#LA training Online

[luvsavos]

decided to cave and name my nergi plushie after vodrem. that was, predictably, a Mistake

[fictionalwh0ree]

Hi!

I wanted to make a Billie request please, with reader being either her gf or fwb and she starts pushing Billie away since she feels insecure since Billis constantly hanging with exes and flirting with other girls online? Thank you so much 🤗

jealousy- billie eilish

summary: even though you're strictly friends with benefits, that doesn't stop you from feeling jealous when billie talks to other girls.

word count: 1.6k

warnings: smut; fingering, use of vibrator

billie eilish masterlist | main masterlist

“you’re so pretty”

the words flowed effortlessly from her mouth, no thought behind them. the words seemed so foreign to you, words you’d gone from hearing multiple times a day to once a week. you couldn’t help the jealousy you felt. your eye twitched slightly, but you fought the urge to look up at billie, at her live. you trained your eyes on your own phone. you tried to tune it out. you’d gotten used to it.

billie would go on live a couple times a week, and when she would share it with others. her fans, overjoyed that they would get the chance to speak with their idol, would blush and scream as she complimented them, flirting back and forth with some of them. but what bothered you most was that she would do it in front of you. the fans didn’t know, as you were hidden off-screen.

you were over at her house multiple times a week, your hookups becoming an almost daily occasion. you would lie next to her in bed, in only one of her t-shirts, your panties and other clothes discarded on the floor somewhere, and watch her as she was on her phone. you watched as she texted other girls, liked their stories and pictures, all while your arm was pushed up against hers. you told yourself it didn’t matter. she didn’t owe anything to you, you weren’t together, just friends with benefits. but if that was the case, why did you feel so worthless? every text she sent would punch a hole through your heart and you couldn’t do anything about it, because at the end of the day, you’d rather have her for a little bit than not have her at all.

now, you laid next to her, out of the camera’s view. you listened as she laughed, trying to ground yourself by taking deep breaths. you looked up at her phone, seeing a notification pop up.

i’m in la

you waited for the next one.

we can finally meet up

you read the username and recognized her as a popular instagram model.

my hotel room’s soundproof 😉

your eyes began to sting as you tried to blink back tears.

i’m only here for one night

u in?

fuck.

she clicked on the notification, pausing her live, but before she could respond, you made your move. you got out of her bed and collected your clothes, swiftly putting your underwear and pants on.

“y/n, where are you going?” billie asked as you took her shirt off and tossed it at her face, making sure not to look at her.

“i have to go,” you mumbled, throwing on your own shirt.

“why?” she asked.

“i have plans,” you said bluntly.

“y/n” she laughed, “no, you don’t. it’s 4 o’clock on a tuesday. if you had something, you wouldn’t be here right now.”

“yeah, you’re right billie,” you said bitterly, turning to face her, “i don’t have plans. but you’d better start getting ready for your next hookup, because one person a day just isn’t enough, right?”

“y/n,” she said apologetically.

“where’s my phone?” you asked, searching the room.

“y/n,” she said, this time more firm.

“goddamnit, where is it?” you said, the frustration causing the tears you’d been fighting off to start spilling.

“y/n,” she said seriously.

“what.” you said angrily, running your hands through your hair.

“i’m sorry, but-” she began.

“but we’re just friends with benefits,” you finished her sentence, “i know, that’s why i’m leaving, so you have enough time to wash my scent off you for the next one. but i’m done. this is it. now you’ll have space for as many bitches as you want.”

“i wasn’t gonna go,” she said softly, getting up from the bed.

“what?” she said as she approached you.

“i wasn’t gonna go. i’m with you, why would i go?” she asked.

“me being around has never stopped you from flirting with other girls,” you argued.

“those girls mean nothing to me,” she said.

“i don’t mean anything to you either. that’s why we’re strictly friends with benefits,” you said.

“you know that’s not true, don’t you?” she said, a smirk playing at her lips as she got closer to you, meaning you were against the wall.

“no,” you mumbled.

“no? we see each other almost every day. would that happen if you didn’t mean anything to me? no other girl spends as much time with me as you. most girls don’t spend any time with me,” she said, her hand now resting on your waist, caressing it gently.

“meanwhile, you’re wearing my shirts, cooking in my kitchen, dancing in the living room with me,” she said, her voice now just above a whisper as she was only a couple inches from your face, “you have to know you mean a lot to me.”

“how would i have known that?” you said, getting angry again.

“how could i have possibly known that when you were flirting with the most gorgeous girls i’ve ever seen?” you said, laughing sadly.

“no one compares to you. i promise you that,” she whispered.

“you’re the only one for me,” she said, her eyes silently pleading for forgiveness.

you turned your head away from her, not wanting to meet her eyes. she took the opportunity to latch onto your neck, sucking and nibbling gently.

“billie,” you said reluctantly.

“you’re telling me you don’t want this?” she asked.

“i-,” you began.

“i do. but no more girls,” you said firmly.

“only you, mama,” she confirmed, her eyes falling to your lips before leaning in.

she kissed you gently, but it began to get more heated, as it usually did. she turned you around, pushing you backwards until your legs hit the back of her bed. you let yourself fall back onto it and scooted until your head hit the headboard as billie held herself above you. her hands moved to pull your pants down and once they were low enough you kicked them off. she then pulled your panties off with an undeniable urgency. she moved down, parting your legs with one swift motion. she began to trail kisses up and down your inner thighs.

“billie,” you moaned pleadingly.

she stopped, looked up at you, and smirked, before attaching herself to your clit, sucking it gently before bringing her fingers up to trace your folds. she teased your entrance before pushing her fingers in. she pumped them in and out, curling them to hit your g-spot which she knew so well. moans fell from your lips and soon you felt that familiar knot in your stomach.

“i’m so close,” you said as you threw your head back.

but, out of nowhere, she stopped completely. you looked down at her, confusion clear on your face.

“not yet,” she smirked mischievously.

“pick up my phone,” she commanded, and you did as told.

“open it,” she said, watching you.

“unpause the live,” your eyebrows shot up, but you followed her instructions.

“good girl,” she whispered, “now talk.”

“hi guys!” you greeted after clearing your throat.

the comments flooded with people greeting you. they weren’t surprised to see you, as besides being an established celebrity, your friendship with billie was not new. you began to answer some of their questions when something entered you suddenly. you yelped, looking down at billie. she gave you a cocky smirk before holding her finger up to her lips and pursing them. you put all your focus into the live, not wanting them to catch on, but it was getting increasingly harder as she toyed with the settings of a pink vibrator. she pushed it in and out, turned the setting up and down, all while using her free hand to play with your already swollen clit.

your breathing was getting laboured as you felt yourself getting closer to your climax. you threw your head back, sealing your eyes shut. the comments expressed their concern, asking if you were okay.

“i’m just tired,” you explained, “long day. why don’t i let some of you guys on?”

the knot was building more and you knew you were a mere seconds away from cumming. you rushed through the requests, picking a random fan with you as their profile picture. as her side of the video came up, she started yelling out of excitement. she was sobbing and screaming with no break, and as billie rubbed your clit a bit harder, you released. you felt as billie licked and lapped up everything, relief overcoming you.

‘oh my god,’ you mouthed off camera.

“i love you so much y/n” the girl said through sobs.

“aw, i love you too!” you responded before the girls internet cut out, causing her to lose her spot in the live.

billie moved from her spot and came into the view, smiling into the camera happily. she looked at you and you saw a hint of mischief in her eyes.

“hi guys! this is my g-” she started to say, but you ended the live.

“-irl,” she finished offline.

“not yet,” you laughed, kissing her on the lips as she laughed softly.

[thearchercore]

charles is a PR genius. and here's how he's trying to slowly rebrand his persona to strenghten his personal brand:

recently, especially after the triple header, you could notice charles had a period of time when he distanced himself from ferrari and clearly changed his public statements about his goals. he went from saying he wants to win with ferrari to saying that at his core, he just wants to win. and that he would leave ferrari if he didn't believe the project.

he also changed the way he communicated with fans, through social media. you can notice the change of wording in his post descriptions:

both posts are from the same year, but the wording is now different. he refused to use the ferrari branding and stopped using the typical ferrari-PR wording he was conditioned to use.

fast forward, he started interracting with ferrari by abu dhabi and seemed to be finally happy with the direction the team was taking. however, he still managed to build something from this anti-ferrari period -- the slow rebrand from being "charles, the ferrari driver" to "charles, the f1 driver".

charles is slowly, but surely working to increase the value of his personal brand to possibly gain more negotiating power, and other bonuses that come with having a strong personal brand not tied to any team in particular.

in general, the goal would be to outgrow the team so you are known as an individual athlete, not just someone who drives for the particular team and has their identity tied to the team only.

he also signed with WME for advertisement purposes, he started wearing his personal clothing brand CLACE again after ferrari banned him to do so. he clearly regained more confidence in what he can do as an athlete within the contract (that's usually very limiting from ferrari's pov).

how does he otherwise work on his personal brand? relatability. charles is a gen z child first and foremost, he knows parasocial relationships play a huge role on social media. he works on side personal projects like the LA vlog -- the vlog that had little to do with racing but still showed charles completely SUCK at basketball.

why would you include it, you may ask? it makes him relatable, it makes his personality more interersting. more fun.

his first public post from winter training then was him falling

why did he post that? well, a) he's a silly guy. but more importantly, b) he's not crafting up a perfect PR image, he's aiming for being relatable, showcasing more of his personality. he wants to stand out as an individual in the sea of other f1 drivers who posted more pre-planned content during their winter training.

in the LA vlog he also left in a little dig at carlos. why? because he can. he also used his twitter likes to like controversial things that ferrari wouldn't let him say. he very much knows how to navigate online spaces and how to create more boundaries between his personal brand and the ferrari brand.

additionally, he also now hangs out with people like max publicly even if they don't benefit the ferrari brand. max, in general, isn't liked by the tifosi or ferrari in general. but charles still makes sure to hang out with him on track and outside of it, once again, securing his personal brand and not pushing something that ferrari would prefer.

it's all very interesting to watch, seeing how carefully he's rebuilding his public image and how he communicates on social media with the world.

[mistydeyes]

hiiiiiii can you please do a reader who is captain of a all woman force like top 3 military ranks and shes young to and she dates gaz ex

When 141 raid las v they get over powered by shadows and laswell knew this would happen so she calls in reader and her team to help 141 are there thinking fight until you drop until they see soldiers in all black military outfits with masks take down shadows no sweat. And then soap comes up like “thanks man who are you” and she’s like “we’re the widows” and uncovers her mask to reveal she’s a woman…….

I always imagined in the cod world an black widow inspired branch

THANK YOU SO MUCH AND YOU ARE LOVED,GORGEOUS,SMART,WORTHY 💕💕💕

thank you so much for requesting and the kind words! highkey wish they would introduce a group of badass fighter women into the modern warfare universe

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summary: Working behind the scenes is a group of highly trained and focused women. They're only whispers until the 141 is put into a perilous position and require rescuing.

pairing: Kyle "Gaz" Garrick x fem!reader

warnings: swearing, depictions of violence

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"How's that lover boy of yours doing, Angel?" your second-in-command joked. You rolled your eyes as you closed your final page of post-op paperwork. "Probably trying to beat his mates in a push-up contest," you replied, laughing at the thought of Kyle doing anything else. Despite what you thought, Gaz was pinned down in an empty cargo container in the middle of Mexico. While Ghost and Soap provided cover, he was trying to contact Laswell through a majority-busted radio. "Watcher-1, it's Bravo team," he shouted before he heard the broken-up replies from Laswell. Price pulled the radio out of his hands before he took the tiny window of opportunity to respond. "Watcher-1, we need emergency evac," he rapidly said with a hoarse tone, "we need help, Watcher-1." 

Your restful slumber was awoken by a hurried set of knocks on your quarter's door. You hastily jumped out of bed and opened it to reveal a private, standing sheepishly in front of you. "Sorry to wake you ma'am but Chief Station Laswell is online in the conference room and she wants to speak to you," they said hastily and you quickly followed after them, disregarding the current state you were in. An hour later, you, your lieutenant, and sergeants were on a helo to Las Alamas, Mexico. "They say what kind of shit they're in?" Iris, your most junior sergeant, asked over the howling night air and the sound of rotating helicopter blades. "Only that it's Captain Price's men and their last comm came from a storage container," you replied. Your team could tell you were worried and your lieutenant threw an arm around your shoulders. "We'll get them and make sure Sergeant Kyle is safe, Major," she reassured but this did nothing to help the growing pit in your stomach and the pooling sweat in your palms. Why the fuck did you let this happen, Price?

"Evac in 2 hours," the pilot called over the comms and your team dispersed into the rubble of what resembled a base. You used the back of your hand to shield your masked face from the kicked-up sand and dirt. The midnight black balaclavas felt hot against your face but you disregarded the minor discomfort. Countless bodies of the private militia group, the Shadows, littered the ground and you kicked over each body in a fruitless attempt to identify them. "Cargo holds should be 2 clicks to our north," Viper, your lieutenant, directed and you signaled them to follow your lead. You approached cautiously, hiding behind other containers and building rubble as you swept for enemy reinforcements. You looked down to see a cluster of heat signatures heading your way. "Hold on," you directed with a fist in the air, "we got company." The group stopped on your command and you quickly devised a plan, "Iris and Artemis, you take overwatch," you commanded as they began to move in careful sprints, "Cosmo, you and I will move towards the cargo," with that, you dispersed and moved quickly under the guise of dust.

As soon as you neared the rusted metal structure, you could hear a cacophony of shouts followed by the piercing sound of bullets. "Get down, Angel," you could hear your sergeant yell and you thudded to the ground. Amongst the dust, you could see the soldiers fall one by one with your team's sniper rounds filing through them like they were paper. Despite feeling absolute pride in their skill set, you were interrupted by a tight grip on your ankles. You turned to see a Shadow Company member crawling towards you, knife ready to attack. The adrenaline kicked in as you slammed your boot into their face and prepared to go on the offensive. As they were momentarily stunned, you took the opportunity to savagely jump on their back and crudely drag their knife along their neck. "Good night," you whispered before letting them fall to the ground with a thud. You continued to move to your target, gingerly wiping the reddened blood on your pants. Cosmo didn't question your appearance as you entered her vision and resumed the mission. When you reached the outer doors of the container, your other two remaining members had joined.

