#......and maybe it's because we literally live at the end of the city. Far from the big shops......sigh...............

[rainofthetwilight]

gonna try even more to find any dragons rising sets around here bc I NEED a minifigure I can take w/ me to makkah

[decojellyfish]

So we saw Guard dog! ghost and kitten! reader

Rescued fighting dogs! Ghost and Soap with cat! reader

how about we get some of Price adopting a puppy! reader and reader having to learn the ropes from Older dogs! Ghost, Soap, and Gaz(maybe??)?

or just Price rescuing another former fighting dog! reader and them being all defensive against former fighting dogs! Ghost, Soap and Gaz(maybe??), maybe even fighting against them when they(soap) try to get too close for reader’s comfort

Thank you so much for being my second request!! I decided to go with the second prompt you offered me, and I had fun writing it! I just don't have fun making you guys cry because, fair warning, this one is gonna be angstyyy... 😔 But I hope you guys enjoy!

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Bite

Hybrid AU! TF141 Retired Fight Dog! Gaz, Ghost, and Soap x Retired Fight Dog! GN! Reader x Owner! Price Reader is only addressed as ‘you’

SFW ~ Angst

Warnings: Brief/occasional swearing, mentions of abuse, depression, extreme violence, trauma

───♡───────────── Beginning Your body ached. You didn’t know if it was because you were starving, or if it was your muscles and joints crying out for help from your most recent fight. It was a couple of hours ago, and it was rough. Your previous owner had disowned you when he found a new pup to use and abuse for profit. Part of you was happy, the years of abuse and ruthless training were over. The other part of you was absolutely terrified. You had no more food, no treats, no worn-out bed for you to sleep on, and no roof over your head.

You’d been homeless for nearly a year. You gave up on keeping exact track months ago. Your slightly sunken stomach never ceases its eternal growl, constantly yearning for food. Dumpster diving has become a part of your lifestyle. You had managed to find some food, albeit moldy and/or coated in garbage juices, but it was still food. ‘Food is fight fuel’ was constantly echoing through your head, while you fought off the sickness going through your head as realization set in that you were literally eating garbage. Sometimes, you even wondered if food was even worth it. You weren’t fighting as much as you used to. Sometimes you were suddenly assaulted by other stray fighter dogs as well, forcing you to live in constant paranoia, anxiety, and a never-ending feeling like you had to fight.

There were times that you even lashed out at strangers because of this constant fear. Domesticated dogs would find themselves abruptly thrown into a fight when you were around. They would leave with scratches, bites, bruises, and even chunks of flesh missing due to your fierce bite. In the underground fighting scene, you were most known for how gnarly the wounds from your bites would be.

This would result in animal control being called on you. But you’d evaded them countless times, which meant that you were far from where you originally came from. You would bounce from alley to alley, town to city. You were far from home if you could even call where you came from ‘a home’.

Though you were far from old enemies, you still made new ones. You were so used to lashing out that you were still getting into fights, but now you were getting into fights with fight dogs you didn’t even know.

Some days, you were tired. So tired, you just wanted to lay in your current alleyway and just rot. Let the bugs eat away at you, sometimes you even want to turn yourself into the pound. At least there you would have food in your belly and a semi-warm place to sleep. On other days, you were mad. So mad, you just wanted to paint the town red with any kind of blood, even your own.

Today was a tired day. You were lying against a wall, it was raining. Rain would be the closest you had to being bathed. Your rotted clothes were soaked and falling apart, your hair sticking to your face and skin as you stared at the opposing wall. Your eyes had nothing behind them, you were lost in your little world. Your happy place.

You imagined yourself in a cabin, or a cottage, just somewhere secluded and cozy. You had a loving partner, and pups of your own to take care of. A garden in the backyard, full of fruit, vegetables, and herbs. A flower garden in the front yard, full of daffodils, tulips, rose bushes, and trumpet lilies. You wore soft clothes like they were made of clouds. In your happy place, you were warm. In your happy place, you were safe.

Unfortunately, you were ripped out of your happy place by a smell. A familiar smell. Multiple familiar smells. Your heart had already started to beat rapidly, and the sense of adrenaline you had when in the fighting ring was coming back, slapping you in the face. You shifted your position from laying back against a wall to standing up and ready to fight, your teeth already beginning to show and a low growl slowly leaving your throat.

Familiar smells were never good, it meant that someone who had been made an enemy was close. Another fight was about to happen. You could hear men chatting with each other, though it was muffled by the ringing in your ear as your brain was now filled with nothing but adrenaline, panic, and one word. Fight.

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

Price was going on his weekly walk with his boys, all rescues. His home had become somewhat of a mini rehabilitation center. His pups, although fully grown dogs, were his pride and joy to be around. Gaz was his first rescue about seven years ago, Soap was rescued about two years after Gaz, and Ghost had been rescued three years before today. Price, himself, was a retired military veteran.

He enjoyed going on walks with his pups, he found it to be a nice bonding experience. Although today was rainy, it didn’t stop the group from following tradition. Gaz loved the rain, the sound and the feeling of raindrops hitting windows, umbrellas, or even himself was beyond calming for him. Soap didn’t particularly like rain, it mostly made him think of those unbelievably sad scenes in movies that involved rain, like an intense breakup. Ghost was neutral about it.

But Ghost found himself focused on something else, a smell. He glanced over at Soap, who could also smell this sudden scent. “Stop.” Ghost spoke firmly, grabbing Price’s shoulders and looking at the rest of the group. “Stay here, I smell something.” “Ghost, I don’t want you getting hurt-“ Price protested, only to be interrupted by Soap. “Stay, somethin’s here tha’ could rip out your throat.”

Gaz was worried as well, even though the scent wasn’t as familiar to him as it was to Ghost and Soap. He could smell a large amount of adrenaline and even panic or fear mixed in.

Ghost slowly walked up to the scent source and braced himself, slowly watching as a familiar face came into view. The two of you had been through plenty of fights together, each parting putting up a massive fight. You were snarling at him when he approached you, your body unconsciously moving closer to the wall, further away from him as he grew closer. Your hollow, starved appearance had him taken aback. You looked terrible. You were coated in scabs, bruises, and open wounds that had miraculously not gotten infected.

Your heart was beating so fast, that both you and Ghost could hear it. He had his hands up, his palms open as he showed he wasn’t looking for a fight. That didn’t stop you though. All you could see was all those fights, years ago. Ghost snarling back at you before he would nearly tear a chunk out of you while you almost ripped both of his ears off. You lunged at him with a loud bark, tackling him as you began to scratch and bite at him.

The group was startled, and terrified. They would all run to Ghost as they tried to get this rabid dog off of him. Of course, four men against you was an unfair fight and you were swiftly removed from the fight.

Soap held you against the ground, crouching over you as he pinned both of your arms behind your back as you continued to snarl and attempt to bite. You panted and stared at them with wide eyes, mostly focusing on Ghost and Soap since they were enemies from the past.

“You’re gonna fucking kill me, aren’t you..?” You spoke shakily, to either of the boys. Soap could feel how strong and deep your breaths were as you hyperventilated.

All the men shared a glance of worry, Soap spoke up, “We’re not those dogs anymore.” Ghost would nod in shared agreement. “You don’t look so good, since the last time I saw you.” He looked down at you, noting how your stomach churned from hunger, how tired your eyes were, and your slightly raspy breath. Even your recent wounds worried him, some nearly looking like early stages of infection.

You grunted as you struggled under him, “Yeah, well, ‘m happy to see you guys living the high life.” You grumbled, the other dogs’ ears twitching as they heard a slight crack in your voice. You couldn’t ignore it, you were jealous. They didn’t look as tired as they did at your last fight, not on edge all the time, they looked well fed, and they smelled good too. And worst of all, what made you want to lash out at all of them, even their owner, was the fact that they looked happy with this new life. The life that you desired that always seemed to be out of reach.

All the men looked back at Price, Gaz included, with one question in their eyes. ‘Can we keep them?’

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

Taking you back to their home was a fight in it of itself. You couldn’t help but be scared. Maybe they were all tricking you, maybe they were gonna lock you up in their house and sell you off to another owner in the underground fighting scene. Maybe they really were going to kill you. You only felt slightly safe with Gaz, but that’s because he didn’t look as scarred a fighter as Ghost and Soap, and his eyes held a safer gaze than the other two. He would hold your hand on the way home, firmly but protectively. However, he only did this after you attempted to run away from the group about 4 times.

Arriving at the Price household, there was an overwhelming amount of smells. Everything smelled like all the boys, but individually and in one unit all at the same time. You would stay close to the front door at the entrance, scared to step one foot further into the house. You still didn’t know if it was safe or not. Price respected this, though. He had Gaz let go of your hand so you could settle into the house at your own pace. The look of fear in your eyes was one that he was familiar with, he’d seen it in all his other boys when he first brought them home.

He had the boys all continue on with their night, only giving you directions to the bathroom in case you needed it at some point.

As time went on, your legs would grow tired of just standing. You remained seated, close to the door as you watched the household live out their lives. Price would only stop by you once for the night, and it was to give you a late-night snack and to wish you a good night. He had set down a plate with pieces of watermelon and a glass of water. He left after that, supposedly going to bed. The boys would stay up a bit later, they would watch you in secret. But you were quickly able to tell they were spying on you, however, you let them continue.

You saw it as a way to test if they were trustworthy. Your ears slightly twitch as you listen to their whispers.

“...how do you know them…?” Gaz would whisper, curiosity lacing his voice. “...Ghost and I have had a few tussles with ‘em years ago…” “...Fierce dog… don’t underestimate them…” Ghost grumbled in reply, Soap nodding in agreement. “...Nearly took mah whole face off…” Soap chuckled. “...They almost got my ears…” Ghost added.

You would faintly smile at the warning of underestimating you as a fighter dog. But then you were reminded that you were a fighter dog. And a successful one. Any moral being would never want to be a successful fighter dog. That meant you were scary and either could have killed or even mutilated another dog. Memories of all your fights would flash across your mind, like a blinding camera shot. Your successful ones, the ones where you would lose and your owner showed you what bad dogs get for losing. The bits of compassion you would feel for your opponent as they bleed out, or yowled in pain as their bones broke, pellets of skin torn off, or their bleeding gums from when you knocked nearly all their teeth out.

You wanted to hug them, apologize to them, tell them that you wished you could fix them. Only to have those moments of kindness wiped from your mind as the shrieks and cheers of your owner and the people who bet money on you were released into the air.

Coming back to reality, you were perplexed when you didn’t hear the whispers anymore. Taking a chance, you glanced up at the boys. Only to see that they were now staring at you, curious and worried. You didn’t know why they were staring until you heard a soft pit-pat against the floor beneath you.

Glancing down, you saw little droplets. Your hand instinctively raised to your face, feeling little beads of tears and the streaks they left behind on your face. You would quickly smear your tears away and shoot the dogs a mean growl before reluctantly stuffing a piece of watermelon into your mouth. You just wanted something else to focus on aside from the stares you were getting right now.

An hour later, the men had all gone to sleep and you had eaten all the food Price had given you and drank all the water he offered. You stayed awake throughout the whole night, however. You still didn’t trust anyone, believing the house was a trap.

Morning arrived, your eyes tired but still open as you didn’t want to lose your guard. Price was the first one up, yawning and scratching at his chest as he walked into the room. He would glance down at you, smiling when he saw you’d eaten all your food.

“Food was good, yeah? Don’t worry, I’ll get you some more soon.” He chuckled, taking your empty dishes away and heading into the kitchen.

You felt awkward now, just sitting there as Price had begun to cook breakfast. You would quietly stand up and slink into the kitchen, sitting on the cold tile as you would watch him from a random corner of the room. It had been about ten minutes before Price would look over his shoulder to check on you, only seeing that you weren’t in your previous spot. He would then glance down at you in your new spot, chuckling to himself.

“Got bored of the old spot?” He asked before going back to cooking. He didn’t expect you to be speaking right out the gate, all the other boys were like that too when he first took them in. After a few minutes, Gaz would walk in, rubbing at his eye. A big smile formed on his face as he smelled the currently cooking food. “Smells good in here, Price.” He would then finally look at you, mildly surprised you had moved but he would regain his smile.

