#But that 1 piece of info you need is only in that 1 book

[magpiemirroring]

As a fantasy author writing in the 90's GRRM would not have had access to many of the resources on Deveraux's list, yes, nor would he had had access to the modern internet and the resources it possesses. I don't believe GRRM has ever said what specific research he did do on plains/steppe people, but I do think it was possible for him to have done some.

The 90's were not the dark ages. If you wanted to know something and didn't know how to start, you could go to a library and ask a librarian for help researching. I have even read about authors who would call or write to professors at universities for more obscure info, and often got very enthusiastic responses because specialists in a field LOVE their field and love talking about it!

And mister "unlike Tolkein, my fantasy is concerned about small details like tax policy" certainly knew how to do research into obscure subjects in the 90s if he's getting into that level of detail for his main civilization.

I don't precisely what info GRRM would have been able to find, but it was definitely an era in which, culturally, we were still struggling to be better about how we depicted plains and steppe cultures as something more than good or bad savages. But the conversation was definitely happening! White savior narratives (or even just "white-centered" narratives) were still very popular, but at the same time we were starting to have a lot of conversations about how that was bad maybe, even if we might not have used the phrase "white savior narrative". The 90s actually had a whole "politically correct" movement that strove to do better on a lot of social fronts. Some of it feels pretty cringe now, but 90s "PC" culture is basically today's "woke". (Anyway! I would actually be really interested if someone could dig up reviews from the initial publishing and see if any of them addressed the Dothraki!)

The thing is, though, that most people who are familiar with GRRM's work are probably familiar with the TV show, which premiered in 2011 on HBO, a "prestige" network with a big budget. So, the show was created in an era with access to more of the resources Deveraux listed. And I think the writers of the show and GRRM maybe should have sat down and gone, "Yanno what, this Dothraki stuff might have played okay in the 90's, but hmmm.....maybe not now! What can we change about this?" And then done the research and made some changes.

Research is not some terrible burden an author should not have to do. If you're writing stories inspired by ideas about cultures you are unfamiliar with, you actually should take some time to read about them and find out at least if your ideas, yanno, are perpetuating harmful or tired stereotypes and have a good hard think about why you're doing that. Simply saying "inspired by the popular conception of" is not a magic phrase to absolve you of doing some research to avoid writing stereotypes. Problem not solved!

As an author writing today, in 2024, you do have access to the ivory towers of knowledge. A lot of those specialists arguing with each other in ivory towers are also on tumblr and twitter and writing blogs. Where, yes, sometimes they will talk to ordinary mortals in an earthly tongue about their weird little niche subjects. (A lot of the gatekeeping and lack of access is also not the fault of the average university professor. Many of the them are happy to send you a copy of a paper for free if you ask for it. Some of them write books you can check out at your local library, especially if your library does interlibrary loans. I've gotten all sorts of books from universities via my library's interlibrary loan program! )

Fantasy writers today, even those who do not claim historical accuracy, are not exempt from doing some real research using at least one good, solid source. Yes, your story is set in another world and maybe your story is the type where "medieval tax policy" level of detail is simply not necessary! But your readers exist here and now in the modern world and they are real people who don't deserve to have to read yet another lazy depiction of their culture or their culture's history. You owe it to them to try to do some research.

I do think fantasy authors can and should learn how to do research. It is a skill that can be learned. It sucks that the educational system failed a lot of us when it comes to teaching us those skills, but there are resources online for free to teach you the basics now. And you can develop and practice those skills by developing a passion and reading a lot!

(I can often tell what an author is passionate about by what sort of details show up in their works. "Spot the special interest" can be a fun game when you read!)

But also, have you ever noticed how in the back of some books there will be a couple of pages where the author thanks a whole bunch of people? Sometimes, if you read those, you will discover that the author is thanking people who helped them with their research, people with the expertise to sift through good and bad knowledge and help the author get the details right and avoid pitfalls!

it is very easy to avoid getting dragged over and over again by history bloggers for the quality of your fantasy novels: don’t repeatedly emphasize how ~aCcuRaTe~ they are! Accuracy means nothing in fantasy, it’s a totally useless term, and people will forgive almost any believability-stretching worldbreaking sin if you write well and tell an engaging story–unless you try to stake your reputation as a fantasy writer on gritty realism and being a more historically attentive worldbuilder than that Tolkien guy, who only *checks notes* had a PhD in medieval literature and spent his entire life thinking, writing, and teaching about medieval language and culture.

[pomefioredove]

My brain is kinda sluggish plus I'm indecisive but also i did like several of these (also if i need to divide up this post let me know)

I have no clue which i like best so i simply made a list but let me know if i need to chunk it up

For Riddle Rosehearts

"If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun." Or "I'm putting you on my to-do list."

For Vil Schoenheit

"Don't bite your lip, I want to do that."

For Ruggie

"You like me because I'm a scoundrel."

vil done here!

summary: "if you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun." type of post: short fic characters: riddle additional info: romantic, reader is gender neutral, reader is yuu, maybe ooc, post book 1

You think it's a pretty pathetic sight, but you make no mention of it. Their egos are bruised enough as it is.

"How long?" you ask, sitting across from the shackled duo.

Ace knocks against the solid collar around his neck. "Not long... But we can't present like this,"

You were hoping he wouldn't say that.

And just a day after you told them not to do anything stupid this week, too...

Deuce says nothing; he's been sulking at the end of the table like a puppy with its tail between its legs for the entire lunch period.

"Have you tried reasoning?" you ask. "Maybe he can take them off for the presentation, then put them back on?"

Ace scoffs. "Reason? With Riddle?"

"I thought he was trying to be more lenient?"

"He is," Deuce mutters, hanging his head. "But that just means he only dishes out punishments when someone really deserves it..."

"It was just a stupid painting!" Ace says.

"That we set on fire!"

You look between the two as they bicker over the accident, bewildered by their lack of concern about where this puts you.

Ace and Deuce were supposed to perform the magical component of your defense project, while you and Grim presented. Now...?

You stand. "I'll talk to Riddle,"

Your friends share a pitiful look, but do nothing to stop you as you hurry out of the room.

Surely, Riddle will understand. He wouldn't let you suffer from Ace and Deuce's mistake!

"No," he says.

"But-"

Riddle beheads the wilting flower of a rose with a sharp snap of his shears. It tumbles into the underbrush.

"They destroyed a priceless piece of art. It was hundreds of years old!" he snaps, leaving no room for disagreement. "They should be thankful it's only a week."

He moves on to the next browning rose, inspecting its petals before decapitating it, too.

"But I didn't do anything. I told them not to do anything dumb, I tried to reason with them,"

"Reason? With Ace and Deuce?" he scoffs.

"I would recommend asking for an extension on your assignment until they've carried out their sentence,"

It's too late to ask for another week; he must know that. And you're not giving up so easily.

There must be something you can say...

"But it was an accident,"

Riddle scoffs. "Of course it was. And the rules clearly state that accidental arson of a painting more than three hundred years old must be punished by losing their heads,"

Rules. Great. This is quickly becoming a lost cause.

"There has to be some other way they can be punished," you say. "You said you weren't going to lose your head about these things anymore."

He sighs, rolling his eyes as if frustrated with you. "The rules-"

"Come on, Riddle- If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun!"

Riddle stops. For a moment, it's almost like... he's actually considering your offer.

"...What exactly did you have in mind?"

-

"This is what you call a compromise?!"

Ace's head of fiery hair pops up, the color a striking contrast against the green of the hedge maze.

You shrug. Riddle, sitting across from you as you watch the two tend to the shrubbery, almost giggles.

"The Prefect has been more than fair. If anything, you should be thanking them for the opportunity to end your punishment early," he says, pouring you another cup of tea.

Ace grumbles, scratching his neck under his collar.

Deuce nudges him, and the two get back to work on trimming the hedges, a puny pair of shears in each hand.

Riddle smiles. "I must say, I'm rather impressed by your persuasion skills. It's not often that I change the terms of a punishment after it's dealt,"

"Well, I didn't want to fail on their account,"

"I heard that!" Ace yells. Riddle grins again.

"Perhaps your ingenuity will inspire them, then," he hums, cupping his tea in his palms.

"In the meantime, I believe another tea party is in order for tomorrow afternoon- they have a lot of ground to cover. Care to join?"

[pettypiastri]

gentle hands find tender hearts — lando norris

lando norris x fem!reader summary - day 1 of testing leaves Lando sore and seeking comfort word count - 2.2k warnings - language, allusions to reader insecurity, otherwise none! note - first piece for f1, please be nice! basically just idiots in love but they're not in denial and are already dating. blame Lando's yt channel for the brainrot and info i've loosely based this on. drop by the inbox, would love to discuss all your thoughts about your fave vroom vroom boys (anons are on) 🤍 feedback always appreciated!

Seeing the green verification light flash on the hotel room card reader might be the best thing Lando’s seen all day. Decidedly the best thing he’s seen since leaving you, a vision in his shirt, behind in the crisply air conditioned room, a sleepy smile on your face after he pressed a final kiss to your forehead. Which, notably, he’d only managed to find after a two-handed effort to sort through your messy hair swathing your face and neck. He’d traded all that in for the Bahrain humidity that’s somehow made itself a home in the aching in his head and the weight he still feels bearing on his neck. Seeing you now, just as pretty as this morning, he’s certain a ‘meh’ day 1 of pre-season testing did not make up for what he’d left behind at 6:45. Not even close.

You’re perched on the king sized bed, white hotel bedding bleached beyond identity, with a book in your hand and Lando wants to cry. Or maybe huff frustratedly. At the very least kiss you immediately. The smile you give Lando upon seeing his head of deflated curls peek around the wall, the one you always give him that reaches your eyes and consumes his soul, has his shoulders sagging. More than 100 laps and hours of data threaten to finally crush him as he drags himself toward you, items falling from his hands in time with his steps. Bucket hat, wallet, key card until it's just him, drained and pouty, eager to demand your comfort. Blindly you dog ear your page, cataloging his schlumpy movements. 

“What’s wrong gorgeous?” 

A resounding ‘oomph’ leaves your chest as your boyfriend falls against your frame. Strong hands reach under your hoodie seeking soft skin. Even though Lando’s been in the heat all day, it’s nothing like the toe curling, soul unfurling warmth you can provide. These days, he always seems to feel a chill in his chest when you’re not around. 

“Shit day,” he grumbles, fabric sticking to his parted lips as he snuggles against your chest. Overwhelming fondness makes your heart ache, a playful quip is briefly delayed. As a distraction, your hands gravitate to mirror his, wrapping around his broad shoulders and back. One comb of your fingers through his mangy curls has them frizzing up, tendrils reaching out to tickle your nose. 

“Oh, s’that all?” A sharp pinch between your ribs in retaliation has you tightening your grip in Lando’s hair. Your free flowing giggle encourages Lando to elaborate, his traitorous smile hidden against fabric. 

“ ‘M sore. Back, neck… pride.” On instinct, your hand in his hair dips to the natural resting place on the back of his neck. A pensive hum settles on his ears.

“Hmm… Well, suppose you’re lucky you’ve got a girlfriend then.” 

A truly minimal effort grumble of confusion is all you get in response. Lando, tired and grumpy, never fails to make you smile. It’s why, with great effort, you wiggle down the bed with him still on top of you, crumpling pillows and pulling up the bottom sheet in your wake, so you can be nose to nose with him. His beautiful baby blues, with a streak of exhaustion, a fleck of frustration, and a halo of tenderness, crack open to regard you. Droopy lids are held open by a combative fondness that overpowers the weight of unmet expectations. You kiss him languidly, a need to rush nowhere to be found. Despite your initiation, you part your lips easily for him letting him control the moment how he wants. Lando always kisses you like it's his last chance, in a way that makes you feel it from your stomach down to your toes. Sometimes you find yourself crossing your fingers that you make him feel the same. 

Upon breaking apart you coax him gently, “Lay on your stomach for me? Let me take care of you.”

And Lando resigns to let you. Happily. Defenselessly. Completely. Because you always take care of him. After Sochi, after Carlos left, whenever he loses sight of himself. Your unyielding arms are always ajar for him to crash into.

Lando proves to be absolutely no help as you try to shimmy his hoodie off him, his face pressed into one of four available pillows, arms curled above his head. Your level of struggle makes you giggle, then laugh from your chest, a whine of his name mixed in. Half a cheeky smile is visible from Lando as he peeks an eye open to regard you. He lifts one arm begrudgingly and then the other, allowing you to successfully free his torso.

Gently you lay the hoodie to your side and scan his lean back. You watch his shoulders flex as he shifts again to get fully comfortable, the dimples in his lower back popping in and out. His golden skin, a tan you watched bloom over a long offseason, calls for your careful touch. 

One of your thighs raises to straddle the backs of his, finding a comfortable position atop his legs. As if in anticipation of your tenderness, an adorable sigh whistles out through Lando’s nose. Moving just by instinct, your careful hands start at the small of his back, digging in just enough with your thumbs to coax the tension out. Briefly you wonder if the tiny hiss Lando lets out is one of appreciation or if hours in the air conditioned hotel room have left your extremities just on the wrong side of chilly. You’re reassured when a more full chested sigh escapes your boyfriend upon your hands reaching the apex of his shoulders in one long motion of your hands. The look of contentment is already beginning to set in on Lando’s striking face as you continue carefully in fluid, albeit improvised, movements. 

There is a stillness in the room that welcomes the almost inaudible efforts of your hands pushing into his muscles and grants permission for your mind to wander. A dull hum from the air conditioning unit aims to harmonize with Lando’s consistent sighs. On instinct you itch to trace a pattern between his birthmarks, taking a moment to appreciate even the smallest parts of him. 

