#and accidentally utilizing one feels like i just cast a spell

[soothfog]

utterly surreal to be teaching a class of kindergartners and stumble upon a secret phrase another teacher taught them. you say something like "eyes on me" and they all, in monotone unison, chant back "eyes on you" and go silent like a platoon of toddler sleeper soldiers.

[accidentalmistress]

Accidental Mistress - Cat's in the Cradle

It's that time again! This post is a little later in the day than I like, but it ended up being a little longer than I thought it would. At any rate, today we have the triumphant return of Quinns and Oliver! And this one has some worldbuilding! Woo!

(For more Accidental Mistress content, check out the Master Post.)

Title: Cat's in the Cradle

Word Count: 3,882

Content and Warnings: snz (nonbinary), fantasy violence, some mild gore (translation: there's monster fighting)

In which Quinns's good intentions earn them a bit more than they bargained for...

----------------------

The most basic utility of a sword is to swing it with a degree of force and try to hit whatever you’re aiming at with the sharp part.

Dark blood dripped from the end of their blade and sank into the dirt, leaving a stain that, in the moonlight, resembled a slick of black oil. Their chest heaved with panting breaths as sweat dripped down their brow and neck. The stench of entrails and ichor hung in the air, and they fought the sudden urge to retch that rose in the back of their throat.

The creature was dead. That much was clear as a rush of mana flowed into them, as with killing any monster. Its furred head lay several feet away from its body, frozen in a snarl that bared its erratic tangle of crowded fangs. The rest of the grotesque corpse still twitched as it cooled on the side of the road. The oversized, hand-like paws had too many fingers, too many joints. The massive barrel chest was completely at odds with the slender, almost emaciated, waist and hips. Its skin was a patchwork of fur, scales, and feathers that made no sense, had no pattern, and was dotted with weeping splits and sores.

This was what happened to Devourers eventually. They became an absurd pastiche of whatever they consumed, until the imbalance in their form started to tear them apart. They were then at their most dangerous, attacking indiscriminately and without provocation as they were driven to frenzy by madness and agony.

A barking laugh cut through the tension that clung to them like a suffocating blanket.

“Ha! Amazing! Knight Shaw, you’re incredible.”

They flicked the blood off their sword before sheathing it with a deep sigh.

“You don’t have to call me Knight Shaw. Just call me Quinns.”

They turned to the person sitting on the ground behind them and offered him a hand up, hauling the much taller and broader young man to his feet with a grunt.

“Oh, right. And you can call me Oliver!”

The green and black uniform he wore was nearly identical to Quinns’s own, save that Oliver’s lapel only bore a single gold stripe instead of the three Quinns possessed, denoting their difference in rank.

“Yeah. I know.”

“Oh. Right. Um, then how about you call me Ollie?”

“Let’s just get this thing off the road, please.”

“Oh, sure thing! I’ll grab the front legs if you get the back legs.”

“All right, fine.”

It was no mean feat to drag the Devourer’s reeking corpse, seeing as it was the size of a horse. Even as the two Knights grunted and strained with the effort, Oliver couldn’t seem to keep from chatting with that goofy grin on his face that drove Quinns up a wall.

“It’s a lucky thing -ngh- you got here when you did. -urgh- Another few minutes -hnng- and I would’ve been Devourer chow.”

Quinns made a noncommittal grunt and kept hauling. They weren’t about to tell Oliver that the only reason they’d been there at all was because they’d been tailing him since he left headquarters that night. They couldn’t shake the feeling that if they didn’t keep an eye on him, the naive younger Knight was going to do something stupid and get himself killed—a feeling that turned out to be correct when Oliver decided to take the Devourer head-on, alone, with nothing but a sword and the skills of a First-Rank Knight.

Once the dead monster was safely away from the road, Quinns cast a spell that would immolate the corpse by morning. They tried not to look at its six asymmetrical eyes, dead and glistening in the light of the arcane fire.

“Funny coincidence running into you out here at this time of night, huh?”

Quinns cast a sideways glance up at Oliver’s open, honest face. The taller Knight had a broad grin on his face, the furry, pointed ears on top of his head twitching. The cat ears and tail he bore marked Oliver as an Anima, a type of demi-human with animal features.

“I was just doing my own patrol. Couldn’t sleep, as usual, so I figured I might as well do something useful.”

A hearty clap on the shoulder made them wince.

“Ha! That’s my senior for ya! Always the overachiever! Save some glory for the rest of us, huh?”

They crossed their arms in front of their chest. “I don’t do this for glory. I do it because someone has to. You know, I don’t recall you being scheduled for a patrol either.”

Oliver rubbed the back of his neck with an abashed chuckle, his mismatched eyes, one gold and one blue-green, cast aside like a child caught sneaking a sweet from the kitchen.

“Ah, yeah, you got me. I was doing my own patrol, too. The higher ups hardly ever put me on official patrols anymore! I don’t know why; I don’t think I did anything wrong. Recently, anyway…”

Quinns kept their mouth shut. They were pretty sure they knew the reason: Oliver had quickly built a reputation around headquarters, and not an entirely favorable one. He’d passed his exams less than a year ago and was generally known to be affable and pleasant, yet already he had caused the Knights several embarrassing incidents. Quinns was away at the time, but they heard that during his first patrol, Oliver decided to attempt spellcasting in the middle of the marketplace, spooking a horse that was attached to a merchant’s cart and causing a messy collision with a fruit stand. Fortunately no one was hurt, but the Knights ended up responsible for the damages.

Not long after Quinns was officially introduced to Oliver during a late night sparring match, the junior Knight set up a series of bonfires throughout the training yard, apparently to simulate “being attacked by evil fire mages”, which quickly grew out of hand into a conflagration that set a stack of hay bales and half the company’s wooden training dummies ablaze. When Quinns arrived on the scene, they managed to contain the fire with a magical barrier until the other Knights got enough water to put it out. Quinns could still clearly picture how Oliver’s orange cat ears had been nearly flat with shame against his bright blonde hair as their Captain had chewed him out.

That incident, paired with this fight with the Devourer and a hundred other minor screw-ups on the part of the bumbling, cat-eared Knight left Quinns with the sinking feeling that they weren’t finished cleaning up Oliver’s messes. How had he even passed his exams?

Oliver’s voice brought Quinns back to the present.

“Well, since we’re both out here, why don’t we go patrolling together? I wouldn’t mind the company!”

Quinns blew out a sigh through their nose.

“Yeah, all right. Might as well.”

“Might as well keep him out of trouble, more like…” they declined to add.

As they set off together, walking side by side down the road that eventually led to Chambelf, Quinns remembered the other reason that Oliver quite literally irritated them: Quinns was allergic to cats. They cleared their throat as it started to prickle slightly and managed to avoid coughing, silently praying to any god that would listen that they could get this impromptu patrol over with quickly.

“What do you think a Devourer was doing this close to a town?” Oliver had his hands clasped behind his head and was walking along with his gaze on the starry night sky like he didn’t have a care in the world. Must be nice.

Quinns shrugged.

“It looked like it was dying. They go crazy right before they die, and they’re not exactly stable to begin with, so there’s no telling what it was thinking.”

“Do you think there could be any more around?”

“I highly doubt it. They don’t travel in groups; they’re solitary creatures.”

It didn’t escape Quinns’s notice that when he’d asked the question Oliver sounded a little… excited.

“You’re not actually hoping to run into another one of those things, are you? The first one almost killed you.”

The other Knight chuckled. “Well, okay, maybe not another Devourer, but it might be cool to fight some other kinda monster.”

A scoff of disbelief passed Quinns’s lips. “Seriously? Do you have a death wish or something? Why the hell would you want to fight another monster?”

To Quinns’s surprise, Oliver dropped his arms to his sides and a slightly awkward look came to his face. Was he embarrassed?

“Uh, y’know, no reason… It’s just… I-It’s what Knights do, right? Yeah, we, uh, we fight monsters and protect people, so… Just really excited to do, uh… Knight stuff.”

Quinns regarded Oliver with narrowed eyes and was just about to accuse him of being a terrible liar when an itch blossomed in their nose, so instead they turned to the side and rubbed it against their sleeve with urgent strokes.

“Agh…”

“Hey, you okay?”

“What? -snf- Oh, y-yeah. -snf- I’m fine.”

They thought for certain that their sniffles would give them away, but Oliver seemed to take them at face value and nodded.

“Oh. Okay, good!”

Quinns bit back a sigh. While they were relieved that he hadn’t caught on, it really illustrated just how overly trusting Oliver was. The guy needed to cultivate some common sense before it got him killed.

“You know, I feel pretty lucky right now,” Oliver said, and Quinns wasn’t sure if he was purposely trying to change the subject or if he just always said whatever came to mind. Probably that second one.

“What do you mean?”

Oliver glanced over at them, putting his hands up behind his head again with another trademark grin.

“Well, not everybody gets to go on a patrol with the Quinns Shaw. Actually, you almost always go out alone. Makes me feel a little special, you know?”

It actually took some effort for Quinns to not openly gape at Oliver. Sure, it was true that Quinns usually worked alone, but was that really so noteworthy? Furthermore, why did Oliver hold them in such high esteem? Did they stand out that much? They wouldn’t deny their own skill—they were the youngest Knight to ever achieve Third Rank—but they didn’t exactly go out and do heroic deeds every day. They mostly performed their regular duties, did any other tasks the higher-ups assigned to them, picked up any slack where necessary, and kept their head down the rest of the time. They were so thrown off by Oliver’s comment, in fact, that they were totally unprepared for when the itching in their sinuses flared back up. They froze up, powerless to stop it, before their head snapped forward.

“Etchoo!”

“Whoa, bless you. You sure you’re okay?”

Another rub with the sleeve. “It’s nothing. Thanks… Oliver, I really don’t think I’m as amazing as you seem to think I am.”

“Well, I think you are that amazing. I’m real grateful that you’re willing to spend time with a loser like me, honestly. Feels like you could be doing… I dunno… better things.”

Quinns opened their mouth to reply, but abruptly shut it again as they realized that they didn’t actually know why they concerned themself so much with Oliver. Getting involved with other people only complicated things. Just look at the whole situation with Noelle: if anyone knew Quinns was aiding a witch, they’d be before the Inquisition in irons in less time than it took for Oliver to make them start itching. Keeping an eye on the younger Knight just gave them more work to do and more stress to deal with, so why did they bother? Was it simply to protect a comrade from getting hurt, or were they somehow a magnet for hard luck cases?

They had to say something into the silence that had already dragged into uncomfortable territory after Oliver’s last statement, but no words came to their rescue. No sarcastic quip, no snappy comeback, not even something truthful came to Quinns’s lips. Instead, Oliver’s cat ears abruptly twitched, then flattened against his head the moment before he flung himself bodily into Quinns, pushing them to the ground.

“Look out!”

An explosive frenzy of sound and motion followed. Before they even knew what had happened Quinns was facedown in the dirt of the road. Something blocked the moonlight above, casting a deep shadow in the night’s gloom. Training, adrenaline, and instinct took over. They pushed off the ground, and by the time they were on their feet their sword was in hand. Quinns spun to face what attacked them and briefly froze at what they saw. There stood Oliver, ears flattened, teeth bared in a snarl that showed sharp canines that Quinns had never noticed before. He was face-to-face with a huge reptilian creature: long and sinewy like a massive snake, its hide protected by thick, leathery scales. It had no legs to speak of, and the frilled head with its long snout would not look out of place on a dragon.

A wyrm.

Not quite full grown, but still big enough to snatch up and drag either of them away. Sharp teeth the size of daggers lined its yawning maw, currently held open by Oliver with one hand each on the upper and lower jaws as the creature struggled to make the young Knight its next meal. Oliver’s heterochromatic eyes flicked over to Quinns for the barest moment.

“I can’t… hold it… forever!”

Snapped from their reverie, Quinns tightened their grip on their sword.

“Right!”

With a cry, they ran at the wyrm with sword raised, held in both hands to put their full weight behind it. The wyrm’s hide was too thick for a simple slash to do much damage, and there was no time to cast a spell or perform some flashy move. So Quinns used their sword for its second most basic utility: aim the pointy bit at something you don’t like and shove as hard as you can.

This punctured the wyrm’s thick hide, causing the creature to shriek bloody murder, which was probably warranted given the circumstances. It darted aside, abandoning its attack on Oliver in favor of swiping its lengthy tail at Quinns instead. They leapt back to dodge the blow, the whiplike appendage missing them by inches. When the wyrm did not hit its intended target, it switched its attention back to Oliver, curving the arc of its strike towards the other Knight. He made no move to dodge, standing there with his arms wide open like he was waiting for it.

“Don’t tell me he’s gonna try to—”

With a resounding thump, Oliver caught the wyrm’s tail in the chest and grabbed on, holding it in place. How was he still standing? That strike had to have been powerful enough to break bone. More importantly, though—

“What the Hell are you doing?!”

The grin Oliver flashed them was more appropriate for someone who had caught a prize fish than a guy currently bear-hugging the tail of a monster.

“I got it!”

Quinns watched as a powerful undulation traveled swiftly down the length of the wyrm’s body, and Oliver’s feet left the ground.

“Wooaah! I-I don’t got it!”

The younger Knight was flung backwards, landing heavily against the trunk of a tree with a worrying crunch.

“Ollie!”

Surprisingly, or perhaps less so at this point, Oliver gave Quinns a thumbs up from where he sat at the base of the tree. “Koff! Don’t worry! Koff-koff! I, uh, I’m good!”

“Damn it, just… Just stay there, okay?!”

A guttural growl cut through the night air as the wyrm redoubled its attack, launching itself towards Oliver, still recovering from being thrown.

“Shit,” Quinns swore as they rushed forward, beginning a chant that would cast a protective barrier spell in front of Oliver. Icy panic gripped their stomach as they realized that the wyrm was far too fast.

They weren’t going to finish the spell in time.

With a fluid motion that was unlike Oliver’s usual bumbling clumsiness, the cat Anima rolled to his feet and leapt forward to meet his monstrous opponent. As the wyrm charged, baring its fangs with a horrid screech, Oliver once more managed to grab the creature by the jaws. One step, two—despite the wyrm’s size and strength, Oliver yielded only two steps to its crushing assault. Straining with the effort, he then began to prize the monster’s jaws slowly apart.

Still rushing to Oliver’s aid, Quinns thought for a moment that the other Knight was trying to break the creature’s jaw. Instead, Oliver wrenched the wyrm’s head to one side with a triumphant shout. Confused at first, Quinns then realized that with its head turned they now had a clear shot at the roof of the creature’s mouth.

They turned their run into a charge, both hands on the hilt of their sword as they raised it to eye level. With a rising cry they closed the distance, then thrust their blade deep into the soft flesh of the wyrm’s mouth, piercing its brain. The beast didn’t make a sound. Its long body spasmed with weaker and weaker movements until at last it went still.

Quinns pulled their sword from the monster’s corpse, and Oliver dropped its head to the ground. Within moments, the wyrm’s spent life force poured out in the form of mana, which Quinns felt flow into them. Beside them they heard Oliver gasp.

“Oh my gods, I think… I think I just got mana.”

Quinns raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, that usually happens when you kill a monster.”

Oliver looked over at them wide-eyed as a grin slowly stole across his face.

“Does that mean…” He suddenly looked down at his arms in front of him. “Do I get my Mark now?!”

“Your… what?”

“The Adventurer’s Mark! How do I know if I got it?”

Quinns blinked.

Plenty of people in the world became Adventurers, but it wasn’t simply a job title. Slaying monsters, practicing magic, training in certain martial arts—these sorts of things granted one mana. Once a person’s mana reached a certain threshold, they would gain a Mark: a symbol somewhere on their body that marked them as an Adventurer. As one then grew in power, so too would the Mark, growing in size and complexity as proof of one’s skill.

“Wait, are you saying… you’re not an Adventurer yet?”

Oliver shook his head.

“No, I’m not. Or, at least, I wasn’t? Maybe I am now!” He actually started to unbutton his uniform shirt. “Would I feel it? What does it feel like? Does it, like, burn or something? How do I know where to look?”

Quinns had to admit that they were a little impressed. An Adventurer’s Mark was not a requirement to become a Knight, but a person was limited in the skills they could use and the magic they could cast without one, which of course made the job more dangerous. Though rare, it wasn't unheard of for someone to join up in the hopes of gaining their Mark, Quinns had just never met one before. Oliver had guts, that was for sure, and he could clearly take a beating. His eagerness to kill a monster now made a lot more sense as well: monsters granted a large amount of mana, so monster-slaying was often the fast-track to Adventurer status.

Quinns placed a placating hand on Oliver's arm before the other Knight got too carried away with stripping in the middle of the road.

"Whoa, slow down there, champ. I… I can't really describe it, but trust me: if you gained your Mark, you would know."

They watched as Oliver’s expression turned crestfallen, his orange ears drooping as he began to slowly button his shirt again.

“Oh… Yeah, that, uh, makes sense.”

Quinns pressed their lips together before sighing, though one corner of their mouth tugged up in a small smile.

“Hey, don’t let it get you down too bad. You’re well on your way. You’ll just have to deal the finishing blow next time.”

The quickness with which Oliver’s ears perked right back up was nearly comical.

“Next time? You mean… you wanna do this again sometime? Like, you’ll go out with me?”

At that Quinns was unable to stop a chuckle from escaping as they nodded.

“Yeah, but you don’t have to make it sound like a date.”

“A date?” Oliver’s cheeks quickly flushed pink and he waved his hands in front of him frantically. “N-no, I didn’t mean it like that! I-I mean, not that I wouldn’t— if you wanted to! But if not that’s totally fine! Wait, no- I mean, I’m not asking you on a date! Right now. I… I really just meant patrolling…”

He placed a hand over his face, thoroughly red. Another laugh bubbled up in Quinns’s throat, but all that came out was a cough. As the adrenaline that surged in their veins during the battle faded, the allergies it had suppressed returned in full force. They tried to forestall any further coughing by swallowing hard, but the ticklish feeling in their throat stubbornly persisted. Quinns put their back to Oliver and cleared their throat a few times, which only seemed to aggravate the irritation. A series of coughs seized them, which they tried, unsuccessfully, to smother with a hand.

“Uh, Quinns? You okay?”

“I’m f- Koff! Koff! I’m f-fi-...” Their body froze, which meant— “Etchoo! Etchoo! Ugh… I’m fine.”

A rare double sneeze. With a groan, Quinns remembered that Oliver had touched them when he pushed them out of the way of the wyrm’s initial ambush strike. He must have gotten cat hair on them.

“You don’t sound fine.” The cat in question came around to face Quinns, prompting them to take a step back. “Can you tell me what’s going on? Please?”

Talk about awkward. How do you tell someone you’re allergic to them?

“Uh… I have… Etchoo! … allergies?”

Oliver’s golden eyebrows rose, his expression a mixture of surprise and concern.

“Oh, no… Well, you shouldn’t be outside, then! Come on: let’s get you back to headquarters.”

Quinns felt a firm hand on their shoulder, and suddenly Oliver was marching them back up the way they’d come.

“W-wait, Ollie- Hang on, what about- koff! What about the wyrm?”

“We can inform one of the other patrols, and they can come clean it up. I don’t think anyone’ll use this road anyway, and—” He paused. “Wait, you just called me Ollie!”

“Oh, uh, -snf- yeah… guess I did.”

Slight relief washed over them that he hadn’t noticed them yell it during the fight, but that was quickly squashed when Oliver’s arms wrapped around them in a bear hug.

“Aw, that means we’re friends now! I’m so happy!”

Quinns made a mental note to visit the temple when they got back, because the only explanation they could conceive for the events of the evening and their current situation was that, at some point, they had caused the gods some great offense. Of course, that was assuming that they made it back to headquarters alive, and, given how things had gone so far, Quinns was increasingly convinced they might regret letting this particular cat cross their path.

[ihadthisdreamwhereonetime]

It’s fuzzy at the beginning. I was in my dorm doing work and I left for some reason. I think class was happening on the floor below me. Somewhere along the way, I feel a jolt and sinking feeling in my stomach. I fall to my knees. I wake up, and I can’t feel anything. But I see myself next to me. I look around, I can’t figure out what’s happening. The not me next to me sits up, and rubs their head, confused. I don’t know what’s happening and begin to panic, but no one can hear me or even seems to notice I’m there, except the not me. I look down and realize I’m not there. I don’t have a form, and I’m stuck. I try to move around and get away but the further I go the more pain I feel. It’s the only thing I can feel. The person inside my body looks at me. They do not have my eyes. They know what I am. They quickly run upstairs and into my dorm room before locking the door. 

The other person explained that they accidentally performed a dangerous spell incorrectly and had been lost to the ether, their own body unprotected and soulless had been snatched away and destroyed, his own tether snapped. He didn’t remember much, but time slowly slipped from his senses, leaving a cold, blank void, with nothing and no way for him to perceive anything. I still had my earthly tether, which meant I could still utilize earthly senses without being in my body. He apologized, because he honestly didn’t realize what he was doing. There was but a small gap between my body and would and he had taken his chance. He acknowledged that only he would ever be able to see me, because he knew magic and was inhabiting my form. I asked him to return my body. He refused. 

I tried to fight back, to pull myself back into my own form. Nothing worked. I tried to flee, my spectral legs pulling against whatever tether connected us, and the boy's steely eyes grew concerned when he saw how my form stretched and tightened, painfully trying to sever my own consciousness. He shouted at me to stop, that I would mutilate myself and kill my form, before waving his arm and trapping me within a small crystal. He had to keep me on his person, so my life force would continue to feed my body through the tether like an umbilical cord. His own soul could possibly have provided such energy, but why risk the magical surgery. He did feel bad for having stolen my form, but to perceive, to exist once more, it was too great a thrill to give up. He also wasn’t entirely sure he could. 

Eventually, he let me out. We slowly became friends after he did attempt to leave, but was unable to. We were close, but having no body or way to interact was something I loathed him for. After many months of this, the boy asked if I wanted to try to get my body back. I was ecstatic, but cautious. I can’t let him possess anyone else. What was the catch? He told me that he had an idea for a spell that could allow us both to exist in my body, creating a kind of compromise. I disliked any “compromises” seeing as it was my physical form he had stolen, but I was willing to do anything for my own agency again. We set up the ritual and he cast the spell. I felt dizzy, and passed out. 

