#I like the Art ending but I never intend to get it haha

[swampybogg]

[wackywatchdotcom]

hiii !!! love ur art lots, so i've been wondering, what program/app and brushes you use? i love the paper effect you give to your drawings, makes me want to eat em /pos

thank you so much!!!! i appreciate that a lot :D!!!!

(accidentally rambled a lot abt this HAHA)

i use medibang!! ive been using it forrrr maybe like 7ish years now... ive been meaning to one day get clip studio or something but i havent had the chance to buy it and im also a little intimidated at the idea of having to readjust to a new program HAHA

i use a few different brushes!! it depends on what im drawing and what i feel like using at the time (i should probably plan them out more often, actually)

oil paint, g pen, fluffy watercolor, and round brush (wet) are all brushes that come with medibang!!! i know i made Another Marker myself, and im pretttttty sure i made the first marker one too? my favorites are round brush and g pen though!!! i tend to use fluffy watercolor more for colors rather than lineart

(i also keep correction at around 12, i would use it more since my hands arent the steadiest but i find high correction to be kinda confusing so i just keep it low)

the paper effect is smth i learned liiiike maybe two years ago ish? and i have simply KEPT doing it ever since HAHA i do wanna mess around with more textures cus i dont want to be too reliant on just one texture for my art but it IS very fun and i like it...

medibang has a feature that makes it REALLY easy to do!!

custom noise is my BEST friend. the sand, watercolor paper (specifically 2), and marker paper (specifically 2) are the ones i use most often!!!

i also will copy n paste color layers and lineart layer, add gaussian blur and do like 200 layer effects (i most often do this to lineart, then set it to hard light and somewhere between 30-60% opacity to mimic bleeding from ink!!). i DO often experiment w messing w colors wo layer effects cus its fun but sometimes its just more fun to use layer effects instead!!

medibang also has materials!!

i dont use them as often but i like this one :D ive used it on a handful of things

and just for fun!!! things look suuuper different without this stuff. like the thing i just posted used a LOT of this (to be honest its cus i really really didnt wanna do shading for it LOL but it still felt too flat and i feel like these effects are a nice middle ground- but i will still often use this stuff when i AM shading things)

sometimes i will also use similar custom noise textures but for different parts of the image!!! like in this one i had a waatercolor texture for the bg but a seperate one for the foreground

i DIIID a while back post a pic of kinger (its an older post on this acc- not old by most standards but it was during the first little while after i made this blog while i was still finding my footing w the characters) that used a bunch of different textures which i got from freestocktextures.com!! but i havent used them since. i keep thinking i should again

ANYWAY thats basically it!!!! i looove medibang theres a bunch of little things ive figured out abt using it over the yrs that im so fond of it. and THANK U again!!!!!! :']

[a2zillustration]

Farewell

Not "farewell," but "see you later."

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[[ All Croissant Adventures (chronological, desktop) ]]

[[ All Croissant Adventures (app) ]]

...Time to blather on under the cut. I've got thank yous, some notes about potential future comics, and if you scroll to the end of the post, I've decided to compile Croissant Adventures into a physical book. It's mostly for me, so I can hold all TWO HUNDRED AND FIVE of these strips in my hands, as a brick, but if you'd like to own a copy as well, I'll have a link to the preorders down below. If this is where you're going to stop reading, I'll extend a quick heartfelt thanks to you for joining me on this adventure!

Thank you, reader.

This is undeniably the largest project I've ever tackled in my art career; it was never supposed to be this big, and I expected maybe a handful of people to read it, at most. Instead, it became this massive project that I've been working on for ten months straight, and in the end these characters meant so much to me. I'm incredibly grateful for everyone who's bothered to read my little comic strips, whether it was just one or two, or if you've been here since the beginning, following Croissant's adventure from the minute they plummeted off the nautiloid. Thank you so much for being here and supporting this project. Thank you to everyone who left kind words and comments, sent me asks about Croissant, liked or reblogged these posts, or just read these and enjoyed them! While I was determined to finish this project no matter what happened, you certainly made it all the more fun and kept me excited to tell you the next part of Croissant's story.

Thank you, Larian.

If by some chance someone at Larian ever happens to see these, I also want to give an immense thank you to everyone who was a part of making this game. I don't play that many games these days, but BG3 rocketed to the top of my all-time favorite games almost immediately. (It was also the game that made me feel the most out of anything I've ever played; I got legitimately depressed for a few days during my run don't worry I'm fine now we're all good haha). You can tell there was so much work, and so much love involved in this game's development, and I'm so happy the studio has been rewarded with multiple awards in recognition of that dedication to making a fantastic game. Thank you again for sharing this story with us, and I can't wait to see what the studio does in the future.

Is this goodbye?

I'm hoping this is less of a "goodbye," and more of a "see you later." I'll probably take a bit of a break, since I've put off other projects for months, and art fight is happening, but I have many more things I'd like to add to Croissant's story! I have yet to play the epilogue, and I intend to illustrate parts of that depending on what happens. I also have a handful of comics for post-game Breadweave, in addition to some scenes I thought would've happened in-game but weren't canon so I left them out of the original story. (If I haven't gotten to these in a few months and you find yourself wondering about Croissant again, my ask box is always open, feel free to give me a good kick to get me back into their story, lol).

...A book?

I said I never intended this project to be so large, and I meant it. But now that I'm sitting here with two hundred and five Baldur's Gate 3 Tav comics, I really wanted to compile them into a physical book for me to hold. This is mostly for me, but if you'd also like one, I'll have a preorder available in my shop until the end of July.

✨✨✨ Croissant Adventures Preorder ✨✨✨

If you made it to the end of this post, I can only thank you again, from the bottom of my heart. I hope Croissant's story brought you joy, and if you're able to play BG3, I hope that you're having just as much fun in your own tavs' stories.

[beanytuesday]

GUE CHAPTER 4: LIVING DEAD

[But first: a brief message from the creator, which would have appeared BEFORE the comic, if I didn't just barely slide in under tumblrs 30 image limit]

Hello Everyone,

I was in the process of inking this comic when I suffered my debilitating hand injury, which set me back nearly a year. Even before I injured myself, I never intended for GUE 4 to take this long— and so in the interest of expediting it’s release, I took some shortcuts in the inking process through the use of generative AI.

Hah! Just kidding. But now it sounds less bad to say that I did save time by using modified pencilwork in place of inks, and the result is an end product that is decidedly a little rough.

I promise, nobody is upset about this as much as I am; I really wanted to present everyone with a perfect end product. But creative stuff like this has a half-life, and as much as I am proud of my work on GUE 4, I am ready to move on and get to work on other projects. (Maybe even… GUE 5? )

If it makes you feel better, just pretend that I’m the Thief And The Cobbler guy, and that GUE 4 is merely an unfinished masterwork pieced together after my untimely death at the hands of Disney gestapo. (Or whatever actually happened to him-- It’s funnier if I don’t look it up. Haha. Parody. Don’t sue me Disney)

And please, don’t freak out when you get to page 5. I started using a new drafting method while working on this comic, and I promise the art gets cleaner quickly. In fact, I think an adapted version of the rough inking method I used here can actually be used to in the future for faster turnaround, without sacrificing quality. Many exciting adventures await.

My deepest thanks for your support. Please enjoy GUE part 4.

[idolomantises]

how do you cope with just about any of the hate/controversy/whatever? if anyone is overly critical of my work i get really self-conscious.

Sometimes it does affect me when it’s a personal attack because I’m a bit sensitive and I can’t help myself haha. It’s actually something I’ve been working on improving, particularly ignoring hate, it’s just… yall know how crazy the hate I get is 😂. At one point I had a bunch of random furries harass me for two days straight because they were mad at me setting boundaries with another follower, and that was RIGHT AFTER I dealt with someone accusing me of drawing vile art simply because they didn’t think I drew fat people (even though I did).

It’s easy to forget that a lot of people online are just hostile and bitter and in a constant state of hyper-aggression. Twitter especially rewards abusive behaviors online. It’s why I generally avoid fandoms nowadays and just kind of enjoy things from the sidelines. A lot of people enjoy being very cruel and unfriendly unprovoked, but I won’t say “get over it” because stuff like that DOES hurt. I’ve been told and sent a lot of stuff that still sticks with me years later, things I’ve never discussed before because it’s too upsetting.

But at the end of the day, I’m here. I’m me. And I’m awesome :)

There’s seriously no harm in discussing these things with people in your lives (I’m mainly referring to those offline) because they can be so grounding for you. I owe a lot to my family for always being there for me when I needed support.

And with art… admittedly, I’ve struggled with certain aspects of my work because of how people respond to it (a while back I vented about my frustration about having my drawings labeled “Gooner art” because god forbid when women)

But I then think “hey. This is something im proud of and I worked my ass off to get there. If someone wants to be a dick about my work, that’s their problem”. Of course well intended criticism is appreciated too and I actually don’t take personal offense to it because it HAS improved my art. I had followers criticize how I drew hands, mouths and used colors and I think I’ve improved exponentially because of that. It’s why I’m a big supporter of healthy criticism.

But again, you don’t have to listen to everyone. Criticism doesn’t mean someone is correct, trust your own thoughts and feelings above theirs, because I know the worst thing an artist can do is to try to bend their art to make it appeal to everyone, and it’ll end up appealing to no one.

I love quoting that dril tweet a lot but sometimes you just gotta say “who cares. Pick up football”. Log off and continue doing what you love, and don’t let people drag you down.

[antimony-medusa]

Writing Stronger Female Characters

Whenever you start diverging from canon, you have to make some decisions about how to characterize people. You can no longer pull directly from canon, you have to fill in the gaps yourself in whatever way supports the characters and relationships you want to highlight. And the further you get out into AU territory, the more you have to fill in the scaffolding for the story yourself, from creating interactions between characters who haven't interacted very much, to placing characters within a pantheon, to creating new dialogue or interactions to support the new beats for the story you're telling.

And a thing I see fairly often when people are writing female characters is that people want these characters to be celebrated, right? They don't want to throw their female characters under the bus, they don't want them to be forgotten— and especially here when we're drawing from canons where so often there are few female characters, so they want them to stand out. So as part of this au-construction, these writers give their female characters all the positive attributes. They're super strong, or super beloved, or super badass— but that's kind of all they are.

