#I'm saving it also I'll put it on my personal website later

[riverofdragons]

S - The Twelve Trials of Asterix

A true blue classic. Very funny, there's a lot of varied locations and animation styles and it's just really well written.

The settings are used very creatively to tell jokes and move the plot forward. Certified "can watch anytime" movie.

1 point deducted for gross depictions of background characters of color, 9/10

A - Asterix in Egypt

Fun premise, creative usage of the usual formula and nice change of scenery. This one also has fun and catchy songs.

I only put it lower than The Twelve Trials because it's not as tightly written or funny, but it's still a fun time. If this and The Twelve Trials are anything to go by, it's that Asterix movies benefit from plots that are just a series of events with a predictable yet satisfying climax by the end.

Once more, 1 point deducted for gross depictions of background characters of color and also because it's an European movie depicting a non-white culture in 1968, 8/10

B - Asterix and the Vikings

The Disney movie of Asterix movies, honestly? In the sense that it's beautifully animated have great use of CGI, and a very competently paced plot (which can be an issue from many Asterix movies, but the rest of them tend to make up for it).

It's B tier because it isn't very funny and because it's going for a plot with more stakes that by the end the points it brings up kind of get forgotten. It questions gender roles in the beginning but it entirely drops them. That isn't to say I would have wanted it to commit to it because this just isn't that type of series.

It's a good watch, but nothing special. 7/10

B - Asterix, the Gaul

It's an introductory movie, pretty much. Establishes the world of Asterix and has a simple plot based on the established rules. Not much to say, but it's a neat time. 6/10

C - Asterix in Britain

The joke is that Brits are posh and drop everything to drink tea at five. Also that they strictly don't work on weekends and have plenty of days off? Weird flex, movie, but okay.

The setting is not used creatively in the slightest, most of the funny jokes only come from the ineptness of the Roman Empire which we could have had in any other setting.

The animation is beautiful, but that's all there is to it. 5/10

D - Asterix and the Big Fight

This one is pretty bizarre.

There aren't many jokes maybe outside visual gags that also, unlike usually, don't return to affect the plot. That's when you know, it's trying to take itself too seriously.

That isn't to say the mood isn't conveyed well, but it's so jarring for this series. There's a lot of shockingly graphic scenes despite the fact that it is, like usual, just cartoon violence. It's just animated in a very visceral way. The soothsayer's introductory scene made me shake in my boots as a kid.

But shocking imagery and subject matter does not a good movie make. 4/10

D - Asterix Versus Caesar

This one is bizarre in another way.

Two new characters are introduced who are a macho action hero and a very beautifully drawn conventionally attractive woman who do not fit the setting or the art style at all. They also have little personality and serve little more than damsels in distress in the story. Yeah the action hero guy too. I guess it's subversive but I wish the movie ran with that and made the situation funny.

This movie is also a little bleak in places but it is that in moderation. It's still a little jarring within the series itself but not in the movie itself which already is a little more serious than others.

Still, not many jokes, not many interesting setpieces, the plot isn't very interesting either. It's competently animated. 4/10

D - Asterix at the Olympic Games

This one is not a retelling or already animated Asterix stories, thankfully. The plot is also written much tighter and it's a lot more interesting.

The Michael Schumacher cameo was cheeky as hell I have no clue how that happened. I don't know celebrities but I had a cars phase and I knew my F1 drivers.

It's okay for what it is, but what it is is an inferior medium telling a story that wasn't meant to be live-action. 4/10

F - Asterix and Obelix: Mission Cleopatra

It's literally just a retelling of Asterix in Egypt but it's worse because it's live-action and Asterix doesn't work in live-action.

The sets were fun, but that's it. The songs were also replaced with pop songs. Blasphemy. 2/10

F - Asterix and Obelix (1999)

It's literally just a retelling of Asterix the Gaul but it's worse because it's live-action and Asterix doesn't work in live-action.

The only thing it does better is that the name spoofs are funnier than in the cartoons, but I will also immediately deduct that point for the gross-out scenes. This one doesn't even have a fun set to go with it like Mission Cleopatra. 1/10

F - Asterix Conquers America

This one just has every flavor of racism against Native Americans you can imagine, don't watch it. 0/10

I should make a tierlist about all the Asterix movies tbh

[dotmander]

How To Get Your Character Models Out Of A Game: Tips And Tricks For Bitches That Have Never Used Blender

(it's me, i'm bitches)

(also ignore how messy that lighting is it's 1am and i should have been asleep hours ago. he's there for proof of concept 💕)

a couple people (specifically @forsaken-constellation and @ratasum) asked for a tutorial on how to rip models out of the game. this is not that, but it is a compilation of resources i used to learn about ripping, blender, and 3d modeling in general. i desperately wanted a post like this to exist when i was trying to figure this out, so here we go! all the resources below are completely free, with the exception of a link to the patreon of the person that created ninjaripper.

disclaimers:

there are probably more efficient ways to do the things i am doing. i watched a tutorial to learn shortcuts and then skipped to character models. if you have tips to add, corrections to make, or other thoughts, please feel free to share! i'll link to your post here. ^^

i do not know if any of this will get your account banned. i've ripped several models, so i'm going to assume it's fine as long as you don't try to make money off of it. use your best judgment, be an adult, etc etc etc

last updated: june 30, 2024

PROGRAMS & WEBSITES

ninjaripper 1.7.1 - there's a newer version on the creator's patreon, presumably with support for newer versions of blender and fewer bugs, but i haven't tried that

blender 2.79 - the import addon that comes with ninjaripper 1.7.1 is outdated for the current version of blender (3.5 as of this post), so 2.79 is needed to combine the .RIP files into a .BLEND (blender) file

noesis - ninjaripper saves your textures as .DDS files, noesis lets you view them and export them as .PNGs

blender 3.5 (optional?) - i just like it better than 2.79. if you're completely new it might not matter to you. all of the tutorials linked later are for later versions, though.

mixamo (optional) - rigs your character for you and lets you put them in Situations (like my guy above.) there's a whole library of free animations and poses you can try!

TUTORIALS

how to use ninjaripper - most of what you need to know about actually ripping the files and using ninjaripper is covered here. do not skip this one.

how to use blender 3.5 - full disclosure i haven't finished this series because it's uhhhh many hours long. but if you are a complete newbie to blender, i do recommend at least the first few videos; you'll learn about shortcuts that will make your life easier, how to unfuck your model when it fucks itself for no reason, and different terms that will help you google things you don't know later on. possibly he even covers some of the things i'm about to link! anyway.

what's a uv map?

how to apply textures

how to apply bump maps (note: for our purposes, you wouldn't add a color ramp node, you would add an image node with your bump map, and attach it to the bump node as the person does in the video)

there should be stuff here about weight painting, cloth physics, emission maps (makes your sylvari glow), and other stuff, but um. i haven't figured those out <3  

TIPS

TURN UP YOUR GRAPHICS BEFORE YOU RIP - if you don't, you might end up missing certain textures/glows/etc. HOWEVER, you should turn animations down, because apparently high animation can make your meshes misplace themselves

rip from the character select screen, rather than an instance, because you will have 100 meshes to sort through instead of 1400. i am not exaggerating either of those numbers. if you are new to blender, please love yourself and start with character select.

your textures will be fucked up the first time you try to apply them. this is because the UV maps (the things that tell your textures where to go) of your models are flipped upside down in relation to the texture image. you can flip them back over manually, ooooor you can just flip the entire texture file in something like CSP or photoshop.

for some reason all eyes are red in the texture files. i have not figured out why. i recommend editing the .PNG to have the correct eye color before applying the texture.

that's all i can think of for now - if you have other questions, feel free to shoot them my way, although i can't promise i'll have a straight answer ^^;;

mixamo only works for humanoid characters with tight clothing (or without clothing at all). if you try to use it to rig a charr or asura, or someone with a skirt or big sleeves, you will most likely be disappointed.

2024 edit: sometimes parts of hair meshes just...disappear. i have no idea why. if you can figure it out please let me know LMAO

information from bookahlogy about character proportions, fixing normals, and other fun tips

[sundiced]

not enough people read killer peter on this website. or at all. so actually I'm going to have to recreate the entire fandom experience all on my own starting with the fan theories.

Theory 1: Thaddeus is going to die

"I'll protect you" is the biggest death flag of all time paired with that smile and the sun on his face. He's consistently demonstrated a marked lack of care for his own wellbeing in favor of revenge and protecting Kowloon Hell. He has expressed the desire to be Peter's family and the last person to do that was Simon right before he got his arm cut off. Likely scenario is that he either dies trying to save Peter, hence the multiple promises that he won't put Kim Soongu in danger. Alternative is he joins Peter's new disciples (since Peter specifically starts making that an actual organized thing in the middle of Thaddeus's arc, which I don't think is a coincidence) and then dies later in the manhwa, solely because literally everything about him is likable which means he's much more likely to die than characters who are purely comedic relief or characters who are purely antagonists. From Nathaniel's arc we can tell that the author doesn't have any qualms about offing already-developed plot relevant characters (and Yuika, technically, but there's an argument for her being fridged, in which case her death wouldn't count towards deducing the author's typical stance on how willing they are to kill a character.)

Theory 2, which needs to conflict with Theory 1 for the full fandom experience: There's no way Thaddeus is going to die

Don't listen to the previous person, she's full of shit. This manhwa has been known to bait what feels like death flags. Simon is a noted example of this. I thought he was going to die when Peter left the island. I thought he was going to die when Yuika and Kaego first showed up on the island. I thought he was going to die when Peter found his arm in a box, and when Peter was running back to his room on the cruise, and when there was a flashback scene to them making a promise when they were younger, and when Simon was packing his bags and there was a shot of him walking off into the sun waving goodbye and promising he'd be back soon (you cannot fault me for this pls). This could mean multiple different things, namely a) Simon is going to die, b) this manhwa has a history of making you think a character is going to die with typical death flags and then not actually going through with it, or c) I have completely lost my sense for interpreting what is and isn't foreshadowing. Both b and c stand in favor of Thaddeus living. Also I would really like him to live, which doesn't really increase the likelihood of him living in any way but it does mean believing he's going to live is the right thing to do from a logical standpoint regardless of whether it's plausible because it will make me happier now and make me sadder if he actually dies, both of which are actually good things in the grand scheme of things.

Ideal Situation (surprisingly partially likely given that this is the type of manhwa where Peter will probably never lose):

Thaddeus ends up on Peter's team of new apostles, either via betraying Raphael or after refusing to betray Raphael but being allowed to be there anyway because Peter seems fairly understanding about the whole wanting-to-kill-him thing. Peter finds a way to save Kowloon Hell that doesn't involve Raphael's government connections, because if that was going to be a central plot point there probably would've been some form of a government worker type character introduced already instead of Raphael's influence existing as an unfightable concept. Alternatively Thaddeus gives up on Kowloon Hell and lives his own life and also his mother comes back and buys him tanghulu and everyone is happy yay.

