#Structures Sonores

[dapurinthos]

help i got sucked into star wars linguistics and remembered vulgar exists and it is SO HELPFUL it even compiled me a little dictionary of the handful of words i've compiled from lightsaber styles, moves, names of places/animals/etc on tython (because vulgar will also analayse words to show frequencies of consonant and vowel sounds.

so. uh. i guess i have a star wars conlang now?

it's called:

tython-jen /taɪʒɒn'ʤen/

which is a compound from:

taizhan /taɪʒɒn/ n. new home; also spelled tython

jen /ʤen/ n. word

& with words such as:

a'yi /a'ji/ prep. with, of

je'i /ʤe'i/ adj. mystic

maqa /maqa/ v. debate, argue

makaši /makaʃi/ [/maqa/ + /ʃi/] n. to argue with a blade

padawa'an /padaʋa'an/ [/pata/ + ʋa'an] n. learner, student

pata /pata/ n. raw

tai /taɪ/ num. two; n. new

wa /ʋa/ v. to learn, to know

zhan /ʒan/ n. shelter, heart

-'an /an/ suff. one who [verbs], that which is [adjective]

so, uh, that's where i wandered off to. because i wanted a moment in galaxies wherein ari gets drawn back post-autistic shutdown by translating & conjugating words in different languages to get their bran back on track.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Word List: Mouth

beautiful words with "mouth" to try to include in your poem/story

Blabbermouth - a person who talks too much, especially: tattletale

Cottonmouth - water moccasin

Flannelmouthed - speaking in a tricky or ingratiating way; or indistinctly

Mouthbreeder - any of several fishes that carry their eggs and young in the mouth

Mouthfeel - the sensation created by food or drink in the mouth

Mouth-filling - of notable length or sonority

Mouth of the river - the place where the river enters the ocean

Mouthpart - a structure or appendage near the mouth (as of an insect) especially when adapted for use in gathering or eating food

Mouthroot - goldthread

Mouthrot - a usually fatal bacterial disease marked by severe necrotic changes of the mouth tissues of snakes especially in captivity

Mouthwatering - arousing the appetite; tantalizingly delicious or appealing

Mouthy - marked by bombast or back talk; excessively talkative; garrulous

Open-mouthed - having the mouth open, especially: having the mouth open in an expression of shock, surprise, etc.

Vermouth - a dry or sweet aperitif wine flavored with aromatic herbs and often used in mixed drinks

Warmouth - a large-mouthed freshwater sunfish (Lepomis gulosus) chiefly of the eastern U.S.

If any of these words inspire your writing, do tag me or send me a link. I'd love to read your work!

More: Word Lists

[olis-inkwell-symposium]

As I develop my Pantheon and world of Sonoric Sorcery, I created a detailed guide for…

Geographical Creation by Divine Influences

Purpose and Cosmic Intentions

Start by determining the underlying reasons for the gods’ involvement in geographical creation. Did they shape the world to foster life, establish realms for their divine power, or create natural barriers for protection or punishment?

Establish how the divine will interacts with the world—whether it’s nurturing or harsh, collaborative among deities or singularly tyrannical.

Pantheon Influence and Divine Roles

Outline which gods or celestial beings are responsible for specific parts of the world. A god of oceans might have sculpted the vast seas, while a god of fire could be the origin of volcanic regions.

Clarify if these divine creators acted alone, in alliances, or through conflicts. Introduce rivalries where a god of order creates plains and structured landscapes while a chaotic deity disrupts them with jagged mountains and whirlpools.

Creation Myths and Narratives

Craft epic stories that detail the moments of creation. These myths might include dramatic events, such as titanic battles that split continents, tears shed by a mourning goddess creating lakes, or the laughter of a trickster god forming rolling hills.

Ensure these stories are not just tales but have religious and cultural significance, with ceremonies or pilgrimages tied to these narratives.

Unique Divine Marks on the Landscape

Highlight distinct features that could only be formed by gods. This might include:

Sacred Mountains: Peaks imbued with divine energy, often home to shrines or ancient temples.

Enchanted Forests: Woodlands blessed or cursed by gods, filled with mystical creatures or shifting paths.

Celestial Rivers: Waterways said to carry pieces of stardust, linking the mortal world to celestial realms.

Mythic Abysses: Deep chasms rumored to be gateways to the underworld or places of divine punishment.

Mortal Interaction with Divine Geographies

Explain how mortals view and interact with these divine creations. Do they see them as blessings or threats?

Are there rituals or traditions based around sacred lakes, healing springs, or cursed wastelands? Define the taboos or reverence attached to certain areas.

Divine Errors and Cataclysms

Introduce instances where divine actions caused unintended destruction or shifts. For example, an angry god might have triggered earthquakes that reshaped the terrain or split civilizations apart.

These cataclysms could be seen as divine retribution or warnings, shaping not just the land but the evolution of societies and their beliefs.

Cross-Pantheon Influence

Determine if the world’s geography shows the influence of multiple pantheons or opposing divine forces.

This can create places where magical energies clash or merge, resulting in areas that defy natural laws, such as floating islands, frozen deserts, or fire-fueled glaciers.

Residual Divine Power and Resources

Discuss the remnants of divine creation in the form of powerful minerals, crystals, or herbs that mortals seek for their magic or technological advancements.

These elements might carry divine essence, offering great power but at potential costs to those who use them.

Geopolitical and Theological Influence

Describe how these divine creations influence politics and power dynamics. For example, a city might be built around a sacred waterfall said to have healing properties, making it a pilgrimage site that brings wealth and influence.

Other civilizations might go to war to control such places, viewing them as conduits of divine favor.

Mystery and Forbidden Zones

Leave space for unexplored or forbidden areas said to be shaped by gods whose motives are unknown or feared.

These could be deserts filled with mirages, haunted forests, or towering monoliths etched with inscriptions no mortal has been able to decipher.

This template provides the framework to enrich your world with divine geographies, turning the physical landscape into a character itself, imbued with history, power, and profound cultural meaning.

tag list ; @slenders1ckn3ss @lucistarsfire @mai2themai @fond-illusion @p00lverinecentral

[xxdemonicheartxx]

Flight Rising flights but as art mediums:

There are some overlaps in mediums since dragons are so tight knit and far spread

Earth: tile work/mosaics, jewelry work, ceramics, stone sculpture, chalk, clay work, plaster, leather work, rain chains

Water: plaster work, woven tapestries, shell jewelry and chimes, pearl inlays, decorative sails and flags, basket weaving, sandstone carving, watercolors, mirrors and glass sculptures

Shadow: optical illusions, black and white photography, puzzle boxes, uranium glass work, maybe iron work, mycology arrangements, shadow boxes, gouache, anything that involves glowing in the dark

Light: stone carving and gold foiled painting, sometimes tapestry weaving to depict an image or scene, impressionism, oil paint, tempera, portraiture, clothing and attire, mirrors, pigment making

Plague: hyper realism, and taxidermy, ceramics, bone carvings, tattoos, ink block prints, collage art, murals, leather work, totems and large outdoor installations

Nature: floral arrangements, dye work, wood work, candle making, hot wax painting, landscaping, rain chains, wind chimes, tapestries, needle felting, carpentry, animal cosmetics (haircuts, animal safe dye, nail and claw painting, etc), apparel/clothing, pigment making

Ice: needle felting, wood carving, quilting, ice carving and sculpture, snow sculptures, knitting, the art of tea blends, dried plant arrangements, carpentry, fabric weaving, tapestries, crochet, wood burning, blanket weaving, candle making, dye work, wood turning

Fire: welding, decorative weapon smithing, glass blowing, wood burning, wrought iron, stained glass, latticed metal, terracotta, ceramics, obsidian and basalt carving, graphite, slate, charcoal

Wind: paper mache, ribbon mediums, basket weaving, sonorous sculptures, wind chimes, feathered attire, really tall and thin structures/sculptures, jade carving, blanket weaving

Arcane: resin, stained glass, welding, intricate silver work, collaborative neon work with shadow (they need that special eye for glow in the dark), crystal carving, zen gardens, bonsai art, screen printing, photography, illuminated manuscripts, clothing and apparel, gold foil work, abstract art

Lightning: bronze cast sculptures, sand sculptures (when lightning strikes the sand and turns it to stone) aluminum casts poured into ant colonies/hills, pop art, up-cycled art, photography, art that is still capable of being utilized and interacted with because people and dragons are part of the medium, assemblage art, banners and flags

[antimomophobic]

Okay, so…

Conlangs in Progress

Sūjdisch - based off of English, German and Afrikaans. Name translates to "Language of the South" (lit. "Southish") Less progress on it because it's kinda… uninteresting?