As now warmed fingers detour from their ritualistic path up his back, you stop at one mole, marveling that it looks the exact same shade of brown as the coffee was on your second date. A cup of which had steamed up between your eyes as you glanced sheepishly over the porcelain rim at him, hoping he couldn’t see you staring. The waitress had led with ‘how cute a couple the two of you make’ before informing you it was closing time. Lando had not corrected her. Instead he’d offered you his jacket before walking you home. You’d kissed him before you even made it to your street. The tableau, illuminated by a dusty streetlamp, saw you pushing him back with a hand on his chest when you realized you wouldn’t be able to stop if you carried on a second longer. Lando had found it sickeningly endearing. 

Another birthmark on your course upwards is a bit lighter, more oval, something like the dirt track he had taken you to watch rallying at with his siblings last winter. You’d shared lip gloss with one of his sisters and been asked for advice on the boy problems of the other. Lando’s brother Oliver realized he didn't even have to ask how serious things were when he’d caught Lando staring at you when he thought no one was watching. Oliver had leant over to ask him a question, only to find Lando didn’t even know who the race leader was as he’d practically not taken his eyes off you. You, just existing. Eager eyes darting around attentively at the flurries of dirt before you, your hand on Lando’s wrist, spinning the bracelet his Nan gifted him with absentminded ease. Later he’d watched Lando take about 30 photos of you as you wandered the merch booths and food stands, all of which you were none the wiser to and Oliver knew you never would be. 

The birthmark just at the base of his neck is the one you noticed peeking out from his t-shirt late one warm night in Monaco. When your eyes yearned to fix on something stable. Something safe. Lando’s hand had reached back for yours as he lead you through the Monaco streets. You’d linked your pinky with his, too shy to feel the warmth of his whole hand in yours. He’d driven the two of you around in his Jolly, for once abiding by the speed postings; he was in no rush with you. You recall being envious of the wind ruffling his hair, wishing it was you instead. The hand he placed on your exposed thigh had you looking the opposite direction to hide your glowing cheeks.

Slowly, so as not to startle him, you scooch to sit over the center of Lando’s back, bringing his strong neck into an accessible range. Your thumbs dig into the sides, freestyling a way to massage such a random part of the body in such desperate need of TLC. His curls that you’ve worshiped, pulled on, and braided for the past years are welcomed into the special treatment with your fingers sliding against his scalp before beginning at the base of his neck again.

Lando had looked at you sideways when you’d once commented on his strong neck being one of your favorite features of his. Refusal to elaborate was betrayed by your full body flush and flitting eyes as he leaned over you, hands settling on the arms of the chair you were sat in. That was just last month; he still makes you nervous. 

Nervous in the way that makes your breath catch and your palms clam up. Nervousness akin more to anticipation than anything else; woven with glee and eagerness. Something like you feel right now, realizing you haven’t kissed him in 15 minutes and your hands are starting to cramp. Leaning down, you press a peck to his exposed cheek, Lando’s cologne filling your nose. For someone you thought was asleep, his eye cracks open the instant your lips part from his skin. 

Lando regards you for just a moment before, with much difficulty given his current position and slight delirium, moving to wrangle you so you’re lying down chest to chest with him. One of his arms drapes over your neck, hand planted behind your head, creating a little bubble made just for your heads. Something unrupturable and uninterrupted where he can stare at you without needing a reason.

The eyes you’re met with are droopy, full of contentment, and overflowing with affection. It’s a look that you used to think you’d never receive from someone else. But Lando’s never been afraid to be loud with his love. It took some time, some proof of dedication from him that the beaming smile and honest eyes were not a fluke, for you to bloom. Now when you’re with him, you don’t care who’s looking. You love who you are in his company, how unafraid to occupy space you become. It draws you to place your hand on his stubbled cheek (that you will not stop teasing him about) and stroke your thumb slowly over his skin. On instinct Lando nuzzles closer, so eager to be doted on by you. His lips find yours in an intimate kiss. 

“Thank you baby,” he murmurs, words meant just for you, so soft they would’ve been mistaken for a flicker of the moonlight had you not been paying attention. 

You assume he means for the massage. He assumes you know it’s for everything else: all the support and love and devotion you show him. It’s bliss with you. Lando had gotten over trying to fight against the never-ending spiral of longing, lust, and love in every moment, word, and movement with you, a long time ago. Now he welcomes drowning in your smile and voice and touch. He yearns for the overwhelming clench in his chest and weightlessness of his body. He’s given himself over completely to you in hopes of his demise at the sight of your warm eyes and the way you say his name.

Lando finds his heart squeezing again just from looking at you, curled against him in a random Hilton somewhere in the Middle East. The only remedy, the only distraction is to kiss you again, gently but full of meaning. It makes you blush, afire under his adoring gaze, feeling so safe but exposed, heart bared fully to him. 

In the sacred hush of your hotel room you scoot just a fraction until your nose skims his, eyes fluttering closed. Upturned lips brush against yours involuntarily. 

A deep exhale leaves Lando’s nose, tickling the peach fuzz of your upper lip. It conveys total peace and comfort. It says somehow, this is all he needs. This is how life looks for him when his mind wanders to years his senior. Maybe there’s more noise around your little bubble, more feet, decidedly smaller than the both of yours, leaving prints on your hearts. But you and him together like this? It’s constant, transcendent of location or hardship or outside noise. You and him together like this, with 'I love you's' as the night's lullaby, is not just enough, it’s everything.

[cosmerelists]

If We Had Cosmere-Themed Chess Sets...

Now that I think about it, these might simply exist. B-But anyway, here's how I think a chess set could be constructed thematically from various Cosmere books.

[Spoilers! I wouldn't read these unless you've read the series mentioned in the title]

1. The Stormlight Chess Set

King: Elhokar. He is the king and also, and I say this gently, he doesn't do much or go very far, typically. Just like the king in chess! Queen: Jasnah. Is the queen...albeit at a different time than her brother is the king, but eh. Very powerful. Can move anywhere. Might be the strongest piece on the board. Bishops: Kadash and Pai. I just think they should be Ardents, and I picked my favorite two. Knights: Renarin & Adolin. Renarin because he should be the piece that moves in the most unique way. No one else moves in an L shape! And Adolin? Well...not gonna lie. I just think Adolin should be a horsey piece. Rooks: Dalinar and the Sibling. Dalinar because he needs to be a piece that is strong. That moves in a firm, straight line. That can do that castle move which is about protecting the king. And the Sibling because they are literally a tower. Pawns: Bridge 4. Main purpose was to be sent out to die, although if they make it allll the way across the board they can get a very special powerup and become one of the most powerful pieces on the board.

2. The Mistborn Era 1 Chess Set

King: Kelsier. Yes, the game is supposed to end if the king dies. No, Kelsier-King does not play by the rules. Queen: Vin. I mean, she's a Mistborn, which to me is parallel to being the piece that move in any direction as far as it wants. Very powerful. Bishops: Hammond & Dockson. Stand on either side of the queen and king. One can only move on black squares, and one can only move on white, which symbolizes how Ham & Dockson are on the same side but rarely see eye-to-eye. Knights: TenSoon & Marsh. Knights make hard turns as pieces, and these are characters who are always making hard turns: TenSoon from one side to other, from one body to another (and yes, I gave him the animal piece. Sue me). And Marsh from human to Inquisitor to, uh, Death I guess. Rooks: Demoux & Spook. I can't tell you why rooks read as "true believers in Kelsier" to me, but they do. And I kinda like these two as a pair. Pawns: The Skaa army that Kelsier tries to recruit. Sorry to those men.

3. The Mistborn Era 2 Chess Set

King: Harmony. Can't do much himself, but does direct the other characters. If he gets killed (shattered), the game could be over for Scadrial. Queen: Wax. Harmony's sword. Can zoom all over the place killing other pieces. Bishops: Steris & Marasi, as the resident believers in Survivorism. Knights: Wayne & MeLaan. Yes, I'm realizing that I see kandra as the little horsey pieces, I guess. And the knights can't move straight. And neither Wayne nor MeLaan are straight either. Rooks: Ranette & uh...Marsh again? Am I forgetting someone? Why are there so few characters in Era 2? A-Anyway, Ranette and Marsh definitely make sense because they're both, uh, support characters. Ranette making weapons. Marsh dropping info. And the Rooks are there to support the king! Pawns: All the kandra. Pawns of Harmony, every one. Bleeder is the really angry one determined to make it across the board and get promoted.

4. The Elantris Chess Set

King: Raoden. As a dead guy trapped in Elantris, Raoden doesn't have a lot of moves he can make. But dang is he really good at doing a lot with a little. Queen: Sarene. Sarene, on the other hand, has a LOT more freedom of movement and she uses it. Bishops: Hrathen and Dilaf. Hilarious to have them on the same side as Raoden and Sarene, I know. But listen. They gotta be the church pieces. Knights: Galladon and Karata. Since knights trace out the letter "L" and the Elantrians need to draw symbols in the air to do magic, I thought...wait. I swear this made sense in my head. Rooks: Kiin and Eondel. Kiin because the rooks kinda look like they're wearing a crown and Kiin was due to become king, and Eondel because he's the guy who has the strong private army. Pawns: I think it would be fun if the pawns were people with the Shaod, since they could become really powerful but they aren't currently.

5. The Warbreaker Chess Set

King: Siri. Not only does Siri spend the whole book being shuffled from one room to another (like the king can shuffle one square at a time), but a major plot point is Keep Siri Alive when the other side tries to kill her, so. Queen: Susebron. I do want Siri and Susebron to be king & queen, and it just works better this way. Once he gets his powers figured out, he's an all-powerful sort of guy. Bishops: Lightsong & Blushweaver. They're literal religious figures. Knights: Vasher & Vivenna. Mainly because they're warriors. Rooks: Parlin & Llarimar. I know Llarimar should be a bishop because he has the hat, but I like the Returned gods as bishops. So I made him the rook--and Parlin too (as soon as I remembered he existed. Sorry, Parlin). They're both there to support/protect another character. Pawns: I think they should all be soldiers from the Lifeless army.

[zuccnini]

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Craft Blog @zuccninis │ Sketch Blog @squashni

Miscellaneous info below (Mediums, Contact, etc):

Mediums: I'm a traditional artist and my main medium is watercolor.

I'm not being paid to promote any specific brand, if your looking to start out use what is accessible and affordable to you! With that said here is what I use:

Watercolor: Renesans Half pans, Holbein watercolor tubes, Winsor & Newton Professional, and Daniel Smith Extra Fine Watercolor.

Watercolor inks: Dr. Ph Martins Radiant Concentrated watercolor and Ecoline Liquid Water Colour (These are why some of my watercolor pieces are so vibrant.)

Brushes: 0.5, 1 & 2 Foldable travel watercolor brushes, and those waterfilled brushes.

Paper: Fabriano Hot Pressed Watercolor paper, I usually bind these into my own books.

Other Mediums: Microns, Prismacolor Color Pencils, Posca Wax pastels, Paint markers, Tombow water based markers, Ballpoint pens, Acryla Gouache, and Crayola crayons.

If you are looking to get into watercolor my best advice is to invest in actual watercolor paper. For watercolor the most important thing is the paper, nice paper can make even crayola look beautiful. 300 Gsm is ideal.

For Mini Paintings:

Liquitex Acrylic Gouache and Golden SoFlat Acrylics

Mini Canvases (3x3in)

Mini Easels (5in)

Clear Gesso

Small paintbrushes, brand does not matter I tend to buy whatever is tiny and is a reasonable price. I use Synthetic brushes.

It should be noted that I do scan in all my artwork, I use a epson perfection v370, I've had this scanner for years and it works pretty well, you just need to mess around with the settings. I edit all my art in Clip Studio Paint to remove any lint or dust and to fix up colors.

[Traditional art can be pretty expensive so I recommend if your looking to try any medium to buy a little bit at a time and buy things piecemeal.]

Other Info:

Business Contact: zuccnini@gmail.com [Don't send me unsolicited trash]

If you wish to contact me for other matters most of my DM's are closed, Best places to contact me is Etsy for order issues, or Ko-Fi. (Don't ask me for my Discord that's for friends only.)

If You see my art getting reposted/re-uploaded, report it, the only accounts I post on are included above. Anywhere else I'm being impersonated. Please don't support low quality repost accounts that steal art from actual artists. Many times these accounts screw over actual artists since they love to monetize and sell stolen work.

I schedule posts on here on all my accounts! Schedule is Mon-Wed-Friday on Zuccnini, Bonus posts/Reblogs are Tues-Thurs and Saturday-Sunday.

Dont tag my OC / Original Character art with "pokemon" or any other fandom tags, This is NOT a pokemon blog this is my illustration blog.

As for Fanart: People are free to draw and commission art of my OCs, feel free to tag me in it! I do ask no nsfw without my permission.

That's most of the info I can think to include for this.

-

Extra-Curricular art:

[18+ Obviously]

nsfw twitter │ NSFW Bluesky

[y-rhywbeth2]

D&D Vampire Lore Dump #1

Feeding and Diet It's actually more complicated than just "they bite you and eat your blood." Plus what they're able to eat; how often they need to eat; what happens to you if they bite you and what happens to them if they don't feed- spoiler: it's unpleasant. Incidentally, you should reload and kill Cazador again.

(I was comparing stuff across editions and compiling it into something more coherent and then figured I'd info dump about it in case my fixations are useful to somebody out there.)