[wjbs-aus]

Hey you! Yes, you! Learn how to use GZDoom!

Also if you see this post, please reblog it if you think it's good, like I don't think Tumblr's algorithm (that kinda exists) will like it.

Hi, I'm Lynn "WJB" Beck, and I'm here to tell you about an exciting new old game engine that is extremely easy to use for not just making original games, but also mods and animations and stuff!

And this engine... is GZDoom.

GZDoom is an enhanced sourceport of the 1993 first-person shooter, demon-punching simulator and stress-test for pretty much any technology that contains a computer. As opposed to more low-key and/or "vanilla" sourceports like Chocolate Doom or Boom, GZDoom allows for a lot more options, including Build Engine-style voxels, several types of dynamic lighting, and even stuff that was originally exclusive to specific Doom Engine games, like Strife's light RPG mechanics, This means that it can be used to make extremely impressive "total conversion" mods, and even fully original games with entirely custom stuff!

This guide covers how to get started, and a basic overview of how certain things work (get ready to learn about lumps!).

Getting Started

Ok so before you can start Doing The Thing, you need to... install some software! Don't worry, it's only like 4 and they're fairly lightweight.

Go to this website here and download the most recent version of GZDoom. You will need this to actually run your game.

Go here and get Slade. You will need this to import custom graphics and audio, as well as to use text-lumps (which are basically necessary, even if you're making a basic custom level set, and I will explain why further down).

This ZDoom Forum topic is where you can get Ultimate Doom Builder. While there are other Doom mapping tools, UDB is what I personally use, and it's extremely beginner-friendly while also being fairly versatile. It even has a built-in script editor, so you can modify a script and then immediately jump into testing to see if what you've done has worked!

Finally, you need a copy of specifically Doom 2. You could use Doom 1, but in my opinion Doom 2 is better because it has a lot more stuff than the first game, and - let's be real - you'll probably be doing a lot of vanilla mapping to get to grips with the editor before you can start making your big ambitious game (which is what I'm doing over on my modding sideblog, check it out). I'll leave this one up to you. EDIT: I forgot that Freedoom exists. That's also good.

Mounting stuff into Ultimate Doom Builder

Next, you'll need to get UDB set up. This is fairly easy. First open UDB and, as soon as it starts up, go to the top-menu and click "Tools", then go to Game Configuration. Select "GZDoom: Doom 2 (UDMF)" and click "add resource"; using the attached file-explorer, locate the Doom 2 folder on your computer's file system and add DOOM2.WAD to the list of resources, then do the same with gzdoom.pk3 in the GZDoom folder (making sure to switch the "Add Resource" tab from "From WAD" to "From PK3". Click Ok, and you're done!

If you want to put your custom graphics into the game, you simply create a WAD file in Slade, put your graphics in (more on that later) and save it; then when creating a map in UDB, this box will appear:

If you click "Add resource" here, you can then select your custom wad and use any assets, code etc. in your map!

How Slade works

This bit is a bit more complex because it deals with multiple file formats and methods of importing stuff, but I'll start simply by explaining textures, flats, sprites and patches.

Before I do that though, I need to talk about Markers. To define images as a sprite, patch or flat, you need to put them between a pair of Markers with specific names, which you can create by clicking the "New Entry" button:

"Empty (Marker)" is selected by default, so all you need to do is name it. The naming format is [LETTER]_START to start a section and [LETTER]_END to end one; S_Start/S_End are for sprites, P_Start/P_End are for patches, and F_Start and F_End are for flats. You can, additionally, further subdivide this by making another pair of Markers inside a Start/End pair with a number after the letter, but I'm not sure if this does anything (my only experience with it is that the Doom 2 wad file does this).

Now to explain how these things actually work! First, sprites. A sprite is an image that represents an object or creature in the game, and a cool thing that GZDoom does is let you use generic PNGs instead of Doom's proprietary GFX format. Sprites use the following naming scheme: a four-letter identifier, a single character denoting what frame of the animation the image represents (the Arch-Vile, which has the most sprites out of any monster in Doom 2, has frames that go from A all the way to Z, and then [, \ and ]), and finally a number from 0-8 that indicates the angle the Thing (that's the technical term for a Doom Engine entity, by the way) is at. Using the Imp as an example:

The "0" angle just means that the sprite should look the same regardless of the player's angle; this is used for items, decorations, the death animations of all monsters (including players), and the two sprites used for Doom II's final boss.

A cool thing about sprite angles is that you can actually make a sprite work for multiple angles; by adding an extra frame-letter and angle-number after the first set, you can do things like have a monster whose left and right walking frames are the same but mirrored by formatting the sprite's name as something like NAMEA2A8 (in fact, the Imp uses this technique for all its sprites apart from its death animation).

Next up, flats! Flats are square textures that are designed to go on floors or ceilings (though you can use them anywhere, including as sky textures!) but lack the flexibility of patch-based textures. You literally just. Import your texture and put it between F_Start and F_End. That's it. That's how a flat works.

And finally, patches. Patches are complicated, but very easy to use when you know what you're doing. First, put your image between P_Start and P_End, then right click it, put your mouse over the "Graphics" dropdown, and select "Add to Patch Table". You will then be prompted to create a TEXTURES lump; click "Ok" with the default settings. This creates a Texture1 lump, and the "Patch Table" (which is just a list of patches, which I will explain soon), alongside P_Start and P_End if they aren't already present (and a dummy texture). Double-click Texture1 to open it, and then select "New Texture" (you can adjust the scale, too):

Once this is done, go to the top-right corner and click "Add patch":

By default, you only have access to any patches you have assigned, but a cool trick I use in my own mapsets whenever I want to modify an official texture is to copy its Texture1 entry from the Doom 2 WAD, then paste it into my WAD's Texture1 and rename it. This does create copies of the constituent patches in your own wad's P_Start/P_End section, but you can delete those and it will still work fine.

Both patches and Flats are limited to 8-letter names, so be warned.

The actual final thing to talk about is converting PNGs to GFX; this is a simple process, but it can cause issues with colour. Basically, Doom has a very specific palette:

While this can look pretty good, on images it wasn't designed for or that use colours it doesn't feature, it can look pretty bad. For example, if I put this random image I made through the conversion process:

Then it comes out looking like this:

All the more cyan-adjacent hues become more blue, it nuked the antialiasing, and some of the gaps in my colouring are now much more obvious (especially on the fifth character's head and legs).

My point is, only do this if you want your mod to be compatible with more vanilla sourceports, or if you want to reduce the filesize. Otherwise, you're better off just using a strict palette when making the sprites and keeping them as PNGs.

Custom palettes are possible, but like. Literally all you do is click "New Entry", select "palette", name it, click the "Import from" button (purple page with a diagonal arrow on the top-middle of the palette-view window), set the filetype on the file explorer to "PNG", and import your custom palette image (which should be square (non-square images get squished and lose some colours) and 16x16 at the smallest, though the images I normally use are 128x128 because for some reason they're scaled up by a factor of 8, even though they display the same when imported regardless of size). You can even test them out or add them to the in-built palette list, which is nice. If you want it to override the default palette when your WAD is loaded, name the lump "PLAYPAL", which is what Doom's palette is called.

Now we get to talk about text lumps! I don't have much to say. Do the "New Entry" thing, select "Text", and name the file. The ZDoom wiki - which I will be linking to at the end - has information on each type, so check those out.

Map making

This is the final main section of this, and I'll try keeping it fairly brief and simple. Doom maps use four main elements; Vertices, Lines, Sectors, and Things. A Vertex is, well a vertex; it's a point in 2D space that acts as a starting or connecting point on a Line. Lines can be either walls or walkover triggers, depending on how you use them. Sectors can be rooms or shapes on the floor, and have properties such as damaging floors, being "underwater" (the player can swim and sound is muffled), or even having different gravity. Finally, a Thing is any entity that isn't one of those, ranging from monsters to player-starts to decorations, plus some complex technical ones I can't even begin to explain.

Useful resources

I am not good with words, but these places are!

ZDoom wiki - covers both regular ZDoom and GZDoom, plus other sourceports like the multiplayer-focused Skulltag and Zandronum. It has guides about ACS and ZScript, two of GZDoom's most useful tools for scripting maps and Things, respectively, as well as the obsolete "DECORATE" language which ZScript incorporates many elements of.

Dragonfly's Doomworks - mapping tutorial resource. I use their portal tutorial a lot whenever I want to put portals in a map.

Doomwiki - good for looking up monster and weapon stats for if you're making custom Things.

[thegeminisage]

it is time for. NOT a tng update. but a ds9 update!!! wednesday* we watched "emissary" and actually i'm not clear on if we watched both parts or just one since my website is wonky but either way whatever we watched FUCKING RULED. i'm dispensing w the normal bullet points so i can ramble as much as i want

*it was last night actually but it took me all day to type this up so i'm scheduling it to go up later. it got looooong lol

the first most striking thing i noticed about ds9, or at least the first half of what we watched, is that it FEELS like a video game. someone tell me if this is insane. you're playing as sisko. you get flashbacks of his backstory, you get thrown into this starbase that's in shambles and it's Your Job to fix it up. you go around meeting all the secondary characters who will be in charge of this or that gameplay aspect or upgrade system or shop: kira, o'brien, quark, odo, jadzia, julian, etc. the FOLEY in this was insane. all the noise in the back CONSTANTLY suggested a lively and whole universe outside of our direct line of focus - it felt so alive in the way not even the enterprise in tos did. i could picture myself in the opening gameplay/cutscene like slowly walking my character through what will become a hub area that i gradually upgrade over time while kira or o'brien narrates the list of problems. you're starting at the bottom rung and expected to fail, but you can FEEL the potential even in just one brief walk through the promenade. IS THIS INSANE? it feels like an insane thing to say. someone PLEASE write in if you have ever had similar feelings. if they haven't made a ds9 game yet, they should.

i also notice that not only is the quality of the ds9 episodes worse than that of tng and tos - no one has remastered them into 1080p, apparently - but the lighting is very different, as well. it felt WEIRD to see picard and the enterprise D shot this way. but it also lends, perhaps unintentionally, perhaps not, a really gritty atmosphere to what is normally a very clean universe. i guess since we mostly see it from the inside of starships, it would feel like a sterile place to us, but you know how everyone always compliments star wars on how lived-in it feels? the buttons are wearing, sand is stuck in their fancy thingamajigs, etc? this was how ds9 felt to me.

okay. the characters. let's fucking get into it. what's so fun about ds9 in general is that in all other trek shows i have picked out my specialest little guy in 5 seconds flat. tos was spock EASILY. tng i knew it was data before i started. i already know seven's gonna be my favorite voyager character, but i have NO IDEA!!! who my precious little baby in ds9 will be. what a fun surprise for everyone involved. if anybody wants to place bets go ahead.

