#But this lack of info has been longer than any other!

[wayfinderships]

Wait hold on guys! I think I know what would fix me! A millionth replay of the Entire K.ingdom H.earts series-

[anomalouscutie]

feeling things about morgana. need to talk about him or ill die

[tiredmamaissy]

Ralak te Sepwan ieyk’itan: Special Episode II 

Concurrent Tides

An Illustrated Collaboration with @zestys-stuff

Masterlist ; Rut/Heat/Knotting Info

🔞 minors, do not interact 🔞

Hyperlinks are attached to specific paragraphs that when clicked on will lead you to its illustration by Ralak's creator @zestys-stuff. Most illustrations are now on her patreon.

Characters: Metkayina!Ralak (24) x Sully!Omaticaya!Reader (19) Warnings: nsfw, smut, fluff, profanity, age gap, aggressive rut cycle, heat cycle, dom/sub dynamics, jealousy/posessiveness, knotting, marking, scenting, praise kink, breeding kink, size difference, p in v, mating/bonding, multiple climaxes, creampie, ralak is a bit of a meanie in this, let me know if I forgot anything? Word Count: 10k Requested: Yes || No Author’s Note: the second special episode is finally here. sorry it took forever to get it out, but better late than never :') i hope you guys enjoy <3 theres another part to come after this one! 🤍 Synopsis: what happens if you and your new mates cycles sync? 

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——

“Only I knot you.”

That was the first time you’d ever seen Ralaks eyes shift in colour. That same night right after he pulled you out of his memory of his first rut. A beautiful, deep blue, glistening before your honey glazed orbs. It’s barely been a week since that night, yet it replays over and over. Day and night. How he looked at you with nothing but unadulterated greed, hardly catching his breath as he tried to steady his galloping heart. It was something deep-rooted and primal. 

Something animalistic. 

Since, you’ve longed to see him fully immersed in such a state. A state where self control and sexual desire no longer coexist. He’s always too concerned with you and what he thinks you can and cannot manage that he never allows himself to do what he truly wants. The level of restraint you feel through the bond is indescribable. A level you nor any other na’vi could conceivably attain. Regardless, most nights you find yourself fantasizing about this ‘lack of control’ right before bed. 

Nights like tonight. 

Where the stars shimmer so brightly that you need to draw the curtains, and the air is exceptionally cold and crisp that you need to huddle closely together for warmth. When your nose is buried so deep into his chest that there's no other choice for his scent to fill your lungs. And tonight he smells extraordinarily good. The salt of the sea mixed with leather hide. And oddly enough, he smells like… home. The forest and its greenery. It’s quite ironic but perhaps it’s Eywa’s way of saying that this man is truly yours. It's so comforting and right. Like a cup of hot tea on a stormy night, never failing to put you to sleep. A remedy that works in seconds — but not tonight. 

Tonight you’re restless and he can sense it. 

“What is it?” Ralak husks, shifting his position to hold you a little closer. “Cold?” 

Truthfully, you’ve been feeling a little off. Your body has been restless and haunted. As if it could sense some sort of change of shift in the atmosphere. Or perhaps it was between the two of you. “No.” You mumble, lifting your head to look up at him. “Just can’t sleep.”

Ralaks ears twitch, a little surprised his typical soothing techniques aren’t working. He sits up quite quickly, bringing you up with him as he scoots back into frame of his bed. His brows lower when he ponders about what could be keeping you so on edge. He takes note of your flushed appearance and the minute changes in your eyes, they’re glowing a little brighter recently. 

His brows jump when the realisation dawns on him. 

Could it be? He knows it’s close but is it really already affecting you? How is that possible? And does that mean it will be even more severe this time around? 

He had every intention to stay but perhaps it’ll be more difficult than he expected. He should really tell you, but he knows exactly how that would play out. You would get your way as per usual, it was hard for him to deny you of anything you wanted. A quick swish of your tail and it was yours. Ralak took pride in caring and providing for you. But not for this. This was just plain dangerous. And therefore he couldn’t allow you to figure it out. It’s ultimately safer that he keeps it to himself, at least until you’ve adjusted to him a little more. Your intimate moments together are very few in number after all. 

“Why is that, tanhì?” He asks in a low, steady tone, fixing his mask of indifference tightly to his face. 

You may be a slow learner, but you weren’t slow. You could sense that he wasn’t being all that transparent with you. 

“I don’t know. Something feels off about you.” You say in an almost accusatory tone, finally sitting up to look him in the eye. He’s pale in the face and his breath becomes raggedy. “Tell me, Ralak.” 

You watch as his pupils constrict, leaving nothing but a black dot in an open sea of blue. Within a matter of seconds, they deepen in colour and his eyelids flutter shut. He clears his throat, and waits a few seconds to open his eyes. They’re back to normal but you could’ve sworn they looked different. Just like they did a few nights ago. 

“What just happened to your—” Your heart begins to race as you utter the words, only to be cut off by Ralaks hasty voice. 

“Inland. Tomorrow morning. Overnight hunting trip.” He grinds them out as if it physically hurts to say the words. Anything to keep you from figuring it out. 

What? Is he — lying to you? 

This isn’t like him. He avoided trips inland at all costs. Anything to stay with his tanhí. He’d even go as far as faking an illness, despite rarely getting ill, to get out of accompanying Tonowari. Especially for overnight trips. 

“And why did you not tell me earlier?” You manage to squeak out a closing throat, backing away to create a little distance.

He shakes his head as he blinks rapidly, staying put to allow as much space as you need. “I was hoping I did not need to go.” He utters, dropping his head to lock his gaze on your twiddling thumbs. His eyes trail up your dark blue frame, taking note of how your body is already almost trembling —already responding to him— all out of your control. He bows his head, hiding his face. “But it seems that I cannot get out of this one. I am sorry, my paysyul.” 

For a fleeting moment, you really thought this was the beginning of something bad. Something deceitful. But, his words instantly bring you comfort, slowing your leaping heart and putting your mind at ease. 

But the funny thing is that there was no lie. 

There was really an overnight trip inland with Tonowari. One that Ralak arranged himself. Tonowari was especially taken aback by Ralaks suggestion of a hunting trip and immediately queried if he was alright, putting a firm hand on his forehead to determine if he had some sort of fever. But once Ralak explained himself, Tonowari was smiling and laughing, smacking a few blows on his back as a form of approval, teasing him yet again about ‘the love story between an Akula and an ilu’. 

Your sigh brings Ralak out of his deep thought, chin leaving his chest to witness you sliding back into bed, turning on your side and backing up onto him. A smirk pulls at the his lips as he joins you, enveloping you in his warmth once more. A wave of relief washes over him as he rests his chin on the crown of your head. He’s thankful that you didn’t press any further. Otherwise, he would’ve had to reveal his best kept secret. 

His upcoming rut. 

—— 

The harsh thump of Ralaks heart rouses him to the sight of his mate clung to his chest. He admires your beauty, allowing his eyes to fall on your chest, watching closely as you breathe slowly. He gently pulls back the thin sheeting covering your body, exposing your puffy nipples to the cool morning air. When they stiffen into peaks, saliva pools in his mouth. At this point he would have looked away because of basic na’vi decency, but this morning is different. 

He allows himself to stare. To take in every detail on your chest. To sear it into his memory so he can visualise you just like this as he relieves himself. Exposed before his eyes, supple skin glistening as the rays of sunlight reflect against your freckles, exposed, stiffened nipples, that act as the perfect bait to lure in a hungry predator. 

Predator.

That’s what he’ll be in a matter of minutes. Nothing but a slave to his own urges and instincts. Ravenous. Insatiable. Voracious. With not even a sliver of self composure left to hold onto an ounce of rationality. He can already feel it creeping up on him, the hunger deep in his core turning him into the beast that he appears to be on the outside. It’s always been like this. A little too much. Too overwhelming. 

Too aggressive. 

And as the years passed it only worsened. Six unmated years. With no one but himself to make it through the tortuous few days. He just knows that he would be too rough with you. It’s his biggest fear, after all. To have no self control. To hurt the one thing he loves more than Eywa’s gift of life itself. He would sacrifice his own (life) if it meant to save yours.

He was hoping to endure it. Bite his tongue through it and be by your side. Perhaps take a long bath in the lake and crawl into bed after you’ve gone to sleep and relieve himself as quietly as he can. But now that it’s here in full bloom, he’s already having a hard time containing his urge to spread your legs and use you as his own personal fucktoy. 

But you’re more than that to him. 

And this is why he’s choosing to leave before you wake. Before he can no longer contain himself to just staring at your bare chest. Before he pulls the sheet down even further and parts your legs—already trembling from his leaking pheromones—and has a taste of his sweet, sweet tanhí. Rather, he uses his last shred of self composure to plant a firm kiss on your forehead before quickly gathering his gear and heading out the door. 

Unbeknownst to him, you were awake the entire time. 

You could feel his eyes bore into your tiny frame as the crisp morning air grazed past your nipples, just like you could feel the roughness of his kiss right above your brow. You wanted to open your eyes but the way his pheromones waft up your nose had you in a foggy trance. Your eyes burned under your eyelids and your body felt so heavy and hot. 

You couldn’t help but think, is this his rut?

To be influenced by his cycle? You had felt it before. His first rut in the flashback, but it was nothing like this. Sure, it had you shivering and a little on edge but this was to another level. You could barely open your eyes, much less get out of bed. This entire time your body has been sending warning signals that its mate was peaking in his cycle — restlessness, clinginess, the nesting. You had unknowingly gathered enough fruits and grains to last you a few days. Even in this murky state of mind you finally manage to link the pieces of the puzzle together. 

Listening to his footsteps as he walks out the marui, you muster up as much strength as you can to open your eyes. It’s blurry and honestly all just one blob. You could only make out a few colours trailing behind this gentle giant—green, blue and orange. All of which mix together and move like the aurora in the night sky. If one could see what a pheromone looks like, this would be it. When you finally get enough strength to part your chapped lips to mutter his name, the colours disappear as the marui flap closes behind him. 

You really thought that once he left and the room aired out, that the influence of his pheromones on your body would lift as well. But you were wrong. Instead, the heaviness of your body grew tenfold, making it hard to breathe. It’s as if your lungs were filled to the brim with cold water, yet they burned as you squirmed around to fill them with air. The fire in your lungs quickly spread to your extremities, leaving your entire being in a sweltering inferno. 

This feeling is familiar, yet foreign all at once. A desire so extreme it burns from within. The desire to be connected with your mate on all levels known to the na’vi. To satiate the itch of your empty, fertile womb by filling it with his seed. 

Why did you have to get your heat now?

You call for Ralak a few times in your dazed state, only for you to be reminded by nothing but the crash of the waves that he’s gone. Soon the heavy rumble of the waves is drowned out by your whimpers and whines as you call for your mate to no avail. All you can manage to do in your feverish haze is kick off whatever cloth is stuck to your body, curl into a ball and rock to ease the unbearable sensation between your legs.

All until you hear a familiar, husky voice. 

“I was doing some sessions with Ronal and—”

“R-Ralak?” You call out in relief, hoping your prayers have finally been answered. You roll onto your side and squint at the figure in the door frame. 

“Uh. Not quite.” He quickly mutters under his breath, moving his forearm to shield his nose from your strong pheromones wafting his way. “Eywa—” He mumbles the great mothers name like a curse as he looks around the marui for your mate. “Where is Tak?” 

Tak?

The more you squint your eyes, the more you’re able to make out who this figure standing in your doorway is. Your blurred vision clears just enough to reveal the unforgettable, brawny features of no other than Ka’ani. 

“Ka’ani?” You say the name slowly, unsure if you should believe your eyes. 

“Hah. What do you know…” Ka’ani scoffs, moving his arm from his face to lean in to get a better look at your condition. You’re panting yet shivering, glazed in your own sweat and slick. He smirks a little as he pulls back, spitting out the words, “…bitch in heat.” 

“What are you... d-doing here? You should leave!” You try to shout, although it comes out more as a hoarse cry. 

“Why should I? It looks like you need a hand.” Ka’ani jesters, physically extending his hand towards you as he wiggles his thickset fingers. 

“Haa. I really don’t.” You pant, hugging your knees to your chest even tighter.

“You’re sitting in a puddle of your own sweat.” Ka’ani’s voice is harsh, yet laced with concern. “And whatever else is coming out of you.” His jaw clenches and unclenches as he looks away from you, seemingly out of — respect? He catches sight of the full bucket of fresh water at your bedside, along with empty drinking bowls.

