#But most of the time the game goes out of its way to avoid using gendered terms for Mizuki

[lemonynuggets]

pjsk fans don’t misgender Mizuki impossible challenge

[aliceinborderlandsquidgame]

The Salesman | SFW alphabet + being obsess with his wife

Can be read as part of this

Template credit

Warnings: Parts with Suggestive things - Obsess!Salesman - Wife!Reader - Possessive!Salesman - Grammar mistakes -

A = Affection (How affectionate are they? How do they show affection?)

The Salesman its not someone who usually shows affection or gets said feeling towards anyone. In fact for most years he thought he was unable to feel such a thing.

But then you came into his life and shattered that thought. He ended stalking you around Seoul, getting to know you before he did a first approach. He called it fascination at first, but when he finally got to know you for real he fell hard for you.

His ways of showing affection are quality time together, since he has some complicated hours at work he looks out for things you two can do together. Avoids the places where he usually goes.

Words, he loves calling you cute nicknames and telling you how well you did something. No matter what it was he makes a big deal out of it.

Contact, if he could take you everywhere with him, he would. He needs to have you by his side, being able to touch you its a must. He needs one kiss from you for his day to be good.

B = Best friend (What would they be like as a best friend? How would the friendship start?)

Most likely you two would be friends if you two used to work for the Organization and shared the same twisted dark mind set back then.

Like that he is a chaotic one, he does not like breaking the rules, in fact he lives by them. But would push your limits both inside the island and outside.

If you two worked as recruiters then you two would have friendly competitions on who can get more peopel into the games and bet on them once the games starts.

C = Cuddles (Do they like to cuddle? How would they cuddle?)

YES. He is a big softie for his wife. After a long day of seeing the kind of peopel he hates the most he comes home needing you. 

Will drag you to either the bed or the expensive couch the saw you seeing one time and got it for you, cause why not? The best for his wife.

Will hug you from behind, let his head fall on your shoulder and whisper how much he loves you and how happy he is with you.

If you two lay down then he would like to have you pressed against his chest, facing him so he can give you small kisses or being the small spoon so he can hug you against him and act as a shiled from the world.

D = Domestic (Do they want to settle down? How are they at cooking and cleaning?)

THIS MAN SAW YOU AND WAS ALTERADY PLANNING THE WEEDING.

He is actually good at both. He likes to keep his home clean and prefers food that he made himself. However he cant compare his coking skills with yours. After the first time he tried your food he was unable to make himself food again. Why ? Because yours its just better!! And dont ask him to eat fast food, he hates it.

E = Ending (If they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?)

Oh sweet you, he would NEVER break up with you.

If for some reason you start to act strange and distant yourself from him he will gashlight you and blame you, manipulating the situation on his favor so you would feel bad for even think about it.

No. He needs you like his lungs needs air, he cant and wont ever let you go. He would destroy your personal life first so you would have no one to reach for.

You are his light and muse, he wont let you go.

F = Fiance(e) (How do they feel about commitment? How quick would they want to get married?)

FAST. As I said he saw you and he was planning the weeding.

Even if he wants to get married fast he would work himself to be seen as a proper future husband. If you have friends then he would act as a gentlemen and even make them jealous of you. Your family would love him to no end, and would joke about when the weeding will be.

Your mom/dad may beg you to marry him since he is a good man and wants the best for you.

G = Gentle (How gentle are they, both physically and emotionally?)

SFW: SOFTIE. Loves to hold you close, smell your perfume and have your hands around him. It helps him ground himself down when he is too stressed.

Emotionally he is complicated, for you he is a open book at least with his feelings of devotion towards you. He is very vocal by how much he cares for you and how happy you make it. When it comes to personal matters, mostly his work he prefers to keep you in the dark about it. He does not want you to see him any different.

NSFW: At first in order to not scare you away he would be gentle and vanilla with you in bed. Then he would slowly introduce you to his depraved and dark side of it.

Does he manipulate you into giving in? Yes, yes he does. But you wont ever notice it.

H = Hugs (Do they like hugs? How often do they do it? What are their hugs like?)

He likes them, his hugs are short but with full of meaning. He likes to give you one during the mornings and at night.

Its a routine he has, he needs to at least give you one during the day.

On special times his hugs will be longer, maybe in your anniversary, he will hold you in his arms against his chest letting you listen to his heart beat.

I = I love you (How fast do they say the L-word?)

In is mind, he tells you the L word just days after starting dating you, or even while he stalked you.

He knows he loves you, but wants you to say it to him first so he can respond pulling all his heart in these words.

J = Jealousy (How jealous do they get? What do they do when they’re jealous?)

He gets easily jealous, not because he does not trust you. But because he wants you all for himself.

Not only does he gets jealous over strange males, but over your friends too.

If he feels like you are passing too much time with them, then he will use his charm to keep you away from them.

If things gets more serious...then he will just make them dissapear, he may torture them or take two at times and makes them play a deadly game but the catch is..no one has a chance of winning.

K = Kisses (What are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?)

Oh! His kisses are full of love and passion, his favorite spot its defenetly your lips. He loves to kiss them till they end all red and puffy.

Your neck is another place, he likes to leave both, small kisses and long ones in order to leave marks behind.

He likes to be kissed by you on his lips, neck, cheeck and hands. The last one its his personal favorite since it makes him feel less of a monster...or does not care what he does as long as you like his hands.

L = Little ones (How are they around children?)

Actually no.

He can fake around kids that are not his but he does not want kids with you.

He wants to live a long life with you and only you. He wants your attention only on him.

M = Morning (How are mornings spent with them?)

Depends on how the night activities went.

Sometimes he lets you sleep while he gets ready but he finds you making him breakfast. Thats a thing that always happen.

If he feels like he wants to spend more time with him then he would ask you to shower with him, and help him dress for the day.

N = Night (How are nights spent with them?)

Depends on how he wants the night to go and and what time he gets back.

If he comes early and just wants to spend quiality time with you, you two would watch a movie or talk for a bit.

And if he wants to do another tnings...well you two are in for a long time.

If he comes home late then he would prefer you to be asleep, since he still has to shower and other things.

But you usually wait for him awake or wake up once he gets in, you like to see his tired face light up when he sees how much you worry over him.

O = Open (When would they start revealing things about themselves? Do they say everything all at once or wait a while to reveal things slowly?)

Its complicated. He likes how you see him and only know of his depraved side when it comes to sex.

He may twist the truth about his past and what he does for work, maybe with a few years he will reveal something more, but nothing that would scare you.

P = Patience (How easily angered are they?)

He has much patience, needs it for his work and it traslates to your relationship. Its not like you can do more to break his patience, he deals with worse things.

Q = Quizzes (How much would they remember about you? Do they remember every little detail you mention in passing, or do they kind of forget everything?)

He remembers every single detail.

Even since he stalked you and got all your personal information, its like his second life.

What you like and dislike, what type of music, food, colors and activities, he remembers all of it.

Its impossible for him to forget a single detail when it comes to you.

He remembers your the special dates, from the first time he saw you to the first date you to had.

Your anniversary date its printed on his mind, you will find the most romantic dinner waiting for you, the most relaxing day just for you.

R = Remember (What is their favorite moment in your relationship?)

His favorite moment its one centrain day, the day you told him you loved him.

It was a sunny day of spring, both of you were walking around a park, seeing the flowers and nature as well as other couples.

He had stopped to buy you some sweet and was enjoying seeing you munch over them.

"You know, we have been dating for some time now" You said to him, stopping to look up at him.

Taking a deep breath you added "And I cant keep this hide from you anymore, I love you, I have never feel loved like this before. And I have never loved someone so much before, it makes my heart feel heavy in a good way. And I want you to know it, I love you"

S = Security (How protective are they? How would they protect you? How would they like to be protected?)

He is very protective over you.

While he knows the organization wont do anything to you unless you do something to interfer with the games he feels at ease with that.

He does not trust the people.

He hacks your phone so he can know where you are at all hours. Has cameras at his home and a security system in case someone breaks in.

He even teachs you to use a gun and fight just in case.

(Having you around him its just a plus)

T = Try (How much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?)

LOTS. Each date, anniversary and gift suprasses the last one.

He will ask you what you biggest dream is and make it come true. Gets you the best gifts and take you to the most fancy and fun dates.

Even once you two are married he likes to still take you out like old times.

U = Ugly (What would be some bad habits of theirs?)

He is:

A stalker.

Manipulative

Gaslighter

Possessive

Control freak but hides it.

He is a red flag, a walking one. But even that he gets all softie for you, his dear wife.

V = Vanity (How concerned are they with their looks?)

Well, he knows he is good looking and likes to take care of how he looks. But only for you.

Wants to look handsome and well dress for you. Does not care if he catches the eyes of others, he just wants you to look at him and tell him how good looking he is.

W = Whole (Would they feel incomplete without you?)

Totally. He never felt complete before, always alone and going on with his days. He never cared if he felt lonely, not till he met you from afar and then for real.

To him, you are his soulmate, his other half, his human side and lover. The one who grounds himself and brights his life.

X = Xtra (A random headcanon for them.)

If you have a special plush to sleep with, he gets jealous of it. Even if he got you the plush himself.

Y = Yuck (What are some things they wouldn’t like, either in general or in a partner?)

Honestly if he ends being obsess with you he may ignore whatever thing he may dislike from you.

Does this mean he would not try and change you? Oh no, he would.

Something he dislikes is disobedience , if he tells you to not ask about his work he expects you to do as told. You cant follow, you cant enter his office...

Thats what he hates the most.

Z = Zzz (What is a sleep habits of theirs?)

Before meeting you, he would sleep six hours. And thats it. His nights are plagued with nightmares and lots of times he would wake up before his alarm and look outside the window, towards the dark till the sun comes out and the lights of other houses starts to get on.

But once he meets you, he becomes a heavy sleepier, he loves to cuddle you during the night, with you by his side his nightmares are gone. His six hours passed to be eight hours, more if he feels greedy and want to stay besides you some more.

[literalgrill]

Do NOT Support Hard Drive On Patreon

You might see friends today suggesting you support Hard Drive on Patreon today. You know, the funny video games version of The Onion? As a journalist, I will firmly tell you DO NOT GIVE THEM A DIME.

The CEO has pushed out all former staff that have built the site up to its current greatness and has been pushing the use of AI. The staff begged to have a Patreon before basically all being pushed out, but the idea was refused until now, when it will only line the pockets of a single person instead of hard working writers.

I know they might have provided laughs before, but Hard Drive is a shell of what it was once. Let it die and support the people who actually made those moments of joy possible. Don't believe me? Check out what former employees are saying below:

Kevin Podas: Okay you know what, I would feel bad saying nothing about this, so here goes:🚨SAVE YOUR MONEY🚨

We passionately advocated for a Patreon at Hard Drive & were aggressively shot down. The talent & people who built the site were pushed out. To see this now is beyond upsetting. For the past few years or so I put a lot of myself into this website. I pitched a ton of jokes, got over 120 articles published, & met a lot of great people. I'm sure if you've been following me for some time you could easily see this.

However, there is a lot of misinformation. I was eventually promoted to Managing Editor of the site & was ecstatic. Grateful for the opportunity. Felt like all of my hard work in the comedy mines was finally paying off. But things took a turn for the worst, & each day there were new surprises that affected our livelihoods. These were all very avoidable surprises, mind you.

A patreon was going to be our hail mary, but alas, for some reason, the power that be did not want it. Causing us to leave a dream job behind. "At least we did all we could," we consoled ourselves afterwards. I put a lot of myself into this project. I pitched all sorts of ideas that could have helped-- we all did. Merch collaborations, Patreon-integrated YouTube content, so much more. And most of them were shot down out of sheer stubbornness and nothing more. To see lie after lie spread, and multiple big publications and YouTubers that I am a fan of promote this Patreon under these pretenses is incredibly upsetting. There are so many receipts.

Please share this and consider pulling out if you've already put money into this. On Hard Drive using AI, also from Kevin Podas: I can't personally confirm that part aside from some of the recent header images for articles on both Hard Drive and Hard Times are being made with AI. As far as writing, it's been mentioned in the past, but I personally do not know. Maybe others do, maybe not. MORE From Kevin Podas suggesting the owner denying a Patreon being set up earlier cost an artist a job that was replaced by AI: We had a social media person who was awesome! He made the images until this AI implementation. He had to leave because ad revenue was low and a Patreon was aggressively refused.

Luca Fisher: at the risk of burning some bridges, i have to back up kevin here. i've only been part-time, in-and-out of hard drive since i got in last year, but i can corroborate that management doubled and tripled down about not hosting a patreon/crowdfunding and that many other suggestions and ideas, including mine (and ones much smarter than mine!), were shot down in really long, apocalyptic threads of everyone left on deck desperately trying to come up with ways to keep the lights on. managerially it has been messy and sad

i've written for multiple publications that have long since died, ones that were in the process of dying, and ones that, in this case, are soon to be put in the ground. it is sad and sucks every time. i don't know what could have been done differently, but i do know that a lot of great writers and content creators were left shorthanded and unhappy by the way things have gone. and it is sort of puzzling to see the sudden championing of patreon after we were all told plenty of times that it couldn't work and we should move on also, just to add my own personal two cents here, i was really disappointed by the shuttering of many different article sections on the site over the past 6-8 months. i understand cutting corners in a deficit, and i know it had to be done. that said…

all in all, i'm really sad to see this all happen. i don't fault anyone, if only because i don't really know enough about how this all can happen to make sense of it. games journalism is in a sad, sorry state, and will likely no longer be a thing in the next decade

VideoSealMan: I'm gonna say this because I think I deserve to. For months, MONTHS on end I was bugging Hard Drive management about a Patreon. Often I got ignored for a week+, but when I actually got a response I was encouraged to - of all things, write up a Google Doc pitching the concept I did it regardless. I wasn't the only one trying to sway management on a Patreon, but so fiercely was I fighting for it that last night, I was accused of making this comment directly by the CEO! With no evidence whatsoever! After I'd been gone for over a month.

I vouched so hard for Patreon because I wanted all the writers and creatives working with Hard Drive including myself to get paid better. When I actually got a response, the idea was often shut down. Eventually due to the state of my company, my pay was cut for a second time I confronted management alongside a couple other important figureheads at the org and told them that if we couldn't do a Patreon - I could no longer financially justify staying there. The answer was still no, so I left. Baffled at the decision, but whatever.

It is unendingly frustrating to know that myself and many other people who put their soul into Hard Drive LEFT because of management's absolute refusal to compromise on a Patreon, to then see them launch one anyway a month later and get over 1000 people pledging money. I'm seeing a lot of things float around about greed and people being fired. No one was fired. Everyone who left, left because they were sick of management's decision-making. And honestly, management is a lot of things but I would not call them greedy. (From my experience.) They did genuinely make an effort to pay people as much as possible. I found the pay very fair for a while. I am not disputing that I was paid what I was owed - yet management frequently feels the need to remind critics of that. Lmao, yes. I was paid what I was owed. No one is disputing payment. You did the bare minimum a business owner should do and paid everyone their due, very well done. I make no allegations of greed, cheating or foul play. I make allegations of poor management and incompetence that has fucked over other people.

Basically the only people left at Hard Drive have been there for about 2 months. They will reap the rewards of this successful Patreon I and so many others passionately fought for for so long. We will not see a dime.

I do not know the new people at Hard Drive, But I feel bad for them. They were haphazardly thrust into Hard Drive's workplace with little to no explanation on how anything works, or given any context on the state of the place. Even now managements feeds them half-truths and misinformation about other people's grievances. I am broke and have been for a while. I had to move out of my flat in Reading and back with my family because of how little money I was making. This has basically doomed my flatmate to moving back in with abusive parents, which is something I feel guilty about every day. If we had gone with the Patreon I worked myself hoarse over back then, this could have been avoided. Some of my other good pals could also not have been fucked over.

It was a bad judgment call, but it's not a crime. It's just management getting it wrong.