When I woke up, I looked around. I was myself again! It was me. But something inside felt tight, and squished. I felt a small pop and my eyes rolled back in my head, only to wake up, and there was the boy. His soul tethered to my body. This was the first time I’d perceived him as he perceived himself. About my age, features fuzzy, but deep, steel grey eyes. I noticed the tether and freaked out, asking him what he thought he was doing. As I tried to move away, I felt my body slipping away like thick honey through fingers. My spectral form sliding in and out of my body, having difficulty controlling it. Somehow, with him lodging himself inside of me, he had begun to think of himself in my form, and had accidentally attached himself to me, leaving a body with two souls. This is why he couldn’t leave my form earlier. It was just as much his as it was mine now. He reached out with his own spectral arm, inserting it into part of me and stabilized my frantic, uncertain motions. I felt my body settle around me. It had been so long. But neither of us had full control of the body while the other was inside. I pushed him away, outside my home, my heart. Dejected, he did his best to give me space as I lived my life for the first time in months. He tried to talk to me, to reason or apologize, but I ignored him. 

One day, he finally drove me to the brink, and threatened to sever both our ties to the body. With tears in his eyes he asked me to understand. I told him to explain then, to tell me what’s going on. I felt myself leave my body, easy to do. It became easier every time it’d happened, like popping a sticker off and on, the adhesive slowly just stops working. I hardly even noticed as we argued. I reached out, myself moving into his, and I was hit with thousands of memories and emotions, then pain like nothing else. Suddenly, nothing. Endless, infinite nothing. Barely conscious enough to think and only endless existence. Then, a crack. A small window of feeling. Stimulation, then suddenly, awakening! Life, sight, touch, different than before, of course, but something, anything that wasn’t nothing. I understood. 

I returned to reality, his own eyes locked on something far away. We locked eyes, smiled and gave each other the biggest hug. We spoke over each other, each apologizing for not understanding, for not listening. We both sunk back into our form below, and lived the rest of our life as one being. First taking turns, learning about each other, then being able to switch nearly instantly, to the point of becoming almost the same person. 

Then I woke up

[darkpetal16]

Can we see anything about the Jujutsu story? I'm so excited to see all the chaos!!

Sure thing! I'll take some scenes from chapter one. They haven't been edited yet and I don't have a beta so please forgive the typos / lack of description.

April 13th, 2000

Éclosion was a town of over 25,000 citizens in France. It was a suburb a few hours from Paris, and was known as one of the safer towns in France.

On April 13th, in the year 2000, the entire population of Éclosion instantly died from an “unknown” cause.

To most of the world, it was a bizarre tragedy, something to be marked down as an unsolved mystery for the history books. Each citizen had simultaneously suffocated within a few minutes of being exposed to… something.

Something that could not leave behind a physical trace of its existence yet was so overwhelming it simultaneously strangled over 25,000 living beings within Éclosion.

To a very small group of people, they knew the truth.

That town did not die by ordinary means, rather, from the sheer spiritual pressure exerted by a very dangerous being.

To that small group of people, they assumed it was the work of a curse.

Curses were created when cursed energy leaked from humans as a result of their human emotion. Cursed energy would build up in areas like sediment until it is strong enough to manifest a form. They were known to be lethal when left alone.

Populated locations such as schools and hospitals are hot spots for creating curses because many negative emotions were associated with those places. The same concept applies humanity's collective fear and hatred. An image of fear shared by the masses can create a powerful curse even if the subject was not real, such as famous monsters or ghosts. The negative emotions that humanity directed at that singular fear would cause it to manifest as a curse and in time… a cursed spirit.

Cursed spirits’ bodies are entirely made up of cursed energy--or spiritual energy. Their metaphysical existence made it impossible for normal humans to perceive or touch them.

Only a small group of humans were able to interact with cursed spirits, and in turn, combat them.

They were known as Jujutsu Sorcerers.

Jujutsu Sorcerers formed a society over the past thousands of years to work in the shadows to supress curses in an effort to protect humanity. All Jujutsu Sorcerers were trained in their youth at one of the two Jujutsu educational facilities in either Tokyo or Kyoto in Japan. At those facilities, they were taught how to utilize their own cursed energy in order to exorcise cursed spirits.

After graduating, alumni Sorcerers who remain aligned with the schools typically used one of the two facilities as a home base. Those facilities served as the cornerstone for the Jujutsu Sorcerer community. They mediated issues, assigned missions, and officially established a payroll for all their employed exorcists. The higher-ups were in charge of the schools and by extension all Jujutsu sorcerers.

Sorcerers would be dispatched wherever they found a gathering of cursed spirits. They were dispatched based on how strong they are in comparison to the spirit they face. The jujutsu society would rank spirits--and Sorcerers--like so:

Grade 4 - The weakest; a tire iron is plenty to deal with it.

Grade 3 - Slightly harder than Grade 4; handgun or something of similiar power recommended.

Semi-Grade 2

Grade 2 - An average Jujutsu sorcerer would not come out unscathed.

Semi-Grade 1

Grade 1 - “Even a tank might be insufficient.”

Special Grade 1

Special Grade - “Cluster bombs might work.”

For reasons not yet known to the Jujutsu community, curses and Sorcerers were most commonly found in Japan. While some could crop up in other countries, it was exceedingly rare.

That meant only a handful of Sorcerers were dispatched on rotation to monitor countries outside of Japan.

For example, France.

There were only three Sorcerorors stationed in France and they would handle the curses and Curse Users that appeared in France.

Three Sorcerers.

Who, at best, could handle a Grade 1 spirit.

But on April 13th that year something truly horrific happened.

A curse that had simultaneously slaughtered thousands of civilians within minutes of being born. Its mere presence could be felt by the Sorcerors not only in France, but in the surrounding countries across Europe.

It was only felt for five minutes, and then it vanished.

And so while the majority of the world was in a panicked frenzy over the mysterious massacre, the Jujutsu world was in a different kind of panic.

For a spirit that went beyond their measurement system had just been born… and they had no way of dealing with it.

.

<Skipping a scene here to avoid spoilers>

.

(Lilly - April 13th, 2000)

Again.

Again.

Again.

Again.

Lilly stared in grim resignation at the hanging corpse. The woman didn’t even reach her thirties before throwing in the towel. The body swayed side by side, still warm. Still leaking. The woman hadn’t hung herself from far up enough to snap her neck, so she strangled slowly and painfully.

Dumbass, Lilly thought, finding it hard to scrounge up sympathy for the woman.

Woman could have saved herself the painful death if she just chugged sleeping pills with wine.

But people that desperate to flee reality rarely thought that rationally.

“Geh,” Lilly gasped, clutching at her head as another burst of pain shot through her. She was blinded, her vision going completely white at the influx of memories.

She fell to her knees, struggling to breathe from the intense pain. Her body quaked and trembled, unable to cope with the weight of her soul.

Too many memories. Too many lives. Too many deaths.

If she could forget then the body would carry on without needing her entire soul to be there. She could rest a bit more. She could sleep in death’s kind arms--

But, no.

Again.

Again.

She woke up again in a body too small and immature to handle the weight of her memories.

Lilly was what many referred to as an old soul.

It was not that her soul was older than the others around her, more so that her soul tended to retain the memories and knowledge of her previous lives.

Whereas death granted most souls a clean slate before their next life, Lilly was not permitted the same courtesy.

She was, mockingly, a Blessed being.

The pain subsided, the small body quivering.

How old am I now? Lilly wondered. Which world is this? Where--?

Panting, the old soul glanced around the house. Most of it looked like an average house on Earth from the early 2000s or late 1900s. None of it was in disarray so probably not apocalyptic.

Not completely normal though, Lilly thought, feeling how sensitive her spiritual energy was in her current body.

If was born in a powerless world, she wouldn’t have woken up. The fact that she woke up meant there was something about that world that made it special.

Maybe a Hero will be born here? Will a Story happen?

Her head throbbed again, her soul and energy aching from the strain of being awoken in a premature body. Lilly stumbled around the house, every so often feeling another spike of her insides burning.

It was not too dissimilar to swallowing lava. On top of the pain, she was nauseous, unbearably hot, and had significant difficulty in trying to focus on what was in front of her. Every step was a milestone. Her soul yearned to burst out of the fragile body, to preemptively rejoin death.

Not yet. I woke up here for a reason. There’s always a reason, Lilly thought. She fumbled around the house, searching for anything that could give her a better idea of where she was.

No computer. I think I see a landline phone, though, Lilly thought.

When she went to use it, however, only silence could be heard. She frowned, then hesitantly moved to flick on the lights.

Nothing happened.

Uwa… did I accidentally fry the tech trying to contain my energy? Lilly wanted to groan.

She hated being reborn in tech-sensitive worlds. If her spiritual energy was too overwhelmign for the technology, it became such a hassle. It meant she had to consciously filter, repress, and refine her energy any time she had to use it when around technology.

Whatever.

Time to find a neighbor then, she thought.

Stepping outside the house, Lilly found a bizarre scene. There was a mailman who collapsed right at the door, and judging from how still he was, she could tell he wasn’t breathing.

Lilly stared at the dead body. She looked up and found several crashed cards and more dead bodies.

Oh.

“Oops,” she said.

.

<Skipping several scenes & time skip>

.

March 8, 2001

Lilly was minding her own business the following day. Yuuta was swaddled and placed in a baby wrap carrier that Lilly tied around herself. She kept his head well supported, it rested in the crook of her neck.

It had been a while since she had repeatedly cast so many illusionary and compulsion spells. She knew it couldn’t be helped--she was in the body of a seven-year old, of course the adults wouldn’t take her too seriously.

She had finished authenticating his birth certificate, adoption papers, and was on her way to handle funeral arrangements for his mother. Lilly had already made a few tentative and brief ventures into the world to steal (shamelessly) steal money so she had cash on hand in case the woman hadn’t made prior plans for herself--which guessing by how optimistic she was, Lilly assumed the answer was no.

Yuuta was an easy crier, which made what would have been a thirty-minute errand into a two-hour errand since a lot of that time was spent soothing the infant.

Lilly could feel he had more spiritual energy inside him than some of the adults she had previously encountered, but it was still growing.

If her hunch was correct and he was a protagonist--or antagonist--then she figured his energy would only continue to grow.

Maybe I should start feeding him some of mine? Lilly pondered. If she doubled or tripled the raw power of someone important, what would Fate do? Would it increase the power levels of everyone else to match, or would it give away under her pressure?

She didn’t know the story--if there was one in that world--so she had no way of knowing what to anticipate. She could only catch the common signs and draw her own predictions from her past experiences.

Let’s find out, Lilly thought.

<Scenebreak>

Daiki Choki was had recently completed his mission to vanquish an A-Grade Curse at a nearby graveyard. It had gone much smoother than he anticipated, and the Jujutsu Sorcerer was looking forward to his pay.

As he was leaving the graveyard, however, he felt something… odd.

It was indescribable. A sensation he had never encountered.

Similar… very similar… to encountering a powerful Curse, but…

It was a Curse, yet it was not.

It clearly had a presence. He felt an uncomfortable heat wash over him, as if the thing was projecting an aura of fire, but it was not malicious. Curses were filled with malevolent bloodlust, but what he felt lacked that intensity.

It was still dangerous, that heat.

Perhaps not directly evil, but…

If he had to put it into words, it was as if he had stumbled across a forest fire. The fire held no ill-will, but it was still a dangerous force that if left unchecked would devour the entire forest.

Daiki did not feel that it was especially powerful, however, so he made his way over to it.

To his surprise, it took the form of a small girl holding something in a budle of cloth. She was entering the funeral parlor.

Daiki frowned. Curses had never looked human before.

Suppose there’s always a chance it’s possessing her corpse, Daiki thought. He may not have encountered that specific scenario before, but he didn’t see a reason why it couldn’t happen.

Curses weren’t human, but they were tricky by nature.

Daiki lingered outside the mortician’s office, wondering if he would need to follow after the curse. He hated fighting near civilians, but--

The Curse left, as if sensing something was wrong.

But that’s silly, thought Daiki.

It headed straight past the building, making its way to the graves behind. Daiki followed behind it, slowly pulling his gun.

The Curse stopped, turning around to face Daiki. Its eyes were a vibrant red.

“Why are you focusing on me?” it asked.

Oddly articulate for a curse, the Sorcerer thought, raising his gun and taking aim. He smirked. “Don’t worry about it, Curse.”

“Curse? What--?”

He fired, and then his whole world tilted upside down. He hadn’t even felt it happening, let alone seen it, but somehow his head had been chopped off his body the moment he pulled the trigger. The Curse, who had been several steps ahead of him, was suddenly crushing his gun in her bare hand, scowling at him.

“If I had let that gone off, you woulda woken him,” she scolded the decapitated head. “Rude.”

[lizacstuff]

SCK Asks: Episode 38

(asks under the cut)

Anonymous said: happy edser just HITS different. maybe it's because we've been so deprived of them together and blissful, it's such a joy to watch. i had a silly grin on my face during all their scenes. sure the tumor cloud is looming over our heads, but this episode only laid the foundation for that and then went into romcom mode, which i really appreciated because we've been bogged down for SO LONG with heaviness, it was nice to just take a breather.

OMG! Yes, all of this. And I’m not sure if it’s happy Edser that hits different, or if it was whatever magic and sparkle these writers injected into this episode that made it hit different.  

The magic was BACK. The sparkle was BACK. These writers took the most ridiculous scenario idea (these two famous architects deciding to solve a murder) and just made it sing. I grinned through the whole thing and laughed out loud, A LOT. 

This was the first episode in ages where I wasn’t watching the clock and waiting for some uncomfortable or unpleasant moment or scene to occur. Instead watching was pure joy and no anxiety, even with a tumor diagnosis. 

There was so much good Edser in this episode it’s hard to know what to talk about. I loved every moment they were on screen together. 

Anonymous said: I have to hand it to you, you said that the reason they were doing this pregnancy story is so that we could find out that Selin and Serkan never slept together. ngl I wanted her to suffer more, but as long as she’s gone I’m fine with her punishment being the humiliation of having to admit that in front of Eda. 

Ha! Yes, I have said that all along, and I’ve never been more relieved to be right. They really went the extra mile with having Selin spell out that it hadn’t happened.  With the English subs it almost sounded like they had never, ever had sex, even before.  If so, I could actually believe it, their prior relationship seemed to be very business like, like they were each other’s safe, convenient date to business and family functions, and it wasn’t emotional or physical for him. 

After the gross story around Selin, and how much damage she did and how much she got away with, this was not nearly enough comeuppance to sate my thirst for her pain. These writers started this story and introduced Selin’s role in it, so it’s not like they 100% inherited something they had nothing to do with. However, between Bige’s limited availability due to her father passing, Sarp Can having covid, and the way the other writers drug it into the ground, I’m also just happy it’s over and will deal with this being all we get, plus, while she didn’t get punished adequately, she did take her lumps. It’s humiliating that Serkan went around acting incredulous to everyone who would listen that she could be pregnant because he never touched her, even while she was his fiancé. I mean that’s a shrinker. Can you imagine agreeing to marry a man who you knew didn’t want to touch you? Everyone now knows her sad, pathetic desperation to have him under any circumstances. Yikes. 

And as you say, she then had to stand in front of Eda and Serkan and admit he didn’t touch her. Admit that Serkan never wanted her, and it’s humiliating that everyone at Art Life knows what she did and thinks she’s a monster. Serkan finally knows she’s an awful manipulator who tried to trick him, and in the end she gets an unplanned pregnancy with a man who doesn’t love her and whom she doesn’t love.  So it’s not like she’s winning by any stretch of the imagination. 

(Though I really wish everyone knew (mostly Serkan and Eda) that she sabotaged Eda’s presentation. It’s important for the characters to know that she can’t be trusted professionally as well as personally... but oh well.)

Anonymous said: Two things: 1) I kinda love it even more that they got the tattoos before he found about the illness.. idk why but it was even MORE romantic. Also does this mean they're kinda sorta engaged again since the reason she said no in the first place was Selin? and 2) I need more of that "ring for love" bell ASAP. My jaw actually dropped when he lifted her up since we were deprived of it in 26.. please more breaking of family structures!!

Oh I agree, I found it very romantic they went and got the tattoos and the only impetus was their desire to have a symbol of their love. I already love those tattoos so much, and I love that they sat their designing them together. They really do signify the ultimate commitment. 

I’m not sure if they’re engaged or not. Maybe they’re in a place where it’s obvious they’re going to get married, they both know they’re going to get married, but we’re still going to get one more proposal to make it official?  

As for the ring for love bell, when and where did he get that!? Hee. And yes to more breaking of the Turkish family structure. That lift and twirl through the living room was... HOT. And it was just so effortless, there are just no words at times for how good Hande and Kerem are, I’ve really never seen anything like it. They don’t really have time to rehearse on set, or limitless takes or the time to really block and perfect things, but they’re just so good together they make magic happen every time they’re on screen.  Amazing. Enjoy this kids, because you probably won’t see anything like it again. 

Anonymous said: With the nature of these shows, Eda and Serkan will not a blissful happily ever after without something hanging over there heads or some new drama until the show actually ends. So if the new angst is Serkan's potential illness, I'm down for the potential angst it'll create.. it's already a good sign that, although he hasn't told her about it yet, he's not pushing her away in fear, but instead the opposite. I also don't think, and really hope not, him keeping it secret rn won't cause trouble.

Yes, I like that even with that heavy health news hanging over the episode, it was still light and funny and romantic and had that old sparkle. That tells me that they’re going to strike the right tone with this story which seems to be a very carpe diem thing with Serkan. 

It didn’t bother me that he didn’t tell her. First, he told the doctor that he didn’t want anyone to know until he had a diagnosis. That makes sense, why worry her, or any of them, before they know.  I’m sure I would feel different if he was pushing her away because of the diagnosis, but since he’s holding her close and just seems to want to spend time with her, without that heaviness hanging over her head, I’m okay with it. 

Also, as seen in the new fragman, if this story is an excuse to get them out of the office and put them in all sorts of scenarios together it would otherwise be hard to justify, bring it on.  Let’s see how far down the list of things to do they can get! 

Anonymous said: i know no one reaaaally cares because they're not most people's favorite side characters, but it's really much nicer to watch aydan and ayfer scenes now that they're both on "team edser" and have become really good friends. i swear, the AAA trio scenes were so unbearable to watch when they were fighting over him and i was fast forwarding through all of them.. at least i can sit through team "united" aydan/ayfer scenes.

They’re actually enjoyable scenes now! I love that they’ve become actual true friends, best friends really, and along with Seyfi I love their little trio.  Love that Seyfi and Ayfer were being so supportive about Aydan rekindling something with Kemal.  And I agree that we can root for them when they’re working for Edser’s well-being and happiness.  I just hope Aydan doesn’t do something stupid if there begins to be some question about Serkan’s parentage. 

Anonymous said: the scooby doo gang ending had me laughing so hard i was tearing up when more and more people kept sneaking in and eda and serkan were getting more and more exasperated. erdem accidentally using flash took me tf out lmao. i love when sck does comedy with the whole cast and not just the usual "comedy" characters.. they're some of my favorite scenes! both "asking for the girl" scenes come to mind.

You could see Erdem using the flash coming from a mile away, but that still didn’t blunt the comedy when he actually did it.  So funny. Also Engin not recognizing Eda, imagine him thinking Serkan is there with some rando woman.  I also love the full cast comedy scenes, they are so much fun and really should be utilized as often as possible. 

The scene where Edser walk back into the house and Aydan and Kemal were there paying their respects had me screech-laughing! So so so funny. Both sides being incredulous that the other was there and wanting answers!  I also enjoyed that Serkan obviously put Erdem in charge of Kemal’s project, because he wants that project to go away. Unfortunately for Serkan, I think it’s going to take more than Erdem to drive Kemal away.  

Anonymous said: Everyone is saying serkan planned the whole thing, do you buy into that? Idk would he really put everyone in a gunpoint situation where they don’t know it’s fake? Cause that’s some potentially trauma inducing stuff. Also I have no idea where they’re going with this, since it’s been a 4 day break from set which is kind of worrying. And do you know why Melisa wasn’t in the ep? I know Sarp can got Covid but wasn’t Melisa posting with cast members on her story throughout the week?

Wow, this is a lot of negative energy and fretting after a really good episode. Deep breath. Since you sent this, we know that Hande and Kerem have been shooting for 2 full days at a romantic looking beach location for 39, so it looks like Edser has some sort of mini-getaway. I don’t see any reason to be concerned about the 4 day break last week. (now the fragman’s out, hopefully that puts your mind at ease)

No idea why Melissa wasn’t in the ep, other than the way the ep was structured with the supporting characters, if she had to miss the ArtLife shooting day then I can see that they would have had to write her out of the full episode, because most of their scenes were there and it set up everything for the rest of the episode. So perhaps she was in quarantine for a Covid exposure, maybe she was legit sick/injured (she has had a foot thing) or maybe she had a conflict for that one shooting day. No idea, but I don’t think it’s anything to worry about.  Also her absence gave us Ferit/Melo scenes and I’m 100% behind that, give us more of those! 

As far as if Serkan planned the whole thing, he did look pretty smug and relaxed while sitting there at the end, but he also wasn’t planning for the whole group to tag along and make a mess, lmao. We’ll have to see. 

Anonymous said: Do you think bad ratings makes sck in danger of being cancelled or do you think high social media engagement keeps it safe?

Friends, I don’t know anything about the Turkish system, but it seems to me that SCK will either go through May or extend into summer and end then, regardless of the ratings. We shall see. As I’ve said before I’m not going to engage in the fretting and worrying and discussion on this topic because no fan really knows what they’re talking about and there is nothing we can do to change what will happen. So just enjoy the show while we can, the news on when it will end will come when it comes. 

[potatotrash0]

Your DR magic AU, hand it over 🤲

Okay I have two other anons and I’m just gonna split the character ideas among the three asks. I don’t quite have a plot thought out, and most of these characters’ concepts have only existed in my head up until now...bare with me skdjksjfkd

Mm I talked about them briefly in Prom’s ask? But here’s a more in-depth thing of the THH fighting styles.

