#also you’re like really smart. if you play it right we can limit sacrifices to nine people in the entire world. you in?

[driedlillies]

Itachi can talk about pacifism all he likes but if someone killed sasuke it’s on fucking sight. For the killer for doing it, the Konoha leadership for allowing it, Orochimaru for good measure, and anyone who dares to get in his way

[entertainment]

Entertainment Spotlight: Osric Chau

If you’re a fan of Supernatural or the Arrowverse, you probably recognize actor, producer, writer, director, and martial artist Osric Chau. He landed his first leading role in Kung Fu Killer in 2008, after spending years training in martial arts with aspirations to work in stunts. The following year Osric played Nima, the Tibetan monk, in the blockbuster film 2012, and he recently produced and starred in the film Empty By Design. On the television front, he played genius high school student pulled into the role of prophet, Kevin Tran, in Supernatural, and is currently starring as Ryan Choi in the Arrowverse’s epic crossover event, Crisis on Infinite Earths. Over the years, Osric has more than found a passion for acting and filmmaking. He still enjoys stunts, and has enormous appreciation of the skill and sacrifices involved but he'll settle with doing as many of his own stunts as a production will allow. Osric took time out of his busy schedule to answer some of our questions. Check it out:

With Supernatural ending this year, what is your favorite memory from the show (either on or off camera)?

First day, first episode. The beginning of it all. Met everyone. Got to do some running around as Kevin. And Jared became a father that night. Such a crazy time.

If you could have a conversation with Kevin Tran, what would you want to ask him and/or talk about?

I'd probably talk him into doing some physical training so he could be a hunter too.

You just produced and starred in Empty By Design. What did you learn from the experience? 

I learned that I'd been holding back my whole life. That I'd been limiting myself in what I thought I could or could not do and that there really isn't anything that I can't do with passion, hard work and a couple of good friends.

How would you describe the plot of Empty By Design to a five year old?

So Barbie lives in her house, right? (Child says yes) And GI Joe's always fighting some bad dudes so he's kinda homeless, but he lives in his truck, right? (Child says yes as well) Well let's say Barbie leaves her house and her family and goes to school for years. And one of the bad guys kidnaps GI Joe and keeps him away from his truck for years. And one day Barbie comes back to her house, but things have moved around and it's just a little bit weird, GI Joe escapes the bad dudes, and now he's back in his truck but his brother changed it to a stick shift while he was away and he doesn't know how to drive it anymore, and they bump into each other and talk about how weird it feels to be back home again even though they belong there. That's what Empty by Design is about. Can you tell I'm bad with kids?

What inspired you to make Empty By Design?

I needed to do something for myself. And I found some friends that did too. I asked my roommate Drea if she could do anything, what would she want to do? She said go back home to the Philippines. I told her to write a script about that. This was all happening while we were moving into our new apartment and after daily Ikea trips for a week, the words Empty by Design popped out of her mouth.

Do you have any fun facts about the making of Empty By Design that fans would be surprised to find out?

We flew to the Philippines with one way flights without a budget and we somehow managed to raise the money within the first two weeks there.

Can you walk us through an average day on the set of Crisis on Infinite Earths?

"What're we doing right now?" "Why are they in that costume?" "Wait what happened before this?" "My beard is so itchy..." "Okay this feels like Comic Con! Am I too excited right now?"

You wake up tomorrow morning as Ryan Choi in the middle of Crisis on Infinite Earths. What do you do?

I recognize I am not as smart as him but thankfully better trained and stupid enough to run in with full confidence. I limber up and try not to get in the way.

How does the making of a crossover event differ from the making of a regular episode?

Well for starters the crossover event was filming 5 episodes at the same time, so that in itself is a feat. Now on top of that, you're trying to use the same actors on all of those episodes so to coordinate which character which set and which show at all times and then you have other actors from other shows that you need to coordinate with as well. It was a logistical miracle that they pulled off. Hats off to everyone that made it happen.

What’s next for you?

I'm writing a script right now that I'm gonna co-direct with a friend. It's about my parents and I started writing it after the realization that they're actually real people and getting older. Weird thing to consider but that really scared me and I had to force myself to take the time to appreciate them while I still can. Doing a movie for them is my way of saying I love you, and thank you for putting up with me my entire life. And I'm also in talk with a good friend of mine to starting a vegetarian restaurant in Vancouver. I won't go into the ambition that i have for both of these but they're high haha, and they both bring me back to Vancouver more often which goes back to me wanting to spend more time with my family.

Thanks for taking the time, Osric! Give Osric’s Tumblr a follow right here. 

[xiaoquanquans]

at my disposal

sypnosis : y/n and chishiya became allies after y/n had saved chishiya from getting killed in a game of tag . they helped each other stay alive in the borderlands while also collecting all the needed cards to return back to the real world . after following chishiya around religiously , y/n had fallen hard for chishiya and he had explained to her that he did not care for her and would do anything to keep himself alive . all the remaining players had split out to collect the face cards . y/n and chishiya were focusing on completing the diamond cards . but chishiya did what he had to survive .

tw warnings : swearing , manipulation , death , betrayal , mentions of alcohol , self harm , blood , depression ( do not read if you somehow relate to the tw’s , i genuinely care okay ? take care of yourself bby 🖤 )

notices :

• MANGA SPOILERS!!

• mixed pov’s

• the game announcer speaks in bold and sly remarks or important sentences are written in italic

• lowercase

• this ff might be a bit confusing , because it’s a knowledge diamond based game

• chishiya’s true nature / canon chishiya

• gender neutral reader

• not proof-read

—

the game that we will be playing is the keynesian beauty contest . difficulty K♦️. henceforth, the rules shall be explained . within one minute all of you will pick a number from 0 to 100 . after everyone has entered their numbers , an average number will be taken from the addition of the numbers of all the 5 players . the player that has the closest number to the average number will be the winner and earn one point.

here we were , all five of us facing each other at this pentagon shaped table awaiting for our deaths . the rules were simple , win or die .

if you get an answer wrong you’ll receive -1 point. it’s game over for those who reach -10 points.

kuzuryuu keiichi , the third highest executive at the Beach was directly facing me , chishiya was to my left and an additional two players as well .

benzo, an wise old man and hinako a snobby looking woman .

upon heading the rules it was obvious that only one of us would make it out alive . i wished that i had known that before entering the courthouse .

i turned to face chishiya only to see him sneering at keiichi.

only one player will make it out alive .

-

chishiya

why was he so special to me , so intriguing .

i was the one who saved him but for some reason i’m also the one following him around .

i was a smart person , i figured it out quick .

it was obvious to me that i was in love with him , and he noticed it as well .

one day , we were both hanging around the poolside of the Beach far away from each other when we exchanged glances .

not long after he made his way towards me and pulled me aside .

he stared me blankly into my eyes , no emotion portrayed through them . listen , i’ve seen the way you’ve been looking at me and it’s genuinely really annoying but you have to know .

i do not like you , i don’t want to like you and i never will . if we were in a bad situation i would not hesitate to sacrifice you to safe myself . i would use you at my disposal if i had to so stop giving me those looks , you should know that i hate them and i do not care about you .

after that day , we rarely exchanged words . but for some reason i still kept following him around . he was cold to everyone else , i wasn’t anyone special . but god forbid him , he was just so unique to me . he couldn’t keep me away from him and his god complex even if he wanted to .

-

before i could speak up i was quickly outspoken by keiichi .

“ you’ve all heard the rules . if you have no further questions we will continue and start the game. ”

chishiya snickered. he knew that it was going to be him . he knew that he was clever and he showcased that every chance he could .

he knew he would be the one to walk away from the court with the card in his hand . the K of diamonds would just merely be another addition to his substantial stack of cards that he had collected or as some might say , stole .

the first few rounds had passed and everyone had gotten the hang of the game . it was simple to everyone in the room . all you had to do was get the calculations right in the time limit of 5 minutes .

hinako spoke up , “ so this game , is merely a deduction of how far the opponents can calculate? ”

i let out a quiet laugh , everyone had already registered that after the first round and here she was only figuring it out now .

you made a bet with yourself , she’d be the first one out , if not the second .

“ but what we’re reading isn’t mentality but rationality . ” chishiya replied .

after a few rounds the tables weren’t turning , keiichi had been winning every round because of his solid strategy of everyone keying in either 0 or 1 . someone had to do something or else we’d all lose to him .

so i realised i had to change it up a bit .

i quickly inputted the number 100

it took everyone by surprise , i knew i had no chance of winning because 100 was definitely too far from the average but i inspired the rest to take part in what i was doing while also taking away keiichi’s advantage.

a few more rounds passed and both Benzo and Hinako had reached -9 points . I was on -7 and Chishiya was on -8 . Keiichi was leading with -4 points .

Both Benzo and Hinako were one point away from death , so they had to be extra careful in the next round .

Unfortunately for them , they guessed a number that was too off from the answer , causing the acid on top of them to pour down , melting and disintegrating their bodies until they were gone .

Chishiya smirked at it . Their lives had meant nothing to them and so did yours . He knew what he had to do after this . How he could ensure his survival by taking you out .

-

and here you were , in the pitch black bar of the Beach . gulping down bottles of alcohol , trying your best to forget about what had happened . you weren’t weak , you kept telling yourself that even if you didn’t believe it . but deep down you knew you were .

once you were done with your bottle you slammed it against the counter , breaking it into hundreds of shards .

you took the biggest one you could find and lifted up your sleeve .

this wouldn’t be your first mark, your arm was filled with lines that were distinct in width from past experiences that you had before coming to the Borderlands .

before you could hesitate you did it . the glass shard sliced it’s way through your skin with ease .

you dropped the shard out of pain causing it to break off into many smaller pieces .

once again you scavenged for more alcohol , looking for fire whiskey which was something that could help numb the pain .

after minutes of searching you finally found a bottle-

“ y/n what happened , why is the whole bar in a mess? ”

you turned around to face kuina , a look of worry was displayed all over her face .

she made eye contact for a moment before looking down towards your arm .

“ what were you thinking? ” you heard her mutter .

she quickly took the bottle of whiskey out of your hand and placed it on the counter , after that she slowly brought you to the other side of the bar due to there being shards of glass everywhere on the floor.

once she sat you down she went to look for a medkit, leaving you to yourself and your thoughts . kuina took as little time as she could because she knew you weren’t in the right state of mine to be alone .

once she found the kit she rushed back to the bar , only to find that you’ve fainted from the all the loss of blood . it was a thin cut line but a very deep one , it looked like you might have even accidentally cut off a vein .

after you had woke up the next day you and kuina had a long talk and after that you felt much better .

until you ran into chishiya again on the same day.

-

since there are only 3 players remaining , a new rule will be added into the game. if two players pick the same number they will both get -2 points .

i was already on -8 , meaning any wrong choice would lead me to my death .

picking 0 or 1 would definitely lead me to my death , so I’ll choose a random number between 2 and 100

how about , 62 .

the results are in , chishiya is the winner , number 23.

-

y/n ( -10points )

chishiya (-8 points )

keiichi ( -7 points )

-

and that was it ,

endgame for me .

before accepting my death i had one question , how did he figure out i was going to pick 23 .

and as if he read my thoughts , chishiya spoke up .

“in order to distance yourself you would’ve picked a number in between 2 to 100 because 0 or 1 had the highest chances of being duplicates .

after clearing all the possibilities of you picking a random number i was left with 62 and 74.

and i chose between those , and to my luck you picked 62 and all i had to do from there was divide 62 in half . leaving me with 23.

with this , a player has reached -10 points , it is now game over for that participant .

chishiya laughed , “ like i said you’re at my disposal , should have listened the first time . ”

and those were the last words i heard before meeting my end .

- END -

tags: @donnyhateslife @hvrriicane @myloveforchishiya ( dm to be added to tag list )

oui oui love yall 💖

[asterekmess]

S3A - E9

The last episode took me Hours to get through with all my notes, let’s hope this one doesn’t hurt my fingers so bad.

My fingers hurt too much to come up with a clever pun so Read More:

Thoughts:

This is a dumb first bullet point, but I love Tara’s hair. It looks like it’s braided or something, then in a bun at the back? I like it.

What exactly was the reasoning for her walking into the school alone like this? Let alone going That far into it? If it’s a 911 call that she’s so nervous about she has her hand on her gun, then shouldn’t there be more than one officer??

ALSO, that seems like Very Bad routine procedure? You got a 911 call (but we get no explanation as to what it was FOR) and the first thing you say when you see someone is “Why are you here?” shouldn’t you be asking “Who made the 911 call?” And then you tell them to leave, and to tell anyone Else they see to leave. When they could easily SEE the person you’re wanting to aim a gun at and TELL them to leave because there’s a cop in the school.

So I’m torn between Julia being just that sick and wanting to terrify each of her sacrifices (which...she talks about them like she’s Genuinely sad she had to kill them, but it was necessary to save the world, so that doesn’t sit right with me?) or fear being a Necessary part of the ritual, like, that the sacrifices Couldn’t be willing?

Honestly, Lyds, that’s so smart and reasonable. “I had to have the weird blackout to get here. YOU get to go find the body.”

What was the point of the staging in the shower room if she was gonna get thrown onto the sign?? Why move her at all?

ALSO if this is supposed to be a threefold death, then didn’t she do it wrong? She killed Tara by strangulating her, but didn’t do the head bash or the throat until after she’d moved her body, for some reason??? Don’t they need to happen like..near the same time?

No to mention that there wouldn’t be much blood bc her throat was slit After death, so the blood wasn’t pumping. Even laying her down wouldn’t render a large amount. But they’re going for horror, so...i guess i’ll let it pass.

Why does it feel like Julia is going after people close to STiles specifically? First Heather, now Tara? And then his Dad? That’s a weird coincidence when she’s got the entire town to choose from.

Also, sheriff, i love you, but ‘they’re not going to get away with killing one of our own.” is a REALLY fucked up line. Police getting pissed ONLY when other Police are the ones killed is SO FUCKED UP. Logistically, police are FAR more likely to get killed than citizens are, aren’t they? They’re the ones that’re supposed to be running into danger? Like, Soldiers don’t Only get pissed when other soldiers are killed, right? It’s literally like...your job to be in potentially fatal situations? that’s not even my point! My point is that your line implies that law enforcement was Half-assing it before a cop got killed. half a dozen people have died, so Beacon Hills should be Swarming with cops, but for some reason the big guns don’t come in until a cop dies? Your phrasing sucks, Noah. Were you gonna let them get away with it if they killed everybody BUT the cops? I’m being sarcastic on that last bit, btw.

I’ll admit, it’s nice to get some actual SUNSHINE in CALIFORNIA

Is Chris letting Allison stay home because she saw a dead body? FOr as long as she wants? I’m so confused, she’s seen Much worse things, shouldn’t it like raise an alarm that she’s choosing NOW to stay home?

Your badassery is tainted by the fact that you’re wearing a dress and fishnets, Allison. If you’re gonna go hunting put on some pants. or shorts AT LEAST. that’s just not Practical.

I love how blatant a lie Stiles is telling Julia in class. “do you play?” “No, my father does” when we Know he plays, and besides if his dad plays then stiles MUSt because that’s a two person thing most of the time? But no, he doesn’t want Julia to know Shit about him.

the loyalty of Lydia not going near Aiden after learning he killed Boyd is SO refreshing. I TOLD you, if she knew Aiden was a murderer she’d never have gotten with him in the first place.

NOt Derek. CORA. MY BABE BONDS FAST. (I mean, she was locked in a bank vault with him for however long)

FIrst off, I love Stiles losing his shit. Second, the acting here is so sub-par, and it looks like a writer’s mistake. okay, so, in acting, interruption is an ART. You have to let someone say enough to get their line across, but INterrupt them before they can finish in a way that looks natural. And you have to make sure not to come in late or you get an awkward pause (this is more common with newbies bc experience actors don’t stop their line, they keep it going until you figure it out.) So like The line is ...And shove it up your freaking--” Now, Scott needs to interrupt without being late, otherwise, unless Stiles Continues the line, he’ll pause after saying ‘freaking’ and it’ll be noticeable. here, the way scott interrupts him feels So Wrong, in part because he let’s Stiles get so far into his threat.

Also, I’m fucking pissed that Scott is downplaying how angry Stiles is. “okay, we get it.” is just...a garbage way to respond to a friend who’s hurting and clearly on edge, thinking Ethan is threatening him.

Exactly How do you “Know” Ethan didn’t want to kill Boyd? You weren’t there, fuckface.

Is this set after school? They’re shouting their heads off and no one’s coming? Even Stiles was shouting about wolfsbane.

THAT IS NOT HOW ACTUAL WOLF PACKS WORK YOU FUCKER. THAT’S A GARBAGE MYTH.

Hearing Cora’s little gasp as her head hit the wall hurt my heart.

Normally I’d be pissed about the girl standing back and not doing anything, but Lydia would be ripped apart and I do not blame her for shouting from the sideline.

I don’t understand what the hell is going on with the Chris stuff. Like, I guess he’s supposed to be looking into it on his own, but that still doesn’t explain where he got the information on this very specific ritual.

But I do understand Allison’s hesitance to outright ask her father what the fuck he’s doing, since last time that happened she was taken to a chained up derek in an underground tunnel system. Finding out her family are monsters is kind of her entire life, unfortunately.

Honestly, fuck yes. Cora go off. Though, I’m sad that no one is mentioning Erica, like At All. You realize she ALSO died at the hands of the ALphas, right? why does no one mention her when they talk about getting revenge?

I...am not talking about this scene.

I gotta say that I enjoy the fact that Allison called Stiles. That’s just...that’s p cool. BUT while it’s cute that her contact picture is from her conversation with Stiles in s2, it’s weird bc it’s a screenshot of the show, and we know that Stiles wasn’t taking pictures at that moment. But the effort is sweet!

I will say that it’s interesting that Cora doesn’t fight Stiles about helping him with his dad. She just finished yelling at Scott, Lydia, and presumably Stiles, and she’s clearly unhappy with literally everyone but Derek, but she’s been very humoring of Stiles. In every scene together, even when she’s snarking at him, she’s not an Asshole.

This conversation with Morrell makes...no sense. Scott literally said in the last episode that good liars wouldn’t have jumping heartbeats when they lied. Then he immediately went to ask Morrell if she was the killer and believed her (even though she’s sketchy as fuck) just because her heart didn’t jump. Wtf?

“But if I kill someone, I can’t be a True Alpha, right?” WHO SAID THAT EVER? WHO TOLD YOU THAT? SINCE WHEN? WTF?

I don’t know if it was intentional (maybe they mention it, but i haven’t gotten that far) but technically having this history teacher disappear leaves an empty class for Kira’s dad to fill when she shows up. Which is neat.

I will forever be angry that Aiden is touching Lydia here. He shouldn’t be near her. And that’s not even me being cranky! She IS PISSED AT HIM. She was avoiding him before today and even then the only reason she went near him was to act as a distraction.

Also, again, I am amazed at Cora’s PATIENCE with Stiles here. Seriously, they’ve clearly been there for a while as Stiles tries to find the words, but Cora didn’t just get pissed stand up and say “I’m a werewolf. People are dying. Help.” She continued to wait for him to talk.

When does stiles rearrange his room? I swear in the beginning of this season it was still in the previous formation with the corner bed sticking out and the desk under the window. Now the desk is facing a totally different direction and his bed’s up against the wall. It’s great, but like, when does it happen? Isn’t this literally the second time we’ve seen his room the whole season?

that’s such a weird text. “Mr Westover Missing” like I don’t know if it’s from Lydia or Scott, but you’re allowed to add some detail? Your keystrokes aren’t limited and there are no government agencies watching your texts for information.

Oh, poor Cora. I honestly wasn’t expecting to bond with her so quickly when I first saw her, but there’s something about getting to see characters being calm that really helps me vibe with them? Like, when they’re nothing but Fight Fight Fight it’s hard to actually relate in any way, but when you actually get to see them talk or relax, then you worry about that being taken away from them.

However much I hate Isaac and everyone else Constantly saying “But I want Scott here. We should ask Scott, blah blah blah” I will say that it’s getting REALLY annoying that Allison’s entire personality is “I”m going to run in with almost zero backup bc I want to be powerful and strong, but then I have to be saved bc I refused to ask for help in the first place.”

Wtf do you mean ‘i’m not that good at this yet’ Isaac? You’ve been a werewolf for literally like 5 months, only like two months less than Scott, and you were LIVING with a born werewolf for that ENTIRE time.

Chris you were shooting at nothing for like two-thirds of that time. That was an empty room. ALSO, if you’ve been there the whole time, why did you wait until he was dead to come out shooting?

Chris yells “help Him” and you go run to stand next to his body without bothering to pull him off the cord around his neck? You realize he might not be completely dead right? Or is his throat already cut?

Also, I wanna note, it was daylight when Cora passed out. Now it’s dark! He went to the ER with her and STAYED with her. I get that people say STiles is kind of callous, but he Constantly goes out of his way for near strangers, and I don’t think that should be overlooked.

No youfcking wouldn’t have Chris, you had tons of time while they were using the garrotte and you just stood there. They came in just before the kill was done, and except for Tara Julia has been leaving people’s bodies where they fall so she wouldn’t left right after. You were NOT ‘this’ close.

Yeah, yeah, and you’re both fucking guilty of being incapable of conversation. Chris you are the adult here, fucking act like it. You had a million chances to confront your daughter and you didn’t. Apparently that’s a habit she picked up from you.

What are they talking about, Scott healing himself?? He was thrown back, he wasn’t injured. I literally just went back and rewatched that scene. He falls backward and he’s completely fine. Stiles, there are so many better instances you could point to. For example, things that actually Happened.

That line is never gonna not hurt.

Stop touching Danny. Stop being near Danny. You are a literal serial killer, get your hands off him. GOD. your brother literally said he would murder danny if he saw you with him anymore, why are you putting him in danger? FUck you.

.....okay, lydia’s speech was meaningful until she fucking turned it into scott worship. Why couldn’t you have stopped at letting her say “maybe I’ll find them before it happens” Why couldn’t it be about HER for once? Why did you have to make it about how everyone thinks sunshine comes out Scott’s ass even though he’s literally not done a single thing to warrant it. He hasn’t Saved Anyone. He hasn’t done Anything to warrant all this trust. Lydia wasn’t there when he made Derek kill Gerard. SHE was the one to save Jackson. And Scott was the one who had to be saved BOTH when Allison had to stitch him up and when Stiles had to go after him in the gasoline. Jackson is the one who saved Lydia when Peter went after her. Scott Didn’t save deaton, that was Noah. He wasn’t the one who killed Peter, that was a combination of Stiles and Jackson’s molotovs and Derek’s claws. Scott wasn’t even the one to protect Lydia when Derek and the pack went after her, that was Stiles, Allison, and Jackson. SHe had no idea that Scott was even THERE until she ran out of the house. Scott didn’t stop Matt, that was Allison’s family scaring him off and then Gerard killing him. THe only possible thing that could count was him saving the two little kids while Boyd and Cora were running around in the woods, and Lydia doesn’t even KNOW about that. Scott has canonically done NOTHING worth all this faith and ‘leader’ nonsense.

were...were they hinting at a Scott/Lydia relationship before they brought Kira in? Holding hands isn’t really a friend thing...?

That....is the softest most broken little ‘hey’ that I’ve ever heard and I’m Instantly on the verge of tears, holy shit.

Derek, honey, what do you mean ‘not again’? You’ve never left Cora, unless you count moving to New York with Laura and Cora was in South America! This line would make so much more sense if they’d given us Any idea what happened to Cora after the fire.

Normally, i’d be annoyed that Melissa is just ignoring the laws about paperwork. I’d even be annoyed that she did it for the Sheriff. BUT, Melissa is in the know about the supernatural and she KNOWS that the murders are supernatural. I’m sorry but Supernatural needs trump human laws. Melissa is totally a boss for this.

EYYYY actual druid (specifically magician druids) thing they got right (though i’m not sure it was on purpose). Magician Druids were Very Well Known for their nature magic. For causing storms and droughts and high winds and fog. The building storm around the school is like, Peak magician magic.