Aehryc - Based off of F U it's a language of whatever the hell I want >:3 Dozens of planned ways to mark verbs and no lexicon >:] Very silly phonology hehehe lateral vowels & apical retroflex click

Look at it with horror as I put in sounds no english speaker could even conceive of

And the phonotactics are worse lol

It's hard to actually give a structure to it but it's basically got no structure other than no plosives next to eachother and sonority order and if that's broken congrats the sound becomes syllabic

trsltnplk

look upon it with fear, knowing that it's a 4 syllable word that is pronounceable in the clong

Thanks for coming to my conlang introductory TED Talk ;3

omg no lexicon youre so rebellious :000

also pleaseeee write the word in ipa i must figure out how to pronounce it >:))))

conlangs with apical retroflex clicks>>>>

[mewling-central]

Introduction to Collective Seraphic

Now that Seraphic's at a stable place, I think I'm gonna take some time to delve into the basics of how it operates. For this post I'll only be going into the language itself and not the writing system, as that's going to need a post of its own to elaborate on. I'll try to keep this as concise as possible, but I may make separate posts expanding on topics discussed in this one. So, without further ado, onto the infodump!

Background

Collective Seraphic (which I'll be referring to as "Seraphic") is an artlang that I've created for a comic that as of this post I have not began yet, but am still developing. The majority of the comic will take place on the Seraph Homeworld, an alien planet some 3,000 lightyears from Earth populated by the seraph species (pictured below):

Within the story, Seraphic acts as the lingua franca of the Seraph Homeworld and the many colonized planets under Seraph control. It's used in the government, and among speakers of differing languages. As such, this language was the first one that I knew I would need to make as it will play a vital role in both the storytelling and narrative structure.

Syntax

Seraphic is largely a fusional language, employing affixes to modify the semantic role and meaning of morphemes. Seraphic does not, in the traditional sense, have verbs, so the sentence structure is strictly subject-object (will expand upon later). Nouns decline for number and tense, and are grouped into seven noun classes. Adjectives agree with nouns in number, except if derived from nouns themselves, in which case they'll also agree in class. Seraphic is very head-initial; with demonstratives, numerals, possesives, adjectives, genitives, and relative clauses following the noun the modify; and prepositions preceeding the nouns they modify. Auxiliaries preceed procedurals (again, will expand upon later).

Phonology

Here is the phonological chart for Seraphic:

It has a syllable structure of (CC)V(CC). Plosives cannot exist word finally, clusters of consonants of the same manner are illegal, and vowel clusters are also not permitted. Syllabic consonants are grouped with vowels and behave much like them, carrying tone and stress, so they together are grouped and referred to as vocalics. Seraphic is a tonal language, employing the use of four tones: rising (á), falling (à), high (ā), and low (a). Low tones remained unmarked in both the Seraphic script and in romanization. Stress is syllable-independant. It will take either the ultimate, penultimate, or rarely the antepenultimate. Stress always falls on the syllable with a voiceless initial obstruent nearest to the end of the word. If none are available, it will fall on the syllable with an initial sonorant within the same parameters. Stress will never fall on a voiced obstruent. For clarity, I'll provide a key describing the pronunciation of the romanization.

Sounds that are similarly pronounced as they're read in American English:

m, n, p, b, t, d, k, g, f, v, s, z, y, w, l

Sounds that have special pronunciations:

ŋ, like the ng in English "sing"

p', like the ጴ in Amharic "ጴጥሮስ"

t', like the t' in Navajo "yá'át'ééh"

k', like the კ in Georgian "კაბა"

', like the the space within English "uh-oh"

c, like the sh in English "sharp"

j, like the s in English "measure"

x, like the gh in English "ugh"

ğ, like the γ in Greek "γάλα"

pf, like the pf in German "Pfirsiche"

ts, like the z in Italian "grazia"

tc, like the ch in English "chain"

kx, like the kh in Lakota "lakhóta"

r, like the rr in Spanish "perro", although occasionally like the r in Spanish "amarillo"

i, like the ee in English "meet"

į, like the ы in Russian "ты"

u, like the oo in English "boot"

e, like the é in French "beauté"

œ, like the a in English "Tina"

o, like the o in Classical Latin "sol"

a, like the a in English "bra" although this can change to be more forward or more backward.

Another letter that might trip people up is ł, which is meant to represent the high tone syllabic 'l'. Otherwise, syllabics are written the same as their pulmonic counterparts, with tone markers written when applicable.

Nouns

Nouns make up the bulk of the Seraphic lexicon. Every noun is grouped into one of seven classes:

Solar class: nouns related to seraphim or seraph-like beings, and seraph body parts. Prefix appears as zā-, zō-, zē-, s-, or ts-.

sēr = "person"

Astral class: nouns related to non-seraph animate lifeforms (their equivalent to "animals"). Prefix appears as ğr-, x, or kx-.

xuc = "cherub"

Vital class: nouns related to inanimate lifeforms (their equivalent to "plants"). Prefix appears as wā-, wō, w-, ū-, wē-, or wī-.

wējlux = "tree"

Terranean class: nouns related to landscapes, locations, and natural phenomena. Prefix appears as va-, vo-, vu-, f-, and pf-.

voxāl = "sun"

Metallic class: nouns related to inanimate objects, both natural and artificial. Prefix appears as ja-, jo-, c-, or tc-.

jağrú = "rock"

Lunar class: nouns related to abstract concepts, and terms related to time. Prefix appears as la-, lo-, le-, li-, y-, or l/ł-.

levren = "job"

Oceanic class: nouns related to general words, tangible concepts, numbers, all adjectives, and non-incorporated loanwords. Prefix appears as a/ā-, o/ō-, or aw-.

awuf = "group"

Adjectives do not agree in class, due to the fact that nouns originally are derived from adjectives, and noun classes acted as a way to differentiate between nouns and adjectives.

fa = "warm, hot"

jafa = "fire" (lit. "a hot thing")

When adjectives are used as predicatives, they decline into the oceanic class in order to take the procedurals (once more, will expand upon later).

Nouns also decline for four numbers: singular (one thing, usually unmarked), dual (two things, both things; suffixes as -ac, -oc, -œc, or -c), plural (things, many thing; suffixes as -n, -an, or -in), and collective (every thing, all things; suffixes as -āf/ōf, -áf/-óf, or -'ōf).

Seraphic doesn't use pronouns. Everything and everyone is referred to by name, including yourself. From our perspective, the Seraphic language constantly speaks in the third person. However, it can be repetitive to use the same name over and over again in a sentence, and sometimes you don't know the name of things, so they'll apply what I've called pro-forms. They consist of the demonstrative adjectives fl "this", sl "that", and xl "yon" declined into the Solar class and taking the place of the first, second, and third person respectively. For ease of reference, I'll provide the forms and their declensions below.

zāfl (I/me), zāflc (both of us), zāvlin (we/us), zāfláf (all of us)

zāsl (you), zāslc (both of you), zāzlin (you guys), zāsláf (all of you)

zōxl (they), zōxlc (both of them), zōğlin (many of them), zōxláf (all of them)

Seraphic makes no distinction in the gender of the speaker, in this regard. Although these resemble pronouns, they're not meant to be used as often as regular pronouns, and whenever possible it's much preferred that you refer to someone or something by name.

Adjectives and Prepositions

Adjectives are fairly straightforward. Adjectives follow the noun they modify (e.g. sēr tan "big person"), and agree with them in number (e.g. sēr tan "big person" vs sērn t'aŋon "big people"). Adjectives agree in the singular form with singular and collective nouns, and they agree in the plural form with dual and plural nouns.