Makoto is a mage-type. (I used fighter, support, and mage to describe the various adventurer types it’s temporary just roll with it) Again, he can’t really hold magic for very long? He’s got a large mana reserve but it’s hard to activate and harder to control, so he’s currently working on mastering the little bullets. In the future, I imagine large barrages of bullets would sort of circle around him like they would in the barrel of a gun.

He probably got in accidentally? I’m not entirely sure about this, but I think there’s an entrance exam for Reserve Courses and he was probably forced in on Komaru’s behalf for some reason.

He was basically running the entire time until the very end when he panicked and suddenly the entire field was wiped clean from him waving his arm. HPA saw that, decided that he was worth training, and put him into the Main Course. He doesn’t feel very good about getting in that way, but HPA isn’t exactly empathetic like he is. Again this is like one of three ways I think he could’ve gotten in with the rest of the cast because I’m indecisive skdjsjf

Kyoko is another mage-type, in general the Main Gangs of each game have various themes. THH’s trio has a magic theme, they all use magic. She doesn’t use a weapon, though I’m thinking her gloves act as a limiter of sorts?

As a general rule, more mana means less control, and being half-demon gives her a lot of it. Her gloves help her regulate her mana output so that she doesn’t use too much of it when attacking and tire herself out. Later in the timeline, I imagine there might be a scene where she takes them off and fights off some enemies to buy the rest of the class time to escape something? She would get trapped in the process, but I think this would happen after she’s worked with Makoto for a while and she would trust him enough to believe he would come back for her if she didn’t return.

Oh this isn’t related to her fighting style but on the topic of her being half-demon, that’s mainly because I thought it was boring for everyone to be human and I’m a big sucker for fantasy species so yeah. She’s a cambion.

She has purple-tinted skin, horns that curl up and are fairly close to her head, a thin pointed tail, pointed ears, her pupils are slitted, she’s got carnivore-style teeth, her nails are longer and sharper by default. Whenever she uses the full extent of her magic, her scleras turn dark purple and her irises turn white. Oh yeah her scars came from an accident she had when she was young where her magic got out of control and burned her hands. Her mom’s the demon by the way, for no particular reason, I just thought that the Kirigiris would stay human in this and I don’t know anything about her mom’s side of the family.

I just realized I never said Makoto’s race skdjks he’s human!! He and Komaru just happen to be a special case and have a lot of mana. Most other humans in this AU aren’t so lucky. (cough hinata cough cough)

Byakuya, again, uses magic. He’s the only one who uses a weapon in the Trio, he uses a staff specially made by the Togami family. He also knows how to use a sword and a bow.

I haven’t put too much thought into him, but I know for a fact that his adventuring outfit would have a big sweeping cape later in the timeline. In the beginning though, he just has a stupid expensive suit. The cape comes in later as he, Kyoko, and Makoto start to group up more and more.

I’ve decided that adventurers in this AU group up just as often as they go solo, and while Byakuya would initially be solo, he would deem Makoto and Kyoko strong enough to work with whenever they’re taking on a difficult job.

Groups would change to have matching designs the longer they’re partnered up, and capes/cloaks happen to be the THH Trio’s Thing, as in all three of them would have a cape/cloak of some sort. Byakuya because he’s pretentious, Makoto because he thinks it looks cool, and Kyoko because she uses the cloak for practical reasons like storing things and keeping a low profile when needed. Oh and Byakuya’s bloodline is of royal elven descent, their business is selling spellbooks, runestones, potions, reagents, any magical item you could think of.

Sayaka is a half-siren mage! She mostly uses charm and illusionary magic, as well as healing so that she can support her allies. Later on, she might learn water magic so she can actually deal damage as well. I haven’t decided on her weapon of choice, perhaps she uses a lyre or casts spells from a book. I’m also debating having her learn hand-to-hand combat instead of water magic?

I just like the idea of someone coming up and trying to challenge her, thinking they’ll beat her easily, and barely getting a hit in before she kicks their legs out from under them and tosses them over her shoulder like they weigh nothing. She deserves to take out people twice her size and be menacing, as a treat for the amount of disrespect she gets in the fandom. And I want her to take Leon down a peg because he definitely acts a little like a cocky frat boy sometimes.

Speaking of Leon, we’ve got our first fighter-type!!! I could have him use a baseball bat but that’s boring so I’m thinking he might utilize items as well as a weapon? Bombs or grenades that look like a baseball and explode on impact, baseballs that ignite when thrown and act as fire balls. Alas, I don’t think about him much so this is all just me throwing ideas to see what sticks.

Whatever the case, the main thing I know would happen is that he frequently gets help from Kazuichi and Miu because he just cannot for the life of him stop breaking his equipment. He’s reckless and rushes into battle and now that he doesn’t have Kanon to stop him from setting stuff on fire all the time, he gets detention a lot. (And no she isn’t into him like in canon, I refuse to acknowledge that she ever was.)

Chihiro......they can’t fight djfjsjfjjf. They specialize in making tech and weapons, and in the beginning, would mainly use robots that they programmed to support their allies. Though, they do end up training with Mondo, Sakura, and Aoi to help them become better at combat, and eventually they join everyone else on the front lines as a ranged fighter/support type.

Also, the robots would kinda follow them around like pets. Cute little guys that can also shoot lasers. The robots are powered by mana crystals and each one has a different personality and magic type! Sometimes they follow around different people, the electric one took a liking to Mondo and you’ll see it floating around while he works out. They’re buds.

On the topic of Mondo, he’s another fighter-type! He’s more hand-to-hand combat. A controlled berserker, if you will. Probably started out fighting guys in his hometown and progressed to clearing out monsters when Daiya got concerned about his temper? Perhaps. Maybe. I do not think about Daiya I apologize.

Oh wait hold on. I’m looking at his character art and he’s got a hammer.........it’s decided he uses a warhammer, the biggest one they’ve got, and it’s probably a mana-based weapon. Specifically electric. He and that lil robot wipe the battlefield with their opponents >:D

Taka is probably a fighter-type? I can’t for the life of me find where I read this, but apparently he’s really good at self-defense so I imagine he does hand-to-hand combat as well as sword-fighting for the Noble Paladin Aesthetic.

Hifumi was originally a mage-type, but upon second thought, I’m making him a support-type who uses items and potions and stuff! I like the idea of him making fun little bottles and potions themed after his favorite animes and mangas..........he also definitely helped everyone design their adventurer outfits. He’s the only reason that Makoto’s outfit isn’t boring as hell.

Celeste is, of course, a mage-type. She’s Miss Lolita of course I have to make her an ethereal magic user alright also I love her and I love mages let me have this skfjdkjf. As for her weapon, my first thought was her having playing cards that she throws HxH style?

Or she could summon goons to fight for her, playing into the whole loyal servant dream she has. They would be vaguely themed after the cards, so there would be a jack, king, queen, and joker, all of different magic types depending on the suit of the card she throws. Electric for a spade, fire for a heart, ice for a diamond, something along those lines.

I’m also considering having her little...finger armor thing? I’m thinking of having that cross into her magic, where she attacks with claw-like things formed out of mana. Of course she could also just. Use the cards to cast spells directly skdjksjfkhf

Sakura is definitely a fighter-type. Again, hand-to-hand style, but I imagine she’s more controlled and strategic than Mondo. I can’t see her using a weapon, so I guess she’s like one of the only characters to fight exclusively with fists.

Mukuro’s a ranged fighter-type, but she can also do melee. She uses magic-based guns, ones that shoot mana infused bullets. They have a variety of effects depending on the type of bullet and magic. (I’m not a gun person so take this with a grain of salt.)

Bullets that break apart might be laced with electric magic so that they can shock a target from several points, or fire magic if she’s aiming to start a fire quickly. Exploding bullets are usually used with fire magic, but she might switch to ice if she wants to create a barrage of ice shards for...some reason, I don’t know. There’s more combinations I could probably make, but I’m. Not here to spend an hour researching guns. Not right now at least, who knows what I’ll want info on in the future.

Mmmmmm I’m starting to lose patience here so forgive me for the shorter explanations. I might throw in a fun fact about them for ✨ flavor ✨

Junko’s a fighter/mage-type! She uses a scythe and laces the blade with magic. She could combine it with fire magic to create a flaming scythe and go nuts with it, or she could just channel general mana and slam the blade into the ground to create a big crack in the ground.

There’s about an 80% chance she gets several weapons later in the timeline. Her scythe, a spear, possibly a gun. Monokuma probably exists, I like to think Junko ran into a smarter monster and tamed it and kept it as a slightly feral pet.

Also, yes, she’s still a big adrenaline junkie who gets off on despair. If you see her fighting things she knows are out of her league, mind your business.....actually, call someone to help before she gets herself killed. Please.

I haven’t decided what Aoi will be just yet? I’m veering towards fighter/mage-type, she could use water magic and maybe a leg-based fighting style. Possibly judo or taekwondo. I.....do not have any ideas for her. However I do know that she and Sakura would have a bunch of combo moves together dkfjkejfkdjjd

Toko is a mage-type! She probably uses a book to cast spells from. Or just uses her hands. She would fight ranged, I don’t think she’d want to be up in the action. Too much stress for her, y’know? I

As for Syo, she fight differently than Toko! She technically uses dual swords, but the swords can also connect to create a giant pair of scissors. Again, this is just sort of a fun character thing, but she gets to hate Byakuya in this AU. They have arguments and get on each other’s nerves a lot, but I think the rest of the class usually separates them before anything serious happens.

At some point after Toko befriends Komaru, I like to think that Syo gets a proper fight scene with Byakuya where she rips into him. I don’t think Toko would want to hurt anyone though, even him, so Syo would probably leave him with a few minor cuts at most.

Afterwards, I think Byakuya would quiet down with the insults with Naegi and Kyoko’s requests. (Well. Naegi asked him to try and be nicer because he was worried that they might fight again. Kyoko just bluntly told him that he needed to stop being a jerk and start considering everyone else’s feelings.)

Skfksjfkdh ah. I also like to think Komaru and Toko were initially partnered up by HPA for a job. They were assigned to deal with a couple of school kids wreaking havoc on a nearby city with some monsters they semi-tamed?

But after finishing the job, they decided to partner up permanently on their own. They probably have a few combo moves that Komaru came up with, Toko tweaked them to make them actually possible with their skill set and weapons.

Hiro is...possibly a mage/support-type? He’s probably a bit cowardly and freaks out when on the front lines, but he can use a crystal ball to attack from afar. I’m also considering giving him tarot cards so that he can toss them and attack from several points at once?

Or the ball could shatter at some point during the story and he could just roll with it and spread the shards out during battle to attack from several points at once. They could also be used to create a magic cage of sorts, like electric fence but only electricity.

Okay that’s everybody oh my god. I have plenty more stuff about this au, this isn’t even half of it trust me lmao. I’m sorry about this being so long I didn’t realize it’d be this wordy!!!!!

[phcking-detective]

FOUND

Find Familiar: ch 1

Rating: E

Summary: Nines cast the spell Find Familiar, but instead of an animal, they accidentally summoned a werewolf. Gavin is just happy to have finally found his mate and start pack bonding with the half-elf wizard. His best idea for a fun bonding activity? Touching his dick of course!

***

Gavin wakes up with a warm, breathing body pressed against his own, and it's all he ever wanted.

Then reality seeps in like cold rain and he realizes it's just the one person, not a dog pile, because he doesn't have a pack. Only a wizard who maybe sort of magically owns him now.

So that's a great start to the morning.

He gets a stew started like he promised, once he finds some potatoes and carrots, one lonely haunch of meat in an icebox, and no spices beyond salt. There aren't many places to look, since the whole room is five, maybe six hundred square feet.

Gods. Gavin's a lone wolf living half-feral without a tent or even a fire half the time, and he still thinks this is pathetic.

He knows better than to touch any of the books scattered around—fucking wizards—so he doesn't try to clean anything while he waits for his new … boss? Alpha?? person, to wake up.

(He does risk moving a stack of papers to sit in front of the black leather collar on the desk. Not hidden. Just. Out of sight.)

"No celery?" the wizard asks.

Gavin bites down on a flinch and a few choice swears. Sweet Selûne shift him. Who the fuck goes from asleep to awake completely silent like that?

"No," he growls.

Nines blinks themself more awake. "Is your negative an agreement to my question or simply a negative?"

"Baby, I have no idea what the fuck you mean, but there's not any celery."

"Oh. Thank you."

The conversation ends there when he dishes out a bowl of stew, that Nines eats at their desk, one agonizingly slow bite at a time, almost as an afterthought as they work on creating papers and papers of writing.

Since the wizard is so absorbed in their scribbles they can barely notice food, Gavin strips down and takes a bath. The water runs hot straight out of the faucet, even without any signs of pipes. Sinking into a whole tub of it feels goddamn luxurious.

He's half-shifted before he even realizes, but Nines probably wouldn't notice he got out and swung his dick around like a propeller, so he doesn't force himself back. His hybrid form always feels better anyway, the best of both animals, with human hands and wolf senses, still able to stand and walk upright but with stronger muscles and thicker protective body hair.

He's still sunk down and amusing himself by blowing bubbles in the water with his near-snout when Nines finally surfaces for air on their own side of the tower.

"Gav—oh."

They turn around and blink at him. Gavin hunkers down lower in the water and prepares to force himself back, but even without actively poking the bond, he can tell there isn't any fear or revulsion from the wizard. He still pulls his snout of out the water and scents the air just to check, but … nothing.

"Good. Yes. Feel free to utilize any of the …" Nines pauses, stuck on the words. "Accommodations. Can you read?"

It's probably a fair question—especially since the answer is barely—but Gavin still hauls himself out of the bathtub and onto the sand pit so Nines will have to look at him. All the scars, the body hair almost thick enough to be a pelt, the way his bone structure is clearly halfway between one form and the other right now.

But instead of making the wizard flinch away and stop asking questions, Nines just grabs a different notebook and begins sketching him.

"Why?" Gavin growls out.

He can still speak, but just like his amount of literacy, the amount is barely. With lots of effort.

"Hmm?"

Nines looks up. Sort of. They lift their head at least, but their eyes stay focused down on their notebook, reluctantly dragged up at the very last second.

"Mm? Oh. Yes, here is your contract," they say.

They place the small stack of papers they'd written onto the dining table in the center of the room, then the two of them meet in the middle, each awkwardly taking a seat across from each other at the table, then staring at each other even more awkwardly.

"That is my brother's seat," Nines says.

Gavin raises an eyebrow but doesn't move his ass out of it. At least he put pants on before sitting down.

"I have never had another visitor," the wizard continues. "So. That has always been …"

They trail off, then grab their notebook and begin reading from it.

"My name is Nines. I am a wizard. I am thirty-two year half-elf. I do not have a gender. I use they-them pronouns. Pause for—"

They stop abruptly and look back up at him.

"… Gavin," he says. "I'm a fighter, thirty-six, werewolf. Born, not turned, so we don't really keep track of any races. You're either a wolf or you're not. Probably human though. Uh, he-him."

If they don't bother with human binary genders, maybe they'd understand just … switching genders? He thinks about it while Nines writes down what he'd said, like anything he says is actually important enough to be recorded.

Maybe he should let them get a little more attached to him before he tells them about the other crazy, evil wizard with a claim on him—and all the transformations they'd done on his body.

"Does your entire pack consist of born lycanthropes?" they ask, drawing him back into the conversation.

"Can just say wolves," Gavin grumbles. "And yeah. Haven't taken in a stray for a while."

No one does. That's why he's still—ugh, stop it. Fucking feeling sorry for himself.

"Is there a significant cultural difference between born and turned … wolves?"

Gavin stares at the wizard. Significant cultural difference, Selûne shift and collar him.

"Turned wolves don't have a pack," he finally says. "No one to share the mental load—most of the poor fuckers don't even know what's happening until they're already shifted and scared and starving. They've got just enough instinct to go back home, and then the screaming and running starts …"

He assumes he doesn't have to finish it from there. A hungry wolf sees something run, and they think prey, not child.

"I apologize if I ask simple questions," Nines states while still writing. "But I have never had the opportunity to meet a wolf in person, and so my knowledge is likely biased and incorrect. Is a coastal environment a suitable habitat for you?"

Gavin shrugs. "Sure. You gonna let me run around outside at some point?"

"Yes, of course. You may come and go as you please," Nines says. "How much land will your pack need? I do own the surrounding—"

His pack? Gavin stares at Nines as they ramble on about this land they own and how it's too rocky to support farming but has access to a cove, and the ensuing treaty with the local pod of merfolk, and—

And his pack. He has no idea what game the wizard is playing, but he never imagined it would include letting him "come and go as you please" and providing land for his—

"I don't have a pack," he blurts out.

Nines stops and blinks at him.

"Got kicked out."

He doesn't explain. It's impossible to explain just one thing, because it's all tangled together, in his mind, the words stuck in his throat. Refusing his pack's Alpha, bargaining to have his body changed and transformed, his womb scooped out so he could never be bred, never ever—

And where exactly that got him. They sit together in silence for a long, horrible moment.

"No one has need of a ninth child," Nines finally says.

"You really call yourself that?" Gavin asks in return, for lack of anything less dick-ish to say.

"Yes." Nines looks at him without any self-pity and factually adds, "It states all that most need to know. They do not need me, and I do not need them."

Gavin nods. "Fuck 'em."

"Yes. Well. I—" Nines stops and abruptly pushes the small pile of paperwork closer to his side of the table. "Here is your contract. It details what I … do need. And, expectations. I suppose the fifth clause is no longer necessary, unless you intend to create your own."

"My own … pack?" Gavin asks slowly.

"Yes."

He snorts. "I'm not going to run around and start turning people."

"Yes, that is included in the clause," Nines says. "Subsection A. Not to offend, but I thought it best to lay out a certain number of precautions first. B notes that you will be beholden to all the same laws as any other citizen, and C states you will make adequate arrangements for the full moon with myself or Knight Commander Anderson."

Gavin pulls a face at the rank. That shit's almost definitely a paladin. No sense of humor, holier than thou, and allergic to critical thinking. Just because you pledged allegiance to a deity society deemed "Good" doesn't actually mean literally everything you do is always going to be right or kind or morally just.

"He is also a lycan—" Nines stops and corrects, "A turned wolf, you called it? If expecting the two of you to … have commonalities … is unreasonable, then the subsection can be adjusted accordingly. The point is merely that you arrange for a safe and secure location each month."

"Yeah, we're not going to sniff each other's butts and be best friends," Gavin tells him. "It's probably how you feel about sorcerers and warlocks. Magic just looks like magic to me, but—yeah."

He stops when he sees Nines's face collapse into itself in the purest form of affronted disgust he's ever seen. This time, he can't stop a chuckle before it slips out.

"I can just stay here though?" he asks.

Nines unfurls their face enough to nod. "Yes. My power may be my own, achieved through my own studies, but I was sent to the same monastery as my twin. I acknowledge you have been sent by my patron deity, and I will fulfill my responsibilities to you thusly."

Gavin's eyebrows shoot up. "You're religious?"

"I worship Selûne," Nines answers.

Gavin stares at the wizard.

"Children born under the full moon often have enhanced magical ability," they explain. "She is also the goddess of navigation, quests, and all who work by night. It was the battle with her own twin that caused the formation of Mystral, the goddess of all magic. Many arcane users still worship her as such."

"And werewolves," Gavin says as how this shit all happened clicks into place.

"Your duties outlined in the contract." Nines stops and clears their throat. "Every power has a price, and mine was enacted at my birth. I have always needed certain accommodations. I realize now a mere animal would not be enough to serve as my familiar, yet a person has never been summoned before. A familiar that is both animal and person, however …"

Gavin nods at the stack of papers. "So am I your familiar or your employee?"

"Well, both," Nines answers. "You are magically bound to me, but you obviously are not a simple animal. I have made adjustments due to these extenuating circumstances, but this is a standard contract for all minions, assistants, and others employed by wizards."

He snorts. "Do I have a union?"

"Yes, subsection E, although you will need to opt-in," Nines replies, very sincerely.

Gavin taps the top paper to make a point when he asks his next question, and the paper suddenly yells the word "HEREFORE" at him.

"Oh, my apologies." Nines takes the stack from him and scribbles a few marks in the top corner. "There, the volume should be properly adjusted."

Gavin cautiously slides the papers back over, being careful to only touch the sides of the stack. He takes the first page off the top and pokes his name, one of the few words he recognizes.

"Gavin," the paper announces.

"I have paperwork I must complete to officially register you as both my familiar and my new minion," Nines tells him. "I trust you can be left to your own devices to review our contract?"

"Yeah," Gavin says.

"Very good."

Nines gets up and returns to their desk. Still no collar, only … this contract. Gavin runs his finger along the first line.

"The entity known as Gavin, herefore referred to as THE FAMILIAR, will enter into a magically binding contract with Nines, herefore referred to as THE WIZARD, to serve in the capacities of both a FAMILIAR and a MINION, as outlined by the Wizard Coalition of …"

***

Gavin nuzzles into his bed and groans. Three days of barely stopping to hunt and sleep to get here, and now it's been another three days of slowly figuring each other out.

Which hasn't been bad or anything. He got to run around outside, do a few laps around the borders of Nines's land. Cold, wet, and rocky, but he has to admit, he's kind of digging the melodramatic sea-side vibe. The air smells like salt and storms all the time, crowding out all the memories of soft earth and dense forest.

And he's got a contract. A "boss." That's the word Nines wants to use, so Gavin says that, but they both know he means Alpha.

It's good to have a job, food, and a bed, blah blah blah, he's really grateful and all, it's just—

Maybe not everyone has them or wants to indulge in them, but Gavin does for both.

And it's been nearly a week.

"Nines," he finally says.

He pokes at their bond too for good measure. The wizard won't pay attention to him unless he does. They'll look up and point their face at his face, but somehow their hand will keep writing in the scroll and they won't hear a goddamn word he says.

Even with the mental prodding, Nines barely turns their head. "Hmm?"

"I need to jack off."

Nines keeps writing for half a second before they blink and actually look at him. "… now?"

Gavin half-shrugs, still laying down. "I mean, tonight, yeah."

