#which is why i also have a barracks for every copy i get of him just in case :)

[digitalmidnight]

In honor of his recent birthday, a year 1 f2p's favorite character; Libra.

Despite many efforts, only got one of him on last day of his debut banner. Somehow, I did not get him to +10 until late 2020. He still holds up perfectly fine and will be obtaining Rearmed Lucina's axe soon.

Friend code

[doopcafe]

Star Wars TCW: A Distant Echo (7x02)

Summary: The Banal Batch and Anakin find a borgified Echo. 

Comments: Is the clone base on this planet the same as the one in Rebels: Out of Darkness? Did they just copy the model from Rebels, or...? 

Anakin is Zoom chatting with his “wife” in the officer’s barracks as Rex stands guard outside. First, there’s a bit of tolerable interaction here between Anakin/Padme, albeit with awkward pacing. Second, it’s clear that Rex knows what Anakin is doing and is specifically on guard for Prequel!Wan who, third, shows up and stupidly bickers with Rex outside as Anakin takes his sweet time finishing the call, knowing full well Rex is there sweating balls over the predicament that Anakin has placed him in. This is all in line with Anakin’s character, so the consistency is at least... predictable. 

Prequel!Wan says, “I hope you at least told Padme I said hello,” afterwards, which... I might be an idiot, but clearly Prequel!Wan knows Anakin is holding secret conversations with Padme. I mean, they all have to know at this point, right? 

Anyways, back to the “plot,” The Banal Batch and Anakin fly to Skako Minor where they expect to find Echo and someone says, “We are approaching Skako Minor, it looks to be a difficult landing.” 

But then they just, like, safely land without complication. Like Techno just sets the ship down.

Ah, then a series of seriously stupid things happen. The group is attacked by these flying creatures, so Anakin drops his lightsaber and Tech(no?), uh, directs the fire of the sniper by saying some numbers. Sniper guy hooks one with a grappling hook from like, a kilometer away, which Rex uses to grab onto the creature that’s flying away with Anakin...

Ah, what was the plan here? Rex starts shooting the creature that’s carrying him, which is the equivalent of setting off explosives in an airplane you’re riding in. If you succeed at killing the creature, then you both fall to your deaths? It’s okay, because Rex has read the script ahead of time and unhooks his rope to drop to a ledge right outside the native’s village where he can call in their location and bring in help for Anakin. 

If the goal was to find where Anakin was being taken, why not just like, I dunno, follow in your perfectly intact ship? Through the perfectly clear skies of this planet? Or just home in on Anakin’s signal from his communicator? 

Whatever, it turns out this was a pointless scene for drama because they all just show up in this village anyways and immediately rescue Anakin from the aliens, who have conveniently placed a perfectly shaped, round boulder outside their outpost for the purpose of being used against them for such a purpose. 

Tech has a universal translator built into his head set which allows him to Google Translate anything the aliens say. Okay. Okay, that makes sense. But then, in the opposite direction, it translates English into the aliens language and... Tech just speaks it to them? What the hell? I’m going to just assume there’s like, a microphone and speaker inside his helmet that’s actually recording and translating his speech, but, I don’t know anymore. 

Also, my PhD in engineering *pushes up nerd glasses* tells me that “latency issue with the frequency” is nonsense. Does he mean phase shift? Why doesn’t he just say “phase shift?” If he does mean phase shift, then why can’t he just account for it? Even if it’s dynamic and/or time-varying, I would think technology from another galaxy a long time ago would be able to handle that? 

Er, anyways, Rex is confronted about the validity of their mission—while balls deep in that mission—and he defends the mission by declaring that he “knows” Echo is still alive because he recognized Echo’s voice in the transmission from last episode. Ah... they’re clones? They’re all clones? They all have an identical voice? 

Anyways, the natives help them get to the Techno Union’s city thing where they break into a room at the base of the giant pillar that holds it up. Anakin orders Crosshair, the sniper, to “check it out.” He does so, and sarcastically says, “yah, it’s a lift,” to which Anakin responds, “well, we already knew that,” in like an annoyed voice. If you already knew it was a lift, (a) why did you order him to check it out, (b) why did you order Crosshair, the sniper, to recon a room?, and (c) why didn’t you, an invincible “Jedi” do it yourself? By the way, you may have noticed that, by virtue of being a sniper, the Crosshair’s primary weapon is a seven-foot-long rifle poorly suited for clearing a room. 

Anyways, let me end this “review.” In the lift, Anakin is attempting to explain the importance of stealth, when the doors open, there’s guards, and the Banal Batch storm out, shooting everything. They keep trying to track Echo’s signal, but it gets lost, so they split up, Wat Tambor (?) traps most of them with a bunch of droids, fighting happens (not gonna lie, I skipped over it) and... they find Echo who... LOL... has robot legs... 

Honestly, “droids get shot apart by invulnerable clones” is sooooo f—ing boring to watch.

In conclusion, Echo’s alive because “no one’s every really gone.”

My enjoyment: 1/5

[prorevenge]

Made these kids work for 9 months for NOTHING!

Okay so a little background before I start my story.

My name is Patrick. I am 18 years old and I’m an Eagle Scout. To get Eagle in my troop you have lead a 50 mile hiking or canoeing trip which typically lasts a week or more. For my leadership I got a long three week trip to Alaska (which is pretty substantial since we live in a city that borders Mexico.) One week for hiking, one for canoeing, and one for touring. This requires we start planning at least 9 months in advance. I am one of two main leaders for this trip and there is one assistant leader to help us.

I’ve changed their names for privacy reasons.

Andy - The other main leader on the trip going for Eagle.

Robert - The assistant leader assigned to help us.

Mr. Sammy - My scoutmaster.

Let’s start from the beginning. Since the trip is in June - July we start planning in August - September. We start out pretty smooth. Andy and I get an idea of who’s going and how much the trip will cost per person while Robert manages payments and some paperwork. Things are good. Later on we start to lose track of our work and get lazy (since the trip is like 8 months away). So Mr. Sammy starts laying into us calling us a bad leadership team.

This is where my battle with Andy and Robert begins.

For some reason unbeknownst to me Andy and Robert decided it was my fault the leadership team had temporarily fallen apart. They team up and decide it’s Me vs Them (which is a really bad way to approach this trip). They don’t talk to me and hide things from me. When I do paperwork they decide not to take it and do it themselves. Whenever Mr. Sammy gets mad about ANYTHING they instantly look for a way to pin the blame on me.

I decide rather than fighting with them I try to reach out and communicate to maybe save the Alaska trip dream team. That didn’t really work. Every single time I talk to them Robert decides to lash back at me for minor things being as rude and condescending as possible. Andy (who hasn’t done anything for the trip) just stands behind him with his thumb up his ass. Keep in mind most of this occurs over text. After I’ve reached out as much as possible I decide “okay motherfuckers. You wanna fight? I’ll fight.” But not in the way you’d think.

Flash forward to maybe 4 months before the trip. Up to this point Robert has done most of the paperwork (since he was deliberately hiding it from me) and has managed all of the payments while Andy has been standing around with his thumb up his ass doing whatever Robert says. Mr. Sammy looks at me like I’m a bag of shit left on his front porch.

This is where the fun begins.

As soon as I get the chance I take all of the up to date paperwork from e-mail to Mr. Sammy from Robert and copy it to my computer. After that I see that the excel documents this kid has made are a TOTAL clusterfuck so I reformat them and update the information to look really uniform and pretty (even if your document is full of bullshit having it look pretty is half the battle). From this point on the paperwork is in my control. I send and e-mail to Mr. Sammy with the subject “UPDATED ALASKA PAPERWORK (insert date)”. From that point on the old man only excepts my copy which Robert and Andy don’t have. Even if they download it from my email I make sure to be the one who updates it and emails it first. I copy my two “partners” on every single email to Mr. Sammy just to say “look at me”.

From that point on I control all of the paperwork. Payments, IDs, the roster, the tip calendar, everyone’s contact info, etc. I have it all under lockdown and make sure Mr. Sammy knows it in every email I send him.

The problem is now that when anything goes wrong there’s even more of a reason for Robert and Andy to verbally assault me and put all the blame on me. But I have my battle plan. I just play it cool. Everything Robert says I just answer “okay, is that all?” And when he’s done I say “thanks for the feedback I’ll keep that in mind.” I’ll give you an example of one of these conversations.

Me: (to a group chat with Andy and Robert) okay guys I updated the roster and other stuff. Robert has anyone else made a payment recently?

Robert: Maybe.

Me: Maybe?

Robert: You’re missing a lot of info on the payment roster. This kind of carelessness is going to cost me my leadership and I won’t stand for it.

(at this point I think “that’s why I’m asking you this dip shit” but I keep cool)

Andy: I agree.

(“As always” I think)

Me: Thats too bad. Would you update me on those payments so I can get it updated?

Robert: I guess. he then gives me all the payment info I need

Me: Thanks Robert! 😄

These conversations always made me want to rip my hair out, but by playing it cool and keeping calm and being nice I never really gave them any reason to go after me. Now they don’t have anything to give to Mr. Sammy to make me look bad. Just them being rude to me while I say things like “Thanks Robert! 😄”

This ended up making the two so mad that they spent most of their time trying to make me look bad and trying to make me mad that they didn’t spend any time working on the planning for the trip. This was fine by me even though I had to play attrition with these guys every night for months over text message. All I cared was that I was looking good, and I was. They weren’t which made them even more mad.

When it comes time to distribute the food we need for the trip I also take that over not letting the other two touch it so they can fuck it up and blame it on me. To be fair I could’ve done a way better job at this but I did get the job done and we had all the food we needed for 2 weeks away from civilization (almost).

After 9 months of ripping my greying hairs out for having to deal with these two annoying pestering balls of hate we are finally flying from our hometown up to Alaska to go on this trip. Andy and Robert decide to sit back and blend in with the crowd of scouts in khaki uniforms which is perfect for me. I step up making it obvious that I was in charge and leading the scouts through each airport. When we land I make sure to get everyone dressed into their hiking clothes in the airport and packed for the hiking trip. (It was past midnight in the airport so no one was around to watch us change.) after that we take a bus to the trailhead.

At this point I have stepped up as much as I can for Mr. Sammy and he noticed pretty well. He also notices Robert and Andy blending in with the crowd not doing anything. I speculate that they probably didn’t want to associate with me because they expected me to mess up and didn’t want to be a part of that mess up. Jokes on them. I’m looking pretty good at this point.

1st day of hiking. We run into a problem. Two of these stupid younger scouts have forgotten they’re dehydrated meat so now we have to divide up the other meat but first have to figure out who has it (I didn’t keep good track of who had what food item which I’m willing to admit is my fault entirely). I notice that after like 36 hours of idleness Robert and Andy have sprung into action to document what food item EVERYONE is carrying. You might think I’d try to stop them but I just thought “hey they’re finally doing something.” I offered them my help multiple times which they refused so I simply sat back and watched.

After they documented everything they called me over to talk. I knew I was about to get a meaningless lecture from a pasty Jewish kid and his Mexican buddy short enough to be speedy Gonzales. It went down exactly as I thought it would. They told me basically...

“This is all your fault and you need to acknowledge that. You didn’t even help us fix it and you really need to start stepping up because you’re making US look bad.” They continued to go on bus that summarizes what the said.

I simply asked “is that all” and then went to bed. I could practically feel the heat from their foreheads as they got angrier and angrier.

To make a long story short I did really really well leading the hiking trip according to scoutmaster Sammy. After we had finished he came up to me and told me I’d done a great job. As far as he was concerned I had earned my leadership requirement for eagle but Andy hadn’t and Robert wasn’t doing well either. He asked me to supervise they’re leadership for the week long canoeing trip and week long touring section.

At this point I had them right where I wanted them. I knew Andy and Robert didn’t have what it took to lead a trip this big, so I sat back and watched them struggle. It was great.

The canoeing portion went awful. Andy and Robert broke our propane stoves on the first day! The food was awful and they never planned ahead one bit. I offered to help but always got turned down. I knew they would do that.

After canoeing came the touring part of the trip which went even worse.

For a portion of our touring trip we stayed in a public park in a small town. Andy and Robert decided it would be a grand idea to leave their stuff outside of their tents at night where anyone could see them. Come morning time and their backpacks were GONE! Not only did they lose their scout uniforms but also their cellphones and wallets! I acted like I cared but on the inside I was laughing my ass off.

Later we stayed in an army barracks in anchorage. Mr Sammy told Andy and I to get the scouts to bed by 10:00 but we both totally forgot. Come 10:20 I was doing laundry for everyone while Andy and Robert were messing around in a community room. People were laughing and playing cards and even showering. Mr. Sammy has just returned from dinner with an old friend and he was FURIOUS to find people still awake. I could hear him chewing out Andy in the hallway. He came into the laundry room and yelled at my friend and I.

“PATRICK! WHY ARE YOU TWO STILL AWAKE!”

“We are doing laundry for the scouts sir.”

“Oh... okay.”

AND HE WALKED OUT WITHOUT PAYING ME ANY ATTENTION! He then proceeded to chew out Andy harder and harder for letting people stay awake. He ended up getting all of the blame. Watching him get yelled at was like seeing fireworks in 1830. Beautiful.

Now, almost a year later, I am an Eagle Scout. In case you didn’t figure it out, Andy and Robert didn’t get credit for leadership on this trip. 9 MONTHS OF WORK DOWN THE DRAIN!!! Andy hasn’t even started writing up his eagle project (which is a ton of awful paperwork in my troop). He actually didn’t come to any meetings for like 2 months after the trip. Robert has been scrambling endlessly to make up for his lost leadership which is really fun to watch.

Now I just drive my brothers to the meetings on Tuesdays and get to watch the pair give me dirty looks. It honestly makes me feel ecstatic. 9 months of dealing with their bullshit every night and 3 weeks of taking it face to face in the woods and it was all worth it!

If you made it this far, thanks for reading! Feel free to share this story anywhere.

(source) story by (/u/IF_RealTrap)

[wolfromtheisland]

Reunion

TIMELINE: Pre ARR - During the Events of ARR

LOCATION: The Far East - Northern Thanalan

It was like watching the world continue after dying.

My plan had succeeded. I saw it with my own eyes. The look in mother's eyes when she cut me down. The sight of what a beautiful monster she had become. It was all I wanted. All I needed. I could face this death I had accepted long ago without fear.

And yet I didn't die.

After my body fell into the sea from mother's blow, I awoke on something called a "ship". The other people there had apparently stopped me from dying. I don't think my mind accepted that, that these kinds of wounds which I had seen kill dozens of us on the island, could be stopped. There had to be some kind of cost to this, a price to pay. As if to validate my disbelief, the second thing I noticed after the fact that my wounds were closed was that I was bound in chains.

