#(also i have drawn some stuff but i've posted it to my personal since it's also oops all yakuza. but y'know)

[antirepurp]

annual rewatch of hbomberguy shitting on bbc sherlock to feel a little better about my own writing is going swimmingly btw

[biromanticwritergal]

I have no idea what I'm going to do for NaNoWriMo this year. I feel very uninspired lately.

I just want to do well in my class and my energy has been low lately (season change on my new medicine, I'm guessing???). I need some energy because it's Shakespeare and I need to keep my grades up to stay in the honors society (no pressure lol).

Much More in the tags as per usual... :P

[hailruth]

Do you have any book recommendations for secular Jews? I feel really disconnected from my culture/racial identity/other Jews, but I’m not religious beyond cherishing the practices of our tradition, if that makes sense.

hmm.. i personally think that there can be no difference drawn between the culture, ethnicity, and religion of judaism. so, i don't see how a book about jewish culture could be written without reference to religion. i haven't read or encountered such books. but as a deeply religious person i haven't sought them out, so maybe others who see this can give suggestions. however, i'll try and provide some that might be what you're looking for (also quite a few of these are available on the internet archive)! i will be posting a more extensive reading list later on, so keep an eye out for that if you'd like. books marked with an asterisk are endorsed by the rabbinical council of america.

if you are completely disconnected, i can recommend these introductory books:

TORAH!!! (half-joking)

To Be a Jew: A Guide to Jewish Observance In Contemporary Life* by Rabbi Hayim Donin (my top recommendation)

Jewish Literacy: The Most Important Things to Know About the Jewish Religion, Its People, and Its History by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin (also crazy good)

Essential Judaism: A Complete Guide to Beliefs, Customs & Rituals by George Robinson (like 600 pages and textbook-like but this means that there are very thick sections on what could be described as the secular stuff)

Living a Jewish Life by Anita Diamant ("descriptive rather than prescriptive," quite liberal and a light read)

here's some stuff on specific religious subjects that may help you simply learn, whether or not you engage with the practices:

Waters of Eden: The Mystery of the Mikveh* by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan (a mikveh should be built before a synagogue in a community which has neither, so i think jews should learn about them even if they will never use one)

The Jewish Way in Death and Mourning* & The Jewish Way in Love and Marriage* by Rabbi Maurice Lamm

Shabbos: Tasting Eternity* by Rabbi Daniel Travis

i think folklore is super important for more jews to learn about as it often reflects the collective psychology of what we were going through at the time. it's why i think it should be read/understood alongside general jewish history. i'll probably devote a separate post to info on folklore later. food and diaspora all mixed in here too:

People Love Dead Jews by Dara Horn

A History of Judaism by Martin Goodman

The Story of the Jews: Finding the Words by Simon Schama

The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York by Claudia Roden

Divination, Magic, and Healing: The Book of Jewish Folklore by Rabbi Ronald Isaacs

Miriam's Tambourine: Jewish Folktales from Around the World by Howard Schwartz

okay, i think i've given a good outline. i mostly read religious-specific books so my strictly historical/food-centered recs are sparse, i apologize. it's also been forever since i've read many of these so they may have issues i don't fully remember. check on the replies/reblogs for any info about that or general corrections. i hope these helped! if i misinterpreted your ask, you can always come back to my inbox.

[reimenaashelyee]

TCM 10th Anniversary

I haven't been very online and posting much art as of late, due to a surprising number of OBLIGATIONS (teaching gigs, job-hunting and catching up with lots of other comics work, which includes what I am gonna talk about in this post) and some disillusionment about posting art on platforms.

Some of you are gonna be shocked by this but 2026 is going to mark 10 years since I posted the first page of The Carpet Merchant of Konstantiniyya on my webcomic's website. This is a pretty big meaningful event to me -- TCM is my first ever completed graphic novel and the reason why I am able to have a comics career now. So obviously I want to celebrate it big and wrap my journey with TCM with a nice fancy extravagant bow.

I've been wanting to do a full FINAL remaster of all of 600 pages of the comic. Not so much revamping the art because I already did a lot of art fixes for the hardcover print editions, and I am still pretty chill about how everything looks! More like updating the lettering (again), correcting colours, fixing the dialogue and strengthening the themes between books, and presenting the entire two-book series at the best it could be. I learned a lot about the realities/logistics of publishing and making comics since I finished TCM, so I'm excited to be redeeming the webcomic sins of my naive past self and update TCM to the current standard of the rest of my author catalogue.

Right now I'm about 3/4 of the way of remastering the 600 pages. So close!! But I want to talk about the stuff I've already done for it!

Everything's under the cut if you are keen to hear me yap.

First thing I did for the remaster is a complete revamp of the title design. I designed the original in late 2015 - early 2016 when the webcomic began to form and never changed it. But the 10th anniversary means I can pull all the stops and go wild, especially now that I have improved in terms of design and all the skills needed to make a historical comic.

The old title was meant to evoke Ottoman calligraphic brushscript without being too cheesy. I carried this over in the new one - I still don't want it to be cheesy and I'd prefer to evoke the feel rather than the look of Ottoman/Arabic calligraphy, since the Eastern calligraphic arts (by this I mean non-Latin script. i.e China and Japan are also equally sophisticated) is no joke and I'd prefer not to attempt replicating linguistic brushstokes and patterns for Aesthetique. Not to mention Latin letters don't lend themselves to Eastern calligraphy very well.

Luckily, Latin calligraphy already exists. I wanted to include more of the 18th century English stylings of the comic into the title, and for this I looked at English Roundhand/Copperplate and the French Ronde. Lots of curlicues and flourish. The outcome is this more condensed almost stamp-like design.

The second thing I did is the book cover. I am not really sure what the final cover will look like as it's dependent on whether I get a publisher for this edition of TCM - but I've made a mockup for now!

The 10th anniversary cover has more of the Ottoman carpet influence compared to the previous covers for TCM. I'm thinking of weaving in the Rococo S-and-C leaf scrolls and other motifs into the cover too. We will see!

The third thing I did is update as many of the Turkish marbled pages as possible.

So Volume I has a fair number of marbled backgrounds - but I didn't have a lot of resources back then, so I drew all of those pages digitally. It's not authentic, per se, but it worked.

As part of the remastering, I want to emphasise the imperfect, hand-drawn, there's-a-person-behind-this feel of TCM. Not to say the personnage wasn't there before, but I wanted MORE of that, especially given the AI nonsense that's happening for the past 2 years.

So this time I went to a Turkish marbled pages workshop, taught by an ebru master (shoutout to Eslem at Anatolia Art Studio), to make my own pages ... the traditional way!

I made 6 prints, and they will be appearing in some shape or form in the final remaster. The first image at the top of this post - which is the title page - is one of those prints! The marbled pages aren't perfect - there is so much technical skill involved in transferring the prints from plastic container to paper, and I bunged that part up too much lol - but that fits the point of TCM as a project? It's all me, it's all the artist's handiwork, and it's imperfect, but that's what allows the love to show.

The fourth and final thing I will be yapping about is the actual remastering work.

Top is the 10th anniversary 2025 remaster. Bottom is 2016 version.

The differences are not that extravagant - any tweaks I am doing, including the relettering, is for consistency and clarity.

Mainly I just wanted to fix the colour sins I committed in the past. In 2016 I didn't have any idea what printing a comic entails and would require - so I naively coloured everything in RGB... and failed to consider how dark colours will print in a CMYK space and on paper... and there are a lot of DARK COLOUR SCENES!!!

Top is the 2025 fix. Bottom is the original.

You can imagine how poorly the original printed on paper. :)

It took me a month and a half to work on Volume I, as I had to reletter everything and implement so many colour fixes. Luckily Volume II has been easy, and with any luck I will be done with this project in March.

I am considering rerunning the webcomic at some point! Sound off if you want to reread TCM again. :3c

[vershl]

HELLO ITS ME--

Sorry I've been gone for so long, I've been focusing on drawing for myself, as well as having massive brainrot for Sonic OCs and such. I won't be sharing my ACTUAL ocs at the moment, they're a bit personal and-- yeah.

However; I WILL share new blorbos :] -- Let's start with Sonic, Shadow, and Vespera. I haven't drawn more of my dadow or REALLY made a true design for Sonic, BUT Shadow has gotten a tweak. I yoinked an idea from Lancelot artists, and honestly- I'm obsessed with Shadow looking this way asjfgkajsg

cough cough- ignore the sauce asgjasgj

Vespera also now has a proper reference, so that's fun.

--

SOOOO--- She has two new younger siblings now as well, it was spontaneous BUT I love them.

She needs a little more work, but say hi to Maria. She's an albino hedgehog, and unfortunately I don't have more art of her-- YET.

Well, other than her and her twin brother as babies. :]

--

And speaking of twin brother; This is Orion. Personality wise, he's EXACTLY like younger Shadow, to a fault. He's egotistical, hot headed, self absorbed, and sarcastic. Very much a neutral-evil aligned dude. He's smelly, but we love him.

Had to include a close-up of the really nice one ashgajsg IM GONNA EAT HIMM-

-- This is all I have to share.. for now, I'll try to come back soon with more doodles, as well as share some stuff I've done for ArtFight. But I might leave that for tomorrow.

I know my style has changed since I last posted-- but I've been converting from SAI 2.0 to Clip Studio, and it's been a bit of a journey.

Needless to say-- I think SatCG is going to be put on hold for a while, I'm lacking the braincells to work on a comic 💀

[peaterookie]

Why Do I Like (Manga) Lupin? (yes this is finished)

The not-so-long awaited question shall be answered today!!! I'm sure so many people are so excited for me to talk about Lupin for the 90 billionth time.

This will be a normal and short post, trust me.

But seriously, has anyone actually stopped and wondered: Why do I like this character so much? Why did my brain choose this character and not another? Have you ever stopped and thought about the psychology that goes into why your heart pours so much of itself into just some fictional character, that might just make you become a more well-adjusted individual in society if you just hadn't been aware of them?

