#After being used and crafted into a specialized weapon TWICE

[crash-bump-bring-the-whump]

Mech au mech au mech au

NO NO BAD INFLUENCE BAD INFLUENCE

Okay but I do have thoughts here...war mage mech pilot au. Like especially if it's an alternative to prison for their war crimes. They're already trained, already used to impossible strain and the intensity of fighting for your life. They'd be ostracized anyway by their peers because of their notoriety. They learn the agony of having limbs torn from them, time after time, and reconciling that with still being able to cup a bowl of soup in two hands afterwards.

But they're free, sort of.

They pay their penance in blood and tears and tests and being lauded as monstrous heroes, in being forced to become something somehow even less human than what they already had been. They still have each other. They are impossible figures, mythical almost in how they turned from committing horrors to becoming guardians of humanity.

They aren't sure that they wanted this, but they can't go back now. They've seen the records of the failed test pilot casualties. No one else could do this so now it falls to them.

[angelribbon]

DONT YOU LOVE ME ANYWAY?

tw: slapping, slight breeding kink, smut, dark!luke, corruption kink, daughter of aphrodite!reader

a/n: from your #1 yappist

There was something sacred about it-how he would desecrate-ruin you. Bruises littered your inner thighs, neck, anywhere he could find to mark you. Own you.

And he did.

There was some thrill in it for him, that you'd allow him to fuck with you like this, turn you into something as depraved and corrupt as him. Watching the guilt settle in your eyes when he finishes fucking you, mock disappointment crafting his words.

"should cover those up, yeah?, cant have everyone knowing what a cock dumb slut you are now, can we?"

People began to notice it, slowly. The way your face would burn with embarrassment turning into shame when they pointed out the hickeys. The fact that you were luke's toy to fuck and use as he pleases. And it was, until it became because even after he betrayed you, its his name that falls from your lips when you cum on your fingers.

You shouldve known better. Maybe checked the borders harder, more than twice-brought more weapons. Anything, that would take you back from being here. The metal presses against your throat, sending shocks of fear through you as he tilts your head up, back pressed against the rough bark of the tree.

Clarisse and the others had left camp for some special mission, chiron called it, leaving you and the other year rounders. It was calm for the first few weeks, until it wasnt.

Monsters started attacking more frequently, breaking the borders which you couldve sworn you thought could never happen. And there was only one culprit. The same one that had his head between your thighs-just weeks earlier and now a knife under your chin.

"isnt it past curfew sweetheart?" he asks tilting his head as he smiles "should report you for that"

Like the fucker cares.

Your eyes scan your surroundings, looking for atleast a dagger, seeing most of your weapons discarded too far from arms reach. He sees you, of course, eyes darkening in irritation.

"None of that yeah? just want to talk-"

Something in you clicks, anger that causes you to almost bite at him. "now you want to talk? you fucking left me luke!, no note, not even a simple goodbye-i had to hear about this from annabeth, a-and you want to speak to me with a sword at my throat?!"

He shifts, eyes moving to unreadable, as he backs up only slightly.

"There wasnt enough time-couldnt get you roped up in this shit and risk somethin' happening to you, you wouldnt have understood-"

His words fall on deaf ears, not caring-trusting-what he says anymore. You're quick to move, acknowledging that his sword is now at his side, completely out of the way. The first fist hits and you cant tell when the second one reaches. He lets you hit him, takes it until it actually begins to hurt, grapping your wrists as you attempt to fight his grip. He discards his sword on the ground, moving his other hand to keep you still. "Stop before you hurt yourself" he says sternly, backing you right up against the tree. Theres tears on your face now, he cant tell if they're from sadness or anger, choosing the latter pains him less.

"Just calm the fuck down"

Its the same tone he would use with you before, whenever you'd ask him to stay with you after he'd fuck you for hours on end. Producing the same result, tears brimming along your waterline until his tone changes. "I'm sorry okay? just dont-dont-fuck- stop crying, cant take it when you do that to me"

Your lip stops trembling, soaked eyes looking up at him as his hand cradles your chin. Its silent, none of you knowing what to say anymore and even though, you know better, you kiss him. Your lips are soft against his at first, but when luke gets over his shock? he's all teeth and blood. Violent and angry and so so desperate. Your brains in a fuzz, a high from the way hes kissing you. Maybe you've spent too long alone since he left, maybe you should've moved on. But whatever it is that leads you to do something like this, you're to fucked out of your brain to care.

Fuck elysium, he's got his own little heaven right here, in the way you sculpt your lips into his, letting him find solace in you after everything. His hand reaches to the curve of your waist pulling you into him, as he begs you to let him go further. To fuck out his frustrations onto you once again. He's sick for even asking, and you? you're just as bad for agreeing.

He practically rips of your skirt, ruining the pretty lace hem, muffling your protests with his lips. "I'll but you ten, okay a whole fuckin' set after-"

A promise you know he's not going to keep, but for now, you let him have it. His hand trails over your panties, pressing the damp spot he sees there. "That desperate huh? been waitin' for me princess?"

Somewhere in your stupor, your lips form into a pout.

"Dont be silly"

His lips form into a smirk at that, slapping your clit from your tone as you yelp. "Yeah? you've just been whoring yourself out since ive been gone?-looks like i needa remind her who she belong to hm?"

Another slap connects at your silence.

"Y-yes-fuck-please-n-need it so bad-" you babble out mindlessly, pushing your hips up into his hand-a desperate attempt to get some friction. He chuckles at your neediness, like his cock isnt leaking through his pants right now. He pulls your panties to your knees, fingers teasing at your hole, gathering your slick before he's sliding both inside of you. The sound you make is pathetic, giving him exactly what he wants, to see you pliant and indigent for him again. He's not slow or careful, instead fucking you with his fingers like hes almost enamored with the motion.

"L-luke-!" you whine, when you feel his other finger pinch your clit, the stimulation making your body jolt in pleasure. "I know, baby, I know-'s really abandoned her didnt i? dont even know how much ive missed this pretty pussy"

His words are so sweet, an illusion for how fucked up this all is. He continues to pump his fingers into you, feeling how you tighten up around him as his hand goes back to circle your clit. Your hips buck up into his hand, letting him use it as motivation to move faster. Head falling back, feeling the familiar tightening in your stomach as whimpers emit from you, eyes rolling back in pleasure. Your brain goes white when you cum, thighs trembling as you clamp down on his hand. He pulls out of you, watching the wetness that drips down your thighs.

"theres my girl"

He's quick to pull out his cock, all angry and red, precum dripping along his veins. He rubs his cock along your thighs, shivering at the feeling. He's slow at first, easing himself in, until he fully enters you, a wheeze coming from him.

shitshitshitshitshit-shit-" his thighs quiver, jaw clenching from holding himself back. "g-gotta relax for me, mami-fuck-"

He buries his head into your neck, gritting his teeth as his hands tighten on your hips. It take everything in him not to just rut into you right there.

For your sake, he tries to be slow, be patient as he thrusts into you at an antagonizing, gentle pace. You mumble something under your breath, begging him to go faster, to ruin you again, to break you. And he remembers that really? he was never a patient man.

His hips snap into yours, his movement prompted from that primal need to fill you with him to the hilt. Its disgusting, lewd-almost pornographic sounds that come from you as his curls stick to his forehead from sweat. He fucks you like an rabid animal, harsh, violent and angry-he doesnt understand whats wrong with him-why he needs it so bad. To feel you clench around him, scream out his name as if everythings normal again, as if he's human again. He presses against your stomach, causing a mixture of a moan and a sob to come from you, as he moves against you faster-harder.

He's on cloud nine when you clamp down on him. Hips stuttering, choked out whimpers falling from him as he buries his face back into your neck to try and stifle his sounds. Stars dance across your vision, and you swear you're drowning-mouth formed in a permanent 'o' shape, thighs trembling as you sink deeper. Crash after crash of ecstasy hits you-coming in relentless hard waves that make you see white. Your speech is slurred, rambling about how you love him so much-need him so much, begging him not to leave you again.

And thats what pushes him over the edge. He knows hes gonna leave you again, abandon you like the piece of shit he is, but the reprieve he has is too good to deny. He cums with a fucking sob, your name echoing from him like a solemn prayer, not even recognizing the fact that he just came inside of you as he holds you to him.

He cleans you up, carrying you back to the aphrodite cabin. Lucky for him, its empty. Most of the year rounders being in his old cabin. Laying you down on the bed, as your eyelids flutter, he sits on the side of your sheets, watching your face until you fall asleep.

And whether its guilt or regret, this time he stays and holds you until he disappears in the morning.

[dailycharacteroption]

Jistkan Artificer (Magus Archetype)

(art by Daniewise on DeviantArt)

Two weeks ago when I did the entry on the iron-ring striker, I swore I remembered there being a second unarmed strike-focused archetype for the magus, but I couldn’t remember what it was called, and now by a miracle of list placement, I have been reminded of it again tonight.

In Pathfinder, the Jistka Imperium was the first nation to arise in the Inner Sea region after Earthfall, and was well-known for their mastery of magic and technology, particularly the art of construct-crafting, particularly golems, though perhaps their most lasting legacy was the automatons, constructs with the souls of Jistka’s finest.

While Jistka is long gone, defeated by Ancient Osirian and the Tekritanin League, the relics of their advancements remain in the form of sleeping constructs, wandering automatons, and those who carry their knowledge forward into the future.

One group of these remnants and historians is a group of warrior-mage artisans that seek to perfect their combat magic by combining it with golemcraft. They do this by replacing one of their limbs, most commonly an arm, with a constructed prosthetic animated by the same elemental forces used to power and give will to golems and other similar constructs.

Whether they deliberately replaced their limb or simply decided to turn their need for ordinary prosthesis into a focus of their power, these warriors can bring their foes down with a literal iron fist (or whatever they decide to build it out of)

These warriors start with their first golem arm, but they can rebuild it later made out of any special materials they might desire, though tooling the parts makes it more expensive. Even still, the result is a powerful limb with a surprising  amount of striking power and which they can focus their arcane power into to strike down foes with raw enchantment or various elements. However, their focus on learning how to animate and control this limb does mean their spellcasting knowledge flags slightly behind compared to other magi.

As they grow in mastery, they improve the magical forces of their limb to sport better and better enchantment as a baseline, making it that much more effective.

Naturally, they also learn how to channel their touch spells through the arm as well.

This archetype also comes with a selection of new magus arcana tied to it. The first of which lets them take advantage of the antimagic properties of golem animation, letting them block ranged attacks from spells as long as they have the time to react and the arcane energy to make their limb flare with power.

Whether it be greater training, magical speed, or mechanical improvements, one such arcana lets them strike faster as a monk might, though they can only strike twice with this method. (This may need some clarification, as it seems… underwhelming for an arcana you need to be mid-level to take)

Others learn to equip their arm with a blade so they can stab or slash foes, as well as boost the weapon with enchantments to improve their chance of dealing grievous wounds or cause extreme bleeding.

Others, however, learn to use their arm as a shield to block more mundane blows.

Since the golem arm is both an unarmed strike and a manufactured weapon, there are all sorts of fun ways to use spells and the like. Unlike the iron ring striker, this archetype is less focused on touch spells, but as usual, spellstrike invites their use. The fact you can use the arm both offensively and defensively, as well as how it slowly enchants on it’s own (but is separate from actually enchanting it yourself) means you’ve got some fun options as both attacker and defender. Overall it doesn’t really change the function of the magus, but it does grant a fun and flavorful way of attacking with some good progressive enhancements.

It's tempting to try and apply cyberpunk themes to an archetype like this, but unless your setting draws heavily upon the themes of the genre, they don’t really apply well to the tone that the archetype presents. These prosthesis are, after all, custom-built by the character themselves, so there’s no worry about corporations repossessing your body parts or claiming ownership over your body.

However, what is a good theme to explore here is transhumanism as well as empowering the disabled, the former seeking the strength of the machine and exploring what it means to be human and whether that can be maintained without a human form, while the latter explores what it means to have a disability and not only counter but surpass those limitations. Of course, the latter works best if you roleplay moments of dealing with the disability. Tinkering with the arm with one hand, having to put it on every morning, the struggle if it gets stolen… et cetera.

Industry in the city of Whitestar is notorious for the death and dismemberment of the laborers on the ground level. The consortiums offer magitech limbs to restore functionality, but they cost so much as to put the recipients even further into debt for essentially the rest of their lives. However, there are those that fight against this exploitation, creating limbs free of the bindings of those provided by the companies, and give the most proficient wielders the power to fight back.

Though a mere human, Vekus competes in the Gorromak Arena alongside orc and troll warriors, using his enchanted wooden leg to great effect to even the odds as a martial artist. With it and his magic, he has a chance to rise to the top, but those on high would rather he be sent careening back down.

The pixies and other fey of Allenfor are in a state of paranoia and fear. Those who can calm them long enough to ask learn that a dark figure with an iron fist of cold iron has been hunting the fey, destroying all they find with spell and lethal strikes. Who this person is and what their vendetta against the fey is not known, but they must be stopped.

[pathfinderunlocked]

Necrochemical Skeleton - CR5 Undead

It’s alive.... IT’S AL-- wait no, it’s still dead.  It’s just moving anyway.

Artwork by Oxeren on DeviantArt.

Necrochemical skeletons are undead creatures raised by necromantic alchemists.  The bones are given life through an alchemical process that also hardens them and tints them with a dull green color.  Unlike typical mindless skeletons, they possess some basic knowledge of alchemy, and are used as assistants to aid alchemists in their work.

Necrochemical Skeleton - CR 5

XP 1,600 NE Medium undead Init +4; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +10 Aura frightful presence (60 ft., DC 15)

DEFENSE

AC 20, touch 14, flat-footed 16 (+4 Dex, +6 natural) hp 45 (7d8+14) Fort +4, Ref +6, Will +5 Defensive Abilities channel resistance +4 DR 10/bludgeoning and good Immune undead traits

OFFENSE

Speed 30 ft. Melee 2 claws +4 (1d4-1) Ranged bomb +9 touch (2d6+10 plus 10 splash (DC 16)) Special Attacks bombs, limited deadly aim

STATISTICS

Str 9, Dex 19, Con –, Int 16, Wis 10, Cha 14 Base Atk +5; CMB +4 (+11 ranged sunder); CMD 18 (20 vs. sunder) Feats Improved Sunder, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Weapon Focus (acid flask) Skills Acrobatics +11, Appraise +10, Craft (alchemy) +7, Escape Artist +11, Knowledge (arcana) +10, Perception +10, Stealth +14 Languages Abyssal, Common, Gnomish, Infernal, Necril Gear 16 bombs (acid flasks)

SPECIAL ABILITIES

Bombs (Ex) Each morning, a necrochemical skeleton creates 16 bombs which, in the hands of the necrochemical skeleton, function as thrown splash weapons with a range increment of 20 feet.  Bombs are considered weapons and can be selected using feats such as Point-Blank Shot and Weapon Focus.  A bomb deals 4d6 acid damage, and a necrochemical skeleton adds its Intelligence bonus to the damage (usually for a total of 4d6+3 acid damage).  The bomb deals splash damage equal to its minimum damage (usually 7), DC 16 Reflex save negates.  The save DC is Intelligence-based.

A bomb that deals a critical hit is multiplied in the same way as an alchemist’s bombs: only 1d6 of the weapon damage is doubled, and the bonus damage from Intelligence is doubled.

In the hands of any other creature, a necrochemical skeleton’s bombs function as acid flasks.  A necrochemical skeleton’s bombs become inert and useless 24 hours after being created.