So should you give to the Hard Drive Patreon? I don't know! I don't think any of the new people working there to patch up the holes left by the recent mass exodus have any bad intentions. Maybe they deserve it! But it is not the same site you knew a year ago, or even a month ago. Myself and many people who were there far longer than me and did far more for it than I did are all gone now because we could not deal with management's terrible decision-making and dogass communication any longer. That's what you should know, imo

I had an agreement in place with management that I would receive the next 8 months of revenue from the Hard Drive YT channel from my leaving in November. This was a deal I appreciated, and thought was very fair on management's behalf. So far, the deal has been honoured for 2 months. However as of last night I was removed from the Hard Drive Slack without warning, and as an editor for the YouTube channel. This means I no longer have any way of verifying how much I am owed, I just have to take their word for it. I'm sure management will make their own statements full of half-truths and weird language on the many cases being brought against them - I'd take everything they say with a pinch of salt if some of the screenshots I've seen of them talking about me are any indication lol

To management; I do not want to talk to you. I want you to DM me a screenshot of how much I'm owed every month and then send me the money per our agreement until June, then we can go our separate ways. Do that and admit to your mistakes, and maybe you can recover your reputation! That's it from me, lol. If they pull out of the deal and fuck me over I'll have more to say, but most of what I know is other people's stories of incompetence and poor decision-making, lol. I genuinely get no pleasure out of doing this; I do not think management is evil - I just think they're really bad at what they do and it's cost other, more talented people, lol. You should believe the writers imo

One last thing I wanna say btw, management did often stress that no one should try to make Hard Drive a full time thing. They were transparent about that, and that is fair. I was working on it because at a few points, I was lead to believe we actually were doing a Patreon. Many other ppl have similar stories of being strung along by management changing their minds and stop-starting shit every 2 weeks. We all made the fatal mistake of overestimating our manager - who would tell you one thing one day and something totally opposite the next week lol

Hunter R. Thompson:

I'm not your dad, but speaking as a Hard Drive writer, I don't know that funding Hard Drive on Patreon is worth it

The driving talent on the back end—behind the kickass site I joined in 2019—have peaced out over the years as the site's been (in our view) increasingly mismanaged. Mismanagement like, not setting up crowdfunding before the ship sank and all its best crew failed; or publishing a screenshot of Andy Ngo pedojacketing a trans writer, complete with her deadname; or a disgruntled ex-writer getting falsely accused of shit-talk, by actual staff. I'm grateful for the writing I've gotten to produce for HD (and will forever be kicking myself for not writing even more, in the four years I've had to do it!! i'm a dumbass!!!) but it is very much no longer the site I signed up for.

I don't want to resign as a contributor altogether, because I'm open to the idea of the site recovering and bad practices being retired as finances level out-- it would just be dishonest for potential backers to not be Aware Of The Circumstances, I think.

Jeremy Kaplowitz: i truly don't want to start shit, but feel compelled to say: i want to see Hard Drive succeed w/o resorting to throwing former writers & editors, myself included, under the bus. surely there's a way to save the site without building it over the corpses of those who left. my $0.02 i don't blame anyone who wants to sign up for the HD patreon and i support the website, but that includes those who worked on it for years, have complaints, and don't deserve to be treated like bitter assholes like this kind of stuff is just objectively true, meanwhile there's these new writers who joined the site after i left (meaning, in the last ~3 months) claiming people are liars. decide for yourself if you care, but this is what happened! [Quotes this Tweet]

Seth Finkelstein: Writing for Hard Drive has been a privilege the past few years, and it makes me so angry to see people I looked up to get jerked around behind the scenes. The amount of grenades the editors jumped on our behalf is immense, and I don't think the way they're being treated is right.

Other Bits On AI: We do know for sure however that AI art has been used by the site. Its fucking owner confirms it here:https://twitter.com/MattSaincome/status/1743040541603123622. Seems the owner pushed AI written articles as well! TayFabe: My vaguetweet is making the rounds & these made me apoplectic. - owner regularly lobbied using ai. Once he tested it & said ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. - ai images were used on the site & socials w/o consulting the team or disclosing it publicly I found the ai bit relevant to include bc 1) it illuminates a stark change in HD's current direction & leadership, 2) ai images have previously been used on the site and (since deleted) ig posts, 3) ai content fucking sucks, and repeatedly pushing to use it is a telling quality The "handful of writers who chose to leave" includes 2 editors-in-chief (both cofounders who wrote a combined total of >1,000 articles & defined the voice of HD), & at least 3 other editors. These guys put in WORK since 2017, so cool to be corrected by ppl who joined in Nov 2023 [Link to mentioned vague tweet from post.] More from TayFabe: owner continuously lobbied for using ai in every possible way. No one else wanted to do it, but he kept on, saying ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. Also, ai images were used on the site & socials without public disclosure or consulting the team.

The owner has responded now multiple times in a private discord... Thank you for people sharing screenshots! First Screenshot:

Kevin's Response: He banned me from the server for speaking out, so no, I didn't see it. And he gave no indication of a timeline, it was just "we'll do one when *I* say so" and gave every inclination he was totally against it. It bred an environment that pushed our hands to have to leave. Screenshot Round Two:

Kevin's Response: "Starting one in 3 months" is an absolute lie. He denied it, I have screenshots and others who can confirm. No timeline was given. Just "this is what it is now" and like, I couldn't live off of that. I wanted to do more but he was allergic to good ideas from others around him.

Matt, owner of Hard Drive, responds publicly on Twitter.

Matt: Kevin, the patreon launch was delayed because I didn't think it would work. Everyone is happy that it did work. Everyone who left the site because we didn't have money to pay for creative content which didn't revenue is welcome to return home. But unclear why the hostility.

Hard Drive paid out literally every dollar it had, then a bunch more, to creative people who worked on the site. When we ran out of money, we couldn't pay anymore. We did our best.

Kevin: Right, and my point of this thread was that it was completely and totally avoidable. This is reasonable to be upset about. How could I have been any more clear?

Matt: If we knew with 100% certainly that the community would have supported us via patreon, we would have done that. We didn't know. We had tried 4 years ago and got no support. We were wrong this time. We did our best to figure it out. We paid all the money we could.

Kevin: So you knew with 100% certainty this time? Or you took a leap of faith?

Matt: It was a last gasp panic effort after ad rates got cut in half on january 1st due to seasonal spending changes. We didn't know it would work. We were embarrassed to ask for support. We wanted to figure it out.

Kevin: Every site has a Patreon. Every YouTuber, comedy group, etc. But you insisted that nobody cared about Hard Drive. Which is wildly untrue. I know you see that now, but again, I think you can see why I and many others are pretty upset. A last ditch panic effort was long overdue. A couple more things from Matt:

It was about the size of the hole we needed plugged budget wise, the time I had left of personal resources, and the past data I had about us trying a patreon (which turned out to be a bad indicator). I didn't think the Patreon would help us fast enough. I made a bad estimation

aka "if we make $1000 more dollars a month via patreon, which would be 10x what we got last time, we will not solve any of our problems. If instead we try to plow down path B, we might make it out in time." That was the thinking. I chose the wrong path, but didn't mean to Kevin also retweeted this comment from the user Matt was responding to: So you're saying that you're bad at running the business, didn't listen to any of your employees until after they were forced to leave their jobs, and now you're going to get more of the money from the Patreon that was their idea in the first place? Matt's Response: Respectfully, I made a mistake delaying the patreon decision. But keeping a comedy site alive for 9 years is not easy, there are lots of potential ideas, and think overall we've done a good and honorable job. Will leave this thread in peace now to allow people their space.

Sorry for linking to Elon's hellsite (derogatory), but sources need links so...

[midnite-c6]

Watching the daily dose of sunshine makes me think of a au, where nam-gyu goes to rehab and his main doctor is timid!reader, like he’s always teasing you for being so shy and everything!!

I LOVE YOU. SO SO MUCH. sorry guys i gotta confess, i know doctor x patient is weird esp if its IN a mental hospital, but if i was kim seowan's doctor in ddos i would've FOLDED so fast (sorry).

patient!nam-gyu x doctor!reader <3 warnings: 18+, DARK content, dubcon, manipulation (please read at your own risk!!)(kind of a ddos au!!)

*⁠.⁠✧ : he SCARED you so much during the games, how he was killing people left and right (esp during lights out), how he was practically one of the strongest people there. he made you feel incredibly small, he'd constantly mock you, constantly humiliate and embarrass you because you were just. so. quiet! luckily for you, and for him i guess, player 456 successfully stopped the games half-way thru leaving some of the players to stay alive.

for some reason, to everyone's surprise, he'd try to change for the better. as soon as he got that 400 million something won distributed among all the other players, he'd go to some nice rehab center, he was traumatized, definitely. he'd wait patiently for his doctor to prescribe him some shit since he was definitely on the brink of overdosing himself during the games, but when he looks up to see your face, he flinches, and every self-development in his body crumbles as he grinned widely.

"you?" you gasp, your heart dropped from seeing him again. it was like you were the one who needed therapy right this moment. "what are you d- ahem, good afternoon, sir." you'd carefully sit down on the other side of the desk. "it's really a small world." he plops his arms on the table, resting his head in his arm as he gives you the snarkiest smile. "so? you're a doctor..? you sighed, trying to ignore him, ".. it says here in your file that-" "shhhh." he shushed, placing his finger atop your lips. you are now thankful for the desk between the two of you since he's already uncomfortably close to you now. "miss, are you capable of making me feel better?" he'd ask in a voice and expression you'd truly feel bad for, if it just was anybody else doing it. "..you barely did anything during the games, how could you save me?" he tilts his head. you'd only do what you were most familiar of doing, avoiding his gaze and looking down, you weren't like this with any other patients who'd come to you, but nam-gyu truly traumatized your very being.

"tsk." he'd grab your chin to look up at him. "look me in the eye, doctors should be social. right, miss?" your heart would beat faster, his tone sounding just like the ones he'd use during your first encounter. he'd give you that same look of terror, as if trying to make you fear him, which infact works, and you'd sit there staring at him with a big frown! he only laughs after a couple of seconds, "jeez, looks like you need a doctor for your own." his laugh had broken you from that distracted trance, you were a doctor for christ's sake!! "sir, you've confessed into taking alot of substances during the past month, leading to a potential overdose, i'd advise you to stay here to sober up." you say straightforwardly before he could respond anything else. he'd tuck his long black hair in behind his ears and hum, "that was so fucking cute. you being professional and all that.."

---

he did stay, as it was advised by the one and only you, you'd given him check-ups from time to time and you'd see him with the other patients, but one particular day, he'd occasionally crashout, making you keep an eye on him more frequently. he'd call for you from his bed..and as to not lose your job, you'd come in an instant. seeing him laid down, in his hospital gown,. "miss. c'mere.. please." he whined, a 180 of his own character. "yes? sir, how are you feeling..?" he'd reach out to cup your face, looking into your eyes. "i just can't seem to forget... i've watched so many deaths, right infront of my eyes.. " you nod, listening intently, for a brief second you'd feel your utmost sympathy towards him. "and i was gonna get something like ketamine to forget about it again." - he'd cut you off before you could scold him: "..but, i know i'm here to become sober, so.. i wanna know.. what else are you good for, miss?" like a muscle memory, you know what to answer, "obviously-" but he'd cut you off AGAIN. "..and i don't want those stupid medicine shit." he'd pull you in closer to him, where you could feel his breath tickling your face. "c'mon, you were there too, don't you want to forget, aswell ..?" he'd place a soft peck on your lips, letting it linger before lightly biting your lower lip. why didn't you pull away? that's really the big question. why didn't you? you wanted to.. but.. you know very well about his crashouts.. or how he'd act out.. but in these moments you'd find out you're the worst doctor ever.

nsfw below!!-> (⁠ ⁠◜⁠‿⁠◝⁠ ⁠)⁠♡

he'd use up all his remaining strength to pull you ontop of him, letting out a low groan of relief. he'd now keep a tight grip on your hips, knowing that you'd probably gain some consciousness right about now.. but you don't.. you're stupid. you're a fool to his tactics. "oh wow..." his hands would slowly explore your body, with light feather touches. and you'd only stare at him in shock, wondering why you've let him break that patient and doctor relationship dynamic, "fuck. you're even cuter like this." he'd press your body against his, nothing was covering him underneath that hospital gown, so you could already very much feel his everything. to his surprise, he'd see your face contort from the pleasure, whatever's happening right now is just as fucked up as him. "hmm, you like that?" he'd moan out loud, "it's working on me," he'd tore apart your silly pencil skirt, why were you wearing that as a doctor, anyway? his thumb pressing down on your clothed clit. he'd push your panties to the side, making your juices drip on his hospital gown. "let me feel you for real, miss."

it didn't take long, he was so whiny about it too! you could see him biting his lower lip as you fully take in his dick. "miss.. god, i need you." you swear you were gaining control over him, hearing him whimper so submissively, but he knows that wasn't the case, his little whines were so deceiving. you're grinding on your patient's dick right now, but every request of a patient must be returned! and this was his request.. "haah. such a good girl." he'd hold you down against him, "you'd do anything to save your patients won't you? what a hero." feeling your cunt throb for that was crazy, he thought you were crazy.

both of your pleasure-filled moans were echoing inside the room, you'd thank god not one of his nurses would come in here. at such an unfortunate time. his breathy moans were driving you crazy! "fuck.!" he'd finally get to coat your insides with his nut, how he'd make you roll your hips faster to chase out his high, you were much more sensitive than him anyway. "i think.. you've cured me.." he looks right into your eyes so calmly, not matching your exhausted moans. "bet whoever's watching those cctv cameras is jerking it right now." he snickers, making you look up at the camera, oh shit. you'd forgotten some patients need to be watched 24/7. "your moans were so cute, afterall, miss."

guys i NEED TO GET THIS OUT OF MY SYSTEM URHGNS one of my fav imagines everrr i love jaewon sm i love SEOWAN sm and ik he was depressed in that kdrama but i genuinely would let him do anything to me bye. . . 😭 hes so whiny here. i might post part 3 of that one thanos fic, nam-gyu included !! (spoils). someone request myunggi guys!!🥺

[sluttysnowangel666]

sweet like candy - choi su bong / thanos

pairings : thanos/ su bong x fem reader

summary/request : despite only a few insignificant interactions with thanos, he grows jealous when he sees you talking to an ex marine, dae ho.

warnings: jealous thanos, use of drugs, swearing, violence, ooc thanos bc he’s kinda nice most of the time except for when he’s jealous, lowkey sub thanos idk how it happened but bros a good boy😭, oral(f receiving), hand job, sex(p in v)

ngl this is not my best work unfortunately:( it just feels like i rushed too much at certain parts but i just didn’t want it to be too repetitive to other stories with too much detail when we all know how the games work. send me some requests, i wanna do au or write for thanos where the reader and him are outside of the games

not responsible for the content you consume, use discretion when reading past the border. 18+

“Señorita, excuse me.”

You turn, an eyebrow already raised at the strange pet name you’d just been called. It’s a tall, young ish man. You take in his appearance; his hair is a bright shade of purple, slender fingers painted like infinity stones, marked with dark tattoos, chunky rings, and a cross necklace.

You don’t respond, instead continuing to walk in the eerie room painted like the sky, with a giant doll at the other side.

You sigh, still confused at how you ended up here with 456 other people in ugly green tracksuits and millions, if not billions, of won in debt.

He raps you a song, also stating his name is Thanos, which you try to tune out but its mediocrity makes you stifle a laugh. He notices, and your sweet smile makes him smile.

“I like you.” He says, flashing you a little heart with his fingers. You roll your eyes, walking past him as he lingers on your trail.

A man runs out, player 456, you note. He begins screaming, saying the game was “Red Light, Green Light” and the doll was going to kill us if we moved. His reaction makes you nervous, his fear seemed so genuine.

“My dad comes home like this sometimes,” Thanos says, noticing your shift in demeanor. “Saying there’s bugs in the walls and his phone’s been tapped by the government.”

“Do you think the guy yelling is high?” You ask.

He smirks a little before answering, which doesn’t go unnoticed by you. “Fuck no.”

The game begins, and Thanos takes your hand. You go to pull away but his grip is tight.

“Let go.” You whisper, on a red light.

“Come on, señorita. Let’s stick together.” He whispers back.

Before you can respond, the girl in front of you starts screaming about a bee landing on her. She faces you both and laughs a little.

“Oh, shit. I just moved, didn’t I?”

Bang.

Blood splatters on you and Thanos’ face.

“Don’t scream.” He whispers, but even if you wanted to, you couldn’t. Your body is in shock, frozen. You grip his hand in return now, trying to hold your shaking.

More rounds continue, but neither of you move. That is until the man tells you to finish you have to be behind the doll. Thanos moves you behind him, and you press your head into his back with your eyes shut tight, gripping his jacket. He slowly moves, pulling you with him.

A woman reacts to the body, and an another shot goes off. Panic ensues, as people run and shots fire continuously. All you can hear is screaming and shooting.

During the next green light Thanos doesn’t move, but you feel him fidgeting around. Two rounds go by of this before he finally moves again.

He lurches forward, and you feel him go “Ding” as he pushes a group of people down. Three shots ring off, and during the next green light you let go of him. He doesn’t even notice, skipping and jumping and dancing during every green light.