God, it really....it really grinds my gears watching Isaac’s progression toward the most abuse he can find. You notice how, in season 2 when Derek was attacking the Betas on the regular and doing awful shit like breaking Isaac’s hands, Isaac was loyal as Fuck to him? (right up until randomly going to Scott to decide whether to leave town) Then, this season, we start off with Derek being pretty fucking gentle, there’s no indication that he’s been continuing the abuse. Isaac questions his command and Derek’s response is ‘do you trust me?’ to which Isaac easily says yes. In fact, Isaac asks Derek to be the one to hurt him for the memory seeking thing, and Derek refuses because he wants to do what’s Safer for Isaac.Then he throws the glass and Isaac bails bc it’s a direct reminder of what his dad did. Only he goes to Scott, who was incredibly violent toward him in the previous season. (And who we know will be violent toward him in the future as well) But the only time he lists away from Scott, is to go after Allison, who Tackled him to the ground and held a knife to his throat, and whose father inherently hates werewolves and is a constant danger to him. Yet he never goes in the direction of people who Haven’t hurt him. He could go to Deaton, who’d taught him the pain-drain thing and was nothing but kind to him in that short time. He could’ve gone to Boyd after Derek’s lashing out, his pack member, who would never hurt him. Hell, he hates Stiles’ guts, but he could still have gone to him. Stiles was the one to help Derek free him from Jail after all, and he’s not wanted anymore so Noah wouldn’t have anything against him. Stiles may have threatened Isaac to keep him from hurting Lydia, but he never personally laid a hand on him. But he went to Scott. Someone who’s beaten him bloody multiple times.

So, really focusing on the details here, but on Julia’s death record, her  ‘jane doe’ occupation is listed as “Child” Oh, and apparently there was Froth present on the body.

Okay, so I think I understand what they’re saying. The reason Julia lived after getting to the hospital was because the birds sacrificed themselves and their life force kept her holding on. Now, either this was a spontaneous thing, and the birds did it For her. Or she Made them, because we know she doesn’t need to Be There to control weird shit. She could’ve set it up before she left the Nemeton or passed out or whatever. My confusion is. If that’s the explanation for the bird suicides, then what the Fuck happened on the first day when all the birds came crashing through the window?? There was no reason for that to happen. She was totally fine! And doing it to frighten people doesn’t make sense because she set off the radars of everything supernatural in town. (And Stiles.)

This kind of mass mind-control is kind of insane and makes the situation with Derek just That much more awful. I am so sickened.

Now, on the subject of the chanting, I assume it’s part of the ritual since it’s present at the deaths so much. The question is, where did Julia Get it? THOUGHTS: This chant isn’t present at any of the virgin kills. It’s not there with Heather, and while we don’t see the boy at the pool’s abduction/death, Emily Also didn’t hear it during her hallucination. What if it’s part of the virgin sacrifice perk? Like, Julia could Only Use it after killing the virgins, because it’s got some kind of mind-control thing about it?

Wh--why didn’t Julia tape her arms down before she woke up? Why make the garrotte before ensuring her victim couldn’t Punch her in the face??

I thought you JUST said she wasn’t going to be a sacrifice?

Still confused. You didn’t sacrifice Lydia, so that doesn’t count as the third philo, but then the teacher who died onstage wasn’t a threefold death, or the hanging thing, they just got their throat cut and they were poisoned. So....what? Was that supposed to count as your sacrifice?

Nobody TOUCHES Noah, who managed to be the only fucking cop on tv i’ve ever seen follow sensible procedure which is to shoot them in the fucking leg when they walk toward you menacingly, rather than threatening to shoot them in the head and doing nothing.

Final Thoughts:

There was a lot in this episode that didn’t make sense. It’s very clearly an amping up for the finale thing, but it’s annoying that after all this time they’ve essentially made the Alpha pack a time waster. The whole thing with getting Derek in the pack is relatively meaningless now that there’s a Darach going after the Alphas. I dunno, feels kinda off.

Anyway, onward.

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: “Gravity”

Good lord, folks. Buckle your seat-belts because we’ve got a lot to get through this episode. I think this is my longest recap to date, so settle in.

Episode Eleven’s “Gravity” starts out simple enough, focusing on the two fights we’d set up during “Out in the Open.” First up, Ironwood vs. Watts. Overall this fight does a really excellent job of showcasing their different fighting styles. Right from the start Watts is pointing his gun forward to take a clear shot at Ironwood, whereas Ironwood points his backwards to use as a surge of momentum.

He’s going to do this frequently throughout the battle, constantly using his gun to maneuver in the air, slow falls, regain his balance, and change directions, a much more complicated series of choices than the one-off shots we see Ruby use with her sniper rifle. This is partly because Ironwood seems to have a much larger supply of bullets---some sort of energy/dust ammo---than Watts does. His steampunk-esque gun holds only nineteen bullets, requiring him to keep track throughout the fight. Which is always a fun trope but sorry, Watts, you can’t compare to the king.

Thus, with limited weaponry available to him, Watts is forced to get creative with the arena itself. We see him manipulating gravity, shooting up columns of water and fire, and making use of his own pathways between platforms, all in an effort to throw Ironwood off and catch up unawares. However, Ironwood is, frankly, the much better fighter. He was right last week to assume he could handle Watts even though he sent three off to tackle Tyrian. He’s able to recover much more quickly and learns from any mistakes, as evidenced by his ability to hit Watts dead on while in the air the second time he takes out the gravity. When they come together in hand-to-hand Ironwood easily dominates, no doubt thanks not just to his military training and huntsmen lifestyle, but also in large part to his prosthetics which I would assume grant him more speed and power. Throughout the course of the fight we see Watts consistently take more damage to his aura and he’s unable to sense when Ironwood is sneaking up on him. After that little maneuver, Watts (presumably) grows reckless and lets off his last three or four shots in a random barrage. All of them miss.

This emphasis on emotion continues when they land back onto the main stage with Watts shouting, “You never appreciated my genius, James! You just stood atop it and called yourself a giant.” Oh, did Ironwood actually do something horrendous in the past? Is there something juicy that would explain---though not excuse---Watts’ turn towards villainy? Nah. He quickly follows that up with, “You chose that fat imbecile over me!” referring to Pietro. So... nice one, Watts. Crazy arrogance, willful ignorance of Pietro’s own, clear genius (anyone who can create Penny is no slouch), as well as a bit of fat-shamming on top of it all. No sympathy from me.

This moment emphasizes how unhinged Watts is becoming though as the fight turns against him. Even when he manages to setup a head shot Ironwood reveals, “You’re smart, but you’re not the only one who can count,” referencing that Watt’s emotions got the better of him, leading to him wasting his last bullet before it could be of real use.

...except not. I’ve got to admit, I was very pleased when all of this---or at least this particular moment---was merely a plan to get Ironwood to let his guard down. Watts is way too smart a character to be done in by the “You got too emotional and that made you sloppy” trope. So kudos there (even if it remains to be seen whether that Pietro comment was really his motivation, or just another part of the plan). Instead, he uses Ironwood’s confidence in his victory to trap him with the rings that control the arena, essentially pinning Ironwood’s non-prosthetic arm through the energy shields he’s been using. We can immediately see that the parts that have touched Ironwood already have horribly burned the skin.

And that ends up being Watt’s downfall. Not stupidity on his own part, but his lack of understanding of Ironwood himself. He assumes that this truly is a trap for him, rather than another sacrifice. After all, what fool would ruin their one remaining arm to stop him? Watts himself wouldn’t. Don’t pull, he cautions Ironwood, not “unless you’re hoping to add more metal to that body of yours.” Watts goes so far as to turn his back on Ironwood who then makes the sacrifice we all knew he would. One burned, useless arm later and he’s free.

I would like everyone to keep this moment in mind. Namely the utter devastation of it. I’d go so far as to say it’s as bad at Yang losing her arm in Volume 3. Despite seeing it bandaged later, Watts at least thinks it will be a complete loss if Ironwood sacrifices it. He’ll need to “add more metal,” AKA replace his arm, so though he obviously still has it in the following scenes, we don’t know if it will ever be functional again. Just as important, Ironwood had to choose to do that to himself. That wasn’t a horrific, but ultimately clean cut done in a moment of surprise. That was a conscious decision, a slow pull through all that pain, and then having to finish your fight immediately afterward. It’s a very different kind of psychological trauma, no better or worse than having someone take your arm from you by force. Throughout this volume I’ve seen a lot of fans being critical not only of Ironwood’s main decisions, but just his overall attitude as well. Too strict, too stern, doesn’t smile enough, yells sometimes, etc. basically associating someone who isn’t all sunshine and smiles with someone who is “bad.” Ignoring for the moment that we can say the same thing about many of our group---notably Yang---I have little doubt that I’ll see similar posts after this episode. Writings in the vein of, “Ironwood is unhinged! I can’t believe he yelled and hit his desk like that!” So everyone just keep this moment in mind and ask yourself how calm you’d be if you’d sacrificed your arm like that all of half an hour ago. And then found Salem’s calling card on your desk. And then came to the realization that the allies you trusted have been lying to you from the start. And then Salem herself appears to mock you. And then your city is about to be overrun. Basic summary of the rest of the episode: holy shit. So yeah. If Yang is allowed to be angry and upset after losing her arm, or just angry in general like she is in the later half of “Gravity,” I think we owe it to Ironwood to let him be angry too. I have a lot of feelings about the utter insanity he’s been forced through with little to no support and if he wants to take all that out by hitting his desk once, by god I’d say that’s a good coping strategy given the circumstances. Both the writing and the fans tend to erase trauma once you’ve passed age 25. The girls have every right to be upset, to break, to not trust people because they’ve been through a few months of hardship, but Ozpin isn’t allowed the same after a couple thousand years of that. We’re going to see the same hypocrisy later in this episode---the group can be upset about lies but Ironwood is not---and I’m hoping (against hope) that the fandom doesn’t make that worse by sweeping this injury under the rug. It’s horrific and absolutely has a bearing on his inability to keep his cool with the group immediately afterwards. We’ve long passed Ironwood owing them endless reassurances and calm responses. 

Anyway, Ironwood still manages to finish the fight because his remaining arm is his robotic one, giving him the strength to easily drag and raise Watts into the air one-handed. He dangles him over the edge of the arena, announcing that he will “sacrifice whatever it takes to stop [Salem].” A clear bit of foreshadowing for his decision at the end of the episode. Watts responds that he hopes he does.

We then move to the Tyrian fight which, on the whole, I don’t think was done quite as well. Granted, there are a lot of enjoyable and badass moments. I like that Clover’s first act is to announce that Tyrian is under arrest, maintaining the law that Atlas (and Ironwood) works to uphold. It doesn’t matter that Tyrian is a crazy serial killer in league with an immortal sorceress hell-bent on destroying the world. Even crazy serial killers have rights and are given the option of surrendering, even when everyone present knows there’s exactly zero chance of that happening. It’s the principal of the thing and the ability to say, “We gave him a chance.” In a world overrun with inequality, this is a small but important attempt to level the field. If you do something wrong you face legal action and those rights are announced to you. Same for Tyrian. Same for Team RWBY. But we’ll get to that.

For now, we see Qrow attack first and like back in Volume Four he and Tyrian are pretty evenly matched. The tide doesn’t turn until Robyn and Clover come into play. Throughout this exchange we see a lot of cool combos among the three of them. Tyrian will block an incoming arrow with his tail only for Clover to snag it with his hook. Robyn can get another arrow to perfectly bounce off the walls and then Qrow’s scythe, hitting Tyrian dead on. Clover can dive between Tyrian’s legs, giving Qrow the opening he needs to attack. It is, as said, pretty badass... almost a little too badass. Personally, I would have appreciated them messing up once or twice. They’re all professionals, yes, but Qrow and Clover have only had one fight together. Robyn, meanwhile, wasn’t even allied with them until an hour ago. This is a situation where skills shouldn’t really trump, “We’re three very distinct people who don’t know each other’s fighting styles well, trying to attack one guy in very close quarters.” There should have been some screw-ups. Especially when we take semblances into account. What, are we supposed to assume here that Clover’s semblance just conveniently overrides Qrow’s? That no mistakes---let alone anything bad---will happen in this fight despite the fact that it’s an extreme parallel to Volume Four? That whole battle emphasized, “Don’t come closer!” because when people fight near Qrow bad shit happens. Now, he fights with two other people in a narrow alleyway and there’s not a single repercussion. Based on their travels looking for the geist, I don’t buy that Qrow’s semblance is just conveniently inactive while near Clover. Even if I did... that’s not a very good writing decision. To me, it’s just more evidence that Rooster Teeth doesn’t understand its own rules/doesn’t know what to do with an ability like Qrow’s. It causes problems only when they explicitly want it to. Then, miraculously, it’s no longer in effect.

Still, we’ll acknowledge that RWBY had a lot else it wanted to accomplish in this episode, so the need to power through this fight is somewhat justified. I personally would have had the entirety of this episode be the two battles---I was shocked when both ended just eight minutes in---but I’m obviously not the one writing the show. Thus, instead of an episode devoted to both the action and the emotion of confronting our two main villains this volume, Tyrian loses his cool after getting punched in the gut, manages to catch Robyn’s arrow in his teeth... 

But it’s a bomb. 

Down he goes. Fight’s done.

Which leads us into the second half of the episode. I want to preface this with a short acknowledgment before we go any further.

Did these last ten minutes give me what I’ve been looking for since the beginning of Volume Six? No. It’s easy to assume it did because all the pieces are there. Ironwood is finally angry about the secret keeping. The Ace Ops are criticizing the group left and right. Surely this is the “The group is capable of making mistakes and they should be called out for it!” that I wanted, right? Not really. For the simple reason that there is a massive difference between:

A story that acknowledges mistakes as mistakes. The characters either grow from this lesson or dig in their heels and are painted as being in the wrong for that decision.

and

A story that takes what the audience (me) perceives as mistakes and frames them as justified choices. The characters do not grow because they’re 100% sure they’re in the right and those who would criticize them are painted as in the wrong. 

“Gravity” is so far into that second option I don’t think the series can come back from it. Does the group face criticism? Yes, but every single time the writing insists that it’s undeserved criticism. It paints the group as the underdogs facing unfair odds, rather than equals---with all the responsibility that comes with that---facing criticism that they need to own up to. Absolutely nothing in this second half implies that the group is going to learn from their mistakes because they, and the writing, still insists that they weren’t mistakes. Which is precisely what we’ve gotten before. Cordovin might criticism them, but Cordovin is in the wrong. Winter might criticism them, but Winter is in the wrong. Every time a character goes, “Hey, you shouldn’t have done this” the group responds with, “Yes we should have!” and the story backs them up. Yes, you should have attacked Argus. Yes, you should have stolen an airship. Yes, you should have lied to Ironwood and spilled the secret to Robyn. Yes, yes, yes. That’s the takeaway every single time. The group is never in the wrong. Others just think they are and those others are painted as cruel, militaristic, unhinged characters.

It’s not at all what I was looking for. Just more of the same.

So that’s the preface. In terms of what we actually get, Ironwood returns to his office with his arm bandaged and in a sling, carrying Watts’ bag, only to drop it when he sees the queen piece on his desk. He calls Winter asking, “Was anyone caught entering the school grounds while I was away?” and when she says no Ironwood has her race off to the Winter Maiden, unknowingly leading Cinder there in the process. “Now show me where you’ve been hiding her.”

We then cut to the group where the trouble begins. They’re not just curious about why Ironwood is recalling them with Mantle still in need of evacuation, they’re actively questioning it. This is the attitude I simply don’t understand. The group acts as if Ironwood is deliberately screwing everyone over when they know better. This is no longer the beginning of the volume where they thought he was some horrific dictator hell bent on destroying his own Kingdom. This is just an hour or so after, “We should tell Ironwood!” and the happy-go-lucky ‘We trust him now’ moment. Even less time after Ruby stared up at him in awe with, “He’s doing it.” They had reason to trust him before they even made it to Atlas. They were given even more reasons in the form of Ironwood sharing his secrets, early licenses, and being allowed to work on the tower. They then still waited until Ironwood was doing everything they wanted before giving him some of that trust back... but the moment he stops doing precisely what they want---we want to keep evacuating Mantle---he’s deemed suspicious again. 

I mean seriously, is the group that dense? Are they incapable of thinking to themselves, “Wow, something must have happened if Ironwood is recalling us before evacuations are complete,” which is precisely the case. The scene tries to frame it as “Group Good” and “Ace Ops Blinding Obeying Orders Bad” but that aspect doesn’t even come into play. There’s nothing blind about it. It simply takes two seconds of critical thinking skills to realize that something really awful must have happened back at the Academy that trumps what you’re doing in Mantle. This is what I mean by the writing being biased. Before we even reach the fight in Ironwood’s office it’s trying to paint him as potentially cruel, potentially suspicious, potentially abandoning his people, look how worried our heroes are about this secret decision he’s made... when all that requires ignoring some really basic deduction in order to reach those assumptions. Remember that intelligence is a plot device in RWBY. If they want Ironwood forced to spill his secrets, he’ll randomly start talking about them in front of his enemies. If they want Ironwood painted as the villain, the group will randomly be incapable of realizing that maybe, just maybe, something went wrong on the home front and you’re needed there.

Things just get so much worse from then on. The group splits with JNR going off to find Oscar and, admittedly, I was shocked we got that at all. I mean yeah, it’s setup for the final reveal at the end of the episode, but the fact that anyone remembered Oscar was missing---let alone happily went off to find him---was still a surprise. So only Team RWBY heads back to Ironwood’s office where they find him (rightfully) panicking over the queen on his desk. Weiss tries to baby him, acting like he’s freaking out over nothing, when all these characters should recall precisely what Ironwood himself points out: the last time we saw this symbol it was a message that Beacon had fallen. He’s not paranoid here. He’s entirely justified in his panic. Ironwood likewise points out that they may have been duped into bringing thousands of people into Atlas as easy targets and Vine agrees, setting up that the Ace Ops are on Team Ironwood throughout the course of this conversation. Not out of blind loyalty, but because he’s right. That is a concern. That may be the plan. We do need to try and do something about that. Team RWBY, however, isn’t convinced.

That is, until Ruby realizes that the chess piece is made of black glass. Which means Cinder left it. Normally I’d congratulate her on that deduction---it is the one smart move we see Ruby pull this whole episode---but I just hate what follows. Namely that Ruby and Ruby alone controls her team’s opinions on a situation. Again. We saw it back in the snow, then again when Blake announced in the elevator that they’d do whatever she wanted. Team RWBY is the one who blindly follows their leader, not the Ace Ops, the only exception being Blake and Yang going rogue in regards to Robyn, but we see that hive-mind mindset here again. Ironwood brings up a good point? Nothing. Ace Ops support that point with more logic? Nothing. Ruby supports it? Oh, suddenly Weiss and Blake are taking this seriously. Suddenly Yang is fired up and ready to do whatever is necessary. Ruby controls the room. It’s only when she’s on board that her teammates decide this is worth getting riled up about.

Which, as I’ve said before, is a horrible way to write a diverse group. Especially when the writing is trying to paint the Ace Ops as mindless soldiers. For all their claims that they just have to follow orders, they’re the only ones parsing through this situation and coming to their own conclusions. It’s just that their conclusions do end up aligning with Ironwood’s which is the “bad” take in this scene. Team RWBY, however, waits until their leader makes a decision and then simply rides her cloak tails. The day that Blake, Yang, or Weiss legitimately disagree with Ruby---not a token “Are you sure we should keep secrets from Ironwood? We’re not actually challenging this. Just checking in”---is the day the writing will disagree with her. AKA, no time soon.

Blake tries to give some bland reassurance about them all being with Ironwood to which he responds, “Are you with me? How did Robyn know about the global communications tower?” Thank you! Thank you for giving us Ironwood’s characterization back and acknowledging that he has no reason to buy their generic ‘Got your back’ statements when everything they’ve done this volume has proven otherwise. They don’t support Ironwood, only themselves and their own teams. The minute he does something they don’t like he’s chucked under the bus. Too bad the writing doesn’t acknowledge any of this and instead continually paints the group as being justified in their decisions. It’s that hypocrisy again. When the group yells at Ozpin for keeping secrets we’re supposed to be on their side. When the Ace Ops yell at the group for keeping secrets we’re... still supposed to be on their side.

Weiss tries to diffuse the situation with “None of this matters right now!” which is real rich when they were just complaining about Ironwood not telling them why they were called back. They get to worry over that, but Ironwood isn’t allowed to worry about them outright betraying him? “Loyalty always matters!” he shouts back and he’s right. Why should Ironwood trust them to have his back in this crucial moment when they’ve never had it before? I’m already seeing more of this hypocrisy among the fandom. When Ozpin kept secrets and told lies the group was given a whole volume to be pissed about that and fans still, to this very day, insist that it hasn’t been enough time for them to get over it, to regain even a portion of that trust. But now that Ironwood has been lied to and betrayed in the same manner? People are annoyed that he’s not just shrugging it off. How dare you not get over in thirty seconds what our heroes got weeks to work through. His inability to just suck it up, as it were, is used to make him seem irrational here. I don’t see anyone, characters or fans alike, acknowledging that his anger is as righteous as the group’s was out in the snow. That there is the disconnect.

Of course, something has to break the tension. Drawn by all the fury and fear, a grimm pops out of Watts’ bag. A fail-safe for if he was defeated and captured. Salem immediately takes control of the grimm and kills it, using its form to appear before them. She reveals that it doesn’t matter that her men were captured. They were just there to “set the stage,” which they’ve done. Still doesn’t explain the random Penny side plot to my mind (seriously, why did the story bother to resurrect her when she has done nothing plot-wise or emotionally?), but whatever. Much more importantly, the stage is set for Salem herself. She’s approaching with the grimm army we saw her amassing which is... iffy.

First off, why? Why after a thousand years has she suddenly changed her MO from keeping to the sidelines to a full-on attack? Again, what’s the catalyst for that massive change? We don’t know. Meanwhile, from a writing perspective, I’m hesitant about having our Big Bad thrown into the mix before the finale. We know there are plenty of volumes left in this series, which automatically undermines any battle they might have with Salem. Will they win?? Of course not! Because RWBY isn’t over yet. Granted, this could all just be a ruse of some sort. Maybe Salem just wants them to think she’s approaching with an army, which would be much more up her alley in terms of long-distance manipulation. But if not... seriously, what’s the point of that?

Here’s hoping it’s a bluff.

Speaking of manipulation, we get a fantastically creepy moment where Salem tells Ironwood to “simply accept the futility of your situation” while smiling like a kind mother. That’s the Salem who is truly dangerous. Ironwood reaffirms that he won’t give up the relics and Ruby pips up with, “We don’t have to kill you to stop you.”

Hey wait. I’m gonna give you all another graphic.

This is Ozpin’s stance! This is his plan! His version of hope! We spent all of Volume Six having the cast beat on him for, “Omg Salem is immortal?!” and with the exception of Nora’s comment, no discussion of this in Volume Seven... but now suddenly Ruby is making this announcement? The group came to this revelation sometime off screen which we a) don’t get to see and b) once again created no scenario in the form of, “Wow! Ozpin was right all along! Maybe we should go talk to him...”

I’m just... wow. The number of times the writing takes what the group and the adults do, the exact same perspectives and decisions, and twists it so that the group comes out looking like heroes and the adults look like misguided, unhinged fools who need to be put in their place... I’m really over it at this point. And by extension the group themselves. Their characterizations have been so badly mangled at this point I legitimately don’t like them as people. I don’t care if they say they want to protect Mantle, or if they say they’ll support Ironwood, or if they say they’re unsure about their choices. All their actions claim otherwise.

Rather than grappling with the huge revelation that the group is apparently no longer obsessed with Salem’s immortality (or rather that Ruby isn’t. The rest of the group doesn’t actually matter. As established, they sync up with her beliefs the second she announces them), we return to Summer Rose. Salem goes, “Your mother said those words to me” and Ruby... loses it? What? I would have been 100% on board with this if we’d gotten it last Volume because then we saw Ruby losing her cool periodically. The smashed alcohol bottles. Chucking her scroll. Screaming at Qrow. That was all building to something. But then we had a year and roughly twelve episodes of normality. Ruby jumps into her fight with Cordovin and has been fine ever since. Hell, she’s been bubbly and confident, goofing off with Penny in one episode, then giving strong orders to her team in another. The one time we see her falter was in her conversation with Qrow and he reassured her completely that she was both doing the right thing and in no way comparable to Ozpin. Now, suddenly, one line from Salem and Ruby collapses? Full on incapacitated? I could buy the crying while still standing strong, I could buy a collapse if we’d kept her characterization going from Volume Six, but this kind of reaction in this context just felt so extreme. Doesn’t help that I really wasn’t sold on the voice acting here. Those cries sound less like devastated sobs and more like weird hiccups. Not to rag on Lindsay. On the whole I think she does a really excellent job as Ruby, it’s just this particular moment didn’t read right to me. I didn’t feel Ruby’s supposed grief here.

