#and also The Locked Tomb if i can swing it

[floweroflaurelin]

Gearing up for Huevember! I rearranged this year’s colour wheel to prioritize Red at the end of the month to accommodate Secret Life, since we’ll likely have some Red shenanigans by then :3c And of course I had to make my colour wheel a sunflower ✨🌻

Since I want my inevitable Secret Life fanart to be a part of this year’s huevember, I don’t know what I’m going to paint until I paint it! To compare, last year I had a list of what each colour’s painting was going to be before November even properly started. “Okay, when I get to this shade of purple I’ll paint the Rift, when I get to this shade of green I’ll paint Bdubs’ mossy cloak.” I always knew the subject of the next day’s painting in advance.

Not this time! This year I’m improvising day by day because something epic and cinematic could happen in Secret Life (or Critical Role!) at any time! The lack of preparation is intimidating but also really exciting because it’s just gonna be that much more challenging. Last year I did huevember in order to give me something to do while I was sick as hell from Covid. But now I’m recovered… taking the ankle weights off… I’m so hype to get started! 🧡💛💚💙💜🩷❤️

[lavendertentacle]

currently reading "this is how we lose the time war" and "six of crows" and i'm having a lot of fun, i'm glad my brain is finally allowing me to read again

[cairavende]

My wonderful girlfriend got me Gideon the Ninth for Christmas and I realized why should I just give Worm recaps? Let's read some Locked Tomb! (We'll see how this format works, maybe I'll adjust it. Specifically might break stuff down into smaller segments instead of full acts, but I didn't think of doing this until after I had read all of act 1.)

Gideon the Ninth Act 1 (chapter 1 through 8) thoughts:

This book is so gay oh my god

Like, it's gay in ways I can't even explain. I love it.

Harrow beats the shit out of Gideon in chapter 2 and I don't know if I've ever seen someone get beat up in a more gay way.

"Oh Griddle! But I don't even remember about you most of the time." ROLL A FUCKING DECEPTION CHECK HARROW! You are saying this standing in the middle of the field you spent all night burying bones in just to foil her escape in the most dramatic way. You can't stop remembering her.

Gideon is the most herbo of herbos. I fucking love her. I love reading her PoV. She just knows punch and stab with sword and if those don't work than she'll just do them harder.

Also Gideon is SO fucking gay. Dear god. Dulcinea faints and Gideon turns off all though. HELP PRETTY GIRL. Nothing else.

Ok I could just make this whole thing "EVERYTHING IS GAY" but there is technically more than that.

I love how weird everything is and how little explanation is given. I don't want pages of exposition, I want to learn the world as it comes at me! This is perfect.

And just the very nature of things that seem weird not being given more than a passing thought in the book is information. Something may seem wild to the reader but it's so normalized to the characters that they wouldn't even think about the idea of it being different.

Lack of explanation also helps really show how much of a meathead Gideon is. Do the readers get to learn details about this thing? Only if it is a weapon, has tits, or Gideon is forced to listen while Harrow explains it. Otherwise no, why the fuck would Gideon spend her precious few brain cells on thinking?

And even if Gideon is forced to listen as Harrow explains it, the readers might not learn much cause Gideon might stop listening. I love her.

Aiglamene is wonderful. Crux is fine but I like her more.

Poor Gideon just wants a big sword that she can swing hard. It's not like she can't use a rapier. But why when she can go big sword?

SO MUCH CATHOLICISM

As someone who once was Catholic and then realized I was actually not a straight man, but instead a lesbian, I am in deep.

And the fucking slang used! Or whatever would be the right term. The shit they say! I love it. Just the weird sci-fi far future space necromancer universe and then suddenly "Are you asking me to . . . throw her a bone?", "Gideon had always known that this would be how she went: gangbanged to death by skeletons.", "Don’t hypothetically shove stuff up my butt again, it never does any good.", "Lo! A destructed ass.", "Well we were developing common sense, she studied the blade.", "Double Bones with Doctor Skelebone."

House of the First appears to be Earth. I kinda assume the House of the Ninth is Pluto, even though things obviously aren't in order given that the Seventh and Sixth are closer to the sun. Of course, I'm kinda expecting this to not technically be this solar system at all.

Undying Emperor, King of Resurrection, I Have Ten-Thousand Titles, Boss First, etc etc hasn't been on "Earth" in over nine thousand years. I wanna know MORE.

And the fucking Ninth House has their own prayer! Everyone else has one that the Ninth didn't know and then the Ninth had one that no one else knows! GIMME MORE!!!!

Also again, so many Catholicism metaphors or comparisons or whatever!

I could go on forever but gonna end this one with OH MY GOD SHE FOUND SUNGLASSES I LOVE HER. Fucking "I came prepared, my sweet." and "But then you couldn't have admired . . . these!" as she whips on the sunglasses. God. I nearly died.

[the-insomniac-emporium]

SWORDTEMBER '24, DAY 1: UPGRADE

Quick disclaimer: Since I managed to injure my wrist/hand right before the event started, I won't be able to do quite as much as I had originally planned for, at least not for the first week or so. Mainly that means no art (although I do hope to revisit at least a few of these!), but it also means shorter bits of writing. Chances are each day will be a bit longer than the last until I get back into the swing of things. As a note, I am using the prompt list made by @regal-bones (go check out her stuff!!!). ----- Today's entry, UPGRADE, is inspired by an old tumblr post (if I can find it I'll add a link) that talked about item descriptions in a game getting longer/more detailed the more you upgrade the item, gradually revealing story in a fun subtle sort of way. Originally I was going to try to do a longer writing to go with this, but my wrist is already very tired and the full thing was starting to feel too long, so... maybe we'll see this little world revisited at some point (I know there are definitely elements that don't shine through in just the descriptions)

-----

ITEM NAME: Tomb Guardian’s Sword DESCRIPTION: A sword of carved stone, taken from a statue outside the deserted tomb from which you emerged. Weighs more than the guilt that should come alongside it. Worthless for cutting, but the shape is too familiar for you to let go just yet. Cracks begin to form across the blade the more you use it. You can only hope it will last long enough (for what, you don’t yet know).

ITEM NAME: Mechanical Guardian’s Sword DESCRIPTION: A real blade, forged in the same image as your last, plucked from the hands of a robotic amalgamation. Lighter, faster, with an edge perfect for slicing through the wires of your machine enemies. Added coils gather electricity from fallen foes, to be unleashed on your command, or absorbed to replenish your energy. Don’t think too hard on how that works.