Has she not been tended to all day? Not a sip to drink? Ka’ani thinks to himself, concerned as to why Tak’s mate would be alone, uncared for and in heat of all things. 

You finally muster up the energy to tug the sodden sheet over your naked body and scoot back further to the frame of the bed. “Ralak said he will be back soon. You should leave if y-you want to live.” You lie, feeling a little threatened that a male na’vi has barged into your marui while you’re in heat. 

“Yeah, I don’t believe that for a second, y/n. None of this makes sense.” Ka’ani speaks, taking a few steps towards you. 

You shuffle even further back only for your back to make contact with the bed frame. A rush of fear surges through you. The type of fear that has your heart twisting behind your ribs. You cross your legs over one another, bunching up the sheet between them and beg with trembling lungs, “P-Please, Ka’ani. Don’t.” 

Ka’ani stops dead in his tracks, seemingly offended by your assumption that he’d be approaching you to do something that the great mother herself would look down upon. Sure, he tracked your scent last time, but he was here atone exactly for that. 

“Syor [relax]. I would never do such a thing.” He says through gritted teeth, storming towards the bedside and quickly pouring you a drink. “No matter how strong your scent is. Although, you don’t smell all that great now that you’re mated.” He chuckles lightly as he hands you the drink. Your eyes jump between him and the cup in his hand before you struggle to sit up. His hand instinctively reaches out to assist you, but you bat it away and continue to pull yourself up. 

“Just — let me help you.” He snaps, supporting your back when you finally give in. “Drink.” He commands, plunking the cup in your hand, taking a step back and crossing his arms.  

You gulp down the water greedily, finally quenching your thirst and hoping it will provide some level of relief to your febrile condition. You hum to yourself as the water makes its way down your throat, but groan when you feel no better. Meanwhile, Ka’ani takes in your state, feeling a twinge in his heart for you when he sees how you’ve been suffering. You look more than uncomfortable. You look like you’re in pain.

“You’ll be alright, y/n. Just tell me where he went and I’ll go fetch him.” He speaks in a more gentle tone, taking the empty cup from your hand.

“I-I don’t — haah. He said he went… He went inland to hunt.” You blubber out, feeling your body heat to a dangerous degree. It has you shaking as you ease yourself back into a more comfortable position. 

Ka’ani shakes his head a bit, “Inland to hunt? Really? When his mate is in heat? Tak would never. The only time he’d ever do that is if he is also… in rut.” Ka’ani stalls on the last few words that slip off his tongue, tasting them in his mouth as the realization sets in. Ka’ani quickly fills the cup, sets it next to you and bolts to the door. Before he ducks under the flap of your Marui, he looks over his shoulder and reassures you.

“Sit tight, forest girl. I know exactly where he is.”

— —

It’s been a few hours since coming to his usual spot — the waterfall with the coldest water known to the reef people. It is Ralaks most private and intimate place aside from his humble abode. A place where only a select few people know about. He’s most drawn to the low temperature of the water, making it a perfect environment to endure the heat of his rut in. 

Despite doing this for the past few years, each cycle gets a little more intense. And this one is certainly no exception. 

Ralak sits underneath the overhang, right in the dip of the plunge pool, and allows the water to beat on his back. He’s maintained this position for the past few hours, only releasing himself when the pressure in his core grows too much. A pressure so immense it would have his body acting on its own accord — a wandering hand finding its way to his swollen cock. 

Truth be told, he hated the feeling. 

He hated feeling so out of control. To be nothing but a slave to his own primal impulses. He’d fight it as much as he could, just like he is now, until the sensation is just too intense to ignore. Until he’s grunting and squirming with a body so heated it has him grinding his teeth. 

He quickly stands up, tilting his head back and covering his face from the stream of the water with his hands. At this point his cock is so swollen that it’s outright painful, throbbing and pulsing from the lack of attention. He thinks of you — your thin tail and tiny stature. The way you lay in bed this morning before he left. Naked and exposed before his eyes. Eywa, how he wishes you were here. How he could finally spend his rut with his mate, but he just knows it would be too much for you to handle. 

The thoughts of you make this no easier, sending his hips thrusting into the air — the running water stimulating his thudding cockhead. He groans from the immense pleasure a little water brings him. He’s neglected himself so badly to the point that he feels like this could really make him cum. But how many times has he cum by now? 

Once? Twice? Thrice? 

He lost count after the fifth time, not that he was keeping track anyways. If anything he was downright denying himself the pleasure, and convincing himself that he remained in control. But fuck, the image of your delicate body —the possibility that he could break you if he weren’t careful— pushes him over the edge. Before he can stop himself, his hot cum is spilling from his slit all over the length of his cock and he’s unable to keep his noises at a minimum. 

“Mmmph.” His deep growl rumbles, a hand grabbing a firm hold of his jumping cock. 

He squeezes what’s left out of his slit, finally looking down to see the state of himself. It’s red and raw — spikes fully erect and balls drawn so close to his body they’re practically hiding behind his thick knot. He lets out a loud sigh. 

Relief. 

Finally, he leans back against the rocky wall and slides down into the plunge pool, immersing himself chest deep into the water. He lightly treads back to the bank and makes himself comfortable — allowing his head to rest and body to relax. He takes a few deep breaths and tunes into the burble of the waterfall. 

All until he hears the click of a — 

Ka’ani?

“Tik-Tak.” Ka’ani clicks melodically, cautiously approaching the giant submerged in the waterfall. Ralak doesn’t budge. He remains fixed in position, eyes shut, head and elbows resting on the edge of the river. His chest heaves harshly as he attempts to remain in this less than tranquil state. “Never thought I’d see the day Ralak leaves his mate in heat. To be soaking in a waterfall of all things.” 

Perhaps Ralak heard wrong. Leaving his mate in heat? Ralak would know if his mate were in heat. He would sense it. Whatever rubbish he’s spewing out, Ralak doesn’t have the time, nor patience, for it. 

“Skxawng, what are you on about? Leave me be.” Ralak huffs, wiping the sweat from his face with a quick hand movement.

“Just as I thought. You’re all hot and bothered too, aren’t you?” Ka’ani chuckles. 

“Leave.” Ralak says angrily, his purplish-blue eyes finally snapping up to meet Ka’ani’s. “I have just calmed.”

Ka’ani’s brows knit together, offended and a little confused with himself for being upset from the way Ralak is shooing him away. 

“Oh c’mon brother. All I’ve been told today is to leave!” Ka’ani’s hands fly up as he takes a step forward. “First your mate, and now you. Am I really that unwanted?”

Now he’s got Ralaks attention. 

Ralak gets a whiff of your sweet, sweet pheromones on him. As if he’s been around his tanhì. Scenting his tanhì. Touching his tanhì. His primal urges devour him once more, eating away at him until nothing but a possessive beast remains. One of pure territorial instinct. 

“What did you do?” Ralak growls through a clenched jaw as he jumps out the water and approaches Ka’ani. “Scenting my mate again?” His voice booms as it increases in volume, yet lowers in depth. “Answer me. Did you touch her?!” 

“No!” Ka’ani blurts out, now taking a few steps back with his hands splayed out in front of him. “Is that what you both really think of me? This is the last I ever do some—”

Ralak remains silent, taking quick, calculated strides directly towards Ka’ani, who is now backing up into a tree. Once his back hits the scaly bark, Ralaks' balled fist slams into the trunk, barely an inch away from Ka’ani’s skull. 

“Alright! Alright. I know what I did before. I-I’m sorry. I came looking for you to apologise for that but I found her in heat. Okay? I came here as soon as I realized.” 

Unsure of whether or not to believe a word coming from this skxawng’s mouth, Ralak steps away from his prey, bloody knuckled and full of uncertainty. But the one thing he is certain about is the fact that he wants no other na’vi to find you if you really are in heat. With a huff of defeat, he pushes past Ka’ani and bolts for the shore. 

——

The trek back to the marui is twice as quick. Your pheromones are thick and potent, affecting him even a few feet away from the marui door. And when he steps through the marui door, he’s completely inundated with the thick fog of your pheromones. He feels lost in himself, struggling not to succumb to his instincts. Struggling to regain control.

“Ma’ L-Lak?” You mewl shakily.

You can smell him, just like he can smell you. It only drives you further into your heat, your trembling body now shaking a little more. Sensing that your mate is in close proximity, your scent glands release more of your aphrodisiac to lure him in. In turn, this has its effects on your body — sending you into a submissive state where you feel too heavy to even lift a finger. You lay there, legs splayed out and glossy fingered. 

You watch through blurred vision as the tall and thick silhouette quickly makes its way towards you. Ralak grabs and firmly holds your legs back as he leans in close, making the confirmation that his mate is indeed in heat. He lingers a little longer than he can control, taking everything in him to pull away and calm down — panting and out of breath. 

“It is true.” He huffs, towering over your tiny, shivering frame. “In heat.” The two words drip off his tongue, much like the thick nectar dripping from your slit.

“Lak. Oh — lak. ’ts you.” You cry out in relief, clawing at his thigh to bring him back to you, “‘m so happy it’s you ‘nd not someone else.” His teeth grit as your hand grazes his thigh, but he remains fixed in place, unsure of his ability to keep his composure if he allows himself to give in to your touches. 

What is he supposed to do now? 

He didn’t think this far into his plan… for once in his life. Typically he’s quite calculated and certain of his next move but now — now he’s not sure how he’s going to deal with this. He just knew that he couldn’t leave you alone. Not for another man to find and claim you in the way that only he should. But he has to remain himself. For you. He swallows down his uncertainty before speaking. 

“I should have stayed.” He looks down at the flushed, puffy flesh between your legs with a rapacious glint in his eye. “I am sorry.” 

“Don’t be. Just p-please. It’s to-o much. T-Too hot. It aches, karyu.” Ralak winces when you groan the last few words, it’s almost painful to resist you at this point. You go to claw at this thigh once more, only for him to shift away. “No, don’t do that. Not right now. N-Need you so ba—”

“My rut came. This morning.” He’s quick to cut you off with a strained, yet monotonous voice, unable to peel his eyes away from your swollen cunt. 

“I-I know.” You pant, earning a twitch of Ralaks brows. “‘nd t-that’s good. Ngh—that’s really good,  I-I can help you too.” You mumble, sticking your hand between your legs to fondle with yourself. With the way he grimaces one side of his face, it seems as if he wants to look away, but can’t. 

“No, tanhì. We spoke of this.” His accent is thick as he struggles to string the words together, “No control. Trying hard…” he inhales quickly, eyes plastered to the sight in front of him, “…not to lose it.”

At this point the haze of your heat has you lethargically shaking your head from side to side, mumbling whatever frustrated-fueled words that first come to you “…haven’t cum yet…”, you squirm around to find a position that allows your wandering fingers better access to your hole, “…need to cum.” You slur the words as you barely slip two fingers inside you and you quietly sob when they provide very little release. 

“Ralak!” You cry loudly enough to at last lure his gaze up to yours, the night sea finally meeting the roaring flame. Your voice quiets down into a soft whimper, “Please. Just t-try. Please.” 

A moment of silence passes where you and Ralak stare at one another, hearts pounding and chests heaving, understanding exactly how the other feels. The burning desire to come together. The resistance, yet the lack of control. The eternal flame within. The heat. 

Ralak breaks eye contact to glance at your slender fingers working as hard as they can. He breathes a heavy sigh, feeling a pang of guilt for leaving you when he sees just how raw you are from being in heat all alone. He’s responsible for you even being in this bad of a state, isn’t he? Leaving you before sunrise with nothing but a kiss on the head. If anything that only made it more intense for you. He wants to — no, needs to care for you. It’s what every part of himself is urging him to do. 

“The thought of another finding you… like this.” Ralak rasps as he closes in on you, “so vulnerable… it makes me — haah.” He cuts himself off with a shaky sigh and a clench to his jaw. Beads of sweat ball on his temples, slowly rolling down his angular jaw to eventually meet and drip from his chin onto your stomach. He looms over you, his hair flowing forward when he suddenly grabs and tugs at your wrist in one swift move, yanking your fingers out of you. 

“Ss-ah!” You hiss with a wince, heart skipping a beat when you realise that he’s barely there anymore. “I-It makes you, what?” You ask quietly — nervously, even. 

