#Perception original story

[cymballips]

alyosha karamazov

[serpentface]

Do you have any information on the root scholars that you can share? They’ve always been a cool cult/organization to me

Ok it’s a facet of the Eterhimhamdli religion, which is The most widespread single belief system east of the inner seaway (which isn't saying much in terms of scale but it's still pretty significant) and also one I've barely introduced so I'll go over it a bit here.

Eterhimhamdli has spread past its initial sphere of old (~500 years BP) southern Lowlands Yuroma kingdoms, has many folk practices, and has schismed a few times, so there's a good deal of cultural variation. But its basic tenants/tendencies are:

-Creator deities are wholly rejected, the universe is an interplay between non-personified dualistic forces of Body(evil)/Mind(good). In one schism, the interplay of these two forces is the Dream, in others dreaming is an aspect of Mind.

-Deities in general are not wholly at odds with Eterhimhamdli, but their importance is de-emphasized and worship is usually discouraged in favor of making them objects of contemplation and/or tutelary figures.

-The Mind of the universe exists as a collective soul from which human souls emanate

-every person has two souls: an egoistic soul that animates the body and an ethereal soul that animates the mind. The latter is conceptualized as a single drop from a greater sea of the collective soul.

-belief that true wisdom is derived through access to this collective soul.

-belief that the trappings of the the ego-soul and the body's demands inhibits access to said collective soul.

-belief in the concept of enlightened beings who gain full experiential knowledge of the collective soul while remaining in a body, thus becoming capable of directly communicating aspects of their wisdom to the masses.

the biggest schism in this religion is over whether enlightenment just means experiencing full knowledge of the collective before you die, or whether it means transcending the limits of the body entirely and functionally becoming an immortal, godlike being.

deities of older/other religions absorbed by Eterhimhamdli are often reframed as enlightened mortals.

-most sects believe that only sophont life (or sometimes Only humans) have a etherial-soul along with the ego-soul, while animals exclusively have the ego-soul. Plants and inanimate objects Usually aren't ascribed souls outsides of heavily syncretic folk practices.

-belief in a fundamental good-evil cosmic dualism, though in a fairly complex way (evil is a necessity for life that is to be tempered and grappled with, rather than outright vanquished from the world entirely). The notion of 'evil' here is most associated with bodily desires (this includes all bodily needs like hunger and thirst, necessary to support life but viewed dangerous in excess, and being the root of conflict and pain).

the evil nature of bodily desire is not About sex, but does translate to non-procreative sex being frowned upon to varying extents.

-belief that life is a state of internal warfare between the evil ego-soul and the good ethereal-soul, with the former being more powerful and influential. To lead a good life is to bring the ego-soul into equilibrium with the ethereal soul. To live a wise and venerable life is to fully tip the balance in the latter's favor (this is not an expectation for lay followers, as it is considered profoundly difficult and requires separation from worldly life).

-lay followers practice forms of temperance to bring these forces into equilibrium, priests practice forms of asceticism to subdue the ego-soul and gain experiential wisdom in the process.

-The way you balance your life has consequences for the afterlife. An evil life causes an eternal death (this is usually posited as an underworld), a life in equilibrium causes one to be reborn into a new human body (a neutral fate), and a good life results in full return to the collective soul (this is a state of complete peace and contentedness and access to infinite wisdom).

-A selection of hallucinogenic plants are central to the monastic/priestly aspects of the religion, being seen as the key method through which the body can be transcended and the ego-soul can be quieted in order to tap into the collective. Lay followers do not participate in this facet on a regular basis.

-Priests also participate in self-flagellation, as the struggle with physical pain is a key microcosm of the broader internal war with the ego-soul, and can be a source of wisdom and contemplation. They are extensively tattooed for partly related purposes. Laymen are not expected to flagellate as a practice but rather to apply teachings to/learn from struggles with everyday pain.

-Very complicated relations with violence as a concept. Some strains of Eterhimhamdli philosophy see violence as an exclusive result of evil to be avoided whenever possible (usually more completely by priesthoods than the wider societies they live in), others see it as a neutral tool in of itself that Can be a force for good when used wisely. (Large scale 'wise usages of violence for the sake of good', shockingly, tend to favor the in-group's position in preexisting ethnic/religious/territorial conflicts).

-Most sects are proselytizing and see conversion as a necessity to create a better world, and have broadly unfavorable views of other religious practices.

