#also no one knows better than me that the timeline for this blog is a smidge off canon

[radiofreesanjak]

Normally I try to speak about something that comes to mind once per day, a small commentary on the ways to the new era. But today the sun is warm, the wind is cool, and the birds sing proudly in the trees above the studio.

I'll instead take a moment today to tell you a story:

I was born in the mines, but I was one of the last people to remember childhood there. It's been a while since Sanjak has become free, and since then I have had the great joy to see children born and raised who have no knowledge of our time underground.

This is a source of great joy, but it is also a rift. They will come to me and they will ask me questions of what it was like when I was their age and I will tell them: I grew up in the mines. Things were different there.

They, too, learn history. They ask questions of the nobility that reveal a lack of understanding for the concept. The hierarchy of blood is foreign to them. To explain it is always an interesting trial with myself: I would deny none who seek knowledge the ability to find it, but to explain them faithfully is a trial against myself. (The noble would say they do not view themselves as better, merely suited for different things. But when the things they are suited to deserve luxury, and the things we are suited to are for the dirt, how is that not an assignment of value? This is not a nuance children foreign to the concept typically understand.)

Teaching the children of the mines is always a process. We tell them of the place we lived for so long, what it was like, the floods, the isolation, the denial of basic sunlight. One year, a group of children took it upon themselves to learn this trial by experience, and I remember holding a young child as they sobbed into my arms telling me of the horrors of the dark. "I know of this, dear." I said. "This is what we fought to save you from."

I do not blame them the curiosity but it is odd to feel such a combination of relief and horror. The children do not know of the mines, and this is the future we fought so hard to see. Because the children do not know but see the way it weighs on us, they sometimes take an empathetic leap in order to understand us better, and in the pain they experience at seeing a fraction of what we had to endure, I find myself drawn to tears about what was taken from me.

There many things to take away from this, I suppose. The first we did was to make it harder for them to access the old mineshafts. The rest I find myself thinking on on days like these, when the sun is warm and mild and the wind blows softly and the old horrors seem a distant nightmare.

[reflections-in-a-critical-eye]

i for once want to get the opinion of a "rational" jikooker who knows how to take a step back and take certain things for what they are and i wanna know your opinion or interpretation of jikook in chap2 and them not meeting and also that conversation they had in the car about that please.

And you thought I'm that rational person? Funny.

You know, there's something I always disliked about being in this fandom space. I mean, there's plenty of other things, don't get me wrong, but this one in particular really irks me. It's the need for approval, for confirmation of one's thoughts. There's a severe lack of independent thought. It might be hidden under apparent strong opinions, but when you look at how those opinions are spread to anon messaging to bloggers everyday, that's a sign that the complete opposite happens.

Jikook as a kpop ship always has to be questioned. At this point, I think it's part of its narrative as a ship. But what's curious (and stupid) is that the hardest line of questioning comes from the ones who consider themselves interested/curious. But make no mistake, this is not done for the sake of not becoming delusional and discard any rational thought. It happens because of the need for approval.

You sent me this ask because you hope for me to agree with your own thoughts about jikook and what that conversation in the car means. Not for them actually, but for you. And you're not the only person. A sure sign of fandom insanity is debating for over 2 weeks now a conversation that is not only heavily editated, it is mediated as well. It takes place in the context of a show for fans in which participants are two people who will never reveal everything about their lives. And on top of that, there's an intentional need to ignore that people can speak in hyperbole, that people can ommit or say one thing that actually means more or another that only the other person is capable of understanding the nuances of that.

Communication is complex. We do know that because we engage with it everyday. Except we forget all that the moment we have to talk about this specific ship. We forget a lot of things about human behavior, relationships, etc. It is an intentional act. So we start writing fanfictions. We start making relationship timelines. We start taking about temporary or definitive break ups of a ship that hasn't even been confirmed as a couple. At this point, shippers operate into this alternative universe sphere, canon adjacent but instead of doing it on ao3, they use their blogs and anon messages for that. But hey, fanfics on ao3 are a lot of the times the work of talented writers, while 500-1000 words essays on tumblr are simply a complete waste of time after the first paragraph.

Is this what you would consider a rational perspective? Or should I start writing down a timeline of all the times in which JM and JK have met in "Chapter 2" up until NY in July? (As if in reality their lives are actually separated that clearly, as if a break in band work completely defines their personal lives, jesus christ!). So, should I note down all the public events that they've been to? And to draw a conclusion from it to prove or disprove that the amount of times they've seen each other is reflective or not of what they said in the car when they left for their trip? Of course, we should ignore that there's an entire life outside of what we see.

And that's the thing, you know? We all supposedly agree that they actually share little of their lives with their fans, but practically? The fandom doesn't really give a shit. Because of the classic parasocial relationship we have developed that makes us believe we know everything there is to know.

What we are allowed to see and what we hear from whispers here and there should allow us to realize that no theory over a supposed relationship is better than the other. Believing they are just friends, that they have broken up, that they are fwb and so on is in no way more rational that believing they are together.

What does this mean? If none of us are wiser? It means we have a choice. Some are choosing to be losers or little bitches crying in anon asks about their "insecurities" over a ship. Some are choosing to look at this ship as a duo that includes two people who have really good chemistry and who match each other's freak.

I've always been in the latter category, I thought that was obvious and I've said it before. If one day Jimin makes a public statement that he's marrying the love of his life, a sweet girl that is also the mother of his 5 secret children, then so be it. And if one day, Jungkook shows up one day after he decided to run away and join a bike gang where he met his boyfriend, then so be it. If somehow that next day, a jikook clip would turn up on my tl in which Jimin is brushing his teeth while straddling Jungkook, my reaction would be "well, jikook fuck. Often". You know why? Because for me, the public life of stars and what they choose to share is entertainment. A travel show, a wlive, concerts, these are all forms of entertainment. I do not consume my entertainment by being a loser on the internet, pondering if my assessment over two people might be fucking is real or not or is approved by other people.

[writingwithfolklore]

A Note for New Writers

                When I started this blog, one of my goals was to compile advice that I hadn’t really seen online anywhere. Stuff a little bit beyond the foundations I was already very familiar with. I took university courses and different approaches to writing combined with my own experience and lessons from the mentors and teachers around me, and began to write it all down to share with you.

                The idea was never that you would start writing your first character with Character is Plot say. However, I noticed there are a lot of new, beginner, or learning writers on here, and there’s a great value in really nailing the foundations, so here marks the start of a short series of foundational advice for you new writers (or for writers who have been around the block and may need a refresher. I know I do!)

                I see a lot of new writers in the tags looking down on yourselves or your ability. Stuff like, ‘why can’t I seem to do this’ or ‘if only I could actually follow this advice’. My posts were never meant to make you feel like you aren’t good enough. It was written with over a decade of experience behind it. It takes time to build those instincts in knowing what to do. Unfortunately you can’t just build writing skill by reading and collecting articles—they can be a guide, but they aren’t meant to instantly come naturally to you “if only you were a good writer.”

No one can automatically learn how to write just from reading some advice because writing skill isn’t about the knowing, it’s about the practicing.

                And it takes a hell of a lot of practice.

                Writing is mostly intuition—we practice certain skills to get them to a place where we can just do them without really thinking about it. It’s kind of like when you were learning to type, and you had to constantly remind yourself to put periods at the ends of your sentences. Then, over time and a million reminders, you started to just do it on instinct without really thinking about it.

                It’s muscle memory, it’s trying again and again, it’s a lot of struggling and tears and feedback and more tears and a million and one false starts and unfinished drafts and finished drafts that are really bad and lost contests and rejections. I have been through it all. I’m still going through it all. Only recently have I been published—it took me over a decade of practice to get there. Oh, and in the same month one of my pieces was published, another was rejected.

                That’s how it goes. It’s not some switch that will one day flick where you’re ‘good enough’. And the timeline isn’t so set. While I was working on building up skill, I was also working on building up confidence. In the right publications, with enough confidence, I probably could’ve been published years ago. In the right place, and if you’re brave enough to submit, you probably could too.

                It’s about who sees it, very rarely does it really depend on how ‘good’ it is (and you can tell from all the published work that can’t possibly be better than your unpublished work, right?)

                TL;DR, writing isn’t about the knowing, it’s about time, patience, and practice. If you’re reading advice and don’t feel good enough to execute on it, just take a little bit more time and get a hundred thousand more words under your belt. One day, it will just become intuition.

You will get there.

[colourless-hydrangeas]

Concepts for the Ikéseries RP community:

Since almost every guy from the Ikémen series has an RP blog now, why don't we come up with some new concepts?

Spacetime mail: Just a fun little way to send your favourite Ikèmen guy gifts through asks. :)

Multiverse concept: Why don't we make this Ikeseries RP multiversal, rather than making them take place in the same time/place/world? Everything that happens, happens in its own universe. For example, in one universe, Hideyoshi and Mai may be dating, and in another, it may be Nobunaga and Mai.

Timeline shenanigans: Why don't we do modern AU RPs as well? They are fun too!

Tagging system: We could use different tags for different types of RPs. For example, if it is an angst RP, it should be tagged with #angst. If there's gore, character death or mention of war(since Ikeseries games often deal with themes such as these), they should also be tagged accordingly. #nsfw and #sfw tags are self-explanatory. These would also help people navigate the blog better, and avoid seeing things that they do not want to see by filtering tags.