Waving at you, he would approach you but keep his distance. “Did you sleep well last night…?” You silently stared at him, your restlessness very obvious, especially in your eyes. “Did you sleep- at all last night…?” He looked concerned, his brows only furrowing more when you shook your head no. “...Too scared?” You stayed quiet. “That’s okay, Ghost and I were like that too.” He smiled at you. You couldn’t deny it, he was a comforting ball of sunshine to you.

“I could set up a bed on the couch for you, I could even keep the telly on for you if you like falling asleep to that sort of thing.” You remained quiet as he talked to you, causing him to let out a slightly amused but comforting huff. “That’s okay, you can think about it during breakfast.”

Breakfast included food that was the most delicious food you had devoured in years. French toast, fried eggs, bacon. You would quietly inhale the first actual meal you’d had in a long time, everyone else watching you at the kitchen table, some trying not to laugh at your eagerness.

You awkwardly stared at everyone else, wiping away some yolk on your mouth with your hand. Price chuckled, “That reminds me, we ought to give you a bath today and get you some new clothes.”

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

You awkwardly sat in the tub as Gaz would scrub a sudsy sponge along your back. Price was washing some clothes, making sure the scent was cleaned out so you had no trouble with wearing them.

“Don’t worry, I was like this when Price first took me in.” He laughed a little. “Quiet, scared, and I didn’t know if this place was my permanent home. But it is my home, and it’s gonna be your home too.” He smiled at you, now rubbing shampoo into your hair. “...what’s it like?” You looked up at him. “Y’know, living here? What’s it like?”

Gaz thought for a bit, also trying to make sure none of the shampoo got in your eyes. “Well, it’s nice. Good food, good clothes, good comfort. Price will sometimes pick up our favorite snacks for us, he’ll do that for you too, you just need to ask him or write it on the grocery list. We go on weekly walks around the block, sometimes we go to the park which is really fun. Especially with Soap, he really likes to play games at the park.”

That surprised you, you never took Soap to be a ‘fun games at the park’ kind of dog. Well, that could also be because you never got to see him or Ghost as a domesticated dog, your only memories of them being in the fighting rink. Maybe they have changed. Maybe you should give them a chance to show you they’ve changed.

Maybe they were doing that all along since they found you, only holding you down instead of attacking you in response to being attacked by an old foe.

The bath was eventually drained and you were dried off with a towel, Price coming in with a pair of folded up clothes, a t-shirt and some sweatpants. You were left alone in the bathroom to get dressed, also to let you just have time to yourself.

After a few minutes, you stepped out of the bathroom in your new attire. You couldn’t lie, the clothes were beyond comfy and were nice and warm. Probably fresh out of the dryer. The rest of the boys were on the couch, watching a show on the TV. You would stare at them before slowly beginning to move your legs towards the couch as well.

They would notice your approaching, but wouldn’t bring any extra attention to it. They all remember their first time trying to get comfortable in the new home. It honestly warmed their hearts watching you hesitate on where to sit before eventually picking a spot and huddling into the soft pillows.

Price was already dressed for the day and was writing down the current shopping list before slipping his shoes on. “Oy, Gaz, you’re coming with me for groceries today.” He called out to the couch, Gaz promptly getting up and putting his own shoes on. He waved to you and the other two before stepping out the front door, Price giving a wave as well. “We’ll be back in 30.”

You sat there in silence, now stuck with your past enemies. There was tension, no doubt. At least, that’s what you felt. You were the one who was constantly looking over at the boys, a nervous sweat forming on your forehead. The two were just sitting there, watching the commercials play and pass by.

Now that the only pacifists in the house were gone, they were going to pounce at any second. You were sure of it. At any given moment, they were gonna do it. So you sat there, in a state of constant fear and bracing yourself for a fight you didn’t even know would happen.

Ghost noticed your condition, Soap a few seconds later would see it too. “... you okay, pup?” Soap would ask, seeing the little bits of sweat on your skin. “You’re scared.” Ghost stated, looking deep into your defensive form. “You don’t need to be, you’re safe now. We all are. We aren’t the same dogs you fought those years ago.”

They continued to watch you, watching as you stayed quiet and just stared at them expectantly. “We know you’re also no’ the same dog from those fights. Ye dinnae have a choice, only doin’ tha’ for your own survival. Like us.” Soap’s eyes were full of empathy and concern.

“No need to be scared. It’s safe here.” He smiled at you, slowly reaching out to you to rub your shoulder.

You only saw the worst in people, you would see a possible future where he was reaching out to strangle you instead of comforting you. You thought you could see his teeth start to bare, maybe he was snarling at you.

You felt like you were back in the fighting ring. You could feel the adrenaline begin pulsing and coursing through your veins.

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

You didn’t know how you did it, it went by so fast. The last thing you saw was Soap’s teething smile and his hand. Now you were pressed up against a wall, hyperventilating at the sight of what you just did.

First, you  grabbed his arm, throwing him to the ground before you began to bite and tear at his flesh and clothes. You woke up when Ghost pinned you to the ground, keeping your wrists together so you couldn’t hurt anyone or yourself. You scrambled away from him and coward into a corner.

You thought you were doing good, only a day into this house and you were doing so good. You didn’t feel like a good pup, not anymore. You weren’t deserving of this house, these new clothes. the food that resided in your stomach. You were a bad dog. There was no way you could look any of the boys in the eye now. Not after what you did.

Lost in a tsunami of your thoughts, you couldn’t hear Ghost trying to reassure you, that it was normal for an outburst like this to happen. He, himself, did it to Price. He brought Soap to the bathroom, taking out the first aid kit along with a few extra bandages. Living in a house with a bunch of retired fighter dogs, the first aid kits would be a bit more extreme than a regular, everyday one.

When he returned to check on you, to tell you that Soap was going to be okay, he didn’t see you in your corner. Not even the spot you were in on your first day here. But he saw that right next to the spot, the door was left open.

They lost you. ───♡───────────── End

If you have any requests, or asks, feel free to submit them!

[rayroseu]

Wait this is actually interesting, so from what the story implies, Wild Rose Castle is weaker than Black Scale Castle because it probably has no magical atmosphere that serves as its defense, there's probably fewer troops here, and the fact that its just on a clear meadow makes the terrain not suitable for defenses unlike Black Scale who is atop a mountain and covered in a Valley.

So I kinda think that Wild Rose Castle is a newly built castle in Briarland. After all, Meleanor was a kid only 200 years ago so Wild Briar is probably that age as well (or more), i think that age is young (compared to Black Scale which probably several centuries old?) thats why it has weaker defense facilities.

Maybe Wild Briar is older as Black Scale, but this game says this is Meleanor's castle so I assume she's the one who had built this.

But I have this HC that this castle is actually built because of Levan. For his diplomatic mission between humans. Building a castle in an easy terrain would make sense to make it easier for magicless humans to transport in. Because I don't really expect(?) Maleanor who is a military commander, which she probably has knowledge of strategies, to not see how disadvantegous this location is considering its close to humans

But I also think Wild Briar was built as like a refuge for the faes that live far away outside Dragon City(I wont call it dragonopolis lol)

Wild Rose being a few centuries old also kinda makes sense since the Silver Owls only recognize Meleanor as the only ruler in Briarland, they probably arent aware theres a queen named Maleficia because she's ancient(?) atleast I didnt caught any silver owls mentioning her iirc(?) They went to the mountains near Dragon city yes-- but like it was to pursue General Lilia and not to besiege Black Scale as well even they kinda had the potential to do so since they took down Maleanor and Silver Owls' is implied to be very greedy--

I actually think its more interesting to not summarize Maleanor's cause of death as just her overestimating her win against Knight of Dawn-- I actually think its because of several reasons such as:

"Wrong time" in working out the diplomatic relations between the conflict between humans and faes, Levan's plan to educate wasn't pointless effort, but I wish the story states as well what he did to counter the fact that the faes hates humans not because of a misunderstanding, but because of their mistreatment towards faes(the story literally implies rhe humans kills faes meanwhile we have yet to see a royal guard fae that killed humans the story only tells us they chased them away), Levan does this when its clear that the Silver Owls was getting hostile, like objectively speaking, this was kinda not the right time to communicate and Meleanor was the receiving end of the build up hostility of the Silver Owls

This is kinda countering my first point, but Meleanor's decisions was kinda weird too in the story lol, why send your best Generals to the enemy fortress.... 😭💥 But I actually think this is interesting as well, because its likely a reference to the wars in LiveAction Maleficent... I remember watching that movie especially Maleficent 2: Mistress of Evil and just wondering why the Moors never plans (and even if they do its very simple, just charge in and overpower the enemy with strength), they just charge in instead of treating it "like a chess" where you save your best pieces in dangerous situations and everyone has a role in dispelling the enemy. They also hold this belief that only the strong ones would guarantee their success and heavily relies on them. Meanwhile, Queen Ingrid used deception and control to subdue all the faeries. Like Meleanor/Faes vs Humans, the faes never thinks about what the human enemy plans, they rely on raw dodging it lol probably alluding to the fact that the faes have trouble thinking like a human.

And lastly this point lol, poor choice of headquarters, the terrain is easy for humans to invade in, and the castle is still weak, also the fact that Wild Briar was alone in fighting several human nations was a factor as well because it couldnt get back up in time because it was too far away from Black Scale Castle, kinda adding Wild Briar was outnumbered too atp

[boba-beom]

bff!beomgyu NSFW

okay but beomgyu as your best friend since birth, who’s literally experienced everything you have because you went thru it together.

the whole kindergarten, elementary, high school and a shit prom where both your dates bailed on you so you thought you guys were so dumb for not just going with each other in the first place. after all, that’s what best friends do.

and then when it came to college, you moved away and he went to your city’s college. you only came back for the holidays and every time you came home, beomgyu would have inches added to his height, his features fitting his face, his jaw defining, shoulders broader every time you hugged him.

and then you come back after not visiting for so long, excited to see everyone. especially beomgyu. you eye the expanse of his large family house, and as soon as you knock on their door, an unfamiliar face opens it, followed by what you assume is beomgyu’s voice calling from inside. “babe, who’s at the door?”

and they stutter, their face contorting with confusion because they didn’t know your name. and when you tell them, they relay it to beomgyu, who’s now running to meet you, opening the door wider and his supposedly significant other was standing aside before walking back inside as he pulls you in for a deep hug, his face tucked into the side of your neck and his arms not wanting to let go of you.

a part of you didn’t want to hug him back because he never told his partner about you? not even a small slip or mention? your arms froze, not wrapping around him until he speaks.

“I’m so happy you’re home. I’ve missed you.” is what he mumbles against your skin, and because of that, his lips also move against your skin. you’re fighting back a shaky sigh, feeling the hairs on your arms stand. you missed him too.

you arrived just in time for dinner with his family, your family and another family, not so familiar with them but you assume it’s the family of beomgyu’s partner.

you’re seated beside beomgyu; he had already pulled out your chair for you before you could even choose. but you notice he didn’t do that to his partner sitting opposite him. you were all towards the end of the table so it wouldn’t be too much for him to go around, but you shrug off the thought.

after eating plenty of good food you decide to catch up with beomgyu’s brother and the rest of the guests. but you were mostly listening to their conversations instead. maybe also because beomgyu’s hand was placed high up on your thigh, fingers drawing shapes, but you realise they may be letters since you used to do that to each other’s backs when you were younger.

you blankly stare at no one in particular, your brain and your senses working hard to spell out each letter and you feel an ‘F’ followed by a ‘U’ and his ‘CK’ was joint, finishing with a question mark at the end. you were far from listening to anyone when all you could hear was your pulse drumming in your ears.

not wanting to attract attention to yourself, but you slowly turn your head towards beomgyu, noticing everyones talking to each other so you were able to freely to beomgyu thanks to their grand, rectangular dining table.

