment ever. I really, I really, really appreciate that. And I think we all want to be like original and we all want to feel like work coming from like our own source to like compile our knowledge together.

48:50 And so I agree, I'm not offended by that. I hope you're not either. No, yeah, I'm. Like wait a second, let me just pass this really quick. So with love, I pass by your videos. Yeah, with, yes. And it makes it so much cooler too when we like converge to the same place. Yeah. What do you think? About this, yeah, that will happen too.

49:09 Because like I will see like, and this will happen too. Like we'll get comments like so and so came up with this too. We're like, we've heard this elsewhere and that's just even more validating and even more fun. But like, yeah, we came to the same place from different from different places, so. I agree and I wanna say I've been I wasn't on the Instagram for a while.

49:29 The Instagram I meant your but I've been seeing your stories Abby and your crap. You're literally cracking. My unhinged story. I love it because I'm very also unhinged and unserious. So I talked to Ronnie and I was like, can I cuss because I let him slip on the TikTok all the time? Yeah, OK, cool.

49:52 Not that I'm going to intentionally cuss, but sometimes just how you. Express it. I know we we put the disclaimer, we were like this our Christmas special, but it's still rated R. We might curse, we're not sure. This is the unholy Christmas special. Unholy. So cute it's. Like disco balls, but you can't see.

50:11 So cute. All right, keep going. Sorry. Fun fact, I I don't know if Abby caught this, but in the outline that we are working off of, call this the Winter Solstice special. It is winter solstice. Today, today, today. Winter Solstice. So not for you guys, not for anybody listening to this. Sorry, but sorry that we're recording. This is Winter Solstice birthday. Happy birthday, Ferum.

50:35 When you're done with this separate off of this topic on my talk stories, I posted this video about this girl who has like this tradition for winter solstice and putting your intentions into the world. It's on my TikTok stories so cute. You should look at it. OK, All right, we'll do. We'll do Winter Solstice intentions. Maybe we can.

50:50 Do it. That's so cute. Amazing. OK, are we ready to dive in? Yeah. Should we deep dive? Yeah, we deep dive. Let's dive in. OK, let's do it. All right. The first thing I brought to talk about is I wanted to this is it's not necessarily theorizing, but just putting on the table for moving forward the comparison, which means Farah's experience being made and Nesta and Elaine's.

51:20 We don't really have a lot from Nesta's experience, but I would put Nesta and Elaine in the same category. And I think that there's a lot of evidence to show that Farah made the draw versus Nesta and Elaine being made via the cauldron. And I think at first glance, it seems very similar. Just one is like in the metaphorical cauldron of, you know, existence.

51:39 But when you get down to the details, they are mimicking Bryce's drop. And what's interesting about that is like there are requirements that have to be met in order to successfully make the drop. And my reason for bringing this up is I think at the end of the day, there might be some knowing on Reese's behalf that is sort of telling us that maybe was this planned?

51:59 And I will preface by saying I'm not in the like hater club. I just, I, I think it's important to be able to be objective in that situation. And this seems like some plotting and planning. So I think that there is some like villain esque 5 Charisse. I don't think he's the big bad, but I think there is some plotting and planning happening and I just want to compare the different situations.

52:25 OK so the first thing I wanted to compare was Bryce's description of the drop. And this is in Hofast page 97 and I'm going to skim through some of the details. So this is not all in order. OK, so then again, this is the drop from Sky and Breath. So says the drop was the easy part, falling into one's power. But once the bottom was reached, one's mortal body expired, which is where favorite is.

52:46 When she she dies, she's beginning. At this stage she's already dropped. And then the countdown. Then the clock began counting down. Mere minutes were allowed for the race back up to life before the brain shut down permanently from lack of oxygen. 6 minutes to start barreling down a psychic runway along the bottom of 1's power.

53:02 A single, desperate shot at launching skyward toward life. The alternative to successfully making that leap? Tumbling into an endless black pit and awaiting death. Someone else had to act as an anchor, a beacon, a lifeline, A bungee cord. And I always say I'd like to add tether to that list for funsies. Yeah.

53:21 To make the drop alone was to die and no one knew if the soul continued living down there. And what's interesting about that quote is that the Carver in Pharah have that exact conversation like what is what happened? What is in the darkness? Was there a portal? So I think that also kind of connects to Pharah's experience We're. Doing our Bone Carver episode tomorrow and I've been heavily reading that passage.

53:43 I'm like, Oh my God, this is exactly. The same exactly exactly so I think it even shows the connection to to Pharah in that part right there and then it says some claims that 6 minutes were called the search and it was only upon making the ascent and reaching that threshold back to life and reaching that threshold back to life, brimming with new power that immortality was a change.

54:04 So I think the key there is that you're brimming with new power when you reach immortality. When Rice makes her actual drop on this is 767 of the same book says Bryce plunged into the golden light. So we're going to keep those. We're going to keep those things in mind when we're reading the very short experience on favorite for favors drop.

54:25 And this is page four O 7 of thorns and roses. So Farrah says everything was black and warm and thick, inky but bordered with gold. I was swimming, kicking for the surface where Tamlin was waiting, where life was waiting up and up, frantic for air. The golden light grew and the darkness became like sparkling wine, easier to swim through the bubbles fizzling around me. I gasped, air flooding my throat. And so I think that's obviously they, they're pound for pound to me.

54:54 And I think that what's interesting is if we compare that to Nesta's experience being dipped into the cauldron, which many would say, oh, well, Nesta also made the drop. They're they're described a little bit differently. This is the prologue of Silver Flames. And this is Nesta's memory or just sort of relived experience of being dipped in the cauldron. It says the black water nipping at her thrashing heels was freezing.

55:18 Not the bite of winter chill or even the burn of solid ice, but something colder, deeper. The code of the gaps between stars, of a world before light. The code of hell, true hell. And then it says the icy water bit the soles of her feet, a kiss of venom. The water gripped her ankles with phantom talons, tugging her down.

55:35 These are not things that she's just swimming through. This is like interacting with her and pulling her down. So it says she felt the burning as she sank into a sea that had no bottom. There was no sound but darkness, agony and power. And I think that this is really indicative that this is not like a peaceful, this is not a peaceful darkness, a climb back up where Favor is describing hers as warm and golden and like sparkling wine.

55:59 And where they overlap is that there's the inkiness, the depth list, there is the blackness. However, we see the comparison all throughout Mass First, but especially in Crescent City where anything that's like icy and frozen is hell related. So I'm not necessarily making a connection between hell and the Daglin, but I do want to specify that two of these people, Bryce and Farah, are experiencing warmth and golden light, and the other is experiencing frozen agony.