ITEM NAME: The Guardian’s Sword DESCRIPTION: The blade that inspired all the others, a legendary artifact belonging to a hero of the last age, once locked away as a key piece of history. Guarded fiercely by haywire robots… until you retrieved it. No machine can replicate the ancient magic flowing through the blade. It answers your call, surging around you as you fight, calling forth to storm down upon the mechanical tide. Yet even with all this power, you know it holds back. There is more to this blade… but only for the one who first held it. They only need to ask to access that last expanse of energy.

ITEM NAME: Your Sword DESCRIPTION: Welcome back, Guardian. May the return of your memories mark the turning of the tide.

[voxofthevoid]

Hi Vox, what books do you like to read? Genres etc, physical or e-books? Also do you have any recommendations on books to read? I'm dying to get into new books but I have no idea where to start looking.

(by books I meant outside of fanfic.)

PS, will you ever continue your doubledong dickfest (the train age swap one) fic again? I'm so down bad for teenage Satoru getting dicked down haha.

Recently, I've mostly been reading online even when I'm not reading fanfic—stuff like the SCP stories, r/nosleep authors and series, and original fiction on Ao3 and Fictionpress. Been hearing good things about Royal Road too, though the popular genres there may not be to my taste.

Anyway, when it comes to published books, I prefer fantasy or SF. Or both! And I'd rather have physical books than digital ones.

As for recs, the ones from my recent reads are—

The Locked Tomb series by Tamsyn Muir. It's a blend of SF and fantasy. It has four parts, and three are currently out. We're waiting with bated breath for the final one.

How to Survive Camping series by Bonnie Quinn. It's a complete four-part series of supernatural mystery and horror that started out on r/nosleep but has been published as books.

My last proper reading spree was over five years back, so I have no idea how I'll feel about these books if I were to read them now:

Whyborne & Griffin series by Jordan L. Hawk

Cut & Run series by Urban and Roux

Literally everything by Megan Derr. Her collection was impressive even circa 2016, and I'm sure it's grown now.

A few classics™, if you swing that way:

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Candide by Voltaire

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

I have an extensive to-read list too, and I can't exactly recommend anything from that, but here are the ones I'm looking forward to the most:

The Murderbot Diaries series by Martha Wells

Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

Ahh, double-dong dickfest, my beloved! That one suffered from having my attention diverted at just the wrong moment (thank you, chapter 236). Other, shinier ideas keep pulling me to them. Plus, what I currently have is some 14k that could easily stand as its own fic; the remaining outline is an escalating pornfest, and it's got a lot of fun bits I'd like to tackle, but if I don't start, what I've written would make a coherent oneshot.

I can promise a lot of teenage Satoru getting dicked down though. That, I keep going back to faithfully 😂

Thanks for asking this! It was fun to answer.

[terezis]

📓

For the locked tomb if you have any you haven't talked about, otherwise any fandom

HAHA ok so this is technically not canon bc in the second book wake says that after she died her revenant was trapped "in her bones, then [gideon's] sword,"

but i rly love the idea that part of the reason why everyone on the ninth was so put off by gideon was because for most of her childhood, she was being haunted by her dead mother. she gave off the same bad vibes that harrow felt from the sword while wake was possessing it. mad heebie-jeebies up in that kid.

if anyone cared about her they might have noticed that she was possessed, but since no necromancers ever really got close enough to her to tell, wake evaded notice.

anyways it would also be a nice parallel to harrow, who spent most of her life possessed by the body.

so the premise of this fic is: what if wake was haunting gideon, but similar to how harrow could see the body, gideon could see her dead mother's ghost. therefore she is kinda raised by wake, insofar as one can be raised by a ghost who planned to murder you as a baby and turn you into a bomb. LOL

scenes would include: bb!gideon's cradle being rocked by nobody, gideon having full-on conversations with what looks like empty air... at one point aiglamene would catch her practicing parries with a stolen knife, swinging it like she'd been taught how to even though this would have been before aiglamene had ever started training her with a sword.

wake would probably possess her at some point to try and make contact with boe, to varying degrees of success. gideon's attempts to escape the ninth suddenly have MUCH HIGHER STAKES. in this au gideon doesn't plan on joining the cohort: she plans on meeting up with blood of eden.

gideon already hated the ninth but now she's spent her childhood getting secretly propagandized by wake, mama’s little boe sleeper agent <3

i don't know if it would be punchier to end with wake and gideon being like, let's open that fucking tomb, or if harrow should do it, bc then gideon would get to feel guilty that at least when HER mother died, she "loved" gideon enough to stick around...

anyways i think that would be real juicy don't u

[ponycycle]

Stellar Blade: Less Than The Sum Of Its Parts

Stellar Blade is a "character action game" that has some great stuff, some good stuff, some bad stuff, and some terrible stuff. The writing that follows is going to assume that you already are familiar with what it is (at least on a surface level). Also, if you somehow didn't know, this game is uh... heavily inspired by Nier: Automata. Basically a copy (not necessarily a bad thing on its own!)

Great:

-Excellent, varied cinematic soundtrack. I'm looking at a tracklist right now that has 97!!! entries on it. Flavours are all over the place in a good way - NieR, Ace Combat, Detroit(???). But** (see below) -Pretty game. I dunno if I feel like it's necessarily pushing the PS5 to its limits or not, but it does look good and they do make good use of the high resolution available (UI, composition of some scenes). -Main gameplay loop is pretty good. It's like a more involved version of the combat in FF16? It's not as deep as a Platinum game (but combat is much more complex than it was in NieR: Automata). Success in combat is satisfying. Timing felt a little weird to me sometimes, but maybe it's just because I'm old. -I did like the vast amount of collectible cosmetic items, all of which are pretty detailed and there are basically only two joke items.