In the end, you survive. Splattered in blood, yes, but alive nonetheless.

You avoid him after that, feeling unnerved by the way he played during the games. You noticed him sharing a pill with a guy later, which made his behavior in the game make sense to you.

You sat on your bed, your face buried in your knees as you rocked back and forth. The lights were out, everyone going to sleep but, how could you? After everything you saw?

You glanced up at the piggy bank, glowing gold

and filled with won.

———

The next game was about to begin.

You had been brought into a room, eerily similar to the one with the doll, except the room had rainbow tracks and pink suit men standing around it. They ordered you to get into teams of 5.

You wandered around, searching for a group of people who wouldn’t kill you for fun.

“Hi.”

You turned, facing a handsome dark haired man, his hair half tied up. He was neatly kept, carrying himself with confidence and grace, despite everything.

“Hi.” You respond, meekly.

“Would you like to join our group?” He motions to the 4 men behind him. Their faces are stoic, but they look friendly enough. You notice the one man on the team was the one who warned everyone about the last games. You accept their offer; it’s not like you really had a choice anyway. Besides, why not let them pity you if they felt sorry enough to offer you a spot? No one else was itching to have you on your team…

Or so you thought.

On the other side of the room, Thanos was searching for you to be in his group. He felt inclined to protect you now after the events of the first game. The drugs were fueling him into wanting to be the hero of your story. He was convinced he could you get out of here, and you would tell the world Thanos the Great saved you with a snap of his fingers. Besides, such a sweet face like yours? It would be such a waste for you to die somewhere so silly.

He finds you, in the sea of people, talking to another man.

He fumes with rage, the ecstasy making him react more uncontrollably than usual.

He bites his lip, all of his prior convictions now forgotten. Let the bitch die then, he thinks to himself.

The games start, and players drop like flies from the first groups alone.

Thanos’ team goes, and you can’t help but cheer when you see them play successfully. You jump up and down, laughing and clapping at their win.

Thanos locks his eyes on yours, noticing your childlike joy at his win. It makes him strangely prideful, makes him forget why he was so mad at you in the first place.

He bows to you, like a musician after a performance. You blush a little, smiling at him, forgetting why he scared you in the first place.

Your team is last, and you’re up first playing ddakji. Your whole team plays successfully, and you survive another round of the games.

You go back to your bunks, Dae Ho wrapping a friendly and comforting arm around you as you both walk. You sit with your group, eating and laughing while you slowly forget the chaos around you.

Thanos watched it all play out with Dae Ho again. His palms were sweaty the whole time, hoping you’d survive and walk back into that room. The second you walked back through the door alive, his eyes were on you.

“Are you good?” Nam Gyu asks Thanos, noticing his eyes constantly following you.

“I don’t know what the fuck are you talking about.” Thanos spits, defensively. He takes another pill, needing the courage for his next move.

“Let me have one.” Nam Gyu begs. Thanos reluctantly hands one over.

Nam Gyu takes it with haste, as Thanos stands and makes his way towards you. He quickly gets up and follows his friend, ready for whatever fight may come.

Each time you laugh at Dae Ho, Thanos picks his pace up a little faster. He’s convinced that it’s like with each laugh that slips past your honey coated lips, then the closer Dae Ho is to getting to taste them. He sways his body unnaturally as he walks, wanting to appear more bad ass than he really felt.

“What the fuck are you doing?” He says as he approaches you.

“Thanos.” You say, a warning in your voice to leave you alone.

“You good, bro?” Dae Ho asks.

“Why the fuck are you talking to my girl?” He addresses Dae Ho now. You and Dae Ho both scoff in disbelief, but this is how your reaction played out in Thanos’ mind.

They both laugh

“Dae Ho, you’re so funny.”

“Well, you’re sexy.”

“Let’s make out and fuck right here in front of Thanos.”

“Whatever you say, beautiful.”

He reaches his hand out, grabbing you by your jacket and yanking you to your feet.

“Thanos!” You yell. Dae Ho and In Ho stand up to diffuse the situation. Before they can even intervene, you land a closed fist to Thanos’ eye.

He backs away, holding it as a little cut forms.

“Crazy bitch.” He says. He points at Dae Ho. “You stay away from her.”

“Fuck off.” You yell at Thanos. He backs away, still facing you and nodding his head in anger. His face reads This isn’t over.

“You okay?” Dae Ho asks. You nod, slightly breathless.

The way Thanos grabbed you was rude,

unnecessary,

controlling…

and hot.

You wanted to kick yourself for feeling so attracted to him in that moment. He was mentally unstable, high; everything that could be wrong with a man, he was.

Yet here you were, yearning for a piece of him just as he yearned for you.

Later that night, you couldn’t sleep in your bunk. You were stressed with nerves, with the thought that each next day could be your last. You tapped your foot relentlessly against the frame of the bed, until a person above you made a threat.

You sighed, getting up and walking to the door to be let to the bathroom.

You washed your face again for what was probably the 15th time, feeling like the blood was still on you.

You didn’t even hear the door, didn’t hear him walk up behind you, didn’t notice he was there until his hands were on your hips.

You gasped, turning with your fist, ready to make a collision; but Thanos was quicker than you this time, catching your wrist before you could seal the hit.

“Whoa.” He said, “Relax, girl.”

“What are you doing in here?” You yelled at him. He shushed you, making a tcht tcht tcht sound.

“You embarrassed me out there.” He said, tilting his head to show you his bruised eye.

“You? How about you yanking me to my feet in a room full of people?”

He says nothing, but he smirks at you.

“You’re just so pretty. How am I supposed to sit back and watch my girl flirt with other men?”

You sigh, rolling your eyes. “Is that what you think I am?”

“It’s what I know you are.” He says lowly, his hand resting against your throat. “You’re mine.”

“I’m not yours. You don’t ask, you just take from people. You’re a bully.”

“What are we, kids on a school yard? I’m a bully?” He steps closer than he already was, pressing himself into you.

“Yes.” You whisper out.

“Quiet now, aren’t we?” He teases, his voice low.

“If you’re gonna kill me, just fucking do it.” You say.

He laughs loudly, “Kill you? Get serious, girl.”

“Then what do you want?”

“You.”

You say nothing. Your hands are pressed against the counter top of the sink, and his body is pressed against yours. Chest to chest, you have nowhere to go.

“Move.” You say. Your eyes are locked, and you feel like prey being tortured by predator. Tortured in the way he’s doing nothing, just staring you down. He doesn’t budge still.

You grab him by his collar, pulling his face inches from yours.

“Move.” You say again, your voice pleading.

He notices. You’re not pleading him to move because of fear, you’re pleading for him to move because of lust.

His fingers trail up your arm, then trace your jaw to pull your chin up. He laces his fingers through your hair, pulling you so that your lips are on his.

He didn’t expect you to kiss him the way you did, it took him by such surprise, which he dared never admit because he was almost never surprised. But the way you grabbed his collar, trying to pull him so deep into you that you both might collapse into each other like stars.

“Where’d this come from?” He asks breathlessly, barely able to break away from you to get the question out.

“Can you just shut up?” You say quickly, pulling him back into you.

“As my queen commands.” He says, matching your ferocity with the kiss.

Both of his hands rest on your cheeks while he kisses you, but you take one and slowly push it down to your sweats.

“Why so eager?” He asks, breathlessly.

“You’re talking too much.” You say, pushing him off you. “Get on your knees.”

He scoffs, shocked. “Are you serious?”

You nod, and so he listens. He kisses down your body, tugging on your sweats when he’s on his knees. He kisses your thighs, mumbling sweet nothings about your body that were too soft to hear.

“Thanos-“

“Su Bong.” He corrects you, needing to hear you moan his real name.

“Su Bong, please don’t tease me.” You whine, so he concedes. Lifting up your leg onto his shoulder so he can kiss and lick and suck every part of you. You whine, pulling his purple tufts of hair.

“You are so sweet,” He whispers. “Sweet like candy.”

“Oh, my boy.” You moan, egging him on. His nails grip into your thighs unintentionally. He’s just so desperate for you, desperate to taste every drop.

Your nails dig into his forearm, scratching for release.

“Please, oh, please, Su Bong.”

He looks up at you, pupils dilated like the size of black holes. You throw your head back, grinding your hips into his mouth, chasing your release.

You pull his hair harshly, and he digs his nails into your thighs even more as you release. You cry out, repeating his name like a prayer, and he moans into you, fueling your release. He doesn’t miss a drop.

He comes off you, breathless. He sets your leg down, pulling your sweats back up as he stands.

You stare at each other, both of you panting in silence for a few moments. You sneak your hand down, resting it against his hard crotch. You smirk a little, and he mirrors it.

“I think I love you.” He moans as you rub him.

“I think you’re high.” You respond, and he laughs and nods. He leans down to kiss you again, gentler this time.

“Do you want one?” He asks, nodding to his necklace. You hesitate, but end up shaking your head no.

“I think we should head back.” You whisper, still rubbing him. He shakes his head no, moaning into your neck. He grips your jacket in desperate agony.

“I need you so bad.” He finally admits.

“Fine.” You fold, and he’s ever so quick to pull your sweats back down. He unhooks one of your legs from the pants, pulling it up so he can rest it around his hips as he pushes his sweats down just slightly so he can insert himself into you.

So, there you both are. Standing with one leg hooked around him and absolutely gripping the sink as he thrusts into you relentlessly. You don’t even try to hide your moans, throwing your head back in euphoria as Thanos buries his face in your neck with shameful whimpers. You grip onto whatever part of him you can for support. Your back is slamming into the edge of the sink over and over, surely leaving a bruise on your tailbone.

He kisses and sucks on your neck, leaving dark bruised purple hickeys on every inch. Marking you, so that you knew who you belong to and so that everyone else out there knew too.

His thrusts were relentless, and the angle he fucked you was crucial, hitting into your cervix each time. Your hands pushed on his hips, resisting his movements slightly, which only fueled him more.

“Stop it.” He moans.

“You stop, you’re being so rough.” You whimper.

“This is me being gentle,” He says. “You want something less than this, then I better not ever catch you speaking to another man again.”

You moan in defeated acceptance, grasping at his shoulders instead for balance. His perfect thrusts make you leak all over him, his pants soaked with your juices.

“You’re so wet.” He moans. “I think you’re gonna make me cum.”

You tighten around him, sending him into a frenzy. His hands tighten their hold on your thighs, and you yank him by the collar to pull his lips onto yours.

“Fuck, I’m cumming, oh please.” You beg him, between kisses.

“I’ve got you.” He manages to get out, holding you as you let out the most heavenly cry. Your moans send him over, and he pulls out to spill himself all over your cunt.

He smears it on your folds with his hands, and you smack his chest, giving him a push off you while he laughs at your irritability.

“You’re such a dick.” You say, wiping yourself with a paper towel from the dispenser. He kisses your neck with a smirk.

“Come lay with me when you’re done.” He says, walking out of the bathroom.

You roll your eyes, cleaning yourself up before walking out.

You re enter the bunks, searching the room for his bed. He’s in a lower ish one, laying down with hands resting behind his head and his eyes blissfully closed. Your eyes move back and forth between his bed and your empty one, until your feet start moving before your mind can even decide.

He doesn’t even open his eyes when you crawl in beside him. He just wraps his arm around you, kissing your temple as you both drift off to sleep,

both of you blissfully unaware of the horrors of tomorrow’s game…

Part 2?

[grison-in-space]

Listening to Artificial Condition again, it strikes me how much Murderbot uses empathy reflexively as a survival skill. Look at this bit.

Upon meeting it, ART allows it on board and then announces that it knows that Murderbot is rogue. Then ART threatens to destroy it if it hacks ART's own systems. Murderbot is immediately terrified and shuts down all inputs, gives serious thought to spending the entire three month journey unconscious, and then considers the potential avenues of damage from ART's drones. ART, not realizing why Murderbot had suddenly gone silent, tells it to quit sulking, which understandably pisses off the still-terrified Murderbot. It dumps a bunch of memories of coercive treatment into ART's feed, and ART goes silent.

Then this happens:

Then it said, I’m sorry I frightened you. Okay, well. If you think I trusted that apology, you don’t know Murderbot. Most likely it was playing a game with me. I said, “I don’t want anything from you. I just want to ride to your next destination.” I’d explained that earlier, before it opened the hatch for me, but it was worth repeating. I felt it withdraw back behind its wall. I waited, and let my circulatory system purge the fear-generated chemicals. More time crawled by, and I started to get bored. Sitting here like this was too much like waiting in a cubicle after I’d been activated, waiting for the new clients to take delivery, for the next boring contract. If it was going to destroy me, at least I could get some media in before that happened. I started the new show again, but I was still too upset to enjoy it, so I stopped it and started rewatching an old episode of Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon. After three episodes, I was calmer and reluctantly beginning to see the transport’s perspective. A SecUnit could cause it a lot of internal damage if it wasn’t careful, and rogue SecUnits were not exactly known for lying low and avoiding trouble. I hadn’t hurt the last transport I had taken a ride on, but it didn’t know that. I didn’t understand why it had let me aboard, if it really didn’t want to hurt me. I wouldn’t have trusted me, if I was a transport. Maybe it was like me, and it had taken an opportunity because it was there, not because it knew what it wanted.

The thing about Murderbot's survival is that it clearly involves quite a bit of negotiating with other constructs and bots. That's how it talks its way onto cargo hauler bots in the first place. It uses empathy--envisioning the emotional and cognitive context of the individuals it encounters--to work out what different kinds of people want, so that it can offer them fair trades. It also uses empathy to consider what humans might be looking for, so it can practice blending in and hide.

Murderbot would never have survived so long if it wasn't capable of assessing the individual desires of the people--human, bot, and construct--around it. It thinks about ART's probable fears and motivations so that it can consider whether ART is inherently an ongoing threat or a potential ally.

When your survival depends on evading detection, you get really good at assessing perceptual biases so that you can shape yourself to fit into them. People talk about murderbot being radically empathetic as a choice it makes, or as a feature of its personality that makes it a good person. But I think murderbot would be the the first person to tell you that this empathy is part of its threat assessment suite, a skill that was developed out of necessity in order to allow you to survive.

It is also a trait that makes murderbot a good person, of course: it chooses very carefully to try to survive by doing as little harm as possible and by offering things, like media, that buy it access to things it needs. But it started as a survival skill. It's part of hypervigilance.

I think one of the strengths of this series is that so many of the things we love about SecUnit are traits developed for survival in an inherently threatening world. The shape of its mind and heart have been changed by the trauma of its origin--but they don't make murderbot less good for being altered, even if that skill was developed in a traumatic context.

I like that.

[verdantwyrm]

In Defense of Curly (Again)

This post is not about absolving Curly of his “sins” or anything, Curly is not an innocent angel that has done no wrong, no, he is morally grey as they come. But I will not stand for slander on my wife NO MORE. Curly is not as guilty as you would think, but neither is he Innocent. Anya is so much more than a victim, Curly is so much more than a bystander, and Jimmy is so much more than a rapist, they are multifaceted characters in a very multidimensional game. They’re all characters that have been individually crafted to tell a story, and everyone is avoiding that by reducing them to a singular note of events rather than their entire personality and even going as far to twist their dialogue and character to fit their own bias, ignoring whats actual factual and canon for the sake of projection.

So with that out of the way, let us begin.

────────────────────────────────────────────

A sense of timeline for better understanding.

Curly's Psych Eval (and by extension, Jimmys) was 7 Days before the crash. Curly does not know Anya is pregnant here. 

The birthday Party is 6 Days before the crash. Curly doesn't know here either. 

The Dead Pixel scene is 2 Days before the Crash. Curly doesn't know here either. 

Anya stealing the gun is 1 Day Before the Crash. Curly Finds out Anya is pregnant here and that Jimmy is responsible. Anya tells Jimmy about the pregnancy and tells Curly about it. 0 Days before the crash (The Same Day)

────────────────────────────────────────────

Pony Express’ Abuse

As for the first subject, I want to make it very clear about Pony Express’ Failure to comply and have any standard safety measures (most noticeably in the lack of locks) and the fact that they very often penalize their employees by taking from their pay and that they’re extremely lazy and known to cut corners for everything. The poster in-game tells us a lot about this if not backed up directly by the dialogue.

"Proper preparation prevents accidents, it is your responsibility to keep yourself and the crew safe. Medical expenses will be docked from person credits."

"Punctual delivery is our pride and promise- No matter where you are! Late deliveries will be docked from personal credits."