I love everything about Lupin III, if you haven't known already. But I also like psychology, and talking about myself. So let me guide you through the crevices of my brain and show you why I love him so much. After this you will surely gain an appreciation for him at least, if not invite him to live inside your brain rent free.

Chapters:

Name

Design

Personality

How Lupin Changed my Life

Other Stuff!

Chapter 1: Name

sorry guys but WE GOTTA TALK IN LENGTH ABOUT HIS NAME

I think it's a really cool name!! Before I got into the series, the name Lupin III has always caught my eye. It describes straightforwardly a lot of his character premise: He's the grandchild of the well renowned thief Arsene Lupin. Wouldn't that kind of character already sound interesting to you?

I think there are very few works of fiction where the title/name of the character already tells you everything you need to know about the series. And to that i find it pretty impressive.

Aside from that, I think Lupin is a cute and fun name to say. It's very funny to have an absolute psychopath be named Loop-on. That's a grown ass man dude.

Him being the third generation is also quite interesting. You typically see people when making a fan-child of a character usually have it be a direct offspring, but no, MP skipped a whole generation to write about Arsene Lupin's grandchild.

That, of course, makes sense because he needed to have it match the time period he is writing it in, but being the third gen brings a deeper sense of inferiority to Lupin that being the second wouldn't have. We get the impression that he isn't as good as the past two Lupins and also that he is probably the most disconnected to the identity of the gentleman thief, reflected in how he dresses and acts. He's a lot more modern and young, I think this disconnect helps him be his own character.

Lastly, I find the lack of first name very intriguing. It probably doesnt have any significance but i like to think that his parents didnt give a fuck enough to give him his own first name. It's okay because he doesn't need one. His name is already that good.

Chapter 2: Design

Lupin III is designed with the manga medium in mind. Since manga is primarily in black and white, Monkey Punch needed the character to have good contrast and be easily drawn in any sort of poses and angles. I'd say he did a great job in the end, and Lupin's design is one of the best I've ever seen.

His sleek black body compliments extremely well with his jacket and tie, which with its bright colors, makes his body stand out. Having shirt and pants be black also lessens the need to add detail onto the clothes. In a way he functions like a stickman.

His head is also interestingly featureless, which makes it quite distinct from many other characters with their unique hair styles. I think it works well with his motif of being able to disguise as anybody. The sideburns also give him extra unique points and his hairline gives him a fun facial shape. I remember seeing a screenshot where Monkey Punch stated that he initially wanted Lupin to have hair similar to Goemon's, but decided against it because it would take too much time. I think this was a good choice on his part, and that sort of hair style I assumed was then reused for Lupin's child design.

(terrifying.)

Another thing I find cool about his design is just the overall roundness of it. Have you guys ever wondered why Lupin, this bastard trickster of man, has such smooth and round shapes ? Wouldn't it make more sense personality wise for him to have more sharper shapes to encompass his wild nature?

(im not going to be your art teacher and explain shape languages to you guys, here's a picture.)

Personally, I think the round shapes are to show Lupin's softer side. While he is cunning and evil, he also exhibits a child-like and playful personality and overall his movements are quite bouncy, kind of like a bouncing ball!

In contrast though, I feel like that appearance is also to disguise his sinister side, to make him look softer than he truly is. Although his shapes are round, they are composed of rugged lines, topped with angular posing, and a sharp smile. It gives you the impression that he doesn't really fit into the soft and friendly mold.

Wow, I'm this far into the design chapter and I haven't even talked about how he looks like a monkey yet! I think for that I'm better than about half of the Lupin fans already /hj

I believe his monkey-like appearance was unintentional, but what I find pretty funny about it is that it really does fit Lupin in a way. Monkeys, often depicted as goofy and friendly animals in media, are actually quite dangerous and unpredictable animals if not handled properly. Lupin is also a smart but dangerous character, but gets softened up throughout the series to attract a more diverse audience. (Not saying that Lupin isn't goofy and silly, he is, but I feel like it's a vast oversimplification of his character.)

Monkey analysis is over, let's move on.

Lastly... Lupin III is SO FUN TO DRAW!!! Adding all that I've talked about; his monkey-like head, the nice contrast on his outfit, and the general simplicity of his design, his design is simple to draw and very malleable. I get a lot of mileage out of designing outfits for him and drawing him in various styles, so there's a lot of room to add your own artistic charm to him! I also love how there's really no correct way to color him either. Monkey Punch experimented wildly on his color palette in the past; he has a variety of outfit palette and skin color and that sort of looseness is very awesome...

His variety of expressions is also one of the best things about this design because. there's just so much you can work with and it makes him like literally the best character ever you don't understand. You can not look at this set of panels and not love this goofball.

and uh oh yeah he's really hot and I want him.

Chapter 3: Personality

I've tried avoiding talking about his personality in the last chapter, but now it's time to go ALL OOOOOOUUUTT

I've always loved the trickster character archetype ever since I was conscious. There's something very entertaining about a character that throws away any sort of moral responsibility and decides to troll the entire world. They always have extremely charming and lovable personalities as well, and Lupin is no exception!

Let's start at the surface level. I love how much of a BASTARD he is. I love how much he gets on everyone's nerves (including mine's) just by merely existing and he is proud of it. Those types of characters are so fun to follow because they make everything they do and anything around them a laughingstock, Lupin often has a shit-eating grin whenever he knows he's doing something bad and it's so entertaining!! It's also equally satisfying when he gets punished for being a bastard and I love seeing him suffer.

On top of being a bastard, he's also an ASSHOLE. Manga Lupin is a massive asshole and he exists to shit on the world whenever it does anything against him. He gets angry very often in the manga and it gets fucking crazy whenever someone ticks him off. He will literally do anything to get back to whoever pissed him off and it is super funny. He's an angry, dramatic, pouty shithead. Love him for that.

Speaking of dramatic, his strongest points as a character is just how expressive he can be. It's endearing just how much emotion is stored in that man's body and I'm drawn to those kinds of characters because despite my personality being sorta big here, I have a lot of trouble expressing myself in real life. So seeing characters like that just being able to express freely feels very empowering to me even if Lupin looks like a little bitch when he does it sometimes.

I'm also very endeared by his mannerisms. He moves very... strangely (like most MP characters do) but I think he exudes this weirdness much more due to his eccentricity and expressive personality. It makes me think that he's neurodivergent but we will talk about this later. His expressions are also really exaggerated and funny, he's like genetically engineered to act as entertaining as possible and I really enjoy observing the way he does things like watching a bug in a cup.

Okay okay I'm done with talking surface level shit. Let's talk about all of Lupin.

I don't only just enjoy trickster characters, I also like characters that have multiple layers to them (like onions) and Manga Lupin is probably the best example of this.

"I wanted to make Lupin a top-notch villain, but I also wanted to make Lupin an extremely human man. The result was the meticulous and perfectionist assassin, with a gruff, awkward, and clumsy personality."

The best part about Lupin is how multi-faceted he is. He is both a genius and an idiot, cruel but kind, emotional and logical. He is the type of man you can imagine existing in real life because his actions and feelings are extremely realistic and sometimes even relatable!!

Every one of us don't just have a single personality, there are suitable moments to be serious, suitable moments to be silly, we are never always one extreme over the other. Like Lupin, some of us are smart but are bumbling idiots on certain things, and we all have the capacity to be both the kindest people alive or commit atrocities on others. That level of complexity and humanity in Lupin makes me feel very connected to him on a level I've never experienced from any other fictional character, because he feels like a character that any of us can become if we take the wrong steps in life.

Some people say that manga Lupin is a very inconsistent character and frankly I disagree with that and I don't like how non-manga readers spread that around to diminish his character. I feel like many people fail to acknowledge the nuance he has; he is inconsistent because that is how humans are, there are no rules to how we can behave and our minds are an enigma, especially for those dealing with mental conditions and/or trauma.

Oh yeah! I haven't ever discussed how Lupin is like, severely mentally ill yet huh?

So these two pages are from the New Adventures chapter "Island of Thieves (Part 2)" the first ever Lupin manga chapter I read.

In this chapter, Lupin has what I would likely describe as a mental breakdown, followed by a series of irrational and fucked up decisions. For all that it's worth, I think this chapter won me over because I Love having a mentally ill character to study because it's such an interesting topic for me to dissect. this isn't gonna be some super deep dive into what mental illness he has because I am personally not that kind of person, but just general observations on his behavior.

The first thing I can pinpoint is his inability to control his emotions, which leads to him making rash and violent decisions towards others. There really isn't a set of things i can pinpoint that lead to his emotional outbursts because there are times where he is very levelheaded in tough scenarios, then experiences an outburst at some minor inconvenience, this sort of instability is an obvious sign that there is something wrong.

I believe that this sort of behavior came from how he grew up in the Lupin household. In the Confession Series, there were various times where he grew extremely frustrated with his father and grandfather's actions towards him.

This pent up frustration and anger in him was then directly fostered into a coping mechanism because of his occupation as a criminal/assassin, where he needed to be violent and cruel to others to survive. When that is the way that he can solve a problem, he will see it as the only way to eliminate a stressor because he has been taught no other way to cope with his feelings.

Have a problem with someone? Hit them, kill them, rape them.

Sorry, that got a bit heavy huh? I just find Lupin so fascinating, it's almost like looking into a real criminal's brain, someone who has been hurt throughout all their life and has decided to hurt the world back.

For why I focused so much on his emotional regulation issues, it is because I deeply related to this part of his character. ahh I'm gonna get suuper personal in this part so be prepared?? I guess??? And also have an open mind of course.

Chapter 4 (but also kind of sticking on Ch.3's topic): How Lupin Changed My Life

Content Warning for I will be lightly discussing about real case of parental abuse, suicidal ideations, murder ideations, and other sensitive topics.