Regarding polyamory: Now that characters have started going on dates and what not(some are getting married too), it is highly probable that they will have more than one partner. Now, why don't we make this thing multiversal too? Like, every relationship is in it's own universe? There will be no jealousy involved, or any sort of conflict regarding cheating.

Regarding ships and polyamory by @masamuneskitchen.

If you want to suggest more ideas, or include your own ideas here(just so we can all see it in one post), please let me know. :)

[romana-after-dark]

The Wrong Way Master List

Gif by @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog

Raider!Joel Miller x Fem!Reader

Raider!Tommy Miller x Fem!Reader

Spotify Playlist

Inspiration came from @toxicanonymity and her fantastic Raider!Joel.

Summery: You are sold to Joel to clear up some of your fathers' debts, and he takes you back to his house where him, Tommy, and high ranking members of his raiding trope stay. Joel is mean, cruel, and hash, but had small moments of softness that confuse you in your venerable state. Over time, you get to know him and Tommy, and see different sides of each, an both are hiding secrets. Was it possible to fall in love under these circumstances? Or was that just another way Joel was fucking with you?

Aka: my mom sold me to One Direction

WARNINGS FOR FULL FIC, NOT CHAPTER BY CHAPTER UNLESS SOMETHING NEW IS ADDED AFTER MASTER WARNING LIST: DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT!!!! Fic contains graphic depictions of sexual assault, rape, molestation, dubcon/non con. Blow Jobs, PIV sex, lose of virginity, sex trafficking, past incest, death/people dying everywhere, Stockholm syndrome, falling for your rapist, victim blaming, torcher, branding, physical abuse, rape (not Joel), somno, dub con on tommy? idk he's not really into it but feels like he has to, self-harm/depression/suicidal thoughts (not a lot) but fair warning, major age gaps, love triangle, pregnancy/birth, threats of abortion, major character death, mentions of potential csa/child abuse but does not even come close to happening, forced pregnancy, forced housewife shit, breeding, breeding kink?!?!

This is a reader fic, reader is early 20's, Joel is 40's at this point, reader is small enough that the men can lift her, but these are strong men. Reader is also refered to as little one, little girl ETC, but that's more in reference to her age/innocence than physical size.

Unknown chapters at this point but heres a starter

Chapter 1: Joel takes you away from everything you know

Chapter 2: Joel takes what he wants, Tommy tries to make things easier

Bonus Chapter: Tommy takes Little One's virginity

Chapter 3: Joel softens up, and readers learns her roll in all this

Chapter 4: Little One is getting cocky, and finds herself in trouble, but Tommy and Joel are there for her

Chapter 5: Joel and Tommy don’t feel good

Suggested drabble: Period sex

Chapter 6: Things change with Tommy, and Joel shows a more vunerable side during a near disaster.

Chapter 7: Little One and Lorenzo spend some time together, and Lorenzo drops a bomb on Little One.

sick bonus chapter

Chapter 8: For 6 months of Little One's pregnancy her relationship with Joel and Lorenzo shifts and changes.

Suggested Drabble: Brotherhood

Chapter 9: The aftermath.

Suggested Drabble: “It Wasn’t Always Like This”

Chapter 10: The escape does not go as planned.

Alternate ending: a happier end

Canon Sequel Mini Series, Ghost of You

Follow Ellie's life sifting through to lies to discover the truth of her creation.

Dark Ending Timeline: Going Under

Going Under: Chapter 1:

Going Under: Chapter 2:

Going Under: Chapter 2.5:

Going Under: Chapter 3

Going Under: June and Tommy

Going Under: Chapter 4

Going Under: Finale

Suggested drabbles to see how the uncles are doing after the canon ending: Lorenzo, Zach and Tommy, and Better Than Revenge

If neither ending satisfied you or if there was something you wanted to see but didn’t, if you wanna write something in universe will be happy to link it to my masterlist!

Art by @melodymakesart

Drabbles, One Shots, Thots

Period Sex: Period sex with Joel makes Little One more confused than ever at what she is to Joel

Well, That’s Alright Because I Like The Way It Hurts: Joel is gone for longer than expected and you worry about him. When he comes back, you let him take his frustration out on your body

Brotherhood: Tommy and Joel reflect on their relationship as brothers.

“It Wasn’t Always Like This”: In Tommy’s arms, Little One thinks over her year with Joel

Lorenzo, Zach and Tommy: Lorenzo is slowly recovering, meets his niece for the first time

Better than Revenge: Lorenzo and Tommy can’t get revenge on Joel, but they can get revenge on the one who started it all

Zach and Lorenzo’s Wedding

Gateaway Car by Taylor Swift, thoughts by @fandxmslxt69

Art by @k-ra

Joel and Lorenzo by @fen-is-unwell

If this sort of thing doesn't interest you or triggers you, hide dub con and non con from your tags as I will be tagging any fics like that as such

Main Blog (filled with more normal fics lol): @romanarose

This is absolutely not anything anyone needs to do bc ur lovely comments are enough but if anyone makes a book board, art, a fic or anything based off this series, you absolutely can! I know some creators aren’t for it but I love when people do that, and I’ve written a few fics for a few series myself. If you are so inclined and are okay with it, I’ll attach them to this master list (that includes if you don’t like my endings you can make your own 😂)

But as always, nice comments mean the world. I know with this sort of content you may not want to Reblog it on your page, but if you leave a comment or send an anon, that means the world and keeps me writing!

[yuri-is-online]

Hello hello! Anon here. First of all, congratulations on getting accepted for your courses! Don't worry about trying to balance work and the blog, we will always be here waiting for you. Second of all, your whole Yutu AU has been really fascinating to look through. (Though that may be because of my bias toward Fire Emblem Awakening, as it was what got me into the series) Sorry for the incoming wall of text, but it's been giving me THOUGHTS.

So imagine this: whoever Yutu's dad is (I'll pick Azul for this example because I headcannon his English voice somewhere between Matt Mercer's Chrom and Olivert from The Legend of Heroes games) finds out who Yutu really is. You remember that cutscene after Chapter 13 in Awakening, with the Lucina reveal and Chrom has this: "You deserved better than a sword and a world full of troubles. I'm sorry."? Imagine Yutu hearing something like that: the acknowledgement of everything he's gone through, the pain of knowing his dad couldn't do anything and can't do anything more than offer words, and the reality that it might now be really possible to change the future? I imagine Azul breaking down after hearing all that because the last thing he wants to do is hurt Yuu or his son after everything he's been through. Oh goodness, the two of them both need hugs.

Second: did Crowley tip off the Magic Marshalls (because I think he would) and force Yuu to take the blame for his negligence (because he absolutely would)? Now imagine Yutu finding this out and telling his dad. Now his dad knows Crowley is a cheapskate who fobs his work onto everyone else without a second thought. And now he's responsible for having Yuu taken away and starting all this? Knowing the boys and how far they would go for Yuu I'd imagine they don't take that well. In other words, to slightly alter a quote from Regina in Once Upon A Time: "I guess killing a crow suddenly made the top of my to-do list."

Sorry for the wall of text but that's been rattling around in my head for a few days (so make of it all what you will). Hope you're doing well and looking forward to what's next!

-The anon who loves Riddle & Azul

AHHHHH (i feel like I always take forever to answer your asks I am sosososososososososo sorry, this one just drove me crazy in a good good way)

Listen fire emblem awakening was my entire personality for like all of middle school.  The only thing i wanted to talk about was chrobin.  I celebrated Morgan and Lucina's birthdays by drawing them. I think I still have a Cherche x Libra fan art thing I drew on some sheet of paper somewhere in my things because I was SO MAD that no one shipped them and I couldn't find fan art of them anywhere and I just oooooooooooh.  THE WAY CHROM GETS A NEW CRIT LINE ABOUT HOW ANYTHING CAN CHANGE AFTER THE REVEAL???? BECAUSE OF HOW DETERMINED HE IS TO KEEP THAT PROMISE AND GIVE LUCINA A BETTER WORLD???? i just cant be normal about them i am so sorry.  R+A annon I love you, I love you so much for this you made my entire month and possibly my year.  Awakening is also what got me into the series and made me so many friends I just love her so much.  She's an icon and I hope she gets remastered with Sumia either deleted or with a fucking personality.

I should probably sit down and actually write a timeline for myself of events, but since I am free to lean in to the fire emblem pacing, I want to say that monsters from Yutu's timeline start showing up (similar to how the Risen do in Awakening) in the past and stirring up trouble, which leads to an event where Yutu panics and forgets himself in his desperation to protect his dad.  The main way the future kids always proved themselves was by showing their mother's wedding ring, but Yutu doesn't have that so really it's just up to his dad to see someone who looks like him and Yuu blended together, supposedly from Yuu's world using magic and above all else crying out and driving up his own blot levels to protect him calling him dad. For Azul! Yutu it's especially painful, he feels like he already knows what his dad is going to say. That he's disappointed in him. That he has no idea how they could possibly be related. That he hopes in this future he turns out to be different. But that's not what happens.

Before Azul overblotted he was quiet. There's a similar quiet over him now, a similar look of tense surprise, but Yutu- no- his child doesn't know that. His child is looking at him in fear, in worry for his reaction or his safety he doesn't know but he knows the way those tears start to form. Azul knows the quiver of the lip and the shriek, of all the things he could have passed on to such a treasure.

