#The Brightest Stars

[brightest-stars-if]

The Brightest Stars

Forum Page | Demo [54k Words] | Discord | Patreon

In the kingdom of Taras, everyone lives with a prophecy. The fortunate call it a gift, the unfortunate a burden. You are the youngest child of House Rauz, a powerful noble family only a tier beneath the king. Shortly after your thirteenth birthday, you travel to the capital with your family with a distressing, newly minted prophecy scrawled out across your skin.

Soon enough, you find that you have other, equally pressing concerns; a key purpose of your visit is to place you at the side of Lux, the younger, more favored child of King Caius. When Lux gets a prophecy, it seems even more damning than yours.

Can you save Lux before it's too late, or will you both go down the wrong road together? And can you solve your own prophecy? Only the years ahead will tell.

Note: The Brightest Stars is a single RO game, with a mandatory romance path. This is necessary for the plot.

Lux zi’il Aurym (M/F)

Lux is the favorite child of the king, though they're a legitimized bastard. They're charming, passionate, and proud to a fault. There's a darkness lurking in them, a corruption that could rot and fester, but there's kindness, too, ripe for fostering. Maybe, with your help, one side can win out?

Lux is tall and lean, with light brown skin and curly black hair. They have bright green eyes, with a mole under their left eye, and a delicate, slender face. Both Male and Female Lux grow to be exceedingly beautiful in adulthood. Female Lux is the same height as Male Lux.

Play as male or female

Customize your MC's looks and personality

Make choices that raise the MC's corruption and Lux's, and impact endings

Experience different dynamics with Lux depending on their gender and the MC's

Try to survive the backstabbing, politicking and intrigue of court, and maybe even conquer it

Play a game spanning years, from the MC's early teens to their mid-twenties

Bring out the best in Lux, or make them worse!

[origamihoshi]

This could be better but I don't want to spend months on another painting when I'm still working on a months long painting (that someday I'll be done with)

anyway this is my MC Elysia from @brightest-stars-if's game, don't know if I got the clothing right or not but I just took what I liked from the different era of fashion I was given and made this, I do think fancy dresses are fun. There should also be jewelry but I'm lazy and hate drawing jewelry so...

no surprise that I would have my MC's highest stat be charisma, but I do think it fits her with how I see her probably thriving in social environments, she's good with people and enjoys being social.

over all I'm happy with this even if I got lazy with somethings.

[immortalbutterflycos]

Things My Younger Sibling Has Said To Me (a Sirius kin) That Give Off Regulus Energy:

"It's fine, I'll just kill your family. Which is myself."

"I'm having FOUR waffles. Because FUCK the government!"

"I'm about to give up on this motherfucker"

"It's an appointment with my psychiatrist -_-"

"Did she do the stretchys?" (about my cat when I told them she woke up from her nap while they were away)

"Dude I'm genuinely considering that grippy sock vacation"

"How pissed would mother be if I did get baker acted? Lmao"

"I ended up having an anxiety attack."

"I can wait. I'll survive off of coffee for now."

"Ugh fiiine what if I were to commit arson?"

*sends me a series of pictures of our cat* "That one is my favorite. I call it Existential Dread."

*talking about going on a date with my friend who I introduced them to* "Do you think this sounds like a good place to eat lunch with Celeste tomorrow?" (this is some Sirius and Regulus behavior if I've ever seen it)

"No I'm just sad"

"YES ITS A MUSEUM! Also, we're in fighting range for Celeste's mother."

"Did I have a breakdown today? Yes, yes absolutely I did."

*before they started actually dating Celeste, definitely drunk* "Dude. I wanna tell Celeste how I feel rn."

"Have the idiots come yet?"

"I wanna scream. Some old guy just told me I would look prettier if I smiled more and I hate it so much."

"Okay, then punch him in the dick."

"Find better friends"

"Do I add, "and I'm gay and wanna date you" or is that too much?"

"WHY AM I SO GAY AND SAD?????!!!!!"

*after meeting my dnd friends (Celeste included) for the first time* "I just realized that I was talking to everyone the way I talk to you, which is basically insults and curse words."

[bloodandrunes]

Hey, I saw that you had a new active WIP, so I was just wondering if Blood and Runes was on hiatus now or cancelled?

Blood and Runes is on hiatus. While I doubt I'll come back to it, I won't completely dismiss the idea. However, it was a first attempt at writing IFs that I made while I was a junior in high school, and I think that shows. If I ever pick it back up again, I'm going to have to overhaul a lot, and I don't have the time or energy for that at the moment.