DISCLAIMER: There are two things to note about the lore presented here: First, while the standard stat block in the monster manual is the default, in terms of lore vampires have this annoying tendency to be incredibly, stupidly varied. They are magical monstrosities ruled by the power of symbolism and superstition above anything else.

The next is that D&D is decades old, spans five editions, several settings and hundreds of writers. One guy establishes a piece of lore, and then the next picks it up goes "nah" and writes something else. I collected info from four different source books, all from different editions, which naturally don't entirely agree on how vampires work. Lore never stays consistent and may contradict itself. You may see information somewhere else from a source I don't have that contradicts what I wrote here. If you read this and like some of this stuff but not other bits, take the good and ditch the rest.

Basically, in D&D, canon is what you decide it is.

Feeding | "Biology" | Hierarchy | Weaknesses and Cures | Psychology

They only need to feed once in a 24 hour period. Vampires can survive between 3-9 months of starvation, but it's a terrible idea. -

There are three different categories of "Undead Hunger." Vampires have two of them and actually need to consume more than one thing to stay "healthy": Blood and life force. -

The blood is obvious. This is categorised as a "diet dependency." It's required to preserve their bodies and powers, and without it their powers* are suppressed as their bodies begin to shut down. *This refers to the powers a vampire gains with age; they cannot lose power they had as a newborn (the base stat blocks given for vampires and spawn given in the monster manual) A vampire requires the equivalent of 12 hit points of blood a day, or it begins to revert into a corpse-like state. Mentally they slowly regress into a desperate, mindless animal frenzy where they'll kill and drain anything containing blood they can get their hands on. Ultimately, if they don't get any blood then they revert into a corpse and they're trapped in their own body as it begins to wither and mummify. They're trapped in a coma, vaguely aware of the passing of time in flashes of awareness until somehow they are fed blood. If they ever wake up again, they will probably wake up feral and absolutely ravenous. -

Vampires rely on the victim's blood pressure to expel blood from the wound they create, lapping and mouthing at the wound rather than actually sucking on it. Being bitten is a highly pleasurable experience that victims can't help but desire, even when they know they shouldn't. -

While the damage done remains, the wounds from a Vampire bite closes itself quickly after the feeding (assuming you're still alive). It does however leave a mark. The bite mark itself is often "less than half an inch in length", and leaves behind a significant bruise that causes no pain or sensitivity to touch. Other side effects include fatigue and a weakened immune system. -

Vampires typically target sleeping victims (less likely to fight back) and favour the blood of their own race above others. So theoretically, Astarion finds elf blood tastes best. -

Drinking animal blood tastes bland and is health-wise akin to drinking tainted water: yes it might keep you alive in desperate times, but it's ultimately bad for you and will probably make you ill. That said, it has no mechanical detriments and a vampire that's forced to live on animal blood will be just as strong as its kin, but considerably bad tempered about it. -

A vampire's secondary feeding requirement is called an "inescapable craving", which means that if a vampire doesn't get that fix then their hunger begins to devour them instead. The pain is described as a spike boring into the vampire's brain, obscuring their awareness. They begin to obsess over feeding to the exclusion of everything else, they become willing to take ridiculous levels of risk to stop the hunger as they become more and more desperate. As they are consumed they become progressively more feral until they're just a rampaging mindless horror driven only by horrific hunger. For vampires, their inescapable craving is life force, which a vampire leeches from their prey through touch leaving the victim weak. Direct skin contact isn't required, if you're wearing full plate and/or the vampire is wearing gloves and they lay a hand on you they can still drain you. Mechanically these were combat abilities, energy/level draining occurred when a vampire struck a target with their own body (usually their hands). Before 5e hit them with a nerf bat, vampires could permanently weaken you this way (you could lose character levels from this). 5e also seems to have rolled life drain into the biting, so a vampire can consume your blood and energy at the same time. -

Post feeding, a vampire starts to look alive. Their skin is flushed and warm and they feel elated and energetic. In contrast, a vampire that hasn't been feeding properly becomes more corpse like and feels "sluggish" (I'm interpreting that as flu-like symptoms). It's purely emotional however, the vampire is no less capable and dangerous and suffers no mechanical penalties. -

Vampires can feed on other vampires, which is actually more filling than living humanoid blood and gives them the ability to communicate telepathically for a few hours. They don't like it though. If a vampire drinks from another vampire then they can be controlled by that vampire and the link forces them to feel affection for each other against their will until it wears off. The results of both vampires in question feeding on each other is described as "debilitating" since they both paradoxically become enslaved to the other's will and forced to "love" each other creating an absolute dysfunctional mess of control, obsession and resentment. The good news is that it only lasts a few hours. -

Some vampires can eat regular food (no nutritional value in it for them) while others would regurgitate it if they tried. As they retain their tongues, vampires can also taste food. That said, it's a bad idea for them to eat garlic, even if they can eat solid food. -

Some kinds of vampires don't drink blood. There's all kinds of weird and wonderful stuff a vampire might be required to consume instead. Spinal fluid stands out. Or the bit about ones who drain the ocular fluid from your eyes. Gale might find interesting things to talk about with the magic eating ones who prey on mages. They're much less common, probably something to do with most people not finding that very sexy. I don't think any of them exist on Toril.

[cedric-k-rossignol]

The French Crown Jewels Theory - Parts 1 & 2

The gem in Undertaker's ring is 'diadochos', the Phantomhive Family Ring is indeed a diamond, and Sirius (r!Ciel), Canopus, Vega, & Polaris all possess their own gems as well. All of this jewelry was sourced by Undertaker from the French Crown Jewels that were stolen/went missing in the midst of the French revolution of 1792.

Alright y'all, once again I am back on my medieval French literature shit. This time in Latin! Fun stuff. No poetry analysis in this one, thank God. Instead, I got to go back in time to my years wasted spent studying biochemistry! Fuck me!

I have tried to find evidence of this being discussed online previously and have come up empty (obviously the hope diamond has been discussed, but not in the context of the Golden Fleece), but please let me know if this has already been theorized and I just missed something!

The gem in Undertaker's ring is not a diamond but a mineral that was once known as Diadochos. From ancient Greece through to the middle ages this mineral was considered sacred and powerful, thought to be capable of summoning and holding the 'shades of the dead' and making demons clearly visible to its user.

The gem being Diadochos would also explain the color difference of the ring between season 1 of the anime (green) and what would later appear in further seasons and in the manga (unclear....no pun intended). It also provides a link to the French Crown Jewels...

Which brought me to what I believe is a confirmation that the Phantomhive family ring being sourced from "The French Blue" diamond (a portion of which is now known as The Hope Diamond) as was seen in season 1 of the anime will become canon in the manga. I also am going to predict we will meet a certain grim reaper named Hendrik Fals that's based on a real person.

Not only that, but the idea of another ring with a sister diamond (as seen in the anime with another portion of The French Blue) was an interpretation of what will happen in the Manga. R!Ciel is likely in possession of The Bazu Diamond, which was a part of Louis XV's insignia of The Order of The Golden Fleece. Canopus, Vega and Polaris likely hold the three yellow sapphires that surround the Bazu Diamond, and I believe the other diamonds in this piece have something to do with Undertaker's other mourning lockets.

This also supports my theory of Undertaker being a Breton (from Brittany, France) as I believe he's represented by the dragon called "le Côte-de-Bretagne" in the insignia. And of course, that he was the one to originally gift the Phantomhive family ring to Ciel's grandmother Claudia as a symbol of his devotion and commitment to her, and in doing so "cursed" her and her family (it's a metaphor y'all)

The French Monarchy had no shortage of drip, you think only one measly giant ass diamond went missing when people's heads were getting chopped off? Buckle up, I fear this is going to be a long one. Trigger warning for discussion of suicide and mental illness.

Let's get into it.

Part One: Undertaker's Ring

In researching French medieval age jewelry for my Floire et Blancheflor series, which involves two rings (one of which is magical), I came across a gemstone that was noted to be "the most powerful" (or something along those lines) but I'd never heard of it before - Diadochos/Diadocos And then I googled it, and nothing came up. I had to dig into scholarly articles and Latin text to get info on this, and even then it's sparse.

There were three main sources I could find; two books on minerals hailing from ancient Greece, the other a popular book from the middle ages - 'De Lapidis' by Marbode de Rennes. Translated into several different languages shortly after publication, the original Latin text was written in the late 11th century by a French bishop from - say it with me everybody - Brittany.

Coincidence? Maybe. But I doubt it. I really need to finish my Undertaker is from Brittany write-up...

All these sources make similar and frustratingly brief claims, as neatly summarized in one article on the the ancient Greek text Tetrabiblos;

1. The stone diadochos is similar to the beryl. 2. It is as useful for divinations through water, and for the summoning of shades (adductionibus umbrarum) as no other stone. 3. Furthermore, it makes the appearances (effigies) of all daemons thoroughly visible. 4. Do not apply it to someone dead (=a corpse), because it is opposed to the deceased. 5. For this stone is divine and sanctus and santified by a perpetual consecration.

Side note - I will absolutely be making another post about Tetrabiblos and it's companion volume Almagest. Written in the 2nd century by Claudius Ptolemy, they're the respective astrology and astronomy bibles of the middle ages. Tetrabiblos literally means "four books", and it's Latin translation is titled Quadripartitum means "four parts". There are some very interesting notes about demon summoning in this. All of Claudius Ptolemy 's books are addressed to an unknown person named Syrus. He also has what appears to be a relevant volume on music (this guy REALLY likes fours...) looked to see if anyone had mentioned this in a theory before and when I couldn't find anything I was shocked. Let me know if I've missed a post cause there is absolutely stuff to be discussed from Claudius and these books - I just can't get into it or this post will be 5000 years long.

So, Diadochos is actually now known as Beryl.

Whereas diadochos means "heir, successor", the word "beryl" is Old French for a "precious blue-green color-of-sea-water stone".

It's worth noting the element "Beryllium" is #4 on the periodic table of elements.

Gemstones high in beryllium include beryl (aquamarine, emerald, red beryl) and chrysoberyl. It is a relatively rare element in the universe, usually occurring as a product of the spallation of larger atomic nuclei that have collided with cosmic rays. Within the cores of stars, beryllium is depleted as it is fused into heavier elements.

Diamond is element #6... Interesting.

This stone was, as I mentioned, considered sacred and magical - used often in divination, and to create crystal balls. But it also had much more practical uses -

When the first eyeglasses were constructed in 13th-century Italy, the lenses were made of beryl as glass could not be made clear enough

Well that sure is interesting...

Season 1 vs Canon - Fight!

As I said, this mineral is now known as 'beryl' - but you would be more likely to recognize the names we use to refer to the different colours beryl comes in - morganite, heliador, gosenthite, aquamarine, and emerald. You're likely familiar with the signature colors of some of these gems, all of which are different shades of the same mineral.

As previously mentioned, 'beryl' is the Old French word for the blue-green color of the sea.

I think it's pretty widely accepted that the creators of season 1 were given information from Yana that hadn't yet been released to readers of the manga. The most obvious example of this (so far) is the 'Undertaker is a reaper' reveal. Now I have no idea what the creative process behind developing an anime is like, how much contact or creative input Yana Toboso would have had, but I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest it's possible that admist a wealth of information that was handed over, there was a note that said Undertaker's ring was one of 'Beryl', and the creative team went with the 'traditional' Beryl color of blue-green - which is why people think the ring in season 1 is set with an emerald.

Peep the fleur de lis 👀 y'all they knew not to leave THAT out at the very least.

And yes, emerald is a shade of Beryl - but this was never intended to be an emerald.

The difference in color is something that's always really bugged me, so I'm relieved to finally have an explanation that makes sense (to me at least). Now as for the colour Yana chose...

So What Fucking Colour is it Anyways?

If you know of better official art that demonstrates the color of this damn beast of a rock on his hand, feel free to point me in its direction because I was struggling. There seems to be a pattern of colour-washing the art or appears in, or Undertaker posing in a way that hides the ring from view.

This is a much-discussed character design that shows a lock of hair embedded/underneath the gem of Undertaker's ring (we will return to this detail in a future theory), as well as confirmation of the fleur-de-lis on the side of the ring, and then of course the gem itself. Perhaps a light yellow, or perhaps just showing the gold backing through the translucent stone?

We do get some shots from the anime in BOC and BOA respectively;

Well, I get why people think it's a diamond.

Even in official artwork sometimes it's white, sometimes it's yellow, sometimes it's tanslucent , sometimes it's a little...blue, dare I say?

Back! on! my! Chemistry! Shit!

Alright, and now we get into the chemistry of it all. I know, first history and now this bullshit. I'll keep it brief; excuse me my nerdy nostalgia for a spectroscopy graph.

Basically, the different colors of Beryl are due to impurities within it (unclean one!). The purest form of Beryl is goshenite, which is clear/white.

The other colours are formed based on what ions (charged atoms) exist within them as impurities - for emerald it's Chromium, for Morganite it's Manganese... And both the yellow and aquamarine colors are due to the presence of iron (element #26) ions.

Now when you think of the gem aquamarine, you probably think of a pale blue; and for most gems sold nowadays that true. As a March baby it's my birthstone, and I've been gifted many a pale blue aquamarine birthstone reminiscent of the water it's named for....

Oh wait a second, who else is a March baby? Motherfucking Cedric K. Ros(signol), that's who!

Okay, I'll admit; I'm sort of invested in his ring being an aquamarine gem because it would relate back to both his birthday and his 'rebirth' as a reaper when he drowned, and the more I string these crazy red threads through French history the more I'm convinced these details are critical to his character. So yeah, I'm biased - but before you write me off as delusional, just hear me out, because the chemistry is in my favor!

