#also idk what blood caste to make her

[fishlings]

a young mare stands in her bedroom...

[igbylicious]

under the new moon [yunsan x reader]

pairing: yunho x f reader x san

rating: 18+

genre: werewolf au, smut, hurt / comfort

summary: an altercation with a hunter leaves you wounded, trapped in an aggressive frenzy, but Yunho and San know exactly how to safely bring you back home to them.

wc: 2.9k

general warnings: established relationship, supernatural werewolf strength for everyone, she/her pronouns for reader, pov switches, mentions of blood & injury, reader killed a werewolf hunter in self-defense, a pinch of angst, reader is literally feral and tries to fight yunsan first, they calm you down w/ sex yay

smut warnings: dom Yunho & San, feral sub reader, rough sex, manhandling, scratching, choking, biting, breeding kink, belly bulge, they got big dicks ofc, cum inflation, multiple orgasms, overstimulation, knotting, DP (vaginal & vaginal / anal), vaginal / anal fingering, bodily fluids as lube, unprotected sex, pet names (good girl, darling)

a/n: idk yall, it’s not even themed for the mv i don’t know what happened??? maybe it was San’s fur coat maybe it was just the wolf living in my chest cavity. either way this was written in an unedited frenzy in the dark hours of the night, have fun! ( ˘ ³˘)♡

The forest is dark. Only stars shine overhead, the new moon casting no light on the trees and underbrush. Two large wolves prowl through woods, their path guided by the thick, metallic scent of blood.

The forest is quiet. Even during a new moon, its wildlife knows better than to cross the two predators. Even when unable to tap into the full height of their powers, they are dangerous.

Even more so when they are agitated with anger — and worry.

Yunho sniffs at the blood streaked over the bark of a felled tree. It’s still fresh. It’s yours.

San whines in concern, pressing his snout into Yunho’s neck to hurry him along. His black fur makes him near invisible in the cover of night, yellow eyes shining in the darkness. Usually the younger wolf is too rash, but tonight his impatience is justified. They don’t know how badly wounded you are. How much time you still have.

They found the hunter about two miles back, or what was left of him. Torn apart; a gaping hole in his abdomen opened by furious claws, his neck shredded by sharp teeth. (Deservedly so, Yunho had thought with quiet rage, when he saw a bloodied spearhead by the hunter’s side. The wooden shaft was shattered to pieces.)

Your trail leads them deeper and deeper into the forest, the night cold doing its best to penetrate Yunho’s thick silver fur. He tries to keep his head clear, to focus on finding you. He can’t afford to be distracted now, not by anger, not by fear, not by guilt.

It was a mistake, to let you go off on your own tonight. He knew the pack would be vulnerable tonight, he knew the human village nearby has been restless.

But Yunho can punish himself for his regrets later, because he also knows two other truths; the blood is still fresh, and you are strong.

They will find you. Alive. They will.

San growls in frustration when your bloody trail dissolves into a shallow river, the scent lost. The two wolves shift back into their human forms, wrapped in large fur cloaks, the ones they can take with them even when they turn. San’s pitch black, Yunho’s streaked with silver, matching the colour of their fur; and now their hair.

“She’s close,” San murmurs lowly, restless as he looks around the seemingly abandoned forest. “I can feel her.”

You are close. Closer than either of them realised.

The underbrush rustles, and San doesn’t even have the chance to blink before a shape pounces him from the shadows, snarling wildly. San curses as bloodied nails claw at his face, and he grabs at his assailant to hold them at bay — to hold you at bay.

Yunho’s eyes widen at the sight of you, feral and growling; your body human, but pure primal aggression in your mind. Fur cloak tattered, skin covered in scratches and bruises, an ugly gash on your shin. The injury does nothing to slow you down, momentum and surprise on your side as you pin San to the ground.

Yunho swears under his breath, leaping forward to help San to subdue you.

Fuck. You went too deep.

Had to push yourself too hard under this new moon, dug too deep for the power you needed to survive. Your wolf has overtaken you; and she is too frenzied to recognise friend from foe. To recognise her mates.

You yowl when Yunho grabs you by the scruff, yanking you away from San. You instantly turn on Yunho, scratching at his chest while you try to bite at the hand on your neck.

“San,” he grunts, hissing at the red marks your nails leave on his skin. “Now.”

San throws himself around you, pressing against your back as he grabs your wrists and locks his arms around your waist, engulfing you in his black furs. You snap at him, teeth flashing, but Yunho’s hand slips around your throat and he forces you to face him.

“Calm. Down,” Yunho growls, his own wolf instinctively rearing up against yours.

You can’t calm down. You can’t. Something is familiar about the two figures surrounding you, their scent like an itch in your memory — but it can’t penetrate the feral haze that’s taken over your mind. Your wolf trashes against their hold, howling danger, pain searing through your injured leg.

The bleeding has stopped by now, your regenerative powers feeding off your frenzy, but no matter how you struggle, you aren’t strong enough to break free from the two men and their strangely enticing smells. The hand on your throat tightens, your growls forced down to a weak wheeze as your body sags in their hold.

“Good. Good girl.” The hand relaxes, but does not release you entirely. Slowly they go down on their knees and lower you to the mossy forest ground, keeping you propped up between them. Long fingers brush up against a scarred patch of skin in the crook of your neck, and sudden heat lashes through you at the touch, drawing a sharp moan.

The one behind you groans and presses his nose into your hair, breathing in deeply. “Yunho…” he rasps, pulling you closer into him. Familiar name. Familiar scents. Familiar touch, fire licking sharply at your core. He is naked under his furs, same as you — and the growing hardness that twitches against your lower back is not unknown to you either. “F-fuck, she’s…”

“Yeah,” Yunho murmurs, rubbing his fingers into the mating bite he left on your skin years ago. “Her body remembers who she belongs with. Come, Sannie, let’s help her mind remember too.”

He pushes your tattered furs away to drop on the ground, and San takes immediate advantage to lap at his own newly exposed mark on your shoulder. You jolt in his hold, your wolf pulled in two directions. Yunho instantly tightens his grip again when you snarl and try to bite at San again — but he can smell your other, stronger instincts flare to life. His free hand finds wet slick when it slides between your thighs, a strangled whine torn from your obstructed throat.

San whines at the soft squelch when two of Yunho’s long fingers press inside you. Relief and hunger melt together inside him. You’re safe, back in his arms. They will take care of you now.

A primal need stirs in San’s blood as his teeth scrape over your skin, suckling at his old mating bite like his tongue can tease the memories out of you. Maybe it can. Or maybe it won’t be enough — maybe he needs to fuck them out of you. He groans, feeling dizzy on your scent, and ruts harder against your backside.

You’re trembling, gasping sharply as you’re pushed deeper on Yunho’s fingers by San’s humping. Every noise only fuels San’s need to fill you up, to ram his cock into your leaking hole until his knot catches, reminding your sweet cunt how the shape of him was made to fit inside you.

“Wanna touch…” he groans, gathering your wrists in one hand so he can reach down the other. Weakly you squirm against his hold; but it’s barely a fight, your aggressive haze subdued by your two mates.

Yunho grunts at the sight; he can’t deny it, his wolf preens at your submission. An animalistic urge to claim you, like he’s mating you for the first time all over again. Blood rushes down to his cock, revelling in your whimpers when San pushes another finger into your sopping cunt alongside his.

He watches how your stomach tenses and your thighs shake, telltale signs of a budding release, and he knows damn well his hand on your throat has long become unnecessary. He does not take it away.

Instead Yunho tilts up your head and he leans in, slotting his lips over yours. He groans when your lips part willingly for him, desirous for your mates. You whine as Yunho filthily licks into your mouth, adding another finger as he and San stretch you open for them. They’ll both take you tonight. Together. It hasn’t been said, but Yunho knows that San also knows this.

Mindlessly you grind into the fingers opening you up. You pant into the heated lips pressed against yours, a greedy tongue mapping out the wet cavern of your mouth. Wanton moans spill freely, growing louder with every added finger to your twitching cunt. Every time you think this must be your limit, and every time they prove you wrong, sending your head spinning.

You’re chasing something, barely knowing what it is, but hunting it down with every buck of your hips all the same. Something familiar again, pulling taut inside your aching cunt. It pulls, pulls, tighter and sharper until finally the strings snap. You cry out a ragged yowl as electrified heat tears you asunder, convulsing in the strong arms that hold you up.

You don’t even notice those hungry lips pulling away from your mouth — not until two sets of teeth sink deep into your shoulder and neck, into those two scarred spots that make your heart sing like it can finally come home.

With a wretched sob you clutch onto them, your hands finally released from San’s iron grip. He presses rough, reverent kisses against the broken skin of your shoulder, clumsy with urgency as he slips his fingers out of your cunt and grabs onto your waist. He barely waits for Yunho to pull his hand away, too frenzied to finally sink his cock into the wet hole where it belongs.

Yunho chuckles with dark fondness at San’s impatience, running his slick fingers through San’s hair as he presses a kiss on his matted forehead. “That’s it. Show her,” he whispers, and San whines at the encouragement, fingers digging harder into the meat of your hips.

“Y-you too,” he grunts tightly, strained as the last shreds of self-control slip through his grasp. “Our mate— she needs you too.”

Yunho hums in acknowledgement, pressing another kiss on San’s forehead before he pulls back. He takes your arms and loops them around his neck, and his cock twitches at how pliantly you let him move you, nuzzling into his chest. Still trapped in your delirious haze, but your wolf tamed and rendered docile by their command over your pleasure, willingly surrendering you to them.

You whine beautifully, your glistening folds parting to make way when Yunho guides his thick cock inside your loosened cunt. For all their efforts to stretch you open, both of them are big, and Yunho groans when he sees how your stomach bulges as he presses deeper inside. He takes San’s hand and guides it so he can feel the swell of them in your belly.

And something snaps inside of San.

He bares his teeth with a wild snarl, bucking his hips as he fucks into you recklessly. Fresh bites litter your shoulders, future bruises forming under his grip on your waist. You’re jostled by his rough thrusts, whimpering loudly as you claw at Yunho’s shoulders.

Yunho growls at the sting of your nails, meeting San’s violent pace. You’re moaning helplessly against his chest, hiccuping soft “ah ah ahh”s as they hit deep inside your needy, sopping cunt.

“Gonna fill you up,” San growls, lost in his frenzy. “Fill that belly with every drop of seed we got. Not gonna stop until we got you stuffed and bred. Won’t even know whose litter it is, won’t even matter. Ours, you’re ours.”

You whine in mindless agreement, trembling between them.

“You like that, hm? Like the thought of carrying our pups?” Yunho chuckles, though it comes out more a groan. You’re still so tight around him, San’s cock sliding against his in the snug space they made for themselves inside you. “You remember who you belong with now?”

His last question causes a hesitation in your squirmy moans, but it only spurs Yunho on harder. He can’t feel his knot begin to swell yet, so he just slams into you, drowning in every wet squelch of your leaking hole, only needing a few hard thrusts before he groans and spills inside you. Yunho hisses when San does not slow down — but his own cock does not soften yet. This night is far from over.

San moans at the smoother slide as he fucks Yunho’s seed deeper inside your hole. It does not take him long to follow, his hand on your stomach feeling every thrust as he buries himself into you, hips stuttering when he comes with a low growl. He pants against your shoulder, nosing at his mating bite, barely even slowing down through his release. Yunho starts moving again too, drawing fresh moans from your lips.

You feebly gurgle something against Yunho’s chest, the foggy haze in your mind consisting of nothing but white-hot pleasure now.

It’s overwhelming and yet you can’t get enough of it; addicted to the stretch, to the fullness that grows every time they cum inside you, until you can’t take more, their seed leaking out past their thick lengths and bubbling at the rim. You’re losing count, just as you’ve lost count of all the times you’ve clenched around them, milking their cocks as another orgasm was ripped from your worn-out cunt.

You can’t tell anymore where you end and where they begin, their hands and cocks melded into your body — until one hand wanders, first down to your sodden folds to slick up his fingers, then back to your ass. You whine as a thick finger eases past the tight muscle; but your body is so pliant and relaxed, melting away in the haze of pleasure, and soon the slight burn only makes you greedy for more.

San groans when you weakly press your ass back into him, two fingers now working you open, and then another. He will knot soon, he can feel it pulsing at the base of his cock; and no matter how well they stretched you out, they will break you if they both knot in your cunt.

But San does not mind taking your ass instead — he can feel the beautiful swell of your stomach, distended from the sheer amount of cum that you took so well from them. He did his part there, now happy to bury himself between your plump asscheeks.

You whimper when San pulls out, a sudden emptiness at the loss of him, but bite down a gasp when he pushes back inside your other hole. His cock is slick with cum, smoothly continuing his rough pace.

Yunho sighs contently at the loose and easy slide of your cunt, using this chance to fuck harder into you. He guides you to sit upright, cupping your chin to steady you. He tilts your head up, giving himself a good look at the blissed-out expression on your face. Nothing but empty pleasure behind your teary eyes, all your earlier fear and aggression wiped clean. Leaving yourself vulnerable and exposed between them, knowing you are safe here. That you can let it all go.

“Got one more for us, darling?” he grunts, trying to hold back a little longer. “Show us how good we make you feel?”

The words come to you through a thick fog, but you heed them all the same. You can’t help it, not when nimble fingers suddenly press against your clit, pinching at the swollen, oversensitive nub. Your entire body seizes up with a strangled cry, and you sob at the pure, overwhelming fullness as two knots swell up inside you, plugging both your holes.

You’re shaking, tears spilling down your cheeks as you slowly come down. Four hands move warmly over your body; rubbing your back, your shoulders, the distinct swell of your belly. One of those hands cups your cheek, lifting you up to meet a pair of shiny brown eyes.

Yunho’s eyes.

He smiles tiredly with rounded cheeks, long fingers gently caressing your jaw. Your breath catches at the recognition, staring back at him with wide eyes before you whip your head to look back. There, San gives you a slow, satisfied grin, his cheeks flushed and sweat beading on his forehead.

Relief breaks through your haze, and the sudden outpouring of emotion is too much for you to carry.

San startles when you hiccup a weak sob, and he immediately presses soothing kisses on the scattered bites he left on your shoulder. “Hey, hey, it’s alright. We’re here,” he murmurs. “We got you.”

“I know, I know” you snivel, grateful for Yunho carefully wiping away your tears. “You found me. I knew you’d find me.”

“Of course we found you,” Yunho smiles as he gently rubs his thumb over your cheekbone. “You wouldn’t let us lose you. You always find your way back to us.”

Your shoulder shake silently as their arms wrap around you, engulfing you in their body heat. You slump into their solid, strong frames and relish how they’re still connected inside you. It will take time for their knots to come down, and they fully intend to use every second of it to lavish you with tender affection. You sink away into the comfort of them, knowing you are safe and home again.

[otakubimbo]

I see your doing a prompt listttttt

can we get a (maybe fluffy, idk) smutty fic

with prompt 70.

a aizawa x reader fic

❤️❤️

lol hi, i know it's been ages but thank you for the ask! I hope you like it. The writers in my head have went on strike T-T

Jealousy, Jealousy

aizawa x f! reader

Aizawa never thought of himself as a jealous man, well that was until it came to you it seems.

Content: plot w/porn, fingering, unprotected sex, misunderstandings, aizawa bad at communication and feelings, drinking, voyeurism, Aizawa being jealous, big simping, avoiding feelings, pinning

for my 200 followers prompt list, i'm still taking them since i went on a lil hiatus, my bad, also if you like it please leave a comment it fuels me

Masterlist

“I don’t want you…. I need you”

The only thing Aizawa could focus on was the sound of your laughter. He was supposed to be focusing on whatever Principal Nezu was saying during this teacher's meeting. You’re giggling at something Sniper had said to you. You were trying to keep your voice down, but you couldn’t help yourself whatever Sniper had said had you in a fit of giggles, and that had Aizawas blood getting warm.

He didn’t think of himself as a jealous man, if anything his demeanor could be described as nonchalant, and yet, here he was, irritated at hearing your laugh with another man and not being the cause of that laughter. His tired eyes stared at the two of you from across the room as present Mic tried to get his attention.

“Earth to Shota!” Mic says almost screaming into his ear, “Stare any harder and your quirk will activate on its own”

“What?” an annoyed scowl crossed Aizawa’s face as he turned towards his friend.

“You’re glaring at her.” Mic points at the quietest frequency he can muster, not quiet at all. A few heads shoot over to the noise, but most ignore as it’s a usual occurrence from Mic. Aizawa huffs with a groan proceeding, turning away from your direction, unable to get the look on your face and the sound of your giggles out of his head.

The rest of the meeting goes through one ear and out the other, the only focus that Aizawa could keep was on your face. You started paying attention to the meeting, done with whatever you and sniper were speaking about. Once the meeting concluded, most of the teachers decided to go out for drinks and dinner. Aizawa wasn’t even considering going until he heard you speak up.

“Oh my gosh, yes. I need a drink after this long week” The excitement in your voice making his head turn and your eyes met his almost immediately as if you were looking for him, “you’re coming right?”

Aizawa tries his hardest not to give that you were making butterflies bloom in his stomach and just gives a curt nod. The feeling in his chest was blooming as the group walked towards the nearest restaurant, that was until he saw the way you looped your arm around Snipers and you were giggling again at whatever he was saying to you. Another scowl was making an appearance of Aizawas face as he watched the scene before him, Mic caught what was going on, throwing a supportive arm over Aizawas shoulder and he didn’t shrug it off surprisingly.

“Just talk to her, man” Mic does his best to whisper towards his friend. Aizawa just stays silent as they continue to walk forward, not even sparing his friend a sideways glance.

You hadn’t been at UA long but from the first interaction with Aizawa, he knew there was something different about you. The way you softly smiled at him as you introduced yourself had his words caught in his throat. It was the first time in a long time that the man actually felt self conscious about his appearance, thinking how disheveled he must look to you. But you didn’t seem to cast any judgment on him, it wasn’t like he was known for his style anyways. Your graze was soft yet curious as if you were picking him apart to see inside of him, it wasn’t judgmental it was calculated curiosity. Ever since then sometimes he would catch you just glancing at him as if you knew something he didn’t, and when he caught your eye, you would just smile that smile of yours and go back to whatever you were doing. You mesmerized him.

It didn’t help that you were absolutely gorgeous, his eyes always drawn to you, but you were also kind, kind in a way that seemed so effortless for you. It wasn’t even that you went out of your way to be kind, you just were. On the days that he was at his most exhausted, you always appeared out of no where with coffee for him. When the stress of his students was getting to him, you always had a funny story to tell him that got his mind from it even if it was for a moment. It was as if you always knew what he needed.

And here you were, sitting across from him giggling at something Sniper says as you take shots of sake together. Now Aizawa barely drank, but tonight as tight as his jaw was clenching, he was going to need to do anything to keep his cool. The alcohol taking his mind other places then you across the table. He was doing a decent job at keep the fire without him down, that was until your head landed on Sniper’s shoulder face flushed from the alcohol and the way you looked up at the other man set gasoline on that fire. How could you just do that so casually in front of him? Did you not feel the same way? Did you not feel his gaze always driving to you? Abruptly and uncharacteristically Aizawa quickly stood up and just walked outside, everyone looking at each other in the confusion at his quick departure.

Your brows furrowed in concern as you watched him leave, you could tell he was pissed but about what you had no clue but you were worried. Quickly, you excused yourself from the table following him. He was waking faster than you had ever seen him go, making you jog after him trying to call his name, but he was either ignoring you or couldn’t hear you. Eventually you caught up with him outside in the side alley of the restaurant, you could tell as you approached that he was fuming. But he looked like a frantic kitten, almost lost.

“Aizawa?” Your voice soft and careful as you approached him. “Are you okay?” Your question barely audible as you reach out to him. He turns to glare at you, gaze so sharp it makes you take a step back, but he says nothing. The alcohol making his eyes redder, deeper.

“What happened back there?”

The question hung in the air for a moment before Aizawa scoffed. There was no way you didn’t know what the problem was, but you didn’t know, your concerned look turned into one of confusion. Aizawa rakes his hands aggressively through his before his tired eyes fall back onto yours. He knew his behavior seemed strange, but he had no clue what to do at this point. He was a grown man for fucks state, the stoic, nonchalant pro hero Erasure Head, yet here he was acting like a jealous child over a woman who wasn’t even his. The drinks flowing through his system weren’t making his thoughts any more logical. As he looks at you, he lets out an exasperated sigh, he couldn’t imagine how stupid he probably looked.

“You can just tell me what’s bothering you, you know I won’t judge. You know that.”  You say while taking a cautious step forward, he looked like a frightening kitten.

Aizawa let out another sigh. There you and your kind heart go again, making him docile, making him fall for you. He couldn’t take it anymore, the liquid courage giving him the push to finally do what’s been on his mind since the first moment he met you. Without speaking, he starts walking towards you getting closer and closer forcing you back until your back presses against the alley wall.

“Aizawa” you breath out his name as his arms cage you as you look at him wide eyed. He was close, so close.

“I don’t think I can take it anymore” his voice barely above a whisper, strained biting his lip as if to hold himself back. His eyes were closed as he was gripping the wall beside your head. You can smell the sake on his breath, as he leans closer into you hovering right over your mouth.

“Can’t take what?” Your voice coming out just as quietly.