Time has obviously passed since I first tried my hand at making an IF. I'm older now, and I've learned a lot from working on that Blood and Runes. I still love it very deeply. Now I'm going to take the lessons I learned for it and make The Brightest Stars the best game I possibly can 💙

[sonysakura]

SonAmyShad Week 2023. Day 1: Hugs + Day 3: Revenge

I figured I will keep all the prompt fills in somewhat the same universe, although they won't be connected by the same plot. The first installation is for both Day 1 and Day 3 (I skipped 2, and will probably skip 5...). A drabble about the way Sonic and Amy helped Shadow, and how he helped them.

[nightly-ruse]

Critter has convinced me to share my things so here you go

Kinda long post be warned dashboard scrollers

Sun and Moon

The sun and moon are called Solarwing and Lunarwing by the cats.

Solarwing was the first Star to ever climb to the sky and brought light to their dark withering world, her pelt of glass and eyes beaming with light reflecting to all the creatures below. Other names for her are First Star, Solar, and Radiance.

Lunarwing was the second star to rise right after her sister, shining when her older sister couldn’t so the world was never fully dark. She is has a wavy glowing pelt and eyes as dark as they night sky. She always looks up to her sister and pads behind her at all times. Other names for her are Small star, Luna, Illuminate, and the Second star.

Solar eclipses are when the two sisters meet and a day the whole wings celebrate. It’s a rare event that marks new bonds and amending broken ones, most cats getting together when one happens or in the days following. When the sun is dark and turns the sky red cats gather underneath to share stories and talk, feasting together, hunting in large parties, singing/performing for everyone. The sky is tracked well by the cats so most often a gathering will happen on a Solar eclipse to really bring everyone together, ones that happen unexpectedly can be seen as quickly sent to mend things in times of need

Lunar eclipses are when the moon is shaded making it partially black or deep red like it’s been painted in blood. These are not so lucky and taken as the little moon feeling lesser for her dimmer light, making her dim even more, or angered over how she’s always chasing after her sister, going red. On these events cats can start worsening relations or taking it as a sign to finally cut/end relationships with others. The most breakups, acts of war, and fights happen after a Blood moon. To try and amend things cats try to shine lights up to Luna, hoping to encourage her to shine once more as well as singing long songs of sorrow at her darkness. Since they happen a little more often then Solar eclipses they are less best tracked showing up and usually catching cats in shock.

The Hoard + Solution to No Humans

The Hoard is a banded together group of cats who specialize in scavenging the dangerous city. Walls are put around the town to keep whatever it is that roams inside or any banished cats trapped. They follow one leader called the Overseer looks over all the trades, alliances, enemies, and bounty of scavenges keeping it in the tower which is on the corner of the wall.

They would easily be swept away by a real force but no cats dare as no one would want to take on the role of collecting from the city. And some whisper that the runner of the Hoard can control the beasts within it walls, deterring almost all threats to them.

The Hoard is how the Immunity has access to scrap, medicine, various human trinkets, gold, silver, cut gems, almost anything found in a modern town. While they try to keep good marks with them the Immunity has been getting rather tense with them, especially with the new successor taking over more and more control of The Hoard.

[camilleflyingrotten]

The Fallen Kings

Elendil and Gil-galad

[ca-d]

perseids and northern lights?!!?! magical ✨

[m4rs-ex3]

something something leola's star being the star that humans use to find their way when aaravos lost his way because of leola

[immortalbutterflycos]

Okay, but this would be so good!!!

Imagine with me:

Pandora is the one who switched them. I'd say I don't make the rules, but I absolutely do. Evan tries to stop her but fails and would like to help, but he has a strict, "You have to let the idiots figure it out on their own or else they won't learn anything" policy. Pandora tries to do the same, but she just got fed up with it all tbh.

Sirius and Reg switch after yet another fight about Regulus still being in contact with their mother. As expected, it explodes and things are said and not taken back quickly enough.

Regulus wakes up in Sirius's room, and he looks around it seeing posters of Bowie and Queen and the cherry red record player he'd gotten Sirius for his birthday last year on the dresser wondering if his wine had been spiked with hallucinogenics somehow. Then he sees himself in the mirror and promptly flips tf out. I'm thinking in the sort of way that Sophie did in Howl's Moving Castle? Like he's definitely panicking, but he's low-key an expert at staying calm in bad situations.

Sirius wakes up in Reg's apartment and instantly thinks that he's been robbed. Until he sees the expensive rings in the bowl on the bedside table and wonders if he got drunk and robbed Regulus. Things get weirder for Sirius when he gets a knock on his(?) bedroom door and he stands up to get it but before he can answer, James walks in with a smile that Sirius has only ever seen directed at one person back in school and it certainly wasn't towards him like it is now. "Hey love, Barty let me in, hope that's alright." Love? Barty..? He's even more confused when James crosses the room, concern touching the corners of his smile as he lifts his hands to cup Sirius's cheeks, gently brushing his thumbs under what he assumes to be some Gucci^TM bags under his eyes. "I know you had a rough night, did you get any sleep?" Sirius opens and closes his mouth, fishlike. Trying to find the words, and landing on, "Prongs..? What are you doing here..?"