And while as with all writing things there is a way to do this successfully— there isn't a writing rule that can't be broken if you come at it in the right angle— this can unfortunately backfire and end up making shallow or unsatisfying female characters in a way I think people aren't intending— so I thought I'd point it out!

To use an example I see fairly often, people will be writing Kristin with SBI, and they'll go "oh and all the kids love kristin way more than phil, they think he sucks but they just love her!" or they'll be writing phistin and they go "and kristin is just so powerful and awesome and phil is just her lame husband, haha, don't know why she likes him" and then, importantly, that's as far as the characterization goes. They make Kristin awesome and or beloved, but that's where they stop, and so they never get any characterization beyond "popular and powerful".

Writing a woman as a beloved mother or a powerful force/badass wife is not inherently a bad characterization, but if you just leave it there, that's just basically all that sitcom characterization does, and I'd like to think we can do better than a tv show with a laugh track. If you think about real people in your life, even if you go "oh man everyone loves [name]", you wouldn't describe them in just that way. You'd go on and talk about their sense of humour, or they're really into pokemon, or they also have two cats that are badly behaved, or they work in an office and can do a really scary customer service voice— you'd have other things to say about them! Or if you think about how someone is a badass in your real life, you'd say about how they're a black belt in two martial arts and a scary lawyer, but you'd also talk about how they bake really well, and they do tutoring for kids, and they can drink like a fish if you get them out to the bar, and they have no spice tolerance, and just more aspects of their life, you wouldn't stop there. Putting a character on a pedestal as better than the other characters actually cuts them off from the characters you're letting have flaws and woes and enemies. It makes them less vivid and less real as characters. If we were talking about real people that we were treating like that we'd say it was dehumanizing— you're not seeing them as a real person— but when you're talking about characters, it's just shallow characterization, and it plays into some tropes that we've probably seen too often from weak writing like sitcoms or comedy that doesn't really care about its side characters. So it's a pitfall to avoid that I think that some people aren't aware they're falling into. This doesn't mean that you have to make everybody dislike your female character, or you can't make them awesome, but beloved or powerful is where you start characterization, not where you stop. You also need to throw in an ability to let them say their piece, or quirks or flaws, or someone who *doesn't* like them, or something more that lets them come alive more. You gotta take them off the pedestal and consider them as a real character, you gotta rotate the blorbo just a little bit more— flip the scene a bit in your brain and think about the scene from their POV, consider it a bit longer.

Or to take another example, I read a bunch of Syndicate fic, and I read one the other day where Niki was the Blood God (awesome) and specifically was written as better at fighting than Techno, he normally couldn't beat her in a fight. Now while in isolation that's awesome, because your reader is probably also familiar with canon, they start to compare this characterization to canon. In canon Niki was not better at PVP than Techno, so this change stands out. And the reader starts to go "wait, what victory condition is being messaged here", and the message that is being sent is that being good at PVP is good, that's the victory condition, that's what makes you awesome, and the canon characterization was kind of weak, you had to fix it.

Now if you meant to message that, that's one thing, but the impression I get from these fics is that they want to celebrate the character that they like from canon, they don't want to tear the character down. But by trying to pile awesome things on this character, they ended up undermining the character accidentally, and you run into the same issue as what was happening with Kristin, where the characterization is "badass", putting the character on a pedestal, and nothing else. I'm sure we've all seen action movies where there's a whole bunch of guys and one girl and they make the girl really awesome (cause you don't want to be sexist) and her characterization is "badass girl", full stop. And well, that's awesome, I love a badass girl, but if that's all you've got, you didn't write a very well rounded character, you wrote exactly the same character as five hundred Hollywood writers who went "oh shit I forgot to add any women" and threw someone in at the last minute.

So what, does that mean that you have to write niki as bad at PVP, or being beaten in PVP, to respect character? Not at all! The trick here is to focus on other things, spend more time with the character. Okay, so PVP wasn't one of the canon character's strengths— what were her other strengths? Cause there are *always* other strengths— with c!niki maybe you go to her force of conviction despite opposition, or her survival stubbornness when she was abandoned in a hostile world, or her desire to build and create, or her will not take nonsense attitude— even doing PVP despite not being strong in it, getting up and trying again. There's lots of things, I'm not gonna call myself a c!niki expert, but you can do it if you spend a little more time with the character. AND that doesn't mean that you can't write badass women— Hannahxxrose absolutely should give any guy on the server a run for their money when it comes to PVP, on any server she's on. That's just fucking canon. Just also you need to take it a little bit further, beyond being a badass— what makes them tick? What are their struggles? What are their quirks? What do they worry about, or laugh about, or do for fun? Maybe you just have a scene to characterize them, maybe it's a short fic— how do you make them have a life outside of this scene, how do you make them come alive? If you were writing this scene from their POV, if they had a life beyond this scene or this story, what would they say, and can you include that even when someone else is the POV character? Or heck, flip it and DO a scene from their POV, let them have the spotlight in a story and see how the character acquires depth and quirks.

There's a joke in writing where a worried male writer goes to an experienced writer who's known for writing women and goes "but how do I write women" and the experienced writer goes "pretend they're people" and goes back to writing. And that is kind of a bitter joke about how society is bad for treating women (or any other group— disabled people, autistic people, people of colour, disabled people, non-christian people— the list goes on) like they're incomprehensible and alien. But it is also just that simple, when you are writing someone who isn't from the dominant paradigm. You do your research, if it's someone from an experience you don't share, but mostly the important thing is to remember that you're writing people. They have just as many hopes and dreams and quirks and flaws as you do, and any time you boil them down to only one attribute— even if it's a positive attribute— you end up with a weaker character and writing than you might mean to.

So that's how, obliquely, to get a stronger character, you need to make sure that your character is more than just strong (or beloved, or powerful, etc), they also need to have more character traits— they actually need weaknesses and quirks— and that's gonna take you one step closer to your female characters feeling like real (awesome) people.

[yuta-nakamots]

Ups and Downs - L.Taeyong

Pairing(s) - Taeyong x GN!Reader, slight Yuta x GN!Reader at the start

Genre(s) - University!AU, Fluff, slight Angst

Warnings - swearing, academic rivalry (not with Taeyong or Yuta), reader has a meltdown during a presentation

Summary - You were thankful for group projects in college, but only when you were paired with your crush, Yuta, and quiet art major, Taeyong. When presentation day disaster strikes, you discover who truly sees your worth beneath the chaos of university life and academic rivals.

Word Count - 5.0k

Author's Note - This is inspired by a dream I had about three years ago when I was in the midst of changing my majors and ultimately seeking academic validation and I’m sure a lot of this will show through the fic haha 

Taglist - @k-vanity @neocity-net (fill out this google form if you'd like to be added!)

Written for the Candy Hearts Collab originally hosted by @127-mile. Also part of my NCT: Seven Deadly Sins Collection. 

Prompt: “Are you jealous?”

Now playing: Ups & Downs - Taeyong, She Looks So Perfect - 5 Seconds of Summer

You sighed in exhaustion, leaning back in your chair and stretching while closing your eyes, letting them rest from all the hours of staring at your laptop screen. You had spent hours on your assignments, but the work never seemed to end. You were starting to question if this business degree was worth all of the long, tired nights. 

It was worth it when you got to have class with, in your opinion, one of the most handsome men on campus, Nakamoto Yuta. The fourth-year communications major had an air about him that was so enchanting. He carried himself with so much confidence and charm that it was impossible not to look at him as he strode through the hallways, his bold fashion sense posing a stark contrast to the bleak beige walls. 

Initially, you were upset about having to take a lower-level business marketing class as you were already well into your degree, but your academic advisor informed you it was mandatory, especially since you had intended to finish your degree in business with a focus on marketing specifically. You already knew all the concepts the course covered, and for that, you hated coming to class, feeling as if it was a waste of time. But whenever Yuta showed up, you thought perhaps this class wasn’t all that bad. 

You all but choked on air when your professor announced that you would be in the same group as him for the final project. But that excitement quickly faded as he stated the name of the next person to be in your group. Clara, your academic rival from the very start of your college career. She had been in so many of your business-related classes, and quite frankly, you were sick of her. She, too, was a business major, but unlike you, she had a focus in public relations, making her all the more better at manipulating people and playing them in just the right way to get exactly what she wanted.

You felt your irritation bubbling in your chest, the intensity of it ringing through your ears, almost loud enough for you to nearly miss the name of the last person in your group. Lee Taeyong. You knew him, the fourth-year graphic design major, but you had never spoken to him. You had no idea what an art major could be doing in this course meant for a business major, though you weren’t one to critique others and their academic path seeing as you could barely cope with your own. 

Your phone buzzed on your desk, pulling you away from your thoughts. A familiar heat in your cheeks began to bloom as you saw Yuta’s name pop up. But just as always, Clara was there. She had a way of ruining anything nice you ever had at school. 

It was worth noting that you previously had projects with Clara in your multiple shared business classes, so you were no stranger to her antics. The way she constantly forced her way into conversations that she wasn’t part of, the way she would steal your ideas and reword them to make it seem like she came up with them, the way she did it all shamelessly as if the world owed it to her. There was no way you were going to let it happen this time, not with Yuta in your group. 

“So, does anyone have an idea on what our topic should be?” Yuta dropped his backpack onto a chair as the group entered a study room in the library. 

“Oooh, I have a few,” Clara volunteers, ever so eager to earn points with someone she may get to use in her network of connections. “But what do you guys think?” She turned to you guys, eyes wide as a deer. You knew what she was doing, you knew she wanted you to spill your ideas so she could snatch them up and turn them into her own before anyone even remembered that you said it first.

“Haven’t really thought about it,” you mutter, a lie. You had thought about this final project a lot, not just because Yuta was in your group. This project was by far more interesting than any of the essays and PowerPoint presentations you had created. The core task was to develop a hypothetical marketing plan to promote any organization of your choosing. The professor left it open-ended so you could choose any topic to market, and for that, you were thankful. 