I also grew up with a family that has not treated me the best. In the position of the family as the youngest child, I lacked power, and thus lacked the power to stand up for myself and express how I felt whenever I was hurt by my family.

Like Lupin, this caused me to have trouble with expressing my emotions in a healthy and proper way, and I often vented my frustrations through emotional outbursts in the past and have hurted others verbally and psychologically in the pursuit of feeling like I was in control of something. I also developed violent ideations of killing others or harming myself, thoughts that I have struggled a lot in repressing and still do today. That is why when reading the manga, I was able to connect to Lupin's struggles because although he has done arguably worse things than me, the root cause is the same between us and I felt... seen.

For a long time, these thoughts inside my head and the mistakes I have made due to it caused me to believe truly and deeply that I am a bad person and I internalized it as the truth, almost as if I have made peace with the plague inside my mind and that it will be a part of me for as long as I live. Reading Lupin III and seeing this character felt like he was a physical and visual representation of this part of myself, and I felt happy. Happy to know that I am not alone in what I experienced and also happy that I am not Lupin.

I still have the chance to be a better person, I have accepted that I was a bad person in the past, but it doesn't define who I am now and who I will become in the future.

Lupin in a way humanized my mental illness. Although it has caused considerable harm to myself and others, it is wrong to say that it is a plague because it was born out of circumstances out of my control, and what it was doing was merely its attempt to cope with the situation and save myself from more hurt. Like Lupin, it did what it had to do to survive, and for that I do not blame it for trying.

Although Lupin can be seen as a warning to others like me, there are parts of him that I found inspiring and has contributed to great changes in my life. His eccentricity and confidence as I've stated previously was something I wish I could have, and I have been trying to adapt that sort of personality into myself ever since I read the manga. I exude much more energy and joy than I had in the past, and used the overwhelming amount of emotion I have inside me to spread happiness to others instead of the opposite. (regulating bad emotions is a must, but good emotions, I'm letting that all out and spreading it to others! sparkle on remember to be yourself or something)

My love for Lupin has given me the greatest friends and community I've had in my life, and I am so happy to share my passion and love for this character with them.

And golly, don't even get me STARTED on my art improvement ever since I got into Lupin III. I credit Monkey Punch for most of my art improvements but I also have to give Lupin credit because he is literally my muse. I feel like I can literally draw anything if I add him on there and I have made considerable strides in my human anatomy skills from how much I draw him. (A renaissance painting of Lupin III will be done one day, I promise.)

Chapter 5: Other Stuff!

Ugh, these are the stuff that I wanted to mention but Couldn't include in this rant because I am a bad writer. Please give me a break I wrote 80% of this in less than a day. I don't give a FUCK enough to make this look good im literally talking about my skrunkly, it doesn't need to sound like a peer reviewed essay written by a professional AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHH-

He's a bitch and an asshole, but he's KIND to his friends and children and you can really tell whenever he cares. And it's cute when he acts like a nice person for once.

Mental illness is also common in neurodivergent people and I really think he is one of them (Autism and ADHD specifically) Autism because he's socially awkward and acts like a FUCKING WEIRDO

seriously he really doesn't know how to talk to people normally.

ADHD because have you fucking seen that dude. I feel like his special interests are sex, crime and machinery because that's all he's good at doing, he'll probably never do anything he isn't interested in.

Bisexual king

Kind of trans-coded? please just read my genderfluid rambling to get more of the details.

It's so cute whenever he sticks his tongue out. he's so silly.

His whole thing of freedom being more like putting others down and controlling them is past me-core i am afraid

If it hasnt been clear to you, he's such a mess of an individual and I love it.

I have a feeling hes a bit of a tsundere and I like that, he feels like the type to be afraid of being actually emotionally vulnerable to others.

On that topic, he suffers so badly from toxic masculinity that its fascinating. he needs to be treated as a case study.

i forgot

Cool, handsome, wealthy, and so sexy

If i haven't mentioned something that I should've, I've likely touched on it in another post (ex. how lupin being a rapist is a good device to develop his personality)

i dont think ive gone a single day these past 2 years where i havent thought of him.

and yeah, that's it? Hopefully? This post was made for Lupin's second birthday, March 3rd! It's celebrated primarily by the japanese fanbase but I wanted to get this out because he is a character that means a lot to me and he deserves to be celebrated for two days! Maybe every day!!! Everyday is a Lupin day for me!!!!!!! Hooray!!

....

.........

............What?

What makes you think I like Lupin?

[soleminisanction]

Your post about Damian'story changing the way the Robin mantle is seen is interesting. I like the take on Robin defying traditional social relationships. So I'd love to (if you want) read a more precise/complete definition of what you think Robin was before and what it became after Damian took over. Do you think all queerness is gone from the role, or are there still residues persisting despite the heteronormification of the role? Sidenote: never a fan of Dick being called "golden" after all the crap he endured from Bruce and the rest of the Batfamily over the years.

So, the stuff from that Damian post is actually drawn from some notes and musings that I've been gradually collecting into what's shaping up to be a long (probably) video essay on the history of Robin through a queer lens, which is something I've wanted to write for a while, I just have no focus and also a day job and a side gig so no promises about if or when I'm ever going to actually pull them all together.

Needless to say trying to summarize it in the length of a Tumblr post is not really feasible since I'm still collecting all my thoughts on the subject as it is. What it mostly boils down to is that, for a very, very long time, Robin -- specifically Dick -- was portrayed as Bruce's Beloved, in narrative sense, the person whom Our Hero loved and was motivated to protect. Most superheroes had at least one of these, but they tended to be Designated Love Interests, only the very luckiest of which -- like Lois Lane -- ever got the focus, page time, and attention to be treated as more than plot devices.

Robin, on the other hand, was always supposed to be his own character, and to an extent made being The Beloved part of the power fantasy. Most people understand the core fantasy of being a superhero, but for some there's just as much comfort to be found in the fantasy of being the person that the superhero would do anything to protect and go to any lengths to save. And, on the flipside, there's joy to be had in not always being the strongest or smartest or best hero, but being just good enough to help your hero when he needs it.

What resulted was a relationship of mutual care and affection that was vital to the core of the storytelling, but never given such a concrete framing that you could call it any one thing -- the closet they got was the classic, "...and his young ward," a term that has its own complicated history of ambiguity.

This relationship of reciprocal care resulted in Batman and Robin gaining a notable fanbase of gay men and boys. They weren't the only superheroes who had one -- not with the loving attention artists paid to the manly physique -- but they were notable enough that the sort of prudes who freak out about every new mass media being corrupting and degenerate were accusing the pair of being -- and this is a direct quote -- "pathologically homosexual," a good decade before the infamous Seduction of the Innocent was even published.

Even in a post-Comics Code era and the various efforts to de-gayify the franchise (introducing the original Bat-Woman and Bat-Girl, replacing Alfred with Dick's Aunt Harriet, etc.), Dick and Bruce's relationship remained in this kind of nebulous gray area of Beloved Wardship pretty much right up to the 80s, when the narrative choice was made to deliberately distance Dick from Bruce and tie him more firmly into the Teen Titans, eventually leading him to shed the Robin identity completely.

This is of course where we start getting into the other Robins and their specific relationships with Bruce, starting with Jason, whose relationship with Bruce was deliberately more parental but not entirely so, and then Tim, who for a long time set himself apart by having a father who was alive and an active part of his story, making his relationship with Bruce something else. Not that there was no parental element to it, just that there was far more to it than that. And yet they were both defined by being someone that Bruce (and, in Tim's case, Dick, and most of the other adult capes bopping around Gotham) loved and felt motivated to protect.

(Steph doesn't really factor into this discussion because her brief time in the cape is a whole other can of worms)

That then brings us to Damian, whose effect on the role I think I mostly covered in the previous ask. The most fundamental difference between it and what has come before being this: the unambiguous relationship between a father and his son, by its very nature, cannot be reciprocal. For Bruce to be a good father to Damian, he cannot expect Damian to provide the same kind and level of support that the other Robins did, which then creates problems because Bruce narratively and psychology relies on that support.

This has gotten very rambly and long so, to bring it back around and answer your second question:

No, I don't think the queerness is entirely gone. I think there are people who have tried (deliberately and otherwise) to push the ambiguity out, but they tend to fail for a simple reason: Tim's famous statement from ALPoD, "Batman needs a Robin," was a metatextual one. He wasn't just arguing with Bruce, he was arguing with the cynical readers of the superhero Dark Age, who wanted Robin dismissed as "too childish" for their grim and gritty champion knight. And he was right.

Batman and Robin stories have been popular for 85 goddamn years. There will always be people who want more Batman and Robin stories, and there will always be creators who want to tell Batman and Robin stories. Like I said in that other post, Damian doesn't tell those stories. Which is why, even before Tim officially dropped the "Red" from his name, there was a period of time when he was functionally acting as Robin in all but name -- because Damian wasn't.

It doesn't have to be Tim forever -- Maps Mizoguchi, for example, would make a fantastic Robin if they ever decided to pull the trigger on that for real. But even if Tim is written to move on, even if Damian winds up being the first Robin to make it to live action since the 90s, even if Wayne Family Adventures runs for twenty seasons, I don't think the queerness and ambiguity can ever really be cast away for good. It's just too foundational.

[askchuuyanakahara]

@fictional-men-especially-chuuya

(I'm gonna answer this ask in parts as it's quite long! I'll be putting my response under the read more:

(Hii!! I just wanted to say, when i first saw a post on this, (the most recent one), i was obsessed already! And since it was the first one that i saw, i thought, "i HAVE to know the backstory and binge read it from the start" and so i did! I love your art and everything so much, your storytelling, how you incorporate the asks into the storyline, you even reblogged the explanation of anon! (I js found out what that was) and i love how interactive you are, with your fans.. I cant believe id found a creator so........ AMAZING?! i dont know.. No words can seem to describe what i think of you. Youre amazing. I binge read from the bottom up, heh.. I didn't see the pinned post. But i dont regret it.