It's a strange thing, the mind dying before the body. A sense of self, opinions and feelings, they die with the mind. But knowledge, reflexes, sensations, they do not. They told me I was “a slave". It apparently meant I had to do whatever they told me. That I would be "rented out" to people for a task and returned, like how I used to borrow Vigilis' tools for traps and hunts. They tried to hurt me to make that point, to show me what happened if I disobeyed, but they didn't keep it up for long. Even if my body was in pain, my mind wasn't able to react to it. Nevertheless, when given an order I reacted reflexively, as if they were her orders on a hunt.

These traits of mine apparently made me bad for social jobs, so I would get sent out on manual labor jobs most often. I would often be returned with high praise, like, complimenting me as if they liked my craftsmanship. 

There was a lot of information to hear on these jobs, knowledge to record. This place I ended up was called "The Far East '' it seemed. The people I kept being returned to were called "The Five Dragons Cartel ''. The people who spoke seemed to talk of them with the same regard the clan spoke of monsters. These people? Monsters? I didn't see it.

Upon completing a task I would always be returned to the ship and then put in some kind of lower chamber called the barracks. There were others like me there, slaves, but all very much alive body and soul. Whether big and bestial in size and demeanor, or meek and cowering, the pain of living was vividly present on all of them. Except one boy, a "miqo'te" as they seemed to call us. He hid it much better than the rest.

When I first was placed down there I noticed him attempting to tell stories to the other slaves. The bigger ones would scare him off, while the meek ones would plead to be left alone. That's probably why he gravitated towards me, corpse-like as I was. I never responded in anyway, but he would always go on about stories from his land. Fantastical tales of Five Headed Monsters and the 8 immortals who defeated them. The story seems to go that was the origin of his country and he would continue on with it's history from there. They were always rambling dumps of information, probably only memorable because I had nothing else to focus on when he told me, but whenever he did he would have a wide grin on his face. That bright smile in the midst of great hardship seemed almost familiar.

I’m not sure why I remember that.

The cycle of being sent out for jobs and returning to the boy's stories continued until one of our owners took an interest in me. Something about my physicality seemed to make them think it would be good to train me. He simply handed me some sharp metal and told me to attack him. I'd say the lesson started out miserably because I threw the sword at him as my first action and went to attack with my claws, instinct kicking in. Unfortunately for me that had been clipped since coming here, and my former way of fighting was left unusable. After that however things went smoothly. "Do as I do" he said, doing technique after technique with a blade. I copied him to the best of my ability, which appeared to be an impressive feat, perhaps even a scary one from his reactions to me.

Before long, I was sent on new jobs. No longer just moving heavy objects or moving long distances, but jobs called "assassinations" where I was told to kill. The smile left the boys face when he learned this; one of the few times I ever saw such a thing happen.

He told me how those jobs were very dangerous, that I might not come back from them. This seemed to cause him pain of some kind. It was odd, as the boy had more than enough reason to display his pain as it was. He wasn't the best at jobs from the look of it, and would be taken to the owners before being returned to the barracks, more battered than before. He would even be returned from jobs battered, which strangely would make the owners happy and get them more "money" than usual. Despite all of that, the most pain I ever saw him reveal was when he heard this news about me. 

Why? What was it called... worry?

It seemed... familiar.

But that's not important.

The cycle continued from that point on but was changed. The jobs were longer. The preparations for hunting a human were more extensive than I would have thought, but they taught me a lot about them in their own right over the many assassins. Weaknesses, strengths, fears, pleasures, they all varied a bit from mark to mark, but not enough to matter. Besides a change to the environment and some lies having to be told here or there, it was no different than hunting beasts. Like the beasts, I don't even remember how many of them I hunted. It must have been a lot though as the owners were very happy with the "profit" I brought in talking about "charging" more for me. They all seemed very pleased with themselves, except for the one who trained me, he seemed almost... nervous.

After every excursion, the boy seemed more and more happy to see me come back, and would barrage me with stories more than usual, many of which I had heard before. They seemed different though, when he told them those times. Before it seemed more practiced, but this time there was a genuine warmth to them.

It made me feel.... something. 

Which was uncomfortable for a corpse like me.

And it was also something else I don't remember. It didn’t matter.

It would all change soon. After I saw her again.

The Five Dragons started doing business with some entity known as "The Garlean Empire" after the notoriety my jobs seemed to bring in. From what I had heard of them, they were the first thing these people regarded with fear that seemed to approach a true "Monster." We journeyed to some fortress of theirs, but in the course of our voyage, something had gone wrong. We approached their port to clear signs of combat and hostility. It looked like a largescale hunt. And then, from the distance out at sea, we saw that warzone disintegrate. A massive explosion left all in the surrounding area devastated in a circle of flames. Then, there, standing amongst the fires, The first real Monster I had seen in these 5 years. A mechanical behemoth towering over 8 people. I felt like I could just about feel my heart beat for the first time in these five years. Had it caused that explosion? If so, it was terrifyingly beautiful. The most beautiful monster I had seen since-

and then I noticed. The Behemoth was losing, losing to the people, losing to the "adventurer", as I heard them called, that was leading the charge. What person could possibly have become monstrous enough to match such a monster?

It was her.

I was yalms away from the actual fight but I could tell. The way she moved, the way she roared, changed over these years, adapted, but adapted exactly how I'd expect her to adapt to this world.

It felt like every heartbeat I had missed for five years hit me at once. I could barely keep myself standing, tears were streaming down my cold face and I spoke for the first time since I died.

"Mother...!"

As I watched the fight however, more keenly, more emotionally, I realized. Something was wrong. 5 years ago my plan should have turned her into a monster, a furious untameable terror on this land a ruler among beasts. She had that in her, that beautiful potential. But as she felled the mechanized giant and it's operator was ejected, she didn't go for the kill. Nor was she alone, seven others fought alongside her. Friends? Allies?! 

No no no no NO!!

This was all wrong. As long as she had something left to lose,  someone that she had not lost yet, she would never truly reach her monstrous potential. I cursed the foolishness of it all. I cursed my own foolishness as well. Clearly I had underestimated her, thinking that I would unlock her potential back then. As she fought now was well beyond my childhood dreams, as was the entirety of this world outside our torturous little island. But I had seen the world, I had seen her. A new plan was needed to unleash the queen of monsters.

"Oh what would you do without me mother...?"

I was stuck in my own world so I hadn't noticed. Apparently 3 guards had tried to tear me away from the boats edge and back into the barracks. They laid dead at my feet. I took a moment to process what must have happened. The first one likely grabbed me casually, given my reputation of being docile. I'd likely have flipped behind him and strangled him with my hand restraints. Breaking those with the sword he dropped, I would use that to cut down the other two who approached me so I could keep watching mother's hunt. Having finally snapped out of my own head, I looked upon my current situation. The entire force of guard we had, including the head guard who trained me, the majority of the slave body, and even the five dragons, albeit from a safe distance, had their attention turned to me on the deck of the ship.

I took in the situation, processed everything I learned about these beasts known as "man", thought about how best to go forward with my plan, with what's best for mother.

I started my hunt.

I started with a tactic I from my old world, one I saw mother use often, and challenged the head guard to singles combat. He kept a strong face, but I had seen the fear in him before this incident even began. He talked a lot more as my offensive pushes gained ground, shouted words like "animal", "beast", 

"Monster".

That's how I knew he was finished. Revealing his fear of a false monster like me. He soon became nothing more than a cornered beast, biting off more than he could chew and then calling for the rest of the pack to save him. I'd seen his kind before in many forms, this is exactly what they looked like before they died.No one moved an inch to save him from me, in fact, the majority of them backed away. After I cut him down, the rest of the guards barely put up a fight. 

The Five Dragons turned to the slaves to protect them, pleading to them, bribing them with promises of money and freedom. I used this to gauge them. I could easily tell from their faces alone. The arrogant smile of someone too stupid or strong willed to truly be brought to heel. The fearful gaze of a coward that couldn't be trusted to stay loyal to strength. I needed a middle ground. Strong enough, ambitious enough to follow power, but smart enough, fearful enough to bend to someone stronger. One by one I cut down the unsuitable faces. Only seven were left when my slaughter was finished. Seven slaves, eight counting me, that fit the criteria, and five dragons. I backed them to the edge of their boat. They were too measly, too cowardly to even jump and take their own lives. And the people of this land considered them monsters? 

Pathetic.

Disrespectful!

Disgusting!!

That they would even be compared to such beauty!

I hunted them slowly, unlike anything I had ever hunted. But in the end this wasn't a hunt. This was something else. Something I learned from them, anI made sure to copy them perfectly. The methods I had seen them use, the wounds they had put on that smiling face.

Smiling?

Who?

The torture I was copying never resulted in death, so I hadnt an idea how to do it. In the end, I left them to the seven remaining slaves. Hours passed before the dragons finally died. And then those former slaves turned to me, expectantly.

"Ah, what is one supposed to do here... a speech?" I thought to myself. And then I thought more. A memory came to me.

"Brothers! Sisters! Our captors are slain by the eight of us! And in their place shall we rule their fallen empire eternally! As the Five Dragons fall, us Eight Immortals, The Anba Xi’an Cartel shall rise!!"

There was a pause. And then they cheered with me. That speech though, where had I heard it? And why did it make me think of a smile?

A smile...

Thinking on that, not all the faces I cut down were arrogant or cowardly. There was one that was different.

One that was smiling.

Why did I cut down that one? What did I feel as I did so?

I don't remember.

But it doesn't matter.

All that matters now is the plan

All that matters now is changing Mother, 

changing Xantunsia, 

into the beautiful monster she deserves to be

[alloveroliver]

Mousse x Alice (MC) “Are You That Type of Girl?”

Fluff; Mousse Atlas

A Valentines Day Kiss Event: Bonus-Bunch Winner!

WC: 1,995 Prompt: Kiss in the rain.

Ikemen Revolution Fanfic

♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡  ♥ ୨♡୧ ♥  ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥

Mousse spots Alice ducking into the cafe across the street. The sprinkles of rain stain the dull concrete filling the air with the scent of grass and wet dirt. He marvels for a moment how cute she looks even with water messing up her carefully crafted curls. Smiling to himself, he takes one last swig of his coffee. The coins chime on the wooden table, the payment he leaves for the bill, while he darts away from the cover of the restaurant.

He pulls up his shirt collar and hides from the sprinkles as much as he can while crossing the narrow street. Alice runs her fingers through her moist hair, trying to tame the frizz, and sets down her large shopping bags at an open table. The patio wasn’t packed, but there were a few people still out enjoying their morning brunch.

“Hello there, Alice. Got caught up in the rain I see?” Mousse beams a kind smile at her, tucking his shirt collar back down under cover of the patio’s plastic awning.

“Oh! Hello!” Alice spins around to see him making the bottom of her dress form a bell shape. “I did, unfortunately. I was hopeful I could make it back to the headquarters before it really started to pour.”

“It isn’t pouring yet. Just a few sprinkles, but you never know when the sky will open up.” He stands next to the empty chair and watches her take a seat.

“True, but the bags I’m carrying seem to be getting heavier by the minute.” Her laughs chimes like a bell.

“May I join you?” He gestures to the chair.

“Oh, sure!”

“I figure if we wait together maybe time will go by quicker.” Mousse states, scooting his chair closer to the table.

“Talking to someone seems to have that effect, huh?” She glows, even after being misted with the rain.

“It does, especially with you I find.” He smirks, wiping off the droplets on his sleeve.

The rain falls heavier, then lighter in waves as they sit and chat. Alice pulls out a small notebook she purchased from a nearby vendor and examines it.

“I was worried some of my things may be getting ruined from the water.” She uses an available napkin at the table and wipes down the small diary.

“That is a legitimate concern. Did you purchase anything that you could cover your other items in?”

Alice pauses for a moment, tapping her finger to her lips. “Oh! I did! I found a thick peacoat just around the corner.” She digs through her other large bag and begins to arrange things on the table. “I can take things out that may soil and wrap them in my coat while I walk back. Then the coat can simply be washed.”

“That’s a great idea. You’re so clever.” His mint eyes rest on her smile.

“Well, it was your idea. I just went with it.”

“True. However, you took my words to heart. Only a wise person would listen to others the way you do. I always feel like you really hear me when I speak.”

Alice stopped rolling items in the coat and cut her eyes up to him. “Of course I hear you.”

“I don’t think you know how well you hear me though. Most people pretend to listen and respond, but you internalize my words and respond with profundity.” His voice is soft as it floats over to Alice’s ears.

“I see.” She bites her lip while going back to her task. “Well, I’m always willing to talk with you.” He watches her hands fumble with the coat for a moment before someone can be heard clearing their throat next to them. Mousse jerks his gaze away from Alice, while Alice peers wide-eyed at the interloper. The women holds her hand on her hip, wearing a teal apron and a slight frown.

“You can’t sit out here without buying something. This cafe is private property.” The employee speaks in an annoyed tone.

“Can I get a pot of green tea for us to split then?” Mousse takes out his wallet and removes a coin to hand to the worker. 