like, i thought tng had a pretty solid lineup (hence my eternal frustration with its wasted potential) but they're not anywhere as eclectic as ds9's core cast. iirc, sisko and o'brien are the ONLY humans who for once are outnumbered by trek's cool aliens. i'm saving sisko for last because that was the part of ds9 that touched me most profoundly, but for o'brien - it was a little sad to see him leave the enterprise, because picard was right, it WON'T feel the same without him, but i'm really excited to see why everybody says he suffers more than jesus and to find out if the eyepatch is a permanent thing or if it's just mirrorverse fuckery. either way, i win. like, o'brien is cool, and i always miss him when i don't see him in tng, and i'll continue to miss him in tng from here on out, but he could never shine in that show. it's too stiff and too reluctant to put its characters through any real development. it's a shame they can't ALL move to ds9, tbh.

the next person we met was kira, who was WONDERFUL. it took me a minute to warm up to her, not because there was anything wrong with her, but because i figured at first glance she was ds9's version of ro laren, the obligatory bajoran cast member to connect us with the bajoran/cardassian plot - which would of course be good because ro is awesome, but it's not necessarily anything new and i already love ro. BUT I WAS WRONG! kira's personality is very distinct from ro's; really the only thing they have in common is not liking cardassians which lmao Yeah. my favorite thing about kira is that she smiles when she's upset or angry. that's Such an acting choic, to have her grinning at the cardassians when she's almost certain they're about to blow her whole space station to smithereens. all love light and respect to ro laren my beloved, but i think i actually like kira BETTER.

odo: WHAT is that thing he can do oh my god...is this a changeling?? i got that result in a star trek quiz once. i really loved when he snuck aboard the enemy ship posing as a bag to hold gambling winnings. i was like oh they showed us the bag to show us it will get stolen soon BUT NO it was odo!!!!!!! such a fun surprise. the exposition on his backstory was a little slapdash but i enjoyed it all the same, i cannot wait to learn more

i was most nervous to meet quark because i hate hate HATE the ferengi in tng, but he was actually so entertaining! like, you're never gonna be able to entirely remove the antisemetic undertones from the ferengi as a whole, but he was smart, practical, and endearingly longsuffering. i love his wryness and deadpan humor. i have a feeling he is gonna be so much fun to torture lovingly.

meeting julian bashir felt like meeting a famous person. for the longest time all i knew about ds9 was that cardassian guy wanted to FUCK that gay little doctor, so it was a little hilarious that in his first scene he was asking a woman* out on a date. sir do you not know you're gay?? even funnier was the fact that out of everybody in the pilot he had the least lines. we barely know him, but we finally met him. relatedly, i can't to wait to meet more cardassians, especially The cardassian. so far, they're still all gay.

*jadzia!!! gnc/trans queen! the trill stuff is SO interesting and watching that worm slither in and out of people during those flashbacks was so wonderful but also made me wince. i love that she used to be an old man and the jokes about it are actually really funny without feeling transphobic or anything SO FAR. who knows if that changes. i feel like we haven't gotten much yet from her either but i cannot wait.

SISKO. damn. where do i even...first of all, he should be allowed to bite kick kill picard. i say this as someone who experienced a genuine THRILL of pleasure upon seeing picard's borged self again. i loved that whole thing, i'm obsessed with the borg. that it comes back in this small way in ds9, and has such a HUGE impact on the storyline, was so so so fucking good. i always say tng tells and not shows, but even after just knowing sisko for a few moments i felt keenly how much it devastated to find his wife like that and THAT WAS JUST FROM THE FIRST SCENE. and it only gets better! he's a great dad. he's FUNNY. he is not above manual labor. he wants to tear picard limb from limb. and he exists HERE.

the wormhole alien sequence was. so good. it was SO GOOD. explaining linear time to aliens. the aliens using his memories to talk to him. HE EXISTS HERE. back and back and BACK to finding his wife in the rubble because HE EXISTS HERE. he CHOOSES to exist here. he existed there when he applied for a transfer to earth. he existed there when he confronted picard. he never left the ship because HE NEVER LEFT THE SHIP. they dragged him out but they COULDN'T DRAG HIM OUT. he exists here because he won't leave her to exist here alone because damn it we can't just leave her here. that was the most insane series of events i ever watched. like, because at first you DO think it's the aliens taking him back there BUT IT'S HIM. HE IS DOING IT TO HIMSELF. when the penny dropped i got literal chill bumps and when the aliens said "it's not linear" and he, openly weeping, replied "it's NOT linear," i genuinely, truly, shed a tear along with him. TNG COULD NEVER. none of those miserable fucks EVER cry!!! sisko did it in the god damn pilot!!!!!!!

and like, the fact that he can choose to stay at the space station at the end, to shake picard's hand, to exist SOMEWHERE ELSE. AAAAAUGHGHGHG

i really loved the final confrontation, too. kira is so so so so good, again, i LOVE that she smiles when she's angry, when she's sad, and it's not a fake smile, it's genuine and honest emotion, and she's genuinely and honestly going to start eating the cardassians for sport if they don't leave her alone. it was very scrappy, them pretending to be bigger and badder than they actually were because they had no other choice. you get the feeling everybody on the station and indeed the station itself is barely holding together, and what little togetherness is present comes from sheer spite.

anyway, absolutely 10/10. i was so worried ds9 wouldn't be good but it not only met my most furtive hopes it surpassed them with flying colors. it's gonna be REAL hard to go back to tng after this.

[foxys-fantasy-tales]

hi hi! what can you share with someone who's new to your blog?

This is a VERY wide net, but I'll do my best to be thorough yet succinct as possible. -Deep Breath- I am in my 30's and self published my debut book just over two years ago. Arigale: Spite in the Spirit, and the rest of the upcoming series I'm working on, is very dear to me as these characters have followed me since college for the most part. I also have another four projects brewing with some closer to completion than others. The second of the Arigale series and the first Made to Taste book should be out this year after having to have been delayed throughout last year due to my chronic health issues. As for what I post, it's mostly about my WIPs listed above and re-blogs for other writers in the community, though I do also post about some of my interests like anime, DnD, cosplay, and gaming less frequently. I just like my page feeling personable and relaxed if I can help it. Links section! I have my own website and (usually forgotten) newsletter you can get to at ArigaleFantasy.com. Here you can find a lot of info about the Arigale series in particular, though when other WIPs get closer to release I will be putting a section for each of those up as well. You can get character art and bios, book summaries and links to purchase, and some free short stories. I also had the first five chapters of Arigale right here on Tumblr, but since the recent link debacle with this site they aren't showing. Sad. If you want any sent later just let me know and that goes to anybody who sees this really.

There is also a trailer!

Made to Taste will be getting a trailer at some point too, though it probably won't have so much nice art since my artist is having trouble with her health and a deep backlog of art. I'll likely find a way to manage something still on Canva I hope. WIP Summaries Section! Arigale: Spite in the Spirit Judith and Chit are called to the lonely tower outside their city with little explanation. The one who summoned them is an old, elven wizard named Maleth, who will send them on a quest to lower their floating city of Arigale to where it once resided. Maleth is intrigued by Judith’s strange form of necromantic magic, yet he is also certain of the anxious young man in training to be a spearman and scholar.

Judith, a bubbly yet mysterious young woman, is eager to accept. Chit remains withdrawn and cautious, a remnant of being raised by the Order that presides over their land. Soon, both discover their meeting with the wizard carried dire consequences. Can they accomplish what has been asked of them and save Arigale by exploring the land below, no matter the lengths they must go to? Arigale: Bond in the Blood (2024) Judith and Chit's journey across the seas to Galavarn was not as smooth as they had hoped for. The standard of living here is much different than what they encountered on the mainland, and the newfound bond between them will be tested. Enigmas run rampant here, along with a woman from Maleth’s past who claims to hold the key to defeating them for good. Unfortunately, this woman has an unruly and strangely apathetic nature to her, along with a profound hatred toward their distant companion on Arigale. 

Meanwhile, back on the mainland, those left behind must bear their own struggles as a stranger appears and insists on taking one of their number with him. This man with red, sunken eyes bears a sharp grudge against Stemoss and worse obligations to a certain deity. 

Secrets of the past will come to light on this desolate isle, and the friends left behind will struggle to not become a cog in a plan devised long before they were even born. Made to Taste (2024) When Lyra Morley accepted a rough and tumble new hire from her bar, she didn't think he would end up her new roommate in a week. Noel Akatash brings his own debts, and the people holding the accounts aren't to be trifled with. Magical home invasions aside, Lyra is more worried about her business serving the city nightlife any food she can handle all made to order.

Cooking with a halfbreed's sense of smell comes with its perks, and one of them is that she can hide her skills in the kitchen so no one is any wiser about her true nature. The night-only diner called Made to Taste is meant to be a haven for those the city would rather keep buried. Lyra, the pacifist and abstinent dhampir, would fight to keep it safe. Good thing Noel knows a thing or two about being scrappy. Dream Escape (2025?) Emma Reed, 26, has a Master of the Arts and no place to put it but in her desk drawer. Once proud of her accomplishment, the lights quickly dimmed when she ended up living back in her old childhood bedroom at her parents place and flat broke. Helping Adrien with graphics for their streaming or Sarah with banners for her pet business is all well and good, but it's not at all how she imagined scrapping by. When her newest piece is rejected from the gallery she had finally convinced to give her a chance, Emma hits a downward spiral.

When she awakens, she finds herself in a strange new world with a strange man hovering around her. He calls himself Jasper, a dream painter, and quickly proves his prowess at sculpting others' dreams. Emma was in his care, but though he's petitioned her to wake up, she can't. Neither knows how she ended up in this place, but surrounded by the dreams of others quite literally brought to life around her, Emma makes the decision to stay.

Jasper won't let her. For one, if she stays there is no telling how badly that could go for her, or for his hopes of a promotion. Emma goes along with his plan to cart her across this new place, more as a sightseeing tour than the arduous task he finds it to be. Along the way, a bit of the light comes back into her eyes, and he can't help but remember how bright they both used to shine. Dulled and muddied palettes that they both became, can they start over? Bloodlines (2025?) Blood was her first memory. Not many can recall birth, but Gwyar is a special case. Though she looks like any old elf and had once been instructed to act as such, in her heart she knows that isn't true. Elves aren't born fully formed. Elves don't have memories spanning hundreds of lifetimes or more. Elves surely don't have her terrible taste in company. Until one does. A half-elf, half- orc bard shows up in town going by a name she would choke trying to pronounce. After he follows her and she threatens him and forces a blood oath of silence about her little vigilante hobby, or perhaps because of it, he sticks to her like glue. A vicious songstress with an even more intimidating old tree in her backyard meets a half-blood who loves sweets and suppresses his own inner rage. Together perhaps they can take on the mysteries in her heritage, whether Gwyar wants to or not.