There are three main types of adjectives: native adjectives (e.g. cna "good"), borrowed adjectives (e.g. anzn "nice"), and noun-derived adjectives (e.g. arfi/ofi "new"). Native and borrowed adjectives don't agree with noun classes, but noun-derived adjectives do. It originated from the animacy-based adjective agreement system in Proto-Seraphic, which has been lost in all other adjective instances. When you want to make a noun into an adjective you'll affix one of two prefixes to it: ar- (if agreeing with Solar, Astral, and Vital nouns) and o- (if agreeing with Terranean, Metallic, Lunar, and Oceanic nouns). There are specific rules on the forms each prefix takes based on the noun they're attached to:

"ār-" when preceeding high or falling vocalic syllables (e.g. sēr ārzājna "popular person")

"ar-" when preceeding low or rising vocalic syllables (e.g. wēn arfe "local fruit")

"ó-" when preceeding high or falling vocalic syllables (e.g. lalel ówē "grassy flavor")

"o-" when preceeding low or falling vocalic syllables (e.g. lesar olvulvren "economic problem")

"ōw-" when preceeding words that start with a vocalic (e.g. lnin ōwāsāvbas "momentary event")

Prepositions occur before the nouns they modify, and don't change form in any circumstance. There are currently 19 prepositions in the modern language, and they are usually connected to nouns via a hyphen (e.g. e-fe "at (the) place"):

cu = of; indicates possession

pr̄ = indicates the indirect object, equivalent to "to" in the phrase "The man sends the letter to me."

in/īn = as or like; indicates similarity or resemblance. Will either be low or high tone depending on the tone of the following syllable.

e/ē = at or on; indicates location.

tsa = near or for; indicates relative distance from a location or an action performed for the sake of the referent.

cni = without; indicates a lack of possession or company.

wa = in or inside of; indicates interior position.

tn = on top of, above, or before; indicates superior position or a prior instance in time.

pux = under, beneath, or after; indicates inferior position or a following instance in time.

pi = with, together with; indicates being in company of or making use of the referent.

fān = from or away from; indicates the motion of leaving the referent.

ku = out of; indicates motion from within the referent towards the exterior.

tun = into or through; indicates motion from outside the referent towards the interior.

xel = to or towards; indicates the motion of approaching the referent.

kxun = across; indicates motion from one location to another

pn̄ = around; indicates location surrounding the referrent.

cāza = between; indicates location in the middle of the referrent.

tē = after, behind; indicates posterior position.

fr = during; indicates a moment in time

Prepositions aren't combined in Collective Seraphic, but may be in certain instances in colloquial speech.

Procedurals

Okay, this is probably the most complicated part of Seraphic, so I'm going to need to get into things individually. First, I'll start with defining a procedural itself. Procedurals are the term I use for the prefixes used to describe the relationship or process of and between the agent noun and the patient noun. These are what act as the equivalent to "verbs" in earth languages. There are three in use:

Existential: used to denote a state of being or equivalence between agent and patient, or to the patient and itself. Equivalent to English "to be" (e.g. A is B, there is B). Usually prefixes as some variant of n-, m-, or ŋ-.

Actional: used to denote an action or process between the agent and patient, or with the patient and itself. Equivalent to English "to do" or "to act upon" (e.g. A acts upon B). Carries a connotation of agency and intent. Usually prefixes as some variant of re-, ra-, or r-.

Resultative: used to denote an occurence or change in state between agent and patient, or patient and itself. Equivalent to English "to become", "to happen", or "to change into" (e.g. A becomes B, B happens to A). Carries a connotation of passiveness or motion. Usually prefixes as some varient of ed- or ez-.

The procedural will change its form slightly depending on the class and declension pattern of the noun it modifies. It always affixes to the patient noun, demonstrating a relationship of an action and what is being acted upon. In this way, the patient can be clearly identified. In transitive or causative clauses, the word order is always S(P)O, with the agent acting as the subject and the patient as the object. In intransitive and passive clauses, the word order is always (P)S, with the patient acting as the subject and the agent demoted to the indirect object or omitted entirely.

Although seemingly limiting, using these three procedural, as well as prepositions, nouns, and adjectives, altogether can be used to make all sorts of verb equivalents that are called "procedural phrases". I'll demonstrate how to build a sentence now. First thing we need to know is the subject and object:

Sāx ... jafa (The child ... the fire)

Next, I'll add the actional procedural in the present tense to this.

Sāx rejafa (The child acts upon the fire)

By itself this is technically grammatically correct, but it doesn't really mean anything. It's too broad. So we add a prepositional phrase to specify exactly what action the child is taking towards the fire.

Sāx pi-sīman rejafa (The childs acts upon the fire with (their) eyes)

Now we know that the child is performing an action involving the use of their eyes. Now of course this could mean many different things in English, but in Seraphic the first thing that comes to mind would be fairly obvious: to see! Thus, "Sāx pi-sīman rejafa" would be the same as saying "The child sees the fire" in English! There are a lot of set phrases that equate to verbs, and remain consistent in their arrangement. Often differing phrases are a useful way to ascertain where someone is from or what their first language is.

Tense and Aspect

Seraphic has six main tenses: two pasts, two presents, and two futures. The two pasts consist of the recent past (happening recently) and the remote past (happening a long time ago), and they prefix and/or combine with the procedural.

Sāx pi-sīman ğrejafa (The child just saw the fire)

Sāx pi-sīman eğrejafa (The child saw the fire a while ago)

Similarly, the future tenses consist of the near future (will happen soon) and the distant future (will happen eventually).

Sāx pi-sīman drejafa (The child will soon see the fire)

Sāx pi-sīman izrejafa (The child will eventually see the fire)

The present tenses consist of a general present tense (happens) and the infinitive (to happen) which is used with auxiliaries and copulae and carries no presence in time.

Sāx pi-sīman rejafa (The child sees the fire)

Pi-sīman ezrejafa (To see a fire)

Whether someone considers an event to be nearer or farther in time from them is completely up to their discretion. There's no set timeframe for when to use the recent vs. remote past, it's all fairly subjective. However, whether you decide to use the recent or remote can really indicate whether you believe something to be in the distant past or future, or just a few moments ago or soon.

Seraphic also makes use of two copulae, the perfective -r and the imperfective -l, helping clitics that expand on the aspect of the procedural, i.e. how the procedural happens over time instead of when in time. The copulae are separate from the procedural, being placed directly before it and conjugating on their own similarly to the lexical procedural. When the copulae are in use, they are conjugated instead of the lexical procedural, while the lexical will be put into the infinitive. The exception to this is if the point in time is considered necessary to be stated for the sake of clarity or emphasis, in which case the lexical verb will also conjugate (though this isn't considered to be the default). The two copulae each conjugate to six tenses, and give 12 individual aspects in total. They are as follows, starting with the perfective:

āgxōnr - Pluperfect: indicates that the action happened at a point before some time in the past either specified or implied (e.g. āgxōnr nidsl "that has happened")

xōnr - Preterite: indicates that the action happened in the past with no reference to if it was completed recently or remotely. A general past (e.g. xōnr nidsl "that happened")

nar - Relative: indicates relative clauses, i.e. clauses that act to modify a noun similarly to an adjective. Equivalent to "that", "who", or "which" (e.g. lsl nar nidsl "the thing that happens")

ednr - Gnomic: indicates general truths, common knowledge, and aphorisms (e.g. ednr nezłsl "things happen")

t'enr - Future Simple: indicates the action will happen in the future with no regard to how near or far it is from the present (e.g. t'enr nidsl "that will happen")

āt'ēnr - Future Perfect: indicates that the action will happen before a time or event in the future (e.g. āt'ēnr nidsl "that will have happened")

And the imperfective:

ŋ̄xōzl - Discontinuous: indicates that an action was happening in the past, but is no longer happening in the present (e.g. ŋ̄xōzl nidsl "that used to happen")

xōzl - Habitual: indicates that an action is done often or out of habit (e.g. xōzl nidsl "that always happens")

īzl - Progressive: indicates that an action is happening at the very moment of conversation (e.g. īzl nidsl "that is happening")

nizl - Prospective: indicates that an action will be starting to, or is in the process of happening (e.g. nizl nidsl "that is about to happen")

t'ezl - Iterative: indicates that an action happens again, repeatedly, or more than one time based on context (e.g. t'ezl nidsl "that happens again" or "that happens again and again")

nt'ezl - Continuative: indicates that an action happens continuously and without end (e.g. nt'ezl nidsl "that still happens")

With both tense and aspects, this largely expands the capability of Seraphic in referring to time.