“beomgyu, we can’t do that.” you sort of whisper to him, your face blank. you wrap your hand around his wrist, stopping him from caressing your thigh.

“why not?” he whines, and you’ve heard him whine so many times in your 22 years of living, but this one made you throb somewhere only recent thoughts of beomgyu have made you throb.

“your partner is literally sitting in front of you beomgyu-”

“wait, gabe? gabe isn’t my partner, we just hang out a lot since they’re kinda new here and you didn’t come home last holiday.”

you bite the inside of your cheeks, cursing yourself for mishearing when he called their name earlier. yet beomgyu’s hand is deliciously trailing back up your thigh and you don’t stop him, he stops himself instead.

“excuse us, I’m just going to help bring yn’s things to her room.” and you hear beomgyu’s mom joking about how you know your way around and not like you’d walk into his room.

but that’s exactly what you did. what the both of you did. he placed your bags down on the side of his window, pushing his hair back before tackling you onto the bed, wrestling each other just like you used to a long time ago. you’re both panting and he lies on the bed, defeated, with you technically straddling over his growing erection.

the weight of your body over his strained dick has his head rewiring, and flipping you over so you were under him—your legs still spread and he does an experimental grind. he brings his thumb to your bottom lip, tugging it down until you capture it in your mouth, the wet muscle of your tongue flat against the pad of his thumb.

“fuck yn, didn’t know you were dirty like that.” he sighs from the friction, but what he’s seeing right in front of him was what turned him on even more.

you moan around his thumb, sucking it like it was his dick but beomgyu couldn’t take it anymore. “oh nah, I want my cock in your mouth.” is what he says as he pulls his thumb out your mouth, smearing your excess saliva over your clothed nipple.

he lies down beside you, propping himself up on his elbow and waiting for you to lay on your stomach between his thighs, helping yourself and pull his pants and boxers down. grey ck’s, part of the set you gifted him the past christmas.

it was your second time touching his bulge, the first being an accident from when you had to sleep in the same tent while camping, and you rolled over to reach for your phone which you stupidly didn’t put aside and instead felt beomgyu’s morning wood while he was asleep, sleeping on his side and facing you.

“damn beomgyu, when d’you get so big?” your hushed voice had his eyes flutter shut while he concentrated on the feeling of your hand wrapped around the girth of his dick, your thumb sweeping painfully slow over the head and spreading the clear bead around.

“shit yn, you’re killing me right now.” he says through gritted teeth before taking over and holding his shaft, slapping his tip against your bottom lip like it was your own lipstick. “suck me good, and I’ll fuck you so hard you’ll sleep good tonight.”

“god your mouth is so filthy gyu, the fuck.” both your eyes seem hazy when you look at each other, not breaking contact even when you begin sucking on his tip. using your soft lips to stimulate him and his lower abdomen is already twitching.

a series of ‘mmh’s and curses leave beomgyu’s lips, enticing you to take him in deeper until his head hits the back of your throat. you thank your college away from home experience that taught you this. having a couple of fuck buddies before, you’ve never thirsted over a dick than beomgyu’s.

“baby come here, ride me.” his hand cups your cheek, making you lean up as he leans forward to capture your sweet lips with a hint of saltiness. he leans over to reach into his bedside drawer, securing a condom packet between his index and middle finger until you lick along his neck.

“wan’ you to fuck me raw, baby.” is all you say between kisses and he drops the condom, not even caring to close the drawer. and he’s back to attack behind your ear and descending down your neck with slow and wet kisses, sucking and licking on the marked areas, eliciting loud moans when he touches your sweet spot. “make me yours.”

you couldn’t resist the empty feeling inside you, throbbing around nothing, so you align his tip at your entrance. your spit and his precum has him all slicked up and ready to be devoured by your cunny.

sinking down on him did wonders to you, your nails were digging through the thin material of his shirt over his shoulder and his were under your ass, gradually letting you engulf him until your hips were flush.

you didn’t wait a minute to adjust, thinking that if you fuck yourself on his dick then it’ll just feel better that way. his dick was reaching so deep inside you; the build up was coming quicker than you’d hoped. moaning his name had his dick jumping inside of you, kissing your cervix each time you sunk down on him. but as soon as he thrusts his his up, it’s game over for you.

“beomgyu, fuck up into me.” you whine and he assists in holding you up, desperately snapping his hips up into you and watching the way his dick disappears into your pretty pussy.

“ynnn, ugh. quit clenching like that or you’re gonna make me cum.” he throws his head back, chasing his high and fucking into you faster and deeper.

the pitch of your cries grows higher, until beomgyu's ramming his cock leaving you to silently sob, mouth agape and legs beginning to shake, your cunny clenching harder than before and beomgyu follows soon after. his cum spurting out in millisecond intervals inside you until you sit back onto the bed, beomgyu's hands still holding your thighs apart so he can see his load ooze out and drip onto his fresh sheets. he wipes the leaked out cum with his thumb and up to your hole, almost like he was playing around with it.

"beomgyu, you're such a perv– oh–" and he's shoving two fingers inside you, his attempt at keeping his load in his new cum dump <3

"I wanna fuck you in every room in this house. god, I love you yn."

"if you do, we better wrap up next time because I need to finish this degree before having a mini you running around."

[love-toxin]

ELLIE!! SO happy that totk finally released bc there's a chance you might hyperfixate and give me the yandere link content that sustains my life force. oh and uh, cuz we waited so long for this game too, of course!

prrrrr i really do love yan Link! so many potential avenues! i was replaying totk recently (bc i was so excited for it i literally blazed thru the whole gam 8 days after release LOL) and some gems really cropped up:

1. Link makes you a little dream house in Tarrey Town to keep you safe and to take advantage of your inherent housewifery. He's so feral you don't even think about leaving even when he's gone for long stretches of time, because you know he'll track you down and drag you back home because you're not the hero silly! :) you stay home :) where it's safe :)

2. Yiga clan member reader who is constantly being hunted down and "rehabilitated" by the Hylian hero. Which is incredibly frustrating to you because a.) ur trying to kill him and b.) the other yiga quickly lose respect for you/shun you when they find out you're practically Link's little playtoy. Especially when he goes x2 as feral on the other yiga in battle when you're around cause he's bricked up at the very sight of you, and you end up getting chewed out by Kohga for letting him hit it and just escape afterwards.

3. You work at one of the stables or the little inn at Hateno village and Link falls so hard for you he's downright creepy. He's constantly hanging around and bringing you gifts and stuff you didn't ask for but you can't just tell him to go away cause...he's the hero. So you kinda just have to deal with his awkward stare and the fumbled kisses he steals behind the barn and try not to hurt his feelings because what are you gonna do if the hero of time decides to quit saving Hyrule because he got rejected?

4. You're part of the Gerudo/live in Gerudo town and Link is undeterred in his attempts to woo you, even though he can't step foot in town or he'll get locked up. So he either dresses up in the vai outfit or just lies in wait for you to leave the city for one reason or another, and then ambushes you and follows you around like a weird little stalker until you love him. Bonus if he scares off another suitor or saves you from a Molduga or--my personal favourite--your sand seal gets spooked and takes you far out into the desert and strands you by accident, and you're forced to accept Link's help when he comes to save you. And now, you owe him.

5. Much like Link, you're a fellow adventurer/wanderer/merchant/etc. and bump into him out in the wild. Maybe you share a campfire for a night and swap stories, or you give him directions, or you just wave at him in passing, and now Link is completely obsessed with you. He stalks you through the wild areas of Hyrule and never lets any harm befall you, be it monsters or gloom pits or pools of malice or just general unluckiness, and while you don't realize it's him you slowly feel less and less alone when you're out in the field. You swear you can even feel some kind of warmth when you lay down in your tent to sleep, like someone's curled up right next to you....

6. Link kidnaps you and takes you to Hyrule castle where he forcibly makes you pretend to be a princess. He dresses you up in pretty gowns and kills all the monsters lurking around so you'll always be safe, and he acts like you're his damsel in distress that he's constantly saving even though you're just some farmer girl he picked up off the side of the road and fell in love with. You're the pretty princess, he's your loyal knight, and if he does a really good job at "saving" you, maybe you'll let him stay in your room for the night when he keeps watch...?

[chosoniisan]

A risk worth messy reward ↠ kamo choso

↠alternative title: swapping spit with choso, literally

↠pairing: kamo choso | sorceress!reader

↠setting: post canon, not at all compliant

↠genre: nasty, nasty fluff

↠caution: suggestive; height/size difference ("my" choso is over 6ft); unhealthy-ish/complicated relationship; kinda owner/pet dynamics; coercion (?); lots of tongue

↠summary: after yet another rural-steeped mission, your first priority is finding the nearest bed to fall into; conversely, choso has other things on his mind

↠authoress' notes: my initial plan had been to write a hc about the oddities of choso, how he has some bizarre and inexplicable habits, but writing hcs (without plot) isn't my strength, so I opted for what could be considered "snapshots" instead :')

also, the context, setting-wise, for this is that once the dusts settles post canon, the high-ups (the smattering of them still kicking), let choso live conditioned on you acting as his controller at all times, lest you risk ending up on the execution chopping block, too. . .

A ripely full moon, and the air’s refreshed with a slight chill:

by all means the sort of mid-autumn night you’d want to bottle up and take with you.

You might just have to overlook the chunks of entrails sticking to your soles, though. And maybe you can pretend that it’s the crickets droning in the grass and not the crisping of bone dissolving into nothingness. As if on cue, you resist the urge to sigh to keep the tang of death, thoroughly worn over, from invading your lungs any more than it already has.

It’s not quite how you’d envision your evening—but beggars can’t be choosers. And on the bright side, at least you’re fully intact, all your limbs present and accounted for despite enough close calls to last you a lifetime. Sure, you might have said the very same thing last time (i.e. a handful of days ago), and you’ll no doubt mirror that sentiment next time too (i.e. in another day or so), though you take your blessings when you can get them.

Granted, your good luck quickly runs its course since there’s hardly anything fortunate about the strain of curses the far-flung reaches of the countryside seem to breed to no end. Who would have thought that the higher you climbed the rankings the more acquainted you’d become with woodland critters the size of your hand (excluding cursed spirits, mind you). Then there’s the persistent feeling of otherness crawling over you like a second skin the longer those prying eyes rake and rove over you. (If only they knew that a city girl and her dutiful charge were the last bit out of place in these parts.)

“I mean it when I say that you’re a lifesaver, Choso.” Your poignant ring is all the encouragement he needs to scrap making sure that dead is actually dead this time around and squeeze himself back into your sphere again. Crunch, crunch, crunch goes the tall grass giving way to your missing piece because obviously solace by another name is your side. Leave it to him to be over 190 centimeters of delicately endearing. “I wasn’t expecting that other special-grade, but, of course, you’re always covering for me in a pinch—I honestly don’t know what I’d do without you.”

In that moment, you’re the stargazer of him; a face lighting up the pearly night beyond measure. “I’m always following your lead, though. You’re a lot more experienced than me, too, so the best I can do is try to keep up. Because I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you.” A dash of sheepishness colors the downward wisp of lashes brushing against his cheeks, but that isn’t enough to distract him from the sway of you in his shadow (even if he has to really drop his head to horde that eyeful for himself). “I’m glad we make a good team,” his brief lull is beseeching, the tilted head even more so, “at least I think so.”

For the sake of his tenderly bleeding heart, your nodding doesn’t miss a beat. “Yep, we sure do. . .! And every good team needs some rest, so I should go ahead and text our supervisor and let him know we’re finished up here.” Another thwarted attempt at a sigh, so you settle for a mild quirk of your lips amidst reaching into your pocket for your phone spared from the fray. “We’ll have to stay the night in town, which isn’t ideal, but we can take the first train back home in the morning.”

The faster you can confirm the rendezvous spot, the faster you can sink into a warm bath and then beneath a cozy comforter, so you’re already a few rapid-fire texts deep when Choso pulls on your sleeve.