You knocked in succession, a code Laswell had told you before you departed. After a few moments of anticipation, the door slowly opened to reveal the tired and grimy faces of Price's team. You looked around and lost count of the amount of injuries you noticed and how some of their limbs were turned in unnatural ways. You could feel your chest tighten as you looked to find Kyle amongst the empty shell cartridges. You were comforted when you saw his face peer over the group. You walked over to him and hugged him tightly, savoring the feeling of knowing he was safe in your arms. "Thank you for the rescue," you could hear him whisper before he pulled you back into an embrace. "You know these lads, Garrick?" you could hear someone say. You turned to see the bruised and cut face of Soap as he tried to feign a smile. Before Kyle could respond, you were sure to make yourself and your team known. "We're not men, Sergeant," you said confidently, peeling off your dusty and blood-soaked mask, "we're the widows."

[199x-furry-archive]

I noticed skunks were much more popular. As someone with a skunksona it warms my heart. I'm wondering if you have any theories on why they were popular around this time?

I get the impression that, if you made a histogram of the most popular furry species, skunks would have been way above the median. Now I get the impression that, in terms of often-anthropomorphized species, they're pretty unpopular. Some species have always been popular, and some have always been unpopular – skunks are neither. So there are two angles to this question: why were skunks so popular, and why are they now not popular?

In the twilight of Usenet, Tiny Toons was a cultural lynchpin among furries online. This might sound strange in our moment, when furries attempt to define themselves as a "fandom without an object," but what is worth noting is that early-90s furries related to the internet completely differently than us—the content they shared across the net was primarily text-based, and visual content was the exception. In general, "content creation" online meant stories and binaries, not bulky bitmaps and gifs. Having a cartoon was useful as a visual anchor for which you could share stories and "fantasize," for lack of a better word.

I would wager that most shows out there had zero prominent Usenet groups. Many had one and some had two, but Tiny Toons was one of the few with three: alt.tv.tiny-toon, alt.tv.tiny-toon.fandom, and, of course, alt.tv.tiny-toon.sex. If Tiny Toons was popular, Fifi La Fume was very popular. Fifi La Fume was romantically aggressive, which many of the young adult male viewers of the show could read as an appealing sexual aggressiveness. For the purposes of this post I'm going to sidestep the question of why so many adult furries were attracted to a child skunk-thing.

That being said, there were Babs and Shirley fans, but rabbits and loons were never as popular as skunks, even though they were all in Tiny Toons--"rabbitfucker" didn't catch on like "skunkfucker." Sexualized characters like Animaniacs' Minerva Mink or EWS's Amy the Squirrel were probably as popular as Fifi, but minks and squirrels never really caught on either. As a result I think this is, at best, an incomplete description, but it might help illustrate why so many "fandom pin-up girls" were skunks.

What I think further helps is that skunks are pretty "easy" to draw for both amateur and professional artists. Striped skunks are black and white, which makes them particularly readable from just a doodle. Eric Schwartz was able to make (off the top of my head) 4 skunk characters for Sabrina Online that look reasonably distinct, and people grew attached to all of them. An amateur artist with no formal training, nor access to any of the online "how to draw" resources we have now, might find a skunk to be the easiest anthro to draw with the ballpoint pen and #2 pencils they had on hand.

But at some point skunks became less popular. I'm not sure what the decline stems from, but it might be the waning popularity of WB/Disney cartoons in shaping the fandom compared to anime, and the evolution of the world wide web into a technology that centered sharing visual data and holding personal accounts. Furries in this time wanted a holistic internet presence for the more visually-oriented world wide web, instead of just “a character” for text-based MUCKs or RP. As a result I think many of them shied away from skunks, which have a reputation for being pests, and to more unique, visually-distinct designs that could stand on their own without elaborate roleplay or description (which might have led into sparkledogs).

[jonasgoonface]

me and Io put Laugh Riot online for free/pay-what-you-want :0 Perfekt last minute gift to send far away friends, enemies, crushes and well-wishees.

No need to steal it anymore. Money is just something you throw off the back of a train. Scarcity is over. The internet is a shangri-la for you baby.

[saphronethaleph]

Rushing the boomer

“How long?” Palpatine asked.

“Do not strain yourself, lord,” one of the cultists said. “Your attempt to possess the Snoke body will have weakened you-”

“I am well aware of my limitations,” Palpatine snapped, then turned to the Final Order engineer. “How long, commander?”

“That depends, my lord,” the engineer replied, his voice firm. “For the whole fleet… fourteen years. A single ship could be completed in eight. One ship coming online at a time in sequence, the first ship will be finished in nine years and the whole fleet in sixteen.”

Palpatine frowned.

“The whole fleet, then,” he said. “The might of the Final Order will blaze a path across the galaxy, and all will obey the Sith or perish.”

“It is as you command, my lord,” the engineer said, saluting.

Palpatine waved him away, then gestured, and a hologram of the Star Destroyers currently under construction formed in the air above him.

They were vast ships, for line vessels, and the Sith Eternal were building one thousand and eighty of them.

One thousand and eighty!

Never again would rebels exploit a single point of failure and destroy his most powerful and only superweapon… a fate he had experienced twice, now, and each one burned like a canker in his heart, the fury suffusing him and lending him strength.

At his insistence, Palpatine’s spies in the wider galaxy, outside Exegol, had found for him the names of every single person who had been directly involved in the attack on both Death Stars.

Han Solo, Chewbacca, Leia Organa Solo, Evaan Verlaine… all of those names were of people he hated. And Palpatine would see them destroyed, one way or another.

But there were four names for which the Dark Lord of the Sith reserved his greatest hatred. The true, simmering passion that Palpatine held for those who had truly thwarted his plans.

Landonis Balthazar Calrissian. Nien Nunb. Wedge Antilles… and, more than anyone else, Luke Skywalker.

If there was anyone who Palpatine wanted to destroy, it was Luke Skywalker… not merely to see him dead, but to humiliate him. To tear him down. To reduce all his triumphs to smouldering ruins.

Break the New Republic. Destroy the New Jedi Order. Turn his own family against him. Shatter his will.

That was what Palpatine would do, to Luke Skywalker.

And then – and only then – would the galaxy burn, worlds submitting to the rule of the Sith or being destroyed.

Thinking such pleasant thoughts, it took a moment for Palpatine to notice the flashing red alert on the side of the holodisplay.

“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “Explain it!”

“We’ve picked up ships, incoming,” an officer said, looking up from his displays on the other side of the room. “Lots of them – Rebel ship classes!”

Palpatine’s hand waved, and the holodisplay reconfigured to show the Red Honeycomb Zone and the tactical displays.

Sure enough, ships were coming through. Two Mon Cal star cruisers, first, then frigates and cruiser class vessels, disgorging a cloud of snubfighters from their hangar bays.

Sith Eternal TIE Fighters were already taking off, but Palpatine could see the difference between the two forces – the Sith Eternal was a secret military and had never actually fought in battle, and it had been aiming for a projected readiness date over a decade in the future.

The New Republic fighter corps was no such easy target. Even without their shields, their skill and training were clearly superior, and the first pass saw a dozen Sith fighters go down in blazing, burning wrecks. A dogfight was already beginning, but it was a dogfight that could only go one way.

But how had this happened? Exegol was secret! With the hyperspace anomalies protecting it, the only way to visit the planet would be to not only know where it was but be shown…

...unless, that was, someone had a Sith wayfinder.

Suddenly gripped by a cold rush of fear that prompted a surge of utter hatred, Palpatine reached out with his mind towards the New Republic strike force as it became haloed in laserfire and explosions.

He could sense a Sith Wayfinder. HIS Sith Wayfinder! The one that had been in his throne room during the Battle of Endor.

Pushing harder, Palpatine located the dancing spark of the wayfinder, alongside a sickeningly familiar presence – a presence ducking and dodging and rolling, as it locked onto and destroyed one TIE Fighter after another.

“Skywalker!” Palpatine shouted, then coughed. “SKYWALKER!”

“Watch out, there’s another fighter flight taking off from the hangar system to port,” Nien Nunb said, pointing.

“Got it, keying them in,” Lando agreed, his gaze flicking between the displays of the Raddus flag bridge. “Hey, Wedge, you want to take those fighters and the battleline will kill the hangar for you?”

“Copy that, General,” Wedge agreed. “Red leader to Red Alpha flight, follow me in!”

Six X-wings rolled to follow Wedge in, and Lando checked over the displays again.

“Well, I’m no expert but I think we caught them with their pants down, Admiral,” he said, glancing back at Leia. “No more than one in fifty of the capital ship turbolasers are working, and most of them seem to still be under construction.”

He whistled. “It’s a damn good thing we caught them when we did, though, I’m reading over six hundred ships in states of construction and there’s hundreds more building slips.”

The Raddus jolted as a volley of turbolasers hit, then the radio crackled.

“Gold leader here,” Verlaine called in. “Princess, I’ve got eyes on where that fire’s coming from, looks like a turbolaser testing facility with some working cannon. My boys and girls will fix that little problem.”

Nien made the adjustment before Lando got to it, and a double volley of proton torpedoes blasted the facility to pieces.

“It’s certainly a damn good thing we found them before they finished,” Leia agreed. “How did you do it?”

“Well, our lead ran out on Kijimi,” Lando said. “Then I realized nobody had actually checked the wreckage of the Second Death Star, and unlike the first the second’s armour wasn’t in place to contain the explosion. I thought it was likely some of it had come down intact, so Luke and I went over to find it and that’s how we got here.”

“I’m picking something up-” Nien reported, then they all looked out the window at once as a flare of lightning crackled up from a hole in the ground. It gripped a New Republic corvette, lightning crawling over the surface and ripping chunks out of it, and when the bolts stopped the engines had been disabled and most of the CR90 crashed seconds later.

“Skywalker here, I’m on it,” Luke said, his X-Wing shooting past and shooting down one of the last enemy TIEs. The Jedi Master’s snubfighter kept going, rolling into a complex manoeuvre and spitting laserbolts down the chasm, then the lightning came back up again – and Luke’s ship absorbed it, glowing bright white as the energy was corralled and neutralized.

“I don’t know about you, but that looks like the main event as far as I’m concerned,” Lando noted.

[skibidilando]

A Day at quadrant: LN4 (Part 2)

Author note: I don’t even know how to post anything on this and never wrote a fic but I hope this is good but I think it’s pretty shit and I haven’t finished it yet and if any writers want to use this idea you can for sure just @ me please oh and if you have feedback please let me know thanks xx

Also i tried to change my like writing style thing cause i feel like it was shit last time but yeah idk

Lando x quadrant fem reader

Blurb: reader is a member of quadrant, she games most of the time but also likes f1 along with her best friend Ria bish. She is friends with all members at quadrant and finds it a good laugh with all her mates, but maybe her view of someone in particular is more than a mate..

Warnings: sexualising, swearing, mention of a gun, leaked tape, sad distraught reader, friends to maybe lovers if I make it a series? Smut-ish? If I missed any let me know (I don’t know how to do warnings sorry x)

Well wasn't last week a fucking eventful week. You still cant stop thinking about Lando right next to you comforting you about what happened. You're starting to feel better about the whole issue and get some support from people online and all the other members of quadrant, but fuck that was just shit. You haven't been in any quadrant videos since, but you're in a better place now and probably need to start participating in them more.

Lando and ethan make the idea of quadrant meeting up at landos apartment and trying to train like him for a day. You aren't exactly looking foward to it but oh well, at least Ria is going. You text your gc back and tell them that you will do it too. Then, you get a message.

Lando: are you 100% sure ur okay to come back and film already? you dont have to if you dont want to.

Y/n: yep. I need to get in more videos and im feeling better anyways, thanks for asking.

Lando: all good

Well that was polite and unexpected of Lando to reach out, but whats more unexpected is for your panties to be soaked right now over 2 text messages. well fuck, oopsies.

That night all you can think of is Lando, it's a bit embarrassing to admit, but he was circling around your head like it was an f1 race. You decide to get your head out of it and call Ria to come over and have a chat, since she is your best friend after all. Shortly she pulls up to your apartment in Monaco, funning in bursting of excitement to see you.

"RIAAAAAAA!" you shout when you open the door for her. "Y/NNNN" she replied back. You give her a hug and make her a cup of coffee just how she likes it. You guys sit and chat about the f1 grand prix in Bahrain coming up, and how you hope Lando continues to have a good season with Oscar this year. "Did you see the chat about the new yt vid we doing" You ask Ria. "omg yes and they are bringing angry ginge in I heard" Ria replies back.

"STOP IT" you yell back laughing. You love ginge and his videos, who wouldn't? he's a very very funny bloke. "OMG i''m definitely coming tomorrow then to the recording are you kidding?".

Unfortunately time goes by when you're having fun, and Ria was the most fun, so she had to go a few hours later which felt like minutes. Besides you both need sleep for the youtube vid you're filming tmr at Lando's. You go to bed and try to sleep as much as you can, which didnt happen lol.

rise and shine love. It's already 6am and time to go to Lando's place to film. Normally you don't have to wakeup early as fuck but for the purpose of the video and "being Lando Norris" you had no choice. You get to his apartment after parking at the front and knock on the door, to which he opens. "hi y/n" he says nicely and gives you a hug. "So good to see you Lando, where is everyone?".

"first here mate" he says almost excitedly. "so what are we actually doing today like playing video games or some shit" you say. "haha your funny mate, we are lifting weights, eating what i eat, using the sim, and neck strengthening" he says laughing at you. "fuck r u taking the piss" you say laughing. "oh my days Landoooo do I look like an f1 driver" you also reply with. "well yeah thats the whole point of the video ya dumb fuck" he replied jokingly.

"hahaha get fucked lando nowins" you snap back. he laughs as you proceed to miss the chair you went to lean on making you flinch and stumble looking like an idiot. he is still laughing which makes you laugh too. "Lando norizz" u reply. "haha you think I have no rizz, funny" he replies egotistically. "yeah i do actually" you don't at all, in fact he hasn't even tried yet he has rizzed you up. "wanna bet?" he snaps out.

you don't have time to think before he pins you against the wall and just looks at you with those hot eyes of his. you can already feel your cheeks burning and your thong getting wet. "you say I have no rizz yet your cheeks are burning, and I bet those panties are more soaked than that porridge you tipped over the counter when you stumbled at my gaze, huh?" he grunts out.

what the fuck just happened, first how did he know and secondly did he just pin you against the wall. not the first time you want that to happen. you know what fuck it if we wants to be like that then he may as well be uncomfortable the whole video.

"how did you know about my tight, black lacy thong i'm wearing over my tight pussy hey? not your first time thinking about it aye?" you tease him, but while walking over to him you see him looking uneasy.

why? because ginge was at the fucking door and heard that, and can see Lando's boner from a mile away. "well bonjour" ginge says laughing. "bonjour mate" lando says as he daps up ginge covering his boner and trying to ignore what just happened.