"You deserved better from me." Because it's true. He might think of himself as a work in progress but he still thinks he has quality; he would have done research, read every book he could get his hands on, taken classes, anything he would need to do to be a good father, a worthy partner. Anything. "You deserved to have the world within your grasp, not whatever shadow of a future and a father I left you with. I am so sorry." He does not expect Yutu to grab him and hold him like he's still somehow worthy of his love, but Azul can't fight the urge to grab back, to stroke his son's hair and let the tears fall on his suit without any care at all. I'm here. It's ok, daddy's here, daddy's got you, he won't let anything happen to you.

As for your second question, I did not really write Crowley like that no. It was more like he was the first person mysteriously arrested after the Magical Marshall's decided to finally do their job. I was writing it like they wanted to ship Yuu away to cover up for their own incompetence in preventing seven overblots instead of properly investigating what might have caused that. He's not completely innocent though, so yes. The boys do not take it well at all. And please do not apologize for sending in your thoughts, I am so so slow but I love hearing from you.

[sluttywonwoo]

instead of you [part thirty-three] || l.mh

pairing: [best friend’s brother] lee minho x college!reader ft. han jisung

summary: you didn’t expect to spend your summer pretending to be your best friend’s girlfriend- then again, you didn’t expect to fall for your best friend’s brother, either. 

warnings: swearing, angst, discussions of plane disasters, mentions of sex (mdni ; 18+)

word count: 3k

a/n: revamped my tom holland series from my main blog ( @wazzupmrstark ) to try and motivate myself to finish it!!

additional a/n: disclaimer that this chapter and the following chapters take place on oahu and kauai, hawai'i. i wrote this a year ago (originally posted on sept. 22, 2022) and included mentions of the negative impact and sentiment tourism in hawai'i procures, but it was before the fires in maui. i included hawai'i in their vacation in the first place because i'm part hawaiian and wanted to bring attention to our people's attitude toward tourists while also writing about the parts of the islands that i grew up loving. and i thought i should clarify that before posting, as i feel the context is important to precede what would be an otherwise distasteful choice if i had written this now. please keep hawai'i in your thoughts, mahalo plenty <3

series masterlist | early access to the next chapter on ko-fi

Predictably, you cried yourself to sleep. You debated over whether or not to tell Minho. He’d probably find out when he woke up in the morning but would he be mad if he didn’t hear it from you? If Jisung was right, he didn’t care about you at all, so why would you grant him the courtesy of a head’s up? You didn’t want to believe Jisung, rather, you wanted to believe that he had only said those things in the heat of the moment but at the end of the day, he knew Minho far better than you did. Whether or not he was telling the truth to try and save you or lying to hurt you was up to you to decipher.

You wound up texting Minho, ‘Jisung knows,’ without any other context and calling it a night. 

The next morning, you woke up to a message from Jisung telling you not to bother getting ready for the day and that he’d be going on without you. It was mostly a relief not to have to put on an act after everything that happened the night before but it also stung.

You weren’t very optimistic about repairing your relationship with Jisung, but any lingering hope vanished when he wouldn’t even look at you in passing in the hallway. 

You spent the entire day in bed, trying to distract yourself with anything you could think of to pass the time. You scrolled through social media until your timelines stopped refreshing with new content. There wasn’t anything interesting enough on TV to pull you out of spiraling so you didn’t even bother trying to find something to hold your attention. 

At one point you remembered the book you were reading but as soon as you opened it you were greeted by all of Jisung’s little annotations he had left for you. He still had your book and you wondered if he would ever finish it now that you’d ruined everything. 

You thought about texting him, just to check in or try and talk about things but you didn’t want to bother him. A couple of times, you almost texted him just out of instinct. You would go to send him a tweet that you thought he’d find funny and then remember.

Minho came by your room that night after dinner when everyone was back from the day’s activities. He knocked twice, letting himself in before you’d even finished telling him he could enter. 

“Care to explain what happened?” he asked, hands on his hips.

You shrugged noncommittally. “Jisung found out.”

“How? Did you tell him?”

“And ruin my own relationship with my best friend? Yeah, definitely.”

Minho rolled his eyes. “I didn’t come here to argue. I just want to know what happened.”

“Then don’t accuse me of shit.”

“I didn’t mean- I’m sorry. That’s not what I was trying to do.”

You sighed and signaled for him to sit down if he wanted to. He did, perching himself on the edge of the bed cautiously. 

“He knows because he noticed me sneaking out and finally decided to follow me.”

The color drained from Minho’s face. “So he heard-”

You nodded. “I don’t know how much, but enough.”

“Fuck.”

“Fuck is right.”

“He wouldn’t say a word to me today,” Minho said. 

“He wouldn’t even look at me.”

“I guess we knew this would happen eventually.”

“Yeah.”

“We fucked up.”

“Yeah.”

“You were right.”

“What do you mean?” you asked, furrowing your eyebrows.

“We really do deserve each other.”

Oh. What Jisung had said earlier rang through your ears again. 

“I guess I was.”

Just then, the door to the bedroom opened and Jisung walked in, scoffing as he passed his brother. 

“I should have known,” he muttered to himself. 

“Ji, look-” Minho tried, only to be immediately cut off by his younger brother. 

“Don’t. Please just fucking don’t.”

“But-”

“God, you never listen to a word I say, do you? Either of you?”

You wanted to protest that you did listen to him but you thought better of it. It wouldn’t help your case at all. Instead, you sat there silently like a child being scolded. 

“I don’t want to hear you explain yourself,” Jisung continued. “I don’t care why you fucked my best friend. I think the act in itself doesn’t need an explanation.” Minho opened his mouth to respond but Jisung cut him off again. “I don’t want to hear an apology either. I already know you don’t mean it. In fact, I think we’re done here so if you wouldn’t mind getting the fuck out of my room...”

Minho looked like he wanted to argue but likely knew it wouldn’t do any good so he simply hung his head and let himself out, bidding you a quiet goodnight as he left. You didn’t respond. You didn’t even acknowledge him. How could you?

“Don’t forget to pack your things for the flight tomorrow. It’s a long one.”

You sat there, stunned. You hadn’t expected Jisung to speak to you at all, let alone say something amicable. 

“O-ok thanks,” you responded shakily.

“I’m sleeping in here tonight,” he added. 

“Oh-” you scrambled up, preparing to leave but Jisung stopped you. 

“No, I meant with you. It’d look weird if I slept on the couch again.”

Of course. Keeping up appearances.

“Is it even worth it to do this anymore?” you asked. “I mean, it’s falling apart at the seams.”

“It’ll be fine,” Jisung argued. “It’s just a few more weeks.”

“Do you really want to keep pretending to be in love with someone you hate?”

He froze, still bent over his suitcase. Then he straightened up and turned to face you. 

“I don’t hate you.”

“You don’t?”

“No, I don’t think I could ever hate you. I’ve been trying, trust me.”

You weren’t sure how to take that. You weren’t sure how you were supposed to take it. You tried not to let his words stoke the embers of hope you were still clinging on to but it was already proving difficult. 

“Maybe with time,” you suggested. 

He shrugged. “Ready for bed?”

-

You managed to get some sleep, despite everything. It took a while for your heart to calm down as you lay there beside your (ex?) best friend who was already snoring softly. He had fallen asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. You weren’t sure how he was able to drift off so easily in spite of your whole friendship falling apart but perhaps the stress was only one-sided. 

You were the one being eaten alive by anxiety and guilt. All he had to do was mourn the loss of everything you destroyed. 

The hours of sleep you did get passed quickly without dreams which was unusual for you. Before you knew it, Jisung’s alarm was going off and both of you were groaning as you dragged yourself out of bed. 

You finished packing the rest of your things in relative silence. Neither of you had much to say aside from when you passed each other’s things back and forth from your suitcases. 

The sun had yet to come up when the rest of the Hans gathered in the kitchen with their luggage. Since the flight was over twelve hours long Jisung’s parents had booked the earliest possible departure which just so happened to be before the sunrise. 

The boys slept during the ride to the airport but you weren’t able to. You were squished between Jisung and Minho in the very back of the van, feeling like a pin in a grenade. They ignored each other, of course, both seemingly dead to the world. 

Minho woke up before Jisung. He glanced over at you and offered an expression of sympathy. You just shrugged in response. 

Sitting in the car like that caused your knees to brush up against each other every so often, each time you rounded a corner or went over a speed bump. Every time it happened you fought the urge to meet his eyes. The touch, be it fleeting, made your chest tighten over and over again until you were half-convinced you were going into cardiac arrest. Eventually, Minho gave up trying to give you space and just let his knee rest against yours. Funnily enough, it helped you relax.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

“It’s fine.”

He was so hard to read these days. Not that he was ever easy to read. You couldn’t tell whether or not he liked having his knee there. You weren’t sure why you were getting so caught up on it in the first place.

You longed to hold his hand. You longed to hold Jisung’s hand. But all you could do was sit there in between the two and wait until you finally arrived at the airport. 

Thankfully, Minho was sat with his parents for the flight, which meant you were squeezed in between Jisung and Felix. You gave Jisung the window seat, knowing you wouldn’t get any sleep yourself. He looked like he wanted to argue when you offered it to him but ultimately surrendered when he saw the look in your eyes. You compromised for switching halfway through since the flight was so long but even that seemed to be pushing it for him. 

It was funny how Jisung was still looking out for you after everything you had done. It was as if it was instinctual to him, to put you before himself. The realization almost made you tear up. Had you cared that much for him too? Or was it all one-sided? Either way, you were positive you didn’t deserve him.