This does not extend to seeing all societies that practice Eterhimhamdli or even The Same Schism Of Eterhimhamdli in a positive light (the birthplace of this religion is currently about 60 semi independent city-states organized into leagues that are frequently at war with each other)

-Highly favors education, literacy, rhetoric, debate, and the acquisition of material knowledge along with deeper spiritual wisdom. Knowledge and wisdom are venerable traits and societies should be led by the learned, or at least by people under their guidance.

---

The Scholarly Order of the Root is one order of Lowlands Eterhimhamdli monastics, functioning as a closed cult/mystery religion. They’re based out of Suurota (one of the biggest Yuroma city-states and dominant member of its league). They're at the top of the league's hierarchy of monastics, very wealthy, and have some involvement in governance (being an advisory body to the magistrate).

The Scholars primarily interact with the general public by hosting many of the league's institutions of scholarship and philosophy, and some of the biggest libraries in this part of the world. Their institutions are used by laymen Suurota citizens and members of government for study, and they host monks and priests (uninitiated to the inner cult) in their halls.

Actual membership to the Scholars cult is limited, they neither expect nor want associates to participate in their rituals. Rather, they position themselves as teachers- revealing small aspects of their secret knowledge to laymen and the lesser monastics as a form of guidance, while keeping dangerous knowledge for only the trusted inner circle.

Their baseline belief system aligns with the general schema of Lowlands Eterhimhamdli (one of three major schisms of this belief system), but their closed cult practices revolve around fairly unique interpretations, understood to be the ultimate underlying truths of this worldview.

The Scholars focus on an extention the Mind-Body model of the universe where their synthesis is the Dream (this itself is not unique to this cult, but the depths of their focus is). Under this model, the world is the dream of the collective consciousness, and achieving enlightenment or even temporary lucidity can allow the dream to be shaped to one's will.

One of their most secretive practices is god-building, in which they utilize altered mental states to shape the fabric of the dream into entities they can use as personal teachers of secret knowledge (also as a type of magic in general, they use it to 'build' guardians and curses and the like).

The process involves using mild doses of Ur-Root brew (mostly derived from roots of the clonal Ur-Wood colony, whose bark has notable concentrations of dimethyltryptamine and also hosts milder fungal hallucinogens) while maintaining an object and concept as a focal point of concentration. The altered state provided by the Root allows the user some access to the wisdom of the collective soul, and they will experience secret knowledge and revelations about this object, how it can best be used (this will be supplemented by material knowledge about the subject). This process is repeated until the user experiences a sense of Presence in the object, which must be interacted with, given a name and a face. Through more repetition, the object is believed to be shaped into a sort of thoughtform god which has come into material existence via manipulation of the dream.

This is considered to take immense time and effort to come to completion, god-building projects can last for years and be the combined effort of multiple Scholars. In the end, you have shaped an entity to your will that can operate independently of you.

The Ur-Wood itself is the center of Scholar cult practice, as it is both the purveyor of their most important hallucinogen and believed to have been the first god ever shaped by this form of lucid dreaming (it's a pilgrimage site for Eterhimhamdli where thousands of followers have undergone Ur-Root trips over the past four centuries, using the woods as an object of contemplation). To them the Ur-Tree is the ultimate teacher of their cult, an extremely powerful built-god that has been involved in almost every journey to enlightenment and contains all these journeys within its substance.

They believe that communing with the tree via Ur-Root can grant access to all enlightened mortals- full trips (with a DMT breakthrough type experience) will often involve sensations of encountering entities, which they interpret to be these historical figures. Within their religious framework, they're kind of speedrunning enlightenment. Under most conventional frameworks, the teachings of wise and/or enlightened people are conveyed in writing or speech as things to Contemplate on one's own journey- you might be able to understand them Conceptually but true understanding is Experiential, a process that can take a lifetime. In their framework, they're both receiving these teachings directly AND embodying states in which they can experientially comprehend them.

That summarizes most of their secret practices, and the rest of their practice is pretty standard for devout Lowlands Eterhimhamdlist priests. They live a partly ascetic lifestyle, they bear extensive tattoos as a contemplation of pain and marker of their journeys, they flagellate, they use tutelary hallucinogens, they refine their non-experiential body of knowledge through debate and rhetoric, they work to accumulate both worldly and spiritual knowledge, they work as scribes, etc.

[scoobydoodean]

Oh, I see. You and all your little friends are just too DUMB to understand. Too low IQ. The arguments sure is convincing.