“Wait. Before that. . .” he begins, slow, measured as if he’s taking the time to taste every word before it leaves his lips. Like that’s not enough to prod at your attention, you’re especially perceptive to rose stain swashed across the expanse of his face, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think him too innocent to sell his soul to the devil for a life of strife alongside you. Though perhaps innocence in its purest state is wetting his hands in blood, bearing your burden of nocturnal calamity with the occasional slip of diffidence. “Can I. . .” Gulping down that lump in his throat. “Can I have my reward now?”

It's your turn to sound things out for good measure.

“Your. . .reward?” (Emphasis on the furrowed brows there.)

He bobs his head once, meanwhile you’re rifling through the pages of your mental archives in search of this reward, whatever it is. A contemplative hum sifts through you at the recollection of saying something in the realm of treating him once this mission wrapped up; admittedly, it was the sort of remark made in passing, but if it’s Choso, you don’t mind staying true to your word. Besides, you have an inkling of what he might have in mind (or you hope you know him well enough to make that guess. . .there’s only one way to find out).

“You’re talking about the souvenirs near the station; I think you were looking at the sweet dumplings, yeah? I don’t know if that shop is open this late, but we can go over and check—”

“No, not that.” Vehemence strums in his tone, so much so that you start a bit, setting off the ripple effect of him offering you a repentant look in return, one that’s still very clearly brimming with fervor. “I did a good job, right? And you promised I could have a reward if I was really good.” As a matter of fact, he’s not wrong, but his moonstruck gaze, expanding, plants an unnamed sensation between the open spaces in your chest. (You’re not daunted by him, it’s just that unpredictability has never been your forte.) “. . .So I was thinking that I wanted you.”

Doesn’t have a chance to click together in your brain until the warmed heart of his palm envelops your entire cheek, and even then you’re still too many steps behind by the time he’s level with you: face-to-face, eye-to-eye, lips. . .dangerously close. Inhaling a mingling of dried copper and powdery musk doesn’t help you figure out what he means by wanting you, having you; rather, with each fanning of his breath over you in crests, you’re gradually unraveling into something entirely unlike you. Something a lot more nerve-ridden.

If you had intended to chime in after scrambling to make sense of the situation (or not), the reality is that you’re simply opening the door for him to carve a place inside you. Literally. Considering it’s not the sound of a mildly articulated concern that echoes in the air, but a muffled squeak when he catches his lips on yours, inviting himself into the niche of your mouth before you can try to recoil. Even when you do think to reel away, his arm is already circled around your waist, seizing you into the bulk of him to the point that you can’t tell where one of you begins and the other ends.

You’ve long given consideration to the fact that Choso’s spent more time sealed than unsealed, that to this very day he’s still working out the kinks of what it means to be mostly human—but this. This goes beyond his idiosyncrasies of not knowing the particulars of kissing. No, this is nothing of a kiss and everything of devouring you whole.

As susceptible as you are, he has no trouble crowding his tongue against yours, which is the difference between tasting him and choking on him. Testing the waters is the last thing on his mind (you suspect it had never been there in the first place) when he’s using the anchor of his hand to steer you right where he wants you, because how else could he map the ridges of your palate without you shrinking like the violet you’re steadily flowering into. Intrusive is him eating away at your lips like a man starved, but it’s also the blooming of heat curled through your insides with a particular penchant for the midst of your tummy.

The compulsion to stagger back is second nature to you, except he’s unnaturally folded into you, so there’s really nowhere for you to skitter off to, especially not with the fixation given to a mesh of sticky pink. And it feels foreign, sinfully so, as he overwhelms you with broad, saliva-rife sweeps of his tongue, undeterred by your stagnate self, too paralyzed by the knotting in your core, the blistering up of sweat at your temples, and the uncut wildness—or is that obsession?—of him before your very eyes. Either way, it’s just the push needed to send you over the edge of quiet bleating. . .that finds its premature end swallowed into him for safekeeping at the bottom of his stomach, just like every other morsel of you.

Heady appreciation is quick to follow on your heels by way of a long-winded moan from him, to you by virtue of his snare. The stammering in your chest is the clear mark of being caught off guard, and Choso in all his fevered glory capitalizes on your lapse of self to plunge his tongue as deeply as it’ll reach. Nevermind the fact that there’s no stifling the stuttered heave around him or the full-bodied quaking against him, either, he’s still singularly focused on partaking in the mess of you. Willingly or not, you can’t help but indulge him when you’re varying shades of fluster, and it’s the gilt reflection of your disarray that has you clamping your eyes shut. Too bad for you, darkness doesn’t temper the dizzying sensation clambering through your veins that’s becoming more, and more, and more intertwined with him.

(You don’t know how much longer you can weather the storm of him, or if you’ll even be able to mend what he’s already bitten through, and maybe it would have been preferrable if he had taken your skin & tissue with him. He took something far more softly perverse.)  

Though in the end, it’s of his accord, only, that he spares you of the kind of smothering that’ll have you icesheet cold against him in no time flat. And you use spare loosely because he simply moves to sucking and nibbling on your bottom lip as if parting from you means imminent death. If he’d give you a chance, you could assure him that his fears of relenting are unwarranted, but in the thick of hungry fascination, he’d rather stripe his tongue along the corner of your mouth to gather up a stray bead of slick. Whether yours or his, you don’t know—you do know that when he’s done, it’s every bit of his tacky memento etched on your skin.

His gift to you for letting him have one of your deepest intimacies.

As expected, he doesn’t keen over from unlacing himself from you—truthfully, his hand is still palming at your cheek, so it’s not a full untethering—though you’re certainly not boasting a modicum of stability yourself. If that unyielding hold around your middle is anything to go on, you suspect that he doesn’t seem to mind in the slightest; you might even say that he’s savoring in the ruby-rich reliance of his handler.

“Uhm,” Reticence returns with a vengeance despite having just rooted through you mere moments ago; the moonlight glancing off traces smeared across his lips a testament to that. “. . .Do you we could see about those dumplings now?”

And of course you’ll oblige him—even knowing you’re complicit in preserving his devotion.

[kerubimcrepin]

The Dofus MMO Timeline : Leorictus Sheran-Sharm, and the curious case of an implied tenuous relationship between the Crepin-Jurgens

Today we will begin reviewing MMO lore, which was helpfully compiled by yours truly in a video-series. And this post is entirely about the historic events and chronological happenings of the game, as pertaining to Joris, Kerubim, and Atcham.

A Short Summary of Leorictus Sheran-Sharm and the Huppermage Genocide:

The events preceding the game, and the way Leorictus obtained the cursed crown that drove him insane, are quite well explained by this little summary from the Dofus Site:

Even though he was cursed after these events, the war between Bonta and Brakmar at the time is described as nothing short of a slaughter, which might signal to us that, perhaps, even before his descent into madness he was not a very good man.

While ending his own life, Leorictus, through some manipulation, took the Ivory Dofus with him, and used it for evil even after death.

After his death, a horrible civil war and a genocide of huppermages followed.

Kerubim and Joris (and maybe Atcham's) Never-ending Nightmare:

Kerubim's dialogue on the topic, as well as Joris being on good terms with the huppermages, show us that their opinions did not align with those of the Bontarian masses, which would have, at the time, made them outcasts, or outright put them in danger.

And yet...

Even though Luis and Kerubim appear in Astrub within the game, we know for a fact that they did not live there until very recently, thanks to multiple NPCs mentioning them moving to Astrub from Bonta — which means that, all this time, despite the horrific events surrounding them, they continued living there.

Personally, I think they couldn't leave Bonta out of a moral sense of duty, to help their city flourish once more, or to try and help the huppermages that could not leave. It is similar to what they do to a greater extent in Waven, and fits timeline-wise, with the presecution ending around the time of Dofus MMO.

This would mean that they moved back to Astrub, a city of great emotional significance to Joris and Kerubim, after decades of civil war and prosecutions. Because living in such conditions, out of a moral obligation, is bound to put a toll on a person, and is, in my opinion, the precise reason they move to Astrub in the first place.

Atcham AKA Real Winners Quit:

You may have noticed, so far, that I had not yet mentioned Atcham. It is because at the time of the MMO he defected back to Brakmar and went back to a life of crime.

While it is possible that the author of the wanted poster was simply mistaken, I do want to stress the fact that this game takes place around two hundred years in the future, and realistically, by this point, Atcham would be known as a Bontarian.

However, he isn't on bad terms with Kerubim, who speaks very fondly of him, and protects him from receiving punishment for literally beating up random adventurers (using his "defending obvious criminals" skills as demonstrated in episode 42 of Aux Tresors de Kerubim. By which I mean I think he bribed this guy).

In my opinion, Atcham just hated the events in Bonta so much that he fled, went back to Brakmar, and is now refusing to come home because he's mad at Kerubim and Joris for putting themselves in danger.

The Move to Astrub:

Their house in Astrub is the same as it's always been. Warm and welcoming.

At this time, Joris spent his time guiding new incarnates in Incarnam.

We know this to be canon even after his removal from the tutorial, because he is mentioned as an easter egg for players who leave without finishing said tutorial.

My pet theory is that Joris left Incarnam due to lack of respect from his co-workers...

The reason I keep mentioning Joris and Kerubim living together, despite Joris's absence from the home, is that the Zaap to Incarnam is free of charge, and located in Astrub's Temple of Twelve.

It's quite realistic for Joris to be able to make the trip every day. Especially when Kerubim was also able to make the same trip, just for his own leisure. (in my mind, he could even just come and visit Joris...)

Joris and Kerubim's interpersonal relationship:

Since I already mentioned Atcham and what he may generally think, it would be rude not to mention Kerubim and Joris, and the glimpses we have at their relationship at this point.

One of the things that is most notable about their house, is the absolutely dilapidated state of the attic — which is, usually, where Joris has historically lived.

It's a bit of a shaky connection, but if it really is his bedroom, or a place close or adjacent to his bedroom, it might imply Joris just gave up on taking care of it, (not that it's quite taken care of in general, even in Wakfu times...) or that he lived in another area of the home.

Joris is mostly absent, and preoccupied with helping Bonta, despite his attempts to perhaps distance himself a little by moving to Astrub.

He mentions Kerubim once, and it's quite in character: he likes to keep his personal life very far from random work acquaintances.

Kerubim does not mention Joris or Atcham (save for a singular line of dialogue), but talks about dead people from 200 years ago incessantly. In my opinion, it is his way of respecting Joris's privacy and wishes. (And saving his own skin.)

(Imagine you were a calm, collected professional with an image to uphold, and your parent, who works in the same sphere and sees similar clients, went around telling stories of what you did as a child behind your back... brr.)

However, a lot of his dialogue reads as very... lonely. So I really doubt he's entirely on board with Joris and Atcham going off on their own, though there's not much he can do about it.

(The second screenshot is included because Kerubim saying "it's good to have someone small at home" deranges me. He is so empty nest syndrome'd it's crazy)

[peterparkouryo]

rebound | ✧.*

✧.*

prompt; You and Peter have been dating for a few months, but you noticed he's been distant and you finally find out why.

warnings: def sadness, angst, w/ maybe a few swear words, and a break up

word count: 3k

part two

You couldn't say you didn't notice your boyfriend's sudden distance from you. Well, it wasn't sudden, sudden but it definitely was out of nowhere. For the past month or so, Peter barely was able to have a full conversation with you, let alone show you the sweet, kind and affection side of him that you always adored.

It all started when you two were at lunch and the brown haired boy's attention would always wander away from your stories about literally anything and everything. You thought maybe it was your stories that probably was boring to listen to, but when you asked he assured you that he was just tired and tried to pay attention only to gaze at the end of the table where one of your classmates, Michelle sat. At first you thought nothing of it.

The second time was when things really started taking a turn. It was the day before your exam that you've been dreading since you found out about it and guess who was supposed to help you, but didn't show up. Yup, that's right Peter. The next day he apologized and said he got caught up in his Stark Internship, which you knew was a lie. And again, you thought nothing of it and decided to let things slide.

The third and final time was the worst of the worst. By now, Peter has made it pretty clear he wants nothing to do with you and to say it hurt was an honest understatement. 