Good:

-This is a simple thing, but the way Stellar Blade handles ladders is excellent: if you run into a ladder from the wrong side, Eve will simply do a little flourish and swing around to the correct side. I'm going to be thinking about this forever now any time I ever run into the back of a ladder in any other game. -Eve has a snazzy animation for activating a checkpoint that managed to not wear out for me the entire game -Fast travel is generally pretty snappy inside of a zone. Going between zones is a little clunky, and warping around zones without an overworld map can be confusing, but considering how many game fumble fast travel still today I'm willing to call this a good one. -The way the game will let you optionally warp directly to a quest giver to hand in a quest is nice -Enemy designs are all good. All visually distinct, yet they all feel related

Bad:

-Suffers a little bit from FF16's problem of excessive sidequests, except in this game there's even less things to spend regular money on (the most common quest reward). -The gun is clunky and not very useful in normal combat. It feels like they put in a lot of work just getting it to where it already is, but it still doesn't flow very well with regular attacks. Why does it break target lock??? -As good as ladders are, ropes are kinda bad, ESPECIALLY trying to grab one to descend. -There are a couple of Tomb Raider/Uncharted run sequences and they are all bad. -This game did not need TWO desert zones!!! One was enough! -There is also a skateboarding sequence that is really bad. If they just yanked it entirely the game would be better for it.

Terrible: -So I'm not going to be the first person to say that the writing in Stellar Blade is bad, but... it's usually presented that it has a bad "story", and that doesn't cover how big the problem is. Horizon Zero Dawn is a game with a great story but only a couple of good characters. Nier: Automata is a game with a plot that is arguably kinda stupid but with GOOD characters that you give a shit about. Stellar Blade is a game with an unsurprising plot that doesn't have a single character in it that I give a shit about. Not a single one!!! And there's SO MUCH TALKING being done by these people I don't care about, about things I don't care about. And the writing is weird! You can't get through one conversation without getting whiplash from non-sequiturs. The writing is easily both the single worst part of this game and the DEFINING characteristic of it. -**The bad writing unfortunately means that most of the time, the soundtrack is wasted. Nothing is emotionally connecting because there are no emotions to connect to. It's trying so very hard to carry the game the whole way from start to finish, but it can't. It's impossible. -Also related to the bad writing: there are so many delayed UI interactions in this game!!! What the fuck!!! If you die in the game, a respawn prompt will appear but remains uninteractable for a good second or two. You can mash through some dialogue (thank GOD) but only after the first two seconds of each line comes out. There is no visual distinction between skippable and unskippable dialogue. When a cutscene ends, or there is a transition between non-combat animations, Eve has to stand there stupidly a second or two before she starts responding to player inputs. If you want to buy something at a shop, you have to mash through inane dialogue first, EVERY TIME, then you get the OPTION to open the shop menu. -There are unskippable cutscenes. I probably changed the shape of my PS5 controller trying to futilely skip through many cutscenes on NG+. I was not surprised at all to see by the end of the game that the credits themselves were unskippable (you can SLIGHTLY speed them up) -There is a sequence where you're supposed to run from cover to cover while turrets are firing at you that I very quickly gave up on. If you turn the game difficulty to easy for that sequence, you can just run through in one shot. Would highly recommend you do the same.

So would I call Stellar Blade a good game or a bad game? I don't know. It's a finished game - there are no signs of rushed development visible to me here. This is the game they wanted to make. I bought it on physical media, so I could sell it off if I wanted to. I don't think I do though.

Hey you know what? Here is a good video review by Sphere Hunter you should probably watch if you haven't yet:

[altschmerzes]

As a fellow whump lover who just discovered your Locked Tomb fic I am aghast. LITERALLY ALL IVE EVER WANTED and your writing is incredible 😭 also can we TALK about how much whump potential there is with the cavalier-adept pairs in general?? like its literally the perfect setup AND it’s found family?? And the relationships between the houses too like hello???? Not to even mention griddlehark because if I get into that I Will Cry but THE NINTH AND THE SIXTH COMPETITION TURNED FRIENDSHIP?? LITERALLY EVERYTHING AB THE FOURTH AND THE FIFTH??? I am constantly just losing my mind over this and I am so glad a fic like this out there. Keep up the great work ❤️

IT'S SO MUCH!!!! ISN'T IT GREAT. BIG, BIG FAN. gah i love writing in that world so much there's just so much to work with in so many ways. i'm so glad you are enjoying my fic and i hope you're looking forward to the next chapter bc i AM getting back into the swing of it <3 <3 thank you for this it was a delight

[idiot-mushroom]

Did you ever have a day when you're trying to drink And your favorite cat walks in and your tiny heart sinks Because just yesterday you hung it from a string And now your wife's in the way when you got an axe you're trying to swing Did you ever meet someone with a filmy blue eye And when he looks at you, it's kinda hard to describe You even like this man, but you know he's got to die And so you carry out a plan in the middle of the night. Do you chop it up And burn the bits Or throw it in a well or Do you pack it in a box and ship it Dig a grave down in the cellar What do you do with a corpse Don’t you worry about the smell And also how do you know When someone’s dead Sometimes it’s hard to tell When your friend’s beloved sister dies one tragic afternoon Do you hold off on the burial and lock her in a room On a dark and stormy night when she rises from the tomb You will realize she was only in a cataleptic swoon When you have a little problem you don’t want folks to find Or perhaps you’ve been insulted and revenge is on your mind Just go down to the basement in the back behind the wine Consider some home masonry to cover up your crime Do you chop it up And burn the bits Or throw it in a well or Do you pack it in a box and ship it Dig a grave down in the cellar What do you do with a corpse Don’t you worry about the smell And also how do you know When someone’s dead Sometimes it’s hard to tell One morning in cool blood I stopped the drumbeat of a heart And never have I slept so very well I know I am not mad Because my senses are acute I can hear things in heaven earth and hell Were you ever taken over by that fiend intemperance Were you ever so influenced by that gin-nurtured malevolence To offer your own wife a taste of personal violence Till you know you have destroyed all hope of God's mercy or innocence Don't you hate it when a sick man's in your mesmerizing gaze And though he passes in the night, you got him twitching for many days And then he gives you a nasty fright when he croaks "let me die please" Once you release him from that state he turns to goo like marmalade Do you Chop it up And burn the bits Or throw it in a well or Do you pack it in a box and ship it Dig a grave down in the cellar What do you do with a corpse Don’t you worry about the smell And also how do you know When someone’s dead Sometimes it’s hard to tell Do you chop it up And burn the bits Or throw it in a well or Do you pack it in a box and ship it Dig a grave down in the cellar What do you do with a corpse Don’t you worry about the smell And also how do you know When someone’s dead Sometimes it’s hard to tell Do you chop it up And burn the bits Or throw it in a well or Do you pack it in a box and ship it Dig a grave down in the cellar What do you do with a corpse Don’t you worry about that smell And also how do you know When someone’s dead Sometimes it’s hard to tellllllllllll

idk what this is from i’m sorry 😭

[bad-ads]

my locked tomb playlist:

1. Mezzanine by Lady Lamb

its literally written by harrow abt alecto

“There's a ghost, a ghost in the mezzanine

And she's soaked, soaked in a glimmering

Sort of bone, her bones, and I'm blathering”

“How I ache, I ache in the pit of me

I awake, awake with this fear in me

How it makes, makes a fool out of me

With its knife how it carves the seeds out of my heart

For to plant in the soil for to feast”

2. Total Eclipse of the Heart by Bonnie Tyler (i also really like the Angie McMahon cover)

its abt gideon and harrow sorry

“Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time (All of the time)

I don't know what to do and I'm always in the dark

We're living in a powder keg and giving off sparks

I really need you tonight

Forever's gonna start tonight”

3. Murder in the Dark by Gia Ford

also gideon and harrow

“Murder in the dark keeps running in my head

And I'm never getting bored, baby girl

Never wanna be standing still

All the love we bled all lit up in red”

“Ready to implode next to you (Do-do, da-da)

No one can do it in the way that we do

I wonder how I'd ever live without knowing (Do-do, da-da)

No one could make me feel the way that you do”

4. Organ Donor by Jeremy Messersmith

just the whole series tbh

“I was born in a mortuary

Full of worry

Ice water in my veins”

“Swing low

Grey bones

I don't know

If I'll ever be whole again”

5. Abbey by Mitski

nona wrote it

“I am hungry

I have been hungry

I was born hungry

What do I need?

I am something

I have been something

I was born something

What could I be?”

“There is a light, I feel it in me

But only, it seems, when the dark surrounds me

There is a dream and it sleeps in me

To awake in the night, crying "Set me free"

And I awake every night, crying "Set me free"

6. NFWMB by Hozier

harrow and alecto

“Ain't it a gentle sound, the rollin' in the graves?

Ain't it like thunder under earth, the sound it makes?

Ain't it exciting you, the rumble where you lay?

Ain't you my baby? ain't you my baby?”

7. Sinnerman by Nina Simone

John Gaius and the RBs, and especially now that Alecto is free

“Oh, sinnerman, where you gonna run to?

Sinnerman where you gonna run to?

Where you gonna run to?

All on that day”

“So I run to the river

It was boilin', I run to the sea

It was boilin', I run to the sea

It was boilin', all on that day

So I run to the Lord

Please hide me, Lord

Don't you see me prayin'?

Don't you see me down here prayin'?

But the Lord said

Go to the Devil”

[c0rpseductor]

i think for christmas if my mom can swing it (we're having car trouble so this depends) i might ask for some actual physical books. i think it's just way easier for me to read a physical book and stay focused.

i think the books i want most would be a big omnibus of his dark materials, to replace the one i lost since i wanna reread it but dont have my old brick to do so, and then the locked tomb books. bc i keep wanting to read them and not doing it.

i would also really like to have a copy of lolita but i'd have to choose it myself in person bc i'm as particular as nabokov was about the cover. i want it to be plain. i don't want any of that heart lollipop sunglasses nonsense. what a fucking insult to that novel.

[foulbearobservation]

r u on purpose not into the locked tomb or i it just something u haven't tried yet? bc it truly has a lot of things that remind me of stuff u've said u enjoy dghksjhg -🦭 (also totally chill if ur not into it on purpose - i just truly am surprised that u aren't lmao)

I tried reading it once and just something about the writing style just truly did not vibe with me. idk it was too,,, fanfic-y for me? Like I dunno the vibe kept swinging wildly and I was never along for the ride and the writing style felt too self indulgent fanfic writer-y for me (and I fully admit I'm a self indulgent fanfic writer) but something about the tone just never hit right for me. Idk. I might give it another shot now that it's been a while since I tried to read it, see if I can get past my weird mental block this time around ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(��ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

[iviarellereads]

Gideon the Ninth, Chapter 22

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For detail on The Locked Tomb coverage and the index, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

(Fourth House icon) In which the terrible teens reappear.

That evening, Harrow has still not returned. Gideon goes back to her training exercises. When she's pretty certain Harrow won't return, she even sneaks her longsword out of the false bottom of her chest and does everything over again. By the end, despite knowing it's trouble to get used to, having two hands on a grip feels so right that Gideon is "happy as a child."(1) But, Harrow still hasn't returned. With uncharacteristic courage, Gideon runs the hot liquid tap in the "uncanny tub" in the bathroom and has the first hot bath of her life. In the end, she still uses the sonic shower, out of worry of how clean the water could really get you(2), but she feels and smells incredible. Her hair is so floofy it takes a lot of effort to get it to lay flat again.

The bath also has another effect: Gideon feels sleepy and content. She lays in her nest of blankets, gets out a magazine, and wakes nine dreamless hours later with it stuck to her face with drool. She even finds Harrow curled up in the bed in the next room.

She said, "Wake up, assmunch, I want to yell at you about keys," but this imperative did not have the desired effect. "The white key is now with your precious Septimus, as per the agreement," snapped Harrow, then pulled the covers over her head. "Now go away and shrivel." "This does not satisfy me. Nonagesimus."

Harrow slithers further under the blankets, so Gideon takes the opportunity to dress and paint her face with minimal critique, and leave their quarters. On the staircase down to the atrium, she realizes she's being followed. Eventually she draws her rapier and swings around to see who it is, but it's only Isaac, saying Jeanne wants her. The kid looks terrible, covered in soot and soil, he's lost at least three earrings, and his hair is crumpled flat. He reiterates that Jeanne wants her, and somebody's dead.

Gideon hopes this is a misplaced cry for help, but Isaac has already turned away, so she has no choice but to follow.(3) Down and through Canaan House they go, to the room with the formerly chemical-reeking pit, now clean and filled with water. Coronabeth and Naberius are doing laps in the pool, which absolutely fries Gideon's poor mind, having never seen anyone swim before.(4)

Isaac gets Corona's attention and tells her that someone else is dead. Corona's face does what Gideon's had wanted to, which is to express "What??", which Corona also says aloud. Isaac says Jeanne wants her, specifically. Naberius asks what's the holdup, but Isaac says he promised he'd only leave Jeanne alone for five minutes with the remains. Corona vaults herself out of the water (leading to Gideon making her "first and only devout prayer to the Locked Tomb of thankfulness and joy") and asks what that means. Isaac says it means someone's dead and he's leaving in ten seconds.

