#Franca Grey

[nochvemo]

Quando l'Amore è Oscenità (1980)

Esta obra maestra dirigida por Renato Polselli (AKA Ralph Brown) trata sobre la idea de que, en el Jardín del Edén, los hombres y las mujeres eran iguales, pero después de que ella se comiera la manzana, los hombres tuvieron que convertirse en amos y las mujeres en esclavas, y nadie ha estado contento con eso. Los hombres tratan horriblemente a las mujeres, las madres a su vez tratan a sus hijos aún peor, y el sexo (que debería ser un acto sagrado) se ha convertido en perversión. La película presenta una serie de escenas bastante heterodoxas, desde sexo con un árbol, masturbación con velas, azotes, preliminares con armas, orgías en presencia de animales, una mujer orinando en un balde, rituales lésbicos de magia negra, masturbación con los dedos de los pies, mujeres jugueteando con una mazorca de maíz y, por último, pero no menos importante, una escena de zoofílica con un burro.

Thumbnails

Esta película debió estrenarse en 1973, pero la productora se declaró en quiebra antes de su estreno y, 1975, la Junta de Crítica Cinematográfica Italiana la prohibió (bajo el mandato de la Democracia Cristiana de Aldo Moro). En 1979, Renato Polselli volvió a montar y doblar la película, aparentemente para convertirla en una alegoría de la opresión femenina. Esta nueva versión fue aprobada por la Junta al año siguiente, y una versión ampliada con imágenes de sexo duro se estrenó en cines para adultos, sin autorización. Después del estreno, la película fue incautada por las autoridades durante unos meses. El director pretendía que la película fuera sobre la obscenidad, y cómo se ha impuesto en el mundo y en los círculos religiosos. Presentó la película en 1973, pero los censores italianos finalmente se impusieron alegando que “han hecho una película demasiado dura".

Acceder

[blogbirdfeather]

Grey Heron - Garça-cinzenta (Ardea cinerea)

Vila Franca de Xira/Portugal (27/12/2024)

[Nikon D500; AF-S Nikkor 500mm F5,6E PF ED VR]

[olympeline]

It’s fascinating to have the rest of the UK bros as part of Hetalia now because the fandom gives us a little peek into how the rest of the world sees the UK beyond just England. Or rather the South East and London, which is the England most foreign media tends to focus on

One thing that tickles me is there’s apparently a big stereotype among tumblr non-Brits that the non-London/South East residents of the British Isles are big into our native languages and really resent speaking English. Which is such the opposite to the average experience here it makes me giggle. I’ve lived all over Britain and - I know, I know, “no true Scotsman” and all that - but if there’s one part of our culture I’m sure of, it’s this

Thinking back to all the years being forced to learn an endangered UK tongue and how we felt as kids vs. the attitude here in the fandom? Absolutely night and day! Yeah, there are still pockets of native speakers and others who are passionate about Cornish or Gaelic or whatever, but the average person on the street? Could not care less. Just happy they grew up, did their time, and don’t have to break their tongues on it in school any more. It’s already an uphill struggle to get kids to care about learning other languages when they won the lingua franca lottery by being born in the anglosphere, but when it’s a dying language endemic to one tiny region or country? Yeeaaahh. You can’t blame most of us for not being interested. Even if other people keep telling us we should be. I wanted to do French or Spanish so badly growing up because I knew those were languages I might actually use one day. I haven’t had a need to use my “native” language even once since leaving school, sadly enough. It’s part of my heritage but it felt like such a colossal waste of time

Whether nations represent their people, their land, their history, national stereotypes, or some combination, is kinda a grey area in Hetalia. But if it’s the people, then the attitude among the fab four in modern times would definitely be: “Oh, my old language? Yeah, it’s interesting, I suppose. Heard it’s on duolingo now. That’s good. Anyway, let’s speak English.” 😆

Ah well, no one said Hetalia had to be 100% accurate. That’s part of the fun

[ithilienns]

Notes on Middle Earth Name Etymologies

Hi all! I'm currently doing an edit series on the name etymologies of Middle Earth.

Since I've seen some discussion in the tags and reblogs of my first edit, I thought I would use this post as a fact sheet. Here, I'll go into a bit more detail on the conlangs and note real-world etymologies of the edits and add to it as I go! Basically, I thought I was normal about this, and it turns out I am decidedly not.

A note on translation:

It's important to remember that Tolkien presents The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings as translations of the Red Book of Westmarch. This means that for the most part none of the names given to the hobbits, for example, are their 'real' names. Instead, their names are in Westron, a language descended from the 'Mannish' languages spoken by the Edain of Middle Earth as opposed to the 'Elvish' languages.

Westron by the Third Age is a lingua franca across the regions of Middle Earth where the events of the books take place. However, it is not English and is not related to English in any way. Within the framing of the books, Tolkien is only translating the stories in the Red Book of Westmarch from Westron into English. Other 'Mannish' languages also exist at the same time, like those spoken in Dale or Rohan. Tolkien uses languages related to English to roughly approximate the relationship these other 'Mannish' languages have with Westron. For example, the people of Rohan don't actually speak Old English. Instead, Tolkien translates the language of the Rohirrim as Old English in order to reflect the relationship that language has to Westron (more archaic, phonologically and grammatically distinct, but closely related and you are able to understand a few words just by guessing).

A good example that captures this is the word "hobbit". The real-world etymology is fairly simple, since it was a spontaneous invention of Tolkien's. However, if we look at the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings as translations of the Red Book of Westmarch, "hobbit" is just a translation of the Westron word kuduk. Similalry, when Théoden uses the word holbytla, it's just a stand in for the word he would have actually said: kûd-dûkan, meaning "hole dweller" in the language of the Rohirrim. Tolkien constructed the word holbytla using elements from Old English, so in that sense it has a real-world etymology. But this is done to provide an in-world etymology for kuduk and reflect the shared history hobbits have with the Rohirrim from beore the two peoples settled in the lands they inhabit by the War of the Ring. Théoden (whose name in the Red Book would not be Théoden!) does not speak Old English.

Of course for fic purposes we still use English for Westron and Old English for the Rohirrim (we are not all jrrt, we can't all construct / reconstruct these languages!). But this means that there are real-world etymologies for a lot of names (like Gandalf, the dwarves, or many hobbits). These are often meant to reflect their in-world contexts. It was also incidentally an easy way for Tolkien to borrow cool names without breaking the world mythology he created.

Gandalf

The internal etymology of Gandalf is that it is a name from an older 'Mannish' language from the North. The external etymology of the name is that Tolkien took it, along with most of the names of the dwarves in The Hobbit, from the Dvergatal in the Völupsá (part of the Poetic Edda), and it features across various Old Norse texts. In Old Norse the name means "wand elf".

Incánus

Gandalf is meant to have picked up this name during his travels in the south, potentially in Harad. Incánus is thus the Quenya rendering of a Haradic word Inkā-nūs meaning "North-spy" (x). It might also have had an exclusively Quenya origin, or even Westron. In terms of real-world etymologies, it may have been taken from the Latin meaning "grey-haired".

Mithrandir

Gandalf's Sindarin name. It comes directly from the elements mith "grey, light grey, pale grey" and randir "wanderer, pilgrim" and means "Grey Pilgrim" or "Grey Wanderer"(x).

Tharkûn

This is a Khuzdul name given to Gandalf by the dwarves and means "Staff-man" (x). This is one of the few names of Khuzdul we actually have, since most of the dwarves we meet in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings use their common names (as opposed to their secret Khuzdul names) that are in the 'Mannish' languages.

Láthspell

This is the name that Gríma Wormtongue gives Gandalf when he arrives with Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli at Meduseld. It is meant to mean "ill news" in the language of the Rohirrim. The real-world etymology is "evil tale" or "evil news" in Old English. More generally, Gandalf is referred to by the Rohirrim as "Grey-hame".

Olórin

The name is derived from the Quenya olor, meaning "dream" or "vision" and was used by Gandalf in Aman (x).

Saruman

Saruman is the anglicisation of the wizard's common name in Westron, in the same way that Frodo's real name is Maura Labingi and Frodo is the way his name is translated into English. It's external etymology is probably connected to the Old English searu meaning "skill, cunning, cunning device", so that the compound [searu + man] is the equivalent of his Quenya and Sindarin names, Curumo and Curunír respectively (x).

Curumo

The name means "Skilled-one" in Quenya from curu "skill, craft" and the agental suffx (to indicate someone who performs an action) -mo (x). It was the name Saruman was known by in Valinor.

Tarindor

Saruman was known by this name when he first went to Cuiviénen to protect the elves alongside the other maiar who would later form the Istari, as well as Melian. It comes from tar- "high" and indo "mind, thought, will", meaning "High-minded One" in Quenya (x). Please note that this name (and the idea of Saruman going to Cuiviénen at all) comes only from the Nature of Middle Earth and was probably a very late addition to the Legendarium, so its canonicity can be debated.

Curunír

The name is a Sindarin rendering of the Quenya Curumo and is taken from curu "skill (of the hand), craft, magic"., meaning "Man of Skill" or "Man of Craft". The name is also used for the word wizard (x).