A bestial growl begins to rumble in his chest, causing a shiver to ripple through you—hardening your nipples into peaks within seconds. Jawbone fluttering from his reluctance to answer, he harshly cups your pussy with his hand, causing you to gasp. His sharp, intimidating stare locks with yours, brows tensing as he allows two, thickset fingers to slip down to your slickened opening. His growl fades into a single, drawn out word. 

“Nìfmokx. [jealous]” 

His admission slips past his lips just as his fingers sink into your aching core, leaving your mouth agape and hot tears spilling over your cheeks. Jealousy isn’t an emotion Ralak is used to feeling. Much less something he would subject you to experience with him. But you could see the raw emotion in his eyes, as they flicker from a dark blue to something even deeper. It’s the way his stare bores into your innermost being as he fills you up with his digits alone, telling you that you were his, and his only. 

He hooks his fingers right into your gummy walls, holding his position as he moves his hand in an up and down motion at full tilt. The tips of his fingers repeatedly slam into your swelling sweet spot, coaxing out broken, filthy noises from your throat. He hums with pride, yet his face remains stone cold, minus the occasional twitch of his jawbone. He’s trying so hard to keep at a steady pace, and not to be too rough with your fragility. 

“Oh f-fuck.” You curse under your breath, both hands grabbing a firm hold of his forearm. You’ve been unintentionally edging yourself all day that you’re already almost there. And no matter how hard you squeeze and claw at his now-veiny arm, he remains unmoving. 

“Go on, then.” He huffs impatiently as he looks down at you, feeling your walls clamp down on his fingers. Your heels sink into the bed when you push your hips into the air, fingernails digging into his skin as you near your first release. You begin to whimper, bucking your hips to chase the feeling of relief. It’s right there. It’s so close; and you just need to allow it to wash through you. You tense up so badly your whole body shakes, sending your teeth chattering and your bottom lip quivering. You swear you can see the stars from the night sky litter your vision and feel your heavy lids flutter shut.

“Look at me.” Ralak demands in a sharp, gruff tone. Your glossy eyes shoot back up to his, and you start to sputter out whatever gibberish comes from your mouth — a few curses mixed with his name and your fathers’ mother-tongue. He continues to glare down at you with a rigid face, tensing his jaw as he wills himself to be gentle and patient with you. “Good. Now cum, little one.” 

Your pathetic noises suddenly fade into a sweet, little cry. A cry of relief when your frustration washes away as you finally come undone on his fingers. The alleviation is so intense that it’s almost consuming; “T-Thank—” you collapse back down onto the bed, “—you. Thank you—haah, thank you karyu.” You pant repeatedly, his forearm ripping from your grip when he unexpectedly wrenches his fingers out of you. You squirm from the sudden emptiness, “Wait—” 

“Do not thank.” He spits the accented words as he stumbles back to create some distance between the two of you. He pants as he attempts to recollect himself, his face of stone finally screwing into something of a grimace. “So…if another na’vi found you, would you thank him too? Hm?”

“Lak. I… N-No.” You stutter, unsure of what to even say. 

“You are mine. My mate…” he growls through thinned lips, “My duty. Understand?” 

“Yes.” You nod quickly, feeling your cheeks heat up. It arouses you to see him so jealous. So possessive. So assertive. 

Ralak slams his eyes shut and gulps so hard it’s audible —visible even. You could see the bump in the column of his throat quickly undulate, his chest heaving harshly and his shoulders dramatically rising and falling with each breath he struggles to take. And for a while, there’s nothing but silence and his heavy breathing that you feel the overwhelming need to break it. 

“Ralak.” 

Your trembling, tiny voice snapping his head back up to you, once tightly closed eyes now flying open to reveal the most beautiful shade of mauve. They pierce into you like a spear through an unsuspecting prey, full of nothing but pure, unadulterated greed. 

You never thought you’d see them again except in that vision. You get lost in them for a little, studying how the gold ring around his blown pupils still remains even in a sea of indigo. 

You sense that he’s in the thick of his rut now and you need to relieve him soon, like he did for you. Or only Eywa knows what will happen. You allow yourself to finally take in the man before you in full, eyes trailing down his sweaty, muscular physique — perfectly carved v-lines and six fingered tattoo — until they land on his aching cock. 

Oh, fuck. Is he bigger? You think, admiring his mushroomy head and erect spikes. It’s oozing and dripping, unable to keep still from how hard it’s pulsing. It’s at least an inch bigger than usual. 

You look away to study his facial expression and by the way he’s looking at you, you can tell he’s waiting for your command, trying his hardest to prevent himself from pouncing on you and fucking you senseless right here and now. You’ve never seen him this way before. Straining so hard to keep himself in one position and struggling to keep his hands to himself. 

“Ralak… More.” You spread your legs as wide as they can go, holding them apart by the bend of your knees, exposing yourself completely. His heavy lidded eyes widen almost as much as your legs, pointed ears flicking upwards in excitement when he sees you assume such a vulnerable and submissive position. 

“Y/n.” He groans, voice thick with arousal and want and maybe a little desperation as he takes in the sweet sight of your still-pulsing and swollen clit poking out between your folds. “I am… losing control.”

Hearing your name fall from his lips in this way — this tone, instantaneously reignites the flame in your core. In seconds your slit is practically dripping, forming a pool of your slick underneath you. “Good.” You pant as you stare up into his slit-like pupils. You swallow quickly before mustering up the courage to invite the beast in. “Now…remind me who I belong to.”

How could he resist now? 

With the way you’re talking and your pheromones so pungent that they fill his lungs to the brim with no space for any other option but to fall into the thick of his rut. Before you can formulate another thought in your foggy state, Ralak has your legs pinned back and is diving nose first into your cunt. 

He wastes no time to have his fill of you, lapping up your juices so desperately your body moves from the force of his licks. He has been wanting to taste you ever since you made a mess on his fingers, fuck — ever since he got a whiff of your scent from outside his marui door, but denied himself the pleasure in the case he couldn’t stop himself from going any further. But now, all restraint and denial is now left out at that very door. 

The flat of his tongue trails up your inner thigh and then back to your folds, tasting a mixture of the sweetness of your slick and the saltiness of your sweat. He groans when his tongue finally grazes past your clit, feeling it throb against his taste buds. He lingers there for a while, swirling and sucking on you until he unlatches to come up for a quick breath of air. 

“Fucking ftxìlor [delicious].” He gasps out a curse, shoving your legs even further back to have seconds of his meal. 

It becomes evident that he’s doing this for himself. Because if he were doing this solely for you, he would have made you cum by now. He’s eating you out as if he’s been starved for weeks, sucking and popping off your clit just to lap up the sweet, sticky nectar seeping from your hole just to coat his tongue. 

He’s nowhere near as quiet as he usually is, grunting and groaning as he swallows your juices. His fingernails dig into your thighs as he tries to keep himself from being too rough with your tiny, dainty body. But, his attempts prove to be futile once you feel your hips lift off the ground from his grip tightening around your thighs. You stare at the sight of your mate between your legs, crinkling his forehead and squeezing his eyes shut as he can’t stop himself from indulging in his urges. 

“Fuck me!” You let out a frustrated moan, your heat having you so on edge you need to cum again. 

His eyes fly open, and within moments he’s tucked under your hips, pelvises flush together as he rests his throbbing, neglected cock between your folds. His tip touches your belly button with ease, beads of precum oozing out of his slit one after the next. 

“This is what you want, yes?” He bucks his hips into you, the tip of his cock smearing his slick all over your deep blue skin. 

“Fuck, yes.” You whisper shakily, chin meeting your chest to look at the masterpiece he’s painting on you. “I want my mates cock.”

He only responds with a rough growl, flipping you over and pushing you onto your stomach.

“Oh shit.” You mutter under your breath, a little afraid of what you’ve gotten yourself into. But you trust Ralak. 

You know that even in rut he would never hurt you. Not intentionally, at least. Of course this is not to say that he would be gentle —you expect that anything but.

With a firm hand to your upper back, his body is pressed against yours and his face nuzzled into the crook of your neck. He breathes in deeply through his nose, holding it in his lungs, and then letting out a hot, shaky breath against your skin, finally allowing himself to really take in your scent. 

He almost becomes drunk off it— at least it feels that way for him. Your scent has him feeling like he’s downed two full bottles of fermented fruit with no chasers in between and he simply can’t get enough of it. 

Hand moving swiftly from your back to your head, he pins your face to the bed as he trails his tongue along your jawbone to the nape of your neck. He lingers a little longer than he can help, suckling on and grazing his pointed canines against the skin. It sends shivers down your spine until your tail curls into the air and back arches in complete submission. You push back into him, feeling his hardened length pressed between the swell of your ass and base of your tail. 

Fuck, you just want it inside you already. 

“Lifting your tail for me, hm?” He huffs, puckering his lips against your skin and suckling tenderly. You can feel the emptiness creep back in, and that maddening itch deep in your womb. You moan softly, like a low hum under your breath, which only riles him up more. He feels like he wants to make you his all over again.

To mate with you. 

To mark you as his in every way so that no other man would even dare look your way. Without warning, Ralak pushes up off you, his sinewy arms caging you in with one hand binding your wrists and the other keeping your head pinned to the bed. His legs hold yours down, his knees locking your ankles in place. 

“You belong to me.” He growls next to your ear, his hand abruptly leaving your head to reach for the base of his skull for his kuru. With a quick tug, he brings it over his shoulder and pops it into his mouth to hold with his teeth. He reaches for your kuru that lies innocently in the dip of your back, and brings it towards his mouth.  

A wave of anxiety washes over you when the image of Ka’ani finding you earlier in your own mess flashes before you. You can’t help but wonder if he would see that if he made tsaheylu right now. Imagine how he’d react when he realizes Ka’ani saw you naked and covered in slick? Your body squirmed at the mere thought, only making Ralak tighten his grip on you. 

“Wait!” Is all you could blubber out before you feel the connection —the bond. Your eyes bulge when you feel him surge through you, two minds becoming one. It takes you by surprise, he’s never one to hastily or unexpectedly make tsaheylu with you. But tonight he makes the bond as if you were a tsurak to be tamed. 

What he sees next drives him further into his territorial urges — your interaction with Ka’ani. The way Ka’ani barged into his home. How he saw your naked, vulnerable body. The fear that you felt when another man invaded your space. When he helped you. Innocently touched you. 

“He touched you.” He says between pants, a mixture of emotions washing over him all at once. But the sharp pang of your heat transferring through tsaheylu has him entirely succumbing to his own urges and carnal instincts. 

He’s simply not there. 

His hips start bucking uncontrollably and his cock is poking and prodding at your puffy folds. The crown of his cock jabs at your clit a few times before finally parting your folds and with a quick snap of his hips he’s probing your entrance. 

It stings when his swollen cockhead breaks past the resistance of your tightness, and he can’t help but lay hold of your hip and hiss from how tiny you feel. This is the first he’s ever had his cock stuffed inside a pussy during his rut. The feeling is all-consuming and he unapologetically yearns for more.  

Hips snapping back, he pops his cockhead out of you only to shove it back in again. And again. And again until he’s repeatedly using your tight, little hole as nothing more than a fucktoy for his own self pleasure. 

He leans back to take in the hazy sight, admiring the way your hole stretches perfectly to accommodate the sheer thickness of his cock. And when he sees the mushroomy part of his head slowly emerge he can’t help the way his hips stutter just to sink it back inside you. 

It’s torturous, not having all of him inside you when that’s what your body is pining for most. He’s so much bigger than normal and you know that this is an itch that only he can scratch. “God—” You whine the foreign word, “—just fuck me already!” 

“Agh. Quiet.” He lets out an irritated grunt, both hands flying to your hips to shove you down onto his cock — a loud, audible smack permeating the air when your sticky pelvises collide. 

It almost overpowers the hoarse yet piercing cry that escapes your quivering lips. You’re so tender that the sudden stretch is too intense and with no time to adjust to his size you find yourself shuddering like you did after he took your innocence —your virginity. 

His head dips back in ecstasy just when his tip kisses your cervix, his eyes screwed shut as he tries not to spray his seed inside your womb right now. His fingers sink into your skin, surely leaving bruises behind that will last for weeks. 

“Hngh — woman.” He groans longingly, dropping his head forward and opening his ineberated eyes to witness how your cunt is sucking in every single inch of his cock with glee. 

He grinds himself inside you, tugging at your hips and pushing against the resistance as if he were trying to stuff more of his cock inside you. Your high-pitched shrill fades out into a pathetic little whimper, your wobbly elbows and knees struggling to keep you up.