Limited Deadly Aim (Ex) Twice per day, a necrochemical skeleton can apply the benefits of the Deadly Aim feat to a thrown bomb attack, taking a -2 to its ranged attack roll in order to deal +4 damage.

Corroding Bomb (Ex) A necrochemical skeleton can make ranged sunder combat maneuvers with its bombs.  The target creature is still subjected to splash damage from the bomb.  An item sundered in this way does not take half damage from the bomb as usual for energy damage.

[ragesin]

Light's Bane

In the past, due to his preference for heavy weapons, Meliodas wielded a massive broadsword more than twice his size. It was said to be a wicked blade that fed off of slaughter and bloodshed. There's some truth to that as it used to be an ordinary sword, but the demon-steel ( specially gathered metal that will not melt under the heat of purgatory fire ) it was crafted from has been tempered over time by the darkness of it's wielder and the blood, malice, and anguish of its victims after Meliodas' liberal use of it to kill countless people from the other clans. As a result, it was twisted and warped into a unique weapon. The sword turned into a specialized conduit for Meliodas' abilities, and became capable of unprecedented cutting power, even being able to shear through magic. It was later reforged into Lostvayne.

A favourite trick of his was to imbue it with corrosive hellblaze in away that allowed the sword to ignite with every attack he performed. The injuries from his blade aren't meant to ever heal, difficult even to remove by the goddesses' standards. When he fails to outright kill something, this ensures the flames fester and spread internally, dissolving anything that can heal or close. It essentially infects the target’s body and never lets the wounds recover as long as they remained. To let the injury heal, one would have to tear into the target’s body and remove the flames by hand, a dangerous and painful process that had the added risk of the fire latching on and continuing to burn. 

Lostvayne

A Sacred Treasure, also known as the mythical "demon-splitting sword", crafted by the legendary weaponsmith Dubs. A curved shortsword said to cut through anything in the hands of the right wielder.

It allows Meliodas to make physical clones of himself. The power of each of clone is determined by the number of them, evenly divided by one half with each subsequent clone. Meliodas' own strength not weakened at all by making clones. The sword works by splitting a part of his soul and creating a stable construct around it with magic, granting a physical form. Theoretically, Meliodas can make however many clones he wants as long as his soul can handle it. However, ripping apart one's soul into so many pieces at the same time is generally inadvisable. It puts a heavy strain on him spiritually, so he typically makes about four to five clones and no more than seven or eight at once.

A clone retains all the memories and skills of Meliodas through the soul splinter, allowing it to be semi autonomous. It can make decisions on its own, fight on his behalf or serve as a distraction, and use Full Counter. They can't read Meliodas' mind and understand beat for beat exactly what he's thinking but they can sense impressions of what he wants through their shared soul. Unless dismissed by Meliodas or dispersed under enough damage, a clone lasts indefinitely. They can also choose to seamlessly merge back into Meliodas' form, even in the middle of an encounter. Once that soul splinter reconnects with his own, he gains it's experience since in a roundabout way he did everything it did. Under normal circumstances the clones cannot be made to turn on him.

[thecreaturecodex]

Wrenganan

Image © Kenzer and Co.

[I don’t know if this piece is by Anthony Carpenter or not. It doesn’t look like his style, but matches a few other pieces in the book. There’s some additional art credits in the frontmatter of the Hacklopedias, but none that refer to specific illustrations.

In the original Hackmaster, the wrenganans just drink the corpse juice they collect. I wanted to give it some sort of mechanical effect, so I went with Brew Potion. After all, undead NPCs in Pathfinder often have potions of inflict X wounds in their equipment--who makes them? Also a head’s up: this one is gross.]

Wrenganan CR 7 NE Undead This humanoid appears stretched out, standing almost twice as tall as a man. Its face has sunken, somewhat bat-like features. Its hands are oversized with spidery fingers, and it stinks like offal and bile.

Wrenganans are vampire-like undead that feed not directly on blood or life force, but instead on the fluids of decay that drip from a rotting corpse. These vile effluents they collect in urns and brew into disgusting potions, as well as drinking them fresh from the source, so to speak. A wrenganan’s potions are prized by other undead creatures, and some wrenganans work for more powerful undead as a supplier in exchange for ample access to victims. Anyone living who drinks these brews find them foul tasting but surprisingly invigorating, acting as a necromantic drug.

A wrenganan usually hides during the day, as they despise the light of the sun. At night they go abroad to hunt. They work well in groups, cooperating to isolate prey. A wrenganan’s typical strategy is to attack from ambush, grab a foe by the neck, choke them unconscious and then snap their spine with a coup de grace. They know that their constant stench is able to give them away, and so attack sleeping targets, from upwind, or attempt to conceal their aroma with spices and perfumes.

A wrenganan’s lair is truly horrific to behold, as they string their victims up to rot in the sun and collect the juices that flow from the corpse. The stench often attracts scavenging animals, whose presence is tolerated to a certain extent—urine, feces and maggots are incorporated into the accursed potions, and any beast that presses its luck and feeds too heavily ends up killed and rotting for a later batch. Wrenganans can be found in any habitat, but prefer moister climates to facilitate decomposition.

Wrenganan             CR 7 XP 3,200 NE Large undead Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft., lifesense 30 ft., Perception +13 Aura stench (30 ft., Fort DC 18) Defense AC 20, touch 11, flat-footed 18 (-1 size, +2 Dex, +9 natural) hp 85 (10d8+40) Fort +6, Ref +5, Will +9; channel resistance +2 DR 10/magic; Immune undead traits Weakness light blindness Offense Speed 30 ft. Melee 2 slams +11 (1d8+4 plus grab) Space 10 ft.; Reach 10 ft. Special Attacks constrict (1d8+6), crushing pin, strangle Statistics Str 19, Dex 14, Con -, Int 15, Wis 14, Cha 16 Base Atk +7; CMB +12 (+16 grapple); CMD 26 Feats Brew Potion (B), Combat Expertise, Magical Aptitude, Stealthy, Toughness, Weapon Focus (slam) Skills Climb +15, Escape Artist +12, Knowledge (arcana) +13, Perception +13, Spellcraft +15, Stealth +15, Use Magic Device +15 Languages Abyssal, Common, Necril SQ accursed potions Ecology Environment any land and underground Organization solitary, pair or clutch (3-7) Treasure double standard (potions) Special Abilities Accursed Potions (Ex) A wrenganan gains Brew Potion as a bonus feat, and treats all cleric spells as being on its class list for the purposes of crafting potions. Any potion it makes is infused with rot—it functions as normal for an undead creature, but a living creature treats it as a dose of mumia as well as gaining the potion’s benefits. Crushing Pin (Ex) A creature pinned by a wrenganan must succeed a DC 19 Fortitude save or be knocked unconscious for 1d8 rounds. The save DC is Strength based.

[soobadnoonecanstopher]

Touch it for Real, Part 4

Genre: Humor / Fluff / Eventual Smut

Warnings: OMG they were roommates / slice of life / slow burn / mutual pining / crude humor / cursing / virgin!baek / idiots to lovers

A/N: The song featured in the kitchen scene is Fantasy by Mariah Carey.

Characters: Baekhyun X You/Female Reader

Description: You teach Baekhyun how to date. (Basically the Get You Alone M/V)

Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5

You were puzzling. Alone in your bedroom, laying within the comfort of your own bed, you were positively puzzling.

After sorting out just who Ben was and fixing the damage Baekhyun had done to your reputation by explaining that your idiot roommate had just gotten a hold of your phone, you reintroduced yourself and apologized for the confusion.

This ‘Ben’ actually seemed to laugh off the odd behavior he’d gotten as a first impression of you, mentioning that your roommate seemed funny, if not weirdly protective of you.

You could see what he meant when you read through the rapid fire questions Baekhyun had asked him from his age, to his preferred operating system, whether or not Ben had Facebook so “you” and him could be friends, his profession, and his parents line of work, his current place of work, how long he’s worked there and whether or not he moves around a lot, his hometown, his hobbies and even whether or not Ben has now or has ever had any pets; it seemed that Baekhyun had actually done a whole lot of legwork to give you a pretty good idea of what Ben might be like.

But the moment Baekhyun’s conversation topic changed to innocently ask Ben for his astrological sign, something struck you as off to see Baekhyun proclaim you to also be the same sign and after the two compared birthdays you began to find the whole exchange quite odd.

You realized that Baekhyun had simply lied about your birthday. Baekhyun knew your birthday. Why had he given a fake date to Ben? Unless there was something else happening that you didn’t understand. Then again, Baekhyun had always been rather stingy about giving out personal information; both yours and his. He was probably just being cautious about revealing too much to a stranger.

And actually, Ben seemed rather …. nice. You always hesitated to give them this adjective right off the bat as most of the guys you met who seemed nice right away turned out to be very good at faking nice and stringing along at least three or four girls at once for the shot at fucking at least one of them, and the hopes of fucking all of them.

You’d been called the wrong name late at night, whispered through a sleepy voice over the phone. You’d been sweet-talked and then abruptly called a bitch for refusing to send nudes to a guy you’d been talking to for only a week. Apparently a week was his limit and all his other girls gave him what he wanted within a couple of days. You’d been ghosted by nice guys who felt victimized and led on when you said goodnight politely with a smile and a wave instead of inviting them inside for ramen.

You did want a nice guy. But you wanted a real one.

What you wouldn’t give for one of them, for just one of them to be honest with you and really show you their true self.

Perhaps you had been going about it all wrong.

Your conversation with Ben quietly fizzled and you put your phone away to charge and now, now you were simply puzzling.

It panged at your heart to think of it, but the upset with Baekhyun hours earlier kept replaying in your mind. You propped your feet up on your wall and let your head hang off the edge of your bed, enjoying the way the gravity pulled at the blood in your brain and you tapped your fingers on the bed absentmindedly to the soft beat of music you heard playing from his room.

And you puzzled.

Don’t use your beauty as a weapon against me.

You hadn’t been this bothered by something since you’d watched that Mission Impossible movie the first time and spent an hour and a half trying to wrap your head around the complicated plot.

A Weapon.

Your beauty … a weapon … against me.

Why did it bother you so much? Why had he been so upset that you were playing with him, that you were messing with him. He messed with you all the time. You messed with him just as much. He never got this upset. No, he never got upset in this way. In such a way as to call you out on using something you had, against him. Something that you hadn’t even known had any power at all to attack the man. Your beauty. Did you have such a thing?

You thought about the other times you fought with him.

Not really fought, the two of you never did that, but that fake sort of fighting like when he’d woken you up at 2am for the third night in a row with his loud working music and you found him out in the kitchen disassembling your favorite toaster, the one with the wide slots for bagels that also toasts four slices of bread at once and even has special buttons for frozen items. The stainless steel one that you won in a work raffle and proudly marched through the office carrying with a huge smile on your face. It was a deluxe model. Supreme even. The master of it’s craft. Said so right on the box. Your toaster in a million pieces on your kitchen counter; all because he needed some components or resistors or whatever the fuck it was and he decided the best move was to take your toaster apart rather than to just order what he needed online and wait two business days for them to arrive.

Sure, he put it back together a few days later but not without enduring the laser eyes you shot him over breakfast when you had to toast a piece of bread in a frying pan on the stove like a loser who did not own a four slice Deluxe Toastmaster Supreme.

You’d planned your revenge then. It was something tiny and it involved his TV remote. His precious TV was enormous, took up almost the whole wall, OLED or SUPER-NANO or ULTRA-NANO some similar nonsense words and had 8-Ks of pixels or so he claimed and had so many smart functions you could hardly get comfortable using it for anything that didn’t involve the Netflix button. And no, no, you didn’t do anything to the actual TV. Relax, this was just the remote. This was harmless. Absolutely harmless. Easy to solve really if he had half a brain in his head.

You just carefully cut out the smallest tiniest piece of IR blocking tape that fit exactly over the infrared sensor on the remote control and fit so well it was undetectable to the human eye. Unless you knew it was there and knew exactly where to stick your fingernail in under the plastic bezel to peel it back. You simply applied the tape and left the remote right on the coffee table before you left for work.

You’d come home that night to a pile of assorted battery packs all strewn about the coffee table, and the remote completely taken apart down to the tiny circuit board and Baekhyun was quietly touching the tip of some tiny tool to the different spots on the scary looking green part from inside of the remote with all the metal bits stuck to it and when you slowly walked by he looked up at you through the magnifying eye glasses he wore. His eyes looked comically enormous and you swallowed away your laughter and considered how long you’d let him suffer.

“Something wrong with your remote, Peanut Butter?”

“It was working fine yesterday. I just don’t understand it.”

“Maybe it’s the batteries,” you offered innocently and he just ignored your helpful suggestion as he began screwing tiny screws into place with a precision screwdriver.

He was reassembling it all now and you sat down beside him on the sofa about as amused as you had ever been to sit and watch him suffer.

He grabbed two new batteries from an unopened pack on the table and aimed the remote, pressing the buttons again and again. Nothing happened.

He was surprisingly calm about the whole thing and judging by the various shopping bags and different brands of batteries you saw, he seemed to have been working on this all afternoon. Probably for hours now.

“I’m going to have to take the TV apart.”

He was already standing up and walking across the room toward the wall mounted monstrosity when you leaned forward for the remote. He glanced back at you as you did it and he looked at you just in time to see you shake the remote back and forth and then hit it twice lightly against your left hand. Just a little knock-knock should do it. You were careful to keep the expression on your face calm and well controlled.

When you pressed the power button, the big TV came to life and you pressed the button for Netflix and scrolled through your recommended titles. You had a new episode to watch. You’d have to make time tonight for that. After he was done with his little project here.

Baekhyun instantly pulled his hands away from the TV and hopped back and away from the screen, peering up at it with his mouth hanging wide open. His eyes shot back to where you sat on the sofa holding the remote control. You did not allow your smile to form. Nothing in your whole life had ever been so difficult. You felt as if you could pop right here. You casually flipped through the menu on the screen and the man looked back up at the TV and back down at you again.

You could see him coming in then. He was moving fast with several large steps toward you and with the quickest movement you could manage you used the tip of your finger to slide the IR tape back over the remote sensor. You could not be as precise as you had been before with him coming right at you so quickly, but hopefully it wouldn’t be visible.

He reached for the remote. “What did you do, how did you fix it?” He held it up and pointed it toward the TV. Again, the remote did not work. You bit down hard on the inside of your cheek.

He was pressing buttons again and nothing happened with each new button he smashed down. You could see the madness growing in his eyes the more he tried.

He made the smallest whining sound from the back of his throat and it took every ounce of self control to keep from laughing as he lightly tapped the remote twice against his hand just as he had seen you do. Nothing.

You tried to hold it. You tried so hard. A tiny sound escaped, the smallest sniffle with a laugh broke free from your throat and you coughed lightly to hide it.

His face turned on you and those crazed eyes were back only instead of directing them at the remote, he was looking at you now.

“How did you fix it? Do it again.” He looked insane and desperate and a tiny smile betrayed you as you grabbed the remote from his hand. You played the smile off as part of the help you were willing to offer him but you also had to inhale a deep breath and carefully and slowly exhale it through your mouth to keep from breaking completely.

You held it up in your right hand and gave it a little shake. As quickly as you had done it before you turned the remote on its side as you gave those two little knocks and his head flipped toward the TV when you aimed. With his eyes averted you were able to slip the tape off just before pressing the button.

The Netflix logo greeted you and Baekhyun threw his head back and let out a loud frustrated yell into the ceiling above him.

You’d been holding your laugh for too long. It was becoming too difficult now and he was back, reaching for the remote when the first suffocating giggles took your composure and you laughed out loud.