Hello!!! I'm so glad you like this blog! I started this blog as just a silly little rp blog for Chuuya but it quickly turned more story based as time went on haha! I've been making different askblogs since around 2017 and I don't think anyone knows my old blogs (which I think still exist, I just don't have the login anymore lol!) but I hope I am able to keep up this one for as long as I can.

Having someone like yourself, interacting and responding, is honestly the lifeline for these sorts of blogs so I really appreciate the interaction!

Plus, I am always an advocate for drawn rp askblogs as they were popular around 2016 but slowly disappeared overtime. I always seem to join things a little bit too late haha!

Since i also got to read the "#modask" ones, and got updated on your life. I hope youre doing really well today.. And im sorry for practically spamming your inbox notifications... I couldn't help. Youre amazing, and i love that. You make others smile, including me. I had jst finished reading angsty stuff and your au healed me sm.. Youre really inclusive, and help some other's voice get heard.. I also love how, youre the only artist i know that can keep chuuya from being ooc or fanon even though you took away his tendencies to swear.. Istg, thats a SKILL. I can NEVER dream of doing that..

I totally don't mind you writing into my askbox! I love recieving asks and seeing the little number pop up next to the inbox button makes me happy. It certainly makes me feel more human to recieve asks that ask about me as it's sometimes quite difficult to get people to care about the artist rather than the fanart, (although I am trying to do more original stuff) but I totally understand why this happens.

I'm not very good at writing angsty stuff but if I do, it'll have to be a combination of 'hurt/comfort' or 'angst with a happy ending'. Seeing happy stuff makes people happy, after all haha! (Plus, I'd love to be an animator for kids media so I suppose it makes sense I like more happy stuff than sad lol!)

It's always a bit finicky to balance between canon and fanon behaviour, especially for situations which clearly would never happen in canon. But I always try to think about how my Chuuya would act, rather than use other peoples' opinions. It makes it easier to be a bit more consistent that way (and you can always convey a message without the use of swearing! Not that swearing is a bad thing, I just personally try and not swear myself haha!).

Sigh.. I hope youre doing well, and you know that all of us love you. Take frequent breaks to rest, and stay hydrated. This is supposed to be fun, and not stressful. So dont be pressured to post everyday. We'll wait for you no matter how long you disappear for breaks, for holidays, for family, for work, and especially for yourself and your mental health. This message is really long, so i dont really expect you to... Err.. Read all this. But I'd be really grateful if you did. I feel like reading the comments and questions, youre not told enough how much you are loved and appreciated by strangers online. Heh.. When i phrase it like that it sounds rlly weirs lol.. But anyways, youre popular, and you deserve it. Although, youre not popular enough. You deserve so much more for making people smile. Its strange, a random stranger on the internet just.... Telling you how much she loves you. I love you so much, your art, you make me appreciate small things, because even just the tags, sometimes it makes me laugh. Sorry if i ever said anything offensive, or mean, when i commented. I hope youre doing well, your family's doing well, your friends, your job, your.. Pets(?) If you have any, and especially i hope your social life and mental health is good, or gets better. Im sorry if i come off as a weird and obsessed fan, but i just felt like i wanted to tell you what i felt. Thank you, for this... Sorry for the long note, sorry for the notif spam, and everything. Make sure to stay hydrated, have a healthy schedule, and not feel pressured by us. Ok? Thanks! We love you. And so does the fandom. Youre not just some outsideoutsider because you love slice of lives instead of slicing lives, or fluff over angst, believe me, we're a cornerstone of the fandom.

Thank you. Genuinely thank you for the kind message. I'm certainly not forcing myself to release updates so that this blog doesn't feel like some chore I need to complete and I really appeciate the fact that you are willing to wait for me. I also understand that you put in time and effort to send this message to me so I'm definitely going to put time and effort to reply to you!

Work has made me quite anxious and a bit depressed which has dampened my motivation to draw. But knowing that people are looking forward to the next update motivates me to continue working on this blog.

I don't think anyone has been particularly rude or offensive on this blog and honestly, sometimes things just come off a bit different than what you were expecting (especially on the internet!) so I try and not assume someone is a rude individual from the get go. But, I'm glad everyone here has been kind and understanding, it's made running the blog very enjoyable. Plus, I don't think this blog is popular enough at all to recieve rude comments haha!

With the BSD fandom, it tends to be full of theorists and writers (which makes sense lol) but it's nice to see that there's a place for me to write my silly little insignificant stories too. I've struggled with keeping up with the manga but that shouldn't be an issue for this blog as it's not really following canon at all.

And i cant wait to wish chuuya his birthday this month, and i cant wait to wish yours in june/july (sorry i forgot if it was 28 jne or 28 jly) and i also cant wait for updates or where this fic (?) Is going! Please do take care, for the last time, and stay healthy, mentally, and physically. *hugs you* and heres a little gift for you! 🫴🎁→🍪🍪🍪🍫🍫🍬🍬🍭🍩🍵🥐🌷🌸🌸🌼🌻🦋🦋🦋📱💻 And a little note 🫴✉️→✨✨✨ "get glitter bombed! And hehe. ❤ from 🇲🇾" And a boquet! like the one Dazai gave our little fashion icon in denial! 💐💐💐 or three.. Heh.. Anyways, its too long now. Love you, Hugs and forehead kisses and headpats for the amazing person behind the screen, byeee I'll be sure to ask more questions for chuuya!! <3)

I am also excited to see all the fun fics and artwork that'll be released for Chuuya's birthday! I hope I can create something for his birthday, even if it's not a big piece or anything.

My birthday is July 28th and I'm surprised you remember the day! It's a small thing but it makes me happy that you remember.

Thank you for all the gifts, flowers, and glitter and I hope you have a good day! Hopefully my response is understandable and readable (as there is a lot of text on screen and I rambled a LOT) and I thank you for asking Chuuya questions.

I hope that you, and anyone else who has somehow read this far, stay happy and healthy.)

[tacoma-narrows]

Between the Sea and the Sky!

Hi everybody! Meet the TWO new guys I made between last night and today! Their names are Tarmac (an Aeromorph dog) and Soda (a pooltoy fox), and they've filled a desire for these two specific kinds of OCs I've had in mind for MONTHS lol. They were super fun to design and draw and I'm super excited to do more with them soon!! This piece is relatively simple but more so serves as their introduction hehe

See more about them, including refs and some additional pieces/information below the cut :] (it kind of turns into a huge braindump lmao)

Tarmac is an aeromorph, although a bit more towards the furry side of things rather than the plane side lol. His design is influenced primarily by the Concorde and the Space Shuttle! I couldn't decide for the life of me which of those two things I wanted to use so I thought "why not use both?" and here we are lol. I'm super happy with his design, with the black/dark gray markings mean to emulate the look of the Space Shuttle's thermal insulation tiles and then I really like how the red and blue stand out against the gray. I really like his icon too! I wanted to make it look like a stylized depiction of a plane (mainly a Concorde hehe) breaking through the sound barrier with a sonic boon! In terms of personality, I don't have a whole lot in mind yet. Mostly that he'd be the brave, adventurous type and since he can fly both in the air and through space, he's gonna be friends with Astro too :3

Soda is a pooltoy fox! I have wanted to make a pooltoy OC FOREVER (blame my mutuals for always posting/reblogging so many cool pooltoy OCs hehe). I finally got brave enough to actually give it a shot, and I love how he came out! I was mainly just thinking about summery themes and as I was just trying out different colors and stuff, I thought about orange soda, and that's the direction I ended up going! He's got a big stupid tail [affectionate] and can have either rounded bappy hands or have actual fingers, you're free to stylize that either way! I've only ever drawn a pooltoy character once ever before, so this was something way out of my realm of familiarity, but I'm so happy with how he came out! He's so shaped I love him so much already <33

So those are my two new guys! Making two new OCs at the same time is already a rarity for me lol. The only time it's happened before was when I made Rye and Pumpernickel back in August of 2021. And then making these guys when I had only gotten Astro about two and a half weeks ago means this is an exceedingly rare event for me lmao. My friends know how infrequently I make/get new OCs, so this just goes to show how much these guys have been bouncing around in my brain lately lol.

They are definitely gonna have some sort of connection to each other, but I'm not sure how I wanna go about that yet. Since I made them back to back, they are already connected in my brain, but I'm not sure how I wanna express that in a meaningful way. I don't wanna make them siblings bc, well, they're obv very different from each other lol, but they're kinda parallels (with one being in the sky and the other being in the water yknow), so as of right now they're definitely good friends with each other. I might upgrade that to bfs at some point in the future, but we'll see how things go hehe.

Anyways huge braindump of a post lmao, thank u for reading if u did! I'd love to hear your thoughts on these guys since they're so different from all my other characters! Also if anyone may wanna do an art trade of either of these guys (or Astro as well! I'd like to get more art of him too!) let me know hehe

[a-student-out-of-time]

I'm extremely curious about your post regarding staffside. Would you like to elaborate? No pressure!

//Well I can't say I've read much beyond the halfway point of Part 1 and there's still a lot to go, so I'm really just getting started. But there's still a lot that I can talk about.

//I will be honest and say that I initially didn't really understand what role Staffside has. Not in the sense of "Ugh, why does this exist?" but in the sense of "What are we meant to take away from reading this story?" Especially since it's apparently not mandatory viewing.

//I was also way more skeptical of it when people said it was good but also very dark and upsetting. The subject matter alone is not very appealing to me.

//I fully acknowledge that's not any of the creators' fault, that's a me problem. I've unfortunately come across so many stories that discuss things like SA and power imbalances very clumsily, very poorly and very tastelessly. Yes, the goal is typically to show that these acts are evil and do great harm to people, but I'd say the vast majority of writers are not equipped to really handle it.