56:27 Pain in a do feels like in a different way. So one to me sounds like pre cauldron, pre Daglin corrupted cauldron. And I would say that like Farah and Bryce's experience, whereas Nesta and probably Elaine, they're experiencing this traumatic cauldron making. But my point there kind of starts at why is the drop in this form different, reacting differently than then sort of being made via the cauldron? It's so interesting to not to take you off track, but I think it's worth just touching on.

57:03 Like what do you make of Pharah's drop? Seems so like tit for tat. To your point, what we hear in Earth blood in that she had a tether, like she had a Reese, right? Like anchoring her in a way. And like who did Nesta have that? Like Nesta had no one. Exactly, And so I sort of so say because I kind of made this A2 part with that High Lord tithe what was necessary for the drop. But that's sort of one of the points I wanted to make was there was no exchange Bryce and they were have to have these requirements to make if this possible, whereas Nensta and Helene are just shoved in.

57:39 There's no trade. Now. We don't know. Like did they already have magic? Obviously there's things that we don't know about their their past, but operating on what we know, we are supposed to assume that they don't have any innate magic similarly to the mortal Queen. And so we're all under the impression that the reason the mortal queen ages and becomes this crown is because Nesta took from the cauldron. But it also could be that Elena Nesta had innate magic. You know, that could also be the consensus. But otherwise there is no requirement to come out alive. They both were alive at the end and there wasn't a tether. There wasn't anything holding to them, But that's required of the drug would favor have made it

58:21 without being tethered to Reese I and without getting the the high Lord tide, which is the next part. OK, so that's. An only we're just like shoved in and really find your way back. Yeah, fine. And it is a different experience. I wonder if one I was sort of thinking 1 is aligned with like the malevolent.

58:36 I'm sorry, one is aligned with like the benevolent mother, the pre corrupted mother and then one is sort of aligned with this malevolent aspect of it. So here that I wanted to talk about that Reese has seemingly now facilitated her drop because she was only able to make it because of the tether which he created via the bargain. And then she needs magic.

58:57 Either it doesn't even matter either it doesn't even matter. Either she had magic innately and we're giving her more magic similar to Bryce who just is able to then claim a larger wealth of magic, or she didn't have any magic and he knows that she needs some magic to successfully make the drop. Either way, he's it has to be. There's some sort of plotting and planning happening here. I just wanted to we remind everyone that when Bryce is in Perthy and she's talking to Azrael and Amron and Rusand at the very beginning and she sort of they have her like strapped to a chair.

59:31 And so she says the hysteria are ancient immortal beings who feed on the power of others. They harvest the magic of people of a world and then eat it. We call it first light. It fuels our entire world, but mostly them we were we're required to hand it over. Upon reaching our immortality, we seize our full mature power through a ritual called the drop, and in the process, some of it siphoned off.

59:51 The point that I'm trying to get to is that the drop is to seize your full power. And at the end of this, I want to kind of make the claim that that when Reese sort of says to everyone we'll bestow what our predecessors have granted to Few before, he's not saying we'll bestow immortality pound for pound like he's saying we'll bestow.

1:00:13 The wealth of power that comes with like a side of immortality. And I think that that's significant because we all are sort of looking for is this planned? That would be a motive to make a tool. And either way you cut it if she had magic or not, there's still a way to sort of exacerbate or make for him better this tool.

1:00:32 So obviously there's also the reference to Reese and Tether. And I wanted to read just I wanted to kind of go into his exact verbiage about the predecessors on page four O 4. This is chapter 45. It says I was far away, but still seeing, seeing through eyes that weren't mine, eyes attached to a person who slowly rose from his position on a cracked, bloody floor. And this is obviously Reese on the next page towards the bottom, it says Restan stepped forward, bringing my shred of soul with him, which again wouldn't be possible if this tether hadn't been connected.

1:01:05 And then he says, for what she gave, we'll bestow what our predecessors have granted. If you. The first part of that I think is interesting to know because this is the same thing that Jessica says to Bryce when she saves her and trades life, trades her life. She says basically for what you gave to Midgard, we are able to sort of make this life trade, and that's what's happening here. For what she gave to Krythian, we will swap out. And in both cases, they're kind of like protecting the heart of their realm.

1:01:35 I'm not exactly sure. But so remind me, what did so when Jessica said that to Bryce, what did she give? So her life. Part of it is that she gave her life fighting to a guy, fighting against the black hole and trying to get the Asteria out. And then I think it's also connected to her sort of bringing life back to a Valen.

1:01:56 But it says what you gave for us, Midgard is giving back because she says basically that there's a sentience to Midgard, which I thought was very interesting. Yeah, which is very and we it's. Very Prithian. It's very Prithian. We get that with the island. Yeah. Yeah, we get with the prison. Yeah, and like the land, the land has its own magic.

1:02:15 Yeah. So is there a guardian for Prithian? And I'm not totally making that point, but I think it's something that's interesting to think about. The next line, though, the predecessors line is really what got me hung up. So I was kind of mentioning already that the second part is not necessarily talking about bestowing immortality, but rather that it's a result of claiming power at this.

1:02:36 I think just to back that up at this point, we don't have knowledge of the Cauldron reviving people. It's not something that people are using by and large re suspects it and we learned that later as the reader in Akumath when we're talking to to the bone Carver basically confirms, like your suspicions are are confirmed that you can do that to revive jury and but otherwise that's not a thing that is being used. And I would say the only other case of immortality being given is Miriam, and one Ameren says word for word. The only other human to be given immortality is Miriam, and she was given a new She was given immortality, not a new body. Right.

1:03:20 Where and I have that quote if you think I should quote it but. We've actually already read it in multiple you guys know it this. Morning. So basically she's just pointing out the fact that there's only been now two people who are made immortal from being human and and they're so so Phaera is still a standalone is my point.

1:03:39 And if then who are the few granted a few before? Who are they? And if the other Lords have no idea that Phaera is going to get a part of their magic, they seem to be in the dark about this form of revival. Why does Reese know about it? Why does he know that their predecessors have given it to anybody?

1:03:57 And and who was he talking about? And what predecessors so? Not to mention he's seems to be a recipient himself. Yeah. And later when he is. Yeah, when later when he's forgiven, when he comes back to life, is that him doubling down, double dropping? And he's like, I didn't claim any extra power. Yeah, he's like my power remains my own. I know.

1:04:18 Yeah, that's slow way to pull the quote. So if fair is a standalone, I think that what he means when he when he's referencing the predecessors is the Daglin. I think he's talking about the Daglin, which again, he is strange because he acts like when he talks to Ameren, like he doesn't know a lot. He's like they were we were rid of them, right? And it's almost like he relies on Ameren for in that history. But then at the same time he knows. So I think the High Lords are sort of granting they read the ability to make the drop, collect more power, become immortal, and it's kind of all at once. So I guess my question here is, do you think that this was a way to make a tool?