You didn't understand why that was, you've been nothing but the best girlfriend you could be and it was him that had a crush on you for sometime, him that asked you out, and him to initiate the first kiss. So the problem? You have no idea what the problem was.

Anyway, today was your birthday, yes your birthday was today and you were fully expecting that maybe Peter would take a break from his weird behaviour just to be with you to celebrate your day. But boy, you truly were asking for a lot from the same boy who barley spared you a glance and whenever you would attempt to have a conversation with him, he'd keep it small.

You sighed to yourself, looking in the long mirror attached to your door, fixing your hair and smoothing out your dress that your mom had bought you a few days prior.

It was a simple look sure, but you never really went all out on your birthday, especially this once since your so called "boyfriend" didn't even bother to call or text you a happy birthday.

You blink back the tears at that thought, opening your bedroom door to make your way into the kitchen where your mother was baking you a delicious vanilla one layered cake.

"Hey, mom." You greeted her with a weak smile.

"Hey, my sweet birthday girl!" She greeted back with a cheery voice, turning to glance at you for a split second before turning back to mix the batter of the cake.

Your mother was your pride and joy, she was the one you could tell all your problems to, the one to let you cry on her shoulder, and she was the strongest single mother you knew.

"That cake smells really good." You tell her, taking in the sweet baked goods ingredients that met your nostrils. 

"Why, thank you." Your mother said, probably smiling to herself at your compliment.

You weren't having any sort of party, because one, that wasn't your thing, and two you barley had friends that were more than two. So, it was pointless to have a party with so little friends and the rest of your family lives far from New York City. You'd much rather eat cake while watching your favourite show, or if it was an easy task, eat cake and watch your favourite show with your boyfriend, but it obviously wasn't.

"So, what do you want to do today?" You hear her ask, breaking you from your train of thoughts.

"We could go to delmar's, get a sandwich or go shopping." You suggested with a shrug, holding yourself due to the coolness of the kitchen, maybe it was because the window was open or you just always had weird chills when entering the kitchen.

"Why not do both?!" Your mother exclaimed, pouring the finished cake batter into the baking pan, then finally putting it in the oven, setting the stove to the required degrees.

You shrug in response, not really caring.

"Great!" Your mother said, clasping her hands together before removing the apron that had all sorts of mess on it, folding it and putting it on the counter.

"Peter coming or does he have a special thing planned for you?" Your mother questioned, raising one eyebrow with a smile.

This was thing thing you really didn't want to talk about, but you figured you have no choice but to tell her anyway.

"Um.." You started, scratching the top of your head as you thought of a way to tell her everything that was going on without her worrying or getting mad at the poor boy.

"He said he would try to see me before the day was over, but he's been really busy with the- um, the uh, internship." You lied. 

Peter didn't even talk to you today or let alone yesterday. It's safe to say the last time you two had a decent conversation was when you had tried to figure out a strategy to get a free brownie from the lunch lady every Friday.

"Oh, well, hopefully he will be able to make it up to you." Your mother reassured, walking past you and out the kitchen, probably going to change into a decent outfit to do some birthday activities with you.

You nodded, though she couldn't see it and quickly made your way back to your bedroom, closing the door and grabbed your phone from off of your bed, going to the contacts and dialling Peter's number.

"It's Peter! Leave a message!" You hear your boyfriend's voicemail, after a few rings.

You let out a shaky sigh, desperately trying to hold back your tears.

Instead of texting him, and asking where he was you settled to call Ned, who was a mutual friend, but nevertheless still the sweetest boy ever. You figured if Peter wasn't answering your calls you'd call Ned to see where he was, or if he was okay.

And after a few rings, you hear the phone pick up, your heart rate suddenly speeding up.

"Hello?" You hear the voice ask from the other line.

"Hey Ned, it's Y/N. I was just wondering if Peter was maybe with you?" You ask, fiddling with the hem of your dress nervously.

"Oh, Peter? Last time I checked he was with Michelle at the library." Ned informs you.

You furrow your eyebrows in confusion at his statement. Since when did Peter and Michelle Jones hang out? And since when did he like libraries?

"Does Peter even know what today is?" You ask out loud.

"What's today?" Ned curiously ask mindlessly.

"My birthday." You simply say.

Then, there was a silence on the other end.

"OH SHIT! HAPPY BIRTHDAY Y/N!!" Ned exclaims quite loudly, making you flinch as the noise entered your ear.

"Thanks Ned." You say with a small chuckle at his outburst.

"I'm so sorry I didn't call and tell you sooner-" Ned starts but you cut him off.

"It's fine, you didn't know." You wave off, not holding the grudge on Ned considering he genuially didn't know because you two were rarely even friends and only talked to each other when Peter was around.

And you figured if Ned didn't know, surely Peter forgot as well, though respectfully you never told Ned your birthday.

"I'll call Peter if you want." Ned offered.

"No, it's okay I'll just visit the library later." You tell him.

"Y/N! Let's hurry and get back before the cake is done!" You hear your mother's voice shout from the distant.

"Oh, I should probably go." You quickly tell Ned as you grab a jean jacket from the closet, putting the phone in-between your shoulder and head as you put it on.

"Yeah, sure. Happy birthday Y/N!" Ned tells you once again before you both bid goodbye.

You made your way out the bedroom, going toward the apartment's front door where your mother patiently waited for you, letting the thoughts of Peter possibly forgetting your birthday leave your mind for the time being.

⎯⎯⎯

It's been hours since you went shopping and got your sandwich from delmar's and there was still no sign of calls or texts from Peter.

You sung happy birthday with just you and your mom, had your cake, and even watched a movie to take your mind off that hurtful thought, but after all of that, still no sign of your supposed boyfriend.

Now it's 11:05PM, which meant fifty-five minutes left until you received at least a 'happy birthday' from him.

You cried when you got home, cried after you sung happy birthday and cried after the movie. You were now in your room, scrolling aimlessly through your socials, trying to get your mind off your awful excuse of a boyfriend, Peter. 

So far, it wasn't working.

Your mother even asked where he was and you once again lied to her and told her that he did say happy birthday through text. She believed the lie, though you had a feeling she didn't and if that was true, she didn't say anything about it.

Soft knocking could be heard from your window, making you avert your eyes to it, only to see the person you've been waiting hopelessly to see all day.

At first you debated on going over to the window and letting him in, wanting nothing more to just shut the blinds and pretend he wasn't there, since he was so good at that already, but something in you told you to hear him out. Boy would you regret that later.

Choosing the second option of letting him explain himself, you go over to the window and your eyes never leave each-other as you did, your mind completely ignoring the question of how he even got up to your window in the first place.

Once you reached the threshold, you slowly open the window, being greeted with a guilty faced Peter Parker, which you thought was because he forgot your birthday.

"Hey." You quietly say, backing up from the windowsill and watch as the brown haired boy carefully climbed in.

"Hey." Peter greets back awkwardly, his eyes not meeting yours.

Of course you found that weird, but you thought it was because he felt guilty for ignoring you for the whole day of your birthday.

The room was filled with an unexplainable tension, a tension that you weren't all too comfortable with.

"So, where were you today?" You ask curiously, trying your hardest not to sound angry.

"I was...uh busy." Peter lied, darting his eyes around the room, eyes still not meeting yours.

"Since when was being at the library with Michelle "busy"?" You ask, putting quotations around the word, busy.

Peter quickly makes eye contact with you, his eyes widened as he did, you just folded your arms over your chest in annoyance.

"Wait, how did you know about that?" Peter questioned, narrowing his eyes at you.

"Ned told me." You simply say, watching as your boyfriend clench his jaw, which you'd probably normally find attractive, but the anger was slowly blinding you of any good qualities he had left in him.

"Right..." Peter trails off, soothing his gaze as he saw your eyes practically burning a hole into his.

It was clear to you now. He had no idea it was your birthday.

But before you could even tell him, he blurts out something.

"We need to talk." Peter stated, his eyes trained on you intently.

You just nod, not giving a verbal response. Maybe he wanted to talk about how shitty of a boyfriend he's been and he wanted to apologize and explain his cold distance behaviour.

"I think we should...break up." Peter tells you as it is.

At first, you thought he was joking, which is why you laughed. Peter breaking up with you on your birthday? Now that was hilarious.

"Are you serious?" You ask with a small chuckle, covering your mouth with one of your hands to control your giggle fest.

Peter stares at you for awhile, still holding that same trained gaze as if he was truly serious about his suggestion, and you quickly stop your giggling, looking at the boy in-front of you in confusion.

"You are serious." You tell him and watch him nod slowly, bringing his gaze away from your eyes and looking at the ground.

You felt the tears build up, your throat close, and your heart beat quicken. There was no absolute way he was serious about this. Surely, this was all just a bad dream and maybe when you woke up, the real lovable Peter would be cuddling you on the couch, telling you about one of his random rambles.

"No." You state, shaking your head at him, his head still lowered.

"You don't get to be a shitty boyfriend for a month, not wish me a happy birthday and decide to just break up with me on my birthday." You countered, and with the last sentence Peter finally meets your gaze again, seeing your heartbroken eyes stare at him in disbelief.

"It's your birthday?" He questioned, and that finally broke you.

The tears that's been built up ever since you saw him at your window finally break free, not only because he forgot your birthday but because he was literally breaking up with you on your special day.

Instead of saying yes or something like that you scoff in disbelief.

"Yes, it is." You said as the tears kept coming.

"Y/N...." Peter whispered, stepping closer to you to try and wipe away your falling tears, but you back away from him.

"Why?" You ask, ignoring his taken aback reaction.

"I just, I realized some things." Peter admits vaguely.

"Realized what? How bad of a girlfriend I am? Because we both know if anyone's the bad person in this relationship, it is you. I try my hardest to make you-" You start, the anger boiling up inside of you, but Peter interrupts you with a statement that truly does send you over the edge.

"I'm in love with MJ!" He blurted, wincing at his outburst, awaiting for your reaction.

It all made sense now, the way he would gawk at her, how he suddenly had weird interests in the things you'd only know she would like, not you. Let's not forget how distant he's been, which him being in love with someone else probably confirms that reasoning. Peter didn't want to be around you because he didn't want you anymore, and he just didn't know how to tell you whenever he was.

"Oh.." Was all you could say, your heart aching as that sentence replayed in your head.

Your eyes wander to the ground, in a trance, sniffling a bit, feeling more heavy tears try to break through.

"Y/N, I'm really sorry. I didn't mean for any of this to happen, it was all so sudden." Peter admits, watching as you do nothing but stare at the ground, his worry quickly flowing through his body.

You wanted to say 'It's fine', but that would be a lie. None of this was fine. Why is it that every time you find someone that you felt was the one, they always managed to break your heart in the worst ways possible. Granted, this only happened to you twice, the second time being someone you never thought this would happen with, which made this all the more worst.

Now you really thought you weren't the best girlfriend in the world, because if you were Peter wouldn't had fallen in love with someone else, not that he was in love with you to begin with.

"No, I'm sorry for not being the girlfriend you wanted me to be." You apologized, feeling the warm tears unknowingly down your cheek.

"Y/N, no-" Peter started, but stop himself as he shook his head, once again stepping closer to you, and wiped your tears away from your cheek, and you let him since this probably was the last time he'd touch you.

Peter's hands linger on both sides of your cheeks, the warmth of them drawing you in, but also hurting since once again he wouldn't do anything like this anymore.

"I'm so sorry." He whispered, tracing your face one more time, before dropping his hands from your face and slowly backing away a bit.

You managed to show a really sad attempt of a smile and shrug, still feeling the warmth of his hands on your face.

You also were way too tired to yell at Peter from all the crying you did earlier anyhow. Plus, you figured it wasn't truly his fault since you lacked a lot in the girlfriend department for him, hence why he didn't want to date you anymore. You couldn't be mad at him, because at the end of the day, the heart wants what it wants and you had to respect that. Maybe this was the universe's way of telling you that you could and probably would end up alone.

"You should probably go." You choked, biting back another cry for the millionth time that day, meeting the red eyes of Peter Parker.

The brown haired boy nods in understanding, turning around and making his exit out your window he previously entered.