The best-known green beryl is emerald, which obtains its colour from Cr and/or V ions. However, a different green colour can be obtained from mixtures of the yellow and blue beryl chromophores described above. When yellow and aquamarine chromophores are simultaneously present, the colour becomes light green. Depending on the relative concentrations of the two chromophores, the colour can vary from light yellow-green to light blue-green. Shang et al. (2022) classified the colours of beryls containing these chromophores into five groups, from yellow to light blue.

Fridrichová et al. (2015) heated crystals of deeply coloured aquamarine and yellow beryl to different temperatures. After heating one of the yellow crystals to 300°C it was still yellow. Heating of additional yellow beryl samples to 500°C and 700°C in each case resulted in light blue aquamarine colouration. Another yellow crystal heated to 900°C lost almost all its colour.

All this to say; apply enough heat to a green beryl and it will turn to yellow, to aquamarine, to clear.

Here's a little basic color theory refresher for you as well; blue and yellow pigment together make green, whereas blue and yellow light create white light.

Here are some examples of various coloured aquamarine gems, some set in gold bands like Undertaker's, based on the verbiage with which they were advertised;

1. A clear goshenite gem; 2. A pale aquamarine; 3. A yellow aquamarine

4. A clear blue aquamarine; 5. A yellow aquamarine; 6. A yellow aquamarine

5. A yellow Aquamarine; 6. A yellow Aquamarine; 7. A pale blue aquamarine

All of these could conceivably be made from the same source mineral - what changes its nature is the amount of heat that's been applied to it.

Neat, huh? And I would argue symbolic for this story. Both in that there's a whole lot of manors being burned down, but also as a metaphor for life experiences and trauma.

The scientific debate on nature vs nurture continues, but it seems to be proven again and again that the way we develop is significantly weighted towards nurture. Nature plays its part, for sure - if there weren't iron ions in these gems, the fire wouldn't have an effect on the gem's color. It might get a little toasty, but then it would cool off and have no lasting effect on the gem's appearance, structure, chemical composition... But since there are iron ions that are a part of the gem, that were within it when it first formed (which it can do nothing to change), it is significantly impacted by its environment. If the fire gets hot enough, it can lose all of its color.

For someone like Undertaker, who I believe to have been (and continue to be) mentally ill, depressed, and ultimately suicidal to wear this ring is symbolic of the mental illness he was born with, and the trauma he experienced living in Brittany from 1331-1366 (Black Plague, The Breton War of Succession, and The Hundred Years War between France and England).

I've seen it mentioned in discussion that Sebastian is a physical representation of Ciel's trauma - a physical demon to represent his metaphorical demons. I also see the story of Black Butler as an allegory for generational trauma and inherited mental illness; that which we bestow upon our children like heirloom jewelry.

However, this metaphor is also sort of hopeful in that the change isn't necessarily permanent. The color of the gem can revert back towards its original hue over time depending on the circumstances.

Undertaker & Water

There's a panel in the manga that implies Undertaker's method of suicide was drowning. I currently have two different theories on where he drowned that are duking it out for the top spot. Currently the top contender is that he jumped from La Pointe de Plouha, the tallest cliffside on the Breton coastline, and drowned in the waters separating England from France - The English Channel. Plouha has a very interesting myth about the Ankou, the Breton version of the grim reaper, and I find it poetic for him to be reborn in the waters seperating him from a country he'd been at war with for most of his life - especially given that he would proceed to fall in love with a British Aristocrat.

This French crown jewels theory seems to support the idea that he drowned in the English Channel as I believe he's represented in the insignia by the dragon, le Côte-de-Bretagne (Translates literally to the coast of Brittany) - but I'm not ready to fully call it yet. Withholding my final judgement for the moment.

Regardless, if Undertaker did drown, his character being associated with Diadochos/Beryl/Aquamarine, stones intrinsically associated with water, makes a lot of sense. Consider after all, the arc where we first really met him - book of the Atlantic takes place in the middle of the ocean.

The Romans believed Aquamarine to be sacred to Neptune, the god of the sea. Supposedly the gems came from mermaid's treasure chests (they're actually formed in hydrothermal vents) so saiilors would wear it for protection against shipwreck. They also thought it had healing properties because the gem would appear to disappear when submerged in water.

Well, Undertaker did disappear when submerged in water, didn't he? He was reborn as a reaper, only called himself by his serial number 136649 (an oddity even amongst reapers, who have all also committed suicide), and (externally at least) completely disassociated himself from his former life.

Cloudia and Undertaker share the zodiac sign Aries, a fire sign, so there's symbolism in water killing him. Extinguishing his flame, so to speak.

As mentioned in Tetrabiblios, Diadochos is useful for divinations in water, and the same is said of beryl;

Beryl was a popular skying stone in the Middle Ages. Most sources indicate that this was done either through dowsing, attaching the beryl to a thread over a bowl of water, with the crystal just touching the water...An alternative method involved throwing the stone into a bowl of water and reading the disturbance it created.

Undertaker threw himself into a body of water, then revolted against Reaper HQ, had an affair with and sired two illigitimate half-human children on the Queen of England's guard dog, and went against the laws of Gods and men to raise the dead. If thats not a disturbance, what is?

There's also a religious aspect to look into. Book of the Atlantic takes place over the holy week that precedes Easter - and I have a theory outlining why I believe both he and Cloudia's birthdates fall on 'Holy Monday'. He was also born on the day of the Annunciation - that's the day that an angel came to Mary to tell her she'd been chosen to carry the Incarnation of God. He's also associated with the white lily, a flower associated with Easter, and he carries a lot of religious symbols. His cassock, prayer beads, and the crown of thorns on his scythe and on Cloudia's locket are not there for shits and giggles. This religious symbolism ties into my theory on the circumstances of his birth, and the thread that I believe ties the lockets together...

...all of which I've been in the process of researching and writing for a hot minute, I just don't know how to keep it brief 😩 I'm a dog chasing squirrels.

Anywho, religion - there is the concept of Baptism. Undertaker being reborn into a new life when he submerged himself in water.

Baptism is a Christian sacrament of initiation almost invariably with the use of water.It may be performed by sprinkling or pouring water on the head, or by immersing in water either partially or completely, traditionally three times, once for each person of the Trinity. The synoptic gospels recount that John the Baptist baptised Jesus.

Speaking of Jesus, since he and Undertaker seem to be so tightly knit, Jesus performed seven canonical miracles, and two of the most notable (imo) are with water; walking on it, and turning it to wine. The last of course was Lazarus, raising the dead...

Magical Properties

I'm not suggesting that this stone actually grants Undertaker any abilities, but it's interesting that the supposed magical properties align with his character attributes.

It's been theorized that Frances is always making comments on how slovenly Sebastian's appearance is because she has the ability (on some level) to see his demon nature due to her half-reaper blood that she gets from her father, Undertaker/Cedric. This is somewhat supported by Ladger and Sascha speculating Ciel's ability to see them is from his bloodline - which is of course, where we got Cedric K. Ros- from!

Then there is of course summoning the shades of the dead and holding them here on earth. And I find it super interesting that this specifically mentions not to "apply it to a corpse" because "it is opposed". Like, what the heck does that even mean? A vague warning that if you fuck around, you'll find out? I have not been able to find any further details on what this might be referring to, but it sure sounds ominous.

And finally a note that the stone itself is "perpetually consecrated" - unable to be desecrated or corrupted. The stone is "divine". I will have to come back to this in another theory, because it's a can of worms, and this post is long enough.

Finally, I must note that according to the French wiki, Aquamarine is a symbol for a happy & faithful marriage. Specifically 23 years of marriage.

La couleur marine de ce minéral fait qu'il a été utilisé comme talisman pour les marins. Symbole de fidélité entre jeunes mariés, c'est un cadeau censé leur garantir un mariage heureux, ce béryl symbolise 23 ans de mariage.

Frankly it doesn't seem to have the most reliable source, but it's worth noting that is you take Claudia's age when she died, 36, and subtract 23 years, you get an age of 13.

Giving you maaaaaaaad side eye Undertaker 🤨.

Now to be clear I don't think they ever actually got legally married; perhaps not even "spiritually" married. However it is very possible that they met in 1843 - Undertaker likely deserted the reapers around the time of Queen Victoria's ascension to the throne in 1837. We don't know what he was doing during this time, what goal he might have been working towards - but befriending Claudia's father, the current guard dog of the new queen, might have been part of it.

I have my own personal head-canon that he worked as a jeweler during this time, but I don't have any real support for that - just that it makes sense given all this damn drip the guy has, it would be a way to familiarize himself with the British Aristocracy and perhaps even The Royal Family themselves, and the black market trade of stolen jewels might have been of particular interest to him. More on that in a minute.

Anyways it makes sense within the narrative for them to have met when Claudia was 13, as much we might find him even knowing her at that age icky, because of how significant the number 13 is to this story.

Part 2: The Hope Diamond & The Hirsch Aquamarine

Alright so as discussed - Undertaker's birthstone is aquamarine. Let's say for the sake of this argument, you agree with my interpretation of Undertaker's ring being a pale aquamarine gem. While he and Claudia share a zodiac sign, and a birthday on the same 'day' of Easter, they were born in different months. Cedric in March, Claudia in April. Which makes Claudia's birthstone a diamond.

The Origins of the Hope Diamond

Going back to season 1 of the anime, where the animators had more knowledge then we did about future events (even if they were interpreted oddly), they made the Phantomhive family ring not a sapphire but a blue diamond. Specifically, a gem cut from "le Grand diamant violet de Sa Majesté" a French Crown Jewel that was stolen in 1792 in the midst of a revolution. This is commonly referred to as "Le Bleu de France" in English circles, but the French actually called it purple, not blue.

Back to chemistry briefly for this point - in a similar concept to what has previously been discussed with Aquamarine and Beryl, impurities in the French Blue is what provides it with its distinctive colour - specifically, Boron (element #5).

Visually, the gray modifier (mask) is so dark (indigo) that it produces an "inky" effect, appearing almost blackish-blue in incandescent light. Current photographs of the Hope Diamond use high-intensity light sources that tend to maximize the brilliance of gemstones. In popular literature, many superlatives have been used to describe the Hope Diamond as a "superfine deep blue," often comparing it to the color of a fine sapphire—for example, "blue of the most beautiful blue sapphire" (Deulafait)—and describing its color as "a sapphire blue." Tavernier described it as a "beautiful violet".

The diamond also exhibits a phosphorescent quality (it glows);

Phosphorescence: The stone exhibits an unusually intense, brilliant red phosphorescence after exposure to short-wave ultraviolet light. This 'glow-in-the-dark' effect persists for some time after the light source has been switched off, and this strange quality may have helped fuel its reputation of being "cursed." The red glow is a phenomenon of blue diamonds that helps scientists "fingerprint" them, allowing them to distinguish real ones from artificial ones. The red glow occurs because of a mix of boron and nitrogen in the stone.

It's worth noting that while an Aquamarine is changeable, it doesn't fluoresce when exposed to ultraviolet radiation like a diamond does.

A cursed blue diamond glowing red? Hmm....

You likely know this gem as The Hope Diamond, which is a recut section of the French Crown Jewel, which itself was cut from a diamond called "The Tavernier Blue", originally purchased by a French merchant in 1666 (yikes) in India, who then sold it to King Louis XIV, who is also known as Louis le Grand (the great) or le Roi Soleil (the Sun king).

Louis XIV's great grandson, Louis XV, had the diamond (as well as other gems) reset into a pendant for "l'ordre de la Toison d'or"- "The Order of the Golden Fleece". We will discuss this pendant more in Part 3, but it fell into disuse after Louis XV's death. It became property of Louis XV's grandson, Louis XVI, who married the infamous Marie Antoinette (also referenced in season 1 of the anime in relation to both the Hope Diamond and to Undertaker). Antoinette used many of the French Crown Jewels for personal adornment by having them reset - however, this pendant of The Golden Fleece stayed intact through their reign.

On September 11, 1792, while Louis XVI and his family were imprisoned in the Square du Temple during the early stages of the French Revolution's Reign of Terror, a group of thieves broke into the Royal Storehouse—the Hôtel du Garde-Meuble de la Couronne (now Hôtel de la Marine)—stealing most of the Crown Jewels in a five-day looting spree. While many jewels were later recovered, including other pieces of the Order of the Golden Fleece*, the French Blue was not among them and it disappeared from history.

A likely scenario is that the French Blue, sometimes also known as the Blue Diamond, was "swiftly smuggled to London" after being seized in 1792 in Paris. But, the exact rock known as the French Blue was never seen again, since it almost certainly was recut during this decades-long period of anonymity, with the largest remaining piece becoming the Hope Diamond.

*this is misleading - so far as I can tell, the only other piece of the Order of the Golden Fleece that was recovered is le Côte-de-Bretagne, the red dragon. This piece is now in the Louvre.

Is it terrible for me to say I see a resemblance between the dragon and Undertaker lmao?

So the French Blue (and le Côte-de-Bretagne, and perhaps the rest of the Order of the Golden Fleece) was smuggled to London... But I'm going to pause here, and talk about another gem that disappeared - the Hirsch Aquamarine.

The Hirsch Aquamarine

Not nearly as well known as the French Blue, this is a gem that was in the possession of Louis XV, the same King who had the French Blue reset into the Order of the Golden Fleece. (Fun fact, King Louis XV was also the one to cede 'New France' to the British... And so New France would became Quebec).

I have been unable to find a lot of details on the Hirsch Aquamarine - supposedly King Louis found having it on his person to be soothing. There is no record of it being sold, or even stolen - it simply disappeared.