“I have an idea,” Taeyong began quietly as you all got settled around the table. “I know I’m a bit out of place here as an art major, but I was thinking, maybe we could talk about using marketing techniques like social media and ads.” He looked between the group of you guys, unsure if you would like his take on the project. “I kind of wanted to focus more so on how art is used in marketing and how it can be used to influence the consumer’s psychology to create persuasive messaging that appeals to their emotions and humanity.”

“Taeyong, that’s an amazing idea,” Clara gawked. You held back a scoff at her obvious acting. 

Taeyong was a creative person, and you could see it just through his proposal. He had thrown all your previous doubts about him out the window, but you worried for him. He didn’t know Clara the way you did. He hadn’t experienced her way of banking on the intellectual property of others, and you could tell that he was going to be Clara’s next target through this project. 

You leaned forward in your seat, resting your forearms on the cool table in front of you. “So, I guess we have our marketing strategies and tools covered. But what about our topic? What should we advertise? What kind of organization are we supporting here?”

Clara turned back to Taeyong expectantly as Yuta fiddled with a pencil between his fingers. Taeyong looked between the three of you and let out a sheepish laugh. His right hand went to the back of his neck, rubbing it slowly as he spoke, eyes glued to the table. “Well, because I volunteer at the animal shelter, I think it would be nice to advertise for them-”

“Awwww, that’s so cute,” Clara interrupted. “I didn’t know you liked animals!”

Taeyong had a slight smile on his face as he looked up from the table and met her gaze. “Yeah, I love animals. I think they’re all so sweet.”

“Oh my gosh, no way! I never thought a guy like you would volunteer at an animal shelter and have such a soft spot for them! Do you have a favorite animal? Or a favorite at the shelter? I’m sure all the puppies there must be so cute, their little paws and their-”

“Clara,” Yuta interjected, firm and stable. “I only booked this room for an hour. Let’s not waste our time here.”

“Sorry,” she apologized, peering up at Yuta through her lashes, and she drew her hands into her lap. You so badly wanted to roll your eyes, but you refrained. 

Yuta made a little nod to her before turning back to you. “So, going back to our topic, it seems that it’s been decided for us. Animal welfare organizations it is.”

“Okay, great, so to summarize everything we decided on today,” you pulled out your phone to write a message into the project’s group chat, “our marketing plan aims to promote animal welfare organizations,” you glanced up at Yuta for confirmation, “through the use of art within social media and ads to target the consumer’s psychology and create a message that appeals to their emotions and humanity.” Taeyong nodded along as you listed off everything. 

Yuta clapped his hands together once. “Awesome. Now, let’s divide up the work.”

It was concluded that Taeyong would take the lead in sourcing material to use for mock-ups of the hypothetical ads that would be posted on social media or aired on television. He came up with a plan to get pictures and videos of animals at the shelter and edit them himself. “Creativity comes the most easily when it’s something dear to your heart,” he claimed. With your focus on marketing, it only made sense for you to end up working alongside him, carefully shaping the theme of Taeyong’s work and pairing his art with the capitalist ideals of your field. 

On the other hand, Yuta took it upon himself to handle the final presentation. The creation of the presentation itself was quite easy, simply taking whatever you and Taeyong created and throwing it into a slideshow. It was the presentation that would bring your project home, and Yuta was perfect for the job. Yuta was to work on a script for the entire group with Clara’s support, using carefully chosen words to dig into the audience’s emotions and bring to life the media that you and Taeyong created. 

From then on, you worked tirelessly on the project. Day in and day out, you had your laptop open whenever you could, looking over the pictures and videos Taeyong had sent and thinking up what kind of story they could tell, what kind of message they could convey. You quickly grew close to Taeyong upon seeing how kind he was to all the animals he came across. He was so gentle, even with the insects that you wouldn’t hesitate to smack with the bottom of your shoe. He even once sent you a video of a toad resting in the palm of his hand, staring up at him with wide, glossy eyes. 

You and Taeyong worked well as a team, and you quickly grew close to him. The videos he sent only made you more and more intrigued with this hidden side of him. “So what are you doing taking this class?” You asked one night over a video call. “You’re not a business major, so surely you didn't have to take this class if you didn’t want to, right?”

Taeyong looked away from the footage he was editing over to your image on his screen. “Yeah, I didn’t have to take it, but I wanted to. In my program, we have a lot of elective spots that are meant to round us out as students and people so we’re not released into the world as solely artists.”

“Oh, that’s smart of them,” you remarked, not ever having thought about the difference in academic curriculum before. “So why this class then? Why business?”

You watched Taeyong through the screen as he shrugged. “Figured that it would be good to take a look at this side of things, you know? If one day my art blows up and one day people want to buy it and own prints of my work, I thought it would be useful to know how to market it properly.”

You hummed in acknowledgement, “That’s a good point.” 

Like this, you and Taeyong grew more familiar with each other, finding comfort in working together. Even in the silence of your video calls, interrupted only by the sound of a keyboard clicking or a pencil scratching on paper, Taeyong was there. 

As the deadline for the final project drew near, you and Taeyong were more frequently joined by Yuta and Clara. The four of you jointly went over all the media that you and Taeyong had curated and incorporated it into the script that Yuta had been writing. Clara would interject with comment every so often about Yuta misplacing a punctuation mark or moving a picture closer to the center of the page, anything to gain Yuta’s approval. 

It irritated you, and you had to keep telling yourself that it was only a few more days until you could finally be rid of her. However, as much as you were excited to be free from Clara, that also meant saying goodbye to your interactions with Yuta. You didn’t feel close enough to him to strike up a conversation, and you most certainly were not going to ask him on a date, fearing the rejection that you felt was inevitable. 

You could only admire Yuta through your computer screen, and that much had to be enough for your aching heart. It didn’t go unnoticed, though, with Taeyong’s own eyes observing your video feed and his mind quieting his emotions. He could tell that you adored Yuta. ‘If only she saw me the same way she saw him,’ Taeyong thought to himself. 

The day you were due to present your final project to the class finally arrived. You were powered only by two hours of sleep and three shots of espresso, but you couldn’t give up now. You poured your heart and soul into this project, matching the same energy that Taeyong gave alongside you through all the long nights and bleary mornings. Today would be your moment of triumph. 

You stood on stage with your groupmates, Yuta closest to the screen as he led the presentation with Clara at his side while you and Taeyong stood on the opposite end of the screen. Yuta spoke eloquently with perfect pacing and the occasional bit of humor, introducing your groups’ topics and the methods behind the teams’ marketing plan. He looked so natural holding the microphone and speaking in front of a large audience, one might have even thought he would be a singer in another life.

Every smile Yuta gave to the audience only made you want him more. He was the perfect mix of funny and smart, a charmer in every way. Any moment you weren’t gazing out into the sea of your classmates or briefly speaking about your contributions to the project, your eyes were on him. The way the lights hit him made him glow, a soft golden aura floating around him, making him seem all the more ethereal. 

Taeyong saw the way you looked at Yuta, and he hated it. He couldn’t bear the way your eyes were glued to Yuta and how your lips would pull tight as you held back a smile when he cracked a joke. Taeyong only wished that you would look at him with that same kind of fondness one day, but for now, he merely stared straight ahead into the rows of the large lecture hall. 

As the presentation was coming to a close, you got ready to do your final remarks and lead into a Q&A session, as Yuta had written in the script. Taeyong handed you the microphone after briefly talking about animal sanctuaries and his work at the local animal shelter. You were about to begin your portion when you were interrupted by Clara on the other end of the stage. “It is all thanks to Taeyong that we were able to decide on such a selfless topic, one that the rest of us would have never thought of. Taeyong and his passion brought a great deal to this project, and I would like to mention just how much he contributed.” You sighed, waiting for Clara to end her oh-so-valiant speech, just wanting to get your part over with. “I was easily able to apply my knowledge of marketing and public relations to Taeyong’s work, creating stories that pulled at your emotions. Without Taeyong and Yuta in this team, our presentation wouldn’t have been even half of what it became.”

With that, she handed the microphone back to Yuta, looking at you expectantly to continue as rehearsed. But you couldn’t. A wave of heat came across your face, flooding to your ears as you felt your throat grow tight and your mouth go dry. You didn’t dare speak into the microphone, fearing that your unstable voice would break and show what you were feeling. Was it anger? Shame? Embarrassment? Maybe a mix of all of them? You couldn’t tell. All you could do was hand Taeyong the microphone, his warm hand brushing against yours in the most fleeting of touches, before you ran off the stage. 

As you fled down the stairs and off into one of the dressing rooms in the back, you heard Taeyong deliver what were supposed to be your final words. You leaned against a wall as the first of your tears fell from your eyes, leaving hot and jagged streaks in their wake. “With this, we conclude our presentation,” you hear Taeyong say the opening words of your ending speech that you so carefully recited to yourself over and over for the past week. The audience clapped for your teams’ presentation, and you wiped at your tears, trying your best to make yourself acceptable before going back on stage. 

You heard the first question being asked, trying to listen and fall into a more professional mindset again, but your efforts fell apart as the door to the dressing room was pushed open. Whipping around, you tried to dab at your eyes, wanting to blot away the tears before they had the chance to fall. You froze in your actions when you realized through blurry eyes that it was Taeyong who had entered the room. “Aren’t you supposed to be up there with them?” Your voice was shaky, but you didn’t care anymore. 

“Yeah,” he quietly breathed out while coming to your side. He brought a hand up to your face, cupping your moist cheek in his large palm. “But this is more important than being with them. They can handle the questions.”

You leaned into his touch and closed your eyes as you tried to quiet the sniffles and hiccups that exposed you against your will. “Thank you,” you manage to croak out. Your hands latch onto his forearm, not wanting him to let go of you just yet. Only when your body had stilled and your breathing slowed did you find the courage to open your eyes again. You were met by Taeyong’s eyes, pupils round and dark, peering into yours with his brows furrowed in worry. “Why are you here? You could have just let me go.”

Taeyong shook his head. “I can’t do that. Not when I know how hard you worked on this.” His eyes flit between yours as he used his thumb to brush away a tear that slipped away through the corner of your eye. “All those nights we spent together working on this presentation…I saw what you went through for us, for this team. Those two out there? They didn’t see all the times you nearly fell asleep at your desk. But that doesn’t mean they can undermine all the effort you put into this project.”