You already know this video is gonna be the longest set of your life..

sorry its a short one x

[eldorr1e]

CHAPTER 0: To See a Familiar Face [Lookism x Reincarnated!reader]

DESC: After three boring and uneventful years, you finally know where you got reincarnated into. And it all starts with: befriending Zoe Park, your new neighbor.

Warnings: none

It’s been three years since you’ve been reincarnated into the world of… Well, you don’t know yet. To be precise, you’re currently three years old and chopping down vegetables for the stew you were currently boiling. The shifting of pages could be heard behind you. It was your mom, reading a new novel she picked up from the bookstore, while your dad was watching some baseball game on the tv.

Why were your parents allowing you to cook, you ask?

Well, after a few years of raising you, they realized that you were far different from the rest. At the age of 1, they saw you drawing using your left hand on a piece of paper. Then, the letter alphabets your parents jokingly placed on the refrigerator was arranged with the words “I’m hungry.” On the bottom. Somewhere a 1 year old would reach.

As time passed by, your mother, (M/N), decided to train you into using kitchen utensils by using silicon appliances. Lo and behold, after a year of practicing you were able to make your own dish and clean up the mess in the kitchen without any help.

There was no shadow of a doubt that you were a gifted kid! Your father tested your intelligence by using math and science, and was chocked to see you answering correctly like a breeze.

They wanted to enroll you into a school for gifted kids, but you rejected. I mean, if you were given a second chance in the afterlife to live again and start anew, who on earth would immediately ditch their childhood for education?

On the day you were born, you made a promise to yourself. You wouldn’t live your life wasting away by doing nothing and depending on people for your wants and needs, you wanted to become a better person than before.

Which brings us back here, to the present.

You took your chopping board and poured down your veggies into the stew. After mixing them together for a while, you closed the lid and went back to the living room with your parents.

You didn’t exactly know which world you were in yet. You only knew you were in a different world altogether was due to the odd censoring of brand names that surrounded your life. Coca-Cola was named C#ca-C#la, or clothing brands like H&M were now named L&M.

You looked over to your parents who were still sitting down. They noticed you walking into the living room awhile ago and nodded towards your direction. Speaking of parents, you were lucky you were born into this family.

Your father, (F/N), was just like your father in real life. Same as your mother. There were some stark differences however. Like how your father’s job was being a network engineer. Your mother‘s job was being a stay at home online assistant for a corporate company that typically didn’t need her presence in the building.

Both parents had successful jobs that raked in enough money for them to live in a big apartment in the city, and enough to spoil you. Honestly? If the original soul of your body was a normal one, you would have guessed they would eventually become a spoiled brat.

The beeping of your timer snapped you out of your thoughts before standing back up and running towards the kitchen. As the stew was done, you called in your parents to eat.

While setting down the various food you prepared along with some leftovers from last night, you couldn’t help but think about which world you reincarnated into.

It had been an uneventful three years in your opinion. Just going to family events, out to shop or to hang out as a family, or just staying at home, playing with toys you asked front our parents.

Nothing gave you an idea as to where you reincarnated really. Which disappointed you to the idea that maybe you were reincarnated somewhere not special at all, which dampened your mood hit you couldn’t care less.

You were living the life of luxury. You had both living parents who had stable jobs, toys you couldn’t have when you were a kid in your last life, and even a loving, respectful, and open minded relatives who accepted anyone for who they are.

Your lunchtime was disrupted by a knock on the door. Your parents stopped talking and looked at each other before nodding. “I’ll go get it.” Your mother responded as she stood up and ripened the door.

You decided to not look back at them and continue eating your meal. Eventually, your father stood up as well to greet the new neighbors.

Wait— new neighbors? You thought.

You looked back from your seat to see a woman, accompanied by a little girl who was hiding behind her. Tiny hands clutching the hems of her mom’s skirt, slightly shaking due to the new people infront of her.

You walked away from your seat and joined your parents to greet the new neighbors.

“Oh! And this is my daughter, (Y/N). She hasn’t started nursery yet, much like your daughter!” Your mother gave the woman a loving smile before holding you right next to her. You look down to try and catch a glimpse of said kid, but now she was hiding more than ever.

The woman, noticing your curiosity, tapped her daughter’s head as a sign to tell her to introduce herself. The girl shakes her head in disapproval, but her mom wasn’t having it. She kneeled down to face her kid with a smile of comfort on her face. “Come on, dear. There is nothing to be afraid of. It wouldn’t hurt for you to have more friends.”

After a few seconds, the girl finally took her hands off of her mom, as she walked infront and hung her head low.

“Hello…. My name is Zoe Park… it’s nice to meet you…” she uttered.

The smile on your face faltered. Only for a slight second, before putting it back up and nodding. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Zoe. I hope we get along.”

Your welcoming words surprised Zoe, which made her look straight into your eyes. You were expecting to see a pretty face with her iconic bob cut. But what you see almost made you trip on your own feet.

Despite being 3, Zoe’s face was adorned with, what you’re assuming is, pimples. Her eyebrows were thick, almost forming a unibrow. The glasses resting on her face had thick green and orange striped rims. Her lips were incredibly chappy, despite being a toddler. Her hair wasn’t helping her case. Despite being long and silky, they were thick. It was tied up by a ponytail.

But before you could even react, a blue screen popped right infront of you. On it was:

QUEST UNLOCKED!

After three years of being reincarnated, you finally met one canon character from Lookism! Zoe Park, one of Daniel’s love interest at the beginning of the series.

She seems surprised by your welcoming nature, as she is used to be looked down upon due to her appearance.

QUEST: Befriend Zoe!

Reward: 2000 points!

Penalty: In the near future, Zoe will harass and bully you.

…?

A nudge from your father broke your trance. “Aren’t you going to welcome her in, (Y/N)?” He asked. You looked over to your parents facial features to realize that they weren’t bothered at all by Zoe’s looks. Rather, they were testing how you would react to her appearances yourself.

You looked back to Zoe, now anxiously fidgeting her hands, still awaiting your invitation. You gave her another smile before backing away and ushering her to come in. “Would you like to come in?”

Your parents gave you an affirming nod and welcomed Zoe’s mother in as well.

As the adults in the room conversed each other, (like your mother asking when they were from, why they moved, how were they doing, etc etc,) you and Zoe were left alone in your room. She was going around your room, looking at your toys and aweing at them all. I mean, you did have quite a lot of toys. Enough to make your room look like a mini toy store.

“Wow! You have so many toys, (Y/N)! I bet you never get tired from playing all day!” Zoe beamed, shaking your hand in the process. You laughed at her excitement, but more so from endearment. “I’m glad you like them. If you want, you can always visit anytime to play with me.” You replied.

As she was left busy with rummaging around your toys, you sat still on your bed, still completely shock due to three factors.

One, you’re face to face with Zoe Park right now. A lookism character. Which meant that you were in the PTJ universe, and being the same age as her only gave you one thing to think about: you were the same age as everyone else in the main cast of lookism. Was this pointing to something?

Two, why did Zoe look like that? Don’t get yourself wrong, you had absolutely no problem with Zoe looking unconventionally attractive than the rest. It only confused you because… well, Zoe was one of the most canonically beautiful girls in J high.

And three; a mysterious blue window stared right back at you right now, still displaying the same text from before.

It was the type of pop up windows you’d see from regression tower manhwas, where they would give the MC a quest or mission to fulfill in exchange for some goods. The only difference being, your rewards were points. Not physical objects, but points.

Your eyes looked towards Zoe. Good, she’s distracted right now. You thought to yourself. After a bit of detective work, you noticed that there were other options on the left side of the screen. It showed many various things such as a shop, a search bar, (for what exactly?) a storage area that was complete with perfectly arranged and organized empty files, and an AI named Sofia. However, all of these features were locked.

You sighed in disappointment before looking back again towards Zoe. Your theory was that Zoe was bullied and ridiculed a lot in her childhood, which made her obsess over her own looks, and eventually stemmed to liking handsome men.

Honestly, you felt her. Back in your past life, you weren’t exactly the most prettiest girl on the block, but not the most attractive. This made people ignore you or treat you indifferently from others. When you got reincarnated here however, you noticed how pretty you looked. You were assuming this level of beauty will eventually follow you as you age, but you couldn’t assume.

You finally stood up from your bed, startling Zoe, as you walked towards her direction. She thought you were getting annoyed by her constant touching of your toys, but she couldn’t be more wrong.

As she prepared herself to get verbally harassed, you took a toy from the ground, a doll, and held it up to her.

“Would you like to play Magical Girl with me?” You smiled. She stood there, stunned, before returning your smile. She took the doll from your hands with a grin. “Sure!” She replied.

Befriending Zoe Park won’t be so bad after all.

AHHHH— I ACTUALLY DID IT—

Chapter 0 is here babiessss

I was supposed to upload this to quotev and wattpad, but after some thinking I made a decision.

If the next 10 chapters gets received well here on tumblr, then I’ll upload it on wattpad and Quotev. I just need to garner some audience so I know I’m not wasting my time ehe.

Also, to those who were there for the pilot episode, some of you might be wondering:

“Wait I thought this was an oc x lookism? Why did it change?”

Well, after some thought I realized that many people would rather read an x reader rather an oc. So basically what’s gonna happen is, the reader will have the same preferences, and personality as my oc but the difference is their appearance and name. I’m also still not sure if I like this first chapter even, I feel like I’m still gonna make some changes just like what I did with the pilot.

How about you guys! What are your thoughts? I’m always open for some criticism and some recommendations for future chapters!

[dollfaced-erin]

𝔻𝕣𝕒𝕘𝕠𝕟'𝕤 ℂ𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕝𝕖 (Blade x F!Reader x Jing Yuan)

PART 17

PART 1 , PART 2 , PART 3 , PART 4 , PART 5 , PART 6 , PART 7 , PART 8 , PART 9 , PART 10 , PART 11 , PART 12 , PART 13 , PART 14 , PART 15 , PART 16

A/n :

i have JUST finished Penacony, and i have to say, THAT WAS A WILD RIDE FR HELP ?!?! i did NOT expect it to end that way. Okok, hear me out, you might cancel me or whatever, but opinions are opinions right, and i LOVE how they made Sparkle some little gremlin that REALLY knows how to flame people good. ye ye i know about the things happening on twitter, but push that aside. that's merely a reference. all in all, the races in the game still dont exist. and getting mad at a fictional VILLAIN is somewhat hilarious to me ngl...i never even SAW the racism until i watched tiktok. my eyes. anything on tiktok is like...corrupting my brain rn and i hope your fyps are favoring you all too ! But still. We're all humans and we all have our opinions. so dont start messing around and bullshitting people online youre never gonna meet, okay ?

Taglist : -

@rebeccawinters , @nayukiyukihira , @pix-stuff , @fluffy-koalala , @swivy123 , @starxao , @kaoyamamegami , @kimura-uzuri , @rsvye , @seikouryuu , @just-here-reading , @matsulovesyou, @sincerely-aaronette , @prettyliliy , @chibiduck , @hermosacolibri , @la-diablas-thingz , @farelady-fate , @everi-eve , @shadowfoxey , @helloyuki , @immahuman , @samptlay , @boomie-123

Back then, he was only a young man, staring up at the starskiffs that flew by in the sky. He looked no older than a mere teen, but as a Xianzhou native, looks are VERY deceiving. Even for someone as young as Jing Yuan.

The young man looked up at the sky, his adolescence was only peaking up back then. But even so, he was a splendid Cloud Knight, already the climbing up the ranks to be a Sword Champion like his master. Though she had shielded him from much the horrors she had faced when she was a mere child, she tried her best to raise her student as her very own.

He remembered seeing his friends earlier, during the crowning of Jingliu as the Legendary Sword Master, entitling her with the nickname transcendent flash due to her movements that had seemingly cut through time and space within a blink of an eye. They all came around, wanting to congratulate her.

There was the legendary craftsmen, though hailing from another land and being a short-lived species, he had come to present to her the sword made of alien material, shining ebony matte black even under the bright sun. And not far behind him, was the Imbibator Lunae, coming over adorned with his robes of silk and jewelry of jade. Then, there was the mischievous Baiheng who roamed across the stars and set to stay on the Luofu.

But clinging to the sleeve of the High Elder of the Xianzhou Luofu, like a little lost girl, though he was sure that she was most likely just a couple decades younger than the Imbibator Lunae himself. And with the glaucous horns perched atop her head, he knew that she was inevitably the relative of this royal dragon before him, the one they called Saltator Lunae.

She was a beautiful young woman, with bright, curious (e/c) eyes that shone with wonder for the world. Her silky (h/c) hair was held up with a beautiful hairpin made of glass that seemed to be sturdier than plain ceramic he saw the nobles wear. But it matched her innocent look, and it seemed to him that she had yet to see more of the outside world.

He saw her for a mere glimpse, and she seemed to be talking to either her brother, or Yingxing the craftsman who seemed to be very much absorbed into his conversation with her. The middle-aged man even seemed to adore the young woman.

'Cute...' he remembered thinking as he saw her.

It was hot that day, and he was just fresh after training. But after remembering his master's swordsmanship, he quickly got back up, grabbing the sword he used to train, and went on with his practice. There was still much to learn, much to face before he could even dream of being half the person his master was.

"Jing Yuan, meet Imbibator Lunae's younger sister. Saltator Lunae." Jingliu said, appearing seemingly out of nowhere, as he was in the middle of training.

And he saw her again, from a much closer distance. The pretty girl from the other day, this time with an intricate hand fan in her hold, closed. This time she seemed much more...reserved ? Was it because her brother wasn't around ?

"Huh ? Sister ?"

"Yes, she'll be training with you. Other than Cloudhymn magic, she wants to learn about forming wind and water together to form ice. It doesn't hurt to learn more, especially from someone with core differences like you, Jing Yuan."

"Ah..." sighed the General as he shook his head, pulling himself out of his thoughts. He chuckled softly, looking at the item in his hand, which was a small decorative hand fan.

It was a beautiful oriental fan, with intricate designs carefully inked and dyed with care and professional handling. And it was no ordinary fan, instead it was a beautiful silk fan that he had seen her hold on the day they first met....

And was entrusted to him by Dan Feng who loved his sister very much before he had to part from this world.

The fan just...was just a reminder of what sunny days he blindly lived through, never anticipating the position he'd assume current day...

"General ?" A young voice piped up, snapping him out of his dampened mood.