She takes the payment and drops the coin into her front pocket. “Anything else? We have a lunch menu on now.” She adds. Mousse looks over at Alice and perks up his brows with an unspoken question. “Oh no, I’m not hungry. Thank you.” She bows her head sincerely. The waitress nods and walks back into the establishment. “Hogwash.” Mousse whispers with a smirk. “I’m sorry?” She cocks a brow at him, unable to wipe the smile off her face. “You’re always hungry.” “Maybe…” She chuckles. “I’m hoping the rain will stop soon and I can rush home at a moments notice.” “I can help carry your bags for you.” “You don’t have to do that. It’s not that far of a walk from here.” Alice plays with a strand of her hair, twisting it around her fingers. “It’s no trouble. You said the bags were heavy so let me help you take a load off.” “Okay… If you insist.” He catches her smiling at him out of the corner of his eye. The waitress returns with a piping hot teapot along with two teacups, cream, and cubes of sugar. “Let me know if you two need anything else.” The woman nods to Mousse and retreats back inside. Alice places the large coat wrapping all her valuables back into the larger shopping bag. She rearranges other items she purchased and turns her attention back to Mousse. “How many sugars do you like?” Mousse asks, snapping the mini tongs used for holding the cubes of sugar. “One or two? Or more, I really won't judge if you like it sweet.” “Um, three?” She bashfully states, moving her empty teacup towards the tongs. The minutes pass while they chat. The pot of tea slowly empties as they both drink their fair share of the warm liquid. With the rain finally letting up, the sun peeks through the clouds, spilling rays of gold over the wet ground. Soon the awning they sit under becomes humid. The warm sun evaporates the rain giving the plastic walls a coat of fog. “I think now is our chance.” Mousse takes one last swig of his teacup and stands to his feet. “I think you’re right.” Alice joins him, gathering half her bags in her hands while Mousse gathers the other half in his. They take off at a quick pace towards the bridge to the black army barracks while the thick air taints their skin in a wet sheen. “Thank you for the tea, Mousse.” Alice tries to set a quick pace. “Anytime. I really enjoy my time with you.” He relaxes his face and lets the happiness in his heart radiate through his body. “I also… enjoy spending time with you. It’s very fortunate we keep running into each other like this.” She laughs, scratching the back of her neck. “It is. I hope next time it can be a planned date.” “Date?” Alice gulps, slowing her pace to a normal stride. Mousse copies her as not to surpass her as they walk over the bridge. “Would you like to go on a date with me? In two days time, there is a monthly market full of foods and pop up restaurants. We could sample some of their cuisines and eventually have dinner at our favorite one.” His hands tighten on the bags he carries, but he keeps a confident smile on his face. “I think-” The sky grows darker while small droplets begin to fall on their cheeks. “I’d love to.” “Great! I will pick you up then.” His heart rate speeds up along with the falling rain that splashes the ground around them. “That could be date number two.” “Two?” She shouts. “When was the first one?” She uses her shoulder to nudge his arm while pink stains her wet cheeks. “Just now, if you wish to call it that.” Alice presses her lips together in a thin line trying to hide her smile. “Okay, then It’s a date- was. Then it was a date.” Their strides slow down further, unconcerned for the rain beginning to fall in droves around them. Mousse’s fingers brush against the back of her knuckles as they walk. Alice looks up at him expectantly and splays her fingers open for him. Sliding his warm hand against her cold one, their fingers weave together perfectly. In a comfortable silence, they finally make it to the headquarters courtyard hand in hand. Mousse drops her bags on the steps to the front doors, and Alice does the same. “Well, thank you for that. I really appreciate it. And, your genius idea to wrap the items in the coat.” Alice faces him, not letting their hands part. “You are very welcome.” His voice is quieter than before. Mousse stands tall, watching the falling rain drip off the ends of her hair. “Why are you looking at me like that,” She pushes her hair behind her ear and hits the tip of her shoe on the ground. “Because I have a question.” He swallows thickly trying to keep his face relaxed. “Yes? Go ahead and ask.” A moment stretches between them as the rain patters on the ground set a calming rhythm. Mousse shifts his weight to the opposing leg, gripping her hand tighter. “Are you the kind of girl to kiss on the first date?” He smiles playfully and squeezes her hand. Alice’s cheeks deepen shades of red while her whole body warms a few degrees. She gazes into his crystal clear jade eyes and takes the smallest step towards him. He moves closer as well, like a magnet drawn to another, and cups her cheek in his hand. “Then, Alice, May I give you a farewell kiss?” His wet nose brushes hers while droplets roll off his face.   She nods a few times before breathing out an affirmation “Yes.” Their lips meet right as a roll of thunder booms in the troposphere. Inciting warmth between them, Mousse kisses her without bounds. His hands moves over every part of her which was appropriate, fueled by his simple desire to know her. What would she feel like in his arms after a long strenuous day? Would Alice want him even when his mood proved foul and frigid? Alice would be the one to save him from his monotonous life, Mousse was sure of it. His tongue teased the seam of her lips, and she invited him in at once. With her in his arms, the stress of the week melted away revealing his true self, playful and silly. She allowed his tongue to roam past her lips with infinite curiosity. Mousse took her farther into his arms, slowly deepening the kiss. Emotions bubble up in his chest, feelings that he’d long since forgot he could feel. The quickened pace of his heart was addicting, she was addicting. Her powerful aurora intoxicated him. The rain that was once a hindrance was forgotten. Their soaked state became the new normal while they let go of their inhibitions. Her fingers tangled in his dripping hair and a content sigh past his lips. His heart was full, love and yearning splashed the walls of his mind, and he couldn’t tell which was stronger. It was almost too perfect how they fit together, like puzzle pieces coming together flawlessly. The last kisses were dangerously feverish. The chill that the rain dared to coax him with was kept at bay from her closeness alone. He continued his gentle touch, moving down her back holding her tight in an embrace he prayed would never cease. .

.

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Thank you to everyone that voted for Mousse Atlas in the kiss event!!! 

I hope you enjoyed this fic, thank you for reading!

𝔸𝕤𝕙 - 𝔸𝕝𝕝𝕆𝕧𝕖𝕣𝕆𝕝𝕚𝕧𝕖𝕣

[marvelmymarvel]

Copycat

Herbert Sobel vs Captain!Marshall!Reader

Richard Winters x Captain!Marshall!Reader

Synopsis: Showing up to Toccoa with a strong head on your shoulders, you were determined to make your company, Easy Company, the best in the 506th. You were bold and unshakable, but Sobel still seemed to try and knock you down. But he was nothing but a Copycat, and with Richards help, you saw that as true.

Song: Copycat by Billie Eilish (Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebb5AinKxWI) (You can tell I have a huge love for her okay its. fineeee.)

A/N: This is just a fun story to keep you satisfied. :) I’m currently writing one fic a day just to catch up, but if I have moments like this (Before bed or when my mama is at work) where I have a bright idea, I will absolutely write them quickly and send them out right away. Keeps you on your toes... Doesn't it. Also, how I have it set up is that you will get the two scheduled weeks (This past week and next week) either back to back or combined (Meaning no breaks just to get back onto schedule), it depends if I can write all 20 fics in time ;). Trust me, I can write 5 fics a day with no problem, but it may not happen. Either way, you may at least get something at night or in the morning, but not really during the day. Love ya sweeties and enjoy the story!

(Don't be cautious, don't be kind). Showing up at Toccoa was interesting, to say the least. You came in sweet and kind to all of the officers, but that changed. Winters and Nixon were one of the first officers to take you in as one of them so you wouldn't sit alone at the mess hall. Then the other Captains and  Lieutenants followed. But there was one. “Sobel” You called out as he ranted on and on to the other soldiers. (You committed, I’m your crime). He turned angrily to you and you just raised an eyebrow at him, as if begging for him to make the first diss or to throw the first punch. (Push my button anytime). “Why are you yelling at my men” you growled lowly. You didn't look away from his face, but the men behind him looked shocked, some even tried to stifle their laughter at the fact that a woman was putting the big bad Sobel in his place. “They drank from their canteens, they disobeyed my order-” 

“Yes, but that wasn't my order Lieutenant... Last time I checked... I control these men and they may follow what you say but you follow what I say. Got it.” you snarled out menacingly. He huffed out a sharp breath as his anger rose in his chest. “Lieutenant Winters, these men are excused, PT tomorrow morning at 0500 hours is canceled,” you called out as you broke your eyes from Sobels to look back at all the men who were smiling wickedly at you. You looked at Dick and nodded, he nodded back before throwing a wink, turning he dismissed them and repeated what you said as you turned back to Sobel who was seething. Leaning in, you got closer to his face. “You wanna say something Lieutenant?” you snarled quietly. (You got your finger on the trigger). “No Captain, nothing” He whispered out like a puppy who got in trouble and you nodded before leaning back. (But your trigger finger’s mine). “Dismissed then and remember, I own you” You whispered out snarkily and he turned to leave. You looked out to all the men as they disappeared into their barracks. Sighing you walked over to your own tent that was nearby. Walking in, you let out a deep breath as your mind raced over Sobel and his antics. Sobel got on your nerves, that was no shocker. (Silver dollar). He was nothing compared to you. (Golden flame). He was cruel and unfit to lead. (Dirty water). You, no you were the best thing to happen to Easy company. (Poison rain). You smirked to yourself as you changed out of your gear. Sitting on your bed, you thought back to all of the times he pissed you off to the point of you just embarrassing him to make a point. You controlled him. (Perfect murder, take your aim). It didn't matter what you did or said to him, you wouldn’t get in trouble. Y/n Marshall. The Colonel and your father were best friends... Meaning you got away with a lot, thankfully. (I don't belong to anyone but everybody knows my name). Flying back onto your bed, you smirked wider at the ceiling of your tent. He didn't know what hit him. 

*3 Months Later*

(By the way). You walked sassily past him as you approached Colonel Sink. “Hello Colonel Sink, I’m so happy that you called me up” you started out sweetly as you shot your hand out. (You’ve been uninvited). Sobel watched in anguish as the Colonel guided you into his office. You were going to be promoted. Sobel was going nowhere. “Please, Y/n. Call me Robert” Sobel heard from the room and he shook his head angrily before storming off. He was hoping to be promoted to Captain and overtake you, but that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. Or so he thought. When he got his pin only 3 days later, he walked past you all cockily... As if this achievement meant anything to you. (’Cause all you say are all the same things I did). Been there. Done that. Rolling your eyes at him you winked at Winters across the way. The corners of his mouth lifted a little but fell when Sobel walked towards them. You crossed your arms watching as he tried to copy your ways. (Copycat trying to cop my manner). He talked firmer but stood like you when you were the Captain. Like he owned the place, except he didn’t. He never would. These were your men. They will always be your men. He continued on and on and you didn't interject, until. “Your weekend passes are revoked, officers included.” He called out and you clicked your tongue angrily before approaching from the side. “Now, now, now... Haven’t we been over this? These are my men-” you started but he just scoffed at you. “You’re nothing to these men anymore Major Marshall... Now back away and let me lead my men,” he growled back angrily. (Watch your back when you can’t watch mine). You bit your lip before stepping towards him so your faces were inches away from one another. “Watch your back Sobel, these men are my men and they always, will be.” you snarled out before turning to storm away. Catching Dicks' eyes, he sent you a small smile but you just looked away, ashamed that Sobel did that to you. That was your move. (Copycat trying to cop my glamour). Days passed and you stayed back from Sobel as he led your men more and more without you in the middle of it. You hated it. What you hated the most? He was trying to act like you. And when the men didn't love him like they loved you... He became upset. You caught him crying one night near the bathrooms. It was a moment in which you learned that he was failing. “What” he snapped at you which made you recoil in fear before you remembered that you were in control here. You raised an eyebrow before silently passing him to head towards the barracks where Richard and Lew were waiting for you. You smirked as you walked away. (Why so sad, bunny, you can't have mine?). He deserved it. They were your men, not his. He wouldn’t get respect unless he gave it. Dick smiled at you as he saw you approaching “Hey sweets, Lew’s almost ready” he stated and you just nodded before standing next to him.

Leaning against his body, you two just stood there in silence. You had grown fond of the Lieutenant. He had grown fond of you. You were thankful to have him by your side, especially with what Sobel was about to do. 

“She's a horrible leader” you heard as you slammed back to the wall, listening in as Sobel ranted to another officer. (Call me calloused). “She’s just doing her job Herber-” 

(Call me cold). “She’s a cold hearted bitch” Sobel growled out. Your breath was knocked out of you as your jaw dropped. “I wish she was in a different company because honestly, she's a horrible leader and she’s corrupting my men.” You pushed off of the wall, not wanting to hear any more of the mean and cruel words. Running into Richard on your way out, you burst into tears. He guided you out as you stumbled over your words like you stumbled over your feet. No one ever hated you so much to call you a bitch... No one. It made Dick angry, but he knew how to calm you. “He is just jealous Y/n” he stated firmly down at you as he pressed you to a wall so you could stable your self. His hands were on your hips, and any other time, you would be on him quickly. But today was not the day. (You’re Italic). “He wishes he could be you. Lead like you. Love like you... But he can’t.” (I’m in bold). You nodded at Dick’s words as you composed yourself. You were better than him, in every way. He didn't like that. Throwing your arms around Dick’s neck, you hugged him deeply. (Call me cocky, watch your tone). You didn't care what Sobel said about you from that point forward. He could call you cocky, but that would be detrimental to his success. He had to follow your rules... After all. (You better love me ‘cause you’re just a clone). He was just a clone. 

*1 year later; Aldbourne, England*

(By the way). You strutted past him once more as you walked from the Colonel's office. His first mistake was making Dick choose trial by court-martial. His second mistake? 

Was underestimating you. (You’ve been uninvited).

(’Cause all you say). You smirked to yourself as you swung your hips a little in joy at what you just managed to do. It was so easy... So easy to get him moved. So easy to show the Colonel just how horrible of a leader he was. (Are all the same things I did). After all. All he was-was a half-assed version of what you were. (Copycat trying to cop my manner). He was nothing but a copycat. Nothing more, nothing less. (Watch your back when you cant watch mine). He didn't even realize that his back was unguarded while he was watching yours. He was so busy watching your next move, that he didn't see your sneak attack. (Copycat trying to cop my glamour). These men wouldn't follow him like they would follow you. That would leave to many lives lost, and you wouldn't stand for it. (Why so sad, bunny, you can't have mine). Which is why you went back down to the role of Captain. His place to be exact. Anything for your men. For your boys.

You watched the building as you leaned against the tree beside Dick. He talked about his court-martial, but you were too busy waiting to see Sobel after he learned the news. He was being moved. All thanks to you. He walked out of the offices with a sad look on his face. (I would hate to see you go, hate to be the one that told you so). You hated it, hated to be the one to make it happen.  (You just crossed the line). But he crossed the line, he made you do this. For your men’s safety, you had to do this. (You’ve run out of time). It was only a matter of time before he was moved to a different area. He wouldn't lead your men into battle. Not on your watch. (I’m so sorry, now you know). His eyes locked with yours, and a knowing look set in on his face. You did this. ‘Sorry’ you mouthed sassily as he only glared at you. (Sorry I’m the one that told you so. Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry, sorry). He got into the jeep and you smirked finally when he looked away.

(Sike). 

(By the way). “Where is Lieutenant Sobel going?” Dick asked from beside you and you only turned towards him with a mischevious look on your face. Scrunching your nose up, you only smirked wider. (You’ve been uninvited). “I got him moved and I am taking his place as Captain of Easy” You purred as you put your hand on his cheek lovingly. You were feeling cocky at the moment. Getting Sobel out of the way only meant you could control your men the way you wanted to. The cockiness transpired into confidence as you leaned in closer to Dick. (’Cause all you say are all the same things I did). Your lips collided with his as his hand went to your side, pulling you closer to him. (Copycat trying to cop my manner). He couldn't copy you, Sobel could never, ever be you. (Watch your back when you cant watch mine). He didn't watch his back, you thought, as you kissed Dick deeper and deeper against the tree. (Copycat trying to cop my glamour). Sobel would never get the love and respect that the men had for you. (Why so sad, bunny, you can't have mine?). Pulling away from Dicks' lips, you smiled at him proudly. “I saved these men. The men saw who he truly was” you whispered against his lips softly. “And whats that” Dick whispered out before pecking your lips sweetly once more. You leaned back with a wide grin on your face. 