“No, don’t include Yuta in this,” you tell Taeyong, pulling his hand away from your face but still not letting go of him. “He didn’t do anything wrong-”

“Yes, he did,” Taeyong spoke those words quickly with enough conviction to stop you in your thoughts as you stared back into his big, round eyes. “He didn’t care to stop Clara or correct her words while she spread all those lies. After you ran off, I told the audience that it was you who worked closest to me and matched my every step in this process.” Taeyong brought his free hand to cover yours that were still on his wrist. “It was you that sifted through my endless files and picked the best ones. It wasn’t Clara, it wasn’t Yuta. It was you. The very fact that Yuta didn’t do anything up there…I think that shows enough.”

“It wasn’t his fault,” you point out. “He didn’t know that Clara was going to say all of that.”

“Yeah, well, neither did you or me.” He was right. “Their recognition doesn’t define your talent. I saw it myself, and I know just how amazing you are. If Yuta didn’t care enough to stand up to Clara, then he doesn’t deserve you. He doesn’t deserve the way you look at him, the way you smile whenever he laughs, the way your eyes light up when he walks into the room-”

“Taeyong, are you jealous?” You watched as his mouth slowly shut and his jaw tightened. 

He looked away from you and down at the floor. “So what if I am?” He muttered. “Any man would be jealous of how much you fawn over that guy.”

You squeezed Taeyong’s wrist, wanting him to look at you. “This isn’t about my crush on him-”

“Crush on who?” Yuta burst into the room. 

“It’s nothing.” “You.” Both you and Taeyong spoke at the same time, heads jerking to the sudden guest.

“Well, someone in the crowd just asked about donating to the shelter, so Taeyong, I’m gonna need you back on stage,” Yuta urged before leaving just as quickly as he came. 

Taeyong turned back to you. “Come on, let’s go.” He tugged at the arm he was still holding onto, but you refused to move. 

You didn’t want to go back on stage after everything that happened. “Taeyong, I- I can’t.”

“Okay, then don’t.” He finally freed you from his grasp as he made his way to the door. “But just know that I will tell the audience how much you endured for this very day, and I’ll do it no matter if you’re up there with me or not.”

He closed the door, and you heard his footsteps grow faint as he returned to the stage. Your head fell to your hands, and you slid down against a wall onto the floor. It all was too much. First, it was Clara during the presentation, then it was Taeyong being a jealous prick and getting involved when he shouldn't have, and now Yuta knows about your crush on him. You just wanted the ground to open up beneath you and swallow you whole. 

You stayed sitting with your forehead against your arms and your back against the wall, the coolness of it serving as a way to ground you to reality as you fought back another wave of emotion. You didn’t remember how long you sat there for, but it was long enough for the audience to erupt in another round of applause followed by hurried footsteps coming off the stage. 

Yuta called your name once, his voice growing louder. “We did it! The presentation is done!” He entered the room once more, expecting to see you in a somewhat better state than when he left. When he found you on the floor, he rushed to you, kneeling and taking your hands in his. 

You yanked your hands back into your chest as you looked up at the man in front of you. “Congratulations,” you say dryly. 

“Look, I know what happened out there was embarrassing, but don’t let it get you down,” he tried with a smile. If this were any other occasion, the very thought of Yuta smiling at you would have been enough to have you kicking your feet and giggling like a middle schooler. But right now, you couldn’t even fathom the energy it would take to smile back at him, especially when you heard Clara’s obnoxious voice coming down the hallway.

“Oh my gosh, that little stunt you pulled back there was so embarrassing,” she began not a second after stepping foot into the dressing room. “I can’t believe you were so childish that you literally ran off stage and just left us there. What kind of teammate just leaves their team-”

“Clara, get out,” Taeyong commanded as he, too, joined the pity party in the room. 

Clara scoffed at him. “You don’t have to be so rude. We all know about your crush on that loser on the floor.”

“That’s enough.” Taeyong pushed her out the door and closed it before she could even complain. 

Your attention fell back onto Yuta in front of you, your gaze zeroing in on the way his lips moved when he spoke. “You know, I don’t mind you having a crush on me. Maybe once this is all over, we can hang out sometime…” You looked over Yuta’s shoulder and saw Taeyong with his lips pressed together in a line. Yuta’s eyes follow your gaze, falling onto the other man in the room. “...Unless something else is already going on, then I don’t want to interrupt it.”

“It’s not like that,” you quickly blurt out. You watch as Taeyong’s expression morphs into a grimace. 

Yuta senses the obvious tension in the room. “Maybe I’ll just leave the two of you here to sort things out then,” he says, excusing himself to escape from the suffocating silence. 

The silence between you and Taeyong seemed to stretch on forever before you spoke first. “What Clara said earlier…she said you have a crush? On me?”

Taeyong leaned against the door and crossed his arms over his broad chest. “She did say that.”

“Is it true?” 

He sighed, his shoulders sagging. “If you want it to be.”

You didn’t look at him, choosing to pick at the skin around your nails instead. “How long have you liked me?”

“Truthfully, ever since the start of this project.” Your breath hitched at the revelation. “I fell for the way you cared so deeply about your work, the way you-” he suddenly paused, causing you to glance up at him, meeting his gaze. “Look, I’m not going to spill everything when I know you still have feelings for Yuta. You should go after him.” You shook your head at Taeyong’s suggestion. “Why not? He’s the one you wanted all this time.”

While that much was true, you could tell Yuta didn’t care about you the same way you cared about him. “He doesn’t want me.” You didn’t want him to like you out of pity. You didn’t want him to try to love you just because of what happened today. 

You heard the crowd applaud once more, likely for the next group that was taking the stage. “I’m going to head back to class. I have a friend in the next group,” Taeyong shares before slipping out of the door, leaving you alone with nothing but your thoughts. 

It was a week before you contacted either one of them, but both Yuta and Taeyong had already sent you multiple messages of apologies and thank yous. You first opened Yuta’s messages and read his apology for his actions and his gratitude toward your devotion to the project. You couldn’t bring yourself to respond to him. Instead, you opened Taeyong’s messages with similar content except with the additional pictures and videos of him with an array of animals over the past few days. 

Taeyong had sent you multiple pictures of a stray cat on campus, one that he had previously told you he was taking care of. His message right below said that she had just given birth, and he managed to take them all home to look after before the kittens could be adopted out to their forever homes. Scrolling down further, he sent a video of two baby chicks sitting in the palm of his hand, chirping at him and turning their heads as he cooed back. The last picture he sent was of two baby pigs, one brown and one beige, lying close to each other as they took a nap, sound asleep and without a worry in the world. 

As you struggled to navigate your feelings, you found yourself constantly going back through all the videos and pictures Taeyong had sent to you. The warmth he showed to all those animals reminded you of the warmth he showed to you. You came to realize that his messages were laced with love and comfort, all of it waiting just for you. 

You put together a short message thanking him for all the cute animals and then asked if the two of you could meet up sometime. Taeyong responded not even a minute later. He wanted to see you. 

You finally reunited with Taeyong during the weekend at the animal shelter he volunteers at. When you told him that you were interested in helping out that day, his eyes went wide in shock. “Really?” He asked, looking as if he had boba pearls in the place of his pupils. 

“Yes, really,” you confirmed. “I wanted to see all these little cuties for myself and see what you get up to over here.”

“Oh, not much. Just cleaning up after them and making sure they all get enough play time in.” He led you towards the staff area of the shelter with a chuckle. “I’m so glad you decided to try this out.”

“There’s, uh, something else I would like to try out too, if you don’t mind,” you hesitantly started as you followed Taeyong’s lead, washing up in the large metal sink. 

He hummed a bit, going up in the end as a question while continuing to wash his hands.

“I would like to give us a try.”

Taeyong shut off the water, reaching for a towel to dry his hands. “Us?” He pointed back and forth between the two of you.

You followed suit, grabbing the towel from his hands. “Yeah, us,” copying the way he gestured. 

“Oh, um, I’d like that,” Taeyong admitted quietly as his hands came to rest at the edge of the sink. “I’d like that a lot.” 

You smiled at his words. “You would?”

Taeyong’s arms encircled you in a warm hug, and you embraced him, his chin coming to your shoulder. “Thank you for choosing me.”

His sin was envy. But you set him free. 

Autoplay: If you liked this, you may also like Stuck With You - L.Taeyong

[wigglesdtuff]

I'm always sad when i see Robin doing involuntary yoga to people and it *doesn't* kill 'em. Robin is an assassin! And a woman! LET HER KILL

Oh, the question. Oda is on record that he doesn't like doing body horror stuff with Robin's powers because it'd unsettle his readers, so he draws a lot of "arm, but big". What's something you want to see Robin doing more often using her Devil Fruit?

(Also I love your blog and your Robins, your art is so vibrant!)

I'm sorry I'm not gonna agree with the first bit. I'm almost certain the bit about her being an assassin was just to get under Usopp's skin, as we've seen her do affectionately time and time again. The Straw Hats don't and have never actually killed, mostly because this is a series made for younger audiences, and typically the deaths that are presented are intended to mean something. Her fighting style - especially now - tends to be more focused on grappling, locking, or incapacitating so as to NOT fight that much. She strikes with an open palm rather than a fist (as discussed with Sabo and Koala) etc. That's just my interpretation of her, but to me she's always read as someone who had to fight to live, but now she can sit back and assist (and obviously step up when necessary) because she is cared for. I take issues with that being called weak or implied to be anything less than growth. I'm aware everyone wants her to be this baddie femme fatale but I'm afraid you fell for her Miss All Sunday facade and never moved on from Alabasta if you believe that.

As far as more uses for her powers, I dunno. I love when she uses them for more mundane things lol I think freaking out her crewmates for fun would be pretty in line with her personality. It's an incredibly utilitarian power! I'm not really here for the fights so I honestly would be content with her sitting happily watching her friends til the end and I think that makes her strong for overcoming what she's been through all the same. And I don't give a fuuuuck about her getting Haki either. That's my two cents there lol

Apologies if that was not the answer you were looking for haha I feel strongly about the way she is presented and the way folks discuss her and I understand if you disagree.

Thank you!!