Peter glances behind himself once he's out of the window and on your balcony, you slowly making your way to close it.

"Happy birthday, Y/N." Peter quietly says with a small smile.

You thought the timing was a little weird, but you were too sad to make yourself even more miserable, so you just nod in thanks and close the window and blinds, not bothering to care how he would get down from your 15th story balcony.

You sob just as you did and dragged you way over to your bed, burying your face into your pillow as you cried.

This was by far the worst birthday of your life, but somewhere inside that sad broken heart of yours, you hoped Peter's rebound relationship with Michelle was everything he hoped for. After all, he really deserves to be happy.

Even if it wasn't with you.

[eorzeanscholar14]

A Thematic Analysis of Dawntrail (and Endwalker BUT MOSTLY DAWNTRAIL)

SURPRISE I REMEMBERED THIS BLOG

Anyway, I was thinking about Dawntrail and how it's thematically similar to Endwalker while still carrying its own message, and I want to ramble about it.

This is going to be a LONG post, so the analysis itself is under the cut.

So. Dawntrail has been out for two, maybe three months now, and because of uni I've not been able to play FFXIV for a while, but that's given me time to digest the new storyline a bit and the themes that are present in the story.

I think I'll divide this post into sections, for easier readability, going from the background of both expansions (yes I will tag spoilers) to my thinking on it.

Part 1: Dawntrail's Story

THERE WILL BE HEAVY SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Dawntrail picks up pretty much where the post-Endwalker MSQ left off, with the party of the WoL and their friends (now featuring Erenville and Wuk Lamat!) setting off on a boat to Tural. A storm rattles them a little bit along the way, but most people end up being fine thanks to our intrepid heroes, and we make it to Tural no problem.

Once we're there, we go through the rite of succession, and Wuk Lamat learns a lot of things along the way, but mostly that in order to be a good ruler, she has to be willing and able to learn about the people she rules over, and be willing to listen and take action to help them with their struggles.

Surprising no one, she ends up becoming the new Dawnservant (and asking her brother Koana to help her, which I love) and her father, Gulool Ja Ja, steps down so she and Koana can begin ruling.

(Oh, and they kill Valigarmanda, a Tural Vidraal that not even her father could kill, and thoroughly smoke both Bakool Ja Ja and Zoraal Ja in the trials after that. Zoraal Ja then disappears and eventually opens the gate to and enters the golden city.)

Things are peaceful for about a day. During that time, the WoL accompanies Erenville to Xak Tural so he can visit his home, and they help settle matters in Shaaloani first.

After that, though, a weird sphere pops up over Yyasulani, and airships are seen heading towards Tuliyollal. Erenville and the WoL rush back, only to find a bloodbath, and Zoraal Ja battling his own father, covered in strange technology.

Zoraal Ja wins, and Wuk Lamat grieves for her father, promising to avenge his death.

She follows Zoraal Ja's airships into Yyasulani, where she and the party discover a changed world - and meet Queen Sphene, the ruler of the land and Zoraal Ja's Queen of Reason. The new world is called Alexandria, and she leads them on a tour of it - but something is... off about the whole place.

Eventually, Sphene reveals herself to be the big bad, and we defeat her, but Wuk Lamat promises to help Gulool Ja, Zoraal Ja's child, take care of the citizens of Alexandria as if they were her own.

Part 2: Dawntrail's Important Themes

Ok, so why the overview? Well, because it helps me keep the story somewhat straight, and lets me dig into some of the most important moments in it.

The first happens in the first part of the story, and it's about accepting differences in each other's culture, and learning to live in harmony with those around you. That's literally what Tuliyollal was built on, remember. And we see Wuk Lamat learn this lesson in a number of different ways throughout the rite of succession - she grows as a person because she allows herself to learn.

If you ask me, we should all strive to be more like Wuk Lamat in that regard.

The second happens right in the middle of the story, and Wuk Lamat is not the focus of it at first, but her brother, Koana, is. He is the first to recognize his faults, and work to overcome them, turning them into strengths. In turn, Wuk Lamat follows her older brother's example, even going so far as to ask him to serve as Dawnservant alongside her.

No one is perfect for one role alone - but if we collaborate, we can achieve great things. And while this has always been a theme of FFXIV, it really shines in the newest expansion.

And finally, some new old themes to consider:

Grief, but also remembrance.

This is the one I'm going to talk most about, so buckle up.

We first see the theme of remembrance in the Yok Huy, who do not have gravestones, but rather epitaphs that depict a person's life story, that they may always be remembered. They preserve important historical events in the same way - through murals and epitaphs, such as the discovery of the golden city.

And the near extinction of their people.

People, mind you, who they are still very much grieving. After all, a LOT of people died when the Yok Huy traveled to Xak Tural. In fact, we can see this plain as day in the Chirwagur population - they still believe the Yok Huy should be the overlords of the land, although they lack the strength to do anything about it and mostly just keep to themselves. And some people do that in grief - they cling to what once was because it brings them comfort in a time where there is very little to find in their life.

You know where else we see this?

Alexandria.

In fact, that's the whole concept of the Endless right there. They are AI that wear the faces of departed loved ones so that they may be eternally remembered, never forgotten, never dying, living in a veritable paradise.

A paradise that is at least partially based on Alexandria before the Electrope Wars.

In fact, Sphene did not become Queen of Alexandria until the Electrope Wars, so really her whole existence is an example of clinging to the past.

Part Three: What Does This Have To Do With Endwalker?

Boy oh boy, am I glad you asked!

In Endwalker, the Ascians have brought about the end of the world. Everyone is scared, and they don't know what to do, and then Radz-at-Han and Garlemald nearly fall to ruin. Many people die, and many more are actively grieving.

Ourselves included.

At this point in the story, the WoL has seen MULTIPLE friends die in front of them (although really only Moenbryda is brought up time and again, but she wasn't the only one - remember Minfilia, Ysayle, Haurchefant, Papalymo? Heck, even ARDBERT, who at one point tried to kill us and later helped us kill Hades.)

How everyone handles grief in Endwalker is different - some give in to despair, and become monsters themselves. Others try their best to hold out hope for a brighter tomorrow, like those in Radz-at-Han, and Garlemald, and Sharlayan.

Yet others actively do something with their grief, channel it into something useful - like the WoL. Of course, they literally travel to the aetherial sea, confront their grief head on in the form of the souls of their dead friends, and then beat the crap out of the last remaining Ancient who may as well be a god at this point so they can use her last bits of aether to power their ship to travel to the end of the universe and battle the literal embodiment of despair. And we can't all do that. But the message is the same no matter what: No matter how grief affects you, things can and will get better, even if you have to try and try and fail again and again to make it so.

Also can I just talk about that last fight with Zenos really quick? Because to me, that symbolizes the WoL finally letting go of what haunts them. Zenos, to me, is the shadow that haunts the Warrior of Light - literally. Not only is he our mirror, in Endwalker, he is a metaphor for grief, and how it never truly leaves, even when we've made peace with it.

And considering the real-world events going on at the time of Endwalker's release, this makes sense. It was the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, death tolls were climbing by the day, and many people were losing hope.

Part 4: How Does THAT Tie Into Dawntrail?

In talking about how Dawntrail and Endwalker are similar, we need to also consider the real-world events around the time of its release.

COVID-19 is still a very real threat, and ruins if not ends many people's lives daily, no matter how much we pretend it's gone away.

In multiple countries, there are elections being held that could determine whether certain groups of people even get BASIC RIGHTS, and in multiple other countries, people are being massacred for (from what I can tell) no other reason except genocide.

While Dawntrail begins as simply a new beginning to a new story, it ends as a reminder of the previous expansion's message - and a new addition to it.

Those who have left us are not truly gone, so long as we remember their stories. They can't come back to us, but they can stay in our memories until we ourselves pass on, and in that regard they never truly leave us.

[after-witch]

Horrorfest: Twist of Fate [Yandere Shigaraki x Reader]

Title: Twist of Fate [Yandere Shigaraki x Reader]

Synopsis: Were you always going to end up here, running, with death at your heels?

For Horrorfest request:

Happy Halloween! Could we see perhaps something like Shigaraki as Death? Some unstoppable force, bringing decay and destruction, while his love tries to run. But she cannot outrun death...

Word count: 450

notes: yandere, descriptions of death

How do you determine what events in your life were inevitable and which could be avoided?

For instance, the pavement you just tripped on--was it predetermined that you would take this specific path at this specific time, that your shoes would catch on the crack in the sidewalk, that you would stumble? Not enough to fall down, but just enough to slow your flight, to give him a few seconds to get closer to you?

Or could you have avoided this if you’d made a different decision? If you took a different path, if you saw the crack and jumped over it, if you were running 2 inches to the right and missed it entirely?

Maybe you could have avoided tripping altogether if you weren’t running for your life. 

Ah, but then: wasn’t it inevitable that you would be running for your life, thus negating any choices within this inevitable experience?

Because there was no other outcome for you than to run for your life, quite literally.

Shigaraki Tomura was death himself, and death came for everyone.

Even you. 

“You’re being stupid. Just give up, sweetheart.”

You hear his words spat from somewhere behind you--how far away is he?--but don’t turn or stop or think too hard about them. That’s what he wants. He wants you to waste your breath with arguments, even though you desperately need all of it to keep your body moving. To keep your blood and arms and legs pumping.

To keep running.

Not everyone was able to run. And it was your fault, wasn’t it, that he was tearing through the city; that he was reaching out and crumbling the lives of anyone who got in his way, knowingly or not? Because you refused him. Because you told him he was a sick fuck and you would never, ever love him. Because you ran from him

You can taste the dust of other people’s corpses in your mouth, blown by the wind. Sometimes when you round a corner you’re faced with evidence of his presence--piles of dust, dust, dust, where a person used to be. 

Eventually, you hit a wall.

A literal one. 

You’ve run out of places to run. You’ve run out of places to hide.

You hear his footsteps, his own labored breathing, making its way down the alley with deliberate slowness. You can smell his death and decay, like stains on his fingertips that won’t go away. A rot that has no doubt seeped into his bones, his soul.

Still, he goes slow. He doesn’t charge. He doesn’t taunt, though you’re sure it must be tempting.

Because he, too, knows that this was inevitable.  You’ve just been delaying it… and for what, really, nothing at all. 

All that’s left now is to decide: do you keep staring at the wall, or turn around and face him? 

[giorno-plays-piano]

Thorns In His Mouth

Part VII

Pairing: fae!Steve Rogers x reader

Warnings: obsession, dubious consent, minor character death, drugs (neither reader nor Steve are involved), slight eating disorder, mentions of tumor, high tech elves.

Words: 1.2k

Summary: Maybe it was a good idea to chat with a waitress a bit more once she brought you your order. Perhaps she could at least tell you with whom you should speak because you simply couldn’t force yourself to look at others, most of them already high, shouting something loudly or laughing or weeping. You could constantly hear the flapping of someone’s wings, weird whispers and noises, and the sound of boots and hooves that made your hair stand on end.

Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV | Part V | Part VI

_______

"But where are we going?" You hurried after the elf who was walking way too fast on his goddamn perfectly long legs.

"My friend is a phooka who doesn't like sunlight much," Steve said, turning his face to you but not slowing down. "Since magic costs us too much in your world, not many fae can afford constant glamour. And phookas don't exactly look like humans, so he has to hide where not many people can see him."

Oh. You hadn't thought of that. Phookas were black-haired cat-like - or goat-like? - creatures, as far as you remembered from a book about Celtic fairies you've had as a child. It would be incredibly hard not to freak out if you suddenly saw one in the middle of the city.

Poor creature. Where was it living? How hard it would be to not only be unable to use magic, but also communicate with pretty much anyone at all with an exception of fellow faes? Steve, on the other hand, looked perfectly human even with his strange face and piercing blue eyes, his ears perfectly normal. Was he using glamour?

He seemed to be amused with your expression as he laughed, extending his hand to you so you could walk close instead of dragging behind him.