Corona dashes to the training room and returns, not with towels, but with Lieutenant Dyas and Colum the Eighth. Isaac leads them to a broad terrace outside, to an incinerator, where Jeannemary looks like a live electric wire, practically sparking with energy, rapier drawn. She tells Isaac she wanted the Ninth and Princess Coronabeth, but he says everyone else tagged along, and he couldn't leave her alone any longer.

Corona walks over and tells Jeannemary kindly to put away her sword and explain what happened. By way of explanation, Jeannemary opens the incinerator to expose a heap of cremains. Colum the Eighth takes a piece out and examines it in his hand, heedless of the inevitable burn as they're still hot. Isaac says he can tell fresh cremains, can't Coronabeth, as a necromancer? She hesitates, and Dyas butts in that one of the skeleton servants might have fallen in. Colum says they could ask, but Isaac says that's rendered fat and flesh. Someone(5) asks if the Fifth are still- but cuts off. Jeannemary confirms that they're still in the mortuary. Someone else has been killed.

Naberius says it's ghost stories, the kids are losing it from lack of sleep. Jeannemary says she hopes whatever killed Magnus and Abigail and this poor soul gets Naberius too, she'd like to see his face then. Gideon steps between them before it comes to an altercation, and stares into the incinerator where Colum is still poking around. He says it needs a bone magician, and he's heading back. Naberius gets instantly distracted from glaring at Jeannemary, and offers himself and Corona to ref the duel between Eight and Seven.

Colum and Naberius leave, and Dyas trails behind them. Coronabeth stays, looking troubled, which makes Gideon sad, but also still soaked to the skin, which makes Gideon need a lie-down.(6) Isaac says he keeps seeing things in the corners of his eyes, and waking up hearing something moving, or sensing someone standing outside the door. Jeannemary embraces him, and Gideon is almost embarrassed to witness the connection between necromancer and cavalier. Jeanne looks up at Corona and Gideon and says she wanted to see them because Magnus liked them, so they get the warning: "Don't say I didn't tell you." Then she leads Isaac away, as Corona closes the incinerator.

Gideon can feel rain coming in the air, she's learned the weather a little in the weeks here. When the storm comes, it'll break hard. Corona thinks the Fourth aren't being reckless, they might really be in trouble. Gideon takes off her glasses and nods, causing her hood to fall back.

Corona is watching her, and her face brightens instantly to a radiant smile, her violet eyes crinkling with her grin.

"Why, Gideon the Ninth!" she exclaimed, mourning banished. "You're a ginger!"

The rain starts later that afternoon. The first time it had rained, Gideon couldn't get over how people could live with that kind of atmospheric weather. Now, it's just a distraction. She goes back to check on Harrow, wondering if she hallucinated seeing her this morning, if Harrow fulfilled all Gideon's childhood dreams by being thrown into that incinerator(7), but finds her in the bed where she was left.

Camilla finds Gideon while she's eating lunch, and says the duel's off. Seventh never showed, and they're not in their quarters. She tells Gideon to move, and Gideon never questions the order. They go Dulcinea-hunting, and find her in a conservatory, sprawled on the flagstones. Gideon's insides churn as Camilla kneels to check her vitals, but Dulcinea gives a great, hacking, bloody cough, says "He never came back," and faints again.

=====

(1) You might even say… giddy? (2) How many among us just Can Not Even with baths because it doesn't feel clean enough? Body soup, no thanks? Not me, I could live in a bath if it stayed hot, but I understand where you're coming from. (3) There IS a choice here, but it would be pretty heartless to abandon these poor kids at this point. (4) No baths, no pools, the water-poor Ninth House indeed. (5) The unfinished sentences here mean it could be anyone, but my guess lies with either Dyas, thrown off her game, or Corona. I am open to evidence otherwise, though. (6) And people say these books are insufficiently lesbian. (7) I love that Gideon is still thinking as if she hates Harrow, after all they've done for each other that they could have said no to.

[mandaloriandy]

I posted 12,614 times in 2022

24 posts created (0%)

12,590 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@the-grey-hunt

@tanoraqui

@leonspardas

@anonymousalchemist

@milaek

I tagged 7,179 of my posts in 2022

Only 43% of my posts had no tags

#dc - 881 posts

#batfam - 591 posts

#star wars - 524 posts

#tolkien - 478 posts

#q - 449 posts

#silmarillion - 317 posts

#art - 272 posts

#locked tomb - 269 posts

#wheel of time - 242 posts

#pokemon - 196 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#tag theft: this whole section of the book really got mehe lived with these guys for…weeks? months? and they could all tell there was someth

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

WIP guessing game: star.

"Another mandalorian, bright like the stars. A soldier, one with a familiar face, who’s learned how to not yield. A Jedi padawan, one of the balance points. A would-be Sith, burning with the desire to be more."

5 notes - Posted February 8, 2022

#4

WIP Ask Game

Rules: Post the titles of your current works in progress. If someone sends you an ask with one of those titles, explain the concept or post a snippet!

tagged by @willowcrowned sorry for waiting like a month to do this, my only excuse is brain bad

also most of these don’t have titles yet rip

Jedi Shmi AU (of course)

Sith Shmi AU

Tim Drake and Jason Todd alternate meeting AU

Tim Drake: Robin Exposed!

Serial Killer Tim Drake AU

Reverse Robins: Everyone Has A Bad Time (Except Dickie!)

Absolutely Deranged Dick Grayson AU

The Dragon Reborn Musical Chairs AU (secretly like five AUs in a trench coat)

tagging uhhh @viciousmaukeries @squirrelwrangler @lumateranlibrarian

5 notes - Posted August 10, 2022

#3

was really excited to get back into the writing swing of things and then realized that the place I left off was not, in fact, in the middle of a scene, but in the middle of having to edit two scenes together, which I hate doing.

so rip that impulse

9 notes - Posted March 14, 2022

#2

Chapters: 2/? Fandom: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Shmi Skywalker, Slick (Star Wars), Original Clone Trooper Character(s), Dooku (Star Wars), Qui-Gon Jinn, Bo-Katan Kryze, Beru Whitesun, Komari Vosa Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Jedi Shmi Skywalker, Flashbacks, Interrogation, Secret Identities, Betrayal, Prophetic Dreams Series: Part 15 of Jedi Shmi AU Summary:

Death, yet the Force. Soon, everything will be revealed. What is the price of the truth? What is the cost of the lie?