The General turned to see his retainer by his side, peering cautiously at the fan in his master's hand, knowing that it must've belonged to someone of position and status. Especially since the wood forming it was no ordinary slice, but rather elaborately detailed to the smallest feature.

"Yes, Yanqing ?" He responded back, the lazy cat-grin on his lips as his golden eyes met one he considered his son.

"Lady Fu Xuan has given signal that she has deployed the anomaly team towards the suspected location of the Plagues Author's devotees." Yanqing said, the young boy nodding his head to signal to his master something.

"Thank you, Yanqing. It is time for me to depart, and reunite with the princess herself face to face. I cannot have the Ace of the deck be pulled out before its time." Jing Yuan said as he placed the fan onto the table, and rose to his feet.

"An...ace of the deck...?" Yanqing asked, cocking up an eyebrow as he suspiciously eyed the General of the Xianzhou Luofu.

"Yes. One of the keys in saving the Xianzhou itself." Jing Yuan said, giving no room for his retainer to further impose on his agenda.

"Now, Yanqing. I will be leaving to coincide with the Master Diviner's troupes, and those stationed in the Alchemy Commission." Jing Yuan said with that same smirk plastered on his lips.

"Do not lay your foot in a trap laid down by yourself, lest you be the hunted instead of the hunter." Was Jing Yuan's final warning before he walked off to leave the Seat of Divine Foresight.

But what he didn't know was that his little apprentice had been exposed to the sights of the legendary without either of them noticing it. And this youngling was very much eager to try his new profound knowledge in bringing justice to the land he served.

Though the General had yet just finished another meeting with the Master Diviner, even issued her with the official warrant to temporarily command the Cloud Knights, it was clear that things were far from over now. Affairs on the Xianzhou Luofu this time wouldn't be so easily averted, not with the interference of outsider hands in this matter.

He shook his head as he remembered the contents of the earlier discussion with Fu Xuan earlier. He remembered the troubled face of (Y/n) who had not dared utter a word as he issued another errand for the Astral express team to run.

He remembered his own words, spoken with his regular slyness and his lax tone in order to conceal what he truly felt inside...

"Miss Tingyun, I would like you to continue to serve as a guide for our Astral friends. And Lady (Y/n)..." he said, trailing off as he turned to look at her.

She looked...troubled. Biting her lower lip was a habit she had built long back during the prime era of the High-Cloud Quintet. Not only did she look troubled, she also seemed quite...saddened. Perhaps...it was the memories that surged her, or even the weight of her duties to reseal the Ambrosial Arbor. And everyone knows that...Lady (Y/n) isn't quite complete in herself...

"I hope you understand the importance of your presence within this mission. I am sure that the team will be able to safely escort you through the paths, and guide you safely to the Alchemy Commission."

He had once again broken the rules and regulations of the Luofu. With the next task he issued...was to get the Astral Express team towards the Ambrosial Arbor through the Alchemy Commission's delve. It was a hard decision, knowing the routes they needed to pass through were heavily infested and affected by the growth of the Ambrosial Arbor and it would be increasingly dangerous for (Y/n) to continue venturing along.

But he had no other choice yet in this matter. She was the King piece in this chessboard. Though her Queen piece...was nowhere in sight.

But he knew that man would appear sooner or later. Along with the young prince, who served the missing half of the current king's severed power.

He just hoped she was faring well.

"Phew ! That deer sure was a tough one !" March said, a relieved smile on her lips after the team had departed from the Alchemy Commission and saying good by to a certain...Furnace Master.

"Quite a deer friend indeed." Replied her companion, Stelle, who earned a tired groan from March due to her pathetic excuse of making jokes.

"But Lady (Y/n)..." March said, looking at the woman who was walking ahead of them, her back turned towards the team. Robes of expensive silk fluttered in the wind behind her, light shining off the material. Her (h/c) swayed in the wind, giving off nothing but an air of royalty.

But despite her ice cold gaze...everyone saw how shocked she looked when Gongshu had introduced himself as the Furnace of Creation's master. The woman was silent, merely staring at the man before her, uttering not a word. But she bit her lip, as a way to prevent herself from saying more than she should.

Then there was the deer, the Ebon Deer that was nothing but an abomination. Colors of blue, gold and green, representing life, vitality and wealth. A beautiful yet horrifying mix of colors forever ingrained in her mind.

"Are you alright, Lady (Y/n) ?" Welt asked, making sure that the young woman behind her was faring well.

Fighting against the Ebon Deer was hard work, at it seemed that even (Y/n) had trouble against it before they dispelled the outer source of power it was extracting from the power of Abundance.

He watched her horrified reaction as it withered and yet regained its former state, almost as if she were haunted by the extremes of power an Aeon can possess...

Or perhaps were those the same eyes of the people who fought in the War of Abundance...? The eyes that witnessed fear and loss time and time again. Maybe...perhaps even those eyes were included in the horrors of the abominations.

Powers of the Vidyadhara were nothing short of the definition of power itself, but she struggled to face it off, as if having second thoughts while fighting, or even extending the period of fighting just to conduct a couple observations and conclude a couple thoughts.

This woman...was trying to learn something. Gain an insight, perhaps...?

Even as Welt was making his own observations and conclusions regarding the change of paths from the Abundance to the Hunt, (Y/n) stood away from them, deep in her own circle of thought.

"I...am alright." Said the regal lady, dusting of the sleeves of her dress. It was tough, but she knew there was more to come, especially with the warning Jing Yuan had discretely yet undoubtedly been trying to relay to her.

Her presence was playing a crucial part in this play of his.

Did that mean...she had to meet...his reincarnation...?

Jing Yuan had never told her what had become past the period of molting rebirth. But did she really want to know...?

"It's just...that deer..." she said softly, shaking her head. "Reminded me of someone."

The man she loved, falling at the hand of the abundance, due to some...forbidden ritual they were trying to pursue. And he too...began one of the Abundance. Healing time after time, without even having a say in his own life.

The woman looked back to meet the gaze of her worried companions. All sorts of gazes landed on her form, pity, worry, concern, understanding...she appreciated them all, but...

"That's enough. We should keep going. The Alchemy Commission...shouldn't be far from here now..." said the dragon lady before she turned on her heel to leave the scene.

Right...there was no need to say anymore. Words...could not convey the feeling of loss she felt etched deep inside her heart. Nor did the memories even fulfil the void that grew day by day, with a certain longing for times of old to resurge...

Through the gates of the Artisanship Commission, it led the team straight towards the Alchemy Commission, a delve where all the medicinal and healing practices were carried out. It was the perfect place for concocting medicines out of herbs and materials of rare items to treat unknown diseases, or a place to jot down prescription after prescription while attending to the endless stream of natives that need the attention of professionals.

Some came here to learn, and some came here to help others. But ultimately, the desire of all here was one, to make the Xianzhou Luofu more prosperous and longevous than it ever was.

But this place...was also the same place for dubious plans to be carried out. With the high-tech equipment, materials only those in the alchemy would be able to obtain, should the Luofu fall into peril, this...would no doubt be their lair.

(Y/n) led the team into the commission, walking past the walls that were once so familiar to her. Though it has been centuries, this place...was almost as same as it used to be back when she was in her prime, looking over the apprentices like a protective mother watching her eggs.

Bodies of the mara-struck, celestial bodies and the Cloud Knights littered the stone ground left and right, for as far as the eye can see. It was no doubt that a fierce war had indeed taken place within these walls, no time to reach out for help since the delve had been sealed off, and the commission was deemed to be deserted.

"Whoa, looks like the battle here was intense..." March said, the poor girl looking around the blood-bathed battlefield with fear and horror in her young eyes. Her hands were to her mouth, almost in disbelief with what had occurred here.

Tingyun sighed, looking behind her to meet the gaze of the young girl. "Looks like the Master Diviner had launched a campaign while we were delayed in the Artisanship Commission."

"She must've divined it at the right time..." responded the usually silent Stelle, only ever opening her mouth to let out the most unheard of jokes (Y/n)'s pointed ears had heard of, or to say something incredibly out of character.

"Seems like she had sent in the Cloud Knights to clear out the way before we arrived. It would've been dreadfully dangerous had she let us in without proper preparation and training like the knights." (Y/n) said, her sharp and luminescent eyes scanning the area, the scene before her like flowers wilted on the ground.

But this...was nothing compared to the flooding blood rivers she had witnessed as a young maiden. Should things continue as they are...well...the Luofu would be drenched in mixed blood once again.

But unlike last time. She would do everything in her power to stop from memories of the past haunt and overshadow her future, refusing it to take shape it once took form as.

She wouldn't dare dream of losing another person dear to her.

Not the warm and kind-hearted General that had embraced her with loving arms the moment her eyes had revealed itself to the world. Not when she had to let go of her lover that remembered so little of her yet yearned for their long lost intimate moments.

Back then...she had so much to lose. And this time was no different.

She just hoped...that his reincarnation was doing well somewhere.

Welt noticed the unease in (Y/n)'s gaze. Being the attentive man he was, riddled with experience and written with history of a distant land, he knew better than to outright voice his concern over the Dragon Lady.

"Time is of the essence. The most important task for the Xianzhou Luofu is suppressing the Stellaron." Said the brunette, his arms crossing over his chest as he too observed the concluded battlefield before him. "General Jing Yuan tasked the Master Diviner with commanding the Cloud Knights-- he would've known she'd act on the results of her divination."

"Maybe that's why they sent us through the Artisanship Commission. To avoid direct contact with the battlefield. It is too dangerous for us here. If fighting the Ebon Deer was already breaking more than our usual threshold, imagine actually engaging in a real battle." (Y/n) said softly, looking sad at the loss before her.

"But...that's out of your scope." She whispered, walking towards one of the knights to check on their conditions.

"Lady (Y/n)..." March said worriedly, and Tingyun looked a little...somber at the Dragon Lady had returned back to her post as the Miracle Healer.

"This...must be hard for Lady (Y/n) to see." Tingyun said softly, shaking her head. "As I remember records...the past Dragon Lady was someone of immense caliber and knowledge, having pulled strings no one dared to interfere with."

"But this is nothing compared to what she had seen back in her days. Centuries ago, an Emanator of Abundance besieged the Luofu with the aim of the Ambrosial Arbor. They destroyed half our delves and killed most of the Cloud Knights." Tingyun said, looking up at the sky, perhaps wondering what the sky looked like when the ground was bathed in red.

"For long-life species, such events are more like yesterday's memories rather than ancient history. This awful spectacle is child's play in comparison to what they've seen and been through."

"It's...hard to tell if the Master Diviner won or lost here." Welt said with a heavy sigh, that was until (Y/n) walked back, her (e/c) clouded with regret and shame.

"There...are many losses here. I might be able to restore and patch some up, but...it would be too dangerous for me to venture further alone without back up." (Y/n) said, her eyes never leaving the fallen soldiers. "If only Yingxing and..."

She cut herself short, her thoughts snapping back to prevent herself from saying anymore of those forsaken memories of old. She shook her head and cleared her throat, as if to regain composure.

"Nevermind." She said sharply. "There aren't many Cloud Knights here, so I reckon there's a retreat nearby, or maybe they really did make it out with a minimal count of casualties. Deeper into the delve, perhaps."

"Will you try heal those here, Lady (Y/n) ?" Tingyun asked the horned woman before her, noticing her determined gaze. And (Y/n) nodded. "I'll...try my best. I'm a healer, a doctor even, or whoever I used to be, but I'm not miracle granter."

"Please be careful, Lady (Y/n), Stelle. These monsters seem pretty tough..." March warned carefully, fearing the safety of her companions and the lady they were meant to escort safely.

(Y/n) leaned down to inspect the wounds on one of the soldiers that seemed to have been ridden with mara, rooted deep inside its body. As she scanned the figure with her sharp eyes, she noticed how this individual...a woman, perhaps in her early 300s...was far too deep in mara.

Mara was plaguing her body like flies eating away at rotting flesh. Slow, constant, but unbearable. The wounds were shrinking away beyond a usual native's ability, and with the lack of injured vital signs, (Y/n) knew it was best for her to try freeze the cores and quickly move away.

So that was as she did. To those still blessed with life, she leaned down to bestow them the gift of her healing, hoping that they would be able to be to at least endure less pain than they should. She even froze cores, wishing that it was enough to prevent the rapid outbreak of the plague, harming others beyond control.

She knew...those mara struck before her...had their regrets and their ambitions to see another day. She knew another person who was just the same, bringing flesh of a fallen Emanator, striking his beloved with a fatal blow, yet he himself was a victim to another's plan who wished to deny the cruel nature of death.

The beloved who once held her hand so tenderly, an arrogant man who was yet so soft towards her, bestowing her with a gentle kiss on her forehead as he held her close by her waist.

(Y/n) looked up, knowing that those days were no more, and the sky above them...was never a witness to the moments she held dear to her frozen and recovering heart. Her heart that was facing conflict and turmoil with her current identity and her past self, knowing both were nonetheless one of the same.

Though she had forgotten most of her past, only bits and shred able to be brought forward to her current time, she knew it was time for her to step up and once again place the crown high on her head, though it weighed so heavily on her shoulders.

"Look ! There's someone over there." March called out, taking (Y/n)'s hand to point towards a woman wearing an Alchemy Commission uniform, and a kneeling Cloud Knight by her feet.

(Y/n) didn't have a good feeling about this.

[gavisuntiedboot]

Just Pretend (Gavi x reader)

Part 1

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Epilogue

Tinder is not a great place to look for boyfriends, but neither is the workplace.

Gavi x Physiotherapist! reader. Slow burn. I can't make things fast he's gotta work for it. Smut? Not in this part but maybe eventually.

A/N: Hi everyone! Not super new on Tumblr but I have never been brave enough to post a fic despite my constant maladaptive daydreaming about imaginary scenarios. The stress of being sick and not wanting to write my personal statement have lead me to actually write this and post it online. Please be nice, hope you enjoy!

Song inspo: Just Pretend - Bad omens

Writing inspo: Plot inspired by @zeegaazeegaah and their amazing Gavi x physiotherapist imagine. Other inspirational accounts will be tagged at the end.

TW: None

Word count: 4.8K

"So what do you do?"

y/n hated this question. Even being asked for nudes might be preferable to being asked about her job. y/n had been on 12 first dates since moving back to Barcelona, and without fail every one of them had been ruined by this simple question. She considered lying - she could pass as a student or a waitress or even a model (ok maybe not a model): there were literally thousands of jobs she could pretend to have. But, being the idiot hopeless romantic that she was, she decided to be honest with the man across from her. What if Thiago from Tinder was her soulmate? She didn't want to ruin it by lying.