Sharkey

Sharkey is the name given to Saruman in his role as the leader of the men who take control of the Shire. It may be related to the Orkish sharkû, meaning "old man" and then adapted to Westron (i.e. anglicised). It has various external etymologies.

[changelingsandothernonsense]

Number two from the OC worldbuilding ask game for Sydari! Tell me all about them languages >:)

2. How does your OC communicate? Are they monolingual or multilingual? What is the linguistic environment they’re in? If they’re monolingual, is there a social penalty for only speaking one language, or is it the norm? If they’re multilingual, which of their languages or sociolects has the most/least prestige? Is there a separation between written and oral forms of the language? Can your OC blend in or does their language mark them in some way? What are their levels of fluency, and how do they feel about them?

Sydari primarily speaks Cyrodilic, she grew up in Windhelm, and her native tongue was heavily repressed, particularly after the Great War. Ulfric's ascension saw a city-wide crackdown on all cultural practices that deviate from Nordic tradition. You'd think that would mean she picked up Nordic? No, her people were mostly confined to the Gray Quater with a few exceptions, Dunmer were not permitted to speak Nordic. They are not permitted to engage in their festivals or freely hold their own. So Cyrodillic, as the lingua franca of Tamriel became Sydari's first language. It's the only language that she can read and write in. And even then, her literacy leaves a lot to be desired. She coasted by with semi-literacy until she couldn't hide it any more. Dunmeris, though heavily repressed as of 4th Era 199 was freely spoken in the Grey Quarter just long enough for Sydari to pick it up. These restrictions came in slowly throughout her childhood, ramping up with the outbreak of the Great War, around the same time she fled the city. She's semi-fluent in the Windhelm dialect, though she never learnt how to read, let alone write using the daedric alphabet. Her father was no help, though he did speak exclusively in the Vvadenfell dialect of Dunmeris, it was often slurred, mumbled monologues that she only half remembers. She never really thought much about it. It's not a language commonly used in Skyrim, and though some of the Dunmer in Riften spoke a similar dialect, it was never the language anyone used to address her. Her husband knew even less, so she had to teach Brand-Shei a few key phrases. (The journal Sydari finds in the Pride of Tel Vos was translated for her by Enthir for a few favours). She was always mildly bothered by the fact she couldn't read or write in Dunmeris, mostly due to an old note she was given as a child, something secret she kept as good luck. She's had multiple opportunities to have it translated, it's just something she's built up in her mind over the last half a century. It's almost better to not know what it says. There's a scribble of an eight-legged creature she later discovered was either a netch or silt hopper, the drawing was kinda crude. Sydari hadn't really planned on visiting Morrowind, her life was in Riften, she had a home, and was attempting to build a family. But things go wrong as they always do and she found herself alone pursuing a job on Solstheim. She found that she couldn't really understand the version of Dunmeris that was spoken in Raven Rock, she had the basics but there were intricacies, phrases, implied context that she just did not have the background to understand. What makes it worse was that her knowledge was just assumed, most Dunmer that live there come from Blacklight. Sure a handful lived in Windhelm but that was before the more obvious restrictions. When she first arrived, it was hard to get anyone to speak to her unless she switched to really basic Dunmeris, Skyrim-born Dunmer are somewhat pitied but not coddled. If she wanted to speak to them, she had to use her mother tongue. Sydari is pretty good at bullshitting, so she's been able to bluff her way into acceptance. Geldis was willing to speak to her in Cyrodillic right off the bat. The guy is usually pretty open and wouldn't disparage her for not understanding half of what was being said to her. Being a tavern owner gives him more experience in dealing with outlanders. Teldryn spoke to her using Cyrodillic pretty early on, though he still assumed she was more fluent than she let on. He writes to her exclusively in Dunmeris and it's begun to cause issues. She's asked Geldis for translations on several occasions but she's embarrassed by her lack of knowledge. She mostly just switches to smiling and nodding. Only getting the letters translated if he brings them up. The letter form is familiar but she hasn't made the connection yet.

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Beyond the Darkness (D'Amato, 1979)

It goes without saying, but Goblin's score for this is great. It's got some of the proggier DNA of their '70s work, but also with a more pronounced sense of funk like they'd hone in their soundtrack for Tenebre, a driving sense of momentum, and lots of top notch computer beeping and booping. There is one track here that sounds like something by Weather Report, and others that sound like you layered Kraftwerk's Computer World on top of an Italo Disco album. Listen, some of this is probably word salad, but I'm bad at discussing music so this is the best you're gonna get. Anyway, because I was listening to the soundtrack yesterday, I got a hankering to revisit this, especially as I've warmed up to or, more accurately, developed a greater fascination with Joe D'Amato.

What I will say about this, aside from praising the soundtrack, is that it has two great bits of casting. One is Cinzea Monreale, as the deceased wife of the protagonist, as well as her twin sister. Monreale in The Beyond imbued her blind oracle with a great deal of warmth, empathy and poignancy despite the movie around her being so punitive in its violence. Here, most of her screentime is spent playing dead and the rest is spent reminding of you of somebody who's supposed to be dead, but I think that innate warmth serves her well in rendering her characters' psychological impact. There isn't much in the way of the warm and fuzzies in this movie, so there's added weight on her shoulders here.

The other is Franca Stoppi as the protagonist's maid, who seems pretty eager to both assist in his crimes and indulge his more outre desires. Stoppi's severe facial features, with her harshly sculpted cheekbones, jawline and nose, serve her well in playing villainous characters. Although speaking for myself, despite her being ugly-coded, I find her quite striking looking. And this is probably TMI, but you're already a few paragraphs deep into this review so fuck you, you're gonna have to deal with it, but because her character is so unabashedly kinky, I found her really hot in this. But yeah, I liked her a lot here and in The Other Hell, which I suspect is as conventionally good as a Bruno Mattei movie gets. She doesn't appear to have too many other movie roles and most of the other notable ones look to be for other Mattei movies, so perhaps I'll have to give them a look at some point.

All that being said, I didn't like this movie very much when I last saw it and I still don't. I really think it comes down to the protagonist. Kieran Canter has some pretty striking eyes, but he plays the protagonist slack-jawed and bozo-like. Given all the weird and kinky and gross things that the character does (gorehounds will appreciate how gnarly the violence is; a bit where he pulls a victim's fingernails had me wincing pretty hard, plus there's some classic D'Amato face trauma), he needs an obsessive, off kilter quality to make him work. The obvious comparison is the nervy energy Anthony Perkins brings to Psycho, which is a clear inspiration for this movie. And I think D'Amato miscalculates with his matter of fact handling of the proceedings. In this respect, this feels like a predecessor to Absurd, with which this also shares the dark and grey countryside ambience, but I think the bluntness and rigidity of the approach works better in the context of a pure slasher, where the clinical look at the violence compounds the sense of brutality. Here, the fact that the violence is coloured by the protagonist's kinks and obsessions means that it begs to implicate us, and the distance with which D'Amato captures it does anything but.

[karbinhake]

Tag game time! (About me lol)

Thanks for tagging me @bill-fraser !!

Last song: Graceland by Paul Simon

Favourite color: Red 🍒

Last book: Madhouse at the end of the earth by Julian Sancton. (Highly recommend to all polarheads out there!)

Last movie: Conclave (also really good!)

Last tv show: Arcane season two last back in November lol.

Sweet/savoury/spicy: Sweet 🍪

Last thing I searched: "What's the Lingua Franca in the Vatican" (it's Italian if anyone was wondering).

Current obsession: My man Dylan ig :)

Looking forward to: "A complete unknown" the movie when it gets here in February :)

Fav Drink: Earl Grey Tea ☕

Fun activity you would like to get into: I want to learn how to crochet this year! And also gouache paints.

Current fav character: This is a hard one bc I'm not in the media trenches rn but Francis Crozier is truly one of the all time greats.

Last video game: Read Dead Redemption 2, me and my bff are replaying it together 🧡.

Last comic/graphic novel: Scott Pilgrim against the world 🌎 it goes so crazy.

Idk who to tag but feel free to do this it was really fun thinking about my favourites!

[existirrrrr]

Este año nuevo ha sido particular. Estuve con mis perritas en casa... Me Bañé cercano a las 12. Antes de eso dormí todo el día y comí pizza de oferta. Me vestí, me abrigué, distraje el ruido. Fuegos artificiales.

Luego de un rato las mire a los ojos hermosos que tienen y les di un abrazo doble-triple. Nos prometimos cosas. Nos hicimos un par de arengas. Nos dimos unas lengüetas. Mucho amor entre las tres. Terminamos de ver ozark. Digo "terminamos" porque a Dobby le fascina netflix, sobretodo las series de drogas y cartels. Dormimos acurrucadas. Yo estuve extrañando. A veces pienso que ellas también.

Despertar temprano por la mañana, 8 am preparar un té. Emoción por el último capítulo. Fabuloso termino de trama. Triste. Ruth, eras nuestro personaje favorito. Tu giro me recordó al de Alex Karev en Greys. Seguir durmiendo.