Chapter 2 is up!

Two Mandalorians, two directions.

22 notes - Posted March 18, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

28. noceur & 29. selcouth; sith shmi and sith qui gon

noceur - one who stays up late

selcouth - unfamiliar, rare, strange, and yet wonderful

(prompt list)

Qui-Gon finds her outside, late at night, the day before their plan will go into effect. He doesn't say anything like shouldn't you be sleeping or won't you be tired tomorrow morning because he's not a complete idiot, but he does have to ask – "What are you doing?"

Lady Searah hums. "Practicing. It's been over a decade since I could touch the Force well enough for something like this. The better a grip I can get tonight, the less I'll have to worry about tomorrow." Her eyes flash towards his, bright and burning in a way they hadn't been before he'd removed the binding keeping her from touching the Force. "Watch. You might find this interesting."

Oh, might I, Qui-Gon thinks, but holds his tongue. The Force has guided him here, to exactly the kind of teacher he'd wanted, and placed him in position to do her a favor. The message is clear enough.

Sand swirls around, carried by more than just the cold nighttime wind. It collects together, swirls and eddies, wrapping around the two of them like a netted kaleidoscope.

Because he can't help himself, Qui-Gon reaches out and touches–

And yanks his hand back, biting off a curse. Flecks of blood drip down from his fingers, before he grimaces and pulls out a cloth to wipe them on. "You could have warned me," he grumbles.

Lady Searah laughs. "I'd have to warn you every time you saw it, if I'd done that. But now you've learned a lesson, haven't you? Think before you touch. Anything can be deadly, if you use it right."

He glares at her. She's right, damn it. "And how will this be useful tomorrow? If we're robbing Gardulla's treasury, we'll want to be stealthy. Not leaving sandblasted corpses everywhere we go."

The sand in the air twists, reaches inwards, closer and closer to Qui-Gon. A small tendril curls its way towards his face, and he refuses to flinch away, feeds his rage and fury. He on the Dark Side and goes to push away the sand, but – there's nothing to push on, and the tiny particles escape his grasp, continue on, scratch the lightest brush against his cheek. Not even enough to draw blood.

"Fine control," Lady Searah says, and raises her eyebrows. "Which you'll need to practice quite a bit, before you can manage this trick. Tomorrow I'll be taking the lead on this infiltration. You will follow my orders, and if you feel the need to deviate from the plan, you'll explain your reasoning to me beforehand. Do you understand?"

Qui-Gon grits his teeth. He wants to protest, but the swirling sand around them... he wonders how she's doing it. She can't be managing each individual grain of sand, not with so many of them; yet the complexity of the patterns, the way it drifts together and apart, always in motion, has such strange elegance to it, like a flock of birds or a colliding galaxy.

"I understand," he says.

"Good," she says. "Now go get some sleep. You'll want to be well-rested for tomorrow, Apprentice."

37 notes - Posted January 20, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[arbitrarygreay]