It’s all too much and your fucked out mind goes blank. You can’t even process how your body is submitting to its owner and his rough touches, opening itself up to be bred already. You sense what’s coming next. Your back bows, elbows and knees burying into the softness of the bed as you try to ground yourself for Ralak to use you for his own relief. 

He does exactly that— hunching over you and shuffling his knees closer so he can gain more leverage to fuck into your slippery cunt. He puts all his weight on you, his fingernails almost piercing your skin when he begins rutting into you like his life depends on it. 

He sets a merciless pace right off the bat, pounding into you as if he were angry with you. He huffs and puffs from trying to catch his breath but fails because he can’t stop himself from humping at you. His body won’t let him, not until he’s ensured you're full with his seed and will bear his child. 

Hands quickly leaving your hips, he grabs your wrists, binding them together once more and the other grips your kuru and yanks it back. Your neck is exposed and your mouth hangs agape as you’re given no other choice but to take the jackhammering of your life. He’s never fucked you so hard or fast and perhaps it’s the haze of your heat but you just want more of him. 

“F-Fuck. FuckFuckFuckmeFuckme— yes!” You beg deliriously, pushing yourself back onto him. You can feel the way his cock is bulging from your lower stomach, but you couldn’t care less because you just want it even deeper inside you. Fuck, it hurts even but it feels so good that you can’t stop begging for more. “Deeper — oh, yesyesyes!” 

Ralaks groans become drawn out and he’s burying his hot face into the crook of your neck as his pulsing tip bullies its way past your cervix. It’s like white hot pleasure surging through your entire being and it has you so lightheaded you may actually pass out before he’s finished with you. 

His cock heats up inside your cunt, becoming so veiny you could practically feel each vein press against your gummy, slimy walls. He’s now panting open mouthed against your throat, his tongue darting out to lick your skin. He shoves your head down so he can access the back of your neck—a hot spot for your pheromones— and grazes his canines against you. Every fiber of his being is urging him to sink them into your skin and see if you taste as good as you smell. His fangs throb in his mouth at the mere thought, his hot saliva dripping off their length and down your neck. 

You’re so overwhelmed and overstimulated that you can’t form a coherent thought much less process the fact that you’re quickly nearing your climax. It’s as if you’ve surrendered all control over your body to him and he’s dictating what happens next. Your pussy walls tighten around him so much it aches and he outright whimpers. 

“Sst-ah.” He pulls away from your neck and slams his eyes shut, grimacing from the way your cunt is gripping his cock. At this point you’re so on edge that you’re just pinching him, locking him inside you and almost cutting off his blood supply. It’s more than painful for him, and he becomes peeved that you won’t ease up. 

Irritated, he aggressively slams himself into you so that you stop with your pathetic little pinching, but all that does is tip you over the edge. Next thing you know your cunt is helplessly fluttering around his cock and your pussy juices are trickling down your thighs.

“Mmm-fuck I’m cumming!” You moan the words so quickly they jumble together, “Cu-cumming! Cumming!”  

You throbbing around him has his eyes rolling into the back of his head but the more your body convulses underneath him the more he grows frustrated with you. How could such a little thing put on such a big performance? Why won’t you just stay still?

So he thrusts. And thrusts. And thrusts. 

Taming you in the only way his body knows how. Fucking into you without mercy or sympathy. He lets out a hiss, the first he’s ever directed your way, and tightens his grip. “Keep…” He pulls out of you until only the tip is left inside, “...still.” Ralak’s deep voice rumbles next to your ear as he slams every inch cock into your cunt, the mere force of his thrust almost knocking you onto your stomach. You let out a broken whimper, coming down from your high and already feeling the coil in your stomach wind and heat up again. 

“Haa—‘nna…make you swell.” He groans the fragmented sentence like a dying man, grinding so deeply inside you that his swollen balls rub against your puffed up clit. Your bruised cervix feels so good against his cock as he uses it to massage the most sensitive part of his tip. 

Experiencing nothing but absolute rapture, Ralaks head slumps into the crook of your neck, where he’s flooded by your scent. He only grinds harder. And harder, until he’s panting like a viperwolf against your skin.

“Fuck — please…” You beg through a shaky whisper, trying to free your hands from his undying grip, “I j-ust c-came.” 

He’s just so fucking big and deep that he’s touching parts of you that have never touched before, and he’s only getting more aggressive the more you push away his advances. Right now, you’re just a squirming, noisy bitch in heat that needs to be put in her place. To surrender and submit. And the pheromones wafting up his nostrils only drive him further into his bestial urges to claim you as his.

His teeth and gums throb in his mouth once more when the urge to mark you as his becomes indubitable. Much like the urge to keep you still enough to make you into a vessel for his seed. He indulges himself, yanking your head back to expose the bend of your shoulder. He hovers open mouthed over your flawless skin and gives you a kitten lick before ruthlessly marking you. 

Your eyes bulge and pupils constrict into nothing but dots when you feel his lengthy fangs plunge into your flesh. The wail evading your throat is deafening and only gets higher when you feel your shoulder set ablaze. His jaw locks into place and he holds you still as he incessantly claims you as his in more ways than just marking. Your eyes start to water and your body stiffens when you feel it. 

He’s bulging inside you. 

Stretching you out until your shoulder isn’t the only part of you on fire. You lash around, clawing at whatever’s in your way until your nails are dull but the more you move the more it burns. “Y-You’re getting bigger inside me!” You release a high pitched squeal, your elbows and knees finally collapsing under you. Now all his weight is on top of you, pinning you flat to the bed with nowhere for you to go. He begins groaning low and deep, drawing it out until it turns into a depraved growl. It feels as if he’s swelling inside you, as if he were doubling in size. As if he were — oh fuck. 

“You’re — you’re knotting me, lak!” You yell when you come to the realisation. It feels like there’s two of him inside you, stretching you to unfathomable lengths. Despite your continuous attempts to get him to let up, he continues to bulge inside you. “You’re knotting me.” You repeat the words in a weakened, croaky voice of defeat, finally giving in and accepting your fate. 

Riding out his high, his hips stutter out of his control — a familiar sensation now flooding your core. A rush of warmth inside you. It’s his hot seed pumping inside you, his cock thumping with each spurt. He groans and moans until you’re so overloaded with his cum it begins to drip down your thighs and mix with yours. 

He unlatches from your shoulder, lapping at the wound to prevent it from bleeding too badly. He plants a few rough kisses on the double crescent shaped mark and works them up to the lobe of your ear. He’s panting and sweating and he can feel the fog lifting now that he’s had his release. “‘m sorry.” He mumbles between wet kisses, now trailing them back down to the fresh wound to lap at it some more. “‘m sorry.”

“Ralak, I-I” You stutter, overloaded with all these new sensations. It’s burning worse than a hellfire wasp sting but at the same time it’s everything your body hungers for. “Haah.. it-it hurts” You whimper quietly, looking behind you to see the most inebriated eyes you’ve ever seen on this man’s face stare back at you. He releases his pheromones to help your body calm down and feel less pain, ultimately scenting you all together.  

“Mawey.” Ralak huffs, trying his hardest to stay still now that he’s quickly coming to the realisation that he’s knotted and marked you in one go. “Doing… so well, tahnì.” He tries to praise you but truthfully he’s still in and out of it, dazing off when he feels the occasional throb of your walls. 

“Am I? Am I helping you too, lak?” You ask in a surprisingly optimistic tone, proud that you were able to do what you were told was unmanageable. He musters out a nod, grunting as he finishes emptying himself in your womb. 

Feeling some level of sense and rationality, you ask him a question that’s been on your mind. “I’m going to get pregnant, aren’t I?”

“Mm.” He hums, nodding his head as he nuzzles himself into the dip of your shoulder, inhaling your seeping scent. 

“Is that what you w-want?” Your breath hitches as you flinch from his cheek resting on your shoulder.

“Mm.” Another grunt, followed by an unexpected, fervid thrust — his body answering your question on his behalf by ensuring every last drop of his essence is inside your fertile womb. 

You focus on steadying your breathing now that you’ve gotten your answer. 

“Irayo, muntxate [thank you, wife].” He says weakly, finally rolling you both onto your sides for some much needed rest. You chuckle. A weak one, but a chuckle nonetheless, and repeat his own words back to him.

“Do not thank.” You say with a smile, getting yourself as comfortable as you can for the long night ahead. 

—— 

[barblaz-arts]

Stephanie Beatrice had played my 3 favorite characters (Rosa Mirabel and Vaggie) and since I watched Encanto and B99 I have my head canon that Vaggie have both Rosa and Mirabel personalities.

Any way, I just want to know what is your head canon or theory about her? ( specifically about Lute calling her weak and why the other exorcist hate her)

Since she is your girl, I would love to read your essay about her.(I’m joking you don’t have to write that much I just like to read your post)

Thank you

"My girl"... Am I just "that one artist who's the biggest Vaggie stan" to you guys? (I won't mind it!)

Oh man! I do have some ideas! A lot of my headcanons were already kinda sorta mentioned in my fic/art tho, so sorry if you're not getting a lot of new info

- I have this headcanon that Vaggie's always been "softer" than the other Exorcists, which is what I assume Lute meant when she said she "always knew [Vaggie] was weak". I know it probably has more to do with how little time each episode has, but what if Lute was so ready, already behind Vaggie when she let that kid go, because she knew this wasn't the first time Vaggie spared a sinner? Maybe that was just the first time Lute actually caught her. Maybe she's always had her suspicions, when Vaggie's kill count would lower every year, and she'd sometimes find Vaggie saying a sinner got away somehow despite cornering that demon moments ago.

- although she's gotten used enough to her lack of depth perception when it comes to her hand eye coordination, especially when fighting, i like to think her reading ability could never truly go back to the way it used to be, so she has trouble reading/ writing/texting (if you notice, i always showed instances of this in my fic ;> )But because she's the hotel manager she still has to deal with them because of paperwork and shit, so she has prescription glasses that help. I'd wanted to include a scene in the First Guest where Vaggie almost cries after seeing Charlie thru the glasses for the first time, because she didn't think Charlie could be any more beautiful, but i scrapped the idea because I couldn't expand the concept enough to an actual scene that could be relevant to the overall fic. I probably should have just mentioned it in a paragraph or something, but by the time i remembered id already posted the chapter I intended to add it in. Maybe I'll use it for another fic.

- she prefers femme clothing so she doesn't really have a reason to do this, but she learned how to do all kinds of ties so that she could do Charlie's whenever

- she grew her hair to compensate for her lost wings

- she wasn't exactly a great cook before she Fell, but she was pretty capable when she lived alone in Heaven. Cooking for Charlie tho gave her the motivation to get better and actually enjoy it

- an angel trait that she could never truly abandon is being a stickler for rules. She's very strict on everyone and herself with these things, within reason. So even when she and Charlie started dating, she insisted that they can't sleep together until they've had their third date. When they're on the clock, they have to be professional and avoid flirtatious advances in front of staff and guests. Charlie didn't mind because she prefers privacy too.

- Vaggie's physical appearance slightly changed gradually the longer she stayed in hell. As an angel, her sclera was paler, her incisors duller, and her skin grayer. But as time passed, her sclera got more and more peach/pink, fangs sharper, and skin more purple toned

- i still like to think that Vaggie's old backstory back when only the pilot was out (having died in 2014 in her early twenties who worked as a sex worker in El Salvador) was still true. Maybe it's just because I've liked Chaggie since pilot, and I've grown really attached to that backstory. I also just really don't want Vaggie to be Heavenborn for some reason. Among the cast she just seems the most grounded to reality to me, so having her revealed to have never been human and born "divine" just doesn't seem right to me. I also just think it'd be cute and funny if it turns out she's chronologically the youngest in the hotel even tho she's basically everyone's strict not-mom.

- idgaf what Adam says, I wanna think that "Vaggie" is short for "Evangeline". I used to have these 2 coworkers in their late 50's to 60's who had Evangeline as their government name, but one of them goes by "Vanj" and the other "Vajee". Being older Filipino women who aren't really too fluent in English, they never thought there was anything wrong with that when they grew up with their nicknames. I like to think that the case was the same if Vaggie used to be human. I'm not sure how common English is in El Salvador, but I'm willing to bet it's possible she could have been given that nickname as a kid by an older family member who didn't know a lot of English. Also Evangeline makes more sense to have been the name of an angel cmon now...