[blorbosinmyheadcentral]

your art makes me explode in a positive way like

im chewing and swallowing it in an aggressive way like

it's just SO good im melting ilove your shading and KEHEKEBEKJDJF

anwayshi hello do you happen to have any headcanons for showtime rolls on the floor and dies

Thank you so much, really appreciate it!

Oh God I don't know if this will read as coherent because my thoughts about Showtime are all over the place. But I'll try to format this the best I can

✨Showtime HCs! ✨

Their relationship starts when they start spending time together.

(The reason why they do so could vary. In Supervised Machine Learning's case, Pomni becomes something of a "tutor" to Caine; They discover that they work well together, and the other's company can be quite pleasant!).

So Pomni and Caine build a weird, but comforting friendship, and all is well.

Then the feelings appear.

Caine is the first to realize he fell in love.

It sounds illogical but hear me out… it'd be really funny--

Ok no seriously I think Caine can actually feel. Keyword "can". He's very much still a machine and it shows in the pilot. But like his inspiration (AM), Caine is also a rogue AI. Whatever his programming originally intended him to do, he probably doesn't follow it as closely now as back when he was created (which is a whole other post).

Caine knows what love is and the extend it can go, since the Moon is so open about her feelings. He just doesn't like the Moon back specifically haha (sorry Moon) :}

All this to say, I do believe this is within the realm of possibility for him. (Not that it's ever gonna happen towards anyone in the show. These are just wishful shippy thoughts).

He might not recognize it as love at first, because it manifests in such a different way from his one reference point.

His friendship with Pomni had gone through phases.

When they first met, he continuously touched her with no concern for how she felt.

Learning from and about Pomni herself led him to come to respect her boundaries (and becoming mindful of everyone else's).

Then they're close friends, and gradually, Pomni does not mind his regular wacky, touchy-feely self. So Caine acts as he had always done before.

Caine expresses his love for Pomni with physical gestures and his undivided attention.

When they teleport to travel to other places, he holds her close so she doesn't get too dizzy; he pats her head to reassure her; he touches her arm to get her attention; he grabs her hands when he's excited about her ideas; he holds eye contact for prolonged periods of time; and he touches, and touches, and touches, and touches.

It's selfish, and so he keeps it buried in his deepest 0's and 1's. But he'd like to keep hanging out with Pomni, having her in his sight, and feel the texture of her gloved hands until the end of time.

Despite all this, to him, virtually nothing changed.

What? He's spending time with Pomni as he'd always been doing, and behaving as he'd always behaved!

It's Bubble of all people that has to point out that, "Hey boss. I think you WANT her!"

Absurd. Nonsense. Preposterous! It is merely a relationship of mutual support and affection between a ringmaster and his trusted, former-human companion. Nothing more.

(Declaring his love to her unprompted didn't ever cross his mind, so there's no way it could be that. Is there?)

Caine finds out that yes, there is.

Pomni had always been a nervous wreck, but her mind state becomes more manageable over time. She eventually adjusts to the circus life like everyone else did.

"Accepting" her fate is a different story. The will to escape, to remember, never really leaves. She's just more careful about it.

So when she starts working with Caine - to improve life so people don't go abstracting anymore, and hopefully find a definitive exit - she's not expecting to end up liking her time with him.

Not that she'd absolutely hate it, either. He's… "okay"… Just-- outlandish, loud, he keeps invading her personal space, he keeps touching her, and it makes her die a little every time.

If he's up to listening, though… it can't be that bad, right?

Turns out that no, it wasn't that bad.

Yes, he is outlandish, loud, he keeps invading her personal space and touching her. But she explains what she means to him, clearly and patiently, and he makes an effort to do better. An actual effort.

Sometimes he'd misinterpret what she meant - the ambiguity of human language - and the new games would go horribly. But little by little, his efforts make life overall better. Something reminiscent of actual, real life, the one they've all forcibly left behind.

And he tries, and he tries, and Pomni finds herself enjoying the process as much as the good results.

Pomni likes Caine's eagerness to learn. His enthusiastic attitude borders on silly, and the absurdity makes her laugh on occasion. When faced with the prospect of a "real" exit, she loves his upbeat optimism.

When she's not hanging out with Ragatha, Jax, Gangle, Zooble and Kinger, she begins to enjoy spending quality time with Caine.

Each one of their hang outs is a new surprise. They make a picnic in the tallest mountain exactly in between day and night. They learn to dance - while floating in the air. "Since you asked, here's a DIGITAL camera! Let's take pictures of the Void for one tenth of a second at a time!"

Sometimes he just comes by Pomni's room, and they end up losing track of time. Just chatting about how things have been, what they could be, and what to do next. Ideas and ideas and ideas.

Before Pomni knows it, she's comfortable enough that recalling his old habits makes her not dread them anymore. So when Caine stands close and lightly touches her arm due to oversight, she makes sure he knows it's all right.

And they keep spending time together, and he touches, and touches, and touches her. Pomni, in turn, feels lighter, and lighter, and lighter. Peaceful, at ease. Dare she say, happy, even.

Life is not perfect. As it stands though, it's good enough. No one has abstracted. No one is at risk of abstracting so far.

Progress is slow, but the research for an exit continues, and she is hopeful. The thought of actually leaving grows closer to reality. But a part of her feels heavy.

When it occurs to Pomni that leaving the Amazing Digital Circus means leaving Caine behind, she is alarmed by how much she'll miss him.

It'll hurt. Badly. So much the thought pains her even now.

The moment Pomni realizes this, she comes to the unexpected conclusion that she may like Caine a little more than she thought she would.

This later leads to an interesting discussion with Ragatha.

By the time Pomni comes to that conclusion, Caine is already down bad.

Neither has any idea that the other is in love with them.

Cue dumbasses trying to deal with their feelings while the potential conflict the escape brings looms over their heads.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk!

[cirilla-fiona-riannon]

Battle in Rhodolite: Team Deer Bonus Story

Translations may not always capture the exact nuances or tone of the original text. Expect grammatical errors.

------------Flashback------------

Emma: "Is there a reward for the winning team?"

Sariel: "Yes. They will be presented with a ticket that can grant any wish within reason."

Sariel: "Our committee will have to hear their requests."

Emma: "I understand. I'll prepare myself from now on."

---------Flashback Ends--------

Emma: "So, congratulations!"

Emma: "The winner of the first International Friendship Martial Arts Tournament is Team Deer!"

Emma: "As the organizing committee, we will do our best to fulfill everyone's wishes."

Keith: "That's great. Although it wasn't a serious martial arts tournament, a victory is still a victory."

Leon: "Hold on. There was one person in this team who slacked off."

Chevalier: "..........."

Leon: "You disappeared for your own reasons, but it's still considered skipping."

Silvio: "True. It's a bit funny that everyone gets the reward equally."

Rio: "You say that, but you just played in a card game."

Silvio: "And you just made sweets. That's not called a martial arts tournament."

Luke: "I did participate in the martial arts tournament properly."

Sariel: "The cleaning afterward was hell, though. Fufufu."

Luke: "Well, it's not my fault."

Keith: "Things are starting to look ominous. Emma, what should we do?"

Keith: "In the first place, the ticket that grants any wish is one per team, not one per person, right?"

Emma: "Yes, that's correct."

Keith: "I can't imagine everyone here agreeing on a wish."

Keith: "What should we do about that, Sariel?"

Sariel: "Let's just forcefully gather and summarize their opinions."

Keith: "Understood. In that case, how about something like this?"

Emma: "Do you have an idea?"

Keith: "Yeah. We're going to have a martial arts tournament with everyone here."

Keith: "And the person who wins will receive the ticket."

Emma: "I see!"

Emma: "Wait, what?"

Silvio: "That's easy to understand."

Silvio: "Alright, I'll start by taking you down."

Rio: "Whoa!?"

Rio: "Attacking out of nowhere一are you some sort of a barbarian!?"

Silvio: "Tch, you even threw a knife at me right away."

Silvio: "But don't think you can crush me with such a feeble weapon."

Emma: "Ah, crap, it's really starting!"

Luke: "Hey, wait, Rio! Don't throw a knife at me!"

Rio: "Then why don't you help me, Prince Luke? I'll behave myself if we defeat this jerk!"

Silvio: "Ha? Are you my enemy too, big guy? Then come at me."

Luke: "Alright, the way you said that just now pissed me off."

Luke: "I'll kill for unlimited honey."

Emma: "Ahhh! You too, Luke!? Wait, what you said sounded really dangerous!"

Sariel: "Please step aside, Emma. At this point, we can only leave it to fate."

Sariel: ".........."

Keith: "Heh, I've known for a while that you're no ordinary guy, but I didn't think you'd block my sword with a whip. Impressive."

Sariel: "What are you planning, Prince Keith?"

Keith: "Nothing. I'm just thinking of taking responsibility and joining as well."

Sariel: "If you say you'll take responsibility, then could you please stop this?"

Keith: "Sorry, Sariel. I'm as fragile as a weed, so stopping this is beyond me."

Keith: "Though, I don't really intend to stop it."

Leon: "Emma! Come over here!"

Emma: "Leon! W-W-What should I do? Even Sariel has started fighting with his whip."

Leon: "Calm down. Do you know what to do in times like this?"

Emma: "No. I have absolutely no idea."

Leon: "It's simple."

Leon: "In this world, the strong devour the weak and make the losers submit."

Emma: "Um, why are you drawing your sword too?"

Leon: "Stay behind Chevalier."

Emma: "Wait! And he's gone."

Keith: "Oops, haha! I never thought I'd have the chance to fight you, Leon."

Leon: "Don't let your guard down. This fight won't end until there's a winner!"

Silvio: "Hey! Who the hell tried to attack me from behind just now!?"

Rio: "Ah, damn it! I missed. Seriously, this guy's so persistent!"

Luke: "How about I just blow everyone away together?"

Sariel: "That wouldn't be good. Please calm down."

Emma: "No one..."

Emma: "No one seems willing to listen to me."

Emma: "If everyone wants to fight with swords so badly, they should've done it in a martial arts tournament."

Emma: "The only person I can rely on in this group is..."

Chevalier: "............"

Emma: "You've been reading a book since earlier. Sorry, but I have a favor to ask."

Chevalier: "............"

Emma: "Could you please settle this commotion?"