-

Dom had chosen Hawai’i as his destination. A controversial choice, given the state of tourism at the moment, but it wasn’t like you had much say in the matter. Jisung had confided in you earlier in the trip that he had tried to talk his father out of it but that he couldn’t be swayed. 

“We might as well try to make the most of it,” you argued. “It’s like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, right?”

He shrugged. “I guess.”

The flight from Bali to Hawai’i was over twelve hours long which meant that you had roughly six hours to figure out how to entertain yourself before it was time to trade places. You could try to sleep but that meant leaning on Jisung and you were almost positive the last thing he wanted was for you to touch him right now. 

You didn’t feel like paying for the in-flight wi-fi so you had to get creative with how to keep yourself busy. You scrolled through your camera roll for a while but it just made you sad. The pictures from the trip were one thing, but then there were all of the ones of you and Jisung back at school. The further back you went, the happier you seemed. There was no way that was actually true, it was just putting more distance between what had happened in the present from the way things were in the past. That, and you had a tendency to romanticize the past. 

“Did you know flight attendants are trained to take oxygen masks from passengers?”

Felix’s voice from beside you pulled you from your spiral of self-pity almost immediately. You turned to look at him and cocked your head in confusion. 

“What?”

“Like, you know that whole spiel they give you about safety before the plane takes off? And they’re like ‘during the flight, oxygen masks might drop from overhead’?”

“No, I know all of that. Why would they take the masks from passengers? Do they not have their own?”

“They do, but they might need to move around the cabin when that happens in case of an emergency or something, and if that were to be the case, they’re trained to take masks from passengers to oxygenate themselves. They’ll give it back, but in order to do their jobs they might have to borrow one without asking.”

“What if the passenger passes out?”

“Then they’ll be able to help them! Because they’re fully oxygenated.”

You made a face. “I’m glad you’ve got the aisle seat, then.”

Felix shrugged, grinning. “It sounds fucked up, but it’s just logistical. Wanna know something actually fucked up? These seat belts are practically useless.”

“What?” you weren’t sure if you really wanted to know where he was going with this but your morbid curiosity got the better of you once again. “What do you mean?”

“Well, they help with turbulence and stuff but in the event of a crash, these aren’t going to do shit for us. They’re just here to keep us strapped to the seat so they can identify the corpses by looking at the flight log.”

You sat there in stunned silence as the information Felix had just told you sunk in. 

“That is... so dark,” you said finally. 

“Yeah, but isn’t it interesting?”

“I guess, but why did you have to tell me all of this while we’re in the air?”

“Because it’s relevant!”

You sighed and glanced back at Jisung who was asleep and slumped against the window. “Ready to switch?”

It was just a joke but Felix scoffed nonetheless. 

“I’m offended,” he whispered. 

“And I’m traumatized.”

“My bad.”

Somehow, Felix kept you occupied until it was time to switch with Jisung. You lost track of time talking to him about everything and nothing. Out of all of the Han brothers, Felix was the one you knew the least. 

You learned a lot about him in the six and a half hours you sat next to each other. You learned that he, like Jisung, had a passion for photography. He liked anime but manga adaptations always disappointed. He wanted to be a dancer when he was little, just like his big brother. 

When it was Felix’s turn to inquire about you, you were sort of at a loss for words. You had to tread carefully around how much to actually reveal about yourself. When to lie, when to stretch the truth. You were exhausted. It was exhausting. But Jisung had made it clear that this was still important to him despite you not seeing the point anymore. So you played along for his sake. It was the least you could do since you ruined everything else. 

You talked mostly about school, what you were studying, what you wanted to do with your degree... all the small talk that usually took place when you first met a person, not after you’d been traveling with them for over a month. But Felix didn’t know a lot about you interests wise so he listened intently and asked a lot of questions. 

When it was finally time to actually switch, you were half-relieved, half-bummed. Talking with Felix was fun but you hated lying to him. 

Jisung lifted up the armrest between you and him to let you slide over while he stood awkwardly in the aisle. 

“Do you want to use my hoodie as a blanket, baby?” he asked.

“Sure, thanks.”

He laid it over your shoulders after you got settled against the window, kissing you on the head and telling you goodnight. 

You shut your eyes and tried to relax but sleep wouldn’t come. You knew it wouldn’t. You took deep breaths in an attempt to slow your heart rate, lowkey considering holding your breath until you passed out. 

Next to you, Jisung was flipping through the in-flight movies. You could hear him tapping on the touchscreen, huffing in frustration when he couldn’t find anything he wanted to watch. 

“You okay, bro?” Felix asked his twin. 

You felt Jisung sort of shift, likely checking to see if you were asleep. He sighed. 

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Relationship troubles?” Felix guessed.

“Why do you ask?”

“You’ve been pissy for like, the past two days. I assumed it had something to do with your girlfriend.”

“She hasn’t been sleeping well,” he explained simply, lying through his teeth. Well, it wasn’t technically a lie because you weren’t sleeping well, but that had nothing to do with why Jisung was upset. “The exhaustion has been leading to a lot of fights.”

“Sorry, man.”

 “It’s okay. It happens. Not that you would know.”

Felix scoffed. “Ouch, I try to have a heart-to-heart with you and you go there?”

“This is a heart-to-heart to you?”

“You know what I mean. A real conversation.”

“Okay, but I’m right. You wouldn’t know.”

“Not all of us can have healthy relationships like you, Jisung,” he sighed.

“I know. I think I’m mom and dad’s only chance at grandchildren at this point.”

“Not if our brother has anything to say about it,” Felix said lowly. 

“What do you mean?” Jisung asked.

He sounded genuinely confused but you knew that internally he was panicking because you were too. You were still pretending to be asleep but you had stopped breathing, waiting to hear what he would say next. How much did Felix know? You and Minho weren’t great at sneaking around but you had at least tried to be a little careful. 

“You mean you haven’t noticed the way Minho looks at her?”

“Not really? But you spend more time with him. You know him better than I do.”

“Well, you should pay more attention. He makes it kind of obvious,” Minho muttered.

“Makes what kind of obvious, though?”

“That he wants her.”

“What?” 

“I can’t believe you haven’t caught on to him flirting with her.” 

“Well obviously he’s doing it behind my back so-”

“Sorry you had to find out this way,” Felix said, likely grimacing, “but at least she isn’t reciprocating, from what I’ve seen.”

“Yeah, at least there’s that,” Jisung murmured. 

You were able to exhale in relief, but only slightly. Felix didn’t know everything but he could tell Minho was interested which wasn’t a good sign. How long had he been picking up on that? 

Your best friend sighed angrily. “The one thing I thought Minho couldn’t take from me-” 

You bit the inside of your cheek, guilt consuming you all over again. 

“Don’t you think that’s a little dramatic?” Felix asked. “He hasn’t even made a move or anything, mate. I just think he thinks she’s cute.”

“With Minho, that’s enough.”

i'm sick so no tags :(( but i've got nothing else to do so here ya go, lmk what you think I always appreciate feedback!!

add yourself to the taglist here!

[nexility-sims]

SIM DONATION DRIVE: "1992" EDITION

i need to fill in leonor's 1990s dating history for story reasons, so i am soliciting sims from you wonderful, talented, generous people. if you'd like to donate someone, check out THIS FORM ♥️

for guidelines, see below, & let me know if you have questions !

i want to fill in leonor's dating history for the period from roughly 1993 to 1998. i'd like to have these exes attend her big, giant, extravagant wedding in 2001; i will be doing some Yet To Be Planned media coverage of said dating history (something like this stuff). as a treat, because i love to take pictures of other people's sims, i'll probably do some random photoshoots like these as well :^) [you can have leonor's files for your own purposes, if you so desire.]

i have no idea how many sims y'all're gonna donate or if they'll all be the same level of compatible, so: i'll try to incorporate as many as i can but, realistically, would have to choose if there are more than 5-6 options. this isn't a bachelorette challenge, so it would theoretically be based on which characters make sense for leonor and the timeline.

not all of the form's questions are required, but more detail is welcome ! entirely up to you how much fleshing out you'd like to do beyond the basics. i provided vague prompts, some which are optional, so ... go wild or don't ! if you want to discuss any of it before you submit the form (or after), then please don't hesitate to reach out.

your sims can be from uspana or somewhere else, btw. if they're not from uspana, they might be from the fictional country your story is set in, generic Simerica™, literally anywhere else ... if you don't state it, i'll just make something up that feels convenient sdjhfs they can be existing characters or new ones you create for this purpose; it's all up to you !

i am assuming you're familiar with the spinoff story OR leonor as a character, in some way or shape or form. you may know the story better than i do or have scrolled her tag on my blog earlier today for the very first time or somewhere in between. either way ... a little familiarity would help, i imagine !

leonor's existing love interests include: arturo, a very sweet and thoughtful son-of-a-politician (circa 1986-1990); renzo, a very famous actor who loves music and cutoff shorts and doing drugs (1991-1992); andre, a very happily married and painfully shy father of three who also happens to currently be his country's king (1992, 2016–); dan, a very chill tech founder who enjoys, like, space travel and wearing fanny packs and letting his wife do affairs and stuff, whom she marries in 2001 (circa 1998–).

leonor doesn't have a type, and there are no gender restrictions. she likes people who are interesting—peculiar, even. she's a wealthy princess and a government employee by 1993-1994, so that may affect either your sim's occupation and / or the necessity of a "how'd they meet" backstory. her birth year is 1970, and she’s more likely to go for agemates or older rather than younger people (at least while in her twenties, anyway). she could theoretically reconnect with anyone post-2001 but pre-2016 on account of the open marriage, although that feels unlikely / case-by-case.

okay, that's all i got for now ... thanks for reading this far !