So that was... a lot for one line from Salem in a volume of otherwise confident and cool-headed Ruby. We also don’t see it amounting to anything, as per usual with RWBY’s writing. Ruby isn’t out of commission for the rest of the conversation or anything. She pops right back up after a second in Yang’s lap, just as confident and go-getting as before. There was no lead up to this and there are no consequences for the breakdown. Rooster Teeth honestly seems to think they can just chuck random things into the story---Ruby needs to show emotion at some point!---and then just leave it at that, entirely disconnected from everything else around it. Would we have known that Ruby just had her first breakdown of the series a minute later while once again betraying Ironwood? Nope.

Finally, this scene shows us again that the Argus battle was a bunch of nonsense. Ruby’s eyes nearly activate when she’s grieving for her mother, imagining---or perhaps seeing via Salem?---a sad Summer, not a smiling one. Just like her eyes activated while seeing Pyrrha die. Just like they activated when Blake was nearly killed by the Apathy. They activate now while thinking about her mother’s death. The montage of happy moments in lieu of the sad ones not working last volume was entirely out of place.

Salem finally leaves. Now everyone is panicking about this army. Elm points out that they’ll know if anything approaches. Vine checks and realizes that Watts took out their perimeter. Either that or Salem has already destroyed everyone and everything out there. It’s impossible to know. During all this Blake asks if the Amity tower is actually finished and we get more nonsense about how Ironwood is evil for telling a lie, but the group is always justified in telling theirs. The writing really tried to compare Ironwood telling Mantle---who I guarantee 100% does not care about whether a communications tower is finished while they’re getting attacked by grimm---a lie to lure out one of their biggest threats to Blake and Yang going behind Ironwood’s back to tell a potentially non-trustworthy outlaw about said tower, risking that the information would fall into the wrong hands and doom the project before it could be completed either way. Those are not in any way comparable situations, yet the writing really has Weiss going, “General Ironwood?” in a ‘How could you betray us like that?’ tone while Yang continues to look pissed.

And as if they didn’t know! How is this a personal betrayal? They were all helping to build that tower. Surely they’d know it it was that close to being done. Again, critical thinking skills, people. Anyone with two brain cells and their insider information should have looked at Ironwood’s announcement and gone, “Oh, that must be a bluff. Just a few days ago we were arguing about whether to continue taking resources from Mantle. No way is Amity ready. He’s going after Watts. Who is indeed the much bigger threat. Considering that he has control over the entirety of our technology and there’s literally no downside to telling Mantle about a finished tower when they’re getting devoured by grimm.” This is another, “But lying is wrong!” in the face of “But lying kept us alive...?” 

Does everyone get what I’m saying here? How RWBY takes these situations and tries to paint them in an absolutely ridiculous light, expecting the audience to blindly accept this perspective despite everything else they’ve seen for themselves? Like, two episodes ago? I swear I’ve never encountered writing that treats its audience this badly. Scene after scene relies heavily on the viewer having no ability to think for themselves. Just accept that Ironwood is a horrible person for lying about the tower even though there are no repercussions for that and we JUST watched him defeating Watts as a result. Like, five minutes ago. That just happened. In this episode. 

Ironwood then drops the bomb that Winter has gone off to claim the Maiden power. Interesting development. I wonder what that means exactly. Is she just going to lock herself away until the Maiden dies naturally? Do they have her on some sort of life support and is there an agreement to pull the plug if necessary? Are they going to use a machine similar to the one Pyrrha was in and try to force the change early? Or is this just a misleading comment and Winter is merely off to protect the Maiden, no intention of taking the power now? Who knows. We’ll have to wait until next episode to find out.

Ironwood likewise announces that the staff and the lamp need to be locked away now that they’re compromised, even though they’ve been compromised since they first saw Tyrian in Mantle. Insert another [this scenario is so stupid and contrived] explanation here. It’s made worse by Ruby’s childish “You said we could keep it.” Excuse me? What, did you think the lamp was your personal property now forever and always? Is Ruby really sitting there arguing that something Ironwood told her weeks ago trumps the obvious logic of putting the relic where it’s somewhere safe? That’s the characterization we’re going for, a leader who cares more about, ‘But you said we could have it!’ over the fate of the world? What even is this? The fact that Ironwood has to explain to them that the situation has changed just reinforces the group’s overall attitude. That is, one of arrogance and importance. They literally need to be told why putting the relic in a nearly impenetrable vault is better than letting them have it just because they want it. Plus, you know, they lied about the lamp from the start. So there’s that too.

Finally, Ironwood reveals that Amity was originally a plan of Ozpin’s but he didn’t push it far enough. Instead, he intends to use the staff to lift all of Atlas instead, hopefully taking two relics and a Maiden far out of Salem’s reach. Ruby wants to use the tower for its designed purpose instead, which is only a valid option in her mind because the writing was stupid last week. If there had actually been any logic there---if people had been allowed to react naturally and in a variety of ways to the Salem announcement, rather than a super convenient “Yeah! Let’s all work together!” across an entire, panicking city---she wouldn’t be quite so eager to tell the whole world. But we all know at this point that logic bends to the protagonists’ whims, so Ruby wants that same perfect ending across all of Remnant. She stands her ground, as does her team. Obviously.

Meanwhile, the Ace Ops aren’t just following Ironwood’s orders like the writing wants us to think via Harriet’s earlier comment. Rather, they’re each thinking through the situation for themselves and making very good points. If Salem has taken out our perimeter than we know our tech and people don’t stand a chance against this army. We just finished up the fight in Mantle and none of us are in a position to start another. Notably, Harriet brings this up, the one whose aura took a massive hit while nearly getting crushed underfoot. Vine points out that sometimes you have to lose a battle to win the war, but Team RWBY, to be blunt, simply doesn’t care.

I’ll be blunt myself here too: I don’t have an easy solution to this particular scenario. I don’t know what the “right” or the “wrong” choice is. Weighing starting a fight with VERY high stakes you’ll lose against abandoning the people of Mantle is just a straight up horrific decision. Like so much of what Ozpin faced, there is no clear-cut, good answer here. Do you stand by the people and risk the world, or work to save the world and doom the people? I don’t know and I do commend Rooster Teeth for writing a difficult choice... just not in giving each side the weight it deserves. Because as said, we’re meant to root for Team RWBY, always. Theirs is presented as the “right” choice every time, despite the fact that, as established, this is far from a black and white decision.

What frustrates me the most is when faced with all of these logical and very important considerations (we might not have backup, we’re in no position to fight, if Salem gets the relics and another Maiden the world is screwed) the group won’t even acknowledge these things. They’re so set in their own perspective they won’t even give these HUGE concerns the time of day. Rather, Yang shoots back, “You can’t just back down from a fight!”

That’s it. That’s the group’s problem in a single line.

This is what got Pyrrha killed.

It’s something the group should remember. She also insisted on fighting when she should have retreated and, since this was back during the days when characters actually faced consequences for their actions, it cost Pyrrha her life. Granted, going after Cinder was a truly useless endeavor. Pyrrha achieved nothing with her sacrifice. Here, Team RWBY hopes to save the people of Mantle, adding a clear justification for their insistence on fighting... but this is nevertheless indicative of that larger “punch it until it stops moving” mindset. It’s not that they decide to fight instead of retreating that’s the problem, it’s that to their mind fighting is the only option. Ever. This is what led to them attacking Cordovin and destroying Argus’ mech, drawing a massive grimm in the process. When faced with the option of backing down, Team RWBY doesn’t consider that an option at all. Which is heroic when up against an actual enemy, far less so when you’re facing an ally and the choice to fight has serious repercussions attached to it. Hell, the group doesn’t even consider compromises. They could have easily acknowledged that collecting the relics, the Maiden, and getting the staff to work on Atlas will take time. You do that while we focus on evacuating the rest of Mantle to the city. But no, even the concept of a compromise simply isn’t possible. You just always fight. Straight up. Anyone who suggests anything less isn’t a true huntsmen. “We’re loyal to the people!” Ruby shouts, as if “the people” doesn’t also include the rest of the world that Ironwood is trying to save and that they’re endangering by keeping the relics and Maiden within Salem’s reach. 

That is one messed up perspective to tout in a story infused with the complex and the morally gray.

The real kicker though? Ruby’s ‘My way or the highway’ attitude obliterates a solution that fell straight into her lap. Jaune calls and says straight out that they have another situation. If Ruby had listened to her teammate for just three seconds they all would have learned about Oscar, thereby undermining Ironwood’s plan. He can’t keep the lamp safe if he doesn’t know where it is. You look for it while, again, we evacuate Mantle. Then we take everything out of Salem’s reach. Win-win. Instead, Ruby blasts her way through the situation. Literally, dodging Ironwood and hiding behind his desk shouting a highly bias version of his plan in the hopes of getting everyone on her side. And it works. 

Because those like Clover don’t get to hear any of that context. Like how the perimeter is gone, there’s an army potentially coming, no one is in a position to fight, we’ve already lost a relic... they just here a Ruby’s version of events that paints Ironwood as the callous man Robyn thought he was---oh my god he’s abandoning Mantle for no good reason!---and people will react accordingly. Ruby likewise doesn’t care that shouting such information over all channels does things like, say, clue Tyrian into their plan. She just wants to do things her way, right now. Pausing to think (because thinking isn’t fighting) simply doesn’t happen.

I used to adore Ruby as a hero. Someone who was intrinsically good, hopeful, and wickedly clever in her ability to come out on top. Now she’s stubborn, arrogant, at times cruel, and charges in headfirst like her sister, refusing to consider any perspective other than her own. And her team endlessly supports that. The writing endlessly supports that. This isn’t our hero working through her flaws, but rather a flawed character that the writing refuses to acknowledge is flawed. When Ruby flies behind Ironwood’s desk the music rises triumphantly, just like it did when she attacked Cordovin’s mech. When Ironwood announces that they’re under arrest, Ruby spits back, “We won’t just let you take us” and we’re supposed to cheer.

Which brings us back to the question of whether the group really faced consequences here. Let me give you all a random, non-RWBY example of two scenes. Scenario One:

Parent: You punched her?

Teen: She insulted me!

Parent: I understand that, but that doesn’t mean you were justified in attacking her.

Teen: Oh, I was.

Parent: Maybe you were, maybe you weren’t, but you can’t solve all your problems that way.

Teen: I... I know that, okay. Back off. I just get so angry...

Parent: I know. We’re going to work on that. You’re grounded this weekend. We can discuss this more then.

Teen: [sighs] Fine.

vs. Scenario Two:

Parent: You punched her?

Teen: She insulted me!

Parent: I understand that, but that doesn’t mean you were justified in attacking her.

Teen: Oh, I was.

Parent: Maybe you were, maybe you weren’t, but you can’t solve all your problems that way.

Teen: Screw you! It worked didn’t it? I think a good punch goes a long way.

Parent: That’s not... okay look. You’re grounded this weekend so---

Teen: Like hell I am. [Proceeds to run off]

Teen: [Later to friend] ---and then she tried to ground me? Can you believe that?

Friend: Holy shit what an asshole.

If we put aside my own iffy dialogue for the moment, Scenario One acknowledges the complexity of the situation while likewise pointing out that the teen didn’t handle herself well. RWBY has achieved that here: the ethics of this scenario are acknowledged as complicated, but the group did things they shouldn’t have, as evidence by Ironwood’s anger and the Ace Ops’ criticism. However, Scenario One goes on to let the teen acknowledge that mistake, thereby validating it in the first place. A consequence is set, grounding, and they accept that, thereby further validating that their behavior needs work. They accept the consequence because both they and the writing acknowledge that the consequence is deserved. It takes what was previously two subjective stances---they say I’m wrong, I say I’m right---and encourages the audience to find the middle ground. Neither was totally wrong or right. The teen might be justified in some respects, but still made mistakes in others. She needs to improve. 

RWBY, however, steers firmly into Scenario Two wherein the teen (Team RWBY) insists points blank that they never made mistakes in the first place, thereby encouraging the audience to question whether Ironwood and the Ace Ops (the parent) is right to be calling them out at all. We see no humility or guilt, only confidence. Ruby shouting “No!” at Cordovin when she’s told to surrender. Yang keeping silent after admitting that she and Blake told Robyn, not bothering to apologize or admit that this might have been a breech of trust. They challenge the validity of the claim that mistakes were made and by virtue of being protagonists encourage the audience to challenge it too. Finally, we see them reject the consequence because they will not admit that it’s deserved. The teen will not accept a grounding. Ruby: “We won’t just let you take us.” We’re then told by others that this rejection was warranted. The friend reinforces the view that the teen was right to run because that punishment is undeserved. The message is, “You never did anything wrong in the first place.” The plot of RWBY likewise reinforces the view that resisting Cordovin’s arrest was right by having her randomly let the group go. The consequence is replaced with a reward and, presumably, we’ll have a similar situation wherein the group either defeats the Ace Ops or is released by them. The consequences never take hold because the writing doesn’t think there should be consequences in the first place. Team RWBY isn’t going to be arrested here. They’re certainly not acknowledging that on some level they deserve to be. We didn’t see that humility while they were cuffed on the airship---that most basic acknowledgement of, “Did we make some mistakes? Could we have done something better? Is Ironwood right to be this mad?”---and there’s none of it now here, either. The tone is pure, “How dare you try and arrest us? We’re the good guys here!” 

This remains as pro-protagonist as it has been the last two volumes. There are no consequences, only another hurdle for the group to overcome, painted as heroes for doing so. It’s Team RWBY vs. The Ace Ops and there’s no confusion about who we’re supposed to be rooting for. The Ace Ops because the group should rightly be stopped from hindering Ironwood’s attempts to keep the relics and a Maiden out of Salem’s hands, for their own lies and secret keeping that endangered them all this volume? Nope. It’s Team RWBY as the presumed heroes, facing off against soldiers who (supposedly) prioritize orders over what’s “right.” 

And yeah, Oscar is gone. There are a number of dismantled robots and blaster fire in the room where Neo presumably took him. So unless they do a flashback we don’t get to see if/how Ozpin reacted to this initial attack. I hope they do provide a flashback because otherwise that’s another crucial scene of Oscar’s that happened off screen...

Can’t wait to see what else we’ll end up with next week! Until then, 💜

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: Roman Sionis

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)

Birds of Prey is a fun, silly movie. So you’d expect a fun, silly villain for such a film, right? Well, we sort of get that… but this is an R-rated fun, silly movie, so the villain is going to cuss a lot and peel people’s faces off and be a raging psychopathic manchild. Roman Sionis, everybody!

Good old Roman Sionis, known to comic fans as Black Mask (he isn’t ever called that by anyone except Harley during his introduction, and he doesn’t even wear his mask until the end), is just an absolute raging lunatic. He gets mad at the drop of a hat, is creepily posessive of Dinah Lance, has a very close relationship with his murderous second-in-command Zsasz, and is just generally unpleasant to every single person who crosses his path.

But that’s par for the course for Roman Sionis, who is never really EVER portrayed as a charming, likable guy. The real question here is, is he an entertaining villain? Well he’s played by Ewan McGregor, what do YOU think?

Motivation/Goals: Roman is a relatively simple villain, but I think this works in his favor. You see, a big issue with Harley’s previous outing, Suicide Squad, is that the mission was way too high stakes despite the cast featuring a group of people who didn’t really have any powers beyond “fighting really good.” or “has weapon skills.” You’re telling me you’re gonna put Harley Quinn, Deadshot, and Captain Boomerang up against Enchantress and her army of ancient Aztec super-zombies? WHAT? Here, we have a street-level threat much more suited to Harley’s capabilities: Roman is just a very powerful gangster, and his goal in this movie is the simple “get this diamond that was stolen back to me so I can make fat stacks of cash.” That’s really all their needs to be here, a simple MacGuffin to drive along the plot to its various setpieces.

Performance: I love Ewan McGregor, so, really, he didn’t have to do much with the role of Roman Sionis to make him great. Still, this man went above and beyond despite having comparatively little screentime to Harley. Roman seems incapable of going a single sentence without cursing up a storm and is the epitome of a psychopathic manchild, tormenting people for the slightest of reasons. He forces a woman to strip and dance on one of his tables because she was laughing too loud when he was upset, and decides not to spare a girl’s life because she had a gross snot bubble on her face from sobbing while he had his crony Zsasz peel off her parents’ faces. As funny and hammy as he gets, the dude is a stone-cold ruthless bastard who has no line he won’t cross to get what he wants.

Final Fate: Cass hides a grenade on him and steals the ring, and then Harley kicks him off the pier while he panics. Before he even hits the water, BOOM! Never would I have expected to laugh out loud at the sight of Ewan McGregor being blown into bits, but this movie was just full of surprises.

Best Scene: I think that the honor has to go to his establishing character moment with Zsasz, as they cut off the faces of a family who crossed Roman, and then when Roman decides to spare the daughter, he notices snot on her face, says “Ew” like a petulant child, and has Zsasz cut her face off anyway. It’s a great way to establish that Roman is an awful human being no matter how you slice it, and firmly establishes that while, yes, he is a misogynist villain in a female-led blockbuster, his misogyny is just a tiny facet of how unabashedly terrible Roman is.

Final Thoughts & Score: So, this is gonna sound weird, but… Roman kinda reminded me of Justin Hammer. Hammer is a villain who I have greatly warmed to over time (mostly thanks to Nando V Movies on YouTube), to the point where I think he’s actually pretty funny but is held back from true greatness by the sloppy nature of Iron Man 2. The film was big, bloated, and didn’t know what to do with itself. And this film is KIND OF like that… but it knows what to do with Roman.

The movie has an undercurrent of female empowerment, so why not make the villain emblematic of things women have to overcome? Roman is creepy, misogynistic, and even a bit racist especially with his condescending actions towards Dinah. And he even throws a fit when she “betrays” him and decides to murder her. But the movie is smart so as to not make this hamfisted; the movie makes it entirely clear that even if you take away his misogynistic elements, Roman Sionis is just an utterly disgusting human being. Everything about him is just so hilariously vulgar and repulsive, but the way he’s performed helps lighten it and help keep him within the tone of the movie. He’s just dark enough and just hammy enough to work.

My big issues with Roman are mostly due to his utilization and the wasted potential, which is a problem that really hits a lot of stuff in Birds of Prey. He is great every time he’s onscreen, but his screentime is fairly limited, and then he dies at the end which robs him of any chance of coming back in the future as an antagonist. He actually functions great as a more grounded threat rather than some larger-than-life end of the world threat, but the fact he dies horribly – before even having his mask burned onto his face, even! - just kind of feels like a waste of a character. To be fair, Black Mask is not the best or most interesting Batman villain crime lord; we have the Penguin for that. But when you cast  someone like Ewan McGregor and he’s clearly having a blast, it’s hard not to feel at least slightly bitter when he gets hilariously gibbed at the end.

Still, I can’t let Justin Hammer’s sacrifice go in vain; he walked so Roman could run, and Roman ran so that perhaps someday Hammer could sprint. Roman gets a nice, fat 8/10, which he definitely earns with the heaping helpings of ham he brings to the table, though he is held back at least a little by the wasted potential of his character.

But hey, if you want to talk about wasted potential…

Psycho Analysis: Victor Zsasz

I really like Victor Zsasz in this film. I really do. The angle they went with, the implied homosexuality, the actor… it’s all good stuff that helps make a disturbing character like Zsasz easier to swallow. But he gets hit with wasted potential harder than even Roman does.

Motivation/Goals: He’s Roman’s right-hand man, so basically his motivation is to do whatever Roman wants him to do. However, there is a bit of an implied thing between his boss and him; Zsasz seems undeniably irritated with the attention he lavishes on Dinah, and is very hands-on and affectionate with his boss. A lot of his later actions in the film and his cruelty towards Dinah does seem to stem from some place of anger towards her for taking Roman’s attention away from him.

Performance: I have to say, Chris Messina does a stellar job at portraying Zsasz as creepy and obsessive, and certainly showcases the fanatical loyalty he has towards Roman, making him something of a dark mirror to Harley’s former relationship with the Joker. I also appreciate that, despite not going with Zsasz’s original psychotic serial killer angle, they still made him a bloodthirsty psycho with a sort of nihilistic edge to him. Frankly, this might be the best possible take on a live-action Zsasz without things getting intensely uncomfortable.

Final Fate: This is probably the worst element of Zsasz: his death. Right before the climax he gets shot out of the blue by Huntress and then Harley just repeatedly stabs him with the arrow. And I have to make it clear here – Zsasz barely got to do anything. He never really poses any sort of physical threats to the heroines, never gets into a fight, and is never mentioned again after his death despite being very close to Roman (to the point where the two may have been lovers).

Final Thoughts & Score: As far as henchmen go, Zsasz is pretty solid conceptually. He’s established early on as a psychopathic enforcer of Roman’s gang, he has an eerie air to him, and he has a lot of elements from the comics you rarely see on Zsasz in other media, such as being blonde. Messina does a fantastic job at making the character seem like a competent killer in the employ of Roman.

But the key word is “seem,” because Zsasz frankly never lives up to his hype. Despite being introduced peeling the faces off of a family, he is just never utilized to his fullest extent. He’s kind of just there in a lot of scenes, and while he isn’t unmemorable or anything he never really does anything that makes him into a worthwhile addition to the franchise. He’s honestly just a glorified mook with a few interesting gimmicks to help set him apart.

I’ve gotta give him a 6/10. While he’s definitely a step above average, he’s really not anything amazing, mostly because the movie refuses to allow him to reach his full potential. He doesn’t have any great quotes, his most memorable scene really serves more to establish Roman than anything, and he is dumped and quickly forgotten right before the climax. He would easily be a 7 or 8 if the story treated him with a little more weight or respect, but he just ends up underwhelming despite having so much going for him, and it’s frankly a bit depressing. It’s just a very sad state of affairs for the character, especially when he managed to be more intimidating in the Arkham games despite the fact that he posed even less of a physical threat than he does here.

Well, while we’re here, let’s go over THAT Zsasz briefly.

Portrayed in the games by Danny Jacobs (who you may know as Sacha Baron Cohen's stand in on The Penguins of Madagascar. Yes, Zsasz and King Julien had the same voice actor.), Zsasz is never really a major antagonist and is, in all honesty, a pretty weak fighter; you can always take him down in one punch. The thing with Zsasz in the games, though, is that it’s always tricky to get to him, because he usually has hostages of some kind. In Arkham Asylum, he appears twice, and you need to use stealth to take him out before he kills his hostages. In City, he gets a much longer sidequest where he requires you to pick up ringing telephones and then glide to another one across the city within a time limit. Once you’ve listened to all of his messages, Batman finds out where his lair is, sneaks through it, and whoops his ass.

I certainly can’t say he’s the best villain in either game he appears in, but he’s definitely scary. His messages and game over screens are really freaky and unnerving, and the Riddler even requires you to find some of Zsasz’s work as parts of riddles… and by “work” I am of course referring to corpses posed in life-like positions. There’s also the horrifying little tidbit that in City, Zsasz actually does kill one of his hostages and there’s nothing that can be done about it; if you switch to detective mode in his lair, you can see a corpse at the bottom of the water in the room.

I think how creepy and intense he is really helps make him stand out among the more colorful characters in those games like Joker, Clayface, and Riddler, so I think giving him a nice 8/10 for his appearances is well-earned. I feel like Birds of Prey could have learned a few lessons from this portrayal; if they wanted to make him more creepy than physically intimidating, that could have worked well and it would have made his anti-climactic defeat a bit more plausible. Instead, they kind of tried this middle ground where he’s creepy enough and intimidating enough physically that it just feels like a letdown when he’s offed.

Oh yeah, did you know he appeared in Batman Begins? He had a brief cameo and didn’t do anything significant and looked like this:

Pretty sure he’d get a low score if he wasn’t just a quick little reference.

[hqgodspeed]

a few days after valentine’s day, basteon gather’s the demigods together in the banquet hall, his demeanor seems different than normal, as if the tension between his shoulders is becoming less and less—maybe he’s beginning to believe in the demigods, in their capability to combat the evils of this world. 

he clears his throat, arms crossed over his wide chest. “sons of olympus, the time has come to discuss the next trial. we’ve lost one worthy son and gained another. now it’s time to increase those numbers.”

his gaze lingers over each demigod until he stares blankly ahead. “if you believe that you’re ready, step forward and plead your case. let your words sway your companions into action.”

he leaves, then, and demigods begin to stand, one by one, trying to bolster their friends with their words. 