“A Copycat.”

tags: @hell-itwasyou @desired-love-

[mynameisdreartblog]

Teachers 2

Leo: Karate instructor. Having an action figure of yourself would be rad. I mean, just imagine your very own Oro figurine to pose and play with. And in the fashion that every toy company hates, you can use it to interact with toys outside of the designated set. But the profiteering part of my brain wants to create an entire set of me and all my buddies and adversaries. We’ll call it something like, The Misadventures of Oro Quarez with an entire playset of the Ola Diara headquarters. Oh, we’d have figurines for Viz and Hunah, maybe even Mecatl! Hey, if we’re gonna go this far with it, we might as well add in a new dog sidekick to spice things up; we were losing sales with the original cast, you see. I don’t even have a dog, but let’s just pick a popular breed and call him Coco. Yes, Coco! That’s the generically adorable Spanish name everyone wants for a canine sidekick, right? [,,,] That got me thinking of how many parents have chose a name for their child only to then recognize later on post-birth that they’d have a more appealing set of circumstances if they possibly had a better name. Typically, the forces of Americanization persuade people chose dumb names like Bryce or Bryceler, but I can’t tell if this is better than traditional names. On one hand, I want experimenting, but on the other, I don’t want white people to engage with it. But if you wanna sell your products, you have to sell them in the U.S.; nobody here is soulless or rich enough to buy the entire collection. [...] Okay, I got back from contacting a toy factory here and they told me that it’s incredibly expensive and out of my league to attempt that, so I’ve resorted to creating Minecraft skins and potentially selling them to Mojang so they can create a DLC pack in the Bedrock edition of the game <the sound of chicken NPCs in Minecraft can be heard softly in the background>. Yeah, we got off topic a bit. Going back to square one… I really like action figure sets and Minecraft.

Taurus: Cooking instructor. The McDonald's toy—the one you stashed away in your car yesterday, under all of the hidden compartments—has shown itself again. It's shape was made distinct and it appeared almost as a silhouette to you. The franchise it was modeled after was Alvin and the Chipmunks, and the toy itself was based off one of the Chipettes: Jeanette to be specific. The cheap paint applied to her plastic mold was chipping with the relatively long amount of time you had her in the barracks of your Hindustan Ambassador, and the essence of her visage was fundamentally altered. With strength like yours, the figure was as easy to bend and mold like rubber: It was so close to shifting from a carbon-copy production into a unique shape of broken product. [,,,] Suddenly as you were remembering why you hid her for so long, a violent quake shook your car and forced you to pull over in a rather steep spot. You hid the toy back where you unearthed it from, and you get out of your car to avoid the possibility of being tossed over in this deep area and take a deadly plunge. As you waited outside your car, the violence of the quake stopped and you were left in a disturbing stillness. The earth's natural movement didn't cause that, it was something attempting to disrupt you. That disruptor was heard in the sound of a faint giggle, but the faintness of said giggle didn't matter, as you could instantly recognize who made it. […] You didn't forget this time; he didn't forget this time: The purple fucker was back for a second go. You frantically searched to attempt to locate his presence, but he was peering over you from the mountain cliff: Behind him was a city of foretold disaster made out of a broken reality bearing only Jeanette's face. Legends once told us that this was the mountain top which contained an ancient temple at its peak with finely crafted marble statues indicating where it is. Maybe that's why the Purple Entity came here once more. He hasn't come to fight you, but only to prevent you from retrieving something you would've discovered on your own had you made your travel up that cliff. Stop him before he gets what you were meant to discover.

Aquarius: Art teacher. I’ve been a party animal for a while, and I was always known as that person who’d bring the strangest gifts. Today, I think I’ll show up at your doorstep with a five-foot-tall leather-bound grimoire on all the sexual practices in the West wrapped in a pretty bonnet, gratifying you with a curtsy and a flash of an eye. Now, what I won’t tell you is that I’m the author of that book, and I’m creating a neat, tight-knit ploy in which you’ll soon recognize that the true grimoire of all the sexual practices of the West was me. You’ll promptly take me in and I’ll vomit onto you all of the painfully memorized information relating to the long, dark, and disturbing history of how people counteracted the popular narrative of heteronormative chastity. [...] “Nay, they must say! How are you so lackadaisical to forget your humble origins of bath-side instrument cleaning; you must understand that you can’t hop to-and-fro so rapidly and understand how the sexual grimoire controls you as much as you control it! Your body is just a fatty vessel for the liquid diaspora you’ve soaked up like a sponge; far too easy to make the connections and symbolism obvious as if you’re trying to imbibe your crew. I’ll continue to vomit the pages of the buoyant emotions that keep emerging back up no matter how hard you push them down.” [...] Yes, most of the pages are based on my personal life but I was sure that the consistencies wouldn’t be picked up on ‘cause I live mostly out at sea where anything can happen… as long as it’s nautical based. Er, speaking of nautical things, I’ve been having this strange feeling there’s some hairy boy somewhere in Florida who’s creating a write-up about his state’s maritime history and publishing it on, God, Medium out of all places. Best of luck to this hypothetical person though! Now back to the grimoire.

Pisces: Literature teacher. Our wrestling instructor didn't take their tummy medicine today and they were very cranky at the practice matches today. A beautiful piano solo was playing in my head when they were given a note that told them they had to substitute today. Ha, Idrissa almost broke character when they were training as the Simb this morning, so they went from a false lion to an honest lion! Heh, heh, heh… In all seriousness though, it was an unwarranted act of frustration that left many of us on the wrestling team quite uncomfortable. I thought it was just part of the bàkk beforehand, but it escalated way further when I felt one of my ribs snap under their hold on me. I’d complain about the safety violation that took place that day, but I did sign the EULA and it was pretty lenient on what was worthy of pressing charges over. I mean, it’s by tradition they allow hand blows, but Idrissa hit a little too hard. I mean, the thought of a huge, masculine-presenting lion grappling me and then proceeding to roughhouse me is pretty alluring, but I'd prefer if it was a different animal costume… I said too much; I'm sorry. […] Anyways, do you wanna talk about my aspirations instead? Someday, I hope to be as good of a wrestler as Boukar Faye, but with my seemingly indeterminate body weight and mass, I think I'll take on a different destiny as a wrestling legend. I'll be known as the shifting mass whose weight can change unexpectedly and can throw off even the most experienced of wrestlers. I'll also be known as the guy who never wears the proper attire, leading to a situation where I piss off the organizers. I'm not so good at Luttle Traditionnelle avec Frappe, since I don't use it to show off because… quite frankly, there's nothing about me to show off. Uh… How are you enjoying your stay so far? Do you wanna look at my trophies from the times I scared the contestants away?

[vmedley90]

In-Processing and Housing

So today, I’m talking about how I, as a spouse, in-processed and our experience with housing. I’m putting these two together because they happen in-tandem; however, this post will be structured by topic. Feel free to read what’s most relevant to you.

TL;DR-

In-Processing: as a spouse, I didn’t do much to “in process”. First, I got every pamphlet from ACS that I could carry at one time. Next I got into IACS and got my SOFA stamp. Third, I rested. Haha! That was pretty much it. Everything else I’ve done and want to do is extra- not mandatory.

Housing: We shipped our HHG SUPER early- as in a month and a half before we left. So when we got our house, we were able to get our HHG the very next day. YESSSSS!!!!!!! We turned down our first offer and accepted the second. We weren’t picky; realized housing was trying to accommodate us as best they could; and military housing can never match your idea of “home”. 

The long story:

In-Processing: So by this point, you know that we couldn’t in-process right away. I can’t speak to this too much because he went through the process and not me. I can say that he went to a briefing early one morning and came back with lots of information and a two week schedule of briefings and such. Some of these included: setting up our APO (like the first day), getting into IACS (ID Card access), getting a USEUR license, and German language and culture. Be sure to speak with your spouse about things like TriCare coverage and what you would like in a house because he will more than likely encounter these things before you do as a spouse. Be sure to debrief with him each day of the in-processing because he will come across really good information that you can use to help get settled. 

He did the first step of the process which was to basically fill out some paperwork and get our name on the list. I was not with him for this. It will probably be the same for you and your spouse when you arrive as housing was on his in-processing schedule. 

As a spouse, as aforementioned, I really only had to get into IACS which required a trip to the Soldier for Life building in Graf. Super simple process. I also had to get my SOFA stamp because Bragg wouldn’t do it. That was also a really simple process that required a trip to the same building but to the Passport office. You can definitely get a lot of things done before lunch if you just get to the Soldier for Life building early that morning and just work your way through the different offices.

General note- the whole base basically shuts down between 11:30 and 12:00 for lunch. Handle your business before 11:30 or plan to wait until at least 13:00. Some places only open on certain days and at certain times so call before you go. Also, lots of places in the mall area of the PX and Commissary open at 10AM... some banks do too. Keep this in mind. I definitely got my feelings hurt thinking I’d be able to go do something at 8:00 only to find out it wasn’t open.

 In the first few weeks, you will be using your copy of the orders, a marriage certificate, passport, and ID fairly often so keep them handy with you if you plan to handle any official business. It is also good to have a Power of Attorney because some things can only be done by your spouse. For example, renewal of ID cards. Mine was about to expire so I went to the office to inquire about the renewal process. Babes had to be with me if I didn’t have a PoA. I was able to accept and deny housing offers without the PoA and luckily he was there with me to sign the paperwork for the one we accepted. So I’m not sure if it would be required for this step. Babes and I have decided to keep an active one even though he is home from deployment because it makes things super simple when we are handling business. I can handle whatever business I need to handle independently of him and he can focus on his daily tasks at work. 

Another thing I did to “in-process” was go by ACS and assess the services they offer and they offer ALOT!! It was overwhelming how many different services you can take advantage of through ACS. Like I said, I took EVERY. SINGLE. PAMPHLET. (Thanks for showing me the way Grandma!). Literally! That was the only way I could process what I needed and what I didn’t. It was all really good information and if I ever get a car I will definitely take advantage of all them. I also got a Spouse Checklist that was super helpful! I would advise giving ACS a good gander when you get here. They really take care of you out here! Everyone felt like family. They many opportunities to learn the language and culture, become acquainted to the area, and meet other spouses.

That’s it. I really didn’t do much to in-process but I believe the steps I did take were key to getting settled so quickly. Knowledge is key here!

Next up is Housing! HURRAYYYY!!! Everyone’s favorite subject!

We shipped our HHG extremely early. We scheduled our HHG shipment prior to our flight so we had no idea when we were leaving as they packed our things. We simply discussed how we would live after the goods were shipped and where we would stay until we left regardless of when that was. With that information in mind here is our timeline:

Nov 19: HHG Packed up

Dec 14: Move out of house

Dec 26: Car shipped from VA

Dec 27: Flight to Germany

Dec 28: Flight landed and bus to Graf

Jan 2: Begin in processing

Jan 7: Initial housing offer

Jan 11: 2nd housing offer

Jan 14: Accepted housing offer and got keys

Jan 15: HHG delivered and move in

Jan 21: Set up internet with Jobst

Jan 30: Internet hardware installed officially set up

So roughly 2 months after packing up our house we were resettled and pretty comfortable. Naturally there are a few creature comforts that we still lack- (wifey needs her face creams!!) but we are home for the most part. 

I think the key to this was shipping our goods super early. We decided to basically camp out in our living room to ensure our goods got here when we arrived if not before. That way, we wouldn’t have to wait too long to get comfortable again. We had two camping chairs and a good blow up mattress, blanket, and pillows. We used Styrofoam plates and plastic utensils. Food was kept to a minimum and we basically ate what was in the freezer. We only bought the healthy essentials like greens so we didn’t constipated from all of the noodles and junk food ahaha! Another key thing we did was pack our bags early as well so trying to decide what to wear was easy. We did this until we moved out. We left the bathroom the way it was when the movers came because we knew we were getting rid of most of those items and we wanted a little stability to our living situation after all of our things were gone. Everything that was left in our house was able to fit in his Wrangler and my PT Cruiser. We rented a small U-Haul because we had the washer and dryer to move but if we didn’t have those two large items, we wouldn’t have needed the U-Haul at all. 

The HHG pack up process was really simple. Someone came to the house about a week or so before we were due to pack up to look at the main items we had. We try to live minimally so we didn’t have a lot of stuff. A living room sofa set, a dining set, two bedroom sets complete with a vanity and tall chest of drawer, a book case, an L-shaped desk, and some closet racks. The moving company came super late- SUPER LATE. Apparently, they are always late but they are also very thorough. First they came in and started putting everything in boxes. For about an hour all we heard was boxes and packing tape. They packed up everything except our bathroom. EVERYTHING! A few pieces of trash included. I had heard they would, but having never experienced it, I was unprepared. We didn’t have to do anything but sit back and watch, we answered questions and gave guidance where necessary but we basically just tried to stay out of the way. 

Take pictures of everything major that is being shipped because if it can be taken apart- it will be. They dismantled everything and assured us the moving company here would put it back together which they did. Some items were a hassle because we didn’t know which table leg and screw went to which end-table-top. So, make sure you have pictures of your items to make this process easier and ask the moving company to label things as well. As they took things a part they packed it in small crates. In total we had about 6 or 7 crates. I think living so lightly also made getting resettled easier because you won’t have much to ship and unpack. OK, next on to how we got our house.

We’ve been married for almost four years now and this is our fifth address but our first PCS. Out of all those moves, this is the first time we’ve been able to choose a house together. We didn’t have a long extended conversation about what kind of house we wanted; we just felt it in our gut which is how we tend to do things in our relationship anyway. When we got our first offer, we were able to go there together and check it out and neither of us felt it was home. It wasn’t bad at all. In fact it was clean and modern. Very nice. So nice in fact it felt like a hotel room. Which is one reason we turned down. Our first offer was a 3rd floor apartment. Big no no for us. The outside looked like the barracks. A turn off. The ceiling was low and there was a huge support structure in the middle of the living room. We’re kind of tall and preferred not to hit the ceiling every time we stretched. Jeez. It was 2 bedrooms with a playroom/office and 2 bathrooms. No carpet. Modern and up to date appliances. Seemingly new flooring. Walking distance from the commissary and other frequently used services. It wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t for us. And that’s ok. 

Now, it’s just me and him; so, we knew we couldn’t be too choosy. You can take that route if you want; but, trust me it won’t end well. While I was declining the first offer, there was a different service member there desperately explaining why he needed a 3 or 4 bedroom house even though he wasn’t qualified to have it. Housing was like “nah bruh”. Not sure how that turned out. If you know you’re picky, just go ahead and find your own housing through a German realtor. There’s more work involved in getting resettled but it’ll be worth it because you’ll be more comfortable (in theory). We, however did not want to go through that hassle- we really didn’t have a reason to do so and it just didn’t seem worth it since this isn’t our forever home. Plus having the “rent and utilities” come directly from his check was and still is more appealing to us then having to have a foreign bank account with enough money to cover these necessities each month. Not that we couldn’t afford it but just the whole process of transferring funds and such didn’t (and still doesn’t) sit well with me. Hiccups happen and I prefer not to get burned on a technicality- know what I mean? 