 Aizawa opens his eyes looking straight into yours, they were as beautiful as ever, a bit glossy from the previous drinks and as always curious as always seemingly looking through him. He doesn’t blink as he looks into your eyes searching for something, waiting for you, waiting on you to push him away, waiting for you to tell him no. But then nothing came, you were just looking back at him with that face of yours and now he couldn’t stop himself. f Slowly, still giving you the chance to push him away, he leans his face closer to yours capturing your lips with his own. Your body not even giving your mind time to process what’s happening as you automatically lean into him kissing him back. The kiss is slow, steady, strong but filled with so much passion, just like Aizawa.

You’re the first one to take it up a notch, grabbing onto his shirt to pull him closer, opening your mouth for him to explore. At this, he stopped holding himself back letting his built-up frustration get the best of him as he kisses you more sloppily grabbing the back of your head with one hand and your ass with the other.  You gasp at the action surprised at the sudden change from him, giving Aizawa the opportunity to bite on your lower lip which illicit a sharp hiss from you. Your hands move to wrap around his neck as he resumes kissing you fiercely. It was aggressive, it was sloppy, it was everything that he dreamed about, his lips molding into yours, the feeling of your tongue wrestling with his.

As everything started to get more passionate the hand, he was using to hold your hair goes down to your ass to lift you up for him, forcing you to wrap your legs around his waist as he presses you into the wall. His lips trailing from your mouth to your chin and then down to your neck biting and sucking as you try to keep down your moans as whines from his ministrations on your neck as he hips grind into yours. There’s a hitch in your breath as he bites down hard, grinding even harder into you making you clench around nothing.

“Fuck Shota” you moan as you can feel one of his hands make its way towards your soaked panties. Oh, the sound of his given name on your lips. He wanted to hear it more.

“You’re already so wet for me” he says against your lips, a cocky smirk gracing his face as he makes his way to the other side of your neck. As his digits move your panties to the side, sliding up and down your slit just grazing your yearning clit while you thank whatever divine being told you to wear a skirt today. You moan his name again as you feel his thumb rub long circles around your clit, pressing your hips more into his hand as you grab his hair causing him to bite down on your neck with a soft groan.

“Shota please” you beg, needing more from him. His mouth finds yours again as he inserts two fingers inside you, giving you what you asked for. He curled his fingers inside you as his thumb rubbed tighter circles on your clit. At this point you were dripping down his hand, your feet digging into his back as he swallowed your moans.  He could feel you getting tighter around his fingers, his mouth left yours and went to your ear.

“Yes, just like that. You want to cum for me? Are you gonna cum for me?”  He speaks straight into your ear, his ministrations getting more aggressive as you nod senselessly feeling your peak quickly nearing.

“Yes Shota I’m gonna cum for you, I’m gonna cum for you” you pant as you lose yourself in the pleasure he’s giving you.

A grown escapes his mouth at the sound of your voice, “fuck I love the way you say my name.” He nibbles at your ear, “go ahead and cum for me”

And you do, you cum hard, gushing all over his hand eyes closed, head thrown back as your chest quickly rises and falls. To Aizawa, he doesn’t think he’s seen anything sexier.  As you’re coming down for your peak, Aizawas lips find yours again, kissing you slow and longingly his fingers sliding gently out of you to grip back on your ass, pressing himself into you. He can feel all your residual wetness seeping into his pants. Fuck he wanted you so badly.

You pull back from him, your eyes slowly opening as you look at him with heavy breaths. The look he was giving you was dangerous; he was no longer a kitten but a tiger that was starved. It overwhelmed you as you turn your head and gaze away from him which reminded you that he just finger fucked you in an alley way. Your hands go to push on his chest as his mouth latches on your neck again.

“Wait Aizawa, wait” you say pushing with the little strength you have after your orgasm, your breath coming out heavy and strained. He doesn’t pull away, but his lips still against your neck. “We can’t do this here, we’re gonna get caught, someone’s gonna see or hear us”

He chuckles smugly into your neck at your words, still not moving away placing gentle kisses up and down it as your breath hitched, “you weren’t saying that when I was knuckles deep into you, and..” he starts as he nips at your neck “what happened to calling me Shota? My name sounds so much prettier coming out of your mouth.”  Aizawa didn’t know if he was drunk off the sake he drank previously or if it was just you.

You take in his words as he grinds, his hard dick into your already sensitive core while his hands roam over your body.  A small whimper coming out of your mouth as he licks a long stripe against your neck.

“Plus I don’t care, I want you right here and right now.” He huffs as he presses his body into yours, taking one of his hands to turn your face back to him. The way you looked right now, flushed, breathing heavily, pupils blown out from him, for him. It ignited something even more depraved in him as he shakes his head aggressively, “No no no, I don’t want… I need you.”

The look in his eyes tells you he means every word, he needs you right there, right now, no matter who could walk past and something about that makes you even wetter. Another chuckle leaves his lips as he can feel you wetting him even more. Oh, you were a nasty little thing, you were going to drive him crazy.

“And you need me to, you need me to fuck you here in this back alley.” A cocky grin plastered on his face as he frees himself from his pants, taking his tip to rub on your clit. You breathe out shakily nodding your head as you try to push him in. He places himself right at your entrance, not yet pushing himself in as he feels you trying to sink down on him.

“Tell me you need me to” he says as he smears more of your juices on his dick. A moan escapes your mouth as your overstimulated core is stroked.

“Shota please”

“No, I want to hear you say it. Say you need me” he pulls back from you slightly, tip again right at your entrance, he can feel your cunt trying to suck him in. His mouth going back to your ear, his warm breath sending shivers down your spine. “Say it”

“I need you; Shota I need you right here and right now in this back alley” you whine and beg, causing him to smirk feeling the way his lips turn up on your ear.

“Good girl” Aizawa whispers before pushing himself in, slowly, agonizingly slowly. The stretch of him burned, making your nails dig into his back.

“Fuck” you both say in unison as he bottoms out, you’re already clenching around him. Tight, you were oh so tight. Your pussy clenching so tightly around him that for a moment he didn’t even think he could breathe. Oh and it felt so good, too good, you really were going to make him crazy.

“Relax, I got you” his voice strained holding himself back from cumming just from entering you. Your body relaxes at his command, grip less tight on him. Such a good girl you were, such a good girl for him. With the slight relief he starts moving into you, feeling the way your pussy tries to pull him back in every time he drags himself back. It was an intoxicating feeling, his eyes shut as he slowly moves in and out of you, quietly moan your name. Each drag on his hip making you feel more and more crazed as your pleasure climbs towards it peak again.  Your high feeling just out of reach with how slowly he was moving in and out of you. You needed to feel more of him, needed him harder, needed him faster.

“Please fuck me Shota,” you whine as you try to take him deeper into you, almost hitting the spot that would drive you wild “fuck me harder, fuck me faster”

He chuckled into your arm, stilling his movements gaining another whine out of you in frustration, “For someone who claimed they were so worried about getting caught, your actions surely prove different.”

You attempt to roll your hips into him, but he just presses his hips harder into you forcing your back against the wall, unable to move. “Please” you breath out, clenching and unclenching around his length.  “I told you I didn’t care; I told you I needed you. Please. I need you to fuck me Shota, please fuck me Shota”

Oh, how he loved hearing you beg. It made him even harder inside of you, groaning into your neck as he calms himself down from cuming just from your words alone. Your nails did into his back, and you breathe out another please, another beg. At that, something snaps in him he grabs the bottom of your thighs, pulling them up so that your legs are now on his shoulder pulling you off of the wall. You gasp at the sudden movement, the feat of strength should have been expected from him but it didn’t stop it from being any less hot involuntarily clenching around him, wetting him even more. His strong hands find a tight grip onto your waist lifting you up and slamming you back down on his did, his hips moving in tandem with his upper body movements to fuck into you deeper, harder, faster.

It was exactly what you wanted but all to much at the same time. He was moving you as you weighed nothing to him, while all you could do is moan out his name as he fucks you like a feral beast, the grip you had on his shoulders almost painful to him making him go even harder. The sound of your pussy was almost as loud as your moans.

“You have to be quiet, baby or we really are gonna get caught.” He says not stopping his assault that was causing your volume. Your pussy had a mind of its own, clenching  harder around him at the thought of someone seeing the way he was treating your body. Aizawa didn’t think he could be any more turned on but you keep doing it to him. He slams your back into the wall, using his hand as a cushion behind your head as he pulls it towards him in a searing kiss. As he pulls away he smirks at you, his hips not stopping their movements, “ Oh you want to get caught don’t you? You want everyone to see how much nasty you are, how you’re letting me fuck you like a slut in this dirty alley way?”

You shake your head, but your body betrays you as you clench again on his dick, getting closer and closer to your peak. Your juices were spilling out around his dick, soaking his pants. “But baby I can feel it, you’re drenched. I never thought you would be so nasty, someone who looked so innocent, someone so beautiful would have such a filthy pussy. Now be a good girl for me and have this filthy pussy cum on my dick.”

As filthy as your pussy was for him, his mouth was even dirtier for you. He started pounding you into in exactly the right spot, eliciting a loud moan from you, making your eyes roll back his mouth finding your neck and biting down to silence you. 

“You’re taking my dick so well. Fuck, I’m so deep in you. You feel me right? You feel how deep I am in you?” He asks and you just nod your head no words being able to form in your mouth. One of his hands went down to rub your clit, feeling you clench harder at his movements wetting the two of you more and more that it was dripping on the ground. Before you could tip over the edge, he pulls his hand back slowing  his movements down again. You try not to whine so loudly but you couldn’t help it, the burn and strain in your legs returning as you no longer feel the euphoria that he was giving you. A pout forms on your face as you watch Aizawa raising his hand covered in you as he slowly grinds his hips into you, straining your legs further.

“Let’s see how you taste.” He says before licking one of his fingers, closing his eyes as if he was savoring the flavor of you. “Delicious” was the last thing he says before he shoves his slick covered fingers into your mouth down your throat making you gag. You start sucking on his fingers the best that you could while he resumes the harsh pace that he was at.  You looked so sexy to him sucking and choking on his fingers, he could only imagine how you would look with his dick in your mouth but now is not the time for that, not here.

But it did drive him crazier, fucking his fingers into your mouth as his other hand presses onto your stomach as his thumb rubs fiercely on your click. It was all too much for you, as if you could feel him everywhere all at once, so overpowering that you didn’t even have time to register that you were cumming and hard, the grip of your cunt on his dick was so tight that he could barely move. His movements didn’t stop and now you were squirting on him, soaking his shirt and pants. The scene before Aizawa was so vulgar, so sexy, you just came on his dick in a dingy alley and squirted all over him. He couldn’t stop himself anymore from cuming in you, his seed hitting your cervix which made you clench around him again, even harder. He kept cumming and cumming , he didn’t even know he had that much in him to give. Your greedy pussy sucking everything out of him, he had even forgotten to breathe. He slowly puts your legs down back around his waist, panting as small spurts of cum still shoot into you. Your foreheads are pressed together as you both catch your breath.

You’re the first one to say something, “well that was….”

“Yeah” he finishes your sentence opening his eyes to look at you, “are you okay?”

And then there you go with that smile again, “never been better” you breathe out with a small giggle. “But I do think we should probably get ourselves together.”

He nods as he slowly pulls out of you, both of yall hissing from the movement, extremely overstimulated leaving a connected trail of both of your juices as he leaves you. You start straightening out your shirt and your skirt, thinking back to how you got yourself in this situation in the first place. Not knowing how the two of you even ended in this predicament, you couldn’t blame it on alcohol. Neither of you even drank that much, but it was still making you overthink. What did any of this mean?

You look over at Aizawa while he fixes his pants, clearing your throat nervously as you fiddled with your skirt, “so would you like to talk about what just happened?”  Your question making him halt his moments. He sighs as he fixes himself, running his fingers through his hair seeming just as nervous as you were as if he wasn’t just fucking the soul out of you. Everything is quiet for a moment and you think maybe you really fucked up, that none of it meant anything to him, and you were just a quick relief to some stress he was under.

“I didn’t like seeing you with Sniper” he confesses after the long silence avoiding looking at you.

You blink several times, trying to process what he just said to you. There was no reason to be upset at seeing you with Sniper. “What?” you say louder than expected making his gaze turn to yours, his jaw clenched. Your face was crunched in a way that didn’t really give away what you were thinking.

“I was….” He exhales “jealous. Seeing you laugh and talk with Sniper. The two of you were so close during the whole meeting and then seeing you lean your head on his shoulder just set me off. I was jealous.”

“Are you serious right now?”  Your question matching the confused disbelieve that your face now showed. It didn’t make sense to you why he would be jealous of Sniper, it had you looking at him in a way that made him feel even more exposed than him voicing his feelings had him.

“Well seeing the woman, I like flirting back and forth with another doesn’t really bring me joy. The way you laughed and whispered to him as if it was just the two of you in the room ticked me off. And then you went and laid your head on his shoulder. That was it, that’s what made me storm off.” he huffed in annoyance so unlike him, getting more irritated as he sees a wide grin spread across your face before your burst out into laughter. You were laughing so hard; you had to grip your stomach and tears streaming down your face. Eventually you calm, wiping the tears from your eyes to see an extremely irritated Aizawa.  How could you just laugh in his face after he confessed his feelings for you? He never thought that you were that kind of person.

“This is funny to you?”

You let out a few more giggles, before you sigh happily looking up at him like you always do, “you’re really cute you know that”

He just scowls at you as you walk towards him, but he doesn’t back away allowing you to grab his face in both of your hands. He tries to turn his head, avoiding your gaze but you turn his face back to you, placing a gentle kiss of his lips. It takes everything in him not to kiss you back. He glares down at you when you pull away, more embarrassment in his look than anger.

“You know he’s my cousin, right?” You say with that stupidly beautiful smile on your face. It took a few moments for Aizawa to register what you said, his scowl deepening as his face reddened at the realization.

“Your cousin” he says with an air of relief and embarrassment

“Yes, my cousin” you giggle kissing him again.

“The two of you look nothing alike” he huffs out, thinking of how he could have possibly known that.

“True but that doesn’t make him any less of my cousin.” You release his face taking a step back to quickly scroll through your phone, showing Aizawa what looks like a large family picture and there was you and yup there was Sniper. “I could of sworn I told you before, he was the one who conceived me to move here and apply for UA.”  You say as you tap your finger on your chin, thinking back to when you first became his assistant.

Aizawa takes a deep breath, he feels like an idiot. He was jealous of your cousin. JEALOUS of your cousin. Fucked you for the first time in a back-alley (yes it was really hot, and he thoroughly enjoyed it but still that wasn’t how he envisioned his first time fucking you). His face reddens even more just thinking about it, his stoic expression trying to settle back into his face.

“And I like you too by the way” you say as you bat those pretty little eyes at him

“So let me take you out on proper date then” he tells you more than asks you, regaining his previous confidence.

“I’d love that”

Later that night after you’re home and cleaned up from your activities, while you lie in bed looking at the texts between you and Aizawa about the future date you’re going to have with him you get a text from none other than your cousin.

BadShot🔫: I know you fucked Erasure Head in that back alley

You stare at the message in horror, thoroughly embarrassed wondering how the hell he knew as you see the typing bubbles appear

BadShot🔫: the two of you weren’t very quiet.

You quickly respond back “blocked for harassment”

BadShot🔫: that’s fine I’m telling your mom

You never called someone so fast in your life.  He was definitely no longer your favorite cousin.

[plumipal]

Omg who is she?

She’s so pretty.

She has twice the wings Eden has. Idk what that means but it probably means something.

Also her name being Lilith… guys I’m sensing pattern here. Are you keeping another one named Adam locked in the basement?

Is she maybe his sister? I mean you can’t just drop a new bit of lore and run away. Explain yourself. Please? Pretty please with a cherry and cream on top? It would be much appreciated and desperately looked forward to.

Little side note who hurt my boy Eden in the second picture? Was it Lilith? If so her likability just dropped of dramatically.

Chat, meet Edens... Sister.

HER NAME IS LILITH!!!

So to even start this off, they are NOT human (I know, shocker). They're children of the stars, serving to protect and help the stars shine as bright as they do. Becasue of defects on both of them (the extra parts near their star core, making them unstable), they were cast out of the colony, cursed to wander the endless galaxies.

I know no one has wondered why Eden has a huge scar on his back or why he even got into the twst universe in the beginning, BUT LET ME TELL YOU ALL! It's her fault.

After a childish spat where it ended with Eden reaching for his weapon to strike her, she instead grabbed for hers and beat the ever living shir our of him, sending him flying to hopefully kill him. This resulted in him reaching the atmosphere of the twst world, crashing down (like a fallen star) into ramshackle around a week before the prefect arrived.

He was passed out for a week, motionless untill y/n, grim and crowley discover him in a vacant room in ramshackle, waking him up and tending to his wound.

So yeah this blond little bitch is the reason we have Eden in the twstverse mmm...

A look at the weapons, they both serve to be protection incase the star they serve gets attacked. The little vacant spot on the spear is for the core to be put in, aka their little star in their chest, the source of their power.

They can take it out, the spear acting as a magicpen sorta to help with their "magic" and being able to direction it. Don't take the core too far away from them tho, it serves as someone cutting off oxygen or blood flow ro us, easy kill on them.

Lilith has a few more wings on hers than a normal one does, just like her defect. This was becasue of a power imbalance, leading to her absorbing way too much power compared to the others during her creation, leading to her being very dangerous (basically a ticking timebomb).

Also a look again on Edens scar that Lilith caused. She foes not feel sorry for that, nor does she feel sorry for burning half of edens face off (first panel whre he is badly damaged, don't worry he will regenerate quickly).

You may also notice her wings being lighter, and that is becasue of their "purity" of other magical influences. Edens darkened quickly during his first week in twst, the blot around him forcing its way into the pigment. This also depends on how easily they adapt with other living beings, with Eden easily being able to copy and show humane emotions.

The love and devotion he feels for you is something he felt similar to his creator while he served the star, that love however turning more dark and twisted because of him copying the environment around him (aka the other twst men into you lol). He is also very heavily inspired by a raven, whish is why he has this "copying easily" ability.

Meanwhile Lilith is meant to resemble more of a dove, elegant and beautiful. Will she be romanceable? We will see...

One thing to make clear,

EDEN FUCKING HATES HER GUTS!! DO NOT PUT THEM IN THE SAME ROOM ONE OF THEM WILL DIE-

Thank you for coming to my Eden Ted talk I will be here all week.

[yourbiggestcrybaby]

The Lake

Clarisse La Rue X Reader

Warnings: um reader almost drowns, suggestive parts kinda, aggression, idk

You and Clarisse had never quite got along. She teased you and was outright rude. You hated her! Or at least that’s what you kept telling yourself . After one fight (over a freaking practice target) ends up in Clarisse accidentally drowning you. Turns out she’s not as mean as you expected…

Life at Camp Half-Blood was like stepping into a whole new world. As a demigod, you had always felt like something of an outsider, never quite fitting in anywhere. But when you arrived at camp about three weeks ago, everything suddenly clicked into place.

You had only realized your identity after being attacked on your way home from school. Your day had been completely normal. The regular mundane classes and hanging out with friends. You were on your way home, walking to the bus stop and that is when disaster struck. You couldn’t remember what had happened. All you knew was that you had been attacked from behind. You felt massive claws dig into your back and you had passed out. Thankfully, you were saved by a stranger who turned out to be a fellow demigod. It was a terrifying experience, but it opened your eyes to a reality you had never imagined.

The journey to Camp Half-Blood with your frantic mother was a blur of explanations and disbelief. She told you about the monsters that had attacked you, about the dangers that lurked in the world beyond camp, and about the truth of your heritage. At first, you thought you were losing your mind, but as you stepped through the gates of camp and saw others like you, training and honing their skills, everything suddenly made sense.

The first few weeks at camp were overwhelming. Making friends, exploring camp, and learning to fight—all of it was scary, but it was also exhilarating. For the first time in your life, you felt like you belonged somewhere.

But then came Clarisse La Rue, and everything changed. Strong, fearless, and undeniably beautiful, she also had a mean streak a mile wide. Your feud with her started almost immediately, sparked by a prank that went too far.

It began with Clarisse and her friends stealing your clothes while you were in the shower. Left with nothing but a towel, you had to walk back to your cabin in front of the entire camp, humiliated and angry. Clarisse's laughter only made it worse, and when you confronted her about it, she just smirked and made a crude joke stating, “what’s wrong angel? Maybe I just wanted to see you in a towel”

Disgusting! Well that’s what you told yourself. You hoped she hadn’t seen the flush on your cheeks or the way your breathing sped up.

From that moment on, it seemed like every interaction with Clarisse ended in a fight. Insults were thrown, tempers flared, and the tension between you grew with each passing day.

You had been trying to take the high road, to rise above Clarisse's constant taunts and jibes, but it seemed like she always found a way to get under your skin. Her ability to fluster you with just a few words was infuriating, and you were tired of letting her walk all over you.

It was a sunny Saturday afternoon when you finally decided you'd had enough. As you went about your usual activities at camp, your mind was made up: you were going to stand up Clarisse and put an end to her bullying once and for all.