[voxmilia]

Do you have any HCs with inkblade and Ivy

YOU MEAN OISIN AND HIS TWO FAVORITE GIRLS? THREE OF MY FAVORITE KIDDOS? ONLY ALWAYS

I latched on so hard to "mean girl with the Garthy O'Brien accent" so I've adopted Ivy, she's one of my favorites, I literally write her on my rp blog, I have a character/timeline study for her in the works so I have many headcanons. Some of these are, as usual, created in conjunction with my friend Nick @starlingcity !!

I've had to cut this down like 3 times because I have so many thoughts about all three of them so literally ask me for more anytime!

Ivy was born in Leviathan. She doesn't remember it much; she and her bio mother (her mama, bc Fabian parallel) emigrated to Solace when Ivy was around 2 or 3. Her accent is sort of a mix of Leviathan and Fallinel, as her second mother (her mum) is a high elf.

She meets Oisin at Oakshield Middle School. He's sitting by himself, reading a spellbook and Ivy, who even before the rage never really knew how to express herself right the first time, tells him it's "too sad" to watch him all alone and insists she has to join him from now on. She does. They're inseparable from then on.

They develop minor separation anxiety after their first death in the Mountains of Chaos; it's tenfold by their revivication in junior year. Jawbone helps them both and also helps them find accredited private therapists.

Oisin has a panic attack for the first time ever during his first appointment with Jawbone, because Ivy isn't there and he's terrified she'll be dead when he comes out.

He has another one when Lucy's out for a summer trip, reconnecting with her family after a year dead, and he hasn't heard back from her in almost a day. Adaine finds him, knees tucked to his chest, arms and tail wrapped around them, just outside of Jawbone's office. It's their first real conversation beyond his initial apology to her.

He laments that he should be stronger than this, should know better. Adaine still doesn't trust him but she understands so she huffs and assures him that anxiety doesn't mean he isn't strong. She has anxiety and she's been in so many battles., defeated so many foes

"I punched a dragon in the face and I have anxiety!" (It makes him laugh. She hates that she likes the sound of it.)

Ivy, as bad as she is with words, is the first to apologize of all the Rat Grinders. Mazey is kind, too kind. Ivy sort of rambles. She isn't even sure why was she so unkind in the first place; she apologizes, says Mazey deserved better. They're not friends but they've buried the hatchet at least. (Years later, they run into each other at a Fig and the Cig Figs concert and smile at each other but say nothing.)

Oisin and Ivy kissed exactly once, at 14, the summer before their freshman year. They were two confused, curious kids who wondered if the warmth in their chests when they were together was meant to be romance. They hated it immediately and never attempted it again. Ruben is still convinced they're exes, though.

Oisin, Adaine, and Ivy end up in the first Bad Kid/Rat Grinder mixed group chat, beyond their initial mega chat with both parties. Oisin kept sharing memes Ivy sent him to Adaine, who would tell him to send Ivy one from Adaine in turn. He got tired of being the middle man eventually and makes them a group thread.

Ivy texts the chat one night that she feels sorry for Adaine, because Oisin is an awful kisser. Adaine tells Ivy to speak for herself. Oisin is too embarrassed to reply for almost an hour, to Ivy's joy

[ohisms]

can i please ask how you made the noise filter? i'd love to be able to recreate it for myself so i can better tweak it to my liking, but i haven't been able to figure it out by deconstructing yours. any help would be appreciated, and thanks so much for all your work on this blog ♥

okay so bear with me because i'm terrible at arranging tutorials !! but below the cut is an explanation on how i created the noise , particularly in adobe photoshop since i don't know how to do it in photopea . &. thank you for your kind words !! i hope this helps !

1. you need to make sure you're in video timeline mode . ( window > timeline > 3 lines on the bottom bar > convert to video timeline ) 2. color fill a blank layer to any shade , grey recommended . ( middle tones work best. mine is #5f5e5e , but you can use any color . ) 3. bring the fill layer down to one or two frames on the timeline. ( one frame makes the noise faster, two makes it slower . )

4. duplicate your fill layer no less than 4 times &. make sure it's on the same track as the others .

5. select all your fill layers on your layers bar, &. convert them to a smart object. they should still be blank color slates at this time.

6. select your fill layer , go to filter > add noise . now if you drag your timeline, your noise should move ! you can duplicate the smart object &. create larger / longer smart objects by combining them ! just make sure you don't rasterize it .

you can also mess around with colored noise , different colored fill layers , etc ! have fun with it ! unfortunately i don't know how to create this effect in photopea , so i hope an adobe explanation suffices ♥️ pls ignore my photoshop being buggy in the video ! p.s. i usually put the noise in 'soft light' when overlaying ♥️

[rowena-rain]

Looking for some simple one-shot tomarry Bottom!Tom ideas plz 🙏 Tag your friends and make them give me some too ;)

Simple tomarry?? That’s a big ask :). But I shall try. Here are some random one-shot ideas organized by broader context. If anyone is interested in potentially writing any… let me know ❤️.

Time-Travelling!Harry convinces Professor Merrythought to retire a few years early and  becomes the new DADA professor to “keep a better eye” than Dumbledore did on Tom. Tom is obsessed with his new professor (obviously). (Except for the first one, these could also work as a same-age, Harry and Tom go to Hogwarts together, either time-travel or timeline-mashup.)

After a string of increasingly outlandish bad behavior by Tom, Harry is finally forced to give Tom detention even though he’s pretty sure he’s doing it on purpose to get him alone. Harry, honorable human that he is, tries very hard to think of a detention assignment that Tom can’t just turn into another ploy to seduce him. Tom takes that as a challenge.

Tom is the only Slytherin to choose to stay at Hogwarts over Christmas. Harry, who doesn’t have family here either, feels bad. Tom feels an opportunity.

Harry catches Tom going into the second floor girl’s room in his fifth year and panics that he is about to find the Chamber. He makes a desperate attempt to distract him. It backfires. Optionally, it ends up with Tom bent over the sink, watching Harry pull his hair while fucking him in the mirror.

TWO Harrys from alternate timelines show up. One wants to raise/reform/guide Tom into a better version of himself. The other wants to kill him before he becomes Voldemort. Tom wants both of them.

Time-Travelling! Or Timeline-mashup!Harry and Borgin & Burkes-employee!Tom

Auror!Harry is undercover investigating the sale of illegal magical artifacts at Borgin & Burkes (or Time-traveller!Harry is just snooping on Tom). Either way, Tom knows this cute new guy is up to something. Fortunately, he knows how to be just bad enough to keep Harry’s attention focused on him without landing himself in Azkaban.

Time-travelling!Harry gets the locket and the cup from Hepzibah Smith to prevent Tom from getting them. Tom finds out. Now, he has a new, much prettier target to swindle. 

Tom is a con-man posing as a very expensive whore (either in place of or in addition to working at Borgin & Burkes). He’s not interested in degrading himself for these pathetic old losers, but he likes their cash and getting access to their collections of valuable magical artifacts. Auror!Harry poses as a client to find out why so many wealthy people seem to have had their memories altered lately. Tom is intrigued. He could maybe make an exception for this one. Well, he’ll still probably rob him, of course, but he might not have to modify his memory. 

Depressed Post-war!Harry raises reincarnated!Tom

Harry is left feeling empty and incomplete ever since Voldemort died. It’s a few years after the war, but he still can’t shake the feeling that something important is missing. Ginny thinks the solution is a baby. Ironically, Death agrees. Well, Harry is pretty sure that was just a dream where Death came and told Harry he really was Death’s Master and then gave him a strange offer to help. If he’s absolutely terrified a few weeks later when Ginny announces she’s finally pregnant after years of trying, that’s just… normal nerves from being a first-time father, right? (Lol, okay, that’s not really tomarry I guess since Tom isn’t even born yet. Either that or it’s definitely not just a one-shot ahhaa)

Okay, I seem to have gotten away from the “simple” assignment, so I’m going to stop now 😅. Also, a couple of them are calling to me. And I already said I wasn't going to start anything new until I finish the first arc of heir de la mort. Sighhh

Tagging @sweetalison007-blog because they always have a ton of tomarry prompts and @cindle-writes because I know they have a lot of bottom!Tom ideas in particular!

[syscest]

I saw the post about like horns and stuff and…… ughhhh it’s so true I’m a catgirl and when my bf just gently traces his hands where my tail or ears would be i goooo nuts and this only works on me n the other tailed people 😋😋

non-human phantoms are like. a very important concept to us. cool to learn how to interact with those sensations to make ur friends (plural or not) feel better embodied.

honestly we could have ended up with a non-human/alterhuman/therian/furry/whatever sex blog instead of the plural sex blog in another timeline. but alas the weirdos who let me know i could be a puppy doggy if i wanted were also weirdos letting me know i could be more than one person/thing at the same time~

[xfancyuu]

~ hold your breath, love dive. [aemond targaryen]

this is my first fanfic!!! this fic is also a repost, originally posted on 16th october 2022 on a different blog however i want all my work to be on this blog. reader is afab with she/her pronouns and has no appearance indicators. this fic has also been reformatted and edited, reposted on 7th april 2023.

premise: reader meets vhagar (my queen) [2,945 words]

The betrothal between houses Targaryen and Bolton was a choice not many had seen coming. You especially, you had gone from a girl who was content with the fact your father would marry you off to some Lord, and you'd live a life, you weren't sure if it had been a happy one, but it would have certainly been a life. You knew Aemond Targaryen was unpredictable, unstable even. He chose to claim a dragon as a pre-teen, stable wasn't something you'd use to describe him. He was chaos personified, like waves in the sea, uncontrollable, and you weren't sure what your father thought he was getting out of the arrangement. (You knew what he was getting out of the arrangement: power and selling off his only daughter was clearly the only way he'd receive such notoriety.)