Moods

Seraphic makes use of seven modal particles to denote seven moods. They are always placed at the beginning of clauses, and no two modal particles can exist in the same clause. They are grouped into four categories: the declaritive (indicative and negative), the inferential (evidential and interrogative), the deontic (volitive and imperative), and the epistemic (subjunctive and conditional). They add extra clarity in the speakers mood or opinion concerning the clause they modify, and are as follows:

Indicative: base form of a clause. Indicates that the speaker is stating a fact or what exists, and is unmarked (e.g. idsl "that happens")

tu - Negative: indicates that the speaker is stating a fact that is untrue or what doesn't exist. Usually only appears in formal, official texts, as the first syllable of the procedural will chage tone to contrast as well and leaves the particle unneccesary in colloquial speech (e.g. tu īdsl "that doesn't happen")

cuc - Evidential: indicates that the speaker is stating a fact that they believe or understand to be true, regardless of having experienced it or not. (e.g. cuc idsl "apparently that happens") Direct evidentiality is denoted using a different method.

an/ān - Interrogative: indicates that the speaker is confirming whether a statement is or isn't true. Forms questions (e.g. an idsl? "does that happen?")

tcān - Volitive: indicates that the speaker desires for the statement to be true (e.g. tcān idsl "that wants to happen" or "that needs to happen" or "that should happen")

má - Imperative: indicates that the speaker is giving a command or suggestion, to themselves and/or to other referents. Functions additionally as a cohortative and a jussive (e.g. má idsl! "let that happen!")

tir - Subjunctive: indicates that the speaker believes the statement to be possible or likely (e.g. tir idsl "that could/would/might happen")

nun - Conditional: indicates that speaker believes the statement to be possible under specific circumstances or conditions (nun idsl "if/when that happens..."

Miscellaneous

That's about the basics of the Seraphic language outline. I'd like to eventually get into things like comparison, evidentiality, declension forms and the like, but those are all topics that definitely need their own individual posts. Real quick, I want to provide one more additional fact about Seraphic.

Seraphic uses base-16, meaning it groups numbers in sets of 16 instead of sets of 10 like we do. 1-16 would be written 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F, 10. 10 would be read as 16, and equally 20 would be 32. They're still counting the same amount of things, they're just dividing it up differently!

Anyways that's about it, I hope to share more about Seraphic soon, and when the comic gets released I hope you'll all be able to read it and pick out the many many lines of Seraphic I've poured into it!

ŋKowīci cu-stux 'ōf tsa-levp'ā cu-zāsláf pi-lizt'n ğōdjasa! (Thank you all so much for reading!)

[oliolioxenfreewrites]

Sneak Peek at this Magic System I'm working on RN ;)

Acoustineering: Creation of Mechanisms

One of the most intriguing aspects of Sonoric is its unique ability to create mechanical constructs out of sound waves. Practitioners of this rare and mystical art can manipulate and solidify these sound waves into tangible, physical structures. These structures can range from simple tools, like hammers and wrenches, to highly complex machines such as intricate clockwork devices or even functioning automatons. Although temporary and eventually dissipating back into their original sound waveform, these constructs are incredibly versatile and can be adapted for various purposes, from constructing buildings and infrastructure to exploring dangerous and uncharted territories.

The applications of these sound-based creations are virtually limitless, making Sonoric Sorcery an invaluable skill for both practical uses and adventurous endeavors.

Sonoric also gives the practitioner the ability to create mechanical constructs out of sound waves. Practitioners can solidify these waves into tangible structures, ranging from simple tools to complex machines., though temporary, are incredibly versatile and can be used for various purposes, from building to exploration.

[readmypaws]

What is /h/ deletion and Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening? (Linguistic Tidbits #1)

Introduction

Hey there! Today I’m writing about the fascinating phenomenon known as /h/ deletion and Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening (CVL). As a conlanger, I’m very interested in learning about sound changes that can help make a conlang sound more naturalistic, and one of the first ones I learned about is /h/ deletion and CVL. So I wanted to share my knowledge to help any fellow conlangers or linguistic students and enthusiasts.

What is /h/ deletion?

In the realm of linguistic evolution, /h/ deletion stands as one of the earliest and most common sound changes observed in both natural and constructed languages. It involves the dropping or loss of the /h/ sound, with the preceding vowel often being lengthened to compensate for its absence. Just like in some English dialects, where "hello" /ˈhɛloʊ/ becomes "ello" /ˈɛloʊ/ or even /ˈɛːloʊ/, we can incorporate /h/ deletion into our conlangs to introduce diphthongs in CV syllable structure langs (Turning them from strictly Consonant-Vowel to Consonant optional) or to add a more naturalistic touch to our langs.

What is Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening (CVL)?

As conlangers, we a lot of times strive to create naturalistic languages. One sound change to include with the previously mentioned /h/ deletion is Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening (CVL), which typically occurs simultaneously with /h/ deletion. CVL manifests as the lengthening of a vowel sound after the deletion of the /h/ sound, both before and sometimes after the vowel. For instance, consider the word "hand" /’hænd/ transforming into /’æːnd/. Incorporating CVL can in many ways make the difference between a naturalistic conlang and something that sounds suspiciously synthetic. (Although keep in mind that you are the creator of your conlang and can do whatever you want with it!)

What triggers /h/ deletion and CVL?

Now, what is it that triggers h-deletion and CVL? The primary cause of /h/ deletion is the lengthening effect that the /h/ sound exerts on the preceding vowel. As a result, the /h/ sound can blend into the vowel or become redundant, prompting its deletion. For example, "ahna" /’æh.nə/ can transform into "āna” /’æː.nə/, with the vowel sound being lengthened to compensate for the lost /h/. Another trigger for h-deletion is when an /h/ occurs before a vowel and the weak unvoiced /h/ gets lost to the more sonorant vowel sound. This interaction between /h/ deletion and CVL showcases the dynamic nature of language evolution and jus how complicated sound changes can get.

Summary

To summarize, /h/ deletion and Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening are common sound changes in the real world that can make our conlangs sound more naturalistic. By incorporating these phenomena, we add a touch of authenticity and natural evolution to our constructed languages. The loss of the /h/ sound and the lengthening of the preceding vowel can create a really beautiful or unique sounding lang.

Conclusion

As conlangers, understanding the intricacies of sound changes like /h/ deletion and Compensatory Vowel-Lengthening allows us to craft more realistic and vibrant constructed languages. By incorporating these changes into our conlangs, we can create languages that feel alive, evolving, and rooted in the natural patterns of linguistic development. Happy Conlanging! ^w^

[ibchemist]

Notes for Metallic Bonding

METALLIC BONDING AND STRUCTURE

Delocalised electrons - electrons that are not associated with one specific atom and are free to move within the molecule structure

Metallic bond - the electrostatic attraction between a lattice of cataions and a sea of delocalised electrons.

In metals, state which electrons are the delocalised electrons present between positive ions in the lattice = valence electrons

Mg(s) has metallic bonding in the interaction between positive metal ions and delocalised valence electrons in a three-dimesional lattice structure. The metal itself is neutral and is made up of many, many atoms.

Identify the ways in which solid metals are similar to solid ionic and covalent network substances:

I. Lattice structures II. Non-directional bonding III. Electrostatic attractions between positive and negative species

Solid metals, ionic compounds and network covalent solids form three-dimensional lattices. In all three types of bonding there is an electrostatic attraction between positively and negatively charged species. Metallic – between cations and delocalised electrons, ionic – between cations and anions, covalent – between positive nuclei and shared electron pair.