"I'm finishing my sports medicine and physiotherapy certification, so I am working with one of the football clubs here to do practical training and gain experience."

"Oh that's cool! Which club? You can tell me, I know most of the 3rd and 4th tier Catalan clubs, so I'll probably know it even if it's really small."

Wow. Thiago from Tinder was an overachiever: he messed up before she even said which club she worked for, which was faster than every other man she had been out with in the last four months. y/n took a deep breath and resisted the urge to leave before confessing where she worked.

"I actually work at a pretty well known club... F.C Barca. I think you might of heard of it?" y/n watched this man's jaw visibly drop. His eyes got wide and lit up, like someone had told him he had just won a brand new car.

"You're a physio at Barca?? No way! That's my team! I think I would actually commit manslaughter if Pedri asked me to. So you get to see all the players every day? And Xavi! Have you ever spoken to Xavi? Do you know he won Spain their first world cup? You might be too young to remember. That's so amazing!"

y/n felt all the muscles in her head tense as she focused all her energy on not rolling her eyes. A fanboy. Typical. This was the most common response she got when she said her place of work out loud. 6 of the last 12 first dates had been major fanboys for the club, talking endlessly about how they would steal and kill and get on their knees for Barca. One had even been so bold as to ask if she had ever seen Lewandosky naked, to confirm if some measurements he had seen online were true. While the fans were annoying, the haters were even worse. 4 different dates had said they felt bad that she worked at a "dying club", throwing up football statistics, and going red in the face when she said she could not possibly care less about who had more Champion's League wins.

Then there were those that went out of their way to offend her. You would think that a man trying to get laid would have some more common sense. But that didn't stop one of her tinder matches from calling her a liar in the middle of a restaurant. He was still on his first glass of wine, leaning back cockily in his chair when he said that La Liga would never allow female physios to work with the first team because women couldn't "handle the intensity of football injuries." She should have gotten up and left when he said that, but he was 6'3 with a brand new Porsche, so she let him buy her dinner and drive her home before telling him that she genuinely hoped he never interacted with a female doctor ever again, even if it was to save his life.

The worst had been when she went out with Jose. He had invited her to a pretty expensive spot in central Barcelona. They were having an amazing conversation until the fated job question. She had downed a good amount of wine at that point, and wasn't as cynical about the reaction as she usually would be, so she spoke about her role with pride. Big mistake. He perked up, then threw his head back and laughed. He laughed so loudly it startled the waiter clearing plates from the nearby table. "21 years old and working as a physio for F.C Barca... Who did you have to sleep with to get that job, hm? Xavi? La Porte himself? Or maybe someone at the university? Regardless, you must fuck like a pornstar to have landed a job like that. Can't wait to try it first hand." y/n said some choice words about Jose and his micropenis, and promptly left, seeking to avoid assault charges that night.

The truth was that y/n was extremely talented at what she did. She grew up watching football with her father and brother, developing an interest in working in sports professionally. She worked herself half to death during high school to be accepted into a sports science program in the U.S. She interned with the college teams there, learning about sports injuries and treating them. She finished her program in three years, and despite programs across Europe fighting for her, she came back to Barcelona to finish her physiotherapy certification. She would be lying if she said it was just for her family and friends. The program in Barcelona advertised opportunities to work with F.C. Barca, her favorite football club since birth. It was a love she inherited from her father, as shown by all her childhood pictures in the Blaugrana uniform.

The program was harder than expected. She was one of 7 female first year students, and the only girl in her year that wanted to work with the first team. y/n was made aware that this might work to her advantage now that professional football was pushing for more female representation (in referees, coaching staff, and now on the medical team). The guys in her class either hated her guts or wanted to sleep with her (sometimes both) - it really was like legally blonde without the law.

In the middle of August, close to the beginning of the new season, all the applicants for the Barca placement were called into the university on a Sunday. Their professor introduced Dr. Gonzales, the head physiotherapist for the club. y/n started to sweat despite the air conditioning hitting her directly. She was terrified to even breathe wrong in the presence of this man.

"It's a pleasure to be here with you all today. Thank you for your hard work in submitting to fill the assistant physiotherapist position at F.C. Barcelona. Now, there have been rumors that we are hiring a student to fil this position because it is cheaper and we are broke, but I would like to assure you all now that it's not true."

The two boys in front of her snickered quietly, one whispering a "yeah right" to the other. Dr. Gonzalez looked up at the boys. "You two giggling in the back. You don't seem like the type we need at Camp Nou. You can leave now." Everyone in the room sat up straighter after that. Everyone was on military behavior, not wanting a wrong look or a chair squeak to blow their chance. "As many of you know, one of our strikers, Ousmane Dembélé, presents with consistent right hamstring tightness, leading to frequent injuries."

As Dr. Gonzalez turned to face the screen, y/n found enough bravery to pull out a pen and paper to take notes. The doctor continued to describe the player's condition, his playing style, and the current course of treatment being used. After speaking for 25 minutes (while facing the screen instead of the students), he turned around and addressed them. "Your project is to develop a continuous muscular therapy treatment for Dembélé in the next two days. The best and most cost effective method gets the job placement. You at the back," he pointed at y/n, "Smart choice to take notes. I advise you not to share."

Y/n drove home that evening checking her rear-view mirror every few seconds. The possibility of being followed by one of her classmates so they could steal her notes was low, but never zero, and so she did both of the locks tightly on the door. She sat at her computer and got to work right away. Truth be told, she felt like the whole assignment was kind of a trick. Dr. Gonzalez had told them the current treatment plan for Dembélé, which had obviously been working seeing as they kept using it. She made a few adjustments based on leg dominance and the anticipated excess strain of playing more minutes each game, and then she decided to facetime her friend Angelika while she made the PowerPoint look pretty.

"Good evening Dr. y/l/n, finally ready to ask for my hand in marriage? My parents always wanted me to marry into medicine." y/n rolled her eyes and smirked. She had met Angelika when she was living in the US through a Facebook group for Spanish students studying abroad. Ever since then, not a day had gone by where they hadn't spoken (except once when Angelika had dropped her phone into a pint of beer and couldn't get it fixed for three days).

"You know I'm ready when you are gorgeous, just send your ring size. What're you up to?"

"Nothing much, just scrolling on the internet trying to find clubs that are no cover for ladies tomorrow. You're still coming out with us right?" y/n looked away from her computer and looked at Angelika with the "I'm about to bail on plans look" that was all too familiar. "Y/n!! You cannot be cancelling plans with us again! You haven't been anywhere except your house and the university in like six weeks! People will start to think you're with child and in hiding."

"I didn't know I was the new virgin Mary." y/n quipped, trying to make her presentation equally professional and cute. "You're not, because that would require you being a virgin. I know it feels like it's growing back because you haven't looked in the direction of a man in centuries." y/n could only shake her head. It was not a lack of trying. "Well, I'm presenting to the Barca head physio Wednesday morning, so if you ever want a chance at seeing the inside of that locker room, you need to let me skip out on tomorrow."

Angelika sighed and threw herself on the bed dramatically. "Fine, but you need to be our DD and come pick us up after. Shockingly, it's really hard to order an Uber while drunk." y/n agreed to pick the girls up from the club at the end of the night, an spent the rest of the evening chatting idlily with her friend, living vicariously through the stories she told.

The following day, y/n spent all morning refining her presentation. She spent over an hour watching videos about the Barca training facility to see if there was any equipment she had overlooked in creating her treatment plan. The day progressed as normal - cleaning, cooking, practicing her presentation, watching TV on the couch. As 1am rolled around, she still hadn't received any communication from Angelika. While she was not an inconsiderate person, Angelika did have her moments where she would completely forget about the world around her: that was when she met a man who showed interest in her. Despite being gorgeous and intelligent, Angelika, like most girls in their early twenties, suffered from a condition known as "Nothing is true about me unless an attractive man says it". y/n also suffered (mildly) from this affliction, but being surrounded by weirdos all day in university had helped substantially. She knew that if she did not leave then, she would never get any sleep, and so she grabbed her car keys and headed to the address of the club that she had been sent earlier on.

She parked several blocks away from the club, and called Angelika for a record 41st time. y/n knew she wasn't going to receive an answer, so she changed into a tight satin top and a pair of heels that she always left in her car in case of emergencies (What if Joao Felix decided to take a random trip to Barcelona and she was unprepared?). She could feel the street practically vibrating beneath her as she walked towards the club. She was let in easily - it was a Tuesday night and the establishment needed female patrons. She kept close to the bar, and asked the girls working there if they had seen her friend. Once y/n pulled up a picture of Angelika, the girls laughed to one another.

"Oh yeah, she's up in the VIP section. They've dropped like 6k on bottle service already."

y/n felt the vein in her forehead start to pop out. Of course Angelika had found herself a man that would take her to the part of the club that was the hardest to get into. Especially on the night when y/n really needed to get home. Because why wouldn't that happen? She made her way over to the VIP section, where she was promptly stopped by two large bouncers, who obviously didn't believe that she just wanted to grab her friend. While standing there deciding whether she should just make Angelika order an Uber (or have this new lover order one for her), she was tapped on the shoulder. She turned around and was met by a very attractive man (boy? His age was hard to determine in the dark).

"Hey, do you need to get into VIP? Are you here alone? " "That's a really creepy question to ask a girl in a club." y/n yelled back over the thumping music. What were all these people doing out on a Tuesday? "No not like that. I can help you get in if you want." "I don't really want to get in, I just want to get my friend and leave." The man (boy?)'s eyes lit up. "Perfect! My tea- friend. My friend that I'm with is pretty drunk and the person that drove us is in VIP. I can't leave him by himself because he's kind of rowdy even when sober. Could you watch him while I go grab them?"

y/n didn't want to look too deeply into a good thing, but the offer felt suspicious. She scanned the boy (she had decided that he was young), looking for any indication that he could live up to his end of the bargain. She looked down at his feet, noticing the white Alexander McQueen sneakers. She decided that she could trust him, and if not, she was still in a public place, and someone would notice if she was being dragged out of a club kicking and screaming. She walked over to where the friend was and had to stifle a laugh. Another boy was sprawled across two high bar chairs, legs up and head rolled back. He was wearing a pair of Louis Vuitton sunglasses despite it being the middle of the night and them being indoors. His white button up had the first two undone and the collar popped, like he was Pitbull in 2011. He was in a pair skinny jeans (because, as y/n discovered quickly, everyone in the world had moved on from skinny jeans except for Spanish men) and some white Dolce and Gabanna sneakers. Where were these kids getting all this money?

"Pablo! Look who I brought you! This is..." The first boy looked back at you expectantly. "y/n". "y/n! She's really great and going to take care of you while I go get Pepi so we can go home." The drunk one (now Identified as Pablo) lifted his head, and tilted the sunglasses just enough to get a good look at the girl. "Wow Angel, nice job." The first one (Angel apparently) apologized to y/n, explaining that Pablo was a "really flirty drunk" but that he was never like this sober. y/n showed Angel a picture of Angelika, and off he went back into the beast that was the club. y/n stood awkwardly by Pablo, who appeared to have fallen asleep. Suddenly, he sprung up and asked her, "so what is a pretty girl like you doing in the club by herself?"

"I'm not here to go clubbing, just picking up a friend." "You're dressed like you're going clubbing." "Right, because they wouldn't let me into the club in my scrubs." "Scrubs? You look too young to be a doctor." The music was starting to take a toll on y/n, the thumping rhythm giving her a splitting headache. "You don't look old enough to be let into the club, but everyone is full of surprises." Pablo did not take this comment well. He stood up, feeling all the blood rush to his head as he rested his weight against the bar. He pushed his glasses up his head, and looked straight at her.

This was the first opportunity y/n had to admire how gorgeous Pablo was. The glasses pushed his hair back on his head, showing off his striking eyebrows and cheekbones. His eyes were wide and glassy, making him look like a teenager who had gotten drunk for the first time. For all y/n knew, that could be the case. His nose slopped downward, a subtle bump in the bridge like it had been broken before and reset. His discontent made his bottom lip poke out, and y/n suddenly was overwhelmed by the urge to treat him like a child: make him feel better with a kiss. "I'm 18, and this isn't even my first time in a club. You want to see my ID?" Pablo had gotten much closer to her than she had expected. In her 4 inch heels, y/n was looking him straight in the eyes. He was mere inches away from her face, cheeks flushed from the alcohol and the anger of being called a child. She couldn't stop her gaze from flipping between his eyes to his pouting lips. 'This is normal,' she thought to herself. 'I'm overwhelmed because no man has been this close to me in a while. Even if my scumbag cheating ex was standing this close I would want to kiss him. I am simply in desperate need of affection.'

This internal monologue ended just as another club patron bumped into Pablo, causing him to lose balance. He put his arms around y/n and rested weight against her, head pressed into her shoulder. "I feel like dying. I shouldn't have drank that much." He muttered. She just held him there, scared that he would hit the floor if she shifted. "Then why did you keep drinking?" She asked. It couldn't hurt - in the state he was in, she would be surprised if he even remembered his name in the morning. "So my brain would be a little quieter." y/n's heart ached at the statement. However old the boy in her arms was, he was being burdened by something far beyond his age.

Before she could ask anything else, she was tapped on the shoulder by Angel, who signaled for her to follow out of the club. She put one of Pablo's arms around her neck and began shuffling through the crowd. Once they left the club, Pablo quickly separated from her to throw up on the side of the street. "At least he waited until he was off of you to do that," a male voice echoed from behind her. y/n turned around to see Angelika clinging to a tall brunet. "Thank you so much for carrying her out. I think I can take it from here." y/n said, trying to get Angelika to remove herself from the nice man. "It's ok, I can walk her to your car. It might be easier than you carrying her." y/n smiled apologetically, and turned around to the sound of Pablo continuing to wretch his guts out. She ran over to make sure he wasn't puking blood and didn't need medical attention. "Come on Pablo let's go." Angel said from the curb. "No no, don't rush him. Let him get it all out before he gets into my car. Otherwise he'll have to start taking the city bus to matches." y/n looked up at the new voice. He walked up and stood by Angel, glancing at his phone before looking up at his friend and the girl making sure he didn't die. "Thanks for looking after him. I hope he wasn't too bad, he's a tag aggressive." y/n stood there speechless. The man thanking her for taking care of his drunk friend was none other than Pedri Gonzalez, one of the young stars of F.C. Barca. He was an absolute magician with the ball, and quickly becoming a favorite in y/n's household. She wanted to let out a scream: jump up and down and tell him that she was a huge fan and ask for a picture. But she had her presentation tomorrow. The last thing she needed was to make a bad impression on the player by causing a scene. So she took a deep breath and insisted that it was no problem.