Necesitar aire fresco. Querer ir a la playa. Playas llenas. Elegir una playa que no aceptaban perros. Gracias al cielo que me quedaban 20 minutos de parking. Y en todo ese rato te pensé.

Sentí las olas del mar golpeando mis tobillos. El agua estaba rica. No se sentía helada como otras veces. Corrí con nuestras hijas. Flo no corre con nadie como ella.

Mirando al mar recordé un video que le grabé. Siempre me gustó contemplarle con la naturaleza de fondo, y siendo la naturaleza también. Le amé. Le amo.

Flo y Dobby haciendo amigos poddles. Poddles simpáticos. Sobretodo Tomás el poodles, que según dueña, era bien mal genio, pero se acercó a nosotras. A mi. La dueña dijo que nunca se acercaba a la gente. Me veía agradable y liviana. Que loco, yo siento una mochila muy pesada la mayor parte del tiempo.

Ahora pienso mucho si, por no comerme las 12 uvas, o las 6 cucharaditas de lentejas, o no usar nada amarillo, o no guardar el billete de la suerte o no darle un abrazo a un humano me afectará en el desarrollo de trama. Aunque, siendo bien franca, nada podría ser peor. Ya me puse en el infierno.

Feliz nuevo año.

[prestige-fashion-world]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Diane Von Furstenberg Franca Light Grey Combo Bodycon Knit Dress Size P.

[blogbirdfeather]

Grey Heron - Garça-cinzenta (Ardea cinerea)

Vila Franca de Xira/Portugal (20/12/2024)

[Nikon D500; AF-S Nikkor 500mm F5,6E PF ED VR]

[tatatechnologies]

Digital Transformation - A New Age Perspective Towards Venturing Into The Unknown

Digital” has become the sought-after lingua franca

For the new age industry — a bespoke language tying the disjoint members of an organization together, allowing them to communicate in harmony.

However, the direct and indirect benefits of this overarching genetic transformation of an organization’s DNA: reduction in the overall product development costs despite of a huge upfront investment, significant shrinkage in the time-to-market adding to the profit numbers, collaborative employee engagement to the tune of “One Company, One Being”, amongst others, has the market gravitating towards its adoption.

The dirge of the middle to large-scale industries reverberates the escalating pressure in their competitive ecosystems (the race towards being one of the early adopters), the ever-volatile customer expectations pressing the need to constantly innovate and transform (the fear of becoming obsolete), and the tightening grip of government regulations factoring the environmental and customer safety.

In the light of all these barging advancements, the need to address the reason for an integral transformation greys out, or otherwise becomes implicit, giving way to the fundamental question-

How to take the first step?

Key market insights reveal over 900 billion dollars’ worth of loses in failure for companies trying to embark on the digital transformation journey, highlighting the biggest reason for this to be ineffective communication of organizational goals, strategy, purpose and outlook with their employees. Churning and building on our diverse experience in working and interacting with a substantial number of these companies globally, we further elaborate on the reasons for these failures as follows:

Lack of a Unifying Vision:

In their hurried zeal to transform their business capabilities, executives often take the shorter path to imitate or draw heavily from the strategy of other companies within the same domain.

While the short-term gains and the quick start advantage gives them a tempting starting point, however, the plan still lacks the sense of an overall mission tying an onerous 2–3 years journey together at later stages of the initiative.

In other words, Digital Transformation begs a unique interpretation for each organization, from which the vision for the change is drawn and cascaded throughout. It is advisable, but not mandatory, to bring in an outside view (how others have done it and succeeded, or failed) which serves the purposes of education, reference, course correction and validation, but the “Digital Transformation Strategy” is tailor-made for individual organizations, serving their unique vision and mission.

Another consequence of the lack of a vision is that business leaders often find themselves heavily invested (in terms of both time and money), burning out cash in initiatives that are not in alignment with their end goal. The myopic view of the strategy has them chasing after results which have nothing to do with being “Digital”.

The significance of having a strategy guided by a vision and advocated through an appropriate business level is a critical success factor.

Many Digital Transformation strategies revolve around the motive of reaching out for the low hanging fruits first. This works in principle and is profitable for the business because of early benefits realization; however, we have seen in our experience that it quickly spirals out of focus.

A common example is individual departments within the organization starting out with their own assessments of potential areas that could benefit from digitization, and quickly coming out with several, discrete, untied initiatives.

If we were to classify these initiatives in the buckets of tactical, strategic and visionary, a majority of them would fall in the tactical category, overlooking the potential of strategic or visionary initiatives that require heavy initial investment, and take significant time for value realization.

It is a tremendously difficult task to come up with a holistic Digital Transformation Roadmap for any organization, owing to the fact that much of the finer details of the plan are developed and amended while the transformation is underway.

Realizing the right level of clarity and framework and plugging in

As we highlighted earlier, the ever-changing customer expectations is one of the key drivers for Digital Transformation and accentuates its urgency.

In the era where disrupting technologies are providing the means to the organizations for coming up with a better product, it becomes essential to leverage the technological ecosystem and build a customer-centric business model which could sense, assess and react to what the customer needs.

This includes radical out-of-the-box thinking like bringing customer within the development space, using data as an asset vis-à-vis expanding on the customer touchpoints with the product even after delivery and hence, enhance and evolve the product. One should not look at Digital Transformation as just efficiency or productivity enhancement tool, but as a means to reshape the working methodology and mindset of the employees, ultimately affecting the product and its interaction with the customer.

It is a pervasive observation that business leaders often misunderstand Digital Transformation as an IT initiative, which leads to minimal involvement of the business; a majority of these transformations fails because of a lack of traction or adoption by the users who would benefit the most from it.

How to Build a Digital Transformation Strategy

Our experience and knowledge gained through working with a myriad of Automotive, Aerospace, and Energy & Life Sciences Companies has enabled us to understand and tackle business problems in an innovative and pragmatic way.

We have worked with a substantial number of middle to large-scale organizations to chalk out their Digital Transformation Strategy, and therefore understand that the centerpiece towards realizing this vision is to bring together various thoughts and directions creatively, and collectively figure out the most expedient strategy to embark on this journey.

We will delineate, in the subsequent sections, the critical elements that could help formulate the plan and cover the length and breadth of the organization to bring in a holistic purview.

Identifying the Transformation Boundary and Aligning the Digital Focus

High-Level Product Development Lifecycle Phases:

The guiding path for product development, i.e. the Product Development Lifecycle (PDL) is a plan that defines the various phases and critical milestones from Product Conception, Planning, Engineering, all the way to Maintenance & Upgrade. Further categories of the PDL are the plan for creating a new product (NPI — New Product Introduction), for delivering a Build-to-Order product, or the Decoupled Program Lifecycle aiding the research & development process — cradling innovation and Intellectual Properties (IPs). A clearly defined boundary for Digital Transformation subsumes the following:

Selection of the appropriate PDLs that befit the organization’s business, encompassing all the offered products or those that are of interest.

Distinct definitions of all the phases for each of the selected PDLs, described at a level which is neither too detailed as would create a disarray, nor ambiguous as would stir multiple interpretations.

Alignment of all the selected PDLs, i.e. logically connecting each PDL with the others in a continuous feedback loop.

This forms the framework for bringing in the appropriate stakeholders for the in-scope business functions and continue detailing down the holistic perspective.

2. Digital Focus:

Considering the array of possibilities of digital futures for each of the phases of the aligned PDLs (in permutation with other phases), it is of paramount importance to qualify a finite set, termed as the Digital Focus for that phase, to further concentrate the priorities of the business and help in giving dimension to that phase.

For example, during the Product Definition phase of the PDL, among the many possibilities, ‘Customer Requirements & Validation Targets’ could be the area of Digital Focus that the business owners want to work with to formalize requirement definitions, cascading requirements and validation targets for each of the requirement, and organization-wide requirement status tracking.

Understanding the critical challenges of the business stakeholders is the key for identifying the most appropriate area of Digital Focus for a phase.

Once we have identified the Digital Focus for each of the phases, it is now practical to elaborate on the phases vis-à-vis detailing down the critical activities carried on during the same — albeit solely the activities surrounding the area of Digital Focus Building on our previous example, for Product Definition Phase, if the Digital Focus identified is ‘Customer Requirements & Validation Targets’, all the critical activities carried out in the Current Business Process Landscape — to the tune of capturing, prioritizing, developing, inter-relating, linking and cascading down the Customer Requirements and the Validation Targets measuring their success — are captured.

Since the participating business stakeholders have a niche viewpoint pertaining to their area of expertise, it requires someone with a holistic perspective to pick out the relevant pieces — experience playing a significant role.

Overlaying Digital Threads across the Product Development Lifecycle

Data has become a torrent flowing into every area of the organization. Any activity carried out during a phase of the PDL generates data in various forms, and the biggest challenge for organizations presently is to connect these individual data points across the same.

The problem in maintaining cross-connectivity of data both upstream and downstream of PDL germinates from a difficulty in understanding the characteristic of the generated data, and requires business acumen as well as technical expertise to establish order in a haze of chaos.