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES AND APPLICATION OF METALS

Lustre (shiny appearance)

Delocalised electrons in a metal lattice interact with visible light. When visible light hits the surface of a metal, the electrons absorb some of that energy and vibrate. This vibration generates a second wave of light, which radiates from the surface.

Sonority (sound when struck)

When a metal surface is struck, the free electrons in the metallic lattice can move easily, propagating the incoming sound energy easily throughout the material.

Malleability (can be reshaped on compression) & Ductility (can be drawn out into a wire)

When stress is applied (for example, by bending, hitting with a hard object or pulling), layers within the lattice shift in response to that stress. As these layers shift, the cations in the lattice remain surrounded by delocalised valence electrons, meaning the metallic bonding also remains unaffected.

Electrical conductivity

The delocalised valence electrons can move throughout the metallic lattice. When a potential energy difference is applied to the metal, the delocalised electrons are repelled by the negative terminal and attracted to the positive terminal. This is why metals can conduct electricity in their solid state and why metals are used for electrical wires and cables.

Thermal conductivity

Thermal conductivity in metals is a result of the free electrons in the lattice.

STRENGTH OF THE METALLIC BOND

Strength of the metallic bond

The smaller the radius of the metal ion, the stronger the metallic bond. This is because of the shorter distance between the positive nucleus of the cation and the surrounding delocalised electrons. Dictionary

Charge of the metal ion

The higher the ionic charge, the stronger the metallic bond. This is because:

greater charge on the metal ion

greater number of delocalised valence electrons

The greater the ionic charge and the smaller the ionic radius, the stronger the metallic bond. The stronger the metallic bond, the higher the melting point.

TRANSITION METALS

As there are a large number of valence electrons from both the s and d orbitals, this results in a greater electron density within the metallic lattice. This increased electron density in turn increases the strength of the metallic bond.

Hardness

valence electrons (delocalised) increase attraction and increase metallic bond which results in greater hardness

Electrical Conductivity

Transition elements are electrically conductive. These metals form their metallic bonds through the delocalisation of electrons in unfilled d orbitals. The electrostatic attraction between metal ions in the lattice and delocalised electrons increases with an increasing number of electrons in d orbitals.

In comparison to s block metals, the melting point and electrical conductivity of transition metals are HIGHER and HIGHER

[possessivesuffix]

My latest in trawling thru semi-random comparative etymological dictionaries: Hudson (1989) on Highland East Cushitic. He gets together 767 reconstructions, a decent amount on a group of relatively little-studied languages. A nice chunk of vocabulary can be reconstructed especially for the major crop of the area, the enset tree (*weesa), its parts (e.g. *hoga 'leaf', *kʼaantʼe 'fibre', *kʼalima 'seed pod', *mareero 'pith', *waasa 'enset food') and tools for processing it (*meeta 'scraping board', *sissa 'bamboo scraper).

There surely has to be material among the reconstructions though that represent newer spread, most clearly the names of a few post-Columbian-exchange foodstuffs: *bakʼollo 'maize', *kʼaaria 'green chili' — same terms also e.g. in Amharic: bäqollo, qariya (Hudson kindly provides Amharic and Oromo equivalents copiously). (Note btw a vowel nativization rule appearing in these: Amharic a → HEC aa, but ä /ɐ/ → HEC a [a~ɐ~ə], as if undoing the common Ethiosemitic shift *aa *a > a ä.) Slightly suspicious are also a few names of trade items and cultural vocabulary / Wanderwörter like *gaanjibelo 'ginger', *loome 'lemon' (at least the latter could be again plausibly fairly recent loans from Amharic lome) but these could well have reached southern Ethiopia even already in antiquity.

In terms of root structure, interesting are two monoconsonantal roots: *r- 'thing, thingy, thingamajig' (segmentable from a diminutive *r-iččo and from Sidamo ra) and *y- 'to say'. Otherwise verb roots are the usual Cushitic *CV(C)C-, clusters limited to geminates and sonorant + obstruent; with several derivative extensions such as *-is- reflexive, *-aɗ- causative. *ɗ actually occurs almost solely in the last, I would suspect it's from one of the well-attested dental stops *t / *d / *tʼ with post-tonic lenition. Long vowels also seem to occur fairly freely in the root syllable with even several "superheavy" roots like *aanš- 'to wash', *feenkʼ- 'to shell legumes', *iibb- 'to be hot', *maass-aɗ- 'to bless', *uuntʼ- 'to beg'; *boowwa 'valley', *čʼeemma 'laziness', *doobbe 'nettle', *leemma 'bamboo', *mooyyee 'mortar'… A ban on CCC consonant clusters does seem to hold however, apparently demonstrated by *moočča ~ *mooyča 'prey animal', which probably comes from an earlier *moo- + the deminutive suffix *-iččV; resulting **mooyčča would have to be shortened in some way, either by degemination or by dropping *-y-.

In V2 and later positions there seems to be morphological conditioning of vowel length, cf. e.g. *arraab- 'to lick' : *arrab-o 'tongue'; *indidd- 'to shed tears' : *indiidd-o 'tear' (and not **arraabo, **indiddo). And as in these examples, also many basic nouns appear to be simple "thematizations" of verbs, similarly e.g. *buur- 'to anoint, smear', *buur-o 'butter'; *fool- 'to breathe', *fool-e 'breath'; *kʼiid- 'to cool', *kʼiid-a 'cold (of weather)'; *reh- 'to die', *reh-o 'death'. I don't actually see a ton of logic to what the "nominalizing vowel" ends up being though and maybe it's sometimes an original part of the stem, not a suffix. Quite a lot of unanalyzable nouns on the other hand are actually fairly long, e.g. *finitʼara 'splinter', *hurbaata 'dinner', *kʼorranda 'crow', *kʼurtʼumʔe 'fish', *tʼulunka '(finger)nail'.

Further phonologically interesting features include apparently a triple contrast between *Rˀ (glottalized resonants) and both *Rʔ and *ʔR clusters [edit: no, it's just very inconsistent transcription]; also ejective *pʼ is established even though plain *p is not (that has presumably become *f).

Lastly here's a some etyma I've found casually amusing:

*bob- 'to smell bad': take note, any Roberts planning on travelling to southern Ethiopia

*buna 'coffee': yes yes, this is the part of the world where you cannot assume 'coffee' will look anything like kafe

*mana 'man': second-best probably-coincidence in the data

*raar- 'to shout, scream' 🦖 [and looks like maybe a variant of *aar- 'to be angry?]

*sano 'nose': "clearly must be" cognate with PIE *nas- with metathesis :^>

*ufuuf- 'to blow on fire', oh yeah I've needed that verb sometimes

*waʔa 'water': Cushitic With British Characteristics

[grey-gazania]

Tell us about your Easterling conlang! Was it inspired by any real world languages?

No real-world languages at the moment, at least not consciously, though once I get deeper into developing the grammar that may happen. Tolkien doesn't give us much for the Easterling languages, just a few names. (I know he later changed his mind and said Bor & Family and Ulfang & Family were Easterling names and not Sindarin, but I find it too hard to swallow that Bor and Uldor just happened to have names that were cognates with Sindarin terms reflecting their choices in the Nirnaeth Arnoediad.)

So I took some of the sounds that Tolkien seems to have disliked, and then I used the OT constraint model to develop a functional phonology. I ended up with a quantity-sensitive monopodal language with syllable structures of CX(C) and CX:, where X is anything more sonorant than a glide. Its feet are trochees and are aligned with the left side of the word. It requires onsets and CC-voice-agreement, and bans epenthesis and adjacent identical segments. It also bans [g] in outputs. It allows complex clusters and deletion when necessary to prevent violations of higher-ranked constraints. It does not force agreement in place of articulation.

It's called Lathtesh ('speech'). The Easterlings call themselves Rikishim ('sun-people').  The plural morpheme is -ishim, though the output obviously changes based on the noun it's modifying. So nuv ('mountain') becomes nuvishim, but ki ('person') becomes kishim because *kiishim would violate the Onset constraint, and *ki?ishim (? = glottal stop) would violate the Dep constraint. Brodda ('wolf') becomes broddashim for the same reasons, as well as the additional reason that *broddishim would violate the Max-Root constraint.