Remus has a feeling that something is wrong with Sirius the very second that he doesn't get his regularly scheduled barrage of good morning texts. Remus knows that something is wrong when he calls Sirius to see if he's okay and gets back a sharp, "What do you want, Lupin?" (this is while Regulus is amidst his "holy shit how am I in Sirius's body right now" Panic so we can't really blame him for this. XD)

I might actually have to write this if you don't because this is so much fun to think about. 😂

freaky friday au but it’s sirius & regulus who switch bodies, send tweet

[brightest-stars-if]

The Update Is Here

So y'all know how I said the update was coming out on the 31st? Well surprise, it's coming out 2 days early! I had more time on my hands than I was expecting these last couple days, and I managed to wrap up chapter 2 sooner than expected.

Please let me know if you find any bugs/typos. Knowing me, my brain probably skipped over all of it even with my editing rip. Chapter 2 is 22.5k words long, bringing the demo to a total of 44k words. I advise playing with both a male and female Lux to get the full benefit of variation/branching.

In Chapter 2, you:

Flashback to the MC getting their prophecy

Seek comfort from either Alaric or Eulia

Have lessons with Lux

Meet Arjun, if you haven't already

Have tea with Isolde

And make an impression on Lux, if you haven't already

Here is the link to the demo and here is the link to the forum page. Happy reading!

[starseneyes]

Heart-Warmed and Teary-Eyed: Kindness Matters

I have a P.O. Box that I check once a week. Right now, I mostly use it for letter correspondence with my friend @always-coffee—a tremendous published poet and beautiful human I met by chance online.

Monday she said she mailed her latest letter. So, I stopped by the Post Office on the way home from dropping the kids at school on the off-chance it made it through USPS faster than normal.

I found no letter inside, but a flyer from the Post Office saying they were holding something for me that wouldn't fit in the box. I wondered if Ali had sent a letter that was too tall (because she has such amazing stationary). I had no idea what was about to happen.

I glimpsed the package as they pulled it from a cabinet and wondered what on earth Ali sent me. That was not a letter.

Then I saw The Golden Notebook Bookstore label and knew it was something @neil-gaiman related.

For those who don't know (normal people who don't follow Neil on social media, for example), that is the local bookstore near Neil's home in New York. He periodically signs books for them that are sold with zero markup.

I am a fan of Neil as a writer, but also as a human. I don't follow many celebrities—a side effect of my set-kid youth—but I did follow Neil last year during the WGA Strike. Been a fan of his for ages, and Neverwhere is my favorite book.

Ali knows all this, and I just knew she had done something sneakily sweet.

I rushed home with a smile on my face, trying desperately not to set off the speed-trap on the road back. Let me tell you, driving speed limit when excited is not easy for me!

When I finally whipped into my driveway and sprinted into my house, I carefully opened the package (more excruciating slowness) and tried not to cry happy tears when I saw what was inside. Wrapped tenderly in bubble-wrap rested... a book.

What You Need to be Warm is a poem Neil wrote that features illustrations from some of the best artists in the industry. That in itself is wonderful. But the mission of this little book is what is so amazing.

See, the sale of every copy supports UNHCR—the UN Refugee Agency. This book literally helps people when you buy it.

I have wanted to buy a copy for ages, but you all know I thrift and buy books secondhand. I didn't want to do that with this book.

I wanted to buy it outright to ensure the maximum amount of money went to support the cause. So, I have been waiting until we were a little more stable so I could buy it full-price, outright.

Thanks to Ali, I have a copy that was purchased outright (so it helps people in need) and it is signed!

Yes, it's a signed copy with pen bleed on the opposite page, and all.

I would never do something like this for myself. You all know I am woefully practical and doing things for myself isn't second-nature. I’m working on it, but it is slow coming reprogramming a lifetime of behavior. So gifts like this... oh, they mean everything.

I am overwhelmed with gratitude that such a kind soul would do something like this for me. Thank you, Ali.

[immortalbutterflycos]

I just spent the last couple of hours doing 5-card tarot readings for the marauders based on my fic I've been working on, and I have a "Constellation" deck that is my favorite of my 3. And so I was doing Regulus's and the final card I flipped over was 'Sirius.'

[mynabirb]

melting wings were worth it to meet you

[sonysakura]

SonAmyShad Week 2023. Day 4: Sleeping / Multiamory March 2023. Day 12: Cuddling

These two felt like fitting prompts to combine, and I figured since I'm already very late with Sonamyshad I can at least post it on the correct day for @polyamships' Multiamory March 😅

This time, a drabble about a day in life of Sonic and Amy when Shadow is away on a mission...

[skyistheground]

SUPERNOVIC!!!!! I JUST HAVE TO EXPLODE!