Zalgo: The good, the bad, and the very, very ugly

Have you ever seen this? The best way to predict the future is t̷o̶ ì̴͇n̵͓̆v̶̝̕ȇ̷̝͈̩͊̇̾̄̂̀̈̔̀͛͋͆̓͒͘͝ͅn̸̦̙̣̤͓̜̼͙̲͔̺͚̮̬͆̇̇͐̇̽̒̎t̵̮͎̃̒͒̋̂̏̒̀̿͌͗̄͑̀̀͒̈̚͠͝ ȋ̸̧̛̭̠͈̰̰̦̹̥̜̖̈̂̀̽̿̋̊́̇̍̓̆̉̄̄̊͊̒̎͋̂̒̍̽̄͝ͅt̶̨̢̺̱̻̭̣͉͕̥͚̯͍̣͕͔̬̥͔̘̼͌̉̀̄̊̆͛̽̍̐̔̐̀̾̋̆͒̏̏̋͋̽͗̌͋͗.̸̧̨̧̡̢̪͙̦͙̝̜̦̞̳̤͖̟͍̮͖̘̙̳͉̳̲̲͉̠͎̽̍̓̒̅̿͂͑̎͊̋͒̈́̅̈́̆̽̒͛͐͛̉̀̈́̈̉̏̏̋̒͘͝͝͝ In the lore of the web, this kind of a strange glitchy text is known as Zalgo: Zalgo is a meme where a popular picture/​comic is edited in a way that “corrupts” it, producing scary results. The term “Zalgo” refers to the being apparently responsible for the corruption, whose name is uttered by its victims in an eldritch manner. I’ll let you read up on that at the above link if you are curious, but what’s interesting for us here is that… Zalgo is text. You can grab the line above. You can copy and paste it. You can even try to edit it. But… what is that, and why is it possible to construct text this way? In Unicode, ä is a completely independent character from ą, and they are both…