"Teamwork is the soul of success! When you have completed your tasks, always check on other tasks! HR complaints about poor team synergy may result in collective punishment"

"Sleep is the best rest after a long day of work, earn that rest! Don't overdo it or fall behind! Do not indulge in over 5 hours of forest, including leisure time. Sleeping over the allowed budget will result in disciplinary actions."

Neither Curly nor Jimmy are getting anything close to the required amount of rest for such a demanding job, with only 5 hours compared to the IRL guidelines for pilots to get an average of 10 hours of rest between shifts with 8 hours of sleep, it's also implied by Anya and Curly's own dialogue that he struggles to sleep. Which all together implies that they're both working 19-hour shifts every day. Every. Single. Day.

We see them both on shift at the same time multiple times during the game and Curly is the only one with clearance to make certain extremely important navigation decisions (like turning off the autopilot) and we can easily come to the conclusion that they are both extremely overworked, Curly Especially.

We can easily see that Pony Express are not shy to punish their employees and even goes as far as to routinely engage in collective punishment, and this is shown to be the drive behind a lot of Curly's decisions in particular, especially with how he reassures Anya that her stealing the gun case will not go on the performance log and reducing the chances of her being punished at all and to probably put the pressure onto himself in case Pony Express does find out. Given her precarious financial situation, she literally cannot afford to have her pay docked and Curly knows this.

Pony Express is known for its laziness, negligence and its ability to cut corners, they are also seen to not trust its employees by making everything have to go through him from axe usage to making a cake. To not supplying enough medical equipment, a fifth cryogenic pod to account for Daisuke or even to account for him at all. Curly himself even commented on how he should have made a bigger “stink” about the situation of Daisuke being thrown on the Tulpar last minute, which implies that he did raise this as an issue and a safety risk and was ignored.

I'm not going to take this as seriously but it is worth mentioning regardless because it is just absolutely Kafkaesque levels of absurd, They actively make it borderline impossible to report anything, so even if Curly or Anya were able to get ahold of Pony Express to send in a report, they never could due to the requirements and the prerequisites. It also implies that if you apply for a job there but refuse the medical evaluation, they can fine you despite the fact that you don't even actually work there yet.

Another classic example of Marx's theory is of the alienation in capitalism, wherein workers are estranged and separated from the products of their own labour. The crew had absolutely no idea what they were delivering, and judging by how much was put in place, they were never supposed to.

Marx's theory, the implementation of automation would negatively impact workers by depriving them of job opportunities that could have been filled by humans. This is strongly suggested to be the primary reason for the downfall of Pony Express and why the crew was fired.

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Anya’s Assault

Anya being assaulted is never outright said, with an intentional layer of vagueness layered over the top with how she talks about it and how she mentions it to Curly. The words “Assault” “Rape” or even “Attacked” are not mentioned at any point, we only learn this through visual imagery and subtext of Anya mentioning the lack of locks on the doors, how unsafe she feels around Jimmy, and she would rather him not have the gun at all—fawning at his every response in a panic of upsetting him or escalating the situation. The words are never explicitly said as many other victims can sympathise with, saying the words out loud can be very difficult sometimes, and Anya’s vagueness was intentional on the happenchance that Curly did take Jimmy’s side. She was trying to put distance between herself and that possibility by being as cautious and as vague as she could, in hopes that Curly would pick up on the signs himself and come to that conclusion himself instead of Anya babying him and dumbing down the situation.

This is a believable reaction, especially when your abuser has any kind of power over you or other people, and he isn’t the only one either. Curly has just as much power, if not significantly more over her, which adds more to the fear of even mentioning such a thing, as mentioned earlier in my section of Pony Express' Abuse towards them, the possibility of being penalized with her– and everyone else –pay being docked because she made a simple complaint, was a very real threat, and even more dangerous after finding out about the whole crew being laid off. Jimmy tears her down every chance he gets, makes her feel little and even compares her to Polle in his hallucinations. And Anya knows that he and Curly have a very lengthy history, so her caution and anxiety about even mentioning the incident, let alone saying the word “rape” is borderline impossible for her. It’s a manifestation, it’s a verbal acceptance and confession that it’s even happened. Something she has been trying to avoid coming to terms with.

And when she does eventually tell Swansea what happened, as much as you want to think she told him- she most likely told him to not do anything, to try and keep the peace for as long as possible.

Again, her vagueness is not her fault, nor is it her responsibility. It was Jimmy’s responsibility to not abuse and rape her.

It’s also very present that Jimmy is verbally abusive to her, putting her down at every opportunity by ignoring her very talented medical skills by saying Pony Express only hired her to cut corners in an attempt to reduce costs because she failed Medical School and that she’s not a “real nurse” because of that, and how he constantly questions her skills despite keeping Curly alive for such a long time in such a state.

After being insulted by him multiple times, she fawns to get him to actually do something beneficial because she knows he responds well to praise, and he complies, all while still insulting and belittling her for being "weak" and "sentimental"

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The Dead Pixel In The Room

Going to immediately preface this with a very big obvious “Curly did not know Anya was raped” warning sign to hopefully weed out the weak that don’t want to actually read this. You can leave now if you’d like, no hard feelings. This scene is supposed to be your first clue as a player, as well as Curly's. It's intentional to be like that, it makes the most sense chronologically as well because up until that point, we don't even know.

Okay, we can start now. First, off the bat, I want to talk about that dead pixel scene. And how both Anya and Curly have their own individual meanings behind It, and how both play into each character’s relationship with Jimmy. With Anya’s being a constant reminder of Jimmy’s presence, how it affected her and how it’ll always be there no matter what. And Curly’s is something that he knows exists, but cannot see for himself, because he’s too busy looking at the bigger picture. Even if he knows it's fake, even if he knows it’s an illusion.

He doesn’t doubt her here either, and even though he admits he cannot see it. He believes that it's there, despite this, and that it doesn’t ruin the image. Choosing to see the good, the beauty, of the bigger picture. The Dead pixel scene isn’t just about Anya, it’s about the both of them. And you’re probably asking how Curly hasn’t gotten the point Anya is trying to make, and thats again because she’s being intentionally vague here, and her comment about the lack of locks ties up pretty well with the previous two conversations she’s had with Curly directly. Complaining about Jimmy being weird during the psych evaluation and then her pithy comment about Pony Express’ cutting back expenses on their food and the comment she makes about the code scanner during the birthday party.

All of her previous conversations with Curly have been about their work or something going on in the ship or even with Pony Express directly. So it’s not unusual for her comment about the lack of locks on the sleeping quarters, it’s not random, it’s pretty on theme with the direction of how their conversations go, Curly wouldn’t pick up on that alone because it’s not a strange thing to say.

It's also very much shown that Anya trusts Curly, trusts him enough to not only confide in him first about the pregnancy but also allow herself to be open and friendly with him, even going as far as to try and get him to open up to her during his psych evaluation. She is also hiding behind his seat when she steals the gun. She feels the safest when she is with the real captain and how uncomfortable she is listening to Jimmy's orders to strip Curly of that title.

Every single time that Curly and Anya speak directly, he is always reassuring her, attempting to calm her down and her safety is the first thing he's concerned about when he finds out she's taken the gun.

And once she mentions the pregnancy, his priorities flip, again to her safety, reassuring her that she won't get punished for this. Once again telling her that everything is going to work out, that WE will fix this, WE WILL figure this out TOGETHER. He and Anya.

A key important word here is "what would you have done"

Would. Not, what will you do, no she's asking in past tense. The assault has already happened, she is reassuring herself here before telling him about the pregnancy that he is on her side, that he believes her and that her trust in him isn't misplaced.

And when he does find out she's pregnant, he still doesn't know exactly how. And it's important because it reflects back onto how Curly does ultimately behave when he does approach Jimmy. He doesn't know he's confronting a rapist, and his dialogue here proves that he does just think it was ultimately her choice, her decision. And the most painful part Is the very blatant unwanted pregnancy, not anything else.

Anya is still being intentionally vague here as well, as mentioned earlier. Curly did not actually know that Anya was raped, as the only thing that's mentioned is the pregnancy and that Jimmy is involved. Which is absolutely something to be worried about, regardless of how it happened, because they're on a ship. In the middle of Space.

Someone who knew would not react like that. Curly never once doubts Anya's words or her truth. And after Anya tells Culy about how she told Jimmy about her pregnancy, Curly says that she should have waited for him because he wanted to be there just in case.

Curly even does it literally. The most important part that everybody overlooks is how determined he is to get to the cockpit as the ship is crashing. He knows it's crashing but all he can do is try, he could have run away, but he didn't.

Curly took responsibility multiple different times which is easily overlooked because so much happens in such a short time span that people literally think he had months between knowing about Anya being raped and then the crash when it was barely a day. Just like how people easily overlook the dead pixel scene and how it also represents something to Curly as well, and just like how people overlook Anya's "I told you so"

Curly's kind, forgiving and trusting nature is not inherently bad. It was how it was used against him in an extremely difficult situation, which is exactly what Abusers do time and time again. He failed Anya in such a delicate way and in such a difficult situation, but it's something to understand that Pony Express failed her first, failed her in all the most important ways by even allowing a situation like this to happen. It was Jimmy's responsibility to not be a rapist, but it was Pony Express's fault for even enabling that in the first place.

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Curly's Trauma

A very common thing that people tend to overlook, and this is either because they subconsciously forget that men can be victims of abuse, or simply because they don’t care enough to consider Curly to be one– his relationship with Jimmy and what we can glean from is very abusive, emotionally and verbally and then soon later on physically. Curly is just as much a victim of Jimmy's mistreatment and abuse as Anya is, in their own unique and parallel ways, they both had everything taken from them. We can tell in Jimmy’s behaviour and the way he intentionally isolates Curly in the Birthday scene and the Psychological evaluation in the cockpit, Jimmy takes Curly’s weakness and anxieties and twists them around to isolate him from receiving any help or support from others.

Curly’s biggest weakness is his forgiving nature. We all talk about how Anya is a victim of Jimmy, and she absolutely is, but so is Curly. His first immediate response Jimmy's reaction to Anya announcing her pregnancy is met with immense fear and anxiety with the added soundtrack of what could be equivalent to the sound of Curly's heart racing. He freezes, he fawns, he panics.

Curly's good-natured heart, being lax, trusting and a constant mediator isn't inherently a problem. It was the circumstances that turned that so volatile. If Jimmy wasn't who he was and so readily abusive then Curly's character would not be that detrimental, and his actions would not have such a catastrophic impact. And everyone immediately boiling down those harmless traits and villainising them does much more harm than good, especially since the character they should be targeting is Jimmy, not Curly.

He is beyond terrified, and when he does finally get to Jimmy, he immediately fawns and freezes. He makes absolutely no mention of Anya or anyone else because all that mattered in that panicked situation was easing Jimmy down and resolving the situation. There was truly, absolutely nothing that Curly could have done that wouldn't have resulted in either direct consequences or collective punishment. All of Curly's thoughts, behaviour and actions were as carefully thought out as he possibly could in the short 24 hours or so that he was made aware of Anya's pregnancy and Jimmy's involvement.

He is trying to eliminate all potential problems in the situation so Curly can take the full front of Jimmy's rage. This again furthers the point of exactly why Curly wouldn't recognise the signs of Anya being abused as well because this is all so normal for him. He’s terrified of Jimmy, and an abuser's main tactic is to make sure that their victims never feel confident to speak up against them, or to ever seek out help from others. It’s why he never rushes to defend himself, he just lets Jimmy do and say all of these horrible things.

And Jimmy immediately stabs back putting him down. Twisting the blame and putting it into Curly. Like he somehow was a part of it all and that it was his fault.

Curly was and has been a victim of Jimmy's abuse for a very long time on an emotional and mental aspect that clouded his judgements and perceptions in the scenario which devolved into physical and medical abuse very quickly once Jimmy got his chance. And it is also true that Curly had a responsibility to protect Anya as a crew mate and Captain that he failed due to bias towards his abusers, and his kind and forgiving nature of simply wanting to see the good in Jimmy, which is also another aspect of what victims believe. Curly enables Jimmy's behaviour towards himself and even goes as far to completely blame himself for everything that happened in How Fish Is Made.

A lot of victims tend to surround themselves with excuses of why they’re abused, that it’s somehow their fault and that he’s done something awful to deserve it, that this a normal thing that happens, that Jimmy has his reasons to be like this and it isn’t his fault. People argue that Curly should have done more and that he "failed" in any regard is putting a huge expectation onto a victim like him of someone like Jimmy's relentless abuse and how it takes such an impactful toll on someone like Curly. Everyone who plays or watches the game looks over the very easy and subtle warning signs of this abuse and is too busy claiming Curly to be the antagonist here and holding him responsible instead of Jimmy.

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Conclusion + Other Comments

Curly is not perfect, but he is not as guilty as everyone wants him to be. If you go into mouthwashing anticipating Curly as a cruel, selfish monster, of course, you're going to interpret him that way and twist everything he ever does or says to fit your narrative although he very obviously isn't that way at all and get upset when someone tells you you're wrong. You need to remember that he had a whole crew to think of, Curly is not judgement, nor is he the executioner. His hands were absolutely tied and for one reason only: Because Pony Express does, did, and will not care. Pony Express has it explicitly like this so you cannot do anything. So people like Jimmy who manipulate the vulnerable can prey upon his co-workers and get away with it.

The situation on the Tulpar is not as straightforward as people would like, I understand it's extremely cathartic to think of a situation where Jimmy gets what he deserves but it isn't realistic, and thats what this game is trying to say. Abusive corporations, exhausting capitalism, this environment breeds Abusers like Jimmy and victims like Anya and Curly. There was nothing that could be done. Pony Express is what doomed them all, they're the catalyst.

At some point, you have to understand and accept the fact that certain scenarios are simply just cathartic fantasies that simply couldn't have happened. They were all doomed, right from the start. It wasn't just Jimmy's actions (Although they significantly influenced the outcome), and it sure as hell wasn't Curly's inaction. It was Pony Express. I think something that a lot of people get mixed up in their interpretations of Curly is that he's not us, and we're not supposed to be him. Constantly projecting your own fears and experiences onto him to sway your interpretation of his words takes away from the already written-in-stone character he is. You saying "He didn't mean it" when talking about Curly saying he cares about Anya is not only incorrect, but it's YOUR projection onto a character that is already extremely upfront and honest about his intentions and kind personality. He is not malicious, evil, cruel, selfish or misogynistic, so saying that because you interpreted his words to be half-truths or him lying through his teeth to Anya and that his kindness is fake is literally obstructing his character.

Everyone wants them both to be perfect examples of victims and refuses to understand or even believe Curly's situation. Curly DID fail Anya but not for the reason everyone thinks he did.

They're both victims to the same man, they both believe in the best of people (although to their own detriment in a way) they want to find peace, and fulfilment in their career and life. They're so alike in such delicate and intimate ways, that trying to constantly paint Curly as this great, horrible oppressor over her does way more harm than good.

Curly's character is painfully obvious, very very upfront and honest. He is kind, constantly weighed down by guilt and anxiety about his future and career and is being abused by his so-called friend and the company he's working himself to death for that he absolutely hates that just discarded him like he was nothing. Like a lame horse.

Thank you so much to the Mouthwashing Mania Discord server for helping me with this thread! Specifically Mogs for their amazing analysis on Capitalism which can be found here!

Thank you for reaching the end of the thread, please don't be scared to share your thoughts in the tags or in my inbox, I'd love to hear them! good job! (っ˘з(˘⌣˘ ) ♡

[leog4u]

Adult Gaming Survey Results!

Hey, hey! Here's the results of that survey on adult games I set up a while back. I was blown away by the amount of responses, totaling at 1,159! After reading every write-in, I've made a little write up with some analyses that adult game devs could chew on. I think it's also interesting from an audience stand point, so give it a read! The link above goes to the survey results, so you can see the percentages and write-ins for yourself. Oh also here's a link to the top 12 favorite adult games of the responses, so you don't have to count the 591 answers yourself.

As a reminder, this is a survey for adult games. Search any game in the response list at your own risk. Minors go do something else.

And with that out of the way...!

How often do you play adult games?

Something I noticed was quite a few replies mention very large gaps between adult game sessions. I'd like to drill down on this, because paired with respondents mentioning not know how to acquire adult games, this lack of awareness might lead to less opportunities for playing adult games.

The flip side to many responses in “Other” mention binge bursts, followed by long periods of no adult game activity, it might just be a case of adult life lacking free time. 

How long do you expect an adult game to be?