[pomefioredove]

um um. the nbc boys with a reader thats smart and learns easily but has trouble keeping up with the school system(? for lack of better words). they get distracted and bored easily, forget about homework, doodle on their papers and stare out the window, etc. they get great test scores and do exceptionally well when they are interested in what they’re learning, but otherwise get burned out really quick. i don’t know much about your nbc but it seems like the system is pretty fast paced and doesn’t really leave room for mistakes! 🫶🫶 i love your designs for nbc so far. can already tell the readers gonna have a blast (and a migraine)

my first ever noble bell oc request... rubs my hands together evilly

*ੈ✩‧₊˚ no room for mistakes (noble bell college)

inspired by my AU

type of post: headcanons characters: rollo, original characters; pierrot, bou, phoenix, clodio additional info: romantic or platonic, reader is gender neutral, reader is yuu

Rollo Flamme will arrange a precise time to study with you every day, whether you ask him or not. it's within his best interest that you succeed at Noble Bell (heavens forbid you're shipped off to a lesser, simpler arcane academy like that terrible Night Raven College), and so there will be no room for mistakes. this isn't something you should take for granted, either; Rollo is a very busy man, and to have an hour of his time for him to tutor you is a privilege. at least, that's what everyone else will tell you

to Rollo, this is nothing. he would make his whole weekend for you, if you asked. perhaps his whole life

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

Pierrot Gregoire is probably the last person you should be going to for help. yes, he's exceptionally intelligent in the ways of history and literature, and yes, he could lecture you for hours longer than your actual professor does, but I doubt you would actually get anything but a headache out of it. he's a poet, not a tutor, and he has a tendency to talk himself in circles, go on tangents, anecdote about his personal life... yeah. it would take a special sort of mind to keep up with him, otherwise, you're probably better off trying to make sense of his unorganized class notes... which are just as full of doodles and daydreams as yours

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

Bou de Neige is known for making harsh judgments about his peers... which are often accurate. and so he can tell, by the way you talk and articulate and express, that you're not a blithering idiot. you only lack the discipline that the typical Noble Bell College student has. and if it weren't for Rollo's faith in you, and his own damned pity, Bou would have been happy to let you fail...

...but he doesn't. he sits next to you in classes and pinches your arm when you're dozing off, or not paying attention to something important. he leers over you and corrects the mistakes on your homework before you turn it in. he begins carrying clean paper for you to doodle on, and insists it's nothing (it's so over for him)

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

Phoenix Bussiere is not what I would call a trustworthy tutor. he's not even a trustworthy student. oh, but don't think he wouldn't love to waste a few hours every week "helping you study" while he vandalizes 500 year old wood desks and falls asleep in the library. he's way too eager to volunteer. and how can you say no? his attention is highly valuable; the jealous glares of other students make that obvious. and perhaps you wouldn't have minded working alone, without anyone breathing down your neck... except he doesn't let you. he couldn't care less about the homework, but he'll ask you a thousand questions about yourself

...you can never quite tell if he actually cares, or if he's just passing the time

*ੈ✩‧₊˚

if you think Clodio LeFou would be the worst of the group, you'd be very wrong. is it chaotic? yes. but he'll teach you Latin while hanging upside down (and he's really quite good at it). he's managed to get by at Noble Bell without raising any eyebrows, after all, and his grades certainly reflect that. he'll act out your history lessons and critique your writing assignments like a professional. he'll make a puppet just to teach you math. it's unconventional, especially for Noble Bell, but it's much better than the dry lectures from your professors. you'll take what you can get

[fuck-customers]

This situation truly felt like the closest I've ever gotten to reenacting the L vs. Light from Death Note battle lmaoo I kept my cool and plausible deniability, but I was dying laughing internally.

(I think I've won the battle, btw. I'll have to wait and see. There's more to this war, though)

So, for background (and I've complained about this on this blog several times...sorry) my moron boss refuses to put price tags/signs on the products in the store, especially at the register. Considering I work in a retail store...this is obviously a problem. So I've made several attempts to get products priced, in varying degrees of extremity.

1. I made handmade signs/tags out of receipt paper/scratch paper and put them on the products around the register. (Candy, toys etc.) Braindead manager took them down.

2. All but 4 of the shopping carts at work are broken, but customers are stupid and still try to drag them halfway through the store and then abandon them or somehow blame me personally for them being broken. So I put signs on the broken ones and blocked them off. Dumbshit managers keep unblocking them and then customers try and fail to use them and abandon them throughout the store, rinse and repeat daily.

3. I then got the idea to go over my manager's head, but without having it fall back on me. Write to corporate. I originally started snatching receipts to leave negative reviews on the store survey, but that seemed to be a dead end, as the SM and DM are the ones who are supposed to read the surveys, but appear not to, as not a single thing was fixed in over 6 months of "customers" complaining weekly. (Usually at least 1 every 2-4 days)

4. I found a clearance price gun and tagged everything with it, even if it wasn't clearance. One way or another, it had a price on it, right? Of course the braindead moron took them off.

5. I then found actual price tags that were technically for different products, but had the same prices as our current candy, so I tagged the items with that. (For example, we'd have a tag for chocolate that we no longer carry that was $3.99 and we have some current chips on the shelf that are $3.99, so I'd just put the old tag for the current candy, since all customers need is the dollar amount and blacked out the old product description) These lasted longer than the previous attempts, but were ultimately taken down, but this is (hopefully) the turning point.

6. Just to really make sure something would change, a month or so after reusing old price tags, I (simultaneously, while also putting up old tags) made several fake emails posing as disgruntled customers and emailed corporate complaining about the lack of prices and the broken carts (among other things) at my specific location. (I did not name any specific employees or throw anyone under the bus. I just complained about the appearance of the store and any mention of employees was simply left at "the cashier" "the manager" etc. with no personally identifying info) I did this on the feedback section of the company website as well.

This all came to a head today when the braindead's mini-me (the ASM) pulled me aside before I clocked in today to basically call me out. She said that she knew that I was the one who put the handmade tags and also put "broken" signs on the broken carts and blocked them off. I, of course pretended not to know about it, because I'm not THAT stupid. But I'm not in trouble, because she has no real proof. (It was very much "I know that she knows and she knows that I know she knows lol) Anyway, she says (and we'll see about this) that new carts have been ordered and are on their way and also that she had to go around and undo all the tags (oh boohoo, she had to do her job, poor her) and will be putting real, correct tags on the products.

We'll see. In the meantime, "customers" are still going to leave bad reviews and contact corporate until changes are actually made for real. There are still other issues that need to be fixed, but are not as important as the lack of price tags and carts. (Such as the lack of price checkers, the shit radio music, the lack of employees, the dysfunctional inventory system, the bare shelves, the disorganized store, etc.)

Posted by admin Rodney

[putschki1969]

The "rito" Situation

Following my post about Hitoshi Konno, I thought it would only be fitting, to round up some info on rito as well, especially after the most recent announcement. When the detailed lineup for YKL Vol#21 was released, many people were not only shocked by Keiko's absence, they were also wondering why rito was not included. I received as many questions about her as I did for Hitoshi Konno but I didn't really feel qualified to talk about her (I still don't really but now we have a bit more information to work with). There's not much to say here and also, her connection to Kalafina (and Keiko's situation) is peripheral at best so I will keep this short.

Today, on January 31 2025, rito announced her departue from Highway Star. Her contract will officially end on March 31 and it seems like no attempts have been made by either rito or the agency to extend said contract. It sounds like it was mostly rito's own decision to distance herself from her current situation so that would also explain why she's no longer participing in YK events as regular member. Judging from her personal comment and Yuki's tweets on the matter (she has nothing but kind things to say about her), this is most likely a standard case of moving on due to a lack of creative opportunities. Perhaps she didn't find what she was looking for or she simply exhausted all possible avenues at Highway Star or maybe she had hoped to gain more from her collaboration with Yuki, who knows. Obviously, these have been some valuable experiences for her but now she is seeking new paths.

Even to a casual onlooker like myself it does feel like she kinda fell along the wayside during these past few years and not much was invested in her. As far as I know, she did have a couple of solo releases and a dedicated song from Yuki on the PARADE album but other than that, nothing much to write home about. Her appearances at lives and events were a great bonus of course but despite frequently being referred to as "regular member", both her and Lino Leia didn't have a lot to do. Maybe that's changing now with all the restructering taking place but sadly, rito will mostly likely not benefit from that. Yuki did include her in one of her "top secret" recordings from last year so we'll see if that will lead to anything at least. It's a shame she wasn't used more, I like her voice a lot more than Lino's tbh and it fits better with Yuki's style of music if you ask me...but one has to admit that Lino is the more seasoned singer among them with what appears to be a lot more experience handling her own solo stuff so my best guess is that she's quite happy with the current arrangement since she can effectively juggle all of her activities. In contrast, rito seems to have been a newbie with no established solo career. Also not sure about their exact age but I'd assume that rito is probably a bit younger than a lot of Yuki's other vocalists (could be completely off on that though, I've honestly no idea how old any of them are but rito just comes across as quite young).

Circling back to Kalafina for a little bit here. Just the other day I was having some discussions in the reply section of one of my posts and among other things, I was talking about why Hikaru (and even Keiko) would have never considered signing up with Highway Star during all these years. After all, Keiko could have just as well joined Highway Star instead of Tristone back in 2020 when she made her solo debut. And Hikaru has been a struggling freelancer for quite some time now so a contract with a seemingly decent agency (with the added bonus of an official Yuki Kajiura affiliation) would have sounded like a good idea to me. We don't know of course if it was entirely their choice or if Highway Star (and Yuki) were not willing to negotiate something with them. Whatever the reason might have been, now I am thinking it was maybe for the best that they never joined. Their management of rito was certainly not great.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for making my sister break up with her boyfriend?

My (20M) sister, “S” (28F) has been dating this man, “D” (40M) for about two years now. I didn’t like D at first, before I met him — I liked my sister’s ex-girlfriend a lot and hated her new partner on instinct. I especially didn’t like D when I found out he was 12 years older than my sister, who isn’t even 30 yet. (And yes, I know, there is nothing really wrong or creepy about a 28 and 40 year old dating, she is more than old enough to make her own choices. However, consider this fact: I am allowed to have biased opinions on my sister’s dating life. That’s basically my job as a little brother.)

I thought I would warm up to D eventually, but I never really did. He’s not awful, really… just didn’t have any personality I cared for. He’s very boring. Very obviously a 40 year old man, if you catch my drift. I don’t see what my sister sees in him, but, whatever, right? She’s happy, that’s all that matters. Except the longer I knew him, the less and less I liked him.

While at first he came off as a casual, polite guy, the more I saw of him, I realized how rude he is. He always comes to family gatherings late (and last Thanksgiving he literally fell asleep and wasn’t seen for the entire last half of the night. He didn’t even get to eat.), he never greets me when he sees me, and I realized he belittles my sister a lot, too. When she excitedly shared her birthday plans with him, he immediately laughed and tore her down, saying “who would even go to that?” in response, for one example of that.

Now, I definitely wouldn’t have gone to the lengths that I did if this was a casual boyfriend. However, my sister is dead set on this guy. She’s even talked about marrying him and starting a family, and she’s a total hippie. She’s NEVER talked about that kind of thing, not with any partner she’s EVER had. Never even crossed her mind before. I refuse to let this man be my brother-in-law, and I refuse to let my sister spend the rest of her life with this scumbag that nobody in the family likes. (And obviously, for the record, I and the rest of my family have tried to speak with S about her boyfriend before. But as you can probably guess, most people don’t really listen when their family says “we don’t like your boyfriendddd!!” or else nobody in the entire world would have a relationship.)

So, one day when D left his phone in a room alone with me on accident, I had a plan. When I returned it to him, I gave S a subtle concerned look, and whispered that I had to talk to her when he left. When he did leave, I told her I saw conspicuous messages from another woman on there. I knew, obviously, that there was no proof, but I knew she would believe me over him, with the simple excuse of “he probably deleted the messages from his phone” excusing the lack of evidence. She believed me just like I thought, and dumped him.

Maybe I overreacted here. It’s not like D was (to my knowledge) abusive, just an asshole. And I know that if S ever finds out what I did, it will destroy her trust in me forever. At best, I’m honestly expecting JAH. But I still don’t regret what I did. I just won’t let my sister spend the rest of her life with a man like him. She’s a kind, attractive, fun woman, and she plays for both teams, so I know she can do better. I felt like I had no other choice and they didn’t seem to be breaking up by their own choice anytime soon.

So, am I the asshole?