Your laughter brought all of his attention right to you and only you. The entirety of his focus shifted and that brought those crazed eyes of his bearing down on you, wide and demanding.

It was, by far, the most successful and meanest prank you had ever played on him to date and you were gasping for air and laughing as he reached for you. He grasped both of your shoulders and he shook you as you laughed and laughed at the absolute madness in his eyes. Oh he was crazy. It was just so damn funny.

The remote was still in your hands and you flipped through the different inputs on the TV as you cackled and tears formed at the corners of your eyes.

“How did you do it? You devil! Tell me how you did it?”

He balanced with his knees on the couch and his hands were on you, roaming over the fabric of the sweater you wore, lifting your arms to look under them, maybe for spare remotes or for hidden batteries or secret formulas, who knows what he thought he might find.

You’d stashed the tiny circle of tape by sticking it to the skin inside your elbow and he was currently examining the fingers on all of your hands up close as if they concealed all of the secrets he was looking for.

It wasn’t until he searched higher, pulling your hand forward toward his chest and his thumb grazed against the shiny plastic of the tape circle you had on your inner arm when he did a double take, pulled your arm harder and lifted an accusing finger to point at the tape.

“What is that?!” He clearly thought himself to be the world’s greatest detective.  

You allowed yourself to be manhandled by him a little bit more as you got every bit of humor about your recent victory out of your chest and you lifted your other hand, the one he did not have held hostage right now to wipe at the tears that had fallen from your eyes.  

“Stop laughing and answer me, woman! What is it?”

“It’s my birth control patch,” you said through a laugh and his eyes widened as he pulled his hand back. It was a tiny movement but you were so close to his accusing eyes that it felt monumental and the dramatic reaction to your teasing lie made a fresh wave of laughter bubble up in your chest. You knew he would react this way. Any mention of your contraceptives always made him clam up.

“It’s IR tape, Baekhyun. Infrared blocking tape. I put it on the sensor this morning after breakfast. After I made toast in a pan instead of in my toaster.”

The truth pulled his whole head back and he fell down on his butt on the sofa briefly before he slipped and fell right off the couch onto the floor and he sat there with a blank lifeless look on his face; staring ahead without any focus in his eyes.

“Do you know how sad pan toast is, Baekhyun? Tell me, how am I supposed to be satisfied with pan toast when I should have been having Deluxe Toastmaster Supreme toast?”

He was shaking his head back and forth as you spoke and when he did move it was to lay down flat on his back on the floor of the living room. His hands were up and he rubbed roughly over his face.

“Oh my god. Oh my god—it’s so good. I would have never checked for tape over the sensor. Fucking tape. A piece of goddamn tape. I was so focused on the batteries.I went to three different stores today. The circuits to the sensor were all intact, I checked it, it was good — I never even considered this. Are you an evil genius? My sweet innocent Bug ... is actually an evil supervillain.”

You left him on the floor and made your way into the kitchen to make dinner. It was your night to cook and thanks to the man stewing on the floor of the living room you had to do it around the scattered carcass of your third favorite kitchen appliance.

You remembered the way he reacted then. He pouted and moaned on the floor for a few moments until he smelled the stew you were cooking on the stove. It was comfort food. Something with meat and potatoes and warmth and spices. It would lift anyone’s mood and his had been lifted almost immediately. There were no apologies or any tears. Just a promise to put the toaster back together tomorrow after he went to the store for the parts he needed and that was the end of it.

He didn't storm away. He didn't raise his voice or say you were mean or unfair or too beautiful for him to withstand. He didn't get angry about closeness being used the wrong way, in a way that was unfair to him. In a way that could hurt him, like a weapon.

If he said you had the kind of beauty that could be used against him, didn't that mean he found you beautiful? Wouldn't that mean that Baekhyun found you attractive?

The words protested inside your mind. You shook your head.

That was impossible. Definitely. You’ve been so close to him for so long without even a hint of that sort of a feeling from him. Sure you were close to each other. Sure you cared for each other. It was a familiar sort of affection you shared. But attraction? Because he found you beautiful in a way that was unfair?

The puzzling was giving you a headache. There were some things that just did not exist in the same space in your mind and that was the existence of your roommate, Byun Baekhyun, and the possibility that he was attracted to you in any way.

You’d been inside your bedroom for hours now and you were no closer to answers than when you first came in here.

Baekhyun would be done with his episode. He would have watched it with Mia and discussed themes or scenes or dramatic moments with her. Did he talk to her on the phone or maybe though a headset as they streamed the episode together.

Did he like her voice and did she like his jokes?

Did he make her laugh? Of course he did. He made everyone laugh. Baekhyun was charming and hilarious. But could she make him laugh? Could she make him giggle and shake like he laughed with you?

It was late. That didn't really mean all that much to Baekhyun, as the man didn't really have any set bedtime and usually just fell asleep when the sun began to come up. It was a weekend night and you didn't have work in the morning and frankly your curiosity had grown too much for you to just stay in here and fall asleep without at least checking on how the streaming date went.

You knocked lightly on his door. You could hear music playing inside. Nothing too loud or crazy. The man seemed to be having a somewhat low key evening.

“Yeah,” his voice called lowly and you opened the door and peeked your head inside.

“How is our girlfriend doing?” Baekhyun was sitting on his butt on the floor in front of his bed with his head laid over his arms and his phone abandoned in the middle of the floor out of arm’s reach.

He let out a long low groan but did not lift his head up when you stepped inside.

“I don't even know. I don't know.” He sounded defeated already and this had only just started.

“Peanut, what happened?” You picked up the phone and unlocked the screen, searching through his apps to find the dating app so you could see if they had said anything to each other that might give you some clues about what went wrong.

“Nothing happened. I was too quiet. I couldn’t talk at all. I didn't say anything during the entire episode. Why is this so scary. Uggghhh...I feel unsafe. It’s gross.”

You stepped over him and climbed onto his bed, sitting up against the head of the bed as you scrolled through the chat logs.

It looked normal. Not unfriendly. A little terse and abrupt on his part. The man didn't know how to loosen up when he talked to girls and you wondered if maybe you needed more one on one lessons with him before he was really ready for this stuff.

When you leaned back against the headboard you felt the bed dip and he climbed onto the bed beside you and angled his body toward where you sat up against the pillows.

When you got to the end of the chat you could see that she was the last one to speak and she remarked that he felt a bit different from when they spoke at the beginning of the day. He didn't say anything in response to that.

Baekhyun moaned with his eyes closed and he turned his head into your waist. He was obviously reliving some perceived embarrassment he must have felt during the interaction with Mia and when he moved his arm around your waist you looked down to find yourself trapped under his arm that constricted as he pulled tightly, hiding the entirety of his face somewhere in the shirt you wore. He was warm. The weight of his arm around you felt nice.

“I felt so unsafe,” he repeated his complaint from earlier and his voice was obscured and muffled as he hid himself. He switched the tense though and you wondered if he no longer felt unsafe now that you had come in.

You typed out a quick response to Mia. You didn't think it was right to just leave her hanging without an explanation for his strange silence during and after the show.

“I’m going to tell her that you were so quiet because you were nervous. I’ll also thank her for watching the episode tonight.”

You heard and felt a hum and the tightness of his arm around your waist relaxed a little as his arm went slack. He did not move though. He still hugged you. He was still warm and it took only a moment for your nose to pick up the pleasant smell of his clean bed sheets fresh from the dryer. You both had a schedule for washing things like towels and bed sheets. Yours had been cleaned today as well, but something about the smell of his bed felt better than yours had. Perhaps it had been all that difficult puzzling that had tainted yours.

Mia responded right away to your message. She was flattered by his nervousness. You could tell with the way she reassured that he really didn't have to be nervous around her. That she was an easy going kinda girl. Low maintenance she said. You scoffed at the thought of a computer geek being low maintenance. As if you didn't know how difficult to obtain fancy GPUs were and how expensive high powered CPUs, high capacity SATA drives, and their required cooling systems were. You looked around Baekhyun’s set up and figured it had to run somewhere in the multiples of tens of thousands of dollars; just in this room alone.

Low maintenance. Please, she was just as high maintenance as any other regular girl just with a different catalogue of parts.

You switched to the emoji keyboard and keyed off some random happy faces and closed her chat window with more force than was necessary; suddenly and unexpectedly irked when she responded with similar emojis and the notification popped up on the screen. You swiped it away quickly to be rid of it.

“She sounded nice though, even if I couldn’t talk. She sounded nice. Do you think she will even want to talk to me again? I think she likes you more than me.”

“She will like you. If she doesn’t she’s an idiot. A girl would have to be an imbecile, Peanut, to not fall for you.”

He lifted his face then, just enough for the corners of his eye to peek out and you looked down at the side of his face as he looked at you for a moment, absorbing the encouraging words you spoke to him. His leg began to shake somewhere on the end of the bed. You could feel the rhythmic motions. He often did this when he was tired.

You had been scrolling through matches on his phone, building on an idea that popped into your head.

The man needed some practice to build up his confidence. Maybe, just maybe you could find another girl. Someone who he could talk to, chat with, be friendly with, that maybe wasn’t just so wonderfully perfect for him. Someone just to break the ice with.

You stopped on a girl. Her dress was short and the neckline was low. She really left very little up to the imagination with this outfit. Outside of the revealing clothes, it was clear that she was a beautiful woman. She was sexy and very confident in herself despite the glaringly obvious grammatical typo in her bio.

You spun the phone around to show him.

“She looks nice,” you said. Baekhyun blinked at the phone and pulled his face back a little to see the image clearly.

“—-follow you’re dreams — you are — Never too old to follow you are dreams.” Baekhyun read out the sentence with the typo out loud and you laughed.

“Come on, she’s pretty,” you said softly, “right?” You probed gently and he chuckled once to himself and closed his eyes up with a sigh.

“Yeah, she’s pretty,” he said after a while and you felt yourself stiffen just a little bit with his admission. Of course she was. Anyone could see it. He’d be lying if he didn't admit it.

“Okay but like, just pretty or do you also think she’s beautiful?”

He hummed some non response and you focused your attention back on the phone in your hands. After scrolling through a few more profiles you found another woman whose beauty shone brightly right through the screen at you.

“And her? Is she pretty or is she beautiful?”

Baekhyun’s eyes opened again but just barely. He looked half asleep and you wondered if the reason his arm was still around you was because he was so sleepy he didn't realize he was still hugging you like this on his bed.

“Pretty,” he mumbled and pushed his face into your waist again. This time the shaking in his leg began to settle and you could hear a slow steadiness in his breathing.

“Should I message her? Maybe we can practice talking to her so you’re not so nervous talking to girls?”

“Sure Bug,” he said quietly, “you can do anything you want.”

He was falling asleep now. You could feel the change. It didn't matter. You’d let him rest a bit while you opened up a chat window and began talking to Candy.

She responded quickly and had a completely different feeling from Mia. Maybe this was good. Candy was easy to talk to but she had nearly nothing in common with Baekhyun. She casually asked what a computer programmer did and when you went into specifics you had trouble finding synonyms for words that didn’t just make it all more complicated. You finally settled on a simple explanation of what kinds of computer software Baekhyun had developed and left it at that.

After a while Baekhyun shifted in his sleep and uncovered his face. His lips were parted and from the upside down angle you could see the dark splash of his pretty eyelashes that landed over his soft cheeks. He looked lovely and peaceful. All the worries and fears of the day were gone and he was sleeping so calmly. You watched his sleeping face for a while, growing warm inside with the strange contentedness you felt.

You could see some light movement behind his eyes and you wondered if he was dreaming about anything.

Candy had asked for a picture. She was asking something superficial like what sort of car Baekhyun drove and you slipped into his picture gallery for the folder with the shots you took for him when he first bought his car. You found a nice one with him smiling behind the driver’s seat, bright red seatbelt across his chest and the logo of his fancy ride on the steering wheel.

‘Wooo, baby boy an Audi? you must be loaded. When are you gonna come pick me up in that?’

You laughed at her obvious reaction. Candy was exactly as you expected her to be. Baekhyun would be able to laugh and chat with her easily without too much pressure of impressing a complicated woman like Mia was. Candy was an open book. The stakes were lower with Candy.

Your giggle made him stir and you looked down to see his eyes open a tiny bit before he closed them again.

“It’s going well with Candy,” you whispered and he inhaled a breath and nodded his head as he closed his eyes again.

“Mmm, the pretty one?” he asked in a sleepy voice and you hummed your confirmation. Something buzzed inside of you; just a bit of nerve. Call it gumption.

“Baek,” you called quietly and his lips parted with his breathing but his eyes stayed closed this time. He did not respond. He didn't give any indication at all that he heard you call him.

“Baek, what about me?” Your voice was tiny when you asked it. You felt more warmth in this bed suddenly. You felt it in your chest and it seeped up to warm up your face too.

He hadn’t responded at all to your question. It had been pretty unclear though. He might not have heard it, or might not have understood it. Or his sleep may have just been too deep to register your words.

“Am I pretty or am I beautiful?” You said it so quietly there was little chance of him actually hearing it. He was asleep and you were just here, trapped in his embrace on his bed as he slept and you puzzled over the words he had told you during an upset. The words that you had pried from him when he was vulnerable and emotional. The words that you shouldn’t be over analyzing like this. Those words felt too risky to be giving this much thought to.

Here you were again, using your sneaking methods to try and trick him into something when you knew it wouldn't work, when you knew there was nothing really there and you were reading too far into things.

His steady breathing continued. His eyes remained closed and his arm still gripped around your tightly, holding you still, holding you close to him as he slept.

So you gave up. You’d moved back to the phone to respond to Candy; something silly and lighthearted, something easy just like she was, when you heard him speak.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” he said so far under his breath the statement sounded more like air than actual vocalization of any kind and your fingers stopped their rapid typing in the middle of your sentence.

Your eyes looked down. Your entire body was frozen. Half of you expected to find his eyes open and a wide teasing smile on his lips, begging for you to take the bait and believe his words just for the chance of laughing at your shocked face and making fun of you for being stupid enough to believe them.

He was asleep. His eyelids did not pull open when you looked down at him and his breathing remained as steady as ever.

Baekhyun was asleep.

That damn puzzling — your jaw was sore from clenching your teeth down and your lips were dry and chapped from biting them.  

You had dropped the phone and it disappeared somewhere amid the bedcovers.

Baekhyun’s sleep was deeper now. He must have been very tired to be falling asleep so recklessly like this. You shifted downward and made some attempt to find the phone without waking him up and your small movement made him inhale a deep breath through his nose and he was moving now. You felt him shifting, moving his sleepy body up higher in search for some comfort; for something to lay on that was a bit more comfortable than flat on the middle of the bed like that.

You used the movement to reach for the blanket and pull it over his body so he could be warm at least and when he finally settled he shared the same pillow as you. His forehead rested against your shoulder and he was once again, fast asleep.

His arm though— you found yourself still very much trapped in nearly the same embrace as before, just shifted. A forearm landed over your chest and you felt a new heaviness of his bent leg land over your thigh.

You could wake him.

You could push him off and let him roll the other way so you could make an escape back to the peace of your own bedroom.

You would. You would do that soon.

Your current state of thoughts was simply too overloaded to follow through on any game plan. If you could only have a few more minutes of his warm steady breathing, you would move away from this. You would do it.

It wasn’t that you had never considered it. It was that you had gone through many lengths to come to this place. You were safe and secure here.

It was that you had nowhere else to go when it was over.

This place was your home.

Peanut was part of that home.

Things were nice right now; the way they were at home.

But…

As they sometimes do, and against your own will, your thoughts wandered.