The Salvatore School Shipping Megapost

tl;dr polycule centered on Panda Squad

So the thing is, Hope is annoyingly monogamous in Legacies. She shows zero attraction to anyone who is not Landon, despite the show playing around with the ideas of Rafael, Ethan, and Clarke. We don't even know what her crush on Josie might have looked like. As such, even my favored femslash relationships don't really twig when Hope and the other party are in a good place with each other. What you do get, subtext-wise, is Hope having Feelings when her relationship with anyone isn't quite on track. And, of course, the show packs in all of this stuff about Hope repressing herself in order not to become A Great Evil, and that she does have the capability to be a real social butterfly (and yet even in that relatively unrestrained state, annoyingly monogamous!). The implication is that poly!Hope really only happens in a semi-bad end where she "snaps" and embraces the family hedonism. Otherwise, she'll be clinging to illusions of what normal romantic (monogamous) relationships should look like. So, sadly, I can only see her being partnered with one primary in this polycule, and merely being accepting of having metamours. Everyone else, on the other hand, seems like they could get into the swinging life, and then move on to poly. The show avoided any hint of that (the most we get is Alyssa cheating on MG offscreen), unlike the TORN FEELINGS DRAMZ of TVD and TO, because the writers are apparently nerds hard into traditional ideas of romance, but they and the actors also don't quite know how to differentiate friendship, romance, or lusty chemistry, so their no-romos have the cred of a no-homo by dint of their yes-romos being indistinguishable from the no-romos. Hope-Landon: I like it, to be honest. Landon is so traumatized by episode 2 that he goes all in on communication and truth, and then after the Miss Mystic Falls ep, he is almost always a supportive boyfriend. The show literally has to keep doppelgangering him in order to make Hope not trust him. They have Locked Tomb vibes, with every bit of irony that entails. I'm okay with Landon being a primary! Hope-Lizzie: Yeah, yeah, I'm so easy, I have a ship Type. Where Hope-Landon is a ship that would proceed stably along if it weren't for external factors, Hope-Lizzie is a ship where they want to be on-side, but their very personalities keep leading to them clashing, partially because they don't back down on each other, in positive and negative directions. This harkens back to the way TVDU and TO did relationships that just kept vacillating between opposing polarities, but always with the amplitude on high. No wonder it's compelling as a ship! However, in practice, the "there's never any doubt that they have strong Feelings about each other" is really from Lizzie's end. Hope does desire friendship with her (the strongest point for the ship as mutual feelings is that losing her sire bond is the first tipping point for Hope's humanity coming back), but for the most part, there's an argument to be made that Hope fears loneliness more than wanting any friend in particular. She's used to being resigned about the twins. What's different about Lizzie, though, is that after they reconcile in S1, Hope begins to meet Lizzie where Lizzie is, not holding back on her when they disagree. Because Lizzie is such a dynamic character, and everyone else goes with placating her, this makes Hope-Lizzie a dynamic with more consistent sparks than any other combo, but it's dependent on Lizzie providing that high base level of emotion for Hope to mirror. And, when Hope herself goes too far, the other (more mentally stable) characters tend to choose to disengage, whereas Lizzie is the one who will indignantly go after Hope, which leaves her as the only option for Hope to engage with. So, Hope-Lizzie is endgame in a world where Hope continues to get more dramatic like her family, but otherwise, it's likely that Hope will pick a more "oasis-type" partner. Hope-Josie: Basically femslash Hope-Landon, lol. I have nothing against this ship, but the show doesn't give us much of a look at what their dynamic is without external factors dominating their conversations (all other convos they have are basically processing their childhood). However, Josie's entire arc during the show is that she decides that being around the Squad doesn't allow her the space to re-discover herself and so she has to peace out, and that includes all of Hope's DRAMZ. So, this ship is either something that happens down the road, as like the alternative to the above (Hope picks Lizzie if she embraces the dramaaaaa, and could pick Josie if the world lets her be chill instead), or you have to go with Hope-Twins, lol. (Sidebar, Spring Break Fire is canonically 3 years before S1, and Legacies canonically begins while Hope is 17, meaning that their crushes possibly overlapped before Josie literally burned it all down lol.) Hope-Twins: Yeahhhhh Panda Squad OT3 get it! My actual favorite Legacies ship. Unfortunately, there aren't any fics of this on AO3 that aren't just pure porn, because the Legacies fanfic writers are COWARDS. This ship works out in particular for Josie because per above, just Hope-Josie would still put the onus of support on Josie, but in the Panda Squad configuration, Lizzie makes doubly sure to put Josie first, which solves that issue. The problem, as usual, is that in canon Hope ditches them quite a lot! It's almost like Hope is the Lizzie to the twins' M.G. Hope-Cleo: Into it! Panda Squad is honestly cheating a bit by building in all that history, Hope-Landon gets the canon fiat, but Hope and Cleo have tons of chemistry without either. Cleo also can understand the burdens of being someone chosen, of being elevated in a way that makes others continually look to her. Hope-Clarke: One of the unique things the show did was that Hope stayed devoted to Landon throughout the series. One of the side-effects of this was that there was never a brooding bad boy love triangle rival (which matches the show's not-so-subtle dislike of Damon). At the sme time, that's not going to stop teenage girls from loving that kind of ship, which is why HoLarke seems fairly popular in Legacies fanfic. Honestly, I can relate. HoLarke isn't unlike Hizzie, as a dynamic where both characters are constantly challenging each other, with all of the chemistry sparks that generates. It is to the show's credit that they subverted those expectations so thoroughly (the utter reversal of everything in season 4 was perfect for the themes they were going for in that episode), but hey, ship potential has little to nothing to do with how a canon should go. Hope-Josie-Landon: Lizzie would never let them live it down, lol. This could be the most chill and supportive threesome ever, but I think that they would not be able to weather consistent external pressure without starting to be bad for each other. Essentially, they would gift-of-the-magi themselves into destruction. Lizzie-Hope-Landon: I honestly think that this could go the distance! Lizzie would never actually fall for Landon, but I think that Landon would rise to her provocations and earn her respect, becoming an even better partner for Hope in the process. Landon can moderate when Lizzie and Hope get too into it, as well. As some have pointed out, Lizzie and Landon are both all in on chairing the "no Hope self-sacrifice" club. The fact that they don't mind openly arguing with each other, though, means that they would call each other out before ever running into the situation as described above for Hope-Josie-Landon. Rafael ships: I don't know if this was an acting choice or not, but Hope showed zero feelings for him whatsoever, so Hope-Rafael was sunk from the start. She showed more interest in Ethan than Raf in the Croatoan ep. They also completely dropped the Rafael-Josie thing they played with in the first couple of eps, which was weird. Meanwhile, I do think that down the line, Raf and Lizzie could work, as mature adults, but the show never let us see them really interact after season 1. In general, the show did not know what to do with Raf, and did not let him develop any relationships beyond Landon and Hope, which was a real problem with the writing. No wonder the actor bowed out after S2. Ignoring how badly canon treated Raf, though, I would have been rather into a Hope-Raf, Josie-Landon configuration, because that was some of the best Raf-Landon times, ironically. Raf wasn't wracked by angst, and Landon was really happy for him. Landon-Rafael: The show didn't let Rafael have any other relationships! And at the same time, they didn't let him provide any meaningful resistance to Malivore, either. Change the latter, and this ship basically sails itself. Twincest: Look, I am not immune to wincest. Movies and TV continue to stubbornly not believe that "codependent battle couple" isn't shipping catnip, and their current strategy to no-homo/no-romo the subtext is to make them siblings (see: Frozen, Alias, Supergirl, Merlin, Arrow, Kill La Kill), but that doesn't change that the underlying dynamic is still shipping catnip. Their storylines together were simply the most interesting in the show, too. Ben-Wyatt-meme-"It's all about the [devotion]." Lizzie-MG: Writing really sunk them on this. There's no sense that Lizzie would ever seek out MG in order to relax and have fun, or that MG would enjoy the things that Lizzie was into, or how they would talk to each other without plot reasons to drive the conversation. They're very cognitively aware of each others' appeal points, but this doesn't translate into being able to spark joy for each other in the day-to-day. Even with the "Lizzie is a closet geek" characterisation, which I honestly find dubious, the fact that she so doggedly never indulged that with MG says something about them. Plus, as the whole show's run demonstrated, Lizzie has never put MG first, and MG became a stronger leader by staying away from her. They might work if they skipped straight to raising a kid together, because having that focus would paper over their chemistry gaps, but the moment that kid flew the coop they would crater. Lizzie-Ethan: So, Lizzie's stated taste in ep 1 is hot+angry+damaged, which plays out with Rafael and Sebastian, but obviously the show was subtly linking that to her self-loathing, and the long arc of Lizzie-MG was partially to demonstrate that her tastes would change as she got to a more mentally healthy place. However, she is attracted to Dak Romo, and then just two episodes later, is not attracted to the actual much-more-like-MG Ethan. (And she acknowledges that bad-girl-image Finch is hot, as well.) Then, in S4, she uses Ethan the same way she uses MG, exploiting their blind spots for her. So really, these two ships are basically the same ship, and both demonstrate how much Lizzie is not into either of them. But also, her using Ethan also reinforces that she wants someone with that dark streak, someone willing to be ruthless. Something something supreme daddy's girl something. She doesn't want Big Blue Boy Scout, she wants Wonder Woman snapping Max Lord's neck. MG-Ethan: YES. The Blur-some and E-ssential! Mighty Guy and Rescue Guy! They were a real love story over the course of S3 and S4, and MG had as much chemistry with Ethan as with Kym and Nia. They confide in each other, they try to be better men for each other, they love hanging out, they would be good together. Lizzie-MG-Ethan: Look, this would be a really compelling ship to think about if canon execution hadn't throroughly squashed any notion that Lizzie has credible feelings for either of them. But setting that aside, S4 rather made the case for V-configuration with MG as the pivot, with Lizzie and Ethan as just metamours. Also, the main thing for them is that they would be unstoppable as a football team. Lizzie-Landon: lel. But why not? If the show can try to make Lizzie-MG happen, then Lizzie getting over her nerd hangups could happen with Landon. Of course, this would have to be a no-Hope AU. But we know that Lizzie can be impressed with Landon's moments of showing spine, and once Landon has that kind of loyalty in his corner, I think he would develop to respond to it. MG-Kaleb: They're pretty emblematic of my ambivalent feelings about the show as a whole. The highs are incredibly rewatchable highs, but in between you have a lot of inexplicable time where they seem not to know the other exists, and then also lows where they're arbitrarily estranged for reasons that don't ring true. It hurts this dynamic in particular more than others because there's so little about their dynamic that organically implies the latter two cases. Sure, they could have leaned into the early days of Kaleb stabbing MG in the back during StuCo elections, but the show did not do that, so. They would make a strong romance, nonetheless, but not as primaries, because I think they really prioritize that family connection more, and so retain each other as people to confide in when they're having conflicts with their primaries. Kaleb-Cleo: They're cute. Pancakes was easily their best scene. However, it feels like Kaleb's character development with Cleo wasn't continuous with his character development with everyone else, and that felt odd. Their relationship had very little to do with the primary themes associated with their characters otherwise, not even in a "they are an oasis from the stress of their lives" way. Kaleb-Jed: The last vampire-werewolf rivalry! I would watch that enemies-to-frenemies-to-lovers. Lizzie-Jen: I'm not sure this does work, really, because the worst Lizzie's parents have ever been is not being there in person while working their hardest to make the best world for her and Josie. She fundamentally doesn't know what it is to have a malicious family (even including Dark Josie). I feel like Lizzie wouldn't have the necessary empathy for that not to cause a major conflict in a relationship down the line. But they would work well as non-primaries. Josie-Penelope: I'll agree with a lot of people that this was my favored Josie canon ship, but that's mostly on the strength of Penelope as a character. The relationship itself was pretty one-sided as we saw it in canon, which limits my ability to visualize what they would look like if they were together for the long term. Josie-Finch: It's fine. You can see all of the writing's intentions, and they're executed fine. Josie helps Finch enter a world where she's no longer a loner, and Finch turns that loyalty into someone Josie always has in her corner. But I just don't watch TV for "fine" relationships. Mainly, this ship was at a disadvantage for always limiting Finch's inclusion into the Squad. There's a problem when your reactions to Lizzie aren't distinct! In that sense, the Finch-Jed friendship arc was more interesting. Josie-Jade: We didn't actually get to see what their relationship would have been like. Seems like it would have been pretty boring, or it would have been a case where Jade has hangups and Josie focuses on them, so they have to break up because Josie needs to prioritize herself, etc. They might have done well in a dark AU, with all of the betrayal and Rippers and Dark Josie and whatnot. Other Ethan ships (Hope, Josie): The show was weird about Ethan, throwing him at every member of Panda Squad as a potential love interest, but then not following up except for Lizzie. Hope was sunk by aforementioned annoying monogamy (i.e. she was still hung up on Landon), while Josie was sunk by both Maya's preexisting crush, and Josie's guilt over breaking his arm. Speaking of which, did Ethan ever get to process that with Josie? Jed-Ben: It's fine. They're extremely pretty. They had a lot of future potential. Again, though, the Jed-Finch friendship arc was more interesting. Other MG ships (Alyssa, Kym, Nia): MG sure got to mack on so many people. I think Nia was MG's best match. Kym was a lot of fun, but the point of her being in too much danger is valid. Alyssa ironically shares the same problems as Lizzie, where they theoretically like that MG is kind and supportive, but don't actually like or respect what MG does for his own sense of fun day-to-day, which is toxic in the long run. Twins-Alyssa: Mean Girl Hatefucking Fun Times