I’m not kidding they really are saying somewhere out there that Kripke couldn’t possibly understand what it means to be blue collar because to do that, you’d have to have read about the value of a linen coat (which is not directly related to any of this btw) from Marx’s Das Kapital. Kripke of course couldn’t possibly have read it, and if you haven’t read it, you can’t possibly understand anything about class. You have to have read Theory™️ to understand what it means to be *looks down my nose at people who I assume Have Not Read All The Books That I Did* blue collar *sips from tea cup with my pinky out, chortling*

[metaphorfordeath]

Watch Where You're Going

Two trans people talk about life while one of them finishes her shift at the local video store. 2k words. Originally published in Olit Magazine. Content warning for discussion and depiction of transphobia.

“I’m not necessarily saying it’s a bad movie, I just think it’s in poor taste.”

“What makes you say that?”

Lake flipped the hatch shut on top of the lightbox and took a step back. Lit from behind, the new poster depicted an image of a shimmering red wave the height of a skyscraper looming over a seaside metropolis. The title, printed in screaming orange block letters, read “HEATWAVE.” Then, in smaller letters near the top: “It’s too late to run.”

“I dunno, doesn't it feel a bit tone-deaf to you? Like, people are dying, dude.”

A few steps back, Freddie picked idly at some flaking plastic on one of the DVD cases. “Or is it timely? It's basically commentary on climate change."

“Climate change commentary should probably have fewer explosions and CGI of people being vaporized.”

“Yeah, I guess. I do think the Rock was really good in it, though. Did you watch any of his marketing interviews? He’s basically an activist at this point.”

“Okay, now you’re antagonizing me on purpose.”

“Am I antagonizing you, or am I winning this argument?”

Lake shot them a look as she rolled up the former occupant of the poster display. “If the Rock wants to be a climate activist, then he can get an environmental science degree like the rest of us. Go pick a movie or I’m gonna make you salt the sidewalks.”

“I literally don’t even work here.”

“All the more reason to go pick the movie.”

The store, as usual, was empty. Muted screens flickered movie trailers over the vast expanse of green low-pile carpet, the rows upon rows of gray shelves packed with plastic anti-theft DVD cases. Plate glass windows at the front of the store looked out onto a desolate parking lot, wet pavement glittering in the light of the towering marquee sign. 

Stowing the rolled-up poster under the front counter, Lake looked at the clock. Nine-thirty. Still an hour and a half before she could close, and no one besides Freddie had walked in the door since eight. Standard traffic for a weeknight—on nights like these, the cash deposits she took to the bank after closing were sometimes less than she got paid to be there. Oh well, she thought. At least my homework gets done.

“How about this,” called Freddie from across the store. Unseen between the high shelves, a hand shot up above them holding a DVD. Lake squinted to make it out.

“No, not that. Don’t pick something that someone would conceivably try to rent while we’re watching it,” said Lake. “I hate when people do that.”

“Okay, something else then. What about…” There was a long pause.

“Hurry up or I’m unmuting the ad reel.” Lake opened the cabinet that housed the DVD player and grabbed the remote. “I’m gonna do it!”

“ALRIGHT, Jesus, I’ll just pick one.” A second later Freddie emerged from the aisles, strode to the front and slapped a movie down on the counter. “Free her.”

With a click, Lake picked the magnetic pin out of the center of the case and removed the disc. “Priscilla,” she said. “Good choice.”

“I’m in the mood for some gay shit. Put it in.”

The movie blinked onto the screens simultaneously, spaced twenty feet apart around the perimeter of the store. While opening credits rolled, Freddie dragged two decorative chairs no one was supposed to sit in up to the registers, and the pair of them sat down.

“You brought snacks?”

“Sure did,” said Freddie, scooting a plastic bag across the carpet with their foot. “It sat in my car overnight so the candy might be a little stiff, but it’s still good. Nothing perishable.”

“Thanks for the heads up.” Lake reached inside and fished out a pack of gummy worms. “Want a Code Red or something? We had a bunch that just expired.”

“I’m good, I got coffee before I came. Probably gonna have more when I get to work.”

“When’s your shift start?”

“Eleven, I know that’s when you close so I’ll bounce before you have to lock up.”

“Didn’t you just work earlier?”

Freddie shrugged. “Yeah, noon to eight. Such is the grind.” They plucked a worm from Lake’s lap and chewed thoughtfully. “Days like this are such a bummer. Too short of a break between jobs to go home and sleep, but too long of a break to sit in my car.”