1:05:01 Does it seem to you because again, also I want to add that Baron being the first person to like donate his magic doesn't seem the MO for Baron. And we know that Reese like goes into their mind and this is an Akimath when he's sort of saying like I was willing to like bend them to my will basically.

1:05:20 But I spoke to them and I convinced them all to donate to you. And he kind of alludes to the fact that they didn't say they didn't complain. But we don't know. And I think that Baron being the first one to go up there, that's the last, last person I would have expected to go up first, Maybe Thiessen or Tarquin or Helian. Those are like kind people to me. I think it's not in his like normal spiel to be the first one to be considerate.

1:05:44 And so I think that to me speaks more on mind control. So my question, what do you think? Do you think that that sounds like some plotting and planning? I like it. I think what you said about Barron is interesting. I think Reese insisting on saving Farrah is interesting. I also think our predecessors being the Daglin, whether Reese, whether that's true or whether Reese only thinks it's true, is really interesting.

1:06:10 Like that's that never even occurred to me, but I don't know why it didn't occur to me. Reese does like on paper believe that their predecessors are the Daglin. He has said the Daglund created the fae. So that makes perfect sense. I don't know why I never thought of it. So I guess going back to the drop and and understanding what you're what you're getting out with the drop. Totally agree and think it it makes perfect sense that Fayrah's drop like Fayrah base Fayrah made the drop right, but it's interesting right that Fayrah made made a drop at all right given.

1:06:45 He. Was just a was just a human. So there's so there's that very interesting piece, right, that you drew parallel to, to use your words like pound for pound parallel between, between the drop and Crescent City and the drop that Pharaoh made with with Reese as her anchor before the high Lords did anything to her. Exactly.

1:07:10 Oh, wait, wait, wait. Well, I see what you're saying. So like that I think has to be, yeah, dependent of anything that the High Lords gave. I think I was sort of connecting it to like, like Bryce is holding on to the gates when she makes the draw. I'm sorry, she holds on to the gates. But while she's falling, it's from my perspective, I was reading it like she was still getting the magic. And so I think it's like a broken process that Farrah is is dropped and is dead, but she still has those 6 minutes if it if it sort of goes the same way.

1:07:41 And so I was sort of thinking, while she's down there, could she still claim that Matt, she was down there and dead and that and she's able to make the climb because within that 6 minutes, if it's still a six minutes in this in this realm as well. Yeah. Is that what gives her the ability to come back up? Because otherwise she would just be down there. And I think that you could probably, and especially because she can still, she still has that connection to the living realm.

1:08:07 So I still think she could sort of suck in that battery power similarly to how Bryce does while she's holding on and dead I guess. And that, I think, also makes sense. Like the High Lords, colonels serve as like Bryce's first light equivalent that allowed Farah to make the ascent using Greece as the anchor.

1:08:29 I also think that that makes sense. Abby has her thinking face on. Yeah. I think about Aylen and I think because because you said something Morgan about having a new body at the end of the drop. And obviously when Aylen closes the word gate, she ends up with a new body and what she gets, it's a very similar thing, right? What she gets is a kernel of Mala's power. That's that's like the exact it's like a kernel of Starlight is what's used.

1:08:54 So like, and it's funny because Aylan says she comes out of the gates with less power, but she's also been given a kernel of power by a God. Like was Aylan also? And obviously we have this crazy theory that the throne of glass gods are the Asteria, although I'm wavering on that a little bit these days. But if Aylan is also going through the drop and if Mala is acting as her anchor and and also giving her this kernel of power here and she ends up with a new Fey body, the way that Feyra does, like is it, is it what you said is like the origin of the drop?

1:09:22 It's kind of a reverse though, right? It's like it's the Asteri giving them power. It's like a reverse of the tithe. But like, is that where it all comes from? Because obviously with the drop, The thing is right, the Asteri are there on Midgard. They have the parasite. That's why that's why the drop is necessary.

1:09:37 So I've always had trouble with these ideas of it happening in other worlds. But then we do have these parallels between Farrah, Bryce and Aylan. So it's like even without the parasite, is there this idea of and obviously Aylan is like constantly dropping into her power, right? That is the like that is the imagery that's used. So like, were there Asteri origins to it everywhere or is it something that all say go through, but then the Asteri kind of took it and corrupted it the way that they did with the Cauldron.

1:10:01 It's kind of where my mind what was that? Yeah, I think that when because I do, I did make that comparison too. I was sort of saying that the drop is is connected to the settling in that in turn of glass you settle, but in turn of glass you're settling into your immortality. You don't correct me if I'm wrong. They don't get a new wealth of power. They just sort of sit into their forever or like they're like state where yeah, age slowly and I thought. Was settling.

1:10:32 I thought it was like a question mark with half breeds. I think so. That's what it is, yeah. It's you're either going to be immortal or you're not. But with Alan it's different because Alan loses her ability to shift with this right? So it's not really like a true settling the way it is with other half breeds.

1:10:48 It's she has lost the human part of herself, which for other Faye would be like the animal part of themselves, right? And I think that Aylan makes like 3, at least what I can remember including yours. 3 like metaphorical drops. Like I feel like she drops. Yeah. When we hear the back story, is it the is it the Fluorine River?

1:11:08 Is that what it's called? Where she drowned, the dam where she. Oh yeah, yeah. So that I feel like drops because she dies, Yeah, but she doesn't. Is she given more power? I don't think so. But she has innate power. So maybe she sort of mimics that drop and mimics it like how is it all connected to all the realms?

1:11:30 I think because in the same way that Urd and Word and the Mother and Creation and the Cauldron, they're all sort of this like Fate speak, it's just all creation. And so maybe that's like at the core of the universe and then the Daglin have corrupted this core functionality, manipulated it. Because I thought that too far at first. I was like the drop, not like I thought it because I it still is true.

1:11:51 But the drop seems like something that's only Crescent City, but maybe it's something that they're manipulating. Yeah. To like because of the parasite, like the parasite is the present city thing and they're manipulating this functionality of the universe to get there. But I think that like so Allen does her drop in the flooring and she kind of does like in a live drop in era fire when she's like the get up. I love that.

1:12:20 I love that book. And then again, just like you said, when she kind of re gets that power because she's out. So if she were to drop again, she would probably die all the way. What's it's kind of goes in the same line with like Nesta and Elaine. They don't have to make a trade. They just get in the cauldron and then they get their prize at the end.

1:12:36 Aylan she does make like the trade for the last one. But like fall, what the settling is supposed to be is just getting immortality. So I don't think that they have to make a trade for that. But the drop specifically is only is like the only one where they have to make this like they have to have these requirements. So I don't know.

1:12:54 I just I think it's very interesting that like these certain steps had to be taken. And that's really what I was getting to is I feel like the high Lord tithe is what I'm calling it. The drops of the power is the same as Bryce's gate interaction. So when she's sucking up and then she's able to facilitate her drop, it's the same between fair and Reese in my mind.