"Do you use glamour to change the shape of your ears?" You blurted out, unable to keep silent to satisfy your curiosity, and then shame bubbled up inside you as you realized it was a too personal question to ask a literal stranger. Nevertheless, you took his hand when his fingers brushed against yours.

His gaze warmed up. "I do. What, do you want me to oblige you and show you their true form?"

"No, no pleasure, I'm sorry! I don't know why I asked that."

"It's a shame," the elf winked at you. "I'd ask you for a wish in exchange."

Warmth crept into your cheeks: was Steve flirting with you just now? Or was it his fae nature showing itself? The fair folk were supposed to be overly playing - or utterly horrifying. Steve, you thought, was likely both.

Turning to the left, away from the bus station with a long queue of tired students nervously clutching their Ipads and Iphones, you followed the Watcher with your eyes on the road instead of looking at him. It never came to your mind that he considerably slowed down his pace so you could keep up with it, his palm warming yours as he held it gently. You missed his intent stare as he stopped smiling, and his eyes flashed oddly.

"Your first lesson," he finally said after a couple of minutes, breaking the awkward silence. "Don't ever bargain with a fae if it demands a wish in return. Always try to propose something first. Give it something valuable, but what you're ready to part with."

"Like my earrings?"

There's a faint smile on his full lips, "Like your earrings."

"But what if I really need to bargain with a fae, and it wants nothing else but a wish?"

Steve abruptly stopped, and you nearly fell down the ground if he didn't catch you, steading you with his unbearably hot palms on your shoulders, towering over you, his expression somber.

"You NEVER bargain with that fae," he said, and your knees started to tremble out of nowhere when he squeezed your shoulders tight. "Never. Come find me, and I will trade something else with you to help."

There's something dangerous in the way his lips crooked, but you continued staring at his face, anyway, like a snake charmer at a cobra - except it was you being controlled, his voice a low command.

"There has always been plenty of malicious fae even in Sacred lands, but many turned worse in exile. You will never guess which one is which, and you don't want to know what they'll do to you if you give them a chance."

"But... but weren't fair folk forbidden from harming us?" Your voice trembled a little, and Steve blew out a little breath, his thumbs drawing circles through the fabric of your blouse to comfort you, probably, after he stopped painfully squeezing your shoulders.

"When you give them a wish, you hand them the power over you. Do that, and the law will no longer work in your favor."

It was a rule #1, perhaps the most important one among the long list of other rules you were given when dealing with the little folk. Never have you ever allowed a fae to ask you for a wish since then, promising yourself you wouldn't waste your own life even for your mother. There was always a different way, Steve said, glancing down at you as he towered far above you. Sacrifices, whatever their nature, rarely led to anything good in the end.

By the time he walked down the stairs to enter the nearest metro station, you realized you had a very vague picture of a place you were going to, immediately asking the elf where he was planning to take you. Why were you leaving fae's part of the city? Did some creatures live outside it? Was it far? Was it a dangerous place, too?

The man was chuckling again at a limitless number of questions you could ask without drawing a second breath. "You were a worrier, weren't you?" He asked, and your cheeks grew hot with embarrassment.

"He lives close," he finally said, motioning to the metro tration. "And no place is dangerous as long as you're with me. You might get nervous, though. It's dark and dirty there."

Dark and dirty? Was it, like, some sort of a cave.

Looking at the growing smile of the elf, you suddenly realized why he was taking you down the metro station. Dear God, that's where that hairy phooka lived, right? Somewhere on an abandoned metro line or between the stations where no one but rats would see him, and so he wouldn't need glamor.

It all felt like some sort of urban legend.

You didn't have it in you to stop, knowing your mysterious friend was expecting results in return for his earnest work, but when Steve was helping you jump over the protective fence right on the tracks, you squeezed his hand, breathing heavier.

"Can I hold your hand, please? This place gives me the creeps," you smiled nervously at him, and Steve let out a loud laugh in his typical fashion, grasping your shoulder.

"You weren't scared of coming to a place full of drug addicts and all sorts of scum, but the metro scares you?" He helped you up when you had finally jumped down, barely believing you were really doing it, your anxity amping up. "Don't fret, you lovely little thing. I know this place better than anyone. I've lived here for many long years myself."

________

Tags: @heavenly1927 @yazzzmints @devils-blackrose @lost-and-founds @kennafild @toodlesxcuddles @shygardengalaxy @heimtathurs @moonlightazriel @tsujifreya @lilithmoon92 @greenowlfactif @minshookie29 @nina2697 @youngdreamer3214 @jsrblue

[citrous241]

1.21 is looking fire, but 1.22 has got to be an End update.

Minecraft has always had really good lore and story-telling, but does anyone else feel like the End is just missing something?

It's to be expected, it hasn't been updated for the last 7 years and the last update added more questions than answers. I feel like it's just on the cusp of being as clear as the rest of the game.

It's a dimension that's supposed to feel off, and uncanny. Literally the only track that plays is 15 minutes of warped mash-ups of Overworld tracks. End stone is just inverted Cobblestone.. etc. But even then it's still wrong.

I just have to know, Minecraft lore is built off of head canons but I'm just unable to form one that makes sense regarding the End. Endermen make sense, I believe they're warped and "evolved" humans. Eating only chorus makes them teleport, their long arms and bodies to reach the high snaking chorus plants, their larger eyes to see in perpetual darkness, etc. Their aversion to water is a wrench in that but I'm not perfect and my head canon isn't right. Endermen could have nothing to do with humans.

Shulkers and End Cities are what confounds me. Are Shulkers natural living organisms? The Dragon and Ender-men both have black skin and dark purple eyes but this thing has yellow skin and an almost magenta shell. I think they're some sort of automatons, but built by who? The ancient builders, the ones who evolved into Endermen? But the spiral staircases in the End Cities don't seem designed for humans (or maybe I just suck at climbing them) and the ceilings aren't really high enough for Endermen. Maybe Shulkers are another protector mob of their area. But protecting what? Protecting the means of personal flight maybe, but that looks nothing like the rest of the end - its literally made from the wings of the Phantoms of the Overworld.

End Cities themselves do kind of make sense to me, their architecture mimics the branches of a chorus plant. But whilst chorus seems to be the only natural thing in the End, the cities very much aren't. There's no way that structure would work under normal gravity. But surely the End just has weak gravity? Nope, it's the same as the Overworld.

Everything in the End just feels so artificial. The central island; with Obsidian pillars punching through the whole thing, a material that can only be made using 2 fluids that don't exist in the End, topped with a crystal made partially from the tears of a creature in another dimension and some sort of Eye which we can only make by killing an Enderman and fusing it's remains with the ground up remains of another creature from said other dimension. Also, it is so far away from the rest of the End, as if someone destroyed or moved these other islands away. The Dragon itself to, she works like no other mob. People say that she's a machine which I don't agree with, her erratic behaviour is because she is the only mob of her type and hasn't been updated like ever. I don't think she's native to the End though; Endermen, the only other creature in existence that looks like her, can be hostile to her.

Trying to piece this together as I'm writing this is making me think of a new head canon: The End is just a melting pot of travellers who got lost and stuck. Think of something like the Void from the Loki show. I think the End was initially just a mass of floating islands with the chorus fruit, in the Void between dimensions. Then the ancient builders arrived, constructing the obsidian pillars and the bedrock portal frame. I think they found something, maybe it could be whatever made the End Cities. But regardless, something dangerous. Something that made them separate the only way out of the dimension by several kilometres of Void, that made them create a Dragon to guard said way out. Something that made them sacrifice themselves by sealing themselves into the End.

There are a few holes in this. Maybe the ancient builders did build the End Cities before/after becoming Endermen. Maybe the danger was the Dragon, but why would it guard the exit portal? And I've kind of ignored the fact that Endstone is inverted Cobblestone, maybe the whole dimension if artificial? Built by the ancient builders entirely? Or maybe the End was spawned from ancient humanities collective mind, like a sort of yin to their yang.

I would love an End update to add a few things. I don't like most popular ideas or mods for an End update, as they often stray too far from what the End is. I would like to be able to find whatever gravity-defying sentient race built the End Cities, maybe they could also be warped into Endermen like the ancient builders were - but could still have a sense of self and humanity, or maybe they're some sort of Phantom People. I would like to find this danger that caused the ancient builders to sacrifice themselves, a new huge boss at the edge of the End would be awesome. I would also like, if they made them less annoying that is, for Phantoms to spawn in the End just normally. They feed on Insomnia right? What's more insomniac then an entire dimension where it's always night and nothing can sleep?

I would also like purple chorus wood lol.

[hardylettuce]

Who's up for a crackpot Metalocalypse theory?

Brendon Small said in an interview, "there's one song on the record that I think kind of embodies what the future would be. I don't know if it would be as mystical or as crazy, but it would be funny."

I believe the song is Gardener of Vengeance.

The thing that sticks out to me most about the quote is that he thinks the future is "funny," which is saying something in a comedy series. I assume that means it's something that contrasts the show we've seen thus far. Brendon has another quote about Metalocalypse and AOTD where he said, "part of why I really had to finish this is because that to me was the arc from the beginning— selfish to selfless. Alone to together. That’s the big arc in the series." So if we assume the next chapter would continue that arc, it has to be something that continues the theme of growth and togetherness.

Let's think about where the series ended. Dethklok has stopped the apocalypse, but they haven't really saved the world. Metal rained from the sky, a lot of cities were destroyed. Even before that, it's probably it's safe to assume climate change existed in the show, but think of all the ways Dethklok themselves have made it worse: The environmental destruction caused by the liquid recording technology, raising the sea level in Doublebookedclock, destroying a chunk of the rainforest in Dethcarraldo, etc. The world is trashed, and a lot of that is Dethklok's doing.

So then we look at Gardener of Vengeance's lyrics. It's a song about the planet and nature, which is already notable for the "go into the water" band to be writing a song about the land. It describes the "punisher of industry" who is doling out "retribution for the toxic station." The earth is getting revenge on the people who abused it, either literally (some sort of nature spirit hunting people down) or figuratively (the planet no longer supporting human life).

Remember how the last song on Galaktikon II was called Rebuilding a Planet? My theory is that a season 5 or another movie would be about how Dethklok, being the most respected figures in the world, now has to do just that. And it's not metal to try to convince the world to lower their carbon emissions, or plant more trees, or even give up some of the things they think are fun because they realize how harmful they are. But it's what has to happen for the planet to have a future, and Dethklok's finally mature enough to care about the future.

This is even more speculative, but I think that could also be a theme: Living past the point where you thought it would be over. For the characters, that's having survived the Metalocalypse. But the show itself overcame death by getting a movie ten years after a very brutal cancellation. And I think it's a very human emotion a lot of adults deal with. Maybe you have a health condition or struggle with your mental health, and assumed you wouldn't live past a certain age. Or maybe you're just a teenager who can't imagine being 30. But then miraculously, one day you wake up, and it's your 40th birthday. Now what? What do you do with this time you never really thought you'd get?

In any case, I think the future of Dethklok would involve reconciling being both a death metal band and a symbol of hope for the world. It would be about taking responsibility for their past actions, and having to keep showing up and doing the right thing every day, instead of having short-term objectives like in Requiem or AOTD. It's not glamorous, but maybe it's fulfilling to be … Givin' Back? To the environment this time?

[averseunhinged]

wip wednesday!

more very extended prelude to smutty literature. also yet again possibly more of an outtake than a sneak peek. i'll have to see how it works when the whole thing is done. which i really, really hope will be soon.

this

then this

this

this

then this week's

this one

then this

and finally this

“Why did you come back?” she asked, a soft, near-murmur. “You keep saying you're leaving, but you never do.”

He looked away, the usual parade of emotions in his eyes and the way he worked his jaw, before something like resolve took over. He sat up, probably to make himself feel less vulnerable, but it brought him so much closer to her.

“When I went to New Orleans, I discovered a boy I'd raised from childhood, my son in all but name, had taken over the city and was calling himself king. I'd thought him dead for over a century. We were unprepared when Mikael came for us. It was the longest we'd ever stayed in one place, and I became complacent.”