Training beside the lake, practicing throwing daggers at a target, you were feeling unusually relaxed. That was until Clarisse showed up with her usual entourage, her presence casting a shadow over your newfound peace.

Turning around to face her, you squared your shoulders and looked her dead in the eye. "What do you want, La Rue?" you said, your tone dripping with defiance.

Clarisse smirked, her eyes wandering up and down your body. "You're at my target," she quipped, gesturing toward the bullseye on the target you had been practicing on.

"Really?" you retorted, feeling a surge of adrenaline. "Last time I checked, it didn’t have your name on it." You cringed internally at your own words, realizing they sounded like something out of a bad action movie.

She rolled her eyes and looked at you again defiantly. “If you don’t move, I guess I’ll just have to I’ll make you”

You took a deep breath, steeling yourself for what was to come. "You know what, La Rue? I'm tired of your games," you said, your voice steady despite the nerves that churned in your stomach. "If you want to fight, let's settle this once and for all."

Clarisse's grin faltered, replaced by a look of surprise and then anger. "You think you can take me on?" she snapped, her eyes narrowing with hostility.

"I know I can," you replied, your voice falsely confident. "Unless, of course, you're too scared to face me without your little entourage."

That really made her mad. She gestured for her friends to back off and picked up her spear from the ground. This was so stupid! You were going to get your ass beat over a target. You were thinking about backing down but you had always been stubborn, and the beady glint in Clarisse’s eyes only fuelled you on.

Clarisse came at you with a ferocity that took you by surprise. She moved with lightning speed, her spear flashing in the sunlight as she struck again and again. You barely had time to react as you dodged and blocked her hits, feeling the force reverberate through your arms.

You hadn’t expected her to be so aggressive. This girl obviously had some pent up anger.

Despite your best efforts, Clarisse's meticulous hits soon had you on the defensive. You could feel yourself being pushed back, your footing becoming unsteady as you struggled to keep up with her relentless onslaught.

But then, due to both sheer luck and desperation, you managed to turn the tide. Ducking under one of Clarisse's swings, you seized the opportunity to land a solid strike square on her side. The impact sent her stumbling backward, momentarily stunned.

Seizing the opportunity, you pressed your advantage, launching a series of attacks that left Clarisse reeling. Before Clarisse could fully recover, you found yourself on top of her, straddling her as you pinned her to the ground. The world seemed to stand still as you looked down at her, the heat of the fight still coursing through your veins.

You couldn’t help but notice the light blush that spread across her cheeks and the way she glanced quickly at your lips.

But then, to your surprise, Clarisse's lips curled into a smirk, and she looked up at you with a glint in her eye. "You know, for someone who claims to hate me so much, you, you seem to really enjoy being on top of me." she said, her voice low and husky.

You felt your cheeks flush at her words, your mind momentarily distracted by her suggestion. And in that split second of distraction, Clarisse seized her opportunity.

With a swift and decisive move, she managed to flip you off of her, regaining the upper hand in the fight. Before you could react, she was on her feet, her spear pointed at your chest.

"Nice try, newbie," she said, her tone laced with amusement. "But it looks like I win this round."

Before you could protest, Clarisse reached out and shoved you backward, sending you tumbling into the lake with a splash

Turning around to her friends she laughed and high fives them.

“Seriously Clarisse?” One of her siblings said “I know you wanted to prove your point but this seems too far”

Clarisse froze, her laughter dying in her throat as she looked up at her sister, confusion etched on her face. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“You know she can’t swim...right?” her sister replied, her expression grave.

Time seemed to stand still for Clarisse as realization washed over her. What had she done? Without another thought, she sprinted over to the lake, her heart pounding in her chest. She could feel panic seizing her body as she scanned the water's surface, desperately searching for any sign of you.

And then she saw you, your form still and unmoving at the bottom of the lake. Without hesitation, Clarisse dove in, the weight of her heavy metal armor dragging her down. But she paid it no mind as she reached you, wrapping her arms around your still form and propelling you upward toward the surface.

Breaking through the water's surface, Clarisse gasped for breath, dragging you with her as she swam to the shore. As she laid you down on the ground, she could feel her heart pounding in her chest, her hands trembling as she frantically checked for a pulse.

When she found none, panic threatened to overwhelm her. Without hesitation, she began performing CPR, the sound of her own ragged breaths mingling with the rhythm of her compressions. With each breath, she prayed for a response, a sign that you were still alive.

And then, after what felt like an eternity, you coughed and sputtered, your eyes fluttering open as you gasped for air. Relief flooded through Clarisse as she pulled you into a tight embrace, her hands shaking with emotion.

“Thank gods” she said, looking up to the sky as if she was actually thanking them.

You were in shock. What had just happened? Within the span of about twenty minutes, Clarisse had challenged you to a duel, had beaten you at said duel, had tried to drown you, and had then saved you.

You looked up at her, eyes wide, “I’m using the target”

She looked at you slightly perplexed, that’s what you cared about? Not the fact that she had almost killed you?

“Whatever you say pretty girl”

[kradogsrats]

Now we know What Viren Did(tm), and...

My personal side-eye aside, that denouement is actually an incredibly elegant application of the story's themes, within the scope of restrictions imposed by this particular medium (i.e. a cartoon targeted for pre-teens and younger). Like, I personally assumed for a long time that we would simply never find out the details, because it would be either too grim and/or violent for the story's intended rating or... kind of a let-down. On the surface, what we got seems like the second.

Most of us have looked at Claudia killing the baby deer to heal Soren's paralysis and went "well, it was obviously that, but y'know... worse, somehow," which is a completely reasonable assumption to make. It was definitely what was narratively implied, which makes the supposedly-damning ingredient being "your mother's tears" instead of like... idk, "your mother was pregnant again and I used the life of that unborn child to save you" or something kind of "... oh. Okay, then."

To be fair, that might also be why they went so hard in the IMO inadvisable male-dominated writer room direction of "so I held her down and took what I wanted" to convey the requisite "he's doing A Bad," which is what all my side-eye is toward. But here's the thing:

On some level, dark magic is about violation—of nature, of others, and of the self. Even violation by Aaravos, ultimately.

But it's also not just that.

Dark magic also sits at the center of one of the primary themes of the whole story, which is the evil of denying others' personhood. We see it again and again from the angle of the heroic cast: "You keep calling it a monster," "You knew he was a person, just like you," "She's not 'the elf.' She's Rayla." The evil they do not allow to take root is seeing people as things, the place where all other evils begin. (GNU Terry Pratchett, IYKYK.)

So Viren's damning crime, the crime that is dark magic, is this:

In that moment, he looks at his wife, and sees only a source of what he needs. One that he can take from as he wills. That's why Lissa leaves—Viren has pulled the circle he draws around "people" versus "abstractions, things to be used" in so tightly that she has found herself suddenly on the outside of it. That's not something you come back from, in a relationship.

As for it all being over something as innocent as Lissa's tears, as opposed to something like her blood, her unborn child, her heart, her last breath—that's also, I think, part of the point. It's a renewable resource, harvested without doing permanent physical harm, but it's still a violation of her. This is the ultimate refutation of the "but what if ethically-sourced phoenix feathers" argument as being, for the final time, bullshit.

When Viren bursts in looking like he walked straight out of hell and demands use of her tears, could Lissa have given them freely? Sure... but she didn't. Could he have talked her around, if he invested the time and respect for her that would require? Probably, but again, he didn't! He took what he'd decided was necessary, did what he decided he had to do, because he could.

And like, he knew, even then. Because while dark magic twists your perceptions and reasoning, dragging you deeper each time—it can't twist you so much that you no longer have a choice. It will do everything it can to make you rationalize making that choice, over and over, but it can't erase that it is a choice.

Like, I'm honestly kind of emotional about it because while the surface level watching experience is kind of hmmmmm, it delivers so well on a thematic and meta level that I'm just like idk. Fuck. It's good.

[oh-no-its-bird]

Celebrating my 21'st birthday by posting an obnoxious amount of

Warring States Hatake OC things !

Continuing the warring states era Hatake oc train as I try to fill up all 21 slots for the clan !!! I honestly don't know if I'll make all 21, but I'd like to at least give them all names, just to make the world feel lived in. I might ask someone else to donate an oc or two in the future to guest star in the cast, idk

But anyways !!!! In a clan who loves to adopt, it stands to reason that they ofc have people among them who weren't born Hatake.

With that said: Pyromaniac explosion enthusiast Hatake who was a failed bloodline theft anyone ???

Both Sora and Tsuki are pretty fucking horrendous towards Tetsuo, but in large part it's Tsuki leading the charge. Sora follows his lead, as he's the first friend she made in the clan. They're honestly pretty close

Meanwhile: Sora remains the biggest Haruka fan ever. Being saved from the bloodline thief camp by the woman really cemented her in her mind as her hero.

After Sora lost her arm at 12 when playing with an explosion seal she'd explicitly been told not to play with, Tsuki proposed they learn to do hand signs together.

Sora would eventually be able to figure out how to do pull off a jutsu with only one hand, but it takes a long time to get there— and even when she is there, it still takes longer than if she had 2 hands. Working with Tsuki, they can both pull off just about any jutsu as fast as any one person can. Faster, even

Top ten images taken 5 seconds before disaster...

I was gonna draw 2 more pages for this, of the actual drowning attempt, but I got tired and wanted to post this today so you get a summary of what comes next instead. (Maybe I'll finish drawing it and post it separately another day)

Tsuki and Sora bullied Tetsuo pretty relentlessly till the boys were about 13, when Tsuki took things a step too far and basically tried to drown Tetsuo. Tetsuo fought back, beating both Tsuki and Sora's asses pretty soundly— and catching Haruka's attention in the process.

Seeing Tetsuo fend off the other two made up Haruka's mind, and she declared he'd be her new heir. Which he... didn't actually want to be. Oops!

Sora was pretty effectively scared out of bullying Tetsuo any further, and Tsuki mellowed out a good amount— though he remained mischievous, but that was pretty standard for him.

The blue tint of Tetsuo's skin would fade only some months later as he grew out of his Hoshigaki traits and into his Hatake blood. This also helped to lessen teasing from the other kids, along with the whole "he's the new clan heir now" thing.

Good for him.

The next day Tetsuo is super pissy and sleep deprived while Tsuki is suspiciously smug and well rested. On the bright side, Tetsuo has officially learned his lesson and will now refuse to let Tsuki ever give anyone anything he's drawn ominous spirals on.

As adults, Tetsuo and Tsuki are... fine, honestly. They're friends, in a way. Might even be counted as close— or as close as you can be, with Tsuki.

The fact that Tsuki got himself permanantly posessed by an Uzu spiral demon on that mission gone wrong in Wave doesn't make things as complicated than you'd think. Tetsuo seems to often land himself in the position of acting as Tsuki (and often times Sora's) handler.

I had a few more things I wanted to draw, but ran out of time. I'll probably just try and draw and post it later. No Sora piercing lore, Daisuke introduction post or full Tetsuo drowning comic for you!!! (Yet)

Umm final thoughts:

Tetsuo is doomed to forever be surrounded by maniacs

Early Konoha oc art pt. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]

[m4rs-ex3]

so naturally i was up at 1am the other night watching tdp related youtube videos and i figured i'd watch the 2020 comic con panel since it'd been a while and oh my god some of this shit

(also just me talking about how much i love this cast)

"IT IS I, DARK_MAGE_DAD420" i cannot believe that is real

aaravos: "if i want to do a screen call, i must perform a cosmic blood ritual. with a mortar and pestle. AND FLOATING KNIVES" you are fucking kidding me (edit: i realize that pertains to what he did in s2 but still like "cosmic" "ritual" "knives"? cmon)

jason simpson playing the ukulele. that's all.

jack: *talking about how he had a baby in quarantine* eric: i've been doing a lot of gardening... uh i haven't had a baby, but you never know! i mean if it's possible through social distancing aaron: if anybody can make that happen through social distancing it's aaravos you are F U C K I N G KIDDING ME

racquel: some fun things i did- i uhh died my own hair and burned my scalp and i would like to inform you all it's finally healed and we're good to go, i'm ready to do it again! i'm obsessed with the fact that racquel is quite literally claudia irl

the ttm read is awesome. jack came with the Rayla Voice fucking PREPARED oh my god

i don't think i've ever actually talked about the dnd sketch but it is one of my favorite things in the entire world

rayllum in this sketch is amazing particularly callum he is SO down bad like "my character is a mysterious elf assassin with two beautiful blades to match my two beautiful eyes~~ ✨" like hello that's canon idc if it's a sketch that is canon

"my character cannot help but look at her. he locks eyes with rayla's mage" "....there will be time for roleplaying later" HELLO THATS GOLD

viren in this skit is genuinely one of the funniest things i've ever seen. i cannot emphasize enough this is comedy

necromancer ezran. i think about him daily.

s: "i start swinging my sword at, uhh, idk, rayla's mage" r: "WAIT WHAT" c: "uh wait wait i take it back MY SWORDS GLEAM INTO THE LIGHT AS I LEAP TO THE DEFENCE OF THE BEAUTIFUL MAGE!" s: "hey no takebacks!" sibling ass fight i love them

"LIKE WHAT DO YOU ACTUALLY DO?"

i rolled a 1 😐

i loot their corpses for blood >:D

"do elves have four toes?" "i always assumed that they would have 6 so they could learn how to count to 20" paula my love

someone get sasha some hamantaschen

i don't need arc 3 actually i just need the beta script including as many guns n roses references as possible

racquel: ok call me crazy, call me crazy... jesse: you're crazy, racquel racquel: THANK YOU FINALLY they are literally just them

"I WILL NOT BE POSTING A SINGLE THING ABOUT ICE, FOR I AM JULIA" (okay but.... venous frigoris anyone?)

paula: ugh, no one likes soren jesse: well no one likes rayla racquel: you two should fight 😈

long hard sigh

bonus: jason: literally no one likes viren so let's move on

"how old is bait?" "sasha, how old do you think bait is?" "3."

"is-is a glow toad kinda like a toad?" "................kind of"

i fucking love sasha have i ever mentioned that i fucking love sasha

"i think that he's 56." "either 3 or 56 only, apparently"

the saga announcement is great i love how everyone's is so excited they don't even know all of their characters are about to be destroyed physically and emotionally

the way aaron says it so fucking funny "is there gonna be a season 4?" "uh so i think it's really important to emphasize: yes-"

"i too want to cry" "just cry, just-" "IT'S A PANDEMIC. NO TEARS. THERE'S NO CRYING IN A PANDEMIC." "...where is this rule coming from?"

and finally there were a handful of moments that i could not do justice by transcribing in a post so here is a masterfully edited compilation i made

[ezrazone]

also like. i don’t have this fully articulated in my head so i’m kind of just working it out here. bear with me. but part of the “mission” of the amc iwtv show is to repair anne rice’s text, right? to respect what works and to let new things fill in the gaps where the text is, um, lacking (see: violently racist and misogynistic). and i would say that the show so far has been successful in many regards - ldpdl is an actual Black character. credit where it’s due. jacob’s here to stay. but ultimately a show that is deferent to anne rice’s estate and to the power of amc’s money is ultimately always going to be in service of antiblackness because antiblackness is the blood that oils the machine that allows television shows to make millions of dollars. plain and simple. that kind of TV money in a capitalist state does not exist without imperialism, without slave labor, without genocide, without eradication of indigenous people and their lands, without the dehumanization of black people. so there’s just never any such thing as keeping your head down and just being grateful a show is less racist than the racist book being adapted. i guess i just don’t believe in “fandom” anymore because to be a “fan” is to accept a level of subservience to capitalist forces protected by intellectual property law and ultimately normalizing of empire that i just do not fucking believe in and it does not suit the needs of fans who are the most ostracized time and time again by these white supremacist fan communities regardless of the alleged anti-racism in a given text. that anti-racism can only ever be symbolic in a pre-revolution context. the least we can do, since amc is not actually keeping our lights on, is to engage with the text and all texts as bravely as we can muster, including releasing this fucking false idol worship that makes IP holders into gods. fuck anne rice and her genius brain. she was a racist wretch who hated to share so much she blew up half of her own “fan” communities. idk man i dont think it’s a coincidence that the fans with the most concentrated hitler particles seem to be the ones with the most access to the cast and crew. antiblackness gets you really fucking far in this world. gives you access to material resources. replicates the lie that power is the most important quality in any artist, and that to love a text is to want to rub up against the chosen few who are involved in this legal iteration. you think those fans will give a fuck about jacob anderson when he’s no longer under amc contract? these old modes of popular culture worship will turn to sand in the dustbin of history full of white louis funko pops amen

[theriverbeyond]

Okay please help me I'm not good at the media literacy; did we ever find out who tried to smother Harrow at the beginning of HtN? With all the gaslighting (and gatekeeping and girlbossing) going on I genuinely have no idea what was happening there. Like,, I doubt it was Ianthe for some reason. Pls advice, i am lost

HIII sorry i was going to reply to this a few days ago and forgot whoops

so, in text, we never get specific confirmation of who tried to smother Harrow. What specifically happens there is also obscured by Harrow's own perception/ exaustion/ grief etc, because she doesn't investigate anything that we might want her to -- like figuring out WHOSE blood is on the nails embedded in the wall or doing any psycometry on the crates moved to cover it all, etc.

Anyway -> John logically makes sense, because he both has access to her and also later sics G1deon on her repeatably trying to get her to "activate" in the Lyctoral sense -- however I actually don't think it's so clear cut for the same reason: John doesn't do his own dirty work, generally, unless totally cornered, and attempting to kill her *himself* to trigger a fight/flight Lyctoral reaction is a BAD idea -- what if it works, and now she is a full Lyctor who knows the Emperor just tried to kill her? Also, at this point in the book it's only been a few days since Harrow ascended, and the lobotomy is fresh -- the 1st murder attempt is *before* Ianthe delivers the letters "upon coherence" -- so I'm not sure he'd be yet motivated to attempt murder vs waiting a couple more days and attempting some amateur trauma therapy.

I agree that Ianthe seems unlikely, because she wouldn't have approached Harrow in her murder mode. Also she wants Harrow to be in debt to her, and she wants Harrow to be alive. So she has no motivation. AND she's missing one arm & rejects the new one they graft onto her, so. Not really a pillow smotherer, IMO. Augustine and G1deon don't show up until the Mithraeum so they're out as suspects, and I am pretty sure Mercymorn WOULD attempt a mercy-killing but I don't think she'd use a pillow, and also I don't think she showed up until after Harrow achives coherence.

Like I think John is the most logical possibility of the avalible named cast, but TO ME it's not clear cut. I mean I guess John could have ordered a random cohort grunt to attempt murder but idk. If anyone else has opinions/thoughts pls lmk!!

[moneymartin]

MAY I REQUEST FOR LOTTIE WITH A SKATER GF HCS

🦌-lottie with skater!gf hcs

k this has been sitting in my inbox for like a week im sorry zzz also pulling stuff out of my ass cuz im so sleepyt

rich girl yes, she def buys you your gear and shit

if you ask her for a new deck she will literally get it for you no hesitation even if she already got you one

even the clothes and shoes like okayyyy (all brand name clothes for skating r so expensive too omfg)

offering her some help cause she wants to learn just for you

one day before she asked for it though she came home with scratches and a few bruises here and there cause she was trying to learn while you were out of the house :(

cannot balance thats why it happened

when you do end up teaching her though she is gripping onto you so tight it feels like your shirt is gonna rip 😭 she’s terrified of falling in front of you it is literally her biggest fear

teaching her tricks is a whole new level like she cannot pop up the tail properly and always holds on to you cause she sux!

you probably get her the skate trainers so she can do them when you’re gone ☹️

idk if ppl are gonna know what i’m talking abt but having her stand on the board while you hold her hands and she jumps so you can make the board underneath spin

please tell me you guys know what i’m talking abt or i’m gonna sound fucking crazy…

when she gets what she considers good she always calls you out so you can see her do a silly lil pop shuv or a strawberry milkshake 😭

when you sucked at skating you would get hurt ALL THE TIME!!!

lots of blood thats for sure.. lottie tending to your wounds and calling you ‘stupid’ for not wearing a helmet

you tell her “it looks dumb on me” and she ends up smacking you in the area where it hurts just so you know not to do it again and wear the damn helmet no matter how dumb it looks 😒

makes up for that tho fs! kisses your little scratches and bruises while you sleep so they magically feel better in the morning

definitely gives you massages too like she is such an angel oh my god

i think if you broke her arm or leg she’d FREAK!!!

she sees your hand twisted in that weird way but you’re just sitting on the floor holding up your wrist while she’s literally sobbing and calling an ambulance 🤧

same thing with the leg me thinks… your ankle twisted or something like that

when you get your arm casted up she helps you do everything like dress and cook and all that shebang

also she writes all over the cast like she makes it hard for the other yjs to sign it cause all there is on there is her name a bunch of times and a million hearts and doodles

one space on there where the yjs have their names cramped up while lottie’s is everywhere 😕

when it heals and you start to skate again lottie makes you wear a big ass sweater with a shit ton of padding underneath

probably makes you wear big old pants too so she can pad them up as well

gets you a big dumb helmet too so you don’t get hurt

but in reality she just cares about you too much and hates seeing you in pain 🙁🙁🙁

[theetherealbloom]

AS GOOD A REASON - CH. 3 | OBERYN MARTELL

Chapter Three: There Will Be No Glory

Summary: You, who has made it her life's work to get retribution on those who mistreated and harassed you when you were a child. The scars on your body are a physical reminder of the suffering you endured at the hands of abusers, and they also provide the fuel for your years-long quest for retribution.