A relief to game devs, there’s no major expectation for an adult game to be pulling JRPG playtime numbers. A majority would rather play a game that does what it sets out to do at its own pace, rather than hitting a target goal of X hours and be subject to poor flow and padding. 

How long is an adult gaming session?

A majority spend over an hour, with time set aside to do said adult gaming. While “till i finish” could be less than an hour, it’s still a designated time set aside to play an adult game.

What’s interesting is the responses in the “Other” category that go into detail, if the goal is to just get off, it’ll be quick. But if a game has plot and gameplay, like some kind of video game, then it’s likely they’ll take more time as they’re now being entertained in the way a video game does.

When it comes to art, what level of quality do you expect?

Again, something that should come as a relief to adult game devs. There’s not a big expectation of painted, master quality art that would be hung in a museum. People want something that gets the idea across and something fresh. 

The style should match the actual content of the game. Too many times I've played a game with the most facebook friendly mobile game style, and it just feels like it's distracting from what the game is trying to actually do.

It also would help if when a potential customer scrolls down the itch.io adult game page, their eyes don't glaze over at art that looks like every other game on the market.

Do you buy your adult games?

A problem that is highlighted here is the lack of ability or knowledge on how to buy adult games. Storefronts hide the settings needed to see adult game options, which actively lead to a lack of knowledge on how to purchase. 

A majority of the “Other” category mentions it being a combination of spending money and playing free games.

Another point to note is that some mentioned that they will pirate with the intention of spending money later. A free demo, like some mention seeking out first, can help devs avoid piracy, since some people use pirated games as a demo when none is available to see if the game’s worth it.

Another note, which unfortunately won’t help the devs affected, but when non-english games aren’t available in english or on english storefronts, some respondents feel that the only way to play is by pirating. It’s difficult to get the numbers, but I’d be interested in seeing how well japanese adult games on steam that have been localized for english speaking audiences are doing, since that previously wasn’t an option for japanese adult devs until very recently.

How important is writing in adult games for you?

This was actually a surprising result to me. Adult games primarily advertise their art. How much of it there is, how well drawn it is, if it’s animated or not. So seeing 77% of respondents cite good writing as one of the most important parts to an adult gaming experience really changes what the priorities should be for an adult game dev. 

While some would skip writing, either to get to “the good stuff” or just to skip over bad prose, some have an actively worse experience with being shown bad writing.

How important is animation in the porn scenes?

A recurring sentiment in the “Other” category is that if the animation is bad, don’t bother. 

Combined with the majority of 67.1% saying that animation is optional, I think adult game devs are safe to not prioritize it unless their game is the kind that needs it to function, like a side-scroller. It drains a lot of money and resources, especially for a first time project.

Even the live2D tweening has little payoff with these numbers considered.

How important is voice acting in the porn scenes?

Similar to animation, voice acting is a nice feature to have, if it’s done well. Otherwise it can feel tacked on, or worse, detrimental to enjoying the game.

With 50% not caring or actively muting, I think it’s safe to say that it’s a “nice to have” and resources should be focused on other things like writing and gameplay.

How important is sex sound effects in the porn scenes? (moaning, wet slapping, squelching, etc)

What’s really fascinating is that the sound effects and audio design are more appreciated than the voice acting. If I had to pinpoint a difference, it’s that bad delivery can ruin a scene, but a sound effect is far less intrusive.

What genres of porn games do you like the most?

The genres chosen were a combination of which were the most populated as well as recent trends. A large amount of write-ins were expressing that simulation games were a favorite. 

Now comes the question, is the number one favorite genre RPGs because that’s the best genre for an adult game, because it’s a genre people enjoy playing for gaming’s sake, or because a massive amount of adult games are made in RPG Maker? I think it’s a little bit of columns A, B, and C.

When it comes to adult games, what matters more?

People are here for porn, but that doesn't mean they're here for just porn. They want a good delivery vehicle for the porn. Both parts of this sentiment mean that there's one thing you should avoid more than anything and it's annoying padding and grinds. They bought your game, there's no need hide a nipple behind five hours of gameplay. Likewise, it's not very good game design to give the player everything at once, as I've mentioned before.

There are several draws to adult games. It's intimacy in a safe, virtual environment. It's making bonds with characters the player falls in love with that end with a climax, or two. It's exploring kinks. And it's blowing off some steam by getting your rocks off. These should be considered when designing a porn game.

Does a kink you enjoy influence if you buy an adult game?

In the future, I would rephrase this question as asking how much your kink factors into buying a game, rather than what was presented. As it stands, “I buy things if they’re good” isn’t that interesting or valuable of an insight.

Respect to the small slice that don't buy shit unless it has their kink in it.

Does a kink you dislike influence if you buy an adult game?

Making more extreme or polarizing kinks optional enables the developer to explore said kinks while allowing the player to avoid uncomfortable situations. As long as it’s clear what’s optional and what isn’t on the product description, this seems to be the preferred method. 

What’s your stance on AI art?

A landslide stance. This can be attributed to politics: there is a hardcore stance against any and all AI. That aside however, when it comes to selling a product to a consumer, why would they want a product they know was made with no care or effort? Where else were corners cut? AI in porn games are usually used to generate the art and writing, the most important parts (according to the survey) to the porn game. It's where you want the most care and attention, not the opposite.

What aspect of an adult game do you care about the most?

Players care about the porn in their porn games. This isn’t a surprise. Audio being ranked so low also isn’t a surprise considering the previous results. But, what is interesting is how gameplay is ranked highest in the “important” category, past art and writing. I interpret it as “come for the art and writing, stay for the gameplay.” 

Talking Points From the Free Form Responses

Replayability and customization are gameplay features people value, which can be reflected in the amount of responses citing games such as Corruption of Champions and Degrees of Lewdity as their favorites.

Porn games are really unique because you need to list out its content. We're used to spoilers being a bad thing in marketing materials, but for porn its mandatory. A customer needs to know: what's the degree of sexual content, is it cheese cake, is it gay, is there dub-con, is there inflation, the list goes on. Nobody will be mad to know that something they don't like is in something. Well, some people will be, but it's a lot worse when it's a surprise. Also consider, it stops comments asking if there's content like pregnancy in your game or not.

I can not understate how important customization is to a number of people, wanting the body and pronouns they have to be reflected in the player character. This gives text based games a bit of an edge, since it's significantly less resource intensive to accommodate for all these different identities in text vs having to make art assets for every configuration and body type.

There’s a general lack of knowledge on where to actually get adult games. This is due to social media sites making it difficult for adult content to be shared, as well as limited market places for adult content. Epic Game Store has a ban on it, despite allowing for full on con-artist projects like NFT and Crypto games, while Steam requires some settings to be changed that aren't advertised. However, Steam's new feature to hide games definitely helps gamers feel more comfortable acquiring adult games since their friends won't have to know when they're jerking off.

Woman focused content that doesn’t involve non-con is lacking. Meanwhile, a lot of adult games that feature a woman protagonist that does consent either have her be bimbofied or a literal succubus, rather than an actual character that wants sex like their male counterparts. These male counterparts could be extracted from their porn game and placed in any other fantasy story and get along fine, so why not women?

Don’t forget to add a gallery to your game.

[kikyoupdates]

Infatuated ⭑˚💌⭑ ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑑

yandere!bnha x reader

yandere, reverse harem, bnha x fem!reader, slowburn, slowburn yandere

Your Quirk is rather unique. It plays out almost like a game, giving you missions and goals that help you become stronger. On top of that, you also have the ability to charm those around you. It sounds innocent enough on paper, and you can’t help but revel in the attention everyone keeps showering you with. But what happens when their feelings give way to something more sinister?

previous | story masterlist | next

News spreads around the neighborhood, and before you realize it, you’ve built up quite a reputation for yourself.  

“That’s [Name]! If you’re not careful, she’ll kiss you and make you faint with her Quirk!” 

“You’ll end up getting cooties too!”  

Obviously, you understand where they're coming from, but it isn't like you want to make anyone pass out. You're still doing your best to come to terms with your powers, and the fact that most people are now hellbent on avoiding you doesn't really feel that great.  

You wait and wait, hoping to receive more missions so that you can progress and get a better hang on your Quirk, but a new message never comes. It's either entirely random, or there is perhaps some way of triggering new missions that you haven't yet discovered.

For the time being, there isn't really much you can do, so you decide to focus on playing with your friends and let fate run its course.  

But even that doesn't really go as planned.  

“Are you going to use your Quirk on me again?” Katsuki grits out. “What you did the other day was total bullshit. You snuck up on me, so it wasn’t fair! It’s not like you won or anything. I’m way stronger than you are.”  

“I know,” you acknowledge. “I doubt I’ll ever be as strong as you, Katsuki. I just wanted to make you stop. You were saying some really mean things to Izuku, and... I didn’t like it.”  

Katsuki balls his hands into fists. “Do you think you’re Deku’s guardian angel or something? Just forget about him already. He’s a loser. The longer you stick up for him, the more you’re just embarrassing yourself.”  

“Izuku.” 

“What?” 

“His name is Izuku,” you correct with a frown. “Why are you acting like this all of a sudden? You never used to make fun of him before. I liked it when all of us played together and got along. Can’t we keep doing that?”  

The vicious glare Katsuki gives you is pretty much an answer in itself. 

“He’s Quirkless and lame,” he insists. “And it’s kind of annoying that you’re always taking his side. Do you like him better than me or something? There’s no way you actually think he’s better than I am. Right?”  

You're awfully young, and so the nuances of his words are completely lost on you. To you, it just seems like Katsuki is annoyed that you are actively opposing him and siding with Izuku, but his tone actually conveys so much more than that.  

Jealousy, paranoia, and even slight desperation... all of it goes over your head.  

Which is why you simply smile at him. “I don’t think either one of you is better. I like you both a lot. You’re my best friends. That’s why I don’t want you guys to fight anymore.”  

Clearly, that isn't the answer Katsuki was hoping for.  

“Whatever,” he scowls. “You’re really getting on my nerves now. Ugh. I should’ve known better than to let a girl join our group.”  

Even though you know you have to stand your ground and protest against Izuku’s bullying, it definitely doesn't feel good to be at odds with Katsuki. He's acting a lot differently than what you're used to, but despite that, you still care about him and idolize him. You really hope this is just a phase and that it will pass soon.  

You shamefully bow your head. “I’m sorry, Katsuki. I don’t want you to be angry. Just please try to be nicer to Izuku from now on... okay?”  

“Shut it. You’re so annoying.” He turns to leave, but before he actually walks away, he pauses to give you a sideways glare. “Did you... ugh. Never mind.”  

“Did I what?” you blink. 

He blushes, suddenly unwilling to look you in the eye. “Your Quirk,” he mumbles. “You have to kiss people before you can use your powers on them, right? So... did you ever use it on Deku? And don’t bullshit me. I want the truth.”  

Katsuki is urging you to be honest, and you don't really see a point in lying anyways, so you just nod.  

“I did,” you affirm. “I was curious to try and use it again, and I wanted to figure out how it worked. Izuku let me practice on him. I was hoping it wouldn’t make him faint, but unfortunately, it still did.”  

Once again, Katsuki looks none too pleased with your answer.  

“Ew,” he grimaces, outright mashing his teeth at you. “I can’t believe you seriously kissed that Quirkless nerd. You’re gross, [Name]. I don’t want to see you for a while.”  

Your brows shoot up in a panic. “Huh? Katsuki, wait—!”  

He doesn't wait, and from that day onward, the dynamic between the two of you changes for the worse.

[𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐎𝐍: 𝐔𝐬𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐨𝐧 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐧’𝐭 𝐚𝐥𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐨𝐧.]

Sure took long enough.

After what feels like literal eons, you’ve finally gotten a new mission. It's similar to what you’ve already done: use your charm ability on someone, except you apparently have to try it out on someone completely new. Which is kind of a problem, because you’ve already exhausted all your options when it comes to your friend group.

The idea of kissing a total stranger, even as a five-year-old, doesn't really appeal to you. There's also the matter of making that person faint, which is another thing you aren't all that thrilled about.  

Thankfully, the system seems to have more information for you this time.

[𝐂𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐭𝐬, 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐧, 𝐦𝐚𝐲 𝐛𝐞 𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐯𝐮𝐥𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐚𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲. 𝐈𝐧 𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐨 𝐤𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐦𝐞𝐝, 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐞-𝐭𝐮𝐧𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐩𝐮𝐭. 𝐅𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐯𝐨𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐨𝐜𝐮𝐬 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫. 𝐀𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐚 𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐟𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐞𝐝, 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐛𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐩𝐮𝐭 𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐢𝐧𝐟𝐥𝐮𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐫 𝐬𝐚𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬.]

Huh. So, that's the purpose of your ability. It isn't just to make people faint left and right. Clearly, you haven't been using it properly so far, but that's to be expected, since you still have a lot to learn.  

“Um, can I ask a question?” you try, but unsurprisingly, receive no response. Communication really doesn't seem possible. It kind of sucks, especially since there's so much you still don't understand.  

Whatever. At least you know that one day, you can actually charm someone without making them pass out. You aren't sure when exactly you’ll be able to pull it off, but you're choosing to remain optimistic.  

Some more time passes, and Katsuki is unfortunately still acting like a total ass. If he's in a good mood, he sometimes lets you hang around him and his underlings, but if you ever dare to try and bring Izuku so that they can rekindle their friendship, it quickly turns into a rather nasty altercation, and you are almost always forced to break it up. 

It isn't really something you take much note of, but lately, Izuku has been sticking to your side like glue. You're pretty much the only friend he has left, so it makes sense that he would want to be with you.  

Unfortunately, neither you nor he seems to realize that he is starting to become almost entirely dependent on you. It isn't just that Izuku enjoys being around you—he is gradually growing clingier by the day, and he can't seem to shake the fear that at some point, you’ll kick him aside, just like Katsuki has done.  

“[Name],” he whimpers, squeezing your little hand tightly in his. “Y-You still want to be friends, right? You don’t hate me just because I’m Quirkless, do you?”

Every time he asks that question, you never fail to respond with a bright grin. 

“Silly Izuku,” you muse. “We’re best friends for life. I’m not going anywhere. Katsuki’s acting like a real butthead lately, but he’ll change his mind. Things will get better soon. Just wait and see.”  

Izuku doesn't smile back. Instead, he squeezes your hand even tighter. He's afraid to let go. Afraid that he might lose you for good.

“Do you promise?” he mumbles. His voice is faint; barely a whisper.  

“I promise, Izuku. We’ll always be friends.”  

“And you’ll never leave me behind?”  

“Of course not. That’s part of what being friends means, right? That we’ll always look out for each other.”  

Izuku is going through a rough patch in his life. Even though your Quirk is tricky to figure out and is by no means all sunshine and rainbows, at least you have a Quirk. You can only imagine just how heartbroken Izuku must be. He’s wanted to have an amazing power more desperately than anyone else you know, so that he can become a hero and protect countless people.  

He needs you, and you are going to do everything you can to support him. 

“I have to go home now,” you say. “It’s late, and my parents want me to be back in time for dinner.”  

When you try to pull your hand away from his, Izuku lets out a panicked gasp and flings his arms around you.  

“N-Not yet!” he insists. “You can stay a bit longer... can’t you?”  

“I’m sorry, Izuku.” You gently pat his pack to try and calm him down. “I promised my parents I wouldn’t stay out so late today. We can play more tomorrow, though. And we’ll see each other at daycare too.” 

You try to pull away a second time, but Izuku still refuses to let you leave.  

“No,” he repeats. His voice trembles slightly, but it's a lot firmer than before. A wobbly smile rises to his lips. “Oh, I know. You can just have dinner at my place instead! Tell your parents that you’re coming over. My mom always cooks really yummy food.”

“Izuku,” you frown. It isn't like him to be so stubborn. You know he doesn't like it when you have to say goodbye, but it's not like you'll be apart for very long. “I really have to go now,” you insist. “We’ll play together again tomorrow, okay?”  

This time, you are able to lightly push him back, but you don't make it very far.  

“I said no!” Izuku screams. “I don’t want you to leave!”  

You're too shocked to muster up a response. It's the first time you’ve ever heard Izuku yell at anyone, let alone you.  

To be honest... it's kind of scary.  

“O-Oh my god.” After a few moments of heavy silence, the realization of what he just did finally sinks in. Izuku’s palms cover his mouth in a hurry, and you can already see tears forming in his big eyes. “I-I’m so sorry. [Name], I didn’t mean to yell. I really didn’t mean to. Please, please don’t hate me...” 

It doesn't take long for him to start sobbing, so of course your first instinct is to hug him and try to get him to calm down. He sobs loudly and unrestrained, burying his face in the crook of your neck while he braces his body against yours.  