1:13:16 But. Yeah, Yeah, I think that makes sense. It mirrors Farah well. I think it's an interesting thing. You pointed out the differences between what she went through and what Nesta and Elaine went through, which feel very different. Well, maybe going forward, maybe we'll get more of a nation of like what happened at the beginning with the mother and the dad one and what belongs to what. It's not a solution.

1:13:39 This isn't even like a huge theory as much as I think it's really important to point out because from the same way that when Nesta goes in the bog, the bog acts like the cauldron, like Nature's Cauldron. There's just some, there's some funkiness going on with the new cauldron and how it's making things versus how Pharaoh does it.

1:13:56 I just get hung up. I get hung up on a line and I'm like, who are these few and who are the predecessors? What are you talking about? Why is no one asking? And I think also, don't you think that the High Lords would be like, what are you doing if they weren't? I feel like that, you know, and I don't even, I don't know.

1:14:11 And, and sorry, I just read this passage. Somebody says when Reese makes Pharaoh human emissary, someone says there hasn't been a human emissary to the Night Court in 500 years like there was one 500 years ago and like who was it? Was it? That's when Ree says like, yeah, Ree says, well, there also hasn't been like a human made fae in 500 years either, or something like that.

1:14:35 So like, was it Miriam? I don't know. But like, who was the human emissary? Was it more? Is that how she fell in love with the Queen? Maybe, probably, I don't know. Like, why would Moore still be a human? Sorry, I don't know. I don't trust that girl. I don't trust her or no? We don't trust her.

1:14:51 Yeah, we absolutely we are certified. I wouldn't call us more haters, but we are certainly more suspectors. Yeah, she's us. Me too, fellow Morgan. And I just can't do it. I don't like it. I also, I didn't. I also thought it was interesting to point out that in Aqua Math, when Farah is in the weaver's cottage and she says I was granted gifts, gifts, considerable gifts.

1:15:16 And so she's talking in the same way where it's like we'll bestow what our predecessors have graded Duffy before it is the gift of magic and fadem and rather than immortality. She wasn't, she was given gifts, not the gift of immortality. And who really cares about that? But I, I care about it. I think. I think that that's important to kind of get to what they're talking about.

1:15:39 They're not talking about his dad and his dad's dad. Talk him. Way back, which is what I want to know. I want to know what happened back then. Yeah. So that's all I got for a favors drop in the High Lord tithe. That was awesome. OK, thank. You, Sir? Yeah. OK, so the next this is like my little fun theory.

1:15:58 I think that Saya made a bargain with hell for the dagger and Gwidian slash the stars award. And so just to start us off, we obviously know that they made it seem like she met Edis while they were on Midgard. And I have the quote somewhere. We've gone pretty deep into how we don't believe that that's true if it's specific. I want to get the quote, yeah.

1:16:24 Yeah, yeah. So. You probably remember then that Thea's like, it's like she was, she like was kind of sitting there. And then she nods her head almost like, I've decided that I'm going to do this. And to me, that's like, I have to sort of bring out this tool that I have that I didn't want anyone else to know, but maybe I read too far into that.

1:16:42 So she opens the portal and the first thing he says is you're ready to, you know, accept Hell's help. Then then is that you know what I mean? That sentence is like, I've asked you if you wanted my help before, and now you're ready to accept it. So they definitely talked before. Also there's like the timeline, I wouldn't say discrepancy but we know that Hell was taken over and lost around 17,000 and one, and Magarg wasn't conquered until 17,000 and three.

1:17:11 So my point there is that when Hell gives chase to the Asteria and then they capture their lieutenants. And this is House of Sky and Breath page 758. I can read the quote if we need to, but basically they say that hell gave chase and they captured lieutenants, stereo lieutenants and they learned how to walk through the cracks or sneak through the cracks. And so back to like the bog connection, which I feel is heavily hell coated.

1:17:36 And I feel that way because again, we know that everything icy and frozen and cold and dark is it's how Bryce and Hunt summoned the demon and they were like turning blue and they had to stop a conversation because she almost froze to death. Same with under the tunnels of a Valen. Same with like the icy cold waters under the dust court down where the midden guard worm is. So the bog has that same vibe and I, I sort of hypothesize that there is either hell underneath Prytheon or that it's maybe one big thing at the end.

1:18:05 But I think that they was communicating with Adis or Hell at least some point in between there. And I think that there's like that overlap time of when Hell gave chase and when Midgard was founded. We can sort of see that there's some wiggle room from when Hell learned to slip through the cracks and when Midgard was even founded, because we know that the Steri were there for a little while waiting for them to come over.

1:18:29 So my point is that there's time. There's time in between that Hell could have chatted with Theo. Do you feel like do you agree? Yeah, sorry, I'm just pulling up my notes on a STERI timeline. You're fine. Just so I can see. I can never tell if I'm just talking someone into an early grave or if I'm making sense. OK.

1:18:48 Yeah, so so I'm just going to back up real quick because I have the quotes if that's OK. So we have this is the story timeline under the Crystal Palace in Midgard and we have AE 17,000 and one lost hell. They do not say when they conquered hell, but the date is 17,000 and one lost hell. The notes about that are a dark cold world with mighty creatures of night. They saw through our lures.

1:19:09 Once warring factions, the royal armies of hell united and marched against us. We were overwhelmed and abandoned their world, but they gave chase, learned from our captured lieutenants how to slip between cracks in realm. So that's that's what you were just referencing. And then we have 17,000 and three.

1:19:25 Well, I have 17,000 and two, but I don't know if this is just my notes or if this is in the timeline. Hell finds the Asteri on Midgard and then we have 17,003 conquered Midgard. So that's those are the kind of two years that you're talking about there? And I think that there's probably that I'm just sort of highlighting that the time between hell learning how to slip through the cracks and Midgard even being conquered by the Asteri, there seems to be at least two years of time when they could have been interacting with the beings on Pythian.

1:19:55 Obviously, I don't know that for sure, but so to kind of explain this, I want to point out that first, the truth teller, the dagger glows with a black light and we only see reference to the black light regarding truth teller or the light that Adis throws at the very end of Flame and shadow when they're trying to. Pool hunt and Bryce back through the portal of the void. Apollyon's like holding it open.

1:20:22 And those are the only two instances of black light and and it's mentioned you know that that throughout that there's the black light, but those are the only two separate entities, Adis and truth teller. And So what I think sort of happened is I think that there was some sort of significance to Fionn because again, why would the Asteri have cared about a fae warrior and to them like a slave girl?

1:20:46 Why would they have cared about them having an affair unless Fion was some sort of important to them? And I haven't really finalized what I think that is, but he is important to some degree. And I think for the same reason that maybe Hell wanted to trade with him because he was sacrificed to the Bog. I mean, why else does she just?