Paring: Oberyn Martell x Fem!Reader

Warnings: 18+ MDNI DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT, MINORS GO AWAY, GoT is full of serious and harmful topics, mentions of SA, Rape (not the reader), Murder, Violence, Gore, War, Poison, Scars, Burns, Scratching, Su!c!de, AU, Age–Gap Romance, Angst, FLUFF, Eventual SMUT, Swearing, PTSD, Depression, Anxiety, Crying, Suggestive content, Flirting, Blood, War, Religion References, Nudity, Domestic Abuse, Incest, Prostitution, Weapons, Fire, Horror, Character Deaths, Rewrite Alternate Universe, Sex, Alcohol, Revenge, 

Word Count: 8.4k

A/N: I swear I’m cookin’ back here. I've been writing this series non-stop for days lmao. Idk what hit me?? I actually have the next chapter ready to post too lmao. Hope everyone is doing well!

Side note: I’m dyslexic and English isn’t my first language! So I apologize in advance for the spelling and/or grammatical errors. As always, reblogs, comments, and likes are always appreciated. Thank you and happy reading!

Song: hunter by Paris Paloma

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KING'S LANDING, THE SEPT OF BAELOR — EARLY MORNING

The Sept of Baelor was alive with a flurry of activity. Servants moved swiftly, preparing for the grand wedding of Joffrey Baratheon and Margaery Tyrell. Every corner of the grand sept was being scrubbed, every flower meticulously placed, every banner hung with precision. The sun had barely risen, casting a golden hue over the stained-glass windows, but already the heat of the day was making the air feel thick and heavy.

You were in the midst of it all, arranging the delicate floral garlands along the altar. The scent of the flowers was overwhelming, mingling with the incense that filled the Sept. Your hands moved mechanically, arranging the blooms with precision, though your mind was elsewhere. The headache that had been gnawing at the edges of your consciousness all morning now pulsed with a vengeance, a searing pain behind your eyes. It was getting harder to focus, and the heat didn’t help.

Voices echoed through the Sept as people hurried by, servants calling to one another in preparation, but it was all a dull hum in your ears. You pressed a hand to your temple, closing your eyes for a moment as the migraine intensified. The world seemed to blur at the edges, the weight of your own thoughts pressing down on you, mingling with the physical pain. 

Then, suddenly, a firm hand gripped your arm. You gasped, eyes snapping open as you were pulled away from your work, your feet stumbling beneath you. The world spun as you were dragged through the corridors, away from the main hall. 

Your first instinct was to fight back. You kicked, struggled, your heart pounding with panic. But the grip was unyielding, dragging you into a darkened alcove, hidden away from prying eyes. 

“What are you—? Let go of me!” you hissed, your voice strained with fear and frustration as you fought against your captor, kicking and trying to free yourself.

Then, in the dim light, you saw him. Oberyn Martell. His eyes gleamed with amusement, but there was something else in them—a hunger, a dangerous edge. He didn’t release you, instead pressing you further into the shadows, the cool stone wall biting against your back.

“You—” you began, breathless, still trying to regain control of the situation, but Oberyn leaned closer, cutting off your words with the intensity of his gaze. 

“Shh," he whispered, his voice a low rumble that sent a shiver down your spine. "I’ve been looking for you.”

His words hung between you like a dangerous secret. His body pressed against yours, firm and unyielding, his hands bracing on either side of your head, caging you in. Your heart raced as you realized there was no escaping him now. You forced yourself to meet his gaze, determined to maintain your composure despite the sudden surge of heat that flushed your skin. 

“What are you doing?” you demanded, your voice shaky but defiant. “We shouldn’t be here—”

Oberyn’s smile widened, the corner of his lips curving into a wicked smirk. “Shouldn’t we?” His tone was teasing, but his eyes were dark, intense. His face was so close, his breath warm against your skin. “You’ve been avoiding me. I’ve noticed.”

“I’m working,” you replied, trying to maintain control of your voice, trying to keep your heart from pounding so loudly in your chest. “And you should be—”

But Oberyn interrupted you, his hand brushing lightly against your arm, sending sparks shooting up your spine. "You carry yourself with grace, more like a lady of the court than a servant.” His gaze trailed over you, studying you, watching the way you tried to hide the tremor in your breath. “It makes me wonder… who are you really?”

Your throat tightened. The question cut too close to the truth. You had worked so hard to blend in, to be unnoticed, yet Oberyn’s gaze seemed to peel back the layers you had carefully built. He was too perceptive, too sharp.

“I’m no one,” you lied, your voice steadier than you felt. “Just a servant.”

Oberyn chuckled softly, but there was no humor in it. He leaned closer, his lips brushing the shell of your ear as he spoke. “A servant who speaks with such eloquence, who watches others like a hawk, as if you’re calculating their every move.” His breath was hot against your skin, his presence overwhelming as he whispered, “You’re planning something, aren’t you?”

Your pulse quickened. His words were dangerous, far too close to what you had been so careful to hide. Oberyn was watching you with an intensity that made your skin burn, and for a moment, you couldn’t breathe. He saw through you in a way no one else had. The facade you wore was slipping under his gaze, and you weren’t sure if you could hold it up any longer.

“I don’t know what you mean,” you said, your voice barely more than a whisper.

Oberyn tilted his head, his dark eyes searching yours, reading the fear and the defiance in equal measure. He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You’re a good liar,” he murmured, his lips brushing against your skin as he spoke. “But I’ve spent my life around liars. And you... you are no ordinary servant.”

You swallowed hard, your back pressed firmly against the cold stone as Oberyn’s presence enveloped you. His fingers brushed lightly against your jaw, tracing the line of your face as he studied you. "There's something about you," he said, his voice soft but dangerous. "Something... familiar."

Your breath caught in your throat. He was getting too close, too close to the truth you had buried so deeply. You had to regain control, had to push him away before he uncovered everything.

“Let me go,” you whispered, though your voice lacked the strength you intended. 

Oberyn’s eyes glimmered with something unreadable as he held you there, trapped between him and the wall. He leaned in, his lips hovering near yours, the tension between you crackling like wildfire. “Not yet,” he whispered, his voice a promise, a warning. 

And in that moment, you realized you were caught.

Oberyn stood so close, his presence overwhelming, his eyes filled with that dangerous blend of curiosity and something more primal. You could feel the heat radiating from him, the air between you thick with tension, as if the entire world had fallen away, leaving just the two of you in this darkened corner of the Sept.

His voice, low and smooth, broke the silence, sending a shiver down your spine. “My sister used to write to me, you know,” he began, his lips curling into a small, almost bittersweet smile. “Princess Elia. We were always apart, but her letters kept me close to her.” He paused, watching you closely, as though he could see right through the facade you’d carefully built over the years. 

You stiffened at the mention of Elia, your heart clenching painfully. You hadn’t heard that name spoken so intimately in years. You were only a child then, but you remembered her well—kind, gentle, her presence like a soft light amidst the darkness that surrounded the Red Keep. Your hands trembled slightly, but you quickly clenched them into fists, trying to maintain your composure as Oberyn continued.

“There was one letter,” he mused, his voice softening as if recalling a distant memory. His fingers lightly traced the air, as if mimicking the act of writing. “She wrote about a servant. A girl, a child really, whose parents had given her away. She never mentioned the girl’s name, but she always said how kind she was. How strong, despite everything.”

Your breath caught in your throat. You knew he was talking about you. Elia had been the only one who had shown you kindness, who had given you a place to belong when the world had taken everything from you. But you couldn’t let him know that. You couldn’t let anyone know who you truly were. The weight of your past was a burden you had carried alone, and it had to stay that way.

Oberyn stepped closer, his eyes searching yours, as though he could find the truth hidden behind your carefully guarded expression. “I wonder…” he whispered, his lips hovering near your ear. “Was that girl you?”

You swallowed hard, every instinct screaming at you to run, to get away, but Oberyn’s presence held you in place. His gaze was relentless, burning into you, waiting for an answer you couldn’t give.

“I—” You struggled to find the words, your mind racing, but your throat felt tight, your heart hammering in your chest. You had spent years building this mask, this life as a mere servant, someone no one would look at twice. But now, in the span of moments, Oberyn was threatening to tear it all away.

His hand lifted, fingers grazing the side of your face, and the world seemed to narrow down to that single point of contact. “Who are you, truly?” he asked, his voice barely more than a whisper, but there was no mistaking the intensity in his tone.

The question hung in the air, suffocating. His proximity, the way his body loomed over yours, the way his eyes pinned you in place—it was all too much. The pressure, the closeness, the danger of being exposed—it all came crashing down on you, and suddenly, something snapped inside you.

Without warning, you moved.

Your knee shot up, connecting with Oberyn’s side, hard enough to knock the wind out of him, but not enough to cause real harm. He staggered back, his expression briefly shifting to one of surprise before it morphed into something almost amused. But you didn’t give him time to recover. You slipped out from under his arm, using his momentary lapse to dart past him, your body moving with an agility you hadn’t shown before. 

He chuckled, low and dangerous, clearly not expecting the sudden resistance. “I see,” he murmured, rubbing his side where you’d struck him, his eyes gleaming with something far more dangerous than before. “You’re full of surprises.”

But you didn’t stop to listen. You were already moving, slipping back into the main hall of the Sept where the other servants were still bustling about, preparing for the wedding. The light from the stained-glass windows bathed the room in a kaleidoscope of colors, but you barely noticed. Your heart was pounding in your chest, adrenaline still coursing through your veins as you forced yourself to keep walking, blending back into the crowd of workers.

No one seemed to notice your disheveled state, the faint tremor in your hands as you returned to your duties. You grabbed a bouquet of flowers, your fingers working mechanically as you set them in place, your mind racing with the encounter you had just escaped.

Oberyn had been close—too close. You had no idea how much he truly knew or how much he suspected, but it was clear he wasn’t going to let this go. You could still feel his eyes on you, the way he had studied you as if he could unravel all your secrets.

But you wouldn’t let him. You had survived this long by keeping your past hidden, and you wouldn’t let anyone—no matter how charming, how dangerous—pull you back into that life. 

As you worked, your mind kept replaying his words, the way he had looked at you with that knowing gaze. You could feel the danger closing in, but you had no choice but to press on. The game was far from over, and you would have to be even more careful from now on.

But one thing was clear—Oberyn Martell was not a man easily fooled.

KING'S LANDING, THE SEPT OF BAELOR — DAY

You lingered in the cool shadows of the Sept, hidden from view, just another servant who wasn’t meant to be seen. You weren’t supposed to be part of the grand ceremony at all. Your role, after all, was to prepare for the feast that would follow this extravagant display—a celebration meant to rival even the greatest of royal unions.

But something compelled you to stay.

The air was thick with the scent of incense, and the sound of hushed murmurs echoed off the high stone walls as nobles and lords gathered to witness the joining of Houses Tyrell and Lannister. It was all falling into place, every step of this elaborate plan leading to this moment. The tension in the room crackled like lightning before a storm.

You stood, your heart pounding, as Margaery Tyrell, radiant in her flowing gown, walked down the aisle on the arm of her father, Mace Tyrell. Her golden hair shimmered in the light of the stained-glass windows, and her face was calm—serene even—as though she had been preparing for this her entire life. You watched closely, your gaze sharp, dissecting every movement, every flicker of emotion. The entire event was a spectacle, a symbol of power, of politics. It was all theater. 

Mace Tyrell paused at the base of the steps, his expression proud as he handed his daughter to the waiting king. Joffrey stood at the top, his grin smug, cruel even, as he accepted Margaery’s hand. For a brief moment, your eyes lingered on the boy king, revulsion curling in your stomach. His reign had been a reign of terror and madness, and yet, in this moment, he stood like a conqueror, basking in the adulation of his subjects. 

Margaery, ever poised, ascended the steps with him, her head held high as she moved beside Joffrey. The High Septon awaited them, his voice booming through the Sept as he began the sacred rites. You felt a strange sense of detachment, as if watching the scene unfold from a great distance. Yet, there was a thrill beneath your skin—a deep, quiet satisfaction. Everything was in motion now, and there was no turning back.

The High Septon’s voice echoed through the hall, reverberating off the stone walls: 

"Let it be known that Margaery of House Tyrell and Joffrey of the Houses Lannister and Baratheon are one heart, one flesh, one soul. Cursed be he who would seek to tear them asunder."

As the words filled the air, you couldn’t help but smirk slightly to yourself, hidden in the shadows. Cursed, indeed. The irony of it all, the pageantry, the vows, the promise of unity, knowing what was to come—it was almost poetic.

You watched as Joffrey, in all his arrogance, turned to Margaery, taking her hands in his. "With this kiss, I pledge my love," he declared, loud enough for all to hear. His voice carried the same venomous self-importance it always had, as if he truly believed himself a benevolent ruler.

The crowd erupted in applause as their lips met in a kiss that was supposed to symbolize the unity of two great houses. You watched with an unreadable expression as Margaery played her part flawlessly, the perfect bride, while Joffrey basked in the adulation.

From your vantage point, you caught a glimpse of Sansa Stark, her face pale as she leaned toward Tyrion Lannister. Her eyes were dark, her lips pressed into a thin line as she whispered, "We have a new queen."

Tyrion, ever the cynic, barely glanced at her as he muttered under his breath, “Better her than you.”

You felt a surge of something—was it pity?—for Sansa, trapped in this viper’s nest with no escape. But this wasn’t your concern, not today. Today, the wheels were turning, and soon, this entire charade would unravel. You could feel it in the air, the undercurrent of tension beneath the applause and celebration. It was almost time.

The ceremony concluded, and the newly crowned queen and her king descended the steps together, the picture of royal power. The applause grew louder, the lords and ladies of Westeros rising to their feet in celebration of this union. But all you could focus on was the bitter truth behind it all. 

Your migraine throbbed in your temples, the dull ache intensifying as you stood there, watching the farce unfold before you. But you smiled, knowing that by the end of this day, Joffrey would no longer be king. The poison had already been set in motion, and the pieces on the board were exactly where you needed them to be.

For now, you would watch. The storm was coming, and you would be ready to strike when the time was right.

THE WEDDING RECEPTION 

KING'S LANDING GARDEN, RED KEEP — DAY

The garden was a riot of color and sound. Banners of crimson and gold fluttered in the warm breeze, the sigils of House Lannister emblazoned on every surface. Long tables stretched across the lush greenery, laden with golden platters of roasted meats, fruit, and delicate pastries. Lords and ladies of every great house in Westeros mingled, their voices a hum of excitement, laughter, and gossip, all gathered to celebrate the union of Joffrey Baratheon and Margaery Tyrell.

Jugglers tossed brightly colored balls high into the air while fire-breathers sent plumes of flames into the sky. Their movements were smooth and practiced, as if the entire performance were just another part of the show that was the king’s wedding. Some even walked on stilts, towering over the crowd, while musicians played lively tunes in the background, the melodies weaving in and out of the general din. 

You stood back, observing from the edge of the gardens, the soft perfume of roses mingling with the smoky scent of roasted meats. The spectacle of it all, the opulence, the grandeur—it was enough to make anyone feel insignificant in its shadow. You glanced down at your own hands, trembling slightly as you worked to keep them busy, adjusting a garland of flowers, though your task had long since been finished.  

The whole scene was a display of power, the ruling elite flaunting their wealth for all to see. Each lord and lady wore their finest silks, their jewels glinting in the midday sun as they danced, laughed, and raised their goblets in celebration. But beneath the surface, there was an undercurrent of tension. It lingered in the air, a brewing tempest on the horizon.

As your eyes drifted over the crowd, you spotted Bronn, Tyrion, and Podrick making their way through the guests. Tyrion’s face was hard to read, his usual wit tempered by the weight of the moment. He and Bronn exchanged quiet words, but even from a distance, you could see the unease in Tyrion’s posture. He didn’t want to be here, that much was clear.

And then, from across the garden, your gaze landed on Oberyn Martell. He and Ellaria Sand were seated near the fountain, utterly captivated by a contortionist performing impossible bends and twists before them. Ellaria laughed softly, her eyes alight with amusement, while Oberyn watched the performance with a more measured gaze. 

For a fleeting moment, his eyes found yours.

The world seemed to slow as the intensity of his gaze sent a jolt through your body. His dark eyes, filled with a mix of curiosity and something deeper, locked onto yours, as though he could see through every wall you had carefully constructed. Your heart quickened, and an unexpected warmth spread through your chest. The moment stretched between you, silent and loaded with meaning.

But you couldn’t hold it. Your pulse raced, your palms dampening with sweat as you quickly tore your gaze away, focusing on the flowers at your feet. You forced yourself to breathe, but the weight of his attention lingered on your skin, like a touch that burned long after it was gone.

You busied yourself again, rearranging the flowers though they didn’t need rearranging, anything to distract yourself from the flutter of nerves in your stomach. What was it about him? The way he looked at you wasn’t like the others. It was as if he knew something—something about you that no one else did. 

Your hands shook as you tried to steady your breath. You weren’t supposed to stand out here, in this garden full of lords and ladies, and yet… here you were, caught in the eyes of a man who seemed to see too much.

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Ellaria lean in closer to Oberyn, whispering something into his ear, her hand resting lightly on his arm. Her eyes flicked briefly in your direction, curiosity burning behind them. The same possessive glint you had seen before was there, but now it was tempered by a different kind of intrigue.

Your heart pounded in your chest. You weren’t sure if you were relieved or unnerved by the brief reprieve from Oberyn’s gaze. Either way, you knew one thing: nothing at this wedding was what it seemed.

The air was thick with revelry, the laughter of lords and ladies mingling with the melody of flutes and the clink of goblets. Everywhere you looked, you saw power—power flaunted by those who had it, and coveted by those who didn’t. But you played your role, dutifully present, a servant watching a play unfold.

At the head table, Olenna Tyrell moved with a deliberate grace, her hand trailing through Sansa Stark’s carefully braided hair before lingering on the stones of her necklace. The movement was subtle, her fingers deft, plucking at the polished purple gems with a kind of ease that only someone of her station could manage. It was easy to miss if one wasn’t paying attention—but you were always paying attention.

Your eyes narrowed, recognizing the faint gleam in Olenna’s fingers as she discreetly palmed something. The strangler. A crystalline form of poison, almost impossible to detect once dissolved in wine. Your heart beat faster, but outwardly, you remained composed, blending into the background of the celebration.

No one else seemed to notice. Not Sansa, lost in her sorrow, nor Tyrion, pouring himself another goblet of wine as he approached the table. Olenna’s conspiratorial smile went unnoticed by the rest, except you. You stepped closer, pretending to busy yourself with the trays of wine, ready to serve at a moment’s notice, but your ears were sharply tuned to their conversation.

You heard the last bit of Olenna’s words as she turned to Sansa, her voice low but pointed. "Perhaps if your pauper husband were to sell his mule and his last pair of shoes, he might afford to bring you to Highgarden for a visit. Now that peace has come and all is right with the world, it would do you good to see some of it." Olenna cast a glance toward Tyrion, her eyes gleaming with amusement. “You must excuse me. It's time I ate some of this food I paid for.”

Tyrion smirked, but the bitterness in his eyes was unmistakable. He raised his goblet in a mock toast, the weight of his station pressing heavily on his shoulders.

As Olenna moved away, the music changed. The musicians struck up a familiar tune, the one they always played for the Lannisters—a song of lions, of power.

"A coat of gold, or a coat of red, a lion still has claws..."

Margaery seemed to be enjoying the performance, her laughter light and genuine. But Joffrey, ever the restless king, was bored. He stood abruptly, tossing coins at the musicians as if they were little more than beggars. "Very good. Very good. Off you go," he said dismissively. The musicians scrambled to collect the coins, bowing as they backed away from the table, desperate to avoid the king’s wrath.

From where you stood, the entire spectacle felt sickening. You clenched your jaw, your hands hidden beneath your sleeves as you forced yourself to remain composed. It was all a game to them. A game of politics, of power, of lies. The poorest in King’s Landing would never see the remnants of this feast, no matter what Margaery or Joffrey decreed. You knew the truth. People like you—those without titles, lands, or coin—were little more than pawns to be sacrificed in their endless struggle for dominance.

You watched Margaery lean toward Joffrey, her hand resting on his arm as she tried to soothe his restlessness. "My love, why don't we make the announcement?" she said, her voice soft, almost coaxing. Joffrey banged his goblet against the table, the sharp clang silencing the crowd as he stood.

"Everyone!" he called out, his voice booming over the garden. "The queen would like to say a few words."

The crowd cheered, applauding the queen they had already accepted as their own. Margaery stood gracefully, her smile serene as she addressed the crowd. "We are so fortunate to enjoy this marvelous food and drink. Not all among us are so lucky. To thank the gods for bringing the recent war to a just end, King Joffrey has decreed that the leftovers from our feast be given to the poorest in his city."

More applause followed, and Joffrey beamed, soaking in the adoration of the crowd. Cersei, ever watchful, approached Margaery with a forced smile. "You're an example to us all," she said, placing a kiss on each of Margaery’s cheeks. The queen mother’s jealousy was palpable, her eyes glinting with barely concealed disdain.