Well, I'm going to say it was stolen. And this was the thief - j'accuse...!

I propose that reaper 136649 knicked it while on the job.

It is not noted as being among the gems that were stored at the hotel from which the Order of the Golden Fleece, or indeed being in the posession of a King after Louis XV. Perhaps he reaped Louis XV's soul when he died in 1774. Perhaps Louis XV, who found the gem soothing, had it on his person at his time of death (his cause of death was smallpox), and Undertaker decided to grab a little momento of their time together.

Why?

Well... He's obviously sentimental. We will leave it there for now.

So let's say Undertaker stole the Hirsch Aquamarine while on the job - how did he end up with the remainder of the missing Order of the Golden Fleece? Let's return to the French Blue, the Côte-de-Bretagne, and conceivably the rest of the Order of the Golden Fleece being smuggled to London

The Recutting of The French Blue in London

Historians suggested that one burglar, Cadet Guillot, took several jewels, including the French Blue and the Côte-de-Bretagne spinel, to Le Havre and then to London, where the French Blue was cut in two pieces. Morel adds that in 1796, Guillot attempted to resell the Côte-de-Bretagne in France but was forced to relinquish it to fellow thief Lancry de la Loyelle, who put Guillot into debtors' prison.

So in 1792 the Order of the Golden Fleece is stolen from a French hotel, and smuggled to London. The Côte-de-Bretagne then turns back up in France in 1796, and eventually it is sold to the Louvre in 1887. So we know in the manga, Undertaker is not in possession of this part of the insignia. Him being the dragon has more to do with symbolism of the dragon who guards the Golden Fleece in the Greek myth, and the symbolism of being from Brittany - but I'm getting ahead of myself.

However... It's looking more and more to me like we will end up going to Paris in the manga, and I'm betting our little Lord will take a tour of the Louvre and see the dragon...

The next time this diamond appears in history, it is 20 years later, and in that time it has been cut into what will become known as The Hope Diamond.

A blue diamond with the same shape, size, and color as the Hope Diamond was recorded by John Francillon as in the possession of the London diamond merchant Daniel Eliason in September 1812, the earliest point when the history of the Hope Diamond can be definitively fixed. The 1812 date was just days after 20 years since the theft of the French Blue, just as the statute of limitations for the crime had taken effect.

Well that's bloody convenient.

So sometime in between 1792 and 1812 the French Blue is recut, with the Hope Diamond appearing in the jeweler Eliason's posession in 1812, and the Cote-de-Bretagne showing back up in France still in Guillot's posession, but none of the other gems. Those - there is no record of what happened to them, nor what happened to the other recut portion of the French Blue.

Now, an oft-cited source peaked my interest, so I went ahead and tracked down a copy of the book Blue Mystery: The Story of the Hope Diamond, written by Susanne Steinem, published in 1976. Within it is a list of the supposed deaths that trail the owners of the diamond. I went searching for something specific on a hunch - and boy, did I strike gold.

7. Wilhelm Fals, a Dutch diamond cutter, is said to have recut the French blue, producing a brilliant of 44 1/2 carats. He then supposedly died of grief after his son, Hendrik, stole the diamond. As for Hendrik, he is said to have committed suicide in London in 1830. 8. Francois Beaulieu is said to have obtained the diamond from "a nameless suicide" presumably Hendrik Fals. Beaulieu was supposedly forced to sell it to Daniel Eliason for a fraction of its value - and then died the next day of starvation.

Hendrik Fals, whose father cut the French Blue, and who himself was in possession of the Hope Diamond in 1830, killed himself.

Now you might be scratching your head going wait, what? You just said the ring showed up in London at Eliason's place in 1812, but in this version of events he wouldn't have gotten it until after 1830. I also don't mean to be insensitive - Hendrik Fals was (supposedly) a real person, and if it's true that he committed suicide, that's incredibly tragic.

To be completely frank, the author of this book says that there is no evidence for this sequence of events - it's the mythology of the ring. There are a ton of events detailed in the book as legend that have no basis in fact. That the diamond is cursed is itself a myth (I mean, duh, but also in that there are not a weird number of deaths that follow it).

However - I 100% believe Yana Toboso has read this book. The fucking title is Blue Mystery. Hendrik Fals, in the Black Butler universe, is now a Grim Reaper.

And he became a Grim Reaper in 1830 - and Undertaker likely didn't desert until 1837, around the time of Queen Victoria's ascension to the throne.

Now, Undertaker still being with the reapers between 1819 and 1837 is weird, given that the massacre at reaper HQ of 1819 wiped out half of management. I doubt our boy 136649 is just chilling in the employee lounge after pulling a stunt like that. But I am certain at some point Hendrik and 136649 met, and well, if I wanted to know where the gems from the Order of the Golden Fleece were, Hendrik Fals would be an excellent place to start.

Other Posts

Like I said, I tried to google to see if this has been discussed before and came up mostly empty (again, obviously, there has been a lot of discussion on the hope diamond but nothing I could find in the context of the other French Crown Jewels). Let me know if I missed something!

I did find an old post discussing a poem that was referenced in the Public School Arc between @abybweisse , @thaliaarche and @white-queen-lacus that referenced Beryl which is interesting. Seems like the poem also mentions shades of the dead, and the river Lethe from Greek mythology which I referenced in my Rossignol theory post and part 2 of my Floire et Blancheflor series.

That's All For Now!

If you made it this far, you deserve a medal...or a knightly order.

I really tried to fit this all into one but I'm going to have to split it. Next Part will focus on analyzing the other gems in the insignia of Louis XV, a look into the elements that make up these gems, how the Bazu is likely to be the 'sister diamond' of the Phantomhive family ring instead of another piece of The French Blue, the properties of yellow sapphires and how they might relate to blood (more spectroscopy for me whoopee), how the Dragon, Bazu Diamond, and Golden Fleece symbolize Undertaker and the twins, the Order of the Golden Fleece and its History, and of course the myth of the Golden Fleece itself.

A sheepskin is a brutal fucking metaphor - I'm sure you can guess what comes next, it's not a new theory.

If you liked this theory, you can take a look at my other theories via this masterpost that I will update as I crank these out. The theories I've developed mostly have to do with French history, French Christianity, Breton culture, and medieval French literature... I hope and pray chemistry does not become a trend.

I hope you enjoyed my insane rambling, my ask box is open and I'm always happy to talk about this stuff and thanks so much for reading!

[paper-starz]

WELCOME HOME THEORIES(+ Observations)

I CANNOT BELIEVE IT

after so many hours, days, months.... ITS BACK!

And now, after careful observations, I present to you fine fellows a few theories and observations. THIS WILL BE VERY LONG AND IT WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR THE UPDATE!!

OK to start off, lets debunk a theory thats been bugging me: THE WELCOME HOME NEIGHBORS ARE DEAD THEORY!

yeah.... has been debunked. Look no further than the guestbook! PG 2 SPECIFICALLY!

Image reads: idonotknowwhatclownis_iaskedfrank_hesaidbarnaby_hereisbarnaby.png

So, Wally was able to ask Frank what a clown was during the time of this ask, therefore, none of the puppets are dead (yet)

"But Paperstar!" I hear you cry. "The neighborhood descriptions were in past tense, while Wally's and Home's neighborhood descriptions were in present tense!"

And for that, I have a simple answer: The puppets aren't aware. Since they aren't aware, they still think that they are living during the 70s. To us, the 70s have already past! And since Wally and Home are aware that they aren't living in the 70s anymore, they use present tense. NOW ONTO THEORY NUMBER 1

THE RED BOOKS THEORY

As we all know, when we look into the website, doodles (presumably made by Wally) are littering the website and sending us into secret links!

While these doodles are fun, creepy, and cool to look at... have we ever stopped and wondered how exactly Wally is doodling onto the website?

By doodling onto a book.

Throughout the website, we see few instances of Wally doodling. Where was he doodling on specifically?

On a red book. But I can take it FURTHER.

I believe the book that Wally is doodling on is THIS ONE

A RED BOOK WITH SWIRLS AND AN EYE.

All 3 things connected to Wally. (Lord knows Wally loves drawing swirls and eyes, especially in this update) "But PAPER!!!" I hear you scream. "THIS BOOK IS IN REALITY! HOW CAN WALLY GET THIS BOOK IF HE'S STUCK IN WELCOME HOME?" Ah, patience, dear viewer! This is called the Red BOOKS theory, not the Red BOOK theory. It's simple, there's two books, one in Welcome Home, and one IRL. As above, so below

Whatever happens above, also happens below!

And it seems like the Question Answerer is in possession of this book as well.

Which brings me to my next theory!

THERE ARE TWO PEOPLE HACKING INTO THE WEBSITE

Specifically Wally (pretty much confirmed) and the Question Answerer.

If the Red Books theory is (hypothetically) true then the IRL book SHOULD be able to doodle onto the site as well! But how do we know this?

Pay close attention to these doodles of Barnaby. Notice one that's... Different from the others?

YES YOU ARE CORRECT, VIEWER! THE RIGHT ONE IS DIFFERENT!

As you see, the right one is scraggly, rushed, not coloring in the lines at all!

BUT WAIT THERES MORE!

Yeah, so it appears to me that Wally draws neater, while the 2nd doodler seems to draw messier and they don't even color the full drawing in most of the time! (For all I know this info could be vice versa. With Wally being the messier drawer and the 2nd doodler being neater.) BUTTTTTT IF YOU WEREN'T CONVINCED OF THESE DOODLES, I HAVE MORE EVIDENCE TO PROVE MY THEORY OF TOO DOODLERS

WALLY CANONICALLY CANNOT DRAW HEARTS (<- Click for proof)

And yet, there are hearts littered not only in the Guest Book page, but all across the website as well. And unless Eddie is helping Wally draw hearts every time he needs to draw one, then I doubt that Wally is the one doodling these hearts.

And for the last piece of evidence saying that there IS a second person, look no further than the HANDWRITING.

Say it with me kids! "One of these things is not like the other!"

ITS THE MIDDLE ONE! YES THE MIDDLE "hello"

It's all lowercase, while Wally usually writes in all UPPERCASE, and in red.

Even his signature supports this statement as well!

Therefore, dear viewers, I believe we need to pay closer attention to the doodles. Who is the one ACTUALLY writing to us?

[logicbutton]

Hey guys what's up I learned bookbinding to make @cindthia a physical copy of Synchronized Cardioversion for our anniversary :3

Pics and process documentation below!

I used the following resources:

How to Make a Book by ArmoredSuperHeavy

Bookbinding Resources Master List by Renegade Bindery

r/Fanbinding

the fanbinding tag on AO3 - shoutout to r3zuri's fanbinding of a FFVII fic for their extremely informative cliff's notes version of the process

the Intro to Hand Bookbinding class at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts, an incredible resource for anyone in or near Minneapolis interested in learning how to bind their own books.

First, I typeset the fanfic. I did this by downloading it from AO3, trying to figure it out myself, checking How to Make a Book for help with a problem I was having, and realizing that I should have just used it from the beginning in the first place. I used Microsoft Word 2013.

Fonts: Palatino Linotype, Helvetica (for the characters' text messages), Beatline (for titles) Margins: .88" top, 1" bottom, .75" inside, .75" outside, .25" gutter Front matter: - Title page with only the title - "Praise for Synchronized Cardioversion" with comments from the fic - Title page with title, author name, and a colophon I made - Copyright page with fic copyright, fic URL, TLT series copyright, disclaimer, AO3 fic summary, first chapter author's notes, copyright for in-text art, book design credit, font info Back matter: - Acknowledgments (from the fic) - "Also by CindFourth" with all their TLT fic separated into Synchronized Cardioversion Extended Universe (might make another book of this at some point); Other Camgideon, Campal, and Team 69; and Other Locked Tomb

I set the page layout to "book fold" with 16-page signatures. As for the art, one of Cind's requests in last year's TLT Holiday Exchange was for art of this fic and they got not only a fantastic one-page comic from their assigned creator, our friend @anaeolist (who also did a sketch of Cam and Gideon kissing - we'll come back to that later), but also a lovely piece as a treat from our friend @kat-hikari. I got permission from both artists to include their work in the book.

The finished file was 408 pages, so I added four blank pages (two sheets) to the beginning and the end to make 26 signatures even.

Next, I printed the pages. I used my Brother DCP-L2550DW and Hammermill 11x8.5 24/60 lb. cream bookbinding paper from Church Paper. I'd read that sometimes using short-grain paper in a regular printer could cause it to jam, but it went fine. The cream color made the pages look so professional.

I folded the pages into signatures and then pressed them overnight. Since I don't have a book press, I sandwiched them between two sheets of bookboard and put a heavy box on top, and that worked well.

The next step, punching holes and sewing, was my favorite. I'd made a punching cradle using instructions I got in my bookbinding class. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be, and it only used bookboard and PVA glue, so I didn't even need to buy anything I hadn't already bought for the project.

I used three pieces of tape and sewed them on using a kettle stitch.

Then I went to MCBA to use their guillotine on the text block and their board shear to cut boards for the cover.

I chose orange cardstock for the endpaper, and because I am a novice making novice mistakes I unfortunately forgot to get a size of cardstock that would let me fold it on the grain, but anyway. I trimmed it to the exact size of the pages and glued it to the text block. Next I glued the spine of the text block, rounded it a bit (not the way an expert would; you learn that in Intermediate Hand Bookbinding), added a strip of super mull and headbands at either end, and sat it under a weight to dry while I made the cover.