Once we have the critical activities charted out, we capture all the data points generated in and around those activities — every information exchanged digitally or manually, any object created or Bills of Material maintained — encompassing all the attributes of the data and the stakeholder’s utilization.

The true intent of this activity is to carve out Digital Threads across the PDL (multiple processes joined by a stream of data generated and consumed within their execution) which promise the most tangible, quantifiable and profitable benefits across the value chain. Eventually, in the bigger scheme of things, an organization implements these individual Digital Threads throughout the Digital Transformation Journey in a coherent order after the completion of their prioritization, feasibility analysis (through Proof of Concepts) and potential value realization assessment.

Following is an elaboration on the characteristics of Digital Threads and their overall contribution towards the organizational processes:

Decoupled Programs:

The Decoupled Programs, or the Research & Development Lifecycle, focuses on:

Building Pre-Developed Architectures and Systems which can be fed directly into the Product Development timelines.

Enriching the Organizational Libraries (Design, Standard Data, Requirements, System Architectures, Plant Resources, Material, amongst others), maximizing asset reuse.

Building IP and alternate revenue stream products which could help expand on the organizational offerings to the customer.

Although it runs parallel to the Product Development Lifecycle, Decoupled Programs inherit the Digital Threads that are common.

2. Scaled Agile Development:

Scaled Agile Developments form one of the process backbone for a Digitally Transformed organization, and is adopted in the form of multiple product development cycles (the V model of product development) in the Decoupled Programs (separate development for each disparate System), and a single V model for Product Development Lifecycle. Its adoption by the business owners and the congruency with the newly defined KPIs post transformation is an essential part of the Digital Transformation Strategy.

The virtual counterparts of the product through various stages of its development and after sales utilization — Product Twin during engineering development, Process Twin during manufacturing, and Performance Twin after sale and during maintenance — together make up the Digital Twin.

We can leverage Digital Threads to obtain the corresponding Digital Twin at each lifecycle state of the product through streaming right data for the right stakeholder.

Since there is an enterprise-wide connectivity of the Digital Twin, we can monitor any changes done to the product during its development and the consequence of that change in real-time.

Building a Digital Twin relies heavily on the core Data Model of the organization that Digital Transformation Strategy governs.

Key Methods & Tools Required For Managing a Successful Transformation

Although it is premature to narrow down on the exact tools and methods required for running a Digitally Transformed Enterprise during the formulation of a strategy, cognizance of the forthcoming market products capable of handling huge volume of data in tandem with a flexible Business Model could help in:

Building a viable tool inventory for investigation and benchmarking through PoCs (Proof of Concepts) for realizing each Digital Thread.

Drawing in Industry Best Practices for each of the product development domain for a more robust solution trade-off analysis.

Inter-departmental tradeoffs on where to become market leaders and followers, for transformation’s implementation time and cost optimization.

Conclusion

Organizations embarking on a Digital Transformation Journey need to realize the importance of formulating a holistic transformation strategy, and the obvious pitfalls of a myopic, quick benefit realization tactic that branches off from the big picture.

The core elements of formulating a strategy and the industry perspective discussed in this paper, if rigorously adhered to, could help the organization bring out a vision for the transformation tailored for their business need.

Furthermore, it will allow for active, constructive participation from all relevant business functions to realize the essential Digital Threads — Digital Threads that form the core of implementing the Digital Transformation Strategy.

Learn more at www.tatatechnologies.com

About the Author

Archit Verma — Delivery Partner for Digital Consulting services at Tata Technologies

Mr Archit Verma is presently working as Delivery Partner for Digital Consulting services at Tata Technologies. With a career spanning close to seven years, he has worked with a myriad of industries (Automotive, Aerospace, Heavy Machinery, Life Sciences, amongst others) in helping them realize their business potential through crafting their unique digital transformation journeys, be it in North America, Europe, or Asia. This rich experience has enabled him to understand and articulate the unique pain of any business executive he interacts with and give them the confidence to be a partner in their journeys to realize their mission. Never at rest from hopping between continents and customers, Archit finds time to spend with his family in Dehradun, India. Ever hungry for knowledge, he invests his time in learning the latest technological trends, from block chain to artificial intelligence, to stay relevant and real amidst the ever-turbulent digital age.

[thevindictive]

flashback — 2022

Nora diria que nenhum dia era igual ao outro, mas todos dentro de uma redação se tornavam quase que extensões de si mesmos, presos na monotonia, entre sons de teclas e cheiro de café. Não que ela odiasse, o café ou o emprego, ela escolheu aquela vida afinal, mas a mudança da coluna de esportes para a de política a tirou levemente do sério. Sempre foi excelente jornalista, tinha conhecido sua noiva durante a cobertura das Olimpíadas de Tóquio. Sua vida poderia ser considerada perfeita se não fosse a promoção que a levou para o andar de cima, literalmente. O último andar do prédio dedicado ao jornal era considerado a elite, somente os melhores jornalistas poderiam frequentar a cafeteria patrocinada pela Nespresso.

Como grande e primeira notícia no alto escalão, Nora escolheu deixar seu veneno escorrer sobre a curiosa e inusitada união de famílias poderosas do país, os LeBlanc e os Zhanlan. A descoberta do casamento claramente forjado entre as famílias somente ampliou ainda mais a desconfiança de Nora em relação a eles. Quem eram, afinal?

Sua matéria rendeu muitos likes nas redes sociais e um elogio de jornalistas que admirava. Nela, Nora traçou ligações entre os milionários, citando o confuso e falso casamento e os filhos que vieram dessa união. Não tinha nada contra as crianças, de fato, mas saber sobre a rede de ligações forjadas que os trouxeram à vida a deixaram curiosa sobre que tipo de criação estavam recebendo. Depois de sua matéria, o mundo todo parou para perceber que talvez, só talvez, a família LeBlanc não servia para ter filhos. Nem ela mesma, se fosse franca.

Naquela tarde de quinta-feira, como sempre, Nora Grey não estava em sua sala na cobertura, mas sim degustando o café fraco do andar abaixo, porta de entrada ao Los Angeles Times. Cercada por colegas, discutiam com afinco sobre qual time levaria o Super Bowl quando um furacão em forma de mulher adentrou às portas de vidro. Levantou a cabeça a tempo de ver que era nada mais e nada menos que uma das protagonistas de sua história, Donna Zhanlan em carne e osso.

Sabia que tinha mexido em um vespeiro, mas não pensou que teria a própria matriarca LeBlanc plantada no hall de recepção do jornal, gritando em plenos pulmões que exigia vê-la. Arqueou uma das sobrancelhas ao reconhecer seu nome, deixando um sorriso debochado pintar aos lábios vermelhos enquanto, ainda com seu café na destra, apoiava a canhota em sua cintura e se aproximava da mulher enfurecida.

— Esperava mais educação de uma Zhanlan. — Retrucou de modo divertido, os olhos se estreitando a medida em que a fitava de cima à baixo, estalando a língua ao concluir que gostava do que via, principalmente o olhar inquisitivo e a linguagem corporal que demonstrava não estar para brincadeira. Se Nora fosse sincera, diria que ela também não. — Nora Grey. Imagino que esteja atrás de mim, não?

A postura permaneceu intacta, altiva, competindo de igual para igual com a mulher a sua frente enquanto a oferecia a canhota como sinal de cumprimento, apesar de seu tom, expressões e principalmente o olhar carregarem um leve tom de curiosidade, misturado ao de intriga.

ㅤㅤ⸻ starter with @thevindictive in 2022!

ㅤㅤA verdade era que Donna pouco se importava com o que falavam sobre o pai, sobre Marcelo e sobre os Dragna. Porque ela se importaria? Estava calejada por aquele mundo que nada mais a machucava, ainda mais quando envolvia homens que naturalmente a fizeram ser daquele jeito. Porém quando aquele artigo chegou nas suas mãos através da assistente e ela viu não só seu nome como o nome dos filhos mencionado em acusações fajutas, sem nenhum objetivo claro, se irou. Donna não tinha nascido para ser mãe, mas tentava ao máximo manter as coisas sobre controle. Criar indivíduos melhores do que ela. Ter uma espécie de família melhor do que ela teve. Falhava na maioria das vezes, no entanto ela tentava. Sendo assim, deixou tudo de lado e foi atrás da tal da jornalista que havia feito aquilo. Quando chegou na redação, usou seu tom de voz mais inquisitivo. ⸻ Preciso falar com Nora Grey. AGORA! ⸻ Odiava acabar naquele papel de uma filha e esposa mimada que queria tudo do seu jeito e só estava onde estava por causa dos homens e dos sobrenomes que a cercavam — Zhanlan, Montgomery, Dragna —, mas não era inocente para não usar quando lhe convinha ou era necessário. Os olhos percorreram o lugar, lendo faces incertas, pessoas se movendo rapidamente e tudo porque conheciam. Sabiam que Nora Grey tinha mexido com pessoas erradas, por mais que Donna fosse o elo menos perigoso de toda aquela cadeia.