The arrangement wasn't as horrific as you originally thought it would be, Aemond had seemed pleasant company though you were always in public, always chaperoned, so the man could not spend time truly alone with you, while your father wanted to marry you did not have your own opinions or goals in life, he did not trust the man you were to marry fully. Nor did you. You knew the tales of the women his brother ruined the reputations of, while his dutiful wife had to put up with his antics. You never knew how a man behaved behind closed doors, your brothers were a prime example of this for you. A prince was just a man after all and men were much different to the ladies you had spent time around. Kings Landing was entirely different in general, the styles, the hair, the people even, it was far too busy and put you on edge far too much.

They were dragons, both in sigil and temperament, you had thought. Each member of the family was equally fiery and hard to read, comparing them to the creatures which set them apart so vastly was a correct comparison in your opinion. Being around them made you feel powerful, that nobody could cross you, but you knew much better that politics can change in an instant — Rhaenyra and Rhaenys were proof of that. It scared you, being in the dragons pit.

Your time is spent with Helaena, she is a few years older than you though you think she is wise beyond her years, often telling you about the things she dreams about and often times speaks in riddles though you find her company more entertaining than most people. She understands you on a level which others do not, and you think in another timeline you would not be marrying her brother and she would not be married to her own husband, you would still be friends or perhaps more.

She doesn't want you today though, she claims she's ill with a sickness which is contagious — you'd get sick to spend time with her, you consider her your only true friend in this place, though Helaena being the kind sweet soul she is would never allow you to give yourself a sickness on her behalf. Suddenly you're alone, the day grows boring, the library is unappealing, you can only walk around a garden — no matter the size of it, so many times without growing bored. Needlepoint is tedious, and you think you could not cope if your life was to be like this once you were married. The garden however is where you find him, alone. It's the first time you've spent time together alone, and your palms feel sticky, and your heart is beating out of your chest. You don't know how you'll survive within a marriage when you cannot speak to the man without wanting to run away due to shyness.

"You avoid me far too much," he's the first to speak, you doubt words could process from your brain to your mouth to do so, "Do I scare you that much?"

You do not want to answer at first — perhaps he's talking about his presence or rather the scars he could not help, but you're strong, you're from the North and Northern girls aren't typically timid nor shy, "Why would I do that my Prince?" you can see how it would consider it mocking, but the playful tone in your voice indicates your intent. "Am I too fast for you to catch?"

You doubt you've thrown him off guard, though maybe that's why he had chosen you, "Do you think you are fast enough to outrun a dragon?" he asks.

"I do not know, you see I've never met a dragon nor seen one to know how fast they can be... though I have no doubt I can outrun one" you're being cocky, or perhaps you're flirting, you do not know which one would be better though you seem to amuse the price in question.

"Would you like to see one?" you don't know if it's a euphemism or if he's being serious, perhaps he does have a sense of humour after all.

"Hmm... I'm not too sure they would take kindly to those who aren't of Valyrian blood, what if one tries to eat me... I've heard the tales of the dragon who resides on Dragonstone who eats its own kind and humans alike." you're teasing him, who wouldn't want to see a dragon? You'd encounter them eventually, you surmised, it was hard to live in a family with such beasts without doing so.

"You know of the Cannibal?" his interest had piqued at that, your time with his sister had clearly come with advantages, learning more about the Targaryen family, the dragons owned (and not) by his family had interested him, next you'd surprise him by speaking Valyrian.

"Only what her grace, your sister, had told me about it, that apparently the dragon is older than Balerion the black dread — though it seems unrealistic and hearsay, your father rode him once did he not? Balerion I mean, —" your sentence was cut short by the prince, who was seemingly not paying attention to you, it was awkward for a few seconds before he excused himself.

Aemond had seemingly looked off to the side, as if being summoned though you didn't pay it much mind, the two of you were having an enjoyable conversation (well in your personal opinion, the prince may have just been conversing due to the fact his family didn't want the arrangement to sour due to his or your behaviours). Though, he had pulled away at seemingly the last second, muttering an apology and leaving you in the garden alone.

As fast as he'd disturbed your peace, he disappears almost as abruptly, almost making you wonder if you'd spoken out of turn and offended him somehow. And you could not help but notice how much lonelier you had become without his presence.

Some days had passed and the interaction with Aemond had lived within your head, when you weren't needed or doing something you'd thought back to the conversation, he was a seemingly lovely match and paid attention to you. Not that you could say the same for your parents, they hadn't known where you were or what you were doing most of the time, they only lectured you into behaving around the royal family, ladies do not laugh loudly, ladies do not spend more time daydreaming than needlepoint and ladies certainly do not frolic around the gardens unchaperoned. Helaena hadn't miraculously recovered, which meant your family continued to lecture you. Perhaps they were more irritated about the fact you weren't strengthening the bond of both families to ensure the marriage, as your mother had kindly put it. You were aware your family wanted more power, but the possibility of you getting sick while they were heightening their station could not have occurred to them.

Your days continued to be as boring as ever without Helaena's company you were beyond restless, your parents had told you to behave far too many times, so much you could recite their speeches. Though it didn't stop you from wandering alone — again. You wouldn't be shocked if it got back to them — again. However, just as the last time you were alone, Aemond Targaryen once again approaches you. Cockily as ever, though being a Prince of the Seven Kingdoms and having the largest dragon could perhaps have that effect on one's self-confidence.

"Lady Bolton, you are the exact person I was looking for," he once again spoke, he often left you speechless, from his undeniable beauty to the confidence he exuded — you had found out he wasn't always this way, gaining Vhagar had changed him, and you surmised it was most likely for the better. "If you can recall we spoke about dragons and I have reconsidered the terms of our arrangement."

This made your blood go cold, you were certain you had not offended the Prince, though with the way he'd looked at you during meal times you could see how speaking about the dragons which were an extension of his family could offend him. "Have you spoken to my father about this?" He wouldn't be happy, you knew him well enough to know that.

"You misunderstand me, my Lady," you were sure your heart would have stopped if it was not for the words he spoke, "I cannot marry you without being certain."

It was not a good conversation to be had, and you were almost panicking, and you were certain you saw a taunting glint within his eye, "I can assure you, our union would be fruitful, and you would be happy." You've been taught what it takes to be a wife from your mother, but she had never explained what it truly entailed, your words feel rehearsed and panicked and came out of your mouth far too fast.

"I cannot be happy without being certain that you could handle this life," you're not sure what he's talking about, you've handled court well, made friends, were well liked by most people, and before your mind drifted somewhere else to think of every single misdeed you'd done, he spoke again, "The dragons are loyal, they want to protect their riders, Vhagar especially so," there was something in his tone which told you, you were missing the context of this statement, "I would like you to meet her, hopefully she won't harm you."

You weren't sure what to think, on one hand seeing the marvellous and beautiful beast that she was, was a once in a lifetime opportunity, on the other hand you could be hurt, or worse. It was seemingly a deal breaker to Aemond, if you chose to say no he could easily break off the engagement without remorse, he's a man, they never face the repercussions of their own actions.

"When do you wish to plan this meeting?" you asked, you didn't fear much, and if a dragon harms you, burns you or eats you, you supposed there were worse, less dignified ways to have your life ended.

"I was heading there now and while you are unoccupied I had asked your father's permission," he can't say no to a prince, out of fear of offending, you knew that much.

"With the way some at court speak of you Aemond, I'm surprised you asked for permission," the playful tone in your voice was evident that you truly did not believe court gossip. "How could I ever say no to meeting the eldest dragon known to man? If she eats me it would be a happy day for me."

He finds you amusing, you can tell, he's poker-faced, but you can always tell by the subtle way his body moved closer to yours, "I hope she chooses not to, it would be a sad day. I'm afraid I would not know what to say to your father about the occasion, his only daughter, eaten by a dragon, how would he recover?"

"You don't know my father like I do, he'd spin some tale that I was courageous and chose to fight a dragon and paid for it with my life." You're divulging far too much about your personal family life now, you're giving him too much insight and unnecessary information which could be used against you in a moment's notice. "However, I am not going to let a dragon eat me today, my outfit simply will not allow it."

The journey to the largest dragon currently roaming freely was not as daunting as you'd originally thought, the nervousness you were feeling in your stomach hadn't subsided. Though, you could almost feel the anticipation radiating off of Aemond. Perhaps he wanted a show, perhaps he wanted to see how you'd react to such a magnificent creature, or perhaps he wanted to see Vhagar burn you alive.

She was there, laying and looking lethargic, or maybe she was simply not wanting to live life any more, she was beyond the size you had imagined, though something about her looked gentle. She hadn't harmed Aemond when she was a child and this made you feel safer, along with her rider being there, maybe he'd calm her with his presence. "Are you bonded to her?"