1:21:04 Yeah, and the middle just died with him. Yes, which which is? You don't know much about like, I feel like it's noteworthy that we know so little about what he is and like what his powers were. Because we know that like his Kingdom was Romul, and the carvings we see that once they're together, it's like a king and a queen seated on a throne with a peak with stars overhead. His Kingdom is Romul.

1:21:29 At least that's where his throne is. And if he's the high king of Prythian, I've said in my video about this, either he's his, his Kingdom is Romio and the surrounding area or all of Prythian. But the bog died with its king. Makes no sense. That's not you know, we know best British drink from the land and the land drink from her. And when she was like poisoning under the land, just that land died.

1:21:51 So it's not really following a theme. There's something going on there with Theon's relationship to the ball. Why? Why does he? I found that to be so weird. OK, so. And just to sorry, just to get maybe you're going to get here, but the we have talked so much about the fact that Selena and Helena have shadows and it doesn't make any sense because Thea is starborn, so it should be light, but she has light and shadows.

1:22:16 So Fiona is their father. We have speculated that maybe Edis is actually their father, but it works with the Earth theory too. I think Fion is their father. Ought to be hell. Got to be hell adjacent at least, yeah? Yeah. And I think, yeah, I think that I hopefully talked to. Well, I don't want to put someone else's theory out there, but someone else has theorized something about mushing them together, my very good friend Cheryl.

1:22:39 But I think also that it's very interesting that they had children so late and five years apart. I wish I could remember. I'm rereading Akatar and in guitar also, there was a mention at the very beginning that it was very odd that Faye people had it was Alice. I think Alice was talking about her her nephews being born and she was like, it's already so rare for them, let alone two of them being born within a certain amount of time triggering like it was the IT was five years. It was five years said in that quote as well. I can look for it if you want me to, but. No, I think we I think we've actually talked about 1. I feel like that quote is memorable to most people who have read a guitar.

1:23:21 And I feel like also just the dichotomy of the fact that Alice mentions that Faye children and it's generally mentioned that Faye children are rare and hard to to have. But also like Baron has seven, right? There are there are several royal families that have many children. And then also yes, like like they're randomly suddenly after many years of being unsuccessful with VN has two in every. Child, which if we go by how normal reproduction works, that's unlikely.

1:23:54 So I agree with you. I think that some way or another hell specifically ate us. I love him. I love it as I don't know about you, but I feel like he's there. He's there, Papa, as my husband says. So I just wanted to talk about the weapons that we see made and the comparison of why I think that they were made.

1:24:11 But we know that they were made specifically to defeat the Osteria, which is I think already cues us in that you need this thing to defeat future conquerors. And it's the exact thing that's needed to defeat the Osteria. And it glows in the same way from another group of people who also defeated the Asteri. And I just want to put out there my sort of crack theory. I don't even think it's really that crazy. But if Hell is equivalent to the Underworld, the underworld obviously consumes souls.

1:24:42 Donna Show says I once drank from souls like fine wine, not the land like Vesperia says. And So what I think is that I think that Hell, AKA the Underworld is just a normal cycle in this universe and these in this web of universes. And I think that the Esteri have like infested as the parasite, they take the second light, which the underking says like more second, let more souls is more second light.

1:25:06 So they take the first light, they take off the second light and Hell's getting nothing. They're getting no souls, they're getting no sustenance. That seems like a pretty good motivation to me to want them out. And it's still selfish. And it makes sense because there we know there's some sort of selfish notion behind I'm the Princess of hell, but that makes sense to me.

1:25:26 Like you're eating my food, get out. And they're willing to cross all all of the realms that are interconnected over the same Ley lines. So I feel like that makes sense. We did our library episode last week. One of our big theories from that is that basically the bond with the library is a thin place with hell. So like, I think and like, yeah, like Thea and Fionn were ruling from the Night Court.

1:25:45 I think that's pretty much confirmed. So I think that totally, like I definitely think, and we, we've talked about this at length, but we definitely think that hell was as involved 15,000 years ago as the Asteri. Like you brought it up yourself with the cauldron, like the cold, cold, dark. When Nesta is crying for the cauldron, we we had a precog theory that she actually has gone to hell. Like there has to be, it feels like we're getting set up for some hell like elements in the creation of this world along with the Asteri.

1:26:15 So I totally buy it. Yeah, we definitely think truth. I definitely think Truth Teller is from hell. I don't know about Gwidian. I still think the Gwidian might be like a staring maid because it glows with the light, whereas Truth Teller like pulses with the shadows. So I still think those two things might be separate.

1:26:30 But yeah, I don't. I totally think Truth Teller is a hell knife, so to speak. Hell knife. Yeah, just finish this off with this one. So I just wanted to quickly compare. Atoraxia we know is made from the cauldron via Nesta being made from the cauldron. Star sword slash Gwidian are also made of the cauldron. There's two accounts of that, either Fiona himself or Oleana, and I think those.

1:26:54 Who the fuck is Oleana? Literally, we need to talk about. I know the video about it because it's the only time it's mentioned across all 16 books. The name it means of the Greek Helene meaning light of the Greek Celine meaning meaning like So I'm like it's Thea. It's literally Thea and it's fun.

1:27:12 Maybe because her name has been white from existence. But two, I was like, can anybody dip something in the in the cauldron? Like maybe you have to be a high priestess. Maybe she was a high priestess. Maybe that's why it was like an affair. But we know that those two swords are able to kill the unkillable. And I have the quote if you need it, But basically when they're in the tunnels, the tunnel tombs, I call them Nesta Bryce and Azrael, they're sort of sitting around. And she's like, tell me about your sword and does it kill the unkillable?

1:27:41 And she's like, yeah, they both say yes, both of their swords kill the unkillable. And then Bryce looks to Azrael and she says, does your weapon kill the unkillable? And he says no. And obviously we could assume that that's because we don't have an instance of it being made from the cauldron, but it is made with Gwidian.

1:27:59 And that's said a couple times I wanted said that Thea helped make both the weapons at the same time, and that's why they answered to answer to the call in her blood. But if that would mean that Gwidian was remade with Truth Teller in the bog, which again is the Bog Nature's cauldron, Yeah. It's so weird.

1:28:19 Yeah. This is page 539 of Hofast. It says both weapons were key to her power. It is why the Star Sword calls to the descendants of of Helena of Thea, but only those with enough of Thea Starlight to trigger its power. And then it says the Aseri have no power over the blades. They lack Thea's connection to the weapons. Since the Star Sword and Knife were both made by Thea at the same moment, their bond has always linked them. And then it says it says she knew that despite her mother's fears talking about Helena, the sword and the knife are needed to destroy the Aseri.