He's a werewolf using testosterone cream—kept in a jar in his coin purse, which was much more important to enchant to shift with him than shoes—who just formed a mental pack bond again. Full moon already past or no, his hormones are screaming at him that he needs to fuck.

But that's probably not Nines's idea of a fun bonding activity.

"Do you have adequate lubrication?" Nines asks, then continues with narrowed eyes before he can even reply, "Do not use my spell components."

Gavin barks out a laugh. "What—I'm gonna jack it with oblex ooze? That'd melt my fucking dick off!"

"Yes, it would."

He pauses. "Do … you know that for sure?"

Nines sighs. Deeply. "I attended an academy meant to train paladins, clerics, and perhaps the odd druid."

"All the most repressed spellcasters, huh?"

Nines doesn't deny it. Gavin snorts, imagining all the magically-inclined tithe-children being told to keep themselves pure so they can be properly donated to the gods turning into magically-inclined teenagers hit with guilt and libido in equal measure—and all the idiot fuckery they probably got up to without any actual education about their bodies.

"Do you have adequate lubrication?" Nines asks again. "I do not keep supplies for that on hand."

"You don't keep supplies or you don't uh, keep anything on hand?" Gavin wiggles his eyebrows.

Nines flushes and glares like they're still a prefect at that academy. "I—that is not—"

Gavin raises his own hands to prove they're above the sheets. "If that's not any of my business, sure. Figured that, honestly. Which is why I'm telling you that I've got needs, but I can just go downstairs if you want."

"Downstairs?" Nines frowns less furiously.

"That little entranceway at the door is large enou—"

"I'm not going to send you out into the hall," Nines says, like that's what will make them clutch their pearls in shock. "You can stay in your own bed."

"Yeah?" Gavin gives the wizard a once over. "I'm good with that. So good. But what I'm willing to do with pack and what you think is appropriate for a roommate probably isn't the same thing."

Nines's frown turns more calculating, like they're correcting the runes in a spell. "We are discussing you staying in your bed to masturbate while I continue my studies, correct?"

"… yeah?"

"Are you going to call me names, attempt to touch me, or—"

"No, no," Gavin rushes to reassure them. "I can just …"

He moves his hand down and cups himself, just to demonstrate that he's only going to be touching his own body, before he remembers that's not socially acceptable around humans either. Nines only cocks their head to the side though, a mild curiosity leaking through their mental bond.

And fuck, just his hand feels good right now. It's been nearly a goddamn week.

"Do you have adequate lubrication?" Nines asks.

Gavin shivers under the sound of their voice. "Don't need it. Get wet enough myself."

He feels the bond pulse again with that academic sort of curiosity, like Nines is going to start taking notes on him again while he jacks off. He pushes his trousers down, moving slowly enough to give his boss plenty of time to look away. He isn't wearing smalls of course. They'd just be another piece he'd have to pay to get enchanted.

Nines eyes his cock like they might sketch it in exact anatomical detail.

Gavin doesn't mention how he got it—his bargain and the Collar, the collapsed tower, the vows of vengeance—he'll get around to confessing it all eventually. But in the meantime: a fun bonding activity.

Gavin grips his cock and gives it a few strokes. Nines blinks in a way that's more like shutting their eyes repeatedly. He exhales slowly and makes himself stop, although he does still keep his hand held loosely around the base.

"If you don't want echoes, you'll have to wall off your mind on your own end," he advises Nines. "I'm uh … a little too busy here to concentrate."

"Echoes," Nines repeats.

Shit, right. Human. Doesn't seem to specialize in any divination or enchantment magic—so they probably don't have any experience being inside someone else's head.

"Yeah, that's why I offered to," He jerks his chin at the door. "Distance helps, some."

Nines does that tiny little head tilt again. "May I observe?"

Gavin licks his lips. "Yeah."

"May I ignore you?" they ask next.

"Uh, sure?"

He doesn't have any human hangups about nudity, but he's not going to whip his dick out and waggle it at anyone who doesn't want to see it. Jacking off in the same room is probably already pushing it, but then again, the rules seem to be different in boarding schools and barracks and sometimes bars but sometimes not—humans have so many weird fucking rules.

"Then," Nines says. "You do as you please, and I will do the same."

"Works for me."

Gavin gives his cock another squeeze, and Nines turns back to their scroll. Yeah, he's a little disappointed about that, but it's enough just to have his pack in the same room and know he's not alone.

Since the wizard isn't watching anyway, Gavin rolls over and shoves a blanket down around his crotch. He has a whole nest of them, all piled up on top of a mattress Nines insisted he have. They'd tried to bring in an actual bed, but it's just weird, sleeping so high up and away from the ground for no reason.

He gets a soft little mound built up and grips himself again through the blanket. Even if Nines makes him wash it after, this will make his bed smell like him and home and—

Gavin buries his face into his pillow and inhales. It still has Nines's scent on it. All the blankets do too, so now they'll smell like the both of them, like pack.

He feels a fresh jab of interest spike back through their bond and guesses Nines is watching him again. Maybe jacking off right in front of them like that was a little too much, but with everything mostly out of view now, they're back to curious again.

It only takes him a minute to build up a steady rhythm, rutting into the blankets and his own hand. He groans into the pillow and hears Nines breathe in sharply.

Echoes. He grins and keeps going.

He doesn't know what kind of needs Nines has or wants to fulfill, but he likes the thought of making them feel good. Would like it even better if he could crawl over between the wizard's legs and find out what they're working with by licking it.

"Gavin …"

The wolf whines in response to his name in his Alpha's mouth. He squeezes his hand tighter at the base of his cock against the knot trying to plump up there, just in case Nines wants it.

"Yeah, baby?" Gavin manages to growl.

"Oh."

Nines breathes the word, and Gavin can feel a small simmer of arousal bounce back and forth between them—this time from the wizard's end, not his.

"Does it always feel like this?" they ask.

He groans in answer, the only response he has to the soft wonder in their voice. He knows humans' senses are weak and dull, that they don't get hit with lust and frenzy the same way wolves do.

But hearing the awe in his human's voice the first time they feel it too makes him want to show them how good it can really feel.

"Yeah," he bites out. "Better with … you."

His canines get in the way of the words, the partial shift rippling through his body. He's never had particularly good control of it, so there's no stopping the change now when his blood's up.

"Are you wet?"

The question stabs through him. Gavin loses his rhythm with a whimper, nearly overcome with the instinct to crawl over and show his Alpha, present his cock or his mouth or whatever hole they want to use.

And he is wet. He can feel it dripping down the length of his cock, more pooling at the head, smearing into the palm of his hand.

"Uh huh," he pants.

Gavin bites down into the blankets as he ruts harder, but a sharply clicked tongue brings him back to awareness. He turns his head to the side and blearily stares up at Nines as he continues fucking his own hand.

"I would like to hear you," Nines says.

"Baby," Gavin breathes in reply.

Nines closes their eyes and shivers. Well, if they like his voice …

"Wanna lick you," he says. "Suck on you and make you—ahhh, make you feel good."

"I—" Nines stares at him with wide eyes.

"Shh, shhh." Gavin keeps making the noise in a low mumble as he slows down his pace into a dirty grind. "Gotcha baby, get my mouth on your nipples an' your neck, your mouth, make you wet too."

"I don't usually like to be touched," Nines admits.

Gavin's brain snatches onto the word usually, but he doesn't want to push. There's some shit he knows for sure he won't ever do, but then there's a lot more he just doesn't know if he really doesn't want, or maybe only in the right situation, with the right pronouns and body parts, the right person, but then how is he supposed to know if he wants it enough to try it if he won't know if he actually wants it until he's already tried it?

So that's a whole big nest of wyverns, and neither of them need to try to sort it out right this moment.

"Can give you this though, yeah?" Gavin asks.

He twists his wrist on the upstroke against the head, but then stops and holds completely still. Nines tries to strangle a whine in their throat at the lost sensation.

"… yes."

That confession sounds much better. Gavin grins at the wizard and starts thrusting again, still looking at them. Their long eyelashes and shoulder-length hair almost soften their face into pretty, but then thin lips, a straight nose, and strong jaw sharpen the effect back up again. And the ice-blue eyes set against pale skin and black hair just sends it all careening past beautiful or handsome into big words about being scary-haunting-magical that the wolf can't think of right now.

He can feel his orgasm building up, drowning in those eyes staring right back at him, but he squeezes harshly at the base of his cock. The sensation strangles at the root, like the little moans Nines won't let escape their mouth.

He probably shouldn't tempt it, but he sinks into the feeling of tightening and loosening his grip around his knot and the waves of pleasure that sends rolling through them both.

"You," Nines says but can't seem to find anymore words.

"Mmgff." Gavin huffs into the pillow and tries to make his own words work. "Good, feels good. Sorry. Won't knot if—fffuck."

If that scares you. Disgusts you. Bores you, to be stuck listening to him come and come and come while the exasperated wizard is trying to focus on their studies.

He pries his eyes back open when he hears footsteps and stares up at Nines paused in an awkward-half crouch over him, like they're not sure if they're allowed to touch. His tail makes the decision for both of them by immediately wagging in anticipation of pets and attention.

"May I touch you?" Nines still asks.

Gavin nods past a desperate whine. A hand slides up the back of his neck first, while another soothes over his bare flank. Must've kicked off his trousers at some point. All that matters is the hand on the back of his neck, pinning him down, holding him place, exactly where he should be for his Alpha.

His tail wags harder.

"May I see?"

The hands urge him to roll over, and he does, without hesitation, like a dog showing his belly when his master comes home.

Laying on his back like this, he knows the partial shift is even more apparent. Just about everything humans think they know is bullshit, but his hybrid form really does look like those shitty illustrations of big scary wolf men.

And that's without the thick, hairy cock jutting out between his legs.

He's proud of it, wanted it, needed it, but that was for himself. He wasn't trying to impress anyone, and he's not expecting a human to like it.

"Does your phallus typically have this appearance, or is it increasingly engorged due to your partial transformation?" Nines asks.

Gavin stares up at them and tries to impress through their mental bond just how many fucking words that was.

Nines flushes and tries again. "Does it get bigger when you shift?"

"Yeah," he says. "Touch me?"

He holds his cock slightly out toward the wizard in offering. Nines hums in consideration but doesn't make any move toward it. That's fair.

"Do you knot without …" They struggle with the words again. "Sex?"

Gavin strokes himself, tugging upward and pause at the head. It leaves his knot free below, not quite there yet, but noticeably swollen under the attention.

"Can. Sometimes."

"Will you show me?"

Nines stares down at him and meeting their eyes is like looking at the moon. Humans want so badly to sort everything into Good or Bad, even the deities they worship. But some things aren't good or bad, only intense.

Gavin nods, mouth slack and panting. He wraps his left hand around his knot to work it while his right keeps stroking the rest. Nines's eyes sweep up and down him like a search light scanning for a rogue.

"Feel … good?" he asks between pants.

Maybe he's already asked, but it's hard to think right now. He tugs at the bond, trying to pull Nines's mind closer to him, get them to come down out of the sky and feel it with him. The wizard's hands clench into the robes draped over their kneeling legs.

Then they open their eyes again, and Gavin could swear their irises really have turned a silvery-blue.

"Behave."

The order thunders down their bond and into his chest. Gavin groans, the tightness coiled inside him easing another measure. He's not quite ready to unspool, but maybe—maybe just a little?

"I am asking about you."

Nines's voice changes from questioning and a little stilted to informing him of how it is, like casting a spell. Gavin doesn't have any ability himself, but as far as he knows, that's kind of how they do it. Spell casting is just telling reality what to do with enough conviction that reality up and does it.

"Do you want to be mine?"

Gavin thrusts into his hands in answer. It's sloppy and a little pathetic, because there's nothing for him to rut into. But he starts nodding again, just in case that wasn't enough.

"Like this?" Nines touches him for the second time, one hand gently curling around his throat. "To be mine."

He's coming undone. Falling apart. Food and shelter and an Alpha, their own little pack of two, someone touching him and promising to claim him.

"Suh … 'posed to be … yours."

He knows it's true, it's true, true. The call in his mind, their contract, both of them bound by Selûne.

"Yes," Nines confirms. "Show me."

Gavin comes almost before they finish speaking. He tries to hold eye contact as long as he can, but eventually his own squeeze shut as he curls in on himself with a shudder. The first wave passes deceptively quick, with just a few spurts from his cock.

But he's not done.

"Good boy."

Those hands are back again, just like before, this time encouraging him to roll back onto his belly. They stroke through his hair and scritch behind his ears when he obeys, and he thinks life couldn't possibly get any better until there's a warm body sliding onto the mattress behind him.

Then he's being spooned and everything inside him unravels without any warning.

When he's done coming for the second time, he's aware of a few things: the hand wrapped back around his throat, first. That the gangly half-human, half-elf is tall enough to almost envelope him completely. The soft murmur of praise in his ear, shifted halfway up his head now and nearly wolf-like.

Yours.

It's harder to send the thought out when he's only partially shifted. Even with other wolves, they all share best as animals, some basic concepts as hybrids, and only faint echoes when unshifted.

But being the wizard's familiar must be different, since he'd heard the summons in his head from damn near across the country, in all forms, while Nines can't shift at all.

You are mine. I will take care of you, if you allow me to keep you.

Oh yeah, that's definitely different. Wolves share senses and feelings, not full sentences.

Keep me, Gavin manages to think back.

"Yes," Nines murmurs aloud.

The third wave hits him, and he sobs as he comes for his Alpha. His body is just doing the best it can to please, still managing to pump out another two shots of cum. He can finally feel a tinge of mild revulsion from Nines, but it seems to be aimed more at the mess than himself. Bold feelings from a wizard who left a hunk of bread to mold so long they mistook it for a stoneshroom.

"Perhaps I should invest in a toy," they muse. "A sleeve somewhat akin to a bag of holding, so that it can contain all this mess."

Gavin groans in a not-sexy way. "Don't make me fuck a void."

"No, the pocket dimension would only be applied at the tip of the—"

He can't help but start laughing. Pocket dimension applied at the tip—and said completely straight. Goddamn wizards.

Nines expresses their irritation at being laughed at by nipping his ear, and yep, there's wave number four. To their credit, they do continue to hold him until he gets another brief reprieve.

"How many times does this occur?" they ask when he's done.

"Depends," Gavin scrapes together enough brain matter to say. "More with … partner."

"Hmm," Nines says, like the feral scientist they are.

Gavin flips off his pride and goes straight to begging. "Please."

He's not sure what exactly he's begging for though—not to be forced into multiple orgasms while Nines observes or takes notes, or that the wizard will get started on that right away.

"Please, please, baby."

Nines pulls him back to rest half on top of their body, which lets them switch their right hand for their left hand around his throat without him laying on top of their arm. And that in turn frees up their right hand to drop down to his cock.

"Yours, yours," he mumbles. "Alpha."

"What do you need?"

Their hand brushes his own, the one gripping his knot. He lets go for an agonizing second to press their hand against it instead. Nines lets him wrap his hand back around theirs, using both of their hands to squeeze and lightly tug the knot.

"Ah … ahhh …"

"Ask properly," Nines orders.

"Alphaaa!"

He practically wails the word, shaking apart in Nines's arms and beneath their hand, but he can't now, it's not enough on his own anymore, not without permission.

"Hmmm."

Gavin cries freely, but doesn't make Nines grip him tighter or stroke him off. His Alpha will give him what he needs, and he'll take what he's given, like a good boy.

But that doesn't mean he can't ask for more.

"Baby," he groans. "Need it, need it, I—phck, please!"

"Yes."

The final wave sweeps over him so hard he goes blind, or his eyes shut, or he's back on his belly again, face smushed into the pillow, Nines's hand still around him and the blankets beneath his cock to rut into and it's not the last because Nines tells him Again and Again, until he's coming dry, throat hoarse from crying.

And then once more after that.

When he regains consciousness again, his whole body feels sore in the best possible way. There's drool running down his chin, tacky and drying to the pillow. He has his knees tucked up beneath him, but that's OK, because this is how he's supposed to present anyway.

Except the hand reaching between his legs doesn't breach him. Something soft and wet swipes over him instead, and he can't even muster up the mental energy to be scared, to explain why that's still there, that he managed to bargain for a working cock and all his insides scooped out, but that's still—

"Hush." Nines soothes him with another hand rubbing his back. "You did very well. All you must do now is rest."

Gavin sinks back down into the delicious ache and doesn't move while Nines cleans the slick from between his thighs, then further up to his cock. The blankets he'd rutted into have already been removed at some point. He knows from experience not even the best wizard on the material plane could wash his scent out though and takes a moment to feel a little smug about it.

"Yes, you came a truly impressive amount," Nines says. "Excessive, actually."

Gavin smacks his mouth before he can speak. "Your fault."

"Hmmm."

Nines stands when he's done and moves away. Gavin manages to flop onto his side and curl up. His boss did say he could sleep now. He just needs a little nap.

He gets a flask of water shoved in his face instead. The hand petting him goes back awkward again, pat-pat-pat instead of real pets. Nines doesn't seem to know exactly what to do now that they're done, but clean up and water was still really nice of them.

Gavin finishes gulping down the flask and heaves in air.

"I have work I need to finish," Nines informs him. "Have your needs been sufficiently met?"

Sufficiently met? Fuck, he's had orgies that didn't wear him out this good.

"Yeah," Gavin answers. "Need to sleep now."

Nines smiles at him. "Excellent. Good boy."

Gavin grins lazily back at them. "And when I wake up, I'm gonna crawl over between your legs and make you feel good too."

Nines flushes and half opens their mouth to protest.

"When you need a break from your scroll-thingy, and only if you let me," he adds.

Nines closes their mouth. They don't say anything else, but that means they also don't say no. Their blush doesn't go away either. They simply stand back up and sit down at their desk, spending far too much concentration fussing over the exact alignment of all their inks and quills instead of looking at Gavin.

Who keeps grinning, even as he yawns and snuggles down in his bed. He just needs a little nap, and then after that … he has all sorts of ideas for fun bonding activities.

***

***

This fic was commissioned by one of my followers to continue the first drabble! Subscribers to my Patreon get early access to all my commissioned fics 2 weeks before they’re posted to AO3 and tumblr ^^

[breadoffoxy]

BTS and their D&D Classes

Jin - Bard 

• Mr. World Wide Handsome!! A face that could seduce anyone. • Technically all the members would be bards since they are performers but I feel Jin is the bardiest of them all. • He’s supportive to all the members and sticks up for them despite the consequences/their uncertainties. • CHAOTIC • I think he would use bardic inspiration on himself haha. �� Jin does what he wants when he wants ok. • Who better to cast Vicious Mockery than him? He can be completely savage. • Has the voice of an angel. • He has the self-drive to learn how to play any instrument. • You think you’d have Jin figured out in a fight but then he pulls out Magical Secrets and goes surprise bitch. • Would be a Bard of the College of Lore. • He gets to use cutting words and more magical secrets. • He would get his knowledge from everything, wouldn’t matter if it’s a peasant or a scholarly tome. • His loyalties lie in the pursuit of beauty, truth, his friends, and whatever the hell he wants. • Nobles, deities, organizations can’t control him. • Honest over being political.

Yoongi - Warlock

• Immediate gut reaction is that he is a warlock. It just seems to fit him so well. • Not all things they bind to have to be fiendish but I feel like Yoongis would be just a little bit. • He would think of the darkness as another part of himself but be able to control it and turn it into light. Or if you want to go kingdom hearts style he’d be twilight. • Warklocks have a deep thirst for knowledge and power. He’s a genius who can’t be stopped. • If he had a familiar it would take the form of Holly haha. • Ok more thematic I’d say a raven or cat. • I think Voice of the Chain Master is something he’d use a bit with his familiars. • And use One with Shadows to stay hidden. • You can’t find him unless he wants you to. • As all warlocks do its never-ending eldritch blast. • Once he decides to use up an actual spell slot watch out your done for. • Would learn the spell fly so he wouldn’t have to walk, but he wouldn’t go up very high. • Warlocks are also charisma based. • This man has a way with words.

Hoseok - Rouge • The most dashing of Rouges. • He’s really nimble and light on his feet. • He could be really sneaky sneaky. • He likes to make noises while chasing down his prey to taunt them though. • In nonserious/nonlethal situations would make up his own theme songs. • Knives everywhere! • Just imagine him with his serious gaze when he performs (tear dior yeah) • Now imagine it when he is going in for the kill. • He can still be sweet sunshine when not on a job. • Hobi would have a lot of fun with Thieves’ Cant. • He’s quick and fluid so cunning action would be no problem. • No one would be able to ever hit him. • If they do then Uncanny dodge! • Reliable Talent, he’s a master at what he does. • I love the idea of Assassin Hoseok but I think Swashbuckler fits him better. • Fancy Footwork and Elegant Maneuver. • Plus, Charisma skills. • He is the mood maker come on.

Namjoon - Wizard • Scholarly magic user, enough said. • His intelligence is beyond compare. • Just imagine all of the magical accidents. • Magical God of Destruction! • Would choose the best spells for each situation. • Just make sure he doesn’t loose his spell book please. • People would make him learn the fun utility spells just because they worry about him. • Prestidigitation would be his life saver. • If he makes a mess, he can magically clean it up. • It can magically cook for him too so he doesn’t have to step into the kitchen. • The spell also makes faint musical notes so he would be the most musical wizard there is. • He wouldn’t stick to one school in magic and dabble in everything. • I think he would be most proficient in the new school of Onomancy. • It’s the study into language and the magical significances that weave through names. • He can make his spells stronger if he knows his target’s true name. • Good for both attacking and supportive spells. • I think its also neat with the use of his stage name RM. • How it transformed from Rap Monster to Real Me.

Jimin - Monk • Have you seen this man move!? • Look at all of his amazing gravity defying moves. • Plus, he has a martial arts background. • Monk is perfect for him. • He really trains for mastery and is a perfectionist so he would always strive to have a flawless form. • Who needs armor anyways if you can’t even hit him. • I would say he would study the Way of the Drunken Master but that doesn’t seem to match his elegance. • He does drink a lot though haha. Straight down the hatch! • I think Way of the Kensei fits him the best though. • That way he can be the strongest swordsman! • Just imagine the fluidity of his movements with a sword. • It would be like sword dancing! • It also includes instruction into calligraphy, he’s so talented at that too.