"In what way?" Aemond asks, keeping you behind him while he spoke in Valyrian — words you couldn't understand but if you were to have children in the future you should take note to learn.

"Can you feel what she feels, can she always feel your presence? Does she know when you're in trouble?" The questions come from your mouth before you can stop them, "You're speaking to her right now, are you not? Are you telling her to be on her best behaviour?"

"Did you not know we're always on our best behaviour." His response had made you laugh, you couldn't help it, if it had came from any other person you would have believed it. "Do I amuse you?"

"Yes very much so," Vhagar is stirring now, being so big she looks heavy to even move her head properly, you'd fear her moving her body without injuring anybody within the surrounding area. "It's a good sign she hasn't eaten me yet, isn't it."

"Don't be fooled by her, she's cunning, but she favours the brave." he spoke.

"Would she consider me brave if I were to touch her?" You ask, already moving forward however Aemond hadn't chose to stop you, perhaps he thought you too foolish for your own good.

"Isn't that what we're here for? You're to meet her and she chooses if we marry." Now you knew the motive. There was so much more than what met the eye with Aemond and you'd do well to remember that.

Taking slow and steady steps towards Vhagar was the easy part, she had emitted heat, much like the dogs your father chose to keep around in the Dreadfort. It was hard to stay away from her, she was utterly captivating, and it did not stop you from placing a hand on her. You don't doubt that you looked like an ant to her, tiny and easy to destroy with one singular movement. However, she stayed in place, letting out what sounded like a sigh. It was a good sign for you to continue touching her, it's not at all what you had expected her to feel like, she had felt warm and inviting despite her intimidating appearance. She was like her rider in more ways than he'd ever let the world know.

"You weren't serious about her eating you, were you?" Aemond asks, while you're completely mesmerised by how big and docile she was, your hand still holding the dragon's warm scales while Aemond's presence was felt closely behind you.

"Seeing her up close, I fear I misjudged her," and you goes unsaid. "She seems lonely and I wish she had more company, do you keep her company often? When you're not at court?"

"I suppose I too would be lonely if I lost Balerion and Meraxes." He confesses, "But she is well taken care of, I can assure you."

"There are tales of you claiming her, that you were a child and the only one brave enough to go near her," the stories are fabricated most of the time, "That you lost the eye for the dragon, was it worth it?" you hadn't approached the topic of his long gone eye, though you fear you may have offended him when he does not speak straight away.

"A dragon is a great price for something so small as losing an eye" he spoke though you can tell there's melancholy within his tone, you were so close now, incredibly so, never had you been so close to a man. "It does not frighten you does it?"

"You lost an eye for a dragon, why would that frighten me, my prince?" it's a question he can't answer because he's the one who's finally speechless. "Are you fulfilled in the answer you so desperately sought from this encounter?"

"I think I have all the answers I need," he had pulled you away from Vhagar ever so gently, it was the softest you had ever felt the man, "I shall tell your father we shall be married as soon or as late as you wish to do so."

"When we are married will you let me fly with you?" the answer was unspoken, he'd take you to the ends of beyond the wall if you so much as wished it. Perhaps the marriage was the perfect match despite being arranged, he'd found somebody as equally obsessed with dragons as he'd once been.

as stated before, this is a repost and not entirely a rewrite, just an edited version of mistakes i realised i made months ago. i hope y'all still enjoyed this. crossposted on ao3 under the name hedonism.

[tempural]

hello. it might be an odd question or maybe, you've got it before. you prob did. but how did you find like-minded folks? as someone with specific tastes, i wonder if simply posting stuff is enough. and it's not even that i want friends. i just want to see different kinds of content and takes on things. which is why i tend to visit your blog from time to time. we don't even share ships, but you have your own vision and i respect that.

Hiya! Not odd at alll, trying to find artists, friends, and acquaintances is one of the big questions of social media. Especially if you're into very niche stuff (old man butthole).

Thanks for hanging out even if you don't have the exact same interests 😃 I find that's who I tend to follow... I like other people's passion in their interests! Whereas I'm usually one out of two people who have the same ship (the other one lives with me) haha.

Much yapping under the cut.

Honestly I mostly just post stuff. I don't browse social media much anymore ever since the tumblr nsfw ban 😭

The only place I actively look for artists now is the fediverse, especially cuz the server i'm on is explicitly kink and lgbtq friendly. So I almost never see like "freaks dni" sorta people on my timeline, which gives me massive diarheaa on every other socmed. Downside is of course the small size makes it so there's less posts to browse through, but sometimes staying small is nice.. you can talk to what people made the effort to post even if no one else is :)

Before the NSFW ban, I actually made my closest friend just by posting stuff! Way back in the DeviantArt days, I was the only one in the [band yaoi] tag, and another person happened to be browsing that niche tag with one thing in it. We started talking.. and now we are pregnant with 5 kids. So even if there's literally no one else in the tag but you, you can still find other people in that niche!

Makes me think of that story where those tumblr people got married cuz they were both in some niche self-ship tag...

A lot of the people I talk to now are from just posting stuff too. Not even just art, but even just yapping about random shit like dogs or ships or farming. I always wait for the other person to start a convo LMAO but other people seem to find connections by being proactive!

I also met some other like-minded people by joining art and fandom events, and hosting them! Some events are run better than others, some have a nicer crowd, and you might vibe with different people depending on the niches (i almost never do broad events with no subject, I do a lot better if you give me a subject like "chinese food" or "evil lesbians". I found a lot of cool artists that make OCs by hosting artcade, i found a lot of chill creative TF2 fans by hosting the Gore Zine and Gorl Scouts Zine.

Yeah it's scary to put yourself out there, cuz there's always hordes of unwashed basement dwellers waiting to jump on you for liking art of necromance or whatever. But it should be worth it to build up a lil net of art and writing to enjoy, and knowing that there's other people with similar interests out there...

Hope that gives you something to spring off of?

[curio-queries]

I think AYS definitely found its flow post-US trips. Compared to the later trips, you can tell their time in the US really was more spur of the moment, less thought out. I think that's probably why the editing and filming were better in the other places and they had product placement. I wonder if they originally had something else in mind for the content, such as making it just a bangtan bomb kind of like some of the solo adventures we got during chapter 2 (like jungkook's camping vlog), but then they decided to do more trips or pitched it to Disney or something so they put more money and effort into it.

About the behind the scenes content, I do think whatever was kept out of the main episodes was primarily for pacing reasons (despite the fact that I don't think the pacing was super great until Sapporo) and/or some content that was kept for the purpose of making money off the behind the scenes package. Weirdly I don't think bts cares at all about 4th wall breaks. I saw another blog complain about this a while ago, about being able to see staff in the background and ruining the vibe of AYS or messing up the illusion from a production standpoint, but I think bts themselves never try to put up that 4th wall. Obviously the content is supposed to stay focused on them, but the boys have never had a problem talking to their staff on the other side of the camera even during things like run episodes and even in AYS, the last night Sapporo, jikook are sitting around the table drinking and talking with their staff. Beyond what takes focus off the members or respecting that staff aren't public figures, I don't think the members ever care to create that illusion that they aren't filming something or surrounded by staff. I remember reading parts of bts' book and jungkook talks about jikook's trip to japan in 2017 and mentions how the company was worried about their safety if they went and when they arrived in japan, staff was already waiting for them. Even in a private trip that was meant just for the two of them, because of who they are staff were involved and they don't try to hide that.

Also side tangent, but their book was more interesting than I was expecting based on how I'd seen people talk about. A lot of it is summarization of events with bts' thoughts thrown in throughout, but there were some interesting tidbits I didn't know. Like jimin listening to Army sing-along of Young Forever and that's basically what made him come out of a dark place regarding the band's future and contract renewal tensions. Reminded me of Wembley when he cried and said that song had helped him a lot. Also the book and reading things as a timeline really emphasized how much jikook helped each other through that dark period from 2017-2019: the japan trip when they needed to get away from everything, then jimin showing up at a bar for jungkook and them both crying together (the crying together seems to be a theme for them LOL).

Anyway, back to AYS. For the title cards, we can see in Sapporo that they already edited most of the US trip, so the title cards were probably an idea they thought would be good when editing that, but then they didn't really fit as much in the editing of the other trips. Like the Sapporo vibes are just different from jimin's silly little title card recordings.

I really hope we get more AYS when they come out of MS. I expect group activities will be back in full swing, but since they seem to really enjoy traveling together, I think it'd be nice if we got to have future seasons. Its obviously still work, but I do think its on the more enjoyable end of work for them. I want to see them in Montana, US on a ranch riding horses, or in Venice, IT doing a romantic gondola ride, in the Australian outback where jungkook can finally fight a kangaroo.

Hi anon,

You definitely hit on many of the points we'd been discussing here through these posts so it's nice to see I'm not the only one with some of these thoughts.

After seeing the I Am Still documentary though, it's do feel more confident saying that this team's production engine likely gives very little control to their distribution partners. Again, I still need to do an album watchthrough of most of the Disney documentaries but for now, I'd wager that Hybe fully completes their product and then only sells it for distribution. Maybe there's some back-and-forth if there could possibly be any content censorship for brand cohesion but BTS content as a whole is already very low-risk on that front. I'd even go so far to say that the product placement sponsors had more of an impact on the actual end result of the content than Disney did. But that's purely supposition on my part.