1:28:56 That says they need the sword and knife to make that power count. Thea's power when whole is the only thing that can unite and activate the true power of those blades and stop the Aseri's tyranny. So I feel like to me that speaks to she's the only one who can do it. They were made at the same time when we know Gideon was made so far in the past.

1:29:16 They're talking about it being made in the bog at the same time as Truth Teller. That's when she calls it to her hands. So like, why are they made? Why is it being remade? Why is it being remade in the bog? How is it being made in the bog? And they're being made for the purpose of defeating the osterry. So was that a trade?

1:29:35 Did she trade Fion with Hell? She gets this power from Hell, and Hell is the one that's passing on this information. They're the only ones who know that they have to be worked together to kill the osterry. Yeah, Ronnie, is your mind Spyler. The way minus. Or where I'm going is like, if it, if it's Thea, like there's been a handoff, right? Like there's been a handoff at the conclusion of Crescent City 3, at the conclusion of House of Flame and Shadow that says, hey, like Bryce to Nesta, your problem now go figure out like go get rid of the Asteria.

1:30:09 Implying that like there are Asteria to be defeated somewhere on Prythian. Prythian has something to deal with. Nesta has something to deal with. But like Thea's light is in Bryce. All of it. All of it. So when Bryce going to have to come back? I I hope so, I think. So like, is Nesta going to be able to do this without Bryce?

1:30:28 Is Nesta going back to the bog? What's crazy is Nesta has eight made weapons at her disposal right now. I'm pretty sure right she hasn't. If you're including the trove she has. Her three made weapons with three swords? She has asked. The crown, the the harp. The harp and truth teller technically like at her disposal and Gwidian. That's a lot of weapons.

1:30:50 A lot of weapons that she really can. Give Bryce a phone call. Maybe. Maybe she. Just got 9. Oh, wow, I'm like, that's seems a little crazy to me, but I don't know. What do you think, Abby? So any thoughts? Yeah, I, I, we haven't done our Crescent City season yet, so we haven't been diving too deep into this. Yeah, but.

1:31:10 Yes, so the idea of Thea making both of them is wild to me. Because of the shadows, again, because we know Thea has the Starlight, but we don't know where she has the shadows from. But her daughters have the shadows. And the only way we've seen people imbue other people with powers in this universe is through sex.

1:31:27 So I'm like, OK, so I think her and Ada's had sex and then she did. This is my thinking. Yeah. We don't know if that that does not work with the timeline. That specifically doesn't work with the timeline, But we think that that story is a lie anyway because that would mean they met when she was still back on Prythian and then only say as descendants being able to control the star sword. Truth Teller only starts glowing when Bryce shows up, right? Like Azrael has never been able to get it to glow. Esta has never been able to get it to glow. We think that NASA has star Warren power, but we think it's a different a different flavor of star Warren power. But Reese should have it and Nix

1:32:05 should have it, and now Nix is in play and now we have both of these swords back in Christian. So I realize he's only a baby but like he's. A baby. That's a Jack, Jack. Well, one of our discorders pinged me and I did go back and look at this quote. And I was going to maybe do it in corrections on missions, but I'll do it here. There is like there is a line that Nick's glowed with the Starlight of both of his pirates. His eyes glowed with the Starlight of his pirates, right. So yeah.

1:32:34 So like, I think it's back in play. I think the power is back in play so. That's so cool because we that like we know Thea has all of the we know that Bryce has all of the light, but there is so there's Thea's light that was broken into thirds and she has collected all of Thea's light. Helena's light, her innate light still goes down through her lineage.

1:32:55 Same with Saline. Exactly. Exactly. That's definitely the case. And I have another video where basically when Selena's talking, she's saying child of my child, heir of my heir, and she's talking to Nesta and Bryce. So yeah, yeah, right is likely. Or both of them. I was thinking Amber Quinlan and Nesta's Mama Archeron could be sisters.

1:33:15 I would love that. Guys, she's talking to both of these women who had to be able to get through the wards. And we know that Bryce is of Helena's line. So is her mother. I don't know. What do you think? I went to, I think it's a great point that she's talking to both of them, right? Because the prison door doesn't open in the tunnels until Nesta and Bryce kind of both knock on it.

1:33:34 Yeah. She like, leans on it. I said that. Yeah. What is that? It needs to be both of them, yeah. So I think that totally works. I hope, but if they're related and that's why Nesta is so close with Ember in there. Yeah. That's like in Crescent City stuff. But anyway, I just thought that was very strange that.

1:33:54 It's funny that you bring up Ember because we keep saying Ember has to be so important. Like it doesn't make sense that this line went through the Autumn King, but we think we're like crazy for that. We're like, it's got to be Ember but. I think so. I think she's the name Ember is too. Yeah. And two, I mean she has like this weird relationship with the priestesses where they notice and they protect her, her womb. And I definitely agree.

1:34:20 And the Autumn King like had to breed with Lauren to get Rune to be starborn. And then like Bryce is suddenly just like pow superstar born like it's Ember and Lauren. Sorry, it's not Einer Einer, you're not special. Oh. My gosh, which I we'll talk about that later, but about the Autumn King stuff.

1:34:43 But I just realized that I never answered you about Fion being the mask person, which kind of connects what we're talking about. Remember how? Oh my gosh. It's mask because when Nesta find the mask in the bog, it says that the mask was made for a long forgotten king. There's only one. There's one. There's one thing.

1:35:03 I think that. So for one, I thought that I thought that the Bone Carver was fion like I thought that when he was traded. I don't, but it doesn't match up the timeline. But he says like I am forgotten. And you know he does. Well, yeah, I think that forgotten SGM ASGMASJM just means death, I guess.

1:35:26 What I don't know. For context for listeners and for Abby, because this is DM situation. So we talked about we posted a clip about Helion having said that his power, like he he reacts really strongly to the map because an ancestor of his wore it like he basically says, like perhaps an ancestor of mine wore the mask and that's why, you know, it impacts me so strongly.

1:35:51 And we assumed that we knew that Theo wore the mask like that was Canon. Like we were aware of that. And Morgan comments. Yeah, Fiat. And I was like. I yelled at you. It was like when. I get so. Excited and this is her answering that it is because it was made for a long forgotten a long forgotten Yeah, I think it has to be yeah, I remember having that I think I.

1:36:16 There's a note in my. Kindle Fiat. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So. That's so funny. So I'm gonna just get 2 books really quick. I recently posted this theory about So I'm like Maeve is my obsession. I love Maeve. She's like my favorite thing to look into. We also love Maeve memorized her back story. Yeah I love love so much.

1:36:38 OK, so I'm going to be in Kingdom of Ash and Thorns and Roses and I'm just going to look between two chapters. So the part of the it's basically, I was rereading this and I came across something that I was like, that's exactly something that happened in this book. So in Kingdom of Ash, when just to give you the the setting, the back story, Maeve has Eilan in her, in her chamber, in her like mask and she's has her, she's captured her and she's been going she's been torturing her. She's kind of at this point trying to do what I've what I've said is like her version of good cop, bad cop. So she's like torturing her and then giving her these mental projections of like.