Otherly (Future Trilogy only in planning stages) Daphne Bennet has been waiting her whole twenty-two years for someone to notice the strange events that follow her must be more than just her imagination. She’s never caught a cold, can follow the wind to find lost friends, and the one time she was in a photograph only her area of the picture bore smudges in the background. Believing she may be haunted afterwards, her parents take her to the witch at the edge of their town, only to discover their daughter is not their own. 

No, Daphne is actually a fae. Shocking revelations of child exchanges aside, now Daphne is enlisted at once to upend her life and attend a prestigious magic school to learn to control her burgeoning powers before they control her. Upon initiation day, Daphne is given a bitter drought with all the new students, which will prevent any of them from wandering off school grounds. Everyone is also given a diary to record their thoughts and experiences as a daily exercise, which will magically respond to provide advice and companionship. However, Daphne’s diary seems to be more on the condescending side. As she reluctantly writes, the diary begins to sound as scared as she feels. Every teacher looks less than enthused to be there. Strict rules for curfew, magic containment, and other safety precautions often hinder learning. When her snooping leads to a thinly veiled threat from staff, Daphne resolves to uncover the school’s mysteries within the pages of her diary. Only to watch the words “I’ll help” appear.

All in all, I have a lot going on and need to be more frequent posting on here and getting the word out. I like ask and tag games, but sometimes it can take me a bit to get to them. I hope all this helps and let me know if I fudged it or if you have any other questions! <3

[duhragonball]

Nanwum Schemin'

I finished my August writing challenge tonight, and I'm pleased to say that I managed to hit 20,000 words and that's actually enough to cover this year's Christmas special. I tried this last year, but I only wrote 15k in September, and Red Christmas ended up being 32k long, so I wound up writing more than half of it in December anyway. This time, I took that into account, which is why I used August instead. I figured if Blue Christmas ran long, I'd be able to use September to finish it off, but it looks like I managed to fit the entire plot in 20k, so that's satisfying. I need a little more to finish the ending, and there's some stuff I'll want to add and take out, but overall, I have a working first draft that I can have ready for AO3 without much trouble.

I still have to figure out what the hell Yellow Christmas will be about. I saved that one for last, since yellow is the Luffa color, but I think I've used up all the good fanfic AU tropes by now, so I'm gonna have to get creative. But that's a problem for 2024, and I'm here to talk about the fall of 2023.

Concerning the Apocrypha Liveblog, I plan on wrapping up some loose ends in September. Super Dragon Ball Heroes episode 50 came out last week, so I can write about how the Aeos arc (we won!). I also want to knock out the DBS movies, and I think the DBS Manga will probably be done with their Super Hero adaptation, so I'm penciling that in as well. Whatever's left over I can deal with in October or later.

November is NanoWriMo season, and this will be my 7th entry in the event. I don't count my ill-fated attempt in 2003, since I never logged it with the website, and I had no idea what I was doing and flamed out by the second or third day. But I've been doing these since 2017 and I've been racking up wins ever since. I'm feeling confident at the moment, so I'm going to try to set some goals for myself, which I'll put under the cut.

Looking back at my past runs, I've had some good years and some difficult ones where I didn't reach the 50k goal until Day 29 or 30. I always find it more satisfying to finish early if I can. My preference is to have things wrapped up by Day 20, so I can write more stuff in the overrun, or start editing and posting, or just slack off for the next ten days. It's always enjoyable, so I think I need to make this a priority.

For a number of years, my objective was to boost word count and reach certain milestones in the Luffa storyline, but I passed one million words last year, and this year I've nearly finished the Xenoverse 1 adaptation, so things are a little different. I think I can afford to think about how to improve productivity, rather than how to hit certain plot points. So we'll aim for that.

Currently, my earliest win date is Day 17, which I pulled off back in 2021. So I'm going to try to hit 50k on or before Day 16. Here's how.

This month, I learned I can get more done by breaking up my large word goals in to 500 word chunks. To finish by Day 16, I'll need to average about 3000 words a day, which is something I've always struggled to do consistently, but now, I think I can make that work. The idea is to devote six hours across a day, where I write 500 words in each of those hours. It really seemed to help me out this month, so it's time to see if that technique can push me further.

One other thing I want to try is to break my personal record for one-day writing totals. Currently, that stands at 7023 words. So I've chosen three days where I can attempt to do that. I'd like to do more than jut hit 7024, though. 9001 would be pretty sweet for the meme value, but it sounds really daunting.

The important thing here is that I give myself permission to fail. If I can't maintain 3k per day, that's fine, because even falling short of that goal still makes good progress. If I can't make it to 7k or beyond, that's fine too, because wherever I land, it's still a lot of progress. And if I'm not done by Day 16 it's fine, because I'll have two weeks left.

But I think I can do this. The rewards would be sweet. AEW Full Gear is on the 18th, and it'd be pretty great to just have a lazy Saturday where I watch that instead of writing. NJPW will probably run their World Tag League shows between November 15 and December 15, so I'd have the whole second half of November freed up. And mostly, I like the precedent it would set if I could consistently land 3k in six hours or less. I feel like that's something I need to prove to myself.

If this is going to work, I need to do some solid plotting in October so I'm ready. I do reasonably well with "they fight" as a prompt, but if I have a list of spots and story beats to work with, that would cut down on the indecision that usually holds me back.

[dyrewrites]

Author Ask Game

Tagged by @rmgrey-author and no, I haven't done this one yet. =)

I'll use Weald and Wen for this one, because it's done so I know the most about it.

What is the main lesson of your story (e.g. kindness, diversity, anti-war), and why did you choose it? I don't really strive toward a lesson when writing, so I'm not sure how to answer this one. I can say that, for the characters, the lesson is perseverance. They endure a lot in a very short period of time, with even less to really process it, but they have to go on. They have to keep going. So they need to learn, quickly, how to do that. Which I probably chose because of personal experience and never having the time to really process the things that happened to me, so I just learned to keep going. Luckily, for my characters, they'll have that time in a later book and they have eachother to help.

What did you use as inspiration for your worldbuilding (like real-life cultures, animals, famous media, websites, etc.)? Mostly real-world animals, and plant-life, but there's a specific piece of media that impacted the mood and visuals quite a bit. That is Dark Crystal, both the 80s movie and the recent show. Actually, I could toss Labyrinth in there too, and Guillermo Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth as well. Dark, moody but colorful fantasies with morally gray characters, both friendly and violent monsters, and fae-like chaos certainly inspired this world.

What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, help readers grow as a person? Each MC has their own personal goal but the shared one is to save the world...and to survive. What I suppose I tried to achieve with them (and will continue throughout the series) is to teach others that living is worth doing. No matter how bad it gets, no matter how bleak it feels, life is worth living. You may need help, and it may not come in forms you expect and may be the hardest thing you've ever done, but it's worth it. Life is worth it.

How many chapters is your story going to have? Weald and Wen has thirty-two chapters.

Is it fanfiction or original content? Where do you plan to post it? Original and I've shared some chapters here, and only here. It'll eventually be published through Amazon though.

When and why did you start writing? I started writing, in general, at the age of twelve because a teacher saw potential and encouraged me to. That is, coincidentally, also when I first started coming up with what became Weald and Wen and the entire Mar series. Took a while to be able to actually write it though. >.>

Do you have any words of engagement for fellow writers of Writeblr? What other writers of Tumblr do you follow? Write what you want, don't put yourself in a box because of genre expectations or listen to people who tell you it'll never sell or find readers. Write what you want and your audience will find it. As for those I follow, I am going to forget some but these are who come to mind; @scribe-cas @stesierra @repressed-and-depressed @palebdot @jgmartin

Leaving it an open tag, but if you're looking at this because a mentioned you and you haven't done it yet...>.>

[thefeistydragon]

Contrary to what a reblog above said, I understand it can be hard for some people.

Especially if you're not used to an interactive website, and used to the ridiculous social rules of other sites, it's intimidating at first.

Hopefully I can cover some of the hang ups I've seen mentioned.

Newbie Guide To Reblog Concerns

1. "Isn't it the same as reposting"?

Not at all. It gives credit to the original poster, and helps to spread it. It's like sharing a link to a post in a discord!

2. "What if I enjoy too many posts from one person? Won't reblogging all of those be spamming them?"

Most people are really happy to get multiple reblogs from the same person. Some people view it in a bad way, but those are mostly new users who are used to other sites.

3. "It's an old post, won't it bother the OP/ won't people make fun of me or call me creepy for interacting with it?"

Definitely not! Part of why Tumblr is great is that posts don't have an expiration. They're as good now as they were sometimes even 10 years ago.

4. "Don't I need to have something to add?"

Nope, you can just share whatever you like. You don't have to add on.

5. Alternatively "I want to make a comment but it isn't good enough/I'm too scared to add to a reblog!"

You can talk in the tags! Just type the comment out as a tag and anyone who sees your specific Reblog will get to see your comment, but not everyone looking at the post will see it.

6. "I'm nervous in general. I'm worried I'll be judged or attacked for what I like!"

It sucks we've gotten to this point but I understand. Fandom isn't safe and welcoming to a lot of people, and you might be worried about social consequences.

If you can eventually kill the cringe police in your head, you'll be s lot happier, but getting there is a process.

The way around this is something called a Side Blog. It isn't your main, people don't need to know who runs it, and you could literally just make one for the things you want to share but are afraid to.

It also works for putting things you want to reblog to your main in the future, but aren't ready to yet for whatever reason.

7. "I tag everything very specifically. I don't have the ability to right now."

This is part of what likes are for. You can use them to bookmark posts you want to come back to in the future. You can also save a reblog as a draft.

Maybe you don't have time, maybe you're out of spoons. Either way, just save it for later.

8. "Reblogging is too many steps for my brain right now/in general."

There's a quick reblog option that does it in like one step.

And finally

9. " I don't understand why reblogging is so important."

See the above post, but basically it's what keeps the site and fandom alive. It helps create a community you can participate in, supports creatives, and honestly is what allows people to have better interactions on Tumblr than many other sites.

Even if you only help show it to one more person, that can end up with many more people getting to experience it down the line.

And even if you don't care about that part?

Like mentioned above, it's how we make sure this hell site doesn't become like Facebook and other sites.

Hopefully this helps cover some of the concerns I've seen people have. And at the end of the day you don't need to be perfect. Sometimes you just won't be up to reblogging, and a like is still something I at least appreciate.

Just Reblog when you can, and know that when you do you're doing something really great.

if you’re a new tumblr user from tiktok or IG or something and only like posts and dont reblog them yeah people will think you’re a bot and block you but you will also make this website actively worse. they want “algorithmic” users like you, served recommended posts through likes, not people who just follow each other and respond to the direct chronological feed. there is a reason this website is still better than the rest, even with all its problems, do not ruin this

[badwasabi]

I'm going to complain about Firefox

So, new computer. Due to the way the browsers work, I have half my screen in Chrome for Youtube/GDocs voice typing, and the other half in Firefox for everything else, because it's better at everything else. 