The Bristol board I cut for the spine was probably 1/8" too wide, which makes a bigger difference than you would think. Next time I'm going to err on the side of slightly too narrow when I'm already giving myself three board widths of a buffer on either side.

Aside from that, the cover turned out great! I could have done a better job lining up the endpaper when I glued it in, but that's the kind of thing you practice I guess.

I love the way the navy blue bookcloth looks with the cream paper, the orange endpaper, and the red and white headbands.

Now that I had the exact dimensions of the book, I could finally design the dust jacket. Remember that sketch of Cam and Gideon kissing that anaeolist did for the holiday exchange? I commissioned them to turn it into a finished piece for the cover, and boy did they ever deliver. I also asked some of our other friends who had read the fic to give me blurbs for the back cover, and they delivered too. Cind's and my relationship wouldn't have been possible without the wonderful community we met in and I wanted this gift to reflect that.

I created the jacket in GIMP at a print resolution of 300ppi and saved it as a pdf. The final step was to get it printed, which I was nervous about because it was the only part of the process that I had no control over at all. Long story short, I ended up with something I was very happy with done by a small chain print shop where I had to go in and talk to a human about what I needed.

I also posted this to AO3!

[pointdotiozao]

🌟Slots for January🌟

You can see more of my art in my blog with the tags #myart #art2024 #pointsketchbook

DM me if you’re interested! Rbs are appreciated!

More info under the cut ↓

Process

DM or email me (rose_captain@hotmail.com)* your inquiry so we can discuss the quotes and book you a slot if none are available at the moment. *I might take I little longer to reply emails.

I start working after receiving half the payment upfront.

Payments are made via PayPal invoices, I’ll need your PayPal email.

It’s alright if you need to reschedule your comm for another time, or even just cancel it, just let me know. But no cancellations once I have started working, so no refunds.

How to give me a hand!

IMPORTANT: Give me a heads up if you change your url after getting a slot with me, so that later I can still find you!!

Let me know if you need to cancel your commission.

References are appreciated but not required, and well detailed descriptions work just fine, but please try to have all information necessary for the commission ready by the time we start. (References and/or descriptions for the characters appearances, facial expressions, clothes, poses; background, if any; lighting/type of coloring.)

I won’t charge for tattoos of which you provide transparent pngs.

Additionally:

I reserve the right to refuse a commission.

I reserve the right to post my artwork and use it on my portfolio, but I’ll keep a commission private if so requested.

The commissions are for personal use only.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

Will Do

OCs, fanart, ship art;

NSFW and fetish art;

Gore and body horror;

Humanoids and furries.

I’ll give almost anything a confident try! 👍

Won’t Do

Mecha;

Hateful imagery;

IRL shipping (doesn’t apply to actors interpreting characters);

Create new designs (characters, clothes, etc.);

And I will no longer be accepting irl face claims for painting style commissions (this doesn’t apply to realistic looking video-game characters).

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

The styles:

Sketch- just the early stage of the drawing, rough forms and somewhat messy lines. May include 1 rough color for free, or more colors for a price up for discussion;

Lineart- lineart :3);

Flat colors- includes lineart and simple coloring, no shadows/source of light;

Shaded- includes lineart, more detailed coloring/rendering, simple lighting/one source of light;

Painting- either pieces with no lineart (regardless of type of lighting), or those which have lineart + complex lighting/two or more sources of light.

〃く⁠コ⁠:⁠彡 ₊ ˚ ⊹ 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

And here's my business card with a bunch of social media that I don't use which I made bc I got scared tumblr was going down for the millionth time. But still, what if, right? Here's where you can probably find me if one day tumblr finally does die.

[choicesficwriterscreations]

September Creator of the Month: Tveitertotwrites

Please welcome this month’s Creator of the Month: @tveitertotwrites

Each month, CFWC highlights one of our talented fanfic writers or artists. The writer or artist is selected at random. More info can be found on the navigation page. Past COTMs can be found here.

Tumblr Blog Name: Tveitertotwrites

How do you want to be known on Tumblr? Megan

Quick Links:

Tumblr Blog

Masterlist

1- When did you start playing Choices? What was the first book you played? 

I started playing in 2019, and my first book was Rules of Engagement.

2- When and why did you join Choices fandom?

I joined the fandom in January 2022. I had taken a break from Choices for a while but went back in November/December 2021 and started trying to look for fanfiction for Open Heart as I wanted to see if there was more Open Heart content, so I turned to Tumblr and AO3 and decided to join.

3- How did you pick your blog name? 

It was the first thing I could think of. I’m not creative with naming things (if anyone remembers my original blog name, it was openheartfanfiction because I only wrote for OH and couldn’t think of anything else). So I was like, “I’m a fan of Aaron Tveit. His fans are called Tveiter Tots, so why not?”  I then added writing because most of the content I make is fanfiction.

4- Pull up the first post in your archive, and tell us about it! 

It was actually a little intro to my account, but I had deleted it a while back so now it’s this. It is not my favorite. I would definitely redo it now that I have had more experience with text fics. 

5- Do you write fanfiction, create fan art, or are you one of those really gifted people who do both? 

While I would love to make fan art, currently, I only write fanfiction.

6- How long have you been creating for Choices and for any other fandoms?

I have been writing/creating Choices content since 2022. But I have been writing for Star Wars and Adam Driver Characters since 2020 (even though I am on hiatus from it, and I don’t know if/when I will pick it back up). I also wrote some Marvel fanfiction with a friend in 2021. More recently, I have started writing stuff for Aaron Tveit and Cillian Murphy characters on my non-Choices blog.

7- What is your favorite Choices book, and what is your favorite Choices book to create for?

Right now, I would say either Red Carpet Diaries or America’s Most Eligible is my favorite. But I also like Open Heart, High School Story, and others. I want to create more for RCD and AME, but I think I like creating content for OH.

8- Share your first Choices fanfic or fan art that you posted with us. Do you still like it, or would you change it if you were creating it today?

Since I already mentioned the text fic, I chose the next fic I did. It was for my Open Heart MC’s (Claire Evans) Birthday. And I would 100 percent go back and rewrite it. I like the idea of what I wrote, but I don’t like its execution, and I need to go back and rewrite it.

9- What is your favorite piece of fiction or art that you created? 

Right now, I have these two favorites. While I like writing angst, I enjoy writing fluffy stuff like these two fics. Plus, it’s my MC and OC who are besties (Claire and Adelaide), so I had to choose one from both of them.

10- Do you have a fic/art that you didn’t expect to be well received, but it was? What about one you expected to do well but found it could use a little more love?

This was a fic that I wasn't expecting to get notes on. I was still very new to the fandom at the time and hadn’t really interacted with anyone at that point, so seeing people like it was a shock.

Something that I wish I could do better is the content I make for my RCD and AME MCs (Brooklyn Moore and Charlie Howard). I love that people like my OH content, but I don’t see many people liking content from those books (which is fine if you don’t like it).

11- If you could write only angst, fluff, or smut for the rest of your writing life, which would it be and why? 

Fluff. While writing Angst and Smut can be fun, writing fluff is a nice escape from real life.

12 - Do you ever recognize yourself in any of your MCs or in your writing?

Yes, I have put some things from myself into my MCs and OCs, like some personality traits, some physical traits, and some hobbies/things they enjoy. So, I do see myself sometimes, but not always.

13 - What element of writing/art do you struggle with most?

Either coming up with titles or writing bits in between the big parts. Usually, one of the last things I do is come up with a title because I can never think of one. Also, writing the “less important” parts in between the parts I want to write is what gets me sometimes and is why I have unfinished fics that I have abandoned.

14 - Do you have any neglected work you really want to finish?

I have some fics that I had done some previews for (last year or the year before) that I would like to finish at some point. Right now, I am trying to finish a Dancing with the Stars AU for Adelaide and Tobias, so that is my writing priority.

15 - If someone you know in real life (who isn’t involved in fandoms) asked to see your work, would you let them? If yes, what would you show them first? 

Maybe it depends on who it is. While I don’t think anyone would be too judgemental, I would still be very nervous to show them in fear of them hating it or something like that. I wouldn't show them the smut or some of my earlier fics but the fluff I would.

16 - Are there any writers (published authors and/or fanfic writers) who influenced your writing or art? Are there any artists that influence you?

Not really. I have liked a lot of people’s work, but I don’t think that it really influences my writing at all though.

17- Which one of your stories would you most like to see as a movie/series? 

I think my fic “Coming to You” would be fun to see as a movie. Seeing how Ethan and Claire’s relationship grows on screen when they’re in two different worlds would interest me.

19- Do you write original fiction or create non-fandom art? 

I have thought about trying to write an original fiction book, but right now I don’t. I do currently write some original screenplays as I am in college for screenwriting.

20-  What other hobbies do you have?

I like to paint and listen to music. I like to take drives in the morning to get coffee and relax or at night with my dogs. I like to watch movies and musicals (like Moulin Rouge and Six). 

21: BONUS - tell us anything you’d like (if you want to)

Thank you to anyone who has read any of my fics or enjoyed the content I create. It means a lot, and I hope to continue writing content that both you and I can enjoy.

[fanauthorworkshop]

Introducing the FAW Summer Asynch Session!

Many people have mentioned that the times I lead the spring and fall workshops aren’t accessible for those with busy/unpredictable schedules, but they would still like to participate in the workshop and join the FAW community. To address that feedback, I’m running an asynchronous summer session. An asynch session doesn’t have a set meeting time. Instead, you’ll read up to 2 pieces presented each week by fellow participants, write them crit letters, and participate in discussion over Discord. 

The only required* meeting is an individual 30 minute Zoom call with me any time during the two weeks prior to the start of workshop. We'll use that time to go over the syllabus together and I can answer any questions you have. You'll book via Calendly once I send the welcome email.

*Optional for previous participants

Participants of the workshop receive:

Attendance in a 4-6 week asynchronous course during which you’ll provide feedback to your peers and workshop one piece of your own work, up to 6,000 words.

Access to the Fanauthor Workshop Discord server, an active community where we host weekly accountability meetings, writing sprints, a twice monthly short story club, and other events.

A 15-30 minute pre-workshop consultation with me to go over the syllabus and any questions you have.

A 30-45 minute post-workshop consultation with me to discuss the feedback you received, come up with a plan for revision and/or publication, or anything else you’d like to discuss regarding your writing.

Open enrollment option in future workshops.

Timeline

Applications close: June 14

Syllabus calls: July 1 - 12

Workshop begins: July 15

Workshop ends: Before August 23, depending on the number of participants

Cost

The recommended amount is $150. If you’re experiencing financial hardship and unable to pay, or can't pay the full amount, please let me know.

How to apply

Eligibility

Anyone over the age of 18 who considers themselves a participant of fandom and who is familiar with fanfiction may apply. A stable internet connection is also required. Submissions must be written in English.

Application requirements

To apply, you will need:

A brief cover letter discussing your fan history and goals as a (fan)writer (more specific instructions on submittable).

Maximum 1,000 words of your writing, either original work or fanfiction. This may be previously published/posted.

You can apply via submittable. Applications close June 14. There is no fee for applying.

FAQ and other info under the cut.

FAQ

Are there any content restrictions to what I can workshop?

The only restriction is word count (max 6k), with the following caveats:

If you workshop a piece in a form other than prose (for example, a script), your peers may not be able to offer constructive feedback on that aspect of the work. Participants are asked only to have a familiarity with prose.

Content warnings are required for each piece (if applicable), and participants who are uncomfortable reading certain subject matter may abstain from your workshop.

What is the time commitment of the workshop?

As a participant of the workshop, you'll be asked to:

Workshop any piece of your own prose up to 6k words, which will need to be uploaded no later than the Sunday prior to your workshop week. For example, if you sign up to workshop in week 2, your submission will be due July 14. Participants will have a week to read it and write their crit letter, and discussion will begin over Discord on July 22.

Read 2 pieces per week, write a 1-page crit letter for the author, and participate in the Discord discussion.

What are the benefits of being in the Fanauthor Workshop community?

We have an active Discord server open only to those who have participated in the workshop. Once you've completed the workshop, you'll have access to attend our weekly accountability meetings*, writing sprints, our twice monthly short story club, and other events we host.

*I'm working on figuring out an asynch accountability group.

You'll also have an open enrollment option in future workshops, where in lieu of applying again, you can pay a portion of what you intend to pay and secure your seat in the upcoming workshop.

I'll be working on rolling out additional events and benefits throughout the year.

Can workshop participants submit to OFIC Magazine?

Yes! Part of the reason I run the workshop is to inspire and promote the original work of fanwriters. You can follow us on tumblr @oficmag.

Who is running the workshop?

@bettsfic! In short, I lived a dreary cubicle life as a banker until I found fanfiction at 24. I loved it so much that I quit my job to get an MFA in creative writing. I loved the MFA so much that I became a writing teacher. I have some publications, awards, an agent, and 2 million words of fic on ao3. I don't have a book out yet but I'm getting there.

Currently I'm a writing coach and freelance editor. I also have a lowkey writing-related newsletter. And I've been answering writing advice asks on my blog for 10 years.

If you want an idea of the kind of writing activities I create, last summer I worked with @books on a workshop series which includes craft essays and some fun prompts.

If you're interested in my original work, my short story "Not If, When" is a good representation of my writing. For something darker, check out "Shut Up and Kill Me."

What is the workshop like?

Check out G's experience of attending the workshop. And here's some feedback from previous participants.

One final note: This is the first summer asynch session so there may be some hiccups. I've taught asynch classes before so it's not totally new to me, but there's still bound to be some pivoting when the workflow that makes sense in my head doesn't work super well in reality. It happens sometimes. I'm always taking feedback and trying to improve the workshop.