Poor Izuku. He’s dealing with so much. I should be more considerate of him... 

“It’s going to be okay,” you reassure. After a few moments, you pull back to grin. “Alright, you win. I guess having dinner at your place does sound pretty fun. I promised my parents I would eat with them tonight, but I’m sure they’ll understand.”  

The second you utter the words, Izuku stops crying.  

“R-Really?” he splutters. “So... you’re not leaving me?”  

“Nope! We can hang out for a while longer.”  

Izuku hastily wipes his tears away, then lets out a happy giggle. “Yay! Thank you so much, [Name]. Everything’s always so much better when you’re around. D-Do you think you could maybe sleep over tonight? We did it once before... and it was a lot of fun.”  

“I’ll call my parents while I’m at your place and try to convince them,” you nod.  

“You don’t need to call them. Just tell my mom you already got their permission.”  

“But won’t my parents get worried if I don’t tell them in advance?”  

“It’ll be okay,” Izuku beams. He is by no means a rule-breaker, and in the back of his mind, he supposes he does know it's best to get your parents’ permission for stuff like this, but in the moment, all of that is secondary.  

He just wants to be with you for as long as possible. 

So, you stay. You stay for dinner at his house, without alerting your parents even though you were supposed to be home a long time ago. You even try to stay for a sleepover, like Izuku suggested, but at some point, Inko receives a very frantic phone call, and you are forced to leave.  

Izuku doesn't let it show while he waves you off, but he isn't happy about it in the slightest.  

“Sweetie, you can’t just invite your friends over for the night without checking if they’ve gotten permission first,” Inko frowns, crouching down to pat his head. “I know you like [Name], but her parents were worried sick, so make sure she’s spoken to her family first, alright?”  

“[Name] is the only one who still likes me,” Izuku sniffles. “I want to be with her all the time. She’s so much nicer than everyone else. I really wanted her to spend the night... why are her parents being so unfair?”  

“They’re not being unfair, Izuku. They just worry for her, that’s all. I’m sure you two can have a sleepover some other time, so long as her parents are given enough of a heads-up.”  

Izuku furrows his brows, tiny little hands clenching into fists. “I hate [Name]’s parents,” he grits out.  

“Izuku!” Inko gasps. “You don’t mean that!”

“I hate them, hate them, super-duper hate them!”  

He runs to his room and slams the door shut, then promptly buries himself under his blankets, hugging one of his All Might plushies against his chest. Everything is just so awful. He doesn't have a Quirk, so becoming a hero will be infinitely more difficult than he ever imagined. After receiving the diagnosis from the doctor, his own mother sobbed while hugging him, apologizing over and over again, as if telling him that she should give up on his dream.  

But you still believe in him. You don't make fun of him the way everyone else does, and you're always encouraging him to try his best and become a hero no matter what.  

Also... it's embarrassing to admit, but lately, he finds himself wishing that you would use your Quirk on him again. He just can't get that warm fluttery feeling out of his mind, especially knowing that he got to kiss you.  

That night, he dreams of a world where he does have a Quirk. One where you are by his side every minute of the day.

“Okay, sweetheart. We just need to go buy a few more things, so please wait right here for us, okay?”

You are in the middle of a shopping trip with your parents. It's fun to tag along with them from time to time, especially since they usually let you pick out a few goodies for yourself. While they go to look for the last few items on their list, you are tasked with the responsibility of watching over the shopping cart.  

You're a good kid, so you have every intention of listening to your parents and staying put.  

At least, until you see him.  

He catches your attention almost immediately. With his striking dual-colored hair, he stands out like a sore thumb. That still isn't the most noticeable thing about him, though. 

It's the fact that he has a bandage covering the entirety of his left eye.  

The boy looks to be around your age, so probably no older than five or so. He's trudging down the aisle with a vacant expression, and your chest throbs while watching him. The bandage across his eye is no doubt concealing quite a big injury. You really hope it isn't as painful as it looks.

Out of sheer concern, you can't help but call out to him. 

“Um,” you frown. “Are you... okay?”  

The boy glances in your direction, still with that same hollow expression. He doesn't say anything back, and you're starting to regret speaking to him, especially when it looks like he wants to be left alone.  

But then he starts crying.

“No,” he whimpers, crumpling to his knees and burying his face in his hands. “I-I’m not okay. I hate this. I just hate it... why did this have to happen? It isn’t fair. I’m so sick and tired of everything. I can’t stand it anymore...”  

It seems that his previously stoic demeanor was no more than a facade, and he can't stop his tears from pouring down his cheeks. You don't know anything about this boy, but whatever is going on in his life, it's clear that he needs help.

Before you can even think it through, you're already hugging him. 

“I’m sorry that you’re suffering,” you frown. You honestly don't know what else to say, and you doubt you can possibly begin to imagine what he's going through. All you can do is hold him in your arms and show him that despite being a stranger, you still care.

He seems taken aback by the suddenness of your touch, but is far too distraught to try and push you away. Countless tears fall from his eyes, and the bandage across the left side of his face is starting to grow damp from all the crying.  

“I hate him,” the boy just keeps on sobbing. “I hate my dad! He always ruins everything!”  

You nibble on your bottom lip. He's in so much pain, and it hurts to know that you can't do anything to help. 

Unless... 

What if I charm him?  

The system said that it's possible to control people’s actions while they're under your control, so maybe you can use your powers to try and calm him down. You definitely don't want to make him faint, but you're hoping to ease his pain, if only a little.

Besides, you have a new mission to complete anyways. You plan on doing things right this time and using your Quirk to help someone out.  

Feeling a bit hesitant, you quickly kiss the boy on the cheek. He stops crying for a few moments, just from the confusion of it all. His right eye, which is a warm gray hue, stares back at you in utter bewilderment, and his cheeks are even starting to get a bit red.

[𝐔𝐬𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐨𝐧 𝐓𝐨𝐝𝐨𝐫𝐨𝐤𝐢 𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐨?]

>>[𝐘𝐄𝐒]

This time, you focus as hard as you possibly can to manage the output of your ability. You want to help this boy—whose name is Shouto, apparently. You want to help him feel better and forget his worries, at least for a little while.  

“It’s okay,” you say, using your hands to cup his damp cheeks. You smile warmly. “I know it hurts, but you’re going to be alright. Just keep breathing. Try to relax. I’m here for you. I promise things will get better.”  

Your Quirk takes effect, and you can feel him softening under your touch. His breathing becomes less labored, and it looks like his tears have finally stopped falling.  

“I’m going to be... okay,” Shouto mumbles hazily.  

“Yes. Just be strong. Can you do that for me?”  

It takes a few moments, but Shouto eventually nods. You can tell that he isn't anywhere near as tightly-wound as he was a few moments prior. Your reassuring words, coupled with the effects of your Quirk, seem to be somewhat therapeutic.

“I can do it,” Shouto insists, small arms reaching around to hug you back. 

You smile, relieved that for once, your Quirk hasn't made someone faint. Not only that, but you’ve been able to stop him from having a panic attack. If used correctly, it looks like your powers are able to influence not just a person’s actions, but their emotions as well.

Of course, at the time, you don't realize that this line of thinking also applies to negative emotions.  

You pat Shouto’s head for a while longer, unwilling to pull away from the hug, lest he start crying again. “Are you here all alone?” you can't help but ask.  

Shouto nods slowly. “I ran away from home. I really didn’t want to be there anymore. My dad is awful... but I’m sure he’ll find me soon enough. I guess I’m not doing a very good job of hiding, but I didn’t know where else to go.”  

“Does your dad hurt you?” you ask, even though you're honestly afraid to hear the answer.  

“I guess... sometimes. But it’s mostly just during training. I can handle it, though. I don’t care about that. But he hurts my mom. He’s always being mean to my mom and making her cry,” Shouto grits out, trembling furiously. “And now, she’s been sent away. I won’t get to see her anymore.”

You don't know what you can possibly say in response. You're still only a kid, and definitely not equipped to tackle heavy subjects like domestic abuse. It sounds awful, though. Your parents are lovely and kind. The thought of having to share a home with someone like Shouto’s father is absolutely terrifying. 

The most you can do is hug him even tighter.  

“You’re amazing,” you mumble. “It must be so scary, but you’re still staying strong. I’m really sorry. I wish I could do more to help.” 

Shouto doesn't say anything. He feels fuzzy and warm, still under the influence of your powers. Even though he despises his father and everything he’s put the family through, in this moment, he feels like he could take on the whole world. You've just brought out a bravery in him that he didn’t even know he had.

“[Name]? Oh! What’s this? Did you make a new friend?”  

The moment doesn't last much longer, because your parents eventually return with the stuff they went to grab. 

Blushing, you break away from the hug, not noticing the disappointed little gasp Shouto lets out.  

“He looked sad, so I was just trying to cheer him up,” you say. 

Your mother smiles. “That’s very nice of you, darling. Hello there, little boy. Are your parents around? You didn’t get lost, did you?”

At the mention of parents, Shouto flinches a bit, and his earlier sadness seems to return. “I’m fine,” he says stiffly, and before you can even protest, he’s already run away.  

Your shoulders slump. Well, that's a bummer. You didn't even get to introduce yourself to him. 

“Alright, we’ve got everything we need now,” your father says, placing the items inside the shopping cart. “All ready to go?”  

Honestly, you don't want to go. You're worried about Shouto. You just hope that your words will encourage him going forward, and if things ever get extra tough, he'll reach out to someone else and get the help he needs. 

[𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧! 𝐀𝐬 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝, 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐬𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐥𝐲.]

Just like last time, your body starts glowing a bit. If your parents notice, though, they certainly don't make any mention of it. Perhaps just like the system, this is a phenomenon that only you can observe.  

You soon leave the store, and no matter how hard you try to look around and spot Shouto again, you don't see any sign of him.

To you, it's just another good deed. Helping out a person in need seems like the natural thing to do. After all, just like Izuku and Katsuki, you've also been inspired to one day become a hero. That's why, as much as you worry about Shouto’s condition, you don't dwell too much on this simple act of kindness. 

Little do you know that Shouto will never forget what you’ve done for him.

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[dailyadventureprompts]

Homebrew Mechanic: Battles of Attrition

I think we can all agree that there’s something a little wonky with how d&d’s combat system changes between the early and mid/late game. Heroes go from being rightfully cautious about danger to being outright banal about it, confident that their accumulated power will be enough to dispatch all but the most outstanding foes.  The traditional solution is to put them up against stronger enemies but in my experience these mismatched encounters are a failing proposition: combat just gets more swingy and there’s only so many high level threats I can throw at them in a short period of time before it begins to strain credulity.   

While a lot of folks (Especially the OSR crowd) have taken the stance that 5e is broken because of how much it empowers players, I think the real fault lays with the lack of systems that exist to provide challenge outside of anything related to the damage based tug-of-war that is combat.  I think a lot of those systems were part of the non existent “exploration” pillar of the game before Hasbro realized they could make easy money selling the game in its unfinished state and gutted it along with the development team. 

Thankfully, I and other homebrewers are around to do what the megacorporations cant, namely have some original thoughts and try and figure out a way to add challenge back to the game without resenting those playing it for having fun. 

TLDR:  Trying to make our games challenging by upping damage numbers in combat is a losing proposition, in no small part because that part of the game is DESIGNED around the heroes winning. Instead, we up the overall difficulty by making them temporarily weaker with systems like sickness, stress, exhaustion, & item degradation. All of which I have details and guidelines on below the cut. 

First and foremost let me state some of my goals for these “attrition systems”, so we can all be on the same page. Whenever I make homebrew rules I try for something that’s going to require little to no paperwork on behalf of the players and can be seamlessly implemented into my DMing style. It’s not about realism, it’s not about punishing players, this is a way for me to add mechanical depth without bogging down the machine entirely. 

Attrition should be largely non-permanent.  The 5e audience invests a lot in their characters both emotionally and mechanically, so it won’t do to pile on debilitating debuff after debuff to the point of making a character useless. 

There should be an inverse relationship between the severity of the affliction and how long it lasts. Think in term of encounters, days, or weeks, (with the understanding that an attrition that goes on for long enough becomes a questhook in itself) 

The exception to this rule is if someone hits 0 hitpoints. I’m outspoken in my stance that characters should only die when it’s alternatively appropriate, but the dm is at liberty to inflict thematically devastating setbacks in the unlikely event that the party DOES suffer losses in the damage tug of war. 

We want to be sparing with how much attrition we throw at the party at once, so as to not create a “death spiral” where failures compound upon one another and make getting through the adventure impossible. 

In most cases suffering Attrition should be something the party is able to avoid by being fast/lucky/cautious/clever or whatever else the encounter requires. It’s there to add weight and consequence to their actions, and as a factor for DMs to build scenarios around. 

Exhaustion:  Unlike a lot of the other changes made in Oned&d, I actually quite like the overhaul of “each point of exhaustion is a cumulative -1 to all d20 rolls and spell dc, beyond 10 is death” as it allows us to play with exhaustion far more readily as an attrition. 

Every night you don’t rest in a haven (a safe comfortable place)  you need to make a con save or take a point of exhaustion, with the ruggedness of the environment determining the DC. Characters with the survival skill or natural explorer feat don’t have to make this roll. Only rest in a haven removes exhaustion at the rate of one point per night (though spaces like a luxury inn or a peaceful glade watched over by friendly fey may restore more)  

Hitting 0 hp and then being healed gives you a point of exhaustion. Nothing’s going to tire you out like getting magically defibulated so now everyone can stop complaining about healing word spam. 

Poison:  For our purposes, the “poisoned” condition as written  is too severe. Disadvantage on all attacks and ability checks is downright punishing for anything other than a single battle. Instead we’re going to make it work like charmed, where there’s a baseline effect for the purposes of resistance, but the status of each poison is dependant on the source.  

Poison falls in the “ short term big effect” side of attrition, specifically undermining a player’s ability to do most things since most effects end on a successful save or at the end of an encounter. Long lasting poisons should have more minor effects than the default poisoned condition, only applying to a few types of rolls or having a bane-like effect that makes judging the odds just a little bit more difficult.  

This makes poison great to use for dungeons and short-ranging exploration where the party is likely to face multiple encounters in one day. 

Diseases:  4e aced the design of these maladies by treating them as a contained skill challenge with their own CR  with various stages: stage 0: you were cured, stage 1: you suffered the initial effect, stage 2 or 3: you suffered a severe effect, with the final stage (3-4) being some effect that made the disease permanent.  When you got a disease it was usually stage 1, and you (usually) saved for it at the start of each day. Beating the DC by 5 or more meant you went down a stage (closer to 0), where as simply succeeding meant it stayed as bad as it was. Failing meant you got sicker, meaning a character could bounce up and down in wellness as an adventure went on. 

Diseases are best for longterm adventures, and often undermine one particular aspect of a character ( healing, actions assosiated with a particular stat).  Counterpoint to poisons, diseases should start out fairly gentle and then get worse the longer they’re left alone, leading to eventually devastating effects.  

Curses:  While borrowing the mechanics of diseases, I’d have curses be specifically weirder in their effects. The sort of thing that can make up the central hook or b-plot of a whole adventure.  This should also mean that curses are the hardest for the party to stumble into, but also the hardest to shake. 

Item Degradation: Detailed in a previous post HERE, the long and short of it is that item degradation is a form of player driven attrition that gently curbs their overall power level. If they go too hard, use their best items recklessly, get involved in needless fights, then they’re going to be in worse shape by the time they reach the final challenge. This was supposed be the idea behind HP/limited class abilities per day, but attrition systems cover that better IMO. 

Stress:  The psychological counterpoint to exhaustion,  I’ve already talked about Stress HERE. I tend to only use stress in horror themed adventures and campaigns, as it builds upon 5e’s optional “madness” system which fits the theme when gothic terrors and eldritch abominations but less so with the game’s usual heroic fare. 

Hunger & Supply:  I made a super lightweight system based off this idea of “depletion die” for potions and other consumables, check it out, it’s lightweight and fantastic.  Using this kind of system gives us another avenue to challenge our party, lengthening or shortening their lifeline as they lose supplies and seek out new caches. 

Thinking environmentally:  Part of the fantasy of being an adventurer is travelling to dangerous places and living to tell the tale.  We’re denying our party that fantasy if we don’t follow through on the threat the idea of these places imply.  You should risk sickness if you go into a swamp, sewer, or jungle, thirst should be a factor in desert exploration, just like freezing is for mountain and winter expeditions.  That’s to say nothing of magical hazards; cursed landscapes that drain your will to live dead marshes style, alchemical smog in a steampunk industrial zone, fading into nothingness as you approach the edge of existence.  