𝐖𝐎𝐋𝐅𝐑𝐀𝐌

There’s a silence when the attention turns to the son of Zeus, a careful, stoic expression on his face. In his hand is a heavy, cloth-wrapped object, a symbol. “We’re here again, ready to throw ourselves back in the fire.” He starts, glancing around at the faces of his fellow demigods. “I’ve seen you all survive the flames, emerge stronger, beaten, but better.”

“I’ve faced my own trials too, personal and around the world, both wins and losses.” He pulls the cloth off, revealing the half of Zeus’ shield. “I found this in Greece, and I take it as a sign, one that I have to complete what I’ve started.” He stands tall, back straight. “I’m ready to prove myself.”

𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐎

"it has to be me. i think, there's no roundabout, bullshit way of saying it. i've been here the longest, with ari and tristan, and it's time i show you guys what i've learned and the drive i have to do this. i've lost a lot of friends on the way here, and all those times i always thought i should be going faster. i need help. i need my dad's shoes or whatever, because that's going to be the thing to make sure i actually save the next person. so no one dies on my watch again. i'm ready."

𝐃𝐀𝐈𝐓𝐇

Daith stood up and cleared his throat as he looked at his fellow demigods. "I have to admit that I wasn't expecting to propose myself for a trial... I honestly planned to wait until the last possible moment because... It would suck a lot if it turns out I'm incapable of it, and I used to think my mother would be so dissapointed that she'd call the next son on line and put me out of my misery" he said, chuckling for a second before his expression turned more serious. "But... things changed. People changed. We lost people... but we also gained them..." he said, smiling at the others briefly, his hand wrapping around the Necklace of Sacrifice, that he never took off now. "I know I'm not the strongest demigod of the bunch. And Ari will be mad at me, but I also have to admit I'm not the best. I panic. I'm selfish. I'm impulsive. I get easily distracted by cute guys..." he said, smirking, as a lot of his current sources of distraction were present. "But I'm also one of the demigods that had stayed the longest here at camp. I used both my fighting and my abilities to survive. But, most of all, I had the support of all of you. And, if the trials and quests had shown us something is that if we don't face challenges united, we will all fall. So I'm willing to put aside my own fails and shortcomings and battle to be recognized as the worthy son of Aphrodite". He then took a deep breath and looked down, to find Mr. Candle waving another flag with his face, which made him laugh. "I understand if you decide to choose another demigod but... know that I'm ready to do this. And that I believe we can do this together. My mother started wars. But she also joined nations under her cult. Love unites us. And, if we are together... Love can conquer all. Thank you all". Mr. Candle waved the flag excitedly before jumping on Daith's lap, clapping and looking at everyone so they would clap too. Or else.

𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐄𝐑

"So here's the thing," Asher begins, and instantly he felt like he was going through a stint of Deja vu. "A lot has changed since we voted on our last trial. Mostly, we know that there are forces outside of Eris that are coming for us. Forces with powers none of us really know the limits of. I think from a necessity base, we need my artifact that can combat what they can do. I am the son of Time, my father's powers are a trump card, they have to be. If we can secure that, our possibilities are endless." He looked at each of the other demigods, trying to look them each in the eye, "I'm confident that I'm ready to rock my trial. Not only have I been through our latest one, I have assisted in taking down plenty of enemies, and that's just me at half strength. Imagine what I'm capable of once I have my father's gift? Plus. I mean, my father's trial is in the Palace of Westmincer. It beats the hell out of trekking through some enchanted palace. Make the smart move, and give yourself and the rest of us the power of time to get this right. Vote Jones."

𝐑𝐀𝐆𝐍𝐎𝐑

"attention, losers," ragnor leapt on the stage and faced the others, a flourish to his movements.

perhaps it wasn’t the wisest to begin a speech with such a term—but he hoped it was as endearing as he’d meant it to be. ragnor’s heartbeats were rampant within his chest, but the smile that cut through his face was bright, rehearsed. he needed to be the bronze-haired hero for them today, someone martyr-boned and trustworthy. it was a performance but a seamless one that came with much ease.

perhaps a part of ragnor truly believed he was a hero.

he began, and for once his words poured out raw; no sugar-coat, no honey.

“i am not going to stir idle conversation about how i am the perfect candidate; i am not.” that, he believed. that, he knew. “but,” ragnor’s gaze swept over every face. “i am not the fuckin’ mess from a few months ago, either. no more drunken shenanigans, no more rookie mistakes. these past few quests and the trial have been exhaustin’, but i’ve saved some of your asses with my dancing skills—helped freed kit’s mother from her corruption—held my own against some of those dark aether dip-shits with ari and keaton.” he steeled his jaw then. “what i am saying is, i am strong enough to take on my father dionysus's trial now, i am ready to face his frenzy." he was also ready to confront whatever curse that laid dormant within him; to let his father's madness cut it from the root. "the anklet may not be that remarkable of an artifact but some of you have seen, first hand how powerful a well-timed dance can be in battle.” he let his smirk unfurl then and made a graceful, theatrical bow to signal the end of his speech.

before ragnor left the stage, however, he added: “also, it's in fuckin' vegas, c'mon.”

𝐓𝐔𝐂𝐊𝐄𝐑

"second verse, same as the first, am i right guys???? haha but seriously, vote tucker rhee! not only will i put my, like, proverbial pedal to the metal, but i promise that i won't let anyone die without a proper seance. also, cali is like a really great vacation spot and stuff, so i'll be able to take everyone out to expensive dinners and we can, like, go to a yoga retreat or something. cheers!!! xoxo!!!"

𝐈𝐆𝐆𝐘

"look," iggy starts, shrugging, "i know i'm newer than most of you that spoke up already, but just because we're new doesn't mean we're not as important." he pointedly looks at everyone, but lingers on the veterans. "you can look down on us all you want, but we're never going to prove ourselves unless you let us." he grins, cocky and sure of himself. "let me be the first to show you all that we newcomers are just as worthy as the rest of you."

𝐊𝐈𝐓

there's a new sense of confidence that swells in the pit of his stomach. before, there was hesitation to his words, in his being. but too many things have happened since talk of the last trial, his eyes have been opened, his focus recentered. "i'm still not the strongest among us." he starts, looking around at each of the demigods gathered. "but i'm relentless." his fingers rest against the table top of their dining tables, closing his eyes for a moment. "i was relentless in trying to figure out where my mother was, so much so that i nearly killed myself trying to find answers. relentless in setting souls to rest after they were forcefully taken from this world. relentless in my pursuit of knowledge." he pauses, eyes lingering over each and every demigod, making eye contact for a moment before looking to the next.

"i found where my mother was, followed the clues that lead ten of us to samothrace. together, we figured out where my mother was, discovered what eris had turned her into—what she might have turned all our parents into." his expression changes, eyes almost flickering dark as he remembers the embryo, the multi-headed abberation that his mother had become when he let her out of her confinement. "and together, we freed her from that corruption, i was willing to die if it meant that she be restored and i almost did—my magic kept me alive and i destroyed the foulness of whatever was corrupting her heart with the magic that runs in my veins. when we got back here, ari and i restored her back to her rightful home down in the crypts and we felt something—power—that was being restored back to olympus, protective magics." his expression softens now, a smile playing upon his lips as he remembers the tremor, that feeling of power that radiated from ancient runes he could barely understand.

his eyes close as he remembers the feeling of her arms around him, the warmth, that same feeling of belonging he's always longed to feel. "she told me she loved me." his voice quiets down to an almost whisper. "she hugged me and told me she was proud of me." his eyes open, the softness of his expression mirroring the look on his face. "and she told me something else, something that this trial—my trial—is the next step in doing."

he takes a deep breath, a sigh parting his lips. "she told me that when i ascend, we'd be together forever. she believes in me." he looks out now, his expression gentle, but a fire lingers beneath the surface of his eyes, one that burns with determination. "and i hope that the rest of you will, too. i'm ready. i was willing to die in order to help the cause, but now i'm willing to survive and fight until we get our parents back and defeat this darkness once and for all."

he takes a seat, eyes still looking out at each of the demigods until his gaze rests on ragnor, a smile on his face as the nerves begin to settle in. 

[fairyroses]

How Do I Make Gifs? - A Photoshop CC Giffing Tutorial 

(for @elektrawwf, and anyone else interested in how I make gifs I guess, lol) 

So, I feel like I should preface this by saying that I'm certainly no expert on this, nor am I a Professional Giffer™, but I’ve been making gifs for a few years now, and have developed a pretty standard system for doing so. Hopefully it works for you like it’s worked for me! :) 

Basic Tutorial Steps:

Step 1 - Recording the scene you want to gif

Step 2 - Importing, deleting, and cropping your gif frames

Step 3 - Adding adjustment layers

Step 4 - Resizing your gif and setting the frame delay

Step 5 - Converting and sharpening your gif

Step 6 - Trimming and saving your gif

BONUS STEP - Adding text (OPTIONAL)

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Programs Used/Needed:

- QuickTime Player

- Photoshop CC 2018

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The finished gif that I’ll be making:

This tutorial is VERY screenshot-heavy, so the rest of it will be below the cut. Happy giffing!

STEP 1 - Recording the scene you want to gif.

All gifs start as videos. I use the Screen Recording feature on QuickTime Player to create videos of whatever scenes I want to gif. If you have a Mac, you can find QuickTime in the Applications folder:

Right click, then select New Screen Recording. 

You can then play the scene you want to gif on your computer, and your screen with the video on it will be recorded. Hit the stop button when you want to end the recording, and then save the video. 

It’s best to not record more than a minute or two at a time - basically, just record the exact scene that you’re looking for - because the longer the video is, the harder it’ll be to select the portion of it that you need for giffing.

You can technically screen-record any type of video, but I (and most giffers) vastly prefer videos that are 1080p, which is the best kind of HD. That’s why I usually don’t gif things unless I can find them either on Netflix, Youtube (in HD) or the CW site (or NBC, CBS, whatever). There are definitely other (less legal) ways to get your hands on HD videos, but I’m just not super comfortable using those lol.

That being said, 720p videos are usually okay for smaller (268px-wide) gifs - they’re just less ideal (I wouldn’t really recommend using them to make 540px-wide gifs, but you can still technically do it).

STEP 2 - Importing, deleting, and cropping your gif frames.

Now that you have your video, you have to import it into Photoshop. Once you open Photoshop, you need to go to File > Import, then select Video Frames to Layers.

A window will pop up, where you can set the amount of frames that you want Photoshop to import, and select the exact section of the video that you want to import. Here are my settings:

The two little toggles below the video are meant to be dragged around, and you use them to section out the specific Range of the video that you want to turn into a gif. Once you have all of this set up to your liking, hit OK. 

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NOTE: The selection of Limit To Every 4 Frames is more my personal preference than anything else. If you want Really Smooth Gifs, then you can uncheck that box and simply import every single frame in your Selected Range. This is what High Quality Giffers always say to do. Unfortunately, while those gifs do end up really smooth, they also end up being really short, which I don’t particularly like. 

So basically, I’m personally willing to sacrifice some smoothness in favor of an increased gif length, but you do NOT have to do that if you don’t want to. Choose whichever option you like best - these Steps work no matter which one you do. (We’ll come back to this later though, once we get to setting the frame delay in Step 4). 

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Okay, back to the tutorial. 

Once the scene is imported, you can delete any extraneous frames at the beginning and end of the frame animation Timeline, which can be found at the bottom of the screen.

As you can see, I have the first 6 frames selected. Those are the ones I ended up deleting (among some others at the end of the Timeline).

You can also go to the Layers panel on the right, and delete the corresponding layers from there, once you’ve deleted the frames. This isn’t technically necessary, but it might help free up some computing space if you’re deleting a lot of frames. 

Next, you need to click the Selection Tool in the top left corner of the screen. Then, set your selection preferences (circled below) as follows:

Style: Fixed Ratio

Width: 540

Height: 250

This is specifically the ratio to set for a 540 x 250px sized gif, which are the dimensions of the example gif I’m making. If you want to place two gifs beside each other in a gifset, each gif needs to be 268px wide. (The heights can be whatever you want them to be.) 

Use the Selection Tool to select the area that you want to be your gif, and then go to Image > Crop. 

STEP 3 - Adding adjustment layers.

Now it’s time to make your gif look pretty™. For this part, you’ll be using the Adjustments panel above the Layers panel. 

Adjustments will affect all the layers below it, so you want to make sure that your adjustment layers are placed above all of your gif layers. 

These are the adjustment layers that I used for this specific gif, but they’re also just generally the same three adjustments that I use for every gif I make. (I also usually add a Hue/Saturation adjustment to my gifs, which I set to +15 Saturation, but since this scene was already so heavily saturated, it didn’t need it.)

Here are the specifications for the Brightness/Contrast and Levels adjustment layers:

Regarding the Curves adjustment layer (pictured below), if you click on the RGB dropdown menu, you can single out specific colors in order to color-correct the gif, which I did here (by removing a lot of extra reds and yellows).

While these are good general adjustment examples, just take note that the values pictured here won’t be exactly the same for every gif, and you need to toggle and play around with them to make every new gif look its best.

Here’s the example scene before any adjustments:

And here’s the scene after my adjustments:

STEP 4 - Resizing your gif and setting the frame delay.

To resize your gif, go to Image > Image Size, and then change the gif’s width (in this example, I change the gif’s width to 540px). 

As long as Resample is checked the you’re working with Pixels, the gif should resize properly. Hit OK.

Next, to change the Frame Delay of the gif (basically how fast it goes), look for this button in the right corner of your Timeline, then click it and Select All Frames.

Once all the frames are selected, you can hit one of the little downward arrows next to the 0.02 values, and select Other.

Now you can set your new frame delay. I always set my delay to 0.09 seconds, which produces gifs that are a bit slower than the Professional Gif Standard™. This is due to a combination of personal preference (I just like slower gifs) and an effort to maintain as much smoothness as possible, given how I choose to import my frames. 

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NOTE: Remember the NOTE from Step 2? Now, if you chose to import every frame, rather than “Every 4 Frames” like I do, then you should set your frame delay to 0.04. 

Doing so will produce a final gif that looks like this: 

Notice how this gif is smoother and faster, but also shorter than my example gif? Yeah. Like I said, whichever style of gif you choose to make is up to your own preference. 

STEP 5 - Converting and sharpening your gif.

You never quite realize how blurry a gif really is until you Sharpen it. To do this, you first need to convert your Timeline from a Frame Animation to a solid Timeline. You can do this by making sure all your frames are still selected, and then clicking the Convert to Timeline button in the bottom left corner of the Timeline.

Now your Timeline should look purple, like it does in the picture below. 

Next, you need to select all of your layers (MINUS the adjustment layers) on the right side of the screen. Once all of your layers are selected, go to Filter > Convert for Smart Filters.

Once your gif layers have been compressed into a Smart Object (see circle below), you can select Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen. 

The first time you select Smart Sharpen, you need to set all the parameters for it. But once you do that the first time, you shouldn’t have to set them again. Basically, make sure your window looks exactly like this one:

Then hit OK. 

You’re going to do this TWICE (so you’re going to end up with TWO Smart Sharpen layers below your Smart Object layer). Then, you need to click the button to the right of the top Smart Sharpen layer, and change the opacity of that layer to 30%. (Otherwise, your gif will be way over-sharpened.) 

STEP 6 - Trimming and saving your gif.

You’re almost done! It’s time to save your gif. 

To save a gif, you must go to File > Export > Save For Web (Legacy). 

However, this gif has a problem.

This number in the bottom left corner of the Save For Web window tells you the current size of your gif. As you can see, this gif’s size is currently 3.541 MB. That size wouldn’t be a problem if you were intending to upload this gif to Twitter, because Twitter has a gif size limit of 5 MB. 

Tumblr, however, only has a size limit of 3 MB. So, to get your gif to work on tumblr, you need to Trim it.

Trimming is the process of changing the length of a gif without actually deleting any part of it permanently. This gives you the freedom to edit your gif and pick the portion of it that you like best. 

You can easily trim your gif in the Timeline, by clicking the dragging the Gray Sliders at each end of it (see the arrows below). Wherever you leave the stoppers will become the new beginning and end of the gif. You can make this process more precise by using the Blue Slider (circled below) to choose where you want your stopper to go before you drag it there. 

The Timeline pictured here has already been trimmed. 

Trimming your gif will often require some trial and error. Whenever you want to check the length of your gif, simply go to Save For Web again and check the amount of MBs in your gif. (Click Cancel if your gif is still too big.)

Once your gif falls below 3 MB, you can finally save it!

The last thing you need to do before saving is change your Looping Options from Once to Forever in the bottom right corner of the window. Then, click Save.

You now officially have a finished gif! 

Mine looks like this: 

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BONUS STEP - Adding text  (OPTIONAL)

Now, I’ve just shown you how to make and save a gif. But what if you want to add text to that gif? I’ll show yow how to do that too.

First off, you should only add text after the rest of your gif is completely done and ready to be saved (basically, once you’ve already completed Steps 1-5). Then, before you save it, you can click on the Text button on the left side of the screen. 

Click on the gif to create a new Text layer, and then type whatever you want. Generally, dialogue captions are placed in the middle of a gif towards the bottom, while other, more artistic types of Text can go wherever you want. 

Now that you have a Text layer, you want to make sure of a few things. First, make sure that your Text layer is your TOP layer on the right side of the screen, above all of the Adjustment layers. 

Next, you want to make sure that your Text layer spans your entire gif Timeline. Notice how my Text layer (depicted as a purple rectangle in the Timeline) doesn’t reach the Gray Slider on the left? To fix this, simply click and drag the Text layer until it extends past both Gray Sliders. 

And finally, I always add Effects to my Text. You can do this by hitting the fx button in the bottom right of your screen. Specifically, I use the Stroke and Drop Shadow effects to make my gif stand out from whatever background it happens to be on. 

My Stroke is always set to 1px thick, and my Drop Shadow settings are as follows:

As a final note, if you want your text to look exactly like mine, then you need to use the font Myriad Pro in size 14, which I then italicize and bold. You can also open Window > Characters, and make sure that your preferences look like this: 

ALRIGHT. Now that you’ve added your extra text, you can FINALLY go to Step 6 and save your gif. 

Now, your finished gif should look like this:

I hope this tutorial was helpful! I tried to be as thorough as possible to avoid any confusion, but if you have any additional questions, you should always feel free to ask me! 

Have fun giffing!! :)  

[aphrodicted]

Hi. I’d like to request a shell spread and will happily leave as much feedback as possible. Initials: GC, sun sign: Leo, question: I have a lot of confidence internally but I let some insecurities play over that, particularly in work settings. For example, I know that I am smart and hard working and yet I let insecurities shadow that and look for reassurance externally even when I don’t actually need it. What parts of me do I need to work on or change to get past this and let my confidence flow?

Hi, GC!

1. Who I think I am? Four of Pentacles (reversed), Four of Wands (reversed), Knight of Wands

You don’t describe yourself as a person at all happy today. I think this situation is making you something unhappy, since you can’t shine everything you should shine. Don’t worry, GC, this is a temporary situation that has a solution. I see you, also, celebrating very little with friends or family. Are you going out less with your friends or other people? I see you locked in yourself on some occasions. You aren’t too secluded, but neither do you lock yourself for too long.

Being a fire sign, you can be someone very impulsive and doesn’t plan what you want to do. You are someone passionate, although at the moment I don’t see so much passion in you, and you must have confidence in you. Especially, Leo you are people with a lot of perspective for the future if you are able to balance the ego. Balance those fears that are drowning your security, GC!

2. Who I really am? Two of Cups, Three of Swords, Ten of Swords

You are someone full of love. A person who wants to receive and deliver love from others. My cards consider you someone who is easy to make friends, meet people, partner with co-workers and/or studies… Have you had any kind of betrayal in the past that has marked you? It doesn’t have to be a romantic betrayal, but it can be a betrayal or disappointment by friends, family… The cards are very aware of some pain that has marked you a lot and there may be the core of all your insecurities. If you have not suffered any disappointment, the cards may be talking about yourself. At present you may be betraying yourself by not having security in yourself or in your abilities. Lastly, don’t worry, GC. The situation is temporary and the solution is in your hands, but you must find what to do to end it. You may feel somewhat tired of living this, but the happy ending is very close.

3. How others see me? Three of Wands, Five of Swords (reversed), The Hermit (reversed)

The others see in you a lot of learning ability, your desire to always know more, and you are someone intelligent who knows how to use the acquired knowledge. Also, those around you see you as a wise person and that you can give good advice. On the other hand, those around you think that you are a person who looks to the future and that, in addition, this future of yours is successful. The others view you as someone who doesn’t like fighting with others and doesn’t play dirty when yo want to get something.

4. What I contribute to others? The Tower, Five of Pentacles (reversed)

You are able to deliver success and recovery to others. I don’t know if you’re aware, but you can “heal” people. I don’t feel it is in an emotional way, but a social success or helping them achieve what they want. You are someone who creates opportunities for others. Getting to know you means new beginnings. You are someone who brings change or renewal in others. You “force” them to renew themselves and leave the past behind to make way for the future.

5. What should I accept about myself? The Star, The Chariot

Accept the moment you are living in this moment. I find you very insecure, unstable and you don’t see possible recovery to your situation. You may be believing that your life has stagnated and you don’t know how to get out of the moment you are. The first thing you should do is accept what you are living and not block the pain or insecurity you feel. It isn’t the same to accept and seek a solution to negative feelings or emotions that block them and make it appear that we don’t feel them. It will be useless to try to change if the inner transformation you must do is not sincere. 

Check what motivates you to do what you are doing right now: Are you happy? What you do makes you really happy? Would you change something of your life? It’s necessary to accept that everything changes, be filled with courage and patience and be guided by the signs of the universe. The instability that manifests you leads to fatigue, depression and stagnation. With which you cannot free yourself from fears and dependencies, nor achieve true realization. Therefore, you must accept instability and look for the solution to it.

6. What do I need to forgive myself? The Desire (reversed), Knight of Cups, The Emperor (reversed)

Don’t force yourself in those moments where you cannot become a leader or take the initiative. On some occasions we must respect our insecurities and look deeper into what motivates us to find ourselves in this situation. If you ask me what is causing this feeling in you, I think it’s a mixture between lack of leadership and self-confidence caused by the lack of passion in what you do. You must find a balance between logic and emotions. What do I mean? This problem cannot be solved only from logic, but you will need the use of emotions to accept the negativity around you and put an end to it. Don’t take this situation personally, but learn from what is happening. Therefore, forgive yourself for finding yourself so “weak” right now, and don’t be too hard on yourself.

7. What should I learn from the past? Nine of Wands

You must learn to heal the wounds of the past, GC. You still need strength and energy to overcome the struggles that await you in the future. The conflicts of the past can continue to appear in your present, and you must be alert to be able to put an appropriate end. However, don’t be too alert. Don’t believe that everyone approaches to fight or that everything that happens to you is to hurt you. It’s important to get rid of insecurities that were born in your past. The insecurities that persecute you now have their beginning in the past. You could have gone through a difficult situation that caused these insecurities. We must find what happened and solve these insecurities and limits that you provoke yourself. It could be a situation, a person… you are the only one who can know.

The cards recommend you balance your inner energy: meditate, pray, read, seek peace and quiet to find the answers inside. You have the strength to get what you want.

8. Positive points about myself? Ace of Cups, Six of Swords, Six of Wands

My cards see several positive points about you, GC! You are a person who carries success under his arm. Everything you intend to do you get, so you shouldn’t have any kind of insecurity when it comes to life. In the end, you are the only one who can create obstacles to achieve the happiness you want. You have the success within you and you must be the one who gives you permission to return to your life. Also, my girls represent you as a person capable of sacrificing you for what you love (both people and dreams). However, be careful, GC! Sacrifice is necessary to achieve success, but don’t sacrifice yourself too much. Just sacrifice for what you think is important. Finally, my cards tell me that you are someone capable of using your emotional side correctly. That emotional side can help you connect more deeply with others and with yourself. On the other hand, my girls recommend that you use that emotional side to create art. Let the imagination fly!