You wondered as they wandered — wondered about him.

From the deepest parts of your mind; down where you’d shoved them roughly many times before, those wondering thoughts danced and swayed lightly to the soft music playing in this room.

Those secret thoughts about the sweetness in his eyes. Secrets about the fondness you felt for the little tips of him; the tip of his nose, the tips of his fingers, the pink tips of his ears. Thoughts you refused to encourage.

Baekhyun was asleep and you were thinking.

With the thinking came the shame and your skin was hot to the touch. The last thing you wanted was to ruin your home. With the thinking came the denial. You could not encourage anything. You could not afford to become complacent. You did not need these thoughts to become so brazen. You did not need them taking root. The last thing you needed was them making an appearance again.

The sounds he made while dreaming pulled your closed eyelids back open. You turned your face toward the sound. It was soft, the small groan from the back of his throat. But his face changed then; eyebrows screwed together and his lungs constricted as he let out a softer sound, like a whine. It was a complaint. His face showed signs of pain. The dream must have been unpleasant.

You lifted a hand then, shifted within his embrace you raised your palm and laid it carefully over the side of his face.

The shift happened with the warm contact and his features evened out and that pained look was gone.  

You smiled then. So sleepy but satisfied that you could help when he needed it.

You would move after he got a little more sleep. After he’d had a little more comfort from you, you would move.

You weren’t the first to move. And it seemed by the change in light that shone through the windows that your visit had lasted much longer than you had intended.

It was the untangle that woke you up. A conscious and deliberate lifting of limbs; the careful grip of a hand lifting your arm by the wrist and setting it gently down on a flat mattress.

You opened your eyes when he pulled his own leg out from between your thighs. The temperature change was most jarring. You had felt so warm before.

Baekhyun was sitting up in his bed. His hair was standing up in places all over his head and he was moving slowly and carefully, in an attempt to disengage himself from the tangle of this woman he had just woken up with.

The sleep was still very thick in your head. It hadn’t been a full night’s sleep had it? You felt like you had just closed your eyes a minute ago and yet the sunshine was so bright outside already.

“Sorry,” Baekhyun whispered when he realized you were now awake and looking at him, “guess I got too comfortable...must have fallen asleep.”

His voice was thick with sleep and with embarrassment too, you could hear it everywhere, with the quick words he spoke to you and the pink that covered the back of his neck and flooded his cheeks too.

This situation...this was an embarrassment. Of course it was.

This was something that should not have happened. Not with two adults of similar age who shared so many liberties with each other; spending time in each other’s arms at night, well…

You felt awkward all over. What if—what if you’d done something in your sleep? What if you said something?

And he already wasn’t meeting your eyes as he climbed out of the bed and awkwardly made his way into his bathroom.

You could hear the sound of the running water faucet and the door closed with the smallest click like he went out of his way to close it as softly and quietly as possible to avoid disturbing you any further.

You could feel the heat burning on the skin of your cheeks and you used his absence to get up and get out of his bedroom before he came out and found you still, still tangled in his bed sheets like you’d been tangled in his legs and in his arms all night.

You had to ignore this. You had to forget it ever happened, and anyway, you were best friends with the guy...right? Wasn't this thing bound to happen in the course of a friendship? What if you went on a holiday with him and the hotel only had one bed? These things really did happen, you read about it on twitter once. Would you be that asshole best friend who let him sleep on the floor just because he was a man? No! You could build a little pillow wall between your bodies and sleep as still and motionless as possible, like a corpse.

This feeling would go away. The red hot embarrassment would wash down the drain of your shower. The sticky warmth left behind by his skin would go with it.

You’d made it as far as to undress and turn on the hot water when an awful memory dawned on you.

Baekhyun still had your shampoo.

You didn't have any other shampoo in this bathroom that you could use. You pulled open cupboards and drawers, searching for anything; tiny hotel sized travel bottles, a nearly empty bottle under the sink for a rainy day, even maybe something in the trash can that still had a few drops. Nothing.

You eyed the hand soap on your sink and pictured stepping out of the shower a frizzy, tangled mess.

A soft knock vibrated against your bathroom door.

“Bug, your shampoo.” Baekhyun’s voice called out, muffled by the sounds of the running water and the door itself, “it’s almost empty, but there’s a little left. Sorry, I’ll run to the store and get more.”

Your ear was pressed against the door so you could make out everything he said; so you could listen carefully to the tone and delivery of his words to see if he was still embarrassed about last night or if he’d brush it off easily like he did most things that seemed to bother him.

There were another two soft knocks, “B-Bug?”

“Yeah, Peanut, thank you. Can you just...put it by the door. I’m already undressed. I’ll grab it in a bit.”

He did not respond right away and you stayed with your ear against the door waiting for some sound. Some indication that he had left. The click of your door, anything.

“I left it by the door,” you heard his far away voice shout and then the click of your door.

When your shower was done and you were dressed in your favorite weekend outfit, the high waisted comfy shorts with pockets and a cute top that made you feel somewhat pretty even on a casual day and you emerged from your bedroom feeling ready to face whatever weird moods or wacky situations accosted you today.

You found him singing a song to himself in the kitchen as he made something that smelled delicious for breakfast. The radio was on a pop station that played hits from all the past decades and the upbeat rhythm of the song that played was a definite favorite that had him dancing at the stove.

It was a groovy little love song, quite old now that you thought about it and you felt the beat hit hard in your chest with each pop of his shoulders and hips. The joy you could feel in this song hit you just like that beat hit; heavy and prominent, and you smiled wide to welcome this morning mood it brought with it.

When you stepped into the kitchen to grab a mug to make yourself some coffee you couldn’t help but sing along to the song, you loved the song as much as he did and when he noticed you enter the room you could hear him singing the main parts; expertly, even though the singer was a woman, his voice could always reach the high notes as well as the low ones. She was the kind of epic singer with one of a kind of talent that was world dominating. Baekhyun was singing along, doing the same kinds of ad-libs and vocal runs that she did and he did it while holding the spatula up to his face like a microphone.

As you walked by he dipped his head and looked into your face and his eyes caught ahold of yours. You knew what was coming. You could hear it coming in the song, the chorus. The part you had to sing. These were the rules. He leaned hard and brought the spatula up to your lips just in time for your part to come on. You did not disappoint. You gave it your all closing your eyes up tight and throwing your head back, singing from the very center of you, this part you always sang during this song. The part that was made for you; he knew it and you knew it.

His smile was genuine and breathtaking and he grabbed your hand with his spatula-less hand and pulled you into him, the beat taking over whatever bit of nervousness he might have had before. This was different. This was dancing. This was singing to simply the best song for a Saturday morning and it was moving and laughing with your best friend and you let him spin you in a small circle, careful to keep your coffee mug lifted so it didn’t hit anything during the spin.

His sense of rhythm was perfect. His hips moved as if they were made for this. You had no choice but to follow. An occasional hand on your hip told you where to go. The song was reaching its peak and you knew it was a short one. The best ones always were. It was going to begin winding down now. It was always such a sweet and short lived moment of happiness that you always appreciated immensely.

As a final move, he gave you a little spin and released you to go on your way toward the coffee maker you so desperately wanted to get to when you first entered this kitchen.

He finished the eggs with the last notes of the song.

As you both sat down to eat, his eyes met yours and yours met his and you dug into the eggs and bacon he’d prepared. You offered him a perfectly buttered toast slice and he took it, nodding his head as he bit into the crisp corner.

“So Bug,” he spoke up between bites of eggs, chewing and swallowing thoughtfully, “about this...Candy.”

You swallowed the hot coffee in your mouth and clasped your hands together, suddenly remembering how asleep he had been when you had hit it off with Candy, his practice girl.

He listened to your explanation. Your theory that the stakes were simply too high with Mia and he needed someone to talk to that was a bit more of a relaxed task for him. You called it easy mode so he might get the game reference. He ate and listened to you talk and occasionally his eyebrows would lift or screw together with whatever sorts of thoughts he was thinking inside his head. You could tell by his body language that he didn't exactly want to start something with Candy and you had to emphasize that it was really just for practice, talking to her. It was to help build his confidence.

“She’s already in, Peanut. She thinks you’re super cool, she thinks you’re rich and thinks you have a very good job and plus, you make lots of money and she seems super into that.”

He was not speaking yet, despite how much you had talked and you were beginning to get worried that he didn’t see the benefit of practicing his conversation skills a little bit.

“It’s not even real, Baek, you just have to make some things up with her. Just to get over that anxiety about talking to women. Just until you are more comfortable.”

When he finally did speak, it was as you feared.

“It just feels kinda gross, Bug. She’s a real person too, even if she is obviously a gold digger. It just seems wrong. I’ve been...thinking lately. What if this is...wrong of us?”

“What if I just have to tough it out with Mia and get the fuck over it and just,” he thrust his hands forward over the food on the table for emphasis, “just — blehhhh — talk, just fucking talk to her.”

You lifted a fork with eggs toward your lips but your stomach protested. You suddenly didn't want any more food. The coffee you were drinking had suddenly gone too cold for your liking and you pushed the plate and mug away from you with your fingertips.

You were bothered.

Why did he choose right now to suddenly grow a conscience about this? Did he forget that Mia was chatting with both of you and not just him?

“I...I just — I want to try with Mia. I know I can get over it and talk to her. And I don't want to talk to Candy. The person Candy thinks I am, well...that’s just false. I can’t be the person she’s expecting me to be.”

He had obviously read through the entire conversation with Candy last night and found the tales you told simply too stretched out for him to try and live up to.

“But that’s what people do when they start dating. They stretch the truth, make themselves sound just a little bit better, make themselves taller, or make themselves look richer. They all do this.” You simply could not understand why he didn’t get this. Why he didn’t just play by the rules that everyone followed to get through the door so he could stand a chance here.

“Well I don't. I don't want someone to fall for a fake version of me. I want someone to like me now. This me. Byun Baekhyun. The Peanut with anxiety who lives with Bug who almost killed him over a cheese stick, but who makes really great toast.”

He was smiling now, joking about the funny memories. You pulled your lips into a forced smile and lifted the coffee for another drink so you didn't have to smile any more.

He was watching your face. You were sure he sensed it. Something had bothered you to the point of giving up on your breakfast and every pass your eyes made over his face led to the same thing. He was watching you.

“Why are you upset?”

You shook your head lightly. Willing the obvious signs to leave your face. You didn't even know why. You didn't have a name for this. So you just shrugged in response to him.

“Because I don't want to practice on Candy? Did you actually like her for me?”

You really made your best attempt. You inhaled deep and closed your eyes and you shook your head.

Candy did not matter and you knew it. There was something ugly inside of you maybe. Something that did not want Baekhyun to get along with perfect Mia. Something that was fighting against the idea of him being happy and healthy and free of this unhealthy attachment you had to him. Free and happy away from you.

“Then why?”

Enough. You were being unfair to him. You had promised him that you would help him. You had gotten him this far and you’d be the worst kind of asshole if you didn't see him through to the end; if you didn't follow through with your promise to find him someone who would love him like he deserved to be loved, exactly as he was now. The amazingly wonderful Byun Baekhyun.

“It’s nothing like that,” you smiled softly. It felt like a sad smile, but at least it was genuine. “I just worry when you get so anxious. You know you fell right asleep last night. As soon as I came in, you passed right out.”

Your words skillfully slipped out of your lips and you successfully changed the subject. You felt like a coward, but you simply did not have words for what was happening to you.

“I didn’t...say anything did I? Before I fell asleep?”

This question was quiet. His fingertips grazed over his lips as he asked it, nearly muffling the words he shyly asked you at the breakfast table, the morning after.

You are so fucking beautiful.

You are so fucking beautiful.

You lifted your coffee cup to drink the tepid liquid inside and dropped your eyes from his shaking ones. The answer to his question sat on the back of your tongue even after you swallowed away the liquid.

You swallowed again and it refused to budge and yet you sat in silence, unable to utter a single word in reply to his quiet question.

Your silence went on for too long and he looked up into your face. An instant smile lifted at the corner of your lips and you forced it up into your eyes.

“You just slept, Peanut. We—” you had to exhale the breath that you had been holding for too long in your lungs, “we just slept.”

 Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5

Tag list: @j-pping  @blahblahblah-boo  @his-mochi-cheeks  @amyeonzing@littleflowercrown13  @baekinmylife  @insta1010  @nana-banana  @f4ncyvelvet@bbhbeth  @totallynerdstuff  @byunbabybaek @maijinki @bbyunz@theclawofaraven

[monstersdownthepath]

Theme Bestiary: Hive Warriors and Workers

CR 5

Neutral Evil Medium Aberration

Horror Adventures, pg. 237

Yep, that’s a Xenomorph if I’ve ever seen one. Paizo went ahead and painted it green, but we know. We all know. I may give it guff, but it’s all in good spirits I assure you; I LOVE the whorling metallic patterns on the Hive creatures. It gives them just as much personality as the Geigeresque organic piping on the Xenomorphs, and the way the designs bend and twist makes it look like they were literally twisted into shape. I mean, check out the corkscrew pattern going down each arm! The juxtaposition of the nigh-robotic armor plating stuck together with organic fibers that look more like they’re being used as glue than musculature! That’s how you know they were designed to be destructive.

Bereft of the need to eat or sleep, Hive Warriors and Workers toil tirelessly to expand their nests and their numbers. You may be wondering why I’m saying “warriors and workers” in a single article, and that’s because the book states there’s two distinct castes with two distinct sets of powers, yet their actual bodies are statistically identical. Warriors have significantly stronger jaws and possess the ability to spray their incredibly destructive acid out as a projectile, while the Workers can secrete and shape a resinous substance the Hive nests are made up of. At the end of this article, I’ll give you my take on that particular quirk since the book doesn’t actually have Worker mechanics!

With that out of the way, why not have a quick look at what else these Xenomimics can do? I mentioned that Warriors have strong jaws and acid spit, and boy howdy do they. Their Acid Spit is their most devastating but most seldom-used weapon, this ranged touch attack dealing 8d8 Acid damage on a successful strike, and dealing the same damage again each round for 1d3 more rounds. This attack is, ironically, mostly used for excavation rather than battle, as Hive Warriors are purely concerned with taking prisoners alive to be used to expand their brood. Their acid is used mainly against creatures that they either have no use for (like Constructs) or against creatures that have proven to be too dangerous to try and take alive (like Barbarians).

Their Rending Mandibles deal damage to the armor of any creature they strike with a critical hit from their bite, their 1d6+4 jaws crunching down on the clothes and shields of anyone they’re attacking. While unlikely to destroy--or deal significant damage to--magical gear, at the level a party is engaging these creatures, they shouldn’t have many of those. As you may expect, being more or less based directly on the famous Alien of Alien, a Hive Warrior (and Worker) has natural weapons and skills that make them terrors to stand up against. They’re able to disassemble nearly any 6 HD or lower encounter with a CCB and a tail slap on top of that, their bite dealing 1d6+4 damage, claws 1d4+4, and tail slap 1d6+2. A Full-Attack from a Hive Warrior HURTS, and it’s their natural weapons and Stealth (+13) in tandem with their Climb speed (20ft) that let them easily get enemies into a position where they’ll HAVE to take the Full-Attack. With Vital Strike at their disposal, they can pull off the ever-faithful Xenomorph Tail-Stab against any creature that hasn’t yet noticed their presence, potentially slicing a sizable chunk of health off anything with a d6 hit dice. If only they had Sneak Attack... which they can, because they’re intelligent enough to take class levels.