“That’s what I’m for,” said Lake. “I’m like the truck stop of people. Rest your bones, take a shower.”

Freddie just laughed. On the screens, a man in the crowd whips his beer can at Hugo Weaving. He tumbles to the floor, laughter filling the room as he rights himself and staggers away. Backstage, he pulls off his wig and cradles his head in his hand, makeup settling into the somber creases of his face. 

“Did I tell you some guy flicked his cigarette butt at my face the other day,” said Lake, staring up at the screen. “While I was getting gas.”

“Jesus, really? That’s horrible.”

“It’s fine. It’s not the worst thing anyone’s ever done to me. The look on his face hurt more.” She gestured to her own face, drew up her lip to show what she meant. It made her feel ugly to even approximate. “The sneer, you know. You get the sneer.”

“Yeah. My boss at the call center does it to me sometimes when he thinks I’m not looking.” Freddie folded their arms over their chest. “Haven’t told anyone. They’d probably just fire me to save HR the trouble.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

They fell silent as the movie filled in the gaps. Headlights flashed at their backs as cars on the road drove past, less and less frequent by the minute. Someone shoved a handful of DVDs through the drop slot with a metallic rattle but didn’t come inside. The gummy worms were depleted, and Freddie started in on a bag of spicy chips. On-screen friendships develop even as homophobic graffiti defaces the film’s titular bus between stops through the outback.

“Do you ever want more?” said Lake after a while.

“I’m good on snacks I think.”

“No, I mean—more from life.” She turned in her seat. Freddie was still looking up at the screen, a film of peach fuzz visible on their face in profile, whiskers turning gold in the light. “Do you ever feel like… I dunno. Like it’s all over?”

“You’re in college. Everyone feels that way in college.”

“Did you feel that way in college?”

Freddie shrugged, wiped red powder from their fingers onto their jeans. “Sure I did.”

“And now?”

“Now I don’t really care.”

“Okay. Elaborate on that.”

“Alright.” Freddie licked their fingers and turned to face her. “Here’s the thing: in college, everyone wants something from you. And they expect something from you. And they expect you to want something, and to put effort into going for it. But once you’re out of college, the number of people around you who give a shit about that stuff drops pretty dramatically. Right now you feel like it’s all over, but you haven’t even gone anywhere. Nothing has even started.”

“What if I don’t even know what I want?” Lake thumbed a buttonhole in her cardigan. “I’m getting this degree, but now that I’m almost done, I don’t even know if I want to do anything with it.”

“You see me using my degree? I work nights at a gas station, babe.”

“But do you like that?”

“I like it enough,” said Freddie. “I like that my boss doesn’t care if I sit and draw as long as customers get helped and checklists get done. I like that when I’m done with work I get to go home and make art and play with the cat and no one can tell me what to do. Granted, I don’t like the call center,” they added, “but the money’s fine for now. It’s just a job. As long as I get to make my art and be the most authentic version of myself, then I don’t care what other people think.”

“That doesn’t feel like giving up to you?”

“Not really.” They hesitated. “You know what would feel like giving up? If I stopped making art so I could like, go into marketing. Or if I detransitioned so I could be more hireable. I’m not interested in compromising what I care about so I can want what other people think I should want.” Freddie paused again, rubbed their eye with the heel of their hand. “Or, you know, maybe I’m just a burnout, and I’m only saying that to make myself feel better. I don’t really know.” 

The two of them fell silent for a while. The movie played on. The door alarm dinged and Lake jumped to her feet, Pavlovian customer service response in action. He didn’t need any help, said the customer, and he returned to the register after a few minutes with a copy of some action blockbuster from last year and a porno. She felt his eyes on her as she pulled up his account and rang him up; a long, curious stare, like he was trying to figure something out. 

            Once he’d left, Lake glanced at the time. “You can hang out up here while I do the rest of these returns,” she said, “but you’ll probably want to head out soon. Almost closing time.”

“Already? Damn, I should have picked a shorter movie.”

“It’s cool. We can always watch the ending another time.”

“Definitely.”

Movies were scanned, then re-pinned and restored to their usual locations around the store. While she made the rounds, Lake watched out of the corner of her eye as Freddie tidied up the registers without being asked, even tying off the trash and leaving it by the door for her. When she came back to get Priscilla, she hesitated over the “eject” button, watching as the climax of the movie played out. The heroines climb up the cliffside, sweating and squinting in the sun, red dust coating their boots. At the top, they catch their breath. They are beautiful and tiny against the backdrop of the canyon, drag regalia resplendent in the setting sun. The camera pulls back, and back. 