9. What should I improve on myself? The Moon, The Strenght, Four of Cups (reversed)

Pay attention to your dreams and their messages, so that you know or recognize your shadow and prepare for the necessary change. Sometimes it is very difficult, if not impossible, to decipher the messages of the unconscious, because we try to do so with the logic of the conscious side of the mind and both levels speak different languages. The unconscious may seem capricious or meaningless. It is expressed in images, emotions and feelings that belong to us, even if we do not recognize.

Do a creative, psychotherapeutic or mystical work to unleash what your subconscious mind wishes to reveal. Recognize the fears, resentments or pride that stop you or set you back. You are in an intensely emotional and sensitive period. You can feel receptive. You should not force anything in this cycle. Let things happen and watch. From your inner jurisdiction you will know when to act.

More than “physical strength”, we speak of “mental strength” and is the ability you have to manifest the mastery of reason, and even of the spirit, over the passions, emotions and thoughts that limit you and consume your energy. The Force reminds us that we achieve more with gentleness and prudence than with imposition and authoritarianism. The keys are in our inner clarity, decision, perseverance and authority.

10. How to become the person I want to be? Queen of Wands, Ten of Cups, Seven of Swords

Turn the skills of the Queen of Wands into yours. Trust yourself and be true to your emotions and convictions. That doesn’t mean that you don’t listen to the opinions of others, but that you defend your experiences with conviction and know how to get the good out of everything around you and help you grow.

Find what and who makes you happy and set aside everything that causes you otherwise. Don’t waste energy in living with people who don’t contribute anything or waste your time doing things that do not cause any feeling in you. You have a very strong attraction power and you should know how to take advantage of it: use the power of the law of attraction.

11. Advice: Ocean of eternal love: Healing, creativity, fertility.

It’s said that love conquers everything, and this is especially true for you right now. Something is resolved and healed thanks to love. What was once arid now becomes fertile. A seed is planted and you are the co-creator. The conditions are favorable, the weather is perfect, a new creation awaits you. The birth of something new gives you joy and excitement. The endless changes of this season of eternity turns its invisible wheel and a new cycle begins. A new image is born.

Love heals. Love brings determination. Love conquers. Love creates. Love is eternal

Good luck, GC!

Please consider leaving feedback to know whether or not my reading has resonated with you.

[anchoredtether]

Why I think Plance and Kallura as endgames results in the best character development arcs

[THESE ARE JUST MY THOUGHTS, IF YOU DON’T LIKE ONE/BOTH OF THESE SHIPS, YA DON’T HAVE TO READ THIS]

These two ships happen to be my main ships for the fandom (and I’m quickly becoming a Hunelle diehard) and I think the reason why is because of the meaning behind these two ships and how they relate to each other.

There are some gorgeous tropes and symbolism (and overall fantastic messages) in these two relationships, even more so if both ships happen because of their impact upon each other. 

Delve into my literary rambling below the cut.

First let’s start with Lance’s obvious crush on Allura.

Lance is immediately in love with Allura, or at least the idea of her. In season 6 we learned that he eventually passed the infatuation stage (at some point) and developed genuine feelings for her. You can see this in the series as he progresses from obnoxious flirting to giving her motivational speeches and being an emotional support. 

This scene was huge. Lance’s feelings for Allura were actually addressed in season 6, and yet he treated her as a supportive friend instead of trying to take advantage or capitalize on her broken heart. Season one Lance might have done that, but not the Lance we have now.

If Lance moves on from his crush on Allura, we already know he’ll stay a supportive friend. This is huge. Most shows would approach this situation as Lance matures but he still ends up with the girl of his dreams, or even worse, Lance matures and forgets about Allura entirely (or even WORSE is Lance maturing and Allura coming to him after her breakup with Lotor because “Lance has been there for her all along” *gags* For a good discussion on why Allurance is a disservice to both Lance and Allura, read this post). I’ve seen it happen so many times, and you know what would be incredibly refreshing?

A man and a woman progressing from unrequited love to a strong, platonic, supportive relationship. 

Things get even better when you add Keith ending up with Allura.

Lance and Keith may not have a “rivalry” like Lance likes to claim, but it’s clear from episode one of season one that Lance does not like Keith. I don’t think it’s outright hatred, but for whatever reason Keith just gets under Lance’s skin, and he feels the need to always prove himself better than him. (some Garrison flashbacks may better explain why this is, but for now it’s all speculation)

Keith and Lance have both amazingly progressed into the roles they were meant to fulfill. Keith never wanted to be a leader, he was always comfortable being a loner. Lance is a showoff and wanted to get the glory and lead the team. In the end, Keith has become a strong leader and Lance has become a leader in his own right by being Keith’s right-hand man.

That character/relational development in and of itself is incredible.

But it gets even better if Keith ends up with Allura. Why? Because not only would Lance become a great friend/partner to Keith, who used to be his rival, but if Allura ends up with Keith Lance could potentially end up supporting his “rival” who is now dating his “dream girl.” Most shows take such a scenario where Lance would become incredibly jealous and vindictive, and ruin both his relationship with Keith and Allura.

How often do we see someone turn a rival and an infatuation into a brother and a platonic friend? I think that’s an amazing message.

Another fantastic development is Keith and Allura’s relationship.

Honesty time: I really did not like Allura at first. She had to grow on me before I came to like her. When she started hating Keith for NO REASON besides the fact he was Galra, I wanted someone to slap some sense into her. Luckily, Keith did.

Keith and Allura had a definitely rocky start to their relationship, even before Allura started being racist. I feel like Allura had little faith in him since Keith was reckless and a bit of an emotionally loose canon in the beginning (which you can hardly blame her, but still) and never really seemed to understand where he was coming from. 

Over time their relationship has progressed, Allura saw the fault in her line of reasoning, and Keith in turn became more patient with her. Keith and Allura’s progression shows that it’s the actions and heart of a person that defines them, not their race (and symbolically can apply this to gender, sexual orientation, appearance, etc.). 

Allura falling for Keith breaks the barriers that you can fall in love with someone who shares characteristics of those who have hurt you - that not everyone of a similar characteristic can be “lumped together,” as Keith worded it.

Not only is this an amazing message against racism, but literally every other kind of triggered perception towards people of a certain race, gender, nationality, religion, wealth, or what have you.

Alright, girl power time.

First off, Allura and Pidge are two vastly different yet fantastic role models for all girls. We have Allura, your typical “girly” girl who is gorgeous and likes sparkly things, and Pidge, your typical “tomboy” who doesn’t fall into typical feministic stereotypes and isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. Two stark contrasts, practically polar opposites for both appearance, quirks, interests, and personality.

But both our girls are strong role models in their own right. 

Allura is a leader but she still has her insecurities, she isn’t afraid to sacrifice for the team and she loves everyone dearly, she admits when she’s wrong and works hard to set things right. Pidge is ambitious, pragmatic, brilliant, and although she can have a sharp tongue at times she is basically a force to be reckoned with (which I love considering she’s a very smol human). 

At first Pidge is rather savage towards Allura. There were moments where I was thinking “well, you’re not wrong but was that really necessary?” Basically Pidge has no filter. YET, despite the tension between these two at first, Allura never becomes cold towards Pidge (like she did Keith lol). These girls are supportive and loving towards each other and that by itself is a great message because most people would say that two girls with these kinds of personalities would never get along.

And while yes, if Plance and Kallura both become a thing it would show that the two only (lead) female characters end up in relationships (instead of going the “strong independent woman who don’t need no man” route), it would show that whether you’re a girly girl or a tomboy, you can find love. Most shows would only emphasize one of these girls finding true love, while the other is left forever alone. Besides, I think everyone can agree that both Allura and Pidge are VERY MUCH the “strong independent female” trope.

They don’t necessarily need a man, none of us are questioning that. But wouldn’t it be nice to have already established strong and independent women have a man to love and who loves them back? Now THAT, would be refreshing.

Now here’s my favorite part.

Lance and Pidge ending up together covers so many beautiful tropes. With Lance’s Loverboy character you’d expect him to end up with a gorgeous woman, maybe even a girl who is a bit of an airhead. At first we all think he’ll end up with Allura one day, and now there’s speculation he’ll end up with Romelle. Because falling in love with a princess or a beautiful blonde is such a common thing for characters similar to Lance. It’s also a bit expected that Pidge will just end up with Hunk, someone else who is a total nerd. Preps and Jocks marry each other while nerds marry each other, that is just what is stereotypical and to be expected.

But what if the jock and nerd fell in love?

I think this would cover so many strong messages for both boys and girls. Lance has this terrible perception of what makes a girl desirable (at first) but we see him progress (especially in the comics) into digging a girl who is courageous and smart - two amazing qualities to focus on in a partner instead of just looks!! And considering Pidge isn’t exactly “curvy,” it could showcase how Pidge truly IS beautiful in her own way that doesn’t conform to the standard sexualization of women in society. Showing Lance, who had those kinds of societal standards, falling for someone like Pidge, who does not meet those distorted standards, would be completely out of the norm. And I love it.

I also really like the idea of the genius falling for an idiot? I know this is portrayed in the media a lot, but it’s such a good trope. Pidge could easily never pay Lance any attention and write him off as “too stupid for her,” but instead we see her trying to be patient with his limited understanding and explain things in a way he can understand. Lance in turn has progressively shown more interest in science-related things and tries to focus on the things Pidge does/says instead of just saying “I don’t get it” and ignoring her.

Lance also praises Pidge’s brains?? And not in a flirtatious way either, it’s genuine and full of respect. He knows Pidge is the smartest one on the team and he acknowledges her for it. Coming from the “idiot” of the team, that is incredible. You would expect Lance to get frustrated with Pidge being so smart or try to play her down (like the bully calling her out as a nerd) but he doesn’t. Lance does not fall into the toxic trope of men wanting to be smarter than women and becoming frustrated when they’re proven wrong. Instead Lance knows Pidge is smarter than her and is humbly proud of it.

The writers have also said that Lance will end up not with the person he wants, but the person he needs. And I think this covers the trope of marry your best friend. Yes, Lance and Allura are close friends now, but who was he best friends with since episode one? Pidge. Who was someone that was always under his radar but has always been there? Pidge. Who is someone he gets along with so naturally he doesn’t even have to try? Pidge.

Dude, the guy didn’t even know she was a girl till she revealed it.

I also think it’s amazing that Lance has never shown any romantic interest in Pidge (yet). And I think that’s a great message because the best relationships are built on friendship. We know that Lance’s relationship with Pidge isn’t based off of any kind of romantic desire or lust, but instead the simple genuine concern and love one has for a friend. I personally think Lance does have romantic feelings for Pidge, he just hasn’t realized it yet (because Pidge is her best friend, not a crush to flirt after - and that’s currently what he thinks love is).

Likewise, if Pidge falls for Lance it tells the message that people can change. Lance was kind of a terrible, shallow person in the beginning, I ain’t gonna sugarcoat it. Because of this, it would be easy to have Pidge never fall for a guy like him. But Lance has changed (arguably he’s had the most drastic change of all the characters) and you’ve seen it in how Pidge treats him with greater respect now. Especially in the comics, she takes his points into consideration and doesn’t make fun of him (too much). 

His character development is what makes Pidge attracted to him, and change for the better is always attractive. (although part of me thinks she was physically attracted to him at first since she always got annoyed with him flirting and whatnot lol)

Ok I’m rambling too much so I’m going to stop here.

Basically Lance and Pidge getting together, Keith and Allura getting together with Lance being supportive of Keith and Allura, and Pidge and Allura forming a stronger friendship - I’m here for that amazing combination and the messages it gives. It breaks stereotypes and tells a fantastic story and gives all the characters the development and growth they deserve.

[enouragement-blog]

If you have anxiety, read this

I’ve had anxiety as long as I can remember. I remember being in my early 20′s and not being able to leave my room except to very quickly go to the bathroom and come back. I remember being a little kid and not being able to go to sleep because my tummy hurt, but not knowing why. If you struggle with anxiety, I’m sorry. Few people will ever truly understand you. It’ll feel like you have to walk this path alone most of the time. It sucks.

In a  few weeks I will be driving from New Mexico to Minnesota. This will be extremely uncomfortable. I’m not doing it because I want to, because I don’t, and I’m not doing it for money, because I’m not getting paid and I wouldn’t want to anyways. I’m doing it because I have to fight, I can’t give up, I want to move forward, and I can’t let my anxiety win.

But our culture makes things worse. It’s in the air, and we breathe it, and don’t even realize that we’re breathing it. Our culture is weak, and it’s making us weak. 

- Everyone wants people to feel sorry for them, but nobody wants to deal with their problem. Everyone wants people to know how they feel, but they don’t want to do anything to change it. They don’t want to try harder, or fight, or improve, they just want what feels good. But the things that really matter in life cost us. And honestly, life could be summarized as a constant exchange of comfort. How much of your comfort are you willing to sacrifice for the greater good/the good of others/you’re long term happiness? Or we can try to hold onto comfort that instantly gratifies us and yields nothing - it’s our choice. I don’t have to drive to Minnesota, I could just choose to not help my friend. I could even come up with an elaborate excuse as to how I can’t go. I could spend the time in the comfort of my home playing video games. But what would be accomplished? There can be no great victory without great risk.

-We’re taught to get our voices heard, but not to listen. If you want others to be there for you, you better be there for others. Sure, some will take advantage of you - be smart! - but others won’t.

-We’re taught to get rid of “toxic” people, rather than helping others. We’ve all been a toxic person before. We’ve learned to “divorce” (metaphorically speaking) people who irritate us. It’s as though you cannot be friends with anyone who isn’t just like you. We are divided by politics and many other things. We’re taught to give up on people and to quit: we quit our marriages, we quit on friends and family... We don’t fight FOR anything anymore, we just fight or (surprisingly worse) we just roll over and die. We continue a pointless and directionless life full of vices that give temporary comfort and long-term dissatisfaction just so that we don’t have to deal with the uncomfortable irritants in our lives.

We want to live life the easy way. We want everything handed to us. As good as welfare is, we’ve learned something bad from it: getting something for nothing. We don’t know how to adapt and how to thrive unless things go our way. We want to always be right without judging our thinking critically. And then we switch between extremes of becoming prideful or self-loathing, never judging our thinking correctly.

-We’ve become addicted. Addicted to technology and video games, to wasting our lives with a meaningless existence of (attempted) pure pleasure. Addicted to things that don’t satisfy. Addicted to screens and false reality. Addicted to drugs, alcohol, and being right. And we all want to be right, but without actually learning, challenging, and changing. We don’t know how to live in the moment and enjoy the small things. Everything has to be big and showy for us to enjoy it. 

- We are taught to complain about everything. We complain nonstop about Trump, for instance, when we have no idea of who he really is or if he’s doing any good because we don’t listen or look for the good things. But then we want people to give us a break, but then we don’t want to give anyone else a break. We believe whatever people tell us so long as it agrees with our bias, but if it requires us to reanalyze the information, we are unwilling. I’ll give specific examples of statements that will probably piss you off, if you are like the majority of people: Trump is a good president, Homosexuality is wrong, not all religious experiences are equal. Rather than having a discussion someone who says such things, most people instantly get mad and try to prove it wrong. Just look at facebook: nonstop whining and fighting. 

-We are taught to be afraid of everything. Just watch the news and you’ll see it: the list of things to be afraid of, which includes, but is not limited to: global warming, death, disease, war, politicians... Of course those things exist, but we don’t need to be afraid all the time. NOR do we always know the cause of these things. For instance, global warming has not been proven to be connected with humanity, but yet everyone believes that SINCE global warming is real, then that MUST MEAN it’s caused entirely by people (watch the people who instantly search online for an article to “prove” that it’s caused by people just so you can argue with me, a person you don’t know).

- We’re taught that our lives are all about us and to watch out for number one, and then when we’re lonely, we substitute the human interaction and conflict THAT IS NECESSARY FOR OUR GROWTH with more consumerism. Even if we could trust our feelings and thoughts, we can’t trust them when we have anxiety - our mind makes stuff up and our heart just goes along with it. 

-We’re taught that we don’t have to change and it’s everyone else’s responsibility to accept us as we are. We’re taught that it’s ok to gossip about other people, but then are surprised when people are talking about us. We expect perfection from others, but we want everyone to cut us a break. It’s often heard: if you aren’t there in the sun, don’t bother being there in the rain, but it’s unrealistic to hold others to the standard of perfection, and it’s a lonely and pointless existence that refuses to forgive and move on. Obviously you shouldn’t trust someone who is untrustworthy, but neither should you abandon someone who made a mistake. Everyone else needs to change if we don’t like them, but when it comes to us, they have to just work around us. And because of the rise of artificial relationships (facebook, phone conversations, tv, driving, and other things that put a barrier between face-to-face interaction), nobody has any real friends, nor are they willing to be real friends, yet they want the results of having true friendships. But a friend isn’t someone who caters to you, tells you what you want to hear, and doesn’t challenge you. True friendship is only accomplished by going through the rough times together and being real with one another. But when we refuse to change, grow up, mature, and be better, we also refuse to enter into the vulnerability of friendship. In all of this, YOLO is the mantra, as if living foolishly is a wise investments of only having one life.

- We’re taught that we follow our own arrow and we decide our own standard, but that’s not true regardless of whether there is a God or not. If I’m a psycopath, should I follow my own arrow and murder people? If I’m a pedophile, should I follow my own arrow and molest children? And it’s all a cop-out. We try and convince ourselves that morality is an artificial construct, but we know it’s not. And because we have chosen to be amoral, we lose out on life and happiness, and cause our anxiety to get worse (Spoiler alert, the way you live does influence your anxiety). Usually, psychologists and counselors are making it worse. They use self-empowerment or eastern religion or drugs, and then state their own personal beliefs like it’s fact, like how we are supposedly born as empty vessels, and then even though they are proven wrong time and time again by their naturalistic humanism, we are unwilling to stop listening to their bull crap because we want to be lied to. After all, we NEED their drugs to fight our anxiety, right? What does it matter if we live without the concept of God, so long as we can make ourselves feel better with self-centered living that doesn’t fix the situation? And we’ve lived so long with out battles that we forget that it can get better. Why would they want us to get better, since it’s so convenient for them if we’re not?

And it’s all making it worse. The first step to making some ground with anxiety is to not believe the stupid narrative that the culture tries to sell us. Things won’t make us happy, we don’t put our faith in people because they will always let us down, we forgive people, and we fight. Who cares if people don’t understand you? Stop rolling around on the ground crying about your struggles, get up, and do something about it. Maybe you’ll never get over it, but neither do you have to live like you are living.

That’s easier said than done. Maybe you aren’t there yet. But the point is that you TRY. You TRY to fight, to keep going on, to not give up. And when all else fails, you TRY. So you’ll fail, you’ll fall; get back up and try. If you don’t feel like it? You cowboy up and do it anyways. Do the things that you’re afraid to. Make new friends. Get out of your house. Or you’ll get to the end of your life having accomplished nothing and die alone. Our culture teaches us apathy, selfishness, and laziness, but that will never help you change the struggle with anxiety. Why the hell should your feelings stop you from living?

You can’t do it alone, and you can’t do it without making the decision to fight.

WARNING: some people are not very good people, and they don’t want to change. You should definitely stay away from those people. But be careful of labeling someone as “toxic” simply because they don’t agree with you on everything. 

[wolfliving]

Stacey switches Amazon Alexa for Google

*What a brave woman!  Everyone should benefit from her sacrifice.

Life in a Google Home and what it says about the smart home

By Stacey Higginbotham

In mid-December, my family went cold turkey on Alexa in both our kitchen and living room. Alexa still reigns in the bedrooms, but we removed the Echo Show to try out life with a Google Home, as we had been growing increasingly frustrated with Alexa's inability to answer our dinnertime questions. The results of the Google Home experiment, however, have been even more frustrating.

Google is awesome at answering weird questions. And it does a better job than the Echo Show of "hearing" us when we make requests from across the room. But it has become the bane of my existence because it is glitchy as all get-out. For example, when I say, "Hey Google, turn on television," sometimes it can turn on the TV. And sometimes it can't.

When it can't, it reports back with, "Sorry something went wrong. When you're ready, give it another try." If instead, I say, "Hey Google, ask Harmony to turn on the television," it will often work. But why will one command work only part of the time? I have no idea. This seemingly random ability to work also extends to other connected devices in my home.

When I decided to go all in on the Google Home in our main living area, I unlinked all of my linked accounts and relinked them to give the system a fresh start. Yet, just a week into the experiment, Google stopped being able to reach my Lutron lights. One day they worked, and the next day Google was telling me that it had trouble reaching the "Lutron Caseta RA2 system."

After hoping this would fix itself (yes, I know, but that's what normal people would do), I went back into the app and unlinked the account and relinked it again. Now it works. But for how long? And why did it stop in the first place? Ugh.

So integrations need work. Or maybe they just need regular attention. In the meantime, there are two other areas where Google Home has let me down. One is around voice recognition. Google wants users to train the Assistant on the use of their voice. So when I ask for my calendar, the Home shows mine; but when my husband asks, it shows his. This is a really cool feature. If I suggest that Google call Mom and it recognizes my voice, it calls my mom. If my husband does the same thing, it uses his contacts to call his mom.

That's magical — when it works. But it doesn't always work. Apparently, Google doesn't like my voice, because roughly 30% of the time it won't recognize me. If I take a particular tone with Google I can be recognized more often, but sometimes that doesn't work, either. And that means that I don't have permission to do certain things around my home, such as turn on the television. Google lets you train the Assistant as many times as you want, and I have done so countless times, but it still presents a hurdle.

Yes, I could turn the voice permission feature off, but getting my calendar when I ask for it sure is handy, so I keep trying. And that leads me to the second problem. We have a 12-year-old child. Which means that with voice permissions turned on, she's also incapable of doing a variety of things around the home.

The catch is she doesn't have her own smartphone, which she needs to train her voice and control the Google Home. To get around that, we used a Gmail address I created for her and let her sign in using an app on a spare iPhone. Another way to do it would be to download the Google Family Link app and create a Google account and permitting for specific devices. But if I went this route, only certain permissions and apps would be available to her. Additionally, at the age of 13, when the law in the U.S. deems her no longer a child (in 8 months), the permissions I set would go away.

Given her age and my trust in her judgment, the best way to go was to set her up as a third adult member of the household. Which means that — just like my husband — she got an invite to train her voice and control the Google Home. As one of my Twitter followers pointed out, those permissions are also a pain to set up.  

There are a few other niggling issues that frustrate me with the Google Assistant set-up, such as the inability to put one device into multiple rooms and the fact that when I put several devices in a room and then ask Google to turn on Kitchen, everything in the kitchen turns on when I really just wanted to the overhead lights. Ironically, naming each device for the room it's in works well for the Amazon Alexa ecosystem but is frustrating for the Google Home.

But I promised to tell you what Google's challenges here say about the smart home. Anyone who gets deep into this space begins to recognize that smart homes are still stupid, requiring the user to program the devices or command them via voice. The smart home, despite five years or more of effort, is still not intuitive. We are starting to see what we need to make it intuitive though.

To make a home intuitive, digital assistants need to understand who people are in the home because those people have different needs and requests. They may also have different rights, such as a parent's right to turn a thermostat up while a kid might be told to "put on a sweater."  An assistant also needs to understand where people are in the home. So far, some devices have presence sensors, and facial recognition to offer this, but digital assistants aren't yet taking advantage of it.

For example, a few days ago on a whim, I asked the Google Home if it had seen Anna on the Nest Hello doorbell this morning. I didn't think it would work, and it didn't, but it's an example of information that requires both the context of where a person is and who they are. The Nest Doorbell can actually show me this in the app, but it can't yet offer the information verbally through Google Home.

Finally, these devices have to be much easier to program. They should do a better job of helping people understand how to name a device and why they should place it in a room. If you look at the two leading companies in this space, Google, and Amazon, it's clear the things Google has decided to tackle are very different than the problems Amazon has tried to tackle.

Amazon is working hard to make it easy to set up a smart home using your voice. It makes it easy to control devices and bring them onto your network and even allows you to build really complex routines if you know what you want and you're to invest time in programming them. It's also trying out Hunches, which will offer a suggestion if you make a request that is normally paired with another request or action that Amazon deems obvious. For example, if you tell Alexa Goodnight and it runs the command but also sees another light on, it might suggest you turn that other light off.

Hunches are still rolling out, so we'll have to see if they are a gateway to the intuitive home, or merely an annoyance.