As promised, by the way, here’s a potential take on the Hive Worker’s resinous abilities for your own games:

Secrete Resin (Ex): Twice an hour, a Hive Worker can produce enough thick resin as a standard action to fill a 10ft square that it is adjacent to with thick globules and strands. When this resin is first produced it is incredibly sticky, acting as the Web spell with a save DC of 16, except the resin is immune to acid and fire damage, and it does not need to be anchored between two points. This DC is Constitution-based. After 30 minutes, the resin hardens into a substance statistically identical to stone, except it is immune to acid and fire damage. Any creature still entangled by the resin when it hardens become encased in this substance, and the DC to escape it raises by 10.

Shape Resin (Ex): A Hive Worker can secrete a specialized dissolving agent that quickly evaporates at will. This substance briefly softens the hardened resin secreted by a Hive Worker and allows it to be formed into whatever shape the Worker desires, as if it were using Stone Shape. Sculpting resin requires 1, 5, or 10 minutes of work, depending on the complexity of what is being crafted, at the DMs discretion.

You can read more about them here.

[prestidigitation-nation]

Artificer Specialist: Gunsmith

First and foremost, gunsmiths are tinkerers, constantly adjusting their firearm to meet the challenge of the next day. An artificer who specializes as a gunsmith also enhances their firearms to hone their magic, and unleash potent attacks from a distance. The artificer bonds with their guns, becoming one with them even as they experiment with them and refine their magical capabilities. 

Firearm Adept

When you reach 3rd level, your combat training and your experiments with magic have paid off in two ways:

You gain proficiency with Firearms.

When you attack with a magic firearm, you can use your Intelligence modifier, instead of Dexterity modifier, for the attack and damage rolls. 

Tactical Tools 

Upon choosing this archetype at 3rd level, you gain proficiency with Tinker’s Tools if you did not already have it. You may use them to craft ammunition at half the cost, repair damaged firearms, or even draft and create new ones (DM’s discretion). Some extremely experimental and intricate firearms are only available through crafting.

 Firearm Properties

Firearms are a new and volatile technology, and as such bring their own unique set of weapon properties. Some properties are followed by a number, and this number signifies an element of that property (outlined below). These properties replace the optional ones presented in the Dungeon Master’s Guide. Firearms are ranged weapons.

 Reload. The weapon can be fired a number of times equal to its Reload score before you must spend 1 attack or 1 action to reload. You must have one free hand to reload a firearm.

 Misfire. Whenever you make an attack roll with a firearm, and the dice roll is equal to or lower than the weapon’s Misfire score, the weapon misfires. The attack misses, and the weapon cannot be used again until you spend an action to try and repair it. To repair your firearm, you must make a successful Tinker’s Tools check (DC equal to 8 + misfire score). If your check fails, the weapon is broken and must be mended out of combat at a quarter of the cost of the firearm. Creatures who use a firearm without being proficient increase the weapon’s misfire score by 1.

 Pellets. The gun shoots a shell which discharges small pellets. Make an attack roll for each pellet when firing at a creature. The amount of damage listed is the amount of damage each pellet deals. All pellets hit within a five foot radius. The number of pellets each shell has is its Pellets score.

 Ammunition

All firearms require ammunition to make an attack, and due to their rare nature, ammunition may be near impossible to find or purchase. However, if materials are gathered, you can craft ammunition yourself using your Tinker’s Tools at half the cost. Each firearm uses its own unique ammunition and is generally sold or crafted in batches listed below next to the price.

Gunsmith Spells

Starting at 3rd level, you always have certain spells prepared after you reach particular levels in this class, as shown in the Gunsmith Spells table. These spells count as artificer spells for you, but they don't count against the number of artificer spells you prepare.

3rd: Magic Missile, Thunderwave

5th: Branding Smite, Invisibility

9th: Wall of Sand, Thunder Step

13th: Storm Sphere, Gravity Sinkhole

17th: Swift Quiver,  Hold Monster

 Modified Firearm

Beginning at 3rd level, your metallurgical pursuits have led to you making your firearm a conduit for your magic. As an action, you can transmogrify a firearm you are wielding, provided you have the tinker’s tools on hand, turning into your modified firearm.

You gain the following benefits while wielding this firearm:

The firearm is magical for the purpose of overcoming resistances and using your firearm adept ability.

You can use the Modified Firearm as a spellcasting focus for your artificer spells.

Your Modified Firearm can be summoned to your empty hand as an action or dismissed to an extradimensional space (no action required).

The firearm continues to be a Modified Firearm until you make another firearm your Modified Firearm or you die.

Firearm Design

Beginning at 3rd level, you can customize your Modified Firearm. When you do so, you learn two of the following firearm designs: Elemental Commander, Sharpshooter, Annihilator, or Dauntless. The design you choose gives you special benefits while you wield it. You replace one transmogrification you know with another one at levels 5, 9, and 15.

You can switch a firearm’s design or transmogrify a different firearm (removing the modifications on any previous firearm) whenever you finish a short or long rest, provided you have tinker’s tools on hand.

Elemental Commander

You imbue your firearm with elemental energy and gain the ability to use the following options.

Choose one of the following damage types: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or thunder. When you hit a creature with a shot from your Modified Firearm, you can choose to deal an extra 2d4 of this type of damage when you hit a target with your Modified Firearm. 

If you are damaged by a creature within 120 ft. that you can see, you can use your reaction to force them to make a dexterity saving throw. They take 2d6 damage of your choice (from the list above) on a failed save and half as much on a successful one. 

You can use this ability a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus.

Sharpshooter

You magically fine tune your firearm, making it more precise. You learn two trick shots of your choice from the below list and gain a number of grit points equal to your Proficiency Bonus. You regain all expended grit points after a long rest.

Trick Shots

Deadeye Shot. When you make a firearm attack against a creature, you can expend one grit point to gain advantage on the attack roll.

Disarming Shot. When you make a firearm attack against a creature, you can expend one grit point to attempt to shoot an object from their hands. On a hit, the creature suffers normal damage and must succeed on a Strength saving throw or drop 1 held object of your choice and have that object be pushed 10 feet away from you. Piercing Shot. When you make a firearm attack against a creature, you can expend one grit point to attempt to fire through multiple opponents. The initial attack gains a +1 to the firearm’s misfire score. On a hit, the creature suffers normal damage and you make an attack roll with disadvantage against every creature in a line directly behind the target within your first range increment. Only the initial attack can misfire.

Violent Shot. When you make a firearm attack against a creature, you can expend one or more grit points to enhance the volatility of the attack. For each grit point expended, the attack gains a +2 to the firearm’s misfire score. If the attack hits, you can roll one additional weapon damage die per grit point spent when determining the damage.

Winging Shot. When you make a firearm attack against a creature, you can expend one grit point to attempt to topple a moving target. On a hit, the creature suffers normal damage and must make a Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.

 Annihilator

You transmogrify your firearm to be able to wipe out hordes of enemies. You learn 2 annihilations which are detailed below. You can use annihilating shots a number of times equal to your Proficiency Bonus. You regain all used annihilations after a long rest. 

Annihilations

 Explosion. Upon a hit, everything within 5 ft of the target must make a Dexterity saving throw against your spell save DC or suffer 1d8 fire damage. If the weapon misses, the ammunition fails to detonate, or bounces away harmlessly before doing so.

Blast. Your gun shoots fire in a 15-foot cone that you designate within your firearm’s range. Each creature in that area must make a Dexterity saving throw against your spell save DC, taking 2d8 fire damage on a failed save or half as much damage on a successful one. The fire ignites any flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried.

Disperse. Your firearm shoots a bullet to an area within its range that does no damage, but rather emits a wave of force. Each creature within a 10 foot radius must make a Strength saving throw against your spell save DC or be pushed 10 feet away from you.

Blind. You shoot rays of light in a 15-foot come that you designate within your firearm’s range. Each creature in that area must make a Constitution saving throw against your spell save DC or be blinded until the end of your next turn.

 Slip. You shoot slick oil that covers the ground in a 10-foot square centered on a point within range and turns it into difficult terrain for the duration. When the oil appears, each creature standing in its area must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw or fall prone. A creature that enters the area or ends its turn there must also succeed on a Dexterity saving throw or fall prone.

Dauntless

You use your weapon’s magic to strike fear in your foes and empower your allies. When you shoot a creature with a shot from your Modified Firearm, you can magically amplify the explosion, infusing it with arcane energy. When you do this you have one of the following options:

You can force the creature that was hit to  make a wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC. If the attack misses, the creature makes this saving throw with advantage. On a failure, the creature becomes frightened of you until the end of your next turn.

You bolster your allies' resolve. Up to 10 creatures of your choice within 60 feet of the blast that could hear it add a d4 to any saving throw they make until the end of your next turn.

You can use this ability a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus.

 Extra Attack

Starting at 5th level, you can attack twice, rather than once, whenever you take the attack action on your turn.

 Quickdraw

At 9th level, you are able to quickly adapt to different situations, switching between guns. You can stow a firearm, then draw another firearm as a single object interaction on your turn. Additionally, you can change a firearm’s design or transmogrify another firearm (removing the modifications on any previous firearm) as an action without taking a rest, provided you have tinker’s tools on hand. You can transmogrify a firearm in this way once per short rest.

Improved Modifications

At 15th level, your Modified Weapon gains additional benefits depending on its design.

Elemental Commander. Double the damage dice you roll whenever you deal elemental damage using your elemental commander ability. 2d4 becomes 4d4 and 2d6 become 4d6.

Sharpshooter. You learn one additional Trick Shot.

Annihilator. You learn one additional annihilation.

Dauntless. When you use your dauntless ability to frighten a creature. The fear can last up to one minute. The frightened target can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success. If you choose to bolster your allies instead, they have advantage on all attack rolls and saving throws until the end of your next turn instead of a d4 to just saving throws.

[grailfinders]

Fate and Phantasms #155

Today on Fate and Phantasms we're going back to the Servant Universe to preserve the Saber Empire, thanks to Mysterious Heroine X Alter! This mysterious heroine is a Psi Warrior Fighter for her legally-not-a-lightsaber skills and some legally-not-the-force, and a Bladesinger Wizard for more saber skills and legally-not-the-force lightning.

Check out her build breakdown below the cut, or her character sheet over here!

Next up: Once again, we came so close to making a build at an appropriate time. Oh well, he’s not one for the spotlight anyway.

Race and Background

You might come from another dimension, but you're still Human (er, servant), giving you +1 Dexterity, +1 Constitution, Acrobatics proficiency to help with the impractical swordfighting style you specialize in, and the Mage Slayer feat to ruin the original MHX's day. If a creature within 5 feet of you casts a spell, you can use your reaction to attack them. Your damage also causes concentration checks at a disadvantage, and you get advantage on saves against spells cast within 5 feet of you. MHX is pretty far from a mage, but this will interrupt her saber-tracking efforts.

That being said, you're still about as Far a Traveler as you can get, giving you proficiency with Insight and Perception.

Ability Scores

You are renowned for your ability to knock back sweets, and it's really hard to poison someone who literally has a reactor for a stomach, so we're gonna make your Constitution number one here. After that is going to be Intelligence, you did come from a science fiction world after all, I'm sure you know more than the average bear. Following that up is Dexterity, your armor is at most light, and no matter what form your sword takes it's still a light saber. Your Charisma isn't too bad, you've gotta be able to talk people into buying you mochi after all. Staying under that kotatsu all the time means your Strength isn't great, but we're dumping Wisdom. You want more saber faces in the world, if anything an 8's too much.

Class Levels

1. Fighter 1: First level fighters get proficiency in every weapon, and considering your sword can turn into a chainsaw I'd say that'll come in handy. You also get proficiency with Strength and Constitution saves, as well as two fighter skills. Intimidation matches your dark knight schtick, and Survival will help you cook up some sweets when you're left on your own.

You also get a Fighting Style. Your light saber comes in a variety of packages, but most of them are one handed. That means Dueling will be the most useful for you, giving you +2 on damage rolls while using only one one-handed weapon.

You also get the bonus action Second Wind, letting you stuff yourself with sweets to heal a bit once per short rest.

2. Fighter 2: Second level fighters get an Action Surge, letting you add an action to your turn once per short rest. You spent so much time lazing around, you were just... saving up for when it counted. Yeah.

3. Fighter 3: If you want to be a sith knockoff, you can't go wrong with being a Psi Warrior. When you take the subclass you gain Psionic Powers, powered by psionic dice. They're d6s (that grow when you level up) equal to twice your proficiency bonus that recharge on short rests. Currently, you can use them in three ways.

Your Protective Field lets you spend a reaction and a die to reduce the incoming damage a creature near you is taking by the die roll plus your intelligence modifier.

A Psionic Strike adds the roll + int mod in force damage to a weapon attack to light up your saber once per turn.

You can also use Telekinetic Movement to move a large or smaller object/willing creature up to 30 feet. You can do this once per short rest for free, or by using up a psionic die.

4. Fighter 4: Use this ASI to bring up your Dexterity so your sword skills aren't as bad. You're a saber after all, you've gotta be on your A game! You are a saber, right?

5. Fighter 5: Fifth level fighters get an Extra Attack. It isn't exactly rocket science, but it is very useful.

6. Wizard 1: Moving over to wizard now nets you an Arcane Recovery, helping you recover a couple spell slots on a short rest once per long rest.

Speaking of, you also learn Spells. So many spells. They use your Intelligence for casting and preparation. You get stuff like Shocking Grasp for a cheap force lightning, Mage Hand for some telekinesis that doesn't use resources, your standard gish setup, Mage Armor to make your hoodie worth something, and Absorb Elements to put that magic reactor in your chest to good use.

And that's only some of the spells you could use! Check the character sheet for more.

7. Wizard 2: If you want to blur the line between nerd and sith lord like we do, Bladesinger is a pretty good choice. You get Training in War and Song, which gives you a bunch of proficiencies you already have from fighter as well as Performance. Foreshadowing!

You can also perform a Bladesong proficiency times per long rest if you aren't using heavy armor or two-handed weapons. The song lasts a minute and uses a bonus action to start. While active, you add your Intelligence modifier to your AC and concentration saves, your walking speed goes up by 10, you have advantage on acrobatics checks.

You can also Cause Fear as part of your membership with the Dark R.O.U.N.D.S., and you also get some sci-fi gadgets to Detect Magic.

8. Wizard 3: Third level wizards get second level spells, with Magic Weapon making your light saber a bit fancier and Dragon's Breath for a more dramatic (and consistent!) use of your lightning powers.

9. Fighter 6: Bouncing back to fighter for a bit nets you another ASI to bump up your Intelligence for stronger spells and telekinesis. Again, not flashy but very useful.

10. Fighter 7: Seventh level psi knights gain two new ways to use their psionic dice thanks to being Telekinetic Adepts.

You can use a Psi-Powered Leap once per short rest or by using a psionic die to gain a flying speed equal to 2x your walking speed for the turn for big anime jumps. Dramatically launching yourself at your foes for air combat framed by the moonlight has never been easier.

Alternatively, your Telekinetic Thrust empowers your Psionic Strike, forcing a strength save (dc 8+proficiency+intelligence mod). If they fail the save, you can either knock the target prone or push them 10 feet in any horizontal direction.

11. Wizard 4: Back in wizard for a bit. This level gives you another ASI, so grab the Telekinetic feat, which increases your Intelligence by 1, lets you cast Mage Hand without making it obvious and with an increased range, and you can make telekinetic shoves as a bonus action, pushing a creature 5 feet away or towards you if they fail a strength save.

You also learn the cantrip Green-Flame Blade which makes your saber give off a bit more light and the spells Enhance Ability to activate your true power that's been sealed away for millennia. You also also get Levitate to force choke some people. They don't take damage from the spell, but it opens them up for you walloping them, so same difference.