You stood there, watching it all with clenched fists beneath your sleeves, your breath coming in slow, measured draws. The words, the gestures, the smiles—it was all smoke and mirrors. They paraded their generosity, their wealth, their power as if it were a gift to the realm, but you knew better. This peace was fragile, built on the bodies of the innocent, and it could shatter at any moment.

Your fingers dug into the fabric of your dress, a habit you had developed over the years. You scratched at the skin beneath, the pressure grounding you as memories flashed before your eyes—memories of pain, of cruelty, of the Mountain. The heat of the branding iron. The smell of burning flesh. Your own screams ringing in your ears until the world went dark.

You bit down hard on your lip, forcing the memories to retreat back into the dark corners of your mind. But the tension remained, a heavy knot in your chest, coiled tight like a viper ready to strike. Everything around you—the laughter, the opulence, the false smiles of lords and ladies—was part of this never-ending cycle of power. A gamble played at the expense of lives like yours.

Standing at a distance, you felt Oberyn’s eyes on you again. He lounged with casual arrogance, a wicked smile playing on his lips as Ellaria sat on his lap, delicately feeding him a grape. His gaze lingered on you, his expression one of amusement, as if he found your presence there tantalizing. His nod in your direction was slow, deliberate, and the smirk he gave you only made your pulse race. You quickly turned away, determined not to give him the satisfaction of seeing the effect he had on you.

Your focus shifted, catching Cersei out of the corner of your eye as she exchanged curt words with Brienne of Tarth. Whatever was said made Brienne visibly uncomfortable, and she soon excused herself, walking away with her usual brisk pace. You weren’t close enough to hear their exchange, but the look on Cersei’s face said it all—disdain, irritation, and a certain dangerous pleasure in making the taller woman feel out of place.

Just as you were about to step away, something else caught your attention. Pycelle, with his hunched posture and greasy fingers, had cornered a young maid—Serena, you realized with a scowl. Inwardly, you cursed. Pycelle was one of those men you despised most at court, his pretense of wisdom nothing more than a shield for his lechery. You moved closer, keeping your head down, pretending to adjust your serving tray as you eavesdropped on their conversation.

Pycelle’s voice was low, his tone sickeningly paternal as he said, "No, no, come to my chambers and I will examine you personally."

Your stomach churned at his words, but before you could intervene, Cersei’s voice cut through the air like a dagger.

"She’ll do no such thing."

Pycelle jumped, his greasy face paling as he turned to see the queen standing there, her expression cold and unyielding.

"Oh, Your Grace," Pycelle stammered, his voice trembling slightly. "Yes, well, this young lady sought my advice..."

Cersei’s smile was sharp and cruel. "You should see Qyburn. He’s quite good."

The maid, eyes wide with relief, quickly dipped her head. "Your Grace," she murmured, then hurried away, escaping Pycelle’s grasp.

Pycelle’s face contorted into an expression of disgust. "Qyburn? Deplorable man. Brought shame on the Citadel with his repugnant experiments."

Cersei tilted her head, her smile never wavering. "More repugnant than your gnarled fingers on that girl’s thighs?"

Pycelle stiffened, his eyes darting around nervously. "Your Grace, I am a man of learning."

Cersei’s eyes gleamed with dangerous amusement. "My little brother had you sent to the Black Cells when you annoyed him. What do you think I could do to you if you annoyed me?"

Pycelle’s face turned ashen. "I never meant to annoy anyone," he mumbled, his voice now a pathetic whimper.

"But you are," Cersei said softly, stepping closer, her gaze boring into him. "You annoy me right now. Every breath you draw in my presence annoys me. So here’s what I want you to do: I want you to leave my presence. Leave this wedding right now. Go to the kitchens and instruct them that all the leftovers from the feast will be brought to the kennels."

Pycelle’s mouth opened in protest, but Cersei cut him off sharply. "The queen is telling you the leftovers will feed the dogs, or you will."

For a moment, the old man seemed to consider arguing, but one look at Cersei’s smile—a cruel, dangerous curve of her lips—and he thought better of it. With a shaky bow, he muttered, "Yes, Your Grace," and scuttled away like the coward he was.

Cersei smiled after him, pleased with herself.

What a bold-faced cunt, you thought bitterly, watching her bask in her small victory. Everything about her was venomous—her beauty, her power, her cruelty. She wielded them all with deadly precision, and you hated her for it.

With a steadying breath, you made your way back toward the head table, slipping seamlessly into your role. You refilled goblets, offered plates, your presence unnoticed among the nobles. But beneath your mask of calm, your mind churned. Every move, every word, every gesture at this wedding was a lie—a careful façade constructed to conceal the rot beneath.

The clamor of the wedding feast carried on, a haze of laughter, clinking goblets, and the gleam of gold and silk that shone in the late afternoon sun. The Lannisters and Tyrells reveled in their temporary triumph, their smugness saturating the air like a sickly perfume. But you knew better than most how quickly fortunes could turn in a place like King’s Landing. The city was a pit of snakes, and the shift of power could change in an instant.

From where you stood, just close enough to watch but far enough to remain unnoticed, your eyes followed King Joffrey. He sat at the head of the grand table, restless and bored, his twisted amusement turning toward the fool juggling before him. Margaery, ever the dutiful queen, smiled gracefully at his side, playing her part flawlessly. 

But Joffrey… he was never satisfied.

You saw the glint of cruelty in his eyes before he even stood. The familiar spark that made your skin crawl and your stomach twist. His voice cut through the air, sharp and mocking.

"A gold dragon to whoever knocks my fool’s hat off," Joffrey declared, his sneer stretching wide as he stood, scanning the crowd like a predator ready to pounce.

The fool, a trembling man in motley, barely had time to react before the guests joined in. Laughter echoed as food—chunks of bread, slices of fruit, and bits of meat—were hurled at him. You could see the fear in his eyes, how his smile wavered as he danced awkwardly to avoid the barrage. 

Your hands clenched into fists at your sides. The sight of it—how quickly cruelty had become sport—set your blood boiling. You knew this game, too well. You had seen it before. You had lived it.

Joffrey’s laughter rang loud, ringing in your ears like a taunt. 

You couldn’t take it anymore.

With a sharp inhale, you turned on your heel, walking briskly away from the spectacle. You could feel your heart hammering in your chest, the fury bubbling beneath the surface, the memories threatening to overtake you. The jeers, the screams, the sound of flesh meeting stone… all of it haunted you still, and this—this senseless cruelty—stirred it back to life.

The clamor of the feast swirled around you, a whirlwind of laughter, clinking goblets, and hushed conversations. Your hands moved mechanically as you helped arrange the giant feast table, replenishing trays of roasted meats and lavish platters of fruits. Yet your mind remained a storm of its own, the anger still simmering beneath the surface from what you'd just witnessed.

This court—its twisted bets, the cruelty woven into every interaction—was a festering rot, and you couldn’t allow yourself to forget that. Not for a moment. Not here, where forgetting meant losing yourself to the madness.

As you moved to refill goblets of wine, you saw Cersei and Tywin strolling past, their expressions as cold and imperious as ever. You kept your head down, but their voices reached your ears, low and murmured.

Tywin’s tone was calm, almost bemused. “You’re in rather a good mood.”

“I suppose I am,” Cersei replied, her voice holding a faint, bitter edge.

“I won’t ask why,” Tywin remarked, his gaze never faltering as they passed by.

“Small pleasures,” Cersei added, a sharpness in her words that hinted at something more, something dark beneath the surface.

You busied yourself with the table, arranging goblets when you caught movement from the corner of your eye. Oberyn and Ellaria had entered, gliding through the crowd with a grace that seemed to draw every eye. Their presence commanded attention, not unlike the very snakes that represented their house.

Oberyn's deep, silken voice cut through the air as he greeted them. "Your Grace. Lord Tywin."

Tywin turned to face them, his expression as stony as ever. "Prince Oberyn."

"I don't believe you have met Ellaria," Oberyn continued smoothly, gesturing to the woman at his side. "This is the Lord Hand Tywin Lannister and Cersei Lannister, the Queen Regent. Or, I suppose it is former Queen Regent now." The jab was subtle but unmistakable. "Lord Hand and Lady Cersei, this is Ellaria Sand."

Ellaria stepped forward, her dark eyes gleaming as she curtsied. "My lord. My lady."

Tywin offered a curt nod, the barest flicker of acknowledgement. "Charmed."

Cersei, however, let her gaze linger on Ellaria for a moment too long. “Can’t say I’ve ever met a Sand before,” she said, her words dripping with disdain.

You stole a glance at Ellaria, whose demeanor had shifted, a spark of fierceness flashing in her eyes. Her voice was like steel wrapped in silk. “We are everywhere in Dorne. I have ten thousand brothers and sisters.”

Oberyn’s lips curled into a smirk. “Bastards are born of passion, aren't they? We don’t despise them in Dorne.”

The corner of your mouth twitched, nearly betraying a smile at Oberyn’s thinly veiled jab. You bit your lip, forcing yourself to remain composed, knowing how easily any sign of amusement could draw unwanted attention.

Cersei, however, did not miss a beat. “No? How tolerant of you.”

Oberyn leaned in ever so slightly, his eyes never leaving hers. “I expect it is a relief, Lady Cersei, giving up your regal responsibilities. Wearing the crown for so many years must have left your neck a bit crooked.”

His words were a dagger, sharp and cutting. And as he spoke, his eyes flicked to you for the briefest moment, a knowing glance that sent a shiver down your spine. He knew. He had known the entire time you were standing there, silently witnessing the exchange.

Cersei’s smile faltered, if only for a heartbeat, before she recovered. “I suppose you’ll never know, Prince Oberyn. It’s a shame your older brother couldn’t attend the wedding.”

Tywin chimed in, his voice as cold as ever. “Please give him our regards. With any luck, the gout will abate with time, and he will be able to walk again.”

“They call it the rich man’s disease,” Oberyn shot back, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “A wonder you don’t have it.”

You almost choked on your own breath at the boldness of his words, gripping the tray of food tighter to maintain your composure. Every word he spoke was a calculated strike, each one landing with precision, and you admired his audacity.

Tywin’s expression remained impassive. “Noblemen in my part of the country don’t enjoy the same lifestyle as our counterparts in Dorne.”

Oberyn’s gaze darkened, the air between them thick with tension. “People everywhere have their differences. In some places, the highborn frown upon those of low birth. In other places, the rape and murder of women and children is considered distasteful. What a fortunate thing for you, former Queen Regent, that your daughter Myrcella has been sent to live in the latter sort of place.”

Your grip tightened on the tray as Oberyn’s words struck like a whip, slicing through the false pleasantries of court. You admired him for it—for his boldness, his refusal to bend to their rules, their cruelty.

But you also knew that such boldness could come at a cost.

Without another glance, you quietly moved away, slipping back into the sea of nobles and servants. You busied yourself with pouring wine and serving food, but your thoughts lingered on the dangerous dance unfolding before you. The court was a place where words were as deadly as swords, and you could only hope that Oberyn’s sharp tongue wouldn’t cut too deep.

Yet, as you glanced back at him, standing tall and unyielding, a part of you knew that he wouldn’t be so easily broken.

The air was thick with tension, festivity clashing with the cruelty lurking just beneath the surface. You stood near the head table, your place behind Sansa Stark’s chair, a silent observer in the midst of the spectacle. And Joffrey, the cruel little tyrant, loved his games.

From the center of the garden, you heard the familiar tap tap of Joffrey’s goblet. He rose from his seat, commanding attention as if the entire world existed solely for his amusement. His voice rang out, high and grating.

“Everyone, silence! Clear the floor,” Joffrey called, smirking as his gaze swept over the gathered crowd. “There’s been too much amusement here today. A royal wedding is not an amusement. A royal wedding is history.”

You could feel the unease ripple through the crowd as Cersei and Tywin returned to their seats. Their expressions remained impassive, but there was a shared sense of something darker brewing beneath the surface. You, too, felt the shift, your body tensing as you braced for what was to come.

“The time has come for all of us to contemplate our history,” Joffrey continued, his voice dripping with arrogance. “My lords... my ladies…”

A lever was pulled, and from the gaping mouth of a giant lion, a red carpet unfurled, rolling down the middle of the floor. The crowd leaned in, curious, and you felt your stomach twist.

“I give you... King Joffrey... Renly, Stannis, Robb Stark, Balon Greyjoy. The War of the Five Kings.”

From the lion’s mouth, five dwarves emerged, each dressed to mock the fallen kings of Westeros. They paraded around the floor with exaggerated movements and comic glee, drawing laughter and applause from the nobles. But you could feel the weight of it—the insult, the cruelty embedded in the display.

The dwarves pranced around, playing their parts. One, dressed as Renly Baratheon, twirled about the center with an exaggerated flourish. Another, playing Robb Stark, shouted, “I am the King in the North!” His wolf-head helmet bobbed comically as he danced. The Joffrey dwarf stood at the center of it all, reveling in the absurdity, while the real Joffrey watched, his face alight with sadistic glee.

You saw Tyrion’s face, stoic yet darkened with distaste, and you shared in his disgust. Every part of you was braced for the inevitable humiliation, the way Joffrey delighted in belittling those who had fought and died with honor. The scene continued, with the dwarves mocking and prancing, their movements a grotesque parody of real battle. 

“Let the war begin!” the Joffrey dwarf cried, and the chaos of the mock battle began. Robb Stark’s dwarf clashed with the others, while the Balon Greyjoy dwarf pretended to drown in an invisible sea, his gurgling cries echoing through the hall.

You glanced at Sansa. Her face was pale, her eyes wide with shock as she watched the dwarf dressed as her brother fall to the ground, his wolf helmet tumbling off. Joffrey laughed, his high-pitched cackle reverberating through the room. “Your head!” he cried, pointing at the fallen wolf.

Your fingers curled into fists, nails digging into your palms. You sneered, your lip twitching as you barely restrained the anger rising within you. You wanted nothing more than to lash out, to put an end to Joffrey’s twisted plans. But you couldn’t. Not here. Not now.

The crowd cheered, applauding the spectacle as Joffrey stood, a cruel smile on his face. “Well fought! Well fought!” he exclaimed, his voice brimming with satisfaction. “Here you are—champion’s purse. Though you’re not the champion yet, are you? A true champion defeats all challengers. Surely there are others out there who still dare to challenge my reign.”

His gaze landed on Tyrion. “Uncle. How about you? I’m sure they have a spare costume.”

The crowd erupted into laughter. You clenched your jaw, biting down on the inside of your cheek so hard you tasted blood. Every fiber of your being screamed treason. Never had you wanted more to defy a king than in that moment.

Tyrion rose slowly, his expression unreadable. “One taste of combat was enough for me, Your Grace,” he said, his voice steady. “I would like to keep what remains of my face.”

You almost smiled at the subtle barb, but it was quickly followed by another.

“I think you should fight him,” Tyrion continued. “This was but a poor imitation of your own bravery on the field of battle. I speak as a firsthand witness. Climb down from the high table with your new Valyrian sword and show everyone how a true king wins his throne. Be careful, though. This one is clearly mad with lust. It would be a tragedy for the king to lose his virtue hours before his wedding night.”

The crowd went still, the tension palpable. You could feel it, the shift in the air as Joffrey’s expression twisted into anger. He marched over to Tyrion and, without warning, poured the contents of his goblet over his uncle’s head.

You bit back a gasp as wine trickled down Tyrion’s face, his hands clenched at his sides. His voice remained calm, but you could see the fury in his eyes. “A fine vintage. Shame that it spilled.”

Joffrey, ever the petulant child, sneered. “It did not spill.”

Margaery, sensing the rising tension, tried to intervene. “My love, come back to me,” she called, her voice sweet yet pleading. “It’s time for my father’s toast.”

But Joffrey was far from finished with his torment. “How does he expect me to toast without wine? Uncle, you can be my cupbearer since you’re too cowardly to fight.”

You watched in disbelief as Joffrey dropped his goblet, forcing Tyrion to kneel and retrieve it. Your own anger mirrored the look on Tyrion’s face, your nails biting deeper into your palms as he knelt to retrieve the goblet, only for Joffrey to kick it away. The humiliation was complete.

Sansa kindly retrieved the goblet for Tyrion, silently nodding in acknowledgment. He turned to hand Joffrey the cup but sneered, “What good is an empty cup? Fill it.”

Tyrion pours wine for Joffrey in front of Cersei and hands it to him.

“Kneel,” Joffrey hissed. “Kneel before your king.”

Tyrion did not move.

Joffrey’s voice rose, venomous. “I said… kneel!”

Before things could escalate further, Margaery stood. “Look—the pie!”

The crowd’s attention shifted to the giant pie being carried in. Joffrey turned his gaze toward it, temporarily distracted. He strode forward, hacking at the pie with his sword. Doves burst forth, fluttering into the air.

But you weren’t watching the birds. No. You saw Olenna, her hand quick and deft as she slipped something into Joffrey’s goblet. A stone. A strangler stone that she took from Sansa’s necklace.

Your breath hitched in your throat, but you did not react. You acted enraptured, like the rest of the crowd. You helped serve the pie, your movements mechanical, your mind racing. Sansa turned to Tyrion, her voice a whisper.

“Can we leave now?”

Tyrion’s response was measured. “Let’s find out.”

As you continued serving, your eyes flicked back to the head table, watching as Joffrey took his goblet and drank deeply. A small smile tugged at your lips as he swallowed.

The end was coming. You could feel it.

“Mm, good,” Joffrey muttered. “Needs washing down.”

He took another gulp, arrogant and unaware, until it hit him. The first sign was the subtle hitch in his breath, almost laughable at first—until it wasn't. The coughing came next, sharp and violent, ripping through him like a wild beast gnawing at his throat. His regal posture crumbled, hands clawing at his neck as if to tear the poison from his skin. His face twisted, contorted, morphing from haughty superiority into sheer terror.

The hall shifted with his agony, the murmurs turning into gasps, the gasps into cries of panic. Chaos rippled through the crowd like wildfire, nobles scrambling, eyes wide, horrified. But you did not move. Your body remained still, a statue amidst the storm of panic, unmoved by the sight of the boy-king choking on his own hubris.

Joffrey’s sputtering, retching—every grotesque, gurgling sound—echoed through the hall, yet all you could hear was the pounding of your own heartbeat. Slow. Steady. A contrast to the pandemonium erupting around you. It was a symphony of suffering, and you reveled in the silence that enveloped your mind. His pain meant nothing to you. 

Your eyes drifted across the garden, over the faces twisted in fear, horror, and confusion, and then... there was him. Oberyn. His dark, probing gaze locked onto yours from across the hall. His brows furrowed, lips parting ever so slightly. Surprise? No, curiosity, perhaps even confusion, flickered in his eyes as he searched your face for something—anything—but found nothing. No flicker of emotion, no sympathy, no shock. Just the cold, hollow indifference that had settled into your bones like an old companion. 

You didn’t flinch, didn’t waver. Why would you? This was one of the moments you had been waiting for. The reckoning. All of Joffrey's cruelty, all of his venom, had finally come back to devour him whole. His pitiful gasping, the frantic clawing at his throat, was a fitting end for the boy who thought himself untouchable.

Joffrey gurgled, his face now a deep shade of purple, eyes bulging, lips frothing. The people around him scrambled in vain, trying to save a life that was already slipping away. You remained still, cold as ice, watching it unfold with detached precision. The world could burn around you, and you would not care.

Oberyn’s eyes lingered on you longer than they should have, as if he were trying to understand the enigma standing before him. He didn’t. He couldn't. No one could. There was no more humanity left in you for him to grasp.

Joffrey’s choking grew louder, more desperate. His hands flailed, reaching for his mother, for someone to save him from the inevitable, but no one could stop what was coming. No one could stop you from witnessing the justice you had longed for.

Margaery rushed to Joffrey’s side. “He’s choking!”

Olenna, ever the actress, called out, “Help the poor boy!”

But there would be no help. No saving the king. You watched, unmoved, as Joffrey staggered, his face turning purple, vomit spilling from his lips. Jaime rushed to him, but it was futile. Joffrey was dying.

And all you could think of was how fitting it was. There would be no glory for Joffrey Baratheon. No legacy. Only pain. Only death.

“My son. He’s gone. My son!”

Around you, the world screamed and wailed. Cersei’s frantic cries cut through the air like a knife, but you barely registered them. You were detached, distant. Untouchable. 

It was strange—the numbness. The apathy was a shield you had forged long ago, layer by layer, through every injustice, every cruelty, every wound. You were unbreakable now, untouchable by Joffrey's suffering or anyone else’s. There was a quiet power in that, a dark satisfaction, as you watched the boy-king's life wither before your eyes. 

His torment did not sway you. Not a muscle in your body flinched. Your fingers, relaxed at your sides, held no tension. You didn't care. Not anymore.

“He did this. He poisoned my son, your king. Take him. Take him! Take him! Take him!”

Cersei, her screams filled the hall, but you felt nothing. The king was dead. And soon, the unraveling of this court, this rot, would begin.

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@christinamadsen

[atopvisenyashill]

What are your thoughts on GRRM’s new notablog post on HOTD S2?

omg i'm sorry so i did not get notified that i had a few new asks, i didn't even see this until i logged in on desktop. tumblr eat shit smh.

ANYWAYS.