Pablo had finished puking out his guts by that point and stood up straight, gripping his head from the dizziness. "Alright hermano, time to go." Pedri said, turning his back to y/n, Angelika, and the main carrying her. "Wait." Pablo said rummaging through his pocket. He pulled out his wallet, and clumsily pulled a card from it. He turned to y/n and grabbed her shoulder, pulling her close to him. There were shouts from his friends to stop whatever he was doing, but nothing was registering in his liquor-filled brain. "y/n think's I'm a little kid, so I just wanted to show her my ID." y/n shifted her gaze from his deep eyes to the card in his hand. She didn't look at the age. She didn't have to. Her eyes landed on the name: Pablo Martín Páez Gavira. One of the best young football players in the world had just used her as a banister. "Now that you know I'm not a kid, next time, you should let me buy you a drink." Pablo said, pushing a strand of hair from y/n's face before walking (wobbling) back to his friends.

y/n could not process everything going on in her head at that moment. She turned around and faced the man holding a half-asleep Angelika. "You don't play for Barca do you?" She asked, half joking and half fearful. "No. I play for Real Sociedad. I'm Martin." "Zubimendi??" "Yeah." This was too much. y/n, 7 hours before the most important presentation of her life, was surrounded by so much football royalty it made her dizzy. Martin looked like he was going to say something else, but y/n put her finger to her lips and shushed him. "Please, not another word. Just bring her to the car."

They walked silently to y/n's tiny car, Martin helping to carefully place Angelika in the back seat. "So are you the guy she was with while ignoring my calls?" "Oh no, that was my teammate Ander. He was also kind of out of it so I offered to help her out." "Why is everyone getting drunk out of their minds on a random Tuesday in August?" y/n said in frustration, causing a laugh to erupt from Martin. "It's the last week before training for the new season starts. Not a lot of opportunities to black out after this. People like to take advantage." y/n thanked Martin and got into the driver's seat. He stopped her before she drove off. "Do you think I could maybe get your number? Just to make sure you get home safe?" y/n rolled her eyes at the lame excuse for a pick-up tactic, but surrendered her phone number anyway. She drove back to her apartment with her head reeling, as she tried to rehearse her speech in her head instead of thinking of the events of the night.

The next day, y/n looked perfect. She had work her best school-approved scrubs and coat. and slicked her hair back to make her look more professional. She was in her business attire Nikes. Her note cards were neatly written and organized. She sat in the lecture hall waiting to be called on. The students would be presenting in random order. As all the student filled in to present, the tension was palpable. Everyone side-eyed each other, trying to intimidate the "competition". The door swung open and in walked the professor, as well as Dr. Gonzalez. He stood at the front podium, stern as ever, and began to speak.

"Good morning students. Thank you all for the effort you have put into the presentations you will share today. We look forward to all you assessments and insights. As the new season quickly approaches, we want the new assistant to become acclimated to the workplace quickly. Therefore, the decision about the position will be made today following the presentation." The entire room stopped breathing. "In order to do so efficiently, please welcome our other guests and evaluators, Mr. Xavi Hernandez and Mr. Ousmane Dembélé." The pair walked in, and the room engaged in the most "I wish I was dead" sounding clapping known to man. y/n started sweating profusely. If she had known that Xavi and Dembélé were going to be watching her presentation, she would have made Angelika take the Uber. Hell, she would have made her ride a Donkey back home and gotten a full night's sleep.

Dr. Gonzalez drew names for the order, and because y/n has the worst luck, she was presenting last. She did what she does best: panicked immediately. She tried to think of ways to present the information differently than the 6 students before her had. As she listened to the presentations, the more nervous she got. None of the other students had treatment plans remotely similar to hers. Antonio, one of the smartest in their batch and the presenter right before her, even suggested he get surgery.

It was time. y/n stood up at the front of the room and pulled out her slides. "Good morning everyone. Today I will be presenting my comprehensive treatment plan for player Ousmane Dembélé's right hamstring." She got through the whole thing without stuttering or having her knees give out. As she finished her last slide, she let out a sigh of relief. The hard part was over. She asked if their were questions and Xavi's hand went up. "So Miss y/n, the treatment plan presented is very similar to the one we have currently implemented, with a couple changes in training and every day life. What is the anticipated recovery time for this treatment?" Everyone else in the class had said 8-12 months. But no - of course y/n had to be differently. "6 weeks sir." "6 weeks? No one else has given a suggestion that would take less than half a year." "Yes sir, however, if you take into account the availability of daily therapy, cryotherapy, and the current play style and strain distribution, he can be on the field in 6 weeks. He might not be comfortable playing all 90 minutes each game, but that's not the same as being completely out for injury." Xavi nodded and said nothing more. That was the end of the questioning.

It took them 8 minutes exactly to decide who go the job. Dr. Gonzalez, Xavi, and Dembélé came back into the room, thanking everyone again for their hard work. "We are please to announce," Xavi started, "that we will be offering the assistant physiotherapist position for the 2022/2023 season to," he turned to Dembélé, who finished the thought, "Miss y/n y/l/n." All the men in the room turned to face y/n at once as she struggled to breathe from the shock. "We look forward to having you this season."

And that's how it happened. y/n was now the assistant physiotherapist for the first team at F.C. Barcelona during the day, and entertainment for the absolute worst men in Spain in the evenings. She left her disappointing first date with a headache and leftovers, and drove home listening to her "Maybe Love is a Social Construct" playlist. As she walked into her apartment, her phone chimed with a text notification. She let her hair down and grabbed her phone, preparing to update Angelika about the latest in the tragedy that was her love life. Instead, she had two separate text notifications.

[Unknown number]: Hey, is this still y/n's number?

[Gavi]: I need to see you urgently. Tomorrow morning 6:30 am. I'll be waiting outside your office.

To be continued...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you got this far, thanks for reading! I have had this idea for a long time and have been writing snippets of it down. I will continue to update whenever I can, as this really is a passion project for me (so it's ok if no one reads it).

GIF credit to @gavidaily

Huge thanks to the following for heavily inspiring me to start writing this on the internet: @missgavi @kyiiansmbappe @julianalvarez9 @milawritesstuff @leeamorgan (there are a couple others I'm forgetting)

[mari-writes]

Akaashi Keiji has a secret. One that he’s sure people might be surprised by if they found out.

He has a deep, prevailing love for classical ballet. He’s not sure when it started. Perhaps when his parents took him to a Nutcracker performance when he was barely eight years old. To this day, he spends hours of his free time watching videos online, and reads about the history of the art form. He even convinces his mother to take him to see live performances on occasion.

There's something so romantic and expressive about dancing. The way the dancers can convey emotion through their body, with no words at all—it’s absolutely fascinating. Keiji admires them so much. He wishes he could be like that.

He doesn’t tell anyone. He’s not ashamed, just cautious. Dance should not be a gendered interest, but alas, society is strange. His friends and most of his teammates already know he’s gay. No need to push the stereotype further, right?

What he doesn’t predict is that his best friend (and secret crush), Bokuto Koutarou, is apparently also a fan.

“Akaashi!” The older boy exclaims, right over his shoulder. “Is that the Australian Ballet?”

Keiji flinches, scrambling to switch off his phone. “Bokuto-san,” he scowls, “it’s very rude to eavesdrop.”

“Oh, sorry!” Koutarou plops down next to him. Their futons are close, much too close, and Keiji can smell his mint shampoo. It’s distracting. “But seriously, is it?”

Keiji shoots a nervous look around. Most of the training camp attendees are either taking turns in the bath or wandering around campus, enjoying the warm evening. Only Komi is here, casually lounging with a magazine on the other side of the room. “Ah, um, yes,” he nods. “You’re familiar with ballet, Bokuto-san?”

The other boy nods enthusiastically. “My sister does it! My other sister and I tried it when we were younger, too!”

Surprised, Keiji stares. “I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah! I still do exercises I learned back then. It’s good for flexibility and to strengthen muscles. People don’t know how much of a workout ballet is! It’s really hard.”

Again Keiji nods, awkwardly shuffling on his futon so that he and Koutarou are sitting thigh-to-thigh. “Would you… like to watch the rest of this with me, Bokuto-san?”

Koutarou answers with a beaming smile.

They make it a habit of watching dance videos together. Koutarou is surprisingly knowledgable about the different companies, even mentioning specific dancers and performances. It’s odd, only because he never watches or talk about it otherwise. Perhaps he’s shy about his interest, too?

It isn’t until one evening, when Koutarou is staying the night at his house, that he discovers the truth. 

Keiji is eager to show his crush the souvenir program her purchased after seeing a performance of La Sylphide two years ago. He carefully passes it to Koutarou, wondering if the other boy will be surprised, or maybe even jealous that Keiji was able to attend such a special, sold-out show.

But instead—

“Oh! My sister was in this!” 

Keiji freezes. He turns slowly to look at his friend, unsure if he heard correctly. “What?”

“Yeah, she was made principal ballerina that year!”

Keiji frowns. “Your sister… performed with the National Ballet of Japan?”

“Yeah!” Koutarou grins. “She was there for two years, until she went overseas. I miss her so much.”

“Wait a minute.” Keiji is having trouble trusting his own ears. Because it sounds like Koutarou is insinuating… but no, that can’t be it. Can it? Suddenly frantic, he flips through the program, until he find the cast profiles. He leans in to look at the lead female dancer. A familiar face in the modern ballet scene. He blinks, turning to look at Koutarou, and then back at the woman on the page. 

Intense golden eyes. A wide, toothy smile. Silvery hair, with just a hint of black at the roots. “Bokuto-san,” he croaks, “is your sister… Bokuto Kai?”

Koutarou chuckles. “Well, yeah! That’s my Kai! Isn’t she so cool?”

Keiji chokes on nothing. He sputters, enough for his friend to reach over and pat his back consolingly.

“You okay, ‘kaashi?”

Is he okay? Keiji doesn’t know. The fact that his best friend’s sister is one of the most well-known ballet dancers in Japan, the world even, is actively shifting his reality.

“So… I guess you’re a fan?” Koutarou smiles in obvious amusement.

“Y-yes,” Keiji admits, thoroughly shaken. “I am. She’s incredible.”

One year later, Keiji is standing frozen in the threshold of his now-boyfriend, Koutarou’s family home. He’s been here many times, and spent time with most of the family. But the person at the door is not anyone he’s met before.

But oh, he knows her well.

“Ah, you must be Akaashi!” Kai Bokuto is short, the crown of her head barely reaching Keiji’s shoulders, but her immaculate posture seems to expand her presence. She’s wearing a cotton hoodie and leggings, her silver hair tossed over one shoulder in a long braid. 

She’s a vision.

Keiji’s mouth drops open. He blinks. “B-Bokuto-san, um, hi! Hello there. You… um, I… well...” His words stumble out of him like dominos. He’s never felt so inarticulate in his entire life.

Kai laughs. “Please, call me Kai! I’ve heard so much about you. Come in, Keiji-kun!”

When Keiji finds his boyfriend inside, he greets him with a light punch to the shoulder. “You could have warned me she was here,” he hisses, “I just made a fool of myself.”

Koutarou snorts. “You’re such a fanboy!”

“Shut it.”

It turns out, Kai and Keiji have a lot more in common than a love for ballet. Both of them love literature, poetry and art history. Kai regales him with stories of her time in Europe—including her recent stint in Paris, thes city Keiji wants to visit more than anything.

They also happen to be quite protective of Koutarou.

“He’s very important to me,” she says, as they watch Keiji’s boyfriend hurry to help his mother in the kitchen. “He means the world to all of us, really. It doesn’t matter how tall or strong he gets—he’ll still be our baby Kou.”

Keiji grins softly. “Yeah.”

They exchange numbers that first night, and stay in touch when Kai flies back to France for her next set of performances. She regularly sends him photos, poems, news articles, and of course, updates on the Parisian ballet scene. They ask each other advice on outfits and home design.

“Ya know, I’m starting to think you like her more than me,” Koutarou pouts, one morning when they are curled up in Keiji’s tiny dorm bed. 

“Are you jealous?” Keiji raises one eyebrow.

“Hmm,” Koutarou hums, “maybe a little…”

Giggling, Keiji turns in his hold, leaning up to touch noses. “Don’t worry, love. You’ll always be my number one star.” The comment seems to light a fire in Koutarou, whose face splits into a brilliant smile as he pulls Keiji in tighter. “Promise?”

Keiji smiles back. “Always.”

//

I love the idea that Keiji gets along great with Koutarou’s sisters, and admires them (almost) as much as his boyfriend. The idea for Kai being a ballerina was inspired by the beautiful artwork of Temari! I just can’t get the idea out of my mind.

Please, if you enjoyed this, reblog and comment! It really helps me out. 🥰❤️

[ot3]

neopets

guild wars 2

doctor who

neopets: they truly do not make them like this anymore. in some ways thats necessary but on the other hand man it was a ton of fun being a kid in this space that was very much part of the experimental phase of the internet without being a place where you'd be exposed to more of the darker and scarier parts of the less commercial web. great place to be a training wheels website for arguing online, learning basic html, and being exposed to all of the tyranny of economics. i dont think i would have tried to learn to draw as seriously as i did without neopets... that was most of what i drew when i got my very first tablet as a 12 year old, and even before that when i had to do everything with elaborately constructing stuff with ms paints shape tools

guild wars 2: i respect the fuck out of having a major mmo that is not subscription based, and the xpacs are nice and reasonably priced for the amount of gameplay they have. i also like the fact that its charr women look like big beasts and asura women look like weird little gremlins. sooooo much more fun than everyone looking like an airbrushed anime character a la ffxiv or, even worse, bl*zzards art style. guild wars 2 definitely has the best implementation of mounts of any mmo and the fact that it made being between interesting place fun by making it fun to move around is definitely a feat of game design in that area

doctor who: the doctor is real and he is my friend. despite anything else it's formative tv and the doctor/companion relationship was certainly a tastemaker for my interest in codependency that straddles the line between platonic and romantic. donna noble one of the best female characters in all of television also.

[violetarks]

track 33: la la land

“delivery…?”

you blink at the doorway, where porco holds two bags of ingredients and a wine bottle under his arm. “please don’t ever try that line ever again on me.”

“my bad,” he chuckles as you let him inside, “nice place. i didn’t think you were the gate kinda’ person.”