1:37:15 She's both of the cops. Yeah, she's both cops. So she's putting this like mental projection on Eilan. And the point of it is to kind of make her feel loose. She she makes her have this memory of like arriving to her aunt's castle. This is just her aunt. I picture them talking like Alice in Wonderland at the beginning, like in in like a Meadow.

1:37:37 And it's very comfortable and she's Eilan has this mentality that she's come to visit her end in doing so when she gets there, she sees this like really handsome man, they lock eyes, they're mates. It's this fairy tale version of her reality. And so Mabe is sort of doing this to then get to the story about the Queen who walks through worlds. And really it's just to get to the end of the story where she's like, she gets to telling what happened with with the Queen and Brandon.

1:38:02 And then she's like, so where do you think Brandon left the keys? And it's just her sneaky way of getting in there. But what's interesting is like the setting, the leading up to when she tells the story is exactly this book when Farah and Tamlin go into right before when they go to the enchanted pool, when they go out in the Glen, it is the same exact scene.

1:38:22 So my point isn't that Farah is made. I think a couple of things. I think that there's a lot of cycles in mass for So either Farrah is living a cycle that Mave has once lived or if people say like we were kind of talking in the comments, could Mave could Farrah be Maves origin story and and maybe from once she's remade under the mountain is like her birth, if that makes sense, because obviously we know when she's regular born. She's not being sought after for her magic, but she is reborn under the mountain.

1:38:51 That's not what I'm here to prove. What I'm here to prove is that the story is exactly the same argument would be when you're trying to convince someone or make this fabricated thing that's very detailed. It's way easier if it's something that you've already experienced. She's not making it up.

1:39:06 She's just recalling a memory. OK, so I don't know how well this is going to come out because I have to kind of compare, but I'm going to read. This is chapter 20 of Kingdom of Ash, page 181. And I'm going to read and skim through and then I'm going to go compare it to chapter 18 from this book. OK, so this is Maeve talking to Aylan, and she says, do you know of the story of the queen who walked through worlds? And then it sort of, the narration says. Seated on the mossy carpet of an ancient Glen, one hand toying with a small white flower strewn across it, Eilan shook her head. In the towering oaks that formed a lattice over the clearing, small stars blinked and shimmered as if they've been snared, which is a cute little

1:39:47 parallel to Pharaoh, obviously. So all around them, faint lilting singing floated on the warm summer air. And then here on the next page, she's basically describing how her mate had found a way to sneak her away from the revelry because it's her birthday. And he took her to a secluded pool in the forest heart. And he'd worshipped her in the sun, warm water. The forest pool had been a culmination of those months together.

1:40:13 And then he obviously left mating marks on her neck. OK, so I'm going to compare those things. And I also wanted to quickly point out that we have a reference to summer, spring and Autumn in just that page and a half. And the significance there is just leaning into mythology that the Fates, I think that Prythian is the gods realm and the Fates, which are an aspect of mythology are represented by spring, summer and Autumn.

1:40:36 So I find it interesting that she's just sort of they're just in that part of the text. OK. So OK, the comparison here. OK, Chapter 18 at the bottom of page 156. And I'm going to like, pound for pound, remind you of the of the comparison. So this is Farah, Lucian and Tamlin after their, their blue fairy friend has died. And they're sad.

1:40:58 And they're kind of just going out to take the day together. So it says. We sat atop a grassy Knoll overlooking a glade of oaks so wide and high they could have been the pillars and Spires of an ancient castle. Shimmering Tufts of dandelion fluff drifted by, and the floor of the clearing was carpeted with swaying croak, snowdrops and bluebells. So just ahead, a couple of things I'm going to try to go as I go overlooking a glade of oaks. So wide and tall obviously is towering oaks, and she's comparing them to the pillars and Spires of an ancient castle. In this ancient Glen, which Maeve is referencing, the floor is carpeted in the same way that it's a mossy carpet in the Maeve story.

1:41:38 And then of the flowers are crocuses, snowdrops, and bluebells. And in spring, two of those 3 flowers are white, which in Mae's reference, they're the white flowers blowing in the wind. So then we have though the three of us were alone, I could have sworn I heard singing the little things singing in the background. That may have reference.

1:41:55 That's reference in Maeve story. And then she says I hung my knees and drank in the Glen. Come on. Come on now. Didn't then one lays down a purple blanket. This isn't too special. However, I would say that everyone is very color-coded in the courts and purple, especially with like the purple and the blue tunic. Those don't belong there.

1:42:13 Yeah. Right. This purple blanket, it's just a weird thing to add in here, but it says she was tracing her hand through the feather soft grass, just like she's one hand toying with the flowers and maves and maves version. I certainly wasn't going to ruin the experience by sitting on the blanket. So where is she sitting? She seated on the carpet of the floor of the clearing. And then it gets to like a weird part where it feels to me like when.

1:42:38 Let me read it to you first, it says. Whispers were exchanged behind me, and before I could turn around to investigate, Timlin took a seat at my side. His jaw was clenched tight enough that I stared ahead. What is this place? I said, still running my fingers through the grass. Out of the corner of my eye, Tamlin was no more than a golden figure, just a Glen.

1:42:55 Do you like it? Tamlin asked quickly. And then it says. Shafts of sunlight streamed through the trees, similar to the stars shimming through the canopy overhead. Page 1 158 Tamron basically grabs her by the hand and he starts taking her through the woods, the wooded area and they leave Lucian behind, which to me is giving my mate, you know, took me away from the revelry and it says. We wove between the towering trees and we stopped the top of mound, my hands slacking up my sides. There in a clearing surrounded by towering trees lay a sparkling silver pool.

1:43:26 And then on 163 we have The liquid was delightfully warm. I shred in it until I was deep enough to swim out a few strokes and casually tread and place. And then we have on the next page 164. Maybe it was an enchanted pool. And then the last part is 165. It says a few hours of swimming and eating and lounging in the Glen.

1:43:44 So I think the point there is that one, they're exactly the same story. And I can go through the the mirror images, but I think that they were pretty obvious. Yeah. Why is that? Now I will say when I was referencing the mate thing, I kind of am under the idea that human Pharaoh could be Talon's mate and Faye Pharaoh could be Reese's mate.

1:44:04 And I think that could be maybe because of like the power dynamic maybe set up and I don't exactly know. But do you see? Does it seem to you like the exact same situation? And what does that mean to you? Yeah, I mean, I feel like I, Abby should react more than I heard because I think you sent me this first of all, for anybody who's listening, like you should go watch this video because Mauri explains it very nicely in the in the TikTok as well. But I think it's interesting, right? Like I think it could have a lot of meetings. One simple cop out, right, could be that Sarah J Maas had this like had this narrative outlined and just used it like that's always possible, right?