[thearmoury]

Every man at some point needs to purchase a suit. For all the cycles that come in and out of fashion, the suit remains the lingua franca of men’s style. It’s the one garment everyone needs for serious occasions – weddings, business, and fancy night's out – regardless of their background. And if a man is smart enough to plan ahead, he’ll purchase one well before he actually needs to wear it. We consider these navy and grey suits to be just that, essential. We partnered with Taylor and Lodge to create our own 'Essential' suiting fabric. Check out the link on our bio to see A Closer Look at Harbour Breeze: Our House Cloth. (at Martiny’s) https://www.instagram.com/p/ChSNrjqregI/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[junipernight]

First Impressions/Foreign Tongue

Chapter 3: Smorgasboard/Sobremesa

Summary: Starfire tries Raven's way.

Most of the time, they spoke English, of course. It was the team’s lingua franca, and the language Star came to understand Earth in. Latin simply didn’t have the words for skyscraper, or pizza, or chronoton detonator - though it did have the word for mustard.

Sometimes, however, the two girls still spoke to each other in Latin. They’d become very close in spite of their rocky start, and they found that having a language all to themselves was useful for secrets, and side comments, and shouting “distract him while I come up from behind!” without letting an enemy know that you planned to distract him and then come up from behind. It was also just a very logical language, and sometimes Starfire appreciated that after a long day of struggling with the inconsistencies of English.

“[Why Latin?]” Star asked one day, apropos of nothing.

“[Pardon?]”

“[You and the boys were speaking English the night we first met, and your native language is Azerathian... yet when I kissed you, the first language I found on your tongue was Latin. Why?]”

Raven was blushing. It was a very subtle blush, one that Starfire had only recently come to notice; just a faint grey-lavender dusting on her cheeks, like the shadow of a passing cloud. Starfire supposed she had embarrassed her by bringing up the kiss.

In fact, Raven was not thinking about Tamaranean lip contact at all. She was considering whether there was any way to say what she was about to say that didn’t sound ridiculous. She came to the conclusion that there was not, and came out with it:

“[I was trying to guard my thoughts, just in case any of you were mind-readers,]” she said.

Starfire blinked. Then she giggled.

“Vere?” she asked in disbelief.

“[It’s been known to happen.]”

“[Have you successfully confused any mind readers?]”

“[Two or three, I think,]” Raven said solemnly. “[But it’s hard to know for sure.]”

“[Well, I am glad.]“

“[Because you got to] smooch [me twice?]”

The warm feeling that coursed through Starfire’s expansive aura couldn’t be explained by mere amusement. “[Because you speak more freely with me in Latin.]”

Well, shit. Raven hadn’t expected a sincere response. She probably should have, with Starfire.

“[... I’m glad you speak Latin, too.]”

***

Starfire got her first exposure to the earthly way of learning languages when Cyborg asked to learn hers. It was a short-lived affair; Cyborg was jacked up on the Maximum-7 in a way that wasn’t sustainable, and Starfire didn’t know the most basic things about what made up a language, let alone how to teach one to somebody. In the end, Cyborg learned a couple hundred random words and phrases, and Starfire learned about the basic parts of speech - adjectives, and verbs, and word order - and they never really got to a point where they could speak the language together, but they did have fun peppering Tamaranean words into everyday conversations.

***

Teaching was one thing, but Starfire didn’t try to learn another language the earthling-way until Mas y Menos joined the team.

Cyborg was determined to learn Spanish properly (his two years of half-forgotten high school Spanish were mierda, he said, and didn’t count) and Raven—lover of language and purveyor of fine words—decided to join him.

“And this is how you learn?” Starfire asked. “From books and practice and regional cuisine?”

“And people,” said Cyborg, biting into a taco.

Starfire hopped into a seat at the table “Perhaps I will try it! Conceivably, it could be fun.”

“Like our old Tamaranean lessons!” Cyborg agreed. “Except this time we have textbooks to keep us from kører ikke på skinner.”

Starfire giggled.

***

Two hours later, the three of them were still sitting around the table, with textbooks and workbooks and empty paper wrappers strewn between them, and Starfire was miserable.

“How does anyone learn anything like this?” She cried in dismay.

Raven didn’t reply. She was painstakingly working her way through a book of Spanish poetry, mouthing the words as she went and stopping every two or three words to look something up in a dictionary.

“All of these irregularities and extra verb conjugations are brutal,” said Cyborg, rubbing his good eye. “But you know, I feel like I actually remember more than I thought I did!”

“Deben hablar en español si quieren practicar,” a voice chastised.

Starfire whipped her head around to see who had spoken. The motion caused her fiery long hair to smack Raven in the face. Cyborg snickered as Raven sputtered and tried to claw the hair out of her mouth, but Starfire didn’t even notice.

Robin was in the kitchen, dressed in shorts and a sweaty tank top. He was clearly back from one of his long runs, but instead of being tired out, he only seemed more energized, the bastard. He poured himself a glass of orange juice. Then, soundlessly, he sprung up, vaulted the counter, and flipped onto the top of the fridge so fast that centripetal force kept his drink in his cup. Parkour.

“Robin!” she said in surprise. “You speak the Spanish?”

“Sí,” Robin said unnecessarily, slurping his orange juice from atop the fridge.

Star practically vibrated into the airspace over the table. “Can I learn it from you?” she asked hopefully.

Raven harrumphed. “Et tu, brute?”

“What happened to learning with us!” Cyborg protested.

“Aren’t you always asking how the Earth could have over 6,000 known spoken languages?” Robin said cheerfully. “I wouldn’t want to get in the way of your personal discovery.”

Starfire slumped back down into her seat and groaned.

Robin smiled and sipped his orange juice. And then, inexplicably, he winked. Furthermore, he appeared to have winked in Raven’s general direction (though it was hard to be sure with the mask.)

¿Porque? Raven thought to herself, using her 2 hours of Spanish. She flipped back a few pages. ¿Por qué? She corrected herself. And then she answered herself: yo no sé. And then she thought, I need to learn more Spanish, cuz this is getting on my nerves.

***

Starfire remained slumped against the table, los dos otros returned to their work, and another 20 minutes or so passed in peace.

“Hey dudes! Are you doing something fun?”

“We’re learning Spanish,” Cyborg explained.

“Soooo no, then,” Beast Boy answered his own question.

“It can be fun!” Cyborg protested. “You should try it sometime, broaden your mind and all that.”

“Man, I bet I know more languages than you!”

“That would require you to know more than one language,  BB.”

“I do too know more than one! I speak English and Xhosa, plus enough Swahili, Lingala, and French to get around. That’s, like, 2 and 3 half languages.”

Cyborg’s eyebrow shot up. If BB had claimed to speak Italian or Japanese, Cy would’ve called bullshit in a heartbeat. But the languages he’d just named were obscure enough that Beast Boy (who’d learned most of his social studies from movies) probably wouldn’t have known they existed unless he actually spoke them. Plus, Cyborg knew that all four languages were popular in sub-saharan Africa (thank you 8th-grade Geo Bee) and that Mr. and Mrs. Boy had traveled around a lot, which all lent credence to Beast Boy’s claim....

On the other hand, this was Beast Boy.

“Prove it,” Cyborg challenged.

“Ndithe kuwe ndithetha isiXhosa,” Beast Boy said in a clicking, lilting language. “Ndingazenza njani ezi zandi ukuba andisithethi isiXhosa?”

Cyborg’s jaw dropped.

“Na zali kitoki makasi,” Beast Boy said, switching to a different language, and looking supremely smug.

“How do you do that with your tongue?” Starfire asked in wonderment. Never, in a life that had spanned three galaxies, had she come across a language like this!

Beast Boy shrugged in poorly feigned nonchalance. “It’s a skill,” he bragged.

Raven could already tell where Star’s head was going.

“[How often do you think he brushes his teeth?]”

Starfire shuddered and returned to her textbook.

***

Authors Notes

Disclaimer: Of the *counts on fingers* eight? possibly nine? languages that will make an appearance in this fic, I only speak like four, and I don't speak those four particularly well. If you speak Lingala, Xhosa, Spanish, Danish, Esperanto, Ancient Latin, or Romanian reasonably well and notice that I've made a mistake por favor, tell me!

Disclaimer 2: I don't own the Teen Titans lol. Have I said that yet for this fic? It's no longer a habit I have. It's no longer a habit most of us have hahaha

First Chapter  |  Previous |  Next  |  Read it on FFN  |  Read it on AO3  | Read it and Review? 🥺

[nadiaportia]

Tarántula

Summary: The new Devil receives a visit from someone from a life that feels like it ended an eternity ago.

Word count: ~4,5k

Because I am a sucker for the reversed routes, of course Lucio’s reversed ending gave me fuel to write down something that could happen at the end of my (still-ongoing) route rewrite. As if this part of a reversed route, it will featured a Devil!MC so if that’s not up your alley, keep on scrolling.

To all others, enjoy 💓

The Devil, or rather the part of the Devil deep down that was still Ximena Rubalcaba y Saavedra, felt the presence of a familiar spirit before being alerted by one of the Wayward Souls of a foreign - a human - soul in its mistress’ realm. 