“levi made sure we all had a place with one after jean’s house got broken into by a crazy fan,” you reply as you lead him to the kitchen. you help him put the ingredients away in separate places and take out two wine glasses. “so, how’ve you been? you’re a lot nicer since the first time i saw you.”

“i think me driving you around town getting jean drumsticks was a good start,” porco tells you. he pours you a glass of wine. “i just, uh… was a bit worried about you during your tour.”

you take out the chopping board and a knife as you listen to him. “oh, thank you, porco, really. i appreciate it,” you hum out, “by the way, what are we making?”

“i actually have no idea,” he mumbles back to you, “i just bought some random things. i saw some pasta thing online.”

you smile at him with upturned brows. “no plan, huh? c’mon, porco, you plan a date and can’t be bothered picking something out?” you joke along with him as you hand him an apron. you tie one on yourself and wait for him to do so as well.

“okay, well, i—i’m not a chef, so i didn’t know,” he grumbles out with knitted brows, “you got somethin’ in mind?”

“yes, everyone knows how to make a simple pasta and protein,” you chuckle back as you turn on your speakers to play some music, “can you dice onion, please? be careful.”

“okay, i’m not some—”

“don’t swing that knife around, porco!” you step back and reprimand. he puts it down on the chopping board sheepishly. “y’know what, i’ll chop everything and you can just, uh… provide support.”

he sits back against the kitchen bench with a pout as you cut the vegetables. he watches you though, a bit happy that you were acting as normal as you could. porco crosses his arms over his chest as he listens to the music. you seemed calm.

when you begin to cook the garlic and onion on the pan and stir with a wooden spoon, you freeze up in your spot when you feel porco’s hands on your waist. you lose your train of thought and mumble off into nothing as he steps forward.

“you okay?” he asks you against your ear. his chin rests on your shoulder and he can feel you shiver. “you were saying something?”

“i… the, uh, the tour went really well,” you swallow your nerves before you put in the tomato paste, “fans really liked it and we, um, we had plenty of encores. i ended up—your hands are…”

they’re planted on your hips tightly. you can feel how his fingers dance across the apron, his chest pressed gently against your back.

“hm?” he asks, “is this alright?”

“y’know, i would’ve head butted you if you tried this back at the jaeger’s holiday house,” you state as you stir the pan, “you’re lucky.”

“yeah?” he hums, “you like me now?”

you don’t respond to that; instead, you point to the fridge. “can you pass me the heavy cream?”

he lets out a short sigh before he pulls away from you. but you shift a little as porco keeps a finger looped in your apron strap. he opens the fridge with one hand and uses his knee to block the fridge door as he reaches for the cream.

“are you serious right now?” you let out a laugh as he sinks back next to you, “thanks.”

“you’re welcome,” he replies as he looks down, “i wanted to apologise for everything, by the way. i… pretty much made all this drama happen between us. put you in a pretty shitty position.”

you stare at him wildly before you shake your head. “it’s okay, porco. i mean, every celebrity’s gotta’ deal with something. that, for me, is you. i’m sorry too, i can be pretty childish.”

“that’s for sure,” you jab his shoulder at that. he rubs his arm as he smiles. “so, what will happen between us?”

you glance at him as he opens up the cream. “well, we can’t go public yet, obviously. i’m fine with us just seeing each other in private, if that’s okay. or hiding our faces when we meet up.”

“that sounds good,” he tells you as he leans against the marble bench, “we’ll be extra careful.”

“of course,” you hum back, “you were never a three, by the way. i just said that to piss you off.”

“what about that other drummer? is he still your favourite?” porco questions with a tilt of his head.

“yes, i like the tricks he does with the drumsticks—”

“you’re such an asshole,” he scoffs as he drags you closer to him with one hand on your hip. he watches you smile at him before he’s leaning over and pressing a gentle kiss to your cheek. “let’s just start over.”

you return the kiss to his cheek before going back to cooking. “alright. but if you bug me about my stage presence again i will kick you out of my house.”

his laughter fills the air as you two move about in the kitchen.

track 32 | track list | track 34

anime: attack on titan

character: porco galliard (band! au)

summary: y/n, the bassist of the band 'paradís', finds herself in middle of a 'publicity stunt' with none other than a rival band's drummer. porco, the mentioned member of 'marley', doesn't care about her at all. but they can only ignore each other for so long.

taglist: @makimakimi @hanmascult @ally22042000 @rozewayne2005 @keithandlevi-ontheroof @qaahnarin @queen-flower @id-rather-be-an-outsider @onlylowercase @tonysttank @a-little-pebbl @hannahalanib1 @moonshineandclearskies @aqueerincrisis @tati-the-fangirl @cheesechopchive-blog @hermaeusmorax

[canmom]

The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere, 000-012

Or, what if that mural was the heart of a web serial.

I'm reading The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere, thanks largely to the enthusiasm of @azdoine and @lukore on my dash over the last few months.

This is absolutely not gonna be a liveblog in the level of detail of the great Umineko liveblog project. Rather I'm gonna be aiming at something like the comics comints series or those occasional posts on anime. Or indeed what I wrote about Worth The Candle last year. I must create a robot whose purpose is to watch to see if I start writing detailed plot summaries and hit me with a stick labelled 'remember you have a job now'.

That outta the way, let's talk flower!

No, not that flower!

I will start with an anecdote. When I was at university, I ended up attending a talk by court alchemist senescence researcher Aubrey de Grey, who at that time did not yet have a 'sexual harassment allegations' section on his Wikipedia page. The main thing that struck me at the time was his rather spectacularly long beard. But I did listen to his talk about ending aging.

de Grey's schtick is that he, like many people in the transhumanist milieu, believes that medical technology is on the cusp of being able to prevent aging sufficiently well to prolong human lifespans more or less indefinitely. He believes that the different processes of aging can be understood in terms of various forms of accumulating cellular 'damage', and that these will begin to be addressed within present human lifespans, buying time for further advancements - so that (paraphrasing from memory) 'the first immortals have already been born'. He has some pretty graphs to demonstrate this point.

At that talk, one of the audience members asked de Grey the (in my view) very obvious question about whether access to this technology would be distributed unevenly, creating in effect an immortal ruling class. de Grey scoffed at this, saying he always gets this question, and basically he didn't think it would be a big deal. I forget his exact words, but he seemed to assume the tech would trickle down sooner or later, and this was no reason not to pursue it.

I'm sure de Grey is just as tired of being reminded of how unbalanced access to medical technology is in our current world, or the differences in average life expectancy between countries.

So, I was very strongly reminded of de Grey as The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere laid out its major thematic concerns and characters. I was also put in mind of many online arguments in the transhumanist milieu about whether it would be a good thing, in principle, to end death.

In particular, of course, comes to mind transhumanist Nick Bostrom's short story The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant, in which death is likened to a huge dragon that demands to be fed trains full of humans every day. In the story, humanity's scientists secretly build a giant gun to kill the dragon. Naturally, despite all the doubters and naysayers who foolishly feel obliged to justify the existence of the dragon, the gun works. Bostrom's imagery is incredibly heavy-handed (particularly the trains à la Auschwitz), but just in case you didn't get it, he also spells out the moral explicit at the end: basically, every day not spent putting resources to abolishing death is adding up more and more bodies to the pile of people who don't get to be immortal.

So far, Flower seems to be shaping up to be a critical intervention into that milieu, with a much more grounded view of death and a much stronger model of society - admittedly not a high bar but it's going good so far!

At the time of writing this commentary, I have read the prologue and first two six-chapter arcs, namely Mankind's Shining Future (1-6) and Pilgrimage to the Deep (7-12).

the general shape of things

We are introduced - from the perspective of sardonic, introverted Su, who is going to be the protagonist of our time loop - to a group of brilliant young medical wizards, who have just been invited to visit the headquarters of a secret society whose mission is precisely to abolish death. Su's grandfather was some kind of controversial luminary who was expelled this organisation, and he also did something to her, which is giving her some kind of ulterior motive to find her way into this society.

We know pretty much from the outset that this is a time loop scenario: Su has been explicitly given the opportunity to replay the scenario in the hopes of find an alternative outcome, by some kind of presently mysterious parties. This first part is the 'control' loop, i.e. probably more or less how things went down 'originally'.

I believe Umineko is an explicit inspiration for this story, and the influence is pretty evident. But parallels with the Locked Tomb series, especially Gideon the Ninth, are also quite noticeable. @lukore spoke of it as the STEM to Locked Tomb's humanities, and I can already kinda see it, although we haven't got into the real meat of the scenario yet. This story began serialisation four years ago, making the two works roughly contemporary. The latest chapter was published in the last couple of weeks - no idea if I've arrived just in time for the ending!

Stylistically, it's generally pretty heavy on dialogue and long asides. The characters are a bunch of mega nerds who love to have big philosophical and political discussions, but their dynamics are well enough realised and their dynamics clear enough that it can double up as naturalistic characterisation. So far, the discussions have been interesting to read.

Below I'm going to make some notes and comments on various elements of the setting and story. In a followup post (because it got too long) I'm going to talk a lot about entropy. Perhaps you will find this interesting!

the world

The first few chapters are dedicated pretty hard to exposition. We find ourselves in a distant-future setting - one in which it seems reality has totally collapsed and then been rebuilt using magic, creating a somewhat oddball universe which lacks things like the element iron, and also electromagnetism. This seems like it would have pretty severe implications for just about everything!

However, the 'ironworkers' have, after producing a series of trial and error 'lower planes' that didn't quite get it right, landed on a fairly close approximation of how things used to be on the old world. Though by 'fairly close approximation' I mean like... it's a bowl-shaped world and the sun and stars are artificial lanterns. But still, there are humans, and they seem to work more or less like we're used to humans working, apart from the whole 'magic' thing.

So, an alt-physics setting. Praise Aealacreatrananda, I love that shit.

While electromagnetism might be out, the more abstract physical principles like thermodynamics still apply, and the humans of this universe have managed to find analogues to a number of things in our world. Instead of computers, they have 'logic engines' which run on magic. Horses seem to have made it in, so we get delightful blends of historical and futuristic concepts like a self-driving computer-controlled horse-drawn carriage taxi.

The biggest difference is of course that in this setting, magic - more on that in a bit - has solved most medical problems and humans routinely live to around 500. The setting is ostensibly a semi-post-scarcity one, although a form of money exists in 'luxury debt', which can be exchanged for things like taxi rides, café food and trips on the space elevator.

Politically, we are told that the world has enjoyed a few hundred years of general peace, broken in living memory by a revolution which put an end to a regime of magical secrecy. There are lots of countries, and an alliance overseeing them.

There's a few other oddities in this world. Something called a 'prosognostic event' can happen if you see someone who has the same face as you, and whatever this is, it's bad enough news that everyone is constantly reminded to veil their faces in public and there's some kind of infant 'distinction treatment' to mitigate the risk. Given that, in the regular world, nothing particularly bad would happen if you ran into a long-lost identical twin, it suggest there is probably something a little fucky about how humans work in this world!

There's evidently a fair bit of effort put into the worldbuilding of fictional countries and historical periods. The important elements seem to be roughly along the lines of:

our world is currently in what they call the 'old kingdoms' period, which is poorly remembered;

next up comes an 'imperial' period of high transhumanist shenanigans in which society was ruled by 'gerontocrats' who got exclusive access to the longevity treatment, but this all somehow led to a huge disaster which destroyed og earth;

the survivors built the Mimikos where humanity currently lives using magic and created some kind of huge iron spike that holds the universe together; there was subsequently a 'fundamentalist' period in which a strict cutoff point was put on human lifespans and a lot of the wackier magic was banned;

now we're onto a new era of openness following a small revolution, while the major political structures remain largely intact.

Writing a far-future setting is hard, because trying to deal with the weight of history without the story getting bogged down with worldbuilding details is a fiddly line to walk. The Dying Earth series of Jack Vance might be a relevant point of comparison. Vance leaves the historical details vague - there are endless old kingdoms and strange artefacts and micro-societies for Cugel and co. to stumble on. Far more important than the specifics of history is establishing the vibe of a world that's seen an unimaginable amount of events layered on top of each other and is honestly a bit tired.

Flower makes things a bit more concrete and generally manages to make this work decently well. I do appreciate the asides where Su talks about, for example, the different architectural styles that layer up to make a place, or the way a technique has been refined. It establishes both that Su is the kind of person to notice this sort of thing, and also helps the world feel lived-in.

the names

The story doesn't do a lot with language. The story is written in English, and the narration will occasionally make reference to how things are phrased (e.g. how divination predates the suffix -mancy). We can probably make the standard assumption that this is all translated from $future_language, with the notional translator making a suitable substitution of whatever linguistic forms exist in that language.

The characters are named in a variety of languages. Our main character's full name is Utsushikome of Fusai. We're told that this is "an old name from Kutuy, and means something like 'mysterious child'" - so Kutuyan is one of the languages spoken in this world. It's blatantly got the same phonotactics as Japanese, and indeed if I search up 'Utsushikome', I find an obscure historical figure called Utsushikome-no-Mikoto, wife of the Emperor Kōgen; she has no article on English Wikipedia, but she does have a brief one on Japanese wiki. Just as Su says about Kutuyan, 'Utsushikome' is written 欝色謎 in Japanese, but it relies on archaic readings of those characters and wouldn't read that way in modern Japanese. We could perhaps assume a good old translation convention is in effect where Kutuyan is replaced with Japanese.

A lot of characters have Greek names, as do various setting elements. One exception is Kamrusepa, or Kam, who is named for an ancient goddess of medicine worshipped by the Hittites and Luwians. I know basically fuck all about Hittites and Luwians but it's a cool little nod to mythology, and it won't be the only one!

I'll run down a list of characters and my comments about them in a bit. But many are named after gods or other mythological figures.

the magic

Most of the divergences come from magic existing. Certain humans are 'arcanists', who are able to use the 'Power', which is a magic system with a highly computational flavour. Thanks to Su's expositional asides, we know that an incantation is something like a short program written in cuneiform with the ability to gather information, perform maths, and manipulate particles. An example we are given is a spell called "entropy-denying", which is the following string of cuneiform:

"…(𒌍𒌷𒀭)(𒌍𒁁𒀭)𒅥𒌈𒆜𒈣𒂠, 𒋢𒀀𒅆𒌫𒃶,𒈬𒊹."

We're told that spells always start with phrases ending in 𒀭, and end in 𒊹. Beyond that, I'm not sure how far the author has actually worked out the syntax of this magic system - probably not in too much detail! Seems like the kind of thing it's better to leave vague, but also she seems like kind of nerd who would (positive). It's conceptually a reasonable magic system for a world where more or less realistic physics applies.