And lets say I want to check the weather in my town.

So I hit the URL bar, and start typing "bbc". Firefox suggests the top result, and I tap Enter.

This is not the address I wanted to go to. I wanted to go to the weather page for my town, specifically. I never, ever want to go the Beeb's main page.

For some reason, Firefox has started to suggest the Home Page of websites as the top result, even if I have never, ever gone to that homepage. It's extrapolating from History and Bookmarks. If I searched for a better result yesterday? Nope, it'll still suggest the homepage of a bookmark.

So now I have to tap down and Enter, instead of just Enter. Firefox even highlights the top Suggest result that's not the homepage (IE the actual desired result), so if you're not paying attention, you could think you only need to hit Enter.

This is a really stupid change, and there's no way to turn it off, AFAIK. This is the kind of nonsense Chrome would pull.*

Speaking  of, plot twist, I'm going to complain about Chrome too.

Chrome Android and Desktop both have Tab Groups. A lot of people complained about the Android version, but I like it. It was convenient, it saved scrolling time and screen estate. If I needed to open a regular tab, it was still there.

A few weeks ago, Chrome Android decided that having one tab in a group no longer "collapsed" the group into just a regular tab. Now the group stays a group. You have to manually remove the tab.

….Mildly irritating.

Then Google went, "You know what we need to do? When someone Opens In New Tab In Group, we need to force them to pick a name for the tab group. Every time."

Congratulations! You've made Tab Groups into a hassle!

I know this change is probably to make it match the Desktop Tab Groups behavior, but there, I can just hit Escape. For some reason, hitting Back on Android seems like much more of a hassle. It's an extra "click" and thought, instead of just opening a tab in the background.

I currently have about:config edited to stop the new behavior, but Google will remove that option sooner or later. Then I'll just…go back to using regular tabs, I guess.

Also, it bugs me that Chromedroid has no "Open Image In New Tab In Group" option. You can only open them in a background tab, not a group, so you have to manually add it to the group. Individually. On Desktop? It just quietly opens in the a new tab, in the same group, after the source tab. 

Also, I checked Firefox Mobile, just to explore my auctions, and it still opens links in reverse tab order, unlike literally every single other tabbed browser I've ever seen. Including its own big brother.

 I don't know why Mozilla made it act this way, or why they thought it was a good idea. 

And I don't know why they haven't changed it back, after years of complaining. I haven't seen a single person who likes that "feature".

No wonder Firefox has 1% mobile browser Market Share on a good day, according to Statcounter.

*IIRC, I'm pretty sure Chrome used to work a lot like this. It put most weight on the base URL, and very little on, say, the title of the page, or bookmarks. Or so I assume.

[atl4ntxc]

—character(s), Lucifer, Mammon, Leviathan, Satan, Asmo, Beelzebub, Belphegor, Diavolo, Barbatos.

—genre, angst.

—cw/tw, insecurity, mentions of weight loss, symptoms of bulimia, inner voices, mention of disease, mean voices.

—notes, i am not romanticizing, encouraging nor glorifying bulimia or any type of ed. this is simply written for fanfiction, while raising awareness and educating on such topics that do not get talked about often.

please do not plagiarize, copy, translate or repost on any platform/website without my consent. the headers used are mine and should not be used by anyone.

also, please do not harm your body just to get skinnier or make your weight be reduced in an unhealthy way, health comes first, and it's your body, you can choose what you eat and how you look. ignore the people who says otherwise.

how it feels to be replaced 001<

how it feels to be replaced 003<

You started distancing yourself from everyone, focusing on your weight and education, at the same time ignoring your genetic illness and mental stability.

Questions started to surface as you look at Ella and the brothers from the side lines, insecurity blinding you.

Am I wanted?

Am I good enough?

Am I skinny enough?

Am I smart enough?

Am I pretty enough?

Am I funny enough?

Am I good enough?

Am I enough?

These questions lingers inside your mind for days, turning into weeks and months.

You used to be such a cheerful person, filled with energy and being able to light up a whole room with a single warm smile. Well, you used to.

Now those labels are for Ella, the blue-haired female (which was obviously dyed) with blue contacts. Her whole theme was blue, and god, you had never counted about how many times you just wanted to dip her in blue paint so she could become entirely blue for the rest of her life.

You drunk your 6th cup of coffee, which was undenibly unhealthy and rubbed your eyes, vision becoming blurry as sleepiness started to consume you. Sure, caffeine can boost the metabolic rate and increase fat burning, but after a while you became tolerant to the effects and it stopped working.

You usually have a cup of black coffee with a mix of lemon juice in the morning, and two during the day and three during night.

Your belly fat reduced, and slowly, your weight also drops.

Beelzebub had began to grow more concerned when he noticed that you never really came down to eat, even during breakfast. He had always saved your meal, but you never came out of your room.

When he brings your meals to your room, he would often find you infront of your computer, hair messy, books scattered across the room, some opened, some closed, while some were torn.

He also noticed that your skin had became rough and scaly, nails turned brittle, neck calluses on your knuckles and how red your eyes were.

Demons were not wise about human illnesses, while some researched and showed interest, some never bothered to acknowledge them. Beel was worried for you and your health— so, he asked Satan.

"I'm not sure what those mean, Beel. I'll search for it later,"

Well, that wasn't very helpful.

He walked back to your room to see you asleep on your desk, computer still open as a trail of saliva escapes your mouth, indicating on how tired you were. Beelzebub, being the gentleman he is, carefully picked you up and put you on your bed, gently tucking you to sleep.

You woke up at around 3 am, and noticed that you had a miss a whole day, sleeping, when you could've studied and work out. You wanted to rip your hair out in frustration as you kept gritting your teeth over and over again.

"Beel, go call Mc. We're having dinner,"

"Okay." He mumbled, agreeing to Lucifer's request and he made his way to your room. Beel knocked on your door and waited for a few minutes before growing concerned. "Mc?"

Beel?

Why is Beel here?

No.

Go away.

Don't... you can't see me like this.

Stay away, Beel.

I can't.

You can't see me like this.

You're mind started going south as you panicked and limped to the bathroom that was provided. Staring into the mirror, was not the same person that was staring back.

The insecurities grew and the demons inside you started to grow more and more out of control, but yet you still kept fighting the urge to #### ###### and #### ########.

You shook your head and washed your face, lifting the corners of your mouth up with the two of your index fingers. You stared at the mirror for a couple of minutes and opened the bathroom door to see... Beel?!

"Beel?! Archons, you scared me."

"I'm sorry, Mc."

You forgave him, and he asked for you to join dinner, yet you refused. You can't eat. You'll gain more weight. You're not eating dinner. Skip dinner. Skip. Skip. Skip. Skip. Skip. Ski—

"I'd like that."

What are you doing?!

You can't eat!

Shut up and listen!

You'll be fatter!

No, don't!

Ignoring the voices, you slightly smiled at Beel and made your way towards the dining room, where you can see all the brothers, including the bitc- Ella.

Your ability to walk was slowly dissappearing each day, and your legs will eventually be paralyzed, whether you like it or not. It's not deniable and it is not curable, you're legs won't be working anymore in the future and you'd have to learn to accept that.

You walked in using a mobility aid, Beel assisting you so that you won't fall.

"You look horrible. What is that for?" Lucifer asked, standing up from his seat and making his way towards you. You paused and spoke slowly, "...I need them... for..." Lucifer raised his eyebrow and crossed his arms, hissing. "For what, exactly?"

"Lucifer, stop it."

"Shut it, Beel."

You lowered your head and moved your gaze to the floor, legs shaking as your vision got worse, indicating that you would be experiencing another symptom.

"..."

Silence. The room was filled with silence.

Tears clouded your vision at the mere mention of your illness, because you knew about how you'd end up when you first got diagnosed with a rare inherited disease.

"Well?"

"I...just need them, Lucifer. Please don't... make me remember things that I don't want to." You mumbled, squeezing Beel's hand tighter in discomfort. Beel immediately took note and looked at you, eyebrows furrowed in concern as he whispers, "Are you okay?".

You nodded, asking Beel to take you to your seat with poor pronounciation of words, leaving Beel a bit confused but he understood a few seconds later. Lucifer sighs and furrows his eyebrows, to show how upset he really was.

Before dinner began, Lucifer started, "Lord Diavolo has something to announce. We will have dinner with him, celebrating the new arrival of an exchange student. Apparently, he chose the new exchange student without telling me."

"Ha?! Another exchange student? Is he another human?" Mammon gasped, his eyes wide with shock as he almost fell of his chair. "Oh my, what gender is the student?" Asmo spoke, putting his palm againts his cheek, intrigued.

"Another normie. No one special,"

"Well, that certainly is a surprise. How come we were never informed of a new residence inside the House of Lamentation?" Satan closed his book, not forgetting to mark it before. "I'm not sure myself."

"Well, end of conversation, Lord Diavolo would be arriving shortly."

Woah, they really forgot about your existence huh? Shockers.

You really aren't important then.

That's hilariously pathetic!

You should've listened to us.

"Shut up!" You suddenly yell out, clutching your head in stress. Beel shook your shoulder and made you look at him, and you could see how worried he really was. "Are you okay, Mc?"

Uh oh!

Should've listened, Mc.

This is so funny!

That's just embarrassing. Anyway, would you like some tea?

You took a deep breath and nodded. "Excuse me?" You lifted your head to see an angry Lucifer. " 'm so...rry. i didn't mean to do... that." You slurred, making Lucifer look at you suspiciously as he sighed, "Just don't do that again."

TO BE CONTINUED . . .

This isn't proofread.

TAGLIST ;; @gallantys (send me an ask to be tagged)

[cherrybombfangirlwrites]

Happy Blorbo Blursday!

First of all: you usually use Tumblr on your computer?!

Second, for any OC you want: their partner/an important person for them has a day left to live. How do they spend it? And, similarly, their partner/this important person is dying and your OC can tell them one last thing. What is it?

Go feral, angst queen.

Happy Blorbo Blursday! Yeah, I usually use the website on my computer.... It's easier to type things out and edit them, plus my computer is where I write at the same time. I only use my phone when I can't use my computer.

ehehehehehe........ >:3

I'm gonna do my favorites from Fractured Stars Falling for this one:

Snow

It's Lan. Lan is dying. Snow tries to act like everything is fine, but it doesn't take long for her to just shut down and become unresponsive to everyone but her bestie. She's also super clingy with Lan up until the very last second. They spend the whole day like they always do, exploring in the woods, preferably alone with their horses. Once it's all over and she can't hold it in any longer the floodgates open and the tears will not stop after she's been holding them in for so long.

"You're my best friend. You've always had my back. Thank you for that. I just wish we had more time."