//They often throw these into stories for the sake of shock value and drama, rarely actually trying to sit down and discuss why these things happen and what effects they have on the people affected. Some do it better than others, but it's a topic you need to really understand before you try tackling it, and many writers who try may think all it takes is the bravery to do so. It does not.

//I'm not excluding myself from that list either. I've tried to address topics like SA here on ASOOT, and while I feel like I did an okay job, I know I could've done better. I've been very apprehensive about discussing this topic because I don't feel equipped to do so and I never want to resort to something that traumatizing as just drama fodder.

//In my opinion, if the writer's goal is JUST to show that a villain is cruel or evil, having them be a rapist or a bigot is a very cheap and tasteless way to do it. There's a fine line between writing about these things and using very serious, trauma-inducing topics just to leverage an emotional response from an audience.

//It's the difference between how Pennywise in IT can be read as a representation of the intergenerational trauma that comes from things like discrimination vs. just having your villain dropping slurs to show that they're a bad person.

//But in Staffside, it's not drama fodder. None of this exists just to make Kan more hateable or to horrify and gross out the audience. Staffside is about this stuff, why it happens and how it affects the people involved. It's about how the people behind this game aren't a bunch of faceless unfeeling monsters, but actual people who were drawn into a situation and then given no way out.

//There's so much care devoted to making the facility feel like an actual toxic work environment rather than a den of evil. Yes, the people involved ARE active perpetrators of a monstrous crime, but it addresses their humanity, their flaws, their fears, and what little comforts they can find with each other.

//When Kan assaults people, it's never treated as fodder to make him seem more evil. It's given actual weight and we see how it affects people like Dr. Suga and Dr. Hattori, how afraid people are, the fact that those who aren't involved feel qualified to judge it and dismiss it in favor of Kan's role within this project. There are many layers to it and the consequences are still ongoing.

//That is very, very rare to see, and I have to commend Von Babbitt as a writer. But I have to say, for me, it almost works too well.

//Another big reason I initially didn't want to read Staffside was because I'm an empathetic person who hates injustice and doesn't like seeing people in pain. If there are genuinely good people here, like I'd been told many times, I knew I wasn't going to want to see them go through hell.

//Again, it turns out it's much more nuanced than that, but I still feel apprehensive about reading this sometimes because it's so depressing and visceral and cruel. And unfortunately very realistic with how these crimes aren't taken seriously. Which just makes me upset.

//I was expecting more of the equivalent of Kan holding a gun to their heads and forcing them to do horrible things. Instead, he deliberately injuries people, makes them physically and mentally dependent on him, and makes them do bad things before they even realize what they're done and convinces them it's too late to go back now. The people here are denied control over everything.

//To me, that's more horrifying and upsetting than just dropping in an assault scene for the sake of drama. It's genuinely difficult to read at times and I have to stop frequently because I'm left with so many ugly feelings. As we all should when faced with something as vile as sexual violence.

//Not that it's all doom and gloom. I do like the relationships we have with the interns, even if I have mixed feelings about some of them as people. I'm not sure how that will change over time, but I am curious to see.

//Tl;dr- Staffside is incredibly good at what it sets out to do and I absolutely hate reading it. That's a compliment from me, I promise : P

[the-artist-grimm]

14, 18, and 27 for the ask game :3

ASK GAME

14. what’s something you’ve always wanted to do but maybe been to scared to do?

Hm...honestly just reaching out to artists I admire-I always get shy about reaching out and saying hi to people online, and even if we're mutuals I always get shy about messaging.

18. do you believe in ghosts and/or aliens?

For aliens statistically there's got to be SOME form of life out there, like there's so many planets and galaxies that for only Earth to have life on it seems very improbable. It may not be intelligent life or life like in movies or games, but there's got to be at least something out there.

As for ghosts neutral. I grew up with a father who was a funeral director/volunteered in a cemetery, and sometimes my mother would take my twin and myself over to visit him at work, especially when his original boss was still alive-she had no grandkids so she enjoyed seeing us visit. I often poked my head into empty chapels with bodies laid out for viewings and wandered the halls with not a sight of anything ghostly, and did the same thing at the cemetery my father volunteered at with no sights either. But in the same turn there are things that people just can't explain, so I don't really go 'yes they exist' or 'no they do not'.

Which on that mention of my upbringing that's actually part of why most of my OC characters have stories with heavy themes of life/death and why I'm so into Cult of the Lamb-I find the whole thing fascinating and love exploring the different ways humans contend with mortality. It's interesting writing and studying the different ways people react to death, considering how normal it was to me growing up.

27. are you a spiritual person?

I'm assuming this means religious? In that case not particularly, same with ghosts I can't really say yes a god or gods exist or no they do not since that's not really something you can easily prove or disprove-I'm basically agnostic. Only have been to church outside of just wandering around to study stained glass like...four times. Once for a funeral, then a cousin's wedding, then twice when my mother attempted to try taking us till stopping after realizing how little interest my sister and I had. My house wasn't religious at all growing up and still isn't religious.

What I do like however is religious imagery, like Cult of the Lamb especially though has gotten me really hooked on trying to incorporate it a little in my work. I've always loved gothic architecture and stained glass, but since getting into this fandom I've also found that I'm drawn to the silhouettes of religious garments or the compositions within stained glass or paintings.

My main OC Chrysa (which I post OC stuff here @illustratemuse ) for example is a priestess in training for the Goddess of Death, and her outfit is modeled slightly after a nun's! The necklace her weapon hangs de-transformed from as well is basically a rosary too, though its beads represent the stages of grief.

[theseeingfawn]

Hi Everyone, I have been working on a small town Elriel fic for awhile now and finally decided to post. This is my first time writing fan fiction so please be gentle with me.

Summary:

Elain Archeron, beloved sweetheart of the quaint town of Hewn Hills, yearns for a life beyond the constraints and expectations placed upon her by her family and community. Azriel Rosehall, a captivating yet misunderstood outsider, struggles with the prejudices of the town as he endeavors to forge his own destiny. Drawn to each other by an undeniable connection, Elain and Azriel are determined to be together, even if it means bringing trouble to the charming small-town. “Everything that's worth having is some trouble. - L.M. Montgomery

Chapter 1: Matchmaker Mayhem | Read on A03

Elain

It's official, this is the worst date I have ever been on. It doesn't make sense. The man is gorgeous, almost devilishly so. I've heard nothing but praise about his charm and wit. I've even seen it myself when he didn't think I was looking. But, the man is a nervous wreck and awkward . Or is it me? Maybe we are just feeding off each other's horrible vibes creating a vortex of our own personal hell. I had been reluctant when my sister all but demanded I go on a date with her friend Lucien. For the last couple of years, all Feyre could talk about is how great Lucien is and how funny and on and on and on . It was almost nauseating. I felt like Feyre was close to hiring a skywriter to let the world know that I was destined for her best friend. Ever since she married Rhysand she has taken up the mantle of matchmaker. So, to spare myself from further harassment I relented. Sure, I knew Lucien, but we have never had a meaningful conversation. Nothing other than pleasantries. I also work hard to keep him at arm's length, despite how often we are forced to interact. I see I was right to keep my distance. He seems as reluctant to be here as I am. I almost feel sorry for him… almost .

I'm glad I had the foresight to pick Velaris as our meeting spot and not Hewn Hills, the small town in the suburbs, where we live. I adore Hewn Hills but it is full of nosy nellies and busybodies. My baby sister is the biggest busybody of them all. So, when I suggested my favorite upscale restaurant in the heart of the city, Lucien readily agreed. It would seem he isn’t a big fan of all the meddling either. Though, I assume for different reasons. Thankfully, no one we know is here to witness our nightmare of a date. It didn't make sense. Despite knowing Feyre for years, and serving on our town council together, Lucien doesn't seem to know a thing about me. Well, other than surface level stuff. I sighed internally, of course he doesn't know much about me. My sisters do not truly know me. They only see the version of me that they wish to see, not the real me. No one really did .

I sit here staring off into the distance like I'm lost in a vision, imagining the bubbly young waitress will come back to end my misery. Really, how many awkward silences must I suffer through? As if reading my mind, Lucien broke the quiet tension with a question. “So, you like to garden? What vegetables do you grow,” Lucien asked with the enthusiasm of a root canal patient.“I actually don't grow vegetables, just flowers and herbs for my shop. Vegetables are much more difficult to grow than people realize.” He nodded. Please, where is the waitress.Then it occurred to me, I could use the bathroom and get away. Maybe I could slip out the window and run. What would he do? Tell my sister I gave him the slip? I'd pay good money to see that. No one would believe him. Yes, sneaking out is the answer. I feel like I've won the lottery for coming up with this brilliant idea. “Excuse me, I am just going to freshen up,” I say with syrupy sweetness. I hope I look graceful and not like I am barreling toward the back of the restaurant like I am fleeing the scene of a crime, but I doubt it. Once behind the closed door of the single occupant bathroom I take my first deep breath of the evening. I look around but there is no window, just a floor to ceiling mirror. Son of a bitch. I sigh and gaze at my reflection searching for an answer. Maybe it was my appearance that rendered him stupid. I’ve heard all my life that I’m beautiful. Not the polite kind of beautiful that every mother dotes onto their daughters. But, the type of beauty that could be used. Before she died, my mother dressed me up like her own personal Barbie doll. Taking personal credit for my appearance and awkwardly telling anyone who would listen that I got it from my mama. I cringe just thinking about it. Even my father had dragged me along to client dinners to dangle me in front of prospective clients like a juicy carrot. My sister Nesta is always watching my back, weary of everyone's intentions. Feyre, the bane of my existence at the moment, all but pimped me out to the dullest man in Hewn Hills because she thought her friend's happiness was more important than mine. Just a pawn to be used to make her life more exciting.

That's not entirely fair.