If you have questions about the workshop or application process, you can shoot me an ask, DM me, or add me on Discord (I'm bettsfic there too). Or you can email me at ekweeks@gmail.com.

[limbus-corp]

Welcome to the library.

Faust hopes you find your book in this place.

Hm? No, no, nothing is amiss, Faust assures you. This is how it has always been here, and how it will always be, ever since I created the library.

It appears to be an inopportune moment of visit, as our doors are currently closed. Please come back again soon, when we invite you again. ((ASKS CLOSED FOR NOW))

//just going to work through what I got rn!! They will be open again soon, do not worry.

CHARACTERS UNLOCKED:

Faust and Heathcliff

List of characters

Current Chapter:

1. Eat you alive

List of chapters

BLOG INFO:

//well hi there! This is a blog for my swap au between ruina and Limbus company! I thought it’d be fun to make a blog for it!

//this is specifically an interactive story askblog, meaning we’re starting at the beginning of ruina, and through asks, we’ll unlock new characters and such!

//Please read below the read more if you want to ask, just so you have more info! Have a fun time here :)

Interactive askblog? What's that?

Basically, you all help progress and change what happens in the story! This isn't only done by unlocking characters, but by also deciding what occurs in the story, and how character relationships may change.

Sending asks:

Don’t be afraid to get silly! Though this blog is trying to get through a story, I don’t want it to be 100% serious.

Please don’t spam asks trying to send Heathcliff books. They get lost in the post. And the system doesn’t work like that! Try to get him thinking about a certain topic

Have a canon char or oc or even an abnormality you want to interact with us with? Send them in! You can either send them in to fight, or just to ask questions, either works!

Story progression

As seen on the characters post, you need certain things to unlock new characters. A new book, and for Heathcliff or Faust to talk about a certain thing. Chapters progress every time a new character is unlocked. They don’t really mean much else, and are just there as a way for me to track things.

I’ve tried not to make progression quests hard, but if you need a hint, I will provide one.

Characters

“Whose swapped with who??” You’ll have to stay and find out. I’m not revealing.

“This character works better swapped with this character though...” though I did base off of personality or story similarities, most of these swaps don’t actually impact the characters themselves, so it doesn’t matter who they swapped with in the end, I think.

Also, characters maayyy be a bit ooc, as I'm not too well versed with all of them. I'll get better, I promise <3.

//That is all for now! I will probably update this eventually however

// Most asks will be answered with a piece of art, bigger asks may get lil comics of art, and small asks that I can't draw for will just be text. Though I aim to have at least 90% be art. so answering may be slow, I apologize

//Normal blog rules and all that. Be nice, be respectful, no NSFW... yknow?

//This blog is also ran by the same person (me <3) who runs @dieci-association .

[impatient-traveler]

I realize a lot of the current fandom came to the game after several patches or several *years* since release. So a lot of you might not know the history and how things used to be different.

Now, I personally have very strong feelings about the direction in which FFXV was taken post-launch, but this isn't the point of this post.

The point is to maybe make some newer people in the fandom realize that things used to be very different and hopefully make some of you guys learn something cool about a game you love.

FFXV had several core philosophies that were new, and brave, and really cool, and some of them ended up backfiring really badly. It endeavored to be a multimedia project (the multitude of associated media wasn't just "they weren't able to fit it in the game"!). It was intended to be a live service game (which feels very disconnected from the meaning of that term now, but it was already pretty weird at the time. Tabata, the game's director, seemed to have a very different idea of what it meant from the rest of the world, and to him it meant free monthly updates for multiple years alongside paid DLC). It also was intended to take the players' feedback into account in order to become the best game it could be. That's why we got a huge poll asking for what to add to the game, and that's why a ton of changes were made to the game's main story and content after release. That's also why the original experience is nearly lost to time now.

The initial few patches were mostly a continuation of the game's development. Stuff the devs hadn't managed to do in time or that they thought needed to be better. As time went on, though, more and more updates were made that changed the game's identity in significant ways.

One of the major ideas behind FFXV's storytelling was that it was always intended to be subjective. The main game was Noct's story. You had main characters leaving, you had a lot of things not being explained, a lot of stuff you had to piece together from scraps of info. You were intended to experience the story the way Noctis did. The DLC and other media were supposed to fill those gaps for you. What happened in Insomnia while we were gone? What did the other party members get up to while they weren't with us? You were supposed to get this information from different narrators, different viewpoints.

Think about it. Noctis is only twenty, he was never explicitly told what his destiny would involve, he was never taught how to do this. He's confused, he's terrified, he's just trying to keep going one step at a time through most of the game. It was immersive and impactful when you shared some of those feelings as a player.

The information was there. In other media (Kingsglaive, Brotherhood, A Kings's Tale, Parting Ways, Platinum Demo, eventually all the DLC), but also in little scraps around the game's world. Radio transmissions, Cosmogony books, scraps of newspapers and documents, the environmental storytelling of the nights creeping into your days, the ruined walls of Zegnautus Keep. It was in the context. The subtext. The cross-referencing and theory crafting we, the fandom, did.

You would be surprised just how much of the lore added in DLC and updates elicited no reaction from us back then. It was "duh". It was things we already knew. Things we'd pieced together, discussed, and written fics for months in advance.

Then the Internet did its thing and the loudest voices the devs could hear were the people who didn't love the game, who didn't want to put in the effort, who didn't want to think about it too hard. And instead of only affecting the subsequent content, it also changed the game we used to know.

The random interactable lore dumps they added to many locations with no explanation or reason to be there. The bestiary and character infos (which is a great feature but contributes to making players wait for lore to be fed to them rather than think for themselves). The horrible, disgusting powerpoint presentation they inserted into the middle of the Shiva conversation on the train that just pauses mid-dialogue to offer you an extensive infodump and then continues as if that never happened. There's a lot of things like this.

Did you know the original Ch13 was a horror game? The Ring's spells were tuned in such a way that they incentivised sneaking. It wasn't even mandatory then, you could still bruteforce your way through just by learning the simple counter timing for the Ring. But until you did, you got a precious few minutes of feeling terrified of the MTs patrolling the corridors. People complained that it "took you out of the action" and "interrupted the pace". Oh, do you mean how Noctis was INTERRUPTED by suddenly being all alone, in an unknown, hostile place, trying to rush to save his friend but not get himself killed? It was impactful. It was memorable. Now ch13 feels like a bad joke, Ardyn's attempts at taunts triggering a minute late when you've already moved on from the corpses of the MTs he's warning you about.

Do you know how it felt when Insomnia was a quarter of its current game size and had barely any content? It was rushed, yes. But that was the tragedy of it. The reason why it was so successful at conveying how this felt to Noctis, to the others who'd been waiting for him for a decade. To be reunited only to die. To be robbed of all your freedom in favor of playing the role you were meant for.

Did you realize the entire boss rush at the end is a Royal Edition addition? It's too long. It feels disjointed and at odds with the mood of the story. You're supposed to feel helpless. You're supposed to despair. Instead you get each party member delivering an over-the-top finisher move while yelling extremely cheesy and out of character lines about how much they love their friend. We always knew how much they loved him. It was in their presence. In their willingness to die for him. In the way they didn't look away when they knew they were about to lose him. In the stilted dialogue and awkward attempts at humor, trying to recapture their lost innocence.

This game used to punch you in the gut as it ended. It used to make you feel like you were watching a dear friend walk to his death and had to live with that, with the knowledge that for all its injustice and cruelty, this was "for the best".

Go out. Get the 1.0 mod (which I was consulted for as the person who actually played the old versions and resident modding community grandma but did not touch any of the actual mod making). Get an old disk copy for your console. See this game at its strongest. Experience the version of the story that forces you to grapple with the tragedy and doesn't sugarcoat or distract you from the ugly parts.

[skriblee-ksk]

Adeline Ordelia

Summary:

[An elegant and diligent student who seems to know exactly what she wants. She has a strong sense of justice and an aptitude for efficiency. A girl who always strives to find the truth in the name of justice, she politely detaches herself from the students of NRC out of caution because of their questionable demeanors.]

[Despite her initial awkward air, she actually has a habit of delicately (yet strictly) taking care of those who need it with a crazy amount of patience. It’s like she has experience at this.]

General Info!

Name: Adeline Ordelia

Nicknames: Adelia and Silver (only used by Cynthia to annoy her).

Birthday: August 12

Pronouns: She/her

Sexuality: Straight

Dominant Hand: Right

Hobbies: Reading, Embroidery, Book binding, Journaling, and Scheduling the day.

Likes: Star Anise Tea, Victorian Styled Buildings and Outfits (or whatever equivalent in TWST), Solving Mysteries, and Chatting with Cynthia.

Dislikes: Celery and The nickname “Silver”.

Fears: Ghosts (and the specifics of after-death).

Traits: A natural talent for elegancy, Having a strong urge to do the right thing, and Dissuading people efficiently from bad decisions.

Extra Information: She has a sibling-like close friend who attends RSA, Her favorite color is a deep blue, She likes stargazing (casual), She's memorized half of Heartslabyul's rules by Year 1, and is attempting to memorize the rest by the end of this year (for fun).

“Reveal the site of what once was.” Snapshot Evidence: Adelia’s unique magic that can be used with any picture (physical or digital). To use this properly, she must think of a specific person and a specific time, and if that person was at the place she took the photo of during the time she was thinking about, the person appears in the photo permanently. It's a particular spell with a penalty system that creates more blot if she's wrong than when she's right. Thankfully, Adelia's cautious and meticulous, so it's rare for her to ever be wrong in the rare times she does use this power. Although her photos are generally known to be true through others' confirmations of events, it's not completely trusted by others because she can't solidly prove that these photo manipulations are an exact illustration of what happened. Unknown if it can accurately predict the future.

More about her under cut!!

Curiosity:

Housewarden Riddle’s overblot wasn’t the first one I witnessed.

The first one was just down my neighborhood, when I was about… Hm. 7 years old. I was coming back from a walk with my escorts when I saw Styx members quarantining the overblotted person. Mm, I guess I couldn’t call them a person anymore. I didn’t get to see much of it. I wasn’t tall enough. Still, I could see some of the damage caused to the nearby buildings, with pitch black ink dripping down and slithering through the cracks of the sidewalk.

Apparently, the sight wasn’t morbid enough since it didn’t pique my curiosity enough for me to learn about it.

Of course, until now.

Why, you may ask? Well, because I know about the basics of blot accumulation and overblots now, first off. But more importantly, because Housewarden Riddle wasn’t the last overblot I witnessed.

Doesn’t anyone else find this strange? Doesn’t anyone else find this dangerous?

Doesn’t anyone else want to piece together this awful trend? Or is it just a minor every day event for them? Are you aware of what’s happening?

It was merely sympathy at first. I respect Housewarden Riddle, and there must have been a great deal of trauma involved for him to get to that state. That’s what I told Cynthia.

But two in a row? Both of them are Housewardens. And so close in time, too. Aren’t overblots supposed to be rare? That’s why I’m curious.

Will this trend continue? And if it does, what am I going to do about it?

“What do you want to do about it?”

“I want… to help stop it.”

“I mean, you always have the choice of ignoring it, you know. Like most others do?”

“… Then why did you even ask—“

“Well, just in case~ Even though I already knew the ever-so-righteous Adelia wouldn’t just ignore it.”

“So that’s your goal, right?”

Gather data on the overblots and see if there’s any future ones.

If there are, figure out the reason.

Ultimately, help stop it, but keep others’ safe until I can find a way.

“Wow, that’s a lot. Are you sure you can handle it?”

“Even if I don’t get to all of my objectives, it’s good experience. And you’re already invested in this potential mystery, aren’t you?”

“Ehe, correct!”

I want to help people. I can’t tell you the reason, but I do. I want to save you. Even in minor ways. Even in final ways. Even if you don’t want to be saved, I want to anyway. I’m sorry.

It’s just because I’m curious.

- - -

A/N: YAYYY basically done with the YAI to TWST pipeline!!! Here's Adelia, my other daughter and the other main character of Your Artificial Image that I missed so much.

In here, basically what Adelia and Cynthia do is just. Try and find out what's happening with the overblots, and try and stop them. Near Book 5, Adelia decides to pair up with (threaten) the Headmage and get more access to the student files. Anyways, that's how those two will get more and more involved within the main story!!! I will expand more on them, hopefully. While Cynthia does things for the sake of doing, Adelia always has a reason for her actions, and that's what makes them suit each other so well!!

AND NOW!! With them, I’ll be able to draw other characters I don’t draw as much because their personalities suit other TWST characters’ dynamics!! YIPPEE YIPPEE WHAT JOY!!!!!!

anyways. yeah. thanks.

[alexfromjersey]

𝓓𝓮𝓶𝓸𝓼 & 𝓕𝓪𝓷 𝓓𝓮𝓽𝓮𝓬𝓽𝓲𝓿𝓮𝓼

jenna ortega x g!poc

summary: jah submits a demo. jenna gets questioned by hudson. fans start to piece things together

warnings: mature language

a/n: I want to quit my job 🙂. I wish we got paid to write fanfiction. I walked 14,987 steps in one single shift

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter | Series Masterlist

🤰🏻🩵

@modernbussywhip: AIGHT I NEED EVERYONE TO SHUT THE FUCK UP AND PAY ATTENTION TO ME

@ghostridingwhip: aggressive for wat tho?