Taehyung – Ranger • Ok so at first I had this idea for Tae that he would be a warrior to protect the wilderness and magical creatures. • If it’s not doing no harm then there’s no need to kill it. • He’d often fight humans and other races to protect creatures others see as monsters. • I can see him being raised in a druid circle actually. • But then I read about the new Fey Wanderer Archetype. • And I’m like that’s it! • He guards the border between the Feywild and the Material Plane while acting as a negotiator between the worlds. • Him having fey magic just seems perfect. • And he’s so beautiful and amazing how come he is not a fey himself yeah. • And your supposed to just pick one Feywild gift but all of them fit him so perfectly. I’m pasting them all from this source https://www.dndbeyond.com/classes/ranger o Illusory butterflies flutter around you while you take a short or long rest. o Fresh, seasonal flowers sprout from your hair each dawn. o You faintly smell of cinnamon, lavender, nutmeg, or another comforting herb or spice. o Your shadow dances while no one is looking directly at it. o Delicate horns or antlers sprout from your head. o Your skin and hair change color to match the season at each dawn. • I want Feywild Tae so bad!!! • Fey are mischievous and there are so many dynamics of light and dark with them. • Tae will do his best to protect both worlds.

Jungkook – Sorcerer • I wanted to give Jungkook a more tankier role like Paladin. • Because he’s a beefy bunny. • Proficient in so many things and can help his friends while attacking. • But I can’t get rid of the On music video vibes and Jungkook’s theories on it. • So, I just have to give him the sorcerer role. • And he can turn into a fucking dragon. • How cool is that! • He’s a descendant of an ancient dragon bloodline and gets tapped with raw magic. • Gold Dragons! The strongest and most majestic of dragons. • They be good dragons too! • And Fire! • His arcane focus would be that conch shell. • He would learn Quickened Spell so he can dish out some serious damage in one turn. • Along with Careful Spell so he can protect his friends if they accidentally are in the crossfire for his spells.

[magic-mitchell]

Dnd question list! 3- favourite side quest (or alternatively, favourite problem solving/teamwork moment in a main quest) 25- thing your players have done that you never could have planned for 34- do you choose spells for flavour or utility? Does that vary depending whether the *character* is more aesthetic focused or practical?

3. Favourite side quest/teamwork moment?

Oh I’m blanking hard, haha... the Sunbringers have a lot of cute interactions outside of questing, but there’s not a great deal of cooperation I can recall besides all trying to hit the same thing... we’re not great coordinators. Birta once helped Mitchell build a sign board though, and that was cute. Oh, I also loved the combination of Grease and Cloud of Daggers over the same spot to create something of a giant blender. I have a lot of recollections of being accidentally thwarted by my teammates though, most of them being plans to cast Fireball when all the paladin wants to do is get into melee range.

25. What have your players done that you could never have planned for?

Many, many things my dear. My favourite one was when they spent an entire session running a convoluted con of their own invention and I got to just kick back and watch them all do their adorable thing.

34. Do you tend to pick weapons/spells for usefulness or flavour?

I tend to do a mix. I always try to avoid picking things that are very far from the character’s ballpark, so to speak, but I also don’t want to make them hideously underpowered. It also depends on how aesthetically-oriented the character is. Cato is never going to need Vicious Mockery but it would feel like a betrayal not to give it to him, and Enthrall, whilst not something I’ve ever used, is absolutely a spell he would choose to learn. So he has them both. Mitchell has spells he’s picked up after specific instances of noticing a gap in his abilities. I’ve found that practicality doesn’t have to take a backseat to aesthetic most of the time, so I have a lot of fun letting my characters decide what they want to wield next.

[larpgourmet]

The Essential LARP Cooking Camp Gear List

Figuring out what to bring to game is always stress inducing. I have packing lists for my packing lists just to make sure I don’t miss anything (it doesn’t help that I drive four hours to get to my game. Forgetting something means I’m SOL all weekend, unless I feel like stopping by a Walmart to pickup whatever I left at home.) 

If you’re a new LARPer, this can be doubly stressful. You may not even know where to begin to pack for what you need. I’m pretty focused on only food needs on this blog, but to sidetrack for just a moment -- my advice is always to break it down from a meta level first. By that I mean, start with the big picture stuff:

- Camping Gear (tent, sleeping bag, etc.) - Food and Drink - Costume - Weapons - Decorative - Mundane Needs (medicine, first aid kit, hygiene needs) 

Once you have that list together, then you can start listing things by specific, and that’ll help you organize your head a little bit when things start to get crazy. Make a list on a word doc somewhere you can access it all the time, and keep the same list game after game, that way you have it on hand in case you run out of spell slots to think about it the Thursday night before you travel.

My list below will operate similarly, giving kind of a broad list, and then breaking it down, with only a few major items getting specific call-outs.

That said -- back to the food stuff!

If you want to cook at game, you’ll need a handful of things to make this possible. Listed below is a short list of what you’ll need, and what to look for in those items. Some of these were also referenced on the 20 Items under $20 post, found here (https://larpgourmet.tumblr.com/post/186401312414/20-things-under-20-for-eating-at-larp)

- A Decent Cooler Look for one that will easily fit in your car with the rest of your stuff, but has enough room to work with. Also be aware that you’re going to have to move your cooler in and out of your car -- while it’s full of stuff. Too big, and you risk it being exceptionally heavy.

I bought mine eons ago, but I want to say it’s somewhere in the 48 - 50 quart range. I generally want to be able to fit my cold brew coffee, a frozen gallon bottle of water, my food, at least half of my drinks, and my icepacks into the cooler easily.

I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating -- of all of the items to shell a little extra for, this is the one. Good insulation, a tight fitting lid, and well made handles will go a long way to ensuring your food stays cold, and you have a better time maneuvering it. Coolers are also just generally handy things to have around, even when you’re not LARPing, so there’s little chance this purchase will go to waste.

One side note on this -- I think wheels are a bit of a waste when it comes to coolers in a camping setting. The wheels do just about nothing over dirt and sticks, and are barely better than dragging the cooler on it’s edge -- at least in my experience.

- A Sturdy Table If no tables are readily available, OR those tables are wobbly -- pick up a good, sturdy table of your own, and be ready to throw a tablecloth over it. I like 6 foot hard plastic folding tables available at any hardware store. They are generally easy to pack and move, and give you plenty of room to work with.

Prepare to store your plastic bin of stuff, and your cooler underneath the table. The cooler being in the perpetual shade of the tablecloth, and the breeze of the outside means that your ice will melt a bit slower. I’ve managed July games in over 100 degree heat in southern California without needing to make an ice run, just because my cooler is stored under a table with a good tablecloth.

- Camp Stove This is another topic I’ve covered in some detail on this post: https://larpgourmet.tumblr.com/post/186746785742/what-to-look-for-in-a-camp-stove

Long and short -- though there’s many ways to heat up food at game, including campfires and the hope of a decent kitchen on site, I feel like Camp Stoves are the old reliable. They’re safe (you’re not likely to accidentally start a forest fire), easy to use and keep with you, and if you have your own, you’re not waiting in line to use it -- so you can just heat n’ eat at your leisure!

- A Trash Bin Get a collapsible trash container made for camping, and the appropriately sized trash bags. Invest in something big and flat that you can put over the trash bag to keep stuff out, or prepare to take it to a larger trash receptacle every so often.

- Dutch Oven If you’ve never looked at a dutch oven before, it’s basically a big soup pot with a good lid. Generally speaking, dutch ovens are thick walled and made of cast iron -- but for our purposes, any large pot with a decent lid will fit your needs.

I like these, especially if you plan to make any meals for a larger group. Big vats of soup or even cold salads can be served in a dutch oven, and automatically look more interesting as a result. The lid means you can close in your food to keep dust out, and even if you’re not using it to cook directly, you can fill it with water and cook sous vide style.

ProTip: If you get one big enough, you can fit a lot of your other gear inside of it, making it an excellent storage container for packing purposes as well.

- Frying Pan / Skillet / Griddle What we need is a large, flat surface to toast bread, pan fry food, or set stovetop coffee pots on top of to make sure they’re stable. A frying pan or skillet is probably best (as the walls give them a bit more utility -- but a griddle or flat top surface can be great in the long haul, if you don’t mind buying both options!

- Food Prep Items A cutting board, a good knife, bowls to collect items you’ve cut and prepared, and some bowls or covers to keep everything clean while you work. As with the below, this is really a situational need. If you plan to do any food prep actually at game, make sure you consider what you’ll need to bring!

- Servingware Wooden bowls, spoons, charcuterie boards, and other things are great to lay out your food for eating. You only really need these if you plan on serving multiple people, and will need to leave the food somewhere that photographers might find it. Honestly, source as much of this out of thrift stores as you can, big wooden bowls and big wooden spoons are silly cheap there. You can also get some fairly inexpensive slabs of marble and other easy to keep and clean stone from any home improvement store -- more on that in a future post!

- Flatware / Dishes You will want something to eat your food out of that looks good for the photographers! The 20 Items under $20 has a few links for things to look for on this front, but expect to need at least one of each of the basics -- a cup, bowl, plate, fork, knife, and spoon. I’ve tested my way through a lot of the disposables in this arena, and I find them to be both flimsy, and expensive. Set aside the scratch for one decent set that will last, and you’ll be much happier.

- Cleaning Station Here’s where I admit that I don’t do a full soap and water wash most of the time at game. I’m the only one who uses my own stuff, so most of the time I just wipe down my gear to get any food off, dry it, and wait to give it a good cleaning when I get home. Most of my cooking for game is tailored to this idea, meaning that I generally make a lot of things where I won’t leave a lot of food behind, and if I do, it’s in a mason jar where I’m just going to seal the jar and not worry about it.

I also (currently) use real cast iron for my fork, knife, and spoon -- so getting them in soap and water is really just a great way for them to rust. (I’m thinking of switching over to stainless steel. Cast iron has a taste, and I’m not particularly fond... additionally, it’s a HUGE pain to keep care of, especially at game if someone decides to be nice and wash your stuff for you, so I’m just kind of over it.)

If you’re eating anything that will get sticky or sugary, or where you’re leaving a larger amount of food (not just sandwich crumbs), you will want a way to clean it so you don’t get pests. This set should consist of at least a couple of things; a smallish plastic bin for you to catch your soapy water, a sponge, some dish soap, a drying towel, and clean water to rinse your soap off your dishes.

If you’re a knitter at all, consider making knitted towels out of yarn tailor made to the purpose. Knitted towels will always look great, and they dry up a lot of water! They do just take a little longer to dry, so prepare a spot to hang them up with clothespins, if you can! (I’m not a knitter, but my mom makes me knitted stuff all the time.)

- Plastic Bin with a Good Lid The reason I advocate for this is to carry all of your camping gear in one place, and make sure it stays clean and pest free until you can use it. Get all your stuff first, then decide what size you need -- but one of these goes a long way toward good organization, and ease of moving your stuff!

- Sundries This can be any sort of smaller items that I just catch all into one category. My current list for this is: Matches Paper towels First aid kit Propane Camp lantern Apron (to keep your costume clean) Spare water Trivets (if you’re going to have any hot pans on site)

If you’re worried about forgetting something, set your setup up at home, and mock going through everything. Think about what you’ll need to do for all of your meals, and make sure you have everything you need to that end.

Plan for emergencies! Plan for spills, plan to get cut, or burned on your stove! Make sure everything you need is close by (in your plastic bin) when you’re actually on site, so you always know how to find your stuff if something comes up.

[littlemisssquiggles]

Whit-ty Headcanons: Whitley’s Summon

@ezroar asks: 

“Sorry, but since I have come to love Whitley for what he could be outside of a jealous Schneebling, I actually want to talk about him more with you. I feel bad though since I feel like I’m bothering you.

Basically, I remembered that post you did about Whitley’s geist, and it got me thinking about Whitley unlocking his inheritary semblance and his first act is to accidentally summon. Perhaps there was an incident during an SDC mine inspection with his father to keep up appearances and then grimm suddenly attacked since I’m sure the SDC mines must be a cess pool of negativity. Whitley managed to down the grimm by using his smart and manuvered the grimm into position and poured a vat of molten fire dust over its head. Whereas Weiss’ knight grimm symbolises her loneliness and acceptance and the lancer grimm her empowerment, I thought it’d be cool if his summon was something like this

Image comes courtesy of Air Gear and its creator, Ito “Oh Great” Ōgure I feel there’s been a lack of distinctly feminine grimm (save for Salem) and it’d be a great way to introduce grimm with a different energy to their design. This summon symbolises Whitley need for love and acceptance, as well as protection as his summon stands resolutely in front of him to protect her ‘prince’

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. 

Squiggles Answers:

@ezroar​

Hey Ez. Thanks for submitting this question to me. Reading through your description of how Whitley killed his first Grimm to gain his first summon makes me think back to my original Whitley’s Geist headcanon post. I believe I even described a somewhat similar scenario where Whit gained the Geist as his summon after unintentionally killing it after suddenly awakening his semblance. . Let me see if I can quote from the original post.

“…By the way, I actually do know that the Summons are the creatures that the Schnees with the Glyph semblance had defeated in combat. In my original draft of this musing, I’d included a point painting a scenario where perhaps Whitley was attacked by a Geist Grimm during his sisters’ absence and him defeating the beast was as a result of him unexpectedly unlocking his semblance in the heat of battle in order to protect himself.

I didn’t include this hunch in the final draft but that’s how I saw the tie in with my theory about Whitley’s summon being a Geist.

 Imagine…one night, Whitley is left alone inside the Schnee Manor. His parents had gone out for the night on their own endeavours and Whitley is left to himself with only Klein around in case he needed anything. Perhaps this is a night where Whitley decides to entertain himself by practicing his pianist skills.

In V4, it was hinted that Whitley might know how to play the piano. We never actually witnessed him doing so, which was a wasted opportunity however his picture is hung up inside the music room inside the mansion.

So the implication is there. It’s sad. I wish they had taken advantage of Whitley’s own musical talents. If Whitley does know how to play then I wish we’d gotten a scene of him helping Weiss with her recital.

It would’ve been an amazing brother and sister bonding moment if Weiss is there singing her sweet swan song as Whitley’s fingers danced across the keyboard in coordination with his sister; casting their collaborated melodic spell over the audience. If only; am I right?

Anyways, just as Whitley is getting into the song, he hears a sudden strange noise from outside the music room. At first the young boy ignores the noise but when it became too prominent, he was forced to vacate in order to investigate it. Whitley’s search for the source of the disturbance brought him outside the house in the garden. He calls for Klein, thinking it may be the chubby man just tending to the bushes. No answer and it is at this point, Whitley was growing annoyed.

Long story short, Whitley finds Klein passed out in the gardens after being attacked by a Geist Grimm. In all the stories he’s heard of the Grimm, this is Whitley’s first encounter with one. With all his boosting about the benefits of the Atlesian Army, he never dreamt that he’d ever need to protect himself against a Grimm on his own, much less meet one in the flesh.

For the first time in his life, Whitley’s mind blanked. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t even breath. He had no means of protecting himself and with Klein passed out before him and everyone else in the manor gone, he was alone. No one was going to come to his aid.

He thought…of his sisters. Let’s say, when the Schnee siblings were younger—back in the days when there were good moments that displayed all three siblings actually caring about each other, Weiss and Winter were both protective of Whitley. Particularly Weiss.

Whenever he fell down, got a boo-boo or even just had a bad dream, his big sister Weiss was always there for him to be his comforter. Yeah, yeah, I know this sounds very uncharacteristic for Weiss and her relationship with her brother but let me have this one, alright?

I just need a reason—a deep, significant reason for Whitley to think of both of his sisters, or maybe just Weiss while being attacked by a Grimm—the thought resonating with such force that it’s enough for Whitley to unconsciously call out for Weiss to protect him…all the while awakening something else within him he didn’t know was there.

When Klein finally came to, he awakens to discover Whitley huddled in a corner of the garden, his breathing frantic as his body did its best to contain his fear. As Klein swiftly ran to the boy’s age, he arrived just in time to witness the Geist from earlier wither away. The infernal red eye of its cryptic mask imprinting a lasting effect in Whitley’s mind as it disappeared from his sight. Klein did not know what to make of this scene. He tried asking Whitley to explain what had happened after he’d passed out—how he managed to defeat the Geist on his own.

Instead of giving him an answer, Whitley silenced his erratic breathing and turned the question on Klein, asking him if he was alright. Once Klein confirmed that he wasn’t injured in any way, Whitley withdrew an unsteady sigh of relief before getting to his feet.

Shakily, Whitley left the garden and returned to the quiet solitude of the music room without another word to Klein. Even when the man returned shortly later with some refreshments for the young heir, the young Schnee said nothing more to him even as he stared him down in concern. Finally, then and there, Whitley gave Klein an answer but, not the one he was hoping for. Whitley told Klein to not speak of this moment to his father. He made some other point about discussing increasing security in the household to his father but beyond that, it became clear to Klein that Whitley was adamant on not discussing his feelings on the ‘grimm incident’ any further or at all for the future for that matter.

So with nod of understanding, Klein bowed himself out of the room; leaving Whitley to himself once more. 

Taking a long swig from the warm beverage Klein had brought to him; Whitley returned his attention to the piano. With his fingers to the keys, he gave a strong intro to his chosen musical piece only to miss a note and stop abruptly again.

Whitley clutched his head, grimacing as the face of the beast—the Geist flashed across his mind. Why? He was used to putting things far out of his mind. Jacques Schnee had properly schooled him on the importance of that. Yet…why did that creature still…haunt him? What was that strange…power he display earlier? Where did it come from? Why did he have it? And more importantly, what did that mean for Whitley then?

In spite of the pressing questions swarming his mind, Whitley couldn’t think of any logical reasons as to why this was happening to him. Nor…did he care to entertain the thought much further.

So for the third time, Whitley returned to the keyboard and started playing. And for the remainder of the night, he kept on playing, allowing the music to drown away any fear left following the encounter…even as the Beast’s watchful eye continued to scrutinize him from within the chained chambers of his mind. 

That’s how I’d like to see it. Just a theory but an interesting one to think about, right…”

-Whitley’s Geist (Posted June 3rd 2018)

Back then, the concept I had was if Whitley were to unlock his powers unintentionally, he’d be in complete denial of it to the point of trying to supress his powers. You know how in Disney’s Frozen, Elsa spent most of her life keeping her powers a secret from her sister Anna while doing her best to keep them under control. Y’know ‘Conceal, don’t feel. Don’t let them know’. That’s how I pictured it being for Whitley. Let’s say, for most of his life, Whitley was  raised believing that he wasn’t special ; at least not in the way his sisters were as told by Jacques.

Since the Schnee name and semblance came from Mama Schnee’s side of the family, let’s say Mama Schnee possesses the same kind of power as her daughters but never utilized her gifts since being a huntress was never in her lifelong goals she had set for herself. What if…growing up, Whitley was sort of brainwashed into believing that he had no power. That he was never ever going to amount to anything else in life unless he followed directly in his father’s footsteps since, according to Jacques, Whitley was his prodigy. The one who was born exactly like him. Powerless but cunning.

Imagine a flashback where a young Whitley is secretly observing his sisters training in their courtyard from afar. What if…once upon a time, Whitley was enamoured by the powers his sisters possessed and wished to perform the same feats as them; being inspired and growing excited to awaken his own kind of powers since he had overheard Winter inform Weiss that the power they have was one shared by all the Schnees. This gave Whitley the hope of him possibly awakening own powers someday.

Imagine Whitley being excited by the prospect of unlocking his family semblance since, in his naïve mind, his semblance was the ticket to growing close with his sisters. Picture a young Whit standing in the mirror or playing alone in the garden trying to unlock his own powers like Weiss and Winter.

Whitley is then caught by Jacques who scolds him for even entertaining the idea of the Schnee semblance. Out of curiosity, Whitley asks his father if he had powers like his sisters only for Jacques to burst his bubble by saying that Whitley wasn’t special. He has no power. Jacques told Whitley that he should never look to his sisters for acceptance and support because they would never look at him on a similar playing field. 

What if…that whole ‘the Schnee abilities is beneath him’ notion was probed into Whitley from a young age by Jacques because he made Whitley believe that he had no power. Imagine if from young, Jacques groomed Whitley into thinking that his only place and purpose in the world is by Jacques side as his heir since of all his children, Jacques expected Whitley to be just like him and ensured that he thought that way about himself. This is why I’m very much invested the headcanon of Whitley unlocking his family semblance too.

Up until this point, Whitley has sort of convinced---or even prided himself on being exactly like father since the assumption being made here is that Jacques has groomed Whitley to believe that his power---his own family power---is nothing more than barbaric and beneath him. So imagine how Whit would feel if he did have power. How would he take it?

For me, I’m seeing this storyline going one of two ways for Whit:

On one side, you get the concept of Whitley unintentionally unlocking his powers but choosing to keep them suppressed and hidden from his father out of his denial of his heritage and his loyalty to Jacques. This ultimately results in Whitley losing control of his powers and unleashing the beast that lives to do his bidding. His summon. I loved this original theory because I really liked the idea of there being a mystery where a monster has been attacking adversaries to the SDC and the Schnee Family. Upon further investigations by our team of young huntsmen, it is learnt that the monster is actually a Grimm summoned by Whitley that’s been doing his bidding all along. However Whitley is unaware of this because he has no control over his semblance nor his summon. But it’s through the aid of his sisters that Whit learns to finally accept and control his newfound abilities. That’s one idea.

On the next side is my current favourite Whit-ty headcanon where Whitley is enrolled at Atlas Academy by Jacques as a means of spying Weiss and possibly sabotage any progress she was attempting to make at the academy as a ploy set up by Jacques to spite his own daughter and get her to return home to her cage under his watch. I still like the idea of Whit being the huntsman in Weiss’ Snow White story. However unbeknownst to his father, Whitley had his own ulterior motive for pursuing huntsmen training. Part of it was due to his own curiosity and an eagerness to understand why his sisters would stray from their family to pursue such a barbaric lifestyle. The main reason was Whitley genuinely wanting to use the opportunity to try and develop a relationship with his sister. I know Whitley becoming a huntsman as a means of trying to develop a genuine friendship with his sister sounds a little farfetched. However I personally like it since Whit strikes me as the type of character who commits to certain things out of a willingness to understand.