1:44:40 But I think it's interesting to like theorize about could could Maeve. We know that these Val royalty concept of like living other lives in different worlds exists. We know that Maeve is also say, Mahdi, like could she be aware of other lives? We also have these like admittedly kind of crazy theories out there, but like theories nonetheless that we know that Reese is aware of what's in fair his mind, right?

1:45:06 Like, we know that he has seen her dreams, seen her dreams when she's human. That is that's Canon. That's objectively true. And we have these interesting things that he's said right about her when she was human. Like he has said she would have been it for you to Tamlin. So like, when? When she was still.

1:45:23 Yeah. When she was still human. So could there be something else going on? Like Reese and Mave are described extremely similar, similarly, extremely similarly. So if they do have a connection, is that how Maeve is aware of the scene? We know she was spinning images for Aylan, so she doesn't have to have necessarily lived it to be spinning this for Alan necessarily. And doesn't may have say at one point too, that she has a collection of witch mirrors and that they're actually Valk mirrors and that she's been using them to spy on the different world on worlds.

1:45:56 Basically. It's like it could be that like maybe this, I know a lot of there's a lot of theories out there about this pool of Starlight. I don't have one personally. I don't know what this thing is, but like maybe the pool of Starlight is a type of mirror. Or maybe they're, I don't know, maybe there's a mirror in Chantlet's manner. But like, there's, I think there's a lot of ways Maeve could be seeing other worlds without being in them necessarily.

1:46:18 Yeah. And if I think we know that, actually, I think we know that she's doing that, yeah. And Elena says about, you know, because Maeve refers to herself as a God and Elena says that God's in multiple places at one time, just like you've said she could be in any of these places. And also, there's like a reference at the end of KOA when Aylen opens the portals and she sort of peers through where the wolf tribe comes out. She sees the same scene.

1:46:44 It's a forest Glen with the canopy of trees and the stars blinking out overhead. And it's shocking to her. So I do feel like even if she's not there, I feel like she's she like recognizes this place to some to some capacity. I don't exactly think it's her, but it's a very, it's just very cycle. And I think there's a lot of cycle driven things obviously. Yeah, there's no way that pool Starlight means nothing. No, I just don't know what it means. It's golden and thick.

1:47:12 So I was thinking, is the Starlight pool nature's cauldron Cauldron like the good version of it, You know, the golden light same was Favour's drop, whereas the bald version alter ego of it, the corrupted version, warm and thick and golden and ones cold and icy and deathless and frozen so. It doesn't favor at one point ask what would happen if I drink it and Tam it's like I have no idea.

1:47:36 He's like, he says, a lifetime of happiness. Lifetime, yeah. Says it would make you like basically forget your woes, which is what Haiti says to Persephone. And. Yeah, I do wonder whether when Sarah started writing a guitar she had a Hades and Persephone trope in mine. Why would you think so? She's that.

1:47:57 It's like the story, she said in an interview. I didn't know this when I made the video initially, but someone sent it to me and apparently she said that. So I think she's incorporated so much. I thought that the bad boys were like Peter Pan style. You know, yeah, I like that. With the Lost Boys and then favorite Darling is like Wendy Darling, yeah.

1:48:16 I love that so I look. Very cute, Yeah. I mean, in all of court with a Court of Thorns and Roses is Beauty and the Beast vibes. Yes. Well, yeah, I was gonna say I'm surprised that that line is attributed to Hades, because Tamlin is certainly not who I would think of as Hades in this series. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think that he's Hades, but I have a video where I basically point to I I have another video where I reread this version of Nathaniel Hawthorne's story of Persephone in Hades.

1:48:42 And when fair, when fair is taken into Prythean and taken into the estate of Tamlin, it's it makes me think that like all of Prythean or all of the high Lords are like of this Hades. Yeah. And because it the story is very repetitive in the in that same way. So it's interesting. I don't think that Haiti, because also Haiti's in in like original mythology, is not a demon. He's not a bad guy.

1:49:07 He's just the king of the underworld. He just rules there and he's bored. But I think and completed into demon talk like he's like this bad guy. And I think that maybe can separate people from being a lot, you know, the Tamlin protectors. It's like, I love Tamlin too, but he needs to. We need to be a objective.

1:49:25 Yeah, and well, and it's interesting the idea that of all of Prythian being the underworld, because we have 7 courts and seven levels of hell and all that jazz, 7. Levels of the library. 7 levels of the library, 7 asterisk. Seven everything is easy and I was wondering if it becomes hell or if they I don't know. I'll send you the video, Abby.

1:49:46 It's really cool when you see the comparison. I have a whole video like it's pretty in hell so. Yeah, it's really, I'm so scared. We're getting set up for that. I'm so scared. That what there's a lot of comes. Yeah, there's a lot of Reddit threads asking whether Prithean as hell. I think it's a valid question.

1:50:02 I also think if we didn't hear and like who trusts the Asteria at this point really? But if we didn't hear direct from their mouths, like, and again, not a reason to believe it, but like is is Prithean the Asteri home world? If you didn't hear that their home world was in ruins, I would believe it, right? Because this like this light, this world of like light and darkness that seems to span two sides. Yeah, is interesting, right?

1:50:30 It seems like it could be it could be mirroring that, but I don't know. Well, thank you so much for coming on and sharing your theories with us and everyone. 3 faced goddess on TikTok. There's certainly more where that came from in short form. And she puts kind of her quotes on the on the page, but you got to hear it in podcast form, a long form here today, which was super fun.

1:50:52 So thank you, Morgan, for joining us. Thank you SO. Much and sharing your theories and I think with that we'll close out. Abby, what are you reading? Alchemist again? Alchemist again, OK. I'm going to start the will of the many and I'm really excited about it. Amazing. Good. I'm excited to start that one too.

1:51:09 Morgan, what are you reading? I am finishing metal Slinger. Metal Slinger. OK. So I didn't feel about that one. It's really good. Is it good? Yes, I heard there's. Some might be reading. Twist at the end, so. Love a plot twist. Me too. All right, I'm just I'm reading Alchemist. We talked about that at the beginning.

1:51:28 So nothing new. Nothing new there. Abby, do you want to take us home all? Right, we are drags in the details pod on on instagram.tiktokandyoutubeyoucanemailus.dragusinthedetailpod.dragusinthedetailspod@gmail.com. We are also on Discord because in the details pod server and we have a website becauseinthedetails.com. No pod in that one.

1:51:49 Reach out to us any questions, comments, DMS. We love hearing from you guys. We read your theories if we like them. It really makes our day and that is it. Thanks again Morgan for joining us this week. Thank you, love you. Bye. Thank you so much. Bye, bye, love you. Bye. Love you. Bye.