@modernbussywhip: SSSHHHHHH I HAVE NEW INFO BOUT JAH'S MYSTERY GIRL! I have two potential candidates and please note that one of them is a little bit of a surprise

@highondatgreen: i thought it was clear that I'm Jah's girl

@ghostridingwhip: @highondatgreen whatever u smoke...slide some over here

@ghostridingwhip: @modernbussywhip who are the candidates 👀

@modernbussywhip: ALRIGHT CLASS IS IN SESSION. Now like I said i have two candidates but it could be more cuz we all know Jah is a hoe...a respectable one tho but i digress.

@modernbussywhip: CANDIDATE NUMERO UNO: Stacey Vernon, a popular social media influencer on TikTok. She has a twin sister Diana and with Davis, they all attended school together (as she has mentioned in a TikTok video). They were together at Stacey's birthday party not too long ago and even though Jah shut the rumors down of them being together...we never know when it comes to Shiesty.

@fnthechat: geeeeezzzzz if this Jah's girl....

@behindthespecialk: I love jah but there's no way jah bagged her

@shiestylover: @behindthespecialk: whoa whoa not u doubting my girl's ability to bag bad bitches. you must not seen her roster 😏

@behindthespecialk: HOW?!?! @sheistylover

@shiestylover: she just built like that 😏

@modernbussywhip: LMAOOO while we can admire the untouchable rizz Jah has later....we should move on to candidate numero dos because this one...is a little out there but plausible.

@modernbussywhip: CANDIDATE NUMERO DOS: we all know her, we all love her and it's Miss Jenna Ortega. Now now now before everyone start think pieces just look at my evidence ok come come....evidence number one back when the Scream 6 premiere happened Jah accompanied Davis to it. I'm 95% sure that's where they first met because Jah didn't go to Canada while Davis was filming Scream 6. 1/4

@modernbussywhip: we all saw jenna appear in Jah's vlog...the eye contact, the sexual tension, everything was there between them. But fast forward a couple of hours later, a fan posted a pic with jenna who was at a restaurant and in the pic u can see a tattooed arm and it's the same tattoos Jah has! 2/4

@modernbussywhip: CONTINUE TO WALK WITH ME! Fast forward more, they follow each other on Instagram and as a jenna fan also...that girl avoids that app like the bubonic plague EXCEPT for when Jah posts...every single post of jah has a jenna like...i don't think jenna even likes her mother's posts so for her to only be on Instagram liking Jah's posts....my spidey senses are tingling 3/4

@modernbussywhip: ALMOST DONE! now we always mess with jah on her Reddit so lately it's been nothing but pics and edits of jenna on it...NOT ONCE has she told anyone to stop sending pics and edits of jenna. AND every time she looks at one...her eyes lights up and she starts to smile and blush! Plus after the Met Gala, Jenna stayed in New York...why did she stay in New York?? Jenna's from Cali across the fucking country and she was seen around the Bronx area....YALL NOT FOOLING ME! 4/4

@fnthechat: if jah managed to bag the baddiest scream queen in existence...imma need her to write a book about how to generate THAT much rizz

@ghostridingwhip: fr...that's like level 100 rizz...past Duke Dennis level of rizz

🤰🏻🩵

"Man this is the fucking FIFTH studio I called today and none of them got availability tonight" You groaned out of frustration.

"Why you wait until the last minute to call these studios?" Delyse questioned.

"Well I just signed up for the contest. It was a spur of the moment thing I didn’t really think it through." You said.

Delyse hummed in response and turned her attention back to the food on the stove.

"We can see if Kenny still got his home studio. I think he still live on 33rd" Davis said.

"Bet let's go. We'll be back Ma" You said to your mother and left with Davis.

"You got a song you gonna record?" Davis asked.

"Yeah I wrote it a long time ago. I made the beat and everything" You smiled.

Soon the two of you made it to Kenny's house. You walk into the building and climb up the three flights of stairs, remembering that his elevator never worked. You got to his door and knocked on it.

You waited patiently and slightly out of breath. You knocked again, "Yo Kenny it's me Jah."

Suddenly, the door was ripped opened and a furious looking woman stood there with a crying baby on her hip.

"Uh is Kenny here?" You asked.

The woman laughed sadistically, "Of course you're looking for Kenny. Kenny left four months ago with a skank from Brooklyn."

You and Davis looked at each other stuck on what to say.

"Um...you don't happen to still have his studio equipment?" You asked carefully.

"Nope. I burned it. I burned everything of his" The woman replied.

"Okay thanks" You both gave her a small smile and walked away from Kenny's former apartment. The two of you left the building with you feeling utterly defeated.

"What the fuck am I gonna do? I have to submit this demo by 11:59 tonight" You sighed.

"Don't stress bruh we gon' figure something out. Trust" Davis reassured you. You nodded and took a deep breath in to calm your body down.

🤰🏻🩵

London, England

1:23 am

Jenna had just got to her temporary home after a long day of filming. She was exhausted and was glad she had the day off so she can rest properly. She pulled her shoes off and placed her purse on the table.

Just as she was about to sit on the couch, a knock is at her door.

She internally screams before she walks to the door and opens it to reveal Hudson.

Jenna sighed, "What do you want Hudson?"

"I...just wanted to check in on you. I know you've been working hard which could be harmful to the baby" Hudson said nervously.

"Now you care about me and my baby" Jenna said and raised her eyebrow in suspicious at the boy.

"I always cared about you Jenna. If I didn't I wouldn't be here right now" Hudson replied.

"If you cared about me you wouldn't have told my family about me being pregnant. That wasn't something someone who cared about me would do" Jenna said and crossed her arms over her chest.

"You're right. I shouldn't have done that, it wasn't my place to do that and I sincerely apologize" Hudson said.

Jenna hummed in response, not really believing his words.

Hudson sighed and scratched the back of his neck, "I truly am sorry and I regret doing it. I just...I just wanted to check on you after everything that happened with Neil on the plane."

At the mention of the male, Jenna tensed. She was doing good with pushing him out of her thoughts. Instead, choosing to focus on her filming. She couldn't and won't let him control her...not anymore. She deserved to be happy.

"I'm fine. I'll handle it" Jenna lied.

Hudson opened his mouth to say something but decided against it after seeing the look on her face.

"Okay...I'll uh...see you tomorrow" Hudson said and walked away from her door. Jenna shut the door after he left and sat on her couch. She was stressed and that wasn't good for her or the baby...she needed to relieve some stress.

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

i need help

NYC 🩵:

with 👀

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

im stressed

NYC 🩵:

well taking deep breaths and meditating i heard is a good source of stress relief

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

NYC 🩵:

was that not the right thing to do?

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

nope

NYC 🩵:

ah shit

WAIT

😏😏😏😏😏😏

i know what u want

🤤🤤🤤 vegan food looks bomb don't ya agree

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

I hate you with everything in me 😂

NYC 🩵:

💀💀💀 wym? wat i do? is that not right also?!?

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

you know that's not what i want

NYC 🩵:

what u want then

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

you know

NYC 🩵:

i dont know ms ortega

not a mind reader

use your words

A chill went through Jenna's body as she read the message, imagining you actually saying those words to her...under different circumstances.

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

don't say that

it makes it harder when you say things like that

NYC 🩵:

😂😂😂😂

ain't it like almost 2 am or something over there

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

no...

NYC 🩵:

nice try

go to sleep

goodnight my honey bunches of oats 😘🥰

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

you're annoying 😒

Jenna groaned and placed her phone down next to her. She needed to eat, shower, and sleep. But before she could even attempt to start, her phone dinged again. She grabbed it and opened the message from you, she took a sharp inhale of air.

NYC 🩵:

word?

*attachment: 1 image*

It was picture of you in the mirror with your head titled to the side and tongue stretched out your mouth. Your tongue was naturally long, almost reaching to your chin. But what also caught her eyes was your hand placement which was grabbing your genitalia through your gray sweatpants. That's all Jenna needed.

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

i take back what i said

🤰🏻🩵

You laughed at Jenna's message and fixed yourself before walking out the bathroom. You and Davis got back to your Mother's house defeated from the lack of progress in finding a studio.

You don't know how you were going to finished this demo and submit it in 4 hours.

A knock at the door grabbed your attention, you watched as your mother walks to the door and cracks it open.

"Hey Leon" Delyse smiled brightly at the sight of the man.

"Hey Del, how you doing?" Leon gave her a smile back.

"I'm good just cooking for these clingy kids" Delyse answered and opened the door wider for Leon to see you and Davis.

"Hey Mr. Greenhill" You and Davis simultaneously greeted the older man. Leon chuckled and waved at them.

"Oh I knew I smelled something delicious. Man I missed smelling your cooking reminds me of the old days" Leon flattered.

Delyse let out a little giggle, "Yeah the old days."

The two adults stood in the doorway looking at each other basking in the comfortable silence. Meanwhile, you and Davis looked at each other before looking back at the older adults.

"I...uh just wanted to stop by and say hello. I don't wanna intrude anymore than I already have" Leon smiled at Delyse.

"No, no, no intruding...do you want a plate?" Delyse boldly asked.

It took a moment for Leon to come up with a response but eventually he did, "Uh yeah sure."

The older gentleman walked into the house and Delyse closed the door behind him. Leon pulled off his cap and held it in his hands. He sat next to you at the end of the table.

"How you guys doing?" Leon politely said to you and Davis.

"Eh" You shrugged.

"Eh? Why eh?" Leon questioned.

"Jah signed up for this music competition. Winner gets a five million dollar record deal with Passion Records. The contestants must submit a demo by 11:59 p.m tonight but we haven't found a studio all week" Davis explained.

"And I tried recording it on my phone but the audio is all grainy and hard to hear" You sighed.

"Hmm...can you sing the song you are going to submit?" Leon questioned.

You and Davis glanced at each other again but Davis just shrugged. You scrolled to the notes app and pulled the beat of the song you are going to use.

"Rollin' through with stacks, it's easy, money rainin' down, just like a storm, I got the riches-" You get interrupted by Leon pausing the beat on your phone.

"No" Leon said.

"No? What you mean no? It's a good song" You scoffed.

"Yeah for the early 2015 era when singing about money like that could get you hits. It's 2023 now, people want to hear something different something unique. If I was a judge and I heard that...I would think you're just hopping on the trendy music hoping for yours to be the hit. But you don't realize that everyone is thinking the same thing as you. The only way for you to be looked at twice is if you stand out. Let the lyrics come from within you, come from your heart" Leon explained to you.

Delyse then comes from the kitchen with a plastic bag with aluminum foiled wrapped plates inside.

"Here you go" Delyse smiled and handed Leon the bag.

"Thank you. I really appreciate this Delyse" Leon smiled at her grateful. He stood up from the table and grabbed his cap.

"Once you find those lyrics, come and find me on Southern BLVD but hurry though you got four hours left" Leon said and left the house.

Meanwhile, you sat stuck at the dining room table. Replaying the words Leon said, basically calling your song shit. It stung but deep down you knew he was right. The song didn't feel like you, it felt like a 14 year old wrote it and it wasn't your style.

You glanced at the clock on the wall as you grabbed a pen and paper. 7:48 p.m. Your eyes then glanced down to your phone and an unopened message from Jenna.

Hollywood 🤰🏻:

you have to be the greatest partner alive 😏

"Have to be..." You muttered to yourself. Instantly, your hand starts to move by itself as you write down the lyrics to your new song.

Let the lyrics come from your heart.

🤰🏻🩵

Two hours later, you finally finished and made your way to Southern BLVD with Davis tagging along.

"Why Southern BLVD though? What's here besides crackheads and prostitutes?" Davis commented.

The two of you continued walking down the block until you start to hear the sound of music. The closer you got to the corner, the louder and clearer the music became. It was street drummers and Leon was in the middle of them playing the electric guitar. You and Davis watched in amazement as he kept up with the drummers until they finished their last cord together.

The small amount of people that were gathered applauded them and a couple gave a few dollars before walking away.

"Yo I ain't know you could play the guitar Mr. Greenhill" Davis said.

Leon chuckled, "I'm a man with many talents son." The older male turned to you.

"I'm assuming you got something better with you this time" Leon teased.

You laughed, "Yeah I do. Wrote it from the heart like you said."

"Alright, well you better warm up that voice. You got a song to perform" Leon smiled and patted your back.

"Wait what? Right now? In public?" You questioned.

"Uh yeah. You need to submit that demo in two hours. I checked to see if you submit a live version of your demo and it said you could so get a move on" Leon said and stepped to the side.

"I don't got a beat though I just have the lyrics" You said. You were really trying your hardest not to perform in front of people severely underprepared.

"Don't worry about that" Leon said and placed the guitar over his shoulder.

Leon then played a cord on the guitar, soon the bucket drummer started feeling the vibe and matched the cord Leon was playing. Then you heard someone sweeping from behind you, it surprisingly also matched with everyone. You start to nod your head, feeling the rhythm and you grabbed the beat up microphone from the ground.

Davis pulled out his phone to start recording you.

"Can't wait for you to get home, we ain't got to go nowhere. Airplane on my phone, it can wait til the morning. I can't fathom why you choose me out billions but I'll take it" You sung. You felt your eyes close as you got lost into the music.

Soon, you finished off the song to a large crowd cheering and clapping at your performance.

"I told you let the lyrics come from your heart. You made magic tonight Jah, take pride of your work" Leon educated you.

You nodded at him and walked over to Davis who was fiddling with his phone.

"And submitted" Davis smiled at you as he submitted the demo on the competition website.

"Hard part is over for now. Now we wait" You exhaled deeply.

a/n: if you put a buck in my cup I will shut the fuck up… but you ain’t gotta be a baller to give me a motherfucking dollar…

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