Click. The screen went black, and the player spat out the disc.

Ten minutes before close, Lake walked Freddie to the door.

“Thanks for hanging out with me.”

“My pleasure. Just doing my part to keep you from dying of boredom.”

“Much appreciated.” Then: “Um, I wanted to say—I don’t think you’re a burnout. I’m sorry if I made it seem like I did.”

“It’s cool. I know you didn’t mean it that way.” They took a deep breath. “Anyway, let me get out of here before I make myself late. Have a good rest of your night, Lake.”

“You too, text me later.”

“Will do. See ya.”

Eleven o’clock came and went. A flurry of snow began to fall outside, downy flakes disappearing on contact with the asphalt. Lights off, alarm set, door locked, and then Lake took the drive to the bank. The cash envelope for the day contained less than forty dollars, snapped up into the overnight drop box with a clank. 

A mile down the road, Lake turned into a different lot, parked near a pump and turned off the engine. Then, in the silent car, she gazed through her windshield at the warm-lit interior of the gas station. Freddie was inside, alone at the register, staring down at the counter. A pencil moved in their hand, cutting broad strokes across a sketchbook page. They didn’t look up, focus falling completely on their work even as Lake watched them through the window. 

The sky was dark and close, snow falling fast like hyperspace stars. There probably isn’t a right answer to anything, she thought, and then it was late, and there was nothing to say. Lake drove home and went to bed, and dreamed she was climbing a mountain.

[discoidal]

i dont trust anyone reviewing anything ever bc i LIKE eliza clar/k but this. sucked ass. take it from a short story collection fan there were some good short stories but as a collection it was bad and also as short stories some of it was bad. 3.8 & 4.1????????? it's like a 2.5-3 from me dawg like WHAT this is why i dont have goodreads fr

[backfliips]

Thinking about how when I was in middle school I thought I was the most original person in the world for coming up with the idea of cave elves in some intense political fantasy story I was writing only to find out that I did not in fact come up with the concept of cave elves and the high political drama of elves bring displaced and crammed into cities and discriminated against was literally exactly the setup of dragon age origins

[theprofessionalpromptmaker]

Person A: Since I know you simp for every man with an eyepatch, I would like to show you a picture of this man. Person B: …I hate to say it because of how you called me out, but he is hot…

[littleapocalypsekitten]

So, I full-out re-read one of my old Fire Emblem fanfictions last night after running into someone here on tumblr who said they'd loved that specific old fic. @litlunacy Said same fic is on Ao3. I re-read reviews on both sites. (ff was 2 idiots, Ao3 gave me actual smart reviews). And...I sort of realized something about me and media in general... (Getting long, so read-cut).

One of the reviews there (Ao3) I'd forgotten about got my attention, a guest review by someone I'm sure I actually know, by the style of the review, they are definitely someone who flagged me down on tumblr and who became a mutual and who has PM-chatted with me. They're pretty interesting to talk to. Fire Emblem (all games) is apparently a special interest / core fandom of theirs and they've told me a lot about the lore across the franchise and the mechanics I didn't know. Appreciated, even as I've told them that I've only played a few of the games, and am really only fandom-focused on Awakening. (Fates failed to enchant me. Haven't played enough Three Houses yet. Nada on older games yet). In other words, I treat/have treated my Fire Emblem: Awakening fandom the same way as I treat my Elder Scrolls fandom (I've only played Skyrim). Anything I do creative fanwise will be centered "pretty much on the characters and setting of that game ONLY despite there being a bunch of lore." This is very different from when I do Legend of Zelda fandom work, since I've been a player of that series since I was a pup. Or with Trigun, oh, GOD, Trigun! (Two different animes for that one so far and the core-manga). Trigun owns my soul and if @litlunacy - who loves them some Libra from FE: wants more in the ways of gentle but fighting-capable traumatized blond men, may I offer you a Vash the Stampede in this trying time? Or, if traumatized priests in general are more your thing, may I offer you a Nicholas D. Wolfwood? Anyway, Guest Reviewer talked about the original Japanese iteration of Awakening and how there was transphobia in the story / Chrom being a jerk that was cut out of the English / American localization in a big way (and guessing who they are, they've talked with me a LOT about this). Libra was not trans in my fic, but faces similar social difficulties for reasons obvious to the character. I've kind of realized "I do not care as it is not relative to what I am doing" - in the way of "I go by the localization." If the English-language version (cleaned up of some of the original problematic stuff) is what I am "using" as my fan-base, THAT is the thing I am enjoying. I will readily consider the original a different story and ignore it! It's like, "maybe the original was problematic, but the thing localizers made of it is not or less so" so I'm enjoying the story that I know. (This is very different to how I approach Trigun, for instance, in which I MUST know all lore and translations back, forth and sideways, but that's only because it's my soul-core fandom). Fire Emblem? Less so. I love Awakening's characters, but I choose to love their English-language versions. If Chrom is a better man in English, so be it! It's like... I don't know, how "Samurai Pizza Cats" purposefully went off the rails in English localization and is, quite deliberately, a different show than the Japanese original (and the original creators freaking LOVE it)!