“Klaus,” she whispered.

“No. It's true. I loved New Orleans. It was my city. I'd built it from quite literally nothing. Nurtured and shaped it.”

“It was your home.”

“I hadn't had one in so long. We should have gone fifty years earlier, had I not been a fool. But I was and Marcellus’ life was the cost. Or so I thought.”

“But that's a good thing, isn't it? That he's still alive?”

“We are strangers now, he and I. Not father and son. Perhaps one day we'll know each other again, perhaps not, but it will never be as it was. I left, because I would have been more hindrance than help. I don't have the patience for petty squabbling amongst witches. Elijah’s far better suited.”

“I don't know,” Caroline giggled. “You wear one pretty well.”

His soft affectionate smile was a fleeting reprieve. “He knew. Elijah. He knew Marcellus lived, but deemed it advantageous for the family that I remained unaware. I have made decisions like that for my siblings countless times before, but I couldn't bear to see my brother's face after he told me it had all been for the best.”

“You didn't dagger him.”

“Believe me, I considered it.” He brought his far leg up, bent at the knee, and wrapped his arm around it. The conversation lagged for long enough while he was lost in thought that Caroline almost prompted him to go on. Eventually, he sighed. “What would be the point? Someone needed to stay in New Orleans, and I was in no condition. Well,” he chuckled ruefully, “you saw me.”

She had. There'd been a fragility to him when he'd come back to Mystic Falls. A week after graduation, she'd found him in the Grill, drinking alone, and as much as she'd wanted to march over and demand to know what he was doing there, she'd also spent the past week feeling very alone. Caroline wasn't built to be on her own. She could do it. She was good at it, given all the practice she’d had, but it wasn't the way she'd choose to live. She liked having family, friends, activities that kept her involved with the town. People who knew her, even if they didn’t entirely understand her.

Maybe that was why she kept falling for werewolves.

So, she sat down next to him and pretended it wasn't a surprise to see him. He'd offered her a glass from the bottle of bourbon he'd been knocking back, and his obvious gratitude when she’d behaved like she normally would and made him buy her a vodka sour instead was enough to soften her into spending the evening with him.

She'd complained about organizing the Independence Day celebration, because their usual fireworks display vendor had been recently arrested by the ATF for selling black market cigarettes. He'd complained about the retirement of one of the people who managed his legal business interests, because the man had been particularly trustworthy, and forty years didn't seem very long to someone who'd lived a millennium. She'd talked about meeting Linda Harrison at a screening of Planet of the Apes with her dad. He'd talked about knowing Roddy McDowall and Montgomery Clift in the 1950s. They'd ended up arguing about Cormac McCarthy, the bleakness of his prose, and why the hell was his punctuation like that? They'd touched on nothing of consequence, but it was the most fun she'd had in ages, and she'd liked watching the tension in him unravel minute after minute.

He'd walked her home afterward, perfectly steady on his feet, despite the quantity of alcohol he'd consumed. Standing outside her front door, he'd thanked her for the night so sweetly and sincerely. She'd darted in to hug him without thinking about why that was a terrible idea, but couldn't bring herself to regret it when he'd left her house seeming more solid. Less like a sketch he'd drawn of himself.

[slexenskee]

I'm just curious. Can I ask more about JJK/GOT? It’s just that as soon as I saw the Satoru/Robb couple I immediately became interested 😅

Sure haha I have a few plot points I could use feedback on

The backstory is where I'm??

Idk if I want Satoru to be reborn as Viserys and start his life just vibing as a pampered prince kinda ambivalent about his life / couldn't care less about the rebellion or his batshit father until he gets shipped off to Dragonstone and eventually Essos. Then he kinda realizes A) his little sister is literally relying on him to exist and they're situation is pretty rough and B) he has no more fucks to give and now he can really do whatever tf he wants. Kinda goes a bit wild, takes over one of the free cities (casually), gets worshipped by the Dothraki as a god (accidentally), ends up creating something of an empire in the Disputed Lands/takes over the Stepstones and now all the pirates and traders pay him for safe passing like sailors paying tribute to the altars of gods. Mostly he's just bemused by it, and doesn't care what they do so long as they don't bother him or his sister, who's raising her dragons (a gift from Illyrio) and just living a nice happy life.

OR he's not Viserys at all, he legit transmigrates adult body (and powers) and all and becomes a wandering god around Essos just sort of feeling his way through this random new world - definitely goes to Valyria just because he can, makes a fortune selling all the random junk he picks up there and becomes something of a master on the topic just bc he ends up learning so much about it as someone who regularly hangs out there, and one way or another ends up the accidental god of the Stepstones like he is the first scenario. Except this time he's cajoled to Pentos at the behest of Illyrio Mopatis, who wants to know more about the Valyrian freehold, and while he's there he meets Dany and Viserys. Immediately clocks Viserys as a nutjob and Dany as abused but honestly doesn't really care about either of them until he sees the dragon eggs + his Six Eyes see Dany has magic and it's reacting with the eggs. He pays Illyrio/Viserys a veritable king's treasure in exchange for Dany as his 'bride' and gets the eggs as her bridal gift... which he does not bc he wants a bride but bc dragons are, in his opinion, the only cool thing in this world and he wants to have one as a pet and Dany is his ticket to that.

EITHER way he's the god of the Stepstones and Westeros tries to push their weight around and fails regularly. Gojo eradicates probably like 3 Redwyne and Lannister fleets and lets them wash up to Dorne in pieces before Westeros finally gets the picture to leave him the hell alone. Robert Baratheon comes personally a few times mainly because he has a total hard-on for Gojo and frankly just loves the fighting (his adoration is not returned), Oberyn becomes one of his favorite drinking buddies. They probably fuck multiple times, let's be real.

He's not interested in taking over the world or anything - honestly if it wasn't for Dany he'd have like zero purpose for existing so he's lowkey happy to have her in his life, but it's definitely a brother and sister relationship no matter which way I go with his backstory. It's all very wholesome.

By the time we get to S1 Gojo is an undisputed world power that's also something of an eccentric recluse.

He doesn't get involved in the plot until one way or another he's notified of Shit Happening™ in the far north. Idk how yet - maybe he senses it himself, or one of the Red priests/priestesses tells him?

He goes to the wall, meets Jon Snow, learns some of the Northern history, feels bad for the Night's Watch - who are actually doing the lord's work up in this damn place, what is wrong with westeros, smh - and sends men and plenty of food/supplies as he can see the magic in the Wall and knows it's not just there to look pretty. Especially not when his Six Eyes can see that the Land of Always Winter has more magic and is more active than old Valyria. He jokingly propositions Jon Snow, who to his surprise is not actually gay, and then afterwards when he's summarily rejected casually propositions his 'sister' for him instead- who's going through a romance phase and wants a handsome man and Gojo, being a good brother and also a fucking troll, decides to help out. Whether Gojo is actually Viserys or not, at this point everyone assumes he's Valyrian and also related to Dany no matter what he says, so he just rolls with it. Jon still declines, because he's still all up in his duty and honor phase. (He notices Jon has magic, like Dany, but assumes that's just because of the Northern magic)

He becomes fast friends with Maester Aemon, deeply interested in his stories of the Far North. He's actually interested in the North, in general, bc its one of the few parts of the world he hasn't yet gone to, and also has a history that's almost as old as Valyria. The Free Folk are downright unfriendly to him, so he decides to try his luck with Winterfell.

Idk what the route is but basically from the Wall he ends up in The North and finally meets Robb smack in the middle of the War of the 5 Kings. Maybe he goes to Winterfell with a letter from Jon, and then from Winterfell to Robb? Or from Jon straight to Robb? Basically no matter which way he ends up going, he gets a warm intro from one of Robb's siblings (or both). He also gets tasked, by one or both of them, to look for the Stark sisters. Gojo's all like, 'LOL look for them? Bruh I could blast down the Red Keep and drag them out within the next hour, but sure ok I'll 'look' for them). It's especially easy because he realizes all the Starks have more magic than most, so his Six Eyes can pick them out easily.

So Robb and Gojo kind of have immediate chemistry. Robb has obviously heard a lot about him, most of it mysterious, all of it dangerous, so he's shocked when this stupidly good looking guy comes out of literally nowhere (teleports) and has some messages for him, and is also going to go fetch his sisters as a personal favor. That last one he's a bit cautious about, because he's heard plenty about this Valyrian god or devil or both, and he doesn't believe for a second such a powerful being would offer such a boon for free.

Gojo's only response is 'I've got a little sister too ya know, I understand how it feels to be an older brother that wants to see them safe and sound' and Robb's all like, blushy and flustered, but plays the hard line and sort of just dismisses him and denies his help. And Gojo's all like, 'damn this guy's hot' also 'if my gaydar isn't wrong, which it usually isn't, he'd totally be into me' and also 'he'd be even more into me if I really did rescue his sisters'. Which he was going to do anyway.

He obviously finds both of them. Arya gets a free assassination teacher that doesn't come with the price tag of her soul, Sansa doesn't have a tragic few years ahead of her.

Idk haven't figured much else out after that. Robb pines but refuses to act on his feelings, but Gojo is swapped in for Talisa so we all know how this ends. There'll be plenty of consequences for that though, but no Starks are going to be injured (aside from Bran lo siento) in the making of this fic.

[mockerycrow]

i dunno if ANY of this makes sense bc im high but here goes;

In my own HC dear Johnny grew up in the foster care system. Johnny was an energetic and chaotic child, tossed from household to household. that was until the one he finally stayed the longest in. while he was never adopted, he stayed with this family until he joined the military. he lived in the basement. This family, very nice people, busy, already with a big family, sometimes didn't make enough to pay for heat on top of food and other costs. he never held that against them, they tried so hard and its a mean world.

He spent years in that chilly basement. the Scottish weather, wet and overcast seemed to saturate the concrete no matter the season. eventually, he ended up being more comfortable in the cold. he acclimated. He loves winter. It’s comfortable to him. You, however, hate it. Maybe you grew up somewhere where you never truly knew the cold, the way it bleeds into everything and saps it all away until cold is all that's left. or maybe, the freezing burn of winter is all too familiar to you, an inevitable future to dread in the hazy dog days of late summer. Doesn’t change anything; you hate waking up cold. But john can’t name a feeling he loves more than the pure overwhelming warmth in his chest when you cling to him like a little koala. Curled up like a purring cat to his side, seeking him and his body heat even subconsciously in the depths of rest. It’s something older than time, older than any language made to describe it. All of it falls away in comparison to the feeling of your skin against his own, so tightly bound to him he couldn’t peel you away if he wanted to (he doesn’t). Words fail him. Every. Time. They can’t capture the overwhelming size and weight of the feeling of it. Its all consuming, a internal burning blooming in his chest like a bonfire or a pyre. too big an emotion to describe but he tries in his journals. the closest he gets to it are the words "safe", or "intimate". He loves to watch you flutter on the blurred fuzzy edges of sleep, barely waking with a shiver, snuggling closer and closer, drifting away again. He wants to see it forever, every day he can until he dies. he wants the world to stay so far away from you and him and your shared bed. he would fight and die to keep it safe, keep you safe. cup these moments in his hands to protect the flickering light of it from the high winds of this mean, wide world we live in.

(He’s the type to get cuteness aggression and pull you into bone crushing hug, and lament that it woke you up. He didn’t mean to! He just loves you so much! hes so sorry, he can make the coffee this morning, just stay in bed darling, hell be right back!)

https://youtu.be/V6o7XFKWwn0?si=CpKMm-n35uH9QF3e 🫶

It makes sense!! I personally have different headcanons for him and I grew up in one of the snowiest cities in the USA, so i personally cannot relate anejfjcjkskdd BUT!!! I WILL ALWAYS POST ANYONE’S HC’s!!

you do not know how much i love “i love cold” x “i hate it” ships. literally oh my god anwjfjdka anon i need to kiss you on the forehead because i have no words. your descriptions of love are so. I NEED IT IN MY LIFE!! WHAT!!! SOMEONE PLEASE!!!

[and i thought you were going to rick roll me ngl..]