I know I’m seen as a goodie goodie, a pushover. Maybe I am, I caved to Feyre's demands after all. My sisters love to remind me how I am too sweet for my own good. A chaste virginal angel that they must protect at all costs. My reflection taunts me. Not a hair out of place, a flawless exterior that was pleasing to the eye. But, what had that gotten me? A failed engagement. A cage of my own making. Putting everyone else first and myself second. I shake away the bitterness, burying it deep down. It could be worse. At least Lucien is polite and respectful. I could do this, I could muster some enthusiasm and carry on with this date. No matter how much I wanted to shrink into myself. He is just a man and once it was over I could tell Feyre I had given it my best effort but we weren't a love match. Though I knew I didn't give Lucien my best, in many ways I blame him for what happened with Graysen. I just wanted tonight to be over with so I could go home and binge watch tv without a bra on.

With a new sense of purpose, I step back into the bustling restaurant and head toward the table. Lucien has his back to me as he chats on the phone, “you don't understand Jurian. She's so… so… meek, boring even. I don’t know why Feyre keeps insisting we’re soul mates. I know, she is beautiful, probably the most beautiful woman I've ever seen but she is dull , a snoozefest. Just call me in five minutes with a fake emergency so I can bow out.” Stunned, I dropped my head in defeat. Well, I couldn't blame him for wanting out of the world's most awkward first date. But, to call me meek and boring is just mean. I fought the urge to cry. No need to spill tears over Lucien Vanserra. Besides, it's not like he is the sly and charming man I've heard everyone drone on about. He is the snoozefest. He has barely said a word to me all evening. He is the headliner of the snoozefestival. How dare he!!!

I slide back into my chair and slap on the biggest fake smile I can muster. “Has our waiter stopped by?” I asked, pretending that I don't want to kick him in the shin. “No, not yet. This place is getting packed. It's hard to even hear what you're saying, we can just listen to the music and Ow!” Lucien hunches over and grabs his leg. “Oh my, I'm so sorry! I went to cross my legs but didn't realize you were so close,” I feigned innocence as I bat my eyes at him. I turn my head from his scowl before I start laughing. My eyes peruse the growing crowd of people streaming through the door and there he is.

His dark hair swept back off of his face, dressed in an immaculate black suit that hugs his sculpted form. I don't let myself admit this often but I have a tiny, itty bitty crush on Rhysand's mysterious brother, Azriel . Even his name is beautiful. I have only interacted with him at family functions but the sight of him alone is enough to make me swoon. He is always busy working some sort of mysterious job. I never get a straight answer on what it is that he does because it is all very hush hush. I caught bits and pieces from eavesdropping on conversations when no one was paying attention to me. They rarely pay attention to me. I know it involves surveillance work and traveling, which only adds to his allure. I like to pretend he is a spy like James Bond or even a kingpin in the mob. A dangerous job for a dangerous man. At least I like to pretend he has a dangerous side, he certainly looks like he does. He has dark features and is always draped in black and cobalt blue clothing. He is stoic with a piercing hazel gaze that could slice right through you. He is hard to read but I feel like his eyes give him away. It's the way the corners wrinkle slightly or glow brighter when he is happy. It's how directly he stares when he is mad and fighting the urge to speak out. Despite his appearance, he is always kind and thoughtful toward me. He holds the door for me or pulls out my chair at the dinner table. One time, after I spent all of Thanksgiving day cooking, he took the serving dish from my hands so I could sit down and enjoy the meal I worked so hard on. He even made everyone wait until I sat to eat. Men are rarely that chivalrous these days. The memory sends my heart racing. Azriel is quiet, but not awkward the way Lucien is currently behaving. He is confident and reserved in a way that adds to his enigmatic persona.

I watch him as he walks through the door and turns to the stunning blonde behind him, Mor. He was on a date with her . I recall the time I overheard Feyre telling Nesta that Azriel was in love with Mor. It made sense I suppose, she is gorgeous and has a way about her that makes it seem like she was lit from within. But a part of me doesn’t believe it. Feyre is often wrong about these kinds of things. Look at me and Lucien, she thinks we are fated. But, this date feels like pulling teeth. “Elain, did you hear me?” I shook myself out of my daze, “I’m sorry, what did you say?” Lucien let out a sigh, “I asked if you like bread,'' Confused, I looked at the basket that was placed in front of me. I want to roll my eyes. Does he not remember that I own a bakery? “Who doesn't like bread, Lucien?” He scoffed, “you would be surprised, there are people out there who can't tolerate it.” I blink once, and then again. “That was a joke,” he states as if he were teaching humor to a martian. “Oh,” is all I can muster as I look at the bread, pleading with it to save me from this man. A dad joke, really?

Suddenly there is a long dark shadow cast over the table. My eyes shoot up to meet hazel ones. “I hope I'm not interrupting,” Azriel says, appearing like an answered prayer. “Azriel! It’s so good to see you,” I beamed, hoping the relief in my tone isn’t as obvious as it seems. The corner of his mouth ticks upward, “it's good to see you too Elain. I hope you have been well.” Gods he is beautiful and tall. Why is he so tall? He smells divine. I wonder if he is just visiting for a few days? Lucien clears his throat. I look at him, realizing I am still on a date. “Azriel, this is Lucien, you know, Feyre's friend.” Azriel slowly turns to Lucien and dips his head in greeting, turning back to me. “I didn't expect to see you out in the city,” he says with a curious look in his eyes. I smile shyly, “I'm… here on a date.” He looks back to Lucien slowly raking his gaze up and down, a hint of displeasure in his assessment. “I see. I'm just grabbing a bite with Mor.” He turns towards his companion who is sitting at a table across the restaurant. “I just wanted to stop by and say hello. I’ve taken a new assignment and will be in this area for the next few months. Hopefully we will see more of each other.” My smile widens, I would certainly love to see more of him. Azriel's lip quirks up ever so slightly on one side. BUZZ. BUZZ. BUZZ.

Lucien apologizes and grabs his phone, a puzzled look on his face. “Hold on. It's my roommate. It's odd he is calling since he knowsIi'm on a date.” He answers it quickly, while holding up a finger to shush Azriel and me. “Wait, what's wrong? Calm down.” Wow, he is really committing to the bit. “Are you sure? Okay… I am on my way,” he ends the call and looks up. “I'm sorry to have to do this but there's an emergency and I'm going to have to end our date early.” I fight back a chortle. “Oh no! What kind of an emergency, a flat tire or dead grandma?” Azriel coughs and turns away. Lucien looking stunned mutters out, “uhhh a flat tire.” I wave over the waitress who miraculously appears from nowhere, “Can we get our check?” I turn back to Lucien, “Sorry to hear about your roommates flat tire. I hate when that happens.” Before Lucien can reply, the waitress comes back with the bill. It's for two drinks and a bread basket. I start to pull out my wallet when Azriel clears his throat. Lucien looks from me to Azriel. Azriel asks with an unamused expression, “Aren't you going to pay, since it's a date?” My jaw nearly hits the floor. Lucien sputters and fumbles for his wallet. Hastily slinging a twenty dollar bill on the table. “Well it's been… a date. I will catch you around Elain.” Lucien shuffles around the crowd making a hasty exit. I keel over in a fit of quiet laughter the second Lucien bolts for the door. You know the kind of silent laughter where your shoulders shake and you can hardly breathe? That kind. I feel a warm rough hand stroke my upper arm sending a shiver down my spine. “Hey, it's okay, don't be upset,” came the soothing timbre of Azriel's voice. I look up to see his worried expression and start laughing even harder. His hand stills on my arm and grips me lightly. “Why are you laughing?” he asks, bemused by my giggling fit. I wipe away a few wayward tears as I fight back a bout of hiccups. “ it's just… it's just…” I snort. An honest to gods snort so loud that it draws the attention of at least three neighboring tables. Azriel is smiling fully now. A toothy smile that I just know he rarely gives to anyone. It over takes his whole face making him somehow even more handsome. Seeing him this way suddenly calms my laughing fit and I clear my throat. “It's just, we were having the worst date in the history of dates and he was so desperate to get away he made up an excuse to bail. But, I have to say his acting was pretty solid.” Azriel looks at me a little stunned, “you're not upset, not mad?” I smile again, “I can’t blame him, I wanted to escape through the bathroom window but they didn't have one.” His smile lingers as he stares at me. “You making him pay for the bill was just icing on the cake.” Azriel hums before saying, “it was the least I could do.” I stand and grab my small handbag off the table. “Well, Azriel, I’m happy I got the chance to see you. It’s been too long, I'm glad to hear you’ll be sticking around for a while.” He looks down towards his shoes and back up, the faintest blush on his cheeks. “Have a good evening,” I bid him farewell and walk out onto the street.

I stop to take a deep breath, cleansing myself of the bad date energy. It was terrible but at least I went out and could tell Feyre to back off. It had been several years since I had mustered the courage to date. Not since Graysen. I’m about to take a step when I felt a hand grab the back of my elbow. “Wait, I wanted to make sure you were truly okay.” I whirl around to see Azriel staring down at me. My heart flutters once again, the way it always does in his presence. His face was elegant with high cheekbones, a fine nose and a sharp jawline. In the halo of the street lamp he looked like a fallen angel. His scarred hand was still on my arm, a rose tattoo covered the back of it. “That's very thoughtful of you, but truly I’m okay. My pride is a little wounded but I'll get over it.” He studies me for a long moment before he leans in, “You're too nice Elain.” I stiffen but can't exactly argue. “He's a fool you know? Any man would be lucky to date you.” My stomach fills with butterflies. It was my turn to blush under the weight of his sincere gaze. I swallow the lump in my throat. “You should get back to your date, Azriel. I would hate to take up any more of your time.” He looks over his shoulder and back to me, as if confused. Maybe he was remembering where he was and what he was doing. “Are you sure you're okay? Do you need me to take you home? You could join us…” his thumb tenderly rubbing up and down my arm. He was probably just being kind because I'm Feyre's sister. The thought saddens me. “I'm sure Azriel, no need to worry about me. I can take care of myself.” He looks unsure or perhaps he is just reluctant to let me go. His hand is still stroking my arm. “It was lovely to see you, maybe we can catch up another time?” A smile tugs at my lips, “I'd like that.”