Anywho. Back to the story at hand. We turned down the first offering immediately and while I was there the agent told me they had something else they could offer us that Friday. Pure luck. It was off-post (which we were trying to avoid) but it was quiet, more spacious, and would probably suit us. We viewed it and feel in love. It’s not perfect. We prefer a stand alone single family one story (ranch style) home and this is a duplex townhome but it’s spacious. Has carpet. A little older but has character. It’s got two bedrooms plus a playroom/office and two and a half bathrooms. I fell in love with the huge laundry room (huge to me at least) and our little cute back yard. We’ve had backyards before, of course, but each time they’ve had trees or a woodline at the edge. which makes the grass grow a little weird IMO. This is all soft, lush, green, grass. I may regret this when spring hits but for now I love it. We gave ourselves some time to think on it- you have 72 hours to accept or decline after viewing- and decided this was probably the best we could get, so, we accepted. Plus we were about sick of staying in the hotel room which for us was like living at a Comfort Inn. 

Note: there was a weird smell in the house which I thought was indicative of needing to be cleaned. They sent someone to look at it and that person determined it was fine. The house had been empty for almost a year and almost everything was replaced after being thoroughly cleaned after the last tenant. It was as close to new as we could get. I say that to illustrate this point:  If you want a house but think something is wrong with it, they will do what they can to make it more livable for your including new carpet, another cleaning etc. Just express your concerns and know that they can work with you within reason. 

So, after accepting, the agent asked when our goods would arrive to determine if we needed loaner furniture. I called the moving company and they informed me they could deliver the next day if we wanted them to so naturally that was the option I took. Your move-in date will depend, in large part, on when you can get furniture. Had we taken the loaner furniture, it would have been another week or so in the hotel because the loaner furniture wasn’t ready for us immediately. They really try to take care of you as best they can IF you are reasonable and willing to work with them. 

... and that’s it! Once we got our household goods, we were set. 

I know this was another really long post but I hope you were able to get some information that is helpful- or you were at least somewhat entertained. I’ll try to get some pictures up of the house soon but OPSEC and stuff make it difficult. Next up... Our trip to Weiden!

[blahblahemblem]

heroes barracks tour: infantry part 1 (colourless)

As infantry units are by far the most common, it only makes sense to split them up into several posts. I’m starting with colourless as that covers two different physical weapons and all of my army of healers.

But first, as usual, updates!

Armour update

Build improvements

Refined w!Tharja’s Candelabra for +def.

New units

+def –atk

I just pulled her this morning :D

The bane is really unfortunate; if my sources are correct it’s a superbane (-4 instead of -3) which frankly kind of sucks. That said, I intend on building her with Blarblade+ which would make up for the loss in damage.

Otherwise there’s nothing but great news here. I’ve completed the mage armours trifecta, got another unit with Armour March, and a 40% bonus for the upcoming Tempest Trials. The only reason I haven’t levelled her yet is that I refuse to do it in the Training Tower and today’s training maps (all fliers) are really not suited for –atk magic users with 1 movement. 

Plans

Blarblade+, Moonbow, Draw Back for Lyn. I should have enough feathers for that fairly soon.

Flier update

Build improvements

1. Caeda now has access to a personal weapon, the Wing Sword, although I don’t have enough SP for it yet. 2. Gave s!Camilla Gronnblade+, Draw Back, and Darting Blow 3. 3. Inherited LaD3, Glimmer, and Reposition to Shanna (my free summon on Love Abounds was a 4* Sothe) 4. Gave Renewal 3 to Nowi 5. Beruka is now +4 and has Bonfire

New units

+hp –def

I got her from Love Abounds actually and not Sacred Memories, and also yesterday, which is why she’s still unlevelled. It’s kind of ironic; I tried summoning for her on SM and got pitybroken at 4%, then I summoned on a different banner and she pitybroke me at 4%.

-def is hindering to her as Great Flame’s effect relies on it, but oh well. It does make me consider giving her Lightning Breath+ instead. It would give me access to another DC flier at a relatively low cost, and I could refine it for more def. I still have that one Hector lying around, which is an option, but I don’t want to use him on yet another green.

Whatever I do with her, it’s awesome that I have her, as she fits two separate teams. On the one side, she provides Hone Dragons (although to be honest that’s not anything gamebreaking for me as all of my dragon builds rely on QR making the +6 speed boost rather pointless). On the other side, she is another source of magic damage for my fliers.

Plans

Nothing new short-term besides figuring out a B slot for Myrrh

Cavalry update

GUESS WHO’S BACK

yaaaaay i only waited like 9 months

Yes I got him this morning like everybody else and immediately levelled him I WAITED NINE MONTHS, I saved that PA Olivia and that 2* Subaki for ages, fucking FINALLY

I gave him one of my Wind blessings, largely because I just wanted the SP boost, but it doesn’t hurt that if I ever pull Gunnthra she’s likely going to be on the same team as him and he could really use the extra Res. Distant Defence helps, of course, but only so much.

I’m going to merge him later, obviously.

Back to infantry

Bows

+atk –def

I got her randomly from Rite of Shadows (Celica and co’s first banner).

This build is an absolute mess. I just threw together a bunch of scraps for her when she was a bonus unit in the second ever Tempest Trials. It functioned okay there but there’s not a whole lot she can do now. She’s just really not suited for her own default build, Firesweep weapons are for fast glass cannons while Faye is slow and bulky.

Usage: She has 3k HM. The bulk of it was from the aforementioned TT, and the rest I grinded out afterwards on autobattle just for feathers. Now with the rise of shit like Zelgius, Firesweep + Poison Strike can be useful in AA provided there’s a dancer (not a problem considering I have 7) and only one foe left.

Future improvements: I’m interested in a Guard Bow build. In fact that was going to be the next thing on my to-do list (chosen randomly), but V!Lyn’s arrival overthrew Faye there, sorry girl

+spd –def

Baby boy. Baby.

I got him on the first day I’ve had this account, with the 10 Nintendo Network gift orbs from a full colourless circle, and I love him very much. He was my summoner support for a while. Then he became overshadowed by a different unit I built who did the exact same thing as him but better and also I loved him more because you know who he is, but I’ve missed using him so I didn’t hesitate at all in feeding off the dupe Faye I got from Legendary Ike’s banner. Now he has a niche again.

Usage: Oh boy. I used him for the first four Tempest Trials, and those were a lot more difficult than the ones now and I didn’t autobattle, so you can imagine. He was one of the first units to max HM... twice... and he has 3500 HM again now and going to be a bonus unit in the new TT so lol. I’ve also used him to clear high-end content like GHBs many times.

Improvements: LaD3 as soon as I get another Sothe. I’m also going to start merging him. I got a ton of Kleins while trying to pull for NY!Takumi, and I have 3 in my barracks. I’ve decided that every second one I pull goes towards merges, so that’s one merge for now.

+hp –spd

From Fjorm’s banner.

Unbelievably shitty IVs, of course, but it doesn’t matter. I wanted her primarily because her art is amazing. I wasn’t going to build her with BB+ or Firesweep over Klein and my baby, so in a way I was kind of relieved she wasn’t +spd or +atk, that way I had a justification for prioritising them that wasn’t just personal bias :D

Usage: As you can see she doesn’t even have her default C slot learned yet. I’m planning on using her as a TT healer at some point (through BoL6).

I’ve said before how I feel about Corrin as a character, but Maiponpon draws him so cute I can’t stay mad at him. Look at his wittle face

Anyway, this is a very simple build, pretty much just his default set with Bonfire + Bowbreaker, to capitalise on his own bulk and the defensive buffs he provides to other units. Also, this screenshot was taken before I refined his Hama Ya (for +def).

Usage: He does stuff in AA sometimes, his primary function is to be a bow Lyn counter

+spd –res

The apple of my eye, my child whom I raised all these years etc etc. From Hero Fest 1 :D

All I ever wanted when Heroes was announced was to have a Takumi. Well, here he is with perfect IVs to boot. I love him so much. It’s impossible to tell from menu screenshots like this (unless you know the stats by heart I guess), but he’s my current summoner support.

Quad builds are very powerful; I know not everybody likes them but I do. Oh I do.

Usage: he has 9999 SP take a wild guess

Improvements: Threaten Spd isn’t really the best C slot, but I haven’t really figured out what it can possibly be replaced with

+atk –something, +9

I just realised looking at this that he has the same def/res as Takumi :D

He’s actually +10 now, I just didn’t bother taking the screenshot. Virion, similarly to Est, is a product of spite more than anything, but I do actually kind of like him as a character, so there’s that.

I don’t really have a lot to say about him, he’s just there. I’m going to merge 4* Virions I get instead of sending them home, so that maybe one day I can upgrade him from here to a 4*+10.

Daggers

+hp –res

Got her on the first day of Performance Arts.

Honestly there’s not much to say, she’s a dancer and does dancer things with her dancer build. And her chibi sprite is unbelievably adorable.

Usage: dancer tier

+atk –hp

Apparently I pulled her at 4* on the first day, so when I switched mains and looked at what I had it was a pleasant surprise. I’d had great experiences using a +atk Kagero on my other accounts by then, so it wasn’t a difficult decision to promote her.

Usage: I actually don’t use her all that much outside of AA because she doesn’t do very well against non-infantry teams. Still, I’d say she’s worth the investment even in the current meta.

neutral

mochi baby

The other day I was reading my old comments on the FEH subreddit and found this gem in a thread that was about which characters you wanted to be added drawn by which artist:

Naturally I had to do everything in my fucking power to get him and at 4,50% (...after another 4% broken by Airzura) he came home <3

I don’t know what this build is supposed to be. Antimage, I guess? The double BoLs are because I used him as a combat medic in the two TT minis. He also has Iceberg learned but for TTs a big nuke with Glacies is better, considering Kagami Mochi has a killer effect anyway.

Usage: See above, combat medic for TTs. I’ll probably continue to use him to fill an extra slot and cover healing until he maxes HM (although for the next TT the main team slots are all taken, sorry boo)

Improvements: Desperation is kind of silly now that he no longer has boosted stats from being a bonus unit and I should replace it with something but I haven’t decided what. I might also throw him a Sothe at some point for a neat 51/41 offensive spread.

+1 iirc, +spd –something

This is a consideration more than anything. I don’t really like Gaius’ art but I do love Gaius, and daggers are in a marginally better place than before or at least more interesting, so if I get more 4* copies of him I might build something out of that, probably with a Smoke Dagger.

Staves

+spd –hp

Free summon from Maria and Minerva’s BHB banner, and my only 5* healer, lol.

I have the exact same IVs on a 4* copy, which is now merged to +4. My plan with all healers (that aren’t 5* exclusive, not that I have any of those) is to make them 4*+10s with 5* unlocked staves, so I guess once I get 3 or 4 more Marias I will merge this one into the 4* copy as well. I like the golden sparkles and everything but stats are more important, and I’m just not willing to work on 5* merges for healers on my main.

Since healers don’t really differ that much from one another, at least not when they’re 4*, here’s the rest of the ones I have. I’m not going to look up their IVs because who cares. Most of them will have theirs changed before I’m done with them.

(both +4)

(+2)

(+1 iirc?)

That’s pretty much all. I’m going to promote a copy of Azama/Serra/Wrys/Lissa/Clarine (who’s a horse but I didn’t talk about her or Prissy last time) once I get them to a high merge level to unlock their staves. As for Sakura/Lucius/Lachesis/Priscilla I’m probably just going to wait until they inevitably pitybreak me so I don’t waste my feathers.

Part 2 will cover tomes and also probably V!Eliwood!

[fleamarketloveletters]

March 30, 1942.

2100

Still at Quantico

Hello “Bouncy”,

See you can’t get rid of me. Aren’t you glad?

We waited and waited at the station but about 0010 orders came through changing our trip until tomorrow morning.

I’m sitting on my bunk again, which I thought I had seen for the last time this morning.

Hey “sugar puss”, enclosed you will find the picture that I was telling you about. Remember the letter you wrote my describing how you wore the emblem on everything, even your pajamas? Well can you think of a more appropriate drawing to picture your very words. Pardon me if I say that I bet you look still even more lovely wearing it. How do you like the saying also?

You will also find enclosed a picture of my exact barracks. If you look real hard you can see me leaning out the second deck window straining my eyes looking to see if I can see a certain darling Betty up in N.G., CT.

The barracks is a real “mad house” again just like the last night we shoved off from P.I. I was pressing my uniform when we started horse playing and in the midst of it I tripped and kicked a tin pail I had full of water to spray my clothes with all over the deck.

Also just like last time I received a package from the church and had to get rid of everything chop chop so I wouldn’t have excess baggage.

Say hon, will you copy off the little enclosed poem as I would like to have a copy too. I picked it up out of some stuff one of my buddies didn’t want. All I did was read it over before I am sending it to you. (I also read it to see if it was free from improper language!) No rush as long as I get it sometime before 1950. Ha!

I suppose you will get tired of seeing this sentence so often within two letters but dearest, I miss you something awful. Nothing seems to be able to make me snap out of my lonesomeness. Betty I really am a very lonesome marine tonight. After seeing you I just want you with me always. Darling I can’t wait until we get married and have everything that all happy married couples have yes just You + I. (Son - ‘Darling You and I’ know the reason why… We do to, don’t we hon?)

You know cute, I liked the ride back from Quanitco to Wash best because we were side by side more and kind of snuggled up more than the rest of the time. Gosh I don’t why I should say things like this but we go well together. Gosh your beautiful with a capital B.

I decided to write out the poem that I found typewritten so hon disregard that last part about returning me a copy. I have more time than I thought so here it goes. -- Quote:

“The U.S. Marine Corps”

“You can have your Army khaki

You can have your Navy blue

There’s still another fighter

I’ll introduce to you.

This uniform is different

The best you’ve ever seen

The heins call him a ‘devil dog’

But his real name is Marine.

He is trained on Parris Island

The land that God forgot

Where the sand is 14 inches deep

And the sun is scorching hot

He has set many a table

And many a dish he has dried

He can also make a bed

And a broom he sure can guide

He has peeled a million onions And twice as many spuds

He spends his leisure time

In washing up his duds.

Now girls take a tip

I’m giving it to you

Just grab yourself a good Marine -- (Hello Betty!)

For there’s nothing he can’t do.

And when he goes to Heaven

To st. Peter he will tell

Another Marine reporting sir,

I have served my time in Hell.”

Unquote.

Every bit of that is true. You can vouch for it after seeing Shores of Tripoli, huh? I hope the postman can carry this letter. It weighs a ton.

Well my “one and only” beautiful darling your leatherneck is tired and very, very lonesome so he’s going to shove off to bed and dream of his sweetheart Betty way up in North Guilford. I love you hon, always and forever.