Other than a pretty easy-to-bypass security code, Amazon doesn't provide much in the way of barriers to controlling the device from a permissions and identity perspective. You can train Alexa to recognize your voice, but it only uses that recognition for message playback and calling. On business accounts, you can restrict calendar access by voice, but on home accounts, my husband can ask to see Stacey's calendar and get it.

Google cares more about the identity of people in the home and is clearly envisioning far more complicated interactions. Unfortunately, as it tries to showcase those use cases — such as the ability to call the right mom depending on who is asking — it has let some important usability elements slide. As such, it's really hard to set up a Google Home device and quickly experience any of its benefits. The barrier to entry is higher. You do get access to some cool features once you've breached that barrier, but you're also limited in scope by fewer apps and glitches that make commanding a smart home a challenge.

I suspect that for many people the Google Home Hub, the JBL Google display, and the Lenovo Google Smart Displays may be fancy picture frames that let people ask questions, play music, and see shared Google albums. Meanwhile, Amazon is letting Alexa run away with the smart home and a digital assistant that provides a lot of assistance when it comes to taking basic tasks and making them hands-free.

It's a shame because I see where Google is trying to turn its devices into assistants that can do a lot more than pre-heat your oven or turn off your upstairs lights. It wants them to notify you if your commute will be longer or help you spend less time on your phone by scheduling meetings and reminders with your voice. It wants to make an intuitive home. But while Amazon is trying to address the difficulty of setting up and programming these devices, Google is tackling user identity and rights. Both may get us to the intuitive smart home, but Amazon's approach definitely feels more user-friendly.

[continuouscalamity]

CHAPTER 1 TRIAL TRANSCRIPT

Ding! Dong! Ding!

"Alright, ya filthy worms-- it's trial time! Quit yer teen drama and blubberin' and head down to the first floor in the foyer! Oink, I'll go from there, ya hear!? Oink!"

TRIAL 1 - BEGINNING

[Trial chart done by Mod War]

[3:18 PM] Monoboar!: As you all crowd into the elevator and the doors shut behind you, the noise of the elevator slowly descending down rings in your ears, the low, ominous hum of everything moving around you.

The more you descend, the more it dawns on you-- someone had truly died... someone who was a beacon of light, a light that someone had taken upon them to snuff out.

While you're scared, you can guess what could happen now... in this deadly class trial...!

....

The elevator finally stops to it's destination, revealing a large trial room, with stands all in a circle. One stand in particular only dons a portrait of the late Akihiko Oshiro, a grim reminder of what you're all here for. [3:19 PM] Monoboar!: @Alive (You may have walk to their stands.) [3:20 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: ...Lake reluctantly let go of Hazel and Wilma's hands, looking at them both with a slightly tense expression. [3:21 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "This is all mighty theatrical," Wilma says, with barely hidden disgust in her voice. She squeezes Lake's hand and lets go, walking to her own stand and examining it as if it was going to come to life and eat her. [3:21 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn takes a shuddering breath as her eyes land on Akihiko's portrait. This was horrible. She walks around and finds a stand with her name on it, and silently and falls to a crouch at it, curled up in a ball. [3:21 PM] Willy | DDR King: Willy steps out and looks around the place whilst going to his stand. [3:21 PM] Riku Yasui...: Riku exited the elevator then quickly made his way to his stand. [3:21 PM] Eri [around]: Eri looks around the trial room before walking over to her stand. [3:21 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis cringes at the portrait, Akihko deserved much better than this. She scowled, a foul mood setting in anew as she took her stand. [3:21 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel walked in, arms wrapped carefully around himself. He stepped up to his stand and took a deep breath. [3:21 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...What the fuck are we doing here again?"

@Monoboar (Mars) [3:21 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace steps up to his stand like it's the most natural thing in the world. He surveys everyone around him as if it's actually a throne. [3:21 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana stomps over to her stand and grips it tightly. "Okay," she begins, voice shaking ever so slightly. "whoever did this needs to tell me NOW so I can banish you from my kingdom forever and ever and EVER!" she yells. [3:22 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Except he's next to Artemis. Which he isn't all that happy about. [3:22 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: Rayne walks to their stand. Hello [3:22 PM] Monoboar!: "Woah, woah!" Monoboar cuts in, appearing on a tall throne. "Lemme introduce the trial, you impatient worms!" [3:22 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "SHUT UP! YOU SMELL LIKE A BARN! I HATE YOU!" [3:22 PM] Monoboar!: "Eh? Like that's an insult?" [3:22 PM] Monoboar!: "Anyways!" [3:22 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: She heads to her stand. "What's all this?" [3:23 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Lake groaned. [3:23 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie heads to his stand and avoids looking at Akihiro's portrait. I would too. [3:23 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue at her stand. [3:23 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Yeah! It is! You look dumb and stupid! I hate you!" [3:23 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis gives Wallace a death glare. This is awful. [3:23 PM] Monoboar!: "All this is th' trial room! You gotta have a class trial to find out who did the dirty deed! Usin' the clues you found after th' crime, you gotta discuss it all here! 'Course, there's some certain limits-- jus' make sure you ain't talkin' over each other!" [3:24 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Oh hi she's right across from Wallace. She gives him a look. :( [3:25 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Why do we have to figure it out? You started this, you figure it out!" [3:25 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: At least he was next to the One person he's really talked to. That's something. [3:25 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Also, retcon. Lake's still holding Hazel's hand. [3:25 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana's quiet for a minute, just frowning at the ground. [3:25 PM] Monoboar!: "Enough gab! Let's get this show on th' road!"

Slamming a gavel onto the arm of his chair, he officially declares the trial open for business.

"Let the trial for Akihiko Oshiro, Ultimate Lucky Student start!"

[GIF LINK]

[Sketch done by Mod Death, Finalization done by Mod War]

[3:26 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...That didn't answer my question!" [3:27 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana hated what he just said. She hated hearing Aki's name come out of his mouth. She hated that THEY had to solve all this, and she hated that SHE had to witness it! "Just be quiet, stupid hog! Smelly pig! Just be quiet!" [3:27 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "S-So..." Hazel started, looking around at everyone. "...where should we start...?" [3:28 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: 'Ugh, not listening to it probably won't help, as much as I don't want to play detective when it should be left to professionals...' [3:29 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Um..." Lake coughed, "Don't they usually, um... talk about the... the body first in crime shows? Or what?" [3:29 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "That sounds smart, Lady of the Lake." Hazel nods. [3:30 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana looks at Hazel sadly. [3:30 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: :cluebullet: "The victim received one stab wound to his lower back, and four to the chest," Wallace recited. "As far as I can tell, those were the only wounds." [3:31 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "God..." Lake covered her mouth as she attempted to fight against the rock in her throat. [3:31 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn winces. "T-Too much," she mumbles. "... One was enough..." She glares at the stand in front of her, feeling sick just hearing about it. [3:31 PM] Willy | DDR King: { "Like a slasher movie more than a detective show if you ask me..." } [3:31 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel sniffles, trembling. [3:31 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: { "D-Don't even get me fucking started...!" } [3:31 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma frowns.

"I assume the one to the back was received while th' victim was...trying to escape." She says slowly. "Then the others to. Finish the job." [3:32 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: { "You all make me wanna tear out my hair!" } [3:32 PM] Riku Yasui...: :cluebullet: "His eyes were also red and puffy, as if he had been crying.  There was also a distinct bloody handprint over his mouth." [3:32 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Heavy breathing! [3:32 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma's frown morphs into a glare.

"Someone tried to stop 'im from calling for help." [3:32 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana whined, covering her mouth. She didn't have anything to say. [3:32 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel covers her mouth. [3:32 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace nods. :consentbullet: "I agree with Wilma. He received the stab to the back before the other wounds." [3:33 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Shut uuup...please..." [3:33 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "H-How did you figure that out?" [3:33 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie shakes his head, somehow surprised at how they could stomach that.

:cluebullet: "He wrote somethin' out from his blood, a dying message, most likely. But I can't remember what it said.." [3:34 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana looked like she was in mortal anguish. [3:34 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: :consentbullet: "Yeah, I-I think it, um... kind of looked like a letter?" [3:34 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "I remember." Wilma concurs. ":consentbullet: It was a V-shape, but it was kind of messed up. I don't know if that was the letter he was tryin' for." [3:35 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn furrows her brows. "Like, maybe... M-Maybe a W, or... Or a Y? Or.. S-Something?" [3:35 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "M-Maybe it was supposed to be someone's name?" [3:36 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "No one here has a name starting with V, right...? Wait, was Oshiro-kun even familiar with the English alphabet?" [3:36 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel feels like people are going a little off the rails a bit.. [3:36 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Fuck. [3:37 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "Wh- what else.. Is there?" Aderyn asks carefully. "Wha-- um, the," she takes a breath. "D-Do we have... um.. a mm-- murder. A murder weapon...?" [3:37 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis winced, crossing her arms. "I think I found it- [3:37 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel really wished he had actually investigated. [3:38 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel looks at Artemis. "Hm...?" [3:38 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: :cluebullet: "There’s a knife that's a little fucky in the knife block in the kitchen. It was also a little wet." [3:38 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana gripped the stand, frowning. [3:39 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn looks at her. "A... l-little, little fuh-fucky...?" [3:39 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Someone probably washed it before quickly putting it back?" [3:39 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: {"Uuuu..."} [3:39 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: :consentbullet: "It wasn't positioned correctly." [3:39 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "What Pickle said." [3:40 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: {"Haha, don't call me that."} [3:40 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Oh, uh, by the way, before it's, like, too late to bring it up, I had a thought about the 'V' Oshiro-kun wrote..." [3:40 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "We're all fine... Lake..." [3:40 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "...but continue!" [3:41 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: {"I wanna go home already! I hate this stupid place!} [3:42 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: { "I feel you there, Minami-sama... Really do." } [3:42 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Just thought that maybe, instead of it actually being the English letter V, maybe it was meant to be like an arrow pointing at something?" [3:43 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "Like, what?" [3:43 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Lake-chan! You're so smart!" [3:43 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel squints. [3:44 PM] Willy | DDR King: "Was there something else on the balcony even?" [3:44 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: The crime scene clue has not been brought up! [3:44 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: "It also might have been a different letter. One that he started to write, but didn't finish-- or failed to write, because he was dying. Like an A, a W, or a Y." Wallace crosses his arms. "Was this 'v' actually pointing towards anything in particular?" [3:45 PM] Riku Yasui...: :cluebullet: "The balcony still looks relevantly the same from the last time I seen it despite the body," [3:46 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Maybe it was pointing at something  that wasn't on the balcony...? Might be a stretch, though..." [3:46 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "Is that all, Sir Riku?" Hazel asks. [3:47 PM] Riku Yasui...: :cluebullet: "Well the blood surrounding Aki himself is smudged, as if he had been squirming, but on his left side it seems like the blood had been pooling around something, or someone," Riku added. [3:47 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: {"Urgggh...I feel sick..."} [3:47 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "A-Ah...?" Hazel nearly bites at her nails nervously. "It had to be the killer.. of course..." [3:47 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: {"Aderyn winces. Squirming. "He... must've... s-suffered," she mumbles."} [3:48 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: { Sob. } [3:48 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: {"There's no point in thinking about those things now. He is at peace.} [3:48 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: :consentbullet: "Shit! I remember seeing something that could be related to that!" [3:49 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: What Keiko said only made Hana's heart ache more. She just wanted to get out of this stupid trial already! Dumb place! Stupid people! Arggghhh! [3:51 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: :cluebullet: "There were some footprints from the stairs, it disappears at the foyer but it looks like it was going toward the kitchen." [3:51 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: :consentbullet: "Yeah, Hayai-kun. They looked like they were from bare feet, right?" [3:51 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: :consentbullet: "Yes, there was also a trail of blood drops leading to the kitchen as well. [3:52 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: :consentbullet: "Yeah. That's fucking gross also, why barefoot, but anyways." [3:52 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Wait, why would someone be walking around with bare feet?!" [3:52 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "B-Barefoot?" Hazel asks. "Ew..." [3:52 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn crosses her arms. "Smart enough to-- to take their stupid, stupid shoes off, to be, silent, I guess," she says. "Dumb, too d-dumb to fuh-fucking clean up," [3:53 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Wait, maybe to, uh... Not really have identifiable footprints, too. Since, like, shoe soles." [3:53 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: "Perhaps the killer wanted to hide their footprints by going barefoot. If their shoes were to have a distinctive tread, it would be a clear giveaway." [3:53 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn nods to Lake. That too.. That's smart... [3:53 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "...okay that's fair..." Hazel taps at her chin... [3:53 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: :cluebullet: "Bishop-san is right. The sink where the knife was found had vague red stains on it, as if someone had failed to fully wash them away." [3:54 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: {"Stupid-- Stupid, stu-- stupid culprit,"} [3:54 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: 'Heh, I said it first, prep Johnny Test!' [3:56 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "This wasn't much well planned, was it?" Wilma comments. "How'd the killer get Akihiko up to the balcony anyways? Just ask 'im?" [3:56 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: :consentbullet: "P-Perhaps..." She agreed with Wilma. "H-He's kind, and trusting..." [3:56 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: :consentbullet: "P-Probably," Aderyn mumbles. "He was.. really, friendly," [3:57 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: { "Good thing I didn't wash the berries..." } [3:57 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "We have to take the motive into consideration as well. Why would whoever did it want to kill Oshiro-san? Did they...did they have the gift given to them by Monoboar-san? Or perhaps they were trying to protect whoever has it..." she says nervously.

[3:57 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma pulls the brim of her hat down to hide the growing anger in her eyes. To take advantage of someone that kindly... [3:57 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: "So someone fucking led him there to kill him?" [3:57 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel is shaking, covering her mouth to prevent herself from breaking down. [3:57 PM] Eri [around]: "Actually... I have a theory about the motive" [3:57 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "What is it, Eri-san?" [3:58 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Wait." [3:58 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Eri. Fore you say anything." [3:58 PM] Eri [around]: Eri waits. [3:58 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma looks up at Monoboar. "You said whoever got the gift'd die if they revealed they had it. Someone's dead, now. Does that mean that rule is done for?" @Monoboar (Mars) [3:59 PM] Monoboar!: Monoboar lifts his head.

"Eh? Oh, oink, yea yea, whoever got the ticket can reveal 'emselves!"

@Wilma Ortega (Auz) [4:00 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma takes a small red ticket out of her pocket. [4:00 PM] Eri [around]: "Right, does that mean I can-" Eri deadpans. [4:00 PM] Riku Yasui...: Riku takes out a red ticket [4:00 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "Then I must come forward...I had the tick--" she cuts herself off as Wilma takes out her ticket. [4:00 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: "....Me got one...?" They slowly pull a red ticket out of their pocket. [4:00 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: "...I've suspected that everyone got one from the start." [4:00 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel slowly took out his ticket. [4:00 PM] Eri [around]: "Yeah, I thought everyone got one" [4:00 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel also takes out a ticket, looking troubled. [4:00 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn watches as people start taking out tickets. "... What?" She whispers. She sounds... horrified. [4:00 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Ugh, that's a weight off my--" Lake was taking out her ticket before she noticed everyone else. [4:00 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie takes out a red ticket, feeling sick at the realization. [4:01 PM] Eri [around]: Eri takes out her ticket. [4:01 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "W-what..."

"All of us...had tickets."

[4:01 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis took out a ticket. [4:01 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...You fucking BITCH!!" Lake threw her ticket at the ground before grinding it under her heal. [4:01 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "W...What...!?" Hazel hisses, horrified at this reveal. "Then...!" [4:01 PM] Riku Yasui...: "The pig tricks us," [4:01 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "We were fucking baited." [4:02 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: "Obviously. Why place a motive that will only affect one person? The rule about not telling anyone was clearly established to prevent us from figuring it out." Wallace looks smug. [4:02 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn leans over, gripping her stand. "It-- It, ww, it, it wa, it," she takes several deep breaths. [4:02 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "YOU'RE FUCKING SICK!! SICK!!!" Lake shouted at Monoboar. [4:02 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "Wow, like it's something to be happy about, you dumb prick..." Hazel hisses bitterly at Wallace. [4:02 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko regains her composure. "Calm down, everyone. Yes, we were tricked by Monoboar-san, but losing our heads won't help Oshiro-san. We still have to figure out who did this." [4:02 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue takes out her ticket. [4:02 PM] Monoboar!: "Oink! Tha's how th' cookie crumbles, ain't it!?"

@Lake Kawaguchi (Florence) [4:03 PM] Eri [around]: "You aren't the only one who figured it out" Eri crumples up the ticket and tosses it at Wallace. [4:03 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "I had a feelin' bout this." Wilma says, sighing. "Thought it was suspicious that we couldn't say we had the 'gift.' It'd make it easier to murder if one of us was singled out. But none of us telling it...each of us thinking we'd be the only one to die..."

She looks at Monoboar, and if looks could kill, that pig would be roast.

"The perfect me vs. them situation." [4:03 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel looked down at the floor, close to tears. He let his ticket fall out of his hand. [4:03 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Gh...!!" Lake listened to Keiko and shook her head, trying to shake off the anger. [4:03 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: "Yes. It's gratifying to know that the one behind this isn't able to outsmart every last one of us. Maybe some of us will actually pass this test." [4:03 PM] Riku Yasui...: "People will start to take your motives less serious is you pull things like this pig," [4:03 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "...kay." [4:03 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Shut up Walleye." Wilma says automatically. She's referencing the fish. [4:04 PM] Eri [around]: {"What test you jackass"} [4:04 PM] Monoboar!: "Gwahahaha, this is only the beginning, anyways!"

@Riku Yasui (Alondra) [4:04 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Shut the fuck up, Asshat! This isn't the time to be making insensitive jokes like that!" [4:04 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Shut the fuck up!" [4:04 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: {"Callaghan-san, I think all of us are a little shaken right now. I'll be happy to discuss this at length with you if you wish later, but such comments may prove to be inflamatory in our current situation--" she interrupts herself as everyone else tells him to shut up, "Ah, my point is proven."} [4:05 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I thought, I thought--" She's shaking. "But-- Even-- Even, even, if, if, it had been, just, just one-- It still, affected- everyone. Everyone, because, because--" She gasps. "Even, even if you don't have it-- you don't, know who, so, that's, you don't, know who will snap, you don't, but-- But-- we all-- we--" She's hyperventilating. "What-- What about the pu-punishment?! Was that-- Was that a fuh-fucking lie too? Were you-- Were you, really-- really gonna k-kill, kill us, if, if we didn't--" @Monoboar (Mars) [4:05 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "I think he was." [4:05 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace drags a hand down his face. "Am I the only one actually capable of focusing here? What happened to the presentation of evidence? Surely someone else here has something to contribute?" [4:06 PM] Monoboar!: "Heheh, I dunno! Was I? Sure is a mystery now that'cha know ya had a ticket like everyone else!" Monoboar snorts. "But it would'a been more fun if I did kill alla ya!"

@Aderyn Bishop (Beq) [4:06 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "UGH!!!!!!!!!" [4:06 PM] Eri [around]: Eri stops herself from saying something. [4:06 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel kicks her trial stand angrily. [4:07 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "Fie! cometh ov'r hither and englut mine own coxcomb, thee distemperate fooleth, thee hog!!!!" [4:07 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Hazel-san, you're my friend, but could you say that in a way I can understand, please? [4:07 PM] Eri [around]: "Please fight him" [4:08 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: "I've never learned how to hear." [4:08 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Eri-san, don't encourage it right now!!" [4:08 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "Questioneth not mine own speech patterns, i'm very fell even but now!!!!" She angrily crumples the ticket and throws it at Wallace. [4:08 PM] Eri [around]: "Please fight him later" [4:09 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Walleye, yer not helping the situation any. Please refrain from treatin' the rest of us like idjits." [4:09 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...ANYWAY! If we all had a ticket, how can we narrow down our list of suspects?" [4:09 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel huffs and turns around, crossing her arms. She's giving herself time to relax. [4:10 PM] Eri [around]: "That makes it super difficult, who would likely to cave in out of fear?" [4:10 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn has her hands at her head, pulling on her hair as she takes deep breathes. [4:10 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: {"Callaghan-san...should I repeat myself? Please refrain from purposefuly instigating our classmates.} [4:10 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana had a ticket. She crumpled it and threw it at the ground as hard as she could, and as it was paper, it floated down softly. That only made her more pissed off, so she started stomping on it. [4:10 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma looks around the room, observing everyone.

"Whoever killed 'im...now knows they were tricked. They can't be too happy right now." [4:10 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "I mean, whoever did it probably washed their feet and changed their clothes by now, right?" [4:11 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: {"I merely asked who else had evidence. If that qualifies as instigating, then I believe I am not the one with the problem."} [4:11 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "Did- d-did he-- If-- the b-boar was, was lying-- did..." Aderyn swallows, looking up with teary eyes. "Did... did he die for nothing..?" [4:11 PM] Eri [around]: "I would hope so, who just shows up wearing bloody clothes" [4:11 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: "Whoever did it must've thought that it would've been okay to trade lives for one, or all of us." [4:11 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "I must say I am quite relieved to know all of us had tickets. I thought someone had murdered Oshiro-san for my sake, for a second..." [4:12 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue exhales, taking this all in. "... Hmph..." [4:12 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel turns around and slams her fists on her podium. "E-Either way, Akihiko would've been k-killed for nothing!!! The murderer is a villain, cruel and horrible! There's no use in killing, never!" [4:13 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "I'm not about to forgive whoever took Oshiro-kun away from us, either, Hazel-san, but don't forget the one here we should be the most pissed at..."

She gave a look to the swine in the throne. [4:14 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: :consentbullet: "I agree wholeheartedly with you, Hazeldine-san. Whoever committed such a horrid crime should step forward and admit to their guilt." [4:14 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn whimpers. "Can't-- You can't-- c-can't fuh-fuh-forgive them, you can't-- you can't," she's crying. "Killer is a stupid-- stupid, fuh-fuh-fucking, lowlife-- fucking FREAK, c-can't, fucking forgive, forgive--" [4:14 PM] Eri [around]: "Yeah, no one would outright admit to a murder" Eri looked over at Keiko. [4:14 PM] Monoboar!: Monoboar only leans back in his throne, entertained. [4:14 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis makes a bit of a face. [4:14 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel frowns, looking at Aderyn. [4:15 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Can't the kuh-" she didn't want to say it. "killer...just reveal themselves already? Everyone already hates you, so just, like, ugh! I hate both you and the smelly pig! Tell me who you are now so I can stomp your face in like I just crushed this stupid, dumb, idiot...ticket..." she was only repeating herself at this point. [4:15 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: {Keiko gives Artemis a Look ™ . :unamused: } [4:15 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Much as I agree with y'all, this ain't helping none." Wilma speaks up. "This ain't gonna encourage no one to step forward and admit it. I don't think nothing could convince someone to admit to this."

"Let's review the evidence one more time. There ain't nothing we forgot to look at, is there?" [4:15 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "We- we can't, c-can't f-figure it out, we, we looked over all the- the clues, there's, nn, there's nothing else..!" Aderyn pulls at her hair. [4:16 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: {"Don't look at me."} [4:16 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Maybe we could look at the V shape again?" [4:16 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana draped herself over her stand, rocking restlessly. [4:16 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "...w-well..." Hazel wrings her hands. "Recall the file info... it says he died at 2am last night, did he not?" She says. "Who'd be up so late...?" [4:17 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: She ignores Artemis' words.

:consentbullet:  "I believe we have looked over all of the evidence...but yes, as Kawaguchi-san has stated, I was about to suggest we go over the 'V' shape once more." [4:17 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel goes silent. [4:17 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Um, well...uh..." she thought. "like, I don't wanna accuse anyone. But, like, who here stays up late?" [4:18 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "I've made sleeping early a habit, but that's probably not gonna help anything." [4:18 PM] Eri [around]: Eri raises her hand slowly. "Insomnia" [4:18 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: "I go to bed at a decent time!" Qiuyue states. "I never deviate from it, no matter what!" [4:18 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I'm s-s-ure, sure, many, many of us, do," Aderyn says quickly. [4:18 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel shifted. "I haven't gotten a lot of sleep since i've been here" [4:18 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana looks at Eri. "Then, well...it must be you or something! You look like you'd commit a murder!" [4:18 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "Se--See!" Aderyn points at Eri quickly after her admission of insomnia. Addy that's rude. [4:19 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "If we think he was tryin' to write out his killer's name...well the V was smudged near the middle. I'm thinking it was either a W or an M."