Raven

You already know it's Sapphire who's dying. Man is in tears the whole day. He's gonna do everything he can to bring her back, obviously, but it still hurts because it's going to take a while. He's still going to miss her every second she's gone and he doesn't want her to suffer or be alone until he can come and get her. He does whatever she wants the entire day, whether it's running through the meadows and woods or exploring the city by the castle. He gives her things that she can take with her, and is super clingy and affectionate the entire time.

"I'll come and get you as soon as I can, I swear it. I love you so much and I miss you already. I'll miss you every second you're not here with me. I won't let them keep you down there for long."

Sapphire

She keeps forgetting. Like she'll start talking about plans for tomorrow and then cut off when she remembers he won't be there the next day. Or she'll think that everything is fine but can't figure out where this sense of dread is coming from until she remembers. Then she puts on a brave smile and says she'll be ok, that he doesn't need to worry about her, she's got all of their friends. She smiles and laughs through the tears until there's only minutes left. They spend the whole day in the meadow behind the castle just the two of them. Raven braids her hair, they relax under a tree, they play tag in the grass like kids, and try to pretend that it's a normal day. When it's finally over, her friends just hold her as she cries.

"You've always protected me. I just wish I could've done the same for you, even just this once. You're the best thing that ever happened to me. I love you."

Triveya

Poor Triveya >:). If this were to happen to any of the others in the gang, she's going to scour all of her books and notes for anything that can save her friend. When she comes up with nothing, she caves and makes her friend as comfortable and happy as possible before they go, complete with some tea in front of a warm fire. She won't move from that spot for a very long time.

"You're a good friend. The world needs more people like you. I need more friends like you in my life. See you later."

***

Thanks for the ask @rose-bookblood !

[rainisawriter]

What is the main lesson of your story (e.g. kindness, diversity, anti-war), and why did you choose it?

Hm, I think the main lesson of my story would be... you can't run from who you are. The past will always catch up to you no matter how far you run from it.

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What did you use as inspiration for your worldbuilding (like real-life cultures, animals, famous media, websites, etc.)?

There's no special world that takes place in my story. It's just a normal city is a normal state. It's more about the characters than the setting.

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What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, help readers grow as a person?

MC is trying to learn to accept who she is while facing the horrors she's been running from since she was a child. She's also trying to help save people from falling into the same pit she did.

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How many chapters is your story going to have?

I have no idea. I've never been much of a planner, more of a "write and see where it goes" which is probably a shitty approach to writing a story but here we are lol

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Is it fanfiction or original content? Where do you plan to post it?

It's an original fiction that I've had in my head since I was a kid. I'm struggling to put it into words, though. I would love to have it published as a book, but I have very little confidence of that happening so I'll probably just post it on here, my wordpress and ao3.

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When and why did you start writing?

I was 12 years old and I discovered a website called Quizilla. It was mostly Naruto fanfics and those "who would you choose? a demon, an angel or an emo" stories lol They had sooo many amazing challenges, though. I miss the site dearly. I originally started writing because I was sad.

It was a release and I got to live a better life with characters I loved. I still write for those reasons but it also just genuinely makes me happy.

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Do you have any words of engagement for fellow writers of Writeblr? What other writers of Tumblr do you follow?

If you want to write something, do it. You'll be grateful for it later. Also, just write whatever comes to mind. It doesn't matter if it makes sense or sounds stupid. You can always edit it later, but you can't edit a blank page!

So, whatever pops into your head, just write that shit down. Remember:

“Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.” - LOUIS L'AMOUR

Writers of Tumblr, I have an ask game for you all!

Please reblog and answer these questions, maybe tag others too! My asks are also open for them.

By the way, please read my snippets of TFLOC!

What is the main lesson of your story (e.g. kindness, diversity, anti-war), and why did you choose it?

What did you use as inspiration for your worldbuilding (like real-life cultures, animals, famous media, websites, etc.)?

What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? Do you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, help readers grow as a person?

How many chapters is your story going to have?

Is it fanfiction or original content? Where do you plan to post it?

When and why did you start writing?

Do you have any words of engagement for fellow writers of Writeblr? What other writers of Tumblr do you follow?

[studentbyprofession]

🍂cozy-productive-season

These are the tools/ways I'll be using this time in my 'organised studying and productivity' attempt, so you'll see that I'm using technology a lot :

Samsung note

Google sheet

Youtube

Google

Quizlet

Been using Samsung Notes a lot lately, just put everything in different folders- pdfs, class notes/slides, personal notes, books, also 'newsletter cuts' from some science-related newsletters I've subscribed to for personal study.

Using Google sheets in order to track my study; based on the ideas by Ali Abdaal on YouTube - Spaced Repetition and Active Recall. I like the idea of Spaced Repetition- studying a topic one day, then reviewing it the next day, then after a week, and finally after a month. Seems to me a really organised way learn my lessons more efficiently, not sure if I'll be able to do it flawlessly but I'm definitely gonna try. Plus, I'm so lazy for notes.

Will be using Quizlet just for terms and definitions mostly, because most common warning about flashcards I've found is that you might end up creating numerous flashcards.

My most favourite one: a coffee with a book break at noon, with the tired sunshine on the pages ☕ 📖 Med life is so busy and there's hardly any time, but I'd like to keep it in my schedule.

Another habit I've developed is personal studies on different topics on YouTube, where you can find a lot of scopes and choices from which you can learn stuffs in a easy and interesting way (some channels I might share later). Sometimes what I do is have a quick review of topic from videos before I start it.

Also, have subscribed to various scientific journals and websites for daily newsletters to keep updated with the current discoveries and theses. What I love to do is select anything that interests me or is informative and save it in a note.

I'm also learning Japanese and Arabic on duolingo, not seriously though :) it's fun practice

There'll more prayers in my schedule now - specially for two very nearest persons of my life who passed away in the last two months. Daily afternoon dhikrs with reading pdfs of my fave books, currently reading Anne of Avonlea ♡

There'll be more updates soon! I'll try & this study challenge as cozy autumn-winter-y as possible 🍂 ❄

[tangent101]

Max Caulfield and Post-Storm PTSD

One thing I find interesting (and have done so myself) is speculating on how broken Max will be in a Post-Storm (either Sacrifice Chloe or Sacrifice Arcadia Bay) setting. While some people (usually those who killed Chloe) like to say "she'd bounce back!" the predominant view is that we have a shattered Max after this who needs a lot of therapy. So I thought I'd unpack this and look at why I look at this this way.

At this point I should add there is potential triggers here. I'll be examining my own PTSD and elements of Max's state of mind that may in fact result in her being in declining mental health in the wake of the events of Life is Strange.

First, let's consider what PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) is, and what causes it. And for this I'm going to start by sharing my own trauma. Because I have PTSD. I gained this after I saw a vehicle go out of control and hit two people and run over two others. The final person was trapped under the vehicle and they had to push the van at an angle to pull him out, do CPR, and... he was dead. Even if EMTs had been right there, he'd not have survived.

I suffer flashbacks thinking of this, though it's gotten better. I will flinch, visualize what happened, and feel nausea. I get tense over this and... well, it's not a happy experience to put it mildly. And I have what is likely a milder case of PTSD. I also developed it despite being in an environment that put me at a lower risk of developing it. And yes, I had minor twinges of PTSD writing this up. Two years ago I probably would have had an actual visualization and anxiety break. So you can get better with therapy and help.

But what specifically is PTSD? According to the website for the National Institute of Mental Health, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) develops in some people who experience shocking or dangerous events, with people who have PTSD feeling stressed or frightened even when they are not in danger. PTSD can occur within 3 months of traumatic events or even have you be fine and then crop up *years* later. And symptoms include flashbacks where you relive the trauma, bad dreams, and frightening thoughts which can disrupt a person's everyday routine.

People with PTSD are easily startled, can feel "on edge," have angry outburst, and have difficulty sleeping. They could go through avoidance of staying away from reminders of the experience and avoiding thoughts or feelings related to the event. Further, cognitive and mood symptoms include problems remembering key features of the event, self-negativity, distorted guilt or blame feelings, and loss of interest in enjoyable activities.

Okay, so how can you avoid PTSD? And how could Max avoid this? Well, factors promoting recovery after trauma include seeking support from friends and family, finding a support group, learning to feel good about your own actions in the face of danger, positive coping strategies, and learning to act and respond effectively even when feeling fear.

And this is the kicker. This is why Max is likely screwed as a result of the events of Life is Strange, especially in a Sacrifice Chloe setting. Because Max blames herself and her time travel for the Storm and all the weird shit that happened. She may very well believe that if she uses time travel for any reason, it will result in the Storm and a lot more people dying. And this will get in the way of being in a healthy environment to avoid PTSD.

First, consider friends and family. Max can't tell them what happened because she has absolutely no proof of what she went through. She can't prove her time travel because if she does then she dooms wherever she is and a lot of people die. (It doesn't matter if this is the case or not, she assumes it is true.) So Max is not going to confide in Warren or Dana or Victoria or anyone. She can't. And she's quite likely going to isolate herself because we have already seen at the start of the game, Max is a bit of a loner who doesn't have many friends.

In fact, her two "friends" are Warren (who she feels threatened by due to his attraction to her, as seen by his inclusion in her Nightmare sequence including learning he doctored photos of her to include himself in the picture, his peeping activities on the second day, and the honestly-creepy "Go Ape" thing), and Kate. Kate is going through her own shit and Max remembers Kate killing herself. Is Max going to unload her own issues on someone going through a lot of shit as well or is she going to swallow her problems so not to trouble her friend? And Warren is someone she feels nervous around and who has engaged in some activities that set up warning flags in her psyche. Further, when she told Warren the truth, he promptly blames her time travel on fucking everything up. In short, she trusted Warren and Warren said "you caused all this destruction." (Even if Max initially blames herself, he reinforces that point of view before Max jumps through the photo to save Chloe.)

Nor can I see her telling her parents. Again, she has no proof. Her parents are overprotective already. If she starts going off on this fanciful tale, are they going to believe her? Or are they going to assume their daughter is cracking and force her into therapy and possibly hospitalize her "for her own good" (and thus she ends up medicated and miserable, having lost her autonomy and agency)? It doesn't matter if they wouldn't as Max will worry this could happen. It is better to never say a thing. So Max internalizes everything. And we already see evidence that Max has done this sort of thing in the past. Max keeps her secrets close to her heart. She never told her parents of the time travel even when she could have had proof. So why tell them after Chloe died?

I have been overcoming my PTSD by revisiting it and working through it. Part of this was guided by therapy. Max would not be in a position to talk about this. And how could she? After all, she didn't find Rachel Amber's body (and we have no proof her body is uncovered in a Sacrifice Chloe setting). She didn't see the Storm. She didn't see most of the incidents. The closest that happened was being in the bathroom when Chloe was shot. And her story of what happened would change from the week that beta-Max was in charge and when Max Prime returned to the timeline. So even if she was talking to a school counselor? She'd quickly learn that her story changed and probably shut up and stop seeing them so not to give away her story.