[eatanorange]

haha sorry the fear of being perceived in full and accepted for it got to me for a sec there. No, I don’t usually do that. The whole ‘become worse to sabotage the whole thing’ thing. That would be silly. I don’t fear success. Yes. I can show more than a fragmented and carefully calculated face that statistically ensures you will perceive me how I think you will. I am authentic all the time. 100%.

I haven’t any issues with intimacy why would you think that.

[m4y4vi]

>bored from indulging in the deeper ends of the magic system I am making

>Why not experiment with something more simpler?

>make a rough new system and wrote a POC around it.

>Reread just for fun... It follows a hard magic system...

Fuck...

--

Welp, here's what I wrote... If you are reading anything below this point then know that I wank a lot of words. You are warned.

Oh and it's intended to be the first chapter of sorts...

--

Maya closed the old worn tomb on her lap, 'Basics of herb mixing' - Soul Herbologist, Stevle. Maya sighed... Not at exhausting the last book from the tiny orphanage library... Maybe a bit from the endless puns the author sneaked into the entire lexicon... but more at the boring enlightenment spark she had finally observed last night... Maya stood up to return the book, It was a short way to the library, just a flight of stairs above from her room infact.

Maya walked the wooden creeks of her corridor, that she had haunted like a greedy serpentine gremlin for all of her whole 16 years of life, she had lived in the orphanage... She passed the wooden board from which she often took jobs... Or more specifically the various jobs that she would come to find specialization in... ofcourse! All due to the also boring soul trait she had... which she had proudly isolated when she was 12 years old! But as soon as Maya had done scanning through all available documentation of her soul trait in the measly library and the warden's head... Words could not define how bummed out she was...

Maya's soul trait was... 'trait-less', a simple soul trait, she cursed her own internal language for the trait-lessness of her soul... Her greed for cool shit had seeped into all of the neural netwoking she had aquired in her life... If everything she learns becomes clearly defined and outlined by study... Her venomous fantasy was never satiated... She had fimiliarised herself with every label she was acquainted with... Defining all words that helped one simulate the world in a more comminucatable objective fashion... It wasn't surprising that her neural network was quirkless... Why would her soul trait be anything other than... Trait-less.

Soul traits are what allows soul spiritualists to manifest metaphysical arcane abilities into reality. Every being has one... It's an emergent behaviour inherent to all intelligent beings.

Simpler soul traits form because the wielders inherently have less bias in their language... Therefore making scientific methodology a very synergetic life path the practitioner walked on.

But Maya? She had the simplest... The simplest in all of Permutation the universe allowed... And the same? was her undoing. Maya was never going to have a manifestable arcane ability due to the trait-lessness of her soul... Let alone the cool shit she always dreamed about...

It was a long way to the library, Maya recalled the many jobs she took from the board. It was necessary for everyone who had isolated their soul trait in the orphanage, to contribute to the orphanage.

But that wasn't why Maya took those many jobs... It was either to keep her pockets flowing... or otherwise to indulge in her never-ending quest to find and possibly unlock cool shit... She collected rare herbs, she had once helped a craftsman to make the design blueprint model of his soul puppet more ergonomic, despite her extremely limited expertise in the subject... She even helped a zoologist identify a specific hare he wanted to study! that could hop for a larger distance because it had a unique epigenetic expression... Sad and truly boring old times... But Maya smirked nonetheless... It was fun.

Maya turned the book in, to the librarian's trained hands, waving her a final, still smug, sayonara. She had already packed her things, which wasn't much to begin with... All practical stuff for travelling and some tools she knew would need, the small marsh green travel sack waited outside the warden's room.