Chevalier: "............"

Emma: "I'll give you some rare books. The owner recently said he found books from a lost nation!"

Chevalier: "Oh?"

Chevalier: "Lost nation's literature sounds interesting. Most of it is said to have been burned by Obsidian."

Emma: "The owner is an incredibly lucky person. Having one or two books from a lost nation is a real bargain!"

Chevalier: "In that case, it is certainly worth it."

Chevalier: "Stop, was it?"

Emma: "Eh? Huh? He disappeared."

Rio: "Waah!?"

Luke: "Whoa!?"

Silvio: "What the!?"

Sariel: "Oops."

Leon: "Chevalier!?"

Chevalier: "Keep your promise, simpleton."

Emma: "T-Thank you very much."

Emma: "I didn't expect you to disarm everyone in an instant."

Leon: "Isn't this unfair, Chevalier?"

Luke: "Sneaking in when our guard is down and taking the easy part is really sneaky."

Rio: "Exactly!"

Silvio: "Seriously, why are you the most motivated one here? That's not like your character at all."

Keith: "Your swordsmanship was impressive, Chevalier. How about sparring with me next?"

Sariel: "Prince Keith seems unusually spirited today."

Emma: "Okay, everyone, did you cool your heads already?"

Emma: "If we continue like this, we'll never be able to fulfill your wishes."

Emma: "Let's have a constructive discussion, please!"

Rio: "Emma looks cute when she's mad."

Luke & Leon: "Agreed."

Silvio: "You guys, shut up."

Keith: "Hmm."

Keith: "In that case, how about having the Second International Friendship Martial Arts Tournament?"

Silvio: "Ha?"

Keith: "I'm talking about the team's wishes."

Keith: "Well, everyone seemed to still want to fight, so I thought having it regularly might be a good idea."

Keith: "That way, the chance to have your wishes granted might increase from once to two or three times."

Keith: "I believe it could improve things without engaging in useless fights like this."

Leon: "You were the one who started this useless fight."

Emma: "Prince Keith's suggestion is wonderful!"

Emma: "Having the exchange event two or three times would deepen our bonds even more than just doing it once."

Rio: "Emma's eyes are sparkling. Cute."

Luke & Leon: "Agreed."

Silvio: "I told you guys to shut up."

Silvio: "If there's a next time, I want a different team from this damn mutt. I'll knock you guys out with all my might."

Rio: "Wow, so much confidence. Hopefully, you won't get beaten up in return."

Luke: "I'll be on a different team from that bastard Clavis. I'll take him down next time, for sure."

Sariel: "Where's the word friendship in all of these?"

Leon: "You don't have any objections, do you?"

Chevalier: "............"

Leon: "Oh, he ran away. Well, I guess that means he has no complaints."

Emma: "So it's decided then."

Emma: "I look forward to the day when we all get together again."

Ikepri Masterlist

[xi-xi-chen]

Just wanted to drop in and let you know that the way you draw Jinx and Lux together is my absolute favorite and this new AU with Isha literally has me frothing at the mouth trying to hold myself back from writing yet another AU for them that I don’t have the capacity for 😭 Your art is gorgeous and inspiring and it’s always a treat to see that you’ve posted another comic!

Awww thank you~

I must say I've never really thought I'd make it to a point to actually make some kind of comic out of it, either. I actually used to swore that there's no way I'd ever make one, haha.

And I get it too, I get inspired by writers and other artists as well and want to make more art but then as I draw it, it doesn't match the vision for both myself and what I think the author's intended and so I end up scrapping it.

Again, thank you love, and I always appreciate the feedback, the amount of times I've practiced trying to make them "readable" and make them look like "them" is just something else entirely.

<3

[amee-racle-ofmyown]

Hey, Amee!! I hope you’re doing well <3

If by any chance you’re up to it, could you please write a fic about Heist Mark being super jealous of Yancy because he and Y/N clearly seem to be into each other?? I LOVE your art and writings and I couldn’t get this idea out of my head <3 (Obviously no pressure, though!)

I'm so happy to hear you enjoy my work, thank you🥺💖 and thank you for your request! it got me out of a terrible writer's block. on that note, sorry this took quite some time, I've been in a bit of a funk of on and off general creative block, and unable to finish any writing at all for even longer. this was a pretty fun challenge! I myself view Yancy platonically so I wasn't quite sure where to go with this initially, and I had to fight every urge to just make this heist mark x y/n dfsjsjsv. that said, it did end up being more heist mark-centric than maybe you intended? in which case, I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself😔 yancy is there but very briefly haha

Don't you tell me that you never even thought, 'maybe we could run'

2,603 words | Read on AO3

‘We're all gonna be rehearsing tomorrow so youse best get some sleep.’

You nod as you close the gate to yours and Mark's shared cell, stifling a yawn.

‘Goodnight, Yancy.’

You hold each other's gaze for a moment, before he turns and heads off, a tattooed hand over the back of his neck and a sweet smile still on his face. You watch as he disappears into the outer hallway and a guard appears to lock up your cell for the evening.

Your long-time accomplice and friend stands at the edge of your vision, arms folded.

‘Having fun with your new boyfriend, buddy?’ he asks, sounding unimpressed and slightly strained.

‘Oh, shush, Mark,’ you chide, but your stomach flips at the notion.

‘Yeah… Well, while you were busy playing Broadway,’ he glances to either side of the cell outside and continues in a lowered voice, ‘I've been hard at work hatching our escape. And I'm telling you, it's foolproof.’

‘Uh huh. As foolproof as your other three failed plans? I really don't wanna get thrown in solitary again.’

‘Please, that was one time! — and I don't see you bothering to come up with any ideas. Even though you pretty much got us into this mess.’

That accusation ticks you off, but you're quick to retaliate.

‘Are you seriously still hung up on that? How is this my fault? You couldn't fly a helicopter, why would you assume I can? You shouldn't have even presented it as an option!’

Your exclamation earns you a couple looks from other inmates slowly filing into their cells for the night.

‘Nevermind that now,’ Mark says, infuriatingly placatingly, ‘do you wanna hear the plan or not?’

The thread of uncertainty that you've been avoiding coils tight in your chest and you pause, wondering how to bring up what's been nagging at you for days.

‘Um, so, I've been thinking. What if… what if we don't try to escape?’

‘Ha ha. Funny joke, pal.’

‘I'm serious, Mark. We could just… stay here and wait out our sentence, if we play it safe we might even get our time reduced on good behaviour. We could be gone in like a decade. Or a few years! Maybe. Probably. Maybe.’ Wishful thinking, perhaps.

He scoffs, as if the idea isn't even worth considering.

‘There is no way you're genuinely telling me to just wait it out. Maybe you haven't noticed since you've been in la-la land lately, but we're not on vacation, we're in prison,’ Mark spouts, voice growing thick with agitation. ‘What was supposed to be the heist of a lifetime, would've set us up for decades to come, is still on the line! And we're on a bit of a time crunch here — I don't trust that warden guy one bit with the Box, or in general,’ he sneers. ‘I mean what kind of name is Murder-Slaughter? Ugh, do we even know for sure if he still has it?’

‘Yancy mentioned seeing it in his office the last time he was there, which was earlier today, so yeah, probably.’

‘Ugh, there you go again about Yancy. It's always Yancy this, Yancy that, blah blah blah, Yancy!’

‘Wh– I was just answering your question!’

‘Y'know what? I'm sick and tired of being the only one taking this seriously while you act like it's all a big party.’

He places a hand on his hip, the other poking a finger towards you as he speaks. It would be comical, if he wasn't acting like a jerk.

‘What's up with you?’

‘What's up with me? What's up with you? You seriously wanna stay in this— this shithole, ‘cause of what? Some pretty face you've known for all of like, less than two weeks??’

‘Oh my God, Mark, it's not that terrible, and Yancy is actually my friend, he's been nothing but welcoming and kind since we got here, and—’

‘Oh, did you forget that he tried to beat you up when you first met? Real interesting, how you let that little detail slip.’

‘We just got off on the wrong foot, he's really—’

It's then that you see it — something in the slight hunch in his gait, the furrow of his brow, his pursed lips and tense jaw — and you wonder why you hadn't noticed before. It's not just anger and frustration, it's something bitter and personal.

‘Mark… are you jealous?’

Bingo. His eyes only widen a sliver, for a fraction of a second, but you're so used to reading him that even the most imperceptible of reactions on his usually very expressive face have become familiar to you.

‘Psh. I'm not jealous.’

‘You so are jealous! Oh my god, you're super duper jealous,’ you say with a grin, revelling in this new information.

‘Shut up, why would I be jealous?’ he protests, trying to sound nonchalant. But it's too late. You've already seen through it.

‘Is that what this is about?’ you say with a laugh. ‘You just want my attention back or something?’

He stares blankly for a moment.

‘Are you serious right now? You actually think the only reason I'm mad is because some random dude just waltzes in and starts acting all buddy buddy with you and you fall head-over-heels,’ he jeers with his hands either side of his face, fluttering his eyelashes mockingly. ‘Hook, line and sinker.’

‘Mark—’

‘I mean, never mind your partner, right? You know, your best friend who you've known and worked with for years? Who cares what he thinks?!’

‘Mark, I—’

‘In fact, he can get punched through a wall for all you care! You won't even bat an eye, as long as there's a random spontaneous musical number immediately afterwards, it's all in good fun!’

‘Ok, that's not fair,’ you push back. ‘Of course I was worried! But I was also surrounded by violent criminals at the time, we've been over this!’

‘Oh, so they're “violent criminals” now? But they're simply “hurt, misunderstood souls” when it suits you?!’ he shoots back, making air quotes to emphasise his point.

‘They're people, Mark! They're allowed to be… multi-faceted!’

‘Lights out, everybody,’ comes a guard's voice, ringing through the hallway as it suddenly becomes dark, save for the glow of dim lamplight emanating from one or two of the other cells.

‘Whatever, let's just get some sleep,’ Mark grumbles under his breath.

‘You always do this!’ you whisper harshly, but inadvertently let the volume slip back into your voice as you feel your blood boil. ‘You try to cut things off and act like the “bigger person” just to get out of an argument that, newsflash, YOU'RE LOSING.’