(Just to make things more fun: the input that leads to ri ('sun) is actually /iri/, so if for some reason you wanted to make the compound word 'mountain-sun' you'd actually end up with nuviri, not *nuvri.)

Verb conjugations are not gendered. The first-person plural morpheme is -li, and the third-person singular is -o. So verbs ending in consonants are easy - khavral ('to be', with kh being the voiceless uvular fricative) becomes khavrali ('we speak') and khavralo ('he/she/it speaks'). Verbs ending in vowels behave differently; lathta ('to speak') becomes lathtali ('we speak'), but stays lathta for 'he/she/it speaks' because *lathto would violate the Max-Root constraint.

...I might have got a bit carried away here. Hope you don't mind!

[horizonzerodawnaesthetic]

Chapter 6, "Sun Choirs and Star Charts", is up!

I can't believe it, it's finally done TwT

Summary:

Reader explores the city of the sun by interrogating citizens, a hymn reminds them of a dark memory, and they swap stories with Avad.

Excerpt:

You dismissed your Focus display and sighed. It was getting late, you decided to cut your losses and head back to the house you shared with Aloy. Along the way, a sonorous melody drifted down the street to you. You stopped. The entire city was silent except for an unseen choir. You followed your ears. They led you through the markets, the hushed voices of a few Oseram merchants called out to you in attempts to make one more sale. You trailed after the melody, climbing a set of stairs, and then another. The scene before you stopped you in your tracks.

A handful of Sun priests stood in a ring in the center of a large circular structure. The song came from them. They were bowing and making motions with their hands as they sang. A crowd of mostly Carjans stood around them, overflowing to the entrance you were standing in. Every one of them bowed their heads in reverence. The priests and citizens were illuminated by candles, lit to compensate for the dying light of the sun.

What struck you most was not what you saw, but what you heard. Had you been told there was a daily song to mark the end of the day, you would have expected a lullaby. What came from the priests was closer to a funeral song, and it may have been one of the saddest sounds you had ever heard. They’re mourning the loss of their Sun.

The priest sang on, their voices clashing as they rose and fell together. Their voices reminded you of the wailing you had heard on that beach, all those centuries ago. The priest’s voices faded as a harrowing memory gripped you.

Suddenly, you were there. On the shore of the Atlantic, the frothing waves of machines crashing into the rocks and sand. If you were lucky, a fourth of them were missing a leg or tail. Bodies were scattered across the sand. Some were moving, most were still. The heavy sounds of the photon tanks filled the air, drowning out the voices of the priests. The scream of jets joined them, soon accompanied by the bone-shaking explosions of the bombs they had dropped. Between it all, the screams of soldiers could be heard. Some were shouting orders and war cries. Others held their injured bodies and rolled in the sand. A familiar voice rang through it all. It called out to you.

The voice belonged to a middle-aged man from your squad. He had worked I.T. before the Plague and joined the war voluntarily. He often mentioned how he was fighting for his son’s future. His legs were missing. Two bloody trails were left in the sand as he desperately crawled away from the swarm. A nearby Scarab locked on to him, low on power and hungry for its next meal. You had seen it before, bodies reduced to scarlet ash as screams were cut short. He begged you to save him. Unwillingly, you walked towards him, your legs moving the same motions they had before. You raised your photon rifle at him. He closed his eyes.

[machine-herald-archive]

Ensemble - Rayla Heide

The plump belly of the Rising Howl looms before me, churning with its endless gears and elaborate ironwork. Some say the Howl is named for the wrought iron wolf that cries atop the apex of the hexdraulic descender; others swear the ghost of a black-veiled gentle-servant haunts the cabin, and when the Howl lifts him away from his lost love in Zaun, the sounds of his moans reverberate and shake its metal core. Many Piltovans, convinced as they are in their own sound judgment, are sure the name refers to nothing more than the cold wind whistling between the crevasses below their city.

But to me the Howl is not a single lone cry. It is an orchestra of noise, a melodic blend of a thousand unique sounds. It is why I am drawn to the machine.

The multi-tiered elevator, supported by three vertical structural beams which span the height of the city, descends to the Promenade level and slows to a lurching halt.

“Disembark for the Promenade!” the conductor announces, her voice magnified by a bell-shaped sonophone. She adjusts her thick goggles as she speaks. “Boundary Markets, College of Techmaturgy, Horticultural Center.”

Passengers pour from the descender. Dozens of others board and spread throughout its floors: merchants traveling to Zaun to trade in the night bazaars, workers returning home to sleep, wealthy Zaunites visiting night blooms in glass-domed cultivairs. Then there are the unseen riders who have made the Howl their home. I spy them scurrying in the shadows: plague rats, shadowhares, and viridian beetles.

Sometimes I climb down the crevasses to descend to the Sump, but tonight I long for the harmony of noise I know the descender will create.

Instead of entering through the doorway, I swing around the outside and lock my grip on the bottommost bar where ridged steel brackets frame the glass windows. My metal plates clank as I clamber onto the Howl, drawing stares from the passengers and what looks like a grimace from the conductor. My knowledge of facial expressions grows each day.

Most passengers ride within the compartment, away from the cold and soot, but outside, in the open air, I can hear the satisfying click-clack of mechanical parts snapping into place and the soft hiss of steam releasing as we sink into Zaun. And besides, I don’t easily fit through most doors.

A small boy clings to his sump-scrapper father’s hand and gapes at me through the window. I wink at him and his mouth opens in what I estimate is surprise. He ducks behind his father.

“Going down!” says the conductor. She rings a large bell and adjusts the dials on a bright red box. I can almost feel the commands buzz as they surge through wires into the descender’s engine.

Below us, the iron pinnacles of Zaun’s towers and green glass cultivairs glitter like candles in the dimming light. The Howl whirs and creaks as its cranks spiral down against the three towering beams, weighted down with iron, steel, and glass. A blast of steam whistles from the topmost pipe.

Inside the cabin, the sump-scrapper and his child look on as a musician tunes his four-stringed chittarone and begins a sonorous melody. His tune synchronizes with the clacking gears and whirring machinery of the Howl. The father taps his foot to the rhythm. A beetle snaps her pincers as she scrambles away from the man’s heavy boot. A gang of chem-punks lean against the wall in soft repose, a pause so unlike their usual frenzied jaunts through the city.

The Howl whirs in its perfect fusion of sounds during our descent. I marvel at the symphony around me and find myself humming along to the deep buzzing tones. The rhythm thrums through me and I wonder if those around me feel it.

“Entresol!” the conductor calls out as the descender slows. A pair of couriers carrying parcels wrapped in twine disembark, along with a crew of chemtech researchers and a crowd of chem-merchants. A merry crowd of Zaunites from the theater district steps aboard.

“Down we go!” she says, ringing her bell, and the Howl responds with a whir. The descender sinks and the windows mist as vapor pours from pipes above. Beads of water spread across my metallic chest as the harmony of clanking machinery and whooshing steam begins anew.

A discordant murmur interrupts the pattern of sounds. The vibration is subtle, but I can tell something is off. The descender continues as if all was normal, until a jarring clunk breaks its perfect rhythm.

Though I have never dreamed, I know a break in the pattern this abrupt is a machine’s most frightening nightmare.

The spiralling gearway is jammed, and the cabin’s iron brackets grate against it with a horrible screech. Many lives are at stake and I feel the machine’s pain as it braces desperately against the support beams. The entire weight of the Howl heaves against its bending columns and the cabin tilts at a lurching angle. Rivets burst from their seams as metal is pulled away from itself.

We wobble for a moment, then drop.

Inside the cabin, passengers scream and grasp at the nearest railing as they plunge. This is a different kind of howl.

I tighten my hold on the cabin’s bottommost platform. I extend my other arm, launching it toward one of the three vertical structural beams. The iron column is slippery in the mist and my grip misses it by inches. I retract my arm and steam blasts from my back as I try again, whizzing it toward a second beam. Another miss.