What are these acronyms?

[swanpyart]

Prepare For My Most Deranged Slay The Princess Theory That Makes Sense The More You Think About It - The Narrator IS Another Voice

I'm a bit jumbled so bear with me, but I realized a lot of odd things that give me the idea that the Narrator is actually another Voice and another facet of the Long Quiet.

The game goes out of its way to make it clear that the Narrator is different from the Voices; he has a degree of power over the Player that the other Voices initially lack, he has info about the world that the Player does not, and his authoritative nature puts him (and us by default) in opposition with the Princess. Because of this, none of the other Voices treat him as an equal or even as a friend: They are all either opposed to him, treat him as someone who can be listened to but ultimately ignored, or outright dismiss him. In the Thorn Route, Hero even points out that the Narrator "doesn't count" as one of them.

Another difference is that the Narrator never learns new info from previous chapters; we essentially get a new Narrator each one, while literally EVERYONE else remembers what happened before. This alone feels like the game pointing out the disconnect between the Narrator and the rest of the Long Quiet.

Now, for what my theory hinges upon.... the Start Over Ending, where the Princess wipes the Long Quiet's memories and causes the entire game to start over from scratch. The interesting part of this is that both the Long Quiet AND the Princess remark that there's a chance that they'd done this before, possibly countless times, because they were unable to make a permanent decision the previous times.

If this is actually true, and the Long Quiet and the Shifting Mound have been in this perpetual cycle of the Long Quiet finding five vessels, the Narrator's Echo fading away, both gods realizing their true natures but being unable to compromise, and the Princess wiping both of their memories and forcing a restart.... then what becomes of the Narrator? How does he come back for things to restart?

"Well, obviously he's resurrected," You might say, but we're not given any reason to believe that the Long Quiet can resurrect an actual mortal person, right? The entire point of the game is the inevitability of death, and that "even in rebirth, things can't be the same." Not only that, Nary is an Echo, not an actual person, so his presence as a living being is one that's even more precarious than an actual human life; focusing too much on him makes him fade away. The Long Quiet and the Princess can come back from death, but those two are literally GODS.

So, my main theory is this: The Narrator we hear throughout the game is no longer the Narrator the Long Quiet may have originally started with in the VERY first loop with the Shifting Mound, right after the Creator killed himself and split the Gods in half. The original Narrator is actually long dead, along with his original Echos, and now he is merely another Voice of the Long Quiet assuming His role. Perhaps at one point, the Narrator was actually a person who wanted to rid the world of death, and created an Echo of himself to do it, but the Echo of that human has long since faded away, only to be replaced by the Long Quiet to maintain the illusion of the loop.

In this light, it's entirely possible that every version of the Narrator and the Creator we meet is merely an extension of the Long Quiet playing the role of an omniscient storyteller. This could be part of why the Narrator struggles to answer in-depth questions, and why the Creator never goes into detail about his true identity as a human. The Long Quiet doesn't actually know much about the one who created him, and gives the same recycled lines he heard long ago from the voice of a long-dead man.

So, why does the Narrator never remember previous Chapters? That's his role. Every Voice has specific skills and abilities, and the Narrator's role, as a Voice, is to maintain a status quo. With no storyteller, there is no path in the woods, there is no cabin, there is no Pristine Blade, and there is no basement. There's no vehicle through which the Long Quiet and the Shifting Mound can reach an agreement of some kind.

The irony, then, that, if this idea is true, that the Narrator, hellbent on destroying the Shifting Mound, then becomes a vehicle through which her love for the Long Quiet facilitates. It's no wonder that, Like the Voice of the Hero, the Narrator is ALWAYS with us, and if Hero represents our agency, then Nary represents the scenario through which to exercise that agency.

Let me know if I sound like a madman lmao

[ghostselkie]

White raven Dracula au

So that first post I made about a White raven Dracula au was partly a joke, but then I started thinking about it more, and well this is the result of that brain worm.

Warning: this is a bit ramble-y.

Lenore is in the role of dracula, and annabel, at first, is in the roal of jonothan harker.

Lenore being a vampire is a secret that has been kept by the Vandernacht family for generations. Also they live in the Netherlands in this au.

Like in cannon the Vandernacts are ludicrously wealthy, and they using that money to help keep Lenore's vamp-ness a secret. Also cause vampire immortality, and a lack of male heirs when she was a human, she still has the money that existed when she was alive. Now Dutch families can be big, so only the main line knows about her.

As for why they keep her a secret, and not kill her for being an unholy creature of the night is because she is useful. She is probably at least a hundred years old at this point and has accumulated a vast amount of knowledge over the years, she knows more about the families wealth and how to handle it than anyone else. Also her vamp powers make getting info on competitors easier. They have a deal, as long as she does stuff to help them they wont murder her in her sleep.

Now this relationship has kind of soured in reascent years. There is no longer any one who remembers Lenore when she was alive, and no one who remembers hearing stories from people who knew her when she was alive. To the current Vandernachts she is a mysterious and potentially dangerous entity. So Thaddeus comes up with a convoluted plan to get rid of her.

He can't just reveal the secret, cause that would cause Lenore to retaliate. So he comes up with an idea for some one to discover Lenore, and say if they die, there would be enough rage to get people to investigate. This results in Thaddeus getting in contact with Ira, and therefore Annabel getting to stay at castle Lenore.

Now the intended result was that Annabel would either discover that Lenore was a vampire, or she would become one of her victims, as Lenore kind of has a taste for the blood of young women (she doesn't kill them though). What ends up happening is gay as fuck.

Lenore is not nearly as evil as book Dracula. She's more of a nuisance than any thing else, sucking just enough blood to satisfy her, but not leave the human with any lasting damage. She is unholy though, and therefore people are still scared of her, they just can't really do anything cause of the Vandernachts.

Now, Lenore has been a vampire for a long time now. There is no way she is still acting or dressing like a normal victorian woman. Shortly after she became a vampire she realized "wait, I'm an unholy creature of the night. I don't have to be straight," and started cutting her hair short and wearing pants. Current Lenore often wears things akin to her dreamland outfit now, or just men's clothing. So yeah, Annabel will defiantly be gay panicking over Lenore in her dreamland outfit.

It's going to start similar to Dracula, sans the racism (old stories are like that unfortunately), and the fear Jonathan Harker had felt in the original story with Annabel's horny. So this, isn't going to be a horror story, at least not from Annabel's perspective.

Now, as for why they fall in love with each other. For Annabel, the reasons are similar as in cannon. For Lenore though, the reasons are also similar, but with the add on that, Annabel is the first person who is not immediately scared of her, and who doesn't become scared of her once she sees all the spooky vampire shit.

Gayness ensues. The social season happens in the Netherlands, but Annabel and Lenore do stay in touch cause Lenore kinda had to act as her translator, since Annabel didn't end up learning much Dutch. So they get to be together, but Lenore has to watch Annabel meet with other suitors, all while their inevitable separation is looming. Unlike in cannon, however, they both know of a way to be together, but neither of them want to talk about it cause it would involve Annabel being turned in to a vampire. Annabel does end up going back to London to be engaged to her child hood friend, and Lenore, in good old Dracula fashion, fallows her home. Now this is when Annabel transitions from the role of Jonathan to Lucy, except the whole being turned in to a vampire is a lot more consensual.

Vampire lore for this au

[astroyongie]

NCT Dream January Reading 2024

Note: please take it lightly and lets enjoy this new 2024 edition !

Jeno

Love: Whatever relationship he had, it is no longer from the actual plan. Jeno seems to currently be going through a breakup since his heart is full of grief. I believe he was the one who played around and his partner just left without notice.

Career: he is very apathetic at the moment, his career isn’t even his main focus of the moment and he just takes whatever the company tells him to do, however I don’t feel like he is having fun on what he does

Self: despite everything, on his own self he is rather okay. Jeno is someone rather positive and he takes things on a more lightly way than others. He is focused on himself, on his appearance and body in general 

Jaemin

Love: He is still with his partner but I have a feeling that things aren’t as good as it used to be. Jaemin is getting a little bit more of their routine, he doesnt feel like the relationship is evaluating and that they are currently stuck on something that is “too perfect” 

Career: just like Jeno he isn’t feeling very welcome in the industry at the moment. He feels bored, he has lost the spark and the reason why he liked to perform so much. I feel like jaemin is also trying to stay out of the spotlight 

Self: he is very harsh with himself, he takes things too deeply and he has a hard time separating the artist of the person. A lot of things that are happening on his idol and personal life are in his opinion, his fault

Renjun

Love: He lacks insight in love. There was someone who confessed to Rennin and he rejected it because he thought the person was playing him. He discovered later that it wasn’t the case and now he feels like he has lost one big opportunity in his love life

Career: like his teammates, things havent changed. He also isn’t enjoying the way DREAM is going for musically related. Rennin also has been very stubborn with what he wants. I feel like lately he has been focused on his income which he judges not enough for what he does 

Self: he is stuck, stopped as a person. He feels like he isn’t going anywhere nor is he involving as a person which makes him very frustrated with everything. 

Chenle

Love: well it does seem like Chenle is currently dating someone (I have no info about the person, but it seems like they are from the same background than him, roots related). In any case he is on his honey moon phase with his partner 

Career: again, the energy hasn’t changed much but Chenle also sees things differently. He is much more ambitious and he sees this new opportunities to grow and earn more money. He wants to have more own works 

Self: he doubts a lot of his relationship despite being happy in it. He is enjoying himself a lot but he is scared that his partner goes cheating on him (although it also seems like he is still talking to other people as well) 

Jisung

Love: this boy is also dating (the same person than the last reading). Everything is going well and his partner sem to be the one giving order in the relationship. They are the one who takes all the decisions but Jisung seem to enjoy things like this 

Career: he is probably the only one who’s enjoying things are they are currently. Despite everything, he thinks it’s a good opportunity to improve and involve In their skills and to become a more complete artist. He is taking all the opportunities in. 

Self: everything is okay, Jisung is on a higher self state I think, he is closer to his spirituality/religion and he is just enjoying everything that is being thrown is way and accepting things are they are. 

[fumifooms]

Don't really reblog or leave comments all that often, but I've been reading your Delicious in Dungeon deep analysis posts for a few days now and honestly I can't wait for that Kabru (& Mickbell) party rundown. They're a fine set of adventurers, if in dire need of people more capable of handling monsters.

Speaking of Mickbell's relationship with Kuro in particular – I think it does generally tend to be perceived from Mickbell's side, whether positively or negatively (which makes sense to some degree, since Kuro's perspective wasn't presented in full until the World Guide), as if Kuro isn't himself a maladjusted adult who spent an unspecified amount of time starving in a cage, his family situation unclear beyond "permanently out of contact", and is yet as overprotective of Mick as Mick is of him. I do recall a panel where he furrows his brows at the sight of Mick sitting on Inutade's shoulders, but other than that he is less aggressively isolating and self-insistent and more... coddling, I'd say, or overtly abiding. Kabru should have found Mickbell some books on kobold language tbh.

This is not intended as a criticism of the earlier webweaving post so I apologize if it does have shades of passive-aggressiveness – it's an incredibly on-point assessment of Mickbell's relationship with Kuro and his reasoning. Thank goodness Mickbell isn't a master magician, or else he'd make for a rather tasty dungeon lord (and Kuro would probably end up in a cage again, if not worse).

[context: ask sent on april 14th, soon after I posted my Canines web weaving]

Don’t worry, I loved getting your ask and didn’t read in any hostility! I didn’t want to reply before finishing my party masterpost-analysis (🤡 man it’s been too many months) but Kuro fans are begging for scraps and clamoring for Kuro meta and content everywhere I look including my askbox and man. Man yeah I should throw a bone you guys’ way at least in the meantime. The thing though you see is, one does not simply talk about Kuro without trying to cover every ground and every single piece of info we get. I’ll end up repeating myself a lot on this in my longer upcoming post but that’s just how analysis tends to be, so flash Kuro segment focusing on the Mickbell-Kuro dynamic

In a way I talk less about Kuro because compared to Mickbell his situation feels more straightforward to me somehow, the abused is usually the one who gets empathized with and liked more over the abuser so I don’t feel the same need to explore and explain. But… Kuro is not only generally hard to read but has so many layers. Kuro is both a self-effacing follower who’s communicative but polite & behaved and somewhat stoic, making it hard to gauge how much he’s voicing himself or even repressing, and functionally devoid of the ability to speak most of the time. He emotes in doglike ways but mostly because, lacking words universal body langue and cues like growling are the only way he can emote and communicate, not unlike how tone of voice is what’s important when talking to say, a pet dog. Kuro’s extra where he talks with Kabru is truly the Kuro bible, without it we’d have a much kess clear vision of how he lives his situation with Mickbell. And… It’s whiplash inducing and disconcerting when we see then that Kuro has everything rationalized, that Mickbell is still an angel in his mind and this is normal, just a guy who’s a little insecure that he must bend every which way for if needed.