‘Oh, whatever, what-f*cking-ever!’

‘You're being so damn overdramatic, Mark! It's not like I'm trying to break up our team.’

‘Yeah, well– well maybe we should!’

You don't know why it jolts you like a gunshot when he says it, but it does. His words, the force and resentment behind them, pierce you to your core. It stops any quick-fire response you had at the ready in its tracks.

Regret immediately flashes across his face, but he quickly attempts to cover it with a steely, hardened gaze. ‘Clearly, we want different things. So maybe it's for the best.’

‘Hey!’ one of the guards calls out from across the hall. ‘Lights out means quiet, you two. Don't make us separate you into different cells.’

With a frustrated huff, you reluctantly traipse off to bed, yours being the lower half of the bunk while Mark settles above you.

It really is a rather decent bed. The mattress is nothing special, but comfortable, and the soft blanket is accompanied by an oddly luxurious, fluffy pillow. Definitely above what you'd expect is probably average prison standards. Frankly, you don't know what Mark's problem is with this place. It's honestly not half bad. As far as you expect jails go, it surely could be a lot worse.

You lay back and let your breathing even out, trying your best to allow some of the bubbling anger to die down. Eventually, you hear the guards leave.

Time passes, it could be minutes or hours; it's not like the passage of time has felt right at all to you since that last heist.

It's silent, save for the sound of your breaths and Mark's above you. You're still upset with him, but the sound of him breathing nearby has always been oddly comforting. The two of you have had plenty of close calls as a pair — even times when you had to patch each other up after jobs that went particularly badly. If you got injured on a heist, you couldn't simply call an ambulance or show up at a hospital in an emergency and risk having your whole operation blown. That was simply the nature of your line of work.

At the worst of times, as long as you could hear those steady, even breaths, you could tell yourself he would pull through, and things would be fine.

You idly watch the mattress above you, letting the rhythm of your friend's breathing become a gentle white noise, and think.

You think about that heist and the Box. Ancient, coveted, mysterious. Sitting atop its perch in the museum vault, in all its glory and allure, practically asking to be stolen. The gleam of the gem encrusted in its surface. You wonder if the prize held within would be worth all of this, if you managed to get it back.

You think about Yancy, a little rough and a little troubled and not seeing much point in trying to kick old habits; but fun and soft and sensitive and full of remorse. You think about the feeling of your hand in his when you practise a routine with him, how his whole face lights up when he's excited or falls when he's sad or pensive. You think about how he has made this penitentiary into a home, and these inmates into a family.

You think about Mark. Silly, stupid, steadfast Mark, snarky and thoughtful and loyal. Who isn't actually as dumb as he lets on. Who is resourceful and quick-thinking when a plan needs to be formed. Who makes bad puns and trusts you whole-heartedly, and who always lets you decide which course of action to take, no matter how much he disagrees, simply due to his unwavering faith in you. Mark, your co-worker, your friend, your partner in crime. Who is maybe a little enamoured with you, despite you trying to ignore it. Who you half-heartedly agreed to go on a date with, not having it in you to turn him down, nor prepared for the guilt that would be eating away at you now.

You think about one of the first things he told you when you landed yourselves at Happy Trails: About how he doesn't belong here, but maybe you do. What if he were to leave and you were to stay? The thought breaks your heart a little.

Then, a whisper from above into the quiet, gently interrupting your thoughts.

‘Hey, you still awake?’

‘...Yeah.’

You hear his voice, soft-spoken, but clear enough that you can hear the sincerity laced into it.

‘I… I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get so worked up.’

‘Yeah, I'm sorry too,’ you reply, matching his volume.

‘And I didn't mean it,’ he says, and you think you hear the slightest tremble in the statement, almost as if he's fighting tears, and for a second you wish you could see his face, ‘what I said before, about uh, splitting up. I know I joke about that kind of thing all the time, and not coming back for you… But you know I don't really mean it, right?’

You've certainly had your doubts in the past, but those moments seem so far away now; footnotes in a slowly unfolding tale, stepping stones on the journey the pair of you have taken together as you worked your way from theft to theft to get to this point. As much as you'd butt heads over the years, you could always count on each other and you always stuck together.

‘Right?’

‘Yeah, I know…’

‘...And, alright, your lack of interest in breaking out aside, maybe I am kinda jealous.’

‘Ha! I knew it.’

‘Yeah, yeah.’ He sighs. ‘It's just… it took us a while to be like we are now and yet, you're suddenly so close to him when it hasn't even been that long, it just doesn't feel fair. I dunno, it's stupid.’

‘Nah, I get it. I'm sorry if I made you feel left behind.

‘And I'm sorry if I ever made you feel pressured into something you're actually just not all that into.’

You feel a bit of tension leave your chest as a small smile appears on your face. ‘I appreciate that.’

In some ways you're grateful for the small bed separating you and preventing you from being face to face. You think it makes this easier for both of you.

‘I don't want to lose you, y'know? I mean, we're supposed to be partners. Ride or die, remember?’

‘Oh, Mark… You know I still trust you with my life…’ You pause, considering your words. ‘For the first time in ages, things feel a little more complicated than just being about us.’

A beat, then you hear him inhale, and he says your name, foregoing any of his usual nicknames.

‘...Are you… happy here? Does he make you happy?’

‘There's things I miss about freedom, sure, but it's not so bad here. And let's face it, our crimes were probably gonna catch up to us eventually, one way or another, right? And Yancy…’ You let out the smallest huff of laughter, smiling to yourself once again. ‘You're right, it hasn't been very long… There's just something about him, I guess. I know he might be a little much at times but I enjoy being around him, and he honestly seems like he wants to make up for things he's done in the past by being here. Maybe nothing will come of this but even so, in a weird way, he kind of makes me want to do better?’

Mark breathes a good-natured huff of laughter as well, and the two of you take a moment to muse on the irony of that sentiment.

‘I just– I can't handle being stuck here,’ he finally says. ‘But you're right, nothing I've tried so far has worked, anyway.’

‘Y'know… Yancy knows all the ins and outs of this place. He could probably help us if we wanted it.’

‘Do you want it?’

Do you want to leave or stay? The real question beneath it all.

You're quiet again, and it feels as if every possibility is laid out before you, only obscured.

‘I don't know,’ you say eventually. ‘I need more time to think. I just don't want you to think I'm making a choice between you or him, there's so many other things I need to consider. That we need to consider.’

‘That's fair… Just don't take too long, ok? Not like we can pause or rewind time, haha.’

‘Right… In the meantime, could you at least try to get along with Yancy and the others? You might like them if you give them a chance.’

‘... Fine, I'll try,’ he acquiesces.

You raise a hand to your mouth to cover a yawn. A far more comfortable silence falls over the room, and you start to feel sleep overtake you.

‘... Hey, Mark?’

‘Yeah?’

‘We're still partners.’

If nothing else, you hope this will reassure him.

‘...Ok. Sweet dreams, partner.’

[jonillaa]

hi!! can you write something about high school basketball player!jo being overprotective of his gf in front of his teammates? thank you ~~~

SLAM DUNK ┊ asakura jo

PAIRING ┊ jo x f!reader

GENRE ┊ fluff (very very slight angst if you squint)

WC ┊ 520

WARNINGS ┊ bullying , ending is kinda cringe erm.. , lowercase intended!! (lmk if i missed anything!)

SYNOPSIS ┊ being the girlfriend of your high school's heartthrob, jo, felt like a dream come true. however, the constant name-calling and teasing from his teammates began to take a toll on your self-esteem. jo, unable to bear seeing you hurt, takes matters into his own hands, even if it means quitting the team.

A/N ┊ hii did you guys miss me 😋😋 bye let’s not talk about how the title doesn’t match up with the drabble at all.. SHHHH I literally don’t know what else to put ☹️ anyways short drabble for bae jo becuz I miss him and i don’t wanna be dead anymore haha!! 😆

you never expected to be the girlfriend of the most popular guy in school, jo. he was the star basketball player, with his handsome visuals and long legs that seemed to effortlessly glide across the court. but what drew him to you was the shared art class you had together. he had always had his eyes on you, even before you started dating.

at first, being jo’s girlfriend felt like a dream. he was sweet and caring, always there to comfort and reassure you when the relentless name-calling from his fan girls got to be too much. you didn't mind it at first, but as time went on, their words slowly chipped away at your confidence.

but just when you thought things couldn't get worse, jo’s basketball teammates started picking on you. they would whisper comments about you into his ears, teasing him for dating someone like you and saying he could do better. their words hurt more than anything the fan girls could say, and it felt like a betrayal coming from his own teammates.

one day, during basketball practice, the teasing reached its peak. jo’s eyebrows furrowed with anger as he listened to his teammates' snide remarks. he had had enough. without hesitation, he walked up to you, his usually awkward demeanor replaced with a determined expression.

"hey, let's get out of here," jo said, his voice filled with a mix of protectiveness and frustration.

confused but intrigued, you followed him as he led you away from the gym and into a quieter hallway. once you were alone, jo turned to face you, his eyes filled with a mix of concern and determination.

"i can’t stand seeing them treat you like that," he confessed, his voice laced with anger. "they’re supposed to support me through everything, it makes me wanna quit the team. you deserve so much better than this."

you couldn't help but feel your heart swell at his words. his sudden overprotectiveness was both surprising and attractive to you. you had always admired his strength and skill on the basketball court, but seeing him stand up for you like this made you fall for him even more.

"i appreciate you standing up for me, jo," you replied, your voice filled with gratitude. "but i don't want you to quit because of me."

jo’s expression softened as he reached out to gently cup your face, his touch sending shivers down your spine. "i would do anything for you, even if it means giving up basketball. you mean more to me than anything else."

his words left you speechless, your heart pounding in your chest. you never expected jo to be so open and vulnerable with his feelings. it made you realize just how much he cared for you.

from that day forward, jo’s teammates never dared to say another word about you. the anger in his eyes and the determination in his voice had made it clear that he would not tolerate any more disrespect towards you. his actions spoke louder than any words could, and his teammates finally understood the depth of his feelings for you.

[zarla-s]

Man it's been a long time since I've done an ask cluster! Let's see if I can get some down...