Time slows. Inside the cabin, the chem-punks cling to a ledge while the viridian beetle flies out an open window. The sump-scrapper and his child brace themselves against the glass, which fractures under their weight. The boy tumbles out, scrabbling at the frame with his fingers before he slips and falls.

I reach up and catch the boy in mid-flight, then retract my arm.

“Hold on,” I say.

The child clings to the plates on my back.

I fire my arm up toward the support beam once more, and this time my hand meets solid metal with a resounding clang as I secure my hold. My other arm is forced to extend as it’s wrenched down by the plunging cabin, so much that I feel my joints might fracture. Suspended in midair, I try to steady my grip.

With a great jolt, my arm jerks as the descender halts its freefall. It shakes from the sudden stop, now supported only by my arm. The boy shudders as he tightens his grip on my back.

The Howl is still fifty feet above the ground, hovering over the Sump-level buildings. My overlapping metal plates groan as they strain against the weight and I concentrate all my efforts on holding myself together. If I fall, the Howl falls with me, along with all its passengers.

While locking my arm onto the support beam, I slide my arm down the pillar. We drop ten feet and the cabin sways precariously before stabilizing again.

“Sorry about that!” I shout. Statements of empathy can be reassuring to humans in moments of crisis.

I must try again. I must be strong.

I release my grip on the support column ever so slightly, and with a piercing screech we gently slide down the remaining forty feet to the ground. My valves sigh as they contract.

Passengers echo my sighs as they stumble through the doors and broken windows into the Sump level, leaning on each other for support.

The boy on my back breathes rapidly as he holds my neck. My arms whir as I retract them and lower myself to the floor, crouching down so the child can touch the ground. He scrambles back to his father, who embraces him.

The conductor emerges from the descender and looks at me.

“You saved us. All of us,” she says, her voice shaking from what I think is shock. “Thank you.”

“I am simply fulfilling my purpose,” I say. “I am glad you are not hurt. Have a good day.”

She smiles, then turns to direct the crowd of Zaunites who have gathered to offer their assistance to the passengers and begin repairs. One of the chem-punk girls carries the musician’s chittarone for him as he crawls from the descender. Several of the theater-folk comfort an elderly man.

Two Hex-mechanics stumble toward me and I direct them to a medical officer who is setting up a tented repair station. The murmurs of the passengers and the hissing groans of the wounded descender blend with the whirrs and churning of the Sump. The steam-engine within my chest murmurs along, and I am moved to whistle a tune.

The boy turns and waves shyly at me.

I wave back.

He runs to catch up with his father, his heavy boots tapping a rhythm on the cobblestones. Shifting wheels sing and gears click-clack within the belly of the Rising Howl. The viridian beetle snaps her pincers in time with the beat as she zooms away into the Sump.

[2lim3rz]

BLANK SLATE BEGINNINGS (40K FIC THING) (OC X HORUS LUPERCAL)

Tomfoolery in the dms happened so have a Sibley x Horus fic because I yearn for big men and small women

There were no words at the time to describe whatever Sibley was. No words except the most scandalous type; cursed.

Given that religion and beliefs of the sort were more or less outlawed, it was the worst sort of insult.

But Sibley was used to it. She was by no conventional means beautiful, perhaps she had a possibility, but it had long passed. Her face and most of her body was torn asunder with poorly healed burns, her nose was bent from an equally daunting gouge in the middle, and several smaller scars speckled her body like gruesome freckles. Her eyes weren't even similar; one brown and one green. The only thing she bothered with was the bleached stripe of blonde hair in her otherwise half-shaved head.

So it was by raw miracle surely, that she ended up serving as one of the many untold underlings in the gilded halls of the Emperor himself. She never was going to question how she had ever gotten there. Never. Her focus was better placed upon her job. Better placed upon ignoring how people refused to work near her.

She was used to the treatment. For as long as she remembered, none enjoyed her presence. From where she knelt at an open floor panel, she stroked the oddly smooth texture of her quartered face. Smearing some oil from the coolant lines upon it. An absent habit of a absent mind.

Sighing, Sibley replaced her screwdriver and lifted a wrench. She needed to get this done. While it wasn't the most well-travelled of halls, it was certainly enough to warrant some form of rush. If only to avoid the terrifying golden soldiers.

Of course, given Sibley's track record of any form of luck.. her work was interrupted by footsteps. Heavy enough she assumed at first that it was one of the Custodians but.. somehow it wasn't. It didn't have the same drumming rhythm that their great marching steps had. It was measured yet still sith enough of a pause to have her do a doubletake over her shoulder.

It was a massive man treading down the halls. Upon him was a long ornate billowing crimson cloak belted to him with a massive orange eye that seemed ever staring. Under that was a shirt of chainmail softly jingling with each gargantuan step. His belt was the whitest color she had ever seen, corners gilded in gold with another one of those massive eyes. At his side was a sword that no human thing but him could wield, his right hand encased in a white and gold gauntlet. The left bore a simple wristband.

Another jingling noise alerted her to a series of coins upon his belt, he was too far for her to see what was upon them. Yet part of her thought the.. almost loincloth-esque structuring of leather looked absurd with the puffed out dark grey pants and the furred boots. Not that.. she judged it too much. Even if she self-consciously pulled her own sleeves down and hiked the collar of her uniform up.

She forced herself to look away. To bury herself in her work and away from the impressive man. Perhaps feeling it a touch odd that she didn't feel the rumored effects some of the more out-there workers whispered about when dealing with the massive men. Other than it was uncanny how well.. big they were.. and until this moment she hadn't realized how handsome. Even if it was a brief glimpse-

"Pardon me, I nearly stepped on you there." A warm yet deep and sonorous voice spoke. A shiver rushed down her spine just as much as confusion made her tremble. Why was he speaking to her? No one spoke to her unless they were forced to. Even before her scars it had been like that. So when she looked up to see a kindly (if not overly handsome) face, she couldn't figure out if she was blushing or paling.

"Gh- It's fine." Her voice was more tense, more rude than what she meant it to be. Yet it was unheard of for apologies to be directed to her. She felt as if she wanted to knock herself over with the wrench in her hand. She was more than certainty blushing now. Staring up at his face like she was. Seeing their true differences. A jaw lightly coated in dark stubble cracked into a grin. It was hard to decide if she wanted to look away or stare into those dark eyes of his. Was his head really as smooth as it looked from down where she was?

"If I didn't know any better, I'd have assumed you weren't good around people." His voice, smooth as gold, was a shattering force to her bewildered mind. Forcing herself to look away, she floundered for a moment at her predicament. She was being disrespectful. She should be in trouble. Not.. having someone speak to her so casually. It was horribly uncanny having someone speak to her as one spoke to a friend.

"'M not." She whispered grumpily to herself. Whipping her head upwards again as he chuckled. How did he hear her?!

"Is that why you're working in this hall?" He mused. That gentle smile still upon his face. It left her more.. just more conflicted. He was certainly shattering a personal record of people willing to be around her asides from whatever thing decided to make sure she lived childhood. Gripping the wrench tightly in one hand, Sibley gave a vague sweeping gesture of her hand.

"...No one likes working this hall. Floor panels get stuck. Not enough malfunctions or priority to justify two man teams." No one appreciated working alone most times. Not in such grandiose halls. Not where one mistake would have the techies breathing on your neck faster than you could say 'frag off'. Not only did you have to work fast, you had to be meticulous.

"Ah, I see. So you are using your job to hide from everyone else?" The man tilted his head down at her before abruptly kneeling down. Bending over to look into the large open panel "You should possibly tighten that bolt on the secondary."

Sibley sputtered for a moment. Suddenly uncomfortable by the proximity of the man. People only got that close when they were crammed in a small room. Her eyebrow twitched as she gawked before huffing and doing as he suggested. Surprisingly, it was actually loose. And it prevented a later malfunction to occur.

"I could say the same about you, you know." Hesitantly, she spoke up. Not daring to eye the man in fear of repercussion. Wincing at the chuckle he gave to her remark. She expected punishment.. not.. this. "How did you have me figured out?" The question was unexpected as she looked up at him once more. Staring up at him even though he had bowed so low. Completely engulfing her entire view.