Regarding the 4th wall breaks, I don't think i worded my viewpoint very well previously and I don't think i have much better to say here but I'll try. While I agree that BTS's content isn't trying to shy away from the fact that they have staff around them, I do think there are very specific methodologies behind how they've approached it in the past and likely will continue to.

Take Run BTS for example, at the beginning, they attempted to rely for more in on-screen graphics and having the members themselves deliver the necessary exposition. But...I've said this before and I'll say it again, their production actually really sucks at delivering content that needs to be informative. In my opinion, they realized they weren't doing a great job of this and it was a lot more effort to try to mask, when the episodes that they left in a disembodied staff member explaining didn't have any noticeable drop so they decided to just go with including it.

I know i haven't really talked much here about the Run Jin episodes (as I'm likely going to do review posts as well once I'm done with Run BTS) but one of the main things I've been keeping my eye on is how they're compensating for there only being one member. It's seemingly to fall into relying on guest cast and the staff to give Jin the necessary foil, sometimes successfully and other times less-so.

Anyway, back to AYS, it seems to me like they were absolutely still trying to find the line of staff inclusion. Honestly, I wonder if there was a version of the edit where them watching the first cut of episode 1 would have been only included in the bonus content. Without it though, that episode woukd have been much shorter so I think they kept it in the main release purely for time. It fits so well with the overall tone though and I'm so glad they included it.

Again, wondering about the future. I'm sure they will try to revive this show again after military service and I genuinely hope they try to stick to the format of several mini-trips compiled into one 'season'. It will take a skillful team to be sure there's cohesion though. These episodes worked because there is the overarching tjmeline of their solo projects as they prepare for their service that ties the little trips together. I still think my idea of scheduling trips while they're on tour could work but again only if the tour schedule is a little more relaxed than it has been in the past.

It's all theoretical at this point! I would love to see our guys traveling around to some of the less-dazzling destinations as well. I am from a very rural area in the western US and could not even comprehend what it woukd be like for BTS to even be aware of some of those places, let alone actually visit. That was some of the charm of the USA section. They were out in the middle of nowhere seeing just a little bit of Americana. (But I also completely agree with you and want to see a JK / Kangaroo moment as well!)

I'm remembering now another point that I'd wanted to delve into a little more with AYS, which was how they balanced luxury vs the simple life for this show. It's definitely something I noticed shifting over the episodes and I think that had more to do with those sponsorships as well as wanting to give JM and JK some comfortable experiences prior to their enlistment.

Sorry, i went on quite the tangent anon. If I didn't respond to any of the points that you'd like to further discuss, please point them out in another note. I've already rambled far too much for this one!

[cocktailjjrs]

So......

Since I've been suffering with these angsty thoughts... i though i would invite you all suffer with me...

It's about Chuuya...

I was doing some research for my fic (mainly going through bsd novels, blogs, tags and all) and came across this one Insta post in passing (sorry, i don't remember the name).

It was about BSD's cycles.

First, cycle of abuse, going from Mori-Dazai-Aku-Kyouka

and Second of rescue, going from Natsume-Oda-Dazai-Atsushi-Kyouka.

And then they highlighted a third category, the one's who are not saved - including Chuuya, Aku and Q.

At that point i didn't think much about it, just another post while scrolling Insta.

But now it's keeps bothering me, a constant reminder, whenever i read something BSD.

And It's so heart wrenching.

It also hit me, Q and Aku can still be saved.

Q, while we don't exactly know where they are right now, there is a chance of them getting their own arc, backstory and then being saved.

Aku, while still in Mafia, his partnership with Atsushi is his saving grace already. He is making an effort to not kill, just for their deal/bet. By the end of it all, he will be in a better place than he is now.

But Chuuya. (Spoiler's for light novel's if you haven't read them)

I remember very clearly, when in Stormbringer (don't ask me why i remember this byheart), when Murase dies Chuuya says, "Hey Detective, Weren’t you gonna arrest me?! Weren’t you gonna bring me into the world of light"

Don't get me wrong, I still believe Chuuya belongs to Port Mafia, the darkness suits him better than light.

But that does not mean he never wanted to get out of that darkness. This one instance in SB was proof enough. Makes me wonder, if things had gone even slightly differently, would he be in a better place than he is now? Is there still a chance?

What's even more tragic is that after the whole SB thing, no one seemed stick around enough to help him fight his own demons.

And he definitely has MASSIVE DEMONS.

His whole life seems to be one catastrophe after another! Don't believe me?

His first group, whom he called friends, betrayed him. Classic stabbed by poisonous knife in the back.

Hardly a year later, his second friends group, Flags, was killed by an emotionally unstable man-child seeking validation, insisting on calling him brother.

He went through a horrid ordeal, having to learn he was a lab experiment, seeing your clone vaporise to nothing but bones in your own arms, having to fight those same bones. And as if this was not enough, then fighting the monstrosity of a singularity and in process loosing the only chance to determine your humanity. (Actually whole of SB is dreadful, i don't think it'll ever get worse than that - i really hope it doesn't)

Then, given by the timeline, another year later, his third group of friends was killed by Shibusawa.

And again a year later - his partner, who brought him in all this madness, just fucking leaves without a word. This is the least tragic thing that has happened to the boy, i swear.

And I'm sure it didn't end there.

There must have been so many things going on behind the scenes in those missing years, hell even after the series began, Chuuya has been out of scene because something or the other was going on.

Now you have Fyodor fucking shit up for no apparent reason. With this shitshow, many mafia men, some of whom Chuuya might have developed a relation, are definitely dead. Not to mention the mental gymnastics going to trying to at least be on the same fucking chapter as the two geniuses.

AND ALL OF THIS IS JUST IN THE CURRENT TIMELINE. Don't get me started on BEAST VERSE!!! (That's a can of worms I'm really not ready to open at this point)

The thing with Mentally strong individuals is, they have abnormally high emotional intelligence, they are unnaturally resilient, they can compartmentalize their grief, they empathise with great deal of people, think rationally at any given point and think of ways to make things better.

What many people fail to understand is that no one is born Mentally strong, it's the circumstances that make them as such.

It can happen even through small things.

No one being there for you to express your deepest fears. No one just listening to you, even if they have a solution to your problem. Or having seen other's nightmares come to reality and feeling your own are much smaller, or having made to fell that way.

It creates the mentality of never sharing your fears, your insecurities, your discomfort - because at the back of the mind you keep telling yourself - oh, this person has gone through so much more than i have, my fear is nothing compared to it. I can handle it on my own, they have their own problems to handle. Everyone is busy, i don't think they have time to listen to the same problem I've been facing for years now. I've manages so far, i think I can manager just fine.

You start to undervalue your own feelings and start to fell like you'll burden them. Start to feel like you NEED to handle it on your own.

Now, i don't want to go into a spiral of mental health, but when you look at Chuuya, you can't help but marvel at that kids Mental resolution.

His first action after being stabbed in back was to make a deal with a demon to make sure he doesn't harm them, because they are just kids.

His first reaction to being provoked into revenge was to say Fuck off to his manipulator, not falling for the temptation and doing what he felt right.

He even forgave the killer of his friends (And also the one who tried to kill him) for gods sake! Understanding what he was going through.

He even walked away after knowing his parents are alive (oh the irony) not wanting to put a target on them. (I'm actually on fence with this, the chances of it being a manipulation tactic from Mori is just as high as it being the truth)

He had tremendous mental fortitude.

But you still see the cracks in his emotional state,

He was desperate to know if he was human or not, inclining towards the later.

He didn't know, that your friends can do some nice things without expecting anything in return. They can go above and beyond your regular stuff just because they are your friends, there doesn't need to be of anything at stake in friendship.

Hell, there was a point he believed having a Heart was too sophisticated for him, that he can't be that human!

I can go hours and hours about this.

What i can say for sure is, he has demons in all sizes, shapes and forms, something that he has stuffed in his closet only to deal with them himself, not letting them see the light of the day.

i just don't see anyone actually being there for him long enough for him to trust them fully with his demons.

No, not even Dazai. Dazai himself was a walking cry for help, like hell Chuuya is adding to that pile. He may have found a constant in Dazai in three years, seeing as all other's met their end in one. I believe in those three years, somewhere Soukoku began to feel like his safe place, somewhere he didn't had to think about his demons only by the virtue of dealing with one made of flesh and bones. But then even Dazai left.

I don't think even Kouyou was there for most part. And considering her obsession with a flowers of dark with Kyouka, i think it pulled Chuuya more in her own tragedy. Afterall, she also was never saved.

Mori is there, but Mori is a Demon in his own rights. What we've seen is their interactions have been those of a boss and his close confidents, nothing personal or emotional. Which also makes sense when you think of Mori's theory of running an organization. Chuuya, all things considered, the most powerful member of PM and he is treated as such.

The other significant members of PM, the guerrilla squad, black lizards or Kajji - all of them may know him better than most, but he is still their executive. If a 15 and younger kid took the title of being a protector of his rag-tag group seriously, being a responsible and dependable executive comes with higher stakes. He will carry out his role as one, even if it's the last thing he does.

.

.

.

That was me rambling.

My point is, i wanna give Chuuya a big hug, tell him it's okay to fell tried sometimes. To let himself be vulnerable. That his fears are not invalid. That he is not invalid. That he isn't the problem, never was.

That he will still be valued and wanted, even if he one day looses his ability or he is no longer the strongest.

Can someone please save his boy?