Just your,

Jack (who is “Semper Fideles” to you)

XXXXX

Love + Kisses

I Love you very much

Si, Si, Si

[party-hard-or-die]

The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’

A conversation with C.C. Tsai, a Chinese artist and illustrator of Sunzi’s classic “The Art of War” (Princeton University Press, 2018), translated into English by Brian Bruya.

When C.C. Tsai decided to adapt Sunzi’s “The Art of War” into a more contemporary format more than 30 years ago, his ambition was to breathe new life into the 2,500-year-old text. “When people talk about transmitting the classics to the present generation, it’s often very sterile and uniform and, frankly, boring,” Tsai said. After studying multiple editions of the text and secondary sources about it, he saw an opportunity to reconceive “The Art of War” — which to this day remains one of the most important pieces of writing on warfare and strategy — as an illustrated narrative. In 1990, Tsai created a comic-book version for a Chinese audience, and an English-language edition followed in 1994. Since then, Tsai’s extended series of illustrated classics have sold millions of copies and have been translated to more than 20 languages.

Tsai’s adaptation of “The Art of War” revitalized the millenniums-old treatise by trimming away the repetitive elements, tightening the narrative until the ancient lessons of warfare leapt off the page. But the defining element of Tsai’s work is the illustrations. His Disney-influenced style brings humor and immediacy to the text, with Sunzi himself popping into the story as both the wise and fearless commander of blank-eyed, child-like soldiers and the conniving nemesis to the enemy who tries to cross him. Humiliated soldiers seethe and bluster while Sunzi and his men titter with laughter. A particular pleasure is the anthropomorphized livestock, like the horse who surrenders while standing on its hind legs with hooves raised in the air, mirroring its rider’s hands-up posture. Tsai’s characters are drawn to entertain, whether you’re a comic-book enthusiast or a military strategist.

In June, Princeton University Press released a new edition of Tsai’s adaptation with a foreword by Lawrence Freedman, a longtime professor of war studies at King’s College London. Freedman makes note of something hinted at throughout Tsai’s drawings: Sunzi is a brilliant military commander, but he’s also amoral, “celebrating ruthlessness as well as cunning.” According to Freedman, this is why Sunzi has become associated with villains of Western fiction like Gordon Gekko (from the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street”) and Tony Soprano. Sunzi can be thought of as the master manipulator — always controlling all the pieces (literally on a chessboard in some panels) to stay a step ahead the enemy.

From his home in Hangzhou, China, Tsai spoke about Sunzi, his own time in the military and what readers often misunderstand about “The Art of War.”

The style of the illustrations is such a drastic departure from the traditional presentation of the text. How did you come to choose the style you used for this book?

When I started to think about how to present Chinese classics to a contemporary audience, I felt like I had two duties. One was to thoroughly understand it myself, and the second was to lead the reader through a door into a field that they might be apprehensive about and have some kind of fear of. My duty, I felt, was to use humor and stories to get the ideas across, to get the reader to relax and to be able to accept these ideas in a straightforward and simple format. I feel like this is one of the strengths of the comic format.

I read that you’ve developed 20 different styles of drawing. So how did you choose the style you used in “The Art of War”? And what would you call it?

I do have many styles, and if you see them without my name attached, you’d never know that they were drawn by me. When I did this series with “The Art of War” and Confucius and so on, the style is all pretty much the same, except that if you look closely, you’ll notice the style of “The Art of War” is whimsical to an extent, but it’s more serious than in, say, the Daoist books, which are even more whimsical and humorous. In “The Art of War,” I used very simple lines, and if something didn’t need to be drawn, it was left out. You can see a lot of white space. When something did need to be drawn, I put a lot of detail into it. Even if you look at the smallest horse or person or roof, you can see a lot of details in each one. I don’t have a name for any particular style, but I try to tailor the style to the content.

I understand that you first read “The Art of War” when you were very young. Is there anything in the text that you recall connecting with as an adult that you didn’t when reading it as a child?

Yes. Some things did stand out to me when I was trying to really understand the central ideas and the spirit of the text, like the idea that you should win before you go to war. And that when you lose a war, it’s because you haven’t prepared adequately. Also, that you shouldn’t fight without there being clear goals. You have to have some reason to go to war. Also, that anger is something one should be very cautious about when it comes to warfare. That it shouldn’t be a pretext to warfare.

How did you approach adapting the original text to comic form?

I focused on what I thought were the most important ideas and stories, and so it’s not drawn in its entirety. “The Art of War” is not a really long text, but it is longer than other Chinese classics, like the “Dao De Jing.” So I didn’t draw every word from it. But I think one could say that I’ve drawn all the ideas in it.

What do you think people most often get wrong about “The Art of War”?

I think there is a basic misunderstanding that it’s not really about war — it’s about preventing war. From very early times, the Chinese attitude toward warfare was that you need to end it as quickly as possible. The way to do that was to use irregular fighting: special strategies and tactics so that you could minimize the loss of life and the damage to crops and villages and so on. This started very early in Chinese history. Sunzi says the point of warfare is not the fighting but the winning. He says that anger can turn to happiness later, but a dead person can’t be brought back to life. A country that is lost can’t be brought back either. So the main goal of war from a Chinese perspective is to avoid it at all costs, or to figure out how to win while suffering the least amount of damage.

Can you expand on that idea of preventing warfare?

One way to think about it is when the Chinese settled and became an agricultural society, they had some valuable land, and it would often be attacked by outsiders. So they had to figure out how to defend it. War was not about imperialists going to take something from someone else; it was about defending. If you think about the Great Wall, the Great Wall was not built to attack or to take over somebody else’s land. It was to keep out invaders. China actually had very few horses in the oldest days, like in Sunzi’s time, so they had to figure out ways to fight these advancing cavalries. They had to be very clever about it. If you look at “The Art of War,” it’s about preparation. Only very little of it is about how to actually fight, and I think that people tend to neglect that.

You served in the military for a time yourself. Can you tell me a little about it?

I went into the Taiwanese military in 1968 when I was 20 years old. I was in the air force. In Taiwan, it was always as if a war was coming but the war never actually came. The Chinese on the mainland were shelling one of Taiwan’s islands in the Taiwan Strait, and it was a very scary time. But really, most of the time, it was just for show. We would sit in the barracks and play chess and so on. So in one sense, in my lifetime that I’ve been in Taiwan, there hasn’t been a war at all. You could call me very fortunate.

I was in an antiaircraft artillery unit, and I went to my commanding officer and said: “Look, I’m very good at drawing. It would be a waste to have me just standing guard eight hours a day,” which was basically what people in my unit did. They gave me the job of drawing instruction manuals for these three different kinds of antiaircraft guns we had. And as I drew them, I also inserted stories so they would be more enjoyable for the soldiers to read and understand. I’m not very good at taking orders, so I tried to find a place in the military where I could live in a way where I didn’t feel like I was actually in the military.

John Ismay is a staff writer who covers armed conflict for The New York Times Magazine. He is based in Washington.

Interview has been condensed and edited. Illustrations from “The Art of War” by Sunzi. Adapted and illustrated by C. C. Tsai. Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press.

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of The New York Times Magazine delivered to your inbox every week. For more coverage of conflict, visit nytimes.com/atwar.

The post The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’ appeared first on World The News.

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[dragnews]

The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’

A conversation with C.C. Tsai, a Chinese artist and illustrator of Sunzi’s classic “The Art of War” (Princeton University Press, 2018), translated into English by Brian Bruya.

When C.C. Tsai decided to adapt Sunzi’s “The Art of War” into a more contemporary format more than 30 years ago, his ambition was to breathe new life into the 2,500-year-old text. “When people talk about transmitting the classics to the present generation, it’s often very sterile and uniform and, frankly, boring,” Tsai said. After studying multiple editions of the text and secondary sources about it, he saw an opportunity to reconceive “The Art of War” — which to this day remains one of the most important pieces of writing on warfare and strategy — as an illustrated narrative. In 1990, Tsai created a comic-book version for a Chinese audience, and an English-language edition followed in 1994. Since then, Tsai’s extended series of illustrated classics have sold millions of copies and have been translated to more than 20 languages.

Tsai’s adaptation of “The Art of War” revitalized the millenniums-old treatise by trimming away the repetitive elements, tightening the narrative until the ancient lessons of warfare leapt off the page. But the defining element of Tsai’s work is the illustrations. His Disney-influenced style brings humor and immediacy to the text, with Sunzi himself popping into the story as both the wise and fearless commander of blank-eyed, child-like soldiers and the conniving nemesis to the enemy who tries to cross him. Humiliated soldiers seethe and bluster while Sunzi and his men titter with laughter. A particular pleasure is the anthropomorphized livestock, like the horse who surrenders while standing on its hind legs with hooves raised in the air, mirroring its rider’s hands-up posture. Tsai’s characters are drawn to entertain, whether you’re a comic-book enthusiast or a military strategist.

In June, Princeton University Press released a new edition of Tsai’s adaptation with a foreword by Lawrence Freedman, a longtime professor of war studies at King’s College London. Freedman makes note of something hinted at throughout Tsai’s drawings: Sunzi is a brilliant military commander, but he’s also amoral, “celebrating ruthlessness as well as cunning.” According to Freedman, this is why Sunzi has become associated with villains of Western fiction like Gordon Gekko (from the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street”) and Tony Soprano. Sunzi can be thought of as the master manipulator — always controlling all the pieces (literally on a chessboard in some panels) to stay a step ahead the enemy.

From his home in Hangzhou, China, Tsai spoke about Sunzi, his own time in the military and what readers often misunderstand about “The Art of War.”

The style of the illustrations is such a drastic departure from the traditional presentation of the text. How did you come to choose the style you used for this book?

When I started to think about how to present Chinese classics to a contemporary audience, I felt like I had two duties. One was to thoroughly understand it myself, and the second was to lead the reader through a door into a field that they might be apprehensive about and have some kind of fear of. My duty, I felt, was to use humor and stories to get the ideas across, to get the reader to relax and to be able to accept these ideas in a straightforward and simple format. I feel like this is one of the strengths of the comic format.

I read that you’ve developed 20 different styles of drawing. So how did you choose the style you used in “The Art of War”? And what would you call it?

I do have many styles, and if you see them without my name attached, you’d never know that they were drawn by me. When I did this series with “The Art of War” and Confucius and so on, the style is all pretty much the same, except that if you look closely, you’ll notice the style of “The Art of War” is whimsical to an extent, but it’s more serious than in, say, the Daoist books, which are even more whimsical and humorous. In “The Art of War,” I used very simple lines, and if something didn’t need to be drawn, it was left out. You can see a lot of white space. When something did need to be drawn, I put a lot of detail into it. Even if you look at the smallest horse or person or roof, you can see a lot of details in each one. I don’t have a name for any particular style, but I try to tailor the style to the content.

I understand that you first read “The Art of War” when you were very young. Is there anything in the text that you recall connecting with as an adult that you didn’t when reading it as a child?

Yes. Some things did stand out to me when I was trying to really understand the central ideas and the spirit of the text, like the idea that you should win before you go to war. And that when you lose a war, it’s because you haven’t prepared adequately. Also, that you shouldn’t fight without there being clear goals. You have to have some reason to go to war. Also, that anger is something one should be very cautious about when it comes to warfare. That it shouldn’t be a pretext to warfare.

How did you approach adapting the original text to comic form?

I focused on what I thought were the most important ideas and stories, and so it’s not drawn in its entirety. “The Art of War” is not a really long text, but it is longer than other Chinese classics, like the “Dao De Jing.” So I didn’t draw every word from it. But I think one could say that I’ve drawn all the ideas in it.

What do you think people most often get wrong about “The Art of War”?

I think there is a basic misunderstanding that it’s not really about war — it’s about preventing war. From very early times, the Chinese attitude toward warfare was that you need to end it as quickly as possible. The way to do that was to use irregular fighting: special strategies and tactics so that you could minimize the loss of life and the damage to crops and villages and so on. This started very early in Chinese history. Sunzi says the point of warfare is not the fighting but the winning. He says that anger can turn to happiness later, but a dead person can’t be brought back to life. A country that is lost can’t be brought back either. So the main goal of war from a Chinese perspective is to avoid it at all costs, or to figure out how to win while suffering the least amount of damage.

Can you expand on that idea of preventing warfare?

One way to think about it is when the Chinese settled and became an agricultural society, they had some valuable land, and it would often be attacked by outsiders. So they had to figure out how to defend it. War was not about imperialists going to take something from someone else; it was about defending. If you think about the Great Wall, the Great Wall was not built to attack or to take over somebody else’s land. It was to keep out invaders. China actually had very few horses in the oldest days, like in Sunzi’s time, so they had to figure out ways to fight these advancing cavalries. They had to be very clever about it. If you look at “The Art of War,” it’s about preparation. Only very little of it is about how to actually fight, and I think that people tend to neglect that.

You served in the military for a time yourself. Can you tell me a little about it?

I went into the Taiwanese military in 1968 when I was 20 years old. I was in the air force. In Taiwan, it was always as if a war was coming but the war never actually came. The Chinese on the mainland were shelling one of Taiwan’s islands in the Taiwan Strait, and it was a very scary time. But really, most of the time, it was just for show. We would sit in the barracks and play chess and so on. So in one sense, in my lifetime that I’ve been in Taiwan, there hasn’t been a war at all. You could call me very fortunate.

I was in an antiaircraft artillery unit, and I went to my commanding officer and said: “Look, I’m very good at drawing. It would be a waste to have me just standing guard eight hours a day,” which was basically what people in my unit did. They gave me the job of drawing instruction manuals for these three different kinds of antiaircraft guns we had. And as I drew them, I also inserted stories so they would be more enjoyable for the soldiers to read and understand. I’m not very good at taking orders, so I tried to find a place in the military where I could live in a way where I didn’t feel like I was actually in the military.

John Ismay is a staff writer who covers armed conflict for The New York Times Magazine. He is based in Washington.

Interview has been condensed and edited. Illustrations from “The Art of War” by Sunzi. Adapted and illustrated by C. C. Tsai. Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press.

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of The New York Times Magazine delivered to your inbox every week. For more coverage of conflict, visit nytimes.com/atwar.

The post The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’ appeared first on World The News.

from World The News https://ift.tt/2MSpGeD via Today News

[cleopatrarps]

The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’

A conversation with C.C. Tsai, a Chinese artist and illustrator of Sunzi’s classic “The Art of War” (Princeton University Press, 2018), translated into English by Brian Bruya.

When C.C. Tsai decided to adapt Sunzi’s “The Art of War” into a more contemporary format more than 30 years ago, his ambition was to breathe new life into the 2,500-year-old text. “When people talk about transmitting the classics to the present generation, it’s often very sterile and uniform and, frankly, boring,” Tsai said. After studying multiple editions of the text and secondary sources about it, he saw an opportunity to reconceive “The Art of War” — which to this day remains one of the most important pieces of writing on warfare and strategy — as an illustrated narrative. In 1990, Tsai created a comic-book version for a Chinese audience, and an English-language edition followed in 1994. Since then, Tsai’s extended series of illustrated classics have sold millions of copies and have been translated to more than 20 languages.