Like he strikes me as the type of person where if you told him that you liked chocolate ice-cream and thing it was the best  flavour of ice-cream in the whole wide world, Whit would try and even study everything he could dig up on the flavour himself as a way of understanding why you would like it especially if he was only doing it as a means of trying to comprehend you as a means of growing closer to you. It’s a different outlook on Whit but that’s how I see him.

So Whitley starts training to become a huntsman so he could understand first and foremost why his sisters chose this lifestyle and it is through his adventures at the academy where Whit slowly achieves what he’s always wanted---to be close with his sister. To have her look at him as someone she could trust or at least like. By my head-canons, what Whitley truly wants are his sisters. To have them both trust and finally look at him as family.

As someone meant to stand by their side instead of being left behind alone in the cold.

Growing up in Schnee Manor, Weiss had Winter (as implied by her anthology). It may seem as if the Schnee sisters have always had each other’s backs while leaving poor Whit in the dark. My assumption is that Whit had wanted Weiss to support him similar to how Winter supported her or at least look at him as someone she can trust and count on. But unfortunately for Whit, this never happened due to several misunderstandings from Weiss about her own brother. Right now, Weiss’s interpretation of Whitley is something shared with the FNDM members who distrust and heavily dislike him as a character.

For whatever reason (not properly justified in the main series canon), Weiss sees Whit as someone akin to their father. Heck she probably sees him as being a complete copycat or mini me of Jacques. I think this is what has kept Weiss and Whit from developing an actual relationship. Weiss’ impression that her brother will only turn out like their father. Manipulative. Conniving. But that’s not who Whitley truly is; at least not by my assumptions and by the power invested in my headcanons, I believe that Whit desires more than anything to prove this to his sister.

I swear if Whitley’s endgame isn’t him having a healthy close family relationship with his sisters then I’d be deeply disappointed. But that’s mostly what I’d love to see going forward into V7 with the Schnee Family Affairs side of the arc.

As for what kind of summon Whitley would have, I actually really like your idea Ez. You wanna know something funny? I pretty much had a similar thought. I think it would be very fitting if Whitley’s signature summon has a more feminine look to it for the very same reasons you gave.

In this case, Whit would be the opposite of Weiss. With the exception of Klein, you can almost say that Weiss hasn’t exactly had the best support from the men in her life. As a matter of fact, one of the most oppressive figures in Weiss’ story is her own father so the fact that her summon is an armoured knight meant to serve and protect her is very symbolic. Weiss was oppressed by a male figure yet her key summon (outside of the Queen Wasp) is a rather masculine-looking suit of armour.

This is why I’m saying it’d be the opposite for Whitley. While Weiss was more or less disgraced by the main men in her life, for the most part, Whit was disgraced by the man women in his life. His mother is practically non-existent and his sisters have left him alone while standing by each other only. So Whitley having a female summon to serve as the Queen protecting her King would be excellent. I mean, in a game of chess, the Queen is the important player who protects the King.

So it would be interesting if Whitley’s summon takes inspiration from the Queen chess piece. I’m not saying make it a straight up female version to Weiss’ Armoured Gigas; y’know the ole Angemon and Angewoman treatment (although that actually wouldn’t be too bad of an idea given Whit and Weiss’ relation and similar yet opposite circumstances). 

But a summon that emulates the same sense of strength as you rightfully said.

As a matter of fact, the idea I had in mind was that Whitley’s signature summon could possibly be some kind of Fairy/Elf type of Grimm. I’ve been told that Whitley’s character was inspired by Artemis Fowl. While I honestly don’t know much about this character (I’ve only read like a few chapters of the first book in the series), what I do recall is Artemis having a partner who was an elf fairy named Holly Short.

This makes me love the reference you used from Air Gear as an idea for Whitley’s summon. This character could easily pass for a fairy type of character with the Queen’s Chess piece motif which I think is the perfect kind of summon for Whitley Schnee.

But these are only my thoughts. I hope this answers your question Ez. Again, thanks for picking my brain with this. I really dig this idea a lot. This puts me even more on-board with the idea of Whitley awakening his trademark Schnee semblance.

If I’m being completely honest, I would be very disappointed if the CRWBY Writers did nothing to really flesh out Whitley’s story and character especially his ties to his sisters. Why I believe the likelihood of Whit awakening his family heritage is more prominent is due to the emphasis alluded to it by V4.

Why have Whit say that Weiss and Winter’s abilities---a power that is shared by pretty much everyone in his family---a power that he too might possibly possess---is beneath him if that small titbit wasn’t going to amount to something important. Why emphasis that Whit is supposed to be more like his father if it wasn’t going to potentially lead into Whit being exactly like his sisters---the two were broken free of the patriarchal prison. Why do that at all if it wasn’t going to slowly build up to Whit becoming the person he was meant to be. The Schnee he was meant to be.

I’m also curious to know how Jacques would feel if he discovered that Whit had powers. Would he turn away from the last heir under his control or…being the Machiavellian, greedy man that he is, what if… Whit unlocking his family power encourages an open opportunity for Jacques to use him even more like a pawn in his selfish schemes.

“…It’s foolish not to do what father asks…”

Picture…Jacques exploiting the Schnee family semblance through Whitley to carry out the nefarious crimes of the SDC. Apart from the Faunus abuse, imagine… Jacques making Whit use his Glyphs and summon to terrorize and take out competitors. That could be an interesting twist.

Imagine…Weiss investigating her family affairs only to discover someone with the same kind of powers as her and realize that it’s actuallyWhitley doing it on behalf of their father.

Imagine…the hypocrisy of Whitley implying that the Schnee family power is barbaric when used to serve humanity yet he abuses his power to commit heinous crimes that harms the people for the will of Jacques. That could be another intriguing twist and great subplot for both Schnee Siblings.

But again, like I said, these are only my ideas. We’ll have to wait and see what the CRWBY has in store for Whit in V7.

For what it’s worth, I pray it’s at least satisfactory and gives a much needed and hopefully better conclusion to Whitley’s story than what was done for certain other characters from a certain previous season. Y’know something to make us Whits feel happy as opposed to the latter.

Seriously if Whit’s story ends up being another poorly executed and mishandled subplot in the main plot then…I don’t  know what I would say. I’m doing my best to remain as positive and optimistic as I can be when it comes to the current writing in RWBY. 

While I still wish to stand with the side that believes that Miles and Kerry are talented, competent writers who know how to tell a good story; at the same time, I can’t deny the mistakes (both the ones pointed out by members of the FNDM and acknowledged by myself) made particularly in this last season as it’s still very fresh in my mind.

This makes me miss RWBY Chibi. Usually Chibi is the buffer to cipher off any distaste in the FNDM left behind by the last season while getting us pumped for the next one. But there seems to be no Chibi this year. At least as far as I’m aware of.

If I’m being honest with myself here, I am more nervous for the development of  my favourite characters going forward in the narrative than genuinely excited. Fans thought V6 would’ve fixed the issues created in V5 but by trying to correct the damage from the previous season, V6 introduced its own fair share of problems that can either be addressed or ignored in V7.

For now, I can only hope that this new arc will provide a chance for the Writers to reflect on the treatment of this last arc trilogy in preparation for a much better constructed and exciting new arc trilogy. As the saying goes, third time’s the charm so here’s to the Atlas Trilogy being a success kicking off with V7. We shall see.

In the meantime, that’s all I have to say on that for now, fam. 

~LittleMissSquiggles (2019)

[jasonp43]

Jondami week 2019 Day 4: A Mismatch Made in Heaven

Prompt: Body Swap

Synopsis: The Super Sons are on the Felix Faust case. After just a few days on the case, they've got him cornered, little do they know he's got a special spell ready, just for them.

~Lowkey smut warning~

"It's over, Faust." Robin called out from the darkness, perched on one of the upper beams of the warehouse.

"Yeah! Just give up." Superboy called out, a few beams away from Damian.

"Hah! Faust never surrenders!" The sorcerer said, sweat dripping down his cheek.

"Heh. I was hoping you would say that." Damian smirked, "Maneuver J-7 Delta!" Damian shouted to Jon, as he stood up, pride in his voice.

"Uh.. Damian..?" Jon called out, his voice unsure.

"What?" Damian said, looking over his shoulder at Jon.

"I uh.. forgot which one that is" Jon said with a light giggle.

"TT." Damian said with a sigh, rubbing his temples. "Why do I even try?"

"Hah! Fools." Felix said with a laugh, snapping his fingers, a flame appearing in his now open palm. "Now, be good little boys and stand still." He said with a smirk before launching a ball of fire at Damian.

Damian easily evaded and leapt down at Faust, 4 explosive birdarangs landing near the sorcerer's feet, exploding just Damian's boots touched the concrete floor.

Felix was thrown across the, his back hitting the floor hard just as Jon slammed into the, ground, landing just next to him, cracking the concrete and causing the sorcerer to yelp.

"Give it up, Faust!" Jon commanded, though with his voice and appearance it came out more as unbelievably adorable than anything even remotely intimidating.

"Alright! Alright.." the sorcerer said, rising to his feet. "Faust knows when he is beaten." He said plainly.

"I thought you said you don't surrender?" Jon asked, raising a brow.

"That doesn't mean I can't run! Hahahahaha-oof!" Faust turned to run, able to do so for about half a second before slamming into a brick wall.

"Ouch.." Jon said, squinting one eye.

"Just when I thought you couldn't become more of a joke." Damian scoffed, crossing his arms beside Jon.

"Hrr.r.. you'll pay for that!" Faust said, clawing his hands. Purple lightning shot forth, arcing in the air towards Robin.

"Robin! Get down!" Jon said, launching himself at his partner.

Both boys got struck by Faust's magic, both now a crumpled mess on the floor, smoke coming off their unconscious bodies.

"Well, that's not what was supposed to happen.." the sorcerer thought to himself. "No matter! Time to make my great escape. Hahahahaha- oof!" He turned around to run, slamming into the same wall but this time knocking himself unconscious falling to the floor with an audible thud.

A few hours passed and both of the boys started to wake up.

"Mmmn.. your knee's poking my side.." Jon complained.

"No you.. you got your elbow against my-" Damian paused, his eyes going wide as he stared at the face mere inches from his own; his face.

"Ahhh!" Damian shouted.

"Ahhhhhhhh!" Jon Shrieked.

Both boys got up, their eyes wide as they stared down the other.

"You're me!" Damian shouted, glancing down at his body. "Ahhhh! And I'm you!" He shouted.

Jon dusted himself off, letting out a sigh. "TT. No, hayseed. We're us but... body swapped." Jon said with a shiver.

"B-body swapped?" Damian asked, looking down at his body.

"Yes, the effects of Faust's spell, no doubt." Jon said, looking around the room before spotting him, still knocked unconscious, missing a few teeth.

"Although, I don't see how body swapping would be a useful offensive spell." Jon said, walking over to the sorcerer's unconscious body. Placing a thumb on his chin in thought while Damian was freaking out behind him, rolling around on the floor and shouting.

"Perhaps the spell went awry.." Jon said, kneeling down and reaching for a pair of cuffs in the back pocket of his utility belt only to grope his own butt.

Jon's eyes went, his cheeks reddening quickly. He looked over his shoulder, thanking whatever powers there were that the real Jon didn't see what he just did.

"Kent." Jon said coldly, Damian still rolling around and panicking.

He sighed and stood up, walking over to his partner. Placing a foot on his torso and slapping his very very lightly.

"Snap out of it."

"Ouuuchhhhh!!" Damian complained.

"Now hand me my cuffs before Houdini wakes up." Pointing at Faust.

The boys cuffed the sorcerer and sealed his lips to prevent him from casting any more spells. They brought him to the fortress of attitude.

"W-where am-" Faust was cut off just as he was waking up by Jon slamming his hand on the table in front of his, breaking it in half. The sorcerer was scared shitless to say the least, tied up to a chair, his hands bound behind him.

"You're being interrogated." Jon said bluntly.

"Yeah! So you better start talking." Damian chimed in

"Or else." Jon narrowed his eyes.

The sorcerer chuckled. "looks like my spell worked." He smirked.

"Tell us how it works." Damian said.

"Make me." Faust said confidently.

"With pleasure." Jon smirked, throwing the wizard across the room and breaking his arm.

"Ahhh!" Faust cried out, clearly not thinking his plan through.

"Alright alright! I'll talk..." He said... "24 hours.." he said, out of breath.

"Till what?" Damian asked.

"Till you two change back" he said.

"That's all we needed to know." Jon said coldly, letting him sit back up before leaving the cell.

"Wait! You're just going to leave me here?!" He shouted out.

"Mhm! See you tomorrow!" Damian said, closing the door behind him before turning back "oh! Food will be there like I think uhm.. in a few hours? So yeah- uh! Yeah!" Damian said, before catching up to Jon.

"So..." Damian began, both boys seated at the couch.

"19 hours." Jon said plainly.

"But I thought he said-"

"No, Kent. 5 hours passed since we got turned."

"What do we do till then?" Damian asked.

"We wait, live out the other's day. Tomorrow we'll be back.

"What?!" Damian cried out.

"But- but me and my parents were gonna go to the amusement park..!" Damian complained.

"Yes, and I have an interview with father in couple hours."

"what do I do?!" Damian said, falling backwards letting out an exapserated sound.

"Just sit there. Let father do the talking." Jon said.

"Can't we ask raven for help?" Damian asked

"No, her and the other magical league members are off on a mission to fight mr. Mxyzptlk." Jon said, letting out a sigh "we just have to deal with it ourselves."

Most of the day finished, Damian retired to his bedroom. Being able to fool Clark and Louis.

"Ok.. time to-" Damian paused just as he was about to unbuckle Jon's belt. He was going to go to the bathroom when he remembered this was jon's body.

Damian eyed Jon's body in the mirror, still wearing his white t-shirt, jeans and red shoes.

His mind drifted back to when he accidentally groped Jon's butt, the blush returning.

"No." He said, plainly. Damian's had feelings for Jon for quite some time now and he'd be lying if he said he never wanted to see him.. bare. He never actually thought it'd happen, nor was he planning on acting on those feelings any time soon.. but given the circumstances he had the chance.

"Its not right." He said, wrestling with his thoughts. Before feeling a tent pitch in his pants, the blush darkening as he felt a single bead of sweat drip down his face. He looked down to see a buldge in his jeans.

"Mmmng.. maybe just a little peek.." he said, before dropping the jeans to the floor, Jon's boyhood springing upwards, a drop of pre being flung to his face.

"This is so.. weird.." Damian said to himself as he licked the pre on his cheek, feeling Jon's boyhood throb.

"Mmmn.." Damian let out a hum, before slipping off Jon's shirt eyeing his bare chest in the mirror.

"Heh. Pink nipples. Cute." Damian smirked before caressing Jon's slender body, admiring his frame.

He paused remembering one important thing. Walking over to Jon's school supplies, he pulled out a ruler.

"TT. He's bigger." With a disappointed groan he admitted.

Damian reached for Jon's phone and thought for a second.

"Agh fuck it." Damian said, as he stripped Jon nude. Taking pictures of his pale body, everything from head to toe videoing Jon jerk his boyhood up and down before stroking, pulling down his foreskin and revealing the boy's sensitive tip. He then showered, videoing and picturing himself.

Wiping himself off, he collapsed in bed and began stroking, fondling himself, running his fingers through Jon's messy hair. He videoed himself edge thrice before spewing jon's load all over his bare chest. Licking up the evidence.

He sent all videos and pictures to one of his own alternate accounts.

"Sorry Jon." Damian said, a hint of regret in his voice deleting any evidence from Jon's phone while groping the boy's family jewels.

"I just couldn't pass this up." He said, reluctantly slipping clpthes back on and going to sleep.

Morning came and Damian was back in his own body.

"Mmmn.." he groaned, feeling cold. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he saw he was completely naked. His eyes went wide, as he scanned the room, his underwear was all over the place and that's when it hit him.

He was sore, sore all over especially his boyhood. Reaching down to touch it he recoiled, it was still hypersensitive. Looking down at his bare chest, he was covered in his own cum.

A smirk came to his face.

"TT. Guess this makes us even~" he said, opening his gallery.

A/N: hey, jason here. This was weird but fun to write, idk I didn't have any good ideas for today's prompt, so I just went with whatever I could think off. -Jason

[ansu-gurleht]

rules: what does your character keep on their person? bold for always, italic for sometimes. then, tag some mutuals!

tagging: @nerevar-shid-and-fard @orsinium @devilsworddante @ptsilenthill @sheobaby @ anybody else who wants to do this, i’m bad at this lol. [tagged by @akulorkhan. the edit-tag worked buddy!]

Ku-vastei

➳ BAG

backpack | messenger bag | pockets | satchel | wristlet | purse | duffle bag | briefcase | pouch | drawstring bag | fanny pack

➳ WEAPONS

sword | dagger (or shortsword) | axe | mace | warhammer | staff | (conjured) spear | throwing knives | darts | shortbow | longbow | crossbow | arrows | bolts | enchanted weapon | poison

➳ APPAREL

light armor | medium armor | heavy armor | underclothes for armor | enchanted armor | mage’s robes | uniform | casual clothes | formal clothes | cloak | scarf | hat | helmet | gauntlets | bracers | gloves | shoes | boots | hood | mask | belt | coat | jacket | necklace | bracelet | ring | watch | undergarments

➳ HEALTH + MAGIC

health potion | mana potion | stamina potion | attribute potion | alchemy equipment | herbs | chemicals | ingredients | bandages | burn cream | antidote (spell) | moisturizer | medication (sub-potion salves) | scrolls | crystals | enchanting equipment

➳ STEALTH

lockpicks | probes | trap-making tools | trap-disarming tools | disguise kit | forgery equipment

➳ TOOLS

pen | ink | charcoal | parchment | paper | compass | ruler | saw | hammer | nails | shovel | pliers | needle | thread | utility knife | art supplies | fabric scraps | kindling | magnifying glass | fishing rod

➳ PROVISIONS

rations for themselves | rations for others | fork | knife | spoon | serving utensils | pot/pan | water | alcoholic beverage | nonalcoholic beverage | pet food | drug(s) | sweets | coffee | tea

➳ PERSONAL

small amount of money | large amount of money | map | soap | comb | brush | cosmetics | hair ties | hair product | journal | razor | nail clipper | religious paraphernalia | tent | sleeping bag | blanket | pillow | sentimental item | comfort object | musical instrument(s) | toys | eyewear | identification | important document(s) | torch | book(s) | plant

anything bold, (in parantheses), AND italicized is stuff i’ve personally added to this for clarification purposes. feel free to get rid of them if i tag you!

b/c i want to, im going to elaborate on this under the cut:

she has a backpack wrapped in a bandolier of potions, most homemade. the inside of the bag is....kind of a mess. she just throws things in and has to dig around when she needs something. (not fun when she needs the knife or needle. but that’s what restoration magic’s for, right? there’s no tetanus in nirn, right?) she keeps the shovel (more of a trowel really, mostly used for muck-ing about, hehe) fastened to her bag as well. on top she keeps her guar-hide sleeping bag, wrapped in kresh fiber.

on her hip she (currently) has a sparks-enchanted glass dagger she nabbed off the corpse of one of her first morag tong writs. she thinks. she doesn’t exactly remember where she got it, but she probably killed someone for it, and love it very much.

her primary weapon, however, is a conjured daedric spear. it’s very powerful, and she loves it. just a wave of her claws and it’s hers, ready to stab.

she wears minimal medium armor, just enough to conceal under her robes. right now, it’s an orcish cuirass and bonemold pauldrons. she has a scarf now, but only after having to brave the ashen wastes of molag amur for mage’s guild business, and then winding up almsivi-intervention-ing to ald-ruhn, where there was a helpful ash-scarf merchant. she brings it with her everywhere on this stupid island now. she’s got a belt just to secure her robes a bit, and a few magic rings. 

one of those is the ring of khajiiti, which she got from doing a quest for mephala that she didn’t know she was doing, who it was for, or why. first guy she talks to in the morag tong base when she finds it says “go poison this guy’s food and don’t ask why.” so she did it without asking why, and when she came back, the morag tong guy said “mephala wants to talk to you now” and then she gave ku a magic ring. really nice magic ring, too.

as i said, her backback’s potion bandolier is chock full of useful little brews. restore health, magicka, fatigue, some cure blight disease, some dispel, levitation, etc. anything she might need that she might not (reliably) be able to cast a spell for. (she knows a levitate spell, but it’s really, really hard. she has one shot for it to work, and if it doesn’t, she’s out of magicka.)

she carries a mortar and pestle for on-the-go alchemy, and a lot of herbs and ingredients. she’s very disorganized, but at least she tries to keep those ingredients separated in pouches so as to avoid accidental reactions. she also keeps some of the marshmerrow + saltrice poultice she learned to make from her naheesh so long ago, for those times she doesn’t want to cast a spell or drink a health potion. if you apply it to a wound and wrap it up, it’ll heal, slowly but reliably.

she wants to get into enchanting, and so carries around a fair amount of petty soul gems, and a few lesser ones, and she knows a basic soul trap spell. but she’s constantly cursing herself because she always forgets to cast it, and ends up just killing the thing. she’s got a loose kwama forager, rat, cliffracer soul here and there, but she decided recently to stop carrying them around, because hist knows when she’ll actually use them for anything. still, she keeps some empty gems on her, just in case.

ku taught herself how to pick locks and disable minor traps long ago, when sneaking around the plantation to get or spread information, or to unlock armories to arm her revolt. now that she’s more magically inclined, she knows an ondusi’s spell, but always tries to pick it first, to try and keep the skill fresh.

she keeps a piece of charcoal to keep up with her journal and update her maps. even in her late 40s, she’s not completely literate, having been first a slave, then a revolutionary, then a prisoner. but she can read well enough to get by, and can even write in cyrodiilic enough to keep as detailed a journal as she can. (unfortunately, despite her ability to read cyrodiilic, it doesn’t do her much good in vvardenfell, since a lot of things seem to be written in daedric.)

she keeps needle and thread to sew up any damage to her robes, and to close particularly egregious wounds to maximize the effectiveness of healing magic done on them. she has a knife for utility purposes, generally gathering/processing ingredients such as plants or hides, as well as anything she doesn’t want to dirty her precious glass dagger for. and she keeps some kindling and corkbulb to start fires to keep her warm during the cold nights.

she always carries food and a slaughterfish-gut water bag whenever she’s on a trip for business. usually she eats salted slaughterfish, mudcrab meat, saltrice porridge, and scuttle. she also never turns down any tasty bugs she comes across. she boils her water (and cooks her porridge) in a small cast iron pot, and has a similarly sized pan for grilling meat. she keeps some sujamma on her, not for recreation, but in case she ever needs a bit of a pick-me-up. 

as a child, she spent a lot of time with her khajiit friends, who always seemed to have a way to occasionally get a hold of moon sugar, despite the harsh punishment if a slave was caught with it. as a result, ku developed something of a sweet tooth, and occasionally like to treat herself to some.

she also carries extra food and water, just in case she ever runs into a situation where she needs to escort a slave to safety.

her money never seems to exceed about 3000 drakes, mostly due to having to bribe so many people for information, since she’s not always so good with words. now that she’s got a semi-stable job with the morag tong, though, this might change soon. and if she ever gets around to selling some of the junk she’s got holed away.

she keeps the journal and map she obtained from arille’s tradehouse in seyda neen in a front-pocket of her backpack, and tucks any books she finds interesting in her travels in the bottom of her backpack. currently, she is carrying one regularly: "a pilgrim’s path,” just in case she is close by to one of the shrines, or forgets what offering to leave.

she carries her sadrith mora hospitality papers, as well as her current morag tong writs, in a separate pocket from her journal and map. she’s also been collecting these strange, glowing, singing plants she keeps finding along the water with no discernible alchemical uses. she’s shown them to other alchemists, as well, but none of them knew anything about it. some, however, told her there was an alchemist in caldera who studies these plants. she has yet to visit caldera, though.

around her neck she carries a sentimental comfort item: a fire-proof twig from a hist tree (given to her by her naheesh, it is a small fragment of a branch that fell from a hist tree) bound tightly to a small pearl ku’s mother once found in the soil at the bottom of a marshmerrow paddy. both of these women are now long dead, lost either before or during her revolt. they’re all ku has left of them, and constant reminders of the futility of her actions as a young adult.