"..No reasonable person in rich clothes like that walks in the deeper halls. N-Not that they're not allowed to! They just.. don't." she found herself awkwardly sputtering towards the end. Shifting the wrench closer to her so she could hold it in both hands with a frown. Watching the curious expression on the man's face as he hummed low.

"So I've been caught red handed. You're not going to turn me in, are you?" the question confused her as he told it in a lively way. Was he serious? Was this a joke? "..No?" The curious sparkle in his eyes never went away as he rested one arm upon his raised knee. "Don't you know who I am?" the question was out of the blue. Of course she didn't. If she watched the charts for who was entering and who was leaving, she'd be out of work for hours. Never mind wasting precious sleeping (sewing her several-times-mended clothing) time to watch the news. Slowly shrugging, Sibley despised the feeling of being in a spotlight. She just wanted the handsome man to go along on his merry way and so she can waste the rest of her day like usual.

Though those thoughts paused at the genuine surprise that appeared on his face. Tilting his head back in laughter and shaking it. His shoulders trembling before he resumed grinning down at her. "You have to be pulling my leg. You work in the Emperor's castle and yet don't know me?" The incredulous tone made Sibley's skin tingle all over as she stuck out her lips in a pout. Glaring at him with no heart in it as embarrassment chewed at her. Last thing she needed was an uppity noble laughing at her.

"No. Too busy to. I need to get back to work before I get in trouble anyways." Sibley gritted out. She should have known she'd get mocked in the end. If it wasn't from being avoided like she was some plague-pest, it'd be insults because of her face or the subtle (or more than) limp she'd gain on bad days.

"My apologies," she stopped moving at those words as she was stunned to silence "It's just that lately I haven't encountered anyone else on Terra that didn't know me." How was she meant to respond to that? Relaxing the death-grip she had. Sibley realized how tense she was until that moment. Having enough will to resist raising the wrench in the name of self defense as the man extended a hand.

Looking from hand to oddly friendly face; blinking slowly as she did. She waited another awkward moment as he spoke. "Then let me introduce myself, ma'am. I am Horus Lupercal, Lord of the Luna Wolves." vaguely some of it rang a bell in her mind. Though she still stared at his hand.. Ever so reluctantly letting go of the wrench to shake his. Still somehow surprised that he was warmer than the average human was or that his callused hand wrapped hers with complete gentleness. "Sibley.. of nothing." She threw the flair in perhaps a little dramatically. Even if the man.. even if Horus's kindly face shifted the handshake to hold her hand by the fingers. Raising it (and lowering himself further) to lightly brush his lips across her skin. Briefly her thoughts ruefully drifted to horror that he'd even bring himself closer to her ruined flesh.

"It was fun to meet you, Sibley; Lady of the floor panels. I unfortunately have to return to my duties." Horus's voice was lower. Grinning mischievously with a wink and letting go; with clear reluctance, stood. Leaving her to stare in bewilderment and with a hot blush on her face. "..Uh.. I too. I mean- You too!" Why did this Horus fluster her so much? Was it the fact that he was the first man to show just the barest of friendliness to her?

Her wonderings stopped as Horus walked away and looked over his shoulder a final time. "I hope you meet you again. That one wire is about to come loose as well." he called back. Sibley looked down, checked, and noticed he was right again.

Belatedly, she realized he never recoiled from touching her. Nor did he seem to get grumpy at her for any reason. Resuming her work with a sigh, Sibley begrudgingly thought of how she shouldn't had cowed herself so much into distrust.. even if the scars upon her itched and her legs ached. No, perhaps distrust was more of her safety net. After all, it was slim to none that she'd ever encounter him again.

[womensmusiccanon]

Art, Dance and Eurovision redemption - Women of Central/Eastern Europe

At it again, this time in Central/Eastern Europe! Real Europe? You get the point :)

In which I've spent most of this week caught in the rabbithole that is Romanian music (seriously, the amount I had to cut to make room for everything else is brutal) and I've ended up quite fond of 1997 albums, by the looks of it. Unintentionally!

As usual, the list is not in any way ranked - this is just the order it happened to end up in. My top picks from each album have been gathered in a playlist here (ca. an hour and 20 minutes), if you want more (which, why wouldn't you?), here's an extended version with additional tracks from albums and artists not mentioned on the list (just under three hours), and finally there's a playlist of the full albums.

Justyna Steczkowska - Naga (1997) Spotify Youtube - Kicking off the list with some jazzy polish art pop! The track's on this are so incredibly layered (just take Kryminalna miłość for an example) and Steczkowska is such a skilled vocalist.

Jana Vébrová - Kykyrý (2007) Spotify Youtube - I mean, Vébrová's just cool, right? An accordion heavy folk-ish record, but with plenty of edge. Like I said, it's just really cool.

Ruslana - Дикі танці (2003) Spotify Youtube - Ruslana is so obviously an icon that I had a hard time not including her here, and I don't think there's much to argue against this being her best record. Aptly named, too, because this one will make you want to dance.

Sarolta Zalatnay - Álmodj velem (1972) Spotify Youtube - Of its time for sure, but damn great at it! An energetic pop rock record with heavy funk influence helped by Zalatny's strong vocals - she's really got a voice for the genre and is clearly feeling it.

Diana Arbenina - Мальчик на шаре (2014) Spotify Youtube - Slowing down a bit and moving alt. The album flows incredibly well and you really get pulled in over the course of it.

Margareta Pâslaru - În grădina bucuriilor (1975) Youtube - Not on spotify, to my great displeasure, but Youtube link provided if you can excuse the audio quality (please do <3). As the tracks won't be included on the playlist, I'll point out Ce Nu Știm and Nu, N-a Fost Glumă (La Mélancolie), which also happen to showcase the versatility of this album really well, imo. May or may also feature a surprise cover that utterly delighted me.

Ada Milea - Aberații sonore (1997) Spotify Youtube - I'm not gonna lie, I absolutely fell in love with this record. Like, this being Milea's debut is mindblowing to me. It's incredible. I will also blindly admit that it's not for everyone - it does not shy away from being artsy or avant in any way, but, in my opinion, it manages to do it without being annoying. This was one of those were I had a hard time picking out tracks because it just kept giving. It's just so incredibly fun is the truth of it, and I adored every second of it.

Anastasia Lazariuc - Cine poate ști (1997) Spotify Youtube - Europop at its most energetic and interesting. Look, if this album doesn't boost your energy, I don't know what will. Absolutely one to dance to.

Jana Kirschner - Krajina rovina (2010) Spotify Youtube - Arguably another obvious inclusion, but Kirschner really is a skilled songwriter. The production on this is top-notch, too - the tracks are multilayered and playful, not to mention well-structured and composed. You can - and should - really dig into this one, there's so much to take from.

... And there we have it! The end. For now.

I hope you have even just a fraction as much fun with listening to this as I did. If you have any further recommendations please feel free to share! Mwah <3

[stormvanari]

Titan's Cats AU

(yeah this is very likely gonna rotisserie chicken-rotate in my head only)

So the titan's councilors are cats. They meet a group called the Coven Cats (Heads) sometimes. Many of them get into shenanigans.

That's it. That's the AU.

-Loopy does the most zoomies of the TC

-Sonore and Ripley like to go out of the house....and often wind up missing (but they do come back later in the day, or the next day)

-Berylis loves playing with the other TCs, she's more hyper outside and loves snow

-Ilya loafs a lot (and drags himself on the ground when being taken for a walk)

-Darian steals in and outside of the house; he has stolen items from the "Coven Cats," especially from TC!Darius, Mason, and Vitimir (sometimes TC!Adrian, but he and Darian tend to get into an epic chase when the latter is caught). Also Darian acts like a beaver: he keeps making strange structures around the house.

-Yurei is more active at night but in the day, it often looks out the window (even if it's just the mailman doing their usual work). It is the most submissive of the TCs

-Jasmine tries to stay away from disturbances, and she likes to go out in the rain. She also likes baths, just like Sonore

-Cherry tends to start fights, especially against TC!Terra and Adrian out in the streets (so you might hear an aggressive meowing match from afar)