Wilma spent too long thinking about this and ignored the staying up late convo. [4:19 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "I can provide a copy of my written out schedule if you wish. I don't stay up that late, and even if I did, some areas are forbidden that late at night, and I would not break such a rule." [4:19 PM] Eri [around]: Eri looks over at Hana. [4:19 PM] Eri [around]: Glares. [4:19 PM] Eri [around]: "No" [4:19 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana's just staring at Eri with wide, angry eyes. "Gimmie proof!" [4:19 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I-- I also! I also, think, think it was a W, I mean, it w-wouldn't be, wouldn't be r-right side up, if, it were, an M," Aderyn says. [4:20 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: :consentbullet: "Smudged near the middle, Lady Wilma... if it's smudged, could it maybe be the letter A instead of a W or an M?" [4:20 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: :consentbullet: "I agree with Hazeldine-san...it seems more likely that the letter was an A." [4:20 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Ugh! This talk of when we go to sleep isn't gonna help us, guys!" [4:20 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Let's get back to the V shape thing!" [4:20 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "A? Okay, well, um...Aeri? Ari? Close enough!" [4:20 PM] Eri [around]: Eri just sighs and ignores Hana. [4:20 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "...Huh." Wilma didn't think of that. "Yeah, could be an A, too. Didn't consider that, Miss Basil." [4:20 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "A... An, A," Aderyn repeats, looking pale. After a few moments, she side-eyes Artemis very slowly. [4:21 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana drapes herself over her stand again. [4:21 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko side-eyes Artemis as well. This looks is more of a "please tell everyone how it couldn't have been you" kind of look, though.

"Black-san?" [4:21 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: { Wallace is absolutely fuming right now. } [4:22 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "It wasn't fucking me. If I'd crack under a death threat I wouldn't even have my talent." [4:22 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Or Miss Add-er-in, though I hate to put you in the spotlight." Wilma adds. [4:22 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel looks at Artemis and Aderyn. [4:22 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie quickly glances over at Aderyn. [4:22 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana looks at Aderyn, too. "It better not be you, Aderyn-chan, cause I trusted you I think!" [4:22 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "...Lady Artemis... has a point... she's more strong willed when it comes to... death..." [4:22 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn squeaks. "W-W-- Well, Well, m-m-maybe, maybe, maybe it wasn't a fuh-fucking A at all!" She snaps. [4:23 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel jumps. [4:23 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Aderyn-san, you're not helping your case!" [4:23 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Addy, calm down." [4:23 PM] Riku Yasui...: "Profanity," [4:23 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Aderyn-chan, impolite..." she mumbles. [4:23 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: { "We've been swearing this whole trial, Yasui-kun." } [4:24 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I'm j-just-- just fucking, fucking saying!" She says. "You c-can't, c-can't accuse, accuse, me, when, when it still c-coulda been, been a W, or, or something!" She defends. "I mean, it-- It wasn't even right-side up!" [4:24 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace sighs. "It likely was, when you take into account the perspective of someone lying down and trying to write on a surface behind them. It would be right-side up from his perspective." [4:24 PM] Eri [around]: "From the victims view it was" [4:24 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "..."

[4:24 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel bites her lip, staring worriedly at Aderyn. [4:25 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma stares at Aderyn, her whole demeanor shifting. She looks like a predator that's just spotted it's prey.

"Miss Aderyn. You didn't show up to the body 'nouncement, not at first. Was it cause you didn't wanna see the body, or 'cause you didn't wanna be reminded...?" [4:25 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Ohh my fucking God, Aderyn-san. Don't you say it. Don't you fucking say it." [4:25 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana hides her face in her arms, groaning, half out of anger, half out of fear. [4:25 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "W-Well..!" Aderyn glances around. "Maybe, Maybe-- Maybe it was a fucking-- fucking M!" She tries instead. "Stop! Stop, I didn't I didn't fuh-fucking do it, I didn't-- I'm not--!" Tears are welling up in her eyes again as her eyes flicker about nervously. She takes a step back, looking terrified out of her mind. [4:26 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Gimmie more proof! I-I'll give you another chance if you do...! You're acting weird! Really weird!" [4:26 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "Aderyn-san, for your sake and ours, please just take some deep fucking breaths." [4:26 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: He tilts his head a bit. "Breathe for a sec. Calm down, get your words out. Be careful with what you say." [4:27 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "You called the killer a, um, I believe the exact word was, 'a fuckin' freak.' Do you..." Wilma is staring real hard at Aderyn. "Do you hate yourself that much?" [4:28 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I'm fucking-- Fuh-fucking scared!" She shouts back. "Y-You-- You would be too if p-people were, were fucking ac-accusing, accusing, yyy-- you!" She points a shaking finger at Hana. "I don't-- I don't wanna fucking die!"

She flickers over to Wilma. "I don't-- I don't, b-because, I didn't-- I--" She's openly crying now. "I didn't-- He-- I..."

Aderyn looks down. [4:28 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: "He..?" [4:28 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "..." [4:28 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel is trembling, biting into her lip hard enough to bleed. [4:28 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Addy...." [4:28 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Tell us the truth, Aderyn. You can still make this better. Not right, but better." [4:29 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana's hands are sweating, so she just zoned out as hard as possible, a dazed and angry expression stuck on her face. [4:29 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "Bishop-san? Please listen to Ortega-san..." Keiko looks...solemn. This sucks. I hate it. [4:30 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn's shoulders are shaking, and you can hear her sniffling and hiccupping, and she reaches up to wipe away her tears. "I didn't-- I d-didn't--" She hiccups.

"I just--- I didn't, ww-wanna die," she admits. "I thought-- I thought, I was-- I didn't--... I'm, sorry," Aderyn hiccups again, collapsing at her stand. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry-- I-- I'm," she trails off into wet mumbles. [4:30 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel is gripping her stand, glaring at Aderyn hard enough to blow her onto her back.

"Y-You... y-you admit it...? You truly admit it, then...?!" [4:31 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace's gaze is fixed on Anderyn. He jumps on her hesitation like a predator on prey. "Is that a confession?" [4:31 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "..."

Lake gave Aderyn one of her hardest glares since she first woke up here before she stepped down from her stand and walked over to the other's [4:31 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "......."

[4:32 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: In contrast, Wilma relaxes a bit, but it's more out of exhaustion than any form of relief. It's as good as a confession.

"None of us wanna die, Miss Aderyn. Akihiko didn't." [4:32 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: She pulled her head up. "I hate you!" she shouted. "If you're...you're seriously admitting to this, then, I hate you!" she said, but her lip was quivering. [4:32 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel wasn't glaring. He just looked.. sad. He didn't want anyone else to die. [4:32 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel feels the tears well up again, and she sniffles, shoulder shaking as hides her eyes again, silently weeping. [4:32 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Once she was close enough to her Lake took a step forward towards Aderyn before she-- [4:33 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: "I know," Aderyn chokes. "I know, I know, I know-- He kept-- He-- He said-- Don't leave me alone-- I was just, I was-- I couldn't-- I couldn't leave-- I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry Akihiko, I'm sorry," [4:33 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: ...wrapped her shaking arms around her. [4:33 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "Bishop-san...you are lying. Did someone threaten you so you'd say this? You can tell us." [4:33 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "I don't even care how long I knew Aki-chan, he was like, like..." she slammed her hands onto the thing. "AAAAGH! DON'T TELL ME THAT! SHUT UP! SHUT UP RIGHT NOW!" [4:33 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "SHUT UP!!! I-I DON'T WANNA HEAR IT...! I DON'T... I DON'T WANT TO IMAGINE IT..." [4:34 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "Miss Pond, yer mighty kind, but she could still be dangerous." Wilma says, hand on her holster. [4:34 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn just sobs harder, reluctantly leaning into Lake's embrace. "Stop-- stop, I don't I don't-- you can't-- c-can't, can't fuh-fucking," she sobs. "I'm j-just a hor-horrible, fuh-fucking, mmm, murder-- I killed-- I k-k-- I-- He didn't-- I'm sorry--" [4:34 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie didn't seem to be listening, staring off into the distance. He idly plays with the bands on his fingers, thinking about something else. [4:34 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Shut up, Woody. She's not gonna do shit again." [4:35 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...I know, and I'm not doing this out of kindness."

'...Maybe I am. I can't tell right now.' [4:35 PM] Monoboar!: "...Gyeheheh, so we've reached our climax, huh?" Monoboar snorts in amusement. [4:35 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Aderyn-san," Lake spoke sternly. [4:35 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Fuck you too, pig!" [4:35 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "All he wanted was friends...! I was too mean to him! So...I'm going to be mean to you instead 'cause you ruined that for him! He j-just...! Ugh!" she flicked her head towards Monoboar. "SHUT UP, STUPID HOG! SHUT UUUP!" [4:35 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn tries to curl in on herself further. [4:36 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko keep her frown for a moment longer before...she just starts crying. "Bishop-san..." and to think she'd let that happen. If only she had done more, she could've stopped Aderyn from killing, and Akhiko would be alive...

[4:36 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "A-All he... uuu.. If only... I-If only I told him how good of a friend he w-was..." [4:36 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "It's a bit too late for 'sorry,' Miss Aderyn." Wilma says gently. "Don't curl up on yerself now. Stand up and own it, and maybe then you can 'pologize." [4:37 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: She shakes her head. "Do- Don't, d-deserve, don't deserve, to," she says. "Can this, please-- p-please, just... end," she begs, her voice cracking. [4:38 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Aderyn!" she dropped the -chan. It's too cute and sweet. "Yeah, stand up and own it! You killed him! You...he's gone! HE'S GONE!" she yelled, tears spilling from her eyes. She wiped them away as fast as she could, face pink. [4:38 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Fuck. Artemis scowled, looking to the pig. "You're fucking sick! I swear to god, first chance I get I'm gonna make you fucking pay from the shit you put us all through! I'm gonna fucking kill you and your fucking puppeT master!" [4:40 PM] Monoboar!: "Gyahahaha, so I guess it's time, dont'cha think?" Monoboar says without a care in the world, and slams his... hoof? Boars are weird. On the arm of his throne, and a screen flickers onto everyone's trial stands.

A selection of all the students' faces blink on your screen with the words VOTE! in red lettering taunt you.

"I know I'm sick, so what? Get t' votin' you filthy maggots!"

@Alive [4:41 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "I think we're way past what you do and don't deserve, Miss Aderyn." Wilma is looking at her, expression carefully blank.

"Stand up and look us in the eyes. You owe it to Akihiko. To all of us." [4:41 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma votes for Aderyn. [4:41 PM] Eri [around]: Eri looks over at the screen and votes for Aderyn. [4:41 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie snaps out of it. Hi. He votes for Aderyn. [4:41 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel looked down at his stand, voting for Aderyn with shaky hands. [4:41 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: Rayne votes for Aderyn. Im sorry. [4:41 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana stared at it for a while. She stared at Aki's face on the screen, a red x-mark crudely placed over it. She glances up at Aderyn, votes quietly, and then she puts her hand back at her side. [4:41 PM] Riku Yasui...: With a slight hesitation, Riku voted for Aderyn. [4:42 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel glares at the screen through her blurry, tearful vision, and taps to vote for Aderyn shakily. [4:42 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn pulls herself to her feet at Wilmas words, but she doesn't look at anyone. She can't.

She votes for herself. [4:42 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: "What.. exactly will the voting do." [4:42 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace votes for Aderyn. [4:42 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "I dunno, probably, like, gets her out of here or something. Hopefully in jail." [4:42 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko can barely see their faces. She's crying dawg :(

"We can't....executing someone isn't right! Even if they murdered someone else!" [4:43 PM] Monoboar!: "Yer votin' to send Aderyn off, obviously." [4:43 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Yep! To jail!" [4:43 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn tenses up. What? [4:43 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis scowled, hands shaking. She punched in a vote for herself, it was hard to vote for Aderyn, she knew the rules, she couldn't do that do her. [4:43 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "Did you all forget the fucking rules?" [4:44 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace's face twists into a disgusted frown. Was he the only one who paid any attention around here? [4:44 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko composes herself as best as she can. "It's...stated in the rules. That we must vote for the execution of the blackened." [4:44 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "...Execution?" Hana squeaked. [4:44 PM] Monoboar!: "Gyahaha, thanks fer doin' my job, blabber mouth!" [4:44 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: "The ones that say we all die if we don't choose correctly? Nah, I think we all remember 'em pretty well." Wilma stares back at Artemis, challenging her to continue this bullshit. "You think any of us wanna do this?" [4:45 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: "Does that mean she's actually gonna...die? Did I just vote for someone to die?" [4:45 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel whimpers. [4:45 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Lake gave Monoboar a glare before she turned her focus back on Aderyn.

"...I can't forgive you for what you did," Lake tried to keep her voice as level as she could, "But... But..."

'But... What? It's not your fault? It kind of is, but it's also Monoboar's fault. It's gonna be okay? I don't really want to say that to someone who killed Oshiro-kun, but...

Lake kept her offer for an embrace open as she gave Hazel a look. Vote for Aderyn for her?

@Aderyn Bishop (Beq) @Hazel Hazeldine (Mars) [4:45 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel won't do that. [4:46 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn looks pale, shaking at her stand, she's hardly listening. "N-no, I-- I don't-- I don't wanna die, please--" She whispers, wrapping her arms around herself. [4:46 PM] Monoboar!: "You say that, but'cha still kill someone anyways? Eh, kids are always selfish these days, Oink!" [4:46 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana didn't say anything, she just looked at the ground, stuffing a hand in her heart-shaped apron pocket. [4:46 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn hunches over, guilty. [4:47 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko leaves her stand too after sorrowfully voting for Aderyn. Sorry GMs she's leaving that stand.

She approaches Aderyn, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Bishop-san..." [4:47 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma closes her eyes, sighing.

"I'm sorry, Miss Aderyn. But you knew the rules, and so do we. There ain't nothing we can do to stop that now without getting us all axed." [4:47 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: She was slow to wrap her arms around this time in case Aderyn didn't want it. @Aderyn Bishop (Beq) [4:48 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn doesn't react to either touch. She just... stands there, head down. Tears, still dripping from her face. She's... given up.

It's over. [4:48 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana didn't want to look at any of this! She hid behind her stand and put her head in her shirt. [4:48 PM] Monoboar!: "Wrap it up, fellas, we got a verdict to get to!" [4:49 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "I'm so sorry....Aderyn. I'm...please apologize to Oshiro-san, wherever you go. Maybe someday...you'll be forgiven for what you did." she doesn't know what to say, but she can't send Aderyn to her death without saying anything. Why do they have to kill at all? [4:50 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue votes Aderyn. [4:52 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...I..." 'What do I say? Should I just make it quick?' "I hope it goes by fast, Aderyn-san."

'...Dark, but okay.'

With that and a lingering touch on the shoulder, Lake ran over to her stand, and reluctantly voted for Aderyn. [4:53 PM] Monoboar!: "Yeesh, finally. Let's get on with it!"

The voting screens flicker black for a moment before a light begins to flicker down each name.

"Well, who's it gonna be, ya grubs? Let's find out who killed 'im!"

...

[4:54 PM] Monoboar!: ...

A victory tune chimes out as the light lands on Aderyn Bishop.

"Looks like it's the truth, gwahaha! Aderyn Bishop killed Akihiko Oshiro!"

[4:54 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn squeezes her eyes shut. [4:54 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana's still in her shirt. [4:55 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel covers her mouth, hand shaking. [4:55 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie shakes his head. [4:55 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko walks back to her stand. "Goodbye, Aderyn." [4:56 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: They lower their head and looks down and to the side, folding their hands over their chest. [4:57 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "I hope you're able to find peace." [4:57 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis broke into another scowl, jaw going tense. "This isn't fucking fair. None of this is fair." [4:57 PM] Eri [around]: "Bye Aderyn" That's all Eri says. [4:57 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: "N-None of it... none of it is fair...! The motive drove Lady Aderyn to kill Akihiko, and now... it kills her for it...!?" [4:58 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: "...I hope you become an angel one day" [4:58 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana didn't say anything more. What else could she say? [4:59 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn shakes her head. "No p-pearly, wh-white gates for me," she mutters in response to Cerviel. [4:59 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: "...Addy. I..I'm sorry. I hope you get a lotta cute shit wherever you go." [4:59 PM] Wallace Callaghan || Foyer: Wallace had way too many questions and tbh if I was writing the full Wallace he would have been interrogating her but im just gonna [5:00 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: He looked away. He didn't have any further response. [5:01 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "Do you have something you wish to tell those outside? I can...I can tell them, your friends..." [5:03 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn winces, visibly. "Don't... tell them." She begs. "Please," her eyes well up again. This is... very selfish of her, and she knows. But.. still. "Just.. Don't-- Don't even.. talk to them. Just.. Leave it be. They'll ww-wonder, where, where I went, and... mm-move on. It's... fine." [5:04 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: "I think... they'll look for you. They won't forget you, Aderyn. But, as you wish." [5:07 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Lake shook a bit as she snapped out of her slight daze when she processed Hazel putting the thoughts she had into the words she was looking for a minute before.

'God, I'm embarrassing! NOW I know what I want to say!'

"...Yeah, none it is fair!" Lake grabbed her stand and began to shout, "Fuck, I take back wishing it was quick as my last words to you, Aderyn-san! That's weak, coming from me! None of this bullshit is fair, and you shouldn't have to fucking die when you're not even twenty! What the fuck! Whoever's behind that disgusting swine will pay for the bullshit they put you, Oshiro-kun and the rest of us through!!! Neither you or him will have died in vain, I swear it!!"

"And if they're real friends, Aderyn-san, they'll miss the fuck out of you and remember you!! If not, I'll remember you! And Oshiro-kun, too!!!" [5:09 PM] classical bishop sacrifice: Aderyn sniffles and... nods. There's nothing else she can say. [5:09 PM] Monoboar!: "Gyahaha, touching! But this is the end, whether it matters to ya losers or not!"

Monoboar slams a gavel onto a big red button, and Aderyn is promptly whisked away by a metal clamp attached to a chain snapping around her neck, and she's off...

Aderyn Bishop has been found guilty. Time for the punishment.

[Done by @spiiderboiii]

[Done by @pitoumugis]

[5:10 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: She closes her eyes. She can't look. [5:11 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue watches, but... She regrets doing that. [5:12 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel nearly shrieks, and covers her eyes, and then her ears, and crouches down. [5:12 PM] Riku Yasui...: Riku turned around and put his hood up. [5:12 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana slowly emerges from her shirt, looking at the aftermath of the execution. She wished she hadn't. [5:12 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko flinches as she hears the train, letting out a sob as she presses her hand tighter against her face as if that'd protect her from the sight. [5:12 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Cerviel flinched, finally allowing himself to cry. It didn't matter that he hadn't known her. His tears fell down onto the ground anyways. [5:12 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: Rayne wants to scream but they just gag, having to turn themself around and cover their mouth. Why. WHY? [5:13 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie taps impatiently on his stand, still staring at the train. [5:13 PM] Monoboar!: "That's all for now, maggots. Save th' sobbin' and head back into the elevator! Scram!"

Monoboar slams his gavel, closing the case on this trial, and vanishes from his throne. [5:14 PM] 🔫Artemis Black🔫| Sadness: Artemis, for the first time in everyone's presence, whimpers. She whined from the back of her throat, turning away. Fuck. Fuck! She leaned on the pedastal to keep herself steady, trying to blink away the wet heat from her eyes. After a moment she steadied herself, walking off to the elevator with a stagger to her step. [5:14 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana fucking books it to the elevator. [5:14 PM] Hazel Hazeldine | 🔖: Hazel shakily steps into the elevator. [5:14 PM] Cerviel Winter | Room: Numb, he walked back onto the elevator. [5:14 PM] packie hayai 🌾 💤: Packie fucking yeets it. [5:15 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Wilma tips her hat downwards, listening to but not watching the execution. She won't revel in Aderyn's death.

She lingers in the trial room, not because she wants to, but in case anyone won't go back. She can escort them. [5:15 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana can't wait to go to her room and scream. [5:16 PM] Rayne Maelstrom 👹 Investigation: Rayne bolts to the elevator as fast as their legs can take them. The situation's magnitude hitting them hard finally. Once they get into the elevator they just hunker down into a ball. [5:16 PM] Qiuyue Xu ♣ Foyer: Qiuyue rubs her arms nervously. [5:17 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: Out of respect for Aderyn (And just not willing to see a live death), Lake looked away from the screen.

...She heard the train and put two, two and two together. The first two being, 'Oh, a train.' Second, 'At... At least is was quick.' And third, '...Why a train?'

...

'...Oh, god,' A sick thought seeped into her mind before she dashed to the elevator, wanting to keep the train of thought from going on. [5:17 PM] Keiko Taisei | Death time: Keiko solemnly makes her way inside the elevator, crying quietly once more. None of this is fair. They don't deserve this.

'Akihiko, Aderyn...I'm sorry.' she thinks to herself, wishing she could've done something, anything to prevent this from happening. [5:18 PM] Wilma Ortega || foy air: Alright, I think everyone's in. Wilma follows. [5:18 PM] Hana Minami! | I can';t: Hana's still acting all princess-like in the elevator, hands on her hips, giving everyone a stare-down. Her eyes are puffy, though, and her cheeks are red. [5:20 PM] Lake Kawaguchi | Trial: "...Do you need a hug, Minami-sama?" [5:20 PM] Monoboar!: The elevator closes behind everyone and rises back to the foyer, now two less people but a heavy atmosphere weighing down on all of you...

TRIAL 1 - END.

[thegrammylab]

"She’s Not Posting You (How Other Men View It)" by Lothario

Forget what she "said" was the reason why she doesn't feel the need to add you to the vast array of everything else she meticulously photographs over and over again; this is what every heterosexual male that isn't you thinks when they see her living her best life on social media without you.

I don't think I can describe it any simpler than that, so let's jump right in.

You Don't Exist

This is what 100% of the strangers and acquaintances who happen to interact with your girl digitally think.

This is also what up to a good 60% - 80% of the men in her life who are "friends" without benefits think if they haven't been introduced to you but may or may not have been told about you.

Neither will stop shooting their shot for a dude they've never seen. For a large number of men, we use visual cues to determine who is off-limits with female interactions, and even though it may be an innocent coffee study session, after work assignment, or social media post on her end, if your girl is attractive, all of the men above will try her, openly and directly, as any man should for a woman he is interested in. 

If there is no wedding ring, what is there to stop them? Believe it or not, men do virtual checks just as much and sometimes more than women do, and that includes the people we know are in relationships. The easiest way to see if a couple has broken up is if they've stopped posting and unfollowed each other. Your absence is a go-ahead not just to the "savages" among us, but the regular dudes who normally wouldn't go for someone who is taken. 

She doesn't have to go crazy, but being there matters because that makes your relationship less of a target.

You're Weak

But let's talk about the people who do know, your bros by blood and selection. Don't pretend like they haven't visited her page to see if she's doing right by you as any good friend/sibling would do. Her wiling out on the gram affects you, and if it affects you, it should affect them at some level.

So come around your birthday, Valentine's Day, holidays, or any special events, and the photos that you all took together are noticeably missing. The men's delegation will immediately assume trouble is afoot. Mainly because they also know that other men who aren't your friends are also taking excellent notes.

Trust us; we have heard every justification under the sun:

"I like to keep my private life private"

"I don't want people in my business"

"I'm not on social media like that"

"I use my IG for business not personal"

"I don't want to be fake for all these people"

"I don't want other girls hopping in your DM"

The list goes on and on, and to be fair, most of them have legitimacy. She may completely wholeheartedly believe and live by them. Still, the problem is, the only thing worse than a man unknowingly hitting on your girl is one who is hitting on her because he thinks you are less than a man than he is.

It's important to share this with women you are seriously dating who genuinely haven't thought about it like that because if you two lived in a vacuum, it would be meaningless (just like a wedding ring). However, living in a society means that there are social norms. If a man does have this conversation with his girl and still doesn't post him, his status as a beta male is solidified. Now her ignorance moves to passive consent. 

The majority of heterosexual men assume women are aware that not posting someone translates to their DMs being wide open, mostly because women normally want their men to post them too. Any woman with a boyfriend who isn't represented on their page is still considered fair game; to be taken by a strong enough man command that level of sacrifice and thoughtfulness. Ultimately, her decision to "buck the system," so to speak, is viewed as a lack of respect, which is still her choice to make. But if you don't think it's a red flag, your boys are, and it's definitely not a good look to the greater population.