Remember: Max cannot admit to the time travel because doing so means either killing hundreds of people due to the Storm or being locked away for being crazy because she has no proof.

Next, we have feeling good about her actions. For five days Max had hammered into her skull her actions have consequences. More, those consequences are predominantly bad. Far too often Max has to Rewind to fix things from her actions. If she can't Rewind? That means by acting, she's going to fuck things up. In fact, the fundamental aspect of Sacrifice Chloe states that her action to save Chloe caused all of this destruction. Max is going to second-guess herself constantly.

I mean, if she sees Kate on the roof again at a later point (because women who are the victims of crimes are often blamed by society for the crimes inflicted against them as seen time and time again with how we blame victims of sexual harassment and rape for the crimes committed against them, so of course her church and mother and aunt will continue to blame Kate for what she went through), will Max dare to act? If she does, then she might cause another Storm. She might cause damage. If Kate is on that rooftop again, maybe she was supposed to die. Who does Max think she is by trying to stop Destiny?

So yeah. Max is not going to feel good about her actions. She is going to second-guess herself. She already had that tendency at the start of the game, and Sacrifice Chloe hammers down the truth that action is bad. Better to do nothing and not interact.

We end up with Avoidance. Well, what is the biggest Avoidance? Photography. Max already has a murderer who kidnapped her associated with photography. She remembers being in the Dark Room, being powerless in the face of the man who murdered her Chloe. (Just like she murdered her Chloe. She might not have pulled the trigger, but she caused Chloe's death.) She will see Chloe's death and Rachel's death and her own suffering each time she looks at a camera and remembers Mark Jefferson. More, she knows if she focuses on a photograph she could end up traveling through time and causing the Storm. So she can't even enjoy pictures anymore because they are a threat.

That's not to say that the Sacrifice Chloe setting is all dark and dire. She does have music. She loves music. So if she puts aside the camera she might pick up her guitar and embrace music. (Hannah Telle, Max's VA, once speculated that Max would enter a career in music, probably due partly to her own musical inclinations.) So while she might give up her greatest loves, she might eventually embrace a future in music. I doubt she'd ever play in public but... that might be an outlet for a hurting soul.

Now, I've gone on at length about how dire things are for Max in a Sacrifice Chloe setting, but what about Sacrifice Arcadia Bay? Well, things end up a bit more positive in this setting because she can actually talk about going through some of these things. For instance, Max dug up a body with Chloe. She saw Chloe almost shot by Nathan in the bathroom. She saw Kate attempt suicide (whether or not she stopped it is immaterial to the suicide attempt). She learned that a trusted teacher and mentor was in fact a predator who was kidnapping young women, saw pictures of these crimes, and thus "suffers flashbacks visualizing herself in this setting." She can go to therapy and talk about many things she cannot in a Sacrifice Chloe setting and in doing so she can start to work through elements that could result in PTSD developing.

She can also talk to Chloe about what happened. Chloe knows about the time travel. She knows about almost dying (and Max witnessing Chloe's death multiple times). This gives Max a needed outlet for overcoming her own fears and concerns. But more importantly is this: Chloe is likely to tell Max to face down her fears. Chloe is the person who always pushed Max to try new things. And I honestly cannot see that changing as a result of what they went through.

Max also will learn to feel good about her actions. I mean, she chose Chloe over Arcadia Bay. This is the ultimate action, and while she may feel remorse for those deaths and that destruction... she also knows she saved Chloe and Chloe is by her side. She knows that her actions led to the capture and arrest of Mark Jefferson and saving Victoria Chase's life. Hell, it led to David Madsen (and probably a couple Arcadia Bay police officers) surviving the Storm because they were in the Dark Room at the time of the Storm. Her actions have consequences... and those consequences need not be dire. They can be beneficial.

So the Max of Sacrifice Arcadia Bay has a support group, she has access to therapy and can talk about some of the things she went through, she has someone she loves who believes her, she knows that her actions have benefit, she has someone who urges her to move forward. This isn't to say she won't have PTSD... but she is in a far better environment to overcome this to the point that in Life is Strange 2, we learn (in the Save Chloe timeline) that Max is submitting to galleries and that Chloe is still with her. So she's taking pictures and is in a good place in her life.

Now, what about Chloe? After all, Chloe went through some truly horrific shit herself. Chloe was almost shot by Nathan, she almost got hit by a train, she was threatened by Frank, she dug up the body of a girl she truly cared for, dozens of yards from where she was hanging out regularly, she saw a huge-ass Tornado wipe out her home town and kill her mother... yeah, Chloe's been through some horrific stuff, about as horrific as Max. More, she is in an unhealthy position at the time of the game.

But much of what benefits Max in the Save Chloe timeline also benefits Chloe. She can talk to a therapist. She has Max by her side. She has Max by her side and Max out-and-out chose her over hundreds of people. Joyce chose David over her, and for four years Chloe was in an unsafe environment. Rachel was... Rachel, and she was cheating on Chloe anyway. But Max... Max comes back, she saves her life several times, she helps Chloe time and time again, and at the end she chose Chloe over Arcadia Bay. That is big. That is bigger than big, it is... for once, Chloe was told "you are important." I mean, I'm getting teary-eyed just thinking of how big this is. Chloe has realized just how much Max loves her.

So... Chloe might develop PTSD. She is at risk of it. I think her triggers might similar to Max's - both girls probably will freak over thunderstorms for a while, and both may develop an aversion toward guns... at first I thought they'd differ but really, they'd align fairly well. About the only trigger issue Max would have Chloe doesn't has to do with photography (which is why Chloe is the person who'd help Max overcome any such issues).

[shinahbee]

December favorites 2020!

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GREETINGS

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 Hello,

 So we have finally reached another year happy 2021! let's all hope this year will be kind to us, as I have mentioned in my previous favorites post, I finished my work term and now will be working on my art more

so please look out for more art coming soon!

also this maybe a little too early to think of but I was thinking of opening an etsy store to sells stickers/ keychains, this was a project that was on my mind for many years actually, but I have never really considered starting it

Please let me know if any of you would be interested if I do start one.

I would also like some ideas as to what type of characters from what show would you like to see merchandise from. I know there are some franchises that are not well known and most people wouldn’t be able to find so much as a fanart of that particular character/show

so if you could all let me know what you’d like to see in the shop I will highly consider it, with that being said I don't have any anime recs this month, mainly cause I was very busy in the month of December and have not watched any dramas or anime in a while,

so just a heads up, that part will not be included this month. The only thing I was watching is bunch of end of the year award shows, so like the drama awards and melon music awards and MAMA awards...haha that seems really boring to discuss so i'll skip that.

My friend and I were discussing and thought that they should rename these music awards as the BTS awards because they won so many lol.

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MANHWA/MANGA/WEBTOONS

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 This section of the favorites is on fire! you don’t even know how far deep the rabbit hole i`ve dug myself into.

I finally was able to save my progress and crawl back up to list a few of my favorites/ updates of the old favorites and a special segment to ones that triggered a raging response due to utter frustration

Let’s start with a review of the manhwa I have read and discussed so far

 Recap:

 1) Whose baby is it? (ongoing)

2) Social temperature (ongoing)

3) Salad days (ongoing)

4) To be or not to be (ongoing)

5) Path to you (completed)

6) Here u are (completed)

7) BJ alex (completed)

8) No way, vampires don't exist (ongoing)

 so some updates on the previous ones that I have listed out so far, with the exception of the completed ones.

 1) Who's baby is it? ; last time I read up to chapter 72 and now they have up to chapter 126 and I have to say so much more has happened in terms of story and relationship development and I especially love the development between

yi yun and his relationship with jinyao, they are acting more and more like a married couple without even knowing it. You see a gradual change within the two of them that shifts from being very comfortably being able to talk about their problems to one another to

physical touches that would make them  both nervous, I don't mean physical in a sexual way...it's not at that point yet, it's just holding hands and being near each other makes them, nervous and as an audience I felt that nervous energy

and it makes as the audience appreciate the development even if it is slow, it becomes more realistic over time.

Needless to say, I am still a giant fan girl of this author and her story and I can't wait to see this week’s chapter

 2) social temp; I said that I have read the novel so I pretty much knows what happened in the new chapters that were just out, this manhwa is updating a little slow so I have to wait to really comment

When they go further, there is a scene soon that will be the turning point of their relationship so I am excited to see that in the manhwa

 3) salad days; There is also a slow development here as well in terms of relationship building, so far they are working on their careers as professionals and dealing with bullying and jealousy from their peers

But it's all part of life so I appreciate that the author included these aspects as an important part of the story and not just focusing on romance alone.

 4) To be or not to be; you'd think a person who had studied Chinese for 8 years would be able to read the raws....nope,LOL

So far the story is going into a good direction so I'm hoping to see how this new development will play out in their relationship

 5) no way vampires don't exist; I have and fanart and long post dedicated to this alone, so please refer to those for more details. I am happy this is updating again and hopefully all of it will be translated in no time for others to enjoy

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Welcome to heaven

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Okay so that is all for the old ones that I have read, I will include updates throughout my favorites now and then if it is still ongoing.

now let's look at some new ones that I have found this month, these are just a few of the ones I selected out to talk about, but I have read much more as I have said and these were the ones that were the most memorable

 1) Unintentional love story- "Wonyoung gets unjustly suspended from work after getting caught up in a corruption scandal. But when he accidentally discovers the chairman's favorite artist Yoon Taejun living under an alias, he is tasked with a tricky new mission. Could this be Wonyoung's chance to get his job back?"

 This is the summary from the licensed lezhin website, and it pretty much sums up the story, it is still ongoing right now so I can only comment on how I feel about it so far.

I really like this story its really straight forward and focuses mainly on the two characters and how their relationship went from business partners to eventual lovers

it has minimal drama and works on moving the relationship buildup between the two main characters and I really appreciate that, it makes me less frustrated, since you know there is always that one a-hole that will never take no for an answer

i will discuss that later for the other ones I plan to discuss. But so far the story is straight forward and cute, and I really like wonyoung he is really adorable. This is a manhwa but not in the form of a webtoon, so it's black and white and read in traditional manga style

if you like a straight forward story and development please give this a read, you will enjoy it.

 2) Karasugaoka Don't Be Shy!! - "Sou Izuhara, the leader of the crime prevention group "VOICE" that protects east Karasugaoka, realizes he's in love with the man he keeps butting heads with and leader of the rival group "Karasukai," Tetsuji Shinba...!?"

 omg finally a manga recommendation? lol. you have no idea how much trouble I had remembering the title of this manga, I didn’t save it into my bookmarks and I usually did that if I was going to talk about it in the favorites.