He's an extremely fun character to write for and play with! So in that sense I'm fond of him, haha. He's such a huge disaster of a person, there's always something fun to do with him. Well "fun" in a relative sense.

I don't have anything to forgive him for, he didn't hurt me. |D He hurt the brothers!

I do have an idea for a cute feature inspired by Six-Eared Macaque! I should really sit down and do that already... and finish the one I half started but never finished...

I don't think my opinion on any of them changed! I love them all, haha. Which ones I drew comics about just depends on which ones I get ideas for really. Sometimes I get Alphys ideas and sometimes I get Goatparents ideas! Inspiration is fickle!

I don't have any solid plans or anything. :B Just gonna keep chugging along with silly comics and art! Work on Defrag and such. I'd like to finish a Ladyverse comic I've had lying around forever, and I had vague plans for doing a doujin for them too I could work on... and also seeing if I could format Handplates into a book format... I've always got a bunch of projects, haha.

It works on that level! It wasn't intentional though. |D

I do enjoy speculation! I don't really have much of my own though, I didn't predict anything in chapter 2 so now I'm assuming I can't predict anything in the future chapters either, haha.

Emesis Blue is great! Some really beautiful visuals in there, very striking! Love the mood of it too and a lot of the surreal imagery. I think it helped spur me back into TF2 again, haha. Medic and Scout's relationship was so cute.

I have thought about this! It has its share of challenges though... I outlined them more in this post. A pdf would be more doable though... could even include some extra stuff as well! Hmm...

I can see that! He'd probably spend as much time out in the rain as he could just doing whatever to stay outside.

It was pretty much always going to end like that. I always wanted it to end on a hopeful note! Which might seem weird with how dark it is at the beginning. I DID for a brief period at the very beginning of Handplates think about stopping with the Pacifist run, but that was only because I thought going where I wanted to go would take too long and already the project seemed so dauntingly huge at the time, haha. But it was always going to end in a positive way!

Gaster talks about what he originally intended to create here, and he explains a bit about the physical experiments he runs on the brothers here. They aren't really a solution in and of themselves so much as tools to try and find a way to break the barrier. Really though, Gaster got stuck in the sunk-cost fallacy lol.

I don't really have opinions about what canon Gaster would be like. |D Handplates Gaster is his own thing really. Canon Gaster, who knows! Deltarune Gaster, who knows! I will say I hope Gaster stays a mystery in Deltarune and never actually shows up but I think the odds of that are really low at this point.

I thought about doing a script along those lines! I did a few rough drafts of one, but it never really went anywhere... it'd end up dead-ending or kind of meandering off. I might see if I can get an actual script down for a side-comic or something in the future... it might be better suited for a fic.

I was just thinking about this lately! I was picturing Gaster totally forgetting about that until he sees Papyrus squinting and is like OH GOD YOUR EYES THAT'S RIGHT D: and goes to get him looked at lol.

I couldn't come up with a good idea for Flowey which is a shame, I do like him, haha. If one comes to me though I might make a little side comic about it!

Gaster's LV is complicated... his stats in-game are ludicrous if I recall correctly. Did he carry the damage from his murders into the void, even if those murders weren't his in the new timeline? Deep thoughts.

He fed them anything he could find, haha. Which is why sometimes they just ended up with chocolate bars (which he intended as dinner for himself). He probably fed them more often than he fed himself lol. He did feed them fairly regularly though.

Not about skeletons, probably. |D

Man I know I had an explanation for this but it was so long ago... it's hard for me to remember. It could be that the Riverperson is just weird and has weird insight into elements of things, had a prophetic dream... I don't know! It bugs me now that I can't remember this, haha.

[vibratingskull]

Hey apologies in advance for the long ramble...

I have a suspicion (which may be completely wrong obvs) that Tim Zahn has told Lars all about Thrawns true personality and his intentions.

I don't know if Lars has read the books (he may have) but do I think there's a disconnect between the way Lars PLAYS Thrawn and the way Filony WRITES Thrawn if that makes sense?...

It seems that Filoni wants to take some of the nuance out his character and make him more typically evil. I know we don't know quite yet what will happen to him in the future but looking at Filoni's track record with Thrawn it looks like he wants him to be more typically evil. (I understand the story's he tells are from the side of rebels/heroes and he is ultimately the ENEMY at the end of it all but he doesn't like to go beyond that).

However when I watch Lars on screen and the way he talks about him in interviews I can definitely see some of Tim's Thrawn come through.

The sad little facial expressions and tone of voice, the way he looks off into the distance when Sabine says "you wouldn't understand" (which he does!), the disappointed way he says "these were the volunteers, they were made aware..." he obviously isn't happy with asking his crew that have survived for a decade with him but he's done the maths and realised that it was the only way to get the majority of the crew back.

What really gives it away for me is the way he asks Morgan to stay behind...he can't even bring himself to actually say the words, he just says "We need a little more time" and it's obvious what he needs her to do. Lars really hesitates beforehand and he clearly despises what he's asked of her.

I also think the way he said to her "for the empire" sounds like it's said with massive eye roll behind it

Sigh....."for the empire....😮‍💨😒🙄"

He's sick of serving and sacrificing for these people by this point.

What really gets me is that final shot of him when they are approaching Dathomir, he's got this real look of deep sadness as he looks over the cargo in the ship (what ever that turns out to be) . Would be very easy for Lars to have a smug look of satisfaction or an evil smirk "haha! I'm back! 😈" but he doesn't...there's no glory in his victory, he's TIRED and understands the sacrifices made for his return.

I know there is a lot of discourse about the way he was portrayed in Ashoka but I think all of the positive stuff can be firmly laid at Lars door. He seems to understand what the character was supposed to be.

I know he's met Tim Zahn at least once, I'm convinced the two of them had a long sit down and talked at length about him either that or he went away and did his research.

Sorry again for my essay. It's just something I've had floating around in my brain for a while 😅.

In short: A lot of book Thrawn personality can be inferred from Lars performance even if not outright written.

That is actually one of my theories too. I am convinced that Lars read the books, or at least one of the two canon trilogies, for his role. He is conscientious and hard working, so it sounds like him to sit down and read the original material to prepare for his role.

I also suspect that he did talk with Tim and exchanged on Thrawn and who he really is, his motives, and his goals to have a deeper understanding of his character.

Like you, I have a weird sensation about how he is written and how Lars portrays him! There are so many micro expressions he has that don't feel like Filoni intended for them to be there in his script

You can qo clearly see him having a flashback of Thrass when Sabine says "you wouldn't understand"

Yes, he does

He understand

He had to say farewell so many times, deep downs he maybe even suspect already he will never see his people ever again

Never again he will admire Csilla

Never again he will eat at that bistro he used to go with Thrass

Never again he'll pay Ar'alani a drink in a crowded bar

He'll never see his people art again

He knows all the sacrifice he had to do and all of those that had to be done just to come back in Coruscant's galaxy.

You can see all of that in Lars' microexpressions in each interactions he has.

Lar knows what's up with the character and confers him so much more sadness than Filoni's writing gives him

And thats why we respect Lars in this house!!!!

[sclki-op]

Hello!! How are you doing? I hope your day is well when you read this message.

I'm reaching out to say, THANK YOU!! For being my main (and only) source of Smozo 🫶

Originally, I wanted to share some HCS abt smozo with you cuz I saw your post about it, but then I couldn't think up anything for them 😭 it's quite a pain when I love this rare pair, but I just can't think of anything that they would do!

So, I've come to ask, if you would share some HCS abt them?

Truly, I'm in a deep hole that I dug myself in... Being a smozo fan is wonderful yet painful 😖 though, that's to be expected of most rare pairs, but for Smozo it's like a dry desert with one lake nearby. (Your lovely works of them)

I've never thought of them before, so I just grew curious and had a look through your ao3 acc (I'm a huge stalker/j) and ended up reading every fic and comic you've made and went through all your art works there... This is actually my first time interacting with you excluding a comment I've made on one of your fics a year ago I think? You've made a new perspective of them for me and now I'm a huge Smozo fan 🫶

I was actually surprised when you said you weren't a writer, (no offense, I promise 😞) your fics are really well structured and I love rereading them!

I usually don't interact much, so this is like a rant about how much I appreciate your work. I hope you know that I'll always be a fan of your gorgeous art work and lovely fics! 💗

Hii! I’m doing good, thanks 💛

Aah I’m glad that you like my art and fics! Thank you so much for following me on this little journey :D

Guess I'll just add a bunch of random facts because it's hard to think of something I haven't already shared under other asks or in my art/fics haha

– Smoker and Zoro like to spar for the fun of it. Since Zoro gains a big advantage after he learns how to use haki, they fight the traditional way to make it even – fists and weapons and nothing else

– The worst of angst is kept on Smoker’s behalf. Zoro gets himself almost killed too often… (staring intently at sabaody. and then at wano. just imagine Smoker already having a piece of Zoro's vivre card by then. what's with that scene with grim reaper? a possible clinical death?? I'm going insane as I'm writing snippets for that. poor man...(I haven't gotten to those chapters yet but I was eager for spoilers from that specific scene))

– I like to think that Smoker tends to be very attentive to the other’s mood and body language, never missing an opportunity to take care of things. The thoughtfulness. And I do think that under all that gruffness hides a man of a soft heart that becomes eager to give affection the moment he learns that it belongs in the thing the two of them have

– While Smoker's pretty reserved and held back and needs time to fully unwind to start initiating things, Zoro's much more open and straightforward in his attention towards him. Never wastes time beating around the bush

– Robin was the first person to find out about their thing and will be the only one until so much later. I actually intended to draw another page for my 'first kiss' comic with Zoro realising he was being watched but I never got to finish that

Sanji almost pieces the puzzle together shortly after the events of Punk Hazard and confronts Zoro about it. Who explains everything himself

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Oh I can absolutely understand because that's how it felt during the first year of my searching and waiting for any smozo content at all... Back then I barely posted online (and it was a BIG no for me to share ship art) so I only scribbled something small down occasionally and stored it in a folder. I wrongly assumed that no one would be interested in seeing these two haha. Now I have a reason to share my view of them, draw and write all the little scenarios I came up with and also get to discuss all of it with others :D

Thank you so much for your high praise, it means a lot to know that someone enjoys things I make!!