[salavante]

Odwain! The goodest.

Wow, featuring one of the more flattering drawings I’ve done of Odwain. Like last time, I’ll post all these guys separately and then do all the headshots in a masterpost. In the meantime buckle up for...a lot. (Thank you for giving me my favorite character.) 

Full Name: Odwain Novak. In Ben Yit’gab, the Bennai language, his first name would be Oediwen, and it’s what his dad called him. His mother calls him Oddy and he does not like it.

Gender and Sexuality: Male and Bisexual

Pronouns: He/him

Ethnicity/Species: Odwain is a Ben-Aleth, a Human-Bennai hybrid, also called a mosshead if you’re in coarse company. His human mother Blanche Novak is mixed race. Odwain’s maternal grandfather came directly from Earth, Poland specifically, during one of the several accidental migrations of humans coming from Earth to The Road. His maternal grandmother is from a previous wave who were already settled on The Road by that time, but the family can trace her ancestry back to West Africa. Odwain’s father, Ashatov Novak, was a full-blooded Bennai, a plant-based halfling race. Ashatov took his wife’s last name.

Birthplace and Birthdate: Thinking about this trips me out man. Odwain was born in 1946, sometime in the summer, probably July or August, in Septor Secundis, a coastal, metropolitan city and the seat of The Road’s government. He’s 27 during his first adventure and right now, in Godslaughter, he is 69 (what the FUCK). He will live maybe 20 or 30 years longer than your average human, and is in better physical shape than a human would be at 69. He’s more like late 40’s or early 50’s.  

Guilty Pleasures: A lot, probably - Odwain has just a bit of hedonistic streak just because he feels miserable so much of the time that he needs to feel good somehow. He smokes cigarettes for much of his life (but eventually quits), is a casual cannabis smoker and binge eats really truly terrible junk food (and has a bit of a gut because of it, but because he’s kind of lanky otherwise, he’s just kind of gourd-shaped). He likes beer, but doesn’t drink hard liqour all that often because he gets astronomically bad hangovers. Despite having a generally weak stomach, Odwain really likes frightfully spicy food, and his kids’ obligatory dad-gifts for him are probably hot sauces. When he’s not pounding down garbage, his favorite kind of cuisine is Thai. Not a guilty pleasure per say, but he also loves all things that have to do with insects, and when he and Rusty have a house together, Odwain takes up gardening as a hobby and plants an expansive garden of flora that are attractive to bees. (A Nice Thing: Odwain plants this garden when Rusty is pregnant because he found his love of insects through his father’s garden as a child, and wanted to give his kids the same opportunity) Odwain also maintains an apiary from the time that he’s living in a warehouse in the desert, to when he’s living with a partner and beyond. When he learns how to make Hot Honey it’s over for all of us. He has a modest collection of novelty bee-themed things that he’s amassed over the years, but he is not guilty about asserting his love of bees/wasps, like, at all. He’s also a little kinky but I’m not going into that.

Phobias: All of Odwain’s fears are existential - what if I push everyone away, existing in society is anxiety inducing, what if I’m just a bad person and my existence is making everything more difficult for functional people, etc. Though he’s kind of a sad fellow and has ideated suicide, and came very, VERY close to trying to kill himself after he dropped out of college, he also fears growing old and dying. I think death is more digestible to him if it’s on his own terms, but even then, I think what coaxed him off the edge was fear. If anything ever happened to his chosen romantic partner or any of his kids, he’d be besides himself, and is kind of one severe trauma and emotional breakdown away from becoming a bee-themed supervillian.

What They Would Be Famous For: Odwain is notable at a certain point in his career for being a pioneer in AI programming, and also for designing, building and patenting an invention called the Hercules Rig, which is basically a beetle-wing inspired jetpack. You can see it here. He holds the patent very closely and only allows it to be reproduced for recreation, construction, emergency rescue operations, etc. Odwain has taken a very firm stance on not allowing the military or any paramilitary organization to get their hands on it, though it has not stopped them from making shitty knock-offs that he is constantly suing people about.

What They Would Get Arrested For: Breaking and entering. Exploding something he shouldn’t. Buying illegal hazardous materials. Doing something petty that bites him in the ass.

OC You Ship Them With: To be honest there are not a lot of other characters besides Rusty that I ship him with. Bitter college rivals, thrown back together as late twenty-somethings, becoming better people together and learning to express empathy and vulnerability…it’s good. The only other character that I really go yeah, that’s the good stuff, is Jake’s character Finnick, who is kind of Odwain’s weird BFF and fellow mad scientist type. I don’t think they’d have a super stable relationship, and I think it would most likely be a “we yelled at each other and had weird sex enough that we like each other now” kind of scenario. But I do think they would come to love each other and have each other’s back to the death. Him and Hemlock, my dirty swamp witch who’s only picture was devoured during the great tumblr purge, also make a pretty fun couple for similar reasons. Iona too, but I think they are too explosive of personalities to ever find a stable middle ground. I also think he would find certain people attractive (August, Hare, Ganzrig, Ifechi the man I have spoken of but once, Jonquil in certain scenarios) but may not put himself out there to pursue them.

Neither of us have ever posted any art of her but here’s a few headshots of Finnick I did awhile ago, because she really is my favorite romantic partner for Odwain aside from Rusty, and is the only other one that’s really relevant in our games. 

OC Most Likely To Murder Them: Odwain is fairly physically fragile and to be honest I think that most people could kill him as long as they could get their hands on him - he’s very dexterous and has a lot of gadgets that let him get the upper hand, keep enemies at a distance or escape. He has a ranged fighting/add-spawn build so he is mostly out of direct harm unless he’s reeled in somehow. But uh, Odwain IS dead right now in Godslaughter, he died fighting an eldritch deity named Dreamer who sucked him into a nightmare dimension and flayed his soul out of his body. It’s ok though, as long as the party beats Dio, he’ll be fine. I didn’t cry you’re the one who’s crying.

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Ok, so, first off HAHA Odwain canonically likes Transformers and collects them, which are a thing in circulation after the last human migration from earth in the 90’s. Imagine. Imagine your grown ass father with a genius level IQ and multiple patents collecting plastic robots. Him and Finnick have transformers sonas - ANYWAY, that aside, he doesn’t really read for pleasure, just information, and generally just puts on cable while he works for white noise (and in later years, whatever The Road’s TV streaming service is). Most of the media he consumes is incidental to him, but will get interested in strange things that pique his interest. He probably thinks true crime docs are neat and enjoys pulpy sci-fi stuff that he can complain about. Any documentary about bugs. He’d like Mystery Science Theatre if they had it around. He enjoys things that are the fun, good kind of “bad” and has a fairly high threshold for  disturbing imagery.

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Odwain is that guy who makes 20 minute long youtube videos lampooning movies for “not making sense”. If there’s anything that breaks his suspension of disbelief, his attention and tolerance disintegrates, even if it’s just one of those things that needs to happen to move the plot along. It doesn’t really matter what genre it is, though he is most hard on sci-fi and fantasy. There is a tipping point for him, however, where he starts enjoying the thrill of blasting something and circles back around to enjoying it.

Talents and/or Powers: Odwain is only a little bitty bit magical, and only because Bennai are the most magical race on The Road. He has latent magical ability that allows him to sense magical signatures and incorporate magic into technology, and maybe cast a low level spell if he tries really hard. If he was in a high fantasy setting, he’d be an enchanter. His staff (the big lightbulb thing I draw him with sometimes), the Hercules Rig, his Wasp Suite (robotic wasps with an AI and different spells loaded into them) and any other devilish, bug-based weapons and utility objects do his work for him.

Why Someone Might Love Them: Odwain’s a bit of a tough walnut to crack because I think that he shines in moments of sincerity and vulnerability, but he has to, well, get there. He’s capable of very great, thoughtful acts of selflessness and compassion, and deeply desires meaningful relationships with other people, but he gets insecure about how he expresses himself and can clam up. He’s passionate, emotional and expressive, but has been put down for being so, and was probably a very brilliant, curious child who was beaten down into a somber adult. I actually think that, at some point in his childhood, he was not entirely unlike Whitty in the way that he was eager to share things with people and explore the world around him, which is why Odwain feels very protective of his grandson. I think the most lovable thing about him is that when he’s at his best, nothing can stop him - he’s extremely intelligent, diligent, creative and innovative. He truly, deeply loves making things, and making them better, and when he’s not in a crash, creates prolifically. What he loves, he loves deeply and without compromise, which makes Rusty, a person that could also be said of, a good match for him. I also think his cattiness makes him very witty, he’s a genuinely funny guy who can engage in some really goofy shenanigans when he’s feeling up for it.  

Why Someone Might Hate Them: Oh, lots of reasons. Odwain is an acquired taste to many, or just not to many’s taste at all. He is very petty, blunt and catty, and as a young man is extremely bitter and negative. You’d be very hard pressed to get a positive statement about anything out of him between the ages of 16-25. He’s very confrontational, can become very loud and intense if it’s something that he feels is important, and is not afraid to cut people out of his life if he feels that they aren’t good for him. Sometimes, he will end relationships/friendships prematurely because of this. Being such, he is heavily prone to self-inflicted isolation. He has no childhood friends, and only kept in touch with one person from college. He just cuts and runs. Odwain’s self-loathing runs very deep, which makes it hard for him to accept, or ask for, emotional support or affection. And that can be hard on the people around him who care about him. His executive dysfunction can also be abysmal, making it seem like perhaps he is messy or lazy, but he’s just kind of a mess himself, hah.

A weird non-psychological one but I think is enough to get someone’s hackles up is that Odwain doesn’t like animals very much unless they are insects, invertebrates, etc. He finds mammals loud, messy and needy, and that “I’m the only one in my house that is allowed to be all of those things”.

How They Change: As Odwain ages and gains a stable support network of friends, his edges soften and he learns how to ask for help more effectively. He also learns how to better choose his battles, and how to exercise the compassion that he knows he has, but has been too insecure to utilize. He manages his mental health better, but is never entirely free of it, because you never really are. Most importantly, I think, he learns how to forgive the people who deserve forgiveness, and give people second chances, accepting that people can change. Which means the same can be said for him, too.

Why You Love Them: I’ve talked about this before, somewhere, I’m sure. Odwain is one of those characters that has a very big slice of my personality, and has a lot of my more negative traits, though they are ones we’re both working on. My first session with Odwain was a scene where Odwain’s dad died after being ill for a very long time, and as it happens, it was on father’s day, on the first or second father’s day after MY dad died, after several brutal months fighting with the cancer that eventually killed him. I had to put down the dice, so to speak, and for a short time, thought that Odwain might actually be a character that I scrapped completely. He came too close to something very painful and personal. I don’t remember how, exactly, but the solution to this problem of mine was that if he’s getting close to me on his own, then I might as well just let him in on everything. I can genuinely say that doing that has changed the way that I empathize with my characters and how I make them, and that there is something I share with Odwain that I don’t have with many of my other characters. Also, I like bees.

[mochidoodle]

Houseki - 宝石

Since there’s been some curiosity about it lately, I’ve decided to officially introduce Houseki! Houseki is my original series made with the help of my faithful editor-in-chief @ukitakejuushiro​​​.

It all began with my first D&D character, a half-elf druid named Eizan Shen whose backstory I fleshed out over the past year. The story takes place in the elf nation of Liang (Chinese: 亮), meaning “light/brightness.” I incorporated my Asian heritage into a fantasy, magic-filled world brimming with all the classic (and favorite) fantasy story tropes. Sky-high towers and mages and dragons...a mix modern fashion with ancient Chinese wardrobes...and a set of unique customs built on Asian foundations. (ok now I sound like a chef on Chopped😅)

This explanation ended up hella long, so the rest is under the cut! I’m so happy people are curious about Houseki. It’s the culmination of my love for drawing, world-building, and storytelling (and anime ofc lol). Hope y’all enjoy my first original story!

The Kingdom of Liang

The prosperous Kingdom of Liang is a country landlocked on three sides, facing the sea on its west coast. It’s ruled by an oligarchy-monarchy mishmash I’ve yet to totally work out and three big political factions I won’t delve into too much now. The important thing to know is Eizan’s wife, Saya, connects him to the nobility because she’s the niece of the king. Her entire backstory is a wild ride involving a dispute for the throne, “dishonoring” her clan, and finding a family for herself. 

For the most part, the main plot revolves Eizan and his job. If you’ve read MTNN by Matsui Yuusei, you’ll figure out exactly who inspired Eizan...in fact he’s kinda like a (slight) Pokemon evolution of my favorite MTNN character (lol oops...)

Anyway, for that reason, I gave Eizan a similar-ish job. (I’ll keep Eizan spoilers to a minimum here because the campaign I’m playing right now has yet to reveal his deets... but if asked, I’d be happy to give’em!) We follow his adventures and meet his best friend, Taizi (a human) and his brother-in-law, Chai (an aspiring mage). 

Due to a horrific 100-year-long war (appropriately named the 100 Year War), Liang experiences the aftereffects of rampant xenophobia. Nowadays, border relations are peaceful and the xenophobia is minimal, but the bitter aftertaste of intermittent racism and elf elitism remains. 

We get a dose of this in Taizi’s backstory — Taizi and his human family were immigrant beggars rejected by the locals until Eizan’s father offered them a home and helped them get back on their feet. Ever since then, Eizan and Taizi have been the best of friends, like brothers. 

Meanwhile, Chai, the snooty son of one of the biggest royals around, learns what it means to be the “non-elite.” He meets Taizi, his sister marries Eizan (a commoner and a half-blood), and he becomes a working apprentice at the local woodshop. His is a tale of self discovery, treating people with fairness, finding his own goals, and opening his worldview when he crosses paths with characters from all walks of life.

Jade

One of the most important customs in Liang is the symbolism of jade. Jade is the most sacred stone, symbolizing a lifelong promise between two (or more) people. It is a vow of friendship, family, love, and loyalty. Jade is not to be gifted lightly. Royals tend to have a family and/or individual ring made of jade.

Most, if not all couples, will exchange unique jade pieces when they marry. I call it “Trade a Jade” (˚▽˚) For example, Eizan gave Saya her hair clip and she gave him a set of earrings. Sky gave Yuri a beautiful hair ornament, and she gave him jade chevron ear cuffs. (Couples do trade other items, but these happened to be similar gifts.)

Magic

The theory of magic in Liang is based off the number eight, representing harmony and balance. Mages use “anchors” to connect themselves to the natural energy of the world. While magic theory/technique may vary geographically, Liangese magic always utilizes eight anchors. A gate between the first seven anchors and the universe is established using your soul anchor (the eighth pillar, one’s own mana). The first seven are elemental anchors (fire, earth, water, etc) which draw power from the natural world. The stronger the mage, the purer the magic, meaning one can draw a greater quantity of power with a better connection.

Gemstones — houseki (宝石) — are used to enhance the channels established by anchors. Certain jewels even have elemental affinities. Stones with high purity resonate strongly and channel the best magic. 

Fun fact: If you take away the hat-shaped radical in the first character of Houseki, you get the word for “jade”...! 

Connecting to different anchors produces different spells. For example, combining several elements provides complex magics like telepathy and foresight. Using only one type of anchor creates create pure magic, such as straight up fire or water spells. However, magic is not produced out of thin air — it requires a trade of the user’s mana for the world’s energy. A spell’s strength still depends on the caliber of mage, not just what anchors they use.

Magic tools are very common. They use magic batteries made of gems/metal ores or simply rely on the user’s mana. Inscriptions and magic circles establish anchors if none are enchanted into the gems. High quality magic tools are made of metals with high magic compatibility. The more common items made from regular steel, stone, and glass include thoughtography radios, magic-infused cameras, and quartz crystal TVs.

Additionally, healing is possible by accessing life element anchors (found in your soul anchor or in organic objects) to summon sheer life force energy. Liangese healing magic is very advanced to the point where one can conduct brain and open-heart surgeries. However, the usage of certain magics is forbidden without qualification. Medicinal magic is limited to certified clerics, and alchemy is strictly prohibited unless you’ve graduated from the capital’s School of Alchemy. 

Note: Much sketchy underworld business revolves around black magic, illegal alchemy, and magic weapons trade.

Basic spells are taught in grade schools, but not everyone has strong magic affinity, so mastery isn’t a requirement. Most children continue on to a regular university, vocational school, or magic academy if they don’t enter a direct apprenticeship following primary education. Easy spells are frequently used in daily life to simplify tasks. For example, one can check the quality of materials or speed up certain processes using analysis/trace magic. Cooking magic is an entire art on its own, and very difficult to master.

There are laws banning time-altering magic and revival of the dead, but very few ever violate them. This is because these spells never end well. You can land in an eternal time loop or accidentally create a soulless, man-eating zombie. And then you die.  While spells that save someone on the brink of death in exchange for one’s own life force do exist, you cannot bring back the dead. 

There is only one exception to this, and even that singular instance required hundreds of years of research and preparation, not to mention the cost.

Finally, certain noble clans specialize in different magics, often attaining mastery of multiple disciplines. I’ll save that for a different post, but for now, just know that the Cheng Lis are primarily fire, alchemy, and space/time mages. Eizan is good with earth or plant-based spells (aka he has a great green thumb!)

commissioned art by Ling

Plot (???)

The plot of Houseki is still a work in progress. I have a general outline that I keep adding to as more ideas come. I’m writing out the fine details/arcs, which will include the dark underbelly of the royal world, black magic, a threat to the nation, the secret to life (?), and the truth behind the throne. Love me my cliches hehe~

Here are some character facts you might find interesting! ...okay, yes, my cast is like 90% one royal family and I have terrible naming sense (I legit named Taizi after my fave badminton player) but here ya go!

MAIN CAST 

Eizan Shen: A half-elf druid created for my first ever D&D campaign hosted by a friend! He’s a huge family man and an avid tea enthusiast. Very calm, levelheaded, and specializes in handling a knife...or many knives. (I don’t know where he keeps them...😨) Eizan gives off ultimate dad vibes and his most treasured thing in the world is his family.

Saya Shen: Eizan’s wife, a full elf born to one of the most powerful royal clans. She was supposed to be the first princess of Liang, but was disowned by her family when she rebelled from their ideals and married a commoner (and a half-blood, to boot). She’s an incredibly strong woman both mentally and physically, but also one of the warmest, most loving characters in the series. Oh, also her biceps are made of steel.

Chai Cheng Li: Saya’s little brother, a young mage prodigy who specializes in fire magic. He’s a tad snooty and arrogant, but at heart just a nerdy bookworm who loves magic. He grows up admiring his sister, feeling heartbroken when she “abandons” him and leaves the family, but later rediscovers himself and in his journey to become king. 

Taizi Ying: Eizan’s childhood friend. He and his family were immigrant beggars shunned by the locals until Eizan’s parents offered them a place to stay. After his parents died of illness, Taizi made it his life goal to repay the kindness that Eizan’s family showed him years ago. He becomes the greatest swordsman in the nation and earns great respect despite the human blood in his veins. 

Dae Ongaku: She is spunk in the form of a small elf girl, the one and only Dae. Head apprentice of the Shen Woodworking Company, her skills are nearly unrivaled. She’s known for her contagious smile, eccentric love of cheese, and her liveliness. It really isn’t a day without Dae Ongaku. (Character inspired and written by @ukitakejuushiro)

Sky Silvers: A cool and aloof elven ranger who befriends Eizan during our D&D campaign, later residing in the Shen household temporarily before he becomes a disciple of the greatest archer in Liangese history, Hanzhen Cheng Li. In the future timeline, Sky also ends up falling in love with Han’s daughter and marrying her. (Sky belongs to @ukitakejuushiro, and is her player in the campaign.)

Hanzhen Cheng Li: Youngest brother of the king and Saya’s uncle. Known far and wide as the One-Eyed Archer, Han is the strongest archer in all of Liangese history. He lost function of his left eye in the 100 Year War, hence his nickname. His wife passed away due to cancer, but thanks to my incredible plot armor (backed up by a decent magic theory), she will come back to life. They’re the cutest shit you’ll ever see, so I have absolutely no regrets. Best decision ever.