I actually agree with Xiran Jay Zhao, here, where they said this was a warning shot. It feels like a warning shot. Like a "hey I'm being nitpicky and pedantic now but if you think I won't go scroched earth you got another thing coming." I've seen so much "this is unprofessional" "this is annoying" "why is he complaining" and I think it is not only mind boggling to side with a corporation and the idiots running these shows (and we know I mostly like Condal and Hess, but come on Condal was the mastermind of Sansa Bolton why are we defending him right now!!), I think everyone is blowing his comments wildly out of proportion. He didn't take a dig at anyone but the writer's room and more specifically Ryan Condal, who he has had a working relationship with for well over a decade. He didn't shittalk any casting, he didn't shittalk any specific writers or directors except one of the main showrunners, he compliments the special effects, he has consistently had (and imo is careful) nothing but praise for the actors, even minor roles like Blood & Cheese. This was an incredibly milqtoast "please remember that every change has huge affects on the narrative later" critique and the people handwringing over his behavior are absolute losers, I'm sorry.

And beyond the fact that he didn't make any huge digs, I think this conversation also wildly ignores the way authors have no control over their own characters once they sign the rights over. They can be completely bamboozled by changes and they have no recourse to go "what the hell are you doing." And yet, signing your book's rights away (even if the production sits in developmental hell for decades) is usually what nets these author's the most money - GRRM surely makes a shitton off his books, but most authors get paid absolutely nothing even when they're wildly popular because of how book deals work now. Take, again, Xiran for example - Iron Widow was a huge runaway hit, a good and fresh take on this new boom of culturally based sff. And yet Xiran has talked about how they immediately set to work writing a middle grade novel because they desperately needed the money because they got paid 16k over two years for their runaway hit that made their publishers significantly more than 16k. I think George is not only mad for authors with less control than he has but also, obviously, for himself - I've said time and again, but I do think Dark Daenerys is where we are headed, and the fact that they completely botched showing it has got to smart. And if the ending for Dany is anything other than Jon killing her, that has got to smart too. So he watched these people fuck up his original series and push him completely out of that writer's room as they made more and more changes, and now he's watching s2 of HOTD and seeing some changes and getting some real bad vibes. It's not doomerism to think s3 is going to go massively off the rails when we have seasons 6-8 of the main show to show us just how off the rails it can go!

So anyways, that part of my rant over (and please believe me when I say I checked myself here because I could rant for hours about how it's genuinely so upsetting to see people call him unprofessional over this when not only did he write the fucking series, but he's lived in this series for three decades!!!!! this is his whole life, this is his legacy, of course he's feeling some type of way about how it's handled jesus christ on a cracker, there's people who have said worse about their mediocre nyt pushed bestsellers getting adapted badly!), when it comes to the actual meat of his post....I'm sorry idk how anyone is annoyed by this post because it was hilarious to me. He spent a whole blog post whinging about how Dead Baby #4 and Kingsguard Man #12 are gonna get cut out of the show. I think he framed it in that goofy way on purpose to hide how annoyed he is but you can see where the real annoyance lies - the changes to Helaena, losing one of his grisly death scenes, and being willfully mislead about potential changes to the plot. I think a lot of people missed those points but EYE am not a goofy ass like those people and I can guarantee you that Condal and HBO got the point too.

Of course, I do think he is also irked about Maelor and Ser Rickard's scenes being cut out. He wrote a long ass, highly meticulous, near unadaptable work, and I think when he handed the IP over he assumed he was giving it to people who would rise to the challenge and only make cuts when absolutely necessary. And that just clearly hasn't happened. Incredibly important characters get cut, main characters get their plots wildly changed for no reason, and people get personality transplants on a near constant basis for no other reason than D&D and Condal thought it would look cooler. I think if there was more dedication to keeping him in the loop and keeping true to the story, he wouldn't have bitched so much. But Hess is on record saying she doesn't feel loyal to the story and at a certain point, you reach your breaking point there and I think he has finally reached his. AND GOOD FOR HIM. LET THAT OLD MAN GO APESHIT THEY'VE COMPLETLEY FUCKED HIS WORLD UP!!!

[ariathelamia]

Hellhound HRT Month 8 (4 Month Wolf , 4 Month Hellhound)

Soooo… It’s me again, and there has been quite a bit that happened here so, let's get started.. (And no, I'm not gonna “write more professionally” for you!).

Okay so, I’ve been discharged from the hospital, my body has built some resistance to the high temperatures, though it’s not really able to handle the highest temperatures for too long yet. At least I don't pass out when I get too happy from eating my favorite meal anymore.

Now to something more troubling… turns out my right leg’s bone ended up growing malformed so they had to re break and fix it together again.. so i’m wearing a full on brace there, and a normal cast on the left one which luckily grew back together well… no idea what caused this kinda unequal thing but uh… not gonna complain of only having one being put back together like a jigsaw puzzle…

Coming back to the heat thing- So… i still can’t breath fire really, but i can sort of… direct the heat towards my mouth and when i bite things.. I can basically cook things in my mouth! 

The Nurses also have to be careful when trying to do blood draws… not only does my thick furr make it hard to find a vein to begin with… but… and I hate to make this sort of public in these notes… I HATE needles… And we all know what happens when I get annoyed…

So yeah I actually managed to heat up a syringe with my blood and the nurse dropped it… it broke and god… steaming blood… kinda glowy too? but the glow disappeared shortly when it cooled down. 

Now to more kinda… crazy changes… one night i just woke up… but the weird part is… even though i still had my eyes closed… I could see… and pretty well too even though the room was dark! I did open my eyes… and I could tell that I saw… more.. you know how when you close one eye, your brain kinda ignores the blacked out part and you still see just in a smaller field of view?... And when you open your eyes that field of view suddenly gets wider…imagine that feeling… just not with two eyes… but 4… that's right, you’re girl got two more eyes, slightly below my first pair… and a little closer to my ears… they are also smaller than the original pair.. like around… 3/4th of the size. It took me like.. an hour before i was able to close them… kinda weird to access muscles you never had before.

My hands are also growing slightly?... well the arms are getting slightly thicker and gaining muscles, even though all i was able to do was sit in the hospital.. I am also able to pull in my claws into my paws! No more accidental gushing wounds!

So yeah that's about all the changes I noticed!

—----------------------------------------------

[The following texts have been written in a separate notebook.]

Started this little side project to keep my thoughts in order when it comes to the eldritch kinda stuff happening… I remember when I mentioned weird dreams to Mars before… she got quite mad… not at me but at my dreams?... Idk… I am going to write them down though… because I feel like doing that is important so I can make sense of what's happening to my mind.

During those two months, the dreams of the Moon continued…

The form I have in those dreams is always pretty similar, but it’s getting more.. defined? 

My body in those dreams is like… mhh..  Like a black silhouette of my body… that's shrouded in thick smoke… barely holding shape.. like one gust would spread me in all directions… I can see… but I can't talk.. I literally don’t have a mouth to do so… at the start i couldn’t hear either but that's apparently different now so i guess.. the more i transition… the more defined my shape gets?.. questions for Mars.

Speaking off, I remember Mars warning me about some tentacle lady-... I wondered if that’s the one I kept seeing in the distance.

Though after one particular night, I KNOW it’s the one…. cause she found me… 

Her name is Nyarlathotep… and she hates my guts apparently.  I’ll try to write down the conversation as best as I can remember it…

“Now look what we have here, finally I reached you before you went “poof” again. And by the look of your eyes, this time you can actually hear me. Tried calling out to you little … thing… but you never seemed to respond.”

(I tried to say something back but… no mouth… urgh. I did however move my arms, gesturing to our surroundings…)

“Oh this? Welcome in Azathoths dream, the dream of my Mother… My name is Nyarlathotep, and YOU… you are an intruder, brought in by that halfling that dares to intrude into our domain. You humans just love to play with things you don’t understand hm? You have no idea what kind of things you are inviting into your life, thanks to HIS ridiculous idea of “help”. That damn halfling is hellbend of ruining this beautiful dream… and now you are here… but worry not, I got just the thing. " 

It was then she held out her hand to me… holding a single pill in her hand that shimmered in an eerie glow. I looked at it but then back at her. She had this grin on her face that would have made my blood freeze if that had been possible at that moment… Her presence at that moment was… similar to Mars… just… different and more concentrated… Was she the same species as what Mars was going to be? 

“Just take this, and all can be normal again. After all that fall of yours surely must have shown you that your transformation is unpredictable? You are simply not cut out to become one of us… not that you ever could… Your body is going to burn itself out and you will simply become nothing but a pile of ash… but all of this can be prevented still. Just… take…this…pill…”

To say I was frightened was an understatement… And I could feel this strange pull towards that pill… my body being drawn to it… my head moving towards it as if something was trying to make me eat the pill straight out of her hand.. 

I didn’t want to- I didn’t believe what she said, I knew Mars wouldn’t have helped me just so I ended up as ashes on the floor-... she warned me from this one-... and yet I was powerless.. my face was just in front of that pill when suddenly.. a glow shined from underneath us… Something grabbed my legs and my head and yanked me away… I could hear Nyarlathotep cursing as I was dragged into the moon itself… And as the glow started to blind me… i could vaguely make out the form of some other being… i don’t know what to make of it.. but it spoke too-... though only a few words before i ended up waking up… “Just in time… wake up, you are safe."

That's when I ended up waking up in my hospital bed… Terrified for my life.. The Fire that shines through my chest illuminated the room in a blue-ish glow… guess that's what happens when I'm afraid. I could tell that the fire was a lot cooler than usual.

But god damn was I afraid to sleep the following nights. 

I didn’t see Nyarlathotep in the following dreams… not that every dream happens on the moon but the ones that do I was just panicking.  Though… one night… I could have sworn I had felt Mars’s presence… far away… I tried to get closer but I ended up waking up after some distance… 

I wanted to call her… tell her from my dreams but guess whose phone is broken thanks to the fall… and i didn’t remember her number… in hindsight could have asked to call the library… but i also didn’t want to talk about this stuff over the hospitals phone line… dunno if they keep recordings or anything… Why am I so freaking paranoid about this!? urgh..

Anyway, now I'm out of the hospital… got an appointment next week with Erian for my 9th month check up, even though I kinda missed the 6th month one but.. bureaucracy. 

But before all that… I really need to talk to Mars… cause I would at least know a little more about that stupid bitch that keeps making me sleep with one eye open… And whatever that glowing thing was.

[End of notes]

—-------------------------------------------------------

[Meeting with Mars]

I decided to go to Mars today. Well “go” is a strong word, i wheeled there.. as in.. a wheelchair. Got me a new phone on the way. The good thing was that the card was still intact, so I was able to plan a meeting. So here I am, at the front entrance of the Thayer library, taking a few deep breaths. I wheeled myself in and approached the counter. 

To my surprise, I did not feel that scared when inside. It felt more.. home-y like. Maybe it’s just me being finally around someone that gets me on a deeper level than the hospital staff. I went up to the front desk, and reached over to ring the Bell twice, waiting for Mars to appear. Makes me wonder if she’s the only one working here? big place for one person.. hmm..

I looked around, I noticed the library had changed, ever so slightly. Arrangement of the displays, the tables shifted in different positions, and a stack of new acquisitions building up on a cart outside of the staff entrance. But one detail caught my eye, the desk that Mars normally sat at had a raised almost organic growth forming on the edges. It was a darkish purple and black structure and seemed to be enveloping her space. 

My scrutinizing of the mysterious growth was broken by the sound of a loud elevator ding. The staff door then unlocked and swung open as Mars, now much taller ducked her way into the reading room. She was nearly 13 feet and developed a boney crown around her head. Her tail was longer, and the unknown appendages on her back that twitched and articulated grew in number. Something else caught my attention, one of her eyes, specifically the top left one was yellow.. not pink. Looking closer I noticed scarring on her eye and around her neck. 

With her entry, the lights of the library dimmed but unlike last time, her presence wasn’t as heavy. The shift in temperature caused my body to steam as she turned her attention to me and looked delightfully surprised.

“Arynia! It’s good to see you again!”.

It took a second for her to process my current state as her expression turned to one of concern. 

“Oh my gosh, are you alright? What happened to your legs?”.

It took me a second to actually process the question after seeing her injuries. 

“Uh-... I had a bit of an accident while running over some rooftops and uh… fell. My new organ decided not to wait to flare up, literally, and I ended up taking a nasty fall… Just got released from the hospital the other day actually.”

I chuckled nervously, but… I could tell it didn’t help to really ease the situation. 

“ Well, long story short i… broke a couple of bones… my legs got the worst of it, probably because they were in the process of changing… and one of them grew together wrong at first- they did manage to fix it however, after getting an animal surgeon for help! Isn’t that kinda-... hilarious?... eh-... ehehe… “

Curse my ears and tail for displaying my actual emotions so well… I didn't even notice my ears were drooped down and my tail nervously clutching my midsection like some kinda belt. 

Mars couldn’t help but smile, she let out a nervous chuckle and gave a reassuring pat on the head.

“You were running over rooftops?” She giggled.

“Such an adventurous pup, but I’m glad you’re doing alright. I hope your legs heal quickly! I can promise you, it took some practice getting used to mine after I hatched”.

Mars raised her arm after giving a gentle scratch and returned to her desk. The growths responding to her presence and pulsing with a purplish light in some of the raised sections. 

“So, what can I help you with? Looking for a book?”

I shook my head and pondered on how to say what I was here for…

“Well… no, I’m actually here to uh… talk to you about some of those… Nightmares I mentioned before?... The Moon ones? Especially about that… tentacle freak you mentioned…” I shrunk together a little, the last time I mentioned that cracking moon to her… it did not go well.

“She uh… found me… or rather reached me…?”

Mars froze, her expression shifting to one of horror as she listened to me recount my dreams. She looked down at her keyboard, her eyes wide and her claws twitching. The library once more felt oppressive, the lights barely able to combat the darkness as both Mars and I were casted in shadow. Mars’s eyes emitted an intense yellow and pink glow as the growths around her began consuming more of her desk and chair. 

I nervously wheeled myself back a little. “It’s uh, good though!... I’m safe! uh… she did seem worried about me?... since she somehow knew about the accident too?... The only bad thing was that she tried to make me eat some weird blue pill right out of her hand-... b- but then some light came from the moon and I got dragged away and woke up! Nothing to worry about-.... right?”

I need to learn to shut up when nervous-

Her head shot up, glaring at me, as her expression turned to one of anger. She ran her claws into the desk, easily cutting through the plywood and leaving a massive gash. Her stare was horrifying, like she was about to lash out at me. I tried to say something but couldn’t help but stammer, desperately trying to ease the tensions of our conversation. Right as I was about to say something, she interrupted, her voice was changed, distorted. She spoke with what sounded like multiple voices at once as she asked.

“You don’t understand… do you..?”

She pushed off the desk, its construction cracking underneath her weight as she stood and glared at me. Her height and piercing glare made it hard to look her in the eyes. Despite my inability, she glared at me with no issue. I felt paralyzed, the chair creaking at the invisible force she pushed down on me with. I gritted my teeth, my chest burning like a desperate flame trying to avoid being snuffed out. It took every ounce of my strength to respond.

“Understand…. what?” I stammer. It’s odd, ever since that flame in my chest started to heat me up, I seem to have forgotten what being cold felt like… I know when I am “less warm”, but not “cold” anymore…  but right this moment I got a stark reminder of it. The tiny blue glow that was still fighting the darkness that seemed to swallow this place grew dimmer and dimmer…

“You’re in danger..”

Mars then kicked her desk, the computer tossed aside and the structure breaking and collapsing as she walked up to me. I tried breathing heavily. The closer she got the less oxygen entered my lungs. Mars’s form began to shift, her head splitting into five mandibles as her foot steps turned into floor cracking stomps. 

“You and I.. we’re different from the rest… we’re being hunted.”

Mars leans in, her back hunching as her appendages crack and raise into an agitated state. She moves in closer, the glow from her eyes becoming too intense as I try to shield them. I couldn’t breath, I tried to compose myself but I couldn’t, I struggled to stay conscious when suddenly Mars gripped my muzzle. I was forced to look at her and then… I was.. there.. the moon… I felt like I was holding my breath when I noticed Mars, standing at the edge of the moon's cracking surface. 

“I’m sorry Arynia… I.. I shouldn’t have done the ritual for you..”

I looked around, it was just us.. did i pass out? How did-... I take a deep breath in, noticing that I finally got a mouth in this darn place-, overall the “smoke” around me was taking on the shape of my real body-... or was THIS my “real” one?... 

I walk up to Mars, stopping shortly behind her. “No! You have nothing to be sorry about Mars! I came to you! This is what I wanted!! You can’t believe how much happiness I feel when I look at myself in the mirror! When I see the real me… You saved me that day… I don’t know how long I could have just… accepted what I was before… if I had never gotten this chance…” 

I stopped myself from talking more… Listening to it brought up one question in my head..

“Is… is me following this path a burden to you?... I mean… just hearing me talk about this place seems to be giving you so much stress- when all of your transformation is already putting so much on you yourself-... Is it selfish for me to go on?... should i just… stop and find another way?”

Tears were building up in all four of my eyes as my voice quivered. 

“I don’t want to be a burden for you… maybe i should have just… taken that pill?... accept what i was and find some kinda way to be happy with it?...”

”Nia.. come here..”

She ushered me forward, closer to the edge of the moon. I took a step, shocked to find no pain or tremble, but a strong leg, ready to move at my command. I took a few steps, the drop off rapidly approaching and revealing the hollow insides of the moon. I was shocked, seeing more and more chunks break away. But as I turned to look in I was horrid to see something looking back. Five pink pupils glared, energy swirling as a low growl echoed into the void.

“I can’t help you Nia.. I want to, but this.. this is my burden..”

Mars shifts her gesture to the eyes as the being shifts its focus back to Mars. I follow the creature's gaze to a sadden Mars, as she sighs and grips her arm nervously.

“I’m.. breaking.. I try so hard to keep this contained, to keep myself from fully breaking. That thing down there, it’s anger, it’s hunger, it’s pain.. is mine.”

She turns to me.

“I can’t help you.. I can barely help myself. That tentacled monster.. it’s called Nyarlathotep.. It's been haunting me for months. It nearly killed me last time we met. I can’t protect you, but there might be someone who can.”

I looked at her in shock- nearly killed her?!... Is that how Nyarlathotep does things-?... 

“I didn’t know…” I sigh deeply, looking at the broken parts falling down…

“Kinda feel like a bit of a wimp now that I know of all the things you went through… and are still going through… just piling up on that with my own bullshit.” 

I turn to face her again, wiping the tears from my face, taking a bit of a shocked look at my fur covered arm in front of me… before I let it fall again to my side. “So, that person you know, where can I find them?”

I balled my paws into fists, as best as I could at least. “I’ll get better, and then you and I are gonna work on that together!” I point towards the falling debris and the glowing eyes. 

“That bitch is gonna have to face not only you but me too now, fuck being scared, i’m not gonna sit in self pity and fear, while the person that safed my life is being tortured by some faceless bitch.”

I tried putting on my bravest face… but I was still shaking somewhat… I guess fear isn’t easily combated by a wanna-be heroic speech.

Mars smiles and gives you a pet on the head.

“You have a big heart, pup, never let anything sour it.”

Mars fully turns and kneels down to be face to face, her features relaxing and returning to its standard state. As she smiles, there’s a shift, the cracking slows, the moon grows stable. 

“You’ll hate it but, she works at Erians clinic.. but she’s helped me and I know she can help you too. Her name is Amber Shepherd.”

I tilt my head and chuckle, enjoying the headpats and giving a smile back. “Ohh! That's great actually~ Got an appointment next week with erian anyway, i’ll make sure to ask for her then!”

After Mars was done ruffling through my hair, I put my hands on my sides and sigh. “So uh- this is your place then huh? Weird how I keep coming here then in my dreams, thought it might be a bit of a gathering point for beings like you… and I assume me now.. it’s… nice, if you ignore the part of a sleeping beast right underneath our feet” I said with a chuckle.

“Though I would love to spend more time with you here… I can’t help but feel hungry so… should probably get going and eat something. Thank you for hearing me out, and reminding me of why I'm doing all this.” 

“I’m happy I could help”.

The world grew fuzzy as I felt a rush and sudden release as Mars lets go of my muzzle. The pain and numbness of my legs returning as I get reacquainted with the wheel chair. Mars shifts back to her original form, her shoulders shifting as she readjust her stance. Mars smiles and turns back to her desk, the area was coated in this spiked bone protrusion. She looked a bit embarrassed and chuckled.

“Ah… that’s right.. how about you run along and grab something to eat, I need to clean up this mess.. but it was good seeing you Nia.”

I look down at my legs and sighed, nodding as I then looked up at Mars again.

“Yeah, it sounds like a plan. Would love to help ya out with that cleaning but… not really capable of that right now. It was very nice talking and seeing you again, Mars, hopefully the next time we see each other will be under happier circumstances!”

I give the huge eldritch woman a wave, and then begin to wheel my way out of the library. 

The adrenaline that pumped through me during this entire situation has made me feel like I’m starving!