She turned her attention from her pondering on how to proceed with the Prakran resistance led by former Countess, now again Princess, Nadia Satrinava and her sisters when she remembered a face, slender, unblemished light brown skin, a charming smile with impeccable white teeth, shimmering dark eyes, framed by wavy dark reddish-brown hair.

An impulse was sent to her from the guardian of her Gate.

Step aside, sentinel. Let our guest enter.

As you desire, Mistress.

It didn’t take much for the sound of footsteps to echo through the corridors of the otherwise silent Devil’s Castle, where no mortal soul but one dared to walk through. 

The clicking of heels on the floor came closer and when the door to the throne room opened, a slender figure entered, dressed in a red so dark a human would have probably mistaken it for black. Silver adorned their neck and shoulders and they took a good look at their surroundings before slowly walking closer to the throne.

“I don’t know what I expected… but it wasn’t this.”

It has been a very long time, or at least felt like one, since she last heard someone speak Calpacian, even as it was the lingua franca of the West, few of its native speakers travelled far these days and those that did were of too little importance to be worth watching.

“What are you doing here?”

Heloisa de Rubalcaba stopped as if it was the first time she had heard the voice; in a certain way, it had to be a novelty to her. Lucio had told the Devil that her voice sounded different than before - back when she had only been a weak and feeble mortal. Now it was steely, sharp and commanding. It wasn’t the voice of someone who could simply be disobeyed.

The glint in her visitor’s brown eyes was something that recalled vague emotions, of evenings spent in houses made of glass, of drinking wine in silver halls and sharp jokes at the expense of the unfortunate souls that hadn’t earned any respect yet.

“Is visiting my little sister a crime these days? Are these the rules of the Vesuvian Empire or of the Devil’s Realm?”

“Answer my question.”

The Devil observed Heloisa with a cool gaze.

She hadn’t changed much in the last three years since the Devil had last seen her, age barely left a mark on her as the years - or what was more likely, she was just exceptionally good at hiding it. Upon looking closely the crow’s feet around her eyes had spread a little further, and the lines on her face were concealed well… but not well enough for the Devil’s eyes. 

The Devil didn’t age; she still looked exactly the same as she did on the day the mortal that was before had been so very close to dying, had it not been for the Cold Heart that was now beating in her chest. 

There had been some modifications on her, yes, such as the grey patches of her hair that had turned a stark white and the light grey streaks were among her black curls. Then there were the cloven hooves, the horns that were now spouting from her head and what was surprisingly enough the most unsettling: the golden eyes with a black sclera. 

After some time of getting used to it the part of her that still clung onto her humanity as fiercely as a frightened child to its mother had accepted the changes as something natural that couldn’t be reversed anymore.

“It is very much the truth. How could I possibly have ulterior motives than simply stopping by for a simple ‘Hello’.”

“I mustn’t remind you how our last encounter ended.”

Heloisa pursed her lips.

“And here I thought your ascension to godhood would make you any less prone to bearing grudges! Some things never change. If you want an apology from me, you can have it, but I’m genuinely surprised to see you still care about that little stunt. After all, shouldn’t you be long above that? Above all mortal affairs from back then?”

The Devil gave her a bored look and put her arms on the rests to each side of her throne.

“You’re correct - I don’t have it within me to care about the past. Who showed you the way to my realm?”

Heloisa stepped closer, pretending to casually watch her long nails as she did so.

“A little bird came to me and chirped in front of my window, of ways to enter the magical realms. Now, that little bird had less than good intentions and probably believes I won’t return from my journey, but I intend on disappointing them. If they wouldn’t be a cold-hearted bastard who cares for none other than themselves, one might say they resent you for turning their relatively laissez-faire boss into minced goat meat.”

“Valdemar. A surprise that one such as you who prides herself on her cunning, would make a deal with a Demon.” There was a hint of amusement in the Devil’s voice. Heloisa scoffed.

“Oh please, of course I didn’t. They gave me what I wanted for free; it wouldn’t surprise me if they’re lurking somewhere here and hoping for some chaos to be unleashed.”

“Surely not. I would’ve noticed a presence like that once it enters my borders.”

Heloisa grinned. “Running a tight ship I see. I have a lot of respect for that. You really turned that shithole Vesuvia into a respectable city-state, even Nadia couldn’t accomplish this.” She paused. “Talking about Vesuvia… where’s whatshisname? Y’know, your guy… your personal warmonger? Plaything? Roué?”

“My husband is—” The Devil began but Heloisa broke into roaring laughter that pearled off the walls and rang through her ears. 

She had never liked that laugh a lot but now she felt as if it had desecrated something in her Castle.

“Your husband?” She said in between laughs. “Oh, you have got to be joking! Really, him? And you guys had a ceremony here? Who were your witnesses, the sentinel that led me to the castle?” She wiped a non-existent tear from the corner of her eye but was still grinning broadly. “Oh, how I wish you were lying but I can tell by your face it’s the sad truth. Well, not a surprise but still unwelcome.”

The Devil drummed onto the armrest of her throne with her long dark clawed fingers. Her voice was so sharp it could’ve cut through marble and she had an unamused quirk in her brow.

“...As I was saying, my husband is currently in Firent negotiating with the Papess about her terms of surrender. After that he will return to Prakra to finish this senseless siege. And his name is Lucio — treat him with the respect deserving of a powerful monarch.”

Heloisa scoffed. “What do you want to do, force me to like him?”

“Remember, you are only a guest because I’m allowing it.”

For a few heartbeats there was silence in the throne room. Then Heloisa clapped her hands.

“Anyway, my most earnest congratulations. I hope he makes you happy in whichever way, assuming you still are capable of such mortal emotions,” She shook her head, still smiling. “For fuck’s sake, first Bela, now you, I really am the eternal bachelorette among us. I don’t understand the sentiment of wanting to tie yourself to a person, especially if that person is — just stating a fact here — not on your level. Y’know, Ippolita tried to convince me a couple of times, especially during my house arrest, that we could run off together, take a ship at the port, sailing away into the sunset and never look ba—”

“Don’t waste my time with your personal affairs.” She remembered Ippolita — a skilled warrior, loyal servant to Grand General Esmerelda Rubalcaba and the only one among Heloisa’s many lovers who had remained by her side after years, but their relationship never something out in the open; a high-born noble and a simple foreign commoner who survived in the pits by becoming an assassin was simply not the ideal relationship to be in for someone of Heloisa’s status. “You’re not here just to chat, so get to the point.”

Heloisa regarded the Devil of whom she still thought wholly as her sister and cleared her throat.

“Fine. Since you mentioned Prakra and I happen to have,”, the corners of her mouth twitched, “heard of the difficulties your, ah, ‘husband’ has with securing a victory over the Satrinavas and their remaining hosts… I have a proposal to make.” 

The Devil leaned forward on steepled fingers. She had a suspicion as to where this could be going.

“Go on. I am listening.”

“Alright, so we know that dearest Nadia and her sisters are still holding the territory around and of the Star Lakes. The capital of Prakra not only is quite beautiful but also one of the strongest fortresses due to its location, which at the same time could become its undoing. But this isn’t about breaking through their defenses, with the Prakran Royal Fleet scourging the waters an attack from your troops is virtually impossible unless you happen to bring ships or heavy artillery with you… or are currently building them.”

The Devil scoffed in annoyance. Of course she knew why exactly the situation at the Star Lakes was so bothersome, easy on the surface, nasty underneath it. 

Whenever Lucio returned from Prakra to her, he was particularly agitated and prone to irritation, at times ranting to her extensively about everything that was going wrong in this particular campaign. 

Her own frustration came mostly from having actual trouble with getting past the magical and alchemical defenses, and she knew exactly why. The amount of times the Devil had cursed the name of Sayelle bint Zahir were too many to be counted at this point, and what stung even deeper that this came from someone who had been more than a simple ally to her in a previous life — a friend, maybe one of her best.

“It’s about breaking their spirits, their composure, y’know, engaging in a little bit of my preferred form of warfare: the psychological type,” Heloisa gave her a confident grin. “Your beau cannot get to the capital, but you need someone behind enemy lines who is able to get you insider knowledge or even,” her grin grew wider, “gain the Satrinavas’ trust.”

The Devil stared at Heloisa, then she chuckled. “Nadia will kill you on sight.” 

It was a futile plan, soaked in Heloisa’s hubris and plagued by underestimating how smart the Satrinavas were, how powerful a magician Sayelle was, how united the Prakrans as a whole were in their opposition to the Vesuvians.

“No, she won’t. We have a history.”

“Yes, the history of you wanting to merge the mortal and magical realms so the Devil could help you with getting rid of Esmerelda. That is exactly why she would not hear you out.” The Devil’s lips curved into a deep frown. It was near certain suicide.

“I mean, yes, that obviously happened as well but it’s basically common knowledge that they’re sitting ducks and as such desperately in need of help. I have aided Nadia once already, back when the Plague was running amok through Vesuvia. Even when I was helping the previous Devil I told her I would put in a good word for her. She is aware of that and my immense dislike for Lucio,” she paused and sneered, “... who by all means is my brother-in-law and family now. By the way, do you want me to tell that to the others, or would you rather be the bearer of good news at some point?”