12. Wizard 5: Fifth level wizards get third level spells, Haste lets you run anime fast for up to a minute- you also get advantage on dex saves and +2 to your AC, but after the spell ends you have to take a nap. You also get the big guns- Lightning Bolt. 100 feet of range, dealing 8d6 lightning damage to creatures that fail a dexterity save. An elegant lightning spell from a more civilized age.

13. Wizard 6: Sixth level bladesingers get something very special: an Extra Attack! It still doesn't stack with your fighter one, but now you can use a cantrip in place of one of your attacks! Roast them with lightning then hit 'em with a sword!

You can also use Fear to be an intimidating presence to multiple people at once, and Catnap to pull out the kotatsu.

14. Fighter 8: Use this ASI to bump up your Dexterity once more for even better weapon attacks and AC.

15. Fighter 9: Ninth level fighters get Indomitable, letting you re-roll a failed save once per long rest. Don't even bother with the wisdom saves, it's not going to happen.

16. Fighter 10: Tenth level Psi Knights have a Guarded Mind, letting you resist psychic damage and burn psi dice to end effects that are charming or frightening you at the start of a turn. See? Told you you didn't have to worry about wisdom saves!

17. Fighter 11: Congratulations on yet another Extra Attack! To be honest, I'm not entirely sure how that stacks with your bladesinger attacks, but that's a headache for your DM to figure out!

18. Fighter 12: Another ASI, bump up your Int again for more AC, Spells, and telekinesis.

19. Fighter 13: Thirteenth level fighters get a second use of Indomitable per long rest, and it's totally not because WotC was running out of ideas, no sir!

20. Fighter 14: Your capstone level is another ASI, which we'll use to get your bond CE thanks to Servo Crafting! You use Find Familiar as a ritual to create a little robot buddy who acts mostly like a normal familiar. Aside from that, you can see and speak through the servo as long as it's on the same plane, and you can ignore one of your own attacks to let the little buddy attack instead. Honestly this probably would have been more useful way earlier, but it's a bond CE, what did you expect?

Pros:

Your various forms of telekinesis give you a great deal of battlefield control, helping you manipulate the positions of enemies and allies to your advantage.

You also have great saves with two of the big three: dexterity and Constitution. Add on the fact that you can shut down the biggest problems caused by failed wisdom saves practically at will, and you're a big threat for magic users.

While your physically aren't great at burst damage like assassins or paladins, you make up for that with gobs of consistency and longevity in melee combat. You've got almost 200 HP, and an AC of 13 + your dexterity mod (4) and your intelligence mod (4). 21 AC in a hoodie is not bad at all!

Cons:

While you can shut off the worst of it, your Wisdom saves are atrocious, and will still cause you problems against illusions.

While it doesn't come into effect until very late into the build, the weirdness surrounding how your extra attacks mesh will have to be addressed eventually

Servo Crafting really doesn't do anything for your build. Not only is it not useful, if you were willing to get rid of it you could invest more into wizard levels and get Bigby's Hand for a real force choke.

[twinferns]

tfatws finale!!

ik im late i have no excuses

go watch the ep bc there will be lots of spoilers after this line

- is it bad that i don't feel bad for the government people

- no bc sharon in the disguise thing that nat used really made me think it was nat for a hot sec

- IM SCREAMED I LITERALLY SCREAMED WHEN THE SHIELD SMASHED THROUGH THE WINDOW AND SAM FLEW IN HE LOOKKS SO GOOD THE SUIT IS AMAZING IM SO HAPPY

- that's my captain america im so happy and proud

- can bartoc go away thanks

- the way bucky just picks up the phone without questioning it please

- ik karli did not just tell bucky "i fought in wwII" barnes, bucky "i fought thanos twice" barnes that he hasn't fought for something bigger than him

- bucky talking to karli about the deaths and nightmares kinda hurts

- BUCKY GOT A MOTORCYCLE but can he hurry up please

- GOD DAMN sam is so smooth with that shiled yessirrr

- did yall see how the other flag smashers didn't respond at first, the girls are fighting

- YES SAM GETTING RECOGNITION FROM THE CROWD - YES BUCKY ISNT HOLDING BACK I've been waiting for this one turn it up

- can walker stfu and go away with his five minute crafts shield

- how dare they try and manipulate me into feeling bad for walker

- train fall flashbacks!!

- I LOVE SEEING THE SHIELD WORKED INTO IN FLIGHT FIGHTING

- fully thought sam died for a second

- that lady is the real hero/hj

- ok karli i see you that kick combo thing was smooth as fuck

- bucky i know you're not planning on trying to catch the god damn bus

- i really hate when walker does something good i refuse to agree with him

- SAM DID THAT WITHOUT THE SERUM HELL YEAH LOOK AT HIM GO

- no bc im actually crying "that's the black falcon" "nah that's captain america"

- oh so now bucky is playing babysitter for walker

- omg sharon is the power broker im so shocked i never would have guessed wow

- sharon you good broski

- i love sam so much, and the way he continues to reach out to karli and try to help her, and how he refuses to fight her is just a testament to the kind of man he is, and how he's the perfect cap

- can walker shut up with the lincoln quote

- listen, karli is a cool character and i agree with her cause, but her way of doing it is all wrong, and i do think she was too far gone

- that being said i dIDNT WANT HER TO DIE JESUS - sam's speech literally made me tear up. everything he said was so poignant, and i feel like it all needed to be said in the show. he called the officials out respectfully, but also in a way that gave them no room to disagree or wiggle out of it, and with incredible honesty. his speech also applies to today, and this world. and when they panned to isaiah watching, that was it i cried

- catch me over analyzing torres' shot

- i appreciate bucky's casual line at the end, but i would have loved to see him say "let's hear it for captain america" like he did for steve in ca:tfa

- who tf is the old man in the white gloves

- zemo's just vibing in prison, reading books, getting people killed

- oh my god can walker take a hint and leave istg, but he's officially US agent now ig

- ik a lot of people are upset that we never got to see if yori forgave bucky or not, but i think the most crucial part of that visit was the fact that bucky told him, and got closure, not the forgiveness

- no im actually crying he gave the notebook to his therapist i cant do this

- this scene made me sob. how isaiah said sam was special. how sam took him to the museum to show isaiah his statue, and the way isaiah hugged sam. im so glad they did that, bc it was so needed, and isaiah deserves the recognition.

- it's canon bucky is invited to the cookout. he shows up dressed like the rich uncle, and bringing cake

- FINALLY THE SCENE WITH THE KIDS SWINGING ON BUCKY'S ARM I LOVE THAT SCENE also it shows how bucky doesn't see the arm as just a weapon and that he's growing and im so proud of him

- therapy is expensive, but you know what's cheap and easy and gets the job done? rewatching this scene obsessively

- also how bucky isn't hiding his arm? he clearly feels so comfortable and welcome in that community, and my sam and his family and it's so heartwarming

- I SCREAMED THEY CHANGED THE TITLE CARD TO CAPTAIN AMERICA AND THE WINTER SOLDIER

- they said agent carter and i could only think of peggy

- oh so sharon's gonna be like a double agent? i honestly can't wait to see how that plays out

anyways im simoultaneously so happy and said, bc the finale tied things up perfectly, but it's over.

ig we have to wait until june 11 for more content so ig i'll see y'all then

until then, im gonna obsessively watch shadow and bone :)

[sunnysviolin]

Mafia AU Pt 7

I’m feeling some Aubrey centric content in this Chili’s :O I’ve been thinking about Aubrey’s backstory non stop, and so here it is! I see Aubrey and Mari as sort of parallels to one another in this AU, and that’s how I play with them...this got really long lmao. 

TW: Mafia TW: Death

Aubrey and Mari have very similar origins. Just like Mari’s father fashioned her into the next head, Aubrey’s parents created her for a purpose as well- to be the ultimate hit-woman. They are both mercenaries, guns for hire, but they want more. She grows up being drilled not in multiplication tables, but rifle scopes and different types of poison. She is wrought iron, polished steel that is molded and shaped into the weapon that her parents need for their business. 

At eleven they end training, and they start letting her go on jobs by herself. There are some in their circle that scoff at the petite little girl with a sweet smile and a pretty bow in her hair. Aubrey’s parents send her on exceptionally brutal contracts until those scoffs die a slow painful death. 

Her parents sign a contract, and Aubrey is shipped off. Over and over. Politicians, businessmen, cheating husbands, cheating wives. Her parents point the finger and tell her a name, and Aubrey goes. Once she knows your name, your death is all but assured. Some jobs are interesting, most are just easy hits. 

Aubrey is a black widow, judge, jury, and silent executioner. The top mercenary, A grim reaper brought to life, she is the queen in her parent’s game of chess. Always a piece, but the most valuable piece there is. Aubrey hates all of these terms, she doesn’t even like the word hit-woman. It feels beneath what she does. 

Aubrey classifies herself as an ‘assassin’. Her parents couldn’t care less what role she assigns herself as long as she follows orders and carries out contracts exactly like they raised her to do. 

Mari came into power a year after Aubrey became her parent’s ultimate weapon. She was aware of Aubrey’s parents and their business, her father had contracted with them once or twice before they brought Aubrey in. More than that, Aubrey’s parents are aware of Mari.

They sent a bouquet of white lilies for her wedding along with a fully black business card and a handsome check. She isn’t sure if the lilies were a threat (Mari doesn’t know how they knew her favorite flower) but she cashes the check and buys Hero a handsome watch with it. Then she watches and waits. 

She hears word of a little black widow beginning to weave a web under her parent’s guidance, a young grim reaper who never misses. She hears these stories and sees Aubrey in her mind. A young girl who never had any other options. 

Mari gathers her information slowly and carefully. She tells only Hero of what she’s thinking, of what she wants to do. Her father’s words haunt her as she stares down at the one picture she has of Aubrey. 

Now you’re a perfect legacy. A shiver rolls down Mari’s spine. She calls Aubrey’s parents using the card they gave her two years ago. 

Aubrey is fifteen when she first hears Mari’s name. Her parents have long awaited a call from the young Don, and they’re eager for her business. Mari is known to clean house and take down other groups with a frightening frequency. If they got her to prefer contracting with them, they would make millions. Mari is aware of this, and so she knows she can ask for special treatment. 

Mari starts the call by thanking them for the lilies and telling them of the watch Hero still wears every day. She is nothing if not polite. Then she gets down to business. She wants Aubrey specifically for a job, but she wants conditions. Namely that Aubrey must stay by her side until the hit is carried out. She wants to see the queen piece at work. Aubrey’s parents only hear the dollar amount and send Aubrey off that very night. 

Aubrey is expecting the spartan accommodations she’s gotten used to. She’s even expecting a fight, as some Dons tend to want to see if she’s truly as good as they say. She is greeted by Kel and Sunny, not Aubrey, and brought into the piano room. 

Mari is there, not playing, but lying with her head in Hero’s lap as he reads to her. It’s oddly domestic for a couple that is quickly becoming the leaders of the underworld, and Aubrey is not comfortable with their outward displays of affection. Mari waits until Hero finishes the chapter, and then she sits up finally addressing Aubrey. Aubrey is ready for her marching orders, standing stiff and straight. 

Mari asks what she would like for dinner. That first interaction sets the tone for Aubrey’s entire stay. Mari keeps her by her side for her meetings with her Capos and lets Aubrey watch her wield her power, but she also keeps Aubrey close for piano lessons with Sunny, baking with Hero, movie nights where it is just the five of them in a hidden living room. Aubrey even has an extravagant bedroom, only two doors down from where the strange Don sleeps with her husband. 

It’s frustrating. It’s boring. It’s new, and Aubrey can’t stand it. Yet she finds herself craving their moments of quiet, the affection that Mari is not afraid to lavish her with. Aubrey would have thought it was disingenuous, but Mari is specific about what she compliments. Her eyes shine when she asks Aubrey for her wisdom, and she almost always takes the younger girl’s suggestions. 

The job is over in a month. Aubrey doesn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. She thinks she might end up missing them, but that was not what she was paid to do. She doesn’t even finish the job before Mari is on the phone hiring her out for another hit. Same terms. If Aubrey is working for her, then Aubrey stays with her. 

This goes on for almost a full year. Aubrey is not always with them, but when she has to do she waits to hear if Mari will contract her again. She grows fond of Sunny, tolerates (and starts to like) Kel, and Hero can manage to wiggle himself into anyone’s heart. But Mari...Mari is the one that Aubrey is fascinated by. Mari who listens to her, cares for her, treats her not as a weapon but as a whole person. 

Then Mari begins to play her own game. The game she has been crafting for three years. Aubrey is just past fifteen years old when she’s called into the piano room. She and Mari are alone, which is strange. A contract is laid on the piano. Mari is playing, not bothering to look up at Aubrey. The song she’s playing is ominous, and Aubrey is on guard. She asks Mari what’s going on, but Mari simply nods towards the contract and continues playing

Aubrey opens the manilla folder. It’s a contract for a no holds barred take out. Aubrey is allowed to do whatever she wants. Be as brutal or as gentle. Any weapon. Any time. Any price. It’s all Aubrey’s choice, but one thing. Mari has chosen the target. 

She chose Aubrey’s own parents. 

Mari does not look up, does not bother to acknowledge Aubrey at all as she reads. She has planned this since she heard of Aubrey’s existence. Aubrey is not a person who could be swayed only with kindness and love. Showing her a true family would be meaningless as long as her loyalties were divided.

Mari could have had her parents taken out for her at any point in her game, but that would take away Aubrey’s choice. Mari has been a young girl who had her choices taken from her. She is going on the assumption that Aubrey feels the way she did about her own life. 

Aubrey reads the contract and a blinding fury overtakes her. She feels used, used by the one person she thought would never use her. She says so, and Mari finally stops playing, turning to face Aubrey with a severe expression. It’s at this moment that Aubrey finally remembers exactly who Mari is.

“The game is near its end. You were your parent’s queen, then my pawn, and now you are on the other side of the board, ready to be remade. You are being given a choice for the very first time in your life. I will not take that from you. Do what you will, when you are ready to come home, your family will be waiting” 

Mari stands to her full height after that, walking out of the room with defined grace. She is barely a few inches taller than Aubrey, so why did Aubrey feel so small? Why were her hands shaking? Why could she not think?

Aubrey leaves the contract on the piano, fleeing from Mari’s house and rushing back to her own. Her parents seem frustrated with her absence, but even more frustrated with the call they just got. Someone has put a price on Mari’s head, far too much money to ignore. 

The contract sits on the piano for two weeks. Mari goes about her business as usual, and at night Hero holds her tightly to him. She spends a normal amount of time with Sunny and Kel, but there’s an air to it that none of them can ignore. Sunny and Kel do not know what occurred, what is still occurring, but they know that Mari is uncharacteristically melancholy. Sunny spends almost all of his time in those fourteen days with his sister. They sit at the piano for hours, playing and watching. The contract sits there. 

The morning of the fourteenth day of Aubrey’s absence, Mari wakes up alone in bed. She comes downstairs and sees Hero making breakfast- a full calentado. He tells her that Aubrey is waiting in the piano room. She goes to the room next to the wide elaborate staircase, standing in the doorway. Aubrey is there, her hair now dyed a shocking pink. The contract is ripped in half at her feet. 

“No more contracts. You said I could name my price. That’s my price.”

Mari pays Aubrey in full with her own family name. She brings her newly minted little sister downstairs for breakfast, reintroducing Aubrey to Sunny and Kel when they walk in the back door. They accept her easily, to them she has been a member of the family since she was given the rare permission to sleep in Hero and Mari’s home. A bedroom she always keeps, the third room. The first is Kel’s, the second Sunny’s. They always knew Mari’s plan. 