Figure out the natural hazards, make your party aware of the danger, and then build your adventure around the fact that they’ll need to save against the hazard each time they take a long rest.. Do they take a detour if it means having a safe place to camp? Is there a resource they need to manage along the way? Could encounters expose them to further dangers or make their current exposure worse? Keeping these ideas in mind especially when you’re planning a wilderness exploration adventure should give you lots of ideas to fill up those encounter tables. 

Adding insult to injury:  Giving enemies the ability to inflict attrition in various forms makes otherwise trivial  enemies a credible threat even to a seasoned adventuring party. As an example,  A party might breeze through a fight with some monstrous spiders ( or even ONE regular sized spider, if you can imagine) , but that spider encounter doesn’t need to be the most dangerous thing ever if their next encounter is a navigation challenge fording a river and a few of the heroes are still groggy thanks to the slow acting poison in their systems.  

In this way you can use attrition based battles to soften your party up for greater challenges, long after their HP totals and healing ability have outpaced the damage a single trap/encounter can do. 

Artist

[katiemay-025]

Cabin in the Woods

~~~~~

Summary: After the rebellion you decide to move to District 7 to be with Johanna and help her through her hydrophobia.

wc: 1.7k

warnings: y/n/n = your nickname, mdni, mentions of hydrophobia, swearing, brief nudity, blood. a/n: getting tired of searching tumblr for Johanna Mason fics and not finding any new ones so I wrote one myself.

~~~~~

The train pulled into the station and when the doors open, you’re greeted by the fresh smell of pine and the thick misty clouds. It had been a months since Katniss shot Coin and the victor’s were whisked away back to their district. You were from District 10, and used to live and breathe on the farm where you raised the cattle and horses. After months without a caretaker, some of them hopped the fence but most of them died.

There wasn’t much to rebuild in District 10 so you decided a change of scenery would be nice. More than anything, you wanted to see Johanna in District 7. You wanted to see how she was doing considering she refused any more help from the doctors. So here you were standing at the District 7 platform with a small pack of clothes on your back.

Finnick gave you her address and directions to her house since he’d been there for the victory tour as the mentor for the 72nd Hunger Games. When you had won during the 66th year, Johanna hadn’t had a house yet in Victor’s Village.

Making your way through the town was easy, most people far and wide had gone to The Capitol to see Snow’s execution, they were all still trickling back. The almost ghost town didn’t bother you, but a ghost house did. At first you weren’t sure if you had the right house but then you saw the horse figurine half carved from its stake and the many other figurines. As far as you knew none of the other victors had their talent as woodcarvings.

This was definitely Johanna’s house but it was as barren as when you had came home to your house. Musty and a layer of dust caking everything. Unsure of where she could have gone, you went back to the town where a few people were moving the logs around to help with the rebuilding. Someone must know where she went so you asked around. “Hey have you seen Johanna Mason? She’s a few inches taller than me, with brown spikey hair and brown eyes. She also permanently glares at everything.”

“Oh yeah the victor, she comes into town twice a week for food supplies.”

“She’s not at her house?”

“No she’s out west past the tree farms doing god knows what.”

“Okay thank you.”

All you had to go off of was Johanna was past the tree farms. The farms looked bad, the ground was uneven, the trees were uprooted and some of them had a chunk of the trunk blasted out, District 7 must’ve rebelled here, mirroring District 10 and the main work places.

At the end of the grid of trees, there was a trail between the bushes, at the start you found tracks that led further into the forest. It took another 30 minutes before you heard wooden logs tapping against each other.

Johanna was 10 feet in the air hanging with her legs wrapped around the tree and using the back end of her axe to hammer in the final frame log for her… whatever she’s building.

“So this is where Johanna goes after the war.” You say grabbing her attention.

“You know damn well why, I fucking hate that mansion.” she said swinging down to the roof of the cabin she built below the platform. “How did you find me?”

“Oh you know, I asked for directions and the guy sent me this way to follow angry gremlin tracks.”

Johanna rolled her eyes. “I have an axe in my hand right now.”

“You’re not a threat to me Mason. I can spit on you and you’d go into shock.”

“Shut the fuck up.” She scoffed. It was mean yes, using her fears against her but Johanna needs the reality check and from experience, she takes you more seriously when you don’t coddle her.

“No. You can’t sweep it under the rug Johanna. Not this time, I won’t let you. It starts just like this, not showering, avoiding the rain. Soon it’ll turn to you not staying hydrated and I’m not letting you die.”

“So what? You’re going to stay here until I get better?”

“If that’s what it takes.” You felt it first, the cold drop of water on your hand. “Let’s go inside, you can give me a tour.” You offer your hand towards Johanna and she pushes it out of the way as she walks around the cabin to the front door. You see the hair on her neck stand followed by heavy breathing. Without a second thought, she sprinted towards the door tripping on the steps of her porch and ramming into the door.

You winced watching her in pain so you moved to help her. As soon as you touched her shoulder she knocked it away again. “I’m fine!” She shouted. You could hear the pitter patter as the rain hit the leaves above you. You felt more drops on your head and looked up to feel them on your face. You loved the rain and if Johanna wasn’t going to accept your help, you’d at least enjoy it.

You reached your arm towards the sky smiling at the cool misty air. You hopped from the porch and ran circles around the tree spinning through the forest like a fairy. In the floor, you collected the pine needles and threw them into the air with a giggle, but you quickly turned your head to Johanna who sat with her back towards the door and her knees pressed to her chest.

The rain wasn’t getting to her because of the overhang but you saw the glistening under her eyes. Blood ran down her nose as well and watching her was like that 17 year old girl who cried through her reaping and her interview. Only this time it was real. You quickly stopped your dance and walked over to her, ignoring the squelching in your shoes. You crouched down out of arms reach from her. You wanted to hold her but you knew it would send her into a deeper madness because of your wet clothes.

“Are you okay?”

“It’s not fair! It’s not fair that you get to go out and dance in the rain and I can’t.” She whined. “District 7 is a rain forest, it rains majority of the days here and I can’t even step off my porch.”

“You’re right it’s not fair, but like I said, I’ll be here and I’ll help you every step of the way. One day we’ll be able to dance together in the rain.”

“It’s stupid. I know you’re fine but I-“

You waited for her to continue but her voice died out. “It’s not stupid Johanna. It’s completely understandable.” You reached your hand out to catch the rain and held it out towards Johanna. “Baby steps. If you wanna poke the water, go ahead. If not I’ll just sit here.”

This was a tactic to get the horses to trust you with a brush, holding the item in your hand and letting them feel the bristles of the brush for themselves before you grooming their hair. Johanna crawled to sit next to you. You heard her sniffling and saw her fingers shake when she brought it up. You never moved letting her dip her finger in the pool of your palms. “I can do this. It can’t hurt me.” She said to herself before plunging her finger in the water.

Johanna looked up at you like a child looking for approval and you returned a beaming smile. Your cheekbones rose high to turn your eyes into crescent moons. In all honesty you were proud she at least retained some things the doctor in District 13 taught her, like positive self motivation.

It seemed to click for Johanna that she actually touched water from the first time since The Block. “It’s a start. I’m proud of you.” You said.

Johanna let out a sigh she didn’t know she was holding as she looked into your eyes. If you weren’t here, she’d have hid under her bed until who knows when, but in your presence, it was like a protection. Through everything you had gone through, you were still the same caring and patient y/n she knew.

“I’m going to change before I start catching a cold.” You stood up stripping off your jacket. The cold water seeping down your back and you left it next to the door.

“If I see any water inside I’m strangling you.”

You shook your head as you stripped off the rest of your clothes turning to an all too smug Johanna. “Happy?”

“Very.” She said checking you up and down. “It’s like your horses and the apples you give them when they do a good job. I touch water and you get naked as a reward.

You laugh at her comparison. You couldn’t even be mad at her, after all, you did treat her like a horse a couple minutes ago. If this was going to help her then you wouldn’t mind.

“Okay. I can do that only in private though. I am not getting naked at the market, when you run your hand through the produce sprinklers.”

“That’s better for me then. I get you to myself.” She opened the door and let you go in. As you stepped into her cabin in the woods, you felt a hand squeeze the skin on your butt and snapped your head towards her, her name on the tip of your tongue. Johanna threw her head back laughing at your reaction before walking past you and bumping her hip with yours. "Make yourself some tea, I've got tea bags and pine needles. Collect your own water though. I'll get you some towels and clothes to dry off."

What a day, from being on a train to getting naked in the middle of the forest. No matter what though, you were glad that the day was ending in the presence of Johanna Mason. After putting on her clothes, because you stupidly left your pack in the rain, the two of you cuddled under a blanket and enjoyed the warmth of the crackling fire.

[toxycodone]

Hey Toxy! Sorry for the sudden radio silence on asks from me, but I got nasty icky sick.

Any quick thoughts on the Touden Party (post Falin being revived) with a gn!reader or fem!reader who got sick (stomach bug or flu is okay with me)?

Thank you again! Love your blog!

-Deer Anon. 🦌❤️

NOOOO OMG...im so sorry to hear that i hate. the flu. I had it in the beginning of this year and when I tell you I was DYING. ugh.

Laios

Probably the most visually affected. Literally says out loud "that's awful!!" when he hears you're sick. Bro is not having it

He's not squeamish, so he volunteers to check on you (along with Falin, theyre a duo).

He holds your hair back when you throw up. King

I think he spends a lot of time unintentionally fretting about you. Will you be okay? Getting sick is the worst. He just ultimately feels bad.

I think he tries to distract you by reading or trying to play games. The others have to keep him from you because he's so eager to just hang out and doesn't really think about the reality that hey. you have something infectious!!

Falin

She's genuinely an unbothered queen in the best way possible. Because she doesn't freak out or anything. Falin is just like "okay" and comes up with her game plan

She's good at nursing you back to health but she doesn't overdo it. Falin is really lowkey and honestly an excellent caretaker. She's the one monitoring your temperature and making sure you get enough fluids and she doesn't cringe when you vomit everywhere. Just frowns and gets to cleaning up.

She'll use her magic to help alleviate your symptoms before she goes <3

Marcille

Instantly freaks. Because ew germs and being sick but also like are you gonna be okay?? Marcille wants to like consult every medic in town before Falin reassures her its cool

Marcille makes the best herbal tea for you...since Falin has you covered with the magic, Marcille focuses on her home remedies and such.

SHE WOULD DO YOUR HAIR. It's an act of love. Usually people don't think about that but having icky hair when you're sick is the worst and Marcille won't have it.

Chilchuck

Oh I know he's immediately thinking of a lecture. He wants to go to you and tell you about how he told you so and you shouldn't have pushed yourself

But when he sees you he just sighs. You look terrible (affectionately) and he just feels super bad. Chil presses his hand to your forehead and tsks and immediately starts doing the mental checklist of what he'd do for his daughters when they were sick

He kinda chides you, but ultimately he settles to change your bedding when it gets too sweaty and make sure you're getting some sort of bath/shower.

He also does that dad thing where he comes into the room and just looks at you when you're sleeping to make sure you're good

Senshi

SENSHI THE GOAT IS MAKING AN IMMACULATE CHICKEN SOUP FROM BONE BROTH HE MADE PREVIOUSLY AND STORED. He is so real.

He doesn't pressure you to eat and just like, makes sure you're at least drinking the broth to get your strength up.

I also like to think he'd attempt to make the Orc medicine he learned while living with them too, just in case. Even small doses of that could hopefully get you feeling better.

But he's helping Chil with the sheets and washing dishes and such. Senshi also stays in the room with you when he has down time during the day and will read you pa

Izutsumi

Eh...do not expect much from her. But she assists the others in the background. Mainly by helping Senshi or Chilchuck take care of you.

She could probably tell you were sick like the day before and avoided you or mentioned you having a strange smell.

But when she hears you're sick she's like :/ "called it"

When no one else is there she "begrudgingly" sleeps at the foot of your bed. It helps you with the chills but also when you have a fever you're really warm

(She probably also gets sick then you have to help her out since its "your fault" hehe)

[maximwtf]

“I’m sorry all the same”

Astarion x Reader

Words: 2600

Google Docs Pages: 4

Warnings: Haarlep’s deal’s effects, yk how it goes so I won’t have to tag it all :”D Some spoilers from act 3, such as quotes and a tiny bit of lore. Guilt, emotional hurt/comfort, after graveyard scene Astarion

Opening: Haarlep held onto his promise. Using your body, your form, to do as he pleased. And you were foolish enough to believe that you could ignore it. But perhaps you should have considered that at the very least someone would notice a change in your behaviour. 

AN// So wtf I write for bg3 now? I guess so :”D Mainly interested in writing for Astarion, Jaheira and Zevlor. But we’ll see how I’ll manage c: OH, GN reader. Yall also I’ll open requests again once I finish the last Legolas one I have :3

“I’m sorry all the same”

After the battle with Raphiel, everyone had been so worn out and in need of a breather that you hadn’t even had the time to truly consider what you’d lost. Or even truly notice the price of what had been lost in exchange for information. Or what that could possibly mean for the future or the people around you. And if any of those thoughts had had the chance to cross your mind, it would have only been the latter. What would the others think? How would it affect them? How would the exchange you’d had with Haarlep affect the people closest to you?

And it usually came to the same conclusion. Even if the bother from it would be minor, you’d chosen to try and avert the others from paying their mind to it. To let the incubus do as he pleased, as long as you could lead the party onward without slowing it down. But even the strongest of leaders had to fall in due time, that was fate set for those who chose what you had. Which in this case referred to the facade you’d built, shattering, cracking at the seams at times. And no amount of laughing it off could shake away certain people when they at last noticed what was wrong. 

And so had fate decided once more. The feelings of phantom touches trailed here and there. And as he had promised, you knew exactly what was being done and when. And there was no way of stopping it. Only the thought of this being what you chose lingered in your mind as the touches travelled that evening. Making you shut down of the usual glow you held when talking to others, hope of no one noticing your state still somewhere at the back of your mind. 

And it did work, for most of that evening. Fluently talking to the town’s folk and the people by your side. At times the feelings even faded, disappeared into thin air. Giving you hope that the incubus had stopped for the day, freeing you from the locked state as it felt. But what use was it, if even within those free moments it spiralled at the back of your mind. Reminding you of its existence and the chance of it all returning. On the edge of hoping that it would come back, so you wouldn’t have to suffer so with the thoughts. Because at times, it felt like those empty moments were the ones most pained. 

You tried to soothe the feeling of a never ending hell by telling yourself that this was momentary. The form was new and the creature knew exactly what it was doing. But as time passed, he’d surely get tired of the repeating game and move on to something else. And even if this truly was an infinite infernal road, you had chosen to walk it for a reason. You’d avoided a battle and gotten important information out of the man, which in truth cost a great deal. But if it meant that no one got physically hurt, it did seem like the right thing in the end. 

Inevitably, the time passed as it always had. The sun set, which led you along with the rest back to Elfsong. And for once, there was time in the late evening to sit around and talk. There was nowhere to go, no tasks to run and nothing so important that it couldn’t be left to be dealt by tomorrow. The morning was always smarter than the night, anyway. 

But there was something that wouldn’t allow itself to be left alone, to linger until the sun rose once more. The now more intense phantom touches, the caresses that haunted you. Had ruined most of the day and seemed to plan on continuing to do so. 

As it made itself more known, demanding your every bit of attention, it slowly reached your limit. The top of which when it hit, would at last shatter that rather fragile facade. The facade that at times felt like it was being held together by whatever cheap adhesive children held the glitter on the cards they brought to their parents. Weak. 

The fireplace flickered calmly as the few people in the middle of the room sat on the couches and chatted. You tried your best to throw in a few comments but from your perspective they all sounded the same, forced. It was no use, after being driven to a corner as you’d been. So in order to save face, you stood up and informed the others that you’d be heading to bed to catch up on those countless hours of disregarded sleep. And most seemed to have believed that, wishing you a good night as you slowly walked to the comfort of your bed. 

Though, there was one who’d joined in on the others, wishing you a good night. But they didn’t hesitate to stand up and follow along after you’d left. And they didn’t exactly make the noise of their steps unknown either. Never sneaking up on you, especially at moments such as these. Which was a hint enough to make the conclusion that he knew what was going on. You’d feared for that earlier. Earlier when a pair of eyes had followed your movements and interactions with the others. 