Tsai’s adaptation of “The Art of War” revitalized the millenniums-old treatise by trimming away the repetitive elements, tightening the narrative until the ancient lessons of warfare leapt off the page. But the defining element of Tsai’s work is the illustrations. His Disney-influenced style brings humor and immediacy to the text, with Sunzi himself popping into the story as both the wise and fearless commander of blank-eyed, child-like soldiers and the conniving nemesis to the enemy who tries to cross him. Humiliated soldiers seethe and bluster while Sunzi and his men titter with laughter. A particular pleasure is the anthropomorphized livestock, like the horse who surrenders while standing on its hind legs with hooves raised in the air, mirroring its rider’s hands-up posture. Tsai’s characters are drawn to entertain, whether you’re a comic-book enthusiast or a military strategist.

In June, Princeton University Press released a new edition of Tsai’s adaptation with a foreword by Lawrence Freedman, a longtime professor of war studies at King’s College London. Freedman makes note of something hinted at throughout Tsai’s drawings: Sunzi is a brilliant military commander, but he’s also amoral, “celebrating ruthlessness as well as cunning.” According to Freedman, this is why Sunzi has become associated with villains of Western fiction like Gordon Gekko (from the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street”) and Tony Soprano. Sunzi can be thought of as the master manipulator — always controlling all the pieces (literally on a chessboard in some panels) to stay a step ahead the enemy.

From his home in Hangzhou, China, Tsai spoke about Sunzi, his own time in the military and what readers often misunderstand about “The Art of War.”

The style of the illustrations is such a drastic departure from the traditional presentation of the text. How did you come to choose the style you used for this book?

When I started to think about how to present Chinese classics to a contemporary audience, I felt like I had two duties. One was to thoroughly understand it myself, and the second was to lead the reader through a door into a field that they might be apprehensive about and have some kind of fear of. My duty, I felt, was to use humor and stories to get the ideas across, to get the reader to relax and to be able to accept these ideas in a straightforward and simple format. I feel like this is one of the strengths of the comic format.

I read that you’ve developed 20 different styles of drawing. So how did you choose the style you used in “The Art of War”? And what would you call it?

I do have many styles, and if you see them without my name attached, you’d never know that they were drawn by me. When I did this series with “The Art of War” and Confucius and so on, the style is all pretty much the same, except that if you look closely, you’ll notice the style of “The Art of War” is whimsical to an extent, but it’s more serious than in, say, the Daoist books, which are even more whimsical and humorous. In “The Art of War,” I used very simple lines, and if something didn’t need to be drawn, it was left out. You can see a lot of white space. When something did need to be drawn, I put a lot of detail into it. Even if you look at the smallest horse or person or roof, you can see a lot of details in each one. I don’t have a name for any particular style, but I try to tailor the style to the content.

I understand that you first read “The Art of War” when you were very young. Is there anything in the text that you recall connecting with as an adult that you didn’t when reading it as a child?

Yes. Some things did stand out to me when I was trying to really understand the central ideas and the spirit of the text, like the idea that you should win before you go to war. And that when you lose a war, it’s because you haven’t prepared adequately. Also, that you shouldn’t fight without there being clear goals. You have to have some reason to go to war. Also, that anger is something one should be very cautious about when it comes to warfare. That it shouldn’t be a pretext to warfare.

How did you approach adapting the original text to comic form?

I focused on what I thought were the most important ideas and stories, and so it’s not drawn in its entirety. “The Art of War” is not a really long text, but it is longer than other Chinese classics, like the “Dao De Jing.” So I didn’t draw every word from it. But I think one could say that I’ve drawn all the ideas in it.

What do you think people most often get wrong about “The Art of War”?

I think there is a basic misunderstanding that it’s not really about war — it’s about preventing war. From very early times, the Chinese attitude toward warfare was that you need to end it as quickly as possible. The way to do that was to use irregular fighting: special strategies and tactics so that you could minimize the loss of life and the damage to crops and villages and so on. This started very early in Chinese history. Sunzi says the point of warfare is not the fighting but the winning. He says that anger can turn to happiness later, but a dead person can’t be brought back to life. A country that is lost can’t be brought back either. So the main goal of war from a Chinese perspective is to avoid it at all costs, or to figure out how to win while suffering the least amount of damage.

Can you expand on that idea of preventing warfare?

One way to think about it is when the Chinese settled and became an agricultural society, they had some valuable land, and it would often be attacked by outsiders. So they had to figure out how to defend it. War was not about imperialists going to take something from someone else; it was about defending. If you think about the Great Wall, the Great Wall was not built to attack or to take over somebody else’s land. It was to keep out invaders. China actually had very few horses in the oldest days, like in Sunzi’s time, so they had to figure out ways to fight these advancing cavalries. They had to be very clever about it. If you look at “The Art of War,” it’s about preparation. Only very little of it is about how to actually fight, and I think that people tend to neglect that.

You served in the military for a time yourself. Can you tell me a little about it?

I went into the Taiwanese military in 1968 when I was 20 years old. I was in the air force. In Taiwan, it was always as if a war was coming but the war never actually came. The Chinese on the mainland were shelling one of Taiwan’s islands in the Taiwan Strait, and it was a very scary time. But really, most of the time, it was just for show. We would sit in the barracks and play chess and so on. So in one sense, in my lifetime that I’ve been in Taiwan, there hasn’t been a war at all. You could call me very fortunate.

I was in an antiaircraft artillery unit, and I went to my commanding officer and said: “Look, I’m very good at drawing. It would be a waste to have me just standing guard eight hours a day,” which was basically what people in my unit did. They gave me the job of drawing instruction manuals for these three different kinds of antiaircraft guns we had. And as I drew them, I also inserted stories so they would be more enjoyable for the soldiers to read and understand. I’m not very good at taking orders, so I tried to find a place in the military where I could live in a way where I didn’t feel like I was actually in the military.

John Ismay is a staff writer who covers armed conflict for The New York Times Magazine. He is based in Washington.

Interview has been condensed and edited. Illustrations from “The Art of War” by Sunzi. Adapted and illustrated by C. C. Tsai. Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press.

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of The New York Times Magazine delivered to your inbox every week. For more coverage of conflict, visit nytimes.com/atwar.

The post The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’ appeared first on World The News.

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[dani-qrt]

The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’

A conversation with C.C. Tsai, a Chinese artist and illustrator of Sunzi’s classic “The Art of War” (Princeton University Press, 2018), translated into English by Brian Bruya.

When C.C. Tsai decided to adapt Sunzi’s “The Art of War” into a more contemporary format more than 30 years ago, his ambition was to breathe new life into the 2,500-year-old text. “When people talk about transmitting the classics to the present generation, it’s often very sterile and uniform and, frankly, boring,” Tsai said. After studying multiple editions of the text and secondary sources about it, he saw an opportunity to reconceive “The Art of War” — which to this day remains one of the most important pieces of writing on warfare and strategy — as an illustrated narrative. In 1990, Tsai created a comic-book version for a Chinese audience, and an English-language edition followed in 1994. Since then, Tsai’s extended series of illustrated classics have sold millions of copies and have been translated to more than 20 languages.

Tsai’s adaptation of “The Art of War” revitalized the millenniums-old treatise by trimming away the repetitive elements, tightening the narrative until the ancient lessons of warfare leapt off the page. But the defining element of Tsai’s work is the illustrations. His Disney-influenced style brings humor and immediacy to the text, with Sunzi himself popping into the story as both the wise and fearless commander of blank-eyed, child-like soldiers and the conniving nemesis to the enemy who tries to cross him. Humiliated soldiers seethe and bluster while Sunzi and his men titter with laughter. A particular pleasure is the anthropomorphized livestock, like the horse who surrenders while standing on its hind legs with hooves raised in the air, mirroring its rider’s hands-up posture. Tsai’s characters are drawn to entertain, whether you’re a comic-book enthusiast or a military strategist.

In June, Princeton University Press released a new edition of Tsai’s adaptation with a foreword by Lawrence Freedman, a longtime professor of war studies at King’s College London. Freedman makes note of something hinted at throughout Tsai’s drawings: Sunzi is a brilliant military commander, but he’s also amoral, “celebrating ruthlessness as well as cunning.” According to Freedman, this is why Sunzi has become associated with villains of Western fiction like Gordon Gekko (from the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street”) and Tony Soprano. Sunzi can be thought of as the master manipulator — always controlling all the pieces (literally on a chessboard in some panels) to stay a step ahead the enemy.

From his home in Hangzhou, China, Tsai spoke about Sunzi, his own time in the military and what readers often misunderstand about “The Art of War.”

The style of the illustrations is such a drastic departure from the traditional presentation of the text. How did you come to choose the style you used for this book?

When I started to think about how to present Chinese classics to a contemporary audience, I felt like I had two duties. One was to thoroughly understand it myself, and the second was to lead the reader through a door into a field that they might be apprehensive about and have some kind of fear of. My duty, I felt, was to use humor and stories to get the ideas across, to get the reader to relax and to be able to accept these ideas in a straightforward and simple format. I feel like this is one of the strengths of the comic format.

I read that you’ve developed 20 different styles of drawing. So how did you choose the style you used in “The Art of War”? And what would you call it?

I do have many styles, and if you see them without my name attached, you’d never know that they were drawn by me. When I did this series with “The Art of War” and Confucius and so on, the style is all pretty much the same, except that if you look closely, you’ll notice the style of “The Art of War” is whimsical to an extent, but it’s more serious than in, say, the Daoist books, which are even more whimsical and humorous. In “The Art of War,” I used very simple lines, and if something didn’t need to be drawn, it was left out. You can see a lot of white space. When something did need to be drawn, I put a lot of detail into it. Even if you look at the smallest horse or person or roof, you can see a lot of details in each one. I don’t have a name for any particular style, but I try to tailor the style to the content.

I understand that you first read “The Art of War” when you were very young. Is there anything in the text that you recall connecting with as an adult that you didn’t when reading it as a child?

Yes. Some things did stand out to me when I was trying to really understand the central ideas and the spirit of the text, like the idea that you should win before you go to war. And that when you lose a war, it’s because you haven’t prepared adequately. Also, that you shouldn’t fight without there being clear goals. You have to have some reason to go to war. Also, that anger is something one should be very cautious about when it comes to warfare. That it shouldn’t be a pretext to warfare.

How did you approach adapting the original text to comic form?

I focused on what I thought were the most important ideas and stories, and so it’s not drawn in its entirety. “The Art of War” is not a really long text, but it is longer than other Chinese classics, like the “Dao De Jing.” So I didn’t draw every word from it. But I think one could say that I’ve drawn all the ideas in it.

What do you think people most often get wrong about “The Art of War”?

I think there is a basic misunderstanding that it’s not really about war — it’s about preventing war. From very early times, the Chinese attitude toward warfare was that you need to end it as quickly as possible. The way to do that was to use irregular fighting: special strategies and tactics so that you could minimize the loss of life and the damage to crops and villages and so on. This started very early in Chinese history. Sunzi says the point of warfare is not the fighting but the winning. He says that anger can turn to happiness later, but a dead person can’t be brought back to life. A country that is lost can’t be brought back either. So the main goal of war from a Chinese perspective is to avoid it at all costs, or to figure out how to win while suffering the least amount of damage.

Can you expand on that idea of preventing warfare?

One way to think about it is when the Chinese settled and became an agricultural society, they had some valuable land, and it would often be attacked by outsiders. So they had to figure out how to defend it. War was not about imperialists going to take something from someone else; it was about defending. If you think about the Great Wall, the Great Wall was not built to attack or to take over somebody else’s land. It was to keep out invaders. China actually had very few horses in the oldest days, like in Sunzi’s time, so they had to figure out ways to fight these advancing cavalries. They had to be very clever about it. If you look at “The Art of War,” it’s about preparation. Only very little of it is about how to actually fight, and I think that people tend to neglect that.

You served in the military for a time yourself. Can you tell me a little about it?

I went into the Taiwanese military in 1968 when I was 20 years old. I was in the air force. In Taiwan, it was always as if a war was coming but the war never actually came. The Chinese on the mainland were shelling one of Taiwan’s islands in the Taiwan Strait, and it was a very scary time. But really, most of the time, it was just for show. We would sit in the barracks and play chess and so on. So in one sense, in my lifetime that I’ve been in Taiwan, there hasn’t been a war at all. You could call me very fortunate.

I was in an antiaircraft artillery unit, and I went to my commanding officer and said: “Look, I’m very good at drawing. It would be a waste to have me just standing guard eight hours a day,” which was basically what people in my unit did. They gave me the job of drawing instruction manuals for these three different kinds of antiaircraft guns we had. And as I drew them, I also inserted stories so they would be more enjoyable for the soldiers to read and understand. I’m not very good at taking orders, so I tried to find a place in the military where I could live in a way where I didn’t feel like I was actually in the military.

John Ismay is a staff writer who covers armed conflict for The New York Times Magazine. He is based in Washington.

Interview has been condensed and edited. Illustrations from “The Art of War” by Sunzi. Adapted and illustrated by C. C. Tsai. Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press.

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of The New York Times Magazine delivered to your inbox every week. For more coverage of conflict, visit nytimes.com/atwar.

The post The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’ appeared first on World The News.

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[newestbalance]

The Art of Drawing ‘The Art of War’

A conversation with C.C. Tsai, a Chinese artist and illustrator of Sunzi’s classic “The Art of War” (Princeton University Press, 2018), translated into English by Brian Bruya.

When C.C. Tsai decided to adapt Sunzi’s “The Art of War” into a more contemporary format more than 30 years ago, his ambition was to breathe new life into the 2,500-year-old text. “When people talk about transmitting the classics to the present generation, it’s often very sterile and uniform and, frankly, boring,” Tsai said. After studying multiple editions of the text and secondary sources about it, he saw an opportunity to reconceive “The Art of War” — which to this day remains one of the most important pieces of writing on warfare and strategy — as an illustrated narrative. In 1990, Tsai created a comic-book version for a Chinese audience, and an English-language edition followed in 1994. Since then, Tsai’s extended series of illustrated classics have sold millions of copies and have been translated to more than 20 languages.

Tsai’s adaptation of “The Art of War” revitalized the millenniums-old treatise by trimming away the repetitive elements, tightening the narrative until the ancient lessons of warfare leapt off the page. But the defining element of Tsai’s work is the illustrations. His Disney-influenced style brings humor and immediacy to the text, with Sunzi himself popping into the story as both the wise and fearless commander of blank-eyed, child-like soldiers and the conniving nemesis to the enemy who tries to cross him. Humiliated soldiers seethe and bluster while Sunzi and his men titter with laughter. A particular pleasure is the anthropomorphized livestock, like the horse who surrenders while standing on its hind legs with hooves raised in the air, mirroring its rider’s hands-up posture. Tsai’s characters are drawn to entertain, whether you’re a comic-book enthusiast or a military strategist.