Maya walked into the warden's room. The warden eyed her through his old dotting glasses, oddly sharp for the otherwise wrinkled skin behind it. "hmm... hmm... Are you sure about this dear Maya?", Zanish asked, The old bag of bones clutching her letter, that advocated that the holder has isolated their soul trait and has observed an enlightenment spark, everything needed to persue soul spiritualism.

"Why... Why Creed of Thought?”, the old warden asked, knowing that unorthodox academy was a hassle, for all its students.

Maya smirked, "Yes, Mr. Zanish", she replied. "I am certain that it is the best for me... You know me already, don't you?", she said with thick pretentious posh oozing from her tongue.

Zanish nodded, "yes yes... another hustler added to the Labrinth of hustling, They will let you in... It's not like they stop anyone anyway."

Maya giggled at the old man's habit of repeating the first word of his speech... She wasn't sure if she would miss him, but... it was always fun whenever she was caught sneaking out of her room after the 14th out of 16 fractions of the day.

Zanish signed the document hesitantly, Creed of Thoughts was an academy that didn't teach... Atleast in term of orthodox education... They merely traded resources for information. All promising soul spiritualists would trade by showcasing their, any and all, acquired synergy between their soul trait and enlightenment spark... for credits. Credits that the Creed awarded for getting to document that emergent synergetic behaviour showcased, they would award more for any questions they ask, ofcourse.

And it is these credits that were used to exchange resources, that the Creed traded. Money, textbooks, research material, arcane tools, a lecture on a topic of interest, physical demonstration, beast essence, usage of the many workshops and its facilities, herbs and much more! You name it! For the right credit? They trade it! Some even got a chance to enter the whispy archive of dreams, just for a limited period ofcourse.

It didn't matter that the Creed was originally formed by a malevolent faction... Their system for education was fair, that is all that mattered. The begrudging Benevolent Factions never got any excuse to scrutinise them... For the academy itself wasn't making any combat force for itself like every other faction was...

But the biggest problem for Maya, in Zanish's perspective, was that she had observed the Whispers of the Void as her enlightenment spark... The slowest of all enlightenment sparks.

Enlightenment spark is a signal observed by a being in their neural circuitry... The specific conditions that triggered the spark, basically a matching of a neural signal to a perfected contradiction-less neural circuitry called 'enlightenment', was unknown...

Enlightenment spark serves to shape and therefore dictate the how's and why's of one's soul trait is manifested... And the whispers of the void? It had a torturous pace... It requires one to align their neural signalling with the Void itself... The now aligned signals would become the Void's whispers... The whispers broke chunks out of one's soul form and then worked as a solvent to glue the pieces in any Permutation... Repeat the process to ad nauseum, and the soul gets granular and granular each iteration... Basically making one's soul, clay like... which can be molded in any manner...

What this enlightenment spark gave in versatility of manifesting one's soul trait... It also came with the drag of refinement and the inevitable analysis paralysis of doing actual intelligent design without a fixed end shape... The Whispers of the void was well documented! It allowed for a better accuracy of manifestations but it brought nothing unique the other myriad enlightenment sparks synergising with the various soul traits brought.

Zanish also knew Maya's soul trait was traitless... and knowing that brought him the burden of knowledge that Maya wasn't going to manifest anything metaphysical, Period. For there had been no recorded metaphysical arcane abilities acquired by a trait less soul spiritualist, except ofcourse... They were precise with whatever they did.

Precision and efficiency of a trait less soul... Accuracy and versatility from the whispers of the void... That is all Maya had... Oh and also that smug annoying want for the 'cool shit' she had always claimed she was gonna manifest, ringing in the old man's ears since the age her innocence turned into greed... Zanish sighed... The probability of having both a traitless soul and the Whispers of the void enlightenment spark must be the last plack fraction away from zero... For this Permutation has never been documented in all of his old wisdom... No known example for Maya to follow...

Zanish handed the letter to Maya, "here... here... you better don't disappoint me, lad. Or... Or I am gonna punish you next for never breaking any rules this time around", Maya knew he meant that as a challenge, to find an actual manifestable metaphysical arcane ability out of her hand of cards.

Maya pulled her eyelid down and taunted with her tongue out, bleah. Even if this is a good bye, she wasn't not going to be a brat.

Maya took her small travel sack, now resting on her shoulder, as she set off to Yana, where the Mystical Labyrinth of the Creed of Thought slumbered.

The Creed of Thought was carved into the heart of a literal giant, a stone monolith otherwise. Dreaming in its grey granite mass. What made the stone mountain move? all slow in the plains of Yana... going nowhere... No one knew...