The Devil ignored the last statement and sighed deeply. “They would take any help that is offered to them, that’s what you think. Even if this helping hand is attached to your body.”

“Of course. I am known for my generosity after all, and of course for my lack of interest in war — you can thank me for building that reputation for the last fourteen years after you made everything go tits up.” Her tone was joking but the edge to it spoke differently. There was a fire smoldering deep within Heloisa, and the Devil made sure to not forget about its existence.

“Besides… I wasn't the Information Minister for nothing — I know what people respond most easily, and given their situation this will be more than easy pickings. Give me a handful of people who hand out flyers, have someone convince the Prakrans that if they surrender the bloodshed will stop, and you have basically won. ‘Thank you so much for your wisdom, Heloisa, most beloved of my sisters!’ ‘You’re more than welcome, Ximena.’” 

The Devil didn’t reply like this. Instead she said, “I will stop the bloodshed as soon as Queen Nasrin surrenders. I wish to have Nafizah and especially Nadia as allies, not enemies. It is a shame indeed things came to be this way but there is a future for the Vesuvian-Prakran relations.”

Heloisa’s eyebrows shot upwards. “Even after you led an unprovoked war against them? I don’t mean to rain on that parade you have surely already planned all the way through, but if Nadia intends to fight until the very end… I don’t think a surrender is an option. Better to install a new Prakran ruler, one who is sympathetic to Vesuvia.”

The Devil considered her words and found herself agreeing with them begrudgingly. It was probably true; Nadia’s hatred for her, the perceived betrayal and the losses on her side weighed heavily but it was rather that she didn’t wish to take extreme measures against her. She was smart, politically adept, brave and a genuinely caring ruler - useful qualities to have in a human ally.

“No. Nadia will see reason, she has to.”

Heloisa rubbed her temples. “Do you want to her to adopt your way of seeing the world with a sword at her throat? Word of advice: that rarely works ever.”

The Devil scoffed. 

“But if you have a better strategy of how to beat the Satrinavas, I am all ears. If you’re worried about my safety,”, she put a hand over her heart, “which I would consider quite heartwarming, I wouldn’t even need to go by myself but for the sake of authenticity, it’d be for the worst — but don’t worry,” Heloisa winked, “I know how to take care of myself.”

There was something about blood relations that had always dimmed her perceptiveness as a mortal; it worked well enough on people in general given they had a rudimentary knowledge in magic, could be difficult if the subject had enough magical affinity and was near impossible on trained magicians and of course on residents of the magical realms. 

Now that she was more powerful, looking into the hearts and minds of the residents of the mortal realms came as easy to her as breathing came to them. That powerful magicians such as Sayelle or even Asra were able to hide themselves without great troubles was bothersome but barely a surprise. 

But Heloisa, who was about as magically adept as a houseplant, was a complete blank slate to her — she could sense her life force, her aura fitting for someone with a strong personality and much subdued her feelings, but what really mattered to her, the notion of her true intentions… It was like standing in front of a polished mirror.

It was forcing her to act according to knowledge of their time as sisters… something she would’ve preferred to avoid completely. 

The only person she allowed her humanity to resurface with was Lucio… and he was who he was.

“Hm. I will give the matter thought.” She leaned forwards. “Something tells me that this still isn’t all you’re here for.”

Heloisa let out a defeated dramatic sigh. “You caught me red-handed. That was only the first matter why I am here. Consider it an olive branch, a token of forgiveness and potential allyship between us, Ximenita.”

The nickname out of her mouth made the Devil frown. Not only was she the first human besides Lucio to laugh here but also the one to address her as… something so much lesser. He was allowed to do that, and no one else. 

For a moment, the Devil considered reminding Heloisa who exactly she was talking to, but she halted before she acted rashly. 

She had always been vindictive and resentful, never forgetting injury to her person of any sort. It would… be an easy way to let grievances fester, and at this very moment that was more than counterproductive.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Speak.”

“What are your plans for Calpacia, specifically? I wonder why the Army of the Vesuvian Empire isn’t already at our borders, demanding our surrender. Hjalle and Nevivon were the first to fall, then Zadith and Venterre and yet there are none of your men - because they are your men, I know that - are to be seen near Calpacia, or Karnassos for that matter because you know that if you attack Karnassos you will feel Calpacia’s wrath.”

Heloisa tilted her head and regarded her with an inquisitive look. The quirk in her eyebrow betrayed her though, it was meant to be a dig.

“Are you afraid of facing your past or simply too nostalgic to see us being destroyed?”

The Devil’s eyes widened but she bit down her fury. I have no reason to be scared of you.

“I do know that our magical defenses are strong, you know better than I how exactly the Guild worked but ever since it was overtaken by these zealots, the Court is counting themselves very lucky it is strong enough a pillar to not be swept to the side by them, in no small part due to our strengthening influence. If we weren’t there, you might have a very unpredictable enemy at your hands. But that doesn’t explain your lack of interest in us.”

Heloisa laughed, and the light sound pierced through the Devil’s ears. 

“Unless all of this hard work is meant for us. Is that the case?”

The Devil raised herself from her throne and looked at Heloisa down her nose. She let her take a look at the new ruler of this realm and how much she has changed.

“You give yourself too much credit. My vision is greater than seeing Cartagenth together with its repulsive ruling body and the Zaan burn to the ground.”

“Do tell me though what exactly your vision consists of; uniting the entire world under your Vesuvian Empire so no one steps out of line ever? This reminds me of the plan someone once wanted to hatch, I can’t for the life of me remember who had that idea but I remember a certain young woman being so utterly displeased with that she preferred exile to being around her vicious family.”

Heloisa’s smile was more a baring of teeth now than anything else.

“Where is she now? Does she still have the moral high ground? Does she still feel like a good person who is so much better than her sisters?”

The Devil ground her teeth. She felt her face and ears heat up and could only hope that the red lighting of the throne room worked in her benefit.

“If I had known that one day you’d be exactly what you tried to oppose back then, I would’ve laughed right in your face and told you to get fucked,” she sneered and gave her a look of pure contempt. “You got some nerve to throw us, your family, to the wolves without a second thought, and not twelve years later you are doing the exact same shit you hated us for ever since. How does it feel, knowing that at the end of the day, you’re just like us?”

The Devil closed her eyes. She wouldn’t let herself be provoked by Heloisa, after all she was so very wrong with everything she was saying.

“All of this business with the previous Devil happened because the construction of the realms was fundamentally flawed. I intend on setting things right for once and all under one ruler so that it will not happen again. How I go about that is not of importance to you.”

“It sure as hell is, after all I have a place in this world as well!,” Heloisa exclaimed. In her agitation she stood only ten feet away from her, too close of the Devil’s liking. 

 “You replaced the Devil after allegedly saving the world from certain destruction and now that you settled, you decide to do just continue his work — except that you think of yourself in the right, as some sort of god-empress or whatever the fuck. But I will tell what you are: you’re just as rotten, self-serving and power-hungry as us,” She laughed, humourless and cold. “No, you’re even worse because you’re also a self-righteous hypocritical piece of shit. You might be even worse than Esmé.”

“Don’t you ever compare me to Esmé!” 

The Devil’s voice cracked like a whip and rumbled louder than ever before. Her face was a furious grimace so terrifying Heloisa had to advert her eyes, eyes glowing, long hair billowing and floating around her, and feeling its mistress’ fury, the realm let lightning flash and thunder roar. 

And yet, Heloisa did little more than keep her eyes shut, her face away from the demonstration of absolute arcane power and stand planted on the spot, her delicate hands balled into tight fists and her body trembling, either out of fury or fear. 

The Devil took a deep breath through her nose, taking in the sulphur-stained air of her realm. As she continued breathing, her fury left her body and she felt the Cold Heart within her slow down its enraged pace.

“It’d be for the best if you leave right now. Don’t test my patience and don’t think of coming back. You’re not welcome in this Realm for as long as I have the say in here.”

Heloisa turned to look at the Devil, tears dwelling in her eyes and a very faint but visible enough drop of blood trailing out of her nose. She dabbed at it, grimaced at its sight and wiped it off with the back of her hand. 

“Before I forcibly make you leave.”

“Give me two more minutes of your time; you haven’t listened to my actual proposal. Then I’m gone, unless you want me to come back afterwards.” She cleared her throat and tried to regain her composure.

There was nothing more the Devil wanted to do than throw her back into the mortal realms and hopefully into the deepest and darkest pit that could be found there. But she gave Heloisa de Rubalcaba a small nod. Two minutes, nothing more.

“I sympathize with your course of actions, I really do. If I were you, I personally would have rained fire, brimstone and bloody vengeance on Calpacia, everyone who had wronged me and especially Tía Esmé, both out of spite and to rid the world of her, and in the aftermath leave nothing behind but scorched and salted earth. But this is my nature, not yours. That’s why I’m giving you an alternative course of action.”