[nat-seal-well]

Hello Chrys! Just a thought, what weapons would the listeners choose? I feel like Freelancer would pick the 'Humble Quarter Staff' purely because its just a long wood stick that just break bones and isn't capable of accidently make someone bleed. And Lovely would pick a spear( just a feeling). Any other thoughts?

-◇

This ended up being longer than i intended lol, I’m sorry

I like your ideas! Freelancer would fuck shit up with a quarterstaff. One of my favorite Wheel of Time characters has one of those so that’s probably influencing my opinion. And I think Lovely should have a spear, too.

Darlin’ would use a gun jk but could you imagine huge, two-handed sword. This is based on nothing but the fact that the OC I have for Darlin’ is very heavily inspired Gideon from the Locked Tomb, and I am absolutely in love with her. I’m in love with Darlin’, too. They could crush me and I would thank them.

Babe would have a bow. I just feel like it would be right for them. I see them as being level-headed and able to keep calm really well, and you kinda gotta be able to do that to aim and shoot and judge distance and that sort of stuff. I’m assuming—I’ve never shot a bow before. (I’ve used guns, though, before I decided they scare me too much. I was very bad at it bc the one I was using terrified me.)

I can see Sweetheart with a pair of sick daggers, all assassin-like, because I think it would be cool if stealths were assassins in some fantasy au. Or like the allomancers from Mistborn, if you’ve ever read that. Nice, well-balanced knives that they hide on their person, like up the sleeves of their clothes and stuff, just always at the ready.

I also can see Angel having a spear. This is also just sort of a feeling. I think they would look cool swinging it around? Spears are awesome. Their opponents would probably underestimate them, and realize they made a dire mistake very quickly. I’ve also been reading a lot of WoT (sorry for bringing it up again) and I like the Aiel a lot, who also fight with spears. So that’s probably why lmao.

Starlight should have a battle axe for no reason other than the fact that I think they deserve one. This is, like, the shortest explanation for my reasoning but yeah. Starlight with an axe :)