Azriel

I can't believe my luck. I get back into the city and happen to bump into the girl I have been obsessing over for months. Truth be told, I have a thing for Elain Archeron. How could I not? She is gorgeous and so incredibly kind. She radiates joy and has a way of making everyone around her feel special. I am normally so good with the opposite sex. Hell I have quite the reputation as a ladies man but something about her leaves me feeling like a lovesick teenager. I wish I had a reason to make her stick around and spend the evening with me but I know I probably shouldn't.

I watch Elain walk away down the crowded street. Utterly lost in the way the wind catches her long golden hair. The way her dress skims over her gentle curves. What I wouldn't do to get the chance to touch her. I exhale slowly, burying my thoughts on her deep down, as I always do. I walk back into the restaurant and sit across from Mor. Once, many years ago I thought I loved Mor. But I mistook her kindness for love. I had never been around a girl my own age until I met her. She is so gregarious and radiates confidence. So when she doted on me, I read the signals all wrong. I built up something that was never really there. It took too long to discover that Mor preferred women. Even after, I held out hope that she would change her mind. Truth be told, it allowed me to keep other women at a distance. If I hid all of my feelings in the safety of Mor's friendship I never had to address my own issues with intimacy. But, I was done hiding behind Mor and living in denial. I started to realize I could never be happy if I didn’t face reality, no matter how scary it was for me to open up to her. It was awkward and she was hesitant to even hear me out. It was worth it though, because now she was my friend and one of my closest confidants.

“So, how was sweet Elain?” she asks. Elain didn't know Mor well, but Mor knew all about Elain. Mor being a family friend of Rhys’ was well informed on the Archeron sisters. “She seems okay, though it looks like she was having a bad date. He actually ditched her.” Mor gapes, “that piece of shit! Who was it?” I sneer, “Lucien Vanserra.” Mor rolls her eyes, “seems as though Feyre finally wore her down.” l hum in agreement. I’ll never understand why Feyre thinks Lucien and Elain would make a good pair. I suspect she wants Lucien to stick around and worries he wouldn’t without some other incentive. Feyre dated Tamlin, Lucien’s former college roommate and friend. After the nasty break up Lucien had taken Feyre’s side. But, he had grown distant and their friendship never fully recovered. So, she clings to the hope that if Elain marries Lucien he will become a permanent fixture in her life. Feyre also loves to meddle in other people's lives. She likes to think she has a gift for connecting people but in reality she is terrible at it. No, truly terrible. Her own love life until Rhys had been a shitshow so it puzzles me why Feyre thought so highly of her skills in the love department. I know Elain is too good for Lucien. I don't hate the man but he doesn’t seem like the type of man she needs. Especially after his pathetic stunt this evening.

I think back to Elain, how utterly beautiful she looked. The way her skin seemed to glow, how her face lit up when she laughed. The utterly intoxicating smell of her jasmine perfume. I hate the thought of her dating Lucian. I hate the way they look together, the way she seems to shrink around him. She is a bright shining light in a world of darkness. She deserves someone who appreciates how special she truly is.

“Hello, Earth to Azriel,” Mor says, snapping her fingers in front of my face. “I'm sorry Mor, what were you saying?” She sighs. “I should have known the second you saw her that I'd lost your focus for the evening.” My eyes snap up, face utterly unreadable. “What's that supposed to mean?” Mor pats my hand and I pull it away. I hate it when people touch my hands . “Don't play dumb with me Azriel. I know you too well.” I narrow my eyes, weighing my next words carefully. “I'm not playing dumb. I'm just concerned after Lucien ditched her.” Mor gives me an unimpressed look. “For what it's worth, I think you should ask her out. You two would make the hottest couple.” She pumps her eyebrows at me suggestively. “I'm not going to ask her out… that's absurd… Why would you even suggest that?” Mor tilts her head back and laughs, “oh you have it bad.” I give her an incredulous look, “I can't date anyone, I travel too much for work, not to mention it could be dangerous. Besides, I'm not interested in falling in love.” She gives me her no nonsense face. I want to protest but there is that old saying about protesting too much and I don't want to egg her on. “Let's just drop it and enjoy our evening,” I say, refusing to take the bait. Mor sighs, “here's the deal Azzy, I will enjoy a lovely meal, which you are paying for, by the way. But, I'm not forgetting you are pining after you know who.”

“Fine,” I bite out.

“Have you decided where you are going to stay?” She asks in a tone that feels suspiciously like prying into more than just my place of residence. I shrug, “My assignment is in Windhaven.” Mor scrunches her nose in distaste. Not that I blame her, Windhaven is a shithole. “I don't have to live there full time, but I do have to stay a few days a week.” She nods, “why not stay in Hewn Hills?” There it is, her not so innocent suggestion. It's like she knows what I have planned. She knows me too well. I eye her suspiciously. “Don't give me that look, Az. Velaris is too far from Windhaven, and Hewn Hills is adorable.” It is a nice town, I wouldn't call it adorable. Though there is something there worth adoring . “They have great hiking trails, the parks are beautiful, and the downtown is just like Stars Hollow.” I sigh, “you don't have to convince me Mor, I've already booked a bed and breakfast.” She squeals, and I feel a headache forming. I rub my temple, “don't get too excited. It's the most logical choice.” She claps excitedly, “oh i just love it there, and now I have another reason to visit. You know I love Rita's and don't get me started on Petals.” I give her a perturbed look and pray to the gods that she doesn't read into anything more than she already has. There is only one reason I’m staying in Hewn Hills, Elain . Seeing her with Lucien tonight only reinforces the notion that I need to be close to her. Is it the smart thing to do? No, but I can’t seem to keep away. I’m just glad Mor’s job will keep her distracted from joining Feyre in competing for the biggest pain in the ass award.

[akkpipitphattana]

aw, man. i actually don't like conflict or negativity, and i hate that some ppl seem determined to pit the couples against each other in the first place, but i've seen/read two things in particular today that have got my hackles up (the poll being one) so i'm gonna say it: i don't think i've seen a single post that enthuses about kb at the expense of fs (maybe one anon but that's bout it), whereas the number of times scrolling through the tag i've seen ppl feel the need to crow about how much more invested they are in fs, how fs are carrying the show, etc. - yes, we all vibe with different characters/dynamics and that's fine - vibe away! nay, enthuse away! but, shocker, you can actually do that without invoking your lack of interest in kb (which, frankly, is your loss!). and, since i'm being blunt, there are, imo, two fairly obvious main reasons for the scale of the disparity (so beyond general variation in taste), and neither are particularly flattering for those in question, so i'm not gonna say them out loud! and that's because i recognise some things you can just keep to yourself, and that way everyone gets to have a good time! sorry to be bitchy, but when stuff like that is in the general tag it's hard to avoid, and even though i know i should just brush it off (cos everyone's entitled to their wrong opinions!), it gets me down nonetheless.

yeah, i'll never understand the need to pit them against each other for one reason or the other tbh. like you said, everyone has their own feelings and opinions and sometimes you're just gonna be drawn to one couple over the other, or one character over the other! i know i personally enjoy both fadelstyle and kantbison, and i adore all of our main four characters in their own ways. it's funny cause in the first few episodes, i was sort of flipping back and forth in terms of who i was more invested in, which was honestly a shock to me because while i have enjoyed joongdunk in the past, their shows and characters haven't compelled me in the same ways that firstkhao's have, so i went into thk figuring that they would be the ones to hold my attention the most. and while that did end up being the case, fadel and style have ALSO become beloved to me in their own ways and there was even a period in the beginning of the show where i was MORE invested in them! but kb have definitely captured my attention the most and again, it does just come down to personal taste - i find the layers of their story to be personally more compelling, and i find kant's character specifically to be incredibly fascinating because of the absolute lack of agency he really has in anything he does up until now.

but again, it's all a matter of personal taste. i recognize not everyone is going to view these characters the same way i do or have the same attachment, and that's okay! and it's very odd to me the way that a lot of people who prefer fs will choose to hate on kb or flaunt which one they prefer more. like if you post about the things you love, we'll get the message either way without you needing to bring down the other pair and make others feel bad for enjoying them. i don't think anyone before now has really questioned which couple i prefer, but the only time i ever actually acknowledged that (outside of this ask) was to say that i was SAD fs didn't interest me more because i do genuinely enjoy them as characters, but kb take up so much of my brain that i just can't focus on them as much.

and it's not to say if you wanna be a hater, you can't be a hater, like that's fine. but at the same time idk. people that DO like those things don't wanna see that when they're just trying to enjoy the tag of their fave show, yknow? but that's also why i at least prefer to keep to my dash instead of going into tags, cause i prefer keeping it to those i trust to keep it tasteful than those that will go into main tags and shout their hate for things from the rooftops sjdfsdkj

[milkytheholy1]

TMNT Masterlist

2003:

Leo:

Third base - Leo x Female Reader

Hey everyone, I currently have two requests left to do but I really want to get some stories that I personally came up with as well. I really want to try writing for different versions of the turts besides 2012 and Rise even if they are my fav versions. Sorry if the character interactions are a bit iffy in this one, I haven't seen much of the 2003 series I'm only up to season 2.

Donnie:

Drawn to you - Donnie x GN Reader

No, the tech-savvy turtle was drawn to you by your persistence, by the way you poured yourself into your work, how you understood the need to complete something no matter how long it took.

Mikey:

Turtle titan to the rescue! - Mikey x Female Reader

Okay so far warning, I haven’t really watched past season 3 of the 2003 series, I have been working my way through it though. So some characters might not sound or act like how they should from the show and I might end up getting some stuff wrong, so sorry in advance. This story will flip between 1st and 3rd person narrative.