Yumiko Cheng Li: Han’s beloved wife, a cute little lady with a head of fluffy chestnut hair. She died approximately 75-85 years ago due to an incurable cancer, but I brought her back to life because Han was too lonely and I love her to bits. She is pure sunshine, the actual greatest good in this world.

Just look at this...how can you say no....

Yuri Cheng Li: Daughter of Han and Yumiko. Like her parents before her, she is a skilled archer, and her personality is a perfect mix of the two. She has a passion for fashion, art, and teaching, but her emotionally tragic past hinders her confidence and her relationships. Fortunately, she meet someone who helps her becomes brave again, and fate aligns just right :’)

Hokuzhen Cheng Li: We should finally introduce the King of Liang himself, shouldn’t we? Cheerful and easygoing, Hoku is a kind and intelligent king. He’s very perceptive of the state of the nation, while also keeping up with “hip and cool” trends much to his daughter’s dismay. He can be somewhat clumsy, often tripping over his massive robes. A good man with one too many dad jokes...

Alishan Cheng Li: The Crown Princess of Liang, named after the literal Alishan mountain range of Taiwan. She’s Hoku’s daughter and Saya’s cousin. Ali is polite and well-mannered but not particularly adventurous or motivated. She knows for sure that she doesn’t want to inherit the throne. Oh, and she loves food (especially mantou) ♫

Bonus:

Wakamori Yakaze: A spirit mage from the western island country of Kouhaku. Yakaze is Sky’s first teacher and Han’s best friend. Though he doesn’t appear in Houseki’s main plot, he’s a main character in Han’s spinoff story, which will rejoin the final timeline of the main series. Yakaze’s tale is one of angst and hopelessness and his journey to someday becoming whole again. Personally, I believe his friendship with Han is unrivaled, far surpassing both love and life. Keep an eye out for him in YUMI TO YA —弓と矢  (Yakaze belongs to @ukitakejuushiro)

ANTAGONISTS

Yan Wu Seigi: A cunning mage who runs an underworld spy network. He is the head of the Seigi clan (and political faction), but his heinous actions in the 100 Year War dishonored his clan, and they were stripped of their status. His sly methods and ulterior motives drive the underlying plot behind Houseki.

Akagi Kanshikan: Yan Wu’s adopted son. Akagi lost his family to a house fire when he was young. He grows up a wild, obsessive, and unstable youth who craves social intimacy but doesn’t know how to achieve it. His love for violence and lifelong training as an assassin don’t help much either. He meets Eizan during their school years and plays a large role in one of the more devastating arcs. 

Jimo Kanshikan: Akagi’s younger sister, a small, emotionless, and cold assassin. Trained to be a killer since her formative years, she is fast and deadly...but somewhere deep inside, she wishes Yan Wu would show her fatherly approval and she seeks warmth from her sibling(s). 

Shanmu Seigi: Yan Wu’s only biological daughter, a wicked poison enchantress who adores mind games. She supports her father’s regime but also has an evil plan of her own. The shame of their clan drove her to mother to madness, and Shanmu’s hand in her mother’s demise explains why she has become so twisted. Shanmu is a recurring antagonist who cleverly slips beyond reach of the law.

Hayazhen Cheng Li: The eldest Cheng Li brother, Saya’s father, and formerly the Crown Prince of Liang. He was once a benevolent man to his loved ones, but after an unfortunate plot twist, he begins seeking vengeance in the form of cruelly grooming his heir. Hayazhen is a key national figure and maintains strong influence behind political tides. 

Asuka Cheng Li: Hayazhen’s wife, mother of Saya and Chai. She supports her husband’s endeavors regrets her inability to help Hayazhen make wiser choices. Instead, she blindly takes his side, thinking it was the only way to support him. 

Junzhen Cheng Li: A stingy, arrogant second Cheng Li brother. He’s just straight up mean and rude, no holds barred. But no one gives a damn about him either lol.

SUPPORTERS & FRIENDS

Setsuna Reifan: A renowned healer who spearheads the movement for workers’ rights and class equality. She becomes an important ally to the main cast. 

Ichirou Reifan: Setsuna’s son, a member of Eizan’s team. A really average joe. Pleasant to be around, but not very interesting.

Hyouka Tsaomei: A quiet, sweet girl who specializes in illusionary magic. She loves strawberries. Her name means strawberry. Will kill for strawberry shortcake. 

Qiuzhen Rin Koori: Magic forensic specialist who only likes three things in this world — coffee, candy, and sleep. It pains him to get out of his chair, and it’s near impossible to extract him from his magic lab. 

Old Nao: Headmaster of one of the military academies in the capital. A kind man, but also incredibly ancient.

Torisu Bia: One of the Ongaku Daily Sun’s best political journalists. Doesn’t sleep much, loves to write, and gets her nose into sticky situations every now and then. Uncovers a great conspiracy.

Osamu Raisan: A bard of the royal court who plays the shamisen. Something about him is particularly ethereal and all-knowing...

Maikku Shantian: Another bard of the royal court. He sings. Loudly. A very popular bard amongst the populace. 

Layla Zanabaq: A local florist in the capital’s most immigrant-populated town, where Eizan and Saya live. Has a huge crush on Maikku. (Inspired and created by @harunnn)

Shu’un & Ranshao: Two of Chai’s university friends. The first is a salty little mage who uses familiars, and the second is the token idiot who only knows how to use explosion magic.

Paiya Yoon: Dae’s childhood friend and rival. She moves into the capital when she finds a new job there, rekindling their competitive friendship. She’s named after a papaya. Yes, you heard me, a papaya. (Inspired by @kyahgamis​)

Rem: Sky’s eternally sleepy childhood friend. Even while holding a conversation, there is a 99% chance he is asleep. May or may not be a ninja, but you didn’t hear that from m—

Collie: An archery kouhai from Sky’s youth. She looks up to him a lot and she flaps her ears when she’s excited, as if she might try and fly away. Collie is often mistaken for a boy.

Ra: A very Extra™ healer who has 100% faith in his skills (as should you). He calls people by their full name all the time (a power move), doesn’t skimp on eyeliner, and has known Sky since his village days as well. (Rem, Collie, Ra by @ukitakejuushiro)

FAMILY 

Ezi Shen: The plucky, curious daughter of Eizan and Saya! She adores the color pink and loves bows of all kinds: bow ties, ribbon bows, bow tie pasta, you name it! Ezi is quite the fearless little adventurer and one should consider it an honor to be invited to her weekly tea parties.

Daizan Shen: Eizan’s father, a master woodworker who owns the shop where Dae works. He’s a strict but fair man who earned great respect amongst fellow craftsmen with his hard work and skills. He and his wife serve as the liaisons between local mixed-race business and the corporate elf society. 

Meihua Shen: Eizan’s mother and Daizan’s wife. Though she was born to elite elven family, Meihua pursued her dream of being a seamstress. She now owns a beautiful dress and tailor shop. Despite being a pacifist, Meihua’s incredible intelligence was needed at the end of the 100 Year War, and she temporarily served as the head military strategist.

Tian Cheng Li: The only daughter of the previous king and sister to all of the Cheng Li brothers. Tian is an absolute riot who turns proper princess stereotypes on their heads. She is the root source of Saya’s spunky nature, the rebellious and boisterous Cheng Li aunt. 

Hayano and Irino Cheng Li: The notorious family twins, Tian’s youngest sons. They are the most chaotic duo of memes elves you’ll ever meet. They always have their hair dyed one wacky color or another. Lately it’s been orange (Hayano) and lavender (Irino). 

Hokkaia Hibari: Saya’s maternal grandmother, a very loving and tender woman who taught her grandchildren how to read and write. When the family dynamic turned sour, the children sought comfort in Hokkaia. She taught them to hope and dream :’) 

The Ongaku Family: Dae’s family of two fishermen, a navy boy, and the editor-in-chief of the Ongaku Daily Sun. They’re frequently so busy with work (coastal fishing, deployment, running the newspaper, etc) that they’re often absent from the household. As a result, Dae practically lives with the Shens nowadays.

Rei, Jun, & Maeno Cheng Li: The rest of Saya’s cousins. Rei is the oldest, an elegant but stiff woman. Underneath her guise of propriety, she seems lonely, like she just wants to have fun and be friends. Meanwhile, Jin is her stuck-up asshole of a little brother, a true snob. Don’t give Jin time of day, ever — it’ll get to his head. Finally, Maeno is the benevelent older bro of Tian’s twins. He has a soft, round stature and a warm smile.

Sei Ling Zhou: The former queen, mother of all the Cheng Li siblings, and the most renowned healer in history. She’s known for her quirky attitude and snarky clapbacks, having once turned down the proposal of the last king himself. Sei Ling will discover a never-before-seen spell that could very well be considered the “secret” of life...

Akira and Kawano Cheng Li: Akira is Junzhen’s wife and mother to Rei and Jin. She married into the family forcefully, desiring access to their magic libraries. Akira is not a stranger to getting what she wants. Kawano is Tian’s husband, a calm and steady man to balance out her spontaneity. He comes from a family that owns a fruit import company.

CUSTOMS

Jade: As mentioned before, the jade stone is the most precious and worshiped gem. Recklessly gifting jade would tarnish one’s reputation and belittle Liangese culture. Of course, they are understanding of mistakes, especially when foreigners are just learning about their customs.

Festivals: Liang has four big seasonal festivals — the Lantern Festival on the summer solstice, the Lunar Dance Festival in mid-autumn, the White Tiger Festival on the week of the new year, and the Jade Horse Festival on the spring equinox. People gather to pray to shrines, dance and sing, eat good food, and visit their families. 

Tournaments: Similarly, Liang also has four seasonal tournaments called “Medals.” Winners of the Medals, appropriately called Medalists, are recognized as the greatest master in their respective fields. (Minor competitions also occur, but these are the big ones):

There is the Swordsmanship Medal, which lasts five days and ends on the summer equinox (the day the Lantern Festival begins).

The Ceremonial Dance Medal in mid-autumn, which perfectly coincides with the Lunar Dance Festival. 

The Archery Medal on the winter solstice.

And finally the Horsemanship Medal during the spring equinox.

(all statistics are approximate and not quite final yet!)

Mastery of Arts: In Liang, mastery in any field (magic, arts, athletics, medicine, etc) is a very respected achievement. Oftentimes, masters are the older folks, hence why elders are held in high regard. An important plot point involves Taizi achieving mastery of the sword and winning the Swordsmanship Medal, defying classism and racism, and becoming one of the youngest and most respected masters of his generation. 

Market Day: A day-long event akin to an Asian night market or western farmers’ market. Shop owners, farmers, and restaurateurs gather in the central marketplaces of large and small cities alike to sell their specialty items. It’s a day to celebrate food and advertise your best goods! 

PLACES

Hisui: The capital. It has a circular layout and lies in the western central region of Liang. The Royal Palace sits at its center, hugged by a river that comes from the north. The Inner and Outer Capital are areas separated by the imaginary circle drawn by the river. This line divides the government and business sectors from the smaller residential districts.

Hayashi: Saya’s main hometown growing up. An industrial city slightly northeast of the capital.

Bing Harbor: Han’s city of residence in the northwestern province. It is Liang’s biggest port town, and thus the “gate” to the western world. Bing Harbor is known for its beautiful winter landscapes and seamless escape into vast forests.

Huamao: Eizan’s hometown, where he met Taizi. Known for its peaceful gorges, clear pools, and beautiful small cascades. 

Mountains: The mountain ranges surrounding Liang are classified into three different regions, each with their own specialty resources (i.e. mountain ore, lumber, etc). They are home to a few aboriginal clans. 

Huen: The southernmost Hisui district. It has the highest immigrant and non-elf population in the capital. This where Eizan currently lives. 

Haretsuki Lake: A large lake shaped like a crescent moon crashed into the sun. It lies in a valley to the southeast and has much historical relevance.

Here is a vague, incomplete map of Liang (still a really rough draft so far, and not quite the shape I want it to be...):

As you can see, I have great naming sense (´∀｀；) I either name on a whim or I throw in references to my family in some way or another... Anyway, I plan to change the shape and layout a bit. I’m not quite satisfied yet...

In conclusion... 

That...was a lot. If you made it this far, holy shit? Thank you?? Feel free to check out my Houseki tag and ask questions and just...please talk to me about my OCs omg I’m so excited ( ๑>ᴗ<๑ )

This is kinda my first big original “project.” I’ve always wanted to do something like this and I’m super excited to share it. Most of it’s on my personal docs or in chats with Danie, but I will share it all eventually! And I’ll update the (very unfinished) Houseki blog with all the formatting and plot, so stay tuned!

[phcking-detective]

Find Familiar, ch 1/2

Nines casts the spell and feels the magic pull from their soul. They need this to work. They don’t know what else to do.

They hear nothing, but perhaps the animal is simply quiet. The summon circle contains a perch and a large bathtub, painstakingly levitated all the way to the highest floor of their tower. Even a small area filled with sand. Just in case.

A wizard never knows what form their familiar will take until they summon it.

Nines doesn’t dare open their eyes. They need this to work. They are the most brilliant wizard of their generation and likely several before and after as well, but their brilliance is purely academic. All magic comes with a price, of course. That is why they’re ... like this.

Why bright lights give them migraines, and they cannot stand to be touched, and can only wear certain fabrics, eat certain foods, sleep under EXACT conditions. Why they can understand ancient languages and cursed tomes better than they ever could read a face.

It is their Price, and they need--

Nines opens their eyes and stares resolutely at the empty summoning circle. The spell had worked. They felt it take their energy and a piece of their soul. It had cast.

But out of all the beings on this plane and sixteen others, none had answered.

Very well. They don’t need help. They never have.

A first child for inheritance, a second for insurance. A third for luck, a fourth for the middle. Fifth for work, sixth for status. Seventh to fulfill a prophecy.

And an eighth child to be tithed. Two parents, presumably, and the eighth made exactly ten, one-tenth of the family and all they owned given to the church so that they gods would look favorably upon them.

There was no point in a child after that. No prophecies or tithing, and certainly no inheritance left over after carving it up for seven others first. No one ever needed a ninth child.

And Nines has never needed anyone else.

***

Three days and nights after casting the spell, Nines has eaten few enough meals to count on one hand. The sand has not been swept from the floor, and they have not managed to drag themself from their studies long enough to utilize the bathtub for its actual purpose.

But they’re fine.

It’s fine.

They are the greatest wizard of his generation, and they will ... survive. Perhaps not live, not as others do, not in happiness. But they are not dead yet and he has no less than twenty-two contingency spells if death does dare

KNOCK

Nines looks up from their manuscript for the first time in so many hours, they don’t know if the sun is setting or rising. The crystal ball embedded above the door glows green. Someone just solved their first riddle.

Well. Surely the second will

DOOR

Nines stands, then almost collapses from the black spots overtaking their vision. That was too fast. No one should have been able to solve the second riddle that quickly.

MAT

Nines draws their wand and faces the door as the third and final crystal ball lights green.

Knock knock knock.

“Hey. Hey! Hey, asshole!”

... what? They must be dreaming. Yes, an unexpected social visit from a villager capable of bypassing all his wards is surely the stuff of nightmares.

“Either let me in or shut the fuck up!”

The indignity of being accused of speaking when Nines hates speaking, particularly to “people,” infuriates them enough that they forget their wand entirely and throws open the door to berate the--

The much smaller man glaring up at them.

Not small enough to be a dwarf, although he certainly has that ... stockiness. Perhaps a mixture of human and dwarf, but. Even half-dwarves have beards, while this man just has some rather scruffy stubble and a scar across the bridge of his nose.

“You don’t smell right,” the man informs them.

He shoulder-checks past Nines before they can respond. It’s only due to their momentary bout of dizziness that they don’t smite him immediately for that. Or when he circles around the large living area, sniffing at things like a dog.

“Should’ve expected it to be bigger in here than out there,” he says to himself. “Still kind of small though.”

“I do not receive visitors,” Nines replies as coldly as they can manage.

They have accidentally frozen people before, simply with the freezing burn of their anger, yet their magic lays calm and docile inside their chest.

“Good, I fucking hate people,” the man says.

Nines makes some sort of very undignified noise in the back of their throat at that. The man continues wandering about their space, finally sticking his entire head inside their cauldron.

They’re hallucinating. That last alchemical potion must have--

“Don’t you have any cooking pots?” he asks.

Nines doesn’t answer so they don’t have to admit the answer is no. They will not be judged by some--some vagabond, a dirty ugly little man who is--IS BAREFOOT?

“You don’t have shoes,” Nines says, as if that is the important part about a strange man breaking into their home.

“I wiped my feet, fuck off.”

Nines looks back toward the door. All three crystals glow a fading green as the wards slowly reset themselves.

They did not originally mean to bar all the villagers from visiting them forever. They simply wanted any guests to have basic manners. Knock on the door at the first floor before entering, close it behind them so leaves didn’t blow into the stairwell, and wipe their feet on the mat at the top.

Clearly, Nines had expected far too much of the general public.

Nines turns back to see the man filling their alchemy cauldron with water. Although they sterilize it thoroughly after each use in order to prevent cross-contamination among potions, they scrounge up enough hope past the exhaustion to ponder if maybe they had forgotten to do so in the haze of the last several days.

Unfortunately, the man’s flesh does not melt from his skin as he scrubs it out with a rag.

“What are you doing?” Nines asks.

“I’m hungry and you don’t have anything else to cook in,” the man says. “At least we’ll have leftov--”

“Get out of my tower!”

The man looks up and scowls at them. “You’re the one who kept fucking calling me, bitch. Make up your damn mind.”

The realization leaves them light-headed.

“I ... I didn’t ...”

The black spots creep back again, except now they can no longer accurately be called “spots.” They take up far too much of Nines’s vision for that, then consume it entirely.

Something warm and solid catches Nines before they fall. Their hands grab at whatever they can reach out of an instinctive need to hold onto something--fabric, skin, fur. Fur? Not quite. Hair, maybe. Very thick hair. Dwarf beard? No, only stubble. But very thick hair somewhere, somewhere, oh in the middle. His ... chest?

“Ow, quit pulling on that.”

“Furry,” Nines says, because they are very intelligent and also the greatest wizard of their generation.

“Yeah, moon’s close to full. Damn, you’re a gangly bitch, aren’t you? Where’s your fucking body fat, you need to eat more.”

Nines mumbles his very clever retort into his pillows. Oh, his pillows. They’re in bed. That’s nice. Their bed is soft and warm and good.

The other Warm Good thing wrapped around them lets go.

“Nooo.”

Nines pulls it back. Furrier now. They’d secretly wished for a dog. Obviously, a feline familiar would have been more practical, and certainly more in line with their introverted tendencies. Dogs need too much attention, and walks, and they drool and shed. Cats only do one of those things, and if they summoned a black one, the hair would just blend into their robes anyway.

But still. Some part of them had hoped ...

“All right, fine. Fucking bossy. Scoot over, bitch.”

The Warm Good thing piles into the bed with Nines, but there is still entirely too much skin. Nines does not go to bed with people. Certainly not with skin showing. They want--they need--

They want a dog.

They need a person.

Of course. A fully animal familiar could only do so much for them without thumbs, and monkeys are horrendous. Only a real person would be smart enough to take care of them the way they need it.

But a person-familiar ... unheard of. Impossible. No one had ever summoned a human before, and it would be grossly unethical regardless.

Nines crows with the proof that they really are the greatest wizard of their generation, and likely several before and after.

“OK, so you’re good with me being a werewolf, right? Because if you start crying about a monster and get a bunch of pitchforks up in here, I’m pissing on all your robes.”

A werewolf. Half man, half wolf. Brilliant!

“So. What’s your name?”

“Nines.”

“Fuck, humans are still doing that? Your litters are bigger than ours, goddamn. And popping them out one at a time like that?”

The werewolf shudders. Nines pets over them, much more fur than skin now.

“Was two of us,” they say, all filter gone with how tired they are. “Twins instead of just the last eighth. Connor, Connor was ... just ... a second quicker.”

“What, so they threw you away?” he asks, the question nearly a growl.

“Tech,,nicaaally,” Nines slurs. “They did him too. Gave him. Away. Just, pretended to love him first. It’s, s’crueler. I think. At least I, ahhhhh. I always knew.”

“Phckin’ hue-mens,” the werewolf growls.

“Mmhmm.”

“Miiine.”

That is the last word he can growl out before the transformation completes. Then Nines receives the dog they wanted. Like this, it is far easier to feel their familiar’s mind at the edge of their own, to recognize the bond for what it is.

Good boy, [name].

It’s Gavin, dickhead.

Adequate boy, Gavin.

The wolf huffs. Go to sleep. I’ll feed you soup in the morning and maybe you won’t be so hangry.

I only want potatoes and carrots. NO celery.

Go the fuck to SLEEP.

Nines does so.

--

The wolf licks their face only after he’s absolutely certain they’re unconscious. The dumb human just smells dehydrated.

He didn’t want to come at first. Didn’t understand what the ache in his head was in the first place, or why he kept feeling hungry no matter how much he ate or that he had to pee for four hours straight.

Just that he needed to go, go this way, this way, this way!

Fucking asshole wizard summoning him like he’s their goddamn dog.

(But it’s not like he has a pack of his own. Not like he has anything better to do. No one to protect or feed or cuddle.)

(And this human obviously needs his help.)

He’ll only stay for the moon, just so he has a safe place to sleep it off away from angry villagers convinced he’ll “deflower” their women--who already smell of sex by the way--even though he really prefers men.

And this one wizard, apparently.

Gavin licks Nines again. The human already smells way better with his scent on them, and this is the most luxurious bed he’s ever curled up in.

He can spend the night. Make some breakfast. He’s hungry, right? Wouldn’t make sense to leave a good meal behind.

Yeah, he’s just staying for the food.

***

***

One of my lovely followers recently commissioned a second chapter! It’s rated E for Explicit (sex scenes). Subscribers to my Patreon get early access to all my commissioned fics 2 weeks earlier than they’re posted to AO3 or tumblr ^^