She hesitated but then approached the throne over the steps. 

“I have many allies at the Court, I’m in the Zaan Saturnino’s favour, Cibela has been just a few steps away from open rebellion against Tía Esmé and to be frank, everyone is tired of the current situation. On paper you are disowned and exiled but in reality and despite everything, you are still Ximena de Rubalcaba, third in the line of succession of the title, and the Court knows that. There are people who would give you actual loyalty for who you are, not because they were forced to kiss the ring on a foreign conqueror’s hand.” With each step Heloisa seemed to gain confidence, until she stood just three feet in front of the throne.

Ximena had almost forgotten how small she was able to look.

“Let me be your agent in Cartagenth and I will give you our home as a gift of reconciliation and a token of my loyalty for you.”

She sighed. The Devil didn’t react, and was careful not to. This is a trick.

“What about the part of me being a ‘self-righteous hypocritical piece of shit’? Are these the words of a loyal vassal?”

Heloisa scoffed and a nervous smile played around her lips. “Of course not; they’re sisterly advice. If you can’t stomach honesty, then that’s your business. If you want to pay me back, come up with an insult on your own though.”

“Why reconciliation?”

Heloisa blinked at the question. “Because,” she began slowly. “I was hoping…” She fidgeted with her fingers, something she never did because a Rubalcaba never showed uncertainty to anyone.

“I thought it would be nice if there was a chance that we could be… sisters once again.”

Something within the Devil stirred and she frowned.

“That is a bridge burned a long time ago,” she stated quietly. It had been for the best, for her own best.

“It doesn’t need to. I can only imagine how lonely you are - because I have been too. Don’t you think I missed having you around? Someone in this pit of vipers that is Cartagenth I can trust in, not solely bound by blood but by genuine familial love and despite our differences.”

The Devil tried to find any hint of a lie in Heloisa’s eyes, eyes that looked so much like hers back when she was a mortal, and there was… nothing. No deception, no falsehoods, but a definite truth.

“I wish to help you, dearest Xime. I understand why you might seek havoc and destruction, the gods know that lashing out at this world and all its obstacles is something I have always done in my own way, but I want to make things easier for you. I know you wish to convince your enemies to become allies before anything and that waging a war of conquest is not your ideal vision… so I’m sparing you any guilt you might have over more shed blood that didn’t need to be spilled.”

She sighed. “I will be leaving for Prakra within the next few days, whether you want me to or not, with a small entourage. I will find a way to contact the Vesuvians or you once I am in the Satrinava castle.”

“I have not yet accepted your proposal.”

“Oh, I don’t need you to. Consider it a show of good faith.” She reached out, with her brows furrowed and gently touched her shoulder. The Devil remained where she was, showing no reaction to the first skin contact with another human who wasn’t her lover in years.

“Until then, sweet sister.” Heloisa leaned forwards, her perfume smelt of almond, bergamot, coffee and lemon. She pressed a gentle kiss on her cheek and the moment her soft lips made contact, it was as if a small shock of magic burned her skin. 

She was the Devil and this burning fire within her that was the yearning for a humanity that had once been bothered her. It could make her vulnerable, allow others to deceive her.

It was not something she could allow to persist within her. 

[al-mayriti]

Today I finished detailing the last important language in my fantasy novel, so I thought I could make a post showcasing all of the languages.

So, first of all, here's a post I did about the world it takes place in, as I'll be referring to it in this one.

In total I have created about 20-30 languages in total for the world, but I've only given a proper grammar, structure, etc to a few of them that will potentially be in the novel.

So, first of all, here's a rough model i have with the language families, scripts, etc, just so you know how many languages we're talking about here:

So, the languages I'll be talking about are Amallese, the Magi Tongue, Neu, Peltan, and Zalian. The first four languages are spoken in Duvegh, the region in which the book takes place. So, just so you have a more precise look of where each language is located, here's the map of Duvegh from the previous post:

Okay, so, the three native languages of Duvegh are Peltan (spoken in the pink area), which acts as the lingua franca of the whole area; Amallese (spoken in the green area), and Neu (spoken in the light blue area). In the purple and grey areas they speak the Magi Tongue, which is the lingua franca of the whole world. It is this book's equivalent to the "common tongue", and it's ancient name is Elvish, as it is native to the land of elves, in the south of the world, and due to Colonialism - both direct and indirect - , expanded to the rest of the world. The purple area, named Duyekk, was an Elvish colony, while the grey area is one of the four Border Counties found all over the world. These are neutral countries inhabited by hybrids of all races, very multicultural and with a generally good life expentancy and quality of life.

The last language, Zalian, is native to Zäel, land of Dwarves, and considered the "language of magic", as dwarvian runes and glyphs are common to use magic, and most magic books, high-level enchantments and spells as well as technical terms are in Zalian. As Jiji will be a mage, Zalian will make its appearance in the book for sure.

What I'll do below the cut is give some basic vocabulary of each of the languages plus a small text in that language (with an English translation above) so you can see how it looks like and stuff :)

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AMALLESE:

Hello: Hik

Goodbye: Kingith

Yes: Shanh

No: Al / A

Please: Shajam

Thank you: Cha

Mother: Evegni

Father: Dijni

Sun: Tiskagni

Moon: Ixveshni

[Hereby I write to you, Yishimem Walni of the Fallen Angels Tribe, to inform you that your son Nishaeriel Sisangni of the Fallen Angels Tribe burned the student Shanibiel Menhiththarh of the Divine Light Tribe after they had an argument in the playground.]

Ixenga, atrexikegirash, Yishimem Wal Ridwer Manhwidki, aleri ravvimni e itnheni tireasgar Nishaeriel Sisangni Ridwer Manhwidki aleri shalane Shanibiel Menhiththarh Ridwer Shellriviligetash alfega ihlleya erh herthahane.

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MAGI TONGUE:

Hello: Qotych

Goodbye: Thri

Yes: Uryg

No: Ry

Please: Wraig

Thank you: Haw

Mother: Sol

Father: Fer

Sun: Trum

Moon: Liw

[We recently visited a pub full of sand, in Northern Land. The owner was nice, but he served us cold drinks, and we had to go to a hotspring to warm ourselves up.]

Preiffclust ophsam tallrha bhrechzre u lludhe, wel Naury Ze. Pwmp we thristgwisphri, ryw chrewflwyawlis ji ewers nyrsmeibhl, u jinsam y trawrhioyn bhopych o dia ji bhopllynham.

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NEU:

Hello: Sâephlôbëm

Goodbye: Ëthâathödhâar

Yes: Okh

No: Kha

Please: Nae ad

Thank you: Bemzähäash

Mother: Äap

Father: Retäam

Sun: Gväatha

Moon: Kêtâo

[A farmer was travelling through the desert from Shad Vâe to Aatâadhânyo on his horse. He arrived at an oasis with white flowers, and him and his horse drank some water. Nevertheless, the sky, that was blue before, now was grey; a storm was gathering. Thankfully, a rightful oasis mercenary saw the farmer, and she sheltered him in her house.]

Allcëe Shad Vâe mae Aatâadhânyo grälläkh shale âgoo rao dhôgresh mae më shâañä. Khaash phëe grälläkh cânê lëekhyo mae zavëedhêepäo o shalä âgoo o khaash haalshe yao khae. Thejâañëe, ghrëe, graa hênneet häas më, êyö gvaañâe më, äamsee më daokhasñä. Rasphönbhath, âes bhoodhäarr phëe ghae allcëe yao räeäaha, o khaash shalö ôoshtëe rao acae êenpeclâa.

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PELTAN:

Hello: Taawlaiitayy, Baaheli*

Goodbye: Aadiiv

Yes: Maq

No: Ce

Please: Waanad

Thank you: Vaanuucyy

Mother: Ib

Father: Raam

Sun: Gaadtad

Moon: Qitiih

*only when greeting fellow Peltans outside of their homeland.

["How much time has passed since the incident? You said that not that much".

"Jury, I will call the guards shortly if he continues with those accusations."

"When, defendant? You almost never call the guards. There are no witnesses of the incident."]

"Naayy eeifwaayyfayy miimat wuutdaj-oo-zuundih? Zulbiyguudluudiid vanvauubak."

"Hate, yugaslikyab ibaw-oo-uudoo jaalnaib jaayhuw zulbiyfaatoo waluuluujaadijoyhaitaafuj."

"Vige, ihty? Dihooaab zulifslikyab ibaw-oo-uudoo. Nufeebiynim ouetuufuj oo-zuundih."

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ZALIAN:

Hello: Manmet

Goodbye: Rën

Yes: Daž

No: Prä

Please: Pai

Thank you: Mänsmö

Mother: Rükfra

Father: Jourfra

Sun: Nipnym

Moon: Krei

["Blökmët has drowned because of you, traitor!"

"Wait, Blökmët has drowned? Where?"

"In the great lake of the south".]

"Blökmët nanovt törs töru lomusracv, yüfärdïen!"

"Känquïni, Blökmët töru lomusracv? Fil?"

"U wier neün meis wo ört."