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Thank you so much @dawning-mars for coming back in this chapter <3 it was a lot of fun working with you! - Arynia

[vintagemulti]

shards and splinters

parings: marc spector x reader , steven grant x reader

desc: apparently what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. now you’ve died and returned alive, perhaps it’s time to test that theory; or risk losing your life once and for all.

warnings: blood, angst, swearing, fighting, guns and gun violence, death descriptions, long as fuck, sex mentions i guess(? if you squint), hurt/comfort, gory i guess (jake🤷🏻‍♀️) writers note: idk how accurate these are bc i’ve been writing this on and off for years but cover all bases i guess xx

a/n: psa to pls reblog anyway she’s BAAAAAACKKK did you miss me ?? i missed youse … if there’s even a moonknight fandom anymore 🫣 i’m so sorry for the 2 years gone from the face of tumblr, i’ve quite honestly had two years from hell and insane writers block so. can anyone even remember this series?? idk maybe you should all reread the first parts 👀👀 anyways. there’ll be one more part to this (will it come this year? next? 2026? who knows…) bc i HATED my original ending and just had to change it. also sorry if this feels rushed or like it jumps around a lot, it’s been written over YEARS, but i’ve tried my best for continuity. also, i know there’s a lot missing in like fight scenes but they are BORING and i hate writing em so i’m not doing it. tried, got half way thru then didn’t touch this for 7 months so.. it’s no fight scene or no part at all. but my last part is pretty much done so hopefully it’ll be posted soon! ill let youse savour this for a while tho lol. on a real note thank you all SO much for all the love, even two years later. it means the world. all my love, all the time x

series masterlist

masterlist

the air felt different now. it was funny; you and marc had been apart hundreds, if not thousands of times, but he had never felt your absence. not like this. no, never like this. it was different now because he knew he could look for you everywhere and you would still be in that room, not breathing, not living.

he could see it all so clearly now. all of what? all of it. everything; life, your life, his life, where everything went wrong, what he should have done, should have said, how he could have saved you.

there was nothing you could have done, marc.

“that’s easy for you to say.” he mumbled, looking down at his hands. “you’re not the one who was halfway through a fucking argument when harrow took her. and if you can remember, harrow took her because of me.”

steven sighed, and went quiet.

“i should’ve died on that fucking alter.”

marc said it over and over, like a prayer, to go back in time and pull the trigger. he was fuck knows where, it looked like the middle of the desert but marc didn’t care enough to question it.

he had walked out of that pyramid and kept on walking - for hours. the hot egyptian sun had began to set, casting a rosy hue on everything. the humidity make marc’s head ache.

steven had gone silent - a small hum of anger in the back of marc’s head. it usually would have surprised marc, for steven to be the angry one. but he wasn’t sure he would never feel surprised again.

are you going to wallow here forever?

marc looked up, low sun glinting in his eyes, making him squint. but he could tell exactly who it was - crescent staff in his peripheral.

“fuck off.”

khonshu laughed. that’s one way to talk to a god.

“fuck off.” he repeated.

and why should i, mortal? why should i listen to you?

“you did this.” it was stiff, cold, a definite statement. “you did this to us.”

khonshu groaned, moving to block the sun from marc’s eyes so he could see him properly. aren’t you going to question how i am here?

“no.”

perhaps you should.

marc could never cope with khonshu’s riddles. they had always infuriated him - never getting a straight answer. but this one, he could tolerate.

“fuck does that mean?” he was looking directly into khonshu’s eyes now - something he had readily avoided for years. “and don’t give me any of your goddamn riddles.”

if you must be so blunt, it would seem like osiris has taken a liking to your poor lady wife. hathor isn’t half fond of her, either. maybe you ought to go back to the pyramid, something tells me your needed.

and he was gone. disappeared with a gust of wind, leaving marc alone in the saharan sunset, shaking and still covered in his wife’s blood.

she’s alive?

“i-” marc looked around. “i don’t-”

his eyes slipped into the back of his head.

steven took a deep breath, swallowing hard. he set off in a run - towards the pyramid.

-

“this feels so fucking weird.”

you were pressed flat against the wall, peeking around every few seconds to make sure one of harrow’s followers wasn’t coming your way.

i must admit, it’s been a while since i’ve had an avatar.

you let out a breathy laugh. was that your first ever laugh since being revived? you supposed it must be. oh, you wished it was one of steven’s jokes you were laughing at instead.

you didn’t think you’d ever find one of his jokes unfunny again.

“where is he?”

it’s hard to tell. i can’t check, unless i’d like ammit to spot me.

humming, you looked around the corner once again, breath hitching when you saw a shadow come closer.

what made your breath stop completely, however, was the slow, melodic tapping of a cane, following every footstep the person took.

harrow was less than two feet away from you.

swallowing hard, you pushed yourself against the wall even harder, back cold against the concrete. you hoped - prayed with your newfound faith in osiris and his mercy - that harrow would turn back the other way, not hearing your thumping heart.

but your luck had ran out for this lifetime.

the tapping of the cane became louder, until you could see the tip of it in your peripheral, crunching glass finally becoming audible. he was about to come around the corner, and see you. you would be impossible to miss, even the bright red of your new outfit making you stand out.

it seemed like it was impossible to escape harrow, and the tapping of his cane. he had killed you once, what would stop him from doing it again?

apparently, a guardian angel. someone spoke, making harrow turn to look behind him.

this was your chance - to slip away and turn the opposite corner, escape harrow in your new life as you couldn’t in your last.

his voice made you flinch. cool, charming, low. like a snake - exactly like a snake, now you thought about it. the way he slid through life, from the bar all those years ago, to now, awakening a centuries old god, aiming to destroy the world.

you could slither away too, though.

still holding your breath, you sidestepped along the wall, making sure to watch your step over any lose stones, until the wall fell away behind you and led you into another corridor.

as soon as the light from the hall had faded, you let out your breath, hands coming to your forehead and rubbing your eyes.

we have to keep moving. ammit is almost ready to begin.

nodding - although it felt like your brain was rattling around your skull - you looked back up and saw hathor, still looking as beautiful as ever.

this hallway was much dimmer than the last. colder, too. it was like all the light had been blocked, the only thing keeping your vision was the small, fading candles lining the walls every meter or so.

perhaps it was your natural instinct, or a new given sense as an avatar, but you could tell - something wasn’t right. something in the air had shifted, on top of the hot, sticky, egyptian heat, there was something sinister.

your years as a mercenary had taught you to recognise something - blood in the air. and there was certainly blood in the air around you.

“what is harrow’s plan?”

he wants to judge people. through ammit, he believes he can rid the world of everyone bad, even if they aren’t already bad.

“so he’s playing god?” the corridor seemed to go on forever.

he would never admit it, but yes. and ammit is the perfect enabler for him, she’ll know exactly what he’s up to, but because he can give her her power back, she’ll play along.

you scoffed lightly. “harrow isn’t stupid either. he’ll know what she thinks.”

hathor shrugged, a few paces in front of you. only time will tell, my dear.

for a few minutes, the walk along the corridor was silent. the tap of your shoes echoed down the hall, breeze from your passing flickering the candles on the wall.

why did you marry him?

it stopped you in your tracks, hathor stopping too.

“what?”

marc. why did you marry him?

you stuttered for a moment, looking around as if someone would come and help you.

i don’t mean it in a rude way. i’m the goddess of love, it’s natural for me to want to know.

“well,” you paused for a moment and began walking again, slower this time. “we were young when we met, i was coming up for 18 and he was 19.”

and?

“and i knew what i had done to him.” you swallowed. “i felt fucking awful, i thought, maybe if i get to know the guy, and he’s not as much of an ass as everyone makes him out to be, it’ll make it easier for me to forgive myself.”

the corridor kept on, as if it were never ending.

“as you can tell, it didn’t work.”

he wasn’t as much of an asshole as everyone thought?

“no, he was,” you gave a dry smile. “it just so happened that assholes are my type, and i think he worked it out pretty quickly. so after only about two months of knowing each other, he asked me on a date. a real date. it was my first ever date too, god knows anton never took me out. but god, he was such a gentleman.

he picked me up, gave me flowers, wore a fucking tie. and he payed for everything, too. dinner at a four star restaurant, a movie, then out to a bar for drinks.

i knew i had fucked up when he kissed me that night.”

you regret it?

“not for a day. and that’s my mistake- i mean, i was supposed to hate him. i told myself i would hate him. so i wouldn’t feel bad about telling someone to kill him. i didn’t even know how he got out alive- he didn’t tell me about the khonshu shit until after we got married.

oh, our wedding,” you smiled again, a real one. “it was perfect. i was twenty one, marc was twenty three. we were so young. it was a small wedding, just some friends, neither of us invited our family. it was the best night of my life.

it was the night i met steven, too. i think the stress of the day must have triggered it. and that was it- there was marc, and there was steven.”

didn’t it take a while to get used to?

the corridor began to open up, getting slightly wider by the meter. still - there was no end to it in sight.

“it did and it didn’t. i knew for a while there was something happening to him, he would disappear, look confused all the time. i knew it was a matter of time until something changed. and then came steven, perfect steven.

he changed so much- it was like dating all over again. he was even more perfect than marc, stupid english accent included. but, naturally, abuthing that’s perfect must come to an end.”

hathor sighed. and it gave you the impression, just for a moment, that she already knew the whole story. that she was humouring you by letting you tell it. her sigh, sad and resigned, almost confirmed that she knew what was coming.

“the-” you stopped. your voice had broken, and your feet no longer moved. hathor continued for a few paces before looking back at you.

i understand, but if there’s any time you need to tell this, it’s now.

“you know?” you voiced your suspicions.

take into account which god i am, my dear. there is no one else i could chose, but you.

you swallowed. “what’s the point of talking about it if you already know?”

you have been born again. revived. would you like to carry this, this horrible vendetta against someone who has done nothing but love you, for the rest of your new life?

“no.”

then voice it. i can take this pain from you, if you only ask me too. i can help you.

you bit your tongue, looking down at your feet and kicking around a few of the loose rocks. hathor waited.

“the baby was supposed to be born just after my twenty-third birthday.”

a beat. hathor didn’t reply.

“but he didn’t live past twelve weeks.”

you looked back up at hathor, anxious for a reply. she didn’t give you one, only nodding.

“i don’t- i don’t know what i did. i was waiting until i could get a scan, tell marc, have it done properly, you know? but when i went to my appointment, i knew. she didn’t say anything, she just looked. then she left, got the doctor to come in.

he said that the baby had died, that they weren’t sure of the cause, but it was a boy. that my baby boy had died.”

tears threatened your eyes. never - never - had you spoken about this before. not even with marc.

“i went home, with a hatred in my heart. the next few days were the worst. i was grieving a child no one knew i even had. the blood was horrible, it hurt so badly. i told marc i was on my period. fuck, for all he knew i was.

and then my baby was gone. and i hated marc.”

why did you hate him?

you shrugged. “i have no idea. i needed someone to blame and marc was the easiest. that’s when it all went downhill, you know? i wanted him to be there for me, for something he didn’t even know happened. and when he wasn’t, i blew up at him. and he blew up at me.

and that was it, for three years. this horrible hatred towards each other, me hating marc for something he knew nothing about, and marc hating me for every other reason.

he hated me the most for making him stay a mercenary. he wanted out, he wanted a normal life in the suburbs with a dog and a big house and maybe, one day, a child.

but i can’t have that. i don’t want that kind of normal - not when i was so close to it and lost it. so i pushed him into this world. i made him take jobs and work himself to death, even when i found out about khonshu. i made him do it.

and that’s why we’re here. because i told him to follow khonshu here. and now look what i’ve done.”

hathor took two, wide steps towards you, and cradled your face in her hands.

you have done nothing that makes you inhumane. none of this mess is you fault. khonshu would have gotten marc here one way or another. anyone in your shoes would be the same.

her hands were warm. you felt a tear fall, running underneath her fingers. “but i’ve been so horrible. i’m a monster - if not for this, for everything else.”

hathor shook her head. you are a human being.

there was silence as you cried and hathor wiped your tears. at least two minutes passed - but it didn’t matter to you. harrow could come running around the corner and you wouldn’t bat an eyelash.

hathor took a deep breath, looking to her left along the corridor. she opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, another figure appeared.

is now a bad time, human?

you flinched at the rough edge in khonshu’s voice. “what do you want?”

what do i want? there’s a long list.

even through your tears, your patience thinned. “seriously?”

hathor took her hands from your face, turning to look at khonshu. enough of your riddles. just tell her.

the unmistakable sound of footsteps, running, drew your attention. they were getting closer.

i don’t think i have to say a word, actually.

just as khonshu had finished, a figure appeared, coming around the twists and turns of the corridor.

your heart stopped.

marc looked around in a daze, eyes falling first on khonshu, then on hathor, then…

“y/n!”

just as he had stopped running, he started again, coming towards you like a lion out of his cage, wrapping his arms around you and lifting you off of your feet.

“oh baby,” he mumbled into your neck.

you had just reached - wrapping your arms around him in equal tightness, hands flying into his hair. oh, god. his hair - his curls, his skin - you’d never take it for granted again.

he pulled back, hands on your cheeks in a mirror image to hathor. his eyes locked into yours, brown irises melting into his pupils, filling with tears.

marc stuttered, trying to get several sentences out at once, before you hushed him.

“please, marc, we don’t have much time. harrow is gonna-”

“i know,” he nodded, eyes still not breaking from yours. “i know- baby, i know. please- please, just give me a minute. i never- i thought i’d never- oh, baby.”

he leaned in, moving his hands out of the way to rest his forehead against yours. he was hot - sticky with sweat and dirt and, although you didnt want to think about it, your blood.

“i know,” you whispered, closing your eyes. “marc, i know.”

barely having finished your sentence, he leaned in and kissed you.

it was like the first kiss all over again, and you supposed it was. hot, needy, passionate, desperate. you could live in this moment.

but the unmistakable sound of khonshu clearing his throat broke your kiss.

if you wouldn’t mind, harrow is about to release ammit. i’m sure your couples catch-up can wait another hour.

“yeah,” you nodded, breaking away, but marc was far more hesitant to let go.

“i can’t-” he looked around, paranoid. “i can’t do this, y/n. i just lost you, i can’t run the risk of losing you again, i’ve never- y/n, i can’t let you go, you’re everything to me, and if harrow- oh god, what did harrow do to you? i swear to god, the minute i see him, i’m gonna-”

he blinked. a beat.

“paranoid git never did know when to be quiet, did he?”

“oh, steven,” you threw your arms around him again. “fucking hell.”

steven, unlike marc, seemed far more willing to let you go. “love, i know, but if we don’t go now, we’re all gonna end up dead. please, we can do this all after, yeah?”

he took your hands in his, stilling your shaking fingers. he was so warm - always so warm.

“okay,” you nodded, looking between him and the gods beside you. “okay.”

-

you had severely underestimated how far harrow was willing to go. it had been what felt like hours, an unrelenting fight. you weren’t even sure when layla showed up, hoping to help you in any way she could.

but her attempts were futile; ammit was huge. really - huge, bigger than the pyramid behind her. khonshu had, as usual, gotten involved too, so that meant he was the same size, almost trampling you with every step he took.

you had tried. really, you had. you’d tried to use your new found avatar abilities to at least land something on harrow, but truth be told, you were failing. he’d hit you far more times that you’d even aimed for him, you were covered in cuts and rapidly forming bruises, you were sure your shoulder was dislocated.

but worst of all? your head wasn’t right. you weren’t sure what was wrong with it - it seemed fine every time you focused on identifying the issue, but every time you weren’t paying attention, it was there again. dizzy, a ringing in your eyes, everything a second or two behind; your vision lagging and cloudy. but just as you’d notice it, it was gone.

it was getting worse, too. you could see marc out of the corner of your eye; he was one to one with harrow. it would have made you anxious if you could properly focus on what was going on. but you couldn’t - your thought were scattered, a ringing back tenfold in your ears, the world had gone distant and hazy.

the doctors told you it was a concussion the next morning. layla had actually came in very handy, able to translate the man’s arabic into english for you.

he had told you that you’d sustained a massive head injury - you figured it would have been investigated, if you hadn’t been one of the people there last night.

‘there’ was all people could talk about. first the sky had gone backwards (you’d missed that part, thanks to being dead), then, out of nowhere, two ancient egyptian gods had appeared, destroying all the buildings in their wake, pyramids too.

it wasn’t that you couldn’t remember it. you could - it was clear in every aspect. it just didn’t feel like you’d been there at all. even the build up to it, every moment from when you’d stepped out of that pyramid, hand in hand with steven, hot air hitting your face;

it wasn’t you.

well, obviously it was you. but it wasn’t the same you. everything felt different, you didn’t have the same emotions you did before. the same key ones, yes, like how you felt about marc, and steven, and who you are as a person, but basic thing, like fear, and compassion? it was gone.

you’d have voiced this to a doctor if you could put ‘i died and got brought back to like by an ancient god, but not the same one who destroyed half of your city last night, sorry about that, by the way’ into layman’s terms.

trauma induced dissociation was enough of a label for you. it fit - everything just felt a little hazy, was all. not that you’d asked your doctor, a google search (excluding the resurrection part) had taken you to pages and pages about dissociation and how it’s normal to feel it after a traumatic event. you were pretty sure dying was a traumatic event.

and yes, you could bring it up to your doctor, he was payed to help you, after all. but there was a strange gnawing in the back of your head: that if you voiced this feeling, it would only get worse, and the happy ending you and your husband currently had would be shred in two because you couldn’t feel properly.

so instead, you listened to his professional diagnosis; a severe concussion, fractured rib, dislocated shoulder, several cosmetic wounds, and mental trauma that would be discovered at a later point, if you ever got around to voicing it to a doctor.

what a lovely shopping list, you thought.

-

it was three days before they let you out, and marc wasn’t getting out for another two after that. you’d had to beg him to even go to the hospital in the first place, but now he was getting the medical attention he’d needed for years, he seemed content in his hospital bed. not that he’d ever admit it.

with two days to yourself (not nights, you’d go back to the hospital and stay with marc), you decided to have the egyptian holiday you had come for.

the first stop was obvious; buy clothes. all of the ones you had were either covered in blood or halfway shredded. once you’d achieved this, in a new white linen sundress (cut below the knees to hide the still raw scars), you felt just slightly lost.

of course, you weren’t lost, you were always quick to get your bearings in new places - mercenary years had left you with a few skills, after all - and you kept yourself in a fairly small area, close to the hospital in case you got an emergency call.

no - the feeling of being lost came from deep down. ever since you’d come back to life it was the same, a strange longing for something you couldn’t quite put your finger on. something you felt you just had to have, maybe not right now, but in the near future. the hazy feeling had already begun to pass, you were sure google had served you well. but it left behind this in its wake, a new, even stranger feeling.

a breeze blew your hair lightly as you looked down the street in front of you. it was picturesque, all kinds of small shops and cafes as far as you could see. you could hear kids playing somewhere, a baby crying in the distance.

the lost-longing feeling piqued at this.

“oh.” you breathed. “oh.”

beside you, hathor, dressed in a golden, floor length dress and looking beautiful as ever, laughed.

oh, indeed. did you forget which god i am?

[frenchkanna1808]

Why chapter 3 was a enormous let down and the possible negative impact it might have on the rest of the game

I remember after finishing chapter three one how exicted I was, how deeply impressed I was with the banquet and the qtaro development. And I mean I wasn't the only one, again and again I had seen so much praise about chapter three and how awesome it was. How great midori was as a villain (my like idk how many words analysis about him is very much explicit of that), How amazing qtaro development was, and mainly how great the banquet was, and I had seen the claim around that 3-1 was as great or even better than 2-2. And so I had decided after the hype fell down a little to play yttd again with friends, and that when I realized, god , wait, chapter three is like, extremely mid. I played the entire chapter 1a and it only got to the heights of 1b. I at first couldn’t tell what was wrong with the game, why did it feel so disappointing? And after a while I have finally looked back at the chapter, and yes this chapter is not only extremely lackluster but also a very bad prediction for the future of yttd if 3-2 is written the same. So here in this long french analysis I will discuss the main problem of chapter three the absolute shit characterization of almost all the characters. But also the destruction of emotion route and the crazy pacing

Hi like always, I’m frenchgremlim, I’m the french kanna fan I write stupid essays on yttd from time to time, this one will be compared to some of my others quite negative. But I will try as hard as possible to be an objective critic. This isnt meant to attack any fan of any character no any fan of yttd 3-2, I just want to discuss a possible problem in yttd writing that personally scares me for the future, this topic was one I brought up a lot in many post, if you have seen any of them then well you will already know some of my grievances with chapter 3. So with all my love thank you for reading this, lets start!

THE GOOD STUFF

Chapter Three 1 definitely has many great points. First off, the plot progression is pretty great, we get ton of infos on asunaro, on ways to escape and clues about the hades incident. Midori was a blast and bullying him became my favorite pastime. The dummies were an amazing concept (remember the word concept it will be important for the rest). Despite me disliking ranmaru deepy his development was interresting. THE QTARO DEVELOPMENT WAS CRAZY GOOD, for the first time I got to be justified for being a qtaro fan since chapter 2. Keiji had ton of development in this chapter??? that is very rare considering how much of a stable character he is troughout the game, his relationship with sara is really highlighted and I think thats great. Gin stays the most consistent character in yttd and despite normally being something I dislike in a game I think it makes sense considering gin is pretty much sara anchor in reality in both routes. The obstructors were an amazing idea and I think, adding new mechanics like that truly freshen up the game. Also shin ai is litteraly one of the best idea ever and maple too. And of course the banquet was a thrilling nerve wrecking experience with so many twist and turns that truly got your blood pumping……. Thats my praise for chapter three, the thing that doesn’t make it outright bad but correct. See how I mentioned a few characters by name, but not all, you can pretty much count any of the other either barely present or useless to the narrative. Which will lead me to my first point, the absolute character waste that genuinely every single yttd character going from the least worst to the worst (if you know me you know who will be last).