2012:

All Turtles:

Turtle Power part 1

What if you included even more turtles in the hit tmnt movie, TMNT:Turtles Forever? This isn't an X Reader fic and takes places in the 2012 universe...well, for the start at least.

Leo:

Dear diary - Leo x GN Reader

Leo practicing how to ask them out with many many scripts for acting in front of a mirror:") or maybe they find out about his diary! You can pick

A confident strut - Leo x GN Reader

Went with the first one since it's been some time since I wrote for my 2012 boy! This is going to be set before the whole sister reveal, but I wanna make it clear that I do not ship Karai and Leo together cause that shit is gross. Enjoy!

I heard you - Leo x Female Reader

The reader,who has a crush on Leo, waits by Leo's side for him to wake up in the farm house and she is so relieved when he wakes up after months

Not traditional - Leo x Male Reader

The reader is giving Leo a whole sexuality crisis so Leo asks April if it's weird for a guy to like another guy and April reassures him that it's perfectly normal, and later that week Leo accidentally slips that he likes (y/n) and in a flash the have this little moment of understanding that they both like each other and want to be more than friends.

Goodbye Leonardo part 1 - Leo x Female Reader

I know what you're thinking, two stories in one night? This is somewhat based on the season four episode: Broken Foot. Also sorry it's so long but I had to fill in some blanks to get to the build-up of the story and sorry for the rushed ending it's currently past midnight where I'm from and I'm very tired.

Goodbye Leonardo part 2 - Leo x Female Reader

Okay, okay, you'll get your stinking part 2. This is probably one of the most requested fics I've ever done, the original intention was to leave it as a standalone fic. But, because you all seem eager for more I eventually broke and decided to do it. This is set a few years after the original and doesn't follow the episode 'Broken Foot' like the original oneshot. In my opinion, it's also waaay more angsty and it might actually be sadder than the first one. So I hope the wait was worth it, enjoy!

Donnie:

Wrong about me - Donnie x Female Reader

Donnie gets cheated on by April and (y/n) finds out and hurts April's feelings then comforts Donnie?

Hot - Donnie x Female Reader

Donnie was talking about some science stuff the last 20 minutes, but reader can't fully pay attention to what he's saying because they're just thinking about his voice, his gestures and everything. They think "don't you realize how hot you are?", but Donnie stops talking and reader realizes they just said that out loud and now they want to die.

Happy birthday - Donnie x GN Reader

it’s the reader’s birthday and the turtles just find out and they have to quickly set up a surprise birthday for the reader.

Well done science boy - Donnie x GN Reader

Had this idea in my head for a few days so thought I'd post it, I wanted to make it a shorter story than what I normally do but I got too lost in it and it ended up being just as long, oops. Hope you enjoy!

Hello nurse - Donnie x Female Reader

Literally did this so I could pull off one reference, that's all. Enjoy!

Raph:

Hots for you - Raph x Female Reader

Raph finds out that his girlfriend is bisexual?

Heard you from a mile away - Raph x GN Reader

not going to lie I had to search up what it meant, decided to do Raph since i've never written for him before in the 2012 version. So if this comes across as out of character, apologies. Anyway, enjoy!

2014/2016: Leo:

Red lips - Leo x Female Reader

“Don’t give me that face, it’s so cute I might not be able to hold back.”

Donnie:

Five years - Donnie x Female Reader

Donnie creates a portal that transports them to 2021.

Five years alt ending - Donnie x Female Reader

It’s weird how many people have asked me for them to have kids, but I guess if that’s what you guys want to see then here is a short version 2, if you will, of five years. Be sure to read the original or it won’t really make much sense, this is just the ending. Enjoy!

Life is a dream part 1 - Donnie x GN Reader

You felt the small vibrations of your phone in your pocket, pulling it out you saw Donnie was once again calling you crap, "H-hey Donnie, I promise I'm on Allen Street. I'm like less than a minute away." you panted into the device. You could hear his sigh through the speaker, "Don't worry about it, I'm just wasting valuable pop tart time." he joked, your laughter was his reward.

Part 2 - Donnie x GN Reader

Speaking of the brothers, Mikey was sat playing some video games while leaning over to slurp his coke, you could hear panting and the sounds of something being destroyed coming from the dojo Raph. Finally taking lighter steps into the lair, you could smell a sweet fragrance waft through the air Leo.

Part 3 - Donnie x GN Reader

"Do you remember that video where the cat plays chopsticks with the chopsticks?" Mikey asked, pushing aside Donnie and getting closer to your face. You flinched at his close proximity, your mind still trying to adjust to your bright surroundings. "Can we focus here?" Leo argued, pulling Mikey away from you, he securely wrapped his arm around his younger brother in case he felt the need to jump at you again.

Final part - Donnie x GN Reader

"What?" he asked, "Can I ask you something?" You pondered why you were willing to tell Raph some of your deep, dark thoughts and not someone like Donatello "It's a free country," he quipped going back to his knitting. "Right," you said, glancing down to avoid making eye contact "It's just that...do you think- feel like something is off?"

Mikey:

Parading in style - Mikey x Male Reader

So I don’t know much about pride parades in NYC but I can only imagine they’re triple the ones from where I’m from, I’m also not going to give you a description of Mikey’s human form as that can be up to you. I’ve learned from experience that everyone has a different view of these characters and it’s unfair to the reader to force them to take my view of what he could look like, so yeah he looks like whatever you want him to. Hope you enjoy!

Raph:

A cold night in new  - Raph x Female Reader

Reader's apartment building's heat went out during a really chilly spring day, so when raph comes over he's all like "why tf does she have the thermostat on 5 degrees", but then he finds her cuddled up with tons of blankets on the couch, watching tv. after turning down the volume, reader explains the situation with the heat while shivering and clutching the blankets. raph has a brilliant plan for this.

Begging - Raph x Female Reader

Bayverse Raph and his S.O get into a huge fight and he hurts her feelings and Raph found her on the rooftop crying and he asks for forgiveness

Seeing you - Raph x Female Reader

The reader feels invisible and lonely, so she confides in Raph and telling him how her current boyfriend is using and abusing her. Then later on Raph confesses his feelings for the reader but her abusive boyfriend catches the reader and raph together.

I promise - Raph x Female Reader

The reader has scars from her mother and she shows Raph while crying about them and Raph listens and comforts her.tumblr

[spadem00n]

It just occurred to me I haven't posted about my ISAT OC's in, a hot minute? And since it's close to the date when I first finished In Stars and Time, I thought I'd post at least some of the art I've drawn over the year.

- Oh... huh not sure who that first person is. Could be anyone who knows. - Madame Carina (she/her) , or just Rina to Vela was an old librarian and translator living somewhere on the Northwest Coast of Vaugarde. Most people remembered her for translation on famous books & stories, even thought some were about those weird star things? Huh. Very grandmotherly if a bit spacey. Some people even called her a old wise witch as a joke but she didn't mind. There were rumors that she had a wife before but that can't be... right? - Cassandra (she/xe) , also known by her nickname Cassi was Vela's best (and only) friend growing up. Growing up with a lot of brothers kind of made Cassi very loud and blunt, to put it mildly. Wasn't a big fan with her peers, so that's probably why she gravitated towards Vel was was also kind of an outsider. She moved to Poteria when she and Vel were teens, and since then she has blossomed to a very active Housemaiden there. Hasn't kept in touch with them ever since they started traveling + the King's Curse - And of course, Vela (she/they), my little Vellie, my blorbo. My optional party member OC that i'm very normal about trust. But also potential friend to a certain starry astral being after the King's Curse has ended. Too many thoughts to put in one post but yes I love them dearly.

I have way more stuff under the read more because there is a LOT and only a fraction of the art I've made for them in a the year alone. So I'll just put a few of them under the Read More!

What's a good optional party OC without some battle portraits? Plus a couple of redraws in there.

A ton of art practice because sometimes you gotta draw a guy 100 times as drawing practice. (+ bonus siffrin in the third pic)

And have this unfinished WIP that means nothing surely :)

[manasurge]

Your custom fanspec... tell me about it 👀

:BLUSHYSMILEYCATEMOJI: hehehe well, it is mostly done, it just needs the polishing up for proper posting display with the accompanied drawn diagrams and colour coding (also it's quite old at this point, started working on it a year ago and wanted to work on lore stuff so I put it on hold, so the doodles look kinda bad but oh well alsjdfsdfj). The one main thing I just have to make her Reformed Mordrem minions to display the rest with the little visual diagrams, but I can post what I have done here so far <3 (this is actually the first time I've posted the updated state of this WIP since I last talked about it last year lskjfs. So sorry in advance if some of this seems janky as I haven't gone over it in a hot minute) Note: I also wanna redo the icon thing to be more of an eye instead of the lotus since it makes more sense literally and thematically and to just try to make it look better in general. For context my OC Mourynn/Vallotash (same person kinda) is Mordremoth's (parasitic) Scion in a weird imposter (syndrome) situation (leaving that bit out for now), and her whole thing was inspired by the ??? area in Jahai bluffs with the one quote that inspired her existence "Are you a dragon dreaming that it's a hero? If you were, how would you know?", where the area also matches her colours thematically too, and why her Mesmer abilities all revolve around hallucinations and tapping into the "Dragon of mind/plant, roots/madness, etc." where the spec also evolves slowly over time as she develops, but it does get amped up during LS1 with Scarlet being responsible for kickstarting it (as she brainwashed Mourynn to help cultivate the Dreamthistle into the Toxic Offshoots, and from there with HoT and so on as things got worse and this just evolved into it's own thing, haha). Super abridging explanations (and badly lol) since I feel that part with the Toxic Alliance and those spores were an important step towards this becoming what it is. Also I still need to decide on names for some things, but oh well ;w; ANYWAYS! Mourynn's custom Mesmer elite spec (WIP):