That night as Mari curls up in her Hero’s arms, she finally relaxes. For a year she’s been waiting for this, and now their victory is assured. 

Hero presses a kiss into her hair, closing his eyes. Making an anonymous bid on his own wife’s death had felt disgusting, and Hero had fought Mari on it for months. It was too much of a risk, too much trust to put on a girl who wasn’t their family. In the end Mari had been right, and Aubrey had proved herself. 

She had not wavered in her loyalty to Mari. She never would. Two years later when she sat on the counter and watched Mari take Basil’s hands in her own, she knew that their family had gained another member. Basil was given the same exact choice she was, and Aubrey knew what the blonde boy would say before he said it.

[thetypedwriter]

Lore Book Review

Lore Book Review by Alexandra Bracken 

Lore by Alexandra Bracken was one of 2021’s most anticipated YA novels and it's easy to see why. The plot summary itself is enough to pull you in with the intriguing concoction of calling it the combination of The Hunger Games and the Percy Jackson series. 

What’s not to love when you fuse the illicit danger of Katniss Everdeen with the mythological enchantment of Rick Riordan’s masterpiece?

Turns out, quite a lot unfortunately. 

Before I get into why this book didn’t live up to the insurmountable hype it built up, I’ll attempt to give a basic summary. The key word being attempt as a good portion of this novel’s plot was a mind boggling and convoluted mess. 

The book takes place in modern day New York which Bracken likes to remind you every other paragraph with small snippets about how the city that never sleeps smells like sewage and is yet still the best place on earth apparently. 

Don’t get me wrong, I love New York as much as the next person, but the pandering to the Big Apple got annoying after awhile. 

Within the cantankerous city lives a girl named Lore which we are introduced to by means of her kicking ass in an underground Chinese restaurant’s fighting ring. 

Pretty strong start. 

Lore’s world (and the reader’s frankly) is tipped upside down when Lore’s long lost childhood friend, Castor, reappears to warn her that he is looking for her. Terrified, Lore is then at first unwillingly thrust back into the world in which she was born-a world dominated by violence, bloodlines, and the Greek gods who are very much alive and out for vengeful retribution. 

In a very exposition-dump heavy conversation, we learn that Lore is the last of Perseous’ line with the rest of her family having been horrifically murdered, that a week long event called the Agon occurs every seven years in which the original nine Greek gods or their reincarnated selves become mortal for seven days, and that a series of killing often happen because if you kill a Greek god you then become that Greek god as well as inhabit their powers, abilities, and immortality. 

Well, until the next Agon that is. 

The currently reincarnated God by the name of Wrath is attempting to end the Agon by killing all the other Gods, but in order to do it he needs to wield a special weapon called the Aegis. 

Unfortunately, only the Perseides can wield this shield (for some reason) and thus, Wrath is out to get his hold on Lore as the last of her line so that he can bring this eons old competition to an end with himself as the sole victor and only remaining God. 

Confused?

I’d be surprised if you weren’t. 

Now, I love Greek mythology. I’ve read the classics and would say I’m fairly up to date on the stories, the legends, the gods, and the stories they represent. I’m not an expert, but I would say I’m  knowledgeable on who the major figures are and what they stood for. 

I genuinely think this book would have been miserable for anyone that didn’t know anything about Greek mythology.

 Bracken does a terrible job of explaining what the hell is happening at any given point, and she often throws out allusions and references to Greek mythology without bothering to explain a single shred of information about it. 

In addition, after this laughably and poorly explained world and plot at the beginning, it is almost never explained again. It’s brought up, as are names and titles and weapons and relationships, but it’s never explained in a way that’s feasibly understandable. 

At the beginning of the novel Bracken lists who all the important characters are, their bloodlines, and their titles.

 I soon figured out why, as every other sentence a name like Wrath or Reveler or Tidebringer or whoever was brought up, and it was impossible to keep track of so I didn’t even bother. 

Even Lore brings up that the names are ridiculous, which I appreciate, but the meta moment of clarity doesn't make it any better. 

Also, what Lore and her friends get up to over 90% of the novel is a muddled mass of bewilderment. 

Why do Lore and Castor and the others need to find Artemis? I don’t know, but sure, whatever, sounds good. Why was Lore the last of her line again? Oh yeah, right, okay, I guess. Wait, Castor died? Oh, he didn’t? Why not? Oh, we’re not going to explain it. Sure, sure. 

Throughout this entire novel, what the characters are doing and what is happening is almost impossible to follow with the way it's presented and the way Bracken developed her world. I think this was a really cool idea that had very poor execution. 

Points for the originality and the inclusion of Greek mythology, but all of the positives were taken away when that originality was flushed down the drain with a lack of explanation and logic. 

Lore very much reminded me of a shoot-em up, bang-em up action movie. Almost every other chapter was some sort of super intense, super climactic fight scene, chase, theft, break-in, etc. 

Now. I do think action scenes are hard to write and I think Bracken actually did an incredible job of writing action in a way that was entertaining and thrilling. 

However, when the action takes place every ten pages it gets really old, really quick. Towards the end, I downright started skimming the fight scenes, because they lacked so little depth and stakes and we had read so much action at the end point that it had lost all vigor and vitality. 

Continuing with the action movie metaphor, most action movies focus solely on the bright explosions and the crazy fight scenes as their selling point of the whole movie, often to the detriment of the characters, plot, and development. 

Now, some people like this. I am not these people. 

I find action movies boring as most of my enjoyment from consuming media comes from the characters and the developments they undergo. 

My biggest criticism with Lore, other than the astonishing storytelling, is by far the characters. I just...didn’t care. About any of them. 

Bracken tried to make Lore come across as a strong, opinionated, fierce, angry female character and while sometimes she succeeded, more often than not I found Lore temperamental, aggravating, impulsive, selfish, and shallow. 

Bracken very much invoked the tell-not-show strategy that makes any book hard to get through. While there were some decent moments of showing instead of just stating, more often than not, Bracken would tell us that Lore was strong by having other people say it or others calling her weak. 

I appreciated Bracken’s feminist agenda and how strongly Lore felt about gender inequality, even if it was a bit heavy-handed at times. Still, I did appreciate this inclusion of civil rights on this front, even if some of the circumstances to incite it were ridiculous or over the top. 

In addition, I hated that there was all this backstory that we were just told but not shown. Like in my last review of Wilder Girls, Lore suffers from an intrinsic failure of getting me onboard with these characters and their relationships by telling me how I should feel about them instead of exposing them through action. 

I was told:

Lore and Castor haven't seen each other for seven years, but my gosh, Castor is just the best and is so beautiful. Ensue obligatory YA romance. 

Lore has a best friend! Yeah. Her name is Iro. Here she is! Um. Okay. Why was this necessary?

Miles is just the coolest best friend ever. Like, look how cool and chill he is. How funny is it that he has no idea what’s happening? Really not funny at all. He was a useless character used to build empty stakes. 

  The list goes on and on, but Bracken will throw out some sort of fact or relationship and just expect the reader to go “Okay!” Which. I didn’t. On any of those occurrences. 

Often Bracken would do this in the use of flashbacks at the most inopportune times (during a fight scene, after someone was injured, right before a huge revelation, etc). These flashbacks were the worst. I do not care for adolescent Lore and child Lore was somehow even worse. 

The romance in this book, much like an action movie, is off to the side and really only there to fulfill the trope of having a romance. 

Lore and Castor are boring. I don’t know what else to say. Castor is too perfect to be likable and Lore is the opposite. Nothing about their romance was unique or well-crafted. 

The kiss between Van and Miles I also saw coming a hundred miles away. I also thought it was pointless as Van and Miles had known each for six days and had had maybe two conversations. So. No. I didn’t care at all about the romances. 

It actually made me laugh and scoff simultaneously at the end when Lore is looking at Van, Castor, Iro and Miles and smiles because she realizes that these people are her family. 

Ummm. Sorry?

Castor disappeared for seven years and you’ve been reunited for seven days. You’ve hated Van your whole life until this week. You also haven’t seen Iro in seven years and she tried to kill you at least twice in this book. Miles is...fine, but again useless. I don’t even know why Bracken included him except to make Lore worry about him which she only did about half of the time. 

Phew. 

I know this review has come across largely negative, so this might be surprising, but I didn’t hate it. It lacks substance and depth, but it was entertaining. 

Just like an action movie.

 If you want some hyped fights and a plot that really doesn't matter and characters that won’t stick with you, but a fast-paced narrative that keeps you on your toes nonetheless, then you would probably enjoy this. 

It’s like the equivalent of watching a James Bond movie or one of the millions of the Fast and Furious. Bracken tries to develop the characters, but at the end of the day, most of the story is made up of cool fights, magic, and weapons. If that’s your speed then you would probably really love Lore. 

Recommendation: Action, action, action. If you want some high intensity, get-your-blood-pumping enterprise then this is your novel. The writing is fluid, the adrenaline-inducing scenes are non-stop, and everything else falls to the backdrop of external fights and villainous monologues. If action is not your preferred genre, then your best left to get your Greek mythology needs from Percy Jackson or the Song of Achilles instead.  

Score: 6/10

[thenervousmedic]

I had a minecraft dream last night...

This is going to be a long post, but bear eith me, and take the time to read it.

I don't dream about minecraft very often. In fact this might be a first. I'm still in bed while writing this, as im afraid if I wait I'll lose a bunch of the memories.

It involved myself and a few members of the Dream SMP getting sucked into MC. Ironic, I know. Dream, George, Badboyhalo, Tecnoblade, Wilbur Soot, Tommyinnit, and myself. We all looked like our avatars... mostly, and even had some special skills i'll get into later.

To be clear, they were as they are in real life in terms of personality.

I've not watched the dream smp yet... maybe I should start soon. Anyway, side tracked...

The world worked differently than normal MC. It was more realistic, especially the combat and movement. Anything you can do irl you can do here. The drawback was that it made everything harder and more exhausting.

I was dragged in a month before the others, where over the next four weeks, I'd figure out how the lives system works; how difficult movement was; that crafting was nearly the same as normal mc; and how to build.

Five lives. There was a little tracker on the back of your hand, five squares for five lives. Each life you lost, a square would disappear. But it wasnt that simple. Every tine you died you'd feel the affects of the world more. Eating took longer, everything cost more and more realistic amounts of effort, and most importantly... taking damage would actually hurt.

On your first life damage was less of a danger and more of a 'stat' to just be aware of. Getting attacked, shot, exploded next to, ect wasn't too bad. But the more you died the more these things started to get scary. Arrows would tear their way in and ve painful to remove. You'd bleed and have actual wounds that needed care.

By the time the smp members were spawning in, I'd already been reduced to my last life. I was never good at minecraft, though im alright irl with a bow it didnt help much.

You spawn in unconcious. I'd lost my first life that way. I spawned above water. A painless drowning. I hadn't gone back to the ocean since, it scared the fuck out of me.

The first to arrive was Techno. I went back to spawn for the good sheep spawns there. Found him asleep in the grass. He was lucky no creepers had spawned.

Nearly everyone was bigger than me, I'm pretty small, so hauling this guys limp piglin ass all the way to my little safety shack was really hard.

Then Dream and George one after another. Badboy. Tommy... and finally Wilbur.

Wilbur was... a special case. He was a ghost. Just like his ghostbur skin had been. Fully awake, really freaking out. I was near collapsing from taking everyone else to my home, wasnt really much of a comfort, but I at least managed to convince him to come with me after the sun started to dip.

When we got back Wilbur helped me make beds. Couldn't have everyone sleeping propped up against the walls... Wilbur couldn't grab anything, but he could open and close chests. He also found out he could manafest things like his guitar, and a plushie orca. Things that made him a little less anxious. It was nice to hear music again.

I didnt get to talk to him long. We finished the beds, put everyone on one, then I immediatly konked the fuck out over the crafting table.

By the time I woke up, everyone was already awake and talking. The typical suspects. Why are we here, how, what happened, is this even real. You get the picture. I guess usually social anxiety, especially in the presence of people I admire so much, would've been a big stressor but after a month alone in this world I damn near started bawling at the thought of someone else even existing.

I told them all I know. We are stuck here, we have lives, dont fucking lose them it makes the game harder. The physics are just as janky as regular minecraft, mobs are much more articulated, armour actually has weight and at this point I wasnt aware of the little buffs everyone had to a particular skill.

Dream was incredibly good at exploiting the game's wonky system and parkouring, even of he couldnt nessesarily do it irl.

Techno was suddenly extremely knowledgeable about combat and could handle most weapons effectively. He was also a piglin-type guy which made him immune to fire.

George's coding skills translated directly into redstone knowledge, letting him build ridiculous machines with enough respources.

Tommy had incredible luck with loot and generally got good enchants.

And Bad was, thanks to his skin, some form of demonic entity and would be completely ignored by most hostile mobs.

Wilbur, as you know, was a ghost who could phase through anything and summon ghostly items.

We didn't find out everyone's special trait immediatly, of course. It happened over many days of trail and error trying to collect resources, build, and have fun.

Turns out my skill was useless by myself, hence why I never found it before they arrived. Anything I gave to another person was twice as effective. Healing items helped more, food would fill them on smaller portions, armour would get a free temporary enchant depending on what they needed.

I'd never liked playing minecraft alone.

I'm losing some of the dream, I shoukd wtite some bullet points down or this post will be miles long.

Tommy accidently befriended a wolf, he named it Wilbur to mess with Wilbur. We had two Wilburs.

Bad was constantly driven up the wall by peoples language but truly was using it as a coping mechanism early on because he was afraid of being stuck here forever. We made sure to swear occasionally so he'd get the oportunity to yell at us.

Techno lost his first life when a creeper blast threw him directly into Dream's sword.

Dream never got over it.

Wilbur started making more songs and even made a few targetted at the groups adventures.

Wilbur descovered if he goes into the floor he cant tell which was is up, this terrified him, he never went underground again.

George made automatic farms and eventually even non-minecraft typical things like a morning alarm clock, a compass that pointed to the nearest village, and invented new armour that was more lightweight but still protective.

Wilbur the wolf regularly barked at and mauled giant spiders before they got anywhere near the house, much to literally everyone's relief.

Bad learned how to read and write enchanting table symbols.

I taught Dream how to repair his clothes and in return he showed me how to build traps.

Techno learned he could talk hoglin, piglin, and villager.

Bad learned he could stare at endermen and mistakingly assumed everyone could so he told everyone else its ok to do so.

Tommy lost his first life to an enderman.

Wilbur worked with george for a whole week on special gloves that would let him touch stuff.

I took an arrow dangerously close to the lungs after Tomny's first respawn trying to bring him home.

Dream realised he couldn't take off his mask and wished he could see the world normally again, nobody knew what his vision was like.

Bad descovered a joy for cooking.

Bad also tamed a cat and named it Muffin.

Muffin the cat would ride Wilbur the wolf around.

Dream lost his first life to hunger after pushing himself for too long.

Techno took a wrong step in the neather and lost his second life to a seriously long fall.

I never knew what I looked like...

Tommy lost his second life being overrun by zombies without a weapon. We made a rule to never leave the house alone after this many deaths.

Bad descovered pretty late that milk is poisonous to him and thus cakes will kill him. He lost a life to cake. He was devastated.

Tommy built a cute campfire. He and Wilbur would mess around singing at it. Wolf Wilbur thoroughly enjoyed this.

I would stay up most of the night watching everyone sleep because I worried the house could get invaded or surrounded. They found out after Phantoms started spawning and made a rule that at least one of then would stay awake at night to make me feel better.