You're A Phase / Not Serious

Still, some men won't believe that she is hiding you from the world out of the goodness of her heart, no matter what feminist cause she exhorts. That's because, at a very basic level, people post what they care about and what they think other people are going to like.

You not being up to the standard of her family, friend group, or her past exes are more logical reasons not to get posted. Guys will quickly form this opinion if you are nowhere in sight after she posted her ex almost every second. You can still see some of their oldies but goodies on her page. 

We've had plenty of talks with women who expressed their embarrassment about posting and deleting photos of men they have been with. They've confided that they've just decided to play it safe for two reasons:

Not look like they are running through men like a pair of J's

Keep their options open because they know these next situationships aren't going anywhere

Let me give you a Big Sean verse to put how her ex's feel into a better perspective.

"I'm that n***a, I'm that n***a, that's yo n***a, even when you got a n***a, that you make love with, fill the tub with"

It's course, but very true for many men who have strong connections with their exes. We all listen to the same songs about taking girls away from other dudes, and depending on how bad she is, the level of savagery can and will escalate with an ex who has no real evidence that he's been replaced, so the name of the game is territory. No, she's not your possession, but there are boundaries within your relationship, and that includes signs that one exists to trespassers. Yes, if your girl is attractive, guys will hit on her regardless of what she posts and what you do, but the frequency, amount, and type of guys who do increase dramatically if they connect the dots that you are only an emotional stepping stool to her next relationship.

If that's not what it is, add some social proof. If it is what it is, you need to make some moves, my boy. No shame it happens to the best of us, but don't let yourself be used by a baddie just because the sex is amazing. You're going to miss it more than ever when it's suddenly and permanently taken away in humiliating fashion by the one she really cares for.

You're On Your Way Out

There is one case where the reason she's not posting you is totally your fault but is also a smoke signal for the wolves to start circling your camp.

If early in the relationship, she posted you heavy, even catching you off guard with candid Snaps, and she suddenly stops... for like months. This is not a drill. You need to do some major reassessing because you did something or stopped doing something that has changed the relationship's trajectory.

We may never be able to read women's minds like Mel Gibson. Still, you can certainly read their actions like the latest installment of Harry Potter. As mentioned before, posting is social capital to you and her, don't think she doesn't get anything out of it. In bold letters, it's also saying, "stay away from my man" to any woman that follows her. So if she's exposed you to her audience in a pretty recurring fashion and given you the stamp of approval by association, she has skin in the game.

If she's creating a time gap and diminishing your presence suddenly, it's more than likely because she's unhappy with you. Even girls with side-dudes often keep up appearances because women are smart, and they know that would draw our attention. So her not posting you is meant to draw your attention that something is wrong, so it's probably a good idea to show her that you received the message.

This is also where the definitely not-gay emotional-support-guy-friend is lying in wait, ready to pounce. There's no shame in their game because we've all seen a dude messing up and uttered the famous lines.

"I'm just saying I could do better."

Some do and live happily ever after; some don't and continue the cycle. Regardless, if you've noticed a sharp decline in your camera time, it's an opportunity to say

"I've noticed we been drifting apart, and I want to do something about it before it's too late. Do you want to talk about it?"

Don't just ask her what's wrong or call her out for not posting you because, in her heart of hearts, she wants you to know what is wrong even if she hasn't exactly told you. Make it easier for her to give you better hints by opening it up to discussing where your head has been the last few months, and you know that you haven't been all the way there. Ask where her head is at, and if she's still interested in a relationship, those are better questions because she will either show that she still wants it or start listing the reasons she wants out. 

Don't let the negativity shock you if she wants out because the talk alone means you have a chance. If you're listening, there should be some immediate steps you can take to boost her confidence in the relationship. The most important thing to communicate is that you are willing to try, and you noticed something was up. Things didn't have to blow up to get to that point. Connecting emotionally will not only help you, but it will also take away the appeal of the other dudes who are trying to creep in by being "sensitive" and "listening."

At the end of the day, appearances aren't everything. You should always prioritize the uniqueness of your relationship over anything that other men think. However, as men, we must put up fences, as it's never wise to have anything you care for look defenseless.

[gamemasterr]

Transition: The Beast Tamer

After some thought i decided to enable the ask option for this blog with the idea of making our conversations smoother and also being able to share the answer so any other fag with the same doubt can have responses without me answering the same shit over and over on pm.

I also wanted to share something of me, a while ago i talked about taking this blog though what has been my experience as a DOM and not about what everyone thinks a DOM is suposed to be, i've gotten a lot of questions about me a geek nerdy master and the usual jock "alpha" and how do i compete against them. My answer is quite simple, i never compete and the true is that it is not competition, a fag who loves jocks will not text me and a fag who likes my style won't text jocks. I'm usually drawn to the more manly fags, even to top submissives because the range of abuse you can make'em endure is way bigger than a normal bottom, sure bottoms suck dicks cuz they were born to it, but making one of these so "confident" jocks bow down to me, turns me on in ways that are hard to explain.

Starting with chastity is much higher sacrifice to a top to give up control of his dick than it is to a bottom and that is the kind of sacrifice that i look for. Especially when i'm not trying to turn these Top Fags into bottoms, i still don't consider them man enough to respect them but i also know that i want to strip them away from all sense of identity they have and turn them into horny beasts.

In that mood i decided to recycle some texts that i have written over the years and post’em to let you know how did i became the monster i am. First i will share with you, the story of how i not only survived highschool being a quirky nerd and made my high school bully my personal beast in the process.

When i got to highschool i was quite skinny, nerdy with big glasses, shy and almost "too good" to be truth so it was normal for the "cool kids" to pick it up on me, something that never bothered me to be honest, despite what they could say i was succesful at what i was going for, getting the best grades of the class and having time for gaming and sleeping. After 9th grade things started to change in weird ways, i had discovered another way of doing things, realized that i could get away with whatever i wanted to cuz i was just "too nice" for the adults to think otherwise, after 10th summer vacations and having lived my first "recognized" experiences as a DOM i was way more rapacious, sharper and i was needing to know where all of it might take me, to learn my own limits and the limits of those that i started to call submissives.

However i was used to my high school routine i would be the only one to finish his homework and i was going to stick on my own at lunch. Regular year, regular life... something that in a way forged the sadistic behaviour in me, being in this enviroment where i was expected to be perfect and then having older guys willing to get on their knees on my command was what made it so easy for me, i always knew what to say but i just hold back. After first 3 months my 11th grade and coming back from Christmas vacations, this guy Victor that was a total jock, somewhat handsome, muscular, with some spicy nature and that cool attitude that makes everyone lose was having a hard time with his grades, he's AS DUMB AS THEY GET, so he was advised by the school counselor to try to stick with the smart kind for a while or he wouldn't graduate, something a cool kid wasn't going to let happen.

I remember the confidence he had when he asked for my help like i owed it to him to what i said no, i was starting to find new layers of myself and is not like i had plan i just knew at the moment that doing it; just "to help" someone that never saw me as anything else than the "smart kid" wasn't my path to follow. Having passed half of the school year he got very impatient and kept asking me for help against the fact that i had said no like a shit ton of times.

One day out of nowhere he texted me, he wasn't suposed to have my number but he had it and he proposed to me that if i helped him out he would fuck me, to what i laughed and then remembered all of the times he would make jokes about the "fags" of the shcool about them going to his place and making his homework and sucking his dick, something i knew for sure wasn't right, i was fucking those fags LOL so i texted him back and i said "I'll help with math, but will be my dick on your mouth" i knew he was terrible at that class and we had a test comming and in a way everyone at my class knew that i was fucking guys so i had nothing to lose by playing bold on him, at the best he would stop bothering me... and he did, until the afternoon after the math test when i got a message from him saying "Man i really need your help, i will do what you say just please don't let anyone else know". From that moment on, he was my team mate for almost every single homework we had, simple rules, he would come over after school while my parents where out, suck me off and i will present the homework the next day. The first time was terrible, he was so anxious to leave, so scared of himself going to such lenght but i was left with a very specific comment of him that day that turned on on me a diferent interest. While he was taking off my pants and very slowly grabbing my dick over the briefs he said "this shit is huge, is almost on your knee" leaving me with the curiosity of seeing his own, i never considered my own dick "that big" to match his reaction, but obviously there was something i didn't know and i had to play smart if i wanted to find out so i just went along with the small things, whenever something big would pop up, like really hard work i would either team up with girls or go solo until he failed a presentation on biology class and came to me asking why i didn't helped him with it if we had a deal.

- You don't know how to suck a cock - was all that i said and i wasn't lying, he was "straight" (lol) up terrible, what i got from our encounters was the crazy feeling of being even more than a cool kid, that my power was only mine to take and no given by others. He was lost at that moment, desperated and having already lost his pride the only way to go for him, was down, so he asked me what i wanted and all that i truly wanted was him to suck me like the other fags did, i wanted him to rather have my cock than breathe and that was my new deal, he would get my dick balls deep in his mouth every single time or i wouldn't help him if he sucked me "in a wrong way" i would just left him hanging the next day, and it did happened...

As the weeks went by his grades went a bit up and his cockiness went down. He would sit with me at lunch, he would carry my lunch plate and take it off the table, he would eat his lunch and whatever i left on my plate, people knew i was saving his ass and they thought he was just faking to be nice to me. Deep down i knew he was mine to take so i just decided to take up the antee, from that moment on i wanted him naked while sucking me and surprisingly he didn't refused.

That was another revelation for me, and a confirmation of what i was left thinking the first day, his dick was so small, around 4 inches and it was quite thin and i couldn't help the laugh, he blushed and got his pants up again asap, and i did the same, his expresion twisted - Naked or leave - i said and he didn't even argue, i was living my fantasied, i had already fucked some fags but they were all dying to jump on me, this one wasn't, he was doing what i said it, just cause i said it and i wasn't going to let him go that easy.

At the end of the school year he started dating one of my closest friends, cuz she "saw him evolve into a more comprehensive person that was caring and loving with a person that she had deep respect and care about" still i would fuck his ass whenever i felt like it to then sit and listen to my friend complaining about his tiny dick and then tell him exactly what she had said about it... He started trying harder and kept failing at everything but pleasing my dick. After graduation he kept doing it, why? Maybe he was scared that i would say something to people if he stopped, maybe he thought that us being close would keep my friend interested, maybe he was genuinly loving being my bitch or maybe he was just a grateful slut.

The summer after graduation i had him paint my room twice cuz i didn't liked the first color. I would have him leave his house in the middle of the night to get me snacks i would make him go get a fag i wanted to fuck, drive him here, wait outside and then drive'em home. We stopped our thing when i got to college, and even now that he has a child he still asks me if we could meet and sometimes i accept and we talk, he opens to me like if i was his brother, sometimes when he's tired of his routine he comes to my place, strips naked and talks to me, sometimes i make him wear one of my boy's cages while he's here and even if i don't consider him mine anymore we both know that he needs my dick cuz he got used to it and just because i'm a good friend and he's a very nice beast i'll let him suck me, always sharing my dick with my homeboy so he understands the level he is on related to me.

It is always satisfactory to feel that i changed his life and in a way i love him cuz he is the first protoype of what i have done with my actual slaves.

So... no i don't compete with "jocks" because i've fucked jocks that are bigger, manlier and sometimes better gifted... so, nothing to worry about, my bitches are mine knowing that they look like alphas but they're not.

You're suposed to be a MAN carrying a DICK not a DICK carrying a MAN... BE A MAN, DON'T BE A DICK and you will be succesful.

[tonygaskins]

I struggle with finding the balance between giving what’s needed and giving everything. I’m starting to understand more why so many men say they want to be financially stable before marriage. When I got married I wasn’t that type of man so I never understood the mindset but now I’m realizing why that mindset is normal for good men.

As the head of the household I want to provide for my wife and kids. I find myself wanting to provide their wants as equally as much as I want to provide their needs. That can get expensive fast. It really sends you into a space of evaluation where you’re trying to determine what’s really important in life.

When it comes to the kids, my wife and I may have made some mistakes, but all parents do. None of us really know what we’re doing, we just do the best we know how to do. We have two sons, a 10 year old and a 3 year old. They go to a Christian private school and for the both of them it’s about $2,100/month. We aren’t wealthy and money doesn’t grow on trees but I compare my 10 year old to some of the 10 year old’s I meet from the public schools and it makes Christian private school seem necessary. There’s a big difference for us between a Christian private school and a private school. At our son’s school they instill Christ in the kids and into the lessons. They try to emulate Christ and the love He showed the world. To hear my son learn new scriptures every week really blesses my heart. When he was little and was struggling with his allergies and eczema issues he would miss about 3 days a week. To know that he could go to school with skin completely red and not be bullied for it really meant a lot to me. He would say things like “mommy, I’ll be ok. Jesus will heal me because my friends at school are praying for me.” To hear that from the mouth of a child really blessed me. When our oldest son started going to Christian private school we were on financial aid and we couldn’t even afford that. We had to borrow some months but it meant the world to my wife that he went to a good school. She felt that it made a huge difference in her life and I couldn’t argue with that because I went to public school from K-9th grade and my mindset and behavior was totally different from my wife as she went to private school from K-9th. Her foundation was totally different from mine.

Lil Tony at his Band Concert

As much as we want to believe that everything at home makes all the difference, that’s not true. A child’s environment outside of the home is very important. We’ve always prayed for what we wanted and we went after it. We couldn’t afford it but my wife’s faith made it happen. That same type of faith helped me grow my brand and business and our son’s don’t receive any financial aid today but God has made a way. Looking around and seeing so many other kids in our neighborhood going to public school and seeming to be pretty good kids, I’m torn many days. I say to myself “man I could be saving $20,000/year. If i put that on the market or invested that into my business it would turn into millions.” But then I remember how being in public school I started having sex early even though my parents were ministers. I started stealing and even went to jail in the 9th grade. I was cursing, stealing, fighting, and all kinds of stuff because even though I had good home training, many of the kids around me didn’t and that pressure was greater than my parents influence. I turned it around thanks to the grace of God, but I could be dead or in prison today if just one thing had gone wrong. So I’m brought back to the investment that we’re making for our kids to be in a Christian private school getting their foundation set in place. I also feel some guilt because some families can’t even afford $100/month for school and have no choice other than to put their child in the public school system. I’m sure some private school parents don’t care about that but it bothers me many days. I thought about this the other day and I realize that by the time our sons are ready for college we will have already paid a minimum of $252,000 for their schooling and it’ll probably be much higher than that. It’s crazy to think about it. It hurts and it feels good at the same time. It’s sad to think that there has been a system created to protect the kids of the “rich.” I also realize that faith and the desire to have more for your kids play a part in it because not all kids at good private schools come from the same social class.

This also leads me to the understanding that sometimes we can do more for our kids but we don’t just because it doesn’t make sense to us. We will make our kids suffer just because we suffered in the same way. We limit our kids just because there were limitations placed on us. If it wasn’t for my wife having been exposed to the private school system my sons would probably be in public school. I know you may not think there is a difference, but there is. I’ve seen both sides of it and the difference is very noticeable. So even if you can only get financial aid, it’s worth at least asking the schools before just deciding to put your kids through the public school system. At my son’s school he was doing work in the second or third grade that I literally could not do. I helped him ONCE with his homework and it’s the only D he’s gotten since being in school. My wife can do all of his work of course because her education foundation was much different than mine. Because of her education my son earns straight A’s because she can teach him even what his teachers can’t teach him. Grant it, they both are also naturally smart.

I’m left to the thought that maybe this is the way to go in this day and time. Although it’s a sacrifice and paying $2k/month for school is very hard to do, I see a big difference and it would break my heart to give my sons less than the best if there is a way I can make it happen.

To throw in a little note for those of you who are upset right now and saying “yeah that all sounds good and I’m glad your sons can go to private school but that’s not the case for me because it’s just not affordable, not even with financial aid.” I will say, by having a deep desire to give my sons more than what was afford to me it pushed me to new levels in my life. I don’t have a college degree. I don’t have a mentor. I don’t have any full-time staff. I’ve started 8 companies and created over 40 streams of income, many you have no idea about, all because I wanted to be in a position to give them more. My point is that there is a way to make it happen if you really want to make it happen. Don’t sell yourself short before you’ve tapped into every possible resource and option. Sometimes just pleading with the school and asking them to give you a chance may do it!

Now, to setting my family up for success. This is a calling that many men accept and it is no easy thing. Many women have accepted the same calling out of necessity. I’m investing in my gifts and it changed our lives greatly. I would spend every free dime investing in myself so that I could yield a return. I knew that I was sowing on good ground and that a harvest would come. There was a 6 year stretch that I went from earning $20,000 a year to $500k a year. My faith, my hopes, my desires, and my love for God and my family pushed me on that journey. This fuel in me is pushing me to become a Billionaire one day. I don’t know how it will happen but I didn’t know how $100k/year would happen either. I just trust God and keep working on myself and investing in my gifts. Because I did it and I know it works it has lead me to invest in my family at any cost.

What I want you to understand is that these investments aren’t from an endless supply of money. There are many times that I spend our last dime to make an investment in my wife or our sons or myself. I don’t think scarcely. I think abundantly. My oldest son says he wants to be a professional soccer player. So I invest in club soccer each year, it’s around $2k right now and he’s 10 so I know that will grow to $5k and then $10k when you include all the flights and hotel stays that await us. Just to be on the team is $1,200. Then the uniform is $250. Then some tournaments we have to pay extra. Then some tournaments are 1-2 nights and we have to spend travel money and $200-$250/night on a hotel room. It gets expensive. Many families are swimming in credit card debt investing in their kids. This summer my son is going to an overnight camp at IMG Academy in Bradenton, FL. This camp cost $2k for ONE week! It is absolutely crazy to me, but I’m doing it because I don’t want any other child to have any advantages over him. When he is grown, even if he doesn’t play a day as a pro soccer player I want him to look back and know that we invested in him and gave him every chance to be successful. Outside of those camps he’s going to two other camps. One was about $600 total and the other will be about $400 total. I want to cry just thinking about the fact that his younger brother will have to be afforded the same opportunities. So this summer alone another $3,000 is being invested into my son’s soccer dreams. I probably won’t do this every summer unless I see that it was really worth it. So here you have it, just for my oldest son I’m looking at an investment of $15,000 a year with school and soccer. It’s insane to think about but I’m painting a picture of how our world has separated us by how much money we earn. What we spend is small for some people. These opportunities are not afforded to everyone. I do believe if you want it bad enough you can find a way but it won’t just fall in your lap unless you win the lottery or find a sponsor. I just understand that I’m no one special. I’m just another child of God who has enough to believe that I can have the best this life has to offer.

I’m growing now and learning more about “smart money.” I’m learning that all the designer shoes, clothes, and cars aren’t important. The investments in our gifts and our lives are most important. I’m spending money differently now.

Those investments for our sons will have a return so that’s why I’m calling it an investment. It’s more than what I have to do and it’s not normal. It could be seen as borderline crazy. But I’m doing it because I don’t want them to have any excuses.

Outside of the money there comes, time. As a man or head of your household, the time you invest is more important than the money. The time you spend talking, playing, and bonding with your wife and kids will make all the difference. I remember my father being in the front yard with me all the time playing sports with me and training me to the best of his knowledge. He never paid for me to go to a single camp and I’m not sure why that is, but he put me through his own camps in the front yard or in the driveway playing basketball. I went on to play football in college because of his investments and sacrifices.

Yesterday I went outside and juggled the soccer ball with my son and it was so hard. I’m lying here typing this in pain. My thighs, calves, shins, ankles, back, all that is hurting! I told him we will do an hour a day, 5 days a week. That’s the goal but if we at least get 3 days in, I’ll be happy. I know he won’t forget that just as I haven’t forgot what my Dad did with me. At the same time I watch my wife spend 15-20 hours a week with my sons helping them learn their academics. She also takes our oldest to the fields and works him out, putting him through a training regimen. She was a college athlete too. She ran the 800 in college until injuries and school work took over.

The investment of time is so important for the head of the household. The blessings or curses flow from the head. I do my best to make an effort to give my wife time as well as my sons. She is just as important as them. They have to see the way I love her so they will one day love their wives even better. They see us have date-nights every week. They see me grab her butt and rub on them thighs. I don’t intend for them to see all that but they see it. I slip up and get a little inappropriate sometimes with the public display of affection and my wife has to remind me to chill. As they grow older they will see how the head of the household has a large responsibility. I make mistakes too and those are the areas they will be better than me in. We always leave some room for our kids to grow because none of us are perfect. Sometimes I get agitated quickly and get snappy. I don’t curse or yell so it’s not that bad, but I get one of them nice-nasty attitudes that come with smart remarks, silent treatments and rude looks. It takes me about 10 minutes to snap out of it. When my oldest son gives me a look, I blame it on all the concussions I had in college playing football and tell him that’s why I don’t want him to play football, lol. My family watches my every move, the good and the bad. I’m the head and it all flows from me. I’m also writing this mini novel to hold myself accountable and remind myself of my calling as the head of the household. I’m still trying to get more time. I have to make more time actually. Being motivated and driven to earn more money to give my family more opportunities also comes with less time. So I’m constantly working on time management and creating a system that shows balance. I realize that they appreciate my time more than my money. Many men don’t believe that but it’s true. I know they say that love doesn’t pay the bills but in a very discreet way, it actually does pay the bills. My love for my family is what motivated me to become better so I could give them more. That love for them also has pushed me to another level to create streams of income that earn money while I’m spending time with them or even sleeping. Love is paying our bills.

Lastly, I want to make a point to the men about investing in our wives. She is so capable. She is so strong and so smart. She is smarter than you. She can earn more money than you too if given the tools. She has more longevity than you, in the bedroom, in the boardroom, and on Earth. These are shocking facts that I’m coming into the knowledge of. I’m writing this blog right now as my wife is at a conference. Her ticket to this conference cost us $400 that wasn’t in the budget. It actually cost more because of gas and parking so really about $500 plus. We were sitting in the bed early morning on Thursday and I saw it on my timeline. It’s a conference for women who blog, youtube, etc. It’s called “BlogHer.” When I saw it, I mentioned it to her and offered to send her. She accepted and I dropped $400 on it. Our budget is strict and tight because the more you build the more disciplined you have to be and it is a struggle. That’s why they say “mo money, more problems.” A lot comes with trying to make a better life. Nonetheless, we spent the money and she is loving it!! It’s reviving her and giving her a much needed boost to get back to her blogging and brand building.

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Anything she wants to do in her life, I’m here for it. Anything! We are talking about law school right now. I will need a great Entertainment Lawyer one day and I want that money to go to her and she likes that idea too. She has a bachelors in Bio-medical Science and her masters in Medical Sciences. Her initial goal was to be a Medical Doctor but our lives took us in a different direction and now her interests have changed. I’m willing to spend my last dime on her dreams. She’s a full-time CEO of Home and helps run all of the companies I’ve started. She’s the backbone of our family. Our sons wouldn’t be who they are without her. I would literally be dead or in prison if it wasn’t for her influence in my life. For that, I owe her the world. She’s played a major part in my life. I think as men we often forget about the grace and favor a good woman brings to our lives. I challenge you to remember that and to give back to her instead of draining her more. There’s so much more I want to do for my wife that I’m not able to yet. As of now, I’m praying for abundance so that we can pay for law school if that’s where her heart leads her. If not, then for whatever else she wants to do. My days aren’t promised so for all the focus I stole from her at one point in life, I want to return it 1,000x. As men we can’t get into the mindset that everything has to be about us and our aspirations. Her dreams matter too. So many men want a handmaid instead of a Queen. The woman in Proverbs 31 made power moves and held things together. We have to respect her heart and her hustle and get behind her movement.

Ok, I have to put our 3 year old down for his nap now so I’m going to let you go. If you’ve read this far, thank you! I may not have made a lot of sense but I’m trying to put what’s on my heart into words and sometimes that’s so hard to do without offending or alienating someone. Please know this post is only to share another example. However you raise your kids or run your home, more power to you! I’m not saying my way is the way, but it is my way and I just wanted to share it with you to add a different perspective.

God Bless,

Tony A. Gaskins Jr.

  When a man wants to give the world… I struggle with finding the balance between giving what's needed and giving everything. I'm starting to understand more why so many men say they want to be financially stable before marriage.