In June, Princeton University Press released a new edition of Tsai’s adaptation with a foreword by Lawrence Freedman, a longtime professor of war studies at King’s College London. Freedman makes note of something hinted at throughout Tsai’s drawings: Sunzi is a brilliant military commander, but he’s also amoral, “celebrating ruthlessness as well as cunning.” According to Freedman, this is why Sunzi has become associated with villains of Western fiction like Gordon Gekko (from the Oliver Stone film “Wall Street”) and Tony Soprano. Sunzi can be thought of as the master manipulator — always controlling all the pieces (literally on a chessboard in some panels) to stay a step ahead the enemy.

From his home in Hangzhou, China, Tsai spoke about Sunzi, his own time in the military and what readers often misunderstand about “The Art of War.”

The style of the illustrations is such a drastic departure from the traditional presentation of the text. How did you come to choose the style you used for this book?

When I started to think about how to present Chinese classics to a contemporary audience, I felt like I had two duties. One was to thoroughly understand it myself, and the second was to lead the reader through a door into a field that they might be apprehensive about and have some kind of fear of. My duty, I felt, was to use humor and stories to get the ideas across, to get the reader to relax and to be able to accept these ideas in a straightforward and simple format. I feel like this is one of the strengths of the comic format.

I read that you’ve developed 20 different styles of drawing. So how did you choose the style you used in “The Art of War”? And what would you call it?

I do have many styles, and if you see them without my name attached, you’d never know that they were drawn by me. When I did this series with “The Art of War” and Confucius and so on, the style is all pretty much the same, except that if you look closely, you’ll notice the style of “The Art of War” is whimsical to an extent, but it’s more serious than in, say, the Daoist books, which are even more whimsical and humorous. In “The Art of War,” I used very simple lines, and if something didn’t need to be drawn, it was left out. You can see a lot of white space. When something did need to be drawn, I put a lot of detail into it. Even if you look at the smallest horse or person or roof, you can see a lot of details in each one. I don’t have a name for any particular style, but I try to tailor the style to the content.

I understand that you first read “The Art of War” when you were very young. Is there anything in the text that you recall connecting with as an adult that you didn’t when reading it as a child?

Yes. Some things did stand out to me when I was trying to really understand the central ideas and the spirit of the text, like the idea that you should win before you go to war. And that when you lose a war, it’s because you haven’t prepared adequately. Also, that you shouldn’t fight without there being clear goals. You have to have some reason to go to war. Also, that anger is something one should be very cautious about when it comes to warfare. That it shouldn’t be a pretext to warfare.

How did you approach adapting the original text to comic form?

I focused on what I thought were the most important ideas and stories, and so it’s not drawn in its entirety. “The Art of War” is not a really long text, but it is longer than other Chinese classics, like the “Dao De Jing.” So I didn’t draw every word from it. But I think one could say that I’ve drawn all the ideas in it.

What do you think people most often get wrong about “The Art of War”?

I think there is a basic misunderstanding that it’s not really about war — it’s about preventing war. From very early times, the Chinese attitude toward warfare was that you need to end it as quickly as possible. The way to do that was to use irregular fighting: special strategies and tactics so that you could minimize the loss of life and the damage to crops and villages and so on. This started very early in Chinese history. Sunzi says the point of warfare is not the fighting but the winning. He says that anger can turn to happiness later, but a dead person can’t be brought back to life. A country that is lost can’t be brought back either. So the main goal of war from a Chinese perspective is to avoid it at all costs, or to figure out how to win while suffering the least amount of damage.

Can you expand on that idea of preventing warfare?

One way to think about it is when the Chinese settled and became an agricultural society, they had some valuable land, and it would often be attacked by outsiders. So they had to figure out how to defend it. War was not about imperialists going to take something from someone else; it was about defending. If you think about the Great Wall, the Great Wall was not built to attack or to take over somebody else’s land. It was to keep out invaders. China actually had very few horses in the oldest days, like in Sunzi’s time, so they had to figure out ways to fight these advancing cavalries. They had to be very clever about it. If you look at “The Art of War,” it’s about preparation. Only very little of it is about how to actually fight, and I think that people tend to neglect that.

You served in the military for a time yourself. Can you tell me a little about it?

I went into the Taiwanese military in 1968 when I was 20 years old. I was in the air force. In Taiwan, it was always as if a war was coming but the war never actually came. The Chinese on the mainland were shelling one of Taiwan’s islands in the Taiwan Strait, and it was a very scary time. But really, most of the time, it was just for show. We would sit in the barracks and play chess and so on. So in one sense, in my lifetime that I’ve been in Taiwan, there hasn’t been a war at all. You could call me very fortunate.

I was in an antiaircraft artillery unit, and I went to my commanding officer and said: “Look, I’m very good at drawing. It would be a waste to have me just standing guard eight hours a day,” which was basically what people in my unit did. They gave me the job of drawing instruction manuals for these three different kinds of antiaircraft guns we had. And as I drew them, I also inserted stories so they would be more enjoyable for the soldiers to read and understand. I’m not very good at taking orders, so I tried to find a place in the military where I could live in a way where I didn’t feel like I was actually in the military.

John Ismay is a staff writer who covers armed conflict for The New York Times Magazine. He is based in Washington.

Interview has been condensed and edited. Illustrations from “The Art of War” by Sunzi. Adapted and illustrated by C. C. Tsai. Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press.

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[blahblahemblem]

heroes barracks tour: fliers

same as last time, but with a different unit type!

note: I wrote this about a week ago, lol. I haven’t changed anything since then.

Fliers are probably my favourite unit type right now. The reason is quite simple – their unparallelled mobility makes them highly flexible and allows them to pull off feats that other movement type teams can only dream of. I’m also very lucky in that I managed to acquire all 3 of the currently existing ranged fliers. As of the moment I’m typing this, my main flier team is my arena offence and defence (Michalis is a bonus unit <3). It’s also only thanks to them that I cleared Chain Challenge 11 & 12 (namely, they got me through the chapter 11 bit), and I’ve been liberally using them to clear Infernals of various BHBs and GHBs.

(Note from today: using a mixed team with Michalis on it during the first week of the Winter’s Envoy bonus set, I was able to get into tier 20 for the first time with a score of 4890!)

5* builds

+spd -hp

Random pitybreaker from Ylissean Summer. The story is as follows:

Mercifully this was only at 3,25%.

I’d not spent any effort on her yet at all aside from throwing her the Iceberg. She doesn’t even have enough SP to learn Fortify Fliers which she comes with.

Usage: None whatsoever. Her attack is pitifully low to the point that she does awfully against units she’s supposed to counter because she can’t ORKO them and she takes massive damage in return. Admittedly she could do some mage countering. But she doesn’t.

Future improvements: I have grand plans for poor Caeda. I intend on giving her a Wo Dao+ and refining it for extra MT. As for passives, the good ole Fury Desperation combo. Then she could either do massive damage through Iceberg while also being capable of charging it a bit by soaking up magic hits, or inherit Moonbow to go and go to town on that. Unfortunately that’s quite a long way away because I don’t even have any Athenas anymore and when I do pull one there’s a very long queue for those feathers.

+atk –res

Pulling Nowi was nothing short of a miracle which you can see here under Henry’s section. It’s especially amazing in her case because the reason I only had 9 orbs ready for a limited units banner was that I’d blown all of them trying to get Hinoka, you know, the girl famous for being the only permanent source of Hone Fliers.

I don’t see any reason to change her default build. I quite like Atk/Res Bond as Nowi is glued to other units all the time anyway. Hone Fliers is a given. Renewal keeps her HP in range of Grimoire’s passive effect (which is amazing and I love it on Nowi but Takumi really doesn’t need it).

Usage: As the only carrier of Hone Fliers in my barracks, Nowi is essential to my flier team, so I’ve been working her to the bone since the moment she got here.

Improvements: I don’t have access to Renewal 3.

+spd –res

I had promoted her before I decided to make this account my main, as part of my now realised effort to own a 5* copy of every unit in the game. It’s kind of a funny coincidence that Shanna just now experienced a rise in popularity thanks to the Voting Gauntlet. Personally I’m currently not a very big fan of Shanna even though there’s nothing wrong with her, a fact that has absolutely nothing to do with loving Takumi too much and being bitter.

Usage: She has over 1k HM mostly thanks to the time when she was one of my very few trained 5* units and I had to rely on her in the first two Tempest Trials. I haven’t been using her often lately (see above). When I finally get over myself, I will continue my attempts to create a mixed team with her and BK.

Improvements: She has Firesweep Lance+, LaD2, and Drive Def 2 inherited but lacks the SP. She also needs an assist.

+atk –hp

My first free 5* summon on this account, coming from the Ephraim & Eirika’s BHB banner.

So far this is just her default build. I’ve been focusing on units that fit specifically on monotype teams, so Tana, who would of course be better off on a mixed team so Guidance doesn’t go wasted, has been left behind.

Usage: See above. I do take her out for AA quite a lot because I can then use her to Guidance-drop an armour somewhere convenient.

Improvements: She has Hit & Run and Swap inherited but not learned. I’m also planning on giving her Close Defence from the second Joshua so I can take advantage of Vidofnir’s passive effect.

+spd –hp

First summon from Nohrian Summer; too bad that one was before free summons became a thing. It came as quite the convenience since I was planning on promoting a Cordelia anyway (I had a +atk 4* one in my barracks).

Another constant presence on my main flier team, although unfortunately also the most expendable, as the bulk of player-phase damage is handled by the mages and she can’t tank at all.

Usage: Maxed HM. As part of my flier team, she is fielded very very often, but, again, she is also the member with the lowest kill count. Fortify Fliers is a very big contribution on her part however, as pretty much everybody else on the team appreciates it, and so is Reposition.

Improvements: Merging her might not be a bad idea since she’s so common, but I’m just not feeling it yet so that’s up in the air. LaD3 is also something she probably wants, but I’m not going to give it to her unless I pull a Minerva again by accident; even then it’d probably go to Shanna first over her. Death Blow is on the table, but there are no Kleins available and she’s not a priority for it.

+atk –res

I suffered for her so fucking much. I hit a 5% rate on Nohrian Summer and have given up twice along the way. It was all so fuCKING WORTH IT

I don’t hide the fact that I fucking hate Corrin as a character with a passion, but honestly I love my summer Corrin a lot. She has pretty art and an adorable chibi sprite and she’s the deadly centrepiece of my Flier Emblem. I can’t believe Heroes made me feel positive emotions towards Corrin but here we are.

Build is as standard as it gets, monotype team bladetome nuke.

Usage: Maxed HM, honestly after what I said above you can already infer that she’s one of my most used units

Improvements: I could give her Fury but her default Swift Strike has been working well for me thus far so I see no real reason to.

+2, neutral (obviously)

HIM

I don’t know why but I’m in love with this stupid edgelord. I had him promoted kind of just to promote a GHB unit on my old main and ended up getting very attached and promoted him again when I switched to this account the first chance I got. Now he’s my first deliberate merging project. I gave him a Hector. He’s my pride and joy and my favourite unit (sorry to any tacos that were hurt by this).

I absolutely adore the Hauteclere upgrade as well, because it lets me do so much amazing bullshit, like this:

Usage: LOL

Improvements: I missed one copy of him during his first rerun so unfortunately I’ll only be able to merge him to +3 for now, but you bet your ass I’m going to keep merging when we get more copies. QR3 is in the plans as well. Aether is a distant possibility.

neutral

She’s the reason I don’t have Hinoka. I got her off Flier Boost Skills when there were no blue orbs. I got Nowi literally the next minute though, so it’s fine, I’m glad to have Minerva now.

I’ve literally just thrown DF and Desperation at her default build so far. I may be happy I have Minerva, but I haven’t used her much yet.

Usage: See above.

Improvements: Needs SP to learn Desp 3 and Ward Fliers. Needs an assist. Once I get around to upgrading her Hauteclere (and believe me there’s quite the line ahead of her), I might go for the touted Moonbow spam build instead of building up a big nuke with DF. That’s her brother’s domain (see above).

+atk –hp

Cherche’s Brave build is quite famous and I like her so I made it happen, end of story.

Usage: I’ve been busy with my main team on which Michalis reigns supreme so I haven’t got around to doing anything with her yet after she learned the important skills. I might consider replacing Cordy with her once she learns Fortify if only so that somebody keeps earning HM, but we shall see.

Improvements: Needs SP for Fortify Fliers. I might give her one merge for that one extra point of atk. Might also give her Desperation once I get around to upgrading the Brash Assault seal so I can try that bucket of fun out.

+hp –def

I got two Hectors and a Deirdre from Fjorm’s banner. I decided to give up. Then I had some orbs and an itch to try again. There was one green orb and it was Cammy.

Now that I have her I have zero clue what to do with her. Right now I’m leaning towards Gronnblade, but I don’t have any Ninos at all. We’ll see I guess.

Usage: None yet

Improvements: Different tome, different assist, passives, everything basically

Lower rarity builds and merge projects

neutral

Palla has served me very well as the designated red flier on my makeshift 10th stratum quests team up until I pulled h!Nowi. Yes, I was using this free Palla we got from those Whitewings quests ages ago over my 5* Caeda with good IVs, because well. Palla can tank, and has Goad Fliers. She’s sort of retired now, but I’m considering making some kind of 5* build for her if I get one with good IVs. I’m thinking of capitalising on her good bulk since the other two sword fliers are more glass-cannon like. (Not that I’m about to get an Elincia any time soon...)

+2, +def –res

More bulk, this time in green. I’m sitting on a ton of 3* Berukas, but I don’t really want to spend extra feathers since aside from Glimmer which is still a questionable choice despite the lower cooldown she has nothing to offer as inheritance. Anyway, once I get her past +7 one way or another I will be giving her a Slaying Axe+ from a promoted version of herself. At some point. She’s on the list somewhere.

+10, +atk –forgot

Est haunts my dreams. I just merged all of them to get rid of the plague in my barracks and now I have this. Now, at 3* +10, she has the same raw stats as a 5* of her would, and in fact even has +1 to HP and def. She’s never getting a 5* weapon or expensive inherits unless I’m overrun with pitybreaker Abels, but she might prove to be a good asset in a pinch. With a simple Brave Lance, Atk+3 in A slot and the Atk+3 seal that’s 49x2 atk before buffs. If only I would bother to train her...

Not pictured:

Narcian’s default build is excellent for niche AA usage, but I haven’t needed him in a while. Valter is still untrained. Both of them are going to be kept around for HM purposes and because of GHB quests, but neither are getting any merges. I don’t know what I’m going to do with Panic Ploy yet but I want it as an option, and Lancebreaker 3 is obvious.