I went through 5 websites to figure out the name but at least it was found. This story is both comedic and cute and it was a perfect break from the dark stuff I have been reading, I don't believe it has been updated in while so I'm not sure if it will ever be picked up

but there is a decent amount of chapters to get started on. But as the description says that it is a story about two crime prevention group leaders, they look like thugs but they prevent crimes from happening, so like an anti bullying campaign that recruits volunteers. two of the leaders from the largest groups apparently doesn’t get a long

on the surface but one of the leaders Izuhara really in fact admires the other leader Shinba. they start to get along after shiba went to izuharas territory to take care of some suspicious activity on that side and accidentally discovers a whole new side to izuhara due to the fact that he wasn’t wearing his glasses and didn’t know he was talking to shinba

and invited him to hang out together for that day. lol. You probably know the direction this is heading; it all starts from interest in a person right?

anways, I never recommended a  manga yet so this would be a good one to read,it has a balance of a good romantic comedy.  

 3) Semantic Error- "Computer science major Chu Sangwoo is the epitome of an inflexible and strict rule-abiding person. While working on a liberal arts group project with freeloaders who don’t put in any effort, Sangwoo reasonably decides to remove their names from the final presentation. But he didn’t imagine how involved he would become with the person whose study-abroad plans were messed up because of that project. The involved person: the campus star who everyone knows, Department of Design’s Jang Jaeyoung. He has everything from skills, looks, family background and good relationships except for 1 big problem: Chu Sangwoo. What happens when an engineer and an artist whose personalities are like oil and water have to work together? Jang Jaeyoung is like a semantic error in the perfect world of Chu Sangwoo. Will Sangwoo be able to debug this?"

 this has got to be one of the most accurate portrays of an antagonist relationship start off ever, it was really comedic and relatable at the same time, if you are in current group assignments and are or have suffered the same as sangwoo, please let me know cause I know I have.lol.

there’s only 16 chapters so far and I believe it hasn’t been updated in a while either so I don’t know if it is discontinued or not.

I can't wait to see the development between the two male leads, because their relationship right now in the manhwa is really hilarious and worth the read.

side note, not that this will ever be considered as a k-drama but I would like to see sangwoo being played by kim soo hyun, because he looks like him in the drama it's okay not to be okay.

 4) Tied up in twins- " The story starts off with three friends Jiwoo, sohee and woojung who had been friends since high school began to developed complicated feeling towards one another, woojung had been in love with sohee and sohee had been in love with jiwoo who was in love with woojung, things turned for the worse when jiwoo got drunk one night out and decided to confess his feelings to woojung by going to his apartment, he found 'woojung' standing outside and invited him to go drinking, he finally was able to let out his feelings and 'woojung ' accepted them without hesitation. Jiwoo felt like he was on cloud nine at the moment and slept with 'woojung' that night after thier feelings were made mutual. Turns out 'woojung ' was not actually woojung himself but his twin brother sarang, not knowing this fact he spots sarang with a man from his past eunji that used to bully him during his military service which made him confused and angry that 'woojung ' might be playing with his feelings. Sarang then confessed that he is the twin brother  of woojung and both of them decided that that night was a mistake and that they should just forget about it as it didn't happen. Of course fate had other plans as they keep running into each other during difficult times and decided to become friends. It didn't take them long to be attracted to one another which lead them to end their previous relationship, sarang especially was suffering from his cheating boy friend's abuse and jiwoo with his one sided feelings for woojung. After a series of events sarang and jiwoo found that their feeling for each other were mutual and started to dating, which poses a lot more obstacles than either of the two had bargained for...."

 This is actually my very own summary since I can't find one for this manhwa, I also did and fanart and discussed why i really like this story in that fanart, so please check out my art for my thoughts on it! Shameless self promo....

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Welcome to hell

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ooo now it's time for the fun part.LOL. Now let me just say that there is sometimes a fine line that defines what shounen ai and Yaoi are, sometimes stories is listed as both because one story that starts off like shounen ai will suddenly become yaoi

I define yaoi as a story that includes all the things that i'm uncomfortable with, which is emotional trauma from sexual abuse, sexual harassment and rape, physical abuse, suicide etc

 these stories usually include some or all of the listed above and could make you uncomfortable in many ways, so as a warning if you are bothered by any of that even a little please don't read the ones I’m about to list, because there is a lot of it and there are situations that made me really sick while reading them. on the upside there is a lot of whole heartedness from the love scenes between the two main characters, although it’s like pages of sex scenes, you know from reading that it is between two people that love and trust each other.

 so you have been warned, i'm not going to spoil it in terms of story but there is something these ones i chose out have in common and that is a SICK A-HOLE THAT EVERY PERSON WANTS TO KILL.You should have seen all those comments about calling sangwoo (killing stalking) to kill theses mofos and I could agree more, these disgusting human beings made me sick.

 so let's begin...btw these are in no particular order, I was going to list these from the least worthy of dieing to most worthy of dieing but you know in the end they should just all die...lol.

1) My Suha -"A skillful secretary by day and choosy cruiser by night, Suha is a young professional who’s in search of some no-strings-attached action. He hasn’t had much luck lately, though, since a handsome face doesn’t always match what’s in a guy’s pants. This might be why he finds himself wondering about his dreamboat boss, Director Park Jiwoon. But there’s no way he can mix business with pleasure… That is, until Jiwoon and Suha run into each other in the gay bar bathroom."

 so where to begin, um this pretty much includes all those listed above but it mainly focuses on the relationship between jiwoon and Suha, and it is not abusive and very loving in fact,I'm glad that they show the contrast between how suha's previous realtionships don't work out because of his trauma

and how jiwoon despite being an unwanted heir in his grandmother's eyes was able to give love and protection to the person that matters to him the most. So there's this scum bag...I even forgot his name but the red haired dude in this story he`s the legitimate heir to the family, who is the absolute worse and not only sexually abused Suha when they were younger and also emotionally scar both jiwoon and suha

making them feel incapable of being loved. I didn’t get a good feeling form him when he was first introduced and I was right...lol. But at least the comments section was in agreement; let me sum up my feelings in the form of this gif alone...

 you get the point...

I heard it was going to finish soon so hopefully these emotional scars can be resolved and that suha and jiwoon stick together to get through it all. That would be a good ending for them after everything they have been through.You really need to read it in order to under stand why these events happen the way they do but please remember that suha`s inability to feel love stems from the all of his previous relationships not lasting long yes...but started with this red haired mofo. I am never going to let this dude live, let`s just say that.

2) Crash into me- " Seung-chan is stressed. He has enough on his plate with the long hours at work, and now he can’t even get any rest at home! Every night, the lustful moaning and violent banging from the apartment upstairs keeps him awake. Just as he’s at his wits’ end, he chances upon the gorgeous, enigmatic Hyesung outside his building. Surely all those filthy sounds couldn’t be coming from such a pretty mouth? But as Seung-chan soon finds out, there’s a lot more to Hyesung"

 from that little description you’ve probably figured out what’s going on with the neighbour next door keeping seung chan awake right? well no surprise sexual abuse, after hyesung was forced to suffer from a ordeal that wasn't his fault the brother of the person that died made it seem like it was his fault and sexually assaulted him

and so this ongoing sexual abuse progressed for several years which lead hyesung feel like life is meaningless and he should just die, until he locked eyes with seung chan walking back to the apartment and thought of jumping out the window, because he had a strange feeling that seungchan who he has not met before would catch him if he did.

I just almost cried from what I just wrote...to think there’s is some a-hole out there that would drive a person to suicide like that just to satisfy his own needs or whatever...i don't even know cause it’s still ongoing...i don’t think any amount of back story will justify any kind of sympathy for this person..

from what I have read so far it seems so be going ending soon so i hope seungchan and hyesung will be able to get through all this and live in peace because of suengchan, hyesung was able to love again and find his worth and is able to fight for himself and I’m sincerely glad that he had met and trust him whole heartedly.

3) Dine with vampire- "Caught in the clutches of an abusive relationship, Sooin longs to escape. A vampire who finds human blood repulsive, Chi-hwan only drinks the blood of other vampires. When chance brings the two together, Chi-hwan makes Sooin an enticing proposal. Chi-hwan will help Sooin get out of his living hell, and in exchange… Sooin has to let Chihwan drink his blood. Will this proposal change both their lives for the better?”

 y'all don't even get me started on the mofo in this story....I’ve never felt so much rage from staring at a 2D character on my screen, the amount of times I hissed at him...you don't even know

like I have mentioned before ever since my twilight phase I didn’t consume anything vampire related in a while, I don't really care much for the vampire aspect but I guess it's still important over all

once you start the first chapter you will immediately know why I hate the harry potter a-hole in this story..he is despicable and that’s putting it lightly...but you know he doesn’t last long cause vampire tsukiyama (lol, not his name but they look alike) shows up and kills the mofo

and saves sooin who is the person who harry potter had been sexually abusing...to the point where you guessed it, he wanted to die.

chi hwan agrees to grant any wish sooin wanted in exchange for his blood because being vampire by nature he had not been drawn to anyone’s blood for some reason and had only consumed the blood of other vampires.

of course it was a small price to pay for sooin considering all the misery he had gone through. slowly sooin discovered that love was not abusive through the many times chi hwan...lmao i almost called him tsukiyama again...and he had sex, he discovered that it was safe and gentle and enjoyable

nothing that he had ever felt before, and so they became drawn to each other more than they thought they would to the point where they genuinely care for one another, though of course chi hwan knows that one day sooin will die and he will have to live on forever alone, thus the fate of his vampire blood.

 but here’s the catch..it's not a spoiler really cause you knew it was too easy when main villain dies in chapter 4...and he’s on the front cover...which means yes harry potter mofo is back...ugh...he should have burned his body...WTF and as a vampire no less..

i'm like great now look what happened, you should have chopped him up and threw him into the incinerator!

you know that saying " mistakes were made..."

anyways, now he's back meaning shits about to do down and i'm not ready to see it happen, right now they are going through his back story and i’m like sorry author...whatever you try to feed me there’s no way i can have any sympathy for this dick...

 so that's all i'm going to rant about for these yaoi titles...i had to go back and read some it again to know what i'm going to write about and i revisited a lot of things i’d rather not.I think the rage I felt was ignited again all of a sudden and I felt utter frustration to finish reading it again, what I am trying to say is, ya`ll need to read this once and that`s it...these aren`t stories you`d want to revisit.lol

so if you like this hell segment let me know and i'll continue it cause there’s an endless supply of content for this genre, I have a few more but i'll save those for next month.

and i'll probably come across more in the mean time to discuss, but I guess this is where fiction and reality divides, cause you know in real life if this crap exists absolutely no one will take this bull crap!

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MUSIC

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 I have been listening to the Start up soundtrack and found a lot of songs i like from it, I don't like the drama and have not finished it, but the soundtrack is bomb

I have also been liking some old pop songs and went down the rabbit hole of 90`s pop songs...Britney spears especially

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 so that is all I have for this month, I'm sorry its manhwa and manga focused, i'll have time to watch anime that I need to catch up on and start some drams now so i'll have more

to discuss in the next month hopefully, so please take care of your selves in the new year as well!

take care,

sheena

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