So of course you knew who it was, who it always was. It gave you enough peace of mind to sit down calmly before turning around to face him, attempting to keep up the nonchalant facade of an expression. He stared down at you, the expression on his face awaiting. Like he expected you to tell him something. Making it almost feel as if this was frequent enough to make you expect him and tell him you knew why he was there. And that sadly was the truth. How awful that he’d started to care now that you’d gotten yourself into a mess. But there was a way to dodge this bullet. “You can feed on me tonight if you’d like?” And all you could do was watch his expression fall for a moment, taken aback by the response to his knowing look. But the fun of that didn’t last for very long, he was serious. “Darling, no. This isn’t the time, and you know that yourself.” He answered. Boring, you thought. But regretted the rebellion in your mind straight after. “Well in that case, I’ll get some rest,” you informed him before tucking yourself under the familiar blanket. You knew the vampire couldn’t say much else, nor do anything. He didn’t wish to start any commotion. So the only option left was to drop the topic, there was no use in trying to force anything out of you. And he knew that, respected the choice and left for his own bed. 

But the sleep you’d told yourself would eventually come, never did. The touches never relented, at times becoming more faint but at that point it meant nothing. The sound of the others slowly drifting to their beds and the chatter quieting down got your attention for a moment. But after that it all fell back into the same old silence, in which the condition you were in felt the worst. Because breaking the silence at times like these with any of the sounds you’d held back would have shattered whatever crumbs of self respect you were holding on to. 

Saying that hours had passed since the others had fallen asleep sounded like an overestimate, but then again it wouldn’t have been a surprise. This wasn’t the first time the incubus had done this, you wouldn’t have been oh so familiar with all of this if it had been so. And just like any other time, you laid awake. And to truly follow the usual protocol, the decision to leave and get a breather was the next obvious choice. 

With careful steps, which through thorough practise had learned which plank didn’t squeak, you escaped the pestering silence. Then again, this time of night it seemed just as quiet anywhere you went. A lucky catch if you heard commotion somewhere nearby when entering the terrace outside. Which is where you’d headed, sat down on one of the chairs that sat lonely in a corner. 

It wasn’t necessarily the fresh air that helped, the night air was always so cold anyway. But it was the feeling of not being a bother, not letting absolutely everyone around you have to listen and worry. Worst of all, feel bad. 

A shaky sigh mixed with something like a whine escaped as you leaned back against the wall behind the chair. Eyes closed, there was finally a moment of something that resembled peace. Peace, if you fully excluded the plaguing touches and caresses. A sound dangerously close by got your attention though, getting your eyes to snap open. Nothing but the endless hell with the incubus seemed to last that night. 

In the faint light of the terrace it took you an embarrassing amount of time to even make out a shape. Nevertheless, figure out who it was. But maybe you could blame it on the feelings you were experiencing, later on. Just to save face. 

The figure, now determined to be who you should have expected. Astarion, made his way over. He sat down rather calmly and stayed quiet before drawing in a breath and talking. “Assuming you won’t tell me otherwise, I hope there's nothing troubling you my dear?” You always hoped that his arrival would have been more of a fifty fifty in the usual protocol, but it never was. Neither were the things he said, or how he treated you when it came to this. “Perfectly fine.” You glanced at him, another hitched sigh making its escape, tired of being held back. “That’d be funnier if it was anyone but you,” he said while shifting his chair a little closer. The silence he gave you after was plaguing enough in the cold of the night that it forced you to say something. “It’s all the same, no matter what I do. If only I’d be strong enough to completely ignore it.” You shook your head before turning to look at him, expecting a certain answer from him. Knowing he wasn’t very happy per say about your recent approach to this. Yet, never angry. He took a fast breath but the words he’d prepared never came out. Hoping that the pleading look you’d given him had softened some of the words he’d originally thought of. “I know what it’s like, to lose control of what you have. But you of all people shouldn’t have to.” The rest of the words he’d held back escaped with an exhale at the end, left unspoken. But in truth, you wouldn’t have heard them anyway. The other questions so often filling your mind had appeared back the second he’d come after you. And as per usual, there was no holding them back as they escaped your lips. “Were you ever angry with me for the choice I made?” The exchange of yourself for a piece of information. And as often as you found yourself rewording these same questions, he took the time to answer them. Each time so swiftly that you had to believe he was telling you the truth, “Of course not, dear. More so at the creature itself.” But he couldn’t possibly leave it there. “The control you had was not complete. You don’t have to blame yourself.” 

Awful how he cared, making it harder to keep yourself together. “I’m not sure if I blame myself exactly. I’m not sure if it was worth it. I wonder if it ever made anyone, you, angry.” A shudder ran along your spine, shaking your head slightly to get rid of it before continuing. Not daring to look at the man next to you for longer. “But maybe he’ll get tired of the form eventually. In due time, I’d be mostly free. It’s just…he’s been..active today.” You rambled, eyes resting on the comfort of your lap. But even then, you could almost feel the pair of red eyes piercing through you in the dark. Filled with an emotion you didn’t dare to name, not to even look in fear that it would confirm the care for you he’d formed. 

He stayed quiet, the sound of his and your breathing keeping the silence at bay. Even the breath he drew sounded loud, but his words never seemed to be. As per protocol. “Come inside. I’ll be with you, however you want for me to,” he offered so kindly it almost caused you to cringe. Maybe there was still some getting used to you had to do before this would become more comfortable. But you knew he was trying to fix something within himself as well by doing this. He was trying to offer you something he was never given. So maybe taking a hold of his hand and accepting the offer wasn’t for your sake, but for his. 

His steps were as careful as yours has been, as he led the both of you to his bed. You sat down first, flush against the headboard, wishing it would have provided some sort of comfort from the touches. Astarion stood beside the bed for a moment, holding back on a question before it slipped from him, “what would you like to do, darling?” He asked, making you wonder what it was you wanted. To have the peace of mind you had before. Well, what had been left of it after the tadpole had nestled itself somewhere back there. The shiver that ran along your spine interrupted that train of thought. The only thing you could still achieve and wished to have was rest.  “To sleep,” you answered while observing the man sit down and lean against the headboard. He’d left space for you to come over if you so pleased, a silent invitation. 

You knew he probably wasn’t the most ideal person to comfort someone, but also could see that he felt a form of compassion when it came to this. And knowing that he saw a fragment of himself within you hurt deeper than any deal with an incubus ever could. 

You climbed up to him, leaning your back against his chest before kicking the blanket to a comfortable position. The space was so silent, but hearing Astarion breathe removed any thoughts of that. Keeping your attention on how his chest rose and fell in a familiar rhythm. 

His arms snaked their way carefully around your waist, careful as if there was a chance you’d tell him to back off. But you would never, not when he’d finally allowed someone to care for him and come close. He leaned forward just enough to be able to talk quietly. “It won’t last forever. But I’m sorry all the same.” He said, leaning his head back to rest. And there was an ounce of truth in his words, even if he had meant that this time wasn’t going to last forever. Most likely not even until the next morning. But that the deal wouldn’t last forever either. Astarion himself had assumed the same of his fate, but had gotten the chance to change that path in the end. And the thought of that gave you some form of peace of mind, at last. 

And at last the rest you’d been craving for came, slowly and late. But it didn’t matter anymore. The knowledge of not having to be alone and having someone to care for you was hard to accept but maybe you’d get used to it someday. 

[mundaneskeleperson]

I feel like all the hate on Jimmy has, ironically, morphed into an obsession with him.

You don’t see Jimmy in a post that has the rest of the crew of the Tulpar, and everyone says “thanks for excluding Jimmy” - “good job not drawing Jambalaya” - etc., and when you do see him in a post it’s all “I’m sorry you had to draw Jimmy”. He gets a large wave of mentions on a post either way.

The large variety of nicknames and their use are also starting to paradoxically seem like actual friendly goofy nicknames instead of bullying. I get that people claim to do that in hatred of Jimmy, but I think people have so much fun making them that they get excited to try out a new nickname and therefore get excited to talk about Jimmy.

I’ve seen him called Jimbob, J, J*mmy, Junkyard, Jenga, Jorts, Jambalaya, Jabortion, P. Jiddy, J. Diddy, Jiminy Cricket, Jimmychanga, Jidiot, Juxtaposition, Jar-Jar, Jumanji, Germy, the list goes on further than I could write.

I’m not making this as some sort of callout post saying people are wrong for doing this and should stop, because I am also guilty of it.

I just had the epiphany that it’s ironic how much attention and focus Jimmy gets despite how much people hate him. It feels antithetical to that message of hate everybody’s comments seem to put out. Something like, “if we really want to punish him, shouldn’t we let him be forgotten?”

Nonetheless, I really think Jimmy is a very interesting character who should be studied, discussed, and yeah ridiculed. A lot of what makes Mouthwashing so insane mind-openingly good to me is its use of a not immediately apparent unreliable narrator, which is Jimmy. He challenges the notion that the protagonist is good and correct all the time. It shows the delusional mindset people like him have, which I think was really cleverly shown in the rant with all the quest popups coming up and Jimmy yelling about how burdened and put upon he is by all the requests he has to put up with. It suggests that maybe Mouthwashing isn’t structured like a game because that’s the medium, but rather because Jimmy thinks of himself like a video game hero: the main character enduring trials who’s in the right and just misunderstood. This mindset allows for a lot of “doing what ‘must’ be done” actions, which is apparent from the very first action of the game, where you are prompted “turn right” and nothing else in the face of a screen saying to go left to avoid a crash. As a player, there’s no other way to progress the game than to do the horrible things Jimmy does, and I think that’s symbolic of how Jimmy sees his actions too.

The nuance to how horrible a person Jimmy is mixed with a perspective that tries to justify his side of things makes for a really interesting story to analyze and shows how actual people can become like that in real life. Seeing “his side of things” ultimately doesn’t absolve him of what he did, but I feel like it provides opportunities for some people to try and defend him with that, which once again mirrors how in real life people try to argue that “we just haven’t seen this terrible guy’s side of things!” and may advocate for him when they think there’s some tragic backstory missing. Sometimes it’s just about the deeds that were ultimately done.

I just think if people get over fake excluding Jimmy some really good analyses and fan works could be made about the deeper parts of Mouthwashing without still glorifying Jimmy or whatever

This has really gone of the rails but I think I meant most of what I said.

[sturniolodreamz]

NSFW Alphabet - Matt Sturniolo

a/n - These are just my opinions, so if you don't agree, just be respectful please. And don't worry, I'm doing Chris next!

tags - @sturniol0z @ethereal-lovers @its-jennarose @angelic-sturniolos111

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

This man is the king of aftercare. I'm talking running a warm bath/shower or getting you some of his clothes to wear.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

His favorite body part on himself is probably his hands, because he knows his partner loves them. Matt is definitely a boob guy, so whether they are big or small he loves your boobs.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

His favorite way to cum is when you are in missionary and he can just pull out and cum on your stomach.

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He would NEVER admit this to you, but he loves when you dom him.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

He's definitely not the most experienced before you, maybe 1-2 bodies max, but he still knows what hes doing. If he doesn't know something, he's not afraid to ask you to show him.

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

He's a sucker for missionary. He loves to be able to kiss you and see your face while hes fucking you.

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

He's definitely down to have fun with things, but knows when the right moment is for jokes and when to stay serious. He would never want to hurt your feelings or make you think he's laughing at you.

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

He keeps it trimmed short to avoid any awkwardness, and it's his personal preference.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

He's constantly telling you how much he loves you, he doesn't want to give off the impression that hes just using you for a quick fuck. He definitely likes to set the mood to make you feel special.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

He rarely masturbates, only if hes desperate and you're not around to help him. He would much rather have your hands on him than his own.

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

I feel like he gives off praise kink vibes, constantly wanting reassurance that he's doing a good job making you feel good. Other than that, hes not really a kinky guy.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

Definitely the bedroom. He likes to have privacy so he can take his time with you. He also likes to fuck you in the shower every once in a while.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Gentle kisses to his jaw and neck drive him crazy. He's also a sucker for subtle teasing, like when you rest your hand on his thigh and slowly move it higher and higher.

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

He's not into anything like degradation or impact play because hes so scared of hurting you, physically or emotionally. Also, he's not into anal. He loves your ass, but not being inside it. (lol)

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

He will never say no to a blowjob, but he loves making his girl feel good. Let's just say he's called Matt the Munch for a reason.

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

He can definitively do both, but he always makes sure to ask you how you want him before you do anything.

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

If it's been a while and a quickie is the only opportunity you have, he will gladly take it, but he prefers to take his time with you, even if that means waiting a little longer.

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

He will try almost anything once, but only if you are okay with it and want it too.

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

1-2 rounds max, he tends to get tired after he cums and just wants to cuddle.

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

He's not a fan of toys, both for himself and for you, because he doesn't like watching something that's not his dick make you feel good.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

He likes to tease you to a certain extent, but eventually he can't take it anymore and just wants his hands all over you.

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

Definitely grunts and moans into your ear, but hes not crazy loud.

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

On days when hes tired or just wants to mix it up, he loves watching you ride him, using his cock to make you feel good (and hes not afraid to tell you how much he likes it.)

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

He's not huge, but the size is perfect for you. He's proportional in length and girth, just the right amount of everything to fill you up perfectly.

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

He has a higher sex drive, but also knows how to turn it off when it's not the right moment.

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

Give him a couple minutes, and he's out like a light (after he takes care of you first, of course.)

[maddy-k-reads-all-day]

Okay... so I'm pretty sure the "Play My Way" song is canon considering its an official Amanda 2 song and it's listed in the games credits.

So I'm also gonna consider the two animations the song is based on as canon, too. Bear with me.

If we consider all 3 videos canon then things get really interesting.

Timeline wise, I think all three videos take place before the first game.

The first where everything in the Hide and Seek tape goes smoothly where it's just a storyboard happens before Amanda and Wooly got trapped. I think this may have been a pilot to the animated series. It feels like it sets up what Amanda The Adventurer was supposed to be like. Amanda and Wooly are super friendly with each other, plus Wooly is missing his ears just like the games original pilot.

The second version might be sometime after they got trapped. Supposedly Amanda didn't originally remember her life as Rebecca in the first game right? I think this might be where she started to notice something off. When they replay the Hide and Seek tape, Amanda clearly gets the feeling they've done this before. I'm so sure about Wooly here tho.

Now let's talk about the song on its own, ignoring the timeline and just acknowledging that the characters find this tape familiar.

By the third time (the song), Amanda clearly notices that they've done this before and freaks out. And I think here if Wooly didn't notice something off before, he does when his part comes when he's repeating the lines from the animatics he sounds really unsure? "Right, you're the best... you must play this a lot." Like there's a weird sense of unease in his voice when he says this.

The chorus to me feels really interesting because I feel like we're getting Amanda's true feelings about this situation.

"Now watch us play our part. Now watch us dance and sing. Don't want to fall apart like kids who never seem to scream."

I love the puppet-like vibes these lyrics give off.

After this it seems like the tape resets cuz it's suddenly Amanda's turn again. And Wooly seems like he's really frustrated that he's not getting his turn. But Woolys verse is the most interesting to me.

"Now watch us play our part. Now watch us dance and sing. Don't let it break your heart just play along and-" He gets cut off.

This almost sounds equally passive aggressive as Amanda's chorus. There seems to be an equal amount of resentment. But the "just play along" part seems very fitting for Wooly. One thing I think about Wooly is he seems very avoidant of things that upset him. And it got me wondering if the reason he's always trying to redirect things isn't because it's some "job" of his, instead he simply doesn't like it. He doesn't like tragic stories he doesn't like talking about death or people you trust hurting you. But a lot of these things seem like things that Hameln intentionally wanted in the show so I'm really starting to belive that Wooly himself is the one who doesn't want to talk about it.

Another thing I find weird is how adamant Wooly was about wanting a turn and then how the moment Amanda was gone, he started to panic. As his verse continues after Amanda's chorus, he sounds more and more upset. I can't wait till the animation for this comes out because I really wanna know what Wooly was talking about when he says, " I don't wanna go in there." Omg. Didn't Amanda say that once?

Now, when he finds the "cat under the box," this time it's Mr. Fox? And then Amanda sings about killing someone. I don't think it's Wooly because, continuity wise, that doesn't make sense. We found out that killing Wooly does nothing he just comes back. So Amanda wouldn't try it twice, right? So I think it's Mr. Fox before the first game. Maybe Mr. Fox was a character similar to the opossum? Idk why Amanda would kill Mr. Fox unless if he was in their way. Actually, I know it isn't Wooly because Wooly is still alive at the end of the song- (imagine the music video comes out and makes me look like a fool)

I also wonder what Amanda's "it's you" is supposed to mean. Maybe Kate was the one watching this tape?

Anyway, these are my observations and theories. They are kinda messy and subject to change, but what do you think?