George built Dream an obstacle course with lots of moving parts and such. He ran it every morning.

I learned how to play guitar from Wilbur at the campfire.

Torches never burnt out after they arrived. No idea why.

That's all I can remember...

It was a hard dream, I was sad and angry sometimes... but the happy moments made it worth it.

I hope I return to that dream someday.

[samatedeansbroccoli]

YO

Just

YO

How do I even describe The Last of Us? There is just so much they got right that made the campaign feel timeless and every moment memorable. So much thought was put into the story to make it a near perfect product.

So what exactly am I talking about? How about bullet points because why not?

•The characters: Fleshed out, thought out, worked out, you name it, they never once deviated from their usual character. Each character was unique from their lines to the way they walked, and sometimes even the way they held a gun. Even the villains felt 3D despite there being not much more than the “I’m the bad guy” attitude (I suppose the APC group would be a bit of an exception). No matter how short of a time the character had on screen, they held their own spot within the story and were useful in such a way that removing them from the campaign and keep story integrity would be impossible.

•The worldbuilding: I mentioned this to @ricinbach but I wanted to bring it here. They made such a good choice having Ellie be too young to remember life before the apocalypse. She finds interest in things most people wouldn’t even think twice about, and when asking about the world before the apocalypse, Joel can easily provide bits of exposition without it bogging down the pace of the story. Additionally, it builds the characters too, because of Joel isn’t paying attention to Ellie, you miss a lot of these worldbuilding options.

•The music: The soundtrack is GORGEOUS. Need I say more?

•The little animations: There is something satisfying about ‘grounding animations’ (they have a name but I don’t remember what they’re called). It’s where certain tasks take time to complete. Typically, that’s what happens with healing a character in games. The character cannot be using another item while healing. The same goes for TLOU, though they added the whole crafting, collecting, viewing, switching weapons, all of it in. Also, Joel’s collecting animation is hilarious IMO.

•Crafting and gunsmith?: Weapon mods I think was what it was actually called but I’m blanking. I found the crafting and gun modding aspect to be really satisfying. Both which take time to do, and have a special animation for them (and nice little sound effects. Someone make a ‘Joel Crafting ASMR’ or something). Great little addition to the game.

Anything you didn’t like?

Just a few but many of them had to do with themes which are part of a survival instinct, so I can’t really complain. The only one I had a bit of a problem with was the change in emotion so quickly after something dramatic would happen. Time skips would kick in and the emotion didn’t last long enough for me to feel really involved within those parts.

Overall, hands down one of the best stories I’ve seen. I’ve been warned never to see TLOU 2 so I will gladly be avoiding that at all costs.

[vonbaghager]

just throwing my ideas onto my blog so they’re not buzzing around in my head anymore. DBD fan-killers: The Barber, the Abomination and the Ignited.

EDIT: And a new one, the Faceless.

The Barber, spawned entirely from a single mental image in which I imagined a killer that uses a straight razor as a weapon, cleaning it off by grinding it against a sharpening strop tied to the other arm.

Short lore blurb: Was an Old Time-y Barber, the ones that did both haircuts and surgeries. His own failing health had him search for occult methods to keep himself alive, using drawn blood as sacrifice. Eventually dove deep enough into occult lore to find out about the Entity, and became enamored with both the idea of eternal life in its realm, and with the creature itself. Strove to catch its attention by using the surgical prowess he’d learned to craft “masterpieces of agony” on unwitting victims, hoping that their pain and terror would draw the creature to him. Eventually, he received an anonymous gift: An immaculately-crafted straight razor that grew sharper as it cut flesh and bone until the victims didn’t even realize they had been cut until a single solid blow or attempt at exertion blew open all of their wounds at once.

Eventually fucked up and caught the attention of an Angry Mob, but by then had earned his place in the Entity’s Realm and fled into a foggy night, never to be seen again.

Base stats: 115% movespeed. 32 meter terror radius. Medium height (Freddy height).

Active Power: Masterpiece of Agony. Base cooldown: 5 seconds. Enter a special animation with a 1.5 second charge time, during which the Barber cannot make a normal attack but gains speed, up to 130% for up to 5 seconds. Lunging out of this state causes the Barber to madly swipe the razor out, striking every Survivor in the path of the lunge, afflicting them with a special status effect: Agonized. The Barber is greatly slowed for 1 second after the ability ends, whether he lunges or not.

An Agonized survivor’s bloodstains and grunts of pain are magnified until the status effect ends. If an Agonized survivor performs any strenuous action, such as fast-vaulting, dropping a pallet, or missing a check when repairing a generator, the Agonized state ends and the Survivor becomes injured while screaming in pain, potentially alerting the Barber. Being struck by Masterpiece of Agony while already Agonized harms the survivor as if they were attacked, meaning performing a strenuous action will drop them to dying. Agonized can be cured in the same manner as Deep Wounds.

Passive power: Sadist. The Barber’s movement speed and lunge distance is increased for every Survivor currently Agonized, hooked, or dead.

Unique Perks:

A Shrine to my Love: Your adoration for the Entity brings you comfort when you are closest to it. The cooldown of your missed attacks is reduced by [25/30/40]% while within 13 meters of the Basement. The wiggling of a survivor in your grasp has a [moderately/greatly/tremendously] reduced effect on your movement while you are within 13 meters of the Basement.

Serrated Hooks: You’ve made creative additions to the Basement, increasing the hold it has over its victims. A survivor on a Basement hook has their chance of escaping it on their own reduced [greatly/tremendously/completely], and is painfully aware of this fact*. A survivor pulled off a Basement hook is affected by both Hemorrhage and Broken for [16/20/24] seconds.

*the survivor receives a notification about the Serrated Hooks upon being speared on one, which lingers until they’re freed. Survivors rescuing their fellows from the Basement are also alerted to the Serrated Hooks.

Grasp of the Shrike: Yes, they will do. They will do nicely. The diamond atop the ring, as it were. You and the Entity become Obsessed with one survivor, clinging to them tightly and never letting go. The Obsession takes [0.5/0.8/1.0] extra seconds to unhook. Whenever the Obsession dies, another random survivor becomes the new Obsession after 13 seconds.

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The Abomination, based on the video game archetype of “really fat guy with a grappling hook” that’s really just Blizzard but leaks into other games now and then.

Once a gluttonous ruler in the past, he wished for his feast to never end, sparing no expense to have food brought to him from all over the world even as his subjects starved in the streets. When death came for him, he fought with every fiber of his being to remain in the world of the living, tearing his soul free from death’s grasp and forcing it back into his bloated body. He continued to live, but did not belong, beginning to rot and decay even as he brought in the greatest doctors and surgeons to restore him, using the very people he neglected as replacement parts for his increasingly aberrant body.

Never one to waste food, the remains of those slain to restore him were added to his menu, and soon he discovered a love of the taste for the humanity he became further and further divorced from. Ironically, he became a much better ruler the more monstrous he became, if only because the healthy and fat citizens made for better parts and better plates, but eventually it was found out just where the criminals of this prosperous land were disappearing to, and the hideous ruler was threatened with a second death.

Knowing death would not let him escape a second time, he fled from his prosperous land, but soon encountered a problem: he had not stopped rotting, and without a supply of fresh parts, he would succumb sooner or later. He spent his every last coin and gemstone seeking a cure for this condition, slaughtering those he met upon the lonely roads as he fought to remain whole, and eventually he found a solution. He would never again taste the succulence of the world he was leaving behind, but the new world held a banquet for him that would never grow dull. He wished for a feast that would never end, and the Entity granted it.

Base stats: 110% movement. 44 meter terror radius. Large size (Plague height)

Active Power: Glutton’s Grasp. Base cooldown: 8 seconds. The Abomination is slowed as it lets down a lengthy meat hook and begins loudly twirling it around. Any survivor that comes too close to the Abomination in this stance interrupts it but is damaged by the hook as if attacked. Attacking while in this stance flings the hook up to 10 meters outwards, which is blocked by terrain. If a survivor is struck by the hook, they scream and are pulled 5 meters towards the Abomination and become slowed for 2 seconds. If the survivor is pulled directly adjacent to the Abomination, its middle splits open to unveil the Great Maw, which bites into the survivor, damaging them and causing them to become Mangled for 1 minute.

The hook can also interact with certain props. Striking a partially repaired generator stuns the Abomination for 0.75 seconds as a current runs through it but damages the generator as though it had kicked the gen, causing it to regress. Striking a dropped palette stuns the Abomination for 2 seconds as it pulls the wood into the Great Maw, chewing it to pieces.

Once per trial: The Abomination can stand over a survivor who has been hooked at least twice and use the Great Maw to swallow them whole, sacrificing them instantly and becoming hasted for 2 minutes.

Passive: Corpulent Corpse. The Abomination is considerably wider than other killers, making it difficult to sneak or dash past it if it’s in a narrow enough area.

Unique Perks:

Varied Diet. Even the most luxurious banquet can grow boring without variety. Each time you strike a survivor with your basic attack, gain a token, to a maximum of 4/6/8 tokens. Each token grants you 1/2/3% increased movement speed and vaulting speed. Striking the same survivor twice in a row causes you to lose 2 tokens. 

Hex: Abattoir. This Hex turns the lockers within the trial into deathtraps for your victims. An injured survivor hiding in a locker bleeds profusely, creating a noticeable pool of blood. If a survivor lingers in a locker for 20/15/10 seconds, they become injured, or are pushed into the dying state if already injured.

Starved Rush. The scent of their flesh, the smell of their blood, it calls to you, driving you into a frenzy the longer you go without it. You enter Bloodlust [slightly/moderately/considerably] faster and do not immediately lose it if you break a pallet.

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The Ignited. Had the mental image of someone undergoing an Oni-style rage transformation, except they burst into flames.

There’s not much of a story for this one tbh. Probably someone who was burned at the stake and called down horrific vengeance for their unawful destruction, becoming what they were accused of (a vampire, a witch, a werewolf, etc). The alternate tale that I like more is that they were just a pyromaniac that finally decided to burn down their own house with them inside so they could feel what their victims felt.

Base stats: 105% movement. 16 meter terror radius. Medium size (Blight height)

Active Power, Kindling form: Choking Smog. Base cooldown: 20 seconds. Unleash a cloud of black smoke the Ignited can perfectly see through, but which is completely opaque for survivors. The smoke spreads outwards to cover a 11 meter radius, choking survivors inside of it, causing them to loudly cough. Survivors in the smog are Exhausted and slowed. The cloud lingers for 6 seconds.

Passive power (Cinder Form): Building Inferno. The Ignited is unaffected by the trial’s fog. The Ignited can interact with piles of tormented kindling that spawn throughout the trial, gathering energy from each of them. The Ignited can also gather energy by damaging generators and survivors, and hooking survivors. At maximum charge, the Ignited can activate the secondary power to explode into their Wildfire Form. All the survivors receive a notification when the Ignited enters Wildfire Form as it shrieks in agony and rage.

The Ignited in Wildfire Form has a terror radius that covers the entire map, moves at 130% speed, and becomes taller than the Plague. A pillar of fire and smoke travels up from its body to signify its position at all times. Wildfire Form lasts for 1 minute, after which it drops back to Cinder Form.

Active Power (Wildfire Form): Pyroclasm. The Ignited charges up briefly and then blasts an incredibly wide cone in front of it (roughly equal to its FOV but only 6 meters in length). Survivors in the area are damaged, generators in the area begin regressing, and dropped pallets in the area begin burning and will be fully destroyed after 5 seconds unless a survivor slides across them. Survivors injured--but not downed--by Pyroclasm gain a unique status effect: On Fire! Survivors who are On Fire glow softly with flame and their auras are revealed to the Ignited, shouting and screaming as long as they remain On Fire. On Fire lasts for 1 minute, until the survivor is put into the dying state, until they vault a pallet or window, or until they stop moving and spend 3 seconds patting themselves down.

Unique Perks:

Smokesight: The fog thickens in your presence, though it’s no impediment to you. The trial fog is [slightly/moderately/considerably] thicker, though you see through it as if it were two stages lighter.

Hex: Fear of Failure: To build a tower so tall just to see it fall before you, it is a feeling that can invoke despair in any, and one this Hex enhances to self-destructive levels. If you kick a generator that has been repaired above [75%/50%/25%] progress while your totem still stands, the last survivor(s) to work on that generator shriek in frustration and are highlighted for 3 seconds if they are within [24/32/40] meters.

Hex: Trap in the Blaze: Lock them inside. Seal the windows, bar the door. Let them burn. Let them burn. Let them burn. When the exit gates are powered, this Hex flares to life if there is a dull totem for it to inhabit. The switch to the gates is partially infested by the Entity, slowing all attempts to touch it. Interacting with the switch takes an extra [3/4/5] seconds. Abandoning the exit switch causes it to slowly regress.

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The Faceless. what if there was a stealth killer even more humanoid than the pig?

Not sure of a backstory here. Either a member of an ancient species trying to avoid total extinction, or an envious human who altered their own bodies with strange chemicals, vile magic, and horrible operations until they could look like anyone they wanted. 

Base stats: 110% movement. 32 meter terror radius. Large size (Demogorgon height in true form).

Active power: Assume Guise. The Faceless loudly and grotesquely reshapes its body into the shape of a random survivor in the trial, letting all survivors within the terror radius hear the cracking and squishing just before the terror radius abruptly vanishes. The noises are noticeable enough to be heard a short distance outside the terror radius, akin to the Wraith or the Spirit vanishing. Any survivor within a 15 meter radius is briefly highlighted by Killer Instinct after the transformation is complete. While disguised, the Faceless has no terror radius and is treated by the game as though it were a survivor. If its aura becomes revealed by any perk or item, it appears as though it were a survivor, even if the perk or item reveals the killer’s aura only.

While it can crouch and sprint as a normal survivor, the Faceless cannot interact with props like a survivor can, with the exception of vaulting pallets or windows. It cannot open chests, repair generators, or sabotage hooks. When it assumes a survivor’s shape, it cannot copy any items they hold, nor can it pick one up or use them. If the survivor its copying is injured, it is not. Its voice as a survivor is ever-so-slightly distorted.

Assuming its true form is a horrid affair, stunning the killer for 2 seconds as it bursts from its former body. After transforming back, the Faceless is hasted for 4 seconds and Assume Guise is placed on a 10 second cooldown.

Active power (disguised form): Backstab. If the Faceless performs the healing action on a survivor using the secondary power button, it acts as though it’s healing them for 5 seconds, after which it suddenly strikes, afflicting the target with Deep Wounds and Hindered and beginning its transformation back.

Unique Perks

Hex: False Friendship. This Hex confounds and distorts your aura, leading your prey to blunder into your grasp. While the totem stands, any time your aura would be revealed, it appears as though it’s a survivor aura, and the survivor(s) reading your aura are highlighted by Killer Instinct for [8/12/16] seconds if they’re within 40 meters of you.

Subtle Sabotage: Your machinations are much more insidious than that of your brutish kin. After kicking a generator, the generator becomes Sabotaged for [60/80/120] seconds, regressing continuously even as it’s being worked on, effectively halving the speed it’s repaired at. A sabotaged generator loses this status if it fully regresses, or if the survivors working on it succeed [2/3/4] Great skill checks on it without abandoning it. Sabotaged gens are highlighted to the survivors, and survivors working on a sabotaged gen are aware of how much longer the status will last and how many skill checks are required to undo it.

Calming Emanations: Let them have their hope, if only so it’s more spectacular when it shatters. Each uninjured survivor reduces your terror radius by [18/20/22]%.