AN ENSEMBLE CAST IS AN ENSEMBLE NOT SARA AND HER MINIONS NANKIDAI

MAI AND KURUMADA

okay so I will start with them because funny enough new characters have better characterization, than actual character we knew since chapter 1. If I had a word to describe both ami and kurumada it would be good but lacking. Let’s start with mai, I think mai concept of her starting has a sort of traitor and then becoming a true ally is very good, same for kurumada startinga s a heartless asshole only caring about himself to him literally on the ground crying that keiji doesn’t cause the doom of the other dummies. Overall Mai and Kurumada have the strongest character out of all the dumies and are truly multi layered characters. Mai is depicted as a fake idol like girl who hides herself behing the pop like smilling persona (inverse of shin) to hide the fact that she is terrified but can also be a cunning manipulative person too. She truly wants the best for others but is terrified that she might die and would do anything to survive. Kurumada is a brute, he acts like a bully toward the others, act heartless and values himself over others, he has a sort of superiority complex and rejects affection. But trough the power of the bucket, kurumada starts to warm up, and he starts truly caring about the others. He starts devaluing his life after getting destroyed by maple. But in the end he was the only one of the surviving dummies wishing not to be brought back but avenged. Both have interesting dynamic with their pairs and overall importance on the narrative, something that can’t be said about all dummies. Why lacking then. I think kurumada and mai still suffer from what I will call the dummies problem, they feel like there is so much like missed potential its crazy. Seriously we had like one scene where kurumada learns to warm up to kanna, thats it, it feels like we had the basics but it was very rushed. Which is a shame considering THIS IS THE THING THAT MAKES KURUMADA CHANGE AS A PERSON. Mai has less of this problem I think, but still she has no relationship with like anyone in the group except qtaro ( I still think in logic route we should have had the obvious parralele between her actions and like keiji/shin actions it feels like wasted potential) But again this is a flaw that is ommitable since reminder the characters are well written despite being rushed. What isnt forgivable is that kurumada has no relationship at all with shin in logic route, its clear that nankidai envisioned emotion route kurumada before logic route kurumada. Overall I think the pairing system was terribly done for some characters, which is apart of the overrall dummies syndrome.

But lets take a look at the other dummies where my praise will quickly end.

ANZU AND HAYASAKA:

I am deeply sorry for anyone who is a fan of those characters, but I need to be objective, anzu and hayasaka are the most nonexistent characters in yttd. I complain about the lack of kanna content, but the absolute uselessness of those two is crazy disappointing. Remember how I described mai and kurumada, full rich descriptions, what is anzu character. She is a dumb clown girl, thats it there is nothing more. And the problem isnt that she is a simple character on paper, because for example mishima is quite a simple character, its how nankidai decided to utilize them. Lets start with anzu because I think she shows off well the problem, what does anzu do during the narrative, when is she useful, not even like talking about like puzzles or stuff like that kanna also doesn’t help that much, I mean overrall, what is the goal of this character. A character can be a bit flater personaility wise but he has to HAVE A REASON TO EXIST EXCEPT FILLING IN THE BLANKS.

Why was she paired with the yabusames, because reminder all the dummies were paired with a human for a reason, sara with ranmaru because of joe, keiji and hinako because they are edgy emo dyed hair dodgy person, kurumada with greenbling because he has one of the highest percentages while they have some of the lowest, hayasaka because he is similar to mishima with gin. Anzu was paired up with the yabusame, because she had to be paired up with someone, she has NO relationship with them, isnt a contrast isnt anything. My problem with anzu is that she is a a boring character because they did NOTHING WITH HER, she feels like an C rated anime girl in the fucking cast of death note. And no I’m not saying a nice person is boring not at all kanna is my favourite character of fiction, what I’m saying Is that creating just a nice girl is a problem. If we go to hayasaka its the same, which is even worse because hayasaka IS TIED TO THE NARRATIVE. I would say haysaka is more plot interresting but his personality is so boring that it doesn’t help at all. He is just clone non chad mishima. They can die and it will genuinely almost affect nothing at all(which is also a problem the death problem). You get surprised when they actually talk because you had forgotten they existed. Thats how I will define the dummies problem, it feels like the characters were added but had very limited impact in the end, because while it makes sense for asunaro it doesn’t make sense for the cast, why add characters if they have no meaning, thats just bad writing.And why does that piss me off, because you could have done so much more. Remember the mishima comparaison? Mishima is the most good guy ever made but how does he shine, by his interractions, he is a light of joy and good and shines from how kind he is towards others. He’s a bit silly but his unwaring kindness and undertsanding is what makes him a compelling character. Especially I contrast with brooding characters in the cast. ANZU COULD HAVE BEEN THAT. I think especially in logic route, anzu isnt the brightest light bulb, but she can shine in her unwaring compassion, her passion is making others laugh as a clown. While she isnt the best and can sound awkard she tries her best for others, because thats whats right to do, despite how much she is scared. After keiji gets coffined, anzu goes to see keiji in the coffin and tries to cheer him up with the worst joke ever and it makes him truly laughs from how bad it is. Reko see nao painting and gets depressed about it,feeling like she was able to save nobody whether her brother or lover, anzu decides to show her some epic clown skills and absolutely fails, reko laughs finding the kiddo endearing. After alice discovers that midori had hanged out with reko, he wants to destroy him and get filled with rage but anzu tells him to do the breathing exercises she used to do before any performance. Anzu could be used as this idea of childlike kindness a little light in the dark of the group especially in logic route. She can still be a fail girl clown make her bicker with kurumada more, make her be so impressed by how calm mai is, make her despize ranmaru in logic route, make her a dumb kid with tehir cool aunt/uncle with the yabusames. MAKE HER EXIST. SAME FOR HAYASAKA, hayasaka is supposed to be a straight man type character make him even more of a loser, make him silently judge the crazy ass people he is with, do his development litteraly not Five minutes before his death. A character being simple isnt a problem, what is a problem is not using them to their fullest, and for me in the state that they are in currently anzu and hayasaka are bad characters in term of the narrative.

SHIN

Okay so shin isnt a character in chapter three, he’s just there, I’m putting that low because he is a main character. The problem with shin being a bot, is that we just left one of the craziest chapters for him to do nothing, I understand him being stunned by midori and stuff. But I still think this is quite a letdown, especially for the obvious parralels between him and maple almost never being utilized. You can tell nankidai didn’t have the time or want to do much with the guy, which is bonkers considering THIS IS THE CHAPTER WE MEET HIS ABUSER. Then why isnt shin lower? Because shin is the type of character to have development throughout the story, who has a continuous storyline etc, which means that even though he didn’t get anything special this chapter next chapter he will get it. Its not a case of actual waste of character ,its more so, putting the character in the drawer for now. I am not scared for shin writing because he will always get something and always had something. Which makes is non importance in chapter 3-1 not that bad

KANNA

OKAY SO I WILL TRY TO NOT BE BIASED. Kanna characterization disappointing me In 3-1. As the biggest kanna fan, I think nankidai doesn’t care that much about her character as an actual protagonist. This one will be a bit longer but to explain why it was bad I need to do some sidenotes.

Sara is the protagonist of yttd, and keiji and gin are deutarogonist (idk how its written forgive me I’m french, please tell me if its badly written). Sara throughout the story goes trough many changes and developments, while characters like gin and keiji stay pretty much the same the whole story before 3-1. Sara main development is her living with the grief of losing joe and her importance in the group. While keiji is this morally grey, in the end bad person because of his actions guy, that still deeply cares and wants the best for sara, but what he does for her like putting so much responsibility isnt good for her in the end, it creates this codependent dynamic where keiji wishes to protect sara but in the teaches her how to be like him despite him wishing the inverse. Is keiji a good influence? A bad one ? I would say a bad one, but does he care for her? He sures do, and would do anything to protect her. Why am I going a tangent you might say, because shin and kanna are the mirror to keiji and sara. They are in the end the same. Kanna is a direct parralel to sara story wise, which is why I think if the story was twisted the point of view would be either shin or kanna. Kanna is the emotional core of the game, the soul I would say even, her development has a character is the deepest and most complex. Going trough hell, wishing to die to then deciding to live not herself yet but for the people that loved her, Kanna went trough some of the worst events out of the cast, litteraly everyone she even remotely liked or was friends with dies. And yet she decided to stand, for them, for their wishes, that makes kanna the most emotionally strong character in all of yttd. Because compared to sara she had almost no help and was left to her suicidal tendencies. Kanna represents hope and bravery in its purest sense. Thats why kanna is the soul of yttd, she litteraly made shin realised that he could care about others again. But despite all of that kanna was always in the shadow of someone, lacking self worth and self confidence feeling the need to be protected by others, hiding behind shin schemes despite how dodgy they were. Shin was her shield, and now he is gone, and kanna has never been more alone than now. Two people died for her, she hates herself and wishes to go seem them deeply, but she has to stand up for them. And what do we get for chapter three!!!! One scene. Thats fucking it. Okay maybe a little bit more but like god its bad. Kanna is implied in one scene that she doesn’t understand why shin would sacrifice himself for her, which implies that she doesn’t understand that people could love her, which could imply that in general she doesn’t get why either kugie or shin did this for her. COOL ONE IMPLICATION. And like if you read the scene where she says that she will like be epic for them, its implied that kanna doesn’t feel better and is still very much suicidal she still hates herself, kanna doesn’t think she can live, but she has to survive for them. Kanna is implied to be in survival mode more than having hope to be outside. OKAY COOL.

Now I have a question, why does for kanna we have to acively search for her to have any actual development and like relevance, while for other character its more laid out. Why does sara get a scene where we see her change mentality after seeing the joe ai, while kanna GETS OFF SCREEN DEVELOPMENT. IF THERE IS ANYTHING I HATE ITS OFF SCREEN DEVELOPMENT. WE SHOULDN'T HAVE TO GUESS A REASON A CHARACTER CHANGED. Plus kanna is a victim of this almost all the time, which is why people call her flat or not as interesting as shin (I heavily disagree I could write so many pages about her). Kanna is a character which is made in subtlety, which isnt a problem, what is a problem is that she is perhaps the only one. Kanna like I said is a very important character for both routes and yet she is barely treaten has a main protagonist, she is a sidekick, and thats a problem. Because of that her individuality and complexities are not explored. For example I think kanna has many many actual flaws that are barely treated in the narrative, she is far from a perfect kind person, but never tackled on. Kanna is a character that not only never gets a W but also get no breathing room. THIS IS THE FIRST CHAPTER KANNA IS MORE PROACTIVE AND YET WE DONT SEE HOW HER. Yes there is some things that show that, but again its not protagonist level of development, it feels like non important side character development for a character that shouldn’t be that. Kanna SHOULD be a protagonist of yttd, and should get finally her chance to shine instead of always being in someone shadow. I not making pessimistic claims right now since the last chapter isnt out, but I’m very much not hopeful about how nankidai will handle her #challengewriteafemalecharacterwiththesamerespecthasamaleone.

ALICE AND REKO

I Have already written many post about this, but post chapter 2-1, Nankidai had no idea what to do with yabusames, they havent had any actual interresting impact except from lore in any chapter. They become background character especially after nao death. Despite being actual game changing choice, alice and reko are useless to the narrative. WHY? Because nankidai had decided to get them killed by sheep boy, and since nankidai clearly wrote emotion route before logic route, in emotion route he had no idea what to do with them so the became npc’s. Alice relaionship with cast has not evolved from chapter 1, and reko became just one of sara goons. I think this ties into another problem, the emotion route problem, what should make emotion route compelling the character which is supposed to represent it, kanna and the emotion route based choices, but since kanna and the other yabusame gets zero content, emotion route seems like the least interesting route. Because nankidai was more lazy doing it which is a clear problem. That affects the yabusame heavily, sicne he had no plans with them past death. Thats why they are static. Its also linked to another problem which I will mention later. But yes nankidai simply doesn’t know what to do with them, which is especially worst for alice a character that is LINKED TO THE ENTIRE CHAPTER. I think its not only a waste of alice and reko, but also a sign of favoritism. I think nankidai simply cares less about complex ideas for emotion route, I will perhaps write in another post all he could have written interesting for emotion route. Now lets get into THE REAL STINKER OF THE CHAPTER.

NAO EGOKORO: HOW TO MESS UP THE MESSAGE OF CHARACTER

What. The. Actual.shit. I have no words except from that. This out of every charcater bothers me probably the most and actively pisses me off. Imagine writing a character, a female character who was shown as capable and strong despite being an emotional person, imagine creating a character which showed the defiance of asunaro, the fact that yes despite their overwhelming sense of control and power, that there was in fact a way to beat them at their games, imagine writing a character that fought against adversity and had the only canonical route where despite all their wishes that character won, imagine creating a character with a doomed fate which is in direct parallel to another character and shows why he somewhat has the right to be scarred, imagine writing a tragic story about a girl who was only brought here to suffer and be a tool for the progression of A MAN in the canonical narrative, imagine writing a character who entire existence was a tool for asunaro and died because of them, imagine writing that the floormasters consider her useless and non important because she isnt some holy participants, imagine writing that. Okay so imagine that after this poignant ending you decide to do another chapter where you mention her 1 time in a non essential dialogue. THIS IS INSULTING. Because what this honestly says is that, yes nao life truly was unimportant, we get references to greenbling death in the chapter, NAO DIED LIKE THREE HOURS AGO. THIS MESSES UP THE ENTIRE MESSAGE.

This feels like nao was some kind of rug, that when not needed could be trhown out, was her death just shock value, was that the goal of her character. I wanna remind that yes nao was only brought to boost mishima percentages, which mean she was only a tool for another man progression. THERE IS SO MUCH META POSSIBLE COMMENTARY ON THIS. Asunaro who uses children and women as toys for their own goals, that they will throw out when not needed. But instead the fact that nao was completely forgotten just deepens this idea that yes in fact they were right, she was unimportant, and thst deeply isulting I think. Why does every chapter mishima comes back while we get no mention of nao. Why is there a clear focus in this game about more stereo typically strong stoic figures, isn't this entire game about the conflict between emotion and logic. Why does characters like kanna and nao representations of the conflict get zero content. Characters like kanna and nao MATTER, they are perhaps some of the only representation of empowerment that people like me can relate. Because I will be truthful, logic route is in fact not the good choice, not in narrative standpoint (logic route is awesome for the narrative for sure), in a moral standpoint, its an extremely good idea of course. But the message of the game is that in the end its wrong, it’s a wrong choice to act or pretend to be an emotionless logic based robot, keiji is in the wrong, shin is in the wrong, midori is in the wrong. Whats the point of a moral dilemma if you don’t talk about it from one side. THEN WHY DOES THE CHARACTERS THAT REPRESENT THE INVERSE GET ZERO CONTENT. I think nao disappearance is not only one of the most disappointing things in all of yttd but genuinely gets me scared for the future of yttd themes.

Now that we finished every character, you may wonder, why, why is this chapter characterization so bad? What even happened? Ill tell you what happened, there is two reason everything went to shit and let me list it here:

THE SARA PROBLEM OR WHY THIS CHAPTER PLOT FOCUS IS ASS .

YTTD chapter three was way more plot focused than any of the chapters I would say, and honestly thats great for the narrative, if only it was done well. Remember my speeches about the characters about how like 60% of the cast is useless to the narrative, characters we know since a while, why do characters have no development, why does the dummies gets jack shit to do etc. Thats because of one thing, this chapter prioritized PLOT over CHARACTERS. And how can I claim this, because most scenes are sara and her doing everything. This chapter wasn't really about her, at all even, yet we have focused more on her reactions to the events that literally any characters. Chapter three at least half of it shouldn't have been sara focused. You might say what are you on about french? I’m gonna explain. I wanna state some example to show my point clearer, the reveal of why non candidates were brought here, why, in the flipping heck is sara the charcter in particular they choose to only know that, to have the big emotional scene, why especially in logic route, why?????? Yes she knew nao, sure thing, yeah she knew kai, but she wasn't the only person that knew them, sara didn’t even like mention nao almost the whole chapter, you want me to buy some emotional ass scene, for a charcter you barely even cared about showing in the narrative. I could think of a million characters who knwing this would flip out and have ACTUAL CHARACTER MOMENTS (kanna, reko, shin when he would learn that they brought kugie only to die which in the end CAUSED KANNA TO BECOME SUICIDAL AND DECIDE TO KILL HERSELF, GIN).

Another example the final scene where sara presses the button to get rid of midori that scene feels so empty, it doesn’t feel like a revenge or anything, midori has no emotional connection or link to sara, it doesn’t feel deserved, why out of everyone of the cast, why is midori getting killed by the person who he hurted the least. It feels like yeah sara the protag so she has to do it, it doesn’t feel cathartic because the characters that deserved the most to get this final bow didn’t get to get it. IM PRETTY SURE ANYONE IN THE ROOM COULD HAVE PRESSED THE BUTTON AND IT WOULD HAVE BEEN MORE EMOTIONALLY DRIVEN. I wanna discuss emotion route sara in particular, sara isnt as interresting as before in emotion route, since now she is healing and is closing her arc, which means that compared to logic route you don’t really have this want to see her arc which make scenes that should have been about other characters feel even more flat. I am not saying we should stop having sara as a protag no no of course, my problem is that we have seen that sara can work as the protag while focusing on other characters drama.

Example chapter 2-1, in 2-1 the focus is on reko and alice, and yet sara still has conflicts for herself, but they don’t seem to overpower the narrative. This intense sara focus destroyed the other characters screen time, and caused a lot of scenes that should hav been more impact to be less impact. Sara story in emotion route should have been the keiji stuff an ranmaru stuff mainly(and the whole logic route sara becoming crazy stuff too), the whole conflict with midori just felt like it was created only for the narrative. NOW I CAN FINNALY COME TO MY POINT. The sara focus was because yttd decided to focus more on the plot progression that character driven story, thats why sara does everything, thats why the characters have overall less to do. And imma be honest I did not come for yttd for the plot, people love yttd because of THE CHARACTERS, why do people play logic route, because they want to see shin evolve and sara too, why do people save kanna to fullfill shin wishes and save a kid they care for, what most people play yttd for is not the plot. YTTD IS A CHARACTERS DRIVEN STORY, characters not character. I genuinely don’t give a flying fuck about the plot if the characters are non existant, a bad plot can be carried by good characters, but a good plot will never carry bad characters. I know we are getting closer to the end, but yttd always had that balance between action and character moments. But I don’t think its only the direction of the story that is faulty. ITS the:

PACING

YTTD CHAPTER THREE PACING, wow we met this new guy midori, WTF REKO DEAD, anyway who cares lets move on. Thats it thats the pacing. THE CHAPTER IS WA TOO FAST. We go trough plot points so quiclky, we randmoly see reko/alice die then nothing, they don’t exist anymore, characters the cast know since the beginning, again for the dummies its logical, in a way, they don’t really know them, plus they are robots. RANDOM AHH REVEAL KANNA AND SHIN ARE ACTUAL SIBLINGS THEN NOTHING, NO MENTION, NO ACTUAL IMPORTANCE TO THE ROUTE, this only felt like this was added in for plot for logic route so that we know in advance that shin and kanna are siblings. The dummies just die at the end of the chapter in five minutes, qtaro dies in five minutes then the chapter ends. How do you want us to feel emotional weight for a character dying if you give us no time, joe death is one of the most viceral death because its slow and painful to watch, while if he died in chpater three he would have just exploed for shock value. Shock value thats how reko and alice death felt like, just that. Sara figuring out the whole participant thing, shock value thats it. The pacing is just horrible in this chapter so much so that I had actually forgotten kanna and shin were revealed to be siblings at the end of my first playtrough

CONCLUSION

I don’t think chapter three was bad per say, half of it was amazing truly, but the other half was incredibly disappointing, the whack characterization, the horrible plot focus and the pacing are terrible. Emotion route suffered the most because of this and I think on an objective standpoint is the worst written route (i’m the biggest emotion route glazer but like I can’t lie on how bad nankidai fumbled). I still love yttd and am full of hope that chapter three two will be the most amazing thing ever made, but I am scared of dissapointement now, I hope nankidai comes back to his roots wirting like chapter 2. If you like loved chapter 3-1 then honestly I wish I was you, I don’t like being dissapointed, I don’t like being let down, I am not critiquing from a place of hatred but from a very passionate fan, I know my opinion is pehaps not one of the most shared but as a fan of yttd for so many years I think we need to open our eyes to flaws. Perhap chapter 3-2 will fix everything I say and I hope so, I hope this post becomes outdated, but if it doesn’t then it would in my eyes truly ruin yttd. It won’t change chapter 2-2 changed my life and that kanna kizuchi saved me from a lot of dark times.I love yttd and i belive in nankidai and that why as a fan we shoudl critic his work