Mickbell & Kuro’s relationship is fascinating because they each have a totally different view of the relationship. Mickbell thinks he holds the reigns, he’s the employer, the master, he’s manipulating Kuro consciously to some degree and withholds things like salary or permission to talk with others from him, and he thinks this is how he gets Kuro to not leave him. Kuro has seen through the matrix and pinpointed Mickbell’s insecurities and has decided he must do everything in his power to never make him anxious or upset and be his emotional support, EXCEPT that hilariously he seems to genuinely think Mickbell is a kid. He’s 22. Like, tallman equivalent of 27. Kuro is 18. Kuro has chosen to stay consciously and keeps choosing to stay because he wants to, because he’s chosen to devote himself to Mickbell’s wellbeing. In Kuro’s eyes, before being employer and employee, Kuro is the guardian and protector of this sensitive kid that he must follow and protect at all costs. What everyone is seeing as wage slavery doesn’t even register to Kuro because he’s never really thinking about the money, he dgaf. Kuro could choose to snap Mickbell in half with his jaw at any second and is more emotionally mature than Mickbell, but otherwise the power imbalance both financially and manipulation wise and using whatever he can to keep Kuro where he wants him is 100% tipping the scale towards Mickbell.

The amount of miscommunication they have for being each other’s most important person + person they spend most time with is insane, but tbh I think part of it is that Mickbell is terrified of what would happen when Kuro becomes fluent in common. Not only because Kuro would have the whole world of opportunities open up to him then (and in Mickbell’s mind, who would pick him over the world?), but because then the relationship would inevitably shift, Mickbell would lose some of that power imbalance, he would have to do more listening and both of them would have to learn to know each other better, and rectify wrong assumptions. It’d remind Mickbell that Kuro is truly his own person with a lot of thoughts and it’d make him feel less safe in being able to keep the relationship secure…

This all is why I’m less into mickuro in general, because unless Kuro puts his foot down one day for both their sakes, the status quo would just… Keep going, on and on. Canon supports this too, since Kuro’s profile in the complete adventurer’s bible in the post-canon blurb mentions very pointedly he’s still being worked for peanuts by Mickbell. Kuro being able to speak fully would make it a bit healthier I think like I talked, but Kuro would still be complacent to Mickbell’s unhealthy obsessive needs and man… Man……. Mickbell feels safe only when taking and Kuro wants nothing more than to give, if that makes sense, and that might be a shaky decent enough way to live for them but it also is far from healthy the way it is. I also don’t think getting that house he wants would fix Mickbell. Could even be a huge breakoff point if Kuro mentions his dreams is travelling around.

So yes I definitely agree with your assessment of Kuro being coddling and overly abiding. Both of them are very protective of each other like you said, the difference being that Kuro is selfless and even self-sacrificing with it meanwhile Mickbell is more selfish and possessive. (Although his overcontrolling nature does to some degree come from a protective place. Which would especially if he sees Kuro as helpless because of his language barrier or the way they met. But moments that go towards this is him being worried for Kuro after the chimera fight, after being stung by an aquatic monster in a monster tidbit, Mickbell often mentioning being worried the union or Kabru will steal Kuro away in a borderline trafficking undertone. Beyond just the care he shows him on the regular like washing and brushing him for hours ofc. Mickbell is not uncaring, his worrying and insecurities just bring his worst instincts out of him. Ehem Mickbell tangent over, my apologies.)

I know Kuro also being possessive is a common reading, but I don’t think I really agree 🤔 The support for this is the way he frowns at Mickbell being on Inutade’s shoulders, but I think that and the other hostile over Mickbell behavior he shows fall more in live with being protective. From Kuro’s perspective, Mickbell (the kid who must be protected who might fall and break his neck at any moment or something) is now on the shoulders of this very tall stranger he just witnessed pull off a sneak attack Laios’ party with ease, not something considered particularly honorable or trustworthy, and now she’s handling Kuro’s most precious thing in the world? Yeah better watch them like a hawk. Also remember, this is on top of his language barrier meaning he hasn’t had the same opportunity as others to converse with them and understand what they’ve been saying and thus form bonds outside of "my party trusts you for now so I’ll follow their lead." He also explicitely distrusts Izutsumi. I’ll also say though, I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say Kuro doesn’t know what to do with himself when he’s not looking after Mickbell, there’s the secret studies sure, but his whole life is always centered on him otherwise, so I can definitely imagine this being out of a restless feeling as well, though if that qualifies as possessiveness depends on the behavior it causes imo.

Other times where he growls or such is also defensive in nature. If anything, Kuro unlike Mickbell with him seems very alright with Mickbell making friends with the party and forming relationships outside of him. This does go in line with his "Mickbell is just a sensitive young lad I must do my best to protect until he feels safer and better, I want him to be happy and healthy" mentality. Near the end, we even see Kuro encouraging Mickbell to go towards other half-foots and implicitly join the half-foot union, the very same that Mickbell has told him would take Kuro away from Mickbell. So if it’s for Mickbell’s sake, even if Kuro might feel afraid of change or losing him to some degree (I don’t think he feels threatened bc he doesn’t think Mick would leave him), Kuro is even willing to endanger his situation/relationship/status quo with Mickbell.

Kuro is peak guardian angel……… 🥺😭

You’re also right Kuro is very maladjusted, with his past it feels very unsurprising Kuro would end up like this. Having a language barrier alone is extremely isolating: not being able to really communicate with others is his default with or without Mickbell, so it isn’t innately alarming or anormal to him, even when someone actively tries to make it harder for him. This is of course without mentioning the experience of being taken away from your homeland suddenly, and brougth against your will to a country you know nothing of and have no resources or knowledge to live in. Who knows how long he’s been in a cage— and as we see the living conditions were awful, similar to Izutsumi’s when she was part of a freak show. He was visibly starved and food was all the payment he could have wished for and that + following this guy who got him out of his chains were all the motivations he needed. And this makes sense for the overprotectiveness on both ends, Mickbell is all too aware of how particularly vulnerable kobolds are as targets and Kuro’s second interaction was mauling a guy who was trying to hurt Mickbell. Mickbell did "hire" Kuro as a bodyguard first and foremost, after all. Mickbell was scared of Kuro at first, echoing how he reminds Kuro during canon that his snarling is scary and not to do it. Even at first, the professional aspect to their relationship is a very shaky facade, it’s always been more like mutual aid that evolved into life partnership. Kuro was used to being alone, Kuro was used to having nothing and being starved and beaten, Kuro was used to having everyone dismiss him as a beast that’s not worth even trying to talk to, so of course Mickbell seems heavensent.

Man. The fandom has been so scary esp with the anime wave, Mickbell discourse is something I never expected would be so divisive 😭 Sometimes I hear things about Kuro like "he’s too smart to be abused" which is not only as a broad statement untrue but also harmful and vile. Abuse is complicated!!! You are bending over backwards to justify literal Mother Gothel behavior!!! No one is telling you you can’t sob over Mickbell and want mickbell & kuro fluff oh my god let’s just not normalize well known abuse tactics such as isolating them and controlling their finances and social circle.

Ok fun last ending note, it’s also interesting to note their dreams for the future and directly contridactory. When they have some money saved up, Mickbell wants to settle down with a house with Kuro, and Kuro wants to travel the world with Mickbell. Ohh to be a guy who’s been denied ressources all your life and has lived in constant danger who now wants nothing more than to have the ideal of a stable peaceful life, vs being a guy who’s been kidnapped and traded around and denied your freedom for so long who wants to see the world you’ve always been kept away from…. They’re each other’s world but they’re not a place they can live in, not sustainably not while thriving…….

Ahh, mickuro, mickuro, the ouroboros of codependence…

[heliphantie]

Another fateful meet-cute…

Emerald shards are not likely to work as appropriate substitute for damaged eyeglasses, but what you know about those conjured by magic? You will not able to see vision of your future with it, though… Or…?

Julieta’s gift, by the way, may not be limited just by cure provided via dishes, it can be as well similar to Rapunzel’s healing power, general ability of restoring physical state by transmitting magical energy, food (hair) working as conductor. Making food is just convenient way to provide the cure, both catering to Julieta’s personal interest, accessible for patients, and not requiring unnecessarily intrusion of personal space. Growing, she, probably, figured eventually that kisses of health should stay reserved for family circle only.

On the subject of Agustín: we do know his birthday, but how old he exactly is? Only clues given, from the words of director Mr. Bush, him being slightly younger than triplets and assumption he might be born on Wednesday (referring to “miércoles” line and his somewhat unfortunate tendencies), which points to June 19, 1901, while triplets are born either 1899 or 1900 (I guess it’s former, because age difference on the scale of months isn’t that mentionable). But then Agustín also may have been born in 1907, which gives us 7-8 years of possible age gap. While it’s unlikely what was in mind of creators, rather large gap could clear up some of backstory in aspect of marriages. Judging by the ages of oldest granddaughters, both sisters got married in their mid-to-late-twenties (and near simultaneously as well), significantly later than Isabela was supposed to. Starting with two eventual spouses hanging out in different age groups for all childhood and adolescence, there was no way for anything to bloom between them for all of that time, despite them growing alongside each other. And ever when Agustín was old enough to make attempt in courting, taking in account Word of God that Agustín wasn’t Alma’s “first choice” for Julieta’s fiancée, girl’s mother had reservations about him, and his youthfulness could factor into it as well. But as Julieta, oldest daughter, was expected to get married first of her siblings, and stood her ground in choice of husband, Alma’s prolonged reluctance to accept it led to the subsequent wedding of Pepa and Félix getting postponed, despite them being set for marriage with no objections on mother’s part, probably for ages. No wonder Pepa was so stressed on the day it was finally about to occur! (Maybe Alma, with her 19th century sensibilities, couldn’t stand holding her daughters in the state of old maidens any longer and had to cave in. Poor Agu has won his place in the family by persistence!)

Alternatively, you also can take “Wednesday” comment as a joke and ignore it, which is what I’m going to do and ascribe age difference between Agustín and triplets being around 4-5 years, as he looks mid-forty to me.

Last thing, I know his family name at birth believed to be “Rojas”, though I can’t find source of it. (On the wiki, it’s said to come from artbook, but I didn’t find such info in there.) Anyway, it’s what I’m going to put in tag to mark his young self, for the lack of clarity.

[thoughtsfromlayla]

The allegations are BS. THERE IS A BIG DIFFERENCE between saying “believe all women” and “the facts don’t matter, the allegation is the proof”. In this case, the sources and information are insanely vague and lack any sort of information that would constitute a true “allegation”. PEOPLE HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO INFORMATION BUT HAVE ALREADY DECIDED HE IS GUILTY. People don’t even know what he’s actually accused of anymore because the story has been fabricated and spun so heavily already. I see some saying “he sexually assaulted an actress” or “he assaulted his 20 year old nanny” or “he slept with his 20 year old nanny consensually but it’s still wrong because he’s famous” like WHAT?!? Those are all very different allegations, and not a single one of them have a true source or piece of verifiable information (could be YET or could be NOT AT ALL). Every “source” is just someone saying “I saw some other person say it”. It’s like a bad game of Telephone. It’s not real. Too many people nowadays can just say someone did something to them and people will take it and run with it without fact checking or researching a thing. There are no real, credible sources and absolutely ZERO verifiable pieces of evidence to even remotely prove that it’s true. Crazy that all it takes is for a person to say something online or in a podcast that’s completely made up and BAM- it’s everywhere and they have successfully ruined someones life and career while boosting their own platforms for a quick viral moment. Fame is a hell of a drug. People will do or say anything to have their moment and no one stops to ask “WHY would this person say this? WHY would this person want this particular fanbase to be involved? Why now? WHY would they reveal this allegation in such a silly and fake-sounding way that any lawyer or attorney would completely advise against until actual investigations have been conducted?” People will believe anything they read nowadays. Such a shame. And when the allegations are proven to be as fake and staged for a viral moment as they sound, I hope every person that so easily believed the lies and turned their backs without a shred of information or common sense feels ashamed of themselves. Social media has truly rotted peoples brains 🫠

What’s crazy is- whether Neil is guilty or completely innocent, his reputation and career are ruined. No information, no factual sources, no investigation info, and everyone has still already decided to stone him. The Sandman will likely be boycotted, Dead Boy Detectives will never see a second season, the Sandman fandom will fizzle (you already said that even you intend to be part of ending it on here). He is more than likely innocent and it won’t matter because people have already decided his fate. Sad as hell.