The use of unusual scripts for a magic system isn't that unusual - the old European occultists who wrote the [Lesser] Key of Solomon loved to write on their magic circles in Hebrew, and in modern times we could mention Yoko Taro's signature use of the Celestial Alphabet for example - but the specific use of cuneiform here seems like it might be a little more significant, because a little later in the story the characters encounter a mural depicting The Epic of Gilgamesh, which of course was recorded on cuneiform tablets. Remains to be seen exactly what these allusions will mean!

The magic system is divided into various disciplines defined by the different ways they approach doing magic, with the disciplines breaking down broadly along the same lines as the modern scientific disciplines. For example, our protagonist is a thanatomancer ("necromancer" having become unfashionable), which is the discipline dealing with death; she's specifically an entropic thanatomancer, distinguished by their framework viewing death as the cessation of processes.

Magic relies on an energy that they refer to as 'eris' (unknown relation to the Greek goddess of strife and discord). We are told that eris must be carefully apportioned across the elements of a spell or shit blows up, that it can be stored, and it accumulates gradually enough that you don't want to be wasteful with it, but so far given little information about where it comes from.

Magic in this story generally seems to act as a kind of 'sufficiently advanced technology'. It's very rules-based, and used for a lot of mundane ends like operating computers or transport. Advancement in magic is something like a combination of basic research and software development. But the thing that makes it a magic system and not merely alt-physics is that it's at least a little bit personal: it must be invoked by an individual, and only certain people can operate the magic. We're told a little about how wizards are privileged in some societies, indoctrinated in social utility in others, and expected to be inconspicuous in the present setting. It's not clear yet if you need some kind of special innate capacity to do the magic, or if it's just a matter of skill issue.

With one exception, our main characters are a gaggle of wizards, and exceptionally skilled students at that. They're at an elite institution, carrying high expectations, even if they are themselves fairly dismissive of the pomp and ceremony. They have grandiose plans: Kamrusepa in particular is the main voice of the 'death should be abolished' current.

the cast

We're entering a cloistered environment with high political stakes hanging off of it. Even if I hadn't already heard it described as a murder mystery, it would feel like someone will probably be murdered at some point, so lets round up our future suspects.

Su (Utsushikome) is our protagonist and first-person POV. She's telling this story in the first past tense, with a style calling to mind verbal narration; she'll occasionally allude to future events so we know for sure narrator!Su knows more than present!Su. She's got a sardonic streak and she likes long depressing antijokes, especially if the punchline is suicide. She will happily tell us she's a liar - so maybe her narration isn't entirely reliable, huh.

Su is more than a little judgemental; she doesn't particularly like a lot of her classmates, or people in general, and generally the first thing she'll tell you about a character is how well she gets on with them. She introduces the theme of 'wow death sucks' in the first paragraph, but she is, at least at this point, pessimistic that anyone will manage to do anything about it for good.

Her magical specialisation is entropic thanatomancy, roughly making processes go again after they working coherently.

Her name is a reference to an obscure Japanese empress, as discussed above.

Ran is Su's bestie from the same home country. She is generally pretty on the level. She likes romance novels and she is pretty sharp at analysing them. She will cheerfully team up with Su to do a bit or bait someone else when an argument gets going.

Her magical specialisation is Divination, which is sort of a more fundamental layer of magic, about gathering information by any means. In medicine it's super advanced diagnostics.

Her name is too short to pin down to a specific allusion. Could be one of a couple of disciple of Confucius such as Ran Geng, or a Norse goddess of the sea.

Kam (Kamrusepa) is the de facto class prez and spotlight lover. She's hardcore ideological, the story's main voice of the de Grey/Bostrom death-abolishing concept so far - I think she straight up calls someone a 'deathist' at some point. She loves to tell everyone what she thinks about everything, and getting the last word.

Her magical specialisation is Chronomancy, so time magic. It's described as secretive and byzantine, but also it can do stuff like (locally?) rewind time for about five minutes. No doubt it has something to do with the time loop.

As mentioned above, she's named after a fairly obscure ancient deity of healing and magic.

Theo (Theodoros) is a fairly minor character. He's scatterbrained and easily flustered, he has a similar background to our protagonist, and he's not great with people. His name is shared with a number of ancient Greek figures, so it's hard to narrow it down to one allusion. I don't think his magic school has been mentioned.

Ptolema is a cheery outgoing one, someone who Su dismisses as an airhead. And she is at least easy to bait into saying something ill-considered. Her specialisation is applying magic to surgery. As a character, she tends to act as a bit of a foil to the others. Bit of a valley girl thing going on.

'Ptolema' is presumably a feminised version of the renowned Greek philosopher Ptolemy.

Seth is the jock to Ptolema's prep, and our goth protag Su doesn't particularly like him either. ...lol maybe that's too flippant, I may be misapplying these US high school stereotypes. To be a little more precise then, he's pretty casual in demeanour, flirty, likes to play the clown. He specialises in Assistive Biomancy, which revolves around accelerating natural healing processes.

Seth is named for either the Egyptian god (domain: deserts, violence and foreigners) or an Abrahamic figure, the third son of Adam and Eve granted by God after the whole Caim killing Abel thing.

Ophelia is someone Su describes as 'traditionally feminine' - soft-spoken, demure etc. (Gender in this world appears to be constructed along broadly similar lines to ours). Indeed we get a fairly extended description of her appearance. Her specialisation is Alienist Biomancy, which means introducing foreign elements to healing (not entirely sure how that differs from the Golemancy mentioned later).

Ophelia is of course a major character in Shakespeare's Hamlet, best known for going mad and dying in a river.

Fang is the only nonbinary member of the class, noted as the most academically successful. They're not on the expedition, but the characters discuss them a little in their absence, so maybe they'll show up later. It seems like they have a bit of a rebellious streak. Their magical specialisation is not mentioned.

Fang is a regular ol' English word, but I gave it a search all the same and found there's an ancient Chinese alchemist of that name. She is the oldest recorded woman to do an alchemy in China, said to know how to turn mercury into silver.

Lilith is the teenaged prodigy in computers logic engines, and Mehit is her mother who accompanies her on the trip. They've got a big Maria and Rosa (of Umineko) dynamic going on, with Mehit constantly scolding Lilith and trying to get her to obey social norms, though in contrast to Maria, Lilith is a lot more standoffish and condescending to the rest of the gang. Lilith specialises in 'Golemancy', which means basically medical robotics - prosthetic limbs and such. She spends most of her time fiddling with her phone logic engine, and will generally tell anyone who talks to her that they're an idiot. Sort of a zoomer stereotype.

Lilith is named for the Abrahamic figure, the disobedient first wife of Adam who was banished and, according to some Jewish traditions, subsequently became a demon who attacks women at night. There may be some connection between Lilith and the lioness-headed Mesopotamian chimeric monster Lamashtu, which I mention because Mehit is an Egyptian and Nubian lion goddess.

'Golemancy' is probably playing on the popular fantasy idea of a 'golem' as a kind of magic robot, but given the Jewish allusion in Lilith's name here, I do wonder a little bit if it's going to touch on the Jewish stories of the Golem which inspired it - a protective figure with a specific religious dimension.

There are some other characters but they're not part of the main party on their way to the function, so I won't say much about them just yet. Also it's entirely possible I went and forgot an entire classmate or something, big whoops if so.

the events

In true Umineko tradition, the beginning of the story narrates in great detail how the protagonists make their way to the place where the plot is going to happen.

To be fair, there's a lot of groundwork to be laid here, and the characters' discussions do a lot to lay out the concerns of the story and sketch out the setting, not to mention establish the major character relations. A murder mystery takes a certain amount of setup after all! There's plenty of sci-fi colour to be had in the 'aetherbridge', which is a kind of space elevator that lifts you up to a high altitude teleporter network. (It's technically not teleportation but 'transposition', since teleportation magic also exists in the story, with different restrictions! But close enough for government work.)

They go to a huge space citadel, which is kind of a transport hub; some cloak and dagger shit happens to hide the route they must take to the mysterious secret organisation. They find a strange room with a missing floor and a mural of the Epic of Gilgamesh, albeit modified to render it cyclic. What does it meeaaaan?

The idea of a secret society of rationalists is one that dates back to the dawn of ratfic, in HPMOR. It was kinda dumb then, but it works a lot better here, where we're approaching the wizard circle from outside. The phrase 'Great Work' has already been dropped. I love that kind of alchemical shit so I'm well into finding out what these wizards are plotting.

the dying

A lot of the discussions revolve around the mechanics of death. Essentially the big problem for living forever is information decay. Simple cancers can be thwarted fairly easily with the magic techniques available, but more subtle genetic slippages start to emerge after the first few hundred years; later, after roughly the 500 year mark, a form of dementia becomes inevitable. It's this dementia in particular that the characters set their sights on curing.

One thing that is interesting to me is that, contra a lot of fantasy that deals with necromancy (notably the Locked Tomb series), there appears to be no notion of a soul in this world whatsoever. The body is all that there is. Indeed, despite all the occult allusions in the character names, there is very little in the way of religion for that matter. Even the 'fundamentalism' is about an idea of human biological continuity that shouldn't be messed with too much.

Su distinguishes three schools of thought on death, namely 'traditional', 'transformative' and 'entropic'. The 'traditional' form attempts to restore limited function - classic skeleton shit. 'Transformative' sees death as a process and uses dead tissues together with living in healing. Su's 'entropic' school broadens this 'process' view to consider death as any kind of loss of order - a flame going out as much as an organism dying. At the outset of the story, Su has discovered a 'negentropic' means to restore life to an organism, which she considers promising, even if for now it only works for fifteen minutes.

This is an interesting perspective, but the devil is in the details. Because processes such as life or flames, necessarily, result in a continuous increase in the thermodynamic entropy of the universe. And yet this idea of death-as-loss-of-order does make a kind of sense, at a certain level of abstraction.

Elaborating on this got rather too long for this post, and I think it can stand alone, so I'm going to extract it to a followup post.

the comments

As is probably evident by the length of this post, I am very intrigued by The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere. The setting is compelling, and it seems like it's got the willingness to bite at the chewy questions it raises instead of acting like it has all the answers, which is I think one of the most crucial elements for this kind of scifi. I like how unabashed it is at having its characters straight-up debate shit.

Of course, this all depends where they go with it. There's so many ways it could be headed at this point. I hear where it's going is 'dark yuri' and 'Umineko-inspired murder mystery', so that should be really juicy fun, but I do end up wondering what space that will leave to address the core theme it's laid out in these first few chapters.

Overall, if this and Worth the Candle are what modern ratfic is like, the genre is honestly in pretty good shape! Of course, I am reading very selectively. But this is scratching the itch of 'the thing I want out of science fiction', so I'm excited to see where the next 133 chapters will take me.

Though all that said, I ended up writing this post all day instead of reading any other chapters or working, so I may need to rein it in a bit.

[diazguzman]

Part 4

25/06/16 He said, Ella dijo podcast. (I'm so sorry about the thumbnail YouTube choose for the video 🙈 YouTube said 😬)

Such a wonderful interview, here Ryan talks about parenthood, his martial arts training since he was a child, his modeling career and start as an actor, how dancing was easy to him due his upbringing as Mexican-American because there were many parties to attend Ryan also said that fighting and dancing are very similar. He opened up about his struggles with mental health and past suicide attempt then he talked about his new movie "the present".

Full transcript.

24/06/18 Interview for KTLA (Ryan talks about parenthood, his movie and mentions buddie unprompted 🙂‍↕️)

Gif from ayo-edebiri

Clip of Ryan talking about buddie. Whole interview.

24/06/18 Interview for CBS news, Ryan talks about "the present"

24/06/18 The Jess Cagle Show

Here Ryan talks about "the present" and how he took the role in the movie because the plot of " kids trying to keep their parents together" resonated with him. He talks about parenthood and his 2 children and how one of his kids thought he was a real firefighter because they saw an episode of 911. He talks about 911 and what happened to Eddie in the season finale and how Eddie has lost all foundation and footing and the new season will be about Eddie starting on a new landscape and what this new landscape will offer to him. He is making sure he is super fit to play Eddie, he believes Eddie will be working out more as a coping mechanism. He talked about the boy next door and working with JLO and how he didn't really call himself an actor until 3 years ago. Kenneth helped him to understand he had to put in the works to be an actor, to study and take acting seriously. When his last fight as a MMA fighter didn't end up being what he wanted he left Sacramento to pursue a modeling career in LA where he had to share a small apartment with five more guys. He then started acting because he was very competitive (he was like "if my roommates want to try acting so can I" 🫡).

24/06/21 Ryan with Mario López

He talks about his movie "the present", Ryan also talked about how Eddie lost his kid and had to say goodbye to his late wife for the billion time (😅) so in season 8 Eddie will be finding himself all over again in a new landscape and he thinks Eddie will want to escape somewhere, he finding a healthy or unhealthy coping mechanism is yet to be seen.

Ryan also talked about his art and how art to him is more like story telling. Ryan said he is doing mostly boxing training right now and at the end he talked about his children and trying to get his kids into sports.

24/06/21 Oliver's interview for men's health *

Oliver was on a road trip, during his interview he talked about mental health and how when he's not doing well he tends to withdraw, how he struggled with making friends and how during his trip he met a lot of great people thanks to his dogs ❤️. Oliver talked about acting, how it was difficult for him when a previous girlfriend had more auditions than him back then and how he's really grateful for the opportunity to work on 911. Oliver also talked about the complications due the use of social media, where you don't always find positive things.

He talked about Buck's coming out arc, he's really honored of getting to play a bi character. He also talked about how curating his online experience is very important to him, mentioned having another twitter account that was mostly about sports, he has previously found people sharing negative opinions about him and that's why he refrains from looking about things about himself online. He also talks about how much he loves nature.

24/06/23 Whine down with Jana Kramer The boy next door with Ryan Guzmán 

He talked about how he started acting, he hated modeling. He got into debt thanks to the modelig agencies. What he likes about acting is that acting connects with the human side of things. Ryan also talked about his art and his experience while working with JLO, he talked about "the present" also mentioned he is currently a single father and why he keeps his children out the public eye and how much he misses them when they are not with him. He's not looking for someone to date right now.

24/06/26 Ryan being interviewed for people en Español

Ryan talked about the challenges of playing Eddie and mentioned the parallels between him and Eddie. He talked about his role in "the present" and his costars. Ryan also talked about the Latino community, and the need of more than stereotypical representation and diversity in media he talked about being Latino actor while playing a character and how when he's off set he's still a Latino person even if most of the time people will think he's white 💔