Maya caught up to her friend, Rundra. A fluffy dog for a man, tall and lean, yet built like a rectangle, warm yet rigid as the earth beneath him... they were from the same orphanage... Rundra was also a promising soul spiritualists... his soul trait was 'vigor', it gave him irrational will power and a slightly accelerated self healing capacity due to an unique epigenetic expression... he also had glimpsed the enlightenment spark, 'path of indifference'... Maya never figured out why the synergy bummed him... it sounded cool as shit! 'Indifferent Vigor!', A famous previous wielder of both had manifested Weapon Egos into all her blades... its path never bargained with anyone! but Rundra doesn't seem very excited about it...

Maya thinks Rundra decided to start academy because of her... but why did he choose Creed of Thought too? Little did she know it was Zanish that pestered him to go out and experience his life... He chose Creed of Thought simply because Maya was confident it was gonna be a ride.

"hey, ready to leave?", Maya asked

"I would have long been gone if I didn't wait for you to finish the last few pages of that book", Rundra said with a stearn face... but Maya knew he was wagging his imaginary tail already in excitement.

It was going to be a long journey... Longer because Maya was hell bent on hitch hiking her way there... Spending money on travelling a well travelled path? Especially with a lot of traffic? What is this... A scam? Maya grinned, soon she got a lift on an two oxen pulled carriage... The animals looked well worked... Well feed too! looking at the slush it pulled, logged in the carriage... Maybe its epigenetic expression would be worthy of study... Maybe its beastial essence can be extracted?

Maya closed her eyes long after Rundra, the oxen's beast essence wasn't going to offer an epigenetic suggestion for her body to mimic, especially in any kind that would lead to cool shit...

And with that, Maya turned to the brilliant moon, she could swear it was dim before... But it's not long before a snot bubble starts to inflate and deflate from her nose, as Maya drowsed away into sweat slumber.

[starryeyed-seer]

Can someone please check that the Mountain is. Okay. Please

[aq2003]

Hi! I have a question -

When you talk about Twelfth Night being ruined for you or not being able to read it or listen to it, do you mean in a literal sense that you don't enjoy it anymore, or in the way that people mean when a story is tragic or emotionally painful but still enjoyable?

technically it's the latter but there are tiny aspects of the former in there kind of. like i love the play, and also i am much more overall emotionally attached to it than i was previously, it's just that i don't feel nearly the same way abt it as i used to (positive: olivia went from "i like her the most in this play" to "i think she is one of shakespeare's best female characters". i am a lot more invested in viola and orsino's relationship. Terminal Incurable Malvolio Brain Rot. negative: the ending is kind of a massive downer for me now. moments i found amusing are no longer remotely funny. i don't think feste deserves rights. etc)

[power-handmaiden]

Day 32: Professor T-Rex Teaches Me Gayness

This is an interesting twist on the teacher/student fantasy, since the protagonist is not an enrolled student taking Professor T-rex's class for a grade, so the usual power imbalance of this kind of fantasy isn't there (either an upgrade or a downgrade depending on one's personal preferences, I suppose, but I'm into it.)

We also get a mention of bisexuality for the first time! And lesbianism, but that's not as relevant to the central story. Still happy to see an early acknowledgment of lesbians in the Tingleverse though! (I won't get to read a lesbian tingler til June. Keep me in your thoughts and prayers... the one that just released today looks SO GOOD...) Nice to see that Professor T-rex's scope of Gayness Studies extends to multiple identities.

Also. THE BUTTON from Shared By The Chocolate Milk Cowboys. Well, not the exact same one, this is clearly a different era in a different timeline... but it seems that the mechanics of the button rely some common law of gayness/physics in multiple layers of the Tingleverse and the president ordering the creation of the button is a specific event that both of these layers independently arrived at. Interesting.

[luckytaxi]

just watched arrival, genuinely such such such a good movie. it’s a slow start but those last 30ish minutes where everything starts clicking and you realize it’s intentional is just *deep breath*

[dashiellqvverty]

literally JUST occurred to me that the intended joke of “here’s my review, not gay enough” was most likely “that movie was fucking gay, so it would be funny and ironic if we said it wasn’t gay ENOUGH. because it could hardly be any gayer” and not “wow i was expecting more homoeroticism from the vampire movie”

[eye-of-yelough]

I Am once again wishing i hadn’t played as Aeryn my first bg3 playthrough