I would rather support the victims and be wrong and apologize than be silent about something like this. I will never feel ashamed for standing up for what I believe is right. Neither will I feel ashamed for learning that I was wrong and being taught better.

I said in my original post (which I'm assuming is what made you send in this in the first place) that I understand that the situation is very complex - that the information regarding both parties and the publishing company that made the story made the allegations unclear.

I've also said that I am still a Sandman fan, just that I will not support Neil Gaiman any longer. Which, wouldn't be all that difficult for me as I didn't even know his name until I watched the Netflix adaption of The Sandman. It took me another year to even bother looking him up and learning that he was also the author of other popular works that I enjoyed.

My love for The Sandman and the fandom is not tied in with Neil Gaiman. I love the actors and workers that made the show possible, too. I love the people who create art and write fanfics, that I've met because I decided to share my love for the fandom as well.

I also never said that I would stop posting my Sandman fanfics on here, just that I believe it would be best to refrain from doing do now given the circumstances. I believe myself to be a small and (relatively) new blog and one blog in the humongous fandom that is The Sandman. So even if I did decide to quit, I doubt would cause the fandom to fizzle.

At the end of the day, we don't know what kind of person Neil Gaiman is because he's just another person on the internet. You don't even know the kind of person I am and how and why I would take my stand the way that I do. If you want to defend Neil Gaiman and whether or not he is guilty or not is completely up to you.

If you don't agree with me, that's fine, but do not come onto my blog and tell me or other people how they should feel about the situation or shame them for being hurt by the information, too.

Layla

[possessesnightshift]

i'm not an eloquent political speech person so im just gonna be direct about this

americans, please please fucking register to vote and vote for joe biden in november

and before you jump to whatever policy thing or weakness of his to counter this plea, just stop. it doesn't actually matter. trump is worse. trump is fucking so much worse

our job from here on out is not only to hold our noses and vote for biden, but also to convince all of our friends family and whoever else to also vote for him in spite of all of his flaws. yes all of them

we need to make the fucking argument that trump is so dangerous, the country would be better off with a drooling old genocide lover whose mental faculties are drying up faster than the sahara desert. we need biden voters to be keenly aware of his shortcomings and refuse to back down. there's no use in pretending biden is still sharp as ever or has this mass grassroots support (he does not). he sucks. he is probably the worst democratic candidate in the party's history.

don't care. trump is worse. he needs to be stopped from taking power by any means necessary. he needs to be STOPPED.

from a non-republican pov, democrats constantly leaning on the "but the other guy is worse" argument is frustrating as all hell. i certainly hate it myself. but what gets lost in the conversation is that the republicans are essentially so beholden to this principle nobody even notices.

i know plenty of small town midwestern republicans who were embarrassed to admit they voted for trump. they voted for him in spite of his nastiness and blatant buffoonery (not in spite of his racism bc they're likely ok with that) because he was on the republican ticket, and to them any republican is better than a woke liberal who wants to take away our gas stoves and force drag queens to read us stories at bedtime

so yeah i kinda don't fucking care at this point

biden is a laughably bad candidate for the election of 2024. any other time he could've run (including 2020) is completely different than now, when he's just too fucking old. so should we just roll over and let him lose? just for trump to finish his term, be biden's current age, and either run for a third term or just stay in power bc the supreme court is on his side and they've been preparing for this for decades? fuck that

actually i think a rotting, pulpy corpse would make a fine president compared to dumbass donald "reality gameshow host" trump. literally if biden dies the day of the election he's still got my vote because it is not for him

the left has to learn to have the tenacity that republicans have. we emulate the right in the worst fucking ways (e.g. closing the southern border for no reason) but we never emulate their pettiness. we never say 'i hate the republicans so much i will willingly vote for someone i kinda hate to spite their smug asses'

remember when trump used to be a joke? remember when he was a giant embarrassment? remember the memes about his illiteracy and his lack of awareness? (see 'covfefe' for more info) trump may have the means to become a brutal dictator, but he relies on people smarter than he is to pull it off

if trump continues to hype up his project 2025 and his fascist ambitions with the swagger and confidence of fdr running against herbert hoover, what does it signal to the rest of the world for that man to LOSE to a corpse with the stamina of a wet flounder? it could stop the fascist momentum in its tracks by associating it with weakness and incompetence (you talk up all this hype and you lose to THAT man?? i guess you must be full of shit huh)

these are fraught times. there's no way to get out of this without letting go of our ideals of a perfect candidate who responds to the political desires of the people. that candidate does not exist and never will

right now we have not just an opportunity to preserve our rotting democracy for a little longer, but something much more special. we can fucking put an end to the trump experiment once and for all. we can make trump wannabes like ron desantis scramble to dissociate their image from the toxicity of the trump administration. we can turn him back into a joke.

at this point im screaming into the wind. no person who isn't already voting for biden is gonna read this far. but i want these words to be here anyway because i think they have value. 2024, 2028, and 2032 are all going to be pivotal election years. we can't wait around. we have to act NOW.

vote rotting fish 2024. i will plug your nose with a clothes pin if you refuse to do so yourself...

[louisisalarrie]

i don’t understand how louis is selling out stadiums, having fans crowd him at airports like during 1d, and just have a big fan base (as i can see on social media), however his listeners are like 2 million? it is so weird?

Hi anon! Demographics, venue capacity, tour legs, time of year to tour, venue availability, recent releases, social media traction, tiktok song plays, stunts, radio play, allllllll that and more obviously have a huge effect on streaming numbers and followers and fan interactions. I feel like this may be a bit longer than you probably wanted, and may also stray a bit, but alas, welcome to the show!

Let’s have a squiz at the numbers between the boys real quick:

Harry

Instagram: 47.2m followers

Engagement Rate: 5.05%

YouTube: 14.7m subscribers

Spotify: 62.4m monthly

Top 5 countries: Brazil, Indonesia, Great Britain, Chile, Australia

Louis

Instagram: 17.8m followers

Engagement Rate: 3.17%

YouTube: 4.39m subscribers

Spotify: 2.8m monthly

Top 5 countries: Indonesia, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Argentina

Niall

Instagram: 32.4m followers

Engagement Rate: 1.70%

YouTube: 4.63m subscribers

Spotify: 15.1m monthly

Top 5 countries: Australia, Great Britain, Australia, Indonesia, Ireland

Liam

Instagram: 26.4m followers

Engagement Rate: 0.83%

YouTube: 3.73m subscribers

Spotify: 5.1m monthly

Top 5 countries: Australia, Great Britain, Indonesia, Australia, Australia

Zayn

Instagram: 52.3m followers

Engagement Rate: 1.52%

YouTube: 15.7m subscribers

Spotify: 27.2m monthly

Top 5 countries: Indonesia, Brazil, Australia, Great Britain, Australia

———

So, these top 5 countries and numbers, based on very little info that’s not super detailed or anything and like I won’t go into the statistics of everything else because it’s pretty obvious who’s getting radio play etc etc., show the diversity of listeners and followers in their demographic. These top countries fluctuate often, particularly louis’ being mostly in LATAM right now because of his tour there but… don’t you think he’d still have GB on there? He’s not holding any traction there like the others, and has the lowest monthly listens and followers out of them all.

However, his lack of radio play is hugely affecting this. It may seem that radio play is pretty obsolete these days, what with everyone having Bluetooth in their cars and Spotify/youtube on their phones, but it pulls a wider demographic. Hell, we still have a radio monopoly in Aus. But anyway. It’s not dead, and it’s a great way to plug music, and not focus on just streaming services (not that Louis is, he’s been pretty much blacklisted from radio unfortunately).

Radio play encourages folks to search the artist on Spotify and then it builds from there. It’s still crucial in this day and age to diversify the age demographic, and country demographic, of your fanbase.

But look at those numbers… Zayn is slaying at the moment. He’s ahead of Harry in both Instagram and YouTube. Granted, Harry’s been MIA for ages and Zayn is on a promo run with a new release, but he’s just pulling that liiiiittle bit more than Harry. Louis is extremely far behind all of them, only beating out Liam in YouTube, and it just… it breaks my heart. Because Louis’ songs ARE marketable, ARE good for radio, and should be treated as such.

However, have a squiz at that Instagram engagement rate. Louis is just after Harry, and the other boys are far further behind. It makes sense for Louis to have a higher engagement because he’s consistently posting and on tour, but to be THAT far ahead with the LEAST amount of followers? Pretty fucking awesome.

He has a different relationship with fans, far closer than I’ve seen across many artists. He has a community, extremely dedicated and supportive of everything he fucking does. Harry does, but it’s far wider spread. The bigger your fanbase, the more discourse and differing of fan dedication is. It doesn’t feel like a community, whereas Louis’ does, and so it’s nice and cosy for us. But, what comes with this, is a lack of further PR push for bigger and better.

And you’re correct, he’s selling out venues (of an arena capacity 99% of the time) and has a lot of fan interactions and all that, but he’s not diversifying his fanbase. It’s a comfortable, lovely, and reliable group of fans that get him on stage and pay his bills. He doesn’t necessarily need to get bigger, and I don’t really think he’s that fussed right now about it either.

The BEST way to get more fans and more Spotify listens is to interact with other artists, doing collabs, stunting with them, and getting in touch with their fanbase. He’s done a great job with that with AFHF, which is an awesome tactic to do and also clearly something he’s passionate about, but he’s still not hitting the mark quite yet. But he’s grown massively from the beginning of his solo career, and it’s been more steady and picking people up along for the journey, not just dropping them at the show.

He hasn’t stunted in a long time, and hasn’t really interacted with a big name in ages. It’s not always romantic stunts, though. It can truly be about creating and upholding the relationships with other musicians that can really positively boost you in a bigger direction. No other artist is really vouching for him or posting “hey my mate louis just dropped a live album!” or “Louis is hosting a music festival what a sick lad!” ya know? Or even a selfie or attending one of his shows or anything at all. Niall is carrying on with Shawn and Lewis and having fun with it and being silly and the general public, and other fanbases who’ve never even heard of Louis, aren’t seeing the side to him that we see and love.

His stage show also, is absolutely sick. We love it, and the barrier run is something Harry simply can’t do, but it provides just that more of an artist to fan relationship. Harry kills it with the banter, dedicates entire parts of his shows to have chats with the audience, says outrageous shit and wears outrageous things, and makes a statement. Louis isn’t doing anything like that that would break the internet right now. His songs and funny quotes aren’t being used on tiktok like they are with Harry. He’s not reaching a larger crowd and I really, unfortunately, don’t think he will (to a massive scale, at least) without doing something big, a stunt beginning or ending, or if he keeps building a solid fanbase who he likes to connect with, interacting with other artists.

He seems to be in his own little Louis world right now, our Louis world, and we love him for that. Of course we do. He’s built a steady and dedicated long lasting relationship with us, but yeah.. he’s not making headlines, radio play, or getting the GPs attention. It fucking sucks, but it is what it is at the moment, and I hope it changes for him because I would LOVE nothing more than to see him sell out stadiums worldwide and be the best he can be.

But he’s just doing what he loves right now, and I don’t think him or his media team are really all that fussed on pushing to a wider audience because it involves things that he probably doesn’t wanna do. He’ll take a break after this tour (heartbreaking) but he’ll need to push to get back on the ground after HS4 drops because that’s gonna dominate the charts again. Right now, during this tour without the shadow of Harry, was the time to be making headlines. But he’s happy, and we’re happy, so so be it.

Anyway, this turned into a shit show of marketing and me probably repeating myself 16783890 times, but his strategy at the moment doesn’t seem to be rushing to top the charts (even tho he’s blacklisted too which doesn’t help) to rapidly grow his fanbase, it’s just to spend time with us and enjoy tour.

At the end of the day, dedication and the Artist to Fan relationship are the most CRUCIAL things an artist can have. And Spotify and follower numbers don’t mean shit.

Once more, he’ll pick up people to the way to the show, and not just drop them off.

I’m exhausted now LOL. thanks anon!